Medea: Yeah. Kangaroo Bunnymund left the staff, that numb-skull. D:
YaoiReaderGalor: We are geniuses. 'Nuff said.
CHiKa-RoXy: Thank you so much! That kinda sorta made my day!
RedKetchup: Thank you! I'll try to make the rest even better!
Guardian of Life: Will do! ASAP!
untamabledragon144: Omigosh. You made my day too! Thank you so much!
dreamstar potter: Hahaha thanks! :D I'll be updating ASAP!
LightningPool: Hmm. I guess we're just gonna have to wait and see! :D
Sadie Aurora Night: First Review goes to you! And thank you so much, that means a lot!
Jzaaa: I read your review right before I finished this up and I had to comment on it here. That was awesome; I'm still grinning like a dork over it. :D
And to everyone else who reviewed but I didn't get to, thank you so much! I read everything you all say and they are all just the sweetest things in the entire world. :) I'll definitely keep this up, not only for myself anymore, but for you guys too! Ahhh I love you all! Thanks for the massive support the first day! Made writing this totally worth it, so I'm going to update it RIGHT NOW. And I'll update more chapters as soon as I write them. Like, the SECOND I write them. :D
And now, here is the second chapter to Humanity!
Enjoy!
...
Jack's mind reeled. Human? No... that was impossible. He turned back to his reflection, eyes wide. Chocolate-colored hair. Silver/blue eyes rimmed with brown. His skin was losing its pale color, and some red singed his cheeks.
"Jack," Tooth whispered. "I'm sorry."
But Jack didn't hear. All he could do was stare, stare at his reflection. This face... his face... was the same one on the tooth-container he took from Pitch. His face burned when he remembered; that stupid box started everything.
"Jack." A slight touch on the shoulder jolted him out of his thoughts.
"I'm fine," Jack said quickly, forcing a smile. He was good at smiling; it came naturally to him. But right now it felt forced, fake even, and worry squirmed in his gut. "I'm fine," he repeated. But whether it was for Tooth's benefit or his, he couldn't tell.
Suddenly something small and incredibly fast ran into him, chirping all the while.
"Baby Tooth!" Jack grinned - a real grin this time - and gently stroked the sprite's green feathered head. "How are you feeling, little guy?"
"It's been a couple days since we found you," Tooth explained with a tired smile. "The whole time Baby Tooth was worried sick; wouldn't leave your side, in fact."
Jack frowned. We? "Are North and Bunnymund here too?"
Tooth nodded. "North is by the globe, talking to Man in the Moon."
"And Bunnymund?" Jack almost didn't want to know.
But Tooth only smiled. "He disappeared down his rabbit hole, claiming that it was 'important business'. But he promised that he'll be back soon," she said quickly, misinterpreting Jack's relieved look as one of worry.
Jack turned away, refusing to meet Tooth's eyes. "Is he still mad at me?" he asked, his voice barely a whisper. In his hands Baby Tooth crooned.
Tooth smiled and shook her head. "No," she said. "In fact, he seemed pretty worried."
Worried? Jack swallowed; if the Kangaroo was worried about him, then he was in worse shape than he thought. Suddenly his stomach growled, startling the daylight out of him. Tooth blinked a few times, then burst out laughing. Jack smiled; it was nice to hear her laugh. It made it seem that everything was going to be okay.
"You're hungry," Tooth said matter-of-factly. Jack shrugged. He couldn't recall ever feeling hungry before. Sure, he stole a few cookies from the elves here and there, but he was never actually hungry. He just liked cookies. Tooth suddenly laughed again, as if the thought was hilarious, and began to flutter down one of the hallways. "Follow me," she called over her shoulder.
Jack glanced at Baby Tooth, shrugged, and followed Tooth down the winding hallways. Elves, dressed in their triangle-hats [seriously, what are those things?!], delicately balanced trays of cookies over their heads or carried some toys. Here and there Jack snatched a chocolate chip cookie and, much to his delight, none of the elves noticed.
They yetis, on the other hand, did. They stared at Jack as if he were a stranger. Here and there Tooth gave them a disapproving look, and the toy-makers immediately went back to work. But not before throwing Jack odd glances. He didn't blame them, though. If he was a yeti, he would stare too.
Suddenly Tooth opened up one arched doorway. Candy canes decorated the rim, and Jack could faintly smell peppermint. "It's not much," Tooth said with a nervous laugh, "but it'll work for now." With a slight push she opened the door, and Jack gasped.
It was some sort of christmas-candy factory, complete with peppermint sticks, peppermint bark ginger-bread houses and men, frosting, and all sort of stuff he didn't even recognize. No wonder North is so big, Jack thought, his head practically on a swivel as he tried to absorb all of the scenes at once. He gets to eat candy all day.
"Pick out whatever you want," Tooth said, grinning from ear to ear. Jack's jaw dropped.
"Seriously?"
She nodded. "Yeah."
Well then. Jack grabbed a few more cookies, filled his pockets with chocolate, and stuffed his face with anything else he could reach. Some of the elves shot his looks that could wither a Fearling, one of Pitch's dark creations, but Jack was way too happy to care. Chocolate. My gosh, did he love the stuff.
"Wait," he said, freezing up. "Where's my tooth-box? The one with my memories?"
Tooth's eyes widened and she shot her gaze to the floor, looking guilty. "I, uh, well Jack, it's in safe-keeping. So you don't lose it again," she added quickly.
Jack blinked, then turned away. So that's why she let me have anything... Suddenly, he didn't feel as hungry anymore. "That's okay," he said, slapping a smile on his face. "Maybe it's for the best."
Tooth's eyes widened. For the best? When she first told Jack of the memories inside the baby teeth, his blue eyes lit up like a child's and he was practically bubbling with excitement. But now, beneath that smile she knew so well, he only looked vulnerable, like his world was crashing down on him. He looked fragile even, so delicate like a spark of flame, just like...
Just like a human.
Tooth turned away. Looking at Jack now, with his brown hair and changing eyes, was too painful. "Come on," she choked out, forcing a smile on her face. It was a trick she learned from Jack himself. "Let's go find North."
...
Pitch grinned in the darkness, reveling in the cries of the tooth-sprites around him. They squealed and fluttered in their cages, crying out for sunlight and warmth, but Pitch Black was not about to let them go yet. No; Jack Frost betrayed him, betrayed him in a way no one else could, and for that he was going to suffer. The first step was simply breaking that stupid stick that child dragged with him. The second was to break his 'family', the Guardians, the ones that stuck their neck out to save their youngest member time and time again.
A frown soon replaced his sneer. But how? he wondered, idly biting away at a nail. Nearby a tooth sprite cried out, a little too loudly for his tastes, and he was half-aware of making a horse-shaped Fearling and siccing the beast onto the unwary sprite. A cry rang through the darkness, and all went silent.
Silence; how Pitch loved the silence. The silence where fear was so heavy it simply suffocated the soul, freezing movements solid. In that way, he and Jack Frost were quite similar; they could both paralyze a foe with little warning.
But Pitch's methods were a tad more... brutal.
A laughter rang through the compound, up the winding staircases and through abandoned tunnels. Yes; he had the perfect idea. The best idea. He had already nearly broken the Tooth Fairy... why not kill her off completely?
His idea was so ingenious a low laughter bubbled up from his throat; the laughter soon intensified, ringing throughout his portion of the world, drowning out the cries of the tooth sprites.
Pitch Black, the Boogie Man, the one who strikes fear in every heart, wasn't done quite yet.
...
Bunnymund scowled and hugged himself, shivering. Darn cold, he thought grumpily, looking back and forth on the snowy landscape. In his haste to save Frostbite, he forgot the kids staff back in the crack in the snow. Well, I guess I can't him 'Frostbite' now, huh? he thought drily. He jumped over a snowdrift and gracefully landed back on his feet. I got ta think of somethin' better.
No snow fell from the heavens as the pooka searched. He hated that everything looked the same, the same white color that stretched everywhere. How Jack could stand the boringness of it all, the Easter Bunny had no idea. He preferred the warm greens of spring, how the colorful flowers swayed in the early morning dew and how the Easter eggs added splashes of color to the vibrant green ground. He loved the warmth of the sunlight.
He hated the dreary cold of the winter. He hated it. But Bunnymund scowled and kept pressing forward. And no matter how much he hated it, he was going to find Frostbite's darn staff. Dumb kid.
It took a while, but he finally spotted the crack. It was lined with footprints; the deep one's of North and his long ones, courtesy of his rabbit feet. He peered down the crack; sure enough, there was Jack Frost's staff, still broken in two and still looking as pitiful as ever. With an effortless leap he jumped down and retrieved it.
It was cold, light, and lifeless, like dead wood. Sadness briefly stabbed at Bunnymund; if someone - or something - broke his boomerang, he wouldn't know what to do. But that didn't matter right now.
With a soft tap of his foot, a rabbit-hole seemed to sprout right out of the ground. Bunnymund shivered and jumped down, heading for North's place.
...
Jack and Tooth peeked from behind the corner, watching North. An uncharacteristic scowl decorated his face, and his eyes were locked with the moon overhead. But it was silent, so silent that it made Jack's skin crawl.
Will I even hear Man in the Moon again? he thought. The thought that he wouldn't was so unspeakable, so unbelievable, that he immediately pushed it right out of him mind. His motto was 'Live for the moment', and right now he would rather spending his time being happy than worrying about things that may or may not be true.
Maybe the Moon was just being quite today. Or having a private conversation with North.
Yeah, that had to be it.
Tooth cast Jack a reassuring look and gave him a little nudge. "Go on," she whispered. "North missed you. He was really worried, too."
Worried? Well, truth be told, it did make Jack feel a little better. After being invisible his entire life, it was nice to know that someone cared.
He wasn't invisible anymore.
The thought made his stomach turn as he hesitantly walked up to North, unsure of what to say. Normally he would come bounding in here, probably shouting something stupid, before whipping down some hallway cackling all the way. Maybe even slick the floor nicely too, so that the elves would go rolling and tumbling. But now all the words seemed lodged in his throat, stuck there, frozen there.
"North..." was the only thing Jack could squeeze out.
Suddenly warm arms enveloped him, squeezing the living daylights out of him. "You're okay," North breathed. "Thank goodness."
Jack felt tears prick his eyes, but took a deep breath and refused to let them fall. He wouldn't cry, not here and not now, and definitely not in front of Tooth. "I-I guess," he mumbled. North pulled away and pressed both of his hands on Jack's shoulders, smiling warmly at him.
"Don't try a stunt like that again, you hear me?" he mildly classicized Jack in his Russian accent. "We're Guardians, every single one of us, and we always stick together. Always."
Jack glanced away, shame burning his cheeks. "Y-Yeah." He idly wondered if his face was turning red, like how most kids' faces do when they get embarrassed. He hoped not. "Anyway," he added quickly, trying to change the subject, "how am I okay? I thought for sure that I would be..." His voice trailed off, but North understood.
"You hadn't lost your immortality yet, Jack," he explained. "Your eyes are still silver-ish. But for how long..." He hopelessly shrugged. "I don't know."
"Oh."
North sighed. That look was in Jack's eyes, that look that he hated to see in children. Suddenly an idea popped in North's head. "Jack," he said slowly, warming to the idea. "Would you like to help me?"
Jack's eyes immediately lit up, all traces of sadness gone. "Really?" he asked excitedly.
North nodded, knowing that he said the right thing and loving it. "Really," he grinned, and pointed over his shoulder. "The yetis need help making some toys; want to help them?"
Jack smiled, showing off all of his pearly whites. North could spot Tooth eyeing them enviously. "Yeah," Jack grinned, and then bounded off. North smiled; that was the Jack he knew.
Now, he said, turning back to the Moon. Back to work.
...
Done! Sorry this chapter is a bit slow, but it's necessary. D: I feel bad about it though, so I'll work my hardest to make the third chapter extra-awesome. :) And once again, THANK YOU FOR ALL OF THE SUPPORT. I'm still flipping out about that. You guys are all awesome and made writing this whole totally worth it. I hope you enjoyed this chapter (even if it was a bit slow)- and until next time!
Rand0mSmil3z
3