Unhappily Never After (Neverland Archives II) (ON HOLD)

Chapter 17 | Breakdown

Time loses meaning when I sleep. It's been that way my whole life--I can sleep for ten minutes or ten hours, and dream a thousand dreams or none, but it always feels like I haven't slept at all when I wake up.

Which is why, when I blink open bleary eyes to see a dark room however-long after Mila left me, I'm a bit disoriented. I don't know what time it is, and it takes me a second to even register where I am.

This space is unfamiliar, foreign. The bed I'm on is hard, and the pillow under my head is even lumpier than the mattress. The blanket is scratchy and smells like old... something.

And the world feels tiny.

Am I in a coffin? Did I die? Or they thought I died, and I'm in a morgue, and I'll be one of those creepy cadavers who isn't actually dead--or I am dead, and this an out of body experience.

Though if it was that, Peter would be here.

Right. Peter.

Neverland.

Mushrooms... Nightmares... oh stars. I sit up fast, breaths quickening. I'm in the City of Quiet, with a cursed faerie named Mila, in her inn.

Beautiful.

I rub my face, yawning. This room is blacker than pitch--no windows, I remember. Well, if it's dark, it's nighttime.

Nighttime means I can go back to sleep and avoid dealing with all of King Peter's junk. Fantastic.

I flop back onto the hard, lumpy mattress and sigh contentedly.

Is it a little harder and lumpier than I remember...?

"Get off me."

I scream, and try to move across the room, but my foot gets tangled in the blanket and I end up face planting on the floor.

"You're loud. Be quiet."

I clamber to my feet, unable to see a thing and clutching my nose, which is throbbing and might even be bleeding.

"Peter?" I question, my voice thick.

"I told you to be quiet."

I blink into the darkness, stunned for a moment. He's using that neutral tone again, the one I hate.

"What... on... Earth..." I tip my head back, feeling around my face to see if my nose is actually bleeding. "Peter, what?"

He sighs heavily. "Are you incapable of following simple instructions? Be. Quiet. Some of us are trying to sleep."

My mouth falls open even as I notice that there isn't any blood--excellent.

"Are you high?" Or a ghost... a dream... maybe I'm hallucinating. Maybe the Nightmare killed him.

Peter sighs again, and a soft green glow starts to... glow. Softly. "I'm not dead," Peter says, "nor am I currently flying." He sits up, and I only know because it's now light enough for me to make out his shadow--and it's getting progressively lighter.

"What...?" I let my hand fall away from my face, blinking at Peter. I don't even know what to say. The last time I saw him, he was being dragged into the Faerie Forest by a Nightmare--and I wasn't entirely sure that I believed Mila when she said he'd be fine. I'm... 'happy' isn't the right word, but I'm not upset that he's here and okay.

Or I wouldn't be, if he wasn't in my bed and being rude.

"What is going on?" I demand, hands on my hips. Hey, have I lost weight? I squeeze my love handles, and sure enough, they feel smaller than I remember. Maybe all this walking isn't such a bad thing!