A/N: I am a horrible human being. I regret nothing. 8D

For Jack, the weeks following Easter were spent in complete denial. He tried his hardest to forget his involvement with the Guardians; Pitch was right about that much at least. He moved through life with the same flighty not-quite-faux-happiness he'd perfected over 300 years. The only difference between now and before—Jack couldn't bring himself to even think of the holiday in question—was that now Jack had believers. Jamie had somehow convinced his friends that yes Jack Frost was an actual person and no he's not crazy. Jack had made fast-friends with all of the Burgess kids. He had a special place in his heart for Cupcake though; anyone who loves unicorns as much as she did had to be a good person.

Jack wasn't quite happy, but he was content. That was way more than he had before. It's strange to think that someone with joy for his center never actually experienced joy. Jack somehow just knew his center was joy when he regained his memories.

That was another thing that was different from before. Jack now knew why the Moon pulled him back from death and raised him from the lake. He saved his sister from certain death by replacing fear with fun before dying in her stead. The Moon somehow thought that was extraordinary and deigned him worthy of being a—

-No don't say it! Jack chastised himself. He smacked his head against a tree to bodily remove the traitorous thoughts spiraling through his head. If Jack consciously tried not to look at his hands while doing so, it wasn't like anyone was around to call him out on it.

"That looks rather painful." Pitch stated dryly as he materialized from the tree's shade. Jack nearly jumped out of his skin.

"Don't do that! Jeez, do you normally pop out of random shadows to scare people?" Jack immediately knew how stupid that sounded as soon as it left his lips. Pitch gave him a dry look as if to say 'I'm the Boogeyman. Do you honestly need to ask?' "You know what? Forget I asked. So why're you here?" Jack switched topics as easily as he switched clothes.

"It won't work, Jack. I've told you before." Pitch stated with absolute calm. Fear prickled up Jack's neck, but he played it off with a smile.

"What? You mean your plans for world domination? I could've told you that; there're no zombies involved! Of course it's not going to work!" He sassed. Even Jack could tell Pitch wasn't going to fall for it. He was caught and they both knew it. Pitch just gave Jack that dry look until he broke.

"I don't wanna talk about it." Jack said bluntly.

"Of course you don't; but you have to eventually." Pitch shrugged.

"Since when are you my therapist?" Jack snapped.

"I'd prefer to be your friend." Pitch replied.

That caught Jack's attention. His witty retort died on his tongue as Jack regarded Pitch with both suspicion and curiosity. Jack wrung his hands around his staff; it was a nervous habit Jack had yet to break. Pitch pointedly stared at the web-like scars crisscrossing over the top of Jack's lily-white hands. Jack stopped wringing them and hid them in his sleeves.

"I'm gonna go out on a limb here and assume you meant ally because there is no way you just said you want me to be your friend." Jack dismissed airily. "The answer is no, by the way. Even if I wanted to take over the world with you, I'd probably end up screwing up the plan in the name of fun. I have a bit of a short attention span when it comes to boring things." Jack was just babbling now; buying time so he could come up with a way to elude the Nightmare King. The thought that Pitch Black of all people would want to be his friend was a bit of a shock.

"I mean what I say, Jack. I want to be your friend." Pitch enunciated slowly and with conviction. "If you end up helping me in my plans for world domination, that's completely up to you. I for one wouldn't mind if a Freeze Ray made its way into my plot."

Jack had to take a moment for his brain to catch up with what Pitch just said. Pitch said it almost seriously, but his straight face was belied by a tiny, playful smile tugging at the corner of his ashen lips.

"Did you just joke about Freeze Rays?" Jack gawped. Pitch grinned.

"It was worth a shot." He shrugged. The grin never left his face and Jack had to laugh because this was actually happening.

"Oh my god you did!" Jack crowed. "This is a dream isn't it? Is Sandy fucking around in my head or what?"

Jack suddenly froze when he realized what he said. It just slipped out. He hadn't meant to mention Sandy, but now that he had, he couldn't stop the onslaught of repressed thoughts breaking through the fog. He remembered before—

—EASTER his mind screamed at him. Jack remembered Easter bit by agonizing bit. Jack remembered how as soon as he realized Pitch kept him away from the Warren just long enough to destroy all the eggs, he raced to the surface only to see Bunny get walked through by a child. Being walked through was a feeling Jack knew well, so he wanted to comfort the giant rabbit. He made to go over to Aster, but North stopped him in his tracks.

"Jack, where were you?" He demanded. "The Nightmares came. They smashed every egg, every basket… There was nothing left."

Things escalated quickly from there. Tooth saw Jack's teeth in his hands, accusations flew, assumptions of Jack's allegiance with Pitch were made, and Bunny just snapped.

Jack remembered how each hit felt. How each individual bruise was formed. Jack remembered how Bunny not only broke his bones and tenderized his muscles with fists, but also how he gouged strips of skin and sinew from his arms, hands, and chest with his pewter claws. Bunny put out all the stops to make Jack pay for abandoning hope and allowing Nightmares to raid his Warren. It wasn't Jack's fault—he didn't mean to anyway—but Bunny wouldn't hear it.

Jack remembered screaming. He begged for help from both Tooth and North. "Help me!" He cried. "He's hurting me!"

North looked away. The man who was almost like a father to Jack turned the other cheek as Bunny clawed him up like a scratching post. North was the first to actually trust Jack. He made moves to include Jack as one of the team before anyone else had the chance to process Manny's decision. North was the first to abandon him. It hurt. It almost hurt more than having his hands smashed by the enraged Pooka.

Tooth didn't look away, but that was worse. She watched as Bunny bloodied Jack up and only winced at the loss of his teeth. She made no moves to help. She just stood there and watched. Jack liked to think that he and Tooth were friends—or at least on friendly terms—He could almost picture her becoming like a mother to him. Jack knew better now; she only liked him for his teeth.

Jack remembered becoming hopeless as the Guardian of Hope rained his fury upon his frail body. He remembered how he felt like he was going to die. The thought of dying alone and unwanted scared Jack; enough to give him a surge of adrenaline and use it to escape.

Scared… Fear... Pitch!

"You saved me…!" Jack whispered in hushed awe. "When Bunny was hurting me… I got scared and I… you saved me."

"No I didn't." Pitch quickly denied. "I merely made you see a reason to save yourself. Fear has many uses, Jack; one of which is finding a reason to fight. If fear cannot help you avoid danger, it can help you remember your reason to live." Pitch delivered this profound news with the reverence and awe it deserved. Jack was stunned to silence by it. Jack never thought of it that way. He always thought fear was something to avoid, but Pitch was saying fear was what helped you avoid danger. Fear wasn't the problem; it was a helpful hint.

"You feared dying alone; you would have died if Bunny kept going." Pitch announced. It was a brutal truth that both of them knew. "You would die alone and no one would bat an eyelash. You knew that, so you resolved yourself to live. You would escape and live to continue your search for companionship another day. These thoughts weren't conscious, Jack. They were taking place in a split second right before you made the decision to fight and flee. That is why I'm here. That is what I put in to the world. That is my center." Pitch took Jack's face in his hands and he concluded his fiery speech. "Fear at its center is a way to help people help themselves." He murmured.

Jack didn't know when he started crying, but the soft brush of Pitch's thumbs on his cheeks alerted him to the tears streaming down his face. A choked sob escaped Jack's lips and he thrust himself into Pitch's arms. Jack clutched desperately at Pitch's cloak of shadows and sobbed like he hadn't since the night he was first walked through. Pitch rested his spindly arms around Jack's shoulders; a comforting weight, but not a restriction. Jack's knuckles were bone white with the strain of gripping Pitch's robes so hard, but the bright red scars stayed the same. They would never heal completely, Jack knew that, but in time they would fade into a soft pink; just like Jack's heart would be forever scarred by the Guardian's careless actions. Maybe Pitch could help Jack fade the emotional scars into something less painful too? He seemed to care enough about Jack to help him help himself, so maybe Jack could help Pitch help himself too? It was a nice thought.

Jack eventually calmed his shuddering sobs into occasional hiccups. Pitch held him through it all and never made any moves to dislodge him. Jack suddenly chuckled wetly and asked in a lighthearted voice,

"You threw the fight, didn't you?"

Jack couldn't see it, but he just knew Pitch was smirking. "My reason for attacking the Guardians in the first place was to gain believers and by extension companionship. Why go through such elaborate means when I already had what I wanted? It's a waste of effort and I'm not one for frivolousness." He explained.

"Is that a yes?" Jack asked cheekily.

"Don't ask questions you know the answer to; it's not polite." Pitch snorted.

"Yeah that's definitely a 'yes.'" Jack snickered.

It wasn't the most conventional way to make friends, but it worked. Jack could honestly say he never thought he'd be friends with the Boogeyman, but that was before.

A/N: I was gonna wait until tomorrow to post the next chapter, but I got impatient. XD; I WUB ALL OF YOU AND YOU MAKE ME HAPPY WITH YOUR REVIEWS~

So Pitch is a cool dude, eh? I've seen a lot of posts/fills where Pitch is all 'I teach kids to avoid danger, don't hate.' buuuuuuuuuuuut I decided to add onto that a bit. YES fear helps you determine 'Thar be danger here,' but sometimes we just can't avoid it. So Fear also helps us FIGHT FOR OUR MOTHERFUCKIN LIVES BECAUSE HOLY SHIT THIS IS ACTUALLY DANGEROUS.

Represent, Pitch. Represent.

Make no mistake, this fic WILL be posted in its entirety. I've actually sat myself down and FINISHED this before I posted any of it. Which is why it took so long to get out here. XD; Damn you Pooka-Curse and your distracting livestreams! JK BBY ILU. Don't ever stop.

I had to joke about the Freeze Rays. I had to.