;my lord we're almost at 100 reviews?! you guys are amazing! this is kind of a filler chapter so I hope you all don't mind. I own nothing but the plot and OC's;
It wasn't hard to see why Jack needed help.
Somehow, Bunny had gotten into cans of neon colored paint and covered himself from the tip of his ears to end of his toes. Now he was hopping/waddling after elves trying to paint them as well.
North was crawling on top of the fire place trying to get to his large swords. Trying to find a more simple solution, he jumped onto one of the random flying toys. Forgetting his original plan, North ditched the swords went zooming around the toy factory.
Tooth flew around the room randomly blabbing out words like "swan Fwanciwco" and "swcter tew". She giggled while forcing open the yetis and elves mouths to look at their teeth then gave them an honest opinion on how she felt about them.
Meanwhile, Sandy was having his own underwater-animal-dream-sand-rodeo. Mini sand stingrays, sea horses, sharks, jelly fish, dolphins, and other types of small fish flew around the ceiling while he sat in the center on a sand cloud.
Daughter Nature stood in the entry way with Jack, jaw hanging. He nodded in agreement at her look of shock while leaning against his staff. "Told you it was bad." He muttered.
"I've -uh- I've seen worse." Maeve replied walking into the room. Jack smirked. As if any other kids could be worse. "We need to get them to sleep." He said. "The yetis and I need to deliver the presents in a few hours."
Maeve nodded. She had completely forgotten it was Christmas Eve that night.
"So... I'll take Bunny and Tooth...you get Sandy and North?" She asked as North flew above them riding an airplane. "Sounds good enough to me." Jack replied flying off after the toy builder.
Maeve looked at the two infants she had to catch. Bunny was still chasing after Elves while Tooth was still flying around looking at everybody's teeth. Daughter Nature raised an eyebrow as she came up with a plan.
Maeve kneeled down next to a group of Elves. "Hey can you guys make a large plate of cookies and bring some egg nog for us?" She asked. They all nodded and scurried off, glad to finally get free of Bunny and Tooth's reach.
"Except for you two." Maeve added placing a hand out to stop two of the Elves. "I need you for a different job."
The elves sprinted through the play area trying to out run Tooth and Bunny who where waddling after them. The elves ran around a corner where Maeve jumped out of no where and snatched the babies up.
"Got ya!" She chanted proudly. Bunny squirmed in Maeve's grasp getting paint all over her shirt. Tooth attempted to flap her wings and Escape, but Maeve had her wings pinned down against her stomach. After a minute of struggling, they accepted defeat and allowed Daughter Nature to take them back over to the play room just as the elves brought cookies and eggnog and two yetis cleaned up the paint.
Catching North took next to no effort. Jack simply flew up behind the toy maker when he wasn't looking and grabbed him off the flying toy. "Hold this." Jack said dropping North into Maeve's hands as he flew past to get Sandy.
Getting the Sandman was another story.
There was so much dreamsand Jack didn't know how he was supposed to reach the Sandman with out falling asleep. He ducked as sea horses flew above his head then flew to the side a stingrays zoomed past.
"Hey, Sandy!" Maeve called up to the Sandbaby. "Want some eggnog?"
The moment he heard "eggnog", Sandy disbursed all his sand creations and flew down to the table where Maeve and the Elves had set up snack time.
"Eggnog and cookies." Jack said flying down and landing next to Daughter Nature. "Why didn't I think if that?" "Well I do have more experience with little kids." Maeve said matter-of-factly crossing her arms.
Jack grinned at her while the four guardians inhaled the snacks. Sandy started hiccuping over and over again. He didn't make any noise, he just bounced up and down with each hiccup which lead to him "crying" in frustration. Jack picked up the one year old and started humming. Maeve recognized the song easily. She heard him humming it when they first met.
Maeve down and closed her eyes while listening to him. Weird... the lyrics sounded familiar now. Daughter Nature furrowed her eyebrows and listened harder. She could just make out the words.
"...someone holds me safe a warm. horses dance through a silver storm. Figures dancing gracefully, across my memories..."
Maeve's eyes shot open and she almost fell off the table. Catching herself she cleared her throat and asked: "Uh-Where did you learn that song exactly?" Jack shrugged. "Don't Know. Guess I've always known it." He replied.
Once he stopped hiccuping, Jack set Sandy back down who instantly went back to the cookies the elves kept bringing.
"Why'd you ask?" He questioned. Maeve chewed the inside of the lip. "Oh- uh- no reason. ya know, just curious." She said looking away at the floor. Jack raised an eyebrow. She's hiding something, that was obvious.
"Be right back." He said to Phil while taking Maeve's hand and leading her off to the side. Jack took her into a quiet hallway and shut the door. "Alright." He said. "Your hiding something. You always avoid looking at me when you do so don't bother lying."
Maeve raised her eyebrows. Was she that obvious?
"Well?" he asked. Daughter nature sighed. No point in lying. He'd know if she was anyway. "Pitch came back to see me in my nightmares." She told him while leaning against the wall.
They stood in silence letting this sink in. "What did he show you?" Jack asked finally asked.
"My greatest fears." She thought. Not wanting to be reminded of the horror show her grandfather had put on, Maeve replied: "He showed me this large cavern with cages and bridges and tried to convince me to join him."
Well she wasn't lying. She just wasn't telling the whole truth.
"He said the two of us and the strengthened dark guardians could rule the world." She continued. Jack leaned against the wall next to her. "What did he mean by 'strengthened'?" He asked. Maeve shrugged. "Dunno. How could they get stronger?"
Jack thought about this for a while before saying: "40 years ago Pitch became more powerful because more children believed in him... If the dark guardians replace the real guardians and more kids believe in them..." "...The stronger they'll get." Maeve finished.
They looked at each other half-surprised, half-amused.
"So that's why Pitch turned them into infants." Jack said standing up and pacing the floor. "He wants them out of the way so their dark versions can take over their jobs and become more powerful. All we have to do is get Father Times watch back, return the others to their right ages, stop the dark Guardians and bam! Situation ended!"
"Yeah but how are we supposed to get the watch from them? If we even go near Pitch or Fear they'll just turn us into infants too." Maeve reminded him.
Jack looked a little annoyed, probably because Maeve had rained on his parade, but shook it off. "We'll find a way." He said taking her hand in his. "Right now we have guardians to babysit." "Oh to joy." Maeve replied sarcastically as she headed to the door.
"Oh and uh-" Jack twirled Maeve around so she was facing him and kissed her on the lips. Daughter Nature's face burned red from his sudden movement. He just loves making her blush doesn't he?
It wasn't a long kiss. Almost as soon as it started, Jack pulled away. He grinned at her look of shock. "What? Your not going to give me kisses anymore so I just have to steal them."
Maeve blinked at him then smirked. "good luck with that." she said as she headed out of the hallway.
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"-and the man in the moon destroyed the golden monster and freed the Lepercon's workers from its evil spell. The end." Jack finished closing the book.
Maeve's plan to get the guardians asleep worked. North and Sandy, who was clutching an empty glass of eggnog, where both fast asleep, on the winter spirit's lap. Tooth was sleeping on top of Maeve's head while Bunny, who was cuddling his boomerang, curled up in her arms.
"I can't believe it actually worked." Jack whispered. "Great idea-" He cut off as he noticed Daughter Nature herself had fallen asleep with her head resting against the winter spirit's chest.
He smiled and twirled Maeve's hair with his fingers while she slept.
It's surprising how far they've come in not even a month of knowing each other. Before he had considered Maeve his best friend, someone he could easily talk to about anything and his escape from the world of being a Guardian. Now she was someone he could never stay away from even if he tried.
Phil and two other Yetis bounded over breaking his thoughts while gibbering about how they had to leave soon. Jack shushed them and gestured at Maeve and the other sleeping guardians.
Phil lowered his voice and said they had an hour till take off. Jack nodded as the Yetis gently took the baby guardians back to their cribs. The winter spirit scooped sleeping Maeve up into his arms bridal style and stood up.
Phil turned around and asked what he was doing. "Taking her home. She's been gone all day." Jack replied. Phil started rambling on how many ways this could throw them if schedule. Jack rolled his eyes. "Don't worry." He said waving off the matter. "I'll be quick as a bunny."
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"Here she is Aunt Soph." Lewis said quietly looking into the bedroom. "Maeve's here she's just asleep."
Sure enough, Maeve was curled up on her bed fast asleep laying on top of her bed covers and still wearing the clothes she had worn today.
"Don't wake her, I'll just talk to her tomorrow." Sophie said staying in the hallway. "Where's she been running off to? Does she have a boyfriend or something?" "Maeve? A boyfriend?" Lewis snorted. "That's as likely to happen as she's going to meet Jack Frost."
The 15 year old closed the door quietly, completely unaware of the silvery haired boy crouching next to his sister's bed side.
The boy brushed Maeve's hair out of her face and kissed her gently on the lips. Like he said, he'd just steal his kisses from her.
Standing up, he picked up his staff and headed to her open window. He looked back at the bedroom door and smirked.
If only they knew.
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"Are they ready?" Pitch asked walking out of the shadows to the Dark Guardians whom where currently being drained from their large life supply.
"Yez. Ve vill be fully done in fev minutez." Apathy replied weakly from where he was sitting.
It was the same old thing. Pitch would drain the Dark Guardians of their life forces, aka Nightmare Sand, to create his own army of nightmares. Even as they spoke, Nightmare's where flying around the world collecting whatever was left of the dreamsand that the Sandman had released. And when they weren't being drained of life, they would be running around trying to take over all the Guardian's jobs.
Of course, the others seemed broody about being constantly drained of power and all the hard work, but Fear was in beyond rage.
She was Pitch's right hand. She was the greatest nightmare ever created. And how was she spending her time? Being drained of her life force to create more stupid nightmares for her ungreatful 'grandfather' to use in battle. To top off her anger, she was still second best to her 'good twin'. Janey or whatever the heck her name is. Fear could take out that Nature Spirit without even trying if Pitch just gave her all the power instead of making a larger army.
She grunted as more nightmare sand was extracted from her back and formed yet another nightmare. "Good." Pitch replied turning his back to them. "When you are done, go back to work." At that, the king of nightmares left.
Fear stared at the wall Pitch had vanished from long after he left. She would show him. She would show him she's more than just another nightmare he can boss around.
"I'm going out." Fear growled standing up. Before anyone could stop her, the nightmare vanished into the shadows.
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