(Sherlock holds a syringe of cocaine over a vein in his arm. He breaths in, and out, then lowers it, only to have the needle swiped from his hand by Irene Adler)

"Sherlock Holmes, don't you dare!"

"Why not, Ms. Adler? Come to scold me again?"

"If I have to drag you to John Watson's door gagged and bound, I will."

"That would be tremendously ambitious of you."

"And it would do you a hell of a lot more good than that thing ever will."

"A seven percent solution is ideal for my purposes, Irene. I am not in the slightest bit of danger. Do you doubt my capabilities in such matters?"

"I don't give a damn how good you are with a needle. You've left John Watson as a half-broken man in a world that has decided the only thing he's ever loved isn't real. Tell me, is that a fate you would wish on anyone?"

"Why do you think I've returned to cocaine?"

"Coward."

"I am beginning to tire of people naming me that."

"Sherlock Holmes, shying away from the truth. I'd slap some sense into you if I had my riding crop with me. Do you have one I can borrow?"

"Don't you see?! The cowardly thing to do would be relent! To give in! If I turn up at John's door and push myself back into his life, drag him back into the firing range that is my home, he'll be the next coffin I have to bury!"

"Dear god. So that's why you've stayed away."

"I would have jumped off that building to save him even if I hadn't planned for my survival. Dying for him would be easy. Living for him seems to be infinitely harder."

"Sherlock, if you don't go back to him, you won't have to live for him much longer."

"Anything's better for him than me. Don't you understand? He could have died. He could have died any of the thousand times I dragged him into danger and he followed. You say he carries his gun with him now? Before I met him, he didn't need one."

"You're wrong."

"I'm never wrong."

"Tell me where I was today."

"Obvious. Tedious. Your shoes don't show signs of walking, but there's a loose stitch in your new tights at approximately the right height for the stiletto heel of your shoe to have tapped against if your legs were crossed, so you endured a very long, tedious car ride. Long enough for you to have crossed half the city, but not to have gone outside it. Any longer and there would have been an actual hole. So, what's halfway across the city from your current residence? There's no evidence of food on your cloths, and even you aren't a dainty enough eater to avoid all signs of a meal, so you didn't stay long. So, someone you either don't know well or had little to say to. Your jewelry is very, very plain, as is your outfit. When you're meeting business associates, you dress to make an impression, so it wasn't a work related meeting, rather a social call. In that section of London, for a visit of that duration, and with such somber, unusually un-provocative clothing, I can only deduce you went to visit John this morning, and by your conversation here, I assume you kept my secret. Thank you."

"I've never regretted anything more. You should have seen the man."

"I've taken considerable pains not to."

"He's thinking of moving out of Baker's street, you know. But he can't decide. Half-caught by the memories of you. Distraught enough to wish he didn't remember. Sherlock Holmes, if you can look me in the eyes and tell me that's how you wished your best friend to live the rest of his life, I will leave right now and never trouble you again."

"I don't want to watch him die."