Disclaimer: I do not own the story of Peter Pan, which was written by J M Barrie. Nor do I own Once Upon A Time, which was created by Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz and is distributed by ABC. This story is the product of their characters and world and my imagination.
Peter Pan doesn't love.
Wendy Darling loves too much.
There's never going to be a happy ending.
Wendy falls for Peter fast in a superficial sort of way during her first trip to Neverland.
She's never known anyone like him, has never met anyone as wild and free and blindingly brilliant as he is back home in London.
It's a girlish crush, so there's a lot of blushing on her part and smirking on his. There is sweetness too, and the sort of awkwardness that accompanies a first romance.
It doesn't hurt her much to leave him when she returns home the first time. The shine is wearing off Neverland and she wants to see her family and Bae once more. She loves them dearly, after all.
And with Peter it's only an infatuation.
She returns to Neverland for Bae.
He sacrificed himself to keep Michael from the Shadow and she doesn't forget that. And besides, she believes Bae deserves the love of a family after all he's been through.
Peter lets Bae go, though he refuses to let Wendy see her friend and, as she discovers a century later, he never tells Bae the real reason that he's free to leave.
Wendy does not go with Bae. Peter makes her stay.
The crush soon comes back in full force.
She hasn't quite grasped how permanent Peter means for her stay to be. She thinks they'll have some adventures and then she'll go back home, just the way it happened before.
So she tries to have as much fun as possible, to enjoy every moment in Neverland while she has the chance.
And there is so much to entertain her in this magical land, especially with Peter as her expert guide.
It takes an embarrassingly long time for her to realise the truth – that Peter has no plans to ever actually let her leave.
But in the time before that realisation she progresses from an infatuation to the stirrings of love.
Peter shows her all the wonders of Neverland she never got to see on her first, short visit, and fulfils all her adventurous desires. He teaches her to navigate the jungle and hunt and swim and even to fly with the help of fairy dust. He makes her presents, plays games with her and always listens to her stories with interested attention.
Peter has a way about him. He can make you feel like the most important person in the world when he pays attention to you.
Charisma is a powerful tool, one Peter has in spades.
And Wendy can't help but be drawn to him, to this handsome, confident boy who admires her storytelling and doesn't think it is wrong that she wants to have adventures rather than grow up.
She doesn't notice the darker side then. The cruel, mocking smile he uses when he plays dangerous games with the Lost Boys; the vicious and bloodthirsty way he attacks the pirates; or how he refuses to hear any mentions of her old life, wishing for her to speak only about Neverland.
By the time the truth hits her it's far too late. She's irrevocably attached to Peter. She can't forget all the good even in the face of the bad.
She's in love with a monster.
Wendy's love is unrequited.
Peter doesn't like emotions much. Excitement and fear and bloodlust and bravery and an adventurous spirit are fine. But love is something he mocks, seeing it as a side effect of the terrible idea of growing up and believing it makes people weak.
She tries to hide her feelings, but Peter is the cleverest person she's ever met and he also has the uncanny ability to know her mind, sometimes better than she knows it herself.
He knows what she feels and he uses it against her. If she's upset him he knows just how to hurt her. If he wants something he knows exactly what to say to get her to agree.
Worst of all is that he takes advantage of her love. He despises what he sees as pathetic, useless emotion, and she's not sure he's even capable of love, but as a boy trapped in adolescence he also has physical urges and feelings even he cannot entirely avoid.
He's always touching her, whether it's a grip on her wrist or a hand around her waist, or something far less innocent that she knows her parents would be horrified about.
And she lets him use her like the fool she is, because then at least she can pretend for a while that he returns her love.
Wendy has been in Neverland for nearly seventy years (though it often feels like much longer) when she stumbles across the knife.
She is hiding from Peter, whose foul mood thanks to some minor victory of the pirates has made the camp a dangerous place to be. She heads for Skull Rock, knowing that Peter isn't too fond of the place.
Neverland is built from magic, but there are certain spots that contain more of it than others – Skull Rock is one such place. The magic there is almost wild, though Peter can generally control it. It is dark magic too, darker than that found in any other part of the island. Wendy has sometimes wondered why Peter dislikes the area so much when it suits his more vicious side, but she finds out the answer when, days later, she asks him about the knife she saw there.
He tries to play it off as a trinket of no importance, but something in his expression, something he can't quite hide, tells her that it is something more than that.
She might only be fourteen in physical terms but her mind is far older and she's not stupid.
Peter, unfortunately, knows this too, despite his tendency to believe no one can be as smart as he is.
Less than a week after she first sees the knife, Peter brings her back to Skull Rock.
There, in the heart of Neverland's most powerful magic, he binds the two of them together.
His life and hers.
She's always known that he is tied to Neverland and that his power in this land is great, but she's never imagined it is enough to tie her life to his.
Nothing to worry about, he tells her, only a little insurance policy to ensure she never gets any dangerous ideas about using the knife on him.
It is his words that inadvertently explain what the knife actually is.
The means to kill Peter Pan.
Wendy doesn't visit Skull Rock after that. The place seems morbid to her now, and brings up thoughts she'd rather not dwell on.
She doesn't think Peter would mind if she went there. He is content in the fact that her link to him will prevent her from using the knife on him.
Peter tends to think everyone is as selfish as him. He is sure that she won't use the knife on him because she doesn't want to die herself.
He doesn't seem to realise the real reason she won't go near that knife is how she feels about him, not how she values her own life.
Peter is a mercurial, despotic boy king but she loves him in spite of that and she cannot bring herself to kill him.
She does wonder sometimes, though, in the dark of the night, whether there will ever come a time when she thinks differently.
When Henry arrives in Neverland, Wendy finds herself trapped in a cage, set free only to play her part in Peter's charade.
She wants to help Henry, but she's not sure what she can do with Peter watching her so closely, clearly trying to ensure that nothing ruins his plan.
This is too much for her, too cruel a plot for her to ignore despite her love for Peter and for Neverland.
She's still got a conscience, you see. Peter hasn't taken that from her yet.
So Wendy gives Emma, Regina and Gold instructions on how to reach Skull Rock via the main route.
And then, as soon as they are out of sight, she sneaks off herself to the shortcut Peter showed her decades ago.
When she arrives at Skull Rock she walks through the magical barrier without a problem, having finally found a perk to her link to Peter.
She can hear him talking to Henry and she moves as quickly as possible to try and gain the advantage of surprise.
She finds the knife, hidden in the same part of the cave that it has been for so many years. The knife that can kill Peter Pan, just as long as she can use it before he takes Henry's heart and it becomes useless against him.
She never thought she'd actually consider using it. She loves Peter so much, despite all that he has done, and she's never wanted to be a murderer.
But enough is enough. There are limits to what she can take, and what she can watch happen.
Peter can't be saved. She's tried and tried for decades and she is finally accepting that he may be a lost cause, a lost boy in the truest sense of the word. He won't (can't) love, and he will do anything to keep his power and eternal youth.
Everyone is expendable to him and she doesn't want to wait around for the day when he decides that she needs to die so that he can gain even more power.
It's a drastic option but she's got no choice. Peter is tricky and manipulative and fiendishly clever – there isn't a prison that would hold him for long, or a bargain that can be made to keep them all safe.
She'll do what she has to. Peter is too dangerous.
Her heart hurts. She thinks it might be breaking.
She doesn't want to kill Peter. She has never hated the idea of something so much.
Her mind races frantically for another suitable idea, for any idea at all.
Because she's scared.
But not of death. She's lived too long anyway and she wants a little rest. No, she's scared of failing. If Peter lives then he will make her life a living hell in revenge for what she tried to do. And he'll ensure she lives as long as he does so that her torment lasts. That is what truly terrifies her.
She cannot fail.
Henry can't see her. That's good, he won't give her away.
She grips the knife behind her back and strides quickly up to Peter.
He is surprised to see her, more surprised still when she stands on her tiptoes to kiss him quickly (she can't resist the chance for one more kiss before they die).
"I'm sorry Peter," she tells him, "so very sorry. I wish it could have been different, I truly do."
Then, with all the strength she has, she plunges the knife into his chest and tries not to cry at the look of betrayal and horror on his face.
They both gasp in pain and grip their chests as their hearts fail in unison.
She can't help but smile softly as she falls to the ground and her eyes close forever.
She's finally free.
When Emma, Regina and Gold enter the cave they find Henry sitting in shock, though unharmed, in the corner of the cave. His eyes are fixed on the bodies of Peter Pan and Wendy Darling, which are lying still and cold.
Pan's frozen expression is one of anger and surprise and fear. Wendy's is peaceful.
They bury them next to each other in Neverland.
There are some objections to laying Wendy to rest with the one who had held her captive for so many years, the one whose linking spell was the reason she perished on Peter's death.
Tinker Bell overrides these objections.
"Wendy loved this place more than anything except Pan. I don't understand it and I don't think she did either but she loved him beyond reason and sense. And if he didn't love her then I can at least say he favoured her above all other people, even if he did not choose her over power. Wendy would want to lie here, beside him, and we should honour that no matter our personal thoughts - she saved Henry, saved us all, and she deserves to have her wishes respected."
Later on Tink, Hook and Baelfire, the ones who knew Wendy and Peter best, look down at the graves and mourn.
So much potential wasted. Such a tragic story.
They don't think on all they have to do – return home, deal with the Lost Boys, break the news of her death to Wendy's brothers.
They only think about what could have been, if Wendy's story had a happier ending.
Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed it.