A/N: I have been notified that "An Awfully Big Adventure" has been nominated for the Fanatic Fanfics Multifandom Awards in the category of "Favorite All-Time OUAT" fic. I am deeply touched and so grateful for the nomination. Voting starts April 11 and lasts for three weeks, I think. So if you want to cast a vote, please keep me in consideration. Thank you. My only regret is that I didn't have my beta OnceSnow to help make sure it could be the best fic it could be. In addition, I want to thank Florencia7 and Ereshkigalgirl for all the wonderful discussion and friendship. Be sure to read the former's The Vampire Diaries works, and the latter's "Nodus Tollens."
"Lay by my side and we'll sail away/off to the shores of another day..."
Killian's eyes snap open as he coughs out a rush of seawater. Adrift. Somehow, his hands knew enough to press against some wreckage, a makeshift raft that Liam was bracing against, kicking them towards a black strip of land on the horizon line.
"All set to go once I hear you say/Goodnight, my friend..." Liam sings, spitting out water as he does so, constantly glancing over at him. "Killian! You're all right."
"You're singing Mother's song," he grunts, his legs suddenly kicking of their own accord, every muscle aching as his trousers and boots weigh them down.
"I needed something comforting," Liam pants, holding his breath and sticking his face down in the water, shaking his head. Letting out a whistling exhale when he brings his head back up, he lets out a shaky laugh. "I-I thought, well, I knew we weren't done for, but..."
"There's land ahead," Killian says, nodding at the dark shoreline ahead of them. Blinking salt water out of his eyes, he focuses on it and adjusts his kicking form, using the entire leg versus from the knee-down. Something tangles around the collar of his vest, though, tugging on his neck. With one hand, he gropes around his throat until he pulls up the ring Liam just gave him.
"The lucky ring," he breathes.
"What did I tell you?" Liam laughs, and the sight of his normally curly hair matted down does seem to warrant a laugh.
"I never doubted you."
"It's yours now, Killian. It's got more meaning now than just luck. It's more than that. It's to remind you we'll always have each other, that we'll do anything for one another." Liam's hand balls up into a fist and knocks against Killian's while still managing to hold on to the wreckage. Swallowing, Liam takes his eyes off the horizon and gives the ring a solemn look. "Anything."
"You don't need to preach to me, brother. After tonight, I am never taking it off."
It hurts. Bloody hell, it hurts...what's digging into his back? Groaning, he tenses his legs, shuffling the gravel underneath him, each fine point stabbing him. One leg feels heavier than the other. What now? Lifting his foot, he follows the never-ending coils of shackles. Had his hand been chained, he might have been able to break loose, but manacles around the ankles with no magic to speak of, he's as trapped in this cellar as...
"Zelena," he coughs at the false serenity smiling at him. "Why are you here?"
"Your insane girlfriend sped up my pregnancy, kidnapped me right after giving birth, and separated me from my little girl!" she spits at him. "And they say I'm wicked."
That explains the hospital attire, but little else. Ignoring the way the gravels scrapes his palm, he wiggles up to a sitting position, glancing around at the empty basement, eyes fixating on the stone where Excalibur was once embedded. The lack of anything calling out to him now—no ringing, no whispering—should be a relief, but the situation's spiraled too far into the realm of the bizarre for him to find any comfort in the quiet. Himself, Zelena with no baby, and an empty stone.
"Why would she do that? What does she need you for?"
"From the looks of things, she's casting a spell to steal my magic," Zelena says, narrowing her eyes past the stone at the table, too full of books and bottles for any one detail to stand out.
"Why does she need more dark magic?"
"I don't." With a whoosh, Emma appears to them, some color in her face, but then that could also be the harsh lights around them. "I'm not taking Zelena's magic. I'm giving her mine instead."
"What?" Zelena bolts up, as does he.
"Killian, you were right," Emma says, ignoring her, looking straight at him. "My plan is not to destroy light magic. It's been to destroy dark magic, the dark magic that's inside of me."
"If that were true, why keep it secret from me or the rest of your family?" he asks. Bloody hell, if she had wanted the Darkness out of her, their kiss should have worked. Every new piece to the puzzle found uncovers dozens more that are still missing. He searches her face for them, finding nothing new.
"Because I knew you would never let me do what was necessary to get the job done."
Zelena snorts. "And that's where I come in."
"Yes! The Darkness needs to be contained in a vessel. You."
The murderous glare Zelena gives Emma indicates this is no ordinary transference of power or magic or whatever this mess is, he thinks, wishing harder than ever he could draw some conclusion to all this. Looking back at her, he needs to try again to reach her, reach Swan, reach the woman who was straightforward to a fault.
"Emma, what are you going to do?"
"What needs to be done. I'm going to cut her down with Excalibur's enchanted blade, and the Darkness will be vanquished forever," she murmurs with wide eyes, as if she's surprised by her own plan. Shaking his head, his lips try to form words. Then why accept the Darkness only to try to destroy it? Surely this hadn't been Merlin's advice? If she'd embraced the Darkness to trick it somehow, draw it to her instead of Arthur... The temptation to destroy it permanently couldn't have been enough for her to go to these lengths...kidnapping, taking hearts...
"That's why you needed my baby out," Zelena snaps him out of his possibility-induced trance.
"I don't want anyone to get hurt who doesn't have to. There are limits."
"You call those limits?" No. For Henry, she wouldn't care what had to be done. Maybe for her parents. For everything else they've ever encountered, she's been the resilient one, the grounded one, the one who never lost sight of who she was. "Emma, you're still talking about cold-blooded murder."
"Killian, she killed Neal and Marian. Given time, she will kill you, too," Emma argues.
"After today, you can be certain!" Zelena snarls at her.
The Witch, he can handle, especially a cuffed one all too desperate to taint some innocent newborn's life with her presence, and if it were only up to him, he might be able to shrug off killing her, but not Emma Swan. She was riddled with guilt whenever she took a moment for herself rather than help another person find their happiness.
"This isn't about Zelena, Emma. It's about you." He has to ask her what he's been fearing—if their entire quest to save her culminated in betrayal and shattered hopes. Cringing, he braces himself for an unpleasant truth. "We went to Camelot for Merlin's help. Surely...he has a solution to the Darkness that doesn't require this?" What's the price? She tucks her chin in and averts his gaze. If Merlin's price had been too high for her, he'll pay it. Better than being a shackled prisoner being fed answers on her schedule.
"Merlin can't help us anymore."
Muttering it, her eyes brim with tears. Mourning. Gods, Merlin's dead? She'd killed him. Or the Darkness inside her had. It had defended itself and lashed out at the Sorcerer when he'd attempted to help and now Emma was on her own. When she's afraid, her walls go up, reduced to the lost little girl not worth anyone's time. Well, he'd brought her walls down once. He could knock them down again.
"Why not? What happened there? Why are you really doing this?" he demands. Recoiling from him, he holds his breath and freezes in place. Fear. Fear of him. Exhaling, he takes a step toward her, softening his face, making it as readable as he can, but it's not enough. She disappears in a puff of smoke.
"Nicely done," Zelena scoffs at him, folding her arms. She glances down at the ground as if contemplating sitting back down, only to instead fall back against the wall. "You might as well have asked her to draw us a picture of what happened to make her this way."
"You're the one who was making death threats."
"And yet Emma's not the one chained down here at my mercy," Zelena half-sings, eyes wide and head cocked in a mock-angelic pose. "Although that would be quite the belated baby shower gift should we survive this."
"You know her plan. You were able to come close to guessing what she was up to." Killian approaches her. "How long does this kind of spell take? How much time do we have?"
He might as well have asked her to stick a rancid sausage in her mouth.
"You think I'm an expert on Excalibur? I had never heard of the stupid thing until winding up with you lot. I'd be flattered in your faith in me, Captain, if it wasn't such a stupid question." Rolling her eyes at him, she shifts her weight from foot to foot and stares up at the ceiling. Pouting, Zelena closes her eyes as her chin wobbles. "And now my baby's never going to know me. Regina's going to make it seem like I was a monster."
Don't laugh. Don't laugh. Don't laugh, Killian warns himself. It won't do any good. Pacing back and forth, he runs his fingers through his hair, finding his footfalls are in time with the thuds above him, each one louder than the next.
"Do you hear Emma pacing around up there?" Zelena gasps, eyes darting back and forth. Snapping toward his direction, she grits her teeth like a feral animal. "You're her boy toy. What do you think she's up to?"
"I'm no one's toy," he growls back. Oh, yes, if it were him, he could dispose of the Witch with minimal remorse. But it's not him. "We need to find a way to get rid of these iron shackles before Emma gets back."
"Those shackles aren't the problem. This one is!" she hisses at him, holding up her cuffed wrist. "When Regina put it back on, she enchanted my wrist and I can't cut it off."
Prudent.
"Without magic, we're never going to get out of here alive," she says.
Staring at her wrist, he remembers the sight of her severed hand on the floor of her cell, the scents of blood and potent, sickeningly apple-sweet magic nauseating him. He'd never even had a chance to take her heart and force her to help them. The magic in his hook can take one heart, but an image pops into his head of his hook on top of the cuff, as if it outranks it, like a better hand of cards than the other player's. If it can do more than one task...
"It's a good thing I happen to have some then," he murmurs.
"What? You've got magic?"
"No. My hook does. As you recall, I imbued it with magic to rip your heart out." Bloody fool, of course she would recall such a thing! Not that he's proud of resorting to such a thing, but, as luck would have it...
"Well, go on then." Curling her fingers into a fist, she thrusts her arm out toward him, elbow locked. "What are you waiting for?"
And here he is resorting to it again. Holding up a finger, he motions for her to wait so his brain can catch up. It's Zelena, the most practical part of him screams. The Wicked Witch of the West who cursed your lips, almost drowned you, and came too damn close to erasing your family from existence for comfort. Given the circumstances, it wasn't far-fetched to imagine Emma coming down here again to enact her plan only to find his corpse at Zelena's feet.
"The last time I tried helping you, you betrayed me. How do I know I can trust you now?"
"You don't. But you also don't have a choice."
Cocking his head, he ponders that, choice. He really doesn't, does he? Emma certainly didn't ask that he be part of her plan, whatever it may be. She'd removed all manner of choice entirely.
"Fair point," he concedes. "Well, then, here's to trust." Not quite sure how it will work, he tilts his arm so the tip of his hook snags the edge of the cuff. Intending to drag it downward and slice the thing open, it instead lights up and falls to the ground. Zelena's exaggerated sigh forbids him from bending down to pick it up. Keeping his eyes on her, she rubs her wrist, flicks away her chains with a gust of magic, and switches out her loose hospital gown for a sleek green frock and black cape. Giggling, panting, and sighing all at once, she grinds her gloved fingers together and licks her lips as if she can't get enough of herself. "Ah, feels so good to be back. Now, about that deal we made."
He's seen starving crewmen saunter toward the stale bread and thin soups of taverns with as much ferocity as she stalks toward him. Jaw clenching, he refuses to close his eyes, lest his lack of confidence in their deal should inspire her not to think much of it either. A short wave of her hand, however, flings the chains off of him, the lock falling back to the ground with a hard clank.
"Shall we get out of here?"
He lets her go first. He may have used valuable magic to free a deranged woman, but he's still not fool enough to allow her to walk behind him. Not hesitating, Zelena hurries up the stairs, all but prancing onto each step to avoid making a sound. Catching up to her at the top of the staircase, he waits for her to open the door.
A strange light shines through the windows at them. A barrier spell. Blinking, he snaps his head away from the light so as not to be blinded. There's something scorching about it, not warm like most of Swan's magic. In fact, he feels downright opposed to it.
"Good. She's busy. We'll have to sneak out the back." Zelena nods at the kitchen, still encased in shadows, a side door seemingly immune to the glow.
"I'm not coming with you."
"Are you joking? I actually keep my word and you decide to go down with the ship?" she scoffs. Well, it's not as if venturing into the night with her of all people isn't an enticing prospect, he considers snapping, but he can't give up on Emma.
"If I don't stop Emma, she'll just find somebody else to put her Darkness into, and if I leave now, I may never get the answers I need."
"And how are you going to get them?" she challenges, rolling her tongue every which way. "I don't think she's in a sharing mood."
How will he get them? He can't make her talk to him, even if she seemed dead-set on everything happening tonight. Did she kill Merlin? Has she already tried this somehow? Why bother bringing him to the house only to chain him up? What was the point of spiriting Rumpelstiltskin away?
Ah. For once, the Crocodile's made himself useful, him and his predilection for hoarding magical knickknacks.
"Emma stole squid ink from Gold's shop. If I can find it, then I can get her to tell me what I want." He's not sure how long it lasts—never came close to using it—but he can still reach her. If she wants the Darkness out of her as she says she does, he'll try True Love's Kiss again. Maybe the timing just hadn't been there before. Maybe the only reason she had wanted to hold onto the Darkness then was so she could rid herself of it now. From the incredulous expression on Zelena's face, they'll all need to have the Savior back sooner than later.
"Well then, you better hope she doesn't find you first. Ta-ta." With one last disapproving look, Zelena hustles out the side door in the kitchen. He can worry about her later. The house has so few furnishings, finding the ink shouldn't prove too difficult. Crossing into the sitting room, only two chairs, a table, and a desk provide the proper nooks and crannies necessary for hiding small items. Most of the house is just windows and crown molding, anyway. Starting at the desk, he flings open the drawers and shuffles through a few keys, papers, a stray pen here and there. A few pieces of paper look like receipts and records for the house. Well, no time to give him answers, but plenty of time to keep all the essential documentation in a secured place.
Snapping his head up, he finds himself face-to-face with a black-and-white picture of birch trees, right at eye level. It's not the picture itself so much as what it invokes in him when he stares into it, as if it's triggered some memory of...restriction. Helplessness. Rage. All he wants to do is tear it down and fling it into the opposite wall.
Perhaps it's a hiding place. Lifting it off, he holds his breath for a hidden cabinet or safe, but there is only more bare wall. Well, he won't smash it yet. There must be more places to search. He hasn't even seen the upstairs yet, although he'll be more trapped than ever the higher he goes. Setting the picture down, he considers creeping along the floor to peer underneath the chairs.
"Really?" Emma's stony face barely conceals the irritation in her tone. "I was trying to help you."
"Swan." Bloody hell. Nowhere to go. Nothing right on the tip of his tongue to say. She'll just knock him out again and put him somewhere even more inescapable. From the corner of his eye, he spies a bottle attached to the edge of the picture frame. Instinct takes over, no room for thought. As rapidly as he can, he snatches the bottle and pops the lid. Throwing the contents of the bottle onto her, Emma's body freezes in place, electric blue streaks covering her from head to toe. She loses her grip on Excalibur, sending it to the floor. When they fade away, only her facial muscles seem capable of moving, her eyes bulging in terror.
You're controlling her. You're no better than Rumpelstiltskin, pulling you by your heart's strings.
No, he's always better than Rumpelstiltskin.
"I'm sorry, love. You've left me no choice. Regina was right. You're a villain now, and now you're going to tell me exactly what happened in Camelot to make you that way."
"How are you going to make me do that?" she asks warily, trying so hard to mask her fear. Of him. Bloody hell, she's the Dark One. Why should she be afraid of him?
"I've got some ideas!" Zelena. No, no, she can't be here. He's already paralyzed Emma, leaving her vulnerable, open to any attack the Witch can imagine. And he's already gone and used up the magic in his hook. "I see you found the squid ink, Captain."
"Zelena, why the hell did you come back?" he asks, his voice raspy. Her hand is behind her back. Instead of an out-of-control tantrum, she's cool and collected. Completely, unequivocally mad and he's all but thrown Emma right into the woman's clutches.
"I thought about how you said you couldn't run until you got some answers, and I realized I couldn't run either...not without making the Dark One pay."
She's so close to Emma she's practically whispering the words into her ear. But he knows her game. She'll do something to him first before she pounces on Emma.
"Whatever you think you are doing..." Emma trails off, her face growing paler than it had been before. "No!"
In an instant, Zelena is right in front of him, thrusting a pair of scissors right into his chest. He feels the blade, his body jolting at the sensation of it hitting him. She pulls them out and...that's it. His chest stings, but he's not oozing blood. He's not being brought to his knees in pain. The hot rush of adrenaline is replaced by cold sweat.
"I bet you didn't see that coming, did you?" Zelena laughs. "Of course, that's nothing compared to the surprise that you're feeling right now. You're saying to yourself, 'I just got stabbed in the chest. Why shouldn't it hurt more? Why am I not dead?'"
His hand leaves the spot where a wound would be and veers over to his heart. That-that has to be what's happened—he doesn't have his heart in his body. Someone's storing it somewhere, possibly Emma herself. Doubling over, he hobbles a bit from side to side, trying to relive that muted, dimmed period of time, knowing he wasn't the one telling his limbs what to do, succumbing to every whim of the Dark One.
"What the hell is happening? Answer me, Witch!" Oh, she'd woken up before he had. She'd done something to him down in the basement, orchestrated the perfect plan to counter Emma's, and he'd played right into her hands like a fool.
"Well, you could take my word, or you could return the memories that the Dark One stole, see for yourself." She holds up a dreamcatcher, much like the one he'd found inside, only larger, with shells and more feathers attached to it. It must be his. It calls out to him almost as loudly as Excalibur had. "I found this outside."
For one pathetic moment, he glances over at Emma, almost imploring her to give him bloody permission to view his own memories. So she did steal them, and imprison him, and keep him in the dark all this time about something that clearly involved him.
"Don't trust her," Emma begs him. "I can explain everything."
Zelena crosses in front of her, obscuring his vision of her, holding out the dreamcatcher. So many times he'd given Emma the chance to explain everything, always assuring her he'd still be there, that he wouldn't abandon her. But she'd held onto her walls, kept her secrets... Now, she can't stop him, can't even move.
"Do it," he says after a breath.
Wincing before anything even begins, he doesn't expect to see happy memories. But then, with each golden flash in the dreamcatcher, memories flood his mind—a ball ending in blood where she'd been such a stunning vision in white he'd sworn she'd descended from heaven. Then he hears a horse galloping, the wind rushing past them, laughter and pounding heartbeats. As suddenly as those sensations overwhelm him, he's hit with the overpowering aroma of flowers in an open field with such touching it physically aches to not have remembered it sooner. Prison bars, tree bark against his back, her warm magic against his neck.
The minute you take away the Darkness, that future begins.
Their house.
Flames.
Unbelievable, insurmountable agony. Killian's not sure if his heart being gone would be a blessing as he watches himself strain for breath, Emma holding his hand and frantically pleading with him to hold on, sobbing over him as he dies. Every, every failure and heartbreaking moment being relived as the Darkness engulfed him, showing him how much he needed it...
But, but he didn't need it. He'd given up revenge, given up villainy. He's been working the whole time since they've returned from Camelot on helping, on rescuing Emma. Without sleep. Without food...
"I'm so sorry, Killian," Emma whispers. "But I did not have a choice."
"No, no, no. No, there has to be some other explanation." Sh-she wouldn't do that to him, not after begging her not to, to let him die rather than give in to the wretched Darkness. She did not have a choice? He's the one she wrought her damned magic over while he lay there dead.
"Aw, are you finding the truth hard to swallow?" Zelena simpers, stooping down to pick up Excalibur. "Here. Have a look at the sword."
Taking it from her, he holds it in his hand and instantly, his chest puffs out. Power. It's where it belongs. A brief, magnificent second of crying out to him, and then soothed by his very grip. Zelena brushes the blade with her hand, revealing his name scrolled into it, next to Emma's.
"A glamor spell," Zelena explains, chuckling, and he gasps that he already knows this. "It was there the whole time and you didn't even see it. Ooh, I suppose it's not 'the Dark One' anymore, is it? More like the Dark Ones."
Clever. Brilliant. He should have expected no less from the former Savior, though. She'd always had the upper hand when it came to the two of them.
"So that's why you saved my life twice tonight," he finally says. "I was never in any danger. You just wanted to keep me from the truth."
"I wanted to fix it first to make up for what I had done," she tries to clarify. So beautiful. She's not running away or rolling her eyes at him or leaving him behind on a bloody beanstalk, so he can really take the time to take all of her in now, albeit this twisted, dark version of her. When she wasn't knocking him out or leaving him behind, she was pushing him away, dismissing him. They'd all said it—Cora, Pan, Rumpelstiltskin...even her own father—he would never be worthy of her. She hadn't even allowed him to make the ultimate sacrifice for her, mocking it instead by rendering him just as twisted and dark as herself.
"By killing me?" Zelena sings. "How sweet."
"It was the only way to destroy the Darkness in both of us. Everything I've done since we got back to Storybrooke was to try to save you, Killian," she murmurs.
"This is saving? How could you do this to me?" All the passionate, usually intoxicating, kisses, the smiles, the talk of a future together—bones thrown to a rabid, famished dog, one that had apparently been lovesick enough to convince itself it had been worth it.
"I'm sorry."
"So much for our future, Swan."
He won't look at the swell of tears in her eyes, the magic of the squid ink keeping them from falling.
"Now, tell me," Zelena says, edging toward him with the dreamcatcher. "Are you ready to learn what else happened in Camelot?"
Oh, he's long overdue to learn what else happened in Camelot, and now he will, free of distraction.
"Aye. But first we have to take care of her."
A/N: Yes, I included a song from Galavant here. "Goodnight My Friend" is such a sweet little song that I wanted to fit it in somehow. Coming up? A very dramatic visit to the pawn shop.
