A/N: Wow, twenty chapters already! And I can't believe how much support I've gotten from all of you guys so far :) To all of you who have favorited, followed, or are just reading this, thank you! All my love~ Mwah!

Heeeeeeere's Killian!

Emma could feel a warm hand gently stroking her hair, though she wasn't sure who the hand belonged to. Since her head was pounding, she didn't care to open her eyes to find out who it was. She just wanted to lie there, on the ground, and never move again. Was it really possible to be in this much pain? There was not a single part of her body that did not ache, or burn, or hurt, or throb.

Wait, she took that back. Hair. Nails. Those didn't, couldn't, hurt. Emma silently thanked the Lord that he had given humans these very few parts that felt no pain.

So Emma focused on her painless toenails as someone shifted her into their lap with strong arms. She focused on her unshaven leg hairs as the searing pains tore through her skin at every place the person touched. She also ignored the nearly crippling fear that the Dark One in her would emerge, angered by the pain, and take the life of this man who was only trying to be kind.

"You thrive off of other people's lives now," a whisper came from deep inside her mind. It seemed that it was answering back to Emma's fear of killing someone. "Their pains, their miseries, their sorrows are your glories," the voice told her. "Go on, take a crack at it! Hurt someone. Destroy something. It's really quite fun."

Was Emma going crazy? It seemed she was hearing voices in her head now.

Wait. WAIT. Hadn't Lily warned her about this? Was this the Dark One speaking to her?

"It certainly is the Dark One that speaks to you, Dearie," the voice replied. Emma inwardly groaned and rolled her eyes. Great. Not only was she hearing voices, but the voice spoke exactly like Rumpelstiltskin.

"Emma, love, please wake up," a different voice begged of her. This one was Irish, deep, and immensely familiar. Emma allowed her eyes to flutter open to this voice; she trusted this voice with all of her heart.

Emma sat up a little when she saw those beautiful blue eyes staring back at her. "Killian!" she exclaimed. She wrapped both of her arms around him in a tight hug.

"Hi, love," he responded, hugging her back. Emma ignored the trails of red-hot fire his hands left running down her spine and her arms. She didn't care about the pain. She needed this too much right now. She needed him too much.

Emma laced her fingers together and placed them on the back of Killian's neck. She leaned in and pressed her lips gently to his, paying no attention to the painful fire that now danced on her lips, too.

Killian allowed his hook to rest on the ground and placed his good hand against the small of Emma's back as he kissed her back with all of his love.

For both, the kiss was comfort and the kiss was pain.

Killian had spent years of his life trying to kill the Dark One, and now he was in love with her. Madly in love.

And Emma, she wanted so badly for this to be her happy ending, right here and right now. But she was so terrified of accidentally hurting Killian, of ruining the final piece in her happily-ever-after puzzle, that she was hurting herself by accident, instead.

And that was nowhere near a real happy ending.