Emma, David, Mary Margaret, and I in one car. Belle and Rumpelstiltskin in the other. We were driving towards the town line with Pandora's box. We needed to find out how Pan had controlled his shadow from inside the box. That shouldn't be possible.
When we got to the town line, everyone got out and Emma stopped Rumpelstiltskin who was about to walk across the line.
"Uh-uh," she said. "I'm doing this."
"There's no magic beyond the town line. If I release Pan out there, he's powerless to fight and I can retain my memory."
"It's not about that," Emma told him. "There's no magic over there and all due respect, the real world is my expertise. We're gonna deal with Pan on my terms."
"He is my father."
"It's my hunch. If I fail, you're more than welcome to pick up the pieces."
"Emma," Mary Margaret said. "Be careful."
Rumpelstiltskin unsealed the box and placed it over the town line as Pan was released. Emma aimed her gun at him but he only returned the move with a dazed and confused look.
"Mom?"
"What?!" Emma asked.
"What are you waiting for?" Rumpelstiltskin asked. "Shoot him."
"Don't!" Pan exclaimed. "Please, I'm Henry! Pan... he switched our bodies."
"You expect me to believe that?" Emma scoffed.
"Don't listen to him," Gold told her. "This is one of his tricks."
"No, it's not!" Pan tried again. "He did it right before Mr. Gold captured me in the box, I swear." He took a step towards Emma.
Emma pointed the gun at him, "Don't come any closer."
"Shoot him!"
"Maybe he's telling the truth," I said. "You have to admit, Henry hasn't been acting himself. There's something wrong. He acted like he had never been to Storybrooke before, and barely recognized his own storybook."
"Maybe that's what he wants you to believe," Gold said. "If he steps over the line, we're all dead."
"All right," Emma turned to Pan. "If you really are Henry, prove it. Tell me something only Henry would know."
"I-I got trapped in the mines. I tried blowing up the well. I like hot cocoa with cinnamon!" He tried.
"This proves nothing," Gold stated.
"He's right, Emma," Mary Margaret came in. "Henry could've told Pan all this in Neverland."
"Pan might know facts," Emma said, "but life is made up of more than that- there are moments. He can't possible know all of them. The first time you and I connected, you remember that? Not met, but connected."
"Yeah," Pan smiled. "It was in my castle. Right after you came to Storybrooke."
"And what did you tell me?"
"That I knew why you gave me up. Because you wanted to give me my best chance."
Emma's face softened as she lowered the gun and hugged Henry.
"Mom," he hugged back.
"It is Henry," Emma assured everyone. She turned to Rumpelstiltskin. "Promise you're not going to incinerate us when we step over the line?"
He nodded and they walked back over. Henry hugged Mary Margaret and David as Emma hands the box back to Rumpelstiltskin.
"I'm sorry I doubted you," he told Henry. "And I'm sorry I put you in this box in the first place."
"It's okay," Henry replied. "I would have done the same thing."
"Come on," Emma put her arm around Henry. "Let's go."
"But," I said, "if Henry is out here, where's Pan?"
We headed towards Regina's crypt, where "Henry" and Regina were hiding out. If Pan was inside Regina's crypt with all those magic spells, this would not end well.
"Regina's still not answering," Emma said as we walked quickly across the graveyard, the crypt not in sight yet.
"When we find Pan," Henry said, still not in his own body, "remember he's still in my body. So if you have to throw fire or something, at least avoid the face."
"I'll do my best," Rumpelstiltskin said to Henry.
When we approached the vault, Hook, Neal, and Tinker Bell were already there, standing outside.
Neal was the first to speak,
"Is it really you?" he asked Henry.
"Dad," Henry said and they hugged.
"Did you find the shadow?" David asked.
"No yet," Tink replied.
"We'll be ready for him when we do," Hook said, holding up the coconut candle used to entrap the shadow on Neverland.
"I think it's Pan we should be concerned about now," Rumpelstiltskin said. "Why are we still up here?"
"It's locked up tight," Neal told him.
"Really?" Rumpelstiltskin reached out his hand to try and use magic to open the door. Nothing happened.
"Told you," Neal said.
"Fair enough," he replied. "This is going to take some time."
I didn't realize I had zoned out or was absentmindedly twirling the gem necklace that prevented my magic when Gold said he had gotten the opens. When we walked down the secret stairs in the crypt, Mary Margaret rushed over to an unconscious Regina on the floor.
I looked around the rooms in the crypt, coming back in and telling everyone,
"Pan's gone."
"We're clear down here!" Emma yelled up to the heroes that stayed about the stairs. Rumpelstiltskin waved his hand over Regina and she woke up.
"What...what happened?" Regina asked sleepily as her eyes opened.
"It's Henry," Emma said. "Somehow Pan switched bodies with him."
"And I fell for it," Regina sighed, disappointed in herself clearly.
"We all did," Mary Margaret said.
"I just wanted to believe what he was saying so badly I missed all the signs. I just wanted to believe he still needed me to be his mother."
"I still do," Henry, in Pan's body, said.
"Henry?" They hugged.
"So what exactly did Pan come down here to get?" I asked.
Rumpelstiltskin holds up a hand using magic. His hand stopped at an open box.
"Please tell me you didn't keep it down here," he turned to Regina.
"Where else would I keep it?" Regina asked.
"What is it?" Emma said. "What did Pan take?"
"The curse. The one that brought everyone here in the first place. Why would Pan even want the curse? I already cast it?" Regine spoke up.
"And I broke it," Emma added.
"Well," Rumpelstiltskin said. "That doesn't mean you can't cast it again. And this time, without your parents' true love woven in, even you would be powerless to break it."
"I don't understand," David said. "We're already in this land."
"What exactly would casting the curse in Storybrooke do now?" I asked.
"Everyone will forget who they are," Regina said. "Time will stand still. And Pan will be completely in charge."
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