He didn't always go by the name Dean Winchester. He didn't always have a family, albeit a broken one. He hadn't even known what the definition of home meant, except in the vaguest of concepts. Just that people had them.
In another time, another place, he'd been known as James Hook. Then later, Captain Hook.
All James had was his ruggedly handsome good looks and give-them-hell attitude. And, it worked out - for a while. He survived; slaved away in the mines for years. Longing for the sky, for freedom. It came in the shape of a kid. A puffed up flyboy named Peter. The famous Pan from fairy tales whispered at night.
Seeing a chance for escape, he made up a plan on the spot. Escaped that hell with relative ease within a day. After years in the mines, he could finally go home. Not that he remembered ever having one. But, the newbies constantly chattered away on the subject. Prayed. Cried for their lost parents to come save them. For days, weeks, even years on end they jabbered. He didn't see the point of crying for something that would never come. But all the same, he wanted that mythical family. Wanted it so damn badly. Down in that dark pit, there was nothing else worth longing for.
But, well…he couldn't just leave Peter to fight a war on his lonesome, could he? So, with Tiger Lily's words echoing in his head (Home's not where you come from. It's where you make it.) he came back. His pride demanded it. He was no coward, no matter how many times he'd run in the face of unnaturally sized animals. That was just a strategic retreat. A lost battle not worth winning. Flyboy gave him a reason to fight. Someone to fight for. Alongside.
.
Sammy didn't understand why he was so afraid to fly. How he could look monsters in the face and laugh, but tremble at the mere thought of getting into one of those tin cans.
How could he explain? That it wasn't the act of flying that was the problem. He loved to sail through the skies. It was the crippling fear of falling that was the problem. His mind would flash back to that moment. Feeling his fingers slip one by one, not being able to hold on. To fall into an abyss for what felt like forever, knowing he would be crushed by the cavernous crystalline Pixen below. The very stones he'd spent his life mining.
Flying ships he could understand. They were full to the brim of magic. Even Peter was half fairy. But aeroplanes? Great hunks of metal? What kept them from falling like stones in the sky? He didn't care for the science of it. Sammy could drone on all day and they still wouldn't make any sense.
.
"…you will see me again in this world or another." Peter had recited one day.
If there were two worlds, then what's to say there weren't more? James didn't remember having a home in the first. He both loved and hated the second. So eventually, he set out to state his curiosity and find a third.
No one ever told him the consequences of jumping through time and space. That he would be stuck in the body of a child; adopted by the Winchesters. Time in Neverland was fluid. He'd never paid it any attention. He should have stopped. Asked more questions. But, he'd never been one for excessive planning. He prefered more immediate actions. He'd found a door and walked through. And, he'd somehow landed in a place where he was even lower on the food chain.
Why did no one bother to tell him that there would be monsters here as well? Creatures worse than giant flying crocodiles. Though, those buggers would forever remain at the top of his shit list. The bastards had almost eaten his favorite hand.
Monsters in this world weren't always so obvious as crocodiles or Neverbirds. These hunted in the dark. Monsters here could be fast and unseen, or hidden in the guise of a human.
In the end, he considered people to be the worst. Human beings. He'd always known growing up that adults were rotten. Liars all. But even so, at least the monsters had an excuse. A reason. Humans? No. They did it because they could.