Penny #22
Title: “Places Not To Be”
Author/Artist: Scriptator
Fandom: Concarnadine (original)
Rating: Probably PG
Prompt:: #003 “Sticks and Stones”
Warnings: Involves violence
Disclaimer: Everyone in here is an Original Character. Please ask before borrowing.
Penny was partway back from Mark Lane when she noticed the man. She wouldn’t have, necessarily, except that he crossed the road when there was no need to, apart from dodging out of her line of sight. And he wasn’t dressed right - not improperly, but anomalously, for the City of London at ten in the morning on a business day: a sports jacket rather than a suit, and brothel-creeper shoes rather than polished brogues.
Then she saw the van - a Transit, but with a shaded windscreen, and the sliding door on the side. It looked ordinary, but then again, it looked too ordinary.
She turned into a narrower street, and at once the van turned to follow her, and she saw the sports jacket turn in after her, and start to jog towards her.
And then she was at the International Business Library, and could step inside and away from them. And, as she glanced back (with the sport-jacketed man ducking out of sight again), she was sure that she saw a sticker on the van’s side-window, of Imago Televisual.
She rang Max Levin to alert him, and then carried on with the research she had come to do. Then, when she had finished, she got ready to go. She was just going to try the side exit, into the covered corridor that ran between two merchant banks, when a cultured voice said “Can I be of assistance ?” and her arm was taken gently.
For a moment she felt the flames start to rise within her, but she pressed them down: this was neither the time nor the place, and they might be better employed later if no-one knew she had them.
The she recognised the voice as Elizabeth’s, albeit in a ‘posh’ accent. And, when she looked, this was definitely Eve Starr, with perfect hair, dressed in a severe business suit, and clutching an opera-house clutch-bag. Slightly overdone, but within the bounds of normality.
“We … well, all right, C and Urtu-Ab … heard you might need us.”
“I need to get back to the office,” Penny said. “I really don’t have time - “
“Three men, in a business van,” Urtu-Ab’s voice said in her head. “One has a camera, another has sound recording equipment. The third is some sort of technician. Their driver has gone for coffee but he can be back in a few seconds. They also have a confederate across the street. He intends to ‘doorstep’ you - does that mean anything ?”
Penny shivered, but Elizabeth touched her comfortingly.
“We won’t allow it.” She looked round. “Unfortunately this is far too public a place to use magic - we will need to - “
There was a tearing sound, and then suddenly there was another figure, stepping through a wall, dressed in an overall, like a workman.
“You must come with me !” he said, and he reached out toward Penny as if planning on pulling her to his side.
“Wait !” Elizabeth said, and reach out to stop him.
Penny watched as, almost as if in slow motion, the scene unfolded. She saw Elizabeth’s hand reach to the overalled man; she saw him turn aside to avoid Elizabeth and at the same time she saw him raise his clenched fist. A nimbus of swirling misty-grey was already coalescing around the fist as she threw herself forward, trying to interpose her body. The light swelled and formed itself into a bolt and Penny saw the bolt begin to travel. She felt as though her body was hanging in thin air and then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Elizabeth outlined in a silvery glow. Then the bolt of greyness hit her and she knew no more.
This was, Penny Mortenson decided, getting all too common, being knocked unconscious. She remembered a friend at university who had made much of a fictional character who was knocked out “at least once an adventure. But, then, he had a skull like a rhinocerous.” Her friend, Paul, had suggested that the character, a Colonel Mayfair, would have suffered cerebral trauma and brain damage had he suffered even one half the injuries suggested, and Penny had, seriously, to wonder whether she was not herself at risk.
Coming to this time, though, instead of calm and quiet, she appeared to be in the middle of a vaudeville ruckus, with voices raised all around her, and various people, only some of whom she recognised, standing over her and paying her little, if any, attention.
She tried to call out, for assistance, but the words died in her throat, as she saw that one of the people was carrying a microphone and seemed to be trying to conduct, amid the general hubbub, an interview with one of the Library’s staff. In and among, she heard the name “Mclvennie”, and knew that these were questions she didn’t want to have to answer.
Then she saw Elizabeth, folded down, by a wall, eyes wide. She crawled over to her.
“Are you all right ?”
“We need not to be here,” Elizabeth whispered in reply. “Things are going … wrong.”
“Can’t you do what ever you did to get here ?“ Penny asked.
Elizabeth shook her head: “You aren’t there for me to focus on,” she said, in explanation.
“Then we’ll have to run for it,” Penny decided. “Which, with my head aching the way it is, could be an issue. By the way, what happened to the other fellow ?””
Elizabeth looked abstracted for a second or two, and then said “I think he went the way he came. My shield protected me, and I don’t think he meant to hit you with whatever it was.”
“Hold my hand,” she said.
Gingerly, Penny reached out, and felt a slight tingle as they touched hands. Then the world around her went misty and Elizabeth steered her through the Library, deftly avoiding people, to the front doors. As they got there, Penny felt a wave of fatigue sweep over her. She sagged, and in that moment, the mist around them faded, people cried out and Elizabeth tugged her through the doors and onto the street.
“Where should we go now ?” she asked.
Absent of a better idea, Penny led the way, at something between a run and a stagger, towards Adrian LeGrange’s offices.
Somehow, they got there without being stopped, and as soon as they were inside Penny was telling Maisie McLennan that they weren’t to be disturbed, and heading for the far end of the research carrels.
Max Levin was there within a minute and Adrian fast on his shoulder.
“What’s happened ? Are you all right ? Who is this ?”
“Adrian, you remember a Rayner Mortimer ? He sends his best wishes and this is a friend of his. Mr. Levin, the pressmen tried to get hold of me as I left the Library - I think it’s something to do with Mclvennie. There was a commotion, and Elizabeth - “ she indicated her friend “ - and I ran for it.”
“No-one will get to you here - “ Adrian LeGrange was saying, but Penny held up a hand: “You may want to contact the police - an Inspector Barratt - he knows something about Mclvennie, and he has contacts here in the City who can smooth things over.” She breathed out: “And now, I need tea - strong tea.”
She was halfway through her second cup of satanically black tea (and starting to wonder what it might be doing to her stomach, even while it buoyed up her spirits) when her PDA buzzed, to show a message.
“WHERE ARE YOU ? ARE YOU BOTH SAFE ? I CAN ARRANGE TO BRING YOU HERE AS SOON AS YOU SAY.”
Penny considered: she was almost sure that Adrian and Concarnadine would get on, but their first meeting would need to be a neutral one, rather than in the middle of a crisis.
She got up: “Would you excuse me ?” she said: “This needs attention,” and waved the PDA.
She found another empty carrel and dialled the call return number.
“Mr. Concarnadine,” she said, when the call was answered; “We are both fine and you don’t need to rescue us. Elizabeth and I make our own way back, either to the theatre or to Chelsea, as soon as all’s clear.”
“What happened ? Urtu-Ab alerted us and I sent Elizabeth to your location, but there was another energy, one that I didn’t recognise.”
”There was someone else who appeared out of nowhere - he tried to attack Elizabeth and I got in the way.”
“You should come back to Chelsea, then,” Concarnadine said: “I can do more for you here.”
“Fine,” Penny replied: “I will get us back there.”
She went back to Elizabeth: Adrian had gone off to get on with things and left Max Levin to look after Penny.
“You’re all right ?” was his prime concern. “If I could get my hands on Mister Mcivinnie … “
“I’m not sure,” Penny said: “my head still aches. And,” she went on, “there are still the television people - I can’t promise that that they won’t come here. So, I think it best if my friend and I go, as quickly as possible.”
Max Levin nodded: “I know Adrian would want you where he could see you, but I can see the value of being able to say that you are not in the building and that we don’t know your whereabouts.”
Penny nodded in return. “Tell Adrian,” she said, “that I will be in touch as soon as I know that it’s safe. We’ll use the back door to go out, if you would make some sort of diversion at the front, in case anyone is watching.”
“Pen !”
Adrian, and Eleanor Copressley.
“Pen : if you - or your friend -- will be seeing Rayner Mortimer in the next few days, will you tell him Shaghai Pari-Mutuel, please ? And your Inspector Barratt has been quite forthcoming. Eleanor here will co-ordinate things between him and Georgia Bathanna. And we’re pretty sure there’s no-one watching the building at the moment, so if you needed, as it were, a window … “
“Thank you,” Penny said, trying to keep her voice calm. “We ought to be going - this was just the best place we could come to when things went pear-shaped.”
“What exactly happened ?” Penny asked Elizabeth, once they were safely on the Underground.
“Urtu-Ab could tell you were in panic, and Concarnadine opened a gateway for me to get to you.”
“And at the Library ?”
“You mean, when we walked out ?”
Penny nodded.
“I drew on power, and I made a bubble round us, that bent the light, so that people couldn’t see us.”
“But I could see them,” Penny said.
Elizabeth smiled; “Invisibility isn’t much use if it makes you blind. If I could, I’d teach you the technique - it’s priceless in the act, and I’m sure you could find a use … but you can’t, so … ”
Author/Artist: Scriptator
Fandom: Concarnadine (original)
Rating: Probably PG
Prompt:: #003 “Sticks and Stones”
Warnings: Involves violence
Disclaimer: Everyone in here is an Original Character. Please ask before borrowing.
Penny was partway back from Mark Lane when she noticed the man. She wouldn’t have, necessarily, except that he crossed the road when there was no need to, apart from dodging out of her line of sight. And he wasn’t dressed right - not improperly, but anomalously, for the City of London at ten in the morning on a business day: a sports jacket rather than a suit, and brothel-creeper shoes rather than polished brogues.
Then she saw the van - a Transit, but with a shaded windscreen, and the sliding door on the side. It looked ordinary, but then again, it looked too ordinary.
She turned into a narrower street, and at once the van turned to follow her, and she saw the sports jacket turn in after her, and start to jog towards her.
And then she was at the International Business Library, and could step inside and away from them. And, as she glanced back (with the sport-jacketed man ducking out of sight again), she was sure that she saw a sticker on the van’s side-window, of Imago Televisual.
She rang Max Levin to alert him, and then carried on with the research she had come to do. Then, when she had finished, she got ready to go. She was just going to try the side exit, into the covered corridor that ran between two merchant banks, when a cultured voice said “Can I be of assistance ?” and her arm was taken gently.
For a moment she felt the flames start to rise within her, but she pressed them down: this was neither the time nor the place, and they might be better employed later if no-one knew she had them.
The she recognised the voice as Elizabeth’s, albeit in a ‘posh’ accent. And, when she looked, this was definitely Eve Starr, with perfect hair, dressed in a severe business suit, and clutching an opera-house clutch-bag. Slightly overdone, but within the bounds of normality.
“We … well, all right, C and Urtu-Ab … heard you might need us.”
“I need to get back to the office,” Penny said. “I really don’t have time - “
“Three men, in a business van,” Urtu-Ab’s voice said in her head. “One has a camera, another has sound recording equipment. The third is some sort of technician. Their driver has gone for coffee but he can be back in a few seconds. They also have a confederate across the street. He intends to ‘doorstep’ you - does that mean anything ?”
Penny shivered, but Elizabeth touched her comfortingly.
“We won’t allow it.” She looked round. “Unfortunately this is far too public a place to use magic - we will need to - “
There was a tearing sound, and then suddenly there was another figure, stepping through a wall, dressed in an overall, like a workman.
“You must come with me !” he said, and he reached out toward Penny as if planning on pulling her to his side.
“Wait !” Elizabeth said, and reach out to stop him.
Penny watched as, almost as if in slow motion, the scene unfolded. She saw Elizabeth’s hand reach to the overalled man; she saw him turn aside to avoid Elizabeth and at the same time she saw him raise his clenched fist. A nimbus of swirling misty-grey was already coalescing around the fist as she threw herself forward, trying to interpose her body. The light swelled and formed itself into a bolt and Penny saw the bolt begin to travel. She felt as though her body was hanging in thin air and then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Elizabeth outlined in a silvery glow. Then the bolt of greyness hit her and she knew no more.
This was, Penny Mortenson decided, getting all too common, being knocked unconscious. She remembered a friend at university who had made much of a fictional character who was knocked out “at least once an adventure. But, then, he had a skull like a rhinocerous.” Her friend, Paul, had suggested that the character, a Colonel Mayfair, would have suffered cerebral trauma and brain damage had he suffered even one half the injuries suggested, and Penny had, seriously, to wonder whether she was not herself at risk.
Coming to this time, though, instead of calm and quiet, she appeared to be in the middle of a vaudeville ruckus, with voices raised all around her, and various people, only some of whom she recognised, standing over her and paying her little, if any, attention.
She tried to call out, for assistance, but the words died in her throat, as she saw that one of the people was carrying a microphone and seemed to be trying to conduct, amid the general hubbub, an interview with one of the Library’s staff. In and among, she heard the name “Mclvennie”, and knew that these were questions she didn’t want to have to answer.
Then she saw Elizabeth, folded down, by a wall, eyes wide. She crawled over to her.
“Are you all right ?”
“We need not to be here,” Elizabeth whispered in reply. “Things are going … wrong.”
“Can’t you do what ever you did to get here ?“ Penny asked.
Elizabeth shook her head: “You aren’t there for me to focus on,” she said, in explanation.
“Then we’ll have to run for it,” Penny decided. “Which, with my head aching the way it is, could be an issue. By the way, what happened to the other fellow ?””
Elizabeth looked abstracted for a second or two, and then said “I think he went the way he came. My shield protected me, and I don’t think he meant to hit you with whatever it was.”
“Hold my hand,” she said.
Gingerly, Penny reached out, and felt a slight tingle as they touched hands. Then the world around her went misty and Elizabeth steered her through the Library, deftly avoiding people, to the front doors. As they got there, Penny felt a wave of fatigue sweep over her. She sagged, and in that moment, the mist around them faded, people cried out and Elizabeth tugged her through the doors and onto the street.
“Where should we go now ?” she asked.
Absent of a better idea, Penny led the way, at something between a run and a stagger, towards Adrian LeGrange’s offices.
Somehow, they got there without being stopped, and as soon as they were inside Penny was telling Maisie McLennan that they weren’t to be disturbed, and heading for the far end of the research carrels.
Max Levin was there within a minute and Adrian fast on his shoulder.
“What’s happened ? Are you all right ? Who is this ?”
“Adrian, you remember a Rayner Mortimer ? He sends his best wishes and this is a friend of his. Mr. Levin, the pressmen tried to get hold of me as I left the Library - I think it’s something to do with Mclvennie. There was a commotion, and Elizabeth - “ she indicated her friend “ - and I ran for it.”
“No-one will get to you here - “ Adrian LeGrange was saying, but Penny held up a hand: “You may want to contact the police - an Inspector Barratt - he knows something about Mclvennie, and he has contacts here in the City who can smooth things over.” She breathed out: “And now, I need tea - strong tea.”
She was halfway through her second cup of satanically black tea (and starting to wonder what it might be doing to her stomach, even while it buoyed up her spirits) when her PDA buzzed, to show a message.
“WHERE ARE YOU ? ARE YOU BOTH SAFE ? I CAN ARRANGE TO BRING YOU HERE AS SOON AS YOU SAY.”
Penny considered: she was almost sure that Adrian and Concarnadine would get on, but their first meeting would need to be a neutral one, rather than in the middle of a crisis.
She got up: “Would you excuse me ?” she said: “This needs attention,” and waved the PDA.
She found another empty carrel and dialled the call return number.
“Mr. Concarnadine,” she said, when the call was answered; “We are both fine and you don’t need to rescue us. Elizabeth and I make our own way back, either to the theatre or to Chelsea, as soon as all’s clear.”
“What happened ? Urtu-Ab alerted us and I sent Elizabeth to your location, but there was another energy, one that I didn’t recognise.”
”There was someone else who appeared out of nowhere - he tried to attack Elizabeth and I got in the way.”
“You should come back to Chelsea, then,” Concarnadine said: “I can do more for you here.”
“Fine,” Penny replied: “I will get us back there.”
She went back to Elizabeth: Adrian had gone off to get on with things and left Max Levin to look after Penny.
“You’re all right ?” was his prime concern. “If I could get my hands on Mister Mcivinnie … “
“I’m not sure,” Penny said: “my head still aches. And,” she went on, “there are still the television people - I can’t promise that that they won’t come here. So, I think it best if my friend and I go, as quickly as possible.”
Max Levin nodded: “I know Adrian would want you where he could see you, but I can see the value of being able to say that you are not in the building and that we don’t know your whereabouts.”
Penny nodded in return. “Tell Adrian,” she said, “that I will be in touch as soon as I know that it’s safe. We’ll use the back door to go out, if you would make some sort of diversion at the front, in case anyone is watching.”
“Pen !”
Adrian, and Eleanor Copressley.
“Pen : if you - or your friend -- will be seeing Rayner Mortimer in the next few days, will you tell him Shaghai Pari-Mutuel, please ? And your Inspector Barratt has been quite forthcoming. Eleanor here will co-ordinate things between him and Georgia Bathanna. And we’re pretty sure there’s no-one watching the building at the moment, so if you needed, as it were, a window … “
“Thank you,” Penny said, trying to keep her voice calm. “We ought to be going - this was just the best place we could come to when things went pear-shaped.”
“What exactly happened ?” Penny asked Elizabeth, once they were safely on the Underground.
“Urtu-Ab could tell you were in panic, and Concarnadine opened a gateway for me to get to you.”
“And at the Library ?”
“You mean, when we walked out ?”
Penny nodded.
“I drew on power, and I made a bubble round us, that bent the light, so that people couldn’t see us.”
“But I could see them,” Penny said.
Elizabeth smiled; “Invisibility isn’t much use if it makes you blind. If I could, I’d teach you the technique - it’s priceless in the act, and I’m sure you could find a use … but you can’t, so … ”