If you've been following this since I started uploading, you'll realise that I never actually mentioned Jackie's age. I have since added this in the first chapter, but for reference the birthday here is her fifteenth.

farglewiggins- Thanks for following, and now, just for you, the next chapter.

It was a quiet war.

It had been four months since I got sent home and was then grounded by my parents, as I'd assured them that the meeting wouldn't last more than a day. Summer had arrived and Jack had moved on, leaving me to bear the heat.

I hated summer and dreaded it coming every year, what was worse was that school had broken up, so there was nothing distracting me from the heat except reading and my random doodles and sketches. The irony that was my birthday had been and gone, so now my parents were trying to distract me with cars, which I didn't really care for, my ice was more reliable ad less likely to kill people.

I spent my days indoors or by the lake with Jamie and his friends. It was strange to think that my only friends were five or six years younger than me, but they had all met the Guardians, so I could relax with them to some extent.

I had quickly bonded with Pippa, the tomboy of the group, but Jamie was still the only one privy to my night time practicing. I had ended up meeting his younger sister, who seemed to like me for some reason.

I kept up with the war news, there was an entrance to the base by the lake and every now and again a messenger would pop up and update me. Apparently because I was officially the most powerful Descendant of Jack Frost I had had the potential to be called into action despite my age.

Nothing happened though, and because there were no HOG meetings with my Branch, between the updates I could pretend the war wasn't happening.

The only other thing reminding me was my disturbed sleep. Almost every night images of fire, people I cared about fighting the Descendants of Pitch and losing, badly. Even Pitch himself came into my mind, usually with me killing someone in the same dream. And every night I'd wake up in the small hours holding back screams, trying not to wake up my parents. I had no proof that it was The Descendants of Pitch doing this, but it would make sense if it was them.

I was taking a walk through the town with Jamie and his friends. Their parents accepted
my friendship with them, seeing me as a chaperone of sorts. We were sitting in the park eating ice cream and chatting about random things. When members of the public weren't looking I used my power to stop our ice cream from melting. Ice cream was probably the only good thing about summer, everything else was just too damn hot!

I had to stop myself from yawning though, I hadn't had any decent sleep in a while. The nightmares had seen to that.

I got a sudden chill down my spine, which surprised me, since I haven't felt the slightest bit cold since my little expedition to Antarctica and it was the middle of summer.

I looked up and got the shock of my life.

Pitch Black, in the middle of the day, in Burgess, staring right at me. I stared for a few seconds, unsure whether to be terrified or confused. My voice shook slightly as I alerted the others.

"Guys."

They stopped their chatter and looked at me, concerned from my tone.

"What is it?"

"Look over there." I nodded over to where Pitch was, who disappeared. I blinked and saw black movement out of the corner of my eye; I turned my head to face Pitch and pointed towards him. "Do you see something?"

Jamie looked back at me and shrugged, "I don't see anything."

"Me neither." Chorused the others.

I looked back over at Pitch, who was smiling in a chilling way, sending another shiver down my spine.

"So, just me then?" I said, trying to remain calm.

"Yeah, what is it Jackie?" asked Jamie, who knew better than the others what the danger
might be.

"I think we need to go." I said, getting up from the bench we were sitting on.

"But we just got here!" Complained Monty.

"I know, but we really need to go." I swallowed and backed away slightly as black sand trickled towards us.

"Jackie? What's wrong?" asked Jamie.

"Black sand."

"Where!?" Jamie jumped up onto the bench and began scanning the area, looking everywhere except where the sand actually was.

"Do you really not see it?"

"No."

I was shaking, not having been so freaked in a while. I tried to keep my breathing controlled, but I couldn't stop the frost spreading across my palms.

"Let's just go okay." I said, trying to keep my voice even.

Jamie was now staring intensely where Pitch was, and suddenly his eyes widened.

"It is Pitch!" He cried. He then turned to his friends, "Come on guys, we really have to go!"

It took all of our control to stop ourselves from sprinting away, the last thing we needed was people asking us what was wrong. I felt a tendril of sand wrap itself around my leg and I fell forward onto the pavement, my flailing hand slammed to the ground and frost spiralled out from beneath it.

"Jackie!" Called Jamie from a few feet away.

"I'm coming!" I called as I got to my feet, trying not to hear surrounding shoppers muttering.

Another tendril wrapped around my arm and out of reflex I shot a small blast of ice at it. The gasps all around me sent home what I'd done and where I'd done it.

I looked around at the shocked and fearful expressions of the strangers around me. I felt like something was stabbing me in the chest and I took a step back. My eyes flicked between the people staring, and the stabbing feeling seemed to intensify.

"No, I..."

I followed their gaze to the ground where a streak of frost was, then to a wall where my blast had hit. My eyes went back to the crowd, eyes flickering between them. Every glance in my direction felt like a knife being twisted in my chest.

Before they said anything I began to run, straight past Jamie and go and towards the lake.

"Jackie! Come back!" I heard him cry, but I just kept on running.

I reached the lake, but I didn't stop, I ran straight over the lake and into the woods.
My worst nightmare had come true, the people of Burgess knew. They knew what I could do.
I couldn't believe that it had happened, but it obviously had to do with Pitch suddenly appearing. That may have been what he was intending.

I kept running, managing to keep my power enough in check so that I didn't send out patches of ice with my footsteps. I had been practicing enough to prevent my hands from being covered in frost, but I could still feel it trying to.

"Interesting."

I came to stop and turned, trying to find the source of the voice. All I could see were trees and shadows. It sounded similar to Blondie's voice, but with an unearthly quality to it which made me sure that it was actually Pitch. No normal human voice could sound like that.

Out of nowhere a blast of sand slammed into my stomach and sent me off my feet. I flew through the air and landed hard on the ground and skidding slightly, I wheezed slightly as the breath had been forced out of lungs.

"You know, I don't know what my Descendants were worrying about." I managed to look up to see nothing, I couldn't see Pitch, but I could still hear him.

"You're not a threat, you're just a child. A tired and scared child, am I right?"

I felt my fists clench and ice began to form around them. I managed to get to my feet and looked around the clearing to find the source of the voice.

"And I know what you're afraid of."

His voice claimed through almost gleefully, as if expecting me to retaliate. When I didn't the voice sighed.

"Oh dear, I'd have thought that a Descendant of the Guardian of Fun would be a little more, well, fun."

Pitch seemed to appear out of the shadows, and I tensed up, not sure how to deal with this. I was already tired from running.

"Are you sure your Branch will take you back after a stunt like that?" He asked, and I felt my breath catch in my throat. I hadn't considered it, but now he said it...

My fists clenched and I felt ice spread further across my knuckles and down to my wrists.

"How do you know they don't just put up with you? You're just a kid-."

I finally snapped.

"SHUT UP!"

My fist was flung forward and the ice on my hand flung off towards Pitch. It seemed to hit, although he didn't seem to care as a blast of black sand came from him.

It hit me in the stomach and I was flung backwards. I landed on my back and lay there, winded again.

"Now now, I think it's best if you just stay down, don't you agree?"

I grunted, not having the breath for words.

"Supposedly you're the strongest Descendant of Jack Frost. Well if you're the strongest I don't know what we're worrying about. Although, of course, normally I wouldn't bother with the likes of you, but you really have been annoying."

I looked up to see that he had left the shadows and was standing in the middle of the clearing. I started to lever myself up onto my elbows, but quick as a flash he was standing right next to me, his foot on my stomach.

"Down."

If he thought I was going to stay down, he had another think coming.

My hand shot up to his foot and held it there as he tried to pull away. I looked up at his confused face and grimaced as I sent ice across his foot.

"What are you-?"

I flicked my hand away and sent him spinning away with his foot encased in ice. I got to my feet panting.

"I don't know who you're kidding." I said, "You were there when I blasted and killed several of your Descendants, not to mention the ones I froze solid." I was honestly amazed at how well I was keeping my head, but I tried not to think about it too much, just in case I jinxed it.

"That was when you let your emotions take over." He countered as we began to circle each other, "By reining in your emotions, you've reined in your power."

"Maybe, but it doesn't mean I can't still use it well."

Instantly I formed a bridge and skated in it, Pitch started to follow me, before realising that I was just circling. He flung sand my way, which I blocked as I continued to build up speed, to the point where he couldn't reliably hit me.

I had formed ice shards and had them hovering behind me. Even though I was tired and in pain, I was certain that my accuracy was as good as it ever was.

I flung one at Pitch, catching his robe and pinning him to a tree. I threw the others, pinning his robes to the point where he couldn't even move his arms.

I adjusted my course so that I skated to right in front of his face, stopping just before I collided with him.

"Maybe next time you'll think twice about messing with me." I snarled, before turning on my heels and skating back towards the lake.

"They'll fear you!" Pitch called, "They know, and they'll never forget!" I swear I could hear him laugh, as though being pinned to tree wasn't an issue.

I gritted my teeth and kept skating; I wasn't planning on heading back to town, not now.
I reached the edge of the lake, which had many people crowded around it, including towns people, news reporters and even police. They were all staring at the lake where I'd formed ice. Cameras flashed and people jabbered into cameras and microphones.

I set myself down on the opposite side of the lake, where I was hidden by rocks. Nearby was the entrance to the Tunnel, I just had to knock in the right place.

I spent a while of crawling through leaf litter, knocking at patches of the ground.

Finally I hit the right spot and an opening appeared in the ground.

I felt a pang of guilt that I hadn't told Jamie or my parents where I was going, but right now I had other things to worry about.

I sent an ice path down the hole and shot down it, the hole closing behind me.

Back at tree something strange was happening.

Pitch seemed to be turning much like his name, black, his formed darkened and began to spill away, like sand trickling through someone's fingertips. Once the sand hit the ground it seemed to dissolve, disappearing until the shards of ice in the tree were the only proof that something strange had happened here.

In the shadows a man with dirty blonde hair stood, a small grin on his face. He then turned his back on the ice studded tree and disappeared into the shadows.

I think I realised I had been taking too many cues from MysteriousSherlock on how to write Pitch. Pitch does have a reason to not like Jackie, but not to do this, he's seems more manipulative to me, more words than action. But that's my take on the character.