714 Bridle Path Ch. 01

"Hello, everyone," Karen intoned, a charming smile in her voice. "And how are we all?"

"Kat, darling!" she heard Jenny gush from wherever she was. "So good to hear from you, lovey! How was it?"

"It went as predicted, I'll give you all the details once we've landed," replied the Blackwell matriarch. "How was your night out?"

"Oh, grand, I must say," Jenny answered, and now they heard water running and pattering. The countess was clearly in the shower. "I had a wonderful time!"

"And what about the rest of you?" Karen queried. "Was it a party for the ages?"

She got no immediate response; the air was just... dead.

"Well, don't everybody speak up all at once," she pressed. "How was your night out with the countess?"

"Ma'am?" they heard finally, and it was Ari speaking. "Pretty sure I can get away with saying this only because I'm Jewish, but... never again."

"Holla..." they heard someone say, possibly Andrea. "The geek's right, ma'am. Two grand was sooooo not enough."

Karen frowned slightly. "Miss Prospero?"

The voice on the other end of the line was somewhat hesitant, but also sounded strained. "I'm sorry, Mistress, but... to quote my nonno, preferirei passare un mese a Colobraro piuttosto che rifarlo."

Karen heard her younger sister snicker from the back seat and turned to look at her. Alexa's head popped up and she smirked. Karen spoke some of the Swiss-Italian dialect, because of her times in Lucerne, but Alexa was quite fluent, since she'd lived in Rome and Florence. "She said she'd rather spend a month in Colobraro than do that again, Kar."

Karen was still frowning. Her personal servant would rather spend a month in Italy's most cursed and haunted town than go out with Penrose again? "Penrose? What are they on about? What did you do to my staff?"

There was a laboured grunt before another answer came through. "It's not what she did to us, ma'am," Dave explained, sounding like speaking was downright painful. "It's what she got done to us."

"Which was..." Karen asked leadingly.

Another pause before the answer.

"World War Three..." Dave muttered.

Karen closed her eyes while Mike just shook his head. "Well, it's not like you lot didn't get handsomely paid to begin with, and your health benefits package is very comprehensive," she said finally. "You're covered for everything short of a necromancy ritual to bring you back from the dead. Will another two thousand dollars each set things to right?"

There was no response.

"Three thousand?" she pressed, but still got crickets.

"Don't worry about them, Kat, they're just out of shape and not used to celebrating so hard," Jenny called out, the sound of water splashing around her very audible. "I can take them out again tonight and they'll all be right as-"

A terrible cacophony started on the other end of the line, nearly a dozen people howling and protesting the countess' assertion, the noise quite unintelligible. Karen simply ended the call, and the sudden silence in the van's interior was almost deafening.

"Well, that was unexpected," Karen said, staring at the phone in the holster before looking at her husband. "Do you think we'll have to hire an entire new staff?"

"I sure hope not," Mike replied, turning on some music. "Good help is so hard to find these days..."

***

Don't forget to read the stinger after the Author's Notes, folks!

Author's Notes: Welcome to 714 Bridle Path, the series that deals with life, events, and goings-on from the perspective of the Blackwell Manor staff. I've always loved British shows like 'Upstairs, Downstairs', and the comedy 'Are You Being Served?', and this is sort of my take on those themes here in the Alexaverse. I think the staff all make for solid characters, and very enjoyable, so I'm sure this will be a fun and popular series.

My intent is to keep the Mighty Four in the background in this series, although by necessity they are in the foreground quite a bi this time around. They'll be interacted with and referenced constantly, but it will be from the staff's point of view. With all the things that are about to start happening in the Alexaverse, I'll be keeping them plenty busy.

And don't worry about Jenny, she's just fine, I promise you.

So some characters are the focus of the more sexual escapades right now (Val, of course, and Andrea, and Glenda), but I'm planning on working more of them in. Tunde got some this time around, courtesy of Andrea, and we've seen Trilby doing things to herself before. Other characters will require me to be more inventive, but I'll get there. In the meantime, they'll all be engaging and funny for you.

I figure if you're reading this series, it means you're invested in the Alexaverse, and not just looking for a stroker story. Sex is a part of their lives, certainly, but you want to hear about their lives, and live them with the staff members. They're important to me, and I'm assuming you too. Hopefully you'll develop a favourite, and it doesn't even have to be Val. A few people have told me they love Glenda, and Andrea is also popular.

Jordan will feature in this series as well as in Mike & Karen, not because he's an employee, but because he really is the spirit animal of Blackwell Manor, just like Val is the 'mascot' for the staff. I'm hoping everyone comes to see them as a big family, because I most certainly do. That's why Andrea destroying Val's crotch with an eight ball falls within the realm of funny and acceptable.

This is a very 'slice of life' series, because it runs alongside Mike & Karen, where all the main action is happening. This series will occasionally react to events there, but through the staff's lens mostly. Expect them to conclude a lot of chapters sitting around inside their new lounge, discussing the events and what they've learned from it.

It's as if 'Are You Being Served?' and 'South Park' had a baby.

As a spinoff series, this won't be incredibly long, but it runs alongside my other upcoming spinoffs, 'Lisa's Little Lesbian Life', 'Janet Remington, Your Honour', 'Colour Me Mona,', 'Freja & Jeanie', and 'The Intimate Memoirs of Lady Jenny Penrose'.

'But Mister Biscuit Hammer, haven't you bitten off more than you can chew?'

Let's hope not, shall we?

Ah well, best get back to it. Have a great new year, folks.

Keep your stick on the ice!

- Management

***

One day later...

Tatyana was somewhat perplexed as she came through the front doors, since nobody had greeted her. Things seemed quiet as she looked around while walking, looking for signs of life. She'd been told her employers, Jordan, and the countess had all gone into the city for some brunch function, but where was the staff?

She heard a tapping sound from a certain room and poked her head inside the security office.

"Ari?" she called, inducing a wince and a gasp from the person facing away from her in the chair. The chair swiveled slowly and the young cyber-guru was facing her, looking unusually stiff, and he had a black eye. His normally crisp hair was flopping around his temples.

"Hey..." he said in a laboured voice, raising his hand stiffly. "Glad you're back... 'scuse me... gotta... finish this test..."

With a quiet groan, the young man turned back to his security stations. Puzzled, Tatyana left him to it and began the long walk toward her own offices in the west wing of the main floor.

Walking down the Hall of Ancestors, she saw a small form. Valentina was leaning forward against the wall, her face buried in her forearm while she reached out to the side, feebly dusting at the bust of Harcourt Blackwell, occasionally even touching him with the duster. Tatyana could hear her moaning to herself. She was either wearing dark makeup, or she had a bruised cheek. The seneschal couldn't readily tell from this angle. She kept walking.

She heard voices in the kitchen and went to look. She paused in the doorway as she saw Theresa standing in front of Freja and Jeanie, both of whom were sitting on the big central island and letting her tend to them. Jeanie looked subdued and had something of a fat lip, while Freja looked like she'd gone through a hay-baler. Theresa, who didn't look so good herself, was applying some kind of ointment to the Danish girl's face, especially around her swollen, blackened eyes.

She went by the informal dining room, and saw Tunde, Andrea, and Marie all sitting around the table. For whatever reason, Glenda seemed to be asleep under it, still in her uniform. All four of them, especially Tunde and Andrea, looked like they'd gone twelve rounds with Wladimir Klitschko. Tunde could barely see out of his swollen eyes, and Andrea was almost the same colour as the Zulu man. None of them seemed to notice her, so she ducked back out and kept going.

She reached her office and unlocked it, going in to sit down. She still had no idea what was going on, and she was somewhat reticent to ask. She sat behind her desk, turning on her computer and opening her briefcase. She noticed the stack of papers that Jordan had left for her, no doubt a progress report about the staff over the past week in her absence.

She wasn't sure she wanted to know, at this rate.

There was a shuffling noise outside, along with a groan, and she noticed Dave go shambling by, his face various shades of purple, and he seemed to be wearing a neck brace.

She couldn't take it anymore and she called out to him once he'd passed from view. "David?"

There was a pause, and then more shuffling. Slowly, the landscaper's form appeared in her doorway, turning slowly to look at her. His black eyes matched Tunde's, and his nose was the shape and colour of a heritage tomato. He sounded like his sinus were stuff with cotton.

"Yeah?" he asked in a rough, breathy voice.

"So..." she began somewhat uncertainly. "Maybe I'll just ask. What happened?"

Dave seemed to almost sag, his eyes dull with despair. "The Countess went out partying."

He then turned and left, shuffling off on whatever mission he was performing, groaning the whole time.

Tatyana folded her hands on her desk, staring at the hallway beyond the door to her office, not knowing at all what kind of an answer that was. After several seconds, she sighed and began pulling up medical records and getting ready to make insurance claims for her staff members. She'd never filed so many all at once.

She hoped none of them chose to expire in the meantime. Good help was so hard to find these days, after all...

***