#maybe I just liked the intensity of neals other works more but this series is good!! its rlly good!!

[thetonethetollandthethunder]

I really REALLY need to finish the skinjacker trilogy I HAVE ALL THREE BOOKS AND IVE ONLY READ THE FIRST AND FEW CHAPTERS OF THE SECOND

[spartanguard]

game changers

Summary: Emma’s son’s hockey team—the one she started when got cut from another—is about to play for the state championship. Along the way, she found assistance—and attraction—with the grumpy ice rink manager where they practice. Winning isn’t the only thing on the line; hearts are, too. (aka the Mighty Ducks: Game Changers AU no one asked for.)

A/N: HAPPY BIRTHDAY @thesschesthair​!!!!!!!! wishing you the most awesome, amazing, furry birthday yet!!! After our conversations about the Mighty Ducks series—especially that scene at the end—I couldn’t resist throwing this little thing together in honor of the day. Hope you like it, and thank you for being such an amazing friend!! Love you!!!!

1.6k words | rated G

If someone had told Emma at the beginning of the season that they’d be here, she’d have laughed hysterically and asked what drugs they were on, because she wanted some. There was no way this little ragamuffin team—that, honestly, was half started out of spite—would even make it to the state tournament, let alone to the final.

Yet, here they were, about to face off against the elite team that had cut her son from the roster before the season even started. (She could grumble on for days about the state of youth hockey and the money involved and any other number of social injustices, but what it really amounted to was how it highlighted her own feelings of inadequacy as a young-ish single mom next to all the rich ladies who already had college advisors for their middle schoolers.) 

The puck hadn’t even dropped and she was already a bundle of nervous energy, as much as the pre-teens around her in the locker room. It hadn’t been easy, getting here—god, it hadn’t been that long ago some of these kids could barely even skate—but this was more than they had ever anticipated. She knew she should be dispensing some sage advice, but it’s not like she was ever that experienced in this kind of situation; foster kids didn’t have much of an opportunity to participate in organized sports (part of why she’d been so adamant to make sure Henry had these opportunities).

But then an increasingly familiar presence appeared at her side, gave her a sideways grin she was growing to love, and addressed the kids with a speech that was the perfect combination of encouraging and celebratory.

It may have been a stroke of luck that she found Killian Jones in that run-down ice arena, because none of this would have worked without him. 

And the grin Henry was giving her as they headed out to the rink was worth all of it.

(The way her heart jumped every time Killian was near? Pleasant side effect. But also: not a priority right now.)

The team filed out of the room, leaving her to bring up the rear. “You alright, love?” Killian asked, coming up alongside her, concern furrowing his expressive brow.

“Yeah, just nervous,” she admitted. “Never thought we’d even be here, but now that we are—is it wrong that I really hope we win?” Logically, she knew she’d proven whatever point she’d already set out to prove—that hockey could still be fun, that money was no replacement for drive, that she was capable of running a team. Winning states, though? That would just put it in bold text.

“Not at all,” he assured her. “You’ve done an amazing job with these kids. And Swan: I’ve yet to see you fail.”

The honesty shining in his blue eyes was almost overwhelming, and a sudden tension formed in the narrow space between them; she hadn’t even realized how close he was. Close enough to...no, she couldn’t follow that train of thought. She’d done enough of that for one lifetime, and knew he had, too

So she stepped out of his space, took a deep breath, and started to head out of the room. “Let’s do this, then.”

*********************

She’d hated him, at first. She wasn’t even sure how she managed to convince him to let the team use the rink, despite the “no hockey” signs plastered everywhere. It had to have been Henry—that kid could warm even the hardest heart.

Which was probably the only reason Killian agreed to help coach, too. Emma knew absolutely nothing about the sport other than what she’d seen watching; but how could she teach the kids the difference between icing and offsides if she didn’t even know? Heck, she could barely stop on her (rented, figure) skates without crashing into the boards. 

And she was totally ready to respect Killian’s rule—until Henry found out who he was and couldn’t stop talking about him. About how he actually founded his previous team, and had a pretty respectable minor league playing career until a hand injury ended it, but went on to be a fantastic coach—for a while, ultimately flaming out at the college level. It wasn’t her business how he ended up managing a secondhand rink in the less-nice part of Boston, just that he continued to let them use it. 

It took a couple soul-crushing defeats before he stepped in and helped her teach the kids the basics, and as it turned out, they made a pretty good team. He was fantastic with the kids; Henry liked him a lot; hell, he was even great with her ex. It was perfect—almost too much so.

Because he could also read her far too well.

It only took one run-in with Regina, one of those rich moms, for him to figure out there was more to her starting this team than met the eye.

He sussed out her history with Neal pretty quickly, despite only meeting him once—her reaction said enough.

And when she put distance between them—a lot of it, for almost two weeks—after they shared a rather intense hug after their first win, he called her out on her bullshit.

“Don’t try to tell me you’re not avoiding me, because I’m actually quite perceptive and this? This is avoiding.”

“I know,” she confessed. “But...I can’t take the chance I’m wrong about you.”

They continued to skate around...whatever this was between them. Emma tried to chalk it up to physical attraction—because damn, was he ever: dark, shaggy hair (with a few lighter strands mixed in), piercing blue eyes, the right amount of stubble, and a bit of chest hair that teased her from under the henleys he wore, which also did a good job of showing off the fact that his playing career might be over, but he was still in fine form.

But it was so much more than that. He was a kindred spirit, in a way. She just refused to admit that.

*********************

From the moment the puck dropped, it felt like she didn’t take a breath. She and Killian moved with and around each other fluidly, giving instructions, cheering the kids on, maybe yelling at the referees a bit, but ultimately doing everything they could to support the team.

With less than 30 seconds left in the third period, the game was tied 3-3. “Do you trust me?” Killian asked her at the start of their last time out.

“Of course.” She’d never been more sure of anything.

He nodded at her and then turned to the kids, describing a play that, if all went well, would net them a goal and secure them the win.

She was silent with anxiety as she watched the line skate back out. Killian returned to her side and then squeezed her hand. “This’ll work, I promise,” he said, and gave her one of the soft smiles he didn’t give very often.

All she could do was nod and then turn her attention back to the ice.

She still wasn’t exactly sure what he’d told them to do, but it was genius, whatever it was; the kids were completely in sync, passing the puck surely and accurately, until it was in Henry’s possession—and then it was in the net.

The light lit up, the siren rang out—they’d just won the state championship.

She didn’t know whether to scream or cry, so she settled for some combination of both and instinctively threw her arms around Killian, not giving a fig about propriety. They won.

(It was almost worth it for the sour looks on other mom’s faces—but even more for the unstoppable grin on Henry’s.)

She was barely aware of anything during the awards ceremony—not until Henry was shoving their (surprisingly heavy) trophy in her hands.

Back in the locker room, the kids were passing the trophy around, admiring their medals, taking selfies, and Emma had to brush a tear away at the sight. It was more than she had hoped for at the start of the season. 

She turned away to a corner, so she wouldn’t embarrass Henry or something by getting too emotional, but Killian quickly swam into her vision. “What’d I tell you, Swan?” he said softly, reaching up to brush away a tear. “Bloody brilliant, love.”

“Please,” she scoffed, though it was a bit watery. “That winning play was all you. That was amazing.”

Killian blushed, the tips of his elfin ears turning pink. He was about to say something, but then a cry came from the team, who had suddenly gathered around them. “Hey, coaches!”

They both turned to look—and were immediately drenched in coolers of Gatorade. The kids began to whoop and holler and laugh, but Emma and Killian were frozen in place for a second.

Until she looked across at him, grinning at her through his (very wet) fringe 

If starting a hockey team had been a rash move, it was about to be topped—because she finally caved, grabbed him by the lapel of his coach-like sportcoat, and hauled him into her, finding his lips with hers. 

He tasted like—well, Gatorade, and he stiffened at first, but then wrapped his arms around her and deepened it. He kissed her like he meant it, and she gave it right back. It would probably throw a wrench in a lot of things, but she didn’t care anymore. It just felt good; it felt right.

They did eventually have to come up for air, and not just because the their impromptu shower was making their clothes stick to their skin uncomfortably (she couldn’t help but notice the red-tinged dampness of his chest hair through the open vee of his dress shirt and vest). Some of the kids were playfully gagging, but Henry gave them a thumbs up.

If someone had told Emma at the beginning of the season that she’d end it by kissing her assistant coach in a victory celebration, she’d have thought they were completely mad. But as she dragged Killian in for another kiss (of many more to come), she was so glad it was real.

[captcas]

cardigan

cardigan by capthamm

and when I felt like I was an old cardigan, under someone’s bed you put me on and said I was your favorite

part three of capthamm’s captain swan’s folklore read on ao3 / read the ao3 series / read invisible string / read illicit affairs

Reevaluating her life over the rim of a toilet bowl was not where Emma Swan thought she would be at 20– well, maybe it’s not that far off, but she thought Killian would be here too. Life keeps giving her glaring reminders that he isn’t and hasn’t been for nine fucking months. All she’s got is her shitty one-night-stand turned casual fuck, Neal, who won’t even hold her hair back as she pukes up the Fireball he made her drink.

Killian doesn’t drink whiskey. Even if he did, Killian would hold her hair.

Killian.

Funny how someone 2000 miles away can simultaneously be the cause of all your problems and the only one who can fix them.

She hears the front door shut and yells for Neal. She doesn’t expect a response— assuming he’s left her to her own devices for the night— so she jumps when someone answers back.

“Emma, love?”

Great. Now she’s hallucinating.

Except she’s not, and when she feels the familiar, warm touch of Killian’s hand scoop her sweaty hair from the nape of her neck, she’s confident this is as real as the next bout of vomit making its way up her throat.

Welcome home, Jones.

She hears him sigh her name under his breath, but is too embarrassed to look at him, the bowl of the toilet seeming like a perfect hiding spot of shame. When she’s finished, he gently tugs on the hair he’s twisted into a scrunchie (how he managed to find one is beyond her) and she knows he’s onto her.

Emma groans, the noise echoing through her porcelain hideout and she hears Killian bark out a laugh as she turns to face him.

He looks so much older. He always was more mature, but the Navy made him look the part too. His eyes are still the same though, blue and kind. Emma has so much to say to him, a swirl of every emotion imaginable making her feel slightly dizzy once more. She centers herself by asking the most obvious question, “What are you doing here?”

He winces at the same moment she realizes the venom in her voice. Guess even five– probably more than five– shots of Fireball and an hour of puking can’t hide months of resentment.

But she knew that.

He speaks softly– no pity laced in his tone, just understanding and maybe some guilt, “Your dad called.”

Emma is sure this is the eyeroll her mother warned her about— you know, the one where her eyes are stuck backwards forever and she has to get a dog to help her cross the street. Does Killian even like dogs? Of course he does, everyone likes dogs. Why does it matter to her if Killian likes dogs...

Focus, Emma. Your dad called him.

“Of course he did. Well thanks for coming. Clearly, it’s been great. I can take care of myself.” She spins on her butt to straddle the toilet once more and while she can’t see him she knows Killian is running his hand over his face.

She knows Killian better than she knows herself, every mannerism, tick, and pet peeve. She also knows his heart– fierce, kind, and loyal. And don’t even get her started on his face— handsome and one that would stand out in thousands. Emma thought she was past all this. Get a grip– he left you. He left you in this stupid town with no one but your parents and Neal. Hello, resentment, it’s great to see you again.

She groans and throws her head into her arms resting on the edge of her new friend. Killian chuckles once more and Emma can’t help but shoot him a warning glance.

“I missed you, Swan.”

She missed him too. Despite all the anger in her, love is winning out. Love will always win out when it comes to Killian and Emma’s not sure why she’s surprised. She was too stubborn to admit it was love until he was fourth months into basic training and she felt his absence like a hole in her chest.

When she doesn’t answer, he kisses the top of her forehead and tells her he’s going to grab some crackers and Gatorade but to yell if she needs him. Killian’s always been like this, an anchor to her wild storm. He knows when to push her buttons and when to just be there. Killian always seemed to be there— and then he just… wasn’t.

Emma can’t blame him for changing the life plans they made when they met that first summer. They were only 14 and she’s not sure why her heart put so much stock in what he said under that willow tree.

Probably because she knew he meant it. If Killian Jones was anything, he was loyal.

But life happens— no, shit happens. Brothers go off to war, decide to be the hero, and never come home. And men like Killian feel a duty to continue their legacy.

Like she said, loyal. And who is she to get in the way of destiny?

It’s just… she thought she was that destiny. She thought he was going to be different. Emma’s life threw her an innumerable amount of twists but the one she never saw coming was Killian leaving.

A small voice somewhere deep in her soul reminds her he came back— it sounds like her mother— but a much louder voice seems determined to remind her he left at all. It reminds her that he left and she went off the rails and that somehow that makes it his fault.

Killian would kill her if he knew all she’d done— and not done— in the past nine months.

Somehow she suspects he already knows, and that’s what has her tearing up as he returns to the bathroom with comfier clothes and the promised snacks to calm her stomach.

He makes it so hard to let go. She doesn’t want to let go.

He turns away as she slips into the sweatpants as though he hasn’t seen her underwear a hundred times— trips to the quarry at midnight playing like film reels in her mind. As she slides on the sweater– his oversized cardigan she stole yearsago– Killian slides down the wall and sits across from her. She relaxes at his touch, his legs long enough that the bottom of his feet touch her knees.

Swans. She bought him those socks.

They sit in silence for a while. He watches her intently as she hydrates and eats the crackers he brought. Meanwhile, her head is reeling at how to start a conversation that’s approximately 6 years and 9 months overdue.

How does she tell him he hurt her when he left because she doesn’t know how life works without him by her side? How does she tell him she’s sorry that she’s broken? How does she tell him that she’s used goods now, tainted, while he’s growing into the man she always knew he’d be? How does she tell him she’s not good enough for him?

That she loves him?

As if on cue, Killian speaks, “Swan, we need to talk. I know you don’t do talking, but we can’t avoid this any longer and I don’t have much time before–“

“Don’t say it.” She knows the end of the sentence will pierce her heart like 1000 knives. Logically she knew he’d have to leave again, basic training bleeding almost directly into some sort of placement. (Emma isn’t entirely sure how the Navy works, but she knows Killian will always be somewhere else.) “I know what you’re going to say, but don’t say it. We need to talk sure, but don’t already put us on a timer, Jones.”

He nods solemnly. “Tell me about Neal.”

She can’t help the laugh that bursts out of her. “I haven’t seen you in nine months and you want to know about Neal.” Emma feels herself grow hysteric, the giggles bubbling out of her uncontrollably.

Killian doesn’t seem amused. “Aye, Swan. I had to kick him off your couch– bloody knockered by the way– while you were neck deep in a toilet, so pardon me if I’m a tad curious.”

His tone brings Emma back down to earth like a bucket of cold water. “He’s nothing Killian. Just someone to warm the bed. I’m sure you understand.” A low blow– so low, she has to hold back a flinch. Emma knows Killian… loyal.

But what did he have to be loyal to? They never said more than a goodbye. No commitments or strings attached. Emma told herself that’s what Killian wanted.

She knows it wasn’t.

“Ouch, Swan. You know me better than that.” He levels with her, his eyes slowly becoming lighter than the stormy blue that was present when he arrived.

Emma speaks at almost a whisper, “He told me he loved me…” She doesn’t need to finish her statement. Killian knows what that means to her, and it’s probably why he never said it– that or she’s been seriously misreading his signals for 6 years.

Foster care makes that word as fragile as an antique vase– the misuse of it shattering the antiquity til there is nothing of value left. It’s an easy way to get a foster kid to trust you. Neal used it to get in her pants, and she let it happen. Sure, she has David and Mary Margaret now, but it was 13 years of different homes and broken promises.

That doesn’t go away.

Killian grabs her knee and slides her over to him, positioning her comfortably by his side and she instinctively rests her head on his shoulder. She doesn’t mean to say her next sentence aloud, but it escapes her lips all the same, “I’m too broken without you, Killian.”

She hates how pathetic she sounds, never one to rely on anyone but herself.

Still, Killian was different from that moment in Morrison Park. She went there to read and Killian, new to the area, was sitting in her spot doing just the same. The rest is history. They didn’t know each other their whole lives but they grew up together. He stuck with her through the excruciatingly long adoption process, and she held his hand through the entirety of Liam’s funeral. People rarely addressed one without the other and they became a unit. When Killian left, she broke– a cog in her mechanics coming to a halt.

“That’s bullshit.” Emma sits up at his profanity– she’s not sure he’s ever sounded so American.

“Excuse me?” She can’t help but chuckle at her shock.

“It’s bullocks, Emma. You aren’t broken in the slightest. How could I make you whole when you were already so complete without me?” Emma is stunned to silence as Killian looks at her as intensely as he did the night they said goodbye. “You don’t need me to be you, Emma Swan. I’m just the fortunate one who gets to watch you become who you’re supposed to be.”

Emma is crying now. “But I’ve ruined everything. I didn’t go to school, I stopped showing up at Granny’s, my mom is–“

Killian cuts her off, “And who said you can’t start now?”

It’s the most simple piece of advice anyone has ever given her, but it feels like an epiphany. She thought losing Killian was the end, that she couldn’t go on with life without her best friend there every step of the way, but she was dead wrong. Killian never would’ve wanted her sulking over his choices, so why would she?

This isn’t her. It never was. Killian speaks again, “This lifestyle– it… it may have been easier than venturing out on your own, but none of your life has been easy, Swan. Why start now?” She nods, taking him in. “And you know that no matter what you do or how you feel, you’ll always be my favorite being on this earth.”

Emma wipes a tear from her cheek and looks away, too overwhelmed to think about what he’s truly saying.

He loves her. Always has— probably as long as she’s loved him. Until now she thought it couldn’t be because he never said it, but as she replays the six years of their friendship, she sees it. Vintage t-shirts found at Goodwill, children’s games like Candy Land or hide n’ seek, nights out with fake ids, reading under the willow tree– he left and she thought it was because none of that was enough for him anymore. That she wasn’t enough. And for a moment, when he first entered her bathroom, she was convinced he was only back because of her dad.

She’s a fucking idiot.

Emma stands up abruptly, on a mission to right the wrongs she’s created over the past nine months. Killian looks taken aback by her sudden movement but remains on the floor.

She brushes her teeth.

When she’s done she reaches out a hand to help him stand. Before he can get his footing, she’s pulling him into a kiss that almost knocks them both off their feet. Her back slams into the stone sink, but the feeling of Killian connected to her at last overrides the pain. Killian starts to laugh when they come up for air, and Emma initially fears the worst. He kisses her once more, gently, before speaking, his lips brushing against hers as he talks, “I appreciate you brushing your teeth before doing that, but, full disclosure, I’m not sure I would’ve minded.”

Emma laughs, “I’m sorry it took me so long.” He rubs his thumb over her cheek and she leans into the touch. “You came back.”

He kisses her again, “Did you ever doubt that I would?”

Emma answers him with a kiss, but deep down she knows he’s right. Despite losing her way, and holding months of anger towards him, she knew he wasn’t the same as everyone else who had ever let her down. It was easier to hate him for leaving than to love him and let him go, but she doesn’t want easy anymore. And as Killian unbuttons his old cardigan later that week, sending shockwaves through her system, she realizes no matter what it takes, she wants to remain his favorite forever.

[laird-brochtuarach]

Sam Heughan, on 'Outlander', healthy life at 40 and the independence of Scotland

This 40-year-old Scot (who would say it!) Is much more than the romantic warrior with Outlander's skirt . It has its own distillery, sounds for James Bond and does not cut when it comes to expressing his political ideas. We met him at an abandoned house in New York ... And, of course, things happened.

Is Sam Heughan (Balmaclellan, Scotland, 1980) the perfect son-in-law? He smiles at Esquire's question, while answering "nooooo". Or maybe yes. "I do not know. I can be what you want, ”he clarifies with a smile after throwing lit matches to the photographer, JUANKR, so that he captures how he plays with the light of the flame. Your PR (public relations, or 'babysitter' of celebrities) asks from the other room in the house if it smells burnt. It is a building that the Army built in 1862 during the American Civil War. Is abandoned. It does not seem that anyone has been killed, but many things must have happened there.

Known for his role as Jamie Fraser in Outlander - the series set between the 18th century and the Second World War that reaches its fifth season at Movistar + -, for now it is clear that Sam is Scottish, Scottish . There is nothing more to visit the website where he markets his whiskey, Sassenach Spirits , to see him with a kilt, boots, turtleneck and leather jacket in an area of ​​the Galloway region. He has asked us to please mention his whiskey, which is drunk as if it were juice in the promotional video. He also wants to review that the biopic of actress Patricia Neal and British writer Roald Dahl has just finished, where she plays Paul Newman, and that March 13 opens in Spain Bloodshot , with Vin Diesel. Also, his name sounds strong for James Bond .

How do you digest the Outlander phenomenon ? Outlander is a long and intense work, but the series is like that. They always keep you very busy. But it's very good because I learn a lot, working on television is a great school. The ideal place to get a good training in this industry.

And how are you doing at this point with Jamie Fraser? I think my character is a good guy, of course. A decent, vulnerable man. Yes, I think he is a fantastic man. I also like it and I have a good time playing bad guys, but I have to say that I get along very well with Fraser. It's been six years together!

You started in the theater world from an early age. At first, I didn't want to be an actor. It is a very difficult world. But then I got hooked. I have done a lot of theater in the UK, in Scotland, and I love it. It is a discipline where you receive from the public an immediate response to your interpretation. It cannot be compared with Outlander or with filming movies. The audiovisual is easier and more fun, although you also learn a lot.

It seems that everything is good for you. Well, I'm competitive, especially in sports and also with myself. I like to see how far I can go and challenge myself. I have an association, My Peak Challenge ('my ultimate challenge'), in which I try to help people. The main idea is to lead a healthy life. We make meal plans, exercise ... Last year I ran two marathons in a month and it was a great challenge. But it's all in the mind, not in the body. It happens the same with this job when you don't get papers. You have to be persistent. I think if you want something and work, you can get it.

Now the big challenge is to save the planet. It's very important. We have to start making changes now, we are late. I love activist Greta Thunberg . We have to follow her.

There are people who think that it is better for celebrities to stay out of politics. Do you agree? I know. When I make a political comment on Twitter or Instagram there are people who tell me to shut up, but I think they are wrong. It is impossible for a human being to have no opinion. Well-known people have the power to spread the message. For example, at the beginning, I was against Scotland becoming independent from the United Kingdom. After documenting myself, I have realized that it is better to separate. After B rexit, I think it is important to continue in the European Union. I think that, for the sake of Europe and the international community, it is better to work together.

I think you like Spain very much. Yes, I like it a lot: Madrid, Barcelona ... The people are very funny and the Spanish food and tapas are delicious. People eat dinner at night and then go out. It's great.

You keep single. How about women? [Raises his eyebrow and laughs]. Well, I haven't divorced yet.

So you do look like the perfect son-in-law. I don't know who I am, who do you want me to be? I like being a good man, although I'm sure that at some point I've pissed off someone. That's the good thing about being an actor, that you can be a lot of people. It's a good job. I want to do many things before I'm late. I turn 40 in April and I want to stay healthy. It is a splendid age to make interesting roles. For actresses, however, not so much, and it seems terrible to me. The thing is changing a bit about it and I'm glad. But also, and I don't want to sound ridiculous, the middle-aged white man has enough problems. For example, we never talk about our feelings. When we are sick, we don't talk about our health either. It would be great if there was a place where everyone could share their concerns. In the end, we all face very similar things.

Well, I'm going to write that you're the perfect son-in-law. Thank you, I am but ... what if I later appear in photographs doing things I shouldn't?

And laughs.

[let-it-raines]

Catch Me If You Can (38/40)

298 days. That’s how long Killian Jones was away from a baseball field. It’s less than a year, only part of a season for him, but it might as well have lasted a decade as he alternated between physical therapy and spending an excessive amount of time sitting on his couch.

But then he came back and won the World Series. 

It’s something no one saw coming, and it’s certainly not something anyone who knows about his arm would predict. Now it’s a new season with new possibilities, and anything could happen. On-field reporter Emma Swan will be there to cover it all even if she is not his biggest fan right now.  

Asking her out live on-air will do that.

Rating: Mature

a/n: Thanks to @resident-of-storybrooke​ for being my beta, @imagnifika​ for the cover art, and all of you for being awesome, whether you read this story or not ❤️

AO3: Beginning | Current

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-/-

The thing about being a starting pitcher is that Killian rarely plays. It’s every five days usually, and Killian is too competitive to simply be able to sit and watch while everyone else gets to be out there on the field. If it wasn’t absolute murder on his shoulder, he’d be in Al’s office every damn day asking why he can’t be out there.

Understandably, having to watch his teammates play without being able to help has been killing him more in this past week than it did while he was out on injury, and that was actual hell.

Rob did a fantastic job that first night clinching the first game for them by making it nearly impossible for the Dodgers to get on base, and Killian, while he didn’t play his best, pitched a good enough game and had help from Eric’s three-run homerun for them to win the second. It’s simply that everything after that has been a bit of a nightmare.

They lost two incredibly close games in a row in California to tie things up, won the next one, and now they could clinch the entire Series at home in New York.

Tonight.

With Rob pitching and Killian sitting on the bench.

And as much as Killian would love to get to be an active part of it all like he was during the winning game last year, he would give absolutely everything for them to win tonight so that he doesn’t have to get up on the mound tomorrow. The pressure and desire and want  is so damn intense that it makes Killian’s heart ache, but he knows that this isn’t really about him. No part of him could be selfish enough to want to lose today so that he could have the possibility of the glory tomorrow.

That would be ridiculous, and he doesn’t know what the hell he’d do if he wakes up tomorrow morning with a stiff shoulder and he’s got to get out there and play.

Sighing, Killian stretches out his legs to the seat in front of him as a whisper of wind whirls through the stadium to bring in the late October chill. He fiddles with the sleeves of his sweatshirt, pulling them down to cover his wrists where chill bumps are rising, and he wishes that he had a hat on to protect himself from weather, his ears likely red from the cold. It’s only seven in the morning, most of the stadium completely empty except for the maintenance crew and a few people in the offices, but Killian knew that this would be his only time to take it all in with no one around him.

An empty stadium is nearly as magical as a packed one.

He’s spent his entire life building up to things like this. Sure, there were times when he had other goals. He wanted to be a teacher, wanted to get his degree and help others, but that was always the fallback goal. It was never the main one.

Baseball has been his life.

Lately, though, Killian’s been thinking about life outside of the game more than ever. It’s insane because he feels like he’s one of those obnoxious people who only lives and breathes baseball all the time, especially with what’s going on right now, but his mind has managed to find a way to wander elsewhere.

There are saved searches on his phone about going back to Vanderbilt to finish his degree and a sent message in his email to an advisor asking if it would be possible for him to finish in New York instead of having to take classes in person. He hasn’t told anyone that he’s thinking about it, not yet. Telling someone makes it real, and Killian’s not entirely sure that he wants it to be real quite yet. He’s a grown ass man, but change is still terrifying when he’s grown comfortable in his life.

Baseball isn’t forever, though, and while he may still work in the sport later on, he’s not going to be someone who goes throughout his entire life living out the glory days through memory.

Tonight, might be another big moment that defines his life, but the past six months have been pretty life changing as well. Hell, the past year has been.

Things are changing in ways that he wants and ways that he doesn’t, and that’s simply how it is.

“So, we woke up at the ass crack of dawn so that you could sit out here all by yourself?”

Killian twists his head to the side to see Emma standing a few seats over dressed in a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt, scarf wrapped around her neck and Yankees cap on her head. He was so wrapped up in his own mind that he didn’t even hear her move toward him.

“Hey, love,” he smiles, reaching up and holding out his hand so that the cool tip of her fingers touch his as he intertwines their fingers while she settles down into the seat next to him and props her feet up on the seat in front of her. “I told you that you didn’t have to come with me.”

Sitting here reminds him of another time in San Francisco when he put his heart on his sleeve and willingly handed it over to Emma to crush before they decided that they would give the two of them a go and simply see how things worked out. If she had said no that day, he could have listened. But damn is he glad that she said yes.

Or, well, technically, he was the one saying yes.

Either way, everything in his life shifted.

“I know, but you get all moody and introspective, and I didn’t want you psyching yourself out.”

“I would not do that.”

“You’re a liar.”

“Just a little bit.” His hand flexes against hers, shifting his fingers the slightest bit so that he can get a more comfortable grip on Emma’s hands. “What have you been doing while I’ve been sitting here being introspective and psyching myself out?”

“I was taking some pictures. It’s kind of cool to see the calm before the storm, you know? And then David called me with some work stuff and to give me shit about us making out being all over Instagram, so I sat on a bench and talked to him for awhile.”

“He called you this early? Is he crazy?” 

“I think David forgets that not everyone wakes up this early, and he has no qualms about waking me up. Usually I’m much meaner to him.”

“I’m surprised you’re not being mean to me.”

“The coffee we had at home really works wonders.”

Killian almost opens his mouth to say something about Emma referring to his apartment as home. But only almost. They’re both aware of the living situation, have joked about it to each other and others before, and they don’t need some kind of official discussion about things. It’ll all happen naturally, and when the time comes, they’ll talk about it. For now, things are perfect just as they are.  

Life has been crazy with his injury and then Walsh and Brennan and the aftermath of them being absolute assholes. It’s gotten crazier with the World Series and how much press he’s now getting, both for the games and for his relationship with Emma, much of which is now weirdly being caught on camera. All Killian really wants is a bit of normal here.

The sun continues to rise in the sky, darkness shifting into an orange glow that will eventually turn into bright sunshine that makes it difficult to see without a pair of sunglasses perched on his nose. The grass on the field is wet with condensation, water coating the blades, and if it wasn’t freezing out there, he thinks he’d go out and sit along the edge of the back wall instead of in a stadium seat.

Bringing Emma’s hand to his lips, he presses a kiss to each of her knuckles before pulling their joined hands back down to rest on his thigh.

“I think,” he starts, not entirely sure where he’s going, “that I could stay out here forever. I don’t know…maybe I feel things too deeply compared to everyone else, but this place has always felt like home. I can’t imagine what things would be like if I’d been drafted somewhere else or if I’d never been called up at all.”

She hums next to him, and Killian looks down to see Emma’s thumb rubbing across his knuckles like she always seems to do. “What’s that thing you’re always saying? There’s no such thing as ‘what ifs.’ Not in life and not in sport. What happened, happened.”

“Doesn’t keep me from wondering.”

“It doesn’t keep anyone from wondering, twenty-nine.” Her hand squeezes his again, and Killian’s mind dares to ask once more what his life would be like had he not met Emma. It’s a question he doesn’t want an answer to. “What if my parents had kept me? What if Ruth had never decided to foster a shitty teenager with an attitude issue? What if I had never met Neal or Walsh or Ruby or anyone who has impacted my life they the way they have? What if I never met you?”

“You’d be missing out on the best sex of your life.”

Emma knocks her foot into his as he snickers at his own awful joke. “You’re full of yourself.”

He shrugs. “It happens. And I know. I’m just – my stomach has been in knots over all of this for an entire month. I’m not sure my body is going to make it ten more hours. Or hell, possibly even thirty-six. I’ve had to hype myself up for all of this, and I’m a little…fuck, Swan, I’m exhausted and excited, and I’m scared I’m going to have some kind of adrenaline crash.”

It’s Emma’s turn to bring their hands together so that she can brush her lips over his knuckles. His heart stutters at the movement.

God, he loves her. It’s actually insane how much. Truly, it shouldn’t be possible.

“For one, getting up and coming to the stadium before the sun even fully rises is not something that’s going to help with your exhaustion.”

He twists his head to look at her, and she’s got mischief in her eyes and a smirk stretched across her lips that he has to kiss away. She still tastes like coffee.

“Also,” she whispers against his lips, kissing him again, “you’re not going to crash. Not yet. I know you’re really big on not riding on what happened last year, but you’ve got to do that. You’ve been through this before, and you made it. Those butterflies in your stomach are being felt by everyone who’s involved with this team, and hanging out by yourself the entire time isn’t going to help things. Why don’t we go get breakfast together? Or maybe go back to bed?”

“How about a game of catch?”

“What?” Emma laughs as she pulls back from him with furrowed brows? “I am not playing catch with you. Are we five?”

Killian shakes his head and chuckles as he stands from the seat and begins to stretch his shoulders out, letting go of Emma’s hand and rolling his shoulders back as he laughs at himself.

“We’re twenty-eight. I know you remember your birthday last week. And come on, Swan. I play a game of really expensive catch for a living. It’s part of my job to work on my arm today, just in case, and I need a practice partner.”

“That’s what Will and Eric or August are for.”

“Yeah,” he smiles, reaching forward to tug her up only for her weight to go dead so that he can’t move her, “but they’re not here. You are.”

Emma closes her gaping mouth, and her lips move in different directions while her nose scrunches up so that little crinkles appear around her eyes under the shade of her hat. “Okay, but if there’s one misogynistic quip about me throwing like a girl, I’m breaking up with you on the spot.”

“There’s nothing wrong with throwing like a girl, Swan. It’s pretty badass. But there’s something wrong with throwing like shit.”

“I’m not going to throw like shit.” Killian starts walking over the chairs, easily maneuvering through the stands with Emma following behind him. “But I ask you to remember that while I pride myself in my fitness, it’s in things like Pilates and running or boxing. It’s not in baseball. You, meanwhile, do this for a living.”

“These sound like a hell of a lot of excuses.”

“That’s because they are.”

“There’s no excuses in baseball.”

“I thought it was crying.”

“Fuck no,” Killian scoffs. “There’s a lot of crying in baseball, and anyone who tells you something different is a liar.”

“I can’t believe you just called Tom Hanks, America’s sweetheart, a liar.”

They have to go back through the tunnels to get a bucket of balls and some gloves as well as a few towels to wipe the grass in the bullpen down since it’s wet and neither of them are wearing the right shoes for this, but they do eventually get to the point where he can lightly toss the ball back and forth between the two of them. He’s not going to pitch at full speed, not until he has Will later, but it’s soothing to simply be out here getting a little movement in. He’s been back for two weeks, practicing for four, but it’s still all brand new again to him and shaded under a light that wasn’t there before.

Emma isn’t bad at all. She’s actually rather good, a natural some might say, and he jokes with her that if sports broadcasting doesn’t work out for her, she might take up a career in this. Naturally that gets him an eye roll or two, but she keeps on throwing until the sun is high in the sky and the day has truly begun.

Killian’s ready for it.

Everything seems to pass quickly then. The entirety of the Dodgers team walks out onto the field for their scheduled practice while he and Emma are still messing around in the bullpen, somewhere between still doing a bit of practice and Killian backing Emma up against the wall to make out with her. No one sees them, though, the loud blaring of music startling the two of them away from each other, and Killian presses Emma a little further into the wall while he buries his face in her neck so that he can muffle the sound of his laughter.

He’s not entirely sure that works, especially when Emma is doing the same, but they eventually manage to grab their things and slip inside so that an entire professional team isn’t aware of the fact that he was using the early morning stadium to kiss his girlfriend.

That would certainly have been something.

There is an actual practice that Killian has to attend today, an hour of which needs to be spent with him running on the treadmill and then getting massaged by Archie to work out any knots and kinks in his shoulder and to make sure that it’s not inflamed. Killian is always terrified that he’s going to be told that his shoulder is inflamed again and that he won’t be able to play on a day where he thinks he’s going to be able to. That would completely screw up the lineup, and…No, now isn’t the time to think about that.

Killian tells Emma that he’ll see her later, that he’ll probably come bother her wherever the network has her sitting even though he’s splitting the time in the game between the dugout, the clubhouse, and the suite where his family is going to be sitting. She has to go home and get ready for the day, and even if she didn’t, he very much doubts that she’d like to stick around and watch him run.

And then they’re both off.

Let the game begin.

-/-

“Are you guys going to win today?”

Now, that’s the question of the day, isn’t it?

Killian looks down at Roland who is dressed in head to toe Yankees gear, all his dad’s of course, and there’s a nervous smile on the kid’s face. Roland is almost never nervous. He has that childlike faith in everything even with all of the tragedy in his life of having lost his mom, and he nearly always believes that things are going to work out. There’s no good or bad, just the belief that things will work out the way you want them to simply by the power of wanting them to.

If only it were that simple.

“I don’t know, lad,” Killian answers honestly as he reaches down to pick Roland up, easily putting him on his shoulders as Killian walks him down the hallways to the suite he’s staying in for the game. Roland was in the clubhouse for all of the pre-game celebrations, and the kid heard and saw things that he probably didn’t need to hear for several more years.

A decade, really. Maybe two.

Yeah, definitely two decades. There was some creative swearing.

“Why not?”

“Well, because we can’t predict the future, and the other team is really good too.”

“But I want to win.”

“Me too,” he sighs as he pushes open the doors to lead to the suites. “And everyone is going to try their best. But you know what?” “What?”

“I think if you cheer extra hard, it might help your dad out, okay? He might lose because the other team is good, but you’ve got to cheer him on no matter what.”

Roland’s ankles hit against Killian’s collarbone, and Killian pretends that the bony lad doesn’t hurt like hell when he hits him. “I can cheer really  loud. Like, Grandma says that it makes her ears hurt.”

“If you’re not making Grandma’s ears hurt, you’re not cheering loud enough.”

That sentence pretty much sums up why he’s the best uncle in the world, Killian thinks. It’s basically the equivalent of giving kids a pint of ice cream right before they go back to their parents.

Killian pushes open the suite doors and ducks down underneath them so that he doesn’t knock Roland out. Everyone is situated on the couches and around the tables in front of the TV, and no one pays him any mind as he puts Roland down so that he can run to where Addy, Lucy, and Leo are. He imagines that between the four of them, they’re going to make everyone’s ears hurt from their screaming.

Maybe Killian will go spend time sitting in the dugout instead of in here, but it’s a long game. He’s got time to move around as long as he does make time to study Robin’s throwing patterns against each batter.

“Hey,” he murmurs to Elsa in the kitchen area while she pops a chip into her mouth. “I don’t know that it’s good that you’re playing hooky from work and letting the girls do the same with school.”

“Shut up,” she says in between crunchy bites of food, her hand covering her mouth. “You think that joke is funny every time, but it’s not.”

“It is.” Killian dips his head down and presses a kiss to Elsa’s cheek. “But I fully approve of the skipping work thing, especially when your husband’s lazy ass took the entire week off.”

“He’s supporting his baby brother.” 

“Younger, Els. Younger. I don’t need you encouraging that.”

Her bottom lip sticks out. “But it’s so fun to see your ears get all red with embarrassment.” 

“Every single thing I’ve ever said about me being glad to have an older sister in you and Anna? Yeah, I’m taking all of those back.”

“You can’t.” She swipes another chip through the dip. “They’ve been said, and I keep them all in my heart right next to where Addy told me that even if she got to choose her mom, she’d still choose me.”

“Classy.”

“I know,” Elsa laughs. “Where’s your better half?”

“She’s working.” Killian pinches his brows together. “So we’re not even going to pretend that I could possibly be the better half?”

“Nope. Just like Liam isn’t the better half either. And don’t make some quip about being equals. Just let me have this. I’m already stress eating chips.” He laughs while reaching forward to drag the bowl away from Elsa so that she can’t eat anymore, but she doesn’t let him, grabbing onto it and pulling it back. “I didn’t say to stop me. World Series week is like the holidays. The calories don’t count until my jeans feel a little snug next week.”

“Ahh,” Killian sighs in understanding. “That’s likely a good thing for how many baked goods I’ve sent your way.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be in the dugout?” Ariel questions as she steps up to them with her glass of water in her hand. “It’s kind of a big game.”

“It’s also kind of the top of the first inning, and I’m not playing.”

“Excuses.”

“A legitimate one. How’re you holding up, A?”

She waves him away and reaches for the pitcher of water. “I’m fine. Eric is the nervous wreck. I have enough confidence in you guys that I won’t worry until, you know, we’re losing.”

“Only worrying when we’re losing? What kind of method is that? You have to worry all the damn time.”

“That’s how you have a heart attack, and I have not suffered eating healthily and exercising so much to have a heart attack this young.”

“This is where Liam would tell you that it can happen to anyone in any age.”

“Where is Liam?” Killian questions as he looks around the suite for his brother only to have him nowhere to be seen.

“He and David are sitting in David’s regular seats because David was complaining about Mary Margaret and Leo not wanting to use them. I imagine he’ll be up here soon when he realizes how expensive food is to buy.”

“They’re such old men.”

“Says the man who was wearing a sweater while drinking a cup of tea and reading in his apartment last night instead of coming out to dinner with all of us.”

Killian sputters a bit as he narrows his eyes at Ariel. “First of all, there is nothing wrong with doing any of that. Second of all, how could you possibly know that?”

Ariel shrugs, mischief in all of her features. “Emma sent it in the group text.”

Of course she did. A man can’t even relax in his own home without being called out for it.

“Who is in this group text exactly?”

“Oh, just me, Elsa, Anna, and Belle. Don’t worry. Not everyone gets to see the embarrassing pictures of you drooling in your sleep.”

He’s going to kill Emma.

Or get his revenge. Somewhere in between those two.

There’s a loud groan from everyone watching the game, and that’s when Killian is reminded that there’s a game going on. He didn’t know that he could possibly forget, but apparently being teased about how he spends his nights will let him do that. When he sees what’s happening out on the field, though, Killian wishes that he’d been able to completely and totally forget about the game.

There are three men on base for the Dodgers, only one out, and one of their best hitters is up to bat.

Fuck.

This is not a good start.

This is a long game, but bad starts can change the momentum of absolutely everything. It gets in everyone’s head. The losing team is convinced that they’re going to lose, that they can’t come back from this, and the team that’s ahead gets all the belief in the world with their abilities.

Momentum shifts are everything, and it’s not time for the momentum to shift. Not yet.

And yet it does.

Robin throws what Killian knows is a good fastball and Rob’s specialty, but Stewart hits a sharp line drive down past third base that Arthur doesn’t get to. By the time that he does, the Dodgers already have two runs, Stewart is on second, and Ferguson is sliding into home before the ball can get there.

0-3 for the Dodgers eleven minutes in.

Shit.

Now it’s time for Ariel and everyone else to get nervous.

And it never gets better. Not really. There are times and chances and shots that have Killian grabbing onto his hair in frustration, but nothing comes of it. Nothing at all. Every single time there’s a real chance, something happens: the Dodgers have an unbelievable get, someone fumbles when the Yankees should have an easy chance at a double play, or every single person somehow forgets how to hit.

Until they don’t.  

Because now it’s the bottom of the ninth, and after an absolutely incredible eighth inning, it’s now 7-9.

They’re only down by two runs.

(Two runs.)

Killian is pacing back and forth in the dugout now exhausting every bit of emotional energy he has left in him. He left the suite the moment that first inning was over, texting Emma and Liam that there’d been a change of plans and he wouldn’t be meeting up with them after all. There was no way that he was going to be anywhere other than with his team when things were going to hell.

Being two runs behind is both nothing and everything.

There have been plenty of times when they’ve come back from a deficit like this. There have been plenty more when they’ve blown a two-run lead. And yet, like fifty-five thousand people in this stadium know, this isn’t any other game. This is The Game, and they’re closing in on the golden hour of chances.

It’s win now or come back tomorrow for one last chance of glory or crushing defeat.

Best of seven means nothing when there’s the possibility of there only being one game left.

“You’re going to exhaust yourself if you don’t sit down,” Robin tells him from his seat behind him on the bench.

Will has just stepped up to home plate, his bat in hand and feet in position, and Killian can’t breathe. His lungs have stopped taking in air.

“How could you possibly be sitting down for this? Is your blood not on fire?”

“I just pitched five innings, mate. My adrenaline high is gonedown. I’m exhausted.”

The ball is launched through the air toward Will, and Killian immediately knows that he shouldn’t take a swing at it.

He does.

Strike one.

“Shit,” Killian murmurs, kicking his foot at a water cup on the ground. “Shit, shit, shit.”

“You’re going to give yourself a heart attack.”

“Funny, Fisher, I told your wife the same thing. Aren’t you supposed to be warming up?”

Killian doesn’t even have to look to know that Eric is rolling his eyes. “I’m grabbing my stuff to do just that.” There’s a warm hand on Killian’s back, and he turns to look at it just as a “ball” is called. “Take some deep breaths, man. We’ve got this.”

“Aye,” Killian sighs, “we’ve got this.”

Strike two.

“Shit.”

Ball two.

Ball three.

Foul ball.

Killian’s phone buzzes in his back pocket, and he opens it up to see Emma’s name.

Emma: They’re having to censor you on television right now.

Emma: Just thought you might want to know that. Literally every time they show the dugout, you’re cursing. Ruby is getting a kick out of it.

Killian moves to text her back, to say something witty in response, but then the wood of Will’s bat is making contact with the ball and it’s flying gone, gone, gone…

Until it’s caught in the outfield.

Out one.

“Fuck.”

They’ve still got a shot. They have to. And as much as Killian hates cheering for Arthur King and hates that he only got a monetary fine for what he said to Emma and about her, he’s exactly who Killian has to cheer for now as Arthur hits a line drive that enables him to get on first base.

That’s progress.

It’s even more progress when Eric hits a triple sending Arthur into home.

8-9.

Holy fuck.

They might do this. They just might.

Killian still can’t breathe, but this is obviously his natural state now. This is how he’s going to have to live out the rest of his life.

Emma: Okay, now I understand all of the cursing. I’m freaking out.

Killian: Me too. We make quite the pair.

Emma: The best pair. It’s all going to be okay, twenty-nine.

He smiles down at his phone, his lungs taking in a bit of air at that.

Killian: It will be. I love you.

Killian: A frankly ridiculous amount.

“Out,” the umpire yells, and Killian immediately rests his head against the dugout railing, his nails digging into the hem of his sweatshirt as sweat drips down his back even with the late October chill whipping through the stadium as the night fully comes into effect, the sun long since gone.

Out two.

“For fuck’s sake,” Al yells, throwing his hat to the ground and slapping his hand against the railing. “Why would you swing at that, Whale? You could have fucking walked, and then we’d have two men on base with one out. That changes everything.”

It’s not Whale’s fault. It’s not. He messed up, sure, but it’s a team effort. Killian doesn’t always believe that when he’s the one pitching. It’s hard to get that out of your head when you’re being yelled at by managers and fans and people online sending death threats, but it’s true. It’s not one person out there even when it feels like it.

Killian’s going to have to remind himself of that tomorrow.

No.

He can’t go there. They’re not going to play tomorrow. Booth is up to bat, and he’ll get Eric home. Then it’ll be tied up, and they’ll have their shot to close this out right here and right now.

Hope bubbles up in Killian’s chest, his throat closing up with excitement and anticipation, and that lack of breathing thing comes back again as his knuckles go white from the strength of his grip on the railing. When he looks to the right, he sees that Robin’s knuckles are just the same.

They might do this.

Roland and Addy have to be screaming their heads off up in the suite. Killian almost wants to text Elsa or Liam to see what’s happening, but his eyes are glued to the field as August swings his bat at the very first ball.

It’s a fucking foul.

Strike one.

“Come on Booth,” Will shouts out, clapping his hands together. “You’ve got it, man. Be smart about it.”

“I’m not entirely sure that’s helping, Scarlet.”

“It is, Professor Jones. I’m a great motivational speaker.”

Killian’s lips stretch into a smile, a bit of calm returning, until the ball flies from the mound again, whipping through the air and curving into the strike zone at the last minute.

August doesn’t swing.

Strike two.

The stadium absolutely erupts then, hands clapping together and feet hitting against the floor while thousands of people scream, a mix of cheers and boos for August. If anyone can handle this kind of pressure, can handle the weight of world on his shoulders and the pressure, it’s August.

Pressure is a privilege.

He’s likely not feeling too privileged right now.

And as suddenly as the noise started, it calms down. While there are still people talking and cheering and making all kinds of noise, Killian can’t focus on any of it. All he can focus on is what’s right in front of him.

One. Two. Three.

Foul.

One. Two. Three.

Foul.

Killian’s stomach flips, his entire hand going white, and Will is grabbing onto Killian’s forearm so tightly that he could break the bone there.

One.

Two.

Three.

There’s a thwack of ball against Booth’s back, and it absolutely flies into the air. It’s flying, and Killian nearly jumps out of the dugout to get a better view of where it’s going. It’s got to be a home run. It’s got to be. That’s where it’s headed, and Killian’s arms break out in gooseflesh beneath the thick material of his sweatshirt.

They’re about to win the fucking World Series for the second time in a row.

Holy shit.

But then the ball dips.

It dips, right at the line of the back fence, and the ball is caught.

The. Ball. Is. Caught.

The ball is caught, Booth is out, and the game is over.

And just like the ball, Killian’s mood dips, every high hope crashing down around him and weighing down on his shoulders while his stomach flips before everything heavily settles in its place. This isn’t how today was supposed to end. They were supposed to come back from their bad start. They were supposed to win.

They didn’t, though. They lost, and even though Killian tries to be encouraging to everyone around him as they all finish up their post-game on-field routines, in his head he knows that they’ve only got one more shot at this.

They’ve got one more shot, and a lot of it is resting in the palm of his hands. Killian has been a screw up for this team so many times before, and he doesn’t know if he can do that again.

He can’t let everyone down again.

The mood is subdued in the clubhouse as everyone strips out of their clothes, just a constant murmuring of curses and complaints. Even Al is quiet when he’d usually be fired up yelling at everyone, a combination of disbarring comments and encouragements, and that may be the most shocking part of it all.

Reporters begin to fill the room as well as agents and wives and the occasional child, and Killian sits in his locker with his head between his legs taking several deep breaths to calm himself down. His heart is beating far too quickly. It’s thumping in between his ears, and that’s not how it’s supposed to be.

It’s simply not.

“Hey.”

The voice is soft and very much Emma’s, and Killian looks up to see her softly smiling down at him, Jeff no longer trailing behind her with his camera.

The smile that stretches across his lips is forced and half-assed, and he knows that Emma can tell. She steps in between his knees so that his head rests against her stomach while her hands brush through his sweaty hair. They don’t say anything else, simply stay there together while Killian breathes in the scent of Emma’s perfume on her sweater and shivers run down his spine at her touch.

He is undeniably a fan of every part of her, but being able to simply be, to exist, with her is one of his favorites. There’s nothing quite so soothing as knowing the person you love will always be by your side no matter what happens.

They lost. They did. It’s what happened, and there’s no changing it.

Tomorrow is the last chance.

It all comes down to the last one.

-/-

-/-

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[arsenicpanda]

A,K, U for the ship meme!

Sorry for the delay, U required some thought and I wanted to give it the proper amount it deserved.

A - Ships that you currently like a lot. (They don’t have to be OTPs because not everyone has OTPs.) Friendships, pairings, threesomes, etc. are allowed.

Oh god, how much time do we have?  The top three stand firm: Lelouch/Shirley (Code Geass), Izaya/Namie (Durarara!!), and Betty/Jughead (Riverdale).  Tragically, there is very, very little new content for the first two.  But I'm also on a Neal/Emma (Once Upon a Time) and a Cassandra/Older!Varian (Tangled the Series) kick, both of which are also low on new content.  Oh, and I'm really digging Teen Serpent Friendship right now, which doesn't have much in the way of fic either, thus my having to write it.  And I'm always looking for more one-sided Koizumi/Haruhi, but again, no new content.  Basically, I continue to live off of bughead.

K - What character has your favorite development arc/the best development arc?

Answered here. But this post is late, so you get a second one.

Honestly?  I love how Betty has changed over the course of Riverdale.  She’s gone from this girl trying to fit into a mold that she just doesn’t fit into to someone who doggedy pursues truth and justice (or her versions of them) at all costs and embraces her ability to be ruthless (although not violently so) if it protects/gets vengeance for someone she cares about.  She’s gone from someone pining after an idea of a person who she honestly has little in common with to someone in a committed relationship with a person with similar interests and equally as intense and crazy and smart and devoted as she is.  And it has happened slowly over the seasons, we’ve crept closer and closer to where we are now, from “oh, Archie, your bad music!” to “Jughead, I love your story where we’re both psycho murderers, A++”, and I just really love it?  But I love Betty at all the places in her story because they are all so interesting.  Is it purposeful development?  Almost certainly not!  But Riverdale stumbles into some truly good stuff sometimes, and I think this is one of them.

U - Three favorite characters from three different fandoms, and why they’re your favorites.

Let's see, I've talked about my top three (Shirley, Koizumi, Jughead) a lot, so let's go to some other favorites.

Betty Cooper (Riverdale): Jughead might be my overall favorite Riverdale character, but Betty is Best Girl, so she counts too.  I discussed her some up above, but guess what, can’t stop, won’t stop, I love her too much.  There’s a really interesting mentality Betty has, where she believes she is doing what is right but in a way that is very “the ends justify the means”; however, it is clear that, were you to ask her “do the ends justify the means?” she would probably say “no”, maybe “it depends”.  She thinks she is in the right, but she has done some fucked up shit and has no qualms about doing so, albeit not violently.  Betty draws the line at physical violence because that version of herself scares her (interestingly enough, she does not have that same line with her friends, she seems find with, say, Jughead’s violence), but blackmail and manipulation and vague intimidation of “I will take you down and destroy you” are A-OK in her book, even if she doesn’t realize she thinks so.  And it is so interesting to see this girl who still is, to a certain extent, the girl nextdoor, a sweet heart, be so, so ruthless and also crazy.  But all of this intensity and shady behavior has never been used for just her benefit; it is always, always  in service of helping, protecting, or getting vengeance for someone she cares about.  Also, you would expect a girl like Betty to be about helping society, but no, she is very much a “help people I care about, bonus points if it helps the greater good, but mainly does it affect someone I care about” person.  And that’s interesting!  Betty is very interesting, and I love her for it.

Tsubaki Yayoi (BlazBlue): Tsubaki is initially introduced as a seemingly kind of love interest/motivation for Jin/Hakumen (aka AU future!Jin because BlazBlue is very complicated and werid), but then she actually has connections to other important characters, namely her best friends, and then she gets, like, an actual character arc, and it’s so great?  Her story kind of subverts the story of the fridged woman since she died in the AU past in a way that strongly motivated Hakumen but now she is active in her own story, but I don’t think it’s on purpose at all, which just makes it more interesting.  Tsubaki goes on a journey from “the institution I work for is Just and Right” to finding her own sense of justice and what is right, and I love that whole journey.  But also she is so soft for her friends and Jin?  She loves them all so much.  And her romance with Jin/mentor relationship with Hakumen (who she doesn’t know is AU future!Jin and in love with her) just don’t define her; she actively fights them in order to protect her friends, and that is so, so great.  Also, she’s out of her goddamn mind, and I love her for it.

Yuffie Kisaragi (Final Fantasy VII): This is absolutely cheating because Yuffie isn’t even my favorite female character in this game, but honestly I have such trouble picking favorites from FFVII that I’m counting it anyway, you can’t stop me.  Yuffie is great because she seems like this kind of stereotypical bratty thief character at first, but then it’s like no, she is from a conquered country that has become a tourist trap and she wants to restore it to its former glory, and getting super powerful materia is part of that in her mind, and if she has to steal it, so be it.  And that is so interesting!  You see her on her way to becoming the future leader of her country, and it’s so, so great.  Also, her reaction to Aerith’s death is one of my favorites, just the way she cries on Cloud and it is so, so heartbreaking.  Also!  Even though she has complex reasons for why she does what she does, she still has that upbeat, bratty personality and says shit like “Ok, boring story #1″ to Vincent’s tragic backstory.  Like, she’s great, I love her.

[hasansonsuzceliktas]

Spiritual Movies that Nourish Your Soul

One night in 2003, while channel hopping on TV, I came across a movie named Interstate 60. I read the summary and it looked appealing. The movie then started, and after I finished watching it, I watched it again. (That channel had a repeat function.) My mind was blown, my smile was wide, and I felt great. I had never watched anything like it before. That’s when my interest in spiritual movies began. Four years passed and then The Secret came along. It was also mind blowing for its time. Although it has its controversial aspects now, it was a revolution in spiritual documentaries. Oh, there was also What the #$*! Do We Know?, but it takes my interest only after The Secret. Afterwards, I became deeply interested in spiritual movies and watched many of them. I made recommendation lists for my followers in Turkey, and now I want to share them with you. I don’t want to give details about the movies, though, because you can look them up on IMDb or whatever. I want to instead share the reasons for why I recommend these particular movies. First let me be clear about one thing, though. What is a spiritual movie? Everything is spiritual. The life we live is spiritual, because everything comes out of the spirit. If we looked at it from this perspective, there is a vast number of spiritual movies. You can see the spirit in many such movies. For me, though, a spiritual movie is one that expands your view, your perceptions, your world, and your being. After finishing one, you do not feel like you are the same person that you were two hours ago. It has touched your soul and made you think and feel deeply. Some of them even blow your mind. Such movies have similar effects on others too. That is what I call a spiritual movie, so I selected movies based on that criterion.

Classic Spiritual Movies

These are the ones where I could say, “Haven’t you watched it yet? How can you call yourself spiritual?”

The Matrix You may well say, “Oh, come on! Starting with The Matrix? We’ve all watched it a million times. Give us something new!” Yes, I know. I also said it many times while checking the spiritual must-see lists of others. But last week, I watched the whole trilogy again because I wanted to find clues about “the loop.” By this, I mean the loop in our minds, which we may call dharma. I was thinking deeply about how I could get my mind out of the worldly plane. I then started to watch the trilogy and realized that The Matrix is about the trinity of mind, body, and soul. The machines could not understand love and therefore the soul, so the movie gives the message that the best way to get out of the worldly plane is through love.

Celestine Prophecy James Redfield’s novel was one of the first books I read in my spiritual awakening days. It is still marvelous, but the movie could have been better I think.

Peaceful Warrior Dan Millman’s marvelous book was adapted into a great movie. It touched many people’s souls, as I have witnessed many times. You have to read the book after watching the movie, though. The book has much more, as you can no doubt imagine.

Conversations with God We all love Neale Donald Walsch, author of the Conversations with God series, and this movie is about his life. It is a good movie.

Interstate 60 For me, this is the best spiritual movie of all time. In my mind, it’s a timeless classic. Yet when I checked other people’s lists on the web, I didn’t find this movie in many of them. It may well be that you still haven’t watched it yet. If not, prepare yourself for a spiritual feast. Even after watching it 30 times, like I have, you can still find many messages. Believe me when I say you can watch it many times over without ever getting bored of it.

What the #$*! Do We Know? This early spiritual documentary was labeled as talking heads (i.e., many experts coming together and talking about something). Quantum physics meets with spirituality and good drama in what is still a must-see documentary.

The Secret Ah! The Secret. We can still argue that it represents the law of attraction, but it is still a great documentary. It gave rise to the term “secret-like” when describing spiritual documentaries. Nowadays, when you mention The Secret, many people deride it, but it has still a special place in my heart.

Fight Club “The first rule of fight club is you do not talk about fight club.” Okay, I won’t, but I had to put it on the list.

Avatar If I feel like an avatar living on Earth, being controlled by someone’s conscious in another place, it is because of this great movie. I had to watch it again.

Groundhog Day A funny, classic movie about being stuck in a time loop. No doubt you have seen it already.

Baraka – Samsara Movies without words but with many deep meanings. Many years of work went into Ron Fricke’s movies, which are not just spiritual classics but also works of art.  

Lesser-Known Movies

These great movies are adored by many, but maybe you haven’t heard of some of them

Nossolar Do you want to know how the afterlife is? Based on the channelings of Chico Xavier, Nossolar is a great Brazilian movie about the afterlife.  

Bab’aziz This is the most beautiful movie about Sufism ever made. Nacer Khemir’s work is outstanding, and you can feel this great movie fill your soul. The soundtrack is also magnificent.  

Chaotica Ana This is one of the best movies about reincarnation and the goddess. Ana, a Spanish art student, meets Said in Madrid and they fall in love. After Said disappears, Ana starts to undertake hypnotherapy and finds out she has lived many past lives. You can find out the rest in the movie…  

The Man from Earth This very beautiful classic movie starts with a boring discussion between six university professors and turns into a great dialogue when one of them confesses that he is 14,000 years old. Still not watched it yet?  

Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, and Spring You cannot forget this movie, even after many years. Korean director Kim Ki-Duk uses the symbolism of the passing seasons to tell this story of a young Buddhist monk’s evolution from innocence to love, evil to enlightenment, and ultimately to rebirth. Please watch it in HD on a big screen please. It is a Buddhist poem conveyed through cinema.  

Powder IMDb describes it as follows: “An off-the-charts genius who is home schooled and shunned after his last relative dies shows the unconscious residents of his town about connection awareness and the generosity of the spirit.” It’s the story of an albino boy with psychic powers. It is a classic, and I will never forget the scene with the hunter and deer.  

Defending Your Life This movie is also about the afterlife, but its story is told in a much funnier way. It is about love, karma, and rebirth. You will remember this movie from the scenes of a Japanese restaurant in Heaven.  

Serendipity A romantic movie about love and coincidence starring John Cusack and Kate Beckinsale.  

Sliding Doors Just one door staying open can change your life in this Gwyneth Paltrow classic.  

Little-Known Movies

If you’re saying, “Come on, we all know these movies. Give us something new!” Okay, here you go.

Valley of Flowers IMDBsays, “A great Asian love story, an unforgettable tale about passion, death and reincarnation. A mesmerizing Himalayan epic that spans two centuries, from the Silk Route of the early 19th century to the bustling metropolis of modern-day Tokyo.” It’s the most passionate story about soulmates ever made, and the love of Jalan and Ushna will take your breath away.

Looking for Muhyiddin A man (played by filmmaker Nacer Khemir, who also directed Bab’aziz) returns home to Tunisia to bury his mother. Following the burial, his father gives him an amana to take to a Sheikh named Muhyiddin. The man immediately sets out on an epic journey to find the long-lost Sheikh and deliver the amana to him. Throughout his journey, he is guided by a mysterious spiritual master and many friends of the Sheikh who he encounters along the way. As the adventure unfolds, we learn about the rich life of this Sheikh and his uncompromising love for humanity, for under his teachings, different beliefs, faiths, and ways of life can only converge and become one. The more we learn about the Sheikh Muhyiddin, the more we understand why he is so venerated across cultures and continents. Looking for Muhyiddin is a deeply lyrical odyssey into the soul of Islam through the life and the works of one of its most beloved mystics: Ibn Arabi. This is one of the best Sufi movies you will ever watch.

Happenstance Everyone knows Amelie, but did you ever hear about this other movie with Audrey Tatou. It is about coincidence and chaos theory, possibly the best one on the subject.

Un Buda IMDb says, “Un Buda follows two brothers orphaned as children when their parents were taken by the military during the ‘Dirty Wars’ of the 1970s in Argentina. Tomas is now a drifting and withdrawn young man who experiments with ascetic practices and has an instinctive compassion for others. His older brother Rafael is a university philosophy professor, detached and alone. Their struggles with each other and the world around them in Buenos Aires take a dramatic turn when they find themselves at a rural Zen center.” It’s a great spiritual movie from Argentina

Now and Forever If you want to watch an unforgettable spiritual love story, do not miss out on this one. I watched it many years ago, but some scenes still stick in my mind. IMDb summarizes it like this: “Against a backdrop of clashing cultures, John Myron and Angela Wilson find each other and over the years form a powerful bond. One tragic night, John rescues Angela from a wicked act of betrayal. Faced with its aftermath, Angela flees town, unaware that she has put into motion a dramatic and intense string of events that will forever change the course of their lives. Harboring a secret, John guides Angela to a shocking realization that will uncover the past. Now & Forever is a dramatic contemporary love story combining elements of spirituality, heart and integrity. They say sooner or later all love stories will end; Now & Forever is the exception...”  

An… This Greek movie is so special for me. We watch a choice and then the consequences in parallel universes. Demetris is a handsome man with a dog. One night while out with his dog, he meets Christina. In the alternate universe, he doesn’t go out with his dog, so he doesn’t meet Christina. We watch both sides of this simple choice. But fate says, if you are destined to meet someone, you will meet him or her whatever. Why is this movie so special for me? In one great scene, Demetris and Christina sit with a coffee and share love. I later found this coffee when I visited Athens and sat with my own love. I will never forget either that experience or this magnificent movie.  

Storm If you loved The Matrix, watch this Swedish version. It starts similarly when a man meets a mysterious woman with an evil man chasing her. The story then turns in a different direction. Please just find it and watch it.  

Ink Ink, a mysterious creature, steals a child's soul with the aim of using it as a bargaining chip to join the Incubi, a group of supernatural beings responsible for creating nightmares. It may seem like a horror movie, but it’s not. The less you know about it, the more you will enjoy it.   I know many other movies could be added to this list, but this is just a selection to start you off. There are also many spiritual documentaries, but I will share a list of these in our next issue… Read the full article

[killian-whump]

OUAT 3x03: Rewatch Liveblog

Hey guys! It's me again, back with another liveblog of, uh, me watching another episode of Once Upon a Time.

This one is episode 3x03, called "Quite a Common Fairy" - which means, you guessed it, we'll be meeting Tinkerbell in this episode :)

Let's watch, shall we?

...and we return to the dark jungles of Neverland.

Seriously. Why is this arc so damn DARK? It makes for good atmosphere, yes, but lousy GIFs and caps :/

Is there something wrong with me that I find that lantern David's holding kinda... hot? I don't know, it's just... old fashioned and rugged and outdoorsy and... I just find it really aesthetically pleasing, the way he’s holding it.

HAHAHAHAHAHA EMMA JUST TOOK A WET LEAF TO THE FACE

Awwww, Hook got it a second later, but they barely showed it :(

WHY BE IN THE JUNGLE AT ALL IF YOU'RE NOT GOING TO LET US WATCH HOT PEOPLE GET HIT IN THE FACE WITH WET LEAVES D:

"If Pan's camp keeps moving, how are we going to find Henry?" Gooooooood question.

Oh, so I guess that perilous ending of 3x01 with Pan’s ominous “Let’s play!” as the Lost Boys advanced on Henry was a baseless tease, after all. Here’s Henry sleeping peacefully under a tree, not even a bruise on him.

Henry: "I don't like apples." Pan: "Who doesn't like apples?" An excellent question.

"I call it target practice." So menacing, whilst holding a crossbow inches from Henry's face. SO OMINOUS!!!

SURELY THIS WILL BE PERILOUS FOR OUR DEAR HENRY!!!

There’s no way this will be another baseless tease or anything.

Hey, I recognize this castle from the time we were in the middle of bloody damnation and they decided to cut to another scene somewhere in another realm that was nowhere near as exciting and I almost threw my mouse through my monitor.

AKA: Rumple's old place.

Bae, something tells me if dear old dad had something to make a portal with just hanging out in his cabinets, he wouldn't have needed a big convoluted plan to turn Regina into a villain and have her cast a dark curse. Just, you know, spitballing here. Just having some thoughts. Just saying.

Awww... Roland <3 One of the tenets of Once fandom: Roland <3

Hahaha, Snow. "Have you even been listening?"

"I fear such an attempt would end in your death... and more importantly, mine." Another classic Hook line <3

Oh, Emma. You poor soul. "Tinkerbell?!" Hook: "What, you know her?" This shit’s hilarious.

Oh no. Sad Regina flashbacks. Feels incoming... D:

Go ahead, Rumple. Just invite yourself to dinner. Sure.

Rumple: "Roast swan, hehehe! That's amusing. You'll get that later."

OH LOOK, GUYS, IT'S TINKERBELL

"Snow White? That's her name? Even I think that's a bit precious, and mine's Tinkerbell." Haha :)

Regina: "She had my fiance killed." Well, that's not exactly how that happened, but... no, you know what, let's just go with that for now.

Oh, hey Regina, you dropped something...

Nevermind, some creepy woman in the jungle picked it up for you.

HOOK'S HOLDING THE LANTERN NOW

OH SHIT, THERE'S TWO LANTERNS

HOOK AND DAVE ARE BOTH HOLDING LANTERNS

What the hell is wrong with me?

Regina: *catches up* Regina: "Emma! There is another way..." Emma: "Is there?" Regina: "Magic!"

LMAO The way she says it, tho. It's like a late night infomercial salesman: 'It cooks, it cleans, it'll blow your freaking mind - it's magic!'

Someone please tell me that Regina suggesting magic was a meme in the fandom during S3, because if you lot weren't photoshopping her into everything everywhere with "What about MAGIC?!" speech bubbles, then you're all a disappointment to everything ever and I'm never speaking to any of you ever again.

Emma: "Didn't we just go through this?" Yeah, about five times per episode AND IT ONLY GETS FUNNIER

Regina: "You think it's the best plan because your boyfriend came up with it." Emma: "My boyfriend? HOOK?!"

Snow: "She just lost Neal." Regina: "Sorry." I'm just too perceptive for my own good.

Oh, gee. We're back with Pan and Henry. Oh no! Pan's poisoning the arrow! Felix is looking ominous! Henry's in big trouble n-

Oh. Henry's the one who's going to shoot the crossbow. So he's, uh, not in any danger at all, actually. Huh. Okay.

YES. Henry, good move. I mean, it didn't work out so well for you, but turning and firing at Pan really WAS a solid strategy.

Hook's still got the lantern. Oh wait, that's right, there's two of them, so he can always have the lantern.

OMG YOU GUYS, REGINA HAS THE OTHER LANTERN NOW

Seriously. What the hell, self?

Ooooh... Intense Captain Charming scene D:

Oh, fairy time, everybody!!

"You got big for no reason." That's what she said.

Blue: "I will be the judge of what is fairy-like!" SAYS WHO, BITCH

JFC NOW ROBIN HOOD HAS ONE

Was there a sale at the old timey lantern store or something? Does the director of this episode have a fetish for them? Is it maybe a thing after all?

You know, it IS a dick move to ask another dude to risk his son so you can go save yours, Neal.

Oh, shit. You're seriously going to play the "you owe me one because my dad saved your wife's life" card?! Technically, he didn't even SAVE Marian. Robin saved Marian and Rumple decided not to flat-out MURDER him for it. Not quite heroic. I don't think this dude owes you anything.

Emma: "What'd you do to her?" Ahahahahahaha, looks like Emma's perceptive too XD

Regina: "What? Why would you assume I did something?"

This is the best Swan Queen scene ever. I just decided this right now xD

THEIR FACES, LOL

Regina: "Okay. We have a complicated history."

Aww... "What the hell did you do to her?" "What I always do." T_T

Ahhhhh, the man with the lion tattoo...

Why does Tinkerbell run off, though? Haha, that's silly.

NOT AS SILLY AS REGINA RUNNING OFF THOUGH

OKAY, NOW THEY'RE JUST FUCKING WITH ME

WHAT THE HELL IS THIS SHOT??

Ooooooooh, Tinkerbell's a nasty little fairy... XD

Snow: “It's just a place to sleep.” Emma: “What would you know about that?” Like, have you not paid any attention to the last two seasons of this show, Emma?!

Okay, Hook, honey, you have to stop doing anything and everything, because the way you're sitting on that hammock is making me want to send a nasty little fairy after you.

I blame all these lanterns.

Regina bondage! Yay!

"About time you woke up." Bitch, you're the one who put her to sleep, and that was like, 5 minutes ago.

Regina: "How the hell did you get like this?" Tinkerbell: "I met you."

Regina: "You're a terrible fairy." Tinkerbell: "You didn't go in, did you?" EVERYBODY'S SO PERCEPTIVE IN THIS EPISODE

Pan: "Look at the fun they're having." Ummm... They're throwing knives at the ground. It's not even a target. It's the ground. It's everywhere. YOU CAN'T MISS IT.

Pan: "At one point, I had four boys with missing fingers. Cost of the game. They didn't mind." I mean, I would think they probably DID mind, at least a little...

Okay, follow me for a minute here. Peter Pan would actually make a great life coach. "You were created for a reason... and I can help you find it."

I mean, at least LOOK at it, Henry. Aren’t you even curious?!

Umm. Seriously? That's all it takes for a kid to summon a shadow? "I believe"?

Like, kids would be summoning them left and right on accident. At least have some kind of noun on that shit. "I believe in Neverland" or "I believe the Cubs will win the World Series again before I die." I mean, seriously.

Man, them shadows are creepy ass motherfuckers.

Well, here's a touching Robin and Roland and Mulan scene. Shame that Roland will NEVER SLEEP AT NIGHT AGAIN after seeing that creepy ass nightmare come to life. I mean, aside from the fact that he’s sleeping right now.

Also, wouldn't you at least put him to bed in another room or, at least, under a different window? Those fuckers COME BACK you know. We saw that last season, when they straight up STALKED the Darling family.

Dude. Mulan. Honey. You should've just told Aurora how you feel. I always kinda OT3ed you lot, anyhow. The “Left Behind in the Curse” Bang Train left 28 years ago and you were all on it.

I love how everyone's got their weapons at the ready and Hook just shoulders his sword and looks around non-chalantly, like "lovely weather we're having here in the jungle..."

Mmmm... The looks they give each other... TINKERHOOK LIVES :D

Yeah, there you go. Knew you'd look, kid. I mean, how could you not?!

Hahaha, this is why you have to be careful with drone deliveries. They just drop your packages wherever they want to.

"Welcome home, Baelfire." You're not creepy at all, Felix. "Pan will be so happy to see you." I bet! The only thing that crazy motherfucker likes more than tormenting children and hot pirates is tormenting his own family members.

CS coconut scene <3

OH MY GOD, YOU GUYS, ROBIN HOOD HAS THE LION TATTOO

...and that's a wrap!

PEW PEW PEW PEEEEEEEEEEW!!!

[stopforamoment]

Part Fifteen: Wait for You (Series Eleven, Part 15 of 16)

Series Eleven: It’s uh Movin’ Thing, but Still and All (Sixteen Parts)

Part Fifteen: Wait for You (Series Eleven, Part 15 of 16)

Masterlist

Book: The Royal Romance (After Book Three)

Pairing: Bastien Lykel x OFC Rinda Parks

Word Count: 1,287

Rating: M for Language

Author’s Note: Obligatory disclaimer that Pixelberry Studios owns the TRR characters and my pocketbook with those darn diamond scenes. OFC with all of her quirks is all mine. My apologies if Tumblr or I do something stupid when I try to post this. The keep reading link shows up on my laptop but not my phone. Ugh.

Thank you @asherella-is-a-dork-3​ for always being my sounding board! Thank you @liam-rhys​ and @silviasutton1989 for still being a part of the journey!

Please take time to listen to the song at the end. It makes me happy, and I kept listening to it as I wrote the end of this series.

Triggers: There are going to be some dark themes in this series that deal with the consequences of what happens when parents don’t put their children first. I promise I won’t get graphic, and I’ll tag each section accordingly. This will tie in with future events and another aspect of Bastien and Rinda’s personalities—as individuals and as a couple.

Series Summary: It’s the week of October 14th, the sixth week of the school year. Henry and Rinda are staying in Cordonia, which means that Rinda can now begin to move forward, and backwards, with professional and personal aspects of her life.

One inspiration while I wrote this was a quotation from Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God:

“Love is lak de sea. It’s uh movin’ thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from de shore it meets, and it’s different with every shore.”

The other was these lyrics from the song “I Dreamed a Dream” from Les Misérables:

“But the tigers come at night / With their voices soft as thunder / As they tear your hope apart / As they turn your dream to shame.”

Chapter Summary: This jumps back to Friday night after the appreciation dinner. Bastien desperately needs to see Rinda and make sure she knows how much she means to him.

Wait for You

Friday Night after the Appreciation Dinner

When Bastien first met Rinda he could instantly describe her physical features. He could do that with anyone because of his training. But he quickly learned that she was a contradiction of sorts, using her inappropriate sense of humor to diffuse intense situations, appearing insensitive when really she cared too much. Her passion for work, yet she always made sure Henry knew he was her priority. She seemed so professional and confident, yet she had moments of intense insecurity and self-doubt. She could be so shy and so reserved, yet she swore like a sailor and had a wicked sense of humor. She was a loving mother to Henry—and the entire neighborhood of children—yet she had the most chaotic household and laid-back parenting approach when it came to many things. He was still shocked that Rinda was okay with Henry using occasional curse words at home, or watching Rick and Morty, or not making his bed every morning. But if Henry ever spoke rudely to another person or purposely used a word to hurt someone, he immediately felt her wrath. Henry knew to be kind to other people and do his part to protect them, and Rinda always helped Henry talk through ways he could make a difference in his own way.

. . . . .

After Bastien dropped off Drake he drove to Rinda’s house. It was late, and he didn’t even take the time to message that he was coming over. He was still processing, unsure of what to say to her. But he desperately needed to see her.

When he got out of his car, Bastien heard the boys playing in the backyard. The entire neighborhood was in the backyard. Like always. Rinda’s house was the unofficial gathering place for everyone, and right now there were a lot of happy children running around, some playing tag and others playing football. Rinda was sitting in a chair and had a baby monitor next to her—the Manikas boys must be asleep inside—and she was in her banana pajamas, hair down, laughing with Mr. Ariti. But she knew when he was there and she quickly turned around, happy to see him but also ready to tease him. “Bastien, she wasn’t able to retie your tie?” Bastien came over and dropped to his knees. “Tria. I need to talk to you. Please.”

Mr. Ariti quickly spoke. “I’ll stay out here with the kids.” Bastien nodded and stood up. He took Rinda’s hand as he walked inside with her.

Rinda was worried. “Bastien, what’s wrong? Please.”

“We promised we wouldn’t talk about things until the visit was over. And now it is, and I needed to see you right away. Tria, earlier this week Drake yelled at me when we talked about having Vivian on the guest list. Originally he told me to take Vivian off the list, and I didn’t know anything that was going on with her children, and I told him he was overacting. I’m so sorry. And he did tell me something, but he said it to help me realize how badly I fucked up. He told me that when you two first met, you told him that you wished time would stop so you would have time to catch up. Tria, do you still feel that way?”

Rinda shrugged. “No matter how patient you are and how often you reassure me, there’s always going to be someone like Vivian who is more than ready.”

“Tria, you’re the opposite of Vivian in every way.” He saw Rinda tense and he very quickly wrapped his arms around her and kept speaking. “That is one of the highest compliments I could give you. You’re an amazing mother and even though you always put Henry first, you still know how to balance being an incredible teacher and neighbor and friend . . . and Tria. You’re so damn funny and you drive me crazy, and I can’t imagine my life without you. Don’t ever compare yourself to her or anyone else, because you’re my Tria and I love you just the way you are.”

Bastien could feel Rinda’s body start to shake. “I did always wish time would just stop so I could catch up with everyone. Or that there would be someone who would wait for me to get my shit together and who would wait for me to catch up. And you’re doing that, Tiger. But I’m still not there. I’m still not caught up and I still need you to please wait for me, and maybe for Henry too. He loves you, but I don’t know how he would react if . . .” She suddenly stopped, not sure of how she should finish the sentence.

Bastien stared into her hazel eyes. Not dark eyes. Blonde curly hair that was untamable. Not straight, dark hair that was perfect. Someone who needed to step on her tiptoes to hug him, someone he had to lift off the ground or bend down to reach. Not someone who was only a few inches shorter than him and could easily wrap her arms around him. Someone who was clueless about football and needed forever to order a simple meal at a restaurant. Not someone who knew his favorite teams and would watch games with him, who could quickly and competently order a basic meal. Someone who was so generous with her affection, but only when she was ready. Someone who needed the person she was with to earn her trust and love. Someone who hasn’t kissed him on the lips yet, not someone who kissed him on the lips as a casual greeting, as if it meant nothing. Someone who shyly revealed that she wasn’t ready for an intimate relationship yet. Not someone who made it clear she would have sex with him now. Because really, it meant nothing to Vivian. Not everything, like it did for Rinda.

But now Bastien came back to Rinda, who was patiently waiting for him to respond. “You aren’t taking too long. I promise, you’re not.” Bastien gently cupped her face in his hands and looked into her eyes. “Tria, do you want me to keep waiting for you to catch up? Will you let me wait for you, sweetheart? And wait for Henry?”

Rinda looked at Bastien with so much hope in her eyes. They were green eyes that held the promise of new beginnings.

Her voice was a soft whisper. “Yes.”

Then she reached up to gently kiss his forehead. She slowly kissed down his nose, playfully nuzzling the tip of her nose with his. Her left hand cupped his face and he laced his fingers between hers, no ring grazing his skin. Rinda left a trail of kisses down the other side of his face, tracing along his cheekbone, once again nuzzling him with her nose, this time near his mouth.

Then she stopped, her left hand still laced with his, her right hand slowly caressing his face as it moved to his neck, then shoulder. Her lips close to his, she was letting him know that she wanted this, but he was going to be the one to kiss her.

And he did.

Slowly, lovingly. His thumb caressed her cheek as his tongue gently traced her lower lip, seeking permission to deepen their kiss. As Rinda’s fingers ran through his hair and cupped his face again, she gently sucked on his tongue to bring him closer. Bastien heard himself moan as he melted into her kiss, becoming part of that moment where it was only the two of them. Nothing else. And when she gently pulled back from the kiss, she leaned back in so Bastien could rest his forehead against hers.

“I love you, Tria.”

“I love you too, Tiger.”

. . . . .

A/N Take a few minutes to listen to The Crystals “Then He Kissed Me.” 😊

[myfriendpokey]

my friend computer

a videogame is an excuse to use the computer. to use a computer is to gain additional sense organs, which also causes the ones you already have to work in a different way. a mouse pointer becomes an extension of your hand, and the eyes adjust to follow it - the cursor does some of the work in making the screen intelligible that the eyes were previously doing, leading to a shift in procedures of visual knowledge. this isn't unique to computers - there's the famous saying that if you have a hammer you start to look at things as if they were nails. a stick may not be terrifically different as an extension of an arm, and a mouse or lightpen may not be terrifically different as an extension of the finger, but slight diversions and losses or redirections of sensitivity modify the ways we use them,  which in turn affects the picture of the world they send back. there's a kind of low-level appeal to expanding your perceptions in this way and it's fun to consider what else could count as a sense organ as well (plasticine, a swimming pool, a hamburger, a chair an advertising billboard). neal stephenson once compared the experience of using an operating system to aimlessly, pleasurably driving a car around: "For a short time he was  extending his body and his senses into a larger realm, and doing things that he couldn't do unassisted." the point is not so much that the car or the computer offered an extension of the  will as an expansion of the field in which the  will operates: maybe you didn't particularly want to drive someplace before you had a car, but now that you do you might as well.

i've written before that i started making computer games as something to do while i waited for my limewire downloads to finish. but to be more exact: i partially downloaded things through limewire because it was an excuse to just tinker on a computer. it helped that it was a very computer-y form of tinkering: you typed, played with inscrutable connections, searched, compared, and if you were lucky - bop! you got a song. so it was an activity with a satisfying beginning, middle and end, and a mild sense of accomplishment. and maybe more importantly it was also an experience that could hypothetically be extended and repeated forever. you could compare to children's toys, which give you a shape with certain affordances that assist with private imaginative rituals but also makes those rituals take on a kind of definite, repeatable quality. and it's interesting to contrast that with my first impressions of using a computer, which were mainly that it have you a wide and enticing new toolset but nothing to DO.

here are some early memories of using computers.

- primary school: weekly computer module where we learned microsoft word, a program which would let you do something you already knew how to do (write sh*t), with no apparent reduction in labour (at least to a kid with bad handwriting and no experience of using a keyboard). the only truly new, non-superfluous use for it that i could see was in the "wordart" function, where you could write your name and then cause it to appear in giant metallic letters or something. this quickly palled.

- summer school: as a special treat one day they let us into the computer lab so that we could browse the internet. i think this was my first exposure to "online". you could search for whatever you wanted but i didn't KNOW what I wanted so i just typed in things like "nintendo" and spent the hour solemnly studying the same handful of official screenshots for banjo-kazooie that i'd already seen in game magazines.

- crimson skies: i played crimson skies for pc and beat the first level. the mission completion screen contains various visual trinkets that you can unlock as you do things. there was a big gold doubloon and i clicked on it to see a slightly larger version of the big gold doubloon. the only thing you could apparently do with it was click the button called "print", so i clicked it, and then asked my parents to set up the printer for me. once it was all done i had the same picture of a gold doubloon, but now it was printed on a sheet of paper. i was unsure of what to do with this, or what the process was intended to accomplish.

no point to any of this other than to record that, for me at least, the purpose of a computer was less visible than the series of affordances it offered, and the process of slowly assembling those affordances into semi-coherent directed processes - into "using" the computer - was a sort of piecemeal and provisional one, driven maybe less by any specific desire to do a thing than by just slowly building up a picture of what processes led into each other, which formed satisfying loops, could be closed and repeated. (the question of why this should be desirable or necessary is interesting and maybe linked to the old, similar questions about the movement of sexuality from a general sensory "polymorphous perversity"  into codified acts and rituals with specific effects).

it's interesting to try and track the paths this same process took as computers became a wider part of everyday life in general, particularly among non-nerd types. the developers  of the "after dark" screensaver compilation (the one with the flying toasters and such) still sound surprised by their  success, by the enormous popularity of what they assumed would  be a niche functional product. but screensavers and desktop backgrounds were also some of the first things i could feel satisfied playing around with on a computer - there were a lot to sort through, they were easy to swap in and out with each other, they had an immediate visual effect that could change the screen vibe in interestingly unforeseen ways. and as one of the easier to use, less process-intensive and more visual pieces of software available for the increasingly more accessible home computer, did they catch on just because they gave all those new users something to do?

of course, videogames also give you a very modular, visual, structured, self-contained thing to do. maybe too much so, in that the history of the form is also that of trying to find ways to evade or complicate structure, to avoid the sort of fatuous closure of the win/loss condition - basically to engage with the distracted movements of human attention in ever more subtle and responsive ways, although not always responsive in the technical sense (theme and meaning that could "respond" to being thought about by changing the ways in which the other elements are perceived, etc).  which is fine, but i also think it could be interesting to pick up more deliberately modest ideas of what these things are and what they're doing. maybe as less a form than an echo of the need for form – a sort of primitive early attempt at constructing new use-patterns on computer that’s still present as model and habit, even if they’re clunky enough to necessitate a certain irony in their re-use. less a medium with consistent,coherent standalone internal properties than the ongoing process of trying to partition off a space for mediumicitywithin more general technology movements. something to be filed alongside screensavers and petz and pokemon dressup toys and websites with pictures of people’s families created for no apparent reason other than a vague idea that you could make a website, and upload pictures of your family to it, and have it look a certain way. not trying to get back to the prelapsarian fragment swamp of computer first contact, not resigned to a hammered-out enclave of acceptable use-practice, more using the conventions as these lightweight disposable tent structures that wrap around the process of the one as it turns into the other. sites under construction.

(images: Lemmings 3D; Shadow Hearts; Boppin’; Microbots)

[duncanwrites]

Books I read in 2017, reviewed in 2 sentences or less.

Among other things, in 2017 I tried to read more books by authors from different eras other than our own. I also ended up putting down more books half-read than usual. I’m sure those two things say something about our year in anxiety.

But here’s what I finished and what I thought:

Birds of America - Lorrie Moore: This book contains some of the very finest short stories I've ever read. Every word, sentence and paragraph seems perfectly put together to draw out the real humanity of flawed people in a flawed world.

Wolf in White Van - John Darinelle: Among other qualities, I think Wolf in White Van has the best title of any book on this list: in the context of the novel itself it provides a perfect framing device that allows you to see the poetry of a dark twisted staircase of a story.

The Sympathizer - Viet Thanh Nguyen: If I talked to you about The Sympathizer this year, it probably came out as an excited rant about any number of things - its dark humor, brilliant structure, mind-bending narration - but I promise you that beneath the exuberance there's a genuinely stunning novel sort of unlike anything I've otherwise read.

The Shock Doctrine - Naomi Klein: I re-read this book to get ready for Trump, and it did help, but it also reminded me about how angry I still am about the war in Iraq and so many other things. Still my favorite book by one of the best political writers out there doing the work.

Hegemony How-To - Jonathan Matthew Smucker: Another pre-Trump read, I think Smuker's book is one of the most useful -- as in practically, real-life make your work better -- books on politics in a long time. My only complaints is that I didn’t have a chance to read it years earlier so I could have avoided a lot of the things Smucker describes so well.

Three Body Problem, The Dark Forest and Death's End - Liu Cixin: The first two novels of this trilogy I thought were some of the finest science fiction I've ever read: both grounded in real human suffering, sweepingly large in their approach to theory, and bringing out some exciting ideas. The third book dragged itself down with the darkness that already ran through the start of the series, but that shouldn't at all stop you from taking these on.

Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson: Another re-read, this is a classic science fiction novel that contains the kinds of themes and concepts that you begin to see everywhere around you once you finish it. Noticed a few more plot holes this time around.

The Diamond Age - Neal Stephenson: Set in the same world as Snow Crash, The Diamond Age never reaches the same wild intensity of the previous book, and is plotted more in the model of a shaggy dog story than a sci-fi thriller.

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions - Thomas Kuhn: A classic text, the Structure of Scientific Revolutions is the source of a lot of conventional wisdom that was revolutionary in the 70s when it was published. Maybe a bit more tedious that it needs to be.

Flight Behavior - Barbara Kingsolver: I think Barbara Kingsolver is a terrific novelist, and although this book moves quite slow through its paces (and is a bit stressful if you spend your days already thinking about climate change), the payoff towards the end is real. She does a lot, with a lot of heart.

The Mother of All Questions - Rebecca Solnit: Humane, withering, lyrical: Rebecca Solnit is one of the writers I most admire, and this is a really wonderful compilation of some of her best work on feminism, hope and politics.

In Dubious Battle - John Steinbeck: I love John Steinbeck as much as the next left-leaning American, but only up to a point. This is a rough book about Men doing Men Things, full of people named Mac and Doc who do a lot of fighting and dying and it's just not his finest work.

Native Speaker - Chang-rae Lee: I re-read this book for the first time in about 10 years, and found myself coming across passages that had still somehow stuck with me through all that time. I could recommend Native Speaker as one of the best novels about New York City, relationships and language all at once, and its the kind of thing that will bear re-reading again in the future.

Trauma Stewardship - Laura van Dernoot Lipsky: I dunno, this one just didn't work for me. It felt over-broad, attributing so many behaviors and outcomes to trauma to render the concept almost meaningless.

Moby-Dick - Herman Melville: An epic that earns its place in the canon, I gushed wide-eyed about Moby-Dick at strangers for several weeks/months. Chapters on chapters about whaling history, seeming diversions, pile in between portraits of personal and collective madness: so much of this book is not about the White Whale and yet all of it is at the same time.

Direct Action - L. A. Kauffman: Direct Action is deftly written, insightful in its analyses and one of the best practical histories of contemporary organizing I've read. Hugely recommend for anyone trying to get a handle on What to Do Now.

What is Populism? - Jan Werner-Muller: I put this book next to The Shock Doctrine, Hegemony How To and Direct Action as one of the crucial books to read about Trump and the moment we're in. A book that covers the things that really need saying about Populism, but with the good sense to be brief, approachable and clear.

Bad Feminist - Roxane Gay: I am late coming to this book of essays, but I was thoroughly won over from the very start, because Gay has this way with short, direct but vulnerable language that makes her polemical points land with so much more intensity. I can't quite put my finger on it, but her manner of writing is so special, and she uses it to say such necessary things.

Istanbul - Orhan Pamuk: Let's just say this book is an acquired taste: you need some ready familiarity with Istanbul and a lot of patience for detailed personal stories and obscure asides in service of a memoir with a small focus. I quite like Istanbul and admire the literary goals of the book but didn't quite have the patience needed to really enjoy this throughout.

Dune - Frank Herbert: Apparently some people still haven’t read this book? They really should.

The Thing Around Your Neck - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: A book of short stories that are all elegant windows into the lives of people who are coping with distance, displacement and dread. They cover a lot of the thematic territory she addresses in other books, but with little experiments in style and structure that usually work.

Fear City - Kim Phillips-Fine: I've been waiting for years for someone to write the history of the New York City Financial Crisis that we all need, and I just don't think this book is it. It ended up being a sort of surface level history of a handfull elites involved in the crisis that never dove into the depths I hoped for.

Isaac's Storm - Erik Larson: I didn't always care for Larson's potboiler narrative style but I think the 1900 Galveston Hurricane is interesting and important and I'm glad someone wrote a book that lots of people could read about it.

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running - Hakuri Murakami: Since I read this (all at once, on a beach), I've been drifting back to certain points of it that just seem to stick with me. It's only in part a book about running, but also about writing, and I quite like both of those things.

Quicksilver - Neal Stephenson: Apparently there are 8 more books in this series. I'm not going to read them.

A Little Life - Hanya Yanagihara: I can't remember the last time I was quite this obsessed with a book, to the point of being driven to read into inappropriate hours of the morning and setting aside other obligations to make time for it. I also can't remember a book so devastating and frustrating to read, that puts its characters and readers through so much trauma and then describe in claustrophobic detail how it curtails their experiences of joy and success. There's nothing like it, and you need to experience it to understand.

The Fifth Season - NK Jemisin: I didn't love this book as much as everyone else I know who has read it. The story is clearly brilliant conceptually, but something about the melodrama in the writing style just kept getting in the way for me.

Radio Free Vermont - Bill McKibben: A Monkeywrench Gang for the modern age, but with less weird macho nonsense, and a better sense of humor.

Waiting - Ha Jin: What I most admired about this book was the ascetic, unadorned language that the author uses to follow a simple but elementally powerful plot line. You do end up waiting a lot as a reader, but there's much to observe as you do.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings - Maya Angelou: You don't need me to tell you that Maya Angelou knows how to write exceptional sentences. Instead, you should read some of them and learn the real power of a well-placed metaphor, or how you honor the half-formed, overpowering complexity of a child's feelings.

The Interpreter of Maladies - Jhumpa Lahiri: I've lost track of how many times I've read these short stories, but they destroy me pretty much every time.

Rules for Revolutionaries - Becky Bond and Zack Exley: There's some useful stuff in here.

The Lowland - Jhumpa Lahiri: This was the first novel of Jhumpa Lahiri's that I had ever read, and I just don't feel like she was able to stretch her voice -- which is so concise, spare and evocative -- to meet the scale of this novel.

The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald: One of the greatest books of all time, a perfect picture of the spiritual depravity of money and consumption.

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley: It turns out this book is very little like the pop culture Frankenstein myth -- there is only a glancing mention of dead bodies, the monster is articulate and an almost wholly private terror. Instead it's a nested doll of stories about nature, knowledge and spiritual purpose. Consider Phlebas - Iain M. Banks: A perfectly fine pulpy space opera. I’ll probably read more of the Culture books at some point.

[shakespeareanhoneybadgers]

Fic: Stockholm

Summary: Batman AU. Six months after the Enchanted Forest Massacre, surviving hostage Erzabel French is admitted to the ICU after what appears to be an especially brutal attack by her keeper. Her word written off as delirium, she is quickly scooped up by Mayor Mills who intends to play her as a pawn in Storybrooke's political games. Meanwhile the Black Swan is determined to keep her eye on the Dark One, who doesn't seem to be quite finished with Belle. Is Belle French crazy? Or is there more to the story of the prison librarian and the asylum prisoner?

Rating: M for very Much Mature. TW include super graphic violence, dubious consent, rape allegations, attempted rape, and torture.

((The latest entry for "Which Plot Rabbit Hole Did Shakes Fall Into?". Somehow I didn't realize the worldbuilding was going to be so intense... This is the brainchild combo of me being sick of Stockholm Syndrome being applied to Beauty and the Beast/Rumbelle and curiosity about how fitting Rumbelle into the Joker and Harley Quinn roles would look (spoiler alert: didn't really nail it). Heavily influenced by the Gotham t.v. series, the Nolan trilogy, "Skin Deep", "Mad Love", Suicide Squad, and Season 4 Belle. Mildly influenced by the rest of Batman The Animated Series and Once Upon a Time, plus a whole lot of other subconscious sources. Mood setting songs: "Crazy in Love" (50 Shades Remix) by Beyonce, "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley, "White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane))

Ao3 link

I

He couldn’t feel his legs anymore, or the hands clasped behind his back. His eyes were strained from staring out the tower window unblinkingly at the road that came up to the Dark Castle. He hadn’t moved since...oh, he didn’t know the exact time she had left yesterday, but he was pretty sure before it had gotten too dark. Now the sun was rising and his mind was full of jitters. He couldn’t go spin to try and calm himself down, or else he might miss her. So he made up a jingle to sing to himself.

“Be-elle loves me, this I know. Fo-or she-e told me so. My-y heart to hers belongs. I may be weak but she is strong. Yes, my Belle loves me. Yes, my Belle loves me. Yes, my Belle loves me-” His voice broke, because he knew it was wrong. He knew she was fragile, so fragile, and she had never actually said the words to him. But she promised… She promised she’d come back and yet she hadn’t, and he felt if he sang it over and over then it’d come true, “...for she-e told. Me. So…”

III

“I think you should see this, Emma.”

    If it hadn’t been Mary Margaret saying this Emma would have seriously considered turning around and going back to bed. These late nights were going to be the death of her… That or having to get up at nine when she’d sprawled out costume and all on her bed at seven. She sighed, changing her course from the fridge to the breakfast bar. Neal was already sitting there, nursing a cup of coffee.

“Hey girl wonder,” he mumbled, offering her the tray of bagels. She took one and dropped down onto the stool next to him, glancing at the screen at the end of the table.

“...six months after the riot at the Enchanted Forest, Erzabel French has resurfaced. The only hostage of the massacre, she was used as a human shield to aid the escape of the Dark One.”

It cut from the newsroom to a clip that Emma remembered well enough; an aerial shot above the asylum, showing the swarm of officers at the gates. A small woman in heels and secretary-esque clothes held her hands up, begging them not to shoot. Right behind her, with one scaly hand around her throat was the convict in question, the only details visible his orange jumpsuit and wild mess of hair.

“Makes her sound like the only survivor,” Neal muttered.

“Well it’s not like there were a ton of workers that did. I mean it’s basically her father and a handful mor-”

“Shush, you two,” Mary Margaret scolded from her spot near the counter, turning up the volume.

“Assumed dead, Miss French was found unconscious in an alley a few blocks from Avonlea. She was rushed to the hospital where she remained in the intensive care unit overnight, treated for blood loss caused by gashes all over her body.” An image of the woman, a beaming brunette with bright blue eyes, was shown. It looked like she was just at the beach, a book in her lap and the sunlight giving her curls a halo effect, “Doctors claim that it was an animal attack, but it wouldn’t be a stretch to assume it was the work of her captor. We’ll update the story as it progresses.”

    Mary Margaret flicked the t.v. off, closing the panels over it so there was nothing but a seam in the wall to show where it had been, “You can be sure the mayor will be scrambling over there now that the poor woman’s stable.”

    Emma grimaced at the mention of basically her arch nemesis, “Leech.” She hopped off the barstool, “Mary Margaret, get the Bug, I’ll be ready in five.”

“No shower?” She asked.

“No time,” she glanced at Neal, “You coming, Skippy?”

“I probably should.” He grabbed a poppyseed bagel and the container of cream cheese, “I think that’s my actual job, bodyguarding.”

II

“I’m surprised you wanted to follow in your father’s footsteps.”

    Erzabel French glanced up at him, turning her attention away from the rows of cells, “Well it’s not technically following in your footsteps, papa; I’m not becoming a security guard.”

“That’s right you’re not,” he said gruffly, paying no mind to the convicts that eyed him, “And honestly even working in the library is too close for my comfort.”

“It's a government job being around what I love. You should be proud of me.”

“I AM proud of you, Belle.” He stopped, turning to face her, “...but these aren't wounded animals that you can nurse back to health. They're dangerous criminals that eat sweet girls like you for breakfast.”

She glanced behind him to see a dark-haired man watching her intently, “... they're sick, and they need help. This isn’t just a prison, it’s also an asylum.”

“An asylum that specializes in the criminally insane.” He abruptly started walking again and she jogged a few paces to keep up, “The minor offenders can go to the library under guard supervision. Heavier offenders will require you deliver them to their cells. Make sure they're on the far side when you slide the book through the meal slot; if they're too big to fit then you find a guard to go into the cell and deliver it for you. Don't tell them anything personal about yourself…”

“I’ve read “Silence of the Lambs”,” she teased, “I won't let them get inside my head.”

“This isn't one of your books,” he snarled, “These are sociopaths in the flesh. They are arsonists and thieves and rapists and murderers and everything in between. You're not on an adventure, you’re just doing your job and praying that the doors stay locked.”

Belle took his hand as they rounded a corner, squeezing it, “I know the risks, papa. I’ll be careful.”

Maurice French didn't show his love very eloquently; Belle had learned early on that it often took the form of lectures and nagging. While her mother told her stories and dried her tears, her father taught her how to defend herself and made sure she never left home with nothing less than a full can of mace. They stayed there for a moment, with only the eye of a camera to see them. His hand reached up as if to cradle her cheek...but he merely plucked a fallen eyelash and flicked it away.

“I never should have let you stay in Storybrooke,” he muttered.

They continued away from the majority of the cells, heading deeper and deeper into the labyrinth. They hit a security checkpoint that was far more thorough than the others in the Enchanted Forest; Belle had to surrender everything she had on her, and it seemed excessive to do both an x-ray scan AND a hand wand AND a fingerprint scan.

“Where are we going?” She asked as they met on the other side.

Maurice frowned, “The West Wing.” They descended a staircase to the bowels of the asylum, lit sparsely by fluorescents, “The worst of the worst are down here,” he said under his breath and Belle shivered at the sudden chill, “The Queen of Hearts, the Camelot Killer, the Sweettooth Cannibal… Left here to rot.”

“You wouldn't let ME rot, now would you, darling?”

Belle glanced to her left and was surprised to see a thick plexiglass wall instead of the usual iron bars, the cell lit like a hospital room. A woman stood near the meal slot, blood red lips hovering next to the ventilation holes. The stark contrast of black and white hair immediately identified her as Cruella DeVille, a woman neck-deep in rumors compared to only a handful of convictions. She leaned against the plastic, eyeing Belle.

“Who’s your pet there?”

“What, are you jealous?”

    Belle followed the voice to the other side of the corridor, where a woman sat cross-legged on the floor. She had to do a double-take but yes, the other prisoner had a fishbowl in her lap and within the fishbowl a brilliantly-colored beta. She swirled her finger on the surface of the water to the fish’s annoyance, not bothering to look up at Cruella's reaction.

Cruella straightened, clearly offended by the insinuation, “Oh please, I have much bigger fish to fry.”

Belle wanted to hang back, watch to see the rebuttal, but her father walked on, paying no mind to their banter.

She tried to ignore them as he did, but this wasn't the mild curiosity the inmates above showed towards a new face. It was the perverse interest of a psycho, someone already sizing you up for what you could offer them. They were high profile criminals, their front page exploits major news until the next villain stepped up to out-crazy them.

Her heart was racing as they came towards a dead end, the last cell far removed from the others. As they drew closer Belle still failed to see anyone occupying it.

Maurice’s jaw clenched, “Rumplestiltskin!”

There was no answer.

“Rumplestiltskin, show yourself!”

Belle took a step closer to the barrier, craning her neck to see if maybe he had found a cranny to hide away in. Maurice clicked the radio clipped to his shoulder on with one hand, the other trying to pull Belle away.

“We have a Code-”

With the grace of a cat, the prisoner dropped from the ceiling onto his feet before the partition. Belle jerked back and even Maurice startled, causing the creature to burst into a fit of high-pitched giggles, straightening up and flailing his hands like an excited child. It was such a contrast from his grotesque appearance and the setting, Belle gave a shocked guffaw.

“You son of a…”

“Pardon your french, Mr. French,” he chirped, “Surely you know better than for such language in front of...ladies.”

His eyes flicked from Maurice to Belle and she met his reptilian gaze. He silently took her in and she found herself holding her breath, trying to hide the nervous feeling in the pit of her stomach.

“Is she adopted?” He asked, keeping his attention on her, “I have a hard time believing such a beauty is your flesh and blood. Uh uh uh.” He waggled his finger as she opened her mouth, “A magician never reveals his secrets. I make it my business to know things; secrets are worth their weight in gold.”

“She is the new librarian,” Maurice cut in, “You will listen to her the same as any staff member, or there will be severe consequences.”

“Oh, severe consequences, I see; I was assuming they’d be mildly inconvenient consequences,” His gaze trailed down her body, resting somewhere on her hips, “...good. The former librarian didn’t like me very much for some reason. I hope we can be…” It moved up to her chest, “...close friends, Beauty.”

“All depends on how you behave, Dark One,” she said and his attention snapped back to her face, “I don’t suffer time-wasters.”

He smirked, “...no, I don’t see that at all, dearie.”

Belle felt a hand clamp around her arm as Maurice practically dragged her away, muttering a harsh “we have to go”. She still felt Rumplestiltskin’s eyes on her as she struggled to keep up with her father, fighting the temptation to glance back.

“Don’t you forget about me now, Beauty!” He cried shrilly, “I have quite a lot of reading to catch up on! Save me, Belle French, you’re my only hope!”

She didn’t know how he knew her name; she didn’t even have her i.d. tag yet. Maybe he had somehow studied up... But such details about the Enchanted Forest’s guard staff couldn’t be easy to get ahold of, right? And why was she more curious about the imp that scarcely resembled a man than terrified of him, especially knowing all he was capable of? Years had been spent trying to track him down and incarcerate him; his kill list was easily one if not the longest in the city. And yet, there was something charismatic about his mannerisms that spoke to her.

She had just got done assuring her father she knew better… But here was an enigma too tantalizing to ignore.

III

Emma Charming was not the sort of person who could slip in undetected anywhere; price of being Storybrooke’s wealthiest heiress. Honestly she didn't even know she was anyone but a foster kid who couldn't keep a home to save her life until the founders of the Charming Corporation were murdered and their will pointed to her as their next of kin. It had taken some time to figure things out, but with her foster siblings and the closest people she had to family, she managed not to bankrupt the company that she had taken on.

The only mystery she had left was why they had given her up in the first place.

Neal and Mary Margaret flanked her protectively while the media’s attention turned away from hounding the hospital staff to questioning the billionaire heiress's unexpected arrival. She ignored the camera flashes, the shouting and the microphones as she went to inquire where Miss French was. The nurses, who had been cold and tight-lipped to the journalists, quickly offered to show Emma to the room.

“She's stable,” The nurse confided once they had put some distance between them and the lobby, “Lost a lot of blood though… And a few bites taken out of her.”

“Bites?” Neal echoed.

She nodded solemnly, “Arms, legs, torso…” Her chin quivered, “I mean, it's obvious he’s not human, but to actually see the damage…”

She’d seen worse, Emma told herself. Everyday people dying in the most brutal ways imaginable at the hands of creeps like the Dark One. A few bites were nothing compared to a body post Jafar hypnosis.

The nurse had them wait outside while she checked on the freshly-free hostage. They glanced at each other, holding a silent conversation as they wondered what exactly they should be bracing themselves for. When she returned, she ushered them in.

There were no other patients in the room; just a single woman with long brown hair staring out the window. She turned as they came in, claw marks down one side of her face and a black eye on the other. Her split lips puckered in an “oh” as she recognized Emma.

“Miss Charming. I should’ve realized this would catch your eye.”

“Survivors tend to get a lot of attention,” she said dismissively, taking a seat next to the bed, “How are you feeling?”

“Been better,” she joked. Her smile wavered, “I should probably just be glad I’m alive, right?”

“No, you can whine a little,” she assured her, leaning onto the arm of the chair, “...how did you get away, Miss French?”

“It’s Belle,” she corrected softly, “And I...I don’t remember. I...passed out… Someone must have brought me here.”

Well it wasn’t the Dark One, Emma thought bitterly. Front desk would have definitely noticed if it had been.

“Do you remember the attack?” Mary Margaret asked.

Belle stared straight ahead, fingers curling into the sheets, “I was on my way back… I don’t know which street it was, just downtown, next to Mr. Gold’s Pawnshop… I thought I saw someone in the alley so I went to investigate…” Her eyes welled up with tears, “And then they were on me… I don’t even know where they came from...biting and shaking and clawing…”

“So you escaped from the Dark One,” Emma said.

Belle was snapped back to the present, perplexed by the statement. “I didn’t escape.” The corners of her mouth turned up slightly, “...he let me go.”

It was Emma’s turn to be confused. The Dark One had held her hostage for months… Why would he suddenly let her go? If he wanted to get rid of her he could’ve just killed her; he wasn’t above that. Unless he was cruelly giving her the illusion that he had let her go only to punish her, an elaborate ploy.

Her eyebrows knit together as she read Emma’s silence, “...you think he did this to me,” she said.

“He probably did,” she admitted.

She shook her head vehemently, “No...no he would never… He’s not like that.”

“He used you as a human shield.”

“Because he knew…” She twisted towards the IV in her arm, picking at the bandages that held it in place, “I have to go back, he’s going to be worried.”

Emma rounded the hospital bed, “Belle.”

“No you don’t understand, I promised him!”

    Emma rested her hand over Belle’s and she jerked back as though she had struck her instead. She glared up at her, a cobra ready to strike.

“I. Need. To. Leave.”

“Nurse!” Mary Margaret called.

    Belle sprang to her feet much quicker than Emma anticipated from a woman recovering from an animal attack. She held her by the forearms as she fought against her, machines insisting that something was wrong as Belle thrashed around.

“You don’t understand!” She cried, “If I don’t go back he’ll start looking for me! He’ll burn this city to the ground-”

“He won’t,” Emma said sternly.

“You can’t promise that! You can’t promise anything when it comes to him, only I can!”

    The nurse entered and Emma shifted around to let her get closer. Belle struck out weakly, attempting to shove her arms away.

“I won’t go back to sleep!” She sobbed, “I need to see him… I need to see him…”

“We know, sweetie,” The nurse said dully, exposing a vein to administer the tranquilizer.

    It worked quickly. After a few long seconds Emma felt the small brunette sink against her. With the help of the nurse they set her back into the bed, covering her up.

“I didn’t think she was that out of touch,” Emma confessed apologetically.

The nurse didn’t seem surprised by the outburst and she wondered if it had happened before, or if she was just used to that sort of behavior at Storybrooke General.

“They think she’s gotten Stockholm’s syndrome,” she said, checking the monitors as they settled back down to their normal levels, “You know, when the victim falls for the captor. Apparently it’s pretty common.”

“Who thinks this?”

“The therapist assigned to her case, and Mayor Mills.”

Emma glanced at Mary Margaret and noticed her pursed lips. It figured Regina was in the middle of this.

II

    Belle was surprised how fast she adapted to her new job at the Enchanted Forest. Within a few weeks she had a good idea of which inmates had no interest in books, which ones actually did, and which ones just wanted to waste her time. There were an odd lack of challenge to dealing with them… The only one who caught her curiosity was the Dark One.

“Now Keith, I know you don’t want to check any novel out,” she lightly scolded as he tried to get her attention, shifting her tablet to her other arm. She didn’t have to look back to know he was glaring at her, furious she wasn’t giving him the attention he wanted.

    If his pick-up lines were any indication, he had been in here for awhile.

    As she made her way towards the final check point, her heart fluttered. The Dark One continued to intrigue her, a mix of contradictions and opposites. Arguably the most dangerous man here, he had no escape attempts on his record. There was one assault but he had left the guard alive despite the dozens of murders he had committed outside of the Enchanted Forest. Was the isolation taming him, or was he simply biding his time?

“Darling… Darling!”

    Belle kept her eyes focused ahead, ignoring Cruella De Ville. She didn’t want to check out whatever sordid material she was interested in. She had already given her a book on taxidermy and the Donner Party; she didn’t want to see what came next. Cruella hit the glass with her fist as she continued to shout after her, causing the Sea Witch to snicker at the scene.

    Finally, she came to the last cell on her route, her stomach flipping as she saw she was anticipated. He was standing with his hands behind his back, grinning at her in a way that promised trouble.

“Hello Rumplestiltskin.”

“Mm, hello dearie. I have something to give back to you.”

“Finished already?”

“Oh I couldn’t put it down. Not that there’s much else to do.” He frowned and glanced up, “Come to think of it, it’s been something like three days since I’ve last counted the ceiling tiles.”

Belle smirked, “Well, you know the drill. Set it by the meal slot and then go to the other side of the cell.”

    He frowned, “But what if it falls on the floor?”

“I know there’s a shelf just in front of the meal slot; you’ve done this before,” she gestured towards the mentioned shelf on his side of the glass.

    Rumplestiltskin glanced at it, then looked back at her with full, concerned eyes, “I don’t trust it.”

“You don’t trust it?” She echoed, doing her best not to smile.

“I just don’t. I’d rather hand it off to you directly.”

“I think you’re full of it.”

“I might be.” He went over to the slot but continued to hold the book, an inch or so above the shelf.

    Belle shook her head, “I’m not that naive. The rules are there for a reason.” She turned to walk away, “I guess you want to keep it another day, then.”

“Wait! Uncle! Monkey’s uncle!”

    She glanced back and watched as he gingerly set the paperback on the shelf, holding his hands up in surrender before retreating to the far wall. She felt a thrill of victory as she went to pull it out, her fingers momentarily in the crocodile’s den.

“See? The book is fine.” She held it up for him to inspect. He glanced at her with such a childishly sullen expression she had to bite her cheek to keep from laughing, “Now, since you returned it, would you like to pick a new one out for tomorrow?”

“...yes,” he decided, coming out of his corner. Belle pulled out her tablet, opening up the application that showcased the asylum’s library.

    The weeks turned into months without her realizing it. Belle’s recommendations were getting better and better the more she got to know her patrons. All except for Rumplestiltskin, who went from one genre to another with each choice. He blazed through each book, attempting to get her to agree to let him hand it back to her each time. Each time she refused and, as penalty she supposed, he took longer and longer to pick out a new book.

    It was starting to get rather ridiculous one day when Rumplestiltskin met Belle’s eyes and she saw him nervous for the first time.

“...there’s no children’s books, are there?”

    If he hadn’t of looked so vulnerable Belle might have made a remark about how he really was trying to hit every genre under the sun. Instead she shook her head, “No, I don’t think so.”

    He took a deep breath, “Is there any way I could… Have one brought in? From a library branch or something? It’s almost his birthday.”

“Whose birthday?”

“Dr. Seuss. “Green Eggs and Ham”.” She waited for him to make a quip. But all he added was, “Please. It’s important.”

    Maybe it was shock that caused her to go track down a worn copy of the classic. Maybe it was curiosity. Either way she brought it to him the next day and he checked out no other book for a week. She arrived on the birthday of the celebrated author only to see the Dark One on his cot, rocking back and forth with the book in his lap, reading it out loud under his breath.

    That time, when he finally was ready to give it up, she didn’t demand he set it down and move away. She wordlessly reached into the slot and, after taking a moment to comprehend, Rumplestiltskin went to give it to her. His hand purposefully brushed against hers and it felt cool and smooth, more like a snake than a crocodile. She let the touch linger for a moment before pulling away, glancing up at him as she released a breath she had been holding.

    There was a hunger in his eyes; not the lustful gaze she was so used to getting from a lot of the inmates. A desperate desire for connection, to reach out and fulfill the undeniable need to not be alone. Belle wondered the last time he had felt that, when had he experienced someone willing to touch him and not just having to in order to do their job. Maybe he wasn’t such a monster that the isolation wasn’t affecting him… That he was a lonely man whose only interaction came from the guards and her.

“...thank you,” he murmured.

    She nodded, holding the tablet up to the meal slot so he could use his own finger to search through the library’s database for his next read.

    It was the beginning of the end of the life she knew, and the start of her journey to the Storybrooke’s darker side.

III

Emma found Neal hadn't gone far, just to a couple chairs in the hall. He was smiling so whatever had caused him to walk out wasn't too big of a deal.

“Yeah but WHICH Lost Boy? I don't want to be like Nibs or something.”

Her heart clenched as she saw who Neal was talking to. She always felt that ache when she saw Henry, especially when he was dragged along on his mother's business. He was a bright boy, charmingly precocious for a ten-year-old but obviously damaged from Regina's overbearing child-rearing. In his lap was his ever-present book of fairy tales, his personal Bible.

He glanced up and smiled when he recognized her, “Hi Emma.”

“Hey kid,” she murmured, folding her arms, “You telling Neal here who he was before the curse?”

“Yup,” he chirped, completely sincere, “The book told me today he was a Lost Boy who followed the Pied Piper and once he realized what was happening he was turned into a donkey.”

“Hey, you didn't tell me that part!” Neal protested.

Emma smirked, “Well you can be an...donkey.” She caught herself just in time.

“An donkey? That's not grammatically correct,” Neal teased. Emma kicked him and Henry giggled, the subtext going right over his head.

“Miss Charming.”

The merriment of the moment was sucked out of the air as Regina Mills appeared, all pants suit and business. Even if child neglect wasn't part of the picture, Emma was pretty sure she’d still hate this woman.

“Madame Mayor, I didn't realize you were holding a press conference,” Emma said. On instinct Neal stood, his smile gone.

“I'm not,” she said flatly, “Though I suppose you're looking for your next pet project.”

“It's not a pet project. She's been through a lot, she could use a friend.”

“And what do you think I’m trying to do?” She took a dramatic deep breath, “There are things about Storybrooke you couldn't begin to comprehend. That monster that took her? You think he’s done with her?”

“That would be why he'd toss her out on the streets…” Neal muttered.

Regina gave him a cutting look, “I for one am not going to gamble on this poor girl’s life. She needs protection, the sort even a billionaire playgirl philanthropist can't give her.”

“The playgirl bit is a vicious rumor,” Emma corrected offhandedly, “What about her father? If you think the Dark One’ll be after her then surely he’ll go after him too.”

“We’ll keep an eye on Mr. French,” she said dismissively, gesturing to Henry. He stood obediently, one hand taking hers, the other arm wrapped tightly around “Once Upon a Time”, “I'm sure Belle appreciates your effort, but she's in good hands.”

Neal snorted derisively. Emma opened her mouth to retort but Henry looked over his shoulder.

“Bye Emma,” he murmured.

The harsh words died on on her lips, “...bye, kid.”

Some days she just wanted to grab him and take him home with her and never let Regina touch him again.

A few blocks away that night Maurice French went about closing up Mr. Gold's Pawnshop and Antiquities Dealership. It would’ve been the smarter thing for him to stick with his job at the Enchanted Forest; help train all the new guards who had no idea what they were in for, spend a couple more decades dealing with the scum of the earth, receive his decent retirement package at 65 and never look back. But after what had happened to Belle… He couldn’t make himself go back and he spent six months wondering if his only daughter was dead and how everything could have changed if he had only been there that day. But Belle was alive…

Of course he had tried going to see her once he saw the story on the news, but she’d been labeled “dangerously unbalanced”, the staff at the hospital explained. They told him her captivity had taken its toll. They told him she was convinced she was in love with her abductor. They told him that she’d need extensive therapy, and to be kept somewhere secure lest he try to reclaim his prisoner. And so he felt more like an observer than family, kept from interfering in case he should trigger a bad reaction. They hadn’t even accepted his offer of Belle’s favorite book, and so he held it close as a substitute to her. “Her Handsome Hero”...and instead she had gotten her deformed devil.

He went to the back and picked up where he had left off with an old Cogsworth clock. Honestly this pawn shop was the oddest thing… A “concerned citizen” had mailed him a key after the news of his resignation had gotten out, along with the deed to the shop. Dubious at first, Maurice didn’t have much of a choice if he wanted to pay his bills, and nothing had come of it yet.

Until tonight.

He glanced up as he thought he saw something move out of the corner from his eye, “Hello?” Predictably there was no answer and yet, Maurice set down his tools and went to check the front of the store. A couple were passing by, the woman laughing so enthusiastically he could hear it through the glass.

“Where. Is. She?”

Maurice turned to see him crouched on the counter, a shadow cast by the back room’s light. His blood went cold as he watched the head tilt, teeth bared like the creature he was. There was no barrier between them; no back up that would come fast enough to save him. The Dark One was free and nothing could stop him.

Maurice straightened, trying to feel for a weapon, “Even if I knew… I wouldn’t tell you.”

The beast lashed out before Maurice had noticed he moved, grabbing him by the collar and yanking him forward. He braced his hands on the case and struggled to stand upright, but the monster’s grip was harder, forcing his knees to bend.

“That...is not a very good first sentence,” he drawled, “Now...you...are going to tell me where I can find her… Or there’s going to be a clean-up on Aisle Moe.”

“Even if I knew, I wouldn't tell it to the likes of you,” he glared up at him, “She's finally free of you, and soon whatever spell you put her under will be broken.” He had the satisfaction of watching the beast scowl at him for a moment before he had his head slammed down onto the display case.

“YOU. ARE. HER. FATHER.” He punctuated each word with another slam, “Of course you know where she is!”

    Maurice tried to focus through the searing pain and disorientation, vaguely aware that he was bleeding. The monster pulled his head back and he had just enough time to shut his eyelid before two clawlike nails rested on either side of his eye.

“Moe, Moe, stubbed toe, full of woe, Woe-y Moe-y,” he sang, “Your mind’s tooooo small to understand your little girl’s a big girl now. Everyone and their cousins think she was a poor wittle hostage but you know, there was a distinct lack of locks and chains once I got her home. She could’ve escaped at aaaaaany time if she twuly wanted to… But she stayed. She stayed because she was willing. She...she chose me…”

    He seemed to be lost inside of himself, and Moe thought he could use it to his advantage. But as he tried to move the claws squeezed and the pressure made stars dance against his eyelid.

“Shall I tell you about your daughter’s advances? I’m sure you were aware how naughty she was in the asylum. Does it torture you, how she went into my cell, without any back-up? Do you think about all the things I could have done to her, wandering into the dragon’s den so brazenly? I certainly do.”

“Bastard,” Maurice hissed.

“I’m aware.” He tightened his grip on Moe’s eye and he gasped, “Now, tell me where my beauty is or I’ll squish your peeper like a grape!”

    There was the sound of glass shattering, then the clatter of a bell as the front door was forced open. The beast giggled, releasing his eye and turning Maurice around to face whoever had broken in.

“Look! It’s Miss Swan, a grown woman who dresses up in a costume and runs around doing illegal vigilantism!”

“As opposed to assault and battery.” The dark figure moved closer.

    He blinked and then defended in a ridiculously innocuous voice, “I’m just looking for my girlfriend.”

“Let go of Mr. French before I make you.”

    He considered it for a moment then released Maurice, “I wasn’t getting anywhere with him anyway. In-laws, am I right?”

    There was a rush of air and a swirl of purple smoke, and when Maurice looked back, there was no trace of the mad creature.

“Are you alright, Mr. French?”

    He looked at the woman clad all in black, her face obscured by a mask reminiscent of a Venetian masquerade. Her outfit was a mix of armor and fabric, letting her move freely but still protecting her vital organs. The etched feather designs and the shape of the mask confirmed it was none other than the Black Swan visiting him.

“I’ve been worse,” he insisted, going to dab at the blood on his forehead with his sleeve. She brought her cape around and helped wipe it up, “He’s trying to find Belle…”

“He won’t,” she promised him.

    He shook his head, “You can’t be certain of that. You have no idea what he’s capable of.”

“No, HE has no idea what I’M capable of. That disappearing act won’t work twice, and she’s got the city of Storybrooke looking out for her,” she rested a hand on his shoulder, “We’ll protect her, and help her get well.”

    Emma could see though that he wasn’t convinced.

    She hadn’t seen Neal at all that night and while thankfully she hadn’t needed backup, it was weird he hadn’t immediately responded to her text about a sighting of the Dark One. When she did see him again at home, he was nursing a drink and staring at a spot on the wall.

“Where were you, Boy Wonder? You missed a highly anticlimactic standoff with a Big Bad.”

“I was with a contact seeing if he knew where Belle had gone to,” he finished off his drink, frowning, “I don’t want you dealing with him on your own; he’s not like the rest of the crazies we deal with.”

“Then come with me next time.”

    It had been an offhanded statement but Neal gripped the glass as though he were going to throw it.

“I don’t want to face him if I don’t have to,” he muttered.

    He’d never been one for cowardice, but Emma felt she had pressed too hard already. He had his clammed-up face on, and asking more wasn’t going to lead anywhere good.

“...I do not like it, Sam I am,” he said absently.

“Neither do I,” she said, “Not on a boat, not on a goat.”

    At least that managed to get him to smile.

II

    Belle had gotten drunk off of power. Not in general; she was still plenty careful around the other inmates and only interacted with them as much as she needed to. But at the end of her rounds, when she neared the last cell in the furthest depths of the Enchanted Forest, her pulse quickened for a completely different reason. Her Rumple would be waiting for her, regardless of whether he was done with his book or not, and they’d waste time pretending he was debating on a new one. She enjoyed the hungry way he watched her, drawn to her like she was drawn to him. She knew he acted the predator but, when it came down to it, she was his master.

    She was beginning to wonder if her lust and fondness was turning into something else, something more serious.

“Belle…” She turned from where she was packing her lunch to see her father in the doorway, looking nervous. Internally she began to panic, “We need to talk.”

“...about what?” She asked, setting a fruit cup in the paper bag before rolling the top of it.

    He took a deep breath, “There are...rumors going around. That you’re...going into the Dark One’s cell.”

    She laughed, and hoped it didn’t sound nervous, “That’s ridiculous. How would I even get a key?” By stopping by the master collection and “borrowing” it until she had a copy made. The master keys were only used when a guard forgot theirs anyway, and it had been easy enough to convince security it was for her stubborn father who wouldn’t admit he lost it.

“I don’t know, but you’re a clever girl.”

“I didn’t, papa.” She lied firmly, “I know how dangerous it is.”

    And yet, she had done it anyway. Knowing the risks she had gone in after telling him to put his hands against the far wall, back to her. She had gone in and gingerly touched him, felt along his scaly skin and listened to how tight his breathing got as he stole glances at her.

    He might be called a crocodile, but he had behaved like a lamb towards her.

“I hope you remember that,” he moved closer to her, “If anything were to happen to you…”

“I know, papa,” she went over and kissed his cheek, “I love you, worry warts and all.”

    He gave her a small smile, “I love you too.”

    She brushed past him, grabbing her coat, “Off to work I go. You want me to grab anything while I’m out?”

“I wouldn’t say no to a six-pack,” he said.

    Belle giggled and shrugged her coat on, walking out the door. It was the last conversation they had before she was taken hostage.

    The details as to how the riot began weren’t clear; something had happened to the plumbing system, so major that it distracted most of the personnel. Electricity became spotty and, in between power outages, cells started to open up.

    Belle hadn’t gotten to her rounds yet; she was busy reshelving books when the lights flickered and died. She paused and waited; sure enough the backup generator kicked in and she continued. She managed to shelve a few more books before the power failed again, this time staying off.

    She opened her tablet and used its light to guide herself back to the checkout desk, searching for the phone. She picked the receiver up only to hear silence, not so much as a dial tone. She went for her cell phone, trying to remember maintenance’s number…

Gunshots rang out. She quickly sank behind the counter, holding her breath. The volley didn’t last long though, hopefully meaning that whatever the disturbance had been it was dealt with. She took a few deep breaths, and was just about to stand again when she heard it. Quiet at first, barely discernable, the noise grew louder and louder. Laughter. Cheering. Chanting. Shouting. Moving closer to the library.

The door opened and Belle jerked, wishing she had had the presence of mind to lock it. She strained to hear footsteps but whoever they were they were careful about staying quiet. She shielded the light of her phone and scrolled to her father’s number, starting to text “I lov-”.

The phone was smacked out of her grasp, skidding across the floor. Before she could move away a hand was on her throat.

“I’ve been waiting a long time for you,” Keith growled, pressing himself against her.

    Belle clawed at him, but it didn’t seem to deter him. His hips ground against hers while he twisted her face to the side, running his tongue along her cheek. She struggled to breathe and to keep his free hand away from her breasts. She was beginning to feel lightheaded when he was suddenly pulled off of her.

    Keith barely had time to process the change before his neck was snapped, body tossed aside without a second thought. Fingertips gently took her face, frantically checking her over.

“Pretty, pretty Belle,” he crooned, “Sweet, sweet Belle…”

    A sob choked out of her and while she should be relieved he had come to save her… He was out of his cell. They could all be out of their cells. She was almost… And gunshots…

    Rumplestiltskin scooped her up, carrying her out of the library. The halls had quieted, even in the few minutes since the riot began. (Because that was what had happened, right? A prison riot?) Some of the truly insane lingered even though all of the cell doors were wide open. Blood and bodies littered the ground; not just guards, but other inmates, killed either in defense or for kicks she had no way of knowing. Belle struggled in her friend’s arms, weeping at the sudden tragedy, imagining the surviving inmates scattering like cockroaches into the city ready to bring hell to Storybrooke.

“Shh, shh, pretty Belle, perfect Belle,” he cooed, “You’re mine now… All mine.”

    As they neared the entrance to the Enchanted Forest she could see the flashing lights of police cars, hear them shouting over each other. Rumplestiltskin set her down on her feet and pressed her back against his front, a hand around her throat.

“Just an act, my dear,” he assured her, “We have to make them believe.”

    Belle was not acting as she was led out, sobbing at the sight of all those guns trained on them.

“Please, please!”  She begged as the Dark One carefully maneuvered them past the blockade, keeping her always facing the danger. She didn’t know whose life she was pleading for harder and, when she had time to reflect on it in the Dark Castle later, she realized they had been so intertwined one bullet could have possibly gone through both of them.

    It was almost poetic, in a Romeo and Juliet morbid way.

III

    Sometimes Henry felt like he was the only one who really saw things the way they were, and he wondered if it was because of his book. He hadn’t met anyone else who could read it and sometimes that scared him, like he really was crazy. But no, of course the Evil Queen would want him to think he was, because it gave her control. And if there was one thing he knew about his mother, it was that she loved control.

    Belle had come to live with them shortly after she’d been found. His mother said it was because she wasn’t safe anywhere else; his book told him it was because of her relationship to the Dark One. Belle and the Dark One were a modern day Beauty and the Beast; he didn’t know who that made his mom in their story.

Belle was...quiet, and by herself a lot, when she wasn’t in the dungeon. She didn’t seem like a person; she had no energy, and there was always a twinge of sadness around her. She was a ghost that stared out the window as if waiting for someone to come find her.

When he asked Archie about it during therapy, he seemed to hem and haw more than usual. He said that the mind tries to adapt to situations in order to survive, that Belle’s mind had deceived her into thinking she loved the man that had done horrible things to her.

Henry asked if his mind did that. Archie admitted that it might.

III

    Hook didn’t like to think of himself as easily persuaded, but he couldn’t deny he had a weakness for Baeran Gold. Well, now he went by Neal Cassidy, or “Baelfire”, which Hook failed to understand the reasoning of. At least his moniker made sense.

    The bloody thing was that Bae knew he had a weakness for him, and he exploited it ruthlessly. He was his mother’s child in that regard… So when he met with Hook to ask him to check on that woman of interest’s living situation, he had reluctantly agreed, knowing that meant dealing with Regina. She wasn’t bad to look at but she was fickle and didn’t take to his charm as quickly as he’d like.

    He dropped by when it was convenient for him, which irked the mayor.

“Honestly, Hook, there’s nothing wrong with picking up the phone and calling ahead,” she scolded as she found him snooping around the hallways, not even surprised to see him.

    Hook pouted, “That would take all the fun out of it.”

“What do you want, I have an appointment,” she said, brushing past him.

    He followed her, “Rumor has it you’re the one keeping the French girl.”

“It’s not a rumor if I told the press directly about it.”

“Now why would you go and do a thing like that? Are you trying to provoke the Dark One?”

“He wouldn’t dare come after me,” she insisted, “You weren’t there to see how he was around her, it was nauseating,” she shook her head, “I think he’d cry if anything happened to her.”

“I doubt it,” he muttered under his breath. He’d probably kill her.

    She led him down a staircase to what he imagined had been a cellar at some point. There was a chill in the air with only sporadic lighting, mostly around an exam table. A woman was bound to it, quiet and still as she stared up at the ceiling.

    So this was Erzabel French. The crocodile certainly had a thing for dark-haired bright-eyed beauties, even if this one had much more of a baby face. She glanced lazily at them, as much as she could with her head being restrained.

“Who’s leather daddy?” She asked dryly.

He gave a small bow, “Captain Hook, at your service.”

She burst into a fit of giggles that, while he was used to groans and chuckles, seemed uncalled for. It persisted as Regina came closer, starting to apply electrical pads to her temples.

“Honestly she’s getting as nutty as he is,” she muttered. She sighed before leaning over the incapacitated woman, “So, Belle, is today finally going to be the day you talk?”

“What’s there to talk about?” She retorted, “How useless this is? How it’s only stroking your feminine rage boner?”

    Regina turned on a machine that Hook hadn’t paid much notice to. It was small, but with some intimidating looking gauges and knobs. Belle’s nervous giggles died on her lips.

“What do you know about the Dark One?”

“...I don’t know anything,” She said quietly, her voice quivering slightly.

“You were his captive for six months, surely you picked up on something.” Regina’s fingers traced a dial.

    Belle’s hands clenched into fists, “Not a thing.”

“I think we need to jog your memory…”

    Hook wasn’t stupid; he had a good idea of what sort of machine she was attached to before Regina twisted the dial. But to watch the poor woman suddenly convulse and scream in agony quickly put him off whatever apathy he had come into the situation with. It was perhaps a few seconds of electrical current, but he felt trapped in those slivers of time.

Her body went slack as she gasped for air. Madame Mayor seemed hardly perturbed, “What can you tell me about Rumplestiltskin?”

“He has horrible morning breath! You could weaponize it!”

Belle hardly had the time to chuckle at her joke before Regina rolled her eyes and twisted the dial further along the scale. Hook must’ve counted ten seconds before Belle’s body collapsed again.

“You tell them you keep me here to protect me.” The words tumbled out of Belle’s mouth as she tried to rock from side to side, “You put up an act with me like it’s for information, but really you just want to keep me away from anyone I might tell about your after-office-hours activities. Mayor Mills can’t be affiliated with the likes of-”

    Regina cut her off with what looked to be very close to the extreme side of the dial. He stood there motionlessly as the poor girl screamed and spasmed, pulling at her restraints.

“Regina…” He said. Her face was completely focused on Belle’s, a scowl on her lips, “Regina, stop, you’re going to fry her brain!”

    Like a pouting child she relented, clicking the machine off.

“We’ll try again tomorrow,” she assured Belle, patting her on the head before going to leave. Hook hesitated, his eyes still on the dark-haired beauty.

    She was giggling to herself relentlessly, tears streaming down her cheeks. Her eyes flicked towards him, completely vacant as if she had retreated into herself. The Dark One could go die in an acid bath, but this woman’s only crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

    He turned to pursue Regina, waiting until they had left the girl behind to speak, “She has a point. Why press for more weaknesses when you know she IS one?”

“Just trying to get the most out of my investment,” she said coolly, “Anyway, it makes for good press. Mayor not only taking interest in a victim of abuse, but sheltering them? It’s downright charitable of me. Speaking of, you don’t plan on coming to my charity gala next week, right?”

“I have better things to do,” he promised.

    However, he could think of a pair that would be interested in dropping by.

II

    For six months, Rumplestiltskin felt like a man again. Belle remained in his keep, a handful of starlight to ward off the darkness. She let the world believe that she was a hostage as she kept his castle in order, stealing away to little nooks to read when he was busy. She paid no mind to his work or to the company that visited, continuing on as if there was no crime lord over for tea. He could have easily been projecting, but he was pretty sure she was happy too.

    She told him everything about her; she invited herself into his bed. She let him touch and explore and take, and with that came an even deeper devotion than he had already had for the woman who showed him kindness while the rest of the world regarded him as a monster.

    He immediately picked up on her restlessness as they approached the end of their half-a-versary of freedom, and he feared his days of bliss were numbered. When he caught her staring out the window one night instead of at the book in her lap, he knew he had to comment.

“Something the matter, dearie?” He asked from the comfort of their bed.

    She sighed and shook her head, stepping down from the sill and setting the book aside, “It’s nothing…”

“My interpersonal instincts might be a tad rusty, but isn’t “it’s nothing” code for “it’s a big something”?”

    Belle rewarded his joke with a small smile, going to sit on the bed. It took what scraps of pride he still had to keep from crawling towards her, automatically gravitating towards the center of his world. She bit her lip before finally looking at him.

“I’m worried about my father.” That’s right, she had one of those… And she even liked him. She took his silence as a cue to continue, “You see, after my mother died I’m the only family he has. I know he’s been worried sick but…” She trailed off, and even if he’d been given a multiple choice style menu to pick from he doubted he’d choose correctly what she was thinking.

    Pins and needles seemed to press into his innards at the thought of sharing his treasure. But he couldn’t deny her such a reasonable request, such a human request.

He drew in a long breath, bracing himself, “...then you should visit him.”

    Belle did a double-take and Rumplestiltskin carefully crafted his features to resemble something close to casual. She gave him the sweetest smile in return.

“You mean it?”

“Course I mean it,” he scoffed, “I don’t want you moping about because I didn’t let you run out and say “hi” real quick.”

    She rocked forward and kissed him, and it felt just as magical as the first time. “You want me to be happy,” she teased.

    He wrinkled his nose, “Well… I don’t want you unhappy.”

    She giggled and went to push him back against the bed, swinging a leg over to straddle him, “You make me very not-unhappy,” she assured him.

    He clung to those words as she prepared to leave the next day, and he reminded himself of them as he waited for her at the window to return. He made her very not-unhappy; surely that meant she wouldn’t leave for good. Surely that meant she loved him, like he loved her.

    Belle didn’t look back once she was outside the formidable stone mansion that very much could pass as a Dark Castle; she doubted she could bear the sight of seeing him watching her leave. It had been hard enough when she had been getting ready; putting her hair up, wearing a hoodie, generally just trying not to advertise the fact that the lone survivor of the Enchanted Forest massacre was going out on the town.

    Despite his act of nonchalance, she could sense his fear. Honestly it could be why she had put this off for so long, or maybe she hoped with enough time passing her father would accept her decision to stay with Rumple. Or maybe she had just been avoiding the rest of the world in favor of the seclusion being the Dark One’s “hostage” had offered. He certainly had no shortage of books...

    She took the Cadillac that sat mostly forgotten in the garage, driving out of the foothills and to the metropolis that was Storybrooke. She was careful to avoid the main roads, though she had no idea if it made a difference. She was less concerned with traffic cams spotting her and more concerned with them catching the license plate numbers; how did one register a car for a super villain?

Maybe the media had moved on; assumed she was dead or simply found another scandal to move onto. She could only imagine what they had said about the poor defenseless woman being used as a meat shield… The few pages they knew of her and Rumple’s story.

The area Mr. Gold's Pawnshop and Antiquities Dealership resided in wasn't one of the busier ones, especially this time of night. She parked a few blocks away just to be safe, hoping her father hadn’t called it an early night. She practiced what she was going to say to him as she walked. Hello, Papa… Hey Papa… I know it’s been awhile. I’m sure you’ve been worried but I’ve been alright, more than alright…

Papa, I love-

She was startled from her thoughts by someone knocking into her.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!”

“It’s alright,” she mumbled, hardly thinking twice about it as she tried to keep going.

    A well-manicured hand rested on her shoulder, keeping her from walking away, “...is that you, Miss French?”

    Her blood chilled as she turned towards the speaker. She had never paid too much attention to the politics of Storybrooke growing up; mostly she had just listened to her father’s muttering about the corruption of the Mills family all her life, and it seemed like no matter who went up against them they always still won the election. But then as she stayed in Rumple’s keep, she started noticing how often Regina came to call on him, and the sorts of people who came with her.

“Mayor Mills,” she gave her an awkward smile, “Nice to see you…”

“And nice to see you,” Her saccharine grin didn’t quite reach her eyes, “Is he letting you out now?”

“For errands. Surprised to see you around here.”

“Needed some fresh air, stretch my legs. Can I walk with you?”

    No. No she absolutely didn’t want to walk with this wolf in sheepskin clothing. But before Belle could really object, Regina had her arm entwined with hers and was steering the both of them along the direction Belle had been heading.

“He’s quite fond of you,” she mused, “Then again he must be, keeping you around, letting you see behind the curtain of Storybrooke…”

“What curtain?”

    Regina’s grip tightened on her arm, “Oh, you know… How it really is.”

“I have no idea what you’re inferring.”

    Belle cringed as Regina stopped, twisting around to face her, “Don’t play me for a fool… You may have pretended to be reading during our meetings, but I know better than to believe that charade.”

“You flatter yourself, Mayor Mills; you nor any of his business associates are all that interesting,” she tried to brush past her, “I’m a glorified maid, that’s it.”

    She was honestly a little surprised when Regina let her, her grip sliding off like water off a duck’s feather.

“It doesn’t have to be like this,” she called over her shoulder, “We could work together, help each other out.”

    Belle rolled her eyes, “No thanks. I prefer the devil I know to the one that just so “happens” to bump into me at night.”

    The fact Regina let her go without another word should have been a warning.

    She didn’t have to double-check the address; a hanging glowing sign announced that this was the antiquities dealership Rumple had jotted down, her father’s new place of business. No light came from inside, the shades were drawn, and when she checked the hours she saw she had just missed closing. But maybe he was still in the back...

    She circled around to the alley beside it and spotted a back door. There were still no lights on but she tried the doorknob anyway. Locked. She sighed; all of those precautions and mental speech drafts for nothing. She’d have to catch him some other time.

    Snarls reverberated from one brick wall to the other. Belle turned to see three shadows at the mouth of the alley, blocking her exit.

“You really should’ve gotten me that book, darling.” The tallest drawled, before snapping her fingers and pointing at Belle. Her sidekicks immediately charged, their barks booming across the distance.

    Belle twisted around to flee, knocking into a trash can. She recovered and sprinted, continuing even when she saw it was a dead end.

“HELP!” She screamed, trying to find something to stand on to scale the fence, “HELP ME, SOMEONE, PLEASE!”

    The first clamped its jaws around her calf and pulled her leg out from underneath her. She hit the cement with a hard thud and tried to kick free, but that only seemed to excite the dog more. She went to claw at its face when the second caught her forearm in its mouth. She screamed as they pulled in opposite directions, playing tug-o-war with her body and shaking her about as if she were just a stuffed animal left in a puppy’s reach.

    They raked at her skin, chomping at new parts of her body and trying to rip the meat right off her bones. It was all Belle could do to scream and hope somebody, anybody would save her before she bled out.

    The only person who heard her cries was Cruella, who watched in grotesque fascination. Belle wavered in and out of consciousness, her wails turning into quiet sobs and half-thought prayers.

    She heard Cruella make a call over the sounds of the Rottweilers’ snuffling and growling. She stared at a pool of her own blood as pain rang through her.

“Alright, she’s exactly where you want her… Yes, Jasper and Horace were good boys and did their jobs… Are you sure I can’t let them kill her? ...what makes you think he still cares, he let her go.”

    It was because he let her go that she knew he cared. She squeezed her eyes shut as the stupid mutts started clawing at her face, trying to get a rise out of her.

    The last thing she heard before she finally passed out was Cruella accusing the person on the other end of the line for being tacky in deciding to have a shrimp hors d'oeuvre served at her gala.

III

“One pill makes you larger, aaaaaand one pill makes you small. And the ones that… Mother gives you. Don’t doooo anything. At allllll.”

    He hated that fucking song, and should’ve long ago taken it off the jukebox, but he’d sooner gouge his own tongue out before giving Chelsea Catone the satisfaction. Her entire life revolved around tormenting whatever patron dared to venture into the Rabbit Hole, and himself if he wasn’t careful. The regulars had long since gotten used to her, then again most of his regulars had their own annoying ticks that they inflicted on whoever was unlucky enough to engage them.

           It really wasn’t surprising that his customers tended to be a little off; he was in the heart of the party district known (only somewhat ironically) as Wonderland. Left to its own devices for the most part, at least it was cheap to live in… It had been perfect in his younger years, and he’d been so excited to take over and reinvent this bar. Now the surrealistic design and technicolors gave him a headache.

           He probably wouldn’t have paid any mind to the next fool who stumbled in if the entire Rabbit Hole didn’t freeze. The crack of table croquet stopped, and not because of the twins breaking out into a fight. Catherine’s stream of vapor leaked past her lips instead of in the rings and figures she liked to practice. The absurd confusing drinking game that was like musical chairs on crack ended as the line of racers crashed into one another.

    Jefferson took one look at the arrival and sighed, “Alright, everyone out.”

    He’d never seen all those misfits listen at the same time before. Such was the fear of the Dark One.

“You too, dormouse,” he flipped Grace’s textbook closed.

    She turned away from her staring and gave him a pointed look, “You said I can stay down here if I did my homework.”

“And you also know I have Daddy Veto Powers. Go upstairs, now.”

“Listen to your father.”

    Grace was startled to see the Dark One in all his glittering glory suddenly standing beside her at the bar. He stared back at her, raising an eyebrow. She grabbed her book, slid off her stool and disappeared through the “Hatters Only” door.

    Rumplestiltskin took her seat, folding his arms on the bar. Jefferson crossed his.

“I thought I told you I never wanted to see you again,” he muttered.

“I thought that was a hyperbole,” he mumbled, his eyes wandering towards “Hatters Only”, “...she’s grown up quite a bit.”

“Yeah… Went by too fast,” he said.

The Dark One shrugged, “At least she got her looks from her mother.”

“You going to order something or not, you scaly bastard?”

“Whatever you have that’s strong.”

    Jefferson went over to his wall of liquors, grabbing and pouring like a painter with his palette, “It’s been what, eight, nine years, and tonight you just wander in without warning?”

“I was in the neighborhood,” he claimed, claws scratching at the table’s varnish, “...seeing if Cora was in.”

    Jefferson’s grip tightened on the glass, looking ready to hurl it at him, “What the fuck. Did you not learn your lesson?”

“Ew, not like that.” He waved off the notion, “Like in an intelligence gathering way. But it doesn’t matter, she wasn’t in.”

“And what information could you possibly need THAT badly?”

           His face crumpled and Jefferson almost regretted asking. He hadn’t seen lizard eyes that sad since… Well, ever, he guessed.

He tilted his head to the side like a confused puppy, leaning in as Jefferson set down his drink, “…have you ever been in love before?” He just about whispered.

           Jefferson gave a small smile and nodded, “Yeah, once. You took her seat.”

“But never the romantic sort?” He continued, “Where you’re just…sitting, minding your own business, and a butterfly lands on your arm. It’s so delicate, and perfect… You’re terrified to move, terrified to breathe, lest the moment end and it flits away. Touching it, tainting its purity… Feels wrong. But you want to… Need to…”

           No, he hadn’t felt that way towards Grace’s mother; she had been a fun fling that had ended in tragedy. Grace was the only butterfly in his life and as far as he could see she’d remain the only one. Purity was in short supply in the circles he ran in… And he’d do whatever he could to protect his little dormouse.

           Rumplestiltskin downed his drink and set the glass back on the table, tapping at the rim as if trying to crack it, “…I’d settle for just knowing she’s alright,” he murmured.

    Jefferson frowned, “...I can put feelers out. Who is it?”

    The Dark One’s attention was diverted by the small television he kept in the corner for Grace to watch cartoons. For some reason it had been switched to the local news channel, and it looked like a young lady was speaking to a group of reporters at a press conference. He grabbed the remote and turned up the volume.

“...with Mayor Mills’ help I have been recovering from my incident, and I hope with some more time I will be able to move past what happened…”

    The bartender frowned, recognizing her, “Is that-”

    His voice was cut off by a choking sensation, Rumple’s hand held up in a clenching motion as he stared enraptured by the screen.

    Erzabel French continued, her words hollow as she read from something on the podium, “This is my first public appearance since my…abduction. I hope to continue to heal and eventually go back to being the woman I was before.” There was a pause, a glance away from the written speech, “I look forward to the Everyday Heroes Gala, Mayor Mills’ annual fundraiser for the Neverland Foster Center.”

           She stepped away from the podium and polite applause followed before Regina took the stage again and went on her usual anti-crime tirade.

           Jefferson gasped as Rumplestiltskin released his hold, giggling.

“My clever Belle. Clever, clever Belle,” he trilled, sliding off the stool, “You’ve been a great help Jeffy, we should double-date some time.”

           He glanced between the television and the Dark One’s retreating back, rapidly trying to catch up. Of course he didn’t want to believe whatever propaganda Regina was spewing this week… But he couldn’t deny that the closest thing he had to a best friend was extremely unstable. That wasn’t even touching the idea Rumple was a victim of some sort of reverse Stockholm syndrome…

“Are you going after her?” He asked.

           The Dark One considered his question, head tilting to the side, “Yes, I’m going to make her suffer… Suffer more than she ever knew was possible. She’ll be begging for death by the time I’m through with her,” he glanced over his shoulder, “Unless you’re talking about Belle, then not yet. I don’t even know what I’d wear!”

           He giggled, slipping out of the Rabbit Hole. Maybe if he liked Regina better, or maybe if he thought Rumplestiltskin was capable of rape, he would’ve tried harder to stop him. Instead he turned the television off and noticed the empty glass.

           Bastard didn’t pay his tab. Could pull gold out of his ass, but apparently preferred drinking and dashing.

III

           Henry knew the drill by now; his main job was to stay out of the way while everyone else set up for the night’s party. Bored, he watched the small army prepare for battle against the…what was the word Neal had used? The bushwa? The upper class, basically the royalty of Storybrooke.

           Only some of them were actual royalty though, at least from what he could figure out. It was like playing detective, but he had to be very careful about getting new clues. Most people thought he was crazy, but they were just cursed. He was the only believer, but Neal seemed to want to believe.

           The world couldn’t really be like this, Henry insisted. It couldn’t really let the bad guys win while the good guys were screwed over. That just wasn’t right.

“It wasn’t bold, it was brash.”

           The voice sent a shiver down Henry’s spine. He quickly ducked into the nearest room, leaving the door open a crack. Sure enough, his mom and grandmother stepped into view, raven black and blood red.

           What kind of crummy luck did he have, with the Evil Queen being his mother and the Queen of Hearts being his grandmother?

           Cora turned towards her daughter, her bright lips pulled into a frown, “You’re antagonizing him.”

“I’m making a statement,” Regina folded her arms, facing her mother head on, “It’s an open secret how he feels about her… And now she’s in my possession. Soon enough he’ll know it too.”

“And he’ll destroy you if you aren’t careful.”

Regina scoffed, “Coming from the woman who boasts about how she outsmarted him.”

“Because I knew what I was doing. You, however, don’t.” She reached out and rested a hand on Regina’s shoulder, and Henry tensed up as if she were touching him, “I say this because I love you. Turn this around; offer her to him. Blame the puppy butcher for the attack.”

“No,” she brushed the hand off of her, “He needs to know that I’m not his apprentice anymore. This is my city, and he’s just another criminal I need to keep under my thumb.”

“Regina-“

“Mother,” she cut her off, “You had your terms as mayor. Now it’s my turn. If I want your opinion I’ll ask for it.”

           Cora’s mouth twitched, clearly wanting to continue the argument. Instead she gave a tight smile, “Yes dear.”

           Henry slowly, quietly closed the door. He didn’t want to listen anymore about evil plans, especially ones where the Dark One would be coming after his mother. As bad as she was, everyone seemed to think he was worse. And a beast without his beauty…

           A derisive snort warned Henry he wasn’t alone.

           He nearly jumped out of his skin, twisting around to see where the noise had come from. In the corner like a forgotten doll, their “guest” sat, back against the wall and legs spread out in front of her. Her long curls hung from her bent head but he could still see her smirk and vacant eyes. A book was in her lap as if she had been reading, but she looked as posed and lifeless as a marionette.

           Her head slowly lifted and her eyes flicked up. They sat in silence, regarding each other, until he finally spoke.

“So you’re Belle.”

           She mulled over the statement for a moment, “I suppose I am… I don’t feel very Belle-like right now, though.”

“Maybe it’s because you’re not with your Beast,” he offered.

“Maybe,” she said, in that gentle adult “no but I’m not going to treat you like an idiot” way.

           Maybe the Evil Queen had stolen her heart, and that’s why she looked like a cracked porcelain doll, one more fall away from breaking.

III

           It wasn’t the first time Emma had ever seen Neal in a monkey suit, and it probably wouldn’t be the last. But there was definitely something to be said about his innate ability to pull off a three-piece. It was like seeing the boy-next-door skater punk suddenly on the cover of GQ adjusting his cuff links. He glanced up at the uneven click of her heels and took her in.

“You clean up nice, Girl Wonder,” he commented.

“You don’t look so bad yourself.”

“Oh Emma,” Mary Margaret gushed, unable to keep from brushing stray strands back into her up-do and smooth creases that came from something as simple as walking from the bathroom to the Autoswan, “You look stunning… I knew that dress would look lovely on you.”

“Thanks Mary Margaret,” she mumbled, a little embarrassed.

           Eventually her assistant stopped fussing over her, standing back and glancing between the pair, “I feel like I should be taking pictures of you while Neal slides a corsage on your wrist.”

“As great as smuggling a flask of peppermint schnapps in sounds, I don’t think “prom” is the theme Regina’s going with.”

           The trio made their way to the garage where Emma’s baby sat. It was a goofy stretched-out Bug painted bright yellow, modified to at least attempt to look like the sort of sports car a celebrity would have. But Emma hadn’t let her technician go too crazy; yellow bugs were special to her and Neal and besides, no one suspected Herbie’s drunk cousin of being anything more than tacky and fuel-efficient.

The Autoswan’s twin doors rose Delorean-style and Emma followed Neal around to the passenger’s side. Mary Margaret paused for a moment, then gleefully clapped her hands together.

“I can text David to come up here and he can give the Overprotective Dad Speech!”

“NO!” They snapped in unison. Mary Margaret pouted as she slid into the driver’s seat, Neal taking the passenger’s and Emma getting into the back.

           The ride to Regina’s estate was quiet, and shorter than Emma would’ve liked. Not that she wanted to get there after shit had gone down, but she wasn’t exactly looking forward to schmoozing the other socialites while she waited for the explosions. She wasn’t a great schmoozer to begin with and every one of these events came with the mild threat of her offending someone she shouldn’t have because she was a little too blunt.

           Mary Margaret had tried her best to teach her the ways of the upper class, but Emma was starting to think it was something you either got or you didn’t. It wasn’t her style to sweep things under the rug.

           She pulled up to the beginning of the expansive walkway that led up to Regina’s mansion, twisting around in her seat and looking at both of them in turn, “Now don’t have too much fun you two. I have a novel I’d like to finish reading, and honestly I don’t much feel like having to carry your unconscious bodies out of a burning building.”

“Yes, Mary Margaret.” They drawled in unison. The doors rose and Neal slid out, offering his hand to Emma. She took it and let him help steady her.

Time to enter the fray.

As she suspected, there were tons of press lurking near the mansion’s entrance, swarming each new arrival like ants on dropped fruit. Neal stayed a step behind, keeping an eye on the crowd while Emma picked and chose the snippets of interviews she’d engage in.

Yes, she was excited to be here, supporting this worthy cause that was close to her heart. Why yes, Neverland was where she had grown up, and she wished it wasn’t as crowded as it was. Every child deserved a chance to grow up in a safe environment, and sadly most of the adolescents were all but forgotten when it came time for adop- Who made her dress? She’d have to ask her personal assistant, haha. Yes, still single. Please excuse her, and have a lovely evening.

Rinse. Repeat. Until she was finally inside and could breathe for a moment.

“Is it the blonde hair? Or do I just have “bimbo” written on my chest?” She vented as Neal stepped into his more natural position at her side, “Seriously, you’ll never hear them ask a male CEO if he’s thinking about starting a family.”

“It’s the lack of suits,” he insisted, “I keep telling you that.”

“I shouldn’t have to wear a suit to remind them of my position,” she protested, glancing around. This might’ve been a living room in a standard house, but she didn’t see any furniture that suggested what this giant place was used for when parties weren’t being thrown. Right now it seemed to be the church foyer, a place for meeting and greeting before heading into the main event.

“So what’s our game plan?” He asked, lowering his voice.

“We find Regina,” Emma said simply, “She doesn’t take a step without us knowing about it. Where she is, I’m sure the Dark One will follow.”

“Sensible enough,” Neal scanned the crowd, “Bet she’s in the ballroom.”

“I’ll go check it out,” she offered, “You should scout for the catering trays.”

“You want your bodyguard to abandon you for snacks?”

“What, I’m hungry,” she raised an eyebrow, “Do you really care how you earn your paycheck?”

“I just really hope nothing happens in the five minutes it’ll take me to hunt it down. I’m pretty sure it’s Emma Charming writing my checks, NOT the Charming Corporation,” he shoved his hands in his pockets and glanced around, “...I bet she sprung for the good stuff. You know, for the orphans.”

    With that epiphany Neal was off, weaving his way through the crowd. Emma smiled to herself, because he was being so Neal in that moment, but it immediately vanished when she noticed a man with a cane staring after him as if he were witnessing the second coming of Christ.

    There was something very familiar about the man and yet Emma’s mind was drawing a blank at a name. He looked as though he belonged there in his tailored suit and his kept appearance, but the other patrons had given him a surreal berth. An island in the middle of a sea of people, only his eyes moving as he watched after Neal. They stayed fixed for a moment and then, reluctantly, they broke away.

    He didn’t seem to see her at first; more like stared through her. But his dark eyes came back into focus and he gave her a humorless smirk.

“Miss Swan,” he mouthed across the distance.

    Emma’s heart raced. If it had been any other random surname she would’ve brushed it off as him confusing her with some other blonde in a dress. But paranoia about her crime-stopping activities refused to let her just dismiss it. She cut through the distance, keeping her sights straight on him.

    And yet, as she got within whisper-hissing range, he vanished as if he had taken the opportunity of a blink to disappear.

    Regina was pleased with the turnout, she decided as she looked over the ocean of influence that flooded the ballroom. The band swelled over the multitude of conversations and slowly pairs started to dance. She stood above them, on a platform near the pledge table where she thanked each additional donation that the attendees offered. At this rate they might actually be able to do something about that old orphanage, and she wouldn’t just be spouting empty promises.

    Assuming some miscreant wouldn’t force her to use it as hush money. Try as she might, it seemed like that was where the majority of Storybrooke’s funding went to. Maybe she should consider cracking down on readmittance to the Enchanted Forest…

    ...honestly the little hostage might be the first one she sent. She may have pushed the poor thing too hard in their sessions; it seemed like something had snapped and disconnected her from the rest of the world. The whole evening she hadn’t even tried leaving her side, staring vacantly across the room, shifting her focus every so often so as to not be mistaken for a mannequin.

Regina was wondering if she had been wrong, that Rumple really didn’t care about the asylum librarian, though she’d never admit it to her mother. For such a powerful being, he sure was taking his time.

    She frowned as she realized she hadn’t seen Henry in awhile. Hopefully he hadn’t gotten into any trouble, what with the mixed company of the honest and corrupt socialites. Maybe he had disappeared back to his room to read that book of his (which, by the way, she did NOT look like the illustration of the Evil Queen).

    Another man wrote down his name, contact, billing information and the amount he was giving so he could sign off on it on next year’s tax return. From the emphatic thank yous of the volunteers manning the table it must’ve been a fairly impressive amount. Regina plastered a smile on her face and turned to greet the man.

“Thank you so much for your donation, Mr. …?”

“Gold,” he said, shaking the offered hand.

“How fitting,” she joked.

    Beside her, the blue-eyed puppet stirred.

“Well I like to do what I can for children in unfortunate circumstances.” The words rolled off his tongue with a delightfully thick brogue, “Seems odd that the previous Mayor Mills isn’t here tonight, or have I just missed her?”

    Regina’s smile tightened, her teeth clenching momentarily, “Unfortunately my mother couldn’t make it,” she lied. Cora hadn’t wanted to make it tonight, claiming she wasn’t in the mood for the masquerade.

    Or she thought the event would flop, even though Regina had been doing this for five years now.

“That’s a pity,” he said, his thumb running over the grooves of his cane’s handle, “...honestly I was hoping that your partner might honor me with a dance.”

    It took her a few moments to realize he meant Belle. She glanced to her side, trying to see her through an outsider’s perspective. Belle seemed equally surprised, sizing up the man.

“Well I suppose it’s up to her,” Regina admitted, “Belle?” It would free her up to go make a quick tour of the room, see if she could find Henry…

Her voice cracked as if she hadn’t spoken in a week, “...alright.”

    Mr. Gold grinned, “Excellent.” He offered his hand to her and she took it, letting herself be led away from Regina.

    Elsewhere, Emma was also scanning the room, half looking for Regina, half looking for the creep who might’ve been hinting at her vigilante pseudonym but had definitely been gaping at Neal. There wasn’t much in the way of raised platforms in the room except for where the band was playing and where donations were being accepted (as if the tickets weren’t pricey enough). She dodged conversations as politely as she could, playing with the bracelet on her wrist and thinking maybe she should’ve field-tested it before tonight.

“Good evening, Miss Charming.”

    She turned to see who was addressing her...and then looked down when she heard giggles.

“Hey kid,” she greeted Henry, looking him up and down, “Look at you in your little monkey suit…”

“I know, Mom made me wear it,” he explained, “I like your dress, it’s pretty.”

“Mary Margaret made me wear it,” she joked.

    He rocked up onto the balls of his feet, “Do you wanna dance?”

    She looked at him dubiously, “Do you even know how?”

“No,” he admitted, “But you can teach me.”

“But I don’t know how either.” She scanned the room again, but unless Regina was wearing 12-inch heels she wasn’t going to spot her that easily, “We could always try to get the electric slide going.”

“What’s the electric slide?” He asked.

“A relative of the cupid shuffle. Come on, we’re going to need room for this…”

    Rumple’s mind felt as if someone had taken his skull and shaken it like a snowglobe, but he forced himself to focus. Forced himself to remember to limp, to go first to the donation table instead of grabbing his Belle immediately and taking her away. He saw her heeled to Regina, and he wanted to destroy the Mayor.

    Instead, he made small talk to ensure Cora wouldn’t be a problem. Regina didn’t notice anything amiss about his request to dance with Miss French.

    His precious, precious Belle… She was so far retreated into herself it was like no one was home. Her gold silk dress, laced with rhinestones, cut in such a tempting way… Her long brown curls cascading over her pale shoulders, blue eyes staring.

    They started to focus on him and he could see she was trying to place him. His heart thrilled at the fact he was showing her that she didn’t have to put up with crocodile chic; he could look nice and ordinary for her, be seen in public with her, have everyone stare at her beauty instead of his beastliness like she deserved.

    Lightning shot through his blood when she took his hand, and he led her deep into the mob. No one took notice of his prop cane disappearing, not even his precious Belle. He turned to face her when they were in the dead center of the room, unclasping her hand to rest both of his on her hips.

    She stared up at him as her own rested on his shoulders, her brow knitting together, “I know you,” she murmured.

    He nodded, maybe a little more enthusiastically than called for, “You do...you do,” he promised.

    A new song began and they swayed, eyes locked. He didn’t dare miss a moment, even if her gaze was powerful enough to make the Dark One shy away.

“You came for me,” she stated.

“Of course I did.”

“Why?”

    He frowned, “Because I had to. What other choice is there?”

    The tempo picked up and Belle moved closer, closing the chaste distance between them. Her nails dug into his shoulders, chin trembling, “Why did you wait so long?”

“I’m sorry. If I had known there was a problem I wouldn’t have wasted that first night. I looked in all the wrong places, thinking a woman who ran a city would have more brains than to touch you.”

    Her arms wrapped around his shoulders, breasts pressed against him. He held her tightly, feeling their hips move in sync with each step and twist. They writhed as one, the strings of the music swelling and climbing in time with each turn.

    Tears spilled out, “I’m not the same. Something’s...broken.”

“Dearie dearie dear,” he cooed, “You will never be broken. Only a little chipped.”

    She fisted his hair in her hand, forcing his head down to meet her mouth at the song’s crescendo. Their teeth clacked together, and they were both kissing as though it was all that could save them. Their bodies stilled, clinging to each other while their lips said everything words failed to. He felt the glamour slipping but couldn’t summon a damn, the magic peeling back the mask to expose what he truly was. Belle’s hand squeezed as crimps rippled along the formerly straight hair.

    She pulled away and he opened his eyes, ready for her disgust. Her face split into a wide grin, bringing back his true love as she started to cry and stroke his ugly glittery cheeks.

“It is you,” she said emphatically, “My beastie.”

He pulled her back into a tight embrace, feeling his own sobs spill out. Hysterical laughter bubbled out of her, mixing with her tears of joy. The other guests were starting to notice the transformation and were retreating as far as they could from the couple. Rumple felt the beginnings of panic and reveled in it.

He leaned close to Belle’s ear, his voice a deep growl, “What would you have me do, my beauty?”

Still laughing, still crying, she exclaimed, “Burn it. Burn. It. Down!”

As much as she would’ve liked to forget why she was there, Emma couldn’t. While she smiled and laughed as she and Henry cut a rug off to the side of the main party, she was also keeping an eye on the donation table Regina and Belle were hovering by. Chained pet or bait? Either way, Belle being stuck to Regina’s side was alarming, and not just because of the mayor’s sheer arrogance. The woman she had met in the hospital didn’t seem particularly passive, despite the mental conditioning the Dark One had put her through.

“Do you think I’m crazy?”

    Emma turned to her dance partner, whose face was uncharacteristically emotionless.

“I think you’ve got some crazy moves,” she said, sidestepping the question. He stared her down and she relented, “I think...we all have our way of coping with things.”

    Like how she dressed up and fought criminals. Not the healthiest but a coping mechanism nonetheless.

The way he looked at her, with the quiet solemnity of a sentenced prisoner, told her that her tactful answer wasn't what he needed to hear.

“That's alright if you don't believe,” he murmured, “The hero rarely does at first, or else it wouldn't be much of a story. But you'll see… Your parents gave you up because they had to.”

The scabs over her heart felt like they had been picked off with his words. How many times had she told herself the same lies? And with the grand reveal of her origins it only seemed more likely that she had just been an inconvenience, that she hadn't been tragically ripped from their arms and lost or whatever other story she had concocted to comfort herself.

Henry, bless him, was still young enough to believe that where he came from was better than where he was as a Mills.

She reached out and took him in her arms, holding him the way she wish she had been held when she had gotten lonely. He hugged her back, generously not complaining about the beadwork pressing into his face. The world was theirs for a moment, two lost children finding solace with each other.

Then the screams started.

Emma turned to see the crowd clawing away from the center, desperate for the doors. They shut and locked without explanation. There was a single pair of giggles weaving through the growing hysteria, manic and pleased. A split second glimpse between passing bodies showed the Dark One had appeared in the middle of it all, dressed to the nines and clutching some poor woman. Was that-

The curtains caught fire, and the tablecloths. The potted plants and decorations went up next, including a giant “welcome” banner. Equipment started to explode and the poor musicians went flying.

The panic only grew, and people were starting to shove and barrel through. Emma shielded Henry with her body, rushing him to one of the fallen speakers.

“Hide behind this,” she said, “I’ll come back for you.”

Wild eyes looked up at her as she pulled away from him, “What about my mom?!”

“I’ll get her out too, just stay out of the way.”

The smoke was thickening, only sending the trapped into a larger frenzy. Even in this chaos she couldn't switch personas, and hoped Neal was in a better position.

She covered her mouth and nose, one look telling her she wasn't getting anywhere near the door. The windows though… Some of the men were using chairs to try and break them, but there were openings. She ran across the room, fidgeting with her ring. The diamond rotated in its setting, a sharp point of it now protruding. The layperson, had they been watching, might've thought Emma punched the glass with her bare fist, but it was the diamond edge that met with the window. A spiderweb of cracks formed, reaching to beyond Emma's height, and when she pulled the ring out the shards of glass rained down, leaving an adequate gap.

“Hurry!” She yelled, shepherding whoever she could find to the opening. Gratefully they poured out onto the mayor's lawn, running as far as they needed to for safety. She coughed and blinked back tears, but refused to leave until she could no longer see any stragglers.

She stumbled to where she had left Henry and found him, his head turtled into his dress shirt. She tried to pick him up but she couldn't, he was too big.

“HENRY!” She shouted, but either he had passed out or he was too frozen to comply, “Henry you gotta help me buddy…”

A second pair of arms joined hers and when she looked up, she looked into the determined eyes of her partner.

“I’ve got him!” He yelled and Emma let go. Neal scooped him up into a fireman's carry and rushed towards the escape, Emma only a step behind.

She gulped in air as they hit the outdoors, neither of them stopping until they were well clear of it. Neal bent to set Henry down, checking him over.

Emma took a quick survey of the group who were standing nearby, trying to come to terms with the sudden sequence of events and watching the mayor's home slowly go up in flames. Without a head count Emma couldn't tell for certain who all they were missing… But there was at least one obvious person who wasn’t out.

Before she could make it two steps Neal had grabbed her arm.

“Regina's still in there!” She protested, “She could be stuck!”

“You’re not going back into that death trap!” He snapped.

Emma tried to break free. Neal twisted her around to face him, “You know what my job is, right?”

“To protect me…” She muttered.

“To protect you,” he agreed, “And sometimes that means I gotta save you from your own stupid self.”

“I promised Henry,” she defended weakly.

Neal didn't budge, “I’m sure she'll make it out. Cockroaches survive practically anything, right?”

Emma couldn't even fake a laugh. She stared helplessly at where she had been dancing not that long ago. Regina may have been a heartless narcissistic diva… But she didn't deserve to go out like that.

Regina's evening might have been literally going up in flames around her, but all she could hear was her mother's “I told you so”. As the fire continued to eat up her home, she attempted to focus enough to conjure water to try and put it out. All she could manage was wind, which only exacerbated the problem.

If she didn't know any better, she would think it was a coincidence that the fire was pressing her farther away from the exits and deep into one of the corners. She wondered if he was going to kill her. She knew it had to be him, and not just a bad wiring job. Her mind turned to Henry. Oh god Henry…

           The fire stopped its advance and even the smoke kept a respectful distance. The curtain of flames parted and her former hostage stepped through, the gold dress shimmering as though she herself was on fire.

“They say Emperor Nero played the fiddle while Rome burned around him,” she remarked calmly. Behind her Regina could see the Dark One, the ordinary suit a jarring contrast from his glittering complexion. He paced back and forth, his eyes fixed on her predatorily, “Most historians today disagree; Nero wasn’t even in Rome at the time. But that’s not nearly as compelling an image, is it?”

           Belle walked closer and Regina pressed herself against the wall, causing a sinister giggle to slip out of the brunette.

“You’d know all about propaganda though, wouldn’t you? Exaggerating and lying to make a sensational story, working it to your advantage...”

“His brainwashing was not my doing,” Regina protested, “You can’t blame me for that.”

           All it took was a glance and suddenly Rumple was at her throat, choking her and snarling like the rabid animal he was. She clawed at his hand, unable to breathe.

“From the moment I stepped into the Dark Castle I haven’t done a thing that I didn’t want to do,” Belle insisted, “Which is more than I can say since coming back from the hospital with you.”

“Please,” Rumple hissed, “Pleasepleasepleaseprettyprettypleasewithsugarontopletmeripherthroatout.”

           Silence filled the small battlefield. Regina tried to look past her hate-filled mentor, to the woman she was beginning to feel she had underestimated, but Rumplestiltskin refused, forcing her to look into his eyes. He loathed her for this, and clearly wanted that hatred to be the last thing Regina ever saw.

“No.”

           Rumple’s face scrunched up, “But…but poopsie-kins… She deserves to die.”

“Yes, she does,” Belle agreed, “But I’d much rather her live and know that her comfortable ivory tower is going to come crashing down one day. I want her to exist to fear our retribution, to wake up every day wondering what on earth is in store for her.”

           He trilled at her words, looking over his shoulder, “Have you always been this devious, dearie?”

“Yes, so don’t cross me. Now I’m tired, hungry, in need of a hot shower and a hard fuck. We’ll play with our mouse later.”

           Regina was dropped like a piece of trash, and the Dark One pranced over to his mistress’s side. She took his hand and wrapped the arm around her, nestling into him as intimately as any couple. The fire’s smoke pillared around them, growing thicker and thicker before it rushed out, putting out the inferno that had once been her ballroom.

           The ambulances and fire trucks arrived as the inferno mysteriously went out as suddenly as if it was just a candle. Emma looked up from where she had been cradling Henry and sighed in relief at the sight of medics. She wasn’t liking how he was breathing, or how he was pretty out of it, and didn’t have anything on her to help. Neal immediately went to scoop him up again.

“He’ll be alright,” he assured Emma, “Kid’s as tough as they get.”

“I should have gotten him out first,” she muttered, walking with him to the line that was starting to queue for EMTs.

“You got him and everyone else out, that’s what matters.”

           Ready to contradict him, Mayor Mills stormed towards them, “Miss Charming, Mr. Cassidy, may I ask what you’re doing with my child?”

“We’re hoping they’ll use chest compressors on him, ma’am. Otherwise he’s a goner,” Neal deadpanned.

           Emma fought the urge to roll her eyes, “We were just looking out for him. Not planning on kidnapping him or anything.”

           Regina opened her mouth but Henry let out a rough cough, glancing towards her, “Mom, you made it out…”

           The mayor’s demeanor softened, “Well I had to make sure you were okay, didn’t I?”

           Neal gently set Henry down and he went to hug onto his mother. He looked up at Emma with a reverence that made her insides squeeze together.

“You saved us,” he murmured.

Emma shrugged, “I guess so,” she admitted.

“I knew you were a hero.”

           And, despite the fact she had saved hundreds of lives before this doomed event, his words warmed her heart.

III

“Well that was a waste of time,” Commissioner Lucas declared as she started the patrol car. Her deputy buckled her seatbelt, “Can’t say I feel too sorry for her, and she’s lucky no one died. You hungry, Ruby?”

“A little,” she admitted, even if it was 3 in the morning. The fact her grandmother asked her was a formality; cases like this meant the Widow Lucas wasn’t going to sleep, and when she didn’t sleep she went to her favorite haunt, a 24-hour diner called Granny’s.

           Ruby had pointed out on several occasions the irony of that being her favorite restaurant, given what Ruby had always called her. The humor was lost on the old wolf.

           She picked at the fabric of her pants, staring out the window, “…he took her again, the French woman.”

“Yeah.”

“We’re going after him this time, aren’t we? We know she’s alive, we can’t just let him get away with, with what he’s doing to her.”

           The Commissioner was silent, watching the road more than strictly necessary, “…I would have gone after her right away if I could have,” she confessed, “He’d be back in the Enchanted Forest, they all would be. But it’s not that simple.”

“Of course it is,” Ruby insisted, “That’s our job, isn’t it? To serve and protect?”

“And not be foolish,” she pulled into a parking space, turning off the car and looking at her granddaughter, “I’ve seen the Dark One take out small armies; I’m not sending my men and women on a half-baked suicide mission.”

“It really makes it that much better to let someone suffer?”

“The needs of the many, Red. You can’t just focus on one person.” She stepped out.

           Ruby huffed, jamming the release on her seatbelt, “Don’t give me that “childhood nickname” crap; you’re still wrong,” she muttered under her breath.

           Granny had been in the system too long; she was a regular bureaucrat. They needed a little less pussyfooting and a little more actually doing something to help the people of Storybrooke.

           She trailed after her grandmother, “You’re gonna be sorry when I work my way up the ladder a bit more and have actual power,” she warned, hopping up on the stool next to her, “Because I won’t just sit on my thumbs and hope for an opening. No ma’am, I’m going to actually-“

“Hush.”

           The severity of the command was harsher than usual, which was saying something. Ruby turned to her only to watch her staring intensely at the napkin dispenser. She tapped a finger against her forearm twice and Ruby glanced in the direction she was “pointing”. Sitting in a booth plain as day was Erzabel French, a little sooty and still in her gala get-up. Outstretched clawed scaly hands showed who was sitting across from her.

           Belle watched her partner, unable to keep a straight face. Her hands, hovering underneath his, suddenly twisted up to slap his. He was too quick however and pulled them away, causing him to giggle and flail his arms like a small child. They had to take a break from whatever game they were playing when the server dropped off a strawberry shake with, naturally, two straws.

           It almost looked like a normal couple having a date… If it wasn’t for that pesky arson crime a few hours ago.

           Ruby reached for her belt but her grandmother rested a hand on her arm.

“Granny,” she hissed, “He’s right there, we could end this.”

“You’ll get both of us killed.”

“Not if I get him first.”

    Commissioner Lucas looked her in the eye, “You might be going after the victim.”

    Granny had lost it. There was no way that a woman used as a human shield and held hostage could be the one with the power. But while Granny had her decaf coffee, Ruby watched the pair as much as she could. And while Belle seemed happy, Rumplestiltskin was the one hanging on her every word and movement.

[markmceachran]

Pacing Algorithm for Advertising Campaigns and Inventory Allocations

I’ve was trying to figure out what to do with my Sunday. My options were: build a little header bidding ad server plugin for WordPress; run, sleep and eat; or write up some blog post on a pacing algorithm, because people still seem to be producing crappy ones. Since you’re reading this, you can probably guess which choice I made. I mean, it’s not the first post I’ve written on the subject.

It showed up again last week. I didn’t expect it, but I guess I never do. A saw-tooth pattern on a chart, indicative of a capping of sorts. A chart that says, “I want a thing to happen, but only so much.” In this case it was a traffic allocation. This was a surprise.

A little history

Most of the time when I run into a bad pacing algorithm it’s in the form of a campaign trying to limit itself. It only needs to acquire a few thousand impressions every five minutes, for example. So the hastily written algorithm might divvy up the impression allocation into five minutes buckets. Effectively that’s 12 buckets every hour. So it takes an hour’s worth of impression needs and divides it by twelve. One twelfth of the impressions are purchased every five minutes. Unfortunately at that point it switches to a simple counter that says, “for the next five minutes buy impressions until the number purchased reaches 1/12th of what I need in this hour.”

You end up with a purchase graph that looks like this.

See that blue spiky thing? That’s the one that’ll get ya.

The algorithm has no idea how much inventory is available for the campaign. In many cases it is plentiful. So the campaign serves it’s entire five minute allocation of impressions in the first minute. Then the buying goes dormant for four minutes until the next allocation is released and we start the dance all over again.

Apparently this can happen on both ends of the equation. A media owner or seller can cap the amount of media made available to particular technology partners. In much the same way a campaign pacing can reveal itself with the buying pattern, an impression allocation can show up in a similar way.

Details on the cause

How might one come to write such a curiosity? If this happens to speak to you, then yes, I’m talking to you. You’ve written a odd thing. In an effort to really speak to you about this, I’m doing my best to get inside your head.

Whether due to inexperience, or lack of thought about the magnitude of the problem you were about to introduce as your solution to another problem, or a lack of faith in an alternative approach, you thought this might be a good solution. The thought process probably when something like this:

We have you campaign or impression allocation for the month. Let’s start by dividing that by 30. Now we have a day. Let’s break that down by 24. Now we have an hour. Okay – well, buying all the impressions in an hour right up front might lead to a big spike at the beginning of each hour, right? So, well… let’s just divide it by 12 and we have five minute intervals. That can’t possibly cause a problem, right?

Impact

Problems are what it causes. Not just for you, but for your partners, and their partners, and they tell two friends and so on, and so on. Imagine if everyone did this. We’d have a sixty second blitz of liquidity every five minutes followed by four minutes of empty ad space.

We’d have intensely busy servers to handle the inventory for one minute, and then absolutely idle machines for the other four. Now you’re thinking, “Wait, would I need five times the infrastructure to handle that momentary load?” Yes, yes you would. And so would your partners, and they’d tell two friends… you get the picture now, right? It’s a snowball turned avalanche.

Fixing your pacing algorithm

You might be asking yourself, “How then might one go about fixing this, or rather, build a proper pacing algorithm in the first place?” I’m so glad you’re thinking about this, because I think about it all the time. I think about it a lot when I see some crap, saw-tooth graph. But even when one of those is not available, I still think about it. I imagine the graph just so I can get mad at it.

The answer is akin to flipping a coin, as my friend Dr. Neal Richter might suggest. Rather than basing your pacing algorithm on counting and capping, base it on a percentage allocation of impressions. Instead of serving til you hit the cap, flip a coin and only serve when it lands on heads. Of course, this simplified model only works if you need 50% of the inventory (or are allocating 50% of the inventory to a partner). For a moment though, imagine that it’s a D&D die instead of a coin. Then imagine that you only need to occasionally win, like you need the equivalent of two of the sides of that die, relative to the other 18. Winning twice in every twenty roles is just about perfect.

How to apply a simple percentage based pacing

Mathematically you’d want to boil this down to an equation so that you can write code against it. I’m not going to challenge you with a series equation here. You’ve already written a questionable algorithm, let’s not test the deeper mathematical waters just yet.

Instead I’ll write something akin to pseudo-code. Let’s say allocation requirements are 15% of the available inventory. Your algorithm should do something like:

Choose random decimal number (float) between 0 and 1.

If that number is less than 0.15, then serve.

Almost anyone can write that into code. It’s like two or three lines. Nice, right?

Determine the volume

At this point you should have figured out that you need to know how much inventory is available in order to calculate the percentage that your campaign or inventory allocation needs. Good. You’re asking the right question.

Fortunately you don’t need to burn the house down to make a perfect forecasting solution in order that you might have a better pacing algorithm. You could, I suppose, if you wanted to. Nothing’s quite as nice as a perfect forecasting tool. It’s like a fluffy pillow or a warm blanket. You can cozy up on the couch knowing the exact availability of the thing you’re looking for.

My friends all love to quote Akin’s laws of spacecraft design. In this case: 14. (Edison’s Law) “Better” is the enemy of “good.” So don’t run down the rabbit hole of a perfect forecasting tool.

How much inventory do you have left?

You simply need to determine how much volume you’ve got left available for your campaign’s duration. For that, you just look at what happened in the past, like yesterday even. “Hey, how many impression did I have yesterday? 1,000,000. Cool. So let’s just assume I’ll have 1,000,000 every day.” Seriously, it’s that simple. I mean, you can make it more complicated. Look at last week and divide it by seven, or even last month and divide it by 30. You did that before, remember. It produced a piece of garbage and cost everyone a 5X on their AWS bill, but hey, “learning.”

So, if your campaign needs to run for three weeks it looks like you’ve got about 21,000,000 impressions available to it. If you’re campaign only needs 3,000,000 of those, then you’re allocation percentage is 14.3%.

3,000,000 / 21,000,000 = 0.142857142857143; about 14.3%

Seems like I’m writing a lot of fluff in here for a few simple equations. I’ll be sure to highlight the important bits. Most of us are skimming posts these days and miss things. I guess for news it’s okay. Skimming posts like this might lead you to write a “pacing algorithm,” but maybe not the right one. If you are skimming, you might also be missing all my snark. Sad really. My snark is top-shelf.

Varying the time frame

One of the fun parts about pacing with this algorithm is that you get to follow the rise and fall of the traffic tide with your allocation. It just naturally happens! If there’s more traffic at noon, you’re still buying your 14.3% of it. When traffic dwindles at 11PM (23:00) your just buying a bit, but still 14.3%. You get to follow the ebb and flow of internet traffic for free!

Your old algorithm didn’t do that, did it? If it did, you had to do some crazy coding gymnastics to make it work. I tried to help you avoid all this, and I guess I failed some of you. This other post is on the same subject, but it had those tricksy series equations in it.

Varying the addressable audience

We’ve got three more points to cover before you’re ready to go. Firstly, the audience factor. Really this can be any sort of targeting parameter applied to the campaign or inventory allocation. Basically you want to look at how much of the inventory had that parameter in the past, to determine the allocation percentage. It will modify your equation’s denominator. Instead of 21,000,000 impressions you will have fewer. Maybe your campaign is only aiming at shoe enthusiasts and your system only expects to see 8,000,000 of those in the next three weeks. That means your allocation percentage is now 37.5%.

3,000,000 / 8,000,000 = 0.357; 35.7%

Competing campaigns (and how to address)

Now you’ve got your campaign humming along buying 37.5% of all shoe enthusiast impressions. This a really fantastic progress. Consider where you started. It’s really quite astonishing. Nothing can stop you now, except maybe another campaign that is also, for whatever reason, buying up your shoe enthusiasts. Holy Moly! Now what?

Are you supposed to look at all the campaign targeting and try to determine which campaigns are targeting the same users that your campaign is targeting? Good lord, what a mess that would be, right? Can you imagine the (Mom’s) spaghetti code you’d have to write in order to accomplish such an omniscient technology? That’s some Nobel Prize winning ad-tech is what that is. (Yeah, I’m totally in the “dash” camp of ad-tech. Deal with it.)

Don’t overthink it

There must be a simpler solution. There’s totally a simpler solution. All you need to do is incorporate the win rate (or render rate) into your calculation. Imagine you are only winning 65% of the time. Oh, snap! That’s gonna hit the denominator again because the reality is that you’ve only got 65% of your 8,000,000 impressions available to your campaign now. So I guess the math gets a little trickier now.

3,000,000 / (8,000,000 * 0.65) = 0.576923076923077: about 57.7%.

This just makes your campaign buying a bit more aggressive than it usually is. It’s the equivalent of giving your campaign a dagger to go all stabby on the other campaign.

Of course, an alternative here would be to raise the price your campaign is paying for the inventory. I’m not going to assume your system is in a bidding environment. If it were, you could also pull the pricing lever to actually change the win rate to something more to your liking. That’s where things get a little more complicated. You have to monitor how the new prices change the win rate and populate a lookup table so you know what happens at different prices.

For this exercise let’s keep it simple. I’m thinking that you’re just trying to make pacing decisions with non-monetary levers to pull.

Now you’ve got a complete algorithm that, in a perfect environment, will conclude your campaign exactly at the correct allocation without over or under performing. Then again, when was the last time you saw perfection?

Guardrails

Total Cap

Much like the Price is Right, you want to get the exact amount without going over to win that bonus $100. So you need to add a little logic to your pacing system to put the brakes on when the campaign hits the goal. Ad-tech systems are kinda big these days with servers spread out all over the world. Sometimes you just need a handbrake to stop buying on the thing when it’s done what it needed to do. So add that.

Overburn

The other thing you’ll want to do is run your campaign hot. Add five percent to the numerator. If your total cap function is working then you should hit the hard stop in advance of the final hours of your end date. I’m saying five percent for simplicity’s sake. Maybe you over burn at one percent at the beginning of the campaign and five percent toward the end, with some graduated increase over the weeks or months of the run. Heck, maybe you run hot at the beginning, slow in the middle and hot at the end.

I asked my good friend Neal. He says overburn for the first 80% of the campaign’s budget, then you can let it chill on the beach for the last 20%. He didn’t use those words, but the sentiment is there.

I don’t know. Do what feels natural. Fly casual.

Recalculate again and again and again

Absolutely reevaluate your campaign hourly, every half hour maybe? Do it often. Redo the numbers:

How much inventory is available in the time I have left?

How much of that inventory does my campaign need?

What’s my win rate?

The equation

In case you want to start adding more fun stuff to the equation here’s the template to follow:

allocation percentage = campaign goal / (available inventory * win rate)

You’ve finished and you’re winning

If you’ve made it to the end here, good on ya. Thank you for reading. I hope this helps, really I do. I know I’ve been hard on you for the questionable decisions you’ve made in the past, but that’s all behind us now. Let us look forward to a bright future where your campaigns are humming along, or your inventory allocations are distributing smoothly. Turns out that unbeknownst to any of us, you’ve just implemented a sensor feedback proportional controller. Tell your grandparents, they’ll understand.

If you enjoyed this post, pick something out something nice from my Amazon wish list and hit the one-click.

The post Pacing Algorithm for Advertising Campaigns and Inventory Allocations appeared first on Mark McEachran.

https://j.mp/3fGtvDd May 11, 2020 at 01:33PM

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Latest story from https://movietvtechgeeks.com/lordes-melodrama-andrew-garfields-gay-talk-backfires-amber-rose/

Lorde's Melodrama, Andrew Garfield's gay talk backfires, Amber Rose

With the recent release of her latest album Melodrama, New Zealand-born songstress Lorde is busy promoting and performing her new songs. While the album has only been out a few weeks now, it already has produced several hits, including the songs “Greenlight” and “Perfect Places.” On Wednesday (July 5th), the 20-year-old talent took the stage in Sydney, Australia. While performing for a crowd at Nova’s Red Room on Cockatoo Island, Lorde spoke candidly about the experiences that influenced her new album. In between songs, Lorde told the audience, “it’s all of the most intense saddest that you’ve ever been, or the happiest you’ve ever been. Or it’s feeling as lonely as you can possibly imagine, sitting in your living room touching your own cheek just to feel like someone’s there. That’s Melodrama.” Previously, the star talked to magazine publication Vanity Fair about the inspiration behind her latest album, as well as what prompted her to give it the name “Melodrama.” In an exclusive interview, Lorde told Vanity Fair, “It’s a nod to the types of emotions you experience when you’re 19 or 20. I had such an intense two years, and everything I was feeling—whether it was crying or laughing or dancing or in love—each of them felt like the most concentrated version of that emotion. I also have a love of theater, and I love drawing a parallel with Greek tragedies. But there’s definitely an element of tongue-in-cheek; it’s very funny to title your record Melodrama.” You can now listen to Melodrama, in full, on most music streaming platforms. While she may be on one of TV’s most popular and beloved shows (i.e. AMC’s The Walking Dead), actress Christian Serratos is not immune to Internet trolls and their hate. Just recently, Christian shared a photo of her breastfeeding her newborn while showing off a glitzy custom necklace at the same time. Unfortunately, like many female stars before her, Christian received ample backlash from her followers who did not feel the photo (or, more specifically, her displaying herself breastfeeding) was appropriate. Along with hundreds of other comments, Christian received posts from users in response to the image like, “Oh stop looking for attention…yes you can feed your baby in public, who cares? But, why purposely draw attention to it?” Admirably, Christian decided to stand up to her haters and speak out against their misplaced judgment. In response, the brunette beauty posted another picture to her Instagram, which also featured her breastfeeding. Alongside the response post, Christian captioned, “This is my body and my page. So I will post what I want, when I want. Those who disapprove can suck my left t**.” Christian Serratos, Instagram post: Back in March, Christian announced that she was expecting her first child with her husband David Boyd. In May, on Mother’s Day, the star gave birth to her new family addition. Needless to say, Christian is just as fierce and outspoken as her character on The Walking Dead (note: Christian plays Rosita Espinosa on the show). Andrew Garfield was roundly mocked on Thursday for saying during a panel discussion that — after preparing for a role as a gay man in the play “Angels in America” by watching “every series of ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ ” — he is a “gay man right now just without the physical act.” Later in the conversation, he clarified, “As far as I know, I am not a gay man.” He went on, “Maybe I’ll have an awakening later in my life, which I’m sure will be wonderful, and I’ll get to explore that part of the garden, but right now I’m secluded to my area, which is wonderful as well. I adore it, but a big concern was what right do I have to play this wonderful gay role?” On Twitter, one user sneered, “Hey did you know that if you marathon ‘Drag Race’ you are a gay man? That’s all it takes. Who knew,” while another withered, “Andrew Garfield is ‘gay without the physical act because he watches ‘RuPaul’ — Rich Straight White Men Try To Be Interesting Vol. 53.” https://twitter.com/fariharoisin/status/882801016579776512 A third said, “Speaking of, I am rich without the act.” https://twitter.com/Adam86Valentine/status/882928920068096000 https://twitter.com/tommybravos/status/883041050562002946 But LGBTQ activist and Savage Lovecast host Dan Savage was more sanguine. “With the world on fire . . . I’m having a hard time getting worked up over Andrew Garfield,” he wrote. Many have said that the funny thing is, is that if Andrew Garfield actually did come out, no would be surprised in the least, or really care. A Fox Business Network host has been suspended after a contributor reportedly accused him of sexual harassment. The network said Thursday it suspended "Making Money" host Charles Payne pending an investigation, but didn't provide any details. The Los Angeles Times, citing two anonymous sources, reported that Payne had been accused of harassment by a female political analyst who appeared on Fox Business. "We take issues of this nature extremely seriously and have a zero-tolerance policy for any professional misconduct," a Fox Business Network representative said in a statement. "This matter is being thoroughly investigated and we are taking all of the appropriate steps to reach a resolution in a timely manner." An attorney for Payne didn't immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday night. Attorney Neal Korval told the Los Angeles Times his client denies any act of sexual harassment against the woman. The suspension followed a National Enquirer story Wednesday in which the tabloid said Payne acknowledged a three-year extramarital affair with a female political analyst. The Times reported Thursday that the woman contacted a law firm representing Fox to lodge a claim of sexual misconduct. She alleges she was blackballed from Fox after she ended the affair, the paper said. She was a frequent guest on Fox Business Network and Fox News Channel from 2013 to 2016, according to the Times. The paper withheld her name, citing the nature of her allegations, including a claim that she was coerced into a relationship with Payne. Payne, a former Wall Street analyst, started working as a Fox Business Network contributor in 2007, and began hosting "Making Money" in 2014. Fox Business is owned by Fox Entertainment Group, a division of 21st Century Fox. A series of sexual harassment claims has shadowed units of the media giant, including Fox News, and led to the ouster of such prominent figures as Fox News chief executive Roger Ailes and host Bill O'Reilly. Ailes died last May after a fall at his home. O'Reilly hosts his "No Spin News" podcast on his website, www.billoreilly.com, contributes to Glenn Beck's radio program on TheBlaze and continues to write books in his best-selling series of historical "Killing" books, including his upcoming release, "Killing England: The Brutal Struggle for American Independence." Bill Cosby will be retried in November on charges he drugged and molested a woman more than a decade ago after a Pennsylvania jury deadlocked on the question after deliberating over six days. Cosby, who turns 80 in July, was ordered Thursday to be ready for trial on Nov. 6. He is accused of giving women he met three pills that knocked her out before sexually assaulting her at his home near Philadelphia. Cosby did not testify at the trial, but in a deposition in the woman's civil suit called the encounter consensual. Accuser Andrea Constand testified for seven hours over two days. She said she never gave the actor and comedian consent to engage in sex acts with her. Instead, she said, she considered him a mentor. She was a 31-year-old operations director for the women's basketball team at Temple University, where he, then 66, was a TV icon and the school's most famous booster. Her lawyer said she took the deadlock "better than anybody" and is not afraid to confront Cosby in court again. "She will be absolutely ready," said Dolores Troiani, Constand's lawyer. "She wants to see justice done and she wants to see this through. She was in the courtroom (after the deadlock) comforting everyone else." Prosecutors found themselves back to square one June 17 after the judge declared a mistrial. The jury failed to reach a verdict in more than 52 hours of deliberations. Cosby, in his deposition, acknowledged giving a string of young women pills or alcohol before sexual encounters over the past 50 years. District Attorney Kevin Steele, who pursued the case after an earlier district attorney declined to press charges in 2005, is determined to put Cosby on trial again. Constand went to police in January 2005 to say Cosby had drugged and violated her a year earlier. She left Temple in March 2004 to return home to suburban Toronto. She is now a massage therapist. "In my head, I was trying to get my hands to move or my legs to move, but I was frozen," Constand, now 44-year-old, said in their long-awaited courtroom confrontation. "I wasn't able to fight in any way." Defense lawyers Brian McMonagle and Angela Agrusa declined to comment Thursday on whether they would be aboard for the retrial. Cosby's publicist did not immediately return a call for comment. Amber Rose left nothing to chance when she posted her now-infamous nude photo to Instagram. “I had them Photoshop out my tattoos to focus on the bush alone,” the model, 33, told Refinery 29 this week. “I feel like as women, we always feel like we need to shave or wax — and if we don’t, then we’re considered unkempt or unclean or we’re gonna smell funny. I believe that it’s natural and we shouldn’t be ashamed of it.” The photo, which was quickly deleted by Instagram, created a stir online, and that’s exactly what Rose was hoping for. “People are very uncomfortable with the female body,” she told the website. “It’s OK to leak images onto the internet, and people are like, ‘Yeah, that’s so cool.’ But if you actually do it yourself and in a way that’s owning your own sexuality, it’s almost taboo.” In addition to preaching sex positivity, the post was meant to promote her annual Slutwalk, which will be held in early October. “I go far and beyond to piss people off on purpose,” she said. “That’s what I do to bring awareness to Slutwalk and what’s going on. The fact that there are double standards, that women are not allowed to own their sexuality and their bodies. We can’t possibly be sexually confident, because then we’re whores. We’re not allowed to have a past. We’re incapable of love if we’re too beautiful or if we’re too successful. It’s all really, really f–ked up.” While Rose was applauded for the picture by a large number of her fans, she also received criticism for it from others, including Piers Morgan. But it sounds like the model couldn’t care less about his objections to the photo. “I wanted to prove a point, and of course arguing with Piers Morgan, who is such a d—k … That’s why I kept going back and forth with him. I posted a picture of Adam Levine with a woman grabbing his d–k and balls, and Piers was like, ‘You know that’s different because that was for testicular cancer’ — so that’s okay. Men feel like they can do whatever, and show their bodies off constantly, but we can’t — that’s bulls–t.”

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