It was an odd thing, months ago when he'd first realized that he was going to have to deal with Regina and the trauma that she had surrounding Daniel he'd wanted nothing but that part of her life to be worthless so he didn't have to deal with it. Now that he had a plan in place for handling it, the amount of time it was taking to get to that moment was a bigger frustration than his original discovery.

Perhaps the one good thing that Cora had done for Regina was groom her to be pliant. After years of being forced to play a role she didn't want to play, he found that she was still remarkably good at it. The only difference was that instead of being asked to play the role of a daughter devoted to finding a King to marry, now she was playing the role of a Queen who wanted to learn sorcery for power. She responded to his anger in the tower that night in a productive way. Questioning if Daniel still held her back forced her to prove that it didn't, and now, whenever he looked in the mirror to check on her, he saw her practicing.

One day he'd had the very bright idea to push her forward. He let her come over and just happened to leave the letter he'd once written to Cora about Zelena out in plain sight. He'd watched as she'd found it, read it, smiled, thinking it was about her, and then folded it up and shoved it in her pocket for safekeeping. He pretended he'd noticed nothing. The truth was he was never going to send that letter to Cora, not after what had happened with Zelena, but if it could do some good in some way, then that was how he was going to use it. At that very lesson she finally learned how to make fire. It was small and pitiful, but it was something.

"Teach me more…teach me something new."

"As you wish."

It was a sign that with proper motivation Regina could accomplish anything. In the month that followed she was unusually devoted. In fact, he watched as she became more than devoted, she became driven. A small taste of the magic she was capable of was all it had taken to flip the switch, and he'd been thrilled to watch her master skills that he once thought that she might never accomplish…but not perfectly. Oh she could immobilize and move objects, making them appear and disappear at will now, and finally, she had a desire for what the magic she did could do for her, as evidenced in the questions she was asking about its uses, but a fireball, a true flaming ball of fire still eluded her. She just didn't have the anger for it. She had the craving to learn the other things, things that would impress and scare her husband away from stalking her bed at night, things that would earn her fear and respect among the guards that she was growing for herself, and things that he knew were earning her quite an interesting reputation among the household servants, but true anger...she just couldn't bring it to life and possess it.

And he was growing tired of waiting for her to possess it. He was growing tired of waiting for her to be in a place where she might be in need of the Doctor's "talents". He was growing tired of listening to Jefferson's never-ending reports of failure on the Doctor's part! It was obvious to him that the plan he'd had in mind before wasn't good enough, not to do the job he needed to have done. The one he possessed now, however, was genius. It had taken a while, but he'd finally come up with a plan that could work! In fact, the more he thought of it, this plan would work better than his previous plan. But Regina in this state, as he took her through her drills lesson after lesson, watched her immobilize creatures twice, three, four times her size…she wasn't ready for it to be enacted.

But if the Doctor was successful soon, the plan he saw in his head might not work, and he'd have to resort to the one he'd initially worked out. He didn't want that. Not anymore. This needed to be handled delicately and soon!

And so the night before a lesson with Regina, he watched her alone in her bedroom at the palace. She summoned water, her hairbrush, a spellbook, and finally she tried and failed to spark a fireball in the palm of her hand. It was time to give her a push, he decided, and see if that might spark what was necessary. And wasn't it just his luck that it was the one-year anniversary of Daniel's death? If that didn't urge her on and open up that anger that he knew she had to have, then he didn't know what would.

It was time for her to take a heart.

Not a human heart. She was still too weak for anything like that just yet, an animal would be better. And so as he put her through her drills in the woods that afternoon he summoned to her a rare black unicorn. It wasn't a friendly beast and reared up at the danger it perceived. Regina backed away, her hands close to her belly as if she was afraid of it. But he stayed right where he was demonstrating what it meant to have no fear. He'd already had her immobilize sheep and people, horses and entire carriages. This should be simple for her.

"Now, show me what you've learned. Immobilize it!"

Regina took a timid step forward, then threw out her hands. He felt a wave of magic bloom in the surrounding area, it was unfocused magic but still strong.

"There. I did it!" she smiled proudly as the horse continued to stand unmoving on two feet, a bluish wave moving over its body. Certainly, she had done it. She'd frozen the horse, as well as everything else in the area, but they could deal with that later. Focus wasn't the point of this little lesson. That was what came next, and it made him giggle uncontrollably for this was where her test began. Unlike her sister, he had the feeling that in time she would pass.

"Excellent work, my apprentice. Now there's just one last tiny, tiny, teeny, little detail. Take its heart."

The smile on her face left quick as lightning. This was bound to be a touchy subject for her, he was well aware. But that was the point. It was time she got past this, time she get over Daniel and began to focus what she felt for the past, and how she might use it in the future.

"Like what my mother did to-"

"Oh, your true love. Indeed!" he exclaimed with a less than caring tone. "Then, you already know how it's done!" He didn't want to seem caring, he didn't want to sound as though he was familiar with what anniversary was coming up for her. He wanted it to sound like it was normal. If she could do this without all the cock and bull he was about to give her, that was best! Less work for him and for Jefferson as well. If not…well, he was far more prepared for this to fail than she'd ever know.

Regina didn't want to do this. She loved horses, and that was why he'd chosen such a rare one to start with. But after a moment, at the urging of her teacher, she did inch forward slightly, looking at the exposed chest of the beast before her.

"Gentle," he instructed as she raised her hand. "If you do it right, no harm will befall it. Unless, of course, you will it."

And that was where she faltered, daring to look up into its eyes instead of right at its chest. He could hear her breath grow high and sharp, her own heart pounded, and suddenly she withdrew her hand and turned her back on the creature.

"I can't. It's innocent!"

"Nothing is innocent!" he stressed. Not Regina, not this horse, not even her precious Daniel. Still, he wasn't done pushing. He reached out himself and removed the heart before her eyes. Or at least attempted to before she turned away. Her spell broke as he pulled it forth, the horse gave a great whinny and put its feet back on the ground, but it didn't rear up again as it had before simply because he didn't have time for that and willed it not to. Regina turned around just in time to watch him convince the beast to lie down in the dirt at their feet. "Now, it belongs to me. You see, when you take a heart, it becomes enchanted. Stronger than a normal heart. You're not hurting the beast; you're controlling it. Now, show me you know what to do with that power."

He tossed the glowing red heart to her, and she caught it with little problem.

"Kill it."

"What?"

"You've seen it done, now do it yourself. Show me you can take the next step in your training. Crush it."

In her own defense, she faired better than he thought she would have. By this point, he had expected her to outright refuse and resort to name-calling as she stumbled off. But instead, she listened. And he watched eagerly as his next plans were written. Holding the glowing heart at arm's length, she turned toward the beast and began to squeeze so that he could hear the delicate muscle begin to crack and break beneath her fingers.

But then she stopped.

The second the beast moved to put its head on the ground and let out of cry of pain or sorrow, he wasn't sure which, she stopped. There were tears in her eyes as she shook her head, and the horse slowly started to rise to its feet again. There was that weakness he'd been seeing in her, the vulnerability that needed crushed far more than the heart did.

"Dearie, dearie, dearie. And I had such high hopes…"

"And I didn't sign up to kill unicorns!"

"Magic is power!" he shouted back at her. "Until you can take power, you're not learning anything. Do you want me to teach you or not?"

"Yes!" she insisted.

"Then, there's one simple question for you to ponder."

She shrugged. "I'll tell you anything."

Rumple let loose a loud high pitched laugh. This wasn't a test for him. It was for her. "I don't need the answer…you do. What's holding you back?"

Regina opened and closed her mouth. It looked like she was the one who had her heart torn out. "This old argument again?" she cried. "I thought we were past all this!"

"Oh, we'll never be past it, dearie. Not until you have your answer! Until you can answer that question, it'll be back to potions for you, something a bit less…stunning."

Afterward, back in his tower, he wasn't surprised to look through that cauldron and see her place the heart back in the unicorn. Just as he wasn't surprised to see her transport herself to her family's mausoleum and mourn the body of her beloved Daniel. It was a year, in a few days it would be time to recharge the preservation spell. By then, he intended for everything to be ready for her next visit. Today he'd push, next time, he'd break her.


Straight forward scene. I framed it, added a little to the beginning to show Regina's growth as well as how she came to be in possession of a letter Rumple wrote to her mother, but then added more on to the end, just to give the chapter a nice conclusion. My hope is that you didn't even notice where the OUAT stuff ended and my stuff began. I hope...

Thank you to Jennifer Baratta, Grace5231973, and Alarda for your reviews on the last chapter. With this, we are officially diving into the 2x05 stuff. I think it's going to be interesting to all of you as to how it unfolds. We're back to Jefferson and Dr. Frankenstein for the next couple of chapters to give you an idea as to how this is all going to work. Peace and Happy Reading!