Open RP: Great Hall: It's Alive!

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

The circles under his eyes are more pronounced than usual today. L slips into the Great Hall, to get himself a pot of tea. Once it arrives, he sits and pauses, to wait for it to steep. It needs to be stronger than this.

He's been pushing himself on a case the past few days. It's resolved now, but it was the first real challenge he's had since moving here, so he may have dropped off the face of the earth a little. Time to emerge and make sure everyone is still alive and well.

As soon as the tea is finished steeping, that is.

Comments

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"A? If you harangue him for details and I find out about it, I'll take action against you. Pestering him for details concerning B could be more than a little detrimental to his wellbeing."

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

"A?" she echos. The B=murderer connection is easy. It takes only a moment or two to put together A with the information she's gathered. "That poor little boy in the sorting room?" Yes, this is still her impression of A. "Why on..." Her voice trails off. "What did...?" She shook her head. "I won't harass him!" she declares.

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"Thank you. He grew up with B."

She's obviously intelligent enough to draw her own conclusions from that.

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Maddie shakes her head. "What I meant," she says, trying to gather her wits again, "is that I was told to find B and he told me you looked like him. And, you're going to send me onto someone else who will tell me another tantalizing bit but not the whole story." She shakes her head again. "There's no such thing as an impossible scenario, only improbable ones," she paraphrased what Jonathan had told her often enough. "Therefore, unless you're not thinking laterally enough, he couldn't have stumped you." She assumes much.

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"Ask the FBI agent."

She's lived it.

"It's at her discretion, how much she tells you."

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Maddie frowns. "She wasn't forthcoming." But, that was fairly standard behavior for law enforcement with the press. She wasn't surprised. It was obvious, though, that this one across from her knew more than he was giving. It didn't help that he was ignoring her obvious compliment. How was a woman supposed ot work if she couldn't rely on her charms?

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"Then I'll respect her wishes. Do you have any other questions you'd like answers to?"

The very image of politeness.

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Maddie frowns. She hates being cut off, oh how she hated it. But, she'd find another way, she would.

She sighed. "A," what a horrid name, "mentioned being...trained?" How he took the question would tell her something and then she'd have a direction or three to dig.

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"To take my position should I die."

Absolutely calmly.

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Maddie blinked. "And why would you need replacing?" she asks before she thinks.

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"Because I do important work." Obviously. "Crime rates would increase otherwise."

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Maddie frowns. "Crime rates would increase?" She shakes her head. "I do know statistics. One person doesn't have that much of an influence, not globally."

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"Mmm."

L sips his tea.

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Maddie does not like being made fun of. Not in the least. And she's being made fun of by this freak of a boy across from her now. "So, you're just full of yourself, then."

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"Crime rates are affected by a variety of factors. As a specific deterrent, I'm effective, I catch large numbers of criminals. As a general deterrent, I'm more effective; the knowledge that L exists keeps at least a certain portion of the population honest. Furthermore, in order to work with me, I require governments keep a certain standard of honesty. I can bargain my services for compliance to UN statutes that might be ignored otherwise."

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

"L? I've never heard of L." She would have. It's the world she travels in, more or less. "I'm an investigative reporter. I would have heard of someone named L, or something so ridiculous." She does have connections, ones that would have at least whispered of L, if there is, was, whatever tense, one.

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"No more than I had heard of Hogwarts. Given the existence of alternate realities, it seems sensible to assume we're not from the same one."

He shrugs.

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Maddie is only partially mollified. Physics beyond Newton was beyond her, really, but she's willing to concede that their realties may not coincide.

"So, in your world, you're important. In my world, you either aren't, or don't exist, or go by a different name." She sighs. Just improbable, after all.

"And, here, you know several people." By her count, three others, so far. "Must be a rather strong connection to your world. Or is the school in your world?"

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"The school is not from my world, despite the prevalence of people from it. I don't have an explanation for that."

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Maddie frowns, drumming her fingers on the table. She is tempted to take out a notebook to write down what she knows, to try and sort her thoughts, but she just doesn't have enough to start with.

So, she returns to the beginning. "There's more to this B person that is within your realm of knowledge that you're warning me against." She's not dumb, just slow at times.

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"He's also one who was being trained to replace me."

L shrugs.

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Maddie raises an eyebrow. "And, do you want Novocaine with your extraction?" she mutters under her breath.

"That still fails to explain why you're so insistent on warning me about him and about bringing him up with A," she points out.

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"Does it? I thought it was obvious. If you give him half the chance, he'll torture you. The sight of blood arouses him, too. You'll be in for a slow, and greusome death. I don't know you, but I wouldn't wish that on anyone."

He shrugs again.

"As for bringing him up with A, he's been exposed to B before. For extended periods of time. If you know him, then you've seen some of the results. I don't know what conspiracy you think you're seeing here."

[noseymaddie.livejournal.com]

Were it not for the word 'arouses,' she could let her mind just think he was trying to rile her up. And, her mind is altogether too quick to reach the obvious conclusion. "My god," she says weakly. Any color from the ire she'd been building up has left her face.

[ijk-mno.livejournal.com]

"Precisely. Of course I'm warning you."