A/N: You are going to notice an error in dialogue in this chapter. It's intentional. I thought I was following the timeline just fine and then the "nine weeks ago" thing on 4x17 really threw me for a loop. I asked around to see where the extra three weeks fit in and got everything from there being a week between each episode (which seems ridiculous and out-of-character for everyone to just sit on their problems like that) to the annoying "it's just a show." So...the simplest explanation I can come up with is that Rumple has been banished from Storybrooke for a total of nine weeks and found Ursula on Week 6 of that, hence the "six weeks later" note at the end of 4x11. It's very conceivable that it took him another three weeks to track down Cruella, which is what he's doing in 4x12 before he comes back to town. This is the neatest way I can account for everything and match the timeline without stopping the story dead and always putting in "one week later, everyone decided to do X." Sorry for the discrepancy.

Atlantean is an actual language that was created for Disney's Atlantis: The Lost Empire movie. It is exactly the way I describe it and if you want to learn it, there are websites. I just thought it would be a better shout-out than having Hook and Belle spend nine weeks getting migraines over Klingon.


"What is it, love?"

Swan doesn't answer him at first, nothing on the other end of the phone except a wet clicking sound, probably her tongue trying to settle on the right words.

"I'm faxing...sending...a Missing Persons form to the library now. One of the nuns at the convent who wasn't at Granny's... Look, I told her I know where they are and you guys are doing everything you can, but she's pretty by-the-book and wanted official paperwork. I don't think it's going to help, but I think it belongs more with you and Belle."

He's not quite sure what she means, but the apologetic tone doesn't bode well. One of the machines behind him starts buzzing, so he marches over to it, Belle's head whipping up from a book as he does so. A piece of paper creeps out of the contraption's crevice, line by line of information about the Blue Fairy, her eye color, hair color, where she was last seen—nothing the information board hasn't already provided. Gritting his teeth, he glares at the form right until he sees Sheriff Swan's signature at the very bottom. It's not her fault. It's not even...Sister Manning's fault, although she already sounds like a pain in the ass. He rubs his face and snaps the paper up.

"Still there?"

"Aye."

"I know it's not helpful," she says, her voice softening. "But it's the only thing that was going to ease that woman's mind."

"I know."

"You'll crack it. I know it. I've got to run over to the mayor's office here in just a second. Give me a call if you need anything, okay?"

He forces a smile and then remembers she can't see it. Whispering a brief "okay" back, he returns to the board and tacks the form to it. The Sorcerer's hat. The mansion. The Apprentice's house. All these damned legends and languages that haven't amounted to anything—except the cloying fact that his own stupidity had been the catalyst of it all. With a primal snort, he lashes at the board, actually sending it off the wall.

"Well, I see you still have your temper," Belle sings from behind the counter, a failed attempt to mask her own irritation. With him, he clarifies to himself.

"Nine weeks and nothing! They're still trapped in that bloody hat!"

"Look, we just have to keep at it, okay?" she sighs. Bloody hell, here he is making a travesty of her library. He doesn't waste his breath with a response but picks up the board and sets it back to its spot, hopefully not a permanent spot, on the wall. "But we will find a spell to release the fairies. I mean, these translations are difficult, but I've reached out to some of the finest minds in the world, and one of them will get back to us. I know it."

Oh yes, the email rubbish. She'd sent that out days ago. He's made sure to catch a few glimpses of screens when he can, not that it's hard since the people of this world seem so fond of them. Games and pornography. Oh, and matchmaking. The wonders of technology indeed.

"If we're reduced to those magic boxes, then I'd say hope is in short supply."

"They, uh, call it the internet," she corrects him, tapping one of them. "And it can help us. And once we get the fairies out of the hat, they can help us release everyone else, including that poor old man that you put in there." She busies herself with her book arranging, shelving a cart of them. He inhales. It's a trick he should have picked up from her, keeping busy with work while they wait. He'd thought he could wait forever if he wanted something badly enough, and he supposes that's still true, but he's grown so tired of it lately, the two of them waiting for the other to get back with them about a lead, waiting for the squiggles on a page to magically mean something, and now waiting for the "finest minds" to get in touch with them.

"All because I let myself be tricked by the crocodile. How could I have been so weak?" Blinking, he turns his head to see where she is, if she heard him. In spite of spending hours with her most days, they hadn't discussed all the sordid details that led them to this strange partnership, not since the night he had thanked her. Other than a deep breath, it wouldn't appear she had heard him, but he's known her long enough now to know when she's still in her own world, grasping at words.

"Well, we both were. You know, Rumpelstiltskin got the best of us."

It shouldn't be so easy to forget about her own pain, especially since it must put his to shame. Rolling his eyes at himself as she still chokes on her husband's name, he faces her and finds himself walking over to her. Time doesn't always patch the holes in one's heart, he knows, and all the support and care from her father, her friends, maybe even her mystery suitor can't alter its schedule.

"And you're right! You should have been stronger, but you weren't, and, well, neither was I. You know, I, I should have seen through him," she laughs at herself before her eyes veer up to his chest, where there once had been nothing behind it. Blinking back a few tears, she resumes her work.

"You were blinded by love. What was my excuse?" He picks up a book from the cart and holds it out for her to take.

"Probably the same thing, just for someone else," she says with a shrug, accepting it and returning it to its space.

"Well, he's right about one thing—love is a weapon, as dangerous and persuasive as magic," he says out loud. Probably more so, he muses. He hadn't known about the Dark Curse until it was this close to sweeping him up, but he had pieced together enough to know the items, or rather, ingredients, the Dark One had pursued, tangible love among them. He'd found it, bottled it, and wielded it, and even after all of that he'd still lost.

"Yeah," she breathes, flickers of memories dancing across her eyes, most likely wondering if she'd really been able to see what was going on in them. "Yeah. He had both our hearts."

"Hey. As big a bastard as he was, he did love you." She still tears up, smiling at that, and Killian knows some other version of himself, lacking more than some maturity and wisdom, wouldn't have been able to wrap his head around it, presuming it would be out-of-character for such a selfish, unhinged soul to feel love. Part of him still can't understand it, how a man who tearfully dies for the woman he loves without any false hope of being rescued can be the same man who so easily chooses to see everyone and everything around him as a tool for his use.

"And now, he's gone from our lives forever. Yeah, I, I just, I, uh, I hope he's found whatever it is he's looking for."

He doesn't say anything, merely turns his head and reads the numbers on the spines of the books as she cries. They aren't difficult to master, he thinks, looking up at the shelves. He picks another one up and places it on the top shelf, sidestepping away from the stool she would have had to use.

"Belle, why don't you check your email? You're right. We need to take advantage of every resource we can."

"It's been a few days, Killian. I, I was probably laughed at during their lunch breaks or something." Shooting him a self-deprecating smile, she turns her back to him and the computers just past the shelves.

"Or, these scholarly types have a lot of work to do and might even have the decency to apologize for not getting back to you sooner," he suggests with a grin. He maintains it, waiting for her to smile back. It's that pursed-lip smile he likes the most on her, the one that feels confident enough to be playful, that graces her face as she sidesteps down the aisle back out to the computers. For now, he'll stay with the cart, still feeling like he'll tear the board to shreds if he so much as looks at it. Perhaps, perhaps he should look into the layers of spells that must be on the town line now, lift those, and request Emma take him out of town for a little while, find these professors Belle's contacted...and what? Spout off nonsense about how easy it was to find them compared to time traveling and ice walls? No one from the world she grew up in should look at her the way she had when he had tried to convince her of the impossible, back when she'd forgotten it. Yet another idea falling short.

"Killian! Killian, come here!"

He hurries to the computer and bends over it as she does, the spiky heels of her shoes click-clacking all over the floor, she can barely restrain herself.

"Look at this! I, I'm almost afraid to believe it," she says with a nervous laugh. "Is he saying what I think he's saying?"

"Who is this?" he asks, his fingers brushing the letter keys, still not sure why they're not arranged alphabetically. Robert Herzkutter, professor of linguistics at Oxford University. For once coming to this world so late in the game works to his advantage, for the credentials mean nothing to him and he can therefore read objectively. Heart pounding, his eyes dart to and fro down the message, unable to read it fast enough.

Dear Ms. French

I do hope you forgive me for not answering you right away. The page you provided me in the attachment is actually Atlantean, a contender for the much-desired "root dialect" or "mother tongue" from which all other languages derive. It's quite a find, and I'm sure a well-read lady like yourself will appreciate how priceless it is.

"A bit pompous, isn't he?" Killian remarks, the rather conversational pace of the message curbing his excitement. "And I think he's flirting with you."

"Stop it," she says, slapping his arm.

Even if you decipher the appropriately ancient characters that make up its alphabet, you would perhaps find it odd that it is read left to right on the first line, right to left on the second, back to left-right on the third and so on. This constant back-and-forth seems to be inspired by water, but that is my own theory.

"Get on with it," he snaps at the words on the screen before rolling his eyes at how he knows the man can't hear him. In keeping with the stereotype of the long-winded professor ever eager for an audience, the man dives into the history of the language, the phonology and sentence diagramming that surely would be of use if ever he planned on going to Atlantis...although his life seems to be made of defying the odds. At last, he reads the instructions to an incantation.

"This part here. 'A magical object of greater power than the magical vessel.' You still have the dagger," he says, pointing to the line on the screen.

"And someone who can do magic."

"Go grab the hat. Emma should still be at Regina's office."

"Actually...do you think she'd be offended if we opted for, well, more practiced hands?" Belle asks, rushing back to the counter for her coat. He barely hears the question, his mind spinning, torn between taking the board off the wall and suggesting they burn it, calling Emma and somehow lucidly telling her to meet them out in the forest glade where they need to go, and simply sprinting out the door in a mad dash.

"Not at all!" he calls to her, on the verge of laughing, as his body makes the decision for him and races out the library door with Belle on his heels.


The door is opened, like it's waiting for them, but even if it wasn't, he wouldn't care. But if he keeps running he'll skid right past it, so he scuffs up the corridor floor turning only enough to charge through the door.

"There may be a way to get the fairies out," he announces, pleased to see Swan has turned around and Regina has closed whatever they were working on.

"Yeah, I, uh, found an incantation." Belle rattles off an explanation, spouting off things like incantations and ancient tongues in such a breathless manner he interrupts her.

"Which made translation a challenge." She should get her moment to announce her triumph...but they should be getting to the glade...but all he can do is smile and motion his hand at her to continue as it seems standing here shuffling about leads to bad form.

"But I did it. I found a professor of linguistics from Oxford, and he just emailed me with the translation." She calms down a bit, her speech slowing. "It's an ancient ceremony, but, uh, one that will bring them back." He steals a glance over at Swan, who looks so elated by the news her face must be rivaling his own. At last. Calm down, he tells himself, checking for what feels like the hundredth time that Belle has the printed-out message.

"I just need you to enact it," she says, handing it over to Regina who studies it with an attempt to not look impressed, but of course it gives way to some surprise and pride and hopefully one tenth the exhileration coursing through him.

"Ceremony, huh? Well, Madame Mayor, ready to pronounce today 'Free the Fairies Day'?" Swan suggests, fumbling around in her pocket for her keys. Nodding at him, they take off for her car before receiving an answer. She also reaches for her phone once they've broken into a brisk walk.

"Who are you contacting?"

"Mom. She said she wanted to be the first person I texted when you guys did it."

He doesn't exhale until he's belted into the passenger seat of her car and running his hand down his face, heel bouncing up and down. Somewhere between the hallway and here, she's demanded to know everything, and as much as he'd revel in summarizing the morning, he's tongue-tied.

"Well, it was like any other day, and the Missing Persons...form...thing you sent over set quite the portentous tone, but I have to hand it to her—she didn't give up. The number of times I've been more than happy to be proven wrong... Anyway, the man rambled on and on about this foreign tongue that no one speaks anymore for a reason, and the speed with which those printer machines spat it out..." Glancing over at her, he stops, realizing so many things at once, that his eyes have bulged for one, but, more importantly, she's absolutely beaming at him. The way her head's cocked, her jaw going slack, nothing but, but pure adoration in her eyes...she's stunning. It gives his heart a lurch...and then his stomach follows it.

"What if it doesn't work, Emma?" he whispers, all his senses returning to him in time to see she hasn't started the car yet.

"It will. You guys did it. I-" Opening her mouth, she bites down on her lower lip, a slight shaking of her head indicating she's changing whatever her impulse had been. Turning the key, she leans over and kisses his cheek.


One would think a party would be going on in the forest, the number of cars pulled up into the open glade. The spell must be performed in such a place, and with the dagger that Belle fetched from some hiding place he hopes is a masterful one. Emma leaves the car first, actually walking over to his door and holding out her hand.

"I'm not some damsel in need of chivalry, Swan."

"Then come on. This is what you've been waiting for. Own it," she says, her hand not even wavering. Just as his mind once again replays the question of whether or not it will work, she drags him out and drags him over to where Regina waits for them, slipping her arm through his...apparently a considerate move to preserve some of his dignity. Eyeing the hat on the pillar in front of them, he swallows, at last the entire ordeal becoming real. This will work, for nothing else will lead to the fairies' freedom.

"Here," Belle says, turning the dagger over to Regina. The hat. The dagger. Cursing himself for letting them trigger past memories rather than regarding them as the keys to this final step of his and Belle's work, he feels like he's stepping out of himself, that he's watching Regina assure them she's got it from a distance, that he, Swan, Belle, and Snow have witnessed this all play out before. It's fitting they do have to take literal steps back then, Regina waiting until they're a few yards away before her quivering hands clasp the dagger and wave it over the hat. Her movements take on a surreal quality, deliberate, until she too backs away.

Nothing. Maybe nothing. The silence frozen in the air seems to know how finite it is, growing heavier by the second, Swan's hand never leaving his.

Then a rush—a thundering that rattles the leaves and scatters them in unison, a crackling wave washing over them as they steady their feet. A light streams out of the hat and grows more and more blinding. Shielding his face with his arm and twisting around, he and Emma stare only at each other, everything behind her consumed by light. Consumed, not burned.

It dies down as suddenly as it had been born. There, huddled together with their arms protecting each other, the fairies one by one glance up at the tree trunks. Gasps and breathless laughs fill the glade, and then he sees her, the Blue Fairy, her hands clenched in the soil. Emma breaks away from him to help her to her feet. Her hair's falling out of its bun and she needs to control her breathing if she's to not hyperventilate, but she truly looks no worse for wear. She's alive. They're all alive and well, and, if Killian has any say in the matter, they'll remain that way.


"Why does everything have to culminate in a party when it comes to this town?" he asks Swan, his fingers drumming the base of the passenger window as they pull up to Granny's. Bustling movements through the door and the slats in the windows already—bloody hell. He's spent the bulk of the car ride back into town trying a variety of methods to persuade her to turn the car and speed toward anywhere but its intended destination. Reminders of work and subsequent offers of help, the suggestion they pick up Henry first...David's conveniently handling that task...even seduction, well, the implication of it. An eyebrow raise, smirk, and observation that everyone will be at the diner which would lead to the two of them having the luxury of going anywhere to be alone for "whatever."

"Really? You go from coming onto me to whining in the blink of an eye?"

"No one's whining, merely pointing out a habit everyone's fallen into that is on the verge of being tiresome, that's all."

He sets his jaw, the walls of the diner straining to confine the music and chatter coming from within it. No one exits to greet them, which he'll take as a good sign. How anyone could think the fairies would tolerate being in the same room with him escapes him, and he doubts he'll be welcome for long once people realize he actually didn't do anything. He could sum up the past few weeks with the word "floundering." All the leads he'd followed, the ideas, the searches—none of it enough, and if he continually falls short as Regina's search for the Author progresses...

"Henry and my parents should already be here. I bet they saved us a booth. I'll be back in a second. I've got to go to the bathroom."

He opens his mouth as she breaks away from him, effortlessly weaving in and out of the mingling guests until she's out of sight. Just as well. What would he really have done—forbade the love of his life from relieving herself? And yet...he drifts back to the much quieter hallway so only a few feet and a closed door separate them. He supposes he could take the edge off with a drink and then shakes his head at that. Shouldn't he be celebrating? He'd wanted the fairies free and now they are; ergo, he should celebrate that. If only celebrating didn't require feeling at ease...

"Whoa, beware of lurking pirates. What are you doing?" Swan asks him as she returns, jolting him back into the present, as well as the swelling chitchat emitting from the diner.

"Just thinking."

"Lurking and brooding. That's a classic combo. I think heroes can do a little bit of bragging and celebrating," she says, patting his shoulder. Hero? Ordinarily, he could tell her he was the furthest thing from it, but the innermost part of him knows that would taste a lie, that Captain Hook's idea of time well-spent no longer appealed to him. And yet, heroism and him together leaves too sour a taste on his tongue as well. Stepping away from villainy, too tainted to be a hero...where did that leave him? Honestly, at least a villain has a clear sense of identity...

"Let's go. It's a party! We should buckle some swash or, you know, whatever," she continues, swaying in what she must purport to be a dance that, with any luck, he'll be in a mood to tease her about later.

"I'm hardly a hero. The fairies were only in the hat because I put them there," he says. It prompts a look of confusion on her face, like she for once can't understand what he's saying.

"You weren't in control of that. That was Gold." It sounds simple when she puts it like that, so maybe it is just that simple. His actions, but not his choice. Reassurance, or maybe a memory, guides her hand over to his chest, her palm pressing into it long enough to feel a few heartbeats answering a silent question. "Trust me," she says softly. "You have a mark in the hero column."

"I hope so."

She mouths "come on" to him, giving him a shove in the direction of the diner. The thought strikes him that he doesn't feel he's one or the other because he hasn't had to step onto either side of the line today.