(no subject)

[dangeroushabits.livejournal.com]

Date: August 26th, 1999 (Morning)
Status: Private - Constantine, Chas Chandler
Setting: Somewhere in Oxfordshire
Summary: John plays detective, and finds one of several items gone missing.



"Helluva nice car, that is," Chas said admiringly.

John snorted as he got out of the cab. "You dunno the half of it..."

"So this is the one you were lookin' for, then?"

A pained expression crossed John's face. This was a new variation on a conversation they'd had at least a thousand times before. "No, Chas, this isn't the one. It's one of those other abandoned, mint condition, black 1926 Bentleys we so commonly see littering our fine roadways."

Chas blinked at him owlishly, aware that he was being mocked, but clearly not quite getting the drift.

John resisted the urge to cuff him smartly upside the head. Mostly because he'd need a ride home. "Yeah, it's the same one! Christ."

Chas scowled, muttering under his breath as he walked toward the Bentley, which looked rather forlorn sitting there empty by the side of the road. "Right, fine. I was just askin', no need to take me blooming 'ead off..."

"Don't touch it," John warned him, pacing a circle around the Bentley at a cautious distance.

Chas hauled up short and took a large step backward. "Why? Does it bite?" he asked, with nary a trace of sarcasm. He'd been acquainted with Constantine, and Constantine's hair-raising lifestyle, for far too long.

"It belongs to a demon, Chas. For all I know it might chew you up, swallow you, shit out what's left and flush it straight to Tartarus."

"Right, right. I get the point," Chas sighed, and retreated to a safe distance, leaning against his cab.

Coming up as close to the Bentley as common sense (and certain other, more esoteric senses) permitted, John looked inside, and swore quietly but vehemently at what he saw.

The interior was littered with large feathers, bloodied and broken. Soiling the well-kept leather seats were ominous reddish-brown stains, soot, and here and there, a bit of what looked like charred skin.

"Ah, Christ. Unloaded both barrels at you, didn't they, lads?" he muttered unhappily. "Fucking bloodthirsty bastards..."

A few minutes' reconnaissance turned up no trace of angel, demon or Other in the immediate vicinity. John tried not to find this too encouraging. They hadn't burnt up with the shop, apparently, and any reports of strange winged bodies found in the area would surely have got around to him by now.

Which meant, assuming they were still on this plane of existence (and if John had been a praying man, he might well have tossed one off to that effect just then,) someone or something must have intercepted them en route to...

He frowned. "Where the hell are we anyway, Chas? Where's this drive lead?"

The cabbie shrugged. "No place to speak of. Town's called Lower Tadfield. There's an old Manor house about five minutes along, used to be a nunnery." He gestured up the drive. "I think it's some kind of convention center or somethin' now."

John nodded. "Anything else around here?"

"There used to be a hospital nearby, but it burnt down years ago. Round about the same time as the nuns left, if I remember right. Not much else in town, 'cept for the air base."

Something hovered tantalizingly at the back of John's mind, just out of reach. Like most folk in the aftermath of the Apocalypse-that-wasn't, he remembered very little of the strange events that had swept the world at that time. But the name Lower Tadfield resonated oddly inside his head, calling up peculiar associations.

Ley lines, he found himself thinking, there was something about the ley lines...

After a moment's fruitless contemplation, he gave it up as a bad job. Well, hell. It's as good a place as any to look next.

"You got petrol enough to make it up there and have a look about before we head home?" he asked as he walked back toward Chas and the cab.

Chas gave him a jaundiced look. He'd come some distance out of his way just to bring John out here, with very little explanation offered. "I might. Spot me a tenner and I'll know for sure."

John dug a wad of crumpled bills out of his trench coat pocket. "That's all I've got on me..."

Chas counted up the bills and sighed, cramming them into his own pockets. "Right, fine. But you're gonna owe me. Again."

John grinned crookedly as he climbed into the passenger's side. "You're a good mate, Chas."

"Don't push your luck, Constantine."

A few moments later, Chas fired up the cab and started to pull away, then braked, looking back over his shoulder. "You sure it's a good idea, leavin' her out here like this? I mean, couldn't somebody get hurt?"

John glanced back at the stately old car, which (mess notwithstanding) looked a tempting morsel indeed for anyone with an eye for classics or a need for quick cash. "You got any better ideas?"

He refrained from pointing out that it was highly unlikely she'd sat here for a week or better, unnoticed and unmolested; and yet she showed no signs of vandalism, attempted theft nor police attention. Best not to speculate about that, he thought.

"Point." Chas shook his head and put the cab back in gear, heading them off toward Tadfield Manor. "I dunno why you're so hot to find this bloke, anyway. I thought you hated demons."

John glanced down at the carefully-wrapped bundle that lay on the seat between them. "I do, mostly..."

"So what's the deal, then? This one owe you a favor or somethin'?"

Settling back in the wide comfortable seat, John shrugged as he lit up a cigarette. "Nah. He just ran afoul of some people I don't like. You know, the old 'enemy of my enemy' thing."

"Besides," he added with a rather nasty smirk, "I'm in a mood to rattle me a few cages..."

Chas groaned. When John started in with that kind of talk, it was best to be as far away from him as possible.

(Continues at neutral_omens)