WHO Emma Swan & Morgan Stark WHERE Emma & Killian's place WHEN Villains plot; after Killian's kidnapping WHAT Emma explains a few things about her curse. WARNINGS low/none STATUS Complete
The sudden and rather short disappearance of Killian had rattled Emma. Although she’d been able to find him, free him, stop Hades and heal Killian, it was still a stark reminder that Emma was immortal, Killian was not.
It wasn’t that Emma wished he were like her, she knows that what she did to him was wrong, turning him into the Dark One wasn’t something he wanted, even if it did save his life. Right then, she had other means to save him. The darkness that powered her was near constant, the noise in her head from all of those before her, the push to hurt and scheme and win. Even if she didn’t know what she was winning.
Normally, she’d go to the roof, sit over the city and watch the night pass by. But it was still raining, and while it wouldn’t bother Emma, she didn’t want Morgan to get sick. So when Killian finally passed out from the crazy events of the day, Emma had invited Morgan to their shared apartment, currently not shared with anyone else.
“Would you like something to eat or drink?” For the sake of Killian, Emma had food in the apartment, coffee in the cupboard, chips and snacks in various areas. They even had a bowl of fruit on the counter. But if there was something else that Morgan wanted, Emma could summon it up instantly.
She wasn’t wearing the leather jacket, just her skintight pants and boots and a black shirt, her hair a little loose at the back from the battle with Hades, but little else to say she’d just thrown the God of the Underworld into a vortex.
Morgan was notorious for her curiosity, and one of the things she appreciated most about Emma was the other woman’s candor. She never seemed to mind her endless questions or borderline prying, but this was different, wasn’t it? This wasn’t a simple question regarding Emma’s world or her family, and because of that Morgan wanted to approach it differently.
Instead of prying she simply offered to listen. If her friend- who she was growing to care for quite exponentially- hadn’t wanted to talk? Morgan would have dropped it. She knew better than anyone what it was like to try to be forced to talk about things you weren’t prepared to talk about. It never ended well for anyone involved.
She was, however, grateful that Emma agreed. Despite not wanting to force the matter, she wanted to help- and if helping meant listening without judgment? Listening unconditionally? Well, Morgan was the best girl for the job.
“Coffee,” she asked- tucking a long strand of her dark waves of hair behind her ear- as she looked her friend over. Emma seemed so composed after fighting Hades, but she hadn’t expected any less. “How is he?”
Rather than summon something, Emma went through the motions of turning on the coffee maker, getting a mug from the shelf and then turning back to get one for herself too (a silly pink one with a little silver crown and the word ‘princess’ scribbled on it, because Killian was hilarious) and turning back to Morgan.
“He’s … coping.” Sometimes it was hard to tell with Killian, he put forward the face of surviving everything, and Emma knew part of that was for her good, she’d lost so much in the past, and Killian knew what almost losing him had done to her. She knew that he was a survivor though, if nothing else he’d proven that to her. “He’s in perfect health,” Emma gave her fingers a wiggle to signify that she could patch Killian up, good as new, as she watched the coffee percolate, “but time will tell how he’s doing with it.” Torture wasn’t just physical after all. And she had the inkling that Hades knew just where to prod at Killian.
“He doesn’t so much hide things from me, so much as … protect me from certain truths.” Like how damn breakable he was.
“I get that,” Morgan said- slipping down into one of the chairs in the kitchen. She didn’t hide things from Markus either, but there were parts of her she didn’t want him to see- like that night in the maze. Recently she developed a way for them to share their memories as he had in his world, but despite being very open with him? She wouldn’t allow him to see it all. “I think that sometimes? We need to be protected from certain truths. I’m glad he’s coping though. That’s better than the alternative.”
She couldn’t help but be amused by the pink princess mug and had every intention of bringing that up later, but for now, she was focused on her friend. “And you? Are you okay?”
The alternative was the bottom of a rum bottle, and thankfully, Killian hadn’t resorted to that in a long time. She’d seen his gradual healing, she knew what to watch for. Hopefully he talked to her when he was ready, even if she knew that her current situation wasn’t ideal for them to have a heart to heart with. “Sometimes.” Emma’s walls had been up for so long there was no one else better than her at holding something back.
She just never wanted to do that with Killian anymore. She’d been so close to losing him so many times.
Pouring out the coffee gave Emma a short delay, and while she’d made the coffee the old fashioned way, she summoned all the little additions for them to decorate the table -creamer, sugar, sweeter, flavourings, chocolate powder, the works. “I’m … dealing.” The icy rage that filled her when Killian was missing, cloaked from her magic, it scared her, a little.
But another part of her revelled in it, spurred on by the darkness that was slowly clenching her heart and altering her first reactions. “This power that I have, these powers, they’re not so much … mine as much as something affecting me.”
what are you doing, stop it, kill her, there’s an opportunity
Emma’s gaze was pinned somewhere behind Morgan, her delicate eyebrow raised, stony face expressionless and bored. Nimue was by far more annoying than even Rumple. “Back home, I’ve already shed this persona for Killian, the time he’s come from. But it always has a cost.”
Morgan watched with a smile as all of the potential coffee add-ins appeared on the table. No matter how many times she witnessed it, magic would always be a source of awe for her. Before coming to Goodland, she never believed in such things. Sure, she often thought that what she and Markus had was magical, but chalked that up to being someone young and in love.
The girl’s brain was wired to trust in science, and other than the magic her Aunt Wanda possessed, it just didn’t seem possible. Meeting Emma changed all of that.
Reaching for the chocolate powder, Morgan mixed it into her coffee, and listened carefully as Emma spoke. “Persona? So this thing...whatever it is affecting you...isn’t really you?” She thought about that silently for a few moments as she watched her friend staring at something behind her. She didn’t turn to look though, instead, she kept her eyes on Emma.
Morgan was a lot of things, but she wasn’t naive. She knew that many people probably viewed Emma as dangerous. Everyone was, of course, entitled to their opinions- but she never thought of the other woman that way. “Do you know what happens when you shed this,” she asked, gesturing through the air between them. “Or what the cost is?”
For a moment, Emma didn’t answer, the voices and previously cursed all demanding that she keep their secrets, that she lie to Morgan what does she know? Little cub, toying with the logics, pulling at the string. She’ll use it against you, dearie while Emma pushed them back and slowly ignored them one by one.
It was a careful glance towards the bedroom, Emma’s eyes lingering on the door as she recalled the plan falling apart. Hades wasn’t exactly soft in his telling of what was to come. One day, soon, Emma was going to kill the love of her life.
“This,” Emma’s hand gestured to herself, her overall everything, “is a curse.” Which she knew was somewhat underselling the whole experience, but there wasn’t much else to it. “A year ago I … I didn’t have this level of power, I didn’t… I wasn’t so closed off.” Although there was a degree of openness with Morgan, maybe because she reminded Emma of Henry.
“It’s called the Dark Curse, or a variation of it. Pure darkness, embodiment of magical evil.” Not that Emma was pulling her weight on the evil side of things if Nimue was to be listened to. “And in order to uncurse myself I have to put the Darkness in someone else… and kill them.”
“A curse,” Morgan replied quietly with a frown. Her heart was hurting. She didn’t know much about the world where fairy tales were true, but from what she gathered, she knew it was more often fucked than not. But this? This was a whole new level. Reaching once more, this time for Emma’s hand, there was only a second of hesitation before she covered it with her own.
If Emma didn’t want to be touched, that was more than fine, but Morgan wanted her to know that she wasn’t alone. She didn’t have to go through any of this alone if she didn’t want to. “I can’t imagine...what this must be like for you...can you remember what it was like before the curse?”
The declaration of what must be done to rid herself of this Dark Curse, caused Morgan to inhale sharply. “Is that the only way?” There had to be something else that could be done right?
The sudden warmth of Morgan’s hand over Emma’s pale, cold fingers caused a shiver, but nothing to do with an unwelcome attempt at comfort. She turned her hand, just to give Morgan’s hand a quick squeeze in appreciation before she withdrew.
“I can still remember, sometimes it’s complicated, other times it hurts. Mostly it’s just memories of who I was.” Who she could be able. The bright and ever helpful saviour. Someone Killian could love without it hurting him.
“Well, someone could kill me, but that’s a little more complicated, and I’d rather not die.” Emma could compartmentalise killing someone to live, especially right now, she wasn’t sure how it would affect her afterwards. Killing Cruella had been difficult enough, but Emma’s instinct was to protect Henry.
“The Dark Curse isn’t meant to be easily thwarted.” If it was, why would anyone stay like this? Ah yes, the power. That was alluring.
Morgan smiled a little at the squeeze to her hand, but the corners of her lips soon tugged back down into a frown when Emma spoke about the memories of her former self. Very rarely did she encounter a problem that she couldn’t solve, but she was at a loss on how to help her friend.
“I’d rather you not die too,” she said running her hand through her hair again with a sigh. “So do you want...to break the curse? Is that what you were talking about when you told me you were looking for something?”
“How did this happen to you,” Morgan whispered- not really meaning to say it out loud.
It was probably a testament to how complicated things were that Emma wasn’t entirely sure how to explain what was going on with her. How she got cursed in the first place, what it took to undo it.
“The previous Dark One, Rumplestiltskin, he… was banished from Storybrooke, leaving our town means you cross a barrier from Storybrooke, a world with magic, into the normal world, where there is no magic. Rumple lost his connection to the magic, but it also meant his heart was weakened. He’s… centuries old, so without magic he faced sure death.” Sometimes Emma wondered if Belle realised that, if she knew that sending Rumple away would do that to him, or if it was just an unfortunate side effect.
“An idea came to trap the darkness from Rumple into a magical box, but it wasn’t strong enough,” Emma spun the engagement ring on her finger, thinking back to everything that had happened that night, the rewritten history they lived, losing Killian, Regina’s death. “The darkness escaped and looked for a host. It was going to take Regina, she… she’s been struggling with her darkness for years, but she’s pushed so hard and…”
It was hard to feel the same empathy that Emma had felt before, the drive to not put Regina through another loss, another heartache, make her and Robin deal with those issues. “So I took it, and here we are.” She wasn’t up to explaining Camelot and Merlin and Arthur and Killian’s death. Again.
“For the ritual, there’s a few things I need. I have to make a hero, getting harder and harder to find a candidate there, pull a sword from a stone, find an eternal flame, merge two blades and find a vessel for the curse.” all in a days work, dearie.
Sipping her coffee again, Emma let her shoulders sag.
Morgan sat captivated by Emma’s story. She understood on some level the desire to spare someone you cared about. She couldn’t say that she wouldn’t have done the exact same thing if it were her in Emma’s situation, and upon further thought, she knew without a shadow of a doubt had she been in those shoes? She would have sacrificed herself if it meant preventing any of her loved ones from being met with a dark fate.
“You spared Regina,” she said quietly. “Knowing full well what it meant for yourself, you spared her.” Arching her eyebrows, she offered the older woman another smile. “That kind of makes you a hero. A now cursed hero. But a hero all the same.”
The list Emma rattled off, sounded damn near impossible, but nothing was ever truly impossible was it? “Have you been able to acquire any of those things,” she asked- frowning again at the way Emma’s shoulders sagged.
“Well,” in the turn of events, Emma wasn’t a hero. But self-sacrifice was the natural calling of a saviour, and that had been trailing her for a few years now, since Storybrooke and Henry, her life had been about saving people ever since. Even if it meant she lost something. “I am the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming,” Emma smirked slightly, “comes with the territory.”
The longer the darkness lasted, the more likely Emma wouldn’t be able to part with it, she knew that much. It wasn’t like Rumplestiltskin didn’t have moderately good intentions when he took the power from Zozo. It was just that absolute power corrupted, absolutely.
“I have my dagger, and the sword, currently in the stone, but at least it’s not going anywhere.” Even if she was frustrated to all hell about getting it out of there. “But the Prometheus Flame hasn’t shown up, and summoning it doesn’t work. And with how often this place blips around I’m sure there’s a trick to it.”
Like how she might need to wait until they went to Camelot.
Morgan knew about Emma’s parents from previous discussions, but no matter how many times she heard it? It always caught her off guard. She grew up on their stories, and never in a million year thought she would discover that they weren’t simply fairy tales. “For the record,” she began with a smirk of her own. “That won’t ever not be crazy to hear.”
She turned her attention back to her coffee, sipping a generous amount and simply trying to wrap her head around everything Emma was telling her. Or maybe perhaps she was trying to wrap her head around the fact that she didn’t have the slightest clue on how she may help her friend?
Very rarely did she stumble across a problem that she could not find some sort of solution to, and she didn’t like feeling helpless.
Placing the mug back on the table, she was aware of how loud it seemed to sound, cutting through the silence that had fallen over the room. “You know,” she finally began, her eyes meeting Emma’s. “If you need help- whether it’s just to talk things out like this? Or whatever else? I’m here.”
It had taken Emma a long time to get used to, a very long time. She still had moments where she couldn’t call them ‘mom’ and ‘dad’, where it was David and Mary Margaret, or Snow. While the darkness gripped tightly at her heart she was less inclined to think of them that way too, even if she knew it was unfair and they were trying.
Little voices kept whispering at her, how they weren’t trying hard enough, how they couldn’t save her because she was the savior, not them.
They were more fleeting, as of late, especially with Killian around.
“Thank you, Morgan.” Emma could see the sincerity in the girl, aware that magic was very new to Morgan, where science prevailed above all else. But that she’d managed to somehow find that fierce honesty in someone, a person prepared to befriend her, even as she was, without knowing past-Emma. It was something she cherished. “I may need help, at times. Collecting things is… tedious. And emotions are complicated at the moment,” Rumplestiltskin cackled in the corner, “so I appreciate that.”
“Unless I’ve been doing it wrong? This is what friends are for,” Morgan replied with a wave of her hand to indicate she didn’t need to be thanked. “But you’re very welcome.” She treasured her friendship with Emma more than she would ever know, and there wasn’t much that she wouldn’t do for the other woman.
“Well, count me in when it comes to the finding of things,” smiling a little- she finished off her coffee. “And I’m always here, for talks like these...whenever you’re in a sharing mood.”
She was worried about both Emma and Killian, and pretty much at a complete loss on how to help either of them, but she could offer her support, and sometimes that was all that people needed.