"Well, damn..." she swore. There was no easy way to undo such a bond without blowing her own leg off. If she even had her rune--she checked quickly, almost panicking, but breathed a sigh of relief. Her Hate Rune was still equipped. It was her father's, and she would give a personal taste of hell to anyone who took it away.
There wasn't any sign of the Dock Brothers at the moment, which was probably a good thing. Maybe she could escape before they returned. She looked at the manacle. It was somewhat rusty...probably from the damp environment. Ronnie looked around hopefully for any sort of key that might be hanging within reach...no such luck. She tried picking at the lock, to no avail. This was turning out to be an extremely bad situation for her. Suddenly, the air turned putrid-smelling. One of the Docks must be returning. Hickory entered the chamber, which had a few more chains hanging from various walls, two broken mattresses, and piles of trash everywhere. Hickory was wearing the same outfit he had captured her in--cowboy hat, stupid eye mask, sweaty overalls and bare feet. He grinned lopsidedly, and Ronnie cringed.
"Hey there, pretty girl...you woke up." he said happily, stating the obvious.
"Let me go, right now." Ronnie demanded. "There's been a mistake."
"Now, Pauline..." Hickory said condescendingly. "We can't letcha go 'til yer Pa coughs up the cash, okay?" Ronnie clenched her fists.
"I'm NOT Pauline, don't you understand that?! I'm Ronnie Bell!!" she yelled. "Pauline Fargolon was ALREADY KIDNAPPED when you got there!!" Hickory flashed what he must've thought was a coy grin.
"Now, Pauline, ya can't fool me...I'm smart'r than the average guy!" he claimed. Ronnie burst out laughing. Tears of mirth rolled down her face. It was the most hilarious thing she'd heard in a long time.
Dickory came in, smelling even worse than his brother.
"What's all the laughin' in here?" he asked Hickory.
"Somethin's wrong with her!" Hickory said. Dickory turned to her.
"Pauline, if there's something wrong, ya gotta tell us." Dickory said, speaking to her as if she was a small child with a bed-wetting problem. She stopped laughing immediately, and glared death at the fat pig in man's clothing.
"There's nothing wrong here except for the fact that you two IDIOTS have kidnapped the wrong person!! I'm not Pauline, for the last time. I'm RONNIE BELL." she said evenly. Dickory chuckled a little.
"Ya expect us ta believe that, Miss? I'll have you know that if you really were Ronnie Bell, you'd be all over me right now. I know Miss Bell quite well myself, and I'll have you know she's easier to bed than a two-bit slut!" he declared.
For a second or two, Ronnie couldn't see anything at all. She was blinded by pure, unchecked rage. How dare these two morons accuse her of something as low as sleeping with either of them?! When her vision returned, all she could see clearly was the symbol of her Hate Rune burning the air. She fired several shots in several directions, hoping they would hit and make the Dock Bros. into several pieces. The high-pitched squeal that accompanied all her fireballs echoed throughout the cave. She could hear screaming. Good. Stupid bastards. Two-bit whore, indeed.
"EEEEEEK!" Pauline Fargolon screamed upon seeing the messy living quarters of Bell's Bandits. Of course, there was a distinct difference between the bandits' mess and the Dock brothers' mess. For the cave where Bell's Bandits' lived, the mess was merely a sign that someone lived there--namely, men. A tossed article of clothing here, a choice piece of reading material there. The Dock Bros. cave had signs that ANIMALS, namely pigs, lived there and never cleaned. But Pauline didn't care. It was 'icky'.
"This is utter ick!!!" she screeched. "Jeeves, clean this up at ONCE!" Jeeves looked at his mistress, his calm expression not changing whatsoever.
"I am tied up, my Lady. Is this not what you wished?" he inquired. She considered for a moment. She herself was not tied to anything (she had whined about how the rope would chafe her and RUIN her outfit, which was Not Acceptable) but the poor butler was. Jaoullin, Norman, Bechno, Scotch, and Eyesoar stood behind them, in front of the entrance so they couldn't escape. It's not like Pauline would anyway--she had specifically mentioned how the climb up the mountain was never going to be forced upon her again Or Else.
"Listen, Miss Fargolon. We live here and you don't. Therefore, if we make you sleep on a pile of dirty socks, that's what you're gonna do. Okay?" Scotch said. Pauline scowled at them all.
"You barbarians! You can't do this to me! I have money and power!" she said defiantly. The bandits sighed. Bechno and Eyesoar went off into the hideout, most likely to rest up. Norman quietly apologized and untied Jeeves. Jaoullin and Scotch led Ronnie to a chamber that had been prepared for her. Somewhat, anyway. The other bandits looked proud of the job they had done, but Pauline looked disgusted and obviously Did Not Approve.
"Listen, spare us the speech on how bad it is, okay? The men worked hard, and you'll just have to live with it, okay?" Jaoulliin proclaimed before she could speak. She crossed her arms and sat down daintily on the creaky bed, glaring haughtily at the two men in the doorway. After a few moments, they left.
Scotch called a meeting in the main chamber--but the only ones required to attend were those who had gone on the kidnapping mission. Scotch sat on a large couch in the center of the chamber, with Bechno across from him. Norman sat in his carved-out alcove, and Jaoullin stood in the corner, polishing the Star Ostrich Sword.
"Everyone here? Okay, let's start." Jaoullin said.
"Wait...where's Eyesoar?" Scotch asked.
"He's napping, leave him be." Bechno said. Scotch nodded.
"Okay then, I'm sure you all know what we're here for." he said.
"You mean the fact that the boss never came out of Fargolon Manor?" Norman said.
"Of course. It's not like Ron to get caught...or whatever else might've happened." Jaoullin said worriedly.
"Well, let's review the facts, then. Maybe we can figure out what might have happened." Scotch said. "We went into Pauline's room--me, Jaoullin, Norman, and Ronnie, with Bechno and Eyesoar on guard duty. The only other person who knew we were in there was Jeeves, and maybe those guards that the boss took out. We know that either those guards or the butler alerted the mansion's security, because there was someone coming when we were leaving. As we ran out, the boss went back to get Pauline's hair pin...and she never came out of the bedroom." Norman nodded solemnly.
"The most obvious thing that could've happened is that she got caught by security." the grizzled dwarf said.
"Yeah...the only thing disputing that is the flash of light we saw from the window as we were leaving...some kind of rune or something." Jaoullin said.
"It wasn't the boss's rune..." Scotch said definitely.
"If she got caught, it poses a major problem." Norman said, and everyone looked at him. He looked almost embarrassed. "I mean, with our ransom. We can't demand any amount of money in exchange for Pauline's return if they have Ronnie as a bargaining tool."
"Shit...we never even thought of that." Jaoullin said. "So now what? Do we just send the ransom note anyway, and hope they don't have Ron? Or do we bust in there??"
"I...I..." Scotch said, losing his usual composure. "I don't know..."
After succeeding in administering several severe burn wounds at point-blank range to Hickory and Dickory Dock, Ronnie sat alone again, those two having run off screaming to find some water to jump into. Of course, she was no better off than before, but at least she didn't have to put up with those two. She sat for a moment, trying to decide her next course of action. She realized that she hadn't physically tested her boundaries yet. The chain attached to the manacle on her ankle was still slack, and semi-long. She could safely stand, and walk for a few feet. She looked around the cave again. Around a corner, where she couldn't see, was the only passage leading out of the chamber. She really didn't see anything of use around in the cave.
"Arrgh..." she said aloud. "There has to be SOMETHING..." She finally sat down and decided that if she worked with her rune VERY CAREFULLY on the chain, she could melt it off. She concentrated the Hate Rune's energy into a tiny area, and went to work...
It was too serious a matter to decide alone, so all of Bell's Bandits, along with Pauline Fargolon and Jeeves, were gathered in the main chamber. Most of them had no idea what was going on. Whispers ran through the crowd like a shiver up someone's spine.
"Now that everyone's present..." Scotch began. "There's something important we have to discuss." Another murmur went through the assembled bandits. Where was Ronnie?
"What's going on, Scotch??" one of them asked.
"Ronnie Bell is missing. She never emerged from Fargolon Manor." Scotch said. "All we know about her disappearance is that she went back for something, and then a flash appeared several minutes later."
"You don't suppose she's..." a short bandit said, trailing off. Jaoullin got up from where he was standing in a flash and dashed forward.
"Don't say that!!" he shouted angrily. "Ron wouldn't check out like that!" Scotch looked as if the notion that Ronnie might be dead physically hurt him, but he remained still.
"Calm down, Jaoullin..." he said quietly. He turned to address Pauline. "Miss Fargolon, did you have any runes in your room that Ronnie might have set off?" Pauline glared.
"I don't have to tell YOU anything!" she said haughtily. "My daddy---"
"Tell us, or no amount of ransom will stop me from slitting your snobby throat!!" Jaoullin raged, drawing the SOS. Norman jumped out of his alcove and attempted to restrain him. Bechno jumped in there with him, and they managed to calm the Sunshine Knight down. He sat in the back of the room, with his head in his hands. Pauline looked stunned at the very notion that someone didn't care about her welfare.
"Well," she sniffed, reluctant, "There's no runes except this old thing." She held up her left hand to reveal a Turtle Rune. It was obvious that she only wore it because her family was credited with its discovery. A status symbol, nothing more. She had no idea how to USE it. Eyesoar, still sleepy looking, narrowed his eyes at the butler.
"Jeeves? Did you alert security??" he asked. The butler didn't move an inch.
"My Lady was in need of my immediate assistance. Stopping to call security would have been directly disobediant." Jeeves stated, still with a straight face. Eyesoar's jaw dropped and Norman muttered something about whips.
"O...kay...." the young winger said.
"Listen, everyone...we've established that the flash was a rune. If the lady says it wasn't hers, it wasn't. And the butler's truthful too." Scotch declared. "So, it must've been an outside force. Someone else was in the mansion that night."
"Well Scotch, what do we do? We have no idea what outside force it was, and what they used."
"A Blinking Rune." Norman said suddenly. "It had to have been a Blinking Rune." Everyone nodded. But they still didn't know how that helped--Blinking Runes were everywhere.
"So our only clues would be in that bedroom--Pauline's." Bechno said. Norman turned to Jeeves and Pauline.
"How often is that room cleaned?" he asked.
"Whenever it is needed...however, only one person is allowed to clean my Lady's exalted living space." the butler explained.
"And who is that?" Scotch asked.
"Fifi, of course. My Lady's personal maid." Jeeves said.
"Then we have a new objective." Scotch announced. "Get Fifi."
