LIGHT THE MATCH

[diogenesis]

Who: Mycroft Holmes and ~*you*~
What: An attempt to learn about the City in the most casual way possible.
Where: The Library of Blessed St. Brian
When: Veerdi, Kavadry 3rd
Notes: This is an open post! I have certain things I want to accomplish here, planting certain seeds and so forth, but anyone should feel free to come and poke the antisocial bear.
Warnings: Spoilers for Sherlock S2E3: The Reichenbach Fall.

It has been a long three days.

When Mycroft had first appeared in the small, tiled waiting room at the Inn, his first theory had been that he was dying. Perhaps I'm already dead, he'd thought.

Even now, having had hours of solitude to think it all over, he can't rule it out—there is no absolute way to disprove the existence of an afterlife—but his memories of the moments before he'd arrived here are so clear, and he feels certain he wasn't ill or in the process of being attacked. Surely, there would have been a moment just before unconsciousness, even the smallest moment, that would have allowed him to notice a twinge of pain, a blur of movement, the feeling of disorientation, the sound of a gun going off.

But all he knows is that he blinked, and he was elsewhere.

His chair from the Diogenes Club had taken the journey with him, making the fiasco even more mysterious. Mycroft hadn't even been near the club at the time; he'd been in 10 Downing Street. He can't deny the fact that having something familiar nearby has helped, in a small way, to soothe the burn of such a sudden transition, but in the end it is a single sandbag in the face of a hurricane. Not only has Mycroft been torn away from decades of work in a job only he could do, but his brother, Sherlock, is relying on him for resources and protection more than ever after being forced to fake his own death by the late James Moriarty. Mycroft's level of worry is unspeakable. None of his usual centering techniques have helped to focus his mind. He's beginning to fray at the edges.

This is why, despite the fact that it seems dangerous to go outside what with the City's residents capable of breaking the laws of physics and performing magic (not to mention the place being some version of a police state), Mycroft is at the University's library today. Three days trapped in his own mind was too long (felt the warning signs start to creep in, too much like Sherlock, can't afford that now, have to be alert now). The order of the day is fresh air and fresh knowledge. He needs to learn more about this place, whether it's all in his mind or not.

After all, if he is in a coma, he could be here for quite a long time.

Comments

[byrightsinhell]

Lucius glances up as Mycroft sits, but doesn't comment; it's crowded, and this isn't his library. (Sometimes frustratingly.)

It's some time before he comes to the end of the useful section in his current text that he does more than simply glance at the man. Lucius generally assumes people are muggles, but one can't be sure in Baedal; Solmon wore suits, not robes. Given that they aren't in a completely silent part of the library, he says quietly when Mycroft glances up, "Looking for something specific, or just trying to pass the time?"

[diogenesis]

Mycroft stops himself from sighing. Things had been going so well. Why the man across from him suddenly feels the need to make small talk is a complete mystery. It's true that there are interesting details about him, things that Mycroft is sure would be a benefit to know (the spell research, the old-fashioned writing system, the robes), but there is time to learn, and Mycroft would rather choose that time himself.

"Neither," he says, eyes still on his reading. His tone isn't necessarily rude, but it makes it clear that he's not interested in elaborating.

[byrightsinhell]

Lucius raises his eyebrows minutely. He's still, after all this time, unused to being condescended to - especially by someone who is more likely a muggle than not. Still, he is trying to be an upright citizen (even if for his own ends).

"The system isn't terribly intuitive," he says, however, low and clipped. "If you're new." He really should let it go.

[diogenesis]

Ah. This again.

Mycroft realizes it's instinctual to look down upon newcomers, but it does grow wearisome. Nothing to be done about it, though, but to wait it out (and isn't he growing more resigned by the minute). There's the question of how this man knows he's a newcomer to the City, though Mycroft would put it down to being largely guesswork and perhaps a bit of paranoia manifesting as nosiness. (Immediately, he hears Sherlock's voice in his head saying, "And you would know all about that, wouldn't you?") If it's something more intriguing, like a spell, Mycroft suspects he'll find out soon enough.

For now, though, it's all thoroughly boring.

"You don't say," he replies, having yet to look up as he turns another page.

[byrightsinhell]

Lucius is used to being on the giving, rather than the receiving end of condescension; he's been trying to behave, but Mycroft is inadvertently probing a point he has no way to know is sore. Lucius had simply meant "new to the library" - he was there enough he felt the guess was fair - but the bigger issue is that prior to Baedal (and his previous out of world stops), Lucius had simply never had to dealt with not being given automatic recognition and respect, or at least fear.

He knows he shouldn't care, but he can't quite help it.

"I do hope you'll deign to forgive the unasked-for interruption, then, as you're managing quite well." It's bone dry. "I'll let you read." And resist the urge to do something as petty as squeak the floorboard at random intervals. Because he is an adult.

[diogenesis]

The man obviously has a complex, Mycroft thinks to himself, and isn't overly-versed in the art of hiding it.

Like Mycroft, it seems arriving here has stripped this man of whatever status he may have had before. Unlike Mycroft, what matters to him is likely not the knowledge and control that comes with power, but the respect and fear of others. Respect and fear are the tools of the status quo and of instant gratification, of figureheads, of those who are afraid themselves. Knowledge and control, on the other hand, have no need for the public's opinion, and they exist where few can see them.

Mycroft ponders this in the space of a moment, then decreases the chain of thought's priority in favor of hopefully returning his focus to his book. His only reply to his disgruntled companion is a neutral, "Ta."