The men shout in panic, their cries barely reaching over the howling wind. Only Captain Silver looks calm, and that can't be good for anyone, Killian thinks, shaking off the raindrops clinging to his hair as if he were some drenched mutt. Squinting through the sheets of rain, he finally spots Liam, busy with a spyglass. Running over to him, Killian fights off a shiver at the icy rain slicing away at him.

"Liam! I'm sorry I dragged you into this voyage." If it weren't for him, Liam could be in barracks right now. Nothing luxurious, but dry and warm and with other young men eager to serve. Heroes.

"We have other demons to confront," Liam says, handing him the spyglass with a grave expression. "Look!"

A storm. Tempest doesn't even begin to describe it. A terrible, destructive beauty, that one, so wild it might as well have been summoned by the mermaids. They can't sail through this. The ship won't last. How did they even get to this section of the ocean anyway? According to the last charts he saw, they should have been able to see the mountain peaks of Ithaca by now.

"Captain Silver, are you aware this ship is pointed dead into a storm?" he hears Liam reasoning with Silver. Bloody hell, there's no good answer to that one. If he doesn't know just how treacherous the approaching waves are, they'll all die for his ignorance. If he does know...

"Back to the rigging, Jones. Leave the navigation to the officers."

Killian runs his tongue over his teeth. The number of times he's had to correct the officers could curl Silver's waxy hair.

"Well, your officers are doing a piss-poor job!" he shouts over the wind. "We're thirty degrees off-course, headed into a hurricane!" He will not die by water, he promises himself. Give him fire, give him curses, give him a worthy opponent running him through, but drowning is for land-lubbers, people who have never set foot on a deck and seen firsthand the life-giving power water holds. He's respected it all his life; he won't let it end him.

"We're aware. Carry on."

How can he keep so calm? How can he not give one whit about what's about to happen? He's seen it too many times—ropes snapping and sending the guns straight into a sailor struggling on the slippery deck, sails holding bobbing heads underwater, coils of chains holding feet like snares as everything in sight sinks lower and lower.

"Are you mad?" Liam screams at Silver. "What kind of captain sails into a hurricane?"

"The kind that earns his namesake! The king offered a mighty reward for what's inside that storm."

Raising an eyebrow, Killian braces himself against the shrouds to move closer to them. Off in the distance, flashes of lightning grow more and more incessant.

"This voyage was never about the grain in the hold, was it? You're going after that cursed sapphire. The Eye of the Storm!" Liam gasps. This grabs the crew's attention. Slowly craning their heads in Liam's direction, they pause in their work as best they can.

All this for an infernal jewel? Not something grand like love or revenge, but a pathetic rock?

"So you've heard of it," Silver notes with a nod.

"Every sailor's heard of it. Countless men have sailed into that storm looking for that bloody stone, but none have survived!" Killian argues. His purpose may still be hidden from him, but he's willing to wager his last rations it has breath and a beating heart. He'll not die for some wretched sapphire.

"If you don't like how I run my ship, you should have left when you had the chance," Silver sniffs at Liam. Tears prickle Killian's eyes. Liam's purpose has breath and a beating heart as well, and if he never lives to find it, the only one to blame will be his own brother. They'll die. The men realize it. Something, some supernatural instinct, allows him to feel the fear around him. It spreads and fills him like an ether, its own entity that tells him how the ship itself feels. Afraid. Angry. Desperate.

"Now move along before I string you up for mutiny," Silver warns them.

Liam holds up his hand, shifting his weight so he takes on a sideways stance. "Easy, Captain. I have always abhorred the idea of mutiny."

He turns and locks eyes with him, and Killian knows. A wordless "I'm going to do it" transpires, and Killian can only reply with a silent correction. We're going to do it. Sure enough, Liam lunges and draws Silver's own sword.

"But if that's what it takes to save these men, then so be it!"

He feels like a hound let off its leash at the sight of Silver's own sword pointed at him. With nothing but his bare hands, Killian charges forth.

"Now shall we do this the easy way or the bloody way?" No one has even come to the Captain's defense. Well, one man up on the quarter deck lifts a shaking sword about half an inch. Silver smartly nods for him to stand down.

"The ship is ours, men!" The men cheer, scampering back to their places to steer the ship as far from certain death as possible. Grinning, Killian watches Liam come back to him. They're saved. They'll survive. The Jones Brothers—true survivors.

"Tie these bastards up," Liam orders him. "I'll go find the Captain's charts and plot a course out of this bloody typhoon."

"Thank you, Liam. There's no one I'd rather follow into a storm."


They enter the mansion one at a time, expecting wraiths or apparitions to pop out of every corner. Not that it was ever that friendly a place in Storybrooke, but at least it was neat and tidy, well-lit in most areas. He recalls searching it with Belle, scouring its blank books with his family, and other, far worse memories that happened here. Bending down to avoid one of the endless cobwebs, he scans the covered furniture and dusty knickknacks.

"Wonderful," he mutters. "I love what they've done with the place."

"We should split up. Move fast," Liam commands, starting for one of the rooms.

"Uh, yeah, I guess," Emma mumbles, scrunching her mouth as she formulates her own strategy, lingering when Henry starts to pass her. She jerks and latches onto his shoulder. "Henry, you, uh, got to stay here."

"But this was my idea!" Henry argues. "I'm not going to stay behind and do nothing!"

"You're not doing nothing. You're the lookout," she half-sings, masking a harsher, more scolding tone. Not that he blames her for wanting to keep the lad as far from this little cave of wonders as possible, but after Henry's blatant lies this afternoon, Killian's certain she's expecting more of whatever unnerved her before.

"Lookout?" Henry scoffs.

"Don't argue with your mother," Regina warns.

"But-"

"Or your mother."

He waits for Emma, and then the two of them disappear into the bowels of the house, taking a narrow staircase down to what he hopes is a mostly-empty cellar. She remains as somber as ever. Well, if it were any other type of investigation, he knows how it would go—bouncing ideas off one another, squeezing some banter in here and there, trying to keep her in his line of sight at all times. That last one, he's doing, watching her open a hutch in the corner, brushing all the cobwebs aside. But they're not talking.

Of course not. He shouldn't be talking; he should be searching, helping her get one step closer to leaving this miserable place. Marching past her, he twists his torso so he can wedge himself into the narrow corridor that leads to the secret passage.

"What is it?" she calls after him, her footsteps echoing behind him. He opens the wall the same way he opened it time and time again when he and Belle searched the place. This time, however, he wishes he was armed with a sword and the element of surprise.

Papers. The room is in complete disarray, blank page after blank page scattered along the floor. He can only make out a patch of floor here and there. Tiptoeing in, Swan holds the back of his belt to steady herself after sliding on one of the pages. He exhales when she lets go, inching her way toward a desk.

"What the hell happened?" she breathes.

"I knew it was too obvious a spot," he sighs, avoiding her eyes when he realizes he didn't answer her question. Scrunching her mouth, she scans the room and shakes her head.

"The books didn't have anything on them in our world," she begins, pausing to take a breath. "So...since the stories can't really die, it's more like they just weren't allowed to ever be." Stooping down, she picks up a page and inserts it into the binding of what should have been a book. "Yeah. Not even a way to put it all together into a manuscript. It's like...book birth control."

"Stirring image, that."

"Fine. How about 'untold stories,' just to make it more elegant?"

"Unfortunately, elegance isn't what we need right now," he says, clamping his mouth shut at the amount of bite he just shot at her. Taken aback, she flinches, fluttering her eyelashes at him like she did in Neverland, like she could blink away every sentence that frightened her. "It's my fault. I led you in here looking like I knew what I was doing."

"Killian," she sighs, her bottom lip dropping.

"I found it!" they both hear before she can speak, Liam's excited, hoarse words booming throughout the house. They don't speak on the way out of the passage, nor do they bother to close it. Hurrying through every ray of pale red light illuminating all the dust particles, they find Liam in a large study, standing behind a tall desk that could just as easily serve as a podium, as if he's presenting the book to them. Sure enough, it matches the storybook on the outside. Regina hustles in from an adjoining room.

"Did you already touch it?" she demands.

"No, no, I only opened the cover," Liam sputters as Regina nears him.

"Yeah, okay, that would qualify as touching," she says, rolling her eyes at him as she bats him away from the book. "Although I don't sense any magic attached to this. You got lucky."

"Just find Hades' story," Killian orders. His eyes follow the pages as Regina flips through them, catching sight of the familiar illustration every once in a while. Maybe it's identical to the one Henry has so cherished...but then, was there a story of Hades in the other book? Running his fingers through his hair—never hard enough to jolt him into the present the way Swan can—he closes his eyes and tries to visualize the stories in the book. They'd never actively been looking for it until now, but surely a way to defeat the god of death would have at least been regarded as an interesting footnote.

"Go back," Swan directs Regina. "Maybe you missed it."

Flipping backwards through the book, Regina takes her time, pinching the corners of each page to ensure they aren't sticking together. The closer she arrives to the start of the book, the more Killian feels himself deflate.

"There's no mention of Hades' story anywhere," he concludes.

"Why am I not surprised?" Regina groans, shifting so Swan's arm can pause the page-turning.

"Yeah, and look. There are some pages that are missing." Her fingers graze three or four long tattered nubs that once held a story to the book. It's not the same as in the secret passage. The scent of paper still hovers in the air, as if the rips were fresh. While Swan takes a step back and folds her arms in thought, an image of Hades' smug face laughing at their failure overtakes his mind.

"Back during the first curse, I tore my story out of Henry's book so he wouldn't know I was the Evil Queen," Regina remarks. Yet again, the king of the dead has remained a step ahead of them, tearing out his story before they could find it and leaving the book hidden in plain sight just to give them false hope. Gods know the damned skainsmate hadn't the first clue how real hope worked.

"Well, if Hades has done the same, we don't stand much chance of finding it."

"What do you think, Liam?" Swan asks, and rather pointedly, he notes, raising an eyebrow at her. "You found the book. Was there any evidence it had been tampered with?"

"No. And until I find any, I'll choose to have hope." Reddening, Liam stares back at Emma with a hard stare, as if he's returning shots fired across his bow. "Those pages could have fallen out and still be in this house, and I, for one, won't give up without trying to find them." Marching out of the room, Liam doesn't look back, nor can Killian keep an eye on him, Regina's whispered "I see what you mean about self-righteous" igniting his blood. Emma and Regina gossiping about his brother? Self-righteous? Bloody hell, some people can afford to be self-righteous! What would the Evil Queen know about that, shamefully tearing out pages of a book so her son wouldn't see something she didn't want him to see? She and Emma reconciling their differences and growing closer had never bothered him in the past. A bit vitriolic, but a solid friendship, nevertheless. He had never worried about Emma if she was alone with Regina, but perhaps that's not the real issue anymore, is it? If Emma's doling out criticisms, maybe she should be confiding in him—the whole reason she is here—rather than Regina. It's his brother whose reputation is in question, after all.

As soon as Regina leaves, he turns his head to motion for her to stay put for a moment, but she's already doing so...examining the book with that tight, dead look she'd worn before.

"What's wrong? Aren't you coming?" he tries.

"Uh. Yeah, sorry. Let's go."

"No. Wait. Not until you tell me what's going on. I know when something's bothering you." Waiting, he watches her tense, recoiling. Expecting the standard rebuilding of her walls, he forces himself to smile. It's just me, he tries to convey silently. They might have been put through the ringer and are now down in the depths of the Underworld, but she can still talk to him when something's wrong. And something most certainly is, for she isn't returning the smile.

"It's Liam. I've had a bad feeling ever since we met, and at first I thought it was just because he didn't like me."

Bloody hell. Why would she be trying to descredit Captain Liam Jones?

"I think he's hiding something." No. No, don't look like it pains you to say it. Don't look like you bloody pity me.

"That's preposterous. My brother wouldn't lie."

"Maybe there's stuff about him you don't know. Maybe he does know what his unfinished business is," she tries, and he has to fight the tugging sensation in his heart telling him to believe in her, to support this hunch of hers and look into it. Not this time. This is his brother.

"No, you're wrong about him," he snaps. She can't possibly understand. Liam inspired people to follow him and performed his own brand of magic in outrunning storms and overtaking smugglers centuries before she was ever born...all with Killian at his side. She's wrong about him. She's wrong about both Brothers Jones. "I know who my brother is. I'm going to go help him find those pages."


Well, he might have stormed away from Emma in a manner that suggested he knew what he was doing, but...he doesn't have the first clue as to where to find those pages. Honestly, logic would suggest Hades is far too cautious a deity to bother removing the pages only to drop them on his way out. But he won't let his faith in Liam be shaken now, not after being without him for so long. No, Liam's not a hundred percent sure they'll find the pages, but why shouldn't they comb every inch of the place? Why should they hurry back to the apartment, sad and dreary now with everything shrouded? He'd rather stay productive, thank you, and so his feet know to carry him through the kitchen to the back of the house.

If Hades left through the back door, he could have dropped the pages somewhere on the property versus in the mansion. Scrutinizing the dark, tall grass—every blade bathed in the ominous light of a blood-red moon—he searches for any sign of white parchment.

The backyard leads out into forest, quite the unlikely route for Hades to take if he were in a hurry to steal the pages and return to his lair with the rest of them none the wiser. Sighing, he lets his arms sag for a brief moment, his breaths a series of ragged puffs. Catch your breath, mate, he orders himself, lest Emma see that apparently merely disagreeing with her now takes a physical toll on him. Well, it's more than disagreeing, isn't it? His hand and hook wander over to the loops of his belt as he blows a strand of hair out of his face, gazing up at the moon. He'd have never wagered that his brother and the woman he loves wouldn't get along, not in a million years. Too much alike? Killian scoffs. Other than being the last two people in the world who deserve to be trapped down here, he can't really compare Liam's steadfast leadership with Emma's...he stops in his tracks in order to pin it down...aggressive sense of democracy? His mouth tilts up into a smile.

Perhaps it's a conflict of personalities, he thinks, trudging back up the slight bluff to the house. He spies Emma and Liam at the well, so absorbed in their discussion neither seems to hear his approach. Unable to decipher any words, he quickens his pace.

"Liam, Emma, what's going on?" he asks. It's a little more intense than a mutual decision to end the search.

"She thinks I lied to you," Liam says without hesitation.

"He took the pages. I can prove it." Bloody hell, not one to be outdone, Emma? "Ask him to show you his hands. He's been hiding them since I got here."

Unbelievable. As if Liam's just got the pages wadded up in his pockets. Anything to villainize him.

"Look," Liam says after a pause, tensing his arms. "If it would help to clear things up, I'd be happy to."

"That won't be necessary. I don't need proof to know what's really going on here." Reading her face, Killian nearly balks at the complete lack of guilt on it, so blinded by her own agenda she can't fathom a contrary thought. He won't humor her. He humored the Dark Swan far more than his own heart could bear; he can't with her, no matter how wounded she may look when she cocks her head that way...

"Emma, when are you going to admit that this isn't really about my brother?"

"What else would you think it was about?" she asks in a broken tone.

"Us. You think if you can prove that Liam is a villain, then I'll somehow feel like I was less of one, that you can convince me I'm worth saving, and that we've got a future together." His resolve almost crumbles at how she recoils at the words, her upper lip turning up in disgust at the very thought. She knows of his villainy better than anyone, the cumulative hours of confessing things to her he hadn't even been sure his own voice could utter, moments of his forehead resting on hers as he fought tears from falling down his face. Had he really called her an orphan when the Darkness had taken hold of him? Had he really convinced himself revenge mattered more than the lives of her parents? Her child?

"You agree with him?"

"Why bring me back if I should just move on?" he argues. "After we defeat Hades, I won't be returning with you. My fate isn't in Storybrooke. It should be determined here."

"It doesn't have to be," Emma counters, tears beginning to fall. He's spurred enough tears from her. She needs someone more resilient, more cut out for endlessly stepping up to be the hero...someone other than a one-handed pirate pretending to be reformed.

"You can come home," she pushes, emphasizing the last word with sacredness. "You just have to forgive yourself. Thing is—no matter how many times I tell you, or anybody else does, you have to do it yourself."

With one final glimpse of her eyes shimmering with tears, he watches her turn and march toward the forest. He can't let her go in there alone. He can't let her go angry, not understanding...

Maybe he can't let her go at all.

"Emma!"

"Let her go, Killian," Liam commands, stopping him. "It's for the best."

Glancing down at the ground, Killian wrinkles his nose at the half-fist Liam's making, the angle so unnatural.

"Your hand. You are hiding something."

"It's nothing," Liam protests, but not fighting when Killian grabs onto him. Ink. Smudged.

"It's ink from the pages. Emma was right." Locking eyes for a split second, Liam breaks the contact, ducking his head down as if he'd been cut. "Why would you lie to me?"

"Because," a voice barks from behind him, a voice that still elicits an involuntary shudder. His spine remembers its owner before he does, seizing like it always did in preparation for the sting of the cat o'nine. Dreading what he'll see, he begins only by looking over his shoulder, the rest of his body following. Captain Silver. It shouldn't come as a surprise he knows more people here in the Underworld—he's outlived virtually everyone. But it's Captain Silver, their final master, the cruelest of the despicable lot.

"He's got much bigger secrets than what's in some book," Captain Silver continues in his low, accented voice that never allowed anyone to predict his mood. "Like the truth about what he did to us."

Liam has lied to him. Tried to discredit Emma. He...he should at least throw a punch in her honor...or grip his coat by the lapels and bend his body over the well until he hears a confession...or turn away from the fight brewing between them all.

"What truth is he talking about, Liam? What does it have to do with those missing pages?" Killian asks softly, gritting his teeth so as not to scream for Liam to bring his head back up and bloody face him.

"Your brother is not the hero he pretends to be," Silver says with neither personal satisfaction nor sympathy. Silver, who shouldn't even be allowed to speak to Liam after the way he treated the two of them. "I found that out when I stopped by his tavern for my usual drink. He had a rather...unexpected gust. Hades. He traded our souls for the Eye of the Storm! Hades threatened to reveal the truth unless your brother destroyed the pages from that book."

No. No. That can't be true. The Eye of the Storm is what led to him having the Jolly Roger, led him out of servitude. And Liam Jones would never...

"Liam..." Liam's shaking his head at the ground, his eyes unfocused and far away. "Please tell me there's another explanation for this."

"I'm sorry, Killian!" Liam cries. "But I didn't have any other choice! I had to do what I could in order to save us."

"You lied to me?" he snarls. Meddled with the very souls of others and didn't even have the decency to be truthful about it with the one he did it for? An image flashes through his mind of Emma rejecting her parents, but it's interrupted by Silver's voice and the surrounding men lunging out and placing a sack over his head.


He's afraid of the dark. He craves light so badly he'll come up with any excuse to keep the lantern lit after it's time for bed. Not too many eleven-year-olds would teach themselves to read Elvish to stave off the darkness. If he's in the dark, he's alone. So Killian reads one tome after another, long after Liam's turned his back and gone to sleep. He reads until he nods off, and by then, his dreams distract him from the dark.

Not tonight. The waves crash against each other, the ocean churning. The flame in the lantern flickers, sending out a message of false hope, before it goes completely out.

"Father! Father!" he whimpers. The storm clouds must be a little bit parted, he thinks, watching his father stroll into the cabin, calm and collected and hopefully with a match.

"It's all right son. I'm here."

Killian knows his father is in the cabin and that Liam sleeps in the bunk next to his, but until the light shines on everything—with just the faintest trace of cinnamon accompanying it—he feels alone.

"See? Nothing to be afraid of," Father says, ambling over to the edge of his bunk, sitting awkwardly on it. But Killian finds no humor in his father falling off. If he stumbles into the bulkhead, the movement might put out the flame.

"Now remember, whenever you feel scared, all you have to do is look inside," his father instructs, tapping at Killian's heart with a proud, soft smile. Swallowing, Killian wonders if he'll be shamed for crying out; a few sailors in various ships have pulled Father aside when they think Killian's busy and chide him for "coddling" his youngest boy. But so far Killian only feels a surge of warmth in the spot where Father touched him.

"We're all braver than we think if we just look deep enough. Before you know it, you're going to be a man, so I'm just trying to prepare you. Because then, you're going to have to answer life's big question—what kind of man do you want to be?"

He should have an answer, he thinks, licking his lips. He wants to be brave, able to withstand the dark, but also smart, clever, able, and not alone, and maybe someone who could comfort his own child someday.

"I want to be just like you!" he whispers, grinning up at his father's twinkling eyes.

"Well, that's a nice answer son," Father finally says. "Now, close your eyes and find that brave part deep inside yourself, hmm? And you don't have to worry about a thing. Your father will watch the light for you. Just go to sleep, Killian."


` "I prefer it with the lights on," Killian growls at his captors. Blast it. He doesn't need the gift of sight to know where they are, the smell of sulfur everywhere, the heat seeming to rise and swirl around their legs. An inferno, the boiling sea he's read about in many a morality tale.

"You can remove them now," Silver orders his crew. Sure enough, he and Liam stand at the precipice, molten lava beneath them.

"It's time to walk the plank." There's the slightest smirk on Silver's face.

"I'll gladly walk it. Just spare Killian. He has nothing to do with this!" Liam pleads.

"He should've gone down alone with the ship, like the rest of us, and now he finally will."

And for once, Killian bristles at the dismissal. A violent, weak-willed deckhand he might have been, but he didn't deserve death then. He had escaped it because...because someone loved him. He'd told Emma her parents had just wanted her to be proud of them, and he'd have never met her if he'd gone down with the ship. He'd have never helped save Henry. He'd have never had a hand in the defeat of the Wicked Witch, the Snow Queen...and the Darkness. Maybe, maybe a little bit of what Emma says she sees in him is actually there.

He watches his brother turn to face him, and maybe while he'd been busy damning himself he'd been lauding Liam a little too much, making him a father and a god rather than an actual brother. Hell, his own conscience sounded too much like Liam to be healthy.

"I'm sorry, Killian. I wanted to be this perfect example for you...to inspire you."

"All you did was raise the bar so high, the only thing I could do was fail," he murmurs. It can't be the last words they ever say to each other, but it's not looking like they'll have much of a choice. He'll have to be quick if he wants his hook to catch the jagged rocks, anchor him so he can grab Liam and they can climb their way back up. They can do this. They can escape this. He'll not cross over allowing Emma to believe he preferred moving on to being with her.

"No more talking! Time to face judgment, boys," Silver says, his crew laughing behind him. A blue flame spins between them, wedging itself so it stands at the center of attention...as if Hades' fiery hair wasn't enough to draw one's eyes, Killian thinks, rolling his eyes as the others stand shocked at the god's presence.

"Lord-lord Hades," Silver stutters, quaking. Pursing his lips, Hades blows as softly as if he were blowing out a candle.

To a mortal, however, it must feel like a great gust, for it sends Silver spiraling over the edge into the boiling sea. The crew stand silent, trembling.

"And now for the Brothers Jones!" Hades squeals, clapping his hands together. Rolling his tongue around inside his mouth, he looks Killian and Liam over. "One of them kept up his end of the bargain and gets to live, while the other escaped my dungeon, and for that, he has to pay. At last, we'll see the end of Captain Hook, and this time, you won't be able to protect him."

Liam leaps out directly in front of Killian.

"No! I won't let you hurt Killian, no matter what kind of deal we made!" It straightens Killian's back, puffs his chest out a little more. His brother, Liam Jones, a hero. Just now...a human hero. That's better anyway.

"Fine. Have it your way." Sneering at them, Hades blows again. It knocks Liam head over heels towards the abyss.

"No!" He can't lose him again! Reaching out, he grabs onto Liam's sleeve as they slide to the edge of the cliff. He can maneuver his fingers so he clasps his arm, but not by much. Halfway over himself, Killian can barely make out Liam's face with the searing red flames as a backdrop.

"Liam, please hang on," he begs, searching for a dip in the cliff, a foot hole, anything.

"I'm sorry, brother. Can you forgive me for what I've done?" Liam calls up to him, straining.

"Yes, but that's not what's important! You need to find a way to forgive yourself!" Then Liam will fight; then they can move on from here, get back to his family. No, their family.

"I can't, not after what I did to you. The only way to make amends is for me to pay the price."

"No!" he screams before Liam loosens his grip, falling into the flames. Liam! His brother, who was supposed to go back with him, spend a little more time with him until-until he and Emma find a way to go home together. But...

Hades. He'll kill him. Killian Jones has done the unimaginable before. Finding a way to kill a god isn't out of his scope of surprises. Still on the ground, he tries to scramble to his feet, a white light stops him, and for a moment, he wonders if it's Emma's magic, that she saw what happened at the well and followed them there.

Alas, she's not so theatrical as to wait until the last minute. The familiar scents that accompany her magic aren't there, instead...sea salt and the scent of the air after a fresh rain. Looking back, he sees the boiling sea is a calm, shimmering ocean with a fine ship in the distance.

"What's happening?" he mutters to anyone who can answer. Hades looks on the scene in terror.

"You will pay for this!" he yells with a shudder, vanishing.

Killian turns around, still on the ground, and takes in the sight of Liam standing in a rowboat, the water absolutely glittering beneath it.

"Liam. You're safe," he breathes, standing up.

"Yes. It appears I am." Killian laughs at the stunned, deadpan reaction as the rowboat moves him closer to the cliff—now just coastline—of its own accord. Swaying to steady himself, his hands out, Liam smiles at him. "I suppose this is the sacrifice I should have made long ago. And now I can finally depart."

Depart. Cross over. If anyone deserves to go on to paradise, it should be Liam. Flawed, a touch too proud and—he licks his lips—self-righteous, but a hero, his brother. No one should be trapped here for longer than they need to be. Killian refuses to be someone's unfinished business.

"Then go," he says with a nod, fighting back tears. "All of you. Now that you know the truth, your unfinished business is complete as well. Get on board, men."

Liam extends his arm, and the crew piles in. The boat doesn't even rock.

"What about you, brother?" Liam asks him softly. Part of him sees himself stretching out a leg and climbing into the boat, sailing toward peace...but even if all of him wanted to, something about the boat repels him.

"My unfinished business isn't done yet," he explains. "Not until Emma and I have defeated Hades." And then? And then he wants it all—the house, the attempt at the "white-picket-fence life" that will always be interrupted with some disaster, and Emma...throwing his arms around her and lifting her off the ground, promising her a future with every kiss, every look. Home.

"Tell her I'm sorry, and I was wrong," Liam adds. "She does want what's best for you. And don't worry about reaching that bar anymore, Killian!" He wags his finger at him with a raised eyebrow, prompting a smile out of Killian. "You've become a true hero in a way I never could. Goodbye."

This is it. Holding his hand one last time before they're together again. They clasp arms, as they have since they were children, even after a skirmish.

"Goodbye, brother."

He watches him leave with a trembling lip. The bright whiteness of the horizon sends a cool sea breeze back at him as his brother fades from view. At that moment, Killian staggers back into the little tunnel the cavern has created, the flames and smothering heat returning. With his back against the dark stone, he sinks to a sitting position and cries, weeps, like a lost boy fearing the dark. He's lost his brother again, not forever, but for a long time. He's bloody died, has had an entire family come after him, had probably seemed so ungrateful...at what point does one just rock back and forth for a while, mumbling "it's too much" in a monotone, barely audible voice?

At least it was all a magnificent vulgar gesture to Hades, he chuckles, wiping his eyes. Running his fingers through his hair, he inhales and laughs, savoring how the muscles in his cheeks move. He won't waste another minute. He'll find Emma—he will always find Emma—and give the two of them a future.


She's pacing, the tips of her hair wet with perspiration. She's been searching, and not for the pages. She's known where they were before he did.

"Emma."

"Hook, where the hell have you been?" He fights a grin, suppressing it only at the sight of the distress on her face. She'd been expecting him. She knew he wouldn't go through with it. "First you and Liam left, then Henry ran off somewhere..."

"I'm sorry, Emma." Tears prickle his eyes again, for he truly is sorry. He should have believed in her, should have had faith she was only thinking of him. "You were right about Liam. He destroyed those pages because of a deal he made with Hades years ago...a deal that almost got us thrown into...the boiling sea."

"Are you okay? Where is he?" The frustration is instantly replaced with concern, the color in her face disappearing.

"He, uh, sacrificed himself." He shuffles a little, knowing he doesn't need to add "for me" to it. "But his sacrifice helped a crew we once sailed with. They finally moved on, thanks to him."

"Did he move on, too?"

"He did...but he helped me see the truth before he went—I'm glad you came down here, Emma." She lights up, her jaw going slack, eyes bright...to think he'd have never seen all of that again. "Perhaps I do deserve saving after all."

She edges closer to him, never taking her eyes off of him. "Does that mean, when this is all over, you're planning to come home?"

Home.

"Yes." Breaking into a grin, he feels himself getting lost in her eyes. She loves him. This brilliant, amazing woman came down here because she loves him. "Everything Liam did was to ensure that I had a future, and I damn well intend to have one."

He can't take it anymore. How long has she been here and he hasn't kissed her properly? Their lips smash against each other, her fingers sift through the hair on the back of his head, and all is right with the world. Taking a breath together, the tip of his nose brushes hers, foreheads touching. He can hear the beats of her eyelashes, in time with his pounding heart.

Her hand curls back and cups his face, her sigh almost a purr. Feeling a small snort of breath, he reels his head back and raises his eyebrow at her.

"I was just...I want you to do something," she says.

"Name it, Swan," he grunts, fighting to not simply close his eyes and bask in her love. She's hesitating. That's either a bad sign...or a great sign.

"I want you to name three things you love about yourself," she states. "What? I-I've, well, I've read stuff about low self-worth for, you know, reasons, and just because you've forgiven yourself once doesn't mean it's going to be a habit, so...start."

"So uncompromising," he mock-pouts, tightening his hold around her, shuffling until she's up against the wall. "Very well. I would think bravery would be an obvious answer."

Nodding at him with her lips tucked into her mouth in anticipation fuels his fire. His hand burrows under her layers and wanders up her bare back, fingers tracing the minimalist cotton undergarment.

"Extraordinarily patient," he growls into her ear before planting a lingering kiss on the spot on her jaw that always elicits a moan. Swan doesn't disappoint, practically melting in his arms, weaving her leg around his.

"I have exceptional taste in women."

"Shut up and unzip," she giggles, placing her hand on his chest to keep him from advancing. Not that she needed to, the command not quite registering with him.

"Wait, what?"

Coy Swan, ever his undoing. Smirking at him, she kneels into a squatting position, eyes widening...waiting for him to comprehend. She's at his waist. Swaying, he blinks a few times at the sight and swallows, knowing no matter how long he prepares, his voice will be hoarse.

There's something more somber in her eyes, and if her fingers weren't dancing up his thighs and settling on his ass, he might be more likely to pinpoint her meaning. "You've died three times now, which is three times too many. I just want to...I...this is what I hope you know you deserve."

He relaxes the second she begins. The other part throbs in her mouth, feeling her tongue swirl all around it. He focuses his eyes on how her head bobs, otherwise he's sure he'll go cross-eyed. So damn warm, the way she sucks, licks, fondles...she's looking up at him. Gods, she's looking up at him with naughty eyes feigning innocent while his are drooping, fluttering...she's so beautiful. Relaxing into her, he lets his hips thrust, and then they take on a life of their own. Somehow she alternates between feather-light flicks and taking him in as deeply as she can. He's close, the hisses and shallow breaths now hushed moans, everything in him growing more and more erratic. As soon as she moans with him still in her mouth, Killian shatters.

Stars dance in front of him, so his hooked arm braces the wall. Shuddering as she squeezes his balls and plants wet, loving kisses on the inside of his thigh, he comes back to life panting, smiling down at her.

Is she ever in for a wild time once he gets the chance.

Duck-walking backward, still in a squatting position, Emma smiles up at him as he fixes his trousers, not as easy as it sounds when one can't take one's eyes off of her.

"Is that 'bloody hell' worthy?" she murmurs, standing up and letting her head fall on his chest. The motion seems to allow him to catch his breath, so he wraps his arms around her again and finger-combs her hair, kissing every inch of her hairline.

"Oh, you have got to be kidding."

They don't even react. Keeping Emma close, his cheek resting on the top of her head, he considers waving at Regina. If she had strolled in only a few minutes prior...well, he'll keep that to himself.

"You two act more like her parents every day," Regina complains with narrowed eyes, clearly suspicious, but still ignorant of what just transpired. "We should get out of here and back to the apartment in case Henry headed back there. Try not to trip over each other on the way out."

Sharing a look with his Swan, he motions for her to lead the way, only for her to link her arm around his and nod for them to leave the mansion together.


A/N: Considering I'm not a man, I think I wrote that okay. Let me know if you agree! Special thanks goes to OnceSnow who had tons of helpful criticisms for this chapter. She always does, but this was a long one. Coming up? The Underworld gets a little bit hammier with the arrival of Zelena.