Author Notes: Chapter two here guys! Hope y'all enjoyed the last chapter. :) "This is scaryk26 saying: HAVE FUUUUUUUUUUUN READING!"

Everyone was staring at the ghostly silhouette, shocked, disbelief in their eyes. Why Death? Of all the spirits MiM could have picked, he chose Death?! Then again, it did make a little sense. She was a fear spirit in a way, and so was Pitch. They were both dark in appearance and personality, well, Death had her perks and fun sides whereas Pitch, as far as the Guardians knew, was cold and heartless. In their minds dark and dark went together better than anything else they could think of. Maybe Manny had something in mind for the lonely Boogeyman. North suddenly spoke up, looking between the Guardians and MiM,

"I think Manny might have point. If we lead Death to Pitch who knows? They may get along well."

"And if they don't? What then?" Jack asked concerned. Everyone went silent and thought about what may indeed happen if they didn't get along. Tooth shuddered slightly at the thought of one of the elder spirits being brought down hard and put in their place. And she knew for a fact that the spirit on the winning side wouldn't be Pitch. Once again, North was the one to break the silence.

"We have no choice, Jack. I know that many things can go wrong, but we have to take risks." Bunny took a moment to think.

"'ow do we even find 'er? She could be anywhere, mate. If we're gonna ge' 'er to Pitch then we 'ave to track 'er down first."

"He has a good point there, North. How do we get those two to meet up if neither of us knows where they're at?" Tooth asked. North looked up at MiM and asked him to show them where her current location was. The shadow changed once more to form the word Burgess. She wasn't all that far away, and it'll be a nice little visit to Jack's home town anyway. Everyone, Jack especially, smiled wide as North took out a snow globe from his right coat pocket. He shook it and threw it on the floor, opening up a portal leading straight to Burgess. Once everyone was through they found themselves on a rooftop overlooking Jack's lake. When they turned around they spotted, a few houses down, the same silhouette that Manny had shown them moments ago. There she was, a young woman sitting on a large, bulky, black shire horse, reins in her left hand and scythe in her right. She too was on the roof of a house and it seemed that she was unaware of the Guardians making their way over to her. They weren't afraid of her, they knew she was harmless to them. When they were right up next to her steed they noticed that in her left hand was not only the reins, but she also held a mobile phone. The shire turned his head to look at the Guardians with his flaming red eyes and smiled. He pawed the ground with his left rear leg three times to let his mistress know. However, her eyes didn't move from the screen of her phone, she just nodded as she said,

"That's nice." She could understand her Shadow Horse like Pitch could understand his Nightmares, very, very well. It was like they were actually speaking with words to them, but to anyone else, they wouldn't have a clue what they were saying. The frustrated shire turned to look back at the Guardians and snorted as if saying,

"Sorry about this. My Mistress is a bit absorbed in her game of Pinball at the moment." He turned to look at her again and neighed loudly whilst rearing, causing her to break her concentration. Once he returned to his original standing position, he got a quick and gentle telling off from his mistress.

"What was that for, Mammon? I was just about to beat my high score!" He quickly bowed his head with a sad frown, his ears flopping over the sides. He rarely ever got a telling off from her. Thankfully he didn't interrupt her in anything serious. She looked down at him and frowned slightly, sighing as she rested her front of the back of his strong neck. "I'm sorry, boy. It's just a game anyway. I can beat my record some other time." She patted his neck and stroked it lightly, earning a quick wag of his tail and a few happy flicks from his ears. He brought his head up again and nuzzled her, whinnying happily as she nuzzled him back. She kissed his nose and sat up straight to look at the Guardians and greeted them in a way in which only she could, being the goofball she could possibly be at times. "Hello, Guardians of this large, green, pollution-covered world which we call 'home'! Me and my Shadow Horse was just taking a delightful, well-earned break from our hard work, when suddenly..." she gasped dramatically, placing her hands upon her cheeks before continuing, "... YOU lot appear before our very eyes!" she pointed to the Guardians as she emphasised the 'you' in the sentence. "Now, what exactly is it that we may help you with, Dear Guardians?" she asked with a smile as sweet as honey. The five spirits looked at one another, smiling dumbly as they were confused about the way they were greeted. Bunnymund spoke up, still smiling like an idiot.

"Um... All righ' then. Uh, listen. Death, we need your 'elp. We need you to co..."

"Hold up one second." The elderly spirit butted in, silencing the pooka. "'Death'? Honestly, guys. How many times have I asked you to call me by my first name? It gets kind of annoying listening to your job name being called out to you all the time." Bunny glanced back at the other four behind him before turning his full attention back to the mounted spirit.

"Sorry. 'Raven', we need your 'elp."

"P-p-p..." She interrupted again with a smirk. She enjoyed messing with the Guardians, but sometimes they messed back. He kept a straight face, realising her game. He thought he may as well join in, seeing as she was in such a good mood.

"Peanuts. Now come on." Tooth giggled a little in the background as did Mammon. Raven smiled letting out a gentle sigh. Bunny chuckled, "All righ'. Raven, could ya please come with us? Id is kinda urgent."

"All right. Where to?" They all looked to Jack who already knew exactly where they wanted to go.

"Follow me." He said, to Raven especially. He flew off the roof heading towards the forest with the others close behind. He stopped and stood firmly on the ground, a deep, dark hole in the ground in front of him. As the others stood behind him looking down at the hole, they gripped their weapons tightly, knowing exactly what dangers lurk deep within those shadows and down that hole. Raven dismounted herself from her shire, allowing him to become one with the shadows and darkness, and stood besides Jack.

"Why did we stop?"

"Because the thing that threatens us is hiding in that hole." She peered into it, her gaze coming into contact with a distant floor. Now, being so close to darkness and living her entire immortal life in it, she could also see very, very, VERY well. North rested a hand on her shoulder and said,

"Raven, Man in Moon thinks you could help us with this problem, and who are we to go against his word? Now, we ask you to keep calm and try not to lose it. We need you to try and reason with him down there, okay?" She took a deep breath and released it.

"Can you tell me what it is I am dealing with here?"

"We'll explain it once we're down there, okay?" He replied calmly.

"Okay." She looked towards Jack and smiled as she said, "Ladies first." He laughed as he leapt down the deep hole, followed by Raven, North, Bunny, Tooth and her Mini Faries, and Sandy. Jack softly landed on the ground, whereas Bunny and North landed with fairly loud thuds, Tooth, Sandy and the Mini Faries didn't even touch the ground and Raven sank straight through the shadows, appearing behind Jack. "Now what?" She whispered.

"Now, we explain what you need to do." North replied. "The spirit you are facing is Pitch Black, the Boogeyman. He caused us trouble last year, big trouble. He nearly wiped us out of existence."

"He actually killed Sandy and if it wasn't for Jamie and his friends, he wouldn't be here today." Tooth said as quietly as she could, but slightly above a whisper.

"Exactly. Now, he has come back. Probably for revenge. So, we need you to try and stop him from continuing with this mess. Man in Moon wouldn't have picked you if he did not believe you could accomplish this task!" North smiled hopefully at her as did everyone else, but Raven was far too occupied with the shadows dancing around her feet and speaking to her as they floated up and past her ears. She could also understand shadows well too, like she could understand Mammon and any other shadow creatures. They wooed into her ears almost hypnotically to catch her attention, they spoke at different times to make sure she was concentrating. They crossed words and sentences with each others and spoke in different tones. These shadows were hers, but Pitch had his own too.

"Mistress..."

"Mysterious... being..."

"Dark horses..."

"ShadowMaster..."She closed her eyes as she listened to them go on, fading and crossing their words, speaking quickly, speaking slowly, raising and lowering their voices. Those few messages repeated themselves a few more times before they disappeared. She exhaled, a ghostly breath leaving her mouth, before they whispered loudly from behind her.

"THIS WAY!" Her eyes flung open revealing bright, shining blue eyes like sapphires being caught in bright light. She ignored the Guardians as she swiftly turned and wandered briefly down the long, dark tunnel, following the constant woos of her shadows. The Guardians knew she was up to something so they ran, flew, and hopped as fast as they could to catch up to her, trying their best not to make any sound. Jack nearly bumped straight into her because she stopped without slowing down first. Bunny crawled so he was beside her so he could see her face. Her eyes were locked to focus on something straight in front of her. Everyone turned their attention to focus on something dark moving through whatever light was there. It seemed to sense them in the darkness. It slowly turned around to face them and chuckled, revealing its sharp, white teeth.

"Come to pay me a visit, Guardians? How thoughtful of you." Bunnymund frowned deeply and pinned his ears back. Everyone else seemed to also bare the same expression of anger. Raven, however, was nowhere to be seen. Bunny stood up straight and spoke.

"We came to introduce ya to someone..." he looked around the lair for any sign of her and smirked, "... who 'appens to be righ' be'ind ya."

"Hey!" Raven spoke out from behind the man, startling him slightly, causing him to step into the light. He was very tall and thin, he wore a long black robe, similar to Raven's, just without the hood and quite a bit shorter than hers. His hair was black and looked as if it was combed back with a large amount of hair gel to keep it in place. His nose sloped straight down from his forehead and he had no eyebrows what-so-ever. His cheeks were hollow, his lips were thin and black, and his eyes resembled golden eclipses that were set deep into his head. He stared at her wide-eyed, shocked as to how she could have managed to get behind him without him noticing or hearing her. Raven just stood there and smiled politely with her hands behind her back. "Hello." He blinked and held a rather dull and unimpressed look upon his long, grey face. He ignored her and turned his attention back to the Guardians. Her smile faded and she frowned. She licked the inside of her mouth, then a couple of her teeth, then her lips and ended it all with a 'pop'. She glanced around the lair and noticed the hanging cages. Her smile quickly returned.

Well, at least he had good decorations in his home. More than she had in hers... WAY more! All she had in her home was a long hallway leading into the main room which was completely empty, excluding the few blue flame candles scattered around on the walls. Then after that there was another large room... every room is large in her place... which posed as a living room with a huge fireplace, which was at LEAST 7ft long and about 10ft high, a couple of armchairs and sofas around it, and a large, red, circular rug laid out in the middle of the floor. No picture frames or nothing, but we'll get into detail later.

"I don't take kindly to strangers. I would've thought you'd know that." He seemed to be in a surprisingly calm mood, judging from the Guardians' point of view. Toothiana was about to speak when Raven suddenly butted in.

"Well, it's certainly a good thing I'm not a stranger then isn't it?" Her expression a sly smirk, her eyes dazzling like the stars. She was playing another one of her games, but this time with a much tougher opponent.

"We've never met." The Boogeyman replied, slightly confused but not showing any physical sign of it. She step forward into the light and offered her hand to said Boogeyman.

"Then allow me to introduce myself." She began, her hand still awaiting its match. "I'm Raven. Or as most people know me as Death." He was about to shake her hand until she revealed her official name. He froze for a second or two then replaced his hand behind his back.

"I'd rather not shake hands with the Devil's partner, thank you." She curled her fingers as she brought her arm up to her chest.

"I see. I have you know that I am also partner with The Powers That Be. Half partner I should say. Things have been a lot easier for me since." She smiled gently with slightly hooded eyes. He shook his head lightly as he spoke.

"Why should that be any better for me? I have no connection to Him upstairs, nor should I ever want to have. He's done nothing for me in the past so why should He do anything for me now?!" He half shouted the last part, catching the Guardians' attention. They knew something bad was going to happen.