Chapter 18: Queen Takes Knight

The ground ran out half a second before David ran off the ground. He skidded to a halt, arms windmilling, as stones and roots crumbled out from beneath his feet and clattered down to the coast some thirty feet below, the bluff eaten out by the crashing, restless waves. If he'd fallen down that, there was no telling who he'd think he was when he hit the bottom.

Mary Margaret grabbed her husband around the waist and jerked him back. Ruby slammed on the brakes to avoid running into them, but Leroy wasn't quite as quick on the uptake, and had to veer off and barrel into a tree, rather than the Charmings. He was only on his back for an instant, then popped up like a jack-in-the-box. The entire moment would have been black comedy in other circumstances, but all of them were too focused on their mission to bat an eyelash.

"Henry," Ruby said grimly, sniffing the air. "He was here. With that – with that monkey thing. And there are other scents as well. The ones that were in the apartment."

"Don't tell us," David said. "Cora and Regina."

"Yes." The she-wolf's lips were thin. "As if we didn't know. They have Henry, and I can't tell which direction they've taken him." She indicated the crushed leaves, the tire marks through the mud. "Regina's car was here. . . they drove, I could try following that scent. . ."

"The ship," Leroy reminded them. "Emma said we had to find the pirate ship, that there was a giant on it, and I don't know about you, but I don't want that witch unleashing a giant on us. Shouldn't we also – "

"The ship can wait!" David snapped. "We don't even know where it is, much less if we can reach it without crossing the town line. And then – "

"Look," Leroy interrupted, pointing out to sea. "There."

David stepped up and squinted, shading his eyes with his hand, trying to put aside the panic and focus. At first he couldn't tell what the dwarf was on about, then he did. About a thousand yards down the coast, and maybe a few hundred out, the waves were acting strangely, flattened and frozen. Seagulls were intently whirring around what appeared to be nothing at all, some of them settling in to roost, and if they were all very quiet, they could just make out the sound of wood creaking among the crash of incoming breakers. The Jolly Roger was there, it had to be. Tantalizingly close, and harrowingly far.

"We'll keep it in mind," David said, turning around. "For now, I'd rather we track Henry before the damn flying monkey comes back. They didn't bring that thing through, however the hell they did, for a one-time use."

"It must be the netherworld," Mary Margaret interjected, pulling the strap of her bow tighter. "Like Emma told us. It's open, and it's pretty much an interworldly freeway."

"That's what I'm afraid of." David put both hands on his hips. "Let's move it."

Following Ruby, the Charmings and Leroy retraced their steps back into town, feeling a bit like an old slapstick in which they were running first one direction and then in the other with some unspecified menace on their heels. Ruby lost the scent of Regina's car a few times, but picked it up again, and finally came to a halt on the sidewalk outside the town library. "It's strong right here, but it goes on as well. I don't smell them here. I think they stopped, but didn't stay."

"Should we take a look?" David glanced at his wife. "Scope it out just in case?"

"No." Mary Margaret frowned. "Something's wrong, David. I don't know what, but it isn't just Henry, and it isn't here. Remember that dream I had? I knew something was wrong then, I knew it, and that must have been when Emma fell into the tornado. We didn't realize it was her since Belle was in her bed, but last time I ignored my instincts, it was a horrible mistake. We have to go find them."

"But look." Leroy indicated the scratch marks on the front door. "Somebody's broken into the library. Can't just leave that without a backward glance."

"How about you check it out, then?" Ruby suggested. "I have to come with David and Mary Margaret, to track the scent. Will you be all right alone?"

Leroy looked deeply insulted. "Is my name Grumpy the Dwarf?!" He gripped his pickax tighter. "I'm gonna beat the crap out of anything I find in there."

David was unsure if they should split up, but the clock was ticking and they didn't have time for indecision. He nodded brusquely at Leroy, then grabbed Mary Margaret and Ruby and bundled them both off down Main Street, following the waning trail. He didn't have the same instinct as his wife, but something felt distinctly wrong to him too. A disturbance in the Force, his cursed memory quipped to him. A very definite one. Black and choking and oozing, like an open toxic waste pit. For a moment, horrifyingly, he did lose sight of who he actually was, was just David Nolan and David Nolan alone. If that was the netherworld, it was even worse than they thought.

"There!" Ruby screamed. "Look!"

David's eyes jerked open, and sense returned to him in a flood. They were standing on the state highway leading out of Storybrooke, dangerously close to the town line. But Ruby was pointing down into the trees, where it was possible to see two figures, one digging in the dirt and one standing over him. The latter, unmistakable even in profile, was Gold. And the former –

"Isn't that – " David turned to Ruby, staring. "Neal Cassady?"

"Neal," Mary Margaret hissed, sounding every inch like the fierce warrior princess she was. In that word, it was possible to hear all her guilt and rage and pain, her memory of the baby girl who had been torn from her arms while she was still bleeding from labor, the girl whose first smile she had never seen, the girl whose heart she couldn't stop from breaking, the girl who had to grow up thinking she had been abandoned, twice, in the worst possible way. Because of her – and because of him.

"Neal," Mary Margaret repeated again, almost calmly. "I am going to kill him."

And with that, she started to run.

David and Ruby exchanged a horrorstruck glance, looked at her, at each other again, and then flung themselves down the hill after her. Snow had a sizable head start and she was fueled by bestial rage, so both of them – even Ruby with her werewolf speed, had she chosen to employ it, which she didn't – had trouble catching up. They pelted headlong through the trees, just in time to see Snow seize an extremely startled Neal by the collar. While he was still demanding to know what was going on, while Gold was shouting at her as well, she drew her fist back and punched him in the nose with all her might.

Neal toppled backward, dropping whatever had been in his hand – an unremarkable bundle wrapped in brown paper. Snow was already crawling on top of him, continuing to punch him. At least until David reached her, grabbed her around the waist, and pulled her off.

"Thanks, man," Neal gasped, looking stunned. "I don't even know what I did, is she crazy or – "

"She didn't have the wrong idea!" And with that, David wheeled around and punched Neal again, just as he was attempting to get to his feet. Neal crashed back down with a yelp.

"Are you both mad?" Gold roared. His hand was upraised, a fireball crackling between his fingers. "How dare you treat my son like that?"

"S – son?" David's circuits fried. He took a step back, staring at the whimpering specimen of humanity sprawled in the leaves at his feet. Then he looked wildly at Gold. "That's your son?"

"You said we had to go out of town to look for him!" Mary Margaret cried.

"I didn't know he was already here!" Gold lowered his hand, but didn't extinguish the fireball. The three of them eyed each other evilly; there was even less love lost between them after their aborted deal to find Emma. "And after what I've done to find him, it's my duty to warn you that anyone who tries to hurt him is not going to live very long."

"If you're threatening me, Rumplestiltskin, after what your son did to my daughter, then it's my duty to warn you that anyone who tries to – "

At that moment, as David and Gold were getting into each other's faces, and Mary Margaret appeared undecided whether to run interference or to go punch Neal again, a scream ripped through the woods. Ruby's scream.

"Ruby?" David broke away from his adversary. "Ruby!"

"Over there!" Mary Margaret pointed to where they could see Ruby on her hands and knees, next to another body on the ground. "Oh my God – is that – "

Neal and Gold exchanged a look. They both seemed on the verge of saying something, then decided against it. Squinting upslope, David could see a tangle of long blonde hair on the ground, at the same time his wife did, and –

"Emma!" Mary Margaret's scream was painful to hear, cracking and breaking in her throat. Then she was running again, plunging upslope, skidding in the leaves, as David barreled after her. They reached Ruby at the same time and fell to their knees, staring down at their daughter insensible in the mud. A silver hook was wedged so deep in her chest that it had almost vanished.

"No." Mary Margaret began to sob in earnest as she grasped hold of it, trying to work it free. But she couldn't budge it, and her efforts only made more blood bubble up from the wound, soaking Emma's black wool coat a dark, arterial crimson. "No!"

"Still regretting not letting me kill that pirate?" Gold's voice was a lethal purr as he limped up after them, Neal hot on his heels. "After this?"

"Emma!" Neal jostled Ruby out of the way, and knelt down next to her as well, a tricky feat considering he was simultaneously trying to maintain his distance from the Charmings. "Fuck! I knew Hook would do something like this!"

"I told you, Bae," Gold pleaded. "He's a killer, he'll stop at – "

"Shut up, Papa," Neal said furiously. "You don't get to talk about anyone being a killer, not after what she told me about what you did to Mama. Can you help her or not?"

Gold's eyes flicked to David and Mary Margaret. "What makes you think she needs it?"

"The hook in her chest might be a goddamn giveaway, you son of a bitch!" David boiled to his feet and seized a fistful of Gold's immaculately pressed purple shirt. "I don't care what's between us. She's the mother of your grandson. Do something!"

Gold flinched at the mention of Henry. He extricated himself from the prince's grasp, then said curtly, "I'll have to take her back to my shop. Bring her."

David hoisted Emma's upper half in his arms, glaring off Neal when he tried to help. Mary Margaret took her legs, and between them, the Charmings carried their bleeding, unconscious daughter up to the road, up to where Gold's black Cadillac stood waiting.

(8888888)

Hurt.

A bloody lot of it.

He bloody shouldn't have been surprised in even the bloody least degree.

Killian still hadn't worked up the ability to move after the force of the magical blast Cora had used to throw him into the shelves. He was surprised his ribs weren't sticking out of his skin, as he sprawled on the cold library floor and thought to himself just how bloody much he hated books and how, if he got half a chance, he would gladly burn this sodding place to the ground with all its contents. But it had served its purpose. Aye. Enough.

He'd found the map, all right. Told them where the dagger was – or so they thought. Regina had hared off on whatever wild goose chase he'd sent her on, gullible bloody bitch. When he'd done a fine job of acting furious and betrayed, Cora had told him sweetly that it was nothing personal, but she had to leave him here. She had something she needed to do, a little call to pay on a certain fetching blonde savior. Then she removed a familiar item from her pocket, and held it up to show him.

His hook.

At that, Killian's pretend fury had become very real, and he lunged at her like a wild beast. She threw him back, unloading another cascade of thrice-fucking-damned books onto his head and employing him to mop the floor, and made a languid gesture. Fetters sprang into existence, locking him to the shelf. She smiled again at the mad desperation on his face, and told him that it was plain he was never going to succeed at their task. The one little job he'd had. Just one, and he couldn't even manage that. He was without doubt the worst pirate she had ever heard of.

She'd be sure to give Emma a kiss from him.

And then, as he roared at her, she vanished in purple smoke.

Killian hadn't felt such devouring, consuming insanity since he was tied to a mast and watching the crocodile rip out Milah's heart, then holding her in his arms as she fell back, whispered, "I love you," and died. He started to heave, wincing in agony each time his struggles threw his ribs further out of whack, feeling broken edges grind together nauseatingly, ripping and wrenching at the fetters, sobbing and swearing like a lunatic. But he couldn't get them free. Cora was going to bloody kill her, kill Emma, and he was chained in a sodding bloody fucking hell of a library and couldn't do a damned fucking thing about it.

At last, the pain overwhelmed him, and he sank into a dazed half-consciousness. Some time passed. He had no idea how much. Then he heard, to his shock, the library door grinding open, and heavy footfalls entering.

They're back. Back to finish me off. Killian struggled to think of some memorable last words, but profanities were all that came to mind. "Come on, you poxy back-alley whore," he grated out, tasting blood in his throat. "Come and try to kill me." He spat, weakly.

"You!" It wasn't Regina or Cora that answered. Instead, Killian saw the bloody dwarf marching in with his pickax at port-arms, clearly in expectation of having to promptly use it – then stopping dead and staring. It was fair to say that the bastard had not anticipated his foe to be a half-dead pirate, spread-eagled on the floor due to being chained to the romance section.

Grumpy recovered. "Hook."

"Oh, well spotted." Blood dribbled down Killian's chin. "Wit like that, they should call you Brainy."

"Shut up." Grumpy took a better grip on his ax, and Killian considered that it was likely not a wise idea to antagonize him while the dwarf had sharp objects. "What are you doing here?"

"Taking a bloody vacation, what's it look like?"

"Where are the witches?"

Killian tried to move again, and almost threw up. He swallowed down the taste of bile, eyes watering. "I don't know."

"Where's Henry?"

"Does it look like I fucking know?" He was almost screaming. It hurt more.

Grumpy threw him an absolutely exquisite specimen of what his Swan girl, with her gift for turning a memorable phrase, would have called "bitchface." After a moment he said, "It looks like you got your arse kicked, is what it looks like."

"Congratulations. You'll be trying out for the sodding genius club in a moment." Killian was struggling to look as if he wasn't about to pass out again, since that was how he felt. "As much as I'd love to swap scintillating bon mots with you, you'd better get the buggery out of here and find Emma. Cora's going to kill her."

That, to say the least, Grumpy had not expected. "What?"

"They're looking for the Dark One's dagger, all right?" Killian growled. "I tricked Regina, but Cora's after Emma. Don't stand there and gape at me like a bloody halfwit, even if you're a quarterwit at best and will have to aspire vainly to halfwit status for the rest of your miserable life. Get out and do something about it. I'm – detained."

"The hell do you. . ." Brainy was blinking like a concussed hippopotamus. "What are you trying to pull on me, pirate?"

"Pirate." Killian laughed. The word sounded almost funny to him; it had been ringing in his ears longer than he could remember. She'd thrown it in his teeth back on the beanstalk, and he'd been sarcastic, as always. Oh, the pirate thing. Never trust a pirate. Time was when he'd be the first to inform you cheerily that that was a wise idea. Back when he didn't mind whose back he stabbed. But that was all before, bloody before, and his own idiocy had been what gotten him here, forced to serve as a spectator while it all went to hell. He laughed, kept on laughing, and then his voice broke and he started to sob, sounding like a madman even to himself.

There was a sudden silence overhead. But he didn't look up. He just lay there, praying for Grumpy to put the bloody ax through his brains and end his misery. "Come on," he rasped again. "What are you waiting for? Kill me."

The dwarf didn't. Instead, after one more moment, he glared ferociously at Hook as if to warn him not to try anything (what a bloody joke) and then knelt down and started to fiddle with the fetters. They were magically locked, of course, but even dark magic was no match for a dwarf on a mission, and a few moments later, Killian heard the click as they opened.

"Don't make me regret this," Grumpy warned, holding out a hand. "Get up."

Killian stared at him blankly.

"Up!" Grumpy seized him by the scruff of the neck and hauled, managing to assemble the pirate into a more or less vertical state. Killian started to lurch forward like a badly jointed marionette, gauging his prospects for escape and deciding that they were bloody slim indeed. It felt like he was taking a red-hot spear through the ribs with every step. But he'd kill Cora if it was the last thing he did, and –

Just as Killian and Grumpy were making it to the door of the library, something whizzed past on the road outside. An automobile, Killian realized, and not just any automobile, but the crocodile's, the one that had been present at the town line the night of the confrontation. And to judge from Grumpy's reaction, he'd seen something in it to startle him badly.

"No bloody hurry," Killian croaked, when the dwarf continued to stand there like a lump. "I feel so good I may dance a bloody waltz in a moment."

"Shut up," Grumpy said again, but distractedly, frowning down the street in the direction of the vanished mechanical monster. "They were in it."

"Who?" Gods, his head hurt. And the rest of him.

"Snow and Charming."

"Do I give half a squealing shit about them?"

"You might," Grumpy said grimly. "If I tell you they were looking for Emma."

(8888888)

"Set her there." Gold gestured at the striped chaise crammed into the back room of his shop, teetering mazes of junk walled into the cupboards on either side. David and Mary Margaret shuffled through it and gently laid their daughter down. Her face was the color of bad milk, and her lips were going blue. When Mary Margaret lifted Emma's coat away, it revealed that her white shirt had turned a dark, visceral red, sticking to her skin. The blood was pooling on her chest, dripping down her shoulder and her side.

Gold regarded it without blinking, then tapped his cane. "Ah. Yes."

"She's bleeding to death," David snapped. "We don't have time for whatever games you're about to play."

"No games. Now, I'm the last man who would be caught dead speaking a good word about our pirate, but there's something about this that doesn't quite add up. Somebody was trying to take Emma's heart, but only succeeded in breaking it. Because she was vulnerable. She wasn't strong, she was off her guard, she was already. . . hurt by something. Or someone."

David glared at Neal, slouching in the doorway. "I have no idea who that could be."

Neal raised both hands. "I didn't do anything to her, all right? I want to help you make her better just as much."

"Yes, but she was in a pretty bad state when we saw her at the hospital." Mary Margaret moved to stand behind her husband. "I'd say she qualified as heartbroken then."

"How about you quit blaming me for something that's done and over, and try to save your daughter's life?" Neal took a step forward. "Huh?"

"Sweetheart, let me punch him again," David muttered. "Please."

"Much as I want to, he's right. That's not going to help us." Mary Margaret turned back to Gold. "What do you mean?"

"Her heart is broken," Gold repeated. "Literally. She was in a fragile emotional state when she met me, something must have happened with that pirate when she stopped me from killing him, and then she has. . . a. . . history with my son." He glanced at Neal, who stonily looked away. "So when the hook went in, it still couldn't manage to rip her heart out, but it's damaged it. Quite. . . extensively. Physically, to match the emotional damage."

"And now she's dying," Mary Margaret said tightly.

"And now she's dying," Gold agreed. "A broken heart. Very. . . lethal."

"Unless?"

"I haven't done this in centuries."

"How about you give it a try."

"Very well." Gold sat down on the chaise next to Emma. "Here's the trick. If we can get her heart the rest of the way out, she'll live. There is magic that can heal a heart, but only one."

"True love." It was Mary Margaret who spoke, reflexively.

"Hold on a fucking second." That was David. "Did you seriously just tell me that if we want to save our daughter's life, we have to rip her heart out?"

"Rip? That was your word, not mine. I said we had to remove it. Or we can leave it in her chest and let her bleed to death. As you may be aware, people can live quite well without their hearts. It will make her better, for the time being. Until we can mend it and put it back."

"And you just so happen to be the only one here who can take hearts."

"If I've dedicated my life to mastering a different skill than you, Your Highness, that's just apples and oranges, isn't it?" Gold took hold of the hook. "On three, then. One. . . two. . ."

And as the last number was leaving his lips, they heard the door open.

(8888888)

"You," the crocodile said, the only word that broke the silence. "You."

"Me." Killian had to do his bloody best not to trip over his own feet as he stalked forward, leather coattails swirling atmospherically. "Surprised?"

The miserable reptile got to his feet, his eyes never leaving the pirate's. "Bae," he said. "Mr. Nolan. Kindly remove that from my shop, or there's nothing I can do for Miss Swan."

"You were going to rip out her heart!" Killian roared, causing everyone present to flinch. "Do you think I'm blind, you maggot? Do you think I'm bloody stupid? Do you think I'm going to stand here and watch you do it? Was it you, then? Put Cora up to stealing my hook, so you could be the one to have the victory?"

"Get out," Neal bloody Cassady warned – had the crocodile called him Bae? As in Baelfire? Gods, no, not that, anything but that. "You better get out or else."

"Shut your shit-belching pie hole, you arse-munching cockfungus." Killian shoved the bastard aside as Neal tried to get in his face, and reached Emma's side with the next step. He closed his fingers around his hook, laid his stump gently on her shoulder to brace himself, and pulled as carefully and slowly as he could, easing the metal from where it was trapped deep inside her. It came free with a slurp, wet and red. Her vitiated chest pulsed blood.

The Charmings stared at each other, then at him. Finally, David croaked, "Where's Leroy?"

"Oh, you mean the dwarf genius? Might be I knocked him out and left him in the alley. What would you do if I had?"

"Stop!" Mary Margaret pleaded. "Will you all just stop! Emma is dying here while you're having your power plays! And if – " she shot a nervous glance at the pirate – "doing that is the only way to save her, then we have to."

"There's something else to consider," the crocodile said thoughtfully. "If we do take her heart out, she can travel in the netherworld freely."

"What the – "

"Cora can go into it and bring whatever she wants here to Storybrooke. We can't, because we have our hearts. But if Emma goes without hers. . . for a short while, say. . ."

"But her magic is connected to her love!" David cried. "How can she love – how can she do magic – how can she be anything she is without her heart?"

"Do you have a – "

Just then, fast as a snake, Killian lunged. It took every scrap of wherewithal he had, but the bastard wasn't looking, and by the time he was, he was in a violent headlock, the pirate jerking him upright as he dug his hook into Baelfire's throat. "Let me uncomplicate the situation. You, crocodile, give me the ability to do whatever needs to be done for Emma, now. Otherwise, your miserable little shitstain of a son. . ." He tightened his grip, scraping the sharp steel against Neal's neck so they could be in no doubt of his intentions. He'd never kill the man, much as he wanted to, if only in memory of the boy and the boy's mother. But they didn't have to know that.

Gold's face had frozen. The hate in his eyes boiled at Hook as the standoff continued, two, three, four agonizing moments. Then, as Emma began to convulse on the bed, blood bubbling at her lips, Mary Margaret screamed, "NOW, GOLD!" and he moved.

Looking as if he was being flayed inch by inch, the crocodile jerked up, raised a hand, and slapped it against Killian's. A bluish-purple glow engulfed his skin, then faded, and he didn't waste a second. Fighting his memories every step of the way, he half leapt, half fell across the room, landed next to her, and pressed his hand against her bloodstained breast. There was a hot, searing sensation that he didn't remember from the last time he did this (with a hook, with much less care, to some bloody chit he didn't give a rat's arse about) and then his fingers slipped into her chest.

Killian could feel their eyes boring into him, but he didn't care. Nothing mattered to him but what he was doing, the feeling of her heart, broken and bleeding but still struggling to beat, warm and slick against his skin. It wouldn't have come out if the crocodile just stuck his filthy paws in here and tugged. He had been supposed to do this all along. . . to find a way to remove it, make it a weapon. . . but all he cared now was if he could save her life. They could kill him after, he didn't care. She'd already made plain she wanted nothing to do with him.

For a moment, he couldn't hear any echo of her, and panicked that she'd gone too far. Emma! He called out to her wordlessly, searching for her, wherever she'd crawled, deep into her barrow. He wouldn't take it without her permission. Even if she'd die, she had the right to make that choice.

Emma, he whispered again. Love, please. Trust me.

But what if that was a lie?

What if the crocodile was going to kill her anyway?

He'd never forgive himself.

But they both had to take this chance. Together.

A moment, one more. Then he felt something, felt some spark of her, deep in her battered body, releasing. He felt the walls come down, and he felt her give it to him.

Slowly, slowly as if he was holding the most precious thing in the world (he was) Killian eased his hand out of Emma's chest, her heart bumping weakly against his fingers. It was a dull, bruised, washed-out pink, not healthy, vivid red, and the hook wound was plainly visible, a long, ragged scar across the surface. It made him feel something even closer to pure and perfect madness to look at it, to know that Cora had been the one to do this.

"Here." Gold held out his hand. "Give it to me."

"In your bloody dreams," Killian spat, reminding himself not to instinctively tighten his grip. He kept his fingers curled around it, as lightly, as delicately as he'd held anything in ages.

"You can't keep it," Gold pointed out, with a twisted grin. "Your little deception is going to be discovered, you know, and then both the witches will be after you. Do you really want to have Miss Swan's heart on you when that happens? Do you know how much, how very much Cora would like to have that in her possession? Because if she gets it, we're all done for."

"You will have to cut me down, here and now, if you think you're taking it from me."

"Tempting prospect." Gold's grin widened. "Very tempting."

"Stop it!" Neal bellowed. "You haven't changed at all, Papa!"

Gold jerked, seeming to surface from a reverie. He shook his head, suddenly looking old and scared and tired. "I'm – I'm sorry, Bae. The habit. . . it's deep by now. I just – "

"Try harder." Neal turned away when his father glanced imploringly at him, and moved closer to Hook. Flatly, he said, "I don't like you, you don't like me. We both understand that. But I'm the only one here who's qualified to take care of her heart. I'm getting the hell away from this place, and the crazy bitches can't follow me out of Storybrooke."

"And you think that makes you qualified, mate?" Killian bit out the word. "Take it away and what happens then? Do you think she'll be thrilled to discover that?"

"It doesn't matter what she wants. It matters what's best for her."

Killian gazed at him with something verging on admiration. In a friendly, conversational tone, he advised, "Shut your mouth before I actually do kill you."

"My forbearance is not infinite, pirate," Gold growled. "Watch yourself."

Killian gave him a cold, challenging stare, then got up and limped across the room toward Snow, who was still watching him suspiciously – but with an expression in her eyes that made him think the princess had understood exactly what just happened, and that she had been considerably thrown by it. He held out his hand, and she reached up with both of hers, so he could place her daughter's heart into her cupped palms as delicately as an egg. "Here," he said quietly. "Take care of it, aye?"

"I – I will." Snow glanced up at him then, looking into his eyes. "Hook. You're not a bad man. You don't have to help them, and I don't think you want to. You're a pirate. You know which way the wind is blowing."

"Toward them?" Killian said bitterly, staring down Gold and Neal. "I don't think so. There. I've done what I can. Emma doesn't want to have a damn thing to do with me, and unlike some others present in this room, that's a choice I respect. Now, if I recall, your precious bloody grandson is still missing, and gods know what the witches are getting up to."

"You're going to find them?" Snow stared.

"No." Killian whirled around, jabbing a finger at Gold. "I'm going to find a way to kill you."

And with that, he fled.

(8888888)

Hurt.

A bloody lot of it.

She bloody shouldn't have been surprised in even the least bloody degree.

Emma wasn't awake, exactly, but she was aware of muffled voices pressing in on the darkness, the bottom of the endlessly deep well where she was trapped. Pain stabbed through her intermittently, wet and red and burning. She could hear blood leaving her veins, struggled to cling onto any sort of consciousness, could feel herself falling farther and farther as she scraped and flailed and fought to hang onto it, to pull herself out, to live – but couldn't.

And then she felt someone else inside her. A hand around her heart. There was enough of her old memory remaining to know what this meant, that she was about to die – but there was no excruciating yank, no crushing, no dust. Instead, she felt something strong enough to make her breathe suddenly, a jerking gulp, light shot through her prison. It was gentle, tender, careful, asking her if it was all right, telling her that she could choose to let go or not. That no matter what, he (how did she know it was a he?) wouldn't go further without her permission.

Emma was aware that this must be dying. She didn't want to die.

But it was still her choice.

The voice was in her head. Calling her name. Asking her to try it. Asking her to trust.

It was the hardest thing she'd ever done, but she agreed. She let her walls down.

She let him go. Let it go.

And then, it didn't hurt anymore.

(8888888)

The first thing Emma saw was the ceiling. Which was strange, because she didn't remember there being a ceiling in the woods where Cora had ambushed her. It was a familiar ceiling, however, and it took her a moment of intense, squinted concentration to work it out. It was Gold's ceiling. In Gold's shop.

What the fuck?

"Emma?" It was a familiar voice now, a face that floated over hers, pale and drawn with anxiety. "Emma, can you hear me?"

"Yeah," she mumbled. "Yeah. . . I hear you."

"Oh, thank God." The face – it was Mary Margaret, it was her mother – collapsed in relief, and tears welled in her eyes. "How do you feel?"

A whole fuck of a lot better than she'd expected, actually. Sensation was slowly returning to her extremities, and where there had been a burning, driving agony in her chest, there wasn't anymore. "Pretty okay, actually. What the hell happened?"

Nobody – there were apparently more participants in this conversation – seemed inclined to answer. Emma pushed herself upright, wincing, and David and Neal – oh god, what were they doing here? – both offered her a hand. She took David's and ignored Neal's, reaching up instinctively to touch her chest. Something felt off about it.

"What's going on?" she said nervously. "What's the party?"

Nobody wanted to answer that one either. She didn't like this. Gold – oh wow, this really couldn't get worse, could it? – was regarding her intently, fingers steepled under his chin. The silence got thicker and thicker, heavier and heavier.

"Well, Miss Swan," he said at last. "It's time."

"Time for what?"

"Time for you to go into the netherworld."

"You're crazy." Emma still didn't know what was going on, but she liked it less and less each instant. "What was that about how Cora was the only one who could, since she didn't have a – "

"Matters have changed." Gold shrugged. "Not entirely for the worse, I think. I'll still be able to guide you, Miss Swan, but you're the one who has to do this now."

"Do what?"

"Go in and bring them out. All of them."

"Oh, no no no no." Emma could feel panic rising in her throat. "One day you're telling me that we have to close the netherworld portal, that it's going to kill all of us if we don't, and the next you want me to jump in for a joyride and make it even bigger? Not to mention that I don't know what happened and I don't like it anyway and – "

"Please, Miss Swan," Gold interrupted. "This is extremely urgent, and everything that we have done to save your life will shortly go in vain unless you trust me. It's too late to worry about closing it. We can't. Cora's already torn it open to kingdom come. You have to go in now and get help. She's already summoning everything you can think of through, and this town is about to become hell on earth. There's one man in particular you need to find. Bring him back here." He was speaking faster and faster. "He stole magic even from me. Him and his thieves."

"Oh God. The last thing we need is more thieves."

"This one's different, believe me."

"And how do I bring him back here, exactly? Through the netherworld? But I thought he can't, that only people without a heart – "

"That, dearie, is the one thing we're all counting on you figuring out."

Emma fought an extremely strong urge to punch him in the nose. "Can you at least tell me if this mystery man I'm after, in some unspecified other world, who I reach by going down the rabbit hole again, who I may or may not be able to bring back without murdering, has a name?"

"Of course he does." Gold grinned. "Robin Hood."