A/N: I don't mean to have the large gaps in updating these days, but things get in the way a lot. Things have been very busy at my new job, and it takes time for me to write new chapters. However, it does look likely that I might have the next chapter out next week, so look out for that.

The season finale was awesome, and it has convinced me to make my decision. Asgeir WILL appear in the last half of Season 4, ready willing and able. I wasn't sure on wether or not to write him in it, because I have an exciting sequel/spinoff in plans to make when this is done.

Hopefully you like this new chapter as we see more of what Asgeir aims to do to those that wronged him.

Chapter 16: Quiet Minds

In my long experience of living in several realms on the front lines of the war of the Assassins and Templars, I became a huge fan of popular culture in the Land Without Magic. Many of the Assassins did, as it turned out. Films and programs on television I partook in when I wasn't getting shot at by Abstergo, and many times I was even required to read some novels believed by many to purely be works of fiction, only for us to find out that their worlds truly did exist, as did some equivalents of Assassins and Templars in that world.

What became a personal favorite film of mine is now probably a regular household name for a movie: Fight Club. It's themes of anarchism, psychological issues and just how broken the system truly was spoke out to me as closely as any struggle between an Assassin and Templar war. It became a favorite of mine when I saw it in the theater while I was in California working with the IRA. Almost found that I was suffering from problems very similar to Edward Norton's character. And as I would soon find out, I was beginning to suffer a very severe case of sleepwalking and blackouts not entirely unlike Norton's character's struggles in the movie. Every year after Arendelle froze became another catalyst towards my struggles that only made my involvement with the Assassins become worse and worse. I was seeing evil in every direction while under the influence of what afflicted me, and not just in Templars. I was becoming more and more paranoid that I was losing friends in other Assassins, with me believing I was the sole survivor of the Dark Curse, let alone the Arendelle Assassins. Imagine having to start over, with everyone you know ripped from your hands, and you're forced into another group who claimed to have the same goals, but whose actions prove otherwise. Every Assassin who I grew up with was swept up in the curse, staying behind to let me finish what they started in the Land Without Magic. Matthew, Jason, Zar, Troy and Rabbit. All gone.

The thing about putting that much pressure on a man, is that no matter how strong he is, no matter how determined he is to seek the end of his struggles, eventually even his own brothers he was sent to see him as a threat, and not someone worth fighting with. It was my increased anger at what I had seen in my extended life that drove me over the edge. The higher Assassins sent me across several realms to fight in their bullshit wars and ensure that this man would take this throne and that man would kill that man and such and such and such and such and-

The nightmares, the sleepwalking, the blackouts, they all became worse. And then the other Assassins did what all "brothers" do, even when they promise that they would follow you to the ends of the Earth: they turn on you, toss you out in the middle of nowhere, and take your hood with them.

"Asgeir? Wake up!"

I snapped my eyes open to the voice, and then felt myself fall a foot, hit something hard, and then fall another three feet onto the hard linoleum floor.

Once I recovered from the wind getting knocked out of me, I rubbed my eyes and wiped a bit of spit off the corner of my mouth. Made me think a lot about Anna as I sat up with my feet outstretched on the floor, my palms pressed on the tiled floor on either side.

Ruby stood above me in front of the door looking concerned with her hands on her hips.

"What are you doing in here?" She asked.

I squinted my eyes, the morning daylight rushing through the door's window behind her. Nice to finally wake up inside instead of in a river or a tree.

"Can't a friend crash here or something?" I said, trying to disregard it.

"Not really." Ruby said as I got up. "You know we have an inn upstairs, right?"

"I'm aware." I replied. "I have my own room at Cormac's."

"Then why are you in here? More importantly, how did you get in here? I found you asleep on the bar table, but Granny and I have the only keys."

I shook my head. "It's complicated, Ruby." I said. "But listen, if I broke any windows while trying to get in here, I'll pay for them."

"If?" She asked, curiously. Why wouldn't I know if I had broken any windows? "No, not that I know of. As far as I can see nothing was broken and you didn't take anything, so we're good."

"Ruby, you better get to-" said a gruff voice.

Granny was just walking in as she was ordering her granddaughter around, but she smiled when she saw me.

"Asgeir." She said. "Glad to see you again. Heard you were in town to help us on this witch hunt."

"Absolutely, Granny." I replied. "Us Assassins are never finished with our work."

Granny nodded. After meeting up with her again during the war against Regina, I learned that two of her older brothers were Assassin war heroes, and that's why she knew of them. "If you're lookin' for the Charmings, they said they're meeting here before we open. Might wanna stick around." She turned and walked back into the kitchen.

Ruby looked back at me suspiciously. "Something you're not telling me, Asgeir?"

"Lots of stuff." I replied. "For good reasons. If you'd have seen the shit I've seen, a case of nightly sleepwalking and nightmares would be the least you'd have suffered from."

I sat down at the bar table. "Can I get a cup of coffee, Red? Black."

The Charmings, Regina and Hook came a little while later, and soon afterwards Emma came in after pounding on the door furiously. Granny opened it for her.

"If you want privacy, talk fast. We open in 20." She explained. "And no one gets between Leroy and his bacon."

I smirked as Hook started.

"So any sign of our quarry?" He said.

"I went all around that farmhouse and the land around it." Emma said, doubtfully. "Nothing."

"Well, now that the sun's up we should hit every place Gold might go." David stated. Clearly the rest of them knew what to expect from this bugger imp after he ran from Zelena. "His house, shop, his cabin."

"I got teams of Assassins combing those woods with extreme precision." I said, the typical anger in my voice that was usually present whenever Rumplestiltskin was the subject. But no one really noticed it. "We'll find him."

"Right." Emma said with that dash of sarcasm I was getting used to coming from her. "Because dead men love vacation homes. Can someone explain to me how this is even possible? We all saw Gold he-"

"Disappeared into nothingness." Said Snow. "I know."

"Doesn't surprise me in the slightest now." I said.

Emma glimpsed at me. "How so? The White Reaper somehow knows a way to cheat death?"

At least Emma was starting to learn my reputation as an Assassin.

"Rumplestiltskin and I go far back. If there were one thing I know about the Imp, he wouldn't kill himself without some form of insurance. How he did that still escapes me at the moment."

I remembered reading almost every book on the Dark One in an effort to try and find a way to kill him without the Dagger. Somewhere among the thousands of manuscripts I had read, I had the faintest memory of something like this. I just couldn't remember all the details since the book was under ice in Arendelle's castle library.

"I might have an inkling." Replied Hook to my statement. Everyone looked up at him when he explained. "When we went back to the Enchanted Forest, Neil was talking about the possibility of getting his father back."

And here I thought Neil was just as angry with his father as I was. He told me himself that he was done with him when we first met many years ago. I wished I knew what it was that had changed his mind. Must have been pretty recent.

"What?" Said David. "How?"

"He didn't say." Hook replied. "He just..." He had a brief moment looking towards Emma. "He missed his family. And he was desperate to find a way to return to this world. He believed that bringing his father back was the key."

Emma shook her head. "Well, if that was his plan, then obviously something went wrong, because while Gold might be alive and kicking, Neil is-" She stopped herself.

I could only imagine life would be cruel enough to take one of the most ruthless souls in this life back from the dead and take one of the bravest in return.

"He's- we don't know what he is." Said Emma. "We don't even know if he made it back to Storybrooke! No one's seen him since this new Curse."

"He's out there, Emma." I said. "Don't worry."

Regina piped up. "With all due respect," she put in. "We have bigger issues right now than who brought Gold back, the fact that he was in the Wicked Witch's basement for one. I want to know what the hell she was cooking up with him."

"Well, the best way to find that out would be to ask Gold, right?" Snow said.

"He could tell us who the Witch is." Said David. "Maybe how to track her down."

Zelena was an Assassin problem just as much as she was a threat to the town. It would be my job to expose what she was doing before I gutted her myself, and in order to have complete security for that operation, I had to keep it secret from everyone. Until Zelena started dropping heads, there was no real bad reason to keep it all under wraps.

Regina stood up. "I gonna head back to that farmhouse." She said. "It's possible this witch left behind some trace of potion or special ingredient."

Emma nodded. "Have at it. Just be careful."

Regina smirked. "She's the one who needs to be careful." She said, boldly. "She invaded my space. When I return the favor I'm not pulling any punches."

I held up a hand. "Regina, just don't make any sudden movements when your outside the house. Goddamned snipers are all around the cottage with shoot on sight orders to anything out of the ordinary. The former Templar Grand Master definitely applies to that."

Regina nodded as she opened the door. "You Assassins and extremes measures." She snarked, although in a much more friendly tone than she usually spoke to me with.

After setting up the search grid and dispatching the Assassins to comb the woods for Gold, Jason and I headed over to the pawn store, where Emma had told us to meet.

"Are the weapons really necessary?" Said Emma as we approached. She was waiting for us as the door.

Jason had an AK slung over his shoulder along with most of his other usual weapons, and I myself had everything I carried on my person as well. Needless to say, this was not the first we had of uncomfortable glances, since none of the Assassins had taken any efforts to even try to hide their weapons in their hoodies or somewhere.

Jason raised his hands slightly. "You and I haven't seen eye to eye on much, Swan. But I'm hoping that we can still let bygones be bygones. Asgeir is a mutual friend here."

Emma crossed her arms, apparently waiting for something, but then nodded. "Just be careful around my son. He still has no idea what's going on."

I kept silent as Jason replied. "Of course. You know I have a tender spot for dear Henry."

As we walked in, Jason noticed my look of confusion. "When Emma first arrived here, she and I faced off hard when Graham deputized her. I may not have been the head of this gun running operation, but she saw me as the biggest threat regardless."

"Who were you here?" I asked.

"Aaron Milburn. Bartender at Cormac's by day, shipment guard by night."

Of all people to be reunited with, Belle was one of the last I expected to find so soon. She sat at the table in the back room, staring at the piece of gold straw I had swiped as the others explained the circumstances of Rumplestiltskin's return. I sat off to the side, trying hard not to purposely break anything that looked expensive since the store belonged to him. And from the look of the room and the shop, the word "expensive" seemed to factor into almost everything in the room. I just sat down while Jason kept eyeing me suspiciously, like a fly on the wall. I had still been very vague from the circumstances surrounding my demons, and why I was really here.

"So…Rumple's alive?" Belle asked, still finding difficulty believing it. "I mean, how is that even possible?"

"We were hoping you might be able to tell us that." Emma replied. "You know him and the shop better than anyone. If he's here in Storybrooke, there has to be a clue in here about how he got back and how we can find him, now that he is."

Hold on. Belle knew Rumplestiltskin better than anyone? The same Belle that Anna had helped to find the trolls? The same Belle that I had last seen trying to track down a Yaoguai? I know I missed a lot during this gap, but every day was bringing more and more surprise to me. And barely any of it was good.

Belle nodded. "Yeah, I'll…" She sniffed. "I'll start looking right away."

"Keep your eyes out for him, too." David warned. "If he comes into town-"

"He'll come to me." Finished Belle. "Yeah, I know."

Okay, now I know that I missed plenty. A friend of mine was now fucking an enemy. I escaped a Dark Curse, only to end up at the bottom of a hole while all kinds of mayhem ensued outside it. Just perfect.

Emma then nodded to Hook, and he understood. Hesitantly, he offered his help to Belle.

"I will stay here with you." He offered. "I'm surprisingly good at research."

Belle looked up at him, a mixed look of disbelief and slight anger. "You will stay with me?" She repeated.

"He'll protect you, if the Witch comes." Emma explained.

Belle faced back at us and dropped another shell shocker on me, although this time I just decided to roll with them. "You do know he tried to kill me?" She said.

Hook slightly shrugged, trying to play it off. "Well, there were extenuating circumstances." He said.

"Twice."

He shook his head, trying to climb out of that hole. "Sorry?" He offered, cocking his head to the side.

I smirked. "You're quite the charmer, Captain." I said.

"This will be my way of making it up to you." He continued, still trying to patch up the festering wounds.

Belle scowled. "Fine." She said.

Emma nodded. "Alright." She said. "We should really get out into the woods." She glimpsed at me and I nodded, pulling my radio off my belt.

"Alpha and Charlie teams mobilize." I said into it. "Locate the Imp."

Snow started to stand, but David stopped her. "Hey, maybe you should stay home." He said.

Snow didn't like that idea. "Me?" She protested. "But I'm the best tracker here!"

I scoffed. "That's debatable. Do you have the Sight?"

David nodded to me, then glanced at his wife. "Asgeir's right. He can help us just fine along with Jason. Remember what Zelena said. You need your rest."

Snow glimpsed at me, then raised her hands, giving up. Emma just shrugged and stood up.

"Belle, thank you for your help." She said, the brunette turning towards her. "Don't worry, we're going to find him."

Belle smiled. "Okay. Thank you."

Then she looked at me. "Nice to see you again, Asgeir." She said.

I nodded. It was upsetting enough that she was with someone so close to the top of my list, but the last time I saw her, it meant another would hate me for what I did.

While the Assassins out in the field kept combing the woods for Rumplestiltskin and Zelena, Jason and I returned to the Bunker to go over our heavy guns. Assault rifles, SMGs and handguns were small enough that we could ship them by the bulk in crates of whatever numbers we chose. But as Jason was explaining to me as we went over the belts of ammunition for LMGs, some guns like PKPs, M60s and RPGs were so big that they had to be shipped one at a time, and Cormac's customers had such a high demand for the big guns, that we had a very limited supply of them. I counted only six RPGs between the fifty-plus Assassins operating here in Storybrooke.

Jason slung his AK off his shoulder as he counted the bullets on an LMG belt.

"What do we have in terms of ammunition for these kinds of weapons?" I asked as I clicked in a rocket for an RPG.

"Depends on the kind of objective, really. I mean, the amount we have for ammunition isn't subjective, and I'd say that we'd have more than plenty heavy ammunition if we had a force of forty Assassins. Since it's fifty, most of us are using the more standard weapons. But for the others using stuff like this, we have a small outpost in the woods where we hide the other half of the heavy guns. I even remember us unpacking a few prototype Quadrotor drones."

"That's quite a step up from what we were using in my time under the IRA."

"It's easier for us to use this kind of hardware out here since this whole town is cut off from the rest of the world. And the drones we have may be prototypes, but they pack a serious punch."

I suddenly jumped when my phone started ringing. Jason looked over in interest as I answered.

"Yeah?" I said to Emma's voice on the other end. "You serious? Yeah. We'll be right over." I hung up the phone.

"What's going on?" Jason asked. "We found the son of a bitch?"

"We haven't found the Imp, but Belle just found someone else. Neil."

Jason and I ran down the hallways of the hospital to the room where they were keeping Neil in the hospital. Emma and David had just arrived as well. He was several years older from when I last saw him, but I knew it was him the second I saw him.

"Neil!" Said Emma in a shock matching my own. "You're here. What happened?'

Neill rubbed his head. "I…I don't know. I remember seeing the yellow bug cross the town line, and next thing I know, I'm running around a forest back in Storybrooke, where, apparently a lot has been going on."

"Yeah, you pretty much summed it up, brother." I said.

Neil glimpsed at me. "Asgeir? Jeez, it's been a long time."

"That's the understatement of the decade, really." I replied.

Hook cut us off. "Are you going to tell him, or shall I?" He asked.

Neil looked up at us. "Tell me what?"

David piped up. "Neil, we think your dad's back."

Neil wasn't buying it. "Back?!" He said. "I just watched him die. What do you mean he's back?!"

Emma gently took Neil's hand in reassurance. "Take it easy." Then she stopped, glancing something on Neil's palm. It appeared to be a serious burn there, the swelling on his hand forming a triangle with three squiggly lines on each side of the shape. "The hell is that?" She asked.

Neil shook his head. "No idea. It was there when I woke up."

Okay, now I knew I had seen this shape before, and some fragments of that book I had read were starting to come back to me. That symbol had something to do with the hidden vault of the Dark One, where the very first Dark One was created. But that was all that I could remember for now. Emma held her phone up to the scar and took a picture of it.

"Belle, can you do some more research?" She asked.

Belle nodded. "Yeah, sure. Absolutely." She said.

"Great." Emma said. "I'll send you the picture." She tapped the screen a few times and sent it.

Neil looked up at us again. "Guys, can we have a minute?" He asked us.

I nodded and Jason and I walked out along with the rest of them.

"That burn is bothering me." I said to my brother when we were on our own. "I remember seeing that mark somewhere before."

Jason crossed his arms. "So what do we do?" He asked.

"For now, all we really can do is just continue searching the woods for Rumplestiltskin until Belle finds out what that mark means."

"Agreed." He replied. "I reckon that you should stay here right now and I'll check the farmhouse. The snipers we have posted there haven't checked in yet for today, but hopefully nothing too serious has happened."

After Emma and David left, I went back into Neil's room and sat down at the end of his bed.

"Asgeir, I'm still confused." He said. "All this time you're still alive? We promised that we'd meet six months from then. That was more than nine years ago."

I nodded. "I know, mate. And it's complicated. All I really can tell you is that the Assassins dragged me into another war in another realm. Had to stop a madman from burning his kingdom to the ground."

"But after all we'd been through, I was only hoping that we were still more than just friends. Brothers, even." He said.

I leaned towards Neil in my chair. "Neil, I will offer you a piece of advice. I learned many things in the past few years, the most important from a ghost from the past. I've seen images that haunt me more than anything because my own blood was killed by a freak witch when I failed to act. But somehow I was contacted by an ancestor that taught me what the Assassins truly mean. None of my brothers here know of what the Assassins out there in the rest of the world even did to me. So my advice: you don't mean shit to your brothers. I mean, sure they'll always say they'll have your back. But then, when you need them the most, they'll turn their back on you, and one of them will even try to kill you. All that matters is that you look out for yourself, because none of these shites are going to do it for you."

Neil shook his head. "No." He replied. "Come on, Asgeir. Back when we last saw each other in Vancouver you would have cut every limb you had off if it meant the Assassins would win against those tyrants. You said it yourself that all you had left of your family lived in the Assassins. Your sisters and everything they stood for still lives as long as the Assassins live. Don't ever tell me again that they'll turn their backs on you. You still have the hood to prove it."

I got up and started for the door. "I wear a white hoodie with a green lining. That doesn't mean I still have the hood of an Assassin." I said without looking back. I walked out as Hook walked back into the room with a bowl of green Jello.

Jason reported on the radio that there hadn't been any sightings of Zelena from the farmhouse. Though one novice reported seeing Robin Hood and Regina enter the house on their own. Jason recommended that some of the Assassin teams split up and cover more ground in teams of two. As for me, I headed off through the woods, following the trail from where Neil said he last was. Emma and David said that they would meet up with me there.

What kept bugging me as I walked through the chilling, frosted forest was that mark on Neil's hand. It was right at the back of my head and I knew I had seen it before. There was even one time during the war against Regina that I took the opportunity to break into her library to find whatever weakness I could against the Dark One. I didn't find anything to kill him in the books aside from the Dagger, but turning to Precursor artifacts sometimes reaps certain rewards.

I heard a shriek in pain that made me look up in surprise. Almost as soon as I heard it, a second one came. I sprinted off through the woods, climbing up a fallen tree propped against a second, which then provided me the swiftness to reach the source of the noise in record time. I always moved quicker through trees.

I didn't recognize the freak at first, but then I realized that it really was him, but not with the usual toad like complexion that made him instantly recognizable. He was instead finely dressed, but somewhat crazed looking and unclean. After all, Zelena had been keeping him in a basement for who knows how long.

Emma and David were running up just as I coming up behind him and drawing my flintlock. I'd been waiting for this for too long. I pulled back the hammer and got ready to fire.

"Whoa!" cried Emma. "Asgeir! Calm down!"

"CAN'T QUIET THE VOICES!" cried Gold.

"Don't hurt him!" She said, holding her hands up to me. "He knows who the Witch is!"

Hesitantly, I holstered my pistol. Soon enough, Emma. Soon enough and I wouldn't be taking orders from you, whether you truly were the Savior or not.

Emma knelt down in front of him as he fell to the ground in fright, clutching his head. "Gold are you alright?" She asked, although somewhat rhetorically.

"No! Not alright! Not alright!" He yelled. "I can't quiet the voices!"

Eye for an eye, then. What inflicted him was not unlike the pain that I felt for thirty years.

Emma tried to get something out of him, although his time she tried a calmer route. "We know you were held captive by the Witch." She said, slowly. "Do you know where she is?"

Gold started nodding, shaking horribly. "Yeah! Yeah she's- AUGHH!" He thrashed again. "There's no room! No room! There's too many voices! Too many voices!"

David went up towards Emma and Gold. "We gotta get him out of here!" He said.

"Screw that! Best let him die here right now!"

David glimpsed at me with slight shock, but regained his composure and looked back at his daughter. "Emma!"

Emma didn't have the chance to respond, because a flying monkey suddenly dive bombed from above. David swiped at it, causing it to crash land right past us. It got up and started snarling at us. I groaned, pulled my revolver out and put three shots in it's head. The monkey fell back dead, the fur on it's face now damp with that familiar crimson water.

"Asgeir!" said Emma. "Gold's getting away!"

"Then let's get him!" I yelled as I shot my Rope Blade and flew up into the trees. From above I could see Gold running off into the trees out of sight.

After a few minutes of losing Gold, I dropped down from the trees and Emma approached me.

"What was that back there?" She asked, angrily.

"What? Never seen someone show such bloodlust for Rumplestiltskin?" I said, still walking.

"Not at that level. I saw Hook even try his shot at killing Gold, but I see something different with you. For you it's personal."

I glimpsed at the Savior. "Begging your pardon, but aren't all vendettas against him personal?"

"Have Mary Margaret or David told you about my superpower?"

I stopped, and turned to her. "What?"

"My superpower. I'm really good at telling when a person is lying."

"So you have the Sight?" I said, remembering how some Assassins have honed it to use as a makeshift lie detector. Rabbit was also amazing at it as well.

Emma stopped. "Sorry, now you have me confused." She shook her head. "Doesn't matter. No. I know when a person is lying to me, and right now you're telling me a load of crap. That that back there wasn't something personal against Gold."

I raised my hands. "You got me. I want to kill Rumplestilskin just like any other bloke with common sense would. But I'm not telling you anything further than that. All you need to know is that because of dear old 'Rumple', my whole family is dead. And while he's not the only one responsible, he's high on that bloody list."

Emma could only stare at me in speechlessness when Neil came out of the trees.

"Emma? Asgeir?" He said.

Emma wasn't too thrilled to see him up and about. "Neil, what the hell are you doing here?"

He kept walking over. "You expect me to stay in bed while you're looking for my dad?"

I smirked. "Guess we forgot whom it is cooped up in there. No one stops Neil Cassidy."

"So you got a bead on him?" He asked.

"Yeah." Emma said. "We just saw him but he took off again."

Neil smiled, but I still had trouble accepting what I was hearing out of this man's father. Regardless of the man he was supposedly now, it never changed the fact that Rumplestiltskin pretty much helped George, Regina, everyone else that I hated in this world, and worst of all, Ingrid. So forgive me if I wasn't jumping for joy at his resurrection.

"So it's true?" Neil asked. "He's alive?"

I nodded, and Emma just said "Yeah."

"How'd he seem?"

"Completely fucked up." I said, boldly.

Emma winced at my language a little, but nodded. "Asgeir's not wrong. I don't know what that witch did to him, but he seems a little crazy. When I asked him about her, it was like he wanted to tell me but he couldn't."

Neil glimpsed around for a moment. "Well, he can't be far. Come on."

Emma didn't seem on board with that, but I just said to her "We're wasting time enough. Let's go."

"You wanna waste time dragging me to the hospital? Cause that's the only way you're going to get me there." Neil said.

"Fine. Let's go."

"So New York, huh?"

This wasn't my conversation, so I started strafing away whilst Emma and Neil kept talking.

"I liked the pizza." She replied.

"Did Henry like it?" He asked.

"He loves pizza."

I smirked. "I think Neil meant living in New York."

Neil shot me a glare that made me back away.

"Sorry!" I called. "Not my discussion."

They both went on about how Emma was with this guy that eventually proposed to her and then turned into a flying monkey.

Neil only laughed. "I almost married a minion of my evil grandfather Peter Pan. So I know what you're saying." He sniggered.

That boy was the reason that Neil and I eventually met. The circumstances however weren't as cut and dry as you might expect, though.

"I'm sorry it didn't work out." He said,

Emma looked back at him. "Really?"

"I care about you Emma." He said. "I always will. I just want you to be happy, even if it isn't with me."

Emma smiled. "We were happy. Once."

They both took a moment to stare each other until Emma's phone rang. Right after she picked up, I received a text.

"I looked up that symbol on Neil's hand and went over all the books we had on the Dark One. If that symbol is on Neil's hand, it means he used the key to the vault."

And then, as Emma heard something that made her shudder, it all came back to me. I've spent my whole life killing Templars for the death that they inflicted on fellow brothers and broken souls. I took their lives in exchange for the ones they took. The only thing that can truly pay for life is death. And if Neil used the key to open the vault-

"NEIL!" I cried as Neil fell to the ground with a yell.

Emma and I both rushed to Neil's side as he reared over on the ground. Then something really weird happened. His face seemed to shift into another's.

"Gold." I breathed as Neil quivered with pain.

"I think Gold- I think he's inside you!" Emma said. "I think that's how you're still alive."

Neil strained to speak. "I heard my father's voice in my head!" He wheezed. "He's in there! He's in me!"

He truly would save his son? He actually cared about him? I saw it happening before my eyes, but I still refused to truly believe it.

"He said there was no room." I said. "He meant you, Baelfire! There's no room for you!"

Neil grabbed Emma. "I need you to help me, Emma!" He whimpered. "Use your magic. Separate me and my father!"

"You kidding?" Emma said in disbelief. "Then you'll die!"

"I know." Said Neil. "But you need my dad more than me! To figure out who the Witch is! To save this town!"

I couldn't hold it back any longer. It could mean saving Neil if I revealed the secret. "I know who she is!"

Emma looked at me. "What?! You knew?"

Neil glimpsed at me. "Don't blame Asgeir, Emma. I know him. If he kept it secret, he had a good reason for it! But either way, I can't handle the voices! There's no room anymore! I can't take any more pain!"

Emma looked back at Neil. "I've never done anything like that before! Not that big!"

I held Neil's hand tightly as I could as he made his decision. "Do it! To save you and Henry! Do it! Please!"

He couldn't take much more of the pain. Emma took Neil's hands in her own, and concentrated. I sat back as the two people in one split apart in a flash of light. Neil fell backwards as Gold took his place.

Emma and I crawled over to Neil's side.

"Neil! Neil!" Emma cried. "Are you okay?"

"What have you done?!" Gold exclaimed.

"We're putting him out of his misery, you shite!" I snapped.

Neil smiled as he lay on the ground, dying in front of us. "It's okay, Papa. I told her to."

His father was bewildered. "But why?!"

"So you can tell her who the Witch is." Said Neil. "So you can defeat her!"

Gold was about to, but I beat him to the punch. "Zelena!" I snarled.

"What?" Said Emma. "She's the Witch? What does she want?"

"What she doesn't have." Gold whispered.

Emma desperately hoped that Rumplestiltskin had a way of saving Neil. "There has to be a way you can save him, right?"

Gold's lip trembled as he stood up, his expression giving us the clear answer. There was a lot of bloodshed I blamed him for, and I doubted even I would see him cry at the sight of someone, even his own son, meeting their end. Yet, that misery I saw on his face was genuine as my rage at him, Zelena, and Ingrid.

"It's too late, Emma." Neil breathed.

"Just hang in there, please!" She sobbed. "You never even had a chance to see Henry! For him to remember you!"

Neil smiled weakly. "It's okay. He doesn't need to. He just needs to know that, in the end I was a good father."

He looked up at me. "And Asgeir. You were like an older brother to me for so long. You taught me so much. I'll miss you just as much!"

I looked down at Neil and smiled a little, tears still coming to my eyes. "Nothing is True…"

"Not yet!" He groaned, reaching into his pocket. He pulled out a necklace, a silver coin with a swan on it. Fitting.

"I saved this for you to give to you again." He wheezed. He placed it into Emma's miserable hands. "Go on, take it. Go find Tallahassee, even if it's without me."

"Neil!" She sobbed harder and harder.

"Hey." Neil smiled. "I'll be watching over you guys from somewhere. Promise me- just prom- promise me you'll both be happy."

Emma cried as she repeated the promise back to him. Gold suddenly was at his son's side.

"No! No, no, no I can fix this!"

Neil wouldn't have it. "No, you can't. You can't. Thank you Papa." He grinned. "For showing me what it is to make a true sacrifice. It's about saving the ones that you love. It's my turn now."

Gold started crying to. "No…" He sobbed. "I don't want to let you go!"

Neil shook his head. "You have to." He whispered. "Let go." He looked up at me. "See you on the other side, old timer. Nothing is True…"

I weakly placed my hand on my heart as Neil fell back and closed his eyes. "Everything is Permitted." I sobbed.

Emma and Gold both looked at each other with misery. I, instead, looked up into the forest trees and roared with rage.

"ZELENAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

I smashed my foot on the hard white door as David, Emma and I burst into the Charmings' flat, weapons drawn. Splinters from the door frame went flying and now littered the floor.

"Emma! David! Asgeir!" Snow gasped from the dining room table. "What's going on?"

"Where's Zelena?" Emma demanded.

Snow was confused. "In the bathroom, why?"

David drew his sword and beckoned Emma and me down the hallway to the bathroom. They both took a door on either side of it, and kicked them in. The window was wide open, giving us all the notice we needed to know that she wasn't there.

"That bitch had to know we were coming." I said.

Emma pulled out her phone. "I'll call Regina. We need to get a protection spell around this apartment right away."

Snow looked over at us from the living room. "Does anyone want to tell me what's going on?"

David went over to his wife. "I'm just glad you're safe." He said.

"Of course I'm safe. Why wouldn't I be safe?"

"It's Zelena."

Emma looked over at her mother. "She's the Wicked Witch."

Snow was confused. "What? How do you know?" She asked.

"Gold told us. And Asgeir knew all along. Kept the truth hidden for reason that truly escape me at the moment!" She snapped at me.

"Oi! Easy, blondie. If it weren't for me, that witch might have taken your bloody ungrateful throat out!" I snapped back.

"Enough, Asgeir!" David growled. "We'll discuss it later!"

I shook my head. "No, I'm through talking shit out with that Witch. She's just taken it too far!" I started for the door.

"What are you doing?" Called Emma.

"Getting even!" I replied, heading out the door.

Rushing through the forest, the Outpost came into full view as a small cabin with two Assassins standing guard outside. They nodded as I walked right in. They knew who I was, but not what I intended to do.

While the Bunker was hidden very well and protected easily, the guns in the Outpost were ripe for the taking as soon as I opened the basement door. I had parked my truck not far from there at the lot at the end of a hiking trail. I immediately saw what I was looking for on the wall right in front of me, along with several pieces of ammunition right below it. An RPG-7 rocket launcher with a shot already loaded in. I grabbed it off the wall along with three other rockets and holstered them to my hood. I ran out of the Outpost, the Assassins behind me now noticing that I was carrying something I shouldn't. They yelled at me to stop, but I didn't listen. It didn't matter.

I jumped into my truck and tossed the rocket launcher beside me into the shotgun seat, then floored it. The tires skidded on the cold wet pavement as I flew down the backroads through the forest until I got to the driveway.

Jumping out of the truck with the RPG in my hands, I held it up, pointing it at the farmhouse where we had found out Zelena was holed up in days ago.

"ZELENA!" I roared, pulling the trigger. The force of the rocket shooting from the launcher tossed me backwards, but I recovered quickly as a portion of the house went up, small pieces of wood and stone raining down on me. I loaded another rocket into the launcher and shot again, this time the house really feeling the rocket's magnitude on it's already weakened structure.

Suddenly I heard a loud crack of a gunshot, followed by the familiar force of a bullet tossing me to the ground. I had forgotten about those snipers. I guess they thought I was considered something "suspicious" to shoot on sight with me shooting a rocket launcher wildly at the house. But I ignored the gunshot in my leg, got up, and loaded another rocket. I shot it again at the house, more debris raining down on me.

It didn't mean much. To blow up her house for killing Neil. No house can replace a friend. But it was making me feel slightly better. I was just about to shoot a fourth rocket when I felt it yanked from my hands.

"Now that's just rude." She chuckled as she tossed the launcher aside. "Didn't your proud old father teach you manners?"

I pointed a quivering finger at her. "Neil was a good soul! And you killed him like he was nothing!" I was more mad than I had been in months, but I could feel boiling wet salt pouring down my cheeks.

"On the contrary, dear." Zelena sneered. "I simply passed on the message of how he could revive the Dark One, and he obeyed."

I pulled my flintlock. I had loaded in the proper shot for this one. I could end her right then and there and she didn't even know it. But Zelena only smiled.

"I know what's in that pistol. Like you think a special bullet is going to stop me? Please. You won't just kill me, Asgeir. You're going to want to savor this, and you can't do it with a gun."

"I just blew up your house, have you by gunpoint and you still taunt me? You're stupider than even I cared to realize.

"A house is only a pile of sticks and stones." Zelena scoffed. "It meant nothing to me, that house. So do as you will."

I heard the roaring of engines as Zelena looked behind her. Two white vans were coming up the drive.

"Well, I'm off." She sneered. "Ta."

As soon as she disappeared in a puff of green smoke, The vans stopped and I ran over to the launcher for one more shot. Six Assassins armed with assault rifles each jumped out of the vans in threes as I loaded one more rocket into the launcher.

"Asgeir!" Jason called among them. "Put the launcher down! It's over!"

I shook my head as I turned and took aim at the house. It was already burning to the ground, but one more shot couldn't hurt. "It hasn't even begun." I replied faintly, as I shot the rocket at the house.

As soon as the rocket exploded against the house, I dropped the launcher and knelt down on the ground with my hands in the air, my back facing the others.

"Turn around!" one of the Assassins cried out. "Now!"

I did, and the young Assassin who looked no older than Anna raised the butt of his rifle towards my face.

"Here we go again." I murmured as it met my face, and I blacked out.