Title: Leverage International Swan Division

Author: Joshua "The Evil Guy"

Disclaimer: Once Upon A Time, and all associated characters, scripts, etc are owned by the ABC Company, and thus Disney. Leverage, Parker, Nate, Sophie, Hardison, and Elliot were created by Chris Downey and John Rogers, and belong to TNT. Spoilers for the pilot episode of OUAT. Emma Swan/Parker is NOT portrayed by Jennifer Morrison, but she is instead portrayed by Beth Riesgraf. All other cast are portrayed by their original actors.

Summary: Leverage/OUAT X-Over. One-Shot. Parker is Emma Swan. Emma Swan is Parker. Nuff Said.

Story:

New York City, NY

Thirteen Years Ago

She was hungry.

She was used to being hungry by now, but that didn't make it any better. She needed food. In order to get food, she needed money. There were people all around her, a lot of them probably had money. She needed money. She was hungry.

Looking at the people, the young blond girl judged her chances of success at getting money without being caught and… sent back. If the police became involved at all, she would be sent back, it had happened before. Sure, she kept escaping and getting out and everything, and… well, at least they would feed her and she wouldn't have to sleep in the gutter behind the chinese restaurant at night just to keep warm, but everything else about being sent back made being hungry, dirty and sleeping in trash well worth it.

She was hungry, she needed money, and she would take it from the people around her to get it. But who?

There were a lot of options. The woman with a big purse hanging loose off her arm. A few tourists with fanny packs and bulging wallets practically hanging out of their pockets. The fat man trying to juggle papers, his briefcase, and his lunch. And though it was tempting to just take the man's lunch rather than his wallet and briefcase, a few different factors came into view that made her pass on him.

Finally, along came an old man in a long coat with a walking stick. She could outrun him, and if she struck at the right moment she wouldn't have to worry about the police showing up or chasing her. Decision made, she moved rapidly through the crowd until she was coming up right behind the old man and she struck.

She made sure to time lifting his coat out of the way and reaching in to grab his wallet with the motion of his steps. She'd learned this the hard way, had been forced to, ever since her foster-father had given her the challenge of becoming a better thief. She was sure that she'd done it correctly, and that the old man hadn't noticed a thing when she succeeded in retrieving the man's billfold without him turning around. Prize in hand, she turned and started to run off. Maybe actually buy a plate of those noodles whose scent still flooded her nostrils.

God she was hungry!

Unfortunately, her meal plans were suddenly and abruptly changed when a strong hand grabbed her on the shoulder and held her in place. She found herself spun around on the spot and looking up into the dark-silver-haired gentleman, an amused look on his lined yet smooth face.

"I don't believe that is yours, my dear," he spoke with a refined and cultured cadence. "My wallet, if you please?"

"AAHHH!" she screamed, raising a fuss and struggling to get away. So long as she vanished into the crowd before the police showed up, she knew she'd be OK.

Startled, but not letting her go, in fact holding on even more firmly (and yet not hurting her), the gentleman looked about at the crowd that was even now watching the display of a young girl 'struggling' against the grip of a much older man. With a sigh and a roll of his eyes, he said, much louder than necessary, "Now, granddaughter, I know you want some ice cream, but that is no reason to make a scene! Once your mother hears about this, you know what will happen!"

With those two sentences, almost ninety percent of the crowd turned away, half of them giving looks of sympathy to the 'kind and patient grandfather'. The few that didn't happened to be nearby police officers, which the starving waif noticed before things got any further out of hand. Pouting and playing her 'part' as well as she could, she stopped fighting him and made it more like she was crying for attention rather than crying for help. She held onto his wallet though.

"Hm, so you're not stupid," Archie Leach, the world's greatest thief said to the wild young thing in his grip, "Just desperate, I'd imagine. Still, if you'd gone after anyone else, I do believe you would have gotten away with it. That is a rare gift you have there, my dear. Hm…"

He seemed to be inspecting her, and not in a creepy weird way like she was used to from older men. If anything, she felt like she was being judged, and she wasn't entirely sure for what, or even how she wanted to be judged by this strange old man.

Finally, he came to some decision and nodded to himself before kneeling down in front of her so they were eye to eye. Only then did he release his grip on her. She didn't run, though she couldn't be sure as to why.

"Yes, you'll do just fine," he said. "I have a proposal for you, young lady. My name is Archie. And as I find myself getting older, I'm unable to keep up in my… chosen career. I need someone to take over for me, to… continue my legacy, as it were. I think that you have the stuff to do just that. With a bit of discipline, of course. It would mean that you would always have the necessary skills to survive, no matter your circumstances. Interested?"

She thought it over. Several pieces clicked into place in her mind as she considered his offer, and a decision was made. She then handed him back his wallet as her answer.

"Excellent," he said, smiling as he stood up. "Now, what is your name, my dear?"

Looking up at him, her eye caught sight of the road sign just beside his head, from her point of view, and made another decision. Emma Swan, orphan girl left by the side of a road and found by another orphan boy, who then ran away leaving her entirely on her own, told Archie Leach the name she would henceforth be known as.

"Parker," the future thief said, reading the sign for Parker Ave, which happened to be the road they were standing next to.

And thus Parker was born.

L3V3R 93 / 0U +

Boston, MA

Present Day

The beautiful, sinewy blond stepped off the elevator into the four-star restaurant, wearing a form-fitting, knee-length red dress. She glanced 'nervously' around at all the people sitting and talking, partly to take in her surroundings, but also so nobody thought it odd when she reached up and 'timidly' brushed some of her long yellow locks behind her ear. Which she used as a cover to put in and activate her coms.

"Now remember Parker," Alec Hardison's familiar voice came through to her inner-ear, at sub-vocal frequencies so no one else could possibly hear unless they put it into their own ears. "No stabbing. No biting. No hitting, punching, kicking, or headbutting. And absolutely no groin-shots!"

"Aw, but those are the most fun," the blond thief sub-vocalized, so that while everyone on the coms would be able to hear her like she was talking normally, those standing right next to her wouldn't even be able to know she'd whispered a thing, unless they watched her lips move of course.

"Woman!" Hardison yelled in her ear. "The last time you did something like that, I had nightmares for a week! Nightmares!"

"Parker, listen to me," Sophie Devereaux's voice spoke next. "Don't worry about what the mark is thinking or wanting to do next. Just focus on what you are going to make him do next. We've gone over this a hundred times now. You're ready. We just need a few soundbites so that Hardison can do his thing, and for you to buy enough time for Eliot to take care of his car."

"Five minutes, Parker," Eliot Spencer's gruff tone came on the coms. "Promise, you'll only have to deal with this asshole for five minutes, tops."

"All right, enough," the Mastermind of Leverage, Inc, aka the Team, aka their Boss, aka Nathan Ford interrupted all the chatter, right as Parker zeroed in on the mark. "Parker, you've got this. We've got your back. Eliot, Hardison, get to work. Parker. Go get'em."

Allowing herself one brief moment, Parker couldn't help smirking as she pictured Nate, standing behind their platform-desk in his loft-apartment, IE Leverage Inc's home base, his expression one of a predator cornering its prey and readying to pounce. There were times that Nate's ruthlessness and cold calculating nature frightened the crazy thief. And there were other times when that same cunning appealed to the crazy in her and made her want to cackle in glee right alongside the Mastermind.

The mark wasn't too terrible to look at. Although, given everything that she knew about him, she'd rather go on a date with Sterling-blindfolded and handcuffed-than go on an actual blind date with this creep. At least he'd dressed up and was wearing a suit. Parker honestly had no idea if it was a 'good' suit or not, that was Sophie's thing.

"Emma," he stated questioningly, standing to his feet as she approached his table. She quickly fell back into character, as Sophie and Nate and the rest had taught her to.

"Ryan?" she asked, sounding more than a bit nervous herself. "You look relieved."

"Well, it is the internet," he shrugged helplessly, sitting back down as she took her own seat across from him. "Pictures can be-"

"Fake. Out-dated. Photoshopped. Stolen from the Victoria's Secret Catalogue," she listed, but a harsh word in her ear forced her to stop. "So…"

"So…" he agreed. "Tell me something about yourself, Emma."

Emma. Right. Her character. The name that Hardison and Sophie randomly pulled out of the ether and attached to the online dating profile they'd put under the mark's nose. Emma. A name that she hadn't heard or been called before… or rather, since…

Too busy caught up in her own memories, Parker went unexpectedly off-script. "Oh, uh, well, y'see… today's actually my birthday."

"And you're spending it with me?" Ryan asked, surprised. "What about your friends?"

Parker could easily (far too easily to be honest) picture her friends all staring at the bank of monitors, feeding back the images of her mini-cam hidden in her necklace, surprise and incredulousness masking their expressions as they shot confused looks back and forth.

"Kind of a loner," she gave him a cold smile, berating herself for the slip up. Nobody, not even the US Government, IRS, and especially none of her teammates knew when her birthdate was. Only two other people, still alive, knew about her birthday. Archie was not one of them.

"And… you don't like your family?" Ryan continued his interrogation. Why did people do this for fun, again?

Emma Pillsbury had two parents, three cousins and a godmother, all from Ohio or Indiana. Parker was the one with no family to like. Stay on script Parker. Do your job, she ordered herself.

"Yeah, but they're back home in Lima, Ohio," she shrugged. "Couldn't get off of work to fly out, and they're too busy to come visit. We talk. Text. On the phone. Y'know?"

"Lima, Ohio?" he repeated. "Is that where you're from?"

Refusing to blink, the blue-eyed blond slowly nodded her head yes, and said carefully, "Um, yep! Lima, Ohio. Oh-Hi-oh! Birthplace of the lima beans, or something…"

"Parker!" Hardison, Nate and Sophie all screamed in her ear.

"C'mon Parker, get your head in the game," Eliot chastised her.

"Huh," Ryan grunted. "So what brings you to Boston, then? Work, or something else maybe?"

She was really wishing she'd paid more attention to "Emma's" online profile that Hardison had crafted. She wasn't so good with on-the-spot script changes like Sophie or Nate were. But, she contemplated, she was an expert pickpocket, and sometimes that meant distraction more than quick and nimble fingers.

"Work," she shrugged, 'accidentally' knocking over her glass of water. "Oh no! I'm so sorry! I am such a klutz!"

"It's OK, it's OK," he assured her. Turning, he called for one of the wait staff, "Can we get some towels or napkins here?"

While his back was turned, she quickly acted and pulled out her phone and accessed 'her' online profile so she could see what Hardison had put down as her occupation. Personal Assistant. Great, thanks Hardison.

"You're welcome," his voice sarcastically retorted in her ear.

Oops, did I say that out loud?

"Yes!" four voices said at once.

Sorry.

Ryan turned back around and she was in the exact same position he'd last seen her in, and the table was being dried by the server, who happily replaced the spilled water and anything else ruined by her 'accident'.

"To answer your question, hopefully without the spill this time," she said to Ryan. "You know how it is, I'm sure. Workaholic, this one. Only reason I had this night off was because my boss forced me to go home and take some of my time off. Ready to run yet?"

"Oh, not a chance," he exclaimed, laughing. "You, Emma, are, by far, the sexiest friendless workaholic klutz that I have ever met."

"OK!" she smiled back at him, using the look Sophie had told her was her 'sexiest', and the one Hardison had made her promise to never use on him when she was asking for something. "Your turn. No, wait, let me guess. You are handsome, charming…"

"Go on," he grinned back at her.

"Ready out here, Parker," Eliot informed her.

Thank god, she said only to herself.

"I've got what we need from what he said already, and other stuff we've been sampling for the last few days," Hardison added.

"The kind of guy who... and now, stop me if I get this wrong," Parker said, right before her smiling face devolved into one of accusation and blame, "embezzled from your employer, got arrested, and skipped town before they were able to throw your ass in jail."

"What?" he blurted out, surprised at the sudden change in his 'date'.

"And the worst part of all this is your wife," she said. "Your wife loves you so much that she bailed you out, and how do you repay that loyalty? You're on a date."

"Who are you?" he hissed, moving from surprise to anger.

"Parker," Nate urgently instructed her, "He's on the run, and he knows he's bigger than you and in a public place. We need to push him to running back to his car, so…"

Parker smiled and repeated what Nate told her to say.

"The chick who put up the rest of the money," she might have ad-libbed a bit.

"The bail bondsman!" Ryan said the name like it was a curse.

"Bail bondsperson," she said back mockingly.

He stood and knocked the table in her direction, turning to run before she could do the same. Standing up, Parker looked down and saw that her tight pink dress was now ruined with whatever liquid now staining in. Rather than comment and feel dejected about the stain, she ran her finger along it and then stuck said finger into her mouth.

"Hm," she hummed in pleasure. "Nice champagne they have here."

She began following after the mark, although she did make sure to stop the wait staff and ask if her meal could be made To Go, and that she'd be back in a few minutes.

By the time she made it to the entrance, he'd already run across the very busy street and was in his car trying to start it and race off. Seeing this, she did nothing to slow or change her pace as she calmly walked across the same street, stopping traffic in a very literal method as she did so. She ignored the voices screaming her name in her ear just as easily as she ignored the skidding cars and blaring horns.

She stopped right in front of his door just as he noticed the wheel-lock in place on his car. "You don't have to do this, okay? I can pay you, I've got money," he begged.

"No you don't," she scoffed. "And if you did you should give it to your wife and take care of your family."

"What the hell do you know about family, huh?" he snarled, seeing he wasn't getting away.

At the angry question, Parker experienced something that she very rarely allowed to happen. The moment she noticed it happening, she immediately shut down, but objectively noted she still had too much of it pent up and that wasn't good either, so she let it out. Lashing out, she slammed his head into the steering wheel, knocking him out.

"Nothing," she whispered the answer to his question. Unfortunately, it wasn't quiet enough.

"Parker, what just happened?" Nate demanded.

"She knocked him out," Elliot reported. "Damnit Parker! Y'know we're not actually bounty hunters, right?"

"He made me angry, OK?" Parker confessed her crime, even if it wasn't the one that had everyone else so upset. There was no excuse for losing control, Archie's Lesson #1.

They were all conspicuously silent for a beat or two, and then Nate turned around and adapted the plan, the way he always did when something didn't go perfectly. "All right, Hardison, you got what we needed, right?"

"Uh, yeah," the hacker confirmed. "Already got his codes, we just needed his voiceprint, which I can string together from everything Parker got me. Give me an hour, tops, and his Caymen accounts will be emptied out and all the money back to the families he stole from. Plus a little extra, because I am very good at what I do. Know what I'm sayin'?"

"Then shut up and do it already!" Elliot snapped. Coming up behind her, the hitter mouthed without actually speaking, 'You OK?' She nodded, though still frowning.

"Nate, what d'you want us to do with this guy?" he asked out loud.

"Nate, what are you doing?" they heard Sophie ask the mastermind.

"Calling the actual bounty hunter," came the rather smug reply.

L3V3R 93 / 0U +

The job all started when they were approached by "Mrs. Ryan", a lovely woman by the name of Heather Anderson, seeking only the repayment (and divorce) of her con artist husband, who had skipped town on her and their two children after his latest scheme had been uncovered, but before he could be sent to prison. Of course, that was after she paid for his bail, which enabled him to run in the first place.

Tracking him down was merely an afternoon of work for Hardison, who was, of course, not truly appreciated by the rest of the team for his genius, but he took it in stride. And maybe a few back-and-forth snide comments with Elliot.

Part of locating the mark involved the discovery that he was participating in online dating, even while his family sat in debt thanks to him. Just getting him caught by the bounty hunters wasn't enough for Nate, though. They needed to break the man and get back all the money he'd squirreled away and repay his family before sending him away to prison for the rest of his life.

Sophie got the job as the man's "personal assistant" at the 'new firm' he'd started up, which allowed them to locate his bank and the accounts, but none of what they'd need to get the money back to the right people. So, Nate got the brilliant idea to send Parker out on a date with the man to capture any soundbites so they could put his voice through some of Hardison's software on his computer and from there they just all had fun 'talking' to the Cayman banker and approving the transfer of funds, all while Ryan was being taken in by the bounty hunter that had been after him for months now and booked downtown.

Not bad for a job that had started off with the Nate-line of "Let's go steal a Blind Date!"

Job now over, Parker made her way from the Leverage Offices, over the bar, and downstairs from Nate's apartment, to the place she'd be sleeping tonight. Ever since the Inside Job, where she'd helped out Archie and the others had seen her actual place, rather than continue to believe she'd lived at one of the many dummy addresses she gave out, she had changed up her M.O. quite a bit.

For one, she now had twice as many dummy addresses, half of them for actual apartments or homes, none of which she actually stayed at. She still maintained a 'central base', but she never told anybody about that address, despite being quite certain that Nate already knew about it. Nevertheless, she also maintained a handful of other addresses, and these were unoccupied, except by her. Occasionally, that is.

Every night of the week, she slept in a different location, only visiting her central base maybe once or twice a month. She definitely avoided it on her birthday. Which was today. Which was why she was at the modern 'upscale' apartment with wood floors and really big windows. No balcony, but the hammock bed she'd set up so she could see out the highrise view on three sides mostly made up for it.

Walking in, she pulled off the pink high heels, (hated the damn things and she hated the color even more), and briefly juggled the rest of her burdens as she sat down the gourmet cupcake and groceries for breakfast onto the counter. After putting away most of it, she went back to the cupcake, and performed her annual tradition; placing a lone candle in the small pastry cake, lighting it, staring into it for about a minute before closing her eyes and blowing the candle out as she made the same wish she had ever since she started this tradition when she was a little girl.

Two seconds later, there was a knocking at her door.

Frowning, Parker made her way to the door, staying back away from it in case something was about to bust through, her mind already cataloging all possibilities and her response to each in a simple flowchart path. The only thing that happened was that the knock came again. New scenarios of people staking out this apartment and having seen her come in and potential possibilities of who exactly was on the other side of the door began to cycle into the flow chart. She fingered her earbud, putting it in a 'safe place' inside her dress as she finally reached out to the door after they knocked a third time. Hardison had made it a point to let her know why she should never let anybody knock on her door four times.

Opening the door, she had to admit absolutely none of her pre-thought scenarios had included a ten-year-old brown-haired boy dressed in a navy coat with a red-checkered scarf and a boys Catholic School Uniform.

For a while they just stared at one another, which is about when Parker recalled this was the point where she's supposed to say something.

"Uh," she scrambled for something to say and finally fell back on the 'platitudes' Sophie had taught her to say in their 'awkward social introductions' lessons, "Can I help you?"

"Are you Emma Swan?" he asked perkily, smiling at her in a way that made her heart skip a beat. Or that might have been the question he'd asked, as it felt like her heart had skipped more than just one beat, more like it had stopped entirely, judging by how she felt the blood drain from her face.

"Yeah," she answered, suspicious and ready to bolt at a moment's notice. "Who wants to know?"

"I'm Henry," he said, still smiling in that way that was tickling at her memory. And then he said three words that made it all click together… like the circuit of a bomb completing. "I'm your son."

Next thing she knew, he'd slipped by her and she was shutting the door while unsteadily following after him. Then, right before she got to the kitchen, she caught her reflection in the windows. It was distorted, and only clear thanks to it being night outside and all the lights being on inside. A tall, skinny, blond woman in a stained pink dress, her blue eyes wide enough to be seen even in so distorted a reflection, her skin and face a pasty pale white. Her expression one of raw emotional turmoil. That was a woman on the brink of losing control, she realized.

Like a switch being flipped, between one step and the next, she locked down on those emotions and Parker took full control, of herself and the situation.

"Now wait just a second there, kid!" Parker called out to him, observing him the same way she would a job. "Hey Kid! I don't have a son! Where are your parents? Is this some kind of con? Who are you working for?"

"Ten years ago, did you give up a baby for adoption? That was me," he said.

Blinking hard, just once, Parker suddenly knew what to do. She pulled out her comms, while saying to the kid, "Give me a minute." Then she practically ran to the bathroom while sticking the earbud in and practically screamed into it, "HARDISON!"

"Whoa-oa-oohhaaahhh!" There was a shout and a crash that came through, so she tried again.

"Hardison!"

"Parker?! Girl, do you have any idea what time it is? Don't answer that. Look, job's over. This is where we all go off and get our 'me-time', know what I'm sayin'? And don't scream like that. Please. The comms work just fine at conversation level volume, y'know?"

"Hardison, I need a huge favor," she said while pacing in the limited space of the apartments bathroom. "Like, an immediate HUGE favor! I need you to get me everything that you possibly can on two names. And I need you not to tell the others. Not until I tell them myself anyway."

A note of concern in his voice, he came back, "Parker, is everything alright? Is something going on? If you're in trouble…"

"I'm not in trouble," she snapped, then winced as she realized how sensitive the hacker could be and immediately apologized. "Sorry. I'm not in trouble," she repeated at a more normal tone, "But I really need this information. Like… within the next ten minutes at the most."

"Alright, alright," Hardison said soothingly, and in a way that told her he was finally in front of his computer. "I got you girl. You know you can come to any of us, right? About anything. What are the names?"

"Neal Cassidy and Henry Mills," she recited, having gotten the second from the boy's ID card she'd lifted from his backpack. The address on it was kind of interesting. She'd never heard of a town called 'Storybrooke, Maine' before.

"OK, got a few hits already on the first one," Hardison said after a few seconds. "He's in the system. Oh. And by system I mean that he's an orphan. Put in Juvie a few times, handful of minor arrests up and down the east coast. Mostly stealing or stuff like that. Works as a broker. Some sort of deal-maker between clients or something like that. Current address…"

"I don't care about that," she interrupted him. "What about the second name?"

"Uh, you'll have to narrow it down, I'm afraid pretty mama. I've got several dozen hits in the greater Boston Metropolitan Area alone. Any particular age range?" he asked.

"Ten," she answered. "He's ten years old, this past August."

"Uhh, OK. I think I'll avoid asking how it is you know that, but… got a hit. Just the one actually. Henry Mills, adopted son of Regina Mills. Home address listed as Storybrooke, ME. Born in Phoenix, AZ. That is… actually all that I can find about him. I mean, I know he's only ten, but kid doesn't even have a facebook account yet? Huh, can't even find out what school he's with. That's… weird."

"OK, thanks Hardison," she said. "Just save everything and I'll go through it all tomorrow in the office. Gotta go."

"Parker, wai-!"

She pulled out the comm and turned it off, just in time to hear her new houseguest call out, "Hey, do you have any juice? Never mind, found some!"

"Hey, that's my breakfast!" she shouted as she left the bathroom, to find him chugging straight from the bottle. Seeing her approach, he put it down and recapped it.

"You know," he said suddenly, "we should probably get going."

"Going where?" she asked automatically, taking the juice from him and putting it back in the fridge.

"I want you to come home with me," he replied.

"I'm not going to Storybrooke, ME," she said.

"How'd you know where I lived?" he asked, sounding both surprised and excited. In reply, she merely threw him the ID tag from his bag. "Whoa! How'd you even get this? I saw, you never even touched my bag!"

"Because I'm the best there is at what I do," Parker said. "And what I do isn't exactly all that nice."

"Like Wolverine!" he exclaimed excitedly.

"Who?" she asked, confused.

"Never mind," he shook his head.

"So what do you do?" Henry asked.

"Kid, you don't know the first thing about me!" she snapped at him. "And I don't know the first thing about you! Why exactly should you even take me to your home, let alone should I go?"

"If you're that distrustful, why haven't you threatened to call the cops?"

"Cops and I don't exactly get along," the thief confessed with a shrug. "Professional differences. You understand."

"Not really," the boy shook his head.

"I'm not calling the cops," she finally told him. "But I'm not taking you all the way back to Storybrooke either. Not until you convince me otherwise. And I'm not exactly someone that can be easily convinced."

"I need your help," said Henry.

She looked him in the eye, stared for maybe one whole second of actual time, and said, "OK."

Henry blinked rapidly, doing a brief double-take, before shrugging it off.

"I just gotta get changed first," Parker told him, already moving back towards the bedroom, shouting back at him once she was down the hall, "Hey, could you fix me up an omelet? Gotta use up all the food before it goes bad! So… use everything, kay?"

"Uh… sure?" Henry called out, a little bit thrown, but overall rather pleased with how the meeting with his birth mother was going so far.

CHAPTER END