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It had only been a handful of hours since the curse had been broken and already the town seemed to have come to some sort of acceptance with the fact that they all had questions and no one to answer them. Regina was locked away for their protection, and Mr. Gold was nowhere to be found. Not that anyone would have gone to them for answers anyway after hearing Moe French brag about leading a small group to his jail cell (that in itself was a completely different story to be spread through Storybrooke, though no one got the details right) only for someone else who had been in the group to relate that Rumpelstiltskin had his magic back, and broke out of his cell to vanish into nothing.

So with Mr. Gold gone, that only left Regina and no one in Storybrooke had it left in them to face the (arguably) lesser than two evils, despite the new knowledge that not only was she locked up and powerless, but badly injured as well. Even with that, they knew The Evil Queen to still be dangerous, and so it was decided amongst themselves that they didn’t need answers after all, they just wanted to go home.

David found himself walking back down main street, hands stuffed tightly into his jean pockets with his head looking down at his feet as he walked. There was so much going on in his mind at once he was drawing total blanks, unable to concentrate on one thought long enough to even know what he was thinking about. It was too much; if Snow where here, she would know what to do. David stopped walking and picked up his head as a thought came to him. If he couldn’t have Snow to help him, then he could have the next best thing.

David hurried across the street and over to Marco – Gepetto; the older man greeting his new king with a cheery smile as he swept away the last of the leaves that had been littering the front porch of his shop for the last few days.

“Hey Marco, have you seen Red anywhere?” David asked.

“Sure, sure. Last time I saw her it was about ten minutes ago. She was following Leroy and the other dwarves as they headed out of town. Not a bad idea if you ask me; if we can’t go home, then perhaps we can-“

David didn’t hear the rest of what Marco had to say, his hears were filled with an inaudible ringing the moment he heard ‘out of town.’ They couldn’t leave! Could they? David took off down the road, there was no time to get his pickup truck, he’d get there much faster if he just ran.

XXX

“This, gentlemen, is our mission. The great barrier of our existence; does it remain? We must investigate…[i]the line[/i].” Leroy capped the can of spray paint, a bright orange line now permanent on the road where Storybrooke ended, and the world beyond began. He looked to his fellow dwarves, all looking upon him with leadership and as much as he didn’t want it, [i]someone[/i] had to do something. 

“I made straws. Shortest crosses. Draw.” Leroy handed out the different-sized straws to his friends, none of which were brave enough to even look at the length of theirs and instead closed it up tight in their hands.

“With the curse broken we can cross right? Should be no problem, yeah?” Happy asked.

“With magic back it could be even worse now.” Sleepy groaned.

“Like, vaporize us.” Doc added on.

“Let’s go home.” Bashful pleaded, finally causing Grumpy to reach his limit.

“GUYS! We are the Royal Guard! Dwarves loyal to Snow White! This is our chance to prove ourselves to the prince. We must do this!” There was a mix of apprehension and anxiety among the crew, but no one said anything otherwise. “Show your hands!”

The seven dwarves gathered together and revealed the straws they had picked, the straw in Sneezy’s hand being the shortest as was brought to everyone’s attention with a series of sneezes.

“You’re up snotty.” Leroy grabbed Sneezy by the arm and began to guide him to the town line.

“You know, what if we found a turtle and sort of nudged it over first?” Sneezy tried.

“Oh, for the love of-“

“WAIT!”

Leroy had quickly been interrupted by a female’s voice and the entire group turned to find Ruby staring back at them, wide-eyed of what she was seeing before him.

“You can’t just push him over Leroy, what if something happens?”

Leroy lessened his grip on Sneezy (of which immediately took a good few steps away from the line he had nearly been forced to cross) and took a couple steps towards Red.

“Well it’s not like we have much of a choice sister. We drew straws, fair and square. He has to go.”

“Why?”

Leroy exchanged glances with his fellow dwarves.

“Well…no one is exactly volunteering now are they?” He asked, looking back to Ruby.

“Really?” Ruby looked over the face of each and every dwarf, none of which (aside from Grumpy) able to look her back in the eye. “What is the matter with all of you? Snow would have crossed that line in a heartbeat if it meant knowing something about the safety of her people.”

The was an uncomfortable shuffling between the dwarves, but none said a word. Ruby sighed and shook her head.

“Fine, I’ll go-“

“What?”

“No way sister!”

“We can’t let you do that!”

Ruby ignored the pleas of the dwarves and walked past them, teetering over the orange line that Leroy had painted on the pavement.

“What if it does something to you? We won’t ever be able to forgive ourselves if we let you do this.” Leroy tried again, hoping to reason with the stubborn waitress.

“Please, in case you’ve forgotten I’m a werewolf. Nothing this barrier can do could be worse than that.” Ruby joked, but not a single smile was cracked from the dwarves. Ruby sighed, letting her own smile fall as she realized that no matter what she did, her decision wouldn’t make the dwarves happy. “And you don’t need to feel that way guys. I’m doing this for Snow; for David. It’s the least I can do after I-“ She stopped, unable to finish the sentence. Mary Margaret had promised that they could talk about things later, but for now, this was all she could do. Without another moment’s hesitation, Ruby took the step over the town line the very moment that David had caught up with her.

“RUBY! NO!”