among her own kind

[she_sells_seashells]

Shell Bell finds Milliways once when she is eighteen. She has been there for two days now, setting up her sign ten minutes out of every waking hour, wiping down tables for her quarters in the staff area, eating buttery potatoes (she has been told that this is a complete nutrient package, for humans). Her wand is holding a bun of hair in place on the back of her head. Her shells are stashed safely in her room; she's budgeting carefully and she'll pay her tab when she leaves.

No one's talked to her due to the sign yet. They don't always. She sets it up anyway, like clockwork, so everyone gets the chance.

Comments

[sicaria]

Sherlock reacts with mild amusement.

[she_sells_seashells]

"What, you don't want to introduce yourself?" Bell asks Sherlock dryly.

[sicaria]

"She has known my name since she first saw me. Haven't you," she says to Elizabeth.

[prima_sequentem]

"Not quite. The Sherlock I know is a boy. I had to do some translating first."

[she_sells_seashells]

Bell laughs. "Well. I think Sherlocks and Tonies are probably useful enough that having two of each couldn't hurt. I don't suppose I look familiar?"

[prima_sequentem]

"Nope," says Elizabeth.

[she_sells_seashells]

"Pity," grumbles Bell.

[prima_sequentem]

"Why's that?"

[she_sells_seashells]

"I've never met one either, but I've heard a fair amount about my template and its variants secondhand, and we tend to be empresses with considerable magic power to throw around. Lucky me, I get born in a world with no magic."

[prima_sequentem]

"There's magic in mine, but no global empires. That I've noticed."

[she_sells_seashells]

"Maybe you don't have one of me," shrugs Bell. "Or she's too young to have taken over yet."

[prima_sequentem]

"Maybe," she agrees. "I'll keep an eye out."

[she_sells_seashells]

"Uh, be nice to her," advises Bell. "We are by all accounts good at running worlds. People tell me this even when it's clear I'm not an empress and don't have magic and won't smite them for being insulting, so it's not just nervousness talking."

[prima_sequentem]

"I'm not keeping an eye out just so I can have her assassinated."

[she_sells_seashells]

"Do you routinely have people assassinated?" inquires Bell neutrally.

[prima_sequentem]

"Not if I can avoid it."

[she_sells_seashells]

"That's good then. What time frame are we looking at for borrowing your Sherlock and Tony, may I ask? Is this a lean-out-the-door-and-yell, or a hope-we-run-into-each-other?"

[prima_sequentem]

"More the latter. First I have to convince them to be interested. I'm afraid Sherlock doesn't like me very much."

[she_sells_seashells]

"You'll have to tell him about this one and her Tony. And also about how very terrible a world he'd be helping to fix," Bell says. "I hope that would at least help."

[prima_sequentem]

"Oh, he'll be fine once I explain it to him. It's getting him to listen in the first place that's the trick."

[she_sells_seashells]

"Try Tony first? If he likes you better?" suggests Bell.

[prima_sequentem]

"And that would be the trick."

[she_sells_seashells]

"Fair enough," laughs Bell.

[prima_sequentem]

Elizabeth chuckles.

[she_sells_seashells]

"Until next time, then, or do you want some fraction of your entertaining advice up front?" Bell asks.