Blood didn't come back that night. John wandered downstairs around 3 [had that become the new witching hour?] but didn't seem concerned.

Lestrade showed up at the flat bright and early.

"Another hit?" Sherlock asked frowning.

Lestrade nodded, "You coming?"

"Yes, where is it?"

Lestrade told them and both John and Sherlock frowned, "That's rather close to here again."

"New hit?" Blood asked bounding up into the living room, swerving around the D.I. in a manner that was either graceful or not, depending on which side of the room you looked from.

"Yeah, want to come?" Sherlock asked.

Now Lestrade had been slightly prepared for Blood to start showing up at crime scenes, but he hadn't expected Sherlock to ask.

"Sure why not, I have nothing better to do anyway."

Greg and Sherlock missed the look John shot the girl.

"Who's the new one?" Donovan asked as the group of four wandered up to the police tape.

"The name's Blood, I'm here to sanity check, don't mind me." Blood smiled at the older woman, hand extended for a shake.

Donovan appeared rather flustered, but shook Blood's hand, "Sergeant Donovan, let me know if you need anything."

And without even a rude comment for Sherlock the woman let the group through.

"Extraordinary" Sherlock says blue eyes boring into Blood.

"How did you manage that?" Lestrade asks, completely puzzled.

"Oh it was easy, she just needed to think someone had put a leash on Sherlock, it helped that she was a little off balance from the name."

John chuckled, "Though really, if you're the one in charge of our sanity we're all screwed."

The group entered the crime scene, also an office building. Anderson turned towards them and immediately started complaining about Sherlock. The consulting detective stopped to argue with the man. Lestrade began to attempt to get the two men apart, and Blood wondered over to the body, pulling on a pair of gloves. John followed her.

"Fuck, its Jackal." Blood whispered, carefully lifting the body to see the face.

John's face tightened, before he wiped it clean. "Same hit team as last time, but they were shooting down, but there's no window over there."

It was true; Jackal had been facing the window. Blood stood up and wandered over; tracing the path the bullets must have taken in her mind. "Give us a hand up John."

"What are you two doing?" Donovan snapped, just coming into the room, diverting the three arguing men's attention over to John and Blood.

"There's a ledge built in here, this is where the shooters were hidden." Blood explained, tapping John's head.

The ex-soldier lowered her back to the floor. "It's too narrow for anyone to stand on, much less hide on." Anderson snapped, "We already knew about it."

Blood shook her head, "Then you missed the marks on the walls, they're from a harness of some kind. I'd say that the hit team was literally tied to the wall to keep them from falling."

Sherlock swoops towards the body, studying the man on the floor while Donovan gapes at Blood and John takes notes of the detective's deductions.

"Same tag as before." Lestrade notes pointing to the yellow spray paint on the wall.

"It looks Asian." Anderson comments inanely.

"Such brilliance" Blood mutters out of the side of her mouth, sending Donovan into giggles and causing John to raise an eyebrow.

"Well, I don't see you contributing anything about it." Anderson snaps, blushing red.

"Not surprising, considering you missed the marks on the wall and the footprint by the window."

The crime scene freezes as everyone looks where Blood's pointing. Sure enough there was a footprint there.

Sherlock moves over to it, studying and deducing faster than the rest of the world can keep up with.

"Bloody hell, I thought you went over the scene Anderson" Lestrade chided.

"It wasn't there before, neither were the marks I swear." The man stuttered.

"Oh maybe they were under an illusion." Donovan's voice was sweet and mocking.

Blood shot John a look, and tilted her head. The two moved over away from the group and Sherlock.

"There's Grammayre left on the walls, it's possible."

John nodded, "This gets weirder every moment. Who's hounding this one?"

"Two new kids, came in after you left for Afghanistan. Pretty good, but not this level."

The two looked over at the body of their mutual friend, "At least he wasn't one of Them this time, otherwise we'd both be fucked." John said at last, dismissing Jackal as yet another casualty.

"We may still be, he was a high ranking red, someone's killing them off, someone they all knew."

"A mundane, or someone who appeared to be a mundane."

"John, Blood, we're leaving." Sherlock calls [not jealous that John is talking to her in a hushed tone that says he's not invited to the conversation].

"Bloody child."

John swats Blood on the head, "Respect your elders".

The crime scene is frozen again and Sherlock's brain is whirling. John didn't hit people, not even in play, he always felt like the army had given him and unfair advantage. Blood's laughter broke the freeze, "You people act like you've never seen someone get slapped upside the head."

Her laughter broke the silence and everyone started moving again. Sherlock managed to arrange the group so that he was walking next to John. [He wasn't jealous; he just wanted to discuss the case.]

Blood saw the movement, and Lestrade noticed something dance across the girl's tawny eyes, some sort of hidden laughter. The inspector shook it off, 221 B seemed to attract the oddest of people.

The walk back to 221 B was silent. Sherlock was trying to fit all the pieces together, unknowingly joined by John and Blood. But the case wasn't the only thing on Blood's mind that night. Sherlock was jealous of her, or rather of her relationship with John. Never mind that John was more her brother than anyone else, Sherlock had, for the first time, seen someone who could rival his closeness with the doctor. Blood herself was content, even happy to see the relationship forming between the two men, she liked Sherlock.

At the flat Blood surprised both men when, instead of ordering takeaway, she managed to put together some decent spaghetti in the same amount of time.

Sherlock looked puzzled at the food poking it with his fork.

"Usually one uses the fork to eat the food, not mutilate it." Blood observed.

"I don't eat during a case, slows me down."

John sighed, it was an old argument. "You need the food to continue running your massive brain."

"Digesting slows down the thinking process."

"Fainting from hunger and sleep deprivation will do the same thing."

The two men went back and forth, Sherlock adamant that he would not eat, John equally sure that he would. Blood watched the two with a fond smile, which Sherlock noticed.

"Why are you smiling?"

John raised an eyebrow; Sherlock rarely asked such questions, usually managing to deduce the answer. Sure enough the taller man continued, "Obviously you find this conversation amusing."

"Yes, it's funny, but you act like such a child at times, refusing to see that your body needs certain things to continue." Blood smiled, eating her food innocently.

Sherlock ate half of his, admittedly small, plate of spaghetti having learned a valuable lesson: Blood was a superior manipulator. She might even match Mycroft, though further experimentation would be needed.

After everyone had finished, Blood began the dishes, leaving John and Sherlock alone in the living room.

"Something's off about this case."

John looked up from his paper, "Excuse me?"

Sherlock was frowning at a laptop screen, Blood's judging by the fact that John had never seen it before, and said, "Nothing adds up, who would hire hits on two men who don't even seem to have existed before they died. Perhaps an underground gang war?"

Sherlock was too busy looking at something on the laptop screen to notice John's faint wince, that was a little too close for comfort.

"Sod it all"

John jumped, Sherlock wasn't one to swear, or make such exclamations. The younger man was glaring at the laptop as if personally affronted by it. John imagined he could see the screen smoking from the force of the detectives glare.

"What is it?"

"I can't guess the password."

John couldn't help it, he laughed. He put his head in his hands and laughed. Really it was something closer to hysterics, because honestly the only part of Blood Sherlock hadn't dismantled was the magical part, and really, between the hits and both Blood and John in the same house, Sherlock was going to find them out.

Blood came into the living room, looking perplexed, but then she saw her laptop. "Why are you attempting to use my laptop?"

John suddenly cut off laughing, Blood was picky about her laptop, and most anything she would actually write on. Then another thought struck him, which a quick glance at Blood confirmed: there was research Sherlock did NOT need to see on the computer.

Sherlock had quickly picked up on the 'not good' vibe coming off the two. "Bit not good?"

John nodded, eyeing Blood, "Blood's laptop is off limits, yeah?"

Sherlock looked between the two.

Blood has things on her laptop he's not supposed to see, but more than that she has personal things. A new fold of both Sherlock's flat mate's characters unfolded as he gently shut the laptop and put it down, padding into his own room.

Sherlock emerged to see Blood once again curled around the top of the arm chair, looking over John's shoulder as the soldier looked at something on her laptop.

How she managed to remain perfectly balanced was an interesting mystery, after all, it's not like there was a lot of room. Silence reigned in the flat, Sherlock searched for the runes, and, unbeknownst to the detective, John and Blood did the same thing.

An hour later Blood's cell phone rang and she twisted in a movement that made Sherlock wince to get her phone out of her coat without actually leaving the arm chair.

"Yeah?"

"No, we're fine."

"Why?"

John looked up as Blood muttered a curse, Sherlock just ignored her, to focused on the case at hand. Blood hung up a few minutes later, "I'll be back, play nicely while I'm gone."

Blood walked down the back streets quickly, masking herself from prying eyes with a subconscious thought. Her contact was sitting on a cold bench far away from the fires of the other homeless people.

"Blood, thank you for coming on such short notice."

Blood smiled and shook the proffered hand, "You have news?"

John sighed, shutting Blood's laptop, she had the most extensive database on runes, but only she fully knew how to work it, and besides, runes weren't either of their specialties. "Tea?"

Sherlock nodded absently, still busy doing who knows what.

John puttered around in the kitchen making the tea. When he brought it back into the living room, Sherlock was looking up at him, storm colored eyes looking at him intently.

"How long have you known Blood?"

John paused, "What?"

"Nothing, never mind." But those eyes were still suspicious.

John sighed, Sherlock was already figuring out the mystery. He hoped Blood found a way around the covenant so nothing bad happened, mundanes who found out weren't exactly welcomed with open arms.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHH Blood was taking over, I'm trying to shift focus back to John and Sherlock. Thank you all my lovely reviewers! You make my day!