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Post by Jenny on Nov 25, 2006 14:27:42 GMT -5
Running shoes. Actually, tonight she wouldn't need to do much running-- or any burying dead bodies, or any lying or any scheming tonight. All she had to do was sit in the passenger seat, look important, and help him out with Kit.
He climbed into the drivers seat, starting the engine. 'We have another passenger to pick up.'
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Post by Hanna Squalor on Nov 25, 2006 22:09:49 GMT -5
"We what?" she asked staring blankly. Then someone in the back seat said Beatrice's name. She turned to see a mess that was Kit. She watched her eyes move around her new hair style. Esme turned back around. "Olaf?"
"What?" he asked.
"You never really did say anything about my hair. Do you hate it?..." no response "Tell me honestly." Esme urged.
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Post by Jenny on Nov 26, 2006 9:37:07 GMT -5
'It doesn't suit you. You don't look like you. But I suppose black is slightly more acceptable in this line of work than blonde angel curls were.' he said bluntly, looking back at Kit and narrowly avoiding a lamp post.
At her silence, he elaborated. 'You don't resemble Beatrice, though. Kit's just... asleep, and with all the...water...in her eyes,can't see properly. You look like one of us now,' which 'us' he was reffering to-- Olaf and his assistants, he and Kit or something else-- Esmé couldn't be fully sure.
'I just wonder if that was what you were going for.'
He changed his tone before she could make any comment. 'Kit? Wipe the... stuff... out of your eyes, sit up and concentrate. We have a lot to discuss. And you'll have to fix your hair before I'll be able to seriously talk to you without bursting into hysterical laughter.'
After a few slow movements from the backseat, Kit muttered something and glanced at Esmé again, as if she couldn't believe what she was seeing.
Olaf stopped the car beside one large plot of land-- covered in ash and dust, sitting lonesome in the middle of the city with no construction under way to repair it-- and looked back at Kit Snicket, and the new Esmé that sat beside him.
'You both have a decision to make. Take a flashlight,' he said, motioning to the few he'd placed beside Kit on the backseat. 'And follow me.'
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Post by Hanna Squalor on Nov 26, 2006 9:50:03 GMT -5
Esme was laughing out loud. More acceptable in this line of work... Wonder if that's what you were going for... As Olaf told Kit to fix her hair and made a joke about it, she abruptly stopped laughing.
She grabbed the flash light from O, and got out of the car. As the rain hit them once again she noticed that Olaf was looking at her as if he had an immense wish for the colour to start leaking out of her hair.
"Where the hell are we going?" Esme asked over the rain.
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Post by Jenny on Nov 26, 2006 10:00:55 GMT -5
Who are you?
Olaf looked away and into the ashes with his flashlight- an expert at hiding his feelings. Truthfully, Esmé shouldn't ever have been in 'this line of work'. A sweet little girl-- she could have done much more than this.
Time for thinking about that later.
'We're looking,' he said. 'It would help if it stopped raining. We're looking for important objects. Do either of you know where you are?'
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Post by Hanna Squalor on Nov 26, 2006 10:11:49 GMT -5
Esme looked around. "R's house?" she asked. It was the most recent fire, but not for long. It was never long. Esme looked around trudging through wet ashes wasn't the most fun evening activity.
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Post by Jenny on Nov 26, 2006 10:28:04 GMT -5
'Not quite,' he said, grabbing Kit to stop her falling over her own dress. 'But it resembles it. R's house is nearby as well. This is one of my parents old houses. I was a boy when this burnt to the ground. It's unsettling to think the council just let it lie here like this.'
Silence followed his words. Nobody stopped walking.
'The purpose of this sweet little evening walk I'm taking you two out on,' he continued. 'Isn't to show you how unlucky I am, or how many houses my parents bought before they.... tonight, or how much I regret being born into an already existing war that I can't escape from. You both know those things already, I should hope. I hoped you'd both see-- both knowing me so well-- that perhaps I'm not the criminal.'
'And Kit, you can go back to HQ if you wish to. I'm not keeping you. Just remember that The World is never quiet. No matter which side of the schism you choose.'
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Post by Hanna Squalor on Nov 26, 2006 10:38:56 GMT -5
"I don't think you're a criminal, Olaf." Esme said examining the remains of a painting that seemed to have survived. That was odd. Normally the remains of a fire didn't include paintings, the paints were flammable. Esme pulled on the frame and to her surprise it opened, revealing a tunnel of some sort. It went down. She had heard of these tunnels during her V.F.D training. "Olaf!" she called him over. Shining her flash light down the hole she didn't see anything.
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Post by Jenny on Nov 26, 2006 10:52:21 GMT -5
'I never memorized he tunnel systems,' he said, not in the least bit surprised. 'And I actually have no idea where that leads. I can only guarantee that it wont go to a select few places-- like a certain herpetologists house, for example, or to the Baudelaire mansion.'
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Post by Hanna Squalor on Nov 26, 2006 11:04:56 GMT -5
Her flash light reflected off something shiny. "Did you see that?" she asked. She reached for it, but it was out of her reach. Her feet slid on the wet ashes and she fell forward. His hand grabbed the back of her sweater and pulled her back up. she found herself in his arms for a few moments before she was released.
She felt like an idiot, blushing, or so it felt like. She was acting like she had a crush on him again, like before they started dating.Olaf gave her a weird look.
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Post by Jenny on Nov 26, 2006 11:23:07 GMT -5
'I didn't see anything,' he said, looking at her strangely. She was blushing, and smiling dazedly as if she was fourteen and desperately in love with him. He kept walking.
The other sets of footsteps stopped.
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Post by Hanna Squalor on Nov 26, 2006 11:41:17 GMT -5
(I placed Esme at about 16 during this one..it's supposed to be early...that would place Olaf at like 31 by my age system.)
Esme saw another sparkle reflect off her flash light and this time she knew she saw it. Kit did too. Esme was on her hands and knees digging through ash. That's when she found it. It was a large Sapphire. "Olaf, I've found something." the Quagmire fortune was in sapphires large ones like this. "Is this where the Quagmire fortune was lost?" Esme asked.
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Post by Jenny on Nov 26, 2006 11:52:29 GMT -5
(I can see how that works. I didn't expect her to be any older than that.)
He smiled, taking the sapphire off her and examining it with his flashlight. She was certainly half-redeeming herself tonight.
'Remember the sapphires, Kit?' he said, throwing it into a bag. 'Perhaps not.'
He addressed the other girl-- the darker one. 'Keep looking. There's something I want you to find.'
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Post by Hanna Squalor on Nov 26, 2006 12:02:55 GMT -5
"That means there's a another in that passage behind the painting. That's what I saw down the tunnel." Esme figured.
She turned toward the opening. "Sweetie hold my feet." she instructed as she reached down the hole. Olaf's hand held onto her ankles and she reached for the large rock. It was heavy. She put it in her pocket. "Okay pull me up." Esme hollered up to him.
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Post by Jenny on Nov 26, 2006 12:18:17 GMT -5
He pulled her back up-- wondering where the 'sweetie' had come from.
He took a look down the tunnel after she was standing beside him.
'I've always fancied knowing what's down there,' he mused. He recieved a warning look from Kit. 'Well, unless you know, I don't see how either of could could be against it. I'll go first,' he offered.
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