A/N :

This got done way quicker than I expected so I thought I'd post it now :D

Thank you all for your amazing feedback, the support really does help authors write faster, as ridiculous as that may sound.

I hope you all enjoy this too

Snow finally found Emma in the tiny laundry room off of the kitchen, it was so small that it took quite a bit of effort to manoeuvre around the door and through the doorway, squeezing between the overly large cupboard and the old fashioned washer.

She finally made it fully into the room and, with only a few seconds of internal debate, she slid down the wall to sit beside Emma. She was going to speak but there were no words for this situation, and whenever she had tried to make it better she always said the wrong thing. So she sat beside Emma trying her very best not to do anything to get Emma to shut her out.

"How'd you find me?" Emma mumbled after several minutes.

"Well you did slam the door on your way in here and this is one of like three rooms which have doors in our home. I thought I was supposed to be the emotional one out of us." She teased half heartedly. She looked down at her daughter evaluating the worst possible thing Emma could do, just in case she needed to prepare for it, though she hadn't even considered her joining a magical fight club so she wasn't too certain about this method of parenting anymore.

Emma sniffled loudly and wiped her eyes with the back of the fist and looked up at Snow. She knew she looked pathetic, but she didn't care about Snow seeing it for once.

Snow's voice was as tender as her touch as she brushed hair out of her daughter's face. "What're you thinking, sweetie?"

"It's not fair." Emma had planned to not say that, and if she had planned on it she would have made sure it came out mad, pissed, vengeful, like she was going to overcome the odds. Instead it came out in a choked sob. Tears spilled out of her eyes and the next thing she knew floods were coming out of her eyes, so many tears she couldn't even keep her eyes open.

Snow stopped trying to control the situation, instead she acted on instinct, pulling Emma into her arms, she held her as close as possible as she cried, she whispered platitudes telling her it would be okay, though she really had no idea how she would be able to convince Emma of that, or how she would be able to make it okay, any of it. She had no idea about anything other than the fact that for Emma she would do anything, and she would make it okay.

"Here, put this on your knuckles." Regina handed David a magical ice pack. She stared at him until he reluctantly took it and placed it onto his right hand where it had stopped bleeding but it was already hurting. "You need to stop punching someone who could kill you with the click of his fingers."

"You need a thumb and a finger to click, not just fingers." He rolled his eyes at his inability to ever make Regina laugh. "I'll stop punching him when he stops deserving it."

"You're an idiot."

"If he had gone after Henry like he went after Emma then you would have done more than just punch him."

"Which is why I'm reluctant friends with people like; Snow, and Tink, and you." Regina rolled her eyes and took the seat opposite him. "He was being a dick, but he was also right. Emma overdid herself, she would have felt it, but she refuses to learn to control her emotions when she's using her magic. And she's been extra emotional recently."

"She's fallen out with Henry before and it's not caused that."

"It's not just that though, is it?"

"Well no, but things with Neal aren't that bad, they've both moved on. What? Why are you giving me that look, your 'you're an idiot' look?"

"If the boot fits." She told him dryly. "It's not just things with Henry and Neal she's been avoiding, is it? Otherwise she might not have minded putting up with you two for more than a few hours at a time."

What are you on-" His sentence dropped off as realisation struck, a frown deepened on his face, finally he squeezed his eyes shut. "Shit. I, we, we thought she needed time, that she was just stressed about Henry and being forced to stay here, or because she was finding it hard seeing us as, fuck."

It was nearly fifteen whole minutes before Emma stopped crying. She felt exhausted; emotionally and physically, she couldn't move from Snow's arms back onto the laundry room floor, and she didn't want to.

Snow combed her hand through Emma's wild curls, she seemed to have calmed down but hadn't moved away, Snow began to think she might have fallen asleep, after all she had barely slept the past couple of weeks, she ducked her head down and saw Emma's beautiful green eyes blinking away the remnants of tears but she was still awake.
"I wish that I could fix this for you, fix everything for you, I really wish I could." She hesitated and found herself rocking, she wasn't sure if she was trying to comfort herself or Emma, she hoped it was the latter. "I wish I could tell you that they're wrong or lying to conspire on an evil scheme, but Regina wouldn't lie to us, not anymore, and Rumple, well he probably would lie but not about this."

"How'd you know?" Emma's voice was small and doubtful even if it was muffled by the fact she was keeping her face pressed against Snow.

"He's, well he's The Dark One, but he's a dad, a parent, he wouldn't lie about this. We'll keep searching, there's always hope, but I think we're going to have to find our new normal."

Emma allowed herself to slump fully against Snow, or she would have if that stupid huge tummy wasn't in the way, she tried to swallow down the lump in her throat but it was still there, no matter how much she pretended it wasn't.

"Emma, why the hell did you get involved with this? It's not completely your fault this happened, but why did you get involved in that at all? You could have ended up seriously hurt, you could have woken up dead instead of in the hospital!"

Emma slipped off of Snow's lap and crossed her arms over her chest. "I was fine, I had it under control, I'm good at it - and it's not like I had another teacher or anything else to do!"

"Regina was just spending some time with her son and her new boyfriend, she would have gotten around to teaching you again, that time with trying to drop you off a bridge over a ravine, and Henry will stop being mad at you soon, trust me I have some experience in the area. He was probably just worried you were going to leave but as soon as you didn't he would have been going to the arcade or to bug Ruby for free milkshakes again. And you were going to stay… weren't you?"

Emma shrugged her shoulders. "What's it matter now?"

"It matters! Emma, why would you have left? I know you had a life in New York when you were there with Henry, but he's here now, and you've got a life here too. What were you planning on staying away until fourth of July, you were going to go months before meeting your sibling.

"Look I get it. I'm sorry, you didn't plan for this and I'll figure out a way t-to fix it, so just… I'm sorry." She pulled herself to her and left the laundry room as fast as she could without overtly running away from Snow.

"Emma? Emma!" She called after her daughter but stuck on the ground where it would take too much time to get up to be able to run after her. She was left watching with an open mouth after her daughter, running through everything she said trying her best to find out what it was she had said.

She was slowly manoeuvring to her feet when it finally hit her. It was as obvious as the nose on her face, or the eight months of pregnancy in her tummy. It would have been obvious if Emma had always been three years old, but they just hadn't expected twenty nine year old Emma to be experiencing the same sibling jealousy. She thought about all the times she should have caught it, either of them should have, they were her parents after all.

When Emma walked back through from the laundry room several people had left the loft; Thomas was in the kitchen making drinks, Robin was trying to help but was mostly staring in disgust as Thomas heated up a mug of tea in the microwave, she froze as she saw David at the table with an icepack on his hand he was talking low to Regina.

"Hey, Emma, you want a drink, there's some juice boxes?" Thomas offered, trying way too hard to sound casual, which wasn't helped by his 'casual' lean against the kitchen counter, as he tried his best to distract her from whatever was going on with David.

"What happened to David?"

Thomas turned his back to duck into the fridge. "Erm, he just hurt it casually, just the usual," he was trying so hard to sound casual it was taking up all of his concentration, causing him to nearly pass Emma a bottle of beer instead of a juice box, "shit, not that, here, apple!"

Emma took the juice box but narrowed her eyes at Thomas. "How'd he get hurt?"

"God, you look like Snow, she purposely pushed me into a freezing cold late one time you know? It was winter and she was clearly trying to murder me."

"You probably deserved it, Tom."

Emma turned on her heel and found David towering over her, within seconds he dropped onto one knee so she wasn't having to look up at him.

"You might not know this about your uncle Thomas yet, but sometimes he deserves to get hypothermia, it's barely even avunculicide because everyone agrees he's that annoying."

"I've done nothing wrong! I'm getting my favourite niece a juice box, see!" He pointed towards the one Emma was currently holding.

"I saw you nearly giving her a beer, dipshit." He looked back at Emma.

"What happened to your hand?" Emma's eyes were firmly on the red knuckles and she didn't mean to but her finger was out and carefully touching where the skin had split.

"I'm okay, kiddo."

"Your father punched The Dark One in the face because of how he was behaving to you, he was doing what any good father would do."

Emma had looked at Robin as he talked, that way he was talking made Emma certain that David must have really laid into Gold. And that David was doing a dad action yet again. Emma didn't know how to feel about that. She didn't want it. She didn't need it. Well she didn't used to need it, but why was it starting to feel so… no she wasn't going to let herself think about it. She gave a small nearly indecipherable nod, mostly in fear that he would continue talking if she didn't give some sign she understood.

When she looked back at David she could see he was looking embarrassed, and she was still touching his hand with her own, she was about to move it away when his hand turned and gently took her own. She was forced to look into his eyes even as Snow walked back into the room, both because she was waiting for David to say something, and because she didn't want to have to say anything about her outburst.

"I'm glad I punched him but I still shouldn't have done it. I know it's something both of us seem to have a little trouble doing, isn't it, controlling our tempers." He held up his little finger on his other hand so he wouldn't have to let go of her other one. "How about we make a pact to try our best?"

Emma thought it was insanely cheesy. Beyond insanely cheesy. She held up her own finger and locked fingers with him. "I'm not going to be able to punch Gold for a while anyway. As soon as… if Regina finds…" She looked over towards Regina who had her hand on Snow's back, the other two men were also gathered around them. She felt suddenly struck by desperation, or despair, no- fear - of having to go over there and listen to everything in depth. It was too much.

"I was thinking, we can go over there and join in with them all, or I can help you get changed upstairs, because you do need a little help with both of those things Em, and I could fill you in on the long and short of it?"

Emma bit her lip and nodded her head, suddenly feeling every year of her size and only them. She watched him stand up and was hit by the icle of fear again, she held her arms up to him before he could go away from her, before he could leave her. It was stupid, ridiculous, there was no reason why she should feel like that, hell she wasn't even sure if she had ever felt like this before.
Just like she knew that Snow wasn't mad at her, because there wasn't really one, not a big, well a big one because they were now being burdened with her, but she didn't do this to piss her off.
But it still felt like she did, it was why she couldn't look at her after they came out of the laundry room, because if she did she felt like she would burst into tears, again.

"C'mon Monkey." David hushed quietly, he didn't mean to keep letting nicknames and monikers slip from his mouth quite so easily, but they did, along with a mutation of protectiveness and hope - it was how he had felt when Emma was a baby, only just born and so brave already. It was how he felt every time a curse broke, before Emma would push him away, before she would want to run away, even if she didn't.

He had always allowed himself to be pushed, though, always afraid to take it too far, wanting Snow to be able to take that role, but he couldn't anymore. Not now, not when Emma couldn't push him away, and when she needed him to prove that she was just as important, that he would be just as involved in her life as he had been enthusing about being in the baby's for the past couple of months, since they got back.
He cursed himself for not noticing that Emma needed him to talk straight to her - before she had joined a magical fight club instead of trying to tell them that she felt like she was being replaced, before they had let the ball slip.

He held Emma on his hip, as he had the night before, so her ear was resting against the steady echo of his heart. The bag of clothes Thomas had brought were on the kitchen island, he scooped it up as he tried his best to have a silent eye conversation with Snow, they would need an actual physical one too, but it would do for now, she should talk to Regina to find out the facts that perhaps Emma didn't need to hear right then. And David would try and make sure that Emma knew big changes had happened and were still happening, and that it would be hard for her but, well, they were her parents, and they knew best, or at least they were trying to.

Snow watched David carry Emma up the stairs. Apparently the earlier argument had some effect on Emma because she seemed to be letting David help her, probably only a little, and this could all change in a moment, they could be having that same argument in hours, days, weeks, months, next year. A small squeeze of her hand and she came back to herself.

She was quiet as Regina spoke, Thomas also spoke, though didn't bring up his own knowledge, he had taken over Belle's research and Gold's knowledge, the former who was apologetic and the latter of whom was bleeding, when they left. She sipped her tea, it was not hot enough, the tea bag had not been left to stew for long enough, she drank it anyway.

"So," she said finally. "She's been overusing her magic repeatedly because she would rather be in a magical Fight Club than spend time with me and David-"

"-Snow-." Thomas tried to interrupt but Snow carried on in her unaffected business like tone.

"- most children start small with their magic learning little by little, but Emma obviously couldn't, because of this her magic is still new, essentially a child's magic. But because her magic runs on emotions and she's extra emotional lately she overdid it."

"Majorly overdid it." Regina interjected. "Like a fuse being blown on an entire city."

"She should have died." This was the first show of emotion in Snow's voice, she wasn't sobbing, but her voice came out in an almost whisper catching before the last word. She shook her head at herself and began to talk again. "But her magic changed her into a child in an attempt to save her, to change her to a state where she needed very little magic to survive." She knew that magically people could not survive without magic for long, like leaving a head trauma untreated. "But magic doesn't recharge when it comes to things like this, her magic will build up again as she grows, but she will grow the same as any other child."

Regina waited for Snow to say or do something else, when she didn't, Regina nodded.

"She can't be turned to an adult again in The Land without Magic? New memories, even without us, if..." She trailed off, her heart ached at the mere idea of having to be without her daughter yet again, she, they, would sacrifice it if it saved Emma, if it made her happy, if it allowed her to be safe and happy."

Regina shook her head. "The adult brain is too complex, it was risky enough the first time, even trying it again would break her brain, it would hemorrhage and she would die. Anyway I know no way to turn someone like Emma into an adult again, she's not like Pinocchio, he's technically still a puppet. I doubt Gold knows any ways either. This is it, the only possible option which will allow her to survive. As she grows up I can teach her magic properly, but there's no way to speed either up. She's going to start to feel and act more childish, the same as her physical age.

Snow placed her hands on her stomach to soothe herself, she couldn't hold Emma like she wanted to right now, so this was a good enough substitute. Her mind was on Emma that morning, from the second David had brought her home, the little glances of what parenting books had called separation anxiety, Emma holding her arms up to David to pick her up played again and again in her mind. "That makes sense."

"I could give her adjusted memories, only three years old means she wouldn't have many anyway so it wouldn't be the same as giving her an entire new fake life, or she could be left as she is, her brain might make up slightly adjusted memories on her own, as she begins to act more child like."

"That's Emma's decision, she doesn't need to make it right now, she needs to process this first, or it'll be too much."

"You're going to have to start treating her more like a child." Regina's suggestion was careful but she clearly felt it was needed.

"I know."

"She's going to need it sooner than later and the sooner she gets used to it-"

"Regina." Her voice was sharp in a way she never was to Regina. It silenced her step mother and now she softened it. "I know, we already are, starting to treat her- keeping her safe." She paused for a second.

She thought about the fact Emma's walls seemed to have been strengthened overnight, she had thought it was purely to keep her and David out, but it was possible it was also to keep her feelings and emotions hidden, her wants and needs hidden, her thoughts and fears. David had told her quietly of Emma's fear about falling down the toilet, how the way she seemed scared was childish. Emma was going to resist it, the change in how they were going to have to treat her, but it would be what she needed. She would get used to it. Eventually.

Regina and Robin stuck around for a little while longer, Robin was volunteering to take some shifts at the station should Thomas need him to, David was already planning on taking paternity but Snow wasn't sure if he would choose to take more time off. They would take it as it came. She was mostly in her head as she drank her tea.

She was watching her cousin, Thomas, there was something different in him, something he was trying to hide on his face.

Thomas and Snow had been close as children, the only royal children in their family they had found that the other one was the only one to understand the politics of their family, and the only friend the other had who would treat them normally, not as royalty. Thomas was a few years younger than Snow but when they were sent back to the Enchanted Forest he and Ashley, as she had opted to continue to be called, had decided to travel. When they got back they found they had been in a place where time was different, instead of being only a baby Alexandra was now four, and Ashley and Thomas were still together but distant from each other.

"How's Alex?"

"She's good, amazing, her preschool teacher told me that she's settled in well, that's she's very clever, I already knew that but the teacher said she was very very smart."

Snow smiled at his proud daddy bragging, David was the same and she was sure that he would be even worse now Emma was younger and there would be more firsts and milestones and achievements, both with Emma and the new baby. "She definitely doesn't take after you then." She joked surprised at her own laugh when he pulled a face at her. "How about Ashley?"

Thomas busied himself looking down at his own mug of coffee. "She's fine, yeah, she's good, she's looking for a new job." he let out a sigh and looked older than he ever had. "She has an interview in Boston, she, I don't know, I think it's just to see if she can become an interior design artist."

"And if she gets the job?"

"We haven't exactly talked that far. I don't know." He tried his best to look fine with it, but he obviously was not. He stood up collecting his and Snow's mugs, before he could take the other two's Robin stood with them, leaving Snow and Regina alone at the table, once again.

"Snow," Regina said before Snow could say anything about Ashley, "it's possible that the only reason why Emma's magic was able to save her is because you cast the curse- you were thinking about your family as you cast it, so it saved her even though the actual curse broke, it's used up all the remaining magic from it to save her- kind of like blood magic, but not really."

"I'm the reason she got turned into a child?" The knowledge stabbed at her heart like a knife.

"You're the reason she's alive and not dead." She corrected.

Snow looked up when she heard David's even paced feet on the metal staircase, the remnants of the group had left a little while ago and Snow was sat making a list at the kitchen table.

David placed Emma down on the ground and she walked over to Snow as he collected his jacket and put his shoes on.

Emma was dressed in an outfit which clearly made her look uncomfortable. The reason for this was clear to anyone who knew her at all; the clothes were pink, sparkly, and the shirt announced that she was a princess. The only possible upshot was that it wasn't a dress, but that was barely an upshot considering the cartoon on her shirt was wearing a pink tutu. Emma was tempted to call child services for Alexandra, considering she usually wore this ensemble, or perhaps she could call them for herself.

She had cried again, while upstairs with David, in front of David, when he had made sure she knew there was no chance she would be changed back, she felt lost, beyond lost, astray, misplaced, vanished. She had clung onto David as she had cried, crying harder when confusion and ache mixed with her feelings when she found that she desperately wanted to hold onto both her mom and her dad - considering she refused to even call them those monikers out loud.

When she had finished crying she was numb and placid, raw really, she had tried to get herself dressed but had struggled to put things on the correct way around and had nearly burst into tears again. David had swooped in and saved the day, distracting her by telling her about something stupid one of the newer deputies had done (resulting him ending up being chased down main street by a parrot) which had made her laugh despite herself.

She was only now realising that he had purposely distracted her.

Emma bit her lip as she was placed down, she continued to bite it as David left her side and Emma walked over to Snow, she realised a few seconds too late that her mother was waiting for her to say something.

"Da-," she stopped herself from calling David what she sometimes called him in her head, what she kept thinking of him as that day, and stumbled to change it before it came out, "David said we're going shopping."

Snow gave her a warm smile, Emma didn't wanted to talk about their talk in the laundry room, and for once Snow decided to go along with the slightly emotionally unhealthier option - though she wasn't sure whether it was (in this situation) the unhealthier version, she didn't think Emma would be able to have a long conversation about her soon to be sibling after all that had already happened that day.
"Yeah, we thought that we should get some things to make things around here easier for you, and I thought you might prefer some clothes which are more you… unless you'd like more like you're wearing." The twinkle in her eye assured Emma that she was joking.

"No!" Emma's words spilled out of her mouth loud and alarmed but the exaggerated expression assured Snow that she knew. They both gave a little laugh. It trailed off as Snow looked like she had an idea and wrote another thing down on her list. Emma looked down at her borrowed sneakers, they would have been the colour 'sparkly pink' had they not been grubby from presumably playing outside, they had multicultural princesses printed on them, Emma stared down at them, wriggling them as she did. She looked back up at Snow, biting her lip. "You are coming with us, right?"

Snow looked surprised, so surprised that she just looked at Emma for a second before she placed her pen down and took Emma's hands, her skin was soft, not yet dried or hardened by age. "Of course I am, honey. Me and your father aren't letting you out of our sight for a while, you gave us a worry." She dropped one of her hands in order to feel her head. Emma winced as she gently brushed it. "How's your head? Do you need medicine?"

Emma smiled softly at Snow's concern, she shook her head despite the slight distant pain which came from it. "Dad-vid, David he gave me medicine while you were in the shower." Her cheeks blushed from her slip but she valiantly pretended that she hadn't said slipped at all.

Snow tried, and failed, not to smile so intensely. "Okay." She said simply. She finally let go of Emma's hand and she could have sworn that Emma looked disappointed. She stood and slipped the list into her pocket as David came back into the kitchen.

"You girls ready to go?" He asked more as a pleasantry than an actual question, he scooped Emma up into his arms before Snow could try, not wanting the fear of his eight months pregnant wife walking three flights down with his twenty nine- no, three year old daughter in their arms, dreading them slipping and falling with each step.

Snow looked to Emma who nodded at her. "Yeah, let's go. I made a list."

David playfully rolled his eyes knowing that Snow would, list making was one of her main hobbies, she made hobbies for everything, and he loved her for it. He liked to tease her though so he did so now.

As Snow led the way, grabbing her station wagon keys, David lowered his voice for just Emma. "Let's see who can get the most things which aren't on the list." He proposed with a smile, and Emma smiled back, a big full smile which lit up her entire face, it had dimmed within seconds, but she looked a little happier at the thought of annoying Snow as a game. It would be worth any eye rolling Snow would later give him.

A/N :

Aww poor Emma experiencing so much sibling jealousy.

Henry will come into the fic in a few chapters, once Emma's had a little family time, and this will be a fic where Emma stays a child.

Plenty of fluff and some angst in the next chapter!

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