Jack spent the next few years doing pretty much whatever he wanted, with a few exceptions. He went to the Colosseum when a portal opened, killed a bunch of shadow men-which Pitch insisted on calling Opponents, because he said shadow men made them sound too much like they were Pitch's creations-spread snow, and brought a little fun to people who needed it. Wars came and went, and Jack chased some people out of Russia a couple times. Okay, a lot of times, but who was counting? The Guardians did their jobs. The seasonals did their jobs. Even Pitch did his job, and Jack would sometimes join him in scaring people out too late at night. It was fun to make people jump.

He and Pitch were spending some time together, even if the two of them argued half the time and tried to kill each other the other half. Jack would drag Pitch to theater productions and Pitch would whine about how he'd destroyed things much more spectacular than whatever they were watching, or that 'you can fly anyway, why are flying trapeze so spectacular?'

Pitch, in return, would get Jack to go to great cultural events, or moments that would later make history. Jack was the first-ever photobomber, with Pitch as his accomplice. He loved to see how many important people he could alarm with a well-placed breath of chilly wind, or a quick spark of pure cold on the back of their necks. Especially kings, they had the funniest reactions!

After quite some time, though, Pitch began to grow more distant. He was busy more often, and had less time to go to ridiculous musicals or important elections. He always met with Jack at the agreed-upon bimonthly treaty meetings, though, so Jack wasn't too alarmed. Scaring people was hard work, even if Jack saw Pitch in the field less and less often. Unlike Jack, Pitch had a growing population to influence. Unless Jack was asked to take care of the Southern hemisphere as well as the northern, he really had a very set job-it wasn't like the Earth was growing, even if its population was. He just did winter in the winter, and spread fall around in the fall. Pitch had to spread fear to everyone, so he was probably just adjusting to all the new people in the world. He'd have spare time soon.

At one treaty meeting, Pitch wanted to add something. More than their usual quibbling over technicalities or bothering with adding clauses whose only purpose was to prevent loopholes, he wanted to add something important.

"I want to make it so we'll have a whistle for a meeting. If one of us wants to meet peacefully, alone, with the other, we should have a way to signal that in the real world, regardless of current events," Pitch proposed, deftly knocking Jack's hand away from the latte he'd been about to steal.

Jack was puzzled. "Why would we ever need that? We made the signals so the sh-the Opponents, sorry-so the Opponents wouldn't understand our nefarious plans as we made them. We're kind of automatically alone, unless you count the Opponents, and we're probably trying to kill them at the time of the whistle anyway." He carefully snatched the latte away again, yelping and dropping it into Pitch's hands a second later. That thing was hot!

"If you didn't want to get burned, you should have left my drink alone. Besides, I wasn't talking about the Colosseum. I meant that we should be able to declare a temporary truce in the real world, if we're ever fighting. It's only a matter of time until we begin warring, so we should set up a way to have a temporary truce." Pitch took a long drink out of the latte, smirking at Jack over the rim of the cup as he did so. Jack scowled and iced his feet over.

"You're so focused on how we're gonna be killing each other soon! It's been, what, three hundred years now? I'm about three hundred-" three hundred twenty years, five months, a week, six days, and approximately fourteen hours since he'd come out of the pond, in fact "-so that means it's about around two hundred fifty years that we haven't been trying to kill each other actively. We haven't even had an epic betrayal! Why are you still so fixated on that? Can I suggest therapy?"

Pitch scowled as he shook out his frozen feet, trying to look dignified as he did so. It was hilarious to watch, really-all wounded pride warring with owowow that's COLD-but he ruined the whole image when he began arguing back with Jack. Didn't he see how much harder it made Jack's life that Pitch wasn't a mindless underling he could harass for reactions without argument? Then again, Jack didn't have any underlings, so he wasn't sure if he would harass Pitch if Pitch had been a minion of some sort. "It will happen eventually, and then you'll see that I was always right!" He swore, looking almost like he was trying to take himself seriously while saying that.

Oh wait, he was. That was even funnier.

Jack laughed and said, "Okay, fine. We'll make a truce-whistle. How's this?" He whistled the chorus of 'Whistle While you Work' and stole a blueberry shake off a waitress.

Pitch looked annoyed as shadows gathered ominously around the two of them. "Take this seriously," he ground out between gritted teeth that Jack swore were getting sharper. The thickening shadows stole the shake right out of Jack's hands, and Pitch suddenly looked much less threatening and much more smug. Wait, so he'd pretended to begin a temper tantrum just to steal Jack's drink? Unfair! "No, it should be something simpler, like this." Pitch whistled a simple three-note melody. "Do you think you can remember that? Or should I make it into a children's song, so you can be sure to understand it?" He smiled at Jack, all saccharine-sweet and razor sharp teeth.

Jack pouted at his lack of drink some more for good measure before responding. "Huh? Sorry, what was that? I was busy being betrayed because someone I loved and trusted very much stole my precious blueberry goodness away from me. But I guess your problems must be more important than that deep-cutting betrayal. Here, let me sweep the broken pieces of my heart out of the way so that we can mock my musical preferences, that's fine," he faked sobbing into his hands, then pulled himself together with a few sniffles. "But actually, sure. That's a fine code, I guess. It'll come in handy if we ever do fight, and it's looking more likely with every drink you steal,"

Pitch was unaffected by his 'obvious brokenheartedness' and merely nodded. "I'm glad you have your priorities set straight. Now, was there anything else?" Look at him, just ignoring Jack's implication of future revenge! Like Jack's idea of revenge for drink-stealing was something to sniff at! Boy, was he an arrogant one. But Jack could have been stuck with much worse, he supposed. He could have...

Well...

He was sure there was someone worse out there than Pitch Black, at least when your life had to rest in his hands. At least Pitch hadn't started mocking his height yet.

"I would like to motion to add something to the treaty! All blueberry goodness must be sent directly to me and remain in my possession until you poison it and I throw it at you!" Jack suggested eagerly.

Pitch rested his head in his hands for only a moment before announcing, "Then this meeting is over. I'll see you in the Colosseum, Frost," and disappearing into the shadows.

It took Jack all of three seconds to realize what was missing.

"Hey! That jerk, he never gave me back my drink!"

Oh, right, and he hadn't told Jack why he kept disappearing. That, too.

Ah well. He'd just corner Pitch next time.


He did not corner Pitch next time. In fact, he continued not cornering Pitch until he saw something flash by one evening. A shadow.

Was that Pitch? One of Pitch's minions?

As it turned out, it was the Easter Bunny. Greeeat, that was just what Jack needed. To be cornered by one on a long list of spirits that didn't like him, and then to be kidnaped.

It only got better when they tried to make him a Guardian. Jack? A Guardian? Yeah, right-he needed Pitch's help to keep himself alive, he'd be able to do absolutely nothing for a bunch of kids who couldn't even see him.

Well, that wasn't true. He could remember a couple of times when he'd defended children quite well from ill-intentioned spirits. But that generally meant that Jack would have some sort of near-death experience, since he wasn't used to using his powers instead of his staff to attack people and would thusly fight clumsily and with no real experience. If he wasn't whacking people with his stick or using a couple of other weapons and fighting styles he'd learned over the years, Jack was useless in a fight.

But even if that weren't true, Jack would make a terrible Guardian. It was even worse when he learned that Pitch was the enemy. Yeah, no. Not happening.

But then he was dragged into a back room, and he was quite sure that he was going to get killed by Santa Claus, and then the sleigh was too cool to resist, and, and...

Well, what it boiled down to was that Jack and Pitch were both in the Tooth Palace. Briefly. They were there for a confrontation, Pitch mocked him a little, and then when Pitch ran away Jack was kidnaped for the second time in twenty four hours. Jack had barely ever traveled through shadows before, but he felt it happen as Pitch disappeared into a rock formation.

"Don't worry, I won't hurt you. Yet." Pitch intoned indifferently once they got to...somewhere. "Now, would you mind telling me what you were doing with them?"

Jack shrugged. "Um, whoops? I think I got kidnaped, but I'm not really sure. Maybe I wanted to see the sleigh."

Pitch muttered under his breath. "You don't know if you were kidnaped or not? Remind me again why I decided to put my life in the hands of an idiot."

Jack grinned-Pitch had left himself open with that one. "I think it happened when you were helpless and surrounded, and I heroically came to your rescue! Now, you don't have to build a monument in thanks, but I would appreciate at least a shrine."

"Never mind. You and the Guardians deserve each other. What happens from here on out is irrelevant to our working relationship as per the treaty in clause A, parts one through thirteen, clauses C and D in their entirety, c-" Pitch was interrupted from what was going to be a mind-numbingly boring lecture by Jack's need to get the final jab in before they ended up on the battlefield again.

"You want to talk about our relationship? Honey, you could have just asked! You know, I never knew for sure if you loved me or not, but now I can always look back upon how nice you're being now, taking me out even though you were busy taking over the world to talk about-" Jack's sugar-coated mocking was cut off in return by the transportation back to Tooth's realm. Well, if that was how it was gonna be...this meant war!

Pitch was gone when he came back-of course he was, the Guardians had chased him through a crack in the rocks when he had kidnaped Jack for a time-out. He'd be stupid to come back when he sent Jack back.

Jack floated around the Tooth Palace for a minute or so before he found the Guardians near a mural.

"Jack! Are you okay? When you weren't there, we were worried that-" Tooth flew closer to him, hovering worriedly a few inches away, and Baby Tooth chirped and cooed in agreement.

"Relax, I'm fine! This place of yours is a maze, you know that? I have no idea how you even get around, it's so big!" He responded, gently easing himself away so that she wouldn't be alarmed by the movement but would also be out of his personal space. "Did I miss anything?"

They'd filled him in that no, he had not missed anything, and told him about the importance of belief even though Pitch had gone over it not five minutes ago for everyone to hear, and then Tooth had told him about the memories.

The memories.

His memories.

He'd been someone once! A person, someone who didn't get teleported to the Colosseum to fight every other month or so, someone with a family and maybe even a little sister or brother who could see him! Him! Jack Frost!

Well, maybe he'd been an only child, but there hadn't exactly been a lot of only children when he'd been born. Maybe he hadn't even been born then, maybe he floated around the lake a while before waking up that night. Maybe he'd been someone important. Maybe he'd been a hermit! A spectacularly young hermit!

That was when it got personal for Jack. He liked Pitch, but those memories were his and he was getting them back. That, and he needed revenge for his shake.

Then...Sandy.

Jack didn't like to think about what had happened with Sandy. Even though he came back later, the time after Sandy's death was the only time he'd ever seriously wanted to kill Pitch.

After that, things happened too fast and he didn't have time to think about them. Sophie was in the Warren, and Jack used his happy-flakes to get Bunny to look after her, and that too-familiar, painful voice from the teeth, and Easter, and the Guardians kicking him out because Pitch had decided to play mind games with him for a while...

He was angry with Pitch, hurt over Sandy's death, and not in a good state when they met in Antarctica. Both of them said things they would later regret. Pitch broke Jack's staff and left him in the bottom of a pit.

But then he tossed Jack's staff down with him, and Jack thought he understood. Pitch didn't want to have to hurt him, so he'd broken the staff. Without it, Jack couldn't talk to Wind, so he'd be effectively stuck in Antarctica until Pitch came to get him or until he next ended up in the Colosseum. Jack could feel none of the odd pressure in the world, so there would be no visits to the Colosseum soon, so Pitch probably meant to defeat the Guardians and then come back for Jack.

However, no long-term harm would come to Jack. Pitch and the Guardians would duke it out, and Jack couldn't get caught in the crossfire. In his creepy, cruel-to-be-kind way, Pitch was protecting Jack. It was probably his way of recognizing centuries of loyalty and companionship-as well as his way of keeping Jack alive, so that Jack could waltz in and save his sorry behind next time they went to the Colosseum. Well, Jack was having none of that!

He just...needed to convince his body to get up. Which he would. Eventually.

Maybe...maybe he could rest a bit. He was so tired...

Luckily, Baby Tooth was there to show him his memories. He wasn't going to just give up, no way! He was a Guardian! More than that he was a brother!

And then Pitch was soundly defeated, but he deserved it for stealing Jack's blueberry shake earlier. Blueberry shakes were sacred. Jack had to admit to a tiny bit of horror when Jamie ran straight through Pitch, but Pitch could handle one more kid running through him. The two of them had been dealing with that for centuries. Besides, the old man was too stubborn to let this get him down for long.

Jack was made a Guardian. Officially! The moon had finally made a move to show him his purpose! He'd almost begun thinking that his purpose was simply to fight in the Colosseum, but now he had a real job, something to do besides spreading winter and changing the leaves in fall.

There was one thing wrong, though. He wasn't sure if any of his actions broke the treaty. They hadn't made a specific clause against using one's own powers against the other, nor had they written anything about shutting someone in a hole in the ground. It wasn't impossible that he'd broken their contract anyway somehow, but on his third reread on the sleigh ride home he concluded that the treaty had enough 'if we fight each other, that's life' clauses that he was perfectly fine. Though he'd have to ask to add a 'don't touch my staff' clause or three next time he met with Pitch.

"Hey. Hey! Show pony! Hello? Can ya hear me?" A voice broke through his concentration.

"Bunny? What's up?" He asked, finally looking up from the ancient parchment.

"Ya been looking at that paper for a while, and there's a party set up in the globe room that you're ignoring. Tooth thought it was best to let you think a bit, but this is gettin' ridiculous! Why's that thing so important?" A gigantic rabbit was looming over him asking what his treaty with the Bogeyman was. Think fast!

"Um, it's a piece of paper. It has things on it. Did you say party? I like parties. We should go to the party. Yep. Paaarty!" He replied hurriedly, and the treaty was rolled up and back in his pocket before Bunny could snatch it out of his hands. He sprang out of his spot in the sleigh, wincing a little when he uncurled from the position he'd been in for hours. Wind flew him off to the globe room quickly, so that Bunny wouldn't have time to realize that he'd answered absolutely nothing. There was a yell of, "Frostbite, get back here!" from behind him, and he darted forward to hide behind North, cackling as he did so.

Clearly, this was the start of a beautiful friendship.


Yep. The entire defeat of Pitch Black was partially because Jack was doing the right thing and was mad about Sandy, but mostly because Pitch stole his drink. He really likes blueberry shakes.

Also, I hit 500 views in one day! YES! Granted, they were not all on the same story, but still! 500!

And this chapter goes out to the anonymous meh, who was very kind and supportive and also to Quraina, who was so kind and patient about this chapter it was ridiculous. THANK YOU SO MUCH, you two!


Review replies to the anonymous:

meh:

I was quote inspired, and while I intend to play with the Guardians a bit more before I let them find out that Pitch and Jack actually do know each other, I did add something like that to the Tooth Palace just because it was fun. Jack was moer worried about his smoothie than the treaty at that point, though. Also, tours of my brain happen every hour on the hour, just don't lose your tour guide or we'll never find you again. It's suspected that lost brain-tourers become plot bunnies.

Candle Dark:

Thank you! I didn't get to update very fast, but here it is!