A lump rose in the little nymph's throat as tears blurred her vision of the Lady Nymph standing before her. The older woman looked down to her in a sympathetic way as she longed to reach out to the little girl and comfort her. Dawn let out a sob as she looked down to her bare feet on the polished wooden floor. So much has changed within just one year and now it has finally come down to this. Dawn swallowed hard as she shook her head violently as if she was trying to force something out of her mind. She looked up to the older woman and stomped her foot in frustration.

"No!" Dawn yelled out, "I am not going to hide in my tree while everyone else is frightened. That is what the Evil Queen wants, for us to hide while her Curse is being done!"

"We have to" the Lady Nymph said gently, "There isn't much that our kind can do for this disaster. We mind as well start looking after ourselves and hope everyone else will be alright"

"I'm not leaving Pinocchio or Geppetto," Dawn told her leader.

"Geppetto has already talked about sending Pinocchio through the portal" the Lady reminded her.

"I know, but I want to see him off"

"Pinocchio will be saved... you won't"

"I know that if the roles were switched, Pinocchio would want to stay with me in the end also" Dawn said as she avoided the Lady's look in her eyes.

"You can not think that he will do the same for you... I am your leader and I am commanding you to return to your tree by the end of this week" the Lady Nymph said in a firm tone.

Little Dawn opened her mouth to argue but instead a tiny whimper came out as she thought of the Lady Nymph's tree and how soon it would be cut down with her inside it. Her lip trembled as her vision blurred, knowing this was one of the last times she would see Lady Nymph so she should listen to her final request. Instead of running away, Dawn charged at the woman and gave her the biggest bear hug imaginable. The Lady gasped but smiled as she patted Dawn's head as her own tears filled her eyes. She knew this was a goodbye hug for her and the leader should cherish this moment with the little time they had left.

"I will do as you ask, my Lady" Dawn whispered.

The Lady smiled to her as she advised her, "Thank you, people will look up to you, Dawn and sometimes that means putting friendships aside in order to help your own people… and that is nothing to be ashamed of"

Dawn ran a hand through her hair as she watched Emma type in codes as she read a language that was foreign to Dawn. She swayed impatiently as David came back with three coffees from Granny's, Dawn was surprised at first that David even suspected that she would be here but David said that if it were his best friend, he'd be at the Sheriff's Station in the morning as well. It was true, Dawn was waiting by the door when both Emma and David pulled into the parking lot. They both didn't seem surprised as Emma immediately went to work on tracing the phone.

Emma sighed as she leaned back, "Clever bastard"

"What?" Both Dawn and David asked.

"It seems that August knows all of my tricks" Emma turned to the others, "And knows how to avoid being seen, he had a bug on his disposable phone in order to not really get a connection as to where he is… I didn't even know you can do that"

"Does it show a location at all?" David asked.

"Not one, but several" Emma answered, "He went through a lot of trouble to not be seen, it shows he went to four different places in order to call Dawn"

Emma looked over to her as she said, "Sounds like he really wanted to speak with you"

"Where did he go?" Dawn asked.

Emma turned back to the screen and started to bring up the locations before putting up the town grid in order to know where exactly August went. Dawn didn't know whether or not she would get an exact location but wasn't surprised at all that it still remains a mystery where her friend was.

"Looks like he went to the overlook of the town, the well, the harbor, and a little part of the woods" Emma reported.

"He wouldn't be in the woods" Dawn shook her head, "Not anymore, he saw me there with Rumplestiltskin and I looked everywhere after our first call"

"What were you doing there with someone like him?" David asked, referring to Mr. Gold.

"Nothing really, I was just trying to strengthen my powers and there he was around the grove of Nymph's I sensed" Dawn answered.

Emma glanced up to her father, "Should we be worried?"

"When it comes to Rumplestiltskin" David sighed, "Always be worried"

Pounding footsteps behind her made Emma jump to her feet so fast that her chair fell backwards.

"Holy shit" Emma let out.

Dawn opened up her mouth to ask what was wrong but the expressions on both of the Charming's faces, made her immediately turn around and drop her coffee on the floor. Archie was standing in the doorway, his clothes were wrinkled, hair a mess, and the smell of his body odor burned Dawn's nose hairs to the skin. Despite all of this, it didn't stop Dawn from running up to the man and giving him a massive bear hug as she cried into his shoulder realizing that he was real. Normally, Jiminy would be shushing her and telling her that everything was alright now, that he was here but Archie instead, hugged her just as tight and gave her a few extra kisses on the cheek, almost as if he was afraid he was never going to see her again. When they broke their hug, Archie smiled tearfully at her as he cupped her face, taking in her appearance like he first did when the Curse broke.

"How?" Dawn croaked, "We thought you were dead"

"I wasn't" Archie sniffed, "She made it look like I was dead, to Pongo's eyes, she knew the steps that would be taken in order to convict Regina. She's such a clever witch, I didn't know why she would do any of this until I was sitting at the bottom of that ship. She's working with some pirate, I don't know, I've never seen him before but they were talking about this being the perfect plan to make the townspeople turn on Regina. I was only able to get away because Belle found me and as I made my way here, I bumped into Mr. Gold and told him where the ship was located"

"She? Pirate?" Emma repeated, "Archie, who was framing Regina?"

"Her mother, Cora" Archie informed them, "Emma, she's so evil, she makes what Regina has done look almost saint-like. She would manipulate the truth in order to make her own daughter look evil. She must've been following her for a couple of days, otherwise, Cora would've never thought to have come to my office in order to stage the murder"

"Cora's here in Storybrooke?" Emma let out, "How's that possible?"

"You and your mother have only been back for a week from the Enchanted Forest" David mentioned, "If the same goes for Cora, what has she been doing all this time?"

"Poor Regina" Dawn let out, "Everyone thought that she killed Archie that no one wanted to believe that she was innocent when I said I never sensed Archie's death"

Dawn looked up to Emma, "Didn't I tell you that not all magic is what it seems?"

"Well, yeah but" Emma glanced to her father before she said in an embarrassed tone, "We saw her in the dreamcatcher"

"If people are already shunning out Regina then I must go to her now" Archie responded, "I was just barely starting up the exercise of her opening up about her past as the Evil Queen and people treating her as such will spiral her down further into her past. Excuse me, but I have to go now"

"That's not going to be easy, Archie" Dawn sighed.

"Why? What do you mean?" Archie asked.

Dawn looked to him, "Ever since your death, she's been underground… no one has even seen her since then"

Archie's face dropped as he glanced around to everyone in the room, "Oh my God, what have you all done?"