Chapter 2!

Wood!

Yeah!

Enjoy!


Shay let out a groan and ran her knee-length dyed hair. "Where the hell is everyone?" she asked to no one, looking around the hilly plains.

"Well, I am right here, in case if you hadn't noticed," A girl said from Shay's right.

"Hey Marina. How's it going," Shay asked absent mindedly, glancing at Marina before returning her gaze towards the setting sun.

"Good, good. Can I braid your hair?" Marina asked.

"Sure," Shay muttered. Marina began to pull the long, black hair into two high braids, the crimson and silver streaks creating a strange pattern.

"Ooh! It looks so pretty," A black-haired girl said, walking up with a broom stick under her arm. "Can you do mine next?" she asked, her voice muddled by a heavy Irish accent and a lollipop in her mouth.

"Sure Eve," Marina said, moving on to the other girl, pulling her hair into a single, lose braid. "Where is Carter?" she asked curiously.

"He's probably coming soon. He need to check up something. Apparently it was very important. I just left him to it," Eve said, biting down on the lollipop, crushing it in her mouth. She immediately pulled out a second one and began to suck on it instead.

"I'm all done," Marina said, stepping back.

"Thank you very much," Eve said. "Would you like a piece of candy? In a not creepy, kidnap you way?" she offered.

"Sure! What kind do you have?" Marina asked.

"Well, I have saltwater taffy for you," she said, tossing a small bag to Marina, "And some copyrighted chocolates that are shaped like tear drops for you, Shay," she ended, throwing a bag of the chocolate at Shay, who caught it and immediately unwrapped one of the delicious chocolates.

"Thanks, Eve," Shay said happily.

"You're welcome," Eve said. "But you really should be thanking my Jack O'Lantern workers," she added.

"Hey guys, what's up?" a boy asked, walking up as casually as possible. His black hair was messed up, and his clothes torn, but his brown eyes were bright with excitement, and possibly pain. He was also covered in feathers.

"What did you do this time?" Marina asked, walking over to brush feathers out of his hair.

"I pulled a prank on Goss while he was flying on that giant, slow goose. It didn't go too well," Carter said casually, trying to play it off. "But it was really funny."

"Good job. That stuck up jerk could use a joke sometimes," Shay said approvingly.

"Hey, what about me?" another boy asked, flying in on a floating skateboard.

"You helped out too, Zack?" Eve asked the skinny, red-eyed boy.

"Yeah..." Zack trailed off. "Quick, get these feathers off before anyone else sees," he said urgently, becoming Eve and Shay over to help.

"Why do you guys always do this?" Eve asked, sighing.

"I ask him that every day," Goss said, landing on a ginormous goose. Goss was the stereotypical beach boy, but with a giant goose that he flew around on. And this particular goose was missing half of its feathers.

"Hey Goss. What's up?" Shay asked, her lip curling with distaste.

"Nothing much," he said as a little dog hopped off of the goose.

"Who are we waiting for? We need to start heading to the meeting," Carter asked as Marina got the last of his feathers out of his hair.

"Well, we have Marina, Zack, Carter, Eve, Goss, and me," Shay said.

"So, where's Happy and New Years?" Carter asked, looking around as if they might be hiding.

"Happy has some unfinished business to take care of, apparently, and New Years is always with Happy, so I assume they will meet up with us at the meeting place," Eve said thoughtfully.

"What are we waiting for then?" Goss asked, climbing back on to his very unhappy goose.

"We are waiting for our last group member, idiot," Shay said, watching the treeless horizon. "And here he comes now," she said, watching a pale, black haired boy climb over the ridge of the nearest hill. Despite the lack of trees for miles around, several autumn leaves blew around him, dancing and floating in the gentle breeze.

"Hey Marshall! We've been waiting for you!" Eve shouted. Marshall double timed down the hill.

"Sorry I'm late," the thin, fragile looking boy said.

"It's fine. We're about to leave," Zack said, clapping him on the shoulder. "We wouldn't leave without you, though."

"Thank you all," Marshall said, still looking unsure.

"Who's going to take point?" Marina asked.

"Well, Happy usually does, but I guess I could," Carter said.

"Fine, I really don't care. Can we just get a move on?" Goss asked.

"Sure, sure," Carter said, his BMX bike appearing next to him. One appeared next to Marina too, and she hopped on. The two bikes fired up, taking to the sky. Zack followed on his skateboard, looking rather bored. Goss's goose took off next, flapping noisily. Marshall came up next on a horse made of flames. Shay followed him, riding a rainbow mop.

"Really?" Eve asked, looking at the strange mop.

"Hell yeah," Shay shouted as they all fell into a V formation, with Carter at the lead.

"I think it looks stupid," Goss said with a sniff.

"I think you look stupid," Shay snapped back.

"I think you should die then," Goss replied.

"I think that I will kill you first, dumbass," Shay shouted.

"Well, that escalated quickly," Marshall said quietly from his horse.

"How are you, by the way?" Marina asked Marshall.

"I'm good. There was a long Autumn last year, and this year Autumn started early, so I have time to enjoy it," Marshall said happily. "Or, it did in this part of the world, anyway," he said thoughtfully.

"It sucks trying to keep up with that stuff, doesn't it? With all the time changes, I mean," Eve said, joining in on the conversation. "I just go from Halloween to Halloween, following the time zones, but with you guys, you have to remember that in Australia, it's Summer while in the States, it's Winter."

"It's fine, actually. We all usually have the same amount of territory, except when it comes to the more northern and southern parts. It's always winter once you get above Canada, and it's always hot in parts of the middle east, but it is never just Autumn or Spring anywhere, which kind of sucks, but it's still fine," Marshall said.

"That is very accepting of you," Marina said. "I'm sorry that Summer takes up so much extra room."

"It's fine. I manage, and so does the Springtime Spirit," Marshall said. "It could be worse."

"Yes, it could. Now, I really don't care about any of this, so could we please shut up and focus on our destination?"Goss asked crossly.

Eve made some obscure comment about feathers being shoved up the wrong place, causing everyone, even little Marshall, to giggle. Goss began to shout at them in rage, creating even more laughter.

...

Happy looked up at the sky and saw the others zoom past in their loose V formation. She could hear their laughter, and all the shouting, and the swearing. She frowned. She would have to talk to them about the swearing later, but now was not the time.

She turned and flew low in the opposite direction, past a frozen lake, and to a small, broken bed with a deep hole underneath it. She had been coming past here daily, in secret, to make sure nothing was happening in the pit. In the past month, though, she had begun to hear noises, slight at first, barely loud enough to hear, but now they were defiantly there. Voices, plotting, planning, scheming, to do something big.

New Years let out a quiet cry. Happy moved away from the pit and slung the pack off of her shoulders. In the pack was little baby New Years, an adorable little baby with a tuft of black hair and already coppery skin. He was usually smiling, except when he was near anything associated with Pitch or the darkness that he caused. Now was not a smiling time.

Happy comforted the little baby, deep in thought. She had noticed that, after the increase of activity in the hole, things began to go wrong. Eve's factory began to have mysterious accidents, forest fires began to happen in the winter, pranks of all sorts began to backfire.

The spirit of Labor Day was killed.

And Happy planned on taking this up with the top guardians, but she could never talk to any of them. They were all to busy. So now all she could do was talk to the others at the meeting.

Happy sighed, slung the pack back onto her shoulder, with New Years now sleeping, and took off back to the sky, taking the long way around to the meeting point. She could use a break from those idiots.

It's a shame that she didn't notice that someone was following her.

Or something.


Chapter done!

That's two chapters in one day!

You people are so demanding.

I hope you're happy!

Anyway, point out my mistakes!

All of them!

Thanks,

~CatKkit.