Guardians

As Kristoff guided the ice boat holding their sled through the air, Elsa could not help but think back on her time at Neverland. While she could have done without the whole abduction by pirates business, she was glad that she had got to meet Tink and Perri. Already she was beginning to miss them terribly, as well as Olaf, who had wanted to stay behind for a while longer with the fairies, but Elsa was looking forward to getting back home to see her parents again. Elsa had not nearly enough time with them since they had been rescued from their apparent death by Julian, thanks to those horrible pirates kidnapping her the night after Julian had returned to his quest to find his way home, and she was sure that they were terribly worried about her right now.

As they passed through the boundary that divided Neverland from the rest of the world, Elsa was dazzled by all the colors and patterns that filled the sky before them, and from Anna's gasp Elsa deduced that she was not alone in her delight. While she watched, a couple of unique patterns appeared and drew Elsa's eye. While the other patterns were beautiful but rather nondescript, these two appeared to take the form of faces. One was that of a smiling baby, maybe only a year old or so, with a growth of strawberry-blond hair. The other was of an older male. She could not tell how old he was, due to his long white hair and unblemished complexion, but his pointed ears and his impish expression almost gave him the look of a fairy.

While she was pondering what she was seeing, the "baby" laughed huge gust of wind ripped the boat sway and and nearly capsized them all out of the sled they were sitting in.

"Hang on!" Kristoff hollered while he gripped Anna's arm with one hand and held onto the sled and Sven's reigns with the other. Fortunately, it seemed the sled still had enough pixie dust remaining to keep them aloft.

"What's happening!?" exclaimed Anna as she pulled herself more securely to Kristoff's side.

"I think it was that baby!" Elsa hollered back as she caught her breath, "I think it somehow caused that wind!"

"What baby?" Anna asked her in confusion.

Before Elsa could answer her, the baby laughed even harder, and a stronger wind blasted the sled again. Knowing they might be in trouble if they fell out of the sled now, Elsa set to work with her powers. Though it was difficult, as her ice kept blowing away nearly as fast as she could make it, Elsa finally managed to create an ice cage that extended from the sled's sides and closed over their heads, as well as a support harness that kept Sven from being slammed against the sled or ripped away from them. Finally the wind stopped and the sky returned to a normal starry appearance, the two faces nowhere to be seen.

"Well," Kristoff said with an air of calm, trying to not appear ruffled by what just happened while Elsa dissolved the roll cage and harness, "that was exciting."

Suddenly Anna gasped and said, "Look!"

Elsa looked where Anna was pointing and her breath caught in her throat. Before them was not her beloved kingdom of Arendelle but rather another land altogether. Made up of many incredibly tall buildings and more lit windows than Elsa could possibly count, the huge city before her could not look more alien to her. Despite this, Elsa could not shake the feeling that she had seen this place before. Then, as the lights and silhouettes came together in her mind, it came to her: this city is nearly identical to the one Julian had first came to, after leaving his kingdom following the accident that claimed his brother's life. According to Julian's tale, however, this place should not exist for some time yet. Did that mean that unnatural wind that hit them while they were traveling from Neverland had not only blew them off course for home, but also sent them to another time? And if so, how would they get back home, let alone back to their own time?

As they flew past a giant statue of a crowned woman holding aloft a torch, which convinced Elsa that this was indeed the same place, she felt for a moment an urge to use Julian's pendant to call for him and request his aid to help them return home. As she started to reach for it, however, she recalled those faces she saw in the sky before that wind sent them here. While it was a longshot, Elsa felt that the owners of those faces, the people Elsa believed were responsible for this, were here somewhere. If that was the case, she first wanted to find them and, if possible, get them to send the four of them back home. Besides, before her abduction Elsa had never set foot outside her own kingdom, so her experience with the outside world was limited to books and through Julian's window. As such, Elsa felt a need to see this place with her own eyes.

"What are we going to do?" Anna asked in a small voice.

"We find whoever's responsible for bringing us here and make them send us back," Elsa responded.

"But this place is huge!" Kristoff countered, "There must be more people living in this city than in all of Arendelle! How would we know where to start looking?"

"I don't know," Elsa admitted, "but we have to try."

After flying around the city for around an hour, Elsa began to feel the hopelessness of the situation. Describing the city "huge" was turning out to be a major understatement. While she wasn't sure that this city's population was truly larger that the whole of her kingdom, the fact remained that there was more people here than she had ever seen in her whole life. Even if she and the others split up to search the town, it would likely take more than a month before any of them had any luck, and that was assuming that the ones they were looking for remained in one place (which would not be likely). Nor did it help that she was the only one to see those faces before they were blown off course.

When she saw that Sven was getting tired, Elsa suggested that they land on the roof of one of the buildings. While this building was shorter than most of the others they'd seen here (only 4 stories, judging by the number of windows she'd seen), its roof was large enough for Sven to land the sled on it easily, and the fact that the taller buildings on either side had no windows facing it made it ideal for them to use it to rest and gather their thoughts together.

"Julian's tales of this place did not do it enough justice," Elsa said mostly to herself, placing a hand to her spinning head.

"The air smells funny here," Anna commented, her voice coming off distorted due to her hand over her nose.

"That's most likely due to those horseless carriages down there," Kristoff said as he looked down from the street side of the roof, "I wish we could have found out from Julian before he left how they worked."

"Well, getting around will be a problem," Elsa stated thoughtfully as she paced back and forth, "Even if the pixie dust wasn't likely to wear off soon, we can't keep flying around like this. That'll likely end up drawing to us unwanted attention, as I don't think flying sleds are a common sight here. Also, we'll likely need to find a way to get some new outfits in order to blend in. However, I did not have anything of value on me when those pirates grabbed me, and I would have been stripped of those if I had. I don't suppose you two have anything we could trade for garments?" When Anna and Kristoff shook their heads no, Elsa rested her hand over her pendant as she continued, "I just wish I knew what to do here, but this place is completely foreign to me. If only there was someo…"

Elsa was interrupted by a sound like the crackle she associated with Julian's powers, accompanied by a loud and painful howl so inhuman that it sent shills down her spine and set her nerves on edge.

"What was that!?" Anna exclaimed fearfully.

"It came from the alleyway!" Kristoff stated as he hurried over to that edge, and Elsa and Anna followed him. When she got to the edge and looked down, what she saw made her eyes bug out. Down below she saw six people dressed entirely in black from head to foot, wielding strange warhammers that glowed as if Julian's lightning danced on the heads, all of whom were surrounding something Elsa could only describe as a monster. Easily seven or eight foot tall, this creature had slate grey shin and jet black hair, some sort of loincloth belted at the waist, and a pair of large leathery wings on his back.

Though it appeared that the beast was severely injured, it looked at first to Elsa as though the hammer wielders were defending the city against this fierce creature. Then Elsa caught a glimpse of movement behind the creature and realized it was standing protectively in front of a young woman. Dressed unlike any woman in her own country, she had black hair and was wearing black pants and a red jacket. She was also holding something in her outstretched hand in a way that suggested it was some sort of weapon much like Captain Black Adder's blunderbuss, and her stance suggested that she herself was a warrior. However, her apparent inability to hold the weapon level at the approaching men made it appear that she too was injured. Even with the powerful creature by her side, it didn't look as though they would last too much longer against such odds.

"What is it?" Anna asked fretfully.

"I don't know," Elsa answered, "but we have to help them."

" 'Them'?" Anna asked in confusion.

"The female warrior and….the creature defending her," Elsa said in response.

Anna looked shocked and confused for one moment, then her face cleared and she nodded determinedly. Then Anna gripped Elsa under her arms and together they stepped off the ledge, with Elsa using blasts of Arctic air together with Anna's still-active pixie dust flying ability to slow their decent.

"Uh, guys? What about…?" Kristoff started to ask, then he smiled and shook his head and, pulling out his climbing pick, began to clamber down the side of the building.

As her bruised body trembled from the electric shocks it had taken from the Quarrymen's hammers, Elisa cursed those thugs' rotten luck. If their first assault hadn't fried her cell phone then she would have called for backup by now. Additionally, Goliath had told the others that he was spending a quiet evening out with her, so they had no reason to expect help from the other gargoyles. Even if she were capable of holding her pistol still enough, Elisa would not get off more than one or two shots before the others would fall on them. Despite the hopelessness of the situation, Elisa would not show any weakness in front of these cowards.

"Shouldn't you boys be in jail, together with your boss John Castaway?" Elsa said with an air of ease.

"Nah, you had arrested everyone who had assaulted the train, and we ourselves had committed no crime, so your boys had no reason to hold us," one of the hooded Quarrymen responded cockily.

"Ah, but assaulting a police officer is a crime, so I imagine it won't be long before you rejoin Mr. Castaway in prison," Elsa responded determinedly.

"Assuming we were ever identified, but with no witnesses and no evidence you'll just end up another statistic: a senseless victim of a random mugging," a different quarryman replies smugly, "Particularly when no trace of your monster will ever be found."

"You will not touch her!" Goliath growled as he stood protectively in front of Elisa, pushing her back closer to the wall behind them.

"Afraid you have no say in the matter, monster!" the first Quarryman yelled as he raised his hammer high to deliver a brutal strike. Then, before Elisa's disbelieving eyes, a bolt of energy struck the hammer from above and it ended up being stuck to the wall behind him with a thick icicle. "What the…?" the Quarryman exclaimed as he tried in vain to dislodge his hammer from the wall while the temperature in the alley dropped several degrees.

"L-l-l-look! Up-p-p-p there!" a third Quarryman said through chattering teeth as he pointed towards the roof.

Elisa followed his gaze and her jaw dropped. Floating down from a nearby roof were a pair of young ladies who were maybe in their late teens or early 20's. One was dressed in a somewhat conservative dress that was green with white sleeves, had strawberry-blond hair almost the same shade as little Alexander Xanatos, and had something strapped over her shoulder and hanging behind her back. The other young woman had silvery white hair and was wearing a strapless baby blue dress that seemed to shimmer even in this low light. What had caught Elisa's attention about these girls, besides the fact that they were floating down slowly without the benefit of wings, was the fact that it looked as though the strawberry-blond was carrying the other from above, while the silver hair seemed to be generating a stream of wind that slowed their descent, a wind that made this alleyway colder and colder.

When they were close enough to the ground, the blond let go of the silver hair who immediately assumed a fighting stance similar to Goliath's. Then the blond landed beside the silver hair and unslung the rope from her shoulders to take into her hands a frying pan, brandishing it as though she was looking to use it to play tennis with someone's head. Was she serious?

"I believe that he told you people to not touch her," the silver hair said to the Quarrymen in a even tone, "I'd advise doing as he said, for I won't be asking you as nicely."

The Quarrymen looked at the girls in shock for one moment, then they burst out laughing, and Elisa could not blame them. Despite their somewhat dramatic entrance, the young ladies were dressed more for attending the Renaissance Festival or going to a prom rather than for combat.

"This matter doesn't concern you girls," one of the Quarryman addressed the girls while hefting his hammer over his shoulder, "so why don't you just head along home before you get hurt or catch a cold?"

"Don't you worry about us, mister," the silver hair said as she gravitated towards the wall nearest her, the one opposite of where Elisa herself was, "I don't think that we're the ones that are going to get hurt or 'catch a cold'."

Then the silver hair placed her hand on the wall and Elisa was shocked to see ice spreading quickly along the wall from where she touched it towards their end of the alley. As the ice neared them, large and sharp-looking icicles extended from the ice wall, forming a wicked kind of brambles that came mere millimeters from poking out an eye or puncturing a throat of the Quarrymen before they stopped growing. Then, as the blond shifted her grip on her skillet, the silver hair altered her stance while a pair of icicles grew in her hands in the shape of short, double-edged swords.

"Why you little…!" one of the Quarry men growled angrily as he acted as if he wanted to take on the young women's challenge, but one of the others gripped his shoulder as he said fearfully, "Are you crazy!? I'm not taking on a pair of witches and a gargoyle with just the six of us! Let's get out of here!"

As the others follow the lead of the last one who spoken and took off running away from the girls to the end of the ally, the one remaining Quarryman glared at them briefly as he bellowed, "This isn't over, you freaks! We'll be back!" Then he took off after the others as well and hopped into the open sliding door of a van that had appeared at the alley's entrance shortly before it took off.

Once the van was gone from sight, the silver hair girl released the ice swords and they dissolved into mist before they hit the ground, with all the ice in the alley disappearing along with it. Just then, Angela and Broadway swooped into the alley.

"Father! Elisa! Are you two all right?" Angela asked as she landed next to them.

"Angela? Broadway? How did you…?" Goliath started to ask.

"Angie and I were on a date a few blocks away when we saw that van driving suspiciously, so we decided to follow it," Broadway explained, his eves full of concern, "We saw the Quarrymen that came out of here, how did you guys manage to drive that many off?"

"We didn't, it was these two who had saved our lives," Goliath said as he gestured towards the girls. Then he bowed towards them, wincing slightly as the motion twinged his injured wing, and said, "You ladies have my eternal gratitude."

"Think nothing of it, good sir," the silver hair responded with a curtsey, "We are strangers in this land, but even we could see that what was happening here was wrong."

"None the less, what you girls did was very brave," Elisa said as she holstered her pistol, "My name is Elisa Maza, a detective with the Manhattan bureau of the New York Police Department, and these are my friends Broadway, Angela, and Goliath."

"A pleasure," the strawberry-blond girl said with her own curtsey, "I am Princess Anna of the Kingdom of Arendelle, and this is my sister, Queen Anna…"

Then she was interrupted by a screaming from above as a well-built blond male dropped neatly into Goliath's outstretched arms. The strawberry-blond suppressed a chuckle before continuing, "…and that's my boyfriend, Kristoff."

"Hello, sorry about that; loose brick," Kristoff said sheepishly as he gestured towards the brick piece still lodged on the end of his pick, "Thanks for catching me, though."

"Uh…don't mention it," Goliath said in confusion as he set Kristoff on his feet, then he turned back towards the girls and asks, "You say that you two are royalty? What brings you to this country?"

"To be honest, we're not sure….Goliath, was it?" Elsa said. When Goliath nodded in confirmation, Elsa continued, "The fact is that we were on our way back home when a strange wind had blown us off course. The next thing we knew, we were headed towards this city." Elsa then turned towards Elisa and asked, "You said that this place is called New York City. Would you please tell me what year it is?"

Elisa raised her eyebrow at the odd question, but simply said, "It's 1997."

Elsa then turned back towards her sister and said in concern, "It's just as I feared. We'd been sent forwards nearly 200 years!"

Goliath rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he mused, "That was no ordinary wind. Tell me, did any of you see anything unusual before this wind sent you here?"

Elsa nodded and said, "Faces. I saw a pair of faces in the sky: one was of a baby who had hair the same shade as Anna's, and the other was of a man with long, white hair and pointed ears."

"Alexander Xanatos and Puck?" Broadway guessed.

"But I thought that Puck was forbidden from using his powers by Oberon, except to train or protect little Alex," Angela countered in confusion.

"This would not be the first time that Puck had found some loophole in his restrictions, like the time he'd provided his 'help' to our brother and sister Coldstone and Coldfire," Goliath mused thoughtfully.

"You know who might have brought us here?" Elsa said quickly, her face flush with excitement and desperation, "Can you take us there?"

Goliath rubbed his injured wing as he answered, "Angela and Broadway can lead you to where the ones you may be seeking reside. I cannot glide on this wing, so I'll have to find a safe place to rest before dawn."

"I don't like the idea of leaving you behind here. Those guys could come back, and I don't think they'll stop looking just because you aren't exactly where they had left you," Elsa countered, then after a quick glance towards the rooftop she added, "If you don't mind, we have our sleigh parked up there, and I'm sure that Sven's rested up enough now that he can take you where you need to go."

" 'Sven'?" Angela asked.

"Sven's a reindeer and my best friend since I was young," Kristoff explained, "and he has pulled far heavier loads before in helping me with my ice cutting, so I'm sure…"

Elisa could not help the short burst of laughter that came out of her, despite what she had just been through. She then cleared her throat, still unable to smother her smile, and said, "I'm sorry, but you said that you have a reindeer-driven sleigh on the rooftop? What, did you guys fly here?"

Elsa, confused by Elisa's reaction, simply said, "Yes."

Angela, who had been brought up by humans, gasped and asked, "Like Saint Nick?"

"What? Oh!" Anna exclaimed in revelation, then with a small chuckle of her own she said, "Yes, we flew here in a sleigh, 'though we've never net Saint Nick. As my sister Queen Elsa had said, we were flying back home from Neverland when we were blown off course."

"Neverland? As in Captain Hook and Smee, Peter Pan and Tinker Bell…?" Broadway asked in bewilderment.

"Well, we never encountered anyone named Captain Hook or Peter Pan, although there was a cabin boy named Smee among the crew of Captain Black Adder, who had kidnapped me and taken me to Neverland, where Tinker Bell and her other fairy friends rescued me from my imprisonment," Elsa clarified.

"Are you serious?" Elisa asked in confusion, then her legs began to wobble as the fight and the events of the last couple of hours took their toll, prompting Goliath to reach out to steady her as she said, "Thanks, but all this is just a little much."

"I agree it's all a bit overwhelming," Goliath said to Elisa, then he turned to Elsa and continued, "but if your offer for a ride is genuine, than I would gratefully accept."

"It'd be my pleasure," Elsa replied, then she turned and, with a blast of energy that came from her hands, created a short but wide platform of ice by one of the alley's walls before saying, "Here, climb on. I'll get us back to the roof."

Angela and Broadway, who had not yet bore witness to Queen Elsa's powers, stared in shock and amazement as Broadway exclaimed, "Jalapeña!"

As the platform slowly rose into the air, raised by the platform's own growing pillar-like legs, Elisa had to wander and admire how something that looks so fragile could possibly hold the weight of all of them, particularly considering the gargoyle's clawed feet. Equally awe inspiring was how this "Queen Elsa" was able to do something like this with no visible effort whatsoever. Elisa had wondered if perhaps Elsa and her sister were, in fact, both children of Oberon, like Puck and Odin, or perhaps Halfling descendants, like young Alexander and his mother Fox.

When they reached the roof, Elisa's jaw dropped slightly as she said, "I don't believe it. There really is a sleigh and a reindeer up here."

As the reindeer Sven saw them, he began to prance in place as his tongue lolled out happily, his mannerisms reminding Elisa more of those of a dog like Bronx.

"Hey there buddy, sorry we left you behind like that," Kristoff said as he walked up and scratched Sven on the head between his antlers, "You rested up enough for another ride?"

As Sven Happily bellowed his acknowledgement, Goliath said apprehensively, "One moment, there might be a problem here. While this sleigh may be large enough to hold me, I figure there would only be room enough for three others to ride inside. While Angela and Broadway would be able to follow once they gain enough altitude for gliding, I do not wish to leave Elisa back here. As you said, the Quarrymen may return, and they would surely take their revenge out on her."

"I could carry one of them back to the castle," Broadway offered.

"That's okay, Elsa and Kristoff can ride back with you guys," Anna said to Goliath and Elisa, then as she floated off the ground and performed a short loop-de-loop she added, "I'd like to get in some solo flight time while I can."

As Angela and Broadway goggled at the younger sister, Elsa asked in concern, "Are you sure? We don't know how much longer the pixie dust will last."

"I'll be fine, Angela and Broadway can catch me if I start to fall," Anna assured her, "I'd be more worried about you guys if the dust wears off mid-flight."

"It'll be okay. I can catch us with an ice ramp and a soft blanket of snow if that happens," Elsa assured her in return, "Just….be careful, okay?"

"I will," Anna acknowledged, then she called out as she flew up into the air, "Come on, guys!"

As Angela and Broadway began to scale the wall of one of the neighboring buildings, Kristoff, Goliath and Elisa climbed into the sled while Elsa covered the roof in a thin layer of hard-packed snow.

"Are you sure that this is safe?" Elisa asked uneasily.

"Don't worry," Elsa assured her as she finished and climbed into the seat beside Kristoff, "So long as we don't encounter any more sudden, unexpected winds, then we'll be fine."

"What?" Elisa cried put in a sudden burst of panic, but before anyone could answer Kristoff gave the reins a snap and Sven pulled the sleigh forward in a jolt of speed. Even though she had went gliding in Goliath's arms a good number of times since they met almost three years ago, and even went gliding herself once before back when she'd been briefly changed into a gargoyle herself (courtesy of Puck), Elisa still felt her heart leap into her throat as she felt the sleigh dip as it raced over the roof's edge. Then, amazingly, they were flying though the air! While it wasn't the same as gliding along with Goliath embracing her, Elisa had to admit that it was exhilarating in its own way. As she watched, she saw the younger sister do a barrel roll around the airborne Angela and Broadway as she took the lead, whooping in her delight.

"Showoff!" Broadway called out in mock admonishment, and Anna laughed in response.

"So where is that we're going?" Elsa asked Goliath and Elisa.

"There, our home," Goliath answered as he pointed ahead of them, "Castle Wyvern."

As Elsa saw where he was pointing, she gasped in astonishment. There, atop the tallest building in the city, was an old-fashioned castle done in Scottish style. As Elsa took in the wondrous sight, Goliath continued, "There, in the castle, we will find safety and refuge. There, in the castle, you may find the answers you are looking for."