CHAPTER SEVEN
1253 Words
John stared at the large sculpture that graced the entrance to Hampton Station. It was a large round bronze casting in the shape of a square-holed chinese coin, its surface covered with finely detailed carvings of animals. He had seen it for the first time many years ago, back when he was still married to his ex-wife. In fact he had lived about five blocks from the station in an old rundown house in the middle of Oak Cliff.
Happy memories called up unbidden in his mind of the time he had spent in this neighborhood when his daughter was born. They were bittersweet though, colored with the profound sadness he felt being separated from her. He shook his head as burning tears threatened to form in his eyes and took a deep breath to center himself before lowering his psychic shields. A wistful mindset is not helpful, nor safe to be in, when dealing with the unseen world. You never know what might take notice of you while exploring and might just become something’s lunch if you’re not careful.
Allie and Becca were wandering around the platform, reading the messages in the molded bricks that decorated the station with facts and trivia about Stevie Ray Vaughn.
“Beccs?”
“What is it, hon?”
“Have you ever been around John when he does this sort of thing?”
“A couple of times, why?”
“He doesn’t seem like himself…”
“He’s not. Well, not entirely.”
“Pardon?”
“He once tried to explain it to me soon after he started training as an ovate, before he was made a Rigfennid. He said, ‘I’m not just looking at what’s happened like a camera pointed at the past. I’m inside it, a part of it, observer and observed indistinguishable from one another.’ I kinda get it, but I’m not a seer. I figure that in order to sense anything he has to get inside the mind and perspective of who you’re trying to look at. I figure that it helps and makes the connection stronger.”
“Couldn’t that be dangerous? What if he was tracking a serial killer–”
“Let me stop you right there. Rowan may not be himself but he is the one in control, not the other way around. If there was a problem, he is able to shut the link almost immediately. I’ve witnessed him do it before when we were in Cali. While I may have been a little nervous before, we were chasing after… Well, let’s just say it wasn’t pretty. Anyways, he was going in deep and he had been set off by one of the newbies and was about to throtle the poor boy when he broke the connection and went back to his usually saturnine self.”
“‘Saturnine?’”
“Opposite of ‘mercurial,’ quick tempered.”
“Right…”
Allie pondered this as she watched John focus on an empty parking space nearby. More questions started welling up, the experience she had when she took John’s hand had unnerved her a bit.
“How do you know you’re not an ovate?”
Becca just shrugged.
“I’m just not. Whatever it is that I see, it’s not what an ovate sees. I see the world around me as it is in this reality and nothing else. Ro on the other hand… I can’t even begin to imagine what the world looks like to him.”
“When he was doing a reading, have you ever touched him?”
“Yeah, emotional support and all that. Why?”
“Did you ever see anything when you did it?”
“Huh?”
“I don’t know…”
Becca squinted at her apraisingly, then realization broke on her.
“You have! Haven’t you!?”
“I don’t know… Maybe. I don’t know what it was. I’ve never… I can’t even find the right word to describe it… Did I see it, feel it, experience? The last one is closer, but still, it was only for a split second.”
“Tell me!”
“I don’t know if I can…”
“Damn. I wish you could. I’ve always wondered what it would be like, but I wasn’t gifted like that.”
“You are gifted though. I love the art you make.”
“Thanks, sweetie,” Becca beamed. She pulled Allie in close and gave her a kiss, drawing the attention of a couple of people waiting for the Red Line to come in. “I love the performance art you make in the bedroom.” She winked at the taller woman.
“I swear, you have a one-track mind, little minx.”
“Well, it is the best thing to think about, I find. Almost everything in our society is created from it in one way or another. Even those lonely arbiters of science are so fervent in their craft simply because they tend to give up chasing tail that won’t chase back, then cloyster themselves away in their ivory towers to salve the hurt of crushed egos.”
“I’ll take your word for it. At least I don’t have that problem.”
“What? Not constantly having s*x on the brain or not getting any period?”
“The later. I’ll admit that between the two of you, my apatites in that regard are usually quite sated. Don’t go changing on me, my little nymphomaniac. At least not in that way.”
Allie stuck her hand into Becca’s back pocket as they strolled.
“Don’t worry, beautiful. There’s no danger of that happening. Let’s go check on our boy. He might be done by now.”
After turning about, Becca stuck her hand in Allie’s pocket and gave a playful squeeze, leaving a shy smile on Allie’s lips. John was finished and he was on his way to meet back up with them.
“What’s the virdict, my marvelous mental mutant?” Becca winked at him to show that she was playing.
“Our boy was here alright. He met with someone here and from what I can tell he’s the one we need to find, not some middle man.”
“What do we need to do from here, John?”
“I know we need to track the other man, but I want to look over the other crime scene. I need to know just how he was killed. Going against a person who can kill from a distance is dangerous, especially if they know you’re after them. Right now, we have the advantage. He doesn’t know about us.”
“That makes sense.” Becca absently tapped her toe against the concrete slab.
“Ready to go?” John felt her impatience.
“Maybe,” said Allie.
“What is it?”
“I don’t know yet. Let me wrap my head around it first.”
John raised an eyebrow as he gazed in her eyes. Even though he felt her confusion, he didn’t want to probe just yet… Yet.
“Okay, love. Until then. As for here and now, we need to go. Daylight’s burning and we have only a few more hours before nightfall. I’d like to be done with the scene before dinner.”
“Where were you thinking?”
“You know that little taco joint over by Parkland?”
“Yeah.”
“Been craving that. Not sure why.”
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