Author's Note: I know I said I was going to do an I interlude, but I was too sleepy and decided to put it in the story instead. Can you guess which part it was? It was only supposed to be a small cute part, but it to took over the chapter instead and gave me ideas about Pitch. As always, thank you for all the faves, follows and reviews! You guys' reviews make me all warm and fuzzy inside. :D Anyway, on with the story!

Chapter Thirty-Five: Sincerely, Pitch Black

Pitch watched Jack as Jack sipped his cold tea. He recalled how tired Jack still looked, yet he seemed reluctant to go back to bed.. He knew that look.

"Jack?" Pitch asked, as Jack looked back up from his tea.

"Yeah?" Jack said, trying to sound casual. He wiped his tearstained cheeks with the sleeve of his hoodie.

"Did you have a bad dream about all of this?" Pitched asked gently.

Jack flinched and looked back down at his tea. The nightmare had been horrible. He had dreamt again of the Guardians' rejection of him, and of that terrible moment in Antarctica. But instead of forcing Jack to join him, Pitch had weilded that knife and stabbed Jack.. right in the heart. Jack had stared up at Pitch with a look of utter betrayal and hurt, as his life began to fade away. With the last bit of life left in him, he had looked at the dark Lillian, only to see her grinning down at him, a look of malicious glee on her face at his death.

Jack shivered as he remembered the dream. He didn't say anything, but he didn't have to. Pitch could tell what the answer was just from Jack's reaction.

"It wasn't me," Pitch said. "Sometimes when terrible things happen to people, they are more than capable of producing their own nightmares without my help. What happened to you was clearly very traumatic, so this is your mind's way of dealing with it. I think once things are more settled between you and the Guardians, and.. us.. then your nightmares will stop. But you know you can always come to me or Lillian if you have them, don't you?"

Jack nodded at his tea, and tried to mentally will his tears away. He couldn't help it, but when Pitch had hurt him like that, just to turn him evil.. it had felt like Pitch had stabbed him right in the heart. That betrayal right on top of the one from the Guardians..

Jack buried his face in his hands. He couldn't deal with this. Pitch was back to normal, he and Lillian were normal, everything was supposed to be fine. The Guardians had apologized, Pitch had apologized.

But everything didn't feel fine.

It didn't feel fine at all.

Jack started when he felt the arms wrap around him from behind. He felt something ruffle his hair and hold him close. Jack sniffled and relaxed against the arms.

"Don't hide away your feelings," Pitch said gently to him as he held Jack in a sort of backwards hug. "No one expects you to get over this right away. It will take a long time, but I guarantee you that with time, it will. Perhaps the hurt won't ever go away, but it will feel better."

Jack felt more tears fall down his cheeks.

"..I.." Jack shuddered from the memory of it, "..I had a d-dream.. about you.."

Pitch stared down at the top of Jack's head in surprise, but soon smoothed his face out as he expertly hid the emotions away. He should have realized, espeically after Jack had explained how horrible that he, Pitch, had been.

"I'm sorry," Pitch murmured to Jack. "I wish I could say something to take it all back, to make it go away.. But I promise that I won't ever do such a thing to you again."

Pitch gave Jack one final squeeze and finally let him go. He ruffled Jack's hair as he resumed his seat across from Jack.

Jack was looking far too sad and solemn for Pitch's tastes, as Jack just didn't do angsty. It made him look very un-Jacklike.

"You know, I'm surprised you're not thinking of ways to use the new toy you're inventing," Pitch said, trying to keep his tone light. "Personally I think it would be a good way of waking up a certain sleepy spring spirit, don't you?"

Jack's startled look, then watery smile were a start.

The smile became a full on grin when Pitch suggested that he might look the other way if Jack wanted to use his powers to wake Lillian up today.

Two seconds later, there had been a WHOOOSH and then Lillian's surprised shriek could be heard throughout the lair.

Pitch smiled to himself as he sipped his tea, but that smile soon slipped.

How long had Jack been having nightmares?

Had he been having them ever since he came back?

Pitch set down his cup, looking into it thoughtfully.

What could he do about this?

A thought occurred to him and he tried to push it away.

But if it was to help Jack...

Pitch sighed. Sometimes he really disliked his brain.

Not too long afterwards, Pitch found himself at a desk in his room, with a piece of paper in front of himself.

He still couldn't believe this...

Pitch Black writing a letter to Santa.

Soon however, he had the thing written. Using the shadows in his room, he had slipped outside. The sun was rising, but it was still weak.

Still, Pitch was surprised as usually the sunlight hurt him, but this time he felt.. nothing. He gazed up at the sun in consternation, then looked at a pale hand.

Could this be the Man in the Moon's doing? He shook his head as he slipped from shadow to shadow. He had a letter to mail.

Some time later, Phil returned to the Pole with an armful of letters. He had volunteered for letter duty on the grounds that it was the off season, and there shouldn't be too many letters. One letter in particular though, drew his eye. This one didn't have a childish scribble on the front. This one had very good penmanship, with the cursive almost looking like calligraphy.

When Phil read the front of the envelope, his eyes practically popped out of his head. He rushed off to North's office to give him the letter.

North looked less than pleased to be interrupted again, in his office, but the look passed as he realized Phil was waving around a letter.

He remembered that Phil had volunteered for letter duty and looked at the letter with interest.

"Is from Jack or Lillian?" he asked. It was unusual that they would write to him when he knew they were coming to visit any day now.

Phil shook his head and thrust the envelope into North's hands.

North read the return address and almost dropped the letter in shock.

Pitch Black.

What would HE be writing to North for?!

North hastily ripped open the envelope to read the letter inside.

It read:

North,

I realize that you weren't expecting this, but I trust you will pass this message along to whom it needs to go to. As you must suspect from our last visit, Jack has some issues yet with this past Easter. Even though he refuses to say so, I believe that he's been having nightmares about it ever since he returned home. If you hadn't realized, the Sandman's dreamsand is incapable of penetrating my lair, so Jack or Lillian often don't have the good dreams that the Sandman gives to children. I fear that living here has given the both of them more than their fair share of nightmares. My main concern at this moment however, is Jack, as he appears to be the most distressed from all of this. If you could please pass the message along to the Sandman, perhaps the Sandman can figure out some way of passing along good dreams to Jack as he so desperately needs them. I would greatly appreciate this.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Pitch Black

North stared at the letter. Pitch was asking for help?

But then North nodded. He wasn't just asking for help, he was asking for help for Jack.

He stood and brushed past Phil, who had been hanging around in the hopes of finding out the content of the letter (was he was certain it was about his two favorite spirits), and walked out of his office.

It had been a few days since Pitch had sent that letter, and he had heard nothing. Not a thing.

He had just finished spreading nightmares for the night, but his heart hadn't been in it. Not when Jack had woken up very early again, and was more silent than ever as they sipped their tea.

Pitch had mostly spent the night slipping into children's rooms and watching their good dreams a little jealously. Why couldn't his children have such good dreams?

And he had heard nothing from the Sandman. It was this that had Pitch seething, and it was this reason that he had appeared from a shadow in the woods and proceeded to stomp all the way back to the lair.

It was as he was preparing to slip under the bed that was over the entrace to his lair that he finally noticed the three small golden sacks of dreamsand each tied off with a golden ribbon. A folded sheet of paper lay under the one in the middle.

It read:

So that all three of you can have sweet dreams. Use a pinch before bedtime. Let me know if Jack still has problems, and I'll see what else I can do. And just because Lillian hasn't been more vocal, doesn't mean she isn't having troubles too.

If you want to get in touch with me, I'm often around Burgess just after sunset.

Pitch folded the letter and tucked into his robes. He shook his head at the notion that all three of them needed good dreams. It had been so long since he had had a good dream, he didn't remember what they were like. But he was used to his nights holding horrendous nightmares or else nothing but darkness until he awoke. He shivered, ignoring as he always did, the desperate cry of "Daddy!" in the back of his mind.

So he had been having nightmares as well.. It was only natural, since a large portion of his life was suddenly.. gone. Obscured and beyond his reach. Memories he hadn't thought of in centuries had suddenly starting surfacing, and since the ones directly before becoming Pitch Black were most unpleasant, he had been having nightmare after nightmare about them.

So when he was overwrought, he did what he always did, he threw himself into his work. Only now he couldn't work, since whenever he saw a child whimpering in their sleep, all he could see was Jack.

Pitch rubbed a hand down his tired face. He was getting too old for this. He looked back down at the sacks and nodded to himself. If he gave Jack and Lillian his share, then the dreamsand would last that much longer. He doubted if Sandy actually cared about his dreams or not. Probably he just sent three as a curteousy.

With that thought in mind, Pitch grabbed up the three bags and disappeared down into his lair. If he had been a little less preoccupied, he might have heard the stamp of a hoof and snort of a horse coming from a nearby shadow of a tree.

That weekend found Pitch with a headache and two very hyper child spirits. The dreamsand seemed to be doing the trick, as Jack had now taken to sleeping in a bit later and didn't seem to be brooding so much over that Easter. Meanwhile, Pitch had been having more trouble than ever sleeping and being woken up early every single day was taking its toll on him.

Not that he'd ever tell anybody. He was Pitch Black. He could handle his sleep just fine, thank you.

So it was with this thought in mind that he was gripping his tea cup a little harder than necessary as he heard Lillian and Jack rocketing around the lair, very noisily and happily proclaiming that their grounding would be done on Monday and then they could go visit Santa!

Pitch shook his head at this. Only a child could go from being all upset about the Guardians to only a few days later be so happy about visiting one of them. But he had to admit, even North still held a magical quality that made all children adore him, even Jack Frost.

Besides, he knew that ever since he had implanted the thought in Jack's mind that Jack was so eager to finish his toy so he could mercilessly pelt Lillian with snowballs as a wakeup call.

Pitch was not looking forward to that day.

By the time Monday rolled around, Pitch had a serious eye twitch and children around the world were wondering why their nightmares suddenly.. stopped. Pitch was seriously starting to consider that perhaps he did need a tiny pinch of the dreamsand after all, but as it was nearing the afternoon it was too late to have any at this moment.

Which was a shame, as Jack and Lillian had been hyperactive all afternoon and his headache was worse than ever. He had sent word ahead that weekend that he, Jack and Lillian would turn up at the Pole on Monday afternoon. He had requested that he appear via the shadows in the globe room and as he hadn't heard any negatives on this, he was now in his own globe room making sure that Jack and Lillian were prepared.

He made sure that Lillian had her scarf and gloves on and Lillian made sure she had her notebook. He clucked his tongue at Jack and produced a scarf from who-knows-where and started wrapping it around Jack's neck when Jack chuckled at Pitch's antics.

"I can't get cold, remember?" Jack said cheekily to Pitch, who was just glad that Jack was more like himself again.

Pitch, whose tired mind hadn't remembered this, merely nodded absently and abandoned his efforts to tie Jack's scarf around his neck.

Jack finished tying it off anyway, as it was the same shade as his blue hoodie, with white snowflakes and tassles at the ends.

Pitch made sure they were all bundled up, even though they wouldn't go outside if he could help it and soon ushered them through a shadow into the globe room at North's.

He shouldn't have been surprised to see all four of the Guardians waiting on them.

Author's Note: Sorry to leave it cliffhangery, but I can promise that the next chapter will definitely have toy making in it! And you'll FINALLY see what toys Pitch is going to make. I'm also highly amused that I'm having a winter storm on the day I decided to update. If you guys have any more plot suggestions, I'm willing to hear them. Not sure when I'll update again, but it probably won't be until next Monday. And yes, I was a little amused that Pitch was having nightmares. I'm guessing it will be Sandy to the rescue on this one!