Chapter Text
Jack didn’t know what happened. One second, he was panicking in one of North’s closets, and the next, he was asleep.
His dreams had been filled with shapeless forms and abstract patterns. Not a nightmare, but not really what you’d call a good dream. Just… neutral.
Jack’s neutral feelings disappeared once he awoke, realizing that someone must have found him and moved him to a bed. And maybe he should have been grateful for that, since it wasn’t like the closet was particularly comfortable, but he didn’t. He just felt a strange combination of anger and fear, which he still needed to sort out- a task made difficult by the remaining tendrils of sleepiness and exhaustion that still clung to him.
He sat up and rubbed his eyes, looking around. He was in what seemed to be a simple bedroom, what little decoration there was being mostly red. There was a closed window that showed snow outside.
So he was still in the North Pole, then.
Jack considered trying to leave, but when he got up and tried the window, he found he couldn’t get it open. He didn’t know if that window just never opened or if the Guardians had purposefully locked it to keep him there, but it made his anger spike either way.
And then he realized he didn’t have his staff.
Where was it? He was pretty sure he had it when he ran away from the Guardians, but his memories after that were pretty fuzzy. He hadn’t dropped it, had he?
Had the Guardians taken it from him?
Soon, his anger at least had a target, as a door opened, and the Easter Bunny walked in.
“Oh, so you’re awake, then.”
Jack glared at him.
“What. The fuck.”
Aster just sighed and stepped further into the room.
“You were panicking, and Sandy knocked ya out with some of his sand,” the giant rabbit explained.
Jack rolled his eyes.
“You know, I think you guys being the Guardians of Childhood is concerning considering that you have both kidnapped and drugged me at this point,” he huffed.
The rabbit shrugged, though he at least had the decency to look guilty about it.
“Knockin’ ya out wasn’t exactly the plan, but it did stop yer panic attack.”
Jack sent another glare at him, and Aster turned away, his ears falling back a bit.
“Look, I’m sorry about what happened. I shouldn’t’ve yelled at ya like that,” the rabbit, surprisingly, apologized.
Jack, however, wasn’t in the mood for accepting it.
“Whatever,” Jack spat. “Where’s my staff?”
“Yer staff…?” Aster blinked, seeming confused for a second. “Oh. You should probably ask North about that, mate.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s the one who picked it up,” Aster explained, raising an eyebrow. “I don’t know where he left it.”
Jack wanted to let out an angry yell, but he held himself back. He didn’t want to start another argument that could send him into another panic attack. He just wanted to get his staff so he could leave .
So, instead of saying anything, Jack just marched over to the door Aster had entered from and threw the door back open. He started down the hall, Aster following close behind him.
“Yer goin’ the wrong way!” he called after him.
Letting out an annoyed sound, Jack turned around and started going the other direction, only stopping when he came to a fork in the hallway. Aster took this opportunity to walk past him.
“Come on, instead of wandering around, I’ll just show you where North is.”
Begrudgingly, Jack followed the Guardian down the hallways, silently admitting that it was easier to have Bunny show him the way, but he hadn’t wanted to ask. He didn’t even want Aster to be there- he didn’t want to be there- so he had just been hoping he’d gone in the right direction.
Eventually, Aster led him back to the place he’d been dragged yesterday: the Globe Room. Inside, the other three Guardians were standing together, talking about something (or, making images in Sandy’s case). They, however, stopped talking when they spotted the two of them.
Toothiana immediately flew over, getting much closer than Jack was comfortable with.
“Jack! How are you feeling?” her voice oozed with pitying sweetness that just ticked Jack’s annoyance up a notch.
“Fine. I need my staff,” he replied shortly.
The Tooth Fairy frowned.
“Jack-”
Jack turned his gaze to North.
“The kangaroo says you have it.”
North nodded.
“Yes, but-”
“Give it back.”
Jack didn’t really care that he was cutting them off.
“We will, but we think we need to talk first,” Toothiana told him.
“I think we’ve done more than enough talking ,” Jack hissed. “And I already made it pretty clear that I don’t want to be a Guardian, and I don’t care what the Man in the Moon said.”
“Not about being a Guardian,” the woman clarified. “About what happened after.”
That brought Jack’s fear, which had been pushed under his anger before now, to the forefront of his mind for a second. Before it could do anything, though, Jack pushed it back down.
“No,” he denied. “We don’t need to talk about that, and we aren’t going to.”
Sandy made a series of symbols that Jack still didn’t understand.
“Yes,” North said, apparently agreeing with whatever Sandy’s message was. “Jack, we need to apologize.”
Was he still asleep or something? Because this was the second time one of the Guardians had attempted to apologize to him.
“We are sorry we did not find you sooner, and we should not have overwhelmed you with becoming Guardian like that. Perhaps we should have waited on the ceremony,” North admitted. “… I have also been informed that you were actually not a fan of the yeti sack.”
“Oh, really, what gave it away?” Jack asked dryly, ignoring the rest of the apology in favor of giving a sarcastic reply.
His emotions were reaching a point where they were starting to mimic the apathy he tended to fall into. They were still there , but for the moment, at least, he wasn’t really showing them.
“We really are sorry, Jack,” Toothiana added. “Becoming a Guardian is a big responsibility, and we didn’t realize you weren’t going to be excited about it.”
Why would they think he would be excited about it? They kidnapped him and then expected him to do what they wanted, ignored him when he tried to tell them that he didn’t want to do it.
“And about what happened with Pitch…,” Toothiana continued. “We really did try to find you.”
Jack crossed his arms.
“Yeah, ‘Cuz I was supposed to help you defeat him, right,” he pointed out. “And like you all said, it turns out you didn’t need me. So why bother now ? Pitch is gone, so whatever purpose I was supposed to fulfill is a moot point now.”
He took a deep breath in.
“So, really, why fucking kidnap me and all this?” he asked. “What, did you guys just want to mess with me? Get back at me for whatever pranks I’ve pulled over the years? Seriously, what. Was. The. Point?”
The room was quiet for a moment before the silence was broken.
“You are still Guardian, regardless of what happened with Pitch,” North explained. “Manny chose you because of Pitch, but he would not have chosen you if you were not meant to be a Guardian after. Pitch’s attack decided when you were meant to become Guardian, not whether you are a Guardian.”
Jack, without meaning to, laughed.
“I’m not a Guardian,” he stated. “I told you- I don’t care if the Man in the Moon wants me to be. I don’t , and I’m not going to.”
“Jack…”
“No. I said no,” Jack repeated. “I’m not- I’m not some damn lapdog that’s going to jump at its master’s command. I’ve been ignored for 300 years, and maybe you four didn’t specifically have any responsibility to talk to me, but Manny- Manny did . He made me and gave me a name, and that’s it . If he wanted me to behave , maybe he should have trained me better.”
He laughed again. So, that was the end of his false calm, then.
“Like, seriously? ” Jack continued. “Do you know how long I spent trying to get him to talk to me before giving up? Do you know what it’s like to have everyone , even the spirit who made you, pretend that you don’t exist? To have every human you meet walk through you, not be able to see you, but then find out that other spirits can see you and talk to you, but they just don’t want to? And now the Man in the Moon decides that he actually has a use for me, so he tells all of you to go fetch me? And so, what now? You all want me to do what I’m ‘supposed’ to do. You never wanted to talk to me before, and now that I have a use, now you want to talk to me? You don’t want to talk to me- fine. No one else does either. But you don’t just get to decide to change your minds when you want something from me. You don’t.”
Jack’s words were punctuated with another silence, this time broken by Aster.
“You’re wrong.”
And those two words almost made Jack shoot ice at him before the rabbit continued (though, he couldn’t have done it without his staff anyway).
“Jack, we did have a responsibility to you,” he clarified. “We’re the Guardians of Childhood, and you are a child. We just didn’t realize that before… So, we’re sorry. We shouldn’t have ignored ya.”
Bunny’s words just made Jack’s emotions get even more tangled up.
“But you did .”
“We did.”
Another laugh.
“So, what? You apologize, so we’re just all supposed to be buddy-buddy now?” he asked.
“No,” Bunny sighed. “But… Maybe we could try to be civil, at least. Honestly, I know I’ve been the most hostile to you, so you probably don’t believe me, but…”
The large rabbit sighed.
“We’re not gonna ignore ya anymore,” he promised. “And we can just forget about the Guardian stuff for now. Okay?”
Jack just stared at him, stared at all of them. He was still so angry, but he also recognized that they were offering him something he wanted, a long time ago. He wanted them to talk to him, to acknowledge him. But part of him felt like it was too late, now.
“… Can I just have my staff back?”
North nodded and walked over to another closet, taking the wooden staff out and handing it back to the teen. Jack instantly felt the tiniest bit better with it in his hands.
“I will tell yetis not to throw you out if you want to come over some time,” the older man offered.
Jack didn’t accept the offer, but he didn’t deny it, either.
Instead, he just found the nearest window and, with the help of the wind, left.