Lost Boy, Stolen Memories

Chapter 30

Erin's POV

All I can do is lay here, staring at Colt's lifeless body, letting the emotions seep into me. I barely notice when Pan approaches me and says, "He was asking for it, you know. His loyalties were no longer acceptable to me."

I don't want to, but I raise my head, looking the cruel bastard dead in the eyes. I grit out, "What the hell are you doing, Pan?"

"I suppose I can explain it to you, though I get no benefit from it," he says, lazily waving his hand around in circles.

I muster a look of anger upon my face, but I fear that my curiosity peeks through my veil of rage.

"When I first created Neverland," he begins, without any confirmation on my part, "I knew that it wouldn't last forever. I know there were people here before me, and their paradise didn't last. But that was because they either didn't know about or weren't able to locate the Heart of the Truest Believer.

"You, Erin, possess that heart, or rather, possessed it. It was Colt who figured it out; he suspected that since you think I'm capable of loving, that you could save Neverland. What he didn't know was that I'd have to sacrifice your heart in order to do so," he shakes his head in derision towards Colt's corpse, which is already fading into nothing but a shadow.

"Well, get on with it then," I grit out, "I obviously don't have the strength to stop you."

He crouches onto one knee, still looking down on me, and whispers, "Any last words, Erin?"

I see my heart in his left hand, and I feel tempted to seize in from his grasp, but it's just out of my reach. Also, he's too quick for me and would somehow punish me further. I sigh, accepting defeat. But there is no way in hell that I'm going out of here without some badass last words.

"Fuck you, Pan," I speak. "But I don't regret a single second that I had with Peter, the other you. And you know what, I still believe that he exists somewhere. Maybe not inside you anymore, but no one is incapable of loving. Despite all you've done to me and who knows how many other girls, I hope that you find someone to love. I just hope that after all I've been through, that I'll get to see the old you on the other side." I don't know when the tears started falling again, but I feel no remorse for them.

"If you're quite finished then I'd like to get on with the show," Pan says with absolutely no sympathy.

I close my eyes and nod. I feel his presence leave my side. I intend to keep my eyes closed and welcome my death, but they snap open when I hear the horrendous scraping noise.

The origin of the noise is the giant hourglass. Pan is hovering beside it, shoving off the top lid, causing the awful sound. He then holds my heart over the now open hourglass, which has only the slightest bit of sand left in the upper half. His hand tightens around my glowing organ, sending waves of agony through me.

My vision goes black around the edges and I can hardly retain consciousness. I can just glimpse my heart dissolving into ash and mixing with the remainder of the sand before everything goes dark. And silent.

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Pan's POV

At first nothing happens. The ashes that remain from her heart simply settle on top of the little amount of sand that is left. The next few seconds pass by incredibly slowly and a feeling of terror grows in my chest, telling me that I must've done something wrong. The sand just keeps falling into the lower half.

I watch helplessly as the final grain takes its final fall, paralyzed by fear. But then the sand starts to glow brightly and churn violently inside the glass. It gets so bright that I have to back up and shield my eyes.

Now the hourglass is cracking, pieces of glass flying haphazardly. Some of the shards slice into my skin, but I'm too caught up in watching the scene before me unfold to care. I still have no idea whether Neverland is ending or having a new beginning. All I can do is wait and see.

At this point the hourglass has self-destructed and all that's left is a swirling cloud of sand. It seems like it will keep expanding forever. Instead, once it reaches a certain size, it shrinks back down to the size of a fist. It still gives off a bright glow, but it no longer seems to pose a threat. I eye it cautiously for several minutes, to make sure that I was truly successful.

Once I'm positive, I let out a victorious yell. That's when I realize that the Lost Boys are a level below me and have no bloody clue what just occurred. I'm about to go down and relate the good news to them, when I notice Erin's shadow.

Her dead body has disappeared and the black silhouette is hovering next to the eye of the skull. Normally, after I take someone's life, their shadow immediately flees to join the others in Dark Hollow. This one is different, however, it pauses to look at me right in the eyes for many seconds before continuing out the cave and into the night.

There was one other slight difference between her shadow and the rest; Erin's shadow didn't have the standard glowing white eyes of the others, the color is instead a blood red.