Based on the song: You Found Me by The Fray
Inspired by the Youtube video: Where Were You - Jack Frost by oOZewyOo (Link on my page)
Might add more chapters. Time will tell.
Summary: Jack has been alone for as long as he can remember. When he finally find someone who can see him, things don't really turn out the way Jack wants them to.
Jack is being pushed away by the Guardians, tormented by Pitch. Mention of Baby Tooth dying.
All he had ever known and felt were loneliness.
From the moment that the moon had awoken him till now, no one had ever been able to see him. Sure, sometimes he had allowed himself some glimmer of hope, letting himself believe that someone had seen him, but in his heart he knew it wasn't true. He knew it wasn't possible. He often wondered why he questioned why it felt so strange that no one saw him, it was after all the norm for him to not be seen, so why did it feel so strange? It just felt so off. It wasn't right. It wasn't fair. Why were everyone else allowed to be seen, heard and have someone to play with - everyone but him?
The first few years Jack had done everything in his power to make people notice him. Sometimes he had pretended to be part of a family, to be loved, to have some place to call home. But his own delusion always got shattered in the end so he gave that up pretty quickly. That's when it really took hold – the loneliness.
When you are alone for such a long time you soon forget that you are alone. You accept the loneliness and take it to heart. Soon Jack forget that 'wanting' feeling, the one that let's you know that something is missing. He had a hole in his heart but he had forgotten why it was there. When that happened Jack filled that hole with something else. Anger. Anger towards anyone that were happy, anger towards everyone that have someone and last he filled it with anger towards himself. The anger kept him occupied, but it didn't quite fill the hole.
Jack had almost completely forgotten why he was feeling so empty, why he had filled his life with pranks, why he was talking to the wind like it was his friend – that was until he had landed in a small town. A town that Christmas were soon due to come but there were almost no snow in the whole town, just ice and cold wind. Jack had planned to bring forth a huge snowstorm during the night while all the kids were sleeping, he had already started up by bringing with him some snow clouds. He were just about to start letting the snow rage down when he heard laughter – a child's laughter.
He turned around, trying to pin-point where the laughter came from. He took out towards the sound. A child shouldn't be awake at this hour. There, there it was again, the laughter. It was most definitely a child laughing. It sounded like it where a block away, just around that corner – there! A child. Jack froze. The child was talking to a big man, a man in red. He had white hair just like Jack. His voice was deep with a bit of an accent. The child was smiling and the old man was smiling right back. None of them seemed to have notice or seen Jack, but then again Jack hadn't expected them to either. Jack felt that gripping pain in his chest again – jealousy. They seemed to have so much fun, just standing there talking with each other.
Then anger hit him, he wanted to bury them in deep deep snow. Why should they been allowed to have so much fun just talking? What was so great about having someone to talk to anyway? They should just freeze on the spot, not to been seen again until spring. The big man in red looked up – up at the sky. Seeing the snow fall made the child laugh even more. The big man made an even bigger smile, and then when he lowered his gaze to look at the small child infront of him, laughing, he and Jack's eyes meet.
He smiled at Jack. Or did he? That couldn't be possible.. Could it? The big man in red continued to look at Jack, offering him a kind smile.
"Conan!" Jack jumped a women was running out from one of the houses, in her hand she was holding a small jacket. "What are you doing out here in the cold?"
The boy simply smiled at his mother, pointing towards the big man. "Santa is here."
"Don't be silly! Come in right this instant before you catch a cold." The women grabbed the boy's arm and pulled him back into the house. While being dragged in the boy waved towards the big man that he had called Santa. And the man called Santa waved back while laughing loudly.
When the door had been closed the big man in red pulled out a pipe from his coat and lightened it. He turned his gaze back to Jack and gave him a smile. "My dear boy, what do you want for Christmas?"
Speechless... Jack was absolutely speechless. He had to look around him to make sure they were alone, that the man called Santa really were looking and talking to him. All the anger he felt, all the jealousy went away. Santa chuckled at the stunned boy in-front of him. He wasn't suppose to be out and about this close to Christmas, but there had been a young boy on the verge of losing his faith in the guardian of wonders, so he had felt the need to leave his workshop for an hour to pay the boy a visit. He hadn't expected to meet another boy in the street that late at night.
The chuckle had brought Jack back, the man could see him. He had so many questions, so much to tell the man. But the most important question were - "Where have you been?"
The question made the man laugh. Children always said they believed in him, some really did, others tried to and some just tried to believe for the sake of others. Through the years that he had been a guardian he had realized that most children needed to touch him to believe that he was real. He put away his pipe and grab the young boy's shoulders. He gave his best smile to the boy and said, "Ask anything."
He was treating Jack like a child. He might look like one, but he had lived far longer then any child had ever done. Somehow this filled Jack with anger. How could this man just laugh Jack off? He had been alone so long, looking all over for someone to see him. He had been through so much pain, with no one by his side. He backed away so the man's hands no longer could hold his shoulders. "Where were you?"
The question seem to confuse the man. So jack decided to make it even clearer. "Where have you been? I've been looking so long for someone to see me, to hear me." Somewhere along the realization that the man in red could see him Jack had unintentionally stopped the snow, but now it was raging down again. "No one has ever been able to see me. I've walked this earth for 200 years searching for someone to tell me who I am, or just someone to talk to. Why haven't you answered when I've called?"
Santa just then realized what the boy was. The women and the boy hadn't been able to see him, which could only mean that it was the boy that the northern winds had whispered about. The boy that they called Jack Frost. The boy who brought winter with him wherever he went. A winter spirit. This wasn't a child who needed his help, nor did Santa need his faith. The belief of a dead kid won't help you a lot when you have billions of other kids that needs you in just 4 short days to deliver presents. "Son!" Santa stepped closer to Jack and lowered himself down so they were eye-to-eye. "Your job is to bring winter, mine is to bring wonders to the children of this earth. You do your job, and I will do mine." He backed away from the winter spirit and started to walk away towards his sleigh. He got into the sleigh all while avoiding to look at Jack for even a second, but before he took off he took one last look at the winter spirit. "Do your job son, and you will be rewarded. I must be off now – Christmas is in 4 days." He flicked the reins to the sleigh making the reindeers start moving. "Merry Christmas Jack!" And with another flick he was off.
Left in the street stood Jack. Confused, angry. But now he knew that he wasn't alone. He knew some could see him. Spirits. He needed to find more, he needed to find them all.
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...…...100 years later...
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Jack had found other spirits, he had found the Guardians, but none of them had time for him. For them all he was were a spoiled brat. Someone who ruined their hard work. He had picked up a small fairy that followed him around. Jack wasn't sure, but he think it was one of the Tooth fairy's fairys. All those fairys ever thought about was work work work. So he had been surprised when this small fairy had decided to follow him around. It made him feel less lonely to have the fairy with him.
Still the words of Santa echoed through his mind. It had been hard being pushed away by everyone, but it had hurt the most to be pushed away by the first one to have seen him. Even though Santa had hurt him, he had tried over and over to get his approval. He had tried over and over to get into the workshop at the North Pole, only to be stopped by the yeti's.
When he finally had given up on the Guardians, that's when it had happened. He had been thrown into a red bag, tossed around only to find himself on the floor in the home of Santa. He crawled out from the red bag, looking up he got greeted by not only the guardian of wonders, but the ones of memories, hope and dreams as well. Before he could understand what was happening there was a huge bang and suddenly there were elf's and yetis everywhere playing music. What had the stupid red man just said? Becoming a guardian? Becoming one of them? The ones who had pushed him away? Jack lifted his staff high in the air, before slamming the end of it hard into the ground sending out a blast of frost and a cold wind around him. The music stopped, the guardians had taken cover behind a book.
"I'm not becoming a guardian!" Jack looked angry over at the guardians still covering behind the huge book. "You where never there for me." None of them seem to no what to say. To reply back to calm the winter spirit. The sandman nudge at Santa, urging him to reply.
"You don't seem to understand Jack. The moon choose you, we need you." Santa had lowered the book and walked closer to Jack while speaking. He had a stern look on his face, trying to show the winter spirit how seriously this was.
Jack made a sarcastic chuckle, "You need me? Where were you when I needed you?" Santa opened his mouth as to respond but Jack continued before he had time to reply, "Where were you?" His cold ice blue eyes were looking hard at at the red man in-front of him, making sure he understood that the next word coming out of his mouth could make or break this little guardian deal.
Santa made a hand jester towards the clock on the wall over the fire place, "Jack we don't have time for this! Don't you understand how important this is?"
Jack snorted and turned away walking towards the door. "Time. Time is all I have old man, but time for me is something you and the guardians never had before, not until now when you NEED me."
"Jack, we need you to defeat Pitch and save the children." The were no traces left of the jolly man in Santa's voice anymore. Jack turned around to look at the guardians, Pitch, he knew him very well. He knew how dark that man could be. How he brought nothing but pain where he went. He hated the guardians, but he hated Pitch even more.
He had been alone for so long. When he had finally found someone to be friends with, the little fairy, Pitch had taken her away from him. He had promised Jack to replace the fairy, to become his friend instead, but all he had brought Jack were more pain.
All the memories of the small fairy came rushing back, he needed to leave the room. He needed to get some air. He couldn't breath, it felt like a cold hand were gripping and squeezing his chest. Everything became like a blur, it was like looking through a thick fog.
When the fog finally cleared he found himself sitting and looking out one of the windows of the Santa Claus' mansion. He heard footsteps behind him, soon the red man himself joined Jack on the window sill. Jack looked up at the man, with his eyes gleaming with tears that didn't want to spill. He thought that the man of wonders were going to be sympathetic with him, understand how much they had hurt him. The face that meet him wasn't the one he was expecting. It looked tired, and angry.
"Jack, we need you. Without you all is lost. Do you know how dangerous Pitch is?"
Jack couldn't believe it, of course he knew how dangerous Pitch were, of course he had planned to help them, but he just thought they would feel a little bit sorry for ignoring him for all those years. He couldn't stay here. If he stayed he might hurt them. He got up and started to walk towards what he hoped was the door to leave the mansion. A hand on his shoulder however stopped him. "Jack if you leave now, you will be truly alone." Santa had turned Jack around so their eyes meet.
Alone. Jack knew the meaning of that word all too well. "In the end, everyone ends up alone." Santa removed his hand from Jack's shoulder. "I wasn't always alone you know old man. A couple of years ago I found a fairy badly wounded. I took care of her and soon she was healthy again."
The old man, as Jack phrased it, sat himself down on the window sill again, listening to Jack's story. "I thought she was going to return to her mistress."
"Toothiana?" Santa questioned. "I heard she lost one of her fairys in a snow storm. She blamed you for it."
Jack didn't look at Santa but continued speaking. "Yeah, I guess it was one of Tooth's fairys. I don't know how she got injured, but I know how she died."
"How?" Santa was rubbing his bearded chin. Looking at the angered winter spirit.
"Pitch killed her." Santa lifted an eyebrow, this meant the winter spirit have had contact with the Nightmare King. "After the fairy was healed she stayed with me. She never left my side. She seemed to know me, somehow. I can't explain, she just knew things. Somehow we got involved with Pitch. We found him, or he found us. I'm not sure. He needed our help. He wanted to take down the people who had been treating him badly." Jack looked up at Santa, as to imply that the Guardians had been the ones treating him badly. "I could understand that. But Baby Tooth."
A surprise expression spread across Santa's face, "Baby Tooth?"
Jack made a sad chuckle. "That's what I called the small fairy."
"Baby Tooth didn't want to hurt her mistress, so we agreed to not help Pitch. That was our mistake. He got mad. And when he got ahold off Baby Tooth he tried to force me into joining him. But she fought back. Which was her mistake."
Jack went quiet. When it didn't seem like he would continue Santa leaned in and asked with a soft voice, "He killed her?" Jack nodded as a reply.
He cleared his throat before continuing to speak, "I've been calling for you guys for years and years, trying to warn you about Pitch. But you never listen. You never replied." Jack voice got louder and louder. "All you did was have meetings and blaming me for stuff I didn't even do!" By now the other guardians had heard the loud voices and stepped into the room where Jack and Santa were in. They seemed impatient and annoyed. Over what - Jack wasn't sure, but it sure as hell pissed him off. "You've got some kind of nerve to come and take all of me, asking me to do the impossible, thinking I'm a jerk for not helping you." Jack had gotten so angry that it had started to snow around him. "But guess what, you never helped me! When I needed help handling Pitch, where were you?!"
No one answered him, no one knew what to answer to it. For the Easter bunny it was all just a tantrum. A tantrum from a silly boy. He decided to give the winter spirit a firm look to put him back in his place. But looking at him he saw that his eyes were locked on Tooth, he seemed to have calmed down a bit. "Years after she had died he approached me again. I think it was around Christmas and I felt lonely. So lonely. He somehow twisted the blame around, making me think – believe that I were the one who killed her." He stopped and looked over at Santa who were still sitting at the window. "Where were you? I needed you to be there, to guide me right." Santa Claus turned his gaze away from Jack, ashamed perhaps. Jack, angry that Santa couldn't even look at him, continued, "I spent years trapped in Pitch's dark caverns, lost confused, blaming myself for Baby Tooth's death."
Jack once again looked over at Tooth, sadness filling his eyes. "I didn't kill her. I didn't kill your fairy." At first Tooth didn't look at him. She tried to process what he was saying. For years she had blamed him for the death of her fairy. She had held so much anger towards him. She had smashed the shrine Jack had build of ice for the little fairy. She had thought he had made it to mock her. She looked up at Jack. His eyes filled of remorse, guilt, sadness. She reached out and squeezed his shoulder reassuring. "I believe you Jack, and I forgive you. Now we need you help to defeat Pitch."
Forgive him? Forgive him for what? Jack didn't quite understand. He wanted to punish Pitch. But helping the ones who had ignored him when he need help the most. Helping those who had thought they were better then him, that still thought they were better. They seemed to think Jack should be grateful for being allowed into their little group. Grateful? They needed him. They should be grateful. No. He couldn't help them. Wouldn't help them.
He backed away from Tooth's grasp. "Why you had to wait, to find me? I can't help you. Not now, not anymore." Jack backed up even more. The window beside Santa was open. "I'm sorry. " Jack turned and flew out the window, leaving the Guardians alone to try and defeat Pitch Black by themselves.
The End?
Very rushed at the end. If I am to continue this serie/fanfic I would very much like a BETA reader.
If continued the future chapters will be about what happens after Jack left the Guardians, and also flashback to what happened during the 100 years mentioned in the fic.
I highly recommend to watch the Youtube video. Much better then the actually fanfic!
Thanks for taking time and reading this!