Open Post 002

[2020mod]

• Step one: start a thread in this post!
• Step two: specify who the thread is for (or open) in this post!
• Step three: make people reply to this post!
• AND THAT'S THE WAY YOU DO IT.


And don't forget, there's still the ooc discussion post! And nothing needs to be contained to this post! Create new logs to your heart's content! This AU is yours, so have at it!


musebox • rules • character list

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Open!

[deductives]

It's been a few months since Sherlock's last visit to the City. If John hadn't stayed behind, he's not sure he'd still visit at all. It's not that he needs to stay away. No, as far as the government knew, Sherlock Holmes and John Watson were long dead, killed in the early waves of registration resistance. He travels now under the pseudonym, Scott Trevelyan, an expatriate from Britain who holds professorships at several unremarkable universities across the country. In reality, Sherlock rarely taught a class, and has been traveling far more globally in order to keep up his consulting business, and to collect intelligence for the growing imPort resistance groups.

He seeks no credit or glory for this work, and certainly doesn't socialize even if these people are on his side. It only invites trouble. Sherlock only dreams of the day he and John can live in London under their true identities again. Even if their real London seems eternally closed off. Deep down, Sherlock relishes this far more than returning home, where he'd be doing much of the same thing, but only in complete isolation.

For now, though, he's just a ghost haunting streets that barely look familiar, surveying the damage seven years has done. He hasn't done much to alter his appearance, but time and not living with John anymore have had their own effects. His eyes, though still sharp as ever, are more sunken, and his face is more sallow without anyone around to force him to eat regularly. Cigarettes have replaced that once again, and it's rare to see him without one pursed between his lips. His hair is shorter and tinted auburn, no longer framing his face with unkempt black curls.

Sherlock's adaptability and affinity for disguise, however, have been his greatest ally in remaining unseen. Even if he doesn't look terribly different when he isn't trying to, a quick change of clothes and a few changing facial ticks allow him to blend into the crowds. And when that isn't enough, he simply sinks back into the shadows that he knows all to o well now, and someone might wonder if he was ever really there at all.

Re: Open!

[foreshadower]

It's not the City, that Sherlock finds himself in, so to speak. Just outside it, actually. He rarely stepped into the City, features that stood out, movements that revealed him to be import simply by existing.

Ah, but the Shade loved the world. He walked and stepped where he wished, and stood in crowds all over the world, with little trouble, or little question of his identity. The issue was that he didn't trust the City, after discovering with a few close scrapes that perhaps the enforcement would be able to stop him.

He traveled, walking shadows and listening where he could. People didn't look for imports so much outside of the City. This was where they were thought to congregate, and many did.

Today, it was New Jersey, the scene where they had first met a haunting specter, much like the clocktower that loomed above. The Shade stepped out of the shadows, darkness clinging and dripping off of him in ways that it had only suggested before. He spent much of his time walking in the shadows, and it was having an effect. He was starting to forget that he was human again.

"Mr. Trevelyan, was it?" his voice, even, sounded different. Oh, not in timbre, or tone, but in accent, years without speaking wiping away the years of removing inflection and tone. He sounded more authentic to his time, even as he tipped his hat.

[deductives]

Big Ben remains the the one tiny slice of London Sherlock doesn't have to stow away on ships to see in person. When he'd first arrived in this universe, he'd been rather affronted by the idea, but over time he'd become grateful, in his own wry sort of way. He usually stops here before going into the City to visit John, and to survey how much damage time does to the place.

As is customary, he lights a cigarette and smokes to the old monument on a bench across the street. It's not really his Big Ben, theoretically speaking, but not a duplicate by any means. If he were to be illogically ambitious, he might even aspire to get it back to Britain once this all blows over.

Of course, everyone's been waiting for it to blow over for seven years.

When he feels the presence of someone else nearby, it's a much quicker, more tense reaction than when he and Shade first met. His hand grips the gun in his pocket; he has his own now rather than John's army issue. The voice stops him from pulling it, altered as it seems.

"Depends on the day," he replies calmly. It's late and there's no unwanted ears about, at least not in Jersey City. "Been a few months now, hasn't it?" He rarely keeps track anymore.

[foreshadower]

The Shade has his own pipe, tapping it gently against his palm to pack the tobacco, pressing the loose leaves on top with a thumb, before he pulls out a small flipbook of matches, and he sets it alight, the musky, rich scent of tobacco filling the air. It was woodsy and rich, a hint of cocoa in the leaves.

He smiled at the other man, one moment he's still stepping behind Sherlock, the next a cloud of dark wisps of shadow fabric materialize into a man shape on the bench next to him. He pulls his hat off to take a good look at the monument. He felt no attachment to it, of course. Even now, he didn't think of himself as a Briton, but having it here was still... odd.

Even now. He never voiced such concerns, but it still felt wrong. "Indeed it has been. I trust you've been well in that time? You hardly look worse for the wear," his voice was light.

He was, however, somewhat concerned. He liked Sherlock, and for an immortal, it was terribly rare to find gentlemen he enjoyed. It was always hard to see someone lost, and know that he would still be there long after.

[deductives]

It's easier to relax once Shade is out in the open, and the sumptuous smell of his straight tobacco helps. While he may be in the habit again, Sherlock doesn't splurge on his cigarettes; they're cheap and always disappointingly low tar.

Shade's increasing ratio of shadow to man quietly alarms him every time they meet again. Sherlock always wondered in the back of his mind if relying on shadow walking too much could have adverse effects, and indeed some days he found himself staying within the dark far longer than he should. Deep down, his own power instills fear into him. Not only has it become a social boon, how long until it consumed him completely? Unlike Shade, he isn't an immortal. It's not common for Sherlock to admit being outmatched, but Shade is his elder in every way, especially when it came to the dark.

Sherlock pushes those thoughts away with another puff of smoke. The present is more important.

"As well as can be expected. Had a close shave with German customs last month, but nothing insurmountable." He furrows his brow. "I'm sure you've heard there's talk of lightening restrictions in Eastern Europe. We'll see how the rest of the Union feels about that."

[foreshadower]

"My, my. I would hardly get your hopes up on that one," he mentioned, lightly. "You know how the union gets," he held the pipe deftly, one handed, fingers lightly gripping the fine wood, even while his other hand held his hat, cane leaning against the back of the bench, somehow perfectly still.

He leaned back, smoking. The words weren't important, to the idle passerby who may hear. Just idle things, mere speculation. "They're often stuck in their ways far more than a rather new collaboration should be."

The Shade had been listening. Sherlock had good reason to fear the shadows, of course. He hardly knew the circumstances of Shade's transformation. He'd never been human, since receiving his powers. For some time, he was better, actually, than he'd been in a long time. However, isolation did funny things to a mind that was all shadow and only attempted at being human.

The Shade was an odd sort, all in all. It was a lucky thing Sherlock hadn't seen him bleed.