A/N: Well, under complicated circumstances I thumbed a Sherlock Holmes book for teenagers where the premise plot was a classic: Mycroft is found on an alley, kneeling by a bloody corpse, holding the murder weapon; Mycroft gets wrongly accused of murder; Sherlock needs to prove his innocence and reveal the culprit. (I don't know if John is a part of the book.) I couldn't get the book – long story – or find it since, so I guess now I have to write the story myself. Bah. -csf


.1.

Two glasses filled with clear liquids rest on 221B's kitchen table. Inside there are a gummy bear each. The consulting detective and part time scientist is eyeing both drowned bears most attentively.

'What are you doing?'

'Science experiment.'

'I can see that much.'

'And yet you ask, John.'

I shake my head in mock exasperation. 'You know it doesn't take a genius to explain, if you actually know what it is you're doing.'

Sherlock's lips quirk upwards despite his attempts at neutrality. 'Why would I experiment if not to advance science?'

'Don't give me that, loads of scientific discoveries were achieved by accident or random occurrences. And that' – I open my laptop decisively, powering it on, and fall on the Union Jack pillow on my armchair – 'is precisely what you are aiming at, Sherlock.'

'That is absolutely preposterous, I would never—'

'Sherlock.'

My interruption refocuses the detective at once, as if he recognised the undertones clipped in his given name. Silent and fluidly he's at once approaching my armchair, peering over my shoulder. Then he springs to action, thumbing his phone, grabbing his long coat. 'Lestrade!' he calls on the line. He never turns back. He doesn't need to. He knows I'm right on his heels.

.

'He was found inebriated, sir. Almost passed out twice and threw up on constable Jones there, he did. He was drunk, alright. Talked gibberish and couldn't walk in a straight line... Holmes, you say his name is? Oh, yeah, here it is, detention cell 13. I'll show you... Well, less gibberish than I thought. I didn't quite believe anyone would actually be called Minecraft Holmes.'

'Mycroft', Sherlock hisses the correction to the friendly police officer. Despite the Holmes brothers legendary rivalry they'll defend each other in public, as if they themselves be the only ones privileged enough to insult each other in equal terms.

'My-Croft, you say? Might have been, he was drawling a bit. Must have been the alcohol in his system.'

'My brother's not an alcoholic.'

'That's what they all say, innit?' the officer responds wisely, as he pulls open the heavy doors to the detention cells. A white, sterile clean straight corridor franking several doors left and right.

I purse my lips thin. Oh, what ignominy it must have been to Mycroft. He must still be feeling the pain of it, deep down in the expensive seams of his tailored three piece suit.

Sherlock walks in first, I follow second and the officer pulls the door closed behind us. Sherlock is impatient, I can tell, as we wait to be led to the correct cell, yet he stands tall, firm and proud. Perhaps as if he could muster in himself enough dignity to share with his brother.

Soon we're on the move again.

'Sherlock, your services are not required', the lonely well spoken voice filters through the base murmur of conversation, in the well known projection of Mycroft Holmes.

He must have recognised the sound of his brother's footsteps.

Sherlock glances at me to share an amused eye roll.

'Mycroft, I wouldn't miss this for the world!' the younger brother pretends to gloat already. The rivalry pantomime is to be kept at all times, particularly within witnesses earshot.

Sometimes even when no one else is in the room, just because they've grown so accustomed to it, it's now code for their brotherly interactions.

'Come if you must', says the long suffering Mycroft's voice.

'I brought my blogger, someone should witness your crude downfall, brother dear', Sherlock further alerts him to my presence.

'I foresaw that much. A great man casts a long shadow... a mediocre man drags one along.'

Sherlock stops short in front of the detention cell, eyes the man inside and sniggers. 'Seen enough. I'll return once I solved the murder. Sit tight.' Short, business-like, no empathy, all Holmesian trademarks. And to me, he directs, 'John, doctor him. I'll be outside. I'll keep the cab waiting.'

With that Sherlock turns away, abandoning his brother with calculated coldness, leaving me stunned behind.

I glance inside the holding cell, to a bedraggled version of the older Holmes I'm familiar with. It's a pitiful sight, but I keep myself from showing that. 'Hello there, Mycroft. Fancy seeing you here!'

'Oh, spare us, doctor Watson. I've had a long morning and I'm about to be accused of murdering a stranger in a back alley where I do not recall going, nor can I make sense of why should I find myself there, among those near inhumane people with their filthy nomadic possessions.'

'You mean homeless people? Classy, Mycroft! You know it could easily be you or me one day, none of us is that safe from a bad turn of fortune.'

The haggard man faces me with the same cold dead eyes he always has. 'I'd say you have come closer than I ever would, but that would be guessing.' He stresses the lie in that last word and I shudder to think how much he knows of this veteran thrown into London without family support, running out of his compensation and not enough pension on his pocket before I met his brother.

Mycroft's attack is his way of making me back off. Redirecting me. It's how a Holmes communicates.

'How are you?' I ask instead. Sherlock should have asked this. Maybe I can carry the answer to the younger brother.

Mycroft squints, disdainfully.

'You want me to do your doctoring for you too? What next, find the actual killer from within this cell?'

'No, you idiot', I snap, and it's not nice, as Mycroft is locked up in a holding cell, and his shoelaces have been taken away from him. 'I'm asking how you are.'

'It's a useless question. There's a case for my brother to solve, if he's not too busy. Hurry along, or he'll leave without you, doctor Watson.'

I let go of my previous anger momentarily .

'It's not a useless question at all. It's the most important question there is, Mycroft.'

He blinks. Confused, perhaps. I feel a bit saddened that a genius will not be aware of the importance of reaching out.

Yet he answers me this time. Controlled, sarcastic and miffed beyond belief.

'How am I? I'm stuck in a dirty holding cell riddled with misspelled profanities scrawled on the walls, ready to be accused of murder by a representative of the law who watches every episode of Inspector Morse on television, religiously. I think what you are trying to make me say, John, is that I'm royally screwed.'

I smirk.

'Don't worry, you've got us. Sherlock will solve your case.'

Mycroft leans back on the hard wood bench and cold wall. 'Ah, I feel better already', he mocks.

Only he jests with the truth.

.

'Sherlock?' I look around at the quiet parking lot. Can't believe Sherlock just left without me already. Although in all honesty, he keeps doing that. Why it still surprises me, I don't know.

'John!'

I'm called out from near the gates and sure enough there's the familiar figure in a long wool coat, impatiently waiting for me. I sprint my way over, as he's already entering a waiting cab.

'St Bart's teaching hospital', he directs the cabbie as soon as I enter as well. The engine starts and we're soon on the road.

Sherlock is yet to acknowledge that I'm eyeing him attentively. After all, his brother has just been set up for murder and is about to be unjustly accused. If ever there was a vital case for Sherlock Holmes, this has got to be it.

The detective finally dispenses a glance my way, before looking out of the window into the drizzle rain falling outside.

In my hand he has just planted an evidence bag. It holds a badge. Sherlock, we talked about this! I'm about to snap when I realise there's not enough buff in the silver chromed surface.

Mycroft threw up on constable Jones. This is Jones's badge, and that is enough biological sample to run our own tests.

With the same answers as the blood tests will give the police.

Only Sherlock can run them faster.

Or Molly can. In the morgue. Sherlock's home away from home.

.

TBC