From mrspencil - Holmes needs Watson's assistance, but he cannot get his usual locum to cover his practice, what does he do? Thanks to Hades for helping me with the plot for this

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Up until the late afternoon it had been a frankly mundane day at my practice. There had been the occasional virus-ridden victim, and I had prescribed menthol crystal steam treatments and bed rest. One mother and her small child had come in because her child had eaten several petals from her prized orchid. The child could not have been healthier. It was plump, with a pink tinge to the cheeks, and periodically throughout the consultation it would kick its feet in the air and give me wide, toothless grins. The mother of the child kept asking: "But you're sure he is going to be alright? Are you sure?" I patiently reassured her repeatedly that the child was in no danger, and eventually recommended a dose of camomile tea, since she was so obviously looking for either advice or treatment.

I lunched at my club, before returning in the afternoon. The waiting room was empty, so I sat down to complete my paperwork – an arduous undertaking at the best of times. Accompanying Holmes on his cases and then subsequently publishing my accounts leaves me with little time and energy for paperwork, and I had built up rather a backlog. In fact, it was worse because Anstruther had succumbed to the seasonal flu and I, in payment for the many times he had taken on my duties, was taking his practice for him whilst he recuperated at home.

Halfway through the afternoon there was an urgent banging on the door, and a familiar high, strident and strangely out-of-breath voice called my name. "Watson! A moment of your time if you will!" It was with great regret that I had, earlier on that day, declined his request for my assistance at the culmination of a robbery case he had been working on, and so although I had declined in order to engage in work-based matters, I opened the door readily. What I found was rather startling. Holmes and Mrs Hudson, both pink in the face, were panting, and lying on the floor was the huge, unconscious mass that was Mycroft Holmes.

"Bring him in," I said, and together we heaved and huffed him into the room. It was beyond our power to lift him onto the examining table, so he lay on the floor, looking rather like a beached whale. Mrs Hudson fetched a pillow, which Holmes placed under his head, and I loosened his shirt collar.

"What on Earth happened to him?" I asked.

A slightly embarrassed glance passed between the two of him.

"Well," Holmes said, "Since you were unable to assist me, Mrs Hudson kindly offered her services. I was initially sceptical I must admit, but she demonstrated excellent analysis skills, and an ability to sort the unimportant from the important when making observations, giving me, in effect, and extra pair of eyes. But I fear she will never have your natural ability of keeping a cool head in the moment of attack."

"I am intrigued," I said, as I applied a compress to the rapidly growing bruise on the back of Mycroft Holmes' head. "I pray, tell me more."

Holmes cleared his throat. "As you know I had been tracking the thief who stole that most exquisite medieval Cathedral painting from the National Gallery. I had reasoned that since he did not wish to attract attention he would hardly stay at a hotel for the night, and that he could not get far carrying such a painting. I therefore asked the gallery staff who had been in since the robbery, and as I asked them in the morning, only the gallery staff had arrived, and they use a separate door. Upon examining the road outside the public door, I found the wheel-marks of a very particular type of hansom. I followed them to a small holiday house, which told me that he did not plan to stay long. Upon checking his letter box I found an urgent letter with a man's name on it. The name was French, and the writing was in a Latanic hand with a French stamp. Returning to France would involve a train journey to a harbour, so yesterday I visited all the major stations in London and managed to obtain his booking details. He was due to catch his train at three in the afternoon today. This is the point at which I sought Mrs Hudson's kind assistance.

"After an early lunch we stationed ourselves, along with Inspector Lestrade, outside the thief's only door, concealed behind some shrubs that framed the doorsteps. Presently a man came out carrying a painting. Mrs Hudson has excellent reactions – better even than mine, and she hit the man in the head by throwing a potted plant. It must have hit surprisingly hard, as you can now see. Unfortunately it was only afterwards that I was able to introduce her to my brother. Lestrade ventured into the house and found the man bound and gagged, presumably by Mycroft. The thief was promptly arrested, and Lestrade left Mrs Hudson and I to bring my brother to you following his unfortunate accident."

Mrs Hudson looked shamed. I caught that impish twinkle in Holmes' eye, and saw his shoulders quiver. Then I was seized by the mirth of the situation and suddenly we were quite unable to control our laughter, and broke out into a simultaneous roar. Mrs Hudson, who had been watching us with a shamed expression, saw the funny side as well and began to giggle. It was at this point that Mycroft opened his eyes. "What on Earth could be amusing about a situation like this?" he enquired grumpily. "Help me up, dammit." Holmes, still chuckling, grasped his brother by the arm and steadied him as he stood up groggily. He rounded on Mrs Hudson. "I saw you throw the plant pot. Don't you suppose you'll get away with it."

"Well really, Mycroft!" Holmes admonished him. "You have very little to be annoyed about, in a broader sense. We captured our criminal which we could not have done without your timely assistance; we returned the picture to its proper home and you have sustained no lasting damage from an honest mistake on the part of my landlady!"

"I just thank the Lord that it's all over. Don't expect my help again. I give you cases, you solve them. Now where's a cab?" Mycroft gave me a cursory nod, before wobbling out of the room. Mrs Hudson, eager to make up for her mistake, went with him to make sure he didn't fall.

Holmes and I were alone in my office.

"You really should pay the owner of the house for damages to her potted plant," I said.

Again, Holmes tried to suppress his boyish mirth, and again he failed, and again the laughter was contagious. "Really Holmes, it is wrong to laugh so!" I told him.

"What else can one do? You're doing it too," Holmes spluttered. "Surely it's better to laugh than to cry over something which has now passed?"

"That is true," I acknowledged. "I really can't leave you to it, can I?"

"To what?"

"Your cases," I said.

"You cannot," he agreed. "I have tried to tell you on several occasions how indispensable you are, and how much I value your skills. If you would only rate your own abilities a little higher these things might not happen!"

I was about to answer, when a familiar looking woman came running into the room and plonked her perpetually happy baby on my desk. "Doctor Watson," she sobbed, "I think he's swallowed a segment of my best cactus!"