cop_an_attitude | 02 | [Written/Voice/Action]

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02 | [Written/Voice/Action]

[Early enough in the morning that it's clear someone couldn't get back to sleep, a series of doodles appear on the page: they're Sally's best estimate of the floor plan of her apartment, with little rudimentary sketches of furniture in various placements. Over the span of a half hour, several are drawn with different configurations and crossed out before one ends up circled. A check mark is drawn next to it for good measure.

She was too lazy to get out of bed and find real scrap paper, but she figured no one would care.

Much later in the morning, at a reasonable hour, Sally makes a voice recording.]

Right. I've got a question, much as I hate to ask it: since I've been a bit of a dosser when it comes to actually talking to people since I've come here, what with the rampant madness of...everything, and being busy with a few things, I've run short of friends who're willing to do me favors. That being said, I've several articles of heavy furniture that need to be moved up seven flights of stairs.

My usual find-help-moving-house tactic of offering free beer and crisps is moot here, but if there's anyone who can help me out, I'd be happy to negotiate some sort of payment. A favor in return, or something. As I said, I wouldn't ask, but...well. Some of you lot have magic and super strength, and I'm just a regular copper with one very slightly weak ankle. [A self-deprecating laugh that's a little more rueful than she intended. Sally really hates asking for help, but she also really wants her flat not to look like a room in a mental institution, so something had to give.] Thanks, everyone.

[In the afternoon, Sally can be found poking around the item shop, looking for home decorating items and some things she's hoping will show up from her world, and in the evening she'll be at the library doing some cursory research of other worlds and waiting for something interesting to jump out at her.]

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[He looks at her, as if surprised by the idea that it sounds anything like that.

Then:] Why would I ask? If it was my doing, why reveal my own insider?

[The rate at which this man can switch gears is capable of giving a person whiplash.]

What? No, not - you're not telling me your methods, you're making something clever up to cover for the clever thing you actually did - hypothetically. Cocky perps do it all the time. They have to prove how sharp they are, but they don't want to end up behind bars. You've seen it; I know you have.

[Give him a moment... Give him a moment...

...Nope. Not worthy of a reply. Instead, he takes a step closer to her, somehow seeming drawn up and leaned in at the same time. Close. Dangerously so? Hard to say with him.]

Watch him. When you get back, watch him.

A good man's life may depend on it.

[So simple. So ingenious. Lestrade would think nothing of being alone with a rookie, would turn his back to the man...]

Watch him. And hope that you catch him before I do.

[That? There is no hinting, no questions. That is a threat against the man.]

[Hmm. Backing down? Moving away? How about no. Not only does Sally hold her ground, she makes an effort to invade his personal space right back. See how you like being loomed at (although Sally may be at a slight height disadvantage).]

I plan to. And if anyone catches him for anything at all, it won't be you. Because if it is, and you assault him like you did that man at the clinic, you will find out first hand at least two of the ways I know to incapacitate a grown man without care to his personal safety.

You claim not to be a criminal? Stop giving me reason to treat you like one.

If I get to him first, Sally, [now he's calm again, dead serious] then you'll be able to make a case to charge me with murder.

[Even if the man had never pulled a gun on Lestrade, he'd only been waiting for the call to do so. That was guilt enough where Sherlock was concerned.]

[Sally rolls her eyes, turns away, and puts her hands up in surrender.]

You are a madman. I know it's obvious, but sometimes it bears repeating. You're a madman, and if you're trying to frighten me it really isn't working.

[Then a horrible realization occurs and she puts her face in her hands.]

I hope you're just trying to frighten me, because this place doesn't have a bloody jail.

No jail. No police force. No law of any kind.

[He pauses. And he sounds almost cocky as he hits upon the word she said before that he hated.]

Here, you're as useless as I am.

[She glares. Just a little.]

I'm not useless. I could break your wrist and I contribute to community fitness by not being a berk.

Don't think that would look good, breaking a man's wrist with no physical provocation.

And that is what matters, isn't it? [He hasn't forgotten your "real people" remark, Sally.] Appearances. Looking like you're doing the right thing. Playing nice. That's what normal people care about, isn't it?

Could. I could, if you make me, which I would not for a second put past you.

[This again. She crosses her arms and looks as unimpressed as possible.] It's not about lying, it's about caring. Not looking like you're doing the right thing, but actually doing it. Being nice, not playing nice. That is what matters to most people.

[A pause.

Then, simply:]

No, it's not.

I... [Phrased that completely wrong. She's never had to teach someone morals from the ground up before, and she suspects toddlers don't throw many curveballs.]

No, it's not. It's what's supposed to matter. It's what matters to good people.

There aren't many of those.

[It isn't that he doesn't know about morals. It's that he learned an entirely different set. He'd rather, as she put it, be "an obnoxious, arrogant prat who speaks his mind" than couch his responses to people and be better liked.

"Honesty" over "acceptability."]

There are plenty, as long as your definition doesn't exclude anyone who isn't a genius.

[Of course, the world is full of rotten people. You don't get to be a detective sergeant without knowing that. But the way Sherlock says it sounds like some sort of excuse.

She turns to idly straighten some items on a nearby shelf, and after a moment, she lets out an exasperated sigh.]

I'm psychologically disturbed, aren't I? I must have a deep-seated need to fix hopeless cases or I wouldn't do these things.

I know three. [A pause. This is as close to sentimentality as he'll get when speaking to her, but it's... something.]

None of them are particularly gifted intellectually. Smart enough for their chosen fields, of course, but not exceptionally brilliant otherwise.

[Should she ask who he's picked?

No, definitely not.]

Dare I ask who you're talking about?

[He actually hesitates.

He stops sorting through the small objects on the shelf-- which was just multi-tasking, not a distraction-- and just... stops. His hand hovers over one, but he doesn't pick it up to examine it.

He just thinks.

It isn't the kind of silence where he's intentionally keeping something to himself or pausing for effect. He does like his dramatics, but this isn't part of them. The expression on his face-- which might be notable even in profile view-- is one of uncertainty. He doesn't know whether he should say it or not.]

[Sally stops her own sorting when she notices Sherlock has done the same, and she actually does a double take when she sees the look on his face.

She immediately grins and adopts a posture like she's surveying a piece of fine artwork.]

Sherlock Holmes, I don't think I've ever seen you at a loss for words in my life. What I wouldn't give for a camera.

[Silence.

Then a breath.

Saying it would be putting too much out in the open, revealing too many weaknesses to someone he doesn't-- can't trust not to exploit them. His hand withdraws, and both fold behind his back. A common enough posture for him.]

It doesn't matter.

[If Sally were a better person, she would let it go.

Welp.]

All right, all right, let me guess, then. One's John...

[She's positive about that one.]

One's Lestrade...

[Slightly less sure there, but moreso now than she used to be.]

The third; who's the third? Nobody else from Scotland Yard, I know that. I've no idea who else you spend your time with, honestly. Is it your new girlfriend?

[Now she's being juvenile, but man, she just couldn't help it.]

[...New girlfriend? But he remembers her remarks to John.

It seems, male or female, he cannot get along with someone without dating them.]

I don't know Temperance well enough to know her character. [Especially not so out of context. He could make a lot of good hypotheses, but he couldn't be sure here. Nor do his observations always tell him much about what someone will do when desperate.

Kitty? Kitty had been easy. Desperate and aggressive when he'd met her. Easy.

Temperance... He wasn't sure yet.]

"Decent," I would guess. Like most people. Not good, though. At least that's not a call I would make yet.

[It's interesting to know that he does, in fact, make the distinction between "decent" and "good", but Sally brushes past most of that.]

Fine; someone you knew back home, then. I'm positive it's not your brother... Oh! Oh, um, your landlady, is it your landlady?

Mycroft and I are the same sort of man.

[Not exactly alike, but on a similar moral level, by Sherlock's gauges.

The lack of answer as to Mrs Hudson likely means, as with John and Lestrade, that Sally's got the last of them.]

I met him. The resemblance is uncanny. He's more...subtle, though.

[When Sherlock lets her guess go unanswered, she gives herself a little golf clap of congratulation.]

I knew I'd get it. I don't know why I didn't guess her sooner; you shout at her constantly and destroy her flat, but the fact that she still lets you live there has to count for something.

[They like different things, he and Mycroft. Mycroft is about secrets and power. He likes knowledge and danger.

But their methods are similar. Their morals are similar.]

And cheaply. She could let the flat for more.

[It's charity... but he doesn't mind charity. It's repayment, in a way. He helped her with something, she helps him. Like Angelo's generosity at his restaurant.]

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