Author's Note:
After a two-week hiatus, I return~! (Here's the deal—I really don't update unless I get at least one review. Otherwise, what's the point, you know?)
Well, I've finished watching the series! Oh my goodness, SH22 really is a great show and so terribly underrated! Holmes never disappoints in dialogue, action, reaction—his characterization is so delightfully perfect. Moriarty isn't quite the chilling Professor we know and love from the Canon, but he's loveable in his own right. (And he's not a goofy bad-guy, like so many cartoon villains are—you have to take him dead serious.) And… okay, okay, I admit it! I love the Holmes/Lestrade interaction as a shipper. *sighs* Yup.
To my reviewer:
Elerrina Star: Thank you very much! I think 10 is my favorite, too—I must confess, however, that I've read deplorably little classic literature. …I intend to rectify that error this winter. (Ah yes, good old Tolkien and Lewis!) Well, you don't have read books to know what they're about, but I did figure Moriarty would be interested in certain 20th-century classics. Hee-hee, yeah, I love the HOUN part, too! Glad you enjoyed it so much!
Disclaimer: Not gonna bother with it this time, 'cause the only thing I own here is Lestrade's back-story and Mark.
==11. The Problem with Guys==
Rating: T
Summary: Lestrade has problems with the guys in her life, including an old friend.
Pairing(s): possible H/L, Lestrade/Gregson friendship
Warnings: crackiness
Word Count: 908
…is that they love to get on girls' nerves.
"So that's the Great Detective."
Lestrade spun, surprise and delight struggling for dominance in her features. "Mark!"
Mark Gregson perched his tall, well-built body on one of the cafeteria tables and grinned. "Hey there, Lizzie. Good to see you again."
Lestrade blushed. "Don't call me that," she hissed in an embarrassed whisper.
"Nobody calls you that anymore?"
"Not since I left the Met on that highly-classified mission that I still can't tell you about, no. It's either Beth or Lestrade."
"Highly-classified mission that took three blooming years," Gregson muttered, but his blue eyes twinkled. "You take off and the higher-ups won't tell us lowly constables what the zed is going on, and then you show up after your own Great Hiatus wearing a D.I.'s badge." He shook his head in wonder.
Lestrade glanced over her shoulder to where Holmes was in line, chatting with Watson and Hopkins. Like her own family, the Gregsons, the Hopkins, and the Bradstreets kept sending their children back to the London Metropolitan generation after generation. She had a very strong suspicion that a certain private consulting detective and his biographer were at the root of that tradition. "Are you angry?" she said quietly. "For me making the grade like that?"
Gregson exhaled slowly. "Nooo, I'm not. A little jealous, maybe, but not angry. I just wish I could know why the Foreign Office decided to endorse you for such a big promotional leap at such a young age."
Lestrade nodded just as slowly. "I wish I could tell you," she admitted. "I really do. But there's…" she shook her head, "there's so much at stake. I just can't."
"Yeah, I figured."
She smiled ruefully up at the guy she'd casually dated in the Academy (which she knew must've had their poor ancestors rolling in their graves). "Sorry."
"Eh, you gotta do what you gotta do. I can live with that."
Her smile widened fractionally. "Good."
"Soooo," he drawled, and Lestrade was instantly on the alert. "That's Sherlock Holmes." He gave her a smile that she thought he must have inherited from his own famous ancestor—she could well imagine that look driving Geoffrey Lestrade as nuts as it drove her.
"Uh-huh," she said slowly.
"'S not bad-looking. No wonder you work with him so much."
She slammed her palm down on the table, her eyes abruptly blazing. "Mark Tobias Gregson!"
He threw up both hands in either a pacifying or yielding gesture, she wasn't sure which. "Peace," he soothed. "Sorry." He grinned unrepentantly. "But I always did think I was competing with something Victorian back in the Academy."
"Aaargh…" Lestrade folded her arms on the table and dropped her head onto them.
"Oh, c'mon, I was."
"It was Watson I fangirled over, for crying out loud—you knew that!"
"Yeah, the name for your compudroid was kinda telling."
"Mark, I swear, if you don't cut it out…"
"So is the way you look at him. Holmes, I mean."
"Mark."
"Hey, relax. If it's any consolation for me bugging you, I think he looks at you the same way."
"Okay, that does it." Lestrade shot to her feet, and, the next thing Gregson knew, he was reeling precariously on the table from a slap across his face.
"I say!"
"Lestrade!"
Oh, no, Lestrade moaned inwardly. There were Holmes and Watson, the latter looking bemused and the former looking almost… thunderstruck.
"Is there a problem?" Holmes said frostily.
No, no, no, this is not happening…
Gregson blinked and smiled weakly at the Victorian detective. "Me, I guess." He held out his hand. "Detective Sergeant Mark Gregson, Mr. Holmes. Honor to meet you."
Watson looked more confused than ever. Holmes's grey-blue eyes narrowed, and he did not take the hand. "I might have known. The resemblance is remarkable, the tendency to irritate a Lestrade not withstanding."
Gregson winced and withdrew his hand. Lestrade found herself duty-bound to come to the poor boy's rescue. "I overreacted, Holmes. It's okay, really—Mark and I are old friends." Then she winced, herself, realizing that she had used Gregson's given name, implying a good deal of intimacy.
The icy eyes flickered to her. "Indeed," Holmes said flatly.
"Holmes, I mean it," Lestrade insisted, much more forcefully this time. "Mark's always a pain—I should be used to that by now… Oh, zed, Mark, go have a nurse check that and make sure it won't interfere with your workload. Greyson'll kill me if I incapacitate you."
Gregson grinned around the red and purple swelling across his face. "Nah, he won't. I'll be your human shield if it comes to that."
"My hero," Lestrade said sarcastically. "Just go."
"I'm goin', I'm goin'." Gregson slid to the floor. "Nice to meet you both," he nodded to Holmes and Watson. "See ya 'round the schoolyard, Lizzie."
Lestrade glared daggers at the man's retreating back and growled, "One of these days, he's gonna end up on the business end of my ionizer—and I am going to enjoy every zedding second of it!"
"Oh my" was Watson's comment.
Holmes's was something akin to a snort. "Lestrade, I trust there was a good reason for causing such a scene?"
Lestrade blushed. "Um, well, kinda… Like I said, he's always a pain. 'S okay."
Holmes gave her That Look.
"Really!"
"Indeed."
Lestrade huffed and stalked away towards the line. "Men," she muttered loud enough for him to hear.
Author's Note:
No idea where this came from, so don't ask. Isn't it hilarious irony, though: the descendants of Inspectors Lestrade and Gregson dating in college? =D Writing Beth and Mark's dialogue was fun—"I was competing with something Victorian." Lol!
Next Friday, "The Once and Future Master." See if you can guess correctly as to the identity!
Please review!
