Hey! :) This is my second Sherlock fanfiction and this time I'll try writing an actual crime story. It's inspired by "The empty house" and "The man with the twisted lip" by Arthur Conan Doyle.

I hope you find it interesting! In later chapters there's gonna be some Johnlock stuff, too, but no slash.

Please excuse occasional mistakes, I'm not a native speaker.

As usual, I own none of the characters.

Chapter 1

The missing porcelain

The message was a relief. At least for John.

Could you meet me at the Yard in about half an hour? There's a new case for you.

It's about the robbery at the house of the Hallings family. GL

After weeks of boredom, fed by an extraordinary peaceful and murderless November in London, finally there was something to stop Sherlock's endless crave for anything to do, which he tried to drive away by doing absolutely stupid things to pass the time. Which by and by drove John mad.

Therefore he could not suppress an exaggerated cry of joy, when Sherlock read the message out to him, while they were both sitting in front of the fire in their room at Baker Street.

„Yeah! Finally there it is! Let's take a cab at once!"

Sherlock studied the message contemplatively.

„No", he murmured then.

John gazed at him in disbelief: „'No?' What? You're not going to take the case."

Sherlock rolled his eyes: „Seriously, John. What is there to misunderstand about the word 'No!'?"

John leant forward and focused Sherlock sternly.

„'No!' is not an option for you, Sherlock. Your eternal boredom is totally bugging me! You get to the Yard within the next 30 minutes, or I'm going to tell the whole London Police department to come here!"

This one did work. Sherlock gave him the most killing glance he was able to give, but at least he arose from his chair and walked over to the coat rack.

„So what is it about this case you don't like?", John asked him.

„It's solution is totally obvious, John, that's what I don't like." Sherlock said when he came back into the room, already wearing his long deep-black coat.

„A family inherits a big fortune in form of Japanese porcelain, but by will they are unauthorized to sell it. Now they allege that it had been stolen, so that they can get money from the insurance, which has been effected by the former owner in case of robbery. This is not very clever and at any rate not worth wasting my time."

„You've been wasting your time for almost 3 weeks now, what harm could some more days do? Anyway, is there any evidence for your suspicion?", John asked.

„Well not yet, but criminals always make mistakes."

„So it's your job to find those. Come on, Sherlock, do it for me. For my stressed nerves. I'm getting bored, too."

„But it's not even been a murder yet!", Sherlock complained.

John sighed. This was so typical. Sherlock was sitting here waiting for weeks, craving for any case at all and now, when there was one for him to solve, it wasn't interesting enough. That man really was unbearable sometimes.

„Does there always have to be a murder first to attract your attention? You really are kinda cold-hearted sometimes."

„I've been told so.", Sherlock replied. „But in my job it's more helpful to be unemotional, emotions make you blind."

„Well, I'd say the make you see", said John. „See behind the facade of a person."

Sherlock shook his head. „You see nothing, John. That's why I'm the detective. You just think you understand, but I observe and make my deductions. And you must admit I most seldomly fail. I'm doing perfectly fine without emotions."

This hurt a bit, but John immediately shook off the anger. This was one of Sherlock's uncomfortable features, but he had learned to live with it.

Sherlock stood in the doorway waiting.

„Will you accompany me now or not?", he asked, still a bit testy.

John jumped up at once. „Sure, let's go."

The office at the Yard was crowded as usual. People running around with their mobile phone in one and a pile of files in the other hand, trying to get the permanently raising flood of Londons daily crime issues under control.

Police work in this city really was a back-breaking job and John was happy that he and Sherlock were able to choose which cases to take, so they could pick only the ones that were interesting to them.

They found Lestrade in his office, looking totally exhausted. Paper stacking up on the desk in front of him next to 3 empty cups that probably had contained strong coffee once. It obviously had been a long night.

His mood lit up a bit when he recognised the detective entering his office.

„Ah, there you are. Oh, hello John! I'm really glad you came. As you can see I'm not lacking work at the moment. All these weeks almost without anything happening and now the whole city seems to have gone crazy within days. I assume it's the weather. People get bored, so they commit crimes. It's really a..."

„Well, ok, fine. Thank you for that load of interesting information about the case.", Sherlock interrupted him impatiently sarcastic. „Is there anything more to come?"

Lestrade opened his mouth indignantly, but then he only said: „Anyway, you probably read about the case in the papers. It's about the Hallings family, the grandfather of the family bequested his porcelain collection to his daughter and her husband, they..."

„Yes I did read about it in the papers. Please continue with something interesting now!"

„Alright then.", Lestrade said jaded. „Some new information: Some of the stolen vases have been found this morning in the attic of an abandoned house near Hide Park. We assume this house might be the place where the thieves store their prey and for the information about the find has not left our offices yet, we are led to believe that they will return to the place soon and you are supposed to catch them in the act."

„This is all I wanted to know", Sherlock said with a tiny smile, then he frowned. „So you expect me to wait there for the thieves?"

„Actually yes", Lestrade answered.

„But it may take days for them to come back. Or maybe they did hear about the find, because your people are as unreliable as usual, and they are miles away by now. By the way, who did actually find the vases?"

„A homeless man, who looked for a place to sleep. He was stopped by a passing officer when he tried to throw them out of the window. He said the ornaments would 'scare him out of his guts' and affirmed that the vases hadn't been there the day before. I think he's a bit loony, but he couldn't tell us anything more, so we released him after a short conversation. I promise you, he won't tell anybody. He didn't even remember his whole name. After some minutes of talking he thought I was his old history teacher, who took a magic potion to become younger.", Lestrade told Sherlock in amusement.

Sherlock seemed to think about what Lestrade had just said. Then he nodded.

„Ok, I'll do it. I probably will have to stay there day and night, won't I?"

„I think it would be best if you did so.", Lestrade answered. „Well maybe you and John could take turns."

John, who had been quietly listening up to now, suddenly stirred.

„What's that to do with me? I got work to do!"

Sherlock turned around and looked at him with that knowing-look John hated so much.

„Come on, you just told me you were bored, too. This is going to be an interesting case, I know you can't wait for it."

John gave in. Actually Sherlock was right, he couldn't wait for a new adventure to come. And spending some nights in an emtpy house waiting for a crime to happen did seem to be one.

Thanks for reading! I'd be happy about some nice reviews. I'd be happy about critical ones, too. ;)