AN: "Once Upon A Time" always felt to me like a show that could be darker than it turned out to be. Aren't all fairytales kind of horror stories? This is my take on this - a slightly silence-of-the-lambs-inspired version of those characters we all love. Hope you enjoy it. Comments are more than welcome.

Chapter 1: Initiation

At first, it was all about learning. It was about discovering. Because the third trimester was nearing its end, and most of her friends and acquaintances had already chosen a topic for their thesis. The deadline was coming up, and she had picked without thinking. Prison. Why? She wouldn't be able to answer that, but why not? It seemed as relevant as anything else, and she would at least get a decent mark for originality.

Although her teacher warned her about this and asked if she could meet him in his office, Emma didn't exactly feel worried yet. She had no concrete idea why she had chosen this particular topic for her studies, but she felt ready to stand her ground.

If she was given a chance to take it back now, she supposed she would. She really couldn't tell you why she had defended her choice so well, even when she didn't know why she had made it. She probably only had herself to blame.

Doctor Archie Hopper had always seemed like a kind man, to Emma. The concern on his face, when he greeted her in his office, was almost enough to move her.

"Emma." He smiled, curly hair peaking out of both sides of his glasses.

"You wanted to see me, sir?"

"No need to look worried, it's nothing serious. Sit, please."

She complied and folded her hands on her lap. Her golden hair was gathered into a smooth ponytail, and she resisted the urge to fiddle with the few strands that fell free. It wasn't as though Archie Hopper was an intimidating man, and yet Emma could not refrain from being nervous. It was because of the thesis, she knew it before he had to say it. That's what made her uncomfortable. She knew that for certain, even though she couldn't explain why in God's name.

"I'll be honest with you, Emma." The man spoke quietly. "It's about the topic you've chosen. Alienation is a vast subject, and although I'm certain prison would be one very interesting way to treat it, I feel that I must warn you."

"Warn me?"

"Don't get me wrong, the subject is difficult to handle no matter how you put it, only I'm afraid the one you chose might be more difficult than others." He continued, looking earnest. "There will be visits involved. I hear the mere environment is enough to change a person. If you want to write about what prison does to inmates, you'll have to meet a few."

"Sir, with all due respect –" Emma made sure to smile, radiating confidence. "I wouldn't have chosen something I can't handle."

"I just wanted to make sure you had thought it through."

"Thank you." She answered understandingly; she did understand.

She understood her teacher's concern, she understood he had to make sure she knew what she was getting into. Truth was, she hadn't thought it through; she had thought that to study prison as an alienation of the mind would make an interesting reflection, and she had filled the paper hurriedly in class because she and Neal had worked late on wedding invitations. Now, her teacher wanted to know whether she knew what she was doing, and she didn't. It occurred to her briefly that this was the ideal time to change her mind. An open window.

And without understand exactly why, she closed it shut.

"I appreciate your concern, sir, but I'm fairly certain it won't be an issue."

"Certain?"

"Yes. I don't spook easily." She smiled, and her teacher smiled back, but there was still a light trace of worry sparkling in his eyes.

"Prison?" Her fiancé spoke the word as though it were the first time he heard it in his life.

Emma shrugged innocently, letting her hair loose and removing her jeans before she joined him in bed. A wedding magazine still lay on his lap, above the covers, but it seemed that the article had entirely lost his attention.

Neal and Emma had been childhood sweethearts. Neal had been her first kiss and her date at homecoming, they had finished high school together then gone their separate ways, and although many of their friends had believed it would be the end of their relationship, time had proved them wrong. She had gone to college in New York while he had stayed in Storybrooke to ultimately become the town's mechanic. She would come home to him every weekend and he would be waiting for her with a cherry tart, because it was what she had ordered on their first date. In the meanwhile, marriage had always been the obvious turnout of their relationship.

He had proposed just a month ago, when she had come home to him a Friday night, as always, and a diamond ring had been waiting for her along with the usual sweet.

Emma slid in bed and switched off the nightlight as though it would erase the astonishment on Neal's face.

"Well, I'm afraid my choices were a bit limited." She said for an excuse. "Seriously, what would you have picked concerning alienation?"

"Anything that would not imply meeting with murderers."

She acted as if he was being unreasonable, "Come on, Neal."

"I think I get a legitimate right to worry on this," he said, before resuming more earnestly, "Will you at least be safe?"

"Perfectly safe. If I do meet with prisoners, it will be through bars and glass. Really, there's nothing to be worried about."

"Yet I'm pretty sure that interrogating inmates is not in the to-do-list for a bride glow."

It only half sounded as if he was joking. Emma settled with a shrug, "In any case, it's not as though I'm signing up for life. My essay's due in six weeks' time."

Though when she said it, she was convinced that her fiancé did not buy it. Part of her did not fully buy it, either.

"Well, it's not that I don't want to help you Miss Swan, only I don't usually foster a – heated environment, when it comes to my inmates. I'm certain you understand the delicate position your request puts me in."

Emma paused for a second. The office seemed neither cold nor hostile, and yet it inexplicably made her more uncomfortable than Doctor Hopper's. Ultimately, she looked back at her interlocutor, the prison warden, and echoed the single ambiguous word he had spoken. "Heated?"

"Excuse me if I sound crude, Miss Swan. You must be aware that your presence wouldn't favor the most serene atmosphere."

Emma bit down on her irritation. So basically, if she were an ugly guy, they wouldn't be having this conversation.

"Look –" She interrupted herself when she realized the man still hadn't told her his name. "Sir. I hardly see how any of this has to do with what I came here for –"

"To write a thesis, yes. Though I'm sure you realize that I must take the welfare of my prison in consideration."

"You're saying my presence would induce a hostile environment?"

The warden smiled; it was forced, and visibly annoyed, yet at the same time, intrigued. "What I'm saying Miss Swan, is that if you bring fresh meat at the zoo and wave it in front of the cages, the animals will bite."

"Animals?" She echoed, half-amused and more startled than actually outraged. "Are you sure it's an appropriate metaphor?"

The man's smile widened, flashing a predatory array of teeth. Suddenly, Emma wasn't at all in the mood to laugh anymore. There was something gruesome about that smile.

"I'll tell you what." He said calmly, as though the surprise in her last remark had genuinely made her more amusing than irritating to his eyes. "I'll agree to your request. I'll let you write your essay and meet with one of the inmates for the following six weeks." He still hadn't dropped the grin, but sounded as serious as can be. "And then, Miss Swan, you can tell me whether the metaphor was appropriate or not."

Her heels clicked like metal against the cement ground, as she entered the lugubrious corridor, every bit of her bravery crawling into hiding down the pit of her stomach. The setting was vast yet felt narrow, and there was something frightening about its symmetry, staircases and steel-grey doors – like stepping right through the shiny surface of a mirror.

Emma's gait was quick, though she was barely keeping up with the prison warden, whose footsteps appeared to glide like fog over the ground, as if the air around him eased him forward. The further that Emma got inside the prison, the more it seemed to her that she was beginning to understand what Doctor Archie Hopper had meant, when he had spoken of places so macabre that they change you.

Something about this place made you feel as though you were walking underwater. It felt exactly like walking underwater.

For twenty-four years, Emma Swan had lived a quiet life and had never imagined that anything in the world could be so dark.

It was like spending years looking at the ocean and never seeing below the surface. You've always known what was there, but you've never really looked. It felt like an epiphany. Falling through the looking glass; towards the bottom of the sea. It looks quiet from the surface, but from below, you can see all the things that are forgotten; the wreckage, seaweed and rocks, and though you tell yourself that it's the all the same world seen from a different angle, something about it just feels darker. Much darker.

The world was filled with sharks and fish, and Emma Swan was uncertain what role she would play in this theatre.

"You'll meet the prisoner through glass." The warden spoke calmly. "He will be restrained. If there are files you wish for him to fill, remove all trombones or pins from the pages. Give him nothing but soft paper."

"Yes."

"The man I've chosen is someone who has only recently been apprehended. Someone I'm sure you've heard of. The sentence is life in prison, so you'll have plenty of time to ponder what these walls do to his brain."

Emma wasn't certain she was meant to answer, and she didn't have much time to think it through before the warden abruptly stopped walking. She did too, reflexively; her feet felt sore. If she had really thought this morning, she wouldn't have worn heels.

The warden smiled once more – his smile was an ice shard down Emma's spine. "He's a murderer." He specified. "But this won't bother you, will it, Miss Swan? You could even ask him where he's hidden his victims, I'm afraid even the police failed to get an answer to that."

Emma was unsure whether he was trying to intimidate her.

"Anything I failed to mention?" He asked, and it took a second for Emma to answer.

"Your name?"

The smile widened. It had something of a crocodile's grin. "To you, Miss Swan, it'll be Mr. Gold."

Emma waited for a moment, sitting on an iron chair, for them to bring the prisoner. A thick glass separated her from the yet empty seat. The man didn't have a face yet, but in her mind, he did; the face of true evil. There was something wrong about this place, something deeply unwell, and yet as Emma Swan realized her hands were slightly shaking, she acknowledged it wasn't just from fear. There was excitement; thrill. Because she had spent all her life on the bright side of the world, and it had never occurred to her before to take a look at what was underneath.

It wasn't too late, she thought; she could still back down. Mr. Gold would be glad, no doubt, and indulge himself in the thought that his prison wasn't a place for decent girls, but she wouldn't have to stand the sight of it for very long, and Doctor Hopper would understand.

Yet Emma remained frozen in her seat.

Because terror does that to you. Because true evil makes anyone curious. Because Emma was uncertain she could ever fully believe that the world was bright again. Because she felt she needed to take a real look at the darkness before she could step back out.

And then, they brought him in.

Two guards were there to drag him inside the seat, although he showed no sign of struggle. There was viciousness in his smile, manacles on his hands and feet, and such malice in the look he gave her that his eyes appeared pitch black.

The guards left them after securing him to the iron seat, and for a long moment, both remained silent. Emma was aware she should introduce herself, but something jammed her throat. Recognition. The man was Killian Jones. He was the Driveway Ripper. She had followed his crimes on television, feared him like the rest of the village when the police had established a curfew, and had felt relieved at the news of his arrest.

She was staring at the Master of the Sea. The King of the underworld.

Shadow seemed to gather in the center of his eyes, and despite the grotesque prison-blue of his uniform, despite the glass between them, he didn't look at all like the prisoner of them both. On the contrary. Something about his ruthless smile seemed to indicate that he knew her. An irrational thought, yet struck Emma as undeniable. He knew that she had taken a fall down the rabbit hole and that he was the darkest thing she'd ever seen.

And the glimmer of his smile breathed: initiation.

"Mr. Jones." She said, and her voice did not fail her. She refused to sit there, wordless, like an intimidated schoolgirl.

"You must be the student." He replied, the tone of his voice a sharp contrast of a wild blaze and smooth milk. It was the kind of voice that compels you to do just about anything.

"Yes." She felt the need to swallow back her words; he shouldn't be the one asking questions, yet to reverse their roles felt beyond her abilities.

He paused, and looked at her. His smile was knowingly wicked but trustworthy, somehow; a smile that bewitches you into letting him into your home, and into your bedroom. That gets you to open your door to a stranger, even when a murder-wave is going on. The kind of smile that genuinely makes you think that he might spare you.

Killian Jones's ostentatious gentleness was that of a wolf who dipped its paw in flour to make it look white.

"You're here to learn from me?" He asked.

"Yes," Emma saw no point in denying.

Breathing out softly, a patient, tender smile that broadened his grin. Really – it was the kind of smile you'd sell your soul for.

"Well, Goldilocks." He said. "Welcome to wonderland."