Disclaimer: I do not own Rise of the Guardians or any of its characters.

Enjoy.

Chapter One:

He doesn't remember resting inside of this small four walled room—Jack Frost is absolutely sure that the other Guardians were also not with him, considering he had fallen into an undisturbed sleep in the middle of a snow bank after losing his ability to continue going through Burgess. But there's no sight of any freshly placed snow, no scent of clear air and he's completely dry, covered in a red cotton blanket.

He bets they're being held captive. It does smell like rotten flesh and if Jack's hearing isn't too screwed, he's sure he can hear the rattle of metal coming from somewhere near.

The tip of Bunnymund's nose twitches and he lets out a groan, albeit stifled due to his mouth being pressed against his furry arm. Jack can see North and Tooth's bodies lying on the rock hard cement ground—he wonders if they can feel their backs cracking as they wiggle into comfortable positions—and Sandy, ever the gentle Guardian, is knocked out peacefully in the corner.

Crust falls out of the crevices of Jack's eyes when he wipes them sleepily, mumbling incoherent words under his breath. With a sigh, he peers at the door handle behind him, twisting his neck to get a good view, and contemplates if he should get up and look around. In the end, he does, and his feet drift further with slow pace as he reaches for the door. It opens teasingly.

And just like that, Jack loses the capability to differentiate reality with other worldly things. When all he hears is black, all he sees is thumps, all he feels is the atoms in the air and all he knows is nothing, Jack slams the door shut and falls back. He loses his balance, tripping on the wet flooring due to complete befuddlement and surprise. Never before has the winter spirit experienced the feelings of absolute emptiness while staring into water.

Then he remembers. He has—once before. 300 years ago.

His death had been a messy one. Despite the lack of blood, lungs had been filled with a never ending supply of water, the desperate gasps for oxygen merely spreading bubbles out into the deep, ice cold lake. His ears didn't hear anymore; all sounds turned into a quiet buzzing from his own brain working and failing in an attempt to stay alive and his heart pumping rapidly in his chest. To put it simply, he felt numb. All throughout his fingertips, his toes, his nose, even his eyeballs as he clenched them tightly. Jackson Overland was terrified.

But it ended just as quickly as he'd slipped under the ice—the Man in the Moon is his savior. He revived him for the sake of protecting the world's children and nature from evil forces such as Pitch, and Jack intends to carry out that exact mission as long as he stands on Earth's surface.

That means lots coming from an immortal.

Jack's fingers curl around the blanket draped on him, swallowing heavily as his veins pulse within the seconds and the distending of his heart. He crawls into a ball on the floor, trying to keep himself warm. Drawn out mutters rise in the silence and the spirit's head whips around to see Bunnymund and the rest of the Guardians waking up, dopey smiles consistent on their faces. As soon as they rub their closed eyelids, they survey the room, wondering exactly where they are. But when they have a good, long glance at the Guardian of fun, they immediately go pale.

"Jack?" Tooth asks, motherly worry evident on her face. She brings her fingers to her mouth, widening her eyes as her feathers ruffle.

Bunnymund looks utterly confused. "Mate, your hair's turning brown."

Jack reaches to touch his hair, feeling the shaggy strands coarse through his fingers whilst stretching them further into his point of view. His eyes show dubiety as he glances at the other Guardians unsurely.

"Dat was Jack's hair before he vas Jack Frost," North comments with a smile.

"Yeah, but what's going on?" the sprite questions, drained of most of his energy by now. "Why isn't it staying white?"

"Wait a second," Bunnymund interrupts, "are you telling me Frostbite here's reverting back into a human?"

"No. But immortal hair will change if memories played with."

The Pooka leans his head in, eyes narrowing with doubt. He tries to ignore the harsh whispering coming from behind him and the bangs of bodies crashing into walls, but gets irked enough that he starts tapping his foot.

(Tooth is flying around the room, angrily muttering things while Sandy attempts to knock her out with his dream sand. "If anybody so much as messes with Jack I will have their head on a silver platter!")

"So you're saying some mongrels are messin' with Frostbite's mind?"

"I have made point clear," North says with enthusiasm, smiling despite the seriousness of the situation.

"That still doesn't answer how," Jack intervenes harshly, running his hands through his hair. He looks at his palm as if expecting paint to be staining his skin. "I mean, Pitch is locked away and I've only visited him once out of guilt so it's not like he has access to anything." The winter spirit looks into each of the other Guardian's eyes, hoping his assumptions are true. "Right? Am I right?"

Waving it off, North says, "Yes, Pitch is long gone. But dat does not mean other spirits be . . . nice to Jack Frost."

Noticing the sudden pause in North's statement, Bunnymund can't help but feel even more curious. "Other spirits? How many are there? Frostbite's the end of the line!"

"Who would answer to a talking Kangaroo?" the Guardian of fun asks sarcastically, deciding to rest his back against the wall.

He makes a face when it burns his skin, the steam rising off his fingertip. This goes unbeknownst to Bunnymund as he glares at Jack with heated eyes.

"What did you call me?"

As Jack glares back, North steps in with an irritated expression. "No jibber jabber, be good Guardians."

Bunnymund mutters something under his breath, rolling his eyes at the look he's given. Sandy and Tooth calm down, having run out of breath along with their sore bodies, and Tooth flies over to Jack concernedly. She slaps his cheek lightly when she notices the food stuck in his teeth.

For the Tooth Fairy, she is quite the character.

Sandy comes in between all of the Guardians and forms a question mark above his head, motioning around himself. He clearly wants to know what they're all going to be doing about their current predicament, and figure out the reason behind being here. But right when North gives him a reassuring look, Jack yelps, having burned himself on the wall by accident again.

"The wall's hot," he says, furrowing his eyebrows.

"Exaggeration gets you nowhere, mate."

"No. I mean, really, really hot."

"I have swell ears, seeing as I heard you the first time—"

Jack rolls his eyes, smiling falsely at the accusation. "It almost burnt the tip of my finger off."

Tooth is nodding enthusiastically, having accidentally set one of her feathers on fire by touching the wall. "He's telling the truth."

"See!"

Butting his nose in, North brightens. "I have idea."

He pushes on the wall using all of his strength. His teeth grind together as he uses enough force for it to push in, showing a blinding passageway as the wall concaves and then disappears in a rush of dust. Behind it shows a faded silhouette, black being the obvious color of the choice of outfit—the Guardians have to blink rapidly and squint for the radiating light to not be so wicked to their vision until it begins to lessen.

Bunnymund looks at the figure and embodiment of Christmas with a questioning glance (and through squinted eyes). "Where'd ya learn to have such senses, mate?"

North wiggles his eyebrows. "It's all in belly."

Out from the glaring light comes a familiar boy dressed in black armor with a staff completely different from Jack's—it has a moonbeam on the end attached to a metal base while Jack's is obviously a wooden stick back from the 1700's—and the Guardians, with the exception of the youngest companion, immediately perk up in this mystery person's presence.

Nightlight: Once the bodyguard of the Man in the Moon, now the protector of light and a reason for evil disappearing throughout the world's history. Also the entire package of light radiating from a single lanky body that holds such power and strength.

Jack is fascinated even without others informing him of these facts—for some reason he just knows them. Every neuron and brain cell work together to form the perfect depiction of Nightlight's life, the image glowing in the winter spirit's jumbled mind. He stops dead in his thoughts, gaping at the other boy with awe.

"This is so cool."

Bunnymund kicks him in the shin, silently telling him to keep quiet.

Gesturing behind himself, Nightlight invites all of them inside with haste. The Guardians topple in, now being able to see clearly what with the bright light having dimmed to a dark atmosphere, but the steaming hot air gives them a struggle to breathe. Nightlight's glowing body creates a vibrant aroma of dancing flames and with every flicker, Jack feels like he's soaring closer to the moon.

The narrow but curved path that they take leads them to a three walled area, each wall made from dark blue rock. A gloomy feeling surrounds each Guardian as they take notice of the dug up pit placed neatly in the middle of the room. It is inevitably bubbling, blue fire sparking out of the steaming pit. But on the top, there, inside of the hole, are a multitude of shying away white fragrances—a sign of life being taken from the teeth which store memories inside of them like safes. A sign that Tooth's memory boxes and their containings have been stolen and brewed like stew.

And in the far corner, golden eyes flash.

"Well look who we have here," comes the mirthful voice, accented with snide.

Jack's eyes widen while Tooth and Bunnymund look like they'd be ready to fight if they were abruptly attacked. The Tooth Fairy's expression is full of dripping acid as her saucer like eyes dig into Pitch's slithering torso. He moves around crossly and each of the Guardians expect to soon hear the hissing of a snake if the Nightmare King continues to crawl around like said animal.

"What is he doing here?" Bunnymund asks defensively.

"I thought we took care of him?" The winter spirit's eyebrows furrow as he directs the question to Nightlight, to which he receives no answer.

Sandy huffs, creating images of violence with his sand—Bunnymund quickly covers Jack's eyes, but the sprite shoves his companion off with a scowl and extreme effort; the rabbit lands on his butt with an angry narrow of his eyes.

North merely glares, lips a thin line.

When Tooth finally speaks, she belts out a long, furious rant: "How do you expect me to live knowing the Bogeyman is free to hurt all those poor, poor children around the world? And why hasn't anybody done anything to fix this? Where is the Man in the Moon when you need him?" She grips her face hopelessly. "I told Baby Tooth to watch the memory boxes, too, and with the slightest turn of her back, everything has disappeared! Childhood memories existed in those boxes dated all the way past Jack's timeline in the 18th century!"

Pitch rolls his shining eyes at her, the action causing Nightlight to burn brighter with irritation.

"Poor girl," he mocks, "losing her entire pride and joy."

Jack's staff rises as he heaves angrily, but can't seem to find the right words to shout at the King in the shadows before him. The other Guardians look to Nightlight for some explaining of their current situation.

The air around them is sweltering hot that their skin drips sweat, the white memories diving in and out of the pit while spouting out sounds of happiness and sadness, anger and madness.

The firefly like boy smiles reassuringly, clearing his throat shyly. He talks with a soft voice, "Normally, I do not speak. Only do I ever on certain occasions. In your time of need, I shall assist you in every way possible." The Guardians' expressions of shock stay firm. They never expected him to use speech as his form of communication—he usually used drawings. "The hole over there contains melted teeth as one of you already know." He nods to Tooth, keeping his eyes focused on Pitch. "This is because they were stolen in a rush of black sand and they dissolved in thin air. Every lost memory finds itself here in the pit until they can be returned to their, or its, correct box."

North strokes his beard thoughtfully. "And Man in Moon sent you to us?"

"Yes."

"So whose is it?" Bunnymund questions with genuine curiosity. His friends are taking in the new information like vacuums, but they still glance at him when he speaks up.

Nightlight tilts his head.

Sighing, he clarifies, "The memory box. Whose is in there right now?"

With a sharp blink, Pitch seethes, "Jackson Overland."