"Where's my mom?" Henry asked Emma. We had all gathered in the diner with as much of the town as we could find.
Emma looked guilty and it took her a moment to answer him. "She wanted to sacrifice herself for the town. She said that she could destroy it but it would kill her."
"You can't let her do that!"
"Henry's right," Mary Margret said. "Regina may not be the best person but we can't let her die, not when we're so close to being able to escape."
"Here comes David now," one of the seven dwarves called out. Sure enough David and Killian were approaching the diner. I hadn't realized how many of us had been holding our breaths until David came grinning with a small bag and we all exhaled at once.
"Regina is still in the mines," Mary Margret told David. "We're going to get her out and take her with us."
David nodded and tossed the pouch to Emma. Before Emma could catch it Killian snatched it out of the air. "If Regina wants to die, I say we let her die. This could be our only chance to get out."
"We're saving her," Emma said.
"Maybe you are, but I'm not. Let's go, Darling."
I shook my head. "I can't leave them, Killian. I'm not going to let them die, any of them, not even Regina." I looked at Henry and then back at Killian. "That's his mother, you already took one boys mother away from him, do you really want to do that again?" I asked. I knew bringing up Milah was a low blow, but it was an effective one. He handed Emma the pouch.
"Henry already lost one parent, I'm going to make sure he doesn't lose another," Emma said.
I knew it was an inappropriate time to ask questions but I couldn't help it. "Who?"
"Neal was his father and Tamara killed him."
I felt like someone had just kicked me in the gut. I'd just seen him. We'd been in Neverland for a month together before he'd disappeared, I hadn't seen him until yesterday and now he was gone. I wish I could have remembered more about him, something that I could say to Henry or Emma to tell them that I understood how they felt.
But all I knew were facts; I'd treated each and every one of those boys like my own even when they were rude or annoying. Bae had been new when I'd arrived and he still remembered his home, we had traded stories. I had wanted to catch up with him, trade stories again. It almost felt like losing a child even though I knew he'd grown up.
"I'm sorry," I said finally. Emma looked at me, really looked at me, and nodded. Even though she couldn't have known anything about Neverland or what I'd just thought through in my head, she could tell how much I understood, even if I felt like I didn't have a right to.
Killian touched my arm and guided me out of the diner. Neither of us said anything to each other. I'd almost forgotten bringing up Milah, but I didn't know if he had. Or maybe he was being quiet so I could process the fact that this was the first time someone I knew had died. I drove to the dock and we headed to the ship.
I went as far to the bow as I could get without actually climbing out onto the bowsprit and sunk down against the railing. Killian went to the stern and began steering the ship away from the dock. I didn't think we'd be able to make it to safety before the failsafe kicked in, but he was trying.
Finally he gave up and walked back to me. "Why can't I remember?" I asked. I glanced up at him and he looked away quickly. He appeared to be struggling with something, like he wanted to say something but couldn't do it. "Does that just happen? Do you just go numb? Was it because of Cora's time bubble?"
He continued to avoid eye contact with me. Finally he knelt down in front of me and held out his hand, he had the two remaining magic beans. "How did you get those?" I asked.
He shrugged. "We can go wherever you like."
"You brought us out here so the people in Storybrooke wouldn't know," I realized.
"I don't know if Baelfire told you this, but before he reached the island he was on my ship." I shook my head slightly. "I knew who he was, that he was Milah's son, and I wanted to protect him. I offered to let him stay on the ship, but once he realized who I was he didn't want anything to do with me. He said I could only care about myself and I proved him right, I gave him to Peter. To you Peter may have just been another child, but he was more evil than you could see."
The way he said it, it seemed like he was giving me a clue. But the clue was for a scavenger hunt I didn't know I was on. "Bae was wrong, you've changed. You can change, if you want to. But to do that we have to take the beans back."
He sighed but nodded and stood up. "I thought you'd say that." We hadn't gotten that far; I could still see the dock. There was someone waiting for us. By the time we had reached the dock the group had multiplied. I was ready to let down the gangway as soon as we got to the dock. "You're going to fall off the ship if you don't wait until the anchor drops," Killian grumbled. I didn't listen and jumped from the ship to the dock.
Belle had been the first person standing on the dock. "Belle?"
She nodded. "I have my memories back. My real memories."
"I didn't like Lacey," Ruby said coming to stand next to us.
"Neither did I," Belle said.
"Did they stop the failsafe?" I asked. Belle and Ruby nodded. I turned around and looked for the Charmings, who had stopped a few yards away from the ship. "Excuse me," I told my friends. I walked up to Emma. "I'm sorry about Killian taking the beans, I didn't know about it. He brought them back."
"Good, we're going to need them," Emma told me.
"Did something else happen?" I asked.
"Greg and Tamara took Henry through a portal," Regina told me. "Mr. Gold thinks he can track them but we need to hurry."
"Yeah, of course." I nodded towards the ship. I led the group towards Killian, but Belle grabbed my arm. I motioned for the others to board; I expected they'd inform Killian.
"Wendy, before you go, I just wanted to say that I know you, Hook, and Rumplestiltskin may not really be on the best terms, but I'd like it if you didn't kill him."
"I think that we're done with that," I assured her. "I think Killian put revenge behind him. Taking the high road and all of that?"
"Follow your heart. I think you have a good one." She hugged me.
"I'll see you when we get back. It might not be that long, what with the time lapse and everything." I shrugged. "I haven't worked it out. I mean I was planning on going grad school at FIT not MIT, what does a fashion designer know about the space time continuum?" Belle just laughed like she understood a thing that I'd said.
"Wendy, we're leaving!" Killian called.
"Right. Bye, Belle!" I turned around and jogged back on deck. "We know where we're going?" I asked. Killian nodded grimly. "Where?" I prompted.
"Neverland."
OoOoO
Emma found me in my cabin; I was furiously ripping some of my new wardrobe apart. "Whoa, what did those clothes ever do to you?"
I looked up surprised. "Nothing. I just wanted to make something else with them. You know the clothes I was wearing when you found me? My own creations, made from Milah's old stuff. Now I have new material. It's kind of a nervous habit I guess. I've been doing it a lot since I left Neverland. I never really did it before that."
"You might find answers in Neverland."
"Answers for what?" I asked.
"For why you can't remember it. You can act like it doesn't bother you, but I know you want to know what happened to you there."
I shrugged and grabbed a box off the table. "Macaron?" I offered. She nodded and took one.
"Did you get these while you were in New York?" She asked, taking a small bite.
I nodded. "John made me take two suitcases worth of my old stuff and he bought me a massive box of my favorite macarons. I was too upset to eat them on the way home though. They've gone a little stale."
"Still tastes good to me."
I shrugged. "I'm sorry, about Henry and Neal. That must really suck."
"You knew Neal, didn't you?" She asked.
I nodded. "From Neverland. Wish I could tell you more about him."
"But you can't remember."
"Nope." There was a sudden jolt and several of my things flew off the table onto the floor. "I think we're here." I tossed my sketchbook and the dress I'd been working on onto my bed. "Let's go take a look."
Emma went to talk to her parents and I headed towards Killian at the wheel. I looked out towards the island, it was hard to see it through the fog but what I did see was dark and foreboding. It certainly wasn't the tropical paradise I'd remembered.
"What happened here?" I asked Killian. He didn't answer. "Has Neverland always looked like this?" He nodded; he had the same look as when I'd asked him why I couldn't remember Neverland clearly. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"I didn't think we'd ever be back here. You had such a perfect picture of this place, I thought it would be better if you remembered it that way."
I removed one of his hands from the wheel and slipped in between it and him. "Teach me how to steer."
"You already know how to," he reminded me. I frowned even though I wasn't facing him.
"Humor me." He sighed. He took my hands and moved them to the wheel, keeping his hands on top of mine. He looked over my right shoulder and I turned back and kissed him on the cheek. I had been trying to distract him and it appeared to work. I could already feel him relaxing.
"Don't you think the professional should be steering?" Regina asked, startling Killian and I. "I mean this is a life and death situation."
"Wendy knows exactly what she's doing," Killian snapped. He was on edge once again and I sighed in defeat. "We'll go around the island and sail up the river so we can surprise him," he told me. He looked at our new crew. The Charmings huddled together talking while Rumplestiltskin stared at the island intently. "We spent ages trying to leave this place, only to be back with the man we planned to kill."
"If this was a novel that would be an example of situational irony," I mumbled.
"Not exactly the happy ending I expected."
"Greg Mendell told me that villains don't get a happy ending," Regina said quietly. No one said anything and eventually she walked away.
"I don't believe that," I said. "Honestly, I don't really believe in villains or heroes. No one is one hundred percent bad or one hundred percent good. But even if there are real villains, I don't think there's a single one on this ship. People don't care about villains." I looked down at the rest of the group and noticed that Rumplestiltskin was missing. "Where did he go? He was standing right there a second ago."
"Do you think you can keep this under control for a moment?" Killian asked. I nodded and he went down below deck.
He'd barely been gone ten minutes when the ship started rocking. It wasn't anything I was doing, I'd just been slowly sailing the ship to the far side of the island, and I hadn't even started to turn it towards the river yet. "What's going on?" David called. I ran to the edge of the ship and looked overboard. A woman popped out of the water and sneered at me.
"Mermaids!" I shouted back to the others. "Get Killian!" I ran back to the wheel and tried to get us back on track. I heard someone fire a cannon and saw a flash of light as Regina hurled a fireball into the water. Hands grabbed mine and I looked up to see Killian.
"Calm them down," he ordered me. I descended the steps to the main deck just in time to see Emma and Mary Margret lifting a mermaid onto the deck.
"What are you doing?" I yelled at them. "You don't know what mermaids can do, put her back!"
"We should question her," Regina said.
"Question her about what?" I asked. "Put her back!" I demanded. A loud noise interrupted our argument and I turned to see the mermaid blowing a conch horn.
"What was that?" Emma asked her.
"A warning," the mermaid said calmly. "Let me go or you will all die."
"What did you do?" David asked.
"If you don't tell us, I'll make you," Regina threatened. Thunder boomed and there was a flash of lightning in the distance. Wind whipped around us; if this got much worse we'd either be thrown completely off course or straight into the shores of the island.
"She's causing this," I realized. "Let her go!" I yelled again.
"Stop the storm and we'll let you go," David said, he held his sword under her chin.
"Go ahead and kill her," Regina said sounding bored. Mary Margret gasped shaking David out of it, he backed away realizing what he'd been about to do.
The mermaid looked at me. "I know you," she said.
"I've never spoken to a mermaid before," I denied.
"We should just kill her she isn't going to help us," Regina told Mary Margret.
"We aren't killing anyone!" Mary Margret shouted in response. The mermaid was still trying to talk to me but I could barely hear her quiet voice over the shouting.
"…drowing," she insisted. "You were…remember?"
"I can't hear you," I told her.
She shook her head and tried to tell me again but what I did hear didn't make sense. "They took it from you."
"Took what from me?" I asked. The rest of them were still arguing and I turned to glare at them. "Would you all just shut up?" I yelled.
"I'm done arguing about this," Regina said. She gestured at the mermaid and the mermaid was instantly turned to wood. Mary Margret and I both gasped. Thunder boomed even louder and the lightning seemed even closer. I whirled around and punched Regina in the jaw.
"You have to turn her back!" Mary Margret screamed at her before Regina had a chance to retaliate.
Emma grabbed my arm and pulled me away from them. "It's not the mermaid, it's us. We have to calm down." Emma jumped overboard.
"What the hell, Emma?" I yelled. There wasn't a response. "Guys! Emma needs our help!" The other three were still at each other's throat. I walked right in between Mary Margret and Regina. "Emma went overboard. We need to help her!"
"What?" Mary Margret asked surprised. She and David rushed to the railing of the ship. Emma was struggling to stay above water. A pulley, dangling off the ship, fell and hit her. Emma went limp and the waves knocked her into the ship.
"Are you all done arguing?" I asked. "Because if you aren't, she's going to die."
"I'm going in after her," David said.
"Wait!" Mary Margret and I said, but he jumped in anyways.
"This excursion was a horrible idea, we're all going to die, no one gets along and no one listens," I mumbled walking up to the helm.
"I've got her!" David yelled. "Drop the net!" Mary Margret used the same net she'd captured the mermaid in to get David and Emma back onboard. Regina used magic to get them over the railing and dropped them on the deck. I realized the storm had subsided.
"Wow, Emma was right, we were causing it," I said.
"Perception, that's what makes Neverland what it is, Darling," Killian said. He turned the ship so we were heading straight for the island.
"So much for the element of surprise."
"Nothing is ever easy, haven't you learned that by now."
"Unfortunately."