Chapter 2: Nice to Meet You

Disclaimer: I don't own Frozen or it's characters.

The ride back was quiet. The whole time there was nothing but the wind rushing past my face and the crunching of gravel beneath my wheels. Elsa didn't say anything, to my relief and slight disappointment. She just held her arms around my waist, squeezing every so often. I guess she was convincing herself that I was real, that I was here and that we were together again. I only hoped she didn't notice my heart bursting out of my chest, or how I shivered whenever she breathed past my ear.

I slid my back into the usual spot: halfway between a broken fare meter and an old unused pipeline. I looked up at the building. It had definitely seen better days. Maybe there was a time when the paint wasn't peeling, or the gargoyles had all their fingers, but nobody could remember it. It used to be an old tax office, until the local government relocated all their workers to the new business district and abandoned this one. Since then, nobody had given much thought to remodeling or even reselling the old girl. When I had come over, they were practically begging me to take it off their hands. I guess there was something about a gothic style building with gargoyles and black roof lining that really didn't scream well with the locals. Come to think of it, why did a tax office have gargoyles in the first place? Shrugging to myself I turned back to face my guest.

"So, here's the place. Is it everything you imagined it would be?"

She looked it up and down and hummed a bit to herself. "It is rather… quaint."

"Quaint?" I repeat, raising an eyebrow. "Quaint is what you call your grandmother's black santa collection. Come on, this is my home."

"Anna, we don't have grandmothers. And Saint Nicholas was of Greek descent, making him rather unlikely to be of African skin tone."

I was incredibly close to smacking my face into the motorcycle. "Have you always been this bad at metaphors, or is this something new for you?" She opened her mouth to respond but I pressed a finger to her soft delicate lips. "Don't answer that. That was a rhetorical question." Oh boy, she is going to have fun meeting Kristoff.

She smiled and gave me a slight squeeze. "It fits you."

I huffed and gave her my best incredulous look. "Really. Is it the gargoyles? I think they bring out my eyes."

She smiled and shook her head gently. "No, though they do compliment you well." She let go of my waist and stepped off my bike. I tried to pretend that I didn't feel empty where her arms used to be. "It just, looks rough. It looks rough, imposing and broken. It can come off as uninviting if you were not to know better."

I hopped off my bike and leaned on the handle. "Wow, I had no idea that's how you saw me. Is this the part where I say thank yo-"

"But it's safe." She said, not heeding my sarcasm. I felt the blush creeping on my cheeks as she looked towards me. "It has strong walls that tell me that I can be safe here. It looks rough because it has been through much, yet still stands tall. It is imposing because it needs to be to protect the people inside. And it looks broken because it has been through more than the other, but still remained standing tall and proud." She smiled at me and my blush turned into dark red. "Do you prefer that?"

I looked away, holding onto my bike handle. "It's been 30 years from where I stand. Things change."

She stepped up to me, putting her hand over my clenched one. "You're right. Then I suppose, I just have to find out more about the new you. Though, from where I stand," She looked me in the eyes and my face burned crimson, "I have a feeling that I would be right."

She let me go and I removed myself from my bike. "Heh, well let's hope you don't get too disappointed. Speaking of disappointments, keep your expectations low before you come in. I may have… neglected to clean up before I left this morning."

"I was not aware that you were the uncleanly type."

"Oh believe me, I haven't been clean in years." I smirked when she tilted her head in confusion. "Like I said, things change. Now, welcome to my home." I twisted the knob and gestured into the entryway. I had a 'quaint' little home, as Elsa would put it. The original entryway and waiting room had been combined with a sledgehammer, giving me a large living room area. There was a television in the corner that only played hockey, Spanish dramas and the news. Kristoff tried to teach me hockey, but I gave up pretty quickly and watched the other channels. And by that I mean the soap operas because anyone who watched the news to relax had to be incredibly bored or an incredibly boring person. So every day I'd sit down for a few hours and watch the adventures of Seniorita Juana and her illicit love affair with the archduke's mistress Elincia. Said plot and character dialogue and names may have been improvised during a fit of incredible boredom. At least I do the voices well according to Kristoff.

While the TV and the couch took up the bottom right corner, we kept the desk in the far back. It was a big office-type desk that clashed with the rest of the room. It had this incredibly professional look, if you overlooked the fact that the front right side of it was being propped up with outdated phonebooks. I found it on a job one day and lugged it back home. Regardless of what Kristoff insists, the table was already in that condition when I found it. Strapping it to my back while riding a motorcycle did nothing but air it out. It absolutely did not touch the pavement for a second during the ride home. On top of the desk was a pile of books and dvds. The books contained a bunch of things from various supernatural tomes, bestiaries, spellbooks (for Kristoff) and romance novels (for… Kristoff. Yeah). The dvds were a decent size of my personal collection. I had about every action movie, medieval knight movie and comedy that they sold in the county. And a copy of Titanic which makes me cry whenever I hear a tin whistle. Nestled on top of a pile was last night/this morning's pizza that still had a slice of pepperoni waiting for me.

Above the desk we had strung Christmas lights, because we decided that the room looked way cooler with a soft green and blue glow instead of an expensive normal ceiling light. The lights ran around the area of the room, giving us a nice backdrop that I'm sure clients appreciated.

On the left side of the room was a simple table next to a bookshelf. This is where the bulk of our books was kept. We had practically everything on every subject there. How to Treat Succubus Bites? Check. One Thousand and One Ways to Treat a Frozen Limb? Check. Snowman Building: The Complete Anthology? Double check. We cashed in on most of these when they were on discount. After the first demon invasion people were swarming to find out about these now not mythical creatures. They sent hunters out to gather data. They wrote books. They made movies. It was a huge scare and I for one made a killing when it happened. Sadly as interest died out, so did the number of media on the subject. Wasn't too hard to make a living, but it still wasn't the same as the glory days, not that I was particularly well off back then either.

The only thing left in the room was the stairs which led to the old offices. There were about three of them, so Kristoff and I took one each and decided to use the other for 'guests'. Unfortunately our only guest is usually Sven, Kristoff's ghost reindeer, but I'll get to that later. Thankfully he doesn't stink the place up like a real reindeer does, but it's still fairly unused. My heart fluttered when I realized that that was going to change soon, but I quickly took a breath to compose myself.

"So, welcome to my home." I gestured in with both my arms. "Ta-dah?"

I must have been looking like an idiot because I saw her chuckling. She patted me on the shoulder when I pouted and looked at me with gentle eyes. "It's beautiful."

I blushed again at those words. From virtually anyone else I would've passed that off as patronizing. Angels can't lie. It's not in the nature of an angel to be dishonest, tell false praise or make euphemisms. Sure, they can fudge the truth a bit, but you can't fudge a word like beautiful. All you need to do is look in their eyes and you know they meant every letter. I laughed a bit, hoping that I'd get out of this blushing habit quickly.

"Heh, well you haven't seen anything yet. Come on, you should eat. Have you even heard of pizza? Or chocolate, oh yes you need to try it it's to die fo-"

"Hey, you used up the toilet paper again didn't you?" a voice from the stairway called. "I swear to god Anna, you promised me that you would…" his voice slowed to a pause as Elsa and I came into view. "Oh."

Shit, I forgot Kristoff was still in tonight. Wait I forgot to tell El-

"Intruder!" Elsa called out, empowering her voice. In an instant she had unsheathed her sword and had it fixed on Kristoff. "Speak your business now, or let the wrath of God be upon you!"

Kristoff shook the confusion from his face and reached into his pocket. "Look, I don't know who you are, but this is my home. I should be saying that to you." He narrowed his eyes and the air around him crackled with magical energy.

I quickly jumped between the two holding my arms out. "Wait wait, guys stop! Kristoff this is Elsa. Elsa, Kristoff. He lives here." She lowered her sword and looked at me with a confused look in her eyes. "With me." Brows furrowed into a look of disapproval. "As a friend." I added.

She visibly relaxed and sheathed her sword. "I see." She looked up at Kristoff who had not taken his hand out of his pocket. "I apologize for jumping to conclusions. I thought Anna's safety was in danger. Please, let me reintroduce myself." She crossed her left arm over her chest. "I am called Elsa here. I am a knight of God, a crusader for justice and pleased to meet you. I apologize for attempting to assault you."

Kristoff just looked at me and I smiled back. I owed him an explanation, but that could take place after I got Elsa settled in. He took his hands out of his pocket and sighed. "Yeah, okay. I'm Kristoff, nice to meet you." He said with a slight roll of his eyes, but thankfully Elsa didn't seem to notice. She just smiled and muttered a quick thank you which Kristoff returned.

"Hey, I'm going to take her up to her room. She'll be using the old guest room." I grabbed Elsa's hand and half-dragged her to the stairs. Kristoff stepped to the side and we ascended to the second floor.

"I am truly sorry." Elsa said once we were on the second floor. "I fear that I have been in your home for only a few minutes and I have already embarrassed myself."

I snorted and patted her on the back. She flinched at the touch but smiled at me. "Look, it's fine. I highly doubt that he'll hold it against you. I mean, I've done way worse things to him and he still talks to me."

We stepped off the stairway and stood in the hallway. There were four doors there, two lining each of the walls. She stepped forward and put her hand on the closest door on the right. "This one is?"

"That's Kristoff's room. I don't think he'll want you going inside. Even I'm not allowed inside, and I technically own this place." I motioned her along and tapped at the room across from Kristoff's. "This one is my room. It's not… exactly clean right now so I'll show you later. This one is yours." I opened the door to the guest room and showed it off in all its empty splendor. Seeing as we never thought this room would have guests, spirit reindeer notwithstanding, we kept this room as bare as possible. A simple bed was against the far wall under a window next to a nightstand with a lamp. There was a closet on the other corner of the room, and a large bed of hay where a carpet would normally be. She stepped inside and looked around. Breathing in the scents she smiled and looked back at me.

"It's wonderful. Thank you so much." She said and I felt the heat in my cheeks. I pulled at my hair a bit and smiled before motioning across the hall. I walked over to the last door and grasped the knob.

"This one is my other room. Would the lovely lady care to look?"

Elsa nodded and I threw the door open. Inside was my second sanctuary. When I couldn't relax in my room, I always found solace in here. The walls were lined with various firearms of varying sizes. The floor was covered in weapons of practically every other discipline. In the middle was a bright glowing purple orb. I ran inside and started grabbing at every weapon I could get my hands on.

"Anna… what exactly is this?"

"Trophy room. Armory. Playroom." I giggled and turned towards her, holding a pile of guns in my arms. "Take a look at the-woah!" Unfortunately to me, I had knocked over a halberd in my excitement and took a quick plummet to the ground, scattering guns to the ground. Well, this is great. Maybe if I continue to lie here she'll think I died. Sadly that was not the case as I heard the scraping of metal.

"What's this one?" she asked and I looked up. She was holding the nozzle in her fingers, as if she was afraid it would bite her.

"His name is Olaf." I got up and took the pack in one hand and the nozzle in the other. "He gives out warm hugs. Take a look." I pointed Olaf's nozzle to the center of the room and squeezed the handle. First came the hissing noise as gasoline vapor streamed into the air. Then came the spark and an amber jet of flame shot out, lighting the entire cloud in a flash of fire and heat before it disappeared into mist. I blew at the still hot nozzle and smiled at her. "See? Warmest hugs in all of Arendelle. Demons are allergic to fire. Something about the purifying qualities of an open flame. I dunno, but man they're pretty when they burn."

I shuddered a bit as I looked at Elsa. She was biting her lip and shaking her head. "That is certainly…different."

There was this sinking feeling in my stomach. Gingerly I lowered Olaf on the ground and sighed. "Sorry, I guess this is… a bit much isn't it?"

"No!" She yelled, immediately clamping her hand over her mouth. "I mean, no. This is just different for me. Please, tell me more."

"Really? I mean, really? I mean, yeah. Okay, uh. Ooh, what do you want to meet next? I've got Starfire, uh Clarence."

"What about the orb?"

I dropped the guns I was picking up and skipped over to the orb. "I never thought you asked. This here is a transporter. It's a long range teleportation device that can send anything in this room to the receiver at a simple flick of my fingers."

Elsa mouthed an 'o'. "Where is the receiver?"

"You're looking at it." I tugged at my coat. "This here is linked to that glowing orb. Anything that I want in this room can be retrieved as long as I reach back into my coat. I got it off a dead flash demon a few years back. See, you should have seen this thing. Tiny little guy, probably about half my size. Weird nasty teeth, ew. It was teleporting around town and it had broken past the gates. I chased it down and it kept teleporting. Like you touched him and poof he was gone! So I found out that he was hiding this." I nudged the orb with my foot. "In the park under a bench. It was a crazy race but I beat him to it. I took the orb for myself and blasted him in the face. I guess he couldn't teleport if the orb was in motion. After I killed him he turned into this jacket and I've been wearing it ever since. Groovy huh?"

Elsa grasped the corner of my coat and hummed to herself. "Yes, very. I had heard that strong demon souls had practical uses. I had no idea that this is what they meant."

I laughed and tugged at my coat. "Well, I'm glad it turned into this. I never leave home without it. I like the weight on my shoulders." Reminds me of the old days.

"And… that one over there?" Elsa asked, pointing to the back wall of the room. There, apart from the other weapons stood a stand. A crimson sword, my Summerglow, leaned against the wall, shining in the dim light. "Is that-"

"Yeah. It's my baby. They let me keep it you know."

"Thank the heavens. I shudder to imagine what you would have done without it. Memory serves, you even slept with it."

I rolled my eyes at the complete trueness of that statement. "Yeah, well. Some of us actually get cold like normal people. Speaking of normal people you look tired."

She opened her mouth to protest but a yawn escaped her lips. She blushed and bit her lip, sending more palpitations down my heart. "I suppose a rest would be in order. I shall see you in the morning, Anna?"

I nodded and she turned to her room. She gave me one last look and smile before closing the door. I waved even after the door shut. Eventually my hand went down over my chest and I heaved a heavy sigh. How am I supposed to get any rest tonight?

Downstairs Kristoff had already turned on the television. He didn't look up as I plopped myself on the couch. "I ordered pizza. Figured we were going to need one for this talk." Opening the box on the floor he handed me a slice of Hawaiian.

I let out an exaggerated sigh. "Again? Pizza? What do you think we are, made of money Krissy? And all that dough is going straight to your thighs!"

"Hey, I'm just following in your example boss."

I glared at him and huffed. "I don't gain weight. It's a personal policy, but chocolate and pizza do not go anywhere near my buns and thighs thank you very much."

He grunted as he munched on cheap ham and stale pineapple. "I never really thought about it before, but that never really made much sense."

"It's a girl thing." I nibbled and a trail of cheese stretched to my chin. "You wouldn't understand."

"That's the problem Anna. Girls say that, but you actually don't. I don't think I've ever seen you gain weight or visibly age since I met you."

"Oh come on Kristoff, it hasn't been that long."

"Eleven years. I've been working for you for Eleven years Anna. I wasn't even a teenager when you saved me."

"And your point is?" I grumbled struggling with some ham that was stuck on my nose.

"You hardly look a day over twenty. I didn't think too much of it, or how you never come home hurt. I didn't think too much of how you were able to actually hurt those things. I didn't think too much about the room you refuse to let me in. I haven't thought to ask and now you bring home some 'knight of God' and just let her take one of our rooms. I haven't thought about all of these but now I think I should start."

I groaned and swallowed the rest of my slice. "You're being too paranoid. Look, you don't need to worry about that other stuff, okay?"

"No. Not okay. I live in this house. I support every stupid thing you do. Don't I deserve to know?"

"You don't need to know everything. Maybe I don't tell you some things because they're not important."

"Not important?" He sat up and glared at me. "What do you mean not important. Is it not important to you that I'm basically living with a stranger!?"

"I didn't exactly ask you twenty questions when you first came to live here, did I. No I didn't."

"And I didn't think to ask until you bring someone home and she immediately threatens me. Don't I deserve some sort of explanation? Anna, please!"

I buried my face in the sofa and screamed. "Fine! Okay, I'm sorry! I just don't want to think about it, so I don't talk about it."

"What's so bad that you refuse to tell me? What could possibly be so bad that you'd refuse to talk about it for more than a decade? Do you even have anything that you do want to tell me?"

I looked back up at the ceiling and closed my eyes. "Look, I don't want to go there. There are things in your life you don't want to remember."

Kristoff sighed and leaned back into the couch. "Even the good ones?"

"Especially the good ones. Makes it harder when you remember how it all went bad."

Even though I said that, I felt my mind wandering back to the old days. Days with me and Elsa. Days when I saw her glowing in the sunset. I felt myself shudder before a strong hand laid itself on my shoulder. I held in a sob and shook my head. "Promise me that no matter what I say, you'll treat me the same. No, swear it. Swear it on the immortal soul of your reindeer."

"It's really important to you, isn't it?"

It's everything to me. "Yeah, I guess. Swear it." He swore it and I took another deep breath. "There isn't a real good way to shorten this, so I'll start from the top. Pass me a slice of pizza, this will take a while."

A/N: I'm not very good at exposition, but I'm glad I got it out of the way. Next chapter is gonna be a flashback, hope you guys like that. Thanks for reading :)