Realistic or Modern Orthrus Detective Agency

[KamiKahzy]

Mason was listening to the line intently as Mars had put the call on speaker. He wasn't sure how Mars got his number to Abigail but it was a clever move all the same. Now they had direct communication with the girl herself outside of her mother's knowledge.

Mason was a tad confused when Mars started motioning to his pocket with his hands. Did he want a smoke? Mason couldn't think of anything else useful he had on his person so that was going to be his assumption. Mason pulled out his pack of Marlboro's and offered one of the few remaining sticks to Mars.

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

"How?"

Mars rolled his eyes and mimed lighting the thing. Honestly, what was he supposed to do with an unlit cigarette? "Hmm?"

"How can you help?"

"Well, I'd like to figure out where you went the last few weeks. Your mom was very worried about you. I'm sure if she knew that you were safe and nothing bad happened that she'd feel a lot better."

"Okay. But I really don't remember."

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason's eyes narrowed in frustration. Was he the man's servant now? Smokers lit their own cigs, everyone knew that. Mason WAS willing to hold his lighter for the man, but apparently he had to do everything for him. Mason put the cigarette in his own mouth, lit up, took a particilularly long drag just fo spite Mars, then gingerly offered up the smoking stick to his partner. Several choice monikers flashed through Mason's mind as he did all this.

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

Mars took the cigarette happily, not at all bothered by Lionel's attitude. It wasn't like he planned on sticking the thing in his own mouth.

"That's fine," Mars assured the girl. "Whatever you can think of will help, no matter how little. If you don't mind, I'll hand the phone to my friend now. I don't know if you got to see him, but he was the grumpy-looking fellow that spoke with your mom earlier. He's better at remembering than me, so I think it'd be better if he asked the questions."

"Uh... um... okay."

Mars tossed the phone at Lionel and twirled his hand for the man to take over speaking. Meanwhile, Mars lowered himself back into the hole with the other Abigail.

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason cocked a heavy brow at Mars as he barely caught the phone being lobbed at him. He made his displeasure known by his scowl, but quickly focused his attention back to the phone conversation to make sure Abigail was still on the line. "Uh... Hello? Abigail?"

"Um... Hi?"

"Heh, sorry. Um, my name's Lionel. ...Like the big cat at the zoo." Mason actually heard a tiny giggle on the other end of the line, and despite his distaste for his own name Mason couldn't help the tiny smile that crept up his face. "Yeah, it's kinda funny. So listen, thank you for calling us. That was very brave of you."

"...Thank you."

Mason let that one go, he figured the girl might be scared of any reprimand from her mother if she were caught. Speed would be key here, so he jumped right into what he thought was most important. "So, Abigail, can you remember anything at all from before Mr. Marsh found you? It could be as small as a weird feeling or a sound or even a smell."

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

"Um... I really don't remember. I was just swimming... Daddy said I could..."

The voice on the other end of the line was quiet for a second, and for just a moment even Mars down in the hole turned to look up from whatever he was doing over the body.

"I was in the pool, then I wasn't. I didn't know where I was. I couldn't find my suit. It was scary."

 

[KamiKahzy]

"...I'm sure it was." Mason's heart ached a bit, hearing the anguish in the young girl's voice. But he tried his best to steel himself, he didn't yet know if this Abigail was the real girl or some kind of trick.

Mason trudged on, "Ok, well let's try going back further. Do you remember anything strange from before you went swimming? Did anyone try to talk to you? Or maybe your dad even?" Mason instinctively flinched after he said that last line. He had no idea if bringing up Abigail's father would be a good idea or not given the circumstances.

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

The line was quiet. Mars waited.

"... I don't think so. Daddy was home, but he still had work to do..." It sounded like she might have been close to crying. "I hope daddy's done with work soon. Mommy will be happy once daddy gets home. He can always make her smile ev- Ah!"

The girl on the verge of tears suddenly let out a surprised sound. It seemed like she'd dropped the phone, too.


"Well then... it seems like that really is Abigail Jameson," Mars said with a satisfied smile. In one hand he held the glowing cigarette. In the other rested the open palm of the corpse, with a fresh mark there where he'd pressed the hot cigarette against the cold flesh.

If it was possible to curse a person with just a little of their blood or hair, it stood to reason that having their whole corpse to work with would do the job just as well. Though if this was Abigail, and that was also Abigail... nope, he still didn't see the easy answer to this situation. Which only left the uneasy answers. Perhaps it would be better if he sent Lionel back and worked this case solo...

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason was taken aback when he heard Abigail's shriek on the phone. He looked to Mars to see the cigarette in one hand and the burn on the slightly moistened hand of Abigail's corpse. His brain made an assumption he wasn't quite ready to believe. "Is... Did you... And she..." Mason went back to the phone lightning fast and, in an amazing show of self control, managed to speak like nothing had happened. He was perfectly calm and inflected the right amount of concern one might expect from a casual conversation. "Hello, Abigail? Are you ok? Did something happen?"

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

There was only indistinct sounds on the other end of the line, followed by the call ending. Abigail must have hung up the phone.

Mars pulled himself up to sit on the edge of the hole. "Well I don't know about you, but I found that quite informative." He put out the cigarette in the cold dirt.

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason locked the phone and handed it back to Mars, himself staring off into the distance. He started to speak his thoughts aloud as he absentmindedly began to fiddle with his zippo lighter. "...So if I'm reading the room right, Abigail felt you put that cigarette out in the corpse's hand. Devil's advocate would say there's no way to prove that's what actually happened, but unless her mom found her at the exact right moment I'm hard pressed to find any other explanation. Which means that the girl at the house and this corpse are, at a minimum, connected."

Mason clicked open his zippo and watched the fire dance and sway, smelling the acrid fluid as it slowly burned. "...That still leaves the big question of 'how', though. And we could speculate about that all night, but the truth is that we don't have enough clues here." Mason snapped the zippo shut, extinguishing the tiny flame in a flash. He then grabbed the shovel and stood next to the dirt pile, looking at Mars. "Unless you can think of something else useful we can glean from this place then I say we clean up and call it a night. Before somebody catches us graverobbing, as it were."

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

"You're close. Five points to Hufflepuff." Mars held his hand out over the corpse. "I did a little trick I learned from an evil witch to make a curse doll out of the body. A little girl fetish if you would." Mars bust out laughing at his own black humor, almost falling back into the hole on top of the poor corpse in the process. It took him a second to rein himself back to continue. "Ahem..." He chuckled again before snapping back to semi-serious.

"A curse doll should only work on one person, the owner of whatever parts are used to make it. A little hair or fingernails is the standard, but I thought, 'Screw it, I got a whole dead girl right here, might as well use the whole thing!' If Abigail there felt pain from Abigail here, then it means the body here and the body there are the same. A blood curse wouldn't make a little mistake like going after a secret twin or doppelganger. Biologically and spiritually, these two girls are identical."

"Sure, we could rebury this doll, but who knows what effect that would have on the living Abigail. Left linked to a rotting corpse, the living Abigail's body might start falling apart thinking it's damage to the 'doll.' Thankfully, the method of defusing a cursed doll is simple, and something that should always be your first approach to any unwanted unnatural object!" Mars reached inside his coat and pulled out a flask, which he promptly unscrewed the cap of and dumped the contents of over the body.

"Good old holy water. Universally useful against uppity spirits, demons, cursed objects, and thirst in a pinch. In the future always carry some on you. I can introduce you to a priest I know. He's an annoying jackass, but he's one of the few Bible-thumpers in town still willing to take my blood money, so try to stay on his good side, yeah?"

"Unless you're planning on pulling out something fun like you're actually a necromancer, I don't think we'll get anything else from this girl. Not tonight at least." He swung his leg and kicked the casket's lid shut with a slam.

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason was upset. He was upset with being left with more questions than answers. He was upset that he was stuck out here, forced to listen to the indulgences of a man who, by all accounts, was an unapologetic asshole. But he was mostly upset by the fact that there was nothing he could really do about it. He needed money, and Mars had paid up front for more than his fair share of time with whatever insane venture he dared to bring him in on. So here he was, back to working for a shitty boss for the umpteenth time in his life. Somehow he fooled himself into thinking it was okay to hope for better prospects. Not in his lifetime, it would seem.

Without a word, but with his distaste clearly evident on his face, Mason started burying the casket once again. The one joy he allowed himself was with the first scoop, which he deliberately tossed into the hole to dirty Mars' white pants and shoes. Or, at least, more than they already were from mucking about in the loam.

It was petty, but sometimes that's all one could hope to get in this world.

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

Mars watched Lionel work for a bit before deciding to take a stroll down the line of dead names carved into stone. Normally Mars assumed that when a person was in a bad mood, he was the root cause, but in this case it seemed more likely that a bad mood was an integral keystone of Lionel's personality. He struck Mars as the type of person in desperate need of a hobby, or a prostitute. Or ten. Mars grinned and filed the idea away for closer to little Leo's birthday. If the man hadn't loosened up some by then, he deserved whatever drastic measures Mars forced upon him.

Mars covered a long drawn-out yawn. He'd spent most of the nights this week in graveyards, and his body was already reacting to the dimming light. No, I will not be sleeping here! Don't even think about falling asleep you useless body! Mars punched the side of his head to wake himself up. He should have expected that two days wasn't long enough to make up for a week without rest, but he was stubborn and impatient. And it had been a case involving a kid...

When he'd initially seen the case, Mars had guessed either necromancy or a deal with a demon. The father had stumbled upon a way of reviving the dead and traded his life for his daughter's, or he'd done the same but taking the shortcut of having a demon do it. It really didn't make any difference from an outside perspective, and Mr. Jameson would be the only one to notice the extra price that came with dealing with a demon. Mars didn't think it was either of those at this point, but if it had been, then investigating the truth of what had happened here meant condemning a child, either back to death or a worse fate depending on the contents of whatever contract her father would have no doubt failed to read closely. Mars had wanted to see what Lionel's reaction to such a scenario would be. No quiz, not a hypothetical he could dismiss with hollow bravado, all the real weight of free will in his hands. That was what Mars had wanted to see here.

Instead this case had become a bit of a headache. Necromancy that didn't need the corpse... A demon that left none of the telltale signs anywhere... Mars really hoped that the little voice in the back of his head was wrong about what he might be dealing with. But why had the father needed to die if that was the case? Had he just been in the wrong place at the wrong time? There had to be some reason, right? Strange...

Mars returned to Lionel after a while. "Will you be returning into the city? Whenever possible I like to avoid multiple long drives in one day, so I plan to find a motel nearby. You're free to do as you wish."

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason tamped down the last of the earth with a few gentle pats, more gentle than he had planned. He had to be careful, this whole thing was reminding him too much of her... 'Just put it away Mason, like you always did on the job.' Even as he said it to himself Mason didn't believe the lie. If he could compartmentalize properly he wouldn't have been kicked out of the force in the first place.

Mason shouldered the dirty shovel and popped one of his last cigs into his mouth one handed, lit it one handed, then began to puff on the smoke. He looked up towards the stars in thought for a second, then dropped his head to Mars and replied, "Nah, you've got the right idea. Plus you paid me enough so it only makes sense to stay near the investigation." Mason decided to lead the way towards the road, where Mars had somehow managed to convince their cabby to stay. If Mars had no other magic besides getting cabbies to cooperate, Mason would consider him a miracle worker.

As they walked, Mason mentioned rather nonchalantly, "Might as well get rooms at the same place, saves us the trouble of having to find each other in the morning." Mason quickly held up one of the fingers holding the shovel towards Mars in order to cut him off. "And unless you wanna spend the night listening to me masturbate, don't even think about rooming with me."

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

Mars' response to Lionel's threat was his trademark mocking smile. "As you wish."

It didn't take long for the cab driver to drop the pair off at a small motel situated just outside the north side end of town. Sunrise Motel. Mars had asked for it by name. The cabbie had asked if he'd be needed tomorrow, sounding almost desperate about it - I must have paid him too much, Mars thought - and after initially saying no, Mars changed his mind and told the man he could come at noon tomorrow.

Mars found the motel to be rather plain. And he couldn't have been more pleased with that. He'd stayed in many motels, hotels, and inns, and if plain was the word that came to mind entering this one, it was already worthy of receiving a five-star review. Temporary lodgings averaged at filthy, with many sitting comfortably down at uninhabitable.

"It looks like I'll actually be able to get a good night's sleep after all!" Mars smiled wide at Lionel on their way to the rooms. "This place looks like they even change the bedsheets between visitors! That is a rare treat, let me tell you! I have horror stories I could tell you about the places I've stayed at. One place had bedbugs so bad I ended up lighting my own bed on fire just to get some peace without them all climbing and biting and stinging for five minutes. People in charge there didn't like me that much in the morning. Ah, here's your room."

Mars walked right into Lionel's room and looked around, even taking out a spyglass from his pocket and inspecting the room for any tampering before they'd arrived. He tapped the window and muttered a few words, a simple alarm spell should something break in through the window. "Looks clear," he said, slipping the spyglass back into his pocket. "Just don't go repeating any names into the bathroom mirror if you know what's good for you. Get some sleep Leo." He waved and slipped out and into his own room just next door.

As much as Mars' body wanted to just fall onto the mattress and cease functioning until morning, Mars was on a job, so there was still work to do. He pulled a small black notebook from the inner pocked of his coat and found a pen inside a drawer in the room.

On the investigation regarding A J​

​

Pre-investigation assumptions: ​

141 Case N involving the father​

141 Case D-R involving the father, possibly with a Case of D-P as a result​

​

First day investigation:​

Spoke with the mother. She seems to know nothing regarding the daughter or father.​

No signs of D-I within the home.​

No signs of N-Z or rot within the home.​

No useful information in the father yet.​

Was able to speak with A J. Claims no memories of missing time.​

Spoke with individual that first found A J. A J was naked when found. A J appears to have been walking from NW.​

Opened A J Bbox. B inside, in expected state. Case N seems unlikely. No signs of D-I around B, but cannot rule out yet.​

No watcher was present at site C. No presence at C at all.​

Confirmed that B in Bbox and current A J are the same.​

Mars read over his notes for the day with tired eyes. Necromancy... demons... missing ghosts... two bodies... He yawned. In the morning he'd have to investigate the father some more. Check in on the body, and check the place it was found. If his hunch was right... Mars yawned again, and managed to reach the clean-enough top of the bed before his body forced him to sleep.

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason let out a long, loud sigh as soon as Mars had left the room. He dropped the shovel unceremoniously to his side and began rubbing his face, hoping to massage away even a modicum of the stress he'd accumulated over the past 48 hours. Too many things were running through his head right now. The damn Chinese poison incident from yesterday, digging up a dead girl's corpse today, practically all of Mars' bullshit. But most of all, he couldn't stop thinking about her.

Mason dragged his hands down and scowled out from between his fingers. He was an adult, he was supposed to be over this by now. That whole 'pain button' analogy should have kicked in, but as far as he could tell his trigger ball was still about as big as the day it happened. 'She's gonna be ok,' Mason told himself robotically. 'She's getting better, day by day.' It was the only thing he could cling to at times like this, and in spite of his cynicism Mason did start to feel a little better after spouting his mantra. So he mechanically began to strip down and allowed himself a long shower to wash away the grime and ghosts of the day. It was a simple comfort that did more good than he expected. Mason toweled off and hit the bed like a sack of bricks, his consciousness turning off even as he fell.

--------------------------

The next day Mason was up at his usual time of 6AM, cleaning himself with the motel's meager offering of complimentary toiletries. The continental was nothing to write home about either, but the muffins looked moist so Mason snagged one along with a banana and a glass of OJ. Mason idly watched the news play on a tiny TV bolted to the wall, seeing nothing of significance from either the anchors or the tickers sliding across the bottom of the screen. There was a gentleman at the counter bar who looked like a trucker enjoying his own breakfast of eggs and coffee, and a young woman dressed in very matronly woolen shawls sipping what looked like tea and reading a book while making notes in a leather-bound journal. Mason guessed she was a college student either enjoying a vacation or working on some kind of study project. A wandering poet or similar creative could also be likely, especially with New York City acting as a hub for such types.

Mason took a bit longer to finish his breakfast than he normally would, just to give Mars time to catch up. But when it was getting close to 6:45 Mason decided it might be best to check in on his new partner. Mason walked up to Mars' door and knocked loudly, but only three times out of courtesy. "Yo Mars, you up?" No response. Mason waited with his ear slightly cocked towards the door to see if he could hear some sign of movement from inside. Nearly a minute passed before Mason tried pounding on the door again, this time with enough force that he was sure would wake even his old Marine buddies from their post-patrol sleep comas. "Mars! Turn to, slack-ass! We've got work to do!" Mason channeled a bit of his old sergeant's energy with that one. The crusty old bastard ate nails for breakfast as far as Mason was concerned.

And yet, still no response. Mason waited a few extra moments just to make sure he hadn't shouted over Mars startling out of bed and hitting the floor, and when he was convinced that wasn't the case he checked his phone to see if Mars had left any messages. Not a one. Mason pocketed the phone and folded his arms, tapping his foot as he pondered his options. His phone said the time was getting close to 7, and at this rate they were burning daylight. A case lived or died in the first few days of investigation, and since they were already late to the party their chances of solving anything were statistically slim. A few seconds of thought was all Mason needed to conclude that they couldn't afford to wait for anything. Mason pulled out his phone again and left Mars a quick text. "Went out solo, wake up earlier next time. Gonna follow Abigail's trail back from point of contact with Marsh."

And with that Mason was off. He walked towards the front entrance with purpose and was about to pass his own room when he stopped mid-step. He looked towards it, sucked on his teeth in thought, then shook his head and went inside. A moment later he emerged with the shovel slung over his shoulder, cleaned of grave dirt after a quick rinse in the shower. Mason got a strange look from the trucker at the bar as he was paying his bill, but otherwise the concierge just nodded towards him and thanked him for his stay. Mason nodded back and went outside, pulling up the number for a local cab company since their ride from yesterday wasn't due for another five hours.

--------------------------

The drive to the road in question was surprisingly short, barely a half hour from the motel. Mason had to be more specific with his directions, but thankfully his cabby wasn't the chatty type so there were no problems outside of a confused glance. When Mason arrived he thanked the cabby and paid him a few bucks extra for the trouble, then waited and watched until the cab had driven out of sight. Once Mason was satisfied he started walking in the direction he and Mars had guessed Abigail had wandered from. He took it slow and careful, keeping an eye out for any kind of details that seemed out of place to him. But most importantly he reached into his jacket and pulled out a metal pocket watch. He opened the clasp and glanced down at the face, which held not numbers but rather mystical symbols. Alchemical, he'd been told at the station. The NYPD's Paranormal Affairs Division wasn't exactly a well funded branch of the department, but they were given some toys for safety reasons. It couldn't pick up everything, but for the most part this 'watch' would let Mason know if there was anything paranormal nearby.

So Mason continued his walk, carefully glancing between the road, the tree line, and his watch for any indications of something that didn't belong.

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

Nothing in particular stood out as Mason walked. There was very little traffic here on the outer edge of town, so it was possible Abigail had walked a while before Randy Marsh had spotted her. But Mason hadn't been walking long when his 'watch' picked something up. The reaction was more than a little odd though. The needle almost seemed like it swung around uncertain between a few different symbols before finally settling on the topmost symbol that simply indicated 'other', some being or force not covered by the 11 other symbols. Just as usual, the symbol should have glowed to indicate the strength of the thing it had picked up, but the symbol wasn't glowing at all despite the needle having finally settled.

Nothing in Mason's immediate surroundings stood out as unusual. The only slight difference about this section of road compared to the rest of the road he'd been walking down was the brook that passed under the road here.

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason stopped when he saw his watch react. He was close enough to open woods that he was half expecting some false readings from the residual energies of the forest, but he figured the asphalt road would mostly cancel that out. However when he eventually saw the needle shoot straight up and stay there unmoving, even after he tried taking a few steps back for confirmation, he knew that something was likely around. Mason took a closer look at his surroundings to see what might have set off the dial, but the only thing he could really notice was the shallow brook below the road.

It could be nothing. In fact, with how little the symbol was glowing, Mason was inclined to believe it was just some weird hiccup with the device. It wasn't exactly a highly prized artifact, just some mass-produced tool that the department had ordered wholesale from various 'government approved' artificers. But he didn't have the luxury of being dismissive. They were grasping at threads and he had to make every attempt to suss out the right one.

So Mason clutched the watch tightly while he navigated his way down the steep hillside that led from the road to the brook. Once down there he peered towards the tunnel where the brook flowed under the road. Even in the morning light it was still very shadowed, so he pulled out his flashlight and began to walk closer. Mason kept flipping his eyes between his watch and the tunnel to see if anything changed.

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason couldn't see anything directly, even with his flashlight. And the watch wasn't reacting anymore than it had before. Mason crouched right next to the opening and stared down it, seeing the light where the far side of the road ended. He sighed a bit to himself, then stuck the shovel into the dirt and got down low so he could start crawling inside. This was one of the last things he wanted to do, but if there was even a hint of something inside he had to check it out. You didn't get far as an investigator without being thorough.

 

[KamiKahzy]

A somewhat soaked and somewhat aggravated Mason climbed back out of the tunnel after he was sufficiently convinced that he had made a dumb assumption. He could already hear the ridicule in Mars' voice, deriding him for thinking that the tunnel had anything to do with Abigail's case. He probably would have started calling him 'Alice' for his trouble.

Mason stood up and tried vainly to brush some of the mud and filth from his slacks. It didn't help the sting of his failed thought, but at least he looked less slovenly. Looking around Mason saw the brook and allowed his eyes to follow its flow. "Going downstream would take me to another river, and eventually the ocean. No sense in that." Mason's eyes followed the brook's path back upstream instead, where it wound lazily into the woods beyond. "Back to the source? ...Yeah, that sounds right." There were two drownings already. The presence of water was what got Mason suspicious in the first place. He probably should have followed that initial reaction first instead of crawling into a road tunnel. But... Eh, he could self analyze later. He had a stream to chase.

The walk took much, MUCH longer than Mason was expecting. The area wasn't exactly mountainous, but there were plenty enough steep hills that Mason figured the source wouldn't have been too far into the brush. But it took over an hour of chasing bends and trekking overland before Mason saw any signs he was making progress. He almost thought he had something when he spotted a small waterfall with white flowers growing nearby, but his watch hadn't reacted so he kept moving.

At the end of that hour Mason's watch started to react a bit more. The needle still stayed at the 'other' symbol but it was now glowing brighter than it had. "Finally," Mason thought to himself as he trudged onwards. After cresting a low hill Mason was met with the broadest section of the river yet, and his eyes followed it further north where it spilled out of the side of a relatively small lake. In fact it was concerningly small for the amount of water it appeared to produce. Mason's watch was now glowing steadily, and because of that he was convinced that this place was where Abigail had came from.

True to his cautious nature, Mason un-holstered his pistol and slowly began advancing on the lake. He was sighted down the gun but he had it paired next to the shovel. It might be a simple tool but it was hefty and had reach, which was fairly good for an improvised weapon. Mason only hoped he wouldn't have a need to use either weapon as the lake steadily grew closer and closer to the investigator.

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

He heard a voice, but it was muffled and distant. He didn't understand what the voice wanted. The voice came again, a command this time. He ignored it. Why should he obey an unfamiliar voice...

It felt like he was lying down somewhere windy and cold. Flakes of ice caught in his white hair. He felt a warm hand brush the snow away, and finally he opened his eyes.

There was sunlight coming in through the motel room's window. Mars groaned. What time was it? He checked his phone. Half-past eight. He groaned again. Someone had left him a text. That was strange. No one able to contact him would bother leaving a message for him. It was from Lionel. Mars groaned a third time, putting extra exasperation into this one.

Went out solo, wake up earlier next time. Gonna follow Abigail's trail back from point of contact with Marsh.

Why though? Mars cheated by using magic to refresh his day-old and slept-in clothes, just a simple spell to erase smell and some hot air to flatten the wrinkles. It would be faster to start the search in the place she most likely came from. Mars pulled out the map he'd definitely paid for yesterday and found the point where Abigail was found. His finger trailed over to a thin blue line marked on the paper crossing the road right near there. The blue line snaked to the northeast for a ways before turning from a little blue line to a little blue circle. Lake Havring. The lake on the map was already circled in black ink as one of the key locations related to this case. It was where William Jameson had drowned. Mars had planned on checking in on the father's corpse before approaching the place he'd died, but if Lionel wanted to do things on his own so be it.

Mars typed and sent a response:

Have fun
Try not to fall in

Lionel was just a tagalong at this point. If he got himself into trouble, Mars was under no obligation to lift a finger to help. In fact, he might stop by the convenience store again to pick of a bag of popcorn just in case. But first, coffee.


Lake Havring wasn't anything impressive, only a few hundred feet across and surrounded on most sides by trees. There was a road that cut through the forest heading north from the town and running along the western edge of the lake, and a small rocky area had been cleared of trees there so that vehicles could pull off and park to allow for fishing. The lake wasn't stocked regularly, but some fish could still be caught given some luck and patience. There was a blue Jeep parked there, with a small camping trailer behind it. A woman, presumably the owner of the vehicle, was sitting in a folding chair next to the water, an unattended fishing pole stuck between two rocks while she took a nap. A hat was covering her face, but her hair and clothes were wet, like she'd been swimming and had thrown on clothes after without bothering to dry off.

 

[KamiKahzy]

Mason hadn't noticed the vehicle at first thanks to a copse of trees obscuring his vision. As soon as he saw the car his eyes darted around for a possible owner, eventually landing on the woman lounging next to the fishing rod. Mason sighed and holstered his gun, then looked around and found a reasonably sized tree to lean the shovel up against. A random dude coming out of the woods dressed in casual work clothes was weird enough, but if that dude had a shovel in tow it would just raise too many questions.

Mason glanced around the area as he casually made his way over to the woman. His head was on a lazy swivel just to make sure he wasn't missing any details, but the fact that she was out here relaxing told him that there probably wasn't any immediate threats to be concerned about. When he was about 10 feet away Mason casually pulled out his watch and checked the face as a force of habit, just to see if perhaps she was paranormal in some way. The 'other' symbol was glowing a tad brighter now, but he couldn't tell if it was coming from her or his proximity to the lake. Maybe even the jeep if he was being pragmatic. Regardless, he resolved to be a bit more cautious in case something was different about her.

Mason called out politely when he was a respectable distance away, so as not to startle the woman too much. "Pardon me, miss? Sorry to disturb you but I'm a private investigator looking into the death of William Jameson." As soon as Mason said that a light bulb went off in his head and he instantly wanted to smack his face into the nearest oak. This was the lake where William had drowned in the first place. If he'd remembered that he could have just sought out this lake from the get go instead of following a measly crick for clues.

Mason did his level best to keep the color out of his cheeks by clearing his throat softly and turning his attention back to the woman. "Uh... yes. Would it be alright if I asked you a few questions?"

 

[OverconfidentMagi]

The woman didn't react right away, she may have been sound asleep. But no, after a sigh came out from under the hat resting atop the woman's face her arm rose to push it aside so she might see what kind of person was interrupting her highly attentive fishing. A dark blue-green eye stared sideways at Lionel. The woman made no effort to cover up the fact that she considered a strange man coming wandering out of the woods just to badger her with questions was something she found more irritating than unusual or interesting. She let out another annoyed sigh and finished pushing her hat up over her dripping-wet black hair. Now that her freckled face was visible, the full picture of the woman somehow only became more unclear. Even an ex-cop used to profiling people at a glance would have trouble pinning down a guess for how old the woman might be. She could have passed for anywhere between just shy of 30s to just shy of retirement and it would be hard to say either guess was unreasonable.

The woman ignored Lionel's question. She seemed like one of those people that did things at their own pace, much to the annoyance of those who cared about getting a timely response. The woman retrieved her pole from the rocks she'd stuck it between and took her time reeling in the line. There was no resistance, and she seemed neither surprised nor particularly upset about the empty hook at the other end. She pulled a small tacklebox out from under her chair and tossed into it the lure she'd had on the line - something gold and blue that seemed too large for any fish one might find in this body of water - and then began rummaging through the box for a different lure to put on.

"Well?" The woman wasn't even looking Lionel's way when she finally acknowledged he was there. "You didn't seem to have a problem bothering me with your first question, what seems to be your problem getting the rest out? Ask away or go away."