Sherlock looked around the mortuary with surprising composition. Most humans would scream, or at least feel fear, walking in on such a sight. Bodies laid scattered on the floor, torn to unrecognizable shreds. There was a lot of blood in the room, but it couldn't be from the shredded deceased. Something living had been attacked in that room. A man in a brown trench coat and rectangle rimmed glasses stood in the mortuary, spattered with blood. He held an odd electronic stick in his hand that was lit blue on one end. The man was out of breath, and judging by the stains of his coat, he was responsible for the blood everywhere. Sherlock expected the stranger to run, but to his surprise, the man just panted and looked at him.
"Well, look at you! You're plenty late, don't you think? I could have used a hand with all this!"
An attacker and possible murderer who doesn't run when he's caught? Sherlock eyed the man quizzically. He sees his actions as justified. It could have been self defense, Sherlock hypothesized, but the blood spatter is all wrong. And he didn't mutilate the corpses. The bodies are ravaged and torn at. No human could do that with their hands, and the wounds are too rough to be caused by modern cutting tools.
"Late, indeed. It seems I've missed quite the party."
The man laughed merrily. "Worst party I've ever been to. And I've seen some go up in flames!" He adopted a pensive expression with a sigh and mumbled, "Quite literally…."
If this man had been attacked, he would be in shock right now. Unless, of course, he's acclimated to dangerous situations. A guilty man would run. An assaulted man would be relieved and seek sanctuary. Upon my arrival, however, this man only seems tired.
"What happened here?" the detective's baritone echoed off the walls and filled the eerily silent room.
"Ah... well, it's all rather complicated." The man scratched his head with the glowing blue stick. "It's quite a long story, you see. Wouldn't want to bore you with it," he dismissed the question with a wave of his hand.
Sherlock had no patience for this man's nonchalance. Something very interesting was indeed going on, and even under boring circumstances, this strange man's behavior would be interesting enough.
"If you won't tell me, then I'll get started, and you fill in the rest," Sherlock began. "Something wild came in here, something very large, something vicious, something with large teeth and claws. This large something was not tamed or domesticated in any way, a wild animal," Sherlock pulled out his phone and continued speaking. "Not a whole lot of large wildlife in London—the traffic doesn't seem to get along with them—it causes quite a nasty bit of chaos. That means it could only be a non-indigenous animal, a alien predator in our city, so to speak. There is hardly wildlife in the city that would want to feast on dead flesh. That is very odd indeed. Most wild animals want fresh meat, so that significantly narrows the possible culprits.
"Let's see," he continued hastily, losing his patience. He read from his phone. "'Primary necrophagous or 'scavenger' animals are vultures, raccoons, hyenas, bears, and jackals.' It's safe to rule out vultures and raccoons because there are no traces of avian presence and a raccoon could hardly cause this much damage. Hyenas, bears, or jackals? Couldn't be a bear. Bears are far too conspicuous. Jackals are rather small, so I doubt they could be responsible either. No nearby zoos have lost hyenas. So it was brought here illegally, probably for game. The government keeps tabs on that sort of thing, so the captors would have to keep a low profile.
"So," Sherlock continued with a deep breath, "it escaped from its captors, hungry, and snuck around until it found the mortuary." God only knows how it got in, Molly probably left the door open. "That's when you came in, found it tearing at the dead bodies, and were forced to kill it." The detective pocketed his phone with smug confidence. "And now the only thing I still need to know: Who are you, and what are you doing here?"
After a moment of staring at Sherlock, with mouth open and eyebrows raised, the man laughed lightly. "Well done! Shockingly close, detective. A bit spotty on the details, but, overall, a pretty good analysis! You know, it is really great to meet you for the first time," he beamed and shook Sherlock's hand. "I'm The Doctor!" he announced proudly.
"A doctor?" How could he know I'm a detective? Sherlock eyed him suspiciously. "I've never seen you round Saint Bart's before."
"Ah, you see, that's because I'm a traveling doctor. You know, traveling around the globe… and… stuff…."
"And what are you doing here?" Sherlock's eyes narrowed.
"Right now? Oh, not much! I ought to do some cleaning up, though. I've made an awful mess. It'll take me a while to tidy everything back to normal, so I'd best be starting now. Come back in, say… an hour or two?" The Doctor asked opening the door for Sherlock.
"What's that?" Sherlock asked, ignoring his cue to leave.
"This?" asked The Doctor, holding up his sonic screwdriver. "It's a… flashlight. I made it myself. It's not very good, though. Not bright enough and it makes this horrendous sound every time I try to use it. Honestly, it drives me nutters! Strangest thing. I should made a better one. Perhaps you should be leaving, now?" he motioned toward the door suggestively. Sherlock paid no mind and began inspecting the bodies.
"No one wants to make a blue flashlight," he said in a wry tone.
"Sorry-?"
"No one deliberately makes a blue flashlight," Sherlock interrupted, examining a dead body's lacerations. "White light is the combination of all colors, so it allows all colors to be seen. If you used a blue light, yellow would look like green, red would look like purple, et cetera. It wouldn't be useful. If you're smart enough to create a flashlight, you wouldn't be so dense as to make it blue. It's not a flashlight, so what is it?"
The Doctor looked around the room, trying to come up with some clever response. After a few moments, he took a deep breath an said resignedly, "It's my sonic screwdriver."
The detective paused. "Sonic screwdriver," he said, testing the words out. "A device that uses sound waves as a tool? Very interesting. A tool for what?"
"Oh, just about anything! It can hack into electronics, databases, computer networks…. It's good for locking and unlocking doors, fixing things…. I once used it to put some cabinets up…. It's very versatile!" he said fondly, admiring it in his hands.
"And you made it?" If he's a doctor, he's certainly not a medical doctor.
"I sure did! There are gobs of sonic devices out there, but this is the only sonic screwdriver. I invented it!"
He's awfully proud of it. A gadget like that would sell high at retail price. He's not interested in that, though. "No patent?"
"No… it wouldn't make much sense to do that. Everyone would have access to it, then! A sonic screwdriver in households around the world? Doesn't sound like much fun. I like it to be special. And then there would of course be the dilemma of when to patent it. Release it too soon, and the course of technological history would be changed forever. Release it too late… well, then it just wouldn't rake in much profit anyway." He shrugged.
Such unusual wording. 'The course of technological history would be changed forever.' An invention has no effect on history. It only changes the future. He acts as if he knows of some predetermined future that would be thrown off by his technology. But if his technology is too advanced for present day publication….
"You're not a doctor. What are you?" Sherlock asked him. "What are you for real?"
I just love the clever ones, The Doctor thought to himself. Sherlock Holmes is nothing like other humans. This is going to be so very interesting. "I'm a Timelord!" he announced lightly. Oh yes, this would prove to be very interesting indeed.