Yep, you'll be bombarded with chapters today because I was having both internet-trouble and a meeting with my thesis mentor yesterday. So get ready!
With Zelena's identity revealed it's time to get some more action going into this story. Keep an eye out for the EF-chapters especially; the new characters have quite a lot to discover in the upcoming ones ;) However for this one we're staying in Storybrooke. Enjoy!
They stayed at different places that night, half of them heading to Granny's while the other half headed to the hospital – the ones who picked the latter had all been pushed back by Gold at the stand-off. Most of them wondered if they would be able to sleep again, though; Zelena's revelation about the wands had shaken their confidence. If she had been able to read every spell the wands were capable of performing, what use would they then be to the people of Storybrooke?
"There must be something we can do", Clarissa said and lay back on the bed in the room they still used as their meeting place.
"Well, whatever that is we're probably not going to figure it out tonight", Catriona responded. "We'll meet up with the others again tomorrow and figure it all out. Right, Rachel?"
The older girl blinked and looked up from her position on the floor.
"Sorry, what?"
"What is with you today?" Indira asked. "You were perfectly alright this morning and then when we met up here again before heading down to Main Street you were just..."
"It's nothing", Rachel interrupted and turned towards Catriona again. "What were you asking?"
"Just that we'll figure this out tomorrow, right?" Catriona responded. Rachel nodded.
"Yeah, sure. Absolutely."
Voices from outside the door caused all of them to look up and Rowan, who had been leaning against said object, barely had time to move aside when Chris and Wolfgang walked in.
"You've been with Hook all day?" Miranda asked with a frown. The mentioned pirate popped his head in through the door in response.
"Yes, and they have behaved very well, so don't go too hard on them, ladies... and guy."
It was not hard to tell that most of them tried not to roll their eyes at him in response.
"Haven't you got somewhere else to be, Hook?" Indira asked. The leather-clad pirate took a step inside the room with a lopsided grin.
"Why?" he asked. "Do you require some privacy, love?"
Indira's mouth fell open in surprise and she obviously had to fight back a blush.
"Is there anything we can help you with, Hook?" Rachel asked, crossing her arms over her chest as she rose. The pirate's cheeky grin vanished as he turned to close the door.
"Alright, listen", he said, "my memories of the missing year are intact. Not that it matters since I left everyone else right after arriving in the Enchanted Forest, thus I had no knowledge of the Wicked Witch's business with everyone else until we discovered her here. There is, however, one thing that might be important for you all to know."
"And what would that be?" Chris asked.
"I came back here because of that I received a message by bird, which I believed came from Snow White", Hook responded. "There was, however, one piece of that message that always confused me."
He stuck his hand into his coat pocket and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper. It smelled of salt. Rachel accepted it and unfolded it.
"New curse, Storybrooke", she read. "Find Emma Swan, New York. Memory potion attached. WWoHP gang = danger."
Everyone stared at the small note for a few moments before turning towards Hook again.
"Why haven't you shown this to us before?" Rachel asked, her voice low but still perfectly audible.
"Because I did not know you were the ones called the WWoHP gang until Chris used that exact term when discussing something on the boat with Henry", Hook responded.
"You discussed who we are with Henry?" Rowan asked, turning towards the ginger boy.
"No, not who we are", Chris responded. "I'm not stupid. I found out Henry liked Harry Potter so I told him we'd visited WWoHP in Orlando. Of course I had to make some stuff up since we never finished our visit there, but it was a good topic on the road home."
"But what does it mean?" Catriona asked. "Does it mean that we are a danger to this place? Should we be locked up?"
"No", Hook responded, "my belief is that you are in danger. The Witch wants things from the people she brought here; revenge. This means she wants something from you all as well."
As silence settled in the room the pirate nodded in farewell and disappeared out through the door once more.
"Well", Wolfgang said after a while, "that's a cheerful way to end the evening."
Despite the force of Gold's magic when she knocked them off their feet, none among the affected had suffered from more than scrapes and ripped clothes. Along with a lower self-esteem, of course; they had expected this to be when they defeated the Wicked Witch and instead found that she had been playing with them this entire time.
Not having memories of the past year when they had obviously dealt with said Witch back in the Enchanted Forest did, for a lack of better word, suck.
The six people affected by Gold's blast, meaning Toby, Maryse, Arianne, Filipi, Jade and Tessa, were all mulling over this very annoying fact in the room which also held the still unconscious Ella. Doctor Whale had been monitoring her throughout the day and had announced that there was no decrement when it came to her coma state, but on the other hand there was no improvement either.
Jade absentmindedly flicked her wand around while causing various objects to float in the air.
"Jade, please stop", Toby sighed.
"What, stop using magic now that I finally know I can use it?" Jade asked and sat up on her bed. "No way! How can you even say that?"
"Because Zelena has a thing for him and it's uncomfortable", Filipi responded. Toby bolted out of bed.
"Of course I'm uncomfortable with her!" he exclaimed. "She's the Wicked Witch and she's... she's..."
"She's somewhat like the Huldra", Tessa admitted. "I mean; red hair, flirty behaviour towards Toby..."
"Stop it!" Toby begged, his voice betraying just how uncomfortable he was with their current situation.
A knock on the glass door leading into the room interrupted them, however. Arianne, who had been sitting on the bed closest to the corridor, rose and opened the door for their visitor; Ruby, the waitress from Granny's and also the counterpart of Red Riding Hood.
"Hey, I hope I'm not interrupting anything", she said.
"No, you are definitely not", Toby said and, with a final glare at Tessa, sat down on his own bed. Ruby smiled as if she knew exactly what was going on, but before anyone could ask her about it she opened the big bag she had carried on her shoulder.
"I brought these", she said and pulled out a set of mobile phones, still in their casings but of an older model. "There were only six in the store, but it's better than having just Emma's old one to split between fifteen people."
"Ruby, you are a saint", Maryse said with a wide grin while Toby exclaimed a phrase in Latin.
"No problem", Ruby said with a smile of her own. She then glanced over at the bed holding the unconscious girl.
"Nothing yet?" she asked.
"Nope", Filipi responded with a sigh. "Nothing at all."
"She'll come around", Ruby said and walked over to the bed. "I know she will."
She gave the others a comforting smile and momentarily placed her hand on her namesake's shoulder. A moment later the previously unconscious woman sat up in the bed while inhaling a deep breath, causing the others in the room to jump and yelp and shout in surprise. Ella slowly leaned back against the pillows of her bed while regaining control of her breathing. Then, she opened her eyes.
"Red?" she asked, eyeing the waitress. "Why are you wearing that?"
"Wait, what?" Jade said and jumped down from her bed. "What are you... what?"
"Why are you calling her Red?" Arianne asked.
"Because it's her name?" Ella responded, frowning. "Red Riding Hood, nicknamed Red?"
"Yes, but how come you even recognize her?" Toby inquired. Ella looked around at her friends with an ever deepening frown.
"Because I met her in the Enchanted Forest, where all of you also were?"
"Am I the only one who's really confused about all of this?" Tessa exclaimed. "How can you even remember the Enchanted Forest?"
Ella looked around at all of them once more.
"You don't?"
SOMEONE'S REMEMBERING, PEOPLE! SOMEONE'S REMEMBERING!
Also do check out the "sister-story" The Dark Ages if you want to find out about Toby's adventure with the Huldra, because I'll keep referencing that X)