The Most Resilient Heart.

Too Many Evil Queens.

Writing this while watching the dog pull the couch to bits with his teeth... he's already pulled the soles out of my favourite Converse... maybe I should stop him... So sorry if I'm a bit distracted, but I'm totally in the fanfic zone and nothing is stopping me!

"Emma? W- Wh- Why did you-" Snow was trying to put her finger around it all. She had thought her daughter would never have done a thing like this...

Emma was silent for a moment just staring at the gap in the crowd that Regina had walked away through whilst her mother stuttered, completely and utterly disappointed in her. But she chose to speak up. "It's just, Mr Gold said-"

"Mr Gold said? Mr Gold said?" Snow was outraged. "I don't care what Mr Gold said! He's a manipulative, terrible, selfish and vindictive beast." She gasps and covers her mouth. What was she saying? Emma's actions were not only turning her into the Evil Queen, but also the pure Snow White.

Emma stared at her mother, surprised by the outburst. "It's just he told me that Regina was breaking from the inside... that is was her heart that was going to make her evil again. And so he told me that if she isn't hurting inside, then she won't hurt anyone outside."

She looked up, surprised to see that her mother was listening to her.

"He said the only way to do that would be to pull out her heart... to stop her from feeling." Emma trembled. "Mum, I knew it was wrong... but something needed to be done."

Snow turns away from her daughter, still disappointed, and turns to the townspeople. "Everyone, I need your attention." Everyone turns to see Snow's determined face. "I want Regina's heart here, unharmed. The search starts now and we don't go to bed until we have found it. A friend is in danger of destroying herself, so we must all help her. Is that understood?" Snow could be powerful and foreboding if she wanted to be.

Everyone nods.

And at the back of the crowd a man stares at Snow. He stares as his wife whispers something to him and takes his son home. He continues to stare as the crowd starts to whisper, passing around all sorts of gossip about the one woman he couldn't stop thinking about.

Robin turned away from the crowd and started his purposeful walk towards the forest.

This isn't the first time.

***

The box seemed to glow, even if the contents weren't visible. It seemed to glow as he held it in his hands. He was right. She had hidden it in the same place as before. She had grown too sentimental in some people's opinions but Robin found it fascinating. Fascinating that a Queen could become so fond of a special place that she shared with an Outlaw. 

"Regina..." He whispered, closing his eyes as his lips pronouced a name he so loved to say. It would send shivers down his spine at just the thought of it... at just the thought of her. "Why would you do this to yourself?" He sighs feeling the faint beat of her heart through his fingers.

"The pain..."

He swung around to search for the mouth of the seemingly lost voice and there she was standing a few metres away with her back turned to him. Her head lifted, staring straight ahead, and her amazing posture that only a real lady could manage. "The pain?-" He started.

"It wasn't like anything before. I had never felt my heart beat so forcefully, like it was telling itself to keep going, as if at any moment it felt it would stop." She spoke slowly, but not uncertainly. Every phrase sounded like a statement; a fact. She didn't move. She didn't turn around to look at him. And she didn't take the box from his hands. She just stood there as he felt his own heart feel that same pain; as if it had to force itself to keep going. "I had lost a true-love already... and a son, but my heart had never gone through so much pain in any of my past tragedies. It had never eaten at my insides, killing me slowly, forcing me to the floor, dragging my fingers along the boards to reach for it... to clutch it... just to stop it... It had never tortured me like it did when it was in my chest."

He stares at her. "Regina... I'm so sorr-"

"You know,"  Her voice gets softer. "I wished you had died instead."

He continues to stare, speechless. He could feel his heart drop, like her last 'statement' hurt him terribly.

"Because a dead true-love, that just empties you. And a lost son, the memory just lies in that large part of your heart. But when there's a choice..."

Robin takes his eyes off her for a second and looks down at the box. The beat was faint; faint as if it was slowly dying away. Robin couldn't believe that this was indeed the heart of the once powerful woman in front of him. He remembers that feeling holding her heart; the way it would beat powerfully, meaningfully, full of memories, love and... resilience. None of it was there anymore. It no longer beat with the same confidence and it made Robin worry. It made him worry for this woman that made him feel unlike anything he can remeber feeling before.

"When someone else is chosen... and you're left there to watch as the first man you have ever let into your heart in years, embraces the other woman as if he had been holding back that love for all the time she was gone..." Regina could feel the tears fillling her eyes but her voice remained steady with the excessive amount of energy she was using to seem confident. She just couldn't break in front of him.

Robin could feel her pain. He could feel it through his own heart and through his fingers as they unlatched the lid of the small box in front of him.

"If he had of died, he wouldn't have had to choose. And if I had of lost him instead, I would never have known who he would have chosen..." Her voice weakened with every word. 

Robin could hear the suffering in her voice and it hurt him. What was he doing away from his wife and son? Why did this woman attract him so? Why couldn't he just forget? Why did it kill him so much inside to know that she was suffering? He could feel his head battling with his heart. He could feel that side of him coming out; his head winning. He could feel his hand slowly opening the lid only to close it quickly before seeing the contents. Everyone seemed to have a part of them that reflected the Evil Queen and his respect for Regina just grew with every thought that crossed his mind. And with respect came love.

"With death, all you get is an empty heart. With loss, all you get is a heavy one. But with choices..." She gasps with tears in her throat. "Choices... They only break a heart."

Robin opens the box, his heart finally winning over his head. He gasps softly and a pang hits his heart as he stares into the box. He stares at the contents and suddenly understands. 

The Evil Queen's heart had finally given in; its resilience finally finished. So there it sat, darker than ever, barely beating... broken into several pieces.

... Perfect Day...

CC;)