Chapter 1

Sherlock Holmes was a Consulting Detective. For the past 5 years, he had been enlisted by Detective Inspector Lestrade and his band of morons to solve mysterious cases all over London. When he wasn't being brilliant and solving unsolvable crimes, he was in the Morgue running experiments. Several days ago, he had been testing how bruises might appear on a corpse shortly after death, when an old friend had introduced him to a most interesting man. Dr John Watson, obvious war veteran from Afghanistan, with a psychosomatic limp in his left leg, was looking for somewhere to live. Sherlock had just found a lovely apartment in Baker Street that he simply could not afford to rent alone, and immediately decided John could be useful to have around. He was in need of an assistant, seeing as the majority of the police were so adamant against working with him. He couldn't see why. It wasn't his fault they were idiots.

Whilst Sherlock had been showing John Watson the apartment, Lestrade had turned up, finally deciding that the recent string of apparent suicides required Sherlock's attention. 3 bodies had been found so far, all in secluded locations, places they didn't need to be in, and they had all taken the exact same type of poison. Lestrade had decided to ask for Sherlock's help when a fourth body was found, and a note left. This was the first note, and Sherlock had been very excited to work on the case. Deciding to bring along Dr Watson, to see how useful he could be, they both had headed straight for the crime scene. The victim was called Jennifer… something. The moment he had walked into the room, Sherlock forgot her name. It was unimportant. What was important was she was dressed entirely in pink. John confirmed she had died of a possible drug overdose, and Sherlock had successfully impressed the good Doctor by deducing that the woman had travelled from Cardiff, was having several affairs, and was in London for one night only. The 'note' that Lestrade had mentioned was the most intriguing part. E. Rache was German for revenge, but that didn't make any sense. It almost certainly was supposed to be Rachel. Why would the dying woman scratch the name Rachel into the floorboards?

Sherlock had further impressed John by stating that there had been a suitcase. There were track marks on the back of the woman's leg, and the suitcase was quite obviously pink, like the rest of her outfit. Sherlock had immediately left the crime scene, in a world of his own, or more particularly, his Mind Palace. His Mind Palace was his happy place, the place where he stored all of his information, and sorted through facts until things fitted together. Using his brilliant deduction skills, Sherlock found the victim's lurid pink suitcase within half an hour, before taking it back to his apartment.

Several hours later, Sherlock was sitting in his flat, back in his mind palace. John Watson had finally responded to his text, and Sherlock had instructed him to text the dead woman's phone, to illicit a response from the killer, who quite clearly still had the phone, as there had not been anything in the woman's suitcase. No-one who was clever enough to have multiple affairs would leave their phone anywhere accidentally. After the killer phoned John's mobile, Sherlock had suggested the two go for dinner. The restaurant happened to be opposite the location that John had texted to the killer and provided a perfect place for a stakeout. Angelo, the owner, had naturally already started to keep an eye on the property opposite, and after a particularly nasty moment where Sherlock had thought John was flirting with him, the duo had chased down a taxi cab that they thought had stopped outside the location. Sherlock had been convinced the man in the taxi had been the killer, staking out the place just as Sherlock and John had been, but alas, the man was nothing more than an American tourist.

Not only had Sherlock and John had to chase the taxi down, but they also ended up having to run away from a too-cautious policeman, after the tourist had flagged him down. Both Sherlock and John had arrived back at 221B, out of breath and laughing at the evening's events. Sherlock anticipated the knock on the door, and as John went to retrieve his forgotten cane from Angelo, Sherlock grinned to himself. He was never wrong. "Mrs Hudson! Dr Watson will take the second bedroom!" Sherlock laughed as John shut the door and came back into the hallway, rolling his eyes. This was going to be fun! The euphoria increased as Mrs Hudson, the landlady, came running down the hallway. "Oh Sherlock, what have you done?" As if in response, a loud crash echoed down the stairs. Now there was an intruder? This evening was proving very fruitful indeed.

Sherlock and John took the stairs two at a time. Oddly enough, the door appeared to be closed. He never closed that door. Beginning to feel dubious, Sherlock entered his flat, to find that Lestrade was seated in Sherlock's favourite chair, lounging about like usual. Crime scene techs milled around in the flat, pulling things off shelves, clearly making every effort to make a mess. Sudden anger burned in Sherlock's veins as he turned to confront the detective. "You can't just break into my flat!" Sherlock was thunderous. Lestrade grinned at him. "It's a drug bust!" Incredulous, John rushed to Sherlock's defence. As usual, the noise in the room was easy to tune out, as Sherlock turned slowly to survey the damage the techs were causing. He shouted at Sergeant Donovan, Moron Number One, who had just recovered his favourite jar of eyeballs. He was using them for a particularly important experiment, which he told her. "Freak" She always called him. Who didn't enjoy a good eyeball experiment or two?

"Is there anything in the case, Alyssa?" Lestrade's voice held a subtle undertone that Sherlock couldn't quite place. Intrigued, he turned to face the girl who was rather cautiously pawing her way through the victim's absurdly pink suitcase. Taking a step forward, he watched as she methodically inspected each item, before carefully returning it. Despite looking younger than everyone else in the room, she at least seemed to be doing her job properly. Tucking a strand of long, blonde hair behind her ear, she rose from her crouched position, and stretched her neck. Sherlock took the opportunity to briefly study her. She was less than average height, slender build. What she lacked in body mass she more than made up for in her chest region. Oh, and in her posterior too, Sherlock noted as she turned away from him to face Lestrade. Out of the corner of his eye, Sherlock watched John with amusement. His study of the woman was much less subtle. "Hi. I'm uh. John. John Watson." Sherlock stifled a laugh as John held out a ridiculous hand for her to shake. She raised an eyebrow, eying John's hand as though confused as to why this stranger was introducing himself to her.

"The case, Alyssa?" Sherlock turned his attention back to Lestrade, who was showing an uncharacteristic amount of attention on the woman. He had never seen Lestrade focus on anything that wasn't food or tea for more than 5 seconds. Cocking his head to the side, Sherlock followed Lestrade's eye line. Of course, the detective was focussed more on the tech's body than on what she was telling him, which was of course, that there was nothing in the case. Sherlock had rather hoped she might at least mention the absence of the victim's phone, but of course, no one thought quite like he did. How dull.

Lestrade began to fill Sherlock in on the mysterious Rachel. Apparently, the victim had had a stillbirth 14 years ago, and Rachel was the name of the baby. Sherlock shook his head at the sudden shift of emotion in the room. The tech girl (Melissa or something, wasn't it?) had looked down at the ground, subconsciously wiping at her eyes and shaking her head. Both John and Lestrade had a look of sadness that tightened their eyes. Was Sherlock missing some key point here? No, that couldn't be it. He never missed anything. John wondered out loud that maybe the killer had talked the victim into taking the poison, that maybe he had used the death of her daughter as an incentive for her to take her own life. "That was 14 years ago. Why would she still be upset about that now?" Immediately, the infuriating noise in the apartment stopped. Sherlock became very aware that every person in his flat had turned to stare at him. "Not good?" He whispered to John. "Bit not good, yeah" John whispered back.

The conversation once again went back to Rachel, and what it meant as clue. Sherlock sighed loudly. It must be so relaxing having such dull, unobservant minds. He said so, and John looked very confused. Sighing again, Sherlock resigned himself to yet another explanation of the obvious, and he began to explain that the victim had used Rachel as a clue to help them catch the killer. The tech girl stopped him in his tracks. "There is an email address on the suitcase label." Lestrade moved to stand by her, and Sherlock noted how his hand rested on her arm. Odd. That seemed highly unnecessary.

"Oh wonderful, we can possibly get access to her emails. How useful!" Sherlock rolled his eyes at the familiar, nauseating voice. "Stop talking, Anderson, you'll lower the IQ of the whole street." To his amusement, the girl bit back a laugh. Clearly, Sherlock was not the only person who had noticed the forensic scientist's complete idiocy. Like Sergeant Donovan, Anderson (Moron Number Two) had always refused to work directly with Sherlock on cases that Lestrade asked for his help on, which suited Sherlock just fine. Usually with them both around, there was too much stupid in the room, and that made it difficult to concentrate on what really mattered.

"He is right though. What good is an email?" Lestrade was speaking only to the blonde-haired tech now. What was her name, why could Sherlock never remember names? Annoyed, Sherlock butted in. "Well, it is fairly obvious. Or at least it should be, even to you." John continued to look vacant. Once again, the tech girl shocked him. "The victim had a smartphone, Anderson. Even you know that smartphones can be tracked via GPS. All you need is to sign in. The username will be her email." She smiled confidently, and Sherlock nodded in approval. Maybe there was some hope for her yet. "What good is the email without the password though?" Anderson had moved closer to the group, and suddenly clapped a hand on Sherlock's shoulder in fake wonder. "Oh, I get it. Mr Know-It-All probably already knows it." Lestrade waved Anderson away, who went enthusiastically back to ransacking shelves.

Lestrade and John both looked to Sherlock, who in turn, looked at the girl. Finally remembering what Lestrade had called her, he decided to speak to her directly. She didn't seem quite as unobservant as everyone else in the flat. "Alyssa isn't it?" She smiled. She was rather pretty when she smiled. She turned to look at Lestrade, who was stood so close to her, his arm was gently brushing against hers. Had there been a moment this entire time when he wasn't touching her? "Haven't you figured it out yet?" Lestrade shook his head at Alyssa's voice, looking quite sheepish, and Sherlock clapped his hands in delight. She understood! Finally, someone interesting! Alyssa turned to meet Sherlock's gaze. "By leaving her phone with the killer, and scratching her daughter's name with her dying breath, the victim was giving us her password." Sherlock raised his hands in a silent hallelujah. "Excellent, someone understands! Can you read out the email for me?" Sherlock had time for a brief look at Lestrade's face before turning to face the laptop. Was that… jealousy?

Putting Lestrade's off behaviour out of his mind, he quickly typed in the email as Alyssa read it out to him. Instantly, the GPS tracker showed up on the screen. John took his seat to watch the tracker, as Mrs Hudson called up to Sherlock. His landlady was quite batty at times, and she seemed to think there was a taxi waiting for him. As Mrs Hudson moved to stand in the doorway, continuing to talk, John shouted that the victim's phone was in 221B. Sherlock suddenly went to his mind palace. He yelled for quiet, and for Anderson to turn around – his face was always distracting. He was vaguely aware of Alyssa moving across the room to stand near him. Usually, this would have irritated him, but there were more pressing matters to attend to, and anyway, he didn't find her presence annoying or off-putting.

Who hunts in a crowd? In plain sight? Who could have abducted 4 people from crowded areas, and taken them to such secluded spots for their suicides? Once again, Mrs Hudson was chattering about his taxi downstairs. Sherlock felt Alyssa move even closer. He opened his eyes to meet hers, and suddenly, it all became clear. There was a shadowy figure behind Mrs Hudson. He knew Alyssa saw it too, as her body suddenly became rigid. A text came through on Sherlock's phone. 'Come with me'. He saw Alyssa glance at it and knew that this simple tech somehow understood what was going on, understood better than anyone else in the room, save for himself of course.

Meeting her eyes again, he looked from his phone to the now empty doorway. She nodded slightly, and moved to Lestrade, telling him they were wasting their time in the flat. She was giving him time to act on the mysterious text, before Lestrade and the rest of the Idiot Squad could get involved. If he survived this (this thought always sent addictive adrenaline through his veins), he would have to thank her properly. "John I am going out." Putting on his coat, Sherlock was vaguely aware of John's surprise. "I need some air. Clear my head a bit. Be back in a few."

And with that, Sherlock Holmes walked out of the boring, predictable safety of his flat, to get into a serial killer's taxi.