It was just another average day at Baker Street. I, John Watson, was going through Sherlock's previous cases. I had been told to throw out cases that were no longer relevant or necessary. Of course, how was I supposed to know what Sherlock needed still. He might want a case from 5 years ago for something. I've never been able to figure out how that mind of his works. I continued with the task at hand, knowing that I would never get it exactly how Sherlock would want it.
I was slightly shocked to discover a file that read January 2009. That was from nearly 20 years ago! I looked at the wall. The clock read April 4, 2026. Why would he still have this? I wondered. Was he solving crimes then? I quickly did the math. He was 14 when this case had occurred. I had been 17. If there had been a crime spree, how did I not remember it? It wouldn't hurt to read the file, right? I sat down and started reading.
January 14, 2009
Today I just wrapped up my first real case. "The Case of the Schoolhouse Blues" I call it. Unfortunately no one will hear me out except the girls. The police think nothing of it. They still think it's just some virus, even though Billie, Clara, and I were able to prove it wasn't. If only they would observe for once instead of looking for what they want to see. I discovered the truth behind all the sickness at school and why all the teachers are acting so oddly. It was...
I looked up, startled. Sherlock was standing there with his hand extended. I guess it wasn't such a good idea to read the story.
"John, the file."
"For once could I just get to the end?"
"No. That case is entirely too dull and irrelevant for you to be reading. It was such a long time ago, too. Highly unlikely you would find it amusing now, after much better adventures such as The Hounds of Baskerville and A Scandal In Bohemia. Far too dull."
"You know I don't mind, Sherlock. I'll read anything, no matter how dull you think it to be. And besides, you think everything is dull."
"No. Absolutely not. Never."
"Please, Sherlock? You know I'm not going to give up until you tell me, so you might as well make this easy for yourself."
"Fine. If you really must know, look in the 3rd filing cabinet for The Case of the Schoolhouse Blues. You should find what you're so intent on discovering."
I found what Sherlock had said and was immediately intrigued.
The Case of the Schoolhouse Blues
It had been a normal first 2 months of school. Students were settling in, and work loads were increasing. Everything seemed to be smooth sailing.
But then, a teacher got sick.
Nothing too bad, right? Wrong. At least that's what Sherlock thought. No one else thought anything of it. Teachers get sick all the time. They get the flu, stomach bugs, colds, and other illnesses.
The odd thing with this case was that the teacher, Mrs. Tyler, was not quite herself when she returned. She was usually fairly quiet and reserved, except for when her class was acting up, but after her return, she had been unusually so. She stayed in her classroom, talked to no one, and didn't talk with as firm of a voice. She was in her early 40's, so she really shouldn't be sounding weak, but she still was. She also wore the same outfit for days on end and would frequently stare off into space, tapping on her desk, as pale as a sheet.
She used to wear a new outfit every day, always have a mystery going, and love dark chocolate. She was always talking to students and helping them in any way possible. She loved word games and would never turn down a challenge. For her to be completely introverted in such a short amount of time was very strange indeed.
No one, save Sherlock, found this odd. The others said she just needed to be left alone. Sherlock attempted to talk to her, but she always locked her door when there were no students in her classroom, making it impossible to even talk with her.
Then Mr. Smith got sick. Fatally so. He was out for 2 weeks when word got around that he had miraculously recovered. The doctors were keeping him a few extra days to see if they could discover what had happened and to make sure that he was stable. Some thought he had been faking it. Some thought he had really made a miracle come true. Others could care less, they were just happy he was okay. He was a very well loved teacher, young, early 30's, had a few young children, and was pretty well off.
He was able to come back within a week of the recovery, but something was noticeably off. He talked way too much and would argue about everything and anything that didn't matter. He would talk for hours about which college was best to go to, colors of lines, whether "moo" was a sophisticated word or not, if clown cars were classics, where smells come from, and whether trailmix should be hoarded or shared with those good people who work with kids. He used to talk about more scholarly subjects such as Shakespeare and art.
Then 2 more teachers got sick within days of each other. The first to go was Mr. Jones, the favorite of most students due to the lack of homework in his class. Sherlock did not care for this. He loved more work. Anything to keep him from being bored. Then, 2 days later, Ms. Song fell ill during the school day. Sherlock had been in this class at the time and had noticed something was very odd. Ms. Song had looked at her phone, blanched, and promptly became ill. She was very strict and had always looked so healthy and fit. For her to blanch was very far from the norm. Again, the whole "looking at the phone" thing was only noticed by Sherlock.
This was the first time Sherlock had seen what happened in each "stage," as he liked to put it. In Stage 1, the victim gets the virus and knows they only have so long before they fall ill. During Stage 2, the victim falls ill. Then in Stage 3, something causes the victim to turn into an alternate version of his or herself and makes them paranoid about something. Then in the final Stage 4, something worse happens, possibly if they tell what has happened, or just they fall into a worse state.
Sherlock needed help to find out who was doing this and why. This was his first real case. He'd always loved mysteries but had never had any of his own to solve. Now that he did, he was like kid on Christmas morning. He needed help, however, because one teen cannot possibly catch a criminal single-handedly. He requested the help of the only 2 people who loved mysteries almost as much as he did and were almost as clever as he was, given that they were girls.
He chose my twin, Clara, and myself, Billie, to help him out. He called us one day to ask if we would meet him in the park the next day after school. We instantly agreed. Nothing would be better than getting to solve a case with the cleverest boy in the whole school.
We met on a clear Tuesday afternoon. Sherlock had some very intricate plans and theories he'd created to show us after explaining what in the world he thought was going on. Some were downright wrong, but we at least knew we had something. We agreed that this was deliberate. All you had to do was observe the changes in the teacher's behavior. But we disagreed on how and why this was happening. He thought there was some threat going around along with a virus. We thought the teachers were all contracting a bug of some sort, then being threatened while sick. There were other theories about every aspect of the case, but they didn't matter as much.
We decided to collect some data and more knowledge. First, we had to wait for a new teacher to fall ill. Through careful observations, we realized that Mrs. Noble was acting strangely. She was usually very laidback and would only give the smallest amounts of homework. Recently she had been very jumpy and was giving huge loads of research projects for students to do at home.
We knew it was only a matter of time before she "fell ill" too. We met with Sherlock and agreed that we needed a DNA sample. We decided that Clara would ask if she could go to her locker and hand Mrs. Noble a sterilized pen so we would be able to get a clean sample of DNA. That afternoon, we met back up again. Clara had easily gotten the sample and had it in a plastic bag. Sherlock took it home and ran a couple of tests on it. He discovered something very shocking in the sample.
He called later that evening to share the news. He had ran some bacteria tests on the sample and had discovered there was a virus lurking there. He had discovered that Mrs. Noble had bacterial meningitis, which is a fairly deadly disease if not cured within a few days of contracting it. Sherlock assumed she had already had the disease in her system for 5 days now. That didn't leave much time before something possibly fatal could occur. On this note, we resolved to pry a bit more tomorrow.
The next day rolled around and with it came a strange conversation indeed. We all had gotten to school an extra 20 minutes early and waited for Mrs. Noble to arrive. During that time we rehearsed what we were going to say so as not to scare her off. Five minutes later she drove up. We waited another minute so as not to seem suspicious before confronting her.
"Good morning, Mrs. Noble," Clara said.
"Oh hello, dear. Oh my! Sherlock and Billie, too? Whatever is the matter? My top students only come and ask questions when something is truly the matter," Mrs. Noble said, looking quite flustered.
"Oh there's nothing wrong with us, we were just wondering if everything is alright," I said.
"Yes," said Sherlock. "We've been noticing that you've been acting quite strangely recently."
"Oh really my dears, it's nothing to worry about," said Mrs. Noble, who had paled considerably and was slowly backing away from us. "He didn't send you did he? No that's preposterous. Why would he be working with these sweet little children? They've done nothing whatsoever. Why would he want me now? I'm not ready yet."
"Mrs. Noble what are you talking about? We haven't come for you and came here out of our own interest in your wellbeing. Please. You have to believe me," Clara said.
Mrs. Noble kept murmuring things about how she wasn't ready and how he couldn't take her yet because she had not completed some task. I attempted to go up to her to try and calm her down, but Sherlock held me back.
"Shh. We may learn something valuable. Like who this man is and what he wants with her," Sherlock said. "Mrs. Noble? Who do you think sent us? What haven't you finished?"
"This must be a trap. He must want to prove that I can't follow his wishes. He with that silver tongue and sweet words. That crooning voice that promised great riches to me. The threat of my husband being killed and my past being uncovered. How could this not be to trap me?" she muttered.
Suddenly we heard a ringtone. The three of us looked at each other. We knew it wasn't one of our phones. Slowly we looked back to Mrs. Noble. She was cowering away from the phone in blatant fear.
"Mrs. Noble? What's wrong? Who sent you a message? What's wrong?" I asked, stepping towards the scared woman.
"No!" she shrieked, backing even further away. "It's him. He's found me. It's not safe around me anymore. Run! Don't let him know you've caught on to his scheme."
"Mrs. Noble, please. We're not leaving until we learn more about this man, whoever he is," Sherlock firmly retorted, picking up the phone and looking at the message.
He held the phone out to us. It simply read "5 hours."
"Well what's that supposed to mean?" asked Clara.
"Going by her reaction and the comments she's made, I would say she has 5 hours until something major happens to her. Like the virus takes full effect or she loses something she holds dear. Am I right, Mrs. Noble?" Sherlock implored.
"But how did you think of all this? You had next to nothing to go off of. Now he will get you, too. I'm so sorry my dears, so, so sorry," Mrs. Noble sniveled.
"If you tell us everything, we can help, Mrs. Noble," I said. "That's all we're trying to do here. We don't mean to harm anyone. Just tell us. We can handle it. We'll call the police if we need to."
"No that won't do us any good," Sherlock informed me. "This is under their noses. It's been happening all over the place, not just here. People getting sick in a fatal way then miraculously being cured. Whoever is running this crime ring is a mastermind."
"But that's where you're wrong, little Sherlock," crooned a voice.
Clara shrieked, "Where did that come from?!"
"He's coming for me! Run if you want to stay alive!" yelled Mrs. Noble with a crazed expression on her face. "Run and leave me. I'm gone anyway."
"Oh, I do love a game of chase," sang the same voice. "Why don't you run for me? Make this fun."
"It's coming from the phone!" Sherlock exclaimed, snatching it from where it lay, forgotten. He answered it. "Hello?"
"Oh dear little Sherlock Holmes. Do you really not recognize this voice? You've heard it every day. Always lurking in the corners, waiting and watching," it crooned.
We watched Sherlock as he thought this over. Obviously this was significant. If we knew this, then we would know the leader.
"Does this mean a student it running this, Sherlock?" Clara asked.
"Oh that one's smart, Sherlock. I think I like her. So figure it out yet? This is so much fun. I really should do this more often," the voice said.
"Shut up. If you really wanted me to figure it out, then you would give me time," Sherlock snapped.
"Oh but I have! 5 hours!" it exclaimed.
"Sherlock, hang up. You won't get anything done while listening to that voice. We can figure this out. It won't even take 5 hours. We'll figure it out. Trust me. We've got the 3 smartest brains in the whole school working on this. This will be easy," I said in an attempt to smooth out the situation.
"You're right, Billie. Catch. You. Later," Sherlock spat out, ending the call.
"So let's start with what we know. He is seen every day by at least one of us. This student has a big head. He must also be smart but hidden. He must talk some, but its so rare that we never notice it. He also knows how to use technology extensively, based on his ability to hack into that phone unnoticed," I said.
"Yes. All very true. Now we just need to figure out who it was. I bet they'll be here today, attempting to not draw attention to themselves. After 1st hour lets meet back here to see if anyone had discovered anything new," Sherlock decided.
First hour came and went. We kept our eyes peeled for anyone acting oddly. No one found anything. We decided to give it one more hour. Again, we didn't find anything new. Sherlock did have a hunch, however. He thought it was with David Piper or Jim Williams. Clara thought it was either Rory Pond or David Piper. I thought it was John Harkness or Archie Clarke. Since 2 of the 3 of us thought it was David, we decided to investigate.
We did discover he was acting a bit oddly. He was being very quiet and wouldn't talk in more than 1 word answers. I thought he was just acting a bit odd. He was a nice boy. The others thought that he was nervous about something. We decided to confront him next hour, but then we got a call.
"Close yet, Sherlock? I'm not scared. I'm sure Mrs. Noble will be alright," the voice sneered.
Sherlock slammed the phone without answering. "You'll never guess it. Look who just came out of the boys bathroom. David Piper. He looks pretty suspicious too if you ask me. It's gotta be him."
"Well why don't we go up and ask?" Clara asked. "We have what we need."
"Where's the fun in that?" Sherlock smiled. "We need to make sure he won't ever do this again. No one messes with my teachers and gets away with it."
Sherlock called the number back. "Hello? Yes. You do know that since you have caused physical harm to teachers, you are entitled to going to jail. We have evidence stacked sky high against you. Thank you. Have a good day."
He shoved the phone back into his pocket and walked away to class.
We never heard from David Piper again. If you were to ask Sherlock what changed his mind, he would tell you that David had only wanted to have control over teachers for a change. He never thought anyone would catch on. He hadn't realized how close together these cases must seem. He had been power hungry and that had ruled his choices.
It wasn't until much later that we discovered that he had been in league with Moriarty. That was why he was truly scared. He thought Moriarty had discovered that he had majorly messed up the plan and had sent us to check on him. That was the reason for the "tough guy" act.
This was one of the few times that my twin and I got to work with the now famous Sherlock Holmes. There were a few cases throughout school where he needed an extra set of eyes or a lady's opinion on a case. After school however, we lost contact with him until he asked me to write this case down for his records. I gladly obliged and was slightly shocked that he was able to contact me but he's Sherlock. He knows everything and everyone and knows how to get what he wants.
Written by Billie Oswald for Sherlock Holmes 23/7/2020
John sat back in shock. How had he missed this? He vaguely remember a year where lots of teachers got sick with the flu. Why did Sherlock hate this case so much? Was it because he had had help? Was it because no one would listen to him about it? And what had happened to these girls? Where were they now and why had he not heard of them? So many questions and so few Sherlock would answer.
"What did you think?" Sherlock asked as he strolled in from the kitchen. "Dull?"
"No it was brilliant! I doubt anyone noticed anything was amiss at the time. I do vaguely recall a year where many of the teachers were sick with flu-like symptoms. Now I must ask, who are these twins and where are they now?" I implored.
"You've seen Billie before. I don't recall Clara ever stopping by however. They're Mrs. Hudson's younger sisters. I don't know how I never told you this. I must have told you sometime."
"Honestly, Sherlock. Do you ever notice when I'm gone?"
"No, I really don't. Now excuse me. I must go deduce where these scorch marks could have possibly come from on this hand."
John laughed to himself as Sherlock walked away. Yes, he thought. Just another normal day at 221B Baker Street.