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Who: Conan and Anyone
What: Some things have happened that Conan probably should have explained. He hasn't. Come bother him.
Where: Various
When: Latter half of Fiddlesticks, before that post

1. Kitchen, late night
When Conan arrives at the kitchen this time, it is with a great deal more wariness than normal. He checks around the kitchen and dining area before he pulls a chair into the kitchen to make his usual coffee.

2. Gym car, afternoon
Conan has claimed a corner of the gym car for soccer practice. He'd started with fairly basic drills, but quickly moved on to bouncing the ball off the walls, floor and occasionally the ceiling at increasingly implausible angles.

3. Library, morning
Conan can be found in one of the chairs close to the train's makeshift library, a stack of books by his side. A frown is on his face as he takes notes in a small notebook. Anyone standing nearby might notice scrawls referencing Sherlock Holmes, Watson and alternate universes.

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Peter thought that maybe after talking to May it's alleviate some of his insomnia but then Gwen left and then May disappeared. Maybe sleep and Peter Parker just aren't meant to be friends. So he does what he always does when he wants to avoid sleep-find something to hype himself up on caffeine and sugar and either play video games or watch movies. He still had time to decide.

He steps into the kitchen and notices Conan and lets out a sigh before rubbing at his eyes. Seems like he's not the only one that sleep has vendetta against.

"S'up Conan." He offers as if it's perfectly natural to run into him so late at night.

"Hello Peter," Conan says dully. "Coffee is in the pot."

"Yeah, thanks." Peter nods, moving over to the cabinet grab a mug.

"...You okay?"

"I'm fine." As much as he ever was, anyway.

Glorfindel was meditating, waiting for the dough he'd been working on to rest when he heard Conan enter the kitchen. He cleared his throat before the other climbed onto the chair, so there wasn't an accident.

"Up late again?" he asked.

He jumps a little at the sound of a voice, but relaxes as he recognizes Glorfindel.

"Or maybe I'm just up early." He'd tried to sleep. But insomnia wasn't often convenient.

Glorfindel nodded, accepting that the reverse might be the case. "So not up too late reading this time, hm? Then was it nightmares?" he asked, bluntly. This wasn't the first time the two of them had met this way.

He stood up and and got a cup for Conan, so he didn't have to stretch. "Want to talk about it?"

He gladly takes the cup.

"Perhaps," he says. It had been. But he'd long ago learned the habit of never confirming or denying anything personal. "But I'd rather not talk about it."

Yawning, Kaito follows him in and flops on the chair next to him.

"You realise, if Ran-san realises you're here, you're screwed."

"I am aware. But she should still be sleeping right now."

And insomnia didn't go away that easily.

"Mm, well. Better take your coffee while you can, although it's only going to make your sleep pattern worse, you know."

He'll stand guard, or something

Edited 2020-06-29 14:55 (UTC)

"I doubt it can get much worse than it already is."

And Kaito, you don't have much room to talk. Considering you're always here at the sme times.

"Don't tempt fate." He yawns and lounges against the table like a loose limed cat.

(If he is here deliberately to keep Conan company... well, what of it? They both have issues)

"Next thing you know, someone is going to show up to give you a headache."

Edited 2020-07-06 15:01 (UTC)

"More than the one I already have?"

Conan stares sourly down into his cup.

"No help is needed there."

"Seriously, Fate is a cruel mistress, so I wouldn't tempt it."

He eyes Conan and wonders if it's worth him trying some.

"I'd offer to help but I don't think I'm much help in this scenario."

"Fate is just a narrative fiction. It doesn't control anything."

He... probably should not have said that.

"I'll remember you said that when Fate bites you back"

But he won't say Told You So, because... he's not THAT mean.

Conan is lucky that Ran is catching him in the afternoon rather than for another late night coffee run -- though he's certainly been caught a second time at this point.

Dressed in the cobbled-together clothing that she's been wearing for training, Ran finds him in the gym. For a moment she admires his abilities; it's another way he's very like Shinichi, so completely accurate. The ball goes exactly where he wants, no matter how implausible the angle.

Then, approaching to interrupt: "Ne, Conan-kun."

There's an air of business about her.

He flinches a little at the business-like tone, and hastily traps the ball under his foot as he looks at her.

"Yes, Ran-neechan?"

A blink -- she hadn't meant to startle him. He looks a little nervous, and there isn't any need for it; she just has something she's decided she wants to try to do.

Squatting down next to him so that they're at eye level: "I've been thinking a lot about what the next mission will be. I know they're supposed to be part of the train and happen at least once a month. Last time I worried a lot; I don't think our mission was supposed to have fighting, but it did. We don't know what the next one will be, and I don't know if I'll be able to be with you every minute. I'd like to start to teach you some self-defense."

"Self defense?" He laughs a little. "Are you sure? Don't you have to be taller than this to learn?"

She doesn't answer the laugh -- doesn't even smile, really. "No, there are still thinks you can learn at your age and height, and I think that it's important that you learn."

While she's talking about it with him, there's no sense from her that this is a choice. In her mind, it's already something she's planning to do.

Conan casts an assessing glance at her. There was more to this. He was sure of that. If it hadn't meant something to her, she would have laughed at that. But she was very serious.

After a long moment he nods.

"Mmm, I guess it would be something to do!"

"An important thing to do," she replies. "Conan-kun needs to take this seriously, okay?"

She moves to stand again. "Tomorrow morning, early. Make sure you can move well in whatever you're wearing."

Normally he would protest more. His soccer skills had served well enough for self defense so far, and he had a lot of doubts on whether learning self defense moods would be at all useful with his current height.

But... Ran wanted this.

And if it meant that she wouldn't worry as much about him here, he would go along with it.

"Mmm, okay." Not that he had much choice in what to wear. The only clothing he owned here was what had been issued to him when he'd arrived.

Rapunzel had been heading to the library to see what was on offer before stop and looking over, looking at the stack of books next to the other and taking notes. She didn't quite understand what the purpose of writing notes was, but she figured she could at least ask out of slightly curiosity,

"Are you taking notes from the book? What notes are you taking?"

Conan glances up at her. It wasn't a secret, exactly. But he also didn't really expect anyone else to be interested in this.

"Do you have a favorite book from home?" he asks."Someone gave me a book from their world, and it was similar to my favorite series. Even the characters had the same names. So now I'm trying to figure out how similar it is."

Edited 2020-06-29 02:00 (UTC)

"I only had three books, I liked them all." So she didn't exactly have a favorite one, but however, they got boring after a while because they were also the only ones that were around. Discovering books here was new and exciting.

But those books she liked were also not even fiction. "So...you are trying to find out how many similarities there are? How many have you found so far?" She asked curiously.

"That's right! I'm trying to figure out whether it is just a coincidence, or whether it is really an alternate universe version of the same story. And if it is, to see if I can figure out how to request more from other universes in the train shop."

This is the one and only part of the alternate universe issue that Conan was actually excited about.

"I have two so far. One that the train gave me when I tried to get it from my home world, and one that someone else gave me from their world."

She seemed interested as she went to sit down. in what he was saying as she placed her hands in front of her. "So how is it going in finding the similarities with what you do have then?" she asked admittedly still rather curious.

"There are quite a few! For example in my book at home the detective was named Holmes, and his assistant was named Watson. But in this book the detective is named Wattson!."

"So...the names have been switched in a sense?" So that was at least one. Not that Rapunzel would actually know what the similarities actually are, however.

"How many books are there if I can ask?" She added curiously. All this talk about it might make her want to read them in the future.

"The names, and some of the personality traits! Its really interesting seeing what has changed and what hasn't."

Conan was cheering up just being able to talk about this to someone.

"What do you mean by how many books?"

"So what has changed? I am asking as someone who has never actually read the books." Which gives a bit of a reason as to why she might have been asking how many there actually were.

"I assume it's a series, right? So there are a set number of books... Am I right or very wrong about that?"

"I'm actually looking at three different versions of the same characters, so the answer really depends on which one I am looking at. But in general all of the surface details have changed. Key traits of characters, locations, names and the order of events. Some of these have entirely different cases. Although I think there is some version of the Hound of the Baskervilles in all of these."

He shakes his head. "I think this one is a series, based on how it reads." He gestures at the last book in his stack. "But I don't have a list of all the books, so I can't say how many of them there are." He gestures to the next book in the stack. A very thick book. "This is what I received when I tried to request an omnibus of all the Holmes stories from my world. So I think that must be all of them. And in my world there are four novels and 56 short stories. Plus all of the additional materials that has been added by other writers, but those aren't really considered part of the original stories."

"That is still a lot of books." Though she had never heard of a short story before so those in her mind might be considered a rather interesting read. How can one do short stories? How does that work?

It will be interesting to at least find out. "But would it be okay if I read them sometime myself? I enjoy reading new things and honestly there are a lot of new things for me to read and it's all rather exciting."

"Of course! And there are lots of other mystery books I got from the train store. I donated them all to the train library, although I still borrow them to reread them a lot."

"That reminds me I had books I needed to give to the library, but kept ending up reading them. Just a couple books but interesting ones."

Dairine had been meaning to pester Conan about a number of topics. One being a certain book in her possession. Now that she was done reading it, now seemed as good a time as any to hunt down the tiny detective.

Book under one arm, Dairine makes her way through the train. How fitting that she finally ends up spotting him in ridiculously tiny library.

She leans over to peek at the stack of books and notebook, then grins.

"Got yourself a little project, huh, mystery geek?"

He actually looks a little happy about the project.

"Alternate universe Holmes novels," he informs her. "I have proof that they exist."

Oh boy... Holmes nerd is in full swing. Well, at least it's good to see Conan happy after the rough months he's had.

"You mean besides the odd version that you got from the train's store?"

"Mmm, Eva gave me a book that she got from her home world. And I think its another alternate version of Holmes."

All it took was this for Conan to finally be interested in the concept of alternate universes.

"Huh. I suppose a story like Sherlock would cross over to some universes," Dairine says like it's an obvious fact. As a sci-fi fan who retained memories of other worlds, it feels obvious to her.

Should she tell him about the different people named Sherlock Holmes that were in Paradisa? ...Maybe not. It might just make him disappointed.

Anyway.

"Well, if you're looking into alternate mystery novels, you might want this." She slides the large book she was carrying onto one of his stacks. If he looks, he'll find the title is 'The Complete Works of Hercules Poirot' by Almost Agatha.

"If any story would, it makes sense that it would be Holmes." Conan, your geek tendencies are showing.

He immediately takes up the book and opens it up, glancing over as he does so.

"Poirot?"

Dairine rolls her eyes. What an absolute nerd.

As if this Star Wars geek can talk.

"Yeah," she answers with a slight smile. "You might be an utter Sherlock Holmes fanboy, but I know you've read Agatha Christie's works before. And a little variety in your mysteries can't hurt."

He peers at it suspiciously. "From the title, I assume that you ran into the same problem at the shop as I did with Holmes?"

"Yup. Not sure if the train's got something against notable mystery novels, or if it's our worlds that's causing the mix up."

She'll have test it further or ask around.

"But it's still a good read. The changes make the mysteries feel fresh, in a way."

"The alternate Holmes was the same. They were good mysteries." A sigh. "But when you're hoping for the book you know, it is still a disappointment."

A nod. "I can get that."

She'd be pretty miffed if she tried to get the Star Wars films, and they were different.

Dairine grins cheekily. "Still, I doubt anyone on this train reads Sherlock as religiously as you."

So he might be the only one who really cares.

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(no subject)

What? It's time for another insomnia club meeting already?

Apparently

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