Author's note: The second chapter! Much more interesting than the first. You may recognise some dialogue from the episode, just with a few alterations. I'm not going to do these note things on every chapter because that would just get annoying and tedious. They'll probably just be on a few of them.
Again, I only take ownership of Selena and Dave. Go ahead and start reading and let me know what you think.
A growling sound from within her stomach woke Selena from her sleep. She had been dreaming of the time when she and her best friend from her school days were on a beach they regularly visited during their childhood. It felt like a completely normal dream at first, both of them playing around and having a giggle in the waves, except Selena's strange mind managed to somehow include an inflatable chair and a pot of yoghurt in the dream. After a good twenty years of putting up with weird stuff happening in her dreams, it became as normal as falling asleep itself. The yoghurt she could understand, as she did feel very hungry, but the inflatable chair? Nope, can't quite put my finger on that one, she thought, looking back over the subconscious events, and I don't even like yoghurt that much.
The noise her stomach made must have been louder than she first anticipated, as she noticed the muscles in Sherlock's face form a subtle frown like something distracted him from "thinking". He was lying in more or less the same position except he clutched the arm with the nicotine patches on with his other hand. Selena looked at her watch again and gave a despairing sigh, far too dramatic for her liking, realising that she had only been asleep for half an hour. This day is going so slowly!
Selena shifted in the chair, burying her face in a pleasantly squishy cushion. From the bottom of the staircase, she caught the sound of the front door opening and closing. Selena assumed it was Mrs Hudson either going out or coming back in, since she wasn't aware of anyone else in the house. Sherlock gave a relieved sigh. Selena perked her ears at the sound and the footsteps coming up the stairs. When they stopped, she expected to here a feminine voice but instead the voice was deeper - evidently masculine. "What are you doing?" asked the man entering the room.
Selena lifted her head from the cushion to inspect the stranger. He appeared to have a limp in his right leg and carried what looked like a crutch to assist him. His sandy colour hair was much shorter than Sherlock's. Dave looked up at him too, taking in his scent. Selena paid no mind to this man and she dropped her head back onto the cushion. The man didn't seem to notice her presence – either that or he didn't bother to question it.
Sherlock replied to the man's question, "Nicotine patch." He showed him the arm with the numerous amounts of patches. "Helps me think. Impossible to sustain a smoking habit in London these days - bad news for brain work."
"Good news for breathing." This man seemed to talk sense, unlike Sherlock who had a very unusual perception of things.
"Ugh, breathing. Breathing's boring."
Selena chuckled at his statement, "Try life without it and see how that goes for you."
The man who entered earlier finally noticed the young woman curled up on the chair and the black dog and gave them a confused look. "Who's this?" he asked turning to Sherlock.
Sherlock, with his hands pressed together explained Selena's presence, "Selena Owen, graduate from Huddersfield University. She's come down from Golcar for an interview, well…I say 'interview'."
Selena sat up in the chair, impressed by Sherlock's accuracy. She hadn't mentioned to him where from Huddersfield she came from, but Sherlock had a habit of being able to tell things about someone that that person hadn't even mentioned. Selena was aware of this when she looked at his website so the demonstration came as no surprise. Although, the same couldn't be said for the man; he pulled another face, this time directed at Sherlock. Perhaps he wasn't quite accustomed to it. He then looked back at Selena and introduced himself, "Dr John Watson," he offered her his hand, the one that wasn't holding onto the crutch.
She shook his hand in greeting. Far too formal, she thought. She sat back into the chair with Dave's head on her lap stroking his black furry head and looking into his eyes as if having a telepathic conversation with him.
John wandered over the one of the tall windows overlooking Baker Street, peering out, watching pedestrians and cars pass by. Sherlock observed him curiously. "What's wrong?" he asked, reading John's body language. Something must have been nagging in his mind.
"Just met a friend of yours," he replied.
"A friend?" Sherlock sounded unnerved at the mention of a 'friend'. Surely he couldn't be so antisocial to not make any friends. A more likely reason was that most people thought he was 'abnormal' and chose not to befriend him. So, anyone who would consider themselves Sherlock's friend either didn't really know him at all, or accepted him for being the peculiar, interesting individual that he was. Sherlock may have accepted what people probably thought of him and knew that he might only have very few if any friends.
"An enemy," John corrected himself.
"Oh, which one?" Sherlock asked, strangely much more relaxed at the word 'enemy'. "Which one"? How many enemies do you have?
John gave him yet another confused look. This would be the third one Selena had seen in the space of a few minutes. He seemed to be nothing but confused.
"Well, your arch enemy according to him. Do people have arch enemies?"
Sherlock didn't answer but eyed him suspiciously. "Did he offer you money to spy on me?" he asked in an undertone.
"Yes."
"Did you take it?"
"…No," John shook his head. Selena thought she picked up a hint of an appalled expression in his face, among the mass confusion.
"Pity, we could have split the fee. Think it through next time."
Wait, what? Fee? Next time? This guy's either crazy or gets up the some exciting stuff. More intrigued than anything else, Selena was curious as to what Sherlock and John got up to in their daily lives. It certainly sounded exciting.
Selena's stomach growled again, and Dave cocked his head at her. Suddenly feeling very self-conscious, she could feel all eyes in the room watching her. "I'm hungry," she said timidly. Though she hadn't eaten since some unearthly hour that morning, she didn't feel comfortable about eating other peoples' food, especially people she had only just met.
John, although hopelessly confused, appeared to have more social skills than Sherlock since he was the one who gave Selena permission to get herself some food.
Behind the chair she had been sleeping on was a doorway to the kitchen. It was a smallish kitchen with a table in the middle, a fridge against the far wall by a window and a couple of work surfaces and a cooker on the right side. Cupboards were mounted on the right hand wall as well under the work tops. Spotting the toaster, one thought crossed her mind – cheese on toast. Simple but just as satisfying as any full course meal in a posh restaurant, if not more.
In a kitchen, Selena was in her element. She loved experimenting with new recipes and enjoyed making a mess, similar to one that a child would make while trying to bake a cake, especially in her own kitchen; mess was definitely not an option in her mother's kitchen. She approached the cooker, trying to figure out which knob worked the grill, since one cannot make cheese on toast in a toaster! Miraculously, her old housemate didn't actually know that. Feeling completely at home, despite the fact that it wasn't her house and there were two strangers in the next room, Selena proceeded in making herself some well deserved food. Dave looked up at her with big brown eyes as he sat patiently, watching her cut some cheese.
"What's up, Dave?"
Dave whined at her in response. How could she ignore that look? Selena gave in and offered her companion a piece. Gratefully, he took the cheese from her hand, chewed once or twice and quickly swallowed.
In the next room, she could hear John and Sherlock having a conversation. Sherlock had moved from his place on the sofa and crouched on one of the leather chairs. John sat on the one opposite. They were both talking over a pink suitcase that Sherlock placed on a chair and flung the hideous pink thing open.
Something appeared to be missing in that room. In Selena's experience, whenever anyone was having an in-depth conversation, it always had to be accompanied by a cup of tea or coffee. Quicker than a scolded cat, she filled the kettle with enough water, switched it on and placed three cups and teaspoons, a teapot, a small bowl of sugar and a little jug of milk onto a tray. It's just like being at home, she chuckled to herself. Once the kettle boiled, she poured the steaming water into the teapot and carried the tray into the next room. "I am the Tea Lady," she sung aloud, completely by accident. If anyone gave her a funny look, she didn't notice, nor did she care. The Tea Lady was her identity in every household she lived in, like it was an unpaid profession. They accepted the offer and organised their own cups, while they discussed something to do with the pink suitcase, a phone and a murderer.
Selena tended to her small late dinner, giving Dave some more cheese, wondering what case they were investigating. She pulled up the chair tucked underneath the desk and sat with them intrigued with the investigation. She listened intently taking another bite out of the toast.
"Nobody could be seen with this case without drawing attention to themselves, particularly a man which is statistically more likely," Sherlock analysed the situation the two of them had been discussing, speaking almost too quickly for Selena to register anything he said. "So obviously he'd feel compelled to get rid of it the moment he noticed he still had it; wouldn't take him any more than five minutes to realise his mistake."
"Who are you talking about?" Selena asked, swallowing a mouthful of toast.
"A serial killer," was Sherlock's quick reply. Selena nodded in acknowledgment and took another bite while Sherlock continued, "I checked every backstreet wide enough for a car five minutes from Lauriston Gardens and any way you could dispose of a bulky object without being observed; took me less than an hour to find the right skip."
"Pink, you got all that because you realised the case would be pink?" John asked dumbfounded by the explanation. He clearly was not used to it.
"Well it had to be pink, obviously." Sherlock narrowed his eyes at John, slightly irritated at how stupid he could be. Selena had only been listening for that part of the conversation so she had an excuse to not know the case would be pink.
"Why didn't I think of that?"
"Because you're an idiot."
John eyes opened wider in shock at such an insult – that was something a child would probably say to offend someone they didn't like.
"No, no don't be like that, practically everybody is." Selena guessed that Sherlock was trying to be reassuring but John didn't get that impression.
"Just wondering, why would the case be pink?" Selena asked, wanting to join in with the conversation. She had finished her toast and now that she was satisfied, engaged with discussion, though she had little evidence to go on. I can still offer my ideas.
"The woman found dead was wearing all pink. It's obvious that she would have a pink suitcase as well," Sherlock explained to her.
"Makes sense. You really must be an idiot to not know that," she said to John in a playful tone. He sighed, displeased by the comment. Selena's way of breaking the ice and befriend others would involve one or two light hearted insults, not meant to offend the person. John didn't appear to see it that way, so she reframed from making anymore comments.
"Do you see what's missing?" Sherlock gestured at the open case.
"From the case, how could I?" Selena could see John was starting to get rather fed up now.
"Her phone! Where's her mobile phone?"
Selena thought about the question. The woman must have had a phone, there's hardly anyone who doesn't have a mobile phone these days. "Perhaps she kept it on her person? People don't tend to keep their phones in their suitcases," she suggested.
"There was no phone on the body, or in the case," Sherlock pointed out. Hm, it was worth a try.
"We know she had one, that's her number there, John just texted," he motioned to the phone on the arm of the chair where John sat.
"Maybe she left it at home?" John also gave a suggestion, though not a very probable one. Sherlock shifted to a proper sitting position on his chair.
"She has a string of lovers and she's careful about it. She never leaves her phone at home."
A long pause passed, and all three of them robotically took a sip of tea, as they tried to come up with a reason as to why the murdered woman's phone was missing. "Why did I just send that text?" John asked looking at his own phone.
"To find out where the phone is," Selena said in a confident tone. Lessons from life suggest the best way of finding your lost phone is to get someone to send a text or to ring it, which was probably the idea Sherlock had in mind when asking John to send a text. Again, John came out with another obvious suggestion, "She could have lost it."
"Doubtful," Selena became more and more engrossed in the investigation, "She'd be careful not to lose it or let someone steal it. Wherever it is, it's no accident that it's there."
Selena fancied she saw a flicker of approval in Sherlock's eyes. She silently praised herself, proud of her efforts. And she hadn't even had her interview yet.
"The murderer," John mumbled, "you think the murderer has the phone?"
"Maybe she left it with her case, maybe he took it from her for some reason. Either way, balance probability is that the murderer has her phone," Sherlock concluded.
"Sorry, what are we doing? Did I just text a murderer?" John seemed slightly frightened at the prospect of texting a murderer, but then again, who wouldn't be? Although, the murderer would hardly know who the text was from, and it was for a good purpose. John's phone began ringing, and all eyes turned to face it. Selena thought it may be a response to the text John sent.
"If the phone was lost, then you definitely wouldn't get this sort of response," Selena just thought she'd make a point to John about suggesting the obvious.
"A few hours after his last victim and the murderer receives a text that can only be from her," Sherlock seemed to have the slightest growl in his voice, "Indeed if a stranger found the phone, they'd ignore a text like that, but the murderer would panic." He flipped the lid on the pink case closed.
This just gets more and more exciting! Selena grinned. She hadn't been there long and already something fun was happening. Sherlock quickly sprang up from the chair pulled on his blazer.
The phone had stopped ringing when John said, "Should you talk to the police?"
"Four people are dead; there isn't time to talk to the police."
Four? What have I been missing? Selena felt her eyes bulging from their sockets. She'd make sure to catch up on these events later.
"Then why are you talking to me?" John retorted, unable to understand.
Sherlock didn't answer but looked over at the mantelpiece in dismay, "Mrs Hudson took my skull," he whined.
Skull…? Selena gave him a questioning look as he pulled on his long coat and wrapped a dark blue scarf around his neck.
"Well?" Sherlock asked expectantly. Selena still sat, unsure of what to do. "Well, what?" asked she and John in unison, which came as a surprise to both of them.
"Well, you can just sit there and," a disgusted look crossed Sherlock's face, "watch telly." Selena didn't blame him for that; stuff of TV these days was nearly always rubbish and completely pointless to watch.
"You want me to come with you?" Judging by that question, John didn't spend much time with Sherlock, or that they had only just met the day before. The way they behaved with each other suggested the latter.
"I like company when I go out. I think better when I talk aloud. A skull just attracts attention."
Again, what's with the skull thing? God, I'm confused. Selena decided questions will be asked later, at some point when they can have a proper conversation.
"Problem?" Sherlock directed the question at John who pulled a weird face that looked amused yet slightly disgusted.
"Yeah, Sergeant Donavan," he replied.
At the mention of that name, Sherlock rolled his eyes and turned away annoyed. "What about her?" Selena could tell that he certainly didn't like this woman though for what reason she did not know.
"She said," John told of this woman, "that you get off on this. You enjoy it." Selena frowned in disgust, what kind of person says that? Urgh…great, I now have wrong images in my head. She buried her face in her hands, ashamed of thinking about such things.
Sherlock didn't deny nor confirm the accusation but replied with, "And I said dangerous, and here you are," then strode out of the room and down the stairs.
Selena turned to face John, eyebrows raised, perplexed. He returned her gaze, before heaving himself off the chair, cursing, "Damn it," and hobbling with his crutch after Sherlock.
Dave looked up at Selena as she looked down at him. There was something expectant in his eyes. "Well…" Selena sighed, "What do you think about that, Dave." He shuffled on the spot where he stood and wagging his tail.
Sherlock's voice suddenly sounded from the bottom of the staircase, "You coming, Tea Lady?" It could only have been directed at her as she was the Tea Lady after all. A smile on Selena's face stretched from ear to ear, and more to herself than to Sherlock she said with a laugh, "Hell, yeah." She hadn't removed her jacket since coming in so she sprang to her feet, and ran down the stairs with Dave close behind to meet the detective and the doctor on a mission to find themselves a killer.
