"It looks familiar… as if in a dream, or a dream of a dream…"
The Lion, The Witch, & The Wardrobe; movie version
If you know what happens in the future, can you alter it?
Location: Unknown, Time: Unknown.
Sherlock could distinctly hear a sound. It was faint, but he heard it: the sound of a woman crying. Turning around a corner in the covered alleyway he was standing in, he saw a woman lying slouched against a wall, blood trickling down her side from a gunshot wound.
"I trusted you, Sherlock, and you failed me. You failed! I loved you, as much as any human being could. Do you hear me: I loved you. And now, you've failed. That homicidal maniac is loose again, and may the Good Lord help us if he goes rampaging again with those cursed circus freaks."
Sherlock felt stunned at the woman's harsh words. Sure, people had called him a freak -and worse-, but to hear the dreaded words, 'you failed' snarled at him made him feel as if he'd been hit in the stomach with a ton of bricks. The sound of pattering feet reached his ears, but before he could look up, an earsplitting gunshot pierced the night air. Looking down at the now-lifeless form of the woman and back up in the direction that the shot had been fired, Sherlock noticed a man standing but a few feet away.
"Beware false prophets that come to you in sheep's clothing, but inside, are ravenous wolves," The stranger warned, and, with a snarl, turned into a wolf, and lunged straight for Sherlock's throat.
Omni Hotel, Room 111, Corpus Christi, Texas, U.S., 1:01 a.m.
"Sherlock! Sherlock! Sherlock!"
Sherlock opened his eyes. John was standing over him, a worried look on his face, appearing as if about to shake the daylights out of his friend.
"You were dreaming again."
Slowly -more like reluctantly-, Sherlock pushed himself up into a sitting position, rubbing his face with his hands.
"The same dream every single night. It's so strange. I wonder…if it means something," He mumbled, still drowsy with sleep.
John stared at the sleuth like he had carrots growing out of his ears.
"The same dream, every single night…" he echoed.
"Yes." There was a pause.
"Would you like to talk about this, this, dream of yours?"
"Okay… um, I'm standing in an alleyway, and there's an injured woman lying on the ground…"
"Uh-huh; what did she look like?"
Sherlock paused, that faraway look he got when he began thinking deeply coming into his eyes. "Blond hair, brown streaks, natural coloring; normal height is about five feet, three inches, but she was wearing three-inch heels, making her look more like six feet; white t-shirt with an eagle emblem on it; pair of blue jeans. But why on earth was she wearing heels with such casual clothing? Maybe-"
"Okay, what happened next?" John interrupted before Sherlock could complete his train of thought.
"Oh! Right, she began jabbering on and on about how I'd…failed her."
"Failed her? What did you fail?"
"Apparently, catching a person that had committed homicide, and, uh… love."
"Love? Love? Sherlock Holmes, in love?"
"I must say she was in love me; thank you very much!" Sherlock retorted hotly, not realizing what he was saying.
"But didn't you just say-"
"NEVER MIND WHAT I SAID!"
Both Sherlock and John were surprised at the sudden outburst; Sherlock was surprised that he'd been so flustered with John's mention of the word 'love' one too many times that he had actually shouted, and John was surprised that no other slumbering hotel-go-er (whatever they were called) had been apparently awakened.
"Never mind, old boy, continue." John mumbled, almost under his breath.
"After this woman had finished speaking, she was shot."
"Shot?"
"Yes; shot. And the man that had shot her said to me, 'Beware false prophets that come to you in sheep's clothing, but inside are ravenous wolves'. Then, believe it or not, he turned into a wolf, and jumped at me. Then I woke up."
"Interesting…"
"Oh well, it probably doesn't mean anything."
"Doesn't mean anything!" John cried incredulously. "You've been having the same dream over and over; maybe it does mean something!"
"I've just, been under stress, that's all."
"What do you mean, 'under stress'?"
"I've just been so bored lately!"
"You do realize we went on holiday, and, might I add, in another country, simply to break up your daily routine, don't you?"
"Yes I do, and I'm grateful for that. Maybe I just need to go back to sleep."
"Maybe you do!" John muttered irritably.
But Sherlock discovered he could not go back to sleep. His brain longed for work to do. He was like a Border collie: he needed constant stimulation and activity to stay happy. And one could only be so stimulated by staring at the ceiling or listening to the deep, rhythmic breathing of sleep. So, to work his brain a little, he began thinking about his dream again. He'd never seen that woman before in his life, so it wasn't someone he knew; don't you usually dream about people you know? He wondered if the man that had shot the woman was the "homicidal maniac". And what on earth could the "circus freaks" be? Perhaps they were literal members of a circus run amok. But Sherlock had learned not to take everything literally. Running these problems through his head, he finally fell asleep.
Brush-country of Backwater, Texas, 2:05 p.m. the next day
The scruffy-haired midget had no idea how he'd let himself be intimidated into working for a man like Harry "Wolf" Reid, a man with mass homicide hanging over his head.
Nonetheless, he'd been persuaded, bribed, and then finally threatened into being the eye in the sky for the criminal; his friends didn't call him "Gullible Gary" for nothing. And poor Gary: here he was, marching up to Wolf (who'd earned his nickname for his love of training wolf hybrids) with news of the latest developments on a particular subject; he'd no idea what, or who.
"Uh, sir?"
There he was: Harry, in the flesh, one of those terrible mongrels at his side.
Harry gave an exasperated sigh.
"What is it now, Gary?"
"News." Gary tentatively handed Harry an envelope. Harry snatched it away with an air of irritation and impatience. He tore it open and proceeded to read the paper previously inside. Gradually, he began to look even more angry and frustrated, and he balled the paper up in his hands and tossed it across the room. The wolf hybrid heard and saw it touch ground again; upon discovering the paper wasn't food, it trotted back to its master's side.
"W- what's the news, uh, uh, s-say?" Gary stammered.
"Our subject is planning to hire a specialist to hunt me down and have me…"
"Have you what, sir?"
"Have me executed."
Omni Hotel, Room 111, Corpus Christi, 11:00 a.m.; earlier
John had finally convinced himself that it was time to get his lazy behind out of bed. As his feet hit the floor, he realized Sherlock wasn't in the room. Upon investigation, John noticed he wasn't in the bathroom or balcony, either. Nor was his phone on the bedside table. John was considering sending his friend a text message when he recalled Sherlock leaving the room earlier, saying that he'd be in the breakfast lounge "if you need me". Poor old John, only half-awake at the time, had simply rolled over and gone back to sleep.
After getting dressed as fast as he could, he hurried down to the breakfast lounge. He found Sherlock slouched in a chair, phone pressed to one ear.
"Yes, yes, yes, of course, absolutely. The best time to meet… um, you know what, let me get back to you on that, I'm getting ready to eat breakfast here in a moment so… what? Oh okay, I will! Chow, chow chow chow!"
This was the conversation that greeted John as he sat down, and as soon as Sherlock had finally hung up, he asked,
"Whom were you talking to?"
"A girl named Molly Mallard. Says she wants my help to track down a man that's committed mass homicide."
"Mass homicide?"
"No, he got ripped and painted an orphanage; yes mass homicide!"
"… Ignoring that. What do you know about the case?"
"The criminal is named Harry Reid. First moved into a town in Texas called Backwater. The lower class people were apparently treated rather badly, as they had to revert to crime to get by. So this Harry led an uprising against the upper class people, and Molly Mallard is a personal witness of this event. Says she knows some other eyewitnesses who can help convict him if necessary. It's probably going to be pretty easy." Oh, how Sherlock would regret those words...
Just to let you know, Backwater is based off of the town I'm living in now, but of course it's not really called "Backwater". Since I'm constantly changing POVs, locations, and times, I thought I'd put a header whenever location and time are changed between POVs. At first, I thought it would spoil the whole surprise of the "dream scene", as I was hoping no one would expect that, but when I put a header above that paragraph, I realized that it actually didn't spoil it too much in my mind. Anyways, review! And, as an added bonus, R & R, and I'll R & R back! The review button gets lonely:'(.