"I honestly don't know what I'd do without the tower's computer."

"What do you do with it? I believe you mentioned reading books and hunting wild 'mon and playing the violin, I don't see how the computer factors in."

"...It's difficult to explain."

"I haven't got anything else particularly intellectually stimulating to do while we circuit the lake, and it's a big lake," Ace points out, eyes scanning their surroundings for odd lights or uncharacteristic motion in the grass or the water.

"I suppose not."

"But we can talk about something else, if you want, do you follow tournaments or anything standard-small-talk-y like that?"

"Among the things the computer does is offer us regular reports on such goings-on. So yes."

Bella turns out to have many and nuanced opinions on tournaments. She personally knows her guild's entrant to this year's Golden Apricorn Games, and doesn't like him very much, although she admits that he's the sort of person to have a shot at winning and give half the prize money to the guild after, so it's all right.

Sherlock does not have such insight into the personalities of the entrants, but he listens raptly to Bella's analysis.

"Yes, I like them," says Sherlock, scratching behind Watson's ears.

"I'm usually not up this early. Not such a morning person."

"I am not always up this early, but when I am, I appreciate it."

"I wish I didn't need to sleep. I probably still would sometimes, but not daily."

"Why?"

"Why would I rather not have to sleep or why would I sometimes do it anyway?"

"Both."

"I don't like needing to do things - especially things that have no useful products, which sleep wouldn't if it weren't required for me to be properly awake the rest of the time. I'd do it anyway because I like dreams, and because sometimes there's nothing interesting going on and the next interesting thing will happen some time in the future and I could sleep through those occasions."

"Your logic is sound."

"It usually is!"

Sherlock grins.

And there's the tower again. "Nothing," sighs Bella. She slides off Fireflower's back, pats her neck, and returns her. "I'm going to check out the lake itself, d'you want to join me for that too or have you got other stuff planned?"

"I can think of no better way to occupy my morning," he says cheerfully.

"What've you got that swims? It'd be a bit cramped for us to both sit on Zag." She sits down and pulls off her boots, because Zag's not even big enough for her to keep her feet dry.