Once Upon a Time in Storybrooke - OUAT DR

Chapter 21 - A True Believer at Last

I invited August over late that night, needing to go over everything again, finally ready to hear what he had to say and ready to really receive it. He came over not long after, having finished up at Marco's shop, spending what time he could with his cursed father. 

Once he got there, I asked him to explain everything from the beginning and he did – starting with his life in the Enchanted Forest, crafting the wardrobe with his father, coming through the wardrobe to the World Without Magic, finding Emma and me in the tree, lying to the police and news about where he found us, how he abandoned us in foster care, everything. I then asked him to show me his leg again. He rolled up his pant leg to reveal the mostly wooden leg, the proof of his crazy tale. I touched it, feeling the smooth wood beneath my fingertips, and finally allowed myself to accept what I'd been wondering for so many weeks now – the curse was real, everything August said was real, and somehow I was a part of it all yet had no true role to play.

August explained he was only getting worse, and we needed Emma to believe and break the curse. We stayed up talking late into the night but he did end up heading back to Granny's so we could both get some rest, agreeing to meet up at Granny's the next day.

I received a text from Mary Margaret the next morning asking if Emma was with me. When I told her no, she told me she was pretty sure Emma had left, her bag was gone and she hadn't said a word or even left a note - she was running. I'd never seen Mary so heated before, but when I offered to come over she told me not to worry about it, Emma had just parked outside and she had some words to exchange with our friend once she came in.

When I got to Granny's August wasn't there yet, so I found a seat and ordered a coffee from Ruby while I waited, but she told me August asked her to send me up to his room once I got there, so I headed upstairs, finding Henry knocking at his door. August invited us both in and he revealed how his arm was now wooden. He also informed us both that he wanted to spend what time he had left with his father, Marco, and was out of Operation Cobra, but it was real, and now Henry and I knew it too. Together, maybe Henry and I could convince Emma to believe.

When we exited August's room I looked down at Henry and told him it really was real, it was all true, and I believed him. I expressed how I wanted to talk to Emma and get her to believe, but I wasn't sure if I could. Knowing and believing didn't provide much help when Emma was the Savior and the one who needed to believe. I told him I didn't think Emma would listen to me, but if she came to work, I'd talk to her and try to convince her.

She didn't show up to work though. All day I played different versions of the conversation out in my head and every time it ended horribly, but still, no sign of my wayward sister.

Holy shit, I had a fucking sister, a twin. I still couldn't wrap my brain around it, how could I ever hope to convince Emma? 

She did end up shooting me a text toward the end of the day telling me she was leaving town, refusing to talk to anyone or hear logic according to the messages I received from Mary Margaret when I messaged her about it. Emma had abducted Henry the night before and taken him with her when she left, something Henry had not informed me of when I saw him earlier. I closed things up at the Sheriff's Station and rushed to Mary Margaret's, hoping to catch Emma before she left town for good.

I did get to the loft before she left, but Henry had beaten me there. 

He was holding a pastry when I walked in the door. My stomach dropped and I had a horrible feeling something bad was going to happen if he took a bite out of that pastry. Before I could say anything he took a bite out of it. 

His eyes fell closed and he collapsed to the ground, unconscious. Emma and I rushed over to him and saw that he was still breathing, at least, but otherwise completely unresponsive. When Emma told me it was an apple turnover she had gotten from Regina earlier that Henry had taken a bite out of, my fears were realized. 

My face paled and I whispered that it was her - Regina - she had done this expecting Emma to eat the pastry. He had been poisoned but it had been meant for her.

Emma rushed Henry to the hospital, not wanting to wait for the ambulance to get there. I called and let them know to be expecting Henry and Emma, informing the person on the phone of everything I had witnessed. I bagged up the cursed pastry to bring to the hospital for testing to see what poison had been used and rushed to the hospital myself, calling Mary Margaret on my way there and telling her what happened. 

My nephew had been poisoned by his adopted mother, with a pastry meant for his birth mother, the very woman destined to defeat her and her curse. I got to the hospital not long after Emma and Henry and handed a nurse the bagged-up pastry to test for poison. I asked her how Henry was and she told me he was in a coma and being taken in for testing.

My nephew was in a coma. 

My nephew was in a fucking coma and my sister didn't even know he was my nephew, or me her twin. She had no idea that everything he'd been telling her since our 28th birthday was true. She really was the savior, Regina really was the Evil Queen, Mary Margaret really was Snow White, and her mother - our mother - it was all real. And she had to believe to break the curse.

She had to believe. 

I had to make her believe or Henry... Henry may never wake up.