#killian whump

[snowbellewells]

CS Fic Rec Monday: “Blood on My Name” by: @justanother-unluckysoul

My last rec for this Monday morning is a long one shot by @justanother-unluckysoul . I have come to really adore her particular blend of angst, whump and hurt/comfort over the last several months as I have begun to explore her catalogue of stories. This one caught my imagination, and I wanted to urge others to read it too.  This is a wartime AU where Emma is a nurse and finds a mortally wounded Killian after he falls on the battlefield. I loved how they were characterized, how their bond developed, the emotion and damage Killian in particular had to work through, just all of it up to the well-deserved healing by the conclusion. If you’ve missed it up to now, please check it out.

And @justanother-unluckysoul here’s hoping you’ll like this attempt at art for a wonderful read!

“Blood on my Name” by: @justanother-unluckysoul​

[laianely]

Just quick mischief

Tag people who may be interested: @killianxswan @teamhook @booksteaandtoomuchtv @exhaustedpirate @anmylica @hollyethecurious @kmomof4 @winterbaby89 @undercaffinatednightmare @resident-of-storybrooke @caught-in-the-filter @tiganasummertree @stahlords @lfh1226-linda @darkshadow7 @fleurdepetite @captainswan-kellie @motherkatereloyshipper @soniccat @jrob64 @beckettj @whimsicallyenchantedrose @jonesfandomfanatic @zaharadessert @bluewildcatfanatic @once-upon-a-happy-end @ultraluckycatnd

[beatenbruisedandbloody]

Jaw clenching collection 1

[hooked-on-swanics]

Chapter 2 of my Underworld/5b rewrite is up! If you like whump, if you like angst, if you like feels, this is for you.

I hope it hits you in the heart <3

[hannahhook7744]

Once upon a Hope part 7;

Emma and Killian talk and David finds them.

[temptressofyourdarkestdesire]

Chapters: 5/6 Previous Fandom: Once Upon a Time (TV) Rating: Mature Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Captain Hook | Killian Jones/Emma Swan Characters: Captain Hook | Killian Jones, Emma Swan, Evil Queen | Regina Mills, OC - Character Additional Tags: Whump, Blood, Knives, Poison, Magic, Angst, Pain, Killian Whump, No Sex, No Smut, just whump with a little bit of story, Choking, ropes

Summary: A former adversary of Hook opens up some old wounds.

Chapter V: The Cure

He had to get rid of the nightmares. He knew he had to. Although Emma hadn’t asked about them anymore he couldn’t miss her questioning glances every time he woke up from another one. He knew curiosity would get the better of her eventually and then he wouldn’t be able to shake her off with some made up story. Better to not let it get so far. The cure was still daunting but it was better than Emma pitying him constantly. On the bright side he would be rid of the nightmares once and for all, but he was still scared. Therefore he hesitated with going to Carmine. Then the perfect opportunity arrived. Emma was planning a trip with Henry and would be gone for two days. It was now or never. So he set off reluctantly after they’d left.

The friendly receptionist went to fetch Carmine once again, after Hook had arrived at the order. He was resolved to do this, but he was on edge. He was reminded of what had happened in the cell far too often and giving himself into the hands of his torturer once again felt terribly wrong.

“Hook, how nice of you to visit me. What can I do for you?”, Carmine said cheerfully.

“You know exactly why I’m here,” he growled.

“So you’ve finally grown weary of your nightmares. Took you long enough. Didn’t your girlfriend want to do it?”

“I don’t want her to do it. Now could we get on with it?” Carmine smiled.

“She doesn’t know you’re here, does she?”

“This is between you and me.” He hoped they would be done before Emma came back. He’d left a note that would buy him some more time. Hopefully it would be enough.

“Won’t she come looking for you? Certainly she’ll miss her little pirate after a while,” she said mockingly. Hook didn’t reply. Had this been a good idea? It was too late to turn back now, but her tone wasn’t making him more confident in his decision.

“I think we will find out, won’t we? Please follow me.” Carmine led Hook down the corridor behind the doorway. There were doors left and right and at the end of it a stair led upstairs and the corridor turned to the right. Carmine opened the last door on the left, next to the stairs. The room looked eerily similar to the cell with a bed on the right wall and two armchairs and a coffee table on the left wall, but it was a lot friendlier. The bed looked comfortable and there was a bedside table next to it.

“This room is for our clients and our staff to rest. There are more of them upstairs. Please take off your jacket and your shirt, I’ll be right back.” Carmine left Hook standing and disappeared. He undressed very reluctantly and put his clothes over one of the armchairs. Then he removed the harness for his hook. He really hated doing that, because it made him feel helpless and vulnerable. Carmine returned with another vial, but the same dagger as last time.

“Here.” She handed him the vial. Knowing what it contained he didn’t hesitate and drank it. Unsurprisingly it had the iron taste of blood. Carmine had propped up some cushions and motioned for him to get onto the bed. He sat down and was glad that he was more in a sitting position than lying.

“This is the last opportunity to back out. Are you really sure you want to do this?” The concerned tone of her voice surprised Hook. As if she’d sensed his surprise she told him:

“Look, I won’t say I’m not going to enjoy that, but I’m here in my healing function and I will try to make this as painless as possible.”

“Why?”

“Unlike you we don’t bear grudges. I caught you spying, I punished you and we’re done. In my view you’re here because you need help and I’ll help as best as I can.” Suddenly the anger Hook had felt when he first met Carmine in Storybrooke flared up.

“It was a hell of a punishment and it’s still going on!”

“The only other option was killing you, besides I’m not the only one who hurt you.” She’d laid her hand on Hook’s shoulder to calm him down and obviously sensed the wounds left by Hades.

“Someone messed you up pretty good.”

“Yeah, that was literally in hell,” he snarled. She’d moved her hand to the spot where Emma had run him through with the sword. He winced at the memory and the touch.

“You should be dead.” Carmine sounded surprised.

“How are you alive?”

“Divine intervention.” Carmine started to laugh.

“What’s so funny about that?” His anger was fading and made way for confusion.

“Well, for a start...” Carmine was still chuckling and held her hands up in front of Hook.

“...they could’ve brought you back with two hands. And they didn’t have to bring you back with poison in your blood. They could’ve cured you. They really have a strange kind of humour.” She shook her head in disbelief.

“Are you ready to start?”

Hook nodded and braced himself. Carmine took the dagger and opened the wound with a clean cut. This cut was a little deeper then the first time and the blood started to trickle out of the wound immediately. Hook had grabbed the sheet and clenched his teeth. The cut was stinging, but he hadn’t to worry about that for too long. Shortly after Carmine cut open the scar, his body felt as if something was pulled out of him that desperately clung to him. Every vein felt as if something had dug claws in them and held on for dear life. It was agonizing. He barely noticed how his chest got sticky with blood and that he started to shake uncontrollably after some time. Then Carmine healed the cut and the pain almost vanished. It was still there, but it felt like a faint memory of what he’d felt just seconds before. In exchange he was feeling now the full extent of the blood loss and the strange sensation of the potion that replenished his blood supply. He felt awful and he knew it would get worse.

“I will give you some time and then we will have to do that again.” It was too late to do anything else now anyway.

“How long will it take?”

“How long? Are you in a hurry? Do you have anywhere to be? It will take as long as the first time, so three days. And before you ask; it’s not possible to speed things up, if you want to survive this.” Three days. He closed his eyes. Emma was only gone for two days, maybe two and a half. He could only hope she wouldn’t come looking for him. He didn’t want her to see him like that. It was better to worry about Emma than to think about the fact that that also meant that he would have to spend another three days in agony.

Carmine repeated the cutting and healing a few times and slowly the poison started to withdraw from his limbs only to wreak even more havoc in the rest of his body. He lost track of time and how many times the wound had been ripped open and healed. The pain in his body grew with every cut. The poison fought with fervour against its undoing. At one point it got so bad that Hook fought Carmine with hand and feet, when she tried to cut him once more. He knew they had to go on, but he just couldn’t. He cried and wailed and tried to push her away. She had to use her whole strength to push him down and slice the scar open again.

“I’ll have to tie you to the bed, if you don’t calm down.” Her words where lost in his screams, when even more blood flowed out of the wound. His chest, part of his pants and the bed where covered with dried and fresh blood by now. He should’ve fainted from the pain or the blood loss hours ago, but the poison kept him awake.

Some hours later the pain in his body started to fade gradually. It was still burning like fire, but compared to the agony he’d felt in the worst moments, it became almost bearable. It looked like he’d soon overcome the poison. All would be well.

Then suddenly the door flung open and there stood Emma.

[lassiewhumpee]

We as a fandom, and the writers as writers, didn't and don't focus on the fact that Archie Hopper was literally tortured by Hook. Like, this pirate who's never met him ties him up under his ship, bounds and gags him, and tells him "I've always wanted to dissect a cricket" whilst forcing his chin up with his hook. So, after all that, I think it's funny that Archie then officiated Hook and Emma's wedding. It's never mentioned, like, ever- Like, Archie, this guy literally disected you like a cricket and you're just chill with him???😭

[stubblesandwich]

You have to help me, Swan!

Your family needs you.

If anyone deserves to go to the Underworld, it's me.

Clearly still thinking about S5 in the year of our Lord 2025. Made with ardent love for the birthday girl, @the-ginger-avenger 😘

[mockiery]

Abstract Reflections - Ch 1

He'd dealt with Pan for two centuries, played his games, took his demonic thrills in stride. But Killian feels the difference here and now. Those were men, boys, mindless monsters. This is a god. After his sacrifice, Killian Jones awakes in the Underworld and is faced with the torments of a sadistic god, his own body and mind turned against him. Memories of Killian's long life and lost loved ones weigh heavily on his soul, some sending him into spirals of guilt and despair, others grounding him and giving him hope. All he can do is try to resist the pull of darkness and oblivion until Hades bores of him; or better yet, someone he loves deems him worthy of saving.

Tags: Captain Swan, Jones Family, Underworld Arc, Character Study, Whump, Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Guilt, Flashbacks, Memories, etc. (more listed on ao3)

[AO3] | Rated M | 4.1k words

Next Chapter | Masterlist

thanks to the wonderful @brucethegirl for beta reading for me!

-

Chapter 1. An Underworld Welcome

First, is the cold. The feeling of frigid stone beneath him, rough against the exposed skin of his hand and cheek — a cold that settles into his bones. Then, it's the heat. Burning, intense heat from above, like standing too close to a bonfire or forge, radiating through his flesh. Neither extreme offers any respite from the other, just further discomfort.

His eyes blink open, slow. There’s no light at first. He rolls from his side onto his back, body aching, but as his left arm finds ground, something sharp and burning presses through the fabric of his jacket and into his skin. He flinches away, grabbing at the spot, feeling the new wound. Only an inch wide, it doesn't seem too deep, but gods it stings. He's had severe wounds that felt better than this one does, and it leaves him wondering if the burning was the heat or something more insidious: a poison or an acid. His eyes are as adjusted as it seems they’re capable of in this darkness, finding no firelight to account for the oppressive heat.

He breathes stale air and gives whatever space he’s in a proper and thorough scan of his senses. There's a crick in his neck that goes taut as he stretches, limiting his movements. He'd not slept on the floor in a long while, and he always had the sense to put his arm under his damned head when he did. His mind is hazy, and while his joints and muscles ache, there's no pounding in his head that signifies he's been knocked out.

It's hard to push his senses beyond the cold and heat overwhelming his focus, but he manages. The room smells of dust, stone, rust, and metal, with an undercurrent of human stench. Something acrid is muddying the metallic taste on the heavy, still air, making it harder to determine if it's blood or not. Killian had been in a number of dungeons in his time, and this felt like an amalgamation of the worst each brig had to offer.

Every breath and movement he makes echoes through the space, proving his instincts right- he's in a small room, big enough for a person. The perfect size for a cell.

Where, then? He can't hear anything beyond the sound of himself in this damn room. Maybe the flicker of a torch somewhere far away? So much metal and rust to breathe in, but no clinking of anything but his own necklace on the floor below. It's maddeningly quiet, eerie and lifeless. For a moment he fears it's his own bloody hearing at fault, failing him, his ears damaged, but his breathing sounds just as loud as it should, as does his sigh of relief that follows that assuring thought.

He closes his eyes tightly, trying to make them adjust to the darkness, taking inventory of his own body in the meantime. His hook is sharp as ever, and the weight of his rings grace his fingers. Good. Wherever he is, he hasn't been robbed and disarmed. His hand continues inventory, he's dressed fully: jacket, belt, vest all from the magic-free realm of Emma's, and-

Emma. His hand freezes at the center of his abdomen. He thumbs through the buttons of his shirt, finding only an old scar at the base of his ribs that he's had for ages. Nothing new. No... no sign of Excalibur's cursed blade. He reaches for his neck — no cut there either. Did...? That all happened, didn't it? How...?

He reaches out with his hook tenderly, slowly sweeping it back and forth, surveying for any hazards to avoid as his mind races. What happened? How did he get here? The last thing he remembered...

Emma. Her eyes fill with tears, a pleading in her eyes that Killian has never seen before. Killian holds the sword out for Emma to take.

Her voice wavers, "I don't want to lose you."

"And I don't want to lose you." Killian is struggling, the sword pulsing in his hand. It’s taking everything he has to keep the darkness in it. He looks to Emma and knows she's his whole world. He'd do anything to save just her, and this sacrifice will save so much more than just her. "But you have to let me go. Let me die a hero! That's the man I want you to remember, please!"

Emma takes the sword, and the release of tension is short lived as he sees her arm shake with the power she is now containing. He knows she can hold it. Far better than he ever could.

"I love you." She kisses him. She's so warm and good and he doesn't let his hand find her because he knows he wouldn't be able to let go. The time feels slow but is gone so quickly.

"I love you, too." He returns as soon as the kiss breaks. Emma steps back.

He gives a small, reassuring smile. "It's okay."

Emma lets out a sob, readying the blade, shaking. He steals one last look to her family, seeing the pain and the fear in them. Henry looks scared and confused, the lad wrapped in his adoptive mother's arms. Regina's look is knowing, as is David's. David holds his wife, Snow's shock juxtaposed to David's pained acceptance, the glisten in his eyes squeezes his heart in his chest more than he'd admit to the man. He wishes he could say how sorry he is for everything, but they know already. It's in their eyes. He almost wishes Belle were here, so she could see the regret and apology in his face now, but she's better off not seeing this. He squeezes his jaw tighter and hopes that his own eyes say everything he needs them to.

With a shuddering breath, he looks back to Emma and the glimmering blade she raises. He steels himself and nods.

His body tightens to brace for the pain as Emma moves, the sob escaping her as the sword pushes through his center, and he can't hold in the cry of pain that comes out. He wanted to stay strong, wanted to make it easier for her and her family, but he couldn't. He's always been the weakest.

Excalibur, pulsing with darkness, tears into his body with a viciousness, and it's all he can feel for a moment, the overwhelming pain, his head is light and his balance teeters. Emma's head is on his shoulder, his chin on hers as he falters against the heaviness weighing on his consciousness. But he pushes it back, his vision is fogging, and he can only reach his hand up to ground himself, his forehead to Emma's, his hand finding her cheek.

He forces his eyes open as much as he can and sees the darkness leave her, the red of that jacket of hers in his peripheral. He'd smile if he had the power to. She pulls back, drawing the sword out of him and he hears his own whimper like it's coming from somewhere else.

He barely catches himself as his knees start to buckle, and Excalibur disintegrates in Emma's hold. The sword gone, Killian feels that horrible burning gash open on his neck, like it never left. Emma surges to him as he fails to hold his own weight up any longer, and he feels her ease him to the ground. His eyelids are too heavy, he's so exhausted. He doesn't have to see her to know she's with him.

It's familiar, the way he's fallen. How he's been caught. Held. Once again, his body rests on the grass, hand cradling his head as she lays him down. This time she doesn't try to stop the bleeding at his neck with magic, instead pushing sweat-matted hair away from his forehead. She holds his hand, her tears coloring his skin as she sobs into his chest. There's a tremble in Emma's hands long after Killian's own hand has stilled. He hears her crying, soft and shuddering, incomplete shapes of words in shuddered sobbing breaths. He thinks he hears "sorry" and "love" and he exhales shakily when her lips touch his forehead. Emma's hold on his hand is tight and close to her chest. He feels the heave of her breath, the throb of her heart in her chest, and he knows he's breaking it.

He wishes he could hold her, thank her, say he's sorry, say he loves her. As the end finds him, Killian is glad he could die in her arms a second time.

Killian shudders, frozen in place. Did... did she bring him back somehow, heal Excalibur's wounds? Did she find a way? Did she... did she take it back, did Emma try to-

"You have to help me, Swan. Take it."

"I can't. It should be me."

No, no she couldn't, even if she wanted, that cursed sword was gone. It'd been destroyed with him.

"Your family needs you." Killian couldn't understand how Emma could offer such a thing, her life was worth more than his ever would be. "If anyone deserves to go to the underworld, it's me."

His eyes widen. He swipes his hook imprecisely ahead of him in the darkness and shoots up to a sitting position.

The smell... Brimstone. Sulfur. Blood. Ash.

Another frantic sweep of his hook above him nearly throws out his shoulder, the hook unexpectedly catching on a chain above. He yelps and thrashes until the hook is free, rising to a crouch, not yet daring to stand. He slows, trying to steady his breathing. If he's where he thinks he is... Why is he breathing? Why does he hear his heartbeat in his ears, why does he have a heartbeat at all?

He reaches his hook higher, testing for anything above him other than the chain. Finding the chain alone, he rises steadily, the stiffness in his limbs slowing him more than his caution.

"Oh please, don't stand on my account," a voice echoes through the small space. Killian flinches, his hook raising and his hand instinctively going for his cutlass, finding nothing on his belt.

He stares hard in the direction the voice came from in the blackness and speaks as forcefully as he can, "Show yourself. Who are you?" It comes out hoarse at first but is satisfactorily strong by the end.

"Is that any way to treat your host?" The snide response comes from behind him, and Killian quickly turns to face their new position. He hadn't heard them move.

"Who are you?" He demands again, a growl in his words.

The voice laughs, deep and condescending, once again from a new location. Whoever it is, they're toying with him. And enjoying it.

"Come on, now, Hook. You knew where you were going."

"Show yourself now or-"

 "Or what? You'll hook me to death?"

"I've done it a hundred times before." Killian's delivered better threats, but he's not exactly in his realm of comfort.

"A hundred? Oh, don't sell yourself short, I'm sure it was more than that. You've killed more than that, I'd wager. But never something like me."

Something. Not someone. Something.

The space alights, blue in hue and flickering from a source behind him. The room he’s in is worse than he'd imagined: dried blood on the floor, on the wall, mixed into the dust. A small dagger caked with dried blood lays on the ground — the blade that had nicked his arm.

Somehow the air is even hotter now and Killian turns to the source.

Before him, his taunter stands with arms crossed, leaning against the cell's wall. The man's scalp and shoulders are aflame with blue fire — and yet there's a cold impassiveness in his eyes. He looks at Killian like he's an insignificant speck of dirt, an annoyance.

"You're..."

"Hades, yes." The god waves his hand with disinterest. The fire diminishes, leaving a dim wall-mounted torch as the only light source. "I'm sure you're honored."

"Wh-" the start of an incomplete question escapes his lips before he has enough mind to think first. He clenches his jaw, sharpening his expression.

The god continues without pause. "I, on the contrary, am not what you'd call honored." Hades crooks his head with a frown and steps further into the cell's tight space. Killian stands his ground, glare following Hades as the god circles him.

"You have been an inconvenience, to say the least," the god assesses aloud. His cold gaze sizes up his new captive soul from head to boot and seems to find Killian more than lacking.

A shiver rockets down Killian's spine. He conceals it with a roll of his shoulders, straightening up to meet the god's height with his own, but his nerves stay balanced on a razor's edge.

"You're centuries overdue, for starters. But I could let that slide with all the souls you were sending my way." He's close now, speaking over Killian's shoulder. "Lost boys, sailors, knights, merchants, all sorts. But ooh, you really started slowing down, didn't you, Hook?"

It takes every bit of his self-control to not pull away, refusing to allow Hades to gain a single inch in this game of intimidation. Killian knows these ploys all too well. He'd used them and been at the mercy of them for centuries.

"Or do you prefer Killian these days?" Hades mocks, rolling his eyes.

 Killian's mouth twitches. "Captain, to you." 

Hades slows to a stop and laughs. Another shiver shoots through Killian, this one less concealed. The god turns his head to him and smiles.

Killian feels his airway close before he processes the sight of Hades grabbing his throat. He's dead, his body is back in Storybrooke, his heart pierced through by Excalibur, his blood poured out onto the lake’s shore. But he bleeds here in the Underworld, and he needs to breathe. His vision starts to darken at the edges as Hades suspends him a foot above the ground like he weighs nothing.

His hand and hook latch onto the god's arm, scratching, pushing, pulling, trying to lift himself to find relief. Before Killian's boot can make any contact, Hades sharply yanks him sideways through the air.

"I hate to tell you, Captain, I'm the only one with any titles or command around here." He throws Killian against the wall, head slamming hard into stone, clattering to the floor. "And you haven't led a crew in quite some time."

"Aye, I've not," He admits, croaking out between a heaving breath and cough, hand shielding his throat, checking his neck for anything broken. Finding nothing out of place, he recovers, rising up. Thankfully he feels nothing wrong with his movement or sensation beyond the bruising. He pushes himself up to stand.

"Hook, then. At least while I let you keep your little toy there, hm? Sound good?"

Killian's blood runs cold.

Hades smirks. "As I was saying, you've really let me down these past few years, Hook. Just not enough souls dying by your hands- or hand, forgive me." He makes a false apologetic face that makes Killian want to throttle the bastard, but he holds himself.

"Now that- that was enough for me to want to have some words with you. But this recent business, this Dark One mess?" Hades grabs him by the throat again, slamming him against the wall this time. "That requires more than words."

Killian's hook is useless, failing to even snag the god's sleeve as he struggles. But when Killian meets the god's eyes, trying to speak, the grip loosens enough for Killian to wheeze out, "I'd have thought you'd like what I got up to as a Dark One." He raises his eyebrow, shoving down the panic igniting his nerves, aiming for his playfulness in duels past. He doesn't think he's all that successful.

"Up until you went and raised all the Dark Ones out of my domain, I had." Killian must look confused because Hades scoffs. "They were my best torturers down here, whether they were working for me or not. And now? I'm fresh out of all my favorite dead Dark Ones. Thanks to you."

Killian smirks, and were his vocal cords not being crushed, he'd tell the evil bastard 'you're welcome'. Hades catches his meaning well enough it seems though, squeezing tighter until Killian's vision goes dark at the edges. Before consciousness abandons him, Hades throws Killian face first to the ground across the room. His arms don't move fast enough, unable to stop his forehead thrashing into the rough stone.

He coughs, his hand at his throat again, as if that'd help him breathe better. He pushes himself up by his hook, the metal scraping against the stone with a dreadful noise.

"Forgive me for being unaware of Dark Ones’ continued employment after death." The gravel in his voice strains painfully, but he grins up at the god as he rises to his eye level. "Would've considered that more thoroughly before I sacrificed my bloody life."

"You think you're cute, don't you?"

Killian huffs a painful laugh. "I think I'm right bloody handsome, yes."

The pure, gleeful malice that ignites in Hades' eyes is enough to make Killian's stomach turn. "Let's see what I can do about that."

Hades grabs him by the collar and pushes him down to his knees effortlessly. When the god's fist finds Killian's face, his vision goes white, his neck snaps back like whiplash from the carriages of Emma's realm — cars, or whatever. He's still reeling, his hand limply clawing at Hades' grasp, when another impossibly powerful strike collides with his face. His left eye feels like it's been crushed inside his skull. When he goes slack, Hades' grip on his collar is the only thing keeping him up. Then there's a hand in his hair, pulling, ripping him up from the freezing floor before just as quickly slamming his face to the stone of the wall and releasing him. His own dead weight drops him to the floor, where his cheek and chin take a final blow.

Killian has bested men with greater strength than his own more times than he can count. He's killed a few dozen that he'd consider more talented swordsmen than him. He bloody well held his own against a giant undead witch for far longer than anyone should've, after a 30 foot fall onto unforgiving rock. He'd dealt with Pan for two centuries, played his games, took his demonic thrills in stride. But Killian feels the difference here and now.

 Those were men, boys, mindless monsters. This is a god. 

He deals more force into a hit than Killian has felt before; Killian's left eye is swollen over, a pool of fire in the socket, and the surrounding structures throbbing enough that Killian fears the browbone's been fractured. The pain is blinding in more ways than one. His throat is bruised enough that every breath hurts. He swallows, forcing down a whimper at the pain of the action. Still, he pushes himself up, managing to get to his hand and knees, feeling every impact bruise across his body. He forces his breath to steady.

When Killian dares to look up to the god, Hades is watching. His hands are tucked behind his back as he leans over patiently, studying him. With Killian's face in view now, Hades grins at his handiwork. "Now, that's a start."

"What do you want from me?"

Hades' grin widens. "Why, what a lovely question! Someone's finally catching up. I thought you'd be a slow one, but here we are already!"

Killian exhales, pushing himself up and back, sitting on his heels unsteadily. He looks to Hades and waits.

"First, I want to try something. This need not be a wholly negative relationship. You may well prove to me that you can make up for all the Dark Ones you lost."

"How so?"

"I'm glad you asked."  

Hades' smug face isn't one that Killian thinks he likes much. He'd worked for ship captains with that look — if you got yourself in trouble and wanted to make it to shore, you apologized, and you groveled. You asked to make it up to them, offer to work the whole night through, something grueling. Or on the rare occasion, you offered invaluable information that'd either make money or reveal a side-dealing first mate. But that was rarely all they wanted, not from a sailor that'd wronged his captain. The lash was always part of the deal.

Hades looks to the dagger on the floor. Killian's eyes — or rather, his eye, he's down to one now — follows it as the blade shoots up, handle first, into Hades' hand. The god ponders it, turning it over in his grasp. Dagger was a generous word, it's small, more a knife than a dagger.

"What do you plan to do with that?" Killian's brows raise, the left one alighting with pain at the movement. He grits his teeth.

"Oh me? Nothing. It’s what you will do with it." He places the handle in Killian's palm with a devilish look. "I'm surprised you don't recognize it, considering, well, what you've done with it before." 

Killian holds it, his mind in its air-starved and rattled state sluggishly trying to piece together Hades' implication.

"Oh, I like that. Searching your mind for all the blood you've shed, looking for a time you used something as small as this. No hook, no sword, but an itty bitty knife. How personal it had to have been, right? Feel the blood on your hand, see the look in his eyes up close as you take a man's life."

Killian's heart stutters in his chest.

"Oh, there it is! Tell me. Please enlighten your audience, captain."

Killian's jaw is a vice, tight enough that his bruised throat burns. He forces the words through clenched teeth. "Brennan Jones."

"How cold, truly. Name, not relationship? That's a good sign, I'd worried you'd gone too soft." Hades grins, that vicious fire in his eyes returned. "Who was he, Hook?"

"You already bloody well know." The contempt in his expression could rival the god's.

Hades steps into his face so he's all Killian can see. The god himself burns and freezes like the cell itself does. "I want to hear it. From you."

His gaze falls. "My father."

Killian couldn't look his father in the eye as he drove the knife into him, and Hades knows it, it seems. There are very few lives he's taken with a broken gaze. He'd excused it as remaining vigilant of his surroundings, and it was. But in truth, it was simple guilt. Hades has chosen to toy with his mind, with his guilt — it's a familiar twist of the knife that's been stuck in his gut for centuries. Killian dreads the game that this god of demons has in store for him. He'd thought he'd seen the worst that the worlds' most manipulative bastards had to offer, but this was a god.

"Thank you." Hades whispers it condescendingly into his ear, before stepping back and opening his arms in a grand gesture. "Now, I have a very special gift just for you. Consider it an audition."

"For what?"

 "You said it yourself, didn’t you? Dark Ones don’t get to retire." He clicks his tongue disapprovingly with a shake of his head.

"What do you want from me?" Killian spits. He's running out of patience. And sense.

 "That's the spirit! Keep that energy going, you'll need it."

Killian almost lunges at the man, stepping forward with the knife raised in threat. His hook did nothing, he doubts this little thing could do any better but wielding it in Hades direction feels better than just standing around. Hades feigns surprise.

"Easy, now." The 'surprise' turns to a smirk. "Save it for your cellmate."

Killian squints, keeping the blade up. "Cellmate?"

"You didn't notice? My, my, I thought your instincts were better than that, Hook."

Hades practically pouts at him, shrugging when Killian's eyes scan the cell. The grated bars lack any door, and the other stone walls are empty. There's nothing but blood and chains hanging off the wall. He looks to Hades again who smiles, his shrug relaxes as his eyes drift up from Killian to something directly above him.

Dread fills Killian's gut. He follows the god's gaze up to the cell's ceiling and his stomach drops.

Above, wrapped in hanging chains, is a bloody mass of a man, hanging limply. His blood-matted hair hangs down and obscures his features, but Killian knows that face. He knows it anywhere. He's seen it in nightmares for centuries, seen his smiling assurance that night before he sold Killian and Liam away. He's seen that desperate dying face tell Killian he could still change and be a better man, seen it every night when he's closed his eyes. Killian's father hangs unconscious, beaten, bloodied, and chained. In hell. And Killian sent him here.

[chaotic-orphan]

The Immortal Hunter (6)

Read part one here // continued from here

*~*~*~*~*

Heath didn’t leave Killian’s side for a week after Felix’s party. On the third day that Killian stepped outside his quaint cottage on the edge of town, he smiled, bemused at the vampire who lingered on the stone wall across from his house.

“Do vampires sleep?” Killian asked that morning. Heath nodded along, enjoying the conversations he had with the human. It had been a while since he let himself have a friend, let alone a human one.

“Yes. We can sleep. I enjoy sleeping, I just don’t need to do it. Vampires are crepuscular creatures anyways so we—”

“Crepe— what?”

Heath blinked. “Oh, sorry. We’re nocturnal. We sleep at day and wake up naturally at night for the hunt. The opposite to humans who sleep at night and wake during the day.”

Killian hummed. “Felix isn’t nocturnal,” he said quietly.

Heath’s haze hardened as they came up to the gates of Felix’s estate. “No. Felix is an exception to many rules.”

Felix raised an eyebrow when Heath opened the door of the state house, Killian following behind. His cat-like eyes drifted lazily to the clock, a minute before the start of Killian’s shift. Hmph.

Felix greeted them in his usual cheerful way. Killian nodded stiffly, responding politely before dismissing himself to get to work. That left Heath as the object of Felix’s attention.

“You seem to have taken a liking to my darling pet,” Felix told him with a smile.

“He’s your employee, not your pet.”

“Well, he’s not as fun as you were. You could do it all. Employee, human punching bag, entertainment, blood source.”

Heath bristled when Felix slung a lithe arm around his shoulders, guiding him into Felix’s study. It was a beautiful room, and Heath could see why Felix spent most of his time in here. The walls on either side were fitted with mahogany shelves, lined with at least two hundred titles, all of which Felix had read. Some that even Heath read after Felix taught him how.

Dark oak wooden floors boxed in the lush, burgundy carpet that ran the length of the floor; the middle strip where Felix’s cherrywood desk stood proud, commanding the space. Behind the desk was the giant gothic window that opened out into the grounds behind the house. Heath remembered when he was helping the stable hand attend to the horses, feeling eyes on him and looking up to see Felix observing him from his study window. His proud head held high, arms behind his back, and even from the vast distance Heath could still feel Felix’s hungry, predatory grin on his face.

“Whiskey, darling?” Felix asked, disentangling himself from Heath and walking over to his decanter beside the two armchairs off to the left of the room, near the exposed fireplace.

“Why not.” Heath said with a shrug, following him to the armchairs and settling into one, staring into the flames of the fire. “You can’t touch Killian, Felix,” Heath said, the fire dancing in the reflection of his eyes.

The vampire paused his movements for a brief moment, a cunning smile gracing his lips. “Mmm. I love it when you’re bossy.”

“I mean it,” Heath told him, taking the glass of whiskey with a pointed look. Felix ignored it as he sat in the other armchair, staring into the flames. “The Hunter is protective of him, and if you get between that… he’ll rip you apart.”

“As if you wouldn’t love that,” Felix purred. “Such a shame that you’re leaving us to return your green hills of old.”

Heath bristled, shifting to get more comfortable. He felt Felix’s cat like eyes on him, studying him, everything he did or didn’t do.

“Well… I think I might be sticking around for a bit.”

“For how long?” Felix didn’t give him the time to answer, humming to himself, swirling the honey-coloured liquid in his glass. “Wait, no. Let me guess. Around… 80 years?”

Heath took a sip instead of answering.

Felix laughed. “And if I turn him before then?” He asked, his voice low and sultry. Heath looked at the vampire, letting his emotions pass over his face. “I guess you’d have to stay around forever, love.”

“Don’t test me, Felix.”

“Oh come on. You just need a little blood in you. Then you’ll lighten up.” Felix said. “I have blood on tap if you want it.”

“I’m about two seconds away from ripping your throat out.”

Felix waved him away. “You old flirt, you. Though, we do have to discuss your living arrangements if you are to stay here with me.”

“I’ll find somewhere in the village.”

“Nonsense.”

“I’d rather not stay here, Felix.”

“Well… that just won’t do, will it?” Felix asked, his bright eyes basking in Heath’s attention. “I’ll tell you what, darling. Because we’re such old friends, and because I understand that that monster inside of you will protect Killian at all costs, I have a proposition for you.”

Heath scoffed, nostrils flaring, because he knew exactly what Felix’s propositions were. Heath turned his eyes back to the flames, wondering vaguely if setting himself on fire would hurt less than whatever evil Felix had concocted in his mind. “Is this one I can refuse?”

“Of course, love. I’m not unreasonable. You always had a choice.”

Heath downed the rest of the liquid in his glass, savouring the burn in the back of his throat. “Alright.”

“I won’t touch a pretty little hair on Killian’s head, he will be the most protected human in the village. I’ll even spare his little family my wrath too.”

Heath nodded. “Okay.”

“But you have to understand, that that would mean I would be extremely bored, and you know how I get when I’m bored… so either, wow, look at me. Giving you options aren’t I so generous? The years have made me soft, Heath. Or maybe that was just your effect on me.”

“Either?…” Heath echoed, imploringly. Felix exposed his fangs over his lips, knowing he had Heath right where he wanted him.

Felix kissed his teeth, tsking Heath lightly as he stepped around to the back of Heath’s chair, slinking his arms over Heath possessively.

“You’re no fun, darling,” he said with a playful pout, lips beside Heath’s ear. Heath raised a hand, wrapping his fingers around Felix’s wrist, trying to dislodge the touchy vampire from him, but Felix just clamped down harder around Heath. “And you forget, I’m stronger than you,” he whispered, pressing a kiss to Heath’s temple.

Heath huffed out a breath. “Either?” Heath repeated, defeated.

“Either, you take up your old position for me, in place of Killian. You provide me with all the joy and entertainment you used to before,” Felix murmured, smiling when he felt Heath shiver under him at the mention of entertainment. “Come back under contract for me, and work for me again…”

Felix trailed off, running a hand through Heath’s hair and pulling his head back and to the side, grazing his fangs along Heath’s throat. “Or you go out and you enthral a sweet little human for me to play with while you protect poor little Killian.”

Heath stiffened under Felix, his grip turning white knuckled on the glass. The sound of glass cracking punctured the silence between them until Felix tutted and Heath relaxed his grip.

“That’s—” Heath stuttered. “You know that’s not even an option.”

“But it is, love. I’ve always given you the choice.”

“The illusion of choice,” Heath spat, his words coated with a helpless venom. Felix’s free hand roamed to Heath’s chest over where his heart used to beat.

“Well, if it makes you feel better, I’m making concessions too. It’s so much more fun to terrify humans, the taste of their fear, the pounding of blood.” Felix tightened his hand over Heath’s heart, puncturing his chest with his claws. Heath jerked forward with a hiss, but Felix pulled him gently back. “Though I’m sure I could make do with having you by my side again. You always were my favourite, you know.”

If Heath had a heart, he knew it would be racing a drumbeat in his chest. His lungs would tighten in his chest, pulsing against his ribs at the panic that threatened to overwhelm him at Felix’s generous offer.

“And if I refuse?”

Felix sighed against Heath, nuzzling his nose into Heath’s throat. “Then I’d have to use Killian in your place.”

Heath froze under Felix. Felix’s fangs traced a line down Heath’s throat, already knowing what Heath was going to choose.

“I hate you.”

“I know, little one.”

Heath’s fingers curled into fists, useless. He knew coming back here was a bad idea, a terrible idea, but to think that Felix would trap him again like this? He got out, why did he come back?! Why!

“We make a blood pact,” Heath demanded, tightening his free hand into a fist on the armchair.

“I wouldn’t have it any other way, darling.” Heath’s breath hitched as Felix’s fang drew a bead of blood in his throat. “Can I take that as a yes?”

Heath deflated in the armchair. He swallowed thickly.

“Yes.”

Felix hummed, delighted and sank his fangs into Heath’s throat. Heath bucked against him, trying to dislodge the ancient vampire from his neck, but Felix held him down with ease as if Heath still had the strength of a human. Heath hated the way he could feel Felix’s fangs draw the limited blood from his system, weakening him the more he drank.

Felix moaned happily against Heath, drinking every last drop with all the greed he wanted to. Heath was a vampire, he wouldn’t die if he was drained dry. Felix didn’t know why he didn’t think of this before. All the worries and limitations of humans could be mitigated with a vampire slave.

It was only when Heath let out a small keening whine that Felix pulled away, licking the wounds to seal them and stop Heath bleeding out. He didn’t even have to do that, it was more like a reflex than anything else.

Heath’s vision blurred, feeling lightheaded as Felix pulled away. He dropped the glass to the floor, which Felix caught before it hit the ground. The vampire set the two glasses on a table between the armchairs, smiling at Heath who was glaring weakly up at him through half lidded eyes. The venom must still have an effect on Heath’s body. Something Felix noted and stored away in the back of his mind.

“Oh, look at you,” Felix cooed, booping Heath on the nose. “Still as adorable as the first day I found you.”

“Fuh—ck you.”

“Still as feisty too.”

Heath tried to sit up, but his body felt as if it was cemented down to the chair in lead. Fuck. He hadn’t felt this powerless since… since he couldn’t remember when. He watched through half-lidded eyes as Felix cut a line over his wrist and Heath tried to push himself forward to reach the vampires arm. He had to drink Felix’s blood for the pact to be binding, to protect Killian if Heath agreed to be Felix’s fucking slave again.

Felix held his wrist out of Heath’s reach, his bright eyes shining as he watched Heath struggle and pant against Felix’s venom. “Come on, Heath. Just a little further,” he coaxed.

Heath shook his head, trying to shake off the numbness that kept his body still as the grave. He grunted with the effort, slamming his eyes shut as he moved forward, the world spinning as he fought against the compulsion to keep him docile.

“Come on, Heath,” Felix taunted. “Don’t you want to save that poor human’s miserable existence?”

Heath finally grabbed Felix’s arm at the elbow, pulling it down towards his mouth. Just before his fangs lowered, however, the wound healed and Heath glared up at the ancient vampire unimpressed.

A cold hand stroked Heath’s jaw. “Come on, darling. We both know it’s more fun to just take what you want.”

Heath swallowed, and bite Felix’s wrist, his fangs sinking deep into the flesh and drawing the old, recycled blood from Felix’s wrist. The blood tasted putrid and wrong, but Felix practically moaned above Heath as he pulled more and more blood from the vampire’s body.

A hand wound itself tightly through Heath’s hair and yanked back suddenly, pulling Heath off of Felix with a gasp. He coughed and spluttered, trying to get the horrible, acrid taste from his mouth, wiping the back of his mouth with his hand. Heath glared up at Felix who grinned, showing his fangs down at Heath.

“Good,” Felix murmured, thumbing away a drop of blood that was dripping down the corner of Heath’s mouth. “Now, dear. Only one thing left to do,” he said, and sliced his left palm, the gash going deep. Before Heath could protest Felix grabbed his wrist and did the same, before joining their hands together.

Heath hissed as he could feel the pact take hold between them, burning through his palm to the back of his hand. Tendrils of black ink-like blood traced a beautiful pattern from the back of his hand, up his arm and locking like barbed wire over his heart. He lurched forward, clutching his chest with his free hand, trying to pull his hand back from Felix’s, but Felix clamped his fingers down around Heath’s until the process was complete.

The ink-like blood seeped into Heath’s skin, burning all the way through until he was a sweaty, trembling mess, his hands still held by Felix’s. Felix’s hand burned with the same pattern, except the colour of the blood on his arm was a garish, scar-like white. The intricacies of the deal, the covenant, the contract, were scrolled onto each of their skin in the old tongue, a reminder of what they had promised each other.

When it was finished, Felix dropped Heath’s hand and studied the strange glowing contract on his arm. “Wonderful. Now, all done. It wasn’t that bad, now was it?”

Heath didn’t answer. He didn’t even have the energy to glare at the vampire. He shut his eyes against the pain that lingered like dancers following the brand up his arm. Heath’s breath hitched as he felt Felix’s cold hands were on his forehead. His fingers gently moving the sweaty strands out of the vampire’s face so he could see every twinge of pain, every after effect of the blood pact on the once human thing.

“That almost killed you, darling boy,” Felix said with barely contained glee behind the words. “You really would risk anything for a foolish human.”

Heath didn’t have to energy to fight back, but he couldn’t deny that Felix’s cold hands felt so nice on his forehead, and he leaned into the touch like a cat would a human.

“Oh, my sweet boy. I think we should get you to bed, hmm? I don’t you fainting on your first day back in my service, oh all the things we will do together, Heath.”

Heath groaned as Felix wrapped an arm around him and pulled him out of the comfortable chair, letting him lean all his weight onto the ancient vampire. “There you go, sweet boy. Oh I could just eat you when you’re like this.”

“Fuck— off,” Heath whined as Felix walked them out of the study and towards the foyer. The backdoor opened to their left and in walked a quick-stepping vampire, pulling garden gloves off her hands and smiling when she saw Felix and Heath. Then she smelled the blood, and suddenly Celeste was in front of the pair, red eyes locked on Heath’s.

“What happened?” She asked, her voice breathless. She saw the bite marks on his throat and her gaze cut into Felix. “What did you do?” She hissed, bearing her fangs at him.

Felix smiled an easy smile. “We made a deal, didn’t we Heathy?”

Celeste’s eyes went back to Heath, softening at the edges. She put her hands on his cheeks, tilting his head to look at her. “You idiot.”

“I know,” Heath said with a breath, closing his eyes at her soft touch. He didn’t want to see the pity in her face, but she would understand when he told her later. She would understand and curse Felix and kiss him and everything would be okay.

“If you’ll excuse us, darling, the boy’s a bit drained. I’m taking him to bed.” Felix said. Heath could hear the smile in his voice as he spoke, so proud to have Heath under his thumb again. God. He was such an idiot.

“I’ll take him,” Celeste said immediately.

“Nonsense,” Felix replied already walking forwards, dragging Heath along with him. “I’ll be down shortly.”

Heath smiled at Celeste’s protests, his heart would’ve beamed at her care and love, but Felix was older than both of them, and older meant stronger, and Heath didn’t want the guilt of having Celeste hurt because of his foolishness, so he was happy that she remained in the hall, watching the pair as Felix helped Heath up the stairs.

Heath stopped in the room he and Celeste were sleeping in, but Felix dragged him on, further down the hall. “Felix, where’re—”

“Hush, dear boy. Just let me worry about everything, you shouldn’t trouble your pretty little head about it.”

Heath swallowed, trying to straighten in Felix’s hold and dig his heels into the carpet, but Felix pulled him along, all the way down to the door at the end of the hall. Felix’s room. Heath’s heart leapt into his throat, as he struggled against Felix’s venom injecting weakness through every inch of his body.

He hadn’t been in Felix’s room since he was human. It was the last place Heath was human, and it’s not a place he’d like to revisit, or filled with happy memories. It felt as if Felix had taken a knife and plunged it into Heath’s gut, twisting the metal as he opened the door and Heath was greeted with the familiar scent of the vampire.

It wasn’t like Felix ever did anything untoward to Heath when he was human, but he had a very strange possessiveness about him that Heath knew humans just didn’t. Some nights, when Felix didn’t leave Heath in his own room, or in the basement in chains for misbehaving, Felix would bring Heath into his room, into his bed, and cuddle him like he was a teddy bear.

It was so foreign a touch, so strange and upsetting. Felix would wrap Heath in blankets until he couldn’t move his limbs enough to cause any real trouble and cuddle him the entire night, his arms like iron chains wrapped around his entire body. He remembered not sleeping initially and Felix noticing this, and that was worse.

Felix would talk to him then, or sing softly in his ear. Or he’d drain him until Heath passed out, and eventually Heath learned to just sleep as quickly as he could before the vampire tried to do any of the other things to try and get Heath to sleep.

“Felix, please, let me sleep in my room,” he begged, his voice coming out high and whining. “Please.”

“We’re here now, darling, don’t worry. Here, sit down there,” Felix said, setting Heath down on the side of Felix’s bed. Heath gripped the edge of the bed, the soft duvet bunching under his hands.

“You did this… on purpose,” Heath huffed out, the world swimming in a mixture of colours that made him feel sick. Felix appeared in front of him again, taking a knee in front of the immortal hunter and grinning up at him.

“Did what?” He asked feigning innocence and tilting his head as he worked on unlacing and removing Heath’s shoes. Heath closed his eyes, trying to stop the world from turning but it didn’t stop the wooziness in his head. He groaned and shot a hand out, grabbing the poster of Felix’s canopy bed. “Oh, pet.”

“I’m not your pet,” Heath seethed, eyes flashing open. That was a mistake. Felix moved with unnatural speed, scooping Heath up in his arms and depositing him in the middle of the ridiculously big and comfortable bed.

Felix grabbed the duvet and pulled it up, tucking Heath into the bed. “Now, surely, I don’t have to stay with you, do I? Or tie you down so you don’t try and get up, hurting yourself.”

Heath shivered at the thought. “No,” he said weakly. Felix beamed.

“Wonderful. I’ll be downstairs when you feel better.” Felix leaned in, pressing a kiss to Heath’s temple. Heath turned away, but Felix just carded his hands through Heath’s hair. “I’m so happy you’re back, darling. I really have missed you. It’ll be just like the old days.”

Heath suppressed the whine of protest, opting to just stay silent and let the vampire just do whatever he wanted until he was satisfied and left. “Just call my name when you wake, sweet boy. I’ll come get you.”

Yeah right, Heath thought, but he just said: “okay.”

Felix beamed down at him, smile exposing his fangs and then he left. The heavy door shut and Heath flinched when he heard the sound of the lock. The bastard locked him in? Fuck. Felix told him once that he had made his house vampire proof.

Dramatic things, us vampires, he had told Heath one night when Heath was struggling to sleep in Felix’s bed, shivering against the monster. We like to break things and doors and furniture to make a point, so I made this manor vampire proof. Well, as much as possible. Ancient ones like myself could still destroy this place, but normal vamps? They may as well be human in this place.

So Heath would have to call Felix to come and get him when he woke up. Great. Perfect. Right now, Heath was exhausted and he just wanted to sleep. He could deal with Felix when he wakes up, hopefully after the venom leaves his system. Sleep came easily, his last thoughts were warm: at least, he thinks as darkness grabs him in its comforting grip, at least I saved Killian and his family from eternal torment.

[colinoeyebrows]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ONE OF THE KINDEST/WONDERFUL PEOPLE I KNOW, HAPPY BDAY SHARI (@killian-whump) !!!!!! Hope you will have the most amazing day hun. PS I never thought I would make a whump gifset haha so hope you will like it:D! Thanks for being an amazing friend!!! Sending a lot of love and hugs on your bday <3333!!! LOVE YOU!!!!

[hookaroo]

@jarienn972 :)

Captain Swan Halloween Reruns presents: The Inbetween

Written by: jarienn972

Recommended by: anon

Summary: Emma is tasked with locating 3 teenagers who didn't come home after spending an evening trying to be amateur ghost hunters in the abandoned Sorcerer's Mansion. In a house they already knew was full of surprises, Emma and Killian find that the teens might not be the only one

What the recommender loved: I love the author's writing style, it's a creative premise and the relationships and characterizations are all wonderful!

What we love: It's a fun story with lots of spooky elements! I was on the edge of my seat! -kazzy

read it here!

[brucethegirl]

A Future Almost Lost

A Future Almost Lost by HundredTimes (Brucethegirl)

Some wounds fester and never heal properly. Sometimes that can lead to emotional wounds so gregarious that they still harm years later.

Or: Emma and Killian have a very long overdue conversation about their time as dark ones.

AN: This is entirely self-indulgent angst/whump/emotional openness and a kind of part 2 to my last fic about Hope reading her parent's story.

Also available on AO3 and FF.net

Word count: 2201

Part 1 (By Design)

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Killian patted the warm addition to the growing pile on his arm. The fearsome pirate of eons ago gave a depreciating smirk at how his life had settled. “She hasn’t even seen the worst things I did.” He tried to continue the conversation his wife had kept trying, unsuccessfully, to shut down. 

Emma continued folding the towels while Killian waited patiently. “Don’t start.” She gave in a teasing warning. In the few weeks since Hope’s birthday, when she’d received the go ahead to read the story book detailing her parents’ love story on her own, she had been devouring it. And every day, Killian had been a bundle of nerves and tension, waiting for the apple of his eye to disown him. Now they waited with bated breath as she rapidly approached the darkest things either of them had ever done. Their time as the dark ones. 

“Emma-”

“No, you were tempted by the darkness. Something I forced on you. You wouldn’t have chosen the darkness, you knew the temptation would be too much for you to resist. You wanted to die-” Her voice broke, “instead of giving in to the temptation. We’ll explain it to her.”

His head tilted, he heard something in the way her voice broke. They’d buried the hatchet in the underworld. Each of their sins forgiven. A total understanding for each other’s actions. Or so he’d thought. “You thought I wanted to die?” He said slowly as he set the towels aside on the bed.

She paused, surprised that was what he had shifted his focus to. “What?”

“In Camelot, in that field. When you were holding my hand,” he took easy, careful steps towards her, “and begged me not to leave you. When you were asking me to think about our future, and I told you I was just happy you would have one, free of the darkness. You think I wanted to die at that moment?” He was overtaken by something that felt like a punch to his sternum. It was such a subtle distinction. Of course he didn’t want to be made into a dark one. That meant he needed to die. But here she was, apparently thinking he had come to that conclusion some other way. Had spent years thinking he was ready to give up their future. He clenched his jaw and gently cupped her face with his hand, his hook coming to rest against the small her back. “I knew what I was capable of, Emma. I knew what I had done, and as much as you kept me on the path of goodness, it was a near constant temptation.” He gave a depreciating smirk and looked away, knowing what he was going to say would be hard for her to hear. “You had forgiven me, your family had welcomed me, but my own path to self forgiveness for the centuries of fear and pain I’d inflicted was still raw. I still didn’t think I deserved you. I still felt like if something came to offer me a strong enough incentive I would have taken it. I was right.” 

“No,” her eyes were swimming but the tears had yet to fall. She’d clutched the towel she’d been in the middle of folding tighter, as though forgetting it was even in her hands. “You weren’t. I took your self control away from you. I knew your history in bondage, the exploitation you went through when you were a boy. How much you couldn’t feel like you were in bondage again. I knew that, and I took that freedom away from you. I told you we would fight the darkness together, and took away your agency.”

“And that was enough for the darkness to grab hold, and I let it. Emma, I had just told you why I was afraid of becoming the dark one. That I would be too tempted. Why wouldn’t you respond to that and have a backup plan?”

“Because I trusted you. I always trusted you. I was just so scared. I don’t know. What if you did give in right away? Then you… didn’t, you were mad but you agreed to fight it together, and I didn’t know how to tell you.”

“You gave into the darkness, and for you it was giving in to your fear. Your fear of being alone, of my reaction to finding out you hid Excalibur. We both gave in.” 

They sat with that revelation for a moment. “I was terrified of having a future without you. You’d promised.” She was whispering and he leaned forward both to hear her better, but also to press his forehead against hers. An intimacy to show he would never leave her, that he understood. “You said the future was nothing to fear, that you were a survivor, that you’d be by my side. And then…” She let out a shaky breath in the space between them

He breathed in her fears, suddenly washing back after all the years of them proving to each other over and over that they were true love. “And then I wasn’t. And I seemed to be all too eager to leave you.” He whispered back, recognizing this was something that always festered beneath the surface. 

They’d never been good about consistency when arranging meetings with Archie. This conversation was proving to him that maybe they should get better at that. 

With his fingers tangled in her golden locks, his wrist pressed against her hip, pulling her closer. Her arms reached around his neck and he heard the soft whoomp of the towel dropping to the floor as her own fingers filtered through his hair, nails lightly scraping his scalp in the most pleasant way. He shifted his chin to lay a gentle kiss on the apple of her cheek before brushing his lips against her ear. “You know that I would never have left you. I was just so sure of what you were capable of, and so convinced that you didn’t need me , it never even passed my mind that I would be what turned you to darkness.” She shifted her head so their breath mingled again and he continued, “Like I said then, you turned to darkness for love, true love. I turned because I was mad you kept me in the dark. But I need you to know Emma. Even after that.” He pulled back a moment and observed her. She gave a soft moan at the separation, her eyes shut as though lulled to sleep, before opening them and allowing them bounce back and forth between his own. “When I cast the curse, and they told me I needed to crush the heart of what I loved most. Not for a second did I consider you. I would never have. I knew it then, even with the darkness whispering in my ear, turning my heart even blacker. I refused. When I learned what I’d become, and planned to kill Rumpelstilzchen.  You know why I was going to kill him?”

Her brow furrowed, “of course I-”

“For you.” He interrupted. “For turning you dark. I’d- well not forgiven him, but had turned away from vengeance for Milah. I’d planned to rip out his heart, sure. But kill him?” He shook his head, “I had a new cause for vengeance. Turning my good and heroic Swan into a dark one,” he said with a light lilting tone, as though they were teasing. She recognized his old defense mechanisms coming back to lighten the mood and ran her fingers through his hair comfortingly. “You probably still could have helped me fight against it given time. I know I said some… horrific things to you, planned to hurt people you love, people I love. I planned to hurt Henry for god’s sake. But I have no doubt underneath all that was the truth that you could have helped me. And the darkness convinced me I had to push you away so that I could stay in that dark bubble all alone. It knew you were my weakness,” he smiled and kissed the tip of her nose, “in the best way possible.”

“You know, you spent weeks not even knowing you were a dark one. And was completely fine. Kind of helped prove my point about being able to fight it.”

He laughed, finally pulling away slightly to toss his head back. “I wouldn’t go that far,” he said after a moment. “There were certainly moments looking back I thought was just frustration, was actually the darkness rising up. But I don’t think anyone noticed cause, well” he gestured to himself, “pirate.” 

She laughed as well and stepped around him to bend over to pick up the forgotten towel. Then felt his warm hand brush the exposed skin between her top and her jeans. “Although, one thing that has plagued me.” He trailed off, his fingers getting bolder and skimming under the waistband. She started to straighten her spine, and he didn’t adjust his hand. Allowing it to skim up her back, her top gathering as she did so in his finger before stopping at her upper back. She hissed when she felt the cool of his hook brush down her now exposed spine. “Those hours between my reawakening and learning you hid Excalibur. We didn’t get to do much… exploring of our darkness.”

She looked over her shoulder at him, “I don’t know if you remember, but there was a persistent interloper.”

“Not if the blood was pumping fast enough,” he husked, his tone full of innuendo and force. "And you in that leather, well that certainly got my blood pumping. I wonder what we could have accomplished with you commanding me."

She leaned carefully back into his palm and hook and he groaned as he peeked down the front of her loose, billowy top now falling lower due to the shift from his hand. 

“Ugh, are you guys serious?” Came the very exasperated, and very over it, preteen voice of their daughter from the stairs behind them. 

Quickly dropping his hands, and adjusting her shirt, they turned to face her. Their faces both bright red and Killian’s body shifted away to hide what his tight leather pants showed too easily. 

Hope rolled her eyes, her look of disgust never dropping as she walked past them to her room. “You have a room, use it.” She called, and Emma was fairly certain at ten Hope only had a vague notion of what that entailed, and was suddenly too aware she’d need to have a certain conversation with her daughter in addition to the whole ‘ your father did evil things and was a villain and tried to kill everyone we love ’ conversation.

Their daughter walked past them again a moment later and let out another performative gag. She was certainly getting sassier in her age. Emma caught Killian’s eyes and they both had to stifle laughter. 

When they’d calmed, Killian stepped forward to wrap his arms around Emma again, “I love you,” he said after a moment of staring into her eyes. “I have always loved you.” She braced a hand over his heart as her other arm reached around his waist as well. “And when I said I wanted to die instead of be the dark one, its because I was scared I would hurt you. I never wanted to leave you, Emma.” 

The tears in her eyes finally fell and he kissed them away. “I know,” she whispered. “I never want to be in this life without you,” She said, her head resting on his chest.

“Well that’s a problem for another day.” He teased gently. “But I will say, when that day comes, many many years from now,” He pulled back, “I know I said you wouldn’t be my unfinished business, but that was when we thought there would be decades, if not more, between meeting again. When I thought you might find love again. Next time, I’ll wait here for you. However many years it takes.” 

She knew he meant the version of their home they lived in while rescuing him. She smiled at the thought, “I think that sounds fair.” She leaned up and he met her lips in the middle. Quickly, she broke away, “when you said goodbye, did you think I would meet someone else? When I’d had true love?”

He gave a huff of a laugh, “I had hoped you wouldn’t be alone.”

“I would have just been with my family. I wasn’t going to find someone else,” she was vehement. Almost angry. 

“Aye, love. I can’t admit to it being a comforting thought.” He conceded. 

She smiled and swayed closer into his arms, “now what were you saying about exploring our darkness?” She teased and he raised an eyebrow while he searched her eyes before he glanced to the stairs where Hope had disappeared back down before shifting his stance to slide her arm under her backside and lift. 

She gave a quick yelp of surprise before slamming her mouth shut when she realized her husband’s intention. She was always impressed by his ability to toss her around like a rum barrel. 

[mockiery]

Abstract Reflections - Ch 2

He'd dealt with Pan for two centuries, played his games, took his demonic thrills in stride. But Killian feels the difference here and now. Those were men, boys, mindless monsters. This is a god. After his sacrifice, Killian Jones awakes in the Underworld and is faced with the torments of a sadistic god, his own body and mind turned against him. Memories of Killian's long life and lost loved ones weigh heavily on his soul, some sending him into spirals of guilt and despair, others grounding him and giving him hope. All he can do is try to resist the pull of darkness and oblivion until Hades bores of him; or better yet, someone he loves deems him worthy of saving.

Tags: Captain Swan, Jones Family, Underworld Arc, Character Study, Whump, Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Guilt, Flashbacks, Memories, etc. (more listed on ao3)

[AO3] | Rated M | 6.9k words

Previous Chapter | Masterlist

thanks again to @brucethegirl for the beta read and edit help! and thanks of course to my lovely discord friends for enabling me <3

-

Chapter 2. "Hook"

Killian had known what refusing Hades' offer would entail, or thought he did. In all his years, he'd thought he'd seen every way a man's own body could be turned against him. He was sorely mistaken, and the god seemed intent on educating him further.

Two of the chains that held his father to the ceiling are now murderously tight around his wrists, snaking up his arms. When they'd animated at Hades' behest, Killian had been more fearful of his father being jostled awake than he was of being restrained. Brennan is suspended lower now, low enough to be within Killian’s reach were he standing. But he isn’t standing; Hades has forced Killian to kneel beneath his father’s body, his arms restrained up and out. The shackles connect his taught chains to the ceiling, the ground, and to his father. Killian is unable to rest his weight on his haunches or his knees with the absence of slack, lest the metal bruise his arms – with more pressure than should be possible. Instead, his aching muscles hold taught, forcing his ever-grinding joints into awkward, painful angles. Every movement rattles Killian's binds as well as the unconscious man dangling above him.

Not that he wants to move; not with the knife lodged in his shoulder and another identical blade in his thigh. A third magical copy is planted deep in his gut, just beneath his ribs, making every breath and heartbeat agony. Hades had delighted in pushing their edges into his skin with brutal precision, varying the speed, pressure, and the sting of fiendish magic. The metal had hummed, practically sung in the god's grasp, beginning first with shallow gashes and ending with deep stab wounds where the tool of torture would remain, stinging from the inside out. As he’d torn into Killian, he’d mocked and bargained with every stroke of the blade, with the reminder that all it would take to stop the pain would be to let his father feel its sharp edge again. Once a knife was secure in its place, buried to the hilt in his flesh, Hades would leave for what felt like hours before returning and summoning another knife to begin the process again.

The wounds throb and scream at him, every pulse of his heartbeat putting pressure on the blades within him, blood pouring out slowly. If he wasn’t dead already, he’d have died of blood loss by now. He feels it, still. Feels the way his consciousness slows, like he should be able to pass out, but he can’t. His body won’t let him.

He’d had many restless and sleepless nights in life, from nightmares as much as his body’s own aches. Over two centuries of hard labor at sea had left his body battered, his joints as creaky and stilted in the movement as an abandoned ship’s rudder. He’d maintained the Jolly Roger far better than he’d maintained himself. And he’d paid for it with every ache that set in as he lay in bed at night, and the stiffness that he’d slowly work out every morning.

Kneeling for hours with his arms immobile, his muscles are cramping, seizing up around each blade. His spine is locked into place, like cracking his neck would shatter the whole column. His knees feel inflexible and liquid at once, and the knife in his shoulder sends a stabbing pulse down his nerves to his missing hand. The loss of blood alone has muddled his mind, and every ache and stinging wound compounds it.

Existing in his own body day to day had been uncomfortable at best, and miserable at worst. Here, the tortures are designed to turn his body against him further. There is no weapon more efficient. Hades only needs to use a tool in his repertoire once, force him to go rigid by leaving it stationary, and then gravity, exhaustion, and Killian's daily pains will do the rest.

He hopes that his father hasn't spent his afterlife this way. He can't imagine thirty years of this, that is if time moved in any way similar here. Neverland had acquainted him with the fluidity of time; he supposes the Underworld could be akin to that infernal place. In truth, the two realms seemed more alike than not. While he's thus far only seen what this cell has to offer, one thing is all too familiar: a controlling, sadistic overlord wielding far more power than any one man should have. God or not, Hades is nothing more than the same kind of bastard Killian has dealt with for centuries – if slightly more hands-on.

His mind wanders to the games Pan once played. The weaponization of one's own weaknesses was more refined in Pan's case, rarely getting his own hands dirty.

-

"You." Killian says, staring at the young lad he'd met so long ago. He'd returned to Neverland two years ago, a pirate captain with his crew, and had yet to earn a face-to-face meeting with the boy-king of the realm. And now Peter Pan lounges in the windowsill of the captain's quarters, appearing unchanged from the day the lad's riddle had cost Liam his life.

"Me." The boy smiles, something sharp in its edges. The moonlight streams through the window, reflecting off the quiet waves, silhouetting Pan ominously. The dramatics don't surprise Killian. Pan sits up, collecting what lay in his lap, Killian's eyes landing on the far-too-familiar sextant in the boy's hands. He sets it on the windowsill as he hovers down to the floor. Killian doesn't have to take his eyes off the lad to know his storage chest across the room has been unlocked and pilfered through, Liam's sextant stolen from its rightful place.

"It's good to see you again, Lieutenant Jones." He begins, his fingertips lingering on the sextant before he turns to Killian. "Or is it Captain now?"

"You know damn well which it is." Killian knows he shouldn't let his anger get the better of him, not with the power the lad has here. The first words from his mouth are pin-pointed to get under Killian's skin, and more than that, they're a taunt. They prove to Killian what he's assumed for years: Pan knew exactly what he was doing when he disappeared, leaving Killian and Liam to return to their ship with no idea what price they owed the boy, and no way to find him to ask.

In seconds, with few words, Pan had proven that his reputation amongst his loyal few is well-earned. He'd shown himself to be the gloating villain they idolized, one that would delight in orchestrating the senseless death of a good man who dared to grace Neverland's shores.

"Oh, we've got some fight in us now, don't we?" Pan sneers. "Much has changed on this island since we last met, Captain." He looks Killian up and down, the pretense of playful youth he'd had in their first meeting long-gone. There's only coldness as he sizes up Killian's garb and weaponry, his curious gaze lingering on the hook at the end of Killian's arm before smiling. "It looks like much has changed for you too."

"You've got quite the loyal crew now." Killian straightens up, standing taller, trying to regain a composure of disinterest. "They speak highly of you."

"Good." Pan half shrugs. "I've a reputation to uphold. I'm sure you understand."

He does. "A pirate's reputation is all he has."

"Your new addition there will do wonders for your notoriety, I think." Pan nods to Killian's hook before stepping closer, grabbing the brace of it around the remainder of his wrist and raising to inspect it. "You should thank the one responsible for a gift like this."

Killian snatches his arm away, the ever-tender skin of his stump agitated at the pull on the leather. The ghost of his hand tingles, a phantom twinging pain to match the clenching of his remaining fist.

"Easy, there, Captain." Pan raises his hands up defensively and steps back, his smirk never diminishing. "That hook of yours is best turned elsewhere. In fact, I've a few uses for it in mind."

Killian forces his shoulders to relax, but keeps his arm clear of the hilt of his sword and his hand poised at the ready on his belt. "And what would those be?"

"You seem to understand how things work in Neverland by now. Not as quick a study as I'd prefer, but it's been fun to watch you flounder." Killian suspected as much.

"Your point?"

"My point is, Captain. You know that what I say goes around here. And what I say is this; I've grown rather tired with how stubborn Bae is, how unwilling he is to play along. He's constantly going off on his own to his little cave he thinks I don't know about."

Killian swallows, trying to hide the widening of his eyes. He’d tried keeping tabs on Bae where he could, but none of his crew had seen him in their run-ins with lost boys on the island in months. He’d begun to fear the worst. "And this matters to me how?"

Pan laughs, leaning against Killian's bookshelves, his hand drifting across the spines of the collection he and Milah had put together. It's still in the nonsensical order she preferred; organized by her enjoyment first and the beauty of the art next and so on, the categories intermingling on the shelf in a way that he's yet to decipher.

"You're a terrible liar, did you know that? I'd expect better deception from a pirate, but I suppose you're fresh at it."

Killian's jaw twitches. "I'm not new to piracy, boy."

"Perhaps not." Pan shrugs, moving again to the windowsill, to the sextant. He picks it up with little care and peers through it. "Though it feels like you and your brother were flying away on your little ship not too long ago at all."

Killian bites his tongue hard enough that he tastes copper, waiting for the boy to lose interest. He does eventually, putting the instrument back down indelicately, his sharp gaze returning to Killian.

"I'm looking to do some business with you. Bae's run off again."

He breathes, finally, and pulls out his flask. "I don't know where he is."

"I know you don't." He says it with a chuckle in his voice, but his eyes are cruel. "He wants nothing to do with you, won't even speak your name anymore. Just calls you 'the pirate' or 'that pirate'." Killian finds his flask empty after one swig. The rum has been running low for months now, its allotment to the crew restricted. He doesn't think there's enough rum in all the realms to make him forget Pan's words anyway. "I do think there should be something more specific to call you than that though. After all, you're a full crew of pirates."

"Are you capable of completing a thought?" He's tired of this meandering, of the pointed jabs to flare his temper.

Pan laughs. "Of course, Captain. I'm more patient than you are, it seems." He drifts up weightlessly and lounges across the windowsill again. "Normally grown-ups at least pretend to be patient, but I'm not convinced you're all that much of one." He flicks his eyes up from picking at his nails and shrugs. "You look just as lost to me as you did then. It's been, what, ten years? Twelve? You weren't much older than my lost boys then, were you?"

"I was a lieutenant in the navy. I was no boy."

Pan laughs again, darker this time. "Boys are made soldiers all the time, don't you know? Your boy himself was drafted into the ogre wars, remember? Fourteen years of age, and he would've been sent off to die." The lad shakes his head, a false sympathy on his face that only angers Killian. "And now he's here, where he can live forever, young and without worry of those silly wars or money or any of those adult problems. A land of magic and imagination, and what does he do? He runs off, rejecting it every chance he gets."

"Why not send him back to where you got him in the first place then?" Killian grits out half the question through his teeth, his hand digging the edge of his belt buckle into his palm.

"Sets a bad example." The boy's smile is downright fiendish as he rises up again, now fiddling with the sharp lines of the tucked sheets of Killian's bed.

Killian gestures with a sigh and a disinterested shrug. "Why not just let the lad be if he's such a hassle?"

"No one gets what they want on this island unless it's from me." The look in Pan's eyes would be enough to make a lesser man squirm, but Killian holds the demon's gaze.

"Make a deal with him then," Killian offers, plastering on the emptiest polite smile he can.

"He's stubborn, you see." Pan steps closer, and Killian is glad of it; he would rather have the imp nearer than touching the rich red silks and linens that Milah had chosen for their bed. "He has no interest in dealing with me, I fear his father has ruined any sense he has in regard to bargaining. You surely didn't help."

Killian snaps his teeth together sharply at Pan’s last comment. "So you want to make a deal with me?"

The demon steps around him, but Killian tracks him in his periphery and stands his ground.

"If you want your Bae to avoid the kind of punishment they give lads back in your realm, yes." Pan eyes Killian's back, sending a shiver down his spine, but is quickly replaced with a fire that burns so hot he's moving before he thinks. Shoving Pan against the wall, he holds his hook to the demon's throat. The point presses into the boy's throat, needing only the slightest pressure to break the skin and tear into his jugular. Another threat to harm Baelfire, and Killian won't hesitate.

Pan simply beams up at him.

"You like that hook, don't you? Huh. Hook. Hook? " Pan says, the word like a name on his lips. "Oh I like that. What do you think? Captain Hook." His eyes flare on the words and Killian wants nothing more than to pierce the demon with the appendage he's deemed fit to name him after. "That's a name for a legend isn't it? Captain Jones just isn't the same is it? So forgettable."

"Speak something of substance, demon," Hook spits out, loudly into Pan's face. If the lad wants a pirate, he'll get a pirate.

"Aye, aye, Hook." Pan smirks, then disappears. Hook spins around, drawing his sword. The lad's voice sounds behind him, and Killian can barely prevent himself from flinching. "You want Bae to be left alone, don't you?" Pan circles around like a predator on the hunt. "I thought he'd be a soft spot for you, considering how long it took you to hand him over after you found him."

"What makes you think that?" Hook growls, his restraint failing him.

"I know my island, Captain." Pan straightens the lapel of Killian's jacket, brushing away dust Killian knows isn't there. "I know he didn't set foot on my shores for months after my shadow brought him here."

"Perhaps the mermaids took a liking to him." Killian manages to barely prevent himself from seething.

"Please, don't bother. He told us plenty after you abandoned him."

Killian's jaw clenches tighter, the sound of his grinding teeth reverberating inside his skull. "What do you want?"

"Don't wait so long next time. You did a fine job when you finally came around, I'm sure you'll be a quick study."

"What exactly is it that you're asking of me?"

Pan grins. "If you run into any lost boys where they aren't supposed to be, off on their own, you bring them back to me. And in return, I won't bother your Baelfire. He can live in his little cave all alone and my lost boys won't go near it."

Hook knows Pan worded it precisely. The lost boys wouldn’t go near the cave, not that they wouldn't go near Bae. 'Won't bother' doesn't mean 'leave alone'. But, something is better than nothing. Pan doesn't sweeten his deals, Hook has learned. He makes them impossible to win, treats those he deals with like toys for his amusement. The question is, what are the rules and what are the consequences of breaking them?

"And if my end of the bargain is not up to your standards?"

"Don't sell yourself short, Killian." Pan grabs his shoulders, patting one like a proud bloody parent. Hook considers sinking his teeth into the demon's throat. "You show great promise, a real natural at this business. Lost boys learn best by example, don't we?"

Killian wants to ask what the hell he means, what Pan knows, and how he knows it. But he doesn't, he doesn't ask. And Pan smiles. If it was a question in Pan's mind before, a shot in the dark at the kind of man Pan thinks Hook to be, it isn't any longer. Killian has heard the crying at night on the island long before he knew what hearing it meant.

-

He'd made the deal with Pan, knowing that Pan would punish both him and Bae for any refusal to play the demon's game. Bae was among the plethora of leverages that Pan had on Hook for nearly two centuries. Time and time again, Hook had chosen Bae over all others, from fleeing lost boys to his own crew. He'd vowed to himself that he'd never tell the lad, and he never got the chance.

When he'd taken Emma, her family, and the bloody Crocodile on board the Roger to help save Henry, he'd hoped to do so in Bae's – in Neal's memory. He'd helped save Henry then, but it didn't make up for anything he'd done. Alongside Emma's family, he'd shed the blood of lost boys when Pan wanted a fight, just as he had in the centuries before. The boys were as much pawns as he was, and he'd never fully rid himself from the blood he'd shed. Helping free the remaining lost boys could inch him closer to making up for his past actions, but it wasn't enough. Nothing ever was.

Many of them had shied away from him as they boarded his ship to Storybrooke. A number of them had been brought aboard the Jolly Roger against their will before, to be delivered to Pan as part of their deal. Finding them fleeing Pan’s camp, he’d tried lying to the first few, offering them work as part of his crew. It was a lie to make them come peacefully, but when he’d been believed, it’d sickened him to his stomach. He’d filled them with cautious, desperate hope, only to crush it. The betrayal in those lad’s expressions had led Hook to drink himself into numbness for several days after. Eventually the boys began to notice that run-aways who crossed Hook’s path were always returned to camp, turning their resistance to the pirates’ capture into an inevitability. Killian wished they wouldn’t have fought it so fiercely. The binds would’ve bruised them less. They were all trapped on that island, whether their wrists were tied or not. The lost boys and the pirates alike were pieces on a game board, only capable of moving where and when Pan wanted.

Sailing them away alongside heroes to a land without magic, without Pan’s machinations, many had still avoided his gaze – as if one wrong look would be enough for Hook to break his promise to free them. He’d heard their whispered warnings amongst themselves to behave, for fear of being forced to walk the plank into the mermaid-infested waters. One lad had stared daggers at him for the entire voyage back to Storybrooke, fuming with the same fury Killian had known in his own troubled youth. The boy had spat at Hook as he off-boarded onto Storybrooke’s docks, and Killian hadn’t crossed paths with him or any of the lost boys since.

He couldn't blame them for fearing him, for hating him. They'd only known the mercurial favor of their boy-king for decades, if not centuries, and Hook had handed them over to Pan, to be at the demon’s mercy. He'd never protected another lad from Pan and his cruelty, not after Baelfire. Not until Henry.

After returning from Neverland and all his missteps in the missing year back in the Enchanted Forest, he'd thought he'd at least have been able to stay his hand from causing any more carnage. He'd thought he could try and turn his hand instead towards helping the heroes where he could. But in the days before his death, with the darkness infesting him, he'd failed yet again. The past few years of trying to help Emma and her family do good were all for naught.

His blurred vision turns to Brennan above. His muscles, taught around the blades, are trembling more and more, sending a tremor up the metal links. Hades had left him several minutes ago, but the first blade has been in his shoulder for hours. When Hades comes and goes, his cold, calculated fury seems no more or less than it was before, as if no time has passed at all. Perhaps it hasn't for him, or maybe he’s always that angry.

Brennan breathes shallowly, having stirred only once in the last few hours. Killian had made a snide remark he no longer remembers, and Hades had kicked Killian's legs out from under him in response. Shaking the tangle of chains, it'd made Killian heave out a guttural sound of pain as the wind was knocked from his lungs and the knife beneath them nestled deeper into his gut. He hopes the forgotten provoking phrase returns to him when he's in a more lucid state – he'd like to get under the god's skin that effectively a second time. He hopes he'll have a chance to find some semblance of lucidity again, though he's not sure he’ll get that chance. Hades might intend to keep him this way forever, or at least until he takes up the knife and tears into his father, whichever comes first.

The thought had occurred to him earlier than he'd like to admit. After three decades of regretting the choice he made that night, part of him was considering Hades' offer of employment. The same vicious, insatiable part of him that he'd fed once he'd been made a Dark One. His own personal darkness, festering in his heart, made him fail Henry, Bae, the younger Liam, and every lost boy that crossed his path. In truth, everyone that crossed his path had been failed by him in some way. He'd hoped that his death would've been the end of it. With enough time, he fears he'll fail everyone again, too weak to withstand the god's tortures forever.

He wonders if the man above him has already failed. Before his death, Brennan had become a better man for his new wife and son. He’d been strong enough to tell Killian as he lay dying that it was never too late to change. Here, after some thirty odd years or more of torture, would he say the same? Has he returned to the man he was?

The scoundrel had sold his sons into servitude for a dinghy. Killian and Liam had been making up for what their father owed his family for years before then. For weeks at a time, Brennan had left his ill wife and young sons while he sailed to distant lands for work, or so he claimed; he’d brought home very little to show for his journeys.

Liam had the worst of it, old enough to get work at the docks while Killian got to spend time at home with their mother. Killian cherished those times with her more than anything else in all his childhood; caring for her, and her caring for him in turn.

Her complexion is pale and sallow, her features sunken as she lays in bed. He brings her a cool, wet rag to lay across her forehead. Her hand reaches for his, taking the rag and setting it aside so she can reach for him, her frigid hand touching his cheek. Her smile is weak but nevertheless full, as it always is.

He hates that she's so emaciated in all his memories, her sickness hollowing her out at a pace so slow that it was hard to tell if she was getting better or worse.

She tries to sit up, but it takes too much of the energy she has left. She's stubborn, he's learned, so he goes to her instead. He kneels at her bedside and wraps his arms around her, giving her warmth from his body and from his heart. She holds him close, her fingers threading through his hair in a rhythm as steady as the sea's waves he can hear beyond the walls of their cottage. Despite the coldness of her body, her breath is warm on his scalp. His eyes stay closed as she hums a lullaby, for herself as much as for him. He joins her hum when her own falters, her breath always short and voice always strained by her cough. She doesn't cough as she holds him now, not like she normally does when she sings for her sons. He smiles, unaware of how bad a sign it truly is.

She'd died within the hour, before Liam came home. Their father hadn't returned until after she'd been buried. He'd left them in their small cottage alone for a voyage shortly after. He'd only brought his sons on his next voyage because the neighbors wouldn't have had enough to spare to keep the brothers fed through the winter. Killian hadn't known then, only putting it together later with what little he could get out of Liam.

Liam hated their father even more than Killian did, and he had every right to. Despite Liam usually holding his tongue, it was one of the few expressions of his guarded, controlled emotions that made it through the cracks. Killian could see the anger burn in Liam's eyes, especially when they were young. His brother could always restrain it, though, far better than Killian has ever or would ever be capable of. Part of him wishes Liam had gotten the chance to confront their father. Perhaps he'd have been able to spare him when Killian couldn't. Or maybe he'd have finally let out the anger he'd carried all their lives and killed the bastard himself. Killian isn't sure which he'd prefer.

When Killian took Brennan's life that night, he'd told himself he did it for Liam as much as for himself. He’d killed the man Liam had hated with everything he had, the one that had taken his name and given it to the son he'd inevitably fail in all the same ways – no matter how much he claimed he'd changed. He'd forced his eldest son into the work of a grown man well before the age of ten, and sold the other into servitude mere weeks before his tenth birthday – Killian's half-brother was overdue for disappointment. Whether it was Hook that took Brennan away from his young son or Brennan's own failures, the boy would be orphaned one way or another. He'd told himself these things over and over, that the younger Liam would be better off with another caretaker. That no matter what flowery, assuring words their father said, there was no substance behind them. Killian would like to believe what he'd done was for both Liams, but it wasn't, not truly.

"I would never leave him."

"But you would leave me."

He'd known it then, he knows it now. He'd killed his father in rage, hatred, wrath. For himself, and himself alone.

The bloodied man hangs above his head here, same as he has for Killian's entire life.

The cabin is dark, the lantern is out, and their father is gone. Liam teeters atop a small crate he's borrowed from the galley to light it for Killian, striking the match successfully on the third try.

"He's coming back, isn't he?" Killian asks, his voice shaky and thick from the tears he's already shed. He hasn't been able to fall back asleep for what feels like hours, despite Liam's insistence. The storm and the darkness aren't the only thing preventing his rest.

He sits on his bunk with his arms and Liam's coat wrapped around his legs, the bedding of his cot providing little warmth from the cold of the night. His hair is still damp and his skin cool from the rain, but he had to look. He had to go above deck to see for himself, he had to prove the captain wrong when he saw no rowboat through the calming storm. But Killian had seen it. A speck on the distant waves. That didn't mean the captain was right, though, surely. The boat was too far to see if there was anyone in it, so there's a chance, he knows it. He knows their father wouldn't do that, he wouldn't just… sell them and sail away. He couldn't.

He'd promised to watch the light for Killian. But the lantern had been out for hours.

"He wouldn't leave us… Would he?"

Liam carefully steps down from the box he's climbed, shaking the match out. His hardened expression melts as he sees Killian shaking, from the cold as much as the sobs that threaten to overtake him again. Liam takes a cover off his own cot and drapes it across Killian's shoulders. Further securing the blanket with his arm around his little brother, Liam sits down beside Killian and draws him in close. His own clothes are still dampened by the rain, but Killian's are warm and freshly cleaned. Liam had patted himself dry with spare rags as best he could, while the only thing on Killian's person that received such careless treatment had been his hair.

Liam sighs, his hand firm and comforting on Killian's shoulder. "I don't know, Killian… I don't know."

Liam, once again, hadn't been present for the loss of a parent. Killian had shaken his brother awake after the captain had given him the news of their father's leaving – of their father's selling of them. Killian has very few memories of Liam's strength wavering, but his tearful retelling of what the captain had told him left a hollow look in Liam's eyes for the next few days.

He'd followed his little brother up to the deck, the cold winds and rain unnoticed to Killian as he searched for their father, first out on the waves and then within the belly of the ship. Killian had convinced himself that he was hiding somewhere, that he had lied to the captain and set the dinghy free as part of some clever ruse.

When his search of every nook and cranny of the ship's stores led him to be reprimanded, Liam had taken the punishment for him – two lashes to the rear – and Killian had let that particular hope go. It was far from the last time Liam took a lashing for him, and was the least severe.

Young boys took strikes to their bottoms instead of their backs, an accommodation Silver had spoken of as if it was a show of kindness. A consideration of the frailty of youth – but not enough of one to keep him and his officers from harming the children in their “employ”, of course. The scars he'd earned in his first years of servitude were far fainter and fewer than those on his back, but they remained just as well centuries later.

In his naivety, Killian had settled for quietly hoping their father would return and buy their freedom. That hope was lost soon enough.

Liam didn't want to hurt him with the truth, but when Killian spoke of their father's return, the anger he kept submerged would rise close to the surface. The brother who always encouraged and comforted Killian hadn't done the same when it came to the subject of their father. Liam had tried, but he couldn't betray the truth of the matter. He couldn't lie and tell Killian their father was a good man, but he couldn't break Killian's heart with the terrible reality either, not when it was all that Killian had to hold on to. But he could only believe it for so long. His wish for his father's return, for their father to be a man different from the one who'd left them – it shattered under the pressure of every increasingly miserable day that passed.

Despite Liam's efforts to lessen the blow, Killian's heart had broken the moment he let that hope go. The day he was first lashed, it'd been punishment for his tearful pleas to the Captain as he’d whipped Liam for Killian's disobedience. Killian had begged and cried for Silver to stop hurting his brother, until finally he’d grabbed and wrapped himself around the Captain’s arm to stop the lashing himself. Silver had backhanded Killian with enough force to knock him to the ground, and at that age, it didn't take much. Killian had earned himself five lashes for daring to lay a hand on and disrespect the Captain: lashes that Liam hadn't been allowed to take in his stead.

That day, at the true revelation of the kind of men they'd been sold to, the kind of servitude their father had burdened them with, and the kind of man that Brennan had truly been – the embers of Killian's rage were fanned into flame. Flames that would burn in him for centuries to come. Only Liam kept them from consuming him entirely.

He feels the fire swell in him again, but he pushes it down. No, that's not quite right. Liam had been a balm to them, yes, but Killian had learned to dim it again. With Milah, with Bae – with Emma and her family. He'd lost control with the Darkness rummaging through his mind and adding fuel to the blaze, but now he has it back; or at least he hopes he does. He has to.

-

Hades returns in a flare of blue flame. There's an air of disappointment to his fury when Killian clenches his jaw and stares daggers in the face of the god.

"I'd ask you how you're feeling about my offer, but I'm pretty sure I know your answer already." Hades clicks his tongue, leaning forward into Killian's eyeline and pushing a piece of hair from Killian's forehead. "I may have muddled up your face there, but that angry eye of yours tells me enough."

"Glad I could make myself clear," Killian grits out.

"It's cute, really." Hades taps the side of Killian's face twice, his smirk widening when Killian flinches. "I have all the time in the Underworld, and so do you. As much time as I want you to have. You should really consider my offer. I know you have already. Wouldn't be much of a pirate if you hadn't."

"You can take… your offer… and shove it up your arse."

Hades laughs, twisting the blade in Killian's shoulder and making him bite his tongue to hold in his cry of pain. He tastes blood, but he twists the scream Hades has forced out of him into a vicious growl. Hook's look of hatred returns with little interruption.

"I feel as though you've forgotten exactly where you are, Captain."

Hades steps away, waving his hand and Killian's chains fly backwards and slam him into the wall.

"Let's try it this way." Another gesture, and the chains holding Brennan to the ceiling slither through the air with unnerving speed, dropping Killian's father onto the ground with a heavy thud. The excess chains wrap around Killian, lifting him, the metal links pulling on the knives protruding from his body. Killian yelps before he can bite his tongue. Within the blink of an eye, he's been snapped up from his knees on the floor to dangling in his father's place overhead.

Nothing Hades has done to him yet has twisted his heart like seeing his father stir below, wheezing awake on the ground. The lump in his throat feels like it's choking him, his eyes welling up against his will as he watches Hades nudge Brennan onto his back, eliciting a broken groan. Hovering above him, the point of the god's shoe jabs into Brennan's shoulder as he obscures Killian's view of his father. Killian is grateful, stifling his cry and forcing his throat to allow him a quiet breath, desperate to avoid his father's attention for as long as possible.

In the hours Killian had been left to let his own body and mind consume him, part of him had wanted his father to awaken. He'd wanted to give in, let go, and allow himself to collapse and rest, free to make every movement or noise he needed to. To call up to the man and speak to him. But upon looking up into his bloodied, broken face, expression still twinged with pain in his unconsciousness, Killian couldn't face him. There had been a time in his life when the only thing that could soothe his fears was his father's assuring words. In spite of himself, he longs for his father's steady, patient voice telling him all would be well, regardless of how immense the lie. It's a selfish desire.

Sleep seems like it could be the only respite one could find in the Underworld, and Killian didn't want to take that away from him. He'd taken away enough. And he can't bear to face the man after becoming the worst of him. His time as the Dark One, even when he'd been unaware of it, had given him many sleepless nights. In Storybrooke, oblivious to the curse that’d been forced upon him, what little sleep he could manage in the early hours of the morning had been vital – one of the few things that kept him sane enough to carry on trying to save Emma from the Darkness. He hadn't slept at all when the nature of his new immortality was known to him, and he'd used his extra time for things far worse than Emma had.

If he'd succeeded in helping the Darkness, he'd have sent Emma's entire family here, including Henry. Hook’s initial request that they leave Henry untouched would never have been heeded. He'd have exchanged each of their lives for a Dark One to take their place in the land of the living, and in the moment, he hadn’t cared. If he had, his doubts were drowned out by the cacophony of the Darkness’s roaring whispers. Emma, the woman he loved, would’ve been left alone, without the family he’d once pleaded she stay in Storybrooke for. When he’d learned of the Dark Ones’ plans, he’d wanted Henry left out, unmarked by Chiron. But Hook had nothing but revenge on his mind when the time came to ensure the lad’s protection. Until Regina had confronted him about how he’d destroyed his own family, Hook hadn’t thought of Henry at all.

Killian supposes that his father had done the same on the night he’d abandoned his sons. Brennan’s words had been genuine as he tucked Killian into bed, having every intent to watch the light as he’d promised. But when threatened with capture, his selfishness had won out. He’d thought little of what he was doing to his sons in leaving them behind to settle his debt. At least, Killian hopes that had been the case. For both his and Brennan’s sake.

"Good morning, sunshine," Hades croons, raising a foot and settling it on Brennan's shoulder. While Killian can't see his father's face, the pained, stuttering sigh turning to a groan tells him far more than he wants to know.

"To what do I-" Brennan coughs, "owe the pleasure?"

Killian can hear the sneer in Hades voice. "I'd been in such a generous mood. Had my gift all wrapped up and pretty, but some people don't know how to accept them, you know?"

"What do you want?" Brennan's voice is quiet but steady, a thread of spite laced into his words. It fills Killian with a strange swell of pride.

"To give you a gift instead." Hades kneels down, materializing another knife and places it in Killian's father's hand. "I'm sure you have some things you'd like to work out with this little knife you know so well."

Then Hades is rising, and Killian can't help but close his eyes and go limp, putting off looking his father in the eye for just a little while longer.

Below, his father's quiet gasp breaks something in him. With the softest, "Killian," in his father's strained voice, he wishes that there wasn't so much of him left to break.

[aceofwhump]

Hi Ace! :)

Do you have good OUAT whump fanfics? (Or any user if you know good OUAT fanfics)

They can be from any season!

Thank you very much!

Have a good day

I do!! They're gonna be all Killian Jones whump though. Hope that's okay. That's pretty much all I read (minus a few August Booth whump fics)

You Are Not Alone by scientificapricot Summary: Killian is injured in a fight with Zelena’s flying monkeys. However, he finds that he doesn't have to deal with said injuries by himself.

Don't Let Go (Because I Can't Hold it Back Anymore) by cosette141 Summary: (canon divergence for s4 episode "White Out") Rather than Emma and Elsa trapped in the ice cave, Emma is trapped with Killian. They have to keep warm and stay awake as they fight the frigid cold, or their first quiet moment together may very well be their last.

A Snowball's Chance by cosette141 Summary: After Emma rescues Killian from Hades in the Underworld, David and Snow tend to some of Killian's physical wounds, and end up healing emotional ones. (aka, Snow and David acting as parental figures for Killian) hurt/comfort oneshot

The Servant by natascha_ronin Summary: Killian is tortured in the Underworld by a familiar face.

Last Time by thoughshebebbutlitle Summary: The last time he had been in a hospital bed they had been completely different people. She had handcuffed him to the bed then, but now she waited anxiously for him to wake; the rise and fall of his chest was a reassurance that he was still alive.

To Take a Heart by MisfitWriter Summary: Set in Season 3, after the incident in the boathouse. Killian is left on his own. Zelena ambushes him with the intention to take his heart and force him to take Emma's powers. Our pirate is about to prove that there is one thing stronger than any magic...

We're Living in a Desperate Time (We Won't Give Up) by LadyofAvalon Summary: He knew he was in for bad weather when the Crocodile appeared and knocked him out again. It only got worse from there.

You can take the boys out of Neverland by WinkyCutto Summary: The Lost Ones don't like having to live by the rules and Henry and his family are about to find out that bringing them back to Storybrooke may not have been the best idea... Hook whump galore, you have been warned.

Pale by SignoriaSickFic Summary: Set in the 6 weeks of peace in S4. Killian catches a nasty stomach bug and, feeling sick, fails to answer his phone. Enter a worried Emma who finds herself playing nursemaid to her indisposed pirate boyfriend. Warning: mentions of vomiting.