Sometimes Jack was jealous of humans.

Sure, he had ice powers, and he could fly (which was the best thing ever) but...humans had soulmates.

Not always romantic ones, either. Over the years Jack lost track of how many different types of soulmates he saw, from platonic soulmates, siblings or friends that had each others' backs their whole lives, romantic ones that were friends as well as lovers, even people blessed with multiple marks, sometimes a mixed bag of platonic and romantic or a polyamourous group of complicated but rich and fulfilling romance.

Which wasn't the point, really. The point was, they weren't alone.

And Jack was.

There were other spirits in the world, but most of them were focused on their jobs and didn't have time for silly things like playing or friendship. There were a few, like Raven and Anansi and the like, some of the snow maidens (who seemed to look up to Jack like a big brother) who were willing to be friends, but they had their duties, or were fragile and well...he was still missing something, and alone most of the time.

The few times he mentioned soulmates to them, they were dismissive of the idea. Spirits were generally solitary, they said over and over again, they didn't have soulmates.

So Jack kept quiet about the idea, and the quiet wish that he might have one, even though he'd checked his whole body (or at least, as much of it as he could see without a proper mirror) more than once and found nothing. Soulmate marks didn't always appear in the same spot for everyone, so he kept hoping that maybe, just maybe, he just couldn't see it.

Then came that crazy weekend, that mad wonderful three day spree of highs and lows that ended with being sworn in as a Guardian, actually wanted after all these years and this time, they meant it.

Jack had given up on soulmates a few decades back, but after a few months with the Guardians, that old traitorous hope began to rise again.

He tried to keep it hidden, but, well, when one of the people you are around the most can actually feel hope...

"Pooka didn't have soulmarks, or soulmates," Bunny commented one day, when Jack was helping to pull weeds in the vegetable garden behind Bunny's home. "They felt soulmarks and mates were too emotional. Sandy's people didn't, either. Stars and star pilots were all connected, ya ken? So they didn't really favor one over another."

"Oh...o...kay?" Jack said, pausing in his pulling and sitting back on his heels. Bunny kept staring at the plants he was tending, as if he hadn't just dropped an information bomb on Jack. "You mention this because...?"

"Because that's one strong hope you got there, mate," Bunny said, glancing at the frost spirit out of the corner of his eye. "An' as it turns out, Toothie had enough human in her ta get one. An North was human as you, 'fore everything went down. Katherine too. An' as it also turns out, just 'cuz someone else doesn't have a soulmark doesn't mean you can't have one for them."

Jack fiddled with the weeds in his hand, freezing them over. "I'm not sure what..."

"Ya know, we were wondering for the longest time who the snowflake crossed with a staff stood for," Bunny said nonchalantly, standing from his own crouch and stretching, giving the stricken silent Jack a grin. "Goes real pretty with the other marks. Turns out we were waitin' a long time for ya, Jackie. Sorry about the wait," he added, holding out a paw to help Jack stand.

He grunted as Jack impacted with him, throwing arms around his waist and toppling them to the ground. Bunny grinned and wrapped an arm around the nearly vibrating Jack, stroking his hair. "We're all looking forward to finding your marks, snowflake," he whispered to a suddenly blushing Jack. "Bet it'll be a lot of...fun."

A/N: Posted for polyshipping day - the OT+ is an AU of ROTG where the Guardian Oath doubles as a marriage oath, or where all the Guardians are shipped in a big polyamourous group.