Reset

Sleep hadn’t come easy to Emma that night, for the first third of the night she lay awake mentally kicking herself for telling Regina that she was in love with her and then rushing away from the brunette. Luckily it didn’t seem that her big mouth and fast feet had got her in that much trouble as Regina had come back and helped her to exercise before giving Emma a sweet kiss that she could still feel on her lips if she focused hard enough.

The second third of the night was filled with shades of sleep and shades of deep concern about her life. Fearing about what would happen if she did mess things up with Regina, she could lose everything. The cold feelings of loneliness, abandonment and fear had her frequently getting out of bed and pacing the room in an attempt to calm herself. She had begun to understand that these feelings were irrational fears and that the only way she could guarantee protection from them was to face them head-on rather than retreating into herself like she had done before.

She wasn’t sure when that change had come about but she suspected it was because she felt she had more to lose now, it was as if she had cross some kind of threshold she had previously been afraid of. She had protected herself from feelings of heartbreak by not getting too involved with anyone and each time it looked like she was about to be discarded she acted first and ran away. But now she had crossed a threshold and the things she had were too precious to lose and were worth fighting for.

Understanding that running or retreating into herself were sure-fire ways to lose everything had galvanised Emma to realise what she had and be open about it. She had Regina to thank for that, no matter what happened with their relationship she knew that she had turned a corner in her battle with abandonment and fear. She didn’t want to run anymore, she wanted to stay and she wanted to fight.

Which was why the last third of the night she was consumed with concerns about Sidney Glass and what he might have planned. She ran over everything she knew about the man, eventually sitting cross-legged in bed and making notes about her own personal encounters with him and everything anyone had ever told her about him. Discerning some kind of pattern about his thought process was going to be the key to finding him and stopping him.

Eventually she fell asleep at five o’clock in the morning, she hadn’t technically gone to bed and the pen had dropped out of her hand into the notebook she was writing in. She slumped back uncomfortably against the headboard as exhaustion took her.

Her mobile phone ringing woke her and she fought the disorientation to grab the noisy device, noticing that it was half past nine in the morning and that her alarm hadn’t gone off.

“Hello?”

“Hi,” David’s voice sounded, “you okay?”

“Yeah, sure, go ahead,” Emma said as she sat up in bed. She then realised that her pen and notebook were neatly placed on the bedside table and she had been laying down in bed with the sheets pulled up around her. As she tried to sound wake for her father she wondered if she could have done that in her sleep but realised with a smile that it must have been Regina.

“You need to get to the Mayor’s office,” David told her, “and bring Regina.”

“What’s happened?” Emma asked as she got out of bed and grabbed her crutch to hobble to the wardrobe and grab some clothes.

“Archie’s been attacked, he’s..” David paused and Emma could visualise him looking for the right word, “he’s been frozen or something.”

“Frozen?” Emma asked.

“Yeah, well, there’s this red mist and he’s not moving,” David explained, “we called Gold but he’s not in so we need Regina to see if she can help.”

“Okay, we’re on our way,” Emma said and hung up the phone.

She pulled off her pyjamas and quickly pulled on some underwear before turning back to the wardrobe to pick out some jeans.

Then she heard a quiet knock on the door followed by Regina softly calling her name and she didn’t think twice, “yeah, come in,” she called and heard the door open.

“We need to get to the Mayor’s office,” Emma said as she pulled on a pair of jeans.

When Regina didn’t reply she looked up and saw Regina staring at her in surprise obviously not expecting to see Emma in such a state of undress.

“Regina?” Emma questioned, “you okay?”

Regina nodded her way out of the trance, “erm, yes, the Mayor’s office?”

“Yes,” Emma said as she pulled a shirt on and started to button it up, “Archie’s been attacked, he’s frozen or something, something about red mist?”

Regina raised an eyebrow and stepped closer to Emma and raised her hand and suddenly Emma’s bedroom was transforming into the Mayor’s office. Emma stood in her jeans and half button shirt with no shoes or socks on staring at her father who was staring back at her.

“You weren’t kidding when you said you were on your way,” he said.