Jack stood in the middle of a theater stage.
The spotlights hanging in the metal rafters above him illuminated the aged wooden floors, white specs drifting around the columns of light with the red velvet curtains pulled back on either side of him. The stage looked out onto an ocean of empty seats, surrounded by the most oriental detail of the architecture. The mezzanine imposes itself in the air as another wall that surrounds him.
Jack stands in the very center of the open stage, aimlessly scanning the hollow horizon of the building, at a loss for how to conduct himself. He finds it strange that he doesn't know what to do in this seemingly innocuous scenario, considering that the stage is usually his second home. But here he feels listless and lost. The place doesn't seem to carry itself with the same purpose as it usually does. It feels cold, empty and long abandoned. A feeling that is very familiar to him.
And that's when the applause started.
He jumps at the claps and cheers that erupted from a vast crowd that wasn't there. The sounds of adoration bounced off the theater walls and back to Jack's ears. A pit of unease started to form in his stomach, being able to hear thousands of people clear as day but knowing that there's no one here. No one is here.
Not really.
But he can hear them, as if they were right in front of them. The theater was filled with all the normal sounds but remained hollow inside. Something here was wrong. A feeling Jack couldn't quite place of something being palatably off kilter. He switches his head in every direction, hoping to find some kind of source for the applause, but comes up empty.
And when the sinking feeling doesn't go away, he chooses to leave the situation altogether. Usually, he wouldn't try to ignore an adoring crowd, but something tells him that he needs to keep moving out of the theater. He tried to fight off the feeling of his throat closing up as he left.
The soles of his shoes click all the way over to the stage right exit door, he spares another cautious glance to the "audience", opens the door and exits into a high-ceilinged corridor. The purple walls and dark glossy floors is all the information he needs to recognize it as Father Time's tower.
But even as he meanders into the main chamber, the cheers follow him.
They ricochet into the endless expanse of tower above him, still as boisterous as ever. The ghosts of the crowd have no lungs, no air supply to worry about. Only voices. Voices that carry and linger and hang around Jack as he walks like a murder of crows.
The sense of foreboding is only exasperated as he steps up the pace into a speed walk to the closest door in another nearby hallway. Looking for another exit that will hopefully rid him of the applause, he opens this one to find the North Pole workshop.
And thus, the cycle continues. Every place he goes, all familiar places, was devoid of any life besides himself. The halls were deathly empty, every room a ghost town, as if no one had been there at all. As if the inhabitants all just disappeared into thin air.
Only he and the applause remained.
One by one he ran past and into door after door seeking any kind of answer and some kind of relief to the annoyance of the crowd. The theater, the tower, the North Pole, Mother Nature's garden, the Citadel, even in his own realm, his own home the voice followed.
And with every changing environment they only got louder.
The only company he has.
They all cheer his name, their hands coming together in louder and louder claps, are these screams of joy or pain? Is there even a difference when they're this loud?! Jack only stops his running to put his hands over his ears in an attempt to muffle out some of the disastrous noise. His expression pinches in concentration, trying to take his mind off of it, trying to take some of the edge off.
But it's as if his hands didn't even exist, in fact the voices might have even gotten louder out of spite. He thinks about how his ears were fit to bleed, how has his eardrums not burst yet? Nothing about these cheers are natural.
But it's all so positive! Everything they say is nothing but praise! They're cheering for him with mouthfuls of violently beautiful praise! He should want this! This is the only thing he's ever wanted. They all love him.
He matters to them.
So why are their voices making him so miserable? Why isn't this enough?
The only thing he can do is try in vain to block out the clapping as best he can, pondering these questions he doesn't have the answers to while he tries to somehow will the audience away from his mind. He can feel his heart pounding in his chest as he strains and is only stirred when he feels an odd sensation in the palms of his hands. Something is wet?
He slowly pulls his hands away from his head to see the self-fulfilling prophecy of sizable pools of blood in his palms. The sight of it sends a cold shock up his spine, adrenaline rocketing up with it. He frantically pats down the sides of his head where his hands were, further checking his ears. His horror is only magnified when he finds that in fact both of them are profusely bleeding. Streams of blood pour out of the sides of his head, but none of it inhibits his hearing ability. The volume of the cheers makes their jovial attitude dip into something more sinister. Screaming for sure, but out of excitement or out of fear is up for debate.
And somehow, they've gotten even louder, and Jack was thrown into overwhelming throngs of shock when all of the voices came together in one cacophonous clap of noise. A noise that sounded like when something is so hot it turns white, the sound of a million car crashes, of a cracking bullet, the sound of a soul breaking into a million pieces.
The sound of a broken spirit.
BANG!
Jack was startled awake so quickly one could have mistaken the jolt for a partial and failed exorcism. The bolt of adrenaline slicing through his nerves, he hyperventilates as he shoots up from his horizontal position. A hard swallow only gives minimal relief as his breath rips through his throat.
His head snaps from one direction to another, taking in the room as a means of grounding himself. And in another round of panic, he runs both hands over ears, feeling for any blood. His shoulders slump with relief when he finds no such traces.
'It was just a nightmare,' he exhales, slowly but surely calming himself down. But then he pauses, thinking about his own statement for a moment.
"A nightmare?! Oh, for sky's sake," he uttered.
He swung his legs over the edge of the bed, his face resting in the palms of his hands, hunched over his knees. With the initial shock gradually making its way out of his system, he groaned into his hands, angry at himself for getting so worked up and afraid of a bad dream. He likes to think himself better than that, definitely not afraid of anything he could possibly throw at him.
This latest dream in the string of many only reminds him how nightmares have been a thorn in his side for about 900 years now.
Before he was banished, the nightmares have been of a somewhat usual standard of scary. Generally, very off putting and visually upsetting, but nothing that he couldn't think he could handle, and nothing that wasn't immediately shaken away by the usual morning routine. Annoying? Yes. But otherwise rather expected. He always knew in some way he wasn't going to let him off the hook that easily.
But ever since he was exiled, the nightmares became more frequent, more psychologically upsetting and all too poignant. He has to be some kind of coward to kick a man when he's down. Making worse nightmares for him when he's stuck here and can't do anything about it. Such a cheap shot.
So far, he hasn't had one in about two months, and Jack was starting to figure he was a little overdue.
Now having his would-be restful night's sleep thoroughly ruined, Jack begrudgingly willed his little notebook back into his hand in a huff. He angrily flips to the back of the book where his tally is kept. He started keeping score on this kind of thing when he first got banished, mostly as a means of doing something other than nothing. He started out keeping track monthly but quickly changed to yearly for his nightmare records.
Simple tally marks dot the page in six different columns. 26, 33, 20, 39, 42, and he adds another angry black mark to this year's section turning the twenty-seven into a twenty-eight. Making his nightmare total for the entirety of exile so far 188.
"I swear I need to finish that freeze job once I get out of here," he mutters through his teeth as he wills the book and pen away in a trail of blue magic. His head has been rotating a few different ideas of delicious payback he would get once he's free.
He needs to be free.
He finally stands up from the bed and bitterly decides to start the day on such a sour note.
The room he finds himself in was installed when he was first put into exile, the sleeping quarters as they were. It was more or less, a very plain, minimalistic room all in white. The open, magically concealed doorway gives view to his other prison just beyond this prison. A simple clock hangs above the exit as his only means for knowing what time it is at any given moment. The room is devoid of anything else besides the bed, the clock, a sink and mirror on the opposite wall to the bed, and another door that goes to the bathroom.
Home sweet home for the past seven years. Never gets old.
After a quick change into his regular clothes, he puts on the shoes he stores under the bed frame and makes his way over to the sink and mirror. With both hands gripping either side of the sink, his head falls past his shoulders in defeat. A sigh escapes him as he tries to shake the remnants of the dream from his head.
'I need to know just what in the world Sandy will accept as a bribe to keep him off my back,' he thinks to himself.
He's tried many times to convince Sandy to keep this particular nighttime menace at bay. But so far, The Sandman has been unwilling to cooperate, leaving Jack to try and deal with the bad dream dealer on his own. His scowl only deepens at the thought of him. Sure, he may have made some, small scale, questionable decisions, but a 900-year grudge? Doesn't he have anything better to do?
But before Jack could dwell on the past for much longer, the enchanted chime of the door goes off in his head. He drags his gaze to the clock. 10:30, right on time.
He takes a calculated breath in, half-heartedly smooths out the half-melted icicles in his hair and reminds himself of the mission at hand.
'It was just a dream; it doesn't mean anything!
You're not nothing. You can still be something.'
"THINK FAST JACK!"
Jack takes not even two steps out of the hidden doorway before Lucy's upbeat presence assaults him. And not thinking fast enough, he gets literally assaulted by an incoming apple that strikes him right in the head with a thud.
"OW! What was that for?!" he snaps his attention to Lucy's direction.
The apple fell to the ground, bouncing once before rolling back over to Lucy's feet.
"Well, it WAS an apple for the teacher," she says, picking up the fruit off the ground, "but now it's all bruised and ruined."
Lucy has traded the more winter suited attire she wore the day before to something far more casual. Pink converse has replaced the snow boots, and a sentimental denim jacket has taken the place of a winter coat. The jacket was noticeably adorned with doodles and scribbles of various colors, everything from hearts to plants to the word LOSER were decorating the fabric. And the same dragons fire heat enchantment hung around her neck, making the clothing swap all the more bearable in the frozen tundra.
She looked far more summery than she probably should.
"Yeah, that's what happens when you throw your food!" Jack chastised, rubbing the side of his head.
"Your food," she corrected, "But it's ok because I brought extras!"
Lucy holds up the plastic bag she had brought with her, containing a few small paper boxes.
"I don't know what they're feeding you in here, so I just got a few different things from Needle and Thread at the pole," The girl once again tossed the apple to him, noting he actually caught it this time. "I stopped by before coming here and let me just say that Bypass is such a time saver!"
She smiles at the thought of practically going to the North Pole whenever she wanted. An obvious pleasantness that Jack completely ignores as his faux smile barely takes shape.
"Isn't it just?" Jack bit into the apple, tucking his other hand into his pocket as he started pacing in front of the teen.
"So, one thing, among the many, that you should know about me is that I am a man that gets straight to the point!" he started explaining between mouthfuls of fruit, "And I will not be taking this little experiment lightly."
And here we go. Lucy knew today was going to be difficult, beginning steps in anything always are. If the advice of anyone in her life was to go by, she thought herself primed and ready for any below freezing tricks he could throw her way. She thought she was more than ready for a difficult time.
"I expect nothing less," she crosses her arms, "And I'm not exactly a delinquent ya know. Top of my class, all honors programs. Real teacher real student."
"You do know that this isn't going to be like regular school, right? You are in quite the rare situation here."
"I know. 'The Great and Powerful' Jack Frost would never let that happen," Lucy says, heavy on the sarcasm.
"Then allow me to ask you a couple questions. Get to know my subject matter," he says, "I mean really what are we if not strangers and who am I if not well-mannered?"
Finishing the apple, he aggressively perma-freezes the core in his grip, and casually throws the litter over his shoulder out in the wasteland.
"Well-mannered is pulling my chair out from under me?"
"That was before this little arrangement was made. You'll have to forgive me; I haven't entertained much company in the past seven years."
"Not an excuse. But I'll let it slide for now. I'll check back with that one in two weeks," she warns, "What do you wanna know?"
"Well, aside from all the other business-related questions regarding your magic that I'll get to later, I really only have one personal question. I've always been a rather curious spirit and something about you has piqued my interest."
"Ok...? And that is?" Lucy asked with a twinge of caution.
The cogs start to turn in her head, thinking of what about her specifically has a magic spirit so interested? She has done nothing special or even remotely attention grabbing that he could possibly latch onto in their very small window of knowing each other. At least nothing she knows of.
"Seven years ago, when I was unceremoniously 'hauled off' as it were. Just as we were about to leave, you hugged me," the last words of his sentence hang off in what seems like disbelief or disgust as he continues to pace.
"Yup. I did do that," Lucy continued confidently, "What about it?"
The hug was only something Jack thought about in the first year of his punishment. A very strange and unhelpful action that, like all the other questions he had, remained unanswered. And having more important things to worry about he quickly buried the idea as whole. Content to let the thought die, chalk it up to nothing more than naive childish behavior. But now here the same child stood yet again, giving him such a quizzical look as if he was crazy. And he never lets an opportunity escape him.
"Why? Why did you do that?" Jack tries to cover his curiosity as he asks.
This question catches her off guard. To be honest she hasn't given much thought about the hug since it happened all those years ago. She's rarely ever asked herself such a question, let alone heard someone else inquire about it. With little thought process on the matter, Lucy answers a little too quickly for Jack's liking.
"I don't know! You looked like you needed it," she kindly remarks.
...
Now it was Jack's turn to look at the girl as if she was utterly insane, as he was stopped in his pacing, silencing the crunching of the ice under his feet.
"What? You gotta be joking."
Lucy returned his expression with a smile, "Nope! Not joking. You just seemed like you needed a hug. I got the vibe that no one has given you one of those in a while."
His mind fogs over with confusion and denial, completely thrown off not only by her answer but her lackluster attitude towards the question.
"That's it? There's no other reason? I froze both of your parents and locked you in a closet with them for hours. I expertly swindled your uncle out of his own holiday. What could you have to gain from that hug?"
"Me personally? Nothing," she begins. Her grin doesn't get any bigger, but it somehow feels warmer as she explains, "I gained nothing other than thinking that I did something nice for someone that day. Someone who was having a rough time. Dad says that people who act out and hurt others are hurting on the inside themselves."
Jack rolled his eyes so hard that Lucy could almost hear it.
"But didn't you hate me? Weren't you angry at least?"
Lucy shrugged, "Yeah. I was upset that you froze my parents. It was pretty scary at the time; it would be for any kid I'd imagine. And I will be the first to admit that my forgiveness at the time was a bit misplaced. But I figured that you were just having a hard time. And I like helping people! I like doing nice things for people who need it. But as a ten-year-old there was really only so much I could do at the time so, hug it is."
Her palatable sincerity and kind expression gave Jack a lot to chew on. He didn't expect such a tiny facet of his arrest would have him in such twisted questioning. Is she lying? Was she trying to make him feel better about it somehow? But why would she do that? Is there actually more to this? When WAS the last time he got a hug…? He was caught so off guard by her unsatisfying answer that he forgot to respond entirely.
Lucy picks up on this, seeing the cogs trying to turn in his head and pipes up.
"Do you want another hug right now?" she said jokingly.
Jack was quickly snapped out of his thoughts at the offer, "No! No no no no, I don't do hugs, Miller. Let's keep those firmly off the table, yeah?" he said, taking a few cautionary steps away from the teen.
"But aren't you glad I asked this time? Now that I'm older I've mastered the social cues for these kinds of things," Lucy proudly says with a single finger pointed to the sky.
"'Mastered' is a strong word here," Jack grumbles.
"I am a master, and I'll also be a master at this whole magic biz, so let's get on with it Mr. Gets-straight-to-the-point. Tell me what I gotta do first."
She looks back to him with stars in her eyes, her presence alight with an unbridled enthusiasm. The likes of which Jack finds more annoying than anything else.
"Right, of course. First things first," he clears his throat and widely gestures to Lucy, "Where is your staff? Surely Ms. Top-of-her-class wouldn't forget something as important as that on her first day?"
Lucy perks up with this next question with a curious grin, "Oh! Yeah, it should be here, at some point. I'm running an experiment right now."
Jack looks confused, "It should be here? You don't know?"
"Yeah! I think it follows me around, so it shou - Ah! There it is!"
Lucy points to a spot a few feet away from Jack and noticing the abrupt appearance of the staff made him jump ever so slightly. The staff floats in the air a few inches above the ice, as if frozen in time.
Jack casts a cautious glance to Lucy as he approaches the floating object, "Does it always follow you like this?" He pokes the staff, and it starts slowly floating off in the direction his finger was pointing.
"I think so!" Lucy assuredly answers, "I purposefully left it at home before I came here so, I'm gonna say yes. But it usually doesn't stand straight up like that, it's usually leaning on something."
"Hard to imagine there's much to lean on out HERE — " Jack plucks the staff out of the air, and immediately regrets it.
The sheer weight of the thing comes crashing down on his hands and pulls him all the way to the ground. Awkwardly falling onto his knees, Jack manages to save himself from a close meeting between his face and floor. The staff hits the ice with a thud, with his hands almost trapped underneath. He sits in shock for a moment before trying to recalibrate the strength needed to properly lift the thing.
"Oh, and apparently it's always heavier for everyone else," she comments, throwing her hands behind her back with an impish smile, "everyone except for me. That thing feels like plastic whenever I hold it. But usually, people also don't get crushed either."
Jack struggles hoisting himself back up on two feet.
"That would've been nice to know...!" he grates, not much appreciating the redhead's joy of him being taken down by a stick.
He is quick to hand it back off to its owner, who took it with much greater ease. The titular moon shaped stone on the end caught his eye for a moment more.
"So, what else do you know about that thing? Not all staffs work the same after all," he casually asks.
"Well, as far as I know, this will be my version of the red coat. After the ten-year mark when I'm able to pass down the title, the next person will get this thing."
"Hmmm," he idly scrutinizes the staff from afar as he paces, "makes sense so far."
'Red Coat? More of a dead end than I thought,' he thinks to himself. If it's anything like the last couple new age castors, then this thing is a metric ton of dead weight in his hands. Which means he's going to have to get her to lift this barrier thing on her own.
"Well in any case, use your stupidly heavy stick there and let's go down the list of the things you can currently do. Show me what you've got kid," Jack started, "Demonstrations only."
Lucy hesitates, "Uhhhh yeahhhh about that. I can't do 'Demonstration only'. My powers are already less physical, and more invisible, I guess? And they don't even work when I tell them to anyway."
"You can't summon any of your powers at will?"
"Nope, not really. I've tried doing it on my own a couple times, but nothing happens," she frowns.
Jack lets out an exasperated sigh, "Figures. Just list them off for now I guess."
Lucy switches the position of the staff in her arms to tick off each item as she lists them, "Ok so, the only things I can do is seeing people's cores and auras, generally just having a weird feeling in the back on my head about certain balancey stuff, uhhh oh! And I also did a weird little burst thing at the meeting that made everyone stop arguing with each other."
"Okay and what else?"
"That's pretty much it."
"That's it?"
"So far, yeah," she responds with her arms straight out in front of her, "That's all I got."
Jack rolls his eyes, "Of course. Can't make this too easy after all. You should definitely have more abilities than that. The stories I've had to sit through from the first Tooth Fairy and Easter Bunny were horrendously dull! St. Nick never talked much about his own ascension, but I digress."
Jack sharply swished his arm forward, summoning a long thin icicle in a puff of blue sparkle.
"If my endless well of knowledge serves me right, I believe what's happening here is that your magic is a little…clogged so to speak. You're not actually getting the full picture. What you need is a hard jumpstart to get the full flow going. And you'll need to do that before starting anything to do with magical control," he explained very matter-of-factly, pointing the icicle in Lucy's direction for emphasis.
"Ok," she says, moving the tip of the icicle away, "and how do we do that exactly?"
"First rule of magic, little girl," he draws a curved line in the ground with the icicle just in front of Lucy's feet.
The line then glows bright blue and in a flash produces more, very sharp icicles that shoot straight up from the ground. Lucy jumps back in surprise at the sudden burst, noting that the pointy wall of ice was a little too close for comfort. She cranes her neck around the wall to give him a reprimanding look.
He returns it with a smirk, "It's full of surprises. And very finicky, so it works just a little different for everyone. Kickstarting lagging powers is nothing new, but it may take a minute to find what method is going to work for you."
"Alright, well that's what we're here for! Let's go down the list and see what sticks!"
Jack gives a condescending look over his shoulder as he continues to swing the icy pointer around. The idea already taking shape and being put into action as he speaks, "mmmmm, No."
"...what?" Lucy asks.
"I said, nah. We'll work on that later."
"What do you mean no? You literally just said that we can't do anything else until we jumpstart the magic!"
"Hey, who's the professional here?"
"I have a feeling it might not be you," Lucy shoots him an unimpressed look, "I'm just a little confused here. Why tell me about the thing that we have to do, and then NOT do it?"
"I know it's a stretch, but just trust me here alright? I know far more about this than you do."
"So, you keep saying," Lucy frowns, "Is there something you're not telling me here? Because I am more than willing to help along the process however I can."
"There's nothing for you to worry about. It'll happen quicker if you don't question it."
Lucy makes a noise in the back of her throat, "So we're just supposed to sit here and stare at each other until you decide to tell me anything?"
"I assure you it will make sense in a minute. I'm not trying to deter you here Lucy, I merely want you to do as I instruct. That's the arrangement we both agreed on after all."
It doesn't take a vague magic sense for Lucy to know that he's already going on a little bit of a power trip here. And Lucy might have been the one to come to him for help, but she's not about to be a pushover now on day one! As good of a student as she usually is, Jack said himself that these are special circumstances. And surely nobody would judge her for being a tad abrasive here. She has a sneaking suspicion that she's not getting the whole picture here, and being the one with knew powers she has to know.
"Or what?" Lucy crosses her arms defensively.
Jack stops swinging the icicle and casts an indignant look, "Excuse me?"
"Or what? What happens if I don't do what you want?"
"Then you'll never learn anything about your own magic."
"And then you will never get out of exile or have your own holiday," she smugly adds.
Jack is dumbfounded by the snap back, and stares incredulously as she continues.
"I don't want any part of whatever game you're trying to play here. It's called cooperation and being nice to people will go a long way if you want them to do what you want."
"I know that. And I know how to be nice, the fact that you're even here right now is a testament to that."
"And I really do appreciate that, but you didn't answer my question. What's gonna happen to you if you don't teach me magic huh?" Lucy says with increasing cockiness, testing where these boundaries are.
"I hardly think now is the —"
"Do you get sent to superjail? Is there another Antarctica under this one that you get put in?"
Jack looks on with cold indifference, as Lucy gets down on the ground and puts her ear to the surface to get the taunt across. Any other time he would be silently offended but actively playing the nice guy role to better appease such a confrontation. But he buries such demeanor for now, this plan requires a different role. With her hair and heat enchantment sprawled out onto the ice, the spark of an idea lights. Something that will really tie this all together.
Before she could register what was happening, Jack calmly walked over to her. Standing over her crouched frame, he quickly finds the bottle of fire laying on the ground just in front of her face, and stands on it with one foot, crushing it underweight.
Lucy's eyes go wide as she witnesses the glass bottle break into a constellation of pieces. The little golden orange flame was set loose into the air and flickered away in specs of light, akin to a candle's flame being blown out.
"Oh dear, how does something like that happen?" Jack sympathizes with a very obviously fake concern on his tongue.
"HEY! What the heck!?" Lucy exclaims, immediately jumping up onto her knees.
The change in temperature was instantaneous and nearly gave her whiplash and thermal shock. The cold of the air clawed at her exposed skin and tried doing so through the denim jacket. A nasty shiver making itself at home in her limbs as she picks at the broken pieces of glass with her free hand, mourning the loss of Mother Nature's gift to her. The thing hadn't even lasted a day! Lucy held the remaining twine in her other hand as she fully stood up.
"W-what is wrong with you!?" she shakes, "Mother Nature gave me that yesterday! I've only had a single day with that thing!"
"I'm sure you can get another one somewhere else. There's not exactly a 'hot' commodity," Jack pivots to turn away from the redhead.
"This is not cooperation! Stuff like this is not helping your case here!" she shakes the piece of string in her hand for emphasis.
"It wasn't meant to," Jack pleasantly replies, "It was to remind you of the dynamic that we both agreed upon. The experienced one, and the nobody little human girl."
"E-exactly, which means you still have a job to do and your s-side of the deal to keep up! And this is how you're gonna spend day one? Really?"
Jack scrutinizes the girl as she reprimands him further. A lot of high pitched nonsense about working together and where to get a new enchantment and all that.
But he hardly pays attention to her plight as he studies her hands and moonstone staff, neither looking any more magical than a moment ago. Her eyes are also still the same color she came in with, pale almost hazel blue. He remembers the light purple they were sporting during yesterday's visit; obviously magically influenced. Nothing about her seems more magical than a few moments ago, and with no progress so far given how heated she is, he decides to try switching gears. Lets try turning up the theatrics, let's put on a show instead.
"You were the one who started with the immaturity act first. I open my prison, my wisdom to you and you have the nerve to mock me? Beat a man while he's down? In banishment no less?"
"It's not unreasonable for you to be straight forward, and for you to break my things out of spite! I know being exiled must be hard, and I know you like being the villain here, naughty list people and all that. But this might go a lot smoother if you work with me instead of against me," she struggled through the cold induced stammer.
"I completely agree, and I think maybe you should take your own advice."
With a growl, Lucy pivots on her heels and with staff in hand bluntly exits through the sealed doorway without another word. Leaving Jack out in the cold.
"...Lucy?" he curiously calls out.
He doesn't expect for her to hear him through the barrier, but his exclamation was more for himself than anything else. His expression twisted into confusion as he pondered the notion of her actually just walking out on him on the first day! Definitely the desired outcome.
And he almost would've believed that she actually was done with him, until she came speed walking back into the cold. This time with far more protective gear on, including her usual winter coat, hat and gloves. She aggressively crosses her arms with the staff tangled in them, her eyes narrow, an attempt at intimidation that only slightly carries.
Jack took a moment's pause before commenting, "Where were you hiding all of that?"
"I brought extra clothes and left them with Rusty at the front desk," she said very matter-of-factly.
"Ok. And what does this prove?"
"It proves that you're going to have to try a lot harder than breaking my things to push me around. I'm in it for the long haul, and we are going to make this work."
"Fine by me," Jack cocks a sly grin, "I was just thinking about changing tactics anyway."
In a flash he summons a snowball in his hand and suddenly chuckles it at the teen, who did not dodge fast enough. The snow hitting her right in the shoulder and the residual snow of the impact coated the side of her face.
She stood with her mouth agape at the sheer audacity of this man.
"One way to try and jumpstart new magic is to trigger some kind of big emotional reaction. Usually anger works the best, but apparently that's not working too well in your case, and I am a man that values efficiency."
He punctuates the sentence with another magically curated snowball that also goes flying, this time Lucy barely manages to dodge away from its trajectory, letting it hit the ground just behind her.
"Another option is to at least get the adrenaline up to a certain point or put you in a certain amount of danger to where your powers will kick in on a protective instinct."
His hand waves in the air, summoning a row of five snowballs in a trail of blue magic. The snowballs loose one at a time in succession down the line, kicking Lucy into high gear and sending her running around Jack's perimeter, as he himself pivots to follow her movements. She's fast, and narrowly avoids contact with three of them, but isn't fast enough to evade the other two. One of them shooting right into the center of her back, the other knocking her upside the head, getting a small bit of extra snow going in her collar and down her back.
"Yes! Good! Great! I'm all for it, just TELL ME THAT next time!" she exclaims.
Another round of snow was made in the air, but this time it was three snowballs much larger than the others, and Jack's throw made them almost come crashing down directly on top of her.
"I will admit that I could've gone on with the more subtle approach for much longer," he hollered to her amidst the attack, "but again, to reiterate, I have been deprived of company for seven years. Hardly had a good snowball fight in a long while."
With the boulders of snow flying through the air, and tracking her movements as she goes, Lucy was too preoccupied to provide any kind of witty come back. She skirts past the first that came crashing down beside her, landing in an explosion of snow that she noted was far closer than she wanted. The second was avoided in much the same way, but the third was dead on center. It dropped on her from overhead, stopping her dead in her tracks and pushing her into the floor and into a pile of fine snow as it exploded on top of her.
Jack's grin quickly faded when he heard the sound of laughter coming from the snowbank. Lucy pops her head out from the top of the snow in a fit of giggles.
"Is this all you got for danger? This is barely a snow day!" She challenges.
Jack's expression dipped into something deeply unimpressed, as he watches her untangle herself from the pile, in better spirits than ever,
"This isn't funny ya know! For all you know your life could be at risk."
His tone drips at the edges with something dark and raising one of his hands he creates a single daunting icicle at the tips of his fingers. Dull enough for now, but nonetheless a weapon as dangerous as any blizzard.
Lucy turns to fully face him and her own smile disappears. She freezes in her tracks as she carefully watches Jack hover the chunk of ice in front of him. She slightly shakes her head in disbelief.
"You wouldn't dare."
Jack's smile returns with a sinister zeal, "Nobody can hear you out here so who knows, maybe I will."
"You won't. I'm calling your bluff right now," Lucy cautioned with a choking grip on her staff, "You're not actually gonna hurt me and this is all for show to jumpstart the magic."
Without another word, the icicle, at Jack's command, breaks apart into three smaller pieces and hurls themselves in Lucy's general direction. Surprise shoots through her nerves, causing her to stall for a split second before booking it harder and faster in the opposite direction of the onslaught. Jack pushing the attack further and further away from the entrance so she couldn't run away again.
Various yelps and shouts all over the spectrum escaped her as Lucy tried outrunning the icicles that were biting at her heels. Some stuck themselves in the ground around her ankles, forcing her to switch directions on a dime. A few breezed by her arms and one caught in her peripheral vision zipped right by her head. None of the projectiles were possessed to outright hurt the girl. As easy as that would be, this particular kid was too important to his own escape plans to violently harm. But if she didn't know that then the chances were higher of her magic kickstarting out of necessity.
With one arm in the air conducting the icicles, Jack's other arm raises and summons two sizable walls of thick packing snow on either side of Lucy. And in bringing his thumb and middle finger closer together, so too did the walls of snow. Joining together behind her, Lucy was caught in a quickly shrinking three-sided icy cube.
The icicles stuck themselves into the walls surrounding her, coming all too close to her appendages. Her breath was ragged from the physical activity in the arctic conditions, and being mostly surrounded, the only thing she had left to do was brace for possible impact. Her arms crossed themselves over each other in front of her face as the last of the icicles embedded themselves in the neighboring walls beside her. Stray strands of red hair peeking out of her hat were blown in their direction as they flew.
She stood defensively for a moment more as the onslaught ceased, letting the needed silence sit. And as she slowly removes her arms from her face through desultory breaths, the first thing she sees is Jack casually making his way over to the scene.
"I will give you this. You're very light on your feet in such a heavy coat," he mused.
"Decent aim," Lucy gasped, trying to maintain even footing with him, "but I'm still calling your bluff. You're not gonna hurt me, I can feel it."
It was a mixed batch of feelings regarding her statement. She really did, deep down believe that he didn't want to cause her any harm. He can't if he actually wants this venture to go well for him, if he wants either his council position or his holiday. But having just ran through a blitz of soft and hard attacks, Jack never even breaking a sweat, was enough cause for a sizeable amount of doubt. Who knows what being alone for seven years can do to someone? Maybe he would do something like this. Cocooned by surrounding snow and out of energy left to do much else, uncertainty along with the chill gripped her.
"Wouldn't I?" Jack said, lifting his hand and summoning another much larger icicle, sharper than all the rest.
Lucy's eyes went wide as Jack's arm abruptly flicked upwards, sending the icy bullet cutting through the air and aimed for in between the girl's eyes. She didn't have time to move or think. Thousands of years of natural human instincts took over, sending an electric line of adrenaline bombarding its way through her system.
And then a spark was lit.
Bracing for the impact she could feel tendrils of warm sensations breakaway the cold from her extremities. Something deep within her snapped to attention, deeper than she thought was possible. An attention clearer than glass. The warm feeling took hold of her entire chest, feeling like carbonation prickling and bubbling under the surface.
She remained braced for another moment more, not questioning the strange full body sensation until she realized that the icicle hasn't hit yet.
She cautiously opened her eyes, heart still beating in her ears, when she saw that there was a peculiar lavender glow coming from somewhere right in front of her. Lucy relaxes her posture in awe when she realizes that the glow was coming from her own hand. The open palm glowing with magical intent, facing the icicle that remains still in the air, only a few inches from her fingertips. The staff in her other hand reacting in much the same manner, with a powerful purple glow emanating from the stone heading the wooden stick. Her eyes were completely whited out as they also emitted the same magical light.
Jack watches on in a knowing manner, as the teen's magic was scared awake. She unknowingly stopped the projectile in its tracks, the ice refracting the same color magic that dotted her face in the abstract patterning of moons and stars.
Lucy lets out a controlled breath as she fully takes in the feat she's doing. She wordlessly looks to Jack, his posture switched from offensive to openly neutral.
"And that is how you kick start lagging magic," his voice rings out in a very matter of fact tone. Slightly pretentious sounding even.
Slowly breaking out of the paralyzing shock, Lucy gently moves her hand to the right, watching the icicle move with her command. Her smile grows from nervous to curious and her glowing eyes dim as she does the same thing to the other side, and then up and down and then in circles. The chunk of ice following her thoughtful directions.
"Jack, look! Anti-gravity!" she shouts getting bolder with her movements as the ice goes swinging back and forth in midair.
"Telekinesis, actually," Jack deadpan responds, "And you welcome by the way! Now you should have access to your full abilities, making the rest of this process far easier. I kept trying to tell you that there's a method to my madness here! Honestly hasn't anyone told you to listen to — OWW!"
Lucy is swishing the icicle in the air from one side to another, when she accidentally let's go on the enchanted grip and unintentionally swings it right into the side of Jack's face.
The ice hit with a thud on the side of his skull, and he was almost knocked to the ground by the accidental amount of force behind it. The glow now fully disappearing from her palm and face, Lucy covers her mouth with both of her hands in shock. The icicle dropping to the floor and shattering on impact.
"Oh my god I didn't mean to do that! I'm so sorry I —,'' she pauses. "Wait a minute, No! I'm not sorry, you were gonna impale my face just now!"
"I wasn't going to actually hit you with it! I was just going to let it breeze past you," Jack readjusts himself, rubbing the side of his face. "It was all a part of the plan to jumpstart this process, and you're welcome again! Still not hearing a thank you!"
"Thank you. For almost taking me down an eye!" Lucy snapped, "You almost impaled me like a million times! I can't have a heart attack Jack, I'm too young for that!"
"I didn't tell you so that you could have the most genuine reaction. It wouldn't have worked as well if you knew that it was all an act. First rule of the theater, immerse your audience!"
The door was fully realized.
It was an arched wooden door in a muted dusty rose. A sun shaped metal door knocker on the front, its frame made of pristine white cobblestones.
He reaches out with a withered hand, and the man can actually feel it. The metal handle finally held his grip, as tangible as he was. No longer a blurry haze of what was to come.
The Man's smile crinkles the crescent tattoo on the left side of his face.
He opens the door to the girl's subconscious mind, its light blinding with activity. He proudly takes one gentle step in after another, and slowly closes the door behind him, the door and frame alike disappearing out of existence just as quickly as they manifested.
"And so, it begins. The cycle..."
Lucy stiffened at attention to the sound of the voice. She heard it clear as day, low with a soft echo, but loud enough that it sounded like it was coming from right next to her. She cautiously peaks around each side of her and behind, only finding the same nothingness of Antarctica on all sides. More unease and confusion settled in the pit of her stomach when she could find the source of the voice.
"Hey Jack?"
"What? Are you gonna throw something else at me now?"
Lucy continues to gently scan her surroundings, "No, I - did you say something just now?"
"Yeah, I went on a whole, very important tangent about NOT throwing things," Jack looked at her quizzically, "Why do you ask?"
After another moment more of nothing else coming from the voice, she finally turns to meet Jack's stare, "No reason. I—I think that might have taken more out of me than I thought. Must be time for a lunch break."
She punctuated the explanation with a lighthearted chuckle and started making her way back to the exile entrance, where her plastic bag of food was set just outside the doorway. Jack pays this microscopic intrusion no mind and follows her back.
"What do you mean lunch? we've barely even gotten started. You're fully magical now so you have no excuses to not show off your powers. And here I thought humans got excited at the notion of having magic."
"It's just a little break!" Lucy meandered, "And I am excited, really! But I was also just bombarded with piles of snow and ice and almost got my face stabbed! I am taking a break."
Reaching their original starting point, Lucy sets the staff down on the floor, and procures the bag from beyond the magical veil. She rifles through its contents and pulls out a piece of paper wrapped star bread. With the treat in both hands, she takes her own place on the ground in a huff. Crossing her legs, she maintains eye contact with Jack as she bites into the food. Sporting the same stare that she gave him yesterday that still managed to pierce straight through him.
"Alright, fine. Fair enough I suppose," he caves.
He summoned another ice crafted chair for himself, and tried giving Lucy some bullshit responsibility message as she ate. With great power and such. He goes on about how moon-based magic is extremely powerful, dead god energy yadda yadda yadda. But in this instance, she's not about to listen to a "You Have to Use Your Powers Wisely" speech from the guy that literally froze both of her parents, and just tried to attack her with ice not even 10 minutes ago.
He sounded convincing enough to anyone else, but Lucy takes everyone's warnings into consideration and thinks better of it. Taking everything, he's saying with a mountain of salt.
Either way, Jack's words were only taking up part of her attention, as she was still a little hung up on that weird voice. Very clear, almost a little too clear. And what exactly did he say? She couldn't quite remember. Eventually she concludes that her ears must be playing tricks on her. Maybe it's some kind of magical side effect to hear voices that aren't there, but so far with no other audible intrusions, she decides to brush it off this time. I mean, stuff like this would happen occasionally when she was human. Everybody hears things that aren't there sometimes. It should be nothing to worry about.
The only voice now is Jack's, and it already took up plenty of room on its own.
After the lunch break, the pair only got back to work after Lucy made Jack swear up and down to not pull anymore stunts like that one again without her knowledge. Jack crosses his heart and everything, promising to not lead her on anymore. Lucy hesitantly accepting the promise but making it very clear that his previous stunts are not yet forgiven, and that he would have to earn back some of her trust.
Afterwards, they quickly ran into their first hurdle of actual magical control. Bursts of light came flying off of her staff at the smallest thought and her eyes were near constantly shifting between their usual blue and light purple. The magic itself sometimes shifted in a kaleidoscope of purples, blues and pinks the more she tested them. Jack nearly got hit a handful of times by flying objects and magic blasts alike. The controls on this thing were proving to be a little touchy to say the least.
Jack encouraged engaging in these radical outbursts but urged her to do so near the doorway (and exile barrier). Feigning it as concern for his own physical well-being, stating that she needed to stay farther away if she were to combust into a magical explosion. And then he promptly had to explain to her that she wouldn't actually explode and how that wasn't actually possible.
The portion of power exploration was headed by Lucy herself as she arranged a myriad of exercises to try and get the full scope of her abilities. Most of which Jack could not be less interested in. The experiments unlocked a few magical constructs made out of light, a barrage of blasts that resembled an unhinged firework display, and some kind of glowing circular symbols on the floor that didn't stay for more than a few seconds, but whose purpose still remained a mystery.
"Ok, let's see if I got this right," Lucy said as she sat with crossed legs on the ground, "Balance magic."
"Obviously," Jack replied dryly, sitting in much the same manner across from her.
"Conflict calming stuff, Light based attacks, Telekinesis, that whole thing with the shapes that just showed up? Idk what that one is but it seems cool, and a weird magic circle thingy."
"I'm sure there's more abilities we just haven seen yet. Haven't produced the right stimuli for them. But in any case, it's a good enough start."
Lucy sits upright to scrutinize her staff. She stares down the moon shaped head, trying to unlock her own secrets telepathically. Which is something that they learned she cannot do, Lucy walked away very disappointed that she couldn't read people's minds.
But with even such a fleeting thought of her own powers, the staff head flickers to life and abruptly fires off a beam of light into the distance of the Antarctic. Her and Jack tense as the blast flies off into the horizon, both wondering what kind of damage that must have caused.
"That's going to be next. Learning not to send off magic willy nilly like that," he said with a raised eyebrow, "But other than that, the hard part is basically over. Now we can move on to chipping away at the actual control issues."
Just then a buzz went off in the plastic bag Lucy left by the door. She left her phone there after the whole snow avalanche debacle, thanking the stars that it was still somehow in working order after she was thrashed around so vigorously. She got up and retrieved the phone from the bag of trashed food packaging, seeing that her alarm was going off.
"Ah, that's my time. I gotta bounce," she declared gathering up her things.
"What? Where exactly do you have to be?" Jack questioned also standing back up on two feet.
"Uh home? Duh! I can't stay here all day; I actually have a life."
Jack heavily rolls his eyes, "And here I thought you were committed to this thing."
"I am! But we've been at this for hours now, and I think I might be getting stage two frostbite. Thanks a lot for that by the way," she retorts with her own raised eyebrow.
"You're welcome, it's my job. But I have one more thing for you to do before you leave."
Lucy stands with staff and bag in hand directly in front of the doorway, "And what is that?"
"In Father Time's tower, usually in the back of the archives, under a lot of security measures is a book called The Moon's Tome," he starts, "Said to be written by the Man in the Moon himself. Among other things, it should have a lot of powerful lunar spells in there. It would do you well to take a look at that at some point."
'Probably spells like barrier lifting,' Jack thought to himself.
Lucy was caught a little off guard by his sincerity. At least as much sincerity as she thinks she's getting.
"Huh. Ok. That actually sounds like really helpful advice," she says cautiously, "Have you read it before?"
"I have perused it. It used to be required reading material for Legendary figures, but apparently, we don't have enough use for spells that could alter the fabric of magic itself, or whatever. So, it was put into deep storage."
"Right, but why do I need to know magic altering spells exactly?"
"You don't," he lied, "but it's not every day that you have reading material directly from your own patron, now is it? It's just the smart thing to do here."
"I didn't know you were capable of doing the smart thing," Lucy shoots back.
"You only need to be smart enough," he says knowingly, "just remember to go rent that book at some point."
"Yeah, but how am I supposed to get to it if it's under such heavy lock and key?"
"You're essentially the new Man in the Moon. I'm sure you have enough credentials by just existing to get at least a look at it."
"And I'm sure it will be so incredibly easy to do," Lucy gives him a skeptical look.
"Confidence is key, Miller. A very important, non-magical lesson you should take to heart. That one's on the house."
"I'll see what I can do," Lucy sighs and was about to walk through the door when she paused, realizing crashing into her, "Ah man! You're giving me HOMEWORK? On winter break?"
"Yes! I have two weeks to mold you into a master of your craft. Just read the book."
"Ugh fine! I'll do it but you will be listening to me complain about it tomorrow."
Stepping out of the Antarctic door, the temperate air of the New Haven Bypass washes over Lucy, trying to cleanse her of the bone chilling cold. She shivers at the difference and thinks about how her temperatures have been pushed and pulled far too much for a single day. She can't wait to light the fireplace when she gets back home. Her gaze drifts into the controlled chaos of the Bypass, watching the magical passersby as she takes a mental breath from the training excursion.
"Done for the day?" Rusty, the goblin, asks from behind the desk of the kiosk right next to her.
"Oh! Yeah, yeah I won't be coming back today. Thank you for keeping my stuff for me," she says, dropping the tied plastic bag of food waste into the nearest trash can.
"No problem kid. See ya tomorrow."
"See ya Rusty!"
Lucy gives an enthusiastic wave as she pivots herself to the door back home, located on the adjacent wall. The doorway itself is locked and concealed from everyone else, blending in with the surrounding brick. But because of her input with its installation, only Lucy could see the small glowing outline of the frame, letting her know its location.
She furrows her brows in concentration as she puts her hand to the door's surface. The hand print on the wall glowing in response, and when lifted away the light of the print flows outward off the door and solidifies. Her unique magical and biological signature created the doorknob. She gives another once over of the Bypass, making another mental note to take a day at some point and visit all of these places. All thirty five of them someday.
Walking back into her home's hallway, Lucy gently closes the door and pauses for only a moment before deflating with a heavy sigh. She leans against what used to be the linen closet door, releasing a tension she didnt know she was carrying.
She can very clearly hear Tulip bounding towards her through the house, the echoes of her nails hitting the hardwood floors coming closer, until her golden face pops up from the bottom of the stairs.
Lucy immediately drops down to the floor to greet her, "TULI! SWEET PUP!"
The dog thoroughly knocks her over in search of affection, which got a good round of much needed laughter out of Lucy as she struggled to keep her pet a respectable distance.
"Lucy? Is that you sweetie?" Laura calls out from the ground floor.
"Yeah — ack — Mom! I'm back! Tulip get off!"
From her spot on the floor, Lucy manages to shoo the dog off of her just enough to stand again. Laura makes her way to the top of the stairs to find her daughter shucking off her coat.
"Well? How was it? How did it go?"
Lucy's thoughts crunched at the question, not knowing how exactly to answer. Her response was carefully curated trying to sift through all the things that happened.
"It went well! Progress on the first day and everything." she said handing off the coat to her mom, "Definitely…unorthodox for sure, but that's what I was hoping for. And cold! Very cold, but it's not like I'm not used to a cold winter anyway."
With the coat still in hand, Laura lets Lucy pick her staff up from the floor before squishing her face together with both hands, scrutinizing her flushed cheeks and red nose.
"You are cold. I thought Mother Nature gave you a little necklace that's supposed to keep you warm?"
Lucy stiffened at the comment. She paused before nervously rifling through her pockets to produce what was left of the enchantment sitting in her palm. Laura's face fell when she saw the damage.
"Oh no," she solemnly poked at the piece of glass on a string, "what happened?"
Lucy manages to cover up her nervousness well enough as she hesitantly tries to skate by the truth as smoothly as possible, "I — uh — i-it was an accident, more or less. First day we wanted to get straight to the point, and I guess we did get there. And by 'there' I mean unlocking all the cool new stuff I can do! I can move things with my mind mom!"
Without another thought the broken bottle in Lucy's hand sparked with a purple glow to match the same sudden light to her palm, and without warning rocketed upwards and smacked into the ceiling. Both women jumped at the magical intrusion, watching as the little trinket bounced off the ceiling and stepping back as it landed on the floor between them. The magic dying as soon as it disappeared.
"You know," a wide-eyed Laura began, "I thought I would be both more and less used to all this magic stuff."
"They're a bit touchy right now. But now I have the full range! I can do so many things and probably a lot more that I haven't even seen yet! Charlie's gonna be in for a rude awakening one of these days. He's not even gonna know what hit him!" Lucy excited muses with a feral grin.
"Oh good, magical nonsense to add to your guy's regular shenanigans," Laura smiled, "In any case, just try your best and keep that under control in the house please. A lot things here are both expensive and NOT magically insured."
"I'm telling you this stuff is tricky! I don't know how Uncle Scott and all those other guys use it so easily."
"Practice my dear, just like everything else. If you had nearly twenty years with magic, you'd be an expert too," Laura muses as she fixes a stray piece of Lucy's hair away from her face, "Now let's get you near a fire, warm you up the rest of the way."
Lucy took a few steps towards the stairs when she abruptly stopped, snapping to attention, "Oh! Wait! Just a minute, I gotta write something down!"
She pivots on her heels and dashes into her room, recklessly throwing the discarded gloves and hat onto the floor, and quickly leaning her staff up against the nearest pink colored wall. She takes a pad of gingerbread man shaped sticky notes and a fluffy, feathery tipped pen. She scribbles a note to herself, takes the piece of paper back into the hallway and firmly sticks it to the Bypass door.
The note reads:
Moon Tome — READ!
(FT's Tower)
"Oh! Mom, you'll never guess what he did! The guy gave me homework! Can you believe it? During winter break! Apparently, there's reading material I gotta go through," she calls out to her mom as she speeds down the stairs after her. The rest of the night spent filling in both parents on her progress thus far. Punctuated regularly and suddenly by busts of magic happening around the house.
The Man in the Moon found that the girl's subconscious was rather noisy during waking hours.
Much the same as the endless realm, her mind was an infinite floor with an infinite sky above, all in a nauseating shade of light pink. The white particles that floated around in the air was his magic. Somehow just as foreign to him in this condition that it probably is for her.
Separated from him now, but not for much longer.
After entering the unconscious, the door behind him, the one connected to the endless realm between life and death had not only closed, but entirely disappeared. Much to his relief.
Wandering further into the recesses of the mind, an ocean of various objects and memories engulfed him as he went. Wading through a pair of shoes with their laces tied together, a broken glass bottle on a string, about twenty or so different kinds of snow globes and much more very human trinkets.
He assumes that interacting with any of these would grant him access to that particular memory. But he was still as much a ghost in this plane of existence as he was in the last. Every object floats right through him, as if he wasn't even there.
Not even the magic in the atmosphere paid him much mind. The stars of light tangled in the memories and rouge sky, blinked and flickered in unison as she used her power. It was very noisy in here indeed, but the Man in the Moon found solace in the fact that he didn't have to hear the girl's thoughts or anything like that.
His time to think really came when nighttime fell, when the human would sleep. The stark pink of the environment faded away as she drifted off, turning into a serene navy, almost black background. With the dark soup overhead and the particles of magic being the only light source reminded him of the sky.
He really missed the night sky. He missed when the world wasn't so noisy. He regrets taking the star's company for granted. He thought it would've been a noble cause to grant new life the chance he never had, to have a friend.
But he was wrong. He gave up his once all-powerful existence and became a husk of who he once was. Now lonelier than ever, he's watched the folklore take his power and build something hideous. Unforeseen.
Off balance.
Walking among strangers' memories, the man in the moon had an idea.
Stopping in his tracks, his white robes pooled on the floor as he stooped down to the ground. He concentrated on what little magical capabilities he had left, and placed both of his hands flat on the shiny floor.
His palms and eyes glowed a sterile white, as well as the crescent moon tattoo around his left eye. The floor beneath his palms rippled and warped as if it were water, the surface tension of the hard tile slowly becoming easier and easier to press into. Until his hands suddenly gave way and snapped through the viscous veil and dipped below the floor, in the conscious mind.
Lucy's eyes, while she was still fast asleep in bed, lit up in a luminous white. He looks through her eyes as if they were his own. Tulip by her feet perked up at the sight of her owner's eyes glowing a bright light, but quickly could not be bothered to look into it any further and laid her head back down to rest.
The dull color of the ceiling is all that greeted his gaze, but the imitation of a physical form brought the Man in the Moon a sense of realness. Realness that he had been lacking for hundreds of thousands of years.
But all too soon, the vines of a burning sensation made their way up his wrists, scalding the skin into a broil. It bubbled and melted off of his form revealing the bones of his hands and arms underneath. With a deadpan expression he quickly pulled his hands out of the liquid floor. The light in Lucy's eyes dying as he did, putting her back to sleep as if nothing happened.
The man waited patiently as the sight of his mutilated appendages quickly faded away as he healed in a matter of seconds, afterall, there was nothing really there to destroy in the first place. He slowly checked his fingers and palms, making sure they healed in full.
He gave a snide whisper to the reflection of the floor, "She's not quite ready yet."