PROLOGUE
The Cyclist
In.
Out.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Breathe.
Florence Margaret stared down at her bicycle's handlebars as she crammed herself in the alley overlooking Bart's hospital. She desperately tried to focus on something other than her younger brother's curly mop of hair starkly standing out from the heathery gray sky. The shining chrome of the handlebars on her bicycle was just as bright as they had been on the day her brothers gave it to her. Despite the slight chill, Florence was sweating underneath the dark beanie shoved onto her head. She was tempted to remove it and feel the breeze whisk through her hair, but she knew that the earpiece that she'd attempted to shove into her right ear would fall out if she removed the hat and she might miss an important order.
"The Beekeeper is still on the roof." The voice of Mycroft's PA, Anthea, sounded through Florence's earpiece. They had struck up a friendship after Florence had ended up waiting for Mycroft awkwardly outside his office with her and they had gotten to talk with each other. "I'm still waiting for his signal," Anthea informed Florence and all the Homeless Network they'd recruited to do something that Florence thought she'd never do: help Florence's younger brother fake his death.
"When I call your name, please report in," Anthea said softly. "All right...doctors?"
"Here," a few people whispered.
"Good, how about nurses and other personnel?"
"Ready," more people responded.
"All right. Bystanders all here?"
"Present," a chorus of overlapping voices said.
"Mattress?"
"Here," some more people muttered into their earpieces.
"And Bee?"
Florence gulped. She hadn't expected for Mycroft to use their nickname for her as her codename, so it gave her a shock to be referred to as such.
"Bee, are you there?" Anthea asked again.
"I'm here," Florence whispered.
"All right, everyone. The Beekeeper is still on the roof, talking to The Spider. We're still waiting for a signal. Please remain at your positions. Over," Anthea concluded.
Suddenly, a crack sounded faintly from the Bart's rooftop. Florence's heartbeat thudded in her chest. Sherlock, you all right up there?!
"Did you hear that?" Florence gasped.
A chorus of hushed yeses answered into Florence's ear. A couple of minutes (or was it seconds?) passed, and then Florence's eyes widened as her earpiece burst to life again.
"Alert!" Anthea called suddenly. "All into position, the call is Lazarus. I repeat, all into position! The call is Lazarus!"
"No. Oh, God, no!" Florence whispered, recalling a conversation she'd had with Mycroft just weeks before.
"So we're going to be making John suffer, Mycroft? And Greg? And Mrs. Hudson? So we're going to make them all suffer?!"
"Sherlock has to look like he has died, Bee. That's the whole point of Lazarus."
"But Myc...I don't know if I can bring myself to do something like that."
"Do you want to save lives, Florence? Because if things go a certain way, we will HAVE to do this. And this will be the ONLY way to save everyone's life."
"Fine. I will do it, Myc, but that does not mean that I like this method at all."
She clambered onto her bike and tensed her legs, ready to go. From her stakeout point, she could see some of the Homeless Network dragging a large blue inflatable cushion behind the ambulance station. A black cab pulled up and deposited a confused John Watson, desperately talking on the phone.
Florence turned her gaze to the Bart's rooftop. Sherlock was standing at the edge, a hand clasped to his ear. John took a few steps forward, looking all around for Sherlock. Then, his gaze magnetized towards the figure on the roof and he stepped back.
"God. Oh. God." Florence was whispering frantically, her heart pounding. Her life, injected with images of her two brothers, quite literally flashed before her eyes.
"Come on! Myc said we were going on a picnic, Bee!" A young Sherlock waves frantically at Florence.
"So you've found a friend, Bee?" An older Sherlock asks Florence from the other side of a cafe table.
"Bee! Stop!" Mycroft is, rather uncharacteristically, yelling after Florence and running after her with the stamina of a man half his age. "You can't just leave us! You're our sister! Come back! Only you can set this right, Bee! Bee, STOP! PLEASE, BEE! COME BACK!" But soon, Florence swerves dangerously around a car and easily overtakes her brother, who had always had a singular disdain for "legwork."
Florence sits back in her cottage in the north of England and reads the paper over and over. She's just about memorized the numbers by now, but she's still trying to make a decision. It was hard to call Molly again after so long, but calling Mycroft will be even harder…
She gives in and dials.
"So, he's got a flatmate now?" Florence asks across the well-polished desk to her older brother, whose hair is decidedly beginning to thin. "And he's off drugs?"
"Yes. His flatmate is doing, I must say, a very good job in preventing relapses and keeping him grounded. He has a blog too. The Personal Blog of John H. Watson. You should go look at it."
"Mm. A visit seems in order, then. Jump out of a cake, perhaps?"
Florence is pedaling to the address Mycroft has given her, the key to Sherlock's flat safely hidden in her pocket.
"And I know exactly who you are." Sherlock's voice has grown deeper than the last time Florence has seen him, she will admit. He springs out of his chair, brings a hand up to the oddball 3D spectacles she's used as a makeshift disguise. Gently, tenderly almost, he pulls them off her face.
They are hugging by his fireplace now, Sherlock's poor flatmate just about going into shock.
"I would never forget you, Bee. Never forget the life we've shared as children," he whispers into her ear and holds her tightly.
She buries her head in the crook of his neck and sighs. She is the older one, but nobody would really know that judging by height. Her brother is a head taller than her now.
"Um...Sherlock?" the flatmate coughs awkwardly.
Florence and Sherlock cling to each other for a few more seconds and then pull apart. At the door, a man with silver hair is holding up a camera phone and trying to hold back laughter.
Both Florence and Sherlock redden as he slowly puts the phone down.
Florence is busily taking gulps out of her water bottle on a bench, her bicycle parked nearby. She looks down for a few seconds, and when she looks back up, a car, black as night, has pulled up to the kerb. The other passenger's door opens and a slender woman slides out, walks to the door facing Florence, and opens it.
"Sorry about this," she murmurs apologetically.
"Oh. H'lo, Anthea," Florence greets her with a grin. She and Anthea get along spectacularly. Her grin slides off, however, when she notices her friend's face. "Is it bad?"
"We'll discuss it, just get in the car," Anthea tells her grimly. "We'll take care of your bike."
They ride to Mycroft's Diogenes office.
"So." Florence pauses after looking back from the doorway on her way out an hour later. "Three bombshells in one afternoon. One, Sherlock might die and I'm going to have to make up with him. Two, I might be able to help him die. Except, number three, he won't actually die."
"Sounds about it," Mycroft tells her.
Sherlock and Florence are sitting across from each other in the dining room of 221B. Doctor Who is blaring from the living room and John is watching (or pretending to watch) it.
"So. You forgive me, then, Bee?"
"I can't forgive you for throwing away your talents in the first place," she sighs. "But I can forgive you for what you said to me, because I know now that...that that's all false."
"Thank you. I can at least...go...knowing that."
They get up and hug in the middle of the kitchen, and when Florence pulls away from her younger brother, his shoulder is spotted with tears.
Florence was jolted back to the present, watching Sherlock on the rooftop, talking to John.
"Everyone. Get ready, the note is ending," Anthea said over Florence's earpiece, her voice shaking a little.
In front of her, John yelled, "SHERLOCK!" just as Sherlock tossed his phone backwards. He stopped for the tiniest fraction of a second, then pushed his arms out and fell forward.
And just like that, Florence's heart shattered into a million tiny pieces, for John and Lestrade and Mrs. Hudson and everyone who truly believes that he would die. She fiercely bit her lip to suppress herself from screaming.
CAPTAIN WILLIAM, DON'T WALK THE PLANK! she remembered screaming at him one day as a small child, as he teetered at the end of the board they'd used as a "plank". They'd been captured on an enemy ship and Sherlock had been forced to walk the plank. She'd gone supersonic that day, screaming and yelling at her brother until he ran back to her and took her into the most crushing hug a child could give.
"I won't walk the plank, Bee! Don't cry!" he'd said into her ear. "Please don't cry! I'll be alright! See, I'm right here, Bee! I'm okay!"
In front of her, John began to take a few steps forward, towards Sherlock, towards Bart's. I'm late! Florence muttered a particularly unkind word as Anthea said into her ear, "Bee, go now!"
She hurriedly began to pedal, the familiar motion of her feet mirroring her pounding heart. Her bike was quiet as she rode up behind John.
Her eyes flicked over the army doctor's figure analytically. All I have to do is trip him up. With her front wheel, she could just gently trip him up by the lower leg. I'm sorry, John, but I've got to do this!
She pedaled forwards and shut her eyes, putting on an extra burst of speed. Her wheel made contact with John and she winced as he fell to the asphalt with a grunt.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," she whispered over and over under her breath as she rode away and down the street to a boarded-up restaurant. Tears were rolling down her face freely as she thought of her doctor friend, crumpled on the pavement and desperately trying to get to his consulting detective.
It was heartbreaking.
But it was necessary.
And that doesn't bloody mean I like it!
She came to a stop by the awning of the restaurant and quickly swiped the sleeves of the dark jacket Mycroft had given her over her face to dry her tears. She took a deep breath.
"A colony without a queen is surely doomed without further action," she said to the bored-looking woman sitting in the doorway.
"Here's the coat," she replied to the code, handing her a navy-blue coat similar to the one she normally wore. Florence shrugged off the dark jacket she was wearing and slipped on the coat.
"Here's your phone," the woman added, slipping Florence her phone. "And take off the beanie," she added.
"Oh," Florence exclaimed and yanked it off.
"The earpiece will stay in, don't worry," the woman told her. "Now, go!"
Florence nodded a "thank-you" to her and sprinted off down the road. John had gotten up from the ground already and was beginning to stagger around the ambulance station. Surely he'd already caught sight of the not-Sherlock on the ground.
"Buy more time with the Hedgehog, Bee!" Anthea warned. "They're not done with the Beekeeper yet!"
Florence hissed, "For the love of all that is good, I'm going!"
She put on another extra burst of speed and dashed over to John.
"John!" she screamed.
John whirled around. "Florence!" he yelled, still shell-shocked. "What're you doing here?"
"I...I got a text!" she replied frantically. Tears were still running down her face. She held her phone out for John to see, with the text Sherlock had planted in the phone minutes earlier.
I'm a fraud. A fake.
I will always love you.
Goodbye.
SH
"Christ," John muttered. "Oh, Christ. You too."
"He...he contacted you?" Florence asked him.
"He called me, said it was his note!" John replied, panic increasing in his navy-blue eyes. "We need to get to him!"
"They're ready," Anthea said over the earpiece. "You can go."
"Well then, what are we waiting for?!" Florence grabbed John's hand and they flew around the ambulance station, quick as birds, only to stop right in their tracks. A group of people were huddled around a solitary figure lying on the pavement.
And a river of dark red snaked out from them.
"Oh. God. Oh. God." Florence's breath hitched in her throat, even though she knew it was a fake.
It was all pretend.
"I'm a fraud. A fake."
Just a magic trick.
"Goodbye, John."
The pain in John's tone wasn't, though. Florence could sense the sorrow that lay deeper than words or emotions. It tugged, yanked, and almost broke her heartstrings.
But I have to keep strong. For them.
"No," John breathed next to her. He moved forward as if in a trance. "Oh, God. No."
Florence darted away and into the crowd of the Homeless Network, flashing her Bart's ID around. They parted, recognizing her, and her eyes widened.
Her brother lay on the ground, making a good impression of a dead person.
"God. Sherlock, what…" She quickly dropped to her knees by his head, ignoring the crimson liquid soaking her trousers as she did so.
"I'll cover you," Anthea said through the earpiece. "John won't be coming for a few seconds yet."
"Sherlock. William. William, can you hear me? If you can hear me, nod once."
On the ground in front of her, her brother imperceptibly gave her a nod. Relief washed over Florence like a wave. "Squash ball there?"
Sherlock nodded again.
"John's coming," Anthea warned.
"I will see you very, very soon," Florence promised. "I…"
"Sherlock," John groaned behind her. "Oh, you...what have you done?"
He dropped to his knees by his flatmate and took Sherlock's pale, limp wrist, obviously feeling around for a pulse. The Homeless Network tried to ward him off after he dropped Sherlock's wrist like a stone, his face saying everything that needed to be told about the state of his friend.
Florence Margaret Holmes, do stop crying, it's all pretend!
But Captain William, it's so real!
A voice that sounded a lot like Sherlock himself echoed in a corner of Florence's mind, but the tears came despite herself. The Homeless Network did nothing to take her off of her brother as they gently hauled John to his feet and away from his friends.
Florence, still sobbing unashamedly, shifted so that she was right at Sherlock's head. She didn't pay attention to the fact that tears were dripping off of her nose and chin, spotting her brother's scarf with dots filled with a sadness no words could ever convey.
She gently slid both hands underneath Sherlock's curly head and lifted it onto her lap, careful not to disturb the fake wound that had been applied by the Homeless Network. More crimson ended up on her trousers and coat, but she couldn't care less as she rocked back and forth, carefully stroking her brother's childlike curls away from his pale face.
It was more than the real thing than it was an act for John.
"Florence." One of the Homeless Network tugged at her sleeve. "Florence, you'll have to go."
Florence turned her gaze to the woman who had spoken. "I...I don't want to," she whispered petulantly, sadness tinging every word.
"Bee." For a moment, Sherlock stirred on her lap and looked up at her. Automatically, the Homeless Network shifted to cover up Florence and her younger brother. Florence bent her face over her brother's, letting her honey-brown hair fall over his face. "You've got to go, Bee," he whispered and made himself go limp again.
Gently, Florence leaned down and pressed her lips to his head.
"I love you," she whispered.
Slowly, she lowered Sherlock's head back to the pavement and stepped away from her brother as he was hauled onto a stretcher. She walked over to John, sitting on the pavement, as his legs had seemed to give out from underneath him due to the whole shock of the affair.
Words could do nothing for them as the two friends held each other, ignoring the blood that covered both their clothes.
"Is there any way that we can go on, Florence?" John asked her, grief evident in his voice and countenance.
"We must go on, John," she murmured. "For Sherlock. We must remember him for all he did. Sherlock Holmes is not a fake."
We must remember...