Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or Rise of the Guardians except for any and all OCs.
The silence in the room was stifling for all the Council members as they awaited the Man in Moon's response.
"I agree."
Sandy was tired. Not the sleepiness that comes from tirelessly doing something he loved, but a deep fatigue felt from his very core. Ever since the capture and detainment of Merith and Pitch Black; perhaps even before that when he ended the life of an unborn child with the prejudiced notion that it would be a monster because of its parents.
From the moment the whip hit, Sandy regretted it, but it was far too late, the premature dreams of warmth and safety were already fading away. His purpose, his whole reason for existence was to encourage and cultivate the dreams of children, to inspire them to do things they thought impossible. He enjoyed revelling in the knowledge that many of the lights on North's globe were shining brightly because of him, but because of him, one of those lights had been extinguished.
And now, ever since that wave of… energy, Merith had spread worldwide, all the adults that had once believed, no longer did. And once children grew up, they also stopped believing. The initial drop of believers had sapped all the Guardians of at least half their strength, and with children losing faith at such a young age, they had never required the full strength they had once been at, even though three centuries had past.
However, the most tiring or most worrisome thing was MiM, or his lack of presence. They had argued and debated for weeks about MiM's decision to imprison Merith and Pitch until it was obvious that the grief stricken Boogeyman was determined to plunge the world into darkness and fear; and then, they had no choice but to bring him down, clasp on the cuffs MiM had sent down, and watched as he faded in the moonlight to await his prison. Ever since his capture and the detainment of Merith in his own specially designed cell, there had been absolute silence coming from MiM. They had tried every mean available to contact MiM, even asking other spirits to try, only to fail. They just had to assume that whatever MiM had in store for them had yet to come, because Sandy felt like he was drowning in self-hatred and guilt that he needed to repent for, to have just punishment placed the two that had suffered the most by the hands of the Guardians.
"Wooo! Yeaahh!"
Sandy broke out of his thoughts to find the source of the disturbance, especially at this time of night. He transformed his usual cloud into a propeller plane and flew towards the cheerful yells echoing through the frigid night. Reaching the edge of the town, a smile slid onto Sandy's face as he watched Jack Frost playing in a snowbank.
Jack Frost was one of the few spirits left that didn't hate the Guardian's guts. News had spread rather quickly about the entire situation and by the following morning, every spirit hated Bunnymund, North, Toothania, and Sandy. Even those who had disliked Merith and Pitch said that the four went too far and now most spirits couldn't tolerate being in the same room. The few spirits that didn't despise the Guardians were the newer spirits that never heard about what happened, like Jack. Since he didn't come into being until after the incident, he like a couple spirits, didn't even know who Merith or the Boogeyman were. None of the spirits ever spoke of the horrible incident surrounding Merith, the Boogeyman, and their unborn child as if it was an insult to their memory. And because Jack Frost was often seen associating with the Guardians (i.e. sneaking into North's workshop or hanging out with Sandy), they assumed he was willing hanging around baby killers and thus ostracized him.
'Another victim of our actions.' thought Sandy sadly as he approached the young spirit playing by himself. Like always.
Anyone could tell that the 300 year old spirit was lonely and desperate for friendship or even just friendly human contact, but because of the Guardians, he was kept isolated from everyone without understanding why; and now, because of his consistent sneak invasions into North's workshop and that freak blizzard of 1968, North and Bunnymund didn't really like the mischievous winter spirit. This distance even prevented Tooth, who adored Jack's pearly white teeth, and Sandy who just enjoyed Jack's company, to have little contact with them.
Sandy barely dodged in time as a snowball whizzed past his ear, eyes quickly locking onto the white haired spirit that had apparently snuck up on him during his musings and was now doubled over in laughter. Sandy smirked as he quietly formed a snowball and hit the laughing winter spirit right in the face.
"Sandy!" Jack exclaimed, snow dripping from his face.
S: Want to have a snowball fight? :S
The smile on Jack's face seemed to brighten the night as he flew into the sky with excitement.
~ODF~
Fwip. Fwip.
Narrowed eyes stared down at the half finished Easter egg held delicately within a large paw as the paintbrush slid against the smooth eggshell. Though most of the eggs were made by themselves, every now and then Bunnymund liked to paint and add his own unique touches. So focused on his egg, Bunnymund, the last of the great Pooka warriors, failed to notice one of his stone warriors approach him. An over enthusiastic nudge and a case of butterfingers and both the stone warrior (whose face flipped to a worried face) and the bunny warrior gaped in shocked horror at the smashed horror at the smashed remains of egg. Bunnymund gawked at the stone warrior to the egg, then back to the warrior.
"What the-but-you-MY EGG! MY EGG! YOU- YOU BLOODY GIT! A beautiful egg is broken 'cause of you, what do you have to say fer yerself, huh?! To the child that didn't get this egg 'cause of you?!"
The stone warrior wobbled and a series of rocks grinding together was produced.
"Your sorry? That's all you've got to say, well you better be sorry, 'cause that was a beauty."
More rock grinding sounds.
"What? The signal is up? Bloody-! What does that cookie stuffing codger want now?" yelled Bunnymund as he carefully scooped the egg remains into his compost heap and then tapped the firm ground. As a hole formed to his underground maze of tunnels, he sent one last glare to the stone warrior before he nimbly into his tunnel, his parting yell, "We'll be talking about this when I come back!", echoing through the narrow dirt tunnels.
A few minutes later saw Bunnymund landing gracefully in the arctic tundra outside of North's workshop. Yelping at the painful sting of the wind and the icy ground on his paws, he quickly entered the workshop through the entrance a waiting yeti held open for him. Shaking off any lingering traces of snow, the seven foot tall rabbit made his way around the annoying jingling elves to reach where his fellow Guardians were already standing, or in Tooth's case fluttering around, near the Globe of Lights.
"Hey North," yelled Bunnymund "what in the bloody hell is goin' on? Ya know I'm trying to get ready for Easter in three days; I don't get to laze about all year like you, I'm working with perishables. Millions of 'em."
"Bunny, they are eggs. You dip them in paint, hide them and you're done. I invent amazing toys from scratch and deliver all over world in one night. Much more impressive, yes?"
"Well, if we're talking about impressive, Sandy and I work all night, 7 days a week, 365 days a year all over the world." interrupted Tooth as she distractedly fluttered about, directing her mini fairies to various sectors of the world.
Sandy nodded sleepily in agreement, his mug of eggnog slowly tipping into the mouths of awaiting elves below.
"But that is not work for holidays. When it comes to holidays, Christmas is obviously the best, end of discussion."
"Like there's a chance I'll accept that!" shouted Bunnymund as he shook his fist at North. "The little anklebiters love finding the eggs I hide for 'em. And at least it's warmer weather when my holiday comes around, it's so friggin' cold here." he grumbled. "Why did you even call this meeting, if it's another who has the better holiday competition, I'm leaving. I've got real work to do."
"Ah! Yes!" shouted North abruptly as he slammed his fist into his palm. A serious expression appeared on North's face as he walked towards the globe on the main floor.
"The Boogie Man was here, at the North Pole."
Silence filled the room as everyone froze and set their eyes upon the broad figure. North turned to his silent audience.
"I was working in shop earlier today, and black sand flowed over the globe. Then a shadow appeared with very creepy laughter." said North as he swung his arms about to illustrate his point. "Nearly scared Paul to death."
The yeti grumbled something in protest, but was ignored. Tooth fluttered nervously about as she wrung her hands about. "Are you sure North? Was it really Pitch Black?"
"Yeah mate. I mean, black sand doesn't sound like Black at all, right Sandy?"
S: It does not sound like Pitch, but we have not heard anything from MiM. If Pitch did manage to escape from MiM, he might be stronger than before. :S
"Sandy is right. Even though it has been a few centuries since his imprisonment, it would be wise to stay wary, and perhaps look for support."
"Who in their right mind would side with us in any situation, especially a possible encounter with the Boogeyman?" questioned Bunnymund.
"We need someone who is strong enough to fight by our side against a revenge driven Boogeyman as well as willing to tolerate working with us long enough to defeat him."
North tugged at his beard thoughtfully as he stared through one of his workshop windows, looking at the snowy tundra as the northern winds scattered snowflakes through the air. This beautiful scene was one of the things he loved about having a winter holiday and placing his workshop in the northernmost reaches of the world. The fresh, clear smell of snow in the air, riding his sleigh through the sky and feeling the wind nip at his face, the-
North enthusiastically clapped his hands together, startling his fellow Guardians from their thoughts.
"I have perfect person in mind."
Sandy formed a question mark over his head.
"Jack Frost."
"Jack Frost." Bunnymund repeated in disbelief.
"Yes, it is perfect. We get Jack Frost, we fight Pitch Black, and we win!" yelled North excitedly as he raised both his hands in victory.
"I'm not so sure about that North." said Tooth, Sandy nodding beside her. "We don't even know why Pitch is attacking us and we haven't heard anything from MiM in centuries...what if this isn't Pitch but his husband?"
"Impossible. The room that we secured him in is engraved with moon runes and inaccessible to Pitch through shadows; besides, Pitch is the obviously stronger of the two. That's why he's the main suspect and why Jack Frost is perfect." replied North.
Bunnymund scowled ferociously, arms crossed as he replied.
"There ain't no way I would ever work with Frostbite mate. Don't you remember the blizzard of 1956? The mess he made of my holiday?" he huffed. "That spirit doesn't care about the wellbeing of anybody except himself, we can't trust him to fight by our side."
"But think of the power it took to make that blizzard in the middle of spring! For a winter spirit, that level of power is unheard of! Besides Bunny, it was accident. He apologized, did he not?" stated North.
"It doesn't matter if he apologized!" yelled Bunnymund as he puffed up in anger. "My holiday was cancelled because of him, so many children were devastated; I don't want to work with him!"
"But if we don't work with him, children will never enjoy another holiday from any of us."
Silence filled the room as Bunnymund stared pensively at North. Tooth flitted nervously in the air, her helpers frozen in the air from the tension. Sandy stood quietly to the side as he wrung his hands. When Bunnymund looked towards him, a series of symbols flickered so fast above his head, they almost weren't able to understand.
S: As much as I don't want to involve a spirit into a situation caused by us, we need serious help. And Jack Frost would make a formidable ally. :S
Tooth and North nodded in agreement as they read Sandy's symbols, and Bunnymund seeing that everyone was in agreement, reluctantly nodded as well.
"I don't like it…, but for the sake of the children of the world, let's get that bloody snowflake."