Jack's London, Wednesday Afternoon
Karla
"I should have kept that spell we got from Queen Sophie," Karla said quietly. "It let us recreate the murder scene at the instant of his death." No audio, unfortunately, but it was better than nothing. "Now I'll be left with whatever psychic scents remain. It's been too long for me to pull a vision of what happened from the walls, but I may still be able to pick up something."
You know, besides the expected fear/pain/rage. Sorting through the emotional residuum of a murder was never fun. But it had a)gotten her out of Fandom, and b)kept her mind thoroughly occupied, so she was going to deal.
Jack
"I hope you can. We talked our way past the police at the door -- it would be a shame to waste that," Jack said pragmatically as he looked around what likely seemed an ornate bedroom, even a beautiful one, when it wasn't in such disorder. He kept his face calm, but even someone who wasn't a gifted empath would likely pick up on some of his revulsion. The body itself was long gone, as was the bedding, but sticky brown blood stained the mattress and a light, lingering odor of decay hung in the air.
"Can you tell if a vampire was here?" he asked doubtfully. "Whoever it was, a lot of blood was spilled."
Karla
"Would a vampire have made such a mess?" Karla asked, frowning. She reached out to pat his arm absently, even as she continued to look around. "I mean, it would be like us going to a buffet and having a food fight. It just doesn't make much sense."
On the other hand, maybe the vampire was crazy. There was a cheerful thought.
Jack
"It doesn't, but it still could be," Jack said doubtfully, clearly disliking his own thoughts. "If it was one who was killing for the pleasure of it. There's no need to kill at all when there are people like me around, is there? But if he had a taste for the unwilling --"
He stopped there, assuming Karla could fill in the blank, and ran a finger against the stained mattress. It came away dampened by blood.
Karla
"Why are they convinced it was a vampire that did this?" Karla asked, bending down next to the bed and, making a face, placed her hands on the blood.
Blood is the memory's river.
"I'm going to see if there's anything I can pull," she said. "But it's so old. Most of the useful information is gone, but there's a chance, I might be able to find something." Though it would be easier if there were something more specific she could look for. "Do vampires in your world have any kind of magic? Any supernatural powers that might linger?"
Jack
"They want to think it's too grotesque for a human," Jack answered, clearly disagreeing with the argument. "It looked like the wounds took more than human strength. And of course if it's a vampire, they don't need to worry about what it says about the rest of them."
He pursed his lips as he considered her question. "They can't do magic themselves, but they're stronger and faster than people. Heightened senses. Largely immortal. That kind of thing. Does that help at all?"
Karla
Karla snorted. "Right. Because humans are usually so kind to their fellows," she agreed. "Though I'd have to examine the wounds myself before I'd be willing to say that it required any especial feat of strength."
She called in a length of spidersilk and a frame, leaving sticky fingerprints on the silk as she wove it into a web. That was fine; for this, she'd want the connection. "Not really," she said. "That's not the kind of thing that would linger. Now, if a spell had been used to do this, there might be traces left behind, but strength and speed and keen eyesight aren't really going to remain."
On the plus side, if Karla did find the remains of a spell, it would prove this wasn't a vampire killing, wouldn't it?
Jack
Jack let out a long, low breath that just stayed this side of a sigh. He'd truly hoped Karla would be able to clear vampires, but if she couldn't -- so be it. She was what he had, and any information was something.
"And there's no special vampire psychic scent to look for?" he asked, suspecting he knew the answer but asking anyhow. "Well. See what you get and ... we won't be any worse than we were to start with. And if you find a spell, that rules vampires out."
Karla
"Not really," Karla said. "Especially with all the different flavors of vampires there are. I can usually tell that they're no ordinary human when we're talking, but..." she shrugged. "At most, it's usually a suggestion of blood: the scent, a copper tang, flash of crimson. Stuff like that, and subtle."
Which was why she hadn't realized the truth about Mitchell until they'd all been in Sebastien's house.
Waving her hand around the room, she added, "That wouldn't exactly stick out here, even if psychic scents were inclined to linger this long. They don't; not unless they're really powerful. It takes time for a psychic scent to seep into a room and linger past when the occupant is gone."
Still, just to be safe, she finished her web anyway and read as much as the blood could tell her. It wasn't much more than they'd already figured out. "Nothing stands out," she reported when she was done. "No magic, nothing useful, just a lot of fear and pain."
Jack
"I can't imagine where that came from," Jack said dryly. "Thank you, though, for trying. We can hope the others had better luck at the morgue."
If he was honest, he was glad he wasn't in that group. "For now ... how would you feel about trying to follow David for a bit?"
Karla
Karla almost wouldn't have minded the morgue. It was cleaner, for one, and there would be no lingering emotions for her to brush up against. And maybe she would have been more use there; she felt obscurely guilty not to have found anything here for Jack.
"I'll agree on two conditions," she said, vanishing her supplies. "First, we get to clean up. Second, you owe me lunch. Deal?" The smile didn't quite meet her eyes, bur she figured Jack would understand. Summoning a genuine smile in a room like this was no mean feat.
Jack
"Of course," Jack said, though he himself would have been just as happy with running his hands under cold water and a hot dog from a street vendor. Still, the break would help to clear his head and get the scent of death out of his nostrils. "Back to the house, then we eat, then spywork."
He didn't even try for a smile.
Karla
He also wasn't going to have to shower the residuum of emotions away, either. Though Karla wasn't about to turn her nose up to a hot dog from a street vendor. Emma had converted her.
"You can teach me as we go," she agreed. "I promise to be a better student at this than I was at flirting."
[OOC: Follows this, this and this. Inspired by "Chatoyant." Preplayed with bitten_notshy, chosehumanity, icecoldfrost, and vanillajello. NFB, OOC welcome.]