A/N: At the moment I plan to share the POV between Nixon and Jack. I may add others as I see fit. Normally I write in third person; however I've just finished a Sherlock fic that worked well in first person so I figured this might too.

Please, enjoy and review...

Chapter One:Look Alive. Sunshine

One month later...

I was bored.

I'd moved to Cardiff from Liverpool just over a year ago; it was time for me to stretch my legs and go to university. Cardiff just called to me. I didn't even come to look round; I applied and got in. That was that.

It didn't really matter to me what I studied; I just knew I wanted to continue learning and it had to be in Cardiff. I picked Media Production in the end; it was what appeared to be my strength while I was in school.

My first year was great; plenty of alcohol and boys. Now, though, money was tight. So here I was, stuck in work on a Saturday night while all my friends were getting drunk. Worst still, my favourite unsigned band where playing- I looked at my watch and sighed- right now. Instead I was manning ticket check in a rundown cinema that was only busy because the latest horror was out and we were a little lacks with our ID checks. Me personally, I hoped those twelve year olds shit themselves and ran home to mummy and daddy!

I looked down at my shabby uniform; handed down from someone else who'd long gone. Someone who didn't get along with the clique and, upon being nominated pariah of the month, abruptly left. I would have been considered a pariah if I actually gave a rat's ass! For some reason my nonchalance made me somewhat cool. These people weren't my friends; these people were pond life. There were three types of people who worked here; annoying and short term, annoying and a lifer and finally, the worst of the bunch, those who believe they have better places to be, but are just lifers with a vain hope.

They were the worst kind because those were the ones who ate the discarded pick n mix that the snotty noses punk couldn't pay for. They also put the warm hot dogs down their pants before placing them on the warming rollers. When they were really bored, they'd take turns in snorting jalapeƱo juice from the top of the bin behind the counter.

Tonight was overrun with the third kind! On box; the Three Minx were snarling all the girls that arrived with their dates, deeming them to either be a slag or frigid; never anything in between. On shop where the Neanderthals; physically stocky but lacking everything but one brain cell between them. Me, I was stuck on Newbie duty on screens with another veteran!

I need the money. I need the money. I need the money.

'Look alive sunshine!' A voice purred to me, breaking my safety bubble. I looked up to find a friendly face squished up near my own. His brown eyes where a giveaway, despite having to cross my eyes to see them.

'Kitty,' I hugged the man whose hair was currently the brightest shade of green I'd ever seen. 'How come you're not watching the Killjoys? It's their farewell gig tonight!'

'Mesa have a date!' He whispered into my ear and pointed in the direction of shop. 'She's paying for everything! And if I'm lucky...' he winked

'Please, don't eat any of it,' I groaned, he laughed as if he didn't believe me. 'No, I'm being serious K! Not the food and definitely not her!' I raised an eyebrow and wagged my finger at the security screen that showed up real time images from each screen. I could see the Minx's eying me; trying to work out if I was his bit on the side. They'd seen him before, many times, and their question was always the same; "are you shagging him?"

I wasn't. He was too much of a whore for me, and cared too much about my sexual health and reputation for him.

'Alright tiger, I'll do what you say. You wanting a lift home after?' He asked after I showed him where he'd be going once his, borderline jail bait, date returned with her suspect food.

'Yes please!' I kissed him on the cheek, to the disgust of his date. Oh well, at least it meant he'd now have to up his game. For the next ten minutes she'd be asking who I was and why I was so friendly. I laughed inwardly as she tottered behind him, loaded with junk food that she had no intention of eating.

The evening went a little smoother after that. There was something uplifting about knowing someone was in hell with me; even if he was finding some, perverted, way to pass his Saturday night. Soon enough the last film had started and the waiting game began.

There was stuff to pass the time; unfortunately the company sucked. Alexander, the enlarged foreheaded leader of the Neanderthals, and Chrissie, the giggly newbie, were currently flanking each other while cleaning up shop. Alexander thought she was too prissy and she thought he was too rude and uneducated; mainly because he's hazed her on her first shift by loading the bain marie with cheese sauce ten minutes before she was asked to clean it.

'So Nixon-' I heard him call over to me as I binned all the trashy magazines left behind by the Minxes.

'Fuck off Alex!' I rolled my eyes dramatically; dusting down the countertops and screens; the girls had left greasy finger prints from their contraband crisps.

'Now now; that's no way to talk to a friend.' His face was too close for my liking; I could see the scars from his adolescence which he should have long left behind; unfortunately he was a man child!

'You, ass wipe, are not a friend. Today, you believe I'm the lesser of two evils because you believe that gimp over there to be, well, a gimp. If you had your posse here; you'd be flicking spit balls at me while I cleaned you overgrown ape!'

'You're wound too tight.' He mused as if I'd not said anything at all. 'Perhaps you should let Roger-'

'Roger-' I flared.

'-Likes you.' He smiled his goofy grin and I internally puked. 'I know, I know; he has low standard-'

'-at least he has them.' I retorted, switching off the lights and joining him the other side. 'Ok, I'll level with you Alex. You're a dick... perhaps, if you weren't so much of a dick... no, I'd still hate you.' I stuffed my hands in my pockets before moving back to ticket check as the first of many screens let out.

'Look, forget you hate me for a moment. Have you heard from Max recently?' He suddenly looked vulnerable. Max was his only friend that I actually tolerated; we dated once or twice before deciding that, while we were both in this toxic environment, we'd end up hating each other. I'd not seen him in over two weeks and I told Alex as much. 'He's missing. I came to pick him up on an end shift last weekend; he didn't show. He didn't clock out and no one has heard from him.'

I had a feeling Alex was secretly trying as hard as hell to hide his sexuality. The only person, who seemed to have a problem with Alex being gay, was Alex. He had been possessive of Max and was easy to temper when he caught him talking to other people.

'I can ask around, but maybe he's just gone home. It's not the first time someone's just upped and left this place.' I explain, 'normally your doing, I might add!'

Before he reacted to my snide remark I took myself to check the screens that were currently empty. A quick check through the screens; unopened chocolate, the occasional lost note that had slipped out of a back pocket, all for the taking. The cleaning crew would take it if I didn't. Slipping the goods I'd collected I rejoined Alex in the foyer to wait for the next wave of people.

'Alex, Why do you stay here?' I questioned him as he lounged on the booster seats by the upcoming film poster. 'I'd actually have more respect for you if you got off your ass and did something!'

'Because you wouldn't know me?' He questioned with a grin.

'Well, that yes; but you have an education. You have a charm- to those you like; why not put that to good use and, I don't know, save the world or some shit.'

'Because the world will be here when I'm not; What's the point in doing something someone else will do?'

'Oh, I hope the universe had the good sense to neuter you!' I Iaughed as I crossed off all the screens that had been checked. The plump newbie approached from the left, shaking like a leaf. Apparently Alex had sent her to check a screen in my absence.

'Screen seven's out,' she informed me timidly brushing back her greasy hair and shuffling her dumpy feet.

'Yeah...?' I questioned. 'What do you want me to do about it?' I snapped as I had no time for explaining; I'd already shown her how to check a screen last week. I'd checked the screen early on the monitor; there were no more than ten people in the screening. She didn't even have to clean up; that was the cleaner's job in the morning. I checked the monitor again; the lights had begun to dim completely for the night.

'Could you check it with me?' She stuttered, stepping closer to me. 'Seven is meant to be haunted-' she lowered her voice in a hope that Alex wouldn't hear. He scoffed to ensure we both knew he'd heard.

'You know they're dicks-' I threw a contemptuous look at Alex, who was looking quite proud of himself. '-and they're just hazing you?'

'Please?' She begged, her eyes welling up.

'Oh fuck it. You stay here; I'll do it on my own.' I pulled the radio from the stand before throwing a saluted finger in Alex's direction.

'Miss you too baby!' He shouted towards my retreating back. He was always cocky and flirtatious with me when other people were around; he knew I didn't care enough to put him in his place and it reinforced his fragile ego.

Stepping through the first set of doors, I used the opportunity to check my phone; many messages and a number of missed calls, all trying to entice me to an after party lock in for the Killjoys. I text one back informing them I'd get Kitty to drop me off on his way home. Putting my phone away I step through the second set of doors into the pitch black. I preferred it this way; one time I'd gone into a screen when it was on the credits. By the time I'd gotten to the top of the stairs; the lights went out and I was forced to use other methods to light my way out.

I flipped the switch to turn on the house lights. I walked down the alley to the main section of the theatre and groaned. Walking up the stairs, every inch of the place was covered in popcorn. The soles of my converse were caked in the kernels after taking ten steps. I depressed the button on the radio in my hand;

'You're a bastard!' I growled, not caring if the manager heard me. A moment of white noise and I knew he'd be fiddling for his radio; he always had one. I looked to the camera; 'you heard me! What the hell are you playing at?'

'What are you on about?' Alex replied, confusion in his voice.

'Get in here! Now!' I shouted as I clambered down the stairs to wait for him. A moment later he arrived.

'This better be good, she's having kittens out there; she thinks someone's gonna abduct her or some shit!' Alex sounded hounded.

'Did you chuck a whole bag of popcorn round here to scare her?' despite my slender frame I managed to pin him to the wall.

'What the hell?' He was clearly scared of me. I would laugh if I wasn't so angry at him. 'No, I haven't set foot in a screen at all today.'

'You swear?' I enquired and he nodded. 'Come look at this then-' we walked around but it was gone. There wasn't so much as a box of popcorn left by a customer. I turned and smiled, using his fear of me to my advantage; 'I love the smell of ammonia in the evening! Did baby piss himself?'

'Bitch!' He threw up his hands and left, turning off the lights, leaving me standing near the top of the stairs.

'Prick!' I muttered before holding out my hand, my back to the screen. 'I need light and I need it now, bring me light to help my sight,' I incanted and the projector immediately sprang to life. Not too shabby little spell; it had its uses. I kicked off the popcorn from the soles of my shoes; the only evidence that I'd not imagined it. 'Damn it!' The projector was flickering; that didn't normally happen. The spell usually provided a steady stream of light. I looked up into the projector and noticed it was playing a film.

What I saw made me bolt out of there in three seconds flat, gasping for breath in the space between the double doors.

Projected on the screen was a ghostlike Max; his eyes were bloody and his lips were blue. I knew enough for it to give me the creeps. I knew enough not to tell anyone else in the cinema without them thinking I had a screw loose; Max had been captured and there was a daemon inhabiting the premise.