Okay, this chapter is starting as something nice and sweet, but knowing me, by the end of it there will be some sort of disaster and Santoff Claussen will have been blown up... *sigh*
Thanks to TheAwesomeQoiFish, love-serenades, Kiyomi-Uchiha17, primkiwimon, PippaFrost, gisir9898 and dogluvva99 for the faves/follows!
Enjoy!
Tooth sighed as she heard Strausse playing over the small radio.
She loved the waltz... Heck, she loved dancing in general, but especially the waltz. Only problem was, she had no proper dance partners. North had no idea, Bunny just couldn't and Sandman? He had never had the time to learn. And of the friends she had in the spirit world, only one or two ever actually had enough time to dance with her on occasion.
It was always something that made her slightly melancholy.
North popped his head around the door and smiled.
"Ah, Tooth. What brings you to Pole?"
She shrugged, smiling.
"Nothing much. Just had a quiet few days and wanted to visit. How are you?"
"I am good. Right on track for Christmas. You are wanting to dance, yes?"
Tooth blinked, surprised, and smiled.
"Is it that obvious?"
"Indeed. You always get far away look in eyes when you do want to dance. I am just wishing I could do so."
"Nah, I'm fine North. Is Jack around?"
It was just then that the spirit poked his head around the door, with a grin.
"Jack is always around..." he said, making it sound eerie in an old Transylvanian accent, and Tooth and North both laughed. Then Jack grinned as he heard the music.
"Strausse? You can't hear this song and not want to dance."
Tooth perked up.
"You dance?"
Jack shrugged, considering.
"Waltz, Tango, quickstep... you name it, I've tried it."
"The Waltz?"
Tooth was practically jumping with joy, which was quite hard to do seeing as she was in the air, and Jack blinked, before grinning, propping his staff against the wall.
"Yep." His voice morphed to the very epitome of a gentleman, "Would you care to dance, fair Princess?"
He gave an elaborate bow, which could have come straight from a ball room, and held out his hand, giving her a wink.
She pretty much gasped in delight, and laughed.
"Gladly." She said, taking his hand, and North watched, not at all surprised by the fact that Jack could dance-indeed, it would take something truly spectacular to surprise any of them anymore- as they span around the room.
Soon, the song changed to something much more lively, and Jack grinned as he spun Tooth around, both of them automatically changing to the quickstep, then came the Tango, then Jack had Tooth laughing and attempting to follow a complicated Hand Jive.
North quietly made his way back to his workshop, grinning from ear to ear that his friends were having such a good time, and wondering just how many more secret abilities the guardian of fun actually had.
Jack and Tooth laughed about for a couple of hours, until Baby Tooth finally distracted them-right in the middle of an old French take on the traditional waltz- and chirped about some kind of spirit that wanted to see Tooth.
Jack, having nothing else to do, agreed to tag along, and quickly let North know where he was going before they all flew off.
Jack couldn't help thinking about that as they flew. When had it become so instinctual to let the others know when he was leaving, or where he was going? He hadn't even realised he was doing it until recently...
He spent the rest of the trip amusing Baby Tooth and Tooth by doing a mini version of the waltz with Baby Tooth, using his fingers as arms and legs.
The two were in hysterics as they reached the palace, Jack having been trying to use his fingers to do the quickstep and failing, and Jack was also laughing as they landed. He was just about to fly off when he started getting a strange sense of foreboding. That, combined with the wind nudging him towards Tooth's study, had him catching up to the fairy and earning himself a confused look, which he shrugged to, before they entered.
Jack floated up to the rafters before the spirit waiting there span around.
Jack blinked as he recognised him as a spring spirit he had seen a few times. The meetings had never really gone well.
Tooth looked likewise surprised to see him, and gestured for him to sit down.
"Haze. What brings you here? Is everything okay?"
Haze shook his head.
"No, I'm afraid not. Not three hours ago, a landslide of Ice on the mountains near our home buried half of the burrows. We were wondering if your new guardian, Jack Frost had heard anything of it? He's always around where there is trouble."
Tooth bristled at that.
"Yes, because he tries to help with it." Then she gave a thin lipped smile. "Anyway, have you heard anything Jack?"
Jack floated down to the ground, and leant against one of the pillars in the room, arms crossed and considering.
"Can't say that I have, Tooth. I've noticed an increase in avalanches and the amounts of ice over the last couple of winters, especially this year, but nothing of the landslide-"
"Oh, because that's likely." The spring spirit stormed, "Wherever there is trouble with snow and ice and god knows what else, you're more often than not behind it!"
Tooth glared at him.
"You have no proof of that."
"He's a 300 year old spirit who can ride the wind, control the snow and has the mentality of a ten year old human child!"
Jack blinked, taken aback, as Tooth pinned the spirit up against the wall, and glared at him.
"You will apologise. How dare you come into my home, then accuse my friends of something they could not possibly have done!"
"How do you know they didn't do it, Pixie?"
Tooth grimaced at the insult, and Jack took her arm, pulling her away before turning to the spirit and fixing him with an icy glare that froze him to the spot.
"How dare you. How dare you come into her home and insult her! This is over the line even for you! As for how she knows, I have been with her for the last three or four hours, and have heard nothing of this landslide. As for the increase in other ice problems, I am already looking into it. Now I suggest you apologise to Toothiana, before getting your sorry, shoot sprouting ass out of this palace and let someone who actually has any idea of what is going on handle things. Do. I. Make. Myself. Clear?"
Haze nodded, and Jack backed away, the glacier look still in his eyes.
The spring spirit turned to Tooth, and nodded his head.
"My behaviour was out of line. I offer my sincerest apologies your highness. Good luck with your investigations."
With that, he gave a small bow and left.
Tooth turned to Jack, and flinched slightly at the look he was directing at the doorway the spirit had just left through, but when he turned back to her, all traces of the anger had gone, to be replaced with his usual mischievous twinkle, though there was an undercurrent of guilt and concern in there too.
Tooth shook her head.
"Jack, I've never seen you look like that before. You okay Sweet Tooth?"
He gave a small shrug, looking uncertain.
"There is a reason no-one wants to go near me when I'm in a bad mood. Sorry Tooth. I didn't want you to have to see that... He just... I just didn't like that he insulted you."
Tooth shook her head, smiling lightly.
"It's okay. What's all this about an increase in avalanches?"
Jack ran a hand through his hair with a sigh.
"Over the last few years, there has been a steady increase in the ice levels... It played havoc with the structure of the snow on the mountains. I've spent a lot more time than normal keeping an eye on things on the mountain ranges. The last year though, I've never seen ice levels like it... I don't know what, or who, is causing it, but after what Haze just said about the landslide, I'm gonna have to spend more time looking into it... It seems Pitch's warning a few weeks ago actually had something behind it."
He had started pacing, and Tooth sighed.
"Okay, why don't you tell North, and he can see if any of the yeti's have heard anything strange on the mountains? Phil's family live in the Himalayas I think... I'm sure they could ask around?"
Jack nodded.
"Okay, thanks Tooth. I'd better get going... Hold a rain check on that next dance I promised you!"
He gave her a quick hug, which she returned whole-heartedly, before flying out.
Baby Tooth, from where she had been hovering, unseen, behind a pillar, flew over and chirped.
Tooth nodded.
"Yeah... seems our guardian of fun has a serious side."
Then she smiled.
"Ah well, come on BT, let's go see what the others have been up to..."
_
Jack arrived back at Santoff Claussen just over half an hour later, having taken the higher and much faster stream of the north wind-which had eagerly carried him to the Pole- and immediately set off to find North.
It was less than an hour later that he had sent Phil to see his relatives, as well as sending some of the other Yeti's off to various mountain ranges with orbs, and was looking at Jack, concerned with the slight distanced look in his eyes.
"Is there problem Jack?"
The winter spirit froze, before sighing.
"Not really. Just that... when I had a go at Haze, I noticed Tooth flinching. I mean, I don't blame her. The things I've done when I've been angry and-"
North shook his head.
"Jack, I'm sure it was just surprise. We have all heard of the legendary glacier eyes of Jack Frost, da? We just have not seen that side of you."
He said it in a jovial tine, and Jack gave a small smile.
"Yeah, I know. I just hate it when I feel the anger. It's like a spreading cold... I even scared myself the first time I saw my eyes in a reflection when I was like it. It's actually one of the reasons I took up meditation."
North blinked.
"You meditate?"
"Did. And wait, that's what you took from that?" He looked incredulous, and North sighed.
"Jack, we all have sides that we do not wish seen. But we are your friends. Your family. And correct me if I am mistaken, but I do not believe Father's allow their sons to wallow in something that is a part of them."
Jack blinked. Then he smiled.
"Father and son, eh?"
North gave a rumbling laugh.
"I would not have it any other way."
He pulled Jack, yelping and wriggling, into a full armed hug, which left him gasping.
It took a few minutes for his breathing to return to normal, at which point North laughed as he patted him on the back.
"And besides. The next time we face trouble, it is nice to know we will be having the warrior of winter alongside us, eh?"
"You err... you know that name?"
"I have heard it. That and more. The most recent one, I believe, is the Ice Prince."
Jack face palmed.
"Iceman, I'm going to kill you..." he muttered, and North laughed.
"I am assuming it is old Joke, da? Ah well. We have much time before Yeti's return. What was this idea you had about new train design for toys?"
Jack grinned, deciding to let the huge guardian ditract him.
"Come on, a train track based on the workshop would be awesome! Mini yeti's and everything!"
As they argued about the importance of not letting people know that giant apes were the ones who made toys at the pole, as opposed to small, irritating and jingly elves, Jack soon forgot his earlier worries and North smiled to himself.
_
In a cave, a 25 year old looking, over 500 year old spirit with white hair, shot through with streaks of black, and wearing black jeans, black trainers and a black leather jacket, with a stark white t-shirt, grinned as he sent a trail of ice up the side of a mountain, creating a build up of pressure and causing the side of the rock to crack slightly.
The resulting avalanche swept towards the small fey village at the base of the mountain and he smiled.
"Jack be nimble, Jack be quick..." he muttered, "I'm gonna get hold of Jack Frost's stick..."
He paused, then smiled ruefully at the verse. It was one of the worst yet.
But he would get Jack's staff... The brat new nothing of the power he had. The power that should be his! Pitch Black would be nothing compared to him...
Nothing at all...
Ice Black smiled. He just needed the staff. Without it, Jack was nothing...
And he had a plan to get it...
Ooh, that's right, Ice Black is now on the scene! And he will return... Of course :D As will Iceman and Shady and Clover and maybe a few others I've either mentioned or used in chapters before...
Will Jack defeat this latest threat? Well, we'll see in a few chapters time, when all is revealed and more...
(Wait, does that make any sense?) *Smiles disarmingly and attempts to use the force... this is all making total sense to you all and Raven is not insane...* Did it work? Nope? Darn it...
Please review and let me know what you think of the chapter!
And how it morphed from something innocent and fun to something that even I don't understand... (At least Santoff Claussen is still standing!) I honestly don't know how it started to travel this direction, but hopefully it'll add something good to the fics :D
Till next time then, Raven xx
(oh, and as for the pixie insult? I was kinda short on time... so yeah. Not quite sure why it's insulting, but meh, eh?)