Nothing but Love
Author's note: if you are a member of the Outlaw Queen fandom for the TV series Once Upon a Time, this is a rewrite; the way Robin Hood's most recent scene should've gone in my opinion. Although I don't much care for the utterly revolting triangle Adam Horowitz and Eddy Kitsis created between Regina, Zelena and Robin I will not attempt to change or rewrite any of that in this work. All previous events remain intact for seasons 1 through 5 within this fiction.
Disclaimer: I do not own, and I am not affiliated with the show, Once Upon a Time, in any way. Nor do I own its characters. I just love them and think they should be treated better than they are. Unlike their creators, I do believe in happy endings. This is simply my attempt to right a wrong.
Storybrooke Mayor's Office
Night time
Angry, no not just angry… furious; and not wanting to believe that she had been wronged, or even in the possibility of deception, Zelena re-enters the building at a run. Emma's wrong. She has to be wrong! Clutching the missing storybook pages, intent on proving just how wrong the infuriating blond is, Zelena races for sister's inner office only half aware of the heated voices coming from within that room. Her heart hammers out its adrenaline-fueled two-part rhythm inside her ribcage the same way a panicked bird's wings flutter; beating uselessly against the bars of its own cage. She can't make out all of the confrontational words that she hears coming from Regina's office for the deafening sound of her own blood rushing through her veins. At least not until she hears her sister's chilling warning.
"Hades stop! You don't have to do this! If you kill me, Zelena will never forgive you."
Hades speaks and Zelena runs faster. She enters the room just as Robin attempts to reason with the dark god as if he were merely a man. "It was my idea to break in here. Use that on me, leave her alone."
Unseen by any of them and unable to move fast enough, Zelena watches, frozen in horror. She hears Hades object, and watches him raise the Olympian crystal. Robin dives in front of Regina; literally offering his body and his life to be her shield against all harm. But at the same instant that raw power begins to emanate from the crystal Regina wraps one fiercely protective arm around Robin's waist, pulling his body hard back against her own as she thrusts her other arm over his shoulder, sending a blast of dark magic out before him; providing a barrier of her own between Hades and the two of them.
The two streams of power meet with a crashing vengeance; each struggling to triumph over the other. Regina's magic glows a dull red and then grows brighter and stronger in its intensity as the crystal's magic glows white-blue and fights to penetrate Regina's protective magical shield.
Mildly shocked by the sudden reversal of protection, Robin struggles against her unrelenting hold on his waist.
"Hold still! Don't move." Regina orders hotly. She's agitated; in fear for his safety, and although she doesn't voice her next thought, Robin hears her words in his own mind as clearly as though she'd spoken them aloud. "Don't even breathe!"
Only after he complies, holding his breath, and going completely still in front of her, does she release her hold on his waist and raise that arm as well to aide her in the fight against Hades.
Magic battles magic; roaring across the room. The black, white, and gray tones of the room look hellish in the ominous pulsing glow of power. And yet, with his shoulders bracketed safely between her arms and with dark magic flying from the palms of the woman he loves; destruction arcing dangerously across the room; he experiences, and holds down, the wild urge to laugh at the intense irony of the fact that he knows he's never been safer in his life than he is at this godforsaken moment.
Zelena finds her voice and announces her presence as she demands, "Hades, what's going on in here?"
Not glancing away from his target for even a second, he replies calmly, "She tried to kill me. I told you, you couldn't trust her."
Not wanting to trust even her own eyes and what she herself has already witnessed, Zelena tosses a look of uncertainty in Regina's direction.
Not relenting in her efforts to protect Robin and herself, Regina doesn't respond verbally. She simply shrugs. She's tired of trying to prove herself! The time for reasoning with her sister is over.
"Regina!" Zelena questions loudly; demanding more of a response.
The room continues to glow ominously as, in frustration, Regina growls without sympathy. "I'm a little busy here! Pick a side Zelena; your choice!"
Robin's infant daughter begins to wail loudly in response to the room's dark chaos.
Zelena shoots a pleading look at the man on the other side of the room. "Hades, stop this! Please! She's my sister!"
He'd nods gravely. "And she'll never leave us alone. I told you, this is our Kingdom."
"Why do we need a kingdom? Why can't we just be together?"
"You really think they're going to let us?"
Too determined to be distracted by the pain in her sister's voice, and growing weary with the fight, Regina raises one elbow just high enough for Robin to duck under. "Move!" she orders quietly, for his hearing only; her breath heated against his ear. "Get out of my way! This needs the end; now!"
Knowing instinctively that what she's really saying is that Hades is stronger, and she can't go on much longer, Robin stubbornly refuses; staying rooted in place. "Not as long as he's here."
Loving his unwavering resolve, and being thoroughly pissed off about it at the same time, Regina digs deep down within herself summoning up every last ounce of rage she can magically hurl at the latest demon to come to Storybrooke. Her renewed effort sends out a stronger pulse of magic that does cause Hades to take a step back, but the war rages on.
The baby cries louder, drawing a mere second of attention from the god of the underworld but no more.
"Hades, I know you think you're doing this for me, but you have to stop. Now! You're scaring my daughter!" Zelena's words are as much a demand as a plea.
Frustrated by her sister's doubt, and feeling her strength waning, Regina hisses, "Damn it Zelena! Help me!"
Regina doesn't actually say "His darkness is stronger than mine." but Robin senses the unspoken admission and tries with everything within himself to will her the strength to go on. With her chest pressed firmly against his back, he can feel her ragged breathing as well as the heart thundering inside her chest.
He glances at Zelena and realizes that even if she does help, it might come too late. A thought ignites and burns through his mind. "You can do this Regina. You just need a different trigger. Find a stronger trigger."
As though she heard him, Regina's mind hiccups. In an instant, she shifts her focus. Instead of concentrating on the rage and loathing she feels for the man across the room; the way her mother and Rumpelstiltskin taught her to do so many years ago …rage has always been her trigger… she chooses instead to focus on the love she has for the man standing directly in front of her.
The reverberating red power emanating from the palms of her hands simultaneously glows brighter but also softens in hue; changing gradually from red to a gentle pink. It changes further, slowly going a soft dazzling white before a tremendous room-shaking, volcanic explosion of power turns it white hot; going almost golden and making the floor beneath their feet and all the light fixtures overhead rumble dangerously before she can finally knock the Olympian crystal free from the grasp of her enemy.
Blown backwards by the force of her magic, Hades stumbles wildly as he reaches out to retrieve the crystal while Regina falls backward. Knowing that she's going down, and also that there's nothing she can do to stop it, she instinctively stops the flow of her power and reaches out to pull Robin down along with her. Turning toward her; with the same instinct, to protect the one he loves, they go down in a heap; clinging to each other with Robin placing a hand behind her head just in time to cushion it as it smacks hard against the granite tile floor.
As he winces in response to the pain in his hand; movement registers in Regina's peripheral vision.
Zelena scrambles haphazardly in the shockwave that echoes through the room. She snatches the crystal up before Hades can retrieve it. She holds it out, away from her body, brandishing it like a weapon.
"Yes, use it, my love. End this. End them!" Hades breathes encouragingly; in an eerie whisper.
Zelena's harsh laughter contains too much pain to be maniacal, but even so, it sends a chill down Regina's spine and leaves a cold sick feeling, heavy like a stone, in the pit of her stomach. Both she and Robin are rendered utterly speechless when Zelena cries out, "Love? All I ever wanted was love, but now I know… For you… That will never be enough!"
They both cringe, using their arms to shield each other's heads and faces from the force of the blast when Zelena plunges the crystal into her lover's chest; straight into his heart.
He disintegrates into the air and when the resulting shockwave subsides, both Regina and Robin sit up to find Zelena kneeling on the floor sobbing over the only thing that remains of Hades; a pile of ash.
They disentangle themselves and Robin rushes to hold and comfort his wailing daughter while Regina scrambles to her sister's side. She embraces and holds Zelena as the redhead sobs pitifully for the unavoidable loss.
"I really thought he'd changed." Zelena sniffles.
Regina pulls her closer, hugs her tighter and touches her sister's face with affection as she addresses a question to Robin. "is she OK?"
Robin nods somberly as he rocks his daughter, making soothing sounds to comfort her. "She's not hurt. She's just scared." To the infant in his arms, he smiles and says, "What was all that noise? That was scary, wasn't it? It's okay now. Auntie Regina and Mummy made a very bad man disappear."
Still cooing and making shh-ing sounds, he crosses the room slowly and offers Regina his hand; pulling her gently to her feet. Zelena follows, locked in Regina's embrace, and Robin leads them from the room with a simple quiet, "Let's get out of here."
Out in the hallway, Zelena lingers long enough to look back through the door at the small pile of pale ash.
Regina gently nudges her onward. "It never does any good to look back… And I'm sorry." She adds, with quiet sincerity.
Zelena follows, pulled along as she shrugs with a dejected sigh. "Why should you be sorry. You gave him the same second chance you gave me. It's not your fault he didn't take it."
Not sure she heard correctly, Regina raises a skeptical eyebrow and squeezes her sister's shoulders gently. "Not my fault, huh? Careful Greenie… Change is sneaking up on you."
Zelena offers her a watery smile and sniffles as she chuckles softly. "Nah, I still hate you for everything else."
Regina laughs quietly and shoulders her sister with mock hostility. "Yeah, I know. I hate you too."
While Robin looks on in astonishment Regina laughs boldly and offers him her free hand. She smiles warmly. "What's the matter? Confused?"
"Just a bit. I can't figure out if you two are old chums; or archrivals."
Zelena manages a feeble attempt at laughter. "isn't it obvious." Regina finishes in unison with her. "We're both. We're sisters."
Robin shakes his head. "Okay. I don't understand it but, if that works for you… "
Regina stops walking, and let's go of Zelena long enough to step in close to Robin and offer him a quick kiss. "Just go with it."
He cups her cheek gently in his hand, as he smiles and whispers, "Okay."
The tender moment is interrupted when Zelena groans dismally.
Regina shrugs apologetically but says nothing.
"I think I'm going home now. Unless you think we should clean up that mess first." She gestures back toward Regina's office.
Regina shakes her head." That mess is tomorrow's problem, and you don't have to help. I can clean it up myself. You don't have to go home either. You can come to my house if you want."
Zelena offers her sister a brittle smile. "Thanks, but I think I'd rather be alone… And I know you two would."
Before Regina can form any sort of objection, Zelena disappears in a cloud of green smoke.
Robin squints, mildly surprised by her sudden departure. "I may never get used to the two of you doing that. Do you think she really went home? She's hurting pretty badly. Should we worry about her wrath?"
Regina pauses to breathe deeply before shaking her head. "Not tonight. Tonight she'll be content just to hurt herself."
When he raises a questioning eyebrow, Regina continues. "She'll eat too much chocolate, open a bottle of wine or two, or knowing Zelena, something a bit stronger. She'll be miserable, but with all that sugar and alcohol… She'll sleep eventually."
He nods. "And when she wakes up tomorrow afternoon; lonely, hung over, and pissed off… What then?"
Regina wraps an arm around his waist, keeping him close as she heads once more for the door. "That's tomorrow's problem. She repeats quietly.
He holds the door open for her and outside under the stars he looks into her eyes and realizes that she looks as though she's about to drop from exhaustion. Pulling her close once again he offers quietly, "I need to see my son. You can come to the camp. I'll fix you a late dinner, or we can all go back to your place."
Resting her head on his shoulder, she sighs. "Let's go get my son. go to the camp. You can fix dinner and we'll all have a nice quiet, low-key celebration."
He kisses her upturned mouth gently and the child in his arms squirms between them and babbles; cooing quiet baby nonsense. "What are we celebrating?" he inquires quietly.
"The fact that we survived that." She tips her chin in the general direction of her office. "Just don't expect the celebration to run too long. Battling him…"
He nods again; anticipating her next words. "Just about put you down for the count, didn't it mi'lady?"
"Nearly; yes, but if you let me go to sleep before too late, let me recharge… And if you promise not to steal my covers…" She offers him a teasing smile. "I just might make it up to you after your daughter wakes up for her 3:00 AM howling."
His tongue clicks the inside of his cheek and he flashes a slow lazy smile of his own. "Can't make any promises. I am a thief; you know?"
"I'm well aware. And Robin, one other thing…"
He's close enough to feel the shutter that rolls through her body.
"The next time I tell you to move; get out of my way… Promise me you'll do it. I could've lost you tonight. I could have hurt you myself."
He watches her struggle to hold unshed tears at bay as he gently shakes his head. "Can't make that promise. I don't make promises I know I might not be able to keep. And there's not a chance you'd hurt me yourself. In the beginning of that fight, you had good control over the dark stuff. As for the light stuff; the out of control stuff that finally wounded him, that's no threat to me. That was nothing but love."
She tilts her head to one side and nods ever so slightly, quietly acknowledging the truth in his words before she speaks. "I know you're not scared. I can see that, but you should be. Light magic may be triggered by love, but uncontrolled it can be harmful, devastating even. If I'm going to use it, then I need to get better at harnessing it. I've only used it once before tonight. I can still call up the darkness without consciously making a choice to do so. The other requires a conscious choice and a lot more effort. It drains me."
"It's like anything else worth doing. You practice, until you get good at it. Regina, you once had to make the decision to call up dark magic too. The important thing is not that you have to consciously make the choice for good; the important thing is that you're capable of making the choice. I know you can get there. We'll work on it."
She raises a curious eyebrow. "WE will?"
"Sure, why not?"
She shakes her head; laughing at him. "Do you have a thing for dangerous women in general?"
He shakes his head and murmurs, "Hm um… just you." before stealing another kiss.