I may or may not be a little tipsy on cider, but I came home tonight and realised that I hadn't even updated in AGES and I love Eugene and Rapunzel too much to do this to them. Also the How To Train Your Dragon soundtrack makes my soul dance with love and joy and all things wonderful, which is a great boost to creativity and inspiration.
Flynn Wanted
~13~
There is one thought in Eugene's mind as he stands with his hands on the Captain's shoulders, a single match burning between them. That thought is run.
He doesn't pause to consider if Francis set him up deliberately, or if the Guards have used him as a lure – or even if the Captain knows Francis is here at all – he doesn't have time to worry about those things. Instead he blows out the match, and under the cover of dark he twists and fights away.
"Rider!" the Captain snarls, flailing blindly after him. They tear around the room like a cat and mouse, until Eugene spies the open window he climbed in through and starts to run, sprinting for all he's worth and then leaping into a full-out dive. He lands into a roll across the Captain's immaculately trimmed lawn, flattening a flowerbed in the process. "Riderrrr!" another bellow comes again; the Captain tries to climb out the window after him, but is hampered by his long pyjamas, while Eugene stands and turns to face him.
"It may sound hard to believe," he opens cautiously, "but there's actually a perfectly reasonable explanation for this." Somehow, the Captain doesn't look convinced – steam might as well be pouring out of his nostrils and ears – and Eugene knows it is time to do one of the things he does best, so turns on his toes and flees.
However, he knows he can't run forever, as he bursts out onto the street and tears past the endless gated houses, pursued by slipper-muffled footsteps. He has no direction, runs like a penned, wild animal trying to find a bolt-hole, when something suddenly catches him by the arm, and he goes into a sprawling heap – lashing around like a knot at the end of a whip. He scrambles back to his feet and pulls frantically on the tie for all of a second, because that is how long it takes him to realise exactly what holds him.
"Rapunzel?" he cries into the empty street, the braided hair still wrapped firmly around his forearm, and feels a couple of distinct tugs. He tests his weight, following the trail up to a rooftop out of sight. He hasn't exactly got any better options, so leans back and walks up the wall. When he pulls himself over the rafters, scrambling onto the rooftop ledge, Rapunzel is leant casually against a chimney stack, one end of her hair wrapped around it tight.
"Eugene," she says brightly as he appears, "are you-" she never finishes the inquiry, because he charges forwards and scoops her up in his arms swinging the two of them around in a moment of delirious relief.
"Am I glad to see you!" he proclaims, but she quickly wriggles free and sets her feet back on the floor.
"It's okay," she evenly replies. "I just followed you fro-"
"Wait... you followed me?" he says suspiciously. "For how long?" He doesn't like to think he's slipped enough to be tailed by a plucky eighteen year-old and not even realise it.
"All day," she answers, and his jaw drops – unfortunately, he has.
"You... you... all day?" he echoes uselessly, and the princess nods.
"I stayed on rooftops," she explains with a shrug, and that makes a little more sense – although he still kicks himself for not noticing.
"So you just followed me around all day? That was your plan?" he sceptically professes.
"Well, everyone needs backup," she remarks. "I thought you might need my help." As it turned out, he had needed rescuing – a fact she is a little proud of. "So what happened?" she asks after a moment's pause.
"I wish I knew," he answers despondently. "I went in after Francis, and the next thing I know the Captain's breathing down my neck." He would accuse the boy of doing it on purpose, but he's in doubt as to whether Francis is capable of a streak of brilliance like that – judging from his other actions, at least. "So I ran – what else could I do?"
"Couldn't you explain?" she suggests.
"Explain?" he repeats with a shock of laughter. "Would that be before or after he ripped my guts out?"
"Well I... I..." Rapunzel stammers; she doesn't want the two of them to fight with the Captain all the time, but he and Eugene just can't seem to manage one civil word between the two of them.
"Hey, wait a minute," Eugene starts suddenly. "You saw me run from the house, right?"
"Sure," she answers.
"But... you didn't see Francis?"
"I... no... no!" she cries, and the realisation hits them simultaneously; he grabs her by the arm and they rush back towards the house.
"We might still catch him!" he urges, as she unwraps her hair from the chimney and throws it over her shoulder.
They clatter over rooftops together – for once Eugene can appreciate the advantage Rapunzel has barefooted – her steps fall lightly, she moves with an almost feline silence, while his thick soles thunk down on every sprinting step with all the grace of an elephant in tap shoes.
They reach the house next to the Captain's, panting against chimney stacks, and peer across the gap that separates the two stately homes, while light flickers from behind gauze curtains in one of the upstairs windows. A figure passes by in shadow, hard to see clearly, but it could well be Francis – judging by the womanly scream that comes moments later, it most likely is.
"The Captain's married?" Eugene says scathingly – he doesn't imagine that's how the Captain yells, at least. When he looks back to Rapunzel, she's busy lassoing her hair, throwing it around the Captain's chimney and tugging it firm, ready to swing across. "Hold up, I'll go first," he offers – if one of them has to fall from a two storey roof on a rope-hair, he'd rather it was him.
"No, I'll go," she insists instead. "I'm lighter."
"But it's dangerous," he replies. "What if you..." he trails off when she cocks an eyebrow at him. "... Fine," he grumbles, "but if you get broken, I'm telling the King and Queen it was your own fault." He doesn't mean it, of course – if she got broken he would probably go down after her, because aside from not being able to live with himself, the Kingdom would probably lynch him in the streets. It was a pressure he tried not to think about when they were running around performing high-risk acrobatics.
"Okay," she settles, "we'll both go." Then she hands him the braid and sets her hands on her hips.
"All right," he consents, and carefully tests the grip of the swing, looping it around one of his hands. "Climb up, then." In a split-second her legs are wrapped all the way round his waist, her arms looped round his neck, but he's not sure he even see her move. "How do you keep on doing that?" he asks wondrously, but Rapunzel is too busy kicking him in the sides like a horse to answer.
"Come on," she rushes. "Hurry! Francis might get away!"
"Okay, okay. Here goes nothing." As soon as he manages to defy the self-preservation instinct, Eugene leaps from the safety of the rooftop and goes sailing through the air.
"Woohoo!" Rapunzel shrieks excitedly, which rather ruins the idea of being low-profile about sneaking back into the house, but at least the braid holds; Eugene braces his feet to thump against the side of the house still in one piece, and quickly starts to climb up, Rapunzel still hanging from his back like a bush-baby – the sensation isn't actually all that unpleasant, circumstances aside. Eventually they reach a full-length window, which is unfortunately locked so he climbs a little higher and then lifts a foot – there are some advantages to wearing boots, so he might as well make use of them.
"No!" she cries in shock when he stamps out one of the panes, then reaches through and flicks the latch up; sometimes, the thief way really was the easiest – whether Rapunzel approves of it or not. As they swoop in through the open window and bounce onto the floor, a terror-stricken woman in a nightgown and cap shrieks at them. Presumably it is the Captain's wife, unless the military officer has raced back home and donned a dress and cold-cream, which Eugene sadly enough doubts, as it would be priceless blackmail material.
Rapunzel scrambles up and hops back to the window, picking neatly between broken pieces of glass in a way that makes Eugene shudder; then she grabs her hair and spins it a few times, and the braid drops in a neat coil over her arm. A lot of people who've seen the princess using her hair think she has sentient control over it, because it seems impossible that she can manipulate it the way she does without some kind of magic. Really, she just had a lot of time to practice, but there were very few people who knew about that – Eugene suspects he's possibly the only one with an understanding of that, being the only still-living person to have seen what she came from. Then, while she's at the window, he rushes over to the Captain's poor, terrified wife.
"Which way did he go?" he asks a little too boisterously, because the woman just carries on screaming. He's about to ask again when he hears a noise, and turns to spot what can only be Francis climbing out of a window at the far end of a corridor. "This way, Rapunzel!" he barks, and without further notice sprints from the room. The princess is hot on his heels and speeds past the quivering woman, only to suddenly stop and doubleback, tenderly patting her shaking hands.
"I'm so sorry about all this trouble," she says empathetically. "I promise, there's a really good explanation." She doesn't, however, wait long enough to give said explanation and carries on after Eugene, who is just about to jump out a window.
"Wait for me!" she yelps, and a severely confused woman watches the two burglars – one of which she's certain is Flynn Rider, even though another one already came through once already, and the other looking uncannily like the lost princess – both casually disappear out of her first-floor window. The night first went awry when her husband woke to the sound of their downstairs being burgled, and things have only gone from bad to worse – now she's lost all sense of reality whatsoever; so the Captain's long-suffering wife decides it must be one of those nights where it is better to just go back to sleep, and picks up a bottle of brandy on her way to bed.
Eugene is hurriedly climbing down the wall when Rapunzel shoots past him on her hair, landing with a bounce and then haring after Francis, who she can make out in the dim light still cast from the house, racing through the Captain's garden.
"Francis! Stop!" she screams, but he reaches the back wall and starts to scale it. She hears Eugene's footsteps catching up behind her, and realises what she has to do – they'll never catch him on foot, especially not on the other side of the wall, where they'll lose him on the streets again and half the guards will be out for blood. So she skids to a stop and braces herself, throws up one end of her hair and spinning it over her head. Eugene slows down next to her, panting heavily.
"Think you can make the shot?" he asks her breathily, and she silently nods. When Francis stands up on top of the garden wall, his silhouette cast sharply against the light of a streetlamp, and Rapunzel releases her weapon. The braid flies out and hits the mark perfectly, catching Francis around the middle. With a quick tug she pulls him back, and he falls down into Eugene's waiting arms, dashing forwards to catch him just in time.
"You're comin' with us, kid," he says softly, and though Francis struggles and kicks, before he can break free Rapunzel has looped her hair around him again and again, until he's wrapped like a caterpillar and can only wriggle in protest.
"I won't go! Put me down!" he spits, but Eugene just jostles him onto his shoulder. "Gag him," he tells Rapunzel, who looks on with dismay. "Do you want him shouting up the whole Kingdom?" he challenges, and she realises his point.
"I'm really sorry," she mumbles as she reaches for her bag and pulls out the remainder of her bandages, which she ties around Francis's mouth while Eugene holds him still. "Where are we going?" she asks once their captive is ready for transportation, and Eugene points to a gate that leads into the neighbouring garden.
"We're gonna need some help," he says instead, and sets off at a brisk pace with Rapunzel bounding along by his elbow. He cuts towards the street, and sneaks to the end of the track that runs into the property's grounds; bringing his fingers to his mouth, he whistles loudly – nothing happens. "Psst," he whispers to Rapunzel. "Get Max."
Rapunzel purses her lips and quietly whistles, barely loud enough for Eugene to hear, yet moments later Max comes bowling into the property, nostrils flaring.
"How do you-" he begins, and then gives up with a sigh, and flops Francis down over Max's back. "C'mon, horse," he grunts, and gives a tug to lead him on. Max tries to bite his ear, but Eugene dodges expectantly.
"Where are we going?" Rapunzel asks again, but Eugene suddenly clasps his hand over her mouth and pulls her, the horse and his furious load off the road and out of sight. A minute or two later, a couple of guards amble past them, talking loudly about the state the Kingdom's been in recently and how they ought be grateful for the safety of their jobs.
"Wow," whispers Rapunzel when her mouth is released, the guards safely past them. "You're good."
"Flynn Rider, baby," he lilts with a wink – a parody of himself. "I was the best." Francis makes some muffled noises of protest from his position, but then Max swings his rear around and bumps the boy head-first into the wall, and the figure goes limp.
"Max!" Rapunzel scolds, only for Eugene to hold out his fist and bump it against Max's hoof.
"Nice call," the former criminal compliments, and then strolls back out into the road. "Let's go," he adds seriously. "We've got a fair way yet, and at this rate it might take all night."
"But where are we going?" Rapunzel says once more, a little exasperated by his evasiveness.
"Rapunzel, there's only one place to go," he replies, and glances at Francis – now with sadness and regret. "The only place I can take him," he says solemnly, fixing her with an absolute look. "Home."
And th-th-th-that's all folks! Until the next update, I mean XD
If you leave a review I will do a little dance of joy and excitement. Or if I feel like it.