Chapter 20: Security Duty

Disclaimer: I own nothing except my OC.

Shutting her eyes, Lauren pictured North's Palace and pictured herself there. Upon opening her eyes, she was. Looking around, she saw that she had landed in the center of the toy making section of his palace and was being stared at peculiarly by every single Yeti in the room. Suddenly a booming voice called "Why is no one working?" He peered down in the direction a yeti was staring and saw Lauren. North was taken back a bit but then smiled. He'd expected her to stop by at some point, maybe not so early, but definitely at some point. "Come on up, will you?" he asked. Lauren jumped into the air and was suddenly right beside North. He chuckled before saying "You've been practicing." Lauren's face turned red as she nodded in reply. "Let's go to my office. I assume you're here for something important, da?"

"You've guessed it," Lauren replied, truly scared for probably the second time in her life. North took note of how terrified she looked and frowned. Lauren was just a child herself, a child burdened with the responsibility of being a Guardian. Sure, she put on a brave facade and talked like someone who had just received their Ph.D. from Cambridge, but at heart, she was a child, something that a Guardian was supposed to protect. Sitting down in a chair, North denoted to one beside it for Lauren to sit in. She did so, curling in on herself. Snapping his fingers, two elves came. One had a mug of hot chocolate in each hand while the other had a tray of sugar cookies. Lauren accepted her mug of hot chocolate but declined a cookie. If she ate anything, it would soon be showing itself for the second time.

North had eaten about three cookies before he asked, "So what seems to be the problem?"

Taking a shaky breath, Lauren clarified what she was doing here. "There was a man. He broke into my school last night. I was coming back from the Colonel's school when I saw him. I overheard him saying 'Aw, my pet. Soon our revenge shall be taken, yes, very soon. Once we have our old friend's little brat in our possession, the rest of the pieces will soon fall into play. Tell me, what news do you have of the girl?' And I think he was talking about me."

North's face paled, the cookie he was holding was broken to crumbs as he clinched his fist. He dragged his chair closer to Lauren and he said, "Tell me everything you remember about the man."

Lauren scratched the top of her head before saying "Well, he wore a thick, black, hooded cloak. He only pulled his hood back for a second and his face..." Lauren trailed off, shuddering. North patted her hand soothingly. "It... he shouldn't be alive. It looked like someone had held his face in a fire when he was little and as he grew, the skin wouldn't grow with him, it would only stretch. And he had a scythe. He used it to chop the head off of a skeleton horse, very similar to my father's Nightmares, only much more grotesque. That's all I can remember."

North rubbed his chin thoughtfully before saying "I know this man who you are describing."

Lauren perked up in interest. "You do? Who is he?"

With a heavy sigh, North responded "He is the Grim Reaper. The very embodiment of evil."

Lauren blinked before asking "Okay, but why is he looking for me?"

"When your mother first became a Guardian," North began, "roughly five hundred years ago, the first villain she ever fought was the Grim Reaper. If she hadn't of done what she did, the world would not exist today. She beat him so hard that he stayed defeated for five centuries, but her death must have finally reached his ears because Grim wouldn't dare come near you if she were still alive."

"But this man, Grim, said he was planning on seeking revenge. How can you seek revenge on someone who's dead?" Lauren inquired.

North shook his head. "I don't know." They sat in silence before North continued. "But if he was at your school as you say, then you're going to need to be under constant surveillance from this point on. You're more than welcome to stay with me at the Pole until we get him taken care of."

Before North had even finished making his offer, Lauren shook her head. "Thanks for the offer, North, but I can't abandon my friends and leave them defenseless against this guy, who will most certainly visit my school again tomorrow night." North pondered on that for a moment before standing up. He walked over to a switch and flicked it. Suddenly bright lights shone out from every direction and spread out faster than the speed of light. "What is this?" Lauren asked, reaching a hand into the light.

"That is the signal used to let the other Guardians know that you need to talk to them. When you get older and have a place of your own, you will have one as well." North explained. Not even a minute had passed when the other Guardians began showing up. When they were all gathered around North and Lauren, North turned the signal off. Instead of sugar coating it, North got straight to the point. "It's Grim. And he's trying to capture Lauren."

There was a collective gasp from everyone, everyone except Jack. "Who's Grim?" he asked.

"The Grim Reaper. The very embodiment of evil." North replied.

"That's what you said about Pitch. And, now that I think about it, every other villain we've ever faced. How evil is this guy, really?" Jack flipped his staff around and sat on North's desk.

"Grim makes your first battle with Pitch look like a game of rock, paper, scissors. I've never met someone eviler than him." Jack froze, then, not having a response to that. Humphing in success, North continued as though he hadn't been interrupted in the first place. "We need suggestions as to what to do. Does anyone have any ideas?"

"She's more than welcome to stay at my palace until this all passes over." Tooth suggested.

"No, I already offered her to stay here but she declined. Said she wouldn't leave her friends defenseless. Anyone else?" North replied, dismissing Tooth's idea.

"I could stand guard." Jack offered. "After all, Grim wouldn't be expecting me."

This was met with many heads shaking in disagreement. "Jack, you've already got a lot on your hands, mate," Bunny said as Sandy made little snowflakes out of dream sand.

"It's winter, Jack. You're needed around the world." North said.

"No, I'm needed with Lauren. She's in danger and I need to protect her. The world can be warm for a few days, but I refuse to leave her defenseless." He looked over at Lauren, knowing she would back him up and was very disappointed when he saw her shaking her head as well.

"Jack, you have a job to do and you shouldn't quit in order to protect me. And the same goes for you, North. Christmas is in just a couple of weeks and you probably have a lot to do. That can probably be said for the lot of you so having someone keep watch over me is out of the question."

Jack frowned then, before saying "There's nothing you can do to prevent me from watching over you so if you tell me not to, I still will. Or we could watch her in shifts. There's five of us. That's not even five hours a day each."

"You know what? That actually doesn't sound like such a bad idea." Tooth said.

Lauren frowned. "But whatever would you do for the five hours you were supposed to be watching me? It'd be boring."

"Not if Grim shows up, it wouldn't be," Bunny said, twirling a boomerang between his paws.

Lauren made a sound in the back of her throat before asking "Forget keeping me safe for a moment and answer me this. Why would he want to take his revenge out on me when it's my mother he's pissed off at? I know she's dead, but that doesn't explain where I come in on his plan."

"We don't get why he'd want you any more than you do. He might plan on using your powers for his own personal gain, seeing as you have the powers of your mother and your father." Tooth told her.

"If he wasn't bent on world domination he could have them. I'd give anything to be normal." The Guardians all looked at her sympathetically because they'd all gone through this stage; wanting a normal life no matter the cost. But that was never an option. You didn't choose the Guardian life, the Guardian life chose you. And if it did, you eventually had to accept it. When no one had any more speculations as to why Grim wanted to capture her, Lauren said "I don't know why you people think Jack's plan has potential. If you're with me for any amount of time, Grim could strike your place of residency and destroy it, setting you far back. North, it's so close to Christmas. Imagine what would happen if all the presents you'd already made were destroyed. Or Tooth, if all the teeth you'd collected over the past thousand years were destroyed? Then what? Bunny, if your warren were to be obliterated? Sandy, what if your dream castle were left in ruins? Jack, what... well, where do you live?"

Jack cocked a crooked grin before saying "I'm a free agent. I don't hold up in one building and I never plan to. And if you're so bent on the others not guarding you, fine, but you don't have a single excuse you can make for me to keep me away." Jack stood at attention and held his staff in a mock salute before saying "Jack Frost, reporting for bodyguard duty."

Lauren rolled her eyeballs before poking him in the ribs, making him laugh. "Fine, if you wanna waste your time and come with me, so be it. But it's not going to be fun."

"Oh, we'll see about that," Jack replied in a challenging tone.

"Oh we will, will we?" Lauren asked him.

Smiling confidently, Jack retorted "Yeah, we will."

"Hmm. We'll see about that." Lauren said, flipping a lock of hair over her shoulder.

"And why is that?" Jack asked her.

"Because there's one person I still have to visit and you've just agreed to accompany me," Lauren said, a smile blossoming on her lips.

"Who? One of your cute friends?" Jack eagerly asked.

Lauren smirked before saying "Close. My father." Jack's face paled a bit. He and Pitch weren't exactly chummy with one another. "Let's get going, shall we? Because I'm about to faint from exhaustion but I think I'll manage for the next hour." Lauren laughed as Jack began muttering incoherently under his breath. She grabbed his wrist, closed her eyes, and turned her body, teleporting in the process as the Guardian's laughter faded away.