Chapter 2: All of This

Chapter Summary: Emma and Hook remember Bae.

Chapter Rating: T

Notes: Thank you 1.0 x 10^7 to my amazing beta Rose! And I'm sorry for the month long wait. It should go a a little faster from here on out.


Something akin to hours later, Emma leaned against the bow of the Jolly Roger, looking out at the hostile blue sea before them. She had a blanket from the crews' quarters strewn over her shoulders, shielding her still damp body from the chill of wind.

Behind her, Hook stood at the helm of the great ship, keeping one heated eye on the dark horizon while still observing the disheveled blonde woman in front of him. The shining moon above was just as he remembered it, and was, to Emma's surprise, constantly changing shape. It would go from waning to waxing to missing in mere moments.

"In our worlds, the moon changes with time," he had explained. "But where there is no time, the moon must be both full and new—always."

Watching Emma pore over Neverland with all the fascination of—well, a child—made Hook's stomach knot. He knew what happened to sailors who became too taken with this mysterious, beautiful realm.

Neverland, ironically, was not the place for childlike fascination. Nor had it been for a very, very long time.

It's my fault. All of this.

As Hook stood there, witnessing Emma's captivation, he couldn't stop himself from thinking about the last person he had watched look out over the deck of this very same ship, dumbstruck and enchanted by Neverland.

He thought of Baelfire.

Bae, excitedly running on decks of the Jolly Roger, despite Hook's repeated admonishing. Bae, hands gripping the yellow paint on the ledge of his ship and grinning wildly as they sailed close to shore (but never to shore). Bae, at the wheel of Hook's ship, learning his way around a sea vessel with the very same passionate curiosity Milah had once shown.

And then... Bae, glowering at him with a look of utter betrayal and pain, clutching the image of Milah in his fist.

Bae, looking down at the dread pirate Captain Hook begging on his knees before the eyes of his crew and the gods themselves.

Bae, the closest thing to son he would have ever have, giving him one last look back as the Lost Ones dragged him over the side of the ship.

How fitting, Hook thought now, that the force that had ripped Bae away from him was the very same force that drove Peter Pan to—

No. That was a thought for another day.

My fault.

Hook looked again at Emma. While it had been the memory of failing Bae that made him steer his ship back to Storybrooke, it had been Emma's appeal to him in the café that reminded him some people were worth going back to.

Yet, it was what Emma had said at the end of their brief encounter that Hook found himself still thinking about now.

Emma's son was Baelfire's son too.

And Bae was.

Well—

—'You spoke of your mother's fate. But your father… what became of him?'

Bae was dead.

The last bit of information was hastily spoken by Emma only hours ago and had been the unforeseen catalyst to make Hook decide against ending Rumplestiltskin's life. He certainly had plenty of chances now.

But for some unfathomable reason, Bae had apparently attempted to make amends with the father who had so cruelly done what Hook's own father did to him. And while he would never understand what could have possibly possessed the boy to do so, Hook felt the need to honor Baelfire's memory in his own way.

Helping Emma find Henry was most important, yes, but if Hook could not do just that, but also ensure that not one more drop of blood (—Milah, always Milah) was needlessly spilt in Baelfire's family.

"So no man alone on deck, huh? Even you?"

An uneven voice ripped Hook from his reverie. He looked to see Emma approaching the helm, the blanket wrapped tight around her shoulders.

Hook responded to her question with a halfhearted laugh. "Even me, lass. I've fallen prey to the songs of mermaids on several occasions and it was only the bravery of my crew that saved me then." He attempted to flash one of his signature flirtatious grins, despite his dark mood. "You'll just have to keep me safe with your company, I'm afraid."

Emma rolled her eyes but he saw the slightest hint of amusement behind her expression, as was always the case when she battled Hook's flirtations.

"If you say so, Captain."

A moment passed, and Hook tried not to shiver at the sound of Emma calling him by his title. An uneasy silence soon fell on deck. They made due by pretending to gaze at the scenery around them, but Hook noticed Emma's repeated odd glances at the place where his hand connected with the ship's wheel. Her expression made it seem as if she were recalling some distant memory.

"You've been aboard my ship before, lass." It wasn't a question, just a statement of fact.

Emma gave a terse nod.

"It was the fastest way between Manhattan and Storybrooke. We… we had to save Mr. Gold, after you… you know."

Her expression changed to one of sad nostalgia as she nervously continued eyeing different parts of the helm.

"Baelfire managed to sail my vessel all by himself, did he?"

Shock fell on Emma's face. She clearly had not been prepared for such direct mention of Henry's father.

"Yeah. He… he said he had done it before."

As Emma looked away, Hook couldn't help but pay attention to the way her expressive eyebrows furrowed and the way her pale pink lips melted into a frown.

"Neal never even knew Henry existed."

It was an oddly out of place statement. Emma didn't seem to be expecting a reply. Instead, she allowed him a moment of eye contact and Hook used to it to silently encourage her to continue. She did.

"After he left me in prison, I had no way to contact him or find him. And after a couple of years of waiting for him to turn up, I… I just didn't want to find him."

Hook's breath caught silently in his throat, and once again, he thought of Baelfire. Bae, looking up at him from the helm of this very ship with a mixture of hurt and empathy. The young boy had been the first time since Milah's death that Hook had allowed himself to feel connected to another human being.

—'My papa abandoned me, too.'

Something Emma had said caught his attention.

"Baelfire … he left you alone?"

Emma nodded shortly but pushed on, apparently unwilling to further discuss that particular detail. Hook let it be.

"And when I… we found him again and it turned out Neal was Gold's son, everything…" She took a moment to organize her thoughts before seemingly giving up. "Everything just started happening so fast."

It was apparent to Hook that Emma was fighting with herself about her impromptu decision to share such intimate contemplations with a man she barely knew (Why should she? Why me?). But then... the last day had brought Baelfire's death, the near destruction of Storybrooke, the kidnapping of her son, and a journey to a fantastic demon realm where time sputtered stupidly like a waterlogged pocket watch. It seemed Emma's will to keep her emotions under lock and key was superseded by exhaustion.

"Henry liked him from the start. It was likelike he was just so excited that he finally had a father, and he was calling him dad and playing with him in the park and…" Emma trailed off, glancing quickly over to Hook as if she felt guilty about whatever she was going to say next. "He taught him how to steer this ship when we were sailing to Storybrooke."

—'The left side is called port. The right side? Starboard. Now, go two notches to port.'

Hook found himself struggling to keep eyes steady and focused on Emma's long, messy locks as they tangled with the salty wind but he was helpless to stop his hand from gripping the helm tighter.

—'Well done mate! You were born with the sea in your blood.'

Once again, it was only Emma's voice that was able to pull him back from dark, forgotten reaches of his mind.

"That's when I started to think I could forgive him for what he had done."

Hook sensed there was something deeper in that particular admission, something else she wanted him to hear but just didn't have the strength to say.

He realized what it was too fast to stop from confirming it aloud.

"You still loved him."

Without warning (without surprise), Emma suddenly inhaled a deep, chest-wracking gulp of harsh sea air. Her hand shot out to steady herself on the nearby railing. Hook regretted his words immediately, but he couldn't bring himself to apologize for being so bold.

He thought of their confrontation in the diner, when Emma had stayed behind even as the townspeople cleared out. She had let him accuse her of having an ulterior motive and she hadn't even been offended.

"A part of me always will love him. Never stopped. But…"

When their eyes met again, Hook found himself unprepared. This time, everything about Emma Swan was completely unguarded, her defenses defeated. He could see the walls crumbling behind her gray irises, could almost taste the beginnings of tears as they stumbled forth. Her grief rushed forward to beat violently at the brims of her lids and tickle her lashes but then stopped short, fought back for the time being. But she was unable to keep the surrounding skin from becoming red and swollen.

Her gaze did more than just admit to truth. Hook felt as if she were begging him to do something other than just stand there, to understand, to see the depth and complexity and conflict behind her feelings for Baelfire.

"My parents left me. August left me. And then Neal, he…"

Although he did not know the story behind her words, he didn't need to. Hook had seen her expression when he told her on the beanstalk that she bore the look of the Lost Ones, and he saw it again now. Hook had lived Emma's reality; he knew stories like theirs did not need such petty details. At the end of the day, Hook and Emma—and Bae, Bae—were all just children left alone.

And he knew, no matter how hard they fought it, a lost child is all they would ever be at the end of all their days.

"They said they had good reasons. Every one of them. And maybe they did. But that doesn't change the fact that I ended up without anyone. Not a single person in my life left to love me."

There was no way, no possible way she could know just how much he understood.

"Every time."

But a not-so-small voice in the back of Hook's mind insisted that maybe… maybe she could see that look on his face too.

Emma's gaze drifted off again toward the increasingly black sea. Somewhere in the distance, children laughed and screamed and cried beneath the whisper of wind. Hook felt the man inside him trying to claw to the surface, tearing its way out in torment and anguish and he prayed that Emma couldn't hear the sounds of Neverland, that it was only his well-attuned ears that allowed him to hear such things.

But he needed to make sure she didn't.

"What happened to him? Baelfire? How did he…"

It was quite possibly the least tactful distraction Hook could have come up with, and to be honest, he wasn't really interested in the details. Bae had died a long time ago for him. Nonetheless, it seemed to draw Emma away from her thoughts.

"Tamara. She shot him and used one of the beans to open a portal." She swallowed her pride for moment and let him see her wipe her eyes with her sleeve. "There was just so much blood and he didn't have the strength to hold on to my hand and…"

Hook gently laid a wrist on her shoulder, in what he hoped was a comforting gesture. If Emma was shocked, she didn't show it. She was too focused on getting the last words out with her cracking voice.

"He fell through."

And her face, her body, her soul was so obviously and so completely broken that Hook couldn't keep himself from steadying her shaking frame in his arms, stopping himself just short of embracing her fully.

Through confusion and rage and the foggy lens of tears, Emma looked up at him.

And fuck. After all she had just shown him, Hook felt there was only one fair thing left to do.

"I knew him. Baelfire."

Emma wasted no time looking at him as though he was crazy, or maybe as though he was taunting her in some way. And maybe he was in telling her this. But she deserved to know.

"I was the one who taught him to sail this ship in the first place."

It looked like she wanted to say something, anything, but her body and her silence were rooted solidly and helplessly to the deck of Hook's ship, unable to do anything but listen.

"Bae, he… ended up in this land. My crew found him awash in the surf, but we got to him before the Mermaids could."

And then suddenly, Hook realized he had never actually told anyone this story before. Most people he came across in his violent exercise to kill Rumpelstiltskin knew his mission, about Milah, about her heart and his hand (his crew, though loyal, was also… talkative). But no one ever knew about that still small chapter in his long existence when life stopped being about avenging Milah for one bright moment and became about trying to be a father for her orphaned son.

"And Neal—Bae, he became… part of your crew?"

It should have been easy to continue. There was no reason he couldn't just reply with a cool 'yes' and move on, but something about the way Emma's heart had just broken in front of him made him want to tell her the deeper version of the truth.

Baelfire was more than just a part of his crew, even for the short time he spent on his ship. And he was more than just a chance to keep Milah with him wherever he went, or a responsibility that he owed to his fallen lover (wife—Hook had considered her his wife). Bae was a chance to fix something that had been broken since Killian Jones was a young boy, abandoned by his fugitive father.

The cries in the distance slowly grew sparser, but those that remained only grew sharper.

"I wanted him to. I asked him to."

All because of that little empty part inside him that his father had left behind one night on the ship full of strange men. That part that had always controlled him and led him to do… terrible things.

"I asked him to stay."

Bae had been a way out. Bae had been a way to help him regain that control, to maybe even help him erase all those terrible things if he could just….

And then, Bae, glowering at him with the look of utter betrayal and pain, clutching the image of Milah in his fist.

Hook had never let himself think of it before, but…

Bae hadn't been able to save Hook. Bae had never wanted to. But maybe Hook had saved Bae that night, that terrible night when he'd turned him over to the shadow that called himself Peter Pan and that empty space inside him had grown deeper yet again.

Emma was looking at him, deeply confused. It was the face of a woman realizing she only thought she knew the man she once called her lover.

"Milah wasn't just the woman I fell in love with. She was Baelfire's mother."

He saw everything snap together in Emma's head. Rumplestiltskin's rage, Hook's vengeance, his own unlikely connection with the father of her child (His connection with Henry? No, no no no not now). But there was one very specific thing he could see she was struggling with, striving to understand.

"And Gold, he just… He killed her?"

Emma knew this already, but to learn that the Crocodile had not only murdered the woman Hook loved, but had murdered his own wife, Baelfire's mother… and now Hook was allowing this man to sleep on his ship?

"He did it right in front of me. Ripped her heart from her chest" His voice became rough, gravelly. "Made me watch."

He expected to see her expression sadden again. Instead, he found the same look of calm understanding she had given him after seeing his tattoo in the giant's lair.

The laughter in the distance that once mingled with despondent cries disappeared completely. Only the cries remained.

Emma seemed… distracted.

"So you took Neal—Baelfire in? After his mother died?"

"Aye. But when he found out who I was, he…"

Hook never got the chance to finish his sentence.

There was just one voice crying in Neverland now.

The stars above had begun to darken, not slowly but abruptly and very unevenly, like the flicker of candlelight. Emma, it seemed, had finally realized that she wasn't just imagining things.

Hearing the sounds, the cries of Lost Children was really just one part, Hook knew. There was a dark and immeasurably twisted magic to the way this realm worked. Not everyone could hear or see all the same things. People experienced only what Neverland wanted them to.

The first six months (if months existed) after Milah's death and Hook's return to Neverland, he had heard children cry. Their voices were loud, loud enough for someone to make out words, but Hook never could. The screams were incoherent, the grief palpable and intoxicating, and yet… not quite tangible.

Until Bae came to Neverland.

Letting the Lost Ones drag him over the ledges of the Jolly Roger was either the best or the worst decision Hook ever made. The best because it saved Baelfire from becoming the child Hook never had and kept him from falling victim to all the disappointment and disgust that would have inevitably followed. The worst, because… well, because Hook lost Bae.

In the two hundred and seventy 'years' that followed, Hook heard Bae scream. The cries of the Lost Children would rise and fall in their density, but Hook only ever heard the words of one.

Please!

I should have stayed! Please!

I want to come back!

I want a family! I do! I'm sorry!

Hook! Captain! I need you!

Bae hadn't even been his child (Hook had seen to that).

And Baelfire died anyway, in the end.

So no, Hook couldn't begin to imagine what Emma heard now as she listened to her son cry out to her. For her.

But he could see it on her face.

My fault. All of this.

Emma's hands were white-knuckled on the block of the helm, her eyes wide and bloodshot. The delicate creases on her forehead that spoke of a lifetime of loneliness were etched deeply now. Her blonde eyebrows knitted together. Everything about her was so utterly destroyed and Hook knew: if not for the threat of Mermaids, Emma Swan would swim across the ocean to get to Henry.

There was no way he could just watch any longer. If Emma was going to fall apart, she deserved to have someone there, clutching blindly to keep the pieces together.

Without thought to how she might reject him, Hook kept his right hand on the helm and used his bad arm to pull her hard into his chest. She came pliantly. He couldn't give her comfort, never give, because she fucking deserved every last bit that Hook could offer that might help keep her in one piece. All of this was his fault and if it weren't for him, if—

—if Emma only knew the things he had done.

—if she knew why Henry was gone.

—if Hook told her why every little event in her life even happened

No, no… definitely not a story for tonight. Not ever.

Emma let herself be embraced. If nothing else, Hook knew she had no fight left in her to battle the basic mammalian instinct to be comforted. After endless hours of watching the people she loved be torn from her, Emma needed to be held almost as much as Hook needed to know he was allowed to hold her, to help.

"I'm going to get your son back, Emma."

She sobbed out against him, wetting his leather coat.

"I don't—I don't know what to do. Please help me."

Hook closed his eyes and prayed to no one.


—'I thought pirates only cared about themselves?'

—'Well, you've a lot to learn, boy.'


Thank you for reading! (Smut comes to those who wait)