Chapter 51: The Curse


A while later, they were back at the town line, where Emma, Henry, Jack and Lily were going to leave... Forever.

"This isn't fair." Henry complained, "It's all my fault."

Regina seemed confused and shocked at his words. "What do you mean?"

"If I had never gone to get Emma, if I just lived under the curse with you, none of this would've ever happened." He stated. "I thought I was alone. I thought you didn't love me. But I was wrong."

Lily glanced at her father, it was strange him being beside her after a century... It was like a good dream, one she never had before.

"Henry." Regina started, in a small voice. "I was wrong, too. It wasn't your fault. It's mine. I cast a curse out of vengeance. And I'm I'm a villain. And villains don't get happy endings."

Henry frowned. "You're not a villain." He said happily, with tears streaming down his face. "You're my mum."

Emma was talking to Neal a little further away, all tears. "Neal I'm sorry."

"Don't be." He replied. "You gotta get our boy and my sister the hell out of here. And you have to go back there."

She sighed, looking at Henry as Regina embraced him. "Yeah, I do."

"Hey. This isn't over. I'll see you all again."

"That's quite the vessel you captain there, Swan." Hook complimented, looking at her yellow beetle. It was small talk really, but the look in his eyes said it all; "There's not a day will go by I won't think of you."

"Good." She whispered.

Before he could reply, Regina walked over to them. "Emma there's something I haven't told you."

She sighed anxiously. "What now?"

"When the curse washes over us, it will send us all will be left behind including your memories. It's just what the curse does. Storybrooke will no longer exist. It won't ever have existed. So these last years will be gone from both your memories. And we just go back to being stories again."

"Wait." Lily stepped in. "What will happen to us?" She gestured to herself, Jack, Emma and Henry."

"I don't know." Regina admitted.

"That doesn't sound much like a happy ending." Jack muttered.

"It's not." Regina chuckled. "But I can give you one."

"You can preserve our memories?"

She shook her head. "No. I can do what I did to everyone else in this town and give you new ones."

"You cursed them, and they were miserable." Emma frowned, not to fond of the idea.

The evil queen shrugged. "They didn't have to be. My gift to you is good memories, a good life for you and Henry... And Lily and her father as well. You'll have never given Henry up." Her voice broke."You'll have always been together."

"You would do that?" Henry asked.

"When I stop Pan's curse, and you cross that town line, you will have the life you always wanted." She whispered.

"But it won't be real." Lily stated.

"Well, your past won't, but your future will. Now go." She urged them all to get in the car. "There isn't much time left, and the curse will be here any minute.

And so they got in the car, Jack and Lily in the back and Henry and Emma in the front. "I miss them already." Henry admitted.

"You won't for long, though." Emma replied sadly. "And neither will we..."


They drove for ages, but nothing seemed to change. "Am I the only one here who still remembers everything?" Lily asked uncertainly.

They all saw the green smoke go over Storybrooke, their memories hadn't changed yet and they were still driving. "Something's wrong." Henry said. "We have to go back."

Emma hesitated, but after a few seconds, she complied. She did a one hundred and eighty turn and kept on driving until they reached the edge of a forest. "It's gone." Jack said, "The town. It was right here."

"Wait." Lily frowned when she spotted something on the edge of the small path. "Look. The sign's still there," She noticed. "Henry's right, something is defiantly wrong."

The sign had fallen over, laying on the ground with moss growing around it, as though it'd been their for centuries. "This is Pan's curse... I-I can feel it." She whispered.

Jack tried to put a had on her shoulder, but he went right through her once again. "Pan's gone, Lily." He said, "It's over."

"Is it?" She asked him. "His spell on us still seems to be working and I only just got you back." She whimpered. "And as soon as I got Felix back, Pan killed him. It's never over, papa! Pan's a monster. He'll do anything in his power to take me as far away from my happy ending as possible."

"Lily, I'm sorry I wasn't there for you... I-"

She cut him off. "Why did you make that deal with him all those years ago?" She asked. "Didn't it ever occur to you that I'd rather be dead than spend the rest of eternity with that manipulative stuck up little prick! Why didn't you let me die?!" She yelled, sinking to her knees. "He ruined our lives before, and I pretty sure he'll be capable of doing it again!"

Jack stared at her in shock, unsure of what to say. "I-I-I'm sorry. But I couldn't let you- or your mother die."

"I-I know. But she left you- She left me. All she ever did was leave people." Lily wiped her eyes. "And while I was Pan's prisoner... All that time I thought you were dead." She whimpered. "All this time I thought you left me too..."

"I would never leave you, Lily." He promised. "Never again."

Emma and Henry watched them intently until there was a rustle in the bushes. "What's that?"

"Who goes there?" David's voice growled. Just the tone of his voice was threatening, and even though Lily barely knew him she could easily tell that he never sounded like that. At least when in his own mind.

He stepped out and glared at them as if they were strangers. His clothes were torn in some places, patched in others. Splotches of dirt lingered on his face and hands and his rather dark shade of blond hair looked as though it hadn't been cleaned for a while. "Wait, It's us!-" Emma tried.

But narrowed his eyes suspiciously and took out a sword- wait, 'where the hell did that come from?' Lily wondered.

"Turn out your pockets!" He snarled, pointing the weapon at Emma.

"David-"

"Now!" He yelled.

She did, and handed him her phone. "That's all I've got... Why are you doing this?"

He shrugged. "What is this?" He asked. "Is it a weapon?"

"N-no... What's going on?"

"Don't you remember anything?" Henry asked him.

David glared at the boy. "I remember my duty serving the king-"

"The king?" Jack repeated, stunned. "Who's the king?"

He raised an eyebrow at him as though he was the dumbest person in existence. "Peter Pan, of course." He sneered.

Lily's eyes widened in worry. "We can't let him get away with this." She said.

David pointed the sword at her, a dark glint in his eyes. "If you go against him, you will not survive."

"I've been against him for most of my life. I'm still here aren't I?" She snarled. "Now it's my turn to turn his world into ashes."