I would like to notify all readers of Aurora Borealis that requests for the chapters to be longer have been duly noted. Right, got that out of the way. Let the battle commence!

XxTheMoonRiddlexX

Chapter 13: The Ring of Fire

The battle began with a heat wave sweeping through the city of Houston, Texas, making temperatures skyrocket to 119°F (50°C). Heat waves don't normally sweep through cities, at least not so literally that it is 119°F from four in the morning to two in the afternoon, and then suddenly, the temperature drops to 95°F for the remaining hours of the day. The heat wave reportedly moved south, on to Galveston. And that was just the beginning. Widespread panic ensued around the globe when Hell set off five volcanoes in the Ring of Fire, consequently affecting the Earth's climate for years to come. The Guardians had only 30 seconds warning before this catastrophic event happened, when piece of paper materialized on the Globe controls just after 9:30 that morning. Jack was able to read what was written on it (he had been standing at the controls watching the globe for any sign of Hell) before it spontaneously combusted, leaving behind only a small pile of ashes which the North wind then blew away. But the words on that small piece of paper would forever be emblazoned in Jack's mind:

The Ring of Fire will be your funeral pyre.

~ Hell Brimstone

Jack woke Tooth and Sandy up from where they slept in armchairs by the fire in the Globe Room, and then he flew to get North and Bunny from the storage rooms in the Workshop's basement. When he returned with the other two Guardians, the first thing he noticed was the lights that were rapidly blinking out around the Pacific Ocean. The Ring of Fire will be your funeral pyre. Jack had a horrible feeling that those lights weren't going out due to a sudden loss of belief. They were going out because something very much a part of the physical world was extinguishing them long before their time.

"Oh no...Hell's set them off one by one." Jack flew up to the Globe for a closer look. His heartbeat quickened with anger as he saw whole sections of coastal areas, once strong with belief, go dark all once.

"What?" North manipulated the globe's controls, stopping it's slow revolution on its axis and turning it so the Ring of Fire was facing the Globe Room.

"I think he means the volcanoes." Bunny spoke up. "Really, that's the only explanation for this, besides Pitch and the fire army."

"With powers over literally everything related to everyone's concepts of 'Hell', I bet volcanoes fall under his control." Jack added.

"Volcanoes are not evil. That is our perception of them." Crossing his arms, Bunny studied the dark patches of land around the Pacific. Red lights were pulsing from multiple islands, such as Japan, Fiji, Sumatra, Anak Krakatau, and Luzon.

"Sure. By the way, Hell sent us a note. It burned up-" Jack landed on the banister that surrounded the viewing deck for the Globe, and pointed to the gray smudge of ash on the Globe's controls panel. "But I saw what it said. 'The Ring of Fire will be your funeral pyre.' He even had the nerve to sign it."

Suddenly, red dots started lighting up on the Globe in California. Thankfully, only a few of the yellow lights representing believers went out. The red lights (which the Guardian's assumed represented the locations of Hell and his army) began making its way across North America, looking suspiciously like they were headed straight for Pennsylvania.

Jack looked down at the other Guardians with a mess of emotions tumbling through him. He felt angry that Hell was ruthlessly murdering hundreds of innocent people and thinking nothing of it; he felt sadness for the lives that were lost for no reason; and helpless that he couldn't stop the destruction caused by earthquakes or volcanoes or the resulting tsunamis Jack knew would follow.

"What do you think we should do, mate?" Bunny asked him.

Jack was surprised that Bunny would asked him what they should do, but he took it in a stride, his mind already kicking into overdrive as a plan began to take shape. "Hell's smart, and he was Pitch's ally so he probably uses some of the same tactics. He'll go after things that will weaken us the most, right? Maybe even the kids, like Jamie or Sophie." He hated saying it, and a hint of bitterness entered his voice. His eyes fell on Tooth, who, so far, had stayed silent on the issue at hand. She was hovering above the control panel, facing away from him. When she wiped her eyes, he realized that she was crying. "Tooth?" He asked softly, concern for his fellow Guardian overriding his focus on how to best combat their enemy.

She turned to him with tears in her eyes. "I'm so tired of fighting, and chasing, and being chased. I'm tired of Hell, and his fire army. I want this terrible, awful destruction of the planet to stop. I just want it to end, for there to be peace again and children can be safe. I don't like being this way, I don't WANT to be a killer! All of this, it didn't affect me as much before now. I've destroyed and Nightmares and fire spirits before, but they don't really count. They have not sould, or heart or brain. But Pitch, I don't-I don't know what happened. I took peace for granted. I wish I had known then what I do now."

"I understand the feeling."

"Do you? You weren't there to hear Hell shout Pitch's name when I killed him, or see Hell's face when Sandy let him go. You didn't hear Pitch tell me, ''Tell Jack, tell him, do not fall, do not give up…hope. Please, please, don't hurt Hell. Remember to…live." You didn't watch a 17 year-old grieve over the dead body of the one person he seems to care about, and have to live with the fact that your the one who did it. I killed a living, breathing human being, who happened to have one of the worst jobs on the planet. To bring fear! How 'bout that as your job for eternity? Hell is not so different from you, Jackson Overland Frost. Only he wasn't chosen to be one of the FUN spirits like us, he got to be one of the bad ones! Imagine being the spirit of hellfire and brimstone! Imagine being hated and feared all the time!" By now, Tooth's was anger growing with every word. She and Jack were now face-to-face.

"I'm sorry! You're right, I don't understand!" Jack cautiously started backing away from the fairy with his hands held up in surrender.

"Sandy, you let Hell go?" Bunny turned on Sandy with a frown. With a storm of dreamsand pictures flashing above the his head much too rapidly to see, the Sandman floated up to be at Bunny's eye-level. Both Guardians glared at each other, neither daring to back down. "If you had him, why in MiM's name would you let him go?" Bunny asked, not understanding how such a thing had happened.

"If you had been there and not back at the Warren feeling oh so sorry for yourself, you would've seen Hell, and how Pitch's death DEVASTATED HIM! THIS IS ALL BECAUSE OF ME! IF I HADN'T KILLED PITCH, HELL PROBABLY WOULDN'T BE TRYING TO AVENGE HIS DEATH AND OBLITERATE US ALL! It's all my fault!" Tooth shouted in Jack's face. The air around the winter spirit instantly began to drop in temperature. The northern winds whipped around them in a frenzy, reminding the other Guardians of the young spirit's incredible power. There was a glint of well-contained anger in Jack's eyes, and frost spread out from his staff across the floor. The temperature continued to steadily drop, until the bitter cold permeated the entire room.

"I wasn't feeling 'oh so sorry' for myself. I gave all my energy into to keeping Hell away from you! I knew I had to protect you, Tooth. You, Sandy, Bunny, North, and the Warren! You're the only family I have left! If I lose you, and Jamie and Sophie, I have nothing." A sharp, crackling sound accompanied his words as ice began to grow on the banister and globe controls. "Hell is my exact polar opposite. It take a lot more energy to fight him than it does Pitch, because the whole time, I'm trying to shield myself from his powers so they don't cancel mine out! I'm the WINTER SPIRIT, in case you've forgotten! Hellfire is NOT my forte!" Jack shot back. Blue magic spiraled up his staff like an endless current of electricity.

"STOP, ALL OF YOU! This blame-game helps no one!" North shouted above the chaos. Jack's ice began to recede and the temperature started to return to normal. There was a long, tense pause that followed. "Now then," North chose his words carefully. "We will assume that Jamie is a target unless or until proven otherwise. And we know that we cannot stop Hell alone; we will need help. I suggest the yetis, sentinel eggs, and mini-fairies would be safest choices for now. Still, we must alert the rest of the immortal world to this threat, if they are not already aware."

"Fine." Bunny grudgingly concurred.

"Yeah," Jack nodded, though he kept his distance from Tooth.

Sandy gave a thumbs up, and Tooth nodded.

"The next question is where to attack him. He is doing this to force us to make a move, so we'll have to do something at some time or another. We will not let him get away with this." North stroked his beard thoughtfully.

After the Guardians had come up with a rough outline of a plan to stop Hell from rampaging around the Pacific Ocean, and possibly targeting Burgess, Jack approached Tooth where she hovered in front of the fireplace in the Globe Room, simultaneously directing her mini-fairies to prepare for battle and still collect children's teeth. She was so caught up in organizing her mini-fairies that she didn't notice the winter spirit's presence for some time. Jack leaned against his staff, smiling slightly as he watched her work. Eventually, Tooth became aware of Jack's eyes on her and she looked up at him.

"Oh, sorry Jack, I didn't realize you were there!" she said quickly, nervousness creeping into her voice. She was embarrassed by the way she had shouted at him in their argument earlier, and wasn't sure if she wanted to face what that argument might do to their budding relationship—if they were in one at all. She still wasn't completely sure, because they hadn't had much time to talk about it after their one kiss in North's kitchen.

Jack waved away her apologies. "It's fine, Tooth," he told the fairy, "I just wanted to apologize for earlier. I didn't mean to yell at you, I was just...I don't know, angry at Hell, I guess. Life's been so weird for me lately, fighting Pitch again, getting all my powers taken away, and Hell showing up."

Behind them, the other Guardians were still talking (or making dreamsand shapes) about how to protect the Workshop and Warren from future attacks.

Tooth motioned for her mini fairies to stay where they were, and flew closer to Jack. "I'm sorry too, Jack. Not for everything I said, but mostly how I said it. I know you weren't sitting around the Warren feeling sorry for yourself."

At that, Jack looked down at the floor and muttered, "Yeah. Right. I just wish I'd been able to snap out it after fighting with Hell faster. I could've helped you when you and Sandy found Pitch. Maybe then you wouldn't have had to face him like that alone, you know?

Tooth sighed, understanding what Jack was really trying to say. "It's not your job to make sure I never get hurt, Jack. We're Guardians, sometimes it comes with the job. But thank you for what you did at the Warren." She raised a hand to his cheek, caressing it softly. He closed his eyes briefly, leaning into her touch and relishing the welcoming kind of warmth radiating from her hand that he so rarely felt as the spirit of winter. After a moment, he opened his eyes again and stared silently at her as everything else he had planned to say fled his mind.

Leaning in close to Jack, so close that their foreheads were almost touching, Tooth whispered, "We'll get through this Jack. All of us, we'll find a way." Then she pressed her lips against his in a brief, chaste kiss. When she started to pull away, she heard the sound of something falling to the floor, and cold hands suddenly came up to gently cup her face, brushing against the sensitive feathers on her neck as Jack kissed her again. She did not hesitate to respond in kind, deepening the kiss.

"Oi, lovebirds!" Bunny's voice called across the Globe Room. Jack and Tooth quickly broke apart in surprise, having almost forgotten that their fellow Guardians were still in the room with them. Jack looked over his shoulder to find North, Sandy and Bunny staring at the two of them with expressions of varying amusement (and slight annoyance in North's case) on their faces. Particularly with Sandy, there was a distinct lack of surprise on their faces that Jack found odd and a little disconcerting.

"Um…" The winter spirit, still lost in the high of kissing Tooth, didn't know what to say. Tooth was smiling from where she hovered next to him, although she was trying to contain her smile and the feeling of joy rising in her. There was a very powerful and dangerous spirit out in the world that needed to be stopped; this was not time to get lost in the wonderful thing was kissing Jackson Overland Frost.

Bunny rolled his eyes at them in exasperated amusement. "Yeah, yeah, we know about you guys already, he said, "Anyway, it's time to go. You wanna stop Hell before sundown, or what?"

At that, Jack took a deep breath and picked up staff from where he'd dropped it on the floor. Then North lead the way down to the lower levels of his workshop, instructing yetis to prepare for battle along the way. All five Guardians approached the doors to North's sleigh launch tube, with Jack and Tooth shyly holding hands, Sandy watching them with a slightly smug and knowing look on his face, and Bunny walking along side North. The Easter spirit's demands that North pay up after they stopped Hell could be heard throughout the Workshop.

"Wait, you bet on us?!" Jack exclaimed, glaring at Bunny. The Easter spirit looked over his shoulder and grinned widely at Tooth and Jack.

"Of course," Bunny said, hopping into North's sleigh without the slightest complaint, "I bet that you would get together before Easter within Jack's first three years with us. I was so right, by the way, which means I get the rights for Easter to be the most important Guardian holiday for the next year!" THe Guardian of Hope directed the the last part of his sentence at North with a laugh.

From where he was in the middle of talking to Phil the yeti beside the sleigh, North grumbled in disappointment about losing his side of the bet.

Grand Canyon, Arizona

"Capturing a hellion that is literally the definition of one is harder than it looks." Jack whispered, breathing heavily. He was tired, they all were tired, from fighting Hell and avoiding the infernos that Hell had caused to spontaneously erupt around them as they fought. 'The Grand Canyon is a horrible place for a battle,' Jack thought. It was part of a deviation from his original plan. Instead of attacking Hell in Utah, which his original trajectory suggested he would pass through on his way east, Hell had doubled back through the Mojave Desert, heading further south into Arizona. The Guardians and their "army" (of yetis and sentinel eggs, and mini-fairies) had first clashed with Hell at Meteor Crater. Now the fight had shifted into the Grand Canyon.

Bunny managed a breathless laugh and merely commented with, "YOU are the definition of one, and it was easier than you'd expect!" The two Guardians were hiding inside a small cave in the side of a cliff overlooking the Grand Canyon, waiting for Hell to come near enough for them to attack. Jack's bow and quiver were slung over his left shoulder and his staff was cradled to his chest by his right hand. He impatiently thumbed the bow string, and his eyes followed a peregrine falcon soared past their cave toward the setting sun.

"I wasn't expecting you to show up, shove me in a sack and toss me through a magic portal. Hell on the other hand, is expecting us." Jack pointed out. A burst of fire shot past the entrance to the cave from above, and Jack and Bunny simultaneously tightened their grips on their weapons. They both tensed as a few death threats also reached their ears, assumingly from Hell and his army. The only good part about fighting the fire army was that the fire spirits rarely talked, and when they did, their voices were gravely, their words punctuated by the crackle of flaming wood or bursts of flame.

Tooth's shrill battle cries were intermixed with the sound of whips snapping and lashing their target. North was across the canyon, keeping the area clear of mortals (most of whom had run screaming when the first fire spirit appeared). Jack slipped off his bow and after hooking his staff to his quiver strap, selected a carbon fiber arrow and got ready to draw and fire. 'Come on guys, give us the signal,' Jack screamed in his mind, desperately wanting the agreed signal to appear. Similar to a wish on command, a snowglobe dropped like a bullet past the cave entrance. Jack Frost tipped himself dauntlessly off the cave's edge, arrow aimed at the rock wall. He shot once, then grabbed three more arrows, fired one-by-one the magically tipped, carbon fiber projectiles at his pursuers. The spirits who were hit- as far a Jack could tell while he was falling hundreds of feet per second- exploded like mini supernovae and dissipated in a shower of white sparks.

"ACK!" Suddenly the ground was there way too fast, giving Jack barely enough time to put the bow over his shoulder and flip his staff into his hands (all in about four seconds.) It took a lot of wind to reverse the pull of gravity, costing him just enough time that six more fire spirits spotted him and raced down the sides of the canyon toward him. His heart beating rapidly with fear, the Guardian of Fun forced himself to focus on his Center. He calmed his racing mind. You can do this, Jack, he thought. His staff flashed blue and brown against the red stone as Jack whirled around with a smile playing on his lips, a tornado of cold air blew the fire spirits away from him so Jack could rocket up and away.

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XxTMRxX