Warning: This has potential triggers in it.

Characters aren't mine. They belong to ABC, Disney, and other assorted entities of importance. I gain nothing from writing these stories but the fun of doing it. Please don't sue me.

She gave Henry her most prized possession she still had left, a pocket watch that had belonged to Henry Senior. When her son had looked confused at the gift, she explained he was old enough to have it now, that it had belonged to her father, and she knew Henry would take good care of it.

It had been the chance to open up a dialogue about her father, one she'd never had with her son before, and they'd spent the rest of the day talking about the man after which her son was named. She knew the conversation would eventually end painfully because her son would get around to asking what had happened to his grandfather.

She was not wrong, though how Henry took the news surprised her. He frowned deeply, clutched the pocket watch in his hand, and then he looked at her with such sadness. He said, "I don't understand, but I know you felt like you had to do it. I know you're not that person anymore, Mom, and Grandma says that, back then, you were really lonely and angry and hurt, and I should think about that when you tell me stuff like this. I'm… I'm really sorry. I wish I could have met him."

Then, he hugged her, and she couldn't stop the tears even had she wanted to.

She gave Emma Swan something a little less sentimental but still just as important in a relative way. Managing to pull the Savior away from the pirate for a moment, she'd cornered the blonde in the alley behind the diner. It was clear from the expression on the younger woman's face that she thought Regina was about to hit her again, and the thought was extremely tempting given the pain the blonde had unintentionally inflicted on her by bringing Marian back.

However, striking the Savior and, once again, incurring the wrath of her son and town weren't high on her priority list at the moment. Instead, she held the other woman with her gaze and pulled out a book.

"You need to study, Ms. Swan," she'd said as she handed the undoubtedly old book to the very shocked other woman. "I want to be perfectly clear here. I hate you with a passion beyond reason, and I absolutely despise you and your pathetic excuse for parents, but, so long as you have a hand in raising Henry, I am going to ensure he is taken care of in the best way possible. That means you need to learn to control your magic because your magic is perfect for protecting my son."

She spat the words out as she thrust the book into Emma's hands. "This book will help you with your translations of Elvish. Read it, memorize it, and learn from it because I can't always be around to translate for you and clean up your messes."

She didn't give the reinstated Sheriff the chance to say a word before she disappeared into a puff of purple smoke, leaving the other woman dazed and confused.

She gave Mary Margaret a shock when she appeared rather suddenly in front of her at the park. "Your family could write a book on how to ruin people's lives," she growled out, staring down at the startled younger woman. "Perhaps a crash course in understand the very basic principles of action and reaction are in order? It seems none of you understand there are consequences to the things you do."

Mary Margaret started to speak, but Regina cut her off with a hand held up in the air. "I'm not here to listening to your placations, excuses, denials, and whatever else is about to come out of your mouth. I'm here to give you this." She held out her hand, revealing an intricately hand carved broach. "I believe this belongs to you, does it not?"

"That… that was my mother's," Mary Margaret said in shaking voice. "Where did you…"

"Come now, do you really have to ask. If you want it, take it. If not, then I'll dispose of it some other way." Regina waited for two very long seconds before closing her hand around the piece of jewelry as the other woman stared, gaping at it. "Well, I suppose you don't want it. In that case…"

"No! I do!" Mary Margaret lunged forward, reaching out to touch Regina but stopping herself just before she did. "Please, I do want it."

"Fine," the older woman replied flippantly, casually tossing the treasure at the woman in front of her and smirking when it nearly hit the ground. With a smug look, she vanished just as quickly as she'd appeared, leaving Mary Margaret grateful for the gift but confused by the encounter.

She gave Charming a replacement. She found him at the Sherriff's office working away at a stack of paperwork no doubt left to him by his new supervisor. The click of her heels had him snapping his head up and giving her his full attention before she came to a stop in front of his desk.

She gave him a haughty look and dropped a sheathed sword atop the papers scattered over his desk. "Use it to protect my son, and do be careful, Charming. This is a fine weapon forged of the best Dwarven steel from our world."

He eyed her cautiously as he reached forward and carefully picked the weapon up to slowly unsheathe it. The metal was a brilliantly shined black, reflective and deadly sharp. "Regina, why…"

"Because I can't always be around to protect Henry, and, despite how much I loath the fact, you and your idiotic family are a part of his life. Therefore, I'm providing you with a weapon I know you cannot possibly break so that, if I'm not around to protect him, I at least know you have the means to do it yourself."

David scowled at her as he sheathed the sword and placed it back on his desk. "I am capable of taking care of my family."

"Yes, because history has proven that to be true," she quipped back. "That sword is enchanted. If someone attempts to take it from you by force, they'll be repelled. The silver designs etched into the blade make the enchantment permanent." She gave a dismissive wave of her hand to stop whatever he was about to say. "It belonged to my best knight, but, since he's now a fisherman, I suppose it will do better with you."

"That's very generous of you, but I don't under…."

"Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, Charming. The sword is yours. The enchantments are changed to match you. Use it wisely, and keep my son out of danger."

He nodded, placing a hand over the scabbard as he tilted his head to the side in question. "Does this mean you're not," he rolled his eyes as she disappeared in a flash of smoke, not there to hear the tail end of his question, "angry with us about Marian?"

With a sigh, he picked the sword up again and pulled it out of its scabbard. It was a beautiful weapon. The blade was perfectly balanced, the handle fit his grip precisely, and, the pommel's end was decorated with his family crest on one side and Regina's crest on the other, which he found strange but chalked it up as something more to add to the strangeness of the encounter he'd just had.

With a shrug and shake of his head, he sheathed the sword again and carefully set it against the desk next to him, making a mental note to talk to Emma about the encounter when she came back into the office.

She gave herself a very long look in the mirror.

Standing in her safe room in the catacombs beneath Storybrooke's cemetery, she looked at herself and the hardened expression she'd been carrying for the past two days crumbled.

She was supposed to be strong, to be resilient. She was supposed to be able to come back from anything and do it in style and grace. She was supposed to be above self-pity and self-hatred.

She was Regina Mills.

She was the Mayor.

She was Queen.

Peasants and royalty alike bowed before her. She commanded respect wherever she went. She was a powerhouse, a force to be feared.

She had power. She had her son, and, for the briefest of moments, she'd had a second chance at happiness.

Her mind raced over the moments of happiness she'd had and how long they'd lasted.

Her father's unconditional love had lasted until she had killed him to enact the curse.

The curse had lasted until her son's biological mother showed up and started mucking up what happiness Regina had managed to find by, first, stealing away Henry and, then, breaking the curse. The first Regina finally admitted was her own fault. If she'd simply shown Henry, really shown him, how much she loved him and how much she wanted him, then he would never have become so lonely and depressed. If she'd been truly supportive of him, he'd never become so withdrawn, and then Mary Margaret would never have given him the book. Without the book, he'd never have started to hate her or suspect something was wrong with the town, and he'd never have brought Emma Swan to Storybrooke. In a way, the curse being broken was her own fault.

Daniel came back from the dead, but he was a monster. She had to end his life. For a few brief seconds, when he came back to himself and he recognized her, she was so happy, but it ended all too quickly. That, too, was her fault. Had she never allowed herself to hope she could be free of her mother, he would never had been killed, and the rest of those events would never had taken place. Both of Daniel's deaths were her fault.

Speaking of her mother, for all of 10 seconds, she was happy with her mother. For all of 10 seconds, she was enough for Cora, and she was the happiest daughter in the world, but then Cora had died in her arms. She had allowed herself to hope, to listen to Snow White talk about love, and she had believed. She'd believed in the woman who, as a girl, had caused Daniel's death because she couldn't be trusted with a secret. She'd allowed herself to blindly trust Snow White again, and, because of that, she'd been fooled into killing her own mother. That, too, was Regina's own fault. She should never have allowed herself to believe in such nonsense. She knew better.

She knew better than to believe in hope and to listen to Snow White's advice on such matters, yet she allowed herself to be talked into it again, and it had led her to Robin, who had made her so happy. He was her second chance, and it was good. It was so good, but then her sister had come to ruin everything, which, for a change, wasn't Regina's fault. She had no hand in destroying Zelena's life; that had all been Cora. However, Regina did have a hand in killing Marian, Robin's first wife. At least, she would have had Emma Swan not brought Marian back with her from the blonde's time traveling adventure. So, when Marian reunited with Robin and Roland, the pain in Regina's chest was increased tenfold by the realization that this moment of happiness that had been stripped from her was also her fault. If she'd had the bravery and strength to meet Robin in that bar, then this pain would never have happened, or, if she hadn't been out for blood as Queen, then she'd never have tried to have Marian killed, and this reunion would never have taken place. Either way she looked at it, no matter the situation, the fact she wasn't with Robin Hood, her soul mate, was her own fault.

From where she stood mentally taking survey over her life, everything was her fault, and the burden of carrying around all that pain was becoming too much of a cross for her to carry. Despite what everyone might think of her, despite how resilient her heart is or how much of a fighter she seemed to be, Regina was tired.

Regina Mills had finally hit a point where she was too tired to keep fighting, and, really, when one fights with themselves all the time, the battle is always a losing one, and she was very tired of losing.

She stared at herself, at the wariness in her eyes and the stiff posture that served as her armor against the world, and she couldn't hold back the sob that crawled up her throat and out her red stained lips. She didn't see a mayor, a mother, or a queen staring back at her. All she saw was a weak foolish failure who had allowed her emotions and attachments to cloud her judgment for far too long. Never learning from her own mistakes and never finding any peace, she was destined to continuously fight against herself and the universe, to always struggle to find her happy ending, which was always out of reach, always just close enough to see but never close enough to do more than brush the tips of her fingers against.

She didn't want to do this anymore. She was tired of being a pawn, and she was tired of the pain she inflicted on herself. Everyone had their happy ending, even Rumple. Everyone had exactly what they wanted, except for her, and it had become crystal clear it was never going to happen for her. She was always going to be the universe's whipping boy, and that was something she no longer wanted to be.

In fact, she no longer wanted to be anything or anyone. The fight was all gone, dissipated with the harsh realization that her life was always going to be unhappy with fleeting moments of happiness that served only to accentuate her pain.

She wasn't going to do it anymore.

Taking in a shuddering breath, she turned away from her reflection. It was time to end this once and for all. Everyone was happy; they wouldn't miss her presence. She'd given everyone the means to protect Henry, and she'd given Henry everything she had left she could give him that he'd actually accept from her. Now was a good time to leave it.

With a wave of her hand, she opened the hidden door behind the mirror and turned, walking through it back into the catacombs. It was time to find the right potion. It couldn't be a sleeping potion. Henry could break that. No, this one needed to be more permanent.

With grim determination written on her face, she opened one of the many drawers in a wall not far from the hidden safe room and began looking through the potions there.

Death, she mused as she ran her fingers along the bottles, would be a welcome respite from the hell she'd managed to create for herself.

Don't know if I'll continue this or not.