God it felt good to write this after a three-month long writers' block :P Also, first update of the year. Not bad :PP

P.S. It takes less than two days to perform an autopsy but the time the report gets out differentiates. It can be a few days to, as I've learned, months.

For fic convivence, it was a couple of hours :p

P.P.S Still depressed, slightly more financially stable, still hopeful for the future. I hope you are all the same.

-,-,-,-,-,-,-

16-year-olds had no business walking the streets at night.

Then again, the closest thing to danger in Storybrooke, Maine was when Leroy Miner had too much and sang off-key through the streets.

Pan was disgusted that he knew that. He'd been in the overly quiet town for nearly a month, and had grown uncomfortable there, yet comfortable enough that he had no qualms about walking the streets at night like he would in Scotland.

He exited the Dark Star pharmacy with a playful frown and an Apollo bar in his pocket, unpaid for. Mr. Clark had been too busy sneezing to notice.

With a low hum he unwrapped the candy, breaking one of the corners off and slipping the light chocolate into his mouth. He shoved the rest into his pocket next to the long-handled screwdriver he'd brought with him.

The walk to the convent was short. He could walk across the entire town in less than twenty minutes. Some still and very quiet sleuthing helped him find the head nun's car, the very car the wicked woman had thrown Tink La'Belle into just that afternoon.

Pan didn't know either one of them, nor did he know the blonde stud that had tried to rip the car door off when the nun drove away. But he had seen them around school, even had a class or two with the boy.

What he saw today however revealed all he needed to know about them.

They needed a savior.

First step was to plant the seeds of gratitude in their heads.

He eased carefully towards the car, looking over his shoulder every few seconds as he unraveled the rest of the Apollo bar and broke off one of the symmetric squares.

"Enjoy car trouble bitch." Pan hissed as he unhinged the fuel cap and dropped the sugary squares into the tank one by one. He smirked with each plop of the chocolate into the gas tank. Who said revenge didn't pay?

"What are you doing?"

Pan froze, his mind stilling as his scrapping instincts kicked in. Peter Pan never got caught, not in Scotland, and certainly not in Storybrooke fucking Maine.

The young teen turned slowly. Before him was a young woman, small and mousy in her convent clothes, and judging by the fidgeting of her hands, very nervous to be before him.

Pan dulled his grin. He could use her fear.

"Evening," he greeted, his breath intertwining into the cool night air.

"T-that's Mother Superior's car." The woman said.

"I certainly hope so," Pan chuckled. "Otherwise I'm going to have to get another candy bar." He shoved his hands into his pockets and stepped forward, his blood tingling in anticipation when the young woman curled into herself.

"Please," she gasped. "I don't want any trouble."

Pan shrugged. "That's something we have in common. I plan to finish what I have to here and go home. You can just walk away, and as far as anyone will know, you were never here."

"I…you shouldn't…"

Pan took her moment of conflict to examine her. She had to be only a few years older than Tink, and much less lively than the 17-year-old.

Mother Superior must have already broken her spirit.

"She's hurting someone I know," Pan told her. "She's hurting her the same way she's hurt you," he held up his hand when she began to stutter in retaliation. "I'm simply giving her something to focus on so that she can be free." He watched her eyes wavered and saw what he needed.

Seeds of gratitude.

"You'd like to be free too, wouldn't you? From her?"

That was it. The seeds were planted and fertilized with the hate buried deep in her eyes.

Pan could have easily sent her away. He could have done the act alone and reveled in his own demise.

Yet, when Pan reached into his pocket for his smuggled screwdriver, the handle cool against his heated palm. This time when he approached the young nun, she didn't flinched.

He reached down and took hold of her dainty, clammy hand.

He hadn't had such contact with a person in so long.

He unclenched her fingers and wrapped them around the handle, his eyes never leaving her confused, heated gaze.

"I…what are you—"

"Help me." He suggested. Peter Pan didn't need help, but he needed followers.

In this young woman he could have his first one.

The seeds were planted.

"I…I can't—"

"Yes you can." Pan stated forcefully, leading her up to the car. "What's your name?"

The young woman swallowed, not knowing that once Peter Pan had her identity, he had her all.

"A-Astrid."

"Astrid," Pan chuckled. It was such a strong name for such a timid woman. "Astrid, I want you to take this," he emphasized by tightening his grip on her clasped hands. "And rip her tires a part."

"No." Astrid hesitated. Pan was losing his grip.

"Yes." Pan said firmly. "She'll never stop unless we put a sense of fear in her."

"But…it's a sin—"

"It's retribution." Pan snarled, his heart racing. Adrenaline was his greatest foe and best friend. "I can see it in your eyes. Every humiliation, every moment she made you question yourself."

There was something else there, of course. Past the pain and the temperate hate was a gentle flutter of devotion, of love.

"She's keeping you from someone, isn't she?"

He didn't need for her responsed; it was obvious that there was romance somewhere in the crestfallen woman's life, same as there was in Tink's.

"Why not make her pay for it?"

Astrid blinked, so conflicted, so wanting to do the right thing, to turn away.

But it was too late for any of that. A single moment in Pan's presence and she was already tarnished.

"I'll start." Pan winked, pulling out his house key (Gold was going to be pissed). In a swoop he plunged the key into the aged paint and created a screaming line.

Astrid watched, flinching at the sound.

Pan howled with laughter when the key slipped, a deep silver scar in his wake, the first of his night-long abuse. He turned to the stunned woman, the screwdriver still clutched in her shaking fingers. She needed a release, a way to make Mother Superior pay for the pain she had afflicted onto her, on to all of her sisters inside the convent.

Perhaps this would solve nothing, and would only succeed in buying her and Tink a day, or even just a couple of hours, of peace.

Pan didn't care either way. This was just a small tiptoe onto his path for dominance.

And now, he had his first follower.

"Your turn."

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Wendy awoke in terror when she heard someone jimmying her apartment lock. It had been so quiet last night that she was certain that her days of being terrified in her new home were over.

Now however, it would seem that the demons that had followed her from her misadventures were literally trying to break back in.

Wendy rolled off her couch and made a quick getaway to the connected kitchen, chastising herself on such an idea as sleep left her.

"Demons don't exist, but robbers certainly do!" she scowled as she armed herself with a skillet. Whoever was about to come through her front door was alive and well and fixing to get a well-sized knot on their head for breaking into her flat!

The lock clicked and the door opened quickly, a hand reaching in to turn on the light. Wendy was momentarily blinded and held her breath so that she could hear the intruder coming in.

"Morning." The intruder greeted, and Wendy's hair immediately stood on end.

"Pan!" she shrieked, blinking rapidly. "What the hell are you doing in my apartment? It's 2 a.m.!"

"Oh you know, visiting, checking everyone's water pressure," he closed the door with his heel. "Nice underwear by the way."

Wendy's cheeks lit in flame and she made a dash to her bedroom for proper clothing, having stripped down sometime around midnight without care of pajamas.

She glared at his smirk when she reentered.

"Guess now we're even." He winked, and Wendy flinched at his audacity and the memory of finding him post-coital yesterday morning.

How could he be so peppy after all the devastation he had caused?

"Get out." She growled.

"Look," he laughed. "I came to—"

"I don't care why you're here!" she screamed so loud she was certain her neighbors could here. "I want you to get the fuck out!"

"Wendy—"

"You're a sociopath!" Wendy continued. "You have no soul, no sense of humanity in the least! You don't care about the life you've just ruined despite how it's the life of your friend!"

Pan's stare was hard as diamonds, inshatterable. Once again Wendy couldn't tell what he was thinking, let alone feeling. Except for the anger. She could always tell now when he was angry. He'd stare ahead, his lips pressed in a shapeless pink line, his hands clenching something, restraining.

She acted the same way.

"You done?" he inquired chastely.

"With you." She retorted, stalking around him to the door. Before she could reach for the knob Pan took hold of her wrist.

"Listen to me." He ordered. He didn't have time for niceties.

"Let go!" Wendy fought, clawing at his hand.

He grabbed her arm, pinned it to her side and forced her back. Her leg came up and caught him on his thigh, narrowly missing his groin. He managed to restrain her swaying arms before pinning her to the door.

"I'm trying to help you!"

"Go to hell!" Wendy screamed as she stopped struggling and dug her nails into his wrists. "You are the last person I need anything from! You should be worried about yourself!"

"I always am." He hissed, pressing into her shoulder until she stilled.

"Get off me!"

"Five minutes." He demanded (because Peter Pan did not beg for anything—even when he was reaching a dangerously high level of desperation).

Wendy pushed him back, sending him stumbling into the arm of her chair. She rubbed her hands over her bathrobe and face, feeling shaky.

"Don't you ever do that again." She croaked, clutching her robe tightly.

Pan could have apologized. In fact he had the natural decency to want to. Yet there were more pressing matters.

He was in charge. He was feared. And when Wendy made no threat to kick him out again, he jumped in.

"I just got word from Lily," Pan explained quickly. "Mother Superior's death may have not been a suicide."

Wendy blinked, the information sinking into the knot of guilt buried in her chest.

"How do they know?"

"Time stamp doesn't match up. She died just after you left her and before the paper was printed."

Wendy felt the guilt that had been resting inside her shrink into a wee flaming dot that may never die out.

"How exactly did she…"

"Die? Croak? Expire? It's not that hard to say." Pan snorted, climbing over the arm into the seat, crossing his legs and placing unceremoniously on the coffee table. "Don't be so damn prudent."

Wendy stalked over and slapped his legs off her furniture.

"If you want anything, you need to give me straight answers!" Wendy shouted. "What happened to her!"

"Keep it down." Pan hissed. "Last thing I need is your nosy neighbors waking up and ease dropping. Or god forbid—"

"Pan!"

"The coroner's labeling it an overdose with suspicion of foul play."

Wendy gasped. "Suspicion? They don't know?"

"Tink and some of the nun's are vouching for her immortal innocence," Pan said with a roll of his eyes. "With that, all the evidence is pointing to foul play."

"Foul play from who?" Wendy pondered.

Pan gave her a knowing look, watching as she paled in realization.

"They think it was me."

Pan snorted, though the humor didn't quite meet his eyes.

"You were the last person to see her alive." Pan explained with a humorless shrug.

Wendy paused, Pan's words slowly singing through as an intense wave of fear and anger washed over her.

Pan sighed and stood. "Look, I know a way out of this…" he paused when Wendy advanced towards him, her stance as limber as a prowling lioness.

"They're after me even though you caused all of this in the first place!" Wendy yelled, pushing him away. "You took something that could have helped two people and you crushed it to dust!" she hastily wiped her eyes. "Now a woman is dead and the other…" Wendy stepped away, mourning her lost friendship.

Pan growled irritably. Of course she would bring that up.

"I didn't come here to discuss the theory of cause and effect, I came here to get your assistance."

"What could you possibly want my help with?"

"Assistance." He specified with a hiss. "I don't need help from anyone. Ever."

"Oh whatever." Wendy scoffed. "Get on with it."

"We can find out what happened, who killed her, and stop this from getting any more out of hand."

"Feeling repentant, Pan." Wendy sneered.

Pan curled his hands to his side.

"I regret nothing because she got what she deserved."

"Did Tink?" Wendy snarled. "Did she deserve to have her life obliterated."

Pan rolled his eyes, turning back to the door so that Wendy couldn't see the destress in his features.

"She deserved to know the truth, and the truth hurts more often than naught."

Wendy blinked away tears. They would be lost on the heartless man before her.

She felt like she was caught in a never-ending twister. She just kept circling into nothingness while the world around her was picked up and destroyed right at her feet.

Pan was that storm—uncaring of the damage around him. And for whatever reason, he chose to suck her in the middle of it all.

The young journalist sighed, the silence helping her think, helping her decide what she wanted to do.

She could go with Pan now and follow his lead, solve this thing and work on earning the town—and more importantly Tink's—respect back.

Or she could turn herself in now until the investigation ended. Her family had a good lawyer in London. It would mean the end of her career in Storybrooke or in general, but it would be a small price to pay for all of this to stop.

She stepped up to Pan, her decision resting on her tongue.

She wondered briefly just how and when he got so cynical, and wondered if she would become the same if she continued to follow him down the dark road.

He turned to face her, his indifferent mask back in place, his eyebrow arched as he awaited her response.

With his eyes on her it was hard just to let him go. She recalled their more gruesome adventures and how—somehow, even when Death had their names carved in stone—they somehow made it out okay.

They somehow—even know with blood soaking unjustified on her hands—had somehow built up a strange sort of respect with one another.

He was the storm, and if he was going to suck her up in it, she was going to find the eye.

"Just what did you have in mind?"

-,-,-,-,-,-,-,-

Dr. Whale considered himself a decent doctor. He dealt with his patients swiftly, turned paperwork in on time, and drank only when things were quiet.

And usually in Storybrooke, it's devastatingly quiet. Thus, the doctor did a lot of drinking.

However, due to rules and regulations, he had to sneak his flasks in secret.

The very, very, few people who knew of this very illegal and very unorthodox on-the-job activity knew that, should an emergency occurred in the middle of the night, Dr. Whale could be found in the depths of the morgue.

(On the east wing of the hospital, not the west where the old one was now covered in police tape. Once upon a time the former mayor thought it would be more beneficial to build a new one than to repair the one that was already there.)

The doctor was almost done with his nightly flask of scotch when the back door suddenly beeped and unlocked from the outside.

It didn't make sense. Only he and the morgue assistant (who had gone home hours ago) had the key card.

Well, there was one other person…

"Good, you're here." Pan deadpanned as he rushed through the door, someone else just behind him.

"Pan what…" he paused when the person behind Pan removed their hood. He knew she was Wendy Darling, of course. He had treated her in this very hospital enough times to recognize her.

Dr. Whale avoided small-town gossip as much as he could, but he knew good and well the circumstances surrounding this particular instance.

"You two need to turn right around and go home." He warned them.

"How authoritarian." Pan mocked.

"Pan." Wendy whispered as a warning, her eyes darting around nervously in the familiar but much brighter morgue.

Whale considered calling security, but the smell of alcohol on his own breath kept him from grabbing the phone off the wall.

Pan waived Wendy off, making a beeline to the filing cabinet where Mother Superior's autopsy would be.

"Get away from there, Pan!" Whale yelled.

"Why?" Pan mused as he opened the cabinet and began searching its contents. "I do this all the time."

"Things are different right now!" Whale fought, coming up behind Pan and slamming the cabinet shut. "There's a murder investigation going on and she," he pointed at Wendy. "Is the main suspect as of three hours ago."

"She didn't do it, and you idiots know that." Pan fought, trying to pull the cabinet open.

Whale slapped his hand away, and Pan sized him up when he stepped too close.

Wendy stepped behind them, fearful about the exchange that was unfolding before her.

"Acting frisky tonight Vic," Pan smirked. "Drinking on the job?"

"I feel like keeping my job." Whale growled. "I've put up with you for a long time. Broken the law, hid your dirty little secrets, all just to keep you out of my hair—"

"And you can keep me in it just a little bit more." Pan growled, snatching the handle of the cabinet from Whale's grip.

"For christ's sake Pan!" Whale hollered as he rumpled through files.

The disturbed doctor glanced at Wendy who did her best to look inconspicuous. She could see the inside of a jail cell now—and more terrifyingly she could see Pan beside her in the vision.

She looked around the clean morgue, her stomach turning when she saw her own distorted face looking back at her.

Cruella. Jekyll. Mother Superior.

She looked away, willing away the fierce snarls of her former foes. She looked up to see her a worn, sunken face staring at her in the equally reflective morgue drawers. It numbed her to the core when she quickly recognized it as her.

A loud crack broke Wendy from her musing and nearly from her skeleton. She shot around, expecting to see Graham or some other conundrum awaiting. Instead she found Pan holding a slightly dented tool tray and an unconscious Dr. Whale moaning weakly at his feet.

"Don't know why I didn't do that as soon as I walked in." Pan muttered as he threw the tray aside.

Wendy could have easily exploded at what he had just done, could have chastised him and have him shoot her down as he usually did.

But things were different now. He didn't quite faze her anymore.

"Is he alright?" she asked instead.

"He will be." Pan smirked, pulling the doctor out of the way so that he could better access the filing cabinet. "If we're lucky, he'll count the lump on his head and our visit as a bad hangover."

"I doubt it." Wendy muttered, stepping to Pan's side after sparing the doctor a concerned glance.

Pan found Mother Superior's file quickly and with a swift turn he had it spread out on the autopsy table.

"Alright, timeline time." Pan announced as he spread out the papers.

"What time does the autopsy say she died?" Wendy questioned as she reached for the toxicology report.

"Looks like it was between 10 p.m. and 4 a.m.." Pan mused.

"We were there around 11," Wendy added, the wheels in her mind slowly beginning to turn. "Cause of death?"

"Overdose," Pan confirmed, licking his lips. "Vitacin."

Wendy threw her hands in the air. "That's fine! It was probably an accident or even—"

"It wasn't suicide." Pan declared, pushing the autopsy report to Wendy. "Tink gave an air-tight testimony."

Wendy read over the hand-written statement and her heart sank to the pit of her stomach.

It is my opinion as one of Mother Superior's life-long charges that she did not commit suicide. Accidental dosage or foul play are possible contributes to her death in my opinion.

-Tink La'Bell

The handwriting before her was sloppy, hardly the well-balanced penmanship Wendy had come to expect by the devil-may-care Tink.

She had been in great pain when she wrote this, her hand probably shaking from the grief of it all.

It was also the word choice that made Wendy's mind begin to go into overdrive. Accidental dosage. Or foul play. The grieving woman was looking for someone to blame, yet she wasn't willing to point fingers. She could have easily written, "Wendy Darling did it kill her arse!"

But she hadn't, and Wendy wasn't sure to feel grateful or terrified.

Pan watched the emotions swirl on Wendy's face. Disbelief, inquiry, and hurt, all mixed together.

They didn't have time to deal with her heartbreak.

He didn't have time to deal with it.

"Graham's still going over the crime scene, trying to find evidence that someone else was there." Pan explained, snatching the file from her to bring her back. "Did you see anyone else?"

Wendy glared at him, not appreciating his hastiness. "No, just me."

"What about the first time?" he pressed. "Did you see anyone in her office?"

"No," Wendy sighed. "It was just her, there was no one…"

Pan watched her when she suddenly paused.

"What is it? What!"

Wendy recalled the nun who escorted her in. The lean, mousy young woman who looked at her with pity as she entered Mother Superior's office.

The harder she tried to remember her, the blurrier she became.

"There was…but that couldn't…that was nothing."

"Who?" Pan questioned.

"The nun that led me to her office." Wendy answered. "I cut to the chase as soon as the door closed. Maybe she heard something and…"

Pan smirked. He knew nuns were bored enough during the mundane lives that they would eavesdrop on anything. Whatever she heard Mother Superior and Wendy talk about would be perfect blackmail material.

They may have just found their murderer.

"What did she look like?"

"Like…a nun." Wendy shrugged. She hadn't exactly had time to shake hands and get to know everyone in town.

Pan rolled his eyes. "Hell Wendy, hair coloring, freckles, what!"

"Burnett, about my height, maybe a little bit older than Tink."

Pan blinked as a certain, very distinct nun came to his mind.

Wendy noticed the change in his demeanor, noticed the very rare glimmer of concern in his eyes. This person meant something to Pan, truly meant something to him.

"I saw her leave when I went back to the convent." Wendy added. "I don't think it was her, but she's the only other person I saw. It's probably nothing—"

"It's never nothing. It's always something."

"Pan, we could have the police coming this way right now, we don't have time for riddles!"

"Just…shut up and follow me!" he demanded, grabbing her arm.

Wendy faulted his dragging and turned back to the unconscious doctor. "What about him?"

"He's taken worse falls let's go!"

Wendy dug her feet into the ground, taking hold of his arm to keep him in place. His heated glare was softened only by her wide-eyed desperation.

"Pan, tell me."

Pan stared down at her hand, nails clenched deep into the green material of his jacket, holding him in place and demanding he stay. He smothered a smirk, her dominance stilling the adrenaline coursing through his brain.

"Who is she?" Wendy demanded smoothly.

Pan let the answer balance on the tip of his tongue. If he told her, he would just be revealing another heap of filth to her, let her become just a bit more corrupted.

How long, he wondered, until she was as filthy as him?

Would telling her keep her close to him or push him further away?

"Her name is Astrid," he revealed with a careless shrug, though his heart was about to break through his ribcage. "She's a few years older than Tink and just as abused."

"And?" Wendy pressed expectedly. Pan's stories never ended so jaggedly.

"And I…showed her once that she didn't have to take it," Pan nodded, ever a vigilantly in his own mind. "If we're lucky, that advice would be enough to end all of this."

Wendy shot back, leaving Pan just a bit less grounded without her angry restraint.

"Lucky!" she exclaimed. "Pan, a woman is dead and if your theory is right, another is a murderer!"

"You're off the hook—"

"I don't care!" Wendy screamed so loud the metal drawers shook. "I don't want anyone to take the fall for me! To have their life ruined! I just want…"

"What Wendy?" Pan sneered. "What could you possibly want?"

"For it to be over! For it to never have happened! For you not to be a complete bastard for once!"

Pan burst into laughter.

"Well guess what, darling," he gasped. "It's not over. It happened. And…well, I am who I am."

He leaned forward until the tip of their noses just barely touched.

"Get used to it."

Wendy stormed out of the morgue without a response, just the light cry echoing in the empty room.

Pan's smirk faded as soon as she was gone. His mind was buzzing too much for him to feel guilt, or desire, or other crappy thoughts that would allow him to slow down and just talk to her like he knew—deep down—he should have.

Now, he had to get to Astrid. Had to find out the truth of Mother Superior's death before it was too late.

After all, he couldn't afford to lose anyone else.

He securely tucked Mother Superior's autopsy report back into the filing cabinet, sparing a frown at Whale's unconscious form, and stepped out of the morgue.

"Wendy," he spoke, ignoring the way her shoulders tensed when he did. "We have to go."

I'm sorry.