Good evening, new fandom. I've wanted to write basically since I binge-watched the whole show early last month, but it took me a while to actually settle on an idea I liked that no one else had (to my knowledge) covered. Basic ground rule for this story—at least, the early part of it: if I don't write about it, assume it happens as on the show up to unimportant and/or easily-guessed details, so we can all save time by looking at the bits which aren't the same. It should quickly be clear that most of said bits which aren't the same relate to Emma, her backstory and her worldview.

September 1990

This had to be the worst idea she's had in a very, very long time.

It had always been a possibility that it would turn out this way, of course—one thing Regina had learned very quickly upon her arrival in this realm, this strange world without magic was that it was far, far vaster than she had anticipated, on a scale and complexity beyond her immediate comprehension. At first, this had rather unnerved her, this idea that her kingdom, her victory, had been reduced to little more than a tiny—invisible, to be precise—speck on the map in one state of one country in a very big world.

But of course, there was that whole invisibility aspect—and since those first days, with that child and his father, not a single person had entered Storybrooke from the outside world. No one came, no one left, nothing ever changed in her—her—bubble of a town she'd created, not unless she wanted it to.

She'd won, and that was enough—wasn't it?

Well, if her current predicament was any indication, it should have been, and she was a fool to have ever been curious for more.

She huffed, twisting her neck around to peer at the irritatingly non-descript street signs. Peters Street, East Road—she bit down on a tired groan. What use was that when she didn't have so much as a map? Or a locator spell? Not that the latter would work, of course, not unless her Mercedes-Benz counted as an actual person (which, in fairness, it could, based on the fact that it was more useful than the overwhelming majority of actual people). Not to mention that she hadn't brought any with her on the curse-bound voyage to this land—and the only magic that worked in this realm was only that which she had brought with her. Like, for example, the silver enchanted bracelet that held just enough stored magic for her to poof herself back to her car... if only she knew where it was.

There was no other way to put it: Regina Mills, victorious Queen and Mayor, was lost in Boston.

She hadn't meant to get lost, of course. All she'd wanted to do was visit the city and gain some understanding of the world she'd deposited her kingdom into. But whilst photographs and maps had given her an intellectual sense of just how much larger Boston was than Storybrooke, nothing could have prepared her for actually being here—the concrete-steel-glass behemoths towering up, up, high into the pale blue; the endless cacophony of honking horns, roaring engines, animated conversations; the people. So, so, so many people, none of whom paid the slightest attention to the monarch from another realm.

It was overwhelming and she—well, she'd been overwhelmed.

She'd continued to wander from street to street for the last three hours in an attempt to regain her orientation, as the bright spring sun slowly lowered into a spring twilight, becoming more and more infuriated with her ever-worsening predicament. She'd walked until her feet had all but given out from under her, and now she was here, exhausted against a brick wall in a world she barely understood—

"Excuse me, miss, are you lost?"

Regina looked down to see curious green eyes, belonging to a blonde girl of no more than six, peering up at her. She blinked, then put on her most Mayoral smile. "Hello, young one. Why do you think I'm lost?"

"You look lost," the girl said simply—to a six-year-old, everything was probably simple. She held out a hand. "My name is Emma. What's yours?"

Regina's mouth fell open slightly, more than a little baffled by the child's… forwardness. In another realm, in another time, no one would have—

But she wasn't there right now, was she? She was here, in this world, and she was very, very lost.

She smiled and shook the girl's hand, gripping as firmly as she dared given that little Emma was six.

"My name is Regina."

September 2012

Emma Swan was pissed off.

This wasn't exactly unusual for her—Jessica had once joked that she had two modes: pissed off and really pissed off—but tonight she was seriously pissed off.

Okay, she was less pissed off now that she'd turned that asshole in, and breaking his nose had helped to boil off a little of the steam between her ears—

"Wait, wait. Your broke his nose? " Jess interrupted through the phone on the passenger's seat next to Emma. It was on speaker, meaning she could keep her eyes on the road as she made her way through the still-packed streets of inner-city Boston — she wasn't that bad a driver.

Emma laughed below her breath, a thin sort of chuckle. Maybe not so pissed off after all. "Yeah. Felt good."

"Remind me never to spill wine on your dress." Yeah. Because that was what this had been about. Of course.

What the hell do you know about family, huh—she shook her head.

"Couldn't he just have not run in the first place? Or come quietly? I would have—I mean, I wouldn't have broken his nose then."

"He was a mark. Not your boyfriend."

"Wanted to be, though." She remembered how he'd eyed her from head to toe, leering at her chest and hips for way too long, like she was—"Ugh. Why did I have to bring him in on my birthday?"

"Pretty sure that was your idea in the first place."

"Yeah, yeah." she grumbled. "Not like I had anything else to do."

A slight pause. "We could go out for a drink if you'd like. Or a coffee."

She bit her lower lip. She'd like to, but ... it was already past eight, her dress had an ugly dark streak on it, and she —"I'll see you tomorrow, Jess."

She almost— almost —heard a sigh from the other end. "Take care, Em. Happy birthday."

She drove on for about another twenty minutes in silence, parking her Bug beneath the half-illuminated concrete mass of her apartment block. The lift was out, so she took the many steps up to her fifth floor apartment, the repetitive clicking of her heels on the polished concrete the only noise to be heard. As always, the only lights on when she finally reached her apartment were the ones she turned on herself.

Once inside, she removed her heels (and thank goodness for that) and took out the one indulgence he'd allowed herself on her own birthday: a small white cupcake, lit by a single star candle she'd bought this morning.

"Another banner year," she murmured to the silently dancing flame, resting her chin on a silver bracelet on her wrist, the candlelight flickering off the thin plastic. Maybe this year, this year, that little bracelet would—no.

Magic couldn't give her what she wanted, not after twenty-two years. Even so, she exhaled, closed her eyes, blew out the flame, made a wish—

The doorbell rang.

Emma looked up at the dark-haired woman curiously as they shook hands, her grip strong and firm (for a six year old, at least).

"I like your name. Regina is a nice name," she said brightly. The woman simply blinked, her mouth repeatedly opening and closing.

"Thank you," Regina replied, wringing her hands as if rubbing something off them. "Where are your parents, Emma?"

Emma shrugged; the adults in her home, she knew by now that she was supposed to call them her parents, but—"They'll find me." She paused briefly, circling around to her original train of thought. "So are you lost?"

Regina sighed, her shoulders slumping slightly. "I suppose I am. This—this city is very large, and I'm afraid I'm not very familiar with—"

"Do you have a car?" Emma asked, only to earn a reproving glare so sharp she almost recoiled backwards—almost.

"You shouldn't talk while others are talking, Emma," Regina said, her voice firm but not—not unkind. "But yes, I have a car. Unfortunately, it seems that I've... I'm not sure where it is."

Emma gazed at her for a moment, lips pursed, before beaming up at Regina. "I'm good at finding things. I'll help you find your car. And help you be not lost."

And before Regina so much as had a chance to react, the child had grabbed her hand and was pulling down the street to the sound of whistling—

—whistling?

She opened her eyes, jerked awake by the unnatural noise. She sat up immediately as she filled with early-morning adrenaline, noting the small, hard cot beneath her, the brick walls, the metal bars in front of her—

She suppressed a groan. A jail cell. She was in a jail cell.

Well, it wasn't the first time she'd woken up in jail the day after her birthday. Although on previous occasions there had been good—or, at least, comprehensible—reasons for her to be there. Those had usually been alcohol related, but she didn't feel hungover, and she certainly hadn't been drunk yesterday. One apple cider—the best apple cider you've ever tasted, and it had been no lie—wasn't enough to get her buzzed, let alonedrunk.

She stood, her head still throbbing with the complaints of a sleep prematurely broken. There were two others in the room with her: a grizzled, grumpy-looking man in the adjacent jail cell called Leroy (Liam? Larry? She didn't quite catch it), and a kindly janitor who, apparently, knew who she was (already?) and was patently delighted about her entirely unintended incursion into her birth son's life.

"Actually, I was just dropping him off," she corrected him, rubbing her still rubbery-feeling forehead. She tuned out of the conversation, trying to recollect the events of the past twelve hours. Apparently, her birth son—whose existence she had essentially buried for the best part of a decade—had found her, was called Henry, and had dragged her across two state borders, telling her excitably the whole way about fairytales and curses and a saviour and all these other things that couldn't possibly be true. Nevertheless the kid believed in it—just like she had. Just like she had.

She'd kept her mouth shut the entire way.

Then she'd met Henry's adoptive (actual?) mother, the rather severe, dark-haired Mayor who had seemed simultaneously intimidating and... oddly familiar. Unnervingly so—despite the fact that Emma hadn't even caught her name.

Henry was certainly half-right about one other thing: this town was a weird, weird place. One that she would certainly not miss once she got out of this stupid jail cell. The jail cell she had been presumably shoved in by the man who had just entered the room. Emma glared at the Sherriff—Graham, she remembered—as he let out Leroy, before turning to her.

"Seriously?"

He spread his palms in what she guessed was his way of saying sorry without really apologising. "Regina's drinks: a little stronger than we thought."

Regina. That was the weirdly-familiar Mayor's name. Like the woman from her dream, like the woman who—

She blinked, forcing the errant train of thought off her rails. She was twenty-eight as of yesterday, not six. "I wasn't drunk. There was a wolf on the road," she explained and okay, she couldn't even blame Graham for looking sceptical.

"A wolf."

She opened her mouth to explain in more detailed and hopefully more believable terms, but she was overcut by a breathless, panicked voice entering the room, swiftly followed by the Mayor whom Emma now knew as Regina.

They both froze momentarily, equally taken aback by the other's presence.

Regina was the first to regain her voice. "What is she doing here? Do you know where Henry is?"

Emma sighed. So Henry had run away again—but of course he had, blood-and-flesh offspring of Emma Swan as he was. She knew a thing or two about running away.

And running away from a world convinced that you're crazy—oh, she definitely knew more than a thing or two about that.

It took Emma—having bargained her services for her release—the bulk of the morning to find Henry. Apparently the kid had tracked him down using a specialised website, paid for using a stolen credit card... which, okay, was credit card fraud in a more than technical sense and the sort of thing that she'd be all over like the proverbial ton of bricks in a professional capacity. Still, despite the exasperated sighs, she couldn't help glow with more than a little pride as a result. The kid had—well, maybe not good genes, but her genes at the very least.

She'd met the unwitting victim of said credit card fraud immediately afterwards, an expressly kind—if expressly thoughtless—schoolteacher named Mary Margaret. She'd mused that Henry's troubles stemmed from his status as adopted and abandoned—and hence, thoughtless. Still, the explanation definitely made sense, and a lot of it: constructing a whole world's worth of explanations as to why Emma would give him away, in Mary Margaret's words, was definitely something adopted kids did. Hell, she'd seen it in foster care—she'd done it herself back in the distant past.

But no. Henry didn't believe in his fairytale curse because he wanted to—in fact, the opposite was true. She could tell the difference; although she still had to run a simple test to confirm her theory once she'd found him, down at a small playground by the sea.

"You left this in my car," she told him as she sat next to him, handing over the thick, leatherbound storybook as their legs swung over the edge. She gazed over to the broken clocktower. "Still hasn't moved, huh?"

"I was hoping that when I brought you back, things would change here. That the final battle would begin."

She sighed. "I'm not fighting any battles, kid." Except with—well, with things too vast and complicated to describe in a few words to a ten-year-old.

"Yes you are. Because it's your destiny. You're going to bring back the happy endings."

Damn, the kid really, really believed in this book. "Can you—" She stopped herself, her brain red-flagging her tongue before it could complete the sentence. "Can I ask you something? About that book of yours."

His face brightened at once. "Sure."

"It—your mom. It says she's—"

"The Evil Queen." He nodded somberly, his face a picture of seriousness.

And Emma felt absurd, but—"Right. But she still loves you, yeah?"

"No!" It was a half-yell, too quick to be anything other than utterly sincere, and—oh, shit. "She can't love me. She's evil."

Emma breathed in once, breathed out once. Okay. Maybe her theory wasn't so good, maybe this really was just a construction to help him deal with his mother—both of them, in fact. "What about you? Do you love her?"

A pause. A fidget. Two fingers running down the side of the leather backing of the book. "No," he said, stiff, almost mechanical.

Bingo. "Remember my superpower, kid?"

More fidgeting. "She's evil." But this time it was mumbled, eyes downcast, totally lacking the conviction from before. As if he was talking to himself more than her.

She placed a hand on his shoulder, squeezed. "She's your mom." She pushed herself off the playground. "Come on, let's go."

"But—no!" He followed immediately, darting around in front of her to block her path back to the Bug. "Please don't take me there. Just stay with me for one week. That's all I ask. One week, and you'll see I'm not crazy."

She froze.

You'll see I'm not crazy—

It's all real—

Why don't you believe me—

The words echoed in her head, rebounding over and over, mixing and merging with voices she hadn't heard in years. She squatted down, meeting her son's eyes on a dead level plane. "I don't think you're crazy."

His eyes widened, sparkling as hopeful surprise overtook his face. "So you believe me?"

She pursed her lips, studying his open, hopeful features, unalike yet alike her own, and placed both hands on his shoulder-blades. "One week. Deal?"

"Deal."

The call came just after dinner as she settled into her abode for the next week at the local bed-and-breakfast. Whilst it wasn't a surprise, the caller ID still produced an unpleasant twist in her stomach. Fuck.

"Hi, Jess."

"So where the fuck have you been?"

And Jess made fun of Emma's temper. Still, Emma couldn't help but feel like a shitty excuse of a business partner, having run off three hundred miles and made her deal with all their clients on her own. "It's a long story."

"Emma."

She sighed. "Fine. Short version? My kid who I hadn't seen in ten years shows up at my apartment, drags me to Maine, makes me promise to stay a week."

A long, multi-second silence. "You're kidding."

"Nope."

"Your son. The one you gave away."

She locked her jaw silently, the hard reality of that fact having failed to dull its edge over the course of the day. "Yeah." She twirled one of her blonde locks around a finger. "Sorry about, y'know, today."

"It's fine," Jess immediately replied, although her voice still retained a little of her previous irritation. "How is he?"

"He's..." She paused, biting her lip. "We've really only just met. I barely know him at all. His name's Henry."

"And parents? I mean—" Jess instantly corrected herself, a hint of bashfulness creeping in through the line. "Does he have parents?"

"He has a mother—an adoptive mother, I mean. She's actually the Mayor."

"Jesus. Is she one of those super-uptight types?"

Emma snorted, remembering the confrontation she'd had with Regina after she'd dropped Henry back at the house for the second time in less than a full day. Strict she could understand, protective made sense, but I will destroy you if it is the last thing I do—"And then some. Serious piece of work."

"Shit. Well, you have fun with that," Jess said, irritation now replaced entirely by amusement. "Oh, and Emma?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm happy for you."

Emma sat up slightly, her brow creasing. "What—really?" What happened to where the fuck have you been?

"You got family for your birthday. It doesn't get better than that."

She settled back down, a lazy smile now painted across her features. "Yeah. I guess so. Bye, Jess."

"Take care, Em."

She ended the call and placed her cellphone on her bedside table, the smile having failed to leave her face. She turned over onto her side and readied herself to sleep—but before she closed her eyes, she dug out her right wrist from under her and held it before her eyes. The bracelet, silver, glittering, seemed to shine even in the dim moonlight streaming through the open window. The bracelet she'd made a wish on, not twenty-four hours in the past.

"I was right," she murmured, stroking a finger across its circumference, her smile reflecting a deep, fierce warmth that she couldn't place from memory. "I was right all along."