Chapter Text
A scarlet sunset hangs over Storybrooke, red bleeding through misty white. The mansion on Mifflin Street looms tall, a tower stretching and reaching for the far distance but falling short of its goal. On the balcony, Regina perches, unmoving, enthralled by the crowd growing beneath her feet.
Peasants, she thinks. Peasants coming for her head with pitchforks and torches, as if they haven’t been living in a world with modern technology for the past 28 years. Still, it’s the entire town against her, and in this world without magic, she might as well be powerless.
At least she’ll go down with her head held high.
Turning on her heels and descending down the stairs, she revels in each click-clack sounding from her soles. This familiar sound resounding off of empty white walls in a house untouched by time might very well be the last semblance of peace she’ll be afforded.
But she’ll be damned if these pathetic flies regard her as anything less than their queen. She pulls back her shoulders, elevates her chin, smooths out her outfit, exudes a presence meant to dominate.
Her eyes are drawn back into a glare. “Can I help you?” she scoffs, door flung wide open. She'd rather die than be perceived as cowardly by hiding behind some thin wooden plank.
A crowd of her subjects stand before her, led by Whale. A cacophony of demands for her head echoes from the townspeople behind him. “That smirk isn't going to last forever, Regina. You took everything from us,” he accuses.
She snarls, delighting in the way he recoils, and bellows out a deep laugh. “Kill me, then,” she goads, but inside, her black heart shudders and drops.
Her revenge has failed, and now, she has nothing and no one to live for.
The only person she loves in this world despises her. How could he not, after falling victim to the sleeping curse she concocted? After months of lies upon lies that have finally come to light? Every accusation that’s graced his innocent lips still haunts her, a shadow reeling in the corner of her mind.
“You're the Evil Queen,” her conjured Henry grits. Bitter betrayal flash and darken light brown to coffee black, an unfamiliar shade in eyes she thought she memorized. A sneer plays on his lips. “You did this to yourself.”
“I found my real mom!” he shouts, those same unfamiliar beads burning with fury.
“You’ll never win. Evil never wins.”
Evil, he calls her. Just as poor, innocent Snow White once deemed her long ago. Then, she had no one left to win over in the Enchanted Forest, resigning herself to a bitter life seeking vengeance for a love taken too soon, and eventually embraced the unsightly moniker.
Now, the title clings onto her like a curse, as if it’s her one and only trait. Her own history and reasons be damned, and she will be executed knowing that Henry will never hear her tale.
Executed by strangulation, apparently.
Whale lunges for her throat. His hands bend at his knuckles and joints into a vice-grip, arm aiming for her head.
It’s slow. Much slower than Mother’s slaps or magic, so of course she sees it coming. But she doesn’t budge, doesn’t even flinch, even as her lungs gasp for air and throat pleads for relief.
What she doesn’t see coming are golden strands shuttering her vision, the faint scent of cinnamon and coffee wafting around her when Emma Swan yanks Whale’s hand off Regina’s throat.
“Let her go!” the Savior shouts, positioning herself between an unmoving Regina and the murderous townspeople.
“And why should I listen to you?” Whale spits, fingers twitching.
Emma folds her arms. Her golden hair gleams in the evening glow, and she wears an aura of befitting her title now instead of her usual discomforted self. “Because I’m still the Sheriff.”
Regina stares up at the bleeding sky and wishes she could disappear into its jaws. She refuses to be pitied, least of all by Emma Swan. “I never asked for your help, Sheriff,” she seethes under her breath.
From behind Emma, Regina notices her unwanted knight in shining armor stiffen, dejected shoulders dropping forward. The mayor bites back a grin. It’s much too easy to get a rise from the blonde, to hit this infuriating woman, who is all too much like an open book to Regina, where it hurts.
And besides, this is the one of the few amusements she can afford herself as of late. If she's going to die soon, she might as well enjoy her final moments the best she can.
But before Regina can harass her further, Charming jumps into the crowd. “Because she saved you. All of you!”
“And because no matter what Regina did, it does not justify this! ” Snow White adds, shrill pitchy voice grating on Regina’s last nerves.
“Enough!”
Her queenly proclamation silences the crowd. These damn Charmings see themselves as judge and jury, a trait that seems to have been passed on to their daughter, and she won't have any more of it.
She strides into the middle with her arms outstretched, her subjects inching back and parting like the Red Sea. “Take my head, if you so desire!”
“No!” Emma interjects. “No one is going to take anyone’s head today!”
“Stay out of this, Miss Swan. This is of no concern to you.”
Emma scoffs in response. “This town appointed me Sheriff, and I’m damn well going to make sure to do my job. So we're doing this my way.” Practiced and smooth, she pins Regina's arms behind and cuffs her wrists, and then yanks at its chains once, twice, three times for good measure.
Regina scowls, tugs at the metal encasing her wrist to break away from the idiot’s unnecessary manhandling, but she keeps her head held high and face expressionless. She ensures the same of her voice, each word even and measured. “The one time you choose to fulfill your duties on your otherwise unimpressive rap sheet,” she says, stealing a glance at Emma.
A mistake.
Their eyes meet, unreadable green bearing into the fabric of her soul. Regina refuses to break away first in this show of dominance, but it's something Emma does with ease, as if deeming her opponent an unworthy adversary.
The lack of contact imparts in Regina a feeling of unexplainable loss, and she grinds her teeth until bone against bone erases any undesired sensations in her beating black organ.
Until all that fills her mind is the fact that she despises Emma Swan.
-----
Regina finds that she much rather prefers the dank gray walls of the holding cell over whiny townspeople. Here, she's allowed silence and privacy, and she perches on her sole prison bench with impossibly practiced poise. After all, she's faced much worse under Mother's orders, Leopold’s unwanted ministrations, and Rumple’s abusive teachings, so maintaining whatever scrap of dignity she has left is simple.
“So, I’m a prisoner now?” she says, nonchalant and annoyed.
Emma looks up from her phone. “Yep,” she responds, popping her p . “Can’t have you beheading people left and right. What’s the saying? Off with their heads?”
Metal coats Regina’s tongue, and she realizes too late she’s bitten into her lip.
Of course she still can’t escape Mother’s grasp, can’t shake off her generational legacy, even in a separate realm. This world imagines Mother as a plump, temperamental queen obsessed with decapitation, titled the “Queen of Hearts” because of the measly stick she holds. The wholly incorrect depiction had amused her when she first stumbled upon it, perhaps even combatted some of her worst nightmares regarding the real Queen of Hearts -- a cold, heartless mother who rips out and stores away beating hearts for exploitation, control, and leverage.
She had witnessed first-hand the lengths to which the Queen of Hearts would go, witnessed her own mother ripping out poor Daniel’s heart and crushing it into ashes right before her eyes.
All because of Snow White. Innocent, beloved Snow White, with her big mouth and clueless demeanor, who left her own daughter to guard Regina’s cell.
(Poorly so, Regina might add, unless “guarding a cell” means wholly ignoring the prisoner and relegating all her attention to her handheld device.)
It makes Regina scoff, disdain heavy in her low timbre. “So your parents stationed you here to ensure the town doesn't -- what? -- end up with piles of decapitated heads? The family reunion of the century.”
Emma bristles. “Don't . I don't do family.”
Regina tenses at that, her jaw creaking under pressure. Of all the people to lose Henry to, it had to be to this… this… rash and uncouth princess whose transient lifestyle and runaway tendencies makes her blood simmer. “Ah yes. The lone wolf. How long until you decide motherhood is too taxing and abandon Henry? Again, I might add.”
“I wouldn't--” Emma stammers, taken aback for a second, and then slams two open palms onto the sheriff desk. “Henry's different, okay?! Just because you're a shitty mom--”
“Excuse me? ” Fury explodes in Regina’s gut. She stalks up to the bars, as close to this imputent bitch as she can get. Her knuckles whiten under her grip, fingernails screeching against metal. If she had her magic right now, god, if only she had her magic, then she'd rip this shank’s heart and crush it into dust. “I love my son. How dare you insinuate--”
“You made him think he was crazy! You tried to control every aspect of his life! If you think that's love, I have a newsflash for you, lady! That's called manipu--”
Regina scoffs. She knows what manipulation looks like: physical abuse of power, isolating the subject, instrumentalizing everyone and everything for one’s own gain.
She would never hurt Henry. Never isolate Henry. Never use Henry. No, what she’s doing is not manipulation.
“And you think you know what love is?” Regina goads.
“A whole lot better than you! At least I'm not in the business of framing people and digging up sealed records!”
“No,” Regina says with a glare. “Instead, you tried to kidnap a child from his stable home and from his mother .”
“To protect him from you!”
Regina shakes her head. “That’s what you say, but I can see through you, Sheriff. You used him; you dragged him into our crossfire, for your revenge!”
Emma snorts. “Says the one who poisoned him!”
“What in the world is happening here?” Mary Margaret shouts as she and David enter the station. They’re hand in hand, both sets of eyes fierce and confused, until Mary Margaret shakes it off and pivots, “You know, never mind that! We have a bigger problem here. Both Henry and Rumplestiltskin are missing!”
Every cell in Regina’s body is tensed for battle, and she’s on fumes and panic and anger before she even registers what she's saying. “What?!” she snarls, fist banging against the rails. “You lot were supposed to be keeping an eye out for him!”
“He was getting checked up at the hospital! The Blue Fairy promised me that she’d watch over him,” Mary Margaret says with that same petulant whine Regina’s familiarized herself with from decades prior, when Snow White’s inability to keep secrets and promises led to her Daniel’s death.
“I’m sorry. I just didn't want you to lose your mother like I lost mine. Are you mad?” Snow White had whimpered, and Regina had swore to herself that she would spend the rest of her days avenging Daniel if it was the last thing she'd ever do.
At least one of them had been capable of keeping their promises.
“And you believed that little--” Regina grits her teeth. Counts to ten. Focuses on her breathing. Her palm is rubbed red from the bars, but she doesn't care. Her body thrums with anxiety -- fear even -- and she'll do anything she needs to so that she can escape and ensure her little prince’s safety. She's lived with her rage for decades, and though never abating, it simmers to a low boil. “We need to talk to the Blue Fairy. Where is she now?” she asks, only the slightest bit of vitriol leaking out.
“Mary Margaret and I will talk to her,” David dissents, narrowed eyes challenging Regina. “You will stay here, where you won't be a threat to anyone.”
“He’s my son! I have the right to ensure his safety!”
“Uh-- I don't mean to interrupt…” Emma rubs her hand behind her neck. “But can someone tell me what's going on here?” She flits her gaze around, confusion laden in her eyes.
Henry's best chance is for her to appeal to this blonde-haired idiot, Regina reminds herself, if David’s distrust and Mary Margaret’s naïveté is anything to go by. “Rumple most likely has Henry in his slimy clutches right now. The last person that we know of who's seen my- Henry is Mother Superior. In our world, she’s known as the Blue Fairy,” Regina adds as an afterthought.
At the mention of Rumple, Emma immediately blanches, panic growing on her face. “I'm letting Regina out of here.”
“What?!”
“Emma! No! She's--”
Emma puts up a hand, fumbles with her keys using her other. “Right now, all that matters is Henry's safety. I've witnessed-- hell, I've experienced-- firsthand the kind of fucked up shit Gold will resort to for his own gain, so we need all the help we can get.”
“You don't even know if he has Henry!” David says at the same time Mary Margaret adds, “What if this is her plan to get you to set her free?”
“Look,” Emma retorts. She turns the key and allows the cell door to swing open. “Gold practically left me for dead, so right now, I'll take the lesser of two evils. And I'll keep her in check, alright? Now come on. We have a nun to catch,” she slurs, anxious energy bouncing off her body, before she takes Regina’s hand and drags her along.
“But, Em--”
“You don't know what she's--”
The door slams behind them.
-----
Regina snatches her hand back and rubs at her wrist. “Don't expect me to thank you, Miss Swan.”
“Wouldn't dream of it. Unlike you, I'm not in the business of coercion,” Emma says dryly. “I know you care about Henry in your own fucked up way, so I trust you won't try anything until he's safe.” She shrugs, head bowed and walks one foot in front of the other. “Besides, we need each other. You know this town best, and I can protect you from anyone who wants your head.”
“I don't need your protection,” Regina says, pushing past Emma if only to prove a point. The few townspeople milling around turn their attention towards her, fear and anger scattered in their gazes.
Emma keeps up, right on Regina’s heels, an irritating pattern they’ve adopted both here and in their fight for Henry and the town. “Maybe not, but I made Henry a promise that I intend to keep.”
“What? To babysit the Evil Queen and ensure the town's safety?” Regina grits out, and she swallows down the lump in her throat that forms every time she thinks about how her boy perceives her now.
“No,” Emma says. All of a sudden, her voice is gentle, soft, a whistle in the wind. It’s a tone Regina hasn’t heard directed her way since… she’s not sure how long. “I promised him that I would keep you safe.”
Regina skirts to a stop. The lump loosens and threatens to spill over, and she clears her throat. “Did… did he really ask that of you?” she asks through now shallowed breaths.
“Yep.”
Her still heart lurches back to life, her voice trembling from its force. The temptation to ask for more than that single word is strong, much stronger than her pulse jump-starting to life, but she swallows it down.
She swivels on her heel, vulnerability shedding like ill-fitted skin, and faces Miss Swan again. The sheriff stumbles backwards, feet tangling together as she slips onto paved cement and lands on her behind, hard.
There’s no doubt in Regina’s mind that painful, black bruises will form there. Good. A flesh wound in return for whatever psychological game Emma’s trying to play with her.
She holds her head up in a show of defiance, focusing on maintaining her posture rather than on her fleeting realization that seeing her nemesis decommissioned under her feet is not nearly as satisfying as she had imagined. “Make no mistake, Miss Swan. I still despise you with every fiber of my being.”
“Great. The feeling’s mutual,” Emma drawls, squinting through narrowed slits, before she bounces back to her feet and shakes off Regina’s bitter confession like it’s loose dirt. “So, how do we find Henry, Madame Bitch?”
-----
The Blue Fairy is, as Regina predicts, stationed at the nunnery, barking orders at her other nuns in her battle to restore order amid their regained memories. That little bug has always enjoyed positions of power, altruistic though her outer appearance and words may seem.
But like can sense like, and Mother had always expressed harrowing disdain toward Blue for reasons that Regina didn't understand until she herself tasted magic and its unparalleled possibilities for the first time.
Regina throws open the convent doors, and the frantic hustle and unruly mess immediately halts.
Blue is standing at the center of it all, erect and poised. “What can I do for you, Regina? Or should I address you now as Your Majesty?”
With a roll of her eyes, Regina takes a few measured steps into the convent and Blue’s little bugs skitter to the edge of the room, hushed whispers filling dense silence.
“Christ, are all you fairy tale characters so dramatic? If Regina wanted to kill you all, don't you think she would've done it while you all were cursed?” Emma says tactlessly, breaking the standstill.
Regina huffs a sharp breath. She’s unsure if Emma is acting out of pity or unsolicited saviorism, but whatever the case may be and correct as Emma's assessment is, Regina needs neither pity nor saving, least of all from this woman who pushes past Regina with her princess curls fluttering in the light breeze. “We're looking for Henry,” Regina says, “and you're the last person to see him.”
Blue tilts her head. “Henry? Is he alright?”
“He's missing, or is ‘we’re looking for him’ unclear?” Regina snaps, misdirected anger slicing the inane question. Henry is missing, Emma is infuriating, Blue is moronic, and Regina refuses to be surrounded by incompetent nobodies any longer than she has to.
The head nun raises a judgmental brow and purses her lips, and Regina glowers back, her fingers twitching for long-forgotten action, an ache that even fighting Miss Swan doesn't quell.
“We need your help finding him,” Emma cuts in, shooting Regina a warning glare.
Much to Regina’s annoyance, Blue immediately relents at the Savior’s behest. “Right. Last I saw, he was resting at the hospital.”
“And you didn't see or hear anything strange? No one unexpected came to visit him?”
Blue shakes her head, a finger on her chin. Another fairy, one with bright purple hair, approaches her and whispers something that Regina can't hear, though whenever it is, Blue’s body immediately tenses and she clears her throat. “I don't remember anything of the sort.”
From her pocket, Emma produces a pad and pen. “Okay, then can you walk me through what happened after Regina and I left?”
A terse, calculated nod. “Alright. Please, allow me just one moment,” Blue says and turns to the other fairies. She assigns each of them tasks to complete -- “to ensure the stability of this town in light of this curse lifting,” she assures -- and Emma smiles politely and stands aside.
Minutes past, and Regina impatiently taps the side of her thigh. “We’re losing time. If it were up to me, we'd torture her until she spills,” she says through gritted teeth.
Emma brushes her hand against Regina’s shoulder, and Regina startles and recoils at the unfamiliar gesture. “I got this,” she whispers, though Regina doesn't have a clue what the blonde has “got” or why it's necessary to speak under hushed tones when they're no better than side pieces gathering dust in a secluded corner.
“I fail to see what your genius plan is.”
Emma’s responding smirk provides no answers.
There's a lull in Blue’s instructions, and Emma takes the opportunity. “Hey, Mother Superior,” she calls out. "We're just gonna head out, follow our other leads.”
Regina yanks on Emma’s arm, mouth ghosting the curve of Emma’s ear. “We don't have any other leads, or have you forgotten already?” she hisses. “I should've known better than to trust--”
“Don't leave!” Blue commands, panic tidaling over her. “I mean--” She stumbles backward, fingers playing with the edges of her dress, like a kid caught stealing an extra piece of candy and trying to cover it up. “I'm just about finished, dears, so--”
With the same smug smile, Emma taunts, “I wonder what you’re hiding for you to react like that.” Her hand is on her holster, ready to draw. “Now, why don't we try this again? Where is Henry?”
Blue runs a shaky hand through her coiffed hair, tucking stray ends behind her ears. “I’m not hiding any--”
“Don't start. You've got two anxious moms here ready to maim this entire convent,” Emma clips. Her hand taps her gun’s holster, quick and erratic and rhythmless.
So. Miss Swan considers herself a mother now despite having only experienced two seconds of motherhood. The statement chaffs at Regina's thin patience, and if not for Blue’s growing antsiness and immediate response, the insults lining Regina's throat would have seen the light of day.
“I don't know. Rumple threatened my girls. I had no choice.”
“A convenient lie,” Emma huffs, Blue’s responding aghast offense spurring the blonde further. “The Mother Superior I've come to know wouldn't have backed down so easily if threatened. He promised you something, didn't he?”
Regina has zero right to judge, but Blue’s never been one for altruism. Just like with the Dark One, there's always a cost for her help, and though her price pales in comparison, it is not without consequences. Better hidden, yes, so that others view it as altruistic, but Regina knows better.
Surprisingly, so does Emma. For all of her faults, the Savior is quick to grasp people's true nature.
And there's only one thing in this land that Rumple and Blue would both want enough to cooperate on. Something that equates to power, both in their old world and new.
“Magic,” Regina whispers, and feels equal amounts of dread and anticipation flood her emotions. “He's planning on bringing magic to Storybrooke.’
Blue's pale face glows red. Her eyes widen, and she purses her lips for what seems like an eternity until finally she sneers, “Fairies! Stop them!” and her little religious posse obeys without question.
Emma reacts immediately, unsheathes her gun, pointing it towards the nuns who block the doors they entered through. “Don’t make me do this.”
One of the nuns -- the same one who had Blue tensing -- huffs and rolls her eyes. “She's the Savior! She clearly won't kill any of you!” she says mockingly.
Bang!
A bullet whizzes past Regina and imbeds into the monastery walls.
“Kill, no. Incapacitate, yes. The next one’ll draw blood,” Emma threatens, and the fairies shake, anchored to where they're standing, fear and shock in their eyes.
Together, Regina and Emma are careen past these live statues. The only fairy who isn’t frozen stiff is the purple haired nun. Purple rushes towards Emma, arms outstretched for an unstable and awkward-looking tackle. A single punch from Emma is all it takes to knock her cold, purple hair and langley limbs carpeting the floor, and with one final sneer, Regina shuts the nunnery doors with a flourish, satisfied Blue looks utterly displeased and stressed and enraged.
To Emma’s credit, she doesn’t demand answers when Regina hops straight into that yellow death trap of a car and directs, “We need to head to the well!”
Emma immediately follows suit and books it, gunning way past the speed limit.
Good. At least the wannabe parent understands that Henry and his safety are paramount; curiosity and all other wonderings must fall to the wayside.
They drive in relative silence other than for Regina’s sparse instructions. The space provides Regina time to recall all of her lessons with Rumple, rummage through her extensive magical knowledge.
To bring magic to this world, he needs a vial of true love and a place to act as a tether for the magic to siphon through -- none of which involve her precious Henry.
So then, what could that crocodile possibly--
Emma skids the car to a sudden stop.
Regina lurches forward, forehead nearly missing the dashboard. Her head is pounding wildly, almost ringing in her ears, and any momentarily and measly ounce of veiled tolerance she had for the idiot is now gone, replaced by fumes and worry and anger. “What the hell? Are you trying to get us killed?!”
But the blonde is staring off into the distance like she doesn't register the question. Her hand reaches forward, points to something far, and her mouth gapes open. “Um. Regina?” she stammers. “What… what is that?”
Regina doesn’t even have to turn her head before purple smoke enters the periphery of her vision. It tumbles over the horizon, the trees disappearing in the thick haze that gains speed by the second and shakes the ground as it rumbles closer, indiscriminately enveloping everything in its path.
Regina gulps. She can feel her nerves dancing with excitement, can feel her pulse vying to break free of its constraints, can feel her cravings overwhelm her.
“That,” she says, the horror in her voice betraying the smirk on her face, “is magic.”