Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Jack Frost had been around for 300 years. During that time, he’d spent countless years with humans who couldn’t see him and precious hours with spirits who could. The Yetis, who still managed to keep him out of North’s Workshop after a century of effort. The Easter Bunny, who had confronted him after he’d accidentally caused a blizzard on Easter Sunday in 1968 (well, he’d been testing out his powers, but he didn’t realize how explosive they could be, and he hadn’t known the date either). The Tooth Fairies, who swooned whenever he spoke to them. Mother Nature, who had inky black hair and a sharp, flat smile. The Man in the Moon, who had only ever told him one thing. His name.

In those 300 years, he had never been welcomed. Never been wanted. Never been believed in. So when the Guardians kidnapped him and brought him to the workshop in a sack, he thought it must be a cruel joke. “You’re all hard work and deadlines,” Jack offered by way of excuse, already withdrawing from their invitation to join them, “And I’m all snowballs and fun times. I’m not a Guardian.” Bunny had instantly agreed, sending shards of icy self-hate tearing through Jack’s heart. He didn’t belong here; despite North’s gentle prodding, he didn’t know what his center was. Jack should have left immediately. He’d been planning on it.

But then Pitch Black attacked Tooth Palace, and Jack had been swept along with. He wasn’t a Guardian, not really; he hadn’t sworn any Oaths. But with the fairies in trouble, he couldn’t make himself walk away, so he went. It was devastating. Nightmares darted through the sky around the palace, snapping up the feathered fairies and trapping them within skeletal, ebony ribcages; Jack managed to save one, but only one. When he passed the trembling fairy over to Tooth, she was nearly inconsolable. “They took my fairies.” She repeated shakily, “And the teeth, all of them. Everything is gone. Everything.”

It wasn’t until later that Jack learned what that meant. That Pitch had managed to steal the memories of millions of children. That Pitch had managed to steal Jack’s memories. That Jack had once been someone other than a winter spirit. Worst of all, the lack of belief was leeching away power and vitality from the Guardians; as the lights on the globes waned, so did their strength.

After seeing the destruction of the Tooth Palace, Jack would like to say that he didn’t hesitate about helping gather teeth to keep belief alive, but he did. He was selfish and awful and cold-hearted, just like Bunny seemed to think. They’d had to bribe him with reclaiming the memories Pitch had stolen to get his agreement, but he had agreed. He had even enjoyed himself by the end of the night. Racing Bunny, North, and Sandy through the buildings had been a thrill; the camaraderie was like nothing he’d experienced in his centuries of life. For one night, he even considered joining the Guardians after all.

And then Pitch attacked. And they lost everything.

The fight was a blur of motion and black sand. Bunny’s boomerangs slammed into the Nightmares’ sides, shattering them like porcelain; Sandy’s golden whips of dream sand were lethal and precise. Tooth and Jack flitted through the air, quick and nimble while North charged along rooftops with twin swords flashing. And then a sharp, black arrow slammed into Sandy’s back, starting a slow metamorphosis, an inky spread of Pitch’s powers.

No.

Jack had to save him. He had to.

Jack flung himself towards where Sandy’s round, golden frame was slowly turning black as night, but he was too slow, too far, too weak to save him. It didn’t matter that no one else had even reacted by the time Sandy collapsed into nightmares. It didn’t matter that Jack had been the closest, the quickest. All that mattered was that he failed and Sandy, Sandy who hadn’t doubted him, Sandy who had given him kind, beaming smiles, Sandy who was a real, proper Guardian was gone.

And there was nothing Jack could do to bring him back.

No.

Pitch stood like a general at the head of an army, sending legions of nightmares towards Jack; they were a roiling wave that crashed over him, threatening to drag him under. The remaining Guardians were too far, too busy, even with their fallen ally unavenged. But that was okay; Jack knew how to drown. He pushed forward into the swarm even as they made stinging contact with his pale skin, letting cold ripple out of him; with each desperate movement towards Pitch, he flung ice through the black sand. Directed by the force of his fury, the rime raced up towards Pitch, freezing every nightmare along its path; by the time it reached Pitch, the force had grown strong enough to fling the Boogeyman from the sky. He fell.

So did Jack.

Exhaustion slammed into him, his limbs suddenly too heavy to lift, let alone direct. With a brief hope that at least he’d avenged the Sandman, he let his body tumble back towards the earth. Everything was growing dark - but as long as it wasn’t Pitch Black, that was okay.

Then came the sound of buzzing wings. A flash of blue, of gold, of pink. And then Tooth’s arms were wrapped around him, easing him into North’s sleigh.

Later, North claimed that Jack saved them, that Sandy would have been proud of him. As they prepared for Easter (“This time, Easter is more important than Christmas!”, North had cried), Jack had even managed to help the Guardians of Childhood realize how disconnected they actually were from children. Under the influence of Jack’s joy, Bunny had become a welcoming host showing Sophie how to paint the eggs, his “googies”, in his warren. The eggs had streamed down the path under flowers that puffed dye onto them before tumbling into a brightly colored river; they traveled on quick, tiny feet through their route, decorating themselves as they went. It was beautiful. It was wonderful. And looking around at the pleased expressions on the Guardian’s faces, there was a good reason that Bunny was the Guardian of Hope.

And then Jack ruined everything. Again.

After returning Sophie to her bed, Jack was supposed to join the others at the warren to defend it from Pitch. He was supposed to be there for them. A Guardian. An ally. A friend. But he’d been led on a wild goose chase by a familiar voice, and when he returned to the tunnels with the metal case of his memories and missing Baby Tooth, he’d arrived at a scene of destruction and devastation. The eggs were destroyed. All of them. Because he had let himself get distracted. Because he had been so foolish and stupid.

Nightmares had attacked the tunnels; there was a trail of crushed, colorful eggs that led up to the betrayed eyes of the Guardians. Bunny was the most furious, of course. “He has to go.” He moved on oversized feet towards Jack, each step radiating anger and violence. “We never should have trusted you!” When he lunged at Jack with a fist raised, the frost spirit shrunk back in fear; Bunny’s hand lowered but his ire did not. “Easter is new beginnings, new life. Easter’s about hope. And now it’s gone.” Because of you.

And so Jack Frost had been kicked out of the Guardians before he ever really joined. Not that he could blame them.

Chapter Text

If Jack thought that it would put an end to his miserable, half-remembered life, he would have thrown himself off the glacier’s cliff. Instead, he hefted the metal case full of his teeth and prepared to throw it into the ice abyss below. Once, twice, he tried to force himself to toss it away. Both times, his hand lowered unbidden back to his side with the half-tube still tightly clenched within pale, trembling fingers. “Please.” He squeezed his hand around the case, looking down at the round, brunet face painted on the side of it and then up towards the sky, searching out the full moon desperately. “I didn’t do it on purpose. I didn’t know. I couldn’t stop myself. Please, tell me there’s still hope for them. For me.”

“I thought this might happen.” With a disorienting rush of darkness, Pitch prowled onto the glacier’s top to stand across from Jack, cutting off his desperate pleas. “They never really believed in you; I was just trying to show you that. But I understand. I know what it’s like to be cast out, to not be believed in, to long for a family.” He moved closer, and Jack eased further away. “What goes better together than cold and dark?” Pitch offered him a shared reign, a world where they would both be believed in.

Jack was many things. Gullible enough to fall for Pitch’s distractions. Selfish enough to need to be bribed with his memories to help Tooth. Lazy enough to reject an invitation to the Guardians. Worthless enough to earn every one of Bunny’s insults. But he was not cruel. “They’ll fear both of us.” He raised his staff, ice glittering on its surface, “And that’s not what I want.”

In the end, he fell for Pitch’s lies anyways. Despite her shaking head and frantic squeaking, he agreed to trade Baby Tooth’s freedom for his staff. In a blur, Baby Tooth managed to peck her way out of Pitch’s hand but fell into the ravine, Jack’s staff was broken in half and thrown in as well, and Jack was slammed up against an icy wall by a blast of midnight sand that buffeted his skin and threw his battered body over the edge. He joined Baby Tooth and the pieces of his staff as Pitch’s words rang in his ears. “You said you wanted to be alone, so be alone.”

He felt his body shatter on impact, his immortal nature working immediately to repair it. If he looked, his torso would likely be as blue as his hoodie, stained by internal bleeding that healed with a painful ripple of sensation. “All I can do is keep you cold, Baby Tooth. I’m so sorry.” Despite the agony that coursed through him with each small movement, he picked the quivering fairy up in his hands, cradling her in his palms. “I can’t save either of us.” Just like I couldn’t save Sandy.

When she darted into his pocket, he assumed she had given up on communicating with him and was seeking what little warmth was available. That was smart, even if it stung. But then there was a blast of golden light as she activated the case he’d stashed in his hoodie. “Wha-” Jack withdrew the glowing metal, blinking away tears as he looked between it and Baby Tooth. “You want me to-?” But it was clear that she did; the fairy stroked the closure on the case, looking up at him with soft, pleading eyes. So he raised shaky fingertips to the same line, letting the memories wash over him.

Joking, laughing, playing. His sister, wavering on her skates on fracturing ice. His plan. His offer of a game. “Would I trick you? I promise you’re going to be fine. You have to believe in me.” He’d saved her, he’d saved her! It was the most important success of his life even as he sunk into icy water, the moon overhead filling his vision. 

“Baby Tooth!” Tears were wet on his face now, only noticeable because a drop trembled and fell to where his hands still clung desperately to the case. “I had a family! I had a sister. I saved her.” After 300 years, he finally knew why the Man in the Moon had set him on this path. After three centuries of loneliness and heartache, he knew what had brought him to this point. Not his mistakes, not his failures. But his love.

And so as golden lights grew dim around the globe, Jack welded his staff together with ice and went to the one place where belief had always been strong, Burgess. The streets were empty and cold; Easter had been ruined by Jack’s negligence. But Jamie, Jamie who read books on cryptids and had seen the Guardians (but not Jack, never Jack, who had never even sworn his Oath) in his room after losing a tooth, Jamie still believed. Just barely. His light had dimmed; it flickered erratically as the boy pleaded with a stuffed rabbit in bed, begging for a sign that the Easter Bunny was real. Even that hope seemed lost. 

So Jack did the only thing he could do, used his worthless powers to form a layer of rime on the boy’s window, frosting it up so he could draw a decorated Easter egg and then a cute rabbit. That seemed to be enough for Jamie; the boy was already gaping, but it wasn’t for Jack; he owed the Guardians anything he could offer, any proof of magic he had. So he breathed life into the rabbit and let it gallop around the room until it collapsed into bright blue specks of snow.

Satisfied, Jack leaned back on his staff and gave the boy a fond smile. Even if Jack failed here again, he had offered everything he had. He had tried. Instead of jumping, instead of giving up, he had returned to the town with the frozen lake where it all began, where the moon whispered his name down upon him.

“Jack Frost. Jack Frost!”

And somehow, it wasn’t just Manny saying his name in the sleepy Pennsylvania town. It was Jamie. Who could see him. Who believed in him.

When the others arrived, he could see them too. North, who looked exhausted. Tooth, whose wings were limp and drooping at her back. Bunny, who was small and adorable and furious about it. He could see them all - and despite everything he’d done to them, Tooth turned glittering violet eyes to Jack and said “he can see you!”. 

And Bunny, despite what had happened to him in particular, despite the ruined holiday that weighed heavily on all of them, gaped at the boy in awed shock. “He made you believe in me?”

Somewhere in the space between those two moments, Jack thought he might have found a toehold towards redemption. He didn’t have time to act on it, not with Pitch joining the fray only moments later, but he’d found it. And in the best way possible, his frozen heart thawed.

Desperate to hold onto the hope that he might be able to save the remaining three Guardians, Jack sent them to escort Jamie to safety and faced Pitch alone. He’d learned how to prevent his ice from blasting through his sand, and it didn’t take long for Jack to end up thrown out of the sky and into a dumpster. Each blow landed with bruising impacts that would have killed a human - that would kill Jamie if Pitch had his way. His threats (“there are other ways to snuff out a light!”) made that very clear. So Jack fought and he fought and he fought, and he was losing. Despite his hope, despite their tentative forgiveness, he still wasn’t enough.

“Jack,” Jamie had whispered, “I’m scared.”

His sister, quivering on his skates as cracks spread in every direction underfoot. “Jack, I’m scared!”

Not again.

“We’re going to have a little fun instead.” Even if it was the last thing he did, Jack wouldn’t let Jamie die in fear. He would give Jamie whatever joy he could and hopefully - please, Manny, please - he would get him to safety. After dispersing sleds to Jamie and Guardians, Jack turned to create an icy path to ease their way. He’d done it before many times, including with Jamie, but he’d only ever done a narrow strip. Jack wasn’t sure he could sustain one large enough for their group, but he would try. He raised his crook and - 

Fwoom. Frost blasted out in front of him, caking the entire street in a thick layer of ice. Jack had never pushed his powers to the limits before, except in his fight against Pitch - but he hadn’t had a believer before. Even one was a massive boost to his power. Staggering under it, Jack called the wind and threw himself forward into the air, racing down the street to keep ahead of the sleds, leading them away from Pitch. He could hear his name on the freezing breeze, Jamie calling out to his friends and telling them about Jack, and his strength began to swell; it would have been nothing to the Guardians, but he had been nothing to the Guardians only a week before. To him, this was a treasure.

The treasure of his true believers saved them, in the end. They had stood side-by-side with the Guardians, chins lifted proudly. “I do believe in you,” Jamie told Pitch, “I’m just not afraid of you.” And then his one hand, held defensively in front of his face, had turned black sand gold. Each child had been able to convert nightmares back to dreams with a single touch. Somehow, they had even brought back Sandy, awash in golden glow.

Sandy had almost been too late. Pitch had crept up behind Jack with a giant scythe of glistening ebony, arms raised to swing it; Bunny, Tooth, and North all screamed warnings, true terror choking their voices, but Jack had turned too slowly. At the last possible moment, Sandy’s golden whips twisted around Pitch and hauled him away. The tides turned. Nightmares fled.

Dreams roamed the streets - massive golden dinosaurs and unicorns, dolphins and kittens - and the few remaining Nightmares turned on Pitch and his fear. North gave Jack the tiny center of a Russian nesting doll, painted blue and smiling joyfully. Jack finally swore his Oath. To watch over the children of the world, to guard them with his life - their hopes, their wishes, their dreams. For they are all that we have, all that we are, and all that we will ever be. 

“Congratulations.” North boomed, “You are now and forevermore a Guardian.” The massive Russian scooped Jack up in his arms, placing loud, smacking kisses on each cheek, and Jack silently decided not to tell the man this was the first genuine, affectionate touch he’d had in three hundred years. It was nice, though. It felt a step closer to redemption.

What finally convinced Jack that things were going to be okay was when Jamie came to him with his fears, and Jack was able to soothe them away. “We’ll always be there,” Jack promised, pressing a pale finger against the boy’s chest to indicate his heart, “Which kinda makes you a Guardian, too.” And when he walked away to join the others, Jamie raced after Jack to give him a tight, clinging hug. Just for him.

My name is Jack Frost, and I’m a Guardian. How do I know? Because the moon told me so. So when the moon tells you something, believe it.

Chapter Text

After their disastrous Easter, Jack had practically moved into North’s workshop as he recovered from the strain of their fights with Pitch. He’d been given a standing invitation to visit any of the others as well - although Bunny had looked particularly displeased to offer the Warren, not that Jack really blamed him - after he’d let slip that he didn’t really have anywhere to go. For three centuries, he’d rested in a cave by the lake - his lake, the one where he’d died, the one where he’d been reborn - and eaten whatever he could forage from the forests. All things considered, he was very grateful for North’s offer, and Jack thought Phil might even be coming around to him, although it was hard to tell with Yetis. 

The Guardians seemed to be finding a place for him, welcoming him in belatedly (the way they should have at the start, Tooth later told him guiltily) as one of them. There were no more surprise announcements from North dictating his life, no more raised fists from Bunny when the two bickered, no more feathered hands in his mouth from Tooth (although her fairies still swooned at his smile). They had come to accept him as one of them.

It was much harder for him to accept it himself, it seemed. 

“How did I get here?” He asked Dingle a few months later, absently poking at the elf with his staff as it tottered after him while holding a plate of snowflake-shaped cookies that North had requested for him. “What could I have done to earn this?” He’d expected North to get tired of him always being underfoot and kick him out after a few days - a few weeks, at most - but the man invited him to test out new Wonders every few days, sent him elves laden with food at regular intervals, and often swept him up into hugs that would have bruised a mortal.

“Because you’re a Guardian,” North swept into the room as if summoned by the mere thought of his name, brushing graphite smears off of his massive hands, “And you care about the children. Because you saved them, us, and the world. Because you did that all after we turned you away, even when it felt hopeless, even when you had no believers.”

“You didn’t turn me away.” Jack protested, taking the tray from the tiny elf so it would stop wobbling under the bulk; he turned to face North with the plate held protectively between them, a shield from an uncomfortable conversation.

“We did.” North nudged Dingle aside with one large foot, stepping closer to the newest Guardian, his newest friend. “And we shouldn’t have. We were weak and grieving after the attack on the warren, and we took it out on you. We blamed you even though we hadn’t asked you what happened, didn’t know why you’d been gone or why you had your teeth. We didn’t even ask if Sophie was alright, a child we’d entrusted to your care. You came to us frightened and lost - and we blamed you.”

“I deserved it.” It came out as a whisper, the truth he’d kept bottled up ever since he fled from the Guardians. “You had no reason to trust me.”

“You did not.” North took the plate from Jack, setting it aside. “And we did. The Man in the Moon chose you. Manny told us that you would make a difference; we doubted him.” Vast hands settled on each of Jack’s shoulders, the weight of them nearly forcing his knees to buckle. “But you and Sandy were the only ones who could make a dent in Pitch’s magic. And when there was one last ember of hope in the world, you were the one who fanned the flame. You made Jamie believe in Bunnymund again.”

“I owed you all after being so selfish,” Jack protested, a frosty blue flush creeping over his pale cheeks. “You all had no reason to believe I wouldn’t… wouldn’t have gone to Pitch for my memories instead of guarding the warren.”

“And yet when Pitch offered to trade Baby Tooth for your staff, you gave up your power. You would have left yourself nearly flightless in Antarctica to save one tiny fairy. Why?”

“Because I could save her, so I had to. I could never have walked away from her.” Jack’s hands balled to fists at his sides, his anger and grief from the moment curling in the pit of his stomach. “She was innocent; she was only trapped because she followed me into Pitch’s lair. I couldn’t have abandoned her.”

“Because you are good.” North shook Jack’s shoulders lightly - for him, which was not very lightly at all for the person receiving the gesture; Jack didn’t protest even though he felt rattled. “Because you are a Guardian. And because you are better than you believe yourself to be. Better than we believed you to be.”

“That’s a low bar, North.” Jack shook out his hands, releasing the tension in them.

“And that was our failing, not yours. Now,” North’s hand slid lower, slapping Jack’s back. “Let us fetch you some milk for those cookies, shall we?”

Jack snorted but nodded his agreement, silently asking the wind to scoop up the cookies and press the plate back into his hands; it leapt forward eagerly, rattling the windowpanes as it did so. Hours later, the cookies sat mostly untouched on North’s desk. Instead, the Guardians of Joy and Wonder carefully unpacked a delicately made nesting doll, the hand-carved work of multiple months.

The first doll was of Jack, staff raised before him, a swirl of snow and ice cutting across the careful artwork. “Protective.” North murmured. The next layer showed Jack grinning goofily, a snowball in his hands. “Playful.” The next was of Jack with his eyes squeezed tightly shut, his hands clutching at his arms. “Lonely.” The guilt was obvious in North’s voice, but for once, Jack didn’t reach out to soothe him. He let them sit in the uncomfortable truth until it was time to reveal the blue center North had once given him. “Joyful.”

Jack nested the dolls back together, looking down at the outer layer North had selected for him, one that was prepared to fight for the children of the world. “Recovering.”