A/N: I wanted to practice writing styles outside my comfort zone. Some future pairings. Please review if you liked it and want me to continue!
Warning: blood and crude language throughout that follows the story rating - T.
It's quiet.
The lair is dark and there's a faint scent of musk entwining with the air, but the woman forces her body to repress the sudden urge to shudder. She passes down the dim, dank underground passage with nothing but the flames in her cerise hair to light her path, and the secondary, anxious emotions bubbling in the cavern of her chest almost make her shoot a fireball at her own shadow. Instead she swallows the lump in her throat and presses on.
It's the silence of the setting that unnerves her the most. At any moment the roof can collapse and trap her for eternity inside of a chamber composed of nothing but solid rock, billowing blackness, utter desolation, and, oh yes, solid rock. For the flicker of a moment she regrets coming down here – regrets chasing after that Night Mare. She knows now that this horse does not belong to the Spirit of Halloween, but rather the shadow that lives under the bed in every child's imagination.
This was a mistake.
The corridor abruptly ends and she teeters on the edge of the drop-off, gazing out at the rolling mounds of… yeah, you guessed it, rock. "Fantastic," she grumbles, stepping down the ledge towards the center of the clearing. The Night Mare that had led her into this maze is perched by its master's side. She shoots it a scarlet glare before hissing at the man hunched over his globe set aglow with speckles of lights. "This had better be good, Pitch."
"So many lights," he mutters, receding from the strobe-globe. "To think that my victory was once within reach…"
She crosses her arms over her broad chest. "Look, there's a heat wave halfway across the world I have to be responsible for. I'm not in the mood to play Psychiatrist."
Pitch Black sighs and whirls around to face her. "You're as awkward as always, Blaze. A simple hello will suffice every now and then."
"Unless you want me to light this place up I suggest you tell me what you want."
The boogeyman fades into the black abyss of a shadow beneath him, disappearing from sight. His voice reverberates off the enclosed walls only a moment later, sending uneven pulses of sound across the room from every side. "I want to make a deal with you."
"A deal?" She muses, noticing that a shadow is rippling like the disturbed surface of water. "And why should I cut a deal with a snake like you?"
He materializes behind her and grips her shoulders. She involuntarily shivers against the touch. "Because you owe me," he says emotionlessly. "I've finally come to collect your debt, Blaze. You knew this was coming, sooner or later."
In the background, the Night Mare rears up in uneasy response to the tension accumulating in the atmosphere.
Blaze feels anger flare up in her chest, but then it smolders. "Can't argue with that… What do you want me to do?"
STORM FRONT
Hyped senses trace the children's cries in the black night engulfing him – a darkness painted gray with the heavy downpour of the rain. His ember glare scans the surrounding area, flicking to and fro, milking the town of every detail from curved architecture and slender design to dancing candle lights and flickering shadows. A musky, almost indescribable scent reaches his nose, sending a shiver down his spine.
This town is graced by an evil presence.
He doesn't know whether it is the lingering aftermath of Pitch Black's invasion that had just racked the city several months before, or if there truly is something much more genuine within its borders.
A break in the clouds reveals the moon and allows silver beams to cross along the rooftop, drenching the silent watcher in a soft glow. Then the blackness swallows him again.
The sleek droplets of a crying sky soak into his clothes through his thin cloak. From his perch on the ledge of a building in the center of the city he observes, waits, views the activities with a curious gaze like that of any well trained sentry. Years of experience have left him with a talent for learning to appreciate the little things – like the rain – all the while judging the even more miniscule things – like that glistening frost sliding along the window panes.
The watcher gradually rises, swinging the ax in his gloved grasp over his shoulder.
The boy harmlessly freezing the apartment building windows doesn't notice the assailant, but he can't shake the feeling that a set of prying eyes are studying him from somewhere in the darkness of the nighttime hours. He notes the uneasy atmosphere and, without a second thought, takes off, eager to return to the shelter of his home somewhere too cold for anyone to follow. Still his watcher stalks him.
The boy lands on the next street and listens for any shift in the air. Several moments later the rain lets up – and after a full five minutes of nothing but his own breathing, the downpour comes to an abrupt halt and the clouds scatter, allowing rays of light to filter into the cityscape.
It isn't until the assailant descends from a roof and lands with a gentle splash in the closest puddle does Jack Frost panic. Steeling his nerves he turns a piercing sapphire glare to the shadow poised across the road from him. The man is slender with a jack-o-lantern instead of a normal head, topped with a fedora; it moves to his facial expressions like a marionette, so Jack questions if it really is his actual head. He wears a black cloak and clothes composed of nothing more than pants and a button-up tucked into his waist line, although when he isn't moving the cloak encloses his frame and not much is visible.
"Do I know you?" Jack asks cautiously, whipping up his staff.
The watcher lowers his ax to his side, allowing thin rivulets of water to gather on the elegant blade and slither down to the edge, dripping from the points like tears. "I'm Grimm," he replies, stepping forward. His mouth, carved out to form jaws of jagged teeth, doesn't move as he speaks. "I'm the presence of Halloween. We have never come face-to-face before. But I am not here to hurt you, Jack Frost."
"I find that hard to believe," the Winter-spirit hisses, his staff crackling to life with bitter frost.
Grimm lowers his ax at the signal of the challenge. "Believe what you wish to, Frost. But someone wants to hurt you; as such the Man in the Moon asked me to protect you… and that's what I plan to do."
"What do you mean someone wants to hurt me?" Jack questions, bypassing the brief mention of the moon and lowering his staff.
He never receives a verbal answer - there is an explosion of fire from the road behind him, washing a wave of flames over the pavement. Grimm lunges between Jack and the blast of heat, forming a shield of shadows to effectively defend against the billowing attack. Gradually the blackness dissolves into particles to reveal a flaring humanoid emerging from the wall of fire across the street.
"Isn't that Blaze?" Jack inquires, noting that the entity is rippling with a crimson energy similar to his own blue-hued power filtering through the cracks of his staff. Blaze: Presence of summer, a woman with a temper that made Bunnymund seem like a saint and a tendency to raze everything even remotely flammable to the ground.
"Unfortunately," Grimm utters under a sigh.
The flames whirl around the entity and scatter into a blast of embers, leaving behind a slender woman with cerise hair that licks with flames and a form-fitting, black fire-retardant jump suit that is adorned with red stripes on her sides. Her scarlet orbs shimmer in the firelight. "Get out of my way, Grimm, or I'll burn you with the kid!"
Jack glances at her timidly. "Wait, whoa, hold up! Why are you trying to cremate me?"
"The Boss told me to," Blaze replies matter-of-factly, her fists igniting with flames. Fire laps outwards and she whips out her knives from her belt. "Nothin' personal Jacky, but if you hold still maybe this'll be less painful!"
Jack steps back. "That's a very nice offer, but I enjoy my life so I'll be on my way now"—
Blaze lunges for them with blinding speed, slamming her flaming knives into Grimm's ax which such force he is sent soaring. The Autumn-spirit impacts the wall and slides to the pavement melodramatically, chest on fire and ribs collapsing under each gasp for breath. Jack's staff strikes the asphalt beneath him and snow whips up, spiraling outwards into a funnel of ice and wind that drills in Blaze's direction. She slashes her knives at the twister, slicing it in two and obliterating the attack; flurries of scalding embers and snowflakes fill the street.
"Gotta do better than that," she hisses, launching a fire ball in his direction. A torrent of wind blasts him upwards into the sky and her attack impacts the pole on the street corner. "You can't escape me!" In turn her lower body fazes into flames and she shoots up after him like a rocket, singing the air with overwhelming heat. Jack whips up his staff just in time to deflect her knives.
"What do you want from me?!" He demands, parrying another blow.
She grapples him in a headlock, sliding the edge of her weapon against his skin. When he swallows the sharpened blade leaves a knick in his frigid skin. "Just your life," she purrs into his ear, heated breath warming his flesh, "Don't worry, though, I'm sure the Moon will find someone else to fill in your position soon enough."
Jack nails her in the gut with his elbow and snaps out of her grasp, following through with a spin kick that sends her soaring back. "Why do you want to kill me so badly? What did I ever do to you!?"
Blaze recovers from the blow, smirking broadly. "I told you before: it's nothin' personal. I'm just takin' orders from my boss."
Who could she be talking about? If Grimm claims he was sent by the Man in the Moon to protect me, then it might be one of the spirits. But I know the Guardians would never do this. And the only guy I know who really wants me dead is… "Pitch Black," he seethes, frost crackling to life within his staff.
"Smart kid," the Summer Spirit responds, "cute, too. What a waste."
Jack is stolen by another gust of wind that speeds him away from the city and towards the townhouses close appears beneath him and full-body tackles him from below, driving her knife into his torso; piercing layers of flesh and muscle with relative ease.
Jack Frost tumbles into darkness –
He reawakens when he slams into a building roof, ribs cracking under the pressure of the impact. Frantically he rolls to his knees, gagging on purple-hued blood that bubbles in his throat and spills from his lips. Searing pain spans from his wound into his chest and brain, forcing him to teeter on the edge of consciousness and nothingness. Gradually a sheet of ice forms over the gash, a temporary fix, but it would have to do for now.
"Jack Frost!" Grimm exclaims as he leaps the building front to his side, "Quickly, you have to leave!"
The Winter Spirit chortled. "It's alright, I can take her!" The duo turn their gazes upwards to meet Blaze's, who is glaring down at them in return (they figured she was taking a moment to plot an attack tactic or plan a getaway just in case the battle went south, but for now they were glad she was letting up). "She's powerful considering not a single child believes in her."
Children only believe in the Guardians, Grimm reminds himself, aware that he isn't believed in either, which means I can't protect Jack any more than he can protect himself. "We might not win this," he concludes aloud, helping Jack to his feet.
"Then what should we do?"
"We flee for now; warn the other Guardians." Bat wings explode outwards from Grimm's back and with a single flap he takes flight with the other spirit in his wake, riding Jack's air currents as they head north.
Blaze growls under her breath. "Enough with the running you annoying pests!" She blasts after them –
"Blaze!"
She skids to an abrupt halt and gyrates sharply, facing the man who just called her name.
Pitch Black is perched on his Night Mare, his expression emotionless and un-amused. At first she wonders if he's upset with her for not killing Jack Frost – or not killing him fast enough. "You did enough for today."
"But I didn't get a chance to put an end to that petulant Winter Spirit!"
"I know. I wasn't expecting a certain Halloween Spirit to interfere with my plans." His accusing glare turns up to the full moon hovering in the obsidian sky. "That's why I want to jump straight into the next phase. Killing Jack Frost isn't essential right now."
"But I'll get another chance, right?" Blaze asks hopefully, sheathing her knives and hovering over his horse; her fire dwindles and she lands right behind Pitch. He doesn't respond however, but she figures that she already knows his answer.
The Night Mare vanishes into the darkness of the sky.