Silence
John Watson was caught between before and after, and the silence was deafening.
The park was full of sounds, but they were mundane sounds – the whistling of birds, the rattling of tree branches in the wind, the steady rhythm of gravel crunching underneath his feet and the odd noises that his cane added to his stride. Conspicuously absent was everything that he was accustomed to hearing at that time of day: the chiming of distant bells, the friendly murmur of voices inside his mind, the telltale whisper of wings folding open or shut and the subtly different murmur of primaries brushing against each other accidentally. It smelled different, too. He had never really noticed the fresh, almost citrusy scent of his home, had never paid enough attention to it to realize that he would miss it when he came to Earth, practically choking on the smoggy air of London day in and day out.
John was grateful for the unusually low number of mortals in the park today. The silence was more acute without their low stream of chatter to fill the bright autumn air, true, but he was having trouble focusing on the glamour that kept his wings hidden from mortal eyes, and he was fairly certain that they had briefly flickered into view once or twice already. You can worry about finding a place to live later, when you're not in public,he scolded himself, ignoring the voice in the back of the head demanding to know where, exactly, he was going to worry in private if he didn't have anyplace private to go. You're bad enough at holding a glamour as it is; don't make it any more bloody complicated by getting worked up about something unrelated. He managed to keep his wings hidden for several more too-quiet minutes as he crunch-CRUNCHed his way through the empty park by forcibly pushing his near-panicked thoughts aside, but he found himself unable to banish them completely. They competed with the glamour for his attention as he continued to walk, his pace growing quicker as he found himself suddenly desperate to be somewhere, anywhere that wasn't this place, with all of its wrong sounds and emptiness.
I'm not going to be able to handle this much time in the mortal world, even if I manage to find someplace to live I'm not going to be able to afford anything seeing as I don't have any mortal currency, and anyway I'm crap at sustaining glamours, there's no way I'll be able to do it for weeks at—
"John! John Watson!"
John lost his concentration completely when the strange not-silence was broken by a shout that sent his thoughts careening wildly out of order as he tried to figure out first why someone was shouting in the park, and then – belatedly, but perhaps more importantly – who on Earth would have recognized an angel strolling through it. He could feel the glamour slip away as his mind shot in seven entirely different, but equally frantic, directions at once.
The sight of a wing – just a few feathers, really, in the corner of his eye, but it was enough to identify the speaker as someone who would have seen past the glamour anyway so there was really no need to be panicking as much as he was – at once reassured him and doubled his curiosity. Though it was not unheard of for angels to be sent to Earth as a punishment as he had been, it certainly wasn't common, and John was sure that he'd have heard of anybody other than himself who'd been temporarily exiled in recent years. Which suggested that this – whoever it was, he recognized the ashen color of the feathers but couldn't remember where he'd seen them before – had come to Earth voluntarily. John wouldn't have thought that he knew a single person who would have come to Earth voluntarily.
He turned, and met a pair of hopeful eyes with his own. John couldn't imagine who this person, obviously searching for some sign of recognition, could possibly be; and he grimaced inwardly at the tangible blankness of the expression that settled on his face.
"Stamford," the stranger prompted. "Mike Stamford. We were in that training class together."
John blinked as realization dawned. "Yes. Sorry, yes. Mike. Hello." He forced a polite smile onto his face and shuffled around awkwardly, trying to get in a position conducive to shaking hands and praying that he wouldn't fall over in the process. Now that he thought about it, he had a distinct memory of a young man with primaries that exact shade of grey in the Demon Identification course he had taken, though that man had had rather more feathers than there were on Mike's wings.
Mike unfolded one wing halfway and twisted it off to the side, a casual – almost unconscious – gesture, but one that left John envious of the other wing's ability to compensate and keep him balanced. It was clear, with the surface of Mike's wing spread before him, that the now quite thin layer of feathers had once been much more voluminous. "Yeah, I know," Mike continued with an uncomfortable grin. "I'm balding."
"No, no," John replied automatically, breaking eye contact in order to carefully examine the ground, or his shoes, or anything that wasn't Mike's face. It occurred to him to cast another glamour over his wings, but the idiotic chittering of Earth birds hopelessly distracted him.
"I heard you were with the Sentry somewhere getting attacked," Mike continued, apparently blissfully unaware of John's discomfort. "What happened?"
"I got attacked."
John paused, but after a moment of uneasy silence – well, not silence really, seeing as those stupid birds refused to shut up, but close enough – he took a deep breath and looked up, meeting Mike's gaze once more. "What are you doing on Earth?"
"Teaching. There's always some of our folk down here, protecting mortals from demons and those sorts of things. I prep newcomers for the…unique challenges of working on Earth. Bright young things like we used to be." Mike chuckled awkwardly. "God, I hate them. What about you? Just staying in town until you get yourself sorted?"
John made no attempt to disguise his bitterness. "I can't afford London with the amount of mortal currency they've given me. I can barely afford to go to the pub."
"You wouldn't be able to bear anywhere else, away from all the excitement. Not the John Watson I know."
"Yeah, well, I'm not that John Watson."
"Couldn't Harry help?"
"Yeah, like that's going to happen." The birds were still chirping away as happily as ever and even though he was surrounded by greenery the air was filthy and John felt like he was suffocating. The ground felt too hard underneath his feet and he couldn't get his wings to settle in any sort of position remotely representing comfortable and he really didn't want to be in this park that was too quiet and too loud and too empty and somehow not nearly empty enough.
"I don't know, get a flatshare or something?"
John looked up sharply. "Who'd want me for a flatmate?" He returned Mike's grin with an uncomprehending stare. "What?"
Mike continued to smile, an odd gleam in his eye. "You're the second person to say that to me today."
The world went silent, well and truly silent.
"Who was the first?"
—
"Bit different from the training center back home," John commented as he looked around the room, filled with computers and microscopes and all sorts of mortal gadgets that he figured an angel working on Earth would need to be familiar with.
"You've no idea!"
A low voice smoothly interrupted his train of thought. "Mike, have you gotten a phone yet? There's no signal on mine." John hadn't paid much attention to the man across the room when they'd entered, but he looked him over now. He was clearly an angel, though his wings were a peculiar shade of dark grey that hinted at black. They were slender and elegant, arching high above his back before sweeping down to brush the floor. At the moment they were folded carefully behind him, as he was preoccupied with a gleaming white microscope that cast odd patterns of light across his cheekbones.
"And what's wrong with telepathy?" demanded Mike, something that John had been wondering himself. He couldn't imagine why an angel – even one planning to live on Earth for several years – would need a mortal phone when telepathy was more efficient.
"I prefer to text."
"Sorry, still don't have one."
John stepped forward, the muscles in his back tense with the effort of keeping his wings held tight against his body. "Here, use mine," he offered, digging his phone out of his pocket with one hand and clutching his cane with the other. He winced when, despite his effort, several of his primaries scraped along the side of a computer and dragged up a cloud of dust that made the air taste stale.
"Oh, thank you," the dark-winged angel said, taking the phone without a glance in John's direction.
"This is an old friend of mine, John Watson," Mike said, nodding vaguely towards John.
"Rahe or erithacus?"
"Sorry?"
"Which was it? Rahe or erithacus?"
"Rahe." John shifted, holding his wings even closer to himself in an attempt to avoid bumping any more equipment. Everything's bloody cramped in the mortal world. "Sorry, how did you know?"
"How do you feel about the violin?" the angel asked abruptly, handing back John's phone without making eye contact.
John started. "I'm sorry, what?"
"I play the violin when I'm thinking and sometimes I don't talk for days on end. Would that bother you? Potential flatmates should know the worst about each other."
John twisted to look at Mike and tried to ignore the lingering smell of stirred-up dust in the air. "You told him about me?"
Mike's awkward chuckle returned. "Not a word."
"Well then," John said, turning back to face the other man. "Who said anything about flatmates?"
"I did. Told Mike this morning that I must be a difficult man to find a flatmate for. Now here he is just after lunch with an old friend clearly temporarily exiled to Earth after questionable conduct in combat against rahes. Wasn't a difficult leap."
John paused. "How did you know about the rahe?"
The angel continued, seemingly oblivious to the fact that anybody else might be talking. "Got my eye on a nice little place in central London. We ought to be able to afford it. We'll meet there tomorrow evening, seven o'clock. Sorry, got to dash. I think I left my riding crop in the mortuary." As he spoke, he had grabbed a long coat – a few shades darker than his wings in color – and slid it on, which somehow gave him the illusion of being even taller than he already was.
"Is that it?" John demanded.
"Is that what?"
"We've only just met and we're going to go and look at a flat?"
"Problem?"
"We don't know a thing about each other. I don't know where we're meeting; I don't even know your name."
The angel began speaking at a speed that John found dizzying. "I know you're a halfling who's trained as a medic for the Sentry and you've been temporarily banished after getting involved in a skirmish with rahes. You've got a brother who's worried about you but you won't go to him for help because you don't approve of him, possibly because he's an alcoholic, more likely because he recently revealed himself to one of the mortals he was Guarding. And I know that your wing injury is at least partly psychosomatic. That's enough to be going on with, don't you think?" He reached for the door handle; then, seeming to think the better of it, whirled back to face John. "The name's Sherlock Holmes and the address is 221B Baker Street. Afternoon."
He winked and he was gone, just like that.
John blinked. Once, twice. This Sherlock Holmes had, out of nowhere, filled the room with a maelstrom of energy and just as abruptly left it empty, so that the room felt barren without him in it. John turned to Mike with a question in his eyes.
"Yeah, he's always like that."
—
The air tasted of smog and smelt of fresh-baked cookies, and it occurred to John that this was the wrong way around, but there was nothing he could do to right it, so he let it be and did his best to ignore the low growl that emitted from his stomach. Cars rumbled by and people chattered in the sandwich shop and something clattered to the pavement a few doors down, but he couldn't shake the sensation that London was smothered by an unnatural quiet. And then, Sherlock Holmes.
"Hello." John almost dropped his glamour when a low voice cut through the silence and caught his attention. He turned.
"Ah – Mr. Holmes."
"Sherlock, please."
He glanced around. "Well, this is a prime spot. Must be expensive."
Sherlock reached out – he was wearing that long coat again, John noticed – and rapped firmly on the door. "Mrs. Hudson – the landlady – accepts our currency, and she's giving me a special deal. Owes me a favour. A few years back, her husband got himself sentenced to an eternity in Purgatory. I was able to help out."
John froze. "Sorry – you stopped her husband being exiled?"
Sherlock smirked as the door swung open. "Oh, no. I ensured it."
"Sherlock!" The exclamation came from a small woman with creamy off-white wings that seemed to fall naturally forward and around her body. They were curved low and close to her shoulders and hips when she opened to door, but she lifted them slightly in order to grab Sherlock and pull him into a fierce maternal embrace. John only had a moment to glance at her face before it was obscured by Sherlock's wild curls, but the motherly impression was reinforced by the twinkle of kindness in her eyes.
"Mrs. Hudson," Sherlock said, pulling away quickly, though he didn't seem put off by the hug. He nodded at John before sweeping across the threshold. "Dr. John Watson."
The landlady greeted John with a warm smile. "Hello. Come in." She stepped to the side and gestured invitingly towards the hallway.
"Thank you," John called as he hurried up the stairs, hating the ungainly clunk of his cane on the steps and the way it was impossible to keep his balance with an injured wing. Sherlock was waiting for him on the second floor, a barely-disguised look of impatience on his face.
"Shall we?"
John stepped into a room that smelt, inexplicably, of tobacco smoke and formaldehyde and somehow – impossibly – it was a pleasant combination. He could easily imagine his life fitting into and around the pieces of the flat, the edges of John and Sherlock settling together to occupy the empty spaces. Beneath and around the piles of books and other random junk were chairs and couches and tables that looked like they were waiting for someone to live in them, comfortably filling rooms that were just the right size.
"Well, this could be very nice," John commented as he continued to examine the homey living area. "Very nice indeed."
"Yes," Sherlock agreed, making a similar inspection himself. "Yes, I think so…my thoughts precisely."
And then they were both speaking and their words fit in and around and on top of each other and John hadn't realized that all of this stuff was Sherlock's so maybe he had better ask. Just to be sure. "So this is all…?" he trailed off, at a loss for words, and gestured hopelessly towards, well, everything.
Sherlock looked embarrassed. "Well, obviously I can–" and here he paused to grab a book off of one stack and place it carelessly on another, "erm–" and now a newspaper was being moved from the couch to the table. "…straighten things up a bit."
John nodded shortly, then resumed his survey of the room. He took in the wallpaper, the couch, the fireplace. After a moment he stopped short, taken aback by the sight that greeted him from the top of the mantel. "That's a skull."
Sherlock seemed unperturbed. "Friend of mine." He tilted his head and tipped one wing up in an odd sort of shrug. "Well, I say 'friend'."
"What do you think, then, Dr. Watson?" John started. Apparently Mrs. Hudson had rejoined them without his noticing. "There's another bedroom upstairs, if you'll be needing two bedrooms."
"Of course we'll be needing two."
"Oh, don't worry, there's all sorts round here. Mrs. Turner next door's got married ones." Mrs. Hudson made a dismissive flapping gesture with her right hand and wing simultaneously, but before John had time to process this statement she was already clucking and fussing over something in the next room. Is that a microscope? On the kitchen table? "Oh, Sherlock, the mess you've made!"
John moved to one of the chairs and settled into it carefully, fighting to keep his balance with his cane at a steep angle in front of him and his wings held off to either side. After a moment he exhaled and sunk back into the cushions before focusing on Sherlock once more. There was a brief stretch of silence, during which the other man paid him no attention whatsoever. Then, quietly, John began to speak again. "I looked you up on the internet last night."
"Anything interesting?"
"Found your website. The Science of Deduction."
"What did you think?"
"You said you could identify a Sentry by his shoes and an Archangel by his lower left primaries."
"Yes, and I can read that you're a halfling in your shoulder and your brother's drinking habits on your mobile phone." As he spoke, Sherlock ghosted towards the windows overlooking the street on the opposite side of the room.
"How?"
"What about these demon attacks then, Sherlock?" Mrs. Hudson interrupted, bustling over to join them. "I thought that'd be right up your street. Three, exactly the same."
"Four," Sherlock said slowly, staring intently out of the window. "There's been a fourth. And there's something different this time."
Worry flashed across Mrs. Hudson's face and she wrapped her wings across her torso in a motion vaguely resembling a hug. "A fourth?"
Someone pounded up the stairs and pushed into the living room. John was struck not so much by his sudden intrusion as by the fact that he was also an angel. He would never have expected to meet one angel in London, much less four who all knew each other.
Sherlock, so apathetic before, seemed alight with barely-contained excitement. "Where?" he demanded.
"Brixton, Lauriston Gardens," the man replied breathlessly, his milky-white wings still half-spread in his rush.
A predatory gleam entered Sherlock's eyes. "What's new about this one? You wouldn't have come to me if something wasn't different."
"You know how they never mark their victims?"
"Yeah."
"This one did. Will you come?"
Sherlock only paused for half a second before replying. "Who's the tracker?"
"Anderson."
"He won't work with me."
John wasn't sure if the other man's wings were shaking with indignation or frustration. Possibly both. "Well, he won't be your assistant."
Sherlock huffed. "I need an assistant."
John would have sworn that the deep breath the man took in an obvious attempt to calm himself created a breeze halfway across the room. "Will you come?"
"Not in a police car. I'll be right behind."
"Thank you."
Their unexpected guest had been gone for less than a second when Sherlock leapt up with newfound energy, delight clearly written across his face. His coat was on and he was halfway out the door before his mouth caught up with the rest of his body. "Brilliant! Yes! Four serial suicides, and now a note. Oh, it's Christmas! Mrs. Hudson, I'll be late. Might need some food."
"I'm your landlady, dear, not your housekeeper," she called after him, her mouth stretched in an exasperated smile but her eyes shining with amusement and fondness.
"Something cold will do," Sherlock hollered in reply. "John, have a cup of tea, make yourself at home. Don't wait up!"
"Look at him, dashing about," Mrs. Hudson admonished, though the maternal expression hadn't left her features. "My husband was just the same. But you're more the sitting-down type, I can tell." Her wings peeled away from her body and fluttered comfortingly in John's direction. "I'll make you that cuppa, you rest your leg."
"Damn my leg!" John shouted, jerking his wings open angrily. He recollected himself almost immediately. "Sorry. I'm so sorry. It's just sometimes, this bloody thing…"
Mrs. Hudson nodded soothingly and stroked her hip with the arch of her wing, tilted low at an angle. "I understand, dear, I've got a hip."
"Cup of tea'd be lovely. Thank you." John managed a polite smile to accompany the words despite his frustration.
"Just this once, dear, I'm not your housekeeper." John could hear her footsteps on the stairs as she returned to her own flat.
"Couple of biscuits too, if you've got 'em."
"Not your housekeeper!" The sound of footsteps was replaced by a faint pitter-patter as water was poured into a kettle, followed by a clatter as the kettle was placed on the stove. The small noises Mrs. Hudson made as she bustled around her kitchen felt familiar, and John felt pleasantly warm at the thought that the kindly landlady was just downstairs, sharing the space without intruding in any way.
John inhaled deeply through his nose as he unfurled the newspaper that had been lying on the low table in front of him. The scents of tobacco and formaldehyde swirled together with those of newsprint and a faint hint of cinnamon, all of which combined to form an unexpectedly comforting smell. The front page featured a picture of the man who had visited their flat just minutes ago, accompanying a story about several similar suicides that had occurred recently all over London. It made sense that mortals would write off demon attacks as suicides, seeing as none of the traces they left were detectable by mortal senses. He licked the corner of his lip and turned the page, a faint voice in the back of his head noting that his skin still tasted of the tomato soup he'd had for lunch.
His thoughts were interrupted, once again, by Sherlock Holmes.
"You're a medic. In fact, you're a medic for the Sentry."
He looked up from the paper, trying to keep his expression nonchalant. "Yes."
"Any good?"
John hauled himself to his feet, decidedly ignoring the too-loud thump of his cane on the floor. "Very good."
"Seen a lot of injuries, then. Violent deaths."
"Well, yes."
"Bit of trouble too, I bet?"
"Of course." And then the sensible part of him caught up with the rest and he wondered for a moment if he shouldn't have said something else. "Yes. Enough for a lifetime. Far too much."
"Want to see some more?"
John didn't hesitate an instant.
"Oh, God yes."
—
They were silent in the taxi for all of about half a minute before Sherlock began to speak. "Okay, you've got questions."
"Yeah. Where are we going?"
"Crime scene. Next?"
"Who are you? What do you do?"
"What do you think?"
"I'd say private detective."
"But?"
"But the police don't go to private detectives."
Sherlock carefully resettled his precisely folded wings and a low rustle filled the cab as their tips brushed the ceiling and the floor simultaneously. "I'm a consulting detective. Only one in the world. I invented the job."
"What does that mean?"
There was an unmistakable scorn in Sherlock's words when he replied, his eyes fixed on the blur of lights rushing past the cab window. "Means when the police are out of their depth – which is always – they consult me."
"The police don't consult amateurs."
Sherlock's voice grew sharp. "When I met you for the first time yesterday, I asked 'Rahe or erithacus?' You looked surprised."
"Yes, how did you know?"
"I didn't know, I saw. Your wing is scarred, but it healed cleanly, which rules out most kinds of demons. Typically those who leave physical wounds leave them infected as well. The location of the injury rules out a few more – chondrichthyes and hyaenidae are built low to the ground, so it's unlikely they'd be able to leave such a deep wound that high up. Uninfected wound, shoulder-level placement: rahe or erithacus. Neither of those species is found near cities; they usually inhabit areas only traveled by the Sentry. But your conversation as you entered the room – 'Bit different from the training center back home' – said trained with Stamford. So, Guardian travelling with the Sentry as a medic, obvious. But medics don't get injured. Guardian instincts and Sentry protocol both dictate that you would flee as soon as a demon showed up, only returning when it had been destroyed to tend the injured. You were in the thick of things, to get injured so badly. That says you have strong Warrior instincts – you wanted to get involved in the battle. Someone trained as a medic but with Warrior tendencies? Clearly a halfling. That also explains why you've been sent to Earth: getting involved in the skirmish would have been strictly against standard procedure. You're usually off-balance when you walk, but you don't ask for a chair when you stand, so your injury's at least partly psychosomatic. Then there's your brother."
"Mm?" John shifted in his seat. Sherlock's burnt cinnamon scent permeated the cab, heady in John's nose and under his skin. Sherlock was the picture of boredom, but a coating of unvoiced excitement pressed heavy and thick against John's skin.
"Your phone. It's expensive, enabled for calling mortals as well as back home. You're looking for a flatshare, you wouldn't buy this unless it was your only way of communicating with someone important to you. Next bit's easy. All of your texts are from the same person: Harry Watson. Clearly a family member who wants to talk to you. You wouldn't have gone to the trouble of investing in service down here for anyone but a relative or significant other, and you're clearly single. Not your father, only a young man would get a phone on Earth. Could be a cousin, but you're a Guardian who can't find a place to live - unlikely you've got an extended family, not one you're close to. So brother it is. Now, why do you need a phone to talk to Harry? Most angels would just communicate telepathically. He's done something to get his telepathy blocked, either temporarily or permanently. It's a rather archaic punishment and the only issue it's commonly used to address today is revealing the existence of angels to a mortal. Nine in ten cases of direct communication with mortals occur with Guardians who get too emotionally attached to someone they're responsible for watching over. He insisted that you buy this phone, so he wants you to stay in touch. You're looking for cheap accommodation, but you're not going to your brother for help – that says you've got problems with him. Maybe you don't approve of his careless conduct with mortals; maybe you don't like his drinking."
John moved again, only slightly – the twitch of a wing, the shifting of weight from right to left – but he could feel Sherlock observing, processing the language spoken by his body. "How can you possibly know about the drinking?"
"Shot in the dark. Good one, though. When a Guardian reveals themselves to one of their mortals, it's almost always under the influence of alcohol; statistically speaking, it's much more likely that he got drunk on multiple occasions building up to the incident. There you go, you were right."
"I was right? Right about what?"
"The police don't consult amateurs."
If John didn't know better he would have said he was high, high on burnt cinnamon and tobacco smoke and formaldehyde. "That was amazing."
Something in Sherlock lit up and John could taste eagerness sparking off of his flesh into the air. "Do you think so?"
"Of course it was. It was extraordinary. Quite extraordinary."
"That's not what people normally say."
"What do people normally say?"
Sherlock chuckled, but his eyes, focused on the streets flying past, were dark with something John couldn't identify. "Piss off."