Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to Peter Pan, Captain Hook, or any of Mr. Barry's other wonderful characters. I write about them solely for my own amusement, and make no profit from it except that which I receive from knowing my writing has been enjoyed by others.

Author's notes: Many thanks to Ten-chan, who read it first, Laura-chan, who was with me in the theater the night Sophia first appeared to me, and Rei-chan, for putting up with me while I was writing this and trying to figure out what to call it.

Chapter 1

A Must Unusual Lost One

This tale begins with a first meeting between the most unlikely of people in the most unlikely of places. Neverland was deep in twilight, a time of day that seemed to stretch longer on the enchanted island than it did anywhere real, thus giving mischievous boys more time to slink about in the shadows before complete darkness fell, and preserving the picturesque silhouettes of teepees, pirate ships, and secret hideout trees for just a little while longer. Ponyface Ned, a pirate with fewer years service on the Jolly Roger than most, cut his way through the dense undergrowth of the forest, swinging his sword with short, jerky slashes. Ponyface was out hunting Lost Boys, but he would have settled for finding a Pixie nest, or even two or three Indians he could capture and hold for ransom. He had to try and catch someone, it was simply what the Neverland pirates did – engage in an endless cycle of chasing and ransoming and carousing So, Ponyface saw no harm in hoping he'd be able to lay hands on a Lost Boy. The Captain had given his crew leave to try and catch the annoying little creatures whenever possible, as long as they didn't lay a hand on the urchins' leader, Peter Pan. The honor of catching that one the Captain wanted for himself.

Upon coming to a break in the forest, Ned stopped, sword raised for another cut. Across the clearing, he could very distinctly make out the form of a person standing beneath a tree with broad, low hanging branches. He began to run across the clearing. At the sound of his approach—he was making an awful racket, stepping on every dry twig he came across—the person's head snapped up and turned in Ned's direction. He'd been too loud. His quarry was going to try to run now, Ned knew it, and he would have to chase them half the night in order to satisfy his pride and slink back to the Jolly Roger with a good story to tell his mates. But the person standing beneath the tree did not run, and Ned nearly ran into the one he'd been intending to chase before realizing that no chasing would be necessary.

The person he had found was too tall to be a Lost Boy. After regaining his balance, Ned realized that his person was a woman. A grownup. As far as he knew, the only grownups on the island were pirates and Indians, and she was far too neat to be a pirate. He didn't see any feathers or paint, either, so she wasn't an Indian.

"Who are you?" he asked. She blinked owlishly at him from behind the glasses that balanced on the ridge of her nose. "What are you doing here?"

She seemed more inclined to answer the second question.

"I… seem to be lost," she said.

Ned was too distracted to notice she hadn't introduced herself. He hadn't seen a grown up woman, or even a girl, for so long that he couldn't remember how to act around one. Something was definitely wrong with the order of things in Neverland. That much he knew.

"The Captain," Ned muttered. "The Captain will know what to do." He held out a grimy hand. "Come on, let's go."

She put her hand in his and let herself be pulled along.

"Are you a pirate?" she asked as they retraced Ned's earlier steps.

"Of course I am! And you'd best not forget it!" he warned her. She nodded. She looked curious, and not afraid at all.

"How very interesting," she murmured.

-----

Captain James Hook was very well aware that Smee was agitated. The little man was nearly dancing with anxiety. For the moment, Captain Hook chose to ignore his first mate, and continued to adjust various pieces of his clothing with the help of the mirror that graced the wall of his cabin. A slight change in the angle of his hat to show off its white feather to more advantage, the folding down of a piece of braid that had gotten out of place so it lay smoothly against the green velvet of his coat—every little action was carefully calculated to give him time to think. In his experience, an anxious Smee meant that something out of the ordinary had happened, probably something unpleasant. What mischief had Pan gotten up to this time?

"I… I think you might want to see this, Cap'n," Smee stammered finally. "We've got… somewhat of an extraordinary guest."

"A guest?" the Captain asked, turning from the mirror. Those who came onboard the Jolly Roger were either crew members or prisoners. There were no guests.

"A new arrival to Neverland, and one like I've never heard of before," Smee said. Hook's eyes narrowed. The way his first mate was falling all over himself, one would have thought that royalty was waiting outside of his door. Well, odder things have happened… The thought of a person of importance cooling his or her heels outside of his door made the Captain's eyes narrow in displeasure. If this was a new ally, he had a good impression to make.

"Don't just stand there! Send them in! Are you daft? How long have they been waiting?" Hook demanded.

"Not long, Captain. It'll be just a minute, Captain," Smee said, and scurried out of the room. Hook checked his appearance in the mirror one last time before the door to his cabin swung open. Hook's expectations of a person in finery were quickly turned on their head.

The woman who was peering curiously at him and his cabin was short, and thin almost to the point of being gaunt. She wore a long, plain black skirt that touched the floor, a white shirt with a high collar, and an oversized grey wool sweater with large wooden buttons that she held closed with a ferocity more suited to a winter storm than a fire-warmed cabin. Her brown hair had been braided, then twisted into a bun and pinned to the back of her head. However, several sections had come loose and were hanging haphazardly around her face. Hazel eyes studied him from behind a pair of wire rimmed spectacles.

"You're the Captain, then?" she asked. Her raised eyebrows managed to convey a disarming mixture of curiosity and concern.

"Yes, yes I am. Captain James Hook, at your service, madam," he said. He bowed with a flourish, and the silver of the hook that replaced his right hand caught the sunlight let in through the window. Her reaction was nearly invisible. A slight narrowing of the eyes, and a quick nod as she filed away another interesting piece of information about the strange world she found herself in.

"And, you are…" the Captain prompted after a long silence. The woman blinked a couple of times then smiled sheepishly.

"Sophia. My name is Sophia," she said. It sounded as if she were trying to remind herself of the fact as much as tell anyone else.

"Would you like to sit down?" he asked cautiously. She looked to be easily startled, and he still wasn't quite sure she was friendly.

"I would, thank you," she answered, and sat primly on the edge of the chair he used for reading, hands folded perfectly in her lap. "Do you think," she asked after a moment, "you could tell me where I am?"

"You don't know?" Captain Hook asked. "You, my dear, are in Neverland."

"Not London, then," she murmured, and frowned.

"I'm afraid not." Reaching for a crystal goblet from the cabinet, he poured her a glass of the wine he had been planning on having with lunch. She watched his every move, took the wine from him, and sipped it. A seemingly disturbing thought occurred to her as she drank, and she lowered the glass slowly. "Would you mind telling me what year it is, Captain?"

"I don't know." He laughed. "There are no years here in Neverland."

This seemed to disconcert her even more. "Oh dear. Well, that's a bother. I was thinking that perhaps I had traveled to a different time, but since there is no time here, I don't see how I could find out if that was indeed the case." She sighed, then smiled at him, her eyes unconcerned behind her spectacles. "I appear to be lost."

"We all are, here, so you needn't be concerned," the Captain said.

"So… everyone in this Neverland place is lost? Imagine that… entire cities full of lost people. How very confusing that must be…" she murmured to herself.

"There are no cities, either," he said. The startled look on her face amused him, and he found himself taking great pleasure in slowly revealing the truth of her surroundings to her.

"No cities?"

"None," he assured her.

"Are there towns?"

"None of those, either. There simply aren't enough grown-ups to build them, you see."

Her eyebrows drew together in thought again. "May I take it," she said, "that there are quite a few children, then?" She caught him smiling at her confusion and pursed her lips. "And my I ask why you're staring at me like that?"

"I'm staring at you precisely because Neverland is mostly populated by children. You, my dear, are the first grown woman I've seen in…" he tried to remember, and couldn't. "In a very long time," he finished.

"Oh…" Sophia said, and blushed at the unwanted attention. She took another sip of wine. "This is all very odd and confusing."

Captain Hook considered the woman sitting in his chair for a moment before coming to a decision. As harmless as she may have seemed, she was still an unknown element, and he wanted to have her where he could keep an eye on her.

"It's obviously been a trying day for you," he said. "I hope you won't find me too bold if I offer you a room on this ship. You're welcome to stay on the Jolly Roger while you try to figure out how you got here. I don't suppose you'd make a very good pirate, but as a gentleman, I don't see how I could fail to help a lady in need."

"Me? Stay here? On the pirate ship?" Sophia asked.

"There aren't very many other places for you to go, Miss. I doubt you'd find the children very amiable. Though, there are some Indians. You can see the smoke there, coming up from their village. You could ask them to take you in, if you'd like," he said.

"Oh, no! This ship is more than satisfactory! I would be happy to accept your offer," she said.

Hook ran his hands along the wall until he found the correct spots, and pushed. The wall slid apart, revealing a narrow hidden passageway. If Sophia found that the ship's guest rooms were reached by a hidden corridor connected to the Captain's cabin, she didn't let it show.

"Our best passenger quarters are through here," he said, gesturing at the hallway and allowing her to walk before him. Up until now, he had always wondered why on earth he'd bothered keeping passenger quarters at all. Of course, it was now perfectly obvious. He'd done it because one always needed to be prepared for the unexpected, in Neverland more than anywhere else.