Elijah Mills is dead.
That was what Lestat de Lioncourt told the Queen as she sat with her motionless brother on the edge of his bed as they awaited her little brother to wake up from death. While Basil Hallward's body was disposed of by the newly discovered Hybrid, she couldn't help but look over her brother's older features. He seemed taller than he did, his feature's more mature and sharper, losing his youthful joy.
Today wasn't supposed to be like this, they were supposed to be celebrating the anniversary of his birth. The day he entered her world. The day she became a big sister; the day she became something more, than a pawn in her mother's game.
Tear's shimmered in her eye's as she stroked his cooled hands that lied on his stomach, over the dried bloodstain on his clothes from the fatal stab wound that would have killed him if that man hadn't intervened to 'save' him
"Happy Birthday Elijah" she whispered down to him, hoping he could somehow still hear her.
During her lessons with the Dark One, not once did the sorcerer mention the existence of vampire's. Perhaps it was something she didn't need to know about, but surely it didn't take this long for her brother to wake up. Something was wrong, and she had the unfortunate pleasure to wait for the one person that knew more than she did to answer her question.
"Is it supposed to take this long?" the woman demanded to know out of the returning hybrid as he made his way over to the Queen with her transitioning brother.
"Not sure love" Lestat answered the woman honestly as he stand over his newest protégé "His connection with the portrait may have some unforeseen side effects".
"Side effects?" she repeats back to the hybrid words "Like what?".
"Let's confer with Basil shall we?" he sarcastically asks her "Oh wait we can't! His corpse is is currently burning in a ditch!" he carped at the woman "One's thing for sure, once he wakes, he'll need human blood to complete the transition. I'll assume you'd like to be the willing donor if you wish for him to remain living".
"No" she sharply answers, looking up at the man that stood over his brother's body while her hand firmly remained in his hand. Even if that was the right word to call him. She didn't want her baby brother to become anything like him, even if she broke her heart in the process. Anything would be better than her brother becoming this...creature.
"No?" he questioned the woman's defiance.
"I won't let him become like you" she seethes to the man that killed her brother.
"Your Majesty, I assure you. There is no one like me" Lestat replies "I'm afraid you don't have a choice in the matter. So, you can either hand over your blood by your own will, or I go eat your father and I use his blood to complete the transition. Either way Elijah turns" he tells her "The choice is yours".
He was answered with silence as she looked away from him to look back to her brother, allowing the hybrid to continue.
"Once he completes his transition. I will be taking him away from the palace" it wasn't a request "He need's to be taught how to feed. How to hunt. And more importantly; how to survive".
"Survive? Why would you need to teach him that?".
"While you and the other royals in the land spend your time in their castles and palaces, the Enchanted Forest has been taken over by hunter's dedicated to eradicating my kind as well as others of the second natured. They ran us out of our home, spending a better part of three decades doing as they pleased while we have had to learn how to survive outside our natural environment with one mission in mind. To return and take back what is rightfully ours".
"What part of this story do I start caring?" the Queen interrupts the hybrid's story, growing more bored by the second.
"Tell me, Your Majesty. Do you really think your brother will be truly safe once he's allowed back here with you and your father? Newly turned vampires are born hungry, and those they love the most are more likely to be killed in their first year coming to terms with their new nature. And if he doesn't kill you, the hunter's will, they may already be inside your court, waiting for opportunity to make their move to take away everything you love".
"Let's speak plainly, shall we? The brother you once knew is dead" he tells her as a smirk slowly grows on his lips "When he awakens, he will become the version of himself that he was always meant to be—a version that even your mother could not have dreamed of creating. A true vampire in every way".
As on cue a deep gasp was heard interrupting the verbal sparring between the Queen and the Hybrid as Elijah took his second first breath into his new world.
Present Day
The portal of water swirled around the Jolly Roger as it was guided through the rough waters of the whirlpool before the vessel was finally spat out of the vortex oof water into the air before landing roughly on the water's that surrounded Neverland, allowing the vampire to let go of his sister, looking to his older sister to see any sign of injury from the rough journey only for the woman to reassure her baby brother that she was okay but a gentle kiss on his cheek, before the pair looked to the horizon to see that they had made it to Neverland.
"Is that it?!" Emma called out to the pirate at the helm of the ship as she looked into the horizon to see their destination in the distance.
"Aye" the man confirmed as he glared toward the mountain peaked island in the distance "Neverland".
He couldn't help but to see it's similarities to the land his sire originated from. He had visited the Kingdom of Transylvania a handful of times, the endless darkness was the biggest similarity as the vampire absentmindedly fidgeted with the ring on his finger that protected him against the sun, deep in thought of what he could expect in a place called Neverland.
He hadn't given a second thought to where the Captain was sailing the ship until his sister spoke up to find out why they were being taken away from the island instead of straight to it.
"Why are you slowing down?" Regina hotly demanded to know from the Captain, approaching the man at the helm "In case you didn't know, my son's life is in danger!".
"Oh, I know, my hot-headed Queen" the pirate coolly replied earning a glare from the vampire stood to his right, staring out into the horizon "The plan is to bring us to the far side of the island, link up with the widest part of the river, and.. then we sail right through, take him by surprise" he explained to the former monarch "The irony..." he trailed off outload.
"What irony?" Elijah asked the man, joining the Captain at the helm with his hand deep in his coat pockets.
"Oh, I spent more time than I care to remember trying to leave this place to kill Rumplestiltskin. And here I am, sailing right back into its heart with him as my guest of honour. It's not quite the happy ending I was hoping for" Hook tells the pair.
"Greg Mendel said something funny to me" Reign replied gaining his brother's attention "He said I'm a villain, and that villains don't get happy endings. You believe that?".
"I hope not" he answered the Queen "Or we've wasted our lives" he add to the pair stood either side of him.
At this Elijah couldn't help but find Emma standing alongside the ship's railing, gazing out at sea, in a mind of her own, with no memory of his confession of his growing affection for the woman ever since he first met her.
Everything he had felt for her as a human, before the curse was broken was now amplified into something he couldn't explain until the hallucinations of her during his brief captivity made everything clear to the man.
He was in love with Emma Swan.
But now he had to concentrate on getting his nephew off this godforsaken island. He wanted to talk to her, tell her he was going to save Henry, even if it was the last thing he would do, but she made it clear he was the last person she wanted to talk to.
Instead he listened as her parents made their way over to her, hoping they would be able to speak to her, to gauge how she was feeling, not only with losing Henry to Greg and Tamara, but the sudden loss of her first love.
"What happened to Neal, and Henry, it's not your fault" Mary Margaret told her daughter trying to give her some comfort in the events that had unfolded since Regina's capture, as her father joined his wife "You can't blame yourself".
"I don't" she tells them, turning to face her parents "I blame you" she tells them, making them look at her in surprise "All this happened because I listened to you. You say good always wins? It doesn't. I didn't grow up in some fairy-tale land. My experience is different, that's all I can go on".
"And all we have to go on is ours" her mother calmly retorted "So if you would just let us share our wisdom-".
"I appreciate you trying to be parents, but we're the same age. We have equal amounts of wisdom. And all I want is Henry back. I should never have broken the curse. I should've just taken Henry and-".
"You're right" her mother interjected seeing how upset her daughter was getting "Th-Then you'd be together. We missed you growing up Emma, and it haunts us every day".
"And that's why we're here now" David spoke up "We don't want you to have to go through the same thing, too, and you won't. We are gonna get our family back".
"How can you two be so infuriatingly optimistic!?" she exclaimed at the pair loud enough that the vampire didn't need his heightened senses to hear them.
"It's who we are" the former Prince retorted.
"Why? Ever since you got your memories back, ever since you remembered that you're Snow White and Prince Charming, your lives have... they've... we'll, they've sucked!".
"No. No, we found you".
"And lost Henry! And Neal, and countless other people!" she yelled back.
"Emma, the minute I let go of the belief that things will get better is the minute that I know they won't. We'll find him".
"No, you won't" a voice plainly tells the Saviour making the group on deck to see Mr. Gold stood there, garbed in his old Rumplestiltskin clothing.
"Oh, that's a great use of our time—a wardrobe change!" Hook exclaimed from the helm towards the Dark One, as the Mill's stared at the man that they had both dealt with.
"I'm gonna get Henry" the older man continued over the Captain's sarcasm.
"We agreed to do this together" Regina argued to the from beside her brother in front of the helm.
"Actually, we made no such agreement" the corrected his former student, making the vampire audibly scoff and roll his eye's as he shook his head in disbelief at the man's gall to take over.
"Why are you doing this?" the saviour asked the the bottom of the steps.
"Because I wanna succeed" he retorted.
"What makes you think I'm gonna fail?".
"Well, how could you not? You don't believe in your parents, or in magic, or even yourself" he listed off the woman having heard the argument.
"I slayed a dragon, I think I believe".
"Only what was shown to you. When have you ever taken a real leap of faith? You know, the kind where there's absolutely no proof? I've know you some time, Miss Swan. And, sadly, despite everything you've been through, you're still just that... bail bonds-person, looking for evidence. Well, dearie, that's not gonna work in Neverland".
"I'll do whatever it takes" she states to the man in defiance of his words.
"Well, you just need someone to tell you what that is. Sorry, dearie, our foe is too fearsome for hand-holding. Neverland is a place where imagination runs wild. And, sadly, yours doesn't".
Spinning the cane on his hand, the saviour watched as it fell onto the deck, before looking back up to see Gold missing from the ship.
The prospect of a fresh shirt was too good to pass up as the vampire was guided below deck by the ships Captain to a spare shirt to that wasn't strained from his own blood, to change into for however long they would be on Neverland for.
Emerging from one of the numerous room's underneath the main deck, the vampire heard heavy breathing and grunting coming from another cabin as he pulled his coat over his suit jacket and fresh shirt to find Emma out of her coat and jacket, doing pull ups, on a bar below a hatch, leading up to the main deck, before pausing to take in a deep breath.
"Don't stop on my account" Elijah voiced to the woman from the doorway making is presence known to the woman, who looked like she was preparing for battle.
"Wouldn't think of it" she replies rolling her eye's at the man continuing her pull ups.
"What are you doing?" he asks her. stepping further into the cabin.
"Getting ready for a fight" she grunts out.
"Well, I've never known you to need to 'get ready' for a fight. I thought it was a natural state" he mused to himself recalling all the times she had jumped head first into a situation or argument with his older sister, without so much as a vocal warm-up.
Rumpelstiltskin's harsh words was playing on her mind more than she wanted them to "Don't let Rumplestiltskin get you down, I assure you from personal experience. His bite is far worse than his bark".
"I'm not" she insists to the man, jumping down the the bench she was stood on the reach the bar to face the vampire.
"If your really not, then you wouldn't mind showing me what you've got" he challenged the woman, shrugging off his coat and suit jacket, leaving him in the off-white shirt he had found to wear, pulling up the sleeves, in preparation to spar with the blonde.
"Seriously?" she exasperated at the man with her hands on her hips as she watched him pulling the long sleeves of the clean shirt he was wearing to his elbow "Aren't you like super strong, vampire guy. You'd beat me easily. Human remember".
"I remember" he replies with an amused smirk before it disappeared a second later "However I've found humans much more dangerous than other creatures in recent years. They make up the difference between the gap that separates us by other means".
"How?" she played along with his claim.
"Creating better weapon's, becoming smarter in their pursuit of us, discover new ways to kill us. Which is why I had to learn to adapt when I first turned, I became smarter than them, I learned to blend in better with other humans, ultimately cutting off a part of my humanity that once hesitated to make the final kill" the smirk on her lips fell hearing this.
"Shall we?" he prompts her to fight as he took a defensive stance, a beat or two later the saviour took up a stance herself, holding up her closed fists in front of her face, a look of determination on her face before she threw her fist towards the vampire, only for the man to easily catch the weak effort in his hand.
"As a devout feminist, I refuse to say you hit like a girl" he deadpanned to the blonde, making her snatch her fist out of his hand. She was stronger than this. He knew she was. She was holding back. "Let's try this again shall we" she stood in disbelief question why they were doing this as stood waiting for her to try again.
"Why are you doing this?" she huffs at the vampire with her hand on her hips.
"Because while we are here. You are my responsibility".
"...Say's the feminist" she retorts making him chuckle, as he thought a way to teach her
"Fighting is rhythm, there is a music, there's a meter, there is a pattern. Let that pattern beat within you" he instructed her as he once again took up a defensive stance "Again" he prompts her.
Shaking the hair from her face the saviour refocused on the man in front of her, raising her first to his face once again, throwing out with her left first first, as the vampire to block her with his left forearm, before the vampire saw the saviour next move, throwing out her right fist, only to be easily pushed away by his right hand.
"Legato" he stated to the woman as the pair reset themselves. This time the saviour held her fists to her side, using her left fist aiming for the vampire's stomach, making the vampire push the arm down as she brought her right fist up, to hit him high, making the vampire duck down, allowing her to use her left elbow to hit his face, making the vampire step back to catch it, blocking her other arm, before using her left hand again to hit out at him, making the vampire block her once again with both his arms.
"Ostinato" he states, as the pair step away from the other as much as they could in small cabin, the vampire watching the saviour closely as she took up her stance once again to fight the vampire, as she felt the beat of her heart move her into the next.
Swinging her left fist at the vampire, the saviour opened the vampire up as he went to block the wild swing, allowing her to lift up her right leg to kick out at the man, only for the vampire to easily move out of the way, and catch her jean clad knee in the air, as he moved behind her, making her turn and wildly hit out only to be met by a strong forearm.
"Cresendo" he stated, only for the saviour to use her other hand to pull the arm down to open the vampire to catch her elbow, trapping her against him "And then, once you've established your cadence-" throwing the woman out of his hold, the blonde spun, turning back to the vampire as she used her strength to use her forearm and hand against his chest to push up against a wall, holding him in place with a forearm across his collarbone.
"You change the key" she finished, beaming up at the vampire, she had beaten him as he felt the warmth of her skin through the material of the shirt as their eye's met.
"Very nice" he breathed out, taking hold of the elbow of the hand that was pressed against his chest "Now-the head or the heart?".
The question took the saviour aback, as the look of pride suddenly turned to one of horror "None of this matters if you cannot make the kill" he voices to her.
"What if I can't do it?" she whisper's to him like she was afraid someone would overhear her as her hand fell away from his chest, only for the vampire to quickly retake it and replace it's place above his heart, he couldn't help but savour the way her heart beat harder as he pushed her hand harder into his chest, but he wasn't here to listen to her heart. He was here to teach her.
"You will. To survive. Like I did. Now- the head or the heart?" he repeats the question with as the corner of his lips quirked into half a smirk, feeling the saviour's finger twitch against his chest, like she had already decided what she wanted to do, only to quickly push herself off the vampire.
"No" she refused to be pulled into the man's games "There's a better way" she sternly adds.
"Good" he complimented her "However, other's won't always have the same morals as you" at that the vampire used his speed to reverse their earlier positions, as he pinned her against the wall of the cabin, his face hovering over her's, the saviour didn't even try and push him off her as the woman spotted the first signs of stubble on his face as she felt her hand's land on his firm chest.
"First lesson- Always be on your guard" he instructed her, breaking her out of her thoughts of the man in front of her as he repeated his earlier question "Head or heart?".
Inches separated their faces as he watched every move her eye's made tempted to throw caution to the wind with the man in front of her only be interrupted as they heard a throat being cleared from the open doorway, making the vampire push himself off the saviour for the pair to look at pirate in the doorway.
"Am I interrupting something?" the pirate asked, looking between the pair.
"Nothing important" Elijah answered him, picking up his discarded coat "Excuse me" at that the vampire made his slow exit from the room, pausing at the door, to look back at the saviour giving her one last look before leaving the room to find his way back up to the main deck.
He was going back up to his finds his sister, he really was, but his curiosity got the better of the vampire as he explored the lower decks, feeling the boat rock harder than it did when he left Emma with Hook.
Turning a corner to enter a large room that seemed to be some sort of cargo hold, the vampire's sight went over the crates of things the pirate had kept over the year, until something in the darkest corner caught his eye.
"No" he whispered in horror recognising the piece in the back. It should still be at the bottom of the deepest sea. With speed, the vampire picked up and threw every box, hearing the occasional crate breaking on contact with the floor behind him until he found himself stood in front of the horizontal steel casket that he paid blacksmiths to hold the most powerful creature in the entire Enchanted Forest.
His heart beat into his ears as he reached out, grasping the cold metal, opening it. Instead of seeing his maker stood within it, with chains wrapped around him, those same chain now sat at the bottom of the empty casket as angry tears brimmed the vampire's eye's as he tried to find any sign of how the hybrid might have broken out, but there was nothing, no dent's, no scratches.
"NO!" he exclaimed as realisation hit the young vampire of who was responsible of freeing the hybrid from his never-ending torture.
He couldn't be alive. He couldn't be free. He just couldn't.
"Regina!" he called out for his sister as soon as he lifted the hatch back onto the main deck. He needed to tell her what he had discovered in the hull of the Jolly Roger and the man responsible for freeing the monster within.
Lestat de Lioncourt was alive and free.
Hearing her brother's panicked voice, the older Mill's sibling found him stumbling out from the hatch from below deck to find him in a panicked state, as he found her rushing over to him, quickly taking her by her arms to hold her still as he tried to gain control of his own emotions.
"Elijah, wh-".
"He's alive!" he yelled over the crashing waves.
"Who?" she pressed her brother to answer.
He didn't get a chance to answer his sister question as they were thrown to the side due to David and Mary Margaret's botched joint effort to control the ship through the rough patch of sea, making the vampire catch his sister before she could hit the deck.
Regaining her feet the former Queen left her brother to storm up the stair to find the Charming couple struggling to control the wheel, before the vampire flashed up to the wheel to take over from the couple, catching the handle's of the wheel, in each, using his superior strength to pull against the wheel to steady the large ship.
"What the hell are you two doing?!" she exclaimed at the pair joining the pair at the helm, seeing her brother already their steadying the ship.
"Trying to keep it steady!" the former Princess yelled back at the older woman as Hook returned to deck.
"Prepare for attack!" the pirate bellowed to the other's pushing the vampire out of the way to take control of the wheel.
"Be more specific!" the former replies.
"If you've got a weapon, then grab it!" the pirate grunts out the instruction, failing to see the deadly gaze on him from the vampire, tempted to snap his neck right there and then, and keep snapping it until he told him what Lestats casket was doing in his hull, as Emma emerges from the cabin below to rush over to the edge of the ship to look into the water.
The screeching from the water is what made the vampire look away from the pirate to turn his attention to the water as hi joined the saviour at the edge looking down to see what was attacking them.
"What's out there? A shark?! A whale?!" Emma lists off to the Captain.
"A kraken?" the former Prince adds, using a lantern to try and get a better look.
"Worse" the pirate speaks up as the screeching become louder from under the water, flashes of the creature's scaled tail breaking the surface. "Mermaids!".
"Mermaids?!" Emma questioned the pirate as the screeching intensified for the vampire, as he felt nails being hammered into his skull as the screeches echoed in his mind, reaching up to his ears, the tips of his finger's were instantly met by a warm liquid, making him turn and see the blood that coated them. His ear drum's burst, only he could still here the mermaids in the water and the other's as they heals and burst over and over again.
"Yes, and they're quite unpleasant".
"You think?" Regina quips at the Captain as the mermaids made the first punch with the vampire onboard.
"Ahhh!" the vampire suddenly exclaims in pain gaining everyone attention as he held his hands against his ear, trying to block out the screeches the pierced his skull making the vampire fall onto his knee's.
"Elijah!" Emma and Regina called out to the man on his knee's, only for the blonde to reach the vampire first to see the pain in his eye's and the blood that trailed down from both side of his head "What's wrong?!" she asked the vampire, trying to figure out what was making him yell out in pain like that.
"Make it stop!" he yelled out feeling his ear drums burst again as the screeching intensified in his head, reminding the blonde the way Cora had her son on his knee's in her nursery.
"It's the noise" Regina pointed out to others seeing her brother's pain "They know he's up here. They're somehow targeting him, hoping they drive him crazy enough to kill us" making the other's look at the vampire in concern. Even with Regina's magic, they wouldn't stand a chance against him.
"Ahhh! Make it stop!" he called out to the others again, his eye's clenching together as he tried to push through the pain in his head and the push he felt to make the noise to stop himself, feeling his fangs extend into his mouth.
"How are we supposed to stop him?" David called out knowing something needed to be done to stop him killing everyone aboard the ship before they could even reach Neverland.
"Get him below deck!" Hook orders the others "I'll try and outrun them" that all he could think of doing, to help the man.
"No!" Emma and Regina protested to the pirate at the thought of throwing him aside.
Emma needed to do something, she needed him to refocus on what was going on other than the pain. She needed him to come back to her.
Taking hold of his hands, the vampire yelled out in pain as his ears were left unguarded by the screeching before Emma replaced them with her own making the vampire look up at her.
"Elijah. Look at me" the blonde spoke to the vampire who refused to open his eyes as "Look at me!" she repeated herself louder making the man snap his eye's open to meet her's, seeing the dark veins dancing under the skin under his eyes that darkened as he fought against his natural instincts to fight back and stop the screeching that was hurting him.
"You need to fight this" she firmly tell him, pushing past the fear she felt seeing him like this "Focus on me. On us. You're stronger than this" she sternly tells him.
It felt like someone had turned down the volume in his head as he focused on the heartbeat in front of him as the other's watched how the blonde easily calmed the pained vampire.
"We need you" she whispered down to him. A beat later the vampire visibly relaxed as his human side came back to the surface and the piercing ease from his head as the screeching became more bearable as the mermaids continued to circle the ship.
Little by little Emma lifted her hands off his ears, as the pressure in his mind subsided, leaving the vampire to pick himself off the wooden deck with the blonde following him.
"Bloody hell" the pirate drawled out in disbelief to himself, as the woman managed to talk the ripper down from a rampage as "She did it".
"You good?" she quietly asked him, ignoring Hook's comment.
All he could do is nod at the blonde as the mermaids changed their tactics, instead of trying to get the vampire to kill the human's on the ship, they would have to do it themselves as their strong fins batted against the hull of the ship to, hard enough to make the vessel shake with each hit.
Rushing over to the side, Emma and vampire looked over the side to see the amount of mermaids in the water trying to capsized them, their tails reflecting in the water as they swam around them.
"How many of them are there?!" Emma asks the other as the second wave of attacks came from the mermaids, making the vampire find a rope to hold onto.
"I will not be capsized by fish!" David exclaimed as he ran over to the swivel cannon's, Elijah caught on to what the man was doing as he looked for anything he could use to defend the ship with him, until he came across a harpoon, attached to a rope making him smirk to himself. Perfect.
As David hastily loaded the cannon, the vampire sped over to the harpoon, picking it up with ease, before returning to his original spot, the vampire jumped onto the edge of the ship with the harpoon in hand, ready to throw into the water, hoping to kill few of the mermaids that tried to use him against the others.
"Emma!" Mary Margaret called out to her daughter as her husband and ex-fiancé prepared to attack the mermaids, taking her daughter down onto the main deck.
"What are you doing?!" the blonde asks the woman as she helps her pick up a net from the deck.
"Fishing" she answers her daughter as the pair work together to life the heavy net overboard, while David fire's into the water, aiming for a mermaid, before it's followed by a hard throw of the harpoon by the vampire, a screech of pain coming from the water as a bloom of blood appearing in the water.
Catching the rope, the vampire pulled back hard on it, to retrieve it from the mermaid he had killed only to hear his old yell out "We caught one!".
"One? There are dozens of them" Regina retorted as the onslaught of attack continued despite Elijah and David's efforts to scare them away "Enough of this" putting her foot down the former Queen conjures a ball of fire into her hand, throwing it into the water, making the mermaids flee as it met the surface of the water. Firing another, the mermaids finally disperse, calming the attacks on the ship, before a third and final ball of fire, drove the mermaids away from the ship, with the only sound being that of the creaking ship "There. They're gone".
"Not all of them!" Mary Margaret yelled as she and Emma struggled to pull the net with the mermaid they had caught onto the ship "What about that one?!" she points out. With a simple wave her hand and the mermaid and the net appear on the deck of the Jolly Roger.
"Get that thing off my ship!" Hook exclaimed angrily at the women that brought the creature onto the ship from the helm as David and Elijah joined the woman on the lower deck.
"No. " Regina retorted, but her arguments went ignored by the men Now we have a hostage.
"I hate to say it, but I'm with Hook. Those things just tried to kill us.
"Perhaps we should recall how they nearly made me lose control" Elijah pointed out to her older, blood thirsty sister. Any other time he would be relishing in the prospect of torture, but not today.
"And perhaps we should find out why" she argued to her baby brother.
"How? By torturing her?" Mary Margaret questioned her former step-mother.
"Well, if need be. Sure".
The group were interrupted when the mermaid grabbed a conch shell that was caught up with her and blows into it like a horn. The low vibrations made the others including Elijah to cover their ears as the horn reverberated through the air.
"What the hell is that?" Emma asked the captured mermaid.
"A warning" she tells them as a clap of thunder rang out above them in the dark sky "Let me go. Or die".
In a blink of an eye, the vampire sped over, snatching the conch shell out of the mermaids' hand before crouching down to her level, trapping her gaze with his as his pupils dilated to compel the answer from her.
"What is this? What did you do?" he compelled the mermaid on the deck as she seemed to work for a second or two, before the mermaid to hit him across the face hard, a resounding slap echoing around them, Mary Margaret gasps joining the sound as the other's watched in shock as he was humiliated in front of the humans.
"Your tricks won't work on me vampire" she growled at the man "Let me go" the mermaid demanded from the vampire only to be replied by the latter crushing her shell into pieces in his hand, allowing the pieces to fall onto the deck.
"Not until you tell us. Or we make you tell us" Regina warned the fish.
"Threatening her isn't the way to motivate her" Mary Margaret argued to the older woman.
"Well, I'm all out of fish food" the former Queen replied turning to the former Princess.
"Doesn't matter if you get her to talk" Hook voiced to the women "You can't trust her. Mermaids are liars".
"Of course they are" Emma rolled her eye's dismissively at the pirate's words.
"Maybe they're just scared of Pan. If we let her go, maybe they'll be on our side".
"Or maybe she and her friends will come right back to kill us" Regina retorted "Or better yet, make Elijah kill us all".
"Oh, I don't need my friends or the vampire to kill you. You'll kill yourselves. Now let me go".
"Not until you tell us what you did". the group of hero's and villain jumped as another thunderclap rag out above them followed by a low rumble as the wind started to pick up making the ropes around them shake
"What the hell?!" David exclaimed.
"It's a storm" Hook tells them pointing to the Mermaid "She called it. Don't let her go! She'll swim off and leave us all to die. At least with her, we've got leverage" David rushed off and comes back to the mermaid with a long sword in his hand and points it at the mermaid threateningly
"Stop the storm. Then we let you go" the prince warns the mermaid holding the edge of the sword against her neck only for the latter to simply shake her head in defiance. Frustration gets the better of the Princes as he crouched behind the Mermaid to hold her against the blade, making her struggling under the man's hold.
Regina simply laughs at the Princes actions enjoying his change of tactic "That's more like it, Charming. Filet the bitch" she goads the honourable Prince as Mermaid gasps and whimpers under David's hold. Taking a breath Charming looks up to see Mary Margaret's look of disbelief as his daughter watches on.
"No. We're not barbarians" David tells them much to Regina's disappointment the storm continued to pick up above them as flashes of lighting lit up the deck as the clouds rolled in above them.
"What we're going to be is dead" Emma tells them.
"Hold on!" Hook yelled over the thunder and lightning "I'm gonna turn her around. I've outrun many a storm".
"Enough of this" it was Elijah's turn bringing his wrist to his mouth, letting his fang's extend out before biting down hard on his flesh making him bleed, pushing David out of the way, the vampire knelt down behind the mermaid pushing his bleeding wrist into the mermaid's mouth, as he held the back of her head as Emma and the hero's watched in horror as the vampire force fed the creature.
"What are you doing!?" Mary Margaret yelled at the man as he snatched his wrist away leaving her lips coated in his blood, taking hold of her neck ready to snap it.
"Giving her a ultimatum" the vampire tells the younger woman before looking back at the mermaid "Make it stop, or die becoming something you don't want to be. I won't ask again".
"We are not killers!" his old friend argued with the vampire's making the man look up at the woman his annoyance bristled as her morals.
"Yes, you are" the mermaid told the group under the vampire's hold "And you've brought this death upon yourselves".
"This is why we should free her!" the princess pointed out to the vampire and his sister.
"That feel-good nonsense, Snow" Regina spoke up "Might play in the Enchanted Forest, but this? This is Neverland".
The ship suddenly jerked as the pirate struggled to keep it steady on the storming waters, forcing the vampire to let go of the mermaid to flash over to a nearby rope to hold onto as the David stumbled on his feet.
"Keep your grip, pirate!" David complained to the leather clad pirate at the helm as he held onto some nearby ropes.
"It wasn't me, mate!" Hook yells over the claps of thunder above them "It was the ship! We're taking on water!".
"Now may we resume killing her?!" Regina asked the others wanting to get back to what she and her brother did best.
"No!" the Charming couple exclaimed at the siblings.
"You kill her, and her kind have a personal vendetta against us" Mary Margaret continued the hero's protest.
"Look, the queen and ripper are right" Hook tried to reason with the married couple "They've already tried killing us".
"Stop!" Emma yelled at them, speaking up for the first time while her parents argued with the Mill's siblings "That's enough! We need to think this through!".
"I already have" Regina tells her. Waving her hand towards the mermaid the other's watched as the creature was turned into wood, the other's stunned to silence at the move as they gawped at the wooden figure that was the mermaid "There. That should stop the storm".
"Regina!" Emma was the one to yell out as the sky rumbled again above them "What did you do?!" the sky rumbled again as the lighting lit up the tidal wave that loomed over the Jolly Roger and it's passengers as it climbed the wave "What have you done?!".
"Good heavens" the words slipped out of Elijah lips as sea water lashed down from above them as he held on the ship with all his might as the wave rained down on all of them.
"I thought you said you could outrun a storm!" Emma yelled at Hook as the pair tried to steer the wheel of the ship together through the storm they seemed to be stuck in the middle of, as Elijah continued to hold onto the ship, completely soaked through from sea water that had fallen upon them from the tidal wave.
"This isn't a storm. It's bloody damnation!" the pirate replied, through the howling wind as the former Princess turned the blame towards her former step-mother for their current situation.
"Why would you do this?" the younger woman started.
"You're going to blame me?" the older woman retorted catching her brother's attention to the brewing fight.
"You turned the mermaid into wood!".
"Elijah and I did something about it, which is more than what you can say!" she replied bringing her brother into the argument. going to the extreme of threatening to turn the mermaid when compulsion failed.
"Undo your spell!" Mary Margaret demanded out of the former Queen as a flash of lighting cracked near the ship "Bring back the mermaid!".
"And what, you'll win her over with your rainbow kisses and unicorn stickers?!" the older woman retorted.
"Considering that your plan failed, at least we could try!".
"You're such a naïve princess!" Regina exasperated at the younger woman.
"Urgh! And you are such a..." the princess angrily huffed at her former step-mother, a bolt of lightening with a load clap resounded above them as the younger woman's fist met the side of Regina's face, sending the woman back as the vampire was jerked away from the fighting pair, stopping him from trying to stop his sister from retaliating, while the older woman pulled herself back to face her step-daughter.
"Huh. Is that your best?" the former Queen snarled at the woman.
"Not even close!" Mary Margaret retorted as lighting intensified above them, striking the "I am so tired of you ruining my life!"
"I ruined your life?" Regina scoffed at the woman before swinging her own fist into the younger woman's face.
"Hey!" David yelled out seeing Regina hit his wife as the two women started to grappled with the other, stepping forward to intervene only for Hook to grab his by his shoulder and drag him back.
"Hey, let the slags go. I need you at the mast" the pirate tells him.
"Don't call my wife a slag!" he yelled at the pirate, rounding on the man, sending a hard punch in to the pirate's face, leaving Emma stranded at the wheel, as the other fought one another as the storm around them grew worse by the minute.
While his sister fought his ex, and David fought Hook, the vampire quickly jumped into action to fill the space the pirate had left, taking the weight of the wheel from the woman struggling to keep the ship afloat through the storm, the pair remaining the only level minded people onboard.
"Stop it!" Emma called out to the other's and David and Hook threw punches at the other and the women continued to grapple, the blonde saw how worse with each punch "It's not the mermaid. It's us!" she realized outload as she turned to the one person that could stop the fighting if he really wanted to "Aren't you going to stop them!" the blonde sent the question towards the vampire.
"Miss Swan" he groaned out through his gritted teeth as he pushed against the wheel "I learnt a very long time ago, not to get in the way of my sister whenever she's in a fight!" he replied as the other's showed no sign of letting up in their individual fights.
"No!" Emma called out once again from wheel "If you don't stop fighting, we're all gonna die! Don't you see we're causing the storm?!"
Despite her plea's they went unheard as the blonde to matters into her own hand as she left Elijah at the wheel, to run and jump u on the edge of the ship, with nothing to hold onto but a rope in the howling wind and rain.
"Emma!" Elijah called out in protest of the blonde's actions as he was left to keep the ship afloat as Emma tried once again to get through to her parents, Hook and Regina to stop fighting.
"Hey! Stop! You need to listen to me!" she yelled at the top of her lungs.
"Emma!" the vampire yelled out again only to go unheard as the blonde turned and jumped off the edge into the water below, gaining everyone's attention at last, making the stop and run to the edge as the vampire looked up to see that the storm had disappeared almost instantly, before he heard something snap above him to see a metal pully fall from above them and fall into the water, where Emma had dived into, heard a dulled thud coming from under the water, the faint heartbeat slowing down.
"EMMA!" he suddenly exclaimed, shrugging his coat and jacket from his shoulders, running to the edge, before diving headfirst into the water after the saviour under the water.
"Elijah!" was the last thing he heard before vanishing into the water.
Heart's plummeted into stomach's as the other's tried to look for any sign of the saviour or the vampire that had jumped in after the blonde.
"Emma!" Mary Margaret yelled helplessly towards the water.
"Idiots!" the former Queen called out to the pair in the water.
"Regina, get them up here!" the younger woman pleaded the woman next to her.
"I... I... I can't!" Regina stuttered out "Not in this storm. I can't even see them. I'll just bring up water and half a leg" she tells them, as David pulls himself up onto the edge ready to dive in after Emma when Hook stops him.
"Wait!" Hook stopped the man from doing something that would get the both killed.
"She'll drown if Elijah can't find her" he yells at the pirate.
"And so will you. Let me help" he offer's the father as he goes to find a rope to aid the man, handing one to the man's wife "Here, tie him" he instructs her as David jumps back down to slip it over his head, around his waist as the Queen continued to watch the water to see something coming out of the water, and recognise the head of wet hair that suddenly broke the surface.
"Elijah, you idiot!" she yelled over the edge, making her feelings know to the man that had jumped after the woman, gaining the Charming's attention as they rushed over to see the vampire trying to float on the water with Emma on his front.
"He need's help, quick" Hook pushed the prince towards the edge seeing the vampire struggling to hold the human in his arms.
Looking back at the ship, the vampire let out a sigh of relief to see David dive into the water as the water lapped around his face as the saviour laid unconscious on his chest, with one arm wrapped around her as he struggled to keep them both above the water. The tighter he held her, the stronger her heard beat in her chest. She was alive, only barely.
Once her father had reached them, the vampire hastily handed her over to him "Go!" Elijah urged the man to get her out of the water.
"He has her. Pull!" Hook exclaimed as the three started to pull the father and daughter duo back to the ship as the vampire took his time to catch his breath after so long underwater.
After a minute of manually pulling them back, Hook took the rope from the women to attach it into a pully, to haul the pair the rest of the way, until he heard the sound of the woman's recovery as she chocked up the water from her lungs.
Returning to the edge of the ship, Regina sought out her brother still in the water as watching the blonde, being safely taken aboard as all remnants of the storm disappeared completely from the dark sky above them.
"I told you" he heard the saviour say making him chuckle to himself before turning his mind to make his way back to the ship only to feel something grab both his legs and pull him back down into the water.
"Elijah!" Regina called out in panic catching the other's attention as they gathered next to the former Queen to see what had happened.
"What happened?" the saviour asked the woman seeing no sign of man that had called after her.
"He was right there! Something pulled him back under!".
"A mermaid?".
They seemed to have a natural hate for vampire's let alone Elijah.
"Probably" she breathed out as a something heavy behind hit the wooden deck making them all whirl around in panic ready to face whatever had joined them as balls of fire were conjured into hand and swords were lifted ready to fight only to see Elijah stood there with bare chested and wet, with the shirt he had procured from the Captain as they saw it torn to shreds with a pinkish tinge in his hand as the cuts and gashes on his skin healed in an instant, as they watched vampiric face turn back to normal, face's pulling back into his gum, his eye's softening to their normal gentle brown.
"My apologies" he huffed at the other's with the corner of his lips quirked up in amusement "I seem to need a new shirt" he added throwing the bloodied shirt onto the deck, as his sister snuffed the fire in her hand, rolling her eye's at the way Mary Margaret and Emma seemed to be transfixed on the half-naked muscular man in front of them, while Hook and David simply grimaced and frowned at the sight.
"For gods sake, put a damn shirt on" Regina's voice broke the 'spell' the other two women seemed to be under as he headed back below deck to find a dry shirt to wear, as David noticed the way his wife was looking at the vampire left.
"Hey" he poked her out of her daydream while the other's dispersed.
"Sorry" she quickly apologised sheepishly "Old habit".
Solid land couldn't come sooner for the vampire after finally putting the mermaids back in their place in their natural habitat, the party made land on a small beach on the island after the Jolly Roger was left in a sorry state after the beating it had taken by the storm and mermaids.
Buttoning up the his suit jacket around the fresh shirt he had found, his tie and coat had been long forgotten back on the ship as the vampire refocused on the reason they were in Neverland in the first place.
Rescuing Henry.
He needed to stay strong, which meant finding a source of blood he would be able to sustain on for the during of their stay.
"We don't have to do it this way" Regina started as soon as they set foot on the beach "I can fix the Jolly Roger. My magic is powerful enough. We can execute the pirate's plan".
Hearing this Emma stopped and turned on the mix of hero's and villains behind her, that had already been through hell getting there.
"Sneak attack? Let's not be naïve" she tells the pirate, looking to the former Queen "Save your magic. We'll need it later, because Pan already knows we're here. It's time we stop running".
"Gold was right" she admitted to them "This land is run on belief. All of us have been too busy being at each other's throats to be believers. I was as wrong as anyone else. It's time for all of us to believe... not in magic, but in each other".
"You wanna be friends?" Regina asked the saviour "After everything that's happened between all of us?".
"I don't want or expect that. I know there's a lot of history here and a lot of hate".
"Actually, I quite fancy you from time to time, when you're not yelling at me" Hook admitted outload, as the vampire had to top himself from ripping his tongue out there and then as the other's looked at him.
"We don't need to be friends" Emma continues after the interruption "What we need to know is the only way to get Henry back is cooperation".
"With her? With him?" David gestured to the villains beside them "No, Emma, we have to do this the right way".
"No, we don't" the blonde retorted "We just need to succeed. And the way we do that is by just being who we are... a hero, a villain, a vampire, a pirate. It doesn't matter which, because we're gonna need all those skills, whether we can stomach them or not".
"And what's your skill, "saviour"?" Elijah spoke up with the question.
"I'm a mother, and now I'm also your leader" she answered him "So either help me get my son back or get out of the way".
Turning her back on the group, the blonde drew her sword, marching into the forest that enclosed the small beach, with her parents instantly following her, closely followed by Hook who shrugged at the siblings as he followed the saviour into the island, as the vampire prepared to tell his sister what he had discovered in the hull of the Jolly Roger.
"This is probably isn't the best time to mention" her brother started once the others were far enough to speak to his sister privately "However, given the gravity of the situation, I feel it best to inform you that Lestat de Lioncourt escaped his underwater prison with the aid of our friendly neighbourhood pirate, sometime before the dark curse. And now, is somewhere, planning ours's and everyone we hold dear, eventual gruesome deaths".
The former Queen stood in stunned silence as her brother casually took a step forward to follow their newfound leader into the Neverland forest in search for his nephew.
AN: AHHHH! Welcome to Season 3 of The Portrait of Elijah Mill's!.
HERE WE GO!
Quick Disclaimer: I used a scene from CW'S The Original's 02x04 as reference for a scene in the chapter. As always, I don't own it (Unfortunately) I was using as a guide for a scene in the chapter.
Until next time;
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