Okay... I know I should be working on my Young Justice Fanfiction right now since it's been a while since I've updated it but Rise of the Guardians has kind of taken over my brain and I blame it on Jack Frost... and just a little on Bunny. Cause Bunny is cool too. Anyway, for those of you who read Smooth Criminal I apologize and please don't kill me. I love you all. For those that haven't and are just as big Jack Frost fans as I am Hello and nice to meet you.

Disclaimer: I don't own Rise of the Guardians or Jack Frost. I am however the prideful owner of the Rise of the Guardians 3DS game and several posters which little the walls of my room. My mom thinks I'm childish and my little sis is really jealous.


Chapter 1: Stranded

~*~Jack~*~

It was still early in the year for snow, especially a snowfall as thick as what was falling over the northeastern areas of Canada. Usually winter didn't sweep down from the north until at least the middle of November, but this year winter had reared its frosty head in late October and by the beginning of the following month there was a fair amount of snow and ice covering everything. The universe, it seemed, had decided to play a small practical joke on the unsuspecting citizens of Northern Canada. Well, not the universe really, because Jack Frost was truly the one responsible for the early snow.

The winter spirit seemed to take delight in causing his good natured chaos. His ever present grin never left his face when he was in the presence of playing children, especially if they believed in and saw him. Besides who was he to ruin their fun by allowing the snow to melt early?

Letting out a short chuckle the white haired youth (Who really wasn't a youth if you looked at his age.) shot through the air, riding the wind to where ever his long time friend decided to take him. Thick flurries of snow trailed behind him, expelled from the end of his staff whenever he wished has he flew leisurely through the air. There was already a thick blanket of the white stuff covering many of the towns and cities he sailed over but an extra snow day never hurt anybody. And in Canada he had to work extra had to accomplish that because in the northern regions school was rarely cancelled for anything short of a blizzard. Where was the fun in that?

Now, Jack knew he probably should have started helping spread winter to the other parts of the world, Moscow was in desperate need of a snow storm, but it was still early in the season and he had yet to become bored with Canada.

As he flew over a small town, one with many outlying houses and farms surrounding it in several directions for a few miles, he spotted something he was not accustomed to seeing in the sky. At first he thought it was a cloud, reflecting in the light of the moon until he remembered that it was a new moon and that Manny wasn't shining on anything. So then how was it that a silvery, wispy dog was sitting in the air staring at him?

Jack slid to a stop in midair as the strange animal got closer and he could see that the dog was indeed silver and made of what looked to be a mist of some sort, despite the clearly defined features of the creature's form. From Jack's experience with dogs, which could see him though some people could not, he could identify this dog a beagle by the floppy ears and relative smallness compared to other breeds.

"Hey boy. Now how'd you get all the way up here?" He asked gliding forward, but as he did so the dog perked his head to the side and took several steps backwards through the air causing the winter spirit to stop. The dog stopped just as he did, its tail wagging back and forth and Jack couldn't help but to raise an eyebrow.

He tried approaching the dog again only for the strange, unearthly creature to repeat its actions by backing up so that the distance between the two always remained the same. Still its tail wagged happily and he gave a little yip. Several more times Jack tried to get closer but the little dog always backed up until the winter spirit started to get frustrated. Just when he was about to call it quits and leave, the small pup darted forward and snatched Jack's staff right out of his hand.

Now, since fighting Pitch, Jack had learned that his staff was not the source of his power as he had once believed, but he was still rather attached to it and didn't hesitate to try to retrieve it.

"Hey!" he called after the dog. "Give that back!"

The dog looked back at him and lowered the front of his body to the ground, staff held tightly in his mouth and tail wagging wildly. If Jack wanted his staff back he was going to have to give chase that much was very clear.

And so Jack did give chase, trying to get a hold of his staff before the dog could react, but the small creature was fast and he was already off, zigzagging through the air in random directions to throw the winter spirit off. The chase only lasted a few minutes but Jack actually found himself enjoying the game, you know if only his prized possession wasn't in the hands, well paws, of some ethereal dog creature.

Eventually though Jack did managed to catch up, plucking the stick right from the dog's mouth as he dove down from above, throwing the creature off and confusing it utterly. Jack laughed at the decidedly bewildered expression on the dog's face before he realised that he was still falling. He tried to put on the brakes, to slow his decent but instead he just smacked into the ground, a large snow bank in the center of a small forest clearing breaking his fall.

He popped out of the snow not seconds later and brushed it from his hair and sweater. The cold didn't really bother him but his clothes were covered with enough frost as it was. He looked around for some sign of the dog but the creature was gone, vanished like it was never there to begin with.

"Hey wind!" He called deciding that he had more important things to do than chase a dog. As much fun as it had been, he really was getting behind schedule. However the wind didn't answer his call in fact nothing more than a gentle breeze touched his skin and he frowned calling for the wind again.

Still the wind did not answer and he tried several more times going so far as to agilely climb one of the tall pines, only for the branch he was standing on to snap and send him crashing to the ground again. Thankfully for him being immortal had its perks, however one of them was not immunity to pain and falling nearly two stories through trees a second time in one night was decidedly painful, more so because the second time he ended up landing on a fallen log instead of in the snow. It was a good thing one of the perks was a higher tolerance for pain.

Jack was lucky that there were no kids around at the moment because her used several of North and Bunnymund's favorite curse words, as well as some he had picked up before he'd me them. When he regained his breath and walking no longer hurt as muc0,h he decided to take stock of his surroundings. If he was going to be stuck here he might as well find out where here was.

As far as he could tell he was surrounded by a large expanse of forest, which wouldn't have been a bad thing if he could remember which way was the town was located. If he could get to town then, at the very least, he might be able to find some kids who believed in him and could help him contact the other Guardians. But because of the dog, who had made sure to run in every different direction during the chase, it was impossible for him to tell which way civilization was unless he climbed another tree and he wasn't keen on falling again.

So that only left him a few options. One: he could take off in a random direction and hope he came across the town. Or two: stay here and hope that the wind picked him up so he could continue on his way. Winter was a natural phenomenon that happened whether or not Jack kept up with it. Still it was hardly any fun if he couldn't alter its course for a snow day every once in a while. Or at the very least cause a little havoc.

A sudden, friendly bark to his left let Jack know that his friendly ghost dog friend had not actually left him alone after all. He turned with a slight frown on his usually smiling face, more than a little irritated with the creature and pointed his staff at it with one hand.

"Okay buster, I know you have something to do with getting me into this mess, so how do I get out of it?" he demanded feeling a little foolish to be demanding anything of a dog like it could understand him. Even if the dog seemed to be less than corporeal.

However the dog surprised him yet again. It barked at him from where it sat, it's oddly vacant eyes staring right at him before it got up and turned to walk into the trees. It stopped after only a few steps and looked back at him, as if waiting for him to catch on.

Jack assumed this meant that he was supposed to follow but he was hesitant, after all following this creature was what had gotten him stuck here and he was willing to bet it also had something to do with the unresponsive wind. And if it turned out it didn't, he was sure that it did at least know what was going on. The dog barked at him again.

"Alright, alright, but don't take my staff again." He said walking slowly after the dog. It was better than wandering around aimlessly.

Keeping a close eye on the dog as they went, Jack noticed a few things about it that he hadn't before, small things that he had missed. For one, the dog wasn't silver as he had first thought but a glowing blue mesh of swirling mist and it was see through like an actual ghost would be. Last but not least, even though it was walking on the snow it left no prints. Even Jack left footprints in the snow when he walked, though he wasn't sure if mortals could see them unless they believed.

Jack would be lying if he said he wasn't a little creeped out by this creature. He'd deny it if any one asked him of course but he was still more than a little wary. What if it really was a ghost. Were ghosts even real? The Guardians were real so why couldn't ghosts actually exist? He needed to stop thinking about this or he really would end up freaking himself out.

Just as Jack was beginning to think that the dog was leading him around just for the sake of getting him more lost, the trees around them began to thin and he saw a light in the distance. The closer they got to the light the more the dog's form seemed to fade until, when they reached the tree line, it was completely gone and Jack was left alone to stare at the small home in the clearing of the trees.

The house itself seemed unremarkable, made in an old style of wooden logs with a stone chimney. It had two stories and he suspected there to be a cellar as well because covered under some snow he thought he saw set of stairs and a small doorway hidden by and indent in the ground. There were also a few other buildings further off from the house as well, one, a barn by the looks of it, surrounded by a high fence that was partially covered with snow. He realised after a moment that it was a horse stable when he saw the hoof prints that had been made recently on the inside of the enclosure.

"This... wasn't exactly what I was hoping for." He said after a moment as he stared at the house. Lights were still on inside even though it was getting late into the night. With no other option the winter spirit figured that he might as well take a look. Maybe whoever lived in the house had children who could see him. The dog was gone at any rate so it was unlikely that he'd get anymore help from it.

Walking up to the house instead of floating like he would have had the wind listened to him he peeked inside the window where the light was brightest. The inside of the house was more modernized than the outside, the main floor was merely one big room split by a island counter that separated the kitchen from what appeared to be a living room. The counter itself seemed to also act as the dining area if the high chairs were any clue.

Shifting to another window to see the living room side better, because there was no one in the kitchen, he spotted someone sitting on the couch. A young woman, with dark hair who was reading a book. She couldn't have been any older that he was, well at least physically and he spotted a few children's toys littering the small room which he noticed was lit by only a lamp and a blazing fire in the fireplace. That meant that there was at least one child here and all he would have to do was wait until the next day to see if he could get some help. Provided the child could see him of course.

The next day Jack was still sitting outside the house, rather, he was sitting on the house, his legs dangling over the edge of the roof as he waited for the child he thought to be in the house to come outside. It was a weekend, so he wouldn't have to worry about school and he had seen the older girl already up and about coming outside twice already to go into the horse stable.

He'd followed of course, curiosity getting the better of him, that and he'd been bored nearly to tears while he waited for someone to come outside.

"So why aren't your parents out helping you with this?" He inquired as she hefted some hay into the stable of one of the four horses that were stabled in the barn. The animals had noticed him but the girl had not as she brushed some stray hair from her face and out of her light green eyes. She was pretty Jack noted with some amusement when she wrinkled her nose as one of the horses butted her with its head and unbalanced her.

"Hey now Boreas, behave." She scolded the horse which was by far larger than the other three with shaggier hair like he was built for cold climate. Stick some antlers on its head and Jack would have sworn that it was one of North's beastly reindeer. The horse it seemed did not want to listen to her and pawed the ground a few times its dark eyes fixed on Jack who just grinned at the animal.

The girl looked behind her, like she was trying to see what the animal was looking at but her eyes passed right over him like he knew they would. It was uncommon for anyone over the age of fifteen to see him. From the ages of ten and up the number of people to believe in him dwindled until hardly anyone close to his physical age actually noticed him. Sometimes he found himself wishing that at least one teenager could see him once in a while, it would be nice to talk to someone taller than four feet. Not that he didn't like the kids; it was just lonesome sometimes being so much older than them. Then again he was older than all mortals.

With a sigh and a glance to the wrist watch on her wrist, the girl gave each of the horses one last pat before she trudged out into the snow and back to the house. She left the door open long enough for Jack to slip into the front room as she stamped the snow off of her thick winter boots then peeled them off and went to the stairs.

"Willow! Are you up yet?" She called up to the second level and there was a reply from above that Jack couldn't really make out as he was busy inspecting what looked like a collection of Native American artifacts that had been set on the mantle of the fireplace.

A few minutes later his attention was drawn away as a child no older than ten or eleven bounded down the stairs toting a small dog stuffed animal in her arms. She looked similar to the older girl though her hair was lighter and curlier where her older sister's was straight. They shared the same eyes though.

"There you are." The older girl said turning from the stove where she had begun making breakfast while she waited for the child.

"Morning Atti" Willow mumbled sleepily as she pulled herself up onto one of the chairs at the counter. She rubbed her eyes and shivered as Jack moved to sit in the chair opposite the child. He had been hoping that she could see him but like her older sister her eyes passed right over him and he felt himself deflate a little. "Can we go outside and build a snowman today?"

Jack sighed and propped his chin in the palm of his hand as he leaned his elbow on the counter. There went his fool proof plan for getting out of here. The wind hadn't responded to him all night and he had the feeling it wasn't going to anytime soon. However the mention of play in the snow lifted his spirits a little. He could at least have a little fun today, maybe make a believer out of the small girl who was now fully awake and scarfing down a plate of scrambled eggs as if she hadn't eaten in days.

Jack heard her sister(Atti was it? He wasn't going to remember that later.) scold the girl for eating so fast but the little girl was already done of the food, hurrying to place the plate in the sink then rush over to the coat rack where she struggled to pull her coat from the peg that was a little too high for her.

"Willow you left Poochie at the table!" Atti called picking up the stuffed dog and setting on a chair as she passed to help the girl take her coat and snow pants down from the peg. Five minutes and a lot of squirming later as Jack laughed at Atti's attempts to get the little girl to calm down, the two girls were both ready to go outside. Willow in full snow gear and her sister sporting only a coat, a scarf and some mittens that looked like they were hand knitted.

"Come on!" Willow urged pulling her sister out of the door as soon as it was open. Jack was quick to slip outside ahead of them so he wouldn't be stuck inside and he walked through the snow in front of them turning so he was walking backwards to watch the two.

Willow immediately jumped into the snow, eager to play but Atti seemed a bit more reluctant since she was less readily dressed. Now we can't have that. Jack thought as a mischievous grin spread across his face. He waited until the older girl's back was turned before he leaned down and shaped a snowball into his hands. But he didn't throw it at her instead he tossed it at the younger of the sisters, hitting her squarely on the arm and surprising her so much she stopped rolling the ball that was to become the base of her snowman.

"Attica!" She whined with a giggle, thinking it was her sister who had thrown the snow. It helped that a little of Jack's magic had worked on her, compelling her to finish what he started purely for the fun of it.

Attica didn't turn fast enough as a snow ball was launched her way and hit the back of her neck the cold substance going down the back of her shirt and she yelped in surprise which Jack found highly amusing. He was nearly on the ground laughing as she hopped around trying to get the snow out of her clothes before she turned on the smaller girl with a playful scowl on her face.

"You're going to pay for that Willow... you have five seconds to run." Attica warned.

Willow's eyes widened in mock fear and she scrambled to get as far from her sister as she could before she was caught. Jack followed after her laughing the whole way as Attica began advancing in the snow, instigating a chase that soon had the previously unmarred powder completely covered in tracks.

"Run!" Jack encouraged the little girl, doing his best to trip up the older of the two where he could. He was having way too much fun playing around with these two even though they couldn't see him or recognize his part in their fun. For a little while he almost forgot about his predicament and why he wanted them to believe.


Whew... I hope you all like this, it's kinda been milling about on my computer and in my brain since like November when I first saw RoTG... and then three times after that. I'm sad it isn't in theaters anymore and that I have to wait until March to get the movie. That two whole frigging months!

I really don't know if I'll be continuing on with this fic or not... I already have four other chapters written out and there are plots afoot in my brain so provided my well of inspiration doesn't dry up and I get some positive response from this I'll likely continue. Also check out Atti and Willow on my Deviantart page. I did a really cruddy drawing of them last night for giggles. peter-the-otaku deviantart com/art/Attica-and-Willow-346942254 just remove the Spaces and replace them with dots.