A/N: Sorry about the time jump, there will be flashbacks to Mal's childhood throughout the story.

As Time Goes By

Mother didn't even bother to come looking for me.

Not once in ten years.

I saw her from time to time around the Isle, we'd even exchanged a few words but they usually consisted of "out of my way," or "scram."

As far as she cared I was living on the streets. I wouldn't be the only one. Villains weren't real big on taking care of her kids. A lot of VKs slept rough. And as far as the rest of the Isle knew, I did too.

They didn't know that every night I took a cart down to the depths of the old mine where I had warm bed waiting for me and a full belly.

Children ran when I walked the streets. One day the adults would too.

They would fear me. Just as dad had promised. He made me strong. Stronger than my mother ever could.

He taught me things that my mother would have made me learn on my own. What would have taken me years to teach myself.

With that I saw a side of him no else saw, maybe no one had ever truly seen.

I saw the kindness. Although he would never admit it.

I saw the smile touch his lip when I came home with the school's Evilest of the Year award year after year.

He bandaged my hand the first time I punched someone, breaking my thumb in the process. After that he taught me to punch properly.

They didn't see him dance along to the echoing music from above with his tambourine. They didn't see him take my hand and twirl me around the mine.

They didn't hear his laugh and they had never seen him cry, either in joy or sadness. I had seen both.

Although he would not allow them into our home, he encouraged me to have friends. Mother had said friends were a weakness that could be exploited, dad said friends made loyal minions. Fear could only go so far. It was good to have an inner circle. Someone to watch my back.

No one knew Hades was my dad. Word of a daughter with the blood of both a god and a fairy running through her veins would reach Auradon. The one thing I still feared was how they would react if they found out.

Dad had never tried to quash that fear. Despite his promise. That fear made me safe. That fear made me wise.

To world I was Maleficent's daughter. To me, down to the very depths of my soul, I was Hades'.

"Boat's coming in." The echo would reach dad in the very depths of the mine in the stone craves that was his bedroom.

"Get the good stuff." The echo came back.

"Don't I always?"

No reply.

I made sure to put the old record on as I left. Dog barks filled every nook and cranny. Dad promised that once we made it off the Isle he'd take me to meet the real Cerberus, he would take me to see the Underworld. He would take me wherever I wanted to go.

I could see the world I had been denied for so long.

He promised one day we would be free.

Unlike my mother he never spoke of revenge, only of returning to the life he had been denied. Of the life I had been denied as his daughter.

I pushed myself my way to the front of the crowd waiting for the boat to arrive. It wasn't hard, most villains sent their children on the supply run and the kids were smart enough to get out of my way.

The blue-haired Evie stood at my back, watching it as dad said she would as well as using the parting of the crowd to secure a place at the front as well.

We made a good team.

Jay would have made a good battering ram but he preferred to steal off the kids once they had secured the goods rather than fight for them himself.

I had a brief look for the mess of white hair that was Carlos but didn't see him.

Late again.

I made a note to grab a couple of extra cans for him. It was good to keep your minions fed and loyal after all. Unhappy minions, those that weren't ruled by fear, were more than likely to rise up or dessert you.

The boat tied itself to the dock and lowered its plank. That's when the pushing and shoving turned into a full out brawl.

Evie and I avoided it, at least for the most part. No one dared move against us.

Well, almost no one.

Uma, daughter Ursula, tried to elbow me in the ribs, I twisted her arm behind her. She wouldn't try again. At least not today. She would next time. A lesson I had to teach her time and time again. She never learned.

We gathered the tins first; they lasted the longest and the supply boats didn't exactly stick to schedule. I managed a bag of coffee next, stuffing it into my black bag with the cans. Evie grabbed sine fruits and vegetables, already rotting, before diving into the pile of new, semi-used clothes, grabbing anything blue, anything that didn't fit her or me we could trade later.

Once upon a time, as stupid as it sounded, I wore purple, matching the hair I had inherited from my mother, but the longer I lived with my father the bluer it turned and my style changed with it.

Had the Isle not known better they could have mistaken Evie and I as sister. When we first met, I thought we might have been, that Hades was her father too. But no, Evie's father was brief dalliance of the Evil Queen's during her bad boy phase, one of Hook's pirates. He had as much interest in his daughter as my mother had in me.

We slipped off the boat as the fighting continued. We had our bounty, there was no point in sticking around. Just for good measure I elbowed Harriette and Harry Hook off the plank into the sea below.

Everyone got out of our way, one of the Gastons (Jr, third or fourth, I wasn't entirely sure), preferring to be call to be called Gil actually jumped into the water rather than get in my way. I wasn't entirely sure he could swim. That would involve thinking, something none of the Gaston brood did particularly well.

I nodded to Jay, waiting in the shadows of the docks, waiting to strike.

Heading to Rock's Throw, my personal hideaway, Evie and I sorted out bounty.

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