Breath. Beating heart. Blurry vision. Dry, metallic taste. Burning throat. Dizzy head. Which way is up, then?

Those were the first thoughts that Eleanor thought of when she came to. At least she was alive. Unharmed? Hard to say. She couldn't feel her body. She slowly opened her eyes, still groggy from the drug she'd been injected with. Her vision was blurry, like having poor vision and not wearing eyeglasses. Looking around the room, she saw something wooden in front of her. She couldn't make out what it was, though. Next to the wooden thing was another person sitting in the chair.

Eleanor blinked hard, trying to clear her vision. It took a while, but the blurriness finally dissipated. It turns out the wooden thing was a crossbow, ready to fire an arrow. Eleanor did not like it, because the pointy part was pointed directly at her.

John was in the chair next to the killing machine. He was out like a light, as well. He must've been administered drugs like Nore. Moving her gaze away from John, she examined the room. They weren't really in a room, necessarily. They were underground in the sewers. The brick and cement walls were moist and dripped water here and there. The droplets echoed throughout the chamber, giving the eerie silence some background noise.

She couldn't get away, either. Rope tied her down to the chair Nore was sitting in. Her wrists were tied together behind her back, while her ankles were tied to the legs of the chair. There was no escaping on Nore's part.

Nore brought her eyes back to look at John. "John!" She hissed. "John, wake up!"

There was a laughter somewhere behind her. It was a female's maniacal laugh, even more threatening than Nore's own evil cackle.

"Hello, Eleanor," the woman mused. "That is your name, is it not?"

Chinese accent. Older in years. Old, Asian woman, and she held John and Eleanor captive. With what? She had to have henchmen. There was no way, with her age, that she could carry John and Nore down to the sewer and not look like a kidnapper.

Eleanor didn't answer her, though. Nore didn't want to say anything until Sherlock got here. He could get them out of this mess. But did he even know where they were? He was outside when John and she were taken.

"Smart," the woman said. "You're waiting for Mr. Holmes to awake and for John Watson to arrive."

Mr. Holmes? Awake? Sherlock wasn't even here; John was. This lady had her men mixed up. Eleanor could use that to her advantage, though. If she thought John was Sherlock and Sherlock was John... This could get interesting. The lady walked up to Eleanor and stepped into Nore's view, right in front of her. She looked up at the Chinese woman. She wasn't traditionally dressed, which seemed like a stupid thing to think of because she usually saw Asian people wearing traditional clothing. That was also stupid. She didn't see very many Asian women.

"Well," Eleanor said, keeping her emotions in control, "John isn't exactly reliable, so I wouldn't hold out too much hope." She glanced at John. "And it doesn't look like Sherlock is waking up any time soon."

The lady scoffed. "You don't even have faith in your own companions."

John groaned. He's awake now. Well, that was fast. When he saw the scene laid out before him, Eleanor saw his eyes grow wide and his jaw dropped.

"Ah," the lady greeted, "Sherlock Holmes awakes."

"Sherlock Holmes?" John snickered. "Me? No, I'm not Sherlock."

Eleanor gave John the death glare. John just returned it, though. Nore tried to talk to him with her eyes, but he didn't get the message.

The Chinese woman pulled out John's wallet. "In here," she mused, "there is a debit card with the name Sherlock Holmes on it."

John nodded reluctantly and sighed. "He gave that to me for groceries."

"There is also a check written out to Mr. Holmes himself for three thousand pounds," she continued.

"Yes, because I was holding onto that for him," John tried.

But the lady didn't listen. "You are obviously Sherlock Holmes."

"No, I'm not!" John exclaimed.

"Don't give me your tricks, Mr. Holmes," the woman threatened. "I know your reputation. You won't fool me." The woman pulled out a knife from her robes. "You will give me the pin, or you will watch Eleanor die before your very eyes."

"What pin?" John asked. "I'm not Sherlock."

"No answer?" the woman stabbed the sandbag above her. The sand poured out of the burlap sack. The bag lowered with every grain of sand lost. Now Nore knew what would happen. The bag of sand would fall onto a pressure plate that was set up to the crossbow. Once that was set off, the arrow would fire, and, evidently, kill Eleanor if something didn't happen soon.

"The pin!" the lady demanded. "Where is it?"

"I don't know what you're talking about!" John yelled. "What pin?"

"The jade pin! The one Van Coon stole from us! Where is it?"

"I don't know!" John said. "I'm not Sherlock Holmes!"

The clock was ticking. The sandbag was getting closer and closer to the pressure plate as they spoke. Nore was getting anxious. She didn't have any idea what was going on. The lady wanted a jade pin, probably ancient, and John didn't have it. Nore wasn't prepared to die. Not now, at least. Not today.

"Eleanor's time is running out, Mr. Holmes," the woman mused. "Will you let her die, or give us the pin?"

"I'M NOT SHERLOCK HOLMES!" John yelled again. "I don't have your bloody pin!"

"John," Eleanor muttered, her voice shaky. She was staring at the sandbag.

John looked over at what Nore was staring at. He looked at the woman, pleadingly. "Please," John begged. "Just let Eleanor go. Leave her out of this. No one has to get hurt."

"Not until you give us the jade pin," the lady stated.

"I'm not Sherlock Holmes," John tried one last time.

"I don't believe you," the woman said.

Suddenly, a deep, earth-shaking voice rang through the chamber, "He's not Sherlock Holmes."

Sherlock! Finally, he found out where they were. Eleanor didn't know what was happening, since it was all behind her and she couldn't exactly turn around. She could hear grunting, punches being thrown and colliding with skin and bone, and cries of pain. Eleanor felt Sherlock's fingers working furiously at the ties on her wrists for a brief moment, but it stopped.

"No, no! Sherlock!" Eleanor protested, really not wanting to die.

She didn't feel his hands again. Tears started to stream down her face. The sandbag was only centimetres away from setting off the crossbow. Eleanor became desperate. But what could she do? John noticed, too.

"No, Eleanor!" John yelled.

The sandbag hit the pressure plate, and the arrow fired.