Born of Cold and Winter Air

The Loss of Time

How many winter seasons had come and gone? The world was changing and evolving with every intake and exhale of breath. Jack Frost used to count the days and years, but when two hundred sped past him in a silent blur he began to lose all interest in keeping track. What was the point? With no one who could see him other than animals and the Guardians, all whom which never had the time for conversation, except for Sandman, if that even counted as conversation; very little gave him motivation to notice anything of worth.

Many times Jack had asked the Man on the Moon his purpose in creating him. There was only ever silence. He had begun to doubt that there was even such a being. He hadn't spoken a word to him since he told him his name and role as a Winter Spirit, but even then, he couldn't be too sure it wasn't imagined. Not even a simple whisper was uttered.

Darkness had been his beginning; it was all that he could see. What the hell was all of this for anyway? He had but a name, with no recollection of a past, and it was driving his soul further and further into a numb void. With each passing decade, Jack felt the pull and desire of unleashing destruction and chaos. He could do it if he wanted. After all, he had the power to freeze the earth, sending it back into an Ice Age, if it tickled his fancy. The constant duty of changing the summer season into fall and winter had grown mundane. It had lost it's beauty and significance, but most of all, it had lost it's magic. A magic that once gave spirit to his old bones. With no one to truly share this eternal existence with, the sense and pursuit of "right and good" seemed almost in vain.

Maybe it was morality, or call it a dissolving hope that something was going to give, that kept the darkness at bay. Whatever it was holding him together, it was weakening, and everything that was "good" in him was under threat of disappearing entirely. Day after day of watching life begin with a fierce cry to a final closing sigh, put his existence into a grey perspective. Surely he had a beginning as well? It all couldn't have been dark and silent? What was the goddamn point to all of this?

*****

Burgess, Pennsylvania was falling asleep. Very few carriages ushered along the cobblestone streets, and even fewer souls braved the bitter cold that seemed to steal away the pleasant cool of fall. Jack Frost leaned against the cool metal of a lamppost; staring up at the burning oil, flame flickering against the biting wind that slipped through the glass panes.

He watched as a finely dressed gentleman pulled his cloak closer, cheeks and nose red from the wind's bitterness, battling the newly changed climate. Jack, being in a dismal mood, inhaled and blew a gust of arctic wind in the gentleman's direction. The gentleman's top hat flew from atop his head and tumbled down the almost deserted sidewalk. A chuckle rumbled from Jack's chest as he watched the man spurt and stumble after it.

"Have fun catching that!" He laughed.

The night's sky lit up with dazzling golden streams of dreaming sand. Jack's deep blue eyes lit with the glowing reflection of Sandman's handy work. He longed to know what dreaming was like. Sleep was not an essential part of his existence as it was to mortals, but that didn't mean he couldn't or wouldn't every so often.

The plump silhouette of the Guardian flew above, fingers busy weaving and conducting their magic. Jack had always admired the work of Sandy. Many times he found himself watching the ever changing facial expressions of dreaming children. Not that he made a frequent habit of it, but he had a curious nature. The way their faces relaxed in surrender to dreamworlds always made Jack jealous that he never experienced the same.

He once asked Sandy if there was something wrong with him, something that may have caused the reasoning behind his lack of dreams. The golden Guardian merely smiled and shook his head, confusing symbols of a time watch and a dripping heart shimmered above his wryly hair. Whatever that was supposed to mean...

Jack's eyes unfocused and his mind wandered as the wind lifted him away, caressing the bareness of his feet and calves like a lover. His brown cloak rippled in the brisk breeze that trailed him wherever he went. Without a care for his destination, he allowed himself to be carried across the sea and above mountain tops. Hours, or perhaps days had passed. He wasn't counting.