Finally got London done! Didn't think that it would take this long though... I do hope that you like it. I have honestly no idea when the main story will get another posting but it will be sometime this month if I have anything to say about it. And if you haven't read the Hp/Narnia story then I'll say it here:
R.I.P Richard Griffith who played beloved Uncle Vernon in the movies. He died last Friday I believe. It was in the back several days anyway.
Harry and Kelly were moaning and fidgeting in the waiting room. Gibbs and Shannon were talking to the nurse to try and get a doctor faster so they can get to London, and to make sure Harry's leg isn't infected from Ripper. It didn't take them long to get to the hospital, but the waiting line was long. Very, very long in the kid's opinions.
Gibbs and Shannon were trying to try and get the nurse to get Harry in and out quickly. Gibbs was almost at the end of his temper when he told the nurse that the dog might have rabies. The nurse's eyes widened and immediately called for a doctor that wasn't busy. Shannon turned to Gibbs with a raised eyebrow.
"What? They were taking too long." Shannon just shook her head and waited for the nurse to get back.
"Follow me." Gibbs went to get the kids. Harry couldn't walk on his leg from the pain so Gibbs ended up carrying him, much to Harry's embarrassment.
Walking into one of the wards, Gibbs saw the doctor standing there. Sighing, Gibbs set Harry down for a painful visit.
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One needle, four stitches and two hours later, the Gibbs family and Harry left the hospital to London.
Harry bit his lip from the pain. The pain would go away in a couple hours but it still hurt a lot. Kelly would entertain Harry with stories from America, or what she could remember from it with Shannon throwing in an opinion or two. When London came into view, the two kids stared out the windows, trying to take in as much of the city as possible. They went over the Westminister Bridge with Gibbs and Shannon sharing a secret smile between them. With Harry and Kelly distracted, Gibbs pulled them into a hotel parking lot.
"Come on you two, let's go." The two kids eagerly got out and frowned when they saw the building.
"A hotel?" Kelly asked in a flat voice.
"We're staying the night since that was the original plan. We thought that we would have more time today but with that little side trip, we may as well go and check in our stuff and see if there's time to go and wander around the streets." Shannon said. Kelly shrugged.
"Ok." Harry was being helped by Gibbs with getting out of the car. Grabbing all the luggage, Gibbs went first with Shannon following the kids with Kelly helping Harry out on his bandaged leg.
"Come on!" Kelly dragged Harry to the big comfy chairs that were huge in their eyes. Sitting down on them, Kelly melted into it and let out a huge sigh.
"This is the life." Harry just laughed at her while getting more comfortable in his chair.
"Kids, come on." Shannon called. Grimacing, Harry got up and followed with Kelly. Smiling at her, they went to follow Shannon when Gibbs came up with another idea.
"Shannon, why don't you just stay here with the kids, I won't take long."
"Alright, just hurry up though." Gibbs smiled and shook his head while taking the bags. Harry was confused for a minute since no one grabbed his bags from the Dursley's. Kelly leaned over, seeing Harry's confused expression.
"Clothes from our house, remember?" Harry blushed, forgetting about those. Gibbs came back a few minutes later.
"Well, come on, let's go and check out the shops." The kids grinned and they each took an adult's hand, remembering the rules for being in big, public, crowded places.
This was one of the only times that the kids followed the rules to the letter because they know that they would be in big trouble other wise. Looking around, Kelly and Harry had wide smiles as they talked about where they would go tomorrow. The Tower of London, the zoo, Big Ben and Buckingham Palace were all thrown around. They had a couple of the things that Gibbs and Shannon had planned, but they missed one and they weren't going to ruin the surprise for them. They walked around before finding a small, quaint restaurant to eat in. Going in, it had a diner feel to it. A waitress came up smiling.
"Table for four?" She asked. Gibbs nodded and followed her as they went for their table. Sitting down, the kids saw a small cup holding crayons and that the place mats were paper. Quickly grabbing the crayons, Kelly and Harry flipped one over so the blank side of the paper was showing. Shannon and Gibbs looked on, amused.
The two were writing in a secret code that only they could understand. After five minutes, Kelly took it and folded up the paper when she thought her parents weren't watching. Shannon shook her head and smiled at the two kid's antics. They've always amused her, even if she was on the end of their pranks sometimes.
When the waitress came back and got their order of food, Harry and Kelly were starting to fidget. Shannon sighed, knowing that they have always had trouble sitting still for long periods of time. Deciding to entertain them, Shannon got out a pack of cards and showed them how to play war. It didn't require skill, other then lots and lots of luck to which cards they got. Seeing the look in their eyes, Shannon split the deck into to and told them how to play.
"You each get half the deck to start with, ok? Now, you know the order of the cards, but this time, there's no jokers and the aces are the highest card. You flip over your top card and see if yours is higher. If it is, then you get those cards. When you have, say, a three each, you call out war and place three cards face down in front of you and flip over a fourth. Whoever has higher gets the lot. I once played with someone who had war three times in a row so doing it twice is possible. The winner is the person who gets all the cards, ok?" Harry and Kelly nodded after Shannon gave them their cards and let them go. It wasn't long before the two were trying to figure out how to cheat. Gibbs looked at them with amusement.
"That didn't take long now did it." Shannon just groaned.
"What is it with them and trying to cheat?" Gibbs gave a small shrug.
"At least they don't know how to play spit or poker." Shannon stared at Gibbs.
"Show them poker and I'll show you the couch." Gibbs just raised an eyebrow at this but said nothing.
"War!" Harry cried. The two adults looked over and saw Harry grinning at the two jack's. Flipping over their fourth card, Harry cried out in triumph while Kelly pouted.
"Let's see what I won," he cackled. Kelly gave Harry a weird look. He flipped them over and crowed in triumph.
"I have three aces!" Kelly pouted and stared at her last ace. She picked it up and cradled it.
"Don't worry, I won't let the crazy boy take you." Shannon and Gibbs started laughing quietly at this. When the food came, Kelly got back and ace but Harry still had a bigger pile then her. Shannon took all the cards.
"Aww!" the kids whined.
"I was winning!" Harry cried. Shannon laughed.
"The game could've gone on for hours you two." They just shrugged, getting distracted by the food in front of them. After eating, they decided to go to the hotel.
"The room has a good view of the city," Gibbs said. Kelly helped a hobbling Harry to the elevator where when the door closed, Harry started getting jittery. Shannon held onto Harry as he clung on and had his eyes shut.
This was one way of getting to calm Harry down in closed spaces, but thankfully, wasn't the only way. Getting into their room, there was a small kitchen and two levels. The first level had a T.V. and a small couch while the lower level had a large bed and the bathroom.
"Well, the couch can become a bed so Kelly and Harry can have the bed." The two lit up like a Christmas tree and ran (in Harry's case, limp), downstairs to the bed. After getting ready, they all went to sleep, excited on what they were going to do tomorrow.
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Te two kids looked at the Tower in wonder.
"This was a fortress?" Kelly asked. Shannon nodded as they climbed the staircase that spiraled up.
"It's also where the Royal Jewels are kept but remember, it's also a prison."
"Anne Bolyen, George Boylen, Thomas Moore, a Fisher and tons of others," Harry said excitedly. Shannon laughed at Harry's enthusiasm.
"Yes. We'll actually see where the executions were." Kelly was now looking eagerly at her mother. Shannon shook her head.
"Yes, we'll see the platform."
"Yes!" Both kids shouted. Taking the rest of the tour through the Tower, the four were back on the street.
"Can we go to Buckingham?" Harry asked.
"I hear that there's changing of the guards there." Gibbs smiled.
"Sure. That's why we're in London now isn't it? Be tourists in our own country." Shannon snorted at this and took Kelly's hand as they saw a double decker bus coming down the street. Gibbs saw the bus station and had everyone walk over there.
Getting on the bus was interesting. The kids needed a hand up because they were so short and they wanted to go to the top so there was a lot of pushing and "excuse me," everywhere. Getting to the top may have taken forever, but it was worth it. Both kids loved the view from up there.
As they rode through London, the two adults pointed out the various places that they thought would be interesting for the kids. They already decided to do the Bridge at sunset, so they had lots of time. As they approached Buckingham, the kids started getting even more exited.
"I thought they didn't have sugar." Shannon said, as she watched Harry and Kelly bounce on their feet and couldn't stop moving. Gibbs just smiled and shrugged. Seeing the bus slow down, Shannon and Gibbs got the kids to go down into the lower deck and ring for the bus to stop. Waiting about a minute, the bus finally stopped and the four of them got off and Kelly and Harry looked at the palace in awe.
The graying outside and the gold statue in front of the huge gates made the kids awestruck. Gibbs and Shannon chuckled at their reactions.
"Can we live here?" They both asked. That made Shannon burst out laughing.
"S-sorry kids, but no. We can't afford it." Shannon said while still slightly laughing. Gibbs stopped laughing but still had on a smile. Seeing the changing of the guards was interesting to the kids, who loved looking at the uniforms. After it was all over, the adults took the kids towards Westminister bridge.
Kelly started shaking Shannon's hand. Shannon looked down and saw her daughter pointing towards a market. Shannon smiled at the idea.
"Sure." Kelly squealed in delight, which alerted the other two to her. Gibbs raised an eyebrow and Shannon smiled and shook her head at her daughter while gesturing towards the market. Gibbs got an understanding look and took Harry towards the market as well.
Harry's nose was assaulted with many smells, some that made his eyes water. Kelly was wanting to run around but knew the rule so she just kept turning whatever which way she could.
Shannon ended up buying some spices that she needed, or wanted to try out. Kelly saw a blue scarf that she fell in love with and Harry noticed two things. One was a small dagger in a black sheath the had gold painted around the edges and a small journal that was made out of leather with thick paper that was hand made. Harry looked at Gibbs who chuckled.
"One thing Harry because it won't be fair to Kelly." Harry pouted at that but ended up taking the journal. Gibbs did allow him to get a nice pen to go with it. Harry was very happy with the journal. Shannon and Gibbs carried the two items towards the bridge. It wasn't quite sunset yet, so they went across towards Big Ben.
Gibbs got out the camera with Harry and Kelly in front of the tall clock tower. Kelly made it look like she was leaning against it while Harry had it in his hand, looking surprised. They walked across with Harry and Kelly stretching their necks to keep looking at the top and nearly fell backwards because of all the leaning.
"Come on you two," Shannon called. They made their way to a booth and Harry looked out by the water.
"I think someone at school said that people were thinking of building a ferris wheel on the water," Harry said. Kelly shook her head.
"I didn't hear that." Harry shrugged.
"It's a maybe but who knows." Gibbs smiled at this but said nothing. Shannon came back with tickets.
"Come on."
"Where are we going?" Kelly called after her mother. Shannon smiled.
"It's a surprise." Harry looked slightly nervous but calmed down. He never did like surprises thanks to the Dursley's but Shannon and Gibbs' surprises were always very nice. The two kids looked up with their jaws open. They were going up the Westminister bridge! Shannon smiled.
"Come on." They went up to the deck and both kids clung slightly to each adult as they didn't want to fall in at all. Although, Harry had to admit that the view was amazing, especially at sunset. Him and Kelly looked around at the city from up above.
"This is cool!" Kelly cried. Harry nodded in agreement. They stayed there for about an hour before heading down and walk back to the hotel. Harry grimaced at the thought. His leg was starting to hurt again.
Gibbs looked down at the fidgeting boy and noticed that he was trying to stay off his leg. Gibbs stopped and bent down. Harry looked unsure but climbed on his back regardless. Shannon looked over in concern but Gibbs just mouthed, "leg." Shannon got an understanding look. Not wanting any fights or anything, Shannon gave Gibbs her bag and told Kelly to climb on. Kelly did so and was nearly laughing but almost fell asleep. Both adults looked at each other and walked back to the hotel, where they can drop the kids off and go for a small drink.
Harry smiled. This was one of the best days in his life, but sighed. He never wants Kelly and her family to leave. He'd die if they did.
How was it?