Jordan Gilroy

I went to take a shower this morning and found that instead of my nice adjustable showerhead, I have an overly friendly woolly mammoth that doesn't know how to keep its trunk to itself. This would explain why my hair looks like my primary method of grooming is grub-picking chimpanzees.

At least Tampa decided to wait until spring to hit us with this one. I think a month or two ago it would have been a little too chilly to be sporting the skin-bearing all-leather-and-fur ensembles we've got going on. At least I seem to have decent calluses on my feet - presumably from powering my own car - and that's keeping me from scorching my feet on any dark surfaces.

Fuck, PETA's going to have a field day with this, aren't they? First person I catch throwing blood, real or otherwise, is going to be subjected to me conveniently forgetting that I'm not a cop this lifetime.

She'd been given bad information. That was the only thing she had time to think before she died.

***

Jordan was looking for a runaway. The kid was 16, not exactly the clean-cut type, and had gone missing and come back alright before, so he wasn't exactly a top priority for the cops. She could understand that. It was meant to be an easy case - find the addresses and hang-outs of some names the family had heard the kid mention, pay a couple of visits, drag the kid home by the earlobe and make him apologize for worrying his family.

No big deal.

She wasn't worried when she knocked on the door of the first address on her list. It wasn't a great neighborhood, but people tended not to mess with her, and Jordan could take care of herself if they did. It took a few minutes for someone to come to the door, the peephole going dark for a moment before it was opened halfway.

Lifting the picture of the kid she was looking for, she didn't even get a chance to ask if the guy had seen him. There was an argument in the other room, Jordan moved up a step to take a look, and saw a whole lot of things she shouldn't. If she hadn't looked like a cop, they might've threatened her and let her go.

No such luck.

***

She woke up confused and covered in blood. Her shirt was riddled with bullet holes, and her hair was a sticky mass of blood and brain matter.

It didn't feel like she had a hole in her head, though.

Jordan sat up stiffly, slowly realizing that she was in a ditch on the side of a road. A road that was very obviously still in Tampa.

Funny, she'd never thought that hell would have so many damn palm trees.

The police have investigated Harry's apartment and our offices. I've personally been to my apartment, his parents' house, and all of the places he tends to get himself in trouble. All of the people we've investigated in the past have been contacted, and interrogated if necessary, and none of them have seen him. And there have been no reports of areas where electronics mysteriously start malfunctioning.

( Private )

Whatever happened to him is definitely Tampa's fault.

Wow, flashbacks to my childhood. Though usually the Lego buildings were occupied by action figures of various types - GI Joes were obviously very popular in my house - and not Lego people. I remember it being a big deal when I graduated from the big, chunky Duplo blocks to the smaller, sharper Lego blocks. Even if most of my relatives insisted on buying me the sets with 'girl colors'.

Which, beyond being obnoxious, also made my brothers resentful. Usually, when one boy got a set for his birthday or Christmas, he'd play with it by himself for a few weeks, maybe a month, and then it went into the collective pot. There was no place for the pink, white and baby blue beach house in the collective pot, with it's primary colors and trees and helicopters.

Gavin once swallowed a Lego. They had to operate because he hadn't eaten enough other food to help it move through without its edges ripping everything. He didn't much like playing with them after that.

I wonder what he'd say if I sent him pictures from yesterday.

( Private )

( Harry )

( Harry )

( Tommy )

What I want to know is how much alcohol sales increase in July in Tampa.

( Tommy )

( Private )

( Private )

( Harry )

Anyone else in the mood to run up and down the beach until they fall down and can't get back up?

( Private )

( Sam )

It was one of the few days where she did not take calls. She didn't work on cases, she didn't do filing, and she didn't care if Harry ended up in jail or on the moon, because she simply wasn't available. It was the third Mother's Day since she'd taken her mother off of life support, and she couldn't quite get over it.

Jordan knew it had been the right decision. Her mother hadn't really been around for over a decade, but they'd never considered it while she was still breathing on her own, and while her heart still beat without help. Fifteen years of the status quo, sending flowers to be put at her beside each Mother's Day when she couldn't make it herself, and then it changed. Then the men in her family had left the decision to her because, after all, she'd been Mary's little girl. Her favorite.

They all knew it was for the best. Knew that Mary was no longer stuck in her own body. That didn't stop a couple of her brothers from calling, upset, and leaving messages they'd apologize for later. Didn't stop the others from refusing to pick up when she called to give them the chance too. And it certainly didn't stop her father from saying the same thing he did every year now: "You did what you had to do, soldier."

It was easier, somehow, to let them hate her just those few days a year. Mary's birthday, Christmas, Mother's Day. To give them someone to blame when there was no one else. The driver of the car had never been caught, and none of her doctors had ever made a mistake. It just was, and it easier to let them blame her than to try to defend herself when she was pretty sure she agreed.

( Harry )

Every time a seven rolls around, I miss living on base.

Jordan was really tired of sevens. This had less to do with the sevens themselves and more to do with the fact that she was almost twice as likely to have to fetch Harry from somewhere or save his ass from an angry mob than on any other day of the month. Thank God she charged overtime.

So she set her alarm for early on the 17th, ready to get up and face whatever it was that would happen. Only nothing happened.

That almost made her more nervous than she had been. She drove to the office, stopping to pick up coffee on the way mostly so she could eavesdrop on any conversations and see if anything weird was going on with anyone else. Nada. So she walked into the office with a tray full of coffee cups and passed them around, frowning when she didn't see Harry right away.

Major casework was never scheduled for a seven these days, but she had a few files with easy loose ends to tie up and so she grabbed her bag and went out. She was staked out in her car outside a cheap motel eating a burger when she reached for a napkin on the passenger seat and it flew into her hand.

Jordan immediately pulled out her cell phone and dialed as she drove out of the parking lot. "Harry, you have about thirty seconds to pick up the phone and prove that you haven't found a lightsaber and cut off your own arm with it."

_____________

Name: Jordan Gilroy/Jo Lupo (Eureka)
Domain of: Hathaway/Dillian
Library section: Television
Powers: Sensing - can 'sense' where dependents or those she's responsible for are, and know if they're in trouble.