Note – Apologies for the long time between posting chapters. I haven't been well so haven't been able to write much.
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A cloud of purple smoke heralded Regina's reappearance in the Sheriff's office. By this time David was pacing impatiently around the room. "What took you so long?" he snapped, uncharacteristically peeved due to his concern for his daughter.
Taken aback for a fraction of a second by David's unexpected vehemence, Regina was quick to compose herself and snarled even more aggressively, "Well, do you want my help or not? It's not like the ingredients gathered themselves or anything."
"Sorry," David mumbled.
Regina made no indication that she had heard him. Instead, she placed a bowl on a desk near a large area of bare floor and started to pour ingredients from different bottles into the receptacle. "I need something that you know Ms Swan has touched or held as well," she said, without pausing in her task.
David silently went to Emma's desk and picked up the pen that he knew she favoured using. He went to hand it to Regina but she indicated, with a nod of her head, that he should place it beside the bowl. He then wisely took a step back to give Regina space to work.
It didn't take her long to combine all the necessary ingredients – it was obvious that she was working as quickly as possible – before finally picking up the pen and placing it in the bowl. Regina gestured over the bowl and concentrated – abruptly the pen dissolved and mixed in with the other ingredients. Snatching up the bowl, Regina ordered David to stand back before pouring the contents of the bowl onto the floor.
To David's amazement, the contents of the bowl transformed itself into a purple mist that took on the shape of the Storybrooke region. Regina held out her hands over this miniature map and, closing her eyes, began to concentrate. She pushed all concerns that Emma may have left the area from her thoughts and fixed an image of the young blonde in her mind's eye. For some inexplicable reason Regina felt a sense of urgency about completing the spell as if she could sense something terribly wrong was about to happen.
In what seemed to be a age but was really barely a minute, a green dot began to coalesce at the edge of magic boundary. "There," said David, anxiety straining the eagerness in his voice.
Regina opened her eyes and looked down, allowing herself a small smile of satisfaction at casting the spell successfully. She took a long step over to David and grabbed his arm. "We won't appear next to her but she won't be far away from us," she stated before making another gesture. This time both she and David disappeared in a swirling cloud of purple smoke.
On the floor in the Sheriff's office, the green dot slowly turned red as the purple map disintegrated into nothingness.
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Regina and David rematerialised not far from where Emma's car was parked. "Promising," Regina muttered as she let go of David's arm and stalked over to where the yellow bug sat. "Now what would you be coming all the way out here for, Ms Swan?" she mused, looking around at the surrounding forest. "Did you plan to slip across the border here? But why not choose a way that let you drive instead of walking? It doesn't make sense." The mayor frowned, deep in thought, trying to discern Emma's motives behind her actions.
Meanwhile David had been employing his tracking skills and had been scouting around, looking for clues that would indicate the direction that Emma had taken. It didn't take him long to spot a freshly broken twig at the side of a natural pathway that wended its way deeper into the forest. Worried about the well-being of his daughter David called out "over here" to Regina before starting to follow the path. More evidence of someone's passage along the trail confirmed his initial deduction so David hastened his pace, focussing on hopefully reaching Emma as quickly as possible.
Regina was close behind. Though she would never admit it, she was extremely worried about Emma's well-being. She still couldn't think of any good reason why the young woman would have come to this area – as Emma had uncharacteristically chosen to abandon her son at the diner, all Regina could envision where darker motives behind Emma's actions. This was not good and Regina felt that, somehow, she herself was partly responsible for whatever had driven Emma to come to this remote location. Regina had never considered Emma to be overly sensitive so she hadn't felt any necessity to temper her reaction to Emma's destruction of her relationship with Robin. But maybe her reaction had injured something more than Emma's immediate feelings – maybe she had wounded something deeper. That kiss. Maybe if she had been able to respond to it more quickly... But then she hadn't had any inkling that she might actually reciprocate such feelings – even now she was uncertain of her feelings. All she knew for certain now was that she was worried about Emma and she hoped above all that the girl was alright.
The trail wasn't as long as they had both assumed it would be so it wasn't long before they came upon the clearing where Emma was. It wasn't immediately apparent where Emma was so they both spent several long seconds scanning the area as they walked into the open glade.
Regina was the first to make the sickening discovery. "There," she cried, pointing towards the pile of blood-splattered rocks which displayed Emma's mangled body. David started to run across the clearing towards his daughter but Regina used magic to materialise next to Emma. She immediately checked for a pulse and was immensely relieved to discover that there was one present, albeit a very faint one. Seeing the extent of Emma's external injuries, Regina sent tendrils of magic trickling through Emma's body, attempting to do what she could to mend what had been so severely damaged.
"What happened?" David asked as he reached the rocks. "Who did this? What can we do? Can I help?" He was horrified by the scene before him. It was a gruesome enough spectacle without the added fact that this was his daughter sprawled before him.
Regina was focussing as much of her attention as possible to keeping Emma alive so she had little time for Charming's barrage of questions. Through gritted teeth, she grated, "I haven't enough magic to fix her. I can get her to hospital but I can't take you too."
"But how will I get back?"
"Be creative." Regina took one of Emma's hands and concentrated on casting the spell. The purple cloud was slow to coalesce but eventually obscured the two figures before David. Then the cloud dissipated, leaving David alone beside the bloody rocks.
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A purple cloud formed beside the hospital reception desk. It disappeared, leaving an exhausted Regina and mortally injured Emma behind. Regina slowly looked up at the startled nurses standing nearby. "Please," she whispered weakly, "help her." Then Regina collapsed unconscious beside Emma, her magic completely drained.