He spent the night within his new lair, altering and changing things that he'd never altered and changed in the old house because…well if he was honest, he never really went up to the third floor. Frankly, he'd never even noticed if Belle had cleaned up there. He assumed that she had because it wasn't like her to ignore an entire floor, but he'd never even bothered to check; that was how infrequently he visited. He'd mainly used it as attic space. He was a "packrat," as Belle had always called him, and when it came to that attic, it was true. That was where the things he kept went to die. It was where he put stuff he didn't need or know what to do with but didn't care to throw away. That was all the heed he'd ever paid it in the Land Without Magic, but now that he was here, he was almost grateful.

As much as he missed Belle now, as much as he longed to be home, truly home, living and working in a place where he had memories of really living and working probably would have made this unbearable. This third floor was a godsend. It was just enough of home to give him space of his own while being unfamiliar enough not to haunt him.

So he filled it. He spent the night searching the house, seeking out the little resources he had for this and moving them upstairs. He conjured a table that he stocked with bowls, vials, pippettes, and other things he woud likely need for his magic. He summoned an old spinning wheel. It came to him broken, of course, but with a wave of his hand, it was whole once more. A few more hours of tinkering and the flyer mechanism made it work just fine. There was a book stand he found in another room that he figured would be helpful for spell books, and moved it. And he made sure to move a bookshelf into the room, but it was stunningly bare. The basement where he'd kept his books in The Land Without Magic, was a ghost he hadn't expected to encounter. When he went down there to see what he was working with, he found relics of things he thought he'd never see again.

In the Enchanted Forest, after he'd attempted to capture his mother and question her regarding the Curse, after it had all gone wrong, he'd gone on a bit of a rampage, gathering books around the realm that possessed inklings of knowledge about her and destroyed them. He still didn't know why he'd done it though he was sure that Dr. Hopper would have his theories. Hell, he had his theories…the books were a representation of her; maybe in burning them, he'd sought to eliminate any potential knowledge of their connection, or perhaps it was just that he was an angry man.

No matter the reason, he'd burned them, stopping only weeks later when he held the last two in his hands and stuck them someplace safe in his castle. In his basement, his real basement, back home, he'd hidden them inside a wall, unwilling to look at them, but just as unwilling to destroy them or give them away. Out of sight, out of mind. Careful inspection of that same crevice here revealed those two books were not present. The crevice in the wall was. But it sat empty. However, the books that now littered the shelves he'd once kept all his most precious and valuable magic books upon, now held his worst nightmares. They were all books on his mother or books in which his mother and her history featured prominently. They were the books that he'd destroyed.

That had thrown him for a loop. But it had also provided his first vital piece of information. The books he'd destroyed were here. At the shop, he'd seen a genie's lamp with a dent in it and no magic coming off of it, Jefferson's hat had also been there with a slight magical signature, but in such a state of disrepair, he was sure could be salvaged, but not without stealing the thing for himself. And then there was…

He reached into his pocket and retrieved the chipped piece of Belle's chipped cup. It was small and fragile, but it was here. Its presence seemed to confirm his leading theory.

This realm wasn't just a place for dead people; it was a place for dead things too. That was certainly worth…

Alarms began to chime in the back of his mind, and it made the hair on the back of his neck stand up. Someone was on his property. It was good to know that his magic worked here just as it did in the other realm, that his protection spells and guarding spells were doing their job, but the signature that was within the wards was not a familiar one. It had no magic to it, but that didn't mean anything because this was a different world. While the warning in his head might work the same, there was no evidence to suggest the rest worked the same.

He pocketed the chip in his hand, locked the basement door, and sped up the stairs to the third floor to make sure everything was locked up tight before hiding his dagger within his jacket. A knock on the door rang out. It was muffled from so far up, but for him to have heard it meant someone must have been pounding. Something as simple and ordinary as someone knocking on the door in a place like this seemed odd and felt wrong. Breaking and entering seemed to be more in fashion given the look of the neighborhood here, but with the wards he'd set up and the lack of magical signature on the individual, he knew they wouldn't get through if they had no firepower. For that reason alone, when he headed down the back staircase and looked at the door, for a moment, he wondered if he should ignore it. Let them pound and knock; no one needed to know he was here.

But then he came to his senses. The Dark One hiding and cowering from a threat? That was unheard of, and it was absurd. He didn't know the first thing about what was going on in this place, but he knew he had his magic. And with the previous Dark One gone, he knew there was nothing to fear. Who the hell could possibly be looking for him?

Magic pooled in his palm, preparing to strike should he need it. Then he wrenched the door open, prepared to strike…and stood there in shock at the last face he ever expected to see in this world stood there and stared back at him in equal shock.

"Milah…" he breathed in shock.

"You are here," she squeaked out. If not for the fear in her eyes, then he would have called it an almost romantic tone. Once upon a time, he would have done nearly anything to hear that kind of tone in her voice. But the fear and upset in her eyes shook the stupor of shock away from him quickly enough. A tone like that did absolutely nothing for him anymore. At least not coming from that face it didn't. Now all he wanted was his dead ex-wife, whom he'd murdered, off his doorstep.

"The rumors are true," Milah breathed. "They said it was true, but I didn't want to believe it..."

They? Who were 'they?'

"I-"

But he didn't make it any farther than that before an angry sneer curled over her upper lip, she reeled back, and slapped him across the face.

Heat spread across his cheek. It stung before his magic began working at fixing the injury, and he had to admit that she'd gotten in a good one. The magic in his palm pooled once more, eager to attack and strike back at the perceived threat, but he reigned it in. Unlike when Gorgon had struck him, he felt like this particular act of violence he might have deserved.

After giving his cheek a good rub, he looked back to find that Milah had moved off his porch and was now standing in his front yard, hands on her hips, looking uncredulous and scandalized, every bit the angry wife she certainly had no reason to be at the moment. First, because while they'd never gotten divorced, there was certainly something about death being able to part them and that ship had sailed. Second, because aside from killing her as a gut reaction to some very cruel words she'd tossed around, he was the one who had been fucking scorned!

"I do hope you haven't been waiting around here all this time just to do that as well," he muttered as he stepped out into the foggy morning.

"Don't be so naïve," she spat, turning back to him. "My unfinished business has nothing to do with you. I just heard you were finally here and knew it would make me feel better to finally get a last word in, you unbelievable, fucking bastard!"

Or a last slap, but he'd ignore that because his body was healed, and his brain was already working through what she'd said, picking up on another important detail before she could walk away.

"Unfinished business…" he scoffed. "Why is everyone in this place obsessed with that term?"

"Oh please, you may be new here, but you'll learn soon enough the lowest blow you can administer is poking fun at someone's unfinished business. It's cruel, even for you, and that's saying something," she snapped.

There it was again. That phrase exactly, "unfinished business," like it was a title or something important. In less than twenty-four hours, she'd used it, twice, now! Pan used it. Hell, he was even pretty sure Gorgon had used it.

Had the girl?

He couldn't remember.

"Well, I'd be all too happy to be the villain that 'pokes fun' if I knew what the hell it was."

Milah had been preparing for something else. Her mouth was open, and she'd taken a breath, but at his words, she released it. She stared at him in confusion for just long enough to register that she was wearing jeans and a windbreaker of some kind from The Land Without Magic that actually suited her, but it was still odd to look at once he noticed it.

"You…you really don't know?" she questioned timidly, looking over him with utmost distrust as if trying to find the lie. He held back a huff. He'd told plenty of lies in his life, but ironically, when it came to Milah, he'd always been honest in their marriage. Unlike her…

"I've only just arrived. A small crying girl summoned me before running away from the monster that was chasing her. I'm still trying to put two and two together, but then people keep hitting me and making it difficult to-"

Milah held up a hand to silence him, something that dawned on him wouldn't have made a difference if it was anyone else, but with her, it was second nature to kowtow to her whims and desires. Fuck, it had been years since they'd lived and fought as a married couple, and here it was all coming back to him like nothing had changed. It was like riding the worst fucking bike in existence.

"Summoned…" Milah worked out on her own. "You didn't come on the boat?"

"Have I said anything to you about a boat?!" he screamed in frustration. Where the hell did the idea of a boat come from?!

"The boat! The ferry that picks up the dead souls and brings them here. Charon explains it to everyone on the ride over! But…you didn't arrive on it?"

He glared at her. He'd already answered that question. And yet she stared back at him as though he was growing a twin out of his head.

"Are you sure?" she dared to ask again.

"I think I'd have noticed if there was a boat involved!" He opened his mouth to say more, but the look on her face stopped him. Something was wrong. Something wasn't normal, and he had a feeling it had something to do with the fact that he suspected he wasn't dead. What she was saying was gibberish to him, and that damn near confirmed it!

The trouble was that he wasn't the only one that was catching on to something abnormal. She was too. And when it came to others knowing his secrets, there were precisely two people in all the realms that he trusted with those secrets, and neither one of them was his former wife. He didn't know how rare this abnormality of his was or how well known, but until he knew, he certainly needed to play these details close to his chest.

"Dark Ones are different. They come into this world differently, the last Dark One managed to convey that much to me just fine before he disappeared," he lied. "He said nothing about unfinished business..."

"He's done you a great disserve then. Can't say I wouldn't do the same, frankly," he prompted.

"Unfinished business..." he repeated with a heavy irritated sign. "You have some and that's why you're still here."

"Everyone here has unfinished business," she sneered, looking at him through hateful, disgusted eyes that he was suddenly grateful for because people were easier to manipulate when they were in a heightened emotional state. "It's the entire reason we're all here."

"So, what's yours if not me? Are you waiting for Hook?"

"Who?" she balked, giving him enough time to remember that she'd died almost the same time he'd taken the pirate's hand, so the moniker wouldn't have existed then.

"Your pirate!"

"Killian?!" For a brief moment, a look of vulnerability flared in her eyes but was then replaced with that same look of extreme anger. "My unfinished business, just like everyone else's, is my own. It's rude to even ask down here."

"Have unfinished business, don't ask about the business, don't ask about 'the journey', what odd rules you keep in this realm."

"We make do with this society we live in."

The "we" in her tone scared him. It scared him because if they were "we," then that meant he was "other". He didn't want that.

"Well, seeing as how I missed the instructional video, care to enlighten me?"

"Oh, you've got to be joking," she sneered with a small hysterical laugh.

"Trust me, it's not one of my better ideas. Spending even a few minutes with you is the last thing I want to do-"

"Yes, and after that glowing review, I can think of nothing better than spending time with the man who killed me."

"Oh, you brought it on yourself."

"You couldn't control your anger! Couldn't take a few harsh truths!"

"And you couldn't figure out a way to hold your tongue in the presence of the Dark One!"

"Enough!" she strained, holding her hand up once again and closing her eyes like she had a headache. Fuck, he remembered that look, and he didn't know what he hated more, that look or the fact that he remembered it! This time, listening wasn't just instinctual to stop talking at her bidding it was a choice. This fighting was getting them nowhere. Fuck, how had he stayed married to this witch as long as he had?

"I'll show you," she finally said when she opened her eyes. "May as well. It's not like I'm doing anything else in this hellhole until after school."

"What?"

"I'll show you what you need to see," she stated again, raising her voice. "On the condition that you leave me be. Whatever you are, however, you got here, I don't want to see you again during your...stay."

"The feeling is mutual."

"Then we have a deal?"

Well, he'd have never guessed that "I'll give you what you want on the condition you leave me alone" would be his first deal in hell, but hell, if it meant never seeing Milah again, he wasn't regretting it.

"Deal."

Milah let out a small snort of amusement as he felt magic bind him. "That was almost too easy."

"What? Making a deal?" he mocked.

"No…making your time here miserable as you once made me. Sometimes living with knowledge can be its own form of punishment…"

"Knowledge is power," he countered, purposefully ignoring the first part of that.

"Not here, it's not. Here it's just guilt and anger and despair, and you're long overdue."

"Actually, I think you'll find I've had plenty to spare," he muttered.

"Come with me, Rumpelstiltskin…I'll show you want you need to see."

He sighed as she began to traipse across the yard bidding him follow. "With a sale's pitch like that, I can hardly wait…"

This blast from the past is Milah! And if you've watched season 5 a time or two, then you probably already know why. This is one of those connections that just makes sense. When Milah and Rumple reunite for the first time in the Underworld, I expected something like this to happen. A lot of shock, a lot of irritation, and, yeah, I'd expect someone to get slapped, considering what their last encounter was like. But their reunion in season five was none of those things. Neither one really had any surprise at seeing each other, and the look on Milah's face, to me at least, always seemed to be more of a "not this again." What's more, Rumple, it seemed, had knowledge about Milah's job in the Underworld. He seemed to know right where to find her. And at the same time, the comment he made on the irony of her job made me think that he'd never come to see her there. So to me, the pair had met before, but under a very certain set of circumstances. I had to include this encounter while explaining and not undermining their next encounter. I hope I did a decent enough job, or at least I hope you'll think it's off to a good start. We'll see Milah in the next couple of chapters until their bargain is upheld. And then...well...Rumple never goes back on a deal. He won't see her again, not during this "stay" at least.

Thank you, Rsbeall12 and Jennifer Baratta, for leaving reviews on the previous chapter! This isn't really isn't so much a filler chapter as a bridge chapter. What's coming in the next chapter is a lot more important, and I know more than one of you will appreciate the nostalgia it'll conjure up. Peace and Happy Reading!