Emma POV:

I wake up, not with a start no.. definitely to exhausted for that, it's more like tiny parts slowly clicking into place. One by one they inch towards one another until my body is capable of functioning in the real world again. I have to contain a snort thinking about that cause my real world is filled with fairies, witches and dwarfs now.. go figure.

Shambling out of bed in a glacial pace I'm not sure what to do now. It's still such a jumble in my head but at least I'm starting to think clearer.. not like earlier? Yesterday? Whatever..

Voices creep through the bedroom door, most likely David and Mary Margaret. I sooo do not want to deal with them right now, first I have to figure out what happened before I collapsed. Alright .. focus Emma.. so .. everyone was at the mayors house looking for vengeance I guess, for what she did to them in the enchanted forest and here in this world with the curse. I protected her from them because .. well I finally understand her.

Not the evil queen curse thingie, no that's still totally whack, but I can understand doing everything in your power to protect the people you love, even crossing lines you normally shouldn't cross. Which is exactly what she has been doing ever since I got here and indirectly, sometimes directly, threatened to take her baby away. All she saw was a woman with a very bad track record who waltzed into their life and confused an already unstable boy even further. To top it all off I kept making bad choices, like the fort.. she was right, it was a piece of shit shack that could've collapsed any time. What kind of mother lets their child play in something like that, sure it was fun but fun has to take the backseat sometimes.

It sounds so weird hearing that come from me, she is the serious one.. the one that made the tough decisions, that kept him straight and narrow, I'm the partygirl, the drunk, the one with a record.. but I get it now, I finally do. So I defended her, no one else did .. and it escalated, may have turned into bloodbath considering the magic Regina wielded for a second.. but it didn't. She broke, again, because of him.

So she whisked them all away with some sort of spell, leaving only me and her in the foyer of her mansion. But why didn't she teleport me out as well? Did she expect me to stay with her? No way.. Henry was outside, she must've known that I would want to get to him. Maybe she needed me for the spell.. I recall some kind of connection we had. Had? I stare down at my hands and can still recall the feel of the cold marble floor I never lay on..

"You can't be serious!" I have never heard Archie shout like that before so I'm immediately back in the present, my eyes glued to the door. "She is his mother! How can you even suggest something like that?!" There is a pause for a heartbeat or two but as I inch closer I can make out Mary Margaret saying. "No, she is not."

Jackpot Emma, your mom is a cold hearted bitch mixed with a overdramatic lovesick puppy, sounds kind of shizo. I wonder what 'dad' is like, so far he did nothing, which really sucks considering he was surrounded by people who contemplate murder, really charming of him to stand back and watch.

Anger boils in me and I'm about to storm into the livingroom to give them a piece of mind but I catch myself. Why do I care so much? So much fucked up stuff happened today and over .. there.. in this other realm. She had done such horrible shit when the book is anything to go by. Im defending a .. well .. a dictator and mass murderer of sorts, why? Because I can understand part of her reasoning? Because it's the right thing to do? I broke so many rules in my past life and here in Storybrooke as well .. even as sheriff, why the sudden change of heart?

"She did something to her! She kept her inside and messed with her head!" Mary Margaret yells through the door as if to answer my thoughts. "Snow.. shh.. she might be awake." follows the muted voice of David and my anger is back in action. She didn't mess with my head, she simply needed me for her spells, yeah that's it. That tug I felt must have been some sort of drain to fuel her magic and when I went outside the exhaustion caught up with me and I collapsed.

I can't contain a loud snort as I realise how easy it was for me to make logical leaps like that when the parts involved were about spells, weird connections and mental breakdowns.

Silence storms in from the living room, I can practically feel how everything in there just stops. "Emma?" comes a concerned question and without giving me the time to respond Snow White is through the door and in my bedroom. "Emma are you alright?" I mumble something affirmative and feel her arms around me a second later, Prince Charming follows suit only Henry is missing..

We stay like that for an uncomfortable long time, for me at least, until Snow releases her stranglehold on me and starts an interrogation. Why did I defend the evil queen, how come I stayed behind, why this why that.. I block her out, my face a hard mask. James tries to calm down his .. wife I guess now?.. but to no avail. My eyes move to Henry who simply watched us until now and I tell him we are leaving.

Snow is about to explode as she hears that but I don't care. I try to grab Henry's Hand to lead him outside but he shrinks back .. away.. from me. Behind me Snow and James argue, Archie is kneeling down next to Henry talking to him in this soothing voice of his but the boy won't listen. He fixes his eyes on me. "She did something to you Emma, I'm sure of it!" He says this with the same voice that had claimed fairies were real.. but now he knows he was right about that, had been all along. So he spins the story further, his fantasies made manifest, he keeps writing this damn book of his and looses all track of reality. Or am I? Can I really tell anymore?

Archie looks up at me, his voice so fucking sad and tired, the voice of reason, the conscience of us all and he tells me that it would be best if I take a walk for a bit, so everyone could calm down.

He tells me to go? Go freakin where? Do what? Eat a damn muffin and read the newspaper like nothing happened?! I'm raging, it boils in me in the most painful way but I grab my jacket and leave anyway. I'm out the front door not caring about Snows angry tirade, James whimpy platitudes, Henry's paranoia or Archies sadness. All I feel is anger and frustration. A part of me knows I should care, about everything, everyone in there.. but another part also knows that I have to protect myself or I'd break, completely .. like her .. so I run.. again.. like so often in my life.