Tinkerbelle's Grand Adventure

Revenge of the fairy

Image created on Midjourney

Tinkerbelle was tired of playing second fiddle to Peter Pan. Why was she always written as his comical little sidekick? Was it because she was a girl or because she was a fairy? Maybe it was both. Or maybe neither. She stamped her foot, frustrated. And tiny! Why did they always make her out to be tiny?

She didn’t know the why of any of it, and right now she didn’t really care. She was going to have an adventure. On her own. Or maybe with Wendy.

Tink hated that Barrie had written Wendy as her enemy. Why, when he had found his way into Neverland all those years ago, he had even tried to make them hate each other. All for his stupid story. Wendy was, in fact, Tinkerbelle’s best friend.

When Tink approached Wendy with her idea, her friend was all in. It was going to be a glorious caper. Better than anything even Peter could pull off. But if they were going to make it work, they would need Tiger Lily.

A year ago, during one of her forays into the human world, Tinkerbelle had discovered a strange phenomenon called Anime North. It seemed this was something called a fan convention and people dressed up in costumes and pretended to be their favorite characters from different stories. And they did it at the same time every year.

Knowing that the convention was starting the next day, Tink bided her time, waiting until Peter and the Lost Boys were fast asleep. Just as the morning sun began to peek over the horizon, she flew into their camp, frantically waking everyone with her shouts of alarm.

Of course, Wendy and Tiger Lily had “decided” to pay a visit to the boys and pretended to wake up shocked and scared.

“What is it, Tink?” Peter shouted, flying up into the air and brandishing his sword. “Is Captain Hook back?” He spun in circles. “Lost Boys—to arms!”

“No, Peter, wait, it’s not Hook.” Tinkerbelle grabbed at his feet, trying to pull him back down to the ground. “Listen to me.”

Peter stopped spinning and, with a quizzical look on his face, slowly descended until he was standing in front of the fairy. “Then what is it?”

Tink could barely contain her mirth as she blurted out, “I’ve found them. All of them.”

“All of who?” Peter asked, clearly confused.

“The lost children. They’re all together, right now.”

“Oh, Peter,” Wendy said stepping closer and taking his hands in her own. She stared into his eyes, her own filled with concern and—was that a tear? Way to go, Wendy. “We have to save them.”

“Of course,” Peter said, puffing his chest out. Tink thought he might crow, but instead, his chest deflated, and he hesitated. “How many are there, exactly, Tink?”

“So many,” Tinkerbelle answered, trying to match Wendy’s look of concern. “Peter, we have to save them,” she echoed. Wendy’s words always seemed to get through to Peter better than her own.

As Peter continued to hesitate, Tiger Lily stepped up. “It would be a grand adventure, Peter. I will go if you will not.”

That clinched it. Peter wasn’t going to be shown up by Tiger Lily. He squeezed Wendy’s hand then rose into the air again. “Lost Boys, prepare. We fly!”

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Tinkerbelle led the way to Anime North, a strange place, she said, full of all manner of humans. It was where they hid the lost children. Peter didn’t know what to expect, but certainly not what they found. There had to be tens of thousands of people here, many of them stranger looking than anything Peter had ever seen in all of his adventures.

As they wandered through the crowds, these people, clearly lost children all, laughed and posed for one another in strange tableaus. Tables and tables of strange goods were for sale, and they bought them up—to do what with them, Peter had no idea.

Clearly some evil force was at work here, addling their brains and making them believe this a good place for them to be, forever trapped in a never-ending charade. Peter shook with rage.

He grabbed the arm of a girl with pink and blue pigtails, short shorts, an even shorter top, and garish makeup. She was carrying a baseball bat. “Are you okay?” he asked, not knowing what else to say. “Who are you?”

The girl laughed. “What planet have you been on? I’m Harley Quinn, of course.” She took in the rest of Peter’s companions. “Your group is cool. Your Peter Pan costumes are perfect. Mind if I snap a pic?”

Lost for any response, Peter just stared at her, struck dumb. She arranged them all in bizarre poses and pulled a strange rectangular object from a pocket and held it up between them.

“Thanks,” she said, as if they had done something significant.

These people were bewitched! Many more stopped the group, commenting on their “costumes” and asking for pictures. Peter eventually worked out that the devices were used for somehow making an odd type of painting without paint—or a canvas.

He also realized that not only were these people not lost, many of them weren’t children either. This was something they did for fun. “Tinkerbelle!”

“Yes, Peter?” Tink said with her most innocent smile.

“What is going on here?”

“It’s an adventure,” Wendy said, stepping up beside Tinkerbelle.

“One you wouldn’t have taken on your own,” Tiger Lily added, moving to Tink’s other side.

“And I bought us all weekend passes,” Tinkerbelle finished. “These people have no idea who we really are. We can play here all weekend and not stand out at all.”

Peter stared around at the strange goings on. “Are there more of these—conventions?”

“Loads more,” Tinkerbelle answered. “They happen all over the world.”

Peter let out a whoop, flying up and spinning in a circle before descending back to the ground to applause from the people nearby, who clearly didn’t understand what they thought was a trick. Tinkerbelle had pulled off the best prank ever. This was truly going to be a grand adventure!

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So, Tinkerbelle. I decided to create some images from Peter Pan, but I wanted to see Tinkerbelle as a real person. I used Maya Hawke, a young actress I really like, as a template. I like the result.

But then I got to thinking that Tink gets short shrift. I decided she needed to have more agency and to do it at Peter’s expense—though in a fun way. This story is the result.

Anime North is a real anime convention that takes place in Toronto (Canada for any who might not know). The last time I checked, it draws about 34,000 people. My daughter loved it when she was younger and we used to go every July. Posing for pictures happened a lot!