ADDITIVES AND EXTRAS (A subsection of Absolute Zero)

(A quick fyi) For those who haven't read Absolute Zero, as of this story you're not really missing much. Long story short, Pitch attacks a group of Winter Spirits, but leaves behind a baby Jack Frost by accident. North finds baby Jack, and basically becomes surrogate dad to him. This is a collection of one shots and add ons that take place in that verse.

That is literally it. That's what you missed. You legitimately know everything you need to for this to make sense. Congrats :D

AND NOW THE STORY

CHAPTER ONE – BROKEN BONES

The day Jack Frost breaks his arm is one of the worst days in North's life.

It begins like this.

Jack is seven when it happens; he's still small enough for North to lift in one hand. He's still tiny and small and oh so very breakable that is scares North to leave the child alone for more than an hour. Jack is the type of child that gets into trouble very easily, but doesn't always know his way out of it. North has spent countless hours lumbering after the boy as he sprints down the halls towards something dangerous, so many, in fact, that he's pretty sure that he's learned almost all of Jack's tricks.

Almost being the key word here.

Because one day Jack just up and disappears around a corner, and North can't find him for three hours. North knows he shouldn't really be worried, what with this becoming a very common thing, but the Russian can't help but fret slightly. Jack's so small, even for a normal child his age. The ice sprite looks like a soft breeze could knock him over, which may or may not have been intentional considering his mode of flying.

God, North hated the flying, but it made Jack too happy to be banned entirely.

So when Jack does go missing, North's eyes go skyward as he wanders down the hallways towards the globe room, and he isn't surprised to see a small flash of white and blue zipping around amongst the flying toys that constantly fluttered around the large amphitheatre.

He is, however, surprised when one of the toys suddenly crashes into another (a failure in the wings design would later be pinpointed as the culprit), knocking the second toy off course and spiraling out of control. Not a ridiculously uncommon thing.

What's uncommon about this particular event is the fact that the secondary crash victim careens out of control and smashes right into Jack, startling the boy and sending him crashing into the floor mural of the four Guardians.

North's already moving as soon as he sees Jack's control on the wind waver, rushing towards where he thinks the child will land, but his heart sinks when he hears the harsh thump and pained shriek of his child hitting the ground.

And then the crying.

There's a split second of shocked silence before Jack's first pained wail pierces the room, followed quickly by high pitched sobbing. North continues rushing with urgency across the platform to where a small group of yetis has gathered from where they too had tried to catch the falling sprite.

"Let me through!" North barks at them, worry lacing his tone. "Let me see!"

The yetis part at his asking, quickly splitting the group in two lest they incur North's wrath. Jack's sitting in the centre of the circle, having crashed on the circular center of the mural. Tears wash through his blue eyes as he blubbers, his tiny breaths hitching and gasping as he raises one of his arms in a silent demand to be picked up. North is quick to comply, sweeping Jack up in his broad arms as gently as he can so as to not irritate any injuries.

Jack holds up his other arm, the one he hadn't reached for North with, and claims that "It hurts, Norf, real bad!" between bouts of tears. With growing dread North feels around the arm, and his heart sinks when he feels the definite signs of a break.

He hugs Jack close, rubbing the child's back, murmuring nothings to the wailing child.

"Shh," He tells Jack, picking the child up and carrying him through the vast halls of Santoff Claussen. "It is alright little one, I am here, shhh all will be well."

Jack sniffles and clings to North with his good arm, the tears only coming in small waves as he slowly calms down. A little trooper, he is, North muses. His boy was much stronger than he looks. Not that that would make North stop worrying for him, but at it was a nice thought at least.

At last North arrives at a small room used as a medical ward of sorts. The yetis and North himself hardly ever got hurt or sick, but it was a good idea to have on site nonetheless. One of the more medically inclined yetis quickly shuffled Jack to one of the three beds in the med ward before forcing North out of the room.

It was for the best, North thought sadly, as he didn't think his old heart could take seeing Jack's bone having to be reset.

But god hearing it wasn't any better. When a sharp snap and Jack's screaming begins anew, it takes all of North's self restraint to not go in and give whoever hurt his cold little child a black eye. So instead he takes to pacing, growling at anyone who comes too close as he walks back and forth in front of the closed door separating him from his little boy.

Eventually the yeti comes out of the room, declaring that Jack was going to be fine, the break had been clean and thus easily set, but that the child would need lots of rest and quiet to heal quickly. North thanked the yeti before rushing inside. Jack was sitting on the small bed, wrapped in so many blankets he looked much like a burrito, with a curious expression on his face as he poked and prodded at his new cast.

"Norf!" He shrieked happily as his guardian came in the room. "Lookit what Sherry gave me!" He waves the blue cast in the air haphazardly. North quickly banishes the sad expression from his face and paints on a joyful one instead.

"Is wonderful!" He laughs, sitting on the bed next to Jack. "I see she let you pick ze colour."

Jack nods in the overzealous bursts only a child could pull off, before declaring quite seriously that blue is the best colour, North.

North stays with Jack for the rest of the day. Apparently Phil calls the other Guardians at some point because they all trickle in at some point. Tooth appears first, demanding to know if her Sweet Tooth is okay or not. When she sees the cast she looks ready to cry, even though Jack is ecstatic at it's presence, claiming that it makes his arm look armoured and therefore more dangerous, therefore more awesome.

Bunny arrives next, toting chocolate and healing medicines from his garden. Jack is happy to take the former, but no so happy to see the latter, declaring that medicine was for babies and that he could heal on his own, thank you very much. Bunny would later inform North that the actual medication was in the chocolate, and that the supposed "medicine" were actually placebos. Crafty rodent. Jack also takes great delight in forcing Bunny to paint his cast all the colours of the rainbow.

Sandy is last to arrive, but only by half an hour. The dreamweaver pats Jack on the head, and tells the boy that he's very brave to have fallen from such a height and only come away with a broken arm. Jack smiles at that, exuberantly declaring that he was going to be a Guardian when he grew up, because he was so tough he'd make Pitch Black shake in his boots!

Jack forces all the Guardians to sign his cast, and North even adds a signature for Manfred the stuffed rabbit at the child's request. The child, once getting over the initial shock of the fall and the pain, is back to his usual happy self, bouncing off the walls and laughing everywhere he goes. North tries to keep him in bed for the first week, but after three ridiculously well constructed escape attempts the Russian admits defeat and lets Jack go back to his daily schedule of running rampant and causing hell.

But no flying. Jack even agrees without argument to this, claiming that he didn't want to break his other arm before the first one healed.

As morbid a thought as it was, if it keep Jack literally grounded North would take it.

North also dotes on Jack for the next month it takes for the child to heal, giving Jack whatever he wanted whenever he wanted. Six stories in one night? Go for it. New toys for each hour of the day? Already done. Candy for dinner? Hells yeah.

Jack was ecstatic with all the added attention, especially since this means he can swindle North into letting him sleep in his bed. Jack didn't like the dark very much; it had always seemed to leer at him with promised pain.

But that is where North finds himself, laying in bed with a book in one hand and a sleeping child curled up and pinning the other. Jack's breath is even and quiet, and North can't help but get distracted as he runs a soft finger over the child's cast.

His kid was hurt, and it was North's fault for not catching him in time. This is when North makes a vow he hopes he'd never have to keep. If Jack ever fell again, North would always be there to catch him.

A/N Ohhhhhh shit yeah, we're doing this son. AW YISSSS. Heads up, the chapters in this story are all going to be shorter than the chapters in Absolute Zero, just because they all focus on one particular instance as opposed to the years taken up by a chapter in the main story.