John Watson had been checking into the hotel when Sherlock called, it took him several more minutes, and several more texts to get their room in order than it would have otherwise, and once that was done he decided to go to the police station rather than take any of the bags up.

Once he'd gotten there he was ushered to the morgue by a very irritated police chief.

The mortician practically ran out of the door when he saw the chance to be reprieved.

Sometimes he forgot that Sherlock was five times more irritating to people who HADN'T gotten used to his mannerisms.

He looked across the room to see that Sherlock was hovering over three corpses with mangled throats, he noticed him and beckoned him to come closer

"John, what do these bodies have in common?" Sherlock asked, raising an eyebrow.

Watson sighed, it was obvious he was going to be playing the skull again, so he decided to point out

the obvious.

"The mangled throats?" he asked, hopefully.

"No, look a little closer, ignore the obvious and look at their faces."

John sighed again and tried to repress his gag reflex as he leaned in close to the partially decomposed

corpse's face.

At first he was looking for something subtly obvious, like a lotus tattoo, or identical earrings, but then he noticed something very subtle.

"is it these scars on their faces?" He asked.

Sherlock nodded with approval.

"All three of our victims have three small scars in the same place, on the same cheek. Now, normally, I'd assume that a cat did it, or possibly a tree branch,

or they even did it to themselves while they were sleeping. However, given the fact that ALL of our victims have them..."

John raised a dubious eyebrow. "You think the murderer did this?"

He nodded

"I believe that the killer is convinced that he is a vampire, and has taken to "marking"

his prey, so that he may better pursue the hunt."

John starred at Sherlock. "But, these scar have to be at LEAST three weeks old."

"What kind of predator doesn't enjoy a good hunt?"

He wiped his mouth on his sleeve, he looked around cautiously , just in case someone saw the man collapse. The authorities were more careful about watching the local drunks than usual, if he wasn't desperate, he would have fed from the bottled blood, but it was so close to going rancid, and he needed his strength. Once he was sure there were no cameras or witnesses he dragged the unconscious man further out of sight, and began to feed