A/N: So for all of you who are following all my stories...OMG a chapter each for three of my stories! Happy Holidays. Anyway, I'm still working through some demons and this is the result of that. This was story was originally only going to be an open ended one-shot, and I still don't know for sure where this will be going. But for all you people who are suckers for dark angst...here you go. DARK CONTENT WARNING...same as the first chapter. Also this was written in a bit of a rush late this evening so I apologize for any mistakes.
==^^SQSQSQSQSQ^^==
"EMMA NO!" Regina screamed as she lunged desperately towards the blonde. Her hands closed on smoke and air and she sank to her knees with an inhuman howl of despair.
Everyone stared in shock as the former Evil Queen broke down in front of them over the Savior's intent to kill herself. Heart wrenching sobs began to spill from her lips just as the bell over the door jingled and an excited Henry came skidding into the diner. "Moms! Guess what I f-"
He stumbled to a halt, taking in the scene around him. His mother was hunched over in the middle of the diner, sobbing her heart out and everyone was sitting there with horrified and stunned looks on their faces, most of them crying silently as well. His entrance finally shook a few out of their shock and Archie scrambled to his feet as Ruby rushed forward to drop next to Regina.
"Mom? MOM?! What's wrong? What happened?!" he asked in rising panic.
"Henry maybe you should give your mom some room-," Archie said gently as he tried to pull the boy away. But Henry had gotten strong enough now to shake the older man off.
The teen threw his arms around his mother, tears in his eyes as he looked at Ruby for an explanation. But he waitress was choking back her own sobs as she tried to help comfort his distraught mother and everyone else still seemed to be in too much shock. Anger swept through the teen and he surged to his feet, looking every bit like his mother in that moment as he turned in a slow circle.
"What the HELL happened here? Did someone hurt my mom?!"
Everyone gaped at the boy who was standing protectively over his mother with a glare that rivaled that Evil Queen's. Archie tried to placate the youth. "No one's hurt your mother Henry-"
"WHERE'S EMMA?!" he demanded. Eyes shifted away from him, and Archie struggled to contain his own tears and Henry suddenly felt light headed. "No," he whispered hoarsely as a feeling of dread fill his stomach.
His mother's sobs increased and he dropped to his knees and gently grabbed her shoulders and pulled her to him. "Mom? Mom I'm here. Mom…please….where's Ma?" he asked, his young voice tight and cracking.
"She's gone," was all she could get out before she fell against him, her hands gripping him desperately.
"Ruby please! What happened? RUBY! Snap out of it!" he shouted at the wolf.
She wiped her face and took a deep shuddering breath. "Henry, Emma feels that everyone's fate is being orchestrated like a game. She thinks that if she takes herself out of the picture, that it will stop all of…this."
"What?!" he gasped.
"Your mom tried to stop her Henry, but Emma froze all of us and then magic'd herself away."
"When?"
"Just before you got here."
"We have to stop her! Mom….mom!" he said gently shaking his mother as he tried ot get through to her.
"Mom!" he finally screamed at her shaking her a little more roughly as she continued in her downward spiral of grief. Her eyes snapped upwards and finally locked on his and he reached up to wipe at her tears. "Mom we have to stop Ma and I need you right now."
"How Henry? I have no idea where she is right now?" she croaked out.
As Henry spurred a hope of rescue in everyone, people finally began to shake themselves free of their stupor and Archie knelt next to them. "Emma would go somewhere where she would feel safe and at peace," he told them knowingly.
Regina hesitated, but Henry stared at her with desperate eyes and she finally forced her grief back into the box inside her heart and pushed herself to her feet as she wiped her face dry. "Red, your with me. Henry you will stay here with Archie," she ordered, as the Queen took over.
"But mom-"
"No Henry! You will stay here."
"Henry, your mother is right. You should stay here," Archie intervened. If Regina was too late that was not something the boy needed to see. He met Regina's gaze. "We'll keep him here."
"Henry I want you to think of places you might know where Emma might go. I already have a few ideas, but if they don't turn anything up I will call you."
"Ok. Please find her mom," he whispered, the reality of the whole situation slamming into him. She hugged him fiercely and then laid a hand on Red's shoulder and they disappeared in a purple cloud.
==^^QSQSQSQSQ^^==
Red and Regina reappeared and looked around the spot that had been Henry's favorite place to hide….his 'castle'. "Red?"
The tall woman pulled her cape off and handed it off to Regina and closed her eyes as she called her wolf close to the surface. She inhaled deeply and then shook her head. "She hasn't been here anytime recently."
Regina nodded and clamped a hand on the younger woman's shoulder and transported them to the next spot. Time and again they reappeared in a new place, but none of them yielded any results. It had been about five minutes now, and they had checked in with Henry who had also gotten in touch with Snow and David, but none of the places they came up with turned anything up. And to complicate matters Red was starting to get nauseas from the rapid transporting.
Regina hung up after her third call with Henry and looked around desperately, tears in her eyes again. "Where IS she? How can she do this to everyone?" she exclaimed frustrated.
Red straightened from where she'd been bent over, forcing herself to take large breaths as she fought to stop the spinning in her head. "We've been all over town, she has to be in the woods somewhere."
"But WHERE Red? The woods span for miles!"
Red was silent for a minute as she got a distant look. "When I've run before, during Wolf's time, I've caught her scent near a meadow on the far west side. Do you know where that is?"
Regina scowled a bit. "Isn't that where the Snow Queen was hidden out?"
"Once she took over that part of the forest…yeah."
"I can get us into that general area, but I don't know of the-"
"Just get me within a mile or two of her," Red cut in as she clamped her hand on Regina's shoulder.
A moment later they rematerialized and Red couldn't fight the nausea again. She staggered to a nearby tree and lost her dinner, but forced herself straight as quickly as possible and whipped her head towards the west. "She's not far!" she exclaimed as she started running. "Follow me!"
Regina watched the young woman give herself over to her wolf mid-stride, and had the situation not have been so dire, she would have been in awe of the beauty of the transformation. Regina struggled to keep up and had to resort to magically trailing after the powerful wolf as she flew through the forest at a breakneck pace.
The rapid teleportations were starting to take their toll, but Regina pushed her growing fatigue down as they raced towards their goal. Up ahead she saw the trees beginning to thin out and in the distance the darkness of the night was broken by moonlight streaming into a clearing. A faint shadow moved at the base of a massive and gnarled tree, and there was a brief reflection off a metallic object. Time slowed as Red's body coiled and then launched towards that shadow as Regina's hand lifted in a desperate attempt to hurl a spell that would stop what would happen.
It was the span of a heartbeat and the span of a lifetime.
For a single moment there was absolute silence and then all the peace was shattered as a single gunshot rang out just as Red's body slammed into Emma's the same time the magic hit both of them. Regina watched as Emma's body jerked at the moment of impact, and saw the spray of a fine red mist as went still beneath Red.
Regina was instantly on her knees helping to roll the stunned and struggling Red off Emma's body. The tang of copper was in the air, and with shaking hands she gently rolled the blonde mother of her son over onto her back and then jerked her hands back as red warmth drenched them. "No," she exhaled as if punched, staring at the blood coating her hands. "No,no,no,no,noNONONONONOOOOOOOOOOO!" she screamed until her voice broke and gave way to the tears once more.
Beside her Red lifted her head to howl her own grief at the cold heavens above. They had been too late.
