New Year's Child.

Ch. 2

This is a fill from DreamWidth from the RotG KINKmeme. Please enjoy!

Now edited!

Pairing: N/A

Genre: Humor, fluff, family, angst (mild).

Rating: T (for swearing)

~S~

~s~s~S~s~s~

North, for what had to be the fifteenth time in the last minute, looked up at the clock sitting on the mantle. It was now a full hour past the intended time for guests to arrive, and still the guest of honor was missing!

"Phil…" he grunted lowly. The named Yeti discreetly shuffled over to North, pretending to offer his boss a drink, "Any word from Jack yet?"

The brown and beige Yeti grunted out a negative, along with a few snippets of overheard conversations from the other guests. Apparently everyone was getting impatient and wondering where Jack Frost was. Sure the party itself was great; the food was fantastic, the music was quite pleasant, and they all had no qualms against being able to catch up with old friends. But the main reason they even came, especially the other seasonal spirits, was to see the winter sprite.

The mentioned winter sprite had long been absent since – North checked the clock again – one hour, eight minutes, and forty two seconds. And the other Guardians were getting worried. Or at least everyone except Bunny. The Pooka was up until this point convinced Jack was trying to build up on a dramatic entrance or something. The thought gradually diminished as the minutes ticked by, and now even he was worried that something might be wrong.

But until they could figure out what, the Guardians banded together and made it their personal mission to keep the guests as entertained as possible until Jack's arrival. It worked for a while, but they were starting to run out of ideas – or party tricks in Sandy's case.

Sooner or later, the whole thing was going to go to hell…

"Yo, Jolly-man…"

"Hm?" startled by the juvenile voice, North spun to face the owner of said voice, only to get a view of the rest of the room.

"Down here…"

Averting his gaze downwards, North blinked at the white and silver cloaked child that didn't even reach his knees. The pale child with platinum gold and silver hair wielded a gold and silver staff with an intricately designed armillary sphere with a clock in its center at its top, the clock hands themselves now at a standstill. Eyes with thick white-blonde lashes remained sealed shut yet somehow stared up at North with an inquiring quirk of delicate brows. But despite the childish body and short stature, North felt a shudder climb up his spine. Despite his current form, the spirit he now towered over was still someone to be intimidated by. But he was much easier to talk to in this form at least.

"Father Time!" North bellowed in startled joy, kneeling down to the tiny spirit. A tiny spark of courage prompted him on to hopefully lighten the mood, "Or shall I be calling you Baby New Years?" He chuckled.

The temporal spirit laughed, his white teeth flashing, "Hahaha…never heard that one before. Go on, say something else." Amusement had shifted to sarcasm swiftly – though this made North relax some.

"I only tease," North said, shaking the spirit's tiny hand, "I was not expecting you to attend this year. Always whining about how busy you are, I thought you would decline again."

"Yes, well, not all of us have the privileges of working only one night of the year," the blind time spirit brushed off some invisible dirt from his tunic, "And I only came for the entertainment."

"Oh? Well I am glad my Yetis can bring joy to the spirit of time himself!"

A knowing, mischievous grin spread over the cherub face, "You have no idea."

Father Time – or from New Year's Eve to New Year's itself known as Baby New Year's – was a rather wily spirit. As ever shifting and ever changing as the ocean, and just as unpredictable, he was a force to reckon with. In his natural form, he was someone to fear and revere. Beautiful in his form, he was a sultry and seductive entity, despite the human's views on his kind. He may be an Angel, but his pseudo-title of 'Holy Whore' was more befitting of his reputation.

Every spirit respected and feared him and his power, and at times, an unlucky few can find themselves put under his glamour's spell and fall in love with him. Such incidents often led to the disappearance of such spirits, if not their Oblivion. He was very much capable of making one's life hell, and he would hold absolutely no regret or second thoughts to harming someone he believed deserved it. It wasn't a form of cynical sadism though; Time was incapable of true malice. Time was a true neutral entity – incapable of hatred, grudges, or ill thought towards others. Though he did, however, hold a very dry and sarcastic sense of humor.

Even now spirits tended to walk on egg shells around him, despite his current form. Though this never stopped North from poking fun at the snarky spirit – it was certainly safe enough to do now. Every New Year's Eve, Father Time would shrink down to the form of a toddler as his time powers waned and shifted in his shrunken body. The energy stored inside of him would continue to grow until the stroke of midnight of New Year's, then the energy would be released to 'refresh' the New Year. Afterwards, he would assume his original adult form and go back to being the ever infamous Holy Whore and playing games with the lives of any and all living entity on earth.

So saying, it was quite unusual to see Time himself out of his dimensional domain. It wasn't unheard of per se, but his job of making sure the Time Stream flowed perfectly without falter was a tedious, if not maddeningly life-consuming task. The Time Stream may be at its most stable during New Years, but even still, Father Time rarely left his domain for any reason unless something that could change the world itself was about to happen.

Bearing this in mind, North was suddenly on edge. He certainly hoped Time's attendance was out of sheer boredom, and not a sign of the apocalypse.

"Ah yes, I was wondering about something," The time spirit said, snagging a drink from a passing elf, "Where's the guest of honor?"

North mentally cringed and had the unsightly urge to turn tail and hide himself. Leave it to Time to notice when something was amiss. Granted, it was quite obvious at this point, but still, the Guardian of Wonder held out hope that Time was in one of his more 'oblivious' moods – even if said mood was an act.

"Ah, Jack Frost is just running a bit late, da?" He elaborated as he stood to his full height.

"Is that a question or a statement, Nicolas?" Time inquired with a smirk.

The use of his full first name nearly made North crumble to his knees. And despite the fact it came from a childish looking spirit, he still felt like the kid who had been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

Although he was somewhat thankful that Time was currently without his all-knowing sight, he wasn't powerless or completely 'blind' to what was happening in the Time Stream. North had to wonder if Time actually knew where Jack was and he was just trying to stir up trouble…

"It is…both?" North offered lamely.

Time hummed thoughtfully, tiny fingers tracing the edge of his goblet. A melodious ringing resonated around them, "As fun as it is interrogating you, I believe it would likely do you some good if you actually went out to find him."

North groaned internally. Great, just what he needed; a tiny-terror version of Time himself breaking his balls at his own party. Though Time did have a point, North couldn't just up and leave his guests. What kind of a host would he be if he did? Not to mention the other Guardians would have his head if they found out he left them to their impatient guests.

"It is good idea, but…the others…"

"Let me rephrase," Time said, "You can either go out and get frost-butt up here and we all can have ourselves a party. Or you can stand here waiting for only-I-know-how-long, and we can have ourselves a repeat of the disastrous party of 1912."

North couldn't stop the shudder that ran up his spine. Never…in all his years, did he think having one drunk spirit of chaos and one wasted ice fairy could end so disastrously. The two were still banned from the Atlantic Ocean…

"Ah…perhaps I should go look for Jack," North muttered to himself.

"Wait, he's not here?"

Apparently North wasn't as quiet as he thought, nor had he noticed that he and Time had attracted a crowd not even a moment ago. All of which contained the various spirits he had invited, and all of whom were waiting on the mentioned winter sprite.

Time looked around at all the expectant faces and whistled lowly, "Awkward…"

North sputtered, "Ah, no, no, no! He is just being held up a bit-!"

"Why didn't you say anything sooner?"

"We've been standing here waiting on this kid, and he's probably not even coming?"

"This was a waste of time…"

"NO! No! He is coming! We just do not know…when…" North cringed as the other spirits scowled at him.

The other Guardians, now aware of the mass uproar on the other side of the room, quickly came to North's aid.

"Now hang on! We're sure he's coming! He's just late is all, no need to panic!" Tooth tried, though her frantic gestures were doing little to placate the crowd.

"Yeah, just calm down you bloody maniacs! We'll find him!" Bunny's rather tactless comments only seemed to rile the crowd.

Sandy himself was also faring very poorly. It was times like these he wished he wasn't such a quiet spirit…

The Guardians found themselves pressed up against the back wall as a barrage of accusations, questions, insults, and frustrated inquiries boxed them in. The more temperamental spirits were already causing a mess as their emotional-connected powers brought burns, broken items, and tables and chairs crashing down. A few spirits who knew Jack were angrily expressing their concern and snapping at the Guardians' lack of responsibility for their youngest colleague.

The Guardians were wondering if this was how they were all going to die. It seemed rather lacking in dignity…

"Doesn't Frost live near Pitch's lair?"

The calm, yet slightly annoyed inquiry directed all attention away from the Guardians and down to the two foot tall temporal spirit at their feet. The time spirit nibbled on a cookie while nonchalantly leaning against an overturned table.

Silence and wide eyes greeted the seemingly bored spirit. And when he got no response for a total of twenty two seconds, the time spirit sighed.

"Doesn't it seem odd that Frost has been missing for the past hour, and he coincidently lives mere meters away from the Boogeyman?" He inquired.

There was still staring directed at him, but now murmurs of concern were starting to arise. The Guardians even seemed slightly flabbergasted at the implication.

"You think Pitch attacked him?" North inquired. Time shrugged.

"Hell should I know. I'm powerless at the moment, and therefore I have no foresight. For all I know, Jacky-boy fell down a well," said Time.

His sarcasm now dully noted, the others considered the implication. It wasn't exactly a farfetched assumption. Everyone knew just how nasty Pitch could be; those who never even met him knew the man was known for playing dirty tricks for a laugh. Though the few darker spirits at the party were not one to jump on the bandwagon, they knew Pitch could get nasty if provoked – or bored.

"I thought ye lot banished 'im last year?" St. Patrick inquired sourly.

"We did, but it's not like the dingo would stay trapped forever," Bunny said, "Jack even told us a while ago the hole in the ground had reopened last month."

"Then why are you all standing around and not checking on him?" Cupid snapped, clearly annoyed.

No answer was given by the Guardians, all of whom were starting to look a bit sheepish.

"Wow, Manny will just make anyone a Guardian these days, eh?" The large Groundhog sniffed.

"Oh rack off you bloody gopher!" Bunny snapped.

"I'm a GROUNDHOG!"

"Hey! Here's an idea!" Time interjected in annoyance, "Instead of throwing unintelligent insults at one another, why don't we all go see if Frost isn't lying on his lake with Pitch chewing on his corpse?"

At any other time, the condescending tone and inquiry would have been met with frowns and grumbles. Now though, it was met with a rather large-scramble for the nearest door – or window for the flyers – to get out of the Workshop and to Jack's pond.

Now alone in a rather messy party room with only some Yetis and a few elves, Time blew some of his hair out of his face and tossed his cookie to the floor.

"Idiots…" he vanished in a swirl of energy from his staff.

To be continued…