"It's because no one looks up to the villain."

Those words swam in Nick's mind over and over again. And at the end of each replay was the same scene. Jack raising the snowglobe above his head and then smashing it into the ground. Everything went white after that. He didn't know how long he was stuck reliving that moment but eventually, he was awakened by a loud ringing in his ears.

Nick groaned as he lay on the floor. He brought one paw up to rub his temples to help relieve the headache that was growing. When he opened his eyes he thought he'd gone blind. All around him, all he could see was white. It took him a moment to finally realize that what he was seeing was snow.

"Snow? What am I doing outside?"

He certainly felt like he was outside. Aside from feeling like he'd been hit by a bus, he could feel the cold seeping through his fur. With a groan, he managed to lift his head and look around. It was the strangest thing to see one's home buried under a foot of snow. Boy would Judy be mad.

Judy!

Nick quickly sat up and turned to his side where he last remembered seeing Judy. She was still there of course.

Frozen in a bunny sized icicle.

"Judy!" He stood and went to her. Behind the sheet of ice he could see the look of terror literally frozen into her features. Before he could truly comprehend what had happened, a voice spoke from behind him.

"Ah, you're awake."

Nick looked back and saw the perpetrator of his pain. Jack Frost.

"What have you done?!" He growled.

Jack looked up with a sneer and held up a placating paw. "Calm yourself, she's not dead. Merely suspended."

"Free her!" Nick roared in rage.

"...No." Jack's calm demeanor only served to push Nick over the edge as his rage took over. In the blink of an eye he shot across the room and had Jack by the throat, lifting him off the floor and pressed against the wall. Nick's lips pulled back as he flashed his sharp predatory teeth.

"You will free her or you will die." He snarled.

Jack struggled against Nick's grip as he tried to speak past the sudden vice he found around his throat. "Kill me… agh… and she dies." He managed to croak out before Nick tightened his grip. His vision started to blur around the edges before he felt himself falling, Nick having released his grip and allowed him to fall. Jack breathed heavily as he gripped his aching throat.

"Let her go, Jack! Whatever you're after she has nothing to do with it."

"None of them do." He said as he slowly stood.

"What do you mean, them?" Nick said with a raised eyebrow.

"I'll show you." Jack straightened his tie and walked past Nick, exiting the room.

Nick hesitated a moment, but followed to see what he was up to. Sparing a worried glance at Judy as she stood frozen in place.

Coming out of his private chambers, Nick found the entire place had been covered in snow. He saw Jack taking the walkways towards the factory floor. Following, Nick noticed several others had also been frozen as Judy was. Along the way he spotted both Bonnie and Stu. As well as a couple of the legendary figures. Most notable was mother nature as she was frozen, trying in vain to hold off the coming onslaught.

Nick continued to follow Jack in silence, his anger slowly building the further they went. Till finally they came to a balcony overlooking the toy factory floor. Here Nick had to lean against the rails to support himself. His knees felt weak as he looked down at the hapless group of bunnies and arctic mammals that had arrived to help prepare for the coming year.

All of them, frozen in place and covered in snow.

"How?" Nick whispered in a shaky breath.

"How did I do this?" Jack asked in reply.

"How could you be so cold hearted Jack? What happened to make you this way? What brought you to this breaking point?" Nick looked over with despair.

"What brought me here? I have lived here my whole life. I brought beauty to the cold! I painted the autumn colors. When they created glass to keep the winters cold out I gave them portraits of spring ferns in ice so even when they looked out into the bitter cold they would have hope of a brighter tomorrow. The intricate patterns of snowflakes? Me. And what did I get for my troubles? A name, a name reviled and dreaded. Old man winter they called me. The Hindu's named the Hindu Kush after me, calling me a giant who crushed those who trespassed in my domain. In every story, edict and poem, I am the villain. The cold and hardships of winter existed long before I was born. Yet I bear the weight of the blame for Father Frost's sins and the scorn for the Queen of Winter's mistakes. But you, you exist for a mere millenia and they praise you. And for what? Mere trinkets they cast off in their garbage when they're attention goes elsewhere. Leaving you cookies and milk in homage, songs and an entire season dedicated to your coming for a single night. But me, I'm there everyday. I suffer from the cold as they suffer. I freeze and I suffer as they do. I give and inspire art that brought lasting joy to their lives millenia before the name Kris Kringle was ever uttered on the lips of mammals.

"What brought me here? Winter." His voice cracked with emotion for the first time. "Winter brought me here and I will see your heart frozen as mine is. Whatever the cost."

"Then why not just me?!" Nick yelled back. "Why not just freeze me and take the title? I never wanted it! I never wanted the weight of this responsibility bearing down on me every day of the year. All I do is wake up and hope I'm not screwing something up. Why lay waste to everything and leave me standing?"

"I didn't want to! When I harnessed the power of the globe I used all the power at my exposal to direct it at you. But you prevailed. The magic from that globe was supposed to be enough to stop you. To bring an end to the reign of Santa Claws and put me on the throne I belong on. But instead the globe chose this." Jack waved a paw over the frozen scene below them.

"I may not have liked the elves or the way they looked down on me for being made the way I am but I needed them. I needed them to run things untils I could take over. Until I could master the powers needed to replace them."

"Yeah well your plan failed Jack. Not only have you jeopardized Grizzmas but you've also endangered the lives of all these mammals. So how do we free them? Starting with Judy." Nick demanded.

Looking back over the frozen mammals of the workshop floor, Jack simply shrugged. "You can't."

"Not good enough Jack." Nick growled.

"That's why I used the globe." He said with a sigh. "When a globe is destroyed its power fuses with the nearest mammal to it. Normally the power is too much for anyone to handle and they'd die. You have to be an extremely powerful entity to harness it."

"Enough gloating-"

"It's not gloating." Jack snapped back, interrupting whatever Nick was about to say. "Using the power of the globe nearly ended me. I barely managed to direct its energy away from me and towards you. I don't know why all this happened but I focused on nothing but you. The power of those globes is known only to a few, even the ones that I spoke with admitting to only knowing a fraction of what they were capable of. Anyway the point of what I was trying to accomplish was simple. Freezing you would have connected your life force to mine. That way I could ensure you'd always be out of my way. If something ever happened to me you would instantly be out of the picture. Do you get it now?"

"If you die, they die." Nick replied grimly. He waited for a reply but the bunny just sat there quietly for a moment, still looking out over the frozen crowd below.

"It's very odd." He spoke at last. "I can feel them. It's like an energy, a presence in my mind that's just out of reach."

Jack seemed to be lost as he looked over the expanse of ice below him. As if he was mentally reaching for something he couldn't quite see. Nick couldn't stand it. Couldn't stand the feeling of powerlessness. What could he do?

He decided to take a walk. Doing so had helped him in the past. A way of taking a break to clear his mind and start anew at solving a problem. This one was going to be his biggest problem yet. How to free everyone without killing Jack and killing everyone else in the process. There had to be a way. His wandering brought him back to his apartment in the mountain. Where he found Judy, still frozen. He went to the bed and pulled a blanket off and wrapped it around her shoulders. If only to make himself feel better.

Nick didn't know how long he sat next to her, quietly pondering their situation. He thought about speaking to her but knowing she couldn't hear or reply made it seem silly. Eventually, he couldn't stand seeing like this and stood to leave. Wish shame, he couldn't bear to look at her, a reminder of his own failings. As he looked at the floor he made his leave but stopped at the door. There in the snow covered floors was a footprint. But not one like his or a smaller one like Jack's. But a wider, broader footprint with long claws.

He traced them with his eyes and followed the tracks to the door that led to his workshop. Curious, he made his way to the door and eased it open. And there, sitting at his workbench, looking at another one of the globes, was none other than father time.

"Hello Nicholas."