A/N: I figured that with the ending of the third episode of season two there would be a bunch of these types of fics popping up, and I couldn't resist writing one from a somewhat unusual point of view. Actually, pretty much the only thing I've been wondering (apart from "Where the fuck is season three!") has been, "Well, what does Anderson have to say about all this?" Not normal, I know. But I couldn't resist, so here it is! Hopefully not too OOC, but I'll let you guys be the judges of that.
Anderson sighed as the cab pulled up outside the cemetery. Tossing some bills at the driver, he grabbed the bouquet sitting next to him and got out of the taxi. He knew he shouldn't have bothered with flowers, but he also knew how irked Sherlock would have been to know someone had done something as sentimental as put flowers on his grave, so he couldn't resist, really.
Walking through the marble rows of tombstones, he wondered, not for the first time, why exactly he had allowed Lestrade to talk him into doing this. It was no secret the animosity that the forensic technician and consulting detective harbored for one another, which made it all the more perplexing the DI had even bothered, never mind the fact that Anderson was actually here.
Arriving at the tombstone, Anderson took a moment to stare at the freshly turned dirt and the clean, unworn slab of marble. It struck him then how very plain the stone was. There were no words explaining who Sherlock had been. Just the name: Sherlock Holmes. Nothing to denote what an extraordinary and infuriating and great man now lay beneath his feet. There was no date of birth, or death, and he realized he had never know how old Sherlock was. Despite the great many things he undoubtedly would never know about Sherlock Holmes, this particular fact bothere him, for some reason. So Anderson just stood there for a good long while, just staring at the simple tombstone of the man he had once thought he despised, but really didn't know at all.
"Well, freak," he began finally. "Here we are." It felt exceptionally odd to hear his voice in the quiet of the cemetery. He continued anyway. "I bet you never expected to see me here, did you? All your deductions and observations. Probably never would have deduced this outcome, eh?" Anderson paused, half-expecting a biting and sarcastic voice telling him how wrong he was and what an idiot he was being, and of course he had already foreseen this outcome, something deduced by the way Anderson was wearing his tie, or some other such nonsense.
"You were wrong about one thing though," Anderson began again. "I never hated you, not really. Disliked, yes, jealous of, definitely. I was one of the best forensic techs the force had until you came along, you know. Then one day you come swooping into the crime scene, all coat and scarf and amazingly brilliant deductions, and suddenly you're Lestrade's golden boy and I'm obsolete." Anderson stopped again, gathering up the words he had actually come to say, the words he would never have dreamed of saying to the consulting detective while he was alive.
Taking a deep breath, Anderson let the words spill out. "I always thought you were brilliant. You thought I didn't see, thought I was too wrapped up in my hatred for you, in the 'mundane' things in life, but I noticed. How could I not? I admired you. You could do my job twice as well in a fifth of the time, and I'll admit I was jealous, but I never could have ignored the sheer brilliance of it all. And by the time I realized that, people expected me to hate you, so I did. Kept up the charade and all that. No doubt you'd be bored by the triviality of it all." He paused again to collect his thoughts, feeling oddly liberated now that he was admitting all of this out loud, even if Sherlock couldn't hear him.
"I never really believed you were a fake, if you can believe that. I've seen you work, seen that mind of yours come to all those clever deductions, and I know that you could never have faked it. And for what it's worth, I am sorry. I know I stood with Donovan and her accusations against you, but I never really doubted your intelligence or ability. No doubt you'd be hate the emotion of all this, in particular in it being said by me, the idiot forensics guy, but I think it needs to be said." Anderson paused once more to take a deep breath. "You were a great man Sherlock Holmes. A good one, even," he risked, using words overheard from Lestrade on the first case in which John Watson had appeared. "And I know that the world- well, London or Scotland Yard, at least- will miss you." With that, Anderson leaned forward and placed the flowers he had brought in front of the far too plain tombstone.
"Goodbye, Sherlock Holmes," he said, straightening up. He stayed for a moment longer before turning and leaving, never noticing the tall, coat-clad man standing among the trees.
A/N: Yeah, so, as you may have guessed by now, I never really thought Anderson was that bad of a guy, just a little jealous of Sherlock for pretty much taking his job, but obviously he could never have told Sherlock that to his face.
So, love it? Hate it? Want me to suffer in the lowest regions of Tartarus for writing it? Let me know!
badgermushroom out! :d