Hello all, and welcome!
For those of you who are new to this series, I would like to say that this story will eventually become a multi-fandom crossover, as the two crossovers before this have done. The series this is part of is called the Crossover Collection.
For those of you returning, welcome back!
And to everyone, I hope you enjoy.
This story takes place after the first story in this series, Only the Beginning, and after The Wedding of River Song for the Doctor, and after The Hounds of Baskerville for John and Sherlock.
I may change the title later. If you have any ideas, feel free to drop them in the reviews.
Also, NaNoWriMo went fabulously, and I won on my first year! Anyone else who participated, good on you! I hope you did well! :D
John Watson, when he arrived at 221B Baker Street, the flat he shared with one Sherlock Holmes, was not pleased.
"Again," he grumbled as he trudged into the flat lugging groceries. "Again, I am the one to do the shopping. You can do it next time." He jabbed an accusing finger in the direction of his flatmate, who was currently slouching in his usual chair and pouting faintly. "I don't care if you have a bloody terminal illness - next week you are picking it up." He put away the things he'd bought into their rightful places and then dropped angrily into his usual armchair.
"More troubles with the machinary, John?" Sherlock Holmes drawled, staring boredly at the ceiling.
John's upper lip curled with contempt. "Yes. Those things are unreliable as hell."
Sherlock might have smirked, further infuriating his only friend. "Of course."
John decided to give up on being angry, rubbing his face tiredly. "I have to be at the surgery in an hour, Sherlock. Do you think you can handle yourself?"
His flatmate eyed him with a hint of annoyance.
"Oh, fine," John sighed, and stood again.
"No, you're staying home tonight," Sherlock said, and John stopped in mid-step. "Lestrade said he might have a case for us soon."
"No," John argued incredulously. "I'm not giving up pay to wander around London at night with you Sherlock. My job is the only reason we've got enough money to keep this dump." He waved an arm at the mess that was their flat.
Sherlock mumbled something in the defense of the place, but it wasn't quite loud enough for John to hear. Louder, he said, "We've got enough money."
John rolled his eyes. "Not really." He turned and started for his room. He felt a little bad about calling their flat a dump, because he did in fact like it, but Sherlock kept it so messy that you could hardly see the floor most of the time; especially when he had a case. He didn't now, so John had no idea why the place was so messy, but who was he to predict the behaviors of Sherlock Holmes? Whatever was going on, be it the possible looming case or just simply laziness, John hoped it wouldn't last too long. As much as he had to admit their adventures were exciting, and he wouldn't die if the flat was a bit trashy, he could do with a bit of normality and cleanliness for the time being. He had to earn a living after all, and the ideal conditions for that were clean surroundings. Sherlock, unfortunately, didn't feel the same way, and actually seemed to do his best work when he didn't bother with anything else at all, and things were strewn all over the floor and the bookshelves and the furniture, say nothing about the state of himself.
When he'd donned his scrubs, John came back out into the main room to find Sherlock impatiently rifling through files in the same position he'd been in earlier, although he looked plenty more excited. "Yes," the man was saying, "we've got to go immediately. John, get your coat. We're headed off to a crime scene. Lestrade just called."
John sighed and held off his anger for a moment. "Sherlock, I've got work. I can't call in sick again, not now. Let me be for once."
"No," his flatmate said, and tossed him his coat before he could get in another protest. The consulting detective paused on John's scrubs for a moment. "And get into some regular clothes, would you?" John opened his mouth, but he waved it off with a, "Fine, never mind that. Come on." Then, while tying his scarf, the curly-haired man disappeared out the door.
"I hate him," John growled, but followed him into the street, cursing himself the entire time. He really couldn't resist excitement, could he? Even if it threatened his job. "I hate him, I hate him, I hate him."
Sherlock was waving down a taxi outside, while John dialed the surgery and, once again, called in sick. "Are you sure you haven't caught something, Dr. Watson?" the receptionist asked, with little real concern and more suspicion. "You've been sick an awful lot lately."
"I don't expect it's anything serious," John said. "I'll be fine tomorrow. See you then." He hung up as quickly as possible and tucked his phone away as they were climbing into the cab. "Where are we going?"
Sherlock briskly gave the address to the driver, and they sped off.
The scene of the crime was located in London, and in fact not terribly far away from their flat. It was a building of flats similar to their own, the only real notable difference being the police tape sealing the place off. As they exited the cab, John looked up at the flats and felt a little sympathetic towards those that lived there. Their lives would be in a scramble until Sherlock figured out the case. Shaking his head a little, he followed the consulting detective to the tape, where one DI Lestrade awaited them.
"Sherlock, John," he greeted. His face was lined with stress, and he could only manage a tired smile which almost instantly fell when his eyes locked onto Sherlock's. "Come inside," he beckoned, and led them in, leaving the police cars outside behind.
"So what happened, exactly?" John wondered as they started up the stairs. It was eerily familiar to his and Sherlock's first case together. Hopefully this one would be lacking murderous cabbie drivers and texting said murderous cabbie drivers, though.
Sherlock looked around intently as Lestrade told them the tale. "Mrs. Berkely next door heard a scream earlier tonight while she was in her sitting room. She came over immediately to find her neighbor, Whitney Kyle, dead on her bed, with blood coming out of her mouth." There was a grim look on the Detective Inspector's face as he opened the door for them.
They came out into a very mundane sitting room, which was cozy but lacking in much personalization. There were two boring armchairs around an electronic fire which was still blazing and warming the officers nearby it. An astounding lack of pictures decorated the wall, and the paint was beige.
"Well, she seems like a very interesting woman," John murmured, and thought he saw Sherlock smirk.
"Moved in recently," the man said, "but yes, John, you're right, she was very bland and nondescript." He abruptly started upstairs. "I think we'll find more clues where she was found, yes?" Lestrade followed them up, frowning in concentration.
Her bedroom was just as boring, with cream-colored walls and a completely white bed. Her bedside tables were bare besides an alarm clock on one and a lamp on each.
The woman herself was lying on the bed looking like she had been sitting up before she'd died. Her brown eyes were glazed and dead, as expected, and the outfit she wore reflected her boring tastes. A trickle of blood ran from her mouth. John walked over to examine her more thoroughly.
"Anything?" Lestrade asked after Sherlock had finished pacing the room and John had finished his examination.
"She doesn't have any wounds," John said. "There's nothing else it could be but some kind of internal injury. Have you looked at her medical records?"
"She was perfectly healthy as of her last appointment," Lestrade informed the two. "Sherlock, do you have anything interesting for us yet?" The poor man sounded exhausted, John noticed with sympathy. Maybe he'd invite the DI out for a pint after this ordeal was over. The man sure looked like he could use it.
Sherlock glanced around the room once more. "John is right," he began, "it was an internal injury that killed her." He swiftly checked the body over. "Yes." He then peered at the spot directly beside the bed. "The faint imprint of shoes," he declared, flattening himself to the floor to get a closer look. His coat spread over him like a sort of blanket as he did so. Every line of him screamed excitement. "You didn't notice this before? How stupid of you. Clearly expensive shoes, not new but well-kept. There was someone in the room with her before she died, but there are no footprints leading out of the room."
"Or into it," John said, knowing as soon as the words had come out of his mouth that it was a stupid thing to say.
"There were imprints of the same shoe on the welcome mat," Sherlock said dismissively. "You're all so dull. It's depressing. He couldn't have just appeared here." He jumped back to his feet and spun around the room. His eyes were alight as he again looked everything over. "The man she was speaking to couldn't have gotten out the window, someone would have noticed. And I doubt he'd want to ruin those expensive shoes of his, so. Where is he?"
Aggravation laced Lestrade's voice as he demanded, "How do you know he was speaking to her? I'm guessing you know it's a man because of the shoe, not questioning that, but what if he was the one who killed her? He could have given her something."
"No," Sherlock argued. "He fits into this somehow, but he's not her killer. Somehow I expect he was here to get rid of her, though. She worked for him." He hopped onto the bed, disregarding the corpse and ignoring John and Lestrade's simultaneous grimaces. Then he jumped down, almost sending Whitney's body tumbling to the floor to the rest of the room's horror, and pronounced, "Moriarty."
"What?" John gaped, baffled. "Why would you think he'd be-"
"Because John, look. Her entire flat is undecorated and nondescript. There's nothing notable about her or her living spaces. She's one of his agents."
"Wouldn't she try to blend in, though?" Lestrade asked. "This Moriarty is some criminal mastermind, right? You've told me some things about him before. But don't agents usually try to blend in? That would involve getting interests, even if they were fake ones."
Sherlock shook his head furiously. "You're all idiots! It doesn't necessarily. The idea is to blend, yes, but the easiest way to do that is to hardly exist at all. The people who lived near her knew she existed, the Berkely woman certainly did, if she had another job, her co-workers knew she existed. But did they know her? No. I'm sure she managed to put up enough of a front to convince them not to get too close to her."
"You think she was that clever?" John said.
"She was an agent of Moriarty's," Sherlock snapped, "she'd have to have been clever! But she messed up on something. She did something wrong on a job, or betrayed his trust, and so he came to get her, only to have her die in front of him."
There was a long pause, pregnant with racing thoughts and suspicions and worries. "Then how did he get out?" John said. "He's not still here, he can't be."
"No," Sherlock agreed, "he's not here. Somehow he's escaped." He indulged in a little laugh, slightly mad. "Mastermind indeed. But we'll find him."
"Right," Lestrade announced. "I'll inform my team. You two can go back to Baker Street now, if you want. We'll call you up if we find anything else. See if you can turn up anything yourself, Sherlock. But don't-"
"Yes, whatever," the consulting detective dismissed, waving the DI out the door. "John, we're going back to the flat."
John held back a sigh. "Why?"
"I need to do research." The man looked almost feral, the smile on his face a devious one.
"Fine, you do that, but I have to get to work. I can just say I was feeling better. God knows we need the money."
"Yes, I no longer require you. Come back quickly though, I might need to bounce some ideas off of you later on." Without a goodbye, the man sauntered out the door. John raced after him only to find him getting in a cab. Sherlock didn't even wave as it drove away.
Donovan watched the scene, with a slightly condescending look on her face. John almost expected her to say something cruel, but for once she kept silent.
John huffed, and hailed his own cab, ordering the cabbie to the surgery. Hopefully Sherlock wouldn't call in the middle of an operation.
Again.
Being dead was not easy, but the Doctor was managing surprisingly well.
To most, being dead would involve, well, death. Sitting in a coffin, or in the form of a pile of ashes, not breathing or moving or seeing or being aware. But for the Doctor - who wasn't actually dead, obviously - it was more like tip-toeing around people you'd seen before you'd died, or pretending to be earlier on in your timeline for their sake.
He was just pretending to be dead, because he was supposed to be. For a while, at least.
The things he missed most about being so-called alive, though, were these: 1. the Ponds, and 2. the freedom to move around without lying. Well, lying more than usual, at any rate.
The last of these he was missing the most, though, currently, as he prowled through the dark of night in London. Earth, of course, in the 21st century. Where else would he end up but there. Of course.
His last incident in this time period had been not extremely long ago. However, it had been in America. In New York City, to be exact, with Cybermen, a man called West, and the superhero team known as the Avengers.
And in another universe entirely.
It had been a series of strange and worrying events that had led him to this new universe. First, his death, which he'd been expecting, but that didn't make it any easier. Second, the adventure he'd gone on on the planet of Ruzi Major, where he'd gotten an odd prophecy, fortunately one that was different than the prophecy leading to the end of his tenth life. One that read - The gathering will mean war. The third event was when he'd been pondering these two earlier events in the library, when suddenly the ship had shuddered violently, and he'd stumbled to the TARDIS console room, which was where he'd found himself doing the actual plummeting into another universe. Again.
And so here he was, trudging on. Something or another had brought him here, and he needed to figure out what it was, and if it had anything to do with the strange prophecy.
The gathering will mean war, he mused. If only he could figure out what that meant.
He was still considering it when a man slammed into him, almost knocking him off of his feet. He reeled back and blinked at the curly-haired figure dressed in dark clothing and a striped blue scarf standing in front of him and looking miffed.
"Sorry," the Doctor instantly said. "I wasn't paying much attention, I'm afraid." He waved his hand in dismissal, trying not to be too unsettled by the man's bright blue eyes, which were flitting over him in a calculating way that he thought he didn't like. To ease the tension, he stuck out a friendly hand and said, "I'm the Doctor, by the way. And you?"
The man met his eyes at last, and the Doctor absorbed the cruel intelligence present in his gaze with awe. Humans never ceased to amaze him. "Sherlock Holmes."
"What a name," the Doctor remarked, steadying himself a bit further and lowering his hand when the man gave no sign of taking it. "Marvelous."
"Of course," the man called Sherlock said, sounding as if his patience was being strained. "Excuse me," he continued curtly, and nearly shoved past the Doctor, his brow furrowed in thought.
He didn't turn back, and the Doctor moved on.
So that's that. Remember, reviews = gold. Free gold that can be given at no cost to you. In fact, it might even improve the story, which will be good for you if you intend to read it.
Please tell me what you think, anyway, and what you think could be better or different. I like opinions! Opinions are good. :)
The next chapter will be posted soon, hopefully. I'm thinking perhaps Wednesday.
And if anyone wants more information on the Crossover Collection, see my profile or PM me. Also, check out the two stories preceeding this one; Only the Beginning, a Doctor Who/Avengers crossover, and Not Another Apocalypse, a Percy Jackson/Kane Chronicles crossover, if you like. :)
Thank you, and review, review, review!