enjoy expertly restored and renovated architecture

[cross_and_bow]

After talking to Soph and sending her off to make gingerbread houses with Tony, Bella says:

[Sherlock?]

Comments

[eversomuchfun]

"Happily."

[cross_and_bow]

Door. Door Downside.

[How about now?] she asks the admin.

[ending_of]

[Interesting,] says the admin.

[cross_and_bow]

[Can I get a little more detail than that?]

[ending_of]

[I now have both sets of memories available.]

[cross_and_bow]

[How peculiar; that didn't happen to anyone else without specific intervention. Did you get enough detail about how it happened to tell us how the spell does that?]

[ending_of]

[The spell tried to alter my memories, but I chose not to let it finish the job.]

[cross_and_bow]

[And it only did that when Sherlock stepped in.] They're standing in Shell's old clutterful apartment, door held. [Okay, thanks. While we're here - what changed about Steph? Besides that she's a Christmas light now.]

[ending_of]

[The visual effect represents a change in her nature corresponding with the loss of Sherlock's soul.]

[cross_and_bow]

[Do you not know anything else about the change in her nature?]

[ending_of]

[Until she becomes conscious again, there is nothing else to be known.]

[cross_and_bow]

"D'you want to wake her now, or think more?" Bella asks Sherlock softly.

[eversomuchfun]

"Well, it seems a little silly to come all this way and not ask her what she thinks of the whole business."

[Could you wake her up long enough for me to ask if she wants to stay that way?]

[ending_of]

[Done.]

[eversomuchfun]

Steph appears, perched on Sherlock's shoulder, white with black spots and glowing a bright bloody red.

"Huh," she says. "That's new." She curls her tail up around Sherlock's neck. "And not completely awful."

[cross_and_bow]

"Hi, Steph," says Bella shyly.

She looked up what genets look like; but she never got to meet her.

[eversomuchfun]

Steph sits up, peers at Bella over the top of Sherlock's head, and waves a paw.

[cross_and_bow]

"How's existing?"

[eversomuchfun]

"Doesn't suck as bad as last time."

[cross_and_bow]

"Are you going to go on doing it, d'you suppose?"

Bella has her hands clasped behind her back. Sometimes she reaches for Sherlock without thinking, and right now there is something she is not allowed to touch curled around his shoulders.

[eversomuchfun]

"I don't hate the idea," she says contemplatively. "Might stay tucked away for a while, though."

And she disappears with the usual golden flare of a daemon becoming part of their person for a while.

[Since we're here,] Sherlock says to the admin, [would you mind pinning her on?]

[ending_of]

[Done.]

[cross_and_bow]

"Let's see, anything else I should take care of while I'm here in case the door doesn't cooperate next time," muses Bella.

[eversomuchfun]

[Nothing comes to mind.]

[cross_and_bow]

[Bye, thanks,] Bella says to the admin, and she looks at the clutter in Shell's old apartment and kills a pentagon to wish all the miscellaneous objects into a bottomless box in a corner, and then heads back into Milliways.

"I'm gonna check the Belltower for notes," she says. "In case anyone else has been in."