Chapter: Grim Adventures
Killian regains his memories and is faced with a difficult decision.
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Killian opened his eyes and peered into the darkness around him. Whispers hissed in his ears as the air became cold and sharp.
"Swan?" He called. Silence answered him. "Swan?"
For a moment everything was still. There was nothing but darkness in every direction. A vast endless darkness. Seconds ticked by and he slowly sensed a change taking place. A midnight sky came into focus above. Dark churning woods lay in the distance. A black road stretched out beneath him. Nearby, the town line crackled with bright violent energy, as if sending a warning. The Welcome To Storybrooke sign glittered invitingly against the faint moonlight.
"What the hell am I doing here…?" His voice died in his throat as a slashing, searing pain tore through him.
Collapsing onto the black pavement, he lay helplessly as a warm pool of blood gathered beneath him, dark as dying roses, reflecting moonlight in its slowly spreading mire. The clouds overhead cleared, and for a moment the moon's rays turned red through a graying mist. Murmurs hissed in his ears. Raindrops pricked his forehead, as if trying to shake him from a stupor.
Suddenly a small hand took his, gripping it tightly.
"Belle…" The word choked in his throat.
"Hook?" Belle whispered, her pale face materializing out of the shadows. She was kneeling next to him, tears shining in her eyes. "I'm sorry…so sorry. I won't go. I'm here… I won't leave you." Her hand held his, and he watched as she brought his fingers to her lips, pressing a kiss to each of them. Her dress was stained with something deep and red. Streaks of blood, almost black in the starlight, covered her face and hands.
He could feel the gasping air leaving his lungs and the blood quickly draining from his body. Forgotten images swarmed around him, flooding his senses like a black tidal wave. A glinting dagger, Ingrid's scroll, his beating heart in Rumple's hand…
"It's all right," he tried to mutter even as the words stuck in his throat. His head rested against her hands, both small and pale and impossibly soft. "It's all right Belle, don't cry. It's not your fault…tell Emma I'm sorry…tell her…she deserves better…" Killian struggled to speak but his voice was drowned out by a chorus of whispers floating around him.
Staring at a silver sky, Killian realized he was dying. He saw the red touches of color on the treetops in the distance and the slowly moving clouds veiling the sharp points of starlight. He felt the droplets of sweat trickling down his forehead and the pain blossoming around gaping wounds in his chest. He was dying—this was the alpha and omega of his universe, as elementary as an alphabet. All at once, everything became clear. Everything was laid bare to him at the moment of his death; the man he was, the man he wanted to be, the man he would never become...
Suddenly he was being swept away, gathering speed as the scenery around him crumbled into black shapeless forms. He tried to call out, tried to fight the current hurling him into nowhere. His voice fell away, dissipating into a black river like droplets of water. His breath slowed and stopped as his throat tightened and he felt himself falling into a wide, welcoming abyss as the darkness swallowed him whole.
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"Wake-y Wake-y…Eggs and Cakey. Wake up now… Open those eyes. You've been resting long enough…Come on…Oh do hurry the fuck up. I don't have all night you know…" the sing-song voice came to him slowly, echoing from a faraway place.
Killian groaned and gripped his chest. Air filled his gasping lungs and his heart began beating hard and painfully in his chest. His hands moved over his stomach, his shoulders, his throat, searching for gaping wounds. Nothing. There was nothing. No wounds. No slashes. No blood.
He was alive. He was breathing. He was awake.
"Bloody hell…" Killian muttered, his eyelids fluttering open. Blinking, he sat up and tried to peer into the pitch darkness. The moonlight overhead signaled the approach of midnight. He must've been unconscious for hours…
An icy breeze whirled around him as he climbed to his feet. An eastern wind howled and brought the scent of snow inland from the bay. Snow flurries fell on the empty road and dark storm clouds hung in the air, rumbling and black against the dark horizon. The air hissed with energy and the town line shimmered and hummed. Beside him, the town sign flashed a hard green glare.
"Welcome to Storybrooke," he read aloud. Underneath it, someone had scratched out the town motto and scrawled 'weird as shit' in its place. Killian thought he recognized Will Scarlet's handiwork. He hated to admit that it was a better town motto than 'if it ain't brooke, don't fix it.'
"Finally…" a voice rang out from the darkest part of the shadows, "I was beginning to wonder if we'd be out here all night." A pair of glowing eyes appeared and a figure stepped forward from the darkness.
"Who's there?"
A laughing voice cut through the gloom. "Who else would it be? Surely after getting your oh-so-precious memories back, you must remember who I am."
Killian rubbed his chest. A pain flared beneath his skin, as if a low fire were burning between the bones of his rib cage. "Grim? Is that you? What do you want?"
"Anything and everything." The Useless One bowed, an amused grin stretching across his decayed face. "More recently, I wanted you to take that potion. I worked so hard on it…and you would've saved me endless amounts of trouble if you'd been a good little Dark One and just taken the damn stuff."
"I'm in no mood for one of your Call to Darkness speeches," Killian said hoarsely, the pain in his heart now spreading up his shoulder. He'd never felt anything like it before… "So I'd appreciate it if you'd kindly fuck off."
Grim waved the request away. "My my my… that was clever of you, wasn't it? Getting the Savior to use the dagger and command you to remember who you were. I honestly didn't see that coming. Perhaps I've built better than I knew. I've spent weeks whispering through the chrysalis but had no idea what was going to emerge from the cocoon. I'm almost impressed."
Killian shook his head. "You make even less sense now that my memories back. How is that possible?"
Grim ignored him and drew closer, his eyes glowing brightly against the darkening skies. "I'm actually lucky to have caught you here. This town line of ours has some interesting properties doesn't it? I haven't mastered this kind of communication yet, and it's presented a particular problem for me. You'd be surprised how many times I tried to contact you and wound up trapped in someone's meth-fueled nightmare... It's a self-destructive little realm, isn't it? Everybody wants to break-bad in one way or another."
Killian stared at him. "What are you talking about?"
"Breaking Bad. It's a television show..."
"No, not that… What do you mean you haven't mastered this kind of communication? I thought you've been doing this for centuries…guiding the Dark Ones through their Call to Darkness and all the other poncy horseshit attached to the title. "
Grim leaned forward. His amused eyes glowed a fiery red. "I said a lot of things. It's actually a funny story... and you might enjoy this… but I've been lying. This entire time." He giggled. The sound grated on Killian's nerves like rusted metal.
"You've been lying?"
Grim nodded. "Yes. Most of the things I told you were lies. In fact, everything has been a lie. Every. Single. Thing." He giggled again, this time the sound was suddenly eerily familiar.
A green fire burned on his fingertips as Killian's eyes narrowed. "Everything?"
"Yup."
"Perhaps you'd care to give me a reason for that."
"Oh, I think you know why. You have your memories back, after all. It shouldn't be too hard to figure out, even for you. Think hard." Grim chuckled darkly. "Really concentrate. As much as you can… I know it's hard with visions of attractive blondes running through that thick head of yours."
Killian stared at him, the pain in his chest pounding in time with his heartbeat. Another face flashed in front of him. One with sharp features, small beady eyes and a wicked grin that seemed to glow against the dark. "Because…we've…we've met before."
"Yes."
"Your name…" Killian stared at him. "Your name's not Grim, is it?"
"Nope. Although I've been called worse. Much worse. By you actually." Grim's fingers twirled through the air, as if he were spinning an invisible thread.
Killian watched the sharp points of his fingertips and suddenly felt droplets of sweat trickling down his forehead and waves of pain blossoming deep inside his chest. He saw a moonlit dagger, a bloody scroll, a ruby heart beating in Grim's hand…no…not Grim…it wasn't Grim…
"You're the Crocodile." The words fell from Killian's lips, dripping with venom.
From underneath his shadowy hood, Grim's decaying gray skin fell away and Rumple's face appeared in its place. "My, my, my… I'm impressed. My little ruse was going soooo well…even if the costume was a bit Ghost-of-Christmas-Future for my taste. But it really wasn't all that terrible, considering everything was such short notice." Rumple stepped from the swirl of shadows, emerging in a neat three-piece suit with a wide smile on his face.
"You can't be serious…You evil son of bitch…" Killian stared at him, his eyes wide with shock. A blackened hatred flared in his heart, bubbling with the intensity of slick acid falling on hot metal. The scorching pain clawed at him and a shadowed bruise began to take shape over his chest as Rumple's shrunken heart grew several shades darker within him. "You tried to kill me," he said, his voice barely rising above a hoarse whisper.
Rumple shrugged. "Tried and failed. Although I'll be the first admit my attempts to rid myself of the dagger were…flawed. There were some unforeseen consequences. My actions caused me to lose my title as the Dark One, but because I retained the Sorcerer's hat and Ingrid's scroll, you'll find I'm not entirely helpless. How do you think I've been watching you, even contacting you from outside the realm? Appearing as an apparition isn't as easy as it looks…"
"You were Grim this whole time? That doesn't make any sense."
"No, of course it doesn't. At least, not to you… I know it takes awhile for new and exciting ideas to find their way into that saltwater-soaked brain of yours. Speaking of which, I'm sure Emma Swan will be quite pleased to be getting her old Killian Jones back again. How is Emma? Recovering from those nasty wounds you gave her?" Rumple grinned when he saw Killian's expression darken. "Now now now don't get so upset. After all, what's a few blondes between friends? That little misadventure signaled the start of my new problems—I knew once you spared Swan's life, your memories would start returning. I'd hoped they wouldn't… but c'est la vie…I had to find another way to ruin you."
"The potion," Killian said quietly. "Let me guess, it wasn't going to eliminate my memories, was it?"
"Oh no. It was poison. And quite nasty stuff too. You were supposed to take it and die a painful death, but alas you had to ruin my fun again." He shook his head. "And it really was a chore creating it. Do you know what a thimbleful of Dreamshade goes for in the Troll Market? Took me weeks to find it. Oh, and then I had to find a way to deliver it to you. It's no easy feat, dropping a vial of potion over the town line. Believe it or not, that was the hardest part of the process…"
"Wonderful plan Crocodile." Killian chuckled darkly, wincing as the pain continued to stab his chest. "You wanted me to trust you, take a few sips of a mysterious potion, and die quickly and quietly…that's very clever. So what'd you call this one? Evil Plan #304? Or Operation I'm-A-Sick-Fucking-Idiot?"
"I don't name my evil plans, thank you very much. I'm not five-years-old," Rumple said primly.
"Was leaving Belle behind part of your plotting, or did your wife not fit into the genius design of your grand scheme?"
"I didn't know she'd left the car!" Rumple exclaimed. "I'm evil, not heartless…and now I have proof of that." He thumped his chest. "Heart works like a dream, by the way. Should I thank you or Emma Swan for that?"
He forced a grin. "Enjoy it while it lasts. I plan on ripping it out of you at the earliest opportunity. Perhaps I'll use my hook, for old-time's sake."
"Oh, you'll have to catch me first. I'm small but I'm quick."
Killian rubbed his chest, gritting his teeth against the pain. "As much as I love bantering with you, old friend, why don't we cut the bullshit short and you just tell me what you want."
"What do I want?" Rumple twirled his hands in the air, spinning an invisible silken thread. "I want what I've always wanted. To kill you. To ruin you. To take away your happy ending and secure mine. It's fairly simple straightforward process, but I don't know why it's been so damned difficult. Pain in the ass you are, you really shouldn't be so hard to kill… And you can't imagine how much I want to kill you. I dream about it…" He paused, a smile lighting up his face. "I'd like so much to poison you. Or stab in you through the heart. Or set you on fire. Or tie you to a cannon and drop you in the middle of the ocean or set a kraken loose on you or cut out your tongue and feed it to you so you'd choke on your own blood…"
Rumple laughed self-consciously and sighed. "But perhaps it's for the best. It'll be much more fun watching you destroy yourself from a distance. How long do you think your little dalliance with Emma will last now? I mean, the Savior and the Dark One have such an insurmountable obstacle in their path for true love. I'll say it'll be two, maybe three months before she banishes you from the realm or slips you a little Dreamshade herself… Care to wager on it?"
"Go to hell," Killian snarled, the flames on his hands burning black now. "I'll never hurt Emma. I'll die before I do."
"Perhaps you would before. But not anymore." Rumple gave an evil grin. "The change has started already. Can't you feel it? That tearing sensation that's ripping your chest in half? That's your heart…or…my heart actually, and it's growing darker as your memories return."
"You're lying," Killian replied in a low voice, rubbing his hand over his the shadowed bruise spreading over his heart.
"I imagine it's grown several shades darker even in the last few minutes. All those centuries of hatred and vengeance just coursing through your veins… And it still has quite a ways to go. Feels like a hot poker to the rib cage, doesn't it? It's not a very pleasant feeling. I remember after some particularly nasty spells, how much it'd ache and burn... I'd drink gallons of milk, sit in ice water, chew on handfuls of gingerroot, but there's nothing for it." He grimaced. "And soon the darkness within it will take over. It won't be long before your ragged little heart won't have a glimmer of love or goodness left in it."
"You're wrong." Killian snarled. "I may have your heart, but I know who I am. I'm not a monster. I'm nothing like you."
"Ohhhhh, I wouldn't say that. Certain souls have teeth. And yours are starting to show."
"Shut up. Shut your fucking mouth."
Rumple giggled. "And poor Emma. She will be disappointed, won't she? She finally gets her Killian Jones back, only to watch his love twist into something evil and hateful. Because that, old friend, is the price of your magic and the cost of your power… The Dark One will always destroy the one he loves. Always. And there's nothing you can do about it." Rumple shrugged. "Seems I might have lost my power, but you've lost your happy ending. I'm not sure if it's a fair trade yet. Ask me in a few months."
Killian didn't answer him. Instead he stared at the fire glowing on his fingertips. It matched the deep dark burning he felt in his chest.
Grim sighed. "I wish I didn't hate you with such a vile loathing, because you're going to be a magnificent Dark One. I'm honestly excited to see how you'll destroy the Savior. Should be one hell've a show, and I'll be watching eagerly to see how it plays out. From a distance, that is…But don't despair, I'll leave you with this promise—before you die, you will see my face. So keep a weather eye on the horizon, Dearie." Rumple gave a fluttering bow before he disappeared in a cloud of red smoke.
Killian stared at the empty space where Rumple stood, biting back the bitter rage welling up inside him. The shadowed bruise spread over his skin—swelling and blistering as a three-hundred-year-old hatred coursed through his veins. Flames licked his fingertips, burning black as the heart beating inside him.
He rubbed his chest absently, looking down the stretch of road just beyond the town line. The ragged pain was now sharp and insistent. He could imagine a jewel forming itself inside his body. He knew what was beating inside him, what was pumping the black blood through his veins wasn't his heart. It was something harder, cold and clean, a shard of something sharp and glinting—a heart of stone that would lead him further and further away from any hope of the man he wanted to be...the man Emma deserved...
It was only a matter of time before he'd be the Crocodile, preying on the weak, bending desperate souls to his will. Soon he'd claw his way into the black arts until he was a shadow of himself, his mind painting colors on the dark while vicious plans ran through his head like golden threads. The flickers of humanity he'd fought so desperately to preserve would turn cold and die out, like smoking embers covered by spent ash.
Eventually he'd stare so long into the darkness that the Darkness would begin to stare back...
Killian continued to watch the town line. It was only a few feet away…a few steps forward and he could cross it. Then this insanity would end. With a few steps, he could kill the beast. Stop the monster. Put an end to the dark magic encasing itself round his heart like a steel trap. Only a few steps, and he could spare Emma the misery his love would inevitably bring.
Dark flames danced over his fingertips, but the light couldn't reach him, he had drawn too deeply into the shadows around him.
He stepped forward. The invisible barrier crackled and hummed, issuing sharp sparks of warning as he approached.
"I'm sorry Emma," he murmured as he eased towards the barrier. Running his hand along the spindly energy of the line, he traced the faint light with his fingertips. It brushed against them as softly as spiderwebs. He tried to press forward, stepping towards the edge of the town line.
He couldn't move. He pressed harder, fighting against an unseen force. It was useless. The town line wouldn't let him pass.
"What the hell?" he muttered, taking a step back. "Why can't I cross it?"
"Because I don't want you to."
He turned slowly, his eyes hard and his shoulders squared, ready for a fight.
Emma stood behind him, gripping the dagger in her shaking hand. Her stare burned with a low flame as she watched him through the faint flashes of lightning. "We need to talk."