Title: A delicate test
Author: clarrie
Disclaimer: Most of what you see is owned by, respectively, Joss Whedon, Fox, The WB, The estate of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Jean Marsh and Eileen Atkins, Bram Stoker and Laurie R King.
This is a Sherlock Holmes, Buffy, Dracula, Upstairs Downstairs, Beekeeper crossover. There was a bet.
An illustrated version of this fic can be found at www.geocities.com/bakesale_bitca/deltest.html


Drusilla sighed and let the limp body fall to the ground from her arms. 'All along, down along, out along lee,' She felt a raindrop splash onto her forehead and lifted a hand to touch her fingertips to her face. 'An' though they be dead of the horrid career,' The unhinged vampire crooned to herself as she wandered away down a side alley, 'this ain't the end of this shocking affair...'


'Oh.' Pryce felt a light thump on her shoulders as the last pin gave way under the strain of activity and a gentle mass of tabby coloured hair began to flap against her back. Her hands fluttered briefly around her scalp in an attempt to convince her hair to stay up by power of will alone before giving up an unequal quarrel with gravity and attending instead to her skirts, which trailed amidst the filth. She picked her way slowly along the tunnel, progressing in hops and skips among the more solid looking patches of what she preferred to think of as earth, which lay beneath the ankle deep fluid.
'It is rather disheartening to think that one is about to end one's days, lost, in a sewer.' Pryce sighed. 'There were one or two ambitions which I had hopes of fulfilling first.'
'You cannot begin to imagine the extent to which I agree madam.' Wyndham collapsed heavily on a worn stone outcrop to the edge of the tunnel. 'I had often considered the manner and date of my death.' He reflected morosely. 'And very few of the situations involved sewers.'
'Oh my.' Pryce held up her hand. 'What was that noise? Do you hear it?' She cocked an ear hopefully. 'A splashing sound, regular, there!' They paused for a moment as the sound echoed around the tunnels, 'Almost like footsteps perhaps?'
'I would imagine it would be the rats.'
Wyndham held out his hand to Pryce as she leapt clear of the liquid and began to scrabble her way to 'dry land'.


'Where's she got to?' Spike ended his whimpering prey with a flick of his wrist and turned his attention instead to the Drusilla shaped gap in his surroundings. 'Dru? Precious?' He kicked out in frustration at the dead weight lying at his feet, rolling the broken heap into the already swollen gutter. 'Sod this for a game of soldiers.' William the Bloody shook the rain from his hair and took off in search of his sweetheart.


'You vicious, petty, little trollop. 'Albin bought the edge of his heel down hard in the small of the prone Watcher's back. 'He had absolute years of wear left in him,' The toe of his boot found her kidneys, 'years! ' He grabbed her by the scruff of the neck and dragged the sobbing widow to her feet like a rag doll. 'Come along, dear, come along! Don't you want to stand up straight like a good tin soldier?' He sneered, jerking her upright. 'Aren't you fit for the old model army?'
Albin stared down in shock as the discarded pencil smashed into his chest. 'That waistcoat was brand ne...'
Once more Mrs Travers let herself fall into the dead warmth of the explosion.


'For God's sake hurry!' Dr Giles rolled her cane between the palm of her hands. 'Please, I-I beg, as fast as you can,' she crouched at the edge of her seat, twisting her body against the interior wall of the cab in an attempt to glimpse the streets outside through the curtain of falling water. 'A - a sovereign if you can gain any more speed, please... ' She rubbed, feverishly, at the condensation clouded window with her sleeve and peered out into the night, 'Please, I must - JOHN!'
The horse screamed in panic as the cabby tugged wildly at the reins, hooves sparking against rain soaked cobbles as the creature ground to a halt.
'I- what? What's wrong?' Watson stared at the doctor as she hung from the open cab door, her hands outstretched and her eyes searching desperately around the streets behind him.
'Please, come with me now, I ...Please.' She grabbed at Watson's wrist pulling him into the cab, rapping on the dividing wall with her stick to command the driver onward.
'What happened?' Watson tumbled into the seat beside her. 'Is it the hospital? Should I-'
'You wore it.'
Watson blushed as Giles reached out to touch the crucifix hanging from his neck. 'Yes - I...'
'Do you believe me to be sane, free from mania?' Giles took his hand. 'Do you trust me? You would believe my word?'
'I - Dr Giles.' Watson frowned. 'You must tell me what is the matter.'


'You must think me the most awful wet.' Pryce began to wring the hem of her skirts out ineffectually and swung her legs, schoolgirl fashion, against the ledge. 'Being scared of a few rats when in all probability we shall die down here anyway.'
'Nonsense madam.' Droned Wyndham, staring fixedly into a middle distance. 'I myself have an absolute terror of snakes.' He sighed deeply and turned to his companion. 'I assure you, were anything from a simple slow worm to a boa constrictor to appear before us, I should not be responsible for my actions.'
'Gosh.' Pryce peered nervously between her dangling limbs into the water beneath them. 'It, um, it's not terribly likely though I suppose? Is it?'

'This is lunacy!' Watson drew back against the wall of the cab in disgust. ' You are mad! Or-or lying, or both!' He beat his fist upon the wall to attract attention. 'Driver! Driver, please, back to Baker Street as fast as you can.'
'But you must-' Began Dr Giles.
'No,' He softened his voice, 'Listen to me Dr Giles, Miriam,' he took her hand, maintaining a steady voice and continual eye contact, 'you are delusional, what- what you are saying, it cannot be. It is the product of some sickness, some infection which is affecting your reasoning. At-at the hospital you must encounter many such-'
'It is not a sickness,' Giles stared into his concerned face, pleading for belief, 'It is the truth.'


'I don't want to die, Mr Wyndham.' Pryce stared into the darkness around them. 'I know it's utterly yellow and we spend an absolute age teaching the girls that there's nothing to fear but...' She bit her lip stoically. 'One never considers it from a personal perspective.'
'Nobody wants to die, Miss Pryce, not in a sewer. Even a Watcher makes plans.' He tilted his head to the side. 'I had hoped to see our sister facilities in BudaPest and Tibet one day.'
'I'd booked a walking holiday through the Peak District in May with some of the girls at Bellum.' She dabbed her nose purposelessly with the by now sodden handkerchief that Wyndham had passed to her. 'I bought new boots.' She swallowed sadly. 'It was rather a waste I suppose.'
'I always thought that I'd be able to see the sun rise over the Isis once more before I died.'
'I'd been thinking of getting a little dog.'
'I'd thought I might have a slayer of my own one day.' Wyndham began to work at the brickwork beside him with his thumb. 'There were some theories I had devised about the use of different wood types in stakes I had rather hoped to share.'
Pryce stared out into the dark tunnel. 'I have a niece, of whom I am rather fond.' She paused. 'I'd promised that I 'd take her to see The Nutcracker.'


'You must not worry child.' Holmes placed a hand upon the trembling girl's shoulder, pulling her slowly back towards him. 'Fear of the inevitable is a singularly pointless pursuit.' He ran a long finger along her jaw-line, pushing her head back against the shoulder, stretching her neck to expose almost its entire length. 'Consider the wider view, Ruby, please.' Drawled Holmes, casually pinching out the glow of his cigarette with his free hand and disposing of it into a nearby ashtray, 'There is no-one in the world to whom you are of sufficient importance for me to practically fear reprisal.'
A tear rolled down the maid's cheek, short choking breathes, like those of a trapped and terrified animal, shaking her frame as she began to open her mouth to form a response.
'Cry out, if you wish,' interrupted Holmes, 'And I shall have your friend too when she arrives.' He watched her slowly close her mouth, 'Good girl,' and sunk his teeth deep into her throat...


'I believe, had I known the time and manner of my death,' Wyndham skipped a handful of gravel across the filthy water beneath them, 'I would have done some things differently in my life.'
Miss Pryce shrugged sadly and drove her fist into the palm of her hand. 'Gosh yes.' She tilted her head with a desperate smile. 'Probably would have bought a map of the sewers for a start.'
Wyndham feigned unawareness of her chatter. 'I had hoped to be published by now.' He paused. 'Wyndham's primer to the corporeal demons native to Northern Europe.' He sighed, staring unseeing out into the darkness. 'It was to be my little piece of immortality.'
'You have no children Mr Wyndham?'
'I, um...' The dark haired Watcher began to wipe his glasses self-consciously. 'That is, the opportunity to marry has yet to, uh...' He cleared his throat. 'Yourself?'
'I would urge you to carefully consider the word 'Miss'.'
'Oh dear, I, that is... I do beg your pardon.'


Rose screamed.
Her hand frozen upon the door handle, staring in at the, never more grotesquely misnamed, living room. She opened her mouth and screamed, screamed at her friend's body, twisting in her employers grip, screamed at the carmine tear in Ruby's throat, and the drops of blood on Holmes' lips, shining in the gaslight as if in mockery of his victim's namesake. She screamed, finally, in fear for her own life, terror that this too would be her end.
Rose fled.


'There are very few ways to pass the time when one is trapped in a sewer, that is the problem.' Sighed Pryce, 'Once one has become accustomed to the fact that one is about to die there is so very little which one can do to take one's mind off of the situation.'
'No.' Wyndham broke off the small piece of mortar that he had been working with his thumb and threw it into the water before him. 'Not much.'
Pryce paused thoughtfully. 'Hardly anything at all.'
'Indeed Miss Pryce, we shall just have to sit here and wai...' Wyndham's eyes widened at Pryce's sudden kiss. 'Madam! I hardly think...' His words were cut off as she loomed in again....


'Miss Buck?' Van Helsing reeled slightly as the distressed figure ran blindly into him, clawing at him in unseeing animalistic terror. 'Are you -' He grabbed at her wrists as she flailed at him wildly. 'Dalton!'
'I-is sh-sh-sh-she...'
'Her mind is gone, Dalton.' Snapped Van Helsing as the young woman sobbed into his shirtfront, 'Pass me my stick,' He stared into the darkness beyond the open doorway of 221B and breathed deeply, 'and we will - '
'S-s-sir!' Dalton pointed towards the third floor window, 'Look!'


'Sodding arseholes!'
'Really sir!' Watson glared at the cab driver, 'You are in the presence of a....' He trailed off as he followed the line of the driver's gaze, and saw the body fall from the window to the steps beneath, limp and bloodied, smashing a gory trail along the worn stone as it rolled to street level. 'In the presence of a...' A dark shape leapt from the same window, taking the three floor drop as if it were no more than a high curb, a familiar face was outlined, briefly, hideously, by the street lamp before bolting away at beyond natural speed. 'In the...Oh dear God.' Watson collapsed back into his seat, sickened and crushed by what he had seen, 'Oh God,' He hid his face in his hands, 'That poor girl...He...Oh God....'
'Watcher!' Barked Van Helsing, pulling himself onto the cab. 'Do you see where your inactivity has brought you, Watcher? It is the time for deeds!'
Watson did not follow how it was that this stranger fitted into the picture, how it was that the three of them set off along the darkened streets at full speed, and without their original driver. Nor did he care. His mind was filled with images of what his friend had become, reeling with the descriptions which he had so recently shrugged off as delusions, grotesque fancies born of some brain fever. And over and again the image of the limp, torn body falling through the air, tossed aside like an oyster shell.
'John?'
Watson stared, unseeing, at Dr Giles as she watched him with concern. Watcher, she had said, an existence dedicated to the eradication of vampires, to hunting down what his friend had become and-
'Are you a real doctor?'
Giles started in her seat at the unexpected nature of his question. 'I- of course, I have been practising for over eleven years.'
'That at least was not a lie then.'
'There were no lies, John. I promise you.'
'Of course,' murmured Watson staring out of the window, 'there were no lies, only untruths....'


'Miss Pryce, This is most improper behaviour!' Wyndham pressed his back against the sewer wall. 'I-I-I-I-I really don't think that you've considered...'
Pryce snatched his glasses from the end of his nose. 'There were certain things...' She crowded against him and took hold of his hand. 'Which I had rather hoped to do before I die.'
'Really Madam!' Squeaked Wyndham, staring aghast as she slid her other hand inside his waistcoats. 'Consider the honour of the council!'
Miss Pryce paused, blinked, and stuck her chin out loftily. 'Mr Wyndham.' She enunciated coolly. 'The council can go hang. Now,' She pushed forward and pressed another kiss onto his forehead, 'I do think you might show a little more enthusiasm.'


'D-d-damn it all!' Dalton rested his head upon the cool brick of the alley wall and wiped his eyes with the back of his sleeve. It had happened again, as it had happened in the hills of Southern France, in the icy wastes of Russia and in the Polish ghetto. They had failed, they might tear the beast limb from limb and destroy it forever but they still would have failed. He felt the accusing voices of the dead call him at times like this, screaming for balance, for a restitution that was beyond his power to give.
He had run, run from the uncomprehending cries of the madwoman, run from the sight of the bloodless corpse, called out some excuse that he would alert the police and run for the safety of dark places like the insect he was.
Dalton stood and felt his heart beat whilst the rain poured down.


'Ah...Could you...Yes, just move your arm.'
'Sorry...Is that? Right...Oh do watch out for that piece of brick there...'
'Are you...You're.... I'm not?'
'No, no, don't worry just...Oh!'


'How many are lost?' Mycroft stared beyond the young Watcher who stood before him, wringing his hands, and into the corridor where he could see the swarm of activity, an industrious anarchy born of panic like an upturned beehive. Watchers scurrying from doorway to doorway with paperwork, disappearing into darkened rooms with cracked and ancient books from the library. He saw a group of drained, damp eyed women crowded around a saucer of ink and water desperately trying to focus their minds sufficiently to scry.
'We, um, there are, that, that is...'
'HOW MANY!' Roared Mycroft.
'Three, three Watchers we think, a Slayer, at -at least one Slayer has passed too, the, um, the earlings we have yet to...'
'And my brother?'
'Your...That is, your,' Peters gazed quizzically at his superior and grasped for his sheaf of papers as they slid between the cover sheets to the floor, 'There- there was no record of your brother's involvement in the incident, Sir.'
'I...' Mycroft blinked heavily and ran his hands over his face. 'Carry on.'


'Oh, Vivian!'
'Oh, Matilda!'


'W-who's there?' Dalton peered out into darkness at the sound of footsteps. 'W-w-who is it? I-d-d-d-' Dalton's tongue caught upon the treacherous 'd'. 'I-d-d-d-dentify yourself!'
A petite young woman stepped from the shadows and pouted sorrowfully. 'I'm all lost and lonesome,' she drawled, her eyes staring at some point on a horizon that could not be measured on maps. 'My mother said I never should, play with the fairies in the wood.'
'D-d-d-d-d-d-did she?' Dalton backed against the damp brickwork as the lunatic turned towards him, her head tilted to the side registering his presence fully for the first time.
'I had such a pretty baby boy, I did, but he was a bad boy, he run away from his mummy, and he never came back,' She drifted off into reverie for a moment, 'You're not a bad boy like my baby though are you?'
'I duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-' choked Dalton.
'Duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-' echoed Drusilla, spinning gleefully in the drizzle, 'duh-duh-duh-duh-duh-DUH!' She pressed her cold fingers against Dalton's temple and stared beyond him with sadness in her eyes. 'Shhh....Poor baby, all tangled up inside with books and stories...' She shook her head, the vampire's mask of knotted muscle and overgrown canines exploding outward from her smooth, pale, complexion. 'Mummy's here...'


Wyndham stared down in mild awe at the dozing heap of linen and skin curled in his arms. 'As unto the bow the cord is...'
'Hmm.' A hand pushed up to stroke his cheek. 'So unto the man is woman.'
'Thus the youthful Hiawatha said unto himself and pondered much perplexed by variou-'
'I say, shall we go again?' Said Pryce.


'Emergo!' Bathory crowed, screaming above the whistle of the supernatural gale. He watched, awe-struck as the air within the circle solidified, a blazing white-hot pillar that pained his eyes to look at it. 'Emergo,' he sighed, collapsing to his knees. The centre of the light darkened, twisting and bucking into a shadowy human form.
'Lady Erzsébet,' He cowed down before the reborn vampire as she took her first faltering steps towards him. 'True mother, I prostrate myself before you in....' She placed a benedictory hand upon his crown, smiling sadly, 'before you in....' and snapped his neck like a dog.


'Watcher!' Van Helsing hissed, clutching the sharpened end of his customised walking stick between thin fingers. 'We have luck!' He smiled coldly, 'A dead end.'
Watson and Giles stared into the unlit alleyway, leaning upon one another for support. Dr Giles bit her lip against the pain in her foot and focussed upon the crucifix clasped tightly within her sweating fist. 'Doctor - I must advise...' Dr Giles began, breaking off into a scream as a pale arm looped down and snatched Van Helsing up into the night.


'Allo sweetheart,' whispered Spike as he stooped and tenderly brushed the hair from Drusilla's face, 'I've been looking all over for you, kitten.'
'Spike?' Drusilla blinked into semi-wakefulness, drowsily extending a hand towards her beloved. 'I don't like it 'ere anymore.' She curled against the brickwork of the railway arch and pulled her cloak tighter around her neck.
'Well, we ain't staying a minute longer than we have to, pickle,' Spike crouched and kissed Drusilla gently. 'As soon as we find a nice easy mark to pay for our berth we'll be out like a....'Ello,' Spike drew back her cloak and stared at the unconscious scholar curled in her arms like a newborn, 'Who's this then?'
'It's a little stranger,' Drusilla stroked the unrisen vampire's cheek and lifted her finger to her lips, 'Shhh. 'E's sleeping.' She smiled distantly. 'He was all twisted up inside like the kitty's yarn, but mummy and daddy are going to make it all better...'
Spike shrugged as she cooed over the new addition. 'Come on then, pet,' He heaved the comatose youth over his shoulder and pulled Drusilla gently to her feet, 'let's scarper, eh?'


'Oh God,' Watson leant against the wall and caught his breath in vast, heaving, gulps. 'Where? I-I mean, did you see?'
'He took him,' Giles stared up at the thin ledge which ran along the building above them at the base of the second floor window, 'They're somewhere-somewhere up there - Oh God.' A brief gurgling cry rang out around the tiny side street. 'Oh John, he's...'
A dark shape dropped down towards them. Bowling Van Helsing into them, Holmes took off away down the alleyway.
Watson stared down at the pallid vampire hunter. 'Is he?' He left the question hanging in the air.
'No,' Dr Giles tore a strip of cloth from the base of her skirts and began to pack it around Van Helsing's tattered throat, 'At least, not yet.' She gazed up at Watson, 'He's almost entirely drained, John. Fed upon, like an animal.' Giles pressed a stake into Dr Watson's hand. 'I'll follow you, as soon as I've made him comfortable. Unless you'd rather I-'
'No,' Watson shook his head determinedly, 'I'll go.'


Holmes stared down into the darkness, the mark of Van Helsing's crucifix burning on his neck, even as Van Helsing's blood burnt through his veins. He closed his eyes and breathed in the scent of his two pursuers, the medical mixture of spirits and soap so familiar to him. He opened his eyes again, curled his hands into fists, and made a decision.


Watson trod warily along the pitch-dark alleyway. His stomach contracting with fear at every step. He swallowed hard, hoping to control the acids rising from the pit of his stomach. His footsteps seemed to echo unbelievably loud in the darkness and Watson wondered whether the circumstances had increased his hearing, he had heard stories of men, men who hunted animals in the African bush or the jungles in India. Lions and tigers, big game, who grew so focussed in their hunt that they gained an advantage. He listened to the laboured breathing of Van Helsing as he lay propped up against the wall, the soft murmurings of Dr Giles as she packed more cloth against the welling gashes at his throat.
Watson heard the soft thud as Holmes landed heavily behind him and span. He lunged heavily towards his former friend, driving the stake blindly in front of him. But Holmes moved quickly, grabbing Watson as he thrust forward and pinning his arms against his sides.
Watson froze as his former friend wrapped his left arm around him in a crushing grip, leaving his right arm free. 'Are you going to kill me?'
Holmes pressed his own right arm to his mouth, tearing at his wrist with sharp canine teeth. 'I'm going to free you, Watson,' He watched as dark, dead, blood rose from the wound, 'free for the first time in this miserable existence, you cannot imagine....'
'Please, no. Not that,' Watson gazed up into unfamiliar eyes, searching for a trace of the person he remembered, 'kill me.'
Holmes stared down at Watson, his bloodied arm raised beside him. They stood, immobile, a grisly tableau outlined against the moonlight.
Holmes closed his eyes and shook the demon from his face, hurling Watson's shaking body savagely away from him, he turned on his heels and began to run.
'End him!' Watson heard Dr Giles scream behind him. 'John, you have your stake, for God's sake, end him!'
Dr. John.H.Watson lay on the ground amidst the filth of the overflowing gutter, stared up at the stars, and began to sob.

'And?'
'And what?' She looked up from her crystal at me with distaste. 'A passer by called the police? Ello Ello Ello, what's all this then, brave bobbies save the day once again, knighthoods all round, only doing our job says humble copper.' The gypsy laughed scornfully. 'The little girls were killed, mostly, the villains escaped, mostly, no ends, no sunsets only night. You may leave now.'
'That's horrible.' I gripped at my lapels, pulling my coat tighter around me to block out the sick chill that had entered my bones. 'Horrible'
'Existence is horrible, you may leave now. Goodbye.'
I rose quickly and darted towards the entrance.
'Miss Russell!'
My hands flew to my face automatically, snatching from the air the missile which the woman threw before it could hit me. I opened my fist and stared at it as it lay on the palm of my hand. A spent matchstick, nothing more than a tiny sliver of pine. Shaking my head at the poor disturbed creature I scurried away into the night.


'You might have spared the child some of the gory details, Reenie dear.' Holmes lifted himself to his feet and stepped out from the shadows with a smile. 'You made me sound positively ghoulish.'
'Hmm.' Irene scowled wrinkling her nose as if an unpleasant smell had entered the tent. 'You have disposed of the friend then?'
'Disposed!' Holmes raised an eyebrow in mock alarm. ' Such connotations to the word, I merely presented her with a message from the girl notifying her that she would be returning home with an acquaintance of hers, my dear. We are not savages.' He looped an arm around her waist and buried his nose amidst her hair. 'Come along now, my little Melpomene, Couldn't you just smell it on her?' He placed a line of cold kisses along her neck, 'The dowdy little mare positively reeks of it, Reenie - we haven't a choice in the matter.'
Irene growled.
'A Slayer turned,' Her purred into her ear, 'surely you appreciate the poetry of the thing, if nothing else...'


I turned to face the footsteps as they followed me down the shortcut I had taken on my way to the station. 'Ronnie?' I called out into the darkness. 'I must say you might at least have left word you were...' My words trailed off into the ether. 'Veronica? Is that you?'
'No....'

Epilogue.


'Enter.'
The dry air of the library hung with dust from the heavy volumes crowding the shelves, the pale cold light of a January dawn seeped gently into the room, defining the shadows and illuminating almost nothing.
'Sir?' The clean-shaven, well-scrubbed young Watcher surveyed the room for a sign to tell which of the heavy, worn leather chairs his superior occupied. 'Sir?'
'Mr Giles?' A low voice echoed from chairs surrounding the fireplace. 'You wish to speak? I'm afraid I can't see your face from here.'
Angus presented himself politely before Mycroft. 'Sir. It's Margot Lloyd, she's broken McShane's arm.' He cleared his throat. 'In three places.'
'And?' Mycroft rubbed distractedly at his twisted knuckle joints and stared up at his junior with hooded eyes. 'He has been taken to the infirmary I assume?'
'She broke it through four layers of padding sir. Unarmed. With a congratulatory pat on the back.' He paused. 'She sent him through the door.'
'Ah.' Mycroft nodded in recognition a thin, unhappy smile formed at his lips without ever reaching his eyes. 'Dead, and never called me mother.' He closed his eyes painfully and sighed to himself. 'You will make the necessary announcement of course.'
'Sir?' Mr Giles lingered expectantly. 'What shall I do about the records, that is, for the previous?'
'Incognitus, Mr Giles. 1915 - 1921 Slayer Unknown.' Mycroft's heavy shoulders rose and fell against the light from the fire. 'And hope to God that she died of measles.'

The End