Mystery and Next Steps
San Francisco, 1st Crime Scene, Late Evening of the Day of Landing
Upon activating her Detect Magic Spell, Lumina quickly spotted some sort of magical energy emanating from the tree. Getting closer, she could sense that the energy was a connection to… somewhere, shrouded in darkness. There was not much more she could glean with her current spell, but she had the idea of using another spell to see what was on the other side of that connection. However, she wouldn’t be able to maintain concentration on both spells, so she performed a sweep of the area first, and after finding nothing else, she shook off Detect Magic and prepared Clairvoyance. She pulled a rather expensive glass marble from her bag, consulted her spellbook, and then for about the next ten minutes, she uttered a string of incantations while carefully monitoring her motions. As she did so, the marble transformed into a small orb of energy, which, once the process was complete, she wafted the now invisible orb toward the energy emanating from the trees. She gasped as the ball was taken by the energy. Peering through the orb, she could see and sense a swampy landscape, somewhere across the country. The structures she could see did not appear old, but the style was antiquated, as if they had been built prior to the Great War. Lumina’s gut twisted as she realized that the connection led not just to somewhere else, but some-when else. She could not maintain the spell for long. She was suddenly bombarded by foreign sensations she could scarcely comprehend. Before she could make sense of it all, she was booted out of the spell. She found herself standing, dazed, recalling only a few details from the confounding experience. A swamp, somewhere in Florida, a century prior, and an impression etched in her mind that this all had something to do with the Warren Family. After trying and failing to remember more, Lumina recalled that the name of the victim who had passed away nearby was Olivia Warren. What connection did she have with this place in Florida? And why was this anomaly here where she perished?
“I think the second scene is going to be a bust like this one was. Too many days have passed and too many disturbances. We’re more likely to get more false positives than anything else anyway.”
It took a moment for Lumina to realize that Corinth was talking to her as she came out of her trance. He seemed to notice her distress, and asked rhetorically, “You find anything with your magic?”
Lumina relayed to him what had transpired. He was just as puzzled as she was by the development, and they briefly discussed the possibility of entering through the connection themselves, only to come to the conclusion that even if it was possible, there was no guarantee that they would survive the journey, let alone be able to safely get back. For now, this lead was mostly a bust, but perhaps something could be gleaned from digging into Olivia’s history and ancestry.
Deciding to call it a night, Lumina drove their sexy red Nissan Maxima back to the Stanyan Park Hotel. She was exhausted, and she felt like a zombie as she and Corinth trudged toward their rooms. Following a friendly hit to her shoulder, Corinth instructed her to visit his room once she was up and about. She went into her room as he went into his.
Lumina contemplated trying to do some more reading into Ley Lines from the tomes she borrowed, or perhaps seeing if there was anything that would shine light on the nature of the anomaly she had found at the crime scene, but she realized she was too tired to make sense of those arcane volumes. Instead, she changed into bed clothes, turned on a light across the room to act as night light, set her alarm for seven, and collapsed into her bed. Sleep came quickly.
San Francisco, Stanyan Park Hotel, Morning of the Day After Landing
Lumina hit the snooze button quite a few times as she struggled to wake up. Eventually she flicked the TV onto a news station to help herself get moving. She bolted up as she saw the story making headlines. A student had apparently been stung to death reportedly by bees inside his apartment last night. It didn’t take a genius to realize how unusual this was. Her gut told her that this was another scene worth adding to their investigation. She thought about going straight to Corinth’s room to discuss the development, but then she realized that she might miss out on her only chance to get in a much-needed shower. Lumina decided to text Corinth first, only to realize that she had never actually gotten his number. She would have to remedy that. Okay, she’d take a quick shower, and then…
Lumina did not take quick showers. Ever. She had tried many times after getting out of bed too late to take a quick shower, but she very rarely succeeded. She did not succeed today. Lumina just had too much on her mind. Olivia Warren, killed by needles near some magical anomaly with a mysterious connection to her family in a Florida swamp a hundred years ago. Another boy, Turner Kramer, killed by bees in an environment with no known infestation. A spooky asian girl on the plane with potential magical capabilities. Working with a partner, Corinth Whitethorn, a veteran monster hunter and total badass. Being back in the field after one of the worst experiences of her young life. Thoughts related to all these things and more floated through her head in no particularly productive order as her hands became wrinkly and time passed by her. It almost was quarter till nine by the time she got out of the shower, and she still had to do her hair and makeup.
It was a little after 9:20 when Lumina was dressed (in her usual jeans, blouse, and hoodie), packed, and at Corinth’s door. She rapped on his door and waited for a response. After waiting a minute, she was about to knock again when she heard running water. At least he didn’t get breakfast without her. Deciding to give him more time to clean up, Lumina went back to her room and reviewed her spell book, contemplating which spells she might need to use for the day. As she was reviewing her known spells, she found herself looking at the Speak with Dead spell, and a shiver went down her spine. If all other avenues of information dried up, Olivia, Gail, and now Turner could point them in the right direction. In fact, a trip to the morgue sooner rather than later could be highly beneficial to get on the correct track before the other Societies mobilized their forces. But first they needed to figure out the right questions to ask, as they would only get one shot at interviewing the dead.
She packed her spellbook back in her bag and returned to Corinth’s door and knocked again. Lumina was astonished when a shirtless Corinth cast the door open and leaned on the frame, and she couldn’t help but let her eyes be drawn toward the vicious scar across his chest. He had pretty nice abs and pecs too…
“I’m finishing up. Be ready in a minute. Come in.”
As he turned around, she saw that further scars and impressions marred his back. Corinth had definitely been through some shit. Lumina had her own scars too, but most of hers had been acquired quite recently, and she was much less eager to let them be seen as Corinth seemed to be.
Lumina quickly mentioned the news she had seen to him as Corinth resumed getting dressed.
“We may need to approach this from a different angle. If scene one and two have been scrubbed already, what are the odds that scene three is the same? What was three? A university? For all we know, the university has already given another student the room. Do you have any ideas?”
Lumina sensed that Corinth was a little discouraged, which she was used to feeling at this stage of an investigation. “I mean, I’m sure the university is looking to fill that room, although I personally would be hesitant to take a room in which someone just got killed by bees, but I suppose if they offered a low enough price for that sweet on-campus housing…”
She paused as she watched Corinth expertly handle his weapons as he checked and holstered his armory of pistols. Lumina didn’t even see where he had gotten those second two pistols from.
“So whatcha got? You can tell while we go grab breakfast.”
As they made their way to the hotel’s complimentary breakfast, Lumina continued, “All joking aside, the place has certainly been swept by the first responders and mundane investigators, but we don’t know how close the Illuminati are to this yet. My boss thought they were most likely all over it, but again, we don’t know that yet. I think it would be worth the effort to see what we can find. At the least, we can hopefully find out a little bit about Turner Kramer, which may be pertinent because, well…”
Lumina then told Corinth about her idea about visiting the morgue to interview the victims, and she also told him about the roughly five question limit to the at spell. Once both of them had grabbed food from the breakfast bar, she continued, “Learning as much as we can about our victims through other means can save us questions and time which we can use to learn other details. Also, we should probably wait until Turner is done being reviewed by the Coroner, after which he should hopefully be admitted to the morgue, at which point I can interview all three of our victims in one visit. But yeah, I’m thinking we hit the university first, figure out as much as we can about Turner, and perhaps get eyes on what the other Secret Societies are throwing at this mess at the same time, and then we evaluate where to go next from there.”