"From the same source I have not taken

My sorrow - I could not awaken

My heart to joy at the same tone -

And all I lov'd - I lov'd alone -

Then - in my childhood - in the dawn

Of a most stormy life - was drawn"

- Edgar Allen Poe, "Alone"

Baker Street, 13th of July, 7: 43 A.M.

Sherlock hadn't gotten sleep that night. He sat and watched over an intoxicated, sleeping John from an old wooden chair that's been in 221B longer than they had. He'd seen far too many - even those without an alcohol addiction - expire of choking on their own vomit, and as John had a habit of sleeping on his back, Sherlock worried to distract himself.

He forced himself not to think of her at first, but the fleeting moments he did, Bridge's incredulous face during his confession on the roof embedded into his thoughts. In the indiscernible hours of the morning, where time seemed to blur, Sherlock thought of why he told her what he did. He'd originally dragged her up there to apologize for what he'd said on the train, for John's sake.

But why tell her that he had misjudged her? Why admit defeat and call her what he truly discovered her to be? Why declare her brilliant? Sherlock had hastily thought of using her drunkenness as means of an excuse, though he knew that excuses were for the incompetent.

In honesty, he found Bridge to be quite infuriating all in all. She was a riddle, which he hated. Underneath, though one had to look hard, Sherlock couldn't help himself from thinking her fascinating. Fascinating in the way stars were, like silent guardians that inspired tales and music but at the same time, the light left in those stars are only ghosts. For the star died before its light could reach the earth, and all one saw was the hollow representation.

Sherlock paused on that metaphor for a grim minute and remembered a softer time. When he'd first learned that starlight was an after effect as a boy, his anger led him to burn the book and never pursue astronomy again. He repulsed from it every chance he could. John had made fun of him before about never learning that the earth revolves around the sun. Sherlock had dismissed as unimportance, but it was the stars he took issue with, not the planets. They were beautiful, but they were also sad.

It became a starlight curse, and just like that, every time a case came upon his doorstep...people wondered why he seems so morbid and bleak on the job. Because as the cases came in to be observed and solved, the people were already dead like the stars he loved as a child. Just as the stars have charts, so did the people.

Sherlock didn't "get off" on cases as some at Scotland Yard believed. He only wanted to see the stars.

So it always frightened him in the slightest of ways, looking at Bridge. Because as a star does, she burned with this light that was unmistakable and rare and luminous, but the moment he heard - or rather, read - her story in her own words, he realized how honestly broken she was without her voice and without her brother. Even though she spoke of them as the same thing. Sherlock, in this, saw something a little too familiar.

He leaned forward in his chair, the wood creaking as he did, and rested his forearms on his knees, scolding himself for drifting off in his ponderings. Stupid...

Catching his attention were his friend's pearly eyelids fluttering, John's hands up to scrub at his eyes. His eyes were veined with red, and his movements dallied with the after effects of alcohol. When he saw Sherlock, he jolted as if being woken up to an octopus flailing about at the end of his bed. "Jesus, were you watching me sleep?"

"I prefer the phrase 'observing breathing patterns and preventing death in the form of drowning in one's own vomit' but I won't question your word choice- you aren't at your maximum capacity for cognitive function," Sherlock noted, but there was no defensiveness in him, only a thin disappointment.

John blinked a few times, clearing his vision before he stared wide-eyed, as if remembering something. "Did Bridge-"

"-carry you? Not alone, she summoned me and we hauled you up together," He informed mechanically.

"Did she make it back alright?"

Sherlock hesitated for half a second. After she'd fainted on the roof, he'd had little choice but to carry her back to her apartment, to the claw-footed couch. He deduced days ago that she regularly slept on her belly from way her face always was red on one side, as if she'd pressed her face to something for a time. So he set her down accordingly, and was distantly relieved that he wouldn't have to worry about her as he had John. He was still working out if it had been alcohol or what he'd said that had shocked her so badly, but that wasn't important anymore.

"If you imply that I left her to sleep on the stairs in a heap, thank you for your confidence," Sherlock's sarcasm was thick and cool as granite. He rose to his feet, waving his hand at John. "Get up, we need to get to-"

He was cut off by John suddenly clamping a hand over his mouth and dashing out of bed, to the bathroom. The sounds of him evacuating his stomach set off a strange sympathetic twisting in Sherlock's gut as he followed and leant against the frame of the door. The doctor had himself crouched over the toilet seat, clutching his torso.

The taller man made a face. "And this is your reward for befriending a Scot, John."

"Shut up." The doctor heaved and gagged.

"Once you're finished, we head to the lab. We've tests to do. The samples from Miss Grayson's porch has hit an interesting development. I think there may be something in the intruder's blood but I require a more powerful microscope than what I have." Sherlock paused, and came up with a brief, idle idea. He glanced to his friend. "Shall I make breakfast?"

"I'm being violently sick and you're asking for breakfast?" John griped, swaying back and fighting down another go with emptying his stomach.

"I don't know," Sherlock turned away, a wry smile crept on him out of his friend's view, "I was thinking of serving up a plate of rotting eggs, embalming fluid and dead human entrails."

"I hate you," John's insides lurched, and he bent over the toilet bowl once more, the contents of his stomach erupting from him.

The morgue was colder that day, or perhaps it was the July heat outside St. Bartholomew's that made it seem that way. John relaxed as they got through the swinging double doors into the lab. Though he'd spent a good forty minutes that morning emptying it, his stomach still clenched as if it were holding him hostage in its grip, and the antiseptic smell that lingered about hospitals did nothing to ease his discomfort.

He glanced up at his taller friend, who was as unreadable as ever. John often was thankful that he could read faces, a result of having Bridge as a friend, but as always, he could rarely read Sherlock.

The lab was void of anything human; no one inside, the stench of chemicals and latex hung heavy in the air over the carts and trays of glassware, metal tools, computer monitors and scanners, and microscopes. The detective made a beeline for his usual desk, the center table with the spinning stool that allowed him to reach what he needed behind him without getting up from his seat.

"Satchel," He said, and John handed it over from where it'd been slung over his shoulder. Sherlock unloaded it carefully on the space beside him and began his work.

John's cell phone vibrated in his pocket. He blinked a few times to clear his vision and flipped it open to read the text, ignoring the annoyed glare from the man in the stool. Bridge.

Morning. Does your head hurt as much as mine does?

The doors opened behind him before he could reply, and a small mass ran into his back. He turned to see the sprightly yet shy young woman who runs the morgue. She wore a modest knee-length skirt and blouse under her labcoat, and had her hair twisted up into a ponytail, a mousy waterfall down her back.

"Sorry, John, didn't see you there," Molly apologized, baring a smile to him as she clutched her clipboard to her chest. "What brings you here? On a case with Sherlock?"

"Yeah, for an old friend of mine," John explained, and she peered under his arm to spot Sherlock, who was adding an unknown chemical to a Petri dish. "Just running a check on some samples."

Molly bounced up on her tiptoes, her voice full of curiosity and friendliness. "Oh? Samples from what?"

"The blood of a kidnapper and henchman," Sherlock answered coolly, his eyes not moving from his work. He slid a Petri dish speckled with chips of dried reddish-brown blood under the microscope, and squinted into the eyepiece. "Or the blood of the Marine we're trying to locate and return to his sister. These tests shall determine which it is."

As he talked, John finally got back to Bridge's text. The corner of his mouth twitched up as he typed.

I'm between a horse kick and a tension headache, but I'll live. How about you? Did you make it home alright? Sherlock says you did, but I wanted to double-check.

"What's her name, John?" Molly teased, nudging his arm with the edge of her clipboard. "Texting someone with that smile, she ought to be special."

A muscle in Sherlock's neck jumped, though no one saw it; John waved a hand and despite the tops of his ears, the end of his nose dusting pink. In the foggy memories of last night, he did recall their conversation before the alcohol. When she told him of her deal, and he'd hugged her tight, as if he still accepted her. But above that, he remembered her kissing his cheek, the lightest of touches.

"Nothing like that," He insisted, his eyes not meeting Molly's. "She's a dear friend and colleague. Bridge."

"Bridge," Molly repeated, her lips curled around the word. "I like it."

"While I'd love nothing more than to pretend the two of you don't exist in the same plane as I do," Sherlock interjected, raising his head from where he'd leant into the microscope. "I've found something you may want to relay to the anarchist."

"She's not an anarchist," John reminded him for the umpteenth time.

"What? Your friend's a-" Molly asked, her thin eyebrows pulling together in alarm.

"She's not a bloody anarchist," The doctor said, exasperated in his defeat.

Scribbling a few words on a notepad nearby, Sherlock sneered a bit coldly, "And you say you're not attached to her. But I'm hardly interested in your romantic endeavors, however amusing they may be."

He looked for a second as if he may shoo Molly out of the room, but shrugged, as if making up his mind. His tone mocked. "You may stay, Molly. You learn something new every day."

The detective gestured towards the dish. "Who did we originally believe this blood belonged to?"

"Leonard's kidnapper," John said automatically. Sherlock shook his head, and held up a different Petri dish, labeled 'Bridge Grayson'.

"This is Bridge's blood." John's eyes narrowed suspiciously. With an irritated sigh, Sherlock clarified, "She'd needed the bandages on her cheek changed last night while you were passed out, so I changed them for her and sampled her blood from them."

It was only partly a lie; she had needed her bandages changed and he had gotten her blood from them – that was true, but he'd done it when he'd gotten her back to her flat. He noticed that under the bandages, her skin was agitated like she hadn't let it heal properly. Most peculiar.

"The blood from inside the house matches hers," He said, tapping the dish with a long spidery finger. "Bridge and Leonard are fraternal twins, and although they do not share the exact sequence of DNA strands, they share their blood type, unlike most fraternal twins I've seen. They're B+. And the blood from the broken vase is A+, belonging to the intruder. I found it all over their living room, confirming that Leonard had put up a fight, but was subdued when more men entered the room."

"Hold on a minute, how do you know that Bridge and Leonard have the same blood type?" John inquired, "You haven't left Baker Street all week, and you haven't seen her records-"

"You're a doctor who has worked with both of them. Do they have the same blood type?"

"Yeah, but-"

Sherlock produced a third dish from his satchel. "This is the blood found on Dillion Cass's knife after I hauled him down to the stream to dissolve. I checked him all over and found this around his neck…the blood had to belong to Leonard Grayson."

The detective fished a hand into his pockets. There was a sound of jingling, and he pulled out a long chain, a pair of dog tags dangling from the end. Clearly engraved on the little silver plates was Leonard's full name under the spots of crimson. John's mouth opened as Sherlock dropped them into his open hands. On a sort of unsaid cue, John's cell phone buzzed once again. Mutely, he opened the text holding his phone in one hand and the bloodstained dog tags of the sender in the other. Molly watched with hesitant eyes where Sherlock kept his on his friend.

I did. I'm alright. I'm going to let you go now, I've got a few things to do and I'll be out of Baker Street most of today. I'll see you later, Captain.

"Why didn't you give these to me before?" He demanded, shutting his phone without replying and Molly glanced between them nervously. Sherlock the soul of calm, collectedness, and yet he seemed on edge. John's shoulders squared, his jaw tense.

"I needed to prove my theory. This isn't natural spatter caused from injury to its wearer. This is as if someone, or if Cass had planned to, had planted the evidence the best they could to make it look like a kidnapping. The footprints I found all over the house, too heavy and pronounced to be running or attacking." Sherlock answered lithely, as if what he was about to say wasn't blasphemy to his friend's ears. "I have reason to believe Leonard went with the men willingly."

"That's ridiculous," John spat, and began to feel sick again, though not with nausea. He simply could not imagine one of his oldest friends doing what was being implied here. "'Willingly'? Like he turned traitor?"

Molly grew anxious and she backed away slowly, then dipping out of the room. As much as she would be inclined to step between them and get them calmed down, it was none of her business and she knew it was wrong to poke her nose where it didn't belong.

"It's a very real possibility," Sherlock admitted pensively, "Or our consulting criminal had threatened him to come quietly. He may be closer than we think, John."

The silence in the room after he'd finished speaking was like knives in his ears. His eyes searched the other man's, his hands limp on his knees as he sat. Normally, he would've been happy with silence, but never from John. He watched as the doctor turned his back to him, his head bent and staring at the silvery tags in his hand. Sherlock could hear the man's even, steady breaths.

He could not imagine it really, losing a friend. Sherlock Holmes doesn't have friends, not even colleagues. Not before Dr. John Watson entered his life. Out of a cruel, harsh curiosity, he threw himself into the mindset of the woman in 221C. He thought of what a horrid, desperate world it would be if someone were to rip John from him. He didn't have to think about it: he would scour the world, pull every string, take every vital step, and do whatever was required until John was at his side again. And so, he'd always wondered, perhaps he wasn't that separate in mindset from the Graysons. They would die for each other, just as he would kill in a heartbeat for John.

Tearing them from their thoughts was the sound of Sherlock's phone ringing. John broke out of his quiet and looked at him, the detective retrieving it from his pocket.

Sherlock's dark eyebrows came together, and he raised his phone to his ear. "Lestrade."

John listened anxiously, resting the dog tags inside the breast pocket of his jacket and making a promise to give them to Bridge tonight.

"Yes…St. Bartholomew's, we're on a case….Whitechapel, what's that got to do with-" Sherlock's mouth opened in surprise. "What are you talking about? Of course it's not-…Organs removed… Yes, yes I'm familiar with it…Her name was…Emma Smith? We'll be there momentarily, don't touch anything. Am I clear? Not a thing. Keep Anderson in the van, he's a waste of payroll…I'm very serious." He clicked it off.

"What did Lestrade want?"

Sherlock was already out of his seat, adjusting his black blazer. He pulled a piece of scrap paper towards him and scribbled a few lines in a note intended for Molly. "There's been a brutal murder in Whitechapel, and he wants my input. He thinks it may be of interest to us."

He finished his note and the pair left the lab. John was buttoning up his jacket, and they were half-running down the halls of St. Bartholomew's then. "Something to do with our problem?"

"Not at the moment, but it may be." Sherlock pushed the door open for the doctor, and they were bombarded by the heat wave of London in the July summer. It was almost noon, and rush hour was just around the corner, the streets were beginning to look congested with people.

John called a cab that was about to miss them, and as it approached their stretch of sidewalk, he inquired to the detective, "You were shocked at something Lestrade said, what was it?"

He settled into the taxi seat after Sherlock, and once the cabbie was told where to go, they were on their way.

"He called the murderer 'Jack the Ripper.'"

Dear Readers,

This is where the plot gets rather thick and syrupy, so don't forget to stay tuned and review!

Have a brilliant day!

Best Regards,

GP