Kin of the Child 2 (Patreon)

Just a little more palate cleansing.  This feels good--just writing with no thought to where it's going or if I have my commas in the right place.

“Hey, Chief, how are you doing?” Jim asked as he walked in the door, passing his cat as it sat in the hallway guarding their home. A lot had changed in the last year, and Jim’s spirit animal was only one part of that. At least he had help keeping Blair safe. Nothing, human or demon, was going to get past a spirit animal. They were serious mojo, having enough power from their home dimension to counter almost any magic user or demonic attacker.

The double doors to the small room under the stairs were open, and Blair looked up from his desk. “Oh man, do not ask. I am seriously about to burn every bit of my research, and then piss on the ashes.”

Jim bit the inside of his cheek to keep himself from laughing at Blair's response. The room under the stairs had long ago been converted into a full-time office, and Blair had filled every inch with paper. “It certainly looks like you have enough research here.”

“Enough?” Blair's voice went up an octave. “I have more than enough. When I decided to switch my dissertation to power structures, I had no idea that humans were going to be so damn close to demons when it came to irrational reactions to power and authority. If I didn't know better, I would say that humans are just one more variety of demon, only all of my demonic cousins would disown me if they heard me say something like that.”

Jim dropped his messenger bag on the table next to the door and leaned on the post that divided the kitchen from the main room. “I thought your demonic cousins already disown you, something to do with the fact that you helped stop the last Armageddon, the one they were backing.”

Blair shrugged without denying anything. It was actually a good thing that they had disowned Blair because if any of them showed up around Jim, he was going to seriously reconsider his position on murder. They had sided with an Apocalypse, so if Jim was the one to snap their scrawny necks, that would feel less like murder and more like the universe just catching up with them.

Blair huffed and slammed the tome he'd been looking through when Jim walked in the door. “Given the expression you have on your face right now, I would worry about my cousins and their potential lifespans, only now that Anya is running around telling everyone that you've got Va’nuss blood in you, I'm fairly sure that my cousins have decided to never come anywhere near me again.”

“That's the smartest thing your cousins have ever done.”

“Oh man, that is no joke. But at least Uncle Sal likes you,” Blair said.

Jim was not sure that like was the correct verb to use in that instance. He and Blair's Uncle Sal had reached a mutual understanding. They both liked and respected Blair and they both wanted to avoid the potential world ending conflict that would be caused if they fought, so they had decided to just ignore any less charitable feelings they had towards each other. It was a little easier to do that with Sal because he had taken in Blair and Naomi and helped him, even before Blair had joined Angel and Spike and their crazy crew down in LA. As far as Jim was concerned, anyone who helped Blair was on Santa's good list.

“So, there's a new demon in town.”

Blair's gaze sharpened. “Oh?”

“The adult was suspicious, so I couldn't get close, but it was a male with a very young child.” Jim grimaced. He hated getting caught when he was tailing someone, and he was ninety percent sure the man had spotted him. He’d looked right at Jim, his gaze sharp and suspicious, and his hand hovering near the hidden holder that probably held a gun. Or maybe spell casting materials. Jim’s understanding of what was a weapon had changed since Blair had introduced him to the realities of demon society.

Blair frowned. “Just the two of them? No clan?”

Jim shook his head. “Not that I could tell, but then I couldn't get very close. In fact, I couldn't tell if the male was the demon or if it was the child or both. I just know that something gave me that tingly, cranky feeling that means I don't like having demons in my territory.”

Blair dropped the book onto the desk, nearly starting a paper avalanche as he pushed back his chair. “Oh man, let me tell you, demons don't like being in your territory. No one can clean out demonic activity like you can.”

“That's because demons are smarter than the average criminal in Cascade.”

“No joke.” Blair came over and wrapped an arm around Jim’s waist, leaning into him. Jim hugged him back. For a second, Jim rested his cheek against Blair’s head and soaked up the heat of his partner. He had lost so many illusions about the world—about himself—but the truth had brought him this. Jim would not trade their bond for anything in the universe. After a second, Blair asked, “Do you think there's a chance that this is a human who is kidnapped a young demon? There are a lot of demon species that have properties that magic users might want to acquire.”

“Please tell me you're not talking about acquiring by dismemberment,” Jim begged. Blair stepped back, breaking their connection before he shrugged.

Jim sighed. “Great. Demons suck.”

Blair gestured to the massive pile of research that covered the office. “Oh yeah? Well, apparently humans suck in exactly the same way. I think we can safely say that all sentient creatures are power-hungry sons-of-bitches and that this planet and all planets in all dimensions would probably be better off without sentient life.”

“That's dark, Sandburg.”

He huffed. “What can I tell you? I am feeling the darkness right now. By the time I turn this dissertation in, the university is going to have me committed for being looney tunes.” He emphasized his words by twirling his forefingers in circles near his temples. “Looney tunes.”

“That's okay, chief. I'll break you out of the asylum.”

Blair shook his head and radiated fond exasperation. “Whatever. So, what are the odds that this was a kidnapping? There's no way some demon clan would put out an Amber alert if a human hunter managed to grab one of their offspring.”

Jim shook his head. “No. The girl was comfortable with the man, and she called him Abba.”

“Whoa.” Blair whistled. “Jewish demon?”

“I was going to say a Hebrew speaking potential demon, but something like that.” Jim stripped off his jacket. “Are there such things as Jewish demons?”

Blair opened his mouth, and Jim held his hand up, palm out. “Please. It is been a very long day of budget reviews and effectiveness surveys. Give me the short version.”

Blair gave him a devilish grin, one that made Jim think that he was about to get a full on history lesson of some demonic dimension that Jim didn't want to know about. However, the smile faded and Blair huffed again. “There are a few. You have more demons associated with Christianity, weirdly.”

“Why is that weird?”

For a second, Blair gave him a sharp look. “I don't know. Why is it weird that Jesus, the Jew, somehow triggered demons who were Jewish to become Christian? Yeah, that's not weird, not at all.” Blair rolled his eyes. “Man, in demonic terms Christianity was like two generations ago. However, lots of demon clans found those early Christians way tastier than the Jews.”

“They ate them?” Horror rose in Jim's throat, making the words hard to get out.

Blair gave him an odd look. “They're not Jewish or Christian in terms of their beliefs about saving their immortal souls. If you say a demon is Christian or Jewish or Muslim, generally what you're saying is that that demonic clan likes to hide within that community. And so they take on those traits. They speak that language or dress a certain way. If you want to talk about demons that think their soul can go to the higher plane of existence and find heaven, we’re to be right back to those early lectures about eudaemon and how the world started.”

“No thank you,” Jim said. He may accept that he had a tiny drop of demon blood, and that that drop was from a demon terrifying enough that it had a reputation for wiping out entire dimensions. However, he didn’t want to have Blair’s encyclopedic knowledge of the arcane. In fact, he was very happy that his own demonic clan lived in Los Angeles and he was still a police detective in Cascade, Washington. At least he was for now. The brass was pushing hard for him to take over now that Simon was thinking of retiring. Personally, Jim was fairly sure that if he didn't get to go out on the streets and arrest criminals that he was going to have a whole lot of trouble with his anger issues. As if summoned by that thought, Jim's spirit animal appeared.

Blair stepped around the cat, giving it a quick pat on the head as he headed for the kitchen.

The panther raised his lip in a snarl, but Blair ignored the implied threat, like he usually did. Besides, Jim's spirit animal would never attack Blair. At least, it wouldn't now that he and Blair had started communicating more openly and they understood each other.

“So, are you feeling a need to track down this demon?” Blair asked.

“He’s staying in a hotel a couple of blocks from the oceanfront. If bodies start dropping, I'm going to know where to look.”

Blair glanced over his shoulder “Man, way to show your prejudices, totally uncool.”

“Darwin, the last time we had a family of demons visit, they ate a dozen homeless people and left the bones in the sewer.”

“Yeah, and you then slaughtered them all horribly. Letting the one getaway after you'd hacked off three of his four limbs, only brutal. Totally.” Blair came out of the fridge with two beers. He tossed one at Jim. “After that story got around, Cascade became the most demon free zone in the entire US. I'm pretty sure that people were dismissing Anya's stories of you being Va’nuss as demonic fairytales until that little incident. But trust me, if this guy is connected with demonic clans at all, he will steer clear of your territory.”

Jim frowned as he considered what Blair wasn’t saying. “You're implying that this is someone who's trying to find the territory safe from demons.”

Blair shrugged. “Maybe.” He put his beer on the counter and headed back to the fridge. “Maybe this is a demon who is trying to get away with his child. Maybe this is a human who had an affair with the demon and is trying to get the child away from the demon clan.” Jim winced. For Blair, that had to strike a little too close to home. Blair brought out the leftover roast. “Who knows? But if there is a demon in town, that does seem like the kind of thing someone should know about.”

“If this demon seems to pose any kind of threat, I'll call Angel,” Jim promised.

“Oh man, that's what you said with the last clan, and you didn't call him until after you had disemboweled, beheaded and ritually slaughtered most of the clan. He was unamused.”

“He understood,” Jim argued. If he’d thought the Lubber demons were a threat, he would have called before he’d gone into the sewers. However, the second he read Blair’s information, he knew he could take the clan. He’d told Angel as much.

“Angelus understood,” Blair corrected him. “Oh man, I suspect Angelus was feeling serious envy at how much slaughter you got to do. However Angel, the broody one with the soul… he was not amused.”

“Since they’re sharing the same body, it's good enough that one of them backed my decision to keep our clan out of it. This is my territory and that was my fight.”

Blair snorted. “You are part of Angel and Spike’s clan. I'm pretty sure that makes this Angel’s territory Spike’s fight. You know Spike was put out that he didn’t get to crack any heads. And normally, I am anti-Spike violence, but Lubbers really are anti-human assholes. Spike had a right to a piece of that action.”

Jim suspected that the next time he visited the clan, Spike was going to make exactly that point in person. However, Jim stood by his decision. “I wanted to make sure there were some demons alive to go back to the main clan and tell them to stay out of Cascade.”

Blair gave him an incredulous look and held up a single finger. “One demon. You left one demon mostly alive.” He grimaced. “Maybe partially alive. He was kind of banged up there. Do you really think Spike would've done worse than that?”

Jim crossed his arms. “Yes.”

Blair had been peeling the plastic wrap away from the meat, but now he paused. “Okay, I know you haven't spent a lot of time with Spike, and when you did spend time with him, there was that whole world-ending Jenny Calendar thing going on, but Spike is not a mindless killer.”

“I never said he was, Sport. But Spike and I would've been competing to kill more fighters, and between our aggression and our competitive natures, there would not have been any demons left alive.”

“Disturbing.” Blair went back to unwrapping their dinner.

“Yeah, but true,” Jim said. “And we are not inviting Spike or Angel up until we figure out why there is a demon hanging out in Cascade.”

“Oh man, it's your funeral.”

“No, it’s ours,” Jim said sweetly. “After all, we’re in this together.”

“You’re a real bastard, Jim Ellison,” Blair said with mock horror. “And if Spike gets pissy, I’m hiding behind Xander and aiming Spike straight at you. You can take your lumps like a good little va’nuss.”

Jim bent into a crouch. “You’ll pay for that threat, Sandburg.”

Blair held up the serving spoon he had just picked up. “Don’t you dare, Ellison. I am starving, and I want to get dinner going.”

The nice thing about how much Cascade had grown was that a person could get any kind of delivery at any time of day. Jim wasn’t too worried about either of them starving. He stalked around the end of the kitchen counter, his hands held low.

Blair dropped the spoon and it clattered to the floor as Blair leaped up and over the kitchen counter. In a flash, he was running, and Jim darted to cut him off from the front door. Reversing direction, Blair led the chase up the stairs into their bedroom, and Jim was more than happy to follow. The issue of strange demons could wait until after they’d had their fun.