Do y'all still say sir and ma'am to your parents? I do, but typing it out looks weird somehow. Friendly tip if you ever go to a military style camp - don't try to be impressive and call the DS sir or ma'am when talking directly to them(like answering a question). Just a very respectful "yes, drill sergeant" is all they want. Trust me. #skillstrainingforemergencyprepardness #iambadatpushups #iwanttobeanarmydr
Sherlock leapt from the taxi. He stopped on the museum steps to pull a few pounds from his pocket. John and Lissie hastened to him.
"The museum's closing, sir," a guard told them, gesturing to darkening halls and security gates.
Sherlock gave a shrug. "I can work as well in the dark."
"We're on a case for Detective Inspector Greg Lestrade," began John, feeling that Sherlock hadn't done the best job explaining, but the guard waved them through, looking bored.
"I know who you are, Mr. Holmes. Just please note that you'll be working in an almost empty museum, we've only two staff members tonight."
"Two staff? For that enormous place," John queried. The guard began explaining things.
Suddenly remembering Lissie, Sherlock turned around. "You'd better go back to the flat."
"What?"
"You don't need to be running about a dark museum after a murderer."
"Sherlock, what do you mean? You let me come on the investigation."
He looked pained. "That was - different. We don't know what's lurking in here."
"Who put you up to this? Ms. Hudson?"
He shook his head, and she rushed on, "Don't be so - fatherly. It doesn't suit you. You're young enough to be my brother, you know."
His eyebrows twitched, and she continued, "Nicole, my roommate - her oldest brother's 18 years older than her."
"This is a subject I do not care to discuss with you."
John coughed delicately, and Sherlock wheeled back to him. "Let's go."
"Sherlock, can't I come?" Lissie felt betrayed as she watched he and John move up the steps. What had happened? Why had he changed his mind so quickly?
She made a final attempt, running up to him. "Please?"
He put his face close to her ear so only she could hear.
"I promised I would take care of you. Do you think letting you get kidnapped by Britain's No. 1 threat looks good on a guardianship application? You nearly losing your memory and breaking your arm? Being tortured?"
"No sir," she began, swallowing.
"Listen. There's a social worker looking into all this, as it's a transfer of guardianship, your grandparents' care to mine. I need to look less like a famous detective and more responsible. Make sense?"
"Yes, sir." She sighed. "You could've been less cold."
"Go now."
"Sherlock?"
"What?" He was exasperated.
"If a NHS worker's coming by the flat, much as this pains me, I think you'd best dispose of the eyeballs in the fridge."
She smiled mischievously, hailed a taxi, and vanished.
Everything changed. For the worse.
The entire first week of spring break was awful, the worst of it centering around a conversation one night.
She began timidly enough, remembering how, in Moriarty's dungeon, he had talked a little about her mother.
"Why didn't you try to find Mum? When Granddad sent you away?"
"I don't think that involves you."
The question has always weighed heavily upon her; the whole nearly 16 years of her life.
"Sherlock. You're a detective. Surely you could have done something-"
"Felicity."
She had hit a nerve, and she felt a twinge of remorse, but she knew her only chance for information was to keep pushing.
"Don't you think I have a right to know?"
He ignored her. Just when she thought he was too deep in though to notice her, he said,
"You're barely two years younger than I was then. What would you do if someone older, with money and power, told you to never return or they'd have you arrested? They vanished, traveling all over Europe. He had men watching me."
"I wouldn't leave my pregnant wife to die alone!"
"Lissie, I swear to God, if I'd known she was pregnant-"
They were both screaming now, Mrs. Hudson peering anxiously from the kitchen.
"How? How would that change anything? Either way, you just let them take her."
He turned on his heel, giving her a cold look that seemed to say he'd lost all respect for her.
She went to her bedroom and cried, knowing she'd been horrid but too upset to apologize.