AN: Well, another chapter – I'm on a roll.
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't make any money, and don't get to fly, either.
Warning: No real spanking in this chapter other than a few swats.
Thanks for reading.
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Hook stared at the mess for about five seconds before giving the brat a deathly gaze. He had looked at the boy like that before, giving him the stern, evil eye, but Peter had been flying in the air then or trooping along with a handful of noisy brats or accompanied by a tiny fairy. Now armed with a bunny, Peter shrank back, doing his best to look invisible.
"Who made this mess?" Hook asked ominously.
"Minty," Peter said, holding out the bunny. Then he thought about it and drew the bunny tight to his chest, saying, "No, me! I made the mess. Only – not me."
"Which is it?" Hook raised an eyebrow, curious to see what the boy would say before Hook threatened him further.
"Accident!" Peter declared, shifting foot to foot. "Just an accident."
Hook took a step forward, and Peter recoiled.
"No, don't spank me," he begged.
Hook had been planning to do just that, but it was only mid-afternoon and he doubted that a spanking now would last long enough to have the boy sad that night which he had to be in order to bring Alivia back. Hook sighed; his life had become so very restrictive – one thing needed to make another thing happen.
"Into my bed cabin," Hook ordered. "Put the bunny in the basket," he pointed to an empty basket on the table, "and get yourself into my cabin. Now!"
"Big meanie," Peter muttered, but he placed Minty carefully into the basket and trudged into Hook's bedroom.
Hook followed him. "Take your shirt off," Hook directed, "and I'll have it washed."
Peter unbuttoned the shirt very reluctantly and tugged it over his head. He held it out timidly towards Hook, jumping back the moment Hook took it out of his hands.
Hook thought for a moment, then a truly diabolical idea presented itself to him. He grinned evilly and took a short length of rope from a nearby chair and approached Peter.
"Hands in front of you."
"Don't hurt me," Peter pleaded. "I said I was sorry, and you're just an old ugly pirate who is the meanest man ever."
"Oooo," Hook mocked him. "That hurts so badly I can scarcely bear it. Hands out."
Peter had wrapped his arms around his torso to keep warm in the cool cabin, but he stuck his hands out, his eyes flashing defiantly.
With the long practice of using his one hand and his hook, Hook looped the rope around the boy's wrists twice and tugged on it to ensure that the rope was tight but not biting into his skin.
"Up on your bed," Hook nodded towards the two crates.
Most of the blackening powder had been on Peter's shirt, and Hook knew it wouldn't stain the blanket on the crate too badly.
Without the use of his hands, it took Peter a moment to wiggle himself backwards up on the crate and then watched Hook apprehensively.
Hook sat on the edge of the crate and suddenly twisted his hook around the rope and push his arm out, jerking Peter out on the bed with his arms raised high above his head.
Peter gasped, his eyes wide and scared, as he stared down at his own bare torso. Hook read the fear in those eyes and knew the boy was wondering what torture he would inflict on the helpless boy.
Hook waited a second, letting the boy's terror mount, and then he reached down and lightly ran his fingers down Peter's right ribs.
Peter let out a loud squeal, a huge grin appearing on his face as he tried to squirm away.
Hook smirked and began tickling the boy's other side.
"Oh-ho-ho, stop!" Peter laughed as he tried to get away from the tickling. The fear had left his eyes, and he could only grin and giggle.
Hook smirked even more. He remembered his old nurse who had liked to tickle him when she thought he was too serious for a little boy. Hook recalled with disgust the way she had trapped him on his bed and tickled him. It had been bad enough that she insisted he sit in her lap to read storybooks or that she wanted to rock him to sleep every night in the big soft chair beside his bed. But when she tickled him, she liked to taunt him in that babyish voice, adding insult to injury by asking if he was her "Tweet, widdle tickle boy, yes he was, so ticklish!" Hook remembered how angry and helpless the tickling had made him feel as he lay at her mercy, and he was certain that the brat felt the same way now.
Only . . . Peter didn't seem to be screaming as much as Hook thought he would. Oh, he was wriggling back and forth, trying to avoid the tickling, and he laughed and grinned because he had to, but Peter did not seem wildly crazy the way Hook remembered feeling.
Hook reached down to tickle slight bit of baby fat under Peter's navel, and the boy laughed louder, bursting out sweet laughter that resounded through the room. But still the boy didn't seem angry.
Peter seemed to have trouble breathing after the last attack, and Hook removed his hand to give him a break, but watching the boy carefully.
Peter's chest heaved as he caught his breath, and he still giggled reflectively though Hook's hand wasn't anywhere near his body. He smiled, his eyes soft and gentle, but he made no movement to fight the rope around his wrists.
Confused, Hook lifted his hand and brought it back, towards Peter's ribs.
The boy jerked instinctively, but rather than edge away, Peter leaned his face towards Hook, almost burying it in the side of Hook's knee. Peter scrunched his face up, squeezing his eyes shut, but his lips were twitching into a smile as he waited for the tickling to start again.
Completely at a lost to what was going on, Hook began tickling his sides again. Peter burst into laughter, but when he moved, it was not frantic writhing or thrashing, but rather he kept turning his body towards Hook, almost inviting more tickling.
After about five minutes, Hook gave up. He stopped tickling and loosened the rope from Peter's wrists.
Instead of leaping off the bed, Peter hugged his freed arms around his body, lifting playful eyes up to Hook. A smile still hovered on the boy's lips.
Hook stood, feeling like a complete idiot as he had no idea if he had punished the boy or amused him. Fortunately, the brat chose that moment to yawn, and Hook immediately said, "Time for a nap."
"Aww," Peter complained.
"No, naptime," Hook insisted, covering him up with the blanket. "And when you wake up, you're going to finish those boots while I watch you. And no more bunny while you work."
"Big meanie," Peter pouted. But he closed his eyes and did not say anything else.
Hook left the room, thinking that he knew less about children than he had ever thought. He locked the door and then went in search of Smee. Telling him that Peter was taking a long nap, Hook instructed Smee to have the pirates clean up the blackening powder.
"Wash the bunny, too," Hook instructed, "and rinse off what you can of that infernal bunny. And have it done before I come back."
"You're leaving?" Smee glanced up, blinking behind his round spectacles.
"Yes," Hook said quietly. "I'm going to walk around the island and see where every has gone. The brat claims they have gone, but I want to see for myself. Who knows – they could have been playing Hide and Go Seek, and when he couldn't find them, he thought they had left him."
Sneering at Peter's possible stupidity, Hook got ready for his hike. Leaving his fancy coat behind, he started out from the ship in a white shirt and trouser, a dagger tucked into his belt with his pistol and a knife in his boots. He didn't expect to meet any of the Indians, and even if he did, he probably would not have problems with them. They tended to respect each other's property: the pirates got the sea while the Indians kept to the land, but the Indians let the pirates tour the island and Hook let the Indians paddle their canoes in the sea. Still, he liked to be armed at all time.
He began walking down a familiar path. By his estimation, the island was somewhere between two hundred and four hundred square miles. Hook would have liked a better idea of the land so he could create an accurate map, but he swore at times the island grew or shrunk at random, so he could never get a true layout. But most of the paths stayed the same except for a few which insisted on turning the wrong way just annoy him. Nothing could be worse than starting down a path that he knew turned towards the right to find it heading towards the left. And he had a feeling all the trees were raising their roots slightly and laughing at him when he almost tripped.
"Ruddy island," Hook hissed under his breath as he rounded an oak tree which had moved to the middle of the path sometime between now and last week.
Yet, the island felt different, trembling more than usual. And Hook walked for nearly an hour without finding anything. That itself was the oddest thing. Usually, he would see small woodland creatures or fairies dashing behind leaves or birds fluttering around. He saw nothing, including Lost Boys and Indians.
He decided to go all the way to Peter's hide-out in that huge tree. Hook couldn't remember how long ago he had found out about it. For a while, he had staked pirates on watch around that tree to catch the brat, but Peter managed to avoid him. The pirates had caught various children, but every time the story went the same way. The pirates would drag the children back to the ship, and Peter would come rescue them eventually. Sometimes, the brat showed up immediately and reeked havoc on the whip, cutting down sails and ropes and throwing mud on deck. Sometime, Peter had not shown up for days, even a week, and Hook found himself tending to whiny children who cried and begged for food and water and had tantrums while he waited for Peter to come claim them. After capturing a particularly noisy bunch of children who screamed for their parents for twenty-six straight hours, Hook made the rule of no more hostages on his ship.
Peter's tree was too small for him to get in – indeed, the individual passages made Hook slightly claustrophobic, they were so small and tight and dark. He had no desire to get caught in them, so he simply looped around the enormous tree, watching for some sign of life.
Nothing moved. No scurrying noise from underground, no flaps in the tree opening and shutting, no whispers or muffled laughs.
Hook began to feel slightly spooked. Something had changed.
He made his way back to his ship without any further searching. He had been gone about two hours, and he expected to hear Peter banging around in his bed cabin, but instead he found the boy blackening boots quietly under the watchful eyes of Smee.
Peter looked up rebelliously when Hook entered, but he kept scouring the boots. Hook saw the boy wore a new white shirt with a large piece of canvas pinned over the front of his shirt to catch any split powder. Minty slept in the basket, but clean again with slightly damp fur.
"Afternoon, Cap'n," Smee nodded. "A nice outing, didn't we have? This little boy got right to his work, yes, with Smee to watch."
"I don't want to do any more," Peter protested, glowering at Smee's patronizing tone. "When can I leave?"
Hook motioned towards the door, and Smee left, leaving the bunny behind.
"Leave?" Hook sat down in his captain's chair and lit a cigar. "You're not leaving."
Peter stood up defiantly. "I can leave if I want to!"
"You could try," Hook shrugged. "But I walked around the island and saw no one. What happened to all the other children? The animals? The fairies?"
Peter paled and his bottom lip trembled slightly, but he answered, "They'll come back. They really will. The new boys didn't want to come. I asked them, and they said they didn't believe in . . . you know. So I couldn't take them here with me."
Hook lowered his cigar and fixed Peter with a furious stare. "You give the children a choice before bringing them here?"
"Yes," Peter nodded."
"And you didn't give me a choice?" Hook asked in a deadly quiet voice.
Peter thought for a second, his brow drawn down as he tried to remember back that far. "I had to give you a choice," he finally said. "You have to want to come here or it doesn't work. Yes, I had to ask you, but you were dancing all funny and yelling and singing, I think."
"I was drunk?" Hook leaned towards him. "You asked me one night when I was drunk?"
Peter considered it. "I don't know. I think I saw you dancing around, and I thought you were just a very big boy. So I asked, I think, and you said something like, 'Yes, take me away. Take my whole ship and crew, and get me away from this damned place.' Or something like that. So I took you, but then you weren't happy." Peter frowned. "You're supposed to be happy here. I waited and waited, but you didn't get happy. And now you're making me not happy."
Hook sat back in his chair. He was dimly aware that his cigar was still burning, but he could not think of smoking now. He had been asked if he wanted to come, and he said yes? Then that meant . . .
"Will you take me back?" Hook whispered tensely. "Back to earth?"
Peter scowled and shook his head. "No, you're my enemy, and I don't fly with enemies."
Hook felt angry, but he abandoned it. "Doesn't matter – you can't go anywhere without that ridiculous fairy who has chosen to leave you completely."
"Not true!" Peter protested, stomping his foot.
"Do not have another fit," Hook ordered. "You start choking, and I'll let you faint on the floor. Get back to work before I tan your hide for being such an nuisance."
Peter huffed and pouted, but eventually he settled back to work.
Hook let him stay up later that night since he had a nap, but after supper which Peter ate hungrily, Hook made him get ready for bed around eight. The boy looked tired, rubbing his eyes as he got into his nightshirt, washed his teeth with a rag, and headed for the crates.
Hook grabbed him before he could get into bed and sat down, flinging the boy over his lap.
"No!" Peter objected, "I didn't do anything wrong. I was good!"
"It's to remind to you to obey me," Hook said stoically. He brought his hand down on the boy's bottom, once, twice, thrice, and a final fourth time.
Peter whined, but he did not cry or fight Hook. "Not fair," he complained as Hook put him in bed and covered him up.
"I never intended to be fair," Hook told him. "Are you going to stay in bed, or do I need to tie you down?"
"I didn't get up from my nap until Smee told me to," Peter said crossly. "I'm good, and you're bad. All bad and mean."
"So I've been told," Hook noted. "Now shut up and go to sleep."
Peter sulked for about ten minutes until he fell asleep.
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"What do you want to talk about?" Alivia asked as she stepped into Hook's cabin, her wings smaller but still shining.
"Whatever you like," Hook walked towards her, trying to ignore the small figure sleeping on the crates. "Do you remember our walks on the riverbanks?"
"Always," Alivia smiled gently. "We used to have grand discussions about art and philosophy and poetry. You wanted to read me Paradise Lost – I wanted you to kiss me."
Hook lifted his eyes to her, surprised. "Really?"
"Of course," she said honestly. "You were standing there, so handsome in your new coat and breeches, and I kept thinking, 'Will he ever kiss me?' And then you did, and I could not breathe for the rest of the day."
"Can I ever kiss you again?" Hook asked.
She dropped her gaze and let it travel over to the sleeping boy.
Hook's eyes narrowed. "What do you see in him? He's just a little brat, nothing special. I loved you – I still love you. Me, not that whelp."
"Oh, Jamie," she sighed. "You could never understand. Fountains of beauty so close to you, but you never see them."
"Don't start talking about fountains," he snapped at her. "Talk about us, here, now, you and me – forever. I don't want anything else."
"But you do," she told him evenly. "You not only want more, you need more. More than I could ever give you. But you can't see that. You can't see how everything points in one direction towards what you need, aiming straight for everything you want."
"I give up," Hook raised his hands in despair. "I couldn't understand you then, and I don't now. I should just drown the boy, and be done with it.
Suddenly, she was right beside him. She grabbed his jaw in one hand, and he could feel the warmth in her fingers. "James," she looked straight in his eyes, "listen to me. Follow them wherever they go. Keep the child safe and follow them."
"What?" he breathed, unable to think clearly with her so close.
"Follow them," she said emphatically. Then she rose up and pressed her mouth into his.
Hook felt like he had melted. His hearing disappeared, and he closed his eyes as he lost himself in her kiss. Her soft lips against his, her hands on his face. He wanted to die, he wanted to live forever, he wanted her so badly - ecstatic, mad, passionate longing for her.
And then he woke up to the morning light.
Peter had sat up in bed and watched him carefully.
"Did a fairy come here last night?" the boy asked, tilting his head to the side in curiosity.
"Yes," Hook whispered, staring helplessly up at the wooden ceiling of his cabin.