Title- Price of Remembering

Summary- The one where the Guardians want to see Jack's memories.

Characters- Jack Frost, Bunnymund, North, Tooth, Sandman

Rating- T

Request by- Guest

"I can't disappear."

Bunny should have let it rest. He should have let it go at that, but it wasn't the only thing Jack had said that caught him off guard. The boy was always doing that, carelessly tossing out snips of information like single snowflakes, letting them drift but moving on before they settled. Bunny realized that he knew next to nothing about the boy but didn't know how to fix that.

"Hey Kangaroo," said Jack, sweeping across the open space of Tooth Palace where they were gathering for a meeting. "Did you do anything fun today? Like, maybe you ran into a space ship. Or you could have learned how to make pizza. That would be awesome. I think you would like pizza, it's round like those eggs you obsess over. Or did you learn how to make calligraphy paper?"

"I painted eggs," said Bunny as Jack landed lightly on the steeply sweeping roof of one of the many sleeping spaces for the little tooth fairies.

"That sounds an awful lot like what you did yesterday," said Jack, walking with grace that was insulting to the rest of the world. "What you should have done was mess with the Ground Hog. He's lots of fun. But that's what I did today, so then I guess that is not what you should have done."

"I hate the Ground Hog."

"I would have pegged you two as friends, what with you being so similar and all," said Jack with a smirk, sitting on a ledge that should have been impossible to sit on. "But then again, I suppose because you are so similar you wouldn't want to be friends. You have a lock on the whole grumpy thing and he would be trying to steal that from you."

"Shut up."

"There can only be one!" shouted Jack as if he were an announcer. "Who will be the most grumpy of the spirits?"

Bunny rolled his eyes, his lips twitching.

"Don't worry," said Jack, hopping down and patting Bunny's shoulder. "You'll always be my favorite grumpy spirit. Even if the Ground Hog is more mad than you right now."

"Jack Frost!" screamed Tooth, buzzing down in a streak of colors, making Jack freeze as he turned. "What is this I hear about you turning the Ground Hog pink? You know better than to mess with other spirits and their days!"

"Technically I turned him blue with pink stripes," said Jack recovering from the surprise, smiling proudly. "I was just enhancing his look for his big day. It's important to look your best, especially if you only get out once a year. I mean, it's fine for me to run around in the same thing all the time because no one can see me and quite frankly, I don't feel like stealing new clothes every day. So yeah, I may have taken it upon myself to help him dress up a bit."

"You didn't," said Bunny, his face splitting in to a huge grin.

"He did," said Tooth, furious at the youngest Guardian.

"That's brilliant, mate!"

"But why those colors? They aren't even winter colors!"

"Bunny doesn't own winter colors," shrugged Jack carelessly. "He let me borrow those colors. I had to take what I could get."

Bunny and Jack were still roaring with laughter when North and Sandy arrived. Even Tooth had lightened up a bit, watching the two old rivals together in fits of giggles. Jack as like the wind itself, bringing in fresh air and fun to otherwise painfully ordinary lives. Tooth had forgotten what that was like, to have fun with everything.

"Now Jack," said North, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth as he tried to sound stern. "What have we told you about messing with other spirits days?"

"I vaguely remember something about you not wanting me to mess with them," laughed Jack, sitting on the ground cross legged.

"And how would you feel if someone messed with your season?" demanded Tooth, her anger flaring again.

"I told you," said Jack, his face falling slightly. "No one messes with winter."

"And if someone tried?"

"They don't."

Jack blinked owlishly up at North and Tooth, no hint of a joke in his voice; it was one of the rare moments when the cynical, left-alone-for-300-years side of Jack shone through. He sat there looking like a little kid but his eyes told an entirely different story of how that little kid survived alone for 300 years.

"Care to explain?" said Tooth through clenched teeth, trying to be reasonable, unsure if she was more upset with Jack's pranking or herself for ignoring him for so long.

"I could," said Jack slowly, inspecting his finger nails. "But I don't really think I would do it justice. I'm not that great of a story teller."

"We could watch memories!" yelled North in excitement. "Then we could see why no one messes with winter."

"I don't know," said Tooth slowly. "Memories can be difficult to control. We don't know what we might end up viewing. It's up to Jack."

Everyone looked expectantly at Jack, wanting so badly for him to say yes. If he agreed, they would finally have an excuse to look at his life before. If they could see what happened during those lost years, then maybe Jack would make more sense and perhaps they would finally understand why the Man in the Moon had chosen him to become a Guardian when there were an abundance of older, more well known, highly qualified spirits who would have jumped at the opportunity.

"Strangely convenient that we are meeting at Tooth Palace today where the memories are stored, isn't it?" said Jack, swinging to his feet. "Let's get this over with."

Jack was halfway down the hall before he looked back and saw that no one was following him.

"Don't you want some rare insight into the exciting life of Jack Frost?" asked Jack with a crooked grin.

*Okay, so I will probably update Brave next but I'm sick and have done nothing but sleep for the past day.

Here you go! An update. I know it's been done a million times, but I'm going to put my own spin on the memory thing (surprise, surprise, I know, who would have guessed that I would put my own spin on something?). SO I hope you enjoy it.

Always- Ari