Chapter 4: Damsel in Distress

Chapter Summary: Emma thanks Hook for saving David.

Chapter Rating: T

Emma knew, courtesy of Hook's persistent bragging, that the Jolly Roger was made of enchanted wood, but she never truly noticed the unique beauty of the lustrous oak until she entered the Captain's quarters for the first time.

The wall panels back in her own cabin bore clear marks of lengthy abuse from Hook's former crew members. On the contrary, the walls in Hook's quarters gleamed with an almost golden hue as if from the inside. It also seemed Hook had taken care to polish the fixtures over his years as captain.

As Emma crossed the room to help Hook down on his bed, her attention shifted to the almost opulent furniture. His bed was large with a dense wooden frame and impossibly soft sheets. A large matching wardrobe and an expansive wooden desk sat in the opposite corner of the room. Emma couldn't help but laugh inwardly at the idea of Hook having a soft spot for luxury.

Typical pirate.

As Hook shifted in his spot on the bed, searching for the least painful way to sit, she redirected her attention at getting a closer look at his wound. It was worse than she had originally thought.

"I need to you take off your vest," Emma said. She didn't even bother to avoid phrasing that might bait Hook's love of innuendo. "And your shirt."

"Eager to get me alone and naked in my bed chambers, are you?" he retorted, clearly battling through his discomfort to force out a weak smirk. Emma caught him wincing in pain as he shifted backward on the bed.

"Just do it," Emma said seriously, although she barely managed to suppress a small laugh at his comment.

Hook straightened as best he could and moved his hands down to unlace his vest.

Emma most certainly did not find herself watching with her mouth hanging open a tiny bit.

Even through the disorienting shock of what had just transpired on the deck above, Emma found herself immensely bothered by a single nagging thought in her head. Why was she so abruptly and unabashedly experiencing attraction to this man, a bona fide pirate? Although Emma could admit that this was not the first time she had caught herself admiring his body, or his face, it was definitely the only time she had found herself drooling after him while he was soaked and slowly undressing in front her.

Yet in the back of her mind, Emma knew that her newfound fascination was precisely because of the events she'd just witnessed.

He saved David's life when he could have died himself, she thought. Why?

Hook soon finished his initial task of unlacing the vest. She proceeded to watch him struggle with peeling the drenched article off his shoulders, stopping herself just short of reaching out to help him (helping Captain Hook undress, Jesus Christ). Emma had actually expected him to take advantage of the unlikely circumstances and slyly try putting on a show for her, but Hook attempted no such thing. Instead, it seemed the pain forced him to use his entire focus to simply remove his many layers clothing. The mother in her found it hard to watch.

Growing up, Emma Swan was not like other girls. She did not have a father to kill spiders for her. Thanks to August, she didn't even have a brother to beat up the boys that were mean to her at school. She had been the one to teach Neal how to change the motor oil in their yellow bug. Emma killed her own spiders, learned self-defense skills, and did everything for herself that men in movies always did for their wives and girlfriends. And— a rather large focus of pride for her— she considered herself no less feminine for it. Emma was who she was because her life necessitated it and she liked it that way. It left her needing no one, which allowed her to keep herself detached. Permanently.

So the idea of a damsel in distress had always bothered Emma. Not because she hated the idea of being feminine and afraid, but because she loathed the idea of needing help from anyone. She had been in her share of sticky situations and she always handled them the way Emma Swan handled them and came out better for it in the end. And really, she had never needed to prove to herself that she was just as good as any man—she was born knowing she was better.

This is why swooning over a dashing pirate because he saved the day made Emma immensely uncomfortable. It felt like an unwelcome, almost biological, imperative. Would she be feeling this way if Hook hadn't dove into the ocean after her father? No, she thought, absolutely not.

Except Hook willingly gave me access to his ship and offered to guide us through Neverland, just to find a boy he's never really spoken to, and I didn't feel like jumping his bones then.

(But I was in shock then, she reasoned.)

(But he's injured now! came the internal retort.)

Emma suddenly really hated the voices in her head.

"I think you're going to have to lend me a hand here, love."

The pirate indicated to his right shoulder with an upward wave of his Hook. While Emma had been lost in her own thoughts, the captain had apparently encountered a problem: he was unable to push his vest down his right arm without twisting his side painfully. As much as Emma wished to avoid involving herself with undressing him, she saw no other alternative.

"Yeah," she replied, trying her best to appear unaffected by his state of undress. "Sit straight."

Emma finished removing the black vest with as much composure as she could manage. Combining the psychological impacts of almost losing her father and the intimacy of their current situation left her feeling shaky. His body emanated cold— no surprise given his fully clothed dive into the sea. Emma's motherly instincts surged up once again and she had to resist the impulse to wrap a blanket around him.

"Your shirt now," she ordered, gesturing to the soaked black garment. The subdued tone of her own voice surprised her.

Hook, who seemed to have lost any will whatsoever to make suggestive comments, followed her directions. Emma watched as he struggled with his attempt to pull the tunic-like shirt over his head.

"Wait," she found herself saying before she could stop it. "Let me. I don't want you hurting yourself further."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Hook smile to himself.

Emma ignored the smirk and proceeded to carefully inch the article upward, maneuvering it around his arms without forcing him into any uncomfortable positions. She tried pretending like the way the wet fabric clung to his skin wasn't so enticing.

Once the obstacle of his shirts was successfully eliminated, Emma could finally get a good look at the cut on his side. It was fairly long, about five inches across his ribs, and bleeding enough for Emma to know it would not stop on its own accord.

"I need to stitch this up," Emma said. "It's going to hurt. Where are your medical supplies?"

She didn't see him flinch at the idea. Instead he maintained his labored expression and pointed towards a small box atop the desk. "You'll find a needle and thread in there, I believe."

Emma marched over to retrieve the box. Next to it, there was a collection of long scrolls of parchment. She guessed she would find maps of Neverland if she were to unfold them.

"Grab the vial, too. The small one."

She opened the box and looked through it. The item Hook referred to was a small amber vial, no more than a few ounces. It was filled with a dark liquid.

"What is this?" she asked, collecting the other items she needed and walking back towards the bed.

"It contains an enchantment," Hook answered. "I acquired several of them in a small port town long ago. This, however, is the last one."

Emma knelt next to him and began threading the needle. "What does it do?"

In reply, Hook uncapped the vial and poured the contents carefully over his wounded side. He let out a long, painful hiss.

To Emma's astonishment, the broken skin began almost knitting itself together before her eyes. Whatever the liquid was, it appeared to be some sort of potion that allowed the flesh to heal itself from the inside.

"That's amazing," she whispered.

"You'll still need to close the wound, I'm afraid," he said. "The enchantment can speed the healing process, but it's still vulnerable to re-opening."

"I've never sewn anyone up before," she admitted quietly.

"Then I'll forgive you if I don't end up looking like fine embroidery," Hook quipped. Emma couldn't help but reply with a soft smile.

She set to work. While she wasn't exactly squeamish, stitching someone's flesh together inevitably caused her stomach churn a little; she would need a distraction to get through this.

Emma allowed herself to discreetly study Hook's exposed upper body out of the corner of her eye. She noted that his skin was tanned and his physique toned, unsurprising given his lifetime at sea. There were small, pale scars scattered across his chest and torso where Emma could spot a faint hint of bruising left over from the incident with Greg Mendel's car. The light dusting of dark hair covering his chest was something she had seen many times above the plunging necklines of his ensemble but in the darkly lit privacy of his quarters it made him look different, less like a virile young swashbuckler and more like a matured warrior.

Hook winced slightly, but he made no noise as Emma sewed him up. She wondered how many times he had done to this himself, how many years it had taken him to acquire the patchwork of scars on his solid body.

"Thank you," Emma found herself saying, before should stop herself. "For what you did. For David."

What she expected next would have been a snarky remark about David's carelessness or perhaps a suggestive comment about how Emma might pay him back, but she was met with only silence. Emma looked up at his face and found it shrouded with the shadows cast by the window frame behind her. The dark bars contrasted eerily with the pallor of his cold, damp skin.

Hook seemed to sense her staring. "This is the only crew the Jolly Roger has left," he explained. "It's my duty as captain to protect it."

Emma wasn't buying it.

"It wasn't your fault, though," she reasoned.

Hook either didn't care answer or simply didn't have one for her. For what felt like the hundredth time since arriving in Neverland, Emma got the sense he was holding back on something he wanted to say but couldn't out of fear.

"That wasn't about your ship," she continued, pushing forward despite Hook's obvious discomfort with the conversation. "You warned him to be careful. You don't owe him anything and you certainly didn't have to risk your own life going after him. I don't know why, but you did it anyway."

"Don't think too about it too hard, Swan," he replied sharply, shooting her an acerbic warning glare. "You'll only be disappointed."

Emma was taken aback by his sudden short temper. Any other day, under any other circumstances, she would have replied with an equally snippy retort. She wouldn't let someone else know they intimidated her, scared her. But today, the jumble of emotion of confusing thoughts still swimming in her brain led her to only assume a soft countenance in response.

"I just…" she began again, quietly. "I just want you to know that I won't forget what you've done. For us, me and my family."

Emma paused, unsure of how to phrase her gratitude without sounding awkward. She felt vulnerable being on her knees in front of him and she hated it.

"David won't ever thank you the way he should, he's too proud." She found herself unable to meet his eyes as she spoke. She settled instead for gingerly laying a palm flat on his knee, a light touch to indicate her sincerity. "So I'm thanking you for everyone. For this… for helping us find Henry. And… and for…"

Fuck it, she thought, suddenly not caring if she made a fool of herself.

"For coming back."

Hook remained quiet and Emma dared to look up at him to gauge a response. He looked almost angry, but not in the predatory way she'd seen when he had clambered unceremoniously through the door to Neal's apartment building, ravenous and hell-bent on embedding his Hook as far as possible inside Gold's chest. Everything about him had been wild then, raging forward like a thirsty animal that would stop at nothing to get a drink of water, terrorizing anything and everything in its way.

No, this was not that kind of angry. It was a still, unmoving anger, and he looked hurt. It was as though Emma had just taken a deliberate shot at all his most hidden insecurities instead of literally thanking him on her knees.

But beyond the anger and the pain Emma couldn't rationalize in her own mind, there was behind his steely blue eyes that Emma knew all too well. Though she couldn't explain its presence on his face bow, she recognized it immediately.

It was the look of a scared child, lost and alone, unsure of what to do next but terrified of moving in case they did the wrong thing.

The inconvenient truth for Emma was that her brain was still too scrambled to deal with the barrage of emotions this situation brought forward. Although she was undoubtedly ecstatic to have her father alive and safe, she was also confused—hopelessly and dangerously confused—by Hook's sudden streak of valor. Nothing seemed to make sense anymore—nothing, not Hook or her own thoughts or even time itself. They were in godforsaken Neverland, where her son was trapped somewhere without her, screaming for her in the dead of the night and the only way she could get to him was with the help of a pirate that had inexplicably put himself second, twice, to the life and safety of Emma's family.

And then…

And then Emma couldn't even explain how she got there, didn't remember even moving, but she was kissing him. She was kissing Captain fucking Hook, soft yet firmly on his salty lips and his side was still bleeding and her hand was in his damp hair and he wasn't even stopping her.

He was still at first, obviously staggered by Emma's blunt action but then he was kissing her back. It wasn't like she imagined it would be, kissing Hook (because, yes, she had imagined it, but only at night and only to take her mind off Henry). The movement of his lips was tentative, as though he was afraid she would pull away if he got too eager. The unexpected hesitancy somewhat annoyed Emma. All she wanted him to do was reach up with his arms and surround her, to show her how cold his hook would feel against the small of her back and—

No, Emma thought, slamming on the brakes in her mind. What am I doing?

But Emma knew exactly what she was doing. She would pinch herself (hard) for it later. She was being the impressionable little girl she had never been, the damsel in distress, swooning over the dashing young man who had saved the day and earned her affections.

And that was not something Emma Swan did, no matter how good the dashing young man's lips tasted beneath her own.

She pulled away sharply and suddenly, stumbling backwards as if lightning had struck Hook's body and electrocuted her in its path. Hook didn't look surprised to see her go.

"I'm sorry, that—I shouldn't…" Emma stuttered. "I shouldn't have done that."

Hook looked down and avoided her eyes. Silence fell between them. She saw him wince slightly when he shifted on the bed, moving forward from the spot where Emma had unintentionally pushed him back. The small look of pain served as a reminder that she still had not finished tending to his wound.

Thankful for the excuse to rapidly move on from her embarrassing mistake, Emma returned to her spot before him and wordlessly picked up the needle. She made quick work of the rest of her undertaking, wanting to get the necessary task over with so she could run and hide in her cabin.

She was figuring out how to tie off the ends of the thread with her shaking hands when Hook spoke up suddenly.

"I'm not a hero, Emma," he said quietly. "Don't make me into one when that's the last thing I'll ever be."

It was a good thing his wound was as closed as Emma was going to get it because she couldn't stop herself from standing abruptly and throwing her hands in the air out of pure frustration.

Emma was sick of this, of everything—Hook's strange comments, his poorly disguised attempt at keeping secrets, his inability to explain anything about Neverland without making her even more confused, and now his strange aversion to being told he was good, for once.

"Why are you like this?" she demanded, not caring that she sounded like an angry teenager.

"Excuse me?" His body had gone stiff at her outburst, a reaction Emma recognized as an instinctual defense against onslaught. She didn't care.

"Ever since we got to Neverland, you've been talking cryptically about damn near everything," she said. "Why?"

"I'm afraid I don't know what you're referring to, love," he deflected, looking around the room and pretending, rather poorly, to be bored.

"Stop it," Emma bit back. "I don't know what this is about but I do knowthere's something you're not telling me." When she merged into his personal space, attempting her best to intimidate him, she could smell the saline blend of sweat and seawater on his skin. "Something I probably should know and I do not like it."

"It wouldn't do any good to—"

"It's about Henry, isn't it," she cut him off, asking without any real hint of a question in her tone. "About Greg and Tamara, why they took him." She watched his expression change rapidly, almost blackening at her accusation. "You know something and you don't want to tell me."

Hook remained silent and rigid like a brick wall. Emma wanted nothing but to corner him and somehow force him into doing what she asked, but the defensive, rigid line of his spine told her she wasn't going to get anywhere by simply asking nicely.

He's not going to tell me, she thought, drawing in a deep, shaky breath and struggling to maintain eye contact. She needed to make him think she was in charge, for once.

"I can hear him screaming at night, you know," Emma said. They hadn't talked about the distant cries from the island since that first night up on deck. "And I know you can, too."

The sudden defiance with which Hook met her gaze made Emma feel uneasy. It felt as though he were daring her to bait him further. But instead of snapping back at her aggressively, he forced himself into settling into a more relaxed position, letting his shoulders fall back as he looked away again. Hook's ability to deceive using just body language pissed off Emma to no end.

"It's all very… complicated, lass," he answered. Emma did not punch him. "Much more complicated than I'm sure you'll want to contend with after the ordeal you've just been through."

And that? That was the end of Emma's patience.

"What does that even mean?" she screamed, stepping backward and pointedly throwing some worn-looking papers off his large desk.

"Emma—"

"Who are Greg and Tamara working for?"

Hook shut his mouth. Behind the short flash of warning that shot across his face, there were unmistakable elements of surprise and guilt. His expression betrayed him and made Emma realize she had just called him out on the exact thing he was trying to hide from her.

"That's it, isn't it?" she said, stepping toe-to-toe with Hook and looking down at him. "Tell me! You know I deserve to hear the truth!"

"Sit down, Swan."

"No!" Emma shouted back, not caring who else on the ship might hear her. "Stop telling me what to do and just fucking tell me what you know about whoever—"

"I'm asking you to sit down because you're going to be here a while," Hook interjected, suddenly seething. "This story isn't short, darling, and it starts very a long time ago."

Emma's rage stopped dead. She wasn't quite sure what to say, already had so many other curses and nasty comments lined up to throw at Hook, but she honestly hadn't expected him to cave.

So she did the only thing she could come up with at the moment. She sat.

"How long?" Emma said quietly from the spot on the bed next to him. It was a hesitant question. She wasn't entirely she wanted to know the answer, didn't want more confusing information about Hook and Neverland stifling her brain. Nonetheless, she was positive that her best chance of getting Henry back involved her knowing absolutely everything.

Even so, she was unprepared for the answer that fell from his lips.

"Nine hundred and fifty years ago," he replied. "In Neverland."

Emma watched as his face slowly twisted into that crooked, raw grin she had seen only once or twice before. It was the kind of smile that made him bare his teeth like a cornered animal, and suddenly he was all Captain Hook, looking at her with a menacing visage that spoke both of his confidence and of how much he completely loathed himself.

"Well," he continued, "before Neverland was Neverland."

9/10/13: The following chapter will be very long. As in, 15k-20k words. It also happens to be the most important chapter of this work, so I am definitely taking my time with it and trying to make it perfect.

However, since the wait for this chapter appears to be quite long, I will be updating my blog with draft versions in five parts. This will be on my blog only. When all parts have been beta'd and revised to my satisfaction, only then will I add it on AO3.

If you're interested in reading the parts as I finish them, they can be found here on my tumblr (killipan-jones) tagged "TESW Chapter 5": tagged/tesw-chapter-5