Mary Margaret wakes up in the middle of the night. David’s not there, and Neal is crying. She goes to him to comfort him, but when she turns around she is face to face with Maleficent, who proceeds to take Neal and threaten her family.
Mary Margaret wakes up again, relieved that it was only a nightmare, but is then alarmed to find that David is not there.
Don’t worry, Mary Margaret, he’s just drinking MacCutcheon’s on the stairs. At least it’s not straight out of the bottle (like Desmond, Charlie, and Hurley drank it on the island)! Mary Margaret and David are really beside themselves, as she points out that Maleficent said she’d make them pay for what they did to her, and they know that Cruella and Ursula in town means Maleficent-related trouble.
In the Enchanted Forest, Snow and Charming approach a strong hold only to find Sleepy on guard duty, asleep. Snow is irritated at first, until they realize that everyone is under a sleeping spell. Of course, they suspect Regina, but it was really Maleficent, who was accompanied by Cruella and Ursula. It turns out they wanted to make a deal with Snow and Charming to get access to the tree of wisdom. They also wanted to stop Regina’s curse.
The Charmings reluctantly agree, but after Maleficent kills the guards of the bridge leading to the tree, they are no longer willing to work with her. During the night they leave to get to the tree on their own, but when they ask it how to stop the curse, they are blown back. They are then discovered by Maleficent, Cruella, and Ursula who are just as perplexed as to why the tree denied them the knowledge they sought. It was Maleficent who figured out it was because Snow was pregnant. Why did that matter? Because the product of true love is not guaranteed to be good. It is guaranteed great potential for power, but the pendulum could swing either way. So, the greatest potential for good is also the greatest potential for evil. This is something the Charmings find very hard to swallow!
Shortly thereafter, Maleficent pays Snow a midnight visit and admits that she too is pregnant and that’s why she wants Snow to work with her to stop the curse. Maleficent is stunned when Snow refuses, but Snow insists that she will try to stop the curse the right way, and not turn to evil to do it. Maleficent points out that means she’s willing to risk the entire kingdom to ensure that her child grows up a hero.
In Storybrooke, Cruella and Ursula talk smack at Granny’s. They suggest that Regina rip out Granny’s heart so she’ll hurry up with their order. That was a bit of a mistake on their part as Henry was with Regina. After sending Henry off, Regina tells them as much, saying that she’d send them over the town line faster than they can say “costume jewelry,” a direct jab at Cruella.
As soon as they leave, Mary Margaret and David approach Regina about keeping an eye on them 24/7, but Regina isn’t interested in helping them. Frustrated, they leave as well.
Hook and Emma are walking up to Granny’s to meet Mary Margaret and David for lunch, but are intercepted by David, who insists that Emma accompany him to discover what Cruella and Ursula are up to. As it turns out, they were up to something. They went to Gold’s and stole a box that just so happened to have one of Maleficent’s totems in it. After they left, Belle noticed the box was missing and called Emma to report it.
Emma and David, who are in the police car, pull Cruella over and search her car. David finds the box and the totem within. He takes the totem and pretends he found nothing. Emma knows something’s up, so she heads back to the station to check security footage of Gold’s shop. Just then, Hook shows up with her lunch. It turns out that Hook knows Ursula from his pirating days, but he won’t tell Emma how.
When David returns home, he shows the totem to Mary Margaret, and concludes that Cruella and Ursula took it so that they can resurrect Maleficent. Mary Margaret points out that if all they need to resurrect her is something that used to belong to her, then they will eventually succeed, but David has the idea to collect her ashes and dump them in the harbor. So, they start packing up for spelunking.
Emma found footage of Cruella and Ursula leaving Gold’s with something that looks like a box, so she goes to show it to David. She runs into him and Mary Margaret packing the car to go “hiking.” Not wanting Emma to suspect anything, they add to the lie that they realized the only way Cruella and Ursula can really have a chance to change is if they look for good in them instead of the bad.
Once they are in the cavern, they find the ashes, but Cruella and Ursula are there waiting and knock them out. Of course Gold is there as well, and gives Cruella a dagger with which she slices Mary Margaret’s and David’s hand. She allows the blood to drop onto Maleficent’s remains. It wasn’t a totem they needed, as Cruella explains to the wakened Mary Margaret and David, it was the blood of the ones who wronged her the most!
Mary Margaret and David realize they need to tell Emma EVERYTHING, but when they go to tell her, they find her and Hook talking. They over hear her telling Hook that she has decided to be more trusting of people, like her parents are, and comments about how they would never lie to her. This only serves to revive their determination to keep their secret from her.
Meanwhile, Regina is still on her quest to find the author. In the process she is questioning poor little Pinocchio who doesn’t remember a thing about his adult life. She ends up getting belligerent, causing Geppetto to tell her that maybe her search is ill-fated considering that she destroyed so many happy endings…what makes her think she deserves one of her own! Humbled, Regina later goes to Gepetto’s shop to apologize. Moved by her apology and desire to move forward, he shows her August’s bike and everything else he had with him. Gepetto gives Regina his bag to help her and wishes her luck.
That evening, Mary Margaret approaches Regina discreetly and asks her to go undercover to find out Cruella’s and Ursula’s plans. She then asks Regina to keep her secret, especially from Emma, and proceeds to tell her about Emma’s potential and how she and David did something that caused Maleficent to lose her child, hence her impending revenge.
Problem: Will going under cover and tasting evil again make Regina turn back? Will Emma’s potential for evil cause her to be pushed to the dark side? Are Emma and Regina necessary opposites like Yin and Yang?
If Regina is good, does that mean that Emma will be evil, and ipso facto, is the only way to keep Emma good for Regina to turn evil again? Will she ever have a happy ending?
And, did Gold really see Belle kiss Will Scarlet?
Top image courtesy of Peter West/ACE/INFphoto.com