The next morning Buck arrived at work in a cheerful mood. His mother had called him the night before, after he had cancelled that night's date. She knew that he'd started his new job that day and was interested to hear how it went. She had sounded happy and that warmed Buck's heart. She had been depressed a lot since Buck's father had died. Buck told her about his new friend Eddie and about the house the man shared with his brothers. His mom sounded fascinated by his description of the house. The last thing that cropped up in their conversation was that she might be able to visit her son that month. At present she was busily settling into the apartment she had moved into with her present boyfriend. Buck was very protective of his mother and hoped that the guy would treat her right - otherwise he would be down there straight away. He hadn't met the guy before because his mother had met him after she'd moved to that state
"Good Morning, Buck. You look happy," commented Ezra as he looked in the open door of Mr. Anderson's office at a seated and smiling, lost in thought, Buck. He saw that Buck was sat down at his desk holding an open packet of potato chips - perhaps the guy didn't always eat as healthily as he'd assumed the previous day.
Buck smiled and invited him into the office. His boss had called and said he'd be late in - he had a few things to take care of first. Buck was glad of that - he'd have some peace and quiet before his boss came in and began his constant chatter.
Ezra walked into the office, noticing that it was very tidy. He didn't think Anderson would've tidied it as being tidy wasn't something bosses were usually known for, so Buck must've done it. Ezra sat down on one of the cushioned, metal-framed seats put there for visitors.
"My mom called me last night and said she might be able to visit soon; I haven't seen her since she moved away after Dad died," explained Buck. Then he popped a chip into his mouth. He wasn't used to getting up early for work and had forgotten to set his alarm. He'd got up late and hadn't had time for breakfast at home, so he'd just grabbed a bag of chips from a kitchen cupboard before he left for work.
"My mother left me a long time ago when she just disappeared into thin air, and I haven't heard from her since," said Ezra with sadness in his voice - at least Buck's mom talked to her son. He hoped Buck realized how lucky he was.
"I'm real sorry, Eddie - I didn't mean to brag," said Buck, feeling guilty. It must be bad to not know where or how your mother was. He hoped that Eddie's mom would get in touch with her son soon. He wondered if he had taken having a mom for granted. He always made sure he made the most of phone calls and visits with her (not that there'd been any visits yet) - he could lose her anytime and didn't want to feel guilty after she'd died for not paying enough attention to her. Unfortunately, every time since she'd moved that he'd mentioned visiting, she had rapidly changed the subject. It was as though she didn't want to see him, but Buck was sure that wasn't true.
CH7 - CH7 - CH7 - CH7 - CH7 - CH7 - CH7
At the police station where Josiah worked as a homicide detective, Chris and Josiah were talking about Buck's father's death and how they could work out which demon was responsible for the murder.
"Are there any leads on Wilmington Senior's death?" asked Chris. The case was officially closed, but Josiah was still working on it whenever he got some spare time, looking for anything that might help the brothers find out exactly what demon had killed Buck's father.
"No - another unexplained mystery it seems," answered Josiah. "Did you find anything in The Book that might help us?"
The Book was a very thick magical book that contained spells and recipes for magic potions, as well as information on all sorts of magical beings - both good and evil ones. It had been in the Potter family for hundreds of years and each generation had added to it. Every magical family had their own magical book, each one being different depending on what knowledge the generations of their family gained and put into it. Demons and other evil beings were often trying to steal witch's books, as that would take away the centuries of magical knowledge that the witches had easy access to - you couldn't just go to a library and find a magic book. Then, without their book, witches would find it hard to find out how to vanquish a particular enemy, as each one could only be killed a certain way, and that information was usually in the book.
"There are a lot of demons that murder innocents - we don't have anything to identify what particular demon it is. JD's thinking of writing another spell to try and help." Chris hated the thought of what JD's next spell would say - the one to help him find Buck hadn't worked - probably because of the awful rhyming in it. Then again, Chris doubted he could've written a better one, although he could try writing one that didn't rhyme - spells didn't have to have rhyming words in them.
"I'm sorry there's no useful evidence from the crime-scene - why don't you go there again and try touching everything again to see if you can get a premonition?" suggested Josiah. His younger brother, Chris, could get premonitions of past and future evil events from anything if the evil or innocents involved had been near or touched what Chris touched. In the case of getting future premonitions, Chris would get those visions if he touched someone or something that would eventually be involved in an evil incident. He could also get premonitions from anyone related to the innocent they were meant to save.
The police had found the body of Buck's father on the ground at the law firm's private campsite, but no evidence had been left. Chris had been there soon after the attack, seeing if touching the ground would give him a premonition of the demon responsible, but he hadn't seen anything when he'd touched everywhere within the crime-scene.
"Okay, I'll go there now and I'll be right back if I find anything," promised Chris. It was his day off work that day, so he had the day to himself. The brothers had a housekeeper who went to the house during the day to keep it clean for them. Of course she had known the boys' adoptive parents and knew about magic. They needed to be able to trust anyone whom they left alone in the house - otherwise the person could betray them either by reporting their magic secrets to the media, or if they were evil supernaturals, they might try to steal The Book.
"Are you going to drive there?" asked Josiah, not sounding like he approved of that idea. The campsite was a long way from the police station and it would take ages to go there, then come back. Chris wasn't even half-Whitelighter so wouldn't be able to orb directly there like Vin would be able to do.
"How many family emergencies has Vin had this month already?" asked Chris fiercely - it was clear Josiah wanted Chris to get a lift from someone they knew who could orb, but he couldn't pull Vin from work again. The brothers sometimes called Vin out of work to orb them places if for some reason Nathan couldn't. Chris had the car parked outside, happy to make the long drive to the campsite.
"I wasn't suggesting you use Vin. What's wrong with Nathan? At least he hasn't got a job we have to pull him away from." Even if Nathan had other charges to look after as well, he was still more readily accessible than Vin.
"You know me and Nathan don't always get along; I don't really want to go to the campsite with him," explained Chris, starting to feel a headache coming on in anticipation of Nathan's criticisms and offers of advice once they reached their destination.
"You're running out of travel options, Brother," said Josiah in a gruff tone, not looking happy. He got along fine with Nathan and didn't understand why Chris didn't get on so well with their easily likeable Whitelighter. "I don't want you to go in your car - it'll take too long to go there and get back here before tonight's dinner - and I don't want anyone to be late for that if they can help it, because Buck's coming over for dinner."
"How about Ezra? Blinking's slightly quicker than orbing anyway," suggested Chris, hoping that he could get Ezra to help instead. Even though he didn't always understand what Ezra said, they at least got on most of the time.
"You can't take Ezra out of work on only his second day there. Besides, he has to watch Buck in case his father's killer tries to get to him today. He could attack at any time." Josiah looked at the papers on his desk as if looking for an answer there.
"I suppose I could go with Nathan - but if he starts annoying me, I'll be straight back whether I have something or not."
"I forgot to tell Nathan that Buck's coming for dinner - he needs to be there as our brother, so please can you tell him for me. Ezra told Buck he had five brothers (including our Whitelighter); as soon as Buck knows the truth about us, we can explain who Nathan really is," said Josiah, a bit calmer now. He was happier now that he'd persuaded Chris not to use the slow option to get to the campsite. If they weren't having guests for dinner, Josiah didn't mind his brothers being a little late for it - but if they were expecting someone, then he felt it good manners to have all the brothers there on time.
"Okay, I'll let Nathan know. I'll see you later," said Chris, preparing to leave. "NATHAN!" called Chris. Whitelighters could hear the calls of their charges, so would come to them as long as they weren't doing something more important.
Blue and white orbs appeared and in their midst appeared Nathan. Then the orbs vanished, leaving Nathan standing there. "Hi," he greeted, happy as usual - he was barely unhappy unless there was a very good reason to be.
"You called?" asked the Whitelighter - he knew Chris was at Josiah's work because Josiah, the detective, was unofficially investigating the murder of their last innocent, and they must be discussing that. He wanted Mr. Wilmington's murderer to be found and vanquished (when demons were defeated the word "vanquished" was used more often than "defeated") before he could kill again. It looked like Buck would be the next victim unless they could vanquish the demon responsible first.
"Nathan, I need to go back to the scene of Mr. Wilmington's murder. I need to get a premonition to help us find out what type of evil was responsible. Then we'll be able to find out how to vanquish him before he can hurt Buck," explained Chris to Nathan as he walked over to the man and put his hand on the Whitelighter's shoulder. For a Whitelighter to orb with someone, the other person had to be touching him before he orbed.
"Didn't you already try that?" asked Nathan, trying to save Chris from disappointment when he didn't get a premonition on his second visit. "I can't see you getting one this time if you didn't last time."
"I have to try again - before Buck gets hurt."
Nathan could sense the urgency in Chris's voice. He knew that Chris would fall apart if another innocent he was meant to protect was killed. Chris was still wracked with guilt after his wife and son had been killed about a year ago. Chris had been away at the time and felt responsible for not being there to protect them from the warlock's attack.
"See you later, Josiah," said Nathan, as he orbed Chris and himself away.
Josiah looked down at the reports about the campsite murder, and some other murders that were probably connected to it, on his desk; the cause of death for them all would have to remain unknown, as normal people would find the real cause unbelievable. To the mortal unmagical world, demons and Warlocks were merely make-believe. With murders and kidnappings carried out by magical beings, the cases would be unexplained to cover up the fairytale-like explanations. A normal policeman would probably sell magic-related reports to the press, but with Josiah working there he was already in the know and could be trusted to keep magical incidents a secret from the non-magical world.
To be continued...