Disclaimer -

TheSonador: I DEMAND THE RIGHTS TO ONCE UPON A TIME!

ABC: Hahaha... no.

TheSonador: ...THEN I DEMAND COLIN O'DONOGHUE AND A PONY!

ABC: ...we'll think about it.

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He was slowly being pulled back into the land of the living, but he was so gloriously warm and comfortable that he was fighting the whole way. He hadn't been so deeply asleep for a long time, and it seemed like a cruel punishment for him to be awoken to face another day for no particularly good reason.

He could feel the sun on his face, warming his skin until it tingled with the heat.

Wait.

This was wrong.

The sun shouldn't be shining on his face.

Why the hell was he outside?

He was suddenly very much awake, and opened his eyes in what was close to panic. He would have sat bolt upright if he hadn't felt so heavy. His eyes were as far as he could get without serious concentration. After laying there stunned for a moment, he was able to see that he was laying on the deck of his ship, staring up a the sails. Summoning quite a lot of mental strength, he lifted his head and looked around. Still puzzled, he found that sitting up all the way was difficult. Finally the fog in his head cleared enough for him to realize that there was someone on top of him. Another wave of panic, then he relaxed when he noticed it was just Wendy.

Why was... no, he wasn't confused. He was back!

He squirmed from underneath her sleeping form, shaking her a little so she'd wake. With a displeased 'hrm', she tried to shoo him away.

"Wendy, wake up! We're back."

"Hmm?" She sat up slowly. Killian was trying to stand up now, but it took him a few moments to get on his feet. Everything still felt heavy and a bit weak.

He stumbled across the deck to look out across the water, gripping the rail to keep himself balanced. They were definitely somewhere that wasn't Neverland.

"Did it work?" Wendy asked, her voice softer than usual. She was sitting up now, but she had one hand pressed against her forehead - due to the dizziness, Killian guessed.

"Well, we've gone somewhere,"

"The way you said that wasn't very reassuring."

"Not a lot of landmarks from here," Killian replied. He turned and walked across the deck to the other side of the ship, pointing out at the horizon. "We're not far from land, although I admit that I don't know exactly what land it is."

"If Ariel was right - you know, about the time - what do you think has changed since you've been gone?"

Killian narrowed his eyes at the horizon. It was nearly impossible to gauge their exact location, what with the exorbitant amount of time that had passed and being that they might've been dropped anywhere in the world. Even still, he felt something familiar here, and could guess with a certain extent of accuracy which way they'd have to go.

"Politics," he replied. "Power. Those are always the first things to change."

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. .

.

"What makes you think she's here?" Killian asked.

"Well, this is obviously where she wanted to end up in the beginning," Emma replied. "So theoretically, it would make sense for her to come back if her amnesia's wearing off."

Emma had explained to Killian a bit more about Sophie's diagnosis, leaving out the part about Mr. Gold.

"So your Dr. Whale believes that her memories could just... Return? Just like that?"

He didn't know how he felt about this situation. He would definitely keep her from crossing the town line; he didn't want her memories back, as it were, it was safer that way. If she didn't know him and he didn't know her, it un-complicated things. But at the same time, he didn't like the feeling he got when he thought of her losing them forever. It didn't seem right.

"He says it's possible," she replied. Emma's fast-paced march had slowed to keep pace with Hook, who was strolling along casually down the marina. "Hang on... You're doing it again."

"What?"

"Asking a lot of questions."

"I'm just curious."

"Someone who's 'just curious' doesn't agree to go on a wild goose chase at four in the morning," Emma replied. "You're a little too disturbed by this."

"I'm not disturbed, I just happen to have a passing liking for people who haven't tried to kill me," he explained. "I should have no reason to wish harm on her."

"No, neither does anyone else," Emma replied. "But it looks to me like you have a lot more than a passing liking for this kid. It's a little strange."

"How is having no animosity towards young children strange?"

"Because you don't strike me as the type of man who's overly concerned with anything other than himself," Emma explained. "When you sound concerned about something you 'allegedly' have no connection to, it's not normal."

"On the contrary, I'm not as self-centered as you may think."

"Yeah, I can see that," Emma said. He waited for the scoff, the sarcastic ring, but after a moment Killian realized that she was being serious. "I mean, you're not winning any Good Samaritan Of The Year awards, but I don't honestly think you're the villainous murderer everyone makes you out to be."

"I'm not sure whether I should take that as a compliment or not."

"That depends. Do you want people to see the good in you, or do you want them to see the bad?"

Killian didn't respond to this, because he didn't actually have an answer. When he thought about it, he didn't really care what people saw in him. If being nice got him closer to Rumpelstiltskin, so be it. If slicing through a man with his hook did the same, he'd have no problems with that route, either. What happened, happened.

"See? I'm not the only open book around here."

"You're starting to sound like your mother."

"I don't know whether to take that as a compliment or not,"

"Take it as you will, I don't like to think of myself as completely obvious."

"No, you don't, and you make it more than noticeable that you don't like to give your hand away. Even with that, you still aren't very hard to figure out. You've been after something for a long time and you do what you have to do to get it. You're not a bad person, in my opinion. I'm not saying that I agree with everything you do, but still."

"I won't deny that. I have a goal." Killian strode alongside the blonde with and easy step, noting how easily the words were being exchanged. "What's this sudden analysation about, anyway?"

"Just leveling the playing field. You tried to figure me out, I'm trying to figure you out."

"Not too much to figure out," He said admittedly.

"Did you hear something?"

"Hm?"

"Shh..." Emma froze, holding up her hand to keep him silent.

There was no sound except the waves breaking on the shore nearby.

"I don't hear a bloody thing."

"Something's not right," Emma said quietly. "I can tell."

I can tell.

Killian normally didn't have enough faith in other peoples' sixth senses to pay much attention to those words. Of course you can tell, even though there's not the slightest bit of evidence leading one to believe something is wrong and you've already got a very large problem which gives one a very bad feeling as it is, so it's only sensible to believe that every other feeling you get couldn't possibly be affected by that problem and therefore must be completely based on sound reasoning.

Right.

Despite himself, he knew that the Swan girl was different. She had been one of the few people to see through his lies in the Enchanted Forest, and she had also easily connected Milah to his revenge. There was also whatever... thing... had happened at Lake Nostos. So regardless of his usual skepticism, he stayed quiet while Emma listened.

"There it is again!"

"What?"

"Footsteps,"

Killian still didn't hear anything, but followed the tireless blonde when she broke into a run and headed for the loading docks.

Emma slowed to a jog, then to a complete stop. Glancing about her surroundings, she huffed in frustration.

"Even if you did hear something," Killian panted, jogging to her side. "It could have been anybody."

"No," Emma shook her head. "It was someone I know."

"How are you-"

"Emma!"

"Oh, it's just you."

"Hook?"

"Mrs. Charming," Killian said warmly.

"Emma, what's going on?" Mary Margaret's eyes darted back and forth between the pair.

Emma paused for a moment, confused. Mary Margaret's expression was puzzled, but also irritated. What did she think was going on? They were scouring the town for Sophie. Why was she being questioned?

Then she remembered... the pirate thing.

"Nothing, he's helping."

"Helping?"

"Yes!" Emma replied testily. The accusatory tone Snow held was beginning to annoy her. "Don't like it, go look for the kid somewhere else." Emma scolded herself as soon as the words left her. Not only was this her mother, but jumping to Killian's-she-meant-Hook's defense so aggressively didn't bode well for her 'nothing is going on here' campaign

"Okay, Emma, I was just asking," Mary Margaret's eyebrows arched upwards and a smile threatened to tilt the corners of her mouth.

Killian remained quiet, surprised that the Swan girl had leaped after her mother in such a way. She certainly didn't like having her motives called into question.

"So... Um... Did you or Ruby find anything?"

"Not a lot," Snow replied, "but she did track her going in this direction, so between her sense of smell and your intuition, I'm assuming we're on to something."

"Well, that's better than nothing," Emma admitted. "Where's Ruby?"

"Walking the rest of the marina," Snow replied. "She doesn't have a strong trail, the full moon's not very close."

"Right, well, if I might intrude, may I suggest we continue our search for the young lass before we end up having a repeat performance of the nearly-drowned episode?" Killian said.

"He's right," Emma said. "You go see if Ruby's caught onto anything yet, Hook and I-"

"On second thought," Mary Margaret interrupted. "I think you ought to talk to Ruby. I can have Hook's help searching the rest of the loading dock."

"...okay then." Emma shrugged. "Don't kill each other."

"Ruby should be near the warehouse." Emma nodded and jogged off.

"I didn't know you fancied working with me, your highness."

"I don't, particularly." Snow began marching down the docks. Killian followed.

"So why...?"

"Because my daughter seems to think that regardless of everything you've done in the past, and everyone in this town who you've pissed off at some point or another, that you have a few redeemable features."

"I would say there's more than a few..." Killian smirked.

"Any way," Mary Margaret continued. "I just thought this would be as good a time as any to see for myself."

"Well I'll try not to disappoint you," Killian said with a shake of his head. He found it amusing how aggressive this woman could be when it came to her family.

He supposed that was where Emma got her gumption.

"So if the waitress is off over there, shouldn't that be the direction we should be looking in?"

"Like I said, she can't get a very distinct trail going when he full moon isn't close. She knows that she's in this area, but she can't quite trace exactly where."

"Hm."

"We should check the storage units," She said, nodding in their direction.

Hook was going to argue; He knew Sophie had little to no reason to be in the buildings at this point. If she had run away from Emma and was planning on not being found, she'd most likely have made a stop for whatever she needed elsewhere, or gone without. Pilfering from the units would be useless, seeing as she would have no idea what was in a single one of them and searching through them for anything possibly useful would take too much time and yield too few results.

As for her hiding in them, well, there they had a problem. Getting the containers open would be loud enough to alert her to their presence, and in all likelihood would give her enough distraction to make an escape. The only way for them to succeed there would be if they caught her the first try, which was extremely unlikely.

But he didn't say any of this: instead he just shook his head silently and followed Mary Margaret a few steps. They hadn't gotten very close to the units when a loud scraping noise echoed around them.

"I don't think we were heading in the right direction," Killian said.

"Where was that coming from?"

Killian shrugged. "That way? The opposite? I've no clue."

"Okay, what sort of ground makes that noise?"

"...the hard kind?"

"You know what I mean. That wasn't a noise sand or pavement makes."

"If we keep jumping at every noise like this we're going to be chasing pigeons all night."

"Just... Shush and let me think." Mary Margaret snapped.

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"Stupid rocks," she thought bitterly. She stayed crouched, cold rocky ledge pressing into her back. It was slippery here; the waves were several feet below her but they could occasionally send enough spray up to douse the rocks and make her foothold treacherous.

Jump in.

No, that would be stupid.

But she had to get to the ship...

Which one?

She couldn't think straight. She could hardly think, period. Nothing seemed in place. She would embark on some new venture only to find that she didn't remember where she was or what she had just been doing.

"This must be what it feels like to be Peter Pan,"

That name sounded familiar, but she couldn't recall to whom it belonged now. Ah well, this was what it must feel like to be him all the same, even though she didn't remember why it must be so.

Now where in the hell had she been going?

Oh yes, she'd been ready to jump in. No she hadn't!

Maybe she was waiting for the right time to jump in, or something of the sort. Or perhaps she was looking for a better place to do so. After all, she recalled needing to jump into the water, but it looked awfully treacherous here. Why was it so rocky around here? Why were the rocks so high above the water, anyhow?

She'd been climbing down, of course! That made much more sense. She had been going to climb down the rocks, - carefully, so as not to fall, - and then go into the water. But then, it didn't seem too far away. But it didn't look safe enough to jump from here.

But what to do once one was at the bottom of this small outcropping...

Where in the hell had she been going?

She pressed her hand to her forehead, which was currently pounding from internal pains that were not helping her to concentrate at all.

The soft murmur of voices above her made her glance upwards, pondering who could be talking.

Oh, they must be looking for her.

No, wait, no one would look for her here. Who would have noticed her missing, anyhow?

Or was she missing? Perhaps she was precisely where she was supposed to be and they had invaded her privacy. She certainly lived in an odd place.

What did they want, anyhow? Should she say something? Maybe she would just look. She shifted, turning around and tiptoeing onto a couple of footholds to peer up at the people. They were facing the opposite direction.

She couldn't see them clearly from here, but she felt a twinge of something when she realized they must certainly be looking for her. Unless they weren't.

Needless to say, she didn't trust it. No, not for one minute. They thought they were quite clever, tracking her down like this. Well, she'd show them.

Or maybe she wouldn't.

It frustrated her when she couldn't remember if they were someone she wanted to be found by or not. Perhaps if she made some slight noise to attract their attention, just enough to draw them closer, she would get a better view of who they were and be better able to make that decision.

Unless they were someone bad. God, she just couldn't remember!

Either way, she wasn't jumping ten feet from a man made precipice into water that looked quite cold. Even if that had been her plan, it no longer seemed a very smart one, so she decided to head back up towards the top and maybe just sit out of sight of her pursuers. Unless, of course, they were not pursuing her, in which case she would simply wait until they left anyway, seeing as she couldn't sodding remember.

She carefully picked her way back to the top of the sharp stones, peering over the edge to gain a better view of the... Well, seeing as she couldn't remember who they were, the people.

"Quietly," she thought to herself. Deciding to push herself up just a few inches more, there was a crack. She inhaled sharply when her foothold crumbled beneath the ball of her foot, sending her plummeted downwards. Before she had time to panic, she pushed off of her other foot and hoisted herself halfway onto the ledge. Catching her breath and calming herself, she froze in place while the voices nearby began to murmur again, distracted from their errand by the crackling of the stones.

They hadn't noticed her yet.

She exhaled slowly, softening her nerves. That had almost been a nasty fall. It wasn't a particularly high or steep fall, but tumbling into the carefully stationed rocks that helped keep the marina upright would have not been a pleasant experience.

Well, she couldn't just stay as she was, flopped halfway onto the blacktop like that. She still had one foothold, but it didn't seem all that stable anymore, now that its partner had gone and crumbled into the waves. She didn't have a whole lot to pull herself up with, either...

Where had those two come from?

Shit.

Shit shit shit.

What had she been doing, climbing up like this? There were people up here! She fumbled to scoot downwards, stepping onto the first thing she felt beneath her feet. As the stone was pushed from its resting place, it sent Sophie sliding down the side of the rocks. She caught herself just a few feet down, but the crumbling stone had offset others in the area, sending loosened chunks of granite careening past her. Without thinking, Sophie let out a short, sharp scream.

She could hear rapid footsteps skidding across the pavement as the dirt, sand and stone continued to bombard her. Suddenly, someone leaned over the edge, squinting into the darkness as the small avalanche settled and rolled to a halt. Coughing a little, Sophie was distracted from the second figure appearing, and too worried about the amount of sand in her eyes to notice one of them reach down to grab her.

She found herself suddenly on the flat ground above her, much to her relief now that climbing down had ended quite badly, though she wasn't sure why she'd been climbing down to begin with...

The man who had grabbed her stood up and hoisted her onto her feet by her elbows.

"God, is she alright?" a female voice said. A woman began furiously dusting the dirt from her clothes, turning her head this way and that to check for injuries while the man continued to hold her upright.

"As long as she didn't re- hey!" Sophie begun squirming away from him when she realized that she couldn't remember whether or not this person was okay. She was ready to make a mad dash for her previous hiding place, but before she could completely escape, the man in question managed to get her feet out from under her and hoist her over his shoulder. He muttered something about drowning that she didn't quite catch before finishing with, "and by God we're not bloody doing this again!"

"Let go!" she demanded.

"Sophie, calm down," Mary Margaret said soothingly.

"Let me go!"

"I haven't the slightest bloody idea of what your problem is, but I can guarantee you that fighting us is only going to make it worse."

"I'm calling Emma,"

Suddenly, Sophie was still.

"Who's Emma?"

Of all the things that child could have said at that moment, this was by far the thing that Killian was most surprised and relieved to hear her say.

"That can't be good," Mary Margaret paused her dialing to stare worriedly at the girl. She pressed the phone against her ear.

Killian let the girl down onto her feet, firmly gripping her arms in case she decided to start trying to flee again. He bent until he was at eye-level with her.

"Sophie?"

"Who?"

Killian shook his head at the question. "Darling," he said, more pointedly this time. "Do you know who I am?"

She paused, and got very quiet. Her face took on an extremely puzzled expression, before softening, then scrunching up into confusion again. She seemed to be studying his face, searching for any signs of familiarity.

"Of course I do!"

Oh dear God, why had he asked?

"Erm, no, I don't think I do now,"

Whatever was wrong with her, he realized, had managed to tangle whatever memory she had left into some unmanageable knot from which she couldn't even draw the simplest conclusion.

And he didn't know if he was okay with that or not.

Sure, her mind being an impenetrable mass of confusion had its benefits (you know, crocodile, revenge, that whole thing being jeopardized), but the idea still didn't sit with him quite as well as he'd have liked.

He decided against encouraging her.

"Right then, I think Emma is going to want to take you back to Dr. Whale come morning," he said, using the fake cheerfulness that one is often expected to have when dealing with worried children. "But for right now I think it would be best if you went back and got some rest."

"Rest?" Sophie's expression continued to be that of one who was terribly disoriented. "Where?"

Killian only gave a glance up at Mary Margaret in response to this. She gave a frustrated sigh before shoving her phone back into her pocket.

"It's not working," she said. "We're not calling anyone until I can get a signal."

Sophie was uncharacteristically quiet, and she kept staring the pair of them up and down as if she had seen them somewhere before, but couldn't place when or where.

"Come on, kid," Mary Margaret said, waving Sophie towards her.

Sophie stepped forward, then paused to stand there blinking at the dark-haired woman again.

"Where?"

"To go find Emma," She replied. Sophie shook her head as if puzzled beyond measure, but stepped forward again.

Hook, who had stayed in his kneeling position, finally straightened.

"Do you think it's going to progressively get worse?" Mary Margaret asked.

"I doubt that we'll ever be able to know anything for sure," Killian replied. At the sound of his voice, Sophie spun around, eyes widening. She let out a short gasp.

"Killian!" she cried before leaping towards him and throwing her arms around him.

"What...?" Mary Margaret searched Killian's face for an explanation of the sudden outburst.

Hook's eyebrows darted upwards in surprise. He looked from Mary Margaret down to Sophie and back up at Mary Margaret, who was watching the spectacle with an air of accusation shadowing her features.

"Uh... Sophie?" She prompted her to say something. "Sophie, hey, come here for a second,"

Sophie did as asked and moved to stand near Mary Margaret.

"Sophie," Snow spoke slowly and softly, noticing the girl's rapid behavior changes. "Do you think you can tell us what happened tonight? Why did you leave the apartment?"

Sophie simply stared back, blinking slowly as the words resounded in her head. She heard the questions, but she couldn't put the words together to make any sense of their meaning. Words and faces spun through her mind, dancing just beyond her reach. She saw them there, all jumbled together but never getting close enough for her to get a firm grip on them.

Killian. Emma. Think. Tell. Apartment. Leave.

Each word had a meaning, but not together; they weren't related to her situation. Or were they?

She just didn't know.

"Sophie?"

The dancing words were fading now, spinning further and further into the far reaches of her mind, a few of them were beginning to disappear into the darkness.

"Sophie?"

The name was familiar, but so much that it could distract her from this puzzle she had to solve. Everything was a puzzle - there was no sense to be found in anything. Nothing fit together right. It was like trying to make a picture from pieces taken from completely different puzzles.

Leave.

Had she left? Had she been left? She didn't know, and frankly, she didn't care. It was dark, and she was so tired. She felt the pull of sleep enticing her to fall into that endless darkness, and she quickly let it envelope and embrace her, even as the fading voices on the outside became more frantic.

When Sophie fell limply to the ground, Mary Margaret's first instinct was to try to rouse her. When nothing worked, her second instinct was to give Hook a very stern, "What the hell?"

"How should I know?" He snapped back at her, pretending he thought she'd meant the passing out. He knew very well that the Charming woman had meant the girl's previous outburst of affection, but to immediately concede to that would have simply been stupid on his part.

Snow didn't reply, but she narrowed her eyes and gave him a look that made him a little uncomfortable as he stood, ready to assist if she wanted him, just aside the worried woman crouched over the unmoving pre-teen.

"Do we take her back to the hospital?"

"Not much point in that," she replied, brushing a few stray locks of Sophie's hair away from her face.

"Why is that?"

"If anyone's going to do anything it's Gold. Whale can't fix magically-induced side effects."

"What?"

"The disorientation, everything, it's probably all from him and his potion."

"What potion?"

"She... Didn't tell you."

"Tell me what?"

"Emma went to Gold and he said he could bring her memories back... I just assumed you knew, I thought maybe she told you."

"No, it seems she's left that part out,"

Killian clenched his jaw, trying to redirect some of the irritation that was trying its darnedest to show itself in his voice.

"Well in any case, I think she just needs to rest,"

After hesitating only a moment longer, he picked the girl up in his arms.

"What are you doing?" Mary Margaret asked, her voice heavy with apprehension.

"Well, you're unable to contact Emma, and she's not going to sleep off the remainder of the useless bastard's concoction on the cold hard ground." He motioned for her to follow him. "Come on then,"

"Where are we going?"

"My ship's not far, we can wait there until your phone starts working."

"The... Jolly Roger. It's... Here?"

"Yes, of course, I don't go anywhere without it."

"...right."

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A/N: So. Um. This took longer than I expected. And it also ended up longer than I expected. And I have nothing to say in my defense other than I kept getting... Stuck... But anyway, it's here now and I would LOVE reviews to tell me what a bad person I am for taking so long!