Well, I'm back! And in only a little more than a week, too :) The only reason it took so long was that I didn't write at all for a couple days when I had lots of time, for some stupid reason.
I saw Inside Out and I was worried it would be a letdown since I've been excited about it for a year and a half (I think they were supposed to release it last year but it was delayed), but it surpassed my expectations by miles! Seriously, if you haven't seen it, go out and do so! You won't be sorry! -I wish I'd been payed to write that, but sadly I wasn't :)
This chapter's shorter than the last dozen have been, probably. But I'm happy with it, and I hope you will be, too.
Peri could tell, even with her eyes closed, that no light came from the wand, and she didn't feel anything happen. Which almost certainly meant it hadn't granted her wish again. She slumped down on the ground and was interrupted after a couple minutes of moping.
"Look!" Elsa said, pointing up at the sky. Peri braced herself to hide from a hawk and looked upward. The things Elsa was pointing at certainly weren't hawks. They looked far too humanoid, yet they resembled animals at the same time.
Tink landed with the objects -which turned out to be animal suits- still floating slightly behind her. "Aside from these and pirate clothes, I don't think there's anything that will fit Elsa or Anna." Tink explained "So I flew to Hangman's tree and... borrowed these from the Lost Boys. The pirate clothes would've been too big and it would've been harder to steal them."
"The Lost Boys actually have a whole secret stash with dozens of these animal suits. They make them when they're bored and then never wear them, except to play dress up occasionally. So I got to pick these out. I doubt they'll even notice these are gone, and they probably won't miss them if they do." Tink continued chattering much more than usual, perhaps trying to convince herself she wasn't taking anything anyone needed. She was also laughing inwardly at the thought of the Lost Boys' faces if they'd heard her spill the beans about them playing dress up.
If she hadn't known otherwise, Peri would have thought the suits Tink had chosen for Elsa and Anna had been made specifically for the girl. Elsa's was an arctic wolf suit, while Anna's was a raccoon suit (almost identical to The Twins'). Like arctic wolves, Elsa was at the top of the winter chain, but instead like raccoons, Anna was curious and fearless. Both suits were complete with tails and hoods with ears, and they covered everything but the girls' faces and hands.
Elsa and Anna got the suits on. It looked a lot more like they were wearing Halloween costumes than the skins of dead animals (Peri was beginning to wonder if the suits were actually made from animals or not. The raccoon suit would have been made from a huge raccoon if it was real).
Anna and Elsa looked down at themselves with glee, and started pretending to be the animals they were dressed up as, respectively. They leapt around, growling playfully and laughing and pretending to claw one another. Tink and Peri had to move aside so as to not get accidentally squashed.
"So did the wand grant your wish again?" Tink asked, feeling bad about waiting so long to ask. Sadly, Peri shook her head. "I don't think it'll let you wish for the same thing twice."
Tink thought for a bit and said "If you change your wish just the tiniest bit, wouldn't you technically be wishing for something different? I mean... if Anna and Elsa wished they were fairies for a minute, isn't that a different wish from wishing they were fairies indefinitely?"
The two of them looked at each other, with a bit of hope lingering in the air. They could try it, and if it didn't work they could just reverse the wish. "Anna, come over here!" Peri called. Anna came, with Elsa asking for a translation right behind her. The twins could see all two clearly that Anna was getting sick of having to repeat everything they said.
"All right, now before we do this, would either of you object to being fairies for a tiny bit longer? Maybe a minute and then you'll switch right back." Anna's face lit up and she hopped up and down eagerly. Of course, she had to tell Elsa what Peri asked- Anna really couldn't believed she'd actually liked being the translator before, it was so inconvenient.
"I wish you could understand fairies." Anna muttered to her sister, and Elsa agreed. Fortunately, Anna wasn't holding the wand, but both girls were struck by a sudden thought. They both began to ask (at the same time) if they could use the wand to make Elsa understand fairies. Peri, who was holding the wand, flew up out of their reach once she figured out what they were asking.
"NO!" She hollered, in more of a scared tone than a sharp one. Tink gave her a weird look, and Peri exclaimed "Don't you remember my dream? We died when Elsa wished that! Besides, we were just going to see if the other wish would work."
Anna didn't even acknowledge Elsa asking what they were saying. "You died?" She asked, totally confused. "It was a dream," Tink explained over her shoulder as she flew to Peri. She took the wand from Peri, reassuring her that they weren't going to wish that Elsa could understand them. Peri flew closer to Anna, but still out of reach, and told the girl to wish they were fairies for a minute.
"Take your clothes off, first!" Tink shouted, only to facepalm half a second later. It sounded so wrong. Glaring at her twin, who was smirking with one eyebrow raised, Tink said hurriedly "I just don't want to have to get more animal suits. And seeing as the wand didn't give them clothes the first time they turned into Clumsies..."
Once the girls removed their animal suits (Anna had translated that), the fairies made Anna repeat what they wanted her to wish for, Peri gave Anna the wand. "I wish Elsa and I were fairies for a minute." Anna recited, giving it a wave. Light appeared, and when it faded, Anna and Elsa were once again fairies. They started to fly up, but were held back by Tink and Peri, much to their annoyance. One minute later, there was another flash of light, and the girls were Clumsies again. Peri couldn't help grinning as Elsa and Anna got back in the animal suits. This just might work, she thought. All she had to do was tweak her wish a bit, and it would count as a new one.
Elsa was getting very frustrated at being left out of the loop; the fairies were saying so much and Anna wasn't translating any of it. "I WANT TO KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON!" She finally hollered, which at least got Anna to start translating again.
Peri was actually annoyed she'd made her wish so specific the first time, because it was hard to think of a way to tweak it and still get the same result. Finally, she said "I wish my talent would stay as strong as it is now, when Elsa isn't using it. Or it could get stronger, really... just as long as it doesn't get weaker." She decided not to wave the wand on that one, since it came out really awkward, so she said it again and it came out better. She waved the wand. Grinning, she shielded her eyes against the light shining from the wand.
She realized soon afterward that she'd forgotten something. "I wish I'd keep my talent when Elsa used her magic." She waved the wand again, but no light came this time. That didn't make sense. She'd worded it differently, and she was pretty sure it was technically different from her reversed wish. Besides, it had granted that other one, which she thought was closer to the reversed wishes than the one she'd just made. She tried several other wordings, each to no avail. Eventually she gave up, and Tink took the wand.
Peri wasn't really paying attention to what Tink was doing, but she had that far away look that meant she was probably in the wand's mind. Tink grinned when she'd finished. "Guess what?"
"What?" Peri asked excitedly. Grinning wider, Tink said "The wand just told me it granted your wish, and it says you won't lose your talent permanently, like we feared. It wasn't too happy about it."
"But what about when Elsa uses her magic?" Peri asked. She'd tried every conceivable wording, such as "let me use my talent anytime", and yet the wand seemed to not register that as a different wish. Peri was really hating that she'd been so thorough with her wish the first time, since it left very little room to make a different wish that had the same result. The only other reason for the wand to refuse to grant this wish again was that it was just being obnoxious, like it had with its all-or-none deal for reversing the wishes.
Anyway, her talent remaining strong was better than she'd expected. She knew she should be happy that she'd gotten that much, but she was still disappointed she couldn't use her talent when Elsa was. But having it gone temporarily was better than having it gone permanently, and she'd survived eight years losing her talent occasionally. Losing it wasn't as bad when she knew the reason- the worst had been when she'd lost it before meeting Elsa, and she kept worrying there was something wrong with her.
"I wanna use the wand to understand fairies!" Elsa exclaimed "It wouldn't hurt to have that wish come true, would it? We can make sure it's safe. I promise I won't wish for anything else! So can I? Please, please, please, please, pleeaasee?"
Although she didn't mean for it to happen, other wishes were filling Elsa's head: her parents liking her magic, being able to turn from a fairy to a human at will, and having an unlimited supply of chocolate were among them. Tink and Peri saw the very suspicious gleam in her eyes, and looked at each other.
Although Peri was rather scared the wand would indeed kill them for that wish, she hadn't considered wording the wish in a way that made sure that wouldn't happen. She could see Tink was seriously considering this idea. After all, Anna wasn't the most reliable translator, it it was pretty annoying to hear Elsa ask for a translation after every sentence. Anna was in favor of this wish, too, (she'd even piped up with "You could make sure you didn't die") so it wasn't like they'd be hurting her feelings for Elsa's.
After discussing how to word the wish for a good five minutes, Tink, who had decided to do the actual wishing, said "I wish you would let Elsa understand fairies without changing anything else, which includes killing Periwinkle and myself." Tink waved the wand, and Peri held her breath. After a good half minute, Tink said "Well, I don't think anything's going to happen to us."
Elsa gasped and the others knew the wish had worked just from that. She didn't hear their voices, like she had when she was a fairy. Instead, she heard bells, and she just knew what they meant. She'd actually been disappointed she hadn't heard the bells when she'd turned into a fairy, so this was actually the best of both worlds. Even though she didn't hear their voices, she could imagine them pretty well, and she got to hear fairy bells.
Elsa suggested that since she now had Anna's power of understanding fairies, Anna should get frost powers like she had. It was only fair, she thought, and she'd been wishing Anna had magic too pretty much since she'd found out her little sister didn't have snow powers. The slightly devilish side of Elsa thought about how their parents wouldn't be able to automatically blame her for snow in the castle halls and other magic-related infractions.
Tink and Peri said this was going too far, and to everybody's surprise, Anna stated she didn't even want them anyways. "I'm an animal-talent, not a frost-talent!" She'd explained, while her devilish side grinned about remaining free from blame for things like snow in the castle halls. The fairies also shot down Elsa's proposal of using the wand to make her parents like her magic- messing with people's feelings was very risky business.
Whenever a fairy said anything for the next hour, Elsa smiled. It would have been awful to never understand them after turning back into a human.
XXXXXXXXXX
"Are you two ready to go home now?" Peri asked the princesses several hours later. Both girls nodded, although not nearly as enthusiastically as before. Yes they were homesick, but they were sad to leave Neverland, too.
They'd spent a long time saying farewell to everybody. Gliss, Spike, Fawn, Iridessa, Vidia, Silvermist, Prilla, Queen Clarion and Lord Milori... the list went on and on. Elsa and Anna had made so many friends in Neverland, and saying goodbye to all of them was rather depressing. After all, goodbye was one of the hardest things to say. Needless to say, they were kind of mellowed out.
Pretty much everyone except Vidia and the rulers had offered to make Elsa and Anna honorary fairies. They'd offered to visit Arendelle when changing the seasons, and Prilla had decided to try to blink over there often.
By the time they got around to actually leaving, it was well into the afternoon in Neverland. Terence poured Pixie Dust on the girls, which made the tails of their costumes float, much to their delight. They spent a little time milling around so Anna and Elsa could get the hang of flying without wings again.
Tink and Peri were going to escort them home, and all four were glad about this. As they headed up towards the second star to the right, both girls promised themselves they'd never forget this adventure.
They whooshed through the psychedelic light-show tunnel. They were flung out, and the first thing they registered was that it was night. Instead of stopping in midair, like they normally did, the star kept pushing them, and they were unable to break out of it. Tink and Peri were stuck to the girls' shoulders by whatever force was pushing them.
They were rushing towards two cloaked, hooded figures, each holding cloth-like things that Tink eventually realized were more cloaks. She tried with all her might to break free of whatever clamped her to Anna's shoulder, but to no avail.
The ground hurtled closer and closer and they showed no signs of stopping. They hit the ground at the feet of the figures. Before they knew it, they were being bundled up completely in the cloaks. The girls kicked and screamed, but the cloaks muffled the sound and large hands stifled the rest. With brutal efficiency, they were wrapped up almost like babies, swaddled in a way that prevented moving their limbs. Tink and Peri ended up being captured too. They couldn't see through the cloth, so they had no idea where they were going as they were lifted by strong arms and carried away.
Dun, Dun Duuunnnn! Cliffhanger, although I'm betting you all know who the cloaked figures are.
So, I admit this was a little mean to the characters. I decided Peri needed a little bit of a happy ending in terms of her magic, but of course I had to ruin the happy ending with this. By the way, the end part of what happens when they get back to Arendelle has been planned almost since they got lost in the woods. And Elsa understanding fairies? I figured she needs to be able to understand what's going on and not pestering Anna after every sentence, since that's annoying. You'll see why.
Well, now you know why the wand didn't give them clothes last chapter. I had a mental image of them wearing animal suits once, and I knew I had to use it. (by the way, I did refrain from having the Peter Pan statue in Kensington Gardens show up last chapter, so I don't just use every idea that pops into my head! That one would be going too far... And there actually are other reasons for the animal suits)
I figured the only way Elsa and Anna would get into the animal suits was if they didn't have clothes, so... I personally like the idea of the Lost Boys playing dress up in different animal suits. I'm actually really curious how the Twins can fit into what were presumably raccoons, because they would've needed humongous raccoons. Hopefully you all find the idea of them having a whole stash of animal suits believable. And I hope I'm not the only one that thinks raccoons fit Anna!
This chapter feels kind of like a throwback to the earlier chapters that were this length :)
So, you'll find out more about this abduction next chapter! Hang in there! I hope to have it up in just a couple days, since it's been in my head for forever!