all_inclusive | and straight on til morning

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and straight on til morning

The deep level of mistrust that David holds for his current predicament knows no bounds.

For one, finding himself aboard the Jolly Roger with a pirate, the evil queen intent on making his wife's life an unhappy hell, and his distressed daughter? Not good. Watching Rumplestiltskin evaporate into thin air and doing god knows what where he can't see him? Even more not good. Walking through the Captain's cabin door and stumbling when his sea legs give out from under him because there's no more ocean to compensate for? Yeah, that part is what David's really trying to get used to.

He doesn't have his sword because he'd been looking for a map and didn't think he'd need it to defend himself, but Hook had apparently rigged himself up a portal that led from the seas outside Neverland to this strange building. He'd arrived just as a party was breaking up and he'd watched odd people in mad costumes filter out through the hotel -- though some people went through doors and never came back -- and try as he might, the best answer that he could get out of anyone was this and only this: Nexus Hotel.

He thought he'd seen a familiar face or two, but they were only passing by and wouldn't stop to answer his questions, which is how he's found himself sitting at the bar, chocolate milk in hand and staring forward as he tries to think up a plan.

He will always, always find his family, but sometimes it seems like the universe truly enjoys testing him.

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"I'm very sorry," Charming offers, wishing that he hadn't asked while wishing he could do something for her. "You sound like you could use your very own cup of chocolate milk," he says, giving her a half-smile as he pats the stool beside him. "If you don't mind my company."

"I think I could handle that," Fran smiled and took the seat opposite him. "The milk and the company. I don't really like being alone much. It's really, really overrated."

She winced a little and rubbed at a spot just on the side of the bump. "Ow, okay. I know you're getting all scrunched in there."

Charming can't help his fond smile, thinking of how Snow had spoken to Emma in the last days of the pregnancy. "When my wife was pregnant, I used to tell our child stories of conquest and brave knights and princesses," he says. "She used to like them." Not so much anymore.

Fran rubbed idly at the spot. "I've never really done much of that. I mean, I think about him or her, I was writing down a few things in a journal, things about the world that were gone and I didn't want to forget. But I never really talked to it."

She supposed she should; with everything else they'd had to talk about, to figure out, to plan for instead, it hadn't been high on the priority list. Fran knew that Stu would have laid down his life for her, and for her baby, knew he would done his best to stand in as father. She'd just never felt comfortable asking for more than he wanted to give freely.

"Do you have any names?" he asks, because that had been days of his life when Snow had been pregnant. He would think up names and then would think up more, always wanting to find the perfect fit for the child they'd yet to meet.

"No," she answered softly. "I wanted to wait. To see if he, or she, survived." There was a pause while her mind turned that over a few times. "Probably why I haven't spent a whole lot of time talking to it, or even planning for it, now that I think about it. The pregnancy was just...one more complication in an already messed up world."

She raised her eyes to David's. "You probably think I'm the worst mother-to-be in the world now, huh?"

"No," he promises gently, swallowing hard while he tries not to throw comparisons up to make himself feel worse. He reaches over to lightly grasp her fingers with his, wanting to give her (and himself) a little reassurance. "I think you're being practical is all. Sometimes, people have to do that."

"My life was all about practical before I came here," Fran nodded and returned the soft pressure to her fingers with a squeeze of her own. "But I don't suppose anyone watches everyone they've ever known die and come away from it the same person. I've just had to adjust to being a survivor for so long, I don't know how to be anything else now. I don't know how to relax enough to try and be me again."

He doesn't want to talk about his own life, but he thinks about what the curse did to his sensibilities and how it changed how he looked at the world. "What about here? It doesn't seem like I had to step over too many people to get here. Does that mean people stay alive here?"

Fran smiled weakly. "Yes, thankfully. The plague from our world didn't follow us here. One of the doors I opened went into my old bedroom in Maine, but I made sure that door was blocked off so no one else could go through it. No one," she paused and cleared her throat. "No one should have to die like that."

"I'll make sure not to go there," he promises, though he's been itching to try every door that he can and if hers leads him back to Neverland, then he's willing to open it and take his chances. "Are you going to have the baby here, then?"

"I don't know if I have a choice. I mean, I went through that one door and it was my bedroom from...from before I relocated to somewhere else. If that's the only place I can go back to? Probably not the best choice since I don't really think playing midwife to myself is a skill I want to try. There's that," Frannie took a sip from the milk in front of her. "And then there's no guarantee that he or she is immune to the superflu the way I am."

"Maybe she or he is?" Charming offers, finding that he falls back to his faith when all else seems impossible. "I know what it's like to lose your child, though, and I can assure you that you have every right to worry. They're your precious baby."

"We finally got a doctor a few weeks before I came here. He said the odds were about even," Fran told him, rubbing at a spot just below her ribs where a little foot kept poking out. She winced just a little. "There were a set of twins already born after...they didn't make it."

"I'm sorry," Charming offers, wishing that he could do something for her. "What about here? Have you seen a doctor here?" Maybe the answer would be the same, but there was just a glimmer of a chance that it might be different.

"I haven't even thought to ask if there's one here," Fran admitted, a little stunned by the revelation. "It's strange, how quickly you stop thinking about things like that when they suddenly disappear. I should probably check to find out though. I mean, I have two months to go, but...," she trailed off and shrugged her shoulders. "I'm sure the baby wouldn't have the same problems here. Larry said no one here was sick and they would have been if he carried the superflu here with him."

"Maybe you should inspect to see whether there's a doctor?" he offers gently, not wanting to tell her what to do. "Maybe there'll be a pleasant surprise for you? Maybe there's medicine that can help. I know where I come from, there's a lake whose water can heal all wounds," he says. "Maybe if nothing else works, we can go there. There might be something left at Lake Gnostos."

"I'll ask on the hotel stationary, I think. I've seen people talking on it and it might be easier than just stopping others in the hall and asking for their resumes," Fran smiled. "You seem to know a lot about calming down pregnant women. Is it an innate skill or one you learned?"

He's pretty new here, so he's not entirely sure what stationary has to do with any of this. "I learned it when my wife was pregnant with our child. Snow was fairly calm through the pregnancy, but there were a few moments I had to pull out the charm."

Fran nodded because it wasn't exactly unexpected. She knew from experience that men with no practical experience tended to treat the mound of a pregnancy like the baby was going to just burst out of it at any minute.

"Is your wife here? Or your child? I know some have been lucky enough to have family join them here."

"No, but they're both where I need to be," he says, which is where the passion to return lies. "I need to get back to Snow and Emma before they think I've abandoned them." It's the last thing he wants and with Henry's safety on the line, it's doubly important.

"And you haven't found a door back to them?" It was a question, but she said it like a statement. If he had found a way home, he wouldn't sound as worried as he was. "I know I should want to go back, but part of me doesn't. I don't want to know what's waiting for me there."

"No, not yet," he admits, which is hard to say, but he knows that it won't be a permanent thing. He'll find a door back to them because he always finds them and they'll find Henry. They have to. It's practically the family crest. "Maybe this can be your new home?"

Frannie thought of what waited for her on the other side of the door she'd come though. An interminable wait for a man who may or may not (probably not) return to her, death, plague, and a few remaining friends. "It would be a safer world for the baby, I think, so maybe I can hope for that."

"If you do give birth and I'm still stuck here," he gets out with a miserable little stressed smile, "I'll have to drop by and make sure I get you a gift for the baby."

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ogunquit_girl - 2013-11-18 01:04 (UTC) - Expand

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