ROTG-Frozen Wonder

6

  I wake up to see my kidnapper standing on a building as I;m still bound and sitting beside his feet.

"Frost?"

My head snaps up and I see Jack. I try to yell out to him but my words are muffled. At first he only looks at the dark man beside me but soon his eyes meet mine and they widen.

He notices and chuckles.

"You know, for a 'neutral party' you spend an awful lot of time with those weirdos. This isn't your fight, Jack."

Jack's eyes narrow as he holds out his staff, ready to strike.

"You made it my fight when you stole those teeth. And now you've kidnapped her. I can't let that go."

"Teeth? Why do you care about the teeth?."

He smirks.

"More importantly, why do you care about her?"

Jack goes to reply but the man turns, having seen something on the other side of me. I look to where he's staring and see The Sandman calmly standing.

The Kidnapper quickly sidesteps, moving away from Sandy

"Now this is who I'm looking for-"

Before he can even finish a strand of dream sand whips around him, forcing him to duck and dodge Sandy's sudden attack.

"Whoa--??"

The man in black makes a stream of black sand, turning it into a gigantic sickle and swings it back at Sandy. Jack ducks, avoiding injury as Sandy is pushed back against a ledge. Sandy quickly grabs his foe with another golden stream of dream sand and yanks him off his feet, slamming him repeatedly against the tops of the buildings until finally throwing him off the rooftop. He bounces off the ground as he crashes into an empty street. As Sandy dusts his hands and calmly steps off the rooftop to follow, Jack looks on, astonished.

"Remind me not to get on your bad side."

Before he follows Sandy, Jack flies over to me to free me from my binds. As he works at the ropes, hurring to catch up to his friend, I look over my shoulder to him.

"Who is this guy?!"

"His name's Pitch. But you probably know him as the Boogeyman."

I huff and a tight, almost unbelieving smile comes to my lips.

"Great. Just how I wanted to spend my night. Getting kidnapped. By the Boogeyman! Way to go, Natalia. Life accomplishment."

Jack laughs behind me before I feel the ropes slide off my skin.

"You'll be alright. I've got you."

He then grabs onto my waist and flies over to Sandy, putting me down once we reach the ground. Pitch shakes off the crash, trying to back up as Sandy touches down and moves toward him, Jack and I following, making Pitch cower in fear as we approach.

"Okay, easy! You can't blame me for trying, Sandy. You don't know what it's like to be weak and hated. It was stupid of me to mess with your dreams. So I'll tell you what-"

Sandy continues forward, grim faced, but suddenly Pitch stops cowering and stands up as his tone and posture change.

"You can have 'em back!"

Before any of us can react, a Nightmare shoots up through a storm drain as several others gather in the alley behind him. Jack and Sandy look around as hundreds of Nightmares descend from the surrounding rooftops to encircle them. I take a small gulp of air as I turn, taking in all the Nightmares around us.

"This doesn't look good."

Jack, obviously worried, looks to Sandy and mutters.

"You take the ones on the left, I'll take the ones on the right?"

Pitch rises up from off the ground as another Nightmare takes shape underneath him. He grabs onto its mane as it snorts and snarls.

He then leans forward.

"Boo!"