Your comments are lifeblood to me. Keep them coming.
If things are a bit confusing, don't worry...the story is moving along.
There will be in coming chapters Big Bads you have not seen, and a crossover or two.
Oh, and can you find the Easter Egg I left.
The usual disclaimers.
Granny's Inn (on the way to the Diner...)
Robin decided to stay with Marian and Roland as the maiden recuperates. Regina and Ingrid left. both deciding that their stay was too long as it was. But Ingrid did save Marian's life. It proved to the Evil Queen that the Snow Queen wasn't that much of a villain at all.
The path to the diner was not that far, but the two women decided to walk at a slower pace back. now that the crisis for Marian had passed.
The quietly talked of things. Of powers. Of family. How both wanted something to fill the holes in their hearts and went about the wrong way to get them. And then the conversation turned more focused.
"Emma..."
"Are you talking to me, Ingrid...?
Ingrid stopped, dipped her head, then raised it. " I've seeing how you interact. I've seen the looks. I know you care about her..."
"And I know how you feel about her as well. We've both done horrible things to try to find our 'happy endings.'" The last two words were spoken by Regina with air quotes. She continued: "What I found was that all I have to do was ask..."
"And..?"
"I got Henry. I'm repairing my relationship with Snow..."
"...and Emma...?"
"What do you want me to say...?
"Regina, I think you are in love with my foster daughter."
Regina snorted, "Ingrid, what do you mean..."
"I mean, your majesty, that you are in love with my foster daughter. And I think that's...well...wonderful."
Regina stopped halfway along the path and looked at the Nordic blonde cockeyed as if Ingrid didn't know what she was talking about.
"Look, she cares about you, and you care about her. She'd give her life for you. And you'd give your life for her. And it's not about the child you share. You. Love. Her!"
How the Snow Queen figured it out, Regina had no clue. And maybe she was admitting to herself more than to any other human, but...
"Yes...I love her." And then, the Evil Queen from a small smile to a wider smirk. "And if you tell anyone, I will destroy you..." She tried her best Evil Queen, but couldn't pull it off. what's more, Regina kinda likes this Dairy Queen, as Emma calls her.
And yes, Regina had ask...
"Ingrid...how do you feel about Emma?"
The blonde paused a moment before she answered. "I love her too. But I can't really because she's my foster daughter."
Regina tsk-tsked, shook her head, and replied "You've been in this realm too long. Come along, dear..." Regina started to walk towards the diner, with Ingrid silently laughing to herself, then the blond took her arm, but it around the neck of the brunette, then kissed the mayor in the side of her head. They both started laughing, with Regina thinking "I'm gonna like the woman..."
When the pair did get to the door, it sounded less like a restaurant and more like an episode of WWE Thursday Night Smackdown. And when they entered, a battle royale had already started. Snow and Cora were at each other's necks, with David, Ruby, Cruella, and Ursula trying to keep them apart, and failing miserably at it. Meanwhile. Gold was hurling volleys of magic at Zelena. That was bad enough, but when Belle tried to act as peacemaker, a magic ball hit her by mistake, which made the Dark One even angrier.
And through all this, Emma tried to be peacemaker. She deputized Cruella and Ursula, but a fireball from Cora (it dissipated before it could do damage to the inn...) and a left hook from Snow respectively laid both new deputies low. On top of that, Hook was not even in town (off sailing on his recently returned Jolly Roger), and none of the other people who usually would help out in this situation were not available. There she was, frazzles, a whirling dervish trying create calm in a storm that she knew she could not achieve but she tried anyway.
To the two women who walked in, no more beautiful sight could have been offered.
The sight to Eugenia Lucas, however was less than beautiful, considering that her beloved diner was being trashed. Elsa, on the other hand was yammering a mile a minute, trying to explain to the the pair of Queens the chaos that ensued after they left to care for Marian.
Granny was emphatic and to the point: "Do something, your majesty!"
Regina quietly observed the brawl for a moment. Granny was now beyond pissed: "MISS MILLS...?"
Regina: "I'm thinking it over..."
She was going to do something anyway, but Regina had a reputation to uphold. In mock exasperation, she sighed out, "All riiiight...and froze time inside the diner. Then she slowly walked over to the Sheriff to unfreeze her. She was going to do a zap, but decided to try something.
Emma's face somehow was clearly visible in the scrum she was frozen in, trying unsuccessfully to keep her mother and Regina apart. Regina took a few moments to observe the tableau, which she found pretty funny. She took out her iPhone, snapped the scene for future amusement, put the phone back in her pocket and bent down.
And then Regina Mills kissed Emma Swan.
Hard.
A small wave surrounded the Sheriff as she reanimated, falling away from the frozen moms and falling unceremoniously to the floor. Regina was herself awashed with emotions: laughter at Emma lack of grace, and wonder at the fact that her experiment worked. For kisses only break spells if they were of the True Love's Kiss variety.
A dazed look swept across Emma's face as she looked at Regina's "Wh...what happened."
"Well, for one thing, I froze time so I can keep these idiots from killing each other...and you."
"Well, thanks." Emma was too exasperated to think too clearly, considering the mess she has to clean up. She asked for Regina's help, to which the Mayor nodded. Emma did consider the last part of that sentence that Regina said...about not wanting anyone to kill her. It was quite the change from a few years ago when the Evil Queen almost offed her with an apple turnover.
And as the Queen and the Saviour try to untangle the mass of humanity in front of them, Emma asked "By the way, how did I wake up?"
"Magic." Regina figured that now may not have been the time to tell Emma that she might very well be the true love the Evil Queen has looked for all her life.
Meanwhile, at the Author's Study
The swirl of twinkles that morphed into what used to be a Mother Superior was silent. There was not a noise that disturbed the author as he was sitting at his desk writing in what seemed to be an empty journal. Or at least until a throat clearing cough came from the caped woman with short red hair.
"Blue! I was busy..."
"I'm sorry sir. But I came to tell you that things don't look promising..."
"Blue, I know about the...ahem...activity at the inn. Actually, its working out better than I thought...take a look..."
Blue went over and peeked at the manuscript, and sure enough there was the brawl at the inn, in vivid detail. But there was something added: Regina's freezing of time, and her unfreezing of Emma with a kiss. True love's kiss. "I was wondering when either one of them would act on it."
"Well," said the Author, "the good news is that this was part of the grand scheme. The bad news is that they went off story."
"And what's wrong with that?"
The Author was at his most serious, and maybe his most concerned. "Blue, the very fact that I am rewriting this story to accommodate so many people is fraught with danger. One person going off story is bad enough, even a little. But imagine if 100,000 people all decided to go off-story...all decided to do what they wanted. The chaos that would ensue would be tragic. The possibility of the end of not only our world and the world that we're trapped in, but the infinite worlds that make up the universes..."
The one question the Blue Fairy asked seemed to create even more questions. Questions that, at the moment, she was not really prepared to ask. So on to the matter at hand...
"So...they missed the story they were supposed to see. Are we...off?
"Not really," explained the Author." We're just making a slight adjustment. We can correct small things. Its the big ones that can destroy us."
"So, what do we do?"
"Its already being done Blue. They will know what will be expected of them tomorrow. In the meantime, our...contact...is setting things up..."
And indeed, in a hospital in the San Fernando Valley...
Eva Cameron sits in a waiting area. She has not slept for days. Her long blond hair is unkempt. She's worn the same light blue dress since her son came into the hospital. The doctors say that he would not die this time, but unless something is done, her son soon would be no more.
And on top of that, her husband's on trial for drug smuggling. And the jury's out.
This is not the time for anyone to start a chat. And she is too tired from crying and worry to tell someone to drop dead. That's why when Eva looked up and saw the lanky woman with chestnut hair, brown eyes, and a crooked smile holding two cups of hot coffee, Eva said nothing.
"I saw you sitting here. You looked wiped..." The woman offered Eva one of the coffees. She took a sip. A pretty good cup of fresh joe, unlike the usual reheated Scott's Emulsion they served in the vending machines.
Eva, indeed, was wiped, but this other woman seemed nice. "You look like you need a friend."
The kind woman's invitation for friendship seemed sincere, but when you are tired, your defense shield goes up. For Eva, it was sarcasm: "So who are you...my guardian angel...?"
The chestnut-haired woman just chuckled. "I've been told that I might qualify..." Then she sat next to the blonde at eye level. "Look, I don't know if you want to talk, but if anything, I'm a good listener..."
There was something trusting in the other woman's face that led Eva to at least think she could trust her. So she stuck out her hand. "Well, my name is Eva...and yours...?"
The other woman returned the handshake. "I'm Astrid."
And so it begins...
TBA
Additional A/N: Thank you for pointing out a glaring mistake. I hope the correction shows online.
