Author's Note: What on earth happened to this update? I was only going to write a short contribution to the story, and suddenly I 2,400 words! Ah, well. I suppose it makes up for my very slow updating. Maybe.

Reviews are very, very welcome!

xxRegretteRienxx

He was delivered to Russell Square with no further conversation, not that it was needed; the tightness of Valerie's lips and her refusal to make eye contact spoke volumes.

Sherlock barely restrained himself from slamming the door as he got out of the car, then instantly regretted his decision. He strode away, hands buried in his pockets. He felt…wrong. Displaced. Slamming something, smashing something would have made him feel better. Made him feel something. Tangible. He yearned for it.

"What'll it be?" the ragged man asked, crouched over his stash. Sherlock's feet hadn't failed him: they'd brought him to exactly the right place.

"Make me feel." he ordered, fishing the cash from his pocket and selecting notes to toss onto the floor for the dealer. The man's eyes sparked.

"Feel bad or feel good?" he pressed, flicking through his collection of baggies with one hand, and scooping up the money hungrily with the other.

"Alive." Sherlock answered, and held his hand out impatiently.

"Got just the thing for you, mate." He was told, and a powder-filled sachet finally deposited in his waiting palm.

Sherlock examined his prize. The crystals seemed to sparkle at him despite the gloom of the shabby house. Cocaine once more; the newly-familiar friend. He confirmed his assessment curtly with the dealer, before snatching up some of the gear scattered about the floor and, seating himself, followed the procedure he'd observed being carried out by others. Mix, boil, collect, and send home.

He'd never done it before, and a tremor ran through his fingers at the momentary fear that he would miss the vein, do it wrong, but then the apathy, the dark shawl reminded him. He didn't care if he made a mistake. Either conclusion would be preferable to his current life situation.

The needle pierced his skin.

The next moment he drew breath, it seemed, he had found his way back to the central parkland of Russell Square, a chilly breeze bringing the branches and leaves to life. He shook his head, staggering a couple of steps as he attempted to clear his thoughts, to tentatively prod at his memories and remind himself how he'd gotten there; but the information was not forthcoming.

He toyed with the still-bloated packet his fingers found in his jeans. The dull craving returned, and he darted his attention about the square, lest there be an audience. Seeing none, he wet his lips and began to pry the sachet from his tight-fitting attire.

A car drew in near to him, and he shoved the plastic away from his grasp abruptly, relaxing his pose and swiveling to observe the vehicle. A rather nondescript, navy blue BMW sedan, model from two, or was it three? years ago, but it had had to be serviced last winter – the owner hadn't taken care to protect it from the cold. Perhaps he was lazy, perhaps ill-educated, perhaps too busy to monitor the levels of antifreeze stored in the tank.

The engine idled, and after a short moment, the window closest to Sherlock was wound down, and an elbow – male, approaching middle age, good income, married for some years, but not happily, if the dullness of the wedding ring's metal was anything to go by – was propped on the opening.

Sherlock was certain of the wedding ring's accuracy, since a man who was attentive to his looks enough to wear Gucci as a work suit, as well as to adorn said suit with a pair of elegant, well-cared for cufflinks was more likely to also have his jewelry tended to than not.

He crouched down to bring himself level to whoever was seated in the car.

"Perhaps you've heard," he began, keeping his eyes peeled for any passing patrol. "I am very good at figuring out what people want. Yes, it's true, and yes, I – " He broke off his introductory spiel.

The man in the car cleared his throat awkwardly, leaning his body away from Sherlock in an unconscious signal of embarrassment. "Erm – I wasn't – " he protested, and Sherlock babbled an apology over the top of the other man's words.

"Sorry – so sorry – I saw your – I deduced – " his bumbling was embarrassing, and he closed his eyes, clenched his fists to centre himself.

Obviously the inspector had been at some formalised work function this evening, hence the personal car, brand-name suit – probably the only one he owned, cufflinks…His observation had been incomplete, not incorrect. Get all the facts before making a deduction, he reminded himself, focusing, pushing away the final aftereffects of the cocaine he'd taken.

A deep breath later, and he was able to manage: "Down to the station, Inspector Lestrade?"

"Jesus, Sherlock." The inspector said shakily, still not quite over being propositioned. This really wasn't his area, Sherlock noted. The inspector was, unlike many officers Sherlock had encountered, obviously a very clean-cut citizen. Almost painfully so.

"Look – I'm not here to pick you up." Lestrade explained, switching the engine off and raising his hands placatingly. "Or take you to the station, for that matter. I'm homicide, ok? So unless you're fucking someone to death, what you do to scrape a few dollars in doesn't concern me. Well it does, but not – I just wanted to thank you for your help on my – the – kidnapping case. I got my team to look into your hunches, and you were bloody spot-on with all of them! It's fantastic, I don't know how you managed it!" Lestrade gestured emphatically, conveying his astonished disbelief.

Sherlock nodded silently along with the expected acknowledgement of his work being correct, only muttering: "Not a hunch," when Lestrade uttered the unscientific word. He was starting to get uncomfortable remaining crouched now that it had been determined that he wasn't getting a client, and his cravings hadn't quite gone away. He wondered whether a cigarette would take the edge off.

"Can you tell me how on earth you figured it out, though? I have to know." Lestrade asked, then, jolting Sherlock out of his contemplative reverie. He narrowed his eyes at the inspector, in order to fine-tune his analysis, to better isolate what it was that nagged at him.

"You haven't solved the case yet." he concluded, causing Lestrade to slump forward in exasperation.

"No," the officer admitted. "We keep chasing these really promising leads up, but we can only get so far, and then we hit this wall – we just can't get around the bastard. The team hasn't been able to figure out whether it's one person, two people, a gang of kidnappers…" The frustration was evident in his voice. His eyes begged Sherlock. "I was hoping you might've been able to figure out something more. Point us in the right direction."

Sherlock shook his head. He had more important things to deal with than thinking about ridiculous kidnapping-murder cases that had nothing to do with him. Even as he thought it, the craving flared up in the pit of his stomach.

"I've been…busy." he stated. "And I don't have the resources that the Met has."

"I don't doubt it," Lestrade agreed. "Job like yours, you gotta be on your – um – well, you gotta have your wits about you to get by." Sherlock examined Lestrade's expression carefully. There was something the officer wasn't telling him. "Anyway. I can get you the resources, not a problem. Let you look at some of the files. I shouldn't, but – we'll disregard that for the moment. Do you want to – " Lestrade stopped himself, reconsidered. "No, probably best not. Will you be here in about an hour's time? I'll go and get some of the info from this case and bring it back."

Sherlock stood, stretching his cramped muscles. "An hour." he nodded. "I can do that. But bring all of it. All of the information." he commanded, suddenly testing the bounds. "If you really want me to be of any use to your investigation, that is."

Lestrade's expression again didn't give anything away. "You're here in an hour, we'll see how we go." They shook hands on it, though Sherlock was inwardly laughing his head off at Lestrade's proprietary manner, then the officer drove away, leaving Sherlock to his own devices for an hour. Sherlock had a very specific course of action in mind for that time, of course, and rapidly made his way into a clump of bushes, sitting himself at the base of one so the branches spread out around him protectively.

He wanted to inject the cocaine again; the first time had been wonderful, marvelous, beautiful beyond description, but he didn't have any of the gear on him, he'd left it at the dealer's. He made a promise to himself to source the items needed – perhaps he could drop by the hospital again? But the thought of the hospital, with its prodding and poking and checking for STIs, was not something Sherlock wanted to dwell on at the moment. He would have to make do for now, and moistened his finger, dipping it into the crystals and licking them off, like an illicit sherbet fountain. The taste was rubbish, and his tongue was slightly numbed by the procedure. He wondered whether he should just rub it onto his gums. Better than rendering his tongue useless, he justified.

This method was far more gradual than the injection, of course, and Sherlock thought for a moment that the chemicals weren't working at all, but after a few seconds of compulsively smacking his lips and sucking at his gums, attempting to ensure he had properly consumed all of the granules, a lower version of the buzz he sought made itself known to him. He smiled grimly at the sensation, closed his eyes to focus his mind on it better, wondered whether he could make it increase just by thinking about it, lazily reapplied the crystals to his finger, and took another dose.

He sat there some time, as it turned out, inattentively re-administering doses and eventually it became apparent that his pulse was increasing. Soon he could feel his heart thudding in his chest, twitches of his veins at his jugular, wrists, and groin. His blood was rushing through his body, flooding through; ignited by the glittering chemicals he'd imbibed.

The park around him was coming to life to his senses, and for a moment he was overcome by a deafening, roaring noise, until a somehow still-calm part of his brain told him it was nothing; the normal susurrus of the leaves gently disturbed by the wind. Chirps and squawks and hoots and grunts were also now audible, and when Sherlock finally opened his eyes (the moment when he'd shut them remaining a mystery), he could actually see the masses of birds, squirrels and other small rodents, the various lizards who were venturing out in the dead of night, the chattering insects nervously darting about together as they attempted to obtain food, rather than become food. The necessary, incessant bloodlust of nature overwhelmed Sherlock all at once, and he closed his eyes once more, fumbling the small sachet of crystalline powder in his pocket, taking just a little bit more, just enough to make all this manageable, just…

He snapped to attention. He'd been languorously stretched out across the grass for…quite a few minutes now, hard to tell exactly – which was strange. Wasn't he normally very…what was the word? He normally noticed a lot of things. But this was a different situation. He didn't know what the time was, how long he'd been there, and …what had happened to get his attention? The thing that had happened repeated itself, reminding him. Two male voices, shouting at one another, enraged. Lestrade, Sherlock's mind told him. Tommy, it offered up, and he was on his feet.

There was an attack taking place, something he could – should – intervene in, and bring to a halt, save a life. Wait. But whose life was he saving? He wondered, having broken through the surrounding bushes. He scanned the parklands to find the whereabouts of the altercation. Was it his own life? Was he somewhere here in the park, confronting someone, or being confronted? Had he been beaten up? He did a cursory check of his general wellbeing. Legs, fine. Arms, fine. No real aches or pains, they were all distant, not relevant, he assessed. Had he been hit in the face, perhaps? Was he blind? Oh god – he was blind! He panicked, moaning in distress at being disabled in such a way, and waving a hand in front of his eyes desperately.

Suddenly, he realised he could see his hand – it wasn't a problem of him not seeing, it was a problem of him seeing too much, seeing everything. His brain couldn't make sense of it! He sighed in relief at having figured it out, clasping a hand to his chest as he took deep, steadying breaths. Shit. He started once again. That was it – he was having a heart attack! His heart was racing! Sherlock began searching the park again, running now from place to place. He had to find himself before his heart gave out and he died! Fuck, oh fuck – would no-one call him an ambulance? Did no-one care?

One of the people milling about the park stepped into Sherlock's path. Reflexes down, he ran smack into them before noticing they were there. Arms firmly wrapped around him, holding him still, and when a hand began stroking his back, he relaxed at the soothing touch.

"That's it, shh." A deep voice reassured him. It was so calming, so confident, that Sherlock actually found himself leaning in closer even when the wandering hand descended and grasped his rear firmly, possessively. This person emanated stability. He kept his head down, still attempting to focus his mind, and found himself compliantly following the gentle prompts to walk. It was ok, he told himself. He was being looked after. He sat down where he was encouraged to, but until the door closed behind him, hadn't recognised that he was in a car. That wasn't right, he thought, searching in a panic for clues as to where he was, whose car this – the adjacent door swung open, allowing the other passenger to climb in.

The shock, the stress, overtook Sherlock's heart, stopping it cold.