The Captives

CS Genre: Season 2 Canon Divergence

Hook fell roughly to the cell floor, the air leaving him in a quick oof. He'd not known what he expected to happen when he'd defied Cora to her face, but being trapped in Rumplestiltskin's bloody impregnable prison cell with a quartet of disgruntled princesses was not the ideal, though it was a far sight better than the torture and murder she might have inflicted upon him for his insubordination.

He should be accompanying Cora to Storybook. He should be but minutes away from finally getting his revenge, but no. The Swan girl had begged him not to leave her here when her lad waited for her at home, and fool that he was, he could not deny her.

She'd left him, chained him to a blasted beanstalk, trapped with an angry giant, but he couldn't leave her. He was going soft.

Hook pushed up to a seated position, and then took the hand Snow White offered him to help him to his feet while Swan paced before the bars like a caged lioness. Killian reached inside his coat, retrieved the satchel containing Aurora's heart and tossed it to Mulan with a flirtatious grin (which seemed, curiously, to have no effect on her).

"Thank you," Aurora said carefully, the statement coming out more as a question.

Killian shrugged, and then winked. "I perish the thought of a woman losing her heart unless it's over me."

Behind him, Swan stopped pacing and growled. "Stop flirting with everything that moves and help me find a way out of here."

Killian grinned. Aye, they were in less than enviable straits, but he couldn't deny the thought of spending a bit more time in the enchanting blonde's presence delighted him more than a little. He leaned against the rough wall of the prison, crossing one booted foot over the other. "I fail to see what you think I can do to help love," he said. "You heard Cora. Even the bloody Crocodile couldn't escape from this cell."

Emma glared at him for a moment, and then sighed, slumping down to the prison floor next to where he was leaning. "Of course there's no way out of this cell, because that's apparently my life now. Nothing works out the way it's supposed to. Now I'm going to starve to death in a filthy prison cell alongside my mom, two other Disney princesses, and Captain Innuendo."

Snow White sat gracefully down next to her daughter. "Emma we are going to get out of this cell, and we are going to get home to your father and Henry. We have to hold on to hope. That's what our family does."

Swan tossed her mother a jaundiced look. "Yeah, I think the hope skipped a generation."

Killian's brow furrowed, and he sat beside Swan, so close his thigh brushed hers. She startled for a moment, but didn't move away. Probably too bloody stubborn to admit my presence affects her.

"Your mother's right, darling," Killian said after a moment. "I've known you little more than a day, but already it's quite clear you're a force to be reckoned with. And I assure you, I did not spend three centuries pursuing revenge only to be thwarted by a few prison bars."

Swan blew out a long breath, and looked down at the parchment she held in her hand. "Really? Am I a force to be reckoned with? Look at this paper, Hook. Gold wrote my name over and over and over again. Don't you see? I'm not the savior because I'm strong or special or anything. I'm the savior because he made me that way, because it's what he wanted."

Snow put a motherly hand on Emma's arm. "That is not true, Emma, honey."

"Isn't it?" Emma asked, and the pain, the uncertainty in her eyes shot straight to Hook's heart, for reasons he had no wish to even contemplate.

"Listen to your mother, Swan," Killian said. "The Crocodile may have manipulated circumstances to his own advantage, but he did not make you who you are. Your determination and single minded purpose is what has allowed you to succeed. The Crocodile repeated your name, because he knew Emma would save him…at least until I find him and bury my hook brace deep within his rotting black heart."

Emma shot him a quick (and unexpected) grin. "Thanks."

He wiggled his eyebrows at her. "Perhaps the next time we find ourselves with a bit of privacy you can show me just how grateful you are."

Swan rolled her eyes. "Yeah, keep dreaming buddy."

They fell silent for a moment, and Hook watched as Mulan cradled Aurora's heart in her hands and then gently returned it to its proper place. Emma continued staring down at the parchment while Snow got to her feet and retrieved the small, empty ink bottle.

"I don't understand," she said. "Why would he lead us here if the squid ink is gone?"

"Who knows why the hell Gold does anything," Emma said, scowling fiercely at the parchment. "If he thought it would help him somehow, he'd screw over his own mother."

"She'd deserve it, love," Hook said absently, "if not because she's a right piece of work herself, because she's responsible for bringing that execrable piece of filth into this world."

Hook felt the old wounds fester once again, relived the moment the son of a bitch had crushed the life out of his brave, beautiful Milah. He would pay for what he'd done. He'd suffer such torments he'd beg for Hook to finally end his miserable life. He'd see what it was like to watch his blood dry up within his veins like the ink in that bottle….

Suddenly Killian sat up tall and gasped. The ink! Of course!

"What?" Emma asked. "You come up with something?"

"Perhaps I have," Killian said, "toss me that parchment, love."

"This parchment?" Emma asked, looking at him blankly. "What do you want with it?"

"Don't you see?" Killian asked, grinning as all four princesses flocked around him. "The Crocodile composed that list while in this very cell. He had one, only one source of ink—the ink that was within the bottle you found."

"The squid ink," Snow said, a smile spreading as she began to understand, "but can it really help us in its current state, dried upon the page?"

"There's but one way to find out," Killian said, holding the parchment to lips and blowing.

The letters rose from the page, converging into a kind of thick, black smoke, which obscured the bars of their prison. When the smoke dissipated, the bars were gone, their way was clear.

The five captives raced from the prison, not stopping until they'd reached the crisp, cool air outside.

"Okay, so we're free; what now?" Snow asked.

Swan shot him a look, nodding in gratitude. "Now we find Cora, take back the compass and the ashes, kick her ass all the way back to Wonderland, and get the hell back home."

Notes:

-It's been over two weeks since I've written so much as a word of fanfiction. I needed the break after all the mc's I wrote this summer, but I'm definitely itching to get back into writing.

-This week I obviously decided to go with a season 2 deleted scene. Emma and Killian's dynamic in season 2 is always a fun one to go back to. They're not on the same side, they don't really trust each other, but despite it all, they're already irreversibly drawn to each other. Looking back at season 2 Emma and Killian, I'm shocked how very obvious it was that really, really good things were ahead for those two!

-Up next: I didn't get everything I wanted to done in this week's installment, so I plan to revisit this canon divergence again next week. Hook and the princesses are free, but they've hardly succeeded yet. Cora still has the compass, the dust, and a hefty head start on them. Will they manage to thwart Cora? And just how will the whole Lake Nostos situation work out in this divergent universe?