<div style="text-align: center"><b><u>Tink</u></b><br/>
<i>Darling Estate, the study</i>​</div><br/>Fable scowled at Peter but said nothing.  This was not the evening he had planned on when he left his warm cozy home earlier but here he was, somehow younger and inside an estate that made his snug little cottage look like nothing more than a hovel, indulging in a little breaking and entering at the insistence of his new ‘friends’.  He glanced at the winged woman...fairy, she was a fairy...and found her solemn gray eyes watching him.  Heat and color rose in his cheeks and out into the tips of his ears as he hastily turned his attention to the man in the armchair.<br/><br/>Peter hooked himself around her and a little wriggle ran through her body.  One quick blink changed her eyes from gray to gold as daring fingers tiptoed across his knee.  How clever he was to look so casual by just reclining on thin air!<br/><br/>There were so many questions to ask Georgie and Peter Pan was smart enough to think of so many while at the same time, dodging the questions their old friend tried to lob back at them.  Tink was enraptured, her golden eyes darting back and forth between the two men.  She rocked forward onto her toes, craning her neck and clasping her hands in front of her as she waited to hear what nonsense George would spew forth.<br/><br/>But it wasn’t nonsense.<br/><br/>He answered the questions with questions of his own.  Tink tsked softly as she shook her head.  Peter Pan didn’t like it when his questions weren’t answered.  George Darling learned that lesson the hard way as the heavy handle of his cane crashed into his knee.  Shame he couldn’t fly.  That knee was beyond repair.  She laughed at her own thought, the tinkling of bells filling the cavernous room.<br/><br/>Pan’s sharp call of her name choked the laughter back and brought her forward a step.  He needed her help and how could she ever say no when he looked at her like that and<i>smiled</i>at her in that special way?  Her Peter Pan needed<i>her</i>and not stupid Wendy Darling.  He was even giving her that special smile, the one that made her the happiest she’d ever been.<br/><br/>But in the end, it always came back to Wendy.<br/><br/>Wendy.  Moira.  Angela.  Darling.<br/><br/>A wave of envy pushed through her small body, pushing away the golden hue that colored her skin and eyes and replacing it with a vibrant emerald green.  She huffed a big sigh and bent at the waist to study. George Darling’s fat piggy face.  He had certainly aged since he had left Neverland, a woeful side effect of leaving the wonderful realm.  The roundness of his face smoothed most of the wrinkles he should have gained over the years but there were crinkles around his eyes and deep lines near his mouth.  His cheeks were red but she chalked that up as a companion to his pained shrieks.<br/><br/>“Georgie,” she asked as one finger traced a circle around his damaged kneecap, “what happened to you?” Pushing her finger into the center of his knee, she tipped her head slightly to watch his reaction.<br/><br/>George Darling howled in agony, his large hands with the sausage fingers trying to swat her away but the singular pressure from her finger was unrelenting.<br/><br/>She blinked and her eyes flashed that happy gold color.  Another blink and they were red.  He still hadn’t answered the question.  Tink ‘hmmphed’ under her breath and yanked her finger away from his knee.  This wasn’t going to work at all.  Straightening, she parked her hands on her hips and simply stared at the once Lost Boy.  He had all the answers and Pan had tasked her with getting him to spill the beans.  The red in her eyes and the tips of her wings faded away the longer she stood there.<br/><br/>Mr. Darling blubbered and sputtered, throwing out random half-finished threats of how they<b>would</b>regret this and did they even<b>know</b>who he was?<br/><br/>Fable backed away slowly to put some distance between them and him.  Not that he was trying to escape but more that he was trying to get out of Mr. Darling’s line of sight.<br/><br/>Tinkerbell paid no attention to the new Boy.  Peter had wanted him so Peter could deal with him.  She was going to get Georgie to tell them how to find Wendy.  She sucked in a sharp gasp as an idea smacked her upside the head.  A story!  George had always loved stories!<br/><br/>“George! Do you remember that time we went to see the mermaids?”<br/><br/>He stared at her and harrumphed quietly.  “Mermaids?  No such thing.  Just an invention of someone’s imagination.”  Still, his eyes did not leave the small winged woman.<br/><br/>She shook her head sadly.  “Coralia would be so sad to hear you’ve forgotten her.  She always was fond of you.  Did you know she saved her best songs for you?  She told me that once…that she’d wait until you were close then sing songs of a brave young boy who would cross Crocodile Creek so cleverly to visit the beautiful princess in her tower.”<br/><br/>Something akin to recognition flashed across George’s face.  “...Coralia? I’ve heard that name in a dream.”<br/><br/>“It wasn’t a dream, Georgie.  It was Neverland.”  The corners of Tink’s mouth turned down sadly.  “You can’t come back though, not anymore.  You’ve forgotten how to fly.”<br/><br/>“I could fly?”<br/><br/>“Mmhmm,” she nodded.  “You would fly so high you could touch the stars.  John and Michael try and try but they just can’t do it.”<br/><br/>“John? Michael? My sons? They’re gone.  Lost…”<br/><br/>“Aye, Georgie!” Tink exclaimed happily, her eyes flashing a brilliant gold.  Her idea had worked!  He was<i>remembering</i>.  “They’re Lost Boys!  Do you want to see them again?  You can’t go to Neverland but they can come here!  We just need Wendy, you see.  She’s the key!  Do you know where she could be?”<br/><br/>Eyes of vivid green bore into his as she waited with bated breath for his response.<br/><br/><hr class="bbc-hr bbc-hr--3"/><div style="text-align: center"><b><u>Tiger Lily</u></b><br/>
<i>Starstruck on the left</i>​</div><br/>There was an ancient rhythm to the island, a constant primal beat that coursed through the land from the Hangman’s Tree to Mermaid Lagoon and all the way out to where the Jolly Roger lay anchored in the surging seas.  Most of the time, it was low and steady, the sort of sound that found its way deep into a person’s bones.  But sometimes, like tonight, it was faster, ominous, arhythmic.<br/><br/>Tiger Lily knew what such a shift signaled; she’d felt it before.  Change was inevitable and it was coming to Neverland.<br/><br/>It wasn’t coincidence that placed her feet on the winding path through the forest as the sunset sky faded into the inky darkness of the night painted with great swathes of silvery stars.  He was coming.  He wanted to find her.  To ask for her help.  She would gladly provide it.  After all, the pieces were on the playing board now and she was tasked with guiding them into place for the good of Neverland.<br/><br/>Knowing that he’d never find her or the Tribe unless they chose to be found, Tiger Lily watched Hook as he moved through the trees, searching for her.  A gust of wind blew through the leaves high above their heads as gentle as the woman’s whisper it carried on its back.  His face changed as the breeze reached him, softening as he heard something she did not.  A mixture of emotions came next to the pirate - confusion, curiosity, amazement - but what caused the change was invisible to her.  His hand rose and<i>pushed</i>against the air.<br/><br/>The fabric separating the two realms was growing thinner.  There was no time to waste.  They had to find Wendy...and Peter.<br/><br/>Tiger Lily stepped forward, purposefully snapping a twig underneath her foot.  “Captain,” she spoke with a solemn quietness, “it’s time to find her.  It’s time to make things right and whole.”<br/><br/>A few more steps toward him moved her from the depths of the shadows and into the starlight filtering through the branches up above.  “Can the Jolly Roger take us to her or is it you who must be our compass?”<br/><br/><hr class="bbc-hr bbc-hr--3"/><div style="text-align: center"><b><u>Wendy Darling</u></b><br/>
<i>Starstruck on the Wright<br/>
The Street outside</i>​</div><br/>A shaking hand reached for the fresh glass of tequila the bartender set before her.  She would have taken the one that was already on the bar top, right near James, but she’d ordered that one for him and it felt wrong to just help herself.  Before she even had to say anything, James stepped in front of her, forming a literal wall to keep the bar’s owner from coming anywhere near her.  That brief respite gave her time to pour more tequila down her throat and pluck a cigarette from the pack.  Her hand was no longer shaking when she brought the lighter up to the cigarette.<br/><br/>“Wendy Darling made it all up!” added the woman next to her who had been determined to poke and pluck at the fragile threads of Wendy’s tenuous grip on calm.  “We’ve all seen the articles and the ‘Where Is She Now?’ columns in the papers.  She made it all up and she got rich off it but instead of telling the truth, that she made up the story, she kept insisting it was all real!  And they locked her up!”  Murmurs of agreement joined the whispered conversations whipping around the room.<br/><br/>Her shoulders rolled inward, her eyes alternating between the glass in her hand and the length of the cigarette between the first two fingers of the other hand.  She sucked a deep drag off the smoke then exhaled slowly.  One more large slug of Don Julio was tossed back then Wendy set the glass on the bar and pushed it away from her so the bartender could clean up more easily once they left.  Another hit of nicotine fortified her as she rolled her shoulders, forcing them down and back as she prepared to fight back against all the naysayers.<br/><br/>There was no need to stand up, to argue with these people until she was blue in the face.  James was there and he was more than prepared to keep her safe.  Relief flooded the stormy blue of her eyes as, once more, he offered his arm.  “I’d be honored, Mr. Dameron.”  There was a softness to her words, a roundness that hinted at the sheer amount of tequila she’d had in such a short amount of time.<br/><br/>She let him guide them from the bar, the horrible place with the wretched owner who had stolen the single most important thing to her, sticking close to his side as if being his mere presence could protect her ears from the whispers still filling the air and the hands that tried to reach and guide her attention to them.  Wendy Darling was no celebrity but she was the closest thing to fame most of the people in this room would ever encounter.<br/><br/>The outside air was crisp and clean, fresh after the stale air of Starstruck on Wright.  Wendy took a deep breath and blew it out slowly before offering James a slightly intoxicated smile.  “I suppose, perhaps, my father finally did the right thing in hiring you, Mr. Dameron.”  Wendy savored the feel of his name again, letting the syllables roll around in her mouth before she let them escape into the air to reach his ears.<br/><br/>People pouring out of the bar behind them, tired of the arguments that cropped up about how truthful Wendy Darling was, bumped and jostled, sending her forward a step into him.  Her smile grew but there was a world-weariness lingering in her eyes.  Evenings out always devolved into this sort of spectacle but tonight, she’d finally had someone on her side, someone ready and willing to defend her.  Wendy’s fingers tightened on his arm, the arm of the man who already felt so familiar despite their recent meeting.<br/><br/>“Have you had enough or would you like to try another place?  I know somewhere far more private.  Not very many people know about it.”