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Chapter Five

Actions Are Louder

Mr. Gold waited for me at my car. I froze on my porch, staring at him. "What can I do for you, Mr. Gold?" I asked when I finally recovered my senses. I walked towards my car confidently, not to betray the deep fear I felt. I shifted my purse on my shoulder and found my car key.

"It, uh, it took me a while to figure out who you were." He commented, leaning heavily on his cane, pressing into the grass a small circle. "But now I remember you."

"Is that so?" I asked, unlocking my door. "And what of it?" I put my purse on the passenger's seat and looked back at him. "We're not in our land now. I'm just Penelope Pierce."

He shook his head. "It matters because I wanted to know why you'd help Hook."

"He has a name. It's Killian. I have to get to work, could you make this quick?"

Gold held out a piece of paper and I took it. It was blank, just like the one I'd found in my mailbox – the paper changed and it was no longer blank. There was an image there, one of my family. "I put this in your mailbox to find out. This is what I saw when I retrieved it."

Retrieved it? Hadn't I thrown it away? What had I – had he been in my house? I couldn't remember what I'd done with the paper. How had he gotten it?

"You're doing this to get back at me. For a deal your father made."

"Not Caroline! Please! She needs me!"

"Mama –"

"Hush! Please, sir, you must – take me too. She needs me."

"Mama!"

"No," I replied, my voice wavering. "I'm doing this because I'm a healer. Because taking care of people is what I do. It's my job. He came to me injured, he's still injured. I really need to get to work."

"You're lying," Gold grabbed my wrist and squeezed. "Why are you helping him?" I could see behind the human appearance, see the monster he'd been in our old world – the monster behind –

"A deal's a deal, dearie. The child's mine."

"I know that, but please…let her at least be weaned. What will you do with a baby?"

"I'll go with you. Just let me take care of her."

"Let go of me!" I shrieked. "Let go!"

"This is your revenge! Your revenge against what happened to your sister!"

"Her name was Caroline!" I screamed. "What did you do to her? Where is she?"

"Dead." He let go of my arm and stepped back. "But don't worry. It was painless."

My little sister. Dead.

She was gone.

All the time I'd spent since the curse broke, looking for her, trying to imagine what she would look like now…wasted. My hope withered and dried away because Gold wouldn't lie about this. I remembered my brother crying and then finally committing suicide because of the guilt. I remembered my parents screaming at each other, the blame, the nightmares –

"How?" And how he heard me, I had no idea, for I could barely hear my own voice.

"Needed her for a spell. Well, just a part of her. Her heart."

"Did…did it work?" I swallowed.

"No. And for that, I am sorry."

I closed my eyes and felt the tears start to fall. Then I remembered Killian crying against my shoulder, his anger but unwillingness to let the enemy see him falter. He had channeled all his rage, misery, and loneliness into revenge. That was not who I was, that was not something I could do. But I could feel the grief melting away to anger.

"YOU BASTARD!" I screamed and then slapped him across the face as hard as I could. He fell back against the car, surprised. His cane toppled over as he fell back, too surprised to hold onto it. It was only when he began to right himself that I realized what I'd done. I'd hit the Dark One. I grabbed my purse, slammed my car door shut, and ran towards the house. "Stay away from me!" I screamed. "I'm calling the Sheriff!" I got inside and locked my door. I shoved the nearest chair against it and went about locking all the windows and doors to the outside. I even shut the curtains.

I found Wendy asleep in her favorite spot of the house: my bathroom rug. She opened her eyes and I picked her up to make sure that if Gold came back, he wouldn't be able to harm my cat. He'd already taken my family from me, he wasn't going to take my cat! I locked us in the bathroom and called down to the Sheriff's office.

"Sheriff's station," Emma answered.

I started crying.

"Who is this?" Emma asked. "What's wrong?"

"Mr. Gold…" I sobbed and Wendy mewed. "He…I'm so scared. I hit him."

"Who is this?" Emma repeated.

"Penelope Pierce."

"Penelope…where are you?"

"In my bathroom…I don't know…I don't – what if he comes after me?"

"I'm on my way. Don't worry." The call ended and I rocked back and forth on the floor, holding Wendy. She was slightly annoyed, I could tell because she kept wriggling to get out of my grasp but I just could not let her get away. Soon I heard the sound of sirens and then someone breaking into my house. "Penelope? Penelope!" Emma called out to me, but I couldn't answer her.

Eventually she found me in the bathroom and sat down next to me. "Penelope…he's gone. You're all right, you're safe."

I shook.

"Penny-love," Killian stood up and I realized that Emma had taken me to the station. Presumably I was under arrest for assault. I had no recollection of what had happened. But if I was incarcerated, why did I have Wendy in her carrier? "Swan, what happened?" Killian demanded. "What did you do to –" he stopped speaking when Emma opened the door to his cell and gestured for me to go in. He reached out a hand and steadied me. "Lass, you look positively ill." He wrapped his handless arm around me and pressed his hand against my forehead. "I thought, Swan, you took sick and injured people to the hospital. This isn't a hospital."

"Shut up, Hook, this is where she asked to be. She's not sick, she's just scared."

"No," I said. "Actually, I think I will be sick." My stomach churned and before Emma could say anything, Killian helped me over to the nearest wastebasket and I threw up all of what I had eaten for breakfast.

"I see," Killian said. "You're right, Swan, she's just sea sick. Tell me, love, what rocked your boat too hard?"

"I hit Mr. Gold," I told him and threw up again. Emma handed me a disposable cup of water and I rinsed my mouth.

"Well! Good for you, lass!" Killian couldn't even hide his joy at my crime. "What for?"

I threw up again, just bile this time. How much could I actually throw up? I was so used to helping others as they spewed rejected fluid, not being the one actually puking. "She's dead," I told him and began to cry. "He used her in a spell."

Killian sucked in a breath. "That devil," he cursed. We sat out by the wastebasket for a while until it was determined that I was done throwing up. Then I had to tell my story to Emma and Killian listened in. His hand never left me, somehow he was always touching me. Either my back, my hand, or my shoulder…his support meant a great deal to me. I began to feel safe.

We moved back to his cell while Emma called Gold down to the station. This way, Emma reasoned, if Gold wanted to press charges, he would do it legally. "Too bad you gave back the badge, love," Killian commented.

"Actually," Emma crossed her arms. "Technically she was never a deputy."

"What?" I asked. My stomach churned. Great, now I was in more trouble. Aside from angering the most dangerous man in all of Storybrooke, I had broken the law a couple times! "But you –"

"You didn't take an oath or any training or anything really, but…we're not exactly by the book here. Don't worry, though, this problem will never involve anyone other than…well, us." Emma was right, I had just taken the badge and not filled out a single form, much less agreed to uphold the laws of Storybrooke, Maine.

Mr. Gold arrived fairly soon and I tensed, Wendy hissed in her carrier. I squeezed Killian's hand and he squeezed mine back, giving me a confident smile. "Well, crocodile," Killian addressed his foe. "You're so big of a coward you had to share your fear with the ladies? And they call me a villain."

Mr. Gold turned to Emma, purposefully ignoring Killian. "I won't be pressing charges against Ms. Pierce. We all make mistakes –"

"That's what you call it?" Killian laughed. "I'd call it being a hero – go on then, tell Emma what you did to Penny's family. What you did to her sister." Gold said nothing. "You demon, you're less than a crocodile. You're a barnacle, attaching yourself to whatever and wrecking it. I did Belle a favor –"

"Don't speak her name!" Gold ruined his attempt to avoid looking at or speaking to Killian. "You know nothing about Belle! And I am neither a crocodile nor a barnacle – I am king of the ocean compared to you, you're nothing more than what I made you: a hook. And I can unmake you –"

"Gold. Stop. You answered all I needed, now you can go." Emma stepped between the cell and Gold.

For the most part, they left us alone. I didn't want to leave the cell in case Gold had lied. I let Wendy out of her carrier and she squeezed in and out of the cells as she pleased, but stayed at the station. Killian and I played games, mostly hangman. "You know what's interesting?" I noted when we'd finished up the fifth game (I'd lost over the word 'astrolabe').

"What?" he put the paper away and got out the sketchbook.

"We didn't name a single person. We've never talked about them with their names." He looked at me, brows furrowed. "My sister's name was Caroline."

"You're wrong," he told me. "I told you her name, her name was Milah."

I had to admit he was right; he'd used her name at the docks. "Do you…do you think that there's an afterlife?"

Killian thought about it. "Well, there are other worlds. Why shouldn't there be an afterlife?"

I leaned back and closed my eyes.

When I woke up, I felt disoriented. My alarm clock wasn't where it was supposed to be. I rolled over and felt my sheets refuse to move easily, they felt like denim. "Sure you want to roll in that direction, love?"

I looked for the source of Killian's voice. How could he be here when –

I sat up. "How disappointing. We could have given David something to watch." He shook his head in false dismay.

"I fell asleep in your lap?!"

"No. But you kind of slumped over, and I figured you'd want to lay down, not lean against my shoulder."

"There's a pillow!" I protested and looked towards it. Wendy sat on it, happily asleep. "Oh. You friggin' cat."

Wendy didn't even stir. If she'd looked up at all, I imagined she would have been proud of herself. She'd found the best seat in the whole place.

"You took care of me in the hospital. My turn to take care of you."

"I got paid to take care of you, it's my job." Then I realized that he'd said 'David' and not Emma. I stood up and looked towards the Sheriff's desk. Indeed, Prince Charming was there and I didn't see a sign of Emma anywhere.

"Here," I turned back to Killian and he held out a piece of paper torn from his sketchbook. "It's what I drew yesterday. Added a bit to it, even got to study my model close up this afternoon. Put the finishing touches on it while you slept." I took the paper and looked at it.

He'd drawn me. At the docks. With the Jolly Roger in the background.

It was really good. "How did you learn to draw?'

"I didn't. I started doing maps early on, comes in handy with being the captain. Eventually moved to people and objects. It was just something I did."

I smiled and handed him back the drawing. I didn't want to fold it and I let him know that. He put it back with his sketchbook and then showed me a few of what he'd been working on. There was one of Emma, another of Charming and Snow White, and a few with mermaids. They were easy to spot and I remembered his descriptions of them in Peter Pan. Beautiful creatures, beautiful singing voices, but would drown all who came in pursuit of them. No one had ever spotted a merman, it was said that they were unable to breathe air.

The door opened and David looked up. "Oh, good, Snow. You're here."

I looked at the princess and then asked, "Where did Sheriff Swan go?"

"She left with the crocodile," Killian told me. "To find his son." I could hear the disdain. "They left the town."

"We've decided on a verdict," Mary Margaret said to Killian.

"Verdict?" I asked. "But we didn't have a trial. I didn't testify –"

"Actually, you did. We did. Hook's been here this whole time and has only tried to hurt Gold. And as for your testimony," Charming smiled, "well, you came here when you were frightened and you stayed because you trusted him. So, Hook, you'll help us defeat Cora and then you'll leave. That's the deal."

"And of my crocodile?"

"You'll have to do that on your own. Not in Storybrooke and you can't go into the outside world. They'd lock you away forever. You're going to go back to what's left of our land. That's what we mean by 'leave'. Deal?"

I watched him think it over and then he nodded. "Deal."