044 || dictated;

[workaphilic]

[Sherlock can be found on the castle grounds late this morning, a swath of dark coat and dark hair against the snow. He watches while Gladstone plays, getting much-needed exercise (for the both of them).

Paradisa is calmer and quieter, these days.

He hates it, really. He's been dragged along like a child with a doll for two years (or three or four or five, his mind never quite recovered from the fractures of the intervening time Paradisa shoved in the middle) and what has he to show for it?

Gladstone plows through a drift in front of him, scattering snow for the sake of it, his tongue large and lolling. (A far cry from the noisy, stuttering thing Paradisa left in his (their) flat last Christmas, slipping over too-large paws and leaping from John's lap.)

Sherlock folds the cover of his journal back and smooths his thumb over the next blank page. The chunk of filled ones shouldn't fit into the space of his palm, but does.

(Magic.)

He speaks, even and clear and calm.]

Have you gotten your money's worth, residents?

[a beat]

Don't answer that. I don't actually care. [He says it without any venom, just a statement of fact. (Saves everyone time.)] I'm not in the business of retracking covered ground. Wasn't, at least. Only so much to take from Cair Paradisa, it seems, for as much as it likes to take from everything else.

[The journal picks up Gladstone snuffling. Sherlock has bent to pet him.]

The point is, reconsider whether your rent is worth it.

[That's all he has to say. He doesn't particularly care if his meaning has gotten across (it rarely ever does). The journal shuts.]

Comments

[molotov]

[He may have closed the journal, but whenever he checks again, he'll find a simple message written out in elegant script.]

We all pay the rent, regardless of where we live. So have you gotten your money's worth?

[workaphilic]

[It's much, much later. By the time he reopens the journal, there is no more ambient noise. He writes back, in slanted print.]

Not in the least.

SH

[molotov]

Then maybe re-evaluate how you're living. I'd pay the price again and then some.

[workaphilic]

This place can't give me what I want by virtue of being what it is. It tries, of course, but never succeeds.

Congratulations on your gilded cage.

[molotov]

The cage has its virtues. Things I want and could never get in the wild.

Maybe your desires are unrealistic.

[workaphilic]

Maybe they are. Always been more partial to the wild, myself.

Never stopped me before, though.

[molotov]

What do you want?

[workaphilic]

To finish what I started.

And other things, obviously. The list goes on and on. Desires Paradisa tries to grant by granting something else. But at the moment, that.

[molotov]

What you started will be finished when you go back. Stop longing for the rat race.

[workaphilic]

[The journal picks up his sigh, faint, an exhale through the nose.]

You're wrong, of course, but I don't really care. Not in the mood to argue it.

You're wasting your time trying to convince me to be content in the cage.

[molotov]

[The journal can't pick up Molotov rolling her eye, though the thought is probably transmissible in her words.]

Well, then shut the hell up. If I am wasting my time, then you are wasting yours by complaining. For someone with such a superior tone, you really have no common sense at all.

[workaphilic]

Just yours, actually. I'm content with how I'm spending it.

If it bothers you so much, I assume you have hands. Turn the page.

[molotov]

[Yeah, too late. Her journal snapped shut the second she saw the words "just yours".

Aaaaaaand so goes the life of the man the castle won't miss.]

dictated;

[gottaknockhard]

[...It's not that Spike doesn't see what he's getting at, but he may be curious what inspired this one. He's been out of the loop for a while.]

Bad day?

[workaphilic]

[Sherlock takes a long, slow breath. Then, with more pep:]

I'd say a good one, actually. Now, anyway.

[gottaknockhard]

What changed?

[workaphilic]

[Airily:]

Oh, everything.

[beat]

Happens every now and then. The aha moment, the epiphany, whatever you'd like to call it. Looking at things in a different light, if you want to be boring about it. Still, makes things a little less dreary for a while. Paradisa inevitably stamps it out with drudgery, though, that's the problem. That's always the problem.

[rambling. Maybe not a completely good day.]

[gottaknockhard]

[He almost wants to ask what that epiphany was, but Sherlock tends to talk about things that go over his head, so he probably wouldn't get it anyway.

Still.]

Paradise isn't for everyone.

[workaphilic]

I loathe paradise. [a beat] Might have been what made me such a compelling candidate.

[It sounds like it's meant to be a joke, but it falls a bit flat.]

[gottaknockhard]

[Just so happens that he's telling it to someone who appreciates bad humor.]

Always looking at the bright side.

[workaphilic]

That's me, the ray of sunshine. Not like I needed Paradisa to let me know I'm special, of course, known that for ages, but always nice to be recognized.

[gottaknockhard]

[Spike doesn't really get what Anne was talking about; he's funny. Queens.

Or maybe she changed her mind on the whole thing, since nothing came of it. He'll never know.]

Nobody can take that away from you.

[workaphilic]

[suddenly, with enthusiasm:]

Yes, yes, that's it precisely.

[gottaknockhard]

[A little more enthusiasm than expected, but hey.]

Someone was bound to solve it eventually.