"Never say goodbye because goodbye means going away and going away means forgetting."
-Peter Pan
Chapter 25: Goodbye
(Neverland, Present)
The hull of the ship groaned and gave under the crush of flaming wings. Belle's screams pierced through the crackling collapse of the Jolly Roger and Gold's hands flew through the air of their own accord, stealing the lot of them away in a whirl of his own smoke. He willed them to the island's shore, where they watched the ship crumble under the beast's embrace. David restrained Hook, as if the pirate could do anything, and a light left blue eyes as a burning sail broke away from the dying ship and drifted down to the water.
The scourge must have sensed their escape then, because it whipped its head in their direction, but a sudden, massive blast from the ship consumed the beast whole, and from that blast burst a golden white ring of light. Gold surmised the magic flames had caught the stores of pixie dust the girl left in the hull and found it apt that, in killing the old ship, the dark beast triggered the final blow. The inferno burned hot, but all too quick, and soon ash of both scourge and ship crumbled to the ocean below, leaving nothing but smoke across the sky.
The bright ring of light persisted, and spread on through the air in all directions, gaining momentum.
"What is that?" Emma asked.
"The end of our adventure," Gold replied.
Emma spun on her heels and looked up and down the length of the beach. "Lillian?" she called to the empty sand. "Where's Lillian?"
Gold didn't turn his sight from the light. "You know where she is."
Hook, regaining himself, shoved the prince away and whirled on Gold, looking every inch the pirate he'd faced all those centuries ago—sinister and murderous. Hook dove at him just as the arc of light washed over the island and bright golden light flooded Gold's eyes.
-0-
(Storybrooke, Present)
When his sight darkened back to reality, Gold stood not on deserted shore, but amid the bustling motion of Granny's diner. Decorations from the Charmings' potluck still hung from the walls. A mismatched menagerie of half-eaten side dishes still covered the counter. Most of the town still clustered around the tables or milled about with their overloaded plates. Mary Margaret and David still stood in the back with the baby, chatting with their well-wishers. No one spared him more than a casual glance (or the not so casual glare), nor seemed in the least concerned about the threat of the Scourge.
He looked around the room, the puzzle pieces of the myriad futures spilled out before them. Days ago, they'd drifted by him, blackened by the shadow of the Scourge. Now they pushed in from all sides, bright and boundless and blissfully ignorant of the miserable future they would never see.
Gold smiled.
So she had done it. The girl had killed the last of the Scourge, had dissolved that horrific branch of the future even as the Scourge sought its last gasping effort to destroy them. The resolution of the paradox rewound time to the point of its divergence, returned all of the player pieces back to the moment Lillian arrived in Storybrooke. Only she would never come, not now, not in her own time. Sealing all of her power, all of her potential, into that battered steel swept Lillian from time as a child stolen from a cradle.
He winced at the memory of steel slipping through flame. How close he had come.
"Rumple?" Belle called, and he turned to find her at the diner's door. "Sorry I'm late," she said, and quickly slid into a chair. As with the others, she seemed to have no memory of the flight she'd endured but moments ago. Stiffly, Gold followed and took his own chair as Belle launched into the details of her day, same as she had done before, but he nodded along as if hearing it for the first time.
The diner's bell rattled again and Emma burst through the door.
"Mom, Dad, I missed you," she blurted as she hugged her parents, just as she had done a week ago. She then pulled them into a booth to unveil her adventure before astonished eyes for a second time.
"What do you think they'll name the baby?" Belle asked, taking his silence for discomfort.
Gold pursed his lips to keep from growling. His eyes flicked to the gurgling baby, to Prince Neal. Twice over now, that name reminded him of how close he'd come to restoring the past that should have been, one where his Neal yet lived, and the chance had slipped through his fingers.
With the hook, with all of the components still within his reach, he could have remade Zelena's spell and then, with little more than a wish, he could have saved Bae without repercussion.
He could have had a family again.
"Excuse me," he whispered, and rose from his chair. "I find I need some air."
He whisked out the door before Belle could even respond, but the night air did little to cool his building anger. Anger that demanded action.
He would pour all his effort into finding the talisman, dredge the whole of the NeverSeas if he had to to find it—and if he couldn't, he would rip apart Oz until he uncovered the books of time and skin himself another savior.
The diner's bell rattled again and Belle stepped out of door, wrapping her coat tight about her at the chill.
"Rumple. What's wrong?"
With his back to her, Gold schooled his face. He'd find a way to explain this to Belle, when the time was right—when time was set right—but for now, he tugged down his jacket in effort to compose himself and ran a hand down to smooth his suit jacket.
Belle's voice cracked slightly. "You're not… you're not getting cold feet, are you?"
He turned around at that, gentleness in his voice, "No, of course not."
Belle crossed her arms against the cold and rubbed hands up and down her arms until a crumpling sound from her coat stopped her. She put a hand into her pocket and withdrew a parchment.
"What's this? Did you leave me a note?" She asked as she opened the parchment. Her face fell as her eyes skimmed the words. "Oh no, Rumple. I think someone's in trouble.'"
She pushed the parchment at him and Gold took it, but knew his mistake at the sight of the signature.
Above her name, in sloppy letters too big to miss, Lillian had scrawled the very word forbidden by Pan, forbidden because it harkened back to the land before Pan's corruption, to the dreamland where children outflew their fears until sadness subsided. But no one lived in Neverland then and when child and island had to say their goodbyes, the insolent island sent them away, and kept to itself all the tales of their adventures as secrets only to be shared again with those who returned to soar in its skies once more. That was how the island protected itself and that was how, by sheer accident, Lillian Jones defeated the Dark One with the last rule she ever broke.
The timeless magic of the island, freed now from Pan and Scourge, defied the paradox as a toddler flouts bedtime, followed the word back to Storybrooke, and stole from Gold's thoughts every last trace of the hungry darkness and the adventure of the girl who would never be.
The parchment crumbled in Gold's palm as the magic fled, forgotten by both he and Belle as the skittering magic swept the evidence away.
Belle blinked several times before her eyes flicked back up to Gold. "You okay?" she asked, "You left so suddenly, I thought…"
Gold shook away his clouded thoughts, remembering only the vague need to breathe at the impress of emotions. With the memories gone, the emotions faded. "I'm fine. I just… needed some air. It seems to have done the trick."
Belle slipped her hand into Gold's. "Then come back inside, Rumple. They'll be announcing the baby's name at any moment and I don't want to miss it," she said, and tugged him back toward the door. "What do you think they'll name him?"
"Truthfully, I haven't a clue," replied Gold, and stepped into the light of the diner.
-0-
The door had barely rattled shut behind the couple before Killian and Marian rounded the bushes outside Granny's. Killian fought to keep his eyes open as they walked toward the diner's light. Though she'd taken the news of her kidnapping surprisingly well (and he'd had enough experience with the subject to fancy himself a reasonable judge), the adrenaline from their trip had drained from his system, leaving only aches and exhaustion behind, and he yearned to crawl upstairs to his bed. He felt more than tired, like he'd lived weeks, not days, since falling through the blasted portal.
With the brightness inside, he could see the party still in full swing, see that it stood between him and the stairway, and he just didn't have it in him to plaster on a polite air long enough to make it through without casting a dour shadow on the festivities.
He stopped at the stoop and extended an arm to direct Marian in. "This is Granny's. Emma's already inside. She'll help you sort the rest."
"You're not coming in?" she asked.
"She's been stuck with me for the better part of the week. Too much of a good thing, you know," he said, pointing out Emma at her booth through the window. "Best I give her a moment with her family."
"Family," Marian echoed. When her eyes dropped to the ground, Killian almost took it all back, but Marian spared a soft smile of thanks and disappeared through the door.
Once the door fully shut, Killian lumbered over to a garden table, pulled out his flask, and popped it open with his teeth. He tipped his head back to sip his rum, but when the the first spicy shot hit the back of his throat, the words "not a victory," echoed in his ears so boldly, he thought someone had spoken. He sat forward to look around the garden patio, but found himself completely alone.
Thinking better of it, he capped the rum.
Granny's bell jingled again after a little while. Killian looked up expecting Marian, but Emma sauntered toward him.
"So, do you think Gold was right?" she asked as she walked toward the table.
Too tired even for this dance, the truth soon spilled from his lips; what he'd given to bring her back, to bring her home. Then his brain almost melted at the shock of her lips as they touched his his, and a familiarity warmed him. As well it should, he reasoned; he'd kissed her before—twice, technically. Yet neither of those had been so soft as this, so vulnerable, and it was that tenderness that he knew without knowing. He'd have dwelled a little longer on the mystery, but Emma tilted her head, deepening the contact, and his higher brain functions fell silent.
In the end, he simply blamed the rum.