Disclaimer: I don't own...Jocelyn owns it...hehe...not really...but she wishes

Fate by Definition

Dedicated to Jocelyn: Because she is amazing...and funny

KayFay

Fate [fayt - noun - force predetermining events - outcome - destiny - disastrous consequence

Peter had never been very good at remembering names. Especially when the people who owned those names seemed to flit in and out of his life so easily. But he never forgot one name, no matter how hard he tried, or how often he had thrown himself into the ecstasy that was living in Neverland and never growing old. If he had, perhaps, been a little older, he might have known why that one name kept resounding in his mind, captivating his dreams, and slowly forcing him to come to the realization that he may have made a mistake in his not so distant past. For, for some unheard of reason, Peter could never forget the name of his…

"WENDY!"

"I thought you would like it Moira, I didn't realize it would cause such a problem, and you were asleep, and I couldn't think of anything…" The man abruptly fell silent as a baby's cries filled the air. His wife looked up the stairs before gently setting down the porcelain vase she was about to chuck at her husband's head. Moira had never been quite able to control her temper, and finding out about her daughter's name and just done it. Not that there was anything wrong with the name Wendy. It was just that her mother had been Angela, and she was Moira, and she suddenly sensed that there would be a great deal of trouble once little Wendy had grown old enough to attract a certain ageless boy's attention. But at the moment, Wendy was only a few months old and there wasn't much she could worry about….or so she thought…

Tinkerbell, who spent altogether too much time with Peter Pan to be socially acceptable as a fairy, was a fairy. And as a fairy, she was closely connected with Fate and Time and other strange and unimaginable things that human beings as a whole have yet to fully grasp. But when Peter Pan told her that they were going to return to London to pick up such and such descendent of one Wendy Moira Angela Darling, for he never could remember their names, Tinkerbell tried to persuade him to wait a little longer. Something about the whole thing suddenly felt horribly wrong. As if something rather monumental was about to happen, and Tinkerbell wasn't sure if was a good thing. Of course, Peter being Peter ignored her and she was forced to follow him to London.

Peter winced when he heard the clatter of the books falling in the floor and quickly flew over to the bed. The girl had sat up, and he slammed a dirty hand over her mouth. He had learned the hard way that this was the better way to approach things, before the girl had screamed and grabbed the attention of parents. Not that Peter had any problem with the mothers, he had quite smartly stuck to her bloodline, and most of the mother's had been children he had spirited away. But seeing the ones he had played with, and forgotten, still hurt and sometimes fathers were a trying race. All in all, he was quite pleased that he had silenced her so quickly.

"Shhh, I'm Peter Pan." He whispered into her ear, before his eyes caught a sparkling sign over her bed.

"Is that your name?" He asked, pointing to the shinning cursive writing that broadly proclaimed: Wendy. The girl nodded and Peter Pan's heart leapt. This was the one he had been waiting for, the one he had sensed coming. This was his Wendy!

"Come with me. Come with me to Neverland." He whispered, seeing her eyes light up. Peter almost laughed at how easy this escape was going to be. The girl was already eating out of the palm of his hand. And surely since she was Wendy he wouldn't have to return her when she became homesick. Wendy would stay with him for

"Stop right there Peter Pan." In his haste to hurry Wendy over to the window, Peter had missed the pounding footsteps of someone running and was thus completely surprised to see a very familiar face standing in front of him. It was the face of the only girl to approach Captain James Hook, completely unharmed, and succeed in making the man run away in fear. Moira Darling Anderson had mastered, at a very young age, a sort of glare that signified that even though she was petite she was not to be trifled with. All of those in Neverland had been overly in awe of the brunette, and even Peter Pan had discovered that Moira was a force to be reckoned with.

"She is not yours Peter. She will not be going with you. So let her go and fly away Peter."

"You never had a problem when it was you going with me. Besides, she's Wendy. My Wendy."

"No she's not Peter. I knew this was happening. It couldn't have been a coincidence, Angela, my mother, Moria, me, and finally Wendy. But she's not yours Peter. Wendy Moira Angela Darling is dead, and has been for some time. She's not coming back, and you are not taking that little girl with you to Neverland." Peter suddenly noticed that Wendy had edged away and into the light. He took her in for a moment, seeing all the differences between this Wendy, with hair white as snow and eyes dark brown, and the Wendy he had known. But he had made up his mind. This was his Wendy, and once she came to Neverland, things would go the way they were meant to be and he would always have his Wendy Lady to tell him stories and mother the lost boys…and…his train of thought slipped as he realized that Moira was waiting for an answer.

"Why not ask Wendy?" he suggested. Moira suddenly leveled her infamous glare at him, and Peter fought the urge not to cower. He had never been the target of the glare before and he was quite positive that it was not a fun experience. Peter glanced at Wendy, and she started waving her hands in a rather carefully thought out pattern.

"What is she doing Moira?" He asked, suddenly rather baffled. Moira rolled her eyes in exasperation, suddenly recalling why she had never had the patience for Peter Pan and had all too quickly started harassing the pirates and Indians for something more entertaining.

"She's mute Peter. She can't talk. And that is why she is not going to Neverland. What if something happened, she would never be able to call for help. And you would tire of her. You wouldn't be able to communicate with her properly. It took the family years to learn sign language to be able to talk with her. You just don't have the time, Peter. So leave her be." Peter looked at Wendy, and suddenly felt, for the first time, despair. To have come so far, to have lived so long alone, with only fleeting company and to have his last chance at happiness flit away. But as he glanced at this not-Wendy, he realized that he couldn't plead with her. She looked at him with dark eyes full of some strange emotion that he couldn't recognize and he suddenly remembered an angry voice calling him deficient. So Peter Pan turned away and flew out the window. He didn't see not-Wendy run out onto the balcony to watch him fly away or Moira pull her back inside the house and lock the windows. He didn't see either of them cry.

Angela wasn't at all surprised to see her granddaughter at her doorstep, signing to see if the original Wendy had kept any diaries. Angela had in fact been waiting for it for a few years ago. After all, when Angela had first met Peter Pan and had brushed off getting called Wendy, she had sought all the information about this elusive woman she could find. And when she had smiled at Peter Pan when he brought back her Moira, who was rather annoyed at the whole affair and ranting about pirates who wouldn't learn any manners and throwing around glares like candy, she had had to dig out Wendy's diaries so Moira could sooth the biting urge. When this Wendy had reached her eleventh birthday, Angela had pulled out the diaries in expectation. But…

Angela knew that Moira would have sent some word to her if Wendy had been taken by Peter Pan and it was a sort of unsaid rule that nothing was said about Peter Pan until the child had met him. So if Wendy hadn't been taken, then why was she so curious about Peter Pan?

"Does your mother know you're here?" Angela asked as she closed the front door and pointed to the bookshelf where the worn diaries were kept. Wendy shook her head, and Angela headed to the telephone in the kitchen so she could make some cookies and tea to feed Wendy's body as she fed her mind. Of course, Angela would be busy catching up with her miscreant daughter.

As Wendy read her ancestor's words, she began to realize why her mother had not wanted her to go to Neverland, even though it sounded like a dream come true. That long ago Wendy had shared something with Peter Pan and this Wendy would only hurt him by her presence, by her name. For she could never be that Wendy. She couldn't even speak. And that was the worst of it all, because maybe if she'd been able to speak, she would be able to admonish him, remind him that she wasn't his Wendy. She's be able to return home and be glad that she had this adventure, but know it was time to move on and grow up. But Wendy couldn't speak, and because of that she was safer staying in the real world.

But one does not live as Wendy did with a constant impediment, holding her back, and not develop a sort of empathy with the world. And this empathy would not let Wendy go. She had to help Peter Pan achieve some sort of closure, because deny it as he may, that was really what he desired, Wendy was sure. So she pursued the entries in the diaries pertaining to Peter Pan and smuggled those books out of her grandmother's house and raced on home.

Once there, Wendy crawled through the window on to the balcony. She lit several candles, because she didn't want to explain why she was taking all the lamps out of the living room, and hoped that she was creating a decent enough beacon. And she refused to answer her mother, who watched her prepare with the books in the middle of the circle until she was done. And than she feverishly demanded that her mother wait with her for Peter Pan to come. Moira had argued that Peter Pan would not come again to what was obviously failure, for Moira had complete confidence that her glare had only gotten stronger as she had gotten older for she had had more time to practice and perfect it. But Wendy had been adamant, and Moira was worried about the girl, because she was acting very unlike herself and Moira could still feel that strange force impelling her to the future and she was sure that things weren't going to end well. After all, Moira and Tinkerbell had strangely bonded. It was inevitable that Moira would inherit some of Tinkerbell's talents.

So the two of them, quite ignoring the concern of Moria's husband as was their habit, sat on the balcony waiting for Peter Pan to show up. Because, although Moira was praying with all her might that he wouldn't come, she knew, as certain as her daughter, that the fight for her daughter was not over yet and that this time, she was not going to win.

"Wendy." Moira bit her lips when she heard the familiar voice. It seemed so long ago that she had sat at her grandmother's house waiting for him to show up. Her sister Katarina had always called her crazy, but then again Katarina had quite simply told Peter Pan that she was going to be a singer and if he couldn't promise her something other than pirates, fairies, mermaids, and adventure then she was going to have to decline but he could take her younger sister thank you very much. In retrospect, Moira had often wondered if Katarina hadn't had the better idea.

Wendy proceeded to sign her response which Moira bitterly translated as meaning something along the lines of: I brought you Wendy's diaries in hopes that it would help. Wendy had then looked at Moira, who shook her head to her daughter's unasked question. And then Moira exploded, for after all, she was never one to keep her temper.

"Wendy, leave it be! Stop bringing him here. If you just let things be he'd go off to Neverland and forget about you like he forgets everyone else!" Moira, too preoccupied with her shouting, missed the strange look that had passed over Wendy's face before there was a subtle shift in how she held herself. Peter, a bit more observant and much less occupied by the whole thing, did on the other hand notice so while he was surprised about what happened next, it wasn't nearly as surprised as he could have been.

"Peter Pan would never forget me! And I'll never forget him, and I'll never grow up, and I'm going with him to Neverland, and you can't stop me." Wendy shouted. Moira gasped.

"Wendy" she breathed, "you spoke."

"Of course I speak. I'm a storyteller, how could I not speak. Don't be ridiculous." And that was when Moria got it, and sat down rather abruptly and stared at the girl who was Wendy and most certainly wasn't her daughter.

"Wendy Moira Angela Darling." Moira whispered her eyes wide in shock. The young girl before her looked most annoyed.

"Yes, that's me, but what does that have to do with anything?" The girl was beginning to look very confused, because as she was starting to notice, she was not at her house, this woman was not her mother, and why on earth were her diaries sitting in plain view on this strange balcony?

"Peter, what's going on?" she asked, concern dripping into her voice. Moira sighed and decided that she wanted to handle this, before Peter walked off with, apparently, a dead girl possessing her mute daughter's body.

"Wendy, look in the window – at your reflection." Wendy turned and gasped in horror when she saw that her features weren't her own, that she looked like someone else.

"What happened to me, what's going on?" Wendy looked like she wasn't sure if she was going to cry or going to laugh in hysteria. Moria stood, but Peter reached Wendy first.

"You're coming with me to Neverland, Wendy, it doesn't matter, and we're together. And we'll have adventures and we'll dance with the fairies again, remember." And Moria resigned to watch Wendy be lured away by this piper. For this time, she knew she'd have to wait by the window for her, just like her mother before her, and her mother before her, and so on and so on until the mother of the Wendy that had started this whole mess.

Peter Pan was glad to have his Wendy back, even though she looked different. But he had also noticed that sometimes she wasn't his Wendy. Sometimes she was the not-Wendy who couldn't talk to him, though she tried so hard. But even though she wasn't his Wendy didn't mean he didn't feel anything for her. He watched over her as tears ran down her face, and he showed her the mermaids and the fairies, and he tried his best to make her happy until his Wendy came back and he knew that anything he did would make Wendy smile. But Peter Pan was starting to get worried because he couldn't find the not-Wendy and he had been searching for a while.

Peter wasn't a little boy. But neither was he truly an adult. He was somewhere in between that was magical for all it's impossibility. So he recognized that not-Wendy was in great danger, and he sympathized with her because she was still a child, and children were what he loved most. Tinkerbell had helped piece together that Wendy and not-Wendy couldn't stay in the same body, and one of them would have to die and let the other one have the body. And Peter knew that not-Wendy had figured this out too. Which was why he was especially concerned, because he had shown her the mermaids yesterday. And mermaids were attracted to grief, the sweet salty tears of a crying child, the tears so rare for them in the only place they had left. And he was worried that not-Wendy would let herself be drawn into their depths, where he couldn't reach her and he would lose both of them.

When Peter found not-Wendy sobbing by the mermaid's lake, he knew that time was running out. Not-Wendy was losing the battle; he'd seen her come out less and less. When not-Wendy started crying though, Peter knew that his Wendy would come soon. So Peter dropped to the sand next to her, and hesitantly wrapped his arms around her. Not-Wendy looked at him with tears in her eyes, and sat next to him.

"Tink said that maybe the fairies can help you. Do you want me to take you there?" Peter said, looking down at her head of hair, since she had burrowed her head beneath his arms. There was a quick movement that he guessed was a nod, and he lifted her up, for not-Wendy was lighter than his Wendy had been, and flew her to the fairies, since not-Wendy couldn't fly no matter how much fairy dust had been sprinkled on her.

Where am I? Wendy heard crying in the hazy gray mist surrounding her. What is that? Wendy found herself reaching out toward a blonde curled up in a ball in the mist, crying her heart out.

"What's wrong?" Wendy asked, and gasped as her voice reverberated in the mist. The crying girl looked up at her and burst into a fresh set of tears.

"It's all my fault. I ruined it. I made a mistake and now everyone has to suffer. I didn't mean it. I'm so sorry Wendy!" The girl whimpered. Wendy reached a hesitant hand out to the girl's shoulder and looked at her golden locks.

"You're Wendy." The girl nodded.

"Yes, I'm Wendy. And that's the problem. You're Wendy too. If you hadn't been Wendy, they wouldn't have made me come back and fix things…" She gesticulated.

"Steal my body?"

"And I'm so sorry. You wouldn't have to die if you hadn't been Wendy. I'm your murderer, and it's not fair! You shouldn't have to suffer too! Not just because I didn't stay." Wendy looked at her ancestor, not sure what she should do. Silence wasn't an option, but she'd never been anything but quiet. In this mist, this dreamland greater than Neverland, she had no idea what to do…

The mist dissolved. And then there was only light.

Moria waited patiently for her daughter to return, though she had a feeling she waiting in vain. Katarina was there, to comfort her husband, and Angela was there, to comfort her daughter. Moria felt detached from the world that she was living in, constantly sitting at the window, eyes firmly fixed on that star. It was the third month before something happened. Before she thought she saw an extra sparkle, so she wasn't too surprised to see Peter Pan. She was surprised to see him accompanied by two balls of light.

"Wendy." Moria wailed, as the second ball of light flew closer to her. Peter had the decency to look abashed.

"Mommy?" Wendy whispered softly.

"It was her decision…they both couldn't live in the same body. I'm sorry Moria." Moria looked up.

"Is it over then? No more child snatching to go to Neverland." Peter shook his head.

"Children will still come to Neverland, but I won't take any more of Wendy's children. Not-Wendy is going to stay with you. They said she can." Peter looked hesitant. She knew he was uncomfortable with the situation, he wanted to leave, but he wanted to make sure she was okay first. Moria turned her back on him, barely noticing that fairy Wendy flew beside her. She knew he had done his best – after all speech could be considered a fair trade. But she couldn't help but feel resentment for the stupid, stubborn, selfish little girl that had killed her daughter in order to correct a mistake she shouldn't have made in the first place.

But that was growing up…realizing you'd made a mistake and working to fix it.

Fine