I ended up sort of hovering around the general area for a while until I saw Sandy send out his Dreamsand for the night. General area meaning the great lakes region. I might have even crossed up into Canada a few times. I knew from Jack that after the sand was sent out, Tooth's fairies started collecting the teeth. I landed on the roof of the nearest house once I saw the sand and waited for a fairy to make an appearance. While I waited, I fished around in my bag, looking for the necklace I'd made out of the coin Tooth had given me. I ended up waiting about ten minutes before I saw the first fairy flittering around. I made a paper airplane and sent it after them.

When it finally caught up to one and brought her back to me, the poor fairy was freaking out. "I'm sorry for distracting you, but I was told you guys can show me how to get to the Tooth Palace." I held the coin out for inspection. She grabbed it and held it up to her face, turning it over as she did. Her eyes got big and she started chattering away in her language and beckoning me. I threw the necklace over my head and snatched up my bag, calling my wings as I did. Her eyes widened again upon seeing my wings, but she shook her head and got back to business. I started following her, but called out before we got too far. "Don't you have a tooth to get, first?" She looked back and nodded, darting off in another direction and coming back a moment later, tooth clutched in her hands. She chattered again in a way that I took to mean 'follow me', and did.

After a good hour of flying - the distance of which I could have covered in half the time if it weren't for my guide - we reached a forest and the fairy slowed down. "Why are we stopping? I thought the Tooth Palace was in Asia somewhere, we're still in the U.S." She looked at me and chattered again. I managed to figure that she was looking for something, but I had no idea what. A few minutes later she ushered me into a cave, I had to release my wings to fit, but otherwise there was enough room. She lead me farther in and the rock walls of the cave turned into dirt walls of a tunnel. Because I had to walk now our progress was slower, but not too badly. After about a half an hour it finally dawned on me to ask a stupid question. "This is one of Bunny's tunnels isn't it." She nodded and chattered away again. She held up five fingers and mimed what I took to mean that they - the tunnels - ran from near the Tooth Palace to somewhere on each of the continents. We were obviously in the one connecting to North America.

"When did they set this up?" She chattered something that, even paying attention and asking her to repeat, I couldn't decipher. I was gonna have to ask Tooth to teach me how to talk to them. Not many people could talk as fast as me, and these girls could, I'd love to have a real chat. She shrugged when I said I couldn't understand and continued leading the way. We walked - flew in the fairy's case - through the tunnel for about five hours total. She chattered that it didn't usually take that long, but because I was walking... yeah. To pass the time, since we couldn't quite talk properly, I sang a few songs and she sang along with, in her way.

When I finally saw daylight peeking through the tunnel I was feeling very tired of tunnels. Flying was way better. "Sorry it took so long to get back." She chattered what I took to mean 'it's okay' and I called my wings back together so we could speed up the rest of the journey. We flew north-west for about ten minutes before the Himalayas soared above us. I'd never gotten around to going there yet, so the sight left me even more awestruck than it would have. I actually stopped in mid air for a moment to stare at it. I only got moving again when the fairy gestured impatiently towards the mountains. We flew to a mountain I could not recognize nor name. I only knew that the tallest one was Everest, that's it. She lead me to what, to a mortal, would have looked like a sheer cliff-face, but to us was an opening to the hollowed out inside of the mountain itself. Staring through the opening, I wondered if some lucky mortal had somehow seen in and had started the myth of Shangri La.

The fairy led me to the center of the Palace before darting off to store the tooth. I called thank you to her as she flew off, but I'm not sure if she heard. I touched down and released my wings again, not wanting them to be in the way of the thousands of fairies flittering around me, almost faster than my eyes could follow. I heard Tooth's voice coming from a little ways away and started in the direction it was coming from. It had been a month and a half since I'd seen her and I'd almost forgotten how hyperactive she was. I wasn't so shocked, though, I can be just as hyper. She turned and saw me walking towards her, a smile breaking out over her face. "Story!" She rushed over and launched into a hug, which I reciprocated.

"Sorry it took me so long to accept the invite. I'd promised my bro that I'd visit him when I first got out, so I stopped there first."

"It's no problem. I'm so excited you're here! You found the place alright?"

I nodded. "Yep, I got a hold of one of your fairies and she showed me the way. I kinda held her up, though. My wings were too big for the tunnel, so I had to walk." I glanced around at the Palace again. "You sure know how to decorate."

She giggled. "Thanks but, most of this was here before I took over the place."

"Oh, right, this used to be the home of the Sisters of Flight, right?"

She cocked her head, surprised. "You know about them?"

"Well... I uh, read the book about you. William Joyce's. Though I don't know how accurate he got."

"He actually did fairly well in his stories of us. Though he took some liberties and claimed creative license. Manny told us to meet him and relate our stories way back when. At the time, none of us had any clue why, but... well, now it's obvious. Almost the whole world believes in us now - not just the children!"

"I know. I was one of them. I'd say I still am, but that's fairly irrelevant."

"You know, you're the only immortal I know of who's been made since the books and movie went global. I wonder why Manny chose you."

"It's because I'm awesome, duh!"

She laughed. "I'm serious. Immortals are made to fill a need. The Nature Immortals are to help Mother Nature take care of the weather and to keep natural disasters to the lowest body count possible - while maintaining the balance of course. Legend Immortals are made because mortals have started stories about an event or thing, or because they need a legend to believe in. I was already collecting the teeth of my friends when I was still mortal, and Manny made me immortal so I could continue doing so. Sandy was made immortal because the children needed dreams - good dreams... You see where I'm going with this?"

I nodded. "I get what you're saying. I mean, looking at it objectively, what good does loving stories do? It's kind of like how, before any of you knew Jack, you didn't get the significance of a snowball fight or going sledding or a snow day. I can see what it looks like from an outside view. But, just like how collecting the teeth are important to you personally, telling and being told stories are the same for me. I was never not in love with a story. I can't remember a time when I couldn't read - I mean, my grandpa taught me when I was two. I even remember the first book I ever read." Nostalgia descended upon me in waves and a smile covered my face. It seemed I was just lounging in the past today wasn't I?

"I know that look." I looked up at tooth, a slight question in my expression. "You're lost in your memories." The smile I wore when I was reading was now making an appearance on her face.

"A few of them."

"You know, your box is here. We can go find it if you want."

"Don't you have to direct your fairies?"

"They know where all the teeth are, I give them directions because I feel more efficient. Right now I have a guest to entertain."

I chuckled. "Let's do it." She led me back to the center of the Palace and then off to a staircase on the side where we climbed up a few levels. We entered a room filled with thousands upon thousands of twinkling tooth boxes. My jaw was hanging open so wide, I'm surprised it wasn't dragging the floor. On the ones closest I could make out the faces of the children they belonged to, but the room itself was so huge that by the time my eyes had traveled only about a sixth of the way up, I couldn't even decipher the boxes anymore. It was only a pattern, and eventually, a gleaming gold up at the top of the domed ceiling. I'd gotten to the great cathedrals of Rome, I'd seen the Sistine Chapel - up close might I add - but this... This put them all to shame for the simple fact that this room held memories on top of it's beauty. I was so stunned that the only word I could utter was, "Whoa."

Tooth flew up to hover about ten feet off the floor in the center of the room. She slowly twirled as she spoke, looking over the room. "This is just one of the spaces where the teeth are stored. This is the most current of the ones for North America. The farther down you go, the older they get. The six spires house the teeth, one per continent - not including Antarctica."

"This... is the most current one?"

She nodded. "Uh-huh! In the old days one of these rooms would hold about fifty years worth of teeth, but at the population grew they now hold about twenty-five years, give or take. The one under us was less because of the baby boomers, but this one's almost full. We've only got room for another ten children before we have to start a new room."

"So, am I in here?"

"Yep! It shouldn't be too hard to find you - what year were you born?"

"1994, in April."

She flew over to a section to our left and started searching, muttering to herself. "April '94, April '94..." She glanced at me a moment before turning back to the boxes. "What day?"

"The eleventh."

"Time?"

I had to think for a minute. "Uh... about one in the afternoon, I think." She moved farther down the row she was in leaning in close now to look for my younger face. I walked over and stood under her - almost directly because the row she was looking in was one of the first twenty. I scanned the boxes, my eyes landing on a spot about seven or eight boxes away from her. "I think it's that one." I pointed to the one I was drawn to, another wave of nostalgia washing over me the longer I stared. Too impatient to wait, and seeing an opportunity to help, I scaled the wall, using what little hand holds there were, until I was eye to eye with a picture of myself. Smiling I pulled it out of it's slot and lightly dropped down, cradling the box in my hands.

The box itself was nearly weightless considering the sheer detail of the thing. It looked very similar to the one that housed Jack's teeth, but the colors were a bit different. And, of course, it was my face on the end. I gazed at the box as Tooth gently came to land next to me. She offered her hand. "May I?"

I smiled and held the box out towards her. "Can you see them too?"

She shrugged. "If you want me to, but you have to make the decision, I can't choose to look at the memories of others without their permission."

I smiled again. "Well, there's one in particular that I think you'd appreciate." She smiled in return and lightly laid her hand on the box. We watched the scene unfold, me from the perspective I remembered it. I was small - really small. So small that I could fit easily into the lap of the big person in the chair. My grandpa had one arm around me, holding me up and the other held a children's book open so I could see the pictures. My left hand was out to hold the left page back and I flipped the pages with my right. It was a small book, only a 5x5 square with maybe fifteen pages total, but to me it was the world. My voice reading the words, my grandpa's correcting me. The Toothfairy was sad because she didn't know what she was good at. One day she saw a little girl crying because her tooth had fallen out. To make the little girl feel better, she brought a coin from her home for the girl and gave it to her in exchange for the lost tooth. The other fairies saw how happy this made the kids and they helped her from them on. The Toothfairy wasn't sad any more. I smiled up at my grandpa, proud that I had read it all by myself. He smiled down at me and I begged to read it again. He said it was okay by him and we went back to the beginning.

I was smiling as the carpeted living room and my grandpa's favorite chair faded and were replaced with the gleaming and glittering walls of the Tooth Palace. "The first book you ever read was about me?"

I giggled at Tooth's astonished tone. "I was a little girl, fairies were the coolest thing ever - plus they were pretty!" I laughed again. "Yeah, but knowing the real you I cringe at the depiction from the book."

"Oh, I don't mind. None of us really look like what the children expect, so we don't really mind how we're depicted. All except for Bunny when they have him as a pink fluffy rabbit. I can't count how many times he's seen one of those and objected that he was 'most definitely not pink'."

"Guilty as charged." I raised my hand sheepishly. "I was one of those kids who thought he was pink. To be fair, I thought he was a seven foot tall pink fluffy bunny, so at least I got his height right." Tooth had doubled over in a fit of giggles at the thought of our Bunny bright pink. After less than a second I started laughing too. When I conquered my giggles for the most part I looked around at the room again, shaking my head in wonder. "Man, some of my friends from when I was mortal would have killed to see this place. And I'm just talking about the artists, not to mention the ones who needed to remember happiness." I shook my head again. "How do you know when a kid needs to remember something?"

"I feel it. The same way you can feel when someone's reading, I can feel when they need a memory. We can all feel when the children need us. The rest of the Guardians and myself especially."

I was silent for a time, trying to figure out how to voice a question I could barely put to words within the confines of my mind. "What's it like..."

"What's what like?"

"When someone stops believing in you." She was silent, no doubt surprised at the question. "I won't ask Jack things like this for obvious reasons, and Korri doesn't have any experience with this either. I know that when you gain a believer there's this... adrenaline rush, but I have no idea what loosing a believer feels like."

She paused, to consider her words I assumed. "Well... It feels like a piece of yourself has been ripped away. After a while, it doesn't hurt any more, and over the years, with as many believers as we have, you get used to it. But the first few times a child stops believing in you... it hurts." She stared off, I'm sure not seeing any of the room around us. If I had to guess, I'd say she was remembering when her childhood friends started to forget her. It's hard when people you care about forget you... believe me, I know.

Automatically, my mind brought a line to the surface, and almost unbidden it bubbled from my mouth. "You never forget kids like Emily or Andy... but they forget you."

"What?"

"It's what Jessie said in Toy Story 2 after her song about her kid. Appropriate, don't you think?"

"I've never seen the movie... or any movie for that matter."

"Are you serious? You've never seen a movie in over a hundred years of films, you've not seen one."

"No. Up until recent years I was too wrapped up in my system to even relax, I didn't have time to go and watch a movie."

"Well, we're just gonna have to fix that." The both of us chuckled and I gazed around the room again, in awe still. "This place really is beautiful. I'm not just speaking from an artistic standpoint here either."

She looked slightly embarrassed by the praise, but collected herself soon enough. "Well, thank you."

I was still gazing at the thousands of tooth boxes that were from the past 26 years alone. And only from North America! Honestly, one of the thoughts running through my mind was 'that's a lot of kids'. I looked back to my box, turning it slightly to see more of it. Tooth was watching me - not in a weird way - and I didn't mind. I kind of wondered what she was thinking about, and I'm sure she was wondering the same about me. "You know, I still have some of my baby teeth." I don't know why I'd said it, maybe it was the scenery and who I was with, maybe it was that I was holding my box that I knew wasn't full. In any case I'd said it.

"Really? I thought you were, what twenty, when you became immortal."

"Nineteen. My mom's the same way. The ones right behind the incisors are still the ones from when I was little. My 'adult' teeth never grew in, and the baby ones never fell out."

"Every now and again that happens. In which case the boxes don't have spaces for those teeth, so my fairies and I know to not keep expecting them. Almost all of the children who were like that have an easier time believing in us. Something to do with keeping their baby teeth, even one of them, keeps them childlike in some way."

"Well, I can attest to that. When I was little everything was as real as anything else... come to think of it,, it probably was real. Once I got older, I started really believing, but, by then, so much of the magic was lost to me that I thought I had missed my chance." The faint memory of all those heartbreaks because of possible magic tugged at me for a moment, but, like I always do, I forced myself to be happy by relating another one. "Then I met Jack, and it was possible again. I had proof, even if I couldn't see, hear, or touch it, I had poof. And then I saw him... and the proof was in front of my eyes. That day, everything that the Guardians stand for came true for me. My dreams and hopes came true. My wonder was lit again. Every memory of magic came flooding to the surface, proven to be real. And I couldn't stop smiling."

Tooth smiled at me. "Jack does have that effect on people."

"That he does."

After sitting in the room for a little while longer, idly chatting, Tooth gave me the grand tour. The Tooth Palace was more intricate than I'd at first thought. The six spires were all at different heights because of population and when the continent became inhabited. Asia and Europe were by far the tallest with Africa coming in third. The next one down was South America and then North America. The shortest one was Australia, but only by a room or two. Asia and Europe had actually reached near the top of the mountain, and had smaller sub-spires to house the current teeth. Seeing all of the sheer space that the teeth took up, just proved how many people had lived over the years.

We flew around the upper reaches of the palace to get a full view, as well as walking the halls. To be honest, I couldn't decide which view I liked more. We made it to her globe eventually, and it was much as she described it. The lights glittering over the surface reminded me of the lights I saw all those years ago every night. The tour rounded up with the pool far down by the base of the Palace On the wall, there was a mosaic of Tooth and some children entrusting their teeth to her, and around the pool was foliage that I had never seen in the western world. It was times like these, where I saw such incredible sights, that I relished being immortal. I would have never gotten to see the Tooth Palace had I not.

Tooth and I sat at the edge of the pond. I kicked off my shoes and dangled my feet in the water, leaning back and gazing up at the vast interior of the mountain. "So, did you enjoy the tour?" Tooth asked the question in the expected way.

"Very much. It's a lot different from the tour I gave you, that's for sure. Lot's more color."

"Oh, I don't know, your room might rival it."

"Yeah, I never did think there was ever too much color." We both laughed, me still gazing about. I never was one to shy away from beautiful things.

"You just can't stop looking, can you?"

I shook my head. "Nope." Another chuckle from her.

"I've never met an immortal who was so... you."

"Jack's pretty similar."

"That's not what I mean. You look at everything in a way that a lot of us overlook. You see it differently."

"Well, North has said that he sees wonder in everything, and Jack can always find a way to joke and smile. Sandy's always in a good mood, always optimistic. I don't see why I'm so different."

"It's the way that you're all of those things, but not. How do you manage to... be you."

"Stories. Every book I read had the most amazing people within the pages. I even created some. The more I interacted with those people the more I wanted to be like them. Eventually, I did. I managed to see everything from every angle, every possible way of telling the story, so to speak. Some ways work better than others, some are more widely accepted. Some are just easier to understand. But the ones that are really important are often misconstrued, and our views are different from what they should be. I managed to find a way to see those ones in the way I believe to be correct." I laughed at my own philosophical-ness. "And now I sound like a profit."

"Well... I guess that's one way to look at it."

"My point exactly." A handful of her fairies swooped down and chattered what I assumed were updates, which reminded me. When they flew off, and Tooth's focus was once more on me, I said, "How many languages do you speak anyway?"

"I lost count a while back. I can tell you that it's way more than Google Translate knows, that's for sure."

"I'm pretty sure I know more languages than Google Translate." We both giggled before I resumed my thought. "What are the most interesting ones?"

"Well, I speak Yeti, Draconian - "

"The language that dragons speak?"

"Yes. Most of them know English and the other big languages as well, but when they're alone they speak Draconian. I was actually really surprised to see one at the Sanctuary."

"Everyone always is, but Del's flameless, and he doesn't really live up to the reputation that dragons as a species have. Once you get to know him, it's really no big surprise Jack invited him to stay."

"Hm. Well let's see... I speak..." She rattled off a list of 'interesting ones', meaning ones that humans had never heard, as well as a few lesser known or extinct human languages. "There are actually very few languages that I don't speak."

One of the fairies swooped in again to give more updates. They'd been doing this since we'd started our tour. "Do you think you could teach me their language?"

"Whose?" She looked at me quizzically.

"Theirs." I gestured towards the Palace and the fairies buzzing about it.

"You want to know how to speak like my fairies?"

"More like I want to understand what they're saying better. I can really only understand through their body language right now. It's like trying to talk to TinkerBell."

"Oh, I loved Peter Pan."

"Play?"

"Yes, the opening night, actually. I was above the stage, behind the lights, and it was beautiful. The smiles on the faces of the children was precious, especially when they all shouted that they believed in fairies." She giggled, remembering.

"I wish I could have seen the play, but it was before my time. I'll just have to content myself with the Disney version and 'Finding Neverland', which is a movie about the story being created. But, I really do want to learn their language. I've rarely met someone who can talk as fast as I can, you and your ladies fit the bill."

She laughed again. "I'm not going to argue with you there." She considered it for a moment. "Alright, I'll teach you, but it'll probably take a while."

"I don't mind, I've got eternity after all."

"Hey, um... this is a little embarrassing, but... do you think, um... does..." She paused and took a breath before rushing through the next scentence so fast that, had I not been a fast talker myself, I'd have needed it repeated. "DoesJackevertalkaboutme?" She had her eyes closed as she said it, slowly opening one to see my reaction.

I gave her a smile. "He talks about all the Guardians, but, honestly, he talks about his believers more than anything."

"Oh." Her shoulders slumped and her face fell.

"However, I have it on good authority - my own - that he likes you."

Everything about her lifted. "Really?" Eyes wide and a smile on her face, she looked hopeful.

"Yeah, he's told me a few times. And, between you and me," I leaned in closer to her and lowered my voice. "Hanging out with me all the time, he's gonna be used to your level of hyper real quick." I laughed, to show it was a joke, and not an insult. She started laughing too.

"So... you don't ... like him, do you?"

"I like him in a platonic way. He's one of my best friends." I shrugged. "I'm not sure I could like him in a way that's not platonic, we're too similar. I mean, he's almost like a genderbent version of myself! That'd be far too narcissistic, even for me. And I love myself."

She sighed in relief and smiled at me. "I was really hoping that'd be your answer." She looked at me sheepishly. "To tell you the truth, when we went to the meeting at The Sanctuary, and you were there... I was scared that you were his girlfriend. And then the way you two acted towards each other... But now that I've spent some time with you myself, I can see why you two are so comfortable around each other. You really are similar."

"That's what I'm sayin!" And yet, on Jack it's fine, on me it's annoying. I'll never understand some peoples - Korri's - way of thinking. "Yeah. I can promise you, I don't have any feelings towards Jack other than friendship." I stared up at the Palace again for a moment. "To quote a young man who broke convention through compassion; I looked at him and I saw myself." Hiccup's line at the moment where he makes the biggest decision of his life was always my favorite part of the movie. Up until that point, he could have turned back. The moment he told Astrid that he saw himself in Toothless, he was done looking back.

"Who said that?"

"A talking fish-bone." He confused expression only made me laugh.

I stayed at the Palace for about a week, and to be honest, it was a lot of fun. Tooth and her fairies were awesome, I even went out with her one night. That was interesting, I was the calm one for once. We spent a while looking at my memories that I thought she'd like, I gave her my drawing of her. Oh, she loved it, framed it on the wall even. All in all, I had a lot of fun. Tooth was easy to get along with, and - for me - easy to keep up with. When I finally got around to leaving a handful of the fairies were sad to see me leave. The ones that stayed at the palace had hung out with Tooth and me for most of my stay, and like I said, the girls and I got along. When I waved goodbye I promised them that I'd be back for another visit before too long. As I left the Himalayas I flew towards Europe, feeling an urge to see the cathedrals again after the Palace's grand tooth rooms. I stopped in Greece first, to see the Parthenon, the temple being home to some of my favorite legends from when I'd been alive... the Olympians, or at least one of them.

After hanging around for a while I strolled the streets of Athens, the colors bringing a smile to my face. That's something I'd always loved about most of Europe is that nearly all of the cities are colorful, simply with the architecture. I came across a street performer playing a guitar. Owning a guitar myself, I felt like giving the guy a hand. The melody was one I wasn't familiar with, not surprising considering where I was, but he was playing it in a way that wasn't going to be earning him much money. I walked over to him and stood at his shoulder... well, under it, he was almost a foot taller than me. A few seconds after standing there he started getting lost in his music, which in turn made it better. A handful of people stopped by to listen, dropping change as they moved on. Four songs later, he'd made the U.S. equivalent of about $40. I smiled towards him as I turned to walk away. A woman was still listening to his playing, having stayed there for most of the songs. As I moved away she left and started in the same direction as me. I shrugged it off as coincidence, it'd happened before and probably would again.

About a block away I got the shock of my life when the woman grabbed my shoulder and steered me into the alley. She shoved me up against the wall and glared at me. "What the hell do you think you're doing stepping on my turf? That guy was mine to muse! What gives you the right to steal my potential believer!"

The screamed words, which were screamed in Greek by the way, along with the unexpected physical contact had left my brain temporarily AWOL, so I could only come up with one word in response. "Huh?"

She sighed dramatically and face-palmed. "Great, I'm now having believers stolen from me by an idiot."

My brain snapped back at what I realized was an insult, recognizing the Grecian word for idiot. "Hey, excuse you but I actually possess some intelligence, which is more than I can say for guitar guy over there. Now I don't know who you are or what your problem is, but I don't take kindly to being screamed at by a stranger in a language I don't even know."

"Oh, you're American. Well, that explains a little of your behavior." I narrowed my eyes at the thinly veiled - if at all - insult. At least she was speaking in English now, though with a think Grecian accent that made it hard to understand her. "I asked you why you we're stealing a possible believer from me on my own turf."

"I didn't realize that Athens was anyone's turf." It then dawned on me who this mystery woman could have been. "Wait, you're not..."

"Athena? Hardly, my name is Mnemosyne, and I am the muse."

My jaw dropped at the mention of muse. Then I heard what she'd called herself. "Wait, nemosy... whatever you said, that's not any of the muses. The muses are Calliope, Melpomene, Thalia, Urania, Clio, Erato, Terpsichore, Euterpe and Polyhymnia. Your name's not anywhere on that list." I'd counted the muses off on my fingers as I'd said them so I knew if I'd forgotten them.

She raised her eyebrows at me. "I'm impressed, not many Americans can name all of the muses off that easily... or correctly. Hell, most of them think there are only six thanks to that Disney movie from the 90's."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome, and I tell you that grudgingly. No I am not any of the classical muses, though I've gone by those names at times. No, I am the muse. And my name is Mnemosyne. You still haven't told me yours."

"I'm Story. Story Tale. I'm still fairly new at the immortal business, so I wouldn't be surprised if you don't know me."

"And that explains more."

"Excuse me?" I was really starting to not like the veiled insults.

"Just how new are you?" Her tone was snotty and superior, as if she already knew the answer.

"Six and a half years."

She nodded to herself. "What are you doing in Athens? You're an American, shouldn't you be tending your little plot of believers in your home town?"

I snorted. "Please, The day I became immortal I left that hole in the ground. I only got the nerve to go back this summer. And for your information, I just 'tended it' a little over a week ago, thank you very much."

"So you've actually got believers?" She chuckled. "I take it that you've gotten yourself a mentor, then? An older immortal to show you how it was done?"

"Well, I've got Jack. But I got my believers all on my own, without his help" Though he could have told my brother about me!

"Wait a minute. Jack? As in Jack Frost?" I nodded. "Of course you'd hunt him down first. You're one of his little fangirls aren't you? I can't tell you how many fanfictions about him that I've had to inspire."

"Oh, I know, me too. But no, I actually met him when I was still mortal. The year after the movie he met my little bro and me and after a few weeks I could fully see him. We're really good friends."

"So, you're not one of his fangirls?"

"Oh, hell no! At least, not in the way most of them are. I was until we became friends, now I can't really consider myself one anymore, because, you know, that'd be weird."

"Great, then we can at least be comrades. I can not deal with fangirls of any caliber!"

"Well, then don't drag me into any conversations about Wally West, Jim Hawkins, Beast Boy, Howl Pendragon, Dmitri from Anastasia, Generator Rex, Prince Adam from Beauty and the Beast - the Disney version - or Garret from Quest for Camelot. Those boys I completely fangirl over, and I do so shamelessly."

She leaned in conspiratorially. "I've actually got to agree with you about Howl. I didn't realize he'd be animated so well when I was inspiring him."

My jaw dropped. God, woman! I should be worshiping at your feet! "You've inspired Hayao Myazaki? You've inspired Howl?"

She nodded with a triumphant smile that I could have sworn was smug. "M-hm."

"Man... Okay, so we got off on the wrong foot."