Sorry that this is a bit late, I got kind of annoyed by how it was written and had to redo half the chapter and then I went to see Star Trek Into Darkness and died so I was unable to complete it...
I'm under the impression that Anderson is, like, one of the coroner people so his tiny bit is based in that assumption. If it's wrong, just call it poetic licence; this is already a major AU anyway.
Warnings for blood and stuff. Again.
John was halfway down the fire escape when Donovan tripped and fell.
He put a bullet in the head of all three of the zombies about to attack her, spraying her with zombie blood, and not stopping running until he was next to her.
"Are you ok?"
"Yeah." She said breathlessly. "Where's the freak?"
"Sergeant Donovan, so nice to see you too." Sherlock said poisonously, jumping down the last few steps of the fire-escape and standing next to John. "She's alive, John, I hope you're happy. I don't care if the next person we see running is the damn queen, we're going to get Mrs Hudson now."
John nodded.
"Where are you going?" Donovan asked.
"Don't you ever pay attention?" Sherlock said, glaring at her.
"I heard but it's not safe! I just had to run all the way here! The zombies are everywhere!"
"We have weapons." John shrugged.
"What am I supposed to do?" Donovan yelled desperately as the detective and the doctor started back towards the fire escape.
John took a set of keys from his pocket and threw it to her. "Lock the doors when you get in. Maybe put the kettle on. I need a cup of tea already."
Donovan nodded, stunned into silence as she watched them run up the fire escape and over the rooftops.
Sherlock scowled at John when the doctor caught him up. "Why did you have to do that?"
"Do what?"
"Invite her."
"This isn't a party, Sherlock, this is the end of the world. We need to stick together."
"I understand that," he paused. "But Sally Donovan? Of all the people we could have found first?"
John shook his head. "Just keep running Sherlock, the sooner we get back to the flat, the better."
The detective nodded, changing direction again and leaping onto yet another roof, John only seconds behind.
Lestrade crept down the corridor, not daring to run in case he made a noise. He didn't know if there were more of the zombies down here. He couldn't hear them but that didn't mean there weren't any.
All of this had happened so quickly there was unlikely to be a locked room full of the rest of them like in the first episode of The Walking Dead.
Most of the doors in the corridor just led to more dark, windowless, cell-like offices. He wondered how John and Anderson could bare to work in these places. They were so depressing, even without the fear that an army of the undead could be hidden behind each door. Not that Anderson or John would even be alive by now, he supposed. The creatures were bound to have got at least one of them by now.
He padded towards the next door and peered through the tiny piece of glass in the door.
A window!
Lestrade tried the door. Locked.
But this wasn't a fire door like the others. This was just a regular old piece of wood with hinges. Lestrade took a few steps back then took a running kick at the door, splintering it open. He grinned. He wasn't as useless as Sherlock always said he was, even if the smug bastard did somehow manage to keep stealing his badges.
Too ecstatic at the thought of escape to check the room, Lestrade ran to the window. He was unlocking it with the key someone had so conscientiously left in the lock when he heard the noise, a rough groan from behind him.
Lestrade turned, arms raised defensively, seconds before the zombie would have sunk it's already-rotting teeth into the back of his head.
Instead the monster bit right into Lestrade's left arm and the detective inspector let out a strangled scream of agony. He tried to shake the dead man off but the vice-like grip of the jaws around his forearm just got tighter. Blood was pouring freely onto the plastic tiles and sparks of light, of pain, flashed into Lestrade's eyes. He collapsed backwards onto the desk as it pushed him back, the zombie still not letting go, and picked up the first thing that came to hand: a heavy glass trophy for some medical achievement.
Lestrade slammed the award into the zombie's head with all his quickly ebbing strength, knocking the corpse off his arm. He smashed it into the creature's skull again, finally damaging enough to re-kill him. The glass shattered, bloodying his hands even further, but Lestrade could still see the engraving on the plaque as it fell with the pieces onto the bloody floor.
Presented to S. Anderson for research, 2010
Lestrade swallowed bile in the back of his throat and turned around to face the now lifeless corpse lying on the floor.
Even semi-rotted with a smashed skull, the man on the floor was still identifiable. The dark mop of hair, now thick with even darker blood barely covered Anderson's lifeless face.
"Shit." Lestrade muttered, his mangled, bleeding arm almost forgotten as he stared at the unmoving cadaver of his late colleague. Lestrade had never liked Anderson, Sherlock was right, the man had been a bloody idiot, but... Fuck. How many people had to die today? How many people were already gone? How many would be dead before he saw them again? His thoughts flashed from Donovan to Sherlock and John to the few friends he'd had left.
Lestrade sat on the edge of the desk, alone and silent for what felt like hours before he remembered his injured arm. He cursed again and pulled his belt off, pulling it tightly around his arm just above the elbow and wincing as he felt his arm start to go numb.
Get to Baker Street. If anyone was still alive, they'd be there.
Sebastian Moran touched the vulnerable face of his former employer.
Jim Moriarty, once the happy young psychopath Sebastian had fallen in love with, had been deep in a coma for two years since shooting himself to persuade that bastard Sherlock Holmes to kill himself. And it hadn't even worked. The consulting detective was back from the dead and more successful than ever while Jim wasted away in a hospital bed.
He was just a shell now, barely a man at all. Other than spikes on the monitoring systems, Jim could have been dead. Sebastian refused to give up on him. He owed Jim his life and if there was even the smallest chance that waiting around a hospital bed for a few hours a week would make any difference to that, Sebastian would take it.
After a few failed attempts at killing Holmes himself when the detective was still presumed dead, Sebastian had gone freelance. It didn't suit him, really. He preferred one boss, not a long list of rich scumbags killing over pride and scandal, the sort of guys he and Jim would have enjoyed torturing a few years ago. Not that Sebastian was selective. He'd do it, just not with quite as much enjoyment as when he'd had a good reason.
And he served as a bodyguard for the barely alive corpse of a man lying in bed in the private hospital. Even though most of the world had accepted Jim Moriarty as a hoax, a man who'd been that powerful would always have some enemies.
Sebastian pushed his grey-flecked blonde hair out of his face and took the brakes off the hospital bed. He wasn't going to leave Jim behind, not after this long, even with the insanity happening outside. He had an ambulance waiting outside filled with all the medical equipment they'd need and he'd drive to one of Jim's old places out in the country where there'd be less zombies.
Pity really. If he didn't have such a strong bond with Jim, Sebastian would have enjoyed staying in London just to kill them. It would have been fun. If things were different, he knew Jim would have been amused by it too.
"Ah well." He muttered, pushing the bed down the corridor to the lift. "Back t' work."
One of the few remaining shop employees had shut Mrs Hudson, a young man and a teenage girl in the cleaner's cupboard when the zombies had broken through the glass front of the supermarket. Seconds after they'd heard his screams. The silence after a few seconds was worse than the yelps. The girl had started to cry and the young man was trying to comfort her but Mrs Hudson was completely frozen.
She kept wondering when her boys were going to save her. Sherlock and John would never leave her here. But what if something had already happened to them? What if they couldn't find her in here?
There were sounds of a gun firing then the sickening noise of the zombies moving away from the doors, dragging their deadened limbs away from the door. Mrs Hudson didn't know whether to be relieved or sad that yet another of the poor people outside the cupboard was dead.
There was more banging on the door, faster and harder than before, and the young man and the girl both cowered back against the wall. Mrs Hudson picked up a metal-handled mop from the shelf and stood up. Someone had to defend them.
The door flew open and Mrs Hudson swung the mop at the first figure that came through.
There was a curse and the figure fell backwards. They stood up again, holding its hand to its cheek.
"Was that really necessary, Mrs Hudson?" A deep voice said irritably.
"Sherlock! Oh, I'm sorry, those... Those things were banging on the door and..." She practically fell on him, leaning into his shoulder.
John leant in. "Good hit though." He grinned and Sherlock turned and glared at him.
"Come on then, we don't have much time before more of them come."
Mycroft sat on the front step of a building near the two pieces of Anthea's lifeless corpse and blinked slowly. He could carry on to his own house but it was huge and... Well, he wasn't sure he wanted to be alone after what he'd just had to do. It was to first time he'd been so unsure about anything in years.
But the only other option was Baker Street. As much as Mycroft wanted to ignore it, Sherlock already hated him without them having to stay in that tiny flat together with no way out. And god only knew how much John Watson resented him. He'd made too many mistakes to consider going to find his brother yet. Baker Street was miles away now anyway.
Mycroft stood up unsteadily and started to walk down the street, unsure of where he was actually going, just knowing that he couldn't stay sat there for any longer.