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She wonders if Coin would be late to fewer things if she gave her a teleportation power.
She's saying so, to Sherlock.
And then instead of the ruins of flooded Europe she's in a featureless white room facing some grumpy person in a blue robe, wearing everything she was wearing, less her coin bandolier but including her crown, and something's wrong, her thoughts are slow and won't speed up, her memory's as slippery as it ever was before she met Stella, and how did she get here, why doesn't the brainphone work, where's Sherlock?
Where are her coins? Where's her magic? She can't teleport either, not even across the room - she bites her lip just a little and she can't even remember how moving pain left to right is a thing and it goes right on stinging without regenerating -
Where is she?
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arenaria
Nope.
arenaria
She presses her fingernail into the margin of her sentence file, until she has barely-legible numbers imprinted there, and makes up her mind to find something useless in her apartment and a way to trade it for paper and pencils.
She starts looking for people in her own world she'd be less thrilled to see. People who she knows to be dead.
Lynnis would be one thing, although Lynnis would not necessarily be happy to see her.
She checks for Coriolanus Snow.
She starts looking for people in her own world she'd be less thrilled to see. People who she knows to be dead.
Lynnis would be one thing, although Lynnis would not necessarily be happy to see her.
She checks for Coriolanus Snow.
Coriolanus Snow exists, and died when he died. He's in ^1.
arenaria
...Why wouldn't Lynnis be there?
She'll ask the librarian. But first she'll fingernail Snow's code into another file margin with a little six-pointed snowflake-y star next to it. She's going to look up where that is, and then never, ever visit that neighborhood.
She can't think of anyone else to look up.
She goes back to the librarian. "I looked up someone from my world who died when I was sixteen, and she wasn't there. Why might that be?"
She'll ask the librarian. But first she'll fingernail Snow's code into another file margin with a little six-pointed snowflake-y star next to it. She's going to look up where that is, and then never, ever visit that neighborhood.
She can't think of anyone else to look up.
She goes back to the librarian. "I looked up someone from my world who died when I was sixteen, and she wasn't there. Why might that be?"
"Oh, people usually don't show up in any kind of reasonable order," he shrugs. "If you died before someone else, they're as likely to show up before you as the other way around. And of course if they went Upside they won't be in the directory at all."
arenaria
"Upside? Is that the place above the cliffs? What makes some people go there and not others?"
"Upside, Downside," he says, gesturing the appropriate elevations. "The judges sort you."
"Your life," he says. "If you're beyond reproach, you go Upside. If you're not bad enough for a sentence, but still kind of sketchy, you go ^2. If you've done something the judges think is really bad, they give you a sentence and put you in ^1."
"We can't be sure, because we can't go Upside and check. But it looks like there's no way they could have even half as many people up there as down here."
arenaria
Shell Bell nods. "Can you tell me how to navigate the stacks?" she asks. "And do the computers do anything besides look up dead people?"
"The computers look up books," he says. "And technically they'll give you directions, too, but mostly it's not worth it to track one down yourself. Every so often, someone gets lost and we run into them a few decades later."
arenaria
"So I use the computer to see what books there are to be had, and then I ask one of you to fetch it?"
"Yep," says the librarian.
"Doesn't, mostly," he says. "Losing or damaging a library book is a sentencable crime whether you meant to or not, so most people don't want to risk it."
He shrugs.
arenaria
Shell Bell doesn't want to read a book right now, although she'll probably turn right around after she's gone on her expedition looking for -
Holmes. He can be "Holmes". Her Sherlock is Sherlock. They never did figure out a nicknaming scheme, but the other Holmeses she's met are less important by far than the one she can actually get at today.
She goes back to the station, and deciphers the code she imprinted into her file, and travels to the home of the dead Sherlock Holmes.
Holmes. He can be "Holmes". Her Sherlock is Sherlock. They never did figure out a nicknaming scheme, but the other Holmeses she's met are less important by far than the one she can actually get at today.
She goes back to the station, and deciphers the code she imprinted into her file, and travels to the home of the dead Sherlock Holmes.
finaldiscussion
The man who opens the door... does not look very much like Sherlock.
He maybe looks like he could be an older Tony, though. Maybe.
He maybe looks like he could be an older Tony, though. Maybe.
arenaria
Yeah, Shell Bell wasn't holding out for anyone that close. "Hi," she says. "I don't think you know me or anyone like me, but before I died earlier today I knew - several people with your name or a variant, and I wanted to see if you were an alt of them. I think you might be. I'm Shell Bell."
arenaria
"Nickname you picked up here?" she asks. "That's not the name I found you by."
finaldiscussion
"You will find that almost no one uses the same name here that they did in life," he says. "I am no exception."