The next day, I went to the pool again, to see if I could talk to Jack about the Lights from last night. I took my iPod with me, of course, and decided to listen to the Phantom of the Opera while I waited. The musical always gave me intense feels, because I have always shipped Christine and the Phantom, never Christine and Raoul. I wanted to skip through the love song between Christine and Raoul, it usually makes me unhappy, but I figured I should listen to the entire musical.

Oddly enough, I got through the entire musical without a snowball being chucked at my head.

"Well this is weird," I thought, "Wouldn't Jack be here by now?" I called his name a couple times, to be met with silence. I wandered around, and decided to go 'skating' on the pool with my boots. I stepped on the ice and started sliding around with the music in my ears, and when my boots would start sticking to the ice, I would step in the snow to make them slippery again. (A.N. try this, it really does work in real life, I promise. I do it all the time)

The final chords reverberated through my earbuds and I stood in the middle of the pool, my arms thrust out on either side, hands up, head tilted back and eyes closed, reveling in the sound. When the music stopped for good, I plucked the earbuds from my ears and looked around again.

"Jack?" I called, hoping there would be a reply.

I waited.

And waited.

Holding my breath.

There was no reply. I sighed, and walked off of the ice, the snow being gone from the treads of my boots. I clomped out of the forest, the only sound being my boots crunching in the snow.

All of a sudden I felt watched. I spun around, looking, staring, searching for the thing that was staring at me. I shivered, but not from the cold.

"Hello? Is someone out there?" I waited again for a reply.

I didn't have to wait long.

"Well, I suppose I should greet you, after all, you can see them, so you should be able to see me." It was a dark voice that made the hairs on the back of my neck stick up. A man in a dark robe stepped out from behind a tree. I gasped. He had grey skin, a black, floor-length robe that went to his wrists, black spiky hair, and golden eyes.

"Who are you?" I said, trying to sound brave.

"Don't pretend to be brave, dear, I can practically taste your fear. And that's good. I like fear. In fact, I need fear to survive. So, why don't you be a little more afraid for me?" A black horse with golden eyes stepped out of the shadows. It was probably twenty hands tall, (A.N. one hand = 4 inches. This is how horse people measure horses, legit) and terrifying.

Now, I'm usually not terrified of horses. I rode for three years, and still would be if I could. However, this horse was scary. I couldn't read what it was going to do at all. It was most likely wild. I backed away, trying to put distance. However, the horse and the man stepped towards me, one step forward for every step back. Eventually I ran into a tree. I had nowhere else to go. The horse stopped, but the man didn't. He was about 6'2", thus towering over my 5'6". He leaned in, grinning toothily, but his teeth were pointed, thus making his grin look manic.

"Now, I believe you asked my name. Well, Alana, my name is Pitch Black, otherwise known as the Boogeyman. Would you care for a ride on my nightmare?"

I could tell he was going to make me ride, even if I didn't want to, so I just stood there, eyes wide and breathing hard. He grabbed me, flipped me over my shoulder, and I screamed. I hate being flipped upside down. Maybe I have trust issues, I don't know. All I know is that, if I get flipped upside down and I can't grab anything, I flip.

I screamed and kicked and flailed. He growled, and I could feel the rumble in his chest. Thankfully, it was a short ride on his shoulder to the horse. He threw me on the nightmare's back, and it tossed its head. I sat still, eyes wide, but I was still breathing hard. He jumped up himself, behind me, and reached his arms around my shoulders, caging me in.

He grabbed the main, and I followed suit, at least having that much sense in my terrified state, but I wasn't ready for a flying horse. The thing ran a few steps, bunched its muscles and launched itself into the air. I screamed, and he laughed a sinister laugh, definitely enjoying my fear. Even I could tell that fear was radiating off of me in waves. I ran out of air to scream with, so I took in a huge gulp of air and stopped screaming, but I was still nervous.

We dove straight down, into a tiny hole in the ground, and I groaned, not feeling well enough to scream. One more thing you should know about me, is that the feeling of weightlessness you get when you ride a rollercoaster, where your stomach feels like it lifts up into your chest; that makes me really uncomfortable. I never scream, but it makes me feel a little sick.

It was dark, but we landed quickly. When my eyes opened, I looked around. There wasn't much to see, it was too dark. However, I could hear something. A lot of somethings in fact, and the more I listened, the more it sounded like little birds. Strange, I wouldn't think birds would be in a dark cave like this.

Pitch got off the nightmare, then proceeded to grab me by the waist and haul me off.

"I know how to get off of a horse, thank you very much." I said, trying to keep my brave face on. He simply chuckled darkly.

"Oh, I know you do. However, I don't need you sliding off and getting an idea of running, I need you sane for the Guardians."

I looked up at him, confused, but didn't ask anything. I glanced around, panic beginning to grip me as I saw all of the shadows. He pushed me forward by my shoulders, and I squeaked, but stumbled forward, hunching my shoulders and hugging myself.

"Ah, afraid of the dark as well, are we? Well, don't look the shadows in the eyes, or they'll take offense, much like dogs do. I don't know what they'll do to you." He chuckled, and I shuddered.

Suddenly, he stopped me. I looked ahead of me and saw a huge room with tons of gigantic birdcages hanging from the stone ceiling by chains. As soon as Pitch entered the room, the bird squeaking stopped. I looked up at the closest birdcage and gasped at what I saw: thousands of tiny hummingbirds. But these weren't normal hummingbirds. The closer I looked at them, I realized they had human faces with hummingbird beaks as their noses, human hands and human feet. They looked down at Pitch and I, most of them looking at Pitch in fear, but some looking at me with apparent joy.

"What are they?" I asked, in awe.

"Tooth fairies." Pitch replied in disgust.

I gasped and glanced back at him, "Really?" I looked back at the fairies. "Wow."

He growled again, I noticed he did that a lot, opened something with squeaky hinges, and shoved me forward. I fell to the ground on my hands and knees, looking up when I heard the squeaky hinges again. Pitch slammed a door in my face and locked it with a skeleton key. I looked around and realized I was in a birdcage that was on the floor. Pitch walked over to a large crank in the floor and he turned the handle. The cage lurched and lifted off the floor, swaying, I fell, realizing I couldn't stand or the cage would sway, and sat in the middle, hugging my knees.

The cage stopped ascending, and I saw that I was at the same height as the closest cage. The tooth fairies were looking at me worriedly and I gave them a small smile, but then went back to holding my knees. I hoped Jack would find me.