Three years was a long time to stay in the same job position when you had already held that job position for at least five years before that, but Lestrade was in the exact same place that he had been years before, as were Donovan and Anderson. Many other officers had rotated to a different division, been promoted, or retired; but the station was looking pretty much the same as ever.
Greg still had the same office, with the same chair and everything. Nothing much had changed in his life, except that instead of solving crimes through a consulting detective he had himself, and occasionally (very rarely) a medical doctor who'd learned a few tricks from his best friend and flat mate.
It was strange at first, going to a crime scene and not hearing 'Freak's here' over the radio or seeing the familiar tall, dark form striding in and taking control of everything while seeing, hearing, and smelling everything (even the deodorant of those unfortunate enough to be near him after a night with a 'friend').
However, life went on and Lestrade soon began to forget how it felt to know all by the end of the case, 'case closed' didn't necessarily mean 'we know everything' anymore and cold cases were all too common.
The case of the week was stumping the entire homicide division and it was times like these when the help of Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective extraordinaire, would be very much appreciated. If only… But there was no point in wishing, wishes never came true these days. At least none of Lestrade's, but that was beside the point.
The case was difficult, the murderer would kill the victims at a late hour, between 11 pm and 1 am every night, and the bodies had no marks on them and there weren't any traceable poisons to be found. The end result always ended up being inconclusive and there weren't even any witnesses to the four killings that had already happened.
Another murder had been committed deep in the London core. This crime was the same as the other four and Lestrade felt the sinking feeling that he always felt when a case was unresolved. He hoped that it wouldn't end up becoming another cold case.
Greg's doubts worsened as he drove to the scene of the crime and when he arrived he could see that there weren't many officers there at all; people were giving up on the case.
As he stepped out of his vehicle, someone knocked him over as he ran by. Lestrade shouted out as he fell and when he got up off of the street the man was gone, all the DI knew was that the man had smelled of dust and city smog, with a hint of toxic chemical. That was all he had to go on and the way his day was going Greg didn't even bother to try to find the man to reprimand him, even if his knees and hands were smeared with dirt from the ordeal.
The next thing to go wrong was the worst yet, for when Lestrade reached into his coat pocket to grab his badge there was a slip of folded paper, but no badge. When he unfolded the paper, there were just three words, "See you soon –Altamont" the name seemed familiar but for the life of him Greg couldn't remember where it was from.
Then, like a smack in his face, Lestrade realized that whoever had taken his badge, planned to do something with it. This was one hell of a problem. He'd had his badge stolen on more than one occasion before and nothing had ever come of it; if he was lucky, this time would hold no consequence as well.