Aster limped after his old friend Mike, leaning heavily on his poor old wooden cane. His leg was acting up again. It might be psychosomatic (he knew it) but it still hurt too much to deal with. Mike led him to the laboratories, wherein Aster hesitated for a second because of all the new renovations. A new table was placed in the middle that didn't stand on a few wobbly legs, and there was much more equipment than before, and much more pristine.

"Bit better from my day." Aster huffed a bit, squinting at a new thing in the corner. It did… something. Aster wasn't too big on researching things himself, but he did like to be up to date on certain things. He resolved to find out what it was when he left for his bedsit. Keep him from looking at his gun.

Aster came back to the end of whatever short thing Mike had said "... no idea!" And then he finally looked around the actual place. He hadn't moved much from the doorway, but the man sitting at the center table, using a pipette to squeeze something onto something was a bit of an eye-grabber.

"Mike, can I borrow your phone? There's no signal on mine." And his voice grabbed your attention, and even though it sounded villainous, Aster had too many memories of how that worked. They could sound as villainous as they wanted as long as they were okay people.

Mike sighed at that, as if he was used to lending his phone but seriously didn't want to. "What's wrong with the landline?" His eyes darted to Aster and maybe he was trying to impress his old friend, but it was an iffy thought anyway, so Aster pushed it away.

The dark haired man with a grey complexion and a long, cheekbony face turned to Mike with a deadpan expression. "You know I prefer to text." He drawled, tugging out the word "text" like it was a small bit of gum you can't do anything with.

Mike's eyes darted to Aster again and then he shifted just a little so he was standing straighter and offered up the most cowardly response any one of Aster's (now admittedly old) friends could give. "Sorry. It's in my coat."

Aster had the urge to facepalm, only saving himself by deciding to save both of them and offered up his own phone, tugged out from his back pocket. "Here. You can use mine."

The man's eyes widened a fraction as his gaze shifted from Mike to Aster, slowly walking toward Aster, eyes searching for something. Aster decided it was the perfect moment to introduce himself, since he didn't trust Mike to make a fool of himself anymore.

"My name is Aster Bunnymund. I'm an old friend of Mike." The man reached forward with his hand and almost snapped the phone from Aster's grip, as if his hand was a snake having reached its prey. He opened the phone while keeping one calculating eye on Aster until he started typing, and then he simply asked a shocking question.

"Afghanistan or Iraq?"

Aster blinked.

And then he blinked again, because even though he had perfect hearing, and could often hear things before other people (or soldiers), he could mess up every now and then. Whatever. He was human.

And then he shook his head a little. "Sorry?"

The man paused in his typing as he rolled his eyes. "You heard me. Which was it, Afghanistan - or Iraq?"

Aster decided to just answer on principle. "Afghanistan. I'm sorry, but how did you know…?"

And he was interrupted by a young lady with short brown hair stepping into the laboratory with a cup of coffee in her hand. She looked a little disappointed, but in a way that seemed like she was covering it up. Aster decided he didn't want to know why she was disappointed. He had never understood women when he was younger, he probably won't start now.

"Ah, Pippa. Lovely to know you brought my coffee." He flipped Aster's phone closed and shoved it into Aster's hand while stepping toward Pippa, who had a white laboratory coat on and a green shirt underneath. He took the coffee and stared a little at Pippa. He then squinted his eyes a little, staring (for a second) at Pippa's face.

"What happened to the lipstick?"

Pippa stood a bit awkwardly, eyes darting a bit around, resting a little on Aster and Mike. Her hands rubbed each other the entire time. "It… wasn't really working for me…"

The (still!) mystery man widened his eyes a little and turned away to start drinking his coffee. "Really? I thought it was an improvement." He grimaced at the taste of coffee. Aster winced a little. So there was one thing that hadn't improved. And it was the only thing he specifically wanted improved. "Now your mouth's too… small, for lack of better wording."

Pippa looks a little dejected and Aster can't help but feel incredulous. This is the person Pippa, a seemingly upstanding young lady is pining for? This bloody show-pony?

"... All right." Her eyes are a bit harder now, crystallizing around the edges as starts toward the door, hands clenched to her sides, twitching in desire to punch the git (or so Aster thinks. He's not so sure.)

"How do you feel about the violin?" Aster was taken aback again. What now? He shot his eyes toward Pippa, but she was leaving, and then at Mike, who was leaning smugly against one of the outer tables, as if he was showing off a dog who could do an exceptionally good trick. Aster scowled internally. That was part of the reason he didn't care much for his old friends. He tried to meet up with one but he gave such a flimsy excuse that Aster just hung up on him.

"I'm sorry, what?"

The man reams him with a pointed look but sits down at his computer and repeats what he said after a quick mumble about hearing and repetitiveness. "I play the violin when I'm thinking. Sometimes I don't talk for days on end." Here he glanced up at Aster for a short second. "Do things like that bother you? Potential flatmates should know the worst about one another." At that he almost grimaces at Aster, as if he didn't feel like mustering up the energy to give him a proper smile.

Aster turned back to Mike. "Did you tell him about me?" That would make up for the rest of the foolishness that had happened.

"Not a word." And there went his hopes, crashing to the ground. Good job, Mike. Good job. Could always count on you handing in your biology homework three days late.

Aster turned back to the strange man. "Then who has said anything about flatmates?"

The man sighed and reached for his jacket, which Aster only now realized had hung over the back of his chair. "I did. I had told Mike this morning that I must be a very difficult man to find a flatmate for. Now here he is, just after lunch, with an old friend, clearly just home from military service in Afghanistan. Wasn't that difficult a leap. A child could have made it."

Aster was pushed back to the question about how the grey-skinned man figured out he was a military man from Afghanistan. "How did you know about Afghanistan?"

The man huffed a bit and decidedly ignored the question, instead pulling out his own phone and checking something on it. "I have my eye on a quaint flat in central London. You should be able to help us afford it." He then took two long-legged steps toward Aster. "We'll meet there tomorrow evening; seven o'clock. Sorry – have to go. I believe I left my riding crop in the mortuary." He then took long-legged steps to the door, thinking the conversation to be over.

Aster rounded on him and his long-legged-ness. It didn't matter that he didn't have such long legs, he could be just as tough! Just, in different situations. "Is that all you're going to say?"

"Why? Should I say something else?"

Aster shook his head. "We've only just met and we're gonna go and look at a flat?" This man was maddening!

The man lifted an eyebrow. "Problem?"

Aster tries his darndest not to gape. What was this man even thinking? A quick look at Mike proved that he was still standing smugly and even if he was going to help, Aster had already decided he wasn't going to take his help. "We don't know a bloody thing about each other. I don't know where you're planning to meet me and you haven't even told me you name!" 'You bloody show-pony' was added on in Aster's head, since it would be impolite to say that to a complete stranger.

The man stared at Aster for a few seconds before opening his mouth and nerf bullets out of his mouth. "I know you're an Army doctor and you've been invalided home from Afghanistan. I know you've got a brother who's worried about you but you won't go to him for help because you don't approve of him – possibly because he's an alcoholic; more likely because he recently walked out on his wife. And I know that your therapist thinks your limp's psychosomatic – quite correctly, I'm afraid."

Aster glanced at his leg out of reflex and realized his cane was almost falling out of his grasp. Unconsciously, he shifted his weight to the other foot.

"That's enough to go on, don't you think?" At that he continued his long-legged walk to the door, opening it with such an ease it seems like magic. Then he turned back to Aster. "The name is Pitchiner Black and the address is two - two - one Baker Street. See you." Then, with a quick nod to Mike, whose grin now looked scarily like the Cheshire Cat's grin from Alice in Wonderland, Pitchiner was gone.

Aster blinked a few more times and realized that he was ridiculously exhilarated. It felt like the war all over again, but it didn't feel bad. It was less dangerous but more dangerous because information had a danger all on its own and sometimes nobody realized it. Turning to Mike, he decided to let him try and explain what the heck he was trying to show off.

"Yeah. He's always like that."

Well then. That explains it.

Aster left Bart's with a lighter heart and a few thoughts to think.