A/N: ALL PRAISE THE TCHAIKOVSKY FOR SWAN LAKE. Also, this chapter is allll flashback, so I'd like to know what you think of that.

"Coming through," Regina called, escorting Hook through a hall of harried nurses. The hospital was crowded tonight, as though a storm brewing on the horizon had alerted them to some previously unknown danger.

"Mayor Mills." Whale raised his eyebrows sarcastically. "Didn't expect to see you tonight. And, er, who is this?" He gestured ineffectually towards Hook, who was spinning in circles muttering 'Bombalast'.

This." Regina reined Hook in, "Is Captain Hook." Whale raised his eyebrows, unimpressed. "He's been hit with a memory hex." she added. Whale nodded thoughtfully.

"Gee, I wonder who by?" He asked wryly. Regina smiled mockingly at him.

"Whatever. Just make sure the Sheriff doesn't see him." She stalked off, heels clacking like thunder.

~*/~*/~*/~

"Sheriff Swan?" Whale looked surreptitiously over his shoulder, "Yes. There's a man here. A man with a hook hand. I thought you might want to know." He grinned. "Regina brought him in."

~*/~*/~*/~

"David! Oh thank god." Emma nearly collapsed in relief, leaning tiredly against her desk.

"Um, Emma, why are you handcuffed to your desk?" David knelt down, quickly unlocking the cuffs.

"Long story." She said breathlessly, rubbing at her wrists, now dark with half-dried blood.

"What happened?" David asked, fussing angrily over her wounds.

"Like I said," She sighed, remembering a kiss and a beanstalk. "It's a long story."

~*/~*/~*/~

"Hook?" Emma swept into the hospital, her eternal confidence shielding the trembling flame of hope in her heart. Hook hadn't gone after Gold. He was alive. he hadn't gotten himself killed.

He had kissed her.

"I'm sorry, but who the hell are you?" Hook glared at her. Emma stopped dead, a bright, flickering pain drawn up from the depths of a neglected little girl who had to climb the tallest trees and jump the farthest and talk the loudest because otherwise nobody would ever talk to her. Emma swallowed, blinking away the childish tears that threatened her now.

"I'm Sheriff Emma Swan, and we've met before." She grinned widely, completely without humor... and handcuffed him to the hospital bed.

"What the hell?" Hook tugged fiercely at the metal bracelets binding him to the cot.

"You deserved it," She smirked, masking anger and pain with a sense of familiarity.

"What? I did not." Hook said, affronted.

"You so did." Emma scoffed.

"Did not." Hook pulled harder at the cuffs.

"Anyway." She said, unlocking the cuffs and locking his hands behind his back. "You're coming home with me."

"Hate to decline, love, but I've a commitment to meet." He laughed, smirking widely as she shoved him into her car.

"Yeah. You have an appointment." She swung into the front seat, slamming her door. "With me."

~*/~*/~*/~

Henry was persistent in seeing the pirate, explaining to his mother that he had befriended the man when he had forst come to town, several weeks ago. Only once she had Hook tied tightly to a chair did she let Hery near him, though.

"Killian?" Henry asked, at first excited, then, as his friend didn't answer, disappointed. "DO you not remember?" he asked.

"I have no bloody clue what you're talking about." Hook laughed, as Emma snatched Henry away.

"Watch your language around my son." She hissed.

"What are you going to do, lass? Leave me here?"

"Maybe." She said evenly, tossing a rubber ball at the floor and catching it effortlessly. "I have nothing but time, Hook."

"And you're using it up on me, how charming." He rolled his eyes, growing tired of their little game.

"I'm wasting it on you." She caught the ball again. "SO be grateful." She smiled, throwing the ball at such an angle it hit him in the back of the head.

~*/~*/~*/~

"Okay then, Madam Mayor." Emma walked past the other people in the room and, bypassing courtesy, stood right in front of Regina, arms crossed and legs steady. "What the hell did you do to him?"

"I didn't do anything." Regina smirked.

"Right. Like you aren't the EVil Queen, and Henry's insane." Emma said, rolling her eyes. "I know you did it, now all I want is for you to fix it."

"Fix it? Honestly Miss Swan, that's your job, isn't it?" Regina smiled.

"It's Sheriff Swan, and I have no idea what you mean." Emma turned to walk away, a whisper lingering in her mind.

"Oh, and speaking of Henry, is it really a good idea to have a murderous pirate so near to him?" Regina called after her. Emma froze, tense.

"Two days." Emma said through gritted teeth. "You get two days with Henry."

~*/~*/~*/~

"How far back do you remember?" Emma asked, leaning against the doorway.

"Er, I don't know. Rumplestiltskin took my hand and then... Nothing." He shrugged, fake nonchalance seeping through every line of his being. Emma, meanwhile, was having deep trouble with the gap in his memory.

"300 years." She breathed in disbelief. "You've forgotten three hundred years." She scoffed, a small broken sound. "You've forgotten me."

"I don't see why you'd matter to me in the first place, honestly." He smirked up at her and she felt possessed with a vicious need to smash his head in with something.

"Hm." She laughed, wide, merciless grin appearing slowly.

She handcuffed him to her bed.

"This seems familiar," He laughed, struggling against the handcuffs. "You leaving me chained to something, it seems familiar."

She gave a short, humorless laugh.

"It should."

~*/~*/~*/~

"Gold!" Emma called, slamming the bell-dazzled door behind her, hoping to get his attention. "Gold!"

"Yes, Dearie?" He seemed smug, pleased to see her.

"Hook. His memory." Emma cut to the chase. "How do I fix it?"

"Why would I tell you?" Gold smiled slyly.

"Because right now all he wants is revenge. WIth his memories he's begun to move on." Emma was begging now, pleading a little. "Please."

"True love's kiss breaks all curses, dearie." he muttered, just loud enough for her to hear.

"Why would that matter? What does it have to do with anything?" Emma asked, still impatient and angry and not quite catching on yet.

"Figure it out!" Gold ushered her out of his shop.

~*/~*/~*/~

Emma sighed, slamming her car door. It didn't help the poor car, but it did make her feel somewhat better. Not enough to matter, though. She banged her head down on the steering wheel, gold-silver hair falling over her eyes.

"That's your job isn't it?"

"True love's kiss breaks all curses."

"Shut up." she mumbled, sighing heavily. "You don't get a say in this anymore.

True Love's kiss.

Shit.

Emma's eyes widened, knuckles going white with their grip.

"No..." She whispered.

Great.

She was halfway home when Ruby called her. Emma pulled over, fumbling with her phone for a minute.

"What?" SHe answered, not really in a polite mood now that she'd been so unsubtly pushed into realizing she had just handcuffed her true love to a bed.

"It's Hook." Emma's eyes narrowed as her face creased in confusion.

"Ruby, what-?"

"He's gone to the Sheriff's station, Emma, he was on his way with Gold and Belle when I saw him!"

"That's not possible, I was just talking to Gold." Emma said, attempting to get a level-headed story out of the girl.

"Well I don't know how he did it, do I?" Ruby gasped, hyperventilating into the speaker.

"Thanks Ruby." Emma hung up and gunned it to the Station.

~*/~*/~*/~

When she opened the door, she found Hook holding a remarkably calm, very pretty woman at gunpoint while Gold appeared to be locked into the one cell.

"Hook, drop it!" Emma called, advancing with her won gun raised.

"Why should I?" Hook laughed, a bit maniacally. "What could you possibly do to me?" His whole body shook, fingers trembling around the gun. "What are you even doing here?"

"I'm here to talk about Milah." Hook turned full-on to face her, eyes wide and face ripped open with disbelief and pain.

"How did you know-?" He began, choking on the rest of his sentence.

"You told me." Emma lowered her gun, stepping slowly forward. "You told me how she died, how he ripped her heart out." Belle was visibly shocked by this, spinning to face Gold, who looked ashamed and chagrined. "You told me how she loved her son. How she regretted that loss every day." SHe stepped even further forward, dropping her gun on the ground. "You told me that you loved her. You loved her so much. How she would listen to stories, with her mouth open as though she were drinking or breathing them in. You described her to me, Killian." Emma reached forward, sliding the gun out of his hand. "You told me everything about her."

"Why?" Hook looked as though he was in agony. "Why would I tell you?" Emma smiled.

And then Belle knocked him out from behind.

With a chair.

~*/~*/~*/~

"So." Emma said, walking up behind Regina. "True love's kiss, huh?"

"Yes." Regina sniffed.

"That's going to bring him back to himself?" Emma asked, hesitant but firm.

"He won't remember today, but yes." Regina concluded, "He'll remember everything else."

Emma nodded.

"Didn't go quite as you planned, did it?" Emma asked.

"No." Regina admitted. "it didn't."

They stood there for a few minutes, side-by-side.

The curse-bringer and the saviour.

And then Emma sighed, pushed back her shoulders, and strode into the hospital ward for the second time that day.

~*/~*/~*/~

She sat gingerly on the small stretch of space next to his legs, leaning over himm in a way she never would have if he had been awake, or if anyone else had been watching. But it was late at night, and the only people there were asleep or on-duty, and so Emma felt no shame in letting her walls down just this once.

"Hello." She whispered, brushing a lock of hair from hsi eyes with her fingers. "You didn't miss me, did you?" She smiled ruefully.

"I don't hold out much hope for this," She began in a low voice, almost a whisper and not quite a breath. "But the more i think about it the more it seems to fit. And the more it seems to fall apart." She chuckled. "You're still in love with a woman who was murdered three hundred years ago, and I'm in love with you." She looked around, as though checking for anyone looking on at her secret declaration of love.

"Funny story, huh?" She nodded to herself, drawing her fingers across his cheek, over and over again rhythmically. "Funny." She smiled tightly.

As she leaned down to kiss him, three things crossed her mind. That first of all, if he woke up now, he would probably hate her. Secondly, that she actually wanted to do this, fuck destiny, she loved him. And third, that the palest reach of sunlight eking through the window was a herald of crowds. People occupying the hospital. She'd better do this quickly or not at all.

So she leant down and pressed her lips to his. As far as having one participant went, it was a nice kiss. His mouth was a bit cold and rather chapped and okay, this was kind of stalkerish, but she'd only do it once.

She smiled against his mouth and pulled away, soft echoes of true love flowing out of the ward and through the hospital.

Killian's eyelids flickered, and Emma quickly stood up. Within moments her stony walls were back in place and nobody would ever guess that she had been pouring her heart out a minute ago.

She made it to her car before she started sobbing.

~*/~*/~*/~

A/n: Well. That was interesting. How'd you like the backstory?