"Me?" asked Jack, shocked.

"Yes, you" answered North.

"Why me?"

"Well you're the only one who's been to Pitch's lair, more then once."

"Yeah, and it doesn't matter if the first time you went there it was to completely betray us." Stated Bunny.

"How many times do we have to go over this? It was not my fault, I was tricked."

"Yeah, well, it still counts."

"Guys, guys, no time to argue, time to take plan of action." Proclaimed North.

So Jack didn't hesitate. He flew straight for a clear opening for Pitch's lair, and those could be anywhere. Luckily, Jack found one in an abandoned parking lot in their home town.

It was nighttime, so it was a probability that Pitch was away, creating nightmares. You could only hope, right. Just to be safe, Jack tried to be as stealthy as he could down in Pitch's lair.

Jack searched for any signs of Jill's sister. He searched until he heard a faint whimper of someone crying. Jack looked around, and then he saw Emma in one of those bird cages.

She was curled up in a ball, crying. Wow thought Jack. Emma and her sister must be really tight, or Pitch has been doing some prettynasty things.

He flew over to her cage.

"Psst" Jack whispered. She didn't notice him, maybe Emma didn't believe in him. Well, he heard her call out his name a few times before so that couldn't be true.

Maybe Emma just didn't hear him. Jack decided to try again, but louder. "Psst" Jack whispered again, louder.

That time she heard Jack, Emma turned her head to look at Jack. It looked like she wasn't getting decent sleep. Well, the bird cage floor and being the captive of the nightmare king made it believable.

"Jack" Emma said smiling, like Jack was her ray of sunshine in a dark room. "I should have known you were coming. I felt cold." Emma sounded strained, like she had been crying for some time now.

"Sorry about that." he apologized. Emma had been a captive for he didn't know how long, she was in her pajamas' and he had to make her feel cold. "Don't be." Emma reassured. "I like the cold."

"Really" that was the last thing Jack expected to hear from her, maybe she did have a childish side. He was getting off topic.

"Are you okay?" Jack asked, but soon realized he should have re-worded it.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I was crying tears of joy before because I love being trapped in a bird cage, knowing I might never go home." Emma answered sarcastically.

Before Jack could re-word his question to 'did he do anything extremely harmful to you?' she re-answered a bit loudly "No, I'm not fine. You don't know what he's made me see, it's a surprise I haven't died of a heart attack already. Oh, Jack, you have to get me out of here. It's been pure torture." Good enough for him.

"Shh. I will, but first can you tell me what you're doing here?" he asked.

"Oh, okay. Um, he said I had a childish side, I believed in him, I had a lot of fear but I avoided it, he wanted to take away that barrier, that's why he gave me nightmares, he slipped up, causing me to see sand, he's afraid he's losing his touch, he brought me here to fix that and have me properly scared."

"Is that all?"

"No, he also wants to get a lot of nightmares from me, thinks I could supply him. He said I was never going home, how many days until Christmas?"

"Um, I think about a week, why?"

"Oh, no! When I was kidnapped there was 10 days until Christmas! I was here for 3 days! I'm missing so much, how is Jill?"

"Well, she could have been better."

"This is terrible! I have to get back, can we go now?"

"Yes, we can go, if you keep it down."

"Sorry" it was then she noticed something. "Oh, no!"

"What?"

"He knows."

"He knows what?"

"He knows you're here! Jack, you have to get of here now!

"Why?"

"Just go, now!" that is when a curtain of black sand covered the cage and the last thing Jack heard from Emma was her screaming.

"Emma? Emma!" he was scared now, what was Pitch doing to her. He tried freezing away the curtain, but it was no use, the curtain was too thick.

That is when he heard Pitch's laughter echoing throughout the lair. He had a bone to pick with him, but the last time he stayed too long in Pitch's lair, it had disastrous consequences. He had the information he needed, he could go, but he didn't like the thought of leaving her all alone here.

He had too, she would want him too. "I'm sorry" he said to the cage, "I'll come back to rescue you, I promise." And with that he flew off.