Inspired by this post by and-i-will-win-it on Tumblr: Liam died in that room and he and Milah had lived there and loved there and maybe he was so sick to the bone with grief over his loss of them that every time he closed his eyes all he could see was their deaths replaying in an endless loop, so he never slept in there…maybe he never slept at all and he just stayed awake for as long as he could until exhaustion took over and he passed out anywhere but in the Captain's quarters.
Gone. Liam was gone. His captain, his brother, his hero. Gone in an instant. Taken. Taken by a tyrant hiding behind a mask of supposed honor.
"Left—Captain," a voice interrupted his thoughts as he turned to find a crewman standing at his side. "Captain Jones?"
"What is it?" Killian asked, allowing his eyes to drift back out to sea.
"I've come to relieve you for the night," the crewman answered. With a slight nod of his head, Killian stepped aside, allowing the man to take hold of the wheel, and he started to walk away. "Captain?" He stopped but didn't turn around. "Your brother was a good man. And so are you. We'll follow you…wherever you wish for us to go."
Killian dipped his head slightly, the only movement he was capable of making to acknowledge the man's loyalty…the same loyalty he had shown to his brother…and retreated below deck. He didn't even realize where he was going until he was already there, standing at the closed door, his shaking hand halfway to the handle. But he quickly pulled back, knowing what memory awaited him should he choose to enter. Liam had barely been gone a few hours, his body sinking below the dark waters and disappearing as if he had never existed. Killian had never felt a pain as all-consuming as this. And if he walked inside that door…if he stepped into the room where his brother's last breath had been drawn and found it as empty as he felt…he wouldn't be able to bear it.
So he turned, using what remaining strength he had to walk back down the hallway to the empty hold, and collapsed onto a nearby box. He buried his head in his hands to stifle the sound of the cries that eventually faded into a short, tormented sleep that provided no comfort, no rest…only the same overwhelming pain that plagued him in every moment since he had held his brother in his arms for the last time.
"Captain Jones?" Finn the crewman announced his presence, startling Killian yet again with his ability to appear out of thin air at his side. He'd reminded himself of the young man's name in the days that had followed their interaction on that first night, knowing that there'd be many more to come. They had fallen into a pattern of sorts, as well. Killian stood, eyes focused on the darkness that lay before them and lost in thought, while Finn came to his side and took the wheel from him after a small show of reluctance from the captain. But tonight, something was different, as Killian took notice of an unfamiliar and yet mischievous gleam in Finn's eyes. "I finally found what you asked for," he said, presenting a bottle he'd been hiding behind his back. "It was a difficult task, seeing as how we haven't made port in several days and you had confiscated most of it before…" he hesitated, having been careful not to mention Liam since the first night. "But one of the men finally showed me a stash he kept, and he gave me a bottle." Killian carefully reached out and took it from him, not sure if he should be annoyed that his men were keeping a stash when he explicitly had told them not to or content in knowing that it no longer mattered and he had what he wanted.
"Thank you," he said, clapping his hand on Finn's shoulder as he released the wheel and made his way below deck.
The liquid sloshed against the side of the bottle as Killian twisted the top off, coming to a stop just outside the door that haunted his dreams every night whenever exhaustion finally forced him to drift out of consciousness. With just a brief hesitation, he finally placed the bottle to his lips and took a small swallow that he choked down. Though the moment that he felt the satisfying burn as the rum traveled down his throat and to his stomach, the bottle was at his lips again, a long swallow blazing its way throughout his entire body.
When most of the bottle was gone and he found himself barely able to stand with his head swimming, he threw the door open with a crash and stumbled inside, closing the door back behind him just as forcefully as the swinging knocked him off-balance, sending him into the floor. Leaning his back against the wall, he welcomed the combination of drunkenness and exhaustion that quickly overcame him, knowing somewhere in his mind that when he awoke the next morning to find himself in the very same position where he'd held his brother's lifeless body that no amount of rum would ever be able to burn that away.
"Killian?" Milah asked, waving her hand in front of his face to get his attention as he turned to look at her, dark curls falling in front of a pair of bright eyes that gazed at him as if he were the most incredible sight she'd ever seen. He'd only known her for a short time, meeting her in a tavern of all places, but he could see in her something he'd seen in himself long ago…a longing for adventure. She reminded him that there was still a bit of wonder in a world that had taken so much away from him.
"Being a pirate suits you," he remarked, allowing his eyes to leave hers and to travel down, admiring the way one of the spare outfits they'd acquired in their travels hugged her body. There were women coming aboard and leaving the ship in droves with each new port that they sailed into, so it had become pertinent to keep spare bits of clothing to outfit them should they choose to stay for longer than a night. He realized, however, that Milah was the only one who'd come aboard with the intention of seeing the world rather than seeking the pleasure of the crew's company.
"The leather will take some time to get accustomed to," she said, twisting back and forth with an amused grin.
"You're a natural," he replied, winking at her as she rolled her eyes, though her gaze returned to his lips before she opened her mouth wide in a loud yawn. Upon further inspection, Killian noticed the bags that had formed under her eyes, and after summoning Finn over to the wheel, he placed a hand on her back and led her below deck.
"But I feel like I've spent my entire life sleeping," she argued when Killian mentioned how tired she must have been from a long first day at sea.
"You can't enjoy the beauty all of the realms have to offer if you're unconscious from over-exhaustion, love," he said, adding a "trust me" silently in his head.
"Fine," she grumbled. "Is this it?" He'd unknowingly led her to his quarters, knowing that he wasn't going to have her sleeping with the crew. But they had never really become his quarters. He'd only set foot in them that one time, and only because he was drunk and testing to see if he ever could. The sharp pain in his heart in the weeks that followed that night had been a constant reminder of why he couldn't go into that room, sober or not. But he was no longer alone. This was different. Wasn't it? "Killian?" Milah's voice broke through his inner turmoil. "Shall we go in?" she asked, confusion twisting her features as she tried to read him.
"Of course," he said, shaking his head, reaching out, and pushing the door open carefully.
He could see him, as clearly as he could see Milah standing next to him. He could see it all. The two of them, smiling at each other as the ship glided through the sky. Liam, lying in the floor. And himself, taking his brother into his arms, screaming for help that would never come. He closed his eyes but he could still see it, the pain of it taking the air from his lungs. Drawing in shaky, shallow breaths, he led Milah over to the bed, waited until she had laid down, and turned to leave the room, to retreat back to the deck and the fresh air.
"Aren't you going to stay?" she asked, stopping him halfway between the bed and the door as he turned back to her with a grimace that he hoped would pass as a smile.
"No, love, you rest. I've yet to chart our course, and if you wish to see all of these new lands, we have to know what direction we're going," he lied, knowing that any of the helmsmen he entrusted with the ship's navigation already knew how to get to any of the realms they had visited before.
"Even captains need their rest," she answered, holding out her hand for him to take. He briefly stepped closer, took her hand into his, and placed a kiss to the back of it before withdrawing as close to the door as possible.
"I'll join you later," he said, knowing that this night would be the same as every night before it. He would pull a bottle of rum from his well-stocked hold and drink until he passed out, his dreams still plagued with the same memory that he was seeing now.
"All right," she finally conceded, allowing her head to fall onto the pillow before adding, "And thank you…for everything."
"I haven't done anything worth gratitude, darling," he answered softly, solemnly, before leaving the room and quickly closing the door behind him. As he stumbled back out onto the deck, trying to catch his breath again in the night air, he realized that although Milah's presence had allowed him a welcome escape during the day, the second that the sun dipped below the horizon and night fell, he was still very much alone.
Their lips crashed into each other as forcefully as two waves, both refusing to yield to the other. Instead they merged together, becoming one single impenetrable force. His hands tugged at buckles and loosened laces as they stumbled together down the hallway and through a door, collapsing together onto a bed that sat at the corner of a room.
Darkness surrounded them, but that didn't stop either of them from navigating through the buttons and clasps of every piece of clothing they wore and littering the floor with piles of various fabrics and leathers.
Milah's lips left Killian's suddenly, and she began sucking on his neck, trailing kisses over his collarbone and down his chest, allowing a moan to escape his mouth before he could stifle it.
It was the first time they'd allowed a gentle kiss on deck to become a display of their true passion as each finally gave into the other. The black of night around them had just begun to lighten in the early morning hours when sleep finally overcame them, each collapsing into the other's arms.
It was the deepest sleep Killian had experienced in what felt like lifetimes. But not even that could stop the same nightmare he saw every night in his mind, forcing him awake as he shot straight up in bed. Drenched in a cold sweat, he ran his trembling fingers through his hair and surveyed his surroundings for the first time. They were in the captain's quarters. Of course they would be. It was where Milah slept every night. Where Killian pretended to come in each night, sleep, and claim to have risen before Milah woke in order to relieve Finn at the wheel. Where they had made love for the first time. And where his brother had died.
Gently lifting himself off the bed and grasping at whatever clothing of his he could in the floor before starting out the door, he turned back to look at Milah, the first time he'd ever seen her sleeping. There was a peaceful smile on her face, a softness to her features that he had never seen before. The sight lightened the weight in his heart just slightly, until the memory slowly began to fade back into view and he left, pulling his clothes on as he went. Though, he couldn't help but wonder if he was really as alone as he thought.
Gone. Milah was gone. His first mate, his wonder, his love. Gone in an instant. Taken. Taken by a coward hiding behind a mask of power.
How? How could he lose the only two people in his life that he had truly loved in almost the exact same way? Suddenly. Painfully. Helplessly. Forced to hold them in his arms as they drew their final breaths. Forced to watch as their lifeless bodies fell, sinking to the bottom of the ocean.
"Captain Jon—Hook?" Finn interrupted, the use of his new moniker serving as yet another reminder of all that he had lost on the deck of this ship.
Before he realized it, he was standing below deck, practically shoved down there and ordered to sleep after several consecutive days at the helm spent unmoving and silent. But sleep would never come. Not without twice the kind of pain so overwhelming that he was barely surviving the first wave. Surviving because of Milah. Without her, he would certainly drown.
He wouldn't go down that hall. He couldn't. Not to the room that he'd finally found the strength to sleep in at night with a softly snoring Milah beside him. Not to the bed where they had explored every inch of each other time and time again. Not to the brightly colored linens that she had insisted on acquiring during one of their port stops despite Killian's grumbling about the simple blue bedding being just fine for him though he couldn't help but admit, if only to himself, that he welcomed the change from the bedding that his brother had slept on to something new, for just the two of them. And not to all of the memories that would make death seem an easier option than the revenge he had sworn he would have before he allowed himself to be reunited with his brother and his love.
So with his flask in hand, he quickly found himself stumbling through the halls, collapsing to the floor and leaning against a very familiar box in the ship's hold, head resting on his knees as tears streamed down his face and he struggled to breathe through the sobs that he couldn't hold back. And when restless sleep arrived, the same dream that had plagued him mercilessly every night for years had finally changed, allowing for the addition of yet another, and perhaps the final, piece of his heart that had been torn away.
As the boy finally drew air into his lungs, Killian let out the breath he'd unknowingly been holding. He'd nearly lost Emma on the deck of his ship…if he had…he couldn't even think of it without nearly doubling over in pain. But if they'd lost Henry, who had come to mean so much to so many, including himself…
"…I wanted to be a hero," Henry's voice interrupted his thoughts before he had the chance to imagine just what would have happened had they lost him, and for the first time, he really saw the boy. Stubborn, like both of his parents. Brave, to have been willing to give his heart to save a cause that he believed in. And still hopeful, even after all he had been through. It was as if Killian were looking back in time, seeing a time when he once embodied all of those qualities as well. A young, headstrong lieutenant who simply wanted to do the right thing…the honorable thing.
But the moment that he had buried his brother at sea and the ashes of the Pegasus flame had fallen around him and his crew, Killian had changed. He had given into his pain and his anger. And when he lost Milah, dedicating the rest of his life to enacting revenge on Rumplestiltskin, he had surrendered himself entirely to that pain and that anger and that darkness. It wasn't until he opened his eyes one day to sunlight and a head full of golden hair belonging to a beautiful woman that he'd allowed any kind of light to find its way back into his heart. But those were thoughts for another time…after they'd arrived safely back in Storybrooke, as he'd promised Emma. He had to focus on the task at hand.
"Welcome back, young sir," he addressed Henry, who turned to meet his eyes for the first time, reminding him far too much of both of his parents. "Only the best for our guest of honour, don't you think? Captain's quarters," he added, realizing what he said only after he'd said it.
But as he led Regina and the boy below deck and down that familiar hall, he didn't hesitate as he reached for the door. He didn't step cautiously as he walked inside. And he wasn't overwhelmed by painful memories of the past at the sight of a corner of the room or the brightly colored linens. He felt it, yes. A twinge of pain to serve as a reminder for the family and the love he'd had and lost in this room and on this ship. But here now were a mother and her son, a family reunited in small part because of his help. And up on deck were the source of a poisonous revenge he had since given up on, a chance at a family he had once betrayed in the name of revenge but had helped to save so that he could be reunited with his own family, a reminder of his brother who he could and did save and who he was, in fact, winning over, and the kind of love he never thought he was capable of finding. For the first time in a very long time, Killian Jones wasn't alone.