Jack and everyone else stopped near the corner where the Petroleum gas station was. He saw the way the nightmare clouds rolled towards them like a storm as it crackled and burned with Pitch's nightmares and power.
He and the guardians were grateful and feeling a bit stronger now that Jamie's friends had come to help. He hoped with all his heart and soul that Kailani would come.
His heart squeezed with memory as he last saw her. Broken, confused, hurt, and in pain. Giving up on the Guardians. On him and it sliced him to know that she had waited for him and he never came because Pitch had him trapped, wasting precious time that cost Bunnymund dearly.
Time that could've helped the children believe. Time that he could've used to help Kailani, especially her. Because he knew now why she was the only one who could see him and why he felt all those confusing yet wonderful feelings his body made whenever he thought about her or talked to her or touched her. He knew now why he felt that tangible crackling energy between them when they first met, more like she crashed into him. He knew now why he was so anxious to be near her when she was no longer in his sight. He was feeling that now. That rope that was tugging at him leading him towards the one girl that believed him in before Pitch began to break her beliefs little by little.
He knew now why he wanted to know everything about her and be a part of her life, a part of her heart. He knew because he loved her. He loved her and sensed she did, too even if she didn't understand. He didn't know how or when. Perhaps it was the time she first spoke his name that sparked something in Jack that he felt that he had lost long ago. Perhaps it was when she first saw him and thought she was hallucinating but deep down knew she wasn't. Perhaps it was the way he first saw her carry on believing in him when she had every reason not to, when each obstacle she faced, he thought she couldn't overcome it but deep anyways. Or perhaps it was the time when they first saw each other, really saw each other, as two people and the way they seemed to really connect and the urge he felt to hold her in her arms and for the first time, kiss her. Kiss her like he wanted to, deep and sweet and gentle.
The way he hadn't felt in a long time.
It could be many things but he knew now that he loved her and was going to do everything he could to protect her and her family. Because she meant everything to him and he didn't want Pitch to have his claws in her anymore. No more.
"Yeah-Ah!" The kid with the glasses yelled as he ran to defend them but ran right back around as soon as he saw Pitch on his Nightmare horse.
"You think a few children can help you? Against this?" Pitch gestured to the thundering clouds of nightmare as it began to envelop the town, spreading fear in children's heart.
North tried to lift his sword but was too weak as Jack and Tooth touched him as he leaned weakly on his sword.
"They're just bad dreams, Jamie." Jack said and he couldn't help but notice the similarities between Jamie and Kailani's faces. Was it the shape of their chin or the hair color?
"We'll protect you mate." A small Bunnymund said as he bounced with energy.
"Aw, you'll protect them?" Pitch said mockingly as he began to laugh, thunder resonating with his cold laugh. Jack stepped closer and clutched his staff, ignoring the way his heart seemed to tug towards his right and the warmth that seemed to be coming from there.
"But who will protect you?" Jack hadn't thought about that. He and the Guardians were so focused on protecting the children that they forgot that no one would protect them. At least, that was what he thought until Jamie stepped up in front of them.
"I will."
Soon, everyone began to step up towards Pitch and stand in front of them following Jamie's actions and words.
"Still think there's no such thing as the Boogeyman?" Pitch asked as the clouds rushed towards them like crashing waves of the ocean. It burned out the streetlights and covered the place in darkness. Jack's heart began to race as he waited for the assault.
He would go down fighting if it came to that.
"I do believe in you. I'm just not afraid of you."
"NO!" Everyone turned to see a girl running towards them with a baseball bat in her hands and her face covered by her hoodie. Jack felt the tug in his heart and the warmth attack him like an avalanche. He knew who she was.
He knew and felt fear and a surge of protectiveness well up in him as he saw her hoodie fall back as she stepped in front of Jamie.
"NO!" Jack yelled as he rushed to get to her but everything felt like it was in slow motion. He saw her raise the bat to take a swing, running to stand in front of Jamie, her body conveying fierce determination and anger, her need to protect Jamie overpowering her thoughts and needs until one thought stood out.
She was going to get sucked up in his world of nightmares and would have no hope of getting out. All in order to protect Jamie.
And Jack couldn't get to her in time.
He wouldn't be able to save her and he wouldn't be able to tell her that he loved her.
She swung the bat with all her might just as the cloud came towards her. Jack only had time to graze her shoulder before she was enveloped in the cloud, the cloud sucking her in, leaving the rest of the kids alone. Anger and terror rushed in Jack's body and this need, this huge need to fight off Pitch until he had her in his arms. He had gripped the staff, ready to aim a shot at Pitch until the black clouds that had sucked in Kailani whole had changed into gold dust.
Gold dust that Jack knew very, very well.
The black clouds had changed into gold dust, heading back towards Pitch, evaporating his clouds and turning them into gold dust and Jack felt a surge of happiness and joy to see that Sandy was back and Kailani was stunned as she stood in front of the kids, looking at the gold dust, a hint of remembrance in her confused green eyes. She was unharmed and unhurt and Jack felt relief swamp him like a tide.
Everyone laughed and cheered. Tooth regained back her flying and North looked healthier and was branding up his swords like a warrior.
"No! Get them! Do your jobs!" Pitch yelled as the horses headed straight towards them. Jack saw Kailani stand tall and determined as she brandished her baseball bat like a pitcher. He saw the fierce, determined gaze in her eyes.
"Alright kids, if these things don't kill us, I will," Kailani said, stepping back, standing in front of Jamie and the rest of them. Jack stood next to her and they stared at each other momentarily, the energy crackling between them, tugging them closer. He smiled and she smiled back, a fierce, determined gaze in her eyes.
"Took you long enough. Taking my brother out like that." She murmured as the horses ran towards them.
"You know me, I like to be fashionably late and I love attention." Jack said, feeling his heart stutter just by looking at her and the nerves in his stomach began to ease. She rolled her eyes and looked back to the horses.
"Alright, if anyone of you don't get a hit at them, I'll give you a hit ten times more. Especially you, Jamie." She said, a tone of anger underneath it but Jack knew she was only worried about Jamie.
"But-" Jamie began
"No buts! You are in so much trouble when we get home."
"But Kai-"
"No! None of that Kai stuff. Defeat these ugly horses and maybe I won't kill you." She smiled at this and Jamie smiled back and the kids snickered.
"And that goes for all of you kids. I'm killing each and every one of you for getting me worried like that. Help me and the Guardians defeat these things and I won't tell your parents or kill you."
North created two portals, letting several yetis come through as they ran past them and Kailani and Jack.
"What in the world?" She asked but Jack just chuckled and stepped closer to her. Toys and Bunnymunds' warrior rock eggs came and carried some of the kids on top of them.
"Let's get them!" Cupcake yelled and everyone rushed ahead. Jack saw Kailani swing her bat with a grunt, hitting the horses with a deadly precision, causing them to explode into dust.
Jack knew he should go after Pitch while everyone else was fighting off the Pitch's nightmare horses but he was reluctant to leave Kailani. Either she sensed his reluctance or saw it, she hit a horse, swinging her bat down on it's head like an ax and turned to him, breathing hard but enjoying every minute of it.
"Go, Jack." She said, stepping closer to him, the battle going on around them momentarily forgotten.
He hesitated. He knew she could take of herself but he felt that need to help her, to care for her, rear up in him and he couldn't shut it down.
"But you and Jamie and-"
"Can do this ourselves. Go help the others with Pitch. Make him stop messing with our beliefs. Make him pay for making us suffer." She said, now only inches away from him, her green eyes looking into his blue ones.
Still, he hesitated. He couldn't just leave her. Not without telling her how he felt about her.
"I have to tell you-"
"Later." She said and he opened his mouth to say that he loved her but no words ever came because her lips had come down on his. He was stunned and frozen, the euphoria and warmth and joy of having her lips touch his exploding inside of him like fireworks. He didn't want this stop, to her stop. He wanted this to continue. He kissed her back,arms reaching out to her back but she had stepped back, a fire in her eyes that burned wild and made his blood turn warm.
"I love you, Jack. The moment I first saw you, actually saw you, I loved you. I don't know how or why but I just do. I can't explain this tugging in my heart whenever you're near or the energy between us that seems to ignite whenever we're near each other. There's a lot of reasons of why I love you but we don't have time now."
She stepped closer, cupping her hand against his cold cheek. She didn't seem to feel his cold but wouldn't be surprised because right now he felt like he was burning like a torch. "But one of the reasons is because you helped me believe. You helped me believe in you and the Guardians when I wanted to give up and you didn't let me. You helped me and I fell in love with you because of that."
Jack was completely shell-shocked and stunned. His mouth opened to make words but couldn't make them. He couldn't find the words to say that what she felt, he was feeling it, too. Maybe more.
"Now go. Go, Jack." She said, kissing him once more on the mouth, setting the cooling fire in his body to an inferno again and the energy between them crackling like electricity. She pulled back only after a second and ran off to bash a horse's head in.
