A/N : Alright, this chapter is gonna be very depressing and angsty, I wasn't in such a good mood and it went slightly out of hand. Ahem.

Em : Oh yes, I can imagine that 6 months of winter is a liiittle too much. XD


In a perfect world all living beings treated each other the way they wanted to be treated in return. Hard work was rewarded, ambition was praised, honesty was appreciated and kindness was the greatest good. Being disrespectful to others' efforts was frowned upon, more so was looking down on people who struggled but weren't as successful or lucky as oneself. Bragging was tolerated but not very popular and flat-out mocking to the point of hurt was punished.

In a perfect world.

But reality was far from perfect.

Jack had to learn the hard way.

Getting proper control over his powers and realizing that he as winter spirit was indeed supposed to direct the weather of the coldest season all over the globe took him a while to figure out. The Man in the Moon could at least have given him an instruction manual.

However, through ups and downs and many years later he was doing a pretty decent job at it.

During the first years there were a few too many harsh blizzards haunting the land and forcing the poor citizens to hide in their cozy homes for far too long, but hey, no one could expect him to immediately be perfect at this.

He never intended to hurt anyone but coldness, snow and the sad truth that not everyone had a warm shelter inevitably led to icy deaths.

On the day he had encountered winter's first victim, a young woman who had been in the forest and hadn't managed to escape the sudden snow storm, he was paralyzed in utter terrror.

Countless tears were shed, he hated himself for what he had done and after a sleepless night he had made up his mind. Never would he risk to threaten someone with his powers again, so he decided to keep them inside himself. The world surely would survive without his season and no one would be harmed. No one would freeze to death because of him anymore.

It went according to plan for two days. Then he started to notice the side effects of locking up powers which were meant to spread winter worldwide. First he had just been dizzy, followed by a pounding headache and aggravated mood. He felt like he would explode any time, both physically and mentally.

After 4 days he was a mental wreck, seriously lacking sleep because the fear of losing control over the force within kept him awake. That's when the pain showed its cruel face. Never had he assumed he would be able to feel hot, and yet the burning and less than unpleasant sensation inside him prooved him otherwise. It was like he had been on fire.

For one more day he suffered in silence, ready to sacrifice himself for the well-being of those who didn't even know he existed. The pain had gotten almost unbearable but he was too stubborn to give in.

A few hours before sunset his martyry reached a whole new level. Invisible hands clawed at his insides, ready to rip him into pieces for the sake of getting out of their prison. He couldn't hold it back much longer. With his last ounce of strenght he called the wind for help and desperately begged it to bring him to Antarctica as fast as possible. Fortunately his current location hadn't been that far away from it.

During the flight he was on the verge of passing out a few times but kept fighting against the alluring prospect of simply shutting his eyes and allowing the pain to be drowned by the black void of unconsciousness. No, he couldn't let it happen, too big was the danger of his powers breaking loose. It would cause a catastrophe, one much worse than a common snow storm.

He needed to reach the South Pole before it was too late, there in the vast no-man's-land he could unleash his powers without anyone around to be affected by it.

The wind gently dropped him on top of an icy glacier not a moment too early. The second his bare feet touched the snowy ground he fell to his knees and with a heart-piercing scream he let it all out. Electric blue light flashed around him and soon swallowed him whole as his body spasmed and wave after wave of pure winter power shot out of him.

If it were several blizzards or a single gigantic one which raged over the continent, no one knew.

And no one would have been able to survive this force, had there been any living beings around.

Jack couldn't tell if it had been minutes, hours or days but by the time every last bit of energy had left him he felt more exhausted than ever before. This time he didn't fight the darkness as shadows blurred his vision and he collapsed into the comfortably soft snowdrift below him.

When he had woken up the next day his physical condition had turned back to normal but his psyche had suffered from the naïve plan.

Suppressing his powers obviously hadn't been blessed with success and he wasn't going to do it again. The risk of losing control at the wrong time and place was just too big.

If he wanted to admit it or not, he couldn't defeat destiny.

The Man in the Moon had created him to be the Spirit of Winter, and there was nothing he could do to fight it.

For the coming decades he tried convincing himself that he just did what he was born to do, winter had to be cold, there had to be snow and the occasional blizzard, it was just how things went.

And yet, whenever he caught a glimpse of a frozen still body partly hidden by a layer of his own snowflakes the horrible knowledge that he was responsible for this hit him like a blow to the guts.

No one could see him, no one ever interacted with him, all he had was the wind and his shepherd's crook and his job hurt and even killed people. He was sure his situation had hit rock bottom.

Which soon would turn out to be a mistake.


On a chilly October evening he had decided that it would be a good idea to surprise London with very early snowfall. It was almost November anyway and he had overheard a few children talking about their wishes for a lot of snow during the upcoming winter.

After the setbacks over the last decades he had tried to see his 'job' from another perspective. Children loved snow, snowball fights, building snowmen, sliding down snow hills on their sleighs, everything that was connected to his element.

So whenever one of them said how badly they longed for snow and he was in reach to witness it, he gladly granted their wish. As long as it wasn't in the middle of spring or summer, of course.

Adults were dumbfounded and complained about the crazy weather, but they were rarely satisfied with whatever meteorological surprise nature threw at them.

The children were happy, nobody was harmed, that's what counted for Jack.

When his work was accomplished he headed in direction of a forest in the immediate hinterland of Great Britain's capital to rest for a while and maybe take a little nap. But before his feet had been able to touch the ground he was knocked out of the wind's grasp by a blistering surge of power, throwing him against one of the nearby trees and making him scream out in pain as his back came in harsh contact with the rough bark. With a loud thud he landed on the ground ungracefully and saw stars for a moment.

"What the-" he muttered to himself as he rubbed his sore neck and looked around in confusion.

Back on shaky legs the winter teen stumbled towards his staff which had landed a few metres away from him. Just has he reached out to grab it the same power from moments ago swept him off his feet and slammed him against the thick trunk once more.

Great, he could already feel a vicious headache coming up.

"What d'ye think ye're doin'?!" a pissed off voice with a slight Irish accent echoed through the forest, dangerously close to him.

"I just wanted to ask you the same." Jack retorted and used the tree as support while trying to get up again.

Standing in front of him was a young man who appeared to be in his mid-twenties, several inches taller than him and well-built with broad shoulders. He had long ginger hair which was tied back into a ponytail, freckles on his face and wore a chocolate coloured leather coat which was adorned with embroidery of leaves, a beige cotton short, brown pants and black boots.

"Don't get snarky on me, Frost!"

Then it suddenly struck him like the attack itself had. Sapphire blue eyes widened in shock

"Wait…you can see me? And you know my name?" he asked dumbfounded.

"'Course I do! All spirits can see each other!"

To Jack it felt like his whole conception of the world was shattering to pieces.

Since he had risen from the frozen lake no one had spoken a word to him or at least acknowledged his existence. He had heard humans talking about other spirits like the Easter Bunny or Santa Clause but he had never met any of them. So he had just assumed that he was alone and even if there were others like him, they probably wouldn't be able to see him either.

"They…can?"

Oh how he wished he wouldn't have sounded so vulnerable that moment, but that piece of new information had him paralyzed.

"Sure we can! Gheez, ye aren't the brightest bulb in the box, are ye? And yeah, everyone knows ye but troublemakin' winter spirits aren't very popular so we rather ignore ye. What reminds me, enough of the chit-chat and back to business."

Dark brown eyes glared down at him threateningly.

"Why the hell are ye messing up my season?!"

"Your season?"

The red-haired man sighed, obviously only being seconds away from losing his patience, and explained swiftly.

"I'm Flann MacHarvest, the Spirit of Autumn. Gonna ask one last time, why are you messin' up my season?!"

If it hadn't been clear already, Jack was now fully convinced that he was in serious trouble.

"Uhm…I just wanted to bring joy to the kids, they-"

"Oh shut yer trap, suffocatin' people with yer blasted snow almost 2 months too early isn't what anyone would call 'bring joy'!"

Jack flinched at the outburst and automatically wanted to pull his staff closer to himself but to his dismay he had to realize it was still lying out of reach. With Flann standing in the way.

This only increased his growing anxiety about the whole situation.

He had no knowledge of his opponent's power, didn't have his staff to defend himself and his mental condition as well as the throbbing headache weren't helpful either.

"Look, I'm sorry, I didn't have any bad intentions." the frost boy started to apologize nervously. "It seemed like a fun idea to-"

"Freeze people ta death? Yeah, that sounds like a blast for sure." the older man interrupted sarcastically, disgust written all over his face.

Jack felt his breath caught in his throat.

"I-I didn't-"

"Sure ye did! Maybe not today, and just because I stopped ye, but everyone damn well knows that ye're to be blamed for the deaths of countless people! Yer blizzards killed them, so tell me, how much fun was it to bury innocent people under yer stupid snow?!"

Tears were welling up in his eyes no matter how hard he tried to hold them back. The words were like daggers stabbing his heart. And the worst thing of all, it was the truth.

"Oh don't gimme yer crocodile tears now, ye knew the consequences of yer actions but ye didn't give a damn. And then ye wonder why no one wants ta have anything ta do with ye? Well, newsflash, because yer a bloody murderer!"

"NO!"

The Spirit of Autumn was startled for a moment when Jack suddenly stood tall and yelled at him with all the energy he could muster.

"I just do what I have to do, you think I chose this?! No, the Man in the Moon did and there's nothing I can do against it. You think I enjoy hurting people? I don't! But I-I can't keep it from happening! Winter has to be cold, I can't change that!"

He was on the verge of hysteria, having no idea if he was trying to convince Flann or himself. For years he had done his best to suppress the guilt which threatened to eat him alive, he didn't need anyone else rubbing it in.

However, the brown-clad man in front of him didn't seem to be impressed by his outburst.

Crossing his arms he shot another glare at the younger spirit.

"Doesn't matter how many excuses ye might come up with, it doesn't change the bitter truth that ye have the blood of humans on yer hands." he said matter-of-factly.

Before Jack was able to react a strong fist, which felt like it was made of steel, slammed into his stomach and knocked the air out of him. With a choked scream he dropped down to his knees, holding his abused middle and desperately trying to catch his breath. Suddenly he was grabbed by the collar and pulled up, his feet dangling inches above the forest soil.

"Now listen ta me, Frost, 'cause I will only say this once. You stay out of my season or heaven help ye, ye will regret it!"

The iciness in the autumn spirit's voice surpassed everything Jack could possibly have conjured with his own winter powers.

Deciding that he had made his point clear enough Flann let go of the white-hared teen, who landed painfully on solid ground, and quickly dissappeared behind treetops as he took off to the sky, leaves trailing behind him.

With trembling limbs Jack crawled towards his staff and hugged it close to his chest as soon as his fingertips had touched the conduit of his power, immediately spreading a thin layer of frost over it. Now that he was alone again he let the tears fall freely down his face.

For so many years he had longed for someone to see him, to talk to him, to take notice of him.

After this incident he wished he would have stayed invisible.

There were others like him, other spirits.

They were aware of his existence.

And they ignored him on purpose.

Worse, they hated him.

He was the Spirit of Winter, doomed to do the job no one else wanted to do.

Because it killed people.

He killed people.

Flann was right, he was a murderer, there was no way to sugar-coat it.

He did his best to bring joy to the world, but how could a hundred snowball fights even remotely compensate the death of a single innocent person?

Was it worth that?

No, it wasn't.

And yet, he would continue his duty, because as much as he hated himself for it, he couldn't fight destiny.

The Man in the Moon chose his destiny for him.

He was Jack Frost, whether the rest of the world liked it or not.

And it surely wasn't a perfect world.


A/N : The Spirit of Autumn is a jerk. :P

"Flann" is an old Irish name and means "fiery red" and "harvest" was how the season was called before the 16th century.

Next chapter will be more light-hearted, I swear.