A Curse Upon Thee 2-37B

Laughter bounced off the baked ground, a high musical shriek from the fairy by the treeline blending in with the over-loud cackle from the pirate right in front of him.

Red.

It fell to the floor, dozens of copper-colored strands fluttering down over his face. Each one drifted lazily through the air, landing in front of him as Finn’s boots hit hard clay.

The heat of the not-so-near miss took a second to land, Finn grabbing hard at the side of his head. Motherf— Something slicked between his fingers, a line of wet edging his temple as clumps of hair fell free.

My hair… 

A growl slipped out of him. “Motherfucker!”

“So close!” Finn stared at the laughing pirate as the red-tinged hook rose to nearly hide the pirate’s face entirely. “A little more and the legend of the Black Hook would have another tale added to it!”

“The Black Hook…” Blue eyes narrowed down to slits as Finn straightened up, one hand still pressed over the bleeding bald strip on the side of his skull; a hasty undercut, courtesy of the worst barber on the Seven Seas. Ruby’s gonna laugh her ass off when she sees it. “Nobody calls you that. You’re not gonna make me believe anyone calls you that.”

“Some do.”

“They don’t.”

“They will!” Hook came in again, dust exploding from behind him.

Finn rushed to meet the oddly fast pirate, juryoku snapping tight across his calves as he launched himself forward. The pirate went low like he always did, a heavy leather boot sweeping through the space where Finn’s knees lived.

Finn hopped it with a grunt and immediately came back down, twisting his hips to drop an armored heel straight down in an axe kick.

One aimed right at the pirate’s skull.

Hook refused to dodge, silver curve spinning up.

Armored toe met magicked steel, the collision screaming with the sound of metal as Hook caught the kick with his hook. The shriek ground through Finn’s teeth, sparks screaming off the point of contact as clay and loose stone burst apart under both men — fractured fissures spreading wide past Hook’s own boots.

For a single stupid second, Finn was frozen on one leg, the other hanging in the air; eyes on the man holding his kick like a waiter would a tray. Nani the f-

Silver spun higher, unlocking from Finn’s foot and blurring right on a direct path toward the soft meat of Finn’s throat.

The tip of the hook kissed air an inch off his jaw, a half-inch of fuzz shaved off the black fur of his collar. “Just!” Finn spun where he stood, Cursed Energy packing down his arm. “Give!” Fist readied, red fire flared hot and mean across his knuckles. “Up!”

Once again, Hook didn’t even bother with the concept of dodging.

“Are you mad? To think a man like the Great Captain Hook—!” Cora’s enchantment’s proved its worth again, Finn’s blow caught by a bare palm as the air cracked around them both with a shockwave of red heat and thrown dust. “—even knows the word surrender?” 

Knuckles grinding hard against a hard hand that refused to give even an inch, that stolen engine in the pirate’s chest only flaring brighter as steam poured off him harder. Plumes of white almost shrouded Hook completely as he fought on; the man a kettle on the edge of whistling.

“I don’t know, I didn’t use that word! What I said was-” Finn tore his fist back and swung out, a kidney punch catching ‘the great captain’ in the stomach.

“Give up!” Slaughter Demon slashed in a reverse grip, the blade turning aside the pirate’s quick counter. A moment of victory only lasted for that long, Finn shouting as a single eye slammed shut against the sparks that flew back into it. F-!

One eye shut, Finn swung out wild with his dagger — simply to ward Hook off.

"You're cooking, man." Finn caught the curved weapon on the edge of his blade and shoved back, buying himself barely a foot of space for a breath of air. “Those… those hearts she put into you, they’re not the only sacrifice here!” 

The sorcerer ducked a wild slash in return, the too-sharp Hook claiming another chunk off the other side of his collar. “Think about this!” Finn snapped his head back up, black fur spinning off into the rising mist of the rapidly refilling lake. “You really wanna die for that old bitch?”

"For her?" The laugh came out with steam on it as Finn swayed back. "Perish the thought, lad. I'd not spend a fingernail on the witch. But to kill that crocodile, I’d spend the whole of me other hand!" With that, Hook spun with a snarl, his eponymous weapon carving the air in a sweeping slash.

Croc- Finn batted the pirate’s arm way, follow-up strike caught on the edge of his dagger. “You mean Gold?” Steel rang against steel as Finn pushed forward, both him and Hook flaring red with near every blow. The pirate didn’t even bother to answer, teeth grit as he just swung and slashed for all he was worth. “Why do you even call him that? Not like he has scales!”

Still no answer, not as Hook kept coming harder; a rush of steam surrounding him as both fighters clinched and fought without space as a buffer. Slaughter Demon turned aside a thrust only for a knee to catch Finn’s hip and an elbow to clip Hook on the way around, a boot to the pirate's thigh for his trouble. Language turned from steel and blood to forearms and elbows, no reach to trade blows larger than that.

Which meant — “Goddamn it! — Hook was just close enough for a headbutt, the pirate stumbling back with blood pouring from his nose.

Finn only had a moment to laugh before light shattered against shadow far off to the right of them, only to crack again and again and again and again. It was only when and then the sixth one arrived late that Emma Swan’s voice sounded out in a scream.

“Emma!”

Snow’s voice tore across the lakebed, forcing Finn’s head sideways — No! — to catch sight of familiar red leather leave the ground entirely, the woman in it turmbling through the air as a wad of purple caught her low and folded her over it. 

Emma Swan slammed hard to the ground, crumpling against clay as the sword tumbled from her grip; shine disappearing to simple steel.

“Emma!”

It took Finn almost a full second to realize the second scream was his own, a sharp crack of air immediately after forcing his attention back down to earth.

Wood creaked in the basin.

And then thunder.

Snow drew back her bow again, a new arrow strung and lightning crackling on the head as her fingers pulled back on storm-gray fletching. Before Finn could so much as blink, the queen let it fly.

A bolt of yellow screamed across the lakebed, the thin afterimage stuck in Finn’s eyes for the heartbeat it lasted. The witch it was aimed at didn’t even bother to look, ring-laden hand raised with a thick shield of that same purple smoke erupting from her palm to keep her safe.

It failed.

The thunderclap rattled the air as the arrow exploded against the shield, gold light crawling through the purple in jagged veins as the old witch stumbled and finally made a noise she would have called undignified.

Huh.  The smile on his face was all his own. She screams.

She wasn’t alone in that.

The sound from Hook was louder than he’d ever heard from the man, free hand clutching his chest as the red of the glow dimmed.

Finn blinked. A window.

He didn’t hesitate, no reason to. One foot planted back, the sorcerer drove his hips forward and past the nonexistent guard — a brutal hook thrown straight up into the side of the pirate’s open jaw.

Something gave as Hook’s eyes went wide, teeth clicking shut hard enough to hear for the split-second before another pair of boots left the clay beneath them. Before Hook landed, Finn was already on the move, his own boots hammering across the gushing geyser slowly but steadily returning the lake to what it once was.

“ANGRY!” His fists came together in front of his chests, red flaring and compressing between both sets of knuckles until it wrapped around his right hand — all the force of a hand grenade ready and waiting to be thrown.

And Finn did just that with a punch at empty air. “EMBER!”

The compressed ball of cursed fire ripped free from his knuckles, shape shifting as it flew to form a proper impression of his fist. Wind dragged behind it, the flame launched across the clearing like a missile on a straight path for the Witch of Hearts.

That witch spun.

Purple silks swirled around her, face a mask of fury as both hands came together.

Two hands and the whole world in front of him vanished into purple darkness, a wave of shadow rolling from her hands wide as a house and nearly as large. His fist of fire vanished into it, eaten, swallowed, gone to nothing — Finn already mid-sprint as the wave just kept coming.

It was a bus.

A full one; no brakes and no need for it. 

No other way to describe what hit him.
Clay and sky traded places three or four times before the ground dragged him back down, back and chest torn open as his bandages finally gave up on him.

By the time he stopped — eventually, half his burns had reopened and the breath had left his body all in one piece and was barely managing to return in staggered chunks. …o-ow. Face down, one arm under him and the other barely holding onto his dagger, his ears rung like he’d been headbutted by a bell and he could only hear the geyser roaring from what felt like a mile away… and underwater. Ow.

He rolled onto his back and gasped for air that fought him on the way in, more bandages — stained so many different colors he could barely keep track — came loose, hanging in ruined strips over burned and bleeding ribs. "...okay."

There was dust in his teeth. “Okay.” 

And blood under that. "Okay, that's…” Finn fought the urge to scream, ribs doing it for him as he made to move. “Angry old witch has power." If there was a lesson he didn’t need a third go-around to learn, that would be it right there. “Got it.”

He had to… get up.

He needed to… get up.

Unfortunately, that was nowhere near as easy as it seemed.

The fight kept happening without his permission above his bleary eyes and around his ringing ears, Snow’s strings singing and roaring with thunder as green fire and gold light flared bright against each other. He got a palm flat against the ground and pushed.

The clay pushed back.

It won.

Fuck.

A heavy boot scuffed the dirt right in front of Finn’s face, a shadow hiding the light of the sun. He blinked the blood out of his eye and stared up to see— G-goddamnit.

“You know…” The words were slow and rounded at the edges, a little nasal from a nose half-broken, and slurring over the blood in his mouth. “For all I heard about the dreaded and terrible Red Death of the Infinite Forest…” Hook shook his head, the man swaying like he was on a deck as the pulse under his shirt came back slow and off-rhythm; two drumbeats and both of them tired. “You’re… this… just rather disappointing, lad.”

“S-says the grown man wearing eyeliner.” Finn spat a mouthful of red into the clay, one hand gripping his own chest as he breathed past a bloody smirk. “The… th-the hell did you even get it from?”

“...terrible last words, lad.”

“Suck my dick.”

“And those were no better.”

The hook came down in a flash of dull light—

—and bright steel caught it with a brighter flare.

A straight blade sat above his face, the only thing between him and the point. Above the crossed steel — “Back the hell off my deputy!”

Emma fucking Swan, his favorite magical princess of all time, stood with her sword in a two-handed grip. White knuckled and wavering, she still held her ground, catching the pirate’s strike dead in its tracks — glare locked dead onto Hook’s face.

Mud down her whole left side, blonde hair matted, red leather jacket torn to shit, and sporting a half-dozen bruises he could see, Finn couldn’t bring it in him to claim that the woman had ever looked more beautiful.

“Swan!” Even swaying on his feet, and speaking past slurred words, the pirate captain managed to find a smile. “Our first bout together, is it? Truth told, love, I rather prefer a woman on her back for far more enjoyabl—”

“No.”

Emma’s boot came up between his legs.

The sound the pirate made was far from a word in any language Finn knew, and he had three to choose from. Even still, he understood it just fine.

And it raised a very important question, especially as Emma Swan repeated the same simple move. Why didn’t I think of that?

The pirate folded, knees hitting clay as hands and hook went to protect a pirate’s most precious treasure. She flipped the weapon around, sword held in a one-handed reverse grip, and — just like that — she brought the heavy end of the sword right into the side of Hook’s head in a quick full-body swing.

The already-concussed pirate folded like a wet towel, unconscious before he hit the clay face-first. Steam drifted off the man, thin and aimless.

Emma stood in the mud, catching her breath over the knocked-out pirate. “Enjoy that.” She spat onto his back, bloody saliva trailing down his jacket. “Pig.”

Footsteps scuffed the clay as Finn let out a ragged breath, eyes on the pirate twitching in the mud. A hand came down in front of him, mud all the way to the wrist as it waited for him. “...Bosslady?”

“Get the fuck up, deputy.”

Emma grinned down at him. “Let’s get home.”