Got My Eye on You

The first post-Episode Three chapter. Here be spoilers for The Empty Hearse

Chapter 70 The Good Man -Part One


He was tired. It was late. And a Saturday night to boot; not fair. The Homicide Assessment Team wanted his opinion about a case, before they assigned it to a Murder Investigation Team. Presumably his, otherwise he might not have bothered to pick up the text.

"We tried Dimmock, but he's not answering his phone." The HAT officer was apologetic.

Well, Greg knew that Dimmock was off with his latest girlfriend, 'meeting the parents'. Greg, on the other hand, had no one to impress anymore, so he'd shouldered on a jacket over his checked shirt and casual trousers and gone to the crime scene. Anyway, he had a soft spot for the HAT team. Saturday evenings were a boring round of television and take-out, so any excuse would do. He'd been procrastinating lately by throwing himself into cases as if there was no tomorrow, so why break a habit?

Lestrade knew himself well enough to know why he was procrastinating. Thinking about the case at hand meant he had less time and energy to think about cases past- or one case in particular. An unsolved case- the death of Sherlock Holmes.

The DI had never bought the idea of Sherlock committing suicide. The idiot was too arrogant to care what other people thought. The idea of being exposed by the tabloids as some sort of fraud? Well, it made no sense. Unlike most people who read the tabloid stories, Greg knew something else, too. He'd found the body of James Moriarty, AKA Richard Brook, on the Barts rooftop*, but the case was taken away from him and the Met the moment security service officers arrived. He'd been bundled off the roof and sent home. The Chief Superintendent of Detectives had banished Greg from the Yard for weeks, while IAB investigated whether the Consulting Detective was guilty of the fraud which the tabloids wrote about.

Sherlock would have treated those accusations with the distain that they deserved. As it had been proven just this week, the allegations were finally put to rest by the Public Enquiry.

A piece of Lestrade wondered what the hell had taken the authorities so long. The Met's internal inquiries had been over within a year. Every single one of the cases that the consulting detective had ever worked on was re-opened and painstakingly reviewed. Within four months, the MET knew enough to be sure it was a frame-up.

Of course, Greg wasn't party to the investigation. He'd been relegated to the Homicide Assessment Team- trundling around London to consider whether a reported homicide was sufficiently serious enough to warrant being assigned to a Murder Investigation Team. The Chief Superintendent was a cost-cutter. And every time the Met opened a Murder Investigation, it would end up costing more than a £100,000. So, he'd been told that if there was no chance of conviction, then he'd better find insufficient reason to investigate. Time and again, Greg had found himself thinking how much he'd learned from Sherlock. He established something of a reputation for himself on the HAT team, simply because he could imagine a bored baritone telling him he was an idiot for mistaking a suicide or an accidental death for a genuine murder. Over the years with Sherlock, Greg had learned to assess crimes carefully, lest they fall foul of the man's "Don't bother me for anything less than a six, Lestrade."

Greg welcomed the HAT posting as better than gardening leave. He wondered whether a certain minor official in the British Government had been responsible for the assignment that came a month after his suspension, but he'd not had the courage to contact Mycroft Holmes after the funeral. Don't look gift horses in the mouth.

It was Don Anderson who came to him six months on, and told him what was being found by IAB's investigation. From being Sherlock's most vociferous critic, Anderson had undergone a conversion on the road to Damascus. He was now convinced of Sherlock's innocence. Guilt was driving his protestations that Sherlock was innocent and that the Met should not delay any longer in telling the truth. Then Anderson was caught trying to brief a newspaper about the findings, laying the blame at the feet of the Chief Superintendent himself. That earned him instant dismissal from the Forensic Service as a result. Bitter with disappointment and now unable to find anything other than part time lab work, Anderson joined the ranks of those who argued that Sherlock Holmes should be exonerated. Almost a cult, the group was responsible for putting up posters, spray painting graffiti, holding meetings- all of which Greg watched with faint bemusement.

"He wouldn't have thanked you for this, Anderson." Every so often, Greg would finally agree to meet the former CS Examiner at a pub. But whatever Greg said, Anderson seemed determined. The DI tried to counsel him to move on, but the man would only talk about yet another case where the Consulting Detective had been proven to be right. Guilt has made him obsessive.

It was a feeling that Greg understood. He'd tried hard to deal with his own guilt about the final days of Sherlock Holmes. The arrest, the conversation at Barts, Greg's inability to stop what he could see was coming- they all preyed on his mind when he let them.

He found it hard to talk to John Watson in the aftermath, but tried. He watched the man let things slide, quietly dealing with the aftermath. John seemed to hold no grudge against Greg, which he was thankful for. But, he was remote and withdrawn, dealing with his grief privately. Not that Greg was good company. He was dealing with his own grief and his own frustration. When it came down to it, Sherlock was the one and only thing that John and he had in common, and it was painful to spend time in each other's company because it was a constant reminder of their loss. All they could talk about was how much they missed him, and Greg didn't need reminding. One look at John's face told Greg that the doctor didn't need reminding either.

So, once Greg got back to work with the HAT team, he let the work carry him forward. Contact with John dwindled and then lapsed pretty much for good by the end of the first year after Sherlock's death. He'd passed on some things he found in the box of his desk things when he moved back to the Murder Investigation Team offices; they'd been put in storage, but reappeared on his desk the day he returned, to the applause of his old team.

When the Public Enquiry was launched six months ago, he did spot John in the gallery. Lestrade was called briefly to give evidence, but the focus was mostly on the tabloid papers and how they had accepted Moriarty's lies about Richard Brook and persecuted the consulting detective without evidence. The Public Enquiry finally forced the Yard to make public the evidence of their internal investigations. Then under cross examination by the Enquiry panel, it came out that the Chief Superintendent was in some way being blackmailed by Moriarty. He resigned under a cloud, and Greg allowed himself to feel happy about that fact.

Anderson was ecstatic about the news, and met up with Greg at the nearest pub to the Enquiry. That's when he'd explained his latest hare-brained idea- that Sherlock Holmes was still alive. Greg tried to talk him out of it, but the man was almost fanatical. When Greg was at a vendor selling coffee outside of the Enquiry on the morning the results were supposed to be published, Anderson cornered him there spouting the same idea. Greg could only try to talk him out of it. They raised their coffee cups in a mock toast to "absent friends."

That was just over a week ago. The papers and websites had been full of the news for a couple of days, but now the agenda seemed to have moved on. In some respects, Lestrade was glad. The news had made it hard to NOT think of Sherlock. And he missed him. Seeing it all rehashed in the press brought back so many memories. A skinny sixteen year old high as a kite telling him what an idiot he was the first time he was officer in charge of a homicide crime scene. The times before John, when Lestrade despaired of keeping Sherlock under control and out of trouble. The occasions when the young man's addictions got the better of him, as well as the recoveries that followed.

Today's call had been a case in point. Sherlock would have loved this one. The HAT team had been called to an old terraced house in Whitechapel that was due to be knocked down and replaced with yet another block of expensive flats for the rich bankers working in Canary Wharf. The surveyors working their way through the abandoned and ruined terrace had found a skeleton dressed in old fashioned clothes sitting at a desk. They'd leaked it to the press, who made it into a front page "who done it". But, the HAT team wasn't prepared to open a murder investigation if it was the remains of a body that had been there for a century. "Might as well call an archaeologist," the officer argued. Before deciding, he wanted Greg's opinion.

The place was creepy, covered in dust and full of cobwebs that suggested no one had been anywhere near the cellar for decades. The crime scene was utterly devoid of evidence that could be traced to any perpetrator. No finger prints, no blood, no footprints. The forensic team had been baffled. Greg felt there was something wrong about the whole set up, but couldn't put his finger on it. It was late Saturday night by the time the Forensic crew cleared off.

"I'm going to sit on this for the weekend, Chambers. Maybe I can figure it out, once I've had a chance to think it through. Don't say anything to the media; they've got enough mileage already."

The HAT officer just sniggered. "Yeah, well this guy isn't going anywhere, is he? Take all the time you want. We'll just say it's indeterminate at this moment. When you want to decide, give us a shout. The demolition guys have given us a month."

He taped up the cellar door, and headed back to the Yard to file his draft report on the HOLMES2 database. He didn't want to have to do it on Sunday. Might's well get it out of the way tonight, when things were quiet.

oOo

Down in the darkened underground garage beneath New Scotland Yard, Greg realised he was dying for a smoke. He patted his right outer coat pocket for the packet of cigarettes he normally kept there, but was annoyed to find it missing. He started to dig through the other pockets. Up the ramp somewhere he heard a sound that made him look up. On the weekends the garage was kept half dark- another cost cutting measure. Probably some other poor sod working late, tripping over something in the dark on his way back to his car.

Greg found the pack in his suit pocket. He'd wanted a smoke at the crime scene but knew better than to contaminate the evidence. He put the unlit cigarette in his mouth and flicked the disposable lighter into life, cupping his fingers to shield it against the breeze coming down the ramp.

"Those things will kill you, you know."

Greg stopped, shocked into complete stillness. The lighter flame flickered some distance from the end of the cigarette he'd placed between his lips, but his brain only registered the sound of a particular baritone voice. One he hadn't heard for two years. A voice he had never expected to hear again.

The flame started to burn the hand he had cupping the lighter, and finally triggered his stunned brain into life.

"You bastard."

Greg looked up as a familiar figure moved out of the shadows into the light. The coat, the suit, the hair- it was Sherlock, as if nothing had happened at all in the intervening two years.

As Lestrade drank in the sight, Sherlock said "It's time to come back." He stepped closer, and Greg could now see his face more clearly. A few more lines, and a red split at the left side of his lower lip. Recent- wonder who he let hit him? He's usually quick enough to dodge a fist.

"You've been letting things slide, Graham."

"Greg". The correction slipped out automatically. God, he still can't get my name right.

"Greg." Sherlock obediently repeated his name and then waited. As if the two years had not happened, Greg could read the man's hesitation. He's unsure of what I'm going to do. Oh…I'll bet it was John who clocked him one.

And in that moment, Greg Lestrade threw his left arm around Sherlock's shoulder and pulled him into a bear hugged embrace. He felt the taut frame flinch, but then take it. Yeah. I know you don't like this, but tough, you bastard; you have no idea how much it means to me to see you alive again.


Authors's Note: * If you want to read the back story of Lestrade on Barts' roof, read the previous story arc- the Great Man