Stranger you followed me so far,

Until the roads converged, as did the stars,

Stranger the moon looks blue tonight,

Your photo framed, raw within my mind, but not tonight.

Katie Costello, Stranger

Dusk was slowly sweeping over the curving dirt road. Emma urged her horse on with a light squeeze of her claves.

Dammit, she thought. David's gonna kill me. And then James, and then me again. David hated her riding the back roads in the dark, the sharp turns, the blind hills. I can hear the lecture now.

But this time it really wasn't her fault. Honest. This was all James. Okay so maybe she had been the one to taken the damn horse from Marco's old stables. But James was the one to go and pick him up, and he had been at this long enough to know to have asked Marco what kind of grain the poor old gelding had been getting. But he hadn't. So here she was.

Okay, so maybe it's a tiny bit my fault for taking a horse instead of the truck. She couldn't argue with herself. The truck had been sitting there, and seemed like quite a good idea now that the sun was sinking lower and lower over the tree coated horizon. She couldn't resist taking Bug out though. A chance to take her pretty Palomino for a trail ride wasn't something she was going to pass up. On the downside however, that put her here, close to dark, with a saddle bag full of feed that she would have to go into town to buy more of in the morning.

Despite her bad luck, Emma had to admit it was beautiful. The fading sunlight shown lightly through the golden and red leaves of the oak trees, dappling the road in their pattern. It was peaceful, a few birds still sang, and the wind rustled lightly through the yellow wild flowers next to her horse's legs.

And to think there was a time I was gonna leave this all behind. The thought still made her cringe, even after four years. It didn't last long, however, as a loud screech and crash sent her horse rushing in the opposite direction.

"Easy! Easy now!" Emma said to Bug as she pulled her left rein tight, bring the frightened horse back to the direction she had run from. The loud noises had stopped, to be replaced by something almost worse. It was eerily quiet now. No more birds, even the wind had seemed frightened into a sudden halt. Through the tree ahead came a soft sound: a light crackle, a soft rustle.

Bug began to walk forward again, now rounding the curve. The peaceful scene changed in an instant. A lone car was wrapped around a tall sycamore on the side of the road, throwing red flames high into to sky.

"Oh god." Emma coughed as the smoke reached her and Bug, causing the spooked mare to stop dead in her tracks. The sun had dropped even further now, bathing the sky in a red blaze. Emma quickly pulled out her cell phone, before a quick glance at the screen reminded her of where she was: the middle of nowhere with zero chance at getting any reception. "Come on Bug," she whispered, urging her closer.

Dismounting, Emma looped Bug's reins around a tree before rushing over to the car. It was flipped on its head, with flames billowing from the engine. She didn't know what she could do, but she had to do something. Cars rarely passed through this road as it only lead to Marco's farm, and Emma knew that by now Marco was most likely sitting by his fire carving something or another out of a block of wood.

Here's to hoping he decides to go for a little drive tonight.

Emma bent as close as she could to the car's windows. From what she could see there was only one man sitting in the driver's seat. He hung limp from his seat belt, blood slowly dripping down his forehead and through his dark hair.

Smoke was filling the air in the car and Emma began to cough, I can't even imagine how he feels right now. She pulled at the door handle, but the stubborn medal wasn't budging. I need help, she thought, frantically looking around her hoping for a miracle. Not exactly a miracle, but I've had worse ideas, Emma thought to herself as her eyes landed on Bug.

It didn't take long before she had her rope tided at one end to her saddle horn and the other to the door.

"Come on girl, move it!" Emma chanted to Bug as she led the horse away from the car. The old rope pulled taunt, and the door gave a loud creak before springing open. Emma rushed to the man still unconscious in the car.

"Hey! Buddy! Wake up!" Emma called into his ear as she shook his shoulders. The man gave no response. "Alright-" Emma began before a round of coughing over took her. The flames were getting bigger, the smoke thicker, and the last rays of the sun were working across the surface of the road. "Plan B. it is then." Emma grunted, pulling her shirt collar over her nose.

Unbuckling the man's seat belt proved to be more of a challenge than she had imagined. She wound up completely underneath him to reach for it. The heat within the car was almost unbearable. She gave a sympathetic cringe at the black leather jacket the man wore, he was surely roasting in it. She managed to get the seat belt undone.

"Oh god!" She yelled in surprise as the man dropped forward into her once freed from the seat belt, guess I didn't really think that one through. She heaved, she pulled, and she drug. The man's body moved slowly, the dead weight of him nearly suffocating her in the smoke and flames. Surely, but oh so slowly, Emma pulled him through the door, and onto the ground a few feet beside the car.

"Bug!" She called, before letting out a low whistle. The mare came hesitantly, each step paired with a flare of her nostrils and wide eyes. Pulling herself out from under the man, Emma grabbed Bugs reins. She would never be able to lift the stranger that high, but Bug wasn't her star girl for nothing. Walking the horse next to the man, Emma cued her to bow as she had done many times before. After asking her to stay down, Emma worked as quickly as she could to drag the man across Bugs' neck and the front of her saddle. Emma was quick to claim into the saddle before asking Bug to stand.

The man's weight shifted as the mare stood, but with Emma's hands firmly latched onto his arms and the leather of his jacket he stayed in place. With a kiss to Bug they were off. That's gotta hurt, Emma thought, watching the man bounce around the front of her saddle as she cantered on. Sorry pal, but the sooner I get you to the hospital the better.

Night had fully fallen by the time Bug's hooves touched the main drag into town. Sleepy little Storybrooke was down for the night. Even Granny's, which stayed open far past anything else, had their closed sign out front. On the upside, Emma thought with a dark chuckle, no traffic to worry about. Storybrooke General was just down the street, but wasn't the sole source of light as Emma cantered up to it. The police station stood across the street, and the loud clatter of Bug's hooves against the pavement drew out its occupants.

"Emma!" David called, rushing out the doors, James hot on his heels. "What happened?"

"He crashed his car on the old bridge road, the whole thing is going up in flames." She said, helping to push the man into James and David's waiting arms.

"The troll bridge road?" James asked, slinging the man's arm over his shoulder as David did the same with the other.

"That's the one, I was riding home when I saw him." Emma explained, dismounting Bug before latching her to the pole outside the building with a quick pat to her neck.

"Wait, you were on that road at night?" David exclaimed as Emma ran forward to open the doors to Storybrooke General.

"That is neither here nor there!" Emma sighed as a group of nurses came rushing forward.

For Emma, the next few hours went by in a blur. David and James rushed off to call the fire department and attend to the still burning car. A kind nurse asked Emma a few questions about the man, to which Emma had no answers. They found no ID on him, no cellphone, not even a wallet. As a result, Emma was put as his emergency contact.

It was nearing 1 AM when David and James returned. The whole car was ablaze when the firefighters had arrived with James and David. Any clue as to who the strange man might have been was gone now, along with most of the grass and all of the leaves of the tree he had hit. It was James who informed her that the firefighters said it was lucky they had gotten there before the fire had spread and caused any damage to the surrounding farm fields. It was David, however, that finally sent her home.

"You need to get some sleep." He told her as her walked her out of the hospital.

"What about Bug?" She protested as her walked her to the car.

"I put her in a trailer and sent her home with Marco's son hours ago Ems."

"You did? Where was I?" She asked, trying to remember the last time she had looked outside at her beloved horse. She had made sure to bring her a bucket of water – curtesy of the kind nurse – around 11.

"You were talking to a nurse about John Doe." He laughed. "Don't worry so much," he said, catching the look on her face. "Dr. Whale said he was going to be fine."

"He said he might be fine. He hasn't even woken up yet. They don't even know if he will." Emma couldn't figure out why the idea hurt so much, but she knew if he didn't wake up it always would.

"He will." David said climbing in the car after her.

"And how are you so sure?" Emma asked, turning towards him from the passenger seat of his police cruiser.

"Because you already saved him. The world wouldn't have put you through all that just to let him slip through the cracks now." David told her with a smile.

Her quiet reply was into the glass of the window, "I don't feel like I saved anyone."