Chapter 1: Eleven Months
Eleven months.
It had been eleven months since Jack had almost permanently replaced Santa and achieved his old life-long dream of being recognized and glorified by people everywhere.
Eleven months since he had been defeated. And by a little human girl, to boot!
Eleven months since he had been thawed.
Surprisingly enough, Jack felt great!
Well, mostly.
After being hugged to death by all the inhabitants of the North Pole, Santa delivering the gifts and baby Claus being born, a meeting had been called for the twenty-sixth of December. The Council of Legendary Figures had no idea what to do now. The meeting lasted a while and was fairly intense. Especially when they began to directly address the issue at hand: Jack.
That was when it had gotten interesting. Mother Nature was positive about the change, as was Father Time. Both of them believed his thaw was permanent. Santa, on the other hand, was adamantly against it.
It was back and forth between Santa and Mother Nature for a while, the other figures watching with interest, Jack occasionally trying to interrupt.
"He froze my family, took over the North Pole, upstaged me, and suddenly he's wearing white and you want me to believe that it's a good change?! I don't think so! I've given him way too many chances!"
"Santa, please, you must trust me. Jack has been thawed and I can assure you it is permanent; he won't be trouble anymore. Now, I'm not saying that he shouldn't make up for what he did—that's a must, and we will get to that—I'm trying to tell you that—"
"But to go all willy nilly and just accept him like that? I'm sorry, I just can't get behind this!"
"Oh, give it a rest, Santa. Mother Nature is right, I'm done with the evil things! I've never felt so coherent and-and awake in a while—"
"How do we know he's not just schmoozing? We said if he stepped one toe out of line, he was done for. And I think I'm speaking for most of us when I say he stepped all ten toes out of line!"
"Actually you said if there was one icicle out of place—"
"I said the toe thing too!"
"Not that I can recall."
"Well I was thinking it!"
The argument went on for a while, and chaos ensued. His spot on the council was on the line, and Jack had been devastated—until someone unexpected had arrived.
The doors had burst open, and in came Bernard. Everyone stopped talking, staring at the proper head elf.
"Bernard! You're back earlier than we thought!"
"I'm back earlier than I thought, too. I heard about what happened. Where's Frost?"
Bernard looked around, locking eyes with Jack. He stared at him very intently. Jack knew what he was doing, though. Bernard noted Jack's eyes, and his warm cheeks.
"So, it is true, then. You have been thawed out. I didn't think it was possible."
"That makes two of us."
That had changed the tide for Santa. With Bean pole's blessing, Santa begun to sway. As soon as Bernard agreed with Mother Nature, explaining how he had heard about everything that happened, mentioning his surprise run in with a friend on the way who told him that Jack may have been thawed, Santa reluctantly accepted the thaw.
Of course, he still needed to be reprimanded, as it were. Jack was sentenced to community service once more—but this was intense. He was constantly watched by either Bernard or Santa, occasionally Elle and Curtis every so often as well, and was tossed here and there, working hard alongside the elves and quite often, Santa himself.
Toy making was alright, though not his forte. After that disaster, Jack really did become a Jack Frost of all trades. He was excellent in gift wrapping (his gifts looked so lovely post-wrapping that he convinced himself that they wouldn't be unwrapped violently by little children everywhere). He helped with repairs to the houses, shops, and other buildings of Elfsburg. Sometimes he helped in the kitchen too—he made great cocoa and enjoyed cookie making and decorating (yet he snacked more than he did decorate). On top of all that, he still had to uphold his proper wintertime duties. Mother Nature checked in on him once a week, and slowly but surely, he gained more time to himself, and managed to rebuild and properly earn the trust that nobody had given him in…centuries, really.
And that's when things began to fall apart.
It began to appear as he finally solidified relationships, making friends with Santa and his family (though his eldest did not like him one bit). Carol even let him babysit little Buddy! (Though admittedly he was not fond of parts of this job. Teaching the kid how to blow raspberries and say snowball fight was great—but diaper changing and feeding was less so). Things were going well, and he felt great, except for one tiny, little, teensy weensy problem.
Jack lacked the Frost.
As he made those new friendships, his powers had begun to dwindle and by now, seemed to have all but shorted out. His icy breath was barely there, his snowballs were pathetic; he couldn't freeze anything!
At first, he had told himself it was only temporary, they'd come back, maybe it was just Springtime Blues and he'd be dancing under a snowfall again in no time! Instead, though, it had just gotten worse as his personal life got better. The North Pole slowly got warmer and by June, it was very noticeable. Something that Jack had worked all his life to never let happen, despite his feelings towards Santa, was happening.
The North Pole was melting.
And Jack was ashamed of himself.
The elves started wearing less layers, until they were walking around in breezy skirts and shorts, sundresses and shoes sans socks, sandals on their feet. The icicles he had so carefully crafted were dripping, getting smaller and smaller; even Carol and Santa pulled out summer clothes that hadn't seen the light of day in quite some time!
He couldn't tell them, couldn't tell anyone that the Jack Frost, master of ice and snow, Legendary figure, had no powers—that he was about as useful as a mortal.
Though he had skirted by easily before hand, now this power shortage was costing him greatly. Both the Claus's and the Council were starting to suspect him of going back to his old ways; people looked at him suspiciously again, elves starting to give him a wide berth. Carol had tried talking to him, but he dodged the subject. At every Council he attended, they brought it up, and he narrowly would avoid it.
He was running out of options now. He knew he needed help with this problem, but of course Jack was a prideful sprite. To admit to everyone that he had no powers currently and couldn't fathom why? It may very well send him to Rosehaven much earlier than he had expected. Especially since he was officially out of time—Santa had finally confronted him.
"Jack, c'mon! You've been dodging our questions for months! Everyone's starting to think you're going back to your old ways, and frankly, I'm starting to believe them. You and I both know what happens if the dome melts."
Jack was appalled. "Santa, I'd never force the Deliquesce on you! On anyone in the pole, or the world, for that matter! I couldn't watch the Pole and Elfsburg be destroyed, along with Christmas! You've got to believe me Santa, please! As a friend…please."
"As Santa, and including your track record prior to this year, I can't rule it out. That's why I've called an emergency meeting, right now. As a friend…I've seen you change, I know you're good, but you won't tell me why it's like Hawaii here! Nobody wants to see Santa in shorts, not even himself. I want to help you, Jack. And if this is how you'll accept help, by force, then so be it. My office in ten minutes. Consider it an intervention. Be there, Jack."
And he looked at Jack with pleading eyes, before leaving him alone.
Which brought Jack back to the present. Here he stood, watching the elves work, absentmindedly playing with the smallest snowball he had ever conjured. Somehow their spirit was still high as they worked—but all Jack felt was very troubled. Maybe even a little sad though he would never admit that out loud.
"Jack? Council's waiting on you."
Jack sighed, the snowball bouncing up once and landing back in his hand as he turned and glanced at Bernard.
"I'm going. They didn't need to send you to Frost-sit."
Bernard sighed. "You know they didn't send me to Frost-sit you. Santa just wants to make sure you go. They all want to help you, you know."
"I know," was all Jack could really say.
Bernard frowned, staring at the sprite.
"Do I sense concern? From you? For little old me?"
"It was there but you know what, I can't seem to find it anymore. Let's go," Bernard said, turning and heading towards the meeting room, not looking back.
"Wow," Jack said. He looked at his snowball once more, his good humour instantly disappearing. It was melting right in his hand. With a sigh, he tossed it down into the square (careful not to hit any of the munchkins) and followed Bernard's fast retreating form, as if he were walking to his own execution.
A/N-Edited as of January 19, 2017. I am way happier with this chapter now! I didn't think it need too much work, just a lot of Bernard fixes, but man oh man I went HAM on this one. And below is of course the promised summary of the original AN!
There we have it, chapter one (newly edited!) We know Jack's secret, and are beginning the very fun Flashback Sequences that spread through like the next 4 chapters I think? I had a lot of fun writing thawed Jack. We're not sure how he acts in canon, so we can take a lot of creative liberties and tbh looking at this now, once the story is 3 and being edited, I took a LOT of creative liberties and I think they worked out well!
Please do leave reviews, follows, faves, etc. I'm very talkative and honestly would love to hear your feedback! (Yes, with a story THIS OLD!)
