@lilysmom wrote:
Emma said he was gone, but she also said that she killed him.
“Neal, you’re shot! If you fall through that portal, you’ll die no matter what world you land in!”
It’s a pretty reasonable assumption that if someone who already has a serious injury gets thrown violently through a portal, they’ll be in even worse shape when they come out the other side. And if he’s going to a land without modern medicine, and where he doesn’t know anyone, again, chances aren’t good.
I think everyone will go right on believing that there’s no way he can have survived. Rumple may be the only possible exception, but given the reasoning in my previous paragraph, I’d think that even Rumple would have to admit that the chances weren’t good.
For a decade, Emma has held onto Neal, onto the possibility of their Tallahassee, because she knew he was still out there somewhere. Now she believes he’s dead. This opens the door for her to consider moving on, which could be the setup for CaptainSwan.
There aren’t many people who knew Nealfire apart from Emma. It’s a shortlist of just Rumple, and Hook. I’ve been hoping for ages that Bae and Hook would have had a close friendship in NL. “Welcome aboard the Jolly Rodger, m’boy,” made me squeal with delight and I can’t wait to see their history. So if Nealfire is believed dead by everyone, that will likely have an effect on Hook as well.
I think that their mutual affection for Nealfire and sadness over him being gone is what will cause CaptainSwan to develop a real bond. (Which would be sort of hilarious, given the competition of the ships.) Hook can tell Emma what Nealfire was like as a kid. Emma can tell Hook was he was like as an adult, (you know that the pirate would be proud of Nealfire’s thieving ways). They can fill in the gaps for each other and become close to each other in the process.
But then once CaptainSwan are getting into the swing of things, Nealfire will show up alive and Emma’s feels and hopes for him will all come flowing back and TRIANGLE AHOY.