I'm just working on some stuff
Added 2015-10-19 22:21:55 +0000 UTCRegina had never been scared of Emma Swan. Even when it seemed likely that Emma meant to cause her physical harm, being frightened of her would’ve required Regina to concede that Emma was capable of hurting her. And by the time Regina would concede that Emma could actually do some damage, they were friendly enough that she knew Emma wouldn’t hurt her. Even when the omens and portents that seemed to hang over Storybrooke like a mist seemed to promise Emma would become evil, Regina wouldn’t believe it. Not Emma, who had never been infected with it like Regina had, who hadn’t had it passed on to her by her parents or learned it at the foot of someone like Gold. Thinking of Emma as dark—truly black, not like Little Bo Peep or Hook waking up on the wrong side of the bed—was ridiculous. Regina didn’t recognize in her anything she saw in the mirror.
But then she was in Camelot’s tower, paging through yet another moldy text, when she suddenly felt that old presence. The taste of power in the air, the madness that heeled like a trained dog, the feeling of a phantom intelligence, human and inhuman, regarding her with its cold capriciousness… it was like she was training under Rumpelstiltskin again, having another of her tête-à-têtes with him.
Then she turned and it was Emma. And in that moment of cognitive dissonance—the sight of Emma feeling like the Dark One—Regina was scared. Not for herself, exactly. Scared like she had been for Daniel, only Cora had at least left the memory of him. Going dark meant gouging out those happy memories, replacing them with the scar tissue of evil deeds. Someone strong and true, like Snow White, could look past all the pain and see the young woman she’d once known. Regina wasn’t that strong. She thought if Emma started trying to hurt her, hurt her family, then she wouldn’t be able to help hating her.
Regina feared the thought of again being the woman who hated Emma Swan.
