Henry is wondering, not for the first time, if he is the only sane person left in this town.
(And really, last time he thought that, he had totally been right. Cursed and all.)
Emma, okay, he kinda gets why his mom believes Hook left. He's picked up bits and pieces from the way she looks as Neal sometimes, from the way she still shies away from talks of families and capital 'T' True Love. He remembers the way Emma had been devoted to finding a way to spare Hansel and Gretel from the system, recalls odd-bits Regina had said through the years about 'the system' and 'useless social workers'. More than that, there's the time he spent in Neverland, Pan trying his best to convince he he was unwanted, unloved, totally separated from anyone who would fight for him. He has some sort of nebulous understanding of the kind of childhood his mother had, from the traumas that tend to evolve from such situations.
("So after you get married, are you still going to call her 'Swan'? Because, you know she'd be a Jones then." Henry asked more to keep Hook from punching the third jewelry shop opener of the day and distract him while he fumbled apologies to unsuspecting pedestrians in Boston.
They'd traveled to New York last weekend but after an unfortunate shop owner made a rude comment about exactly why Emma may have been interested in Killian after the pricing had been set, Henry figured a new city had been in order. He was also fairly convinced that Killian's face was all over some wanted posters in Queens for assault, so...Boston.
The pirate was still muttering under his breath but paused at the question, scratching behind his ear. "Er...lad, you know she could very well refuse. Your mother...well I love your mother more than life itself but she doesn't take too well to change."
Henry resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Barely. "Yeah, the whole going to the Underbrooke for you meant nothing, I'm sure."
Oh God. Hook was blushing. Adults were so stupid. "If you..ah...that's...I appreciate the vote of confidence Henry. And your...your corroboration with all of this."
He made a wide hand-gesture and purposefully stepped a little faster, turning so Henry couldn't see his face.
Loser. Henry did roll his eyes this time. "Yeah, I forgot I hate you so much. It's why, you know, I went with my mom to Underbrooke."
Killian chuckled, shooting Henry one of those proud, awe-struck looks that made him want to shuffle his feet and duck. "Ah, I suppose I must extend my gratitude for that as well lad. As for your first question, I'm quite fond of the moniker Swan and I suspect she may be too. I'll let Emma decide on her name as she likes"
He nodded, grabbing the man's jacket to keep him from running into traffic...for the seventh time today and guiding them to the next listed shop. "Ah, Jones is a little common but I don't think mom will really have problem with it...what?"
Killian had made a jerky move, some sort of aborted attempt to scratch behind his ear with Henry still latched onto his sleeve. Seriously, how on earth had he survived all those years of villainy? A teenager could learn his tells. "It's nothing, lad. Now, shall we be headed to Shreve Crumpfellow or DePrisco?"
"Crump and Low, and what-Killian? What don't I know?" He ducked them into one of the numerous Haymarket alleys, turning to face his soon-to-be-stepfather (weird thought) and looked expectantly.
He was raised by two women with the most bad-ass 'no-bullshit' faces. Hook was screwed. The pirate shrugged, not quite meeting his eye. "It's not really my place to say Henry...but your mother had more than one opportunity to take her surname from someone else and choose to create one for herself. I believe it is something she desires and I have no wish to take it from her."
More than one...he vaguely recalled Emma yelling at him when she first returned him to Storybrooke, years ago. Something about how at least Regina wanted him...a family that returned her. Something unfamiliar twisted in his gut not as he recalled the wild look in his mother's eyes from that moment. "So you...you think that she's still afraid you'll leave her and that's why she won't change her name? Hook, you came back to life for her. You guys are 'True Love', and like, totally gross most of the time even if you try to hide it. I mean, that's like saying Grandpa would leave Grandma-"
Henry was starting to babble and he knew it but the weird feeling in his stomach was making him uneasy. His mom was the Saviour. Surely she knew by now that-
"Henry," Killian's voice was lilting as he put a hand on his shoulder, gently drawing Henry from his thoughts. "Your mother is the fiercest, most wonderful woman I have ever met but she is not Snow. She...she did not grow up knowing her parents cared for her and was not...she was not always treated as she should have been. It has made her impossibly strong and kind, but wounds like that...they tend to linger sometimes. And, it should be no surprise to you that I very much love her and simply wish not to cause undue stress with trifling details like surnames."
His churning emotions must have showed on his face because Hook cleared his throat after that and shot him a grin. "Besides, I think Killian Swan would be a delightful name. Now then, how about you show me on your map our next destination, hmm?"
Henry pointed to the shop on the little map he begged Killian not to get, waiting quietly as the pirate figured out the maze of Boston streets and led the way. Something in him wanted to shout at Hook, rebel against the idea that his mother, the real-life Superhero with red leather and magic would be scared of getting married. Like, Emma charged into hell. Slew a dragon. Saved a town. Went to Neverland. For real, what was Killian on?
But as he followed the hard tack sound of metal heel on cobblestone, he also remembered the woman he found with her wild, shiny eyes, screaming at him that at least Regina wanted him. The woman who sat beside him on his castle and feared his rejection. The stranger he never met who ended up in prison. The person who wanted to take him back to New York. The way her hands shook the first time she held him. The way her hands shook now, the visions-
He had the briefest moment of dizziness as he tries to match up those two totally different people and something he read from school floated in his mind. "A typical tool used in coming-of-age novels is the loss or fall of an idolized character...whether by death or the further examining of [said characters] humanity and flaws...such an event causes the protagonist to-"
It was strange, he realized. To reconcile his hero who broke the curse with the woman who wanted to run back to New York. Who Hook feared might need to run at the idea of marriage and forever and happily ever after.
It was weird, to think of his super cool mom as a scared little girl. Unpleasant. Distasteful. Odd-footed.
"Lad," Killian had stopped in front of the store, the vintage facade facing them both as blue eyes looked at him with concern.
It also made him feel oddly protective. "You can't leave her, you know. If...when she agrees to marry you and everything you can't-do you, do you understand?"
Henry wasn't quite sure exactly what he could threaten the much-older pirate with, but he was sure that he could convince David and Gold to help him out if it came to that.
Hook's whole face softened, that rare, proud smile curling at his lips as he clasped around the back of his neck, dragging the teenager to him. "Aye lad. I have no intentions...It would take more than all the monsters in the seven seas to drag me away from your mother-and you."
And Henry, on pain of death, would deny that he cried into Hook's leather jacket in front of that stupid, overpriced store.
Where, of course, they found the perfect ring.)
So like, as uncomfortable as it is, Henry kinda cuts his mom a break when she assumes that the pirate has left because well-trauma and all that.
And he's not even mad at David because finding out your best friend killed your dad has just got to suck. (He doesn't care how much they deny it, they are totally 'mates'.)
But like, grandma? Snow is typically the voice of second-chances and hope and happiness. There are a million strangers in town and some sort of Uber-baby who has said he wants to kill Emma and she thinks that Killian just...got cold feet and left? For real?
His mom's not any help either. Whenever he tries to make Regina see reason he's told that it's complicated or he's too young to understand it to the point that he's rather fed up with everyone.
He says: Hook left his ship.
Grumpy says: Well, he took a sub.
He says: He left Liam's sextant.
Ruby says: He felt too guilty.
He says: Zeus ships them. Like, the god Olympus.
David says: True Love is complicated. Look at your grandmother and myself."
Okay, yeah point to grandpa but he says: You seriously think the evil Uberbaby who wants to hurt Emma didn't do anything to her True Love?
Snow says: Well, it just goes to show how cowardly he really is, running out on Emma at a time like this.
Henry resolves not to talk to them. Okay, he wants to make sure Emma is okay and yeah he still has breakfast with David, but the rest of them get ignored. Because patricide is well...bad but not entirely new to his genealogy now, is it. That and...no way is Hook leaving his ship. If he wasn't in love with his mom Henry is pretty sure he'd find a way to marry the stupid boat.
So really, if he's the last sane person in town: he's just going to put his headphones in and give the stupid adults the silent treatment until they can see reason.
He may or may not sick Archie on them too, not that he's actually angry or anything.
("No one else cares that the literal voice of conscious is Team Hook?"
"Henry-"
"Nevermind, go take Emma to the bar or whatever. It's a stupid idea though and I'm going to the library with Belle." )
He sighs. No one in the town understands the trouble he has to go through to keep his family in check.
Killian owes him a vacation when he gets back.
Everyone on boards has given him a wide berth since slaying the kraken.
Apparently, jumping overboard to stab the mouth of a legendary beast is not a sign indicative to mental well being.
Killian scoffs. His bloodlust was clenched and they were closer to finding a portal. What were they all complaining about?
He leans his head back against the iron curve of the submarine, gritting his teeth when pain reverberated back down his spine. He had glared the Nautilus's medics away and chosen instead to go lick his wounds in peace.
Nothing's permanently out-of-whack, anyway.
He peers down at his hook, wondering if he should grab a beaker when he wipes the aquamarine blood from it just to add those few more drops to the collection.
One third. The damned container was only one third of the way full and there were no new leads on kraken sightings. Ariel having heard of that one had been a bloody miracle in itself.
It's been days. Weeks maybe-time has begun to shift away like it did when he was in Neverland, the heaviness of his soul carrying from one hour to the next. Within the sunless confines of the depths, it was even easier to lose track.
Emma. How long had he been gone to her? Was she still anxious, tearing the town apart looking for him fruitlessly? Or has her long history of abandonment already shifted over her heart, wringing it out so the wide set of their empty bed haunts her as surely as each home she was ousted from as a child? Or maybe...maybe it's been months down here and she has donned her armour again, set back up that impenetrable wall and lit fire in the moats until no one, not even he will ever bring it down again. Accepted her lot to live an existence without love, fighting blindly until she di-
He can't even finish the thought. Killian swallows heavily against the lump in his throat. Weeping will lead him nowhere. He needs to get back to the charts on the table and the logs that designate shipwrecks and hope to the gods that he can find another kraken in some uncharted waters.
He stands again, his legs uncooperative and shaky from lack of sustenance and the fading adrenaline from the fight, but Hook is stubborn. His body will cooperate. He will get back to the Land without Magic, even if only to protect Emma from that monster.
Even if that's all she will let him be to her again.
He grits his teeth, stumbling back to the makeshift desk and drawing out his opisometer again, pen pressed between his teeth as he tries to locate where Blackbeard's logs had entertained the idea of a beast in the water.
He's so focused that he doesn't hear the intruder until she clears her voice.
One can always tell Royal Blood by the sound they came in clearing their throat. A noise that implies impatience with waiting and incredulity that there presence as gone unnoticed so long. Killian almost laughs. Who would have thought he would fall in love with a princess, as idiosyncratic as one as she is.
Jasmine seems to take his lack of reaction to her as acquiescence because she steps into the chamber and primly places her tray down, flicking her braid back. "You know, getting yourself killed isn't going to help Emma."
Apparently, the woman learned nothing from her first encounter with his hook. Killian turned his chin to glare at her from under his lashes. "I suppose it is a good thing my heart's still beating then, aye."
Her clever hands open the various pots and vials on the trail, dipping a clean rag in some pale blue liquid with a woodsy scent. Jasmine seems to just as easily avoid making eye contact with him as well. "Not for lack of trying on your part. You swam out to meet a giant water beast and nearly got your arm gnawed off in the process. It was sheer dumb luck that you managed to pierce its belly before you ended up in it."
Killian shots her a sharp scowl before turning back to his maps and writing the first few coordinates down. Royalty hates to be ignored, he knows. Perhaps he can simply wait the princess out…
He hears Jasmine sigh, placing the wet cloth down for a moment on the lip of a bowl before turning to face him. He feels her stare on his aching shoulder. "I have something for you, gift from Ariel. However, you have to let me dress your wound before I give it to you."
The pen snaps in his hand. He turns a dark gaze on the proud turn of her face. "I am not a dog to be fed scraps for obedience. And if the bloody mermaid wanted something, why are you here in her stead?"
Jasmine meets him head-on despite the dark drawl of his tone, squaring her hips and raising one delicate brow. "I am here because your brooding, turbulent mood was frightened away everyone except for the good Captain and myself. You should be ashamed of yourself, poor Ariel being too afraid to even come to help you."
Guilt pinches between his ribs briefly because he really has cost that girl nothing but pain and still she comes back, again and again to aid him.
It must show on his face because Jasmine's haughty expression lightens, her voice softening some of its anger. "And I don't think you are a dog, Hook. But I do think that you are currently blinded by your dedication to getting back to Emma and may not be seeing reason. Making poor decisions in trying to find your home again," She shrugs, a self-deprecating little smile appearing on her face, "is something I can relate to."
Oh gods, he is a dog. Making the princess come down here to see to him because he's got a foot up his own arse. "Princess-"
She waves a delicate hand. "Jasmine, please. And as I said, I understand. However, the Saviour will be most unhappy I imagine if we return you with one less appendage or as a corpse so please, let me see to your wounds."
He swallows, feeling as cowled by her stern kindness as he had once felt as a boy, under Liam's careful watch. "Aye then, as you say. But-ah, Killian if you would be so kind."
Her face gentles, with a genuine smiled as she sighs dramatically and waved him over to the nearest chair, bringing the tray towards him. Killian makes no fuss when she instructed him to remove his shirt so she could clean the jagged lines of his shoulder, first with the cloth of blue ointment that hissed with disinfectant. He grit his teeth against the pain as she removed the white rag, dipping it in the pot of water to clean it before going for some grimy gray paste.
"Really Killian," Jasmine muses as she works, pressing the paste lightly and precisely over the rather raw cut that goes nearly to bone. "You have only one good one to start. How are you to please the Saviour if you came back, handless, hmm?"
Hook chokes, his whole body jolting and causing her to reprimand him. He turns wild eyes up at her. She did not...she could not have possibly meant what she just said. Jasmine was true-blooded royalty, raised with wealth and decorum and could not have implied-
A tiny smirk tugged at her lips as she washed the cloth again, closing the lid of the gray paste and opening the silver enamel that held strips of bandage, tying one end above his elbow to begin. "Oh please Killian. I'm hardly an innocent."
The pirate suddenly debates the merits of stripping so readily for the woman, but as she winds the bandage up his arm he remembers the pining looks of a certain genie-"Truly, Jasmine? Because Aladdin looks as though he might stake himself for a chance to undertake less innocent encounters with you."
The princess's carmel cheeks redden slightly and she gives a strong tug to tie the bandage off in retaliation, huffing. She pulls away, placing her hands on her slender hips and tapping her foot at him as though evaluating the merits of having him thrown in the dungeon.
Killian just grins. Score one for the pirate.
Jasmine scoffs, throwing her hands in the air and shuffling through the tray again despite the pleased crinkle of her nose. She grasps something in her fist, holding it out for his inspection.
"I don't quite understand it," The princess readily admits. "But Ariel said you would recognize it and that it should work just like the one you had previously, even across realms."
In her tiny palm, there lays a familiar conch shell necklace. A little pinker on the sides then the one he had left back in Storybrooke. In their home. With Emma.
Worthlessness and Elation rise as tides in him in equal measure as she stares between Jasmine's eyes and the necklace. "I-I-I don't know...I'm sorry I've been a blackguard and I don't deserve this but please...tell the mermaid thank you for me, won't you?"
Bloody hell. He had a way to reach Emma.
Jasmine dropped the shell in his greedy hand and simply picked up her tray primly, smoothing her hand back again. "Tell her yourself, pirate. Your plans will bear more fruition if you come up to the common room and allow some more thoughts than your own."
She shoots him another look of false reprimand and Hook is suddenly so grateful for the unlikely, but possibly honest, friend he has found in the desert princess.
(He also has a worrying propensity for woman who deem it appropriate to kick his arse but that is a thought for another day.)
"Jasmine-" He managed to get out before she glides away, head cocked at him expectantly. "Thank you, as well for-all of this."
Killian makes a broad gesture, wanting her to understand it was for more than ensuring he didn't lose a limb to utter stupidity.
For the first time since the Nautilus sunk, Killian Jones has hope.
She gave him a regal nod, regarding him with a fond light. "As you were, Captain. I expect to see you on the upper deck in a bit."
A bit, yes, because first the pirate needed some privacy. He looked back down to the shell cradled gently in his fingers.
Emma.
And she would have heard his voice in that moment, heard him crying out for her from that necklace left on the bureau in their bedroom-
If Snow hadn't snuck in three days ago and surreptitiously moved all his stuff into the garage.
Lifetime insomnia returns to Emma like an old friend.
Both her and Hook always startled awake at the slightest sound until they found themselves curled up together, sleep taking deep hold of their forms once they had the safety and reassuring weight of the other's form beside them.
Now that he's gone it returns and she's grateful for it because when she dreams-
Sometimes its the way the boys would show up after sailing on Sunday, twin tired grins as they shuffled in, smelling of salt with windswept hair and devouring pizza like it was their first meal in days before quickly drifting off to sleep.
It's the way he felt curled up beside her, skin slick in the afterglow and fingers cradling her shoulder even as his shin jerked against her in dream. The way he couldn't stop touching her, even asleep.
She dreams of his smiles. The mischievous waggle every time he replaced a pop-tart with a grapefruit in her hands without her noticing. The open, proud smile when she drank Leroy under the table and he had to half-carry her home. The shy, little embarrassed grin when she introduced him to Ashley's sister as, 'her boyfriend'. The devious, dark smile he wore right before his head disappeared under the covers, tongue curling around sensitive flesh. Licking and devouring until entering. Then lapping and aiming until she would keen and beg and then and only then would he move up to suckle her clit-harshly than soothingly as she came down, protective of her soft places in every act.
She doesn't know if she's imagining it but his things seem to have started to vanish. She can't look to hard into it though, too afraid to find that even the physical reminders of him our vanishing into the night as well.
The sheriff's station has never been so organized. All the paperwork has been digitized and filed. Accounts done and billing processed. Regina had arched an eyebrow and congratulated her on it even with clear consternation in her gaze.
She could fuck off. David had as much of a hand in it as she had.
She spends a night on his ship, afraid to forget the way he smells but wakes to a hundred worried calls and never does it again.
Their bed is too empty though, the house to cold. So when insomnia returns, Emma is thankful for a reason to not be anywhere near the once beautiful Victorian.
Of course, there's Fridays nights now spent with Regina and her mother.
The first time it's under false pretenses but she's too tired to be angry and her mother's a little drunk by the time she gets there so she figures she better stay.
When Snow gets into a bet with some vikings and wins, well she agrees to a Friday night ritual because watching Snow intoxicating is the first thing that's made her laugh in weeks and Henry's reached the age where he seems to crave his time alone with his video games and David's slumbering form. They cause such a fuss that Emma is sudden well acquainted with the bartender, Aesop of all people. Because, of course. But he's kind and never charges her, only says characteristically allegorical things about broken hearts and shoots her pitying looks that aim deep and keep her up late into the night, puzzling over stories.
("She killed him," He finished, wiping a glass clean.
Emma swallowed. "But-but she loved him so why-"
Aesop sighed, giving her that soft smile again. "My dear sheriff, you as well as anyone should know that love wounds as deep as it heals. Passions are always a double-edged sword."
That's the night she stops sleeping.)
Ruby joins them next week, but Snow and Ruby are way too much trouble with liquor involved and her and Regina agree to never try that again.
("You're the sheriff-do something."
"Like what, Regina?! Should I threaten to shot her if she misses the apple and hits Ruby in the-oh god I can't watch."
"I don't know. Cry! You should cry. Snow will put the bow down to come curse you with rainbow hugs or something."
"Ew, no. You stop it-turn her into a frog or something temporarily. Frogs can't use bows."
"...Think we should tell David they kissed on a bet?"
"You know what, I'll tell my dad if you tell Dorothy."
"Right, it never happened then."
"That's what I thought.")
That's the night Aesop tells her the story of the bird who fell in love with the fish.
"But where could they go," He says, handing her another beer without prompting. "The fish belonged the sea and the bird to the sky. Where could they go to be in love?"
Emma swallowed, her surname and Killian's ship coming to mind in sharp relief. Her breathing shallow. "Well..but the bird could land. You know, water birds like...ducks (not swans, definitely not talking about swans) they could meet there."
She doesn't know why she pushes these ridiculous stories about animals but they make her heart shudder and her feet always drag a little heavier whenever she leaves. She still comes back, masochist a hiss in her mind.
Aesop smiles sadly. "But what kind of life is that, Emma? A bird can only land so long before it must leaves again and a fish, a fish will always return to the sea."
Wasn't that one of her fears? One of those unspoken terrors that woke her in the night: that Killian would grow weary of this life and return to the ocean. She remembered the way he would look longingly out the harbor from their bedroom window, eyes filled with longing until he returned to bed.
Was it a stupid dream, that she could be enough for a man who lived centuries at sea?
And her-the girl who runs. Who keeps running. Was she kidding herself with setting down roots here? Was this just another transient stop until she fled?
The third Friday, Snow cries into her cup and blubbers about how much she misses her husband, how hard the curse is. She feels, leaving Regina to tend to her mother as she sits at her seat at the bar. Emma didn't even have to wait for the glass to be presented.
"There once was a lion," He said softly, eyeing her mother from across the bar and placing two stiff cocktails by them before returning to Emma. "Who fell in love with a maiden. He asked her parent's permission to marry her."
Emma's knuckles clenched at the word, 'marry'.
"They said that they feared him and his wicked ways and would only agree to the union if the lion removed his teeth and claws. And the lion was so in love, that he did."
Fuck, that's what she did to Hook, wasn't it? She turned the fearsome pirate to the man who slipped tomatoes in Henry's mac-and-cheese. She thought that she had changed him for the better, given him a purpose beyound revenge but what if she had simply made him softer. More prone to be injured. The pressure of her parent's perfect love. Pressure of being the Saviour's lover in this town.
Fuck, no wonder he hadn't run sooner. This was madness. But he hadn't. He had stuck by her and asked to marry her and removed every piece of armour he had and she had-
"And then they laughed at him," Aesop finished, watching her down her beer and poured her another. "They laughed at the lion when he returned and bade him to do there worst. And the lion, he could no longer fight so he left, dying of starvation and a broken heart."
Her eyes were burning. Oh god, oh fuck, oh shit. What had she done? Why couldn't she just have kept the stupid ring? Why was she always to clumsy to hold onto anything precious?
Killian.
Regina grabbed her the next moment, the Queen dragging her drunk mother and a shaky Emma back home that night.
The town was quiet, too quiet and it made Emma's skin itch and her legs restless. It made her want to flee the town and set fire to his stupid boat.
It's the fourth Friday after Killian's departure and she just wants Gideon to show. Weariness clings to her bones like loneliness does to her soul and she's gotten twitchy, she knows. She carries her gun again and the quiet echoes to loud in her mind. Leaving room for not good enough. Never good enough. Always your fault. Pushing everyone away.
Breaking his heart.
So the fourth Friday, Emma gets wasted because at this point, even passing out would be a welcome reprieve. She stays long past her mother and Regina, not caring about their concerned glances. Aesop pours her shot after shot without reprimand. Patrons funnel in and out of the bar, one drunk stranger hits on Emma only to earn a bloody nose.
By the time the bar winds down, Emma is finally, blissfully, numb. And rather unsteady.
She stumbles out of the chair and Aesop is suddenly beside her with those dark eyes. "Why don't I help you home Emma? It won't due to have the Saviour falling into a ditch."
She doesn't agree but can't argue until the blessedly frigid night air hits her. They're walking a block when Emma feels a strange tingle.
It's not the jerky pull of three weeks without sleep or the leaden weight of her whole body when she thinks of Hook. It's not even the foggy slosh of alcohol in her veins. In fact, she's pretty sure that if the first three weren't in play, she would have noticed much sooner.
It's the prickling at the back of her neck. The half-drowned survivor instinct coming in and warning Danger! Danger! Her foot stumbles and she catches herself, Aesop one step behind her and reaching out.
Adrenaline rouses her a little. And what kind of bartender tells people sad stories, anyway? Every bar she's ever been at, they listen and pour shots and generally try to cheer people up because sad drunks often lead to troublesome drunks. And how many of those were actually his tales? She hadn't read many fables, but his seemed to revolve more around morals and less around tragic love stories if she recalled rightly.
And why the hell did she always feel worse, slower, heavier, whenever she left even if she hadn't drank that much?
And where the hell had Aesop the magic mixologist come from and where-where the fuck was Gideon?
Pieces are falling together too quickly for her intoxicated mind to keep up but she whirls out of his grasp when he tries to help her stand. A swift kind of furry fills her bones, makes her light enough to turn and hiss, "You-"
Just as Gideon drives the sword through her side.