I probably shouldn't have to justify why I haven't written anything over the summer, but I feel like I need to...well, I'll just say depression sucks. I haven't been feeling like myself, and the things that I usually love or feel like I should like weren't as much fun or as satisfying as they should have been. But I'm getting through it.

In any case, once I decided on what I wanted to say in this chapter, the rest of the ideas started to flow like syrup- slow going, but definitely on the way. I've never been on a schedule to write, but I'm going to try it for a bit to see if I can squeeze more out.

Enjoy!

0-0-0-0-0-0

Things were plenty hectic in the hours that followed hiding Soo Lin.

The Black Lotus gang still hadn't crossed the border into England, but she was watching closely. Jack had programs tracking all the Black Lotus' known aliases in the British customs computers, and facial recognition software running on her feeds of the CCTV for all the trains, buses, airplanes, and boats that both entered and left Europe. Sherlock's homeless network had been bribed to keep eyes out. She didn't like to do it, but Jack even pulled rank and got a few of the junior members of her organization to report to her.

As far as she could tell, nothing was happening, which didn't sit well with her. The gang members who lived in London weren't acting at all suspicious. To the idle crooked man, it would look like nothing too unusual was happening. But someone was in the city, tagging walls and threatening bankers while being nigh invisible. The Black Lotus was gearing up for something big, they had to be, so why the hell was no one moving?

Furthermore, it was during her nighttime routine of checking her security systems that she realized there was literally no reason for her benefactors to have told her about the Black Lotus interference. If the Black Lotus had crossed into London, all of Jack's people in the area would have noticed. She would have been on high alert anyway. If she had been threatened, she would have defended herself regardless of affiliation- that's what she was trained to do. They had told her to make her pay attention to it, as a means of distraction. And damn them, she had fallen for it. But she couldn't stop- something was about to happen. She resigned herself to days filled with watching the computer screen and hating herself for it, knowing she was playing right into their hands.

A few quiet days came and went. After thirty-six hours, Sherlock was climbing the walls. Without a case to occupy him, he focused his laser-like attention on Jack.

"What is this?"

It had to be at least the thirtieth time he'd said those words today. Jack sucked her teeth and looked up from her work. He was holding one of her empty tea mugs. Why, she couldn't understand.

She looked back down at the screen. "I worry that you're asking me to explain that to you."

"I know what it is. Why are there eight of them? Why are they all over the table?"

There were various mugs, half-drunk and sticky from tea, decorating the table surface. When she would feel herself crashing, she would brew more and, not wanting to be slowed down by washing up, she simply pulled out another mug. They all had individual levels of obscenely-sugared English Breakfast inside. "I've been working," Jack answered.

Obsessing was a better word for it. She hadn't slept for thirty two hours. She loved quiet days- reveled in them even- but she didn't trust them. A steady stream of danger and violence made each instance of it blur together and lose its intensity. She knew that, after the relaxing few days she'd had, the next episode of actions was going to explode like a bomb. So rather than enjoying the time she had to relax, she proactively looked for what she could, when she wasn't in class or checking on Soo Lin.

Currently she was reading reports of what Mycroft was up to. It wasn't making much sense, but it involved him loading up on cadavers. Something called Bond Air. She'd keep a weather eye out for it.

"The table is a mess."

"You've made worse messes on tables."

"Do you have plans to clean this table anytime soon?"

"Do you need the table anytime soon?"

"You need to clean it. Now."

"I am working."

"On what?" Sherlock walked around the table and took a look at her screen. "You- playing sudoku is not work. You're barely even exercising a modicum of brain power."

Of course he wouldn't think so, and she tried not be offended, but dammit. Jack stopped typing. "If I commit a murder for you, will you leave?" she snapped.

Sherlock looked at her adoringly. "Oh, would you?"

"No." John walked through the living room. "No murders, the both of you."

Sherlock made a disapproving snort and stood up. "Fine. If you are determined to be so ridiculously dull, I'm going out. Perhaps Molly has something new for me to play with."

"Those are someone's loved ones," Jack called out to him as he flew down the stairs. "Try to remember that." The door slammed shut.

John put the kettle on. "Any plans for the day?"

"Just this, for the moment." She was intent on her work. She put a three in the upper right hand corner- Mycroft had procured the dead grandfather of two young girls? Why?

He settled in the chair across form her. "No clinic today?" she asked.

"They gave me the day. I thought I'd work on the blog a bit."

"Best of luck to you." Jack had already seen how slow he typed. He was going to be there all day.

The two of them settled into an easy silence. Jack put the numbers in the correct boxes, slowly decoding the message and only growing more confused as she did so. So far there was no intel on Bond Air, because her benefactors hadn't deemed it important enough to investigate. Regardless, something about it was stirring Jack's interest. She decided to squeeze a few minders in Parliament's firewalls, just in case it turned into something.

"Making more tea, you want any?" She stood.

"Wait." She turned back to him, caught off guard. He came and stood directly in front of her, looking into her eyes one at a time. Suddenly he put his hand on her forehead.

"Are you...examining me?"

"You have eight cups of highly-caffeinated tea on the table and they're all completely drained. You never went to bed last night. Something is wrong."

John was infinitely more perceptive than Jack gave him credit for. It was annoying. "You must not have spent much time around kids my age," Jack scoffed. "I'm in college. This is par for the course in terms of sleeplessness."

"Would you tell me if something was wrong?"

"No." She pulled away. "You're my flatmate. You're not my doctor."

"Can't I be both?"

"Why would you want to be? I have plenty of doctors. Trust me, you don't want to join their company."

The sound of her computer interrupted her. She walked back around the table to find that a pop up had interrupted her game of Sudoku, trying to sell her Dyson vacuums. She decoded it quickly to find that Megan had sent her another message.

Not sure if this has anything to do with what you told me about, it read, but a guy was just found dead in his apartment. He was holding a gun- the police will rule it as a suicide.

Then it was probably just a suicide. Jack had just begun to fill out the ad and say as much when a second ad popped up, this time for a sweepstakes to win a trip to Mexico.

I only bring it up because the bullet wound is on the right side of his head, but I watched some past surveillance footage, and I'm pretty sure he was left-handed.

Jack thought about it for a beat before turning to John. "Has Sherlock texted you?"

John made a disapproving face at Jack's subject change, but he humored her and pulled his phone out of this pocket. "Hmm...yes, actually. Inspector Dimmock got in touch with him. Says there was a murder, but the police are calling it a suicide. Something about the man being left handed."

-0-0-0-0-0-0

It was Van Coon. The Black Lotus had let Van Coon live a bit longer than Jack thought they might, but he was finally dead. His death meant that the Black Lotus was ready to move. And dammit, when they moved they moved fast.

All of the sudden six new Chinese artifacts showed up in three separate auction houses, always by anonymous donors. Private underground dealers came into obscene amounts of opium almost overnight. Jack heard a rumor about some "priceless" ruby earrings trading hands for over $45 million.

Jack checked the surveillance footage of Van Coon's flat; he wasn't even smart enough to realize he was being watched. If Van Coon had smuggled for the Black Lotus, there would have to be others in the city that he worked with.

Jack looked through his journals. The man had kept a detailed itinerary and had scheduled his trips out of the country months in advance. Every time he came back, he made a note of his travel expenses to report to the company for reimbursement. She linked to the bank's computers and checked those records; every single time he left the country, he came back and had coffee at the Lucky Cat diner. Idiot had actually submitted receipts from this place so he could be reimbursed twelve pounds.

Her next move was to the Lucky Cat diner. Shamelessly behind on the times, there was no computer for her to get into, so she went to the diner on foot. The old man who worked there was the kind grandfather type, and he had no problem giving Jack the box of receipts. She matched dates together and found that a few of the receipts matched each other exactly, from menu items purchased to total cost, and the transactions happened one right after the other. Way too close to be coincidence, she took those receipts and left.

After searching for the credit card that had been used to pay for the food, she determined that one of Van Coon's partners was a journalist named Brian Lukis. She found his address broke into his flat to snoop, only to find (after twenty minutes of rifling though his books) that Lukis was upstairs, afflicted with rigor mortis. The police had to be notified, but she sure as hell wasn't doing it. She went up on the roof, fired off a few shots, and the rattled neighbors took care of the rest.

Sherlock and John believed they were investigating a serial killer. They didn't understand the connection to Black Lotus, and there was no way they could, not yet. But it made Jack's work that much more difficult. She understood that Sherlock would eventually put it all together, and when he did, their paths would intersect. He would be able to move freely, but she would need to be careful and not be seen by either man. The easiest course of action would be to work faster than them, and figure it out before they did.

And by easiest course, she meant frustrating as hell.

It took three days of running around and being secretive, but while she was walking through Chinatown she had a brainwave. She knew that the marks weren't letters, but something about them was still distinctly Chinese. She took a left and rounded the corner into a shop that sold tiny souvenirs. The woman behind the counter smiled up at her when the bell rang. "Welcome!"

Jack ignored her and made a beeline for the tiny trinkets. There were a few little toys she could have chosen, but the beaded necklaces made of turquoise was what she landed on. The tag on the necklace was covered in tiny marks that closely resembled the tag on Van Coon's walls.

"How much?"

The woman took the necklace from her. "One hundred fifteen pound."

Jack took the necklace back and studied the tag again. With a smile, she pulled out her debit card. "I'll take it."

0-0-0-0

On nights when Sherlock actually slept (like tonight), everyone in the Baker Street household was fast asleep by eleven. At promptly 11:01, Jack pulled out the tag and made a note of what the original mark in Van Coon's office looked like. The solid line was a one, and the half-finished figure eight as a fifteen.

One, fifteen. Two numbers marked on a dead man's wall. Whatever the numbers meant, Van Coon had recognized them as a threat.

Understanding that the marks were numbers didn't make it more recognizable, but for some reason, Jack was bothered. She couldn't put he finger on why, but she felt like her brain was prompting the next move, the way a hand knows how to write letters. It was familiar in some way, but she couldn't pinpoint why.

Jack decided to percolate. Her mind would work on the problem during her sleep, and she might come up with something new to try. At around midnight, she finally dozed.

At about four, her eyes flew open and her heart lurched into her throat.

Holy shit, holy shit.

0-0-0-0-0

Megan stretched her neck from side to side. The last three hours had been completely devoted to soldering new voltage protectors to the motherboard of her hard drive. It was really annoying when it overloaded and the hard drive stopped working, so Megan proactively put new protectors into her drives before she used them. As a result, she hated buying new drives- it was difficult and it took forever.

Megan started by gently using tweezers to hold the piece of wire where it went and slooooowly soldering the wire into place. A bit more, almost done...

BAM.

She jerked back, thanking all higher powers that she hadn't just fucked up three hours worth of work. Something huge slammed into the front door so hard Megan heard it from her room. And she lived in a mansion, so that was saying something.

She stood and went to the landing of the stairs. The housekeep and the cook were blocking someone from coming inside. They were giving it a valiant effort, but someone was getting in. Everyone was yelling.

"-is in Hong Kong, and we cannot just let you inside-"

"-outside unless you want me to call the police-

"-I can destroy you-"

Megan got to the bottom of the stairs before she recognized her friend. "Stop!" she ordered.

The cook and the housekeeper fell back and let Jack through. "Miss, she just came in and-"

"It's alright, Maggie. This is Jack, one of my friends from school. Let her inside."

Jack grabbed her arm. "I need to talk to you right this fucking second. Where can we talk in private?"

After reassuring her flustered help, Megan led Jack to the library off the second floor. Before she could get a single word out, Jack shoved a piece of paper in her face. It was full of unrecognizable symbols, and it was written so hastily Megan knew whoever had written it was in a serious state of panic.

"Do you recognize these symbols?"

"Jack, what-"

"Do you. Recognize. These Symbols?!"

Megan took the slip of paper and studied it carefully. Now that she was actually looking at the paper, she realized that some of the symbols had numbers written next to them- a one and a fifteen.

"No, okay? What the hell is going on?"

"These symbols translate into numbers. If you were trying to solve this, what would be your next step?"

Megan didn't give a damn, but Jack was so shaken, Megan gave it some thought. "Well... I'll bet the numbers translate to words."

"How would you figure out the code?"

"...with a book, I guess?"

Jack took a deep breath and very gently put her hands on either side of Megan's face. "Why did you say that? Why would you use a book?"

"I-I don't know. Jack what the hell?"

"Listen to me. I had the exact same thought- I jumped to a book. Why did we do that? Why did we have the same thought?"

Why the hell was she so freaked out? "We trained together, Jack. We lived together for years. Why are you freaked out about the fact that we're on the same wavelength?"

"Because this is more than just us being in sync-" Jack's hands went from cupping Megan's face to cupping her own head- "-it's muscle memory. We know what to do next because we've done this before."

"...and? We were trained to look at pop up ads and see hidden messages- I'm not at all surprised to know we've learned to make a cipher like this."

"When?'

"Oh, I don't know."

"Exactly. Don't you see the problem?"

Megan just stared at Jack. Jack took a deep calming breath to try and regain control of her emotions, because she was about to explode. "When was the last time you forgot anything? You talk about our training- we were also trained to commit everything to memory. We walk into a room and pick it apart, and we can tell you the exact location of every item we touched. We have damn near perfect recall; it was bred into us. We do not forget things, ever. We do not work that way. So when did we learn about this cipher? When did we use it? Do you remember?"

Megan thought. And thought. And paled.

"Shit," she whispered. "I- I don't- oh my god. I don't remember. Why don't I remember?"

Jack whispered too. "Exactly."