Author's Note: This is the (technically first but because of circumstances, final and) main part to my fic giveaway, for the winner rebeltimedork. Her prize was a 2,500 word fic, which was based upon a prompt of her choosing.
The prompt in question was this: "In BBC canon, Sherlock is not Molly's colleague/patient or intern but her love interest. I've seen this and I got inspired. What if Sherlock never got his degree in chemistry, and now he's a grown ass man, he needs valid qualification to be admitted on crime scenes. But being his arrogant self, he would not attend a whole year's worth of classes; therefore he plans on ingratiating his ways towards Miss Hooper, who is the Head of the Department and an illustrious professor. So when Miss Hooper categorically refuses to help him, all sorts of madness ensues. Her fiancé mysteriously disappears, students get wild, one of them doesn't get the job done and Sherlock gets hit by realizations and his first sudden crisis as a student."
With permission, I tweaked the prompt a little bit and came out with the story that you see here. It's rated T because of drug mentions/references. I hope you enjoy this, and please leave a review if you liked, as well as/or favourite if you so feel like it!
Wedding ring, clean. Wrinkled shirt, hasn't been home in three days; aftershave on bookshelf, sleeping at the office; recently thrown out of home, negligent towards wife; sloppy filing system, blames promotion for failing marriage. Only in it for the kids.
Those are the deductions that form Sherlock's first impression of Detective Inspector Greg Lestrade.
"So," Lestrade sighs, throwing a file onto the desk and flipping it open. "Breaking and entering – third one this month. Oh, and verbal abuse of officers."
Sherlock smirks. His eyes fall on the cuff around his wrist, shackling him to the chair.
"They're morons."
"One of them – Donovan – said you claimed that you knew who the killer was."
"I'm sure those weren't the exact words she used."
"I'm paraphrasing." Lestrade raises an eyebrow. "Care to explain what you, a civilian, were doing on one of my crime scenes?"
Civilian. He bites down a shudder. How he hates that word. He isn't ordinary; he doesn't debase himself like they do—
"Let me see your arms."
Sherlock glares, but Lestrade's returning expression is cool, impassive. It's easy to see that he has no real choice in the matter. He's in enough trouble already; trouble which Big Brother is no doubt attempting to clean up with as little fuss as possible. Just like he always does. Quickly, he draws up the sleeve of his hoodie. Though healed, the track marks are gruesome, white lines speaking stories of his desperation, his—hisaddiction.
"Scars," he bites out the word. "I haven't used in a year. It's maddening."
Lestrade chuckles, leaning against the desk. "So what? Breaking into crime scenes – some of substitute for heroin?"
"It's not a—" He shifts in his seat, pulling at his hood. "Substitute."
"Alright. What is it then?"
Sherlock glances downwards. It's a lot of things. He's only been out of rehab for three months, his phone wiped of pretty much all contacts and nothing but the four walls of a tiny, shitty flat to contain and tangle his thoughts. It's not enough. But puzzles? Puzzles make him, make his mind, dance. Puzzles quieten that nagging feeling, that thought of it's easy, you fooled Mycroft once before, you can do it again, can't you? Cigarettes used to do that too, but they're starting to fail. The rush of nicotine is no longer that. It's just a chemical, designed to bring the high that heroin once bought him. It doesn't. It just makes him ache; makes him long for something stronger. Something that'll make him sleep. (He quit smoking two days ago.)
Crime solving, cases—those make him sleep. They keep him awake for days sometimes, but there's always that sweetness of the crash afterwards. More than that, it's consistent, and that's apparently what he needs. Consistency. A routine. Crime scenes offer him that, and more.
"A job," he says finally.
Lestrade folds his arms over his chest. "What job leads to breaking and entering?"
"Consulting detective." It's invented, right there on the spot, but it works. It fits.
"So you're some kind of amateur private detective?"
"No." He looks up to Lestrade, scanning him. "Private detectives follow people, take notes and basically do what your police officers do – only worse. I'm a consulting detective."
"Great," Lestrade says, shrugging and it's obvious that he doesn't believe a single word. "What's a consulting detective do?"
"I solve the cases you can't," he snaps, his impatience erasing what little social graces he possesses. Lestrade raises an eyebrow, and can't help but chuckle.
"Really? Prove it."
He doesn't want to prove it. Why should he? The fact they've arrested the man he pinpointed as the killer just half an hour ago goes to show they already believe him. Lestrade's just playing with him.
Then he feels the folder land in his lap. He eyes Lestrade, but the Detective Inspector holds his gaze, arms folded over his chest.
"Let's see what you can do," is his only attempt at an instruction. Not that he could give any kind of instruction. He lacks the authority. Sinking as far back into the chair as the handcuff on his wrist will allow, Sherlock flips open the folder. It takes him a minute to drink in and memorise the forensic autopsy and crime scene photographs (he doesn't need anything else). It takes him another minute to have it solved. He snaps the folder shut.
"Builder, mid 40s. Body discovered in a new building development. Could be your standard accident at work, but evidence – lack of calluses or injuries on the victim's hands, something usually associated with builders – points towards it being staged. My guess is that the victim in question isn't actually a builder at all, has no connections to the building industry, and is instead a stockbroker for a prestigious firm. Injection marks on the right elbow indicate an overdose of cocaine, but the victim's secretary claims he's right-handed. Therefore the only viable verdict is murder. So how come he's dressed as a builder and put on a building site to be found? Simple – it's easier to stage an accident on a building site. But in order for the murderer to put the body there, they'd have needed access to a building site, so the murderer has to be someone with connections to both industries – best bet is the victim's co-worker, as the company, at the time of the murder, was overseeing the renovation of the firm's former office building – providing the murderer with what he thought was a perfect cover."
Pausing, he glances up at Lestrade. "Easy. And as this was in your out tray, I'd take a random guess and say the partner is already in custody or at least being questioned."
"He confessed about an hour ago," Lestrade admits, taking the folder from Sherlock's hands with a grin at the corner of his mouth. "What qualifications do you have?"
Sherlock's brow furrows. "Qualifications?"
"You must've learned that somewhere," Lestrade replies, sitting down and leaning back in his chair. Sherlock sighs and focuses on him, choosing to remain silent for as long as it takes the penny to drop in the man's hopelessly normal mind.
Sure enough, Lestrade's grin slowly fades. "You – don't? Have any qualifications?"
"Dropped out in third year. Got impatient. Didn't think them necessary," Sherlock says calmly, just about stopping the smirk that threatens to come up at his words.
"Yeah, well. While it's – amazing – that you can do – that, legally…"
"I'm lacking."
"Exactly. I can't let you onto any crime scene if you don't have something to back it up."
He prides himself on never feeling fear. The heroin never let him feel fear; solving crimes doesn't allow it either. Sitting in that flat though, that grotty little flat, with nothing to distract him, nothing to help him focus… Oh, but that's the perfect breeding ground for it.
"What do I need to do?" He asks the question quietly, a brief slip of the bravado. Lestrade doesn't seem to pick up on it however. Maybe he's seen that before, seen that same type of realisation whenever an addict (former addict, former) realises just the type of life he's let himself in for.
"Get a qualification." That seems to be the only piece of advice he's willing to give. Right up until he sighs, rubs at his temples and once again, gets to his feet, a pen and paper in his hands. He scribbles something down. "Contact her. She'll help."
Sherlock glances at the piece of paper. Past the stereotypically scruffy handwriting, he sees an address and a name. He squints, looking back up to the Detective Inspector.
"Why should Molly Hooper help me?"
Lestrade manages a smirk. "You'd be surprised."
The first time he meets Molly Hooper, she holds a man's heart in her hands. The first time she meets him, she immediately puts that heart to one side and smiles.
"What can I do for you?" Her pupils dilate. He stores the fact into the banks of his memory along with the fact that she's left-handed, that she prefers wielding the scalpel to wielding a pen, wears size 8 clothing, has small breasts and a small mouth, prefers comfort over fashion, and recently purchased a cat. It could come in useful, in the future.
"Sherlock Holmes," he says by way of a beginning, looking down the length of the corpse between them. "I need you to teach me. This man suffered from cancer."
"Yes, he did. Stage 3 lung cancer." Her brows furrow. "Teach you?"
"Mm, teach me. The cancer was stage 4, by the way."
"His medical records state 3," she says, impatience edging briefly into her voice. "If you really want me to teach you, you'll have to apply, I'm sorry."
He feels himself frown. She's a lot more unhelpful than Lestrade's behaviour might've implied. "You come highly recommended." (Flattery often works.)
"Do I?" She delves inside the open chest of the corpse, and works on detaching one of the lungs. "Who recommended me?"
"Detective Inspector Lestrade."
"Oh, him." She smiles, almost fondly. "He would. But I'm really sorry; I've got a huge backlog of autopsies and paperwork."
He tries a different tack. "It's urgent."
"So is my job," she insists, the lung in her hand somewhat serving to support her point. Her eyes flick over his form, briefly. She sighs lightly, almost subconsciously, as if she doesn't quite know she's doing it. "I wish I could, but I can't make any special cases – even if I do come recommended. You'll have to apply like everyone else and—"
"And what?" he asks stiffly.
She arches her eyebrows, dumping the lung onto a set of scales. "Hope you'll get in."
Entirely unhelpful. He storms out of the morgue. It's with a spiteful curse of her name that he picks up an application form from reception on his way out.
Of course he gets in. He decides soon after strolling into her classroom that the course will be easy. He'll pass it in a year, maximum. A wider grin slips onto his face as he sinks further into his chair. Big Brother would be proud.
Such a belief soon fades when he discovers a most alarming fact: it's hard to please her.
Despite the pink, despite the bright smile and the morbid jokes, she's a taskmaster. She smiles around others, but not him. All he gets is a nod and a brief note of congratulations whenever he pushes a paper into her hands. He's got used to watching her when she sits at the front of the class, papers in front of her and her pen moving across them, making and breaking her students' progress. She does it quickly and efficiently, well-practiced at the art, but she has tells. Small ticks that can't help but be noticed. A smile at something good, a twitch of her right eyebrow at something interesting, a thinning of the lips at a spelling or grammatical error, a furrow of the brows whenever a student has said something completely wrong. (She'd be hopeless at poker. Far too honest.)
He's lucky if he gets a twitch of her eyebrow.
It's not enough. It's not happening quickly enough. He's just sitting there, classroom, flat, classroom, flat, eight walls, all suffocating. The only stimulation he gets—could get—is artificial and he can't, won't, go back to that.
She glances up, and her eyebrows immediately shoot up. He must look manic.
"Sherlock?"
"I need you – to qualify me."
Her eyes trace over his form. They linger over his arms. She sees the automatic twitch that he can't stop even if he tries, and no doubt calculates, figures out the need he has to fold them away every time someone even glances over the spot where his scars, his reminders, stand out, silvery veined cobwebs of someone he no longer wants to be.
She shuts her book.
"There's a thing – called fast track. It's a very intense course."
He doesn't say a thing to that. A hint, an upwards tremble at the corner of her mouth. He just about stops himself returning it.
"Involves lots of work. Hard work."
"Doubtful."
"And there'll probably be some private tutoring involved – outside of university hours."
"That doesn't matter," he says dismissively, waving a hand, and he straightens up. "Sign me up."
Two weeks later, she e-mails him, telling him she'll be around at his flat for their first tutoring session tomorrow.
She was right. It is a lot of work, harder work than anticipated, but it's got the desired effect. It keeps him busy. Busy is good. Busy means being able to breathe within these four walls. Their meetings occur thrice weekly, an hour each time (never long enough) and before he knows it, it's the night before his final exam. She insists they celebrate with a glass of wine. He loathes wine, really he much prefers whiskey, but he indulges her, even if he can't quite understand why they're celebrating. There's nothing to celebrate.
"Yes there is," she says when he tells her as much. There's a twinkle in her eye when she sips her drink. "Because I don't think I've ever been this certain about someone passing my class."
He blinks. "That's – complimentary."
"Might as well be." She pours out a glass for him. "Come tomorrow, you're not going to be my student anymore."
"No," he says flatly. He tries to ignore the itch that comes into his fingers with seeing strands of her hair fall over her face. "What makes you so sure I'm going to pass?"
She narrows her eyes, lips pursing, head tilting as she looks at him. "Because you're clever."
It's simple, quick, a genuine answer. He mumbles a small 'thank you' to her.
"You're welcome," she says, beaming brightly. She stands up, and although she's probably just wanting to go to the loo, he finds he doesn't want her to leave. She stops, glancing down. He follows her gaze and finds his fingers are wrapped around her wrist. Gently enough so she can free herself if she wishes, but tightly enough that they both know she doesn't want to.
He rises to his feet, slowly. Steps forward. Maybe it's the wine. Could be the fact that it's not just the work or the 'keeping busy' that's made this flat no longer feel like a prison cell, but her. Attraction, relationships, is usually an unfathomable thing to him; but she makes all kinds of things possible. His breathing slows, her pupils are blown wide and he leans forward—
He pulls back. Reason has overcome.
"You're still, technically—" he says quietly, unable to finish the sentence.
"Not tomorrow I'm not." Four words, six syllables. It's enough to make him look at her again. She lets her wrist fall away from his fingers, but she's smiling. A proper, genuine smile. It's a beautiful thing.
Stepping back, still smiling, she heads towards the bathroom. The promise of tomorrow is in both of their minds.