A/N: Ok... so I lied...I thought this would be the last chapter of Part 2, and it was attempting to finish the rest of it that caused it to be delayed so much. Not only am I not done with it yet, but this felt like a really good break point. Also, I figured that you guys'd appreciate an update sooner more than a long finale later. Anyway. There will definitely only be one more chapter for Part 2 after this. Then I get to start working on Part 3.
Lil' Line O' Litiguous Lard: I own neither universe. I wish I did. There is an O.C. in this chapter, though.
Part 2
Chapter 7: Explanations and Recriminations
It was another half hour before the other Guardians arrived in North's sleigh; there had been absolutely no change in Jack.
"How long has he been like this?" asked North.
"A half an hour," Tooth replied mournfully, "I've been talking to him, but it's like he's trying to shut out the world."
"We need to get him back to Pole. If nothing else, Yetis can keep him in building." North said, pulling out his snow globe.
Tooth nodded as she carried the surprisingly-light Winter Child to the sleigh, attentive for any indication that Jack might shoot off on his own again. The young spirit, however, did not move or react the entire way to the bed in the infirmary of Santoff Clausen.
The four Guardians looked at the boy, still curled into his fetal ball and eyes clenched shut, lying in the bed. They weren't completely sure what to do or expect. Was he going to snap out of it? Was he going to fly off in a haze again? Was something else entirely going to happen?
North opted to plan for the worst and ordered the Yetis to gently strap Jack down to the bed. Bunny took Jack's staff and hid it in the Warrens for good measure. Sandy had inspected him and informed the other Guardians that Jack had retreated deep into his own mind and there was nothing he could currently do about it in the state Jack was in.
An entire day passed and there had been no change in the Winter Spirit. The Guardians wracked their brains for what they could possibly do. It was Bunnymund who had the final brainstorm. "'Ay, wait a minute. Didn't they 'ave torrential rains in Nevada while we were chasing Frostbite around?" he asked North.
"Aye, but what does that have to do with—Hyas!" North had clearly come to the same conclusion as the Pooka.
"Exactly. I'd bet an 'ole batch o' eggs on 'im being affected like Frostbite. 'E's also a few thousand years older than any of us. 'E might just 'ave an idea." His accent became more pronounced as his enthusiasm about the idea grew.
"To Globe Room! We find him! Sandy will watch Jack." The small Guardian nodded in acknowledgement of the last statement as the large Russian and Kangaroo-rabbit rushed out of the door of the infirmary.
Finding the ancient Rain Spirit did not prove difficult; it was monsoon season in Asia, after all. His monumentally foul mood, however, almost made them regret their decision.
"And what the hell do you two want?" grumbled the surly spirit.
"Um…well…we kinda noticed a bit of a downpour in Nevada yesterday…" began Bunny.
The golden-bearded spirit visibly winced, but defensively stated. "So what? Rainstorms in the desert are always sudden and strong. Besides, since when were you two the weather police?"
Bunny pressed on, "Bloody 'ell. I'll come right out and say it. Were you in control of your actions yesterday, or was somethin' makin' ya do it?"
Hyas visibly stiffened and his eyes looked at them suspiciously, "Why do you ask?"
"Is Jack, Jack Frost. Something decided to use him as its little puppet yesterday. Blizzard and hailstorms along southern U.S.. Now he at Pole in very bad shape."
"What? It—it hit one so young? Damn bloody furballs!" exclaimed the rain spirit in obvious fury.
"Uh, what was that, mate?" Asked Bunnymund dangerously, suspicious of a possible slur on his extinct people.
Hyas, oblivious the pooka and running his hands through his thick hair, continued his tirade. "I knew that bloody thing was going to cause misery. I told them. Did the haughty little bastards listen? NO! I mean, what do I know? I'm just a rain spirit; one of the very things they were trying to make that thing control. The Gods, and now the Moon make us this way for a reason! It took some idiot causing the entire damned Sinai to flood convince them. That damned thing was supposed to be gone for good!"
Seemingly finished with his stream-of-consciousness narrative, he drew a deep and steadying breath and turned to the two stunned-looking Guardians. "I apologize for my outburst. What caused the young Frost to behave as he did is a device designed millennia ago to control the weather. The weather of our world is, as you know, controlled by animate and sentient beings. The designers did not know this, and designed their device accordingly. There were…bad reactions, to put it mildly. Eventually, another group of people removed it from our world." He held up his hand to forestall the obvious question. "No, I will not tell you how, even if I knew all of the details. That is information from an era long-past; one that should stay buried. Suffice to say, it was taken from our world."
"Then how did it hit you and Frostbite yesterday?" was Bunnymund's indignant question.
The Grecian looked a bit bemused, "I…I sensed its return the night before last, although it had been so long that I didn't recognize it immediately. I'm ashamed to say that it took me feeling its grip to realize exactly what I was sensing. Someone had it somewhere in Utah and was inexpertly fiddling with it. That's what made both the Winter Spirit and I cause such unseasonal mayhem."
North was aghast, "You say is back here? Is there way to stop or get rid of it? Jack is bad off as is, being puppet again…would be very bad. I feel it deep in my belly." He solemnly patted the paunch in question.
Hyas shook his head. "No, it disappeared again by mid-afternoon yesterday. I…went to investigate where it had been and I'm…confident it will not be back here for a very, very long time." He was clearly choosing his words carefully, not wanting to give the two Guardians more information than he felt necessary. "As for the young Guardian, what is his condition?"
"Frostbite's been curled up in a ball since yesterday. Sandy says 'e buried 'imself in 'is own 'ead." Bunny paused before continuing quietly, unsure of how to say the next words. "We…looked into what 'e'd been made to do. There were over a hundred ice- and snow-related deaths in California, alone; most were before the snow and 'ail actually started." He left the rest to the imagination of the ancient man.
"I see." Hyas's golden eyes gained a haunted, faraway look. "When you are held by the device…it is like being put inside of a transparent prison. Sound is muffled and feeling is limited, but…you can see everything completely perfectly. Absolutely everything; but can do absolutely nothing. No doubt he saw all of, and heard many of, those things his body did. He's a gentle and sensitive soul, yes?"
The two Guardians nodded in agreement, Bunny too horrified by what he was hearing to lapse into his usual snarkiness about the young Guardian.
Hyas smiled gently. "Can you really blame him for trying to cut himself off from all of that? The only advice I can give you is this: he just went through hell. Sandy may be able to help coax him back out, but this is going to haunt him for a long time. Don't push him; let him process and deal with what happened on his own terms. It will be excruciatingly-slow going for a while, but he will recover; make sure he knows you know that."
The two Guardians thanked the ancient Spirit of Seasonal Rains and left in North's sleigh; both quiet and lost in their own thoughts.
While North and Bunnymund had been gone, Sandy had made some strides in making Jack more comfortable. The boy had relaxed some out of his tight ball; his facial features slowly smoothing to the peacefulness of sleep. The little man turned, manifesting a question mark above his head as he did so, to two returning Guardians.
North seemed unsure how to answer, so Bunnymund took it upon himself to share the most immediately important information. "Hyas says that the thing that got Frostbite's gone and won't be comin' back." To illustrate his point, he began to undo the fastening on the bed's straps. "'E wouldn't tell us what it was, exactly or 'ow he knew, but 'e was sure."
North had managed to gather his thoughts by that point and continued, "Is as we thought, Jack saw and heard everything it made him do. He says Jack will get better, but to give him time. It will not be easy…on all of us."
Sandy nodded, knowing that there must have been more to the conversation, but satisfied that he had the important details. They could take time later to cogitate on whatever they'd gleaned. Right now it was time to focus on the recovery of their youngest member.
Hyas turned out to be a lot more fun than I was expecting. I think I might finally have a character to add to a bank of potential O.C.'s I can use in something later. For those curious. Hyas is from Greek mythology. He is the son of Atlas and the brother of the Hyades. You might know him better as the constellation Aquarius. Everything else about him, I made up as I went. Hope you guys like him.
The "damned furballs" that Hyas is referring to are the Furlings, whom the background-stargatelore says created the Touchstone. In my headcanon, the Furlings were an advanced scientific race who'd outgrown such things as belief in mythical beings, especially those in charge of weather patterns.
Little mini-background-story to follow:
At the time the Touchstone was created, there were small delegations of both the Asgard and the Furlings on Earth. The Asgard's chosen mode of intervention was with the Norsemen, as you already know. The Furlings, more reclusive by nature, saw that a large portion of the planet's population lived in inhospitable areas, where they clustered around and fought over the limited resources of those areas. This is why they created the Touchstone. It was created and tested on Medrona, but found it just as problematic on Earth as the NID did. It took the causing of Noah's flood for them to give up on their efforts and return the object to a place they knew it worked.
And that's it for the mini-exposition.
Effugere: When I read your review, I was a bit amazed at my own reaction. Surprisingly-addicting is a perfect description of how I feel writing it, too. You've easily topped my list of favorite reviews on any of my stories. Thanks a bunch!
Enjoy!
Tzapporah signing off!
