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Homecoming

A/N:This story will feature a very different version of Rumple and Belle, and also cover a topic that I have wanted to do with them both for a long time. This story is rated M for some violence and sensitive topics, such as PTSD and POWs, but will focus mainly on healing and therapy for such individuals. All disclaimers apply, written with great respect and love for actors Robert Carlyle and Emilie deRavin and also all our men and women in the armed forces, thank you for your service and your sacrifice.

When he limped off the deck of the Navy transport ship Jolly Roger, captained by Navy officer Killian Jones of the Royal Navy of Perelandria, a seafaring kingdom to the south of the Enchanted Forest, war mage and Captain of the company Magical Mayhem, Rumplestiltskin Gold was unsure of the reception he'd be getting. A veteran of the First Ogre War, he'd been drafted into the army as a naïve eighteen year old and given command as a corporal of a company, and later moved up to sergeant because his CO had bit it while engaging the enemy on a night maneuver. His heroic actions in saving a camp full of children from being eaten by the ogre battalion had resulted in his promotion to Captain . . . and commander of his own corps of magical personnel, Company Gold, nicknamed Magical Mayhem by his former commander, a sorcerer called Malcolm Pan.

Years later, Captain Gold and his company had been called upon again for a secret mission by the Royal Council of his homeland, the Enchanted Forest. Children between the ages of nine and twelve had been disappearing for over a year and no one could figure out how or why, until Rumple's son, Lieutenant Baelfire Gold, had gone undercover to Neverland, using a regression potion to pose as a child and see what was happening to all of these missing children. He discovered Neverland was home to the now notorious Commander Pan, Rumple former CO, who was using it as a base to bring captive children to and take their youth and strength in dark rituals.

Pan had become dark soon after returning home from the Ogre Wars, where he had stolen a dagger from a defeated ogre shaman. The dagger, known in their tongue as Dharka Ruus—the Dark One—was a cursed item, and it would make its wielder into a powerful dark mage. . . with the price being the wielder's soul. Instead of destroying the dagger, as he had been commanded to by the Council, Pan kept it, reasoning that he could handle such power, and he took the deal the cursed weapon offered, and fell into madness and eternal darkness, becoming a legendary Shadow Mage, and the next Dark One.

Driven from his homeland, Pan wandered for many years, leaving a trail of destruction in his wake, until he suddenly vanished for years . . .only to be discovered on Neverland by Bae. Because of Rumple's reputation as a war hero, and commander of one of the finest magical companies in the history of the Forest Brigades, the Council requested Rumple and most of his company to go on a top secret mission—their objective—take down Pan and his allies and free whatever children remained and bring them home again.

Three months, two weeks, and five days ago, Captain Gold had boarded The Jolly Roger and set sail for Neverland, leaving behind his wife, Mind Mage and retired Lieutenant Belle Gold, and their sixteen-month-old daughter Abigail. He had walked into the jungles of Neverland, intending to complete his mission in a timely fashion and return home to his family.

He had very nearly never come out again.

It was only due to a daring rescue attempt by his son, Bae, master sergeant Emma Swan, Corporeal Jefferson "the Mad Hatter" Moreaux, Bae's twin, Robin, and his Aerial Specialist, a fae named Tinkerbell, that he was freed from his prison on Skull Rock, and managed to turn the tables on his former commander and put an end to him once and for all.

Now he came home . . .but he knew he was not the same man who had left. Due to Pan's brutal treatment and torture, he was now lame in his right leg, and had to use a cane, the Healers doubted if he would ever be able to walk without it for the rest of his life.

But what was worse than even the physical effects were the psychological ones. Pan had been an expert on mind games and control, and Rumple knew that the evil bastard had broken something within him during the eight weeks of captivity on Skull Rock. Something essential had been left behind. Refusing all attempts at a standard psych evaluation, Rumplestiltskin had pledge his word to the Council that he would submit to treatment at the hands of the one person he trusted most—his wife.

His hand gripping his new gold handled cane, Captain Gold made his way down the gangplank of the ship to the docks where a crowd had gathered. He squinted in the sunlight, wincing as the light seared his now sensitive eyes. After being held in a dark cell for eight weeks, the sunlight seemed almost surreal to him, as did the fact that he was able to move further than the sixty paces of his cell, and breathe air not tainted by the stench of dark magic and death.

He was followed by the members of his company, seven strong, all save for Belle. Next to him walked his fellow Captain, Regina Mills, commander of the Red Queens, an all-female company. On his other side was his new company Mind Healer, wet-behind-the-ears fresh out of the Healer Academy recruit Lieutenant Archie Hopper.

His foot caught on an uneven bit of wood and he stumbled.

"Sir, do you need some assistance?" Archie began, offering a hand.

"No thank you, Lieutenant. I'm fine," Rumple barked coldly, frustrated that he could no longer manage such a simple thing as walking.

"Of course, sir! Sorry, sir!" Archie flinched and gave a rather sloppy salute.

Regina rolled her eyes. "You don't need to salute all the time, Lieutenant."

"No, ma'am! I mean, yes ma'am!" the youngster blushed red as an apple.

"And don't mind Gold. He's always a beast before he's had three cups of coffee," she smirked at her fellow commander.

"That's the kettle calling the cauldron black, dearie," Rumple retorted, his mouth quirking in a rare smile. "I seem to remember some of your girls nicknamed you the Wicked Witch for biting their heads off before you drank yours."

Regina laughed. "Soldiers always bitch and moan, and my girls sometimes more than most of them." She linked her arm through Rumple's. "C'mon, Gold, walk the line. We'll give the locals something to see . . .unless you'd rather they remember you falling on your ass because you were too stubborn to take my hand?"

"That a proposition, dearie?" he smirked.

"In your dreams, Gold! You think I want Belle after me with her knives?" Regina snorted. "We'd both end up skinned and hung on a wall. Besides, Daniel and Henry are waiting for me."

With Regina's arm to steady him, Rumple made his way onto the docks.

Amid a burst of cheering and applause.

"Huh. Guess old Guisborne told people what we were really up to this time . . . instead of letting that newshound Glass find out about it beforehand," Rumple said.

"It's a miracle," Regina coughed.

Sydney Glass was the editor of the newspaper, the Magic Mirror, and notorious for digging up dirt on the military, even war heroes like Rumple and Regina. And General Guy Guisborne, head of the Intelligence Division of the Royal Armed forces, should have known better than to let that yellow bellied journalist get the jump on him last time, Rumple thought sourly.

Then again, when you were Black Ops and on a mission, only the success of that mission mattered, and only when it was over could you reveal the truth . . . and sometimes not even then.

Suddenly a tall dark-haired man in the uniform of a cavalry officer raced into view, carrying a little boy on his shoulder who screamed, "Mommy! Mommy's home!"

Regina pulled away from Rumple to greet her husband and son. "Dan! Henry!" she cried, and hugged them both in a smothering embrace.

Archie smiled and murmured to Rumple, "Funny, but I'd heard she was a tough-as-nails bitch on wheels, and yet . . .she's like any other mother with her kid over there."

The captain slanted him a wry look. "Something you need to learn, Lieutenant. She is a hardass bitch, just like I'm the beast's bastard, when we're on campaign. But when we come home again . . . we're like any other husband, wife, or parent . . . glad to be there and hoping to stay put."

"But . . . didn't you volunteer for the Neverland mission, sir?" the young Healer asked. "Captain Turner said your company was the first to do so, and then Captain Mills'. . ."

"That's true. We were . . . because Pan needed to be stopped and those kids gotten back and we were the best ones for the job. But if you think any of us were in it for the glory and honor of the corps or any of that bullshit, think again." Rumple said bluntly. "Here's something they'll never tell you at the Academy, dearie. The only place a soldier wants to be—is home. But until we get home . . .we're the meanest sons of bitches you've ever met, if that's how it has to be. Understand?"

Archie gulped. "Yessir!"

"Now, if you'll excuse me . . .that's my wife and baby girl over there," he indicated a petite woman in a pretty sapphire blue dress with puffed sleeves, her auburn curls wilting slightly in the summer heat, holding a golden brown-haired little girl in a pink rosebud dress with white shoes standing near a pillar. Her indigo eyes were also squinting from the sun, or else she would have seen her husband approaching.

But she was half-turned away, scanning the disembarking passengers, and half-deaf from the roar of the crowd and her little girl yelling, "Papa! Papa come home!" in her ear.

Rumple limped up towards her, intending to call to her, but before he could do so, she turned, as if pulled by an invisible thread, and their eyes met.

"Rumplestiltskin!" she cried, speaking his name as if it were a talisman to ward away the dark, trying to hide her shock at how thin he was, his leather uniform hung off his slender frame and his beautiful brown hair now had streaks of gray running through it. Then of course there was his leg, he had written to her about it, but even he had not prepared her for the reality of it.

"Belle!" he called, his face lighting up, and he limped the three steps to her side, and caught them both in a one armed hug.

"Welcome home, Captain!" she murmured and their mouths met in a brief kiss.

Until a tiny sprite suddenly launched herself at him, hollering, "Papa! Papa home!"

Gold staggered, trying to brace himself against the pillar as the child grabbed him about the neck. "Abby! How's my best girl? My gods, you're almost big enough to knock me down," he joked, trying to cover for his disability.

"Abby, be careful!" Belle scolded gently. "Papa's leg—"

"—it's fine, Belle," Gold cut her off abruptly, shifting his weight so the newly healed muscles weren't screaming at him. He kissed his daughter's cheek, hugging her and his wife in his good arm.

"Didja miss me?" the little scamp asked.

"I missed you—" he began.

"—all the way t'the moon n' back?" they recited together, and then she laughed.

"She doesn't miss a trick, does she?" he said to his wife. "Like her mama."

"She nearly climbed out the window the other day," Belle said, leaning her head on his shoulder. "And when I asked her what she thought she was doing she said she was gonna fly to Neverland and bring you home!"

"Little minx!" Rumple chuckled.

"I think I have a gray hair now," Belle teased. "See?" she held an auburn tress up for him to inspect.

Rumple pretended to examine it, and as he did so, the smoke from a chimney from the tavern on the docks floated over to tickle his nostrils.

And suddenly that innocuous scent caused his mind to spin back to the dark cell on Skull Rock, where he smelled the stench of burned flesh, his own and those of the captive children Pan needed for his sacrifices.

Once again he was in the dark cave . . . his nostrils filled with the burnt offerings of the sacrifices . . . hearing Pan's maniacal laughter over the screams of the children . . .

"Rumple!" Belle called, feeling the sudden shift in his emotions, as she sometimes could because of the bond between them, though she had shut it down at his insistence when he had left for Neverland. "Rumple, what happened?" she queried gently.

She could feel his heart racing beneath her hand, his eyes had suddenly gone dark with pain, and his breath had come in harsh pants.

"Nothing. I'm fine." But his eyes would not meet hers.

And Belle knew then that as his Mind Healer and therapist, she had her work cut out for her. My poor Rumple! What in hell did that bastard do to you? She pressed her lips to his cheek, feeling his skin was now clammy and cold, though they stood in the midst of the hottest part of the summer.

"Come on, Rumple. Let's go home. Before Abby gets cranky."

Putting her arm unobtrusively about his waist, Belle turned carefully, and they began to walk out of the crowd.

Only to be met at the edge of it by her two stepsons, Bae and Robin, and nearly picked up off her feet by their enthusiastic greetings.

Rumple leaned on his cane and watched as his sons hugged their stepmother, shaking his head. "Gods and hells, did I teach you two no manners?"

"Ooh, you said a bad word!" scolded his daughter, shaking her tiny finger at him. "Now you's gonna eat soap!"

Rumple looked chagrined. "Papa's sorry, sprite," he said, too late recalling that little pitchers had big ears. And that he was no longer among his company, and had better watch what he said. He gave her his best puppydog look. "Forgive me?"

Abby smirked at him. "Yup! I loves Papa!"

"Love you too, baby," he crooned, and buried his nose in her flyaway hair that smelled like strawberries, trying to erase the stench of burnt flesh from his memory.

Captain Gold had come home—a hero. Or had he?

A/N: Hope you liked the first chapter. Most of this story will be told through Rumple's eyes, sometimes through flashbacks, and as Belle does sessions with him you'll discover what he went through as Pan's prisoner. Occasionally this will get dark, but nothing graphic. Belle and Rumple's daughter, Abigail, will also play a major role here, Abigail's name means "a father's joy" and you'll see the reason I chose that in future chapters, as well as meet the rest of Rumple's company and family.