After a desperate summons of the Northern Lights and scourging the face of the earth for the Frost Sprite, the four original Guardians realized that they had no idea what they were looking for. Albeit it would be convenient to find a mess of white hair and frost, they couldn't find him anywhere that there was winter, and all traces of him were dead ends. Burgess was too thawed out, none of the sanctuaries of the Guardians contained any signs of the boy, and the only possible scent that could be found of him was in the middle of a desert, which would be far too warm for a Winter Sprite to reside.

The four of them held a meeting on the subject, talking about the fact and coming to the decision that the next best option would be to research the sprites of winter in order to understand where Jack might be. After three days of searching North's library, they found that the only thing that was harder to find than Jack was information about Jack.

After two months of looking tirelessly, they had to accept the fact that they couldn't waste any more time on looking for the kid. He could take care of himself, surely, and the Guardians had jobs to do. Winter was fast to sneak up on them and the preparations of chocolates for Easter could never be started too early in the year. Because of this, they left Jack to his own devices, hoping that he would return in time like a lost dog, safe and sound with his collar intact.

After the two months, North threw himself into the work for his holiday, doing everything in a guilty haste. His temper was shorter than it had been, causing a number of angry outbursts resulting in the destruction of perfectly good ice. Not even the soothing sounds of long lost Russian symphonies could raise his spirits. He knew perfectly well that Jack would be perfectly fine, however, he felt like he took the fatherly position in this family and that he had failed Jack in his protective services in some form. That wasn't something that he was quite ready to face, still mourning the three hundred years that he had let the child wander alone.

Tooth, however, found herself getting distracted constantly and not being able to keep up with her work. The fairies had gone into autopilot, collecting teeth in time but not organizing them into the systems at the tempo that they should have. This stupor would be putting her almost an entire decade behind on her organization tactics, which was terrible because she already struggled with organization and grime and remaining clean. The entire situation had her baffled and a shade guilty for crimes that she couldn't recall committing.

Bunny found himself cleaning and eating much more than he usually did. Sure, his Warren was already extremely clean and he didn't need to eat seven meals a day rather than his usual three and a half, but it calmed him down, so he let his (nearly manic) behavior take over and he rearranged and swept his burrow (even though it had a dirt floor) and he just let himself worry senselessly over his dear friend Jack.

Sandy had no idea why the heck everyone was so worried, and, quite frankly, didn't quite care. He didn't know that they were worried about Jack because if he had he would have told them that he spread dreams of snow that didn't push people to stay inside and people appreciating the fun that a sprite spread in the middle of a desert. Instead he slept through some of the boring-as-math meetings, unheeded and ignored in his undisrupted silence. That was what kept him and everyone else happy, so he didn't bother with trying to fix things like how the other Guardians felt or how he could fix it. If they lost any sleep to it then he would start to worry, but until that day he would stay out of it.

It wasn't until part was through the third month that Bunny had begun to have the nightmares of Jack never returning – the nightmares being one born of stress and guilt rather than the boogeyman. When Sandy noticed that, he peaked in on the sleeping rabbit, whispering quietly in his ear to wake him up. That certainly did the trick, and he inquired of Bunny what was bothering the over-sized rodent.

"Well, Jack's still missing, you know? And what if he doesn't return?" Bunny recited his fears without pause to the trusting figure. Sanderson raised an eyebrow before questioningly making the symbol of a snowflake, quickly followed by an arrow to himself.

Bunny stared at the signs blankly before replying tiredly. "You think you're Jack? Don't be silly Sandy."

The elder Guardian shook his head quickly, making a small map that had the Sahara Desert with a small snowflake and an arrow. The arrow pointed to the map, making Sandy's point more clear.

"It's snowing in the desert? So? I'm sure it's happened before or something," the Pooka responded before his ears shot up in realization. "Do you mean that Jack's in the desert?"

Sandy nodded eagerly, smiling and tugging the paw of the other Guardian quickly. He dragged the Aussie to the place that the sprite was residing, slowly explaining what was happening with the Winter Sprite in sign language so that Aster didn't attempt to wake Jack up or anything ridiculous like that.

After Aster understood he spread the news to the rest of the Guardians, and they all made a silent agreement – that they wouldn't let Sandy sleep during any more of the meetings. Also, that they wouldn't be freaking out over the fact that they can't completely protect their youngest member. The second, however, was deemed more important to all sans Aster, who simply worried more about the smaller.

Not that he would admit that to any of the other Guardians.