greenjacketed | SHARPE'S TEA ⚔ WRITTEN | VOICE

[ he's snug in a corner of the tea shop, with both a brew and a book in hand. the tea is strong; it's uncreamed and unsweetened, and yet it still somehow lacks the bite he's grown accustomed to through flanders, portugal, and spain. instead, this mug is as lightly spiced as the mugs he'd nursed on lonely nights in india. he'd been so much younger, then. and so much more foolish.

another sip and then it's time to get to it. in practice, his message has an intended audince of very few. but fear of his own sentimentality demands that he not approach anyone directly. and so he writes publicly, his script slanty and rough. unpracticed. it takes him a long time to carve out even a brief sentence: ]

Won't be around for a few days --- heading out, took the bloody shilling, got orders to march, &ct.
-- MJR R. SHARPE

[ he loops his pencil 'round the ampersand a few more times, chagrined by its childish slopes. he's no writer. not by any man's account. he's a soldier, he thinks. he knows when to kill and when not to kill, although that line was painfully blurred on the just-passed draft. he should know how to follow orders and protect the colours. but what on earth is a soldiering man to do with orders he didn't understand and no colours to speak of? it gives him a notion. a question, at least.

switching to voice: ] I suppose the village does not have a flag of its own, eh? Don't seeem proper. Perhaps it would've done no good in that last [ shit-hole/dungheap/disaster ] battle. But in future...?

[ he hesitates. he waits. and he lives his day as anxiously as any other day spent waiting to be deployed. a mission, this time? aye. perhaps it'll sooth his nerves and erase from his mind the bloody great cock-up of vaskoth. finally -- if the journal or the tea-shop won't do, feel free to encounter him elsewhere. he's bound to be in good spirits come the evening -- but he bloody well won't drink a drop. not the night before. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I see, I see. You are from the past, yes?

...I'm from the bloody present.

Would the present be bloody? Well, there is quite some bloodshed on Midgard.

That is an accurate description, I think.

That wasn't how I--

[ oh bugger it all. ]

As far as I can reckon, lad? The present's always bloody.

'That wasn't how I...?' What exactly?

[Could this Major mean...oooo, oh, how could Loki forget such a thing.]

Ah! Bloody. As in Bloody hell and Bloody bloke, it is the most British phrase of bloody!

Edited 2012-12-07 14:11 (UTC)

Aye. Even so. Though the other meaning is plain and true enough, I suppose.

[ for he's a soldier, and his present is also awash with blood. ]

I think bloodshed and other similar bloody, bloody have become kind of inevitable.

[Not that Loki is one for peace and quiet, since, for some reason, he works best when everything is chaotic and extremely messy.]

Still, I am fond of very British exclamations like that.

Fond, eh? At least someone is. What does that make you then, eh?

Someone who is quite fond of very British exclamations.

I mean -- where're you from, lad?

I am from Asgard.

Asgard? Where the bloody hell is that?

Asgard is one of the Nine Realms connected by the branches of Yggdrasil. Midgardians like you might know Asgard from old, dusty viking-myths.

What the bugger did you just call me?

[ he assumes 'misgardian' is an insult. ]

Midgardian? From Midgard? Of Earth?

[No really, did he just say bugger? How amazingly British! And wait...]

Do not tell me you were assuming the word 'Midgardian' is an insult...

[ sulkily: ] It sounded like one...

But it isn't one. I do not have a reason to be insulting, now have I?

How should I bloody well know? I don't know you from Adam.

Direst news Major Sharpe! I do not know Adam!

That's the ruddy point, ain't it? No one does.

Is this a cool new phrase or a dusty old one? For old people.

What the--?

Neither. O-or both. Just things people say, Goddammit.

Edited 2012-12-30 12:37 (UTC)

Ah, an universal phrase.

It still sounds as if it is meant for old people, though. Really old people. With wrinkles.

I'm not that old.

At least, I don't think I am...

Maybe you have been around a lot of old people, therefore the old people jokes, you see?

[voice]

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