Disclaimer: I don't own RotG

AN: *waves shyly* Hello, everyone! This is my first RotG fanfic, so I'm a little nervous about it. I'm generally a Merlin fanfic author, but I was convinced by a friend (carinims01) to give this a shot. Listening to "Is This the Day?" by Hoobastank didn't make the plot bunny very easy to ignore, too. Seriously, go listen to this song, and you'll be having Jack Frost feels all over the place.

A few notes, and I'll be out of your hair for the rest of the fic. 1) I chose to use the name "Pippa" for Jack's sister in this fic because I could not get the idea of him calling her "Pip" for short out of my mind. It is too cute. 2) I have never read the books, so I apologize if something seems out of canon. 3) I suck at writing in an Australian accent. I am so sorry about that. 4) This three-shot is already fully written! Nearly 13k words total! I actually wrote it backwards (starting with chapter three, I mean), so we'll have to see how that goes. I will be updating again in a few days.

With that, enjoy "Unsaid Goodbye!" All mistakes are my own.

~Hide and Seek~

"I was never fond of 'ide'n'seek."

Jack, an expression of disbelief on his face, turns around to address the bemoaning Bunny. "Don't you hide eggs for children to seek?" he asks, quirking a brow and smirking.

"Oi, no need to be a smar' arse," Bunny grumbles with a scowl. "This is diff'rent an' ya know it. An' whaddya stoppin' for?" He pushes Jack lightly from behind. "We shoulda never sep'rated from th' othas, but we migh' as well keep goin' now tha' we 'ave."

Jack rolls his eyes, but he continues through the abandoned park, his staff at the ready. "Well, you didn't have to follow me."

"'Course I did. Ya ge' in trouble whereva ya go, and don' even—"

"Save the lecture. It's only one of them," Jack interrupts. "I could have handled it."

And he most certainly could have, if he had caught up to it in time. One stray Nightmare without its herd is hardly a threat, admittedly—without Pitch to direct them, they had few sentient thoughts and no ability to make truly strategic decisions—but even so, Jack most certainly did not like the idea of letting one slip through their fingers. Besides, his fellow Guardians had been disposing of its companions just fine, so he figured they'd thank him for offering to track down the one that escaped because Lord knows how frustrating it's been at times to try to round up all the stragglers after the ordeal with Pitch. It seemed that every time they thought they got them all, another small herd or a lone wolf would appear out of nowhere.

They liked to play hide and seek, Jack had been quick to discover and relate to his friends. Alone, a Nightmare could still be a threat to a child, but it did not have enough power to corrupt more than a single dream or so much as overcome a minor Spirit, let alone a Guardian. Together, they were far more formidable, even without Pitch to order them around. After feeding on the suspense of the seeker from its hiding place, however? In either case, their power grew.

It is a very good thing, then, that Jack is an expert at this game.

"Did you even 'ear us tellin' ya ta wait?"

"'Course I did," Jack scoffs. "I just didn't listen. Do I ever? I didn't want it to escape."

Bunny mutters something like "bloody teenager" under his breath before saying sardonically, "Well, it's gone 'n' escaped now, hasn' it? Prob'ly long gone by now, mate."

"That wasn't my fault!" Jack hisses, suddenly very aware of the prickling sensation one associates with the feeling of being watched on the back of his neck. "I had it in sight, but then you distracted me, coming up behind me like that. Now shut up. It's still here. Can't you feel it?"

To his credit, Bunny catches the seriousness in Jack's tone and stops speaking, his ears twitching in every direction and green eyes darting to and fro. With bated breath, Jack himself pivots slowly on his foot and squints through the fog at the shadowy figure of a rickety old swing set and playground structure.

It is here. He knows it. Immediately, he seeks out the best hiding spots, the hidden nooks and crannies of the contorted metal bars and plastic slides…

Jack smirks. There you are.

Without warning, he shoots a bolt of ice at the dark space tucked behind a fake rock-wall, and the Nightmare bolts out, its glowing eyes and nostrils wide. A cussing Bunny nearly jumps out of his skin behind him, and he is delayed in following up Jack's attack with his boomerangs.

"Coulda given me a little warnin'!" Bunny shouts as the boomerangs fly wide and miss the rearing and shrieking Nightmare entirely, which gives it the time to turn heel and fly.

Jack laughs and shoots himself into the air, yelling behind him, "Where's the fun in that?"

Pitch's stray is fast, but Jack is faster. He heads it off easily, and with another shot of ice, he redirects it toward Bunny, who is taking aim with one of his egg smoke bombs. The Nightmare, trapped between two Guardians, tries to skid to a stop in midair, but in doing so, it provides Bunny with a target the size of a broad side of a barn.

The egg explodes against its flank in a puff of pastel yellow, and as its leg begins to disintegrate into black sand, Jack rushes up from behind and cuts it in half a wide sweep of his glowing staff.

When the thing completely loses its form and scatters into the wind, every black particle flickering gold before disappearing entirely, a victorious grin spreads across his face, and he abruptly halts, pumping his fist in the air and exclaiming, "Yeah! We got him!"

Bunny smiles at his younger friend, amused by how excitable he is, and he looks like he's about to shout some jest at him when suddenly, his entire expression morphs. "Jack!" he hisses under his breath. "Behind you. Slowly."

Confused, Jack slowly spins around to see a whole herd—eleven…no, was that twelve of them?—emerging from the abandoned playground and standing as still and silent as pillars in the eerie glow of the streetlamps. In order not to spook them, Jack makes no abrupt movements, and he lowers his body out of the air and backs away, drawing level with Bunny. Internally, he's chastising himself for his lack of foresight, for not checking to see if there were others there.

His cautious movements do no good. The Nightmares are on them before he knows it, and somehow, someway, Jack loses Bunny in the fog. He fights in a flurry of ice, wind, and snow, and he cannot be sure which Nightmares he's fought and which ones he hasn't. He is sure that he's destroyed at least three of the Nightmares, if not four, and who knows how many he's had a hand in weakening. Who knows just how many slipped away from the fight, unseen and unnoticed.

When his keen ears pick up the sound of North bellowing orders through the fog and a golden glow begins to penetrate even the thickest of it, Jack releases a relieved chuckle—with the five Guardians reunited, they would make quick work of them—and says to the Nightmare he's currently fighting, "You're in big trouble now."

But not in as much trouble as he's going to be in, he knew.

"This i'nt tha time ta be playin' tha hero, Jack!" Bunny had chastised the first time this had happened. "Ya nee' ta see tha big picture here!"

"We are a team, Jack," Tooth had said to him in private. "Don't forget that. We don't want to see you hurt."

"Too rash, too bold, Jack!" North had ranted passionately. "There no need to prove anything to us, do you understand? You already Guardian. You already one of us. We know worth."

Sandy might have been the worst, however, and that silent frown of mild disapproval and sympathy had remained with him…even if it hadn't been enough to stop him from doing it again…and again…and again.

They still lecture, but at this point, they grudgingly accept it. As an unspoken compromise, they started to make sure at least one other Guardian was on his heels when he decided to go on one of his solo runs. They still don't know that he feels obligated to go off on his own from time to time. They don't know why he does it, and he isn't quite ready to tell them yet.

In light of how recently he regained his memories, his reluctance to tell them about his previous life is understandable. After all, flashbacks still occurred, and because of this, he was still trying to reconcile his old life with that of his new. That is something he must do for himself and by himself before he can even think of fully opening up to them.

If there was one thing he knew for sure, however, it was that the moment he saw his sister's face again, he clearly remembered the exact promise he had made, the promise that had sealed his fate and created the roots to his Center. The promise? Long, long ago, when a little baby girl first tried to grab at his nose and giggled when he scowled at her… he made a promise that he would give anything to see her smile, to hear her laugh.

That was his purpose as an older brother, and in memory of all that his sister meant to him, he would keep that promise, even if it were the last thing he did.

So whenever a single one of those Nightmares threatened to erase laughter from a child's life and replace it with fear…he couldn't help himself, and he wouldn't stop until every last one of the loathsome creatures were wiped from existence.

That being said, it makes sense that Jack wouldn't even think twice when he heard a cry of fear—a plea for help—nearby.

No, of course Jack doesn't think twice. After finishing off his opponent, he rockets skyward so that he can see the entirety of the park. It is thanks to Sandy's glowing sand that the fog is a little less dense than it was, and his icy eyes, desperate to find the source of the scream, scan every inch of the area.

There! A strange…shroud, shimmering like a mirage in the desert, catches his eye, and he dives directly for it, his staff at the ready.

Another scream splits through the air, and nearly faltering when a montage of flashbacks pelts his mind, Jack shakes his head stubbornly and mutters, "Faster, faster! Come on!"

The two Nightmares, which are stalking menacingly toward the park's fountain, are in sight now, and Jack repositions himself so that he's falling feet first. Snapping his ankles together, he doesn't slow down, and his bare feet smash into the spine of one of the Nightmares, making it crumple. Jack somersaults off before spinning into the air once again to send a wave of ice magic toward it.

Unable to defend itself after Jack's initial attack, it explodes into black sand, but since its buddy has had plenty of time to react to his sudden appearance, the winter Spirit does not realize that it has begun to charge at him until it collides headfirst into his gut.

Do you remember those nights…when you are so lost in a nightmare that, when you finally jolt yourself out of it, it takes what feels like hours for you to realize what is real and what isn't? Before that moment, your heart doesn't stop, and your insides quiver with the lingering sense of terror, terror so overpowering that it nearly crushes you from the inside out. Within the nightmare itself, the suspense alone is…consuming, and you cannot scream. Sometimes you cannot run, and there is no hiding…

When a Nightmare touches a sleeping child, darkness enters their dreams. Fear spawns. At least they can wake up to a reality in which there is some light to be found eventually. When a Nightmare touches one who is awake, as Jack was, there is nothing to wake up to. Light is nowhere within reach, not when a single touch reawakens all the darkness and fear Jack had ever experienced in both his previous and current lives.

He doesn't fear the Nightmares. He doesn't fear a lot of things. One thing he does fear, more than anything, is failing those who need him, and a single touch from a Nightmare projects those fears and makes them real.

The frightened whimpers behind him remind him that failure is not an option.

At the impact, he is sent sprawling. His staff flies from his hand, and his panic at the loss overrides the effect of the Nightmare's touch. Gasping, he quickly flips onto his hands and knees. He can sense the Nightmare approaching behind, but without his staff, his magic is still weak at best, and he dare not try anything risky with his magic without the conduit. Since becoming a Guardian and gaining believers, this has been changing, but that staff—he feels naked and powerless without it.

He spots it near the base of the fountain, and after lunging for it, Jack feels the Nightmare's teeth latch onto the hood of his sweatshirt and begin to pull him upright. The hoodie begins to constrict around his throat, and thinking quickly, Jack does the only thing he can do. He tugs at the ever-present cold in his chest—the source of his magic—and allows it to spread from his fingertips and up through his staff, which he ferociously jabs upward from behind his back.

Even blind, his staff slices through the Nightmare, and its teeth release him. With a huge gulp of air, Jack unconsciously rubs his neck and scrambles to his feet again.

When he turns to face the Nightmare, however, he finds that it is already dissipating into the wind, leaving nothing but a clear view of what it had been attacking in the first place.

Silver eyes peer hesitantly over the edge of the fountain pool, and Jack blinks, not quite comprehending what he is seeing. He had expected a child, and this—this was obviously no human.

"Um…hello?" he asks more than says.

The silver eyes stare, regarding him curiously and warily. "Jack Frost."

The voice, undoubtedly female, is as soft and airy as the sea foam that kisses the coastlines. She has the tone of someone continuously stuck in a daydream, and a sense of peace and innocence exudes from her.

If he is surprised at her recognition of him, he gives no sign. He nods encouragingly. "That's me. It's alright. I won't hurt you."

"No," she says dreamily. "You won't, will you? It is not your wish to."

A swell of mist rises from the fountain, and it forms into a fluid image of a little girl. Her eyes shine like the moon, constant and unchanging, but every other physical attribute fades in and out of the pearly mists that comprise her form, never giving him a clear view of her face or limbs.

In all his travels over the three hundred years, Jack had thought he'd met every Spirit at least once, but that is apparently not the case. This is a Spirit he's never met before, he's almost positive. Awkwardly, Jack clears his throat and asks, "I'm sorry, but…we haven't met before, have we?"

"No," she murmurs, flitting closer to him. "We have not had the pleasure, have we? But…there was something… oh! Yes, now we are meeting! We are meeting now! This certainly is exciting!"

Unwilling to offend this Spirit, as he was wont to do (and has done multiple times when confronted with others' particular eccentricities), he ignores his reservations about her odd exclamations and asks, "What is your name?"

"Jinivra," she responds, her form becoming more distinct for a mere second before shuddering into a blur of mist. "Jinivra is a little too formal, though, for the Spirit of Wishing Wells, isn't it? Only my father calls me Jinivra. That is why prefer Jinny, Jack Frost. Please call me Jinny (1)."

"Jinny," Jack repeats, a shy smile spreading across his face. "You know, this is actually kind of cool. I didn't realize there was a wishing spirit!"

As soon as the words are out of his mouth, he wishes he could kick himself. Smooth, Frost, he berates himself.

He nearly leaps out of his skin when she suddenly laughs. "No need to hurt yourself, Jack Frost. Not a lot of our kind know of my existence," she muses, causing Jack's eyes to widen in surprise. "I like to keep to myself, you know. I do not like seeing strife or conflict in the world, and I suppose I am not much a fighter for it, am I?" She hums, and tendrils of mist weave around Jack. "That is why I am so grateful to you, Jack Frost. Thank you."

Her calm and almost lazy way of speaking makes it no easier for Jack to process all that she just said, and he stutters, "How—how did you…?"

"I know of all wishes, Jack Frost. The bad, the good, the ones made in rage and greed, and those made in desperation and sadness. Even though I haven't the power to grant all and every wish to its full potential, I do what I can. Those I deem true, pure, and innocent of heart may just see their wishes granted, but I am only allowed to grant three wishes a year. Only three. The others, I may not be able to grant their wish, but I try to ease their troubles, their pain, and their hardship…"

"That's amazing," he breathes. The awe and wonder in his voice is undeniable, and he grins. "That's—that's actually more than amazing. Our world is far bigger than I realize, isn't it?"

Instead of answering, Jinny's silver eyes glow with hardly contained curiosity. "Oh, you are different, aren't you, Jack Frost?"

Taken aback, he rubs the shaft of his staff and tries to follow her eyes as she circles around him. "I—um—I suppose? I am young, so to speak, so…"

"That is not what I meant." Her silver eyes are piercing. "I have told you about my abilities, and yet you—you think of the good they can do others…rather than what good they could do you. Yes…yes, I do believe you are the one."

"I'm the one that…?"

"Who is Pip to you, Jack Frost?" Jinny interrupts abruptly, blinking like an owl.

Jack's breath catches in his throat, and he jerks away from the odd Spirit in shock. Unbidden memories of mused mousy brown hair and laughing brown eyes flash through his mind, and the pang in his chest, so much more powerful than the touch of a hundred Nightmares, causes him to avert his eyes and stare at his bare feet. His throat tightens against a flood of emotion, which he had been carefully constructing a dam for since his memories returned.

Hearing her name nearly makes all his hard work come undone.

The others didn't—they didn't need to be aware of how close that dam was to breaking. They needed him to keep his head on straight. They needed him to smile and joke and be Jack Frost. Since regaining his memories of Jackson Overland, all he's done is be Jack Frost.

That doesn't keep the replays of the memories at bay, and that doesn't change the fact that he hasn't allowed himself to take a moment to just be Jack. He hasn't allowed himself to think about the fact that his Pip is now long dead, that he left her alone, living with must have been a profound amount of guilt and pain for his death…

Who knows just how badly the incident affected her? Did she have an everlasting fear of water? Did she ever skate again? No, she had to have. She loved to skate, and—and…

It would kill him if he were the cause for any pain or fear in her life.

"I—I haven't—I haven't told anyone about her," he manages to choke out, a protective edge in his voice. "I only…just remembered her name, not too long ago… Before he can have the chance to stop it, the dam finally cracks. "God, how could I forget her name, Jinny? Why? Why did I have to forget my little sister for three hundred years?"

"I cannot tell you the mind of the Man in the Moon," Jinny says sympathetically, "But I can tell you that you have a wish, do you not, Jackson?" she asks in her soft, surreal voice. The use of his human name takes him off guard, and finally, he understands what it is that she is offering him.

A chance.

"I—I do," he says, his heart swelling. "I do, and I want more than anything to see her again—to speak with her one last time, just to tell her that I don't blame her—but…" He bites his lip, and his hope-inflated heart is punctured. "I can't."

"Oh? And why can't you?"

Mind whirling, Jack stares at the Spirit, unable to decide if she's mocking him or truly unable to see how difficult it would be for him to make this wish, to see it become real. "How can I see her again?" he asks aloud, his words hardly capable of conveying all of his tumultuous confusion and hesitant hope. "After…after everything that's happened, how can I just see her again?"

"By saying please," Jinny laughs cheekily (2). "I do owe you a favor for helping me with that nasty abomination of Pitch's."

"You don't owe me anything," Jack is quick to assert. "It's just…Another child could do with that wish more than I can."

Jinny giggles, twisting and turning in the air. "Oh, Jackson, that is truly noble, but I have been waiting for this moment. Of course, I did not necessarily realize who and what I was waiting for until now, but I was waiting for you all the same."

"You've been waiting to run into me?" Jack blurts. Never in a million years would he imagine a fellow Spirit saying that to him. Over the past three centuries, he had been a bit of a nuisance, and most of the Spirits he met had already seemed to have had made their judgments and assumptions about him. His reputation was not the best and brightest. "Just to grant me a wish?"

"Oh, yes, indeed I have. Father Time, who sits on Man in Moon's council, has foreseen this and has given me special permission to grant this one when I felt I found the right person. And don't look at me like that! After all, with this single wish, I'll be killing two birds with one stone, and you, Jack Overland Frost, are special and are deserving of this chance."

"What—what do you…?"

"You can't expect that you are the only one who wishes for a second longer, can you?"

It takes a moment for her words to sink in, and a brilliant smile spreads from ear to ear. "Pip," he whispers.

For a brief second, Jinny's smile becomes sharp and distinct in the mist. "Then I do believe that I will be using my first wish of the year for you…and for your Pip."

Overwhelmed, Jack can do no more than stutter, "This…this is…this is happening? This is really…Thank you."

"Ah, do not thank me yet! You have yet to say the magic word."

Jack's awed grin morphs into a playful smirk, and he's just about to shoot a weak quip at her when his face drops, worry and concern replacing his joy. He whips around and tries to peer through the fog. "Oh, no. Dammit, what about—?"

"Your friends?" Jinny shrugs. "You will not be missed, I assure you. I will explain everything to the Guardians. It will be great to see Toothiana again. She was always kind. Now, the magic word, Jack."

Pushing away his worries and allowing excitement and anticipation to bubble within again, he looks back at the wishing Spirit. "Please."

Laughing blithely, Jinny's form condenses into a thin stream of mist, and she weaves her way into the air above Jack's head, a ribbon of pearly white streaking through the dark fog. The ribbon encircles on itself and begins spinning, and as it spins, mist billows inward, toward the very center of the circle that the Spirit had created.

When the mother-of-pearl mists cease spinning and churning, a thin tendril extends from the center and pours forth. Dazzling silver eyes blink open from the mass of mist that had just been expelled from what Jack can only assume is a portal, and Jinny skips her way back to Jack's side.

"Is—is that…?"

"This portal will take you to her—back in time. It will be just days after your human self's death."

Jack nods mutely, his gaze fixated on the portal. "How much time to I have?" he asks dazedly.

He doesn't know if it's weird, pathetic, or amusing that he's only just realizing now how strange his life has become…and how okay he is with that. It makes him want to laugh until his stomach hurts, and the fact that that portal is all that's keeping him from seeing Pippa again only makes it harder not to break into hysterics.

"I can only give you so much time," she explains. "Crossing timelines like this usually has disastrous results, but if you do not linger too long and if you heed my warnings, no harm will be done, and, indeed, some wounds might just heal this day. The Wind will be there to tell you when time is up."

Jack, unable to speak, merely nods again, but when he takes a step forward, Jinny makes him halt. "Jack," she says kindly as he flashes his gaze over his shoulder, "do not be afraid. Your memories have been repressed for a long time, and for some reason, you are yet still repressing them. Don't. Otherwise, you might regret your wish."

Closing his eyes, Jack releases a soft sigh, and with a pounding heart, his carefully constructed dam finally busts. Tears slide down his cheeks, and long-forgotten images, emotions, feelings, and impressions flit through his mind and heart with the speed of a hummingbird. His eyes open, and he steps into the mists.

"I won't."

(1) Play on the word "genie" ;) I know that the name is more similar to that of Ginny Weasley's, but I was trying to channel some Luna Lovegood into this character. I hope it translated!

(2) Inspired by a line in Pixar's "The Incredibles," which I do not own.

Oz out.