"John...? Pass me my phone, would you?"
Sherlock Holmes asked the air of 221B Baker Street.
He sat there for a moment, still staring at the problem in his head, awaiting his companion to comply with his simple request.
But he didn't.
Because he wasn't there.
Sherlock thought back to the last time he remembered John being there. John had mumbled something about going to see Harry for a few days.
Sherlock turned back to his problem full force. Then turned to the skull on the mantle piece.
He tried to discuss the case with the skull, but it wasn't the same anymore. The skull would not ask the right stupid questions, would not make the right stupid suggestions, and, in fact, would not make a cuppa when he asked it to. The skull had outlived its usefulness as an assistant and colleague when compared to John.
But John wasn't there.
And the skull was.
Sherlock also found it rather strange when he would go out to trail a suspect. When in the heat of the chase, and undoubtedly the most dangerous part of his detecting, he somehow... he ventured to deduce... He Felt... Not as... comfortable with the skull as he had with John.
True, the skull helped him gain the element of surprise, not many criminals expected their pursuer to pull a human skull out of their pocket, but if things went wrong, he could not expect the skull to pull out a Browning, and point it with steady hands and nerves of steel at the pursued.
Sherlock had to face it.
John was his colleague.
And a damn good Friend.
Well, Better than a skull, at any rate.