North's POV:

It had been a few hours that I had been searching through books…again. If it was so hard to find information on Sola in the first place, then how are we supposed to find out where she would live? I keep having to remind myself that this was for Jack's sake but each book I slam closed in defeat, makes it that much harder to control my anger. Another thing had occurred to me earlier; now that we believed Sola existed, were we going to be able to see her when we finally did find Jack?

I sighed and sat for a few seconds to collect my thoughts, closing another of my cursed, useless, no good books. My getting frustrated was surely not going to help our winter friend, but can anyone blame me? It has been taking forever to go through each book and I'm still no further to finding him than I was in the first place.

I begrudgingly grabbed another book off the stack and began to open it but I was abruptly stopped when I heard the door slam open. I groaned.

"Phil, I tell you once, now I tell you twice…KNOCK!" I shouted.

Phil motioned towards the door, speaking yetish. After a moment of deciphering, my eyes widened and I sprang from my seat, darting to the globe room. Elves scurried to avoid getting stepped on and yetis with toys moved out of the way so as not to destroy their work when I pushed through them. Phil motioned toward the top half of the globe and my eyes immediately caught sight of the light blue dot glowing through the white landscape…the Artic Circle.

I smiled, quickly writing down the coordinates and yelling at a group of yetis to go prepare the sleigh for departure. For the first time in days, we were finally getting somewhere. After taking down his exact location I looked back toward the globe, eyes widening. The blue dot flickered before disappearing again entirely and only one thought ran through my mind. Jack could be in trouble.

Ella's POV:

I couldn't deny that I had my doubts on both sides but if he wants me to take a chance, then I will. I can't tell which is real anymore, the cruel world as I see it, or the cruel world as my hate and loneliness sees it. The light streamed through the ice, casting beautiful rays on the floor. I stared at them, thinking about what my entire life has been spent like; whether I was wrong or not.

I stood up, walking over to the door and creaking it open to see if Ja-Frost was outside my door. The last time I saw him, he was spying on me as I was playing my guitar, the creeper. He's been rather silent these past couple of hours though. I mean, we haven't talked too much since my weak and pathetic break down but usually I would at least hear him moving through the hallway, trying to find his way through the halls like a lost puppy dog.

Stepping out into the hallway, I examined my surroundings…silence. It was the kind of silence that you got when you were completely alone in an isolated area, the kind of feeling that I had gotten awfully familiar with but now, it hurt.

I walked down into the throne room…no one. By now I was shaking my head in denial. The wind whipping at me viciously but I was too clouded with fear to listen to it. I pondered this feeling for a moment; why was I afraid? Because he might have finally left, that's why. For once, I wanted to hold onto the illusion that someone might have cared for me, just for a second. My mind started screaming at me, so many different voices and emotion blaring in my mind at once. I clutched my head, trying to make them stop, tears forming in my eyes. He'd actually left. I knew it! All he wanted was to get inside my head, he didn't care in the slightest and I actually let my guard down, I let him in!

My eyes should've been glowing red, I should've been out there searching to kill him right now for lying to me, but instead, they were glowing a bright blue. I was more sad, more disappointed in myself than anything. He was never any different, I just fooled myself into thinking that he was and, for that, I felt like an idiot; a gullible idiot.

I was about to walk back to my room and continue with my original routine, hoping that maybe one day the moon would have mercy on me and I would finally pass on, away from this cruel world, when my eyes suddenly caught sight of a familiar brown wooden stick. His staff…it was still leaning against the throne. I'm not sure how long I stood there, staring at it before my mind actually began to process things. I may not be the brightest person in the world but I know that if he were to just leave me without a second word, that he would probably take his weapon with him. I picked it up, shifting the light weight wood in my hands. It hadn't been touched since he placed it in my hands and left it.

Turning around, something else then caught my eye. It was slightly shiny and dark, lightly scattered all over the floor. I came up to it, kneeling down to it. I already had a sneaking suspicion growing in the back of my mind as I began to examine the dark dust.

I picked up some of the black substance, sprinkling it back onto the floor. There was no doubt about what it was; nightmare sand. What I wanted to know was how it got here. Then, the horrible realization hit me like a ton of bricks; I let down the magic wall, leaving Jack to be openly seen on the Globes of Belief…every globe. I had been to most places in the world, just to see the things there were to see, including other people's lairs and homes. I know about the old caves that a certain Nightmare tends to lurk. I know about the Globe of Belief standing at the very heart of it. I know about the feud between him and the Guardians and now Jack.

I narrowed my eyes. He didn't leave, he was taken. I let out a shaky breath, eyes beginning to bleed red and, unlike other times, they were dark and filling with a different kind of hate that I had never felt before. All of the rage that I had felt for mankind as a whole was forgotten and all I could think about was what horrible things would happen to Jack if I didn't do something. Yes, I care, I admit it now! I care about Jack. A horribly evil thought laced with hate formed in my mind. If Pitch so much as scratched him, he wouldn't ever crawl out of his hole again; I would make sure of it. If Jack is hurt when I find him, I won't kill Pitch, no, I'll make him suffer.

I walked towards the door, hand outstretched and forming my sword. Hatred beginning to pound in my head like a constant drum. I had a bad dream to kill.

Jack's POV:

I woke up to a pounding headache…or was I still asleep? It was awfully dark but it felt like my eyes were open. I blinked a few times in testing. Yeah, they had to be open; dreams weren't this vivid. I tried to sit up but then it came…pain. A lot of pain. Every muscle in my body protested as I attempted to shift into a sitting position, specifically my head, then I found that I couldn't. I tried to pull my wrists up, only to discover that they were bound together, metal digging into them.

Why was I here, more specifically, where was I? It took a few more seconds but then, like a vision, the events of yesterday, or, however long ago it was, played through my memory like a movie; a really sick, twisted movie. I fought against my chains, struggling to free myself from them but the more I did, the tighter they seemed to get. There was something gritty blocking my mouth; was that…sand?! I let out a muffled groan of frustration; this was basically the exact same thing I had to go through will Ella, only worse.

The area around me was damp and if I weren't the personification of winter itself, I would probably say it was cold too. I was laying on a hard stone floor, the smell of dew lingering in the air and there was no light whatsoever. Then, I heard footsteps.

"Well, look who's awake." His voice mocked.

I yelled out in anger at him, though all that came out was a muffled sound, and all I seemed to be succeeding at was making him smile. I couldn't see him but I knew he was still there, enjoying himself immensely.

This…well, to say that it sucked, would be a major understatement. In my whole three hundred years as a spirit, the only two times I'm ever abducted land in roughly the same week. Ironic, isn't it? I breathed heavily, my eyes still trying to adjust to the darkness around me but having no luck in doing so. Ella was probably going to send an Ice Age soon if she didn't figure out what had really happened to me. What would she do if she did find out? Would she just leave me to my fate or try to find a way to get me out? This only proves Ella's point, that the world is heartless and cruel, but it's not! Well, most of it isn't. I turned my attention back to the sound of shadows moving around me.

"You should've stayed with your friends Jack." He lit a match, then placed it into a torch on the wall and I squinted at the sudden light. "Too bad you'll be dead before any of them find you."

My heart skipped a beat; dead?! He sounded playful but at the same time there was no hint of joking in his voice; he was going to kill me!

This only caused my eyes to widen as I struggled more against the shackles. Not that I didn't have faith in my fellow Guardians but the likelihood that Pitch would have left me showing on the globes, would be slim and Ella…I don't think she's going to be the one to find me. She probably wouldn't care, I took away practically any hope she might have had all those years ago. All I can hope for is that she doesn't do anything rash because of me.

The shadowy man, if you could even consider him human, stood before me, laughing his heart out at my current situation. I stopped struggling, knowing it was probably what was causing him to laugh in victory, and glared at him.

"My, my, You know, if it weren't for your friends, I probably wouldn't have known you were ever missing in the first place." He started. "Some family."

If anything could have caused a more hateful look than I already had on, it was that. Sure, they weren't the greatest family lately but that comment still struck a rather painful nerve.

"Something drew you away from them though, didn't it?" He laughed. "Call it what you want, desire to be alone, a feeling that you didn't belong there…"

'A girl with serious anger management issues…' I thought.

"…but either way, I suppose none of it will matter now."

I felt a dreadful feeling in the pit of my stomach that the next moments with him would be my worst moments of all time, or even worse, my last. He had an evil gleam in his eye and, while I had no idea what he was going to do, I did know that I probably wasn't going to like it.

Suddenly, a blast of black dust was sent my way. I tried to move back but I was stuck in one place, leaving the sand to easily nail me straight in the face. I coughed, having inhaled some of it, so hard that tears were starting to form in the corners of my eyes.

After my coughing fit was over, I opened my eyes, throwing an angry stare in his direction. He laughed and my eyelids began to feel heavy, likely from the sand he just threw in my face, and then…I knew nothing.

Jack: *angry* Just how many times are you going to make me go unconscious in this story?!

Me: I can't make future events happen if I don't!

Ella: *stifling giggles* I'm not complaining.

Jack: *glares*

Me: Sorry, but if it doesn't happen like it is, then I can't set you and Ella up to ki-*covers mouth*

Ella: O.O How was that sentence going to end?!

Jack: O.O What?!

Me: You can't prove anything!*runs away*