Post Shadows Fic. All characters, plot quotes etc. belong to the BBC.
I rewatched Shadows when it was on over the summer and was struck by a couple of things I have tried to work into this fic. One is a fact, Harry is left handed and one is a suspicion and I eagerly await your views on whether any of you can see it too. It is also not in the same happy-go-lucky mould as the previous two fics, so beware. It has a T rating for naughty words and general unpleasantness, and also a SW fanfic heresy alert. You have been warned.
Phrases that appear centred and in italic are quotes from the episode, I imagine them as flashbacks in Nikki's brain, that are pertinent to the dialogue but not actually part of the dialogue, if that makes sense. Any questions, or you just think I'm mad do let me know.
Inevitable
The knock on the door was inevitable. She had known it would happen. It had to happen.
It had to happen.
It's what she had told herself for the last four hours since Leo had bundled her into a police car and demanded that she be driven home.
"As soon as he's out, I'll send him to you," was all he had said.
Her mind tumbled through the mess that was the day, jumbles and fragments assaulting her senses.
"It's tempting to confuse need with love."
It was like watching life on digital fast forward, a series of blurs and jumps between fragmentary sharp images. And those images were so strong, so vibrant it was hard to take in the fact that she was safe and sat alone in her apartment.
"Harry!" she heard her voice whisper from earlier in the day, so desperate, so impoverished of his presence even though he was there, right in front of her, just a few metres across the classroom.
She could feel her body begin to tremble again.
She heard the rattling of the door, the screams, the shots. Felt her arms around some stranger but out of reach of Harry's. She could see Harry cowering behind that desk, curled into a foetal ball, fists in his hair, arms protecting his head. The stark crisp whiteness of his shirt highlighting the abject terror in his face. It should be him her arms were wrapped around, not this stranger.
"Harry," she sobs again in real time, in the now.
"We're the only medics in the building, they won't let anyone else in for hours."
Jump. His fingers closed around her hand, his legs taking giant but slow strides, out into the familiar but now alien corridors, her own legs shuffling along behind him. Being led by him. Allowing him to take charge. Following him. Shadowing him as if she had nowhere else to go. Nowhere else to be.
Did she?
Jump, an open gunshot wound to the neck.
"Get my mum, get my mum. Please?"
Jump. Blood. Blood everywhere.
Jump. Anger, pain, disappointment, abandonment.
"Don't worry, I'll be quick."
She didn't know why she was so angry, she knew even as he said it, he didn't really mean it.
Jump. Fear, a gaping void of darkness and fear. Alone. Except for a teenager and a gun.
"No one, no one would miss me!"
Her heart ached still from the truth buried amongst the lies she had told.
Neil Corrigan.
The man with the gun.
But her thoughts could dwell there no longer. For the knock on the door had come. And despite longing for this moment, waiting for hours, alone, she dreaded the consequences of opening the door.
"It's tempting to confuse need with love."
"Nikki, it's me," his voice sounded hoarse, exhausted.
"Open the door, please,"
"Harry!"
