A/N: Hello, everyone! I'm here with another chapter, so hopefully you all enjoy it. But I'd also like to thank Doctor John Smith for your review. Your kind words made me smile, and I'm super happy that you've been having fun with the story and that you think I've captured the spirit of both films so well. I hope you continue to enjoy the story. I'd say, after this chapter, we're about 2/3 of the way through the story.
In the savannah of Neverland, two sets of twins were set on a journey through the tall, golden grass. There was Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum, twin brothers from Wonderland, and there was Meep and Jeep, the twin Lost Boys dressed as raccoons.
"My, my, what a beautiful sight!" Tweedle Dee said.
"Aye! Grasslands as far as the eye can see!" Dum said.
"Huh? How did we end up here?" Meep said.
"I thought we were walking back toward the hideout," Jeep said.
"Me too," Meep said. "I guess we got lost."
"You can never get lost if you make everywhere your destination," Tweedle Dum said.
"Contrariwise, you'll always be lost if you make nowhere your destination," Dee said.
"That's logic," the Tweedles said in unison.
"Huh? That doesn't make sense," Meep and Jeep said.
The Lost Boy Twins looked around the savannah, surveying their surroundings. "Now, which way do we go to get back to the hideout?" Jeep said.
"Umm… I have no idea," Meep said.
Jeep pointed at the Tweedles and said, "It's all your guys' fault that we're lost out here!"
Meep said, "Yeah, you took us with you and got us lost in the jungle."
Both Meep and Jeep said, "Now we're out here, even farther away from home."
"We're sorry," the Tweedles whimpered, wringing their hats in their hands.
"We didn't mean to cause you trouble," Dee said.
"We only wanted to have fun with another pair of twins," Dum said.
"We don't see many other twins where we come from," both Tweedles said.
Meep and Jeep looked at each other. "Oh," they said. "We didn't know you wanted to have fun with us," Jeep said. "We like having fun, too," Meep said.
The Tweedles perked up. "So then you'll play a game with us?" they said.
"Sure!" the Lost Boy Twins said.
"Great!" the Tweedles exclaimed. "Would you like to play hide-and-seek? Or 'button, button, who's got the button?'"
"Hmm," Meep and Jeep said. Then they spotted some animals in the distance. "We know! Let's go animal riding!" they said.
"You mean like horses?" Dee said.
"Or donkeys?" Dum said.
"Nope! Even better!" Meep and Jeep said. "Follow us."
The two sets of twins quietly crept through the tall grass of the savannah, sneaking up behind the various animals eating the grass.
"Now!" Meep said, and he quickly wrestled his way onto the back of a zebra. Jeep managed to get on an ostrich. "Weee!" they cheered, riding on their animals. "Now you do it," Jeep said to the Tweedles.
Tweedle Dee climbed onto a giraffe, and Tweedle Dum got on the back of a rhino. "Oh, what fun this is!" Dum said, hanging on to the running rhino.
"Told ya!" the twin Lost Boys said. "Let's do a race," Jeep said. "First one to that tree over there wins," Meep said, pointing to a tree in the far distance.
The four racers tried the best they could to steer their animals toward the tree, but they all faced difficulties. Jeep fell off his ostrich, so he had to chase it down to get back on again.
Tweedle Dee was sitting on top of the giraffe's head, but he lost balance and fell down the long neck and onto the ground. He tried getting back up, but it was very troublesome trying to climb up those long legs when they were on the run.
The rhino Tweedle Dum was riding on started bucking like a bull, so Dum had to hang on with all his strength, and the rhino was too stubborn to move in the direction Dum wanted it to.
The zebra Meep was riding on flat-out refused to go any further and sat down on its haunches. Meep had to get off the zebra and slap it on its rump to get it going again, but he didn't have time to get on its back, so he grabbed its tail, and he got dragged for the rest of the way.
Eventually, they all made it to the tree, but everyone was so preoccupied with their own animal troubles that no one was sure who arrived at the tree first.
"Oh, well, it doesn't matter who won," Meep said. "As long as we all had fun."
"That was very tiring," Tweedle Dee panted, "but it was still loads of fun!"
"Then we don't have to stop now," Jeep said. "We can ride our animals into the jungle."
"Maybe we'll find our way back to the hideout while we're at it," Meep said.
The four of them rode into the jungle on their various animals, running south along the bank of Crocodile Creek.
Meanwhile, Peter, Alice, Tinker Bell, the Dodo, and Bill the Lizard were all in the jungle as well, walking north along the bank of Crocodile Creek. Peter said, "If we keep walking along Crocodile Creek, we'll eventually reach the savannah. Maybe the Lost Boys are over there."
"Let's jolly-well hope so, because I can't find a thing in these jungles," the Dodo said.
Peter suddenly stopped in his tracks, and everyone behind him came to a stop as well.
"What is it, Peter?" Alice asked.
"Shh. You hear that?" Peter said.
Everyone listened, and they could hear faint yelling. It sounded like someone saying, "She has to be around here somewhere! We'll search all day if we have to. No, all week! We've got to find that girl!"
"That's the Queen of Hearts!" Alice whispered.
They heard another faint voice say, "And we've got to find Peter Pan as well. Don't forget our little deal, my queen."
"Hook! Of course he'd be working alongside that wicked queen," Peter said.
"What should we do? We can't let them find us," Alice said.
"Let's follow 'em, see what they're up to," Peter said.
"Isn't that rather dangerous?" Alice said.
"Not if we stay extra quiet," Peter said. The group quietly walked toward the voices of Hook and the Queen until they were close enough to see the band of pirates and card soldiers through the bushes. From there, they made sure to stay behind the pack of villains, and they followed them silently through the jungle.
"Captain, do you really think we'll find Pan and this Alice girl?" Smee asked Hook.
"I'm not sure, Smee, but it's the only thing we can do to save our heads," Hook murmured to Smee. "If we're lucky, the two of them might be hiding together. Then we can get both of them at once."
After overhearing this remark from Hook, Peter couldn't help but start laughing, so he had to cover his mouth to stop them from hearing him.
"Peter! Please be quiet," Alice whispered.
The Queen of Hearts then yelled out, "Everyone! Stop! Do you feel that?"
The ground was rumbling. They heard rustling in the foliage.
"Your highness, look ahead! It's a stampede!" one of the card soldiers said. They saw a rhino, giraffe, ostrich, and zebra approaching from the opposite direction.
"Wait, that's not a mere stampede," Captain Hook said. "Look, Smee! On the animals. It's two of Pan's Lost Boys."
"So it is, Captain!"
"Make sure you stop those animals, you swabs!" Hook said to his pirates. "And get me those scurvy brats!"
The pirates and the card soldiers formed a barrier in front of the animals and stopped them with brute force. Then, the pirates grabbed Meep off of the zebra and Jeep off of the ostrich and tied both of them up with a rope. The card soldiers dragged Tweedle Dee off of the giraffe and Tweedle Dum off of the rhino and arrested them both.
The card soldiers presented the Tweedles to the Queen. "What shall we do with these ruffians, your majesty?" one of them asked.
"Off with their heads!" the Queen yelled.
"And as for you, my little tots," Captain Hook said to the Lost Boy Twins, "you can either tell me where Peter Pan is… or you'll be lunchmeat for the cannibals!"
"We don't know where Peter is," Jeep said.
"Honest, we don't," Meep said.
"Suit yourself. I hope you don't mind getting boiled alive in a pot of hot oil. The cannibals like their meat extra crispy," Hook said.
Peter lunged out from the bushes with his dagger in hand and said, "That's enough, Hook! Let the Twins go! It's me you want, right?"
Two of Hook's pirates snuck up on Peter from behind and restrained him. Tinker Bell tried kicking them in the face and pulling their hair, but the pirates simply flicked her away.
"Why, Peter Pan. What a pleasant surprise. We were just talking about you," Hook said.
"Look who else we found back here," a card soldier said. They nudged Alice out from the bushes with their spears.
The Queen of Hearts rubbed her hands. "Excellent. We searched the whole island looking for you, my dear," she said. "We just couldn't wait to get reacquainted with you."
"Tie these two brats up as well," Hook ordered, gesturing to Peter and Alice. "We'll feed them to the cannibals along with the twin twerps."
The pirates lifted up a hollow log by the bank of Crocodile Creek, and they tied Peter and Alice to the log with rope.
"Wait, I thought it was me you wanted," Peter said. "You can do whatever you want to me, but leave the Lost Boys out of this!"
"Maybe you should reevaluate your position in this situation, boy," Hook said. "You're the one that's tied up, I'm the one that's not. I'm the one who calls the shots."
"I think you're mistaken," the Queen said to Hook. "I'm the one who calls the shots here! Who said you could decide Alice's fate?"
"Very well, how would you like to get rid of her?" Hook said.
"Off with her head, of course!"
"But your majesty, with all due respect, have you ever considered that a beheading may be too swift? Wouldn't you like her to really suffer?" Hook said.
"Hm. In all my years of ruling, no one has ever suggested that to me," the Queen said. "Very well. I have another idea on how to execute Alice—we'll feed her to the cannibals! And while we're at it, I suppose we might as well feed this Peter Pan to the cannibals as well."
Captain Hook raised an eyebrow. He wasn't sure what to say—if he should even say anything at all. He settled with, "That is an exquisite plan, your majesty."
Peter leaned over to Alice on the other side of the log, and he said under his breath, "Alice, come on, why don't you do something? Use that imagination of yours."
Alice said, "I-I'm trying. But I… can't. No matter how hard I try, I just can't."
"The Lost Boys are counting on you. I'm counting on you."
"I know. I'm trying. Really, I am."
One of the card soldiers said, "Your majesty, we found two more spies." The cards came out from the bushes with the Dodo and Bill in their clutches. "What shall we do with them?" the card asked.
"Off with their heads!" the Queen screamed. "But for now, keep them with those two buffoons." She pointed toward the now-shackled Tweedles.
"Off with our 'eads?" Bill said. "Off with our 'eads? No! No, this can't be 'appening!"
"Now, now, lad, don't fret," the Dodo said. "Everything will get sorted out. At least, I hope so."
"No!" Bill screamed. "They can chop off me tail all they want, but I can't lose me 'ead!" Bill slipped out from the card soldiers' grip with his reptilian reflexes, and he began running around aimlessly, desperately trying to escape. He bumped into a row of cards, knocking them down one by one in a line. He bumped into the White Rabbit, then Smee, then the King of Hearts. He bumped into Starkey, one of Captain Hook's pirates, who then bumped into the upright log that Peter and Alice were tied to, thus tipping over the log and sending it plunging into Crocodile Creek.
"No! They're getting away, you fools!" Captain Hook yelled, but it was too late. The log had already drifted out of sight.
The log floated along the creek's rushing current, constantly rotating so that Peter and Alice alternated between being above water and being submerged underwater. "Help me!" Alice screamed in a gurgley voice. They had barely escaped one terrible situation only to be flung into another one.