Summary
AU: What if Jack didn't make Jamie believe in time, and Pitch took over, covering the world with fear and forcing the Guardians into hiding and they were forced to turn to an old "friend" for help? Hilarity, arguments, and mild insaneness ensues, of course.
Chapter One: Everything Goes Wrong
Jack was at Jamie Bennet's window, watching his light slowly flickering out. He knew he should do something, but he couldn't think of anything. The stuffed bunny dropped to the floor and he muttered, "I knew it."
Suddenly, the winter spirit heard rumbling in the distance and turned away, distraught and completely hopeless, when he saw something that drew fear in him; a wave of nightmare sand was coming over the small town, the Nightmare King leading the way with a sadistic smile on his face.
Meanwhile, a clattering of hooves shook the pavement and he turned to see a sight that crushed his hopes even more; the Guardians, all at their weakest. "Jack!" Tooth cried. "What are you doing here?"
"Same as you." he answered hollowly. "He doesn't believe anymore." She tumbled out of the sleigh, almost falling but he caught her.
"Then ve must make heem believe!" North butted in, using his sword as a cane to get out of the sleigh and hold himself up.
"Wait, where's Bunny?" Jack asked, slightly panicked.
The once-jolly man sighed. "Losing Easter took a toll on all of us. Bunny, most of all."
For a second, the spirit thought he had faded away, until a little ball of grey fur jumped up on the side of the sleigh. "Bunny?"
"If ya laugh, Frost, I swear to the Moon when I return to normal size I'll box yer ears." the little creature glared up at all of them.
That is, until a menacing, British voice said cruelly, "You have no idea how pleasing it is to me to see you like this." All faces snapped towards the voice of their enemy. "Weak. Unbelieved in."
North seemed to be having a silent argument with himself. After about 2 seconds, he finally came to a conclusion and pulled out a snow globe, but this wasn't a normal globe. It had a labyrinth in it, a winding maze with no hope of ever finding your way out. Santa Claus sighed and tossed the portal. "I thought I would never have to use thees." He muttered, but yelling in a louder voice, "EVERYBODY EEN, NOW!" Not questioning his order, they all jumped in to be met with quite a sight as the portal closed behind them.
Carter darted around her underground fortress, barking orders to her... minions, which were huge, 3 ft tall penguins, until a giant explosion shook the ground. Everyone froze. Explosions were extremely common there, but this type of one felt familiar, in a bad way.
Sure enough, a few seconds later a penguin waddled quickly up to the sixteen year old and honked something illegible to most humans, but made her electric blue eyes go wide with horror.
"What do you mean the exploding cows escaped?! HOW IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE?!" she shouted, not really expecting an answer.
The penguin just shrugged and gave her another honk, which would translate to, "I dunno. But you'd better take the tranquilizer 5000."
She nodded and said, "I'm on my way." then grabbing a silver gun, which could only be the tranquilizer, and loaded a couple darts before zooming off through the door that the penguin had come ran past about fifty different doors and turned so many corners that it was impossible to keep track until she arrived at a terrifying scene.
The demon cows, which were white with dark red splotches, were everywhere, snorting flame, tipping over panicked penguins, and, of course, exploding. That was the only way they could die, really, by committing suicide. However, they were not immune to tranquilizers, especially ones meant for dragons.
Carter hefted the gun and began the sniping. Unfortunately, after about ten were on the floor happily snoring out fire, the cows began turning their heads at her and staring with red eyes. She lowered the gun when she found that everything was quiet, it was just a stare down between her and the cows. 'Well, I'm pretty much screwed.' she thought to herself as the first on charged.
At the last moment, she rolled to the side and it ran into the wall, knocking itself out. "Huh," she muttered in fascination. "I guess that works too."
"Kaldak!" A penguin came up to her. "Could you get me a machine gun with tranquilizer darts loaded?" It nodded and waddled off again. The rest of the cows charged, sending Carter running around the room shrieking, "HURRY UP, KALDAK! OH MAN, I'M SCREWED, I'M SCREWED, I'M SCREWED!"
Jack stood and rubbed his head before looking around and gasping in amazement. He stood in a hallway, with arched doors going all the way down the long stretch. The carpet was a creamish color, and was thick and comfy against his bare feet. The only thing really extraordinary about it was the brown wooden walls, which were carefully carved with designs that went from plain and childish to extremely detailed, with delicate swirls and slight shading. One showed a woman's face, with caring eyes and hair that swept in luscious curls past her shoulders, but the image was cut off there. The Guardians weren't with him, he realized, and decided to explore a bit and see if he could find them.
Jack walked down the hall in amazement, still not sure where he was, as he stared at the drawings. The wall suddenly ended and immediately turned to stone, using torches instead of electricity to light the way, but the strange thing was that the carpet when on. Cave wall, comfy floor.
He kept walking for some time, unsure what to do, until he heard shouting up ahead. At first it was illegible, but soon it could be heard as, "I'M SCREWED, I'M SCREWED, I'M SCREWED!" and a girl could be seen running towards him.
She had dirty blond hair cut short, styled in the same way a boy's would be, along with electrifying, bright blue eyes. She wore black skinny jeans, red high-top Converse shoes, and a white, short-sleeve T-shirt with a black skull and crossbones adorning the front. At first he couldn't see what she was running from, until they appeared behind her. Demon. Freaking. Cows.
Her eyes spotted him and widened with more confusion, but nonetheless, she grabbed his wrist as she reached him. "Come on! They're going to flipping kill us! I hope Kaldak hurries up with the machine gun..."
"Who are you?" he asked as they ran, dodging blasts of fire from the stampeding cows.
The girl raised her gun and shot at the cow closest to them, which was an alarming two yards. It immediately stumbled and fell as its comrades avoided trampling it with their hooves. "Carter. Welcome to my Labyrinth, Jack Frost!" She flashed him a knowing grin.
The winter spirit was about to reply when a penguin blocked their path, holding a machine gun in his tiny wings. "Kaldak! Right in time, buddy!" Carter said in relief, grabbing the machine gun in one hand and carrying the penguin under the other arm. It honked in protest a bit, but then settled down.
He looked at her strangely. "Penguins carrying machine guns?"
She shrugged. "What's wrong with penguins?"
"Nothing, just... surprising."
They ran in silence for a few more minutes, until the girl paused at a door. Jack would've ran on had she not grabbed the collar of his hoodie and pulled him in. "Here we are." she grinned evilly as the cows follows them into the giant, white room with a single item in it: a straight, wooden staff with the top part it it breaking into several parts around a blue, slightly glowing gem.
She banged the staff on the floor, and a blue forcefield surrounded the trio. She set Kaldak down and snapped her fingers, causing the door to close and the click of the lock could be heard.
A sadistic smirk crept onto her lips as she set down the gun and slid the tip through a small hole in the forcefield. "You all have two choices. You can either make this a whole lot less violent than it needs to be by going into that door over there," as she spoke, a panel in the wall lifted, revealing a giant silver elevator, big enough for all the cows to fit. "Or, I can shoot you with the tranquilizer and we can drag you in there." Then she paused. "There's a third option too, I just decided. You can explode yourselves so that I can be rid of you forever and you wouldn't have to be bored all day in that little cave of yours."
"Carter," Jack whispered, since he felt that the situation just wasn't fit for talking normally. "You're talking to demon cows that breathe fire. Are they really intelligent enough to know wha-" she turned and placed a finger on his lips.
"Hush. I know what I'm doing." Sure enough, about five of the cows walked into the elevator, two exploded, and the rest (around 50) stayed, casting fierce glares at the teens-plus-a-penguin behind the glowing blue barrier.
Her smirk widened into a grin, and she simply said, "Then let the fun begin." and began shooting them down with excitement that couldn't be matched by anyone as the cows blew fire back at them.
Nicholas St. North stumbled out onto the white floor and looked around. He was in a room filled with... penguins... partying. Streams rained from random places in the room, balloons were tied onto chairs and metal hooks, and there were little stands everything giving away every type of dessert food, from ice cream sundaes to cookies to cake to pudding. Penguins were lounging on couches, lining up at the booths, and popping poppers. There was even one tied to a bunch of balloons and floating around the room.
North looked around in confusion, until one penguins came up to him and pecked him gently on the leg to get his attention. He looked down, then asked, "Vhere ees Carter Jones?" It honked something, which was probably, "Follow me." before waddling off, the big Russian tailing behind.
They passed through several hallways, each with different themes and designs, before arriving at the hallway with the wood walls with drawings on them. The penguin stopped right before the wall changed and shook his head, as if saying, "You're on your own now, buddy." then waddled back to the penguin party room.
The ex-Cossack frowned as he stared at the drawings. The teen had improved since they had last spoken, though that was a long ago. He froze when he came to a certain drawing. As he stared at it, it came to life and his mind was sucked it, reliving it.
All of the Guardians stood before the young girl. "I'm Carter. Carter Jones. I don't know who I am yet, but I plan to find out soon." A happy grin split her face. The scene switched to a dark forest, and a storm was raging on.
The four were towering over the girl, who had tears streaming down her face, but they could hardly tell because of the rain. "You betrayed us! Ve trusted you, and you almost had us killed!" the vision-North shouted.
She turned away. "I'm sorry! I didn't- he messed with it and-"
"We don't wanna hear it, mate. Yer a traitor, and we don't trust ya. Get out." Bunny snapped, glaring at her.
The teen stared up at them with shattered blue eyes. "I'm sorry! Please, let me explain!"
Tooth fluttered forward. She spoke softly, not with any anger, just sadness. "There's nothing to explain. You wired your machine to stop us, and that could have cost the world."
Sandy signed nothing, just stared at the ground with remorse.
Her eyes flicked at all of them, and she stood up. "It was an accident. But I suppose I understand. So I'll go, but when you need me again, and you will, I'm not sure I'll be willing to help you." She took out a circular pendant on a chain and pressed a button on it. "Home." was her last words, before she disappeared with a small flash.
The scene changed again, showing her curled up in fetal position, surrounded by blackness. One word flicked across his mind, 'Alone.'
He returned to the present, and the last picture was Carter in that position, but it had a slash mark across it, like claws. Gasping slightly, he backed away from it, turning and running down the hall until he came to a door that had a considerable amount of gun sounds, sadistic laughter, explosions, and mooing. Cautiously, he opened the door and stepped inside, only to be hit by a dart in the stomach. "Nice to see you too, Carter." he mumbled before collapsing on the ground like he had been hit by a gallon of Sandy's dreamsand.
"Oh." she squeaked, pausing. "Oops." A cow crept over to the snoring man and looked as though it was about to roast him, but she screamed, "OH NO YOU DON'T, I NEED TO GUILT TRIP THAT MAN!" and shot it in the rump. "Huh. Is that really the last one?" she poked the force field with the staff and it dissolved.
She looked at the ex-Cossack with an unreadable expression for around three minutes, but right when Jack was about to speak she asked, "You reckon he weighs more, less, or about the same as a cow?"
Disclaimer: Do I look like a person who was smart enough to create RotG? Unfortunately, no.
Anyway, woohoo! First fanfiction! I know, I know, it's vague, my profile picture doesn't match my description, and that yeah, it took me a hell lot longer to write this chapter than I expected. I apologize. But all will be revealed, sped up, and portrayed correctly in the next chapter! Plus, Sandy, Tooth, and Bunny are still missing.
If I were you, I wouldn't expect chapters this long on all of them. Usually, mine are about 1,500 words each, so I kinda feel proud of this chapter. Now, go review, follow, and favorite to your hearts content, my lovelies, and don't forget! Jack isn't a Guardian yet!