Modus Morte: Chapter 12
“You made sure the inner doors were locked, right?” Jasper said as she shook the main door to the Minutemen building.
“Yes I did. Now wait for me.” Reaper said sternly. Jasper hated it when he treated her like a child. The way he acted it was as if she were a two year old in need of constant supervision. Jasper sighed and turned away from the doors to lean on a parking meter near her. Running around J Street was the first thing she was told not to do with her being incapacitated. But as bored as she was cooped up inside, Jasper couldn’t help it.
She found a loophole quickly enough, though. She got Takeo to promise that he would meet her and accompany her out today. Jasper was going to have to enjoy the few minutes of peace that she had without Reaper griping, because as soon as the other man arrived, they would be at it all day.
Someone’s going to have to teach Reaper some tact. She thought as she began to scan the street around her. She had never been afraid of J Street even though she was in an area that most considered a bad neighborhood. But now with a constant reminder from Reaper about all those people she put in jail at one time or another she had to be even more careful. Before her injuries she had been observant, because she was always looking to be a hero, now she was being observant to keep herself from receiving further injury. Jasper hated being like this. She knew she would be thrilled when the cast came off, but she knew she was going to miss Takeo a bit. Where did that come from? She wondered before shaking the thought away.
That was when she noticed a familiar looking teen on the street. He was walking towards her alone, but she had the feeling that he was not truly alone. Jasper turned her head slightly as she adjusted her stance and saw a gang of teenagers in the other direction. That’s when she remembered who they were. They were a gang that tried to claim the building as their home while the Minutemen were away. The group had been easily taken care of, but necessitated a caretaker for the building all the same. She had dealt with them easily before, but that had been when she wasn’t injured and had several broken ribs to nurse.
Reaper wrapped himself between her legs to let her know he was there. “They’re not very happy looking.” He mumbled
“No, actually I would say that they’re a bit too happy looking.” She replied before attempting to cross the street. “Too happy to see me out and vulnerable looking.” This was an exercise in futility. Jasper knew she couldn’t move as fast as she wanted. And the morning traffic was horrendous. She hadn’t managed to move more than a few feet by the time the two groups converged on her.
“Well, hello.” The first boy she saw said. Jasper figured he was the obvious leader of the group. “How’s the leg?”
“Just fine, thanks.” She replied as she watched Reaper dash off. “See your breath is still the same.”
“Not so fast now, are you.” He whispered closely in her ear as he put a hand on her arm.
“That’s only my leg.” She smiled pleasantly before grabbing his hand and flipping him into the crowd of his comrades. Normally Jasper would have walked away and not thought twice about her actions, but that was when she could walk away. Yet again she remembered the full leg cast and broken ribs as she tried to move away from the group. Broken bones did not make that easy.
“It’s not wise for a little girl to throw people around when they can’t run away.” One of the other teens said as he reached for Jasper.
She refused to react to their taunting even though this could turn out bad. “Oh did I? Sorry, I thought that was just the trash.” Of course her mouth didn’t always cooperate with her brain. She swung an elbow that connected, but not as hard as she wished.
“I guess we get to do this the hard way.” He said tightening his hold on her. This made her side hurt as the injured ribs protested against the pressure. “Stupid little girl.”
“She is probably twice your age, little boy.” She heard a familiar voice say. Jasper didn’t sigh with relief, but she was feeling it, as she allowed a small smile creep over her face. There Takeo stood with Reaper at his feet. Takeo was looking at the gang with a smile that Jasper noticed didn’t reach his eyes, and anyone who had been around him any time at all would know that look did not bode well for them. Jasper paused in surprise as she felt she couldn’t tear her eyes away.
She completely missed the look of fright in some of the other boy’s eyes, and definitely couldn’t see the reaction of the one that was holding onto her. When two of the teens started a mad dash to get away, and one started to pee his pants Jasper knew that they had run into Takeo before. The one that was holding onto her still hadn’t let go even after Takeo put a hand on the hilt of his sword. The other boys started running to join their friends in the bushes and even the leader, who now had thoroughly soaked his pants made a break for it.
“You don’t scare me!” The boy holding her blurted out.
Takeo smiled again, now focused on the boy holding Jasper from behind. “I should.”
“You might want to let go.” Jasper said to the one holding onto her. He didn’t say a word but stepped away from her. That’s when Jasper noticed a puddle forming at his feet. He too, had just pissed in his pants. “Run.” She told him quietly as if he needed to be reminded at what to do, and he apparently did because he began running away whimpering as if he had been burned.
“I see they’ve met you before.” Jasper smiled looking in the direction the gang left. “I won’t ask, but, thank you.” She then said quietly. She stopped smiling when she saw the expression on his face. He was still looking in the direction that the gang had run off to, but he was no longer smiling. To anyone else he would have looked frightening.
“You should have waited inside for me, Jasper-san.” He said quietly after he dropped his hand away from the sword. “I cannot fulfill my obligation to you, if you do not let me.”
Jasper didn’t know what to say, or what it was about that statement that made her heart drop inside her chest. She however covered for anything she was feeling inside with her general good attitude smile and said. “Sorry. I got ahead of myself there.” If she had been looking at herself she would have realized that Takeo would not have taken that smile seriously as she hoped because it, like most of his smiles, didn’t reach the eyes.
“Are you ready to go?” He asked, holding out a hand for her.
“Yes.” She nodded as he led her to his motorcycle. Reaper jumped into her lap and was unusually silent as he stared at her hard.
“Where are we going?” Takeo asked in his usual manner as he got on the bike himself.
“The bookstore!” She replied happily. “I need something new to read. Maybe it will help keep me inside.”
“Somehow, I highly doubt that.” Takeo grinned as he started the bike.
Modus Morte: Chapter 13
Jayna left the animator's office feeling slightly better, although not altogether happy, about the situation back home. Ms. Blake had given her some ideas as to what she could use to track the problem to its source, but she was adamant that she would not leave her home dimension to assist them. Although she was fairly certain that the other woman didn't think she was insane for making the suggestion, she couldn't convince her to make the crossing with her at any price.
She returned to her hotel, packed her bags, paid her bill, and found a bookstore/coffee shop not far from her transit point in which to kill a few hours before returning to J Street. It afforded her some time to decide where to try to track down the items she thought they might need to follow the zombies to their animator, and also to be sure that she would be returning home well after dark on the street, as it would give her the opportunity to discretely observe whether or not anyone was ‘casing’ her shop.
She scoured the periodical racks and purchased a couple of bizarre skin art magazines that she was sure would scandalize Ciela and make Michael laugh, then went to buy herself a cup of coffee, which turned out to be an adventure in itself. She had no idea that it could be so difficult to obtain a single extra-large cup of plain, black coffee. After assuring the attendant several times that she did not want any mocha-double-crappa-whatsits, and that the sign over his head did say coffee in large, green, neon letters she managed to walk away with what she wanted, after paying what she was certain was several times what she should have.
The coffee was at least hot, if not that impressive a brew, and the magazines were interesting in a car-wreck sort of way. They kept her occupied until it was time for her to be off. She dropped them into one of her bags before braving the late-afternoon heat. The parking garage was quite busy with what she assumed to be commuter traffic, so it was easy for her to step unnoticed into the access way that led to the portal and slip back onto J Street and into a chilly, foggy drizzle. The sudden change in temperature forced her into the closest bar she could find to change into her night gear, much warmer and better for skulking about unnoticed.
Jayna ducked into the ladies room and changed quickly, then left the bar to find a precog cab waiting for her outside. She told the cabbie to drop her off four blocks from her shop, going the rest of the way on foot in a spiral pattern. Thankfully she saw no one suspicious in the area. She went up the back stairs and entered her home through the kitchen and made herself a pot of tea before going down to the basement.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
The morning was one of those semi-enthusiastic twilights that come with a heavy fog. The emaciated young man sat on the children's merry-go-round, head down with his feet dangling in the deeply rutted sand. It was early enough that there were no children present, the park's only visitors being himself and a few drunks sleeping it off. He drank in the utter stillness until it was disturbed by the heavy footfalls of someone cutting across the grass, coming in his direction. The steps grew slower as they approached until they finally stopped, the toes of the black, thick-soled boots just inside his range of vision.
"You sleeping it off, or waiting for the next party?" the intruder asked. When no response was forthcoming he gave the young man a shove, who then stood and raised his head to look at the intruder, in a motion reminiscent of a snake uncoiling before a strike. "Damn, Faust! Where the hell have you been?"
There was no look of recognition in the young man's eyes, but he began to smile as the other threw his arms around him in an embrace and he began to softly chant an incantation. Lines began to form on the other's skin as though he was rapidly aging and he pushed himself away from the embrace, staggering a few steps backwards, opening his mouth as if to scream, but no sound was forthcoming. Faust continued to chant and the other began to shrivel as muscle tissue shrank, bodily fluids dried, and processes that should have taken years to occur transpired in mere moments. Even the other's clothing was affected until what had been a robust young man, a few moments before appeared to be nothing more than just another J Street zombie, which wandered off across the park. Faust, now thoroughly refreshed, headed for home.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
"Morning!" Ciela was her usual, cheerful, sickening, morning self. "What time did you get in?"
"Late, or early depending on how you choose to look at it." Jayna said with a smile. "How do you want your eggs this morning?"
"Surprise me." Ciela sat at the kitchen table and poured herself a large glass of orange juice. "You must have had some luck. You seem less tense than when I saw you last."
"Maybe, we'll see." Jayna placed a good-sized omelette in front of her friend. "Are you going to be free this afternoon? I'm going to try to get everyone involved together for a meeting at Jasper's to discuss what I learned and I'd like to only have to tell it once and get everyone's input at the same time."
"For this, I'll be free..." Ciela poked at her omelette a bit before taking a bite. “The JSPD had me out on another zombie call early this morning. They put it on ice and want you to take a look at it. Something about energy patterns and if you had any questions call them.” Az took another bite, and Jayna wondered how the girl could eat given their current topic of conversation. “What are they talking about? Is there a reason they wanted it in one piece?”
“Yeah.” She nodded. “I called them when I got in; there are a couple of things I want to check out.”
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
After spending the better part of the morning either on the phone, or in her basement Jayna had gathered what she could of the items she thought they might need and had arranged a time for Torres to meet with them at the Minutemen base.
The trip to the morgue had taken little time but confirmed what she already knew, or rather, what she thought she knew. She was surprisingly relieved, at least for Jasper’s sake.
Takeo and Reaper met her at the door, the cat obviously still not trusting the young-looking man any further than he could throw him. He paced around them as the pair made their way to where the group sat gathered around, Ciela and Torres chatting like old school chums, Jasper laughing at the proper moments. Not a likely group to go zombie hunting - or necromancer hunting, in this case.
“I bet you two were glad to get away, even for a couple of minutes.”
“No kidding.” The black cat growled out. “I expected them to go change into pajamas and start putting on make-up at any moment.”
“I thought that you were glad to see Miss Jasper laughing, Reaper?” Takeo looked at the cat oddly.
“Yeah well, even so I can only handle so much girly stuff." Reaper was making excuses.
"So what do you want her laughing over? Fart jokes and beer cans?"
Jayna couldn’t make out what Reaper said in reply, but Takeo was smiling awfully big.
"What's up?" Jasper asked when she saw that the three of them had come in.
"You should be asking what's down instead." Jayna said as she sat next to them.
Jasper looked at both Reaper and Takeo who both tired to give her an innocent look. Reaper was not succeeding at his. "The male ego." Jasper guessed. When Takeo cracked a smile Jasper added. "Or is it just Reaper's ego?"
“Got it in two.” Jayna smiled. “You should sell tickets, the way those two go at it, you’d make a fortune.”
Takeo sighed, sat down and tried not to look like he was being held hostage. “Shall we get down to business, please? I would really like to get this over with.”
Jayna noted how Jasper’s face fell but filed it away for future reference and said nothing. Takeo had a point; there were some serious matters that needed to be dealt with.
Modus Morte: Chapter 14
“So, I want to go over this with all of you, but do me a favor and wait until I’m done to ask any questions, ok?” Jayna stood up and crossed the room to stand in front of the gathering. She took a deep breath and decided what to explain first. No one in the room knew all that much about zombies, or necromancy, which unfortunately made her the resident expert.
“Ok, first order of business - Jasper, you are not to blame for the current zombie problem. It’s possible that your accident…” She avoided any details on that subject, that discussion would come later, “…might have aggravated an already existing situation. There is no way that your spell is the root cause of the problem.”
Jasper looked around the room at her, then Takeo and Torres. She was visibly relieved, and even Reaper seemed to have been holding his breath. “That’s good to know.”
“Second, I took a good look at the remains of the zombie Ciela stopped this morning. It just confirmed the information I got from my trip off-street. The power signature is completely different from any I have encountered before. Even if Jasper did accidentally help resurrect the zombies from Saint Heathenry’s Flowering Child’s graveyard, the one from last night shows no traces of her power. So there is someone out there, most likely a necromancer, actively bringing the dead back.”
“And now they’re adding to the dead at an alarming rate.” Torres added. “We couldn’t be certain until now…”
Several sets of eyes turned to stare at the Detective. Jayna sighed. Her chances of getting through this uninterrupted were just blown all to hell.
“The guy from last night…” She pulled a folder out from under her jacket, next to her on the oversized chair. “George Alton, a.k.a. Romanov. He was reported missing by his boyfriend three days ago. The PD did some digging, but he was big into a couple of underground scenes that keep to themselves, so it was assumed he’d turn up none the worse for wear, that the boyfriend and him probably just got into a fight.”
She handed out a photo of a teenager in black leather, black hair, and more makeup and piercings than the people in the room had, combined.
“That cannot possibly be…” Ciela started. “There’s no way…that zombie was totally dried-up, it had to be hundreds of years old!”
“Sorry to break it to you, but it’s the same guy.” Torres shook her head. “Things just get stranger and stranger, don’t they? Before you ask, we checked out the boyfriend, he’s got no priors and no powers. Total norm all the way.”
“So we have to do this the hard way.” Jayna crossed her arms. “Is it possible, Detective, that our necromancer is part of one of the ‘underground scenes’ as you called them, and that one of these people might know who our killer is?”
“It’s possible, but they won’t talk to the PD, and probably not to any of us. They keep to themselves, and aside from the occasional D&D arrest, stay out of trouble.”
“They’d talk to Takeo.” Jasper offered. “He’s a shapechanger.”
“What does that…” Ciela started, confused.
“Does anyone know that ‘Romanov’ here…” She gestured at the photo, “…is dead?” Jayna asked, looking at Torres, catching Jasper’s train of thought immediately.
“Not possible. Unless the killer is walking around actually telling people…”
“We do not know with any certainty that the killer and the necromancer are the same being.” Takeo added, not liking the look in the two women’s eyes. “Besides that fact, I know nothing about this…Romanov, how would I be able to replace him with any chance of fooling anyone?”
Ciela’s eyes widened, finally catching on. Jayna had to suppress a chuckle, even as much as the girl had been through, she was still amazingly naive sometimes.
“You’re not going to be replacing him, you’re going to be the bait, Takeo dear.” Jayna answered as sweetly as possible.
“Ah. Of course.” Takeo replied, somewhat sourly.
“Before we get too far into planning the next few nights, there’s another thing that needs to be brought up.” Jayna focused her attention on her resident houseguest, and mentally sighed. No time like the present.
“Ciela, it’s about Warren. He’s back on J Street, at least part of the time.” The other woman said nothing but she did notice her eyes sliding around to glance at the darker spaces in the room, noticed her tense. “I thought you should know, since there is always a chance that we would run into him.”
“How long?” Ciela’s voice was surprisingly calm.
“Since Aquarius vanished, I assume.”
“He killed Aqua?” Too calm.
“Yes.” Don’t push this right now, Cie. “He and Adrianne.”
“I see.” The girl’s hands were clenched, and her tone was clipped. “You were going to tell me this, when?”
“Az…” Ok, so keeping her in the dark might have been a mistake. But damn it, she deserved some peace! “I was hoping he would stay off J Street. I wasn't sure he was hanging around the area until recently, and with everything that we've been busy with, there never seemed to be a good time to bring it up.”
Takeo was completely oblivious to the white-haired woman’s discomfort, or he was pretending to be. “So I would assume that Miss Jarras here is the reason Warren was so very interested in breaking into your shop, Miss Alexander?” Either that or he really was an asshole, Jayna couldn’t decide.
Ciela’s head swung around to gape at the shape-changer. “What?”
“We should leave…” Jasper had moved forward in her seat, preparing to stand, glaring tiny daggers at Takeo. “Help me up, Takeo.”
“No...” Ciela answered quickly. “Let him continue.”
“Before the zombies started arriving, I had a short meeting with Warren. He was very interested in breaking into Miss Alexander’s shop. I assured him it was quite impossible.”
“He’s sane?”
“I would tend to disagree with that assessment.”
This was a slightly different version of events than Jayna had heard, so she kept quiet, but wondered again how Warren had come to find Takeo.
Modus Morte: Chapter 15
“I’ll agree with that one.” Reaper snorted.
Jasper’s eyes widened in surprise before she opened her mouth to respond, “Has hell frozen over?” she asked “Or did you just agree with Takeo?”
“No. I agreed because this Warren person was definitely certifiable when we met him.” Ciela looked at Jasper when Reaper spoke. Jasper didn’t look at the other woman, instead she was looking at Jayna with a slight frown.
“You ‘met’ him?” Ciela asked the other woman stiffly.
“The night I thought I resurrected our zombie problem.” Jasper replied. “We had an encounter at the graveyard.” Jasper seemed to understand how much this would hurt the other woman. She didn’t go into too much. Reaper was not as tactful.
“He’s the reason she’s in that cast.” The cat growled, even Takeo seemed to be glaring death at Reaper for that one. Jayna realized just how much of an ass that the cat could be. He opened his mouth to continue, but was hit by a flying coffee mug. Jasper had another in her hand that was definitely not there before. Takeo seemed to be enjoying Reaper’s indignation at getting hit with blunt objects.
Jasper then turned to Jayna, “Okay, how about dealing with the zombie problem. Jayna, I assume you had some sort of plan for us.” Oh, how good of her to change the topic.
“Yes I do.” Jayna nodded. Ciela seemed to tensely look at her as the others listened carefully. “I think we should split up into groups, and look for the zombie source. I have the signature off that last zombie that Ciela intercepted. I can use my glasses to track it. Cie do you think you can use the helmet?”
“Yes.” Her reply was very sharp, very clipped. This was not going to be pretty.
“Good.” Jayna’s reply was just as clipped. “Torres and I can be one group. Takeo and Ciela can be another.”
“I’m going too.” Jasper said, practically jumping up. She had an unusual death grip on the coffee cup. This seemed to distract Ciela slightly from being mad, but only slightly.
“You are still hurt, Jasper-san, that would be a bad idea.” Takeo was hard to read but if Jayna hadn’t known him she would have mistaken that as concern in his voice, another thing to file away for later.
“I agree with him. How are you going to be of any help with a cast on?” Jayna didn’t think taking an invalid with them would help at all in zombie fighting.
“The cast comes off today.” Jasper said, frowning tightly. “The doctor’s coming to take if off in an hour. If it is not too much trouble to wait I think I can be of some use. My injuries usually heal quickly.” She was definitely upset about that. Jayna didn’t realize leaving her at home would upset the woman that much. Reaper was unusually silent. He was either afraid of her accuracy with throwing coffee cups, or he was too busy dissecting her statements for something he didn’t like.
“I guess you can come with us.” It was Ciela who answered her.
“Yeah.” Jayna agreed. She still didn’t like the idea of taking an injured person along, but Jasper looked like she might continue to argue the point into infinity. Takeo’s expression was unreadable. He however didn’t look too happy as he watched Jasper take her seat again.
“You can go with Takeo and Ciela then.” At least her guardian should be able to keep Jasper from hurting herself further. The others seemed to agree to the arrangement. “We will start tonight. We can meet at dusk. I’ll have lists of places for us to check on by then. Torres, do you think you can get a list of the clubs that ‘Romanov’ frequented?” The detective nodded and looked down at her file. "Then I want a list of every club similar to them in the zombie infected area." Jayna added. “We will be checking a lot of places.”
“This will take some time.” Torres said.
“Are we going to have to worry about running into Warr...” Reaper didn’t finish his sentence, as Jasper had struck him with yet another coffee cup. Everyone looked at her, even as the cat began what sounded like cursing under his breath.
“What?” Jasper asked innocently. She had another coffee mug in her hand, and this one was full of steaming hot liquid. The look on Ciela’s face was a mix of relief and amusement. She probably didn’t need reminding of that subject.
“Nothing.” Jayna said trying not to add nice shot to it, though.
Takeo did it for her, “Good aim.” He was smirking at the cat, who was looking bitter, but didn’t dare say a word. The next one looked like it really would hurt.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
The meeting broke up fairly quickly with a lot less questions than Jayna had planned on answering. Whether that was a good sign or a bad one only time would tell. Ciela left quickly and quietly, in what Jayna mentally termed a snit. She decided it would be the better part of tact for her to let Cie cool off a bit before trying to talk to her about anything, so she took her time saying her goodbyes and left with Torres.
"I don't suppose you feel like grabbing a quick lunch before you head back to work, do you?" Jayna asked.
"I'd love to, but I can't." Torres sighed, "I have to get back to work if I want to get off on time, and you should probably get to your shop. I wouldn't want to have so many expensive breakables in the same building with your roommate right now if I were you."
"She didn't take that very well, did she?"
"You have a real gift for understatement, you know that?"
~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~
Faust lowered the remnants of his love gently into the chair, laying her hands one across the other in her lap, and pulling another chair from the front of his makeshift desk close to hers. He retrieved a convenience store sandwich from his pants pocket, tore it open and offered half to her before sitting himself. When she did not respond he sniffed it and then took a bite. "I forgot you were never fond of egg salad." he said around the food in his mouth. "I'm a bit sick of it myself, but it was all they had left."
He reached behind himself with his free hand to grab a bottle of water from a shelf, only to be distracted by the sound of chittering off to his left. The smell of food, even something as humble as a half-squashed sandwich drew them like a magnet. His head whipped around in their direction, eyes flashing with hate. "Get back, you filth!" he shouted at them.
A dozen tiny points of red hunger glowed at him from a chink in the wall at the farthest end of the room. One particularly brave individual pushed right up against the ward blocking them from entering, rearing up on his hind legs, clawing at it with his front paws and squealing loudly. From the first time Faust had returned home to find the members of the nunnery's resident rat colony sniffing about Priscilla it had been open warfare between them. He had managed to kill two of them outright and one of the rats had gotten a taste of his beloved before they retreated into the shadows, and he had been able to set up the first of his wards. Traps and poisons were useless against them and they could find no openings in his ward spells, so their battles had finally degenerated into taunts in the dark, each hoping for the other to make one fatal mistake.
The lead rat snarled and fought against the barrier in frustration. Faust smiled. His opportunity for a taste of revenge presented itself and would only require a tiny waste of power. He whispered a few words of an incantation and flicked one finger in the direction of the rats. The rat against the barrier screamed a tiny rat-scream as he realized, too late, that he was trapped and his body burst into flames. The others stared in horror for a few seconds before scurrying back into the dark. It would be a long while before they ventured here again.