An Impossible Puzzle
Every morning, seven o'clock on the dot, a blond passes through Baker Street.
Sherlock doesn't bother to notice him.
Or rather, Sherlock does see him, observes him, then deems him as boring and unimportant, and then promptly forgets him altogether.
He's a dull man – businessman, high position, judging by the state of his suit. He like being active and staying fit - walks to work to counter the hours spent sitting in his office. He's arrogant, supercilious, and generally disliked by most working under him. Perhaps by more, if it weren't for his looks, or the fact he clearly had familial ties to his company.
Sherlock really couldn't care less.
… at least not until the blond does a complete change over the course of a single night, without any forewarning.
Suddenly the blond walks with a confidence he never had before. The man's stride speaks of an experienced fighter, of a man who knows danger others can only imagine. He's a man who has suffered losses and carried studiously on, who knows the feeling of the world placed on his sole shoulders. He is man well beyond the twenty-so years he is supposed to be.
It's amazing and unprecedented, this change, and Sherlock finds himself rushing out of his flat to confront him. He skids in front of the blond, fervent gleam in his eyes as they sweep over the anomaly of a man.
"Who are you?" he demands without any preamble.
The man hardly blinks to his appearance. "Arthur," he replies. And Sherlock hears King Arthur from his tone, and there is nothing narcissistic about it, simply fact.
And just when Sherlock thinks this is the highlight of his otherwise boring day, another greater, odder and more impossible puzzle in the form of a gangly, ebony-haired man saunters into the picture.
