Hey guys! It's finally here! First of all, I apologize for how long it took me to get the first chapter of this new story out, but some serious sh*t hit the fan for me and I needed to get through that before I could find any writing inspiration.
Second, yes, I stuck with the same title as the first story, simply because I couldn't think of anything better and it still fits with the plot of this story. I also incorporated the same location (Reine, Norway) into this chapter, cuz it was easier than finding some other place in the world. :P I also think Reine is pretty.
So anyway, thank you to everyone who read and reviewed the previous "Mood Music" story of mine, and I hope you all enjoy this new one! Thanks!
Disclaimer: I do not own Rise of the Guardians or any of its characters.
1. Nuisance
Huge, heavy boots stomped across the wooden floors, tapped impatiently in the makeshift elevator, and scared tiny elves into hiding underneath nearby work tables. The yetis knew not to get in their boss's way when his current expression showed on his face. His thick eyebrows furrowed in anger, his bright blue eyes tired and annoyed, his lips pursed in slight anxiety. Yes, today was definitely a day to make sure one stayed on the Nice List.
When North shoved open the large oak doors, his three fellow Guardians already sat near the end of the long conference table, waiting. Tooth's and Sandy's faces expressed worry and sorrow while Bunnymund's simply conveyed extreme aggravation. North shut the doors before walking down the length of the table and taking his seat at the head.
"Bunny, Tooth, Sandy," he said in greeting.
A soft wind blew through the resort, bringing with it a whirlwind of soft white flurries, as the morning sun began peeking over the mountain tops. Kids dragged their parents out into the snow, laughing and cheering. The snowy slopes were already being dominated by skiers and snowboarders alike. It was a merry scene.
Unbeknownst to everyone, a scraggly, white-haired teenage boy crouched on the edge of a nearby cliff, observing the scene before him. A smile was on his lips as he watched the kids scream in delight, building snowmen and throwing snowballs. He knew he couldn't miss out on the fun, so he jumped into a gust of wind and let it carry him down to where the children played.
"Let's skip the formalities, North; we all know why we're here," Bunnymund said crossly. He leaned back in his tall chair, his arms across his chest, his wide green eyes staring straight into the top of the wooden table.
"It's just awful…" Tooth murmured, hugging her arms to her chest. Sandy, who sat next to her, patted her back silently.
"Yes… we will figure things out, this I know," North stated, interlacing his fingers on top of the table. "This will not go unpunished."
Jack welcomed the feeling of the powdery snow between his bare toes as he landed among the children. He didn't allow himself to be surprised when none of them reacted to his presence. He had gotten used to being ignored and invisible to the world after two hundred years.
He saw an already existing snowball fight in progress, and so he ran over, whipped up some perfectly round balls of snow, and started hurling them into the laughing kids. He laughed along with them, running around and occasionally freezing a patch of ice and sending a kid face-first into a snow bank. They always popped back up laughing.
"I want him gone, North," Bunnymund ordered, turning his gaze upwards. "I don't care where he goes or what happens to him, I just want him gone."
"Understood, but-"
"'But' nothin'! We're the bloody Guardians of Childhood here, we should be able to get ridda' one insignificant spirit!" Bunnymund was on his feet at this point.
"He's not insignificant, Bunny," Tooth said.
"She is correct," North agreed. "Man in Moon created him for a reason."
"Yeah, right. Jack Frost is nothin' but a nuisance! Mistakes are made, and North, that whacker is definitely one of 'em!"
"Nothing like a good ol' snowball to the face, huh?" Jack chortled as a young girl sat up in the snow after being pelted. She stared for a few seconds at the kid who had thrown the snowball, and then burst into tears. Jack stood and took a step back, not expecting this reaction at all. The girl got to her feet and ran towards the large cabin-like lodge where her mother scooped her up into a warm embrace. Jack cocked his head to the side. "Please, that wasn't even a very hard one," he said to himself. He looked up to the gray sky and noticed there was a severe lack of snow falling. "No wonder you're crying!" he exclaimed, and then jumped into the wind and soared up into the sky.
"I do agree that something needs to be done," North responded.
"He needs to be locked away," Bunnymund demanded gruffly, sitting back down in his chair. "For good." North considered this, and then turned to Tooth and Sandy.
"What are your thoughts?" he asked them. The two Guardians glanced at each other.
"I agree with Bunny," Tooth said softly but firmly. "The Man in the Moon may have created Jack Frost for a reason, but when something of this magnitude happens, I don't see any other choice." Sandy nodded and a flash of golden sand danced above his head. "Sandy is right. Mother Earth can take over the winter season again, just as she did before the birth of Jack Frost." North nodded while looking down at the table, contemplating things.
"He killed dozens of innocent people, North," Bunnymund reminded him, his voice a bit softer now. "We have no other choice."
Snow began to fall almost instantly when Jack laced the clouds with the tip of his staff. He laughed with joy as he sailed across the sky, glancing downwards to see kids running around with their tongues sticking out of their mouths. The winter spirit copied them and caught a couple of his precious white flakes on his tongue, and for some reason it seemed to energize him.
Suddenly, he was twirling around in the sky as the wind began to pick up. He soared up towards the tops of the mountains, his arms spread wide to his sides like wings. He laughed and laughed while the snow began to thicken. He caught more snowflakes in his mouth and he just kept flying in circles around the mountain summits.
It happened so fast, and he wasn't prepared for it. He had thrown his arms wide, his staff clutched tightly in his hand, and a huge pulse radiated through the air. There was cracking and rumbling, and the next thing he knew a whole chunk of the snowy mountainside gave way and began racing towards the heavily inhabited lodge. The spirit's eyes grew wide as the screams reached his ears, and then he screamed himself.
"I know, I know. I'm trying to think of what we could do with him, or where we could send him."
"Strand him in the desert," Bunnymund suggested, smirking slightly at Sandy. "Take that staff of his and leave him to fend for himself in a terrain that's exactly his opposite."
An image of the North Pole followed by a cage appeared above the Sandman's head, and there was an almost immediate consensus that keeping the spirit locked up in Santa's Workshop would not be the wisest idea. Especially considering how unstable the boy was.
"We could freeze him and send him to the bottom of the ocean?" Tooth spoke up. Her fellow Guardians looked at her in surprise. "What? There are children whose teeth will never be collected again. We need to figure something out."
"I think you are onto something," North said before Bunnymund could say anything. "Not with dropping him into the ocean, but freezing him. Even Jack Frost could do no harm if locked away within his own element."
He tried to stop it. He really did. But it was just too massive and completely out of his control. He tried protecting the lodge with walls of ice, but they did no good. The monstrous avalanche tore right through everything the spirit tried to conjure up. He didn't know what to do. He felt utterly helpless.
And within seconds, the entire lodge was buried, along with everyone in and around it.
"I know a place," North stated, drumming his meaty fingers against the table. "A very ancient place, down in Antarctica. It is known as the Palatium glácies, or Ice Palace." Tooth gasped.
"That place hasn't been inhabited in centuries," she murmured. Sandy images of what appeared to be large moving boulders flashed above the Sandman's head.
"And it is guarded by ancient spirits," North translated. "It is perfect."
"How are we supposed to get the kid there?" Bunnymund asked, slipping one of his boomerangs out of its sheath. "I'm willin' to do anything."
"We could lure him there somehow, so that he doesn't know it's us behind it and so that he doesn't know it will be an ambush," Tooth said. "Perhaps with… a dream."
It was a catastrophe. Roads leading to the lodge were gone, so no help could come to anyone who may have survived the initial avalanche. He couldn't hear them, but Jack was sure there were people screaming underneath the huge pile of snow.
He sat upon the same cliff he had earlier that morning, when he watched the kids play, completely careless and having no idea what was to come in such a short time. Things would never be the same for him… not now that all of those people were dead because of him. He knew he had trouble controlling his powers, but how had he possibly let something like this happen? Everything happened so quickly. Everything disappeared so quickly…
After spending hours just sitting and staring and even crying, Jack Frost took to the air again and flew far away from those mountains. Nothing could be done. Not for those people… and not for the spirit of winter.
"Please elaborate," North said, leaning back and stroking his long silvery beard.
"Well, I'm sure Sandy has seen it, the way Jack plays with his golden sand whenever it descends around him. It's almost as if Jack has a soft spot for it. Maybe Sandy could put him to sleep, and then when he awakes some sand could take on the shape of something from Jack's dreams, and it could then lead Jack down to the Ice Palace. There's no doubt he would follow it." The Guardians debated it silently within their own heads, sharing a few glances here and there. Sandy immediately agreed with Tooth's plan, and after a minute so did Bunnymund and North.
"How are we supposed to find the mongrel?" Bunnymund asked, putting away his boomerang. "He could be anywhere."
"One of my tooth fairies said she saw him in the fishing village of Reine, Norway just a few hours ago." Sandy did a silent salute and slowly rose into the air, mounting the back of a giant conjured manta ray. North stopped him before he could go.
"Be careful, my friend," the old spirit warned. Sandy nodded down at him. North then turned to Bunnymund. "Bunny, use your tunnels to travel down to Ice Palace and tell guardians of plan. They must know before Jack arrives."
"Right," Bunnymund responded, getting back to his feet.
"Today, we rid the world of the nuisance that is Jack Frost," North announced. His fellow Guardians nodded their heads in approval. Then, Bunnymund tapped the ground twice with his foot, opening up a small hole, and jumped down into the tunnel as Sandy soared out the wide open window. Tooth and North shared a brief embrace before the Tooth Fairy fluttered out the window as well, making her way back to her home.
The Sandman flew over the icy North Pole tundra, the wide oceans, and the many forests until he came upon a small village on the island of Moskenesøya, Norway. Small flurries of snow drifted down from the sky, and this gave the golden man the tip that Jack Frost was still nearby. He tried staying as discreet as possible, floating around the snowy mountains that surrounded the village, until he saw the boy sitting with his knees hugged to his chest on the edge of a cliff. Sandy hovered over to him without revealing his presence, and slowly began weaving thin strands of sand through the air around the teenager.
Jack didn't notice the sand, but also didn't fight the oncoming pressure of slumber as his eyelids began flickering and drooping. He slowly lay down in the snow bank atop the cliff overlooking Reine and hugged his staff to his chest. Eventually, his eyes shut, and he drifted off into sleep with the Sandman watching over him.
Australian slang terms:
Mongrel - despicable person
Whacker - someone with whom you have little patience
So there's chapter one! I hope y'all enjoyed it! I promise you, chapter two is going to be awesome. This whole story is based on a dream I had a little over a month ago, and chapter two (plus the beginning of chapter three) is going to be what happened in my dream and what inspired the whole story! It's gonna be epic, guys, I guarantee it!
Please review! Reviews let me know whether or not the story is well received and worth continuing, so please let me know what you think! They give me inspiration to keep writing! :) Thanks, guys!
~ Tay