Disclaimer-All PW characters mentioned don't belong to me. This applies to the entire story, as well. Just to cover chpts. 2 and 3.
A/N-This chapter is dedicated to all the people that have reviewed so far. Seriously-I appreciate every single one so much it's not even funny.
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April 20th, 5:30 PM
Flight 725A
Row 1A
If there was any doubt in Detective Gumshoe's mind of the existence of karma, it had to be completely erased by now.
His first meeting with Annabel was an unprecedented disaster-he hadn't expected such high levels of physical violence from such a small girl. Nor did he expect her to be able to exude this much hatred towards him. She truly was her aunt's niece.
"I want cookies." This demand wasn't new to the detective at all-she had been saying the same thing for the last two hours.
"I don't have any."
"Get some."
"I can't…"
"Idiot. Can't even get a bag of cookies…it's a surprise Aunty Franziska puts up with you."
"How did I not see this coming…?" He wondered to himself in exasperation. "The looks should've been enough warning…"
"Gumchew."
"Gumshoe."
"I don't care." Angry eyes met his. "What exactly are you doing here?"
"Escorting you to LA, where Ms. von Karma is."
"I'm not stupid, y'know. I figured that out when Mama told me." Annabel smacked him on his left arm for the umpteenth time, causing Gumshoe to wince slightly. The child managed to repeatedly hit him directly on his bruises. Aim seemed to be a common trait among the von Karma family women. "I mean, why did Aunty send you, of all people, to pick me up? It's not like you radiate some sort of trustworthy aura or anything."
"I radiate a very strong trustworthy aura, thank you very much. I wouldn't have been hired as a detective otherwise."
"Well…" He tried to think back to what Franziska's reasoning was. Enough had happened since their meeting that he couldn't really remember very well, so he threw out the best guess he had. "I suppose it was some sort of punishment-"
"WHAT?!"
Annabel jumped up onto her seat as she exclaimed this.
"What do you mean some sort of punishment?!"
"Wait, wait, wait…did I say punishment? I-I meant to say…uh…vacation! Yeah, vacation!" His scrambling didn't seem to be very convincing for the girl, as rage still seemed to flood through her.
"You liar! I can't believe that Aunty Franziska would send you out to get me as a punishment!"
"Excuse me, could you two please keep it down?" A woman sitting directly behind them had poked her head through the seats-a very, very bad move on her part.
"Shut up, you dim-witted fool!" Out of nowhere, a small hand struck the woman in the face, knocking her head against the seat to her right.
"Annabel! You can't hit people like that-"
"I can do whatever I damned well like! I'm a von Karma!"
"Don't say damn!" Gumshoe could feel what little self control of the enraged child that he had quickly slipping away.
"Damn damn damn! You want me to throw some other words in there?"
"Sir! Control that child of yours!" The flight attendant had now rushed over, and the entire first class cabin was looking at the two in shock.
"She's not my child, pal!"
"How dare you disown me, you buffoon!" Annabel jumped onto the detective's back-not an easy feat for someone so small. The girl now had him in a chokehold, causing him to start thrashing around. Small, tiny black dots were appearing in his vision as his oxygen supply started to dwindle.
"A-Annabel-!"
People were now trying to get the small, dangerous child off him.
"All…black…can't…feel…" Fear started to well up inside of him. He had expected violence, yes, but this situation completely threw him off. Dying wasn't very high up in his agenda. Finally, the vice like grip around his throat was released-just in time, too, considering that he almost passed out from lack of air. The detective fell to the ground, gasping. His surroundings came back to him slowly, and with gaps. It seemed that one minute, he was on the ground, face to face with the other passengers' feet, and the next he was up in his chair, a male flight attendant looking at him with worried eyes and asking him if he was ok. He nodded, trying to make sense of what had happened. Something seemed to be coming out of his mouth-words, maybe-but he couldn't understand what it was. They all gave him incomprehensible answers, overloading the small part of his brain that was working. Giving in to what he wanted to do since he woke up this morning, he slowly slid his eyes closed, ignoring the small part of his mind that kept telling him to find something…
March 20th, 7:38 PM
LAX Airport
First Class Cabin
"Sir? Sir?"
A low groan escaped Gumshoe's lips as he woke from his perfect nap to see a young man shaking his shoulder, trying to get him up. Surprisingly, he had slept the entire way through the rest of the flight from New York.
"Wha…?"
"Sir, the plane's landed in LA."
"LA…home. Finally…" He stretched out, stifling his yawn. He couldn't wait to get home and have some ramen.
"Glad to see you're doing alright after that crazy girl attacked you, sir."
"Crazy…girl?" The events of the flight rushed back to him mid stretch. "Oh, right. He's talking about when Annabel attacked and almost killed…"
"Oh my-WHERE'S ANNABEL?!"
"…Who? What?" Confusion was plastered on the stranger's face as he took a step back. Gumshoe was flailing around wildly, trying to find the child that had nearly killed him.
"The-the girl! The girl that was attacking me!"
"Oh…well, after we got her calmed down, she sat with some lady, who gave her cookies. After we landed, she rushed out as soon as she could, carrying her bag-"
Gumshoe never heard the end of the sentence, instead opting to rush out of the nearly empty cabin.
"If I don't come back with Annabel…I need to find her. Now." The consequences for not coming back to Franziska without Annabel would surely be worse than death. However, luck seemed to both love and curse him as a small foot reached out and tripped the detective as he exited the small hallway leading from the plane. For the fourth time today, he fell down to meet the generic airport carpet.
"Ugh…" He moaned in pain, attempting to get up. He was stopped by a sharp hit to the center of his back. Whatever hit him was accurate enough to strike a nerve, causing him to collapse in pain again.
"Argh! Ow!"
"That's what you get, idiot."
Time seemed to stop in its tracks.
"That voice…"
"Annabel? Is that you?"
"Good guess." Another hit fell on his back in acknowledgement at his answer. Positive acknowledgement, if he was lucky.
"Good. That's fantastic…" the detective clambered to his feet, looking down at the small girl. Unfortunately, he couldn't do that, because he was two very familiar looking boots that grabbed his attention. Following them up, it lead to the one face that he would've given his entire ramen collection to not see.
"M-Ms. von K-Karma…" Fear seized him. "Did I make it out before she got to Annabel? Oh god…I…oh no. Is she going to kill me? No, there's too many witnesses…"
"Fool." An amazingly strong hit from her whip struck him in the ribs, taking him out of his worried thoughts quickly. Apparently, he hadn't gotten out in time. Yet again, he fell down, this time landing on his right side. Annabel's evilly grinning face, Franziska's boots, and the random thought of how lucky he was to have some sort of long, leathery thing in his coat pocket to shield the full force of the whip blow drowned out all the other things in the busy airport.