A Curse Upon Thee 30

The machines were all that kept the quiet at bay.

Oxygen hissing into failing lungs and a sterile metronome keeping time for the small heart of Henry Mills. There was no magic to be found in those electronic beeps; no bargains and no loopholes in the cold countdown to the end.

A sterile, mechanical metronome keeping strict time for a boy’s rapidly fading life. The electronic beeps were entirely devoid of magic, offering no bargains, no loopholes, just a cold, biological countdown to zero.

Leather soles tapped softly alongside his cane, sounding off almost reverently against the well-waxed linoleum as Mr. Gold stepped through the doorway. His Belle close at his side, the imp’s dark eyes slid past the dying child with the name of a man long-dead, immediately finding the fiigure slumped haphazardly in the cheap visitor’s chair.

There he is.  And there, indeed, he was. Finn McHale. 

The anomaly of Storybrooke.

The boy was a stubborn stain in Regina’s grand design, stagnant as her masterpiece was. Still breathing, despite three bullets to the chest and a wrestling match with a man so close to mad there was almost no difference. The boy’s head was currently tilted back at an angle that would undoubtedly give him a wicked crick in his neck whenever he finally decided to wake up.

Gold had absolutely no intention of waiting that long. While time certainly was a currency he possessed in abundance for twenty-eight never-ending years, the vault was finding itself very close to empty.

“Mr. McHale.” 

His voice slid out into the quiet room, as polite and soothing as he had grown used to; the tone of a deeply concerned shopkeeper. For some odd reason, people rarely seemed to find it all that comforting. Gold brushed that thought aside as he moved closer to the boy of the hour. “Mr. McHale, I find myself in need of your assistance with something… terribly urgent.”

That head of thick red hair jerked up instantly, a ragged breath tearing through his teeth. Bright blue eyes snapped wide open, pupils blown wide and dilated as they swam without focus under whatever heavy painkillers still working their way through his battered system. Those same eyes blinked hard.

Once, and twice again; the boy visibly struggling to clear the heavy, narcotic fog as his gaze finally landed on Gold’s face.

For a moment, at least.

Then they drifted over Gold’s shoulder, and landed on Belle’s soft features.

“Wha…” The single half-word came out with the slur of a lush, mouth working slowly like his jaw was packed full of cotton. “What’re you…”

“It’s about Henry, Mr. McHale.” A measured dose of paternal concern bled onto his face, Gold doing his best as he leaned forward on his cane. It wasn’t difficult, not for someone who’d been wearing human masks far longer than this dreary little town had even existed. “He’s fighting, yes, but we need to help him fight. His mothers…” Confusing as that was, the two were oddly united for once, star-crossed enemies aside. “Regina and Emma, they’ve gone to fetch something rather specific that might wake him, but there is… a complication. Something that requires your particular… talents.”

The boy blinked again, the movement noticeably slower this time, as his head turned with visible toward the sterile hospital bed. “H-he okay?”

“Not quite yet, I’m afraid.” He shook his head, tone tinged with the softness to pull upon the burgeoning hero complex the boy would deny. “But you… you can help him. We need to move quickly, however. Before it’s too late.”

Finn planted his hands on the armrests and tried to stand.

An admirable effort.

Not quite effective, though, as he only managed a height of six inches from the hospital chair before his trembling legs gave out completely.

One pale hand was there immediately, moving on gentle instinct. His Belle caught the boy’s right shoulder, her other arm sliding securely around his waist to take the weight onto herself.

Good girl. She’d do exactly what needed doing without even fully understanding the why. Her trust was implicit, and her faith in him was as strong as ever. Even with the curse wiping her memory, as it had everyone else’s, it had little to do with warping with the fundamental architecture of her bleeding heart.  

“Easy,” Belle’s voice was soft, breath threaded with a ribbon of pure concern as she physically steadied McHale’s swaying frame with careful strength. “We’ve got you. Just breathe.”

“Emma…” Those blue eyes were still trying, actively fighting to find a fixed point of focus, clearly struggling to string two coherent thoughts together through the thick drug haze and profound physical exhaustion. “Gotta help… Emma…”

“Exactly right, dearie.” Gold moved smoothly to Finn’s other side, cane gripped tight in his left hand as his free right arm came up to securely support the boy’s opposite flank. “We are going to help Emma. Help absolutely everyone. Come along, now.”

Without another word, they moved him slowly toward the door, Gold taking on the vast majority of his dead weight while Belle’s small frame strained in providing just enough physical support to keep them moving quickly. 

The long sterile hallway was their only obstacle, Nurse Sprat sitting behind her elevated station as the guard dog. Yet that proved no trouble at all, as the woman didn’t even bother to look up from her desk, too focused on the stack of medical paperwork and billing forms to truly question the movement occurring ten feet away.

In no time at all, the three of them were through the sliding automatic doors of Storybrooke General, and out into the cold crisp Maine air.

Gold took in his heavy Cadillac waiting patiently at the curb, engine still idling with a low powerful purr. Almost.

As Gold slid smoothly into the driver’s seat, leather creaking softly under his weight, Belle carefully helped ease Finn into the spacious back seat. The boy’s head immediately lolled back against the upholstery, eyelids slipping closed again the second he was horizontal.

Perfect.

Even moreso as his Belle took her designated place beside him in the passenger side.

“Mr. Gold…” Even as that delicate voice touched his ears, it truly stung. “Where are we going?”

A sharp prick of genuine pain, brief as it was, flared behind his ribs every time she referred to him with that same sterile moniker, transactional and bland. Such inherent distance. But he kept his dark eyes locked firmly on the road ahead, manicured hands perfectly steady on the leather-wrapped steering wheel.

It will all be fixed.

Soon enough. 

After all, the curse was already cracking with the Savior finally playing her role. The pieces were moving exactly where he needed them to be. He just needed to move the very last piece.

“Somewhere we can work without… interruption, sweetheart.”

Gold pulled the black car away from the open hospital entrance, their departure smooth and unnoticed as he had hoped for. “We’ll get him comfortably settled, do what needs doing, and have him right back in his bed before anyone even notices he’s gone.”

A lie, of course.

But a lie he knew, deep down in the marrow of his bones, that Belle desperately wanted to believe.

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

Fluorescence was officially doing her zero favors.

It was a fact, the same way the sky was blue and hospital food was bad.

Days with barely any sleep had already painted dark smudges under her eyes, clear enough for Ruby to catch them in the bathroom mirror as she washed her hands clean. Ugh.

Her shoulder hit the heavy wooden door, shoving it open as she scrubbed her wet hands dry with a piece of sandpaper disguised as a brown paper towel. Crumpling the paper ball up, she tossed it over her shoulder toward the half-full trash can. Ruby didn’t even bother to check if it landed or whiffed, her boots squeaking loud on the linoleum as she headed back toward Henry’s room.

By the time she neared the glass, Ruby blinked as she stopped dead in her tracks.

Dampness on her hands forgotted, she pressed up against the glass as the door opened and Ruby stared at what was definitely wrong.

The visitor’s chair was empty.

Hers was supposed to be, of course, but the one beside her own had no one in it.

No. Dark green eyes frantically scanned the small room, darting from corner to corner. Henry was exactly where he’d been, completely still in the oversized hospital bed but the little depression in the blue cushion was the only physical proof that Finn McHale had actually been sitting there five minutes ago.

Bathroom. The first obvious thought forced itself into her brain, Ruby trying to smother the sharp spike of panicked instinct scratching at her insides with every beat of her heart. He just got up and limped his stubborn ass to the bathroom. Except, Finn could barely even manage to stand on his own ten minutes ago without his knees giving out. I was going to get him a wheelchair, even. On top of that, the closest men’s bathroom on this entire floor was in the exact opposite direction from where she’d just come from.

Something made the hairs on the back of her neck stand at attention.

…no. Ruby spun hard on her heels, the rubber of her black soles squealing violently against the waxed floor as she launched herself out of the room, heading straight down the corridor for the main nurses’ station.

Nurse Sprat was sitting comfortably behind the high laminate counter, round face completely buried in a thick medical chart as she looked incredibly bored with her entire existence.

“Where’s Finn?” Ruby’s palms slammed down hard against the counter, the loud smack echoing down the hall.

Sprat jumped, head snapping up from the paperwork. “Who?”

“The redhead.” Ruby leaned forward. “The guy who was literally just sitting in the room with Henry Mills. Where the hell did he go?”

The blonde blinked slowly at Ruby, expression impatient and frustrated, like Ruby was a particularly loud toddler who had just interrupted her favorite soap opera. “Oh, him. Mr. Gold took him home.”

That… that just didn’t compute. “What?”

“Mr. Gold, honey.” Sprat’s eyelids dropped, the woman clearly annoyed as she stared back at an angry Ruby. “Walked past about a minute ago with that pretty little girlfriend taking the deputy home, it seemed. Helped him right out the front doors to the car.”

No.

Something freezing cold and incredibly sharp slithered right down Ruby’s spine as every single nameless animal instinct snapped right to attention, screaming wrong wrong wrong so loud it hurt.

Finn wouldn’t go anywhere with Gold, and he’d told her as much. Working for the guy had taught him enough and he’d honestly gnaw an arm off with his flat teeth than owe that creepy little pawnbroker a single favor. 

He wouldn’t just leave Henry. 

He wouldn’t just leave her without saying a damn word.

She was already moving even as Sprat yelled at her back, boots pounding a heavy rhythm as she hit a dead sprint. By the time the automatic doors slid open, Ruby was already out in the parking lot; cold air slapping her in the face.

No! 

She saw the car, dark against the orange sky; Gold’s vintage Cadillac pulling smoothly onto the dark main street.

A passing streetlight gave her all the light she needed, Ruby catching a glimpse through the back window of the speeding car. A flash of messy red hair.

Finn!

The heavy Cadillac turned the corner at the end of the block, the low purr of its powerful engine fading to absolute nothing. Cold air bit at the exposed skin of her stomach below her crop top and her bare arms, Ruby staring at the empty street as the silence rushed back in, heavy and totally suffocating.

“You son of a bitch.”

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

Blue eyes snapped open, the world under his body swaying back and forth as Finn tried to catch his breath.

Car. 

Lying in the back of a moving car, cold leather pressed hard against his right cheek, Finn made to push himself up, and found he couldn’t. What… Blinking, he tried to flood his arms with a surge of Cursed Energy to fight against the sudden panic, but his hands…

His arms were wrenched tight behind his back.

Tied.

Rough rope bit brutally into the raw skin of his wrists, panic flooding his body with equal parts Cursed Energy and adrenaline for a body that definitely wasn’t ready to handle even half of that. Fuckfuckfuck! He jerked hard against the restraints, sneakers kicking out, desperately trying to sit up, trying to—

The heavy surgical stitches in his chest gave way.

Not all of them, and definitely not completely open, but absolutely enough that wet hot blood bloomed against his skin and soaked into his bandages. He didn’t need to look down to know that white was stained fresh with red again beneath his black shirt. Still-healing ribs ground together like glass as the world whited out, pain blinding him from everything else for a few good seconds of suffering.

A strangled groan ripped free from the back of his throat, the sound wet and involuntary as his muscles gave out. He collapsed heavily back against the cold leather, gasping for air that wasn’t there.

“Ah. Theh we are.”

The voice drifted back from the driver’s seat. 

It was familiar as it was unwanted; the sound a slow, oily pour of dark syrup, perfectly pleasant and casually conversational, like they were merely discussing the morning weather over tea. “I was beginning to wonder if you’d simply sleep through the entire trip. That would have been… terribly boring for the both of us.”

You gotta be fuckin’ kidding me. Finn opened his mouth, trying to force a curse, a threat, literally anything out into the freezing air. He got absolutely nothing but a wet, rattling wheeze pushing past the raging fire in his sternum.

“As crazy as it might sound, I knew something was…” Dark, glittering eyes appeared in the reflection of the rearview mirror, finding Finn in the dark. “Let’s say, strange about you from the very beginning, Mister McHale.” Those eyes were as kind as Gold was generous, meaning not in the slightest.

“The energy you carry…” The old man sighed slow. “No realm that I’ve ever seen has such a thing. Not this one, not any land humans roam, and certainly not in any fairy tale either. Nothing I have encountered in several centuries of curation and collection.”

The heavy Cadillac turned smoothly, yellow streetlights sweeping across the dark interior.

“Regina was entirely too daft to really pay attention, as expected.” The man was smug, laughing with a little breath at what Finn could only assume was a private joke. “That girl is far too full of herself. Like mother, like daughter, I suppose, but I have always been… vastly more observant than either.”

“Mister Gold…”

Who? Finn blinked as a woman’s voice drifted back from the front passenger seat, soft and almost nervous. “What are we doing? You told me we were helping hi-“

“We are, dearhie.” Gold’s smile was perfectly visible in the rectangular mirror. It was all sharp teeth and absolutely zero warmth. “Helping everyone. He just… won’t enjoy this particular part quite as much.”

The taste of copper, fresh and sharp, filled Finn’s mouth as he clenched his jaw. He struggled again, another desperate attempt to force his body to move. C-c’mon… He managed maybe a single, agonizing inch before his torn stitches pulled tighter and his ribs screamed their own warning. 

“Rest now, Mistah McHale.” Gold’s low voice followed him straight down into the suffocating dark as his narcotics fought against the pain. “We have quite a bit of work ahead of us.”