Claimed by a Goo Girl Ch. 02

It took me a second for my brain to kick into gear and when it did there was one question burning in my mind.

"How in the blazes did you find me?" I question, suspicion growing.

"It's kinda my family's thing. Finding things that is. Our heritage, passed down from generation to generation in an unbroken line running four hundred years, back to the sundering and creation of the Veil. The official title for what we do is dowsing, but everyone just calls us bloodhounds."

"That's pretty cool. My middle school mascot was the jackrabbits. Not sure how that's relevant, but there it is anyway."

He stared at me incredulously. "It's meant as an insult. Like we're nothing better than common dogs sent to hunt things down for our 'masters'."

"That's your frame of reference. To me, bloodhounds are awesome ass creatures that can hunt down fugitives with uncanny accuracy, and in one animated instance drive me to tears with a tragic story. RIP Copper. Or was it Todd...? I never could keep them straight. What was I talking about again? Framing! That's right. People are only able to bother us when we let them in, when we let them decide the frames with which we view ourselves. Does that make any sense?"

"A little," he said his face scrunched up in concentration.

"It shouldn't. At least ninety percent of what I just said was bullshit, and the other ten percent was self importance. That's something you should know if you hang around me. I come with very little filter and a healthy dose of sarcasm."

He contemplated my sanity for a moment before letting out a measured chuckle.

"I think we're gonna get along just fine, Jonas."

"Seeing as how I'm new and all I'm gonna assume that you won't take offense at any potentially impertinent questions." He indicated I could go on with an inclination of his head. "Good. So," I said, leaning forward onto my knees, growing a scosche more serious. "How does the magic thing work? My instincts says it's a far cry from the whole Harry Potter 'swish and flick' thing."

"For the most part you are correct but there are certainly a wide assortment of tools utilized by various factions in a large array of methods. The only paranormal ability I'm intimately familiar with is my families." Reaching into his pocket he pulled out the engraved cast iron rods that had greeted me at the door when I first met him. Handing them to me, their weight surprised me, and I hefted them in my hands for a second before examining them more closely. Gold filigree was worked into delicate runes that curled into one another across all nine inches that bent ninety degrees as the ran into unadorned handles, unique in their spiral design. The two rods were mirror images of each other, one set of symbols reflected perfectly onto the other. After I was done looking at them I handed them back to Mikey, who then started talking again.

"The way it works for me is I get a sense of the object I'm planning on searching for. Person, piece of jewelry, car keys, doesn't matter. Once I've got the core, that seed, I focus on it, let the energy build up until it's a seething mass that I can barely control. After that I open a valve, letting the energy flow down my arms and into the metal, attuning them to my intentions and magic. Once that's done it's just a matter of walking the walk and following the rods until I find what it is I'm looking for. The process provides a sense of satisfaction that is almost-"

"Holy. Reverent, like a prayer," I said dryly.

"Yes. Exactly. How did you know that?" he asked, excited by this shared discussion of his passion.

"I've heard that tone of voice before," my voice dryer than the scrotum of a camel in the Sahara.

My mom used to talk that way about going to see the ballet. She'd wanted to join a dance troupe when she was younger but her mother forced her to get a sensible occupation, shoving her into nursing. Not that she didn't enjoy her job but the wistfulness in her voice was tangible whenever she talked about dancing.

"Yeah. There's something about the finding that grabs my family's heart, my own included, during the process."

He finds things. I'm looking for something. For someone... Eventually two plus two actually does equal four if you give my mind enough time.

"How do you start the process? If you wanted to find someone?" I said, suddenly far more serious about the topic.

"I need something of theirs to-" he recognized the look on my face. "I suspect there's a reason beyond common curiosity."

"Yeah." I took a moment to compose myself.

If he's gonna help me out he deserves the whole story. No matter how much I hate telling people. My throat was tight as I finally began to talk, forcing me croak the words out around a seething ball of emotions.

"My... father, if you could call him that, was not a kind man. He liked to drink and sometimes he got... rowdy. Temperamental. During one of his, 'episodes', he shoved my mom. Her foot caught on a rug and she hit her head. I still remember the sound, like a rotten fruit bursting on the concrete... 'Dead on impact', the emt's reported when they finally arrived at our house. The police took my father into custody. Six months later, after a wide swathe of depositions and trials, he was marched into prison and, at least what I thought at that time, out of my life forever. Then, four months ago, police officers knocked on my door, much like you did, and informed me that my father somehow managed to tunnel through concrete walls, escaping incarceration. I've been wandering around the city in my free time looking for him ever since." My eyes were full of unshed tears and burned with a quiet anger, daring Mikey to pity me for my situation. Lara massaged my shoulders, providing soothing support and unspoken camaraderie.

He opened his mouth to say something, and then thought better of it. Lacing my fingers, I squeezed until it was just shy of painful as I waited for him to talk.

"Isn't this something that should be left to the police?" he said as diplomatically as possible.

"... Probably. But I... I just need to do something. He needs to pay for what he did to my mom." I took a deep breath. "How about this, if you get me to him I'll inform the police and let them know where he is. I need to be involved," I said, lying through my teeth.

Yeah I feel a little bad about it but this guy doesn't understand what I went through. The quiet rage that consumes me and rakes my soul every time I picture his fucking face. Every time I see his features, ghosting behind mine as I look in the mirror.

"That sounds reasonable. The kicker is I need something of he owned, something close to him or he had a hand in creating," he said, holding up his hands like there wasn't anything he could do.

Wracking my brain, I came up blank on anything that fit that description. Any piece of his I might've owned I'd discarded long ago, hoping to purge him and move on with my life.

"What about you?" Lara provided.

"What do you mean?"

"Who are you talking to?" Mikey asked, confused by my seemingly random question.

"I'm talking to Lara." Then it hit me. I was my father's progeny. The fruit of his loins as it were. "Would my blood work? I'm something he played a part in making. As much as I'd like to deny it, he did have a hand in making me. Although, as always with him, dick would probably be a more apropo term."

Mikey was startled by my lack of propriety and decorum but my crude joke received a muffled chuckle.

"Do you joke at everything?" he asked, not entirely serious.

"Only the things not worth laughing about. Did you hear the one about the about Hitler's 'stache?" I said, a predatory smirk on my face.

"No." He narrowed his eyes, questioning the direction this was going.

"It's a gas."

.

.

.

Why the fuck do I do this to myself. That's a really inappropriate joke that any decent person would cringe at. Fortunately for me, Mikey shared at least a little of my dark humor.

"That is truly terrible for a number of reasons," he said, but he had a smile on his face as he did it.

"That's me in a nutshell. Now, do you think you can find him or not."

"Blood doesn't work. The body replaces it every seven years or something like that. If you had his blood that would be a completely different bag of hammers."

Hmmmm... Oh. That might be something. But it's so personal... Fuck it. I'll give up some privacy to give me a chance of finding him.

"Would a scar he created work?" I asked, almost afraid of his answer.

Mikey took some time to consider it. Polling whatever internal encyclopedia he used to measure things with his magic.

"It might. I would need to see it though. Is it on your arm or leg?"

"Not... exactly," I said pulling up my shirt and spinning to show my back. I was intimately familiar with the sight I presented to him, examining it in the mirror often enough over the years. Jagged red skin of a poorly healed wound formed a giant 'X' across my back. Ropey, the scar was horrifying to look at, assaulting the eyes with its dark crimson pigmentation.

"What happened?" he said, full of pity, my favoritest thing in the world to receive.

Not.

"It's what happens when a drunk attacks a seven year old with a broken beer bottle after his favorite pro team loses a close football game. It healed poorly because my old man threatened to do the same to my mom if I ever let her know," I said in a growling rage.

"I'm so-" he began to apologize and I cut him off.

"Don't. Just don't. Okay? Do you think you could use this?" I said tersely.

"Maybe. Do you mind if I touch it?" he said quietly, the situation made awkward by his clumsy prodding and my harsh reaction.

"Feel free," I said, failing to let go of my anger.

My back shivered, as his cold hand contacted my back, retreating for a moment before pressing forward more firmly into my flesh. Standing there awkwardly, I waited.

And waited.

And waited some more.

It felt like an eternity, but was probably closer to two minutes stretched out by the uncomfortably intimate contact before I finally broached the silence.

"So what's the verdict doc? Is this horse ready to start the race?"

"Ummmm. I think so. Bear with me for a bit. The connection is tenuous so I need to collect enough of it. Make a lightbulb out of the fireflies, as my father likes to say," he said, his eyes staring into the distance.

"You know that makes no sense, right?" I said, my anger diffused by the silent break and strange phrase.

"Of course I know that. Now, quiet please, and let me focus," he said, using the hand not on my back to rub the magic articles in his jacket pocket.

I counted sheep in my head waiting for him to do his thing.

... Seventy six. That one had a nice bonet. Probably stole it from Bo Peep. Seventy seven. Lovely top hat. Seventy eight.

"Okay. Got what I need," he said releasing my back so I could gratefully lower my shirt and cover up my scars.

"Lara, please show me what he's doing," I whispered into my collar as Mikey drew his dowsing rods, his eyes unfocused, staring into a the middle distance as he settled the rods firmly into his hands. Lara settled over my eyes in a half mask, letting me watch, fascinated, as dusty motes of what I presumed to be magic, swirled around the his hands and the rods, gradually working its way deeper into both. Once the magic settled into an even double helical pattern, the rods twitched once and Mikey started to walk forward, his face scrunched up in concentration. I trailed along after him, quiet as I could, unwilling to risk potentially breaking his concentration by words or actions. Eventually, he relaxed, walking more confidently as he and his magic settled into a familiar rhythm, no longer needing his full concentration. He also began to shoot questioning glances my way, his gaze darting between the half mask and my clothes. Once, his eyes darted to my crotch and he blushed and I had to work not to facepalm as embarrassment brought my own rose color to my cheeks. Mikey was able to stifle his questions for a whole five minutes before he spoke out, breaking the quiet rhythm of our feet crunching the pavement.

"So she's your clothes," he said, as innocently as possible. His eyes darted again to my junk, his demeanor wistful as he turned back to his dowsing rods that were subtly rotating to point to a singular point.

"Yep. She got testy that I went places without her so... in return for doing something for me, I humor her. It's a little a weird at times but hey, I got used to it."

"She can speak? How?" he asked, his stride pausing as he looked at me, incredulous.

"She does this thing with..." I paused for a moment and thought about it. "Actually, I have no idea. Lara, how about it? How do you speak?" I know she's mentioned how tough it is before but I don't think she's ever told me the specifics.

A small lump of blue bubbled up out of the shoulder of my shirt, its surface swirled for a moment before a familiar pair of ruby lips pursed before she began to speak.

"I form a pair of vocal chords. The air flow is created with vacuum bubbles I form, they generate pressure differential when released to the atmosphere. Utilizing the air flow, I vibrate the vocal cords at various frequencies to produce the sound. It took me some time to match the frequencies and arrange them into a pattern to match the words in his memories."

"But vocal chords are such complex things. How did you reproduce it?" Mikey wondered, the dowsing rods twitching in his hands.

"I umm... was able to make a mold of one," she said awkwardly.

"Someone let you take a mold of their vocal chords? That feels uncomfortable," Mikey continued to question.

Man, this dude is curious, can't he tell that she's uncomfortable with this line of questioning. I wonder why she's so unnerved?

"He didn't exactly complain about it at the time," she said, fidgeting internally.

Ohhhhhhh. She's talking about the first time we met. I spent a moment recalling the terror/arousal that inundated the experience. Strange, that's the only time in her wildly varying sexual cravings that she did any sort of erotic asphyxiation. Most other things she's done at least twice, once to see what it does and a second time in confirmation. She's a true scientist, I'm so proud, I thought sarcastically. Wait... there was one other time she did something involving crawling into my throat. Shuddering involuntarily at the recollection, I crossed my arms, covering my stomach instinctually.

Mournfully, Lara gave a tiny whisper into my mind, "Sorry."

"We're getting close now," Mikey said, his dowsing rods pointing steadfastly at a sign that read, "Endless Pines Cemetery."

The graveyard was ominous, a bleak pall hanging over the air as I followed mikey through the opening of the black fence that ran around the property just as tiny drops of water began darkening the ground around us.The rain was warm, the fall atmosphere desperately scavenging the last pieces of warmth from summer's bloody carcass. A strange green smoke lingered in the air, and we could hear some muffled chanting, guttural and angry, in a language I couldn't recognize, the words floating over the pitter pats of the rain. Rounding a blind corner, the trees blocking our view faded as I stared at a scene belonging in a B list horror movie. My father, dressed in dirty and ruffled camo fatigues was kneeling over an unearthed grave. The pile of dirt with a shovel sticking out of it made it painfully obvious who'd done this bit of grave robbing. Illuminating the entire scene in ethereal green light was a ring of thirteen tiki torches, the source of the green smoke.

"What's he doing?" Mikey asked as we scuttled to hide behind the trunk of a tree.

"I have no fucking idea. But knowing him it's a poorly conceived and impossible to achieve get rich quick scheme. Man's never done an honest days work in his entire goddamned life," I said, working my way around the tree as I stealthily approached my father. He didn't notice anything, his attention focused on the words he was reciting from the a scarred leather bound tome that floated three feet of the ground.

"Lara, I want all battlestations at full alert, ninja mode. I'm gonna do this like we did the bank robbery," I whispered as quietly as I could. She shifted from normal clothes to a matte black full bodysuit that helped camouflage my figure as well as hopefully protect me from any nasty surprises my father might have now that he'd learned some form of magic.

"Shouldn't we call the police?" Mikey asked in a fearful whisper.

"Yeah. You do that. I'm gonna go get a closer look," I said offhandedly, my mind anticipating the upcoming showdown. He might have said something more, but I was no longer paying any attention.

Cautiously, I approached the no-man's-land between the tree line and torches. My new angle revealed what I suspected to be the corpse belonging in the unearthed grave, sprawled out on the ground in front of my father.

"Let's shut down whatever he's doing with a surprise leap and a couple of restraining blobs."

"I'll follow your directions..." she whispered quietly in my brain. I could feel the pile of unspoken words she was hesitating to say.

"What is it?" I said, concerned I'd missed something in my haste.

"Please be careful. You aren't as broken and valueless as you think. I love and care for you. Please consider your safety over anything else," her words were slathered in scared resolve and spiced with an inhuman amount of love. Inhuman in that a normal person has enough self care and ego that they hold something back, something in reserve in anything they do.

Lara didn't have that.

Her entire being was comprised of the wholeness and surety of her love.

I love you too. Too self conscious to say the words aloud, I let them ring in the empty space between us, fairly certain that she would pick up on the silent admission.

"Got it. Let's do this." Her body started to stretch, the start up sequence for the launch, anchoring herself to the ground on either side of my body while two orbs detached from my forearms and rolled into my waiting hands.

"Houston the launch sequence is a go. Ignition in three... Two... One...Lift Off." Like a majestic turkey taking flight I was flung into the air, arcing gracefully above the grass hill we were crouched behind. At my peak, I gave a one-two toss, lobbing the orbs imbued with restraining Lara bloblets at my father. They flew through the air, straight and true, directly at my intended target.

Until the tiki torch fire flared into a giant dome of fire that incinerated goo on contact.

I refuse to make any Houston problem jokes before I incinerate myself on volcano dome, the scary cousin of the thunder dome.

Bracing myself as best as I could, which turned out to be ninety percent mental, I slammed into the newly visible magical protection. The fire felt like a million angry vicious cantankerous weasels, with mange, were released to gnaw on my flesh. Flesh that'd been doused with lighter fluid and softened with a meat tenderizer... repeatedly.

The very worst thing, beyond that of the physical pain, was that I could feel Lara trying to shield me from the flame. Regardless of how terrible it hurt her to have pieces of her flesh ripped apart, molecule by molecules, her very essence evaporating into the ether, she poured more of flesh into the flame, protecting me as best she could. The smallest sliver of silver lining was that my contact with the fire was brief, only a moment of undiluted, gut wrenching pain.