Title: Lights Out

Pairing(s): Just a sprinkle of older!SophiexJack (I can't help myself, okay?)

Genre: Humor

Summary: In which the Bennetts must make the best of a power outage.

Disclaimer: I own none of the characters, only the story itself.

A/N: Wow guys, I'm really really sorry it's taken me, what, three weeks to update? I had finals and then I had a paper to write, and with the new semester I had to adjust to all new classes and ugh. I promise I won't abandon you all for this long again! Here, have some sibling fluff!

Beta'd by the wonderful darex2xdream


It had been over 300 hundred years, and Jack still didn't know his own strength when it came to his powers.

"Do you think he's here yet?" Sophie asked, not looking up from her book. She was nestled into the couch, at least four blankets wrapped around her in an attempt to stay warm. She didn't need to look up and out the window next to her to know the storm was getting worse. The wind was howling so loudly by now that Sophie was sure she could feel the whole house moving.

"Dunno, maybe." Jamie yawned, casting a glance her way from the kitchen table across the room. The table was covered in opened textbooks, notebooks, and loose pieces of paper as Jamie slaved away over his homework. "I'm sure he'll be here soon, I mean a storm this big has to be because of Jack."

"I just hope he's not in a bad mood or something. The last time it snowed this hard here was when Jimmy made me cry in front of everyone." Sophie commented, flipping a page of her book.

"Well whatever his deal is-" Jamie cut off as the lights suddenly began to flicker. Frowning, he glanced over at Sophie just in time for the entire house to go pitch black.

"Shit…" Jamie muttered, groping the table for his cell phone. "You alright Soph?" he called out to her, knowing just how much she didn't like the dark, even if she was almost seventeen years old.

"You don't think it's…" She faltered, her voice smaller and much more childlike than it usually was.

"No, it's just the storm. Pitch hasn't been seen in a long time, remember?" Jamie replied, finally finding his phone and using it as a flashlight. He quickly got up and began digging around in the cupboards.

"Doesn't mean he won't come back." Sophie mumbled too quietly for Jamie to hear, wrapping the blankets around herself tighter, book forgotten. She felt so much smaller in the dark, so much younger.

After a few more minutes of digging through drawers and cupboards, Jamie finally let out a victorious "aha!" and made his way into the living room. As fast as he could, he set down a few candles he had managed to dig up on the coffee table and lit them using a small box of matches. Unfortunately, there was still barely enough light for Jamie to be able to see Sophie, who was only a few feet away.

"Hopefully the power will come back on really soon..." He commented sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. Sophie just rolled her eyes and tried to stifle a laugh. No matter how old Jamie got, she was convinced he'd never really be able to take care of himself.

"C'mon, I think there are more candles in the hall closet."


Twenty minutes later, the living room and kitchen were dimly lit with about eighteen assorted candles, and the Bennett siblings were armed with flashlights and thick sweatshirts. Every blanket to be found in the house had been dragged into the living room as well, basic building blocks for a fort just waiting to be made.

"I want popcorn." Sophie whined, dropping all the pillows from her room onto the floor.

"I mean, you could probably try to pop it over a candle…" Jamie smirked as he pushed the couch back against the wall. Fighting a smile, Sophie threw a pillow at him and crossed her arms.

"You're not funny," she pouted.

"I'm hilarious."

The blizzard only seemed to get worse, the snow falling harder and harder as the wind howled louder than it had in a long time. Sophie was shivering by the time they managed to get their fort up; a mound of blankets and pillows and couch cushions.

However, the Bennetts weren't completely miserable, despite the colder-than-average temperatures. Wrapping themselves up in a snuggie-or eight-they found themselves lost in their favorite story game, fortunately/unfortunately.

The rules were simple enough. One person would add to the story starting with fortunately, and the next person would use unfortunately.

"Unfortunately, the situation was getting out of hand. The bear knew he had to act fast, or all of his hard work would be for nothing." Jamie said, and then glanced at Sophie, waiting for his younger sister to take her turn.

Sophie thought for a moment, eyes bright and she mulled over possible directions in which she could take this story. "Fortunately, he wasn't afraid to speak his mind. The bear marched right up to T-Rex and demanded he give back his favorite colored pencils, because if he couldn't finish his drawing, he wouldn't win the art show and a free vacation to Mexico! He had already bought a huge sombrero, so he had no choice. He had to win." Satisfied with her answer, she turned to Jamie, the look in her eyes daring him to try and top that.

Chuckling, Jamie thought for a moment, stretching his legs out. "Unfortunately," he began, "the T-Rex only spoke French, so he had no idea what the bear was saying."

"Fortunately, the bear had been taking online French classes."

"Unfortunately, the T-Rex had already broken all of the colored pencils, for he had tried to use them as toothpicks."

"Fortunately, he had a spare set that he gave the bear in order to fulfill his dreams of wearing a sombrero."

"Unfortunately, the bear was too late, and his arch nemesis, Arthur the tree frog, had already won with his beautiful painting of the galaxy."

By the time they finally got tired of their game, they both had stitches in their sides from laughing so hard.


"I'm gonna get a glass of water." Sophie remarked suddenly, crawling out of the makeshift fort, leaving behind a warm pile of blankets.

"Mmkay." Jamie yawned, absorbed in a text he was typing.

Sophie stretched as she stood up once outside the fort, then frowned as she realized something was off. Five candles were no longer lit. Sophie glanced around the room uneasily, but decided they must have just gone out on their own. Shaking her head, as if to chase away her fear, she made her way carefully into the kitchen.

However, she was startled to find that five of the candles in the kitchen had also gone out. Sophie could feel her heartbeat quickening, but not wanting to make a big deal out of nothing, she tried reaching for a glass as quick as she could so she could retreat to the safety of her and her brother's fort.

Just as her delicate fingers were about to wrap around the cool glass in the cupboard, something entangled itself around her waist and yanked her back into the shadows. Before her lips could part and let out the startled scream that rose in her chest, cold fingers clamped over her mouth, keeping her quiet.

Sophie went numb with panic. All she could think about were deep golden eyes and black shifting sand. Even though she knew fear only made Pitch stronger-he lived for dread, horror, anxiety-she couldn't stop herself from drowning in it. He was going to take her away, he was going to hurt her again, he was going to use her to gain the petty revenge he had been trying to get on Jack for years-

As Sophie struggled to get away, a soft, familiar chuckle came from right next to her ear. "What, aren't you happy to see me?" The voice said in a hushed tone, and a playful kiss was planted on top of her head. For once Sophie was glad it was dark so he couldn't see her reddening cheeks.

Mumbling something into his hand that sounded a lot like "get off me", Sophie shoved his staff away (which happened to still be hooked around her waist) and squirmed until she had turned around to face him, ripping his hand off of her mouth.

"You always have to make an entrance, don't you Jack? Have you ever even heard of knocking?" Sophie scowled up at him, but her eyes gave away just how happy she was to see him.

"Go big or go home." He smirked, leaning against his staff as he stared down at her. "Although," he added with a slight frown, "this blizzard may have gotten out of hand…"

"No shit, Sherlock."

Jack blinked, startled at the way she casually threw around a swear word. As he peered down at the wild little blond that he had grown to love, he realized that even though she still loved to color, slept with a stuffed bunny, and always kept a nightlight (or three) in her room...Sophie really wasn't a kid anymore.

He tried to ignore the pang in his heart, and instead leaned a little closer to her, giving her the best mischievous grin he could muster.

"Let's see how bad we can scare Jamie…"


A/N: As usual, I'm not completely satisfied with this...aw, well.

Hope I made you interested enough to want to know what happened that made Sophie so scared of Pitch, because a big, fat, juicy back story is coming your way soon!

Leave me some love if you can, and thanks for reading!