Notes: sorry for posting late! Hope you still enjoy this chapter.
Chapter 5
[Anita's Pov]
Staring where Mr-King-Ghost Arthur used to be, Anita freezes where she sits. The only movement coming from her is her hanging jaw as she tries to complete the momentous task of answering the angry teen boy while her brain reboots.
Unfortunately this doesn't go very smoothly because the Trollhunter is RIGHT THERE.
Anita is mentally panicking as the two boys look at her in varying degrees of confusion and fear themselves.
They must have heard something, Oh god, what did they hear?! And what should she say? They already don't look like they trust them. They will think they're nuts if the pair say they're just two random girls from maybe the same parallel world that a magic spirit brought here to help Jim fight an evil bloody troll!
They are so real too! They're actual flesh and blood and here, and it's too much to handle all at once!
Sitting on the concrete ground of the barren canal with the boy's eyes on her, it is all she can do to stutter out in panicked, "I-..I.. You….We….We..we are-"
"We're witches."
Anita whips her head round so fast her glasses almost fall of her nose as she stares at Hannah with wide eyes, having almost forgotten the other girl was there in her personal terror.
Hannah seems more relaxed though, more in control and it makes Anita just a little jealous that she doesn't seem to be panicking over the recent developments as much as she personally is.
"Witches?" comes the skeptical voice of non-other than Mr Trollhunter himself.
Looking back to the kids, at a more normal pace as she fixes her glasses, she can tell they don't really believe Hannah but also that they don't completely think its impossible.
Thank god for troll weirdness.
"Y-Yes." Anita adds in, their eyes snap to her as she speaks. She swallows heavily under their gazes, "Prophet witches? To be exact…" she barley gets out her words getting softer as they stare at her.
At least it's a good explanation for why they know so much (if the teens heard anything... and if they know what 'prophet' means).
Oh god, they must look mad.
Looking between the girls, Jim (cause it could be no one else) looks to Toby (surprisingly not as small as Anita had thought) and they seem to silently agree on something.
"Witches, sure. Whatever you say." Jim says, his voice echoing disbelief threw the canal.
"Yeah witches, totally real." Toby adds in, inching closer to Jim. Looks like Toby is pretty nervous.
"So anyway," Jim continues, turning on his heals, pointedly away from under the bridge and there probable original destination, "Lets go Tobes, we got that… homework to do, right?"
"OH! Yeah homework, lets go!"
They can't be this obvious at hiding something, can they…?
Anita, even as embarrassed and half panicked as she is over this event, watches their little act with a critical eye. And to be honest, their act is embarrassing.
They don't even take one step before she pipes up, half because she needs them to… stay, and half (maybe partially) cause she wants to show off.
"We know about the trolls."
The two teens freeze in their poorly pretend-to-be-casual steps.
Toby looks to Jim with varying degrees of worry before looking over his shoulder with a nervous laugh, "Trolls? What are those? They can't be real."
Not wanting to drag this on, Anita, who has got more of a grip on herself and is clasping her hands tightly in her lap, decides that if she says enough they can't just ignore her… right….?
She looks to Hannah to try and get her nerves before she speaks, "Trolls, the rock people who live nearby in an underground community called Trollmarket? They eat nearly everything?"
Seeing what Anita is doing, Hannah even pipes in, ignoring the increasingly worried looks on the teen boys' faces, "Terrible breath, don't wear pants often."
"I-I really don't know what your talking about." Jim's eyes were too wide and his voice too worried to be very believable though.
Anita sighs, looking to the boy with softer eyes. This can't be easy for the kid. Knowing about trolls and keeping it secret from people that have no idea is one thing. Trying to keep everything hidden while potentially dangerous people are just spouting it must be terrifying. Good thing there are no goblins about.
"One lives at your house Jim, in the basement?"
"They know about Draal!" comes an overly loud whisper from the shorter boy, who's currently shaking Jim. That is, until all the eyes in the canal land on him. Taking his hands back to himself, he looks at each person in turn before, with a self conscious shrug, he guiltily asks Jim, "Too loud?"
It was out now, they both know the other knew this big secret. This has to have the boys believe them a little, right? How else would they know?
"CHANGLINGS! Oh my god, Jim get them!"
Ok… yeah a changeling would know. Anita hadn't considered that. She also wasn't expecting the heavy metal horseshow that came flying through the air. Least it didn't hit her.
"Ow! Watch it!" It did unfortunately hit Hannah. That's going to bruise… 'Least it missed me.' thinks Anita.
"Careful. We're only human, humans who want to help you by the way, and that thing's heavy." Anita warns uncertainly, loosing some of her confidence now that she can't just spout facts. She is also a little worried about having something thrown at her, even if Toby is the one throwing it.
Jim narrows his eyes, looking between the girls and the horseshoe. Toby notices the look as well and it seems he catches the Trollhunter's idea.
"Prove it," Jim replies smoothly, seeming more confident now that he has a plan, "Touch the gaggletack." he tells them, gesturing to the horseshoe now sitting on the concrete (after having been thrown at Hannah).
Hannah isn't fazed by Jim's new confidence at all and practically stomps over to the horseshoe and swipes it off the ground, making quite the show of touching it while looking at the teens. Doesn't look like she appreciated being hit by it earlier.
Hannah, after an exaggerated eye roll, hands it to Anita who takes it more carefully, giving a smile to the boys. 'See? Nothing. We're not changelings, promise. Not dangerous. Just 20ish aged women pretending to be witches.
Having seen both of them touch the horseshoe with no effect (and knowing there would be one if they were changelings) Jim seems to be looking between them as he thinks. He also quickly looks over to the wall under the canal's bridge. Only once and quick enough he probably thinks it wouldn't be noticed, but as they stand in an awkward silence, Anita does see and knows why.
Jim then takes a breath and with it stands taller, a determined look covering his worry as he announces, "Ok! Well then, your coming with me."
Anita has never been so happy to be kidnapped by teen boys.
[Jim's Pov]
Jim isn't sure what he had been expecting today, but it wasn't this.
How did his normal teenage life of school and homework get so weird? He could almost cope with the trolls and man eating gum gums. Witches, however, is pushing him over his limit.
He had started that day fairly normal too. Get up, check on his mom, hang out with Toby, check out the new Vespa. Then it went down hill, cause of course a baby was being kidnapped by a goblin right then! Toby doesn't even believe him either. Blinky would though… he's sure he would. He couldn't even get down to Trollmarket to try and talk to the man(… uh Troll?) though cause of two "witches".
Witches that look nothing like witches, if those even look like he's imagining. Aren't witches suppose to be green with boils and back cats?
The two woman with him look too… normal. Yeah one is wearing black and seems grumpy, but she doesn't seem magical or anything. The other woman can hardly look at them, she's so shy!
Walking behind both women, Jim and Toby are leading them back to his home and the large troll who's currently guarding it.
He couldn't exactly walk them into Trollmarket with just their words of assurance. Well… their words and the creepy amount of stuff they know, if they are just humans (witches are still human right?). Jim couldn't just leave them on their own either. What if they were enemies and would have run back and told Bular something the moment Jim was out of sight? No. He needs to keep an eye on them and get information. Draal was his only option. He might not know as much as Blinky, but he knows more about magic and troll stuff than they do. He really hopes this somehow relates to troll stuff and Draal will know what to do.
"Sooooo…" Jim is pulled from his thoughts as the dark grumpy witch starts talking again (they had been real quiet since they left the canal and started walking through the forest towards his home).
Jim isn't sure if he really wants to hear more from them, but Toby doesn't seem as worried as he is and eagerly replies, "Sooo?"
"So you know about the changelings?"
Toby looks surprised that the woman knows for a moment, before remembering that he had thrown a horseshoe at her earlier, "Oh, yeah, yeah we do."
"Which ones you know?" the shy witch asks, peeking at Toby in interest. Huh, the only time she's not shy is when she knows or wants information. Suspicious.
"Why do you want to know?" Jim asks, watching the two women. The shy one looks nervously away and fiddles with the bottom of her zip-up while the grumpy one just seems to roll her eyes at his suspicion.
"Just… we want to help, so if we knew….." The woman continues but soon trails off, not sure what to say or how.
"You know about the pink one?" asks Dark girl, not bothering with being subtle.
"Oh! The museum lady! You know about her too!"
Jim hates how pleased the dark one looks with herself as Toby replies, "Do you know about the one at the dentist too?! I was so sure it would be the dentist himself but…" Toby continues, rather excited to have someone else to talk about their discoveries with…. Well, someone else who is 'maybe' a human anyway.
"And the green one?" she interrupts Toby's chattering, curious. Aren't they suppose to be doing what jim wants? It wasn't their plan to get caught, was it? Maybe they are the enemy after all…
"Oh." the shy one smiles, looking over at Toby and the other woman, seeming to catch onto the changeling that they're talking about.
Wait… green one? What green one?! Jim had already killed the one at the dentist's office.
"You know," she starts, missing Jim's alarmed look as she looks to Toby's excited expression, "small, snarky, wears a diaper."
"You know where a changeling is?!" Jim suddenly shouts. There is a silence following the exclamation. Toby looks fit to burst in excitement, Jim can't tell if the grumpy woman is annoyed or simply tired, and the shy one looks startled. The boy then looks about them. Jim had just yelled in the middle of the street, the group having just left the woods.
Toby notices the sudden tension and the glances shared between the other three members of their little group, and side-steps smoothly up to Jim, "So they know about a changeling. Now they can just tell us, right? They say they're here to help, riiiighht?" he stretches out the word and looks to the woman gesturing for them to help him out here.
Seems Toby already trusts them, even if they sound mad. Then again, hadn't he gone along with Jim when he had just found out about his armor?
While Hannah doesn't really contribute, Anita can see that they need Jim to calm down and hopefully trust them, "Yes! Of course!" she replies, nodding her head as she fidgets with her hands, "I'll tell you what you want about Notenrique, promise."
Jim isn't sure he wants to believe the stranger, specially as he has no idea how she even knows this much about changelings. But Jim needs this information if he plans to stop Bular.
"Ok, where is this Notenrique guy then?" he demands.
This leaves Anita in a difficult position, as Jim obviously has no idea where this changeling is from.
"Um.. well, he's a.. little changeling, like," She gestures about a foot in height awkwardly, "so he's hiding as a.. um… baby." she cringes waiting for their reaction.
Jim's eyes go wide as the event from that morning suddenly makes sense," the goblin took the baby for the changelings Tobes!"
"What?! You mean the bird from this morning? Come on man, we don't know that."
"They just said they know a baby changeling!"
"I thought you didn't believe them! And who says it's a baby changeling from today! No way it's the same one."
Watching the argument go back and forth, the women stand together. Anita is worried about what revealing info might do to the story, or what it might have the boys think of her. Hannah is curious of what they will do with the information as well, though is rather unimpressed that apparently the answer is argue about if it's true or not.
"Hey!" she says just loud enough to give the teen boys pause, their words falling silent, "Have you been offered a babysitting job from Claire yet?"
The following silence is a tense one. The boys mull over what exactly the woman is implying, and Anita looks rather shocked that her companion is giving away information so freely.
"So you're telling me….." Jim grips the sides of his head, "that Claire's brother is a changeling?!"
Notes: we keep stressing out poor Jim.
