Emma Swan

She gives him a ride to his house because he has a limp, and the man, Jefferson, offers her some tea... laced with something to make her sleep. When Emma wakes up, tied up and gagged, she manages to set herself free, and inside the house she finds her friend Mary Margaret, also tied to a chair and gagged. The man, however, finds them before they can escape. He makes Emma tie up Mary Margaret again, and forces her to build him a magic hat. Jefferson, the alter-ego of the Mad Hatter, tries to explain to Emma that he comes from the fairytale land, and that she just refuses to see the truth. Emma therefore makes him a top hat, and he eventually tells her his story, of how he was torn from his daughter. In this world, she belongs to a different family, and thus he is driven to madness not only by the curse's effects, but by his memory of his previous life, and the fact that he can't be with his daughter, for he refuses to instill in her the memories that he has, to keep her from being harmed herself. Emma tells the man that she can understand what he is going through, for she has a similar situation because of Henry, but it turns out she is merely pretending to sympathize. Emma knocks him out and tries to rescue Mary Margaret, but Jefferson gets to them and a struggle ensues. Mary Margaret is able to kick him through the window, and he falls to his apparent death, hat and all... but then only the top hat is found. Emma then gives her friend the choice to either leave town or go with her and trust her to make this framing problem go away. Mary Margaret goes with Emma, and the Mayor is horrified to find her in prison, for the key she used to escape had been planted there as part of Regina's plan. Later, Emma, at the elementary school, recognizes Paige, a classmate of Henry's, as Jefferson's 'daughter'. She then skims through his fairytale book and comes upon the story of the Mad Hatter, only to realize that the Hatter and Grace do look a lot like Jefferson and Paige...