Pitch Black Eclipsed

Winter was the greatest.

In other news, water was wet, and Bunny still had a considerable stick up his rabbit hole.

Of course, one of the more annoyingly practical things about the world was that it couldn't always be winter. And while Jack Frost made a tradition of messing with the start of spring (much to Bunny's exasperation) and hightailing it northward during (groan) summer, he was fond of autumn nonetheless. Autumn was his Easter, with slate-gray skies and the promise of short, frigid days and long, crisp nights to come. It also helped that one of the most fun holidays in existence, one of those without a guardian of its own, was right smack in the middle of it.

Currently, the Guardian was loop-the-looping his way over a field of corn that was shaped, cultivated, and cut for a specific purpose. The lamps and flashlights, countless though they were, barely illuminated the narrow paths.

A sudden chorus of high-pitched screams directed his attention to one of the many criss-crossed paths through the cornfield, and he swooped downward, his smile fading. At the center of the maze was an ominous patch of spreading darkness, nearly enough to blot out the flashlights completely. His jaw tightened. He gripped his staff firmly enough for the wood's twisting grain to press an imprint into his palms, before preparing to plunge downward.

He was halfway to the tips of the tall cornstalks when he spotted the fleeing children, unharmed and free of the dark cloud. Jack halted in midair, the frown easing into a thoughtful look as he watched the small stampede of waving flashlights. The children slowed, and finally halted, and...

Well. Hm. That was interesting.

Why hadn't this occurred to him earlier? It would have come in handy, before. In spite of himself, a slow smile crept across his face, and he silently dove down toward the now-shrinking mass of shadow. He had to be quick about it – it wouldn't be fun if he were spotted.

***

Pitch glowered at the retreating backs of the children, though if he were honest, the sound of their wild, shrieking voices lifted his spirits ever so slightly. Not for the first time that night, he glanced warily toward the sky. One never knew when the Guardians might show their faces; they were so protective of these stupid holidays. At some point he thought he saw something move high above the cornfield, but when he looked again, there was no sign of it. Probably a shooting star, or an owl. He hated shooting stars.

Owls were... tolerable. He did like owls.

A sudden chill crept up his spine, and the Boogeyman shuddered. No, no. He was not supposed to be afraid. He was supposed to inspire fear in others. That... one time... well, that had been just that, one time. The Boogeyman did not feel fear. You might as well see Jack Frost shivering in the cold, or the Leprechaun tossing a black cat under a thirteen-rung ladder.

Despite his efforts to convince himself of this, the ice-cold prickling sensation refused to let up. Pitch shuddered again, and some unknowable instinct made him turn around.

The path behind him, lined with towering cornstalks, stretched on emptily before disappearing around a corner. Pitch shook himself angrily. He was acting like...

Like a child.

Speaking of children, he had work to be doing. Sniffing contemptuously, he turned on his heel to seek out the next group of waifs to frighten.

Blue eyes glared at him in the darkness.

"Boo."

The King of Nightmares drew back with a cry, black sand materializing to swirl at his fingertips as he leapt away from the Guardian and prepared for a fight.

What he was not prepared for was the laughter.

Jack Frost had been suspended upside down, floating high enough that their eyes had been level. Now, he flipped lazily upright again, doubled up in midair and filling the autumn night with his raucous merriment.

"Oh my – did you –  your face! You should've seen your face! Priceless! Man, I seriously need to invest in a camera! Maybe I'll write to North in a couple mon—pfft, hahahahaha oh god make it stop it hurts..." He carried on for a while, until he squeezed a few tears from his eyes that froze on their way down his face.

Pitch bristled, and though his black sand remained in its shapeless, shifting form, it did not disappear. "Was that really necessary, Frost?" he hissed.

The youthful Guardian crossed his arms and made an honest effort to control himself, though his impish grin remained plastered across his face, and he still shook with repressed mirth. "Hello, kettle, it's pot. Newsflash: you're black."

This carefree response did little to improve Pitch's mood. "So? What are you waiting for, then? Going to drive me off and let your precious children have their harmless fun?"

Jack's amusement subsided for a moment, and he lifted a single white eyebrow in response. "I could..." He shrugged. "But I won't. I mean, come on, you do know what day it is, don't you?"

Pitch's glower deepened. "In case you've forgotten, we were enemies less than a year ag–"

"Hold that thought." Jack spun around just as the beams of flashlights lit up the path nearby and gradually approached. He promptly vanished into the corn in a gust of wintry wind, and a pattern of white frost bloomed over the stalks he touched. Pitch watched him, mystified, as a pair of boys made their way around the corner and into view, staring wide-eyed into the patches of light their torches provided. There was no need for him to conceal himself, he reminded himself resentfully. "Watch this," Jack whispered, grinning, and flew through the corn toward them with an audible rustle.

One of the boys froze, pointing his light into the corn. "Did you hear that?"

"Dude, quit it, you're freaking me out. This maze is creepy enough."

Jack poked his head out of the corn, just behind them. His lips pursed, and he blew an icy breath of wind at their backs. Both of them shuddered, eyes wide, and Jack vanished once more off the path.

"What was that?" the first boy asked. "You felt that, didn't you? Tell me you felt that."

"It was just the wind, man!" the other snapped, though for all his bravado he seemed just as frightened. "Are you doing this on purpose? If you're doing this on purpose, I'm gonna kill you."

"Well?"

Pitch turned back to the cluster of cornstalks next to him, where Jack's pale face stared out at him expectantly.

"Well, what?"

Jack shrugged. "I dunno, Boogeyman, isn't this kind of your thing?"

Pitch gaped at him.

"...Come on, do I need to triple-dog dare you, or what?"

Warily, the Boogeyman threw out a hand toward the boys. In the combined light of their flashlights, a shadow rose up, twisting and contorting into a nightmarish shape, with reaching, clawed hands, burning eyes, and teeth that dripped. Both boys screamed and shoved at each other as they fled back the way they had come, practically tripping over one another in their mad dash for safety. It was a miracle they both managed to hold on to their lights.

Jack popped out of the corn again, snickering as he watched them go. "Nice." He turned his smug face back to Pitch's, and feigned surprise at the Boogeyman's wary confusion. "Something wrong, Pitch?"

"Whatever happened to protecting them?" Pitch demanded suspiciously. "Driving back fear, and all that rubbish you prissy Guardians were going on about last spring?"

The Guardian of Fun leaned back in midair. "Weeellll... lemme show you something." Without waiting for a response, he darted through the air after the pair of boys. He paused, looking back to see if Pitch was following him, which he wasn't. "Well? Come on."

A trap was likely, perhaps even obvious, but Pitch nonetheless followed Jack around the corner to a perpendicular path through the maze. There, he found the Guardian standing firmly on the ground, his staff balanced across his shoulders with his hands hanging lazily off it, the very picture of nonchalance. Beyond him, the two boys had their backs to them, and were leaning against each other and breathing hard.

"Oh my gosh..." the first boy panted. "Oh my gosh, that was... that was..." Without warning, he burst into a fit of giggles. The other boy joined in, and before Pitch's bewildered eyes, the two children he had just terrified collapsed against each other with uncontrollable laughter.

"That was great!" the second boy gasped. "That was great! I love Halloween! Come on, let's see if it happens again!"

The pair of them dashed back in the direction they had come, though not before Jack flitted up into the air, out of their line of vision. Pitch did not move, and the boys ran heedlessly straight through him.

The Boogeyman turned to watched them go, and then looked up to Jack, who was pretending to hang upside down from his staff. Jack met his look, still wearing that same smug, impudent expression. A brief staring contest followed, as the King of Nightmares attempted to read the answers in his enemy's laughing eyes. It was difficult to read the answers, however, especially since he could not be sure exactly what his questions were.

"I don't understand," he said finally.

Shaking his head, Jack flipped right-side-up and twirled his staff until it hung across his shoulders again. His winter-white smile flashed in the darkness. "Sometimes it's really fun to be scared." He shrugged. "And if you really think about it, this is kind of your day."

With that, Jack Frost darted away into the night sky, casting a silhouette over the Moon as he went.

Pitch turned his head back to the stretch of path where Jack had first come upon him, where the voices of the two boys still floated through the corn. He smiled, and considered the shape of the next nightmare-shadow he would cast. Might as well not disappoint them.