(no subject)

[mightbeagoodone]

When Sherlock enters the bar, tugging his scarf from around his neck, he almost turns right around to go back.

A certain thieving magpie has just made life unusually interesting.

(However, a cup of tea and a think never hurts, and it's more likely to be helpful here than it is at home.)

When he stops at the bar for his tea, it is delivered with a gift and a note. Like ice. Like sapphire.

Yes, Sherlock thinks with a grim smile as he tucks the iThing away in a pocket. The time is coming soon where he must be both.

He folds himself into a chair by the fire, tea within reach, and steeples his fingers under his chin.



[ooc: Hiatus-thing ...on hiatus? Because I am weak, I tell you. Weak. back on as of 7/14. Thanks!]

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[i_am_your_host]

The Master of Ceremonies is, ostensibly, his usual self today. Crimson lips, kohl-lined eyes with a touch of iridescent peacock blue eyeshadow; a sleeveless undershirt (he will discover proper tank tops eventually) and trousers cut off just below the knee, which reveals, of all things, that he is also wearing sock garters with beat-up combat boots.

With a lit cigarette pinched between his fingertips, he flops onto the couch. And happens to land in a position with a direct view of Sherlock's rather striking profile. All brown wavy hair and Adam's apple, firelight casting sharp shadows on those cheekbones. Damn.

[mightbeagoodone]

A personage such as this one gets through even Sherlock's concentration.

Sherlock raises his eyebrow at him.

[i_am_your_host]

Those long, steepled fingers, that raised eyebrow-- ah.

Emcee blinks, smiles with one corner of his mouth, and wiggles his cigarette-holding fingers at him in a little wave.

"My apologies, mein Herr," he says with a Berliner accent. "I didn't mean to disturb you, but your intense concentration has quite an exquisite aesthetic to it."

[mightbeagoodone]

"An exquisite...aesthetic?" He chuckles. "I suppose that's better than being called a pretentious twat."

[i_am_your_host]

"You have been called a pretentious twat for being deep in thought?" he half-snorts. "Personally I could watch the firelight dance on your face for as long as it took you to sort out your thoughts, but I hear that staring is rude." And he smirks, highlighting the fact that he sometimes does rude things for the sake of doing them.

[mightbeagoodone]

Sherlock smiles to himself. "Yes, I have."

Then, "Thank you for the compliment."

He's pretty sure he understood the man's intentions.

[i_am_your_host]

That seemed to be a very...neutral acceptance of his compliment. He can work with that!

"You're welcome," he chirps, before taking a drag off his cigarette.

"Now, as for you being a pretentious twat, I believe that I will have to form my own opinion about that as this conversation progresses-- unless you admit to being one."

[mightbeagoodone]

"Pretentious--perhaps. Twat--" He shrugs.

If he really wanted to show off, he'd switch to German, but he suspects the Bar's translation ... whatever--would ruin the effect.

[i_am_your_host]

"Twat, dick, it doesn't matter to me," he says with a wry grin.

"Although I think if you were a dick, you would have told me to fuck off for interrupting your musings, so at least I can rule that one out."

[mightbeagoodone]

Sherlock huffs. "And if I said you're a native Berliner who currently works in entertainment after a long career of--other things--and you're no stranger to sleeping rough though you can also make yourself into the pampered pet of someone powerful when it suits you--

"Then you'd likely tell me to fuck off."

[i_am_your_host]

Emcee blinks at him, his neat brows slowly, slowly drawing together.

...And then his face splits with a bright grin.

"Oh, fuck off," he nearly giggles.

"I may be an open book most of the time, but surely you must have seen me here before or someone mentioned something about me to you in passing."

[mightbeagoodone]

Sherlock grins back.

"I observe and deduce. I'm a consulting detective."

[i_am_your_host]

Emcee pulls his feet up onto the couch and sits cross-legged, leaning forward slightly with curiosity.

"A detective? You are the second detective I've met here, but I don't think I have ever heard of a consulting detective."

[mightbeagoodone]

"I invented the job.

"Who's the other detective?"

[i_am_your_host]

"A fellow from New York City," he says. "He reminded me of one of those grizzled, brooding types one reads about in pulp fiction magazines.

"So, what exactly do you do as a consulting detective?"

[mightbeagoodone]

"Hm." No one he knows, then. Unimportant.

"I solve mysteries, sometimes for Scotland Yard, sometimes for private clients, and then my flatmate blogs about it. It's gotten to the point that I no longer have to take the boring ones."

Not that he ever did, really. No cheating spouses for him. Ugh.

[i_am_your_host]

"Oooh. How intriguing! Your powers of deduction must be exceptional if Scotland Yard requires your services."

A pause.

"...What does 'blog' mean?"

[mightbeagoodone]

"It's a kind of public diary, published electronically."

He tries to think of a way to explain the internet to someone from the 1930s, then says, "Do you have a T-minus from the bar?"

[ostro_goth]

Not far away sits an early medieval man with dark hair and a harp, which he is playing quietly, almost absent-mindedly.

On and around his chair, four cats are napping.

[mightbeagoodone]

The music penetrates through Sherlock's musings. He likes it--it reminds him of the ancient songs Sinric has introduced him to.

He turns from disinterested observer to attentive audience in a moment, his fingers folding under his chin.

[ostro_goth]

After a while the man begins to sing, in Gothic -- if Sherlock can tell the difference despite the translation magic.

It is a ballad of battle, defeat, and lasting memories despite it.

[mightbeagoodone]

The language does not come through, but the meaning does. Sherlock closes his eyes, listening intently.

[ostro_goth]

The story is quite long, naming people who died in the vanguard of some desperate rout, day after day, of a defeated people. Of each of them, the balled mentions some trait or tale that made them special.

[mightbeagoodone]

[ooc: Mind if they talk some other time? I need to get back to writing.]

[ostro_goth]

[[OOC: Quite okay. Good luck with that!]]