Bit of a rough chapter for Saran Wrap... Pan doesn't make loving him easy. Please bear with me guys, things only get better from here on out. This chapter is also insanely long, but all the stuff that happens has to happen in one chunk of time or things start to get kinda weird. I only own Sarah, Ben, and the perpetually absent Andrew.

Female whovian - Sometimes I look at the ship name 'Saran Wrap' and laugh because it actually stuck... I can't believe you guys are saying that they are your OTP, it makes my heart melt.
leelee1028 - Of course! Things will develop much faster now. And besides, the first few chapters were devoted to establishing the universe and my OC, not her and Pan's relationship.
glamgirl16 - [distant sounds of author's laughter because she knows exactly what Pan is thinking]
xToxicWaste & PrettyStuffed0nBullshit & Perstephia & scifigrrl - omg, thank you! ^.^
Twilight-A-16 - Shhh, it's been a week, everything's fine. Here's another chapter for you. (Thank you so much, I'm truly flattered that you like my work.)
Robbiekayisperf - He's so perfect, don't get me started. Whenever someone says that they can't stop reading I have to step away from my laptop and flail for 30 seconds, thank you! I can't believe that for some people this falls into the category of fics that are impossible to put down.

I was stunned by the reception of the last chapter, you guys are amazing. The entire crowd of you who reviewed/favorited/followed motivated me to push on and get this chapter out as fast as possible. (I apologize for any typos you may find - I stayed up pretty late writing it.)

"Will you stop giving me that look?" I asked in exasperation. "I learned my lesson, alright? No need to beat it into me."

Sunshine didn't look impressed. "The situation is even worse now that two of their men are missing."

"Felix," I shook my head. "Please don't. I don't want another reminder of the guilt on my hands."

Felix leaned against a tall pine. "Everybody here has something they regret, princess," he said quietly.

Eddie's face flashed in my mind.

"I'm sorry. I know that I shouldn't be complaining about this to you, of all people."

Sunshine studied me for a moment. "I'm glad you stopped seeing this island as it really is. At least for a time."

I rubbed my arms. "Dangerous luxury. I can't believe I'm saying this, but will Pan hurry up and come to his senses? Seriously, three nights back in my tent and I feel like I'm covered in bruises."

Sunshine's eyebrows drew together slightly. "He hasn't…?"

"No, not yet. I can't sleep in my own bed anymore, it's ridiculous."

"Awful being ordinary, isn't it?" he drawled.

"Oh, shut up. I don't see you trying to have sex with him for a nice mattress." I rocked back and forth on the balls of my feet. "How long til lunch? I think I'm going to start eating trees."

Felix made a gallant sweep of his arm at the jungle behind him.

"Glad to know you approve of my diet," I said flatly.

Warm hands settled on my waist and I jumped, squeaking in alarm. The person behind me chuckled.

"I wasn't aware that you acquired an interest for the culinary, Felix," Pan said next to my ear.

I stared at Sunshine in bewilderment, hoping for any answer as to why Pan was suddenly holding me from behind.

Sunshine eyed me unhelpfully. "Neither was I."

"Oh, don't go blaming me!"

"Then perhaps you shouldn't make it so easy, Peters," Pan commented and turned to Felix. "Sort out tomorrow's patrol groups, will you?"

He nodded. "Of course."

Felix sent me a slightly confused look as he left. I stared at Pan's hands, debating the pros and cons of greeting him with a simple, "what the fuck are you doing?" He pulled me against his chest and I seriously considered demanding an explanation. And what was with sending Felix off on that fool's errand?

Pan pressed his lips to my neck and I gasped in surprise, not expecting any kind of attention from him. He brushed my hair over my shoulder to give himself better access and continued leaving a trail of kisses up to my ear. Was three days without sex the equivalent of three years in Pan Time?

I sighed, relaxing against him. "What are you doing?"

He nipped at my earlobe with a chuckle. "You never could resist me."

I rolled my eyes. We were back to this again. How long would it take before he finally stopped using that line?

"I'd say I was doing pretty well for about a month. Of course, then you decided to murder Ben…"

Pan wasn't bothered. "You could barely say the words to refuse me, and you know it."

"Really? Because what I remember is you being hilariously desperate."

I turned around to kiss him and he sighed, taking my waist to bring me closer. He ran his tongue along my lips teasingly before finally pulling away. We looked at each other and Pan reached up to comb his fingers though my hair, tugging gently whenever he met resistance. He didn't move to kiss me again though and I frowned in confusion, dropping my arms from around his neck and stepping away from him.

"What's with the casual touchy-feely?" I asked suspiciously. "And you didn't have to go send Felix off somewhere either. We were having a nice conversation – you know, the kind where he actually speaks."

Pan pursed his lips in irritation and took my waist again. "Felix has his duties."

Logic was telling me something that I couldn't believe. There was no way that- No. I was nuts. The look on Pan's face was almost like – like -

"Oh my god, are you jealous?"

I expected his eyebrows to shoot up in surprise and deny my accusation, but he narrowed his eyes at me and let go of my waist instead. "Whatever gave you that idea?"

"Shit," I gaped. "You are. And of Felix? Jesus."

"Why would I be jealous?" Pan spat the word out as if the very thought was insulting. "You could be bedding him behind my back and I still wouldn't have cause to be jealous."

"I'm not doing Fel-" I stared at him in bewilderment. "Are you saying I can do Felix?"

Wouldn't that result in a collection of dead bodies?

Pan shrugged and looked at me coldly. "Go ahead. You'll come back to me in the end."

I stared at him in alarm. Pan hadn't looked at me like that in – I didn't know how long. Weeks? What the hell was going on? First it was teasing and kisses and now he was telling me that I could sleep around? And to assume that I needed him after all the hell he'd put me through-

"What the hell kind of logic gave you that one?" I demanded.

Pan's chilly gaze didn't waver.

"I'm the one that you crawl to when there's nothing left, not him," he said icily. "Don't deny it. You know that I'm the only one here who really makes you feel."

"Make me feel?" I heard my voice rising. "Make me feel? You fuck me against walls and then leave me there, what the fuck would you know about making me feel anything?"

Pan looked livid. His jaw was clenched and he looked like he was fighting with himself not to lash out. I was too furious to care. That bastard took my world away and nearly killed me, and now he said that I needed him?

"Maybe I'm the one that makes you feel, Pan," I hissed. "Maybe that's what this all is."

Pan's eyes widened as he stared at me. He lunged forward suddenly, precise and calculated like a hungry predator. His hand gripped my forearm so hard that I felt pain flare up as he dragged me roughly after him.

"It's time you learned some things, Lost Girl," he growled.

Cold terror seized the anger in my lungs. I'd gone too far.

"Boys!" Pan hollered. "Who's feeling strong today? I need a volunteer."

Several dozen pairs of confused eyes stared at us. I stared back in horror. The fingers around my arm were clenching hard enough to bruise. Pan shoved me into the center of the circle of boys forming around us and stepped back.

"My Lost Girl," he said icily, "is regrettably uneducated in our ways. One of you is going to teach her."

"What?" I squeaked, voice rising in panic. "Teach me what?"

Pan nodded at a tall, burly boy and he stepped forward. "How to be one of us."

I backed away from him, frantically searching for any gaps in the crowd that closed like a vice around us. I caught Felix's worried eyes.

"Peter," he tried. "Perhaps this isn't the best way-"

"Quiet, Felix," he barked. "She needs to know her place."

My pulse flared with panic. "Place?"

The Lost Boy was coming closer.

The crowd was watching us with curious excitement now. Pan was just joking, right? He just wanted to terrify me, that was all. He just wanted to make sure that I was scared enough to never say that he was jealous again. The Lost Boy made a fist and swung it forward. I ducked out of the way desperately and laughter echoed around us. Had I screamed? The boy grinned at me and tried again.

"What are you doing?" I yelled at him. I darted to the other side of the ring to put as much distance between us as possible. "Felix!"

I didn't get an answer.

The boy in the ring grinned at Pan. "I like it when the newbies are quick."

"Go on, then. I want to see this."

I couldn't find Ben anywhere. Andrew looked at me pityingly and I felt adrenaline sear through my veins. I had to get out of here. Pan had lost his mind and Felix wasn't going to help me and that Lost Boy was advancing-

I barely dodged the third punch and backed away as far as the wall of boys would allow. Why couldn't Pan just take his anger out on me somewhere where no one could laugh at my helplessness? The Lost Boy grinned at me and stepped forward again. My heart tried to claw its way out of my chest. Why wasn't Felix doing anything about this? Oh god, he was the one who took the most pains to make sure that I wasn't hurt so why wasn't he doing anything?

Two hands grabbed me roughly by the shoulders to keep me in place. "I'm bored of embers," Pan hissed in my ear. "Show me who you really are."

An old conversation flashed in my mind. 'I want to see you burn.'

My voice faltered as I stared in paralyzed horror at the advancing Lost Boy. Pan wanted me to – to – oh god. He shoved me forward into the ring and I stumbled, unprepared for the sudden change of balance. I hadn't even managed to right myself when pain spread though my skull and I was on the ground, dazedly scrambling away from the Lost Boy standing over me. My ears rang. I thought I heard the hoots and jeers of the Lost Boys. Something connected with my ribs and I cried out in pain, collapsing onto the dirt and trying to suck in desperate gulps of air that my lungs wouldn't allow. More pain blossomed in my shoulder. I curled in on myself, covering my head with my hands and hoping, praying that Pan would just tell the boy to –

"Stop," I heard myself saying. "Stop, just stop!"

My back burned from the force of another kick and I whimpered, hot tears a welcome alternative to the pain. The crowd's yelling pressed down on me. I thought one of my ribs was broken. I probably already had a concussion, I couldn't think straight. My lungs burned. Pan was just better off killing me. Why wouldn't he just kill me instead of putting me through this torture like some animal? I never should have told him he was jealous. I never should have – was this his way of reprimanding me? I'd be in weeks of pain and if that Lost Boy raised his foot again like that to kick me and started to bring it down –

"Pan I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" I cried desperately. "Please make him stop!"

"That's enough."

I should just move my hands away from my head, let the boy do more damage so I could black out and -

The pain never came. I waited in confused terror as everyone looked at Pan with baited breath. That was it, then. I'd crossed the line into the unthinkable and he was going to do much worse than have me publically beaten.

I tried not to cry. I was Eddie now. The Lost Boy would knock me out and Pan would break my arm for being so pathetic and then he would rip out my shadow and kill me and- the Lost Boy stepped back and walked out of the ring. Confused murmurs went through the crowd. I tried to stifle my sobs, relieved and terrified at the same time.

"Back to your duties," Pan barked sharply at everyone.

Feet shuffled past me. My body ached too much to move. Pan stood over me silently, watching. This was it, wasn't it? He was going to kill me. I couldn't bring myself to look at him; there was no more fear left in me to wring out.

"I expected better from you," he said, and then I heard his footsteps fade away from me.

I sucked in frantic breaths of air in the silence but my lungs wouldn't hold them in. Someone grabbed my shoulders and I tried to scramble away from them.

"It's me, Sar, it's me!"

I forced myself to stop. "Ben?"

He tried to pry my hands away from my face. "It's alright, everyone's gone now. Nobody's going to hurt you."

I let him take my hands and pull me into a sitting position.

"Oh man, Sar. You're shaking."

"He- he- oh god." I tried to bring my knees up to my chest but the angry pain in my ribs wouldn't let me.

"Felix," I heard Ben say. "Help me."

A second set of hands carefully lifted me to my feet and I swayed there, staring at Felix's chest and trying to think through the haze of pain I was in.

Felix.

"You!" Tears blurred my vision as I glared up at him. "Why didn't you do anything?"

I was too angry to read the emotion behind his eyes. "Princess, I-"

"You were right there!" I shrieked. "You let him hurt me!"

"Peter was-"

"You're his friend! He listens to you!"

"I didn't think-"

"No!" I yelled at him, stepping back and clutching onto Ben. "You didn't think!" I whirled on the boy behind me. "And you!"

He held his hands up in surrender. "He would've killed me, Sar," Ben said quietly.

All the fight drained out of me. I felt Felix catch me as I let my legs give out.

"I know," I sniffled. "I can't believe I ever – I can't believe I ever thought things could get better with him."

"Shh, princess. Let's get you cleaned up."

"No," I protested. "He won't touch me if I'm dirty."

Felix and Ben exchanged horrified looks over my head.

"Peter hasn't lost his mind," Felix said quietly. "He has his reasons for everything, you saw how he stopped Evan."

I didn't have the energy to tell Felix that I didn't care. Pan made 'Evan' need stopping in the first place. The ache in my back increased as Felix picked me up. I ignored his apology. He gently set me down on a cot far away from the bustle of camp and walked off. Ben sat down next to me and put a hand on my shoulder to keep me upright.

I bit my lip to try and stop the tears. "He's going to kill me, isn't he?"

The hand on my shoulder squeezed slightly in reassurance and I whimpered at the fresh wave of pain.

Ben jerked his hand away as if burned. "I'm so sorry. And… no, he won't kill you."

I looked at him exhaustedly. "You're my friend, Ben. Please don't lie to me."

"When you…" He shook his head. "You should have seen Pan's face."

"What?" My voice sounded bitter. "You mean the disappointment at seeing me beg?"

"He's not angry at you, Sar. Trust me."

"Yeah?" I sniffled. "Then why'd he try and make me fight? Why did he say he expected better? Why did he just leave me there?"

Felix kneeled beside me with a bowl of water and two washcloths. "Peter's stubborn. Look at me."

He reached up to gently dab at the dirt and tears on my face. The cloth came away brown. I wondered how it was possible for him to see me fall apart so many times and not think any less of me.

Ben took the second washcloth and carefully cleaned the cuts on my hands. "What do you mean, 'stubborn'? You say that like it's an excuse."

Felix gave Ben a questioning look.

He shrugged. "I don't think that, but Sar does and she doesn't seem to be speaking."

I sniffed again and managed a small smile. "Am I really that transparent?"

"I'm your friend," Ben echoed. "You can't lie to me."

I stared at my lap and watched as my vision slowly blurred from gathering tears. I blinked and the drops slid down my face, dripping from my chin and onto my lap. "I really wish I could hug you both right now, but I think I'm a walking bruise."

"It's nice to see you sound more like yourself, princess."

"I don't know what that means anymore," I sighed. "Not since I landed on this island. Everything's – everything's just been survival. Just that. It doesn't really leave any room for self-development."

"Then that's who you are," Ben offered. "A survivor."

"Look at all the good it did me."

He raised his eyebrows. "You realize you're the only one besides Pan who actually has a mattress around here, right?"

"Yippee," I said sullenly. "Mattress."

"I'm serious, Sar. You can talk back to him. You – you begged and you're still alive."

Felix set the washcloths aside and sat down next to me. "He's right, princess. Think about that when you calm down."

"I can talk back because he doesn't care about my opinions, Felix."

"Yeah?" Ben raised his eyebrows. "I'm just gonna insult him at dinner then, see how well that goes for me."

I opened my mouth to protest but shut it again at the truth behind his words. Pan was impossible. "How the hell did you get to second in command, Felix? Tell me you're a mind reader."

He smiled thinly. "Just focus on healing."

The rest of the day was a living nightmare. The night wasn't much better, but at least I didn't have to listen to the whispers that followed me around like a cloud of hungry mosquitoes. My public beating itself was enough to get the rumor mill going, but not only did Pan spare me, everyone saw him do it. Some of the more colorful theories I'd overheard included him being angry with me for antagonizing the natives but then deciding that perhaps an alliance would be a better idea. I scoffed at the thought. An alliance? As if. Pan just wanted me to remember that I wasn't even good enough to be jealous over.

I rolled over onto my side miserably and bit back a whimper of pain. There were bruises all over my torso and my lower back felt like it was on fire, and I was stuck sleeping on a shitty mat while Pan lounged about on his soft mattress like some king. I hoped he fell off the bed in the middle of the night and cracked his head open. I didn't know what he was going to do to me tomorrow but I knew that I wasn't going to cry. I hadn't felt so emotionally drained since he told me that I couldn't go back home; my tears simply wouldn't flow anymore. That was just as well, though. It was hard to see with salt water blocking my vision.

At least I had Ben and Felix, I thought numbly. There was only so much that they could do for me, of course, but at least I had someone. If Will were here he probably would have beaten up – or at least tried to beat up - Pan for what he did, but he was never much of a fighter. I smiled sadly. If only my best friend could see me now, bruised and broken, curled up on top of dirty blankets in an equally dirty camp on a miserable island with a demon for a king. I wanted to go back in time, to scream at myself and say that things would never get better, that I should never show Pan any leniency. I shouldn't have even gone to calm him down several nights ago. He didn't deserve that. I didn't know if the Lost Boys deserved the safety I had provided, either.

I had imagined five different scenarios of running away by the time I finally fell into a restless sleep.

The tide of gossip had shifted to the general opinion that Pan must really like seeing me naked if he still let me live. I grudgingly admitted that this seemed like the most plausible explanation, except for the small detail that he didn't bother healing me whatsoever. In fact, I'd barely seen him all morning, save for a few glimpses of him talking to Felix. I didn't bother to stick around. No need for Pan to see the evidence of yesterday.

Still, Pan seemed to be taking the rumors even worse than I was. I wasn't sure how he'd even made it past lunchtime. It was a wonder the boys had enough self-restraint not to say anything to his face. I'd assumed that he didn't care about what they thought at first, as was customary for someone of his truly legendary arrogance, but that quickly proved not to be true. Felix's intervention probably saved the loudmouthed Lost Boy that Pan overheard his life. That, however, was in the morning, and with the sun setting just past its midday peak things in camp were becoming even more tense.

Ben and I exchanged worried glances as Sunshine spoke to Pan on the other side of camp. He appeared to be trying to reason with him, with limited to no success by the looks of it.

Ben shook his head. "Whatever it is, Pan better not take it out on you again."

I prodded my hip gingerly and winced. "That wasn't him taking things out on me. That was… that was something else."

"It still shouldn't have happened. How are the bruises?"

I wordlessly lifted up my shirt and Ben grimaced, too queasy to bother turning red. "Purple really isn't your color."

"I think the green ones are kinda nice, though." I pulled my shirt back into place.

"I'd say I think you'd look better in red, but I think you should avoid that."

"Good plan."

Pan made a show of narrowing his eyes at me across the camp. I looked away.

"Everything's going to be fine, Sar. Felix is on our side."

"His loyalty is still with Pan," I muttered. "At least my back doesn't hurt anymore. Neither do my legs."

Ben sighed. "Just the bruises?"

"Yeah. Try to avoid making me laugh."

He smiled faintly. "I'll do my be- Sar. He's coming."

My voice didn't seem to be working properly. "I see that."

"Felix doesn't look happy."

"I see that too."

Pan stopped several paces away from us and seemed to bask in my horrified expression. The Lost Boys looked on curiously. I saw Felix pinch the bridge of his nose.

"Any volunteers?" Pan asked, still looking at me.

My eyes widened. "No."

"You'll be fine, Sar," Ben sounded like he didn't believe himself. "He won't kill you."

"No, no, nonono."

Pan's grin seemed too gleeful for the situation. A redheaded boy stepped forward. Pan raised his eyebrows expectantly at me.

"No."

"I don't recall giving you a choice, Peters." He waved his hand dismissively at Ben. "She doesn't need you."

Ben muttered an apologetic "sorry" and stood up.

Pan strolled several paces towards me and narrowed his eyes again. "Up."

I didn't understand what had gone wrong or why he was making such a show of the situation. His expression almost made me think that I'd taken a trip back to my first weeks on Neverland. I hadn't missed the theatricality. I stood up slowly, wondering if I should just tell the redhead to get it over with and knock me out as early as possible. Pan stepped to the side and gestured for the Lost Boys to form a ring as they had yesterday. The redhead grinned.

Dodging the punches was an easier task now that I actually knew what was happening and had no energy left to wonder if Pan was trying to publically execute me. They were much too slow and spaced out for real fighting though, and as I ducked away from the fourth one I began to suspect that this was for my benefit. The redhead's fist grazed my side and I cried out in pain, fighting not to curl in on myself. No, I was wrong. He was probably just less skilled in hurting people than Evan was, that's why I wasn't on the ground yet. Pan made no move to intervene as I backed away from the advancing Lost Boy. The crowd stared at me almost hungrily. This was it, then. I was like some pathetic circus animal, doomed to dance around this ring until I ultimately took another beating.

I ducked away from the redhead's fist but he lunged forward and grabbed my left arm, twisting it roughly behind my back. No one reacted to my scream. No one reacted when he kept pulling until my cries and swearing were inaudible. The boy stood just to my left, so close that his grin was starting to blur in my vision. That bastard was enjoying this? How could he enjoy this? He was no better than those bullies at school that used to push Will around because he was smarter than them. He twisted again and I gasped in pain, horribly reminded of what had happened when I had stepped in for Will once in middle school. One of the bullies had grabbed me the same way until I had begged for him to let go, and the school nurse said that I was lucky he didn't break my arm.

I froze. This ginger bastard wasn't breaking my arm, either. I wasn't some twelve-year-old anymore, I had no more parents to cry to when I got pushed around. Pan glared at me. He wanted to see me suffer, did he? Well I wasn't going to go quietly. I'd wind up in the dirt, there was no question about it, but I'd be damned if I left this redheaded moron without a black eye. I balled my right hand up into a fist, calculating the height at which to swing to cause the guy the most damage. I wasn't in middle school and I certainly wasn't back home. There was no one to defend me here. I had to do it myself. I used the boy's grip on my left shoulder for momentum and swung myself around, arm raised.

My fist connected with his jaw and I cried out in pain at the impact. The Lost Boy released his grip on my arm and staggered back, holding the side of his face and glaring at me. I stared at him in horror, hand clutched to my chest. My knuckles burned. The crowd hollered something.

The redhead glanced at Pan for some sort of confirmation before starting forward again, this time not limiting himself to just punches. Now that he wasn't holding back, the Lost Boy had me stumbling and in pain within seconds. I managed to avoid his fist but he used my lack of balance to shove roughly at my side and send me sprawling to the ground. Hot pain exploded in my shoulder and I cried out, rolling off of the rock I had fallen onto. One of the jagged points was covered in blood. My lunch started to make its way back up my throat. The Lost Boy grabbed my collar to pull me upwards. I closed my eyes and braced myself for more bruises.

"That's enough for one day, I think," Pan called. He was watching us with all the concern of someone running away from a sloth.

The redhead released my shirt and I slumped back onto the ground, biting my lip to stop myself from crying in pain. At least today wasn't as bad as yesterday. The Lost Boys slowly dispersed.

"Nice punch," the redhead told me as he left.

I didn't move from my position on the ground. The bruises on my ribs ached and I couldn't even lean on my arms to hold myself up. My right hand felt like it was on fire and the blood from my left shoulder had started to soak through the hole in my shirt. I shook in pain and terror as I realized I would probably have to get stitches, and that I would feel every one of them. Someone stopped in front of me.

"Ben has an errand," Felix told me. "Can you stand?"

I stared up at him through gathering tears. "It hurts, Felix."

"I know," he said. "You did well."

"Well?" I choked out. "Well?"

He sighed and crouched down next to me to lift me to my feet. "Come on, princess. Up."

I clutched onto him with my left hand, swaying unsteadily on my feet. Maybe I was dizzy from pain.

"Felix!" Pan barked. "See to it that everyone is where they should be."

I whimpered.

Felix pried my hand away from his shirt. "Of course, Peter."

I stared at his retreating back in terror. I wanted to scream at him, tell him not to leave me with Pan, that he was only going to make the pain worse. I wasn't in middle school. No school nurses were going to protect me.

Pan placed a hand between my shoulder blades and I jerked, expecting force, but he pushed lightly on my back instead and steered me to a nearby grove of trees. He turned me around so I was leaning against a tree trunk and frowned, inspecting my body.

"Happy?" I sniffled, not caring about what he thought of me anymore.

"Give me your hand."

New fear froze my lungs. "N-no."

Pan pursed his lips and reached forward. I struggled against him but his hand closed in a painful grip over my wrist and rendered my efforts futile. I tried not to scream. Was he going to break my fingers for trying to defend myself? He was the one that wanted me to fight!

Pan frowned at my bruising knuckles and held his palm over them, seemingly calculating something. The pain faded.

"W-what?" I managed, wide-eyed, and pulled my hand back to my chest. Even yesterday's cuts had faded without a trace. "Why?"

He studied my shoulder. "Where else?"

I bit my lip nervously and slowly lifted up my shirt, wincing as the movement aggravated my mangled shoulder. "I don't think I have any broken ribs," I said quietly.

Pan gently ran his hands over my torso and I felt the ache there subside. The blooming bruises vanished like flowers closing at nightfall.

"No," he said. "Just bruising."

The lack of pain made my skin glow with soft warmth. I let my shirt drop. "Why are you healing me?"

He looked up from running his fingertips over my hipbone. "You did well today."

Everyone seemed to be saying that, and it really pissed me off. I glared at him. "Not begging on the ground is 'well'?"

Pan paused. "Yesterday…"

"What?" I asked sourly. "Yesterday was teaching me a lesson?"

He stepped closer to reach around me and rest his hand on my lower back. The ache drained from my bones. "You shouldn't have fallen. I expected you to have better balance."

I stared at him in cautious astonishment. "You- you weren't trying to get me beaten up?"

He glanced at me. "No."

"But-" I tried, then stopped myself.

Did that mean… what did that mean? Was he not as mad at me for saying he was jealous of Felix as I thought he was? Unless…

"Hold up," I said, irritation with him returning. "Is this your way of offering an apology?"

Pan didn't say anything.

"Some shitty apology." I glared, my body no longer having to deal with excess pain and sending the energy elsewhere. "'Oh, yeah, I wanted to see you in pain but you got a little too pulverized for my tastes. Whoops, my bad.'"

He clenched his jaw and stepped back. "I'm healing you, girl. You should be grateful."

"You make me need healing in the first place!"

Pan's eyes widened slightly and I held his gaze accusingly. His shoulders went rigid in anger.

"Why don't we make this one something special, then," he hissed, nodding at the wound on my shoulder, "since you seem to need reminding of who it is that you belong to."

He pinned me to the tree by my good shoulder and I gasped in pain as he rested his palm on my wound. My blood slowly seeped between his fingers and dripped from his wrist, landing on the toe of his boot with soft taps. He would probably make me clean it up later, I thought bitterly. I grimaced slightly as I felt the flesh of my shoulder gradually knit itself together under his hand, but something felt… different. Pan removed his bloodstained fingers and smirked in satisfaction at the scar now marring my shoulder. My eyes widened in horror.

"There," he murmured. I felt wetness on my temple as he brushed a lock of hair behind my ear. "Now you'll remember."

He left and I slid slowly down the trunk of the tree, wondering why he bothered to even heal me at all.

Felix didn't say anything when he found me sitting under the tree Pan had led me to, trying to find shapes in empty air. I pointed numbly to my shoulder and he stayed silent for a moment before calmly informing me that a tear in my shirt was hardly the end of the world. He didn't comment on the scar. Ben joined us not long after with three bowls of stew but nearly got up again when he saw Pan's handiwork.

"He left me a present," I said vacantly.

Ben struggled not to make a face. "It's… it's not that bad."

I raised my eyebrows at him tiredly. "It's the size of a baseball and looks like a spider web gone wrong."

Felix stirred his food. "It's not bleeding."

Ben looked like he wanted to say something but took the opportunity to shut himself up by shoveling food into his mouth instead.

"Princess," Felix started carefully.

I didn't bother looking at him. "Hm?"

"Why is there blood on your face?"

"I-" My hand flew to my temple and felt the powdery residue of dried blood. "Pan, he- he likes my hair." I rubbed at my skin and a small shower of brown flakes cascaded down. "There isn't any more anywhere, is there?"

Felix shook his head. "No. Just your shoulder."

"I'm so tired of this," I sighed, setting my empty bowl down by my feet.

Ben frowned at me. "What's wrong with stew?"

"Not the food, Ben."

"I know," he said. "Made you smile, though."

Sunshine's mouth quirked upwards at the corners.

"You're ridiculous," I said to Ben. "Also, isn't it your turn to do the dishes tonight?"

He groaned.

"Go on, then. Shoo."

Ben gathered up the bowls and stuck his tongue out at me as he left. I waited until he was out of earshot before asking Felix the one question I wanted an answer to.

"What the hell is Pan thinking, doing all of this?" I waved my hands around to gesture at nothing. "Is he just having a bad week? Is there some problem with the natives that we don't know about and that's why he's always angry?"

"The tribe is surprisingly quiet," Felix said.

"You're not answering my question."

He looked at my shoulder again and sighed in resignation, still not saying anything.

"Is he trying to make me suffer for something?" I asked. "I mean, he healed me, yeah, but that's probably only so he can watch me get a fresh set of bruises tomorrow."

Felix looked up at the canopy as if praying for patience. "Peter has his reasons, but I never expected the first time to be so violent. Something must have upset him."

"He's trying to torture me, Felix," I exclaimed, gesturing at my scar. "I mean, look at this thing! It's there for life!"

Felix sighed slowly through his nose. "Princess," he said evenly, as if talking to a small child. "He's teaching you to fight."

I must have heard him wrong. "What?"

"He's teaching you," Felix said just as calmly, "to defend yourself."

I shook my head. "No. No he's not."

Felix raised his eyebrows.

"He let me get beat up!"

"He was waiting for a positive reaction."

I didn't believe him. "Why couldn't he just say so, then? My entire stomach was purple before he healed me!"

"He does things his own way."

"His own way, my ass," I hissed. "It looks a lot more like he's trying to terrify me into submission."

"It'll be different tomorrow," Sunshine said, looking across the camp at something with slight irritation. "I tried to talk him out of forcing you into everything today, but he was determined to put a stop to the rumors."

"What," I said flatly. "That he likes seeing me naked? That's not a rumor, Felix, that's a fact."

Felix's irritation with the thing across camp deepened. I followed his gaze.

I pursed my lips as I watched Pan say something to a group of Lost Boys. That sadistic bastard… "He's trying to teach me to fight, is he?"

Sunshine eyed me. "Yes."

My anger surged back with surprising force. He wasn't teaching me to fight; he was taking pleasure in watching me get beat down in front of everyone. How was that even necessary to him? Did he want the boys to think I was weak? That bastard probably thought I was threatening the hierarchy of the camp, what with being his whore and all. I stood up.

"What are you doing?"

I glared at Pan. "I'm going to tell him exactly what I think of his methods."

"Princess-"

"Save it for someone who'll listen."

I marched towards Pan in determination, dredging up the memories of every awful thing he ever did to me. I refused to back down. He was going to listen to everything I had to say to him and then he would – he would – he was going to listen to everything I had to say to him. I watched in satisfaction as the Lost Boys next to him took one look at me and blurted excuses to flee the scene.

"You."

Pan raised his infuriatingly active eyebrows. "Something wrong?"

"You pathetic, insecure piece of shit!" The entire camp looked like it heard me. Good. "How dare you let me get beaten to the point of begging and call it 'training!'"

Pan's eyes widened in surprise and he glanced across the camp at Felix. Sunshine could get in trouble all he wanted, I couldn't care less as long as I got to scream at Pan and tell him exactly what I thought of him.

He shrugged nonchalantly. "I healed you, didn't I? You would hardly learn anything if-"

"That's no excuse!" I shouted over him. "You can't keep treating me like some animal, some – some glorified pet because I'm not a man! Oh, you never wanted me here, poor lost baby has to deal with a woman in his camp because he's too much of an ass to send her home! And don't even try threatening me, because I'm not done."

Pan stared at me with ire burning behind his eyes but made no move to stop me from speaking. Did he really think that I'd be too afraid of what he could do to me to continue? I got beat up twice, nearly murdered (also twice), and yet here I was, perfectly fine. As if he could do anything to me.

"How the hell," I spat, my voice rising, "do you justify any of this to yourself? How do you even sleep at night? Please," I spread my arms out, "tell me. Because I can't come up with any kind of logic that would justify kidnapping, destroying someone just so you can get laid, and then torturing them because for some reason you feel threatened!"

"Threatened?" He hissed. "Why would I be-"

"Shut up!" I hollered. "You shut up and you listen to me. You're not a human, you're a sorry excuse."

Pan narrowed his eyes at me but closed his mouth.

"Does all this make you feel powerful?" I asked, stepping within arms reach of him. "This- this magic, this immortality, these boys that know you can murder them at a moment's notice just because you can. Do you honestly hate yourself that much? You know," I laughed at him, pretty sure that my anger was starting to border on a kind of deranged insanity, "normal people have it easy. They graduate college, they get married, they have a couple kids and end up hating their significant others… And look at me, I'm stuck here with you and your fucking satellite dish ears!"

Stunned silence hung over the camp.

"You know what?" I said, determined too keep the tables turned for as long as possible. "Get me beaten up, train me, torture me, go ahead. But I am not some pet for you to toss around on your every whim. I will not be treated as sub-human and I will not bow down to you. You have Felix to kiss your boots but I am worth a damn more than that. If you aren't willing to respect me, then you're just going to have to kill me or I'll do it for you, are we clear?"

Nobody moved. I expected Pan to lash out or start yelling about how pathetic and weak I was, but all he did was look me up and down impatiently and ask, "are you done yet?"

Did he not hear a single thing I just said? Did that pathetic soulless bastard just ignore me because he didn't like what he heard? How dare he think that my opinions were so below him that–

His fingers closed sharply around my hand as he caught it just inches away from his face. I didn't move, torn between being livid and terrified that he would break my arm for trying to slap him. Pan grinned slowly.

"Ooh, good girl," he murmured, stroking my wrist. "But do try and aim at someone else in the future."

My mouth fell open and my anger fizzled away into stunned surprise as he lowered my hand. I had never felt so insulted. He- he was happy about this? I'd spent all this time screaming insults at him and he still found a way to turn it around in his favor.

"As you were, boys," he called easily. "And you… you say you're not a pet, but…" he ran his fingertips over my scar. "What a magnificent collar you have."

My eyes widened. Pan smiled and tugged on my hair before walking past me. I stared after him numbly, not sure what I was fighting for anymore. He turned around and I tried not to shrink under his terrifying smile.

For the first time I could remember, Pan looked genuinely pleased with me. "Nice to meet you, Wildfire."

I should probably warn you all that I have no idea what I'm doing after this chapter. I'll keep writing of course, but throughout the entire history of this fic I've had an outline of sorts to consult for my plot and character development. That outline ends here. I've had the entire story more or less planned out up until the last words of this chapter, but after this everything hits free fall. I'm literally writing blind. I don't even know what the plot climax is going to be (I have a faint idea, but the details change every day). That being said, thank you all so much for sticking with me so far. It really means a lot when readers care about the people I string together with nothing more than words and sentences. You're all amazing.

Now that that's out of the way, what did you guys think of this insanely long chapter? :) Let me know so I have some idea of where to go with this!