Disclaimer: all characters belong to Disney as far as I know. No copyright infringement is intended; no money is being made.
Stormy says: This story begins at the end of the "have a weird Thanksgiving with Annie and the aliens" episode. Comments welcome at mbaring@powernet.net
Ep 1: Friends
"Annie, it's for you!"
Annie dashed up the steps into the house and grabbed the phone away from Jack. "Mom? Dad?"
Their voices came through a sprinkling of static, "Happy Thanksgiving Annie!"
Fi pointed up the stairs; "You can take the phone in my room." Annie nodded and went up, still talking to her parents over the sound of guy football talk in the next room. She had time to notice the sign on the door- Fi's room- as she went in. "Mom you wouldn't believe the time we had trying to get here..."
It was over an hour later when they said goodbye. Annie sat on the end of Fi's bed and hugged the phone; it had been so good to hear her parents' voices again! It sounded like they were having a good time in Pakistan and their work was going better than anyone had expected. Annie was happy to report all the stuff she'd been up to on the tour bus and all the songs she'd written.
The smell of apple pie was coming in the half open door and Annie hopped up to go get some. But she hopped too fast; her foot caught the leg of Fi's desk and a folder full of papers slithered to the floor. Annie caught her balance and turned on the desk lamp so she could see to pick the stuff up.
Dear Annie, remember I said all the engraving had worn off my dad's ring? That's not exactly what happened...
Annie hadn't meant to read anything, but her eyes landed on the first words and slid along them. Then she was too fascinated to stop. What was this? A letter to her, but why hadn't it been sent? Or maybe it was Fi's creative writing assignment!
Under the first letter were others, and scraps of letters that had never been finished.
Dear Annie, I am having a great time here with Aunt Melinda and my cousins, but sometimes I feel like part of me got left on the bus with you guys.
Dear Annie, Seriously? Mom was melting and Jack was a goofy fortuneteller? Wish I had a picture of that one. :) But the Will o the Wisp promised nobody from the spirit world would bother my family. So what's going on???
Dear Annie, When you talk about all that weird stuff happening I really wish I could be with you to try and protect everybody. But I can't so I pray for you. The banshee showed me this... it was LIGHT, bright light that went up and up forever. I don't know if it's God or what, but I feel like my dad's connected to it now. So I pray to that.
...No. This was getting way too personal. Annie shoved everything back in the folder and put it back on the desk. She felt bad now about reading that stuff. But if any of the story was true, a Will O the Wisp, magic rings, visits from the spirit world.... Annie looked down at the ring she wore on her thumb. It didn't get warm or cold, or do anything to signal her that it might be magic.
Carey's voice called from downstairs, "Hey Annie, you off the phone?"
"Yeah!"
"Want pie?"
"Sure!"
In the kitchen Annie found Carey taking a pie out of the oven and Fi watching him like she didn't trust his pie-holding abilities. Molly was on the barstool next to Fi like they'd been talking. When Annie came in she was immediately swarmed by the two little girls, Fi's cousins, who pulled out a chair for her, set a plate and fork in front of her, and asked if she wanted milk to drink and vanilla ice cream on her pie. Annie said yes to all and then asked, "How many pies have you guys had today?"
"Four." Maggie said. "Mom made two but we ate most of them, we made one but it burned so we scooped out the inside and we're going to turn it into applesauce tomorrow, and Fi made this one." She started thinking aloud trying to calculate how many apples for how many pies for eleven people.
The last pie was served up to Annie and Molly, and Fi had a little bowl of ice cream 'to keep them company.' Annie kept quiet and ate, listening to Fi and Molly talk.
"...asked Annie to tour with the carnival but she said..."
"...in the school play, I can't figure out why..."
"...missed you Fiona..."
"...got an email from Grandpa Colin, he said..."
Annie realized the two little girls were looking at her appealingly. She said, "What's up?"
"Um, Annie?"
"Would you do us a big favor?"
"And sing something for us?"
Fi looked over. "I forwarded them the sound files of some of your songs, they're your biggest fans."
"Um, ok. In a little bit." Annie said, a little embarrassed.
"We'd love to hear you." The girls' mother, Melinda Campbell, came around the kitchen bar.
Molly nodded. "Hey why don't we all sing? I can't think of a better way to celebrate. You want to get our guitars, Carey?"
"Go on Carey, you've had enough pie." Fi scooped up the last of her ice cream and got up to leave her bowl by the sink and then vanish upstairs. She returned carrying her father's guitar in its case.
"I didn't know you played, I mean, really played." Annie said.
"Yeah well, I've been taking lessons. Wanted to surprise Mom."
"Consider me surprised."
Carey returned, carefully balancing with two guitar cases. He had Annie's flute box stuck under one arm and another box stuck under the other. "Your guitar, my guitar, Annie's flute... and this was on the porch, I nearly broke a leg tripping over it. It looks really weird."
It did. It was a wooden box tied shut with strange scratchy string with clear postage tape over that. A battered label had Annie's name and Melinda Campbell's address.
"It's for me."
"You think it's from your parents? Sure looks like it came from the other side of the world."
"I dunno. Look at this stuff." Annie got a piece of the string off and held it up. "It's, like, hemp or something."
"Vegetable fiber. Very primitive." Fi said, and offered a pair of scissors.
Annie wrestled the box open. Inside, protected between layers of dried leaves, was a ring with a wide silver band and a rounded blue stone set in it.
"That's beautiful."
"Is there a note in with it?"
"No, nothing." Annie tried the ring on her fingers. She slipped Fi's ring off her thumb to try the new one on. It fit there best. "Fi? Maybe you should wear this again, since I have one of my own." She dropped the Celtic silver ring into Fi's hand.
Everything stopped.
"Well, my duck, looks like you get another chance to choose." A little ball of light was bobbing in front of Annie's frozen face.
"You're gone! I deleted you!" Fi said in disbelief.
"I'm not that easy to get rid of, not with everything I've got behind me. Don't you want to know what I did to your family?"
"Let them go." She wanted to scowl and leave it at that but she had to say, "What do you mean I get another chance?"
"They'll be fine. Won't remember a thing. And I mean ye have a chance to get back your connection to the spirit world. Because of her. If you put the ring on, it'll undo yer spell. Ye'll be back 'online' with us. Are ye going to do it?"
Something strange was happening to Annie, it was like a golden glow around her, light hardening into a visible shield. Fi didn't have time to pay attention. "If I do that you and everybody else in the spirit world will be after us again. Just unfreeze my family and get out. I don't want anything to do with it."
"Quite a change."
"Just go."
"All right. Never stay where I'm not wanted. If you really want to leave little Annie and the other one in the line of fire without your help that's fine..."
"Wait, what other one? What's going to happen?" It was too late. The Will O the Wisp had vanished like a blown candle. A moment later everything came back to life.
Annie held out her hand to admire the ring. "I think this is lapis lazuli, the stone I mean. My mother had a necklace a little like this, one of the tribes we stayed with in Brazil gave it to her."
Fi was thinking. She was happy. She didn't want to get involved. ...leave little Annie and the other one in the line of fire... But was getting involved and losing her own peace any worse than being on the outside, knowing something was going on that she couldn't see? Knowing her family might be in danger and not being able to see that danger for them? And... maybe, maybe, there would be a chance to see her father again.
That did it. Fi slid the ring onto her thumb and watched the pattern glow a warm gold for a moment.
"Ok, what first?" Annie blew a note on her flute.
"In The Darkness, always start with that." Molly said, "Then maybe One in a Million so Fi can hear it?"
"Sounds good." Carey strummed the first note.
They sang until nearly midnight, some songs that everyone knew so everyone could sing along. Even Ned who always said he couldn't carry a tune in a bucket came in to holler along. Annie sang To Dream About You, nervous with only two guitars for backup, but everybody liked it. Then Maggie and Miranda demanded In The Darkness again, so everybody sang that, and then suddenly it was bedtime and they had to figure out how eleven people were going to find space to brush their teeth and sleep in one suburban house and one tour bus.
Annie ended up in a sleeping bag on the floor of Fi's room since Maggie and Miranda wanted to sleep on the bus one night just to see what it was like, and Annie's little room in the bus simply didn't have space for three.
"Um, Fi? You awake?" Annie whispered into the darkness.
"Yeah. Can't sleep, just thinking."
Annie didn't want to say anything, but her conscience insisted. "When I was in here with the phone, I knocked some of your papers over. Those... letters to me. I didn't mean to look at them I swear, but I just saw the first line and then I couldn't stop. I'm really sorry. You can be mad if you want."
"Nah. I'm not mad. They had your name on them after all even if I didn't mean to send them."
"Is it true? About the spirit world?"
"Yeah."
"Whoa. I knew you were into weird stuff but you're, like..."
"In up to my neck, at least I was before I met you."
"That's... whoa."
There was silence for a while then Fi said, "I know Mom calls you her sort of adopted daughter. You can think of me as your adopted sister too. If you want."
Annie was surprised. "Yeah. I'd like that a lot. Thanks."
"Something happened today... but I'm falling asleep, I'll tell you in the morning."
"Ok."
Sometime in the wee early hours Annie dreamed that the panther was there, curled up at her feet like a housecat. She half woke but of course nothing was there, and if the sleeping bag was pressed down like a weight had been resting there, Annie was too sleepy to notice.
Stormy says: This story begins at the end of the "have a weird Thanksgiving with Annie and the aliens" episode. Comments welcome at mbaring@powernet.net
Ep 1: Friends
"Annie, it's for you!"
Annie dashed up the steps into the house and grabbed the phone away from Jack. "Mom? Dad?"
Their voices came through a sprinkling of static, "Happy Thanksgiving Annie!"
Fi pointed up the stairs; "You can take the phone in my room." Annie nodded and went up, still talking to her parents over the sound of guy football talk in the next room. She had time to notice the sign on the door- Fi's room- as she went in. "Mom you wouldn't believe the time we had trying to get here..."
It was over an hour later when they said goodbye. Annie sat on the end of Fi's bed and hugged the phone; it had been so good to hear her parents' voices again! It sounded like they were having a good time in Pakistan and their work was going better than anyone had expected. Annie was happy to report all the stuff she'd been up to on the tour bus and all the songs she'd written.
The smell of apple pie was coming in the half open door and Annie hopped up to go get some. But she hopped too fast; her foot caught the leg of Fi's desk and a folder full of papers slithered to the floor. Annie caught her balance and turned on the desk lamp so she could see to pick the stuff up.
Dear Annie, remember I said all the engraving had worn off my dad's ring? That's not exactly what happened...
Annie hadn't meant to read anything, but her eyes landed on the first words and slid along them. Then she was too fascinated to stop. What was this? A letter to her, but why hadn't it been sent? Or maybe it was Fi's creative writing assignment!
Under the first letter were others, and scraps of letters that had never been finished.
Dear Annie, I am having a great time here with Aunt Melinda and my cousins, but sometimes I feel like part of me got left on the bus with you guys.
Dear Annie, Seriously? Mom was melting and Jack was a goofy fortuneteller? Wish I had a picture of that one. :) But the Will o the Wisp promised nobody from the spirit world would bother my family. So what's going on???
Dear Annie, When you talk about all that weird stuff happening I really wish I could be with you to try and protect everybody. But I can't so I pray for you. The banshee showed me this... it was LIGHT, bright light that went up and up forever. I don't know if it's God or what, but I feel like my dad's connected to it now. So I pray to that.
...No. This was getting way too personal. Annie shoved everything back in the folder and put it back on the desk. She felt bad now about reading that stuff. But if any of the story was true, a Will O the Wisp, magic rings, visits from the spirit world.... Annie looked down at the ring she wore on her thumb. It didn't get warm or cold, or do anything to signal her that it might be magic.
Carey's voice called from downstairs, "Hey Annie, you off the phone?"
"Yeah!"
"Want pie?"
"Sure!"
In the kitchen Annie found Carey taking a pie out of the oven and Fi watching him like she didn't trust his pie-holding abilities. Molly was on the barstool next to Fi like they'd been talking. When Annie came in she was immediately swarmed by the two little girls, Fi's cousins, who pulled out a chair for her, set a plate and fork in front of her, and asked if she wanted milk to drink and vanilla ice cream on her pie. Annie said yes to all and then asked, "How many pies have you guys had today?"
"Four." Maggie said. "Mom made two but we ate most of them, we made one but it burned so we scooped out the inside and we're going to turn it into applesauce tomorrow, and Fi made this one." She started thinking aloud trying to calculate how many apples for how many pies for eleven people.
The last pie was served up to Annie and Molly, and Fi had a little bowl of ice cream 'to keep them company.' Annie kept quiet and ate, listening to Fi and Molly talk.
"...asked Annie to tour with the carnival but she said..."
"...in the school play, I can't figure out why..."
"...missed you Fiona..."
"...got an email from Grandpa Colin, he said..."
Annie realized the two little girls were looking at her appealingly. She said, "What's up?"
"Um, Annie?"
"Would you do us a big favor?"
"And sing something for us?"
Fi looked over. "I forwarded them the sound files of some of your songs, they're your biggest fans."
"Um, ok. In a little bit." Annie said, a little embarrassed.
"We'd love to hear you." The girls' mother, Melinda Campbell, came around the kitchen bar.
Molly nodded. "Hey why don't we all sing? I can't think of a better way to celebrate. You want to get our guitars, Carey?"
"Go on Carey, you've had enough pie." Fi scooped up the last of her ice cream and got up to leave her bowl by the sink and then vanish upstairs. She returned carrying her father's guitar in its case.
"I didn't know you played, I mean, really played." Annie said.
"Yeah well, I've been taking lessons. Wanted to surprise Mom."
"Consider me surprised."
Carey returned, carefully balancing with two guitar cases. He had Annie's flute box stuck under one arm and another box stuck under the other. "Your guitar, my guitar, Annie's flute... and this was on the porch, I nearly broke a leg tripping over it. It looks really weird."
It did. It was a wooden box tied shut with strange scratchy string with clear postage tape over that. A battered label had Annie's name and Melinda Campbell's address.
"It's for me."
"You think it's from your parents? Sure looks like it came from the other side of the world."
"I dunno. Look at this stuff." Annie got a piece of the string off and held it up. "It's, like, hemp or something."
"Vegetable fiber. Very primitive." Fi said, and offered a pair of scissors.
Annie wrestled the box open. Inside, protected between layers of dried leaves, was a ring with a wide silver band and a rounded blue stone set in it.
"That's beautiful."
"Is there a note in with it?"
"No, nothing." Annie tried the ring on her fingers. She slipped Fi's ring off her thumb to try the new one on. It fit there best. "Fi? Maybe you should wear this again, since I have one of my own." She dropped the Celtic silver ring into Fi's hand.
Everything stopped.
"Well, my duck, looks like you get another chance to choose." A little ball of light was bobbing in front of Annie's frozen face.
"You're gone! I deleted you!" Fi said in disbelief.
"I'm not that easy to get rid of, not with everything I've got behind me. Don't you want to know what I did to your family?"
"Let them go." She wanted to scowl and leave it at that but she had to say, "What do you mean I get another chance?"
"They'll be fine. Won't remember a thing. And I mean ye have a chance to get back your connection to the spirit world. Because of her. If you put the ring on, it'll undo yer spell. Ye'll be back 'online' with us. Are ye going to do it?"
Something strange was happening to Annie, it was like a golden glow around her, light hardening into a visible shield. Fi didn't have time to pay attention. "If I do that you and everybody else in the spirit world will be after us again. Just unfreeze my family and get out. I don't want anything to do with it."
"Quite a change."
"Just go."
"All right. Never stay where I'm not wanted. If you really want to leave little Annie and the other one in the line of fire without your help that's fine..."
"Wait, what other one? What's going to happen?" It was too late. The Will O the Wisp had vanished like a blown candle. A moment later everything came back to life.
Annie held out her hand to admire the ring. "I think this is lapis lazuli, the stone I mean. My mother had a necklace a little like this, one of the tribes we stayed with in Brazil gave it to her."
Fi was thinking. She was happy. She didn't want to get involved. ...leave little Annie and the other one in the line of fire... But was getting involved and losing her own peace any worse than being on the outside, knowing something was going on that she couldn't see? Knowing her family might be in danger and not being able to see that danger for them? And... maybe, maybe, there would be a chance to see her father again.
That did it. Fi slid the ring onto her thumb and watched the pattern glow a warm gold for a moment.
"Ok, what first?" Annie blew a note on her flute.
"In The Darkness, always start with that." Molly said, "Then maybe One in a Million so Fi can hear it?"
"Sounds good." Carey strummed the first note.
They sang until nearly midnight, some songs that everyone knew so everyone could sing along. Even Ned who always said he couldn't carry a tune in a bucket came in to holler along. Annie sang To Dream About You, nervous with only two guitars for backup, but everybody liked it. Then Maggie and Miranda demanded In The Darkness again, so everybody sang that, and then suddenly it was bedtime and they had to figure out how eleven people were going to find space to brush their teeth and sleep in one suburban house and one tour bus.
Annie ended up in a sleeping bag on the floor of Fi's room since Maggie and Miranda wanted to sleep on the bus one night just to see what it was like, and Annie's little room in the bus simply didn't have space for three.
"Um, Fi? You awake?" Annie whispered into the darkness.
"Yeah. Can't sleep, just thinking."
Annie didn't want to say anything, but her conscience insisted. "When I was in here with the phone, I knocked some of your papers over. Those... letters to me. I didn't mean to look at them I swear, but I just saw the first line and then I couldn't stop. I'm really sorry. You can be mad if you want."
"Nah. I'm not mad. They had your name on them after all even if I didn't mean to send them."
"Is it true? About the spirit world?"
"Yeah."
"Whoa. I knew you were into weird stuff but you're, like..."
"In up to my neck, at least I was before I met you."
"That's... whoa."
There was silence for a while then Fi said, "I know Mom calls you her sort of adopted daughter. You can think of me as your adopted sister too. If you want."
Annie was surprised. "Yeah. I'd like that a lot. Thanks."
"Something happened today... but I'm falling asleep, I'll tell you in the morning."
"Ok."
Sometime in the wee early hours Annie dreamed that the panther was there, curled up at her feet like a housecat. She half woke but of course nothing was there, and if the sleeping bag was pressed down like a weight had been resting there, Annie was too sleepy to notice.