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[diced_tartan]

Nicholas is in the bar today, out of uniform but still working. He's got a packet of Jaffa Cakes and a cup of tea to keep him company while he goes through the week's case reports. All three of them.

The current one is confounding him. Utterly and completely. Some of it makes sense, and then it just suddenly... doesn't. In fact, he's fairly certain some of it isn't even written in English. (A quick check shows this report was filed by PC Walker. Of bloody course it was.)

If someone could tell Nicholas what... agrafollyerbs ...? is supposed to mean, he'd be much obliged. Because he hasn't got a clue.

Comments

[vyvyan]

"Alright Knickers?"

Vyvyan sits down and starts helping himself to the Jaffa cakes.

[diced_tartan]

Nicholas closes his eyes and tries not to get upset. The nickname, if he's honest, is nothing new. In fact, it's no worse than what he hears from CID on a daily basis.

But those were his Jaffa Cakes, and well. It's not so much that he doesn't like to share. It's just that he's very particular about sharing and how it's done.



Basically, Vyvyan can have those now.



"All right," he says.

[vyvyan]

"I brought you a present." Vyvyan says, putting a bottle of vodka on the table. He hasn't even drunk out of it.

The label reads.

'Deer boss you are a pal no won ever gave me a chanse so u rock from Vyvyan.'

[diced_tartan]

Oh. Well. Nicholas does drink, but not vodka. The last time he had vodka, he was sick for what he's pretty sure was about a week.

But it would be rude to refuse, so he takes it anyway.

"Yes. Uh, thank you," he says, setting the bottle aside.

[vyvyan]

Vyvyan eats another one of his Jaffa Cakes.

"Did you decide what you wanted me to blow up?" he asks.

[diced_tartan]

"Yes, actually. I did," Nicholas says.

He has another folder in his bag, which he takes out and hands to Vyvyan. It documents the full cost of repairs, at about £400 (much better than it could have been, all things considered), documents everything that was done in the line of repairs, and even contains the report filed, with a very liberally-fudged account of events.

"That's what you'll be working off," he explains. "The work won't be regular, since we don't have a regular need for it, but we are in need of a disposal service for evidence from the lockers. It can't be sold or re-appropriated, which means it often just takes up space."

When it's there at all. Which isn't often in Sandford, let's be honest.

[vyvyan]

"You mean I'm not getting paid?" Vyv asks, looking crestfallen.

[diced_tartan]

"I'm prepared to offer the same rate for this as I did before," Nicholas offers. "First to pay for the repairs to the car, but anything after that is yours to keep."

[vyvyan]

"Oh. Okay, thanks."

Beat.

"Why did you give me a job? Nobody else ever did."

[ostro_goth]

He gets disturbed by a small grey cat jumping onto his table and insolently sitting on his papers.

[diced_tartan]

Nicholas jumps slightly at the sudden appearance of the cat, but it hasn't hurt anything really.

"I don't think you belong up here, do you?" he asks it as he picks it back up and sets it on the ground.

[ostro_goth]

The cat comes around and rubs his face on Nick's ankle. He's not giving up easily.

[diced_tartan]

No he isn't, is he?

Nicholas can't easily reach him from where he's seated, but he's not exactly above giving it a playful nudge with his toe.

[ostro_goth]

The cat tries to catch Nick's toes, next.

[diced_tartan]

After nudging the cat a few more times, Nicholas reaches down to see if the cat is wearing tags.

It isn't, of course. It hasn't even got a collar. But it does mean his hand is close enough for ear-scritches.

"Where's your person at?" Nicholas asks the cat, as if it would respond (around here, who's to say it won't?). "Or shouldn't you be outside with all the other animals?"

[ostro_goth]

The cat jumps into his lap instead.

[diced_tartan]

Oh, well... okay. This is better than on the report he's trying to clear (Bob Walker is the only person on the planet capable of writing exactly like he mumbles).

"Just keep your fur to yourself," he warns, knowing already that it will never happen, and he'll be cleaning cat hair from his laundry for the next month.

[the_gene_genie]

Gene is barrelling through the bar as he usually does, looking for a table. He's got a pint in one hand, a lit fag in the other, and a shiny Security badge on prominent display on his chest.

The sight of Nicholas pulls him up short.

'Blimey. Haven't seen your ugly mug in a while.'

[diced_tartan]

Nicholas spares only the briefest glance upward, but he doesn't have to do even that to recognise the voice.

Suffice to say, Gene Hunt is not a man who is easily forgotten.

"Yes, well. I've been kinda busy," he says.

Then he goes back to trying to decipher the report, because Bob Walker is the only person on the planet who actually writes like the talks. Even his handwriting mumbles.

[the_gene_genie]

He reaches down - and over the report - to help himself to one of Angel's Jaffa Cakes.

'With what? Parking tickets?

[diced_tartan]

"Not exactly."

Nicholas decides to just sod it all and flips to the last page of the report to sign it off. A brief, treacherous thought flits through his mind that perhaps it was reading through Walker's reports that drove Frank mad in the first place.

He looks up at Gene, properly this time, and anything he was about to say to encourage this conversation to not go where it's so plainly trying to go evaporates immediately.

"Who put you on security?" he asks.

Probably the same idiot who made Nicholas a chief inspector.

[the_gene_genie]

He'd been about to sit down. Now, he draws himself up, squares his shoulders and is about to retort with his - fairly extensive - powers of righteous indignation.

Once he's finished chewing this mouthful of Jaffa Cake.






'Mel.'

So, basically, swivel.

[diced_tartan]

Nicholas starts to say something about that, while at the same time trying to ignore the fact that Gene has helped himself to the Jaffa Cakes.

The result is a bit of a false start.

"Ah—Well. If that's the case, are you sure you should be drinking while you're on duty?"

Some things, it would seem, will never change.

[the_gene_genie]

This makes him roll his eyes. And now he does sit down, and shove his feet up on the nearest chair. And drink some of his pint.

'Oh, shut it. Nothing here I can't handle while I've had a few.'

[diced_tartan]

Nicholas does his best to ignore that, because it is none of his business.

But we all know how well Nicholas is at ignoring things that aren't his business.

He does such a good job at ignoring it, he doesn't even say anything while he flips open the second report (one of Doris', so it should at least be legible).

He waits until he's got it open to speak again.

"And your superiors allow that, do they?"