Pirate ship in a storm with lightning and rough seas — AI art by @mim86

The storm did not arrive. It declared war. Wind clawed at the Jolly Roger with shrieking fingers, tearing at her sails as though the sky itself meant to strip her bare. Waves rose like black mountains and broke across the deck in thunderous sheets, sending pirates scrambling for rigging and prayer in equal measure. Even the lanterns, bolted and hooded, guttered like frightened hearts. Hook stood at the quarterdeck rail, coat snapping behind him, hat lashed to his head by stubborn pride alone. He had sailed through monsoons, outrun naval squadrons, and once steered a burning brig through a coral graveyard without losing a man. This storm cared nothing for his résumé. “Hold her steady!” he roared, though the wheel fought his helmsman like a living beast. The timbers groaned beneath his boots. Not the usual creak of a working ship, but the deep, splinter-haunted moan of a vessel being asked to survive the impossible. Below decks, Peter, Wendy, and the Lost Boys were secured behind iron and oak, prisoners of salt and circumstance. And Tinker Bell… Tinker Bell had been placed in a glass confinement jar no larger than a ship’s lantern. Hook had done it partly to silence her furious chiming protests, partly to keep her from working whatever star-born meddling magic she might attempt. The jar swung now from a hook near the stern windows, rocking violently with the ship’s motion, fairy light flashing inside it like trapped lightning. Tink paced the curved glass, fists glowing, wings buzzing with enough fury to spark embers. She could feel the ship’s distress through the wood, through the water, through the very air. The Jolly Roger was not merely in danger. She was losing. Another colossal wave struck. The jar’s chain snapped taut, throwing Tink against the glass. She caught herself mid-air, breathless, furious… and suddenly aware the space around her had gone very still. Not calm. Hushed. A soft radiance unfolded behind her, warm as candlelight and impossibly

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