Author's Note: This is an oddball idea that emerged after a new S3 trailer I managed to see twice on a Finnish TV site last week. It vanished after that and I couldn't find it again so my memories are a bit fuzzy… Is this what I really saw happening or is it just a figment of my twisted imagination? Who knows.
Written in the fic form of a 221B (times three), as this is a love triangle. Contains possible spoilers for the S3 Reunion scene. Sort of.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Where the two moustaches meet
A fancy restaurant in London, two years after.
At a cozy table set for two, John and Mary are happily chatting away, celebrating John's birthday.
A tall waiter with dark glasses and a black moustache approaches their table with a confident stride and a bottle of champagne in hand. He leans closer to John and introduces it: "Dom Perignon 1996. For the rare occasion."
A jolt of electricity surges through John. It's the unexpected presence of The Scent that does it, the fragrance of the particular aftershave that gives it away, making his nostrils quiver with an olfactory intrusion that reaches the slumbering department of his mind. The one where the memories are kept. Long before the familiar frequency of that deep baritone has time to register, let alone the words that it conveys.
John immediately tenses in his chair, eyes blown wide and his heart hammering. Slowly, he turns to look at the man beside him. It can't be…
Mary, quick to pick up his alarming body language, asks concernedly "John, what's wrong?" John ignores her. He pushes his chair backwards abruptly and stands up, eyes only for the waiter. He scans the tall man from head to toe and back again, finally settling on those unsettling eyes. Their gazes lock and the air around the table suddenly turns brittle.
Mary watches in confusion as the two men stare each other down. Her worried gaze wanders from John to the other man and back again, like the heated signals that ping pong back and forth over the table between them, conveying a thousand things at once.
Finally, the waiter places the precious bottle on the table. Theatrically, he removes his glasses and slowly strips off his curly black moustache. He tosses them next to the bottle on the table, his intense gaze never leaving John's. In a flat, deadpan voice, he explains: "Short version: not dead."
After a moment of absolute, horrified silence, John stirs. Mary watches as her husband-to-be steps closer toward the waiter, bridging the short distance between them. He touches his face, caressing his cheek. To her utter horror, John then grabs the man by the neck and pulls him down to a kiss.
"John, what the hell…?" Mary manages, in her feeble attempt at understanding. After a long while, John turns to her, eyes blazing with something she has never seen before.
"Short version: not straight", his strangled voice tells her. "Except for this" he adds as an afterthought, curling his left fist into a tight ball which he sends flying straight into the unsuspecting face that just received a kiss from him. Possessive, passionate and bitter.
As the tall man stumbles gracelessly towards the floor, eyes wide with wonder and blood running from his nose, John slowly flexes his tingling left hand and lifts it to his own face. Dumbfounded, Mary watches as John strips off his moustache in turn and throws it on the table. Deserted on the white tablecloth, the bushier sand-coloured moustache curls up next to its sleek black friend, finally joined in their fake existence.
John meets Mary's eyes and continues, with a pained smile: "I'm sorry my darling, but you are like the Veuve Clicquot to his Dom Perignon — bearable only as long as you can't afford the real thing. Once you have tasted it and it's there for you to have, you'll never want to go back."
Stupefied, Mary's eyes flash from the moustache-less man in front of her to the one on the floor who is wiping his bloody nose on the sleeve of his black waiter's jacket. In vain, she is trying to piece it all together, unable to understand the bizarre scene unfolding before her very eyes.
"John, is this… Is this Sherlock Holmes?" she finally blurts out, with utter disbelief.
Before John can answer, the bloodied man scrambles up from the floor and smirks at her: "The one and only. Obviously. Move over Mary, because I'm back!"
Author's Note:
For anyone out there, already flexing their fingers in order to start typing insults at me, I want to stress that this is supposed to be a PARODY of the Reunion scene... This is just an idea that struck me after seeing the trailer and that an evil voice at the back of my head dictated to me. A good or bad idea – feel free to tell me!