The welt was stitched from his elbow, snaking along the length of his forearm and vanishing in the ridge between his middle and index finger. It promised a scar would take its place, a stark reminder of how he was the one that had suffered a misstep. At his side, Archer gouged the tolerance of his pain, wincing at every single prod as if he were the one experiencing it.

Peter remained silent to the action, his eyes cast out beyond the main clearing of their encampment to a distant point in the forest. A quick jab at his wrist proved to be more of a minor annoyance than anything, his brows creasing at the same jab in his concentration. It proved just enough to waver his focus.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd almost think you wanted this to happen."

Peter couldn't find the humor in the Lost Boy's joke, a troubled pinch clinging to his eyebrows.

While Archer dabbed at the wound with a drenched cloth, he remained oblivious to Peter's begrudging expression. He was smiling—the barest trace lifting his dimpled cheeks and stretching his freckled face—but one look up to Peter was cause enough for him to yield. Smile faltering, he cleared his throat and wrung out the fabric, staining the bucket water a murky red. "If you ignored Runner when he's acting like an idiot—"

"He believes that he can be a better leader." Peter mused aloud with firm disdain, an edge to his tone that betrayed his usual calm neutrality. "If I ignore him, all that will prove is an inability to handle conflict. What will the boys think of me, then?" He turned his forearm over, the gruesomeness of it, and what would likely leave behind more permanent damage in the process.

A bright red welt clumsily stitched together, but the sharp pain slowly subsided into a dull throb and that was enough for him to ignore it.

"Nobody on the island would doubt your leadership."

Peter scoffed. "Even you?"

"You know Runner as well as I do." That innocent smile was back with another gentle prod of a joke, ducking his head and fidgeting with the towel in his hands. "He's the last person that I would trust to not lead us off the edge of a cliff for the hell of it."

"You sound confident that I won't." Peter remarked, managing a smile of his own albeit dry and more than a little wan.

The softest exhalation of a laugh breathed out through his nose. "Maybe. That was the case before, but you've changed." Following his confession, Archer's gaze faltered, instead turning his attention skyward. Dark clouds loomed overhead and showered them in the beginnings of rainfall. Save for a few lit torches in the ground, the bare light of morning was their only source, but even that began to diminish with the coming storm. They snuffed out, one after the other.

"Changed?" Peter echoed. "Changed how?"

"Changed as in you're no longer fun." At the remark, a hard punch was delivered to his shoulder with Peter's good arm. It did little to sway the boy's good spirits, but he rubbed at the abused area nonetheless.

"You know what's not funny?" Peter quipped. "You. Ever. I should throw you to the pirates for even trying."

"I wouldn't mind that, I think. It could end up being quite the adventure." He shrugged, moving to stand, tucking the bucket underneath his arm. "Beats sitting in the camp all the time waiting for something to happen."

No, their days of foolishness and scouting the harsh terrain of the island were over. In his time, he'd watched it change, observed a land of childish dreams and wonder turn to something much more malevolent, its creatures exhibiting a new aggression, the fairies having all but disappeared into their holes and refusing to come out should someone snatch them and clip their wings. Groups much worse than the pirates had formed, waiting for the day that Neverland would finally be brought to its knees, and some demanding Peter's head on a stick as though it were something he could actually control.

Maybe he could. He didn't know.

Nevertheless, Peter nodded, ducking his head between his shoulders, fingers fumbling with a stray twig in between his fingers. "I'll wager there are things better than that." He mused, raising his head skyward to scenery that he had seen thousands of times before. Somehow he never tired of it. "Like being fed to the crocodiles." Peter snickered low.

"Cutting off Hook's other hand." Archer added. "Being trampled by herds of wild animals."

"Being assaulted by mermaids."

Archer hissed between his teeth, bobbing his head. "You've got me beat."

A long pause rested between them, stretching out into a thin silence where neither prodded the other for anything more. Their gazes lingered on cloudy skies and the rainfall that came with it, but neither moved just yet. Peter felt it, him looking as he hunched over in the stump, elbows perched on his knees before his attention found the stick again. He cleared his throat.

"You look tired." Archer observed with more tentativity, a curious inviting inquiry that only begged for the honest truth.

"I'll be so honest as to say that I am."

"I mean, more tired." He corrected. "You've been a little distant since you got back."

Peter sniffed and straightened, tossing the stick to the ground in much smaller, split pieces. "Such is the price of wanting something you can't have 'innit?"

The boy nodded, humming thoughtfully. The rainfall pressed harder. What began as a drizzle had morphed into a downpour, threatening a flood if they weren't too careful. It went on ignored, too familiar a scene and far past concern.

"Do you remember what it was?"

The smile that Peter offered didn't quite reach his eyes, bleeding disbelief and flitting along the spectrum of condescending without hpm necessarily trying. His tongue pressed against the inside of his cheek, his eyebrows flicking up to meet it. "Believe me, Laddie, if I did I wouldn't be here." He scowled. "Why?"

"Nothing." With a sheepish smile, he cradled the bucket in his arms, steps retreating back toward their encampment located on the other side of the brush. Even when Peter stood, he didn't stop. "Come find me in a few hours. That'll need to be cleaned and redressed."

Where Archer had even learned such skills, he didn't ask, not that he was necessarily complaining if one of his lost boys had picked up a new hobby. One that was more beneficial than gator wrestling or playing chicken with the mermaids–sirens morelike. "Archer-"

Before he could say more, Archer was gone and Peter was left alone, standing in the middle of their camp with the sounds of the other lost boys resonating profoundly on the other side. He breathed in, running his fingers against the nape of his neck and through the hair that curled there.

And once more, turning toward the sky again, pieces clouded his memory much like the scene above him that promised a worse storm would be rolling through. No reprieve, no mercy and only the barest sliver of a chance for a brighter tomorrow. Before, when the voices had asked him to do things when he first gave his life to the island, he would have never dreamt of actually doing them.

Now he did so without hesitation.

Being alone–in a sense–being a part of Neverland as long as he had left him vulnerable-left him a target for the shadows that lurked in the dark ready to reach out and take him. Once a bright-eyed and innocent young lad, that part of him was gone, a mere shell that he could no longer recall. Left in its place was whoever he was now, varying depending on the moment.

Neverland had crushed him. It beat him down, made demands only because it had needed a ruler. Not a boy, but a man. It changed him to fit its own selfish desire and mischief had turned to cruelty, his shadow enshrouded him in its spectral light-dark and prodding. The urge for violence had grown stronger, the urge for chaos, to let go of childish solutions and urged him to look to a more permanent fix as to what ailed him, or rather who.

War. Bloodshed. Letting go of the reigns of the more primal part of himself.

It did this. Ensured that it would survive through belief and magic if just to change the belief in him, turning him into more of a nightmare than a dream. The Lost Boys' loyalty gew, but only out of fear, only with the knowledge that he was all they had.

The island grew darker, the sunlight bled away and pixie dust became useless.

It was Peter's reality now and it didn't take long to revel in that change. Strangely, he had learned to enjoy this newfound ferocity. And it had left him with a tendency to forget. While he did remember the in-betweens, there were blotches here and there empty with a reminder that there was something missing, but what that was remained a mystery.

He didn't give into it, that temptation or want to know.

For Peter was in the darkness and so the darkness he became.

There was no quiet jingling to bring his attention back, no fairy to land on his shoulder and steer him in the right direction. There hadn't been for a long time now.

Rubbing his index finger against his eyelids, he began his journey back toward the others, only for Archer to burst through the bushes again, eyes wide and pointing urgently toward the area of the forest that had captured his attention earlier. His lips were pressed together, brow creased in worry.

Breathless and gasping, he heaved: "Peter! One of the traps sprung on the South side!"

"Well, look at it then. It seems we've caught a bird." Peter's voice mocked upon arriving at the source. He could hear it, the muffled creak in the trees above him that suggested their branches would crack. They reacted to his presence, swaying with a heightened ferocity while he looked on with only vague curiosity. His hands shoved into his pockets; there was no hint of childish banter in his tone, just a stark and almost threatening formality. "A bit foreign for Neverland, unless of course I must have missed something while I was away."

Archer followed in tow, his own quizzical expression looking up and fixing his eyes on the girl through the holes in the net that had trapped her. "It's… It's a girl." He began, noticeably careful with his next choice of words-something that suddenly put Peter on the defensive. There was an air of recognition, as if there was something he knew that his companion did not. "She's freezing. We should bring her back with us."

Best to play it by ear then.

"Cut her down." He ordered, taking a knife from a sheath in the strap across his chest, flipping it around and extending the hilt out to him. "I say we play a new game."

Archer seemed hesitant, catching Peter in a wide eyed stare. One look was all it took to urge the boy to obey, traversing over to where the rope wrapped around the tree and began sawing at the knot. "I think that we should maybe talk to the others about this. She could have come from Captain Jones' ship–"

"Yes, because I'd most certainly hate to get in the way of a budding romance." Peter said a bit sarcastically–perhaps more than a bit. "Do as I tell you." He silenced any future protest with a dismissive hand gesture before he knelt down next to where the girl remained trapped. One sweeping stare over her form and he cocked a smile.

Suddenly his brow creased, a poking prodding sensation much worse than a needle being insistent, being annoying, something about this lost girl he couldn't quite define, not at a mere first glance.

That bothered him.

"Are you lost? You look lost to me." His head cocked to the side, obscuring his budding frustration quite easily.

"Peter…" It was a whisper, a breath, barely loud enough for them to hear. She sat rigid and still, the space between them closed but holding some form of distance. His face bordered indifference, his eyes flickering over her, her mouth slightly agape and gawking.

"Peter." She repeated, a bit louder this time, a strange mixture of relief and something akin to concern tinting her voice. Without averting her gaze, she wiped a hand across her forehead, streaking it with dirt.

His shadow extended farther than it ever had before, much farther than Archer's who was barely noticeable with the lack of light to reflect it. Peter was quiet for a moment, however brief, his brows suddenly furrowed as they locked gazes. Although it could not physically be seen, a sort of thoughtfulness flickered behind his eyes; contemplating. Thinking.

From her wet brown hair down to her clothes soaked and caked with mud, despite the state of her, despite having no form of recognition despite her uttering his name, whatever spark would ignite and seemingly grant him the opportunity to think of who this girl might be, to welcome her to the hell that Neverland had become with open arms and allow her to slip seamlessly into their lives with only her word as a well enough explanation. He remained quizzical, agonizingly so.

"I am Peter Pan." He confirmed, turning his eyes up to where Archer crouched next to the girl, making use of the knife and cutting relentlessly at the trap that bound her. "She looks as if she can hardly stand the sight of me."

"With a bath and a meal, I bet she'll feel well enough to talk about what happened." Archer suggested, extending the knife out again, tentative fingers wrapping around the girl's wrist and helped her to sit upright. His touch was gentle, as it always was, not trying to push her until she was ready but urging her head out of the mud. He shrugged off his jacket, draping it around her shoulders.

Peter took the knife, still crouched down in front of the girl. Unlike the familiar childish energy that he had so seamlessly carried around before, he was now more measured and accurate; stable in a way that promised every single move would have some sort of devastating outcome with no regret of what that might be. Electricity crackled in the air.

"I can take her back to the camp." Archer offered.

"I'm the one who makes the games here, and she can be sure that I will not play hers." Peter interrupted, steadying that level gaze on her, Archer's incredulous expression dismissed for the moment, just long enough for Peter to size her up. "Do you enjoy a game of questions? I ask you a question, and you answer. The real winner is decided if I happen to like the answer you give me."

In his crouched position, he moved a little closer leaving only a couple feet of space in between them, with Archer grasping her shoulders to hold her upright, but he didn't argue as if he somehow knew better than that. "So what say you, Lass? Did you jump ship from the pirates? Did they tell you to find me?"

"No," she lied. "They kidnapped me. I fell over the railing of the ship this morning." She wrapped Archer's jacket tighter around her freezing form. "I've been looking for you." Her gaze softened a tiny fraction, making his own only harden more. "You–" She trailed off, sucking in a breath and almost imperceptibly shook her head. "You used to know me once."

Her assumption ushered a scoff from him, low and baffled, even more so by her petulant attempt at insisting that she was harmless. It pushed him on the defensive, proving to still be semicautious of her even if she was the one that was sitting below him and in a worse state than even he.

"I'll bet you have." He shoved off from his knees to stand, maintaining that intimidating demeanor quite easily. It wasn't a part of his game, or his facade. It was real. It had been for a long time now.

"But I can't quite see myself forgetting a personality as baffling as yours, but there are some faces that are easy to forget." The words unfolded much more harshly than he likely meant-a mere blunt observation–but still irked by her explanation, by her familiarity and unfamiliarity.

No, he didn't believe her. He couldn't. Peter's eyes narrowed as he looked down at her with painful indifference, cocking a smile, cold and calculated as if his very soul had hardened.

"Do you know the best thing about a bird, Love? When they get wet it's much more difficult for them to fly away."