CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: TOUCHING THE VOID

(In which The Author contradicts the bullshit reasons to remove magic from the equation in the previous scene in order to reinsert magic into the equation... and then never explains how the fuck it make sense.)

Emma had always been a bit claustrophobic. She didn't like the dark either. But nothing would stop her from saving her son... and her son's father who was presently the same (roughly) age as him. As the crew from the fire truck lowered her down she tried not to think the worst, or dwell on the possibility that the mine would collapse on her head and she'd die under a pile of fairy dust blood diamonds that the Blue Fairy was apparently mining to hoard at her convent for some purpose that was almost certainly shady as shit and should have been investigated after the car accident... never mind informed the City Council that the stuff had to be transported using hazardous materials permits and road rules. What if Walter fell asleep parked on the creepy midnight supply train tracks? With their luck, the train would get transformed into a giant town-devouring magical centipede or something!

She really should look into what the deal was with that creepy midnight supply train she'd somehow been completely unaware of until the Second Curse, Emma considered, though, to be fair, she was only in town a couple of weeks aware that it was a crazy magical town before getting kicked out with fake memories, and then she'd clearly become too complacent and just accepted things that were seriously problematic and just laying in wait to turn into the next disaster if they didn't have some kind contingency plan beyond a 'no wearing corsets and cravats or waving fairy wands on Main Street' ordinance.

Some kind of mine safety board ought to be at the top of the list.

When Emma reached the main level where she'd almost died once by a Ring Pop of Doom, she swung herself toward the exterior cage door of the old lift, pried it open, and after giving a tug on the rope, disconnected her harness and headed into the tunnel, the light from her helmet bouncing off a path strewn with large rocks that had come dislodged from the walls and ceiling along with broken beams and twisted cart track.

"HENRY?" she called out. "KID, CAN YOU HEAR ME?"

Emma continued on for a good ten minutes in this fashion before she received an echoing response of, "MOM!'

"HENRY!"

She rushed in the direction of her son's voice.

"MOM, STOP!"

She did, just in time, avoiding stepping off into a crevasse. A rock, kicked by the toe of her boot, went over, and she noted it didn't make a sound, no indication of striking ground somewhere in the darkness bellow.

"Henry?"

"Here!"

Henry was up against the wall of the cave where the ground hadn't given way, his face covered in dirt.

"Kid, you have to make your way toward me. The fairy dust's made magic... unusable."

Henry nodded and carefully, keeping his back pressed against the wall of the tunnel, scooted toward her until he was well clear of the pit and then Emma pulled him into a tight embrace which he returned. It was several moments before she realized he was crying... and realized that he was alone in the cave.

"Henry, where's-"

"He fell," Henry managed to get out between sobs, pulling away. "He pulled me up and then the rest of the track gave away and I couldn't- he was just gone."

Emma's heart seized. The numbness she'd felt each time Neal left began to close in, the familiarity of it, and it was safe...

"You have to find him, Mom," Henry pleaded. "We can't leave him down there. He was my friend. He was my dad, even if he didn't remember. Promise you'll find him."

"I'm promise, Henry," Emma choked out, looking at the hole, remembering the Cannery. Magic had some fucked up sense of irony. And it seemed, no matter what, Neal was destined to die saving his family members. "But first let's get you out of here, okay?"

Henry didn't object, but he didn't say anything either as Emma guided him toward the elevator shaft and helped him into a harness. It took a few minutes to raise them up to the surface and August helped Henry get free and over to where Dr. Whale had arrived to assess injuries. She was glad that her parents, at least, weren't there, probably still at the dance, oblivious as they did an unintended and no doubt horrible homage to that Marty & Bobbi Culp SNL sketch.

"Send me back down," Emma stated, unwilling or unable to say that it wasn't to bring up the other boy as she had her son.

Once she was back in the shaft, Emma released the catch, repelling faster and further, past the mine's upper level... until she very nearly reached the end of line and the tunnel level bellow... where the old elevator had come to rest at the bottom. She had to climb down through its hatch and then pry open the damaged doors; there was no outer cage, being the bottom of the tunnel system. There were no strings of electrical lights on the walls here either, no tracks or other indication of modern Land Without Magic mining other than the elevator. In fact, it appeared to be a completely untouched, natural cave system at this level, the tunnel fairly wide and flat by the elevator but quickly narrowing and sloping into a maize of stalactites and stalagmites and dripping water that left Emma disoriented in the darkness with only the phosphorescent glow of lamplight bouncing off of the rock faces...

Until the light began flickering.

Swearing, Emma pulled her helmet off, dismayed to discover that water had somehow gotten into the battery compartment. She turned it upside down and tried to empty it only for the light to go out completely - and no amount of whacking and shaking the thing worked. Given Regina's near-splinching, she wondered briefly if the Blue Fairy had intentionally given her a faulty helmet in the hopes that she'd die down here with Baelfire

And then she was sobbing, slumped back against the slick wall of the cave, the numbness shattered by a tidal wave of anger and grief.

"Damn it, Neal!" she shouted. "Why do you keep doing this to me? How many goddamned times do I have to lose you!?"

She wasn't expecting an answer, and she didn't exactly receive one... but a faint white glow was suddenly cast on the cave wall in front of her. After momentary confusion, Emma found the glow coming from her... or against her, through the fabric of her shit. Reaching under the collar of her top, she pulled out the swan keychain, the small pendant shimmering with magic.

Heart pounding, Emma leapt to her feet, toward the wall... behind which was another passage.

The glow increased in brightness the further she went, until she emerged into a large cavern, the ceiling which was embedded with glowing crystals - aside from the gaping maw of a recent passage into the mining tunnels. And directly bellow... there was a pool of water, dark and reflecting the light like it was made of obsidian. The closer she stepped to the pool, the brighter the pendant glowed.

Without further thought, Emma stripped to her underwear and dove beneath the surface. The water was frigid and threatened to steal her breath, but she held on and continued down, the glow of the keychain illuminating her way... to the pale visage of a boy pinned beneath the a piece of twisted metal track. Grabbing hold, she pulled until the metal shifted and then lifting Baelfire under his arms, she kicked her way back up toward the shimmering glow, lungs burning for oxygen which she took in after breaking the surface with a sucking gasp before the weight she was carrying nearly pulled her back down.

Fighting her way to the edge of the pool and shivering from cold, Emma finally pulled the body of the boy who was her son's father onto the cave floor beneath the glowing crystals that looked so much, she realized, like the star map he'd made that got them home.

Desperate, she pushed on his chest, trying to restart his heart, with no avail. She tried breathing into his mouth, again with no response, and cursed at how easily her mother had revived "John Doe", how easily she'd saved Killian from that damned water trough, but for them there just never seemed to be enough time.

"Henry's okay," Emma spoke, her voice trembling, after finally slumping against a stalagmite with the unmoving and eerily pale teenage boy who wasn't really a teenage boy. "Even when you didn't know... you still risked your life for him. And I... I'm so sorry," she wept, cradling him as she had that horrible day in the forest. "I'm sorry I didn't choose you. I'm sorry I didn't even try to save you. I'm sorry I said I'd wished you were dead, and I'm sorry I didn't save you that day in the woods. I'm sorry that I spent all that time in the past worrying about my existence and then I had the chance to try to save you and I just... I didn't want to remember how much I missed you. I didn't... I didn't want to go through losing you again. I tried to convince myself that it would be wrong to take dying a hero away from you, but really, I took away Henry growing up with his dad. I took that away from him. And I took that from you. I took Tallahassee away from you. And I'm so sorry.

"I'm sorry that I didn't want to forgive you," Emma cried, "because I was so used to the pain and the anger. And I thought it made me strong, better somehow - when it really made me weak and mean. You were right. I'm the one who's the pathetic jerk. I thought not being with you was easier, but easier isn't better - and sometimes the hardest things in life are the best things. And you... you would have been the best, Neal. The best father, the best friend, the best... you were the best person I ever knew, Baelfire, and you deserved a second chance more than anyone-"

She choked back a sob. "I will always love you. I hope you know that, wherever you are - You will always be my Tallahassee."

Leaning down, she pressed her forehead against his-

As she did, the keychain fell against his chest and the glow intensified, a brilliant burst of light that illuminated the cavern as though it was filled with daylight. Just for a moment. The light infused Baelfire and when it faded, the boy was no more, back to the man he'd naturally grown to be - who sucked in a breath a moment later, brown eyes fluttering open and lips curving into a wry smile.

"No taksies backsies."

Emma let out a sputtering laugh as she helped Neal sit up. Shivering, she demanded, "Are you s-sure you're not still f-fifteen?"

"Pretty sure, but after a couple hundred years, it's hard to shake."

"Yeah, that's s-still weird for me."

"Says the woman sitting in a freezing cave of glowing magic crystals in her underwear. I like the rubber duckies."

"Sh-shut up."

"I'm totally seri-"

Emma pulled him into a tight hug, startling him a moment before he returned the gesture. She had loved his hugs, and it had broken her heart when Henry first hugged her and she knew he had Neal's hugs - and then Neal was there, and he was hugging her again, but she was too afraid to return it, to need that feeling again.

"Ducks? Really?" Regina's snarky voice startled them apart and Emma turned to find the former Evil Queen had a perfect view of her butt. "I knew you had a less than sophisticated wardrobe..."

Emma, refusing to acknowledge her red eyes and tearstained cheeks, shot back, "You're going to make sartorial comments about my underwear? Instead of commenting on Neal not being a kid anymore? Or asking about Henry?"

"It was just a matter of time," she shrugged. "And Puppet Boy radioed that Henry was fine."

"And you still came looking for me?" Neal asked, brows raising. "I'm touched."

"Don't be. I owed Rumple a favor," Regina scoffed, though her heart wasn't really in it. She did give Emma another look that was half bemused and half disgusted, though.

"I see it's colder than a Savior's t-"

"Just shut up and hand me my unsophisticated clothes, Regina."

Smirking, the dark-haired woman uttered, "As you wish," just for the responding glare she always got when making some taunting reference to Emma Swan's pirate mascot. It was said to be poor taste to speak ill of the dead, but Regina Mills had never cared about that.

AN: Borrowed a movie title for the chapter title. Sweet documentary. Since when has Emma ever demonstrated that she's claustrophobic? It's one of those intermittent retcon phobias! And, wow, I managed to find some bullshit way of avoiding TLK, wouldn't you know? Funny how that's not a thing anymore! And who'd just love to see Mary Margaret & David doing a Marty & Bobbi Culp impersonation for a mandatory assembly? Someone good at song mashups, please write that!

Next up: Graham has some cameo screentime and August has another vice on top of booze, gambling, and Thai hookers. Giggidy giggidy giggidy!