Rise of the Guardians One-shots pt.3

Watching a Downfall

a very strange chapter. dedicated to the Jack and Bunny in my life.

tw: religious doubt. suicidal thoughts.

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"Jack? What are you doing, we've been looking for you." Bunny asked quietly. He looked at his son who had his eye on a girl standing in a parking lot. 

"You feel it, Dad? She's hopeless. She's so close to giving up." He whispered. Bunny swallowed as he felt the dark feeling coming from the girl, the dark feeling of giving up. He remembered this feeling from Jack so long ago. He could see that she was older than a child. She seemed to still be young but not young enough to be in their jurisdiction. 

"What is she saying, Bunny?" He sighed, Jack was asking him to use his hearing. He hoped closer to the parking lot to hear what she was whispering. His ears fell as he caught what she was saying. 

"Please, what is the plan here? What is your plan for me cause God I'm sick of this. I need you to tell me what you've got planned. I'm tired." Bunny walked back to Jack's side, his ears showing what he had heard. 

"She's going through a bad time, Jack. We need to leave her be." He watched a fire burn in Jack's eyes as he turned on him. 

"You didn't leave me. You never left me when I was like this. Why are we leaving her?" Bunny looked back at the girl who was just staring up at the sky. He could see the tear tracks down her face, he could feel the defeat coming off of her. 

"She can't see us, kit. I don't feel any belief coming off her." He watched Jack shake his head. His kit was stubborn. He knew this was Jack's way of forgetting what was happening in their life. There were many things going wrong. 

"I feel it. There is a tiny bit of belief in the air, it's small but it's there." Bunny tried to reach out for Jack but the boy had taken to the wind, flying closer to the girl. Aster sighed before following right after him. 

He froze when he watched her look over to them. He watched the girl just blink in Jack's direction, tears still falling down her face. Instead of seeming surprised, he watched nothing change in her sad expression. 

"What are you doing here, Jack Frost? Don't you have other things to do?" He watched Jack step closer. Bunny realized then that he felt no belief coming from the girl in him. The girl didn't believe in Bunny. She believed in Jack. 

"I saw you when I was flying over. You looked like you need someone." Bunny watched her shoulders drop, her head falling to stare at the ground. 

"The one person everyone says I need to speak to isn't talking back. He isn't responding. I'm tired, Frost. I need to feel something other than this...anger. This sadness. I want it to stop." 

Bunny felt his hair stand on end the tone of her voice changed to a hopeless tone he had heard before. It almost took him back to one of the memories he tried to forget of Jack's darkest times. 

"I know what you're feeling. I know how this feels." 

"I know you do. The story you've told to your other sad believers spreads around to other sad people. You've saved a lot of people."

Bunny watched Jack look up to the sky like she was for a few seconds before he responded. He knew in the back of his mind that his son was helping believers in this way lately. The world was going to shit, the children are losing hope. They're choosing to end their lives more than living. 

"Am I saving you?" 

"The belief in you and your other Guardians have kept me going for a while but...it's just not there anymore. The feeling to make stories, to create my own ideas, has gone away. I don't know what to do anymore." 

Bunny swallowed as he watched her slowly sit down. He watched his son move to sit beside her. 

"What do you mean stories?" He knew what Jack was doing. He used to do it to him. Distraction. Learning what makes them happy. Trying to find a new thing to bring them back. 

"I write stories. For myself. For others. Sometimes they are about other people and sometimes they are created from my imagination. People read them and I've never felt happier when I give my creations out for the world to see-"

Bunny heard her hold in a sob. 

"But I haven't touched my writing in months. Every time I go to create something my mind goes blank and I just forget everything I'm writing. I feel like everything I write or type out is shit. That it will no longer be good enough for myself." 

Jack put a hand over hers as he clenched a fist in the anger that she was talking about. Bunny knew it was the replacement of the sadness that wanted to take over. 

"It's so hard. I'm failing in my classes, I'm so mad at many of my friends for no reason. I'm having so many family problems. I can't...I can't take it anymore." 

Bunny moved closer, wishing she could see him, so he could help her. However, he knew that Jack was what she needed right now. 

"You know, my Dad always says that the hardest things will turn out to be the best things. There have been many times I've almost succeed in ending it all. It always ends with either my Dad showing up or I realize that if I leave, I'll never know what may happen in the future." 

He watched the girl sigh before looking back up at the sky. Jack followed her lead as they both looked to the sky. 

"Why don't you show me some of your writing?" He watched her shake her head in a no. 

"If I write, it gets to personal. I bleed my life into the pages and I don't want that. It's not good to change the writing into a diary. People won't like that." 

Bunny held his breath as Jack reached up to grasp her shoulder. He watched her look at him as a soft smile covered his face. 

"How do you know? What if you putting yourself into your stories helps you get back? I'm sure someone out there would appreciate seeing somethings like you're feeling. It'll make them feel seen like it's okay to be sad." 

He felt proud of Jack, watching him repeat words that Bunny had said to him so many times over the years.

"It's okay to be sad. Maybe you should try it, see what happens?" He watched the girl just look out into the darkness of the woods near the parking lot. 

"It's been too long. I'm not sure I could give what I used to." 

"Have you asked? Maybe the stories you write is all they need. Try to create something, something different from what you usually write. Go off script. Make a new storyline but keep the same characters. Find a new flow to create to try out." 

Her fear flowed through the air. It was the slight feeling of hope going through the air that made him smile. 

"What if it isn't liked?" She whispered. 

"Then it isn't liked. You make something else. The only thing you can do is try. But if it's anything like this journal then I think at least someone out there will feel like they can relate." 

Bunny smiled as he watched Jack and the girl talk. He could feel that Jack was bringing something back in her. He watched as hours went by that they sat in the parking lot with Jack talking her down from doing what she had planned to do before they got there. 

"It's okay to be sad. It's okay to feel this way. Just don't get stuck there." 

He watched as Jack helped her up, walking her back to the car she came in. He waited while his kit watched the girl go before taking to the sky to follow her. Bunny smiled as he watched his son fly over her in protection. 

He turned to make a hole, leaving the area. A life had been saved. A spark of hope had been brought back. 

He hoped she'd write again. 

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