Sensitive

Gerhardt awoke with a start and looked around at the small hut the entire party shared. There was the boy Baelfire, his girlfriend, their three male traveling companions. Everyone was accounted for, so the problem wasn't that someone was missing. It was that someone was present. He eased out of bed and walked over to the square in the wall that passed for a window. The street was empty and utterly silent, and he knew from experience that that was very, very dangerous.

He glanced back at the party and then slipped out the door, closing it behind his back. From here he had a better view of the street, and he was already running through his tactical options. What he was feeling was familiar to him, though he hadn't known it for more than a day. An image of the archer and his knightly lord appeared in his mind. The boy's case just couldn't get any stranger, he thought.

He closed his eyes and focused on the sensation, tracking its movements around the village, if there were any to speak of, and so far there weren't. He started to walk back into the house when every fiber in his being suddenly rejected the idea. He turned back to the village, and in front of him he suddenly found the knight and archer. "Hello," he said. "It looks like our traveler's followers haven't given up their quest, whatever that happens to be. Though if I had to guess, I'd say you're trying to stop him." He paused to rub his throat and clear it, and he looked at them again.

The knight regarded Gerhardt as if the latter were a prize. Gerhardt couldn't help but bristle. When the knight gave an approving smile, he said, "Actually, I think you'll do."

"Do for what?"

The knight merely nodded to the archer, who drew an arrow and said, "Here are your options: come with us or do something stupid to get you and your new friends killed."

"You've just proven you can't kill me. Do you really want to engage?"

"It's been said by prophets that there will come a land of opportunity," the knight said. "I just want to find it. Is that a crime?"

"Wanting a better life is no crime, but that's not what you're after. You want to pick a fight."

"And whatever makes you say that?"

"You carry yourself like a man of perpetual war. You can't tolerate peace, and you'll do everything in your power to prevent it. That's what you're here for right now."

"You think you know so much, don't you. That's just so cute."

"Hmm, arrogance. An interesting trait in a leader, but one I've never found leading to any good." The knight nodded to the archer, who filed into the window. The arrow landed with a solid thunk against the wall, and everyone inside stirred into wakefulness. Bae was the first to step outside and stand next to Gerhardt.

"Meet Gisborne and Robin Hood," he said.

"You were right about the legend. Very much preferable to the truth."

"But sadly the truth is the world we live in. Isn't that right, Gisborne?"

"What are you getting at?" Gisborne asked.

"Just giving us enough time to get our acts together," John said behind Bae and Gerhardt. They stepped back to allow the Merry Men to pass. John had his dagger in hand. "We're here now, so let the festivities begin."

"Yes, let's," Gisborne said, drawing his own blade. Bae and Gerhardt turned to Robin as their second knife fight began.

Robin lowered his arrow and looked between them. "I'm looking at two sensitives now. Interesting, but only one has an enchanted heart."

"What do you need an enchanted heart for?" Bae asked. "For that matter, what do you need a sensitive for, anyway? What good can we do you?"

"Gisborne just wants him." Robin gestured to Gerhardt.

"Then I can't let you get out of here alive." Robin turned to him and narrowed his eyes, and Bae took a deep breath. There was no magic to draw on, so instead he turned on Robin's own sensitivity, and that proved to be even more of a challenge than using ambient magical energy. He finally managed to force Robin to turn on himself, and he collapsed to the ground to writhe in pain.

Bae started to sway and stagger, and Gerhardt grabbed him by the upper arm. Suddenly his own senses flared to life, and he was acutely aware of everything in his environment. He even had his sense of touch back. What was more, he was suddenly aware of Robin and his sensitivity, and what Bae was trying to do to him. He looked at Robin, who still writhed on the cobblestones, and in the space of a thought, he finished what Bae started. Robin gave one final spasm, and then his lifeless form sprawled out before them.

Gingerly, Gerhardt lay Bae on the cobblestones and backed away.

OUAT

"What can you do?" D asked.

"Well, I'm not sure yet," Emma replied, walking deeper into the room and burying her hands in her back pockets, "but Mr. Gold is having me look for his son."

"You mean Rumpelstiltskin is having you look for his son?"

"Yeah."

"What's the kid look like?"

"Fifteen, sixteen. Black hair, dark eyes, a little bit baby-faced but growing out of it."

"Weirdo," Peter said.

"Well, now we know why he wanted to come to Storybrooke," D said. "Now we just need to figure out exactly what world he's in right now."

"Can you do that?" Emma asked.

"That requires innate magical ability. I can help, but you're the one that has to do it."

"Why not him?"

"You have an obligation. Besides, he managed to let an evil force into a travel vortex."

"What makes you think I'll do any better?"

"You're more mature, for one, and for another," D said as she reached for a pair of crutches at her bedside and used them to stand, "I'm not asking you to travel."

She made her way to the door. "Where're you going?" Peter asked.

"To check myself out. Then, to find those kids you lost."

Emma turned to Peter and said, "Stay out of trouble." On that, she followed D out of the room.

OUAT

"You're not used to the idea of sensitivity killing, are you," Bae said when he and Gerhardt finally had a moment alone, on a small hill just a half a mile down the road from the village.

"I'm not used to any of this," Gerhardt replied. "Magic and legends...those things aren't supposed to be real."

"You're the risen dead."

"That's a result of my brother's scientific work."

"And an enchanted heart."

"And an enchanted heart." Gerhardt smirked. "He thought science could do anything, but he still needed magic."

"Funny how that works, isn't it?" Gerhardt laughed and nodded. "Taking out that what you did was generally morally wrong, it was cool."

"Thank you... I thought you were unconscious."

"I was close."

"Just as long as you're okay now."

Bae nodded. "That uniform you're wearing..."

"Military. Before I died I was a decorated soldier. I guess it doesn't mean much anymore, but it used to."

"Who were your enemies?"

"There were the people we met along the way, but according to the commander, we never really met them. He did, however, keep telling us we were on the fast track to Romania."

"Where's that?"

"East of here and a little bit south."

"Why did you need to go there?"

"I...My unit...we were hunting vampires."

"Vampires?"

"I've never seen one myself, but the stories I've heard..." He bowed and shook his head. When he looked up again, they had reached the edge of the village. "Do you have vampires in...in the Enchanted Forest?"

"I don't know. I've never been beyond the Frontlands and the haven. As for every other world I've been to so far, I've just been trying to survive. I've been chased around by evil creatures and sent to places I don't even recognize." He sighed. "Sorry, but this is really getting old."

"I can imagine. How many worlds have you been to?"

"Counting the Enchanted Forest twice, first as my birthplace and then where I ended up after Neverland, five, here included."

"And you, a lad of fifteen."

"You really like calling me a lad."

"That's what you are, isn't it?"

"That depends on where you draw the line of manhood."

"Some say what makes a man is war."

"What do you say?"

"I simply don't think fighting is the measure of a man. I think there's something more to it than that."

"What sort of something?"

"I haven't figured out what that is yet." Bae nodded. "It's getting late. We should probably get some rest." He nodded again, and they walked side-by-side back into the village.