Disclaimer: You think I would be here writing fics if I owed Once? No. And Sleeping Warrior would definitely be canon. Definitely.
A/N: Hey! So, I have come to the dark side and I regret nothing, I must say I very much enjoyed writing this and the feels are threatening to overtake me. This has kept me up for the past few nights, and is my first Sleeping Warrior fic so I hope you like. Please read and review!
Enjoy :)
"You don't understand, Mulan!" Aurora screams, her bright eyes ablaze with anger.
No, Mulan truly doesn't understand, and she wonders what she did wrong this time, "No, I don't. I might, if you'd tell me."
They've only been in Storybrooke for a few weeks, popping up in the streets after stumbling across a second portal back in their world. The town, as it seems, was made big enough only for those who inhabited it, so the two women had to share a house, not that it bothered either of them much, they had been traveling together for an awful long time. They, as they were at the moment, still constantly bickered, finding it hard to adapt to the new world as well as continue to get along. Mulan often wonders why Aurora seems more on edge here, where they are safer then they had every been.
"Your impossible!" Aurora shouts, placing her hands on her hips, "You know exactly what this is about. It's about Phillip!"
"What about Phillip?" Mulan asks incredulously, "I thought you wanted to save him."
"Ugg!" Aurora groans angrily, and Mulan's eyes flicker to the knifes that sit on the kitchen counter, much too close to Aurora for her comfort, "So you are in love with him." she acuses.
Mulan's ebony eyebrows shoot up, "What?" she says, taken aback, "I'm not in love with him, I never was!" she says, and she finds herself screaming too now, but it's true. She was never in love with the prince, and she wonders where this all has suddenly come from, "He's your true love."
"He's not!" Aurora yells, and them her voice softens as she speaks sadly, some hesitation in her voice, "Not anymore." she says, falling into a kitchen chair.
"What do you mean?" Mulan asks, she never knows this, why didn't Aurora tell her, "Of course he is."
Aurora sticks her nose up into the air, "Well, maybe I've fallen in love with somebody else." she said defiantly.
Mulan's brows furrows and she tries to ignore the stabbing pain in her chest at the thought, "Who?" she wonders, oblivious.
The fire in the princess's eyes relights and she shoots up onto her feet, "You, you idiot!" she screams, and then turns on her heel, sprinting out of the house. Mulan follows her immediately, almost without thinking, Aurora's words hardly registering in her whirling mind. "Aurora!" she shouts, "Wait!" and she runs out into the middle of the road before stopping, looking defeated as the princess continues to run away. She sighs sadly and turns back around, almost bumping right into a shocked Snow -Mary Margret, whatever- who has obviously watched the whole exchange.
"Mulan," Snow says, and the look in her eyes makes Mulan question if Snow ever left at all to allow Mary Margret to live. Questions if she was every truly cursed at all, "Mulan, you have to go after her."
"I can't."
"Yes, you have to." Snow argues, "Or you might lose her."
Mulan prays despratly that the other women can't see how sad she is right now, because it is ripping her apart deep inside and she doesn't understand. The warrior isn't used to such raw emotion, and it hurts more than any battle wound she has ever attained, "Aurora was never mine to lose." she responds, and the name burns her tongh in a way that feels so good. She wonders if Snow catches the way her voice breaks. Wonders if she understands what that means.
Snow -always Snow. Never Mary Margret, not even here in Storybrooke. Always and forever Snow- shakes her head as she apporachs the other woman, taking he by the shoulders in a firm grip, "She was always your to lose." she says, then spins Mulan around and pushes her in the directions Aurora ran off in.
And Mulan does was she's always been good at, she runs. But this time she is running towards Aurora, not away, and she doesn't even realize that she's running until she starts to become short of breath. It doesn't register to her that she should probably have thanked Snow, or that she has no idea where is is going or what she will do when she gets there.
She just runs, and hopes to find Aurora at the end of her path.
It doesn't take Mulan that long to find the princess.
Aurora had never been that fast, especially now with the tears stinging her eyes and blurring her vision. She isn't that deep into the woods, only far enough to not be seen for the streets, and Mulan doesn't know how she finds her but suddenly she is there infront of her, as if the princess had placed a hook in her heart, and is now reeling the warrior in.
She approaches the other girl slowly, and she causes the princess to tense as a pair of twigs snap under her weight as she continues to walk forwards. "I don't wish to talk to you, Mulan." Aurora says, her voice is thick and she doesn't even need to turn around to know who it is, "Just go away."
Mulan can't leave her, not now, but she pauses where she is because she doesn't really know what to do next, all she knows is that her heart is beating at a rapid pace and she finds that she almost likes it. The brunette was never really good with emtions or dealings with the heart, but tries her best as she begins with a deep breath, "Aurora, I-"
"Please." Aurora cuts her off, and her voice is almost pleading in a way that sound so full of emotion it hurts Mulan, "Please, just go."
Mulan crosses her arms, finally something she is good at, the warrior has always been stubborn, "No." she says firmly.
Aurora finally turns around at this, standing and spinning her body to face the other girl, hands on her hips, "What do you mean no?" she questions, somehow sounding both angry and hopeful in a way that Mulan finds utterly endearing.
"I mean no, I am never going to leave." Mulan announces, and the warrior is speaking fast, because she is so out of her element and somewhat afraid because she has no idea what to do or expect, "I'm not going to just go. I won't leave you, Aurora, not ever," I promised to protect you, "I could never do that." she says, approaching Aurora briskly, and before she even understands what is happening she is taking the princess in her arms and kissing her with all she is.
Aurora gives a squeak of pleasent surprise that Mulan finds much too endearing for her owe good and throws her arms around the warrior's neck. The other girl kisses her back almost immediately, and everything melts away for Mulan as she snakes her arms around her waist and pulls her even closer. All she can focus on is how Aurora's lips are oh so soft on hers and they way that the two just seem to fit perfectly together, as if they were always meant to be.
The two girls pull away simultaneously, both desperate for breath and Mulan thinks that at the rate it's going her heart might just beat straight out of her chest. They rest their foreheads against eachothers, standing there as one unit as Mulan smiles, she genuinely smiles and Aurora let's out a small, completly joy-filled giggle. Mulan can feel that hook in her heart again, pulling her closer and closer to this wonderful, wonderful woman, and she has never let this happen to her before but thinks that maybe, just maybe, this time it's okay to let her walls down and just love.
Because here is Aurora, lovely, headstrong Aurora and she wonders why she didn't realize her love for the other girl until just now. And she doesn't even ecknowledge it when she whispersa breathy, "I love you." until the princess, -her princess now, always and forever- with a smile like a thousand suns says, "I love you too."
That hook in her heart in pulling her in but she doesn't mind. In fact, she thinks that she would happily have herself reeled in if it could always be Aurora at the end of the line.