Author's Note: Here you have it! The next Mycroft POV special in the "A First Time For Everything" series! Shouldn't really be read alone since it deals with Anthea's then boyfriend but I suppose you can, or just go read the series because why not. It was a draw between the rescue and this one and personal preference chose in the end. Also guys, Mycroft is wordy. Seriously, so much wordier than 'Thea! Thank you to everyone who reads, reviews, and follows "A First Time For Everything". This is for you guys. Read, review, and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Clearly I don't own Sherlock. The show is the baby of Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, while Sherlock Holmes itself is the creation of Arthur Conan Doyle.

The First Time Mycroft Met Tim – Mycroft's POV

She didn't need to say anything for him to know. One look at Anthea on Monday morning was enough to see to fault lines in her relationship with the lawyer had become fissures that were beyond repair. To give the girl some credit, she did her best to act like everything was perfectly fine but she was just a little too quiet, took a couple too many sighs, was a little too reflective. Mycroft was going to say anything, why should he? He didn't have any interest in a relationships himself so why should he have to fake interest in someone else's? Not to mention he'd told her near the very beginning of this mess that the relationship was doomed from the start. It was convenient for her, and yet she allowed the man to grow on her the way a fungus might. That was, of course, until she had kicked his filing cabinet. For God's sake, the thing wasn't even stiff. She was merely lost in her own head, therefor had tried to close it at an incorrect angle, and then gotten angry. Mycroft rolled his eyes, huffed, dropped his work and walked over to the cabinet.

"My dear, please do not take your frustrations of your failing relationship out on my cabinets." He said as the girl with the sad eyes watched him. He closed the cabinets with a simple movement – as it should be when you're using the apparatus correctly, and went back to his seat. She'd merely sighed in response and kept working. It was slightly unusual for her.

And then the final guest list for the charity event came in. Mycroft always checked these. You see, so many people could decide to come or cancel at the last minute and totally render your reason for attending void. On that list he found Stephen Burgundy along with four guest tickets. Mycroft pursed his lips as his steel eyes narrowed on the name. So the lawyer's boss was choosing this specific event to treat his four best employees. Fantastic. Usually the man did this later in the year. Mycroft knew this because Burgandy was a man he really couldn't stand – he was so touchy – and therefore tried to avoid like the plague if absolutely possible. Anthea had been looking forward to the event too. She hadn't said anything but it was that slight sparkle returning in her eye when the event came up. Such a shame, they can't risk Burgandy and possibly that boy.

"You've already agreed to go, sir, so it would be weird if we didn't show up." Anthea was leaning forward at her oak desk, arms folded. Her mouth was pouted slightly only to hide her smirk – he never understood what about him amused her.

"It's me, Miss James," Mycroft rolled his eyes. "I avoid parties like the plague. The rich and powerful will hardly be surprised, nor will they take it as a slight." Chocolate eyes scanned Mycroft intensely, searching for some sort of sign as to what he was thinking, as she bit her lip. She closed her eyes briefly and shook her head.

"Why have you changed your mind?" Anthea asked, a frown threatening her smooth forehead.

"Oh, I'm sorry, am I not entitled to do so?" Mycroft scoffed, challenging the girl.

"Since when do you change your mind about anything?" Ah, touché. A valid point indeed, but not check-mate in the slightest.

"It's rare, but it happens." Mycroft spoke playfully. "I once thought that Sherlock would grow out of his ability to get into endless trouble. I changed my mind." He smiled irreverently, wishing the statement was false. Anthea had let the smile come onto her face at that. It was refreshing to see.

Hate would be too strong of a word for Mycroft's dislike of these events, and indifferent wasn't large enough. These events caused Mycroft disdain and discomfort, all the pomp and circumstance, and all the people. Whoever was hosting always tried to show off their wealth as if it prove who was better off in the world. It was ridiculous. This one was certainly one of the worst this year. The room was mediocre at best but they'd tried to make it look more extravagant with garish golden tablecloths and candles to apparently reflect the sunset instead of flowers. It was too much and too over done. But Anthea liked it. The girl in her elegant black dress and silver jewellery that made her look more sophisticated that any lady in the room, and very carefully placed brown curls. The sparkle in those deep brown eyes though, that was the best part, to see just a hint of his mischievous assistant back. She always found a way to make these somewhat bearable, even if it did involve tricking poor saps into getting her their drinks.

Anthea leaned right into Mycroft's personal space and spoke quietly as to not be overheard.

"So how long did you want to spend walking around talking to people before we find a corner or go sit at our table until dinner ends?" She was trying not to smile again and it only made her look far more like she was up to something, it always did. Ah yes, socialising, great. Mycroft took a deep breath as he looked across the room at all the groups of people in black tie.

"Dinner starts in half an hour, so," He mused, pausing to tilt his head as he calculated the minimal time needed, "Fifteen minutes." A soft breathy laugh escaped from Anthea's lips.

"Is that long enough?" She quirked an eyebrow as she too look across the room.

"My dear, it's too long."

And then she had frozen. Anthea's breath caught in her throat and her entire body stiffened slightly. Mycroft follow Anthea's gaze to what he had inferred was on the other side. On the short side, wearing a rather messy and uncleaned suit, short scruffy sandy hair that was due for a trim, deep green eyes filled with a disgusting level of despair as he looked longingly at the woman to Mycroft's side. Mycroft clicked his tongue as he observed.

"Not entirely what I pictured but I was correct when I said he wasn't your type." He was too weak for her, not in terms of gentleness – there was a deep level of gentleness that Mycroft's father had always shown his mother – but in terms of character. It couldn't work. She also seemed to favour men on the taller side, a few of her exes and interests had been men who clearly spent more time at the gym that necessary, and the colouring was all wrong for her choices. Also, he seemed exceedingly unkempt. "The only thing he has going for him as far as you're concerned is intelligence, a busy schedule, and a chance to diversify any possible children." Anthea wasn't listening – which was annoying – she was too busy watching as her lawyer approached, her heartrate increasing.

"What's he doing her?" She whispered to herself but Mycroft chose to answer anyway. After all, he did know the answer.

"Multiple members of his law firm are here." He held back a sigh, coming off very bored instead. That tone will do, it always worked. Anthea's attention was brought back to Mycroft as she looked up, confusion and disbelief in her eyes. She was trying to work out his motivation behind knowing and sharing this information. There was no motive for anything, dear, this is just how it played out.

Tim stopped in front of them, garnering the best smile he could under the circumstances, it was pathetic. Mycroft was just about to roll his eyes and walk away when he got a whiff of something. It was a perfume. A perfume that had approached with the lawyer but did not match Anthea's. Mycroft felt a pang of something at this that he couldn't quite place. Carefully he look the young man up and down. His shirt had not been cleaned but it had been worn recently judging by the stains – it was also where the perfume was coming from. Oh, this was not boding well. He was standing weakly but it was not just from seeing the girl he might as well have broken up with, there was something else there, wasn't there? Embarrassment? Shame? Oh it was shame. Mycroft kept the neutral mask firmly in place as a pit of anger rose up in his stomach and he did his best to extinguish it. So the little lawyer had gone out and slept with another woman and hadn't even tried to clean up the evidence? The little sneak can't be nearly as good at his job as people claim if he let this slip through. How deplorable. How disgusting.

"Hi, Alison." The lawyer spoke softly. Mycroft scoffed at his very tone and took a sip of his drink. He had to look away momentarily.

"Hi, Tim." Anthea sounded so open, so caring, everything she shouldn't be. The lawyer looked at the floor and shuffled his feet – the lie eating him up.

"I've been thinking about you a lot." He shrugged.

"Not enough, apparently." Mycroft mumbled under his breath as he continued to look the other way. If you had been thinking about the brunette with the mischievous smile you wouldn't have slept with the woman with the cheap perfume. Both members of the fracture couple looked up to him, Tim confused, Anthea unsure.

"Sorry, sir?" Anthea questioned. Pretending as if nothing had happened, Mycroft raised his eyebrows and feigned confusion.

"Hmmm?" He questioned lightly, looking from person to person. Anthea scrunched up her nose and frowned. Now she chose to use her skills, did she? On the lawyer? No! On her boss? Absolutely.

'"You said something." Mycroft pouted and shook his head, keeping the act together.

"You must have misheard, my dear." Time laughed at this, smiling fondly at boss and personal assistant. As if he had been privy to stories of their interactions. As if he had a right to know if this was common behaviour. The snake.

"You must be Mr. H-."

"Tim. I see you've already found your way to the most influential people in the room." Burgandy in all his short, fat, oily glory came over and patted the slightly taller young man on the shoulder. Burgandy was every reason Mycroft could hate a person all wrapped up in a too short and too wide package. He was completely immoral, corrupt, sleazy, filthy, touchy, and loud. There was so much to hate about him that his body couldn't contain it and it began escaping his body through every orifice and pore it could in the form of oil and sweat. To give Tim his dues, the boy seemed to dislike the blob as much as Anthea and Mycroft. "That's networking at its finest." Burgandy boasted in his way too loud voice that made Mycroft want to visibly flinch. He looked up to Mycroft and smiled a grin that had too much of a gum to teeth ratio. "Let me formally introduce you, Tim Burgess, this is Mycroft Holmes." Tim, looking entirely embarrassed by his boss now, held out his hand to Mycroft.

"Mr. Holmes, I've heard a lot about you." He smiled, trying to suck up. Mycroft couldn't touch him, couldn't even humour anyone by taking the lawyer's hand. If he did, he'd need to wash it straight after. Instead he faked a smile – not his best, his contempt was definitely seeping through but he hadn't tied to cover it up. Tim seemed to accept the lack of handshake as one of those 'Mr. Holmes' quirks he's probably heard from 'Alison' as he let his hand slip to his side and smile at the girl. Anthea shook her head, clearly embarrassed. Oh, Anthea.

"And this is-" Burgandy stopped talking as he gestured to Anthea, a brief look of confusion crossed his face. He laughed as he stuffed his sweaty hands into his pants pockets. "That all depends. Who are you tonight?" Anthea gulped, Tim frowned, and Mycroft looked faintly amused. Oh this should be interesting. Mycroft had always told Anthea this would come back to bite her.

"Elizabeth." The PA answered, a very polite smile on her glossed lips. Tim's eyes sparkled with confusion and a tad of anger as he tilted his head.

"You're 'Elizabeth' today?" The lawyer's voice came off shrill and almost hurt Mycroft's ears as he attempted to sound light and friendly. What gives this thing the right to be offended?

"I saw her in court once and her name was Annie. Another time a paralegal called her Margaret." Tim mouthed an 'Oh' but no sound came out. This was getting intense. Too much raw emotion, too much talking, too many people he wanted to rip apart. It was time to find a reason to get out of this conversation. Mycroft looked into his glass and took a deep breath.

"Excuse me," He sighed, edging away from the group of emotional people. "There are far more people here who demand my attention." He turned on his heels and walked away. First thing first was to get a new drink and catch his breath. After that he'd feign interest in other people while staying within earshot of his personal assistant. He needed to know what the lawyer was up to.

He'd managed to completely collect himself to deal with people again and made a few circles around the room when something caught his attention. It was the ever so slightly raised voice of his personal assistance, and it was the first time he'd ever really heard true distress in it. It was off-putting to say the least.

"Jamie doesn't even know about that. Why would I tell you that when I haven't told her?" They were in the corner of the room trying to be unnoticed – failing of course, but most people here were so self-involved that they wouldn't care.

"That's why I'm not allowed to meet Jamie!" Ugh, Jamie. Mycroft rolled his eyes and moved closer back to the bar. Who would want to meet the over excited bubble of a girl, anyway? There were three things that blonde thing had going for her. The first was that she certainly wasn't a complete idiot – Mycroft had looked into her grades and despite her choice to go into beauty she'd done well enough that should could hold a conversation that wasn't entirely mind numbing. The second was that she was open – during Anthea's kidnapping she'd happily co-operated with anyone asking for information, after berating Mycroft for 'kidnapping' her, of course. The third was she was that she seemed to keep Anthea sane and was her line to 'the real world'. That was all the blonde thing was good for. Tim should count himself lucky.

"How can I even know if anything you are saying is true?" What was that? Was that the lawyer complaining about honesty? He'd missed the rest of what the boy had been saying due to an elderly couple laughing besides him. Perhaps it was best to stay close to his assistant, monitor her safety.

Mycroft had turned around in time to see Anthea leaning against one of the tables, her eyes dead set on the candles. There was grief in her eyes and if Mycroft was one who left his emotions out of check in might have torn at him a little.

"-why would I lie about something so personal?" Her voice was full of ache. The grief in her eyes and voice, about something personal… Ah, her parents. So the lawyer had gone for the jugular and questioned her parents' deaths. So it was perfectly fine to not tell your partner that you haven't been faithful since you last saw them, but god forbid you have a fake name for a dangerous job! If you have a fake name for a job, then surely you must be lying about something that clearly still haunts you every day. Idiot. Buffoon. The lawyer placed his hands on Anthea's bare shoulders and gently turned her to face him, his face anguished – he'd realised what he had done.

"No, Ali." Oh, he was apologizing, boring. Mycroft walked further away to find a seat to watch the rest from. "Was that Fergie?" Tim's shill voice rang in Mycroft's ear. Oh, did Sarah just acknowledge Anthea? Hmm, perhaps he wasn't going anywhere quiet yet. Perhaps here where he could see and hear everything was the best place to stay. "Did Fergie just smile at you? Do you know Fergie?" Mycroft closed his eyes and tried to keep the distain off of his face. Did the boy really just verbalise the same question three times? What a waste of oxygen. Mycroft watched as Anthea pulled a face and shrug. She was trying to stay perfectly calm and in control but the girl was shaking faintly.

"What?" She scoffed. Ah, good, some backbone. Good girl. "She prefers to deal with me than Mycroft. Which is fine because Mr. Holmes would rather delegate her scandals to other people anyway." Mycroft pouted. Absolutely true, but not necessarily for anyone else's ears, my dear. Tim ran a hand through his sandy brown hair and shook his head, exasperated. The boy looked on the verge of exploding in emotions and Anthea was doing all she could to hold her calm persona together. Perhaps now would be a good time to intermediate. Mycroft wouldn't be saving the girl, merely offering a distraction. He walked closer to the pair.

"Who are you?" The lawyer inhaled sharply, further demonstrating his frustration, Anthea blinked and sighed, showing how she was barely together.

"Miss James." Mycroft called from a distance, intervening. He gestured her over with a smooth flick of his hand. He watched as her face visibly relaxed and the shaking dissipated slightly.

"Got to go," Anthea sighed to Tim. "The lord has summoned." The lord? Mycroft clicked his tongue and looked away. Anthea and her jokes, really. She smiled and the lawyer gave the most pitiful attempt of a smile the whole world has ever seen before Anthea returned back to the safety of Mycroft's side.

Dinner itself was doomed from the start. As it so turned out Mycroft and Anthea were seated at the same table as the self-righteous little lawyer and one of his lawyer buddies. Mycroft could barely stand to be this close to the smell of the cheap name brand knockoff perfume without feeling physically ill. The boy sat their all night with a sulk on his face, the weight of the world on his shoulders while Anthea did her best to enjoy the company of all the other mind numbingly boring people around the table. See, this is why Mycroft hated these events and didn't want to come. And yes, hate wasn't too strong of a word at this point. Mycroft could see the lie in everything that lawyer did, every little movement shouted of hypocrisy. Lawyers, they thought they could get away with anything. Please. Dessert arriving signalled the light at the end of the tunnel. Soon he'd be able to get in the car and go home. Home where it was quiet and people weren't idiotic, and loud, and completely transparent. Home, away from this being that filled Mycroft with utter contempt.

"So," The owner of a line of banks spoke with his mouth full of chocolate fondant. Mummy would have chided the man then and there for such manners. "Anyone have any good dinner games?" It was almost like the figurative lightbulb actually went off in Mycroft's head as he perked up. Perhaps this would be an opportunity to get rid of the foul taste in his mouth and return it to the recipient.

"Actually, I do." Mycroft hummed excitedly, placing the spoon down in preparation. Anthea was watching his with uneasy but interested eyes. "Elizabeth and I play a quite interesting game where we like to guess peoples' secrets purely using our senses, don't we, my dear?" He smiled at her, the neutral mask had slipped to show his confidence and playfulness – a dangerous mix for a Holmes. Anthea's facial expression became something of a mix between confusion and enjoyment. She was trying to find the endgame already.

"Sure," She laughed uneasily. "We do when we're bored, yeah." She shrugged as she tried to explain to the rest of the table. Mycroft crossed his legs and folded his hands on his lap.

"Why don't we demonstrate on one of our fellow guests?" He asked playfully. Mycroft ran his tongue over his teeth as he pretended to look over the guests, acting as if he was trying to choose a participant. He landed on Tim with a sly smile. "Like our lawyer friend, here?" Now it was Anthea's turn to put her spoon down. She hadn't discovered endgame but she had discovered the motif.

"Okay." She breathed.

"Oh, this could be fun." A woman clasped her hands together in excitement like the cliché most of these people were. Tim accepted the challenge quite gracefully – with a nod and relaxing into the back of his chair.

"So, Elizabeth, this gentleman has the unkempt and emotional looking state of someone who is on the outs with his girlfriend, wouldn't you say?" Mycroft narrowed his eyes and bit his lips as if he were truly trying to deduce the boy. He was taking a page out of Sherlock's book and making a little bit of a game from this – he'd enjoy breaking the lawyer to pieces. Anthea joined in with the false deductions, tilting her head and looking her boyfriend up and down very carefully. She was always one for humouring Mycroft's whims.

"I'd say so." She agreed in a pensive tone. "On a break for just under a month if I had to guess." Mycroft hummed.

"He looks like the type of man who is generally very loyal. Perhaps he doesn't enjoy secrets." Anthea scoffed – obviously at the memory of the argument the two just had which was Mycroft's point in bringing it up in the first place. Also to give the lawyer a hint to where he was going, strike a little fear into him.

"Probably due to how many secrets and lies he has to make and keep being a lawyer, sir." Oh Anthea, why are you making excuses for him? You don't ever need to make excuses up for someone's behaviour towards you. People act the way they do because they're people.

"Quite." Mycroft nodded, accepting her response like a good improviser does anyway. "Unfortunately, I'd have to call him a hypocrite." Anthea frowned and Tim leaned forward, both placing their full attention on the man playing deductions.

"What?" Tim laughed as a nervous deflection.

"How do you mean?" Anthea turned back to look at Tim, chocolate eyes searching deep green ones. Time for a Sherlock sized explanation. It had been a long time since Mycroft had done this.

"This suit of his is clearly his only formal outfit. Judging by his overall appearance and the very faint stains around the cuffs he is one of those people who do not wash their formal attire after every use, but rather after a certain amount of time." Mycroft scowled at the thought, the bank owner laughed. "I can infer for multiple reasons that he only wore this last week, and I'm about to make a stab in the dark here," Mycroft raised his hands as if to say 'hold on' but Anthea would be able to see through this very un-Holmsian action. "But bear with me. If I happened to know what scent his girlfriend preferred – say a Chanel number 5 bought duty free on the way back from a business trip to Paris-" On the first trip Anthea had picked up three bottles and Mycroft had rolled his eyes. On his next solo trip, Mycroft picked up one for her anyway. "I would like to hazard a guess that the perfume I have been smelling all over his shirt from the moment he greeted us this evening is most definitely not one she'd ever consider wearing." Anthea's face went blank. Her eyes flickered with a dark fire and her eyebrow quirked as she looked Tim dead in the eyes. The boy looked like he was standing in front of a firing squad. "I would love to be the one to tell his girlfriend that her self-righteous and 'wonderfully easy' boyfriend had slept with another woman a week ago, but unfortunately I do not have the luxury of knowing the young lady."

"Is that so?" Anthea's scoffed. Her voice was steady as a rock but as she picked up her scotch and downed the last drab of it her hands were shaking. Her face was filled with confusion and multiple emotions fought for control over her eyes. She didn't look like she could verbalise what was occurring in her head and that was extremely concerning. Huh. Mycroft may have underestimated his assistant's ability to be subjective and/or her sensitivity to emotions and attachment. That was… not good? Tim just looked between Mycroft and Anthea, wide eyes and mouth agape to let bugs fly in.

"Good for you, Tim!" The other lawyer sitting next to Tim spoke, breaking Mycroft out of his observation of Anthea as he looked over. "This girlfriend has been giving Tim the run around since the beginning. Nice to see you moving on." While he understands the concept of a friend being supportive, this comment cause Mycroft to sneer at the pure distaste of it. Pathetic little man having to put his two cents into the conversation. Anthea laughed, but the laugh was full of pain and it hurt a little.

"Excuse me." She said as she stood up. The brunette almost faltered as she had to lean against the table to steady herself, curls falling to cover her face as she looked down upon the table. "I think I need to make a phone call outside." She picked up her handbag and began walking to the door. Tim's eyes followed her with a desperate pleading look that made Mycroft want to rip his throat out. He stood up, planting his own hands on the table and made to chase Mycroft's personal assistant.

"If you value your life I'd suggest you sit back down, Mr. Burgess." Mycroft growled in a low tone, steel eyes on the lawyer in question. The boy looked at Mycroft for a long minute before gulping and sitting down.

"Someone needs to go check on her." He mumbled quietly. Mycroft looked down at his scotch glass and chuckled.

"And if you think I'm going to let that person be you, you have another thing coming." He looked up and smiled at Tim. "I'd rather be tied to a post while rabid dogs ate me alive than let you anywhere near that woman tonight and I will do everything in my power to ensure this. Do you understand, Mr. Burgess?" The lawyer's face drained of colour and he nodded.

"And here I was thinking she exaggerated about you."

"If anything, Tim the lawyer, she would have downplayed me."

He thought he'd given her enough time to pull herself together and if he was honest with himself he'd only expected he to need a breather in the first place. This was not what he had been expecting when he walked outside the building.

Mycroft Holmes had found his stoic, mischievous, compose assistant on her knees in the parking lot – sobbing so hard he wasn't sure how she was breathing, her curls bouncing in her face with every hard breath. Mycroft felt a pang in his chest as he watched. There was so much sadness and pain in her every move and every attempt at breathing, she looked so small and so broken. It's a very interesting thing to see someone so strong and so beautiful broken into pieces. It was terrifying. He watched in confusion and sadness for a moment, just to let her be, before he stepped forward. Unsure of what one is meant to do to try and fix a broken human being, Mycroft stayed a few metres back. Having obviously heard him, Anthea looked up at the night sky and gave that heart breaking laugh once more as she shook her head.

"You know, you're a dick. You know that, right?" She looked over her shoulder at him in disdain and contempt. Mycroft didn't flinch, he'd been called much worse. She laughed again at his stoic response as she got to her feet. "You've known all night what he'd done." Her deep dark eyes were glossed over with tears. "You knew, and instead of taking me aside and telling me quietly or waiting until we leave you had to go and be a Holmes about it and turn it into a big scene just to make yourself look good." To make himself look good? That's not what he was trying to do. As Holmsian – an apparently inappropriate – as his response was, Mycroft was not in the market of making himself look good.

"Anthea-" She held her hand up as soon as Mycroft had opened his mouth. Mycroft closed his mouth immediately. Anthea walked further into the parking lot, he back to Mycroft. She placed her hands on her hips and looked out to the cars. He could see her trying to piece herself together.

"I always thought I just dated idiots." She sighed. "But no, I create them." Her breath hitched as she tried not to cry. Mycroft considered taking a step forward but found his feet planted firmly to the asphalt. "I take genuinely nice, funny, and smart guys, and turn them into horrible people." She shrugged to herself and turned back to face Mycroft. He didn't want to look at the anguish in those eyes that usually sparked of ideas and snarky remarks, but he couldn't look away just as he couldn't move. "That's why I am like the only person in the world who can stand you. You are the king of the arseholes and I create arseholes." If Mycroft was another person that comment might have hurt. Again, he'd been called much, much worse. It might have made his eye twitch, however. "We're the perfect team. The perfect team of horrible, horrible people." Anthea sounded breathy as she fought back the tears some more. She looked so small in the dead of night, so broken. "This is entirely my fault."

"Oh, please." Mycroft scoffed, unable to hold his tongue at the absurdity of such a statement. How was the infidelity of that weak man at all her own fault? She was better off taking out on Mycroft for his apparent bad timing. She pointed at him with her painted nail, an anger sparkling behind the tears in her eyes.

"Don't talk down to me, please, Mycroft, Not now, don't do this." She never called him Mycroft. Ever. He took a breath and silenced himself, watching her. "If I had just let him move into my stupid big place that you made me get then this wouldn't have happened. We'd be fine." If she had let that lawyer move it things would have worked out? Oh, Anthea, now you're putting the blame in entirely the wrong places. Mycroft found the ability to shift his feet long enough to take a step forward.

"And what would that have accomplished, Alice?" He asked genuinely and sincerely in a calm tone. "It would have bought the relationship another six months at the most. This was never going to work." He tried his best not to sound superior or as if he was talking down to her. He tried his best to sound like he was giving her pure facts with no opinion attached. "You were with him because it was easy, living with him would not have been easy." Anthea's eyes search Mycroft's as tears began to fall from her eyes. She quickly wiped them away with her thumb. He wanted to step forward again but couldn't. "He'd have changed your entire life and you, my dear, would have resented that. You would have looked at this man who you were only slightly attracted to and seen him as an anchor." Her eyes still searched his. She was searching for a lie in his words, or perhaps looking for the hint of disdain that should be there when Mycroft Holmes speaks. She was looking for doubt.

"But then we could have broken up on good terms and he wouldn't have slept with someone else."

Oh, Alice.

Mycroft pursed his lips and shook his head.

"No, he wouldn't have." It was the truth and she did deserve it. Anthea's body fell forward slightly as she laughed and cried at the same time.

"You were right," She sobbed. "We shouldn't have come. God, why are you always right?" She shook her head as she looked back at Mycroft. His lips pulled slightly at the edges as he shrugged.

"It's a burden, but someone must bare it." And Anthea laughed, she only laughed. It was still pained but the spark was ever so faintly there. As quick as the spark was back, however, it was gone. She folded her arms tight around her chest, cradling herself, and sighed.

"You know, you and Sherlock have it right. No relationships, no emotions, no attachments. Life would be so much easier." Mycroft hummed as he looked Anthea up and down. But Anthea, you don't see the point, do you? Mycroft and Sherlock avoid emotions and attachments because they cause pain. They cannot afford to have pain in their way of lives. Emotional attachments slowed you down. Imagine in Anthea gave up emotional attachments. No long conversations with Jamie that lifted her spirits and gave her an extra bounce in her step the next day. No connecting to John so he would be less angry to be picked up for a talk. No bond with James and Carol so they would leap at the chance to help her. No reason to get overly excited because your boss gave you his copy of Le Fantome de l'Opera. She couldn't handle it. She lived on emotional energy, that's why she was a good actress. She wouldn't survive a week in this cold frigid environment when she was heat.

"Can we leave now?" Her soft broken voice broke Mycroft out of his thoughts. "I just want to go home." Mycroft immediately got him phone out.

"My dear, I wanted to leave hours ago." He never wanted to come in the first place.

It was hours later that Mycroft was at home sitting in an arm chair in deep thought as he would at the club. Truthfully, he should have gone to bed already, but it wouldn't affect his mental capacity to stay up a little longer. He had a feeling tonight would be a tad of a fitful sleep.

His phone buzzed in his trouser pockets.

Sorry I yelled at you earlier tonight, sir. I don't blame you, you were just being you. I don't blame Tim or myself either. It was just a shock. – A.

Oh, the girl knew him too well. She'd clearly begun to piece herself together if she was texting him. She'd probably, much to Mycroft's chagrin, spoken to Tim. Or Jamie. Hopefully she'd spoken to Jamie already. He pursed his lips and formulated a response, something light.

My dear, it's already filed under "emotional outburst I don't understand" and filed away. Diogenes Office tomorrow. – M.H.

Mycroft Holmes doesn't talk for purely frivolous reasons, might as well slip some work into it.

IOU one "People are stupid and I hate them" rant in return. Dungeon it is. – A.

The side of Mycroft's mouth pulled into the faintest of smiles. Her humour was there, that was a good sign. He might as well go along with it, keep her mood elevated if she were to get any sleep.

Pencil that rant in for our next meeting with the defence secretary. – M.H.

Next Wednesday at 4pm, got it. Will it be a five point argument or more? – A.

I'll spare you and keep to the top three. – M.H.

You're so considerate. – A.

If anyone else were in the house they would have heard a single laugh escape Mycroft's mouth.

I try. – M.H.

Author's Note: What do you think? Does it change any opinions on the original chapter? Did you enjoy it? I hope you did. Thank you to everyone who reads any of my work – I appreciate and love the support very much. Anyone who follows me on twitter or Tumblr will know how often I gush about the support around "A First Time For Everything". Just thank you! Let me know if you liked this!