Otherworlds
Pairing(s): George/ Nina, possible Mitchell/ Annie later.
Rating: M for swearing and violence. If you can watch the show, you can read this.
Disclaimer: All I own is the story. The characters belong to BBC Three and Toby Whithouse.
Summary: Mitchell, George and Nina know that getting Annie won't be easy, but when confronted by their own feelings, their own secrets and the strange wonders of the world, they aren't so sure if Annie should come back.
Author's notes: This is still a work in progress. More chapters to come.
Chapter One: Nina.
Nina stared at the shop across from the cafe. She wasn't sure of what to make of what had happened last night, but she had to do something. If she hadn't begged George to...
She sighed, pushing the thought aside. She wandered back to the park bench and dropped down morosely beside Mitchell. He shifted away from her, but she didn't really mind. George had only let him out of his bedroom two days ago and he still frightened her. After last night, there was no telling what mood he was in.
After a few minutes she saw George walking down the road towards them. He was staring at the ground, and she could practically hear the words 'Annie, have to get Annie back' going through his head.
"Hey."
He smiled at her, a weak, half-hearted smile, but a smile nonetheless. That was something, right?
"How was work?" she asked for lack of anything better to say. What could she say? They'd lost their best friend. There was nothing to say, not even 'It'll be alright' or 'I'm sorry'.
George glanced at Mitchell, but answered her. "Fine. Bit quiet."
He dropped down between her and Mitchell and she was relieved to have something between her and the vampire.
She nodded and glanced back across the road. They'd been here three weeks now – how had she not noticed it?
Lucy Jaggat was dead and Nina, for one, would not miss her. Nina couldn't help but feel that wretched woman had gotten off lightly. Mitchell had buried her body somewhere in the woods earlier today. Kemp was... well, who knew where Annie had taken him?
Nina didn't kid herself. She knew dick all about the afterlife, even after discussing it at length with Annie. Hell, even Annie was a bit vague about it. But she needed to do something to help get her back.
It was a long shot, but if she had to start somewhere, a magic shop was a good a place as any.
She stood up. "I'm going to take a look in there," she announced, indicated the magic shop, creatively named 'Otherworld'.
George made a face. "Nina, c'mon. That's just a-"
"They might have something," she interrupted defensively. "If we're going to get Annie back, then we need to explore every possible avenue. Can't hurt to look in there."
To her surprise, Mitchell got to his feet. He stared at the shop with grim interest and Nina drew back when she saw his eyes flash black. He strode towards the shop, his shoulders hunched.
George shrugged and with a sigh, followed them to the shop.
Nina pushed open the door and heard a tinkling of bells. She couldn't help but feel a little disappointed. Not the magical Diagon Alley she'd secretly been hoping for.
Crystals galore, chimes, tarot cards, dresses, jewellery, funny little cauldrons, chalices, pentacles, pentagrams, mirrors, and strange paraphernalia that she couldn't even figure out what it was, let alone what it was meant to do. Eucalyptus incense scented the air. There were so many books that they nearly covered an entire wall.
Partly hidden by an electric waterfall fountain, there was a young woman behind the counter reading a magazine. She glanced up when they entered, gave a vague smile and looked back down at her magazine.
Mitchell made a beeline for the books and George wandered over to inspect a shelf of bits and bobs. He seemed just as mystified by the stuff in here as she was.
Despite being here for an entirely different purpose, she found herself drifting towards the racks of dresses. They were clearly handmade, beautiful velvets and silks. A lovely white one made her think of the time she'd attended the Return of the Kings premiere dressed as Galadriel. Mostly to please a nerdy boyfriend, but she had liked the dressing up part, not so much the fake pointy ears.
She went to inspect the books. A Witches' Bible: The Complete Witches Handbook. Satanica Sexualis: An Encyclopedia of Sex And the Devil. Tibetan Magic and Mysticism. The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic and Mysticism. The Witches' Book of Ghosts and Exorcism. Muslims, Magic and the Kingdom of God: Church Planting Among Folk Muslims. Even The Complete Idiot's Guide to Ghosts & Hauntings offered no help.
She sighed in exasperation and looked up to follow Mitchell's progress with the books, but he appeared to be having a hard time even looking at the covers. It took a few seconds for Nina to realise that many of the covers had religious symbols on them. She glanced over at George, hoping he'd notice the situation and walk over to help. George could do that sort of thing, but she couldn't. Not with Mitchell.
She watched the vampire for a few seconds longer and then walked over to a clearance bin. To her amusement, there was a children's book about werewolves in there. She picked it up and flipped through it, trying to remember how if had felt to look at these little cartoons and pass it off as rubbish. Now she was critical, thinking 'That's not right."
"You might have better luck in that section over there," the young woman behind the counter said suddenly, looking at Mitchell. He looked up sharply and remained where he was, glaring at her defiantly. She shrugged and went back to her magazine.
George took the opportunity to approach her. "Hi," he began awkwardly. "Do you, er, know much about this stuff?" he waved his hand, indicating the entire shop. Nina smiled at his fumbled manner.
The woman straightened up. "Yeah. A bit." She was amused by the question.
"Oh, well, good," he said, looking relieved and surprised at the same time. "Well, we need to find out about ghosts."
"Ghosts," she repeated and pointed to a Parkers Brothers Ouija Board. "Will that help?"
George frowned. "Well. She spoke to us last night through the telly, so I don't think that a board game will do much."
The woman laughed. "Through the television huh? How modern of her."
She came out from behind the counter and looked around the shop, pausing to watch Mitchell for a few seconds, and then looked up at George. Nina snuck a peek at the magazine she'd been reading. She was disappointed to discover that it was just Vogue.
"So, ghosts. What do you want with ghosts?" she prompted, smiling.
George hesitated, evidently not sure what to say. "Well, our friend died – she was murdered actually and obviously she was upset about it and became a ghost," he rushed. "But a couple of weeks ago she sort of... well, sort of vanished. Then last night, she appeared and spoke to us through the TV. We saw her."
A thoroughly abridged version of the events, but how could they explain to this woman without sounding mad?
Nina looked the woman up and down, not bothering to be subtle. She was around George's age, maybe just a bit younger. Dressed in a pair of jeans and a blue shirt that said '.mp3 thief', she looked almost boringly normal. The most interesting thing about her was the fact that she had a few leather cuffs on her wrists. Again Nina felt let down, seriously doubting that she had any idea about the supernatural. She was probably all about sitting around a graveyard, praying to the moon and making dramatic statements about being a daughter of Gaia or something.
"Well, if she's gone through her door, then there isn't really much to be done," she said, matter of fact.
George looked at her, shocked. "You know about... the doors?"
She nodded. "I know about the doors," she said simply.
"Oh. Right. Of course. It's just that when she spoke to us last night, she seemed to be in trouble." George hesitated. "She said something about forms and being moved around to rooms."
That got her interest. "Forms?"
George nodded, suddenly hopeful. "Yes. Forms."
She pursed her lips thoughtfully. "I've never heard of that before. How curious."
Nina felt her hope promptly dwindle. Obviously that had been a stab in the dark on her part, trying to sucker them into buying some of this silly stuff.
The woman frowned sharply and looked back over at Mitchell. "Look, if you want to actually read any of the books, try the ones in that section. They don't have any religious symbols on them."
Mitchell glanced up and Nina was startled at the furious look on his face. He took a few steps towards the woman, almost menacingly, but turned abruptly, going over the shelves she was pointing at.
"You know what he is?" Nina marvelled and George shot her an alarmed 'Be quiet' look.
"I know he's upset," she replied ambiguously, and rubbed her chin, thoughtful.
"Well, if she's contacting you through white noise, then she's quite powerful. She must have strong ties to the world." She looked up at George, evidently wanting more information.
"When we figured out her murder and cleared that up, her door opened," George said tentatively. "But she didn't go through it."
"Why?"
"Ah, Mitchell – my friend over there – was stabbed, right in front of us, and she got all frightened and didn't want to leave."
She looked over at Mitchell, not looking overly impressed. "So she stayed because of him?"
George frowned. "Well. Yes. I suppose." He sounded a little insulted.
"That was very sweet of her. You must all be very close. What's her name?"
"Annie." George looked away. "We miss her a lot."
The woman reached beside the little fountain on the counter and pulled out a business card with a little picture of a waterfall in the top left corner.
Sarah Adams
Proprietor of the Otherworld
"Sarah," George read out, looking as pleased as Nina felt that her name was ordinary. If it had been something like Jaua Paiga Blackshadow, Daughter of the Moon Goddess, she would have walked out immediately.
George looked up from the card. "It's nice to meet you Sarah."
She smiled. "And it's nice to meet you..."
"Oh!" George smiled sheepishly at his bad manners. "I'm George and this is Nina."
"George and Nina," repeated Sarah, flashing Nina a bright smile.
"Hi," Nina said, feeling a little confused.
Until quite recently, Nina had always thought of herself as a highly practical person, grounded in commonsense. Then she'd discovered that there were things that went bump in the night and felt thoroughly thrown. That had been the reason that she'd agreed to go to the facility.
Based in science, it had seemed so practical. So she'd gone with Lucy, despite feeling that it was all a big mistake. She'd gone against her better judgement, against her intuition.
Reeling from the slaughter as they'd left the facility, she'd vowed to herself that she would always follow her instinct. And right now her intuition was telling her that this woman knew something.
Sarah smiled sympathetically. "If a person passes through their door, they go into limbo." She took in George's troubled look. "But I could be wrong."
She cocked her head to one side and after a few seconds Nina realised that Sarah was actually looking over George's shoulder. She turned, wondering what was there.
There was a flicker of something, sort of blurred, but she couldn't figure it out. She squinted harder and for a few seconds she fancied that there was another person in the room. Then it was gone.
She turned back and saw Sarah watching her. Again Nina felt the strong insistence that Sarah knew something.
Mitchell stalked over then, hands thrust deep into his jacket pockets, irritated and miserable looking. Cautious, George motioned to Sarah.
"Mitchell, this is Sarah. I was just telling her about Annie."
Mitchell winced at the sound of Annie's name. Despite her current fear of him, Nina felt a pang of pity. Mitchell seemed to have taken this the hardest¸ though many sleepless nights of listening to him scream out Annie's name might have skewered her opinion.
"Sarah might be able to help us get in contact with Annie," Nina offered tentatively.
Mitchell eyed Sarah warily. "Really?" He didn't sound impressed. Evidently the abrupt enthusiasm he'd displayed before they came in had worn off.
"Maybe," Sarah replied neutrally.
"Look, check back in a few days. I'll definitely have something for you by then," Sarah said, looking back at George and Nina. She shrugged apologetically. "It might not be what you want to hear, but it'll be something."
"We just want to know that she's okay," Nina said, feeling pleased that something was being done.
George nodded in agreement, but Mitchell didn't say anything.
A phone rang abruptly and Nina jumped.
Sarah glanced over at the counter and an answering machine clicked on.
"Welcome to Otherworld. Please leave your name, number and a message and we'll get back to you," Sarah's tinny recorded voice announced.
"Sarah? Sarah, pickup damn it," a male voice demanded. "It's important!"
Sarah snorted and the phone clicked off. She smiled wryly at them. "Sorry about that."
Before any of them could say anything, Sarah bit her lip, suddenly looking uncertain. "This isn't really my place to say anything," she said tentatively, looking at George and Nina. "But do you two ...ah, have somewhere safe to be for tonight?"
George stared at her, shocked, but Nina felt smug. She was right, there was something more to Sarah. But what?
"It's just that there's another wolf on the other side of the river and he's a bit territorial..." Sarah trailed off, looking embarrassed.
Choking down his horror of being recognised as a werewolf, George managed to nod. "Yes, we've made arrangements."
Sarah nodded. "Good. That's good. Just thought I'd check."
Nina opened her mouth to say something, but George pulled her away, grabbing Mitchell's shoulder to drag him along as well. Nina struggled to look back as George yanked her through the door.
"Thanks! We'll be back!" she yelled.
Nina let George lead her up the road for a few minutes before shrugging him off. He let go of them both. Mitchell kept walking. Nina frowned up at George disapprovingly.
"That was rude."
George lifted his hands in apology. "I know, I know, I'm sorry. I just panicked."
Slightly mollified, Nina glanced around. "So do you think she might be able to help?"
George shrugged. "She could be full of crap for all I know," he said, sighing. They watched Mitchell storm up the road to where the car was parked. He yanked on the handle, but finding it locked, he just slumped against the side, his eyes closed.
"Is he going to be alright?" Nina asked softly. She hadn't forgotten the mangled bodies that Mitchell had left in his wake or the past weeks of a hysterical vampire thrashing about so hard that the cottage shook.
George didn't answer. He walked up to the car, keys out. He opened the car and Mitchell quickly slid in the backseat.
Nina looked back to the little shop and hoped that Sarah would be able to help.
***
I hope you enjoyed this. Chapter Two: Mitchell will be posted soon.
