Innocent Chaos (an RotG Fanfiction)

Chapter 8: Greater Chaos, Brighter Hope

The present shimmered back into focus for Scarlett. For a few minutes, she just sat there, contemplating everything. So much had happened in so little time. She had woken up remembering nothing, was taken to these strangers, discovered that she had uncontrollable powers, was hypnotized by roses twice, and was told that she had a past life. Then, she had discovered that roses sang to her in said past life, but hadn't been trying to kill her. Why were they trying to drag her underground now that she was immortal? And why could she even hear them in the first place?

And she still didn't know too much about the Guardians. Nor had her memories given her any idea of how to control her powers. All she was left with was more confusion.

She got up, remembering that Tooth had told her to stay where they were when she had rescued her from the roses. She should be heading back there. Of course, Scarlett wasn't going to go too close to there, and risk affecting more people with her powers, but she could at least try to fly to somewhere by that area. The problem was that she didn't exactly know where it was.

***

After flying for quite a while, Scarlett spotted a few dark clouds in the distance that appeared to be made out of black sand. They weren't natural. Suddenly, they all lightened to a golden color. What the heck?

Scarlett flew closer and saw three people fighting in the sky- Jack, Sandy, and Pitch. Jack shot a blast of ice at Sandy, who dodged it and then used sandy whips to slam Pitch into the ground. Pitch, in retaliation, shot an arrow back at Sandy, who narrowly avoided it. Jack tried to blast Sandy with ice again just as the dodged arrow hit the immortal teenager. He let out a cry of pain and started falling from the sky.

Scarlett was flying much faster now in the hopes of catching him, even though it seemed that she wouldn't make it time. However, someone else did it for her. It was Tooth! Sandy and Pitch continued to fight in the air while Tooth landed with Jack, and Scarlett quickly flew to them. Tooth's eyes were full of panic as she took the sandy arrow out of Jack's side. Luckily, it hadn't seemed to have gone in far enough to damage any internal organs, but Jack was still losing a lot of blood. He mumbled something incoherent as Scarlett stared in panic. This was her fault. If she had only been able to control her powers...

"Scarlett!" Tooth exclaimed, snapping the spirit out of her thoughts. "Help me with him!" She handed him to Scarlett, took off his jacket, and tied it tightly around his torso, putting pressure on where he had been injured. "We have to get to my palace!" Before Scarlett had any time to process what she had just been told, Tooth pulled her into the air. Tooth took Jack back from her, and they hurriedly flew as quickly as they could to Tooth's palace.

***

Tooth and Scarlett watched Jack sleep in a makeshift bed. Fortunately, Tooth had had some things here that she had used to patch him up. He was going to be okay, but it would take awhile for him to heal.

"Did you learn how to control your powers from your memories?" Tooth asked Scarlett, still looking at Jack with a worried expression.

"Not really," Scarlett responded. "I learned that the roses would talk and sing to me while I was human, though, but they didn't hypnotize me or try to kill me. I don't know why. But people, like my parents, wouldn't believe me when I told them about the roses singing to me and such, and I was eventually convinced that I was insane. I don't know why I could hear them, or why they would even interact with me at all." Tooth looked very disappointed. "Nothing makes sense to me," Scarlett added quietly, and she continued in the same soft voice as she expressed her confusion about everything. "Nobody has explained to me everything about you, the other Guardians, or Pitch." Her eyes began to tear up. "All of you just seem to act like I know everything."

"I'm sorry," Tooth told her apologetically. "I guess we never really did get to explain much to you." She then proceeded to tell Scarlett about Pitch, the Guardians, what they did, their previous battles, and other things like that.

"So...if Jack was hit by one of Pitch's arrows, why didn't he become corrupted and die like Sandy did a few years ago?" Scarlett asked.

"Jack doesn't control Dreamsand," Tooth responded quietly. "Nightmaresand, what the arrow was made out of, is basically corrupted Dreamsand, and hitting Sandy with it spread the corruption to him. Speaking of which...without Sandy focusing on you instead of his duties lately, it seems that the Dreamsand has...decided to do his job without him, like it has a mind of its own. But it doesn't do it the best... Dreamsand animals just go around and put people to sleep whenever they feel like it, whether at night or during the day. I discovered this while looking for you." Scarlett looked down in guilt.

"H-how...do I learn how to control my power?" she asked.

"I don't know," Tooth replied. "Are you sure that you didn't learn anything about it from your memories?"

"Well, I did offer people advice about love-related things a lot," Scarlett responded, "but I don't know how that can help me."

"Well, you were probably confident about your advice, right?" Tooth questioned. "Maybe all you need is some confidence."

"After I began to think that I was insane, I didn't feel very confident about anything, not even my advice" Scarlett said.

"But you're not insane," Tooth pointed out. "You just have a gift. A power. There's another woman I know who can speak to plants like you, although all plants in general, instead of just roses. You're not just hearing things. You never were just hearing things."

"Really? Who?" Scarlett asked, excited.

"Mother Nature," Tooth responded, "but I don't know where she is, or even if she'd help us if we found her. But the point is that you're not insane, not now, and you weren't in your past life. The people you knew back then were wrong. They broke you down because they were wrong. You had confidence before then, so now you can bring it back, now that you know you're right. Don't be afraid of being wrong." Scarlett gave a small smile. She didn't feel a whole lot more confident than before this conversation, but it was at least a start. 

(A/N: All follows, votes, and comments are appreciated. :)

I will upload a chapter every week unless otherwise stated.

I also posted this fanfiction on DeviantArt and Quotev under accounts of the same username as the one I have on this website.

Disclaimer: I don't own "Rise of the Guardians" (© DreamWorks Animation) or the Guardians of Childhood series (© William Joyce) that it was based off of.)