Chapter 36

There were fifteen names on the list.

He didn't need to keep a list, of course. He had long since memorized them all. The visual reminder wasn't necessary to keep him focused on the case, but he kept it with him nonetheless. It seemed like the least he could do for them. Mihail Puntjar, Awurama Ngosa,… he recited silently as he traced his fingers slowly down the page. Tom and Léa Claes, Ada Krupke, and so on until the newest addition, Diego Rosado. Fifteen names on a piece of paper should be such an innocuous thing, and yet, it was as gruesome as if it were written in blood.

There had not, as of yet, been any word on the missing Kamal Hassine. His name would not be added to the list until he was found, whether dead or alive, but Sherlock's finger still ghosted over the sixteenth line as if the name already existed, just waiting to solidify onto the page in dark strokes of ink.

Sherlock felt a wave of revulsion and pushed away from the table, away from the file, away from the list. Little though the physical distance was likely to help his state of mind.

It was late, and he was tired. He was in the lab at Barts. He didn't especially need to be there, but the idea of remaining in his flat, continuing to stare at stale case notes and leads that trailed off into nothingness, had become unbearable. Besides, Molly was working the night shift.

Aline looked up from the jumble of maps she was examining, her eyebrow raised in question.

"I'm fine," he said.

She gave a shrug and went back to making pencil marks on the map.

He wiped a hand across his face and felt the rasp of stubble that he hadn't bothered to shave off that morning. He wasn't fine. He was far from fine. But it didn't matter. Fine or not, solving this case was the only thing that was important right now. And not for the thrill of the chase or the calming of his mind that usually sparked his interest in an investigation. This was personal. His people were dying. And it wasn't going to stop. Nothing was going to stop these murders until he caught the killer - or ran out of allies.

Fifteen names was already far too many, but there were so many others out there who were still in danger. The list could get so much longer.

He steeled himself and flipped back to the reports from Rosado's post-mortem. His eyes skimmed the impersonal lines of information, trace evidence laid out in lines of black and white, useful only in that it confirmed a complete lack of any useful information.

Whoever the people behind this were, they were very good at covering their tracks. Someone somewhere should have made a mistake by now, yet no one had. No real witnesses, no real evidence. The causes of death were creative and varied. The victims came from across countries and across cultures, speaking different languages and moving in entirely different circles from one another. Had Sherlock not known that the deaths were related, he never would have made the connection between any of them. There was nothing that tied these people together - nothing but their association with him. But who had made that connection? And how?

The never-ending frustration was making his head ache. He rubbed at the bridge of his nose, and then looked up at as the door to the lab swung open.

Molly pushed into the room with a stack of files clasped to her chest. Her face lit up as soon as she caught his eye. He felt a corresponding lurch somewhere in the vicinity of his ribs, but resisted the compulsion to return her smile and instead merely nodded.

She crossed the lab and placed the stack of files in front of him.

"Here are the trace findings from the Hampstead Killer and Broughton cases that you asked for," she said, sliding the stack towards him. "Are you thinking there might be a connection?"

"I won't know until I look," he said. He reached out and accepted the files from her. For the barest tenth of a second, his finger brushed the back of her hand, soft and warm and familiar. He took a breath and filed the sensation away without examining his motives for doing so.

"Where's John?" Molly asked. She glanced around the lab as though she might have simply overlooked him.

"I sent him home," Sherlock replied. "His fiancé called and threatened to have the locks changed if he wasn't home in time for dinner." He opened the first file and began sorting through the pages. "I should hate to think I was the one responsible for interfering with the happy couple's domestic bliss."

At the other table, Aline gave a snort of amusement.

Molly managed a smile, but he noticed that she didn't look in Aline's direction. "Alright then," she said, brightly. She rubbed her hands together as if she couldn't decide what else to do with them. "I'll just let you get it to it."

"Yes, thanks." He gave her a short nod and tried to concentrate on the pages in front of him. There was little chance he would find any correlation between these old cases and the current one, but he'd run out of other avenues of investigation, at least until Hassine's body was found.

When he looked up again a few minutes later, Molly was gone.

He closed his eyes and tried to ignore the uncomfortable knot in his stomach. He didn't need the physical reminder of his guilt any more than he needed the list of names to keep him accountable. He knew quite well that he was being a bastard to Molly. Some part of him felt justified - she knew what he was, she know how he was, and she had chosen to be with him anyway. If she felt slighted by his behaviour, then that was on her. But the other part of him was more honest - she deserved better. He could not keep using her this way. He could not keep turning to her in need and then give her nothing in return. When the case was over, he was going to have to decide what to do about the problem of Molly Hooper.

He glanced over to the table where Aline sat. Her dark hair was piled up in a bun on top of her head, her features composed into an expression of complete neutrality as she looked over the documents in front of her. She was working her way through transcribed internet chatter and making notations on the maps, looking for a pattern, a clue, a mention - anything that might apply to this case. It was like looking for a needle in a stack of needles, but he knew that she was perfectly content to do the work. Aline had never minded even the most tedious efforts, as long as it kept her on the right track to achieve her purpose.

His relationship with Aline seemed so easy in comparison to Molly. He was using Aline too, but in their case it was mutual. There was no guilt involved on either side. They were not dependent on each other for anything beyond a cooperative goal. They simply shared a common desire - to wipe James Moriarty's legacy from the world until it was nothing more than a dim memory.

Forever underestimated because of her youth, Aline had made an art out of taking advantage of people's misconceptions. She was shrewd, calm under pressure, preternaturally patient and fearless to a nearly self-destructive degree. They were alike in many ways, though even Sherlock would admit that he had nowhere near her level of patience.

During the months they had worked together, he had watched her bide her time without so much as a flicker of annoyance. Whether it was hours to execute a plan, weeks and months to hunt down a faction, or the years she had been waiting to have her revenge on Moriarty, she was never impatient. Implacable and determined, yes, but never hurried.

Sherlock's phone rang, cutting through the ribbon of his thoughts.

He glanced down at the screen. It was a number he didn't recognize.

"Sherlock Holmes," he said when the call connected.

"Mr. Holmes." The voice on the other end of the line was an exaggerated whisper, as though the speaker was trying not to be overheard. "This is Mike Padmore".

The number was unfamiliar, but the name was not. Padmore was a longtime member of his homeless network. "Yes, Mike. What is it?" The hand gripping the phone clenched hard. There was only one thing he currently had the homeless network looking out for at present, one person he had sent them to find.

"I'm in Edmonton, Mr. Holmes. Me and Adam was looking around some of them warehouses like you said, and we found a guy what looks like that picture you sent out."

"Dead?" Sherlock asked. He could feel his pulse thundering in his ears. So much relied on the answer to this question.

"No. He ain't dead yet."

"And you're sure it's him?"

"I seen 'im myself. Just like in the picture. They got 'im in a big warehouse just up from the Banbury Reservoir."

Sherlock was already on his feet, gesturing at Aline.

Her eyes widened in understanding. "Where?" she mouthed.

He held up a finger.

"What else? Is he being watched? How many men? Quickly, now."

"There's four what we saw. They all got guns - assault rifles, like military maybe."

"Can you make out anything they're saying?"

"They don't seem to be talkin' much. Mostly just gruntin' and pointin' like."

Something clicked suddenly in Sherlock's brain. "What language are they speaking?"

"I don't know. It ain't English, though."

"Alright." Sherlock pulled out his notepad. "Tell me exactly where you are." He took down the information and then ended the call. He felt surprisingly calm. Turning to Aline, he said, "We found them."

Her eyes blazed. She stood and squared her narrow shoulders. "I am ready. How do you want to proceed?"

"I need to get in touch with Lestrade." He was already pulling the number for Scotland Yard up on his phone. "And then we go after them. This ends tonight."

The phone was ringing in his ear as he pushed out of the lab with Aline on his heels.

Molly was in the hallway, arms laden with a tray of glass vials. She startled when the doors banged open, nearly upsetting the tray. "Sherlock - " she began, and then she saw his face. "What is it? What's happened?"

"We have a lead on our killer," he said, as he strode past her. "Get me Lestrade," he barked into the phone when the switchboard connected.

When Lestrade's voice came over the line, Sherlock recited the information Padmore had given him in quick soundbites. "I'm at Barts," he added as he jogged up the steps to the main level.

"On my way," Lestrade said. "Meet me at the Giltspur Street entrance in fifteen minutes."

Sherlock ended the call and shoved his phone into his pocket.

It was a warm night for mid-May. The hour was late, and traffic on this side of the hospital was sparse because of the nearby construction on the A1. Aline stood by his side, a slight, silent figure. She was entirely still, but not at all relaxed. She practically hummed with potential energy like a tightly compressed spring. Sherlock stood near the road with his face turned into the slight breeze. The thrill of the hunt was pumping through his veins. His senses were sharper, his focus narrowed - a dopamine-fueled, cerebral high.

And then he thought of Molly's pale face as he'd blown past her a few moments before, and he suddenly felt ill. His Molly, standing all alone in the dim hallway with a tray of samples clasped to her chest, her dark eyes wide. She was worried and frightened. And he had left her there without a word of explanation.

No.

"What?"

He hadn't realized he had spoken out loud. But he knew what he needed to do - what he had to do. He turned to Aline. "I'll be right back."

"You'll - what? No!"

Aline was looking at him like he'd lost his mind. Maybe he had, but it didn't matter. He turned back towards the hospital, but before he could take a step, he felt Aline's hand grip his arm.

"What the hell are you doing, Sherlock?" she demanded. Her face was a thundercloud.

Sherlock glanced at his watch. "Lestrade will be here in fifteen minutes. I'll be back in five."

Aline's fingers bit into him. "Non! This may be the only break we will ever get. Hassine is alive, but who knows how long he has. We have no time for you to play the besotted fool."

He shook her off. "We have five minutes. I have to do this. I'm sorry." He could hear her behind him, cursing in French, but he paid her no mind. He was through the door and down the stairs, moving fast. He only needed to see Molly, to - to what? Reassure her? Tell her goodbye? Even he wasn't entirely sure. He would figure it out when he got there. As long as he got to see her before -

Sherlock's momentum carried him through the stairwell doors at a near run. He skidded to an abrupt halt in the hallway outside the morgue and then immediately froze. The door swung shut behind him with hollow thump, and then there was silence.

Alarm bells had started going off in his head. Something was wrong.

"Molly?" he called out. His voice sounded odd in the stillness. It was the empty echo of unoccupied space. There was no one here. Molly was gone.

He took a deep breath. Focus. Identify the anomaly. What was it that had alerted him?

Aside from the florescent bulbs that lit the hallways, the lights in this wing were all linked to motion-detectors. When the sensors identified movement, the lights came on automatically. And when a preset number of minutes passed without registering any activity, they shut themselves off. The sensors had been implemented in the name of cost savings, but they drove Molly crazy when she was on the night shift. The after-hours presets were so short, the lights occasionally cut off while she was working at her desk.

Right now, the morgue was dark. A bit further down the hall, the lab was also dark.

That meant it had been five minutes or more since anyone had entered or left either of those rooms. But Molly had been carrying samples which were bound for the incubators in the back of the lab. He and Aline had gone up the stairs no more than seven minutes ago. No matter how quickly Molly managed to load the samples, it would have taken her more than two minutes to program the cycle into the incubator.

And the self-closing door to the lab wasn't closed all the way.

Unimpeded, the door would swing entirely shut. There was something blocking it, something that hadn't been there seven minutes ago.

A terrible feeling of unreality washed over Sherlock before he had even reached the door.

The tray Molly had been carrying was on its side, wedged between the two halves of the door. It had been caught on the backswing of the self-closing mechanism. Most of the carefully sorted and labeled vials had shattered on the floor, their contents spilled amidst thin shards of broken glass. It was as out of place and gut-churning as if it had been a pool of blood.

There were fifteen names on the list. A stack of grotesque autopsy photos - multiple angles in vivid, high-quality color. Reports that rendered every brutal detail down into an objective series of indifferent bullet points. He knew every fact of every case, every crumb of remotely relevant information. He knew it all. He knew them all. Those fifteen names. Those fifteen people. They were his people.

He saw the list in his mind - looping black script, the lines smudged from use. And on the sixteenth line, a new name.

Molly Hooper.

"Oh, God," he said. It came out as a sob.

"Sherlock?"

He whirled around, but it was Aline who stood in the hallway behind him, looking angry, and perplexed.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Molly," he said. "She's gone." The floor seemed to tilt beneath him. He reached out a hand to steady himself against the wall.

Aline made a sound of annoyance. "Surely, she has only gone upstairs. Really, mon ami," she said, her tone chiding. "We must be going." Then she reached his side and saw the mess on the floor. "Oh," she said softly. "Oh, I see."

He shook his head and stood. "I have to - " He thought suddenly of the back door - the one that funeral homes used to pick up the bodies from the morgue - the one that led directly out into a parking area in the rear of the building

Without a word, he turned and ran, barreling through the door and out into the night.

It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the relative darkness. The diffused light of the utility lamps bathed the parking area in a hazy yellow glow. At first he thought that the square was empty. But no, against the far wall, two men and a woman in nursing scrubs stood outside one of the service entrances, the smoke from their cigarettes swirling upward and dissipating into the night.

"A car," he called as he jogged toward them. "Have you seen a car or a truck drive out of here in the past ten minutes?"

"Sorry, mate. Just got here," one of the men offered through a puff of smoke. He reclined insouciantly against the bumper of a maintenance van.

The woman looked up at Sherlock. "Actually, yeah. I did see a truck a minute ago - or a van, I guess. It was white, like the laundry service. Parked right over there." She nodded in the direction of the mortuary doors. "It drove off - three, maybe four minutes ago."

"Which way did it turn?" he asked, his eyes boring into the woman. "Be certain."

All three of them were looking at him with something like suspicion, but the woman answered. "Right. It turned right. I'm certain," she added with a decisive nod.

Sherlock's mind raced. Three or four minutes was an eternity. But the construction on the A1 would slow them down. Traffic was being rerouted. If he could get around the blockage fast enough, he stood a decent chance of passing them head on. That would give him visual confirmation, at least. Then he could turn around and follow them at a distance.

"You," he said, pointing at the man slouched against the bumper of the van. "Is this yours?"

The man looked Sherlock up and down and then scowled. "Yeah it is. So what?"

"I need it."

The man scrubbed out his cigarette and pushed to his feet. "That's a bit too bad, innit, mate?"

Sherlock blew out an impatient breath. He didn't have time for this. "Aline!" he called.

From behind him came the tell-tale sound of a pistol being cocked.

"Sorry," he said without bothering to turn around. "It's an emergency. I'll bring it back." He gestured impatiently. "Keys."

It took a moment for the man to get his shaking hand in his pocket in order to retrieve his keys. His companions stood frozen, cigarettes burning on unregarded in their fingers.

Sherlock looked back at Aline before he reached for the door to van.

She stood in a relaxed Isoceles stance, both hands on the pistol, arms extended, the barrel still pointed at the man's forehead. If she felt any anxiety at all, she wasn't showing it.

"Don't shoot him," he said. "Unless you have to." He saw the man sway slightly in his peripheral vision. Aline's aim followed exactly. "I'm going after a white van, headed east on Little Britain. When you're done here, find Lestrade. Let him know what's going on."

"What about Hassine?" Her eyes flicked to meet his briefly.

"I don't intend to lose either one of them."

After a beat, she nodded.

He turned back to the van.

"Wait," Aline called out. Without taking her eyes off of the stricken man, she reached into her pocket and produced a second pistol. She held it out to Sherlock. "Take this."

He looked down at the gun and realized that he was going to have no problem whatsoever pulling the trigger when the time came. I'm coming, Molly. "Thank you," he told Aline, meaning it.

"Good luck."

A/N: No! Not his Molly! Who is behind this? And why are they targeting Sherlock's allies? Will he get there in time, or will Molly Hooper become the sixteenth name on his list? TUNE IN NEXT TIME...

Sorry to leave y'all on a cliffhanger. I promise things will start coming together in the next chapter!

I absolutely love reading all of your theories! Thanks so much for taking the time to leave a comment or a review, or even just to *headdesk* out your frustration with the characters:) I can't wait to see how many of you get to the (hopefully) exciting climax and yell 'I KNEW IT!' and scare your families:)

Send virtual high-fives to Katie F for forcing me to cut a ton of completely unnecessary text out of this chapter, thus saving me from having to split it into two. And of course, for doing the usual bang-up job with her mighty Grammar Hammer. You guys just have no idea how many commas have perished during the writing of this fic.