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Who: EVERYONE.
What: Swap meet.
Where: The Apache and surrounding environs.
When: Sukkardi the 14th of Haneden
Notes:
Swap Meet Spreadsheet: Pre-chosen swaps are green. Assigned are blue. There were a few characters that were selected more than once, so objects were assigned on a first-come first-serve basis. If you have any issues or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact the mod team.
For objects that might not be immediately apparent as belonging to their owners, there may be a picture or name attached, or players are welcome to have their characters ~just know~ it's for them. Drr drr drr, bb.
Party post nights are a great time to come join the chatroom.
The topic threads are just suggestions; if you've got somewhere else that your characters simply must be, make your own thread.
Warnings: None yet. Please put warnings up on individual threads.

The Apache is much the same as it always is: dimly lit, with the jukebox playing in the background, and the bartender serving whatever's on tap.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The swift, direct step of this man's approach catches Sherlock's attention; it's a bit at odds with the festive atmosphere. It's as if this man wishes, very much, to deliver what he's got and to be done with the affair. Forever.

He summons an affable little smile, gesturing at the empty place at his table. "Please. Show me what it is, and I shall be happy to confirm or deny."

He's full of curiosity--what's this man got that he thinks is Sherlock's, that he could make the connection without asking his name? A photograph? --Oh, God, please don't let it be something off John's blog or out of the tabloids.

The look he gives the offered chair at first is a bit... Oh. Is he expected to sit in that? Well. His hesitation is brief, however, before he stretches the bottom edge of his sleeve over his thumb and uses the covered digit to pull the chair out, sitting without further ado.

The folder he handles with similar care, setting it flat on the table and opening it tentatively, by its edges. He doesn't deign handle the pictures inside (he doesn't, interestingly, even look at them directly if he can help it), but they speak for themselves. A collection of family photographs, all formal, all featuring the man he's speaking to and one other.

"I found them in my room this morning," he explains, still a bit uncertain about this whole 'gift from the gods' idea.

It's curious, the way this man seems to want distance. To not want to touch anything. Especially the photographs, it's as if he's afraid.

Sherlock slides the folder closer, flipping quickly through the pictures. His face remains as impassive as ever, not betraying anything, though the heart he likes to pretend holds no sway over his mind is busy trying to remind him it exists. The snapshots bring back brief flashes of memory--his brother's hands, straightening his tie before one, smoothing down his hair before this one, holding a handful of the back of his jacket here, to keep his younger brother from fidgeting during the shot.

"You are correct in identifying me as one of the subjects of these photos,' he declares. He watches Hal a moment, and then he closes the folder, sliding it back across the table. "But they are not my property. I'm not so sentimental. I imagine they belong to the other man depicted in them."

There's a moment, after Sherlock first begins to speak, in which Hal has the tiniest glimmer of hope. He knows from the very fact that they're photographs that they aren't of precisely the man (the vampire) he knows, when he knows him, but even Mr. Snow was human once, wasn't he? It's not something he likes to imagine, but it's possible, even probable, and the only escape in sight from that inevitable conclusion is that these belong to Sherlock instead.

The way he pales, like the bottom has drop out of his stomach, at those last few words is hard to miss.

"He's here?"

Sherlock raises an eyebrow, inspecting the man opposite him. The color draining right from his face at the revelation that Mycroft is here intrigues him--he had to know, the gods aren't delivering these objects for people who aren't here.

Oh.

Oh.

He rushed over here the way he did because he hoped it wasn't true, hoped the photos were for Sherlock. Oh, that's very interesting.

"He is indeed. He called me, over the network, when I arrived. I assume the network is not accessible to anyone outside the city. Why are you afraid of him?" he asks, abruptly shifting the focus of the conversation.

Hal gives the man a look that falls somewhere between completely incredulous and mildly ill. "Are you mad?" Why are you afraid of him, like any creature living or undead could spend a minute in his presence without metaphorically shitting themselves.

Unless this man hasn't spent any time with him at all. Unless it's not him yet.

"Tell me, when you spoke, was it a video call, or—?" He seems very fixated on that detail all of a sudden.

Sherlock's not quite sure what to make of this; he's known men to quake with fear at the prospect of having crossed Mycroft, but this? This is something much more visceral.

"He texted me. It's our preference for communication, texting." He frowns. "I didn't see him, but I assure you, it was him, I wouldn't be fooled by another."

Had it been video, Hal would at least know that he was human still, maybe just as terrifying but without the added pull of their shared blood. Without that assurance, he isn't certain of anything--and with every question, he's revealing more about himself than he ought.

"Shit." The crispest-sounding cuss, right there. "I should go," he decides suddenly, reaching to close the folder and pull it back in. "I shouldn't be here."

Here, out in the open, where Mr. Snow can find him. (And yet he can't run, he knows it, he just-- he needs room to breathe, at least.)

He knows his brother is not a man to cross, but could he actually have inspired such bone-gnawing terror in another person like this? This man is clearly afraid, ready to bolt now that he has confirmation that Mycroft is, in fact here. That's how he read this exchange, anyway, the how did he contact you--he assumes this man asked if Sherlock laid eyes on him to affirm that, yes, he's here, not because... vampires.

And yet he came anyway. A moment of courage? No, not to have it dashed like this. The fear clearly goes deep, and yet he came anyway, why did he come anyway?

Oh.

He's that afraid of crossing Mycroft.

Dear, oh dear.

"I wish I could help." A little, if only to satisfy his own curiosity. "But that call is the only contact I have had with him since I arrived. I don't know where he might be found to pass those photographs on to him. Which... well. I'm new here and not entirely versed in local custom, but the rules of this exercise seem to indicate that one must deliver one's boon to its rightful owner. I don't know how much power the local deities have, but I should rather hate to find out by crossing them, mm?"

Sherlock Holmes: neither helpful or comforting.

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