Lestrade took a deep breath, like a schoolboy preparing to give a speech, and stepped forward to the board. "At the moment," he said, "They're disappearances, not murders. Though I suppose the body found today changes that." He grimaced. "But the first boy to disappear was Scott Pigeon, seventeen." He pointed to a blurry photograph of a boy with longish blond hair, wearing a blue and white rugby shirt. Two boys on either side of him had been cropped out of the photo, their disembodied arms wrapped around his. "Disappeared on the fourth of April 1982—nearly a year ago now. The second victim is Colin Bedsworth, fifteen, disappeared on the eighth of June, 1982. Third victim is Derek Metcalfe, sixteen, disappeared October of 1982. Then there's the fourth victim, Keith Embley, fifteen, disappeared fourth of January this year. And now Alan Clarke, sixteen, disappeared on the twenty-second of March, 1983. Three days ago."

"You've missed one," Sherlock said.

Lestrade looked puzzled. "No I haven't."

With a sigh, Sherlock stood up and pointed to the board himself. "April, June, October, January, March," he said. "All, generally speaking, at two-month intervals—except there are no victims between the beginning of June and the end of October. Psychosexual predators get the urge to kill on the basis of a biological clock, and they either kill at regular intervals or speed up. Which means either your killer missed his August/September victim because he was otherwise detained—hospitalised, out of the area, or incarcerated—or, more likely, there's another victim, a boy who went missing in August or possibly September of last year. But nobody knows he's missing—or they're trying to hide that he's missing. He's between fourteen and seventeen years of age, Caucasian, of a working class or lower middle-class background, quite likely into street drugs, possibly into prostitution, and on the balance of probabilities, has been unofficially missing since well before last October. Tell me about the ones you know about."

"Uh." Lestrade tried to pull himself together at the unexpected information and coughed into his hand to buy himself a little time. "Scott Pigeon lived out at Filwood Park with his mother… she's a single mum. I can't remember exactly when the dad nicked off, but it's been a while, and he's been ruled out as a suspect. On the night of the third of April, 1982, Scott spent the night at a mate's house—or so he told his mother. What him and the mate, Peter Noonan, actually did was hitch-hike out to Wookey Hole, which is a distance of twenty and odd miles. There's some limestone caves down that way that teenagers use to, you know, have parties out the way of their parents. There were twenty-two others there that night—the detectives have interviewed them all—none of them said anything memorable happened during the night, but if you ask me, I don't think they'd remember if they witnessed the Second Coming. Next day, Scott and Peter were trying to get home and not having any luck. They walked to Wells—it's two miles or so—but couldn't get anyone to let both of them in the car, so finally, Peter got a lift from a woman who was at the Esso service station in Chamberlain Street and left Scott there to try his luck. He says he didn't expect anything would happen—Scott was nearly eighteen, and it was broad daylight on a Sunday. But he never got home. His mum reported him missing shortly before midnight that night."

"Did the woman who gave Peter a lift actually see Scott?"

"Yes. She confirmed the two had hugged goodbye and Scott was alive and well at half-past eleven on Sunday morning. After that? Radio silence. Nobody saw him. Nobody heard from him."

"Wells is quite a distance from here. Why are the police in Bristol working this case?"

"Because of the next boy. Colin Bedsworth." Lestrade pointed to another photograph, poorer in quality than the one of Scott Pigeon, as if it had been cut out of a newspaper. A boy, much younger than Scott Pigeon, sitting on a floral sofa with a bald, chubby baby on his lap. His dark, shaggy hair hung in his eyes and his twig-like, bare legs seemed too fragile for even a baby to safely sit on. "Lived in Bishopsworth. On the eighth of June, 1982, which was a Tuesday, Colin left his house in Whitchurch Road for school as usual—Bedminster Down—but he meant to bunk off and never arrived there. We don't know where he was all morning, but a copper saw him at a fish and chip shop on St George's Road around midday and told him to get back to school. He didn't, and nobody's seen him since."

Sherlock got up and stood beside Lestrade, examining a map of Bristol he'd tacked in the centre of the boy's pictures. He'd marked each boy's initials in various places on it in his familiar print, neat but inelegant. "The parents say he's no angel, but he's never been in any serious trouble and there's no way he'd just run away," he said. "Didn't take anything except what he'd need for school that day. Scott Pigeon might have decided to clear out because he'd had enough of living with his mum, but this poor kid's fourteen, Mr. Holmes."

"Mr. Holmes is my brother," Sherlock said tersely, ignoring Lestrade's helpless flail at the idea of having to address anyone as Sherlock. "Was Colin with anyone when the officer saw him?"

"He said he couldn't be sure, but as far as he could see, not a soul. Which is pretty… well, look, if I was going to bunk off school, I'd at least do it with my mates. If I had to wander around all day on my own, dodging coppers and the mums of other kids I know, I may as well go to school, right?"

Sherlock shrugged. He'd never 'bunked off' school in his life. "So he probably was with someone. Someone who didn't want to be seen."

"A kid?"

"No, an adult. The next boy."

"Derek Metcalfe." Lestrade tapped the photograph now adorning the front page of the evening newspapers. "First time anyone in town really heard about the boys going missing and decided they gave a…" He trailed off, clearing his throat. "His father's Richard Metcalfe."

Sherlock gave him a blank look.

"Oh, right, you're from London," Lestrade reminded himself. "Local TV presenter, reads the six o'clock news, so everyone knows his face. On October 14, 1982, Derek Metcalfe and a mate were kicking a ball around the sports grounds here at Whitchurch." His sleeve brushed briefly against Sherlock's as he pointed to the place on the map. "At four o'clock, the mate's mum picked him up in the car, and he left Derek there to walk home. It's only four cross-streets. He never got there. Some witnesses living along his route home thought they might have heard a scuffle and a few shouts at around twenty past four, but they thought it was kids mucking about and weren't really paying attention. But get this: that mate of his who left him there? Jeff Noonan. Brother of Peter Noonan, the last person to see Scott Pigeon alive."

"I assume both Noonan brothers were extensively questioned?"

"The detectives have had them in five times, or so they tell me. Both had rock solid alibis—Jeff's mum confirmed that she picked him up and she had Peter and another son, nine-year-old Colin, in the car with her when she did. They all independently verified the time—the four o'clock sports update was on the car radio. Peter had a four-fifteen doctor's appointment, and the surgery confirmed that Sheila Noonan showed up for it on time, with all three boys, acting like nothing was wrong."

Sherlock mulled all this over in silence. "How do you feel about coincidences?"

"I think they're bollocks," Lestrade said. "This one is, anyway. The Noonan boys knew Derek from primary school, but it's not like they're all the one social group. And look how close they lived to one another—the greatest distance between their houses is the fifteen-minute drive from Bishopsworth to Whitchurch. But the Noonan boys have perfect alibis, so what am I to do with that? Anyway, it seems pretty obvious that Derek was abducted by force. Why would he accept a lift instead of walking when he was only five minutes from home? Then there's the ruckus the witnesses heard. I'd put it down to a random snatch, but come on, the Noonans were just there. And Derek was a big, strong teenager. If you were going to take a risk and randomly snatch someone in public, you'd snatch a kid."

"This killer has no use for young children. Nobody's sent out any ransom notes?"

"Oh, yeah, the detectives have had loads of those. All followed up and found to be hoaxes."

"You seem to know an incredible amount about this case for a uniformed constable still on probation."

Lestrade gave a wry smile. "Friend on the force. Friend in the detective quad, anyway. Neil doesn't tell me everything—just enough to keep me interested."

"Keith Embley," Sherlock said, all business. "Similar circumstances?"

"Fifteen years old. Good kid with four brothers and sisters, left a birthday party in Wharncliffe Gardens, Hengrove, at around eleven p.m. on the fourth of January. Four separate witnesses saw him walking along adjacent Fortfield Road on his way back home, the latest at about twenty past eleven, and he was alone in all four sightings. Then nothing. No news, no sightings."

"Connection with the Noonan brothers?"

"Went to school with them. According to everyone, teachers and all, the boys barely had a nodding acquaintance and certainly weren't friends, but come on. And that party he went to was about ten minutes' walk from the Noonans' house."

"Do the Noonans have alibis for the night of the disappearance?"

"They weren't at the party. Both were in bed asleep by eleven, if you believe them and their parents."

"Do you believe them?"

"I've never met any of them, so I've got no reason to doubt. But who'd know? What, do their parents watch them sleep?" Lestrade wandered over to a small cupboard on one side of the kitchenette and opened it. "You want a drink?"

"No," Sherlock said absently, "And neither do you."

A blink. "Don't I?"

"You opened a cupboard, not the fridge. Hard spirits on a weeknight?"

Lestrade shut the cupboard, a little more aggressively than necessary, and went instead to a tiny bar fridge, pulling out two cans of cola. He handed one to Sherlock, who accepted it but did not open it. Lestrade opened his and took a long pull on it. "Anyway," he said finally, "the most recent victim is Alan Clarke."

"The boy you know."

Lestrade did a double take. "Sorry?"

"You tried to fortify yourself with alcohol before you told me about him. I do notice these things." Sherlock remembered, with a little bitterness, how John had accused him of not caring about the victims of crime. Well, perhaps that was true. It was also true that caring about them wouldn't help him save them. But recognising when other people cared about them… perhaps that had its uses. "How do you know him?"

Lestrade dropped his shoulders. "He's from my part of the world," he said. "Worlebury, out west. And he was visiting here with his sister, okay?"

"His sister, who you happen to be taking out?"

"Yeah. Don't start on me. Julie's bloody hysterical."

"I can imagine. Where is she currently having hysterics?"

"The Bristol Grand Hotel. Her parents got here yesterday morning—"

"Unless the parents are also missing, I don't think they factor into the case. How did Alan disappear?"

"The usual pattern. He and Julie arrived here by train on Sunday night, the twentieth. I went to pick them up. They were staying around the corner at a hotel called Doolan's."

"Obviously unsuitable for her more discerning parents. Alan wasn't required at school?"

"He doesn't go. Left at Christmas with no qualifications. Julie's training to be a legal secretary, but she got a fortnight off—"

"Julie is not missing, so her occupation is unlikely to be relevant to the case."

Lestrade, put in check again, almost visibly bit his tongue, then took hold of his patience and started again. "Sunday night was fine, no problems," he said. "I was at work Monday, and Julie and Alan went sightseeing together. Tuesday was my day off, and me and Julie were…" He coughed into his hand. "We wanted to spend some time alone. So I gave Alan ten quid and he went into the city for the day—it's Julie's birthday next week, he said something about going to find something for a present. He left here, right here, around half-past twelve in the afternoon. We were supposed to meet at Barker's, this cafe thing in Corn Street, for dinner at a bit past five. He never showed up."

Sherlock opened his mouth to ask the usual questions: Did he call anyone? Did he withdraw money anywhere? Have you checked CCTV?—but, remembering, nearly bellowed in frustrated rage. Some Bristol businesses were fitted with CCTV in 1983, perhaps; but the public streets almost certainly were not. Lestrade had given the boy cash, and he'd likely added that ten pounds to cash he was already carrying. Trying to work out where Alan Clarke had gone in the four hours and thirty minutes between when he'd last been seen and when he had been noticed missing was going to be harder than finding an honest man at Whitehall.

Speaking of Whitehall…

But no. Mycroft could be of no help. In 1983, the real 1983, he'd been sixteen years old and in his last year at a public school in Durham.

"Alan didn't know the other boys," Lestrade said. "How could he? He'd only just got here. He certainly didn't know the Noonans. Look, I might be new, but I'm not an idiot. If I want to find the other boys, I start with the Noonans. But where do I even start trying to find Alan?"

"You start with me," Sherlock found himself saying. "I'll find him. And the others."

If he was expecting this offer to be greeted with rapture, he was disappointed. Lestrade looked at him blankly for a moment, then coughed and ran one hand through his hair. "Mr. Holmes—um. Sherlock," he said, "I don't mean to be rude about this, 'cause it's a generous offer you just made, but I don't even know you."

"No, but I know you."

Lestrade raised one eyebrow. "Yeah?"

"I know you're nineteen years old and come from a moderately prosperous working-class family," Sherlock said. "Your father is a recently-retired builder, dealing primarily in brickwork and carpentry, and he's nearly seventy years old—there's a significant age difference between he and your mother, and you were her late baby, born ten and eight years after two daughters. I know there's been a lot of recent conflict between both you and your father, who thinks you'd be better suited to blue-collar work than aspiring to be a detective, and you and your prospective father-in-law, who thinks you're not going to amount to much; certainly not enough to be the father of his grandchildren. I know you played football at school and you're a Liverpool supporter, an alliance inherited from a maternal uncle; that you play a bit of guitar but you're terrible at it; that you haven't read a novel since your A-levels, that you're an accomplished poker player, and that your left-hand, bottom wisdom tooth has come in sideways and has been giving you intermittent agony for the past six months, but you won't get it seen to because you're terrified of dentists and don't want anyone to know. Am I making an impression yet, Lestrade?"

For the next seven seconds, there was silence so profound that Sherlock could hear the click of heels from passersby in the street outside.

"You've been talking to Julie," Lestrade said.

"No. Think. Why haven't I been talking to Julie?"

Lestrade, obligingly, thought. "Because," he said eventually, "She doesn't know about the dentist thing?"

"Oh, I rather think she does, though you've never told her. A man's insecurities are usually clear to the woman who loves him. Rather, she doesn't know your father thinks your goal in life should be to take over his trade and marry someone he would probably describe as a 'nice girl.'"

"Hey—"

"You do have some potential," Sherlock said, honestly under the impression that this was some kind of compliment. "But not enough to find Alan Clarke on your own. And you're not going to get any help from the Avon and Somerset Constabulary. Now, Probationary Constable Lestrade, do you want my help or not?"

Lestrade turned back to the corkboard, looking over the material he'd collected there, eyes darting from one photograph to another. Finally he cleared his throat. "Okay," he said. "Okay. But listen, could you just tell me how you knew all that?"

"I didn't know it. I observed it." Though this was, Sherlock admitted to himself, only half the truth. He'd been matching several facts, learned and then promptly deleted from his hard drive, with observations, some of which he might otherwise have had more trouble with. "And I'll tell you how I observed it tomorrow. I'll meet you here at nine o'clock."

"I've got work at—"

"No, you're far too ill to go to work tomorrow."

"Am I?"

"Unless your superior officers will be happy for us to interview Peter and Jeff Noonan with their blessings, you're going to have to be."

Sherlock walked home slowly, smoking a cigarette he'd pickpocketed from Lestrade—a real cigarette this time, pure tobacco—and thinking deeply. It was not a coincidence that he and John were here with Lestrade in what was, apparently, some version of 1983. And he was becoming increasingly sure it was not a coincidence either that Lestrade had a case. A case he had a very good chance of cracking open, with Sherlock Holmes in his court. The only problem was that Sherlock could not see anything particularly unique or interesting about the case. Standard sex murderer: the boys had been abducted by a pederast and were likely all dead. More annoyingly, he could not see any connection between Lestrade's case with what had happened only last night at an indoor pool in Whitechapel.

When he arrived back at John's flat, he went into the bedroom to check on John and found him still in a deep sleep, though the duvet he'd thrown over him had slid onto the floor. The room was freezing, almost as cold in as out; no central heating. Sherlock pulled the duvet over him again and went back out to the sitting room. It was the first time since arriving in Bristol that he paid the slightest bit of attention to his clothes; his coat still covered all, thank God, but his suit was blocky and uncomfortable, and he had nothing else to change into. Of course, he thought bitterly. He apparently did not exist now. Was he just supposed to wear the same thing indefinitely?

He'd deal with that tomorrow.

He took his shoes and coat off and lay down on the sofa, willing a few hours of sleep to come.

A/N: As per my personal canon, and not contradicting anything we saw in Season 1, in this story there are ten years between Mycroft and Sherlock, and Euros doesn't exist. That Mycroft went to school in Durham is my only explanation as to how on earth he has a slight Northern accent when saying some words (e.g. 'one'), and Sherlock does not ;)

As always, your sitting down and reading this has been incredibly appreciated, and all faves, follows and reviews make my heart sing.