Storybrooke

"Have you seen Roland?" Asked Marian as she walked down the stairs and into the kitchen. She'd overslept and Robin hadn't thought to wake her up, which left her with exactly half an hour before she had to go to work.

"Not since last night, probably doing his paper round. He gets out of bed before you do," said Robin. Marian knew he was right. She was proud of her little boy getting a job at his age. Not many eleven year olds get up at six in the morning voluntarily. The brunette nodded and went to make a coffee, her daily routine since having kids. But just before she was going to put the kettle on, something seemed off – he left his lunch box on the counter. She squinted her eyes, "he left his lunch."

Robin lifted his head up from his morning newspaper to meet his wife's gaze. That is odd, he thought, Roland had a massive appetite and never forgot his lunch. "Maybe he got up later and forgot?" He suggested before taking a bite of toast, sensing Marian's worry. It seemed to work.

"Maybe." She went to put the kettle on again and made her drink.

"Mom, I have a temperature," their eldest, Chloe whined. This was the third time this week she had tried to get out of going to school. She plopped down into the chair opposite her father and waited for the pity that never came. She hated school, even more so now she had an older boyfriend. Her parents would flip out if they ever found out. Who wanted to learn about poetry anyway?

Marian sighed heavily at the blonde, she knew this game all too well. Placing a hand on her daughter's forehead she could tell she was trying it on, "you're perfectly fine, love. Don't you have an English Lit test today?" The way Zoe rolled her eyes gave her the answer she needed. "Nice try, Hun."

"But Mooommmmm."

"Nope, you are going to school." The blonde looked to her dad for support on her side, she was always a bit of a daddy's girl. Chloe knew this was the final answer and let out a sound of annoyance before going out the room. Marian gave a small smile of gratitude to her husband before calling out after.

"Wait up, I'll walk with you half way to give Roland his lunch. Its sports day and the field is pretty much your route anyway!"

Once they got to the field she said her goodbyes to her daughter before parting to the bench with all of Roland's classmates. She said a hello to Henry, her son's best friend, before the teacher came up to her. "No Roland, today?" Said Miss Blanchard. Marion gave a confused look to the short haired woman.

"Is he not here?" Panic was now starting to rise inside her. She didn't even want to connect up this to the missing lunch from this morning. "Did you take the register?"

"No, hasn't shown up. Just though he was ill," the teacher tilted her head to the side in confusion. But before either could say anything else on the matter, the Hatter's daughter Grace came up to ask her something and she went off. Marion stood up in a state of panic. Reaching for her phone as quickly as she could. It went to voicemail.

"Roland? It's me, Mom. Listen love, I only wanna know where you are. Could you call me back sweetheart? Love you." She tried a different number – Rumple who owns the local shop and Roland's kind of boss.

"Hi, Gold, it's me. Say, did Roland do his paper round this morning? He didn't? Oh, okay. No, no it's fine, just don't know where he is that's all. Thanks." She walked round again, trying to calm her nerves before calling her husband. Voicemail. Of course.

"Robin, I want you to call me back as soon as possible. Roland didn't turn up to school today either. Call be back now!"

Shit, shit, shit! A million thoughts were going around in her head Maybe Emma would know? She is a detective after all. Before her head exploded she raced to the car and set off.

Nearly half way to there and near the beach, Marian was caught up in traffic that would take ages to clear up. Looking at people get out of their cars to see what the holdup was, she decided to do the same, "do you know what's going on?" She asked a woman with a window down.

"Apparently the police have found a body on the beach," the stranger replied. That's when it kicked in. Marian's face went pale as if she had seen a ghost, no, no it couldn't be. Not her Roland. Not her little boy. Without even locking her car she started sprinting to the beach front, not hearing the beeping of cars and people yelling at her to get off the road. The only thing that mattered to her was to find out who the body was, it could never be her son, could it? He was only eleven years old, barley even a teenager. No, it couldn't be, she tried to reason to herself. Then why was she running for her life? It was times like this when she hated having a mother's instinct. All morning she had felt like something was wrong, this almost proved her theory. Almost.

When she got to the entrance to the beach she saw the police and their vans lying around the place. "Please not Roland, please not Roland," she muttered to herself. Not even bothering to say 'excuse me' the brunette pushed passed the locals and made her way onto the sand. She paused, the only thing she could hear was the pounding of her heart. There was the police tape cutting of a section of the beach and a crowd of people wanting to know what had happened. Tears were starting to form in her eyes – it was now or never.

As quickly as possible she ran as fast as she could, past the crowd of people, past the police who were guarding the place and straight under the tap line she went. Before the police men could stop her, she ran even faster towards the body. She could faintly make out her best friend Emma, with a woman whom she had never seen before. That's when her blonde friend turned around and met her eyes in shock. This is real, she thought. That's Roland's body lying there. She screamed in pain and shock. "ROLAND! ROLAND!" She ran even closer to the body, but before she kneel down next to him a pair of arms wrapped around her.

"Marian you shouldn't be here," Emma tried to be calm with her, but there was a noticeable hint of panic in her voice.

"Please tell me it's not him Em, please tell me it's not my boy!" The brunette looked into her friend's eyes, hoping for an answer that was along the lines of "no, don't' worry it's not him," but it never came.

"Get her off the beach!" A new voice joined in. Marian looked up to see another woman, slightly taller than the blonde.

"Who are you?" Marian asked harshly. Tears now rolling down her cheek.

"D.I. Mills. I'm working with D.S. Swan here. Now would you please remove yourself, only police are allowed past the tape," the woman in question was dressed a lot more formally than Emma, her makeup was on point had her heals in her hand. Not exactly beach wear the blonde thought to herself.

"That's my son!" Marian was fuming, not wanting anything to escalate Emma turned to her friend to try and clam her down. "That's my son!" She kept on shouting as men tried to grab her and get her off the sand.

"I'm so sorry, but you really can't be here Marian. David could you please escort her off the closed off area?" She looked at her friend and silently pleaded with her. Marian eventually gave in and let the men drag her away, sobbing for the loss of her little prince. Once she was out of earshot, she turned to her work partner. "Seriously? First you take my job, then you go and do that?!"

Regina gave the blonde a look with a raised eyebrow, before replying with "and what exactly did I do Miss Swan? Because I thought I was doing my job. Something you would've obviously have done wrong, had you been in my position. Have you ever done one of these before?" She asked casually, as if the previous conversation – if you could even call it that – had never happened.

"A murder? No, first one. And you know, you could call me "Emma," or even "Detective Swan" if you like formal," she shrugged.

The older woman looked the blonde up and down, as if she was silently judging her, "Em-ma," she tried, the name just didn't float her boat. "Emma, no I'll stick with Miss Swan. And you'll earn the title of Detective when you show me what you can do," and with that she walked away to talk to forensics. This left Emma furious as she hurried off after her, not wanting to miss a thing. Bitch.

A few hours earlier

Emma walked to work on a sunny Monday morning, she'd just dropped her son Henry off at the school for sports day and was looking forward to the day ahead. There wasn't many days like this being a detective, but she was just about to get a promotion as an Inspector. Even her boss had said that he was so sure Emma would get it that she could take an extra week's holiday and spend time with her son. Yes, nothing could get her down.

When she got to the station she was greeted with big smiles and hellos from her team, whilst she handed out presents from her trip abroad to Boston. Just as she had given out her last gift to her closest co-worker Ruby, her boss Graham came in the room. "Emma can I talk to you a minute?"

"Uh, yeah sure," she shrugged whilst following him into his office, not reading his very awkward signals he was giving her.

"Now, I know I told you you'd be getting promoted once you got back. But I'm sorry to say the place has been taken." Emma repeated his words in her head a few times before reality sunk in.

"WHAT? How? Why has someone got MY job?! You said I would be the best one for it! That's why I took extra holiday!"

"I know, I know, Emma. I'm sorry but things came up and we found someone more suitable." Graham was trying to make the situation easier for the blonde, they had after all been friends for a while. But he soon realised that nothing could make it better.

Emma massaged her head with her fingers, trying to keep her cool. Sighing she put her hand down once again, "who got it?" This bitch would pay, she thought to herself.

"D.I. Regina Mills," the Chief Superintendent gave her a small smile, trying to lighten the situation. He knew that hiring Regina could be a disaster. The woman's last case proved it, but he wanted to give her a second chance – she was a bloody good detective after all.

"Regina Mills," the blonde repeated, where did she know that name? "Why does she sound familiar?"

"She was lead on the Broadchurch case," he stated firmly. He could literally feel the gears turning in his friend's head.

"Oh for- bloody hell!" She whined. "Her? You chose her over me?"

Graham put his hands up in surrender, "don't hate me-"

"It's hard not to right now," Emma huffed.

"Listen, she might not even stay here for long. But she's a good detective Emma!"

"So am I Graham!"

"I know, but conditions changed and we needed a new lead ASAP." Emma didn't reply, instead she stormed out of the room and went to the restroom, slamming the door on the way out.

Emma sat on the toilet, with the lid closed. What was she supposed to do now? She had been a D.S. for years and she was so, so close to getting that promotion. "Damn Graham," she sniffed.

"Emma?" A voice called. It was Ruby.

"I'M IN HERE!" She shouted back, she really wasn't in the mood to talk to anyone right now.

"You're needed. A body has been found on the beach." Emma sighed, before saying she'd be there now. She most certainly wasn't looking forward to working with Regina, she had heard rumours' of people calling her the "Evil Queen" because she was horrible to work with. God this was going to be awful.

Present

So now here Emma was, working side by side with the Evil Queen, having to prove herself worthy once more. Great. After finishing with forensics, Regina turned to Emma. "That woman, the mother of the boy, she seemed to know you. Can you give details of who he was?"

Emma nodded, "yeah, Marian is my best friend, we go way back. The boy, her son, his name is Roland Hood. He's best friends with my boy. He goes to the local school and, oh God, he has tea round my house," Emma was almost in tears right now, but Regina took no notice. She didn't have time for this.

"I don't need this whole biography, just tell me how old is he?" She snapped.

"11," the blonde said weakly. "His family live here and his dad's the local plumber."

"That will be all," Regina nodded. The brunette looked up and saw the high cliffs above the beach. "This is a suicide spot?"

"He wouldn't do that," Emma replied as if on cue.

"Answer the question."

"No. There are others. There's one just three miles down west and there's another one further in land. But he's just not that type of kid!"