The world was ending.
Emma could feel it underneath her feet. The glaciers were shifting, the poles were turning, and the earth was literally rotating off its axis.
Storybrooke was lost. Their entire world was lost.
She had won and there was nothing to stop her now.
Emma choked on the blood the filled her mouth. Her internal organs were bruised, and she was half sure that her ruptured ribs had sliced into her lung. Breathing was becoming far more difficult than it should.
The Saviour, they called her. They put their trust in her. Snow. David. Ruby. Leroy. They believed in her with all their hearts and souls to lead them to salvation. Which was why it was even more devastating when she failed them.
Her last thoughts shifted to Regina and Henry and the pain amplified tenfold.
She failed them. Her family.
The air was shifting all at once. Her burning lungs sought to fill themselves with the air it desperately need. She breathed hard through her mouth and tasted the cold metallic air with that faint tang of iron.
Blood. She realized. It wasn't her blood. She didn't know where it came from but prayed to any existing deity that listened, and prayed that this wasn't the blood of the people she loved.
She turned from the ground and saw the woman who caused all of this.
This was her doing. The core of her corrupted soul and poisoned magic was now seeping through into their sleepy little town in all its vengeful wrath and glory.
She looked across the destroyed streets and saw her. That woman. She'd once taken everything before and she was doing it again.
Even from her own daughter.
The figure that lay in front of her was still and lifeless. Her beautiful face relaxed as her eyes remained shut as if she was in nothing more than a blissful sleep.
But Emma knew better. She knew better but she wouldn't admit the truth.
No, she couldn't have been dead.
Not now. Not after everything.
If she couldn't save anything, she would at least save her.
So with that, the Saviour stood on her aching feet and felt the movement force more blood out of her throat.
She would make one last stand. One last stand to get her back.
Her enemy gazed at her like a snake would to an ant.
Amused and pitying.
Anger burst through Emma like a raging fire, setting a scorching path of vengeance into every cell of her body until it reached her heart.
Yes, she was letting the darkness taint her. The power was addicting. Strong. It was what she needed to win.
As her irises turned into a frightful glow of silver, she rejoiced internally over the fear she saw in the eyes of her opponent.
Her enemy.
Her prey.
Emma grinned and felt the electricity cackle underneath her fingertips, dancing to the ground like nymphs to a forest tune but it was death, and destruction that clung to her like a blanket as the foreboding howling winds sang in awe of her newfound abilities.
A dark sneer touched her lips, and Emma's voice sounded different. Deeper. Echoing into the caverns of all corners of the earth as she spoke.
"You will not take her from me."