A/N Squeezed this one out before the finale! Which I'm not watching until tomorrow, so shhhhh! on the spoiler front :) This fic in part arose from online debate as to the special effect when Emma kissed Hook in 3x20, and as to whether she seemed like she was lying when he asked her about her magic.

Some maintain the light effect was just her magic leaving her, some maintain there are clearly two effects at work, and one looks remarkably like something we've seen on the show before...

You can see the Gif here:

. /e593f4cbd388e55b45ec91e689e4b84e/tumblr_n52wqpEaA51rywbrto1_

Whether you agree or not, hope you enjoy :)

Of Heroes and Villains

~ You cannot be a hero without being a coward - George Bernard Shaw ~

If there was one thing Emma had learnt from being Henry's mom it was The Rules.

The Rules of Good Guys and Bad Guys.

Even post-curse Henry had had pretty strong ideas of right and wrong... at least for a teenaged New Yorker.

There were certain things heroes did, things heroes categorically had to do, in order to still be considered "the good guys". Equally, there were certain things they would never do.

It was a list she'd kinda come to learn by heart. It was a list she'd always tried to stick to in her dealings with Henry.

But lately, she seemed to break more Rules than she kept...

~ heroes protect the innocent ~

When it came to Henry, this one was a no-brainer. She would do anything and everything to keep him safe. (And she did not appreciate others invading her turf. It was her job to protect him.)

But here was the kicker: that willingness had led her to stand by while Regina ripped out a young boy's heart. Okay, arguably he wasn't an innocent, or actually "young"... and she'd sworn to herself she'd make sure Regina gave it back... and yet.

And yet.

Emma knew what it felt like to have someone's hand in your chest; she knew the visceral, agonising pain of it. But even more than that, if there was one thing Emma valued it was her freedom. Especially her freedom of will.

So much so that, with the exception of Henry, she'd learnt to flee as fast as she could in the other direction if anything...or anyone... threatened it.

And they'd taken that freedom away from him.

~ heroes do not kill ~

She wouldn't have hesitated to kill Pan.

Not when it meant saving Henry's life. But there was more to it than that...

Killian had been right when he named him demon. And after his body swap with Henry... the fact she'd ended up pointing a gun at her own son's head...!

Well, put it this way, she'd been inwardly cheering Gold on when he sank his dagger in.

And as for Zelena...

From the moment she wrapped her hands round Henry's neck, the moment she began squeezing the air from his lungs... It had been light magic that saved him, but Emma's feelings in that moment were far from pure.

And when she saw her baby brother lying in that basket, so small and so helpless, part of a goddamn psychopath's spell, in that moment, had she still had her magic, she would have taken Zelena out with a song in her heart.

~ heroes do not lie ~

Emma's superpower was detecting deceit in others. Perhaps that was why she was so good at it herself.

She'd lied to Henry about his father when he first asked her. She'd lied again when he'd lost his memories. In fact, she'd lied to post-curse Henry more times than she cared to remember.

Henry was probably the person in her life she had lied to the most.

With one possible exception.

"Have your powers returned to you now Zelena is gone?"
"No."

Emma valued her freedom.

Her family in Storybrooke... the residents there... the way they all saw her...

If she didn't have magic, she couldn't be the Saviour. They couldn't play on her guilt, her sense of duty, her desire to do good, to make her stay.

And they didn't even need her any more - not now Regina could do light magic.

And her parents had their son - to love and raise and ease their pain of abandoning Emma. She could watch and love from afar without feeling pressured to meet their needs, be their daughter, erase the years that were lost.

She and Henry could go back to New York. She could leave guilt-free.

Well, almost guilt-free.

Because Emma had felt two things go through her when she kissed Hook.

The first was her magic leaving her. The second was something else. Something she had never felt before. The only thing that could explain how a single kiss was enough to drive the water from his lungs, to restart his heart...

So, better to leave, better to return to New York, better to call him "Hook". Because one thing was for sure, if Killian knew she'd saved him with True Love's Kiss, he'd chase her down, he'd get her talking, he'd make her believe.

He'd make her want to try.

And when it failed again, when her heart was shattered, what would be left of her? What would be left for Henry? What if there weren't enough pieces this time to keep going?

~ heroes never run away ~

Looks like she's no hero.

fin

A/N 2 OH MY GOSH. Just watched finale. Totally in pieces. Also, kinda amused - I wrote this fic before watching it. Apparently, I'm a little psychic ;)