Final part of the You Will Fear Me arc.
Jack hated having to wait here while the others went to confront Pitch. He felt useless. The yetis had brought him a glass of cold milk and a platter of cookies, but they just sat there, untouched. He had no appetite. His stomach felt constricted with worry and more than a little fear. Pitch must be happy.
He pulled up his hood and brought his legs against his chest, resting his head on his knees. He couldn't keep the fear from gnawing inside of him and he hated Pitch for it. What if they never found him? Jack doubted he would simply be waiting for them in his lair. Or what if he was and it was a trap? The thought of the others getting hurt because of him was a lot scarier than the possibility of staying like this forever.
If he closed his eyes, Jack could dimly feel the broken staff. It was like an ache he was only barely aware of and could do nothing to relieve. He caught himself once raising an arm as if trying to grab it, only to have his fingers close on empty air.
Jack wondered why his power was so tied to this staff. Why did he have to depend like that on a flimsy piece of wood? For the first time, he hated the shepherd's crook that had stayed with him all this time. It made him weak. Would things be different, if he had more believers? Would he be as powerful as the other Guardians, even without the staff? Maybe. He looked up to the moon, as if waiting for answers. None came. With a sigh, Jack looked away.
He almost fell right out the window when he looked back inside and saw Sandy standing there, looking up at him worriedly. The little man could be more silent than anyone he knew. Jack had no idea how long he had been there. He smiled down at him.
"Sandy! You made it!"
Sandy made a succession of arrow shapes in the sand above his head, all pointing in different directions, followed by sand blowing out of his ears like steam. Jack chuckled a little.
"Sorry to break it to you, but they're gone again."
Sandy crossed his arms over his chest and jumped on the window's ledge, sitting in front of him. He obviously had no intentions of running after them again. He sent him an interrogative look, accompanied by a question mark above his head.
"They went to Pitch's lair, but I doubt he's there. He must have gone to hide somewhere. It could take forever to find him."
A few more question marks appear above Sandy's head and Jack had to tell his story once more. Sandy looked deep in thoughts for a moment before getting up and taking Jack's arm, tugging him off the ledge. He followed until he realized the Sandman was taking him to the bed.
"I don't want to sleep, Sandy. Not right now."
A new shape appeared in the sand, this time this time Jack's silhouette staring up at the moon.
"I know worrying isn't doing any good, but—"
He did not have time to finish his sentence as the little man blew some dreamsand into his eyes, sending him to the happy land of dreams and away from reality.
"—could not find him anywhere."
Jack slowly blinked the sand out of his eyes as the voices woke him up. The other Guardians stood together in a corner of the room, whispering to avoid waking him. Not all of them were equally good at being quiet.
"So Pitch wasn't in his lair, eh?"
They all spun around at the sound of his voice, looking guilty of having awakened him. Jack slid out of the bed and walked up to them, missing being able to casually throw his staff over his shoulder. It did wonders to make him look like he didn't care.
North sighed and looked down. The Guardians looked so... defeated right now.
"We looked everywhere we thought he was likely to hide, but he could be anywhere. Pitch is good at hiding in shadows. It would take forever to search them all."
Jack sighed and nodded. He wasn't surprised.
"It's alright. It doesn't matter."
He could still feel it, just out of reach. It could be a world away and he would always feel it, even in its broken state. He turned around to return to his bed, to sleep until the thought of staying cooped up here until winter returned started to feel a little less depressing. He stopped dead in his track the moment he turned, standing straight once more. The sensation he was getting from the missing staff... shifted.
"Jack? What is it?" Tooth asked him, looking torn between concern and hope.
He did not answer right away. Instead, he closed his eyes and slowly turned, trying to pinpoint the exact direction it came from. His eyes shot wide open when he found it, a wide grin appearing on his face.
"He's this way!"
Jack sat at the back of North's sleigh once more, bundled up in a few blankets. North had insisted he put on the silly looking elf shoes and he had not protested. Bunny hadn't even made fun of him. That was a clear sign of how worried the pooka was. North had finally shoved a knitted hat on his head and declared him ready to go. He knew that, with his white hair hidden away and his skin flushed from the heat, he looked more like a normal teenager than a dead and frozen one. He wondered what the others thought of that.
As they flew over Europe, Jack continued to keep them going the right way. He could feel it getting closer. A victorious grin remained on his face until Europe was behind them and they were now crossing the Mediterranean Sea. Jack sighed. Of course, Pitch wasn't going to make things easy.
North finally had to stop the sleigh on the edge of the Sahara desert. By then, Jack had withdrawn inside of his blankets, only making the occasional sound to let them know they were still going the right way. He whimpered when the sleigh stopped.
"It's so close... I can feel it."
"You are going back to Pole, Jack. We will search desert."
"I don't know, mate. It's an awfully big desert."
Jack lifted the blanket a little to protest being returned to his room at the North Pole. He would see this through, even if it was from beneath his blanket pile. As he looked at the others, he saw Sandy make the shape of a moon and some stars above his head. He smiled.
"Sandy is right; we can come back at night, when it's not so warm."
"But night is when Pitch is at his strongest," Tooth reminded them.
Sandy punched his fist into his hand. Bunny nodded his agreement.
"We can still take on him. Pitch isn't going to put up much of a fight."
"That is decided, then! We go back to Pole and come back tonight to deal with Pitch."
Jack had to watch the fight from inside the sleigh. They had left him a good distance away, where he wouldn't get hurt. It grated, but it would soon be over. He could not see much of what was going on, but it was obvious even from here that Pitch never stood a chance. He spent more time trying to defend himself than attacking. Jack allowed a smile to spread over his features. Soon.
The smile disappeared as Pitch did. He could see the other Guardians looking frantically around, expecting him to jump out of a shadow any moment. He frowned. If Pitch ran away, they would need to find him again. Jack knew he hadn't gone far, he could still feel the broken staff somewhere close. It was impossible to pinpoint the exact location, though, as the Nightmare King moved in the shadows.
"You can't hide forever, Pitch," he shouted. "Sooner or later, we'll find you."
"I'll save you the trouble."
Jack gasped and tried to roll away, but the blankets hampered his movements. Pitch easily grabbed him by the back of his hoodie and lifted him up. He felt a wave of heat hit him as the blankets fell away. He weakly tried to kick the Boogeyman and claw at the arm holding him. The sound of little bells from his shoes brought a mocking smirk to Pitch's lips.
"It's so nice of you to visit, Jack. You're looking... rather adorable, right now. Feeling well?"
"Let him go, you—" Bunny started to say.
"Not one step closer, if you care for your dear little friend here at all."
They froze as Pitch dragged him against his chest, holding a blade of black sand to his throat. In his current state, he didn't doubt it could really hurt him. The others looked unsure of what to do next. Jack wanted to beat Pitch into a bloody pulp, but he felt weak as a kitten. All he could do was glare up at him.
"Don't look at me like that, Jack. You can't say you didn't deserve this. What did I ever do to you, before you chose to join force with them to defeat me?"
"What do you want, Pitch." North asked with barely concealed anger.
"I've had my little fun, but it looks like it's over. Fine. I just want you to agree to leave me alone, and you can have him back."
"Why should we trust you?" Bunny asked warily.
"Why shouldn't you? If I don't hold my part of the bargain, you have no reason to hold yours."
They looked at each others. Sandy made the shape of Jack's staff in sand above his head.
"Of course, of course. You're not going to leave me alone without that piece of kindling, are you?"
Jack did not know what he had expected, but he was surprised when Pitch simply threw both halves of his broken staff at the other Guardians. They stared in shock for a moment before Tooth quickly flew to pick them up. After hesitating a little more, North nodded at Pitch.
"As long as you don't cause more trouble, we'll leave you alone."
Jack almost expected Pitch to drag him in the shadow or something, but the Boogeyman really did release him. Jack stumbled a step and almost fell before turning to face him.
"Just like that?"
Pitch smirked.
"I got what I wanted, didn't I?"
Jack stayed silent at that. He could not pretend that he had not been afraid. Not of Pitch, specifically, but the Boogeyman would satisfy himself with knowing he had caused him fear. They would just have to call this one a draw.
As soon as he melted back in the shadows, Tooth flew to him and hugged him tightly, still holding the pieces of his broken staff.
"Jack, are you alright?"
"Tooth. Too warm."
She withdrew quickly and he just fell on his knees in the sleigh. They had the staff back, finally, but he knew he wasn't going to repair it here. He tiredly looked at North.
"Back to the Pole!" the man bellowed, taking out a snowglobe.
T.T.T.T
Jack observed the others as the impromptu celebration started to die down, a soft smile on his face. His trusted staff was back to its familiar position on his shoulder. Jack had not let it go for a moment since he had repaired it. No one had questioned it.
In a way, he was almost grateful for what Pitch had done. For even more than fear, what he had felt during the past day was the love and care of his fellow Guardians. His new family. And for that, Jack should thank the Boogeyman when he next saw him.
He doubted Pitch would be pleased.
This story is finally done, so now I get to go back to writing drabbles. Yay!
I think I almost wrote as much of this in the past two weeks as I had for NaNoWriMo in the same amount of time. Even though my NaNo novel wasn't edited at all and was full of useless taglines and smut (you could be surprise how much you can pad a story with smut. It's easy to write fast.). And I also said I would take a month long hiatus from writing, which would end tomorrow, I think. So, as you can see, I'm bad at being on a hiatus (this still beats my week-long hiatus on deviantArt that had been supposed to last all winter).
