The End of the World (and After) Chapter 10: Get a dream of life again, an once upon a time fanfic

Author's Note: In the previous chapter, when Snow and Charming are talking about Regina staying, they are actually referring to her staying with their group and in their 'community' rather than staying specifically with them. Regina isn't moving into their house; they don't really have room in any case. Sorry I didn't make that clear enough!

Interlude: Emma

She's too young to understand what is happening, and too young to remember much of anything. All she knows is that something is wrong now - knows it in a way she can't verbalize but still feels.

So she cries. Cries and cries as the world ends around her, cries as people die around her and she lives.

And then a pair of arms lift her up and hold her. As they have before, but she doesn't remember that. She's too young.

All she knows is that the arms are right now - knows in a way she can't verbalize but still feels. This is right.

So Emma stops crying and looks up at her father, and finds him her whole world.

Chapter ten: Get a dream of life again / a little vision of the start and the end

Mary Margaret

There is always an after, Mary Margaret knows. A day ends and a new one comes after. Hearts get broken, yet life goes on after. Friends die and are mourned, and there are new days after. Even the end of the world has an after, and they're trying to make something of it.

Graham is dead.

There is an after.

David is still sleeping when Mary Margaret slips quietly out of his embrace, kissing his shoulder as she does. He sighs softly, and she lets her hand linger on his head for a moment longer, marvelling at how natural it feels to wake up next to him. It has from the very first morning she woke next to him through all the weeks of it and into the now where they aren't just sharing the bed to sleep.

It just feels right, and she's given up on figuring out how it could from the moment she met him. Maybe true love at first sight isn't just a fairytale and can actually happen – and did.

Emma is sleeping as well when Mary Margaret pauses to check on their baby, who is looking peaceful and happy. Theirs. That still makes her heart skip a beat; that this wonderful baby girl is hers and David's (even if not by birth). They're going to raise her, see her grow up, see her take her first steps and say her first word. (Mommy, David insists, while Mary Margaret thinks daddy.)

That feels right too.

A lot of other things are very, very wrong and she walks out into the chilly air and makes her way to the quiet grave under the single apple tree that is still standing.
Graham's grave.

She stands silently by it for a few moments, forcing back the tears that even now come despite how much she's cried over him already.

He was David's friend first, and she mourns David's loss as much as her own. She mourns Emma's loss too, the uncle she won't have.

"I'll look after them, David and Emma," she says quietly. "I'll keep them safe. I'll love them. I just want you to know that."

There is no answer and can't be, but she still feels better having said it. She has a feeling David will make a similar trip at some point, probably making a similar promise. She knows him well enough to make that prediction.

(And one day, maybe she and David will have a son and name him Graham. Maybe.)

She's cold when she makes her way inside again. Even so, the moment she slips her clothes off and slips back into bed, David still reaches for her. He doesn't seem to care about her cold skin, nuzzling up against her and kissing his way up from her shoulder.

"Hi," he says, as his lips find hers and he kisses her leisurely and lazily. His hands brush her skin and his body is warm against hers, warming her too. She cups his cheek to pull him even closer, and he sighs happily into the kiss.

"Hi," she says against his lips, and she can feel him smile as he steals another kiss.

"Hi the second," he murmurs sleepily. "Where were you?"

"Just had something to tell a friend," she says softly. He opens his eyes and looks at her, and she knows that he can guess exactly where she's been. He nods faintly, lacing his fingers in hers and pressing his forehead against hers.

They lie together in the faint morning light just like that, drawing comfort from each other. Only when Emma begins to cry do they get up, and he sits with her while she breastfeeds their baby, as he always does.

It's a new day. There are always new days.

Days follow days, and slowly but surely their small community begins to make a home yet again. Buildings are reinforced or expanded, fences are built, fields are cleared, a few surviving farm animals are found and rounded up, and they keep a guard in the water tower at all times.

No attack comes.

Instead, Sean sneaks off to scout around Storybrooke (which earns him an angry David telling him off before hugging him and telling him Graham wouldn't want this) and comes back with stories about massive destruction, and no sign of Albert Spencer at all. The library looks as if it has been hit by an earthquake or explosion or something, Sean tells them, a a gaping hole leading into some sort of cavern. Everything around is on fire, and the school is completely burned down.

Gold just smiles at that, making cryptic remarks about sleeping dragons. What that is a metaphor for, Mary Margaret isn't sure. She's just sure it's nothing good, which might actually be good for them.

She can't quite mourn Albert Spencer, but she does feel for the people who might have followed him simply because they felt like there were no other options.

Sean doesn't find Kurt Flynn's body, which apparently Gold had asked him about. They decide to hold a funeral anyway, for little Owen's sake, and the boy buries a keychain under the apple tree. Regina stays by Owen the whole time and thanks them stiffly afterwards, which makes Mary Margaret hug her sympathetically.

And for the briefest moment, Regina actually hugs her back.

Regina comes to visit one morning while David and Mary Margaret are working outside on reinforcing the new wall for Emma's bedroom. It's becoming a lovely little room, stuffed with all the toys they've managed to find and a few David has made. There are even books, a growing collection now after Belle found several in an abandoned home.

Regina watches them for a moment with an expression Mary Margaret can't quite read, a brown book tucked in under her arm.

"Good morning, Regina," David greets her, helping Mary Margaret down from the ladder.

"Good morning, David. S... Mary Margaret," Regina replies. She seems to take a deep breath, then offers a halfway sincere smile and holds out the book. "For Emma."

Mary Margaret accepts it, glancing down at the title. 'Once Upon a Time.' Oh. "Fairytales?"

"Yes," Regina says. "I've been telling Owen all the fairytales I remember. We decided to write them down and make a book of them. He's made the drawings."

"Thank you," David says, giving Regina a quick smile and then Mary Margaret a lingering one. "I'm sure Emma will love hearing these."

Regina nods slowly. "I hope they'll make sense to her one day."

"Oh, I'm sure they will," Mary Margaret says, and smiles. "They have hope, and believing in even the possibility of a happy ending is a very powerful thing."

David takes her hand at that, his palm warm against hers as their fingers entwine.

"It is," he agrees and Mary Margaret wonders if she can dare believing in one despite everything that has happened.

It's getting colder, and they all know it's going to be a difficult winter, especially without any electricity for heating. She can tell David worries about it, as they all do, and she offers what comfort and support in touches and kisses that she can.

She's bolder with him than anyone she can remember, she notices. The faint memories she has of past loves always seem to have her meeker and less assertive, but with David it feels different. It is different. She knows it's right in a way she never has before, she just doesn't know where that knowledge comes from.

So she holds his hand when they walk, she touches him when they sit together, she kisses him when he gives her one of his smiles, she looks at him with all the love she feels and sees it mirrored in his eyes, she sleeps with him with a passion she didn't know she had, and she knows whatever a happy ending might look like for her – it involves waking up with him every morning.

For better or worse, in sickness and in health, through the end of the world and after, till death do them part... She wants that with him.

So does he with her, she learns.

She walks in on David pacing around their bedroom with Emma in his arms one afternoon, apparently talking to himself.

"I would be honored if... No. Mary Margaret Blanchard, you're the... No."

"What are you doing?" she asks, and David turns around with a look on his face that reminds her of catching pupils at trying to finish their homework five minutes before the class starts.

"Mary Margaret," he says. Emma kicks slightly in his arms, but he pays it no heed. "Hi."

"David," she replies, stepping into the room. "What's going on?"

"I was going to do a grand speech," he says nervously. "I was just rehearsing, and..."

"Why do you need a speech?"

He looks at her, then smiles affectionately. "You're right. Maybe I don't."

She stands still as he steps closer, looking at her in that way he does and that still leaves her flushed and breathless.

"Mary Margaret Blanchard," he says softly, dropping down on one knee with the baby still in his arms, and Mary Margaret's breath catches. "I love you. Emma Blanchard Nolan Swan loves you. Will you marry us?"

She forces back her tears, watching the two people she loves more than then world itself look up at her.

"What do you think?" she says, and his face lights up as he breaks into a grin. He chuckles as she pulls him up and kisses him, and then Emma and then him again, again and again.

"I think yes, but I was rather asking you," he murmurs against her lips. She smiles and he smiles, and then they're just beaming stupidly at each other.

"I think mommy said yes," he says to Emma, who makes an impatient noise.

"Mommy said yes," Mary Margaret agrees, and kisses him again.

Snow.

It snows as Mary Margaret Blanchard marries David Nolan, light snowflakes that float through the air and begin to color the world white. They cling to Mary Margaret's hair too, but David seems to find that just beautiful judging by how he looks at her. Or rather, how he can't look away.

She wears white, a white dress Belle and Ruby have found for her and shyly presented her with. It's not a wedding gown, but it is beautiful nonetheless. Emma wears white too, acting as the maid of honor and best woman in one.

David says his vows with a clear voice, looking at her with bright, happy eyes and smiling at every word. He smiles as she says her vows too, drinking in every word as she swears to be his wife. They hold hands, already joined together as Sean simply makes it official.

Husband and wife. David and Mary Margaret. It feels right, and they kiss under the falling snow and lick the snowflakes off each other's lips. Even so, it's a carefully restrained kiss, promising passion rather than delivering it. (That's for later, after all.)

They have a small feast inside the barn, which has become partly the main storage building and partly something like a town hall. There is food, and eventually dancing despite not having any music.

Everyone is there, perhaps for the sense of having a happy occasion for once rather than too many sad ones to count. It's a symbol too, Mary Margaret realises, that even after the end of the world there is a marriage. There is love, there is a family, there is hope.

And so when she spies Ruby and Whale kissing up against the wall behind a tractor, she's not entirely surprised. She just smiles at it, and thinks about kissing David up against a wall – or any surface, really - very, very soon.

Owen dances with Regina - a rather sweet sight. David swings Belle around and Gold smiles wistfully at that until Belle simply holds out a hand and he steps up to her as if powerless to resist.

David doesn't seem to mind, picking up Emma to dance with her in his arms instead, and then Mary Margaret does too, Emma laughing happily in her arms at every turn. Eventually, their lovely daughter falls asleep and Granny takes her with promises to look after her during the night and return her in the morning.

David takes her hand, and then there is just him and her and a dance that needs no music. Slowly, they move around in circles with no space between their bodies. They say nothing, just breathing each other in. Eventually, she lifts her head up from his shoulder and looks at him.

He looks at her with such love, such desire, such quiet happiness that she has to kiss him, has to tell him somehow that she feels exactly the same way. He sighs into the kiss as she tip-toes to deepen it, and then he sweeps her up into his arms and walks them out through the still-falling snow to their home.

They make it to the kitchen table. David sits her down there, and he stands between her legs as they kiss and kiss and kiss.

"Mary Margaret," he murmurs against her lips.

"Yes?" she replies, brushing her lips against his again before he pulls back to look at her and cup her cheek in his hand.

"I know I already said vows in public," he says, smiling faintly as he looks at her. "But I want to make one here too, just between the two of us."

She just nods, understanding what he means. Their wedding felt as much for everyone else as it was for them. She doesn't blame their friends for wanting to share it, quite the opposite. But she would still like something exchanged just between them, just between David and Mary Margaret.

"I, David Nolan, promise to love you and our daughter with all my heart and all my years," he vows quietly.

She swallows, wondering how she can love him this much and still feel like she falls more in love every moment with him.

"I, Mary Margaret Blanchard, promise to love you and our daughter with all my heart and all my years," she echoes, touching the scar on his chin without thinking. "My husband."

"My wife," he says, unable to keep a slight possessive tilt out of his voice. She smiles at that, then laughs as he wraps his arms around her again and kisses her without any restraint as all as he stumbles them into the bedroom and into bed.

They make a different sort of vow there, with hands and lips and bodies; over and over into the night, each time slightly different, variations in positions and emotions and pace. It's slow and leisurely, frantic and almost desperate; it's with laughter and smiles and teasing remarks, with passion and throaty moans and closed eyes; it's Mary Margaret and David and their marriage bed.

One thing remains constant, though, and they've both vowed to keep it so with all their hearts.

It's always with love.

Outside, the snow keeps falling.

Winter arrives with cold, silence and inevitability.

They've prepared for it, made their stockpiles of food and water, reinforced the houses and the barn, worked themselves to exhaustion and fatigue.

All they can do now is endure and survive.

There is no warmth in the sun to help them, only pale light faintly illuminating the snow-clad landscape. It's cold, so very cold, the coldest winter Mary Margaret can remember. It seems to chill them all to their bones.

Only David seems able to warm her, cocooning her with blankets and himself. They cling to each other during the cold winter nights, often keeping Emma in their bed as well to share whatever body heat they can.

Even during the day they go out as little as possible and only to do necessary work. Mostly they stay inside and stay together. It feels almost like a hibernation, with the bedrooms as their den. They play with Emma, they whisper stories to each other, they talk about the spring, they kiss and on days where Emma sleeps in her own bed, they make slow love under the blankets until they're both flushed with heat.

"I love you," he whispers, looking down at her through lowered eyelids. She moans softly in response, lifting her hips to meet his slow thrusts. His skin is slick with sweat and flushed with heat against her own, and she's warm, so very warm and yet wanting more.

"David," she says breathlessly, the friction between their bodies every time he moves stealing her breath. He kisses her in response, slanting his mouth across hers while his hands keep roaming every inch of skin he can manage. Her neck. Her shoulder. Her sides down to the curve of her buttocks. Her thigh. Her leg, down and then up again. Her back when she arches up against him. Her breasts when he presses her deeper into the mattress. Her chest. Her cheek. The back of her neck as she links her legs behind his back and draws him deeper inside her.

She wants more. She has him, but she wants more, not even sure where this deep desire comes from. David. Her David. Her husband. Hers, hers, hers, she knows, and she digs her fingers deeper into his shoulder with every languid thrust he makes.

He comes with a deep shudder, she with a noise he swallows into the kiss. He collapses on top of her, but she doesn't mind the weight, the heat of his body like another blanket.

When he's regained his breath, he shifts them both onto their sides, tangling her leg between his and their fingers in each other. He caresses her face as lovingly with his gaze as he just did with his fingers, she finds, and she returns it. His hair is impressive bed hair, all mussed and sticking up, yet she finds it utterly perfect.

He smiles at her as if he knows what she's thinking, leaning forward to kiss her leisurely, as if they have all the time in the world.

Perhaps they don't. But they do have all winter.

The winter seems to last forever. Days, weeks, months pass and the cold lingers. The snow lingers. It's as if the very world has frozen, as if after the flames the cold has come to finish the job.

But they endure. Life endures, Mary Margaret finds.

Birds move into the barn, finding warm spots to settle and hide in their feathers. The wolf howls through the winter, and they see it padding around the edge of their small community sometimes. It doesn't attack. If anything, it seems to guard, and so, they sometimes leave bones and scraps for it.

The sheep and cows and one horse they've found cling to life too, huddling together much like the humans do, finding warmth in each other.

The children play outside in the snow on days that aren't too cold, Ava, Nicholas, Paige and Owen as one merry gang. Owen seems to lure Regina along now and then, while Jefferson seems to prefer to watch Paige from afar. (He calls her Grace a lot, Mary Margaret has noticed, perhaps because he considers her a graceful or something.) Belle is always willing to play, making snowmen and snowwomen and snow-monsters with equal pleasure.

David and Mary Margaret take Emma out to play too, but very, very carefully and always wrapped up in the warmest blankets they have. Emma seems not to mind the cold, making excited noises at the snow every time.

David makes her snow dragons to pretend to slay, proclaiming himself her knight and stalwart defender. It makes Mary Margaret smile despite the cold, and she always rewards him with kisses, as a fair lady would – and then she joins them in the quest to slay the snow dragon, as she would any day.

On very cold days only David goes outside, leaving Mary Margaret and Emma to play together under the blankets.

Emma laughs as Mary Margaret lifts her up and then lowers her again, up again and then down again, like a swan in flight. No ugly duckling here; their daughter is already the most beautiful in the whole world, as far as Mary Margaret is concerned. (And David, of course.)

Emma babbles happily as Mary Margaret settles her against her chest. Emma is already reaching for the tiny stuffed animal David managed to find on a scavenging trip. It's a sheep and is, along with the baby blanket, Emma's favorite thing in the whole world.

Mary Margaret smiles as Emma makes soft noises to the sheep, clearly communicating something of uttermost importance.

"I quite agree," David says, and Mary Margaret and Emma glance up to see him standing in the doorway. He looks to be freezing, but still just stands there and looks at them with a soft smile.

Emma makes a very excited noise at the sight of him, stretching out her arms.

"I quite agree," Mary Margaret says, and David smiles.

"As my family commands," he says with a mock bow, kicking off his shoes and removing his outdoor clothing before slipping in under the covers with them. He kisses Emma's head softly, followed by her sheep when she holds that out to him. It makes Mary Margaret smile before he encases her mouth with his and kisses her quite, quite thoroughly.

"Hi," he says breathlessly as he pulls back.

"Hi," she agrees. He props himself up on his elbow next to her, lowering one hand to allow Emma to play with his fingers. "How is Granny?"

"Still coughing badly," he says sadly, and Mary Margaret shivers slightly at the thought of another possible death. Graham was enough. Graham was too much. "Whale is staying with her and Ruby to do what he can, so maybe that will be enough. This winter can't last much longer."

She nods, hoping he is right.

"One of the lambs had died during the night but I think the others will make it. We'll have a flock of sheep come spring," he goes on.

"Aren't you quite the shepherd?" she teases lightly.

"I thought I was a Prince Charming," he counters, and she remembers what she told him when they first met.

"You were too late to be, remember?"

"Give me a second chance?" he asks, looking down at Emma crawling slowly upwards. "Emma, don't you think mommy should give daddy a chance to be Prince Charming?"

"Cha-cha," Emma says, and David and Mary Margaret both giggle. "Dada. Mama."

David draws a sharp breath, and Mary Margaret's breath catches. Emma is looking at them both seriously, holding the sheep with one hand and David's thumb with the other.

"Emma, can you say mommy?" David says gently, but he can't quite hide the emotion in his voice.

"Mama," Emma says again.

"How about daddy?" David goes on, sounding as choked up as Mary Margaret feels.

"Dada," Emma says, and Mary Margaret tries to blink back her tears and fails.

"That's right," she manages to say. "Mama and dada. Mommy and daddy. That's us."

"That's us," David agrees, pressing a lingering kiss against Emma's head and looking at Mary Margaret with teary eyes.

Their daughter is going to grow up, they both know.

There is always an after, Mary Margaret knows. Always. The world ends, and even then there is an after. Time passes, after all. Nothing is frozen and nothing is forever. Days follow days, weeks follow weeks, months follow months and years will follow years.

Winter. There is an after, of course.

It's spring.