North's deep voice boomed throughout the workshop. "SANDY! COME!"
The little golden man came rushing through the door and signed a "?!" above his head.
"Put him to sleep, mate!" Bunny frantically gestured to an agonized Jack.
With a distraught look on his face, Sandy quickly produced a sand ball to put him to sleep with.
Alarmingly, after being hit by it, no dream sand circled his head.
The golden snowflakes that would have danced playfully above him were replaced with air.
Sandy lightly touched Jack's hand in an effort to make his sleep more comfortable.
"What do we do?" Bunny asked the question quietly - all three guardians were at a loss.
They left the room quietly to let Jack rest.
—
It was dark. And cold. Jack looked around him but couldn't find anyone or anything in sight. He was alone.
"Hello?" He called out through the darkness.
Jack took a step forward and looked down, not expecting to feel water beneath his feet. He wondered where the water had come from.
Looking back up, he took a few more steps.
"Anyone?" There was no reply.
Jack became aware that he was not holding his staff and grabbed at his clothes with loss.
He started to run. "HELLO?" Where was everybody? Where was he?
A sudden burst of light blinded him, knocking him to the ground.
He put his hand up to block it and squinting, saw the brilliant white outline of the moon.
The halo of light around it concentrated and, like a spotlight, bled down to the ground, highlighting an object a few meters away.
Jack squinted some more to make out the shape and caught his breath as he realized what it was.
His staff! He rushed to it, relieved - as if being reunited with an old friend.
As he neared it, he noticed that something wasn't quite right.
The gnarled wood seemed to be smoking, tendrils of vapor rising through its ridges.
Slowing his gait, he approached it cautiously, wary that it could be some kind of trick. He crouched down and gingerly extended his hand to grab it.
As Jack's fingers made contact with the twisted oak, a spark erupted from it with a pop, startling him.
The staff began to quiver and crackle like the wood in a fireplace.
The smoke intensified and Jack stared in horror as it cracked and splintered, blackening as it bursted into flames.
A suffocating pain shot through his body and he clutched his chest as an immense pressure began to build within him.
The pain was unbearable - unlike anything he'd ever felt before.
It was different than the pain he'd felt when Pitch had snapped his staff in two.
It was a burning, searing pain that made him crumple to the ground.
His breathing heavy, he yelled in agony, and reached out desperately to try to put out the burning wood.
But his powers were no more.
The flooded ground did nothing to help relieve the fire coursing through his veins.
As he tried to get a grip of himself, Jack realized that the water was somehow coming from him, pooling from him rapidly - as if he were melting ice.
He looked up at the moon and screamed the question he thought he'd gotten answer to when he had become a guardian.
"WHY? WHY?!"
The spotlight moved from the staff to Jack as inferno began to rise around him, engulfing him from the bottom up.
His eyes blazed a fervent orange and as the fire heightened, his hair turned an ashy black but for a single stripe.
Tears flooded down his cheeks, sizzling as they hit the flames licking at his face.
Then, as suddenly as it had started, the fire went out, leaving him once again in darkness.