Remnants || (RE: Burning Men)
It was a little over thirty years ago that David found himself examining with grim studiousness piles of ashes that once were vampires. That was in San Francisco, after nothing further could be done for Jesse Reeves, after he was left with nothing except questions for the fate of vampires everywhere. Only back then he had been an old man bending gingerly above those remnants, in a rumpled suit that he’d not changed in over a night, internally hoping that his hip would allow him just a little extra time before it began to hurt as it often did when he exerted himself too much. ‘Out of practice on the field’, is the excuse he’d often used. Anything to avoid touching upon the more obvious fact that a man of his years had no business undertaking forensic study of a vampire’s remains when there were perfectly sturdy young Talamascans to do it for him.
Tonight, while others discussed their response to this event, he was crouched down near an unidentifiable pile of ash and bits of brittle bone. Aaron stood behind him to hold a steady beam of a torch down upon the mess, not that David required it for the light. He let his friend do so merely to let the other Englishman feel that much more useful. What helped him more than the presence of that unnecessary beam of light was the fact that Aaron made a perfect soundboard for him to think aloud, as he knew that the other former Talamascan would help to retain the details and findings uncovered in his examination, utilizing the little tricks of the trade they both had mastered.
“Bones here as well. I cannot imagine that any of these were pushing more than a number of decades in age. Thank God they’re scentless. Horrible to consider the stench we’d be enduring otherwise.” The words had no sooner left his mouth before David regretted them with a sharp pang in his heart. How easy it was for him to fall into the old patterns. To treat these deaths as merely another target for study. Circumstances had changed. It was no longer possible for him to disassociate himself from the crisis around him. He could not simply hang up his jacket at the end of the night and stretch his weary mortal bones while thinking himself lucky for a change to be purely human.
These were his brothers and sisters. With names he had never known. Faces he might never have recognised. David couldn’t wash his hands of this when he was immersed in the epicenter. He straightened with a sigh to stand at his full height, brushing his fingers together that felt soiled by contact with ash and sand. “I expect that the Talamasca’s Agents are also at work making these same observations. I can feel the buzz of their minds nearby just as I’m sure you can. Something drove these immortals to this act. If it was not Amel, then what was it?”