After the events at the circus- which Max was sure belonged on the list of top ten circus accidents- Sherlock, John, Max, and a bewildered Sarah had hurried to Scotland Yard, where they were able to catch Dimmock right before he was about to leave for the night.

"I sent a couple of cars," the Detective Inspector announced. "The old hall is totally deserted." He clearly wasn't in a good mood.

Sherlock, John, Max, and Sarah followed Dimmock into the Scotland Yard offices, even though it seemed like Sarah was still trying to figure out exactly how she had ended up here. It was late at night by this point, so most of the desks in the room were empty and the room was eerily quiet. "Look, I saw the mark at the circus," Sherlock told Dimmock. "That tattoo we saw on the two bodies, the mark of the Tong."

Max nodded. "We saw it on one of the bloke's feet," she added.

Dimmock gave her a look. "How did you see his foot?" he demanded.

The four of them glanced at each other hesitantly. "Err... he may or may not have been unconscious," Max finally answered. "Because we may or may not have knocked him out."

By this point they had reached Dimmock's desk, and the detective sat down on it. His expression clearly said that he wasn't completely sold on their theory.

"Lukis and Van Coon were part of a smuggling operation," John said. "Now, one of them stole something when they were in China, something valuable."

Sherlock nodded. "These circus performers were gang members sent to get it back," he added.

Dimmock scowled. "Get what back?" he asked.

But he was met with silence. Sherlock turned away, stubbornly not meeting Dimmock's gaze, and Max grimaced regretfully.

"... We don't know," John finally said.

Dimmock stared at them blankly. "You don't know," he repeated.

Max shrugged. "Well, we know it's from China," she told him, even though that didn't really help at this point.

For a few seconds, Dimmock didn't move, just continued staring at them as he comprehended that. Then he sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Mr. Holmes," he said, his tone forced. "I've done everything you asked. Lestrade, he seems to think your advice is worth something."

That finally caused Sherlock to look up at him, a faint smile on his face.

Dimmock sighed. "I gave the order for a raid," he told them. "Please tell me I'll have something to show for it... other than a massive bill for overtime."

000

A few minutes later, they had caught a cab back to Baker St and were now walking into the flat. Max, who was by now rather familiar with the cluttered living room of 221B, plopped down on the couch in exhaustion, utterly worn out from the events of the night. Sherlock walked up to the pictures above the fireplace, and John followed him.

"They'll be back in China tomorrow," John commented.

Sherlock shook his head. "No, they won't leave without what they came for," he replied. "We need to find their hideout, the rendezvous." He reached out and ran his finger over the picture of the wall by the train tracks, as if that would give him the answer. "Somewhere in this message it must tell us."

Max groaned as she pulled herself off of the couch and joined them by the fireplace. "We've been over this already," she said. "We don't know enough to translate it."

Nobody spoke for a few seconds as they considered their options, and the flat fell silent. But then Sarah cleared her throat, and the other three turned around to see that she was standing hesitantly in the doorway. "Well, I think perhaps I should leave you to it," she commented.

Max had honestly forgotten all about her, and from the looks on Sherlock's and John's faces, they had too.

Instantly, John was walking over to Sarah. "No, no, you don't have to go," he told her. He glanced at Sherlock, who was still looking at the Hangzhou characters. "Does she?"

"Yes, it would be better if you left now," Sherlock stated.

"You can stay," John said at the same time.

Max groaned.

The two men shared a look, Sherlock scowling in irritation and John glaring at him. But then John turned back around to Sarah, giving her a small smile. "He's kidding," John reassured her. "Please, stay if you'd like."

Sarah was quiet for a few moments as she glanced nervously at Sherlock, but he had already turned his attention back to the pictures. Then she smiled awkwardly. "Is it just me, or is anyone else starving?"

"Oh God," Sherlock sighed, too quiet for anyone besides Max to hear.

000

John had disappeared into the depths of the kitchen to find something to eat at Sarah's request- Max highly doubted that he would be able to find anything- so Sherlock, Max, and Sarah were the only ones in the living room. Sherlock and Max were sitting at the dining table and going through all their notes again, trying to find if there was something that they had missed the first thousand times they had looked at it, while Sarah stood by the fireplace, looking up at the pictures there.

It was awkward, to say the least.

"So this is what you do, you two and John," Sarah commented. "You solve puzzles for a living."

Oh, dear...

Sherlock paused what he was doing, tensing up in annoyance. Max could practically feel waves of indignation rolling off of him. "Consulting detective," he corrected venemously.

Sarah blinked. "Oh," she said.

They fell quiet again for a few seconds, but then Max cleared her throat, feeling the need to say something. "Not me," she said.

Sarah smiled at her politely. "Sorry?" she asked.

Max gestured to the papers sprawled out on the table. "I don't do this for a living," she elaborated. "I just help out."

It seemed like Sarah was relieved that she wasn't the only one who wasn't a detective here, because she smiled happily. "Oh!" she exclaimed. "That's nice."

Max turned her attention back to the pictures, but by now the images were so familiar to her that her mind started wandering to the events of the last hour. She frowned as she thought back to the fight at the circus. Sherlock had confronted one of the Tong backstage, John had come to Sherlock's rescue and tackled the man, and even Sarah had been the one who had knocked him out in the end. But Max hadn't done anything; even when the masked man was going to kill Sherlock she had just stood there in shock. None of them seemed to hold it against her; in fact, they were already moving onto the next thing as if they hadn't just been in a fight barely an hour ago. But Max couldn't forget it as easily, and the more she thought about it the more useless she felt.

"What are these squiggles?" Sarah suddenly asked, pointing to the Hangzhou characters that Sherlock was currently looking at.

Sherlock's jaw clenched in annoyance. "They're numbers," he told her. "An ancient Chinese dialect."

Sarah nodded, looking as if she was trying really hard to pretend that made sense. "Oh, right!" she exclaimed. "Yeah, well, of course I should have known that!"

When is John going to get back from the kitchen? Max thought desperately.

Sarah looked at the picture thoughtfully. "So these numbers," she said. "It's a cipher."

Sherlock's eyes glinted dangerously, and Max was convinced that he was about two seconds from committing murder. "Exactly," he snapped.

But Sarah just continued on, oblivious to Sherlock's anger. "And each pair of numbers is a word," she stated.

Sherlock and Max looked up at her sharply, all traces of Sherlock's earlier anger gone. "How did you know that?" he demanded, looking at her for the first time.

Sarah seemed bewildered at their surprise, and she pointed at the first few characters. "Well, two words have already been translated," she answered.

Max leaned closer and saw that Sarah was right; two words were scrawled out on the picture in black ink, barely noticeable. "Oh my God," she muttered.

"John," Sherlock called, standing up. "John, look at this."

There was the sound of footsteps from the kitchen, and they turned to see John walking up to them. "Mmm?" he asked.

Sherlock held up the picture. "We left the pictures at the museum that night but Dimmock brought them back," he said. "Soo Lin, she started to translate the code for us. We didn't see it!"

Max took the picture from him and glanced at it. "Nine mill," she read.

John squinted at the fine lettering, trying to read it. "Does that mean millions?" he asked.

Sherlock frowned. "Nine million quid," he said thoughtfully. "For what?"

Without warning, he turned to the chair where he had dumped his coat and scarf and started pulling on his coat. "We need to know the end of this sentence," he declared.

John blinked in surprise. "Where are you going?" he asked.

Sherlock threw on his scarf. "To the museum, to the restoration room," he answered. He groaned in exasperation. "Oh, we must have been staring right at it!"

Max and John shared a look, both of them equally confused. "Sorry?" Max asked.

"Staring at what?" John added.

Sherlock turned to them, his eyes bright with the excitement of the chase. "The book!" he exclaimed. "The book, the key to cracking the cipher!" He snatched the picture from Max and waved it in their faces. "Soo Lin used it to do this! While we were running around the gallery, she started to translate the code- it must be on her desk!"

With that, he turned around and ran out the door.

For a second, Max, John, and Sarah just stared in bewilderment at the empty space where Sherlock had just been standing.

The way Max saw it, she had two options; she could stay here with John and Sarah and intrude further on their already-intruded-on date, or she could run after Sherlock and probably get into some sort of trouble. She glanced at John, then at the door, considering.

"I'll go after him," Max declared. She grabbed her coat, and before John could protest, she was out the door.

000

Max caught up to Sherlock right before he closed the door to the flat. "Sherlock, wait!" she exclaimed.

He didn't seem surprised to see her there, and he waited until she passed through the doorway to close it. "Let's go," he said.

They hurried out onto the street just as a cab drove by along the street. "Taxi!" Sherlock called. He ran towards the curb, but he was in such a rush that he didn't notice the husband and wife walking by until he rammed into them.

Sherlock went stumbling backwards, and the man dropped his book. "Hey, du!" the man shouted in annoyance. He continued yelling at Sherlock in what sounded like German.

Max hurried up to them just as Sherlock picked up the book. "Sorry, he's just in a rush-" Max started.

"Entschuldigen Sie, bitte," Sherlock said over her.

Before Max could fully digest the fact that Sherlock knew German- even though she really shouldn't be surprised at this point- the tourist snatched the book from him. "Ja, danke!" he exclaimed, sounding irritated. Without waiting for Sherlock to reply, he turned and walked away with his wife, still complaining in German.

"Well then," Max said.

Sherlock turned back to the curb, but by this point the cab had long since passed. A glance around the street told them that there were no other cabs around, and Sherlock scowled in exasperation.

"So what, do we walk or do we wait?" Max asked.

He was quiet for a few seconds, but then he suddenly stood up straighter. "The A-Z," he realized.

Max blinked. "The what?" she said.

Without warning, Sherlock ran off after the German couple. "Please, wait!" Sherlock shouted after them. "Bitte!"

"What is it, Sherlock?!" Max called. When it was clear that he wasn't going to answer, she groaned and ran after him.

Sherlock reached the couple and snatched the book from the man, who started exclaiming in angry German again. Sherlock ignored him and flipped through the pages rapidly, looking for something.

By this point Max had reached them, and she held up her hands in an attempt to placate the man. "Sorry," she said. "Very sorry, we just have to borrow your book-"

The man just waved his hands in exasperation, then turned and walked away.

"Sorry!" Max called again.

She watched the couple walk away, and it was only once they had turned the corner that she turned back to Sherlock. "What was that about?" she demanded.

He just held up the book. "Van Coon, Lukis, Soo Lin, they all had this book," he told her. "The London A-Z." He showed her the page that he was on. "Fifteen, one," he stated. "Page fifteen, word one."

Max's eyes widened when she read the first entry on page fifteen. "Deadmans Lane, NW9," she breathed. "Deadman."

Sherlock nodded. "They were threatening to kill the three of them," he said. "Van Coon, Lukis, Soo Lin... This is the first cipher."

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the picture of the wall at the train tracks. "Tell me the numbers," he ordered.

Max took the paper, and her eyes went to the next set of numbers that they had yet to translate. "Thirty-seven, nine," she answered.

Sherlock thumbed through the book. "Fore St EC2," he read. "For."

She held out her hand, palm up. "Pen," she requested.

He looked up at her in annoyance; from the look on his face, he clearly wasn't used to being told what to do. But Max just raised an eyebrow pointedly, and he sighed and handed her a pen.

"Thank you," Max said. She took the pen and wrote the word for next to the corresponding numbers. Sherlock was still looking at her strangely. "Sixty, thirty-five."

Sherlock blinked, obviously just snapping out of his train of thought. "What?" he asked.

She gestured to the book. "Page sixty, word thirty-five," she told him. "The next word."

He shook his head to clear it. "Right," he agreed. "Sixty, thirty-five..."

000

It took longer than Max had expected to get through the entire message. By the time they finished about fifteen minutes later, Max and Sherlock were sitting on the ground, huddled together to preserve body heat in the cold March weather.

"Tramway," Sherlock declared.

"Tramway," Max echoed as she wrote it down. "We're done."

Without waiting for her to say anything else, Sherlock snatched the paper from her. "Hey-" she started.

"Nine mill for jade pin dragon den black tramway," he read.

Max blinked. "That doesn't even make sense," she said. "Nine mill for... what?"

He held up the paper. "Nine mill for jade pin dragon den black tramway," he repeated. He stood up suddenly, taking Max by surprise, and he started running back towards 221B. "Come on!" Max stumbled to her feet and hurried after him.

000

Sherlock and Max burst into the flat, both of them flushed from running. "John!" Sherlock shouted as he opened the door. "John, we've got it! Max and I- we got it!"

It turned out that nobody was in the living room, and Sherlock ran into the kitchen without hesitation as Max paused in the doorway, catching her breath. "The cipher, the book!" Sherlock declared in the other room. "It's the London A-Z that they're using-"

Suddenly Max saw what Sherlock had been too rushed to see, and her eyes widened in horror. "Sherlock," she interrupted, her tone dead serious. "Come here."

Sherlock walked back into the living room, frowning. "John and Sarah aren't here-" he started, but then he stopped when he saw what Max had seen a few seconds ago.

Two Hangzhou characters were sprayed across the windows in familiar yellow spray paint. The characters were so familiar at this point that neither of them needed to consult the A-Z: fifteen and one.

Deadman.

"The Tong were here," Max breathed. "John... They've got John. And Sarah."

Instantly, Sherlock was moving, moving faster than she had ever seen him move before. His usual self-control was gone, replaced by pure, undisguised panic. He ran up to the bookcase, scanning it quickly for what he needed. "Tramway..." he muttered.

He pulled out a folding map. "Clear the table," he ordered. Max quickly pushed all of their now-worthless notes off of the dining table just as Sherlock spread the map out on the table. Max could now see that it was a map of London. Sherlock ran his finger over it, searching for something, and suddenly he stabbed it down. "There," he declared. "That's their hideout."

Without warning, Sherlock turned to her, his grey eyes intense as they looked into her own. "Go to Scotland Yard," he instructed.

Max blinked. "What?!" she protested. "No, I'm coming with-"

"No," Sherlock stated. "I need you to talk to Dimmock, tell him that the item is a jade pin and that I need backup at this location." He pointed to the map again. "Do you understand?"

She crossed her arms. "I'm not letting you take on the entire circus by yourself-" she started.

Without warning, Sherlock put his hands on either side of her face, making sure that she was looking him in the eye. "Please," he begged.

For a second, Max was silent, but something in his eyes caused her to nod unwillingly. "Alright," she agreed. Some small part of her was relieved that she wouldn't have to deal with another fight, but that part was overshadowed by her concern for John and Sherlock and even Sarah. "I don't like it, but alright." She took a deep breath. "Go to Dimmock, tell him that the Tong stole a jade pin, and get him to send backup to your location. Got it."

Sherlock nodded. "Good," he said. With that, he turned around and walked out of the door, his coat flaring out behind him.

Max grabbed the map off the table and hurried out after him.

000

"Ladies and gentlemen. From the distant moonlit shores of NW1, we present for your pleasure Sherlock Holmes' pretty companion in a death defying act!"

Tied up to a chair, John could do nothing but watch in horror as men from the circus- or the international smuggling ring, since apparently Sherlock was right and they were the same thing- tied Sarah to a chair directly in the line of fire of the crossbow from the show earlier that night. He and Sarah had been kidnapped from the flat shortly after Sherlock and Max had run out, and now they were currently in some dank underground location that looked like a tramway tunnel.

The Chinese woman who had spoken during the show stood next to the crossbow, without her makeup. John recognized her now as the woman who had been following him and Max for the past few days. She had also revealed to him that she was General Shan, the leader of the Tong... and she believed that John was not only Sherlock Holmes, but that he also had her treasure.

"Please!" John pleaded.

But Shan just ignored him and cut the sandbag, causing the sand to begin to pour out. Sarah wailed in horror, and Shan walked forward to put a black origami lotus flower on her lap. "You've seen the act before," Shan mused. "How dull for you; you know how it ends."

John tried once again to free himself from the ropes that were binding him, but nothing he did seemed to have any effect. "I'm not Sherlock Holmes!" he exclaimed frantically.

Shan whirled around and glared at him. "I don't believe you," she spat.

"You should, you know."

Everyone turned around at the sudden voice, and they saw a tall silhouette at the far end of the tunnel, with curly hair and a long coat. John knew that silhouette well; after all, it belonged to his flatmate.

"Sherlock Holmes is nothing at all like him," Sherlock continued.

Shan raised her pistol and aimed it at Sherlock, but he just dodged to the side of the tunnel, disappearing into the shadows. "How would you describe me, John?" Sherlock asked, his voice echoing throughout the tunnel. "Resourceful? Dynamic? Enigmatic?"

John glared into the darkness. "Late?" he retorted.

000

"What do you want this time?" Dimmock demanded.

Max slammed the map down on Dimmock's desk in Scotland Yard, covering the paperwork that he had been working on. It seemed like he was about to protest, but a glare from her silenced him. "A jade pin, worth nine million pounds," she stated.

Dimmock blinked. "... What?" he asked, still sounding a bit bewildered.

She crossed her arms in irritation. "You asked us earlier what was so important that it brought the Tong to London," she said. "That's your answer: a jade pin, worth nine million pounds."

He started at her blankly. "How...?" he trailed off.

Max jabbed the same spot that Sherlock had pointed out. "That doesn't matter," she said. "The Tong kidnapped John and Sarah. Sherlock went after them, but he needs backup."

Dimmock looked at the point on the map, as if not comprehending what she was saying.

"He. Needs. Backup," Max repeated.

000

A few minutes later, Max stood beside Dimmock as Sherlock, John, and Sarah emerged from an underground tramway tunnel. The police force that had just been about to enter the tunnel stood down, and instantly a sobbing Sarah was rushed to the medical team. John hurried after her, and Sherlock headed over to Max and Dimmock.

Sherlock stopped in front of her and looked around at the police cars surrounding them. "You brought the police," he said. He turned back to her, respect clear in his eyes.

Max smirked at him. "It wouldn't kill you to say thank you, y'know," she replied. Sherlock grimaced, and Max nodded towards Sarah. "What happened to her?"

He waved a hand dismissively. "Oh, she almost got shot by an arrow," he answered casually.

"What?!" Max exclaimed.

"And the woman from the circus is General Shan," Sherlock added. "There was a fight but she got away."

"... Come again?" Max demanded.

"And the arrow from the crossbow hit Zhi Zhu," he continued. "He's dead."

Before Max could even begin to digest that, Sherlock turned to Dimmock, who had been standing silently beside them. "We'll just slip off," Sherlock told him. "No need to mention us in your report."

Dimmock nodded his agreement, and he looked at Sherlock curiously. "Mr. Holmes..." he trailed off.

Sherlock seemed to actually give him a small smile. "I have high hopes for you, Inspector," he said. "A glittering career."

"I go where you point me," Dimmock declared.

Sherlock nodded. "Exactly," he agreed.

And with that, he walked off.