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Yo. Mercutio is sitting crosslegged by the fireplace, staring into the fire. One hand is tossing and catching a dagger - he doesn't seem to even be looking at it.

He's humming very quietly, a Veronan children's song.

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"My Lord," and he bows back. Deeper, because he does know his place despite that chip on his shoulder. "Master Christopher Marlowe."

And, yes, that Master is important. Sniggers aside, he graduated from Cambridge and it's his title.

"The pleasure is mine, Master Marlowe."

He smiles sweetly.

Marlowe's own smile is crooked.

"And how does one of the Prince's household find himself here?"

"Dead."

Fluid shrug.

"A brawl. You know how noblemen are."

He noticed the chip.

"Just men, perhaps," and he brushes his cheekbone just under that eyepatch. "Tempers and daggers and swords."

"More boredom and idle hands and hot summer days. Which is wherefore I say noblemen, since no other breed of man has enough time on their hands for that sort of lightly-considered action. Lower brawls are more serious, or more drunken, and always more substantial. I have felt the difference."

Pause.

"Tempers were high, but not high enough that I expected death."

He tips his head to one side.

"Still at least my death advanced the story." Slight edge.

That gets a flicker.

"Mercutio, Mercutio, Ask for me tomorrow, and you shall find me a grave man...." His soft voice changes on the last, becoming smoother and faintly bitter and oh, yes, Marlowe had been actor once.

Still.

He raises an eyebrow at him.

"You have read it?"

He smiles.

"I had my moments."

"I watched it. First performance, nine years ago. I always meant to compliment Shakespeare on it, but..." He gestures. "Never got around to."

"Ah."

Now that is an odd thought.

"Who played as me?"

"A new lad, for the actor who was going had an argument with a blacksmith over his wife. Richard someone, I forget his last name. But he was very, very good."

A pause, and he rubs the back of his head.

"Does this happen often here, characters having a life and words of their own?"

Please, please god, let Faustus not come here. Please, please god.

It's kind of disturbing, to be told that someone made a very, very good you.

So let's move on, paper over the cracks.

And answer the question about being fictional.
The whole subject is kind of disturbing, frankly.

"No. I am not a character. I am a person, and I have a life outside of what the playwright described."

He always avoids Shakespeare's name.

"There are other stories, I know."

"Life. Not stories."

His eyes are hardening.

There is an edge of amusement, and not a nice one.

"Shakespeare did not write his play off you, no more than I wrote Faustus on a life. Stories. Sources. That is how we find things out. Not real, certainly not."

Oh, this could go downhill really fast.

"I do not care a jot what he wrote off or how he found things out. I am real and solid and..."

Pause.

"Well, I was."

Suddenly, his mouth twitches slightly.

"Ack, think what thou wilt. I do not normally succumb to such easy provocation. Wilt have to try harder, pretty Master Christopher."

Deliberate, careless use of his first name, voice just dripping with lordliness. His eyes are amused.

A wicked grin that takes years from his face.

"But, succumb you did."

"Aye. As I said, it was an unusual occurrence."

He shrugs.

"And a tender place to have stabbed at."

"Maybe I did not seek to cause thee offence, my Lord. More a poet, and a writer, confused upon seeing someone he knew but as a friend's witty character be in fact his own true person."

"Mayhap to begin, but thou certainly did'st not back off when the offence was realised."

Not that he would have done so, but that's frankly irrelevant. He is Mercutio.

"I rather think that such an excuse is beneath thee, my friend. Either be proud of thine own stabbing, or be regretful."

He grins.

"I care very little which."

And he is not touching the 'friend' comment. No way. He doesn't want to hear Shakespeare's name again.

"In fencing, cannot one feign as well as lunge?"

"Irrelevant. We are not duelling."

He stretches out on the floor, yawning.

"So, a writer?"

"A poet, and a playwright. Once upon a time."

"Worth the paper you wrote on?"

"And more." And there is something in the way he says it, something self-mocking and bitter, that says that he isn't making it up.