Disney's Tinker Bell in Storybrooke
A Disney Fairies / Once Upon A Time Crossover
Season 1, Episode 3, Chapter 4

STORYBROOKE, MAINE

Emma Swan was sitting at an outdoor table in front of Granny's Diner. She was perusing the newspaper still looking for an apartment or room to rent. Emma was becoming more and more concerned with Henry's well-being. She had decided to stay in town more than a week to watch over him and make sure her son was in good hands. A cup of hot coffee sat in front of her. She took a sip and saw a middle aged man exiting the hardware store a few doors down.

The man was rather tall; she judged him to be about six foot two or six three. He had salt and pepper hair with more white than black. The man was dressed in a one piece work uniform. Emma took another sip of her coffee before going back to her paper.

"Nothing in this town for rent," she said. "That is so weird." She amusingly entertained the idea that maybe Henry's curse didn't want her to find a place to stay.

"More coffee?" a pleasant female voice asked her. Her waitress was Ruby a tall, dark haired beauty whom she had seen her first day in Storybrooke. She was the girl arguing with her grandmother at the Inn. "Granny" as everyone called her owned both the diner and the inn. Ruby, it turned out, was her granddaughter. The woman was dressed in the most inappropriate attire for waitressing. Her long hair had streaks of red, which were accented by ruby red lips, bright red hot pants and even brighter red stiletto heels. Ruby's work shirt was mostly unbuttoned creating a plunging neckline and was tied off at the bottom, baring the young woman's midriff.

Despite her status in Storybrooke as the easiest woman in town, Ruby still possessed a cheery personality and winning smile. Emma thought it ironic because she embodied the old cliché of the whore with a heart of gold.

"Sure, Ruby, top me off," Emma replied, holding her half empty cup. When the cup was filled, Ruby looked up and waved to someone. Ms. Swan saw that same man wave back. He smiled at the waitress pleasantly and stepped into the street, walking towards the diner.

"Your friend is here," Ruby yelled nicely to the man. Emma was able to get a closer look. Although she couldn't be certain his features looked European, possibly British. He had a strong jaw, nice smile and charming looks.

"Coffee?" Ruby asked. The man nodded from the street. "Okay." Ruby waved again and was about to go into the diner when she noticed something approaching the pedestrian. Emma saw it, too and yelled, "Hey! Hey!" pointing at the vehicle. The man looked a bit confused, and then turned to see the truck bearing down on him. Emma tackled him, pushing the man out of the way of the oncoming vehicle. She had leapt from her table and into the street with a flash.

The truck screeched to a halt.

"Aren't you paying attention to the road?" Emma yelled to the driver. "You could have gotten someone killed."

The driver, a middle aged woman that Emma recognized, but couldn't immediately place, stepped out of the truck. She appeared badly shaken. "Did I hit anyone? Are you okay?" the driver asked, her voice trembling.

Ruby, the carafe still in her hand, came running into the street. "Claire, are you alright? What happened?"

"I..., I don't know," she replied anxiously. "Did I hurt anyone?"

"You nearly ran this guy over," Emma yelled, furious. That's when Ms. Swan noticed the ball cap. The same one she saw while in jail. This was Claire Kensington. Her older daughter was the one who had been brought in by the sheriff for hustling people at the bar.

Emma calmed down a bit. "You could have run this man over," she said in a more civil tone of voice.

Claire looked over to where the man was now standing. She gasped. "Did I hurt you, sir?" she asked him, aghast.

"I'm fine, this young lady pushed me out of the way just in time," he said, pointing to Emma.

Claire started to breath rapidly and shallow. She leaned up against the truck and looked disoriented. "Not again, not again, not again," she kept mumbling.

"Are you alright?" Ruby asked her. "She doesn't look very good."

"I think she's having a panic attack," Emma said. "We need to get her to the hospital."

"I'll take her," the middle aged man said.

"Are you sure?" Emma asked him. "You might need a doctor, too."

"Well, then it's lucky I'm going to a hospital," he said with a grin.

Claire began to hyperventilate. "Ruby, get a bag," Emma instructed. The young woman dashed into the diner and returned a few seconds later with a brown paper bag. Emma put the mouth of the bag to Claire's face to help her regain her normal breathing. When she did, Ruby and Emma helped Claire into the passenger side of the truck. The man stepped up into the driver's side.

"Ruby, would you please be a dear and tell Ned I won't make it for lunch," he told the waitress in a smooth baritone. He spoke with an English accent that sounded of sophistication and education.

"Sure thing, Hartley," the waitress replied.

"Thank you, Ruby." He turned to Emma. "Thank you, Miss..,uh-."

"Swan, Emma Swan," she answered.

"Thank you, Ms. Swan, for your timely intercession."

"Yeah, sure, no problem."

He smiled, and then drove off towards Storybrooke General Hospital.

PIXIE HOLLOW, NEVER LAND (the Restoration Period on the Mainland)

Vidia had noticed some of her guild wearing purple feathers in their clothing. Swift told her that the plumage came from a handful of rare birds that lived only on Never Land Island. The last of their kind, he said. Every year the birds molted, losing all of their feathers. Fast flyers gathered them to give out to those members of the guild who had earned them through some act of bravery or excellence. It was a mark of respect and gave the wearer a certain amount of status within the guild. The more feathers one earned, the more respect and the higher the status.

Vidia wanted to know how she could earn them. Festus said he had some ideas. Tasks to perform that, if done to their satisfaction, would qualify her to earn a rare purple feather.

Her training thus far had been mostly tedious, though nothing too demanding for Pixie Hollow's most talented fairy. What she hated was all of the hazing she was forced to endure. It was humiliating and frustrated her to no end. Yet she held her tongue. Vidia was told at the beginning that to become a well-rounded and accepted member of the guild she had to make it through all of the hazing rituals.

"You can speak to no one of this," Swift and Festus mandated. If she talked to one of the other guild members they might accidentally tell her what to expect. That would be cheating. If she went to the guild master or Queen Clarion, she would be vilified as a coward for not enduring what everyone else had to.

"You'll be forced to live in the sour plum tree," they told her. The sour plum tree was a small, scraggly tree that grew at the edge of cliff which overlooked the pine forest and The Nest. This, according to Swift and Festus, was where cowards and traitors went to live. The door opened to ground level, an insult to fast flyers, she had been told. Second, by overlooking the forest, it was a daily reminder of what they had lost and could never get back.

She absolutely didn't want to live there in shame. Instead, she wanted the respect that the feathers represented. Since she was the greatest talent in the guild and all of Pixie Hollow, Vidia had to set the standard and earn as many feathers as she could.

Festus and Swift were more than willing to oblige.

Her first task was to go outside the boundaries of Pixie Hollow into the wild lands to the southwest. Blueberries grew there. These were the same kind of berries that the garden fairies grew for use in the kitchens. However, because they grew wild rather instead of being carefully cultivated, the taste of these berries was different. They had more zing and a stronger flavor. The cultivated berries were grown specifically for use in cooking. The wild berries were best eaten with cream or all by themselves.

"They are very special and highly prized," Swift told her. So why didn't everyone pick them, Vidia wanted to know. The wild lands were filled with predators that could hurt or kill a fairy. Few would dare venture into the wild lands for any reason, much less berries. The dangers were many.

"You have to watch over shoulder constantly," Festus said. "A snake might gobble you up, or a hawk will grab you. A coyote or wolf might snap you up in one gulp. Barely half of the fairies who venture there make it back."

"Less than half," Swift amended.

"Ri-ight, less than half. Now, are you brave enough to retrieve those berries for us?" Festus asked. "Or should we just give those feathers to another, more worthy flyer?"

Vidia was frightened by the prospect of losing her life. She had just barely arrived. But she wanted those feathers badly. "Okay, I'll do it. I'm no coward."

"Good, meet us at the club tomorrow morning before the sun rises," Swift instructed. "We will take you to that border for your test."

STORYBROOKE, MAINE

Tina waited outside the school. The final bell rang a while ago and there was no sign of her mother or that ratty old truck she drove. Clarence wasn't on this route today; someone else was, so she never got to talk to him about his car.

The crush of students reduced to a steady stream, then a trickle, now just a smattering. More than half an hour had passed and Tina was getting a bit worried. She sat down in front of the school on a bench and sighed. "Where are you, Mom?"

~O~

"Mr. Winter?" a voice called out. Hartley Winter sat in the waiting area of the Emergency Room. When he had arrived with Claire two orderlies came out to help him. Yet once inside she had to wait to see a physician. Finally, a nurse received Mrs. Kensington, taking down all of her necessary information, in this case her insurance. Hartley had no idea where she kept such identification and fumbled through her billfold looking for it. Once checked in, there was more waiting. Finally, Dr. Whale emerged and took Mrs. Kensington to a room for examination. That was the last he had seen of her until now.

"Are you related to the patient?" the nurse asked.

"No, I brought her to be looked after," he said.

"She will be fine," the nurse told him. Without divulging too much personal information about Mrs. Kensington he learned that she had an anxiety attack. "She is calm now and can go home. We recommend that she not drive today."

"Very good," he answered.

~O~

Dr. Whale informed Mrs. Kensington that beyond the anxiety, she was under constant high stress and suffered from a lack of sleep and poor nutrition. Further, her blood pressure had spiked to dangerous levels and he prescribed Lisinopril, 10mg daily, to bring it under control.

"You need to be careful or else you'll give yourself a heart attack," he warned her. Claire had complained of chest pains while in the hospital. "Not a fake one, like today," he added, "but a real heart attack. You may not be so lucky in the future."

That was what was bothering her, she explained. Her future, and the future of her children, seemed very uncertain. She described everything that had been bothering her lately, including the events of last night and this morning.

Dr. Whale offered a comforting smile. "Maybe you should spend some time with Doctor Hopper," he suggested. "He might be able to help you overcome your anxieties. Then maybe a solution will present itself to you."

She nodded. "Thank you, Doctor. I will."

When the exam ended, Claire grabbed her things and walked down the hall to the waiting area. Dr. Whale looked over his shoulder at her walking away. "That woman has one nice rack," he said of her. "And her ass isn't bad, either."

A nurse happened by and overheard him. Disgusted, she sneered, "It's nice to know that in our day and age, there are still Neanderthals like you walking around."

Whale turned to her and snapped, "Get back to work."

~O~

"How are you feeling?" Hartley asked Mrs. Kensington. Hartley Winter knew of Mrs. Kensington through her now dead husband, Charlie. Though they had never formally met, Hartley had always considered her a beautiful woman and envied Charlie for having married her. "What greater cruelty can be visited upon our gender, then for the loveliest creature to ever walk the earth be put beyond our reach?" he used to say with sly grin.

Hartley was never into American sports like baseball or football. He was an aficionado of British sports teams and avidly followed soccer. Yet he and Charlie often met at the bar to watch the one sport they both liked: horse racing. It was there that the two discussed business deals and kept their association and friendship intact. After Charlie's untimely passing, Hartley stayed away from Claire lest he make a clumsy pass at her and create friction where none existed.

Now, eight years later Hartley still thought Mrs. Kensington was as fetching as the day he first saw her. Somehow, the woman never seemed to age. Ned, Hartley's business partner, caustically suggested she had been using facial creams or had gotten Botox injections. Hartley dismissed it as nonsense and described her as a rare and glorious woman whose beauty does not fade or pass with time.

Why not ask her out, Ned often suggested. Hartley wanted to, but he recognized that Claire was still too emotionally attached to the memory of her dead husband to entertain the prospect of romance. Until she was ready to move on, Hartley would keep his distance.

"I'm fine," Claire answered. "I just need rest…, maybe a vacation."

He laughed. "Let me take you home, then."

Claire thanked him. When they got into her truck, however, she remembered something that had been nagging at her for the last half hour. "I have to pick up my daughter from school!"

"Then it is off to collect the dear girl," he said, slipping the vehicle into drive.

~O~

At his "castle" Henry met up with Emma. "I know who your father is," he told her. Flipping through his fairy tale book, he came to a page with a rendering of a handsome prince. He said that John Doe was Prince Charming and showed her the picture as proof. Emma didn't see the resemblance. Henry pointed out that the man in the book had a scar, just like John Doe. This proved nothing to Emma.

"Lots of people have scars," she said.

"In the same place?" he asked. Indeed, the comatose John Doe had a scar on the right side of his chin. The exact same place that the Prince Charming had in the color drawing shown in Henry's book. Henry told her that he was Snow White's soul mate. They just didn't realize it yet because the curse was keeping them apart. Henry insisted that they read to John Doe the story of Snow White and Prince Charming to remind him of who he really was. Emma thought it was ridiculous, but went along with it anyway on the condition it be done her way.

Henry agreed.

~O~

At the high school, Tina was sitting on a bench when her mother's old work truck drove up.

"Finally, what kept her," she mumbled. However, when Tina neared the vehicle she noticed something most unsettling. A man was driving it, her mother was in the passenger seat. She got very worried.

"Mom? What happened?"

Hartley explained the incident and their diversion to the hospital. "Your mother is well, but she needs rest. Let's take her home, shall we?"

"Okay," Tina replied cautiously. Her mother nodded with approval and the girl hopped into the truck next to Claire while Hartley returned to the driver seat. Before putting the vehicle back into gear he asked if Tina could drive.

"Yeah, I have a learner's permit," she answered.

"Excellent, I need to return to my vehicle at the hardware store," he informed her. "Can you take your mother home from there?"

She nodded. Hartley slipped the vehicle into gear and drove them back to the town square. When they arrived, Mr. Winter kindly took Claire and Tina into the Darkstar Pharmacy where Mrs. Kensington could get her prescription filled.

Before leaving them, he kissed Mrs. Kensington on the back of her hand and said, "Thank you for this wonderfully eventful day."

On the drive home, Claire felt something well up inside her. Something she hadn't felt in eight years.

PIXIE HOLLOW, NEVER LAND (The Restoration Period on the Mainland)

Vidia had successfully made her way through the wild lands outside of Pixie Hollow. She remained vigilant, fearful of the many threats that she knew surrounded her. Though she never saw any such creatures that Swift and Festus had described, they had to be watching her, waiting for the fairy to let her guard down. Then in flash she would be sliding down their gullet.

"Not today," she reassured herself, a defiant tone to her voice. "I'm no one's dinner."

Sprinting from plant to plant, ducking under leaves and inside bushes, Vidia kept her presence hidden. Her progress was slow, but steady. Flying was out of the question. Bats and hawks might catch her in midflight. She kept a close eye on the ground, examining it for the telltale signs of trapdoor spiders. They laid strands of webbing that ran to their burrows. When a creature touched a strand it vibrated, sending a signal to the arachnid that a meal was approaching. In less than a second, the spider would launch from its hiding place, nab its prey and disappear back into the ground before the captured insect knew what happened. She stepped carefully over anything that looked like it might be a strand of spider silk. I'm a lot smarter than some cricket, she told herself.

Vidia had also doused herself in a smelly concoction that Swift guaranteed would make her "invisible" to snakes. "They hunt by smell," he told her. "They flick their tongues to taste the scent of fairy in the air." She wasn't sure if this stuff actually worked. It smelled awful. I think this would make me more visible to the snakes, not less, she theorized.

Halfway to her destination Vidia had neither seen nor heard anything other than the occasional rustling of the leaves in the shallow breezes. No sounds that would indicate a creature was nearby. Until now…, branches moved and shook in a bush that was close to her. She ducked under some fallen leaves and waited for whatever it was to vacate the area. Relieved, she stood up and kept going. Vidia thought her heart was going to pound its way out of her chest. She took a few deep breaths and calmed herself.

The flyer got closer without incident. Then in the distance she could see the forbidden berries. "That's it," she whispered enthusiastically to herself. All she had to do was collect two of the berries and make it back to the border alive.

"Not so hard." A second later Vidia wished she had kept her big mouth shut. A huge shadow slid across the ground. A terrible shriek filled the air. It also filled her soul with fear.

A hawk! She ducked for cover and remained hidden. The hawk seemed to circle for a long time. At least its shadow did. She was stuck there. "Now what do I do?"

Suddenly, from behind her came the sound of a snake rattle. Now she was stuck. She couldn't leave the cover of the leaves, the hawk would get her. But if she stayed the snake would find her and eat her alive. Her heart pounded harder than it did a minute ago. Bile rose in her throat, her hands and wings shook in stark terror. She started to whimper.

Vidia then took made a bold move. She reasoned that if she hid under a leaf and moved slowly across the ground the hawk may not see her. Taking one of the fallen leaves she held it up over herself, making sure it covered her up completely. Then she took a few steps out into the path ahead of her. She stopped, squatted and watched the shadow pass from behind her to in front of her. She breathed a sigh of relief and started duck walking closer to her goal.

Every time the shadow of the hawk came within her view, she would stop, squat and wait. Then she resume her duck walk. Steadily she closed in on her target, the blueberry bush. The plant was sitting alone in a clearing. The worst place to be when a hawk was circling overheard. Trembling with fear and wishing she had just stayed in bed, Vidia pressed forward. The little fast flyer started making her way across the clearing, getting closer and closer to the berry bearing plant that was at the heart of her quest.

Halfway there she stopped cold. She turned her head to the left and saw them, glistening in the bushes and plants. Two eyes, red as the sun itself. Those two eyes never stopped looking at her, she was frozen, petrified by them. A rustling to her right caused her to yelp and nearly jump out of her skin. The noise came from the branches above. Was it the hawk? No, the hawk was still high up in the sky searching for her. Maybe it was bats. Or something else that could eat her in one gulp?

She bravely took a few more steps only to stop when she spied what looked like spider silk stretched across the ground. Oh no, trapdoor spiders and I just stepped into its signal web. She looked around her hoping to make out the door of the arachnid's burrow in the ground.

Vidia spun to her right, she thought something was bobbing up and down in the fallen leaves. Then she saw it from the corner of her eye to the left of her. Then another from behind. I'm in a nest of them!

She didn't want to move for fear of giving away her position any further. Then she heard the distinct sound of howling. She gulped, hard! Her legs felt like jelly. The leaf she carried on her back felt like the Island of Never Land itself weighing on her shoulders. The blueberry bush was just a few short feet away.

The flyer couldn't stay and she couldn't move. She had to do something. Carefully, she stepped forward. As her foot left the spider silk a blast of leaves shot out at her.

SPIDERS!

She screamed at the top of her lungs.

Dropping her leaf, Vidia raced for the cover of the blueberry bush. Her legs pumping as hard as they could, pushing her to the safety of the plant. Once inside, she hid among the berries and the dense foliage. She shook and trembled so badly the branches shook right along with her. Her breathing was deep, fast and hard, gulping air and she sounding more frightened with every passing second. Vidia's heart pounded in her chest, ready to burst out at any second. She was surrounded by predators. She made it to her destination, but couldn't leave the protection of the blueberry bush. Vidia would be unable to carry two blueberries and the protective leaf at the same time. Her only option was to wait until sunset, which was still many hours away. If the things that surrounded her didn't find her first.

Vidia was scared out of her mind, hungry, thirsty and convinced she was about to die.

Yay, a little Hartley Winter / Lord Milori for everyone. I hope you found this to your liking. I promise more Hartley in future episodes.

I want to thank everyone for making this fan fiction a big success. It has already achieved more than one thousand views since the original posting. Give yourselves a big round of applause. You've earned it.

I also want to offer my gratitude to everyone who has been contributing reviews to this story. Your feedback makes my day every time.

~O~

If you are wondering how I came up with the name Hartley Winter, well its actually quite simple.

Hartley Winter is a reference / homage to Hartley Winterbottom, a character appearing in the fourth season of he NBC TV Series Chuck.

Chuck, which inhabits many genres at once, is primarily an action-adventure spy thriller / comedy, often parodying the spy movie genre, especially the James Bond films. Why is this important? Because Hartley Winterbottom (a.k.a. Alexei Volkoff a.k.a. Agent X) was played by none other than... wait for it, wait for i-it: Timothy Dalton. Thus the name is both a reference to Lord Milori's role as the Lord of Winter AND a James Bond reference, all rolled into one neat little package.

Cool huh?