Dr. Whale set down the paddles on the tray. Another battle won in the fight for Henry's life. The steady blip indicating sinus rhythm sounded almost cheerful after the organized chaos from a few minutes ago. He peered up at the clock through suddenly blurred vision: 3:23 AM. He'd been at the hospital for over fifteen hours. "I need some shut eye," he announced to no one in particular. "I'll be in the on call room if there is an emergency, and I do mean a real emergency." Shuffling through the glass doors, Whale noticed the lack of either of Henry's mothers in the waiting room. He soundlessly cursed them and their idiotic rivalry for Henry's affections; the boy had enough love for a hundred mothers. What he needed right now was one of them sitting at his side, holding his hand, and telling him everything was going to be fine. Because Whale knew different: since they didn't know what had done this to Henry, they were playing a game of 'treat the symptoms not the cause'. And doctors inevitably were the losers in that game.
Henry's immortal soul is in danger. Whether or not he had been baptized was unclear; neither he nor his mothers attended church with any sort of regularity. He also did not attend catechism classes. Reul was quite afraid that this poor young boy was going to Hell. But she could change that. It was obvious that the boy was going to die. Dr. Whale was good, but this illness had no name, no onset of symptoms, no obvious signs. He was battling God for the boy's life, and God always won. But before that, Henry needed to become one with God. Ideally, a priest would be here, but neither of Henry's mothers had called one in. The nun firmly believed that faith was far more important in these rites than maleness; she would baptize the child and give him the sacrament of the anointing of the sick as best as possible given the circumstances. God would understand.
In a lull between nurses reading vital signs, the nun crept up to the boy's side. "Your parents should be here for this, and god parents. But this will have to do," she whispered. "The Christian community welcomes you with great joy. In its name I claim you for Christ our Savior by the sign of his cross. I now trace the cross on your forehead." She drew a cross in holy water on Henry's forehead. "I ask our Lord Jesus Christ to look lovingly on this child who is to be baptized. By the mystery of your death and resurrection, bathe this child in light, give him the new life of baptism and welcome him into your holy Church." She bowed her head over the still body and recited a decade of the rosary, the mantras of the Hail Mary and Lord's Prayer soothing her troubled thoughts. Henry was such a nice young man; Reul struggled with accepting that Jesus was calling him home. She drew another cross on the boy's head, and placed one hand on his forehead and another over his heart. "Through this holy anointing may the Lord in his love and mercy help you with the grace of the Holy Spirit. May the Lord who frees you from sin save you and raise you up."
As yet another nurse made her rounds to read the machines, the Mother Superior retreated from Henry's bedside. Her rosary beads slipped one by one through her fingers as she prayed for the boy's soul, his mothers, for those that loved him. The boy might die, but at least they would have the comfort that she had saved him from Hell.
Marcie Johnson woke up when the front door clicked closed. She padded to the window to see her son, PJ, loping down the street in the direction of Fiona MacDonald's house. She hoped they were being careful. Having a child at 23 when you already had your nursing degree and you had a husband with a good paying full time job was difficult enough. But getting pregnant while still in high school? With an education that only entitled you to a job that required you to ask 'do you prefer paper or plastic?' or 'would you like fries with that?' She wanted better than that for her children. For her grandchildren (may they come far in the future).
A flash of light caught Marcie's eye and she turned her head to see PJ's best friend, Robby, settle into the couch in his living room next door. Robby's little brother, Mark, jumped onto his brother's lap. Two brothers watching early morning cartoons. Norman Rockwell wouldn't have painted it, but he should have. Life is too fleeting not to appreciate the wonder of an eighteen year old spending time with his eight year old brother. She whispered a prayer for Henry Mills who, after all, wasn't that much older than Mark. And who quite likely was never going to watch another early morning cartoon.
He was surrounded by the dead in some sort of dungeon like morgue. Everything was black, white, or a shade of gray except for the brilliant green moss growing on the stone walls and a deep blue glow hovering under the sheets where the corpses' hearts would be. It was cold and damp, like there was somehow a fine mist floating about the room. His feet squelched in his shoes, and his hair clung lankly to his head as he turned in a circle. No windows, no doors, just an endlessly long corridor filled with gurneys and no life. A hand touched his shoulder and he jumped, swallowed his scream of terror. "Dr. Whale? Wake up! Henry's crashing again."
His nurses were efficient. The room had been cleaned while he slept, the trays of epinephrine and other drugs in the cart restocked, a new bag of saline dripped into Henry's body. One woman was doing chest compressions while another monitored his oxygen levels. "Call his mothers," Whale ordered. "They need to be here. Now." And the battle was on.
The fight for a life was never routine. And yet there was a rhythm to it. A doctor once described treating cancer patients as a delicate balance. You poisoned the patient and hoped that you gave him enough to kill the cancer instead of the patient. The same worked in the ER. You give too much of a life saving drug or you set the defibrillator too high and you kill your patient. You do too little and you kill the patient. The monitor blared its steady monotone, minute after minute. And sometimes, no matter what you do, your patients just die; Whale finally admitted defeat as Nurse Johnson quietly called out, "He's been down fifteen minutes, Doctor."
"Time of death: 8:12."
'Death be not proud.' Donne got that right. Death? You stole this child too soon from us. He wasn't done yet, had barely lived. Damn right you better not be proud of what you've done. The room was quiet except for the machines' beeps and the occasional sniffle that slipped past professional medical deportment. They would all cry later, alone and unseen, for the child they had failed to save. But for now they still had a job to do.
Dr. Whale and the Mother Superior left the room, exhausted both physically and mentally, only to see Henry's mothers finally back from wherever they had spent the night. They mouthed the platitudes their professions told them they must. "We did everything we could." "I'm sorry." Empty words, empty empathy, one size fits all phrases designed to help the speaker cope, not the listener.
Reul added in a jab, "You're too late." An extra bit of guilt added on to the mothers who abandoned their child in his greatest hours of need. Solomon, with all his wisdom, awarded the child to the woman who was willing to give up her baby to a stranger rather than see him dead. But these women? Regina and Emma had been fighting over Henry for months and apparently neither were willing to stay with him as he fought for his life. They didn't deserve him, neither of them. And now Henry was safe with God, saved from Hell by baptism and the last rites. Saved from the mothers whose rivalry was more important than their child.
Emma approached Henry's body as a nurse removed the last bits connecting him to machines. You can't be dead. I fought a dragon for you! With Prince Charming's sword! In the past 24 hours, her world had turned upside down and inside out. Emma was a firm believer that life sucked, people sucked, and no matter how awesome an opportunity or a person seemed at first, you were going to one day wake up and be disappointed. Here was the shining proof: her son lying dead at the hands of his other mother because Emma had refused to believe in the unbelievable. With tears dripping down her face, Emma leaned over her son's body and whispered, "I love you Henry." And she pressed a gentle kiss to his forehead.
Dr. Whale was a scientist; he knew that rainbows were just light refracted by an object like a crystal or water droplet. They had no physical form; you could shine one on your skin and not feel it. But this rainbow was different. This visible wave of energy rushed out from Henry's body and physically slammed through him like a punch in the gut. Except that this punch was to his mind, to whatever had shielded the memories of who he really was.
The rainbow spread out throughout the entire town, waking their minds up from over 28 years of slumber. They frantically sought to reconcile who they had been with who they were now. A loyal follower of Princess Snow White reduced to a town drunk. A prince became a fisherman. A knight fared poorly as a flower seller. A king who lorded over all as a district attorney. A princess noted for her beauty reviled as an unwed mother. The Dark One's true love who didn't even know her own name. An original power living the life of a penitent. The people took to the streets as their memories returned. Parents sought out their children. Brothers looked for sisters. Everyone was anxious to find their loved ones, make sure they were safe. They needed to know who was here and who had been left behind. Exuberance that the curse was broken filled their souls. Many tears of happiness were shed as loved ones were reunited. But throughout the celebration of Emma's success, an undercurrent of hatred towards the Evil Queen grew. The slightest push could alter this festive crowd to a mob screaming for brutal justice.
The push arrived as a roiling cloud of purple smoke that engulfed the town bringing yet another change to the Town of Storybrooke.