Chapter 1: Something's Not Right
The week after Emma returned from Manhattan was nothing short of a nightmare. The last thing she had ever wanted to do was accept that Neal would be in her life again, but now she didn't really get much of a choice. Though she wanted nothing to do with him romantically, she couldn't deny Henry the chance to get to know his father. At this point Henry still wasn't really talking to her much. He was still mad about her lying to him about who his father really was. Then she had to deal with the fact that Neal was Gold's son. Another part of the growing family tree that she wished she could ignore.
Emma sighed staring down at the paperwork that was sitting in front of her. Work was becoming a welcome distraction, but right now she was finding it increasingly hard to focus. For some reason she kept feeling like something was wrong. She had no idea where the feeling was coming from. Despite her current stressful situation, everything in Storybrooke had been fairly quiet. Though she knew that Cora was still out there somewhere planning something, she had yet to make her move.
Maybe, it was just that she was worried about what Cora was planning. She did still feel like her family was in danger and she hated wondering what was going to happen next. Right now she would take any distraction she could get. She was hoping someone would steal something or get into a fight, just so she had something else to focus on right now. Hell, at this point she would take Hook and his shameless flirting and innuendos, but she hadn't seen him since he helped them get back to Storybrooke.
It was unusual for him. Usually she expected him to show up at every turn just to annoy her. He did seem to enjoy that, but lately he was nowhere to be found. In fact nobody had seen the pirate. Part of that worried her, though she wasn't sure why. Maybe he was plotting his revenge still. After all, he spent 300 years planning his revenge, it's not like the man wasn't patient. Still, she couldn't shake the bad feeling she had. Emma shook her head trying to get those thoughts out of her mind. The last thing she needed to be doing right now was worrying about Hook. There were far more pressing matters to attend to.
After staring at her paperwork for several more minutes, she realized that there was no way it was going to get done. She stood up from her desk and grabbed her coat. It was a little early, but she was supposed to be meeting Henry and Neal at Granny's for lunch. Though Emma really didn't want to spend any time with Neal at the moment, she agreed to for Henry's sake. It was the first time since they got back from Manhattan that he had actually invited her to do anything with him and she wanted to take the chance to let him know that she was sorry for lying to him.
Surprisingly, lunch went off without a hitch and it had put Emma in a much better mood. Henry seemed to enjoy the fact that she and Neal were able to get along together for a short amount of time and it appeared that Henry wasn't quite as angry at Emma anymore. That was a relief. She didn't like knowing Henry was mad at her, though he did seem to understand why she had lied, he still had been mad at her for it. Emma started to head back to the station when her mind began to wander back to Hook.
A week had passed without any sign of the pirate and Emma couldn't help, but wonder what that meant. He hadn't exactly decided to be very secretive as of late which made her worry that something had happened to him. Emma shook her head. It wasn't her job to be worried about the pirate. He was perfectly capable of taking care of himself a fact that he had made clear when they were in Manhattan. He wasn't so happy about her interfering with his revenge, but he had claimed that he didn't care if he died as long as Gold went with him. Emma had wondered how hard it was for him to go so many years wanting nothing more than to avenge the woman he loved, especially since he didn't care if he died to get his revenge. Emma decided it was best to just leave the pirate alone and get back to what she was supposed to be doing. Still when Emma returned to work she continued to have difficulty focusing on the task at hand.
After another hour or so of staring at the paperwork that just wasn't going to get done, Emma decided she should head out. There was no way she was going to be able to focus until she figured out what was going on with Hook. Whatever, it was she had a bad feeling about it. She decided the best place to look for the pirate would be on his ship. If he was planning anything he wouldn't likely spend too much time away from his little home. It was the only place in Storybrooke that the pirate spent most of his time. Most of the residents didn't care for the pirate for obvious reasons. Though he had no problem showing up at the station or her apartment to bug her, he didn't really go anywhere else.
As Emma approached the harbor where the invisible ship was docked, she couldn't help feeling like she wasn't going to like what she found. Something wasn't right, everything was quiet. Almost like nobody had been there in days. Though she expected to find Hook aboard his ship, she found that most of the seagulls were not hanging around like they used to. It was unnerving and Emma wasn't sure what that meant. It was almost like someone was trying to keep people away from the area. She drew her gun as she approached the invisible gangplank. She couldn't shake the bad feeling she had and she wasn't about to be unprepared if something were to happen.
When she had finally made it aboard the Jolly Roger the bad feeling she had got stronger. The sea was too calm. The ship wasn't swaying like it usually did. Almost like it's master wasn't home and maybe he wasn't. Maybe she had come all this way and worried for nothing. There was no way she was going to be able to focus until she made sure everything was okay with him. It appeared that the deck was abandoned so she headed to the only other place she could think that he would be. His captain's quarters.
Below deck was much darker than she anticipated. It made sense since it wasn't like he had electricity aboard his ship, but she had never actually been anywhere but the deck of the ship. Her eyes adjusted to the darkness after a few minutes and she headed down the hallway to where she assumed the captain's quarters would be. The large door was a good indication that she found what she was looking for. It had fancy writing on the door that just said, "The Captain," Emma smiled at the simplicity of it and wondered if it had always been like that or if Hook had done that himself when he became captain.
Without another thought Emma knocked on the wooden door and waited for someone to answer, but no answer came. She knocked again this time much harder, but there still was no answer. Emma put her ear up against the door to see if she could hear anything, but it was silent. Normally, she wouldn't find herself barging into the pirate's cabin when it was possible that he could be lurking around watching her, but she found that she didn't have any self-control in this moment. There was something wrong and she wasn't going to stand around and wait to see what would happen. When she opened the door to the cabin she was surprised to see Hook lying on his bed, sleeping. Was it possible that he just didn't hear her knocking?
"Hook?" Emma asked, as she approached the sleeping pirate. He didn't move. Fear began to well up inside her as she put her hand on his shoulder and shook. No response. "Hook?" she asked again, hoping to see the man open his eyes and throw out some flirty innuendo, but he remained silent.
That's when she realized that something was seriously wrong. He wasn't waking up and she had no idea why. She knew something wasn't right when he had stopped coming to harass her, but she was not prepared to find him like this. How long had he been like this and what was wrong with him? There was one last thing she could think of that might wake him up, but she doubted it would work.
"Killian?" Emma asked. She had never used his real name and she had hoped that it would prove that he was just messing with her. However, his eyes remained shut and his breathing stayed even. He wasn't going to wake up.