Okay, hi guys! This is my first time writing a Sherlock fanfic, so please go easy on me. This idea has been floating around for a while, and after planning it with a friend, I finally decided to actually upload it onto here. I hope you like it, and please follow/fave/review - each one means a lot to me, and knowing that people want to read my writing always makes me work faster!
The sound of a violin bow being dragged harshly across its strings was what woke John the morning following his and Sherlock's return from Dartmoor. Rubbing one hand across his face blearily, John used the other to half-prop himself up against the headboard, taking a moment to let his mind catch up with his actions. It was early. So early that Sherlock's most recent case was little more than a blur; a collage of darkness, fog and a hound with red eyes. And gunshots. Lots of gunshots.
He couldn't even remember climbing into bed – or getting undressed, for that matter - after the long drive back to London.
On the floor below, the violin's strings screamed out in protest as someone – Sherlock, definitely Sherlock – worried at them with his bow like a dog worrying at a bone. "Sherlock!" John yelled, struggling to keep his voice audible over the gradual crescendo of noise, "Sherlock, shut that up! It's-" He spared a glance for the small clock on his nightstand, "-Christ, it's four in the morning!"
The violin's strings gave one more clashing screech before the sound cut off abruptly. John lay back with a groan, pressing his hands against his face. Four, three, two, one…
He registered the creak of Sherlock's feet taking the stairs up to his room two - no three - at a time, and pushed away any thoughts of a few more hours sleep with a slight sense of regret. No rest for the wicked, wasn't that how it went? Well, that was how it went on 221b Baker Street, anyhow. Especially when Sherlock was bored.
With a dramatic flourish, Sherlock sent the door flying open as he waltzed into the bedroom, narrowly avoiding being clipped on the backside as the door connected with the wall and rebounded into its frame with a resounding crash. John winced. Mrs Hudson was not going to be happy with all the racket at that ungodly hour.
"You're awake." Sherlock brandished the bow at John like a fencing foil, who rolled his eyes and pushed it aside.
"Not up to your usual standards in the art of deduction, Sherlock. But I'm glad you took the time to make sure I was, in fact, awake before storming into my room."
Sherlock pursed his lips and tilted his head to one side, "It wasn't difficult to work out when you would be waking up. With the amount you drank yesterday, coupled with the fact you didn't go to the toilet before you went to sleep, made it quite clear-"
"All right, thank you. Let's leave it there." John eyed Sherlock as he sat up fully, pulling a couple of pillows from under him to shove between his back and the headboard. "Now, is there any particular reason you have woken me – and the rest of the street – at this time, or were you just… bored?"
His friend/colleague/patient/assumed significant other looked up from where he was examining a picture on John's windowsill. It was an old photo; a shot of John in uniform the day before he left for Afghanistan. A faint smile tugged the corner of John's lips as he remembered, but he quickly banished the thought. The past is for forgetting, not for dwelling.
"I need a case."
John raised his eyebrows and his hands in a synchronised motion of puzzlement, "And you want me to… what? Create one for you?" He set his head back against the pillows with a muffled thump. As much as he'd enjoy shooting a couple of people – Anderson -, he'd need more than Sherlock's "post-problem boredom" as an incentive. "Ring Lestrade later. Maybe he'll have something interesting for you to look at."
"No," Sherlock shook his head impatiently and turned away, "I mean I don't have a case. A suitcase. I need one for an experiment I'm doing. You have one, don't you? I remember it from when you first moved in. I need it."
John closed his eyes slowly as Sherlock strode from the room. It was going to be a long day. That much he could see already.
Half an hour later, John headed for the stairs, freshly washed and clothed. In one hand he lugged the suitcase Sherlock had demanded. It was covered in blue check, and, to be frank, he hated it. Any use Sherlock had for it would be welcome. It had been a gift from Harry when he'd first returned to England – she'd insisted it was for him to use if he ever needed to stay at her's, but John suspected it was more like a subtle hint for him to go on a long holiday abroad. It wasn't a secret that she'd felt inferior, unaccomplished and embarrassed around him. John being back in the country – injured – had been no doubt enough to trigger her back into a drunken stupor. Not that she'd got sober while he was in the war. But he would have better any money that she'd managed to curb her habits somewhat while he'd been away.
"John," Sherlock's voice came from the kitchen, and a second later he emerged into the sitting room, closely followed by Lestrade. "John, Lestrade has brought me a case!"
The detective inspector and John exchanged smiles and nods in way of greeting, before he turned to Sherlock and held up the suitcase, "I thought you wanted this?"
"Why would I want a suitcase? There's a crime to solve!" Sherlock whirled past a motionless John to tear his long coat from a hook on the front door.
John pressed his lips into a bloodless line and counted to ten in his head – a technique he was finding increasingly useful since moving into 221B - before replying. "So was there any reason for waking me up at four in the morning?"
The consulting detective gave John a quick smile as he tore the front door open, "Not anymore!" were his parting words as he barrelled down the stairs. "Come along, Lestrade! And you too, John, now that you're dressed. Why would you want to sleep through a murder investigation?"
A muscle twitched in John's cheek, and he glared over at Lestrade, who looked just as tired as he felt. "It must be an important case, if you're here so early."
"Yeah, well, it's certainly unique. Come to think of it, someone with your level of expertise would be helpful, if you wanted to come down and check out the bodies?"
Bodies. More than one, then.
For a moment, John wondered whether to decline. It had been a stressful few days, after all. And he wasn't completely sure the drugs he'd been exposed to had worn off yet, despite Sherlock's reassurances.
On the other hand…
"Of course I would. Let me just grab a jacket."
Sherlock was already standing with his hands in his pockets, gazing at the horrific scene spread in front of him when John and Lestrade arrived at the scene. He inclined his head slightly as John joined him and spoke softly, without turning his head, "What do you think?"
Jesus, was John Watson's initial thought. Jesus Christ.
It was the pool again. The same pool where John had been taken to, and forced to wait in the company of Jim Moriarty, a bomb strapped to his chest, until Sherlock had arrived and the 'real' game had begun. He'd thought he had seen the last of this place. Hoped he had, anyway. Apparently not.
But this time, the swimming pool had an added feature. Rearing out of the centre of the water, like the broken mast of a long-sunk pirate ship, was a gallows.
The long, single beam stretched out over the water, looming, and the lights from the bottom of the pool picked out and highlighted the four still forms hanging from them. Two on each side. The ropes around their necks were long enough that the bodies hung close to the water, the tips of their shoes just able to brush the surface. They were all male and all tall. Very tall.
The silence in the pool was deafening, the police officers taking photos and checking for evidence without a sound, a breath. Even the water was silent, without the usual whispering as it circulated around the pool. It was eerie.
Sherlock repeated his question softly, and John tore his eyes from the awful scene to answer. "I don't know. I don't know what I think."
"I think," Sherlock rocked forwards on his heels, clasping his hands loosely behind his back, "that this is a message."
"A message? What- Sherlock!" But the consulting detective was already gone, ordering for the bodies to be taken down so that a closer examination could be undertaken. Leaving the officers to figure out how exactly they were going to retrieve the corpses without plunging them into the water, Sherlock made his way over to Lestrade, John trailing along behind him.
"How did you find out about the bodies? The swimming pool doesn't open until eight, and even the cleaners won't be in until seven."
"An anonymous tip," Lestrade pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head, "We've already gone down that route. Nothing. It was obviously made on a disposable phone. They told us there'd been some "activity" down here, and that was it."
"What about the voice? Anything distinguishing about it? An accent, maybe?"
John flicked his eyes in Sherlock's direction at this, a look which was studiously ignored by the latter.
"No. If they used a disposable phone, chances are they used some kind of filter on their voice as well. Whoever they are, they don't want to be found. Not by the police, at least." The last sentence was directed at Sherlock, Lestrade having noticed the look on the detective's face.
At this, Sherlock's eyes did meet his companion's, and he smiled grimly.
John cleared his throat, "We'll have to hope there's something on the bodies, then."
After a brief period of careful manoeuvring and coordinated shifting, the police on hand managed to topple the gallows so that the bodies hanging from it could lie on the side of the pool and be cut loose for inspection.
Donning a protective suit and gloves, John followed Sherlock to the row of bodies, trying to hold back the rising sense of worry which was slowly unfurling in his chest like a blooming flower. Something was off. He just didn't know what. Yet.
Anderson looked up at the two of them when they arrived, curling up his lip at Sherlock's lack of protective clothing. "You're going to contaminate them." He hissed, leaning over the closest body in an almost protective manner, "Can't you wait- Can't he wait?" The forensic scientist moved his gaze to Lestrade, who shook his head, once.
"This is ridiculous." Anderson stood up abruptly and stormed away, pushing his way past John with a grunt of anger. "He has no right to be here."
"Well he is here. The faster you accept that and move on, the faster we can find the one who did this to these people." John indicated the bodies with a jerk of his thumb. Beside him, Sherlock made a quiet, smug sound and crossed his arms over his chest.
Anderson inflated like an angry cat, his eyes flashing angrily. "You're just as useless. Well, more. At least he occasionally gets something right. What are you here for? The only thing you can help with is holding his coat." He turned his back on them all, leaving a tight-lipped John, a still-smug Sherlock and a furious Lestrade in his wake.
It was John who broke the silence that followed. "What the hell is wrong with him?" He finally asked, looking at the detective inspector with both eyebrows raised, "I know he's usually bad, but that was a lot worse than usual."
"God, yes, I'm sorry. I'll go speak to him." Lestrade leaned closer and spoke the rest in a conspirator's whisper, "Pretty sure something happened with Sergeant Donovan. They were an item, but…"
"That's no excuse, Lestrade," Sherlock tore his gaze from the bodies to shoot the other man a sharp look, "You should go and deal with it now."
His dismissal was evident. Lestrade rolled his eyes, nodded again at John, and headed in the direction Anderson had taken. The rest of the officers flocked behind him like chicks after a hen, and John was amused to see Sally waiting by the door, looking increasingly mortified.
"I estimate that we have around two minutes before Lestrade realises we're in here alone and sends someone to keep an eye on us. We're going to have to make this quick."
John glanced over his shoulder, and sure enough, the pool was empty save for them. He moved to squat beside the closest body as Sherlock stepped around them, his square magnifying glass in one hand. The ex-army doctor cleared his throat. "You know, before, you said something about a message?"
The consulting detective stopped what he was doing to look up at him, "Yes."
"What did you mean? How could you-"
Sherlock stood up abruptly and moved to stand at the head of the first body, "I'll show you."
His companion's brow crinkled in confusion as Sherlock leant over the dead man and ripped open the shirt with a swift pull. But as he straightened up, looking triumphant, John caught his first glimpse of the man's chest and felt his breath leave him in a whoosh of horror.
"Oh my- Jesus, Sherlock, how did you-? Jesus!" He staggered to his feet as Sherlock moved to the next body, and stood gazing down at the mutilated skin on the man's pale chest. Thankfully it had been cleaned on blood before being strung up on the gallows, but the effect was still horrifying.
A knife had been used to slice at the skin on the dead man's chest in jagged lines, and the bright pink of his exposed flesh contrasted starkly with the paper-white of his skin. "It-It's a letter…" John murmured, pressing a hand against his mouth. He'd seen a lot as an army doctor, but even this was pushing right up against his boundaries.
"Well done John," Sherlock replied in a voice that John found far too calm, given the situation. "And so are these three."
"They've all had this done to them?" John blew out a breath and raised his eyes to the ceiling, "How did you know?"
"My knife went missing." Sherlock moved closer to John, pressing something into his hand. John looked down, his mouth tight. Sherlock's multi tool knife sat on his palm, one blade stained a rusted-red colour. "Well, I say missing. I mean stolen. Someone took this knife and left another in its place." He produced a second knife from his coat pocket.
"They are identical in most aspects so that anyone but me – such as you – would not notice anything different. But there are various scratches that are missing from the replacement, and so I knew that my knife had been deliberately taken. At first I wondered if someone was going to try and frame me for a crime, as obviously my prints would be all over my knife. But who could get into our flat without leaving any other sign?" Sherlock fixed John with a hard gaze, "I think you know the one person who we are familiar with and fits into that category."
"Jesus…" John clenched his fist around the knife and drew in a deep breath.
"Oh, no, John!" Came the voice of the only person who fitted into that category, "Just me!"
Alright, I'm sure everyone can guess who that is.