Robin is holding one of her hands in both of his, his thumb running over her knuckles, sweeping back and forth over the soft skin. Soft, she is always soft, her hair, her skin, her voice in the night as they whisper together of things like second chances, of futures, of shared happiness.
Her hand is small in his, her limp fingers almost stubby, the nails trimmed neatly, they are painted cherry red.
('To match your lipstick,' Robin had told her as he lounged on the bed, clothed already, waiting for her, and happy to do so, comfortable against the pillows and sheets, comfortable, wrapped up in everything that smelled of her, smelled clean, of apples and the vaguely flowery scent of her soup and lotion. She'd chuckled, a low, soft rumble from her chest, smirking as she plucked the chosen color from her vanity. Regina came to his side and sat beside him, he watched with a hand idly trailing up and down her spine, the silk of her blouse smooth against the pads of his fingers, as each neatly trimmed nail was painted.
One coat, then a second, before she topped the little bottle and hollowed her cheeks as she blew breath against the paint, 'How does it look?' she questioned, turning to regard him, a blush growing on her cheeks as she encountered the full force of his scrutiny.
'Utterly captivating,' Robin answered, gently clasping one of her hands; her fingers still splayed apart, the polish not fully dry. He studied the smoothness of the color, and grinned, 'Shall we match?" he asked, wiggling the free fingers of his left hand, and his grin only grew wider when she guffawed. 'I have seen men in this land with their nails decorated so,' Robin pretended to take offence, but could not stop grinning.
She rolled her eyes at him, pried free with a tsk of her tongue, but he reached out and pulled her hand back to him, turned it over and pecked a kiss to the inside of her wrist.
'Come on, lazy, we'll be late,' Regina ducked her head, the blush hotter on her cheeks as he let her go, she stood, smoothed careful hands down the front of her blouse and skirt, walking to exit the bedroom. She turned back to him, to smile with her hand against the door jam, watching him as he made no move to rise, 'Robin,' she prompted.
He groaned still with that grin on his face, he rolled off the bed, 'As m'lady wishes.')
Robin is cradling her hand against his chest, his chest dances with each torturous intake of air he's able to draw, each breath threatens a sob. Every now and then Robin lifts the hand in his grasp, lifts it to his mouth and presses his lips to the soft skin before returning it to its place against his heart.
"It needs a sacrifice!" Regina screamed over the howling wind. "It's the only way to stop it!"
Snow and Emma were behind Robin somewhere, too far to help, too far, they were too far, hunkered down beside a strange carriage, a- a car, a parked car, they looked like they were trying to speak, trying to yell to him or to Regina, to them both perhaps, trying to say something, but nothing could be heard above the wind that howled and howled, whipping Regina's hair across her face.
Regina took one step, only one, Robin lunged for her, snaring the lapel of her jacket in an iron grip, "Don't you dare," he called, desperation in his voice. "Don't you dare! Regina!" He tried to drag her back, hoping to reach the car beside which Emma and Snow had taken refuge, but Regina couldn't be moved. Magic, he thought bitterly.
(Magic he thought, awe apparent in his gaping mouth, in his eyes that he refused to blink, lest he miss just one moment of the wondrous sight afforded him.
The very air around her seemed to thrum, a soft glow from some inner light that shone and shone through her skin, little rivulets of lace like white spreading from directly under her, the patterns, the little streams of white, spreading and spreading along the dirt, skittering up trees, each leaf brightened and glowing white, every tree within eyesight only moments later with light seeping through the cracks in their bark. Her hands rose, parallel to another and rising, raising, above her shoulders, up into the air, her eyes closing softly, her lips slightly parted.
Until it all cut off all at once, a soft groan accompanying her stumble as she near fell to her knees, would have fallen if he had not been there to catch her around the waist, to help her keep her feet. But she was smiling, 'It worked?' she asked, pride in her voice.
There was pride in his smile too, as he ducked down to kiss the corner of her mouth, the noise of the forest had stuttered to life around them, the forest frozen and cold, silent, all the poor animals frozen mid-lives, they were once again free and warm and chittering, chattering, the twittering song of a bird began up in the tall oak beside them.
She laughed, looked up to catch a glimpse of the happy bird, and the sound, the sight, was so beautiful, enchanting, he ducked down to kiss her again, her laughter muffled against his mouth as her hand played in his hair.)
His hand gripping her coat, pulling at her, but she wasn't to be moved, as if she'd stuck her feet to the ground and she still didn't look at him, only stared into the hole ripped into being in the middle of town square, her eyes narrowed, calculating, her head did tick then, as her eyes swept across town, over the damaged town, she focused on Archie across the way, the man sobbing with Leroy beside him as the pair tried their best to staunch the blood spurting from Archie's broken leg. She shook her head, "You don't understand," she said, as Archie's dog began to howl at his side, and still did not look at him. "It won't stop unless it gets what it wants. It'll destroy everything."
Robin is silent as he sits beside her form on the cold concrete, the wet and unforgiving ground where she fell, she fell and he had not caught her. He's silent but for his shuddering breathes, for the sobs that break free of his control.
Every now and then a word begins to contort his mouth, but no sound escapes his throat, no utterance occurs, her name is almost said at least a dozen times, but instead it is silence from him.
('Regina?' he called, he was up with the sun, dawn creeping hazy light through the curtains of her kitchen as he padded barefoot, but she'd beaten him to wakefulness, he'd woken alone in her warm bed. There was no answering call from her, her huge house was filled only with the little sounds of her home, the little sounds, the ticking of her giant clock in the dining room, the shuffling sounds of Henry's feet in his room, the whooshing of the device she called a washing machine down in the basement, all the little sounds. 'Regina!' he called again, louder, and some inkling of unease that had barely formed disappeared as her voice came to him.
'Out here,' she beckoned, and dutifully he walked outside the patio doors, smiling at the sight of her with hair untamed and matted, smiling at the sight of her still in sleepwear, seated on a lounger with her legs curled under her, a steaming cup of coffee warming both her hands as she held it close to her face.
He walked to her and leaned down to kiss her, he slid his hand up to cradle the back of her head and breathed in the warm, slept-in smell of her hair and clothes, and kissed her. He could not contain the feelings that spread across his chest and into his heart when she smiled into his kiss, her lips quirking up at the corners.
'Good morning,' she breathed when he pulled away.
He bumped his forehead to hers softly, 'Now it is,' he corrected, kissing her softly once more before straightening.
'There's more coffee in the pot,' Regina told him, before sipping from her mug.
He padded back into the house, pulled the mug that he'd begun to think of as his from the cupboard, poured the steaming liquid, strong and bitter and perfect, before he joined her back outside. Regina shuffled forward on the lounger, made room for him behind her, and that's where he sat until Henry came investigating breakfast, sat with Regina leaning her back against his chest, with her nestled between his legs, the pair sipping at their caffeine with nothing but soft touches and sighs between them, watching the morning fog slowly burn away.)
Robin cannot say her name and have her not answer, she will not answer, she cannot answer.
Finally a word does break free, "noo," he quakes out softly, keening, "no, no," and then he cannot stop, heaving out pain filled whimpers, his lungs constricting, the pain is inside him, pressing in his ribcage, pushing his sternum in and in, sharp and searing, pain like he can't imagine, "no, no, god, oh god," he can't stop now that he's started.
He drops her hand, only to wrap his arms around her back and draw her fully into his lap, awkward and heavy, an unresisting burden that he pulled close to him and held tightly. Rocking back and forth, "no-ooo," he keened, "no, no," landing his face in the crook of her neck when her head lolled to the side, her head loose and heavy on her neck, his shoulders shaking as he held her.
"It doesn't get to have you," Robin said, even still pulling at her, trying to manhandle her back to stand beside him. "Let it destroy the world, it will not take you from me!" Panicked, he could feel the blood rushing through his brain as he tried desperately to pull her back. Every beat of his heart felt like a huge hollow drum strike to his being, struck and struck, again and again, consuming and loud, his whole body vibrating with the force of it.
"Please," Robin started, and then stopped, his mouth hanging open. She turned to look at him then, her hands, small hands, clasping around his wrist, and, so slowly, his fingers slipped free of the soft fabric of her jacket, his grip loosened against his will. Magic, he thought. With wide eyes he looked at her, "Please," he said, again. Please what?.
('Please, don't leave,' she cried out, following in his footsteps as he made his way to the door, he wasn't leaving in heat, they were not fighting. But she stopped him with those words, torn from her throat as a needy cry.
Robin turned back to her, saw her slap her hand over her mouth, as if to push the words back in, her eyes wide and filled with fear above her shaking hand. He looked at her, lovely and short without her heels, barefoot against the plush carpet of her den, an arm wrapped around herself, he looked at her, before he could not take it any longer and raised both hands to scrub at his face.
'I'll come back', Robin whispered, moved his hands back to weave his hair through his fingers, 'after Roland's asleep,' he promised her.
'Marian will ask you to stay,' Regina told him, lowering the hand from over her mouth, hiding the shaking appendage behind her back, and they both knew what she said was true, that his wife, no, not any longer, not for a week now, that his once wife, would ask him to stay. Marian would not beg, would not plead, would not demand, but she would ask, calmly, in that patient voice, would ask him to stay with her.
'I'll come home to you,' Robin promised, took the five steps needed to close the distance between them and wrapped Regina in hug, kissing the top of her head as she hummed a sigh and wrapped her own arms low around his waist.
But Roland had a fever; Robin stayed by the boy's side through the night, Marian and Robin working in turns to soothe the boy, to fetch medicine and cool rags for his burning forehead.
Robin picked his phone from his pocket once, the cellphone Regina got for him, taught him to use, Regina still laughed at him when he forgot he did not need to yell into it to be heard, he picked it from his pocket once, and did not even have the chance to wake the screen as a piercing wail from Roland shattered its way through Marian's new small house.
He picked up his phone a second time, nearly half an hour later, and cursed aloud when he found the battery had died.
When finally he returned home, returned to Regina's house, it was to her sitting in the same clothes as the evening before, sitting on the couch almost where he had left her hours ago, it was four in the morning, she sat with the lights on, her hands clasping a book that she clearly wasn't reading.
He cursed his phone, he cursed Roland's sudden illness, and most of all he cursed himself as she lifted red rimmed eyes to look at him, her chin lifted and held out, tense and hurt and proud, as composed and broken as someone striding their last steps to the guillotine. Robin went to her, held her hands in his, he explained what had happened and she heard him, listened to him without saying a word, until she nodded.
But she sobbed while lying in his arms when they finally got to bed, maybe she thought he was already sleeping, maybe she trusted him, at least in the dark, with his arms around her, holding her to him, trusted him enough to cry and sob with her head tucked down against his chest, her fingers holding onto him desperately.)
There were tears in her eyes, those huge dark eyes, beautiful eyes, "You don't mean that," she said, but she was wrong, he would let the world burn if it meant keeping her, would watch a thousand people suffer if it meant her safety. He was more selfish then she ever gave him credit for, his heart not as glowing red as she always thought, but she never wished to see it, saw only the good and noble and pure of him, but he is selfish, and he would let the world burn if it meant her beside him.
"I love you!" he said, she flinched away from him
"I love you too," she told him.
There is a sound, repeating over and over, being called from somewhere behind him, he thinks it might be his name, but he can't turn his head away, he won't try.
He lowers her enough to look at her face, her eyes are open, wide and dark and staring unseeingly up at the bright blue sky. The bright blue sky, all the clouds, the black and angry clouds that swirled, they'd disappeared as she fell, dissipating even before her knees had hit the ground. She looks beautiful with the sun shining on her.
Robin draws her back to him, kisses her hair line, his shoulders shake, a soundless whimper screws up his face, his eyes scrunch shut, he can't look at her anymore, but the image of her, limp and heavy and lifeless on the wet concrete, is burned into his mind. He will see her lying here every time he closes his eyes, every day of his life, every blink will make fresh the horror.
(It's burned onto his retinas, the sight of her, her naked body atop him, riding him. 'Robin,' she pants out, her hands over his, his hands are right at her waist, gripping her tightly, bouncing her up and down on him, the muscles of his arms burning from the awkward strain, even as his hips move up and off the bed, over and over, slipping his cock up into her warm, wet heat.
'You're so beautiful,' he grunts out, his neck straining, every muscle tight as he gets closer and closer to his release, thrusting and thrusting up into her, the mattress aiding each return up into her, the whole frame moves with them, scuttling at the floor, the headboard noisily scraping against the wall.
Henry is with Emma, Roland with Marian, and for that Robin is ever grateful as he pulls Regina down on him and stills her there, holds her down on fully his cock, holds her with his entire length filling her completely, gritting his teeth as she near screams out a shrill wordless cry and ruts, rocking back and forth with him buried so deep, she's whimpering, her hands moving to his shoulders, fingernails carving into his flesh, her tits dangling like ripe fruit just out of reach of his mouth.
Robin moves one hand off her waist, curls it up and splays it between her shoulder blades, he pushes until her spine bends, until she lowers enough that he can take a nipple into his mouth, a bite that has her loose a sharp hiss between her teeth as she rocks back and forth, her hips doing all the work now. 'oh, g-god, Robin,' she moans out, the sound like heaven in his ears.
But it's not the breathless sounds he knows he can have her make, not the barks of pleasure that he wants to hear. He grips her waist once more, pulling her up and off him, he misses the feel of her instantly, the feel of her wet around him, hot and wet and perfect, driving him mad. But she knows what he wants, what she wants, she's smirking as she goes to her hands and knees, he scoots to the edge of the bed and stands, turns back to grab her hips and pull her closer, her knees rucking up the sheets as she moves, her ass glorious and held out to him with zero shame . Robin strokes himself with one hand, the other squeezing the deliciously plump rear before his hand runs up her spine, up the smoothness of her skin, up to the base of her skull and he urges her to lower her head to the mattress with a gentle hand.
'Just like that,' he groans as he guides himself back inside her, as she curves her spine and lowers her head down to the mattress, as she pushes her ass out to him and whimpers, the sound trapped against the blanket she's fisted and drawn towards her mouth. 'no,' he moves his hand from the back of her head, moves instead to ease her fingers from the blanket, thrusting gently, shallow thrusts as he pulls the blanket away, 'I want to hear you, go on, god, I want to hear you,' he begs as he moves to grips her hips with both hands, and pushes inside her harder, faster, balls deep and she barks out a wanton cry of pleasure that has him gasping for what it does to him.
This is what gets her off fastest, bent over, him being as rough as he's willing to be, and he knows she'd like it rougher, but he doesn't have that in him, not really, he thrusts though, hard and fast, pounding into her willing heat as she adjusts her knees and opens for him further, crying out. There's no need for quiet, no need to be restrained, each thrust fills the room with the slap of skin on skin, almost all out and then all back in has him grunting, has her panting, high pitched cry after cry spilling from her open mouth, her jaw open against the bed.
'Robin,' Regina cries when he reaches a hand around and flicks at her clit, before pinching it between thumb and forefinger, squeezing, before releasing and rubbing, rubbing as she tries to move against him and his cock, but the position doesn't allow her much room to maneuver.
It takes two minutes of him desperately rubbing at her clit for her to come, for her whole body to shake and quake against him, a long moan dragged low from her throat, her walls clenching, clenching, holding his cock so tight that he loses his rhythm, bucking wildly, noises of his own, god what she does to him, grunting as he spills himself inside her, coming a minute after her.)
This will haunt him forever, every sleep tainted, waking from a nightmare that will not end when he opens his eyes, the nightmare of a life without her, the nightmare of her heavy and limp and lifeless on the cold wet ground, sunlight streaming on her, her eyes that no longer see, lips that will never wrap around his name again.
She took a step away from him, head turned away.
Robin jumped forward, grabbing her by the arm, rough and bruising, desperate, wrenching her back and when she gasped out a pained cry, he wanted to say he was sorry, but all that escaped him was 'don't'.
"Don't, don't, please, Regina," he begged, griping her arm too tight, pulling and pulling. "Just wait, we have time, please. Don't, Regina."
But there was no time, the hole ripped into being by dark magic, it sucked and sucked at the town, the sign for Granny's Diner tearing free of its chain and whipping through the air, sucked in and spat back out, it hit a car, its lights beginning to flash, it's horn blaring as the sign slammed through its windshield.
It would consume the town if it didn't get what it wanted, it would destroy everything.
"Don't," Robin begged again, "Regina!"
('Don't run from me!' he screamed before he caught her arm and hauled her back, at her sharp intake of breath, at the pained grimace on her features, Robin loosened his grip. But he could not let her go, not when she did not understand him, 'Listen to me,' Robin begged, snared her other arm in his grasp too and held here before him, staring into her dark eyes.
'You're hurting me,' she said, her voice still void of emotion, lacking and empty, a mask so finely crafted even he could not see through it. He loosened his grip, shame coloring his face, but she would not listen to him, he needed her to.
'Listen to me,' he repeated, smoothing his hands up and down her upper arms, before snaking them up to swipe his thumbs over her cheekbones, 'Regina, I love you.'
A fissure appeared in the mask, for just a second, a flicker of pain and anguish, a flicker of hope, before she slammed down her walls.
'I want to be with you,' Robin said, his face twisting when he saw the disbelief in her huge dark eyes.
'Your wife-'
He cut her off, shaking his head, never looking away from her, 'I want you,' he said again, 'I need you, I love you.'
She shook at that, when –love- left his lips, her mouth opening, her mask falling away, she shook her head as if to clear it and raised her hands to his chest, splaying them there, he wondered if she could feel how fast his heart was beating.
'You,' she shook her head again, 'you don't-'
'I love you,' he repeated, knowing in a sweep of anguish that he could tell her a thousand times and she'd never truly believe it. He'd spend the rest of his life trying, he decided.
He kissed her, drawing her to him slowly, if she didn't want him, didn't want his kiss, she had time to draw away, had room and leverage to push him, but she let him, kissed him back.
'But your wife-' she started as stopped to breath, parting only enough to draw air.
Robin fisted a hand in her hair, gentle grip at the base of her skull, 'I love you, Regina, you are my future, my happiness,' he nudged her nose with his, 'my soul mate, Regina.'
It was the next day, waking up with her, in her bed, naked and happy, that he saw that he had bruised her arm, when he'd wrenched her back to keep her from running, finger sized bruises on the inside of her upper arm. He kissed each mark before she started to stir, started to wake from his ministrations, and when her eyes blinked open he cradled her face and apologized for hurting her, for marking her perfect skin.)
Regina turned to him again, desperation of her own coloring her features, "It'll destroy the town!" she cried, surged forward and kissed him violently, with tongue and teeth and desperate wanting need before she flung herself away from him, springing forward towards the danger, a wave of her hand sticking his feet to the ground when he tried to follow.
"No!" he screamed, falling to his knees as he tried to drag his foot up, tried and tried again and again to free his foot, his muscles burning with the useless strain, "nooo! Regina! Regina, don't!"
"Robin?" there's a hand on his shoulder, squeezing gently, it's a woman's hand, a small hand, the thing fingers gripping the material of his coat, tugging.
He turns his head, opens his eyes, and there is Marian, her eyes wide, her other hand, the hand not gripping his jacket, it's up and covering her gaping mouth. There are tears in her eyes, sorrow in her expression, she falls beside him and reaches out to Regina.
He watches her fingers reach and reach, slowly, as if afraid he'll attack, before she reaches the pulse point at Regina's neck, but he knows she will find no sign of a beating heart. He had felt Regina's last breath like it was his own, a strangled awful cry whimpering from his mouth as it did hers, as her life was sucked out of her, before her body, empty of all that made her her, her body just a shell, before her body fell to the concrete hard. The sky was blue even before she'd landed. The Dark Magic finally getting what it wanted.
"I'm so sorry," Marian tells him, drawing her hand back, turning over her shoulder to someone Robin doesn't have the strength to look at, "I'm so sorry," Marian repeats.
And for the first time Robin becomes aware of voices, the world coming to him, its sounds, Emma's voice, choked, "Jesus, oh man, Henry," she says, "I gotta tell Henry."
Snow cries loudest of all, breathy sobs that fill the street, Archie's dog is still howling, there's other sounds, confusing and too much, Robin rocks Regina back and forth and tries to block it out like before, but he can't. Another hand comes on his other shoulder, shaking him, until he looks up, looks up at Tinkerbelle, her hair lit up by the sun behind her head, the sprite is smiling.
The expression is so wrong, so completely, terribly wrong, that Robin doesn't even understand what he's seeing for a long moment, before a snarl twists his mouth. But she speaks before any words can escape him, a breathless, filled with hope, exclamation chirping out of the woman that falls to her knees beside him, her other hand up and held against Regina's hair.
"We can get her back," she tells him.
authors note, was this set up too confusing? please tell me your thoughts, I love this sort of roller coaster ride of memories and stuff, so I'm not the best judge ?
Disclaimer: never mine