Sometimes Emma still feels like a visitor to New York. A bystander more than a participant. When the Stories had decided to colonize in Brooklyn, she'd already spent most of her time on Earth living in Maine. For most people in their little secluded section of the burrow, New York was the only part of the Mundane World they'd seen. Emma's seen enough of it for multiple lifetimes.

When the Darkness started vanishing lands, the residents of the Enchanted Forest knew it wouldn't be long until they were added to the list. It took years for a land to completely vanish and the Darkness had yet to breach any of their nearing countries. So, the planning had begun to make a great Exodus through portals, supplied by Giants who also feared the Darkness' powers.

It took years to evacuate the whole population, including refugees from lands that had already suffered the effects of the Darkness. By the time the last few residents crossed into the Mundane World, the Enchanted Forest was already vanishing. Not that Emma was there to see it.

New York was easy to slip into untraced, though. Too many people living too busy of lives to worry about their little city block. Add the enchantments around the small enclosed coupling of streets to that and they were all practically secret town, mostly hidden from Mundane eyes, was formed. They created a government and along with that government came the Amnesty Charter. Everyone needed to sign it to become a resident of their little colony. It gave immunity to any crime committed in the Enchanted Forest.

After the Darkness, everyone was just looking for a fresh start. The residents who stayed within the colonized section of burrow took to calling it Storybrooke and the residents took on the moniker Stories. It's always been decided they function better as a group, separate from the Mundane World and it's people's - colorfully nicknamed Mundies - rules.

That didn't mean they could run around doing whatever they wanted.

In a town where discretion is key, anything that might bring in unwanted attention is a safety hazard. The sheriff's job is mostly to shut down bar fights, handle disorderly Stories, and keep everyone in check. The worst thing Emma's seen in her time as sheriff is a drunken Will Scarlet streaking past the Nottingham Apartments.

Getting a call to a disturbance at Glowerhaven wasn't Emma's ideal plan for the night but, hey, she'd chosen this job. Or it had chosen her in a way. Regardless, Emma doesn't like to dwell on why exactly she's the acting sheriff. There are some things even in a few decades can't fix.

When she arrives, Victor is drunkenly shaking his fists at an unaffected Ursula. He turns at the sound of the door in the mostly empty bar and glares at Emma as she approaches.

"What's the problem here, Doc?" She asks. Victor turns his scowl from Emma to Ursula. Ursula puts a hand on her hip and stares him down.

"Sea Witch here isn't being very welcoming to patrons," he spits. "You'd think she'd want business at her shitty bar."

Ursula barely moves but Emma can see the anger bubbling underneath the surface. Emma doesn't really want to have to deal with the outcome if that rage gets out.

"He came in drunk and raving already," Ursula says, directing her words towards Emma while she keeps an eye on Victor. "Scared away all my customers when I refused to serve him. Lucky that's all I did to him."

Emma sighs.

"I'll handle it, thanks for calling," she tells Ursula, turning back to Victor. He's glowering at the both of them but Emma hopes that he knows better than to mess with her.

"Don't thank me, Sheriff," Ursula bites, turning to head back behind the bar. "Just get him the fuck out of my bar."

Emma nearly turns back to Ursula at the bite in her voice, annoyed at the general lack of trust she seems to be acquiring lately, when Victor takes a swing. Emma ducks out of his drunken range easily enough, sweeps his leg out from under him. He lands on his ass on the wooden floor, glaring up at her.

"Glad we got that out of our systems," Emma offers dryly. "You feel better?"

"Bitch," he groans, attempting to stand but dropping back down. Emma's fingertips prickle and she takes a deep breath before reaching down and dragging him to his feet by his collar.

"Storybrooke actually kind of needs you, Frankenstein, so I'm gonna let that one go. Go home and sleep this off," she commands. Victor offers her one last look before slinking towards the door. Emma goes to follow, just to make sure he doesn't try to make trouble in some Mundy bar instead. She stops at the sound of Ursula's voice.

"Would you let him off so easily if he were one of us?" She asks and Emma raises an eyebrow. "One of the strays?"

Emma considers her for a minute, wonders how much she pays a month for a glamour enchantment to make her tentacles look like legs. The prices of such enchantments - necessary to continued living in their small community - keep going up. She thinks of the palace living everyone seems to expect from her instead of the tiny apartment on the second floor of Nottingham.

"I am one of you," she offers instead of a response. Ursula scoffs and disappears through a door into the back of the bar. When Emma gets back outside, Victor is hobbling down the street towards where Emma knows his apartment to be located. She takes it as a good sign and decides to call it a night.

-/-

Everyone in Storybrooke has their own problems. It's the dangers of near immortality in an unfamiliar world. They've been in the Mundane world for so long and yet there are still so many adjustments. Most of those who actually did make it out of the Enchanted Forest with much of their fortunes in tact are struggling now. It turns out even a fortune is easy to spend over a couple centuries.

Like any power system, there are those that exploit the struggling residents and there are those that ignore them all together. Every morning, Emma has to walk past a line of poor, bereaved Stories waiting for a chance to talk to the Mayor and find some assistance. Unfortunately, as impoverished as it's citizens are, Storybrooke's government isn't exactly raking in the cash. Donations from their richest residents can only go so far and there's the price of operating that no one likes to consider.

Emma isn't blind. She knows the types of Stories the Mayor favors, the rich elite like Rumplestiltskin and Maleficent can saunter in and have their tiniest problems solved at the drop of a hat. Someone like Ursula would have to wait in line for hours just for the chance for the Deputy Mayor to put on a brave face and say "I'm so sorry, there's simply nothing we can do".

It's a shitty system, but it's the way things are done. As bitter as the Stories want to be, they should count themselves lucky to have Snow White as Deputy Mayor. Emma's parents hadn't made it to the Mundane world unscathed, refusing to leave until their land had been evacuated. Snow fights everyday to find the funds to help who she can, battles with the Mayor for the rights of the impoverished. Emma has always admired that trait in her mother - even if is ultimately unsuccessful.

Snow tries and that's more than Emma can say for most people.

Emma makes it back to the apartment complex around midnight and drifts off almost as soon as she lands on her bed. She even manages a solid three and a half hours of sleep when she wakes up to her phone ringing.

"Sheriff Swan," she slurs into the receiver after digging the device out from the pocket of the jeans she'd fallen asleep in.

"Sorry to wake you, Sheriff," Red says, the slow and quiet way she's speaking putting Emma on alert. "Especially with such bad news but you need to get down here. Now."

Red rattles off directions to the alley she's in and Emma's heart races a bit. There's something to be said for intuition. Emma's powers don't include prophesizing or fortune telling but she's learned to rely on the way her hair raises at the back of her neck.

Whatever Red is leading her to, it's going to change everything.

Red is pacing back and forth in front of the alley when Emma shows up. Her dark hair is messy from being fussed with in her nerves and she currently has one bright red nail between her teeth. Emma approaches her warily, speaks in a low tone.

"What is it, Red?"

The woman startles and turns to face Emma, removing her finger from her lips to run her hand through her hair. Anything that has the Big Bad Wolf shaken isn't something Emma wants to encounter. Not that she has a choice.

"It was so strong it woke me up," Red explains shakily. "We live in Brooklyn and I've never smelled it so heavily. Not in decades. I couldn't ignore it anymore so I followed the scent."

"The scent of what?" Emma tries again, trying to make sense of Red's babbling. Something in her mind tells her she already knows.

"It's horrible, Emma," Red sighs, stepping back into the alley and waving Emma along with her. "I mean, even by my standards it's something else."

It's not like the Mundy movies. There's no sheet over it that Emma has to lift, no way to really prepare herself for it when she finds it. There's only the sudden metallic scent in the air that, even without wolf senses, Emma can't ignore and then there's blood everywhere. And in the middle of it, a woman.

Red gasps behind Emma, like the sight has surprised her all over again. Emma breathes through her mouth and tries not to let the leftover Chinese food from earlier make a reappearance.

"Fuck," she breathes. Red let's out a little noise behind her, something like a distressed whimper of agreement. Emma turns back to the woman. "Okay, you don't need to see this anymore, Red. Go back to the business office and see if you can find out who she was. Send Walsh to help me get the body out of here."

Red nods and turns to follow Emma's instructions before stopping at the mouth of the alley.

"Her name was Trish," she says quietly. And then she disappears around the corner and suddenly Emma is left alone with the body of a woman named Trish. She takes a shaky breath before stepping closer, watching her feet to keep from stepping in the pool of blood.

The woman's dark hair is splayed around her, soaking up the blood spilling from her chest. The wound is on the front of her body so all the blood made its way down her shoulders and torso to create the pool. Emma can understand why the scent would have been overwhelming for Red. She bends down to inspect the wound closer, all jagged edges and no clean cuts. It's gaping and so awful it takes Emma a minute to realize what's missing.

And then she spots it a few feet away from the body itself, creating its own small, separate pool of blood. Even without Mundy medical training the organ is easily identifiable. Her heart.

"Jesus shit," Emma lets out in surprise. "What the fuck?"

And then she turns and throws up against the brick wall behind her.

-/-

Everything turns to chaos after that.

Walsh shows up with a pick up truck and helps Emma move Trish and her heart. He holds a steady calm at the scene that Emma is actually a little grateful for. He spends most of his time as a flying monkey, she kind of expecting him to be a little more neurotic for some reason. Maybe that's an old Enchanted Forest stereotype. They can't do a whole lot about the blood except dump some water over it and hope to dilute it until a nice good rain comes along.

Emma would be perfectly happy with never stepping foot in this alley again.

The business office is an enchanted room on the first floor of Nottingham. It's twice the size of the palace Emma grew up in and houses every magical artifact or record that made it through the Exodus. Red and Snow are waiting for them when Emma and Walsh arrive, standing by the big book of Stories. Emma has Walsh take Trish's body into one of the back catacombs, not to be touched until they've identified her officially and found a next of kin.

Red knew Trish in an adjacent capacity. She ran a fortune telling shop a few blocks south that she used to make money from Mundies. Despite that, she had been a powerful sorceress in the Enchanted Forest with a checkered past with more than one person in town. Their amnesty charter meant that the Storybrooke government couldn't go after someone for their crimes in the Enchanted Forest. It didn't always guard so well against personal vendettas.

Red picks up the stamp and presses it down on the paper. When she pulls it away, a large red framed DECEASED marks the page.

"Unfortunately, we can't do much tonight," Emma says, copying down some of the information from the book to create a file with. "Let's all go home and try to get some sleep. Tomorrow, I'll start on the investigation."

There's a murmur of agreement, though Emma doubts any of them will be able to get much sleep after what they'd seen. She turns to leave before stalling.

"And, guys, let's agree to keep this between us four for now," she suggests. Red looks to Snow who looks surprised at the suggestion.

"You think we shouldn't tell the Mayor?" Snow asks like it's an absurd request. Emma crosses her arms and nods in the affirmative.

"I want to have a chance to get a jump on this before Regina can make it political," she explains. "I'll tell her. Just not tonight, alright?"

Reluctantly, Snow agrees and the three women head for their own separate apartments within Nottingham. Walsh lets his glamor enchantment fade away, returning to his typical primate form and flies back farther into the room to return to sleep himself.

Emma gets another two hours of restless sleep before she decides there are better ways for her to be spending her time. She heads to the lobby and turns down the hallway towards her office, scanning the information she'd jotted down from the book. She doesn't notice the presence waiting in the lobby, moving into action when she crosses.

She's heading down the hallway, past the line of people already waiting outside Snow's office, when she hears his footfalls behind her.

"Today is so not the day, Hook," Emma huffs once she realizes he's trailing behind her to her office. He picks up his pace enough to walk next to her once they've passed the line of Stories waiting to air their grievances to Snow.

"I know you found a body," he says, aware enough to keep his voice down. Emma shoots him a look and ushers him into her office. No good having this conversation in the hallway. "And I heard what state it was in when you found it."

"How do you even know about that?" Emma asks, crossing her arms over her chest and ignoring his insinuation. Killian taps his finger to his ear, but he's lacking his usual flair. Emma can tell he's wound tight as a spring.

"I have my sources."

Emma rolls her eyes and turns away from him to round her desk and sit down. Killian follows the movement, taking a seat on the other side of the desk. The office is in complete disarray, Emma's been saying she'd organize better for decades but there's always some new problem.

"Emma," Killian starts again, oddly serious. They've been doing this back-and-forth for a few years now. He shows up to bother her and Emma tries to actually be bothered. He's not so bad, really. "You had to have known I'd show up. Can't you tell me anything?"

"There's nothing to suggest this is connected," she offers, a little shortly.

"Like hell," he bites. "This is the same bastard and we both know who that bastard is!"

"Dammit, Killian, I can't do this with you," Emma groans, trying to hold on to her composure. She leans across the desk. "There is a procedure, a way of doing things. I can't just go barging in on people with no actual evidence. In that regard, nothing has changed."

Killian stares at her for a long minute before slamming his hand down on the desk in frustration. He rises out of his seat and heads for the door. Emma stops him once he's got his hand on the doorknob.

"I really am sorry."

-/-

Emma can deal with the surly moods of Killian Jones later. Right now, her main concern is that girl and, after that, the apparent leak in her department. She doesn't so much care who told someone, just that now that it's out there it's only a matter of time before it makes it's way to Regina. Emma needs to have at least some answers before then.

She starts a file and, against her better judgement pulls down another file to compare anything she finds with. It's been almost a century since a Story was murdered in Storybrooke. Killian, despite his anger and person feelings, is right about it being eerily similar to the last one. Emma refuses to cloud her judgement by reviewing the actual file but keeps it handy just in case. She remembers it well enough anyway.

Once she's started the paperwork with Trish's information, she heads back down to the business office. The line has only gotten longer since she and Killian had walked by it less than an hour ago. Emma earns a few glares as she ignores the impatient people waiting for an audience with the Deputy Mayor and slips into the office. Snow is being barked at by an angry blonde and Emma continues past them, trusting Snow to be able to handle her job.

Walsh had deposited Trish on a stone slab in one of the back catacombs and it takes Emma a minute to figure out which one. The scene in the alley had been horrifying, seeing her now is just heartbreaking. The blood is gone now, except for what clings to her hair and soaks her clothes. Emma sighs before continuing across the room to the body. The heart sits next to her on the slab like a crushed and discarded soda can.

A fresh wave of nausea hits Emma but she forces herself to power through it.

She starts with the chest wound. The marks are odd, not like any knife or weapon Emma's ever seen. Something niggles at the back of her mind, makes a shiver roll down her spine. Trish's skin has turned nearly as grey as the stone beneath her and Emma considers the act of removing her heart, crushing it the way it had been. There's rage in the act. It might not have been the driving force for the crime itself, Emma is hesitant to label it without more answers, but there's a disturbing amount of anger regardless.

Strength, too, to crush the thick muscle in such a way. She had considered, perhaps, that a disgruntled customer may have cornered Trish and murdered her in retaliation for a bad reading. Emma doesn't know that a Mundy has the ability to do this, though.

She scribbles the few new thoughts into the file she'd brought with her. It's not much but it could be less so she'll take it. She also makes a mental not to give Dr. Frankenstein a call. Assuming he's in a better state than he'd been in last night, he might be able to tell her something she can't ascertain herself.

On a whim, she reaches forward and gently pats the pockets of Trish's jacket. Triumphantly, she pulls the woman's phone from one of them and switches it on. She skims through the contacts and messages. There are a lot of unsaved numbers that seem to belong to customers but Emma does recognize one name that Trish seemed to contact often. It's somewhere to start.

When Emma leaves, she makes it to the mouth of the hallway where it opens up into the main room of the business office and immediately hears Regina's voice. It carries loudly through the space and Emma knows even for Regina that means she's yelling loudly.

"-anyone tell me?" She's barking at Snow when Emma finally makes it to the point where she can actually make out the words. "I am Mayor of this town. I am the one who makes these decisions!"

Emma steps around a bookshelf finally putting herself in view of the scene. She raises an eyebrow at Regina's statement. The woman is hardly an elected official. She'd assumed mayorship upon creation of the town. Regina had actually been instrumental in the opening and traversing of many of the portals - despite her initial distaste for the idea. The Amnesty Charter had negated all her previous crimes and, despite it all, there was no reason why she couldn't be. She'd been a ruler in the Enchanted Forest much longer than either of Emma's parents.

It all seemed a bit like bullshit to Emma but who was she to make waves in government?

"Are you suggesting we shouldn't investigate this murder?" Emma asks, tucking the folder and cell phone behind her back. Killian hadn't seemed to know who the victim was so Emma is hoping that means Regina hasn't been given that particular piece of information either.

"Miss Swan," Regina sighs, "I am concerned for our operational costs, as I always am. Of course, we should investigate but we have to be frugal about it. That doesn't mean the matter should have been kept from me."

She turns her glare back on Snow. Emma thinks her mother is wise enough to let Regina tirade herself out at the point. Emma never really learned that lesson herself.

"It was my direction not to tell you, actually, Madam Mayor," Emma tells her. "I didn't want to wake you."

Regina raises a skeptical eyebrow. "Don't tell me you were concerned for my comfort."

"No," Emma admits. "But I wanted the chance to question you myself before you heard word from someone else."

To her credit, Regina seems genuinely surprised by the accusation. Emma tilts her head, waits for a reaction from the Mayor.

"Question me?" She asks, a ridiculing chuckle in her voice like Emma has lost her mind. "I thought you were supposed to be competent."

"We could talk in private if you want," Emma offers and Regina's eyes go a little sharp while she lets out another titter at the insinuation. She makes no move to continue the conversation somewhere else. Emma shrugs. "No? Okay, then. The woman was named Trish, you two had a history in the Enchanted Forest."

"All of which was pre-amnesty. You're out of your depth, Miss Swan," she informs her. "If you're going to investigate this murder I suggest you go out and find yourself an actual suspect instead of wasting my time."

Regina turns on her heel and heads out of the business office, ignoring the calls for her attention from the waiting citizens. Snow stares after her before standing from her desk to join Emma.

"Honey, I love you, so I only ask this because I care about you," Snow starts. "Are you insane?"

Emma pulls her file back from around her back and turns to her mother. She shrugs and holds the file up for Snow to see. The flap has Trish's name scribbled across it.

"They have a history," she says simply. "And I am going to find who killed this woman. Even if it was our dear Mayor."

Snow lets out a heavy breath and nods. Emma gives her one last look before following Regina's path out of the business office. Snow calls out for the next person as Emma opens the door and a man files into the office. Emma turns and heads back to her office. Her ass has barely touched down on her chair when the door opens again and her father is charging into the office, closing the door behind him.

"Dad?" She asks, surprised at the intrusion. He usually gives her a call to make sure it's a good time. "What's wrong?"

"I was hoping you could tell me honestly," David says and Emma frowns at him. "Red shows up well after operational hours to pull your mother from bed and when she gets back not only does she look about as scared as I've ever seen her but she can't tell me why. Now I'm hearing whisperings that someone was murdered. What's happening, Emma?"

Emma sighs, frustrated with herself for forcing her mother to keep the secret. Mostly, she'd just wanted it to stay out of the general populace and away from Regina. Both of which failed spectacularly.

"I didn't think that she'd think I meant not to even tell you," Emma offers apologetically. "But yeah, Red found a body last night. A woman. I shouldn't go into the full details but, gods, it was bad. Mom didn't even see the body and it shook her up that much."

David drops into the chair across from her desk and scrubs his hand over his face. Emma figures they're only at the beginning of their trying times. She can only see it getting worse before it gets better.

"Jesus," David breathes finally. "And you saw it? How are you doing?"

Emma shrugs, hesitant to admit the way the sight had affected her. Doing so will only add another worry onto David's shoulders who in turn will tell her mother. It's not a good situation. Emma has been doing this job long enough, she's seen enough shit, she can compartmentalize.

"It wasn't pretty but I'll be alright," she answers and David nods like he doesn't doubt that in the least. Emma waves a hand over her desk where Trish's file sits next to the file she'd pulled out earlier. "I should get back to it, though. Regina's already pissed at me for accusing her so now I have to find some actual evidence."

David raises his eyebrows in surprise at the comment but nods, rising from the chair.

"Say no more. Let me know if you need anything, alright? I mean it, anything," he insists and Emma can't stop the smile at the sentiment.

"Of course," she nods and David offers her one last grin before heading out of her office. Emma hopes he'll check on Snow next. She hadn't noticed anything off in her mother's behavior but Emma thinks her mother is almost as good at hiding those thing as she is.

It's odd, certainly, when your parents appear nearly the same age as you. Emma had been sent through one of the earliest portals that had been opened at eighteen. They'd needed a scout for this new world and she'd taken the assignment excitedly, proud to be helping her people and naive enough to be excited for the adventure it afforded her. Nimue, one of her family's friends and a powerful sorceress, had placed an enchantment that allowed her to age, albeit slower than Mundies.

Emma had aged while her parents had continued to blossom in their youth. Once the Exodus ended, Nimue removed the enchantment. She no longer ages and neither do her parents, as long as people continue to believe in their stories. That's how it always been assumed to work - the more people believe in your story, the more powerful and immortal you are.

Emma wonders vaguely what stories the Mundies believe about Trish.

Once David's left the office, Emma picks up her desk phone and dials the hospital downtown to ask for Frankenstein. She's put on hold for much longer than she'd like as a nurse fetches the good doctor. Victor had been one of the only non-magical physicians to make it out of the Enchanted Forest, though he didn't originate there having crosses a portal himself to escape from his own land. Here, he works as a doctor at a hospital close to the city itself, treating anything that ails Stories while also treating Mundy patients.

"This is Dr. Frankenstein," he answers eventually. He sounds much more sober than he had been last night and Emma takes that as a good sign. Maybe he won't even remember her knocking him on his ass.

"It's Emma Swan," she says simply, not up for attempts at pleasantries. "If you can slip away, I need your expert medical opinion on something."

"I don't do house calls," Victor grumbles. So, no such luck on him not remembering. Emma rolls her eyes and persists.

"Trust me, you're gonna want to make this one," she informs him, hesitant to go into too many details. "I need you to examine a corpse for me."

There's a prolonged silence and Emma figures she's won this. Nothing gets people to do things they don't want to do quite like mystery and intrigue. After a moment, Emma sighs and prompts him with his name.

"I'll come down on my lunch break," Victor says finally before giving Emma an approximate time and ending the call. She sets a reminder in her phone. It's still pretty early in the day, due to her inability to get a full night's sleep. It might actually be a good idea to have another set of eyes on this case. Red hadn't been hanging around the business office helping Snow out which meant she's probably off on an errand or been awarded the day off. Emma would bet it's the latter after last night's events.

She stares at the two files on her desk before picking her phone up again.

"Ah, Sheriff, changed your mind, did you?" Killian asks when he answers. Emma resists the urge to hang up on him. It's only the distinct lackluster attempt at smugness that reminds her why he may be the perfect help for this. She'll just have to keep him on a leash and try not to let Regina find out.

"If you actually want to help find whoever killed this girl, get your ass down here," she says. "Before I change my mind again."