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Disclaimer: 'Sherlock' belongs to all the important people that you know. You recognize it, I don't own it.

Warning: A lot of angry people in this one, so some swearing was in order.

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Lestrade had known Sherlock Holmes for years. From the junkie stumbling onto a crime scene with a miracle solution to the arrogant genius in an expensive coat, he'd seen him change, grow walls and experience, and generally be an arse to everyone around. He cared for him, in a way… didn't want him to fall back to drugs, that's for sure, so he tried to give him a focus, a bone to gnaw, a case to solve, whenever possible. But he was always kept at a distance. Maybe he hadn't tried hard enough. Maybe he hadn't known how to breach that awkward silence between them. Or maybe he just assumed that Sherlock didn't need any relationship beyond professional ("Never assume" as the git loved to say).

And then Joan Watson came and tore down the walls ("She's with me"). Suddenly, he was faced with his own unintended callousness, when the unassuming woman bestowed sincere praise and admiration upon Sherlock, and the younger man basked in it. They could yell and threaten for hours to get an explanation from the consulting headache, but a couple of words from Watson, and Holmes was spilling his whole thought process with minimum verbal abuse. It was astounding, to say the least.

Greg popped up at Baker Street the afternoon after the serial suicides grisly resolution, intending to get Sherlock's statement firsthand. Instead, the DI was treated to the previously unheard sound of Sherlock's laughter. Absolutely stunned, he stepped into the cluttered living room, to find the skinny detective draped over a chair in an expensive-looking dressing gown (why all of his clothes look expensive?), facing the blond woman from the previous night, who snickered behind a mug. Sherlock actually greeted him cordially (read – without disparaging his intelligence within the first sentence). And Joan gave him a warm, if a bit nervous, smile and a cup of excellent tea.

He came by Baker Street more often after that (the tea was really good).

Joan very quickly established herself as Sherlock's handler (colleague, Holmes said). Most of the Yard wondered what was the deal with those two, but they generally ignored the pair until they needed Holmes's brains. They assumed Joan was a harmless doctor with a masochistic streak who pined for the resident dark and mysterious psychopath. Lestrade felt like the only one who saw the humor and the silent strength in Watson's smile. He was rather delighted to find an unexpected ally in Dimmock who got a crash course in Managing Mad Consultants 101 on one of his first murder cases. The two DIs sometimes shared stories together in the break room, agreeing that Watson wasn't technically a sane person, but they'd rather have her at Baker Street than anywhere else.

Then somehow the consulting pair ended up being present near the site of a jewelry store robbery turned hostage situation with a death toll, and now they were all chasing the pair of attackers across the streets. Holmes and his thrice-damned long legs brought him to the front of the chase, with surprisingly Donovan just behind. Watson and himself were in tow, with the rest of police force miserably failing to keep up. Both offenders sprinted into an old building, and Greg swore vehemently.

They climbed the stairs as fast as possible, and practically flew up the last story when they heard Sally shout "Stop!". Lestrade nearly fell out the door, getting pushed by Watson. His eyes immediately found his sergeant, who stood near the ledge, trying to aim her weapon at the other building … where Sherlock bloody Holmes was fighting their two robbers. Those madmen had jumped the two-meters gap to the other building. "F..." he almost swore again, catching his breath and trying to come up with a way to help Sherlock. He could hear several of his own men down the stairs, panting with effort. They were so hitting the gym after that…

A choking noise came from the other roof, and Sally yelled unconvincingly "Stop or I shoot!" Sherlock was being currently strangled in a choke-hold by one of the assailants, while the other took up a steel bar from the ground. Before he could even react, a blond blur rushed past him and flew over the ledge. Without stopping, Watson tackled the guy who started to swing the heavy bar around, rolling easily with the fall. She must have done something else, hidden from view, because there was an ominous crack and the man didn't get up. His comrade backed up, dragging Sherlock with him as living shield, and screaming obscenities. Joan slowly stood up, glaring silently at him. Greg couldn't be sure with the distance, but Sherlock seemed to turn a little grey from the lack of air.

Joan said something, they didn't hear with the wind howling and the blood trumping in their ears (he asked her afterwards, and she smiled coldly before simply replying "Scared?"), and the robber roared, dropping Sherlock to the ground and charging towards her. Sally shot her gun, once, twice, missing the target. Greg rushed to the ledge, ready to jump himself, because there was no way this small woman, a doctor who limped badly not a month before, could take on this raging bull. And then she dodged, or more like side-stepped the attack, and delivered a roundhouse kick to the man's kidneys. The robber stumbled, and fell to his knees, and Watson immediately followed with another kick to his neck, successfully knocking him out.

She stood still for a moment, looking down at her fallen assailants, her face reminding the DI of a bird of prey in its intensity. Lestrade heard someone mumble "Bloody hell" behind him, realizing that the rest of the team finally managed to get up there. Sally was staring wide-eyed at the scene. Then Watson's face softened to her usual expression, and she skidded on her knees near the panting form of the consulting detective, hands flying to check his vitals and guide him into a recovery position.

After that incident, Yarders became painfully aware that Dr Joan Watson had also been a soldier. And that she now fought for Sherlock Holmes. Insults and jabs significantly decreased on crime scenes.

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It had been a very long time (two weeks!) since Sherlock had such an entertaining day. It hadn't started right though, he began to go spare with boredom even before sunrise. In an attempt to alleviate the insufferable assault of peacefulness, he had started cracking the strongbox in which Joan kept her service weapon, but was busted by her before succeeding. To thwart any further slightly illegal experiments he could and would come up with, the ex-solider dragged him by the ear (quite literally at some point) to an appliances store, supposedly to replace the micro-waves destroyed in the 'exploding eyeballs' incident a couple of days prior.

Luckily, they never made it inside the store. The neighboring jeweler was being conveniently robbed, and the two trigger-happy thieves managed to break through the police ranks. Of course, they took off after them. There had been a slight miscalculation on his part when the men overpowered him and were about to brain him with a steel bar, but that's when the highlight of the day actually happened - Joan Watson joined the fray. It took her all but three minutes (two minutes eighteen seconds) to effectively neutralize both offenders and start to provide first-aid to the winded detective while muttering under her breath about crazy idiots who should wait for back-up.

Sherlock grinned and fished out two zip-ties from his pocket. Joan's sigh was positively world-weary.

By the time the police relocated from the first building to the roof where all action happened, Sherlock was on the receiving end of a surprisingly informative rant about hand-to-hand combat against a superior number of opponents and the importance of "bloody waiting for goddamn back-up". Officers mulled around, giving them weird looks, and a couple blushing rookies who couldn't tear their eyes off Joan were hovering uncertainly near the staircase. Fanboys. Ugh. "John."

"… and even then, you should never try to…" she trailed off, finally aware of the growing audience. "What?"

"I left the stove on."

She appeared only mildly annoyed by that fact. "Why would you do that?"

Sherlock threw her a bemused glare while dusting off his coat. "Measuring the speed of vaporization of different diluted paints in domestic conditions, of course."

People around them backed away when Joan suddenly emitted an animalistic growl. "You're telling me there is paint boiling unsupervised in our kitchen."

"It's for science, John!"

"I'm going to shave your head while you sleep." The threat was said in a steely voice that left little doubt about the ex-soldier's intentions. Note to self: Not consume anything John prepares in the next two days, and avoid sleeping in easily accessible locations. He didn't get pulled by the ear again, but it was a close thing, judging by Joan's reddened face and tightly clenched jaw.

The paint had almost entirely boiled out, and the flat was full of toxic vapors (Update to experiment file 122.1.A: do not attempt without a protective gas mask. Creating experiment file 122.2 – toxicity of paint fumes and their impact on human lungs). Bent in half, they ran to pull windows wide open and turn off the fire, coughing heavily in the foul fog. Sherlock pulled out tweezers to collect some samples of the residue, but was interrupted by a very irate medic dragging him back to the window. "You can tinker all you want when there is no danger of poisoning or creating a fireball" she said, and given the iron grip on his forearm he had no choice in that matter.

They sat in silence on the window ledge, backs pressed against the cold railing, constant humming of cars and crowds rolling over them and into the flat. It was boring. Sherlock started to fidget impatiently almost immediately (twenty-eight seconds) after sitting down. Joan took several deep breaths of the fresh air before glancing at him again: "Fifteen minutes at least, Sherlock. We can just talk meanwhile."

"Small talk? Really, John."

"I'm not the one conducting dubious experiments in the kitchen!" Apparently, it was too soon to be petulant around Watson without making her explode again. Sherlock raised his hands in mock surrender.

"Alright, Doctor. What do you want to talk about?"

It seemed to appease her for the moment. "Dunno." She dropped her head back, gaze lost in the greyish clouds outside. "Did you hear about one of Mars Rovers having ceased communications?"

Flaring a potential case, Sherlock perked up: "No. Is there a search? Any suspects?"

"Search?" Now Joan sounded vaguely confused. "It exceeded its lifetime by six years after landing. Why would they even try to repatriate it?"

"Landing?"

"Yeah, on Mars."

"Never heard of it."

"Are you kidding me?" Joan sat up straight and fully turned towards her flatmate with a deep frown.

For once, however, Sherlock was absolutely sincere: "I assure you that my pranks are of better quality." Mars… Isn't it a candy? Probably a namesake. Then a country?...

"You never heard of Mars. The planet Mars." Her fingers twitched on her lap. Wants to check my temperature. Suspects fever, perhaps substance intake. Is this Mars-thing important?

"Planet? No. What's its deal?"

"It's the closest planet to Earth in the Solar system, you know. [1]" Oh, just trivia then. Delete.

"Solar system? Never heard of it either."

"Are you serious?!"

*([1]: It isn't actually. Venus is the closest planet to Earth. But Joan isn't expert, is she now?)*

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Sally Donovan was proud of her work. She was a professional, a trained officer, and she was goddamn proud of it. She also liked the attention of men, and considered it an achievement to have kept it while climbing up ranks. That's why she accepted the situation with Anderson. Him being a good shag was an argument in his favor too, though.

Sherlock Holmes was a bloody menace, in her opinion. She had been a constable when the man first popped up at a crime scene, high as a kite, rambling about mud and stabbing angles. Lestrade apparently had understood something from this madness, as he didn't lock the junkie up, but cajoled an emergency contact from him and sent him home. The stabbing angle had been used during the court case.

The young man became a semi-permanent feature of gruesome cases after that. In the beginning, she was skeptical. Then curious. And in the end, furious, because the man reduced their primary witness, a frail old lady (who ended up being the poisoner), to tears and when confronted about it, spilled Sally's personal life for all to hear, including how her father always wanted a boy and how she was cheating on her boyfriend (who was in the same room with them and broke up with her in the wake of this scene). She swore to bring the asshole down after that.

Years passed, and Holmes stayed around. She took evil pleasure in insulting and generally making him uncomfortable whenever he showed up. Maddeningly, he always came up with a stinging revelation to announce to all and sundry. At least, he was insufferable to everyone, and thus they all rallied against him.

When he showed up with a limping woman in tow, Sally didn't pay much attention to the "colleague". Strange people came and went around Holmes. When the woman, Watson, showed up at the shooting scene the same evening, whispering and giggling with Holmes, Sally just frowned, too busy to think about the weirdness of it all. When Watson kept on living together with the freak, tailing him around, and being generally mild and friendly, Sally pitied the poor girl who lost her marbles.

When Joan Watson jumped fearlessly from the ledge to take out almost effortlessly two grown men, Sally realized how wrong she had been. Watching the predatory gleam fade from the soldier's eyes to be replaced with a genuine concern for the man all the Yard scorned, sergeant Donovan put down a memo in her mind to never aggravate this woman (fighter)any more than necessary. Watson was with Holmes, and she was there to stay.

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Joan came home around eleven, smells of fried fish and beer clinging to her jumper. She shrugged off her coat, and looked at Sherlock with a calculating glint in her eyes. The consulting detective looked up from his laptop, intrigued by the silence. "Your brother is a miracle worker" she finally said.

"Excuse me?" He certainly didn't expect that one.

"I've had the questionable pleasure of listening to drunk police officers explain why they hate you so much."

Wondering how exactly the night in the pub came around this particular topic, Sherlock prodded her to go on with a simple "Oh?"

Joan smirked, edging towards her chair. "And I'm surprised nobody strangled you yet. Mycroft's security team must be working themselves ragged."

"Details, John!" Sherlock exclaimed, frustrated with the lack of information. He couldn't improve without identifying the nature of the problem, right?

The ex-soldier smiled openly and went on explaining how people might be a little sensitive about their personal stories being pulled to the light in front of everyone.

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Philip Anderson was a man of method and rules. His work place was always pristine, and he knew how things worked around him. That's why Holmes's intrusions in his routine were so irritating. The man challenged his findings, his meticulous work, and based on what? On some flimsy observations! After some time, he recognized talent, however. There was a method behind the man's ramblings, they just weren't privy to it.

He was eager to share the experience, but Holmes just discarded him, continuously shooting down his ideas and treating the whole forensic department as a bunch of morons. It was so not on. Instinctively, he joined forces with Sally Donovan, just as frustrated by the freak's attitude as him. And plus, she was hot.

When Dr Watson started to hang around Holmes, Philip didn't really listen to crazy rumors circulating around the Yard. Holmes didn't respond to his, Anderson's, overtures of professional discussion, it was simply not possible that he would actually explain and brainstorm his deductions with some washed-up GP. He was a little revolted by the general change in attitude towards Watson after some violent robbery incident. Apparently, the woman had subdued two criminals and then proceeded to provide first aid to a half-strangled Holmes. He suspected the version currently told in the office was heavily romanced and exaggerated.

Fortunately for him, it wasn't.

He found it out the hard way, on the day Sherlock barged in their lab, Watson and Lestrade in tow, to arrest one of his interns who had supposedly tampered with evidence incriminating his brother in a murder attempt. It seemed ridiculous, and he loudly said so, just before the intern in question grabbed a scalpel and charged.

Anderson screamed, stumbling backwards, but there was not much space in a lab to avoid the blade. Someone tugged him violently by the collar, and he found himself on his arse, looking up at Joan Watson calmly disarming the attacker and twisting his arm behind his back, scalpel clinking innocently on the tiled floor. The pressure on his collar released, and Holmes swept forward, handing out handcuffs to secure the man, with an admonishing "Five seconds" towards the doctor.

"Have you seen the space? I can barely move in here" she answered airily, not even out of breath.

Anderson had to reconsider his opinions on Dr Watson after that. He certainly didn't want to find himself on her wrong side now.

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Joan was peacefully typing an email to Harry, with Sherlock playing an obscure violin piece in the background, when the man suddenly stopped. "Harley?"

"Shut up" the blond replied without looking away from the screen. Behind her, Sherlock huffed in irritation and resumed playing.

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A/N: I was thinking how the whole solar system conversation came to be in the series, and this is what I ended up with. Also, please excuse any errors with the paint experiment. My last chemistry class was about twelve years ago.

And thanks to Quesito2015 for "Harley" ;)