Protector of Lost Children

| CHAPTER XX |

Hello, Readers! This is Chapter 20 of 22. I hope you liked it, because this story is coming to an end, and I hope to wrap it all up with a nice little bow.

Also, please remember to answer my survey. The link is on my profile page, which you can easily get to from this chapter once you're done reading it. Please keep in mind that there are only 30 more days to answer it, as the survey closes March 1st, 2018.

~CSP2708~

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| Chapter 20 || One Battle to End Them All |

With only three days to prepare, the North Pole was in a rush. North and the rest of the Guardians were well on their way to making a full recovery and the yetis were doing most of the work, so by the second day, the craziness had already mostly died down. Luckily, all they needed were those three days. Any shorter and they wouldn't be ready, any longer, and they would get anxious, so three days was the perfect amount of time.

Pitch, as he still didn't realise Emily's double-cross, walked right in, pleasantly surprised to find the yetis hard at work in the lower levels, leaving only the elves to guard the Guardians on the upper levels. They remained in the workshop, constructing toy guitars, painting trainsets, and programming mini robots. Their oversized hands were working in fine detail, as usual, appearing to be completely unaware of the dark presence that had just invaded their wintery home, just as said dark presence wanted.

As he walked through the hall toward the globe room, Pitch let his footsteps echo loudly on the floor, unafraid of the consequences, even though Emily knew that he could easily be silent if he so chose. He was, after all, a master of deception and a manipulator of shadows themselves. Truthfully, he could've teleported himself immediately to the center of the Pole, but instead walked right through the front door and chose to remain in the physical world to make his victory that much sweeter.

"So," the nature spirit whispered to her eviller companion, "Where are they? What are we going to do?"

"No need to whisper!" Pitch replied jovially, following his words with an evil laugh, "Those pesky Guardians must all still be recovering from the injuries we inflicted on them, and foolishly left themselves open to our impending attack. They are defenseless – unable to stop us! They will not survive us today, and soon, we will rule over all the children of the world!"

Emily cracked a smile, even though on the inside she was smirking at his naivety. Soon, he would not be ruling. He would either be dead, or free of the Nightmares' control – the latter being possible only if they discovered a way to make such a miracle into reality.

"Sounds like a plan. Do we sneak into their rooms and snuff them out? Or lure them together to get rid of them all at once?" she asked. She was trying to sound curious, as she didn't want to blow her cover just yet, but it was hard to hate someone you did not.

Pitch paused. He raised a hand to his pointed chin and rubbed there as if stroking a beard – though it would have to be a non-existent one as he had no facial hair.

"I would say snuffing them out, one by one would be more strategic, but they are all doomed anyway, and destroying them together is always so much more fun! It would be poetic irony, and I'm not so evil that I would deprive them of that," he decided. By the time he finished speaking, he was standing in the center of the room, between the fireplace and the central control panel, facing the large globe that hung, perfectly balanced in the middle of the facility.

"Very well. Shall we raise an alarm?" Emily asked. She made a vine appear in her hands, ready to let it strike an alarm with the likeness of a cobra.