Over So Soon?
San Francisco, Stanyan Park Hotel, Night after Kramer’s First Death
Lumina hadn’t been too hungry after the stomach churning ordeal she had been through in the morgue, but by the time they got to the bar, that had changed a bit. Corinth again offered to pay for the meal (Lumina really was saving on expenses by hanging around the man; even in the twenty-first century, certain aspects of chivalry weren’t yet dead) and alcohol. Lumina ordered a club sandwich and a Stella, and she made herself comfortable as she listened to Corinth’s theories regarding the case. She had gotten a refill and was almost halfway down again when Corinth got a call from his handler.
Lumina took that time to nibble on her sandwich as she considered her own opinions on the monster hunter’s theories so far. His belief that the Halliwell Sisters were not all bees was most likely on the money, for the reason he listed, and it was likely that much if not most of their magic instead came from the ley lines at the house, however, there considerably more sources of magic than just ley lines and Gaia’s Bees in the world. Magic could be granted, taken, or bargained from supernatural entities (people liked to think the Devil was a popular choice for this, but in truth a warlock or witch had many options they’d probably prefer to go to before they resorted to reaching out to Hell Dimension entities) or drawn from magical artifacts, and that wasn’t even getting into blood sacrifices. Not that she seriously suspected that the Halliwell Sisters were sacrificing people for magical power, but maybe the family had gotten their power from other sources before they settled in the Manor.
She also didn’t quite get where Corinth was going with his conclusion that one of the Sisters dying and then being replaced by a half-sister critically disrupted some sort of magical equilibrium, but Lumina supposed there had to be some sort of explanation for why the sisters weren’t living in their nice, if dilapidated, manor in the heart of San Francisco. Lumina wondered if any of the sisters were still hanging around the city elsewhere…
Then Corinth dropped the news. He was skipping town. Apparently one of his other jobs was blowing up. Any thoughts she had of contesting points of Corinth’s theory left her mind as Lumina reconsidered her plans for the week in light of this development. Hypothetically she could still continue the investigation on her own, but it would take longer, and if Corinth’s point about them being days behind the other societies was true, then continuing the investigation at a slower pace could likely be an exercise in futility. It also wasn’t only her call to make. Owen also had a say in whether or not she should continue the investigation alone, especially when he was the one who wanted her to work with somebody else here in the first place.
The meal ended in silence as Corinth paid the bill (she’d also miss that), and she followed him as they made their way to their rooms.
“You did good today, Jennifer.”
Lumina smiled. “Thanks, it was fun to watch you get us into places, crack a cipher, and stab a zombie too.”
Her second shower that day was as long if not longer than her first. There was certainly weirdness to this case, with many disparate findings that didn’t seem to fit together at all. Why was a magical killer attacking people right after they saw the mothman? Why did Turner write a coded message about the Halliwell Sisters? Why did the Sisters have that book, The End Rite, that showed visions about a bunch of seemingly random things, happen to be in the basement? And why did those visions potentially include scenes of the magical killer and the Florida swamp that Lumina and apparently Olivia had seen at the twisted trees at the site of Olivia’s death? Lumina’s gut told her there was a connection to all this, but what it was she did not know, nor did she have any ideas at the moment as to how she could go about finding that connection.
But even more concerning was, “So what?” With Corinth leaving, was the investigation just going to end? What was going to happen with all the details they had worked to discover? Had the other Societies found all this out already? Did they already know about the Florida swamp and the magical killer? Lumina and Corinth would no doubt report everything they had discovered to the Templars, but what would they do with all this?
In the end, the one thing she knew was that she wasn’t going to find the answers to these questions in the shower. After drying off and brushing her teeth, Lumina changed into loose fitting sweatpants and a T-shirt and considered her next course of action. She probably should write up a synopsis of the day’s events to prepare for Owen tomorrow morning, or she could read more into the tomes she had taken about ley lines.
Or she could go see Corinth since there was a good chance that he was leaving early in the morning and she might not get a decent opportunity to talk to him again after this.
Lumina decided to go with the later option, and found herself checking the mirror. What did she care what she looked like at this hour? Corinth didn’t seem like the type of person who expected a woman to always be looking best around him, and it wasn’t like she was trying to impress him or anything. Well, she was trying to impress him professionally, and considering the unsolicited compliment he had given her, she felt like she had done all right at that. But surely Corinth wouldn’t think less of her professional performance if…
Why do I have to overthink everything?
Before she gave herself the chance to further paralyze herself, Lumina marched out the door (after making sure she had her key card), no shoes, no makeup, and her hair down and still rather damp, and marched over to Corinth's room and knocked.