Neverland8 said: Hi, I'm too lazy to log in, and I have a story prompt, if you don't mind. John and Mary announce that they're expecting another baby. After sulking for weeks, Izzy finally confides in her Uncle Sherlock that she feels she's being replaced.

Slightly tweaked but pretty darn close. Enjoy!


"Isabelle Marie Watson, you come out from under that desk right now!"

"Don't wanna!"

Sherlock sighed and got on his hands and knees, peering through the legs of the chair at his pouting god-daughter. "Really, Isabelle, there's no way I can fit in there with you, and there's no way I'm talking to you through the legs of this chair. You need to come out before Aunt Molly and the twins get home; you don't want to let them see you acting like a baby, do you?"

Something about the way she reacted to his words alerted him as to the nature of her current upset; Sherlock gently pushed the chair aside and lay flat on the floor, chin resting on his hands as he gazed thoughtfully at his god-daughter. Her blue eyes were watery and sad, her golden curls a tangled mess, and her cheeks were red. There were also the telltale signs of thumbsucking, a habit the almost-four-year-old reverted to only in moments of severe stress. "Tell me about it, Izzy," Sherlock said softly, keeping his voice low and soothing but not at all condescending.

She looked at him, looked away, hugged her knees to her chest, and finally burst into a heartbroken wail. "Mummy an' Dada are havin' anover baby an' they won't want me anymore!"

Sherlock mentally nodded; yep, exactly as he'd feared. With a sigh he rolled over and held his arms out; Izzy wasted no time in clambering from beneath the desk and hurling herself into his embrace, sobbing loudly.

With a bit of shuffling and some grunting on his part - Izzy was a solid little girl - Sherlock maneuvered the two of them so that she was curled on his lap and he was braced against the side of the desk with his legs crossed beneath him. He let her cry for a few minutes, stroking a soothing hand down the back of her neck and waiting for the tears to recede a bit before finally speaking to her again.

"When Scarlett and Edmund were born, you tried to hide them in a cupboard," he said with a reminiscent chuckle.

Izzy gazed at him, wide-eyed. "I did?"

Sherlock nodded. "Oh yes, you did. You couldn't wait for 'your babies' to be born, and when they got here, you were so afraid they would take up all our time that you wanted nothing more than for them to be gone."

Izzy frowned. "I was naughty," she said solemnly. "Bad Izzy."

Sherlock dropped a reassuring kiss on her head. "No, you were just a bit afraid, like you are now. But you know that Aunt Molly and I love you just as much as we do Scarlett and Edmund, right?"

Izzy nodded so hard that some of the tears that had been coating her cheeks went flying. "An I love them," she replied confidentally. "Me an' Eddie's gunna get married when we're bigger."

Sherlock had his doubts about that, but wisely kept them to himself; he was trying to calm his god-daughter down, after all, not get her more upset about something that was nothing more than a childish fancy she'd grow out of soon enough. "Er, yes," was all he said. "But the point is, you love them, and we love you; and Aunt Molly and I managed to love two babies at the same time, so why do you think your Mum and Dad won't be able to do the same?"

"Dada's not as smart as you, Unca Lock," Izzy replied doubtfully. "What if he forgets he has a big girl when the baby gets here?"

"Don't worry, your mum would never let that happen," Sherlock said, his words a promise that Izzy appeared to take to heart; after all, she knew who the true heart of her family was...and which parent was the smarter of the pair.

His smug mental digs at his best friend were interrupted by the sound of the door opening; childish laughter met their ears, and the sound of Molly rather breathlessly admonishing the twins not to run. Her previous heartache forgotten, Izzy jumped to her feet to meet them, leaving Sherlock to dust himself off and stand up as well, although with quite a bit less gusto. He greeted his wife with a kiss and a hurried explanation, then proceeded to ensure that his three-year-old son and daughter - and their 'cousin' - had an excellent afternoon before John and Mary came to fetch their daughter.