Disclaimer: I own nothing involved in this story unless I invented it myself. This is written for fun, not for profit. All forms of feedback eagerly accepted. Concrit is loved the most, but everything is welcome.
Fandom: Rise of the Guardians
Title: In Due Time: Chapter 1: Time For Secrets
Characters: Pitch, Jack, Guardians
Word Count: chapter: 3,192||story: 3,192
Genre: Drama||Rated: PG-13
Notes: This is mainly movie-verse, but with some elements from the book-verse.
Summary: [WIP, Pitch, Jack, Guardians] Pitch knows he would've won if he'd had Jack on his side. If there had been no Guardians to fight him. So he's going to make certain that those things are what happens. The laws of time do not allow change. But Pitch is the Nightmare King, and he makes his own laws.

Jack knew there was something going on with the other Guardians. None of them could keep a secret worth beans, especially when it involved him. He suspected that had something to do with all those centuries where they'd been too focused on their work to really talk to him, so now they tried to make up for it by going in the opposite direction. Which wasn't really a bad thing; he rather liked the attention, so long as they didn't go too overboard. Which they had a habit of doing.

But this was different. He'd caught them looking at him when they thought he was too busy with whatever he was doing to notice, and one and all, they looked worried about something. Bunny especially turned out prone to long lingering looks that made Jack want to check the shadows for anything that shouldn't be there.

Rumor did have it that Pitch was busy regaining his power, and no one had to say it for all five of them to know where his eyes would turn once that happened. Pitch had never taken defeat well, and if Jack had seen the Nightmare King's picture in the dictionary next to 'revenge', he wouldn't have been even remotely surprised. He might also have found a marker to decorate it a little, but that was beside the point.

For the moment, though, he couldn't get any of the others to say a word about what was bothering them. Any time he asked, they always brushed it off with a laugh and a smile, and North would frequently offer fruitcake in a clear attempt at distraction.

He skipped along through the workshop, making sure to stay just out of trouble, while still peering closely enough at the toys in all their various stages of construction to satisfy every passing whim he had. After the last few years, he'd grown used to being able to avoid the yetis in the throes of work, while still seeing everything that he wanted to. It was almost boring now, not having to worry about being chased out and with constant access.

Not many people could say they'd ever find Santa's workshop boring, but Jack Frost was special in a multitude of ways.

A glimpse of gray, followed by a form of sparkling feathers and another of gleaming gold, caught his attention on one of the higher floors and he glanced up just in time to see the other Guardians entering North's personal office. Jack frowned; he hadn't heard anything about a meeting, and he knew that he hadn't seen the Northern Lights at any point. Something was going on, and he wanted to know what.

It only took a moment for him to dart upward, the wind curling around him like the old friend it was, and he whispered softly his request, to get to where he could see what was going on, without the other Guardians seeing him. As always, the wind listened, pulling him high up into the rafters and depositing him at last on a high perch where he had an excellent view of what was going on below.

All four of them were there, North behind his large desk, Tooth hovering in the air, hands clasped before her, Bunny over by the fireplace, and Sandy bobbing here and there, without draining the usual glass after glass of eggnog that Jack had become used to seeing him with. Something serious was up, without a doubt.

"You're sure, Bunny?" Tooth asked in between her usual handing out of orders to her fairies. Jack couldn't see Baby Tooth anywhere, and that worried him as well. If Tooth brought any of her fairies anywhere, it was almost always her tiny second in command. Not seeing her there sent a faint trail of unease down Jack's spine.

"Absolutely. It's going to be soon." Bunny looked more serious than Jack could remember seeing him in his entire life. "You got everything ready, North?"

"Yetis and elves are prepared, as are the defenses." North glanced from one to the other of them, worry in his large blue eyes. "But you say it will be of no use?"

Bunny shook his head. "Nope. Nothing we can do, but we're going to try anyway."

Very seldom since he'd become a Guardian had Jack ever wanted to drop down in the middle of them and ask what in the name of the Man in the Moon were they all talking about. He didn't like secrets being kept, especially when he didn't know what they were. Keeping them from other people he didn't mind so much, but when it came to him? He wanted to know. And clearly it had something to do with him, since he hadn't been invited to this little meeting.

"What about Jack?" Tooth asked, fluttering even more before she dropped back to deliver more orders. It would never fail to impress Jack how she could carry on at least two, if not two hundred, conversations at the same time, and not actually lose track of any of them. But he hunched over, staff held tightly between his fingers, and did his best to follow the conversation that he was interested in.

Bunny shook his head, and Jack wished he could be close enough to see the expression on his face. Where he was now was too high to catch anything. "Can't say a word. You know why."

Maybe she does, but I don't, Jack almost hissed the words out loud. After all the weeks of glances and half-caught conversations and fretting and worries, he needed to know what all of this was about.

"You are certain, though?" North asked, leaning forward. "Absolutely certain?"

"Couldn't be more if I wanted to be. And I wish I was," Bunny said. He fiddled a little with one of his boomerangs, eyes cast downward. "This is just like him, you know. Cause a lot of trouble and there's nothing we can do to stop it."

Jack guessed Sandy agreed, but his safe perch meant that he not only couldn't get a good look at what Bunny's face looked like, but he couldn't see Sandy's images, either, not clearly enough to guess what he was trying to say to the others. It didn't look like they were paying that much attention either, since no one looked at the tiny golden man.

"Do you think -" Tooth's question fell unheard into the sound of a door slamming open and the deep voice of one of North's yetis yammering something that Jack couldn't understand. He'd never bothered to learn yeti, though he'd always kind of wanted to. There were always too many snowstorms to make and snowballs to throw and these days, visits to Jamie and his other friends to glory in.

North stood up, and only now did Jack notice his swords on the desk in front of him. They almost seemed to leap into his hands as the toymaker moved around to where the other Guardians now gathered together.

"You're certain it's him?" he asked the yeti, who nodded quickly, adding something else that Jack wished even harder he could understand. "Then where's Jack?"

Well, if that wasn't an invitation, Jack didn't know what one was. He dropped down to the floor as light as one of his own snowflakes. "Jack's right here!" He smiled, a slight slash of frost and a hint of fury glimmering in his eyes. "And Jack has a whole lot of questions for all of you."

Did Bunny flinch? Jack thought he did. He also thought he liked it, because they should be upset by whatever it was they weren't telling him.

"Jack also needs to come with us. Pitch has invaded the Pole once again." North interrupted whatever might have come from the looks Jack sent them all, but most especially Bunny. The kangaroo knew all about this, whatever it was.

But as much as he wanted to get every tiny little detail out of Bunny, the mention of Pitch put all of that to the back of his mind. "Pitch? What's he doing now?"

"Going after something he's got no right to," Bunny said, moving along smoothly as they headed out of the office and down to wherever the heck North was leading them. Jack knew the workshop fairly well by now, but he still hadn't made it to all of the little hidden nooks and crannies. North, on the other hand, knew this place like perfectly, and guided them without so much as hesitating through the myriad of staircases, hallways, and storage rooms.

"Yeah, that's really descriptive. Think you could actually tell me something?" Jack didn't think that they would. And since none of them would so much as meet his eyes, he wasn't surprised when they didn't.

Whatever all of this was about, he'd have to wiggle it out of them later, since they ended up standing in front of a simple door. Jack gave it a look, then looked at North.

"Pitch is in there?" He knew that he'd never been in here and didn't know what North could keep in here that the Boogeyman would want anyway.

"That he is." North hesitated only for a heartbeat, exchanging a swift glance with the more senior Guardians before looking back at Jack. "Be careful."

Jack really, really wanted to ask more about that, but before the words could form, North threw the door open, the room lighting up in that moment, revealing Pitch Black standing in front of... a giant clock?

This has got to be a joke. Jack gripped his staff even as he and the others rushed into the room.

The moment the light came on, Pitch ducked into the nearest shadow, his sharp voice snapping outward. "Really, North, you can't even leave me alone for five minutes?"

"Wasn't stealing Sandy's sand enough for you?" North growled, both of his swords pointing toward the shadow lord. "You look for something else that isn't yours to take?"

"You haven't used this old thing in centuries. No one has." Pitch's shadow flickered near the clock. Jack stepped forward carefully, his gaze marginally divided between their enemy and the other Guardians. Were they looking at him, too? Now was not the time to get distracted.

"That doesn't make it yours to take," Bunny threw out his words as sharply as he did his boomerangs, the wooden weapons sailing across the room. Pitch ducked away, remaining in the shadows until they returned to their master, and rose back up to glare at them all.

"But I'll take it whether it's mine or not. I think you've all had this world to yourselves long enough. It's time matters were fixed."

Jack shook his head; he'd had more than enough of people not telling things straight out today. "What are you talking about, Pitch?"

"Oh, they still haven't told you all of their little secrets, have they?" Pitch smiled, showing too many teeth for Jack's liking. He didn't think even Tooth would want a closer look at these.

Still, Jack had heard more than enough from Pitch already. "Let me guess, you're going to tell me what they aren't." He'd gone through this before. Pitch might not lie, but everything he said was shaded with so many different flavors and slanted toward his particular view of the world, that it couldn't be called truth either.

"This, Jack, is a time travel device," Pitch said. He'd clearly learned from their last battle, since he kept himself hidden in the darkness instead of coming out to fight. That didn't reassure Jack at all. Something was up around here, and it included Pitch as well as him. "It can take whoever uses it anywhere, any time. And I'm going to use it."

"He's joking, isn't it?" Jack asked, darting a quick glance around. "Time travel? Really?"

"He's not joking about what that can do," Bunny said, a note of seriousness that Jack couldn't remember ever having heard from him before. "North's old teacher Ombric used it plenty of times."

Oh, yeah, he really needed to sit down and have a very long talk with everyone about everything that had ever happened that he didn't know about. Maybe once they kicked Pitch out on his nose they could do that. Maybe then they'd stop hedging about whatever it was they were hedging about and he could get some honest answers out of them.

"What would you want with a time machine?" Jack started to turn toward Pitch, ice crackling up and down his staff. He had to admit to himself that he didn't really care. If it had been in here this long, it probably didn't work anyway and he wanted the fight over with.

"Why don't you find out?" Pitch laughed low and rich and mocking, fading back into the shadows. "I want you to have a front row seat anyway, Jack." Those words came from behind Jack, and he turned just quickly enough to see a cloud of nightmare sand blowing toward him. His eyes widened and he tried to back off, to get away from it, but Pitch was too close and the dust landed on his eyes and he could feel Pitch pulling him into his arms, and he fell into water and ice and shadows.

Pitch could hardly believe how easy all of this was. He would've thought the Guardians would fight harder, not only to save their precious time machine, but their precious Jack Frost as well. But it was almost as if they wanted him to make off with both of them.

As soon as Jack fell into his grasp, Pitch rose up through the shadows to extinguish the glittering light overhead, dousing the entire room in darkness. He needed that to make away with the clock itself, as well as Jack. In all of his eons working with darkness, this was probably the largest single item he'd ever stolen, and it took more effort than he wanted to think about.

He'd gone to a lot of trouble over the last few years to regain his strength and reassert his dominance over the Nightmares. But still...just a fraction too easy, and he didn't trust anything that was easy.

But trust or not, easy or not, he'd succeeded. The giant clock now rested in one of the storage rooms in his own lair, one that had gone empty for centuries. Figuring out the details wouldn't take long. He'd hoped to have that much done before he brought the device here, but the Guardians' interruption put paid to that. How had they known he was there? He'd made certain not to trip over a single alarm, and working his way past the workshop wards had taken weeks all by itself.

Perhaps it wouldn't matter in the end. He'd succeeded in both of the thefts he'd planned and now he had all the time in the world to rearrange time to suit his particular whims.

"Uhhhh..." Jack stirred from where Pitch had him chained to the wall. Soon enough the chains wouldn't be necessary, but until that happened, Pitch had no intentions of letting his prize slip away. Slowly frost blue eyes opened and Jack lifted his head, looking around in utmost confusion.

"Took you long enough to wake up. I was beginning to think I'd overdosed you." Pitch slid closer, hands behind his back, staring thoughtfully at his prisoner.

Jack blinked a few times, then straightened up as best he could, eyes flashing bright with anger. "Pitch! What do you think you're doing? Let me go!"

He yanked on the chains, the fingers of one hand curling as he most likely sought his staff. As if Pitch would've left it anywhere where Jack could find it. Breaking it didn't factor into his plans this time. Jack just didn't need it now.

"Why would I want to do that? You're going to end up liking it here very much very soon." Pitch smiled warmly, or his best approximation of such, at Jack. "You won't be able to imagine living any other way."

Jack stared at him as if he'd never heard such words in all of his days. "You have got to be kidding me."

"Not at all, Jack. But why spoil the surprise so soon?" Pitch moved a little closer and gestured to the large clock. "Let me tell you what else I plan to do first."

"Oh, no. Torture." Jack sighed, dropping his head. "Can't you just kill me and get it over with?"

Pitch drew his head back, affronted by the very idea. "Why would I want to kill you? I told you, you're going to love living with me. That does imply that I'm not going to kill you, dear boy."

"Whatever." Jack shook his head, glancing over toward him with a weary set to his shoulders. "So, go on, babble about whatever it is you just have to get off your chest."

Pitch determined that Jack's attitude was going to be the first thing to go. All in due time. Of course. "I told you this is a time machine. Whoever uses it can go whenever and wherever they want, from the beginning of time to just five minutes ago. And I've got five very special stops that I want to make."

Jack tilted his head, a frown forming between his eyes. "What are you..." Something clicked in his mind. "You're going to do something to the Guardians!"

"Clever boy." Pitch patted Jack's cheek, not at all surprised when the young Guardian jerked his head away. "But you don't have to worry. I'm not really going to hurt them."

"Why don't I believe you?"

"I have no idea why. When have I ever lied to you?" Lying was beneath a Nightmare King's dignity, really. He found it so much easier to get what he wanted with other methods. Besides, lies could be uncovered and found out. The truth worked harder and for better rewards in the long run.

"I know at least one place I could mention," Jack muttered. Pitch ignored him; he hadn't lied at the South Pole. The Guardians hadn't trusted him then, and with their actions now, Pitch himself wondered what was going through their minds. In fact...

"Whatever happened then, you should be aware of this now: the Guardians did nothing to stop me from taking you. And the last that I saw of them, they were making no moves to track you down, either. They seem quite content to let me have you." Pitch shrugged even as he started back over to the time machine. "Really, that doesn't surprise me, and it shouldn't surprise you. But don't worry yourself about it. When I'm done with this, there won't be any Guardians to interfere with me ever again: and that includes you."

He could hear the sudden sharp breath Jack drew in and smiled to himself as he began to set the controls. The world would soon be better than it had ever been before, and he could not wait to get started.

To Be Continued