xp_logs | Aftershocks: Capture

The tracking spell yields results.

They were in the city and the city was in them. Buildings, roads, fences, parks... everything was shadowy and ghostlike and yet throbbing with energy and life. Beneath their feet ran the sewers and tunnels, arteries and veins beneath the translucent skin of the streets, above them rose skyscrapers laid bare to the sky. Amanda, too, was there but not there, skin and hair and clothes taking on the same tones as the cityscape around them, the only thing solid about her the chunk of cement cradled in her hands, the blood a deep bright red.

"Anything?" she asked, her mental 'voice' barely distinguishable from the sounds of New York, but the meaning coming through clearly via their link.

Jim, his astral form seated on one side of Amanda's ghostly image with legs crossed and back straight, shook his head. "Not yet."

Even filtered through Amanda, the telepath had quickly realized it would have been too much to absorb everything that came to them. Instead he had built upon the magic that threaded nerves through the city's flesh. The stone drew the city's memory back to the killings. Huddled close to the accessible human consciousness of Amanda, Jim slipped into her spell and made of the dead woman's blood a structure to enclose and join them. It grew into the arteries of New York, a shared nexus of the locator spell.

It was Amanda who received the information, but Jim who processed it. Like blood through a heart, what passed through the telepath flowed in and then out again into the world, shielding them from overload. And within that heart, awash in the rush of life, was Meggan.

Meggan, seated close beside the two of them and leaning forward, didn’t have anything to add yet, so she just shook her head. No pinging to indicate the presence of the person they were looking for. She was trying not to be overly enthralled by all the sheer stuff flowing through her, but it was a close thing. Here, in the heart of the city’s web, distracted by what they were trying to do, her astral skin was instinctively shifting at intervals to reflect small portions of the area. There was no telling how much of it would end up on her actual body.

The telepath sensed as much as saw the nod. "How're you doing, Amanda?" he asked. Her hair was perceptible as the glow of a streetlight, her body as the space between the shape of a doorway and a mailbox. The effect of Meggan's empathy on her astral form was rather fascinating; he had no conception of attuning to anything less than a human mind, and her system was undeniably more adept at processing the sort of stimuli the city supplied. In his perceptions the empath rippled like mercury around a solid core. It was Amanda he was concerned about. He was unfamiliar with her limits and didn't want to see her awareness stretched so far it fractured.

"Don't worry about me." The reassurance came as the sound of the wind in the trees of Central Park, the sound of a busker playing his guitar. "I'm not even close to losing it. If this were London, there might be problems, but New York and I have an understanding."

“There’s something,” Meggan whispered. She thought she had something, only to lose it a moment later. She frowned when she began to feel more of the traces of what they were looking for. A moment passed, before it was fully formed, and not just a trace wafting through the nexus. That was a ping, a very undeniable ping, as she picked up the “scent” impression of that awful coldness bubbling up with intent. “There! Amanda, that’s them, right in there,” she hurriedly called over. If Meggan was feeling it now, she realized, it meant the person was preparing to hurt someone else.

Through the link, Amanda shared the impression of cold and it reflected in the city/mindscape, ice trails forming along the area Meggan was pointing at. "That's him," she confirmed, her voice now sirens wailing, red and blue lights flashing along her shadowy form. "Haller, raise the troops. I might be able to slow him down, but I don't have the connection to actually stop him."

Amanda's own knowledge supplied the physical location. Back in the real world, his body reached for his phone and dialed the number Vanessa had supplied, then spoke the street name and its nearest crosses before hanging up on its own accord. He didn't dare break the connection until they were sure the killer had been caught. Not that there was much chance of that; in the throes of the spell, New York's anger trembled beneath Amanda's skin. It breathed decades of police tape and screaming ambulances, blood drying on the streets and bodies fallen to the ground. It would not lose the killer now. Its attention focused on the aberration like white blood cells against an infection.

In the darkening chill of their link, something flashed like sunlight on a new coin in the gutter. Startled, Jim turned to Meggan. With the city awakened to anger the textures and colors still flowing through her astral form were darker now, but he was sure he had seen something else. Not the flux of unconscious mimicry, but something . . . unique, as if he'd seen through the play of colors to glimpse the prism itself.

But the image was already gone. All that remained was an impression of light, and two eyes as red as the stone in Amanda's hands.

Responding to the call to arms, Jean-Paul and Laura finally come face-to-face with the killer.

Jean-Paul checked his mobile to make sure he hadn't gotten any new information from Bishop or Vanessa and then landed in an alley adjacent to the street address Haller had sent them to - he kept a careful watch on the people walking along the street, but there wasn't much foot traffic to be seen. He was tempted to walk the street himself, see if he could find something, but Laura wasn't here yet and... well. Going into a situation like this blind was generally a bad thing - never let anyone say age hadn't taught him something, at least.

He wouldn't need to wait much longer, though, since Laura entered the alley soon after, hands in her jacket and looking like she was going out to party somewhere, which she wasn't. Blame it to the habit. "Hey", she called to him as she removed one hand from her jacket and waved at him as she got closer. Laura shot a brief smile at him before getting her serious face on. "Wanna go and chase some bad guy around?"

"Some bad guy?" Jean-Paul said, a smile quirking up his lips despite himself. "You make this sound so appealing, mon amie. Of course I will go chase some bad guy, as you say." He offered her his arm, mock gallantry evident in the way he gestured with his hand toward the end of the alley. He kept his voice low as the entered the main thoroughfare, catching sight of a few people here and there as he said, "There are not so many people here." The address Haller had given them was, now, directly across the street from them. "But I see two near the door there. Can you hear them?"

A tiny smile resurfaced as she got a hold of his arm. "What am I supposed to say anyway? Anything more pretentious and I would need some dark shades or something." They walked out of the alley, and Laura let her senses wander around; there weren't really that many people, so it was easier to stop and analyse each one individually. "Hmmm..." Laura cocked her head to a side, focusing on the couple Jean-Paul had mentioned. "It sounds like idle conversation, although they aren't talking loud enough for me to get the details about it. It's certainly being held in a...friendly tone. She's apparently asking for directions or something."

The couple continued their conversation, unmindful of the two newcomers. The man was the older of the two by maybe a decade, broad-shouldered and nearing six feet. As they watched the man reached out to touch the shoulder of the woman -- a brunette on the short side of average -- and point down a nearby alleyway. She mouthed a question, to which the man's body language clearly responded with "I'll take you there". Hand still on her shoulder, the man started to walk her towards the alley.

"The man," Jean-Paul said, frowning a little. "He is taking her to an alley, I think. He could be the person we are looking for, non?" It was obvious they'd need to get closer.

Laura blinked. "He..." And then she stopped walking, as if she had been nailed to the pavement. Closing her eyes, she started to sniff, this time harder. Among the different scents around the couple, blood and that weird lemony antiseptic scent lingered heavily over them. Or just one? She couldn't tell, not from that distance. Opening her eyes, Laura gave the man next to her a worried look. "I can smell blood and that other lemon scented smell I found on the crime scenes coming from them, or one of them, but I need to get closer to tell them apart." Her arm, still tangled on Jean-Paul's, twitched a little. "I think we found our guy."

"Then closer we will go," Jean-Paul murmured, checking both ways across the mostly deserted street to make sure no cars had suddenly appeared, before he lead the way across the street at a slight angle. They reached the pavement just behind the other pair and the Québécois kept a surreptitious eye on the man, rather than the woman, as they began making their way past them. He kept himself between Laura and the others, though, just in case.

The man glanced back at them and frowned, clearly wondering why a couple with an entire street to enjoy were coming their way. The girl, noting his turn of attention, followed his gaze and gave them a look of equal unease. Her grip tightened on her dark-colored knit bag, as if already anticipating a mugging.

Laura blinked as she started to tell apart the smells. "It's the bag", she said absently before she remembered Jean-Paul didn't have her nose. "Her bag, and she herself smells of blood and antiseptic, I'm pretty sure of it." Now that they were closer there was no doubt of it, but it kept on confusing her none the less. The girl, after all, didn't look like much a threat. "What...now?"

"Now," Jean-Paul said, shrugging a little, "We catch her, oui?"

Jean-Paul hadn't been quite as quiet as Laura. The girl turned to look at them. So did the man.

There was almost no warning. In the blink of an eye, the broad man had rounded on Jean-Paul.

"All right you two, back off," he snapped, close enough the Québécois could smell the alcohol on his breath. It had clearly been enough to lower the man's inhibitions, but not enough to make him sloppy. "I don't know what you're doing," he continued, his gaze steady and challenging, "if this is some kind of joke or psych experiment, I don't care. It's making us uncomfortable. Leave us alone."

"Mon Dieu," Jean-Paul half-snorted. "Je suis chanceux comme un bossu." Which was to say, of course, not lucky at all. "You are in danger, of course, and we are here to take the girl in to the proper authorities. She is behind the deaths in the city." He'd carefully disengaged from Laura and put himself between her and the intoxicated man.

Laura, for lack of a better word, completely ignored the man. He was no threat to her, considering she could pinpoint his position based on the smell she was getting from that close without even trying. No, she was far more interested on the girl, and the task of not losing sight of her. So when Jean-Paul let go of her arm she moved swiftly to the side, taking a moment to seize the girl up with a quick stare. "Not particularly hard to catch once you go around with a bag that reeks of blood, are you?"

The girl didn't reply. Instead, without a second's hesitation, she screamed.

"Hey!" That scream shattered whatever impact Jean-Paul's words might have had on the potential victim; it seemed to bypass the man's ears to strike something deep in his brainstem. He spun on Laura, one arm outstretched to stop the imagined assault. And, as he did, the girl with the bag that smelled of old blood vanished into the alley.

Jean-Paul moved faster than the man, wrapping an arm around the larger man's neck and putting him in a sleeper-hold. The man made a few token movements to prize the speedster's arms from his neck, but Jean-Paul's grip was too good. In the end, the only resistance he could offer was a few snuffling gasps. He went limp in Jean-Paul's arms and was still.

Laura spared a second to look at the man struggling with Jean-Paul before darting towards the place where the woman had been a moment ago. She might have made a quick escape, but she had a fresh trail now, and there was no way in hell Laura was missing her mark. So unless this girl was a teleporter or something, Laura was sure she will get a hold of her soon enough.

After waiting a few moments to make sure the man he'd subdued was, in fact, out and not just faking, Jean-Paul flew after Laura. He caught sight of his friend going into a bar down the street and it took him no time at all to get to the door a few seconds behind her. From there, they really only had to keep track of their target - he had trouble believing the young woman they were after was the person who'd killed so many others. He pushed that thought from his mind, motioning to Laura so she'd know he planned to go high, get over the heads of the people in the bar, while she followed the woman's distinctive scent.

Briefly nodding at Jean-Paul, Laura followed the distinct scent across the mass of people; once she had her mark the woman had no hope of getting rid of her. And she had eyes above her, too, so she didn't need to worry about an ambush. Looking around, she spotted the woman sitting on the bar. Surely Jean-Paul was closing on her too, so she just walked towards her, fully intending to sit next to the woman.

The woman's back straightened. Without looking around, she rose from the barstool and slipped between two girls juggling a bevy of drinks to disappear through a doorway.

At some point someone must have bought the building next door for expansion, for the doorway led to a narrow space that looked newer than the rest. There was a temporary stage against the far wall and a smaller bar nearest the front window. Chairs and couches had been pushed against the wall to make room for some kind of art exhibition. Several canvasses had been erected around the room, and small groups clustered around artists as they worked in paint, charcoal, or pastels. With the exception of strategically placed lighting to illuminate the canvasses, the room was dark. Bags and supplies lay everywhere.

Laura was about to rush right after her, but the scent of the blood partly deviated from the woman. Looking around, she spotted the discarded bag among others. Evidence, for all she knew. So Laura went and picked it up, but not before slipping her hand into a glove she kept with her, unsure of how to deal with incriminatory items of sorts. Looking back at the dark room, she sniffed a bit; the woman was still there, the blood stench attached to her as well. "You are not getting away", she muttered as she stood and looked around, trying to find either the woman or Jean-Paul.

The Québécois had tracked the woman's movements as she made her way through the club and toward the back - lucky for them, of course, she picked the wrong side of the building to attempt an escape from. The only doors in her area were the ones that led to the bathroom - had she gone left instead of right, she would have hit an alley and they'd have been on the move again. Landing in a partially cleared area, Jean-Paul signaled for Laura just as the door to the women's toilet closed and he narrowed his eyes. There were many things in the world that held fear for him. A woman's bathroom did not happen to be one of those things.

So he pushed open the door with one shoulder and found... a bathroom empty of everyone save the woman they'd followed. This all seemed... entirely too easy.

A second later and Laura was right behind Jean-Paul. The empty room sort of surprised her, too. "Enough running away", she said as she shook the bag in her hand.

The bathroom door opened. A patron with multiple piercings and bright pink hair started to come in, then stopped and stared at the tableau. One scream from their target and they could be dealing with the police on something less than a passing basis.

But the girl did nothing. This time there was no scream, no flight, not even a furtive signal of distress. Just silence.

With no response forthcoming, the patron came to her own conclusions. In this case, these conclusions involved misinterpreting the intentions of two women and a man alone in the restroom of a club that threw impromptu art exhibitions. She raised her eyebrows, then, without comment, promptly exited the room.

The door swung closed. The girl followed it with her eyes, then turned her gaze back to Jean-Paul and Laura. All pretext of fear or confusion had disappeared, leaving her expression utterly blank.

Then, in a voice that evoked images of honor roles and pep rallies she said, "All right."

"Like Hell it's alright", Laura replied angrily as she frowned at the woman. Nothing was alright with the whole situation. Turning to Jean-Paul, Laura gave him a questioning look. "Now what? We go somewhere else I guess?"

A frown forming, Jean-Paul nodded slowly. "Oui, somewhere, I think, that she will not hurt others. It is possible - I know of a place. It was not so badly damaged during Day Zero. We can secure her there and wait until Bishop and Vanessa arrive, I think." Moving forward, the Québécois took hold of the young woman's wrist and pulled it behind her back, using one of the plastic security bindings he'd been instructed to use. There was rope, he knew, that he could use once they reached their destination. It wasn't very far away.

An informal interrogation begins, though when the suspect proves to be less than forthcoming it becomes necessary to take a less traditional route.

She had a sweet face, round and pretty and framed by slightly waving brown hair. It was the sort of face you expected to see on the girl next door, or a waitress still working her way towards an art degree. She sat in silence, as unconcerned as if she were waiting in line at the grocery store.

But little things were off. The trendy long-sleeved black cardigan she wore was just a touch too warm for June. She carried cash, but no ID or credit cards. The knit bag Laura had retrieved contained keys and an old cellphone as well as the linoleum knife and antiseptic wipes, but lacked common female accouterments like makeup, hygiene products, emergency stashes of medication or any sort of address book or day planner. And that sweet face was entirely devoid of emotion, even fear. Meeting her eyes was like staring into the face of a doll.

Before entering the building Vanessa had needed to take a moment to look up at the sky and tell her father this didn't count because it wasn't in use anymore. Burt Carlysle had been cemented enough in his Irish heritage that he was likely turning over in his grave at the sight of his baby girl walking into a Protestant Church. Maybe it wasn't so bad considering why she was there.

Near the middle of a pew in the center of the rows sat a girl cleverly bound with rope to the bench. Vanessa wasn't sure who had done the tying, Laura or Jean-Paul, but the length of rope was considerable to loop around the back and under the pew several times to hold the girl in place with her wrists bound at her back. She didn't look very old from the back as they walked up from behind her and Vanessa curled her fingers around the lock of hair in her pocket as she shifted into her more normal looking appearance just to be sure. The look she gave her partner when Vanessa finally caught sight of the young woman's face needed no words to be understood. No one would have looked for this girl as their suspect.

"The silent, sociopathic game might work on rookies but I know how things work. Real sociopaths want to get the story right. Intelligently decide on a course of action for a cause and then want to enact it. They want everyone to know what they're doing wrong." Bishop had worked several angles during his questioning and this was the last. Sociopaths did seem to want the news to get the story straight.

As Vanessa approached, Bishop held up a hand, not wanting an interruption just yet. "As far as anyone here will be able to tell, you're killing mutants out of self hatred like a standard bigot. Nothing special." He goaded her one last time; if he was wrong, she'd certainly correct him to avoid being labeled as what she clearly hated.

Bishop received nothing but a stare in return. She had been giving considerable eye contact, but with neither challenge nor defiance. Simply watching. Her head tilted at Vanessa's approach, but that was all. She never looked away from Bishop.

Bishop looked to Vanessa, "Do we have something new?" He stood, letting the girl see they were still investigating and gathering information successfully before walking out of hearing range with his partner.

Keeping an eye on the young woman from around his shoulder, Vanessa pitched her voice low. "No ID. No credit cards. Cash, keys and a cell phone in her little murder kit that Jean-Paul and Laura found when she tried to hide it but that's about it." The metamorph was wearing latex gloves when she held out the phone to him. "I don't know if you know any nifty tricks for pulling something useful off this. Doug might be able to help." Vanessa wasn't super tech savvy with a cell. She used hers mostly to make calls, send text messages and snap photos occasionally. Pulling useful information or knowing what to look for in the contacts was much more comfortably in the ex-detective's repertoire than her own.

Bishop laughed, a little bit of mirth in his smile as he put on black latex gloves, then held his hand out. "Phone, please. I'd like the name of who I'm talking to and I'll give her mine. We don't have long to start a rapport."

The phone was dropped into his waiting hand, then Vanessa glanced over toward the young woman. "Run off and make your magic happen. I'll make sure she doesn't vanish."

After looking through the contact list on the phone until he found just a first name, which suggested familiarity, Bishop hit send. "This is James at Wal Mart. I've found this phone and I want to call for it over the loudspeaker. Do you know whose this is?" Dropping his meticulous choice of words and picking up a slight urban casual manner, he waited patiently for a moment. "Caroline, thank you. Let her know her phone's here if you see her, just if she's already gone."

Bishop closed the girl's phone, treating it with the practiced care of someone that has often handled evidence as he retrieved his own phone from his jacket and dialed. "I have my hands on a name and a phone you'll be very interested in. What do you need from me?" He rolled Caroline's phone over in his free hand as he talked to Doug. It wasn't decorated or personalized in any way like most young women's phones were, he noted as he stepped outside. As always, he paced while on the phone and he needed room for that habit.

And on the other end of the line, Doug Ramsey got ready to work.