Nonexistent (Rise of the Guardians)

11. So... We're Not Screwed?

Toothiana flew up to the globe, her hands covering her mouth in distress. "Look how fast they're going out!" She gasped.

I looked on in concern, watching some of the lights in Africa flicker out of existence. Jack flew up to the northern hemisphere, looking at the blinking lights in North America.

"Its fear." He murmured. "He's tipped the balance."

"We've got to tip it back the right way." I agreed, trying to break the nervous tension in the room that was so palpable I could hardy breathe. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Bunny perk up, his ears flicking as he leapt in front of us with a determined smile.

"Hey, buck up ya sad-sacks. Come on! We can still turn this around! Easter is tomorrow, and I need your help." He practically buzzed with excitement; the rabbit was in his element.

"I say we pull out all the stops and get those little lights flickerin' again!"

North nodded and boomed a confident laugh. "Bunny is right!" And he turned with a swoosh of his fur coat and stomped out the door, heading into the main workshop. He swung an immense door open in front of us, and we all scooted through quickly to avoid being cut off from the group by the huge wooden doors. Only a person of North's size could open those hangar doors.

He strode over to an elevator, and the five of us piled in uncomfortably as the elevator traveled to the bottom floor of the factory. We all tumbled out when North opened the door, and we heard him say, as we were picking ourselves up off the workshop floor, "It pains me to say, but this year, Easter is more important than Christmas."

Bunny leapt to his feet, grinning like a madman. "Did everyone hear that?"

I laughed and hauled myself to my feet, my new knife tapping my thigh all the way. Tooth hovered next to me as we hurried behind North, trailing brightly colored feathers as she went. I watched the purple and green feathers flutter to the ground and doubled my speed, realizing that we were running out of time.

"Quickly! Everyone, to the sleigh!" North bellowed, reaching for the hangar doors to open the reindeer stables. I heard a distressed noise from Bunnymund behind me before he leapt up in front of North with a smirk.

"Oh no, mate. My warren, my rules." His whiskers twitched up in a grin.

"Buckle up."

A rabbit hole opened up beneath us, wide enough to fit all of us, including North, a handful of elves, and a pair of yetis as they passed by us. North looked up with his surprised blue eyes, and exclaimed "Shostakovich!" Before we plummeted into a tunnel with a slide-like bottom, grassy and earthy, but slick enough to make us slide along it behind Bunny as he ran ahead. Jack surfed along the sides as North and I shot past, screaming all the way as I scrabbled on the walls to get a handhold so I could slow my descent.

Jack darted by, laughing giddily as he watched me scramble for a handhold in the tunnel. He slid by gracefully on his bare feet, frost blooming under his toes as he surfed on the walls of the tunnel.

"Jack! Wait come back! JACK! Get your frosty little butt over here and help meeee!" I squealed as I careened past him. He only laughed and flew towards the end of the tunnel, where a golden light was blossoming before my eyes.

I could have sworn I saw him wave at me like the skinny little jerk he is.

North, the yetis, the elves and I tumbled out of the mouth of the tunnel in a huge pile behind Bunny, Tooth and Jack, who flew gracefully out of the opening in the wall, whereas I got pinned under a yeti's arm and North's leg simultaneously.