Disclaimer: I don't own Sherlock.


The Christmas Miracle


Finding Sherlock in the freezer, his skin paler than death, his lips and fingers turning a deep blue, was easily one of the Top Five Most Terrifying Things John Watson Ever Experienced Involving Sherlock Holmes. It edged out "being trapped in a train car with a bomb" and "being burned alive in a Guy Fawkes bonfire" but came just below "watching Sherlock Holmes jump to his "death" but not really".

When you wake up, we need to talk about your tendency of flirting with death, mate, he thought to the still form of his best friend.

The doctors' words bounced around his brain like captive rubber balls. Core temperature close to fifteen degrees Celsius. Second-degree frostbite on his extremities, severe concussion from the blow to his head. Very lucky to have survived without permanent damage. They hooked him up to fluids and antibiotics to combat infection, bundled him up with blankets and hot water bottles, and were cautiously optimistic at his waking up soon. If at all.

"How is he?" came Molly's voice from the doorway.

John watched the pathologist enter and offer him a fresh cuppa. "How's Joshua?" he asked, accepting the tea.

"My sister is with him now. Refuses to let him out of her sight." She sipped her own coffee and looked at Sherlock. "How about him?"

John relayed what the doctors had told him, then added, "And to think, we almost left him in that packing plant because we found footprints in the dust heading for the exit and Lestrade and Donovan assumed he tailed Nesbitt. We caught Nesbitt and thought Sherlock had just trotted on home, but I...I don't know, it was like something tugged at me to go back. I needed to check the freezer. Something told me if I didn't, Sherlock would never let me hear the end of it."

As if his name was a signal, Sherlock began to thrash in his blankets. Dumping his tea in the bin, John immediately moved closer and said, "Hey, calm down mate," in his best bedside-doctor voice. "It's John. You're at St. Bart's."

"Bart's?" Sherlock's eyebrows furrowed. "Molly...Molly..."

"I'm here, Sherlock," said the pathologist. "I'm fine."

"Where's Tam? I want Tam," Sherlock mumbled childishly. His hand reached out to grope for something. John quickly grabbed it to check his pulse and provide some measure of comfort, but Sherlock shook him off. "Tam. Tam, where are you..." His voice softened before drifting away as he settled and fell asleep again.

"That name...He's mentioned the name a few times the last couple days," John said. "D'you know who it is?"

"No idea," Molly murmured as she brushed her fingertips over the detective's brow. "He'd call out to Tam in his sleep sometimes, when he hid in my flat after the Fall. I didn't want to pry, so I never asked about it. You know how he is about sentiment."

Silence stretched between them for a time, broken only by the Christmas carols crackling out of the radio at the nurses' station just down the hall. John smiled when, during a special commercial break, the newscaster announced that the Yuletide Killer had been apprehended earlier that evening. "London's own Christmas miracle," he called the arrest, and advised the city to, "Give thanks to God and all his angels on this night."

"Speaking of angels," Molly said, "whatever happened to the woman?"

"The Woman?" John asked, immediately thinking of Irene Adler despite himself.

"The woman who was with Sherlock tonight."

"There was no sign of anyone else in the packing plant."

"But she's been helping him on the case. She has long black hair, a pale face, wore a charcoal peacoat and red-soled boots." The lack of recognition on John's face made Molly's eyebrows furrow. "She was with him when he came to the morgue after the Bolton murders. She followed him up to my roof tonight. She went after Oliver, then called Sherlock to tell him where to go."

That surprised John. "He never answers calls."

"This one he did. I didn't hear his mobile ring, must've been on silent..." Handing her mug to John, she dug into Sherlock's coat pocket and extracted his phone. In seconds she was in his call history. "Not even password-protected. That stupid...Wait."

"What?"

"There's no record of the call. Not even from a blocked number." She switched to his text messages. "No new texts either."

Now John frowned. "You're sure he talked to someone?"

"Yes. Answered the phone, said the name of the meat packing place, and said he'd be right over." Molly looked at Sherlock's still form, her eyes holding more than a little confusion. "And he wasn't doing it for my benefit. Someone actually told him where to go."

"But there's no record of it in his phone. How is that possible?" John asked.

It was another voice that answered. "Perhaps I could be of assistance."

"Mycroft." John turned to see the eldest Holmes standing in the doorway, leaning on his signature umbrella. "Of course. You called."

"Certainly not. My brother would have never taken a call from me." Mycroft bowed his head slightly to Molly. "Doctor Hooper, your sister requests that you join her and your nephew straightaway. Rest assured that we will make sure that Oliver Nesbitt will never take a breath of fresh air for as long as he lives."

"Thank you, Mycroft." With a last hug to John, Molly excused herself to rejoin her family. Mycroft moved to stand beside his brother's bedside, eyes downcast as if studying some invisible pattern in the sheets. John allowed him a few minutes of silent reflection before cutting to the chase.

"You know Tam." When Mycroft nodded he decided to guess, "One of your agents?"

"No. Tam left my sphere of influence many years ago." John noticed how Mycroft used past tense to describe the mystery person. But before he could remark on it, Mycroft cleared his throat. "I knew when Tam returned that Sherlock would not take it well, that it would end badly. Nothing good ever happens to Sherlock when Tam returns for the holidays, but worse happens when Tam stays away."

"I don't understand. Are they friends?"

"They were more than that." Mycroft cleared his throat and licked his lips. "Perhaps you've noticed my brother's complete disdain for Christmas celebrations. It's not just his personality, I assure you. It's just that...Tam loved the Christmas season."

Again John caught the odd use of past tense. "Who is he?"

"She was - " Now Mycroft looked up, and the blogger was startled to see tears glistening in his eyes. "She was Rebecca Tamasin Joan Holmes, my younger sister and Sherlock's twin. She was equally gifted in mind but possessing a humanity that my brother and I, sadly, were never able to grasp."

"He's never mentioned having a twin." But then again, he rationalized to himself, Sherlock's an intensely private person. Hell, if Mycroft hadn't introduced himself, John might have never learned that Sherlock had a brother.

"Tamasin was a particularly intelligent child, just like Sherlock. But she was also kind and sensitive, more than either Sherlock and I ever were. She helped Sherlock in ways that even our parents couldn't comprehend. Tam's influence would have helped Sherlock grow into a very good man." Mycroft's expression twisted in pain, as if speaking of his other sibling hurt him as well.

"You keep talking like she's not in his life anymore." Now thoroughly flummoxed, John dared to ask, "Mycroft, what happened to Tamasin?"

"She - " Suddenly unable to meet John's eyes, the older man instead focused on his umbrella's polished handle as he continued to explain. "She died on Christmas Eve at the age of eleven."

Horror, shock, and sympathy burst in John's chest. "Oh god, I'm so sorry." And he was. He couldn't imagine losing Harry, especially at that young an age.

"It is a painful memory for him. As it is for me." John could believe it, hearing the barely-concealed anguish in the elder Holmes' voice. "He's always blamed himself for it happening."

"How can he possibly believe that?"

"They had gone sledding that afternoon, just the two of them, before supper. There was a pond at the bottom of the sledding hill that had frozen over. Or so they thought. Tamasin fell through and drowned." A single tear slipped down Mycroft's cheek, although his expression never changed. "Somehow Sherlock managed to pull her out and carry her home. The resulting chill made him catch pneumonia. He was ill for a week, and when he recovered, his first question was about his sister."

"Losing her took a toll on the whole family, especially on Sherlock. He saw the proper doctors, talked about it to everyone he had to, and underwent the proper psychiatric care for a child who had undergone severe psychological trauma, but it was for naught."

A heavy gloom hung in the air, and John took time to digest everything Mycroft had just told him. It certainly explained Sherlock's disdain for sentimental attachments, as well as his scorn for those who stood by them. If he'd lost Harry at such a young age, John doubted he would have turned out much better.

"He was never the same after that. He grew increasingly distant, focused on his intellect and abandoned what little he had of his social life," Mycroft continued. "It was worse when he discovered narcotics in university. He was once found conversing with a wall in fluent German, cursing it for leaving him alone to deal with a world of morons. That's when I knew the true reason he turned to drugs, not to dull his mind, but to bring back our sister. Mummy was distraught when the matter was brought to our attention. He saw all the doctors again, spoke to psychiatrists and underwent the proper rehabilitation. Since the day he got clean he hasn't spoken her name aloud. Until, I'd wager, the day he was first put on the case of the Yuletide Killer."

"So you're saying that Sherlock hallucinated his dead sister during this whole case?" It certainly put Sherlock's strange behavior over the last few days into perspective, thought John. Except that he'd seen the lab results...

"You know as well as I that his bloodwork was clean." Mycroft shook his head. "And you will do well to remember that Dr. Hooper has seen her as well. So did Oliver Nesbitt, as he testified to me during his interrogation." His smile turned diabolical. "Although I'm certain she showed something different than her usual self for his benefit."

"What are you saying, Mycroft?"

"That it was no miracle that you felt that inexplicable need to search the freezer." His gaze slanted over to a point just next to his left shoulder. "Dearest Tam made sure you found him."

John frowned. "I was there when we found Sherlock. There was nobody else in there."

"No one that you could see, Doctor Watson," corrected the elder Holmes brother.

"Wait, you've seen her too?" A bad joke under the circumstances, but then again, John was used to hearing bad jokes from the Holmes family in general.

But the British government answered honestly. "Indeed I have, every Christmas holiday, and without the use of narcotics." At the doctor's incredulous expression, he held out a dark blue object. Sherlock's scarf. "Care to meet her?"


Ah, perhaps we get some answers at last?

Stay tuned, everyone!