A/N: Based off the promo for 4.15 and off the first line prompt I got sent a while ago on tumblr. I've been waiting for Ursula and Killian's backstory with baited breath since before the hiatus and this is the result of my mind going ballistic on the last week of waiting. I hope you enjoy this! xxx

ps: I have NOT abandoned Far Away, I promise! This prompt was just long overdue, and I promise I'll update FA(FFTL) before the new episode!

Poor Unfortunate Soul

Now that the telltale glow of the false Killian's necklace was already fading out, all that Killian could do was watch with darkening vision as his double smiled down at him, turned, and strode up the beach - toward the town, toward Emma - and scream soundlessly from a throat robbed of its voice.

He'd had no time to react, not a moment to gather his thoughts when Ursula grabbed him as soon as he stepped into the woods to meet her, brutally squeezing all air out of him with her tentacles wrapped tightly around his middle, making his lungs feel like they were about to burst from the pressure. Thus she kept a tight, suffocating grip on him as a well-known purple smoke enveloped them both and the next thing he knew, they were standing in the middle of a ship's deck - none other than the Jolly Roger itself.

Before he could ask the sea witch how on earth she put her tentacles on his ship, the one he'd traded with a band of rival pirates for the bean that would allow him to find Emma, he heard that screechy, characteristically despicable laughter rolling along the sea breeze. He clenched his jaw unconsciously, grinding his teeth together with anger.

"Thought you'd seen the last of me, dearie?"

The next moments passed by in a haze. Gold was amusing himself more than his listeners with the quintessential Dark One's monologue, going on about his brilliant alliance with the queens of darkness, explaining how he intended to change the fairytales and rob the heroes of their happy endings, which the villains now would finally get, and so on and so forth.

Killian, however, was ignoring every single word of it. It all seemed so obvious now that the man was standing here in front of his eyes, and he can't help thinking he should have known it all along.

As Gold himself said, he was his oldest "friend". If anyone in town could have realised that Ursula and Cruella wouldn't be able to trick Rumple, figure out his plans, ditch him and find their way to Storybrooke, it was the pirate who had known his arch-enemy for centuries. But he failed once again.

(It seems like that's all he's been doing lately.)

Yet he can't help ignoring the Dark One's ramblings when Ursula is shooting daggers at him with her eyes. Sure, it was a relief that her tentacles had recoiled from his body, but he knew there was something downright ominous about the smirk that suddenly found its way to her lips, a thoroughly satisfied little thing that read looks like the roles are reversed and you're the one who's not welcome on my ship now.

He knew it was coming. He could feel his pirate-y senses tingling all over his skin with that unrelenting look in her eyes, scanning him from head to hook and back up to meet his remorsefully blue gaze. He just knew in his bones that whatever Gold had planned for him, or more likely for the whole town, Ursula had certainly added her personal touch of cruelty to the villain's agenda to exact revenge on his poor unfortunate soul.

The second Gold stopped muttering his overused phrases addressing the last day of Killian's life (Enjoy the last sunset you'll ever watch from your ship, pirate) was the second he saw a tentacle darting towards him from Ursula's side, its tip wrapping around his necklace and roughly tugging it from his neck.

"You took something very precious from me, Hook. It's about time I show you what that feels like."

"You're referring to that hackneyed thing that's long been out of vogue? You'd be doing me a favour getting rid of it." Killian replied with a scoff. "I'm quite surprised, actually. I never thought you were the sentimental type, Ursula."

"You and I both know I'm not, but you are. And I'm not talking about your stupid necklace, captain." Killian gulped hard, the perverse gleam in her eye sending a chill down his spine. "You see, there's a tiny little problem with Rumple's plan. There's a certain saviour who's powerful enough to take us all down before we get a chance at our happy endings, so we have to get rid of her first. I'm sure you of all people will understand the need to sacrifice others for your own gain."

"I swear to all the gods, Ursula, if you touch Emma not even your father could-"

"Don't you dare bring him up, Hook. Not after everything you've done. You can't stop us, and this - " she placed the chain with the skull and the cutlass pendants around her own neck, making a dark green glow appear around it with an elegant flick of her wrist, "- this will allow me to get close enough to her. The poor girl was silly enough to trust you, imagine how crushed she'll be when she finds out how wrong she was about you. Does she even suspect what you did?"

"I was going to tell her." Killian replied in a small, inward voice.

"Just like you were going to be honest and not trick me into making the biggest mistake of my life? Of course you were, Hook."

"Ursula, I can't say how much I regret what I did to you. I wish I could change it, I truly do, but I can't. All I can say is how profoundly sorry I am."

"Well, you're right. Nothing can change it now. Which is why you're gonna pay for it." Her slimy tentacles quickly came around his ribcage, squeezing and crushing him again. "You must have missed being out in the water. Allow me to refresh your memory a little." She added, lifting Killian off of his beloved wooden planks and chucking him into the sea.

He felt the icy water invading his nose and mouth, simultaneously freezing his limbs from within and forcing his thoughts into a halt. The temperature shock was too abrupt, too vivid, too much, and he was barely resisting the urge to stop fighting and let the sea claim him to its depths, the unbearable weight on him starting to comfortably lull him into an exhausted slumber.

As if his heart was well aware of his priorities, even at the cusp of unconsciousness, his eyes shot open and all he saw in front of him were green eyes and a radiant smile and golden hair. His angelic siren appeared in front of his eyes, curling her finger and entreating him to not let himself be pulled under.

So he kicked his legs and stretched out his arms, summoning all that was left of his energy to find the surface again. He swam, swam, and swam some more until it felt like a thousand microscopic needles were prickling his limbs all over. He gave all he had left but breathing again seemed like a distant dream just out of his reach, and it wasn't until his head broke out of the water and he started gasping violently for air that he stopped doubting whether or not he was still alive.

Killian finally reached the beach and let his body fall limp on the sand, as his sore muscles and flaming lungs would not suffer him to stand up anytime soon, much less run across town to find Emma before-

He looked up when he noticed a shadow on the sand coming closer, and that's when he saw him - actually, he saw himself, the very own Killian Jones standing in front of him, that perverse smirk on his face the only thing giving Ursula away in her otherwise perfect disguise. That and the faint green glow disappearing from the charms on his necklace.

"Look at that, you made it out alive. Too bad you won't be there to watch the show after all this effort." Ursula spit out in his own lilting accent (bloody hell, did he actually sound like that all the time?) before kicking him mercilessly on the ribs and striding away.

In all of Killian's 300+ years of life nothing has been as eerily torturing as listening to his own voice taunting him now, except for imagining himself hurting the woman he loves. Lifetimes of self-loathing and regrets had long established this particular scenario as his worst nightmare, though he never thought he'd be off the stage while his non-self performed all the heart breaking and hope crushing.

But, if there's one thing Killian Jones is good at, it's surviving.

And since breaking Emma's heart would most certainly be the death of him, he decided he wouldn't break his promise to her now.

Review and I might add a part 2 with the outcome of this? *bats eyelashes*