amicustenebris | PSL - For Archie, Set After 4a

Entry tags:

PSL - For Archie, Set After 4a

With a kind of numbness that he hadn't felt since he cast Belle out of his castle and destroyed half his collection, Rumpelstiltskin made his way to civilization the very same night he was sent away. Once he hit the interstate it was not long before someone pulled over to offer help to the hobbling man, who looked like he'd wandered from a wreck. The stranger said they'd seen an abandoned car down the way a bit and offered to get him into town to call a tow truck.

He took advantage of his good fortune and was quickly able to access food, an ATM, a cane, and finally a place to collapse and eventually rent a car the following morning. He had thoughts of what he would have to do to figure out a way back over the town line. He understood the magic at work there, knew he could only go back in if summoned back in. But already the scheming began. Belle didn't understand his motivations, and he'd been incapable of correctly explaining. That was all there was to it. Part of him believed if he could say it right, if he could make sense of it all himself -- if he could just convince her that all she'd seen never meant he didn't love her? Then he could fix everything. Then he could be home with his wife, able to visit his son, able to walk and use magic.

He tried to call her from the phone in the motel. No answer. He tried a few times. There was an answer once. He couldn't speak.

Gold haunted that little hamlet outside of Ogunquit for a few days, with limited access to the internet or contact, just hoping he'd find some loophole that'd let him back in, afraid to wander out too far lest he lose his chance.

As far as he knew, Belle never caught on that he was calling. If she did, then she was patient. She stayed on the line longer than she needed. Spoke, and waited. Spoke. Then said goodbye. He couldn't work out why he could never say anything back, or even beg forgiveness. He kept doing it, knowing he couldn't stop himself crying afterward, knowing it was going to hurt every time, because he'd gotten so used to hearing her in the morning when she woke. And now when he called just to hear her it came with apprehension, certainty he'd hear that litany of accusations all over again, but he needed to. Maybe if he did speak, if he did let her know it was him, and he allowed it to happen, she might see he was sincere. She would forgive him. Remember she loved him. He would hand her the dagger and be her slave, be everything Zelena wanted him to be for her if that was what it took.

But he couldn't even bring himself to do that. It took him days to figure out why. That was when he headed south.

His rental car died just inside of Vermont. There were questions about his license. He switched to travel by bus from there -- crowded (good that he was traveling light), slow as sin -- he saw far more of the state than he really ever cared to. It felt ridiculously long for where he was headed, given how short a trip it had been by plane, but he didn't know if he could handle flying again. Not alone.

In Manhattan, the first place that he tried was Neal's old apartment, of course, and he did not expect to find it occupied -- by the Queen's married beau and his family, no less. They offered to leave it to him, which he declined. After a cursory search of the place, he found one or two familiar baubles, things his son held onto from his childhood all these years, somehow, things from their world, and he pocketed those, feeling an uncomfortable tightness that told him to get away, and he left as quickly as his legs could carry him.

Marion seemed especially keen to convince him to stay, at least until he found better accommodations.

He didn't trust it. He got away.

Crossing out into the evening air, he felt a rush of pent emotion and memory. Unkind words said in this very place. Hook's attack and his near death.

Then his actual death.

Then Neal's.

He went numb.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only | Expand All

"Allow that I have little reason to bear ill will toward you in particular. We'll even concede that some good will has been bought. But not enough that you need lie to yourself in thinking you have secured my soul." One of Gold's hands agitatedly passed over his chin. "I have reason enough to want to go back even without need for my magic. Are you willing to abet that with the understanding that I am making no promises that would be foolish of anyone to accept as true in order to see that happen?"

Under the Spell of Shattered Sight, Archie could've torn people emotionally to shreds with just a hint of their own secrets, leveraging their own behaviors against them. One of the skills his parents had taught him was how to read people; they'd intended that skill to be used for thievery, of course, but he'd turned it into something that could help people. With the Spell of Shattered Sight, he would've turned that skill into a weapon that would leave wounds no surgeon could heal. The only reason he hadn't was because the Spell hadn't affected animals and Pongo had had the sense to keep him corralled away from potential victims.

However, that didn't mean Archie couldn't turn that potential weapon into a tool to get straight to the heart of things so Gold could figure out how he wanted to move forward.

"Before I answer that, let me ask you a question: Will you accept my answer as the truth or will you try to argue that I'm lying regardless of my answer? And don't tell me what you think I want to hear. We're both way too old for that."

"The way to prevent that would be to not lie to me, Doctor." Simple, as far as he was concerned. Leave alone that he had a serious problem with doubting good intentions when they were aimed at him, but Archie Hopper was one of the very small few that set that off in him too easily.

"That's not the question, Gold. My question was will you accept what I say is the truth or will you automatically assume I'm lying? Because I fully intend to tell you the absolute truth, but that won't mean anything if you decide I'm lying."

Gold bristled a little but mostly remained composed. "You haven't yet. For now I trust you to do that much." Unsaid: But it only took once for that to be ruined. And that was with many people, not just imps who had a tendency toward doling out hard knocks once people had chosen to put their worst foot forward.

"That's fair."

He stopped scratching Pongo.

"I don't think I can secure your soul or save it or anything like else that. I can try to help you make better decisions to hopefully improve your satisfaction with your life and your relationships, but that's all up to you in the end. Fairies, gods, and who knows what else know my own soul's pretty much forfeit at this point. All I can do is just try to help however I can until Geppetto decides he doesn't need me anymore and Blue's spell ends.

"All I'm offering you the ability to go back to Storybrooke. That's it. No promises on anything else from either one of us. And if you don't want to go back, that's fine. I just want to make sure you'll be okay out here before I go back. Again, it's all up to you."

"I have already said I mean to go back." He sat back. "I don't know if there is much that can be done to make matters better. I don't even know if I care. But there's nothing out here that I want." And everything he didn't.

It might not be missed that he was scanning the area around them.

"You never know until you try," Archie pointed out. He paused as he saw Gold's eyes scanning. "Something wrong?"

Now the question: how crazy would he look if he explained Marion? Was he crazy?

Gold sighed. "Does anyone know where you're staying?"

An odd question to ask.

"Just you. Why?"

"And what of the queen's beau and his wife?" As far as he knew they hadn't come around since the first night. Not noticeably anyway.

"Haven't seen or heard from them since that first day you were admitted. And if they'd asked me then, I didn't have anything in place at the time to give them an answer. I wasn't sure if I'd be staying or, if I did, for how long. That and I must've gone to ten different hotels before I finally got a room that would let me keep Pongo in there long after midnight."

However, the fact that Gold had asked particularly about Robin and Marian tickled something in his brain that had been pushed onto the backburner when Gold had his stroke. He looked at Pongo for a moment before looking back to Gold.

"When you started having your stroke, Pongo moved between us and Marian on the stoop and stayed between us until we'd left the apartment complex behind. He was pretty wound up, so I had to give him the signal that I'd drop the leash if I felt threatened. Does this have something to do with that?"

Gold glanced at him. That...he didn't know if it was a relief to hear someone else noticed, or confirmation that he should be guarded. "Do you think I am insane? Specifically that I should doubt my faculties?"

"No," Archie stated bluntly.

True, Gold had done some things that were rather extreme, but he certainly didn't fit the medical definition of insanity.

"That wasn't Marian." And he didn't know if she would pop up again. But he didn't believe she wouldn't. And now part of him worried that if they stuck out this minute they might be followed.

...Well, Archie didn't know what he'd expected Gold to say, but it certainly wasn't that.

"A spell? Like the one Cora used to look like Regina?"

Without thinking, he started rubbing one of his wrists at the memory of the ropes, the sounds of the ocean and the hidden ship echoing in his ears.

"I don't know, but it's possible." After a fashion. After you get past the fact that if she's who she said she was, then Gold killed her. "...She let herself into my room, the first night."

Cora was dead. Cora was dead. She wasn't going to pull that trick again and leave him to rot on the ship with everyone thinking he was dead and a stranger wearing his face lying in his grave --

Pongo's nose on his neck helped him refocus. Think now, panic later.

"Well, unless she's been following me, she won't know where my room is so we can leave for Storybrooke first thing in the morning. Or we can go back to the hotel, I can get my bag and checkout, and we can start driving once that's done."

Edited 2023-05-19 22:36 (UTC)

He shook his head. "...I would have a better idea if I had my magic." If she were around. But then if Archie was right about Pongo, then the dog might be a good barometer when his own senses were failing him.

She was looking for a way back in to Storybrooke too. If he suddenly vanished back to Maine she might use that as a signal to follow. And with no idea how closely she was watching?

Damnit.

Archie gripped the steering wheel and blew out a breath. He wasn't some adventurer or hero. The major adventures in Storybrooke always seemed to revolve around Emma, Regina, and Gold to a certain extent. He was just an ex-thief who wanted to make up for past mistakes.

"Okay." He started up the engine and pulled out of the hospital parking lot. "Either way, we need to go to the hotel, but if you're that worried, we can start driving right away and just drive through the night. Even if she follows us, she won't be able to get past the town line without the scroll, and I've been keeping that on me."

The last thing they'd needed was to lose their only ticket home.

"I'll leave Pongo in the car with you just in case."

The labored sigh of a very annoyed immortal cursed with sudden mortality. "I hate to say it, but I am under orders to do some resting, not take a long drive. And that will allow time to plan, at the very least."

"Well then, we're still going to the same place unless you want to switch hotels."

Pongo gave an irritated woof as someone cut Archie off.

"For a night at least it will do, and if needed I can put us somewhere else." Which...sounded odd to him to say out loud. That it was just...accepted in his head. This was happening.

And whether he had planned for it or not, he wasn't really alone.

Well, considering that Archie was the one with the scroll, it made sense that they were going to stick together.

Rather than saying anything else, Archie nodded his head as he focused on navigating the streets, sighing with relief when they finally stopped in the parking lot of the hotel and reached his room.

"I hate this city," he muttered.

"It's not high on my list, either." If anything, because of that apartment. Because there were things here he had wanted to share with Belle and his grandson. "What were you expecting of it?"

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject