Author's Note: Hello, hello! Alright, first things first: I haven't written fanfiction in, oh, five years, probably, so reviews are much welcome.

I couldn't resist playing with this idea because, as I was reading The Guardians of Childhood, I couldn't help but realize all the parallels between Nightlight and Peter Pan. Or, more accurately, that Nightlight's a more virtuous and wholesome version of Peter. Apart from the whole "eternally young" aspect, both are accompanied by "lights" (Peter's got Tink; Nightlight, the moonbeam); neither fully knows or remembers their parents or their origin; both, to be fair, have a good bit of fun taunting their enemies and generally laughing at danger; both at least have the opportunity to fall in love with (or kiss/be kissed by) a girl. (Wendy, of course, never kisses Peter - I think he even remarks that no one can touch him? - but Nightlight essentially sacrifices the outward essence of who he is – being a nightlight, an eternal being of light – for Katherine's sake.)*

So then I got to wondering: what would happen if the two met? They're essentially antitheses. And even if not virtuous, Peter's kind of a guardian of childhood – in his own way.

Although I realize that, given the time period, this might not be canon in the end (depending on what Joyce does with Nightlight's character in the forthcoming books – and if you look closely at the cover of the upcoming Jack Frost, you might get a hint),** this is set in Peter's universe, after he's lost his shadow in the Darlings' nursery – but before he's been able to get it back.

*A fact which is being conveniently suspended for the author's sake, since given the time elapsed between The Guardians and Peter Pan, Nightlight's already saved Katherine and does, in fact, need to sleep . . . among other things.

**Which will honestly make me a little sad, if it's true.

Without further ado (brownie points for reading this) . . .

"Can anything harm us, mother, after the night-lights are lit?"

"Nothing, precious . . . they are the eyes a mother leaves behind to guard her children."

J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan, p. 26.

The stars were angry. They whispered of an ageless, dust-blest boy who was nothing but mischief, self-serving and heartless: he was an antithesis to the spectral lad's own goodness. This was one who, himself accompanied by a streak of light - a fairy, no less! - snuck up behind them and tried to blow them out. He had no reverence; he did not know that they were souls. The old ones winked, glassy-eyed, complacent, but the younger ones glared and bore through the void of space - the cloak of night - almost as bright as the Moon.

And they sang a song of regret. We showed him the way, because we pitied him. We said 'Now, Peter!' – and here he is . . .

Nightlight cupped one hand around the diamond dagger, letting his moonbeam's warmth seep through the crystalline facets, playing along his iridescent fingertips. The night was cold. Snow was beginning to cap the roofs below and find a few resting places along the barren tree-boughs. But Nightlight liked the cold. The Moon was brighter in wintertime; the snow paid the Man due homage.

Is you seeing the Small-One?

His moonbeam's quiet melody pulled him from his thoughts; the distant, far-way, bittersweet memories of the Man in the Moon.

He is hurting badly – he is crying.

Nightlight's first impulse was the drop his gaze and scour the snow-caked ground. Nothing. No lost child, shivering in a shadow. No coatless street urchin – one of those who always made him ache as if the suffering were his. Just a couple, walking hand-in-hand – a man and a woman, finely dressed, crunch-crunching through the snow. The woman whispered something tersely about a boy she'd seen –

"No more of that again, Mrs. Darling," the man replied around a weary sigh. Nightlight leaned over his cloud, curious despite himself and the moonbeam's insistent chime that the trouble lay elsewhere. "The nursery's quiet now. We've lit the night-lights and they're fast asleep. We'll be home before you know it."

A small, small smile graced the spectral boy's lips. What would these parents have to say if they knew that the real nightlight watching over their little ones was not a weakling candle – or a lamp – but he? He, a thing of mist and light and courage and hope – he, who bore a spear tipped with a tear-diamond dagger and had at his side the most valiant moonbeam of them all?

Fear nots, Mother-Father, Nightlight thought. He always considered the parents almost a single entity. Fear nots. I am here. I fear no shadow and I do not sleep. If you could be knowing – but you will never know –

Nightlight boy!

Rarely did the moonbeam address him thus, all sharp-edged glaring light, the dagger waxing sharp against his hand until it was almost like holding the Moon Child's tears again. He shuddered, disconcerted; he raised his head and turned –

Because, yes, someone was crying –

A boy, not unlike himself: beautiful, clad in skeleton leaves and fine webs of berry juice; he was a thing wholly of flesh-and-blood – he smelled of sweet sweat and a baby's breath – even though he glittered, sometimes, with a smattering of dust. Silver, the dust – not the dream-dust I remember . . .

Around the leaf-crowned head fluttered a ball of light, not unlike his moonbeam, though to his moonbeam's tranquil glow she – Nightlight paused a moment, considering – yes, she waxed as hot and bright as any star.

She is not dream-giving star-light, the moonbeam informed him gently. I's not knowing what she –

"Who's there, Tink?"

The boy's voice . . . high and clear and warm . . . but choked . . .

There's tears! Nightlight pursed his lips, startled at the drying tracks leaving snail-trails on the boy's softly-rounded cheeks. The eyes which met his own were dark and bright: they gleamed almost as strongly as the sudden flash of teeth when the boy clambered to his feet, mid-air. He was growling, an animal, and gnashing those little pearls –

He yet has his first-teeth . . . !

Bells began to carry on the still night air, softer and sharper than the tolling of any campanile or church-tower. Nightlight felt his moonbeam shiver, as if hearing a language it once knew well but had so long ago forgotten that to hear it now was only sorrow.

But Nightlight remembered, too –

"You silly ass," the sun-bright-light was chiding, "gone and lost your shadow. Gone and lost your shadow and he's what'll stop you getting it back. He guards the children in that nursery. He's better than their stupid night-lights."

But Nightlight is who and what I be . . .

The boy's chest heaved; one hand hovered at his hip, where Nightlight could just catch the smooth pommel of a sword. Instinctively he tightened his grasp against the spear; his moonbeam flashed within the dagger, just as uncertain – and just as ready to protect his friend, his love –

But who's you? he added softly, raising the other hand until it caught the Moon's light, pooling it, holding it out in offering. I am having no wish to fight you. You are fearing. You are sad. Why is it you needs these Small-Ones?

"I just liked the stories," the boy answered slowly. "I just liked the stories . . ."

A surge of pain and hope tore through Nightlight's meager frame. Are they stories as my Katherine wrote?

Doubt clouded the perfect face; his patience, shorter than a lightning-flash, was rapidly waning thin.

Why is it you needs these Small-Ones? Patiently he asked again.

"Don't need them," the boy scoffed. "Need my shadow. Lost it."

He jerked an accusing arm towards the street, sweeping it up to the third-story window. "Their mother there stole it. Closed the window on me. On my shadow. Tore it right off."

Those first-teeth of his gleamed fiercely as he grinned – almost proudly – as if showing off a piece of scab he'd pulled.

Nightlight, faintly disgusted, had never heard of this before; he'd often wondered, though, at these benevolent shades: it seemed that they acted, in their own way, as little guardians to their casters – but, shadows though they were, the thing called Pitch had nothing doing with them . . .

Are you hurting for the losing of your shadow?

The boy laughed harshly, dancing in the air among a spray of silver dust. Only then, in his friend MiM's light, did Nightlight catch the scars – along his limbs, his cheeks –

He is knowing pain . . . ? his moonbeam wondered.

His hands are hard, like North's, Nightlight reasoned. This one's games are rough. These are running-scars, through woods, or falling-scars. And he carries weapons . . . He is fighting someone . . .

Who? His moonbeam flared, dancing sharply along the dagger's edge. He is not a good boy, not like my Nightlight.

But he is not being like Pitch.

And then: You was crying and fearing for your shadow, boy?

"My name's Peter Pan." Levelly, their gazes met, measuring and circling like dualists before first strike. "So you're the nightlight, then? So you'll stop me?"

No. I . . . Nightlight bit his lip. If you are meaning no harm to the childrens, if you are only wanting back your shadow . . .

"And the stories! There's a little-mother with them who could tell me stories."

Nightlight's hand flashed out, ferocity taking hold of him; he'd seen too much of the world's madness and sickened cruelty to ever let anyone speak of a child in that way. She is being a girl! he seethed. She is not a mother. She will not be until she is a Tall-One. So I swear.

"You can't protect all children," the boy named Peter smirked, as if reading the hidden underpinnings of Nightlight's thoughts. " 'So you swear' – but the world's gone big and there's enough darkness for ten worlds more. There's grown-ups that do things. And there's us. There's some of us as needs thinning out, you see?"

And suddenly Nightlight knew that the sword at Peter's hip had killed. And not just bad things – not just shadows –

He raised his head beseechingly, pouring out a silent stream of grief to his old friend. MiM! Why is you letting him - ?

He is not being from this world, his moonbeam whispered tersely. He and his is not the same. There are being different rules.

If . . . Nightlight could hardly force the words; all he could think of was his Katherine – and below, sleeping peacefully beneath what the Tall-Ones called their night-lights, was the other girl – so much the same as she –

If you will not harm them, if you are seeking only your shadow, boy, and will promise then to leave . . .

Peter jerked impatiently against the spectral boy's inexorable grasp – such a strange, strong thing for light . . . "I can't do anything to them," he snapped. "They can't even come with me unless they want to."

Where! Taking childrens - !?

"To Neverland," he answered simply, and for the first time a true note of joy danced amidst the voice – until the face threw sharp shadows, angled lights, across Nightlight's eyes. Peter pulled against his grip again. "Now let me go. While the mother's still away."

My Nightlight boy . . .

And it was futile, he then realized, this back-and-forth – if not tonight, some other night: this strange and savage boy would come again. And he is coming first for stories, before he is mistaking, before losing his shadow . . . The thought settled uneasily in Nightlight's mind, some measure of redemption: dark things – nightmarish things – creatures like and sworn to Pitch were afraid of stories. My Katherine proved that . . .

With a shuddering breath, he trusted in the sleeping girl's goodness and strength, so much like his first, his only love's. His hand slid from Peter's arm.

The other boy of leaves and the little sun-light – so much like and un-like himself, his precious moonbeam – were sprung away –

Suddenly the Peter turned. "If it helps," he added over one shoulder, carelessly, as if taking it for granted as a comfort, "I go with the dead ones half-way, so they aren't scared."

But these childrens will not be – !

Too late: the sealed window latch was broken: the boy snuck in . . .

MiM – moonbeam-mine – have I done wrong? Have I been failing - ? There was nothing doing except wallowing in fear or swallowing the consequences –

And perched against another windowsill, leaving not a trace in the gathering of snow, he could only watch, wide-eyed, heart thumping out an irregular tattoo, as the Peter-boy and his crude little light named Tink woke up the girl – the girl so reminiscent of his long-gone Katherine that it hurt

He watched with growing wonder as she pitied him and sewed his shadow on, although he rapidly grew worried and was smugly pleased to see the Tink stop the pair of them from kissing.

They are too young, they are not-knowing what the kissing is.

Quietly he thanked the Tink, although his moonbeam whistled a disconsolate song: She is being jealous, the thing called Tink.

But she is protecting the Small-One, I am thinking, Nightlight mused. And she is protecting Peter-boy as well. They are wild. They will make the childrens wild . . .

But childrens always have been, always will. His moonbeam glinted once, a flash against his eye.

Nightlight swooped up from the windowsill, heart unexpectedly heavy with this encounter with a world he was more and more loathe to understand. It had been simpler, even in the days of Pitch . . .

His moonbeam flickered out from within the diamond dagger, rising up to flash between the same stars as Peter bothered, dropping down again to play along Nightlight's armor and spindled limbs. The night was cold – but the snow felt good against his face – his own skin, which had known scars as Peter's, gleaned in battles with the Nightmare King –

When he came back to the nursery, finally – sometime later – time never having much stock in his or his moonbeam's mind – it was to find a scene of heartbreak. The birds were flown: the children gone! Willingly, it must have been – his Katherine – no, the other girl – Wendy? Yes, he'd heard that name – would never have left on her own if that boy's savagery and guile were not tempered with some strain of goodness . . .

But there – there sat the poor, poor mother, weeping in the dark: she'd not bothered to even light the night-lights for herself . . .

Tall-Ones is yet needing little night-lights, the spectral boy reasoned gently. They is having nightmares, too – they is yet fearing the dark. In losing hope, they is becoming much like Pitch's Darklings . . .

Mother –

It was strange, considering the mother by herself – but here she was –

Mother – Darling-Mother –

He tapped once at the windowpane, hands leaving trails of moonlight, trails of ice –

The woman startled, staring, blinking through her tears to see a boy . . . but not the boy . . . This one was all silver light and kindness . . . a shy, shy smile dancing at his lips . . . Like the other boy he, too, held a weapon – she abhorred the thought of children holding weapons, even in pretend – though his was bright

Reverently she opened the window, watching as he stepped in lightly. He was not afraid. He did not try to hide, he did not gnash his teeth – though from his smile she saw that he, too, still had all his baby teeth . . .

"The other boy . . ." she whispered, sinking back into her chair. "I see him in the faces of women who have no children . . ."

It seemed strange, to admit it thus, but that's just whom she felt like: that her own children could abandon her, even for him . . .

You's leaving little night-lights for your Small-Ones, Darling-Mother, Nightlight whispered, surprised that she could hear him. She must be yet like a child, in some way . . . He stepped closer, closer, bathing her tear-streaked face in that otherworldly glow. His tongue danced against his teeth, his sharp first-teeth, and he licked his wind-chapped lips. Carefully he leaned his spear against a wall, his moonbeam dancing in the dagger, singing an old, old, song only Nightlight knew.

He sat on one of the armrests of the rocking chair, reaching out to touch her cheek – and then to wrap his arms around her shoulders. Unashamed, overwrought at her children's absence, needing to hold something, she gathered the spindle-limbed and moon-clad spectral boy into her arms.

He laid his fingertips against her lips, just there – the right-hand corner of her mouth where he knew there was a kiss, much like a Good-Night Kiss: a special thing that not even the Wendy-girl could catch.

You's leaving little night-lights for your childrens . . .

"But now you are needing me," he said, with such softness that Mrs. Darling couldn't help but weep again – even as he touched the most tender place above her eyes – even as she began to fall asleep – "and do not be fearing, Darling-Mother: be having sweet-dreams and fear none, for I will stay."