John Hamish Watson perched nervously on the edge of a large chair in the dark burgundy head teacher's office of Elmwood House School.

Yet another intimidating office in an intimidating new school full of intimidating people with fake smiles and very real stares. The large mahogany desk in this particular office only served to intimidate John further as he silently prayed that this would be the final time that he would have to go through this terrifying process.

Military brat. It came with the territory.

John's pensive thoughts were interrupted by a rapid tapping of papers and a clear, booming voice emanating from the ham-faced headmaster sat behind the desk.

"Well, everything seems to be in order John. I've placed you in Mr Lestrade's tutor group-he'll make sure you feel quite welcome here at-Come in!"

The heavy door opened to reveal a wiry-framed young man of around eighteen years old wearing pristine school uniform and carrying a smart black umbrella.

"Mycroft" the headmaster smiled. "Perfect timing as always. John Watson, this is Mycroft Holmes, our Head Boy. If you wouldn't mind escorting John to room 221B so he can get acquainted with his new classmates, I'd be very grateful." The young man smiled as the headmaster rose to shake John's hand.

"Welcome to Elmwood House John"

John gazed at his rather imposing surroundings as Mycroft led him through the old school halls, pausing occasionally to point out one of a number of grand oil or gesture with his umbrella to highlight a piece of notable architecture.

After what seemed like an age, Mycroft paused in front of a classroom labelled 221B, giving a thin smile as he pushed the door open, whereupon a room full of judgemental adolescent eyes turned to face the pair standing in the doorway. John could feel his face flush pink under his newly cropped haircut as he made his way to the only empty seat in the room and sat down.

In the seat next to John was a tall, slim boy with alabaster skin and a mass of dark curls that framed high, defined cheekbones set on a slender face,eyes narrowing as he fixed his gaze on Mycroft in the doorway.

"I must apologise for the rudeness of my little brother has a tendency to be rather…insufferable in my presence"

The boy rolled his eyes.

"Teen angst I suppose you could call it. I hope you're above all that nonsense John"

John smiled nervously as a voice next to him spoke in a low, velvety tone.

"Mycroft"

"Try to be…pleasant, Sherlock"

This was met with a sarcastic smile, which Mycroft duly returned.

"All the best John" Mycroft said in a manner that, for reasons he couldn't quite place, unnerved John as he watched Mycroft sweep out of the classroom.

There was a brief and intensely awkward silence before everyone returned to chatting, texting, sleeping or urgently doing forgotten homework, and John turned his head to the boy he took to be Sherlock, who was now typing out an impossibly quick text message on a black iPhone 5s.

John,realising that no-one seemed to be paying any attention to him, decided to introduce himself and cleared his throat nervously.

"Hi,I'm-"

"Army or RAF?"

John stared at Sherlock, his jaw falling open and eyebrows crinkling as he questioned what he'd just heard.

"I'm sorry, what di-"

"Your father. Is he in the Army or the RAF?"

"Army…I'm sorry, how the hell did you kno-"

A rapid scraping back of chairs drowned out the remainder of John's sentence as the classroom door was flung open by the lively shove of a tall, well built man with ruffled hair flecked with grey, causing the whole classroom to stand up.

"Morning guys!" the man smiled as he spoke, taking broad strides as he entered the room and dumped a mug of coffee on the desk. "Sit down,sit down". He turned and smiled at John. "Ah you must be John.I see you've already met Sherlock…don't mind him if he's being all mysterious or…whatever it is he does." He continued,ignoring the smirk that had formed on Sherlock's face. "I'm Mr. Lestrade, and I'll be your form tutor for the next two years.I'll come and chat to you in just a moment, but first I need to register this lot"

As Mr Lestrade began to call the register, John tried to attach names to faces and store them for later reference. He wasn't having much luck, the only name sticking in his mind being that of Molly-a girl with mousy hair and a brightly coloured chunky scarf who had drifted into a daydream and required her name to be called twice before she awkwardly mumbled "yes sir" and began twitching her scarf through her hands- until a clear voice directly behind him uttered "Yes sir" in response to the name of Mary Morstan. John turned to face the voice, and was greeted by the smile of a young woman running her fingers through short, ash blonde hair that gently caught the sunlight from the neighbouring window.

Wow.

WOW.

She was cute.Very cute. Gorgeous, even, with blue-grey eyes that sparkled in the warm light and a smile that caught John off guard as he noticed the jewels on a small hairpin stuck-

"Hi?"

John shook himself from his thoughts.

"Are you alright?" Mary said slowly, smiling puzzledly.

God, had he really been staring that long?Jesus Christ, this was awkward.

"Uh, yeah,I'm fine…just…uh…."

A hand was outstretched for him to shake.

"Mary Morstan."

"John Watson"

"Hi" she smiled, near-laughing at John's awkwardness as a rapid blush spread across his face.

"…and John Watson, so that's all of us!" John turned away to face the front of the room once again as Mr Lestrade placed a small hardback diary emblazoned with the school logo and covered in some sort of leather-look material and a black lever arch file on John's desk.

Casually sitting on the edge of the desk, he spoke to John in a confident and friendly manner.

"Right then, let's get you sorted out. Looks like your first lesson is Biology- room 110A. I'll find someone to come over there with you-Molly,you've got Biology first haven't you? Great. And Sherlock, you have too?" Sherlock nodded with an odd formality as Mr. Lestrade glanced at his watch.

"Crap, you guys had better be off or else I'll make you late again. Sherlock, Molly, take John over to Biology, and if someone wouldn't mind showing him to his next lesson after break too? See you later guys-and good luck John." Mr Lestrade said as the rest of the class left for their first lesson.

Walking along the large corridors, John walked in-between Molly and Sherlock while Molly nervously chattered nineteen to the dozen, asking a million questions and generally acting in the manner of a Jack Russell puppy as John tried to take everything in. Suddenly stopping dead, Molly gasped and pawed around her neck urgently.

"I left my scarf in room 221B! Damn, I'm going to have to go back…I'll be late again….John, follow Sherlock. He'll get you there. See you later!" And with that, Molly dashed down the corridor, leaving John to scurry towards Sherlock Holmes, who hadn't stopped during this brief pause.

The taller boy's eyes flicked across to glance at John as he eventually caught up to him, and the pair walked together in silence until John's curiosity eventually got the better of him.

"Uh..hi,uh…Sherlock is it?Yeah hi, I'm John Watson, I didn't really get the chance to introduce myself earlier…" Much to John's surprise, Sherlock smiled and extended a hand for John to shake.

"Pleasure to meet you John."

" , listen, I was just wondering…how you…uh…"

"Wondering what?" Sherlock's head sharply turned in John's direction, and John could sense something in his tone that suggested Sherlock wasn't used to being asked such questions. The short pause that followed was broken by the sudden appearance of Molly, nearly tripping over her feet, scarf and god knows what else as she rushed to catch up with the boys.

"Found it!Turns out it just fell off back down the hallway." and Molly was off, chattering away in her own endearing manner until they eventually reached room 110A. Upon entering the room, Molly showed John towards a large white bag rack in the far right-hand corner of the room, simultaneously shoving her bag and scarf into one of the slots and calling to a friend other side of the room to make sure that a seat could be saved for her. Meanwhile, Sherlock sauntered to the back of the room, pulled out a chair from underneath a wood-topped lab bench and retrieved his folder, clipped to which was an expensive-looking fountain pen. John retrieved his own stationary, and was just copying Sherlock's action of flipping open his folder when the door was pushed open by a middle-aged blonde carrying a labcoat.

John jumped as the cover of Sherlock's folder almost immediately clicked shut.

"Oh, do we not need those?" John queried.

"As it transpires, were going to be carrying out an experiment today, but looking at Mrs Charlotteson,it turns out we'll be watching a documentary- something about fish, I would wager" Sherlock unhesitatingly retorted in a quick, silken voice that caught John off guard.

"Uh…why?"

"Mrs Charlotteson has discovered,within the last 15-no, 10 minutes that her husband has been having an affair with his secretary." Sherlock chuckled dangerously. "Took her long enough, they've been at it since mid-June last year".

John's jaw fell open as he stared at Sherlock, who was now opening his leather satchel to stuff his folder inside.

"Ok can you please tell me-"

"Tell you what?"

"How on earth you-"

John was cut off by the weary voice of Mrs Charlotteson.

"Good morning a very special good morning to our newcomer at the back here." She smiled weakly and gestured vaguely in John's direction. "Could someone please fetch John a textbook?Thank you, Molly dear. Now, I'm afraid due to…unforeseen circumstances, I've had to postpone our experiment until next 'll be watching Wonders of The Deep for today."

John just caught the vague flicker of a smile creep across Sherlock's face as the classroom lights plinked off.