Hally, Roy, and Cupid and all other characters and elements non-canon to Rise of the Guardians belongs to me. Anything and anyone canon belongs to Dreamworks Animation and William Joyce.

Bleak.

That was the only word Hally O. Ween believed could properly describe the grey, desolate wasteland she and her fellow Guardians had been exiled to.

Right now, the blonde sorceress stood at attention near a thick forest of dead, bare trees, the flaky, cracked bark black as if made of charcoal rather than wood—proof of the fire that had long ago deprived this place of its beauty.

Hally was glad such was the case; a healthy, green forest would have not only been an eyesore in a flat, unchanging land otherwise devoid of beauty, but also mocking due to the forest's relatively insignificant size.

Mocking the exiles' attempts at escape.

'We certainly don't need a reminder.'

Cupid had been the first to panic. Her tough girl front crumbling instantly after arriving, she had only stood where she'd landed—lying unconscious for an unknown length of time along with her two older associates— for three seconds before dashing off in a futile effort to find the other Guardians...the ones who hadn't been unfortunate enough to fall into the paradox vortex.

In spite of her wavering optimism and the situation at hand, Hally couldn't help chuckling in nostalgia at the newly-turned-teen archer's lack of common sense. Leaving behind one's own comrades after being sent to an unknown and unrecognizable world—calling such a move "amateur" would have been an understatement.

Bunnymund had taught that girl many lessons; patience had not been one of them.

But on the plus side, at least Cupid wasn't straying too far. Hally could still spot the telltale green sweater and magenta corduroys of the figure frantically searching in the distance of grey-and-black speckled plains.

'Now where's Roy?' the blonde mage mused in concern as she scanned her surroundings. 'There's no telling how far he's gone. '

She got her answer when she felt someone tugging at her dress from below.

Her look down revealed an extremely short, bearded, and balding redheaded man staring up at her through narrowed, emerald eyes. He was dressed in a green jacket and darker green pants, a light brown buckle keeping the latter up against his white button-up shirt. Gold adorned him in the form of a wristwatch, a chain hanging from his belt, and the buttons on his undershirt. The man's feet, clad in light brown, dress shoes, tapped against the grass-less ground in impatience, his hairy hands crossed over his chest.

"So, any idea as ta wha' happen' ta us, Banshee?"

Ignoring the Irish man's griping tone and the sharp insult undoubtedly aimed at her occupation, Hally looked skyward to discover, much to her relief, the moon, its familiar, silver light coating the dark landscape in a comforting glow. 'Never underestimate Manny.'

But now to the business at hand: "I'm not quite sure," the taller Guardian put a white-gloved hand to her rounded chin to mull, "but I did detect an awfully powerful arcane signature being initiated just before the paradox imbibed us."

Her redhead companion merely tilted his head in confusion. He looked as he'd just been asked to solve a trigonometry problem. "Ye realize I ain't a lexicon, lass...right?"

'Oh...I did it again, didn't I?'

The sorceress clicked her teeth in embarrassment with this thought. Right, she had forgotten; she wasn't dealing with the certified paranormals (or "monsters," as mortals and most other spirits crudely refer to them) familiar with the more technical aspects of magic. She screwed her face up in thought, thinking of a way to explain in layman's terms.

"I felt a ton of magic being released right before the big, gaping hole in the sky sucked us up."

Her bantam companion nodded, both in understanding of the explanation and in approval for the simplifying of said explanation. He uncrossed his arms and set them akimbo. Hally frowned in confusion when Roy suddenly shifted his eyes in a random direction.

"DAMN IT!"

Okay, scratch that. Roy G. Biv hadn't been looking in a random direction.

Unsurprisingly, the swear word came from Cupid. Evidently, she'd needed some space to vent off her frustration. Hally saw it more as a way for the distressed teen to cope with her pain.

'I can't blame her. I don't even want to know how Bunny is handling this on the other side. Do they even know whether we're alright?'

Dozens of possibilities about how their fellow Guardians could be faring quickly came up in the mage's head.

None of them were pleasant at all.

Pushing these thoughts out of her mind, Hally sighed to herself and walked forward to meet halfway with a slowly approaching Cupid, who didn't even bother to watch where she was going. The brunette archer had her eyes to the ground, her walk furious and hurried, her black-gloved hands tightly balled into fists.

She looked sorely tempted to kill someone—wouldn't take a great stretch of the imagination to guess who. And the thought of what that "who"—or better yet "who's" were doing to the others not trapped in this world chilled Hally to her core.

'I almost wish we weren't the only ones who ended up here.'

But she knew she could never live with her fellow Guardians, especially North, having to spend years—maybe even forever for all she knew—in this nightmare. She felt more than she saw, but Hally knew there were presences in this area that weren't meant to be crossed, much less taken lightly.

'But then again, neither are we.'

Yes, that thought gave Hally hope (oh, how her friend Bunny would've loved to hear that) and encouraged her to spread that hope to her fellow Guardians.

She spoke up the second Cupid stopped right in front of her, the girl somehow managing not to run into the older woman. The elder sorceress tilted her head and bent down a bit to get the teen's attention.

"Cupid."

Navy eyes looked up, wide and wet with doubt and fear. Their owner's voice soon emerged, its tone unusually quiet and fearful. "I don't want this to be the end."

Hally and even Roy automatically cringed in sympathy at the shimmering tears threatening to leave the young girl's eyes.

Cupid was not a person who cried easily. This owed to her murky past as an orphan, as well as to her intense training under the rough-and-tumble Guardian of Hope. But here, in this dark, unfamiliar world who-knows-how-far-off from home, the battle against her tears had been decided before it even began.

Hally could not blame her...but she also could not let her lose herself so easily. No matter what, the three of them had to remain calm and stick together at all costs. The Guardian of Bravery, choosing to live up to her title, took the teen by her slim shoulders and gave her the most assuring smile she could.

"And it won't be, sweetie."

These words, spoken firm and true, caught Cupid's attention, making the archer stop her tears for a moment and gaze up at Hally through water-rimmed eyes. "Y-You think so?"

More than ever, Hally wished North stood right beside her this very instant. They were both optimists at heart, but the bringer of Wonder always showed more confidence in the future than his more wary fiancée. He would've been better able to see past the doom and gloom of this situation and solidify everyone else's fading faith in the possibility of returning back home.

But North wasn't here. Hally was. 'So I'll have to do.'

The Guardian of Bravery kept her pink-painted lips in that same smile, never letting Cupid see even an iota of her hesitation...never letting her or Roy see her fear.

"No, even better...I know so."

I'll be honest with all of you. I'd been putting off the chronicles of Hally, Roy, and Cupid in the Lost Lands because I doubted my ability to weave together decent chapters about their adventures. Not anymore—so hang on tight and get ready for a heck of a ride!