Title: Midnight Town

Universe: Alternate Universe; Emma is a sixteen year old foster kid. Storybrooke and citizens are as we see them in S1. Henry is ten and is her foster brother.

Rating: T (child abuse, minor language, adult themes)

Author's note: I really love the idea of teenager Emma Swan. I wanted to keep the character of Henry in this story. How does Emma Swan eventually end up in Storybrooke under the care of Mayor Regina Mills?

Midnight Town

Emma Swan wasn't a people person. In her opinion, the less people in her life the better. People caused problems for her and she caused problems for them. There were only a few people who were exempt from her number one rule. And by few, she meant one. One person.

A childish giggle erupted behind her. "Emma? You're going to wear that to a bar?" Her younger foster brother, Henry, peered around her bedroom door as she tugged on a plain black turtle neck sweater. His dark hair was matted to his head and the sleeves of his shirt swept over his hands. Emma wished she could get him new shirts that were his size.

Henry was ten and sweet. She gave him a groan and flopped onto her rickety mattress. Taking that as an invitation to enter, he laughed at her and strolled into the room swinging his long sleeves at his sides.

"Mr. Adders is gone! Now, I can laugh as loud as I want," he stamped his foot comically and grinned. "But are you really going to wear that, Emma? I mean it's okay, but-,"

"Yeah, I'm going to wear this. Anyway, I don't have much of a wardrobe to choose from," she winked at Henry as he analyzed her critically. Feeling his young, truthful eyes on her she began to feel uncomfortable. She frowned, "What?!"

"Why are you afraid of making new friends? That Neal guy wants you to go for saving his butt," he assured her. He pushed some hair out of his eyes with a fraying sleeve end.

Emma stammered, "I-I am not afraid of making new friends. And that Neal guy already thanked me so why should I even go now?"

"You are too afraid of friends," he teased.

"Are not."

"Yeah!"

"No! I don't know why I even said I would go. It was stupid. I have to stay here with you and Cordelia." Emma quickly began pulling her arms from the sleeves of her black turtle neck, taking it off.

Henry reached out and grabbed one of her retreating arms. His brown eyes looked up at her in a determined, childlike missionary way. Emma knew he wanted her to feel happy. It made her embarrassed that her little adoptive brother was the one concerned for her happiness when happiness was the last of Emma Swan's concerns. Henry was still too good and sweet.

"Me and Cordelia will be okay. Mrs. Adders will be home really soon. We want you to have friends!" He beamed at her through some missing teeth.

"It's a bar, how tacky is that?" she looked at her ten year old brother for an answer.

"It'll be cool!" Henry guaranteed her.

Emma shook her head. Henry knew what a bar was sure, but sometimes she forgot their extensive age gap of understanding. Henry thought everything was cool.

"If I go… you have to take a bath. Take a bath before Mr. or Mrs. Adders get home, you understand? Cordelia goes after you." Emma looked at him very seriously. "You know Mr. Adders get mad easily."

Their foster father, Mr. Adders, was a very serious man with an extremely low tolerance for children. He was an older ex-military man with thick arms and a gray bearded chin. Not only were the foster children afraid of him, but so was his wife. She was soft and quiet and when he was mad enough and the children were hiding away, he would take it out on her. Mrs. Adders made the mistake of standing up for the children once, resulting in a broken nose and a chipped front tooth. She was always pretty and frail. Emma knew that in a way, Mrs. Adders allowed the children to take the anger of her husband, to steer clear of his cruelness. People at work asked her about her injuries and Mr. Adders didn't like that one bit. It was easier to explain that children fell sometimes and got bruises and such, but grown women did not.

"I will," Henry assured, "I remember how to clean it all back up the way he likes it to be." Henry went over the rules with her again, just to be safe. If Emma was going to leave, she wanted to be sure everything went smoothly. "Emma, I know. I'm not a baby."

She shook her head and pulled him into a hug. He was so skinny, she thought as she gently rubbed his back, feeling his spine through his shirt. Henry wanted her to go and he wanted to show her that he could manage by himself. A part of Emma knew that one day he'd have to do it himself. She wasn't going to be able to remind him of all the rules that she learned the hard way through many different homes, and frankly, it killed her that she wouldn't be able to protect him forever.

"I'll be good," he mumbled into her abdomen.

"I know you will. Honestly, Henry… I can stay." She began, letting him go. The worry crawled up her neck and made her anxious again.

Henry gently pushed her back. "Go! I'm ten! I'll be fine. Cordelia listens to me. I want you to meet friends and then maybe they can be my friends too. Wouldn't that be cool?" He laughed and grabbed her hand, doing his best to pull her out of her tiny bedroom.

She allowed him to drag her all the way downstairs. Emma loved it when their foster parents weren't home. Henry was able to laugh and for even an hour or two, feel like a boy. Mr. Adders didn't come screaming around the corner, his face nearly purple with rage, rambling about politeness and quietness being one with God. Henry was Henry.

When they reached the front door, Henry drew it open acting as a small gentleman and bowed.

"Your chariot awaits, Miss Lady Swan!" he giggled.

Feeling a bit more cheerful, (Henry's good nature rubbing off on her clearly), she returned the bow and walked out of the front door. Turning around, she blew him a kiss.

"Go bathe then read some of your fairy tales to Cordelia. I'll be back before you know it." Emma gave him a grin and turned around. He'd be fine. He was a good boy.

Smokey, thick air hung above the heads of the people in the bar and nobody cared who was who. Emma noticed a pair of bikers with dark beards at a table in the back, belly laughing over the volume of the grungy rock music that wafted through the place. A few angry looking twenty-something's gathered around the pool table in the center of the bar, holding dark colored beer bottles and at times, gathered their heads together to talk. Some skin-showing ladies chatted loudly and sat in a line at the bar flirting with the skinny, dark haired bartender who was more than willing to keep their attention. Emma was sure there were a few older high school students mixed in, dressing older than their ages and doing their best to impersonate someone who was legal. She didn't care. She wasn't interested in them.

Emma followed the group she met up with to the bar where the line of chatting ladies sat. Watching the kids she came with easily squeeze between the girls and order a few drinks, Emma decided to hang back. The bartender looked up from shaking a cocktail and gave Emma a quick, casual look-over.

Feeling suddenly shy, Emma pulled her leather jacket closer to her torso and folded her arms across her chest. She was sixteen, not 21; though she did feel a bit like a sore thumb, she knew no one had given her a second glance for age. This wasn't exactly a professional bar. Building up a good don't-give-a-shit attitude, Emma pulled herself up onto a bar stool next to the guy who invited her.

"Hey, Neal, how long will we be here?" she asked as casually as possible.

Neal shook the bartender's hand charismatically and turned to Emma with a grin. "I don't know," he shrugged, "'till we've had enough, I guess." He dragged a green bottle of beer off the bar and handed it to her. "This one's not too bad for a beer, you'll like it."

Taking it quickly from him, she pulled a five from her jacket pocket. Neal noticed and shook his head, "Don't have to pay me, Emma. We're even. This night is a big thank you from me to you."

Thinking back on what Neal was referring to, she decided it was better not to argue. Besides, she really needed her five dollars anyway.

"Honestly, if I didn't find out you were once a foster kid, I would have told that cop the truth," she admitted. Emma wanted to make sure he knew that.

Neal tilted his head and leaned closer. "I know. You're a hell of a lot better than I am, Emma Swan."

Genuinely surprised, she took a sip of the bitter ale. "I guess. God, this is terrible," she scrunched her face and set the bottle on the bar. "Anyway, is he doing better? Michael? Was stealing forty bucks worth of medicine the cure?"

Neal chuckled and took a huge gulp of his drink before wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "Oh, yeah. I was really worried. I couldn't afford it, you know. His foster parents weren't doing a damned thing for his pneumonia. I called the agency, but you know how that goes… It wasn't a cure by any means, but it made the kid feel more comfortable."

Neal went on telling Emma how Michael, a foster brother he last had before Neal was old enough to leave the system, was back on his feet again after being terribly sick and was now even doing well in school. Emma and Neal both knew doing well in school as a foster kid was almost an impossible feat.

She was surprised to hear the amount of care for his younger foster brother in his voice. When Emma had seen the disheveled young man stuffing pricey medicines into his jacket, she had the intention of turning him in. Maybe good karma would come her way or something like that. Before she could however, the owner of the small pharmacy had talked to a sheriff who was previously in the store, noticing Neal's suspicious behavior. She remembered Neal begging for a deal to get the meds for his foster brother who was pretty sick and when the pharmacist refused to budge on the prices, Neal got desperate and began stuffing his pockets when the sheriff casually talked with the owner. He snuck out and the sheriff and owner quickly turned to Emma to ask if she had seen him take anything.

Of course she told them she saw nothing. And the cop determined that Emma looked like a very trustworthy young lady.

"I wouldn't expect you to be the type of person to keep an eye on old foster siblings, but I'm glad you do," she admitted. "Honestly, I'd probably do that same."

Neal nodded, "I try. I'm one guy." He lowered his eyes at Emma for a second and raised his hand toward the bartender. "I'll get you something different. Fortunately for me, this 'tender is an old friend and is extremely lenient on payment methods, so feel free to order yourself this time."

Not sure how to respond, Emma watched the bartender walk over and greet Neal again.

"Hey, Neal. Whatcha need?"

Turning to Emma, Neal pointed at her. The bartender looked expectantly at Emma and waited. Emma wasn't much of a drinker; she knew what it could do to people.

"Oh, uhh, can I just get a rum and coke?" she stammered, uncertain.

"Sure thing." he sped away to make her drink as quickly as he came.

Emma felt older in the worn down bar. Sure, she normally felt two times her age anywhere else, but here…she didn't feel like an orphaned kid who grew up at age five. In this bar with the bearded bikers and the scantily clad ladies surrounding her, she felt like a sixteen year old aged enough to dare herself to enter a bar and try a drink among the oddities of patrons. Emma Swan felt like one of the edgy high school kids who commonly snuck into the bar and that was the closest she'd ever relate to them.

It wasn't fair, but she didn't mind now.

"Rum and coke!" the bartender slid the drink to her and went on to wiping down a few spilled martinis near a lady with a sparkly blue top.

"Better?" Neal asked as she took a drink from the glass. When she responded with a shrug, he looked over at the rest of his friends who were now nearby the pool table. "Are you any good?"

Emma took a big sip again and shrugged, "I'm alright."

By the time that Emma cared to check her watch, she noticed it was nearly midnight. She knew her foster mother would be made to wait for her return, but in this time and place, with these people who simply did not give a damn that she was who she was, Emma Swan did not really care about those rules. A bit of her worried about the reaction of the foster father who was an easily angered and frustrated man. She knew he would be angered at Emma for keeping his wife up too late. Thank god that he didn't get home until very early in the morning. After all, Emma was essentially their meal ticket and if she didn't act as such, it went worse for her. Though as soon as that worry appeared, it faded away.

She was here with people who introduced her as their friend. Sure, it was kind of corny for her to privately smile behind the backs of the group whenever they would act genuinely interested in her presence. It was a tacky bar and it was illegal for her to even be inside of it, let alone have a drink in her hand, but it was the most comfortable she'd been in a long time. Maybe Henry was a little right in wanting her to go.

Emma cheered on Neal's friend, Wendy, as she sunk a ball into a corner pocket. Wendy stayed leaning on the pool table with an obvious swaying stance and looked over her shoulder at Neal and Emma, giving a very confident batting of the eyes. Feeling uncomfortable, she looked up at Neal who was shaking his head with a little smirk that was being sent her way.

"She's something," Neal mused.

As she was about to answer to that statement rather awkwardly, she felt the pocket of her jeans vibrate. Wondering the time, she checked her watch to discover it was about one in the morning. Pulling out a rather dinged up cell, she looked to see who it was. Feeling Neal's gaze on her, she looked up, flashed her phone quickly at him for an answer to the question he was about to ask and made her way through the noisy people to the back door of the bar to answer it.

"Henry? Why are you calling? Are you okay?" she nearly shouted into the other line as the heavy door of the bar slammed behind her. The night engulfed her as did the coldness of the alleyway.

Henry was her first priority always. Emma's heart jumped into her throat as she considered everything that could have gone wrong in the past six hours. Henry knew better than to use their foster parents' phone line. Mr. Adders didn't like it.

"Emma! Where are you? Mr. Adders came home early yelling about work and he is really, really mad. Cordelia is crying! She wouldn't stop so he got even madder. I heard Mrs. Adders tell him you weren't back yet so I snuck into the kitchen to call you," Henry seemed to be trying to whisper carefully, but it came out as a desperate, hoarse warning.

Emma's stomach plummeted. "Oh, God… Henry, I lost track of time! Where is he?"

"I'm sorry!" his voice pinched and she knew he was holding back a sob.

"Henry?! Henry what do you mean you're sorry? HENRY?" Emma couldn't squeeze her shitty cellphone any tighter. A messy sniffle buzzed on the other line. "Shit," Emma breathed. "Henry, go downstairs and hide in the pantry if you can. Okay? I'm only a few blocks away; I'll run back if I have to."

"Emma, he made me tell him where you were. Cordelia started crying and I got scared. I tried to be brave and not tell him, but-,"

"Did HE HURT YOU?" she barked into the phone.

Through her labored breathing she barely made out the small, 'yes' on the other end.

Hearing a bit of loud banging in the background on Henry's line, she felt panic rise in her chest.

"Emma…" Henry whispered. She could tell he was frightened. It killed her. "He's coming to hurt you now, Emma," the voice was so quiet that she needed to hold her breath to quiet herself down.

"I won't let him hurt you anymore. I'm coming, kid. Go grab Cordelia and hide." She said it firmly as she could though her whole body was shivering.

Hearing the click on the other line, she hung up her phone and shoved it into her pocket.

Tonight was absolutely a bad decision. She should have known better. She should have known better than to go out with a bunch of random young adults and try to join in some sort of stupid friendship. True, that's what a tiny bit of Emma hoped for, but she didn't think the stupidity of it through. Trying to be a kid never went well for Emma Swan. Never.

Clutching her borrowed cell like a lifeline, Emma Swan began to run towards the end of the alleyway with the street. It was dark, cars could be heard honking, braking, bad mufflers chugging, and all of it, and Emma found it deafening.

A voice, threatening as thunder, boomed her way. "You… girl."

Emma whirled around, startled in the alleyway, and watched two silhouettes prowl toward her. She wasn't stupid; she knew the cities and its dangers. Emma Swan knew how terrible and dangerous people were. Her hand slid immediately into the additional pocket she added inside her jacket months ago and felt the coldness of her pocket knife. An older foster boy named Abraham taught her different measures to protect herself. Some violent, but she knew them nonetheless. For the most part, Emma never refused advice from someone in the system. Abraham let her know that one never knew when someone needed a good stab. Protection was protection.

"Back off. I've got somewhere to be and I don't have time to chat," Emma shouted. Her hand squeezed her knife like a life line so much that her hand grew cold with less blood flow. This was turning out to be a terrible night.

"How are the drinks here?"

Emma felt her entire body grow cold. Henry wasn't just repeating an empty threat. Her foster father really was coming to hurt her now. She recognized his heavy silhouette through the light, set like an angry bear living for the moment of a kill. The other, skinnier silhouette she wasn't so sure of.

"I-I'm leaving right now. I'm done here." She stammered reverting to her fearsome state as her hand wrapped the knife even closer.

"I give you a ROOM and my HOSPITALITY and I get no goddamn respect from you stupid kids!? You think you're some hot shit, huh, girl? Going out and whoring around? My wife stayed up for your stupid ass," he boomed. "That Henry really has a smart mouth on him, but I need you to know I gave him a good old beating before coming down here to find you."

The skinner man chuckled and she watched him hand over something to her hulking foster father. They continued forward and Emma backed herself into the door of the bar. Reaching backwards with her free hand, she absently searched for a handle of any sort on the metal door and realized it was a one way exit.

No. Please, just no.

"You're never going to touch him again. If you know what's good for you." Emma yelled.

Emma could not see their faces because of a bright streetlight shone down the alley which was at the backs of the approaching men. As they stopped a few yards in front of her, she realized they could see her perfectly well in the exposing light. The corner of her eyes searched for an exit but there truly were none. The stupid bar was at the end of a narrowing alleyway in a sketchy part of town. She should have noticed something like this beforehand.

"Don't threaten an army man, Emma," the skinnier man said.

Emma felt a moment of stupid, honest, and angry bravery. Before she could hold it back, it slipped from her mouth, months in the waiting.

"I will threaten any man who feels power in hurting people smaller than him. Do you know who this guy really is? I do. Give this army man a bottle of Devil's Cut whiskey and you'll really see. Mr. Adders is a wife-beating, child endangering sorry excuse of an army man."

The thicker shadow strode closer and Emma instinctively backed away. Her whole life in between foster homes, she was victim of wincing at screams, extremely well at avoiding confrontation, and innate at backing away from any advances.

"I'm going to kill her."

Emma couldn't stand by with a statement like that, before she thought better, she pulled out her pocket knife and made it very clear she could use it.

"Come at me and I will stab you in your eyes, you son-of-a-bitch," Emma threatened. Her stance became animalistic. Nobody was fiercer when backed into a corner than a kid who fought like hell their whole life.

The thick shadow of Mr. Adders charged towards her and before Emma realized it he was right in front of her. That asshole was insanely quick.

With as much force as her arm could muster she slashed in his direction. A deep howl echoed through the alley before Emma's head was met with a heavy, wild blow.

"She fucking cut my goddamn arm open!"

A terrifying wail erupted from her mouth as she fell crumbling to the wet street, Emma clutched her face in agony. Her eyes seemed to lose focus in the throbbing and panic of her situation. She'd been hit hard before, but never with the side of a hand gun. She knew what the object was now as she heard the distinct click of a magazine. Her mouth was wet and hot. She turned onto her stomach and searched for where she lost her knife when she fell. Grabbing at wet cement, she felt nothing. A terrible searing of pain and a rippling of cracks, her brain registered that one of her attackers stomped onto her searching hand. Two male voices yelling and cussing, she couldn't tell where they were. Screaming in white-hot agony, she pulled herself into a fetal position. The world swirled around her; she could not see a thing though her eyes were wide open and desperate for information. Terrified wasn't even close to what she was. She realized, as she spat out blood and pooling drool from her hanging mouth, that she would probably die. Mr. Adders may get what he wanted.

She heard voices, angry, bellowing, screaming, off in what seemed like an echoing auditorium. Her face was on the freezing asphalt of the street and her mouth was sticky wet. Feeling sick and vulnerable, Emma did her best to pull herself up. A light behind her shone down and loud music bounced off the alley walls. A shadow rushed past her and her blurring field of vision could see nothing but many different silhouettes bumbling together roughly. Voices so loud, hurting her ears, screamed at the back of her head, bounced off of her skull. She was slammed into the cement again with a kick to the ribs.

"Emma!" a voice called out as foggy as the horn of a train in the distance.

Emma Swan decided, in the last bit of thinking muster, that tonight was one of her biggest regrets of all.

*I'm sorry I hurt Emma Swan*

Talk to me! Send a short review in of the first chapter, your favorite pairing, thoughts or concerns, etc.

(I'm really excited for young!Emma/Regina to meet).

I'll update when I can, until then send thoughts!

Thank you,

Cassie