Questions and Answers
30 minutes later...
“I think we started off on the wrong foot,” Sherlock said, his past half an hour of inquiries had Sherlock convinced that Stark was telling the truth about where he had come from.
“Honestly not the worst first encounter i’ve had with someone,” Stark said with a half smile, “You’ve got a mean punch though.”
“Your elbow was no breeze either, and with a dislocated shoulder. I was quite impressed,” Sherlock exchanged a complement. This man seemed like someone he would get along quite well with. He had an air to him that suggested to Sherlock that he was very intelligent. Intelligent people were hard to come by. “ How is all that doing by the way?”
“Well, I think I have a few broken ribs, but that's happened before so I should be fine, and your doctor friend did a good job with getting my shoulder back to the way it should be.”
“Does this happen often?” Sherlock asked with mild concern.
“Not getting launched back in time, but getting a good beating? In my line of work yes, although I am mostly retired these days, so not as much as it used to,” Stark replied and smiled a little as though he was recalling some fond memory.
“What exactly is your line of work?”
“See that’s where this gets hard to explain,” Stark replied, “Best way I can think to put it, is I fight crime.”
“Ah, I think you and I will get along fine then,” Sherlock said, he was feeling quite pleased. He didn’t think he could like this person anymore than he already did.
“But not crime like you think. I fight against potentially world ending events… or I did. Now days i am more of just a consultant, and let younger people do the actual fighting.”
“Well that doesn’t sound like as much fun…” Sherlock said slightly disappointed, “What made you “retire”?”
“A fight on an alien planet.”
Sherlock was taken aback by Stark’s reply, but he was willing to hear him out
“You don’t believe me? I have the scar to prove it, although i do suppose it doesn’t prove it was an alien,” Stark said and lifted up his shirt revealing a nasty scar on his left side, it looked like something that would be left by getting stabbed on a sword. Sherlock sat back in his chair. Was he being too trusting? He should probably be taking his usual sceptical approach to this, but he really liked this man. There were very few people that he really liked, and this man seemed like he had seen the miles he claimed to.
“Tell me about the thing in your chest,” Sherlock said folding his arms, he was trying to be more sceptical, but he felt like there was some sort of connection between the two of them.
“Its like… um like a battery… are those a thing at this time? I am a little fuzzy on the history of batteries.”
“I’ve heard of them, although they are not common.”
“Well it's similar to that, it is also similar to a magnet.”
“Fascinating, can I look at it?” The glowing circle of blue light fascinated Sherlock.
“It has to stay in me. It is keeping pieces of shrapnel out of my heart.”
“Oh, that is frightfully intriguing. Did you invent it?”
“Yes, i did. Quite a few years back… or well ahead for you… I tried getting surgery to remove the shrapnel, but it failed, so i opted to keep this glowing circle of light.”
“You said it was similar to a battery, what does it power?” Sherlock asked.
“I wish I could show you, its like a suit of armor, but it flys and does a lot of other things.”
“Like that thing that attacked us?”
“I don’t know what that thing was, but i have no doubt that the guy who sent me here, also sent that to make sure i die here.”
“You have told me alot, but not how you actually got here. Can you tell me that?”
“This secret agency pulled in a favor i owed them, and they wanted me to go pick up this kid for them, they told me that she could make portals, but i guess they didn’t know about the time portals. Any way I went to go get her, and out of nowhere this other guy shows up, takes over my suit of mechanical armor, ad takes it away, and then the girl shoves me through a time portal, and now I am here,” Stark finished, he was obviously upset by these turn of events.
“Why were they having get a random child?”
“Well they told me that they wanted me to bring her in to keep her safe, because having a super human orphan on the busy streets of London could be potentially very dangerous.”
“That makes sense,” Sherlock agreed.
Stark stared out into space looking quite sad.
“I need to get home. My wife is pregnant, and the baby is due in a few months.”
Sherlock wished he had some sort of consolation to offer the man but he had nothing. If this man was from the future he had no way of helping him get back, obviously he came from a much more advanced time. Sherlock was beginning to feel quite inadequate, and he wished he could help Stark.
“Well, sitting around idly isn’t going to solve that problem. We will get back home,” Sherlock reassured him, while also trying reassure himself that there was some way to do that.