xp_logs | Sarah and Logan : Sniffing out the truth

Sarah isn't convinced that Amanda is the one who took Strange's books, and Logan offers his nose to the cause.

God, what a Monday. Sarah stretched out on the couch, staring at her laptop screen. First there had been the books in Amanda's car, but now Doug was saying that the girl in the security camera footage
wasn't actually Amanda, just really looked like her. It didn't sound much like Amanda, true, but the only evidence that didn't point to her was something Sarah couldn't actually verify herself. That bothered her. The doorhandle to her apartment rattled, and she called back without looking, "It's unlocked, come on in."

Logan opened up her door and walked into her apartment. He spent so much time here he might as well just move in, spare everyone the hassle. Dropping his duffle on the floor, he put his usual case of beer into her fridge, snagged two bottles, then went to go find her. Seeing her sprawled on the couch, he put the cold bottle against her cheek by way of offering it to her.

Sarah nudged the still cold bottle away with her head and pushed herself up with one arm, her laptop held balanced on her other arm. Tucking the laptop onto the arm of the couch, she pulled her feet up under her and grabbed the beer from him, leaving an open space for him to sit. "You read my mind. Course, I was thinking more along the lines of tequila, but maybe that's not so conducive to figuring out what the fuck is going on around here."

Logan blinked. He'd kept himself pretty out of the loop lately. "What's going on?" he asked as he gracefully fell into the vacated spot she'd just made. The couch complained audibly - it didn't like his metal bones any more than he did.

"Some books went missing from Wanda's room. Bad magic stuff. Powerful. Kurt found them in Amanda's car, but she doesn't remember taking them. And I tend to believe it wasn't her-- she knows not to get involved in that kind of shit." Sarah took a long swig of her beer before continuing. It's not like the suspense would kill him. "But the security cameras show her putting the books in her car. At least, somebody who really looks like her. Doug says the body language is all off or something."

"How long ago?" he asked. "Your parking lot - does it see a lot of traffic?" he asked. Amanda'd always played it straight with him - barring that love potion nonsense from a few years back - and besides, he was curious.

Sarah glanced back at her laptop, to the point in her e-mail where the issue had first surfaced. "A couple of days. Kurt found the books yesterday, and we've been doing a lot of looking into it today. And no, not really. We're bastards about anybody else parking in our garage."

Logan got back to his feet. "Come on. Let's go take a walk." he said. "Got an idea."

---

The florescent lights in the parking garage buzzed slightly as they entered. A couple of cars were gone as people went out for the night, but the majority of them were still there, parked in their usual spots. She took him over to Amanda's. "The security camera is set up over there," she pointed toward the wall, "and it shows somebody who looks an awful lot like Amanda putting books in her car."

Logan waves her to silence irritatedly. He crouched down close to the pavement and sniffed the air. Then he moved forward a few inches towards her car and sniffed again. "Faint. Damned faint." he grumbled. But after about fifteen minutes of this he finally got a more solid scrap of scent.

Straightening, he looked over at the infinitely-amused Sarah. "Not her." he said. "Female, youngish, but not Amanda."

"Well then, we've got another problem entirely." Sarah's amused grin had faded at the prospects of their situation, but she still needed to let Amanda know that she wasn't going crazy. It hadn't been her. She nodded back in the direction they had come. "Come on, let's go give her the good news. At least we know -something-."

"Think they'll buy it coming from me?" he asked curiously as he followed her out of the parking lot. That scent was nagging at him, but he left it alone for the time being. Something about it ... nah. It was nothing. Just a result of the mingling of scents and the overpowering tang of engine exhaust. "It was pretty faint. Just barely got it."

"Don't see why not. Especially coming from you and Doug." It won Sarah over, at least. She turned at the door to face him. "Besides, do they have any reason not to trust you? Just because you're crazy as fuck doesn't mean you're just going to make shit like this up."

"I know that. You know that. Amanda knows that. Do the rest of them know that?" he asked somewhat rhetorically. "Don't matter, really. They can believe what they want to believe."

"I'm not even going to ask what brought this up." She shrugged and then turned to push on the door, entering back into the bright light of the hallway. "Come on. Amanda will believe you, and that's
who we're doing this for."

"Got a point." he said with something closer to his usual state of mind. "Remind me to buy you a beer next time we're out." he said. "Make it two beers." he added after a moment's thought. "You folks don't run like the X crew."

"No we don't. That's why I'm here." She flashed him the slightest hint of a grin, then pulled him along by his shirt. "Now if you'll hurry up, we can get back to the beer that's sitting in the fridge."

There were any number of things he could have done to stop her and the moment she pulled him along by his shirt most of them flashed through his head. But he elected to take none of those paths, instead just picking up his pace to keep her from ripping the shirt off his body.

Again.