Guardian Witch
Rise of the Guardians
Chapter 4
All the Guardians, but one, gawked at the sight of the entrance of the one and only Manny himself. As everyone remained frozen at their spots, Sandy floated over to short man and wordlessly greeted him. Manny returned the silent greeting and turned to the still shell-shocked group of Guardians.
"Wait! You're the Man in the Moon?" Jack pointed at the short man, a stunned expression painted over his face.
"Hm, I chose this form in belief that none would be surprised by my sudden appearance." Manny mused out loud. "It seems as if I was wrong. Would it be better if I chose another form?" The divine-like man turned to Sandy, notifying that the question was addressed to the golden Guardian, who promptly responded by shaking his head.
A wave of silence washed over the group.
"Crikey."
"I haven't been down here for a while, but desperate times call for desperate measures." Manny said.
"This is about mystery person, da?" North, being one of the first to break out of the shock, asked.
"Yes, I had told her to go straight to Bunnymund." Manny waved over at the Easter Bunny. "I had seen to her that she was going to right direction, but, it seems that she went... missing."
"Who was the sheila?" Bunnymund's curiosity getting the better of his surprise. The rest nodded in agreement, their interest towards the subject piqued.
"Ah... well, this is going to be a little hard to explain." The Man, currently not in the Moon, scratched the back of his head, a sheepish expression painted over his face. "She's Emily Jane Pitchiner."
After finally sending away Kira and her chicken-legged house, Natasha was able to rest easy. Even after years of knowing the woman, she was still uncomfortable in her presence. No, she wasn't scared of the older Baba Yaga, it was just that being around her gave Natasha a certain itch all over her body.
One would think living under her influence for over 300 years, one would at least get used to her strange antics.
Natasha leaned against the willow tree before sliding down to sit on top of the entanglements of its roots. The young witch let out a sigh, the recent memory raced through her head. Was it okay for her to just forget whatever happened? Probably. She had done it before. With a wave of her hand, she made sure that she pushed the memory to the back of her mind, determined to make it an unnecessary memory. It wasn't like it was going to affect her anyway.
She gazed absentmindedly at scene in front of her. It had been nearly twenty years since the park which she called her home had been abandoned by the living. (Something about it being haunted by ghosts.) It was a good change on her part, it meant less noise from those obnoxious kids and less people noticing the mess she and her older sister would make after a fight. Which was exactly what happened. The ground was overturned in some places, making an abnormal mess of snow, soil, and ash; a few trees were thrown off from its original spots, some were rolled to their sides, some with its roots pointed skywards, while others were broken into nothing but splinters; she wasn't going to even start on the old playground, or rather, what was left of it.
At least she had the decency to leave this tree standing. She thought to herself. It wasn't the first time she and Kira had a fight like this. The two siblings never did see eye to eye after day one of meeting each other. The youngest Baba Yaga tended to keep her distance from the living, but when she did go close, she'd love to mess with their routines; misplacing things, walking through them, an accidental trip; those were okay to her. But Kira's sense of humor... was much darker than hers. If she could, she would take great pleasure just watching someone scream in agony as she would use her iron teeth to bite deep into their flesh, adult or child, she showed no preference to who she would perform these misdeeds too.
A sadistic cannibal, that was what Natasha suspected Kira was in her previous living life.
The witch began to subconsciously rub her injured arm. Decorating her arm was a horrid burn, the blackened outer skin was already beginning to crack, revealing the raw skin underneath it, a mixture of pus and blood seeped out from popped blisters. That's going to take some time to heal. Without meaning to, her mind rushed back to her sister's request.
"The Bogeyman, huh?"
Just what was her older 'sister' thinking of doing this time?
"Mother Nature?" Tooth's question came out as a mere whisper. Once again, the room was met with another of the Guardians' stunned silence.
"For what reason would she come to us for?" Bunnymund exclaimed. "She's already appointed herself as a neutral party."
"Well, that's not-" Manny began to explain, but was quickly cut off by Jack.
"Hold on just a sec. Who?" The Guardians turned to Jack, an unreadable expression glazed over their faces.
"She is like name." North attempted to clarify. "She is Mother of Nature. She watches over the Earth like how we watch over the children."
"And also, the person who should've mentored and guided you to be a winter spirit as she has done to the other season personifications." Manny added in. "But she disappeared before you even came to existence."
"Disappeared?"
"Yes, disappeared, Jack. You know, gone from existence; never seen for centuries; faded from reality."
"I understood him fine, kangaroo."
"Guys, now's not the time." Tooth flew in between the two myths. She turned back to Manny. "But, why now? Why has she appeared now? After disappearing for so long?"
"This is going to be hard." Manny muttered to himself. "But well, let's just say that we need her. There's a growing negative force that wants to get rid of me. In all honesty, I brought this upon myself." The glowing man looked down, a guilty look plagued his features. "Like you have said, Mother Nature has been... non-existent for the past few centuries. And I have an inkling as to why I haven't been able to detect her for a long time."
He looked over at Jack, who noticed this and began shifting uncomfortably at his spot.
"You're not saying it has to do something with me?" Jack asked, he could hear a certain bunny snicker. "I swear it was not my fault."
"No, it most definitely not your fault." Manny laughed. "But it has to do something with your sudden appearance." He took a breath. "Jack, you already know that you were a human before you were Jack Frost. But what you don't know was that before you were a human, you were already guardian." At the mention of that, Bunnymund began to choke on his own spit. The flustered fairy beside him tried her best to calm him down.
"What?" North voiced for Jack. Everyone was just as astounded as he was.
Today is just full of surprises, huh. Jack thought to himself.
"You don't remember, you probably never will." The Man in the Moon continued. "But your first life began as Nightlight. You were my Guardian. I'll try to summarize it short, but you were appointed by my parents to watch over me. You did a very good job at that, defending me from Pitch Black, but it resulted in the both of you being thrown into the human world. I won't tell you the whole story, maybe some other time. But as a result of being in the human world, you eventually turned into a human and at the same time, you forgot your identity as Nightlight. While, you were human, I had lost all trace of you being alive at all. But when you drowned in that lake, I found you and reappointed you with another name, Jack Frost."
"But what has that got to do with Mother Nature?" Bunnymund blurted. Sandy, who had been silent the whole time (of course), nodded in agreement.
"Alright, I'm getting there. See, I believe that Mother Nature went through the same phenomenon as Jack did."
"You're saying that she became human?" The Easter Bunny asked dubiously.
"Yes."
"For almost 400 years? That's quite a feat for a human to do, ain't it?"
"Well, I'm not really sure of the process of becoming human and whatnot. But I believe that if she isn't revived as Mother Nature, she will keep being born into a human body. It took me a little more than a century to find Jack after he disappeared as Nightlight."
"So, you found her, da?"
"That's what I believe." Manny nodded. "But I'm not as familiar to Mother Nature as I was to Nightlight. So, I needed some of you to clarify for me if it was really her."
"You mean, you doubt your own choice?" Tooth questioned.
"Here comes the real problem." Manny sighed. "I realized that at one point, a certain negativity beginning to grow in the human world, I guess you could say I was scared of this. It was something I haven't seen before, even now, I still don't know what it is. So, after finding out Jack's situation, I tried to find Mother Nature, since that was Earth is of her expertise. I have tried numerous times to revive who I thought was Mother Nature, and well, I chose poorly. I was too rash in trying to find her. The excitement got to my head, and I'm ashamed to say that my lack of judgement had caused me to come to this point." A question mark appeared above Sandy's head, which Manny noticed. "Through the course from when I renamed Jack 'till now, I had 'chose' three woman to be Mother Nature. I believed that if they had agreed to the name, that they were the rightful namesakes, since Jack had no refusal whatsoever. However, all three of them declined. But recently, I had found one who accepted, this time, I wanted you to see if that was indeed Mother Nature."
"Why didn't you name them something else like you did for Jack?" Asked Tooth.
"I thought it was only right to name her the same. I wasn't quite sure why, but this is all very new to me as it is to you all." Manny answered. "It was a miracle altogether for Jack to return being a Guardian. His case was the first time I had seen such things happening. Even now, I'm not quite sure how it works either."
"Another question, Manny, is ok?" North asked. He continued on when he saw Manny wave his hand in permission. "What happened to the three woman? And, why them?"
"Hm? That's interesting, I thought you would've known them by now, or at least have a hint of them, North. Since all three of them do live in your homeland."
"Shostakovich! It can't be!" Realization hit him.
"The three woman that I mistakenly named Mother Nature are now known as Baba Yaga." Once again, Manny's face shone of guilt. "I created what is known as the most terrifying witches in Russian tales."
"And this is where we go back to the real question as to why you are all here." Manny spoke a little louder. The Guardians looked back and forth each other, Tooth still looked a little light-headed, Jack was flabbergasted to finding out a new piece of his past, Bunny was dubious, and Sandy stood in confusion, only North seemed to have a clear grasp of the situation. "The conclusion that I've come to, my recent choosing for Mother Nature, has been kidnapped by Baba Yaga."
"Idet koz a rogataya, za malymi re byatami! Nozhkami top! Top!" The Horned Goat is coming, To small children! Her legs go clop! Clop!
"Where am I? What are you doing to me? Let me go, now!"
"Glazkami khlop! Khlop!" Her eyes go blink! Blink!
"What is going on? Who are you? I only played along because I thought this was a prank!"
"Kto kashki ne yest, molochka kto ne p"yet-togo" To those who don't eat porridge, to those who don't drink milk.
"Am I really dead? Stop! Please stop!
"Zabodayu, zabodayu, zabodayu!" To those children she will go, stab, stab, stab!"
"I'm not Mothe-"