Author: Regency

Title: The Hardest of Hearts (A Bounty of Hearts)

Warnings: None, though if you have an aversion to hospital politics, you may be annoyed.

Spoilers: None

Pairings: Snow/Charming, Emma/Regina, and many other friendships

Rating: PG-13 at most (will change rating if needed)

Summary: Dr. Regina Mills is the second most sought-after pediatric heart surgeon on the East Coast. Aside from her professional accomplishments, the only thing she wants is to be a mother. Emma Swan is a bounty hunter at the top of her game and the son she gave up is the last person she wants to think about. Their fates collide when a parentless boy named Henry comes to Maine's foremost transplant center in search of a heart—and his bail jumping foster brother Killian follows.

Author's Notes: This is a late entry for the Winter 2015 Swan Queen Week of Alternate Universes. In other news, Belfry is a sound-alike for Baelfire, so I picked that as Henry's surname instead of Swan. And, the transplant politics included in this story are totally made up and simplified, but for the purposes of our story, they're going to work the way I write them.

Disclaimer: I don't own any characters recognizable as being from Once Upon a Time. They are the property of their actors, producers, writers, and studios, not me. No copyright infringement was intended and no money was made in the writing or distribution of this story. It was good, clean fun. Anything that even resembles a real life person or place is purely coincidental and not intended, unless otherwise specified.

~!~

Henry Belfry was scheduled for surgery three days ago. Regina should know as she put in for the OR personally while her assistant had updated her scheduler. Three days ago, at 7:30 on Tuesday morning, young Henry Belfry, diagnosed at age 7 with congestive heart failure, was due to receive his new heart. A heart had been delivered indeed, but not to the chest of Regina's patient. Kathryn Nolan, Healing Heart's administrative director in charge of transplants and Regina's longtime friend, had been the one to break the news to her, an obvious ploy to keep her from setting a certain rival heart surgeon's desk aflame and smearing herself in the ashes.

Obvious ethical considerations aside, Regina's hands were tied. A heart had been available and delivered to a child in need. Once done, such an act couldn't be taken back, and Regina couldn't say she wanted it taken back. What she wanted was justice for Henry. He deserved a normal life of robust heath and laughter, no one of struggling to sit upright or even breathe. He was ten and yet had the stamina of an emphysematic sixty-year-old. He couldn't run, he could barely talk. That little boy's body would fail him unless he received a new heart within the year. This should have been his chance. As though it wasn't enough that his body continually failed him, Henry was a child of the system, chronically homeless for all that he had been bounced from hospital bed to hospital bed on the charity of others. He didn't even have the comfort of a hand to hold save hers. He didn't have anyone.

Regina made a vow to herself, as she reviewed Henry's latest test results in the solitude of her office. He will get his heart, if I have I rip it from Gold's cold, grasping clutches. Anyone who knew her reputation would realize she meant it. Dr. Regina Mills collected hearts and then she gave them to children in need.

And, Dr. Gold was running a dangerous race these days standing between Regina and a patient's needs being met. There might yet be casualties.

…

…

Emma Swan slammed into the auto mechanic's shop on what looked—and smelled—like the corner of Desperation Boulevard. She sucked down the taste of motor oil and Armor-All and got up close and personal with the first lowlife she set her eyes on.

"Where the hell is Jones?"

The flabby asshole in the wife beater and greasy specs gave her a onceover she didn't appreciate, expected though it was. She'd lost two collars to a competitor in the last week and rent was due; she was beyond not in the mood.

"I don' know nobody named Jones."

Emma produced a Benjamin out of her back pocket. She'd come prepared. "I have a hundred reasons why you should tell me what I wanna know. That's one hundred more than you'll get if I call in the license plates I see stacked on that shelf."

This isn't even small-time. This is no-time. Not even worth the effort of hauling them all in for a collar. The BPD might be willing to show some goodwill for the tip, though.

"You accusin' me of something', blondie?" Flabby tried to stand his ground, but he looked pretty scared. Sweat gathered on his temples. The place started smelling like pizza, a once beloved dietary staple Emma immediately lost all desire to eat.

"That's a chop shop buzzing in the back of the house. If I call my friends at the BPD, it's going to be a bust, a real expensive waste of time and your ass in lockup. So how's about you listen and let me and Ben ask you again, where's Killian Jones?"

Flabby sucked his teeth and shrugged.

"He's gone. Left the city. Said it was too hot for 'im and he'd be back in the spring."

"Bullshit. His family's here. His girl's here." Milah had been tightlipped as a statue until Emma mentioned the missing persons advisory circulating with her face on it. The woman had folded like a cheap shirt and given her the address to this place.

"I'm just tellin' yous what I got." He grabbed for the Ben and she snatched it out of his grubby paw. There was a smear on the bank note. Grease…she hoped.

"Sorry, that's not worth my time. I'll ask somebody else. Maybe they'll want double."

"You ain't good for it."

Emma wasn't the type to show off so she kept her petty cash in her boot. It was one thing to put your cards on the table, it was another to make a target of yourself and this neighborhood was rough. She didn't want to have to baton anybody—the BPD were starting to know her by defense tactics.

"If you say so. Kid down the street says he needs the new Jays. When he has 'em, you'll know where he got the dough."

Flabby grunted. "Jonesy's got a brother, he says. Up in Maine. Some kind of sick. I don't know the details but he needs work done. It's serious." The guy shrugged like it was nothing.

Suddenly, Emma felt damned old.

"How old's the kid?"

"The hell should I know? Old enough to travel."

"Blood or not. What am I dealing with?" She needed to know if she was looking for another Jones. Killian had been in and out of foster care his whole life. She knew how complicated family could get in that set-up, she was pretty much flying blind.

"Kin, that's all I got. Foster, I think. He mighta mentioned somethin'."

"Mighta? You gotta give me more than might for two hundred."

"Foster brother, a little kid with heart failure. Gone up to Maine for a transplant. I hear it ain't lookin' good."

"This kid got a name?"

"Prolly."

She cocked her head. Loath as she was to stick around any longer, given the conspicuous utility van she'd seen parked up the street, she needed more.

" 'S all I got."

"Tough deal." She pivoted on the glued heel of her boot and turned to go.

3...

2…

1…

"Wait a minute. I might remember somethin'."

Emma affected a bored expression. All the sawing and welding sparks in the back were starting to give her a headache. "What might you remember?"

"Name starts with an 'h.' Harry o' somethin'. Maybe Henry. Last name's somethin' like Bailey."

"Harry Bailey?" It tasted wrong, she didn't know why, but she had a feeling that was as close as she was going to get, and time was wasting.

"Yeah, I think so."

She narrowed her eyes into slits, trying to get a read on the guy. If he's screwing me around, I'm out two hundred and there's my car note.

"Expect to see me again if it turns out you're lying to me to throw me off."

He held his meaty paws aloft, his face a picture of wounded pride. "I'm tryin' to do the right thing. Cut a guy some slack."

With an eye roll at his hangdog expression, Emma pulled out the second hundred and slapped it in his grimy palm alongside the first. "Yeah, all right. Thanks."

"No problem." He licked his lips. "Say, you wouldn't wanna—"

"Not even if you gave back the money," she quipped over her shoulder as she left the dusty chop shop. She smiled in passing at the plainclothes vice cop walking a dog and strode down the dingy street back to her yellow VW Bug. She needed to stop back at her apartment to pack for a trip to Maine. Killian Jones was in for a long trip home whether he was ready or not.