His coat was long. His hair was black. His face was sharp and thin. His scarf was blue. His shirt was purple, and to John it was nothing but him.
"Sherlock!" John ran to the man.
"Do not touch it!" the Doctor's shout stopped John in his steps. "It's not real; it's a hologram, a very good one at that, but touch it and it'll vanish."
"How?" John was baffled.
"The TARDIS is alive you know, she has minor psychic powers, feeding off your memories, in the least creepy way possible and of course from the places and times she has recently been." The Doctor answered. "All together to create one brilliant hologram," the Doctor walked to John who was standing by the hologram. "This is the last thing I can do for you John."
"Can he say anything else?"
"It" the Doctor focused the it, for John's own sake, he didn't want John getting attached to a hologram. "It can say what ever is programmed into it, and its programming has come from your memories so I suppose it will have quite a bit to say nothing new though." He then stepped away from the real Doctor and closer to the illusion detective.
"It was all true John, what the media said about me."
"Don't." John was silent. "Don't say that."
"Heroes don't exist John, and even if they did I'm not one of them."
"You know you are the most human human I have ever met, not matter who hard you tried to disguise it. Stop it Sherlock. Stop this."
"Goodbye John…" its voice was slowing "Goodbye John Watson."
"Powers are running low, John get out of here before it vanishes." The Doctor's voice interrupted and had a ring of urgency within it. John barley listened. His hand was reaching out, coming closer and closer to the hologram.
"Goodbye Sherlock Holmes." his finger tip touching the long coat before being pushed out the TARDIS by the doctor.
Touching the coat.
A real coat.
The two doctors stood within flat 221B, the TARDIS taking centre stage among the forensics equipment, books, and skulls.
"I'm sorry John, I didn't want you to see him go, and it would not have been good for you."
"It's fine Doctor." John was blunt.
"Trust me; I've seen someone fade before my eyes, gone forever."
John gave the Doctor a long look; stern, so stern even the Doctor could not read it.
"Thank you Doctor, for all this, it's hurt, so much, but it's been fantastic."
"John Watson, you are more than welcome!" they were both smiling now as they shook hands.
"I hope it's all helped you, with grieving."
John looked to the Doctor. He gave a half smile.
"Good bye Doctor."
"Goodbye Watson"
And with that, the Time Lord re-entered the TARDIS, as it vaporized from 221B for ever.
"Mr. Holmes, you are quite the actor. You should add expert hologram actor to your C.V." The Doctor said to the fake hologram, which was still curiously inside the TARDIS.
"You have to be in my line of work Doctor; I must thank you once again for all this." The real Sherlock Holmes spoke.
"It's more than fine, I did give you one favour for helping me with catching that loose siltheen all those years ago, and I'm surprised you remembered."
"No one forgets someone quite like you, but I must admit you look rather different from since then."
"Oh I'm always changing me, miss the ears though. I had a coat as well once, would have rivalled yours." The Doctor added, yet Sherlock seemed unimpressed by that statement. The two great men stood proudly in the TARDIS.
"So why this Sherlock? Why give me all these times and places for John to visit, to see you as a baby, a child, a teen. While you hide away in the back of the TARDIS until the end, pooping out as a hologram with all this psychic memory rubbish just to say one last goodbye."
"Because Doctor that is exactly what he needed, closure, a real goodbye, I thought this would help him, and let him see the me so few have really seen. It was odd you know, feeling your memories change before you, the vision of you two in my childhood room is engraved in my mind now."
"It must be so very odd Sherlock; but why can't he just know you are still alive!?" the Doctor seemed frustrated.
"When the time is right John, Ms. Hudson and all the others can know I'm alive." Sherlock explained. The Doctor tutted at his friends deep words and carried on the conversation.
"Did you not get bored waiting around the back of the TARDIS?"
"Doctor is was impossible to not touch anything," Sherlock returned to the room he hid in. "Yet out of everything in there it was this that confused me the most." Sherlock was holding a red cone made of felt.
"A fez Doctor? Really?" Sherlock threw it to the Doctor.
"Hey fezzes are cool!" the Doctor threw it back to Sherlock, landing perfectly on his head.
"I must look stupid." Sherlock muttered throwing the hat off his head.
"You look adorable." The Doctor joked.
The two geniuses simply rode through the time vortex, discussing anything and everything. Books, history, people in their lives.
"Where is Rose Doctor?" Sherlock asked.
"Rose is gone Sherlock, along with all the others,"
"I'm sorry Doctor," Sherlock added.
"Oh it's fine, she is about somewhere, still not smoking Sherlock?"
"No I started stopping when you tore that one at of my mouth those years back, it's a hard battle though."
"The hardest of your life Sherlock."
Eventually their time together came to an end. The Doctor got the TARDIS to modern London, where Sherlock could once again go back to being dead.
"Thank you very much Doctor, it's been thrilling." Sherlock headed for the door.
"Sherlock one thing." The Doctor said. Sherlock turned his coat swaying as he did. "Your favour was to give John the closure he need, which is very selfless of you, but I must ask, if that's what you used it for, how on earth did you survive the fall? For even I the Doctor can't explain that one!"
Sherlock smiled at the Doctor, his hands grabbing hold of his collar as he pooped it up. "Goodbye Doctor." He once again turned and left the TARDIS to remain hidden in the busy streets of London.