#accioecho

She pulled her hood up, made sure her guns were loaded and ready for bear (with powerful tranquilizers, not bullets – SHIELD wanted Hook alive for questioning) then zipped up her jacket, headed down the stairs through the perpetual fug of cigarette smoke, and out into the eye-watering, chest-punch cold of the deep blue dusk. Streetlamps glowed along the dark warrens, neon Cyrillic lettering casting exotic shadows on the snow, and she crunched along the sidewalks, passing teahouses and clubs and upmarket boutiques, neighborhood grocers and little onion-domed orthodox churches, miniatures of the fairytale confection of St. Basil’s Cathedral in Red Square. Everyone who had somewhere warm to be, with family and friends, was there, preparing happily for the holiday. And here she was, as usual, freezing and alone, out in the dark to catch a crazy man.

Emma shook her head hard, dismissing the moment of weakness. She sped up, turned the corner into a darker side street, and arrived at her destination a few minutes later. She spoke Russian to the bartender without an accent, took her drink, and settled into the corner to wait. She didn’t expect him for a while yet, and in a place like this, who knew what else might cross her path?

Time whiled slowly past. She finished her drink and ordered a second. The other people at the bar looked as if they too had nothing else to do and nowhere else to go, and she eyed them carefully, trying to decide if any one of them was Hook’s accomplice. Nobody immediately stood out. Though if they did, or caused difficulty, she might have to take them for a seemingly seductive private visit to the loos, then knock them out and bundle them into the alley with the rubbish bins.

At last, just as she was wondering if she could have a third drink, or if it would mess with her reflexes too much, the front door, covered in old propaganda posters, cracked open with a rush of snowflakes, and someone in a long black coat strode in, the ubiquitous Russian fur hat pulled down around his ears. Emma tensed and leaned forward. She couldn’t be sure, given as there was also a muffler, but as he unwound it from his face and muttered something about this place being colder than a witch’s tit, her heart sped up. There was no mistaking that profile, that flash of blue eyes. The pictures really didn’t do him justice. Damn.

Nonetheless, she was not here to be distracted by a pretty face. She waited, watching him get settled and order a drink, clearly waiting for whoever he was meeting. She let him get mostly to the bottom of the second vodka before she finally made her move, uncoiling from the corner and sidling up alongside. “Evening,” she purred, in Russian. “Looking for someone to keep you warm tonight, sailor?”

He glanced over with a dismissive smile, clearly ready to write her off as either a run-of-the-mill street hooker or lonely desperate twenty-something, then got a better gander at her and had an incredibly gratifying reaction. He couldn’t have looked more as if he’d just been hit very hard over the head if he tried. “I, uh,” he said, blinking. He also spoke Russian well, though with a distinct hint of London behind it. “It’s – it’s bloody freezing, yeah.”

“Mmm.” Under the scarred wood of the bar, Emma let her hand alight on his thigh, curling around it as he visibly gulped for air, words, wits, or anything whatsoever that would transform him back from addle-pated fool to ruthless international mafioso. She hadn’t noticed until now, but his left hand was missing. In its place, he wore what had clearly given him his nom de plume: a full-size, probably lethally sharp silver hook, like a pirate – and given what he did for a living, that was not at all misleading. She let her eyes flick to it in apparently naïve interest, but didn’t touch; it was probably still cold enough to burn. With another sway of her hips, she indicated that this was not at all a turn-off, and perhaps he could give her a more private investigation of what else was surely not missing and in perfect working order?

Affecting just then to notice that his drink was running low, she bought them both another round before he could protest, waited until he was throwing back his shot, then unobtrusively tossed hers out – waste of a good Jaeger, but business was business. In this fashion, playing the part of a wide-eyed country girl who had moved to Moscow for a job and was dazzled by the big city, Emma coaxed him along until he was genuinely tipsy and she was pretending to be a lot more drunk than she was. It was fairly obvious that there was an electric, kinetic sexual chemistry between them, an instant attraction, and she had calculated that if he thought she was easy pickings, he might whisk her off somewhere private to try to take advantage of her – at which point a spectacular turning of the tables would result. But as she leaned in as if in expectation of a sloppy kiss, he gently but firmly pushed her away. “I think you’ve had enough for the night, lass. May I see you home?”

“What?” Emma was so surprised that she almost forgot to speak Russian – which would therefore have the effect of blowing her cover and resulting in all sorts of undesirable outcomes. But she had, to say the least, not expected this man would risk interrupting an extremely delicate handover of criminal contraband, in order to make sure the supposed wet-behind-the-ears pretty blonde he’d been flirting with got home unmolested on a freezing December night. But he was already reaching for his jacket, and she tried to put out a hand to stop him. She rarely went wrong suspecting the worst of people, but this she had not planned for. At all.

Still, after that, it would be awkward to stick around, and too cold to lie in wait outside for him to leave. Yet he wouldn’t hear of letting her walk home by herself, bundled up, and emerged into the night with her. She didn’t want him to know where she was actually staying, and thus stopped them several doors short of her hostel. Now, she was going to have to do it now, and hoped nobody was awake to peer through their curtains. She moved her hand to her gun, all the while smiling innocently at him and thanking him for taking the trouble. He’d go in for a goodnight kiss, and then she’d –

But he didn’t. “You’re going inside, surely?” he asked, gesturing at the door. “Can’t want to stay out in this nonsense.”

“Of course,” Emma lied, tightening her grip. “It was lovely to meet you – I didn’t catch your name?”

He smiled wryly, almost sadly. “It doesn’t matter, lass. We won’t be seeing each other again.”

With that, as they stared at each other and she still made no attempt to go inside, he might have thought she was loathe to leave him, and started to say something else – only for his eyes, just visible between the hat and muffler, suddenly go cold and narrow. “Speaking of names,” he said, this time in English, “what might yours be, exactly?”

“Sorry?” Emma said, still in Russian. “What? I don’t speak English.”

Hook’s gaze remained on her, intent, shrewd, calculating. Then he abruptly stepped forward, looping his namesake appendage through her belt and pulling their hips solidly together, as his gloved hand traveled under her jacket, found hers, and curled around the barrel of the gun. “Innocent little Natasha from the country, huh?” he whispered, close enough for her to feel the warmth of his breath. “I know who you are. SHIELD.”

With that, realizing beyond all doubt that the jig was up, Emma whipped herself into him, knocking him off balance, as they communally lost their footing, hit the sidewalk, and grappled for the gun. She got hold of it first, threw the safety off, and pointed it – then heard an ominous clunk and looked to see that he was pointing one of his own at her, which was almost certainly not loaded with tranquilizer darts. Time froze as solid as the air as they tensed, fingers on the triggers, locked in standoff. Al she had to do was shoot first – if he didn’t beat her to the punch. The Cold War, literally.

After one final nerve-wracking moment, Hook started, of all the ridiculous things, to laugh. “Good for you,” he said. “You bested me. I can count the number of people who’ve done that on one hand.”

“Is that supposed to be funny?” Emma rocked to her feet, keeping the gun trained on him. He matched her movement, backing away, making no attempt to come after her or take her down. Indeed in a moment more, he tensed, twisted, and exploded around like an Olympic sprinter, pelting off headlong into the night.

Emma shouted, spun, and gave chase, but he was faster than her, had a head start, and clearly knew the maze of back streets much better than she did. She was behind to start with, and within about five minutes, she had lost him entirely. This was unconscionably mortifying for someone of her vocation, especially considering everything riding on this, and yet, she couldn’t figure out why he hadn’t just neutralized her. He’d killed plenty of people. And he was well aware of how much SHIELD wanted him taken down, had pegged her for one of theirs and had a gun on her. Why leave her alive, to go and tattle? To not even try to hurt her?

Breathing hard, painful gulps of icy air, Emma holstered her gun, took a final sour look around, and turned on her heel. She’d thought this ended tonight. But instead, apparently, it had only begun.

And no matter what it took, it made no difference. She would always find him.

ii.

It was Mardi Gras in Rio de Janeiro, an unrestrained spectacle of display and debauchery, costumes and masks and glitter, floats and beads and booze and beautiful Brazilian girls, three months after their first encounter in Moscow, when they crossed paths again. Emma had tracked the origin of the Neverland virus to within a fifty-mile radius of here, which had led her to conclude that Hook probably had dealings with the powerful slum lords and organized crime rings that trafficked through here. She was dressed in an elaborate costume – a swan, in fact, all white feathers and golden glitter and harem pants, a bra that barely concealed anything, and about a dozen knives – as she worked her way through one festivale after another. It would not do at all if her identity got out. One of Loki’s attempted alien invasions had nearly flattened the city last year (Christ the Redeemer was still missing his head) and there was considerable public sentiment that the Avengers had not tried as hard to save it as they had New York City. Whether or not this was true, it was a sore spot, and easy to see that someone like Hook, who hated SHIELD, would find a lot of ready-made friends here. But whatever else, he surely was no Hydra sympathizer; in fact, he’d destroyed more of their bases than SHIELD itself had, crashed their networks and blown up their labs, and there was increasing sentiment among the high command that they shouldn’t terminate him altogether, but entice him to join their side. Whatever his price was, they could afford it. They’d converted the Maximoff twins from sworn enemies to fairly reliable allies. Why couldn’t they do the same with him?

Thus, Emma’s agenda this time was slightly different from what it had been in Moscow, and she also had more information to work with. She had finally uncovered that Hook’s real name was, with 99% probability, Killian Jones. He had been born in London, and even served in the British Royal Navy under the command of his older brother, Captain Liam Jones. But everyone had assumed that he had been killed in the same battle that had cost him his brother and their ship, against the Dark Elves that had invaded Greenwich during the Convergence. Emma knew that Thor, Dr. Jane Foster, and Dr. Erik Selvig had ultimately stopped it, but not without collateral damage. And if SHIELD had then come in and tried to erase everything, forbidden the traumatized young man from talking about it and hadn’t answered any of his questions and otherwise thrown their weight around. . . well, not that she agreed with what Hook had decided to become as a result, but she did uncomfortably understand. SHIELD hadn’t been much of a friend to her in her freelancing days either.

In short: Emma had thought she was quite prepared, this time. Possibly even at an advantage. And yet, when a warm hand descended on her waist from behind, whirled her around, and pulled her close, she discovered all at once how utterly she was not.

“Ta, darling.” Those blue eyes gleamed at her from behind an equally ornate mask, and his white teeth flashed in a genuinely delighted smile. “Long time no see, hasn’t it been?”

“You.” Emma should have had a better opening ploy, but once again he had confounded her. She had thought that she would have to chase him down and flush him out of hiding – not that he’d walk straight up to her, as if to an old and dear friend. Still, she did her best to disguise it, linking an arm over his neck as they swayed and ground together, skin damp with the heat and closeness, as far from their first frigid encounter as could be imagined. The bassa nova music was loud enough that she had to lean directly into his ear to breathe, “Well, it so happens, good timing. I have a proposition for you.”

“Do you?” His mouth mused along her neck, turning her almost lightheaded. “I love this tale already.”

“Indeed.” She pulled back, linking her other arm around his waist to make sure he couldn’t get away this time. “Killian Jones.”

He was good at hiding his emotions, but he couldn’t quite disguise his reaction to that. A flare of shock crossed his face, replacing his earlier devil-may-care insouciance. “Do you,” he said, all the teasing and flattery gone from his voice. “Emma Swan?”

It was her turn to flinch. Apparently she wasn’t the only one who had been doing research. His hook was low on her back, angling their bodies together, his hand combing tenderly through the thick, sweaty tumble of her hair. “How did you know that?”

“Now, love. Do you really think I’m going to tell you?” He whirled her by the hand as the steps of the dance pulled them apart and then back together, closer than ever. “I make it a point to be interested in whoever’s interested in me. And you have plenty of a reputation, love. I’m bloody impressed, and that doesn’t happen often. Why’d you have to go and throw it all away by working for them?”

“I decided I wanted to survive.” Emma shrugged. “Surely you can understand that. If they’ll pay me handsomely to do what I’ve always done, why not?”

Caught off guard, he laughed. “Why not indeed? You’d make the hell of a pirate, lass. Are you sure I can’t convince you to quit? Come with me. Just as much money, far less hypocrisy. We’d make quite the team. What do you say?”

Emma hesitated, briefly and absurdly tempted. Then she said, “Sorry. It doesn’t really follow that if I wanted to keep my neck intact, I’d betray SHIELD and take up with one of its biggest nemeses. You can’t beat them, you know. You’re just one man, and they. . .”

“Oh, I know,” Killian – as was apparently indeed his name – said coolly. “I know what they have. Technology to kill everyone on the planet, wonderful projects like Ultron, a sophisticated brainwashing apparatus to shut up all those little people who get caught in their crossfire, an intelligence network they can’t protect from bloody Hydra over decades, a conceited billionaire in tin-pot armor, and a large green man with a very serious anger management problem. Really, who could possibly resist?”

Emma couldn’t help but admire this brutally accurate, if unflattering, description of her current employers, even as she could glimpse the fact that there was no way, ever, he would agree to her deal or to join an organization that he – not without good reason – so thoroughly despised. “So,” she said after a moment. “It seems we’re at an impasse.”

“It seems we are.” Killian raised an eyebrow. “Guess you have to kill me now.”

“Maybe.” Emma undulated slowly into him, taking great delight in almost hearing his blood pressure spike. God, it was hard to tear herself away from him. “Doesn’t seem as enjoyable as the other options, though.”

He slid his ringed hand under her chin, tilting her face up to look at him. “Doesn’t,” he agreed, leaned down, and kissed her.

Emma almost pushed him away, but there was less than the ghost of a desire to do so, and instead she ended up pulling him closer, fisting her hands in his hair, their mouths opening and sighing and drinking the other in, deeper and deeper, the multicolored lights of Carnivale flashing and pulsing around them like the beats of a giant heart. It would be easy to get to one of her knives, incapacitate him just enough to make him come quietly. If she even needed to do that. If she invited him back to her room, he’d agree. All sorts of ways to do this bloodlessly. It was, after all, her job.

Her job.

After a long, boggling moment, he pulled away, looking none so steady as he was trying to pretend. “Well,” he said. “Wonderful to see you again, darling. Let’s catch up sooner next time, eh?”

Emma was still heaving for breath, shaken and unraveled, needing nothing more than to drag him against her, onto her, into her. No matter the consequences, no matter anything at all. But sense returned in the nick of time, just preventing her. “Killian,” she said. “You can’t do this.”

“Can’t I?” His eyes searched hers for a long moment, entirely serious. “And what do you propose I do otherwise, then?”

“If you stop this, if you turn away, we can. . .” Emma tried to choose her words carefully, when her head was still so clouded and muddled and hot with him. “We can take you away. Let you start over. Erase what came before. It’s not too late. If you stop hurting people.”

Killian raised the other eyebrow, but didn’t respond. Then at last he said, “I’m not hurting anyone more than SHIELD is, love. And considering they already tried to erase my past and my entire life, I’m none so sure it’s any kind of inducement to agree to let them do it again. You’ll have to kill me to make me stop fighting them, and well. . . I rather get the impression you don’t want to.”

“No,” Emma said. “Of course I don’t want to! I’m not a. . .” She hesitated. “Not a murderer.”

His smile remained, but turned infinitely sadder, the way it had in Moscow when he told her they’d never see each other again. “Then, my dear,” he said softly. “You are in entirely the wrong line of work.”

And with that, and a breath over her hand more oddly and terribly intimate than a kiss, he went.

iii.

The third and most fateful time Emma Swan and Killian Jones collided into each other was at the end of summer, in Malibu. In Tony Stark’s mansion in Malibu, of all the unthinkable places. Stark had just finished rebuilding it, and while he might not be quite so brazen as to give out his home address to a terrorist this time, that didn’t mean he was willing to back down or fly under the radar, and he’d decided to throw a lavish housewarming party. (Steve Rogers, however, would not be attending.) And he, in typical style, had gone all out. There was a string quartet that had won at least a dozen Grammys between them, white-aproned waiters offering glasses of wine from bottles priced in four figures, real gold flecks on the canapes, and JARVIS and the Iron Legion were clanking around on the perimeter for security. Emma was there because she’d been personally contracted by Pepper to hunt down a missing vibranium shipment that was supposed to be safely in the custody of Stark Industries, but which had been mysteriously intercepted and disappeared en route. This metal in the hands of those up to no good was, of course, a significant concern, and although it hadn’t been openly stated, Emma knew that if she didn’t make this bust, she was skating on very thin ice indeed. Already failing to catch Killian Jones twice despite admitting she’d seen and spoken to him face to face both times, and then this? She would start looking an awful lot like a double agent, even possibly a plant of Hook’s within the organization, and that could only go very, very badly for her.

Hence she was standing on the balcony, gazing out over the dark ocean and sipping something expensive, when she caught a whiff of some rich dark cologne from the man who had just stepped up next to her. Somewhat closer, in fact, than she generally permitted, and she’d just turned to inform him angrily to back off when she saw the familiar flash of blue eyes and white smile, and her innards turned to sludgy ice water on the spot. She managed not to scream or otherwise attract attention, but it was close. “Jesus. . . Jesus Christ!” she hissed. “Are you out of your goddamn mind?”

Killian smirked. “Come now, love. I’m never one to pass up a good party – or a good drink.” In illustration, he flourished the tumbler of golden whiskey in his hand, raised it to her as if in toast, and took a long, slow sip. “Besides, I wanted to see you.”

Emma did not feel remotely capable of essaying an answer to a man who thought the best way to drop in and casually let her know he was in town was to sneak into Tony fucking Stark’s housewarming party, in the middle of a literal swarm of SHIELD people and sentient flying spacesuits who considered him Public Enemy Number One and would gleefully beat the shit out of him if given the slightest chance. She pressed a hand to her chest, still making undignified gulping noises, as he took another nonchalant sip. “Beautiful view,” he said, his eyes nowhere near the star-flecked Pacific Ocean – in fact, never leaving her. “Good for a man’s soul.”

“Look, I don’t know what you’re – ” Emma stopped, seeing absolutely no good to come of this. “Killian, you need to leave. They’ll catch you.”

“Isn’t that what they’re supposed to do?” He shrugged, finished his drink, and tossed the glass over his shoulder; she heard it break with a faint crash on the rocks below. A flash of that grin that did unspeakable things to her insides. “Why, Swan. I think you’re starting to like me.”

“I am not,” Emma said, as coolly as she could muster. “It’s only that tonight’s my night off, and I’m not ruining it having to deal with your dumb ass.”

This didn’t appear to phase him; indeed, it only made that smile wider. “Ah, yes. Locating all that missing vibranium, isn’t it? And how well is that going, exactly?”

“What the – ” Emma whirled on him, snatched him by the silk cravat, and dragged him in, their faces barely an inch apart. Low, even, and lethal, she demanded, “You’re going to tell me what you know about that right now, or we’re going to have some fun. And lest you get the wrong impression, I mean fun for me. Decidedly not for you.”

“Oh, is that so? I do fancy being tied up by a lovely and assertive woman, you know. So don’t be so sure that I wouldn’t enjoy it.”

Emma made a noise of complete exasperation in her throat. “You,” she repeated. “Talk. Now.”

“I don’t have so much to say as all that.” Killian linked his hooked arm around the small of her back, boosting her closer, her breath coming short and her legs twining into his. “Only that I may have bought the shipment and ensured it didn’t end up in the hands of any. . . shall we say. . . unsavory characters.” His finger traced along her jaw to the top of her shoulder, light and gentle as a snowflake. “You don’t want to know what that unscrupulous American oligarch was going to do with it, or where he laundered the money he used to pay for it. You should investigate him, you know. Duncan Crump.”

“Crump’s a raging asshole, everyone knows that,” Emma said weakly. “Good for you, you made sure he didn’t get it. But it still belongs to Stark Industries.”

“Why? So he can go on fighting the Star-Spangled Man with a Plan?” Killian laughed. “Stark should have stuck to being a frivolous billionaire playboy, and Rogers should have stuck to punching panto-Hitler in the nose. Haven’t you realized by now that SHIELD creates all of its own enemies? There wouldn’t be any battles to fight if they hadn’t stepped on so very many people in the name of law and order. No aliens. No murderous AI robots. No jealous deposed warlords or Nazi scientists or crazy Russian hackers. They need to go. All of them.”

“Why are you so fixated on revenge?” Emma held his gaze, flat and hard. “Is it because of your brother?”

Killian hadn’t expected that, she could tell. He visibly flinched, pulling away from the heat of their increasingly entwined embrace, running a hand across his face and through his rumpled hair. In a cool, dangerously self-possessed voice, he said, “What do you know about my brother?”

“Not much. Just that his name was Liam, and he died during the Convergence, defending London from the Dark Elves.” She lifted her gaze to his. “Am I wrong?”

Killian expelled a hard, angry breath through his nose. “No.”

The silence between them remained fraught for another few moments. His shoulders remained tense, hunched, as he stared out at the sea, even as music and light and laughter drifted out from the party continuing indoors. “Not just my brother,” he said at length. “My entire life. Everything I knew about or believed or thought was good or true or real in the world. The Dark Elves may have killed Liam, but SHIELD destroyed the rest. And ever since, there hasn’t been a moment where I wanted anything else than to destroy them in turn, to pay back what they took from me, to think there was any other way to live, until. . .” He trailed off, shutting his mouth with a snap.

“Until?” Emma prompted, moved by both curiosity and pity. “Until what?”

Killian glanced up at her, then away, oddly diffident for such a sleek, dangerous, charming, beautiful man. In barely more than a whisper, he said, “Until I met you.”

Emma opened her mouth, then shut it. She couldn’t begin to sort out the feelings inside her at that moment, or catch her breath or her balance or anything at all. “I – ” she said. “Hook, I – Killian, I don’t – ”

“Leave it.” He sounded unutterably weary. “You’ve chosen your path, I’ve chosen mine. I’ll release the vibranium shipment, even. Make sure you’re the one to retrieve it, so you can keep your job here if that’s truly what you want. Pass information to you from time to time, so you can dispel any suspicions about your loyalty. Only say the word, and you never have to see me again.” He turned. “Goodbye, Emma Swan.”

“Wait.” It burst out of her, raw and stinging. “Killian. Wait.”

He didn’t move. Silent as statue.

Slowly, timidly, having no idea what she was doing, only that she couldn’t stand to let him go yet again, she reached out. Her hand hovered over his shoulder, searching, questing, not quite touching. Until at last it did, and it felt as if an electrical current had been completed, surging through them both. Until there was nothing but that moment of pure, impossible connection and chemistry, nearness and need, and they closed the last space like a shot, clawing into each other’s arms and crushing their mouths together, drinking and deepening, closer and closer. She could not stop and never wanted to, even as his hook and hand slid to the back of her thighs, lifting her against the balcony wall. She wrapped both arms around his neck, breathing raw and ragged, bonded with him on a nearly cellular level, until she had lost all track of what belonged to her and what to him, conscious of nothing but the hunger. God – oh God she had to get herself under control, had to stop, otherwise he would have her right here on Tony Stark’s balcony (or worse, in Tony Stark’s bed) and that would obviously be an unqualified disaster in any number of ways. But she wanted – she wanted more than anything, this strange sensation where nothing hurt and nothing was wrong – when stars collide like you and I, no shadows block the sun –

At last, on the very brink of insanity, Killian pulled back, trying to wrest himself under control with deep, wheezing gulps, their foreheads still touching and his hand cradling the back of her neck, as if she was something unspeakably fragile and perfect and lovely. “Emma,” he managed. “Come with me. Please.”

For a moment, she hesitated at the very brink of doing it, no matter how absurd and dangerous. Take a leap of faith. But she couldn’t. Not this way. There was still unfinished business for her here, still doors to close – or open. Yet the possibility still stood before her, dazzling and impossible. That she couldn’t say yes to him just now – but that someday, in fact someday quite soon, she would. Go with him, and leave the world behind.

“No,” she whispered. “Not yet. But. . . be patient.”

He closed his eyes briefly, clearly fighting his disappointment. But just as he had done so unexpectedly that first night in Moscow, he always gave her a choice, followed her lead, respected her wishes. And so – for once, she almost wished he wasn’t such a gentleman – he pressed one final light kiss to the corner of her mouth, a promise and a token that they would see each other soon. “All right,” he agreed. “Not just yet. But I will find you, Emma.”