Okay, so I recently re-watched the Doctor with my friend (bad idea, I cried again) and she asked me if I would write a short piece of writing dedicated to David and Regina. She gave me the prompt: Archie asks James to check on Regina after losing her true love again. Once there, they forget that they are meant to be enemies. Vulnerable Regina, conflicted James. Angst/Romance/Hurt/Comfort.

Well, seeing as the Doctor basically tore my heart out and crushed it (not to mention what it must have done to Regina), angst wasn't really a problem, nor was the hurt/comfort. Anyway!

Oh, btw, this story is not related to my Hook/Regina story. It's a stand alone.

Let me know what you think! Please leave a review!

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The rhythmic sound of shoes on hollow wood was starting to drive him crazy. And yet, he couldn't force his feet to stop their continuous pacing. Worry was gnawing in the pit of his stomach, refusing to leave him no matter how hard he tried to reassure himself. It was ironic really; a prince pacing the steps of the Evil Queen's house, waiting for her to answer the door. It was ironic that his worry was directed at the woman who had ruined his life.

He hadn't really been sure how to react when Archie had called him, not fifteen minutes ago. He'd been even less sure what to do when the therapist had asked him to go to Regina's house and check that she was alright. It was Regina's fault really that he hadn't known what to do. Prince Charming would have ignored the call; he couldn't have cared less about what happened to the evil queen. But David Nolen would have gone to check on the mayor. David's feelings towards Regina had always confused James. Because now he knew that everything Regina had done had been a ploy to hurt Snow. But he couldn't deny that, no matter how much the curse had influenced David, that man's feelings had been entirely genuine.

It had been the knowledge of how Regina's confrontation in the stables with the man she loved had turned out that had sent him running for his truck. The information that Regina had not been in the best space when she had left that had turned his palms sweaty with fear. He knew exactly how hard it was to lose your true love, how heart breaking to feel that connection you had break. His connection with Snow had all but become non-existent now that she was in another world. His words 'I can feel it' to Henry, meant to reassure the boy, had become hollow with each passing day. He'd started to wake clutching his chest, as if he could ease the emptiness inside him, the missing piece he was beginning to think he would never recover.

What would it be like to lose your true love, twice?

When you fell in love, truly fell in love, everything seemed all the brighter, and you felt as if the evils of the world could no longer touch you. When you lost your love, true or not, things didn't go back to the way they used to be. They became worse, plunged into the darkness of despair. How could you live, knowing that your other half was gone, forever?

How would Regina be feeling now? What would she do if she believed that there was no hope of love left for her in the world? Would Henry's love, love she had barely felt since Emma's arrival in Storybroke, be enough to keep her going?

James spun on his heal for what felt like the hundredth time and knocked sharply on the wooden door. He barely felt the sting of protest in his knuckles. 'Regina! Regina, if you don't open the door I'm going to come in!' He didn't particularly care that his words sounded threatening rather than concerned. All he knew was that Henry was facing losing one of his mothers, and he knew that the boy wouldn't cope if he lost this one.

When he received nothing but silence, James squared his shoulders and drew his foot back. There was a resounding crash as he kicked the door open and it swung wide, making sharp contact with the wall.

James stepped inside, taking in the quiet darkness of the house. The first thing he noticed was the mirror. Shattered and fractured, barely any of the reflective glass remained in the frame. Sharp deadly fragments lay still on the floor, glinting in the outside light. And somehow those slivers of glass, those shattered remanets, sent the fear in his stomach churning in his chest.

'Regina?' He couldn't get his voice to remain steady as he called her name, quickly checking the ground floor for any sign of the woman. The atmosphere in the dark house was heavy, pressing down on him. There wasn't a single mirror left in the house that wasn't broken.

At the foot of the staircase, James stopped his frantic searching, head cocked to the side. The house was silent, except for a soft, almost unnoticeable whimpering sound echoing from the level above. The sound was not reassuring. James took the steps two at a time, his long legs helping him to reach his destination quickly.

He rounded the corner and stood in the doorway of the master bedroom, gripping the frame tightly. He did not breathe a sigh of relief on seeing her, lying on the bed, curled in on herself. In fact, at the sight of the broken woman, he felt his breath catch in his throat as pity and sadness gripped him.

He approached the bed slowly, moving around to the opposite side so that she would see him coming. His legs bent at the knee as he crouched down beside the bed, mindful that he would be looming over her otherwise. 'Regina?'

The evil queen, or the woman who had once been the evil queen, lifted her arm from her face for a moment, and looked at him. Her dark eyes were all the darker for her sorrow, the light fractured in salt tears. But it was the emptiness in her eyes, the hollowness, that struck him. Archie had mentioned it briefly, but it was another thing to see it. It was another thing entirely to feel his own emptiness rising inside him at the sight, to feel the void in his soul reach out to the woman curled before him.

Perhaps that was what caused him to reach out a hand and wipe the tears from her face.

Regina didn't stiffen or flinch from the contact; on the contrary, she leaned into it, sitting up painfully slowly. Perhaps she just needed to feel the warmth, to know that she could still feel something. James stood, though perhaps it was David moving, and sat beside her, drawing her body against his own. Her body was icy cold, the chill seeping out from inside her. She was the ice queen for all the wrong reasons.

At that point, she did stiffen. Regina pulled away, her eyes questioning, and there was a fear there; a fear that he was there to hurt her. The sight of her fear made him feel helpless, and his shoulders dropped in time with his sigh. He looked her up and down, checking for injuries. It was then that he noticed the bruises on her neck and the blood and cuts on her right hand. He reached out and took it with a gentleness that surprised them both, cradling it as if it was the most precious thing in the world.

Was it David moving, or James? David wouldn't have had the courage to approach the Evil Queen at her most vulnerable. So perhaps it was James. Were they that different, really?

The cuts, the blood, were fresh. He felt a mixture of horror and pity and just…sadness, when he realised that the mirrors had been broken by her own hand, not by magic. As far as he could see, there was no glass stuck in her hand, so perhaps fortune had been kind in that instant. Then again, fortune didn't seem to ever glance in her direction, so he doubted that was the reason.

'I killed him'. Her voice was so soft and so weak that for a moment he wondered if it had been his imagination. Never, not even when she had been pleading with him, had he heard her sound so young. So vulnerable.

David, James, whoever he was right now, stared at her. Her gaze wasn't on him, but on her hand, and there was nothing but self-loathing in her eyes. 'I turned him to dust. I'm a monster, rotten to the core. Now at least the mirrors will show me the truth'.

They were wrong. They had all been wrong. Whoever had said that Regina was still a monster, one without emotion, had clearly never bothered to look past the cold surface. But there was no coldness now, no mask of hate and indifference, and he could see right through the weak wall guarding her to the damaged, broken girl beneath. Had anyone ever bothered to hear her side of the story? When had this all begun? Had the stable boy been the beginning or the end?

Why was he asking these questions?

He heard himself asking where her first aid kit was, felt his muscles move and take him to the bathroom. When he returned, Regina was sitting with her legs tucked under her to the side, leaning forwards with her weight supported by her arms. Her head was bowed. The sheet below her was slowly dampening as tears leaked from the corners of her eyes to fall with a soft 'plunk' on the bed. It was such a broken image that for a moment he could do nothing but stand still as wave after wave of sadness and pity gripped him.

He sat down beside her and took her hand gently, avoiding her gaze as he dabbed at the blood and double checked for glass. He bandaged the hand had just as gently, fastening it closed with a safety pin. The white of the bandage was a strong contrast against her olive skin.

'Why are you here?' He heard an attempt at strength in her voice as she spoke, but it broke on the last word.

There was a lot he could say. Too much, in fact. He didn't want to tell her that Archie had called him, not when there was a good chance that Regina would never trust the therapist again. He placed the first aid kit down before he turned to her. Her face was open and questioning, and looking at her it was easy to forget that she had ever been more than a broken, grief stricken woman hiding from the world. It was easy to forget where her grief and pain had taken her. 'I wanted to apologise'. He had, after all, though he hadn't realised it until that minute.

She tilted her head, the movement dislodging more tears from her eyes. 'For what?'

She was still wearing her boots. She must have gone home and gone straight to bed. For something to do, as a way of avoiding looking at her face, he shuffled back and took her foot in his hand. He dragged the zip down slowly and placed a large hand under her knee as he pulled the shoe off her foot. She didn't resist or comment and he wondered whether she was even aware of what he was doing. As he moved to the second boot, he spoke, trying to find some order to his thoughts. 'I shouldn't have tried to kill him. I should have listened to you. I just…I saw what he had done to Whale, and I didn't want anything of the kind to happen to you'. Truth. He hadn't wanted to consider the implications of that before, but now here it was, laid naked and bare in the space between them.

She curled her legs back under her when he removed the boots and regarded him through dark eyes. He couldn't tell what she was thinking. He saw nothing but pain and grief and loneliness in her eyes. 'Something has happened to me, David, and that was never something you could have saved me from'. He was not her Prince Charming, and she wasn't his damsel to save.

David. Was he meant to feel bothered that he preferred the name she had created for him to his known name? But then again, James wasn't his name. It never had been. James had belonged to a twin he had never met. And he had never really like Charming. It made him sound like a pompous arrogant prince. David sounded simple, more like the shepherd he really was.

He didn't know what to say to that. He couldn't stop staring at her. The sheer level of her sorrow and anguish was heartbreaking. She was still beautiful though, even with tears in her eyes. In fact, without the anger and loathing darkening her face, she was more beautiful than he could have imagined.

'Why are you here? You could have waited to apologise. Shouldn't you be taking care of my son?' No bitterness, just frankness and exhaustion.

'I…I know what happened in the stables Regina'. At that, another barrier in her eyes fell, and he suddenly saw the true depth of her misery. It was as if she had been trying to protect him from the void that was her soul and heart.

Seeing it, David couldn't hold back any longer. He shifted onto the bed, kicking his shoes off as he went, and sat next to her. She stiffened briefly when he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her against his strong chest. And who could blame her? He was the husband of her arch enemy. He shouldn't be here, comforting the Evil Queen. Her hand went up to his chest, as if to push him away, but instead her fingers tightened in his shirt. She slid further into his arms, twisting so that her head was pressed against his shoulder. His shoulders were strong and broad, and so like Daniel's that something in her broke.

The tears came then, fast and thick. He held her tightly as she sobbed into his shirt, great hacking sobs that shook her whole body and made it difficult for her to breath. Her hand flattened against his chest and she could feel his heartbeat, strong and steady against her palm. Alive. He wasn't Daniel, but somehow the feeling steadied her, brought her back from the edge of an abyss, and her sobs slowly quietened. He rubbed a hand over her back soothingly as she hiccupped several times.

She looked up at him. He had been crying too. There were clear tear tracks on his handsome face. She wasn't sure what to feel now. Was it an automatic reaction when he leaned forwards and kissed her forehead? His lips were warm and real and she felt heat bloom through her whole body, chasing the chill away.

Was it an automatic movement when she tilted her head up and brought her lips to his? What was it that made him lean into that kiss? Was it a want for comfort and companionship? Was it because they were both lonely, miserable people? Was it something else, something more?

David, because James had never been his real name, pulled her down with him and wrapped his arms around her. He rested his chin atop her head as she breathed into the hollow of his neck.

'I wanted to hear your story'. A whisper in the darkness against her ear. The sky outside her window was darkening fast, the pale pink of sunset already dwindling on the horizon.

She told him. She told David, not Charming, about her childhood. She told him about her life as the wife of the king, of her days as Rumple's apprentice, of the slow but sure darkening of her heart. She told him about her love for Snow, and how that had dwindled and curdled into something bitter. She told him about her quest for revenge. She told him about her mother. She told him about Daniel. The words flowed thick and fast; she had never spoken of this to anyone before. It was something of a relief to get it off her chest. And as the words left her mouth, she felt the pain of those moments slowly dwindling to a dull ache in her chest, until the only thing left was the more recent incident. Perhaps that would never fade.

He didn't know what to say when she finished. What could he say? Snow had mentioned what had happened to Daniel not long after their marriage, but hearing it from this broken woman was another thing entirely. So he said nothing. Instead, he tightened his arms around her and pressed a soft kiss to her hair line, and another to her forehead.

She pressed her hands against his chest, just over his heart, and let herself relax into his embrace. This was what she needed. She needed to feel alive. She needed, perhaps more than anything, to feel cared for. She couldn't bring herself to ask what came next. Right now they were not the Evil Queen and Prince Charming. They were two broken, exhausted people desperate to find some sort of comfort in the world that had dealt them both so many harsh blows.

He didn't know what they had. He didn't know what had brought him here, what had caused the events that had led to him lying in her bed with her curled against him so close that their bodies seemed to meld into one. He didn't want to know.

Right now, they were hollow people with an emptiness they were attempting to fill. They were just people. At this moment there was no broken curse, no lost land. There was no Snow or Emma or the reckoning that they would bring with them when they returned. There was no manipulative Rumplestiltskin, no conflicted Gold. There was no Henry. There was just the two of them. Anything beyond this dark room did not matter, therefore it did not exist.

David, because that would always be his name now, didn't know what tomorrow would bring. Perhaps they would wake up and all this would have been a dream. Perhaps she would wake up and remember that they were meant to be enemies and would push him away. Perhaps he would. Maybe they would hate each other again. Maybe she would look at him with those scornful eyes he was having trouble remembering and blast him through the nearest wall. Maybe he would recoil and leave her in this empty house with her emptiness.

Maybe he would wake as James as she as the Evil Queen.

Regina sighed against his neck, a warm breath against the night chill. Sleep was quickly claiming her, exhausted as she was from her emotional outburst and the story only he knew. 'Please stay, David'. It was a mere whisper, a murmur he could have ignored. Instead, he tightened his arms further and closed his eyes, pressing one more kiss to her sweet smelling hair.

Then again, maybe not.

Okay, so I'm not really sure where half of that came from. Probably had something to do with the emotional trauma that was the Doctor and the Queen of Hearts (Regina baby!).

Anyway, please let me know what you think by leaving a review!