I'm so not creeping down this forbidden corridor
Angelina made another step. Just three more steps and she would be safe. Just two more. Just …
''What are you doing?!'' stormed a voice from behind her. Angelina slowly turned, carefully keeping her face as innocent as possible when one gets caught stalking through the dark corridor in the National Library of Prague. The corridor that is off-limits for the public, of course.
''Me?'' asked Angelina. She looked at the security guard with her blue eyes wide open in the perfect mixture of confusion and surprise. ''I was just heading to the toilet. Isn't this the right way? Maps can be so confusing.''
Guard looked at her sharply, clearly not believing her words. Angelina cursed under her breath. It was time for her least favourite weapon. She hoped she could avoid it, but… it looked like it was inevitable. She started battling her eyelashes and toying with the long blond curls, courtesy of her wig that served as a disguise fort he times that she wouldn't be able to get scot-free just with the use of her family name. Anywhere but in Ireland, actually. Besides being a blond gave her certain advantages as people always tended to underestimate her – in those incredibly rare moments that she had to interact with them while doing something less than legal… while the latter was actually a pretty frequent occasion interactions were not.
''I always get so confused when reading these things. I couldn't find any English sign and then there was such a beautiful photo hanging there on the wall and I just wanted to get a closer look,'' she started babbling in heavily accented English. And then there was this beautiful chandelier and I got lost in all these hallways… How stupid of me,'' she giggled. She threw the guide a shrewd glance from behind her lashes. Damn. He still looked way too suspicious for her liking. Just her lack to be found by the probably the only even approximately competent guard in the whole building…
She was ready to start cursing when she realised that it just gave her a long-awaited opportunity to use her favourite weapon that she rarely got to use due to it being a bit too obvious. Well, extreme circumstances call for extreme measurements.
Keeping up her act of a confused but completely innocent person she snuck her left hand in her purse. She started feeling around with her fingers and quickly found the sought item. She tightly wrapped her hands around the handle and quickly pulled it out, immediately hiding it behind her back.
''Oh, is this Vltava?'' she asked with an eager voice. He turned to look at the picture when she struck. She brought a stuffed panda down heavy on his head. Upon the impact, it released a cloud of green smoke. The guard barely sensed anything when the cloud embraced his head and he dropped down on the floor, out cold.
Angelina looked at the scene with satisfaction plainly seen on her face. Then she suddenly stopped smirking when she remembered some small, but sadly very important detail. Green smoke? The smoke was supposed to be violet, it was in her favourite koala that she took everywhere with her. How on earth… she slowly looked at the panda. ''I'm so killing him,'' she started muttering. ''This was the last time I had let him anywhere near my equipment. He's so going to regret ever toying with my things…'' Her angry ranting was interupted when the guard started mumbling incoherently.
She looked at him. Despite the gravity of the situation she couldn't help snickering a bit at the sight of his face. His skin was already gaining green undertone and his hair seemed to have gained some wonderful dark green highlights that actually suited his chestnut hair. It still wasn't anywhere as good as her own combination of sparkles that covered the person from head to toe and refused to be removed for weeks. Oh, it was easy to remove parts of as it was her intention to leave her victims a little gift in the form of the sparkles that shaped into tiny patterns that were unremovable for months after they removed the rest of it.
However, there was no time to contemplate this there and then. She got her act together and started playing a good Samaritan that came upon hearing some commotion coming from the dark end of the corridor and her care for others simply forced her to go and check. She knew she was laying it on a bit thick but it didn't concern her all as much considering the fact that all her ''animals'' contained a little bit of something that made people dizzy and very impressionable for the first few minutes after they woke up, going even so far to make them believe her version of events before it despite it always clashing horribly with the version they remembered for themselves to be the real recounter of the events.
Therefore it was no hardship for her to make him believe her story to the point that he started thanking her profusely, completely forgetting the fact that he encountered her once before in the forbidden part of the library and was in the middle of berating her for it. She parted with him with one last smile and took away with a satisfied smile resting on her lips.
Another successful feat was behind her, she gained a new treasure to put on display at the next family meeting, and she also got to use one of her favourite toys. Even if it wasn't the one she intended to use. It meant that she had some unfinished business with her brother and that was something that always made her smile, especially since such occasions when she could retaliate for something he did in any way she wanted became incredibly rare from the moment their mother had forbidden it unless it was for something big after getting fed up with their constant pranks and the fact that she couldn't make a step out of her rooms without almost becoming a victim of one of their stray pranks.
I recently found myself without ideas fort his story… While I do have some ideas for future chapters, and of course for her meeting with Artemis (that is currently still somewhere far in the future), I'd really appreciate any ideas and suggestions you might have. And while I am afraid future chapters will be sadly far and between, reviews might make me write faster… Feedback is always appreciated, especially constructive criticism as I am mostly writing this for fun and to improve my writing. I'd also need some Irish surname that I could use as her family name. And maybe even a name for her brother. So, if there's any Irish reading it, or just someone that has a name in mind, I am open for suggestions.
