Disclaimer: I do not own Sherlock. The original Sherlock Holmes belongs to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and the interpretation borrowed here belongs to the talented (if somewhat cruel) writers at the British Broadcasting Corporation.
Summary: His thumb is poised over the send button, the text already written, before he realises there's no one left to send it to. Post TRF.
Author's Note: My first foray into this fandom, more out of fear of not being able to do the characters justice than anything else. Apologies in advance for any liberties taken lol.
Bloody British weather, it can't even rain properly anymore. The air filled with that God-awful drizzle that sticks to your skin and has your clothes soaked before you've even fully registered that the heavens have opened. He looks up and can see, between the gaps in the buildings, clouds of a half-hearted grey looming overhead. Weighing down so heavily it looks like the roofs are grazing the sky. His fingers are almost numb in his pockets. Bitten by the bitter winds that race and coil down the alley, bouncing off the walls and folding back, spiralling crisp packets and leaves dance across the puddle-ridden concrete. He's given up any hope at all that they're going to manage to preserve all the evidence before either the rain or the wind washes it away. They'll be lucky to find anything at all at this rate.
Anderson is crouching by a wheelie-bin, frowning. His lips pinched tightly together as he pushes his hair out of his eyes with the back of one hand, blinking fiercely before heaving himself to his feet with a wince.
Lestrade tilts his head back a little in silent inquiry – there's no point trying to shout over this wind – but Anderson only shakes his head in response. He hasn't managed to find anything.
The Detective Inspector's gaze travels back to the mouth of the alleyway. The body now safely ensconced in the back of the ambulance, ready to be transported to Bart's for the autopsy. It looked like a dump job but between the weather conditions and the bumbling teenagers that had found the man the chances of finding any uncontaminated evidence here was slim. He shifts uncomfortably: his shirt is sticking to his back with a mixture of sweat and rainwater as droplets sneaked down the back of his collar. There's a twinge in his lower back when he twists, minutely, in the wrong direction. Shouldn't have slept on the sofa last night, he muses, should have just apologised and been done with it. No good regretting that now though. He sighs. Then turns his collar up and, scrubbing a tense hand down his face he walks towards the tape cordoning off the scene to the public.
"Call me when you find something," he says to Donovan, not stopping to let her protest her reply as he strolls towards his car, fumbling in his pocket for the keys as he went. One of the perks of being in charge, he supposes, is that you can leave early.
When he gets in the car he shuts the door with a satisfying slam, then peels of his coat, dropping it in to the passenger seat before flicking the radiator on. He turns it down before he's turned the ignition though. He's not cold, save for his fingers, just wet. The last thing he wants is to have to spend all day in damp clothes. His only other choice, of course, being to go home and get changed because this is his spare set, but if there is one thing he knows for certain, walking back into another argument is not on his agenda. Not today. He's had enough bitter disputes, accusing – hurt – looks to last him a last time in the last few weeks. Greg Lestrade is not a weak man, a Detective Inspector with New Scotland Yard no less, but there's only so much passive-aggression he can take; from any angle.
By the time he makes it back to the Yard he's actually managed to – almost – dry off. The cuffs of his shirt and trousers are still damp, the leather of his shoes creaking as he passes the front desk and his shirt collar is rubbing, uncomfortably, against his throat. He flicks the top buttons undone and tugs off his tie before he reaches his office, throwing it carelessly onto the radiator before reaching for the coffee pot.
Three dead bodies in three days, all half naked, all dumped somewhere other than the primary crime scene, each one different, yet somehow, bizarrely, each one was exactly the same. High levels of ketamine had been in each victim's bloodstream, far more than was necessary to kill a healthy grown man, according to the lab reports. However, for some reason known only to the killer, they had each been posed as suicides. The first an Asian youth, hanging from the shower rail in a Travelodge, the second a white man in his sixties, found with his wrists slashed in his bathtub, the third - well they don't know for sure this one is related yet. There hasn't been an autopsy. Hopefully they'll have the report on that one by morning. No trace evidence, no finger prints, fibres, or hair, nothing, each body perfectly, immaculately, cleaned. There had certainly been nothing he, Anderson, nor CSU had been able to glean from the scenes so far.
'World's-Best-Dad' coffee mug in hand, Lestrade takes the seat behind his desk, sighing with frustration as he places the mug on the NSY coaster by the pencil pot. He props his elbows up on his desk, fingers splay through his damp hair, ruffling it even further, when he tips his head into his palms. It's been a long week; a really long bloody week. Pausing with hands over his mouth for a moment he listens to the muffled sound his breathing makes as it moves passed his lips and meets his palms, warming the still chilled flesh there for a moment before he lets his hands drop away.
He reaches for the phone in his pocket without thinking about it, taps out 'Got a case for you' with one hand as he reaches for his coffee with the other. Then he pauses. The mug is half way to his lips, steam curling in front of his eyes as he stares down at the tiny screen. His thumb poised over the send button, the innocuous little text causing a tremor strong enough to force him to put the mug back down before he spills the coffee into his lap.
His heart is hammering in his chest, not quite racing but close to it. An insistent thud against his ribs to match the pulsing throbbing in his throat as he realises that he's listed Sherlock Holmes as the recipient without even thinking about it. He can't quite figure out whether to feel angry or guilty or both. Both probably, but nothing really fits the burning compulsion he has to throw the phone against the wall. Instead, he settles for taking a measured breath and placing it, methodically, in the middle of his desk and pushing his chair back. Since when had consulting Sherlock on cases been such a second nature he did it without even thinking about it?
He was a good officer, and a damn fine Detective if he did say so himself. He'd managed for years before Sherlock Holmes had shown up. Pestering the sergeants at the cordon until they'd called Lestrade over to deal with the 'psychotic white male' who had managed to reduce the poor PC who'd had the misfortune to greet the self-proclaimed consulting detective, to tears by informing him his fiancé was, naturally, cheating on him with his brother.
Whatever possessed Lestrade to let the madman then view the crime scene he did not know. Perhaps it was because they were all stumped. Maybe it was because he was a newly qualified DI, desperate to make an impact on his superiors. More likely it was because if any more of his officers had their dirty little secrets revealed at that volume he might just have started to tear his own hair out.
Yes, the madman (whom they later found out was called 'Sherlock Holmes', whoever the fuck that was) had located several key pieces of evidence that CSU had missed, deduced that the victim was actually transgender, and determined that she had been murdered by her lover's sister within four minutes of entering the room. But that didn't mean anything. It didn't mean that Lestrade wasn't fully capable of doing his job.
Of course that was all null and void now wasn't it?
Lestrade had been startled by how easy it had been to believe. How well a self-proclaimed sociopath could charm his way into any crime scene, piss people off so badly, wind them up, have Anderson suspended for misconduct after swinging a punch at the detective (which if Lestrade was wholly honest, Sherlock sort of deserved). How someone who had absolutely zero people skills could fool thousands of people. Half of bloody Britain had been sucked in by the man.
What had surprised him more was that he wasn't surprised when Anderson and Donovan had figured it all out. When the ruse had been revealed it didn't hit him as hard as he would have predicted. He hadn't felt entirely stunned, hadn't felt the need to fall apart in hysterical laughter. No, it had settled in his stomach like a lead weight, as if it had always been there, loitering somewhere in his subconscious, that this was too good to be true. Nobody could be that clever.
No matter how hard he tried though, Lestrade couldn't quite figure out how he'd managed it. Surely Sherlock couldn't have committed every crime he'd solved for the Yard? Couldn't have conspired for months with poor Richard Brook to create the infamous foe Jim Moriarty? That would take a level of genius that he wasn't willing to admit existed. If he could be played that easily, then what was the point in any of this? If there were masterminds out there who could instigate something that disturbing purely for their own entertainment, how was he supposed to bring that down?
Sherlock had always enjoyed an audience. That much was painfully obvious, for all his sniping, shut-ups and acerbic quips; he just wanted his audience to be a silent one. One that would listen in abject awe as he deduced and flounced about in that ridiculously ostentatious coat, demanding attention, screaming look-at-me-look-at-me-look-at-me with every word, every lie, that came out of his mouth. Wanted people to be so struck with awe that they could do nothing but stare in amazement as he insulted – deduced – them. Sherlock Holmes' ego had been his downfall. Anyone could have predicted that. Certainly didn't take a genius to figure it. Sherlock had needed a bigger audience, to make a bigger bang, to splash across the front pages with something bigger and better than The Reichenbach Hero. He'd need a nemesis to become a legend.
Lestrade hadn't seen the body. Molly had assured them that it was Sherlock and to be quite frank, no matter how big a fraud Sherlock Holmes had been, Lestrade had no desire to see him lying, broken, on a gurney in the morgue if he didn't need to. He hadn't been to the funeral either. Perhaps that was why he'd written the message. Not that he needed to go to a funeral to believe somebody was dead, it was just - it was about closure. Even if Sherlock had been a fraud, there had to have been moments of honesty in there somewhere right? The whole thing couldn't possibly have all been a charade. Lestrade had tried to go, conflicted as he was, he had tried to do the right thing. To honour a colleague he'd apparently never really had. He just hadn't been allowed. John and Mrs. Hudson had seen to that.
Taking a slow breath, gaze fixed on the desk, Lestrade leans forward again, picks the phone up, gingerly, and presses the menu button.
Options, it says, and he focuses solely on moving his suddenly stiff fingers in the right order over the miniscule buttons. He refuses to contemplate the ramifications of what he's doing. Of what it really means. Only hesitates for a second before confirming:
Cancel Message.
Author's Notes: Not really sure what this is lol, but do please leave some feedback (try to be nice!)