Skeletons in the Closet
BY: JaDErUst
The phone was ringing.
This had never been a problem before. Charisse's phone was always ringing with boys on the line begging to go out with her or girls crying and swearing over her stealing a fiancé or two away. However, this terrible unending ringing was not the number one pop tune of Charisse's phone. For that matter it was not the pleasant mocking tone Pandora had chosen for her own cell phone to play. It was the room phone.
Who the devil would call the room?
Groaning, Pandora put her hands over her ears and willed the dreadful sound to go away. Her head was killing her and her mouth was dry. How much exactly had she drunk last night? Too much obviously. Far, far too much.
From somewhere across the room she heard an answering moan and what sounded to be cursing in French. That had to be Charisse. What was Charisse doing in her room? Suddenly Pandora remembered the victorious first mission and the celebration. The champagne. The wine. The toasts. The wine. The ice cream binge. The wine. Being good friends with the heir of the largest vineyard in Loire Valley now seemed to be such a disadvantage. Sure it had meant an unending supply of the finest wine money could buy last night, but now it meant the finest hangover she had ever experienced.
And that damn phone continued to ring.
"Charisse," Pandora gasped out, raising her head slightly. She was on the floor surrounded by a dozen or so empty wine bottles and two large empty tubs of chocolate cookie dough ice cream. Raising herself up slightly higher she looked to see Charisse sprawled over her couch looking a little bit more then dead with her arm covering her face. "Charisse, answer the phone," she moaned as she collapsed back on the floor, face first.
Making a little whimpering noise Charisse rolled over on her side, putting her back to her friend. "No," came the pouty reply. "Head hurts. Get me coffee. I sleep now."
"Charisse!" Pandora winced at the sound of her own voice. "Answer the damn phone."
No reply except the sound of snorting fake snoring.
Groaning, head swimming, Pandora pulled herself to her knees with the aid of a coffee table and promptly collapsed with her head throbbing painfully. Hoping vainly to die soon, and with the phone continuing to ring she tried again. This time she managed to half crawl, half stagger along on her knees to a short table and pick up the phone. "God invented hangovers to show that he hates us," she muttered as she raised the phone up to her ear. "Hello?"
"Bonjour. Pourrais-je parler à Mademoiselle Nashton," came the brisk, business like voice on the other end of the phone.
Pandora groaned and hit her head against the table once. She was too hungover to think in French and now her head hurt even worse from the blow. "Pardon, parlez vous Anglais?"
There was a pause from the other end of the line. "Oui. May I speak to Mademoiselle Nashton?"
"This is she."
"I have a... appel à P.C.V. a..."
Pandora's mind raced even though it hurt to think. "A collect call?" she asked at the woman on the line continued to struggle.
"Oui, a collect call from Argentina. Do you accept the charges?"
Blinking in surprise, Pandora somehow resisted the temptation to go find her cell phone and check to see if it was broken. There was really only way for her to get a phone call from that part of the world and it was through was the one who had bought her the cell phone. "Oui. Please put them through."
"Ne quittez pas."
The line went silent as she was put on hold. Sighing heavily and sinking to the floor, Pandora rested her back against the wall and wondered who could be calling her. There were very few people in Argentina that knew her well enough to wish to talk to her and none of them had ever called her room number before. They always went through her Uncle to speak with her, and that meant calling her cell phone. Rubbing her temples, as if that would get rid of her headache, she wondered what this could mean.
There were three people she knew from Argentina who would have reason to call her, Uncle, Niñera, and Paul. There was silent understanding that she was the one to call Uncle at least once a month, more often if there was important news to report or she needed something, and that Uncle would never call her unless it was something very important. That was the reason for the cell phone. It was always to be on and always with her in the unlikely event that he needed to get in contact with her.
Niñera was to be called once a week, no excuses accepted. Even if there was nothing to tell the old woman she was to call or else face dire consequences whenever she went home. And the consequences were dire indeed. Her first year at school she had forgotten to call Niñera and three months later at Christmas was made to suffer a long lecture in broken English and Spanish as Niñera demanded to know why she didn't love her enough to call her. Uncle had made no attempt to save her from the old woman's wrath. He had just smiled and eaten Christmas dinner as if nothing was happening. However, Pandora had been careful and made sure to call Niñera yesterday in preparation for whatever outcome the mission would bring. The old woman had been cheerful and glad to hear from her as usual and had mentioned nothing wrong. Even if there had been anything wrong she would have gotten in contact with her through Uncle, since technology worried Niñera, and that meant her cell phone again.
The only other person Pandora could even think might call her would be Paul. Paul was Uncle's bodyguard whenever Uncle went overseas and security head whenever they were at home. Paul had been around since before Pandora could remember and even though the man was nearing sixty and slowing down he still insisted on escorting her home and back to school every vacation without fail. The man was almost one of the family with his large soft hands and pepper gray hair. On more then one occasion Pandora had thought of the man as her Grandfather although telling him that would have been completely unacceptable. Paul, kind as he was to her, was all business first and foremost and believed that bodyguards were something to appreciate and be ready to dispose of instead of adopting them into the family. Every couple weeks or so Niñera would put Paul on the line so they could say a few words to each other, but besides that they rarely spoke unless in person. No Paul wouldn't call her, not even to remind her when to expect him coming for her.
In fact the more that she thought about it, the less likely it seemed that Niñera would call her either. Not unless it was an emergency of course. Pandora felt her heart skip a beat for a moment then shook her head. No, there wasn't an emergency. If there had been and if Uncle couldn't call her about it himself, Niñera would have called her cell phone using the house line. There would be no mucking about with collect calls or calling her room. No, something didn't make sense about this whole situation and it was driving Pandora mad that she couldn't think straight long enough to figure the problem out.
Glancing up, Pandora realized that Charisse was sitting up staring at her and she smiled weakly at her friend. "Get me aspirin and some coffee?" she asked hopefully.
Charisse blinked at her blankly for a moment so Pandora repeated the request in French which caused the blond bombshell to frown and swear rather unbecomingly. "I forgot you don't have a maid," she said finally in English. "Why do you not hire one? I refuse to become yours."
Shrugging, Pandora grinned as Charisse tried to get up and failed. "You'd look so cute in a maid's uniform though... and I bet the men would pay me a fortune to be able to watch you dust in one."
Finally standing, Charisse swayed for a moment looking ill before finally turning towards the kitchen. "The wine was too young," Pandora heard her mutter as she went. "I shall never trust Alain again... The nerve of him sending me too young of wine..."
Pandora thought about laughing at her, decided that it would hurt too much, and was then distracted by a click on the phone that indicated that she had finally been connected. "Hello?" she sighed sinking against the wall more. Hopefully whatever this person wanted could be dealt with quickly so she could go sleep this hangover away.
"Pandora?" The voice on the other side of the line was timid and familiar.
"Niñera?" Her brow furrowed in annoyance as she realized that someone she had dismissed as a possibility was the one actually calling her. She waited for the old woman to say something else then froze as she heard a sniffle and a muffled sob come from the other side of the line. "Niñera? What's the matter? What happened?"
"El señor está en apuro!" came the sudden shout and Pandora yanked the phone away from her ear.
Her head hurt too much to deal with Spanish too, but Niñera sounded almost hysterical and she had been raised in a household of Spanish servants so she knew the language better then French. However, despite how hard she tried she could not form the correct words in her mind to speak. Giving up, she hoped Niñera would calm down enough to understand her in English. "Trouble? What sort of trouble? Why is Uncle in trouble?"
Pandora rubbed her forehead as Charisse reentered the room. Niñera was talking rapidly in Spanish, so quickly she didn't have a hope of understanding her. Lord, she wished she wasn't hung over. Accepting the pills and water she offered she downed them quickly before looking up at her friend. "How would you translate 'secuestrado?'" she asked using the word Niñera seemed to be using the most often.
Charisse looked puzzled for a moment. "Spanish?" At Pandora's nod she thought for a moment, biting the bottom of her lip. "Enlevé perhaps?"
"Doesn't help. English please." Niñera was raving now. Whatever was wrong had driven the old woman to near sobbing and Pandora was struggling between being worried herself or going to bed and dealing with this later.
"I would translate it as abducted," Charisse said helpfully. "Kidnapped perhaps?"
"Oh," Pandora sighed. She blinked once. "What!?" she shouted and regretted it instantly. "Niñera! What do they want? Are you okay? Tell them we'll pay them anything if they don't hurt you!"
Looking interested, Charisse sat down on the couch and watched Pandora intently as Niñera began to protest. "No, no niño. El señor está en apuro! El señor."
"I..." Worry was beginning to overtake her and the Spanish was overloading her already strained brain. What had happened exactly? Why couldn't Niñera just tell her in English? She was too hung over for Spanish...
Sighing, Charisse stood and took the phone from her, putting it to her ear and speaking in perfect Spanish as Pandora stared blankly at the phone. "Someone has kidnapped your Uncle, cherie," she said after a moment of listening. "It happened only a few hours ago after someone cut the power to your home and sabotaged the back up generators."
"What? How? ...What about Paul? Why didn't Paul stop them?"
Charisse spoke into the phone for a moment then listened. "Your man Paul is in the hospital. The kidnapper broke his leg."
Pandora stared at her friend, eyes wide. "What to they want from us? Who did this?" she demanded, grabbing on to Charisse's sleeve and bending closer to the phone.
After asking the question, Charisse frowned at the answer as she shook her head. "The kidnapper had made no demands, cherie. However, I do not understand this woman. She says the man who took your Uncle was a giant bat."
"A giant bat?" Her head hit her knees and Pandora wished she was sober enough to be able to deal with this all properly. A giant bat could not have taken her uncle. Giant bats that kidnapped people did not exist much less send old, much beloved body guards to the hospital. Niñera had to be confused. Charisse had to be translating wrong. There was no way that-
Wait...
Fuck.
Hope you liked the fic so far. I know it's a little confusing, but I promise many many things will be explained in the next chapter. The only thing that I can really tell you about this fic is that is inspired partly from reading the always fabulous Chris Dee, the hilarious Bright Nova, and Scarecrow's squeeze BiteMeTechie while being sick as a dog and watching Batman: The Animated Series. This prompted me to pull out all my Batman comics and start re-reading them when my brain started functioning again (The Long Halloween and Hush are my absolute favorite arcs EVER.) So, if there are any problems with the story (and please tell me if I get anything wrong so I can fix it) I blame illness.
I also apologize in case I messed up with the Spanish and French in the story. I speak neither language so for Spanish I relied heavily on the inter-mah-net and for French I forced my friend Kate (who may or may not have been telling me the wrong things) who's minoring in the language. Why? She doesn't know and she told me that I had to tell you all that.
Mission accomplished.