Author's Note: So. Gratzi for all the reviews and cookies. I feel loved :D

Lately I've been in a really bad, utterly hopeless rut of depression, so if the next few chapters aren't on the up and up, there's a good reason, and I'll probably go back to edit them later. :\ Thanks again.

Rated T for: Self harm and (oh no!) language X3

Tooth was infuriated.

Her face, which was always tranquilly composed and eager to carry out instructions to her fairies, was distorted with an outraged expression and flushed red with anger upon hearing the news. After the meeting went downhill, Tooth and Sandy stayed to discuss with North what course of action should be made to better clarify the situation. Baby Tooth was sent to Burgess for a premolar (After becoming close friends with Jack, the small fairy requested to collect all the teeth in an around this area.) It was here where she came across the fighting.

For a brief moment, Baby Tooth had considered helping Jack. Then she saw who he was fighting with, and abruptly came to a halt just before diving into her opponents shoulder beak first. It was a miracle neither of them noticed, too ensnared in their shouting to see the fairy fly back up above them and analyze them carefully. He was fighting with another guardian. That didn't seem right at all. Of course, between the two, some bickering and snowballs here and there was expected. But upon seeing the intensity of this fight… Baby Tooth considered not telling anyone of what she saw. There had to be a legitimate reason as to why they were fighting, after all. Surely they wouldn't fight like this - so angrily, so mercilessly - just because one of them were poking fun at the other. Right? She'd never seen Jack so inhumanely violent, it wasn't in his nature to act so aggressively, especially toward another guardian. Even from a distance, she could make out that spark of pure hatred glistening in his hardened bright blue eyes; the disgustingly powerful anger emitting from his glowering scowl. He just didn't strike her as the same person she was best friends with. And what if this were a secret fight? What would become of her when she told her leader? It was best if she kept it in.

But that idea wouldn't work either, seeing that the Tooth fairy was, in a way, connected to all of her fairies. By this time, Tooth probably already felt the great sense of unease and worry that Baby Tooth had contracted not moments before.

"Guys? Don't you think we should go look for Jack? I feel… I'm really worried for him. I don't want him to be alone, not if he's weak or sick…"

"We are all worried, Tooth. But for now, we must find best way to approach him and help him recover. As of right now, he might be out of shorts, but like Bunny said, he is not helpless. He's fine."

"Don't you mean out of sorts, North?"

"…Is that not what I said?"

"Never mind… It's just, I feel like… I guess it's just me…"

After excessively overanalyzing the matter at hand, Baby Tooth sighed and flew back to the Pole. She deemed it best if the others knew of what these two were up to. The weather wouldn't pose to be much of a problem, seeing that the fairies were built to endure just about any weather condition so their tooth collecting wouldn't be too delayed. The real problem was telling her leader before the fight got too out of hand; if it already appeared to Baby Tooth as a heated one-on-one death match, she couldn't even imagine how bad things would end up if it escalated. That, and seeing Jack so bent on destroying someone simply didn't sit right with her.

"Sandy says it would be most beneficial to wait it out and see if his symptoms go away over time," Tooth interpreted, glancing at the sand snowflake and clock hovering above the guardian's head. The Sandman grinned and delightfully nodded at her quick and accurate thinking. In the past (as in approximately 250 years ago) she was never all that great at making out what his images meant. But now… she was getting good at this.

"But that is where problem lies!" North sighed, rubbing his face and pacing around the globe room anxiously. "Jack will not see what we see! He-…" the guardian of wonder went silent, freezing in his tracks and looking down at the ground shamefully. "It is because we were not there for him," he admitted sullenly, earning equally saddened and guilty looks from the others. "It is because, to him, we are merely acquaintances, just barely past the point of being strangers…" North closed his eyes, slowly shaking his head. "Had we not neglected him all this time, at least had the decency to explain to him who he was and why he couldn't be seen, then maybe he would trust us. But because of all those years in solitude, he will not take our concern lightly. It will be hard for him to open up to us, and will take time… he is remote in more ways than one…"

Before North could elaborate this, Baby tooth came barging in through one of the closed windows and frantically began scanning the room for her leader. She was rapidly chirping and gesturing and flying around in little circles.

"Baby Tooth? What's wrong?" Toothiana's motherly instincts chimed in as she offered a cupped hand for her little fairy to sit in. Baby Tooth took a seat in it gratefully, catching her breath as her leader gently stroked her feathers with her thumb. When she could finally speak without gasping for air, Baby Tooth spilled out what she saw, careful not to go too into detail in fear of working up her leader.

Nonetheless, this happened anyway. "What?" She growled. "Jack and Bunny are doing what!?"

"Tooth," North spoke, "I cannot speak fairy. Please tell me what's going on."

With a bone chilling glare, Tooth looked up to the two guardians. "She said that Jack and Bunny were fighting-"

"Well, that's not much of a surprise, they always-"

"But Jack was really angry, and they looked like they wanted to kill each other!"

"…Again, I am not very surprised."

"And Baby Tooth says she heard something about a deal they formed… deal or not, I want to see what's going on here." Before she fly out the window to Burgess, Sandy leapt in front of her. His glistening golden hands waved an X in the air as he slowly floated back down to the ground. Tooth and North watched as he created an image of Bunny and himself looking at each other intently, and then it changed to Jack and Bunny yelling to each other.

"Sandy's saying that… he knew of the fight beforehand, and didn't stop Bunny because…" the images shifted, showing the two shaking hands and then to a tic tac toe chart. "Because Bunny was going to form a deal with him, sort of like a game…?" the dream sand picture changed again, this time with a sign that said WIN: STAY, LOSE: POLE. North sighed. "Tooth, what do you make of that?"

She rubbed her temples as Sandy huffed impatiently. He really didn't want to have to literally spell it out for them. That would be embarrassing for all of them.

"Hold on, I think… Are you saying, that if Jack lost this game, he'd have to hold up the deal by coming back to the Pole?" Immediately, Sandy's eyes lit up, and an ear-to-ear grin appeared on his face. "And that if he won the game, he could stay at Burgess?" the guardian of dreams nodded, flashing Tooth a thumbs-up. His encouraging gestures were cut short by a blur of blue and gray coming up from a hole in the ground beside him.

The tunnel opening closed up behind him as Bunny chuckled at the expression on Sandman's face. The look was questioning, as if he were saying so how'd it go?

"Ah won myself a bet, mate."

His expression changed to a slightly demanding, more doubtful one once his eyes landed on the wriggling cursing Jack flung over the Pooka's shoulder. It was almost like a deadpan expression, as if he were saying Really?

Upon noticing the unconvinced look on his face, Bunny sighed in irritation. "Hey, the drongo was runnin'! Ah couldn't just stand there! And yes, I was fair, alright? Honest." Sandy's stern expression wavered, only to be replaced with surprise as an angry Tooth fluttered past him and hovered dangerously close to the guardian of hope.

"E. Aster Bunnymund, you've got some serious explaining to do!" She chided, pointing a finger at the winter spirit carelessly tossed over his shoulder like a bag of garbage. Jack was desperately trying to free himself from the iron grip around his middle with one hand, while the other simply dangled down Bunny's back. Quite an amusing sight if you were seeing it from a certain angle, however.

Bunny took a cautious step back, using his free hand to briefly scratch the tuft of fur on his chest before continuing. "Relax, sheila. We were just roughhousin' a pinch."

North stepped in between Tooth and Bunny as a precaution before he pointed to Sandy. "Sandy tells me you and Jack had formed a deal of some kind. I would like to know what happened. Can you please explain?"

"Gladly," Jack spat, momentarily ceasing his struggling and peering at the others from under Bunny's arm as he spoke. "The kangaroo jumped me, tricked me, stabbed me, then kidnapped m- oof!" The Pooka dropped him onto the floor and scoffed.

"Ya bloody wanker! I barely even prodded ya with the thing!"

Jack shot the glaring bunny an incredulous look. "Barely pro-?! Does this look like a fucking prod to you, Cottontail?" he pointed to his bloody shoulder, earning a collective gasp from Tooth and Sandy (well… if Sandy could gasp).

North helped Jack to his feet with a fatherly demeanor about him. "Jack, mind your language please, the elves pick up on everything."

"Wha- the elves don't even talk!" Jack argued. "So why both-"

"About this deal," North interrupted the winter spirit, glancing back at Bunny. "Who won, and what are terms?"

Bunny bore a shit eating grin as he haughtily pointed a thumb at himself. "I did. An' the kid agreed tah stay at the Pole so we can-"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa." Jack interjected, coming between a smug bunny and an interrogative Russian. "Okay. First of all, I did not agree to anything. I was unwillingly dragged here. Second, Bunny cheated,"

Bunny couldn't help but to laugh at how childish the statement sounded. "There were no rules, mate. Ah couldn't have-"

"It doesn't matter! It wasn't fair and you know it!"

"How can it not be fair if I didn't break the rules?"

"Wha-?! There were no rules to break!"

"Exactly. So I won fair an' square."

"Ugh!" Jack hollered, clutching his fists and walking up to Bunny angrily. "Don't give me that shit, you stupid kanga- oww!" Jack felt a stinging sensation on his back, and the impact from his attacker sent him sprawling forward into Bunny. Jack immediately recoiled, pushing himself off of the pooka and flipping around to glare at whoever it was that whipped him.

Sandy stood before him with a discerning stare, one hand gripping a small makeshift sand whip and the other waving a finger at him, as if to say think again.

"Dude! What the fuck was that- Oww!" Jack blocked the weak blows with his arms, but was still shocked at Sandy's unclear hostility… that is, unclear until Sandy gestured to his mouth and a bar of soap appeared above his head. Above the bar of soap, in cursive hand writing, the sand read Watch your mouth. Jack groaned and ran his hand through his hair when it hit him. He was his staff?

"Where's my staff?" he vocalized his thoughts, glancing at his empty hands, then to North, then back to his hands, and then finally to Sandy. Sandy shrugged his shoulders. How am I supposed to know where you put your staff? Was written all over his face. Jack turned and glared at Bunny, his nostrils flaring in frustration and his eyes almost clenched all the way shut. "Where is it?!" he couldn't believe he'd forgotten about it for this long. By now, it wouldn't surprise him if he had found it.

Bunny snorted. "Calm down, ya gumby. S' probably back in Burgess where you dropped it at your arse."

"No, no no no, I need my staff!" Jack spat out, his breath quickening and his eyes growing wide with fear. Unbeknownst to him, his arms and legs began to tremble slightly. He turned his attention back to Bunny. "You have to take me back to get it!"

"Ah don't have to do anything."

"Bunny, please! Just really fast, so I can-"

"So you can make a break for it again? Oh, I don't think so, mate."

"You don't understand, Bunny! I can't- you-you don't know what he'll do with it, I need it with me!"

North's eyebrows furrowed. "What he'll do with it? Who's he, Jack?"

Jack bit his lower lip fiercely, reminding himself that none of them knew about that incident, nor did they really need to find out about it. "…no-nothing, I just need it with me, I can't have it away from me, I-"

"Jack, it's okay." Tooth reassured, placing a hand on his good shoulder and looking him in the eye. "We'll go get it. But for now, let's just get you all cleaned up, alright?"

Before Tooth could whisk him away to the infirmary, Sandy tugged on Jack's sleeve. The winter spirit peered over and saw that the little golden fairy was trying to ask him something. Jack knelt down to better see what he was trying to project to him through the pictures of bandages and first aid kits, but as soon as he was about the same height as him, the keeper of dreams placed a hand on Jack's injured shoulder. Jack winced at the burning feeling and looked over to see just what Sandy was doing to his arm. From the cuff of the Sandman's robe, a long wispy trail of dreamsand tinted with a pale lilac color began entering the wound, earning another hiss of pain from the guardian of fun. But the pain began to fade away, replaced by the strange sensation of numbness instead of the unbearable throbbing that was there moments prior. Sandy shot Jack a comforting look, and above his head sand formed the words feel better?

The winter sprite chuckled and nodded. "Yeah, thanks little man… heh, I think it's safe to say that you've got some pretty neat tricks up your sleeves, am I right?"

The Sandman chuckled, the sound of shifting sand resounding in the globe room as new words formed above his head. Want to see something cool?

Jack looked up to the other guardians, only to see that they've pretty much dispersed. Tooth was harshly whispering something to a fearful looking Bunny in the corner and North was speaking with the yetis surrounded around the globe. He looked back to sandman, who created a cloud of golden sand beneath their feet whilst he was distracted.

Jack smirked. "Looks like I'm going regardless. Alright, short stuff, let's go,"

Sandy carefully maneuvered the cloud of sand they were sitting upon out the window.

\Author's Note: I called Sandy a fairy because, as you might already know, you don't need a pair of wings to be one, and in the movie when Pitch said "No more Christmas or Easter or little fairies that come in the night…" the last part was directed to both Tooth and Sandy. So yeah. And I said robe cuz… well it looks like a robe to me at least…

Something I think I did fairly well on: Bunny and Jack's bickering. :)

Something I think I totally marred: the magical healing dreamsand bit :(

Thank you for the cookies and reviews, I enjoy them so… but now North's feeling a tad bit jealous XD

969~696