The picture I am using for a cover image is derived from a photo titled "Tumbling down the steep valley side to Ponts Mill." Copyright Rod Allday and licensed for reuse under the Attribution 2 Creative Commons License.

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The slab of ceiling and plaster that balanced precariously above Rebecca groaned menacingly. Dust filled the little triangle of space that was all that was between her and being crush to death by the house that was collapsing around her. She shivered, too terrified to move. Her arms where wrapped around her knees, holding them tight to her chest. One false move and it would all come down around her head.

"Rebecca! Come on, you have to move," a woman screamed from her right. She fought to turn her head to see the Mayor calling to her from the ragged edge of her trap. Her voice made the dust that filled the air dance and whirl around her head. Regina motioned her to come towards her, "Come this way, hurry. The whole place is coming down! It's just five feet. Come on."

She couldn't. She couldn't move. She couldn't possibly crawl five feet. Five feet! It looked like five miles. She turned her face away, her eyes tightly closed. A whisper called to her, made her open her eyes. Staring at her, his hand outstretched across the space between them, Mr. Gold whispered, "Please."

She looked from Mr. Gold to Regina and back again. Those were her choices. Who did she trust with her life?

The woman who had been her advocate and supporter since arranging for her to leave her psychiatric prison cell. Who had been kind to her, taken her under her wing. Helped her start to adjust to the loud, bright, fast world Rebecca found herself in. The woman who had helped her find a home, a job, and the beginnings of a life. The woman who now leaned towards, but not into, the hole Rebecca found herself trapped in.

Or the man who everyone had warned her against. Who used and manipulated people. Went out of his way to make other's lives, especially Ragina's, as hard as possible. Who had beaten Rebecca's own father so severely he had spent weeks in the hospital. The man who had been so cold to her, turning from her at every opportunity. The man who was now reaching for her. His arm outstretched in the space between them. His body pressed as far as it could get into the hole. His shoulders braced against the plaster as if his strength alone could hold the ceiling at bay. Whose teeth were bared with the effort to get to her. Whose eyes were full of determination and assurance, yet with an undercurrent of desperation and fear. Whose chest heaved with every breath as he fought to reach her.

There was no choice, really. With more strength than she thought she still possessed, she leaned over and reached out. Gold's strong hand immediately gripped hers. She was as much pulled as scrambled out of the hole. She heard Regina scream behind her, heard what sounded like fists hitting wood, but she didn't-couldn't-look back.

As she cleared the debris, Mr. Gold pulled her against his chest. They sat there for a long moment, just swaying, his arms locked around her, her face in his chest. She didn't know if he was rocking her, or she was rocking him.

With a loud grown and crack, the tunnel she had been huddling in collapsed, sending more building material raining down around them. Gold threw Rebecca to the floor, covering her body with his. Arms wrapped around her head, shoulders hunched over her, he took the brunt of the falling debris.

His hair brushed her forehead, his breath on her neck. She huddled beneath him, instinctively seeking the shelter he provided. She stayed that way, even after the rumbling subsided, her eyes tightly closed, suppressed sobs shaking her body.

"Look at me, love," Gold said, his voice little more than a breath, his finger running lightly from her forehead to her jaw. Only then did she open her eyes. "Are you alright?"

She nodded as her eyes took in his face. Gone was the mask he always wore, full of snide superiority. His eyes radiated concern, and…something warmer. His lips, no longer pressed into a thin line, were full. Rebecca's eyes came to rest on a bloody gash above his left eye that ran from his hair line to his eyebrow. The hair that normally fell into his eyes stuck to the clotting blood.

"You're hurt!" Rebecca said, her hand reaching out to the wound.

"It's just a scratch," he said as he turned his face from her, pulling away. He cut her off when she started to disagree, pushing himself further from her, "We need to get you out of here."

Rebecca bit her lower lip, as much to keep herself from crying out at the loss of his closeness and warmth, as to stop herself from arguing further. She simply nodded as she pushed herself to her knees. She heard Gold let out a hard breath and followed his gaze to his cane. It lay on the floor next to them, snapped in half by a falling beam.

As he looked around, probably for something to replace it with, Rebecca moved towards him. Pulling his arm over her shoulders, she fit herself against his side and helped him stand up. He stared down at her for a moment, his normal mask almost, but not quite, slipping back into place.

"You said something about getting out of here?" she said, her voice a little wobbly, but her eyes didn't waver from his.

"Indeed," he said, and he scanned the room around them. Rebecca did the same. They were in the basement. The cellar doors were on the other side of the collapsed ceiling. The door to the rest of the house lay behind another pile of debris, its stairs in splinters at the base. Desperately, Rebecca looked for another way out. All she saw was a small window, set high in the wall.

Mr. Gold must have seen it too, because he pointed in that direction, "There."

Rebecca nodded. She kept her eyes on the ground as they picked their way through the pieces of the house that littered the floor.

When they reached the wall, Gold placed his hand on the cement and stretched himself to his full height to see out the little window. With efficient movements, he flicked open the lock and pushed the window open, before turning to her. "Up you go."

Rebecca gave him a quick nod, and turned to the window. It was high, so high she doubted even if she jumped she'd be able to make it. But she had to try. Placing both hands on the lip of the window, she gathered her strength to push herself up. She felt a light brush on her calf and turned. Mr. Gold had braced himself against the wall and was leaning over, his fingers laced together to offer her a boost up.

"Thank you," she said, smiling warmly at him.

"Come on," he said, gesturing towards the window with his head, "The house won't stand forever."

Nodding again, she placed her foot in his hands and pushed herself through the window and onto the little garden outside. She crawled on her hands and knees as fast as she could onto the grass beyond the recently turned earth.

She looked back over her shoulder, expecting to see Mr. Gold following closely behind. It was only when he still hadn't appeared after she'd collapsed onto the ground that she realized that with his bad leg he couldn't make it through the window unaided any more than she would have been able to.

Rebecca pushed herself up. She took a step back towards the window, planning on reaching in and pulling him bodily through if necessary. Suddenly, the rest of the house began to come down.

An anguished cry escaped her throat as she threw herself toward the window. Strong arms grabbed her from behind, holding her back. She fought them, tears running down her face, "Let me go! I have to help him. He's still in there!"

The owner of the arms didn't listen. And Rebecca watched helplessly as the house fell in upon itself.

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Gold leaned heavily against the wall as Rebecca disappeared through the window. He stopped forcing his lungs to take air in orderly waves and let his breath come in ragged gasps. Pain tore at him. His ruined knee screamed at him for all he had put it through over the last twenty-four hours. His back and ribs throbbed from where something had hit him as the tiny tunnel his beauty had been hiding in had collapsed.

A shutter ran through him as he thought about how close he had come to watching her die before his eyes. If she had hesitated for a minute more he would have lost her. Again. Though he suspected Regina had accelerated the collapse when she realized that she had lost her little game of tug-of-war. Not that Gold had been playing. For him, this was no game.

Letting his breath hiss out from between his clenched teeth, Gold put his back to the wall and slid to the floor. His knee was so stiff he had to use both hands to lay his leg out in front of him. Resting his head against the cement he closed his eyes and waited for the inevitable. There was no escape for him. But then, there never had been. Not really.

But she was alive and well, and the favor he had finally called in from Sheriff Swan would insure she stayed that way. He didn't fight the memories, like he normally did. He let them fill his mind. His heart. At least he had gotten to see her again. Hold her close and smell her hair. Touch her face and see her smile. He wished he'd been able to kiss her. One real kiss. But it wouldn't have been right. She wasn't his Belle. Not really. She didn't love him. Didn't even know him.

But she lived. And that was enough. It had to be.

He felt the house begin to shake apart around him. He clung to the image of her smiling up at him and waited for the blackness to claim him.

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Okay, now you have to make a decision. Should I mark it as Complete, making it my very first one-shot? Or do I continue the story to its eventual Happy Ever After conclusion. Emphasis on the eventual.

Things you should know before you decide you want me to continue:

- I am a helpless romantic, so there will be a Happily Ever After (or close enough to it)

- I am, however, known as The Queen of Angst among my friends, so the road won't be smooth for these two, both have a lot of growing to do

- I love to read and write spicy stories, however I will do my best to keep the version posted here in the 'T' category, and have the Adults Only version available somewhere else

Your call people. Let me know.