Title: P.B.I.

Author: Wesa

Rating: PG

Status: Complete. Stupid, but complete.

Archive: Santuario, if you want it, Claudia.

Series/Sequel: Chat Stories

Disclaimers: Peter belongs to Beatrix Potter, I think, though I'm not certain. Bugsy belongs to Warner Brothers. Their cousin belongs to the world at large. All other major characters belong to RC group chatters

Summary: PB & Co

Notes: Okay, so it's dumb. I never watched many of those movies, and I didn't have a plot, just a visual of PB in his own private eye office...and I wanted to share.

By Wesa.

My cousins Peter and Bugsy told me that I went into the wrong line of work, that I'd have to associate with unsavory characters, but where did their ambitions get them? Peter got himself chased away by his farmer, and Bugsy hasn't made a picture in years. Even when he did, who did he associate with? A paranoid duck, a stuttering pig, a marsupial with an eating disorder, an ineffective coyote, a bald guy with a speech impediment, and a rootin' tootin' shoot 'em up redhead who more than once married for money - all of them male, and most of them, including Bugsy, nudists.

I didn't see that my associates were all that bad. Granted that one was an unexplained phenomenon that often whirled through a room á là Taz. Granted that two of the others were demons, and one of them was a cross-dresser whose taste ran to fishnet stockings, short skirts and spiked heels, to say nothing of the fact that he was colorblind. But heck, many of them were housewives and college co-eds and working women (with the occasional male counterpart thrown in) who had no greater problem than chewed-up ankles and over-active imaginations.

And talk about job security! The ranks of these ladies is constantly swelling, and I swear the most innocent remark can send them off into giggle-fits, suddenly giving me work than I can deal with.

It was a dark and stormy night when suddenly a dame burst into my office. I put away my chocolate mints - okay, so these girls do have some contagious bad habits - and switched on the overhead light. I let my eyes run up the less-than-perfect figure of my sobbing visitor and came to a startling conclusion: this was no dame; this was a typo demon in drag. I tossed Brian a candy cigarette and took one for myself. "Your mascara's running," I told him. "What's up?"

"They're picking on me again!" he wailed.

I sighed. For a typo demon, Brian was a real crybaby. "Who is?" I asked.

"Those witches at RC chat." He was calming a little, though his lower lip still stuck out a bit; must have been the sugar in the candy cigarette.

"They aren't witches; you need to remember the difference between them and their characters. What did they do now?" I wondered, not too worried about him. He was a demon, after all. I mean, Marq had dropped a house on the Revolving Door of Doom, and it was still active. What could they have done to Brian that could really have harmed him?

"They blame me for everything!" he objected. "Kay types stuff backward, and I get blamed. Marq misspells stuff, and I get blamed. Wesa's fingers don't do what she tells them to, and I get blamed. Jen makes a Freudian slip, and I get blamed!"

I chuckled involuntarily. I had been present the night Jen forgot how to use ice cubes, and I still thought that was hysterical.

Brain disagreed. "It's not funny!" he screamed. He threw the butt of his candy cigarette at me and stomped out, breaking one of his stiletto heels in the process.

I took off my fedora and picked the sticky candy off the felt, looking at the orange lipstick stains on it for a moment. I was tempted, but I wasn't that far gone yet. I tossed it in the trash and got up to close the door behind Brian, suppressing the impulse to laugh at the way he stumped down the corridor with only one heel.

I turned back to my desk, unsurprised to see TextNabber hanging around by the window, looking out at the storm. "There's so much dust out there, the air's crunchy," he drawled.

"S'posed to rain later on," I replied. "That'll make it better. Unless you like dust in your teeth."

He grinned at me. At least I hope it was meant to be a grin. The letters dripping from his fangs made me nervous. After all, if he eats too much text, the girls won't be able to communicate, and I'll be out of business. "Not dust, no," he denied. "Not enough texture to it."

I frowned. "How come you were so mean to Wesa last night?" I wondered.

"Hey, I haven't had a good meal since the last time Fritz came to a chat," he protested. "I was peckish. You shouldn't complain. I hear them talking about you nibbling their ankles to the bone."

"Look, I got locked in the Boss's shower last time I bit anyone," I pointed out.

"Oh, big sacrifice."

"She went to Chile, damn it!" I took a deep breath to steady my nerves. Two weeks in a tiny glassed-in room with nary a pinky toe to nibble on? I shuddered at the memory and thanked the Muses that Wesa had taken pity on me and let me out. Granted she had forgotten I was there, and had only come to clean because Kanetsidohi was due back.

A fast thwacka-thwacka-thwacka sound fluttered through the room, and when I looked around, TextNabber was gone. I twitched my whiskers. Well! How kind of RDoD. It usually picked on Marqaisa, not one of its fellow demons.

There was something weird going on here. I knew I had sunk my buckteeth deep into Wesa's ankle, but there didn't seem to be a plot line anywhere. Thinking hard, I ambled over to my desk and pulled out the box of candy. Candy. That was it! Mystery solved.

Wesa was suffering from a severe lack of chocolate. I looked at my candy morosely. Should I -? Ahhh, heck with it. Let Wesa buy her own chocolate! I was in the business of inspiring stories, not making sure they got finished.

I turned out the overhead light and leaned back in my chair with my feet up on my desk, a chocolate mint in one hand and a Dr. Pepper in the other, sighing in contentment. Rack up another success for Plot Bunny Investigations.