Ficlet: Spiderweb Sherlock
Title: Spiderweb
Author: Unsentimental Fool
Fandom: Sherlock
Character: Charles Augustus Magnussen
Rating: PG
Word Count: 517
Summary: "He's a spider."
Notes: This accidentally turned up on my laptop. More might happen at some point. Consider it a taster.
“He’s a spider.”
Charles Augustus Magnussen smiles. He tags the impassioned audio, adds it to the photograph of the man gesticulating at the jury (a hidden courtroom smartphone from one of his reporters- couldn’t go in the papers, of course, but it had come to him) then puts it away, neatly, in the front of the ballooning file and closes that. He pats the printed name on the front in a proprietorial fashion and picks the manilla folder up with the intention of putting it away.
Underneath the file there is a second photograph. Charles looks at it and his smile flattens out into a blank stare. The file for Sherlock Holmes drops back on the smooth desk and a few bits of paper spill from the edges, disregarded. Charles picks the photo up, extremely cautiously, by a corner and carries it suspended well away from his body between finger and thumb.
Most of his rooms are modern or classical but the door he ends up at is high and wide, thick timbered and spiked with metal studs; it's the side door of a Norman country church that he visited for a politician's funeral two years ago. He remembers (of course) adding the lock as well as the heavy bar after certain recent events. There are few other locks down here. The huge rusted iron key turns with creaking reluctance and it takes his entire metaphorical weight against the door to move it inwards.
Inside there is an oak chair with a velvet cushion and a modern office desk, nothing else. The light is from an ancient candelabra of stuttering candles and there are no windows. Charles settles in the chair, draws the bottom desk drawer out and leafs through the four files inside.
The one he draws out is one of the thinnest in his entire vaults. Five sheets of paper, closely typed, contain nothing but cross-references. Charles places the photo on the desk above the file and picks out the last sheet, adds a reference to the judge, the defence barrister and yet another reference to Sherlock Holmes.
Then he picks the photograph up again. “Spider,” he murmurs to the dark haired man standing in the dock. He is so tempted to attach it to the file but he thinks better of it. He stands, sets the corner of the photo to one of the candles and watches it burn until the smouldering flame reaches his fingers, then drops the last inch or so on the floor and grinds it into the wood with the sole of his very expensive shoe. There is nothing at all recognisable about the final crumpled fragment and he leaves it where it lies.
Charles returns the file marked Jim Moriarty to the bottom of the desk and pushes it closed with a very real though nebulous sense of danger avoided. The acrid smell of the burned photo lingers in the room as he opens the door to leave. By the time he has a need to return to this room he imagines- he hopes- that it will be gone.
Author: Unsentimental Fool
Fandom: Sherlock
Character: Charles Augustus Magnussen
Rating: PG
Word Count: 517
Summary: "He's a spider."
Notes: This accidentally turned up on my laptop. More might happen at some point. Consider it a taster.
“He’s a spider.”
Charles Augustus Magnussen smiles. He tags the impassioned audio, adds it to the photograph of the man gesticulating at the jury (a hidden courtroom smartphone from one of his reporters- couldn’t go in the papers, of course, but it had come to him) then puts it away, neatly, in the front of the ballooning file and closes that. He pats the printed name on the front in a proprietorial fashion and picks the manilla folder up with the intention of putting it away.
Underneath the file there is a second photograph. Charles looks at it and his smile flattens out into a blank stare. The file for Sherlock Holmes drops back on the smooth desk and a few bits of paper spill from the edges, disregarded. Charles picks the photo up, extremely cautiously, by a corner and carries it suspended well away from his body between finger and thumb.
Most of his rooms are modern or classical but the door he ends up at is high and wide, thick timbered and spiked with metal studs; it's the side door of a Norman country church that he visited for a politician's funeral two years ago. He remembers (of course) adding the lock as well as the heavy bar after certain recent events. There are few other locks down here. The huge rusted iron key turns with creaking reluctance and it takes his entire metaphorical weight against the door to move it inwards.
Inside there is an oak chair with a velvet cushion and a modern office desk, nothing else. The light is from an ancient candelabra of stuttering candles and there are no windows. Charles settles in the chair, draws the bottom desk drawer out and leafs through the four files inside.
The one he draws out is one of the thinnest in his entire vaults. Five sheets of paper, closely typed, contain nothing but cross-references. Charles places the photo on the desk above the file and picks out the last sheet, adds a reference to the judge, the defence barrister and yet another reference to Sherlock Holmes.
Then he picks the photograph up again. “Spider,” he murmurs to the dark haired man standing in the dock. He is so tempted to attach it to the file but he thinks better of it. He stands, sets the corner of the photo to one of the candles and watches it burn until the smouldering flame reaches his fingers, then drops the last inch or so on the floor and grinds it into the wood with the sole of his very expensive shoe. There is nothing at all recognisable about the final crumpled fragment and he leaves it where it lies.
Charles returns the file marked Jim Moriarty to the bottom of the desk and pushes it closed with a very real though nebulous sense of danger avoided. The acrid smell of the burned photo lingers in the room as he opens the door to leave. By the time he has a need to return to this room he imagines- he hopes- that it will be gone.