Fluorescent lights always seemed so bright, painfully bright Emma thought. They stung in your retinas and burned green in your vision. They were too much, too revealing like they could show everything about you, so intense and yet without passion, no colour; only the stark white of reality.

Yes, Emma thought, that's what fluorescent lights were: the picture of reality, blinding and uncomfortable. There were no shadows in reality. Everything comes back to haunt you eventually.

Emma was tired of fluorescent lights, but shops were full of them and she didn't have anywhere else to escape to.

This Walmart was the 56th shop she'd been into that day, or maybe 57th, she couldn't remember. She was bored; God knows she was bored, the mind numbing, endless aisles of stuff she didn't want were uninteresting and depressing. Especially when you couldn't afford them. But she was use to that, she wasn't here to shop and she hadn't gone into the other 56 shops to buy anything either. In truth the never ending rows of food or clothes or just plain stuff helped to soothe her mind, it was boring but it was monotonous and the thing about monotony is that it's predictable. Predictability is good because it meant the unexpected never was that, unexpected. If she knew what could happen then she had some form of control. Her control usually ended in running , but it was control all the same. So Emma wondered the aisles of Walmart aimlessly. Lost in her own hellish monotony.

But that was about to change.

Ten yards in front of Emma, stood by the checkout, was a woman. A woman who would change everything. Or maybe it wasn't the woman so much as the two men about to walk into Walmart, right up to the woman and do something unpredictable. They were the catalyst for the reaction that would restart Emma Swan's monotonous life.

Meticulous. That was the first word in Emma's head when she saw the woman ahead of her. Everything about her screamed at perfection: her perfectly coiffed dark hair, her perfectly fitted grey skirt suit and the perfectly designer red high heels. Even her very skin lacked a single blemish, Emma could see this in the smooth flesh of her calves, tanned and expertly toned. After a moment of continued appreciation, Emma began to mull over what the hell a woman like that was doing in a store like Walmart. Surely she wasn't shopping? But apparently she was, although the telltale tap of manicured nails on the counter mirrored in the clack of her heel on the white linoleum suggested that maybe she was used to a higher standard. Emma wasn't sure and she didn't care. People watching was another of habits, but she never let herself ponder too much, thinking too much about others always led her back to her own abomination of a life. But unfortunately, this woman wasn't just about to walk out of her life, at least not figuratively because it was at that moment Emma Swan witnessed a moment that changed a whole lot.

The woman was about to pick up her plastic carrier of shopping, so obnoxiously out of character with her outfit, and leave, when she was approached by two men. Emma frowned. Surely not. Maybe they just know her. And know her they did but certainly not in the way one wishes to be acquainted with men like these.

"Regina Mills" the slightly larger of the two said "you are under arrest for the murder of Henry Edward Mills. You have the right to remain silent but anything you say, can and will be used against you in court of law."

Regina turned as if to walk away, but it was too late. The second man was already cuffing her wrists in silver handcuffs that reflected the lights above.

Emma stared shellshocked. She knew she didn't know this woman, literally not a single thing. You can be a murderer and wear a skirt suit. But it felt so wrong. A feeling that only grew when she finally saw the woman's face. Regina's face.

It was beautiful. There was no other appropriate word Emma felt. Full lips painted deep red, high arching cheekbones and a jawline that could cut glass. Nothing was undefined or indefinite, her eyebrows a perfect arch and her nose straight and small. However, there was an exception to the rule, where here face shouted meticulous control, her eyes were in turmoil.

The dark brown, almost black, irises were alight with a mix of emotions: fear, horror, embarrassment even and perhaps most distressing of all, anger. Thick black rage. Not at her arrest or the accusations but the utter helplessness and injustice of her predicament. Emma didn't know how she knew that, hell she didn't, but something told her that this was wrong, she had always been a good gage on the reliability of people and she felt something here. Something wasn't right, but there wasn't a damn thing for her to do but stare I helplessly as Regina Mills was marched away, cuffed hands behind her back and heels still clacking on the white linoleum.