Hello again, Lovelies! So, there seems to be an issue with FF and reviews. I think I'm getting most of them in my email alerts and have sent an email to them with the issue. I hope I've read everyone's, but if you've asked a question and I haven't answered, that's probably the reason why. Please feel free to PM me or twitter me… is that the right phrasing for that statement?
Anywho…
Song: Supposed to Be by Icon for Hire (go check out their new album. They are freaking rocking it!)
Regina scanned the room again. Garbled cacophony echoed on marble walls in the large council room on the bottom floor of Town Hall. Once word spread that Regina intended to return every single heart she'd taken over the years, masses of people arrived to observe the auspicious event as much as to reclaim what had been taken. For the most part, former guards and soldiers of The Queen's army stepped forward. The fairies used their dust to merge hearts with the proper body. Snow White and David handled crowd control and an occasionally squalling infant. Emma lingered near her wall of boxes after a brief reunion with her parents. The Sheriff's badge clipped to her belt and gun holstered at her side, Emma almost looked normal. Almost.
They'd barely dented the sheer number of hearts waiting to be returned. Each time she squeezed one of the glowing organs to find the owner, Emma winced and swallowed like nausea renewed with every single heart. The Savior said nothing, though, and stood stoically at her side with crossed arms and hypervigilant eyes. Emma's unease rattled her nerves. She'd have thought the sheriff would be as excited and uncontrollably giddy as her mother and father, but Emma never spoke or smiled or lit up green eyes with enthusiasm.
Regina shoved a heart into some unknown chest without looking at the woman's face and crossed the long wall to the sheriff. "I enacted a barrier spell around the house. Ruby and Belle are protected," she assured her. Maybe worry for her friends caused the dramatic responses.
"I know. I watched you, remember," Emma snapped and scanned the room again. A random person walked in front of them, and she clamped her eyes shut, shaking her head back and forth lightly as though she tried to rattle loose a memory of their face.
"Emma," Regina whispered and stepped closer. "Do you know her?"
Images of dead faces staring up at her flickered in and out of reality. They weren't hallucinations, they were memories. Half of these people had died, and she'd watched. She'd seen life abandon their eyes that stared at the sky, held their hands, listened to their dying words, heard their screams as they fell. Yet, they walked by without acknowledging her or that life.
"I killed her," Emma answered, barely heard above the orchestra of jumbled voices.
"Emma," Regina breathed and reached for the forearm pressed tightly over a heaving chest. The Savior flinched away from the contact before Regina touched her.
"Just get this done," she snapped around bared teeth and glared at the room again.
Regina clenched her own jaw and waited for something softer to follow Emma's command. Clamping down on the urge to rail against Emma's order, Regina opened another heart chest and pulled out the thumping organ within. Slight streaks of black laced into the mostly bright red soul. Regina scanned the crowd and added pressure. A large man grabbed his chest, and she held up the heart to catch his attention. He looked familiar, but so had they all, nameless faces that had once displeased her.
"Horace," Emma blurted and took a step towards the man with no flicker of recognition of her in his kind eyes.
"Emma," a soft, feminine voice caught her attention. Astrid emerged from the crowd, nose buried in a clipboard. "Do you know where the checklist for…" The fairy bumped into the broad chest of the soldier who had become her friend and confidante. He caught her with a hand as large as the width of her waist and kept her from following the clipboard to the floor.
"Oh!" Astrid exclaimed and stared up at his kind grey eyes. "I'm sorry," she murmured in no hurry to disentangle from the man who Emma knew would fall in love with her.
"It's my fault," he corrected her quickly, still holding her about the waist.
The moment should have been beautiful. Emma pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes. Adrenaline pounded into her heart. Astrid's dead eyes stared up at her from the marble floor when she opened them. The body existed only in her head. "No," Emma whispered and closed her eyes again.
An iron fist gripped her chest, and she gasped around it, unable to catch a single molecule of oxygen. Bending over, she propped herself on one hand locked on her knee. The other grabbed at her chest, clawing holes for air. "Emma, Sheriff, Oh no." The words blended together as the voices swirled in one distorted sound.
Large hands broke her fall, and she gazed up to find Horace's grey eyes spinning with the ceiling. He picked her up a moment later at Regina's behest and shielded her with his large chest as the crowd parted. Cooler air hit her face in the darker hallway. Astrid and Snow shooed nosy rubberneckers away from the scene as Horace lowered her to the cold stone floor and leaned her against the wall. Emma gasped for breath, tears streaking down overly flushed cheeks.
"Get away from me," Emma growled at the man and shoved his shoulders violently as she came to her feet. "Everyone just get the fuck away from me!" Lights flickered above Emma's head, the start of her magic slipping into a frenzy from sensory overload.
"Out," Regina ordered. She handed the heart to the man; one of the fairies were perfectly capable of finishing the job. "You, too, Snow. She's about to lose control her of her magic, and I need you and your son to go away," she explained calmly, stopping the protest in her step-daughter's throat. Static excited the hair at the back of her neck as Emma's magic expanded. Horace pulled Astrid to safety within the main room and held the door for Snow White, heart clutched tightly to his chest.
"Emma," she called and followed her down the hall where The Savior stood, shaking from holding her muscles so tightly.
"I can't move," Emma whispered, trapped and terrified by what lived inside of her. "If I move, it's going to explode."
Regina stepped into her line of sight. "Breathe," she murmured, still calm and in control of the situation. She held out her hands, palms up in silent invitation for Emma to take them.
"I can't. I'm going to hurt you," Emma cried and clutched her hands tightly against her breasts.
"You won't. I'm going to absorb your magic so I can dispose of it without hurting anyone or destroying the building. In order to do that, I need you to take my hands," Regina instructed in a soothing tone that settled Emma's anxiety just a tiny bit.
Regina stepped into her personal space, leaving only a few inches between their bodies. Emma held her concentrated gaze but made no move to initiate contact. Regina held a hand between them. Static shocks rolled off the other woman and licked her palm, her belly and thighs. With a nod, she touched three fingertips to Emma's fist. A sharp gasped echoed in the empty hallway, but Regina made no other sound, simply held Emma's gaze and absorbed the excess energy threatening to explode in a room full of people. Emma clung tightly to it, afraid to hurt the mother of her son again.
"Don't," Regina whispered. "I can take it, Emma." The Savior nodded and waited for further instructions. Regina equalized the flow of energy between them, keeping Emma balanced on the edge of control.
"Breath," she murmured softly. "Just breathe and focus on me." Emma listened, so Regina continued. "You cannot continue to fight your magic. It is a part of you, and until you accept it, you will continue to lose control. Stop fighting yourself, Emma. It is as much a part of you as green eyes and blonde hair."
Emma nodded. Tears streamed down her face. Regina cupped one cheek, then the other and bent Emma's forehead to hers. "Take as long as you need," she whispered. "I will not leave you."
"There was a war. Gold started a war, Regina. I killed people," Emma babbled. "I killed them, but they're here. Does that remove the darkness on my heart? Is this my second chance to make everything right, to keep The Savior's heart pure? Can I still be The Savior if I'm a murderer?"
"I won't let you become a murderer. The world needs their Savior, much more than it needs an Evil Queen," Regina promised.
"If they come for you, I'll kill them," Emma promised right back and opened her eyes. Caramel rolled upwards to meet green in the small space between them. Emma grabbed her wrists painfully. "I'll kill them."
"Emma Swan, you will not kill for me," the sorceress declared in a deep voice that teetered on the precipice between control and hysteria. Regina breathed for a moment. On the next inhale, she added, "Ever," in a breathy promise.
"He killed Astrid," Emma whined. "She was my friend there. She kept me sane the first few weeks because I wasn't able to see or talk to anyone else. Horace is her True Love, I think. She wouldn't leave the fairies for Leroy, but I think she'll leave for him. I saw her body." Emma bounced back and forth in the narrative, and Regina followed as best she could.
A surge of power exploded, and Regina winced at the slight overload. With a breath, she guided the energy down her legs and returned it to the earth through thick marble and cement. It had taken her years to spindle the excess during heightened emotional moments, but Emma lacked every single bit of training she should have received. She was right to leave, she was a ticking bomb with no timer attached.
"Emma, breathe," she instructed.
"Are they real? I'm not dead, right? Am I in Hell? Am I cursed to live an eternity remembering a world that killed everyone I love while they live and breathe around me every day?"
"Emma, look at me." She waited until Emma complied. "You are not dead. This is not Hell, as much as it pains me to say that, and you are certainly not being punished. What would you even be punished for? Jaywalking?" Regina snapped.
"I left you. I left Henry. I left everybody." Emma parted their foreheads to better see Regina's eyes. "I didn't want to come back because it was easier for me there."
Regina's eyes tightened, facial muscles clenched. Emma's confession had hurt her. More tears streamed down The Savior's flushed face. Still, Regina breathed and channeled magic. "That's why you don't want anyone to know. You want the guilt to destroy you because you think that's what you deserve."
"It is what I deserve," Emma prostrated herself before the woman who knew nothing of what they could share, what they could build together. "I'm so sorry, Regina. I didn't mean to choose that Storybrooke over this one, but it didn't hurt so much there."
"What didn't hurt?" Regina implored, but Emma hung her head and closed her heart. The magic receded, and Regina stood holding Emma's face for no reason other than to keep them both anchored in the moment. "Emma, what didn't hurt on that side?"
"Being with her. I can be with her if I go back, if I recreate the timeline. I don't think she can love me here," Emma said as she raised her eyes again, piercing Regina's soul to gaze inside. "I don't think she can love me here," she repeated, quieter, more soulful.
Regina waited in the stillness that finally followed the storm raging in The Savior's heart. Stiff fingers loosened their death grip around her wrists, slid down her forearms and up her biceps. "Regina, I…" Green eyes flickered back and forth, and Emma's chest jumped up and down as she teetered between speaking and acting. "I…" she tried again. Green eyes dropped to her mouth, bounced back to her eyes, and then lowered to her lips once more.
A door slammed open at the end of the hall, and Emma sprang back from the other woman, shaking. She averted her eyes no matter how many times Regina tried to catch them again and hugged herself tightly.
"Ahh, my favorite blonde and brunette. Just the ladies I've come to see," Gold's voice slithered around them like the putrid stench of rotting flesh. He smiled sweetly. "What the hell are you doing?" He demanded and leaned both hands on his cane.
"I'm having a yard sale. Buy a bundle of used hearts for a discount?" Regina baited him as she slowly turned to face her mentor. Flipping the black blazer behind her, slim hands wrapped around her hips.
Rumpel ignored her and glared at Emma over Regina's shoulder. "Stop this," he warned. "This has your fingerprints all over it, Savior, and if The Queen starts returning magical objects, they'll demand mine next." He shifted his gaze back to Regina's. "You understand." His nose wrinkled like he spoke of a new stop light in front of his store instead of actual lives she still controlled.
"I do," Regina chuckled. "I just don't care."
"Stop this before I do," Rumpelstiltskin threatened in his gentle voice that convinced people to kill themselves and feel good about doing it. Emma shivered.
"Or what? Will you blind me in a dark alley, too?" Regina snapped back. She was done sitting on her hands. She needed to explode his brains and watch him shove them back into his skull.
"Of course not, Dearie." He stepped forward, and Regina sidestepped directly in front of Emma who had been beside her shoulder until that point. "I'd prefer to devour you alive."
"What?" Emma blurted. Rumpel's eyes shifted to hers over Regina's head. A flash of Ruby's bloated face choked her.
"He fucking knows," Emma gasped, grabbing at her throat to loosen the muscles. "You fucking know!"
"Emma!" Regina grabbed her shoulder fruitlessly as she passed.
Gold raised his cane in defense. Emma blocked his wrist and tackled him to cold cement. White light illuminated the dark hallway, a bastardized beacon of hope. Straddling him, Emma stared at her hands for three seconds before meeting his dark eyes. "How did you do it?" She demanded, fist already descending upon his jaw.
"How did you fucking do it!" Blow after blow rained down upon the man who had yet to retaliate against the assault. Blood detached from Emma's knuckles and spattered on the wall.
"Emma, stop. This is not the way," Regina grabbed her arm mid-swing.
"Then what is the way?" Emma growled and shoved her back as she sprang to her feet. "You know better than anyone that you can't beat him with mind games. You can't outplay him, but he's a coward, Regina. He can't stand direct conflict, especially from a strong woman, and I'm done hiding. I'm done fucking losing."
Regina's back hit the wall on the opposite side of the meeting room. Round caramel eyes stared up at her, not even bothering hiding the fear Emma incited. Regina's eyes shifted over her shoulder, and Emma spun, dropping to one knee, in one fluid motion. White exploded from her palm and slammed into Rumpel's gut. His body and raised cane flew through the air. The murmur beyond the doors hushed when he crashed into the room and landed flat on his back. The cane bounced and clattered on marble.
Emma surged forward – a bundle of raw nerves, pure grief, and the liquid heat of adrenaline. She snagged his preferred physical weapon as she passed. He raised as far as one knee before The Savior spun in a graceful arc and brought the full force of the momentum upon his temple with the golden handle of the elegant stick that glowed white under the influence of her magic. A pop-crunch of bone and cartilage echoed on marble. His body twisted in the air, barely caught before his bloody face slammed on the floor.
Simultaneously, Emma tossed the cane to the floor and freed the gun at her hip. Leveling it at the back of his head, the solace of vengeance filled her with peace. Everything slowed down, quieted until only her own pounding heart and heavy breaths reached her ears. Trigger accepted finger like an old friend sitting down to a nice, cold beer. It resisted slightly beneath the pad, inviting the challenge of squeezing like a friendly game between teammates.
"No!" Regina yelled and stepped in front of the gun. She grabbed the chamber, barrel pressed into her stomach.
Emma jerked from the trigger.
"No," Regina repeated quietly. They stared at each other, chests heaving, unyielding eyes challenging. "No matter how much it hurts, you are not this, Emma Swan."
"It won't kill him," Emma reasoned.
Regina smirked. "I'm not concerned for his life. One more thing checked off my to-do list," she joked. Emma refused concession, so Regina took a step closer, forcing the barrel painfully into her gut. "Look around, Savior," she whispered.
Stormy green eyes shifted back and forth. Terrified eyes refused to meet hers. Some who knew her better carried expressions of pity or horror or a mixture of the two. Snow clutched Neal to her chest, torn between intervening and protecting her younger child from the older one. Horace held Astrid close to his chest with a trunk-like arm that practically shielded her entire torso. David fidgeted, eyes bouncing between the mayor and his daughter. He looked pissed and ready to take her down if the need arose. Friends and acquaintances, victims and innocents stared at her, afraid of the woman meant to save them all.
Regina caught the gun as her hand fell. A thumb and forefinger squeezed the butt and extended it toward David. He took it and stepped backwards into the crowd. Emma linked fingers behind her neck, squashing her cheeks with her elbows. "I'm sorry," she murmured to no one in particular.
"Arrest her, Deputy," Gold ordered, a satisfied sneer on his bloody mouth.
"Shut up, Imp," Regina snapped without removing her eyes from the threads unraveling in Emma's eyes.
"I'm sorry," Emma whined. Clamping green eyes shut, her body fell forward until elbows touched her knees. Strong legs crumpled next. Knees and elbows hit the floor, and a hollow sob reverberated on marble walls. Still, no one approached the unhinged woman. She had not been their Emma for a very long time.
"Blue," Regina snapped and scanned the crowd for the leader of the fairies.
"I want her arrested! She assaulted me, and I intend to press charges," Gold demanded again, touching the back of his thumb beneath his bleeding nose for effect as he sat up.
David glanced at Regina and then his daughter. A sense of duty broke his heart all the way to his eyes, and he tucked Emma's gun into the back of his pants. Emma wailed again, unseeing of her father's martyrdom in her pending arrest.
"Touch her, and I'll break every bone in your hand," Regina seethed behind clenched teeth. "Blue!" The fairy appeared from the crowd wordlessly. "Finish returning these hearts. There is another wall in my vault, but it's sealed. Contact me once you've finished so I can bring the rest."
"Mayor Mills, surely you cannot condone this behavior in one of your appointed offices," Gold protested.
Regina's lip pulled back at the sight of him. Rage crashed and swelled beneath her breast, gnashing sharpened teeth at his throat. She lit a fireball, intending to quiet him for the rest of day by shoving it down his smug throat. Gold's glassy brown eyes challenged her, dared her to seek vengeance. She fulfilled that particular role better than anyone he knew, seeking revenge.
"I'm sorry," Emma gasped again. "I'm sorry."
The excited light in his eyes faded when she closed her fist around the flames and ground marble with the heel of her boot, whirling away from him. "I demand to press charges, Madame Mayor," he cried again, but no one seemed to listen, more captivated by their former queen.
She knelt on both knees and touched Emma's back. The Savior flinched, coiling everyone else with her own tight muscles. When she relaxed, Regina rubbed her back and bent her mouth to Emma's ear. "What do you need right now?" echoed on the floor and around the walls for everyone to hear.
"Get me out of here," Emma managed without raising her head.
"Where?"
"I can't be around anyone right now. Just take me somewhere so I can't hurt anyone," Emma blubbered. Saliva and snot dripped to the floor a few inches from her face. She choked on air and tears, coughed. Spit splashed back from the force and spattered her cheeks and nose.
Regina closed her eyes, and they disappeared in a swirl of angry, violet smoke.