Carl Powers Case- Teen style!

The café Sherlock took him to was cozy. Nice atmosphere, nice people, good tea.

When Sherlock finally said something, John answered him just as bluntly. "Maybe they think you're so smart you think they are below you. But I think everyone needs a chance, so I go to unlikely people for friendships..."

John was an interesting guy, thought Sherlock. No one had ever given him a chance before. Maybe he could give John a chance too. It might be OK to have a friend. He decided to give John a little test.

"When you look at the people in this cafe what do you see? What do you notice about them?"

Mmn. Cafe was boring. But then everything had seemed to become boring, after he'd found something so interesting to occupy him. He sat alone at a table in the corner, twiddling with a pencil, avoiding his homework. He drew Carl Powers' name over and over again in his notebook, sketches of his face... His iPod fed something by The Police into his ears as he idly doodled.
He glanced up as two people walked in--tall, pale Sherlock(fancy seeing him again today, that was odd) and one of the other boys who he'd seen walking out of the chem lab.
Boring!
He looked back at the page his pencil was moving over, a few equations surrounded by the products of his newfound interest. He really should get his maths done. He liked that class. But then again, the longer he spent doing his homework, the more time that would pass before he had to head home.
Glancing up again, he saw Sherlock gesturing at the cafe at large. He and the other boy sat on opposite sides of a table, drinking tea--Sherlock was saying something that he couldn't hear because of the headphones in his ears.
Not that he cared, really, but the blonde that Sherlock was out with was now looking at him.
Odd, that.
And ever so uninteresting.
He turned back to his paper again.

((Hi this is Jim and welcome to jackass I'm in your RP making you focus on me <3))

(( i love it! let's see what we can deduce about the weird boy sat in the corner ))

"Um... Like in general, or one in particular?" Asked John in reply to Sherlock's question.

((Your chance to deduce has presented it's self... enjoy))

Jim twirled his headphone cord around one of his fingers, tapping to the beat of his music. His brain clicked through equations, running through variables and balances. He wrote down the answers as he came to him--no writing down his work necessary, thank you, he could do it in his head just fine. The teacher hated that. Then again, he hated the teacher.
And Carl Powers. His mind again turned to the thing he planned. He really would rather not be caught at it--jail time would be inconvenient for him at this point in his life--so he had best find a very good way of doing it. Funnily enough, he felt as though he had a knack for planning things like this. He had several ideas already.
One stuck out. He smiled. Poison. Simple. Elegant. And, if he timed it right, the boy who had shoved him around and called him names would just...drown. There would be no investigation of a drowning when there was no one around to have murdered him. Out in the pool, he was safe. Or so he thought.
But Jim could bring him down.
Jim could do it.
And he could get away with it. Now he just had to research an appropriate poison, and then find a way to obtain it, non-suspiciously, and a way to administer it. His pencil swirled across the sheet, drawing bottles and skulls and a hand reaching out of water.
He was never going to be able to turn this in. He'd have to re-write the answers.
Worth it.

((grammar nazi-ing: *itself))

(( cool thought - Jim could find a way to ask Sherlock for advice on poisons, being a Chemistry nerd and everything ))



Sherlock leaned in closer to John, speaking quietly so that people wouldn't over hear them.

"Take that fat woman on your left. She's clearly just lost her job. Can you work out why? Look at her. Really look at her. And tell me what you see."

Sherlock grinned. He wanted to test John. See if he was clever enough to be his friend.

"Well, she looks depressed, she is staring at her cup like she is asking herself if it was really worth it... I don't know? She keeps counting her money?" Guessed John, still looking for details

((Too smart? Or not enough smart? I don't know, help!))

"Good!" Sherlock exclaimed, pleased that John had picked up on some of the details. "Not bad at all. You can see she's upset and she's counting her money. Fine. But why? Look at the paper open on her table...how's your eyesight from here?" Sherlock squinted. "I'm pretty sure she's looking at the job's section...soooo....she's obviously just lost her job...and she's wondering how long her money will last her. What d'you think? Sound about right?"

Sherlock had know way of proving whether his deductions were right or wrong, short of going over and asking the woman, but he was becoming more confident in his abilities every day. He was quite certain he was correct this time too. He took a sip of his tea and watched John's reaction, smiling. Then suddenly he caught sight of someone in the far corner...someone he recognised from school.

Jim sighed, clicking through a playlist. Boring, boring...
The Village People might be good.
He'd completed his maths homework. He could stall for another few minutes, perhaps, the inevitable fact that he would have to re-enter his personal hell in a very short time. Perhaps he could set to work recopying the problems from the sheet with all his aimless doodling on it.
Well.
Aimless was hardly the right word.
He pulled another sheet of graph paper from his bag and began to decipher the numbers from beneath the hordes of pencil lines that marched across the paper in an extremely disorderly fashion.
When he looked up, the two boys at the other table were looking at him again. He raised an eyebrow and shot them a smirk.
Then his paper again recalled his attention.

((juuuust waiting for you two I'll be psychopathing in this corner if you need me XD))

"Yeah. You're right!" Said John, feeling relieved he was right, but still in awe of Sherlock's talents.
"Um..... Did that kid just give us an eyebrow? His name is Jim, right?" Asked John asked in a low voice.

((I feel noticed. xD))

(( I'm happy for you! any other comments I can be happy for? I like being happy! ))

"Um...yeah," Sherlock said. "Jim sounds about right. He's in the year above I think."

Sherlock gave a little wave over to Jim's corner. "He's smart," he added, with a touch of jealousy. "Wonder what he's doing here?"

"Well, he's not drinking anything, he's just looking and doodling on that piece of paper.. He might just need a place to sit and think..." said John, seeing Sherlock wave

Do something to look normal.
Sherlock's wave and his piercing stare felt almost uncomfortable. Jim was new to this--but he knew, somehow, that the other boy coming over and seeing his paper would be a very, very bad thing. He put it away in his bag, leaving behind the neater sheet with the answers printed on it. Shifting his legs beneath the table, he reshuffled the music on his iPod.
His mobile buzzed in his pocket.
Text.
His mum.
Come home. You're late again.
He groaned internally.
Started stalling.

((BECAUSE EVERYTHING TECHNOLOGICALLY IS EXACTLY AS IT IS NOW))

(( Yeah, lol, I did notice you put iPods in the 1980s...we'll forgive you ))


Sherlock was still staring at the boy in the corner. Jim. There was something unusual about him that caught his attention. He turned back towards John.

"Do you think we should go and sit with him?"

"Um...Only if you want to... I mean, sure, whatever you want." Still feeling the bad feeling he had before

Sherlock stood up and was about to head over there, expecting John to stand up and follow him, but before he got the chance, there was a terrible scream to his left. He spun round. It was the fat woman they were just talking about. "My purse!" she shouted. "Someone's stolen my purse!"

"Sherlock!" cried John, pointing at a young man trotting away trying to conseal a bulky red purse. John ran after him, forgetting about his slight limp "Hey!" He shouted after the boy. The boy turned, and when he saw John, he started running full speed.

((I figured we were kind of just like, rewinding the aging rather than actually going back in time. xD Since, you know, going back in time Jim wouldn't have been at their school and John and Sherlock wouldn't know one another. XD))
((Canon, what is this canon))

John set off running so fast Sherlock didn't have time to think. He had darted out of the cafe and onto the street, in pursuit of the purse thief. Sherlock leapt over the table and followed him outside. He'd made it a hobby of his to learn all the streets in London off by heart, so he knew the best short cuts and back streets to follow.

"Follow me," he said, once he'd caught up with his new friend, and darted left into an alley way.

Jim laughs quietly as the two rush out. Good little samaritans doing their community service, stopping the big bad thief who'd decided on taking that dumpy woman's purse. He accepts bitterly the fact that he has to go now--but he can take the image of Sherlock actually vaulting a table to go after a petty thief.
He gathers his things into his bag. Time to head home.
Joy.
'Home is where the heart is', said someone once.
For Jim, home is where his heart closed off and stopped functioning properly.
Home is what makes him hate.

John heard Sherlock coming up behind him, and instead of saying something stupid like but he's going this way, he followed Sherlock down the dark alley, and soon caught up with him again.