Title: Vengeance, Sacrifice, and Forgiveness
Author: AoN
Word Count: 4,400
Genre: Drama, Adventure
Rating: PG-13
Feedback: Please and thank you! Let me know what I'm doing right or doing wrong.
Summary: With the Evil Queen's curse weakening and Regina struggling to keep Storybrooke under control, hidden secrets and lies from long ago are beginning to surface – and they want their happily ever after.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Eyes still planted on the winged beast in the sky, Emma quickly climbed into the driver's seat of the patrol car without another word to August, who had tried to round the back of the unit to get to the front passenger's door. Just as he pulled open the door, Emma stepped on the accelerator, flinging the car forward. A quick slam of the break jerked the car to a halt. Emma turned to August as he joined her.
"What are you doing?" she demanded.
"Do you really think I'm going to let you chase after a dragon by yourself?" August shot back, something Emma never imagined she would ever hear.
Without responding, Emma turned her attention forward and pushed the accelerator once more while August fumbled to buckle his seatbelt. She was leaning towards the steering wheel, her eyes maneuvering between watching the already damaged street, due to the various earthquakes, and the winged beast in the sky.
"Watch the road, I'll keep an eye on the dragon," August said, leaning over the dashboard.
Emma sat back slightly, which did make driving the patrol unit between large cracks and frantic citizens of the town that seemed to be falling apart much easier, but she did sneak a glance or two at the sky. It was difficult to wrap her head around the scenario: they were following a dragon. A dragon. A winged mystical beast that was only supposed to exist in fairytales – only in fairytales.
Suddenly, Mr. Gold's urgent call was in the back of her mind, no longer as important.
With another fierce, screeching roar, fire erupted from the dragon's mouth, as if to refute any logic onto which Emma was subconsciously clinging. This creature was real and it was dangerous.
And she was chasing it. A real, fire-breathing dragon. They were chasing after a real, fire-breathing dragon. Had they gone insane? What was their plan exactly if they possibly did end up catching the thing? They were not capable, or armed, to fight off a dragon. Well, Emma did have a gun, but would that even do any damage?
They were stupid, complete idiots for going after this thing, Emma thought, taking a quick glance over towards August.
He was not talking her out of this. No, instead, August was by her side, and he was not at all panicking, not even surprised by the creature. He was not questioning its being, not even questioning his own sanity for that matter – unlike Emma, who still had a hard time wrapping her mind around the idea of people morphing into wolves.
People morphing into wolves. Dragons flying in the sky. Fairytale characters trapped in a reality that was not their own. Everything Henry had been telling her, the delusion she had been feeding – it was all true, wasn't it?
"It's heading towards the residential area," August stated, disrupting her frantic train of thought for the time being.
Eyes locked on the road ahead, Emma failed to see the sight in the patrol unit's rearview mirror as they speed past Granny's Bed and Breakfast: Mary Margaret, who had been standing on the sidewalk, running out onto the street, shouting her name.
All she saw was the dragon that would possibly harm – even kill – so many innocent people and the sickening feeling in the pit of her stomach told her that she was one of the few able to stop it.
Emma could hear Henry's eager voice echoing in her mind: 'You're the savior! You're going to bring back the happy endings!'
xxxx
"Rumpelstilskin?" Ruby repeated as Lucy finally looked away from the old stuffed bear that had been placed on the shelf once more.
Lucy nodded slightly, but stopped in mid-turn, looking out Henry's bedroom window that faced towards the street. Something in the distance caught the corner of her eye, caught her attention. She took a step closer to the window as Henry, curiosity getting the best of the kid, tried to move nearer for a better look as well. Ruby, seeing Lucy's eyebrows furrow and lips purse together, placed a hand on Henry's shoulder, stopping him in his tracks.
Something was not right.
"Lucy?" Ruby said, trying to get her attention.
"We got to get out of here," Lucy replied with urgency, frowning. This day was showing absolutely no sign of calming down. Escaping a modern day dungeon, being hunted down by a werewolf, narrowly getting away from the Dark One himself, and now this. "Now," she commanded.
"Why? What's going-" Henry began to ask as Lucy grabbed a hold of his and Ruby's shoulder to whirl them both around.
Wincing, Lucy pushed them towards the bedroom door and into the hallway. At least Ruby was complying. Henry proved to be another story entirely. "Dragon," she answered through gritted teeth.
"A dragon!?" Henry repeated, excited. This was it! This was the confirmation for which he had been looking – more confirmation that everything he had been saying was true. Werewolves and now a real dragon! Fairytales were real. The book was real. The curse was real. He attempted to turn around, but Ruby quickly knelt down and grabbed him around the middle, lifting him off his feet as she stressed that they had to get out of here. There was no time for the young boy's curiosity, but he was about to learn first hand the real dangers of a beast that was not suppose to exist in this world.
It was heading directly for the manor and Lucy did not have the same level of faith in Mr. Bear as Lily once blindly had. The bear was not about to magically produce a sword and protect them all. Not to mention, the last time Mr. Bear fought off a dragon, according to a story that she never questioned, he had the stuffing ripped out of him.
At the time, Lucy did not make the connection. She realized years later, when she was older, that it was not Mr. Bear who defeated the dragon. It could not have been. He had been torn to shreds. The valiant slayer of the imaginary dragon, although she never had taken the credit for it, had been Regina.
Unfortunately for them, Regina was currently not around.
Reaching the top of the stairs, Ruby set Henry down on his feet and he quickly lead them down the steps. The seriousness in Ruby's tone had set him straight, made him realize that their safety was in jeopardy. Lucy lingered behind and glanced over her shoulder before following after the two.
Lucy made it half way down the flight of stairs when the screeching roar of the feared beast echoed from the room from which they had been fleeing. The roar was followed by the shattering of glass and the ripping and snapping of timber as the dragon crashed through the exterior wall, shaking the rest of the house.
Grabbing a hold of the rail, Lucy knelt down, tucking her head close to her chest, and did not look up until the shaking subsided. Ruby had thrown herself over Henry who was clutching onto her, eyes closed shut equally as tight as the grasp around the former waitress.
Standing up straight, Lucy met Ruby's gaze, a silent confirmation that they were all okay. Lucy jerked her head towards the door. Ruby nodded and nudged the frightened Henry, but he did not budge. He was too scared to move.
"Come on, Henry, we gotta get out of here," Ruby urged as Lucy flew down the rest of the stairs.
She knelt down in front of the boy whose reality now terrified him. A dragon was upstairs, destroying his childhood bedroom, destroying his home. Lucy leaned to his ear and whispered words of encouragement that made him relax, a secret that earned a puzzled look, and a set of instructions that made him nod. There was no sign of weakness that she had demonstrated earlier in the backyard. It had been a slip and it had disappeared. She could not be weak, not when people needed her to be strong.
"Alright, good," Lucy murmured with a reassuring grin as she stood up straight, glancing at Ruby who smiled meekly in return. At least Lucy knew she had someone to fall back on during those momentary slips. A friend. "Now, let's go."
Ruby placed her hands on Henry's shoulders, who had stood up also, and needlessly lead him towards the front door of the manor, which he unlocked and opened. Lucy followed a few steps behind. Ruby and Henry stepped outside with ease, but the door immediately slammed shut on its own accord before Lucy could make it to the doorway. She grabbed a hold of the handle as the lock clicked in place. Lucy pulled on the door, on the lock, but neither of them budge. The violent knocking and yanking from the other side confirmed that Ruby and Henry did not have much luck either.
"My, my, my," came the drawl of an unfamiliar voice from the top of the stairs, causing Lucy to turn around.
xxxx
Ruby pounded against the front door until she could no longer feel her fists, yanked at the handle until her fingers ached uncontrollably. The door did not move, not even when Henry had tried to unlock it with the spare key hidden under the doormat. It was magicked into place and Lucy was trapped inside.
She took a step back to assess the situation, trying to keep a calm, clear mind. Henry, on the other hand, continued the futile rampage against the door. He only stopped when he heard the screeching of the patrol unit's breaks. Ruby glanced over her shoulder as Henry ran past her, towards Emma and August who were climbing out of the car.
Henry hurled himself against Emma, his voice echoing that Lucy was trapped inside as August jogged over to Ruby's side. Ruby picked up one of the decently sized potted flowers from the front porch – not too big, not too small. It was the perfect size to hurl against the window, but it bounced off glass.
Whatever was keeping the door sealed tightly was protecting the windows from any sort of invasion as well apparently. The entire house was in lock down. Ruby should have known it would not have been that easy.
"Lucy's still inside?" August asked.
Ruby bit back a snarky remarked. Now was not the time for that. "Trapped," she corrected. "There's a shield around the house."
"How do we break it?"
"If I knew the answer, do you think it'd still be up?" Ruby snapped. August merited it.
"You have to save her, Emma," Henry begged as he pulled away from the sheriff.
Emma bit down on her lip, looking away from Henry, away from the panic in his eyes that she desperately wanted to disappear, and towards the bickering August and Ruby. Things were getting nowhere fast and she knew what she had to do. "Stay here, kid," she instructed before marching past the two, their snide quickly subsiding as she did.
Before Ruby could fill Emma in, Emma had walked up to the front door and delivered a swift kick, just below the handle, causing it to swing wide open. Not wasting any time, Emma quickly proceeded inside, gun in hand. Ruby turned to August, but before she could ask how and before he could respond with one simple word, 'savior,' the two of them were swept off their feet and sent hurling towards the sidewalk.
Henry knelt down over Ruby, asking her if she was alright. Ruby, with a slight wince, nodded as she pushed herself up to a sitting position. August pulled himself up onto his feet and charged towards the house once more. He had a promise to keep, a promise that he had long ago abandoned for his own selfish intentions, but as soon as he approached the door, he was forced back once more by an invisible wave.
They were up against magic.
"Damnit!" August groaned, slamming his fists against the ground. How could he have let Emma run in by herself? How could-
"Mom!" Henry shouted.
August felt his heart painfully skip a beat as he looked up towards the front door, not knowing what to expect, perhaps maybe even the worst, but there was nothing. Eyebrows furrowing, August turned his head towards Henry who was now being embraced tightly by the town's mayor. Ruby had pulled herself off to the side, allowing the two a little bit of space. A part of her wanted to rip Henry away from the Evil Queen, but Ruby could still hear Lucy fiercely defending her and all Ruby could see now was a mother worried about her son. She had to force herself to look elsewhere.
Regina did not want to let go of Henry. Given all that was occurring in Storybrooke, he had been all that she could think about the moment the house alarm had been tripped. She had expected the worst, for him to be captured by enemies. For him to be…
All of a sudden, Henry forcefully pulled himself away from her. Regina did her best to not look the least bit hurt by his actions. She had been building this defense against this new behavior of his since it had first appeared. She had gotten rather good at masking the hurt he caused every time he kept a secret from her, every time he called her evil, and every time he refused to acknowledge any love that he once had for her.
But this time, it was not any of those thing. Henry had pulled away from the hug to dig through his pockets. His scrunched up, concerned face informed that whatever matter was currently at hand, it was of the utmost importance.
"Here it is!" Henry said, triumphantly, fishing out the metal ring from his front pocket. He did not know the ring's significance, but when Regina's face fell at the sight of it, he suddenly knew that it was great. He took a hold of Regina's wrist, forcing her to out her hand before he placed the ring against her palm.
xxxx
Standing on the top step was a woman, who Lucy would not put past Regina's age, leaning slightly against her staff, dressed in a purple gown that followed to the floor. A dark headpiece rested in her blonde curls, giving the impression that she had horns. A faint smirk tugged on her thin lips as she scanned Lucy up and down.
"How the little lily flower has grown," she said, her voice laced with a fake sense of affection and fondness for the child she had never knew first hand. It made the hairs on the back of Lucy's neck stand on end. "Truth be told, I was not expecting you to be, well, alive – it's astonishing how much you resemble mommy dearest."
"Who are you exactly?" Lucy questioned, taking a couple steps away from the door and towards the stairs. Her narrowed eyes watched the bemused stranger carefully. This was the dragon. It was not too hard to believe, not from someone who transformed into a wolf every now and again.
The sorceress – Lucy guessed she was a sorceress since not too many people carried around a staff all willy-nilly – took a few steps down slowly. "Oh darling, you don't recognize your dear auntie Maleficent? Now, that hurts…" she said, feinting dismay.
Maleficent. Lucy tilted her head slightly, eyes never leaving their target. It took a moment for the name to ring a bell. Once it did, Lucy did not allow any facial features to betray her calm façade. The sudden realization went unnoticed.
She had heard the name before, whispered in hushed voices in the forest from traveler to traveler. Maleficent, the most wicked of all fairy godmothers. Known as the Mistress of Evil to the good fairies who denounced her and refused to acknowledge that they were of the same magical species.
"I'm a dear friend of your mother – well, until recently, that is," Maleficent corrected herself. "But that is an issue I will be taking up with her personally. You think she would have been more considerate."
The ongoing knocking against the door had turned into background noise that they were both now ignoring.
Lucy's nose wrinkled as she shook her head. "What are you talking about?" she asked, jumping slightly at the sound of a flower pot clashing into a window – another one of Ruby's attempt to get back inside. The sound of cracking glass did not follow. Ruby failed to break through, causing Maleficent to chuckle lightly.
No one was about to enter. Nor would anyone be able to exit, not unless Maleficent had any say in the matter.
"Twenty eight years," Maleficent stated. "She left me stuck in that form for twenty eight years, trapped in those old mines that reeked of dwarves," she hissed, reaching the bottom of the stairs.
Lucy still had not moved from her spot.
"I assume you know exactly how that feels, don't you, dear?" Maleficent asked, her wicked smirk growing as Lucy's frown became deeper. "How long have you been running around that filthy forest on four paws? It's been longer than twenty eight years, hasn't it?"
"How-"
"Oh, consider me your fairy godmother of sorts – Auntie knows all about you and all about your mommy dearest," Maleficent pointed out. "I taught her, you know, and this is how she repays me. Trapping me underground for all those years, chained like I was just some disgusting animal."
"Taught her?" Lucy repeated. "Dark magic? You turned her into-"
"Oh no, little Lily," Maleficent interrupted after a short bout of laughter. "You. It was you. You've known all along, haven't you?" she taunted. No, this had not been the encounter Maleficent had expected. She would have much rather be staring the powerless Regina down, making her wither in unspeakable pain for what she did, but this was equally as fun and the out come would be the same. Little Lily was not going anywhere, she reassured herself as her grasp around her staff tightened.
"You just haven't been able to come to terms with the revelation, isn't that right?" Maleficent pressed on.
"Don't," Lucy murmured, shaking her head. Her eyes were stinging and her mouth had suddenly gone dry. She felt sick to her stomach. It was a reality that had attempted to cross her mind every now and again, one that she had gotten good at pushing away. She could not accept it, even if it was an accusation riddled with truth. The implications were too heavy for any single person to withstand.
"The guilt," Maleficent added. "That all of this… Everyone's suffering is your fault."
"It wasn't-" Lucy snapped, her voice close to shrilling. It would have given Maleficent much more amusement had the door not managed to bust in. It did not take long to fix, of course. In a split second, access to the outside world was once more blocked.
But now there was a pest to be dealt with. Maleficent met their new guest with a repulsive sneer, as if she had just discovered there was a fly in her soup or another one of those goody fairies magicked another happily ever after. Lucy, on the other hand, could not have looked more concerned even if she tried.
Any sense of blame Maleficent had casted upon her had instantly vanished. There was only one thing on her mind: Emma's safety, something she had, unbeknownst to Snow, had promised.
A safety that was immediately placed at risk the moment Emma had taken out her gun. Emma had good intentions, yes, Lucy would admit, but at the given moment, she would not have thought twice about elbowing her niece in the face once again. She either had no idea how dangerous Maleficent was, or she did and was just too headstrong like her parents.
Whatever the given scenario, Emma was about to put herself in serious danger.
"Freeze!" Emma shouted, gun aimed towards Maleficent. "Don't move!"
Maleficent rolled her eyes in disgust at the petty threat. The fun she was having was now gone – such a shame. It was now time to move on. Against the sheriff's wishes, she took a step forward. Without warning, Emma discharged three rounds.
As if bullets could stop the most wicked of all the fairies.
Both Emma's and Lucy's eyes widened as the bullets came to a halt just inches in front of Maleficent's face. The floated there, suspended in midair, as she tsk the both of them, shaking her head. Maleficent raised her hand, an innocent action to those who did not know better.
Lucy, however, knew better.
"Get down!" Lucy shouted, dashing at Emma. She grabbed a hold of the sheriff just as Maleficent flicked her wrist. The bullets trajectory immediately reserved. Wincing, Lucy tackled Emma. As soon as she hit the ground, everything abruptly went dark.
xxxx
"I don't know what it is," Henry admitted.
"Henry, h-how did you get this?" Regina asked, her shaky voice betraying her. It was Daniel's ring, the ring she had traded long ago for her life, one that she had not seen since the night when she was forced to give it away for her own sake.
"Lucy gave it to me," Henry answered. Well, not so much gave, but slipped into his pocket while she had pushed him away from his bedroom window and into the hallway. The secret he would keep to himself, but he promised to deliver the message. "She made me promise to give it to you as soon as I saw you. She says she knows everything, that she's sorry a-and you'll know what for," he rambled as quickly as he could. "She also says that she forgives you. For everything. Mom, she's trapped inside with the dragon!"
With every word, Regina could feel her chest growing heavier and heavier. The wall that she had built, it had been capable of withstanding many things, oh so many things that Henry had thrown her way, but not this. Only the day before, Lucy had sided with that wretched flake of Snow and now here Henry was delivering Lucy's apology and forgiveness?
And that she knew everything?
Regina's fingers wrapped protectively around the ring. Lucy, who knew everything, had given the ring to Henry. She knew everything? The deals, the sacrifices, the loses? Regina shook her head. How was that even possible?
Ruby knew it was not her place to interrupt, but that did not stop her from speaking up. "She also mentioned something about Rumpelstilskin," she stated.
Just the mere mentioning of his name was confirmation enough. Regina felt the sudden anger, the sudden sadness boiling in the pit of her stomach. Before Regina could question Ruby even further on the matter, three gunshots could be heard from within the manor, grabbing everyone's attention. The sheriff's reckless doing, without a doubt.
None of them could have expected what happened next. The gunshots were nothing compared to the explosion that followed from inside the house. The door was ripped off its hinges, followed by a massive blast of fire and the glass shout out from the window frames. Henry had stepped forward, shouting Emma's name. Heart racing in her chest, Regina had pulled him close to her and then themselves out of harm's way.
It only took a matter of moments of the house in its entirety to go up in flames. The upper balcony quickly collapsed onto the front porch before Ruby and August could make their way, blocking the entrance to the house. It forced them to return back to the sidewalk.
"No," August mumbled under his breath, shaking his head in disbelief as he sunk down to his knees, which only caused Henry to lash out, further. Regina's hold on him grew tighter, but it instantly faltered when she heard Ruby murmur a name she had not wanted to hear, a name that had caused her to go numb.
"Lucy."
She had been – Lily had been inside.
Henry managed to escape Regina's tight embrace, but he had only taken a step forward. There was nothing else the ten year old could do. His shoulders fell and his face crumpled. No, this was not how everything was supposed to end. Tears were already streaming down his face. Any other time, Henry would have denied that he had ever cried, but right now, his entire world had fallen right before his eyes – all because he had asked Emma to save Lucy.
To save his sister. That had been the secret Lucy had whispered in his ear, the promise she made – that he would be alright because she would protect him. Older sisters protected their baby brothers.
Unable to control himself, Henry turned around the buried his face against Regina's chest, who had taken a moment to realize what Henry was doing. Her mind still was processing all that was happening. She wrapped her arms around him once more.
Ruby, who had buried her face into her hand, looked up as she caught scent of a familiar smell. Eyebrows furrowing, her head snapped up and towards the right side of the house, just in time to see the ash covered sheriff slowly limp her way over.
"Emma!" she called out.
August rushed over to her side. He wrapped one of her arms around his shoulder, giving her the support she currently needed to walk her away from the burning fire.
"No," Regina mumbled, shaking her head. Now she felt it, like she had so many years ago, holding onto that cold, lifeless five-year-old little body that was drained of all its energy. There it was, the ache in her heart she had deemed herself unable of feeling again. "No, no, no, no!"
Emma was alone.
To Be Continued
A/N: Thank you for reading this far! Please, tell me what you think in a review. There are only a few chapters left.