Reactionaries

Who: Hunt, Dorian, Teddybear and guest appearance by Megan
Where: Kayos' place
When: Morning

Teddybear had taken a while to come back online. And when he did, it wasn't like he just came back on with the flip of a switch. Being what he was and based how he was, it was a slow process. He did things as fast as he could, but he lost time, he had to try and fix himself, and there was just a bunch of badness, in general. Eventually, however, he managed to unscramble himself enough that he made a phonecall. Or, two, to be specific. He opened up a line to both Dorian and Hunt, hoping his voice was going to work and he didn't have to try and text things to them.

Distracted didn't even cover how off Dorian had been all morning. He was relieved to be tall again, but without that or Rori around as distractions his thoughts had drifted back to Kayos and how badly he'd fucked things up there. Their fight had replayed through his head all morning and he was trying to decide if he should just go to her place to apologize again, with flowers and groveling or whatever might work or if he should just give her space. She'd said she needed time, which he'd agreed to, but he didn't get the specifics. When his cell phone rang he didn't even look at it, just flipped it open to answer it. "Hello?"

Hunt answered his phone at exactly the same time, leading to him speaking over Dorian with a curt, "Yes?" sounding very much like he considered the call an unwelcome distraction, which he did. he'd woken up this morning feeling different. Dorian's stabilising research had only gone so far, and Hunt's personality, after a few days of being stable, had moved again - this time towards the extreme hunter. Currently, he was going through all his weapons, cataloguing, cleaning, taking them apart, checking them over, getting himself ready for... Well, he hadn't decided what yet. That would come. There was always something that needed hunting. Especially these days.

There was feedback on the line, and then a few moments of garbled audio, which generally came across as a staticy, distant 'hello?' until it cleared more. When it was clear, or what passed for clear, it was Teddybear's voice, which was a childlike sort of intonation, not clearly male or female. "Hello? She's gone. Sorry--" there was more static, a little more feedback, and the line seemed to go dead for a moment, but then picked back up. "Kayos. She's gone."

"Hunt?" Dorian couldn't figure out for a moment why Hunt was calling him and acting like he was being called until the third voice filtered through. What in the hell? Dorian actually pulled his head away from the phone then looked back at it again. "What do you mean gone? Who is this?" he half demanded because he sure as hell didn't know that childlike voice. "Hunt, what's going on."

Hunt recognised the voice, even if Dorian didn't and his hand tightened on the receiver. 'Gone' didn't equal good in his head - not if the familiar was calling. "What happened Teddy - gone where?" he asked, ignoring Dorian's questions for now. As far as Hunt was concerned, especially considering his current mindframe, Hunt wasn't into answering questions he considered to be irrelevant.

There were some clicks on the line, a loud burst of static, and then things seemed to stabilize better, the static in the background dying down and when Teddy spoke this time, it was without the garbled quality. "Sorry Dorian, I know this is a crash course. It can get explained later. I don't know where she is. I can't find her. I got knocked out--I don't know how or why but I've been offline for a long time, hours. I don't know what happened, there wasn't any warning, just...gone and I've been scrambling to try and fix myself since I...let's call it 'regained consciousness'. If I was a person I'd be holding my guts in my lap and crying for my mommy about now." he admitted.

Crash course in what? Dorian had that feeling like he'd been left out of an important joke and everything was moving forward without him. Who was Teddy? Knocked out? There wasn't anyone living with Kayos was there? Offline? Dorian was smart, but this was throwing him for a complete loop. Not being able to explain it meant he couldn't deal with the obvious crisis without ignoring it. So, in a very unlike-Dorian move, he just went with it. "Could she have jumped somewhere or something?" he asked, realizing that it sounded like a completely stupid question, another rarity for him.

All Hunt needed to know was that the entity was worried. Hell - that something which couldn't have emotions could be 'worried' said something in and of itself. "Dorian, I'll be round in five minutes to pick you up, bring anything you have that could be useful for finding someone, but be outside and ready to go. Teddy we'll be with you a couple of minutes after that," he said, before hanging up the phone without further ado and starting to pack up weapons. He didn't know what he'd need, so he was erring on the side of 'everything'.

"Oh good. he's in That mood." Teddy said. "I'll talk to you in a few, Dorian...and no. She couldn't have jumped anywhere. I always know where she is. I just...don't know what happened. Anyways, see you soon." he said, and then the line went dead.

Dorian had opened his mouth to ask another question, about her not jumping anywhere, but it sounded like she couldn't as in wouldn't be able to, which was sort of a big deal, but the line had gone dead. Scowling at it Dorian grumbled a few words before putting it away. If Hunt was in That mood it was a version of the man Dorian hadn't met yet, which also meant the stability aspect of what Dorian had put together wore off or wasn't stable enough. Just another thing to work on he supposed. With Hunt's direction on what to gather, Dorian pulled a few books off shelves, two on tracking spells and one on psychics, though that one he had to flip through before he realized why he'd grabbed it. He toss all of them into his bag with his laptop and then he went out front to wait for Hunt.

The other man was as good as his word, turning up a few minutes later and pulling his car up on the curb. He didn't get out and he looked towards Dorian, fully expecting the man to have been waiting for him and to jump, rather than wait for any kind of a greeting. Time was always of the essence to Hunt in this frame of mind. A minute wasted could, after all, be the difference between life and death to someone.

The lack of a greeting was a surprise, but Dorian did jump when Hunt's car pulled up, opening the door and getting in. "Where are we going?" he asked even if he had a guess that it was towards Kayos. The whole "Teddy" thing still had him feeling a little behind the curve though, so for the moment he wasn't making assumptions.

Hunt had pulled away from the curb again, hardly waiting for Dorian to get the door shut. "Kay's place - if she's missing, then that's the place to start. Where we're going after that depends on what we find there," he said, jumping a red light and pulling the car round a corner with hardly a dab on the brakes - luckily there was no other traffic coming.

It took Dorian less than two minutes to determine why it was Hunt wanted to get rid of this personality. When they ran the red light he held his breath, bracing for impact but they got lucky. Dorian also decided he was equally lucky that the ride to Kayos wasn't far; he didn't want to be in the car with crazy Hunt behind the wheel any longer than necessary.

The door to Kayos' place--the front one, not even the back one that was the main entrance--was a little off it's hinges when people pulled up. And the lights in the building seemed to not be cooperating in anything like a proper manner, with flickering at random, sometimes flashing in patterns. There were definite signs of struggle inside, furniture overturned, a little streak of blood on the floor but it was a small sample. "I'm still trying to find her." Teddy's voice sounded from the speakers the place was wired with, though there was static coming from them as well in bursts.

Hunt had pulled up outside and headed in through the opened door, a bag of weapons slung over his shoulder. He hadn't waited for Dorian, or even locked up the car, just pulled over, turned off the engine, collected his bag and walked in, his concentration on what he saw and what he could tell. "This blood hers?" Hunt asked the air, really speaking to Teddybear as he squatted down next to it. He knew a spell that would tell him that, but if the familiar already had some technological wizardry way of saying, that would save them some time.

Dorian scrambled a second, following Hunt with wide eyes and glancing about for the source of the voice. Friends or not, Dorian was beginning to think he knew absolutely nothing about Kayos at all. Hunt was just talking to the air, like it was no big deal which strange as it was, Dorian gritted his teeth and ran with it. "What are you doing to locate her? Like how?"

There was a response that was garbled audio, then static. Then he tried again, the words coming out correctly this time. "I don't know, I'd have to analyze it." Teddy said. "I never lose her. I never don't know where she is." he said, that concern plain in the odd tone. "And I'm searching, I'm trying to find her on the grid but I can't, and I always know, she's tagged, but right now it's flatlined, and if she was dead, I think I'd stop existing." But he didn't sound one hundred percent sure, and like that idea very much bothered him.

"Then analyse it," Hunt said, scrapping some up under his fingernail and holding his hand steady, slightly curled inwards and he headed forward, ready to do the spell if the familiar's analysis failed, or if he came to the conclusion it was taking too long. "This place is wired, right? Do you have any footage?" he asked, before spinning round on a heel and facing Dorian. "I need to know what happened here - this place is as safe as any. Something got in through the door, got passed a familiar that's incorporeal, in the electrics, monitoring everything. And took a damn teleporter, who should have been able to move fast enough to get away. Or, at least, to come straight back as soon as she got gone. You know things - find me an answer."

There was long moment where Dorian just stared at Hunt. He wasn't used to this personality at all, especially being spoken to like that. Something twitched along his mouth, a snarl of sorts that didn't turn into an actual expression. Reaching into his bag, he turned away from Hunt, producing the book he'd grabbed randomly. "Earlier you said she couldn't jump right? Did you mean not at all or just not away? Can you track her jumps?" he asked the air and whatever it was that seemed to speak from the walls and be very attached to Kayos. He turned a nearby table back to upright, setting the book down on it as he flipped through it, trying to figure out why he'd pulled it. His gift wasn't perfect, but if he grabbed a book? There was usually an answer in it somewhere.

"I can't analyze it by looking at it on the floor, genius." Teddy said. "You have to put it into the laptop--it's in her room. Then I can." he explained. "She tagged you, you know where to put it." Or so the familiar hoped. "And no, I don't have any footage. I don't have anything. Everything just went dead. Completely. I might--wait, let me see if I can uncorrupt the data." he said, not explaining whatever the hell he was talking about. "Earlier I said she couldn't have jumped because I don't know where she is. I always know, but I don't, so I just...I don't know." Teddy tried to explain. "I can always track her jumps. Just not now. Like I shouldn't have gone down either, but I did."

Hunt ignored the familiar's tone, given that it was irrelevant whether or not the being thought he was an idiot. He wasn't, but he didn't know what the thing was capable of either. Instead, he strode towards her room to go get blood to where it needed to be. The only thing that was important was results, after all.

"Tell me she doesn't like him when he's like this," Dorian asked nothing, though in a sense, something because he knew whatever-it-was was listening. He shook his head, looking at the book, flipping to a new chapter. Just reading the title made his blood run cold. "This is going to sound stupid because I have no idea what you are, but what would shut you down? Pulling the power on this place? Something else? Or would it take something extra? I'm guessing your more than just a computer?" Something shut everything down and the pages he was skimming over now led him to believe that there was something capable of that, even more so if Teddy or whatever was more than something that could be thrown with a fuse box. "And explain it slow because I'm really good with dead languages not computer jargon," he added.

"I'm pretty sure Mother Theresa wouldn't like him when he's like this." Teddy said to Dorian, though he did try to route it to only the speaker Dorian was closest to, which caused feedback on all of them. Right. So he wouldn't be trying that again. "I'm a familiar." he explained. "I really probably should have said that by now. I'm just...sort of a ghost in the machine." he added. "Pulling the power on the place would be hard. There are back up generators, and I technically am mostly based in her laptop, which has a battery life of it's own, but I got shut down all at once. Everything died. No computer jargon necessary."

Hunt made his way through to Kayos' room, leaving Dorian's voice behind and whatever he was talking to the familiar about. he scanned the space as he stepped through the doorway, noting the mess, the signs of struggle. The discarded pink bunnyrabbit in the centre of the floor. So, whatever it was that took her, it had not only managed to get inside, but a whole long way inside. That was increasing amounts of Not Good. He crossed to the laptop and righted it, working on inserting some of the blood for analysis, the way he'd seen Kay do with his own a while ago.

"A familiar?" Dorian couldn't hide the shock in his voice. That was certainly something he hadn't come across before. The deluge of unrelated questions was there in the back of his mind, but he ignored them. He could ask them later. "That actually makes more sense, with reading this," Dorian said as he pointed to the book below him. "I don't know more than what I'm reading here, but there's a type of psychic who just turns supernatural things off around them. Can't see ghosts, can't use magic, that sort of thing. It might explain it. It'd explain why she couldn't teleport, and maybe why you'd shut down. You couldn't exist to a dead...zone. Yeah that's what they call them, dead zones."

"Dorian--I keep trying to correct you on this, but you seem to still be stuck on your first impression. I know I misworded things earlier, but I'm not saying she couldn't teleport, I'm saying if she did, I can't track it. And I should be able to track it, but I can't, like I should be able to tell where the hell she is. I don't know what happened, because I was offline before anything happened period." Teddy explained slowly. "But that said, it would do a better job explaining what happened to me than anything else." Then there was a pause, and he answered on all of the speakers. "That's her blood."

Hunt heard the response and walked back into the room before speaking again. He'd heard what Teddybear had to say, but not Dorian's half of the conversation. "Okay, so you've found something - what is it, where is it and anything we know about how to kill it?" he asked, literally deadly serious right now.

Dorian was frowning. He had misunderstood Teddy, but her being able to teleport wasn't making sense. "I don't know. If she could where is she? She could have teleported anywhere safe, if someone grabbed her. Hunt's, my place, Alexandria, somewhere else entirely. I can't imagine her not doing that. Or jumping back now. You said it's been hours right?" He looked around the room again. "Someone put up a fight, and if that's her blood on the floor? I'm guessing her." At Hunt's announcement he went back to just staring at Hunt. "I have a guess," he said after a moment. "A dead zone. Supernatural abilities don't work around them, and supernatural beings don't exist or aren't visible. Where I don't know, but you can try something with that. How's your white magic?" he asked, reaching in his bag and holding out a book on tracking spells. "As for killing it? Why don't we find out where she is before we start killing things?"

"I can think of a scenario where she wouldn't teleport to safety straight away. It's called 'it's someone she knows or looks like someone she knows'." Teddy said. "Like if either one of you got the drop on her, I'm willing to bet you could do some major damage and she wouldn't see it coming, and once she gets knocked out, she can't teleport either. Just because she's got that doesn't mean she's invulnerable, or can automatically get out of anything ever. It's damn useful, but it isn't foolproof." Teddy sighed, which sounded like more static, and the lights went crazy again for a few moments, before they evened out, even if they were dimmer than usual. "Say someone knocked me out, got her up, then hit her from behind. Then maybe they were looking for something and ransacked the place. I don't know if that happened at all, but I'm saying it's possible. And with that whole 'maybe she knows them' thing, if either of you went at her with an attack of some kind I guarantee you she'd stick around and try to reason with you instead of just jumping off. She'd want to know what was happening."

"Unlikely to be anyone she knows," Hunt said, taking the book of white magic and starting to flip through it. White magic was far from his forte and that which he did know was generally based firmly in healing, but if someone gave him the instructions for a location spell, and he could get the ingredients for it, he should be able to make it work. He would make it work, and the current personality he was in had the best magical capabilities - he didn't get any better than this. "That's why you felt the need to call me when he upset her. And today - there is nobody else. Except for Doc and I'm figuring that he's still out of the picture." Oh yeah, and his current personality lacked anything even vaguely approaching 'tact' as well.

Teddy's comment about it being someone she knew had Dorian eying the crazy version of Hunt in front of him. Kayos had said herself she had two friends in town, him and Hunt. Fight or not Dorian would never physically hurt Kayos, but he didn't know about this Hunt, even if this Hunt seemed stupidly confident that it wasn't him. "Called you? About me?" Dorian asked, obviously not pleased about hearing that from the asshole version of his friend. He knew full well they talked when he wasn't around and it made sense that Dorian might have come up as a topic, but seriously. Was that necessary? He glared at Hunt for a moment, then wrenched himself back to the issue. "I didn't mean to imply she didn't have vulnerabilities, just that she doesn't have many. If we can do the location spell and she doesn't pop up at all? That might be a clue too. Or we might just find her and go there."

"Could have been someone she recognized from before. Someone from where she came from." Teddy explained. "She isn't miss popularity or anything, that's very much true, but I don't know that it's wholly ruled out." He paused a moment before he addressed other things. "Yeah, I called him. She wasn't going to, but I can't exactly give her a hug." he explained. "To be fair, if he'd fucked off last time he made her cry, I probably would have called you." He thought over a few other things. "Try a location spell. I don't have much of anything to offer there. I should, by all rights, be able to just know where she is and I don't. And like I said...if she's dead, I shouldn't exist. But I don't know, maybe I still would. I guess...no, I guess actually I would. This history's version of her is dead and I was around to help her kids out. So, nevermind, that logic doesn't work." He just really didn't want to believe she was dead and was clinging to even the most paper thin of excuses.

Hunt flipped through the book until he came to a location spell and ran his finger down the list of items he'd need, checking to see if he had them all. Some of them he did - basic white magic spell components that were also used in healing spells which he'd packed into his bag along with the veritable arsenal. Some bits that he could probably get out of her kitchen, if it was stocked enough... He should be able to make this work. "Whoever it is, it's someone. Could be anyone - someone she knows or stranger. We don't have any clue either way, so yeah - location spell. This might take me a few minutes to put together, so both of you, make yourselves useful," Hunt said, heading off to the kitchen and calling out behind him, "And I'll need a map!"

Dorian wasn't feeling great about the 'fucked off' comment being tacked on, even if it was directed at Hunt. Dorian had a history of that sort of action himself and briefly he replayed the last moments of his fight with Kayos over in his head. No, she'd wanted him to leave. He didn't mess up by not staying. The whole thing was raw, but at least he wasn't the only one who'd managed to make her cry at some point. Something else in what Teddy said though stood out. "This history's version? Kids?" Confusion creased Dorian's brow again. This was getting more complicated as it went wasn't it? "Do you know where she keeps her maps? She's bound to have them for jumping right?" Sure, he had a million questions but if he could get up and do something he could ignore them and focus. Find her first, then ask her a million questions and over-analyze for days why she hadn't just told him outright.

"I am being useful, ass, I'm trying to uncorrupt the cctv data." Teddy muttered, the static over the line greater for a second. "Maps...no. She usually just calls one up online. If you need a real physical map, we'll have to print one out...assuming I can fix my print stations." Then he addressed Dorian's questions. "In this timeline and place, Kayos had two children. Twins. One of them went a little off the rails, and by 'a little' I mean 'he fucking killed a dude'. She was older in this timeline too, though, her kids were older. Like in their teens older. But anyways, her precious baby boy went to Crazy Town, which--by the way--Kayos lived there, and when he was put away, she couldn't handle it and she killed herself. I mentioned there's fucking horrible drawbacks to being an entity with no body, right? It's not just not having the ability to hug a girl when she needs it." His tone kept going a little fuzzy, and there was definite emotion in the voice, even if he was trying to play it off like he was just reporting the facts.

Hunt didn't know all of this, and any other personality, he would have been interested, but as it was, he merely filed the information away and carried on with the job in hand: finding ingredients for the spell and dealing with purely what was needed. "We need a physical map - so either you get those printers working, or Dorian needs to make a run to the store now," he said, bluntly as he took jars down from the kitchen cupboards and sorted them into 'useful' and 'not'.

Dorian had been standing, leaning over the table while he flipped through the book, but Teddy's explanation made his legs go out a little and he dropped to a sitting position on the couch. He knew part of it, some of it had been mentioned when they were waiting in Manchester, but not all of it had sunken in, and certainly not the part about kids or about why the here version of Kayos was dead. Dorian couldn't even begin to imagine how hard knowing that about a version of yourself might have suffered through. Even worse though, it was hard to not think of Kayos herself going through that, even if he knew in the back of his mind that it wasn't the her he knew. It took Hunt's comment to really bring him back into focus, running a hand through his hair. "You going to have luck with the printers or do I need to run? I've got local maps at the store." He'd used them to trace out the general location of the loops as well as just for general knowledge.

"Give me a second, it's like trying to rewire my nervous system." Teddy said, then the speakers all went dead, that light white noise ending. The lights in half the place went down too, and there were a few hiccups in the power, on, off, flickering, on. Then they died completely again for a second, before they came back, dimmer than usual but on. "...okay I think I have it working." he said. Then in Kayos' med bay, the printer in there came to life, spitting out first a world map. Then came more specific stuff, but he didn't quite know where to start or stop, so he was just putting out what he could.

Hunt headed back over with an armful of jars and set them down on the table, before positioning them in a neat row to one side, labels apparent. He worked quickly and efficiently, then emptied the rest of his supplies from his bag to his other side, equally neatly arranged. That done, he set the spell book open to the location spell in front of him, leaving a space for maps, which he finally crossed to get, taking whatever was there from the printer and bringing them back over. He considered them, then started with the world, spreading it out before him before sitting down and starting to carefully and diligently prepare the spell, double checking each step.

Dorian had a fleeting hope that Teddy wouldn't be able to fix things and he'd get to step outside and breathe something close to fresh air, but everything came together so he just waited. He watched Hunt lay everything out, processing all the parts as the spell was put together. When Hunt pulled out the world map he couldn't help but frown. The world was a huge and currently not-so-accessible place to start with. There wasn't much he could do, so as before he waited, watching Hunt's process.

Teddybear, for his part just fell quiet too, figuring interrupting Hunt when he was in Superbitch mode probably wasn't going to fly well, and he wanted the spell done as soon as possible too. So, he just waited, much like Dorian. He tried to steady the lights in the med bay out, and managed, though the rest of the building fell dark while he did it.

It wasn't a quick process, but then again, white magic rarely was. That was the thing that annoyed Hunt about it - it was fiddly, often complicated, and took a damn long time. At least with black, once you'd written and learned a spell, it was at your fingertips. White always took time, every single time. And that was when he knew what he was doing. Here, he didn't even have that - here it wasn't just going through the motions. Hunt knew that he had to take his time, even though what he really wanted to do was rush through it. Eventually, however, he was ready and he cast the spell, looking out for some kind of an indication of area. Hell, he had a map of the world, there should have been something, some spark, a black spot at least burned into it, indicating where she was. But there was nothing.

"You do it right?" Dorian asked when nothing happened. He reached for the book, knowing he was going to get a dirty look, but if he remembered right the book said what sort of result they were supposed to get. Skimming the page he found it, yes. A flare in the location of the missing. He glanced up at Hunt again, chewing on his lip while he thought, fast as he could through their issue. "Nothing. Do it again," he said, handing the book back. Dorian realized they'd switch roles, him making demands now, but he needed to make sure the spell had gone right.

"Yes, I did it right," Hunt told him, glaring at Dorian all the time he was looking over the book and then taking it back again, double checking the spell itself. "Okay - it doesn't like the world, let's try something smaller," he said, taking out a map of north america and starting to go through the process again. Surely whoever took her couldn't have... He stopped suddenly and started to shuffle through the maps. "I need a close up map of every loops area," he said, looking through for all of those. "Most people can't get through the loops. Kay can, but - would she have taken someone through the loops?" he asked, generally.

"You think she took whoever grabbed her through the loops?" Dorian asked completely ignoring the glares from Hunt and looking around the room again. They'd righted a few bits of furniture here and there, but it still looked like someone had torn through it. There was still her blood on the floor. Something wasn't sitting right with him about the fight and her not being here. If she jumped to safety, why wasn't she back yet?

"I hope not," Hunt said as he got the maps together, all spread out before him. "Finding her will be a whole lot easier, if we can at least limit it to those areas." But there was no guarantee - according to the first spell, they weren't anywhere on the planet anyway. Not anywhere that could be picked up. "What were you saying about dead zones?" he asked, starting his prep once again.

"Do you need to go through the doors and repeat the spells there? I don't know how that magic works. I know I can call any of the cut off areas, not that anyone's answering in that first place that opened up, but I don't know if magic would actually go through. Is there a way to test it? Can someone find someone you know is in a different looped area?" Teddy put in, just trying to test out logic on things.

"Nothing supernatural works around them. Spirits don't show up, magic doesn't work in their general area," Dorian repeated, looking at the blank map again. "So yes, she might just not show up," he added before Hunt could ask him. "Other areas?" Dorian considered that for a moment. "Rori might have gone back to Manhattan, but I don't know. You could try her."

"Rori - do you have anything of hers?" Hunt asked, not knowing who that was and not really caring right now. If this Rori could be used as a test subject, then that was good for him.

"In Kayos' room, in the nightstand, there's an old beat to shit lighter. Get that. It was Doc's, if you want to try and track someone outside the loops. As for inside...why doesn't one of you just go for a walk and see? Dor, take a ride, and take that door back to Germany or wherever the hell you were, and leave your coat?" Teddy suggested, just kind of tossing things out there even if he wasn't sure anything was all that viable. And, he asked the question he didn't want to ask. "Is there a spell that tells you if someone's dead or not?"

Dorian thought for a moment, trying to remember if he had anything of Rori's. "No, I don't think I have anything," he said, standing to get to get the lighter for Hunt, but Teddy's suggestion had him hesitating. "You want me to go?" he asked Hunt. "Phone'll work, you can call me when you want me to come back."

"No - Doc will do," Hunt said with a cursory nod. "You go and we'll just have to wait for you to get somewhere. If she has something of his, that's fine - you wanna go get it?" he asked in a tone that wasn't particularly questioning and more 'demanding'. "That way, at least we'll know if it's a loop issue or if it is because of a dead zone. If we can find Doc, but not Kay, then we're wasting time with this and we'd be better off just combing what areas we can get access to in the chance we'll find something." Which he knew was longer than a long shot, but when your options were few and far between, you went with what you could.

Teddy waited, but his last question didn't get answered, so he asked it again. "Is there a spell where you can tell if someone's dead or not?" he repeated. The vitals he generally had on people were flatlined too, but not because it was reading death, because it wasn't reading anything. That at least he knew, but he also couldn't trust that his circuits weren't just fucked up as well. After all, he was still fixing himself and wasn't even near halfway done.

Dorian took Hunt's order, heading towards Kayos' room and grabbing the lighter. He didn't let his mind register the obvious signs of struggle in the room because he knew it would knock him off his feet for a good little while. He didn't need to think about the fact that she'd been grabbed while she was sleeping. He returned just as Teddy re-asked his original question. "A spell? I'm not thinking of one off hand. There might be something though..." he trailed off as he tossed the lighter to Hunt and grabbed the other book on location spells. A spell to check someone's vitals seemed similar to a location spell, so he might have luck with the same book. If not, he'd probably have to go back to the store.

Hunt caught the lighter in mid-air without even glancing at it and put it in position. "Tell me if you find anything," Hunt told Dorian as he heard the rustle of pages. "Though I don't think you're going to. Not in black or white, anyhow. If someone's dead, there's nothing that could be picked up. Maybe you could do it with voodoo or something. Track a spirit. But that's well beyond what I can do," he admitted, being upfront, if unhappy about that fact.

Dorian had a hunch he wasn't going to find anything in the book in his hand, which left him feeling frustrated, but he continued to flip through the pages. "You're probably right, about there not being anything in black or white magic," he said, pointing out that his search was probably futile. "I can't think of anything in blood magic either." Which essentially burned out his options for witches and the specialities. "You know a voodoo priest, 'cause I sure as hell don't?" Dorian asked Hunt, but his eyes were on the map, waiting for the spell to be completed again.

"Not lately," Hunt admitted, before turning his attention to the spell in front of him, completing the enchantment and watching as a spark burned for a moment on one of the maps, somewhere in the Middle East. "Well, Doc's still alive, kicking and outside the Loops," Hunt commented. "Which really narrows our possibilities down to two - one of which is that she's been taken by a dead zone and my magic can't pick her up." the other of which was that she was dead. Hunt just didn't want to contemplate that one.

Dorian watched the spark glow with at sinking feeling. Hunt was right, either she was taken or she was dead. Looking up at the older man, he drug a hand through his hair and was quiet for a long moment, brain running through ideas which only served to fight off the panic that was starting to take hold. "If it's a dead zone...nothing magic will work around them. It'd be like a black hole for magic. Is there something we could do that would create a canvas or something?"

Teddybear was quiet as the exchange went on. There was a light static in the air, a sort of light proof that he was still listening, but he didn't say anything for a few long moments. "I don't know what to do with a dead zone. You'd be best to know anything like that." he said to Dorian's comment. His tone was off, distant. "Do I call Doc?" he asked them both. He could. He didn't know what else to do, but then again, Doc was a dude with a whole lot of magic too. Fuck.

"A canvas?" Hunt asked, turning away from the maps to look at Dorian. "Do you mean looking for the absence of stars instead of the black hole itself? I'm not sure that something like that would work - you might just find an area where there's no active magic. magic's not like stars, it's not always there." he paused, before wincing. "No - don't call Doc. Not yet. We'll find her. You know werewolves, right? We're not going to find any better trackers," he pointed out.

"It's a start," Dorian offered, but he understood what Hunt was saying. Maybe the idea wouldn't work. "I know a few werewovles," he said, thinking of Megan first and following up with Astrid. She had tracked his brother down which wasn't an easy feat. Either girl would probably work, though considering Mathias' situation with Astrid, Megan was probably the better choice. "Want me to make that call? And then what? We just start at one end and work to the other, hopefully we pick up something?"

Teddy had commentary about the canvas thing but latched on instead to the werewolves idea. That sounded like a much better plan. Or, well, the plan was sound to use werewolves, but he sighed a bit at Dorian's suggestion. "No, smartass, you bring a werewolf here, where her scent is, and have them do their bloodhound routine and track from here. Why would we fly blind and just hope we stumble onto a trail?" There was an unspoken 'idiot' on the end of that, but he didn't actually say it.

Hunt glanced towards the ceiling, then back at Dorian. "What he said - wanna make the call?" he asked, though it didn't much sound like a question. "Sooner they can get here, the better - one, both, the whole damn pack," he added. he didn't really care as long as they got results. if there was a good trail, then they wouldn't need more than one. If there was a poor trail, or none at all, then they were back to square one again.

Dorian gave nothing a dirty look and hoped Teddy could see it before he turned to Hunt with a far more serious look. "I'll do it, but I need something from you first. You in this mode? I'm guessing you give a shit about very few people. I need you to pretend to be who you were two days ago when I tried to fix you, and I need you to swear on your life that you will not go looking for these people after this. I know you're a hunter and a damn good one, but this will be one thing you leave well enough alone. Do you understand?"

"Listen, Dorian," Hunt said, his voice dropping a few notches and going cold. "You're right - I don't give a shit about anyone or anything right now, except finding Kayos and bringing her home safe. And that includes 'pretending' to be something I'm not right now. We don't have time for me to play nice and I won't do it. If that's a problem for you, then get out of my way and I'll see to finding her myself. But I'd prefer to have you on board because you're damn good and things will be faster with you there. As for your friends, I'll tell you what I told her - I don't hunt lyncanthropes except on the full moon. Remember - I met two of your furry friends when we were in Manchester. I already know who they are. And I'll have no more intention hunting them after this than I had yesterday. they don't pose any threat to the public, I don't pose any threat to them. All they need to do is stay at home on the night of the moon. Something which any reasonable and sensible were would do anyway. So, make the call and do it now."

Dorian met Hunt's gaze, an oddly cold look on his face that spoke of the pain he'd put Hunt through if the man was lying to him. Helping Kayos was number one, without a doubt, but putting Megan and her friends at risk was not part of his plan, no matter how desperate he was. He watched Hunt's for a long moment, studying the older man before finally stepping away and pulling out his phone to dial Megan's number.

Megan was enjoying being back to her normal height and was viewing the shelves in her basement room and contemplating if it would now be worth maybe lowering some things when her phone started ringing. She was so used to the thing being silent that it damn near gave her a heart attack and she flipped it open and looked at who was calling her. Seeing Dorian's name flash on the screen, she frowned a little bit, but hit the answer button. "Hey," she said, a little warily. "Um, this isn't an intranet message." Their usual way of communicating.

Dorian caught the wariness in her tone knowing that it was well earned. "No, this is a little more important than that. I need your help," he said pausing for a moment before launching into the explanation. "Something or someone grabbed her, but we're not sure where or what. We've tried location spells but nothing is coming up at all. There's a type of psychic, a dead zone, that sort of zaps all supernatural things out of it's range and that's a possibility. Or at least a better one than her being..." Dorian trailed off with a wince.

She listened quietly as Dorian rambled, used to him enough that she had no problem getting all of that. "Who's missing?" she asked after he trailed off. "And what's a dead zone? Because um, I'm pretty sure I qualify as a 'supernatural thing'." There was also the question of why he was calling her, especially if someone was missing. "Shouldn't you call the police if they're missing?" Because so far, Marquette still had some semblance of a police force that reporting a missing person wasn't out of the question any more.

"Kayos," Dorian said, not even realizing that he'd left it out in the first place. "Kayos is missing." He took a long breath trying to get a handle on himself. "It's what it sounds like really. You'd still exist, just not be very werewolf-y to him. Or her. Whatever." He paused again throwing a look over his shoulder at Hunt. "We need to track her," he said into the phone.

Kayos. The teleporter that helped them out. Dorian's friend. "I can do that. Track her, I mean. I just need something for scent." That wasn't a problem at all, but the rest of it got her confused. "I'm confused on what you mean by 'not being werewolf-y' to this mystery person who took Kayos." She could hear his deep breathing and the different note in his voice and she sighed on her end. "But before you do that, just calm down, okay? I'll help you find her. It'll be okay, alright?"

"You can come by her place. There's plenty here for grabbing a scent," he pointed out. "And you'd seem like a normal girl or a big dog, depending on your form. Something completely normal?" At her request he stopped for just a minute. He'd hurt her so terribly and then she was missing. He needed to find her, to apologize. "Thanks Meg," he said then gave her directions to Kayos' place.

Jotting the directions down, Megan nodded before remembering that he couldn't see her. "Alright. I'm on my way." And maybe then she could get more answers about this whole form thing. "It's not a problem, Dorian. I'll see you soon." And she hung up.

Dorian hung up and turned back to Hunt. "She's on her way," he said. "We need a plan for what to do if we can find Kayos."

"We bring her home," Hunt said, starting to pack all his things back up again so that they were ready to move the moment that Megan got there. He didn't sound like he thought they needed much more of a plan than that at this stage, or that anything could be thrown in their path which couldn't be dealt with.