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He could only really remember her in his dreams.
Not just how she had died, which was forever driving him onward in his quest for revenge, but rather how she had lived. The sound of her laughter as she stood on the deck, letting the wind whip through her long, dark hair. The taste of rum and spice on her lips when he kissed her. The scent of her skin as he buried his face in her neck, and the soft curves of her body as he pressed closer. The light in her eyes, which had drawn him to her in the first place, with the thirst for something more so evident in their depths.
However the memories had slowly dimmed over the many long years, until he only remembered them as he slept, losing them quickly as soon as he opened his eyes. No matter how hard he tried to keep hold of them, they slowly seemed to just slip away until the only thing he really had left was the memory of the light in her eyes going out as she died in his arms. That, and the grief and rage that came with her loss at the hands of the Crocodile.
Recently however, things had started to change. Lately the memories had lingered on past the moments when he first awoke every morning. Except the hair he saw was no longer dark, but golden. The eyes no longer a soft green, but rather a color that was as difficult to fathom as the sea, changing from one moment to the next.
It scared him, and he was not a man who scared easily. In fact, there was nothing that scared him anymore. After all, he had nothing to lose but his life, and that was no real loss. Yet, now he found that perhaps he had more to lose after all. Not just the memories of the woman he had loved and spent several lifetimes working to avenge, but the fleeting sense of a man he only barely remembered.
In his dreams, he was always Killian, whether the woman’s hair was dark or light. In his dreams, he was still free. Now that man seemed to be trying to claw his way to the surface again, and Hook wasn’t sure he even knew what freedom was anymore, let alone if he had the right to look for it again. Killian had died on that deck with Milah after all, and Hook was all that remained.
Except for sometimes in his dreams.