Fuck Destiny, I choose you
Regina’s office was dimly lit as the sun settled behind the desk, windows glowing slightly as the orange colored rays casted slowly elongating shadows on the untouched papers and pen atop the wooden surface. Regina, seated not on her usual seat but one of the small couches she had, kept an eye on them, mentally counting seconds away as she breathed in and out, right hand on her chin, left drumming a silent tune on her slacks-clothed knee.
In front of her, the small pouch she hadn’t been able to look at ever since Tinker had left the office, glared at her from the corner of her eye. Brown and with small dots of still working magic buzzing against her own purple one, it really didn’t seem much. What was on the inside, however, was what made the brunette sigh deeply as she sat straighter as ever on the couch, refusing to look at it despite the twitching on her fingers.
That had been the word used by Tinker, an excited smile on her lips. Fate and prewritten stories Regina, as the blonde put it, could have if she dared to search for another soulmate. “The one you would get to keep.” The fairy had said, nodding towards the pouch before glancing back at Regina, eyes twinkling.
It had been a nice gift, Regina thought, one the fairy had been very careful to handle as she had put it exactly on the same place it still waited for her. One the brunette knew wasn’t easy to come by as, even with the merging of the realms, fairy dust was still something very difficult to replicate; the powers it held on Storybrooke’s mines not as strong or as safe as it had once been back when the Enchanted Forest had been whole.
After some slow, long seconds, Tinker had realized that Regina, still holding her pen at that point, didn’t plan on answering and, with one deep final nod towards the pouch, had left.
“Just try it.” She had said before closing the door, her voice floating up towards Regina, each word stabbing her mind as she stood, conjuring a cider glass that now laid empty at one side of the couch.
Mind fuzzy but feelings clear, the brunette licked the insides of her mouth as she, finally, dared to steal a glance to the pouch. So close, a voice on the back of her mind whispered to her.
She had come to terms that Robin, both one she had encountered after that trip to the enchanted forest and the one that had been created by Emma’s wish, had been a soulmate. A potential one. One that could have worked wonders to the woman she had once been; just on the brink of becoming the Queen. The one who had later transformed herself on the Evil one, the one everyone had feared at some point. The one who had incarcerated and killed without restraint. She also had realized, as she had sought Daniel’s grave, that as much as she had loved him, as much as a part of her still loved him, she wasn’t the woman she had been then; naïve and full of a light that wasn’t hers to give anymore.
She had realized, at last, that she didn’t need him in order to be happy and yet, as Tinker had left a few hours before, the childlike wonder of having lived at the Enchanted Forest, the tales she got her father to tell her at the light of candles and with the ever present fear of Cora finding them both out, the old desire to discover there was someone there for her made her almost want to see who would be pointed out as her soulmate. The one she could be with.
It was a stupid thought, she mentally scolded herself. She had merged the realms after all; she was now a Queen. She had her family, the one she had ended up creating and finding along the way. A pouch, she firmly told to that voice, wasn’t going to make her happier.
Yet she wanted to see, wanted to search…
Or, maybe, the voice at the back whispered just as her heart spiked, magic quietly crawling up her body, it wasn’t just that.
It was just a fear of what the pouch would show her; who it would be the chosen one, the one at the end of the greenish line. The one that wouldn’t be a woman that she so desperately wanted to be.
Standing, Regina run her hands through her hair, ruffling it up before she let her magic style it back in one simple burst of purple magic. She could feel her lungs constricting as Emma’s name appeared on her mind, accompanied by the blonde’s gentle smile, by the way she had looked at her after the coronation, as they finally got to talk after everything, after decisions that shouldn’t have been made and losses that shouldn’t have happened.
She wanted Emma to be there, at the other end of the line because, despite everything, Regina knew enough of herself to realize that she wanted that, that story. One she had searched on books, all written by different authors, all proclaiming her Queen, all whispering how she had always been a side of a coin which prophecy had been written on her blood and magic, on her magic and prowess.
She wanted that, and, because of it, she felt like a child simply asking for something she couldn’t have. Asking for something she shouldn’t even want.
And yet, there she was, walking towards her desk, resting at its edge, as she felt the powder inside the pouch calling for her. A simple spell, her mind told her, one simple spell that would make everything much clearer.
She wasn’t where she was by following fate and fate alone however. She was where she was now because of her, because decisions had led her there, decisions that went against the evil power she had been taught, the one needed to fulfil the prophecy she had been tied to follow; of the Evil Queen and the Savior, of dark curses and realms and reigns that weren’t there anymore.
And, just like herself, Emma had walked away from that path; refusing to be a character on a mere prewritten story, refusing to be the martyr, refusing to transform herself and just be a footnote on a history book.
That had been the reason why, a month after the coronation she had given Hook his ring back, a shadow of the backbone Regina had always seen on her, returning as she had told him she couldn’t keep going. Not for Hope, not for her.
They were more than characters, more than stories told with invariable endings.
Lighting a fireball, she let her magic engulf her for a second before sending it in a calculated throw towards the pouch, careful to keep everything but the leather bag and its interiors as pristine as they were.
“Come at the office.” She said seconds before, her voice soft on the speaker of her phone, knuckles white and trembling as she stared at the ashes of what had been her destiny until the flames had destroy it. “There is something I want to tell you.”
She was going to write the next chapter, she thought as she heard Emma’s response, a soft smile curving her lips. No more magic, no more ink, no more dust. Only her.
