NOTE: Edited, July 2021

The Final Problem - Final Act

The first thing you notice when you apparate is the sound. The noises of the place where you apparate reach you before your feet have touched the ground or your eyes have seen your surroundings, even if it is only for a few split seconds. When Harry and Hermione landed at Sherrinford, what greeted them was a blaring alarm. The two popped up just behind the desk, narrowly missing the shovelling chair. Without a word, the two set off. Hermione headed for the window while Harry checked on the two guards who laid motionless on the other side of the door. On the balcony there was a woman tied to a chair, her head hanging over her chest. There was a hole in the window the size of a bullet, and a pool of blood under the chair. From the looks of it, the bullet had gone through the woman's forehead.

'Hermione,' called Harry. She looked across the room and saw him standing in front of the TV. The feed showed Mycroft in one of the cells, flat on his back, still. At the bottom of the screen, red digital numbers preceded the date and time. Harry checked his wristwatch. 'It's a live feed. How do we know where he is?'

Hermione sat on the chair. On the computer, the security program was open, showing dozens of different rooms. Harry approached her until he was also looking at the monitor over her shoulder. He pointed at one of the images, of a room with a man sitting on the floor, slumped against a plexiglass wall, and Hermione brought it forward.

'That's a lot of blood,' said Harry.

There's no way he is alive, thought Hermione. Of everyone they had seen so far, none of them had survived Eurus Holmes' wrath. She tried not to think about Mycroft, Sherlock or John, and what might have happened to them. She zoomed into the side of the picture. 'This room leads somewhere, see that gap?'

'Yes, hold on, this one-' Harry tapped on the screen on top of the room he was referring to.'-has an entry and an exit. It looks like a maze.'

Hermione shook her head. 'A test. Like lab rats.'

'How are we going to know where to go?'

'We are going to have to improvise. Wherever Eurus was, has to have the highest security, so that's where we go.' Hermione rose to her feet, and a wave of nausea invaded her. She braced herself on the table, and the gun faltered in her grip. Harry quickly took her by the arm.

'Are you alright?' Hermione nodded. She tried to calm her urge to throw up because really, they did not have time for this.

'We need a card,' she said, with a raspy voice. 'Everything will be closed. And put your wand away, it's not going to be of much use out of this office.'

Harry shot her one last quizzical glance before pulling out the gun Sirius had given him and headed for the door. Harry had always had an excellent aim, and although judging by the way he held the gun it wasn't the first time he'd handled one, it was obvious that he was much more comfortable with a wand. Hermione just hoped they didn't have to use them. She followed Harry, who had bent down to rummage through the clothes of the two dead guards, and from between the folds, he retrieved a blue card. From there, they worked as a seamless unit: one stalked the corridor ahead, the other followed, both with the weapons ready and the sense alert. They walked fast to the first flight of stairs, and down to the next level into a long hallway. Harry stopped and raised his arm to stop Hermione from moving any further. A few meters away, a prisoner was crunched over a guard. Hermione looked at Harry, and he shrugged. They couldn't go back, and this was the only way. They were going to have to reduce him. Hermione walked into the corridor, with Harry trailing behind. The prisoner raised his head. From his bloody red mouth hung a gnawed thumb. She heard Harry gasp for air, and she felt the bile rise in her throat. The cannibal straightened up and charged at them, but Hermione was ready and fired twice without hesitation. One gunshot pierced the man's shoulder, the other shattered his nose, went through his skull and into the wall behind him. The man fell to the ground like he was made of concrete. Harry said nothing but made a noise of appreciation.

They stepped over the corpses and after several rooms, they finally reached a lift. Hermione swiped the card and they both went in. The doors closed and the lift started moving down, until it opened into a large black hallway, with rounded columns flanking the sides and finishing in a small hall, with a circular door.

'Do you feel it?' asked Harry, breathless.

'The magic quenching is much stronger here. This must be it.'

As they got closer to the door, they saw in the distance a man slumped over the keyboard in what Hermione thought must have been the checkpoint. Blood dripped from the edge of the table. Harry took Hermione's hand, and she was secretly grateful. Sensing someone else's magic, in the middle of the slaughter and with all the quenching surrounding them, made her feel a bit more protected.

In that door there was no card reader. Harry snagged the dead guard by the collar and pushed it off the chair. Hermione looked at the computer. A single empty bar sat in the middle of the screen, waiting for a release code. She reached down and took the wallet out of the guard's pocket. From all the papers and cards inside it, a bright pink sticky note stood out, with a long string of numbers, letters and symbols written with black ink. Complexity doesn't mean security if you can't remember it. She typed it into the bar and pressed enter. The door opened without noise, and Harry slipped into the next room, and let out an exasperated noise.

'Brilliant.' Hermione arrived at his side. Harry stared at the see-through dividing wall. 'I'm assuming this is bulletproof.'

Hermione was not listening. She came closer to the sign warning anyone against getting near it. 'It's a magic trick,' she muttered. Reaching with her hand, her arms went through the line on the floor delimiting the nonexistent wall. She took a step forward, and another, and then she was inside what had been Eurus' containing cell. Not wanting to waste more time, Hermione walked to the next room with Harry following her.

'Oh, God!' Hermione covered her mouth. The sight of the Governor on the screen had been disturbing, but seeing it in the flesh, with blood and brain splattered around him, was unbearable. Harry shielded her and made her look away, pulling her towards the next room. They passed several cells without paying attention to what was inside until they found Mycroft. While Harry stayed at the entrance and kept watch, Hermione rushed to him. He had a small wound at the back of his head, which had bled profusely, but his breathing and pulse were steady.

'How's he?' asked Harry.

'Alive. Help me, we need to go back.'

The clock in Alicia's office struck another hour, and Hermione had lost count of how many they had spent playing Eurus' psychotic game. Tiredness was setting in her bones, but she could not rest, as Harry had suggested. Hermione doubted she could close her eyes without seeing the number of corpses, the death and destruction Eurus had left in her wake. Instead, she had been pacing around the room since Sirius and Alicia had taken Mycroft to the on-site medical facility. Checking the time that had been close to half an hour ago. Harry was perched at the edge of the desk, twirling his hand between his fingers. His face surely mirrored her own, grey and sunken, with specks of blood that had transferred while carrying Mycroft. Hermione inspected her own hands. The blood she had not been able to clean was under her nails, and she wondered whose blood it was.

Her pacing stopped when she heard Sirius' voice outside. Harry stood up next to her and put a comforting hand on her shoulder. The door opened, and Sirius gave way to Lady Smallwood.

'How's he?' asked Hermione. 'Has he said anything?'

Sirius made a gesture with his hand for Hermione to slow down on her questioning. 'He's not awake. I suggested we enervate him, but the doctor and a healer suggested it might not be the best for him.'

Hermione turned to Alicia. 'What do we do? There's no trace of Eurus in Sherrinford, or Sherlock or John. How do we find them?'

'I suggest we calm down and think,' said Sirius. He took Hermione and sat her down. 'What's the one mistake people always make when thinking about Mycroft and Sherlock?'

Hermione did not even have to think about it. 'They think they are heartless machines.'

'Exactly. Yet, they are the ones ruled by their emotions the most. Why would Eurus be different?'

'What are you suggesting?' asked Lady Smallwood.

'That she has taken them to a place relevant for them. For her. And for Sherlock, especially. She would have taken Mycroft too if he were as important.' Sirius turned to Alicia. 'Their old home, perhaps? The one she burnt down.'

'We will need to go down to the vaults. I just know the story, not the location... Not even the name.' Alicia purses her lips. 'But they have biometric security. I can get you as far as the vaults, but the safe needs Mycroft's fingerprint.

'Just when I thought I wasn't going to be useful anymore,' said Harry. Hermione, do you happen to know if Mycroft has a comb in his office?'

The scanner by the entrance of the vaults, at chest level, recognised Alicia's iris as soon as she looked into the light. Behind the iron doors, the dimly illuminated room extended beyond what they could see. Long rows of metal shelves at both sides of a central aisle left spaces for equally sturdy tables and chairs. Alicia led them along the shelves without a pause, each one of her steps punctuated with an overhead light turning on as they advanced. At some point, the shelves stopped and were replaced by rooms, with nothing to identify them but arbitrary numbers engraved in silver plaques. Alicia stopped in front of a door. Under the handle, a glass surface of the size of a domino piece glinted, polished and unmarred.

'The fingerprint goes both ways. We need it to get in, and we'll need it to get out. Standard procedure. So we need to be quick. One hour, you said?' she asked Harry. He nodded and took a cigarette tin out of the inner pocket of his jacket. Inside, there were six small vials: a couple of antidotes, blood replenishing potion, veritaserum, ditanny, and the one Harry was taking out, polyjuice. It looked nothing like the one Hermione had brewed when she was twelve. This one had been strained and distilled, the lumps had been removed, and the result was a smooth, silver liquid. The Auror corps had better means than a student, that was obvious. Harry removed the cork and added a few strands of dark hair. The potion changed its colour to maroon. Sirius, who had changed into a dark robe in preparation, sniffed it.

'What does Mycroft smell like?' wondered Lady Smallwood.

'Expensive aftershave and superiority. Bottoms up.' He smiled before putting the bottle to his lips and swallowed the contents. Moments later, Sirius' lean body started to change. His limbs stretched and grew, his stomach rounded, straining against the knot of the belt. The hair receded and straightened, and under the skin of his face, it was like snakes were trying to find their way out. And then Mycroft was staring back at them.

'Let's do this,' said Sirius with Mycroft's voice, and he put his left thumb on the screen, and the door opened a smidge. He pushed it, and the rest went in. The walls were covered in shelves with different black boxes, all of them unmarked.

'I hate Mycroft's secrets,' complained Sirius. 'Let's not waste our time. Each one takes a box.'

'Sherlock?'

His sister had killed his dog. His sister had locked him there, surrounded by old photos of his and Mycroft's. His sister had kidnapped John and put him in the same place she had put Redbeard. Think, think, think!

'I'm in a well. That's where I am; I'm in the bottom of a well.'

Sherlock frowned.'Why would there be a well in Sherrinford?' He raised his lantern. In between the photographs, he could see where two panels of the wall met. There was a small gap between them. His eyes followed the gap where it met the floor. There, there was also a hole. 'Why is there a draught? Walls don't contract after you've painted them. Not real ones.'

He left the lantern by his feet and slammed his hands hard against the wall. The wall trembled. He pushed again, and the entire wall fell outwards and to the ground outside. In front of him, a very familiar house stood proud, even burnt and abandoned.

'I'm home.'

The first minutes of the search had been productive. Alicia had found what seemed to be the first box chronologically. There, an old marriage announcement for Margaret Scott and Siger Holmes placed the ceremony on the grounds of Musgrave Hall. But after that, finding relevant documentation had been complicated. Harry was checking the clock, making sure they stayed within the hour, but their time was running low. Mycroft's voice broke the rustle of pages.

'I found something! Musgrave Hall. The story's not about a fire, though.'

Hermione, Harry and Alicia gathered around Sirius, who was holding several old clippings from a local newspaper. On the front page, there was the picture of a small child no older than six, wearing a plaid shirt and a smile with some teeth missing.

'"Have you seen this child? Victor Trevor disappeared last week when playing in the woods. Any information, please refer to the local authorities." Look, on the map, there is Musgrave Hall.' He pointed to the crudely drawn map of the areas covered by the search party.

'That doesn't say much about where it is,' said Hermione. 'Maybe we can triangulate. Take a bunch of names. We can then narrow the search with a map.' Alicia started reciting out loud villages and places she was finding in the newspapers Sirius had, waiting for Harry to write everything down.

Meanwhile, Hermione opened the next box. It was full of pictures. The photo on top was Sherlock dressed like a pirate, with a girl who must have been Eurus and behind them, a stately home that must be Musgrave Hall. In the next one, the same child from the news was standing beside them.

'The Holmes knew the missing kid.'

'Missing children are sadly a common occurrence in small villages,' said Alicia.

Hermione thought she could probably apparate in the grounds if a picture gave her enough visual information. She continued browsing them. All the photos were dated at the back of each and had different locations, and seasons, and people, all with Mrs Holmes elegant handwriting. After the first hundred, she realised something was missing.

'Where's the dog?'

'What?' Sirius looked at the pictures in her hand.

'Redbeard, the dog. It's not in any of these pictures, and I'd imagined that...' Hermione's voice broke. In the one she had on her hand, Sherlock and Victor were dressed as pirates, each carrying a wooden sword. When she turned it, she read the inscription. 'Yellowbeard and Redbeard, summer 1985'. She felt her blood turning to ice in her veins. Eurus, what did you do? What are you going to do?

'Hermione? What is it?' Alicia asked.

'There was never a dog.' Hermione passed the photo to Lady Smallwood. 'Eurus did not kill a dog.'

'Sherlock? There's something you need to know. Sherlock?'

Sherlock lowered his hands. In front of him, his sister was taunting him, about a problem he could not solve, about the pet he could not save, about the friend he was not going to be able to stop from drowning. John's voice sounded anguished, tortured.

'The bones I found.'

'Yes? They're dog bones. That's Redbeard.'

'Mycroft's has been lying to you, to both of us. Sherlock, they're not dogs' bones.'

'Eurus killed a boy? How could that happen?' asked Sirius.

'Killed, left to die... Your pick,' answered Hermione. She took the box and dumped its contents on the table. She started choosing those with a clear view of the house, or the grounds. 'It makes sense now. Eurus killed Sherlock's best friend, and Mycroft hid it all and locked her away. Now, she was the one leaving Mycrfot locked if it weren't for us, and she's going to kill Sherlock's best friend again. Maybe in the same place, she did it the first time.'

'But he was never found, Hermione.'

'I know, Alicia! I don't know why he wasn't found. But Eurus was four, she couldn't have gone far.'

'It doesn't matter,' said Sirius. 'We just need to know where Musgrave is, so we can get them safely back. And Alicia, if what Hermione says is remotely close to the truth, we are going to need to prepare a dispositive. And have doctors on call. Let's go up and look for the place."

Hermione discretely pocketed a picture of Musgrave on a sunny day, where every brick and flower could be seen. It was made from a distance. That should provide her with enough cover to not be seen by Eurus.

'Victor,' whispered Sherlock, his voice shaking. 'Victor Trevor.'

He remembered. Memories kept coming. They were on the beach, playing. Eurus was with them, but never playing with them.

'We played pirates. I was Yellowbeard, and he was-' Sherlock's eyes filled with tears. Victor's face was now crystal clear in his mind. '-he was Redbeard.'

'You were inseparable. But I wanted to play too.'

'I need the loo. Be back in a second.'

Hermione left the strategy room and turned right instead of left and when she thought she was far away enough, sprinted to the apparition point. After entering, she barred the door. Outside, someone was trying to enter the room.

'Hermione!' It was Harry. Even after all this time, he still knew her. Several pairs of feet could be heard running in the distance. 'You can't go alone.'

Harry's cries died out as her body moved from one place to the other. The cold air nipped at her skin. She wasn't dressed for nighttime in the countryside. From where she was, she could see some lights inside the house, and one structure built in front of the house. At her back, the woods started. When she was sure the trees would hide part of the light, she took her wand out.

'Lumos.'

Hermione had no direction and no way of knowing where John was. She did not know how Victor had died. Eurus might have pushed him over a hill, bludgeoned with a rock, asphyxiated... She looked back at the house. Sherlock and Eurus were there probably, but she thought of the two men, the doctor was the one in most immediate danger. The hairs at the back of her neck stood up. There was someone with her. With her free hand, she took her gun and waited. Behind the bushes, a small shadow hid.

'Hello? John?'

A silhouette shone under the moon. Then she saw the shadow was not behind the bush but inside it, mingled with the branches in a way a solid object could not.

'Victor?' The ghost seemed to nod. Her heart twisted inside her chest, and she fought the impulse of reaching for her stomach. 'Hello, darling. I'm a friend of Yellowbeard, you know him, right?' The boy came out and smiled, bobbing his head up and down. He was wearing a thick plaid jacket, and his hair was plastered against his skull. 'I need your help, I need to know where you are, can you help me?' The ghost nodded again. Hermione went to him. Victor tried to hold her hand, and when he could not do it, he started walking, crestfallen. They walked for at least ten minutes. As they got closer, she could hear John's cries amplified by the rock walls. Hidden behind some overgrown trees, there was the outline of a well. Hermione ran, yelling John's name. She peered over the edge. Water had entered the well and covered John up to his chin.

'Hermione? Oh, God, Hermione.'

'Hold on,' said Hermione. She flipped her wand and a nearby branch transformed into a rope. She securely tied it around a tree and threw it into the well.

'I'm shackled,' said John. Hermione pointed somewhere around John's feet and threw a series of spells, aiming to open the locks. John grasped the rope and started climbing. She then looked back, but Victor had left. She barely had time to think, as John reached the top and hugged her, cold and wet and terrified as he was.

In the distance, police sirens, and helicopters broke the silence. Someone was running towards them, and Hermione retook her gun. Then she heard Sherlock's voice calling at John before he appeared at the other side of the clear.

Epilogue: Our Baker Street Boys

Hermione sat in an old outside settee at the back of the Holmes' country house. The sun was shining high, warming her skin. She closed the thick knitted cardigan around her and contemplated her surroundings. Apart from the noise coming from inside the house, the place was quiet, serene. So similar, yet so different, to Musgrave Hall. Here the stones and the walls oozed life and happiness. It was Rosie's birthday, after all. They owe it to her to give her as much happiness as they could.

Hermione opened her notebook over her knees and started writing.

My dearest Mary,

I don't know why I'm writing to you, knowing that you'd never read this. Maybe because it feels like when we shared secrets, and we knew they were safe with each other. Maybe, I miss you more every day, and not less. Maybe, I'm feeling guilty Rosie is going to spend her first birthday surrounded by her godmothers, but not you.

But it is what it is.

Today, I've found myself remembering you without wanting to cry my eyes out but wishing with every fibre of my being for you to be here, just for a moment. Margaret and Siger have decided to spoil Rosie rotten, and they have made a huge deal out of it. The house is full of purple because she is her mother's daughter, and she loves anything remotely close to mauve. And unicorns. She likes all the classics.

Life has changed. Massively, dramatically, forever. In a lot of aspects, it has evolved. In some others, like the space you left behind, it has stopped. Sometimes we take three steps forwards; sometimes, we fall down the rabbit hole. I guess it's normal. We've all got trauma to last us several lifetimes. Some days I am just amazed by the fact that we are all alive.

Not all. You're not.

Life is not the same without you. It's worse; it will always be worse. I can't help but feel that nothing of what happened these last months would have happened with you here. You were always the perceptive one.

We'd be living a lie, though. When I was younger, I wanted to know everything. Now I'm having problems deciding whether or not ignorance is a blessing. We've added you and Eurus to the set of scars we collectively share. For better or for worse, that keeps us together.

You'd be surprised to know John is taking fewer cases these days and has some routine. He still follows Sherlock into whatever stupid plan he concocts, but with less adrenaline-seeking intentions and more sense of justice. His whole life revolves around Rosie. He's found a new therapist who is not rubbish and not a psychopath. He says he'll never be whole, and I'm inclined to agree. But he's doing better.

Sherlock is recovering—without drugs this time. He's a bit less the Sherlock everyone knew and a bit more the Sherlock we saw and loved. He's changed, but he hasn't. He was robbed of so much he can't really change who he is, but he's getting to know himself again. It's beautiful. He's still not getting dressed for less than a four, but now he's polite about it.

Eurus is still a sore subject. Sherlock visits, as does Mycroft. No matter what anyone says, their ability to love sometimes takes my breath away. There's nothing we can do to fix their heartbreak. Our job is to support and protect. Sherlock has stopped wondering what-ifs, and Mycroft has started forgiving Rudy and himself. Maybe that's the best we can aim for.

Life is changing, and it will never be like any other. You said it once, we are not civilians. We are who we are. We are those things and experiences and people who have shaped us. Our lives would forever be entangled with the unimaginable, with the weird and dangerous. That's the life we chose, and it's the kind of decision you apparently can't take back. But we can mitigate its effects. And I think we've finally understood; we're not alone. We are an unconventional family, but a family, after all—a family with missing pieces but new pieces every day.

Our Baker Street boys will never be safe, Mary. You and I, we never were. But maybe now we have a chance to be happy, whatever form happiness takes. And for people like ourselves, it should be enough.

Until we see each other again.

Love,

Hermione

Hermione closed the notebook as she heard a door opening. Sherlock leaned against the frame, two mugs of his mother's ginger tea in his hands, and smiled.

All was well.

THE END

That's it, this is the end! I am going to leave to your imagination what happened with Hermione and Sherlock, the baby, Harry and everyone else. The end is open because the characters would take a different avenue for each one of us, and that's beautiful.

Funny story: Until season 4 aired, I never knew where this fic was going. And although there are a lot of things in season 4 I don't like, it gave me direction. As soon as I heard the sentence "you look funny frown up" I knew Eurus was going to be a seer, and that was going to be the link I had been missing between Mycroft and Sirius.

I am onto a new adventure after this fic: I am starting Rebellion, what I hope would be a canon-compliant account of the event leading to Robert's rebellion in A song of ice and fire. It's going to be very political (and to be honest, I do it because I want to write Joanna Lannister's POV). Also, I will try and translate this pic to Spanish, my mother tonge. And hopefully, an original book of writings will be out during 2020, so a lot of exciting things!

We will read each other soon!

And please, stay safe, do not go out if not necessary, wash your hands and take care of each other!