Chapter 3
Hook jerked awake, Peter's agonized cry still ringing in his mind. He sat up quickly and collapsed again at the jarring pain in his head. A child's chuckle reached his ears, and he turned to see Peter hovering by the window, his dim glow providing the only illumination in the room. Hook gave a disappointed grunt and turned his head away, trying to pretend the boy wasn't there.
Peter sighed and turned to look back out the window. "I never understood how much you hated me, Captain. Even now, you hate me so much."
I don't hate you, he thought to himself. He wanted to say it aloud, to give the boy some kind of reassurance, but the words caught in his throat. He didn't want to encourage the shade to speak. Any words Peter spoke would only drive the thorn of guilt further into his heart, and drive him further into madness.
"Smee left you another bottle. He tried to speak to me, but he couldn't see or hear me. I'm glad they don't see me anymore, but it gets so lonely with only you to talk to. I wish if you were going to keep me here, you'd at least play with me and stop making me hide."
Hook sat back up at hearing he had a new bottle, and saw that it indeed sat on the small table by his bed. Smee understood, they all understood how terrible it was to see the wan, one handed ghost and to hear his sad voice. But the choice it seemed was either to drink himself to death or to endure the boy until it drove him to insanity. Taking up the bottle, Hook took a long pull off of it, sighing as the ache in his head began to subside. He stared at the ghost, watching as the boy looked out the window. Finally he could stand it no longer and asked, "What do you see when you stare at the horizon? You do it all the time."
"I see home," Peter replied. "And I want to go there, where those who love me wait, but you bind me here and all I can do is to see it from afar."
Hook looked at the pouch on the desk. He knew the sight of it pained Peter, and thought that it was the reason the boy haunted him. He'd tried to rid himself of it twice – once by incinerating it and once by throwing it overboard. But both times he'd been unable to go through with it. He'd nearly been unable to continue before when he'd finally realized that Peter was gone forever, when he'd left Neverland behind and realized that no longer would he hear the boy's laughter, never again cross blades or fall victim to his childish pranks. It hurt him to keep the boy's ghost here, but he couldn't dispose of the hand… it would be like murdering Peter all over again. I'm damned and I deserve it. I deserve it because even now, I'm too proud and selfish to let the boy go.
"Don't worry, Pan," he said, then took another pull on the bottle. "I'm not long for this world myself, and once I'm gone you will be free. You said so yourself that if I died then I couldn't keep you here."
Peter shook his head and began to fade. "Please, Captain, let me go. You must, before you die."
"Why?" Hook snapped, "Why won't you just explain it to me?"
Peter disappeared completely, but a final whisper reached his ears. "I can't. I don't understand it; I just feel that you must."
Hook growled and drank until the familiar drowsiness took hold of him. He lay back down then, closing his eyes and letting himself fall back into sleep. As he drifted off, he thought he heard the boy's voice whispering in his ear: "Remember."
Hook stared in confusion at his sword, not quite understanding why Peter's arm seemed to pass through the blade. Then the hand was pulled away from the steel as Mullins lost his balance, and Hook perceived the blood that covered the arm and the hand, pouring out of the flesh to pool on the deck. Then Peter screamed, pulling his suddenly free arm away and staring at the bloody stump in horror.
He didn't get away… he didn't escape. I got him at last! I cut off his hand… Hook jerked out of his stupor, the urgency of the situation sinking in. His men were all staring, stunned, while Peter lay on the deck, his life draining away. "Starkey, Smee! Help him!" he yelled as he went for the boy himself, lifting the child up.
Peter's skin had gone deathly pale and was alarmingly cool to the touch. His screams abruptly stopped, and he stared straight ahead without seeing, breathing shallowly. His mind was shutting down, blocking away the pain and most thought, putting him into a state of basic survival. His pulse fluttered in his veins as his heart faltered, losing the blood supply it needed to continue. But continue it did, fighting for life. Starkey was the first of the crew to recover and rushed to the boy. Smee followed a heartbeat behind. Hook held the boy while the two men tended to his injury, muttering at them to hurry up and staunch the bleeding. Peter was in shock, and if they didn't help him soon he would die in his arms.
"Jukes, bring the iron," Smee called, snapping the gunner back to his senses. Billy jumped, then grabbed the handle to the hot iron and pulled it free. "Put it to the wound, lad," Smee instructed, his voice calm but insistent. "We gots th' bleedin' mostly stopped, now ya have to cauterize it."
Billy paused a moment, afraid. But then he looked at Peter, recognizing the child's dire situation. Hook hadn't looked this bad when he'd lost his own hand, but Hook's body was stronger than Peter's. Billy had done this for his captain, he could do it now for Pan. Steeling himself, he thrust the red-hot metal against the bleeding flesh.
Peter screamed once more as the pain returned, cutting through the cocoon his mind had spun around itself. He went rigid in Hook's arms, trying to pull his hurt arm away from the men, away from the agonizing burning. Then, mercifully, he passed out and was unaware of anything else.
"Mason, stoke up the kitchen fire," Hook ordered. "We have to get him warm." He would have made Cookson do it, but the cook was busily untying Wendy, who had fainted when Hook had made his cruel cut. When Smee nodded, indicating he'd done what he could for now, Hook cradled the boy to his chest and carried him to the kitchen.
They laid him on the table and propped his legs up to help the blood flow to his vitals. Peter was cold and his pulse was so faint that at first they thought he'd died. But the bleeding was stopped, and if he could recover from the shock then he might survive. Hook stood to the side and allowed Smee and Starkey to continue their ministrations on the boy. As he watched he remembered a time long ago, when it had been himself lying on the table with Smee and Starkey tending to his amputated hand. Pieces of that horrible day replayed themselves as the men's actions now mirrored what they'd done for him then. And once more he felt his hate for the boy surge to the forefront. "I got you, Pan," he whispered. "I've claimed from you what you took from me. And I'll show you the mercy you wouldn't show me by ensuring you'll recover."
Hours later, Hook sat in his room. He took a sip of wine as he listened to Smee speak to the unconscious boy. Smee kept telling Peter that he'd be fine now, that the worst was over and that all he had to do now was rest. Once again, Hook was struck with the memory of the bosun saying exactly those same things to him. Peter lay in Hook's own bed, his legs and injured arm propped up on pillows. His bloody clothes lay in a pile by the bed, the blankets piled high on his naked body to trap in the meager heat he could make on his own.
"I doubt the boy can hear you, Smee," Hook said quietly, not wishing to disturb the child's rest by yelling.
"Ye never know, Cap'n," Smee replied, "T'were many times I spoke with ya, not thinkin' ya could hear me. Yet ya remember more o' that time than I thought ya would." He double checked the bandage on Peter's arm, shaking his head. "The lad lost too much blood, too fast." He turned to his captain. "I dinna think ya were gonna do it fer real, Cap'n, else I'd have put a tourniquet on the lad's arm before ya cut."
I didn't think I'd do it either… I thought for sure he'd escape once more, more fearful of me this time but alive. "I wasn't planning on doing it so soon, Smee," he said instead, "I was going to terrify the brat more first, perhaps wait for the Croc to come so I could tempt her with a morsel of Pan. I lost my temper and made the cut when I wasn't ready."
There was a knock at the door, and at Hook's call Jukes entered. "Cap'n," he said lowly, not looking across the room to see Peter. "Miss Wendy is awake again, but she's in hysterics. She demands to see Pan, or to at least know how he's doing. Starkey's sitting with her, but she won't calm down."
Hook grimaced and sighed. He'd forgotten about Wendy. "Tell her he lives and that his bleeding has stopped. If she won't calm, have Starkey give her some rum. I want her kept under lock and key, but make sure she's comfortable. I'll let her see the boy when he's gotten some of his color back." Hook looked to Peter and frowned. Smee was right, the boy had lost a lot of blood in a very short amount of time. He looked like death warmed over, and if it weren't for the gentle rise and fall of the blankets, he could easily believe the child was truly dead. "Wendy's suffered enough horror as it is. I want her calm when she comes to see her friend."