She stood in the doorway, watching him. Level gaze, crossed arms. Alistair smiled brightly over his shoulder—everything's fine, it said. It'll all work out.
He'd knocked on Jones' door a full minute before, and no answer. So he tried again, the heat of Emma's optimism like a laser on the back of his neck.
"Let the man work." August dragged Emma from her perch. Alistair swore to think more kindly on the man-child going forward. Take a crack at that forgiveness he'd heard so much about.
Still no answer on Jones' end, so Alistair let himself in.
Honestly, why were locks even invented if no one used them?
It wasn't the first time he'd been inside the private mortal quarters of one Killian Jones. But it was the first in recent memory that such a place had felt so cold. Shades closed, lights out. And if Alistair wasn't mistaken, if he hadn't known such a thing to be an utter impossibility in these parts, he would've sworn a breeze had just blown past.
"You know," came a gravelly voice from the shadows. All gruff and no cordiality, "when a man doesn't answer his door, one might infer that he wishes to be left alone."
Alistair took a backward step, then another. Never mind that the door through which he'd entered was the only source of illumination in the apartment, but it suddenly felt like the only point of safety. If he trekked any farther into the dark, would he ever be allowed out? There'd be no wishing himself free of this cellar, that was for sure.
"You can spare a few minutes for a friend, can't you, Jones?"
"Is that what we are?"
Jones stepped into the column of light streaming in from the open door. He wore a grin Alistair was tempted to call sinister. A fire sparked behind his eyes—what Alistair, on another occasion, in another circumstance, might've mistaken for enmity.
Had Alistair stumbled into one of the bad days? Encountered Hook when he'd gone looking for Jones?
"Where did you get that?" Came a horrified voice from across the hall. Alistair glanced back in time to see August snatch a red apple from Emma's hand.
"The store," Emma answered as August stormed off. Alistair heard a loud thud, which he took to mean the man-child had binned the offending fruit.
Not a minute later, August stomped toward Emma's door, the hem of his shirt held up to his chest as small, round protrusions stretched the garment to an awkward shape. August dropped his hand and an entire bushel's worth of apples scattered along the hallway floor.
"Hey!" Emma shouted. "I was gonna eat those! What the hell is your problem?"
Alistair turned to Jones with a shake of his head. "Mortals, am I right?"
Jones was not amused. Not…exactly. He stared at Alistair the way a predator might look at its next meal. Calm, cunning. Calculated.
"Listen," Alistair cleared his throat, "Emma has expressed some concern with regards to your condition."
"What condition might that be?"
"Come now, Jones. Dignity is one thing—let us not be prideful. The forgetfulness and false memories, they're no fault of your own. Merely the result of an outside force wreaking havoc on your life and relationships."
"False memories."
"Not false in the general sense, that is nonexistent. But insofar as it pertains to this version of you, not entirely…accurate."
Jones took a step forward. Alistair, on instinct, took two back. "You know what I've always liked about you? The way you talk in circles—round and round until you've talked your listener into all manner of nonsense. That's what made you such a prolific guide. But don't you ever find it exhausting? The sheer pointlessness of traveling in a circle? Where does one end up except precisely where one started?"
Something was familiar about this Jones, and not for the reason it should've been. This was not the man Alistair had once called protégé. This was not the man he'd spent a century shaping. The man who'd told a secret and broken his heart.
Before Alistair could put his finger on exactly what it was that disturbed him, before he could do much of anything except stare into a sphere emerging like liquid gold from the void of Jones' eyes, August's distressed voice interrupted them again.
"Emma! Emma? Can you hear me? Emma, wake up!"
Jones' grin was slow forming, languid yet absolute in its delight. "Might want to check on the Savior. I would hate for something to happen to her."
"Jones…?"
It struck him then, like lightning. Jones' words. His turns of phrase. His voice. The curve of his lips like a Cheshire cat's.
"Did you really think I wouldn't find you, Alistair Smith?"
He stumbled the first few steps, but once he found his footing, he ran. He fastened every lock and bolt on Emma's door, though they stood no chance of keeping the Director out, if the Director had a mind to get in.
"Please," said August, crouched over a body on the floor. A body that, Alistair realized with abject horror, belonged to Emma. "You have to help her."
Alistair was at her side in an instant, checking for wounds, patting her face, calling her name. No signs of life save for the faintest of heartbeats. A few feet away lay an apple, as round and red and perfect as any he'd seen in his long life, except for a single bite that'd been taken from it.
"What happened?" He asked, not knowing what he expected, who he wanted to answer. He'd never been a man of superstition. Had never paid tribute to any god. But as he watched the color drain from Emma's skin, he begged mercy of any benevolent force that might give ear to a pitiful soul like his.
"I tried to stop it," said August. "I—I don't know how they got here. They were suddenly everywhere, and they were all she wanted to eat. I'd been so careful—I thought I'd been so careful."
In looking around Emma's apartment, Alistair saw the truth of August's words. Red apples rolled off of every surface and onto the floor, like a flood, gently thundering, gathering momentum. Soon they'd be overtaken.
"Emma?" Alistair said softly, touching the side of her ivory face and refusing to believe the warmth was gone from it forever. "If you can hear me, it's time to wake up. Joke's over, Darling—and might I say, it's not nearly as funny as you might think."
Eyes still glued to Emma, hands still trembling, August shot to his feet. If anyone understood that compulsive impulse to pace when panic got the better of a person, it was Alistair. But when August bent forward and howled in pain, clutching both hands around his leg, Alistair was at a loss.
"I'm sorry," August said just before heading for the door, wading through apples as he went.
When he started undoing the locks, Alistair said, "Where the bloody hell are you going?"
"I can't be here for this." His hands shook so uncontrollably, he was scarcely able to grasp the knob—the final barrier to his escape. "I can't…you don't…you don't know what he'll do."
"Don't I? Did you not hear a bloody word I said?"
"You don't understand. I made a deal and I broke it. And now…AH!" August held onto the doorframe for support as his body shuddered. He looked on the verge of collapse—as pale as Emma, if not more. "I can't be here for this."
Alistair didn't know why he was surprised anymore. When had the universe, when he was down, ever passed up an opportunity to kick him square in the nuts?
"Off with you, then! Back to what you're good at—" August was a shadow on the wall, but Alistair kept on. "—abandoning your friends when they need you! At least she's not an infant this time, isn't that right? Unable to defend herself! Who bloody needs you?"
Bastard. Coward.
Liar.
Alistair looked down at Emma and knew that the how wasn't important. Asking how would only waste time. Facts were his best and only ally now.
Fact: The Director had gotten to Emma.
Fact: She'd bitten an apple and fallen under a spell.
Fact: Said spell being penned by the Director made it uncharted territory. There was bound to be some maddening twist that made the thing impossible to counteract.
Fact: Jones' whereabouts were, at present, unknown.
Fact: They were completely, devastatingly, and in all ways fucked.
—
The text he'd received from Charlotte, what'd previously refused to register in his mind, did so now, the words revealing themselves in sudden, stark clarity as Killian pulled back on the handle a second time and the door to his designated portal opened.
Something 's wrong.
Not something. Everything.
How could this be possible? What sort of trick had Alistair played on him? Letting him believe he'd finally broken free of the council. Of magic and wishes. That he'd somehow outrun his fate. That a happy ending was his for the choosing.
How would he break it to Emma? Would she think he'd lied? That he'd manipulated her into a relationship he'd known was only temporary?
The revelation had his head spinning. He reached for something to steady him as the ground swelled. As it roared and raged like an angry sea. As his vision clouded and he closed his eyes. But there was no escape inside his mind.
He was plagued by images. Bombarded with flashes of events he didn't remember living through.
"Who's Milah?" Emma's voice came up on him, hollow and distant, as though from the other end of a long tunnel.
His own answered in kind. "I think I killed her."
He carved the letters deep in the stone. Let them try and forget her now. He held the hook against the moonlight and grinned, a taste of vengeance on his tongue.
"Sleep soundly tonight, Crocodile, for it will be your last on this earth."
Killian gripped the sides of his head as he fell to his knees. He might've been screaming—his chest felt as though it'd been ripped open, an ancient betrayal awakened—but he couldn't hear. All he knew was an emptiness in his lungs, a hunger for breath that might never be sated.
"I love you." She held his face in both her hands and stared so deeply into his eyes, he almost recoiled—for what could she find staring back but a blackened soul, so utterly unworthy of someone like her?
When she said it again, more firmly than before, like it wasn't even a question but a sacred truth that'd existed before them, before the foundations of the universe, what could he do but draw her forward? Unable to shape his voice around four simple words—I love you, too—he conveyed his affections in as sincere a manner as he could manage in that moment. Ruined as he was. Wrecked by one so pure. Goodness personified.
And she 'd chosen him.
Charlotte's voice came next. Or so he thought. So he'd assumed at the time. To the best of his recollection, she'd never been cross with him—quite the opposite. She'd started out afraid and then sarcastic, but always amiable.
"Isn't it obvious, Killian? It's a memory. One you've stolen from its rightful owner." Charlotte clicked her tongue. Her eyes were amber today, and not nearly as youthful. These eyes had knowledge of things Killian could only conceive of in his dreams, and even then, how they'd pale in comparison to the truth. "What am I to do with you?"
Like Alistair's voice once had been—Consider this a warning.
She reached a hand to the side of his face, ran her fingertips along his temple as though to brush back his hair. And then there was calm.
Heavy steps thundered behind him. He 'd done it this time. There'd be no patient, parental talk waiting for him when he stopped running. His father's lenience had run out—possibly for good.
There was a door in the distance, at the end of a long corridor. He would only just make it in time, as long as he didn 't look back.
He reached for the handle with hands too large to be his own—the hands of a full-grown man. Fear gripped his eight-year old heart and squeezed. This wasn 't his body.
But there was no time—his father was gaining. He wouldn 't forgive Killian this time. Nor would Liam. Nor his long dead mother. Nor anyone—
He lunged forward, closed his fingers around the polished brass—
His first mistake was thinking he could escape. The second was turning around to face his pursuer, to catch a glimpse of the threat closing in on him.
It was worse than Killian could 've imagined—that face, those eyes, that snarl curling his mouth—
It was not his father who chased him. It was him.
Only it wasn 't.
It was Killian 's face, but all twisted up and angry. Hateful. Dressed in leather, eyes lined with black, he seized Killian by the throat and brandished a sailor's hook where his left hand should have been.
"I'm afraid this is where your journey ends, my boy."
Killian looked down at his hands. Both of them. He sat back and marveled at the limb that'd been lost to him now remarkably reattached. He flexed his fingers and turned his wrist and laughed. A disbelieving, maniacal sort of sound.
"Are you all right?" Killian squinted up at a silhouette blocking out the sun. Not a tall silhouette, to be sure. "You were screaming a minute ago. I thought you might be dying."
"I am bloody fantastic, thank you for asking."
"Are you sure?" Asked the shadow, which by his prepubescent voice, Killian took to be a young boy. "You were writhing on the ground and clutching your head like someone in a horror movie. It was pretty traumatic to watch. You might need medical attention."
"Yeah? I don't see what business it is of yours—off with you, now, before I rethink my generosity in letting you leave with your life."
"Geesh—just trying to help."
Killian glared at the boy, who shrugged and walked off. Once he did, Killian was hit with another twist. What strange realm was this? Paved roads and towering structures and the noise—what was all that? How was a man to think, let alone plot his next course?
And where the bloody hell was his ship?
"Oi!" The boy turned back. He had a mop of dark hair, bright, curious eyes, and was strangely dressed for any realm. The scarf around his neck was something Smee would've taken an instant shine to, Killian had no doubt. "What land is this?"
"Land? You mean Boston?"
Boston. Killian ran this name against a mental log of all the realms he'd traveled, but came up empty.
"Can I ask you something?" The lad approached him without a trace of trepidation. A quality that showed either great bravery or naivete. "What's your name?"
"What's yours?"
"I asked you first."
"I don't see what bearing that has on the situation." Killian looked the boy over, head to toe, and the boy, to his amusement, did the same to him. "I don't suppose you're in need of a job?"
"I'm nine."
"And I'm in need of a leftenant. One familiar with this realm and how to traverse it."
"Like an assistant?"
"Aye." Killian nodded. "An assistant. You'll be duly compensated, have no fear. Though you should be forewarned of the likelihood that this undertaking will result in your imminent death. Do we have an accord?" Killian held out his hand.
"Wait—death?" The boy looked incredulous, but only at first. Unless Killian was mistaken, the boy's expression softened to something more akin to excitement. "What exactly do you need my help with?"
Killian grinned as something primeval came back to life, something left unsettled and unavenged for far too long. "Catching a crocodile."