A/N: I felt a lot of inspiration today + My day off = New chapter. Enjoy... Or don't. Whatever you want, I guess.
Sherlock Holmes and John Watson arrived in London two days later near four in the morning. They stopped at their flat for the briefest of moments to drop off their things from the trip.
Sherlock took the time to note the recent cleaning of the place. Not a single speck of glass to be seen and there were new windows. He would need to thank his brother, no doubt.
He also took the time to set a small urn on the mantle of the fireplace, directly next to the disembodied skull. For a moment, he was caught up in a memory of Samantha picking a name to call it.
John stopped to watch his friend carefully adjust the urn before backing away slowly. When Sherlock turned, John made eye contact. "Are you all right?"
Sherlock cleared his throat and looked away. "Let's go to the Yard then. Settle Lestrade's panic."
By the time they did get to Scotland Yard, it was open and Lestrade was in and waiting for them. He looked the pair up and down, apparently able to tell neither of them really slept on their plane. "You come here straight from the airport?"
"No, of course not," Sherlock said. "It's not like there's a bomber on the loose."
He brushed past the Detective Inspector, and John tried to look apologetic. "He's in a rough spot right now." John kept his voice lowered as he and Greg followed Sherlock. "Just… give him a little extra forgiveness?"
"Yeah, sure," Lestrade said, his face concerned as he regarded John and thought about the implications of the request.
They passed Sergeant Sally Donovan on the way to Lestrade's office. She tried to glare at Sherlock but he didn't even look in her direction. John was sort of proud of that.
They entered Lestrade's office, and sitting on the man's desk was an envelope.
Sherlock paused and observed it from a distance. "You haven't opened it?"
"It's addressed to you, isn't it?" Lestrade responded.
Sherlock approached it as Lestrade spoke. "We've x-rayed it. It's not booby-trapped."
"How reassuring," Sherlock said, hesitating even in his sarcasm before lifting the envelope from the desk. He carried it over to the lamp, holding it close to the bulb. "Nice stationery. Bohemian."
Lestrade frowned. "What?"
"From the Czech Republic." Sherlock expanded. "No fingerprints?"
"No."
Sherlock looked closer at his name, written on the front by hand. "She used a fountain pen. A Parker Duofold, iridium nib."
John frowned. "She?"
"Obviously."
John found himself smirking, relieved at hearing a bit of Sherlock's arrogance come back full-force. He never knew he would have been happy to see it.
The Consulting Detective grabbed Lestrade's letter opener and carefully opened the envelope. He looked inside, feeling a pulse of shock wash down his spine. As he pulled the object from its packaging, he could practically feel John's surprise as it mirrored his.
"But that's the phone, the pink phone," John remarked.
"What, from the Study in Pink?" Lestrade asked.
"Well, obviously it's not the same phone, but it's supposed to look like…" Sherlock trailed off, looking that the Detective Inspector with a bit of irritation. "The Study in Pink? You read John's blog?"
Lestrade blinked. "Of course I read his blog. We all do. Do you really not know that the Earth goes around the sun?"
Sherlock glared at him for a moment before returning his attention to the phone in his hand. He noted the lack of scratches around the plug-ins. "It isn't the same phone. This one is brand new. Someone's gone through a lot of trouble to make it look like the same phone, which means your blog has a far wider readership." Sherlock looked at John.
John looked away, ignoring the accusatory glance.
Sherlock returned to the phone, powering it on. Immediately, it alerted him of a new message. He played the message. No voice, only the sound of the Greenwich Time Signal. Pips.
Sherlock frowned, the message sinking in as he checked the mobile phone for anything else.
"Is that it?" John asked.
"No, that's not it," Sherlock said, just as he opened the gallery to find a photo. As he looked at the image, Lestrade approached to look over his shoulder.
There was a familiar image on the screen of an unfurnished room with a fireplace and peeling wallpaper.
"What are we supposed to make of that?" Lestrade asked, annoyed. "And estate agent's photo and the bloody Greenwich pips."
Sherlock, however, understood completely. "It's a warning."
John looked to his flatmate, noticing how he stared thoughtfully toward the wall. "A warning?"
"Some secret societies used to send dried melon seed, orange pips, things like that." He looked at John. "Five pips. They're warning us it's going to happen again."
Sherlock looked back to the photo on the screen before brandishing the device at them and beginning to leave Lestrade's office. "And I've seen this before."
John frowned, following Sherlock physically as he also tried to keep up mentally. "Hang on, what's going to happen again?"
Sherlock paused for a moment, turning back to John. "Boom."
What followed was a stretch of events they couldn't have predicted. Hostages. More bombs.
Five pips: A set of trainers that belonged to the victim in Sherlock's first case. He was given twelve hours: solved in nine. Clostridium botulinum.
Four pips: An abandoned car with blood on the seats. Sherlock was given eight hours: solved in five. Not a murder, but a relocation.
Three pips: A photograph of a famous – dead – woman, Connie Prince. Sherlock was given twelve hours: solved in eleven. Murder by botox. The bomb went off anyway; 12 dead.
Two pips: View of the South bank of the Thames, where a body is found. An astronomer who is also security for an art gallery. There was, in the beginning, no restriction of time.
But the Vermeer painting that had shown its face only days ago in the news was a fake. Recorded to having been destroyed centuries before, but now that it's returned it was worth thirty million pounds.
A good fake. An assassin by the name of Golem. A broken pattern. It put Sherlock on edge that the bomber hadn't called. Hadn't reached out through anyone. No new voice. But he knew more lives were at stake. Of course they would be.
But it almost felt like poetic justice. The bombing would happen – more people would die – if he didn't go to an art gallery. And there was silence. Not a single warning.
Samantha would have laughed at the irony.
He stared at the painting, phone in hand. "It's a fake. It has to be."
Miss Wenceslas, the newest owner of the lost Vermeer, scowled. "That painting has been subjected to every test known to science."
Sherlock conceded with a tip of his head. "A very good fake, then." He turned to face her. "You know about this, don't you? This is you, isn't it?"
Miss Wenceslas turned away, toward one of Sherlock's company; Detective Inspector Lestrade. "Inspector, my time is being wasted." She sounded exasperated. Or, perhaps, nervous. "Would you mind showing yourself and your friends out?"
A ring snatched the air from the room.
Sherlock took the pink phone from his pocket and answered the call, putting on the speaker. "The painting is a fake."
Nothing from the other end. Complete silence.
Everyone, even those who didn't know what the phone meant, waited with bated breath.
"It's a fake. That's why Woodbridge and Cairns were killed." Sherlock reiterated.
Still nothing. He felt his anxiety spike and found himself double checking the display to make sure he'd answered the call and not accidentally declined it. "Oh, come on. Proving it's just the detail. The painting is a fake. I've solved it. I've figured it out; it's a fake! That's the answer – that's why they were killed."
Still nothing.
Sherlock took a deep breath to try and calm his racing heart and frayed nerves. He needed to focus. "Okay, I'll prove it." He said, already looking at the painting. Would they answer now? "Give me time. Will you give me time?"
There is the smallest moment of silence in which Sherlock was sure there would be no time given and whoever it was on the other end would be in multiple pieces all over some wall. A building collapsed with who knew how many injured.
But then the voice came.
And the truth was much worse than he'd imagined.
"Ten..."
Sherlock's heart stopped as his mind registered and instantly placed the voice. Cold rushed through his veins as he realized with a sudden intensity that it was only a child.
"It's a kid." Lestrade's horrified words brought Sherlock back to himself.
"What did he say?" John asked.
"Ten." Sherlock quoted, whipping around to the painting and pulling every emotion he felt away from the surface so he could focus.
So he could work.
"Nine…" The voice was warbling, and Sherlock ignored it.
"It's a countdown. He's giving me time." Sherlock's mouth spouted without consultation.
Lestrade cursed.
"The painting is a fake, but how can I prove it? How? How?"
"Eight…"
In a flash, Sherlock was facing Ms. Wenceslas. "This child will die. Tell me why the painting is a fake. Tell me!"
She flinched in the face of his intensity, but he didn't have time for her reaction or her answer.
"S-seven…"
"No, shut up, don't say anything." Sherlock decided, turning back to the painting. "It only works if I figure it out."
He blocked out everything, vaguely aware of movement behind him but uncaring. It must be possible. "Must be possible. Must be staring me in the face."
"Six…"
"Come on." That was John.
"Woodbridge knew, but how?" He was no artist, Sherlock knew that for certain. He was a security guard. An astronomer in his leisure. Not an artist.
An astronomer.
"Five…"
"It's speeding up!" Lestrade pointed out worriedly.
"Sherlock," John said his name urgently. Forcefully.
And just at that moment, Sherlock's eyes fell on three tiny white dots of paint there in the night sky portrayed in the artwork. And his mind connected the pieces. But was it true? What was it called? He couldn't remember. It must be exactly correct.
"Four."
Sherlock wasted no time in shoving the pink phone into John's hands and yanking his own out of his pocket. Rapidly typing Astronomers…
"Three."
…and Supernovas into the search engine.
It was taking too long to load.
"Two."
And there it was.
He grabbed the phone from John and shouted into it. "The Van Buren Supernova!" He didn't care how much desperation was in that single phrase. How much fear colored his tone.
There was a pause thicker than drying paint.
Then…
"Please… is somebody there?" The boy's voice came through the speaker.
Sherlock released a breath he hadn't recalled holding, his knees going weak. He held the phone out toward Lestrade. "There you go. Go find out where he is and pick him up."
Lestrade took the device.
John stood near Sherlock's shoulder. "Are you all right?"
Sherlock clenched his fingers into fists to try and stop their shaking. "The Van Buren Supernova, so-called. An exploding star that only appeared in the sky in eighteen fifty-eight."
"So how could it have been painted in the sixteen-forties?" John finished, looking past his friend to the painting on the wall.
Miss Wenceslas was in a state of shock, staring at her painting without movement until the Yard took her into custody.
It was supposed to be a distraction. Sherlock had taken it as such. The game. The risk. All a distraction, to him as well as the bomber. Sherlock from his pain. The bomber, who Sherlock could confirm was Moriarty, from his boredom.
Sherlock had pieced together a description of sorts. From Miss Wenceslas, Sherlock could confirm Moriarty was male. And influential. From the hostage of the third bomb, he could add that Moriarty's voice was soft. Not entirely relevant to discovering who he was, but it was information enough to get twelve people killed.
Moriarty put together a distraction that only served to throw Sherlock back into the pain he wanted to hide from.
The Lost Vermeer.
Samantha had mentioned it before. Only a few months previously. She'd brought it up during one of their phone calls, how she had found an interesting new artist. Johannes Vermeer. But some of his paintings had been lost.
However, as her mind tended to do, she drifted onto the subject of losing other things, and whether people would ever compile a list of things that they had also lost.
And she'd asked if Sherlock had ever lost anything he would have really liked back.
He couldn't recall what answer he'd given her.
There was a buzz.
Sherlock's eyes drifted to the source; the pink phone.
He lifted it, his heart already racing, to find a text from an unknown number. It read: We get along quite well.
Sherlock stared at it for a moment, unsure of how to respond.
He didn't have to, as another message appeared in the inbox.
I've been looking forward to this for a long time. Meet me?
Sherlock stared at the screen for a moment before hitting reply. Where?
You choose.
An idea came to mind. Sherlock quickly typed his response and sent it. He thought, only for a brief moment, how he wouldn't be able to tell John he was leaving; the doctor had gone to get milk and beans nearly twenty minutes ago.
Sherlock frowned and stood, grabbing his scarf and coat. He didn't have to tell John. He'd be back. Probably.
For a moment, the Consulting Detective was floored by how little he cared for his own life.
But then he reminded himself; if Moriarty had wanted him dead, he wouldn't be alive to think about it. That was simply the truth of the matter. So he elected not to worry and tossed on his coat before pocketing his phone and walking toward the door.
A/N: Thanks again for following this story. Means a lot to me and my cat. He likes to sit on me when I type, so he appreciates the motivation you provide.
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