The second chapter of my fanfic is up! It's longer than the prologue, and took me quite a while to finish. I added more on the backstory of MiM and my OC... plus some other stuff. You'll have to read to find out.

Constructional criticism appreciated, please leave your thoughts in a review!

Disclaimer: I do not own Rise of the Guardians, nor do I own the Guardians of Childhood series. I also do not own any characters from either. William Joyce owns the books and the movies belong to DreamWorks. I only own any of my original characters from this fanfiction.

Chapter 2: Explanations

The amber-eyed girl blinked wearily, bringing her hands up to wipe at them with her palms. She yawned, stretched, and then turned over to her other side to fall back asleep again, snugging into the soft warm pillow. All the while she did not notice the pair of blue-grey eyes behind her, watching in amused curiosity.

"I find it quite puzzling how you have been laying here for about a hundred centuries long and yet you want to go back to sleep."

Before her mind could slip off back into dreamland, the surprised teen jolted upright at the sudden voice. What in the name of the freaking constellations? was what the teenage girl all could think of at the moment, along with quite hateful thoughts to whoever had disturbed her former comfy peace. Struggling to let her mind refocus, she shook her head as if to clear away the dots of dizziness swimming in her vision from sitting up too quickly, then finally turned her head to see a bald middle-aged man sitting to her left.

Well, he was practically bald; the man had only one long cowlick of curly white-blonde hair in the middle of his round head as if the strand was floating off of it. He wore a silver robe, complete with an fancy white bowtie and white cuffs at the ends of the sleeves. The man stroked his chin, observing her with an expression of amusement, worry, but also relief.

The still-slightly-sluggish girl blinked again, squinting her eyes at the man who looked strangely familiar. A quick glance around her told her that she was in an infirmary, for whatever reason that might be - she didn't know. Turning back to him, she caught sight of something next to the man.

The strange floating white object, about the size of a trash, can blinked back up at her with its silver eyes. A robot? the girl wondered. Attached to a wire-thing atop its head was a crescent moon. Wait... moon?

After a few seconds of confused silence and observing, she finally spoke, recognition dawning on her as she gasped. "Tsar?"

Tsar let out a relieved breath, as if he's been holding it for very long. She remembers... good.

"Teva," he paused, considering what to say after having waited so long to see the girl next to him awake again. He cleared his throat. "You are finally awake."

"Yeah, I guess I am," she said slowly. "What happened? Why am I in an infirmary room?"

And why do you look old... she thought, but managed to keep from blurting out the rather rude but true comment.

She couldn't remember why she was here. She knew she wouldn't have wanted to suddenly make the decision of sleeping in an infirmary. "..You have been laying here for about a hundred centuries long.." Tsar's voice echoed through her head.

Before the Man in the Moon could answer her previous said questions, the girl now revealed as Teva spoke again, face full of bafflement. "What'd you just say?"

"That you are finally awake..."

An eye roll. "Before that," she said, wanting to know for sure whether or not she'd heard right.

"You were... asleep for centuries. One hundred centuries." There was short moment of silence.

It is now confirmed that she'd heard correctly, and now Teva was very bemused.

"I did not get a single word you just said," Teva stated blankly, then grunted, stretching and rubbing her aching back. "But I'm not in the mood for chores, if that's what you woke me up for. And I wanna eat now, so move."

Even though being on the Moon it was impossible for her to experience mornings anymore, Teva wasn't such a delightful "morning person", especially when interrupted from sleep.

Couldn't a girl get some nice, peaceful rest without someone startling the crap out of her to wake her up? Coffee sounded about nice, too, at the moment. Throwing her legs over the side of the bed, Teva made a move to get up, whining when Tsar's arm stopped her. No coffee then, sadly.

"Teva, I'm serious," Tsar said. "You were unconscious for at least a hundred centuries. Do you remember what happened?"

The girl paused, considering. She performed a brief mental calculation: a hundred centuries equals ten thousand years. Now, she knows that even for an immortal, she sleeps longer and more often than needed, but if Tsar thought what he was saying was actually true... yup, he was definitely absurd. How could he be serious? All she did before she slept was... all I did was... Teva's eyebrows furrowed. When the girl thought back to what she did before she woke just now, she could only remember the shuddering feeling of being pulled into an endless abyss of darkness. Her mouth opened and closed in confusion, and Tsar raised a white eyebrow, still waiting.

Teva remained helplessly silent, inwardly panicking at why she couldn't remember. The black dots returned in her vision each time she tried to recall anything, and she shook her head, trying to clear it. She looked around frantically as if to find something that could help her, her eyes landed upon several of the objects in the infirmary room. The fancy linen chairs, Tsar sitting on one of them near the bed she lay on. The moonbot who now idly sweeping a table even though Teva didn't see any dust. The other identical beds, topped in the same plush white pillows and grey bed sheets. There was a piece of paper hanging on the wall, one that displayed the different continents and places of a certain blue and green planet. A map of Earth.

Maps! The dark dots in her sight swam and blurred for a bit then finally disappeared.

"We were looking at maps!" Teva practically yelled her response, startling the Lunar man. A crease formed between her brows. "We were looking at maps in the study room, then... I don't know. Are you saying I passed out?"

"Yes, we were. And you did pass out, and lay unconscious here for a hundred centuries. I counted." Tsar pointed at the wall behind him, moving in his seat to show the girl. Teva stared blankly at the ordinary wall for a moment, wondering why Tsar was pointing at it. She thought he'd changed the wallpaper, for now it was white with etches of blue; that was before she noticed that those etches of blue were actually individual lines in groups of five, the fifth one crossed over diagonally over four vertical ones. Tiny tally marks... lined all along the wall and filling it up to what was at least more than a thousand. "Each one represents a year."

"You're not serious," Teva gaped. Part of her was very doubtful that she could've been asleep - or unconscious - for ten thousand whole years, but the other part of her was just very shocked at the fact that Tsar had drawn all those tally marks on the infirmary wall - especially when he had once bossily stated never to draw on his precious ship's walls. She guessed that the part about her miraculously-for-whatever-reason falling into a hundred-century-coma made a little sense because it explained why Tsar looked older. He'd aged quite a bit. She also instantly felt some pity in Tsar for having to have written all those damn tally marks, though.

"I am, and yes I did just draw all those tally marks," Tsar replied simply, chuckling at the end. After a short pause, he continued. "Do you remember what happened when we got onto this ship?"

Teva flopped back down onto the bed, reclining into the pillows. She didn't get why Tsar's question was important but answered, "When we were fleeing..." she trailed off.

"Because of?" Tsar Lunar was quite relieved that the girl had remembered everything so far. He just needed to make sure that she remembered everything from before she dropped unconscious.

He noticed the girl shift in hesitation for a millisecond but Teva simply pretended she wanted to scratch her elbow. Her voice was monotony when she answered. "Pitch."

The Man in the Moon nodded for her to continue.

Teva's eyes darkened as all the bitter memories seemed to flood back to her.

"The Dark Ages, the fearlings and universal destruction he caused happened." She was nine and Tsar was twelve then when Pitch had come after them to destroy next, she recalled. "But he still found us and attacked. The other Lunars are gone so now we live here forever as immortals," her voice took on a bored tone. Then, "I don't think I remember much of the rest, though, those parts seem kind of blurry. That was a long time ago anyways. Why? Is he b-"

"No. Pitch Black is now long defeated," Tsar Lunar assured. "I brought this up because if you remember, you had taken a very dangerous blow to the head, luckily as you can see, surviving. Only you complained about the constant migraines you experienced, and soon that was when you'd fell unconscious for a hundred centuries, as you now know. You hadn't shown any sign that you were every going to wake since, and I was starting to worry, Teva, that you never would." At the last part Tsar's voice was etched with worry, but he still kept his calm state, letting Teva sink it all in.

They were like siblings, Teva and Tsar. Tsar was usually the bossy one, always taking the role of being more responsible since he was older. But he grew more clever and wise as he grew older. Teva always loved to mess with his strange trinkets and let him chase her around the ship. Tsar would pretend to act annoyed, but really he didn't mind. He enjoyed having some company besides the moonbots, moonbeams, and glowworms that were also in this moon. Plus, the Lunar family and Teva's were once very close.

Of course, both of their families are probably long gone by now - probably turned into fearlings by Pitch. Teva shuddered at the thought. When the darkness took Pitch, he'd turned into a monster. She'd thought once that maybe, just maybe, she could find a way to bring the good side of him, the man he once was that everyone knew as a hero... Teva had thought there could be a way to bring him back. But nothing could help. Pitch Black was a manipulative, taunting, cruel man who destroyed almost everything in his path. After everything, of course, everyone knew that the man who once cared so much was gone. Teva hated the thought of him, and she hated even more was her eyes. A constant reminder of him.

Shaking her head as if to clear the bitter thoughts, Teva turned her thinking to Nightlight. He was one of her old friends. She always liked spending time with him; he was always a free spirit. She wondered what ever happened to him - it's now been a hundred centuries (a phrase of which she was starting to slightly despise). No wonder her back hurt as if she'd just been kicked in the spine by a stampede of a million horses - excusing the lame analogy, but that's what it felt like. Anyways, Nightlight was the one who'd saved Tsar and her when they were attacked by Pitch, so he must still be alive. Knowing him, he was probably flying around freely somewhere, hopping on clouds or doing whatever it is he did.

Finally seeming to faze back into the present again, Teva spoke. "Ten thousand years - lucky I'm immortal."

But it still felt like it was both just yesterday and long ago she'd been studying those maps with Tsar while a moonbot came to serve refreshments. Teva thought back, thinking she had dropped one of Tsar's porcelain cups when she fainted, spilling her coffee all over the marble floors. Tsar had been alarmed, then her eyelids felt heavy and suddenly she was being pulled into a dreamless darkness. Anyways, she still felt the same. Tsar aged a couple years but managed to still keep that one strand of floating hair curled above his head. Speaking of aging, Teva was starting to get curious about how she looked now. Did she age while she was unconscious?

"Can I have a mirror?"

MiM chuckled. "Yes, you may." After a quick gesture to the moonbot beside him, the man watched as it zoomed off, the bot returning only a couple of seconds later with a hand-mirror on a tray. The robot lifted the tray to Teva, who took it and peered at herself in the glass.

In her reflection, two golden orbs outlined with long black lashes stared back at her. A few light freckles were adorned across the teen girl's nose and cheeks, and her skin was a light olive tone. Brown hair that was a dark shade practically black stuck out in numerous directions and lay in tangled clumps down on her shoulders. Teva grimaced slightly at that. That'll take a long time to untangle. But other than the messy morning hair that needed a great deal of fixing later on, she looked pretty much the same as she had before her hundred-century-long sleep.

"Huh... I still look sixteen," she said after observing herself.

"That is probably the age you've stopped aging at. Lucky for you, but that doesn't change the fact that you're still very old."

Teva rolled her eyes, but grinned. In response, she said, "Pretty sure if someone saw me, then saw you, they would say you're the old one," she laughed.

"I stopped aging at twenty-nine."

She snorted. "Are you serious? I could say you look about fifty."

"I do not look fifty."

"Tsar, you have one magically-remaining white strand of hair on your head. Do you really think someone else would say you physically look just twenty-nine?"

The two glared slit-eyed at the other, before eventually breaking into laughter, their guffaws echoing off the room's walls.

"Indeed it has been very long, so you and I both are quite old, but since you have awoken I've been wanting to show you some things. Would you like to see?" he said, finally standing up and gesturing to the doorway.

Teva thought for a moment, wondering what it might be that Tsar wanted to show her this time. She had to admit, the things he invented were quite interesting, and she'd always loved to hear the stories of what he'd learned or watched of the things going on on the very planet this ship revolved around. After ten millenniums he must have had a lot more things he invented in all that time. Finally she got up and started to follow.

"Ah, ah, no. Not yet," MiM said, waving a finger.

"What?" Teva asked in confusion.

"You stink."

"Tsar!"

Laughing, Tsar answered. "Well, you do, wouldn't you think? Go take a shower and change. It has been ten thousand years."

"Oh," was all the slightly blushing teen replied. "I guess I should."

After her shower, Teva put on the clothes that Tsar had offered, which consisted of a plain forest green tank top, a pair of loose dark denim pants, and new black boots. Before she'd showered and changed she was dressed in an old-fashioned dull-grey dress that was highly uncomfortable with all the layers, but now she was more comfy with her new given simple outfit. It was strange but comfortable, at least. When she had asked where Tsar had even gotten them, Teva was a little surprised to know that his moonbots had made it themselves to match the modern attire many people wore on Earth, made to fit her.

Fixing her hair wasn't easy. It took about thirty minutes or so until she managed to get it untangled and tie it all up in a high ponytail. The end of her hair reached to just near the middle of her back, and a few loose strands Teva hadn't bothered to put back hung over the side of her face. The now more decent-looking immortal then allowed herself to be led out into the study room by another one of the little moonbots.

Not that she needed guiding, really. Sure, the inside of the moon was gigantic, but the study room was practically the biggest room in the ship. It was easy to find, and not so hard to go through, for Teva. She remembered most of the interior of it by heart, after years of spending her whole childhood exploring and living here.

The study room being the biggest room in the entire ship wasn't an exaggeration. It was like the living room of an ordinary home - it was the largest in it. Only, of course, this was much larger in comparison, and had much different things it consisted of within. All around her, most walls were occupied with bookshelves. Others were covered in maps, or hanging objects and inventions of all sorts. The large fireplace where she always used to read books near blazed as bright as ever in one corner, radiating a warm orange glow. Moonbots scurried to and fro, some tidying up areas, others rearranging the many books and scrolls. The one that had guided her was currently zooming off with the rest to do other chores around the ship. There were the tallest pillars you'd ever see, and spiral staircases weaving paths to different sections of the study room. There was even a globe triple the size of Teva herself that she saw as she entered.

Walking closer to it, she touched a spot that was closest to her randomly, curious. She felt the cool, smooth painted metal beneath her fingers, wondering why Tsar couldn't just have a normal sized globe that would be easier to look at. But then again he still did have those too, so why another so large?

Perhaps this one is different in a way? she wondered. Her thoughts were answered when suddenly a hologram seemed to pop out from the spot her hand was rested on.

Startled, Teva staggered back, almost tripping and knocking over a pile of scrolls nearby that a moonbot had temporarily set down. Mentally cursing to herself, she quickly straightened up again, gazing up at the globe. The hologram wasn't there anymore.

Cautiously this time, Teva gently rested her fingers on the same spot. A second later, the hologram showed up again.

Teva squinted to read the transparent words. She mumbled to herself what she read. "Continent: Africa. Selected area: South Africa. Population estimated: 53,000,000..-" and on it went with the time it was, characteristics of the area, and so on. Figuring that wherever she touched, a hologram would show up to tell her information about the place, she tested her theory by reaching up and placing her finger in another spot. It showed basically the same thing, just different information shown.

Continent: North America. Selected area: Burgess, Pennsylvania.. and etc.

"I wonder if Tsar built it so that it can tell me things other than about just the place.." she mused aloud. Almost as if hearing her, the hologram switched to one showing different information.

Spirits present at moment: One. Believers: Seventy-nine. Belief status: Good.

"Huh. Wonder what that even means.."

"It means that there is an immortal spirit in the area, and there are seventy-nine children there who have belief in the Guardians and some immortal spirits of the Earth."

Yelping at the voice suddenly next to her, Teva became startled again and fell into the pile of scrolls.

"Tsar!" The immortal teen took a moment to compose herself. She hated being surprised. "Could you please just stop popping out of nowhere?"

You scared the crap out of me twice already today, she mentally added, sighing. Tsar might have been depicted as this quiet, content, mysterious character, but really if you knew him like Teva, you'd know how much of a cheery and carefree spirit he really also is, much like Nightlight. Despite being the wise-old-man-in-the-moon he was, he could be purposely mischievous at times. He liked surprising people and was all grins and wisdom. Teva and the two always played together when they were young, and believe it or not, Tsar was actually quite a trickster. Nightlight too, but he was less annoying, since he didn't really speak. And despite her anger, Teva couldn't help but smile.

"I told you to meet me in the study room, but I did not give you permission to wander around and mess with my globe." He said this with a stern voice, but you could tell by his playful eyes that he wasn't mad at Teva either. He chuckled, continuing. "We are immortal spirits, as you know. The people on earth are mortals. There are also immortal spirits on Earth, who do different things. For example, the Leprechaun - he is an immortal who brings luck to humans. Cupid is a spirit who brings love. I have also chosen special ones who protect the children, five spirits who are the Guardians of Childhood." Teva leaned closer, listening. "They are known as the Sandman, E. Aster Bunnymund (though most call him the Easter Bunny), Nicholas St. North (or Santa), and Toothiana (the Tooth Fairy). Jack Frost is the newest addition. They protect the dreams, hope, wonder, memories, and fun in everyone's childhood."

Teva nodded, getting up from her position on the floor. "But what about the belief thing? What's that?"

"Immortal spirits aren't visible to anyone on Earth, unless they are believed in. Otherwise, they pass through you, can't hear you, or see you. You'd be like a ghost." She would've missed it if she hadn't been looking him in the eyes, but Teva saw a flash of regret in Tsar's face when he said this. She was curious about why, but she decided it was none of her business to dig into. She made a mental note also to ask more about these "Guardians" later.

The Man in the Moon cleared his throat. "Come, let me show you what I've wanted you to see. And no touching anything around you unless I say." Tsar could also be like a bossy older sibling.

Woohoo, second chapter done. That's the longest I've ever written so far.. so yeah, it took a while. Most of my chapters for this fanfic will have around 3k or just a bit less. Tell me if I made any errors. R&R and all that.

As you can see, this takes place after the movie-verse. They're still in the Tsar's ship, but don't worry, Teva will get to go to Earth soon. I won't let her meet the Guardians and all that yet because I don't want to rush the plot... I also wanted to make MiM's character a bit different than what most people portray him as. ;]

Tell me if anything's confusing in this chapter, too, by the way. I tried to make it as clear and descriptive as I could. Sometimes I also may go back and revise for errors.

I will be doing a lot of the story in Teva's third person POV. Mostly. Does the name sound weird by the way? Lol. Anywho, too late to change that now. It's pronounced like (Teh-vuh).

Sabaine: Thanks so much for the review! You're actually my first one so, idk, here's a cookie lol *hands over a chocolate cookie*. But really, I appreciate it:) I try my best to put as much detail as I can into my writing. I hope you enjoyed this chapter too.

Thank you to all the followers/favoriters too! If that's even a word..

~FI