The 4 boxes.

Disclaimer-I'm not sure who relic hunter belongs to, but I'm damn sure it's not me!

Summary-4 boxes affect Sydney and Nigel's behaviour.

PG/PG-13

Feedback- Yes please!! I try to thank everyone who reviews in the author's notes, but if I forget you, tell me and I'll apologise.

Author's notes- This is my first Relic Hunter Fanfic, I love the show, but had difficulty finding much fanfiction, so I decided to add my own. This will be a Sydney/Nigel story.

Thank you: SYLVY and Dramawriter ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - The lecture didn't go that badly, the first thing that had gone right all day. When it was over she realised that she probably did not look her best, the chain of bad luck had not given her much chance to fuss over her normally excellent appearance.

She had not counted on the cubicle door of the bathroom getting stuck, leaving her trapped in there. She jiggled the handle furiously, giving the door a final kick before sitting down to calm herself.

"Well what do you think Kayleigh?" Two unfamiler girls had entered the bathroom; the one that was already in there, Kayleigh, she knew was in her class.

"About what?" Kayleigh asked.

"Professor Fox and her TA." One of the two unrecognisable voices spoke, if there was prizes for putting innuendos into words, this girl would have won hands down.

Sydney fought back a groan, this was all she needed, to be stuck in a toilet cubicale, listening to people talk about her. Whoever was forcing this awful day on her, was going to be in big trouble, besides the fact that it had to be the most unoriginal setting ever.

"What do you mean?" Kayleigh seemed to have no idea what they were talking about.

"Well all I'm saying, is that this morning she was an hour late, and she didn't arrive in her own car. Then Mr. Bailey showed up ten minutes later, not in his own car either, plus he looked really tired." Sydney now realised she was wrong, the first girl would get second place in the innuendo contest, this girl was first.

"Hmm," Kayleigh took this in "Well they do always jet of around the world together, plus they seem quite close, their kinda like Mulder and Scully." the girls giggled. Kayleigh seemed to have jumped on the Sydney/Nigel bandwagon.

"Mind you," the second girl said as an afterthought "they'd get into trouble if they had a public relationship, some workplaces are strict about that kind of thing."

"Yeah, ooh is that the time? I'm late for class, see ya." The girls filed out, Sydney waited until she was sure they were gone, before squeezing out from underneath the cubicle. Sighing she checked her make-up an then ran back to the office, hoping that Mr. Williams wasn't to upset about her being late.

"Ah, Ms Fox, you're here." The man stood up and shook her hand smiling warmly. He was a small man, who gave you the feeling that he was a librarian. He had to be in his late forties. He'd been sitting chatting to Nigel amiably.

"Sorry I'm late, I had an unexpected lecture, and then the door to the bathroom cubicle got stuck."

"Yes, Mr. Bailey mentioned that neither of you are having good days, which is what I'm here to talk to you about actually." Both Sydney and Nigel frowned at this. "As you know, the box you bought me was made by a man called Gustopher, he was known as a great practical joker." They nodded "Well it seems that he did not just make one box, he just left the hints for one. Each box affects the people who find it different ways, until the boxes are together again, the people will go on being affected. The box leaves no hints at what is in store for you, other than that the first one gives you incredible bad luck. Which you seem to be experiencing. So," He said, removing the box from his bag, and placing it in front of them "I'll leave this with you."

He nodded politly to them before turning to leave.

"Thank you." They both chourosed.

After he was gone they sat in silence for a while, thinking over what he had said.

"So unless we find the next box, were gonna be stuck like this permanenetly? Well when do we leave? How come we never found out about this before?" Nigel was more that upset know that he knew that this bad luck was on him for a reason, and had no plans of stopping.

"I have no idea, there was nothing like this in any of the texts we read." She picked up the box in front of her. It was small, no bigger than a jewellery box, it was ornately decorated, covered in pink diamonds with ornate carvings. She opened it up hesitantly, the inside was also covered in carvings. But there was nothing that could give a clue as to where the next one was.

She handed the box over to Nigel, who took it inspecting it carefully.

"Hello." He muttered quietly, in a way that showed he was on to something. "That's odd."

"What?" Sydney leaned over, hoping that they had some kind of clue.

"Look, in that corner" He pointed to a small area in the corner of the box "It looks worn, there's no carvings." Aprehensivly he pressed the area. Almost immediately a small area of the carving on the inside of the box slid back, reavealing three more carvings.

"What are they?" She reached over for her glasses "It looks like, like, a globe. So these other two must tell us where in the world the next one is."

"The next one looks like, I'm not sure, a gondola? Venice?" He frowned thoughtfully.

"Well this one looks like a river or a canal, so I'm guessing that Venice is our best option." They jumped as the door opened and Claudia poked her head in,

"That guy's gone, so I'm assuming you're off to some country somewhere. Do you want me to book a flight?"

"Yes, um to Venice please Claudia." Claudia's eyes lit up.

"Venice? Wow I always wanted to go to Venice; you have to tell me all about it when you get back, I bet it's dead romantic, you'll have to go in one of those boat thingies."

"Yes okay Claudia, could you book the flight?"

********** Okay, I think I should mention, that I'm only fifteen and no nothing about relics. I've never been to Venice, I've not been anywhere actually, so if I get anything wrong I apologise.

Gustopher doesn't exist, at least not to my knowledge; he's named after my cat who's a real trouble maker, so it suited him.