Disclaimer: I own nothing.

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Regina shook her head, pacing the length of her couch in her house, the girl who had thrown herself at her sitting on the couch, eating peanut butter and jelly sandwich that she helped herself to. She hadn't called Emma or Henry or—anybody. She just returned the dog and brought the sobbing mess home with her. She could see the similar features all over, but it didn't add up. None of what she had said added up.

Regina peered at the girl as she paced, noting the girl was watching her just as intensely, and she played over the events following the hug in her mind, trying to make sure she had all of it chopped down to the most important parts. She wasn't sure who or what this girl was, but Regina knew how to tell what was truth and what were lies. She would need that skill to determined what to do with her..."daughter".

––

"Is that—really you?" A smile. "Mom." She ran over and hugged Regina tightly. "It is really you!"

Regina was immediately flooded with both confusion and...a sense of familiarity. It wasn't a sense from Regina so much as her magic. It recognized this young girl, recognized her magic. Regina didn't like what she was feeling, but she knew this girl was holding her too close. She pushed her away and held her hand out threateningly, but she knew her magic wouldn't hurt this child. Their magicks were too...close, almost bound, almost...the exact same magicks. She would have to rely on scolding and menacing tones to get answers. She could do that without breaking a sweat.

The girl rubbed at her eyes and exhaled to steady herself. "I'm sorry. That was...unnecessary." She dropped her hands. "Regina."

"You know who I am, so tell me who you are," she commanded, her words laced with hostility.

"I'm your daughter," she replied. "I—I can't tell you much. You told me not to, but I can tell you I'm your daughter." She smiled. "It's so good to see you."

Regina scoffed. "I told you not to tell me anything?"

She nodded. "I can't risk the entire future changing, so I have to be careful with what I say and do." She laced her fingers together in front of her. "Do you have any food? I'm so hungry, and I don't have any money. We don't use money in my time."

Regina shook her head, ignoring the hungry comment. "The future? What the hell are you talking about?"

She sighed, a gentle and understanding sound, and she closed the space between them, gripping the hand Regina had held out. Regina watched as the girl grasped her other hand, curious but with her guard up, and the girl held her hands tightly, thumbs rubbing over her palms. "Wow," the girl sounded surprised and sorrowful, "they're so smooth." She looked at Regina with tears in her eyes. "It really worked. We're here." She laughed, a sound so tormented that Regina's heart ached for her, and she squeezed Regina's hands. "You're even more beautiful than before." She reached for Regina's face, Regina's automatic response was to cast the sleeping spell, and she fell against her.

Regina was so conflicted, her arms moved around the small shoulders of the girl who claimed to be her daughter from the future, and she held her for a moment, sensing magic beyond her years in the child. She ran her thumb gently across her forehead. Hmm, this girl was in her real form. That just left her words. She would get the truth, but for now she had to get this girl home. Maybe she should have cast the spell when they weren't in the middle of the woods. She would have just magicked them back to her place, but Pongo was with them, and she would need her car in the morning.

––

Regina had simply dumped her on the couch and went through her bag. She had a few empty books, like the ones Henry found in the mansion, a faded picture that Regina had to use magic to see—it was of the girl and Regina, when Regina gave birth to her at the hospital—and the "map" was actually a page from one of Cora's spellbooks. It was...a lot to process. The page was crumpled and burned a bit, yet it was the same page from the book as the one Regina had found in her vault. It was all pointing toward the fascinating and horrifying fact that this child was telling the truth. Well, not telling as "future" Regina told her not tell past Regina anything. Tsk. When did she start to leave missions that may be very vital to a child who she instructed to only drop crumb-sized hints?

Regina stopped pacing and her eyes flickered to the ring on the girl's left ring finger as she drank from her glass of milk. "Where did you get that?" Regina grabbed her hand, causing her to drop the glass, and it shattered on the floor, the remaining milk spilling over the wood. The silver banded ring and green gem were worn, scratched, but still the same as the one Regina was wearing at that very moment.

"You gave it to me." She was calm, almost as if she was expecting this reaction.

Regina searched her eyes, long and hard, and the girl was very open. Regina could see she was telling the truth. She slowly released the girl's hand, a knock on the front door didn't draw her attention nor did the voice that called to her, and then in came Henry and Emma. "Shit." She folded her arms over her chest. She wasn't ready for them to be here just yet.

The girl shot up. "Henry!" She embraced him tightly.

Emma blinked. "Who the hell is this?" She tried to pry the girl off her son, but the girl wasn't letting go.

"Sit down," Regina instructed, her tone leaving no room for arguments. She released Henry and retook her seat, resting her hands in her lap. "This is our newest addition to Storybrooke."

"She's...friendly." Emma approached the couch. "What's her name?"

"Her name is..." Regina paused. "I don't know. What is your name?"

"It's—erm, Serah." She was lying. "Serah Mills."

"Mills?" Emma's eyebrows shot up. "Isn't she too young to be another of your sisters?"

"She's not my sister," Regina snapped at the same time Serah corrected with, "I'm her daughter."

A beat, Henry blinked and was very bemused, and Emma just looked from Regina to Serah, seeing the similarities between the two.

"Daughter?" Henry finally managed. "She's your daughter? How?"

"Don't even," Regina cut off Serah. "I will explain this to them."

"You don't even know what's going on," Serah challenged, standing up. "I do. I will explain this to Henry and Aunt Emma."

"'Aunt Emma'?" Emma repeated and found a seat. "I can't wait to hear this."

"Mom, please, just trust me." Serah walked over to her. "I am your daughter; you have to feel that. You said you would, and you said—"

"Stop saying "I said"! I haven't said anything!" Regina hissed.

"Not yet!" Serah snapped back, and Regina walked away to calm herself, annoyed at how this girl kept saying Regina said this and that. She didn't even know her, how could she begin to claim to know what Regina felt or knew or said. "Do you know how old I am exactly?" Serah asked the room.

"No. How would I?" Regina faced her.

"Guess. Any of you, just take a guess."

"Fourteen," Henry offered.

"Fifteen, sixteen?" Emma guessed.

She nodded. "I am exactly fifteen years old." She met her mom's eyes. "In a lot less than fifteen years from now... What happens in that little amount of time—trust me, it's a little amount of time—causes so much shit to happen that I can't even begin to try and tell you, because while it's just a story to you, it's my reality! You all have this lovely town and each other! You're all well and mostly happy! Not me!" Her eyes filled with tears. "Not—not my family. Not...what's left of my family."

Regina frowned. "What do you mean, what's left of your family?"

"Aunt Emma, Uncle Killian..." Her hands balled into shaky fists at her side. "Henry, Roland, Marian...David...Mary Margaret...Neal... and so many others are my family. You all mean the very world to me, and yes, we're a mess, but we're still family. We're a messy, loving, sarcastic bundle of magic casters, archers, sword fighters, healers, believers and book readers..." a small smile, "but we are a family. There just isn't a lot of us left."

Regina sat down in the nearest armchair. "What happened then?"

She sat down and used magic to fix the shattered glass and remove the milk from the floor. "I can't tell you everything." She exhaled to calm her emotions, wiping her thumb under her eye. "Belle made me swear not to, and you don't break a swear to Belle. She always finds out, and she has a scold that makes you feel horrible for weeks." She shook her head. "Anyway, I can only tell you bits and pieces, nothing about your individual futures, and—Henry, don't move."

He froze. "What?"

"If you lean against that stand, you'll break that vase." She nodded her heard toward the vase she was speaking of. "Not that it matters, because if you don't break it now, it'll definitely get broken later."

Henry looked at the vase then scurried over to his mom.

"As I was saying, you'll have to work this out for yourselves. If I just tell you, I may say too much, and I can't afford to make a mistake." She rested her hands in her lap again. "It's a sensitive matter."

"We have to guess?" Emma wrinkled her nose. "You can't give us a name or anything?"

"I'm sorry, but those were yours and Belle's rules."

"All right." Emma rose. "I'll call my parents and Hook."

"And Belle," Serah added. "Belle told me I need to get Belle."

"And Belle." Emma left the room, pulling out her phone and sending urgent messages to Belle, Dad and Mom, and she called Killian. She needed him to do something else, and she didn't want to send it over a text. She peered back into the room where "Serah" was talking to Regina and Henry. The sad part was this kid was being one hundred percent honest with them. Emma only sensed a lie when she told her name. That wasn't damning, but with the way she spoke of their future, it might be.

"Can I ask just one question about the future?" Henry begged, taking his mom's seat when she departed from the room.

"You can ask, but I might not be able to answer."

"Do we find the writer of the storybook? That's all I want to know. I don't need specifics or anything, just a yes or a no."

Serah smiled. "Well, I'm here, aren't I?" Regina lifted her eyes. "Regina and Robin are my biological parents. You and Roland are my big brothers."

"Awesome." Henry grinned.

"Yeah...awesome." A darkness danced in Serah's deep brown eyes, and she lifted her hand to her chest, clasping something that was resting underneath her shirt. She knew Henry didn't notice her pain, and she was glad, but she didn't know that Regina had seen it.

"All right. They are on their way." Emma slid her phone back into her pocket, eyes locking onto Serah's hand. "What do you have there?"

"What? This?" Emma nodded, and Serah pulled out a necklace. It was the swan key chain Neal had stolen for Emma so long ago. The swan was beginning to level, extremely faded, and it held many scratches, but it was the same necklace Emma was wearing around her neck right now. "You gave this to me."

Emma sank down in the seat beside Serah, touching the necklace. "I just gave this to you? Why?"

Serah wrapped her fingers around Emma's hand and lowered their hands down to the couch. "I can't tell you why." She stood up. "I'll be right back. I need to use the bathroom." She hurried out of the room and up the stairs.

"That's not a good response." Emma leaned back on the couch. "So, what has she told you?"

"Not much. We probably have the same amount of information." Regina intertwined her fingers. "I don't know what to think. It's impossible. Time travel?" First it was Zelena who wanted to go back and change her past, and now her daughter. Not only had Serah been able to gather what was needed, but she managed to pull it off without a hitch. How?

"And so soon." Henry removed his coat. "We just dealt with Zelena." He paused. "I wonder how she did it."

"She'd need a resilient heart, courage, a brain, and...the product of true love." Emma glanced between them. "Still, I can't...sense any evil from her."

Regina was trying to wrap her mind around this. "Even if she had all those things," Regina informed them, "she is not powerful enough to have cast that spell. There isn't a chance in hell she could have pulled that off. She is far too young. For her magic to be that strong, she'd have to..." Regina groaned softly. She wasn't entirely sure what Serah would have had to have done. She was too young. She couldn't have simply been born with this level of control and ability to channel her magic that well. She just couldn't have, no matter how young she started training her magic, or who her mother was. It was more than just talent and luck; it required discipline and time.

"But we're sure she's one of the good guys, right?" Henry inquired when his mom didn't finish her sentence. "I mean, you said she doesn't seem evil, and she only lied about her name."

"How'd you know that was a lie?" Emma picked up the glass Serah had repaired.

"She's a horrible lair. Did she see her eyes? They kept shifting, and she stuttered." He gave a shrug that said c'mon. "Besides, she doesn't look like a Serah."

"She looks like Regina." Emma inspected the cup, not entirely sure what she was looking for, but she felt something familiar about Serah's magic. "She certainly has your magical talent."

"Yes, I'm so proud." Regina crossed her legs.

"Well, at least she didn't call herself Hermione," Henry teased.

"For the last time, I was in a pinch. Stop bringing that up."

He chuckled. "She seems nice."

"She seems sad," Regina muttered so softly that only she heard. She was so young, but Regina knew that look in her eyes. Their future was darker than they could ever imagine. She didn't know what was going to happen, but she knew they had to stop it. Robin didn't matter, finding the writer didn't matter, if all they had to look forward to was something so catastrophic they had to send a child back to try and prevent it from occurring. What the hell was brewing in the near future that could cause them to do this? She couldn't even imagine who could best all of them. Who had such power? Perhaps she should ask: what had such power?

– – –

She looked in the mirror in the bathroom, gripping the edge of the counter so tight her knuckles were white, and she drew in a deep, calming breath. As she inhaled, however, her body began to quake, and her eyes were on fire with tears. She squeezed her eyes shut, tears rolling down her cheek, and she tightened her grip even more. Calm down. Don't do this. Don't do this. That was the past. She was going to change it so that it would be like this in her present. She was going to make a difference, and everything and everyone would be all right.

She had to change her future, their future. She had to do whatever was necessary. If anything went wrong here, it was all over. She had to be cautious. She had to be level-headed. Crying at the sight of Mom, and crying at the mere mention of the others was not going to save anybody. Stop letting your emotions get the better of you, damn it! Keep it together, or this spell was all for nothing. Everything she lost to get herself here, and everything they lost to get her here, would have been for nothing. She needed to not feel, to focus on the mission and get it done. That's all that mattered.

Opening her eyes, she knew that her emotions would always get the better of her. She drew in a deep breath and straightened up. She relaxed her entire body and slowed her racing heart. Squaring her shoulders and swallowing, she reached into her chest to take out her heart.