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The Orphan Jones	By : RueRambunctious Category: M through R > Once Upon A Time Views: 1478 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own OUAT and make no money from this.

Chapter List
- 1-One
- 2-Two
- 3-Three
- 4-Four
- 5-Five
- 6-Six
- 5
- 6
Iridiana shadows the heroes as much as she is able, which is much harder than she had imagined as they have a habit of splitting up.

It is frustrating, because Iridiana is terrified of missing something important. At first she mostly stalks her mother, but sometimes she follows her gut instead.

She is uncertain whether this is successful. None of her family seem to notice of her, but the dead certainly do.

She does her best to stay out of their way, but just as Emma back home has a way of scenting out Iridiana, the dead seem to recognise Iridiana's Otherness.

They do not like it.

Iridiana gets used to being mildly accosted, it's hardly different from the bullying back home and the scenery's not much different either, but Iridiana gets outright mobbed as she tries to stay out of sight of her father and grandfather.

Iridiana doesn't cry out, because she is used to absorbing hurt until she can't take any more, and at first it's more frightening than painful.

The dead do make noise, angrily railing at this brat with a beating heart for the suffering they endure. The ruckus causes the attention of Hook and David, who exchange glances and run towards the trouble.

Iridiana is unsure if she is more worried about being seen, or what the dead might do to her. Her living heart hammers.

Quickly wading into the fray, Hook and David pull people out of the way, snarling at the more aggressive dead. The men discover at the mob's centre a frazzled looking young girl of about thirteen. David looks around at her attackers, who seem to have nothing in common but their dead status. They don't seem terribly guilty.

“She's a kid!” David exclaims, stepping towards some of the attackers fiercely. He cannot comprehend why a group of grown adults would accost a waifish little girl. The mob drifts away, but some give the girl vicious looks before they go.

Iridiana swallows, wondering whether Hades knows when she is supposed to die. Her body aches a little. If she gets killed down here, she will have to stay, won't she?

Hook shields the girl with his frame and crouches a little to meet her eyes. “Are you okay?” he asks.

Iridiana's face is mostly hidden under a shock of lavender-blonde hair patterned with very faded pastel colours. An attempt to emphasise that her blonde hair is not like her mother's golden hue. Iridiana wonders whether this position will hide her facial features enough not to make her father stare. It is common knowledge above that Iridiana has Killian Jones' mouth and jaw, possessing all the same quirks of movement.

She lifts her tongue to her lips when she smiles, which would be the biggest tell of all, so it's lucky that Iridiana is in no position to smile. She hasn't been born yet, as far as this Hook knows, so he's less familiar with how his mouth looks in misery. As far as Iridiana is aware.

But that does not stop Iridiana's body chilling with fear. She feels like her features are screaming her secret. Hook doesn't know he'll have a daughter yet, but what will happen if he sees himself blatantly mirrored in her? What if she changes something she's not supposed to?

Iridiana nervously looks up at her father's face, her living heart hammering. It's the strangest thing to have him look at her as though for the first time. As Hook stares back at the girl, Iridiana moves her gaze quickly to the familiar jewellery in his ear which catches the light despite the gloom. It's too disconcerting to be looked at like that.

Iridiana cannot help when her gaze drifts back to the earnest, stubbled face. Looking at her doesn't bring him pain. He doesn't know the suffering that's in store.

She takes a step back.

Hook echoes the girl's backward steps to reassure her, raising his hands to show he isn't a threat.

Her eyes fall on the intimidating looking hook where one of his hands should be. It doesn't scare her, but the vivid reminder of who she is facing does frighten her. He's smart; if he keeps looking at her he'll know.

She must not change the past.

David takes Hook's shining hook and pushes that arm behind the former pirate's back.

“We're not going to hurt you,” David states.

The girl gives him a stare that makes him shiver, and it's got nothing to do with her being a child in the Underworld. She needs to keep the men away, because it would be too easy to make a mistake with them close, and the only way Grandpa David won't recognise his wife's eyes on Iridiana's face is if she fills them with hate.

The girl tilts her chin. “Not directly, maybe,” she states accusingly.

Hook looks disturbed. “What do you mean, lass?”

She crosses her skinny arms fiercely, but the aggression of the action is lost due to how much of her torso is hidden by her faded, wraithlike hair. It doesn't quite resemble the inside of a shell; a pirate knows the look of opal when he sees it. Hook isn't superstitious enough to forbid the stone of tears from his ship, but something about the girl gives him chills.

“Not a talker, eh?” Hook says wryly, trying to soothe the strange emotions storming behind the girl's eyes with his even tone. “That's okay, I grow on women like that.”

David gives him a look that says clearly that he recognised the comment about his daughter Emma.

Hook merely smirks back, now's not the time, and crouches further to face the girl.

“That's patronising, you know,” she comments, but she doesn't seem insulted.

“Is it?” Hook gives the girl a winning smile and stands.

The girl seems unsettled by the attention. “You can go now,” she says. “I'm … fine.”

David gives her a concerned look. She seems about Henry's age but all bones and nervous, awkward angles. “Isn't there somewhere safe we can take you? Someone we can take you to?”

The girl snorts, sounding slightly bitter. Her grip on her arms has shifted into more of a reassuring self-embrace. “You've done enough, thanks. It's going to get worse now they've seen me with you...”

“What, those people that attacked you? Why?” Hook demands.

The girl's arms snap to her sides and she steps forwards crossly, not seeming to care in the least that she can't even see over either man's shoulders. “What, you think your lot have the only beating hearts in the Underworld?” she sneers. “I have enough of a hard job keeping mines that way without being seen with you.”

“You're still alive?” David asks.

The girl suddenly looks embarrassed. “In a manner of speaking. But you 'heroes' have been getting Hades all riled up, and that's getting the dead really, really wound up. Between that woman in the diner, and the phones, then destroying the sheriff? What is wrong with you people?”

Hook glances at David in concern, but although his face has tightened he remains focused on the girl's plight. “We're here trying to help,” David states.

The girl momentarily gives both men a wavering, sad look, then squares her shoulders in her thin dress. “You don't even know who I am,” she protests in a brittle voice.

Hook raises his good hand appeasingly. “You don't have to tell us anything if you don't want to,” he says. “At least let us get you somewhere that you're not going to get any backlash for being seen with us, alright?”

The girl gives him a brief, searching look that makes Hook's hair stand on edge. She bites her lip as though she's afraid of what might spill out, then shakes her head fiercely. Her hair swings around her like a barrier.

“Just leave me alone please,” she tells the men. “I think it's a bad idea to talk to you. A really bad idea.”

David starts to protest again but Hook relents and steps back to allow the girl to pass by. She nods at them as if there's something more she wants to say, but silently walks away on bare feet.

“Do you think there's been much of that?” David asks Hook breathlessly.

Hook can't seem to take his eyes from the girl's retreating form. There's something about her that he swears he almost recognises. “Of what?” he replies.

David looks at him as though he's said something stupid. “Of the dead attacking each other because of us.”

Hook shrugged. “I suppose we watch and see. They've got a fair point to be agitated with Hades flying off the handle.”

“We should tell the others,” David states.

Hook nods. “Aye.” The girl disappears around a quiet corner and out of eye line. “Do you think there's many live people down here?”

“Hopefully there will be less of us soon,” David replies. “I want to see my family.”

Iridiana is a lot more careful after that, and holds back long enough to make her nervous of losing sight of her family before she hurries after them.
- 5
- 6
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The Orphan Jones