When Stars Fall

Chapter 13 - Bones In The Sand

The wind made the blood-red coat with the golden embroidery of the feared pirate captain flutters around his silhouette. Hook stood out sinisterly against the moon's light, throwing a black shadow on the white bone sand. He radiated an unnatural coldness as if death clung to his form like the breath of an imperishable winter. It made even the boatman at his side shiver like a leaf. 

Smee's hands clutched the fallen star while his eyes focused on it alone. As if the small, glowing thing in his hands were the warming hearth fire on that frosty night or a bonfire on distant cliffs. The glow reflected in his small round glasses and lit up the large eyes of the childlike mind.

"I wish," the gaunt man pronounced, the tip of his tongue running over his brittle lips, "Starkey would return to us."

No sooner uttered than the star disintegrated in his hands. It collapsed, trickling like sand, then scattered in the next breeze that carried the silver dust toward the sea. There was silence, then a gurgling and rumbling rose from the black waves of Cannibal Cove. Bubbles churned the surface near the beach. With a loud splash and saltwater poured from the figure rising from the depths. Shuffling footsteps dragged the body with the shrouds to the shore.

A slashed shirt hung from the once-dead pirate's belly next to a massive gash, with innards like vines up to his thighs. The torso was partially eaten away by the fish, with only a tiny portion of the face remaining. The rib cage was already bare, revealing a strange, ethereal glow underneath - which had been inherent in the star just moments before. Like a new heart, magic now beat in the unholy creature, but the once white glow seemed darker, streaked with black-like ink.

"Captain?"The resurrected Starkey opened what might once have been lips and choked salt water over his chest with the words.

Hook spread his arms as if to greet an old friend."Welcome back from the dead!" he greeted the crew member with no warmth. The return of another puppet, for that, was all they had ever been to him.

Sheer horror for Peter Pan and the star, who had witnessed this spectacle of sheer horror with open mouths and wildly pounding hearts.

"It can't be," Peter murmured, a shiver running through his body at the sight of his hated mortal enemy.

"Peter, you mustn't lose your head now!" the star beside him admonished, placing a hand on his arm. "Look ... they have another star!" With that, she pointed to the box from which Smee had already taken out the first one moments before.  The pirates had collected the stars to resurrect their comrades. Whatever it was that these creatures were now.
"We must get the star ... and you must wish me back!" she reminded Peter, hoping he would remember the importance of this task.

But Peter didn't seem to listen at all. His gaze was fixed obsessively on Captain Hook. Countless Lost Boys had this man already on the conscience. Countless playmates and natives of the island, whom he let drown in sardonic joy in Marooners Rock. Hook hung others from the masts of the Jolly Roger or tied them to the figurehead to die so that Peter and the others would be sure to find the dead at the next 'game.'

Peter remembered the last fight against that dirty bastard.
Aggrieved, he had thought about getting new boys from London at Hangmanstree. Grateful lads from the streets who would be happy to take his hand and follow him into a life of adventure.
'No more girls,' he had decided as he played his flute and stared grimly at the ceiling. Girls were nothing but trouble. Because of Wendy, the Lost Boys had wanted to leave him. But Tinkerbell had alerted him that Hook had kidnapped the Lost Boys and Darling children before they could leave Neverland. All that trouble had faded within seconds.