Bane of His Existence
Chapter Ten
When he left the hospital himself, having asked another one of the officers there to drive him, Weaver headed back to his partner's apartment mainly to pick up Rogers' car so he would be able to drive himself around until he met back up with him. He also hoped the coffee cup Rogers mentioned he had drank from earlier that morning after it was given to him by Eloise might still be around. Thankfully it still sat within one of the car's cup holders. If his luck held out, Weaver expected he'd be able to use it to help prove Rogers had been drugged, in an effort to clear his name. Finally, the senior detective drove back to the precinct and looked for one of his more trusted officers aside from Rogers to help him process the evidence.
After Gold spoke with the officer about what he needed from her, he then asked if she had managed to get a location yet on Victoria using the tacking device he had planted within the bracelet she had once given to him shortly after they had become cursed to try to frame Henry for theft, to which the officer told him no location had been found yet.
They worked for nearly an hour looking over the surveillance footage while the computers processed the remaining contents within the coffee cup in search of any drugs or fingerprints that would prove Eloise gave it to Rogers, which would give Weaver the means to be able to arrest her at the very least. With the footage he hoped he'd be able to find evidence it was altered to make Rogers appear as though he killed a man, then kidnapped two women right out from under the noses of a security officer and a doctor.
"If this video was doctored at all, whoever did it did the best job I've ever seen," the female officer said quietly in frustration. "There's no evidence showing other than what we've seen on this tape. I'm sorry, detective. But it looks like your partner isn't the man you thought he was."
"You're wrong about that," Gold answered quietly, watching again as Rogers knelt over the dead man and fired the shot which killed him. "Most of the time he's a better man than I and he deserves to have someone believe in him now. Which I do."
The other cop nodded and was about to assure him she would keep working, until a knock sounded at the office door as the desk sergeant stepped in, then looked at Weaver while he asked, "Where've you been? Have you seen the news just now? It turns out that your new partner is every bit the loser the rest of us all thought he was before he supposedly found that missing girl. Someone turned footage from a surveillance camera at the hospital into the news station showing Rogers killing a doctor and kidnapping Eloise and another woman who was locked up there in the psych ward. You made a mistake to think he was the right man to become a detective."
When Gold felt his phone vibrate in his pocket and looked down at the screen upon pulling it out, he quickly turned to the officer whom he trusted and motioned for her to trace the incoming call, then glanced back at the other as he replied, "I don't have time for this conversation right now, desk sergeant. Just know you shouldn't believe everything you see on TV."
"Detective Weaver here," he then stated once he was alone to answer his cell after it rang several more times, indicating that the unknown caller really wanted to speak with him.
"I was beginning to think you weren't going to pick up, detective," Gothel responded smugly on the other end. "It would have been a mistake if you hadn't. Tell me… What did you think of watching your partner murdering the innocent man at the hospital on the surveillance video? Do you like how I've made everyone, except perhaps yourself and the other so called heroes in this town, believe Rogers is a murderer?"
Gold stared coldly ahead of him as he answered, "It must have taken a lot of magic to do it. The question is how. From the smugness in your voice, I'm guessing whatever you drugged him with was a potion that actually made him do the deed against his will, rather than simply just changing the video to make it look like he did it. You must have put him in some sort of trance like state. Why?"
The witch smiled and then cruelly replied, "First… yes, I did slip him a potion in his coffee that I gave to him this morning. Yesterday, I used my feminine wiles to plead with him to take me to see my poor friend in the hospital with a sob story I knew his good heart and my curse over him couldn't refuse, then today I practically dragged him there. And once I enacted the potion with a kiss, I ordered Rogers to kill the doctor so we could escape from the ward free and clear with one of my sisters in tow. The effects didn't last long, sadly. But they controlled him just long enough. If you think you'll be able to prove Rogers is innocent, you will find it'll be difficult. Impossible even. Because he did do the deed and you won't be able to make everyone within the police force believe in magic. As for why… I did it to ruin him. Hook is supposed to be living a cursed life. A dark life. I didn't expect you to make him detective and your partner before you awoke, Rumplestiltskin. Nor did I expect Rogers to resist me as much as he's been fighting to do. I underestimated the pirate still inside of him, but it won't be long before that changes. I thought you should know. And by the way, tonight will be the night of Anastasia's initiation into our coven and her chance to become the Guardian. Also, if you're still looking for Victoria and Ivy, you needn't any longer. Soon they won't be your problem anymore. Goodbye."
After she hung up, Weaver immediately started towards the exit to the station while he called the officer once more to ask if she got a location from the trace to which she gave him an address like he hoped. He then made a quick call to Rogers as well and told him to meet him at the address given to him, but not to go inside without him. However, as Gold was about to walk around to the driver's side of his partner's car to get in, the vehicle suddenly exploded, the implosion knocking him back hard through the windshield of the car parked behind him, which caused him to lose consciousness upon impact.
Across town…
Rogers left Weaver's apartment upon receiving his partner's call and drove to the location sent to him through a text on his phone. Once he arrived, he discovered it wasn't a building he had come to, but the entrance of an old, long time condemned subway tunnel that hasn't been used in many, many years.
The younger detective remained seated behind the wheel of his partner's car and waited as he asked him to, while Rogers looked around for any sign of trouble that might be lurking nearby. He kept glancing down at his phone for any message from Weaver when far more time passed by without him meeting him there than what he expected from the man. The longer he waited, the more on edge Rogers grew. His instinct was screaming at him that something was wrong. Unfortunately, he just didn't know exactly what it was that was wrong.
Detective Rogers was about to leave to find Weaver, worried that something bad was preventing his partner from meeting him there, until all of a sudden, a woman's scream cried out from somewhere within the tunnel and instead, Rogers didn't hesitate to investigate in hope of saving whoever it was despite Weaver's warning for him to not go in alone.
Rogers immediately pulled his gun from his holster, even though a part of him shook in fear at the thought of using the weapon again after having watched himself murder an innocent man earlier that same day and having no memory of doing so. However, someone was in trouble and as a detective it was his duty to protect and serve. Therefore, his duty overpowered that sense of worry as he cautiously walked deeper through the tunnel until he came to its end when it opened up into a large dimly torchlit room.
Inside, Rogers watched while remaining hidden from behind the brick entryway while the women he knew as Maggie Dawson and Diana Levinson dragged in Victoria and Ivy Belfrey to an altar within the center of the room, then were tied down on top of it beside one another despite their struggle against their attackers.
"Please don't do this!" he then heard Ivy cry out as both Eloise and Victoria's older daughter, Anastasia walked into the room from another tunnel. "How could you betray me like this! After all these years… what happened to our sisterhood?!"
"The sisterhood between you and I ended the moment you darkened your heart when you killed the man you were to marry," Gothel responded darkly, sending a cold chill down Rogers' spine as he struggled to listen closely to the conversation going on between the women who appeared to be preparing themselves for something evil he never expected could come from Eloise Gardener. "I only kept up with this pretense because I needed you for when I was able to revive your biological sister."
Victoria looked over at her oldest girl fearfully as she pleaded, "Anastasia… you don't have to do this. You don't have to help them in this… this witchcraft. If you give into the darkness too, then you won't be able to become the Guardian they claim you can become."
Rogers heard Diana answer, "Don't worry, Madame Belfrey. Your daughter won't be the one who kills you and your other daughter. We get to have that honor. But Anastasia must be released from her loyalty and all ties to those she still loves if she's to become a part of our coven. She is the true witch more powerful than you could have ever dreamed to be had you been born with the power inside you."
"Are you sure this is really… necessary?" Anastasia nervously questioned when Gothel took the large dagger the young woman was holding, then turned towards the altar and moved to stand over the two struggling women now bound tightly against it and helpless. "I know that you and the rest of your sisters are the only ones who can help me get a handle on my power… but I…"
"Love is weakness, Anastasia," the coven's leader replied darkly, as Rogers struggled to understand what he was seeing and hearing while the woman he strangely couldn't help but to trust above anyone, yet felt an unnatural connection to for so long, finally revealed her true colors. "Only once you are free of your mother and your sister by birth, then will you be free to be who you are really meant to be. This ritual will do this. Their blood needs to be spilled in order for us to recognize you as one of our coven of eight."
When Gothel raised the blade over Victoria to kill her, as both women upon the altar cried out once more, Rogers suddenly stepped out from the shadows of the entryway as he fired his gun to knock the dagger from Eloise's hands, then shouted, "All of you, get down to the ground on your knees! Do it!"
Victoria turned her head towards him as she uttered in relief, "Detective Rogers… thank God you're here."
"You may have fooled me into believing you were women who needed my help, but I won't hesitate to shoot you if I have to," he continued while he kept his eyes trained on the woman of his cruel affection as she saw in them fear and the despair of her betrayal. "Please Eloise… or whoever you are… please don't make me hurt any of you."
"What are you doing?" Minerva cried angrily when their leader began to cut away the ropes from their captives until Ivy and Victoria both finished working to free themselves, then ran past Rogers as he beckoned them to run without looking away from the other women before him. "You're going to let them go?"
Gothel smiled coldly as she responded, "It won't be hard to find them again and get them back. We will finish what we started tonight."
Rogers finally fired his weapon once more, only this time at the implement holding one of the torches on the wall to knock it off so it set fire to the room, allowing for him to escape after the hostages, when Gothel shouted, "Stabbingtons! I want Detective Rogers! Alive!"
"Keep going," the detective ordered the Belfrey women while he kept pushing them onward through the tunnel he came down towards the street, until a large brute wearing an eyepatch over his left eye caught up to him as he suddenly struck Rogers down from behind with a club to his right knee.
However, he immediately stood again despite feeling the searing pain where he'd been hit, to fight back against his attacker while he raised his gun at the man. Unfortunately, Rogers was taken by surprise once again when his shot went wide as another brute with a long scar along the right side of his face quickly charged the detective from the side, then began to beat him while Rogers struggled against them until he fell unconscious.
"Stop!" Gothel forcefully called out when she and her sisters finally appeared among her thugs brutalizing the man who ruined Anastasia's initiation into their coven and helped Lady Tremaine and Drizella to escape. "I want him alive. He's mine to do with as I please. Believe me, you'll come to see it will work out better for us to keep him. We need someone to use as leverage against the heroes still trying to defeat us. Forget the fire. We've been compromised here. Bring him."
