Bunny swiped his paws on a nearby elf. "Yuck, Frost germs."

In the end, Bunny had to resort to calling up the Yetis to push the prickly Winter Spirit backwards into a tunnel.

However, Jack certainly didn't go down without a fight. He kicked, punched, created ice under the poor Yetis' feet, and, with a flick of his staff, froze Bunny's fuzzy ears.

Bunny didn't mind so much, because he did get to kick him in the shins and shove him down his own tunnel afterwards.

An extra muddy one. Bunny smiled gleefully.

Jack was not so happy. Wiping mud off his face, he practically snarled to Bunny, "Listen, Kangaroo, I don't know what's going on in that nutty head of yours, but lemme tell you now, I don't have any plans on going along with it. So long, mate-!"

"No!" A huge man with a beard to rival Dumbledore's grabbed onto the hood of Jack's sweater just as he was about to take flight upon the wind. Bunny was still spluttering incoherencies about Kangaroos and Australia.

"You cannot leave! You have just gathered! And now, you are GUARDIANS!" And, as if just to prove his point, a frizzy-haired girl walked out from another hallway, a portal opened to spill out a hummingbird-human hybrid, a scrawny boy and a giant lizard, and the window burst open for a golden man and a golden-haired girl to float in on a cloud of dreams.

North stepped forward. "And now . . . MUSIC!"

Trumpets blared. Drums were pounded. And one little elf, giggling uncontrollably, twanged a small triangle.

Bunny rolled his eyes. Tooth and her fairies giggled and clapped. Sandy raised a glass, smiling proudly.

But the new recruits had different ideas. Glancing at one another, they understood: they needed explanations first.

Slamming his staff down, Jack took out the torchlights in a cold gust. Hiccup shook his head at the Guardians. Merida snatched a tuba out of an elf's hands. Rapunzel, as not to offend, patted the small triangle-bearer's head and gave a small smile.

The Guardians were utterly shocked, of course. Being a Guardian was considered an honor, something to be worked for. They were getting it handed to them on a silver platter! Whatever the matter was, it couldn't be that big.

The Guardians saw the recruits as they normally did. Recruits who needed a lot of work done on them. Recruits who . . . maybe shouldn't have been recruited at all.

But Manny saw what they didn't: a team.

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"Alright, you bunch of kids. I agree, we've been a little rash without giving you guys explanations. And it goes as simple as this: you guys were chosen."

Tooth looked up at North for approval, to which he gave a nod. She kept going.

"And when I say chosen, I don't mean drawn out of a hat at random. I mean that you guys were chosen for a reason. Maybe some of you don't realize it, but you have something special inside. Whatever it is, that's why the Man in the Moon chose you."

There was a long pause. Then Merida, who couldn't stand awkward silences for the world, said, "I hope you don't mean that you talk to the Moon, because me mam doesn't like me talking to strangers who maybe aren't all right in the head."

"Oi, who was it that turned her mum into a bear, again?" Bunny retorted, "on purpose? And you say we're not right in the head!"

He turned to the Guardians. "Folks, I reckon we dodged a bullet here. I mean, look at them! This guy," he pointed to Hiccup, "has no backbone. Carrot top over there has no control and absolutely no humility. The blonde? She doesn't have a clue what's going on-she doesn't know a thing about the world, for crying out loud! And don't even get me started with Frost, over there. He has absolutely no respect for what we do or work for, despite the fact we work towards bringing joy to children. He just doesn't care! Which is something we should explicitly avoid."

Bunny's rant, however aggrandized, took its toll. The recruits, the Guardians, even the little elf bearing the triangle all felt tense. No one said anything; no one really had anything to say.

The silence was finally broken-a sigh. Not the exasperated kind, or the tired kind. More of a sad sort of resignment.

The sigh came from Rapunzel. "Well, I don't mean to say that being chosen doesn't sound like . . . an honor. But honestly? I think Bunny's right. We don't know each other . . . we don't know you guys . . . We don't even know what we're supposed to do."

Her voice, high and clear, sounded quite subdued. Gently, she pulled up her great swathes of hair and quietly exited the room (though if she knew where she was going, I haven't a clue).

Merida nodded, resolutely, and stomped after Rapunzel, her hands in fists. Hiccup also followed suit, with nothing but a defeated glance at the floor.

Jack turned, tapping his staff over the wooden floor and causing frost to sneak over the varnish. He gave a sort of smile that was also sort of a frown, and stared Bunny right in the eye. "Besides, what makes you think I want to be a Guardian?"

Then he, too, exited.