Hello! Time for prompty thing number two: Trust Me.

Hope you all like it. :)

It's a few years since the Winter Spirit became a guardian which has had its great benefits.

The guardians are closer now, reclaiming that bond they had once when they were friends rather than co-workers. Although they are more like a family now which is strange and wonderful.

It's been a long time since he's had a family. Far too long.

He loves them all.

North, the old blow-hard, is like the brother that watches his back in a fight and will offer a glass of the Russian's best once it's over. They bicker like cats and dogs but never walk away from each other too angry.

Tooth, the wonderful Shelia, is the worry-filled, excitable sister he never thought he'd want. As tough as nails but as brilliant as the colours of the Great Barrier Reef. It warms his old war-battered heart to know someone cares and worries for him like Tooth does.

Sandy is next. His oldest, greatest friend. Occasionally a sneaky little Larrikin but he's the older brother who looked after him in those dark years after…. well no use dwelling over split paint. For a guy so silent, Sandy had no problem communicating. Especially when he was annoyed. He'd never told Sandy, but he looked up to the Fallen Star as a mentor. He probably already knew. The sneaky Cobber.

Jack is new. He's not sure where to place him. Calling him brother doesn't feel right nor does a friend. Yet the two of them are close. It makes his head spin a little and his heart beat double time when he thinks about it so he ignores it and yells at the Frostbite when he freezes over the Warren. Sandy shakes his head at the two but never gives away anything. Although that grin on his face is a mite too wide at times even if he can't decipher the meaning behind it.

But as much as he loves them, the whole crazy wonderful mob of them, he feels he can't quite trust them completely. It's his darkest secret. One he can't bring himself to trust anyone with.

In the dead of the night, Pitch or no Pitch, the screams of his race race through his mind and the dark bloody hopeless images plague his dreams. It's like living through it all over again. Only in his mind. it's worse. His old family, his blood family, say things he knows in his rational day-time mind they would dare not even think. But his mind is cruel at night and he can't bring himself to trust the other Guardians with the truth of his nights.

Until one Australian Autumn night in the middle of May.

Jack had decided to spend the night at the Warren because the cheeky show-pony knows that he won't turn him away (not after 300 years of doing so, never again). The nightmares happen randomly without warning or trigger and of course, it would be Sod's Law that tonight is one of those nights.

He is being screamed at by his own kit sister, barely out of the toddler stages, as he stutters out pleas when a cold presence emerges.

"Com'on Cottontail. Wake up. Please, wake up. It's only a will be alright. Wake up. Trust Me."

It's the last two words that make Reality jolt back to him. He is not on the Pookan homeworld. He is not surrounded by the vengeful corpses of his beloved family and friends. He is not being accused of anything.

He is in his nest, in his warm safe Warren. Like always.

And his head's on Frostbite's lap.

Which is new (but not entirely unwelcome).

But now Jack knows. He knows about the nightmares. He knows how he screams at night, plagued by a past long gone. He knows he hasn't trusted anyone with this.

He looks to the side ashamed. It's out of character but he can't help but do so since he's been caught out with his lack of trust.

He waits for the inevitable accusations and declarations that he is horrible guardian if he cannot protect himself from fear, how can he protect children and the guaranteed teasing from the Winter Spirit.

But they never come. Not even the teasing.

All Jack does is pet his head and whisper soft comforts. He looks up and jade watery green (he'll deny it, Jack lets him) meet soft bright blue.

"I'm not going to think any less of you. I won't tell anyone if you tell me or not tell me. I'll keep it secret. It'll get better. Maybe not today or tomorrow or even next year. But it will."

He knows what is about to be said.

"Trust me."

And for once, Bunny does.