Jack felt a change on the winds. While the winds were nigh impossible for others to communicate with, he found it easy enough, but they don't use words so much as feelings. And right now he's feeling rather tugged-along. As his hair was ruffled and his clothed tugged at, he laughed and went limp-but-balanced, in just the right way to be caught up and swept away. "Alright, alright, what's up? Something fun?" He hopes so. The winds knew the best games. And they always knew where he needed to be.

It turns out that now isn't time to go on new adventures with the winds, though. As he's shot into the sky, he sees the aurora borealis, which he's been told is the signal for the Guardians meeting up. More and more often, he's been dragging them away from work and into social events, but it looks like they have to do their actual jobs this time around. Which is too bad, really, because as much fun as it was, fighting darkness could tempt you and trick you, and Jack knew all too well the consequences of that.

Soon, with the winds' help, he ends up at Santoff Claussen. He's always admired the place for its bright atmosphere—he'd built himself a home of ice at one point, and it had just seemed lonely. But the workshop was wonder and life in the middle of cold, beautiful scenery that even Jack could acknowledge could be a bit forbidding at times. Mostly when he was in a bad mood. He wonders, idly, what Pitch has done this time. It's not like he has a whole bunch of firepower now. He blows in through the globe room and finds everyone else already there.

"Bout time you showed up," Bunny grumbles at him once he lands. Sandy waves, but Tooth and North seem preoccupied with their previous conversation.

"What's up? World-ending catastrophes? Magical misadventures? The Kangaroo had an existential crisis when he realized that bunnies aren't natives of Australia? It's okay, you know, we all know you're secretly from Timbuktu." Bunny doesn't even rise to the bait. Something pretty bad, then. "Seriously. What happened?"

"Man in Moon has appointed new Guardian." North replied, finally pulling out of his hushed debate with Tooth.

"Wait, wait, whaaat? If you guys appoint new guardians this often, how are there not about a gazillion of you?" It's a valid question, he's only ever heard of the Big Four as far as Guardians go, and he's pretty sure that unless Nightlight or Katherine needed to be re-appointed, there really isn't anyone out there who'd really want to be a Guardian. Not anyone useful, anyway. Some stupid bootlicking Guardian-worshipping-fanspirits might, but Jack doesn't count them as people. Except the helpers, like the fairies and yetis, they're great...but that's not the point. The point is whatever Tooth is telling him right now, which he's forgotten to pay attention to.

"...might be surprising, but...Jack? Jack? Jack. Jack!"

"Woah, woah, I spaced out there for a second. What was the last thirty seconds of that?"

Bunny bristles at his lack of attention/respect/stick-in-the-mud-ness. "What Sheila was trying to say was that Pitch is supposed to be the new Guardian. And yer supposed ta make that happen."

Hmm, how about...no? He grabs Bunny by the shoulders and looks him straight in the eye as best he can. Stupid unfairly tall kangaroos.

"Bunny. Bunny, I want you to look me in the eye. How many fingers am I holding up? Have you been sneaking a little too much of North's eggnog? It's okay, the first step is admitting your addiction, we're here for you. Just tell me honestly how high you-"

Bunny cuts him off, which is just rude.

"Listen, Frostbite, the rest of us were as surprised as you. Remember how we told ya about how Pitch used to be someone else?"

Jack nods. Of course he remembers, he still hasn't apologized for the near-catastrophic blizzards in Antarctica that day. Luckily, the only ones around to care had been scientists and the penguins.

"Well, MiM says ya have something with the potential to bring the General back, if you wanted ta use it."

Jack leaps almost subconsciously into the air, his natural reaction to surprises. Ease of escape is never an issue is he can help it. Unfortunately, the Guardians decide that he's actually trying to leave, so he is shortly tackled by a pile of sand and North. One is considerably heavier than the other.

"Oof, ow, geroff," he mumbles through a mouthful of fabric from North's coat. They've learned too quickly and far too well his habit of simply leaving potentially painful/awkward/longer-and-deeper than-small-talk conversations. He hadn't been about to fly off this time...well, not yet...

As Jack was trying (and failing, it might be said) to convince himself that the Guardians weren't perfectly justified in taking extreme measures to prevent his running off before the conversation was done, North was kindly getting off him and Sandy was doing the same...once there was a sand ball and chain attached to his foot. The little man crossed his arms, glaring fiercely and tapping his foot threateningly to make sure his point got across. Jack just resigned himself to the discomfort of being firmly attached to the Earth for the time being.

"Jack, I know it's kind of a lot, but that's just what Manny said. Don't worry, we'll help you find out what he means." Tooth fluttered worriedly, helping him to his feet.

Oh, that's real reassuring. The Guardians will help him attempt to bring back the dead. Hasn't anyone here read Frankenstein?

That's what Jack thought. What he said is, "...what? Tell me, are you all suddenly crazy or something? Pitch is a super-powerful psycho. Sure, he's not so much one now, but do you seriously think he'll just stand there and let us kill him? That's assuming we can bring back...pre-Pitch Pitch, and assuming we even want to."

Of course, North zeroed in on the last part of his sentence. "Of course we want to! General used swords, meeting would be most interesting!"

Well, there's North's motivation. He probably hadn't been able to test himself sword-on-sword against someone since Tooth lost her swords or stopped using them or... "Tooth, whatever happened to your swords anyway? Didn't you have swords at some point?"

"Yes, I did, but I stopped in peacetime and didn't have time to get them before Pitch attacked the Tooth Palace. Jack, do you know of anything that could bring back the General?"

Well, there's the question he'd been avoiding. How to answer...? Well, he really wasn't sure what answer would be truth, so he'd have to get back to them on that. He stepped forward into the moonlight that had been illuminating their conversation, dragging his still-chained foot behind him. He looked up into the face in the moon.

"What do you mean, bring him back? Isn't he dead?"

The moonlight looked back at him. It said nothing. Jack isn't surprised.

"Right, stupid question. Better one, what do you expect me to do? Whole planets more talented than me tried to kill Pitch, and they didn't manage it."

In the moonlight that remained in front of him, a little shadow-crown appeared. It was beautiful and intricate, and Jack knew that is he were to see the real thing, it would be the most amazing thing he'd ever seen. It's also been destroyed for millenia, so Jack wasn't really sure what the moon wanted him to do about it. He raised an eyebrow, giving the moon his best skeptical look.

It isn't gone.

Well, isn't that dandy? Some ancient crown that he has almost nothing to do with is supposed to take down the King of Nightmares. Some ancient crown that "isn't gone," which is helpful, but that doesn't mean they can do anything about it. Well, in theory, there are some things...

"So let me get this straight. You want me to try what an entire kingdom failed to do on the basis of the fact that the crown isn't 'gone?' What does that even mean, 'gone?'"

Jack could practically hear the man in the moon's sigh. Served him right.

Don't be stubborn.

"Don't you patronize me! I'm not being stubborn, I'm pointing out that this is stupid! Sure, the Elemental Kingdom could bring people back to themselves when they went crazy. Sure, their crown isn't as destroyed as everyone thinks it is. But the entire planet tried to bring Pitch down, and they all died! I'm just the Spirit of Winter on some backwater planet a million galaxies away, there is no way I can do that! Not when they couldn't!"

The Guardians were getting anxious, not understanding their argument. They shifted in the background as it got colder and Jack got angrier, trying to get MiM to just see that he can't do this.

A different form appeared in the moonlight, and Jack reluctantly backed up to make space for it. It was him, staff in hand, staring down Pitch with a child clinging to his leg. A little girl. He remembered her. Not-Pitch and not-Jack looked at each other for a long moment before not-Jack took the child in his arms and flew off. Not-Pitch let him go without attacking, watching him fly out of the edge of the moonlight and disappear.

Jack understood, suddenly, what MiM was trying to show him. He wasn't trying to us the blood and glory of a dead planet to bring pre-Pitch Pitch back. He was using Pitch's soft spot for him—such as it was—and his knowledge of what broke and how it should be fixed.

When he looked at it that way, he kind of had to do it. He had to at least try.

"I still think this is stupid and we're all going to die. I'm just doing this to repay a debt. And don't go thinking I'll actually tolerate the bastard any more than before." He grumbled. Then he realized how much he sounded like a certain Pooka. He perked up to make up for it. "Besides, this'll be fun! I've never attempted necromancy before!"

The Guardians collectively sighed in relief, in their own ways.

"Now, what was that crown, Jack, How can we find it? What exactly does it do?" Tooth asked, excited.

"We don't actually need the crown, it was a symbol. I just need a couple of seconds to be able to concentrate on Pitch at close range, and kabam! Automatic unpitchifier. Now that I know what he was actually asking for, this should be a piece of cake!"

It was not a piece of cake.

Sandy watched and helped as his fellow Guardians tried to distract Pitch enough for Jack to get up close, but Pitch seemed determined to keep Jack away from him as much as possible. Sandy wasn't surprised, as Pitch had never seemed to like approaching Jack head-on, even less so than he did the rest of the Guardians. They were all wearing out, and they were no closer than they'd been earlier. To add to that, Pitch kept taunting them, frustrating the fighters and making their strikes more wild, less skillful and damaging. Finally, exhausted by Pitch's endless dodging and melting into the shadows, the Guardians regrouped a bit away from where Pitch was. Jack, panting, reached into his hoodie and wordlessly handed Baby Tooth back to Tooth. The fairies weren't really supposed to come to fights, but Baby Tooth had a knack for sneaking along anyway.

"Oh. Is that all the great Guardians can do? Honestly, I'm a little disappointed," Pitch sounded bored. "I suppose it's my turn now? Here, This might work."

With that, he disappeared into shadow once more, before abruptly appearing behind Jack where he was stationed at the edge of their group, the better to dash suddenly to Pitch. Before anyone could react, before he had even finished reforming his own body from the shadows, he had a blade running through Jack's abdomen, entering in his back in a way that surely severed his spinal chord. They saw a second of Jack's surprised face and the Bogeyman's grin before Jack grinned, shakily.

"I win, Pitch Black," he whispered, before a mixture of ice and shadow exploded from the two, forming a spiky dome.

"Jack!" Bunny shouted, racing to the edge of the gigantic structure and pounding frantically on it. He ignored the spikes on it, until suddenly liquid shadow wrapped around his wrists and yanked him away from the cocoon, just in time for him not to get hit by the additional spikes of ice that sprouted aggressively in his direction. A natural defense against an attack on the cocoon, maybe? But it was odd that the shadows were the less-dangerous counterpart...did the two switch powers?

Sanderson didn't have much time to ponder this, as the dome began glowing a light, icy blue, with shadows writhing and changing within it. In seconds, the compound had crumbled into rubble just as quickly as it had sprung into existence, and left only a football field's worth of rubble and a single body in the center.