Emma Swan was used to being alone; in fact, it was something she was rather good at by now. She was used to coming home at night every night to an empty apartment that always stayed the same as she'd left it, she was used to having nobody around to talk to, no friends and certainly no family and she was used to having nobody but herself to rely on. She'd long accepted her lonely life, realising that she'd been alone for the first 27 years of her life, why should her 28th be any different?

As far as birthdays go, today had been pretty average mostly; in fact, it was all going really great when she realised that today's perp, Ryan, was putty in her hands and there was no chance he was about to escape from her well laid out plan. She'd have her pay check in her hand by midnight for sure.

Like with all the men she'd taken down through the means of 'stuff and cuff' technique (stuff them with food at a fancy dinner and then throw the cuff's on before they'd even had chance for dessert), Ryan had been mesmerised by her tall, toned figure before she'd even had to speak or order anything to eat. Emma tried not to be too irritated by this most of the time, even feeling smug occasionally at the stupidity of these guys to let their guard down for even the few seconds that it takes for them to get distracted by her long legs or hourglass figure squeezed into a tiny dress.

She'd worn one of her favourite dresses for tonight's 'date', seeing as this one asshole had caused both her and his poor wife a fair amount of time and money to track him down after he'd skipped bail, leaving his family bankrupt. Emma had tracked him down, trailed him for what felt like weeks, learnt his habits, found out where he was working, what car he drove and then finally found him online on a dating website and sent him a request to meet. From there, it had really all been too easy. A few photographs and a few flirtatious remarks and he was basically begging her to go on a date with him. Just like they all did. These men really were far too predictable sometimes.

Everything had been going smoothly and according to plan until he pushed their table over at her – spilling red wine down her dress – and fled the scene before Emma had been able to tell him just how crappy his wine selection for the evening had been anyways.

They always ran when she had her super high heels on too, it was just so inconsiderate. Not that she let them slow her down however, catching up with him easily enough at his car as she desperately tried to drive off before realising she'd capped his tires.

The look on his face when he realised he wasn't escaping anywhere was almost enough to forgive him for ruining her dress, but then he had to fuck it all up and bring her own non-existent family into it after she'd given him a talking to about being a shit husband and father.

"What the hell do you know about family?"

After basically throwing him into a holding cell at the nearest station and collecting her well-deserved money, she drove back to her apartment, kind of wishing that she'd thought to bring a different pair of shoes to drive in as the six-inch killer black heels were starting to make her wish she'd just worn a pair of normal boots instead. No perp was worth this amount of irritation.

The asshole should count himself lucky that she'd only smashed his head on the steering wheel of his own car and knocked him out. If he'd been awake on the trip over to the station she'd really have given him a piece of her mind.

By the time she got home, her feet were genuinely throbbing and she nearly sobbed aloud in relief when she kicked them off in the hallway, leaning on the wall for support as she regained her balance. She blew the strand of long blonde hair that had fallen in front of her eyes out of her face and debated for the hundredth time that week just chopping it up to above her shoulders to keep it out the way for convenience sake.

Emma flicked the entrance light switch on to give the space enough light for her to see where she was going as she padded barefoot down her hallway into the open plan kitchen/living room space, feeling pretty pleased with herself when she realised how clean and tidy she'd left the place earlier considering how she had left in a hurry as she was already running late for her 'date'. Her apartment was considered fairly small, it would have been a squeeze to fit two people in, so it was probably a good thing that she lived in it alone, finding that there was plenty of space for just one occupant.

She walked straight into the kitchen and put down the white cardboard box she'd collected from the store around the corner on her way home, searching around for some matches and finding them in the exact same place that she'd put them after last year, along with the half-used box of star candles that she only used for her birthday. This would be her third candle used. Her third birthday in this apartment. Her third birthday alone in the apartment, but her twenty-eighth birthday alone without anyone to celebrate with. Trying not to let this get her down even more, she picked out a blue star candle and cautiously poked it through the white frosting of the cupcake that she'd carefully selected as her birthday cake—She'd had a birthday cookie last year and it had been the most awkward thing to try and get the candle to stand up in it long enough for her to light it and make her wish before blowing it out without setting fire to anything.

Taking a match out of the box and striking it on the side to light it, she let the flames lick the wick of the lone candle on the cupcake. She put the match out and then leant down to look at the cake, her head resting on her crossed arms, watching the small flame dance around in the otherwise fairly dark kitchen.

"Another banner year…" she muttered to herself with a sigh, allowing her eyes to close so she could make her wish. The same wish she pitifully made every year. It was yet to come true, but who was she to deny tradition now?

I wish to not be alone anymore…

She took one big breath and then blew the candle out without re-opening her eyes.

All of a sudden, there was a sharp object poking into the exposed skin on her neck, a body pushed right up against her back and a hand covering her mouth.

"I wouldn't move if I were you, lass," advised a calm yet threatening voice.

Emma's eyes flew open in shock, what the fuck was happening? How the hell had someone been able to get into her flat without her knowing about it? The front door had definitely been locked and she lived on the 23rd floor for the love of god, there was no way for somebody to be in here without her having let them in.

Her immediate reaction was to freeze completely in fear, her heart literally pounding inside her chest, but then her common sense started to kick in and she twisted out of the choke hold, grabbing the intruders arm to push the knife away from her throat.

Only it wasn't a knife that was being held against her.

It was a hook.

Noticing that the sharp curved end of the hook was incredibly close to her face she grabbed onto the blunt part of it and hung on for dear life, causing the two of them to stumble into the small living room as apparently, this psycho asshole had not counted on his victim to fight back with quite so much strength. Somehow in the struggle they both ended up falling backwards over the coffee table, smashing it to pieces, Emma landing hard on top of the hooked man. She heard his grunt of pain and immediately struck – ignoring how her own body was screaming in agony. She flipped over so she was pinning him down underneath her, just giving her enough time to reach for her lamp and smash him over the head with it, knocking him out cold before he could push her off and do any serious damage with that freaking hook of his.

"Happy fucking birthday to me…" she groaned, half irritated, half exasperated, giving the man a hard poke to the face to check he was properly unconscious before scrambling to her feet as delicately as she could in her tight mini dress. "Come along, sleeping beauty," she muttered under her breath, grabbing both his arms and beginning to drag him back into the kitchen.

Five minutes later the human swiss-army knife – who she now realised was dressed completely from head to toe in black leather – was handcuffed to one of her kitchen chairs with his legs bound too so he wouldn't be able to lash out or move once he regained consciousness. She had also managed to remove and hide the hook from its holster so if by some chance he managed to escape, he would be less likely to lacerate her to death.

He was attractive as far as potential serial killers went, Emma admitted to herself once he was fully restrained. He was tall with a strong muscular build, a head full of jet black hair, a perfectly chiselled jawline, a small amount of stubble and generally just a dangerous look to him. She still hadn't worked out who the hell this guy was, but she was really kicking herself—this is what she got when she accidentally brought her work home with her, she should probably be more careful and watchful when driving her bright yellow bug back to her own home after an incarceration.

Deciding to quickly get out of her stupid stained dress whilst she had a few minutes to herself, she ran into her room and threw on a pair of jeans, a vest top, her brown boots and her red leather jacket so if she ended up in another wrestling match she'd be less likely to flash him her underwear.

She was about to throw her hair up in a ponytail on her head when she heard movement from back in the kitchen and then heavy boots walking in her direction. Jesus, did this guy not give up?! How the hell had he gotten out of handcuffs so fast too?!

Emma moved to stand up against the back of the door, so when the intruder stepped into her bedroom she threw herself at him and latched onto his back, pinning his arms down to his sides, catching him off guard as he wobbled and stumbled backwards effectively slamming his entire body weight back onto Emma as they collided with the wall. She grunted in pain and was forced to let go of the man so she could pick herself up off the floor, realising pretty fast that she had really hurt her back on impact and moving quickly was something that was going to prove a challenge.

They both scrambled to their feet as swiftly as they could and stood face to face for the first time since he had sprung out at her and they made reluctant eye contact. It was at the exact moment that green met blue that the doorbell rang, scaring them half to death as the had both grown accustomed to the silence within the apartment apart from their own shouts and crashes.

The man in leather reached inside his coat with his hand and pulled a small knife out of one of the inside pockets, turning it towards the direction of the door as if some great monster was about to burst through. At the sight of the knife Emma swore loudly and grabbed her gun off her bedside table just as the doorbell rang again.

All of a sudden, the now hook-less man leapt in front of Emma, almost as if to protect her from some unseen danger, still holding the knife out towards the door.

Thoroughly confused and slightly weirded out, she stepped around the man giving him a wide berth as she moved to go and answer the door, realising that this creep was probably not going to attempt to gut her whilst her back was turned if he'd gone to protect her at the slightest noise from the world outside her apartment.

"What are you doing, lass?!" he asked, clearly alarmed as she strolled determinedly towards the door.

"Answering my front door, so just stay in here and be quiet. You can have another shot at killing me once I've gotten rid of whoever's outside," she snapped back at him in a dry voice, reminded again about how sore her body was as she walked out into the hallway, shut him in her bedroom (probably a decision that would come back to bite her on the ass later) and threw open the front door.

"Erm…can I help you?"

"Are you Emma Swan?"

"Yeah, who are you?"

"My name's Henry. I'm your son."

The next few minutes were a confused blur as the small, talkative child walked straight past Emma into the apartment without being invited inside and immediately started wandering around, nosily picking stuff up to examine it closer before completely making himself at home and sitting at one of the tall chairs up against the breakfast bar.

"Kid, where are your parents?!" Emma managed to ask, momentarily getting over her initial shock of having a child walk into her life claiming to be her son.

Henry turned to look at her, staring back at her with eyes that were far too familiar for her liking, despite not seeing them for over a decade. "Ten years ago, did you give up a baby for adoption? That was me."

Emma physically felt her heart aggressively thumping in her chest, there was no denying that this was the baby she'd had in prison as a teenager. Even if he didn't look so much like his father, she just knew that it was her child stood in front of her; she could feel it. Regardless to this though, she still needed a minute to wrap her head around how he was even here in the first place.

There should have been no way for this kid to have been able to track her down—she'd chosen to go for a closed adoption when she'd given him up – and even more impossible for him to have found her all by himself.

"Give me a minute", she blurted out, needing to have a moment alone to herself to gain some composure.

She half ran to the bathroom and firmly closed and locked the door behind her, trying her best to get a grip and not have too much of a panic attack.

"Hey, do you have any juice?"

She knew what it was like to grow up not understanding why her parents had abandoned her, she knew the pain that went along with that. Did her kid now have the same complex and that's why he sought her out?

"Never mind, found some!"

God, she'd given him up so she didn't have to let down her kid by being a terrible mother, but in the process, she had become an even worse mother…this was so screwed up.

Emma put both her hands on the sink basin and looked into the mirror in front of her, seeing her own scared eyes and pale face staring back at her… a pale face covered in cuts and scratches…Shit, she'd only gone and forgotten about the leather clad weirdo she'd left in her bedroom!

Immediately she threw open the bathroom door and marched across the hall to her bedroom. She took a deep breath before opening the door and cursed to herself when she realised that – just as she'd expected – the room was empty.

"Oh hi, are you Emma's boyfriend?"

The kid had been in her presence for all of ten minutes and she had already been reminded why it was that she was incapable of motherhood. She was going to get him fucking killed and his parents would never know what had happened to him.

She ran from the room in sheer panic, skidding back into the main part of the apartment and she was immediately frozen in shock at the sight in front of her when she rounded the corner.

Both of her 'guests' were sat at the breakfast bar drinking her damn orange juice.

She watched in shock as the kid poured juice into a 'I don't do mornings' cup and slid it over to the psychotic hook-wielding maniac who had attacked her not an hour before. He picked up the cup and held it out to the boy who clinked his own against it in a toast.

"What the hell is happening in here?" she somehow managed to question in complete bewilderment, two sets of eyes shot back into her direction and her kid darn smiled at her with a big toothy grin whilst the other man just sat and watched silently.

"Hey Emma, do you want some juice? You know, before we get going."

"Get going where?" she immediately replied, not able to hide her suspicions in her voice as it came out challenging and untrusting.

"I want you to come home with me," he answered, continuing to grin, taking a large gulp out of his cup which had the caption 'I'm not always a bitch—just kidding, go fuck yourself' on it…yep, she was definitely not winning the award for parent of the year.

"Okay kid, I'm calling the cops."

"Then I'll tell them you kidnapped me."
"And… they'll believe you because I'm your birth mother." Great. Just what she needed.

"Yep," he smirked…smug little

"You're not gonna do that," she replied immediately, half challenging, half desperate that he was bullshitting her. She didn't need to end up in prison again, for the love of god.

"Try me," he replied, doing his best to keep a straight face.

"You're pretty good, but here's the thing, there's not a lot I'm great at in life, but I have one skill, let's call it a superpower. I can tell when anyone is lying, and you kid, are," she picked up the phone and started dialling the number but then his plea stopped her in her tracks.

"Wait, please don't call the cops. Please, come home with me."

Suddenly Emma wasn't sure what the right thing to do was anymore. Surely, he was better off being taken by the cops now back to his family so that she could finally figure out what to do with the other guest she seemed to have been landed with. But then she also had to assess whether there would be trouble for her anyways –regardless of the fact the kid had come looking for her, it would still look suspicious. Not only that, but the crazy person sat at her breakfast bar next to him could be incredibly dangerous and she didn't want to trigger him in any way to make things worse. Why did bad things always happen to her?

Speaking of which, the man was sat silently, watching the other two converse as if he was trying to figure out was happening, just as much as Emma was. Good. At least she wasn't the only one confused out of her mind.

"Where's home?" she finally decided to ask in defeat, taking him back was probably going to be the safest option. She could drop stab-happy off at the station on her way too.

"Storybrooke, Maine."

"Storybrooke?" Emma and the leathered man both asked in unison, one out of disbelief, the other in something that almost sounded like excitement.

"Yeah…" Henry replied slowly, eyeing them both up as if he didn't quite know what to make of them. "Storybrooke; it's where I live."

Suddenly the man leapt up from his seat, sending the stool clattering to the floor behind him he moved so abruptly. "Lass, I'm going to need my appendage back, if you will? I have an arrangement that cannot wait another second now I am finally close to achieving my revenge."

"Hang on, what now? Revenge? On who? And you must think I'm crazy if I'm just going to hand you back the weapon you used to almost turn me into a pin cushion," Emma replied disbelievingly, who on earth did this guy think he was?

His eyes darkened even more and he took several threatening steps towards her. "You don't want to make an enemy of me, woman, I assure you that. Now give it to me!"

"Are you insane? No!" she fired back, wishing she'd just called the cops on him whilst he was harmless enough sat drinking her damn juice.

"Fine, then you leave me no choice," he growled before reaching inside his coat to grab his knife and then lunged for Henry, dragging him ruthlessly off his stool and holding the knife to his throat.

"Stop!" she yelled in panic, watching as the kid she'd known for barely half an hour was close to being murdered after spending clearly too much time in her presence. Henry looked at her, clearly scared and confused, but also with something else that she couldn't quite place, it looked an awful lot like excitement though, which was enough to make her believe this boy was most definitely hers and Neal's, unfortunately.

"Give. Me. My. Hook," he snarled refusing to take his eyes away from hers for even a second.

"Look, please let him go, okay? Then we can talk? He doesn't need to get hurt," she tried to reason, thinking of how on earth she was going to explain this to his real parents when she got him home.

"I don't know whether you think I'm bluffing or just stupid, love, but I will not hesitate another second to slit his throat open unless you give me back what you've stolen from me. Nobody steals from a pirate!"

"You're a pirate who has a hook?" Henry asked suddenly, not able to hide the excitement in his voice.

"Not the time, kid!" Emma reprimanded in exasperation—yep, definitely Neal's kid.

"Lass, my hook? Tick tock, I have a crocodile to skin."

"A crocodile?!"

"You mean Rumpelstiltskin?"

"What the hell are you talking about, kid?"

"Boy, how do you know of the Dark One?"

"It's all in my book! It's all real! The curse is true! How are you here and not in Storybrooke with everyone else?"

"What is happening? What book?!"
"I did not get swept up in the Queen's curse, I escaped it as it swept over the kingdom."

"Escaped? How? Did you come from there?!"

"The Enchanted Forest? Aye, that I did. Or rather what's left of it."

"STOP IT!" Emma yelled, hurting her throat in the process. She had absolutely no clue what was happening, but somehow in all the chaos the knife had been put away again and the intruder seemed to be having an incredibly important conversation with the ten-year-old he'd just threatened to murder.

"Sorry, love, but can't you see you are interrupting a very important conversation?" the man in the stupid pirate costume snapped at her.

"Me? Interrupting? Look, this is my apartment and I want you out of it in the next thirty seconds! I don't care who you are, but you're damn lucky I haven't called the cops on you already!"

The man looked down Henry in confusion and he just nodded in understanding and explained in a hushed tone: "Like royal guards."

Freaking Jack Sparrow nodded in understanding before looking confused again. "Does that mean this wench is of royal decent? This doesn't look like any castle I've seen in my whole – and frankly – lengthy existence."

"I guess she is, yeah," Henry smiled as if the realisation had only just occurred to him. "She's a Princess, but more importantly, she's the Saviour."

"The Saviour? Snow White's daughter?! You mean to say it's been that long since the curse?!"

Emma just sighed, covered her face with her hands and took a few calming breaths before attempting to speak again. "You know, I literally have no idea what you're both talking about. Look, Captain Crazy-Pants, I'll get your hook but then I want you out of my place."

"Actually, Your Highness, it's Captain Hook, although I do appreciate that you got the 'Captain' part right on your first go," he smirked at her and raised his eyebrow in a challenging manner, switching on his charms, going from psychotic to flirtatious in literally less than ten seconds.

"Captain Hook?" she laughed, unable to stop herself. "Of course it is, my bad! But seriously, you're a little old for dressing up and fairy-tales, aren't you?"

"No, Emma, he really is Captain Hook!" the boy announced in excitement. "But look, we really need to be going so my Mom doesn't really try and send out a search party after me."

"Oh yeah, to Storybrooke? Let me guess, is that where the Tooth Fairy and Pinocchio live too? Is the Easter Bunny your next-door neighbour?"

"Actually, I don't think the Tooth Fairy or the Easter Bunny are real and I don't think Pinocchio is in town, but Jiminy Cricket and Geppetto are around, so maybe we just haven't found him yet?" the kid replied with a shrug, moving to grab his backpack from off the floor.

"Perhaps he caught some rare case of woodworm?" the man chuckled and winked at Emma and in turn she glared at him flatly, still not sure what she was dealing with. "Aw come on, love, lighten up! It was only a joke!"

"I'm not your 'love', buddy," she snapped back at him before storming into the kitchen to fetch the ridiculous hook she'd hidden earlier. She stormed over to the microwave and aggressively threw the door open and grabbed the damned hook thing before slamming it shut again. She thrust it aggressively in front of the pirate wannabe with so much attitude he couldn't help but smirk as he took it off her.

"Much appreciated, love." He added extra emphasis on the endearment, knowing it irritated her and even threw in a wink for good measure, finally clicking the hook back into the holster. "Much better! I would hate to be without this when I know you have a special attachment to it too, milady," he announced flirtatiously, even being dramatic enough to drop into a low bow.

"Would you just cut the crap, asshole? Why are you even here anyways?" Emma snapped, confused all over again as to how he even got into the apartment.

"Not sure, lass. One minute I'm in a tavern with my crew, surrounded by rum and beautiful wenches all throwing themselves at me having a wonderful time and the next, I'm in this awful castle of yours with you throwing yourself at me in a contrastingly sexual way," he smirked, lowering his voice to whisper in her ear. "I do love a good wrestle and a challenge, and you, Princess, give as good as it gets."

"You enjoy being knocked unconscious?" she replied, raising an eyebrow challengingly, refusing to back away from him, making a conscious effort to overlook the whole tavern shite he'd clearly made up. He was so close she could have sworn that she could literally smell the sea on him which was weird considering he was most definitely not a pirate, no matter how deluded he was.

"You bested me, sweetheart. I can count the amount of people who have done that on one hand," he grinned in way that made him seem even more dangerous if that was remotely possible.

However, regardless of how dangerous he could possibly be, Emma couldn't help but snort and shake her head in disbelief at his comment. "Is that supposed to be funny?"

He looked confused for half a second before realising what she meant and letting out loud laugh, his eyes taking on a new glint to them. "Oh, lass, I knew there was more to you than that angry façade you let off!"

"Oh yeah? I wouldn't be so sure. Who the hell even are you? And don't give me the whole 'Captain Hook' crap, how old do I look? Three?"

"But Emma—" Henry insisted.

"No, mate, it's fine," he cut in, stopping the boy from trying to reinforce his identity to a non-believer. "My name's Killian, lass. Killian Jones."

"Well, 'Killian Jones' will you kindly leave my apartment now you have your stupid hook back?" she sighed, thankful not to have had more bullshit fed to her when she was up to her quota of it for the rest of the month.

"No, he's coming to Storybrooke with us!" announced Henry determinedly.

"Oh no, sorry kid, but he is not coming anywhere. He's just leaving, right Mr Jones?" she challenged him, giving him a stone-cold look that dared him to go against what she'd said.

"You know, lass, I do quite fancy going to visit this 'Storybrooke' place, I don't suppose you'd turn down the help of a first mate for the venture?" he replied with a grin, seeing the boy not so subtly do a celebratory dance behind Emma's back at hearing this.

"Awesome! We'll meet you downstairs, Emma! Come on, Killian!"

And before she'd had chance to argue back, both man and child had left the apartment, the door closing loudly behind them.

Emma stood in the kitchen utterly gobsmacked for about half a minute, not even knowing where to begin with all that had just happened. She eventually let out a loud string of colourful curses as she hurriedly looked for her car keys and phone. She was half way out of the door before she decided to go back and fetch her cupcake from off the table. It was down to be one of the weirdest birthdays of all time, but one thing was for sure—nothing was going to stop her getting to eat her own birthday cake… apart from the fact that it was missing. Great.

It wasn't until she got out of the elevator and found both of her new companions sat in the foyer licking frosting from their fingers that she realised she'd been a victim of a case of heinous theft, and grumpily marched past them and out the main door with added vigour.

Emma Swan was used to being alone; in fact, it was something she was rather good at by now. But now she was forced into a situation where she wasn't sure when the next moment of alone-time would be, as they all piled into her tiny yellow bug. Although, externally she came across as a woman on a mission to rid herself of company to return things to normal, on the inside, her heart was starting to fill with hope again that hadn't been there for god knows how many years.

Her son had come to find her and – although she still didn't quite understand how – a weirdly attractive man had simultaneously thrust himself both into her life AND through her coffee table. One thing was for sure…she certainly wasn't alone anymore.

But she was still mad they'd eaten her damn birthday cake.