This came to me out of the blue and got jotted down in forty-five minutes, so I apologize in advance for any OOC-ness. Hopefully you guys enjoy the one-shot.
"Why in the name of all that is holy are we at a carnival?" Sherlock groaned, glancing despairingly at his surroundings.
Beside him, Mycroft turned to glare at his little brother, saying accusingly, "Because you allowed your friends to drag us here," And then with a sarcastic arch of his eyebrows, "And where are the Watsons now, hmm? They abandoned us in favor of some trivial ride, am I right?"
"Then why don't we just leave?" Sherlock muttered. "Surely both of us have better things to be doing with our time this weekend."
"Your dear friends have the keys to the car."
"Then let's just take a cab!"
Mycroft took a deep breath, declaring, "Sherlock, I am not in the mood for your dramatics today; kindly cut down on them. We'll leave as soon as John and Mary get back from that blasted ferris wheel, I promise you." He looked around him, suggesting at length, "In the mean time, why don't you go amuse yourself at a game booth?"
Sherlock looked at him like he was batty. "None of this would be mentally stimulating enough to amuse me; you know that."
"Well, at least try not to be such a stick in the mud, yes?"
Sherlock rolled his eyes and Mycroft followed suit, giving up on lightening his brother's mood. "Alright then," he decided. "Follow me." And he took off.
"Where are we going?" Sherlock asked, keeping in step behind him.
"I think I shall find a game to play."
Sherlock laughed, and Mycroft didn't have to look at his brother's face to see his incredulity; he could hear it in his voice. "You?"
"Why not?" Mycroft shrugged, and then stopped behind a brunette woman at the game booth nearest the brothers.
A ring toss – one of the few games he had seen here that didn't actually look to be rigged.
"Mycroft, look," Sherlock pointed to the prizes that lined one of the counters of the booth. "There are actual goldfish here. Doesn't that just highlight to you how utterly stupid this whole experience is?"
The brunette who had been playing the ring toss whirled around to face them, horribly offsetting her final throw as she said with surprise, "Sherlock!"
Mycroft and Sherlock both turned to the woman at the same time, recognizing her instantly.
"Hello, Molly Hooper," Sherlock said, seeming mildly cheered to have stumbled upon a friend of his here.
Mycroft repeated his own "hello" as Molly asked, "What are the two of you doing here?"
"John dragged us only to abandon us most cruelly," Sherlock pouted.
Mycroft added, "And now I am left with the nearly impossible task of getting him to look on the bright side of this temporary situation."
"My condolences, Mr. Holmes," Miss Hooper answered Mycroft with a pretty, teasing little smirk on the edges of her mouth, eyes dancing a bit.
"Are you going to play here or what?" the man who was running the game suddenly spoke up, holding a trio of rings out to Mycroft.
"Ah…" Mycroft hesitated before he exchanged his money for the rings and stepped up to stand beside Miss Hooper. "Very well."
"You know you can't throw, Mycroft," Sherlock objected.
"Oh, be nice, you," Miss Hooper chided. "If not, then it's no problem. It's all in fun, and I didn't get a prize either, so what do you say to that?"
"You'd be wise to say nothing, brother," Mycroft muttered, narrowing his eyes on one particular bottle as he calculated how best to throw the ring in his hand.
Miss Hooper grinned at Mycroft and then Sherlock as she said, "You really ought to listen to your big brother more, you know."
Both of the Holmes men snorted at the very idea of Sherlock doing anything of the sort, and then Mycroft threw his ring. He didn't know what Sherlock thought he was talking about, because the ring landed on the exact bottle he wanted it to, and he looked over his shoulder at Sherlock with an I can't throw, huh? expression on his face.
Sherlock just huffed as Miss Hooper clapped for him. Mycroft grinned a little at her and then turned back to the game, calculating twice more, and achieving two more accurate throws.
"He can to throw," Miss Hooper told Sherlock teasingly, but a bit indignantly, if Mycroft didn't miss the hint of it in her tone.
Why on earth would she be indignant? Surely not in Mycroft's own defense…?!
"Alright, my friend," the man running the game spoke to Mycroft. "Pick your prize."
Mycroft glanced at the fish before declaring, "I'm surrounded by goldfish more than enough as is; I think I'd rather not." A thought struck him then and he turned to Miss Hooper offering, "But if you'd like one in my stead, feel free."
"Oh, I couldn't," she stammered a bit, blushing so sweetly that she had Mycroft nearly smiling. "Maybe Sherlock instead."
"No," Sherlock said thoughtfully, looking at Mycroft in such a way that the elder knew the younger had picked up on the vague attraction that was flitting through his mind and coming out in the smallest ways in how he was carrying himself in the moment. "You go ahead, Molly. Mycroft's treat. When he's in such a rare mood to be nice, it's best to let him have his way."
"Alright then," Molly said, eyeing the two a little warily.
As she stepped away from them and towards the selection of fish, turning her back to them, Sherlock smiled in amusement at his brother, and Mycroft openly glared in return, his gaze ordering, Don't you dare say a word.
"What do you think of this one?" Molly asked, returning to the duo with her new fish in hand.
"It's a very pretty goldfish," Sherlock told Molly, then glanced up at his brother, asking rather pointedly, a question cloaked in a question, "Isn't it, Mycroft?"
Mycroft released a friendly smile for Molly Hooper, answering without allowing Sherlock to further ruffle his feathers, "Indeed it is, very pretty."
Mycroft never dared say anything else on the matter, but he did think of that day at the carnival every once in awhile and even more often of that particular… very pretty… goldfish.
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