AUTHOR'S NOTE: If no caught on from the last chapter, Sage is sort of based off of Bambi. I know that is a ridiculous fairytale to base a character off of (considering the fact that Bambi is a deer while Sage is a human being), but the snow scene where Sage's parents abandoned her was suppose to parallel when Bambi's mother got shot. Remember, when Bambi was just like "Mother...Mother!". Yeah, that's what Sage did...sorry for breaking your heart and ruining your day. This chapter was not edited.
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CHAPTER TWENTY THREE; A CHASE THROUGH NEW YORK
"Do any of these names mean anything to you?"
Three out of the four person group ― Emma, Sage, and Gold ― were all bending their backs as they intensely stared at the doorbell intercom that was attached to the metal gate that was inside a apartment building. They had landed in New York City, specifically Manhattan, early in the morning and almost immediately started their search to find the missing Baelfire. Now that Sage was in the Big Easy and saw how thousands of people lived here, she found the task of searching for Gold's kid to now be extremely difficult.
Before the curse broke, when Sage was a thieving criminal and working for Rumpelstiltskin, one of her jobs was to find people that either wronged Rumple, stole from him, or didn't hold up their end of a deal. When she did find them, well, that was were the nasty part came into play. There were a few different ways those situations went, but most of them ended with either they keeping up with their deal (after a bit of blackmail and intimidation from Sage), or they would be taken' out (by either Rumple or Sage). But it's been years since she's been the Dark One's employee and as much as it pains her to say, she's a little bit rusty.
New York City was a whole different ballpark though. It wasn't the Enchanted Forest, where royalty bathed in jewels and knights were galloping around every corner, or Wonderland, where the most absurd creatures roamed about and the strangest people resided, or even Storybrooke, the quaint seaside town in Maine where everybody knew everybody. New York City was bustling with people, foreigners, speedy cars, and buildings that reached the pale sky (they weren't as glamorize or as elegant as castles, but they did make your jaws drop in slight awe).
And the person they were searching for― Baelfire ― was't some low-life who stupidly made a deal with the nefarious Dark One. Baelfire was the spawn of Rumpelstiltskin, abandoned and thrown through a mystical portal to a completely new world. Finding him had been Gold's mission for the past two or three centuries. Sage could only imagine how hard it could be; to be thrown into a land without magic and to grow up being surrounded by strangers without any family.
Gold glanced over at the ten-year-old, who was on the other side of the room and examining the wall with mail shelves, and answered: "Well, names are what I traffic in, but sadly, no."
Emma suddenly pointed at one of the apartment cards, the only one that had a complex number, but no name, "Here's your boy."
"Or, it could be vacant." Gold sighed in frustration.
"You might traffic in names and magic, but I traffic in finding people who don't want to be found ― " The blonde explained, probably reminiscing about her days as a bails-bond person, "― and those sort of folks don't like to advertise their whereabouts."
"She's right, Rumple." agreed Sage, who was stuffing her hands into her coat pockets. "When I was on the run from Cora and I had to stayed at motels, I payed extra for my name not to be shared."
Confidently, Emma reached over and pressed the white buzzer, "U.P.S. package for four-oh-seven."
The person on the other end didn't responded, but instead, hanged up. All was confusingly silent, until Henry spoke up, "Maybe you should have said FedEx."
"I doubt some people discriminate when it comes to mailing services." Sage muttered, blankly staring at the apartment intercom.
Suddenly, a loud rattling came from outside, specifically coming from the metal fire escape that twisted around the side of the apartment building. The four rushed outside and onto the rain-drenched sidewalk, only to see a man in a black hoodie anxiously climbing down the fireplace.
"That favor you owe me – this is it. Get him to talk to me." Gold was beginning to panic at this point, his only chance to reconcile with his son was slipping from his bony fingers. He needed Sage and Emma to fulfill their end of their agreement. He glanced down at his crippled leg, eyes wide. "I... I can't run."
Sage gulped, glancing between her former boss and the hood-covered man that was breaking into a frantic run. Her and Emma shared a brief nodded, before the brunette exclaimed: "Watch Henry! We'll be right back!"
With that, both woman began running after the man with all of their might. While the man did get a faster head start, Sage and Emma were quickly catching up. Either they were extremely fast runner or the man was losing energy and getting slower. Sage, by instinct, not nature, was always a fast runner; she had learnt how to run that fast when she was running from the Queen's knights chasing after her, when she was a teenager and stealing from street markets, and when she was running from all the problems appearing in her life.
Emma and Sage ran across busy streets (they were beyond lucky they didn't get run over), and was still able to keep the man in eye-view. Both of them jumped over a chain fence in order to follow the man, determined to catch him and bring him to Gold. Sage was internally grateful she had decided to wear her converse as opposed to Emma, who was wearing boots with small heels on them.
After a minute, the man was sprinting down a back alley. Both girls stilled, finding themselves at a crossroads. If they went down a narrow alleyway, that cut through two buildings, they would reach him quicker. So, that's one they did. Both woman ran down the alley― Emma in front of Sage. Unfortunately, Emma forcefully collided into the man, both of them sliding onto the wet, cobble pathway. Sage, unable to stop herself in time, tumbled into Emma as the blonde was falling down.
The brunette flipped a few times, before roughly landing on the road, her body sliding slightly across the water-moist. She winced loudly, a burning sensation running up her right leg. When she looked down, her narrowed eyes landed on the large, bloody gash that was residing on her knee. The fall was apparently so strong it had cut through the denim fabric of Sage's skinny jeans.
"Neal?"
Sage's head shot up at the sound of Emma's voice, genuine shock dripping off that single word. Neal? Who the hell was Neal? The brunette followed her friend's eyes and saw that they were locked onto the mysterious man, whose face they could now clearly see. The man, who looked equally as surprised as Emma's was, gave a strained smile. "Emma?"
Everyone, including Sage who was limping slightly, because of the burning pain in her leg, stood up from their splattered landing on the floor. The man, who's name was apparently Neal, gave a joyful grin to the blonde. "I don't understand. What are you doing here?"
"What am I doing here?" Emma repeated, incredulously. She shook her head, stubbornly. "I'm not answering anything until you tell me the truth. Are you Gold's son?"
Neal furrowed his brows, "What are you talking about? Who's Gold?" His attention finally turned over to Sage, whose presence was ignored through-out this entire conversation. "And who's she?"
"I'm Sage, now who the hell are you?" The brunette exclaimed, becoming overly-defensive and very overly-protective over Emma. She was clearly not pleased to see this man, whoever he was.
"You played me. You're from there. You played me, and he played me, you both played me!"
Emma looked like she was on the verge of having a full-blown panic attack; her green eyes were wide with panic, her body was trembling slightly, and her panting had developed into hyperventilating. With no idea on what the hell was going on or why Emma was freaking out so much, Sage very gently and cautiously put a hand on the Savior's shoulder, staring at her worryingly. Neal was also very alarmed by Emma's hysteria. "Emma, slow down! What are you talking about? Who's Gold?"
"Your father!" blurted out Emma, making the older man become rigid in fear. "Rumpelstiltskin."
"He's here?"
"Why else would I be in New York?"
Neal soon grew furious, his eyes blazing with anger, "You brought him to me? Why would you do that?"
"Hey! I am the only one allowed to be angry here!" shouted Emma, finally shutting up Neal and his accusations. Her voice grew both angry and strained with a hint of desperation, "Did you know who I was, where I was from, the whole time? Was this just some sort of sick, twisted plan? Did you even care about me at all? I want to know! I want the truth – all of it!"
"Fine! We got to get off the street. We can't do it here. We're out in the open. I spent a lifetime running from that man. I'm not going to let him catch me." Neal distressingly looked around, as if the solution to all of his problems was wandering around, awaiting to be taken'. Sage was still be treating like an empty entity, just standing there and being invisible. She almost didn't want to say anything else, too intrigued with the mysterious relationship between Emma and Neal. "There's a bar down the street. We can talk there."
"We're am not drinking with you!" argued the blonde, now speaking on behalf of Sage. Honestly, the brown-haired woman didn't necessarily feel a bar was the appropriate place to talk about their current situation. "Whatever you're going to tell me, tell me now!"
"No, bar's better. Don't worry. You can keep yelling at me when we get there." With that, the older man walked off, expecting both woman to follow him as he strolled down the alleyway, as if him and Emma haven't been yelling at each other for the past ten minutes. Emma, extremely annoyed and frustrated, let out a groan, before stomping off after him. Sage reluctantly followed them both, more confused than ever.
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"Three beers, please."
The bartender noticed the tension that was swirling around the circle of three; Neal had causally sat down at the bar counter, twiddling his thumbs, while Emma wasn't even sitting down, but instead she was shifting on her feet anxiously, looking like she was about to explode in a couple of moments if she didn't get the answers she wanted. Sage, on the other hand, was sitting down silently, feeling too awkward to intervene on their former-lover's spat. Once the bartender realized that these three were having some sort of disagreement, he quickly got them their pints of beer and walked over to the other side of the room.
The sports bar that Neal had brought them too was nice and large, with little to no people around. The people who were in the room were either quietly drinking their alcohol or playing pool, too preoccupied with their own agendas to pay attention to the three fairy tales that were at the bar.
After a moment of uncomfortable silence, Neal tilted his head around and looked over at the brunette, who had made an effort to not speak and to just listen. "Um, who are you, exactly?"
Sage finally looked up and adjusted herself as she sat on a wooden bar stool. There was some obvious ill-feelings being spread through one another, causing Sage to be quite content with her being silent and unknown during this entire conversation. "I'm Sage Chamberlain. I'm a friend of Emma's. I used to work for your father."
He rose his brows, "You worked for him?"
"In a manner of speaking, yes." Sage shrugged nonchalantly, tracing the rim of her beer pint. "Wasn't exactly my best form of judgement."
Emma interrupted them, dismissing their introduction and moving onto the problem at hand, "Did you know who I was when we met?" Her question was directed towards the man of the hour, the man who Sage knew nothing about.
"If I had, I wouldn't have gone near you."
"What a romantic." thought Sage as she looked away and rolled her eyes, bitterly shaking her head at the man. Just from pure perceptiveness, she could already tell that there was probably a justified reason to why Emma was not happy to see this man and why she never mentioned him.
The blonde in the middle scoffed, obviously not believing what was coming out of her former friend's mouth, "Come on."
"Come on? Come on, what? I was in hiding. I came here to get away from all that crap." explained Neal and a small bit of understandings had seeped its way into her heart. Abandonment, especially at a young age, tends to make you never want to see your parents ever again. Sage could only imagine running away from your father, who just so happens to be the malevolent Dark One.
"So, if you didn't know, then you were just using me." Emma harshly accused, her voice being choked with up-roaring emotion. Sage hated seeing Emma like this, when usually Emma was rather confident and strong-headed. This man from her past was creating cracks in the walls around her heart. Sage could some-what relate with that. "You just needed someone to take the fall for all the watches that you stole."
"I wasn't using you." He shook his head, "When we met, I didn't know. I found out."
"How?"
"When I went to sell the watches, I ran into a friend of yours ― August."
Both woman took a sharp, inaudible inhale of air, their heads turning and their eyes meeting one another in a stony, wide-eyed stare. August, the man who had swooped into town on his mysterious motorcycle and a hidden typewriter, was one of their closest confidant, a good friend. Ever since the curse broke, by Emma and Henry's true love kiss, August hasn't been seen by either one of them, oddly. Emma didn't take this mention of their old friend as a good thing, "You left me and let me go to prison, because Pinocchio told you to?"
"Emma..."
"I loved you!" Emma exclaimed and it seemed like out of the trio, Sage was the only surprised one. Emma grew up as an abandoned orphan, the same way that Sage did, causing her to run away from any opportunity to love someone, but now was the moment that the brunette realized who exactly made her that way. It was Neal, the man who apparently left her and let her go to prison for him. Despite his intentions, Neal carved a scar into Emma's heart that could never go away, no matter how long its been.
The older man looked down at the bar table, muttering, "I was trying to help you."
"By letting me go to jail."
"By getting you home." Neal insisted, defending himself.
"You did it in a pretty shitty way." Sage said under her breath, broodily sipping on her cold beer.
Emma hoped onto her bar stool and slumped down, "Are you telling me, that us meeting was a coincidence? Because how the hell did that happen? If it wasn't in your plan, or your father's?"
"Think about it. He wanted you to break the curse. Us meeting – that could have stopped it." He shrugged, nonchalantly, but there was a mask of hope on his face, hope that perhaps Emma could understand why he did what he did. "Maybe it was fate."
"You believe in that?" Emma rose her brows, dismissing the idea.
The man paused, before leaning forward and beginning his explanation, "You know, there's not a ton about my father that I remember that doesn't suck. But he used to tell me that there are no coincidences. Everything that happens, happens by design, and there's nothing we can do about it. Forces greater than us conspire to make it happen. Fate, destiny, whatever you want to call it. The point is maybe we met for a reason. Maybe something good came from us being together."
That's when all the puzzle-pieces came together in her head, rearranging and clicking into place like pure perfection. Sage started to think quickly, revising all of her old memories, "Emma gave birth to Henry while she was in jail...Neal sent her to jail." Once realization finally dawned on her, Sage quietly gasped and stared at the back of the blonde's head, feeling her heart stutter. "Something good coming from them.".
Emma also changed dramatically once the words left her old lover's mouth, thinking the exact same thing as Sage was. As tears burned in her eyes, she pursed her lips and shook her head, "No. Not that I can think of. I just went to jail. That's it. Doesn't matter now. I'm over it. And you."
Despite Emma's intense and obvious hostilely against the man, Neal still chuckled and gestured to the chain that hung around the blonde's neck, "Why do you wear the, uh, key chain I got you?"
Pausing for a split second, Emma eventually yanked the chain off of her and lazily threw it in front of him, "To remind myself never to trust someone again. Come on. Sage and I made a deal with your father we'd bring you to him."
"You two made a deal with him?"
"Yeah, we did." Sage sharply snapped, avoiding all eye-contact with both people. Abrupt anger was beginning to bubble up inside of her, threatening to explode, and if she didn't get the hell out of this bar, she was going to. "We're holding up our end."
"No, guys, you both don't have to. You two know that."
Sage hissed, "We know."
"Okay, so this should be really easy for you two. Tell him that you guys lost me, tell him neither one of you can't find me. You guys do that, neither of you have to see me again." begged Neal, who was on a verge of outright desperation.
The brunette clenched her teeth and looked away, her brown eyes burning into the wooden wall near her. At this point, both her and Neal were beginning to royally piss her off. Sage tilted her head, her cold eyes meeting his brown ones. Brown eyes, the same as Henry. Now, she saw the resemblance. "One of these days, you're gonna have to stop running, stop being a coward, and face up to your past otherwise it's going to bite you in the ass and hurt you like hell." She held up her hands in defense, walking towards the door as the former couple watched her go. "I'm not lying for either one of you."
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Sage angrily stormed down the sidewalk of Manhattan, feeling a fiery rage stir up inside of her. Despite her quick speed and cold-hard expression that was plastered onto her face, the New Yorkers passing her were able to avoid bumping shoulders with her as they walked. She kept running a hand through her hair, an irritation habit she had picked up years ago. When she agreed (well, technically, forced to since it was apart of their stupid deal) to come to New York in order to search for Baelfire, she knew it wasn't going to be easy.
Deals with the Dark One never was easy, but Sage thought that Baelfire would just be some random person in the sea of New York, not the ex-lover of the Savior and possibly (most likely) the father of Henry. The royal Charming family, that Sage was technically considered to be apart of, was more screwed up than originally thought to be. If Neal was Rumpelstiltskin's son and Henry's father, then that meant that Rumple was Henry's paternal grandfather.
A heavy, stress-filled sigh left her mouth, her chest heaving as she once against messed around with her hair. Manhattan's spring breeze, while reassuring and cooling, was whipping her hair around in different ways. Frustrated with both the weather and the new-found news that had been revealed, Sage stilled her movement and leaned against a nearby brick building, her jacket-covered back pressed against the bumpy texture.
Panting, Sage arched her head back and stared up at the baby-blue sky above. How the hell was she suppose to explain this to both Gold and Henry? Two people she had known for a very long time, both of them meaning different things to her. Just as she was trying to wrap her head around both her thoughts and feelings, Emma came jogging up to her, "Sage! Wait, just...let me explain!"
Sage stubbornly pushed herself off the wall and continued her rage-fueled stride down the sidewalk. She knew that Emma was following her by the loud click-clack of her heeled boots, "Sage! Please, let me explain!"
Without a hint of hesitation, Sage whipped around and faced Emma, pointing an accused finger at the blonde, who looked like she was waiting for Sage to yell at her, which Sage gladly did. "How could you? You lied to me, to Henry!"
"Sage ―"
"He's Henry's father, isn't he?" Sage and Emma intensely looked at each other, the brunette's harsh glare acting as sharp daggers. "Answer me, Emma!"
"Yes!" Emma chocked out, her eyes pleading with Sage to understand. But right now, Sage was beyond that point and too furious to act like her usual self. "Listen, Neal, h-he broke my heart, left, and sent me to prison. It was there, I found out I was pregnant. Neal doesn't even know ―"
"You told Henry he's father was dead! You told Henry he was a damn firefighter who died heroically!" yelled Sage, shaking her head in disbelief. "That's what you told me too!"
Emma reluctantly stated, "He's a bad guy, Sage, I didn't want Henry to get hurt."
"Bullshit! Don't give me that crap, Em!" The brunette shouted, angry and hot tears filling her eyes. "You didn't want you to get hurt again! Listen, I get it; this man broke your heart, ditched you, and then left you in prison. I understand why you wouldn't want the reopen that wound, but it was a damn selfish thing to lie to Henry about his own father, to lie me about him! You don't think Henry has a right to know his own father?" When Emma stayed silent, Sage just sighed and shook her head, "I'm not lying for you or for Neal, or Baelfire, or whatever he calls himself! Either you're telling Gold and Henry, or I will."
With that, Sage turned her back and walked away, leaving Emma alone with only her thoughts.