Chapter sixty-one
Emma bit her lip and continued to look around the therapist's office, she honestly had no idea whether this was a good idea or not.
Before she could weigh up the pros and cons of this, the door opened and Archie followed Pongo into the room.
"Sorry, I'm late," he sighed, "my last session ran over and I must admit that I was starving."
The blonde looked up from patting Pongo, who thankfully wasn't trying to jump up her and she smiled at the kind man, "it's fine…"
Archie returned the smile and he fell into the chair across from her, "I trust Henry is safe."
Emma nodded and said, "Regina and Cora have been using every protection spell they can think of, I'm pretty sure that he'll be fine."
The therapist let out a small sigh of relief and said, "should we get started then?"
The blonde looked down at the floor and replied, "I'm not sure that I know where to start."
Archie nodded in understanding and left a few moments pause to allow his patient to order her thoughts before he said, "just tell me what comes to mind first."
Emma bit her lip and pointed down at the chair, "the obvious," she mumbled.
"Is it the fact that you can't walk or the chair itself?"
The saviour was about to snap asking what kind of question that was, but she reminded herself that she was no longer a teenager being forced to attend therapy. She was now an adult with a beautiful girlfriend, an amazing son, parents and a town of people who relied on her.
Emma's eyes widened as her thoughts told her what the issue was, swallowing hard, she said, "how can I be the saviour and a cripple?"
Archie tilted his head and asked, "does not being able to walk erase the things you have done?"
"Of course not, but…this is going to sound stupid…"
The red headed man just raised his eyebrow and waited for the blonde to continue.
After a moment, she sighed and continued, "what if I can't be the saviour again? Henry brought me here thinking that I was a saviour, my parents sent me to this world thinking that I would return as the saviour. If I can't ever walk again, then I can't be what people expect me to be. And as selfish as it is, I can't help feeling that when Snow gives birth, she'll have another little saviour and won't need me anymore."
Archie nodded and considered this for a moment, and finally replied, "and what about Regina?"
"I…" Emma began, not seeing how this was relevant, but she received a nod of encouragement and continued, "when I'm around her…I don't feel like the saviour or the…orphan, I just feel like Emma. She comes with me to physio and she's even more patient than the doctor. I don't feel incompetent around her because she just expects me to be who I am."
"And do you think that Regina loves you more than Henry does?"
"Errr…I guess not…"
"And your parents, since your injuries, have they treated you any different then they did…in the other timeline?" he asked slowly, clearly Henry must have mentioned what happened. Even if he hadn't had any official sessions in a while, he still talked to Archie.
Emma took a second to think about it, in the alternate future, she had been less willing to actually allow them to be her parents, but she had now given them much more opportunity. Her mother made her hot cocoa when she was sad, her father had wanted to tear Neal limb from limb. If anything, they had only treated her different because she had allowed them to treat her as their daughter. She was beginning to wonder if she was so against the pregnancy simply because she was developing some kind of jealous sibling syndrome.
Finally, she looked up from her thoughts to see Archie waiting patiently for a reply, and she smiled at him, vaguely noticing a few stray tears were running down her cheeks.
"You're really good at this," she laughed, accepting the offered tissue.
Archie laughed and said, "perhaps we should make this a weekly thing?"
Emma nodded, as she pulled the tissue away from her face.
-The next day-
Henry opened his eyes slowly as a blast of cold hit his face.
For a moment he considered whether he had left the window in his bedroom open, but then he realised that he wouldn't have opened it in the first place in he depths of winter.
Finally, he fully opened his eyes and shot up into a sitting position to find himself surrounded by boys and one girl each staring at the brunette boy tied to a tree.
He took in a deep breath and tried to remember what had happened, but all he could remember was spending hours trying to fall asleep because he was so excited about his birthday, and then nothing else.
"So glad you're finally awake," a blond boy said and walked over to his captive.
Henry looked contemptuously at Pan and narrowed his eyes, "my mom said that you wouldn't be able to enter my house."
"Your mother wasn't aware that I'm not working alone, I simply sent a good friend to carry out the task," he smirked.
"As soon as they realise that I'm not home, they'll come after you," Henry growled, trying to struggle against the ropes.
"Even if the queen and the crippled saviour," Pan began, ignoring his great-grandson's narrowed eyes at his choice of words and continued, "figured out that Felix isn't you, they will have to save you before midday, which gives them exactly ten hours."
"Why midday?" the brunette asked with a furrowed brow.
"Well, 11.52 to be precise," Pan corrected himself, "the exact minute at which the Truest Believer was born."
Henry swallowed hard and said, "it won't take them that long to realise that it's not me."
"Let's hope so," the blond boy chuckled before going to talk to another Lost Boy.
The brunette boy looked down at the ground and kept repeating to himself, "they will find me, they will find me…"
An alarm went off and Emma opened her eyes slowly with a small grunt of disapproval, looking over at it, she saw that it read 6.30 and furrowed her brow.
"Regina…" she whispered sleepily to the woman she was hugging tightly to her body.
In reply she got a sleepy sound from her girlfriend and she continued to lightly shake her, "Regina, it's Henry's birthday."
A moment later, the brunette shot up and looked around the room, expecting her son to be at the end of the bed impatiently waiting for her to get up.
Looking down at the blonde looking at her with amusement in her eyes, the mayor asked, "what time is it?"
Emma pulled herself up and leaned against the headboard, "calm down, it's only six-thirty."
"Since he found what a birthday was, he has jumped on my bed at exactly 5.30 and begged me to get up and make him chocolate pancakes."
"Well…he isn't that far from being a teenager…" the other woman began, but was cut off by Regina's raised hand.
The brunette shook her head and said, "I can just feel that something is wrong."
"Okay…then lets go and wake him up," Emma said while placing a comforting hand on her arm.
Regina shot her a grateful smile and waited patiently as Emma pushed herself into the wheelchair that had set up beside her side of their bed and then she followed her as she wheeled her way down the hallway to Henry's room.
"Hey, kid," Emma whispered unintentionally as they entered the room to see a lump under the blanket.
The boy was lightly snoring and the blonde gave her girlfriend a triumphant smile, "I told you that he's fine, he just didn't want to get up early."
Regina shook her and held up her hand, "something isn't right," she whispered back and approached the bed.
Reaching down, she lightly shook him and said, "Henry, do you want your pancakes?"
There was a groan from under the blanket, something about being too comfortable and Regina furrowed her brow and exchanged a look with Emma, she was half sure that Henry had never actually slept the night before his birthday.
"It's your birthday," she tried again, but received the same response.
Finally, she decided to just trust what her gut was saying and pulled the blanket it down to reveal her son with his eyes tightly closed, clearly comfortable.
Emma inspected Regina's expression and wheeled over to the bed, she instantly furrowed her brow when she saw their sleeping son.
"I don't see the issue," she said, trying not to sound as if she thought her girlfriend was crazy.
Regina continued to look down at her son and shook her head, "no, there's something wrong."
Bringing her hand down, she lightly shook the boy and waited and then tried again slightly more vigorously, "Henry, it's time to wake up."
With a huge grunt, the boy finally sat up and said, "what could you possibly want?"
Regina narrowed her eyes at him, she knew that Henry wouldn't stay the same forever, but she didn't believe that puberty happened overnight.
Raising her hand, the boy was trapped in place and Emma widened her eyes, "Regina…"
The brunette ignored the other woman and said, "who are you?"
'Henry' struggled against his magical binds and said, "Henry…"
Emma felt her superpower go off, and her eyes instantly widened, Regina looked over to her for a reaction and seemed to have all the confirmation she needed to prove that her hunch was correct.
Closing her eyes, the former queen focused on dispelling whatever magic was at play, and a moment later, Henry changed into a much taller boy with a mess of blond hair.
"Where is our son?" Emma asked through gritted teeth, wishing that she had a gun holstered on her wheelchair, but Regina had been against it.
Felix swallowed hard and turned his head to look at the clock, he instantly closed his eyes in frustration when he saw how far off midday it was.
Once he opened them, he simply shook his head to indicate that he wouldn't be revealing any important information.
Regina raised her hand, only the most violent of spells coming to mind, but Emma quickly grabbed her hand and shook her head.
The brunette swallowed hard and nodding, silently telling her that she understood what she meant.
With a wave of her hand, she transported both herself and Emma to the sheriff's station after magically changing each of their clothes.
A/N Hope you guys enjoyed XD
I'm planning to do one last competition on the last chapter, so please submit questions that I could use, if I use it, you'll get a one shot XD I'll decide later how many winners there will be :)