#shoutout to my brother for spray painting it

[codenamehazard]

.:Piss and Vinegar:.

Hey guys! This one was a doozy of a chapter to make, but I have completed it and I am very every excited to share it with you! Big shoutout to the lovely @rogueshadeaux for her help! Check her out, you won't regret it!

I hope you guys enjoy it!

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Chapter 9: Piss and Vinegar

I sit inside one of the trailers of the convoy vehicle, pulling out an old recording device from my sling. I don’t know how many of these things I have made over the years, but it helps me sort out my thoughts, and right now, I have a lot of them. I hit record and begin to talk.

During the beginning leg of the trip from those damned cages, tensions were thick enough to cut with a knife. Not surprising, seeing as I was going to kill birdbrain number one and leave them short a member. As the trip rolled on, some of the tension relaxed, but not by much. Birdbrain number two shut himself up in the cabin of the vehicle. Not coming out even when it was his brother’s turn to drive. Heh. Looks like I put the fear of God into that pigeon and he’s not gonna mess with me anytime soon.

Kestrel locked herself in a different trailer, a good majority of that time was spent getting ripped into by Mako. I couldn’t help but to smirk at the memory of hearing the shouting, imagining the little bird looking like a sad little puppy while the shark tears her a new asshole. A small pang of sadness intrudes my thoughts as I think back to moments during the Quarantine when I had to dress down Zeke in a similar way because he almost got himself killed. Mako’s tone told me all I need to know. She genuinely does care about the dumbass. I shake my head to rid myself of the ache. No time for that now.

The only one of the four man team that had the balls to come up and actually talk to me was Pangolin. We had some small talk after an awkward silence. He filled me in about what the deal is with this motley crew. Called themselves “the Misfits,” the spray-painted “138” on the lead vehicle now makes sense. I asked if this “Droptown” place they were taking me to was where they lived and the man chuckled. Turns out the bunch is nomadic, this is just one of the conclaves that’s friendly to them and others like them. I was about to ask more, but Pangolin had to leave to trade shifts with Dove. I decided to put a pin in it for the time being.

Left alone with my thoughts, I couldn’t help but to think back on what Mako said about Kestrel saving her life. She’s no weakling, I made sure of that. I didn’t hold back when I sparred with her. To hear that she had to be saved, I had to wonder what exactly was out here. What did she mean by Fracture being “the tip of the iceberg?” What did happen when Mako left?

My thoughts were interrupted when I felt the convoy lurch to a stop. I stop recording and put the device into my sling as I hear Pangolin’s voice boom out. “Alright jackasses! We’re here!” I hear the doors of the other trailers open up and feet hit the ground before I hop out myself. I see the others scatter like dandelion seeds in the wind towards a new patchwork city. Pangolin looked over at me and asked if I’ll be alright on my own for a little bit and mentioned meeting up back at the “HEMTT” he called it. I nod and let him know he doesn’t need to worry about me.

“I know.” He hummed. “Still, always good to ask regardless.”

I hum back in response before taking off on my own, curious to see what this “safe haven” is all about and hoping it’s not gonna be a repeat.

—------

I feel the same rush of awe I felt when I first entered Fracture, but the feel of this place was different. The buildings were still the patchwork materials being held together by cables and wires, but this time around it felt more… Chaotic. Nonsense coming together to make sense. This place felt like it had more character, had more of a soul, and from what I can tell from the Conduits that seem to call this place home, there was also more freedom as I watched them climb around with wild abandon. Any hesitation that may be lingering disappeared when Mako gestured to a wire and told me to go have a look around.

No need to tell me twice.

I climb up and leap onto the wire and zip off, energy buzzing through my body as I take a quick tour around Droptown, something that stands out more is just how… Colorful this place is. Memories of the street art I saw in Empire and New Marais drift by as the art pieces go by. Even pieces more abstract decorate the street, created by creative Conduits using their powers just to have a bit of fun. I smile as I launch myself off of a wire and glide to the next, my eyes scanning the area for the tallest building around.

As I tour around, I spot Mako and Pangolin heading into a small shack. Curiosity gets the better of me and I quickly dismount the wire and start climbing the buildings nearby, taking care not to alert the two to my presence.

Through the window, I see the two walk up to a woman with hair that looks like it’s literally made out of silk strands and begin talking with her. I frown seeing their expressions, full of concern and worry. I listen in so figure out what is causing the sour looks.

 “.... So the project isn’t going to be done on time?” I hear the silken haired woman whisper, worry dripping in her soft voice as she fusses with her braid.

“We’re doing the best we can, ma’am, but we’ve recently had a set-back.” Pangolin grunts in response, trying to keep his poise but the same worry infects his tone. “Couldn’t she make some from what she has?” The woman looks at the two, her voice almost pleading. My eyebrow raises at this tone. “That’s one of the issues, Mari.” I hear Mako pipe up. “She doesn’t have enough, second issue is that the process is going to act like a beacon and make those bastards come faster.” Those bastards? What is she talking about? “She’s doing the best she can and we’ll talk to her to see what can be done, but at this point it looks like we may have to fight with what we have on hand.” Pango shifted in his stance, his mask slipping and showing nervousness. “Against all of them?” “It’s better than nothing…” Mako shakes her head as she looks at the lady, Mari.

My frown deepens, set back? The gears in my mind turn as I wonder what in the world they were going on about. I vaguely remember Mako mentioning something about a project… Then there was the whole “they” situation. Who are “they?”  This mysterious boogieman must be one hell of a threat if it has an entire town of full fledged Conduits terrified, and for once this boogieman isn’t me.

I can ask Mako about this later, right now, it is time to get back on track. I hop off of the shack and go to the closest wire that doesn’t alert the three in the building that I was there before zipping back off. Time to find that gunsmith and get me a shiny new toy.

I blitz through the town, passing a caboose and a… Bomb? Before I see a building decorated with twisting metal that looks almost like something from Aliens, hanging on one of the outcroppings was a sign hanging on it displaying an anvil, a hammer and a pistol. I grin to myself, this is the place. Time to go introduce myself.

I hop off the wire and stroll inside. There are a few people pursuing the wares and a store clerk helping out customers and taking orders, but they don’t seem to notice or if they did, they’re smart enough to not say anything and leave me be. Already falling in love with Droptown more and more. I browse the wares myself and I hum in approval at what I see. I see components for guns so people could make a gun custom and premade “coreless” guns that I remember Mako mentioning, basically meaning that the firearm didn’t have an RFE core in it so that a harmonized core can be placed. I start grabbing some of the coreless shells just to get a feel of a gun again.

It felt strange holding a gun and not fearing it blowing up in my face, but my muscle memory still remembers all the times I went to target practice before I got my powers, be it skeet shooting with my cousin and his buddy or doing target practice at the range with Zeke. Man, I missed the feeling of holding a shotgun and I was eager to feel its kickback again. I put the guns away as I walk up to a counter. I know that I was gonna need a gun built from the ground up, and the premades help solidify what I wanted made. I was about to gently tap on the bell when the store clerk comes up to the counter.

“What can I do for you, sir?” The clerk asks in a bright voice and a soft smile. I couldn’t help but to blink, not everyday I’m talked to by a worker without them cowering in fear or staring at me in disdain.

“Been looking to get myself a new toy, heard good things about the gunsmith’s work. Gonna need it built from the ground up.” I hum as I look at the clerk, the expression he gave me wasn’t promising.

“Oooh… Sorry, she isn’t taking full on custom commissions at the moment. Big project with a deadline” He winces out. “We do have modules and pre-mades though!” Sorry kid, but those aren’t gonna fly and neither is that little statement either. I ain’t leaving until this forge-master makes me a gun.

“Let me talk to her, I bet I can change her mind.” I smirk as I step behind the counter and towards the door. The kid tries to get in my way, saying I wasn’t allowed back there, but I push him aside.

Completely disregarding the clerk, I walk through the door that leads to the back and I am immediately hit by a sweltering heat, strong RFE signatures, the noise of metal striking metal and the sound of blaring rock music. Looks like the gunsmith is home and has great taste in music.

I walk into where the heat was strongest and I look around, awestruck at the setup. The forge is running hot and Blast Shards were carefully placed into containers. I turn my head to look at the gunsmith and see a woman adorned with green and blue runic tatts and scars all over her body, burns and a particularly nasty looking one in the middle of her back seen through her lace-back tank, though I couldn’t help but to feel a gnawing sense of familiarity.

I try to get her attention, but she turns her music up louder. Drowning me out. I get louder and the music rises to overwhelm my voice. Rude little bitch. I growl in frustration and fire off a bolt to short out the speakers. There, now she can hear me. Before I can speak, I hear her growl as she turns around and the voice I heard I couldn’t believe came out.

“You’re gonna pay for tha-”

Her sentence is cut off when she turns to look at me. Same dark brown hair with white chunk, same burn-scared face. It was the fucking bird-bitch.

You have got to be kidding me. That’s the gunsmith Mako was talking about?? At least some of Mako’s behavior onthe trip here now makes sense.

We both stare at each-other awkwardly, as if we couldn’t believe who was standing in front of us. The stares turned into glares and once the realization fully sets in, Kestrel is the one to break the silence. “What are you doing here, MacGrath?” Her voice grunted out in aggravation. “Come here to gloat?” Well, didn’t take long for her to want to try pushing her luck again. Seems like she’s bent out of shape about those Blast Shards still. Well, tough shit.

“Well, I certainly didn’t come here to chit-chat, Morrison.” I hiss at her as I start walking around the forge, examining all the materials. “Mako told me about how there was a gunsmith that could make me a new toy. Never thought it would be you of all people.”

“I’m oh so sorry to disappoint you, but yes. I am the gunsmith of Droptown.” She snaps as she pulls up her safety goggles to glare at me. “Now if you don’t have anything important to talk to me about, would you kindly leave me alone? I have a very important project to complete and I don’t have the time, patience or crayons to deal with you.” She does that dismissing shooing motion with the hand that was holding the hammer. Looks like she’s forgotten where she stands with me.

“You know for someone I spared, you’re acting like an ungrateful brat! Especially with how you knew damn well you were going to die if it wasn’t for Mako saving your ass!!” I growl out as I pop my knuckles, my body instinctively warming up some more sparks just in case I need to fry some sense into her.

“And I will owe Mako one hell of a favor for that, but as I’ve stated before… I’m busy!” She snarls as she pulls out some scrap metal and puts it into some sort of cup.

“Well your little pet project can wait, I came here to have a custom gun made and if you know what’s good for you, you won’t make me wait.” I growl as my eyes narrow. The flippant bird pulls down her goggles and sprinkles glass into the container, clearly trying to busy herself.

“Uh, no it can’t wait. First come, first serve. Besides, like I told the clerk, I’m not taking custom commissions!” Kestrel uses a pair of tongs to grab the cup and put it into the forge. I think it’s about time I give her a reminder.

“What’s so important about this little pet project that you’re literally willing to try my patience and throw away your so called “best friend’s” good will?” I sneer, my lips turning into a smug grin as I see her stop in her tracks.

A sudden burst of molten metal explodes out from the forge as she marches over to a workbench that was covered in a tarp, with one swift movement she yanks the tarp to reveal what was under it. A large rocket-launcher type weapon with a large chamber for its core. Before I could really get a good look at the firearm, Kestrel whips her body around and gets in my face, smoke billowing from her mouth and eyes glowing hot-iron red.

“Not like you give a rat’s ass, but you know those Blast Shards I had to give back to you? Yeah, those ones? Those were the last components needed to complete that so called “pet project” that’s gonna help keep Droptown from being turned into a ghost town.” She hisses out in rage. The girl had to stand on her toes to get into my face in the first place, it would have been funny if she wasn’t being a uppity, mouthy bitch. “But since I had to give them up so I didn’t die, the project is behind and unlike you, I don’t have all the time in the world to fuck around! My policy is “first come, first serve” and I don’t care if you are the Demon, the Beast or The Almighty Messiah himself! I ain’t gonna give you special treatment.” She jabs her finger on my chest and I shove her off violently, growling and sparks arcing off of my arms. She stumbles, but she gets to her feet, fury still burning in her eyes. 

“You’re gonna wait your turn just like everyone else and if you don’t like it, you can just turn your pissy ass around and see if you can find another Gunsmith” She snarls before walking towards her forge. She’s not gonna turn her back on me, I’m not done with her. I stride over and get in between her and the forge, crossing my arms and scowling.

“Oh no, I ain’t leaving until I get a gun made. Even if I have to baby-sit you to make sure you don’t screw me over.” I sneer as I roughly jab my finger into her sternum. “ Mako said I could get a gun from you, and I will get that gun.”

“Who’s acting like a child now?!” Kestrel shouts as she slaps my hand away. “I couldn’t even make you a gun with the current materials I had now even if I didn’t have this sword of Damocles hanging over my head! Any pre-made components couldn’t handle the amount of energy you put out and any foci I have you’d overload completely! Now get out of my way or I will make that forge scorch your back!!” I scoff loudly at her excuse.

“So you’re saying you’re useless?” I jeer as my lips curl into a snarl.

“Clean the charcoal out of your ears, jackass!” The bird mimes the motion of getting water out of her ear before she starts pacing in front of me. “I’m saying that I need a whole ass Blast Core to make a gun that won’t fry when you touch it because, oh I don’t know… You’re the Beast?? The only place that I could get a Core of that quality is th-” She pauses mid-tiraid, her eyes widening before a grin that could give the Cheshire cat a run for his money spreads on her face. My eyebrows furrow. What has popped in that empty head of hers? “Weeeeeeeeeeeeell….. There is something that could be done about this little issue~”

“Oh god…” I can’t help but to roll my eyes damn near into the back of my skull before glaring at her

“You see…” The birdbrain starts as she walks over to a scrap pile. “As I’ve stated before, I can’t complete my project or make you a weapon due to a material shortage…. But that little problem could be easily remedied~”

“What are you getting at?” I narrow my eyes at hers

 “Well…” From the pile of scrap, she pulls out what looks like a piece of a Blast Shard, she seems to examine it with her fingertips as she holds it. “You see, I would be more than willing to make you your little toy, but you have to come with me to get the materials.” Kestrel looks up at me with a grin and I blink my eyes in shock. Is she being serious??

“Excuse me?!” I balk as Kestrel’s face turns into an infuriating smirk.

“What? It’s a fair trade.” She coos in an innocent-sounding tone, but I know that grin.

“You must need to get oxygen to that brain of yours because I think you’re confusing me for your lil’ boy-toy.” I snap as I vent out some sparks from my arms

“Oh no no! I’m perfectly sound of mind. You see, I not only have to replace the Shards I had to fork over, I also have to get cores to make a custom core for your toy…” The bitch giggles mischievously as she darts around as a plume of smoke, looking like an impish spirit.  “And since I know how much you don’t trust me, I figured his royal majesty would want to come along not only to keep me honest, but also to have the “pick of the litter” if you will. After all, only the best for the Beast, right?”

I grab Kestrel by her shirt and hold her so I can look her dead in the eyes, my own glowing crimson. The stupid, smug grin not leaving her face

“You are really pushing your luck, girl.” I growl lowly, sparks jumping off of my back. I wanted to fry her so bad. Get this thorn out of my ass for good, but if she’s the only gunsmith around, I have to keep her alive. She isn’t making it easy.

“Am I though? I mean, it’s a fair trade. You help me get the materials I need for my project and your gun, I’ll make an exception to my “no custom commissions” hiatus. Win-win, wouldn’t you say?” I smirks as she shrugs her arms nonchalantly as if she isn’t currently dangling off of the floor and in the grip of someone who could unleash a hundred thousand volts straight into that sorry piece of meat-jello she calls a brain.

“I really don’t have much of a choice, do I?” I groan out in irritation as I drop her onto the floor. Now it’s my turn to pace.

“Oh you always have a choice in the matter, the question is how badly do you want a new toy to play with?” She grins as she sits up, looking like the cat that ate the canary. I let out a growl before turning to look at her as she stands up.

“Fine! I’ll help you get the fucking Blast Shards, but you better keep your word. Got it, bird?” I shout, getting right into her face. Kestrel does the “cross my heart” gesture over her heart.

 “I’m a woman of my word.” I couldn’t help but to scoff at her little statement. Woman of her word? Yeah, riiiiiiight.

“We’ll see about that.” I sneer before turning around and storming out of the shop. I hate to admit it, even to myself, but the deal she proposed is a fair trade. Assistance with resource gathering in return for an exemption to her stupid “no customs” ban? Hell, she’s even gonna let me get dibs on the best materials. That’s more than fair. The more I think about it, the more appealing the idea becomes. After all, how hard could it be to go and collect Blast Shards? I will have to baby-sit her since I can’t touch them, but if it will get my gun faster, then it’s a small price to pay.

I hop onto the nearest wire and zip back to the HEMTT to rejoin with the other Misfits. I know I definitely have questions for Mako about why the fuck she didn’t tell me Kestrel was the gunsmith she was talking about as well as to let Pangolin know about the little deal the bird and I have struck up.

When I get back to the convoy, I see Kestrel is already there and Pangolin is loading up one of the jeeps. The look on the pain-in-the-ass’s face looks pleased as a Georgia peach as she hops into the driver’s seat of the jeep before Pangolin grabs her by her shirt and moves her to the back seat like a cat dragging around a naughty kitten.

I walk up to Pango and he nods at me.

“I’m guessing Kes already told you?” I grunt, crossing my arms. Pangolin nods in response. “Yeah, she told me you agreed to help her out with a project in return for getting a weapon made.” The shit-brickhouse hums as he loads up a dufflebag into the front passenger side seat. I raise my eyebrow at the bag.

“What’s in the bag?” I question, pointing at it. “Pickaxes, you’re going to need them.” Wait, what?

“Pickaxes.” I repeat. “For mining?”

“No, we’re going to use them them like pogo-” Kestrel starts up before getting a good thawk in the head by Pangolin. “Owwww.” I snerk at the girl’s expression. “I think you’ve done enough smart-mouthing for a good while. Mako already saved your ass once and I can make an educated guess you had another brush with death to make this little deal of yours. If your little gambit is going to work, you need to reign in your tongue.” Pangolin scolds Kestrel with the big brother tone as she huffs. It’s nice to not be the one whipping the idiots into shape for once.

“Fine.” The girl huffs before buckling up and turning to face away from me and Pangolin. The Spartan shakes his head and pinches the bridge of his nose before looking at me.

“I know you’re not keen on being told what to do from what Mako’s told me, but I’m gonna have to ask that you try to reign in the urge to antagonize Kes.” He mumbles as he rubs the back of his head.

“No promises.” I state simply. As long as she keeps her mouth shut, I’ll do the same. Simple as that. Pangolin sighs, but nods. I hop into the back seat and buckle up as Pango gets into the driver’s seat. He turns on the vehicle and soon we are on our way. To where? I don’t know, but hopefully it will be worth the trouble.

If there is one thing I know for sure, it’s gonna be a loooooooong ride.

[silvermahogany]

ITS DONE I HAVE THE K'RIK now i just need to redye my hair and closet cosplay an outfit together and we are SET boys

[niksixx]

New Generation: Meet the Kids

I know many of you have been waiting patiently for anything New Generation related, and I am happy to say I have finally completed a list of the NG kids! I hope you enjoy reading about my little characters, and I can’t wait to write a few little stories about them.��

A few shoutouts first. To all of you who have contributed to the characters’ personalities by sending in messages to my inbox, thank you. You have all made this series possible. I did my best to incorporate my own vision of the NG kids as well as your ideas to create something fun for us all. Second, a big shoutout to @pepeu-stuff for inspiring me. They have gone out of their way to draw a few characters (Farrah, Ezra, etc.) with their own interpretation and have inspired some of the traits for my characters. I truly cherish all of you, and I hope you enjoy the NG kids as much as I do.

A/N: Also, this is just a fanfiction. I tried my best to incorporate Crüe’s and GNR’s personalities into their ‘children’ but we all know kids can 100% be completely different from their parents. 🤗

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Meet the Sixx Kids

Nash Sixx 

Nash Sixx is the nineteen-year-old son of Nikki Sixx. He has dark hair and blue eyes with specks of green and a jawline most men would kill for. Like his father, he has an outgoing personality and a killer smirk that’s manipulated people into giving him what he wants more than once. He’s a college student that is studying music education, as he would like to be a music teacher. One of his best friends is Declan Rose, and he’s taught Declan a few tips and tricks when it comes to schmoozing the ladies. He’s also a big partier, and loves having his friends and cousins over to his college apartment. Nash’s favorite pastime though is sitting around the bonfire, glass of whiskey in his hand, while his father tells him stories of life on the road with Mötley Crüe.  

Harlow Sixx 

Harlow Sixx is the six-year-old daughter of Nikki Sixx. She has dark brown hair with clear blue eyes and free-spirited energy. Harlow and Penelope Lee are a package deal and will go nowhere without each other. She’s creative by nature, and sometimes will paint during rainy days. For a six year-old, Harlow is ridiculously intelligent. And just like her father, she has interests in photography and art.

Colby Sixx

Colby Sixx is the two-year-old son of Nikki Sixx. He has Nikki’s natural light brown hair and light blue-gray eyes. He loves finger painting with his sister, playing with toy cars, and putting together puzzles. 

Meet the Lee Kids 

Penelope ‘Penny’ Lee

Penelope ‘Penny’ Lee is the five-year-old daughter of Tommy Lee. She’s a little girl with wavy brown hair (usually in pigtails with little bows attached), big brown eyes, a love for bright pink tutus, and has a bubbly, outgoing personality. She’s the spitting image of her father, and she has him wrapped around her tiny little finger. Penny Lee enjoys her dolls, her teddy bears, and tea parties. She’s been raised to be an independent child and loves exploring nature and making pretty flower bouquets. Penelope can be friends with anyone, and at five-years-old, she’s already shutting down the bullies who make fun of the other kids at preschool.

Meet the Mars Kids

Dillion Mars 

Dillon Mars is the seventeen-year-old son of Mick Mars. He’s tall, lanky, with soft brown hair, blue eyes, and a sarcastic attitude. He’s not as quiet as his father, but he has his moments. Dillion tries not to take life too seriously, which is why he and Isaac Stradlin get along extremely well. Dillion has no interest in school, although he’s extremely smart in math and science. He’s president of his school’s mathletes club though he was pressured by his teachers and hates disappointing others. Most of his time is spent on the living room aimlessly playing his guitar,  Luckily, Dillon did not inherit his father’s bone disease, but he is a huge vodka drinker and occasionally will smoke cigarettes with the Stradlin twins and Ryan McKagan.

Meet the Neil Kids 

Katerina ‘Kat’ Neil 

Katerina ‘Kat’ Neil is the eighteen-year-old daughter of Vince Neil. Kat’s thin blonde hair is usually styled straight or into two space buns on the top of her head with a few pieces framing her face. Green eyes the color of emeralds, she’s the chick every girl wants to be, and the girl every guy wants to be with. Katerina is friendly to all, but she’ll never let anyone take advantage of her kindness. As a senior in high school, she takes pride in being the captain of the cheerleading team, a lead choreographer in the dance club, and the president of the drama club. While the most popular girl in high school could have any boy she wanted, there’s only one boy that Katerina has ever been interested in. Unfortunately, that boy is Declan Rose, the son of her father’s arch enemy, Axl Rose. 

Carson Neil

Carson Neil is the fifteen-year-old son of Vince Neil. Carson’s shoulder length blonde hair resembles his father’s, and he was gifted with a singing voice that could cure the world’s problems. He’s mature for his age, which is why most of his friends are a few years older than him. Carson can be a bit stuck up though and a bit of a prima donna. When he’s not busy rehearsing lines for his school's theater productions, Carson is confined to his room blasting Aerosmith, Ozzy Osborne, and writing his own lyrics to songs he’ll never share. 

~~~

Meet the Rose Kids

Declan Rose 

Declan Rose is the eighteen-year-old son of Axl Rose. He’s the spitting image of his father, except with shorter ginger hair with longer pieces framing his freckled face. Declan is unique in the fact that he refuses to follow in his father’s footsteps. While he enjoys listening to rock and his father’s old vinyl collection, Declan prefers hip-hop and rap music, much to his father’s dismay. Like Axl, Declan is extremely intelligent, and would decide to major in philosophy or psychology in college. He also does have his father’s temper, and while sometimes his father was misunderstood, Declan is lucky to have Katerina Neil around. She calms him down and supports his true personality, even if they have to keep their relationship hidden from their parents. 

Easton Rose 

Easton Rose is the eight-year-old son of Axl Rose. Easton was lucky enough to inherit his father’s hair color, but instead of the long locks, Easton’s hair is shorter and usually styled with gel. The eight-year-old is as stubborn as they come with a hyper and fiery personality to match his hair. He’s an athletic young boy who is also extremely personable and will talk to anyone. He’s impatient, especially when he wants his older brother Declan to help him with homework or play baseball in the backyard with his best friends Logan Adler and Hunter McKagan. Easton is a little flirt and has no problem charming ladies of any age. Easton also has a big crush on his brother’s girlfriend, Kat. 

Calla Rose 

Calla Rose is the five-year-old daughter of Axl Rose, and she is the queen of the household. Calla is the only child with blonde hair, but every now and again Axl dyes pieces of her pink (with temporary spray on hair color of course) to match the large gemstone on the tiara she wears around the house. Calla Rose is quite shy around other people, and it takes her a good twenty minutes before she’s able to muster up the courage to play with other children in preschool. Axl Rose is fully wrapped around his daughter’s finger, and it’s not shocking to catch them in the midst of coloring, ballet dancing, or playing with dolls. 

Willa Rose 

Willa Rose is the four-month-old daughter of Axl Rose. She’s a chubby baby with ginger hair and big hazel eyes. She loves making faces at her big sister and listening to her daddy as he sings her to sleep at night. 

Meet the McKagan Kids 

Ryan McKagan 

Ryan McKagan is the sixteen-year-old son of Duff McKagan. If teenage girls could use one word to describe this boy, it’s this: heartthrob. He’s tall with wavy blonde hair and a welcoming smile, it’s no wonder the girls in high school drool over him. Ryan can be found exercising (as he’s a hockey player) or running around his neighborhood five days out of the week. Ryan does smoke cigarettes and drinks on occasion, much to his father’s disapproval. Ryan tries not to take life too seriously and would have definitely picked up on some of his dad’s lame jokes. Around his neck is the letter ‘F’ attached to a gold chain as it’s the first initial of his girlfriend’s name, Farrah. Even if they have a rough relationship (thanks to Ryan being a typical flirt around other girls) he’s confident Farrah is the girl for him, so he never takes the necklace off. While Ryan didn’t necessarily inherit many of his father’s traits, what he did receive is the ability to sing. His father has taught him how to play guitar, and they’ll sit on the porch outside in the fall, singing and strumming to Guns N’ Roses old songs.

Hunter McKagan

Hunter is the seven-year-old son of Duff McKagan. Hunter’s hair is darker than his older brother’s, but lightens up in the sun. The seven-year-old boy loves to swim and skateboard (lessons are provided for free by Dillon Mars, Issac Stradlin, and Ezra Hudson), and he’s an absolute terror when he chases his family around the house shooting Nerf gun darts at them. He’s also the reason Duff cannot find his cowboy hats, as Hunter will usually steal them and wear them throughout the day. 

Meet the Hudson Kids 

Ezra Hudson 

Ezra Hudson is the eighteen-year-old son of Saul ‘Slash’ Hudson. Ezra is a bit shorter than his father, and yet could be his brother. Ezra was blessed with the most beautiful curls, and unlike his father he usually keeps them out of his face with headbands or ponytails. Ezra doesn’t have just one style, either. Somedays, he’ll dress head to toe in leather. Other days he prefers flannels and jeans, or button ups and khakis. Ezra is definitely a gamer. He also enjoys hiking, fishing, and hunting. He’s also into music, but is still learning how to play acoustic guitar. College is not in the cards for Ezra, as his dream is to form his own band. As for Ezra’s love life, he’s a total chick magnet. Unfortunately, he’s invisible to the only girl he wants: Isabel Stradlin. 

Mali Hudson 

Mali is the six-year-old daughter of Saul ‘Slash’ Hudson. She and her sister Maya were also blessed with their father’s glorious curly hair, and they’re damn proud of it. Mali’s hair is only to her shoulders, which is how you can tell twin from twin. At just six-years-old, little Mali has a plethora of hobbies such as origami, bracelet making, and flower pressing. Many of her crafts are given to either her parents or Farrah Adler. 

Maya Hudson

Maya is the six-year-old daughter (also the oldest twin between herself and Mali) of Saul ‘Slash’ Hudson. Maya has no problem wearing identical outfits with her sister, but their personalities couldn’t be more opposite. Maya loves to wrestle with her older brother and cousins (especially Declan who refuses to wrestle back for fear of hurting her) as well as having interests in dinosaurs, rock climbing, karate, and reptiles (she convinced her family to adopt two snakes and a lizard). 

Meet the Stradlin Kids 

Isaac Stradlin 

Issac Stradlin is the seventeen-year-old son of Izzy Stradlin. With dark shaggy hair, bright eyes, sharp jaw and toned body, Isaac comes off as intimidating at first glance. He can be intense about the things he is passionate about (music, poetry, history) but more often than not Isaac is laidback and easygoing. Isaac’s musical knowledge comes from what his father has taught him through the years, and he’s incredibly talented when it comes to playing instruments such as guitar, drums, keyboard, flute, and trumpet. He doesn’t particularly enjoy his father’s dark and gloomy style of dress that includes black jeans, black button ups, and even black hats, as he feels more comfortable in sweatpants and tank tops. As Isaac is the only boy that doesn’t mind babysitting and playing with the little girls, he has accidentally found himself a fan club whose members consist of Penny Lee, Calla Rose, Harlow Sixx, and twins Mali and Maya Hudson. 

Isabel Stradlin 

Isabel Stradlin is the seventeen-year-old daughter of Izzy Stradlin and the younger of the two between her and her twin brother, Isaac. Isabel marches to the beat of her own drum and has what most would call a ‘bone to pick with the world’ attitude. Isabel has had many different styles, but her current wardrobe is grunge. Isabel considers herself a humanitarian, constantly joining in protests while simultaneously volunteering at homeless shelters and soup kitchens. Because of her compassionate heart, it’s no secret that she and Farrah Adler are inseparable. Isabel would inherit her father’s artistic ability, but her art would range from pottery to graffiti portraits. 

Meet the Adler Kids 

Farrah Adler 

Farrah Adler is the sixteen-year-old daughter of Steven Adler. Her blonde hair is mostly straight with a few layers here and there, and she has the same vibrant and playful eyes as her father. Farrah’s style is mostly hippie influenced (but on occasion she can rock a leather jacket and bandana), and she has more of a laid back personality, something she absolutely did NOT get from her dad. As someone who treasures the beauty of the Earth and its creatures, Farrah would join in rallies such as ‘save the sea turtles’ and volunteer at animal hospitals, where she discovered her calling as a veterinarian. Oh, and she’s 100% vegetarian. Farrah has a peaceful aura, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that she enjoys yoga, astrology, essential oils, journaling, and smoking weed. She also has an on-again-off-again relationship with Ryan McKagan, who she drags to many wildlife rallies.

Logan Adler 

Logan Adler is the nine-year-old son of Steven Adler. He has wavy blonde hair past his neck, playful gray eyes, and a love for drumming. Logan inherited his father’s happy-go-lucky spirit, and loves to meddle into his sister’s business when he’s not playing sports or building legos. He definitely is the class clown and loves being the center of attention, which usually results in him being sent to the principal’s office. He’s a jokester, a prankster, and loves getting into trouble.

[welllpthisishappening]

One Foot In (1/7)

The facts were these.

Killian Jones was dead. This much Emma knew, standing in the middle of the funeral parlor staring at him. What she didn’t know was why. Or how. Or what she would do when she touched him.

Because Emma Swan had a gift. Touch a dead thing once, bring it back to life. Touch it again, dead forever.

And the last thing Emma could do was bring Killian back to life, talk to him for the first time in years, only to watch him die all over again. Not when she’d spent the better part of those same years being in love with him.

-----

Rating: Teen, but with eventually kissing and magic-type magic Word Count: 9.3K this chapter.  AN: Approximately two years ago, seriously, I got a message asking if I would ever be interested in writing a Pushing Daises AU. I was! So I wrote a little blurb and some more very nice people were like this is good, you should write more. I did. And then did...nothing with it. Until now. I’ve been hoarding this for long enough and I’m actually pretty proud of it and it’s got a whole bunch of some of my favorite things. There will be a lot of banter and more kissing than you probably expect if you’ve seen the show, and a lot of magic and magical explanations. If I have any talent writing banter it comes directly from watching Pushing Daisies, so hopefully I’ve done them well here. Also shoutout to @distant-rose​ for the Fathership.

Updates every Wednesday going forward, and if you’d like to be tagged let me know: @shireness-says​ @optomisticgirl​ @nikkiemms, @teamhook, @dayo488​, @greymeetsblue​, @jennjenn615​, @heavenlyjoycastle​, @klynn-stormz​, @superchocovian​, @onepunintendid​, @jonesfandomfanatic​, @lfh1226-linda​

|| Also on Ao3 if that’s how you roll ||

-----

Emma Swan is nine years, six months, twelve days and, approximately, fifteen hours old when she realizes she is hopelessly, painfully, deliriously in love. 

It’s not a particularly pleasant feeling. 

Mostly because it happens suddenly, without much prompting and the object of her affection is currently spraying her in the face with the hose in his front yard. 

She yelps, water catching on her eyelashes and strands of her hair, but he just grins at her, taking a step forward to make sure her clothes are drenched through. Ingrid is going to kill both of them. Emma can almost hear Liam laughing somewhere. 

This, of course, is why she’s so frustrated by her sudden realization. 

Emma has been standing on the Jones’ front lawn for as long as she can remember – directly opposite of her own front lawn and close enough that Ingrid can still yell for her to come home when dinner is ready. Or when there’s pie. There’s almost always pie. 

Emma’s friendship with Killian Jones is not much more than happenstance and convenience. He lives across the street, with his brother in a great, big house with stained glass windows that paint the inside of the living room different colors when the sun sets. They met by mistake, Emma drawing with chalk at the end of the driveway and he was watering the lawn and dared to disturb her masterpiece. 

She threw chalk at him. 

It went from there. They talked and yelled and Emma may have stomped her foot more than once regarding the destroyed drawings, but Killian picks up the broken pieces of chalk and offers her one and they come up with a rather stunning visual of a futuristic outer space world with some kind of monorail system. The engineering is very impressive. 

And they don’t ever really stop. They dart back and forth across the street for years, afternoons spent constructing spaceships out of cardboard boxes Liam brought home from work and evenings in the kitchen with Ingrid while she lets them test a new flavor of pie she’s experimenting with. They watch movies and celebrate birthdays and there’s a secret handshake because of course there’s a secret handshake, and Emma tells Killian she sometimes wonders what happened to her real parents and Killian tells Emma he’s scared Liam is going to disappear like his dad did. 

She shouldn’t love him. 

And yet, at nine years, six months, twelve days and, approximately, fifteen hours old, Killian Jones is quite possibly the most important person in Emma’s life. 

Except Ingrid. Because she makes all that pie. 

Killian is quiet – at least at first, soft-spoken words, but with a certainty that rings of clarity and confidence and it hadn’t taken long for him to grow a little bolder with Emma around. He laughs easier as the years go on, smile wide and, usually, only for her. His hair is almost always too long, dark strands that drift dangerously close to his eyebrows and a gaze that Emma also seems to covet. 

She doesn’t realize that yet, because she’s nine and she doesn’t know what covet means, but, eventually, it will all make sense. 

And eventually, she will regret not telling Killian Jones that he’s her best friend and she’s absolutely, positively in love with him. 

But Emma is nine and she believes she’s got the rest of her life and the rest of Killian’s life and she hasn’t allowed a little thing like death to even begin to enter the back corners of her mind. 

That will change soon. 

“Killian Jones, I am going to murder you,” she shouts, lunging forward. He laughs even louder when her feet skid on the slick grass, a flash of blue eyes and that smile that, even then, Emma considers hers and hers alone. 

“That’s not very nice, Swan. You’re the one who got in the way of all my work.” “Your work?” He nods seriously, as if he’s not directing the hose directly at her feet now and she’s going to have to throw these jeans away. They’ll never dry. “Did you not see that list of chores Liam left? Making sure the lawn wasn’t dry was one of them.” “It’s a lawn, how dry can it be?” “I didn’t ask.” “Didn’t you want to know?”

“Maybe,” Killian admits, flicking his wrist up to move the water so it hits Emma’s stomach and she gasps when some of the air gets knocked out of her. “But you came over here.” “And?” “And what? You’re here aren’t you?”

It’s impossible for Emma to realize what exactly that question means in the moment, but she’s also just realized she’s in love with Killian, so her heart does a fairly good job of attempting to beat its way out of her chest. 

He drops the hose. 

“You could have told me you had stuff to do.”

“But you were here,” he says again, as if it’s the most obvious answer in the world. It kind of is. She can’t remember a single time he told her to leave. 

Even when she was the new kid in school –  after she and Ingrid first moved to Storybrooke and Emma heard the whispers because she didn’t have real parents and no mom to make her lunch, but Killian just bumped his shoulder against hers and flashed her half a smile. He held her hand when they walked into school. 

Killian never cared about cooties. 

Or anything except Emma. 

“Yeah,” Emma mumbles. She digs her toes into the mud under her, the soft squelch of it almost matching up with the erratic rhythm of her pulse. “Well…”

He practically beams. 

And Emma isn’t sure what’s going to happen next because she’s never encountered a moment quite like this, but she can hear Liam’s footsteps and grumblings about the state of the lawn and— “Killian, if you’re just going to stand around all day...” he starts, but his eyes dart towards Emma as soon as she moves her foot again and the look on his face is unreadable. Particularly to a nine-year-old coming to terms with the idea of first love. “Oh,” Liam says. “Hey, Emma, I didn’t know you were here.” She shrugs. “I was going to ride my bike, but then Killian thought he was funny.” Liam’s expression changes again, more emotions Emma is not nearly old enough to understand or deal with, but it will, eventually, be that kind of day. At the moment, however, it’s sunny and there are a few clouds in the sky. The perfect day to race down the hill on the other side of town.

“How many times in a row have you beat Killian?” Liam asks knowingly, and Emma laughs before she can continue to consider whatever he’s doing with his face. 

“Forty seven.” “Oh, that’s not true, at all,” Killian shouts, ducking down to grab the hose again. Liam’s quicker than him, though grabbing him around the waist and pinning him against his chest. “God, Liam, let go of me!”

“Nah, little brother—” “—Younger brother!” “Semantics.” “Stop trying to show off!”

Emma is still laughing, her sides feeling as if they’ll split from the force of it. Killian scowls at her when she doesn’t come to his immediate aid, but her eyes dart back towards Liam. He nods. And it only takes a few moments for Killian to realize what’s going to happen, more flailing limbs and shouted protests. 

“Swan, Swan, Swan,” he chants, a nickname that isn’t really a nickname, but might be his in the way the smile is hers and Emma shakes her head when she grabs the water hose. “Don’t do that, that’s not even fair!” “I know it’s not,” she says. “But you were being a great, big giant jerk before and Ingrid’s going to be mad my jeans are all muddy.” “You should have dodged better then!” “Ah, c’mon now, little brother,” Liam chastises, still holding him around the waist and he’s probably bruised from Killian’s elbows. “That’s not hospitable at all. Emma’s a guest in our front lawn and you went and ruined her whole outfit.” Killian groans, but the sound turns into a yelp as soon as the water hits his feet and he realizes how cold it is. Emma widens her eyes. “Swan is not a guest,” he argues. 

Emma briefly wonders if her eyes can actually fall out of her face. It feels as if they’re about to, that particular proclamation ricocheting around her brain and her subconscious until she’s certain it’s the only words she’ll ever hear again. 

Killian blinks when Emma doesn’t say anything – or move the hose away from his feet. “You haven’t beaten me down the hill forty-seven times,” he mutters. “That’s the biggest lie you’ve ever told.”

She sticks her tongue out at him. 

And sprays him directly in the chest. 

There’s no way to really avoid Liam in this, but he doesn’t seem to mind, more laughter and tangled limbs, Killian’s hair sticking to his forehead and the shell of his left ear when Emma moves the water again. And for a few seconds Emma thinks she’s winning whatever unspoken battle they’ve staged here, but Killian’s always been a little shifty and and he turns quickly enough that he’s able to sneak out of Liam’s grasp. 

He moves towards her quicker than she’s ready for, tugging the hose out of her hands with an almost triumphant noise. 

“You’ve got to be faster than that, Swan,” Killian grins, waving the hose through the air until it feels as if Emma’s standing in a rainstorm. 

“You are the worst!” “Tell the truth about the hill!” “I am,” Emma yells, sniffling when the water threatens to find its way up her nose. “Oh, my God, I’m going to kill you!” Killian shakes his head, dodging what Emma thought was a particularly well-placed kick at his ankles. “No, you’re not. You like me way too much to kill me.” “That’s not true.” The words feel heavy on her tongue, despite the laughter still clinging to Killian’s voice and Liam’s rather pitiful attempts to get back on his feet after falling in the mud. Emma swallows, desperate to understand what is happening in the pit of her stomach, but Killian doesn’t look away from her. 

He keeps staring and the water keeps running, slowing slightly because they’re probably emptying the Storybrooke reservoir at this point. 

“I don’t know about that, Swan,” Killian says, leaning towards her. Emma gets the distinct impression he doesn’t mean to do that. 

“Liar, liar.” “I’m not the one lying. Forty seven? That’s impossible.” “If you think you’re winning, you should have been keeping better track.”

That catches him by surprise, a quick bark of laughter and water splashing on Emma’s shin when he jerks his hand to the side. “Sorry, sorry,” Killian mumbles when he notices the look on her face. “That one really wasn’t on purpose.” “Yuh huh.” “Swan.” Emma rolls her eyes, the sarcasm obvious in his voice and the half a smile on his face. Liam has finally stood up. “How many times do you think we’ve raced down the hill?” she presses, moving forward to push her finger into his water-soaked shirt. 

That gets him to blink. 

She takes that as another victory. 

“Way more than forty seven,” Killian answers. “And I win most of the time.” Emma stamps her foot – which gives Killian just enough time to wrap his own fingers around her wrist, pulling her hand away from him and pinning it against her side and the water is absolutely getting colder when he holds the hose directly above her head. 

“Say it’s not forty seven,” he laughs. Emma shakes her head, pressing her lips together tightly as if she’s refusing to give federal testimony. 

Liam appears to have given up on even trying to salvage the situation. 

“It’s not forty seven, Swan,” Killian continues. “I’ll give you...maybe thirty two, tops.” “Nope.” “Thirty five?” “I have beaten you down that hill forty seven times Killian Jones and that’s only in the last year since I started keeping track.” “You’ve only been keeping track for the last year?” “You never kept track to begin with!” “She’s got a point, little brother,” Liam muses. He’s sitting on the far side of the lawn now, doing something that may actually be pulling weeds and no one could have taken better care of that house than Liam did. 

“Oh, shut up,” Killian grumbles. He snaps his head back towards Emma, mouth twisted and eyes slightly narrowed. “Alright, so you started counting this year. I’ll give you that you’ve won most of the races, but I demand a recount for the rest of the summer.” Emma scoffs. “No way. You’re only mad because you didn’t know you were losing and—” “—And you were playing a game I didn’t know we were playing, Swan. So, either you agree to the terms or we keep up this...whatever we’re doing.” “You being a jerk,” she mumbles, and that time her kick lands on his ankle. Killian lets out a gasp of pain, expression shifting slightly and they’re both drenched, water falling from their clothes and their hair and everything feels slightly heavier than it had a few moments before.

It’s not a feeling that belongs in summer vacation. 

Killian hums, the tips of his ears going red and Emma learned that particular tell when she was seven and he tried to tell Liam he hadn’t gotten in trouble for fighting with that kid on the playground. The kid on the playground had been making fun of Emma’s distinct lack of parents. 

“Forty seven though?” he asks. “Really?” “Really, really,” Emma promises. “But I’m...we could start a new count. If you want.”

“Yeah?” “We’ve got all summer, right?” “And forever,” Killian says with a shrug, another string of words that seems to take up residence in every corner of Emma’s brain and she feels her lips part slightly. It’s her body’s natural reaction to try and keep breathing. 

She’s stopped breathing at some point. 

And someone else is calling her name. 

“Emma Swan,” Ingrid yells, leaning out the front door of the house across the street and the smell of lemon meringue is already obvious. “If you are done destroying all your clothes, then I think it’s time for you to come back over here and eat some lunch!”

Emma’s shoulders sag with the weight of her disappointment – an overreaction in the moment, but eventually it will seem like the most reasonable thing she’s ever done. “Do I have to?” “In twenty-four seconds or less.” “Fine,” Emma sighs. She glances back at Killian before she turns towards home, the smile still on his face and a piece of hair seemingly stuck to his forehead. He waves a dismissive hand through the air at the interruption, as if they do have all the time in the world. 

“I’ve got to help Liam anyway. But, uh...after? We could…” “There’s pie,” Emma finishes sharply. “I mean...it smells like pie? You could come over and then we could go.” “Ok.”

Liam makes a ridiculous noise a few feet away – disbelieving and adult and Emma ignores it because she’s nine and cutting into her twenty-four seconds of travel time across the street. “Emma,” Ingrid calls again. “Now!”

“Right, right, right, I’m coming. But…” She glances at Killian and she’s not sure why she feels like she has to make sure, but it feels important and—

“I’ll see you later, Swan,” he says. “I’m sorry about your jeans.”

“That’s ok.” Ingrid is shaking the screen door now. “Emma!”

“Ok, ok! I’ll see you later.”

Ingrid takes one look at the state of her as soon as she gets across the street, lets out a knowing laugh and mumbles something that sounds a lot like we should just buy new clothes every week under her breath. “Go upstairs and try and get some of the mud out of your toes before you drag it across the entire house, ok?” Emma nods, a blur of water-logged fabric and muddy footprints. She’s in the bathroom when she hears it, only a few moments later and nothing has really changed, but it suddenly feels as if everything has been flipped upside down, and Emma cannot possibly be expected to keep up with all of these emotions. Or sounds. 

It’s a crash — loud and jarring and then absolute, overwhelming silence. 

She freezes, heart sputtering in her chest and it’s impossible to know how she knows, but Emma knows and something is wrong. 

She hadn’t gotten around to doing anything about her jeans, sprinting back down the stairs and skidding into the kitchen and Ingrid is lying on the tiled ground, the pie splayed out around her when she dropped it. 

“Ingrid,” Emma whispers, knowing it’s pointless. She doesn’t know how she knows that either, but that appears to be the theme of the day and the step she takes forward is alarmingly shaky. “Ingrid,” she repeats. “Are you…”

She can’t bring herself to finish that sentence. 

It’s obvious anyway. 

Ingrid is dead. 

Emma exhales, tears in her eyes and disbelief churning in the pit of her stomach where, just a few moments ago, there were butterflies and the certainty that everything was going to be alright forever and ever. 

She tilts her head, as if that will change the scene in front of her and the combined scent of lemon and drying mud is particularly disgusting. 

“Ingrid?” Emma repeats, moving towards her as if there are magnets and supernatural forces involved. There are. It’ll just take a moment for her to realize that. 

Dropping to her knees, she ignores the pain that shoots up both her legs when she lands on the floor and Emma doesn’t ever actually cry. The tears are there, but they don’t spill over onto her cheeks. They stay in her eyes and, possibly, her soul and eventually that will feel like a very large sign. 

With neon lights and sound effects. 

In the moment though, it’s just another thing in an increasingly thing-filled situation and part of her wants to call for Killian. Most of her wants to call for Killian. 

But Emma’s mouth doesn’t appear to be working anymore, breathing a very particular challenge and Ingrid isn’t her mom. Ingrid isn’t even her officially adopted mom yet, that’s a work in progress and Emma’s fairly certain Liam did something that may help and there were suits involved and Killian stayed at their house that day while Ingrid baked something. 

Emma inhales sharply through her nose, Ingrid’s eyes already a little glazed over and staring at absolutely nothing and, if asked, she would have no idea why she does what she does next. Reaching out a finger, she pokes Ingrid in the shoulder, fingertip just barely skimming her skin.

Ingrid blinks, exactly, three times and sits up as normal as ever. 

She’s very clearly breathing. 

Emma might not be. And she’s worried about the state of her eyes again. 

“Did you get mud in here?” Ingrid asks, like that’s an entirely reasonable question and Emma is still frozen. Her mind can’t keep up with the moment or the feelings coursing through her veins, a mix of terror and surprise and happiness, plus whatever she may still be feeling for Killian and she still wishes Killian were in the kitchen with her. “Must have slipped,” Ingrid continues. She shakes her head, clearly unaware of what just happened and Emma is still doing her best to keep breathing. The pain in her side makes it clear it’s not working very well. 

“Emma,” Ingrid says lightly, leaning close enough that Emma jerks away out of instinct. That will eventually prove important. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost. What’s wrong, sweetheart?” “Nothing,” Emma mumbles. The word comes out far too quickly though, less a word than just a jumble of syllables and—”I just...heard you fall.” “Because of the mud. Did you not even change your clothes yet?” Emma shakes her head. Her throat feels far too small and far too big, all at the same time. “No, I…” “Well, go back upstairs and make sure you wash behind your ears and—” Ingrid glances around, grabbing a handful of plastic bags and pushing them into Emma’s chest. Her fingers never touch Emma. “Just throw them in here. I think we’ve moved past salvageable on that front. I swear, the messes you and that Jones boy get into should be documented for—”

It annoys Emma that no one will finish their sentences. 

But the timer on the oven dings, wholly unnecessary given the pie that’s still on the kitchen floor and Emma’s annoyance ebbs as soon as she hears the first shout. That’s not the right word. It’s less of a shout and more like absolute and complete anguish. 

Her head snaps towards the open window, the same one that looks directly onto the Jones’ front lawn and she can barely make out the top of Killian’s hair. He’s kneeling on the ground, clearly not worried about the state of his jeans or the mud that’s likely working its way into the fibers, gripping something. 

It takes Emma exactly two seconds, one gasp and three blinks to realize what he’s holding — Liam, dead. 

The tears that land on her cheek feel like brands, hot and emotional and she’s moving before she realizes, dashing around Ingrid and across the street. A car honks at her when she runs in front of it, but Emma doesn’t slow down and Killian’s still yelling and Liam is very obviously dead.

He looks just like Ingrid. 

Or just like Ingrid did before Emma touched her. 

Because Emma touched Ingrid back to life. 

“I don’t know what happened,” Killian stammers, eyes already rimmed red and the shake in his voice seems to rattle down Emma’s spine. “He was there and it was fine and then I...he wasn’t and he just...he fell over and it was…”

He lets out another choked sob, falling towards Emma’s shoulders like those pesky magnets are involved again and the only thought in her head is to hold onto him, like she’s trying to keep him there. Permanently. 

She’s got no idea how long they stay there, and it’s impossible to tell Killian’s tears from the rest of the water in Emma’s shirt. She can hear Ingrid on the phone, quiet and slightly frantic and the ambulance arrives twenty minutes later. 

There’s no explanation. 

It makes no sense. Because Liam Jones was young and healthy and fully capable of keeping his brother pinned to his side so Emma could point the hose directly at his feet. A dead Liam Jones makes no sense.

And Emma doesn’t say much for the rest of the day, just keeps staring ahead and trying to breath, her fingers laced with Killian’s for however many hours it takes for his uncles to show up.

“Killian,” a man yells. He jogs up the front steps of the porch, an oversized coat hanging off his shoulders and something that may be several earrings glittering under the street lights. 

Emma dimly remembers Ingrid tearing through Liam’s paperwork that afternoon, trying to find someone to come watch Killian — and the result is two uncles, one named Nemo and the other Shakespeare, who’d spent most of their lives as part of a traveling acting troupe. They’re eccentric in a way that's fascinating at any time, let alone one that includes a dead Liam Jones, but Killian rushes towards the man who called his name. 

His whole body shakes with the force of his tears. 

And, for the first time since she moved to Storybrooke, Emma feels out of place sitting on that side of the street, not sure she understands the weight of wrong that seems intent on dragging her into the Earth. 

“It’s alright, my boy, it’s alright,” the man continues. He barely pays any attention to Emma when she moves, but the other one, wearing his own ridiculous coat that looks like it came directly from the Navy, casts her a speculative glance. 

She tries to smile. 

She does. But it’s been a seemingly endless day and they never rode their bikes down the hill. 

Emma can’t believe she’s worried about riding her bike down the hill. 

“I think it’s about time you got some rest, huh?” Ingrid asks. She’s standing in the doorframe, apron still tied around her waist from that afternoon, but it doesn’t smell like pie in the house. 

It smells like mud and ending and Emma is tired. That must be it. 

She nods, and for a few minutes it’s normal and almost good and the lingering taste of toothpaste in her mouth as she climbs into bed is almost comforting. But then it’s Ingrid stepping into her room and tugging the blankets up under her chin and the kiss she places on Emma’s forehead will linger for years. 

It’s the last thing she ever does.

Ingrid kisses Emma and her whole body goes taut, eyes getting that same glazed look as she falls directly onto her back. 

Emma doesn’t gasp. 

She blinks, opening her mouth and leaning over the side of the bed like this is one, long practical joke. Ingrid doesn’t move. And Emma has had enough experience with dead bodies in the last twelve hours to realize she’s facing her third. 

Or, well, second. Technically. 

“Ingrid,” Emma whispers, not expecting an answer, but frustrated all the same. She reaches her hand out, pushing and prodding and touching and none of it works. She uses two fingers and three, tries punching Ingrid’s shoulder, but nothing happens. 

Ingrid is dead. 

And Emma runs – directly across the street. 

The Navy man opens the door, a little starling with dark eyes and shaved head, but Emma can feel the tears on her cheeks again, shoulders shaking with the effort of running and figuring out what’s going on and he doesn’t object when she falls towards him. He wraps his arms around her middle and lets her cry. 

The rest is a whirlwind of phone calls and suitcases and arrangements that Emma is not capable of making. The state, however, is more than happy to do just that – a car set to pick her up after the funeral that will bring her to a group home in a different state and promises that everything will be fine, but Emma doesn’t trust much of anything anymore, particularly after Ingrid was alive. Again. 

And then dead. Again. 

None of it makes sense. 

But that’s for a different moment and a different day to understand and in this moment Emma can’t help but keep glancing across the cemetery towards Killian, fidgeting in a suit with splotchy cheeks and shoes she knows don’t fit. 

He nods towards the patch of grass in between the two services, hand stuffed in his pocket. His tie is slightly off center. 

The state had to buy Emma a black dress. 

“You’re leaving,” Killian whispers, not a question, but a statement of fact and Emma’s neck aches when she nods in response. 

“I’ll be back.” “I don’t want you to leave.” “I don’t want to either. I’m...I’m sorry.” Killian tilts his head, confusion settling into the space between his eyebrows. “Why?”

Emma doesn’t have an answer to that. She has suspicions. And she’ll figure them out later, but right then, nine years, six months, fifteen days and, approximately, ten hours old, Emma Swan only has the certainty that she loves Killian Jones more than anything in the world and she doesn’t want to walk away from him. 

So she takes a step forward. 

As first kisses go, it’s probably not the greatest. There are two funerals happening and those suspicions lingering in the back of Emma’s mind make the air around her feel heavy, but she’s only a little certain she won’t ever be back and the rest of the reasons don’t matter. 

She tilts her head up, a quick brush of her lips over Killian’s. He doesn’t pull back, but it’s nothing more than that, until his thumb brushes over the curve of Emma’s cheek, catching a tear on the pad and the smile he gives her when she pulls back echoes in her memories for the next twenty years. 

“Ms. Swan,” a state official says brusquely and it must be time. 

She nods another, still shaky and uncomfortable, but that may just be the state of her lungs and the ability of either one of her legs to hold up her weight. Killian hasn’t moved his thumb. He doesn’t appear to want to. 

“I’m going to see you again,” he says, a promise Emma tries desperately to believe. It doesn’t work, the guilt and the weight in the very center of her is too big and too much and nothing has made sense, so it only makes sense that she doesn’t respond. 

She will, eventually, regret that. 

Because Emma Swan doesn’t ever see Killian Jones again. 

At least not while they’re both alive. 

Emma wakes with a start, glancing around her room like she’ll see several different ghosts spying on her. It feels that way, has for the last three days when she first started having these dreams and really the whole thing can fuck right off. 

It hasn’t happened in years – nightmares about that day and that night and how cold Ingrid looked when the EMTs carried her out of the house, the same ones who’d showed up for Liam. 

The irony of that was not lost on a grown-up Emma. 

Because a grown-up Emma was also a vaguely jaded Emma and she stopped having nightmares about Killian Jones and death years ago. 

Her subconscious does not seem to care. 

Her subconscious seems intent on driving her insane. 

Emma never went back to Storybrooke. She left with that state worker, lips still tingling from a first kiss that in retrospect would have been adorable if there wasn’t so much goddamn death involved, but Emma barely had time to linger on that thought before she was shipped to the first of nearly a dozen group homes and foster homes and less-than-pleasant foster families. 

It went on that way for years nothing permanent and everything disappointing and Emma has kept a fairly wide berth between herself and lingering human contact. Because, well, here’s the thing; Emma Swan is not exactly normal. 

In that she’s decidedly unnormal. 

As unnormal as it is possible to be. 

Because Emma Swan can wake the dead. 

And kill them again. 

It takes Emma three houses and one birthday without anyone acknowledging it is her birthday to grow disillusioned enough that it somehow makes sense to start conducting a few macabre science experiments. She’d always had her suspicions after that night and things that timed up too well to be coincidence and Emma starts with a dead bird she finds on the side of the road. 

It’s gross. 

The whole thing is gross, but she can’t shake this feeling that something is wrong with her, some fundamental issue that makes her unlovable and unfixable and she’s got to do something or she’s positive she’s going to shake herself out of her own skin. 

So she starts with the bird and it flies away and something else falls out of a tree and it might be a raccoon, but Emma’s never seen a raccoon. So, she doesn’t spend too long thinking about it before she runs away. 

And the houses keep coming and the experiments keep being...gross and Emma realizes, when she’s twelve years, ten months, sixteen days and nine hours old, that there are some rules to all of this. 

They’re relatively simple, but they’re unbreakable. 

Touch a dead thing once, it comes back to life. Touch it again, dead, forever. Keep a dead thing alive for more than one minute and something else has to die in its place. 

It’s then that twelve-year-old Emma realizes magic never comes for free. There’s always some kind of price. And she never looks for Killian Jones. 

She never goes back home. 

She moves – house to house and family to family, in name at least, until she ages out of the system and scrapes together enough money waitressing to pay the rent on the shoebox of an apartment she can live in. She moves out of that apartment eventually too. 

The concept of roots kind of freaks Emma out. 

Everything kind of freaks Emma out. 

She assumes it’s because she’s wrong. 

At, like, the most basic level. 

She does a good job of hiding it. Most of the time. She’s grown up and the years have passed, as the years have a tendency to do, and she’d saved up enough from those first few waitressing jobs that it only makes sense to open up her own restaurant and Emma may hate roots, but she’s still kind of a sentimental loser and her restaurant is on the other side of the county from Storybrooke and only serves pie. 

Damn good pie, but only pie. 

It’s kitschy. It kind of balances out all the death in her life. 

Emma shakes her head, still sitting upright in bed and she’d left the TV in the corner of the room the night before. The news is on now, some perfectly coiffed broadcaster talking about a murder victim and reward for any information and Emma mutters a curse under her breath because she knows it’s only a matter of time until—

Her ringtone is loud enough that she’s momentarily concerned about the effect it will have on her wallpaper. 

Ruby is already talking by the time Emma swipes her thumb over the phone screen. 

“Em, Em, Em, Em, where are you? Are you home? Are you at work? Are you on your way to your very short commute from your home to your work?” “Are you breathing?” “No, this is more important than breathing.”

Emma slumps into the small mound of pillows behind her. There is only one thing Ruby would consider more important than breathing – money. 

The story of how Emma Swan meets Ruby Lucas is fraught with miscues and miscreants, but the important thing is that a perp Ruby was chasing over the goddamn top of buildings missed a step and suddenly fell directly into the alley behind Emma’s restaurant. 

Where she was taking the garbage out. 

He died rather instantly. And then...was less dead once he slammed his hand on Emma’s forearm. All of which Ruby saw. 

Emma managed to swat at his head before he took off back down the block, but the damage was done as they say. Not Ruby. Obviously. She claims it was fate and meant to be and, well, it’s much easier for a private investigator to figure out who killed murder victims when she’s got a partner who can wake them up and ask them. 

“What’s the gig?” Emma asks, mostly because sometimes she likes to use the wrong lingo on purpose if only to get Ruby to make that put-upon sigh. It works. 

“That doesn’t make any sense at all.” “Listen, Rubes, I’ve got, just like, a ton of mail order...orders waiting for me, so if this is going to take several thousand years then…” “Did you just call them mail order orders?” “That makes sense.” “Ehhhhh.” “Give me a break, I literally woke up five minutes before you called.” Ruby doesn’t sigh at that. She doesn’t say anything. That’s more concerning. “You just woke up?” she asks, a note of concern in her voice that probably shouldn’t feel as if it affects several of Emma’s internal organs. “Was...more weird dreams?” Emma makes a noncommittal noise – mostly to save face and partly because she’s been incredibly vague with Ruby about the dreams, only mentioning them when her partner pointed out how dead tired she looked during a trip to the morgue earlier this week. Ruby thought she was far funnier than she was. 

“Emma,” Ruby chides, drawing out her name until it feels like a reprimand and punishment. “C’mon, seriously. What are you even dreaming about?” “Nothing.” “Is your eye twitching?” “Excuse me?” “Your eye twitches when you lie,” Ruby says. “Like every single time. It may be your most giving tell, honestly.” “How many tells do you think I have?” “I know you have, at least, five. The eye twitch is the most obvious, but sometimes you play with your hair and you scrunch your nose. Plus that foot bobbing thing and, uh...that’s four, right?” Emma makes another noise, eyes flitting back towards the TV and she can’t shake the feeling she should know something about whatever the story is. “Damn,” Ruby huffs. “I can’t think of the last one. You know what, it doesn’t matter. You’re trying to distract me and it’s not working.” “Did it not?” Emma laughs. 

“No. Kind of. But no. Listen to me, do you want to get paid or not?” “I thought we already talked about all the mail order orders I have. There are just...a questionable number of rotten strawberries in my walk-in.” “It’s weird that you use rotten fruit.” Emma shrugs. And tugs her hair over her shoulder. “Cheaper that way,” she explains, not for the first time. “Plus, it’s not like I’m eating my own pie.” “Can’t have your pie and eat it too?”

“I don’t think that’s the colloquialism you were looking for. And you’re still getting sidetracked. Does this have something to do with the body they’re talking about on the news?”

“If the body on the news is offering a five-figure reward for any information regarding his untimely demise.” Emma doesn’t usually react to Ruby’s blunt viewpoint of the world and its numerous dead bodies, but she can’t suppress the shiver that moves her body when she hears his and something is wrong. 

“His? And did you say five figures?”

Ruby hums, sounding as if she’s already decided what to do with her share. “His. I promise that is the least interesting part. The interesting part is that he was found out by the old quarry on the other side of the county, you know right near the bottom of the—”

“Hill,” Emma finishes. “The bottom of the hill. That’s…” Her vision swims, memories and moments attacking from every angle until she has to glance at her arms to make sure she’s not sporting inexplicable bruises from the past. She’s not. 

Magic only goes so far, it seems. 

“Yeah,” Ruby says, confusion obvious in all four letters. “That’s exactly right. They say it looked pretty bad. Some kind of something gone wrong, but the town isn’t happy about it and they don’t like the limelight and the allusions that they’re a hotbed for murder so I guess the mayor’s offered up a bunch of money and—” “—What was the guy’s name?” “What?” “The guy,” Emma repeats, and her voice scratches on the words. “You said it was a guy right? At the bottom of the hill? In Storybrooke?” Silence. 

There’s silence on the other end of the phone. 

And Emma’s head snaps back towards the TV when they finish their report because services for the deceased are being held tomorrow and— “His name’s, well, it was, I guess, his name was Killian Jones,” Ruby says, and Emma doesn’t really hear the rest of it. 

She barely realizes she’s agreed to any of this until the local news ends, switches over to even crappier daytime programming and Emma has no idea how she gets through the day. She bakes. That’s kind of her thing. 

She bakes and comes up with ridiculous recipes and flavor combinations and the customers are happy and Ruby announces I’ll see you tomorrow when she slams the door closed behind her nearly ten hours after it feels as if the world has ended. 

Killian Jones is dead. 

And Emma can’t seem to catch her breath. 

Ruby’s standing outside her car the next morning, two cups of coffee in her hand and an expectant smile on her face. “Your eye is twitching,” she says conversationally, handing Emma what better be a latte. It’s not. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” “Sure I don’t. I’m just paid to observe and critique—” “—No one is paying you to critique.” “Whatever,” Ruby shrugs, swinging open the passenger side door of Emma’s car. “Why the face about this place?” “I will tell you it’s less threatening when you rhyme.” Ruby scowls. “That was not intentional and mostly the fault of the limits of the English language. You lived there at one point, didn’t you?”

“Were you looking me up last night?” Emma balks, and her hand is shaking so hard it’s difficult to move the gear shift. 

“Please, don’t insult me like that. I looked you up as soon as I met you.” Emma jerks her head around, only to find Ruby grinning at her like several metaphorical cats. “Then why the third degree?” “There are no degrees here. There’s friendly curiosity, particularly when it comes to the state of your body and your ability to do what we’re going here to do.” “I’m fine.” The lie is honestly almost offensive. Emma made sixteen pies the day before. One had five different kinds of berries in it. She tested a new crust recipe she’s been thinking about for years. 

Literally. Years. 

She’s so stressed out she’s not sure she even shut her eyes the night before. 

And that’s not the right word at all. 

She’s goodman terrified. 

She can’t believe Killian is dead. 

Ruby throws her whole head back when she laughs, the sound filling the entire car and lingering on air molecules. “God, that was horrible,” she mutters. “Ok, let’s try it again. You know this guy?” “Small town.” “Not an answer.” “I knew him.” “In a personal sense?”

“Oh my God, Ruby,” Emma groans, and she can’t slump down in the seat while she’s driving. It’s definitely the most unfortunate thing that’s happened to her all day. She can’t imagine that will stay the same going forward. “I left Storybrooke when I was nine!”

“Yuh huh, yuh huh, yuh huh. Ok. So...what is it, childhood sweetheart?” “You know me better than that.” “I thought I did until I saw the explosion in your kitchen yesterday and now I’m starting to think you and our body were a little—” “—Can we not call him a body,” Emma snaps, knuckles going white when she grips the steering wheel too tight. 

Ruby blinks. “Still sweet on him?”

“I was nine.” “That’s not an answer.” “No,” Emma says, and she doesn’t expect that to hurt nearly as much as it does. That’s insane. This whole thing is insane. She wrote down conversational ideas for her sixty seconds with Killian somewhere around four in the morning. 

Every one was worse than the last. 

“No?” Ruby echoes. “You should tell that to your right arm.” Emma groans, not taking her eyes off the road because she can feel her arm shaking against her side. Her elbow keeps digging into her rib. “This is going to be fine,” Emma mumbles. Ruby does not look convinced. 

That’s probably for the best since Emma can’t control her limbs – or her mind. 

And she might not be nine years old anymore, but she’s fairly certain part of her never really stopped loving Killian Jones and the rest of her never forgot Killian Jones and they don’t hit any traffic on their way to Storybrooke. 

She figures that’s some kind of sign. 

They come up with some excuse for the funeral director – a portly man Emma doesn’t recognize who doesn’t recognize Emma because she hasn’t been in Storybrooke in nearly twenty years – and he directs them towards the viewing parlor. 

The whole thing is sterile and unfeeling and Emma keeps exhaling dramatically. 

“They think he was into some shady stuff you know,” the man says, voice dropping low like he’s sharing secrets with them. Ruby arches an eyebrow. 

“That so?” “Oh yeah, yeah, very messy crime scene. Guess he came out on the short end.” Emma's stomach turns, mouth dropping open. “And no one else was found there? Just Kill—Mr. Jones? He was the only victim?” “You think the police are hiding more dead bodies?” “That’s not what I said.” “What she means,” Ruby says, stepping in between the two of them before Emma can throw the first punch, “is that it seems strange that there would be a sign of struggle and nothing else. No other evidence of other people around?” The funeral director does not look impressed. “That’s not my area,” he shrugs. “All I know is there’s a reward and the mayor’s going crazy trying to keep the cameras out of here and the kid’s uncles are besides themselves.” Emma has to count to ten in her head to make sure her exhale doesn’t fly out of her. Ruby’s gaze flashes her direction. “Right,” she says. “Well, if you don’t mind…”

There are a few more words exchanged – and possibly a few well-placed bills, but Emma ignores all of that, taking in the scene and there’s an actual sign at the far end of the room. 

In Loving Memory of Killian Jones. 

Emma drags her hand over her face, blinking back whatever has suddenly appeared in her eyes and she resolutely refuses to believe they’re tears. 

She can’t believe he’s dead. 

“Em,” Ruby calls. “We’re uh...we’ve only got a couple minutes here.”

Emma nods brusquely, avoiding the slightly accusatory stare of the funeral director and—”What if I did this on my own?” 

“What?” “My own. Just...there’s, you know, years and a familiarity there and he’s...well, it may be weird to wake him up and stun him like that.” Ruby’s eyebrows set several different records for height and movement. “You think we’re going to stun him? And did you say wake him up? He’s not asleep, Em.” “I know, I know, but...just...I think this is for the best.” “Yuh huh.” “You keep saying that.” “That’s because I can’t figure out another string of words to use in this situation. You know you can’t stay in there long.” “I know.” “You’ve got sixty seconds to figure out who killed this guy.”

Emma shivers. And Ruby notices. Always. Perpetually. Infuriatingly. “I know,” Emma says again. “Trust me, it’s...I’ll be in and out and we’ll be collecting money in no time.” “Announce that a little louder.” Emma sighs, Ruby staring at her like she’s taking stock or emotional inventory. It seems to last forever and Emma does her best to keep her breathing even when Ruby leans around her to open the viewing room door. 

“Sixty seconds,” she repeats. “That’s it.” “Aye aye.”

The door sounds impossibly loud when it closes behind Emma, another sound that makes her jump and sigh and she’s an absolute disaster. Or at least she thought she was until she turned and saw the coffin and then it feels a little like melting and a bit like freezing and it’s a strange combination, particularly when she’s also fairly certain her lungs have disappeared entirely. 

She squeezes her eyes closed, desperate for some trace of confidence or courage. It’s disappointing when she can’t find any. 

“C’mon, Swan,” she mumbles, half to herself and half to the person on the other side of the room because that’s exactly what the person on the other side of the room would say to her.

Emma takes a step forward, wobbly at best and petrified at worst, lifting the coffin lid, and her lungs reappear in a miracle of modern science as soon as her eyes land on him. 

“Oh,” Emma breathes, and that’s about all there is to it. 

He’s wearing a suit, hair even longer than it was when he was ten years old. It curls slightly, just behind his ears, and there’s a dusting of scruff on his face. His hand is folded over his chest, only one hand, making his jacket twist slightly and Emma feels as if her throat is closing. 

He’s got an earring in one ear. 

It makes her laugh. 

“Oh my God,” Emma mumbles. “You look like a pirate.”

She closes her eyes again when he doesn’t answer – she refuses to acknowledge why he doesn’t answer, but she’s got a job and justice needs to be served or something. Ruby probably has several dozen new pairs of shoes she’s already preordered. 

Bobbing on her feet as soon as she’s within arms-length of the coffin, Emma shimmies her shoulders, like that will help shake free the nerves clinging to the base of her spine. Her lips feel far too dry, breathing far too erratic, but she’s on limited time and she’s got to touch him. 

She’s got no idea where to touch him. 

She scans his face, trying to find a spot that isn’t too forward or too weird and her eyes land on the scar on his cheek – a souvenir of a race down the hill and faulty brakes and Liam had been white as a sheet when they came home with Emma’s blood-stained sweatshirt pressed against Killian’s cheek. 

“Ok,” she nods, and talking to herself is definitely a sign of impending insanity, but she kind of hopes she’s already gone insane and—

He moves far quicker than she expected. 

Emma’s no more than brushed her fingertips over the curve of his cheek than he’s throwing his arm out in the minimal space between them, his wrist colliding painfully with her stomach. She stumbles backwards, barely keeping her balance and mumbling a string of curses under her breath and when she looks up he’s brandishing a chair at her. 

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Killian shouts, and Emma does her best to quiet him without taking a rogue chair to the side of her legs. 

“Listen, listen, listen. Do you remember when you were a kid there was a girl who lived across the street from you?” He doesn’t immediately put the chair down. He licks his lips instead. And the tips of his ears go red. “Swan?”

Emma nods, ignoring the lump of everything in the back of her throat at her sound of her own name. “Hi.” “Hi? Did you just say hi? What are you doing here?” “I’m uh...how much do you remember of, like, the last seventy-two hours?” Killian makes a face, an expression that does something particular to Emma’s heart and soul and whatever, tilting his head and his eyes widen when he notices the coffin he just leapt out of. “Oh, shit. Is that…” “Yeah,” Emma says. “So, uh. I don’t have a lot of time here.” “How much time is not a lot of time? God, are you some kind of angel? Is that what’s happening? Because if that’s what’s happening, then that’s a really twisted trick to show me you when I’m dead and—” “—No, no, I’m really here.” She ignores most of that sentence too. She’ll have the rest of her life to linger on what those words, maybe, mean. “But, um, we’re wasting time.” “To?” “Have you tell me who killed you.” Killian blinks – far too quickly to be anything except entirely distracting, and Emma wishes he wouldn’t because she’d really like to see his eyes and she’s almost pleased to realize her memories of his eyes have remained perfect for the last two decades. “Are you a cop?” 

“No, but, Killian, you’re really cutting into your time here. It’s like...twenty seconds now.” “What?” “Killian!” His answering smile is blinding. That’s the only word Emma can come up with. It makes her breath catch and her shoulders sag, as if all the worries and fears and anxieties of the world have disappeared. At least for a moment. 

“It’s really good to see you, Swan,” he says, taking a step towards her and Emma backs up on instinct. That gives him, visible, pause. “I don’t know who killed me.” “What?” “I have no idea who killed me. It was an arrangement and—that’s not important, but I don’t know how it happened. I think I had a dream about some kind of blade but—” He cuts himself off when he twists the wrong way, gritting his teeth when his gaze falls on the blunt end of his left arm. “Holy shit,” Killian mumbles. “That’s...shit did I bleed out somewhere?”

“I don’t know,” Emma admits. “That’s why I’m here.” “To find out why I died?” She nods. “And you’re not an angel?” She shakes her head. “Huh, well I’m sorry to disappoint, Swan, but I’ve got no idea. Does that send me directly to hell or something?” “I’m really not an angel.” Killian hums, rocking towards her and ignoring whatever Emma’s eyes do at that. “So, uh...what happens now? I was dead, wasn’t I?” “Yeah. Um...well, I have to touch you and you’ll be dead again.” “You have to touch me?” “Them’s the rules.” He chuckles, the smile on his face her smile and Emma’s a greedy jerk. She wrings her hands together. That’s probably the fifth tell. “You know,” she mutters. “When I was a kid...I was...you were my first kiss.” “Yeah?” “Yeah.” “You were my first kiss too,” Killian says. “And you’ve got to touch me so I die again?” “Please don’t say it like that.” There’s more laughter and they’re definitely in the final seconds and Emma tilts her head up as soon as Killian’s incredibly shiny dress shoes threaten to brush against her flats. “No better way to go out then to go out kissing, huh?” “Oh my God.” “Admit it, Swan, that was funny.” “It was not.” “You’re arguing with a dead man.” She rolls her eyes, but her stomach doesn’t get the memo about jokes and humor and Killian mumbles hey under his breath. “Missed the mark, didn’t I? You don’t…” His ears are still tinged red, a hand reaching behind his back to tug at the hair at the nape of his neck. “It’s not a requirement, Swan. The kissing, I mean. Just felt...symmetrical.” “You were always way better at math than me.” Killian grins. “So?”

And for half a breath, Emma is going to do it. She’s going to kiss him and it’ll be something, in some kind of way that may result in a complete and total mental breakdown, because Killian’s already leaning towards her and she really can’t cope with the cut of that suit, but that seems a little morbid too and Emma pulls her lips back behind her teeth. 

“Ah,” Killian says, a note of disappointment in his voice that does not make sense for a man who’s standing a few feet away from his own coffin. “That’s fine, Swan.”

He’s called her Swan more in the last forty-five seconds than he did in the last forty-five days they saw each other. 

Emma’s not totally convinced he isn’t doing it on purpose. 

“What if...you didn’t have to be dead?” Killian scoffs. “That’d be ideal, honestly. Is that an option?”

The objection sits heavy on Emma’s tongue, the certainty that the rules are the rules and there’s no way to break them, but he’s standing there and smiling at her and she takes a step back before she can consider anything except how much she wants Killian Jones to be alive. 

With her. 

Emma hears the timer on her phone go off. Her sixty seconds are up. And Killian Jones is still alive, smiling at her.

[always-and-forever-a-killjoy]

Hey fuckers! So I can’t let the all the smiles verse rest, so I ended up writing another four thousand words about the aftermath. This is basically a bunch of found family shit with a little bit of angst regarding Cherri being Not Okay. This one you actually probably should read the first three fics to understand. (You can find them here, here, and here, there’s also the last thing i see here, but that’s not essential to understanding this. And mind the warnings!) Also shoutout to @wishiwasthemoon-tonight for encouraging me to post this.

Title: at the end of the world

Wordcount: 3861

Summary: 

Cherri Cola is back from the dead, but that doesn't mean everything is solved right away. Not to mention that, unsurprisingly, there are some important conversations you need to have after you went to rescue your brother from the dead.

(Direct follow-up to if i died we'd be together.).

Warnings: Some pretty frank discussions of suicide and some implied past self harm.

Taglist: @wishiwasthemoon-tonight @sleevesareforlosers @stressed-depressed-emo-mess @tasteofamnesia @dagger-queen (message me, send an ask, or reblog/reply to one of my posts if you want to be added or removed)

AO3 Link

(Actual fic under the cut)

There was no time for the serious conversations that one needed to have when one had quested into the realm of the dead for their brother the next day, or the one after. Newsie didn’t sleep for a week like they’d threatened too, but they did sleep in until about noon the following day, leaving the afternoon for more catching up and a little bit more ‘you scared the hell out of us never do that again’ to which Cherri dryly said that he would attempt not to die, but death was an inevitability for anyone who wasn’t some sort of storybook immortal. (That earned him a lot of shit for being so depressing.) 

And the day after that, there wasn’t time for important conversations either, since that morning they woke up to three teenagers bursting through the door with a collective “Hi, Doctor D!” and a lot of drama between the three of them. Well, mostly the first one. D explained that these three were the Terrific Trio, a group of young killjoys who Pony had run into and helped out while Cherri and Newsie were off in the Phoenix Witch’s domain. They had already made themselves a fixture of the radio station, dropping by every so often to annoy the radio crew, and they were scouting for a permanent home in the area. Newsie thought they seemed rather chaotic. 

After that, there were announcements to make on the radio (“Turns out our favorite radio poet didn’t get himself ghosted after all and NewsAGoGo is to thank for that, not to mention that they’re back with a vengeance.”) a poetry corner to get up and running again, and more people to tell (“So, sorry I vanished for a month, Hot Chimp.”)

And finally, almost a full week after Cherri and Newsie’s return, there was time to sit down and talk about what had happened in the unreality and before then.

“Why do you think there was an oak tree in Death Valley?” That was how Newsie started the conversation, flopping down next to Cherri on the old and rather saggy sofa of the radio shack.

Cherri shrugged. “Witch magic? Everything there seemed just not quite right, even to me as a spirit.”

“Well why would the Witch do that?” Newsie didn’t wait for his answer before asking more questions. “What was it like as a spirit, by the way?”

He frowned, tilting his head thoughtfully. “It was odd. Very odd. The Witch kept me next to her for a while- I don’t think I could fully move on because she didn’t have my mask. So I ended up in that weird borderland for a while, too, floating around. The further I got towards reality-reality, the less I could do to influence the world. And the further I got towards the spirit-whatever, the more I could do.”

“So were you like, following me the whole time?”

“Oh- yeah. I was.”

“Creep,” Newsie laughed, giving him a playful shove.

“I wanted to help!”

“Well you weren’t much help with the walking!” They gave him a grin to show they didn’t mean their harsh words.

“I couldn’t do much,” Cherri defended, smiling back at her. “You were still too close to actual reality, so all I could really do was brush against you and make sure you didn’t get lonely.”

“You’re such an older brother. I’m assuming it was you steadying my hands on the ray gun, too?”

He nodded. “By that point, I could speak and you would hear me as a low whisper, but I was still most capable of physical touch.”

She nodded too. “Makes sense. So by the end…”

“You were starting to be faded because you didn’t belong in the spirit world. So I couldn’t see you as well, but I could still see and hear you, and you could see and hear me, I think.”

“Yeah.” Newsie messed with the edge of her shirt. “Thanks for that, by the way. Don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t shown up.”

“I think I should be thanking you, given all the effort you went to just to get me back from the dead.”

“Just,” Newsie snorted. “Just. As if your life wasn’t worth every second of that fucking walk.”

He looked incredibly touched. “Oh. Well thanks any-“

“No, seriously. I bitch about it a lot, but you know I’d do that a hundred times if I had to, right?”

Cherri’s eyes were glittering with tears, and Newsie glared at him. “Don’t you dare start crying, asshole, I’m trying to get it through your thick head that people care about you.”

He laughed softly, wiping his eyes. “I love you, Newsie.”

“Love you too, fucker.”

-

“What was it like to die?” That was Show Pony, his time, and Newise glared at em across the room as Cherri flinched. 

“Well, it was painful, as you might expect. And…scary. Dying was terrifying.”

“Why?” 

“God, Pony, shut up,” Newsie muttered to herself. 

Cherri didn’t seem to mind the questioning. “It was scary because I knew I was leaving you guys.”

“Aw, Cher!”

“I didn’t want to die alone,” he went on. “I never wanted to die alone.”

“Why’d you leave?”

“Because I wanted to not be hurting anymore,” Cherri said simply. “I didn’t want to die, not really. It just seemed like the easiest way out. I realized I didn’t really want to leave you all maybe three days in, but by that time, I was already dying. And I was helpless to do anything.”

“Oh.”

“So there’s your answer. Dying is terrifying, and lonely, and painful. But peaceful, too, when you finally close your eyes. There’s no pain when you’re already dead, but…it was still a mistake. I still never should have left.”

“Don’t think Pone was ready for that much honesty, Cherri,” Newsie put in.

“In my defense, ey asked.”

Pony had been briefly shocked into silence, but ey returned to asking questions almost immediately. “So, then did the Phoenix Witch take your soul?”

Cherri nodded, running a hand up and down his arm. “She took the bracelet that Newsie gave me, said it was the closest thing to a mask in terms of soul that she would be able to get. It wasn’t enough for me to fully move past, but it let me into the borderlands between this world and the next. That was where the Witch let me stay until Newsie came for me, and she let me walk next to Newsie on their quest.”

“And you were such an older brother,” Newsie complained.

“That’s kinda my job, isn’t it?”

“It doesn’t have to be, you chose to adopt me as your sibling.”

“Oh, well would you like me to redact that?” He was smiling, a little bit playful and a little bit wry.

“Nope! You’re stuck with me now, no taking it back.” 

“And I wouldn’t want to.”

“Awwwww, do I get to be your sibling too, Cola?” Pony was grinning.

“You get to be my nibling,” Cherri deadpanned.

Pony threw back eir head and laughed. “You’re not old enough to be my uncle, but I’ll take it.”

“Bold words from the person who’s always calling me old.” 

This time, Newsie joined in Pony’s laughter. “You are old!”

“Well if you’re my sister, and I’m old, what does that make you?”

“Young and fun because I’m the younger sibling,” Newsie declared with as much seriousness as she could manage.

Pony was laughing so hard ey fell off eir chair, and that was how D found the lot of them five minutes later, collectively laughing and cracking jokes about age as Pony laid on the floor giggling.

“This is why I can’t leave to do my broadcasts,” he muttered, shaking his head.

“I promise I tried to keep everyone sane,” Cherri said, but he was laughing too hard for that to be really believable.

“Uh-huh, and my name is Dr. Life-loving.”

Newsie almost fell off her own chair laughing, sliding down to join Pony on the floor as Cherri giggled. “Okay, that was a little funny.”

“Anyways, I was coming to tell you that I checked the date, and you ought to be very excited.”

Newsie and Pony both sat up straight at that, ceasing their hysterical laughter.

“Oh?” Cherri was still grinning, but not giggling anymore.

“Christmas is just around the corner, which means-“

“GLITTER!” Show Pony shouted at the top of eir lungs.

“A massive tumbleweed that will fill half our living room and be covered in glitter!” Newsie contributed.

“Decoration!” Cherri looked like a child on Christmas Eve, which wasn’t too far off. “Right, who wants to help me get the stuff out of the attic?”

“Not it, there are spiders up there!” Pony shivered dramatically. “Big spiders!”

Newsie flipped em off with a groan as she climbed to her feet, following Cherri up the ladder into the cramped little ‘attic’- more of a crawlspace, really, but it was where they stashed all their random things, including but not limited to spare power pup, Christmas decorations, old poetry, a bottle of bright pink spray paint, and two Helium Wars era shotguns. Which meant, of course, that it was perpetually a mess, and quite dusty. There were also quite a few spiders, Pony wasn’t mistaken about that.

Newsie squashed one that tried to crawl over her hand. “Alright, fucker, where did you stash the fucking decorations this time?”

“Back here, I- achoo! I think.”

“Great, pass them over to me so we can get down, huh?”

“Hang on, I’m still looking.” 

She waited in silence for a few more moments as Cherri banged around, occasionally swearing when he hit his head on the ceiling. “Hey, uh, Cherri?”

“Yeah? You okay out- fuck! Fucking beams- There?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just wanted to say…you know what you were talking about earlier? When Pone was asking all those questions?”

They couldn’t see him very well, only a bit of his legs, but they knew he had gone still by the lack of crashing and banging. “Yeah?”

“I figured I’d say that you can- and should- talk to us, fuckface. You don’t have to fight all your battles alone, you know.”

“Oh.” 

“We want to help. And we don’t want to trek five hundred fucking miles to get you back from the Phoenix Witch again.” 

“Oh. Thank you.”

“Anytime, fucker.”

Cherri emerged a second later with the big box of decorations, passing it over to Newsie with a tiny sniff. “Fucking dusty back there.”

They smelled bs, but they decided he could keep his pride for now. “Why do you think I made you do that part of it?” She climbed a few steps down the ladder, setting the box on the ground before hopping off fully. Cherri followed them down, still sniffling a little as he gave one final sneeze. 

“We should clean up there,” D muttered.

“Yeah, and how are we supposed to keep dust out of the desert, genius?”

D gave her a glare. “That’s the point of this building.”

“Yeah, well dust gets everywhere.” She pulled open the box as Cherri peered inside. 

“Hey, we kept that wreath I found last year! Great!”

“Of course we did, do we ever throw anything away?” D was smiling, despite his seemingly irritated words.

“Nope!” Pony went skating by, grinning. “Sparkle time! I’m off to the glitter stash.”

“Yeah, you do that,” D sighed.

“I’ll detangle these, see if I can get some working,” Newsie decided, pulling out a strand of lights.

“And I’m going to go get a tumbleweed,” Cherri said with a grin.

“Don’t you dare go alone, you’ll get run over by a tumbleweed! I’m going to radio that Terrific Trio and see if one of them will help,” D said firmly. 

The floor wasn’t exactly comfy, but it was a good enough place to sit as Newsie detangled and fiddled with the lights. Honestly, they would think there was a better way to do it than throw it all in a box every year and have to re-detangle it the next.

After about twenty minutes, a tall killjoy she vaguely recognized as a member of the Terrific Trio came to join her. “Hey, uh, Dr. Death Defying said that I should help with detangling these and sorting the ornaments? Poison and Kobra are going with Cherri Cola to go get a tumbleweed.”

“Oh, my dumbass brother.” They nodded. “Sit on down, sort some ornaments. I’m sure Cherri will look after your friends.”

“He’s your brother?” They could practically see the wheels turning in Jet Star’s head.

“Yeah. We don’t look much alike, I know. It’s not ‘legal’, or whatever.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, we’ve been friends for years and we just decided we were siblings somewhere along the way.” She swore as one of the lights flickered out.

“Oh no!” Jet was sorting the ornaments very precisely. “That’s sweet though, you just adopted him as your brother?”

“Uh-huh. He’s the older one because he’s such a protective dork. Fucking idiot.”

“Ah. I don’t have any siblings, but Poison is so protective of Kobra. Is Cherri like that?”

“Oh Witch, yeah. Just because I’m ‘reckless’ and ‘get myself into trouble’ well who fucking died? Not me.”

Jet was giving her a very concerned look, and she sighed. “Sorry. I’m salty at my brother. Fucking idiot, I had to walk so far to get him back that one time.”

“Oh.”

They didn’t get a chance to say anything else because at that moment, Cherri came through the door, dragging a truly massive tumbleweed. He was followed by Kobra Kid, looking extraordinarily disgruntled and covered in bits of tumbleweed, and Party Poison, who was laughing their ass off.

“Kobra- Kobra he got stuck in the tumbleweed! He got fucking stuck!” 

“I almost died, asshole!”

“No, you just got stuck in a fucking tumbleweed!”

Cherri looked somewhere between exasperated and amused. “He did, but he’s out now, so please stop laughing, Poison.”

That mostly shut them up, since they shot a glare at Cherri instead, but they were still smirking as Kobra flipped them off. Newsie thought the whole thing was pretty funny, to be honest. 

“So! Fucker! You got a massive fucking tumbleweed?”

“Yep.”

“And where are we going to put that?” D’s voice was exasperated (as was common) as he stuck his head into the room.

“The living room,” Cherri said with a straight face (or, well, the straightest face a gay poet could possibly manage). 

“Not what I meant.”

“I know.”

“You, my dear Cherri, are a bit of a bastard sometimes.”

“Only I get to call him that,” Newsie protested. “He’s my brother, only I get to call him a bastard.”

D sighed. “Fine. Anyways, Cherri, where are we putting this?”

“I figured over here?” Cherri was putting the tumbleweed in place in a corner, and D nodded with another sigh. 

“That works.”

“Great! Decorating time!”

“And that’s our cue, since my brother is going to stab me,” Party Poison announced. Newsie waved goodbye to them as the Terrific Trio made their way out, laughing and swearing at each other in equal measure. Which left the radio crew to put lights and ornaments and ridiculous amounts of glitter on a tumbleweed, followed by a strand of bad luck beads each. 

-

Seeing the beads hanging there had given Newsie an idea, and the next day, she hopped on her motorcycle. “I’m heading to the Zone Four market, fuckers!”

“Have fun, Newsie!” Cherri shouted back.

“See ya!” Pony chimed in.

Newsie waved as they revved the engine and sped off.

The market was as bustling as ever, and Newsie had to shoulder her way through the crowd in order to get to the one ‘joy who they knew sold semi-decent beads. “Oof. Damnit. Fuck!” They applied a well-placed elbow to get past the large group of killjoys blocking their way and tromped up to the little stall. “Hey.”

“Oh, hi…NewsAGoGo, was it?” The ‘joy shot her a charming smile. Xe was probably a bit older than her, maybe around Cherri’s age, and Newsie knew ae always had the best beads.

“That’s me and you well know it, Penny Pincher.”

“Oh good, always want to remember my best customer’s names. What can I do for you this time?”

“I could use some beads, wood if you have them.”

“We’re out of stock today, will plastic do?”

Newsie sighed. Plastic would be cheaper anyways, she supposed. “Plastic is fine. I need enough for a bracelet, about as many as I got last time.”

“That will be twenty carbons.”

“Swindler. I’d pay five.”

Penny Pincher laughed and pushed xyr coppery hair out of xyr face. “Ten.”

“Seven.”

“Make it eight and you’ve got a deal.” Ae dropped a couple of extra beads into the little bag, tilting aer head at Newsie questioningly.

“The extras seal the deal,” Newsie laughed. They passed over eight carbons, giving Penny Pincher a smile. “Thanks, Penny!”

Penny grinned back. “Anything for my favorite NewsAGoGo!” Xe waved her off with another bright grin, shining like pennies in the sunlight.

Newsie’s next stop was a ‘joy called American Idiot who sold paints and other art supplies relatively cheap, and then it was back home to the radio station. Cherri seemed to have gone out when she returned, thankfully, seeing as his truck was gone. 

“Where’d Cola go?” Newsie asked, wandering into the living room. 

“Think he’s off to get some water for some crew that got themselves in a pickle,” Pony told them. Ey was lounging on the sofa. “They’re all hurt and don’t have carbons to spare, so you know our Cola just had to go help them.”

“Of course he did.” They plunked down on a chair, setting down the paint and beads. “Warn me if you hear the truck coming, will you?”

“Will do. Whatcha making?”

“A bracelet for Cherri.” She picked out her first color, a pretty sky blue, and started to paint careful designs onto a few beads.

“Shiny! I bet he’ll love it.”

“He better, American Idiot practically swindled me out of all my carbons,” Newsie buttered. That wasn’t exactly true, she had bought some of the nicest paints the other ‘joy was selling, and a lot of them too, but they were still overpriced. Better than going to Tommy Chow Mein’s, though, so they still thought it was a good choice.

She had most of the beads painted by the time Cherri came back, yawning and rubbing his forehead. “Well, that was a day.”

“What happened?”

“Just some idiots being stubborn.” He peered curiously at the bead she was painting a little tree onto. “What are you doing?” 

“None of your business, nosy brother,” Newsie replied. 

“I was just curious,” Cherri said mildly. He pushed Pony’s feet off the end of the sofa to make a place for him to flop down. “Pone, your feet are gross. Stop putting them on the couch.”

“As if your feet are any less gross!”

“Well I don’t put my feet on the sofa when other people are trying to sit there, at least.”

Pony pouted. “Fine, you win.” Ey flipped around so eir feet were dangling off the other end of the couch and eir head was in Cherri’s lap. “I’m not moving, though.”

Cherri chuckled and brushed his fingers through eir (currently rather sparkly) hair. “That’s alright, I won’t kick you out of your spot.” 

“This is why I like you better than Newsie.”

“You only like him because he’s a pushover!” Newsie hollered across the room. 

“Hey!” Cherri was grinning tiredly despite his protests. “Maybe I’m just nice.”

“Uh-huh, sure. No, you just never stick up for yourself! Pone isn’t going to die if you don’t let em sprawl on the couch, you know.”

Pony put a hand on eir forehead like a fainting woman in an old-timey painting, sitting up off Cherri’s lap just so ey could ‘faint’ back into it. “You don’t know that, maybe I will die! I am gay, after all.”

“The gayest Pony in the desert,” Cherri laughed fondly.

“And don’t you forget it!”

-

A few weeks later, it was Christmas day. Usually, being in the desert was about survival. But being a killjoy was about living. Everyone would die in the end, killjoys sooner than most, so they had to take advantage of the time they had. So just for that one day, they ate their nicer food, and danced around to shitty Christmas music which Show Pony sang along to at the top of eir lungs, and eir singing might not have been on-key, but it was filled with joy and feeling. 

Gifts were usually small in the desert, but they all happily exchanged them that evening anyways. Pony had painted ‘world’s best dad’ on a mug for Dr. Death Defying (and covered it with glitter), and for Newsie and Cherri there were pins. Cherri’s said “I lived, bitch” and Newsie’s said “I met the Phoenix Witch and told her to fuck off”. 

“This is the best thing I’ve ever owned,” she told Pony (after she had finished laughing, that is).

Ey bowed dramatically. “Pleased to be of service.”

Meanwhile, the glitter trio (as Pony had declared them) had all pooled their collective carbons, braincells, and scavenging skills to find a set of rare vinyls for D, who spent the next ten minutes exclaiming over and examining them. “These are incredible, you three!”

Cherri, Pony, and Newsie exchanged satisfied grins. 

“Glad you like it,” Cherri told him, still grinning.

Pony nodded. “Uh-huh! Those took some trickery to acquire!”

“I love them, thank you.”

Cherri turned out to have written a poem for each of them, producing three relatively nice sheets of paper covered in his messy but lovely handwriting. Newsie’s was about life, death, siblings, and the word ‘fucker’, a silent promise hidden in every line that said ‘I won’t leave you again’. She didn’t know what the other two’s were about, but she did know that D gave Cherri his sad smile and Pony threw eir arms around Cherri with a “Love ya, Cola.”

And Cherri smiled and said “I love you too.”

Finally, Newsie got to give Pony a new bottle of glitter to add to eir collection (which had cost a pretty penny, they might add), and D a patch for his jacket that they and Cherri had worked on with Pony as well as the records. And finally, finally, she got to give Cherri the new bracelet.

Cherri didn’t look up from the bracelet for several moments after they placed it in his hands, turning it over and over and examining the patterns.

Eventually, Newsie got nervous enough to speak. “I figured I’d make one. Since, you know. Since the Witch took your old one.”

Cherri was smiling broadly as he did look up, still holding the strand of bad luck beads carefully. “I love it, Newsie.” He slid the bracelet onto his wrist, still grinning. “Thank you so much.”

“You’re welcome,” she shrugged. “Fucker.”

“I love you, Newsie,” he added.

“Love you too, fucker.”

[firstlastlovemusic]

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#proclaiming @barneyartist - Return of the Real - Another verse that I'm writing Here from my bed Spittin' verbs doing worse Cus When these borthers are moving tens Then get stuck in the cycle Or back in to make the rent My mom said Don't jump in this live Following trends I said I won't But got caught up lying To make some friends Silly ain't the word When you search To make amends For the dumbness That you've done Gold Never something caught Let me find the Lord Nothing is employing When they slam the door Fortunally good fortune was something That I could afford Cus' when you look like me You never know How you be seen by law Young black man Young black man I said that thing twice But my brothers will understand When they're shaking To shake your hand Claiming they understand Proclaiming they got a plan To be saving us from this land Wow Been speaking to my sister She's got questions And I've been keeping it light Keeping it messured Then I realized That feeding her lies So I spray in the booth Display what I view Able to proof that we the truth Right now it's return of the real Home is where the art is Let me paint how I feel #music #firstlastlovemusic #FLLM #nowplaying #barneyartist #shoutout #pp • • • • #musikk #musica #hiphop #rap #jazz #jazzhiphop #eastlondon #london #rapper #lyricalrap #lyrical #songoftheday #tumblr (ved East London) https://www.instagram.com/p/ByFIMvtFstR/?igshid=1hbvsb5f0y66x

[swanderful1]

Duplicity: Ch 3/?

Summary: Secrets shroud the homes of the idyllic Willow Lane. Its newest resident, Emma Swan is no exception. In a place where perception is everything, the facade begins to crack. And Emma finds herself staring down the deep, dark secrets that the neighborhood was built on and that nothing is as it seems. Not even the blue eyed gardener.

Notes: Hiiiiiiiiii!!!!!!!!! Back with another update, here’s chapter 3! Hope you like it! Also special shoutout to @resident-of-storybrooke for being my beta and @shady-swan-jones for the artwork!!!!!!! 

Word Count: ~6300 

Disclaimer: All rights to OUAT, I own nothing. 

The rest can be found on AO3 and ffnet 

Two days after Killian had first met with Emma Swan about her backyard he began his first phase of work there. It was early Wednesday, the sun was quite literally still rising, when he pulled his truck in front of the house. Another email from Neal Gold had given Killian a specific timeline of when he wanted to work to be done, and it really was not long at all.

Some sort of party was being thrown at the house in the end of May, giving him just under two months to frame the structure with the appropriate landscaping. For any other house, it would be a simple task. But it was during the height of his busiest season and the yard was quite large. So there was a good chance it may not get done in time.

That and he also had other motives for being there.

He unloaded his truck, slipping on his work gloves so no one would see the prosthetic that replaced his left hand. Killian felt himself being extra quiet as he unpacked, hoping that he wouldn’t wake Emma and her resting husband. But just as Killian was heading to the backyard he noticed Neal Gold exiting the house, it was rather early to be headed to the office, he thought.

“Morning,” Neal said, giving Killian a half-assed wave from the driveway.

“Morning,” he said back. The man, dressed in a suit that probably cost more than Killian made in a month, got into his Range Rover and drove off.

As Neal drove out of sight Killian couldn’t help but envy him a bit. Here he was, living in this massive house. Driving an expensive car. Set to be the heir of the largest construction company in the north east just because he was born. Sleeping in bed each night with a beautiful woman.

And, to Killian at least, it did not appear as though the man appreciated any of it. He certainly had not missed the way in which Emma regarded Neal’s management of the project the other day. As much as he knew it was none of his business what she thought of Neal, he still found himself wondering.

He shook off his jealousy, it was entirely uncharacteristic of him to envy the kind of life he had seen so much of in his years in the business. It irked him that, for once, he was picturing being the person in the house. But, it did him no good to pout. Killian didn’t have the luxury of an inheritance nor a wealthy family.

“Good morning,” said a voice from behind. Killian jumped, not expecting anyone to be awake this early. He spun and saw that Emma Swan was standing on the empty back porch, holding a white mug of what he could only assume was coffee. “Shit, sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Hi there,” he said with a smile. “It’s quite alright, I just didn’t think anyone would be awake this early.”

Killian softened a bit, setting his handful of tools down. Despite the early hour, her face was wide awake. Her green eyes bright and her hair tied back off of her face. As she stepped down off of the porch and walked toward him, he tried not to get distracted by the way her clothes clung to her curves and instead focused on what he still needed to get from his truck.

“I’m a morning person,” she said, pulling the mug to her lips with both hands. The rising sun caught the light of the diamond ring on her finger, serving as an ever present reminder that she was completely untouchable. For so many reasons. “I was just about to go for a run. Did you need any help with anything before I go?”

He looked at her quizzically and determined that she wasn’t just offering to offer, she genuinely wanted to help. She was quite different than any of the women he had worked for in the past and he was starting to regret the shallow assumptions he had made about her at first glance. It was a force of habit, and people rarely surprised him in a good way.

“No thank you, love, I’ve got it covered,” he replied.

“Alright,” she said, gulping down the rest of her coffee until it was empty. Killian felt his eyes widen at how quickly she had drained the mug. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

With that she took off, headed toward the front street where he heard her chatting with someone else. Another woman it sounded like, and then soon their voices drifted away. With no more distractions he set to work.

Living in Maine meant warm summers and cold winters. This also meant that Killian did his best to select plants that could grow back after cooler temperatures, so that it wasn’t like starting from the bottom each spring when the weather shifted.

In order to fulfill her wish of a natural looking landscape, Killian would have to get creative.

He had drawn on his sketch pad the layout of the yard. He had accounted for the essentials, factored in the property line. Since the entire back was a plot of dirt plus an empty pool, he had no trouble using a can of orange spray paint to outline where he would be putting things.

When Liam was alive, he had been able to talk to people. Quite easily, which was why everyone was so quick to hire him to work on their yards. Killian well, not so much. He could be charming when he wanted to be, especially with women, but he rarely wanted to be when it came to work. Especially when it was something he could lean on his brother for. Killian knew his strengths. He was the worker, the muscle, the perfectionist. And despite only having one hand, he executed things precisely. So well that none of the people who had hired him in the past fifteen years had a clue he was missing his left hand.

Killian was just about done with the front yard when he heard the chatter of voices behind him.

“Thanks for the run, Emma,” said one woman. Whom he could assume to be Mary Margaret, Ruby’s friend who lived across the street.

“Sure,” replied Emma, her breath ragged presumably from the run. “Same time tomorrow?”

“Yeah! Sounds good!” he heard her say back, before the sound of footsteps carried Mary Margaret away. And then his ears listened for the sound of Emma coming closer.

“Can I get you some water or anything?” she said when she was about halfway up the steps to the front door. He looked up at her from his work on the lawn and noted that she was covered in sweat like she had been the other day when he came to meet her. Killian wondered if she would get into the habit of leaving him alone at her house to go for runs.

“That’s alright, I have some in the truck, and I’m just about done here.”

“Are you sure?” she pressed. “It’s pretty warm out, I for one am parched.”

“That’s because you’ve been running and I’ve been walking in circles,” he joked.

“What’s the spray paint for?”

“It’s to outline where everything is going to go once the sprinkler system is in.”

“Do you mind taking me on a tour?”

“Sure.” He smiled, and she stepped off the porch. Close up, she was about a head shorter than him, and was thinly built but muscular. Her breath was still ragged but somehow it all worked in her favor.

The backyard wasn’t much at this stage of things, so he found it hard to describe to Emma what everything would come together to look like. He felt himself more than a few times at a loss for words. But if she noticed she didn’t say anything, just followed him around and politely waited for him to talk.

“I know I said I didn’t want too many flowers…” she said after walking around the perimeter of the space. “But there was one thing I was wondering if there would be room for.”

“What’s that?” he said turning his head toward her.

“The rose bushes I saw at the mayor’s house the other day, you did those right?”

“Aye.” Killian nodded. The blasted things had given him migraine after migraine. To make sure they were to Cora Mills liking was a particular challenge that more than tested his patience.

“Well, it might not be so bad to have some of those here… maybe tucked away where the gazebo is going to be?”

As much as he hated putting them in and maintaining them across the street, when he looked at Emma’s expectant face, he couldn’t do anything but smile and nod.

“Absolutely,” he said. “Whatever you want.”

“I just thought that they were nice to look at…” she paused as if deciding whether or not to add the next part of her statement. “I wouldn’t mind being able to have fresh roses in the house every once in a while.”

“Then that’s what you shall have,” he said, making note of the change in his sketch. “I’ll be in another neighborhood the rest of the week but I can bring by some floral samples from the greenhouse this weekend.”

“Yeah, that’d be good,” she smiled at him and shifted on her feet.

“I’ll be doing some work next door for Granny Lucas on Saturday morning, I can come by then if you’ll be home?”

She doesn’t need your whole bloody schedule, Killian corrected himself.

“I’ll be around,” she said looking up at him. For a second their eyes lingered, before she broke the stare to walk toward the house. His eyes followed her as she walked up the steps, a confident stroll. Her hips swaying in a way they hadn’t before, he was sure of that.

Killian had a feeling. A brief one, that just barely tugged on his conscious mind. Something that felt like he wanted to give Emma Swan whatever it was that she wanted.

On Friday night Killian plopped himself down on his usual stool at The Rose and the Thorn. After a long week of work he felt he had earned a cold drink. Robin poured him two fingers of rum on the rocks and Killian tossed it back immediately.

“Easy there, champ,” said his best friend.

Killian rolled his eyes, ordering a beer. He wasn’t planning on getting obliterated tonight as he normally did on the weekends. He had a full day tomorrow, part of his itinerary included a visit with Emma Swan. And while there was absolutely no concrete reason why he would need to be on his best behavior around her, he felt himself wanting to be anyway.

“A beer?” Ruby said entering the bar. Bringing over a crate of clean glasses to stack. On weekends she tended bar with Robin to make extra money. With her grandmother getting older, eventually all responsibility would fall onto Ruby financially. She had lost her parents at a young age as well, luckily for her, Granny had been around to raise her.

“Taking it slow tonight, Red,” he said back, sipping on the frothy liquid.

“Any particular reason?” she poked.

“A lot of work tomorrow. So I’m trying to make a good decision,” Killian said snarkily. Now it was Robin who rolled his eyes.

“I hear one of those tasks is making a special house call to bring rose samples over to my new neighbor,” Ruby said leaning across the bar. Her elbows resting on the surface. She was looking at him funny, like she could see right through him.

“It is.”

“Who’s your new neighbor?” Robin chimed in.

“Gold’s son… well and his wife,” said Ruby still looking at Killian critically.

“He has a son?” Robin asked.

“Yes, he’s just about our age,” Ruby commented. “And his wife is….”

“She’s nice,” Killian cut her off, taking another sip. He did not want to get into it with these two.

“Oh I’m sure she’s very nice to you,” Robin smirked.

“Her husband is about to inherit one of the biggest construction businesses in the north east. Forgive me for wanting to stay on the good side of that family.”

Even as the irritated words came out of his mouth, the irony in them was not lost.

“It also doesn’t hurt that she’s gorgeous,” Ruby said backing up to resume her glass stacking.

“Ah the trophy wife type, very nice,” joked Robin as he mixed drinks for a few young men at the end of the bar.

“No.” Killian had immediately said, but realizing how suspicious that sounded he tried to back track. But somehow seemed to make this conversation worse. “She’s uh, very much so her own person.”

“Who are you and what have you done with Killian Jones?” Ruby asked incredulous to his response.

“Go easy on him, Red, maybe this is a sign he’s finally growing up,” said Robin.

“I just think she’s lonely, alright?” Killian said.

It wasn’t a lie. But he began to think that the reason he was drawn to her was because of the reflection of that loneliness he saw in himself.

“I won’t disagree there, moving to Storybrooke was clearly not within her control,” Ruby interjected. Finally. “Mary Margaret and I spent some time with her this week. Otherwise she would be all by herself in that big house all day. Her husband barely comes home.”

“Sounds like the picture of idealism,” Robin remarked. It was no secret that the three of them hated the suburbs.

“Besides, I don’t think the mayor likes her very much,” Ruby continued. Out of the corner of Killian’s eye he caught Robin’s hand freeze just the slightest at the mention of Regina Mills.

“What makes you say that?” Killian wondered.

“We all know she’s not exactly a girl’s girl….” Ruby alluded to the fact that as each one of the women moved to the street Regina had essentially frozen them out. Again Robin fumbled with the glass.

Killian remained quiet, knowing that Ruby was unintentionally treading on thin ice with this conversation. Between Killian and Robin there were two secrets that only the other knew. For him it was Milah, Robin had known at the time what kind of trouble she was in before she died. For Robin though, it was the mayor. The mayor who was now engaged to the chief of police.

“What are you doing tomorrow night?” Ruby asked Killian, not noticing how Robin was just about to squirm.

“Eh… probably this, why?”

“Mary Margaret asked me and Granny over for dinner but Granny can’t come because of her book club.”

“Who is going to be there?” he asked, his eyebrow shooting up.

“Well obviously Mary Margaret and David, then you and I… Neal Gold and Emma…”

“I suppose I could escort you.” It wasn’t the first time Killian had filled in as Ruby’s plus one to an event and it probably wouldn’t be the last. “What time?”

“Around 7ish? Will you be done with work by then?”

“Yeah, Red, I’ll be done by then.”

Luckily a group of people walked into the bar in search of drinks which pulled Ruby’s attention elsewhere. He would have to sit at a dinner table with Emma Swan and her husband. Should be interesting.

Among the group of people infiltrating the bar were a few women, one of whom was eyeing Killian. She was pretty, dark chocolate colored hair and romantic eyes. She was precisely his type.

He smiled politely at her before returning his attention to the half consumed beer and in front of him. On any other night he would have sent a drink her way, used it as an opening for a conversation. But he felt himself retreat and instead continue to nurse the drink in front of him, twisting the base of the glass on the black bar napkin.

It was a while before Robin came back over, the bar was full of people. It was a Friday night after all. The sound of chatter drowned out the music that played over the ancient speakers. Killian’s one beer was almost entirely gone now as his friend set down a tumbler of amber liquid, ice clinking against its sides.

“This is from the lady at the end of the bar,” Robin said. His head shifted toward the woman who had smiled at Killian earlier. He nodded in her direction before sipping down the strong liquid, ordering two more and sauntering over to her.

For as long as Milah had been gone, he had never had an issue with seeking out a random stranger in a bar and taking her to bed with him. Killian had done it time and time again in the five years she had been dead. Not once did he ever second guess the choice to cozy up to someone else also looking for company.

“I’m not a fan of being indebted to people,” he said, handing her the drink. She smiled at him a tint of red hitting her cheeks.

“I don’t usually do that…” she said, sipping the drink, her red lips wrapping around the straw. “But you just looked so lonely sitting there I had to.”

“Ah, I see, so it was a pity drink?” he toyed, his eyebrow raising at her.

“Not entirely.”

Her body leaned toward his in the crowded space. The smoke in the air filling his nose. Killian could be charming when he wanted to be.

But by his third round of drinks with the pretty brunette his mind wandered elsewhere. The deep fissures of his brain opening to reveal that his most pressing thought was that, if he was awake early enough, he would have more time to spend discussing roses with Emma Swan.

And for whatever reason, that seemed to be the most appealing task in the world.

Emma’s first week in Storybrooke had been relatively pleasant given the circumstances. Her situation that she was trying desperately to make the best of, was playing out well. It was early Saturday morning when she heard the sound of an old truck pulling up in front of her house. Since the day was nice, Neal and his father had already left to play a round of golf with the mayor’s fiance, Graham. It was interesting to Emma how all of these major roles in the town were filled by people who essentially lived on one street.

When Neal kissed her goodbye she was still in bed, tucked among the white linens.

“I’ll be back in the evening, Em,” Neal said as he pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I’ll be at the country club if you need me.”

“Don’t forget we have dinner at the Nolan’s tonight.”

“We do?”

“Yes. I told you last night before bed.” A hint of irritation lingered in her tone. You probably weren’t listening, she wanted to add but didn’t. If she picked a fight each time something she said went in one ear and out the other she would never stop screaming.

As much as Emma was beginning to feel like she was perpetually being abandoned by Neal she didn’t want to start an argument first thing in the morning. She swallowed her comment and made a mental note to call him later to remind him of their dinner with the new neighbors. God forbid the Nolans weren’t the mayor or the chief of police or the superintendent of the schools or anything that could in some way self-serve Neal and his father. Emma glanced at the clock. It was already 8 am, so she instead focused on the fact that Killian would be here to pick out the roses for the backyard.

The day was a comfortable temperature, the blue sky above setting the tone for a nice morning. Emma’s back porch was still bare, except for a stack of collapsed boxes from the move. She could hear the faint sound of birds and cars driving past. The sound of children running around because it was the weekend and no one had school. A crew of three men were working in her backyard to get the sprinkler system installed by Monday before the grass would go in. Two cups of coffee were steaming in white mugs next to Emma and the gardener. She was on her second cup, he had barely touched his.

“Now these are heritage roses, they’re relatively sturdy and don’t require a ton of upkeep,” said Killian as they sat on her back porch comparing the several blooms he had brought over. “Baronne Prevost.”

“They’re what?” she said looking from the pink flower in her hand to him. She was clearly his first stop of the day, as his shirt was white and unstained. His gloves were clean. His pants were pressed. For a second her gaze lingered on his blue eyes. “I thought roses were just roses.”

“That’s the name of the type of rose, love,” he said kindly. If he noticed her eyes ogling him a bit, he remained unreadable.“They would grow on a bush about 5 x 5 in height and width.”

“They’re beautiful,” Emma said focusing again on the flower. Attempting to shift her wandering mind.

“Aye, they are,” he said coolly. “I would imagine they would look rather nice on a kitchen table.”

“Huh?” she said.

“You had said the other day that you thought it would be nice to have fresh roses in the house… these will be ideal for that. They bloom several times per season.”

Emma looked up at him again, knowing that it was his job to remember what she said she wanted, but still grateful that small tidbit stuck enough in his head. She felt her skin flush a bit, probably similar in color to the pink rose in her hand.

“Would you like to see some others then?” he asked.

“No, no I think these will be perfect.”

“Well that was easy,” he said, removing his right glove to write something down in his notepad he always carried with him. And maybe it was from not being able to see his left hand, or her current preoccupation with other people’s lives, but she found herself wondering if there was a wedding band on his left hand.

“I like to think I’m decisive,” she replied.

He had to be married. Or at the very least have some sort of serious partner. He had to, he was gorgeous.

“That’s a nice quality in a client.”

“Yeah, because it makes your job easier.”

“That may be true,” he said with a smirk. But neither of them stood up. A tension lingered in the air as neither said anything else for a few seconds.

“Emma!” called a voice from the yard. It was Mary Margaret.

“What’s up?” said Emma standing from her spot on the deck. Peering over the bannister she could see her newest friend walking toward the porch. As she did, stepping out of whatever orbit she had just fallen into, a part of her felt like she had been caught with something.

“I just wanted to see what you wanted for dinner to-... oh! Hi Killian!” said the cheery woman as she rounded the bend and realized Emma wasn’t alone.

“Hello, Mary Margaret,” said Killian, rising as well to collect his things.

“I didn’t realize you two were working on something, it’s good that I have you both here,” Mary Margaret said. “What would you prefer for dinner tonight, a roast or Italian?”

“You’re going to be at dinner?” Emma looked at Killian who was now standing next to her.

“Aye, Ruby asked me to go in lieu of her grandmother.”

“Oh,” Emma looked away from him, realizing that of course he was dating someone like Ruby. And then internally scolding herself for even remotely minding that he would be there tonight with someone else. “I didn’t know that.”

“It’s relatively last minute,” he said quietly, almost like he was only saying it to her.

“Anything you make is fine with me,” Emma said taking her eyes from Killian to Mary Margaret.

“Same here,” said Killian.

And if anyone noticed how uncomfortable Emma had suddenly become, no one said a thing.

That evening, as Emma sat at the breakfast bar of her kitchen, she sipped a glass of Chardonnay she had poured herself. The tall stemware was a Christmas gift she had bought last year when she realized all of her wine glasses were mismatched souvenir cups.

If ten year old Emma could see twenty eight year old Emma, she could only imagine the conversation they would have. She had spent 18 years in the foster system, which meant living out of a backpack. Especially as she aged beyond the cute baby years and into her preteen years when it was a lost cause to be permanently adopted.

As she looked around her new house, she couldn’t help but think about how this had been all she wanted growing up. The big two story entryway with the skylight. The dining room with a big, oak table to have Thanksgiving dinner. The all white kitchen, that had a breakfast nook and bay windows. The living room with big comfortable couches and artwork she had collected over the years.

Beyond all of that though, was the pressing fact that she had essentially assembled this home on her own. Every couch, every picture frame, every glass was there because she had put it there. When they had moved into their first apartment together, when she was 18, Neal had helped every step of the way. Sure, it had been a tiny studio apartment over a laundromat and most of its contents were from second hand stores but still. When they had nothing between the two of them he was there… but now, where was Neal?

Checking the watch on her wrist it was 6:50 and they were due to be at the Nolan’s around 7. She was getting worried.

At 5 before Emma had hopped in the shower, she had called to remind him of the dinner. No answer.

At 5:30 when she was done drying her hair, she had called to remind him of the dinner. No answer.

At 6 when she was ironing a shirt for him in their walk in closet, she had called the country club to see if he was still there. The woman at the front desk had said he had left an hour ago.

At 6:30 when she put the finishing touches on her outfit, simple dark jeans and a cream colored sweater, her usual jewelry, her hair in loose curls she sent him a text. No answer.

The ticking watch on her wrist taunted her, clicking along, minutes going by. All the while hoping he would just call. At the very least, just call. She put up with a lot from him. But how hard was it to call?

Then at 7:05, just as Emma was about to smash the glass in her hand, he walked in the door.

“Em…?” she heard him call out from the foyer.

“In the kitchen,” she said back, her voice an unmistakable monotone.

“Sorry I’m late, we went to dinner in town after the round,” he said, kissing her forehead. What she smelled on him though was the thick stench of bourbon.

“Are you drunk?” Emma sat up in her seat, tugging away from his embrace.

“No.” He stepped back, setting his clubs on the tile floor. The one thing he managed to unpack during the move. “Lighten up, Em. It’s a Saturday.”

“Yeah, well, we’re late for dinner. The one that was actually planned,” she said tightly getting up from her chair. She grabbed her red jacket and threw it over top of her sweater. If she went in on him right now, there would be no making it to dinner.

“We could just cancel.”

“No.”

“Can I have a few minutes to change?” he asked, treading lightly around her.

“That depends….” Emma crossed her arms. “If you go upstairs are you going to magically disappear for 9 hours?”

He gathered his things, pushing past her to walk upstairs. How did we get like this? She wondered while she waited. They hadn’t always been this disconnected. There was a time when he was just about her everything, the only consistency she knew. More so now than ever she felt herself clutching to those memories. But when he started working for his father four years ago, that had all slowly started to change.

By 7:30 they had made their way across the street to the Nolan’s, Emma apologizing profusely for their lateness. When she saw that Killian and Ruby had already arrived, she did just about anything to not be near the two together. So when Mary Margaret suggested a tour of the house, Emma jumped at the opportunity. The woman, being very proud of her home, took she and Neal through each room.

It was very different than their house across the street. The Nolan’s were far more practical than they were. All of the floors a dark, sturdy wood that wouldn’t show dirt. Eclectic, comfortable furniture. The rooms all open to one another so that everything flowed evenly. Pictures everywhere of David and Mary Margaret on trips, from their wedding, from college. Pieces of art made by her students and given as gifts. Books were scattered on just about every surface and candles were lit all around giving the house a warm glow and a lovely smell.

“When we have kids, I want to be able to see them in the backyard from the kitchen,” said Mary Margaret as they finished the tour, looping through the back half of the house. The kitchen was where they ended, the soft brown and beige colors of the counters and cabinets making it feel so homey.

“But for now her being able to watch the dogs is sufficient,” David joked as he handed Emma and Neal glasses of wine. He was the local veterinarian, and according to Mary Margaret, brought home more animals than money. At the moment there were two dogs in the house plus a cat. Which made it feel even more inviting.

“We built this house knowing we wanted a big family… I just didn’t imagine being outnumbered by the animals,” said Mary Margaret. She was the quintessential elementary school teacher. With her sing-song voice, kind face and patient temperament.

“I like to bring my work home,” David said bringing his wife into his embrace. The two leaned against the back cabinets and smiled.

“It’s a good thing I don’t, we’d have twenty two 8 year olds running around.”

Everyone laughed at that, and suddenly it felt a bit more easy to be here. The Nolans were at glance the ideal young couple. But aside from that they were just nice people, and Emma liked that. They were certainly not the worst neighbors she could have.

The dining room off of the kitchen held a modest wood table, filled with different steaming pots of food.

“I hope you don’t mind, I went a little overboard,” said Mary Margaret as they all sat down at their seats. Each place setting with a handwritten, elegant tag.

“Wow you guys are like real adults,” Ruby said as they sat at their assigned seats. David and Mary Margaret at either head. Then in the middle sat Ruby and Killian to the left, Emma and Neal to the right. If her fiance, at all, had a chip on his shoulder about having dinner with the man who was his landscaper he didn’t acknowledge it. Instead he was the opposite of what Emma had predicted he would be.

“Everything looks great,” Neal said. He had suddenly become Prince Charming now that they were in front of people.

“How are you two enjoying Storybrooke?” Ruby asked once everyone had begun eating. The light lull of conversation carrying through. Emma looked at her sitting next to Killian and decided that they made an attractive couple. What with their dark hair, angular faces and big eyes. Though hers were green and his were the same striking blue that kept catching her attention from across the table. Something she was probably imagining.

“Well, I enjoy it here, it’s where I grew up,” Neal chimed in. “So it’s always been home to me.”

“I guess I’m just a bit harder to please,” Emma said, hoping that she hid the bitterness in her tone.

“Where did you grow up, Emma?” the well-meaning David asked.

“Foster care,” she said back matter of factly. The quiet that filled the dining room was somehow still deafening. No one ever knew how to respond to that, which meant Emma was always able to recover from the statement quickly. “So living in a place like this is a dream come true for me.”

She grabbed Neal’s hand that rested on the table, and everyone seemed to simultaneously breath. People loved a happy ending, especially one where the baby left in a basket on the side of the road ended up living the American dream. Outwardly at least. It was a story people were relieved by, just like right now at the dinner table. Except that when Emma’s gaze drifted to Killian she realized he was the only one able to look her in the eyes. And she was most definitely not imagining it.

The rest of the night went off without a hitch. Neal somehow recovered from his drunken day on the golf course and charmed the pants off of the new neighbors. Telling stories and commanding the room. While glass after glass of wine was poured. All the while Emma sat back and watched him dance. He knew he was in deep with her. She would give him that credit, he always worked overtime to make things up to her.

“Excuse me for a moment,” Emma said, while everyone was gathered in the kitchen, distracted listening to a story about Neal’s round of golf with the police chief today. Something about a gofer… she didn’t really care. All she knew was she needed some air.

“Oh… sorry, I didn’t realize you had come out here,” Emma said when she noticed Killian leaned against the pillar of the front porch.

“No, it’s okay, I should get back in there anyway.” He slid his phone back into his pocket, he had excused himself a bit ago to take a call.

Emma could still hear the the conversation going on inside and promptly closed the door behind her.

“Some fresh air, love?” he asked with a half smile, the porch was dim but she could still make out the angles of his face.

“Yeah. The room was a bit… loud for me in there.”

“He’s quite the talker that one,” Killian said, and that made Emma smile. That she wasn’t the only one who was tired of having one person take up all the oxygen in the room.

“Yes, he is,” she said. She knew she should go back in. But for whatever reason Emma just didn’t want to. Instead she plopped herself down on one of the rocking chairs near the door.

The two of them were quiet for a few moments, only listening to the sounds of the neighborhood. Kids getting called in for the night, a car or two driving past, the light breeze that made her curl her arms around herself. The silence wasn’t uncomfortable though, it was like an unspoken understanding. She watched him a bit as his back was turned to her. He wore a pair of jeans and a long sleeve navy blue sweater, it was the first time she saw him in anything other than his gardening attire. Then her eyes shifted to the front of her new home.

It was utterly still, the house, massive but stale looking. True no one was home but it was hard to make the comparison between their house and Mary Margaret’s. Mary Margaret’s was designed to be a home, Emma’s was designed to be a statement piece.

“My brother raised me,” he said finally and Emma turned to where he was leaned against one of the railings, but he was looking out toward the street. She could just barely make out the profile of his face. The tightness to his jaw.

Emma stayed quiet, surveying what his goal was by saying this to her.

“I lost both parents very young. But he was old enough to be my guardian.”

“You were lucky to have him.”

“Aye.”

As Emma looked toward Killian, she noted his body language. His facial expression. And deciffered that his past was not something he tended to share a lot. She didn’t press him though, he wasn’t telling her so they could have a long discussion of their respective parental abandonment. But knowing about it did make her feel like less of an idiot for blurting out her past at the dinner table.

“There you are,” said Ruby as the front door opened. Her green eyes looked toward Emma who was sitting in the rocking chair still. Turning to Killian she said, “I need to get back, I have an early morning tomorrow at Granny’s.”

“I’ll walk you home then,” Killian quickly offered.

The others came out onto the porch through the wide open front door. David, Mary Margaret and Neal filling the space. A mix of goodbyes and thank yous were exchanged between the six people as they all went their separate ways. Emma’s eyes shifted toward her neighbor’s house as she and Neal walked back. While she promised herself it was just to ensure Ruby got into her house okay, she knew deep down there was something else she was watching for.

And when Killian said goodnight to Ruby without anything more than a hug; an unwarranted, undeserved sigh of relief filled her body.

[wingsofanillyrian]

Guys and Cars: Chapter 2 (Nessian AU)

Summary: Adrenaline, fast cars, and freedom.

Nesta Archeron doesn’t take anyone’s shit. She loves few things in life besides her candy apple red 1969 Charger, racing, and the ocean. When a stranger in a sparkly new Audi rolls into the picture, she discovers just how quickly that can change.

A/N: Shoutout to my little brother (who was very distressed to discover he’d helped with a fanfic, lol) for helping me out with the logistics of some of the technical pieces of this chapter, and also @spegetty for helping me with the storyline and making sure it was actually readable!

Chapter masterlist

Saturday nights were Nesta’s favorite.

Saturday nights were for adrenaline and the smell of burning rubber.

Saturday nights were for racing.

Nesta pulled into the repurposed warehouse parking lot on the forgotten industrial district of Velaris. All around her, engines roared and the dizzying scent of gasoline filling her lungs with each inhale. People cheered as cars raced down the strip. Money reluctantly changed hands as back-alley bets were won or lost.

Bertha’s engine purred as she backed into a parking spot towards the end of the lot, away from the self-absorbed, overzealous teenage crowd. They never appreciated the classic vehicles, instead opting for Subarus, Mazdas, or Honda Civics. But no display of shiny turbos, custom parts or beefed up statistics could ever draw her away from her first love: American muscle.

Not that she minded. Nesta fit in better with the older crowd anyway. She wasn't here to sit around and boast (like certain people she'd encountered). No, Nesta was here to win.

Turning off the car, she surveyed the night's competition. There was a better turnout than in weeks prior; the end of the summer heat always had that effect. She spotted a few new vehicles she hadn’t seen before, but nothing particularly interesting. There were the usual’s too, of course: the 1973 Chevy Camaro that she had nicknamed the “Orange Peel” due to the shockingly bright paint, the 60’s Ford Mustang driven by a middle-aged coward of a man, the late 70’s Pontiac who never failed to provide a challenge...

Nesta grinned. Tonight would be a good night.

Any driver worth their salt knew who drove the 1969 cherry red Charger. She was practically a legend among Velaris’ street scene, having beaten every car that dared square off against her.

So she wasn’t surprised at the level of attention she received as she nimbly climbed from the car. Not that she could blame the men and women for staring, she knew she looked damn good. Nesta dressed modestly on most days, usually opting for comfortable shorts and tees to deal with the dry California summers. But she became a completely different entity on race days.

Black denim clung to her long, lithe legs as her boots thudded on the pavement, striding around to the front of the car and popping the hood to display the inner workings. Her low-cut tank top did little to hide her generous chest, which was both a blessing and a curse. Immediately the people gathered, oohing and ahhing at the gleaming engine compartment. One man fought his way to the front, grinning from ear to ear.

"Nesta! We missed you last week. Where you been, girl?"

Normally, calling Nesta Archeron a girl, or anything other than her name, earned one a look sharp enough to draw blood.

“You’re the only one that would dare say that, Harry,” she grinned back, clasping his hand. “What’s the news?”

“Rumor has it there’s some new kid rolling around, claiming to be the best of the best.” A chuckle rippled through the crowd. Unperplexed, Nesta examined her manicured nails.

“Another Mazdaspeed driver that thinks he can beat me? I wouldn’t exactly call that news.”

“He doesn’t drive no Mazda, honey.” Harry’s gaze wandered over her shoulder, and it took every ounce of willpower not to turn around. Nesta's curtain of her honey-brown hair obscured the black sports car from view as it backed in next to her classic. Murmurs carried through the crowd at the newcomer’s arrival, making their judgments.

Her head whipped up to glare at the driver, mouth already open to demand he grow a pair and earn his bragging rights instead of spreading rumors, but the words stuck in her throat. 

Oh, gods.

What was he doing here?

The bastard hadn’t even called her. Go figure, the one time she goes out on a limb, she ends up getting screwed. Her cheeks burned and she ducked her head under the hood, vainly hoping he wouldn’t notice her.

Nesta’s heart hammered in her chest. The sweat beginning to bead on her brow was due to more than just the stifling heat. The Audi’s door thudded shut, a throaty chuckle floating to her ears. She could almost see the cocky grin on his stubbled, tan face as he spotted her.

“Well hello there.”

Nesta closed her eyes, composing herself enough to craft sly smile on her ruby lips.

“Hello yourself,” she purred, throwing her hair over her shoulder and batting her lashes up at the man from the highway. Cassian; that was his name. “I thought I told you that you were taking me on a date?”

Hazel eyes sparkled with amusement, the angled face cast in shadow by the dim light of the streetlamps. “I was getting around to it.”

“Oh, were you?” She quirked a brow, taking a step around him and eyeing the gathering crowd. These kinds of people were drawn to the first hint of drama like moth to a flame, and Nesta intended to take advantage of that. Her boots clicked on the pavement as she circled, his eyes tracking her every step.

“Brought that shitty Audi, I see,” she teased, nodding towards his spotless vehicle.

“Still driving that rotten apple, I see,” he countered, crossing his arms over his chest. The crowd laughed at the jab, and Nesta smirked.

“My rotten apple-“ she thumped Bertha’s grille- “Could beat that stock, blend-into-the-pavement Audi any day.”

The crowd roared at the challenge, adrenaline surging through her veins as she looked into his fiery eyes. He took two steps closer to her, leaving only a few inches of space between their bodies.

“You really wanna test that theory?”

If there was one thing Nesta Archeron knew for sure, it was that she never backed down from a challenge.

“Hell yes.”

“When and where, sweetheart?” Her eyes flashed and she cocked her head to the side, a predator assessing prey. Noting her reaction, Cassian’s eyes lit up with amusement.

“Right here, right now.”

“Let’s race.”

***************

“Alright Bertha. We’ve done this a million times, beaten cars with ten times as many horses as his.”

Nesta’s hands gripped the steering wheel as she pulled up to the spray painted starting line. One half mile up the cracked, worn out warehouse road, there was a second line drawn between two other cars. Their drivers served as judges to settle any disputes as to who crossed it first.

It would take twenty seconds, tops, to cover that half mile.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the Audi inch forward, sleek as a bullet. Through his open window, she could hear the loud screeching guitar of heavy metal pouring from the speakers. The corners of her mouth twitched upward. It would seem this man was full of surprises.

Cassian revved his engine to catch her attention.

She looked over and revved hers.

He winked, mouthing ‘good luck’ and her stomach flipped at his easy confidence.

Bertha had never lost a race.

Would this be the first?

Her head snapped back to the woman standing between the opposing cars, waiting to signal the start. Nesta Archeron didn’t back down, and she didn’t lose. Not in this car.

The 426 horsepower Hemi engine in her Charger packed a powerful punch and a boatload of torque, giving her the clear advantage off the line versus his import. He stood a chance of catching her after the first few seconds though, if he was experienced in street racing.

She was willing to bet that he wasn’t, judging by their previous encounter.

“Ready?” The woman pointed to each of them in turn, and she and Cassian again revved their engines in response.

“Set-“

The key to winning a drag race was timing. You had to hold the clutch in while simultaneously revving the engine, building up it’s RPMs. You had to know your car, too; keep the RPM’s too high and you’d end up spinning tires when you slam the gas.

But Nesta didn’t just know Bertha. In times like this, she became the Charger. The vibrations of the chassis shot straight through her feet and rattled her bones. The pitch of the engine told her if she needed to give it more gas or less. She just felt it.

“GO!”

Both cars shot off the line, the roar of the massive engines piercing over the fevered roar of the spectators. Rubber squealed against pavement, the force of the sudden acceleration gluing her head to the seat. Nesta had timed it perfectly; she’d gotten a pretty solid jump on him.

She shifted into second gear.

Cassian’s Audi pulled half a car length ahead. Shit- she hadn’t accounted for his newer transmission- it could withstand higher RPMs before he was forced to shift. Her heart leapt, fearing for a moment that he would win.

But then he shifted and fumbled to recover from it.

Rookie mistake.

He slipped a full car length behind, and Nesta’s grin turned positively feral. She shifted again, closing in on the finish line. The Charger’s tires ate up the distance as Cassian nosed his way forward.

They were neck and neck.

Two seconds to the finish line.

Nesta pressed the gas pedal the final quarter inch to the floor.

The Charger and Audi shot past the two marker cars. She eased off the gas and released a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. It had been too close for her to call; they would have to rely on the sharp eyes of the other racers.

Nesta peeled off, allowing herself one premature smile of victory before turning around to discover her fate. She parked just outside the ring of spectators, fighting her way through the throng only to find Cassian and his Audi smack dab in the middle of it.

People were shaking his hand and smacking him on the back, probably congratulating him on his supposed win. Her angry voice cut above the excited noise.

“Cassian!”

His attention immediately snapped to her, a lazy grin spreading across his face.

“Nice race,” he said, ignoring his newfound groupies and closing the distance between them in three long strides. He shoved his hands in his pockets, suddenly bashful.

Staring him down, she demanded, “Who won?”

“You did, of course.”

She grinned triumphantly, the thrill of another win taking over as she playfully punched his arm. “I knew it! Classic muscle always beats sparkling new.” Cassian tipped his head back and laughed, the sound light and joyful. Nesta found that she rather enjoyed his laugh, and wouldn’t mind hearing it more often.

She was about to say as much when a foreign hand roughly smacked her bottom. The unwelcome action instantly brought back a wave of memories that she’d rather not remember. She stood slack-jawed, frozen like a deer in the headlights.

The owner of the offending hand stepped into her line of view, the rat-faced creep raking his gaze over Nesta’s body. He whistled, low and crude.

“Hey baby, you fuck as good as you race?”

She was nearly trembling with rage, and though she would never admit it, a little bit of fear, too. She should tell him to stick it where the sun don’t shine. She should knock him on his ass for daring to lay a hand on her.

But she just... couldn’t.

“Why don’t you fuck off?”

Cassian. Oh, thank god.

“I don’t think I will.” Creepy guy took a step towards Nesta. She still couldn’t move, even as his hand latched onto her arm. Her heart threatened to beat out of her chest, and her wild blue eyes met Cassian’s fuming hazel.

That one look conveyed all he needed to see. His brow furrowed, biceps rippling as he swung. Nesta ducked instinctively, but his closed fist connected to the other man’s face with a sickening crack. He dropped instantly, moaning and cradling his most likely broken jaw.

Nesta stared down at the man, shell shocked. He turned his head, spitting crimson blood onto the gravelly pavement. If Cassian hadn’t been there, she didn’t think anyone else would have stopped him from taking what he wanted.

“Let’s get you out of here.” Cassian’s bruised, bloodied hand found the small of her back, trying to steer her away from the scene. Bodies pressed in on all sides as people leered at the man writhing in pain. Nesta’s head spun as she gulped down air.

It had to have hurt. That bone-cracking punch couldn’t have left him completely unscathed.

“Bertha,” she croaked, desperately needing to be away from the massive crowd. This place was normally like her second home, somewhere she could be herself and let go. But now… Everything was just too much.

“Bertha?” He struggled to discern what she was saying. “Oh- your car.” He shouldered his way through, not stopping until she could see the unmistakable beacon of red paint. He opened the driver’s side door and helped her slip inside before softly shutting it behind her. He peered in through the open window, concern etching sharp lines in his face.

“Are you gonna be alright?”

“I’ll be fine,” she affirmed, feeling a bit more like herself again now that she was reunited with her car. She ran her fingers over the supple leather of the steering wheel, centering her thoughts.

“I don’t know how to thank you for what you did.”

“It was nothing.“ His smile didn’t meet his eyes.

“Let’s go for a drive.”

He tipped his head to better gauge her expression. His eyes flicked over her figure, took in her white-knuckle grip on the steering wheel and the strained set of her shoulders. Very few people were allowed near the Charger, and he had already shown her last week that he couldn’t exactly handle the heat.

But tonight… He’d earned a second chance.

He looked over his shoulder at his own vehicle with a frown. The people had dispersed, leaving it stranded and alone.

“Okay.” Nesta turned the key, the car rumbling to life as he climbed into the passenger seat. “Where to?”

“You’ll see.”

Tagging: @spegetty @krm00623 @goldbooksblack

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