Seattle (Roni's apartment)
Roni woke up and felt the emptiness of her bed. August had left sometime in the night after she had fallen asleep. She was used to it by now, but she thought it would be different now that they were engaged. It kind of bothered her a little. Roni considered herself a strong and independent woman, but it wouldn't hurt if August would cuddle a little more once in awhile. He was attentive for the most part, but sometimes he would get a little distant. She just chalked it up to him being a writer and they were naturally introverted, she would rationalize to herself.
Waking up alone all the time just left her feeling a little empty, like he wasn't fully invested in their relationship. She tried to dismiss the feeling, after all he had proposed to her. That meant he wanted to be together, didn't it? Once they lived together he wouldn't have any place to run off to either, she thought with a smirk.
Still, she couldn't help the feeling that she was missing something. Somehow in the corner of her mind there was a memory or a dream of someone. A fuzzy dream of long blonde hair and a goofy smile greeting her early in the morning. The harder she tried to grasp the memory the faster it seemed to slip between her fingers. It was running away from her and she wanted desperately to catch it. This was somehow important to her. Roni didn't want the feeling to go away. It felt so good. It felt like home.
Just like that, it was gone. It began to fade away like it was never there.
Roni got up and out of bed, and began to get ready to start her day. There was a shipment coming to the bar today and she needed to be there to meet the driver and pay. After making her bed she headed to the bathroom to start the shower. Although she liked where she lived sometimes she wished she had more room. Maybe a mansion or even a castle. She smirked to herself again, her in a castle, that's crazy.
The shower was warm enough now and she stepped inside. The warm water felt good on her skin and the pressure began to relax the knots in her shoulders. Why was she so tense? She should be elated that she would be getting married to August.
Shouldn't she?
Storybrooke (Emma and Regina's mansion)
Jeanie Maria was sleeping in her little bassinet right by the desk in Regina's office. Emma was on the laptop right next to her searching for Regina. She was using every tool she had ever utilised to track down bail jumpers during her bounty hunter days. Emma had already searched every state database for a Regina Mills. There were only a few, and none matched her Regina. She had tried Cora Mills, Regina Queen, Regina Forest, Regina Crown, Regina Swan, Regina Swan Mills. Every name combination she could think of hadn't returned anything.
Then she tried the Jane Does that had been reported found at hospitals and morgues. Some had matched age wise but not physical description. She was relieved when those searches proved fruitless. The idea of Regina being dead was something that chilled her to the core of her being. Emma refused to believe that she was dead. Regina was alive, Emma could feel it.
Emma also felt the hole in her heart. Regina's disappearance had devastated her more than she ever thought possible. She never knew someone could miss someone else this much. When Regina's scent had finally faded from their shared bed Emma had laid there and cried for hours. The faint smell of apples that seemed to always be in the air inside the mansion was gone now.
Although she tried and tried, the blonde sheriff could not for the life of her keep the mansion as immaculate as Regina had. Every time she saw a pile of clothes on the floor it made her heartache to know that the mayor wouldn't be coming home to scold her for being a slob. Missing Regina was like an open wound that would not heal. Everyday it hurt more than the last, time was not helping the pain go away.
During her darkest days she had considered ending it all. The thought of living without Regina was overwhelming back then. Only the thought of Henry and Jeanie Maria growing up without either of their mothers had pulled her back from that dark abyss. Emma could not do that to her children. They didn't deserve to feel abandoned the rest of their lives because she couldn't think past her own pain.
That had been her rock bottom. From there she began to try to function again. Emma knew that they all thought she was going crazy. She never left the mansion. She wouldn't let their baby be away from her for long. They just didn't understand why she was behaving this way, but it made sense to her. Regina had been taken from her, but nobody was taking their little girl away. As far as leaving the mansion was concerned it was the only place in the world that she could still feel close to Regina.
They were supposed to be each other's happy ending. It wasn't fair. They had gone through so much shit in their lives and then they found each other. Two broken people brought together by chance or destiny, but finding each other nonetheless. Their hearts had been broken by others and by life so many times so all that was left were tiny pieces. Once they had come together they started to heal and look forward with hope. Finally, they had thought, someone else gets me! There is another damaged person in the world that understands me and accepts me for who I am. There is someone who loves me and someone I love back and we can be together forever.
Fate had different plans. Of course it would, thought Emma, why did she think that she and Regina would finally find happiness? What was it in their past had ever hinted that they would be this lucky?
Emma rubbed her eyes with her hands and shook her head to break the train of thoughts. It would take her down a dark place and she would wind up spending the day in bed crying into Regina's pillow. She couldn't afford to waste time feeling sorry for herself. She needed to get back to work. She needed to find her true love.
The Enchanted Forest
It had been there forever. It could not recall growing from a seed or being planted, it only knew that it was alive. The tree's roots grew deep, so deep that they stretched into other worlds. The powerful magic coursed through the veins of this special tree and spread outward. Flowing ever outward, the magic would grow in these new worlds and radiate in unforeseen ways.
Realms would take the magic from the tree and spread it to its lands, to its animals, to its people. A myriad of realms would use this magic in different ways. Some would corrupt it, some would use it in benign ways, other realms may ignore it all together.
Their was one realm that the roots would not reach. Out of all of the infinite realms and the eons upon eons of time, one realm would remain out of the trees reach. It was this realm that the tree became fascinated by. Why could it not take root there? What made this world so different than the others? The tree's curiosity grew more and more. Unable to act by itself, it waited and it watched.
Eventually it saw that other realms began to take an interest in that world as well. The tree saw the others begin to travel back and forth to and from this world that had confounded the tree for countless years. These beings would bring their magic, the magic the tree had given them, into this realm. The tree could finally begin to expand into the world that it had only been able to observe from afar.
As its awareness grew it became captivated by one of those beings and for the first time in its existence the tree knew love. The magic grew slowly around this being, this woman, in a kind of dance. Once content to just observe, it now began to develop around her until it finally grew inside of the woman's heart.
Then something happened that the tree had not anticipated. The rules of magic had been upset the war between dark and light. Where before the tree had been balanced by both there was now a schism formed inside it. Inside this split between the dark magic and the light magic a kind of infection began to grow. The tree began to know jealousy, it began to know lust, it began to know hate. It became poisoned. Where before there had been a compassionate love for the woman a darker feeling grew. The tree wanted to possess the woman completely.
The tree manipulated others and fashioned an agent of itself, a form that would interact in the realms, through time and space. Through this form the tree could finally have its desire fulfilled, it would have the woman for its own. It would have Emma Swan, and it would destroy anyone that stood in its way.
Storybrooke (Zelena's house)
If she didn't have her magic back Zelena knew that there was no way she could handle all of these kids. Thanks to barriers, protection spells, locator spells, and teleportation, babysitting three toddlers was manageable for a former wicked witch. After herding the children together and arming herself with enough toys to keep them occupied for a time Zelena allowed a green mist to surround them. In an instant they all disappeared from her home.
Storybrooke (Emma and Regina's mansion)
They all appeared in Regina's office in front of a confused Emma Swan. "Zelena? What the hell?" Emma said getting up from her chair and moving around the desk.
"Is that anyway to greet a guest darling?" Zelena replied in an airy tone. "You never come out of this place so we decided to pay a visit to my future sister-in-law."
Emma scoffed. "Sister-in-law, yeah right. Did you come just to make me feel like crap? I thought you had moved past all that wicked witch nonsense."
Zelena gave Emma a look of compassion and moved closer, resting her hand on the sheriff's shoulder. "No darling, that is the last thing I would do. I miss her as well." Emma nodded and tried to keep her eyes from watering but failed. "And as far as being my future sister-in-law, I have faith that that will happen one day soon. Perhaps even sooner than you think."
Emma raised an eyebrow in disbelief. "Oh really? I've been working non stop for almost a year now trying to find her. I'm running out of ideas Zelena. What makes you think I will find her soon?"
Zelena waved her hand in dismissal. "Oh I didn't say you would find her soon." A confused expression crept over Emma's face but she waited for Zelena to continue speaking. "But she will." Zelena pointed a finger at the napping Jeanie Maria who was beginning to wake up from the noise of the three other children in the room.
"What are you talking about Zelena?" Emma said as she lifted her daughter into her arms. "How is my baby supposed to help find Regina?"
"Well the idea came to me like a flash of lightning today. We tried locator spells using my sister's belongings, your blood, Henry's blood, my blood. But nothing worked." Zelena began to explain.
"I remember." Emma said interrupting her. "That was early on and we gave up on it after awhile."
"Yes we did. But that was before you gave birth!" Zelena said excitedly. She was hoping Emma would make the connection, but the savior wasn't quite there yet.
"How does that make a difference?" Emma wanted to know.
"Using my blood or anyone else's blood might work if Regina was still Regina. But what if she had been changed? Transformed in some way or if she had lost her memory? Half measures wouldn't work. I share some of my sister's blood, but not all of it. Jeanie Maria is different however. She has all of Regina's blood!"
Emma looked skeptical. "But she has half my blood too Zelena. So I don't see how any of that helps."
Zelena rolled her eyes and in that moment Emma could see the family resemblance between the sisters. "You're not thinking magically my dear. Your daughter is a unique magical being. She was not created by the physical rules of normal conceptions, she was created purely through your shared magics. Jeanie Maria is completely Regina's as well as being completely yours in terms of magic. A child created by the union of true love between the most powerful magic users in all the realm? No matter where Regina is or what she has become or who she is now, her connection to her daughter is unbreakable and mightier than any curse or spell."
For the first time in a year a small flicker of hope began to light in Emma's heart. Could this be true? Everything Zelena had just told her made sense. Jeanie Maria was a child like no other. If her magic couldn't find her mother then nothing could. With a strength that she thought she had lost forever Emma stood straighter and squared her shoulders.
"How do we get started?".
