Author's note: This story is set in the future, and is NOT meant to imply that the children of this universe are to be permanently aged to adulthood. This was a plot bunny that came to me and it seemed to fit here. Rest assured, the children of the Mollstrade Universe are still going to be young in the following chapters, whenever or whatever it will be!
Like Father, Like Daughter
Genre: Family, FUTURE FIC
Pairings: Greg and Molly, Sherlock and Sally, John and Alex, Phillip and Jackie, Rosie and Julian, all background
Main characters: Greer, first person perspective, as an adult
Nobody really knows when I actually decided.
Not even Dad, and he knows everything about me. I was a daddy's girl the moment I was born, and to this day, that hasn't changed a whit.
I vaguely remember sleeping on his chest when I was only a wee little girl, all arms and legs and not much else just yet. Gangly and lithe, like Morrie was before he turned into a strapping handsome cat who played hellfire and damnation on every mouse on Baker Street. Those times are more snapshots than anything else, in my memories.
Ah yes… Dad's "Little Love". He still calls me that to this day, even though I've taken after him in TWO ways – I have his eyes, for one. Expressive, dark, shaped just like his, and Mum says absolutely gorgeous, and the reason she was never much good at saying no to me when dad had caved already.
I think she's a bit biased there, but to each her own. She's my beautiful Mum and she's entitled.
But I also took after Dad's height. In his eyes I'll always be his Little Love, but now I'm anything but little - I tower over Mum in spite of looking like her in every other way, and I look at him on level with the eyes he gave me when he calls me that.
Lestrade staring down Lestrade, with those trademark dark expressive Lestrade eyes.
Other than that, I'm the picture of Mum, and I know that's always delighted him.
No, as far as my parents know, I decided the summer before I turned 18 years old. By then, they were more accepting of it, thinking that it was an informed and carefully thought out decision, that I wasn't simply wooed by both Julian's decision to follow his own Dad's footsteps and become a Yarder, and the obvious case of hero worship I held for Dad.
He was everyone's hero, he still is. DI Greg Lestrade, at the time. He's been promoted since then, of course. Detective Chief Inspector Greg Lestrade, we call him. On duty, he's Sir. Off duty, he's Daddy.
But, not just him, of course. We had other heroes equally important growing up. Uncle John, and Uncle Sherlock. Julian's Dad too, and Auntie Sally was our heroine, though she downplayed it. Mum always did inspire us, even Uncle Phillip Anderson was an influence, in his way, though I'm not sure he's even aware of it.
Jule and I hope only to be half the coppers as our Dads and Aunt Sally are, and do half as well as they all did.
Indeed, I decided even before Julian did, when he was seventeen. He was torn. He knew he was going to marry Rosie one day only a few years down the road, and even as a teenager, he always had her in mind before making decisions. Of course, Rosie being Rosie and growing up as she did, she supported Julian becoming a copper even before he decided he wanted to be one. She already knew he was going to follow Kieran's footsteps. She deduced it when they were ten.
I decided, if the honest truth were told, when I was fourteen. I'm not sure why it was then, it was just one of those things that a very young woman does. "Girls have their shit together a lot sooner than boys do," Ciana's dad says.
Where Uncle Phillip got that wisdom, we're not quite sure, but as a forensics scientist, I suppose he has a trained eye for detail. Ciana herself has always had a good head on her shoulders. Uncle Phillip always says she gets that from Jackie. "Lord knows I can be a scatterbrain when I'm not wrist deep in evidence in the lab," he's been known to say. "All the good sense she's got in her pretty little head comes from her mother, you can be sure of that."
At fourteen, I was too young to be an adult, but no longer a child. I drove my brothers off their trolley back then. They hadn't a clue what to do with me.
Scott wanted me to have the freedom to go on a little date now and then, with him escorting us discreetly, of course. It was the only way Dad would allow it at first.
John acquired a small treasure box at a thrift shop, and with a bit of craft paint and some artistic flair he wrote on the lid, "Testicle Collection."
As an afterthought, he added, in small print, "Keep frozen."
I think he intended to have a chat with any boy who fancied me and show him that little box. If they passed the mettle test, they may proceed… with Scott's escort, of course.
Mum blanched at it. Auntie Alex giggled. Auntie Sally grinned and winked.
Dad, Uncle John, and Uncle Sherlock simply nodded in unanimous approval.
Uncle Phillip asked if John might craft one for him, because Ciana was a little beauty and he reckoned having his own would be rather handy in a few years.
Men and their daughters.
Dad tells me not to try to fill his shoes, that I have my own shoes and they fit me perfectly and nobody else. Julian has been a Yarder for a few more years than I have. His dad has taught him well to accept his own strengths and gifts, to be his own copper. Dad has taught me to do that as well.
For now, I'm simply a young Police Constable, still in uniform, still on the beat until I can earn my way through the ranks and start preparing to take those detective exams. Biding my time and learning the ways of those of us who are in the trenches, as Dad says.
Where would the Detectives be without the uniforms? he always says. Someone has to do the grunt work. Never think I'm better than them once I'm in plain clothes, he says. Never forget I was once one too.
The uniforms, Dad says, are the first responders. We have to have the gumption and the steady hand, the clear frame of mind. We are to the Detectives what the paramedics are to the doctors. Never discount our role, he says, just because we aren't plain clothes and carry a fancy title that in truth, doesn't give any higher rank than one without "Detective" in front. He always reminds us of that. Making or breaking a witness, or a victim, can come down to how a uniform responds to them at first contact. Uncle Phillip always reminds us as well, it's the uniforms who are responsible for securing a crime scene and preserving the integrity of the evidence it holds. Many a case, he tells us, was made and solved because the uniformed officers were prompt, cognizant, and diligent in their duties.
Dad, Aunt Sally, and Kieran have always said that Julian and I should appreciate our time in uniform, because after that, if we choose, comes a lot more responsibility, a lot more burden. A lot more sleepless nights and even a part of our souls. The Criminal Investigative Division of the Met demands no less.
Jule is a Sergeant already and I know he's gearing up to start studying for his Detective exams soon. He's going to be a cracker of a detective, our Jule.
We've learned a lot from our small group of adult mentors, but I believe our most important lesson has come from Dad. He has taught us that while it's critical to be observant, like Uncle Sherlock, and remember we deal with real people, like Uncle John and Kieran, dogged, like Aunt Sally, and aware of our surroundings for the sake of the evidence, like Mum and Uncle Phillip, if we lose our own sense of humanity along the way, it will all be for naught.
"Greer," he said to me the day I graduated and earned my warrant card, "the moment you become so cynical that you lose your own humanity, you'd best be thinking about another job, because you're going to be a shit copper."
Mum didn't even frown at him by then. Dad knew what I was made of, and so did she, and like Dad, I tell it like it is.
"A shit copper, yeah?" I said. "Never, Daddy. I've too many heroes who have taught me well to ever be a shit copper."
"Oh, Greer," Mum just said. "Like father, like daughter. I suppose I wouldn't have you any other way."
The way Daddy smiled at her in response, I know he wouldn't either.