Trigger Warning- Death, Infant Death, Child Death


"What are we supposed to call you?" Sherlock's voice was steady, and cold.

"You can just call me Moriarty, dear. It is after all, my name." the slight twinge and accent made the voice sound exactly like Moriarty. However, Sherlock's ears had steadily deduced it was not, he had memorized that voice, he would even know if it was distorted.

"Moriarty is dead, it can't be your name." Sherlock scoffed. John sat silently and listened.

"Well I suppose if you would like to believe that, then make up a name for me. Call me smoke, darling, rising, dear, six, honey, dead. Any of them will do."

"Well aren't you going to make me solve the puzzle? Smoke rising, six dead? Is that what I need to stop?" Sherlock then decided to try to appeal to what he believed this person wanted. He wants to be Moriarty, so be it. Let him continue to have his fantasy, it will make it more predictable. "You are Moriarty after all." He spoke in a smooth, nearly seductive voice. John looked shocked at him- but Sherlock waved him off.

There was small pause before it sounded again, "Ah, lovely." The voice sounded very pleased, "Just because I have the name doesn't mean I am him."

The call ended.

"What was that? That- that thing you just did?" John asked.

"It was me appealing to the new Moriarty. This person obviously wants to delve into the fantasy that they are Moriarty. I would think they are delusional. Everyone knows Moriarty's fascination with me. So I appealed to the fascination, Moriarty is a flirt after all."

"Well it obviously didn't work. They said they weren't Moriarty." John was oddly uncomfortable with the way Sherlock handled it. Something about the sexy quality of his voice while speaking to Moriarty- no not Moriarty, this fake Moriarty. Was very unsettling. "They didn't seem to have any reaction."

"They obviously did John the 'Oh, lovely' that was pleasing. They just said the second statement to cover up their delusions. It's obvious, and actually quite boring. This person isn't nearly as clever as they lead us on to believe." Sherlock groaned and got up to gather his coat and scarf. He picked up his phone and started to glance over it. "This is actually rather boring John, I was expecting a challenge."

"What do you mean?" John was very confused. They had just been called by this stranger, it was starting to get late and it looked like Sherlock was ready to head out the door. "Sherlock- it's nearly seven...Where are you going?"

Sherlock quickly turned his phone to John where there were glowing coordinates.

"This phone has a tracer John. Call Lestrade and tell him what's happened while we go to the address."

They yet again called a cab, it was getting later and John was very overwhelmed. He just got kidnapped for God's sake and they were already heading to another crime scene.

The address was rather far away, up in Birmingham at the countryside, it took them a little bit under two hours and by the time they arrived they could see cop cars already there, and the sun was setting. There was a large house in the middle of a green and yellow field. It was old and worn, but obviously had a warm quality to it. It was the type of house that would hold a family for years comfortably. Police tape was however adoring the area and police officers were moving steadily in and out of the house.

Lestrade stood talking to an officer and he looked distraught, though it was Lestrade's sort of distraught. The one that isn't overly emotional but obviously upset. The one that caused him to not sleep at night.

The farmland suddenly became more and more eerie as John looked further. It went out far and into the trees. The faces of the men and women moving out of the old house created a hushed quality. It made warmth seem haunted. When they got out of the taxi is was quieter then John expected- very subtly humming. John paid the obscene amount of money and the cab driver and drove away slowly, his head sort of stuck out of the window as he glanced at the house and then finally he started to speed up and went away.

John followed Sherlock as he walked up to Lestrade,

"I'm assuming you haven't found the new killer. Instead, there have been multiple murders. Six?"

Lestrade passed his hand tiredly over his face and looked up at Sherlock, "Yeah- sorry for not calling, the reception here is terrible. It's located right between power lines," he gestured up at the black strings surround them,"...And yes, there have been six deaths. I'd rather not know, how you know."

"Fire?"

"No, we believe it's gas. Carbon monoxide poisoning." Lestrade looked very tired, "Sherlock- there were two children in there- and one infant. There was no puzzle Sherlock, not like you told me on the phone, there was no one to save when we arrived they were all simply dead. You need to stop this-" The inspector looked down, "Just go."

Sherlock nodded, and John felt sick. His stomach turned as he entered the crime scene, two people, who looked asleep on the couch, but weren't. A mother he assumed, with blonde hair leaning over a father with dark hair. A television was in front of them, as if they were simply watching it before they fell into sleep and died.

John didn't want to journey up stairs, but Sherlock went anyway and John had to follow. Sherlock went left first into a small room with green paint, where a young boy, probably five or six years old was left under dinosaur covers, he had probably just been sent to bed, his cheeks squished against the pillow with no more color.

Then they went into the next room, a bit larger, with comics and clothes strewn around the floor and tons of posters plastered on the wall. Another boy about fifteen or sixteen years old, was sitting up, his head slumped over with a computer that fell down off his lap, and now laid lightly at an angle on the bed. John could visualize it, the boy was probably playing on his computer when he suddenly felt tired. His eyes lightly closing and him passing out as the computer fell off his lap. The teenage slowly being poisoned by gas.

And John nearly couldn't bear going into the next room, the parents bedroom, where a white crib was at the side, little painted flowers adorned the handles and a mobile was over it.

A young baby girl about five months old with small blond curls lay with a pink bear next to her, like her older brothers she had no more life or glow. John left the room. Headed downstairs and out the door before Sherlock could say a word.

This was sick. Unbearably disgusting.

He was outside and he paced around the house, the other officers, not Donovan or Anderson who were collecting evidence outside looked at him with any emotion. Everyone understood, and let him pace and curl his hands multiple times without any bother.

He had expected this to be like Moriarty, where they at least had a chance to solve something before everyone died. He couldn't help to think back to Afghanistan where he would see injured, sick, dead or dying children everyday-

Would you like to see some more?

The words that he heard years ago, asking if he would mind seeing more death. Maybe one with a mystery, one that had meaning, or thought to it. Something that didn't involve young children. Not this though. They knew what happened here, it was simple, one person had done this simply to mess with them. They inadvertently caused the death of these people. It was his and Sherlock's fault for this and he would accept it. These people deserve more then this.

He took a deep breath and wondered out of the power lines so he could call a taxi, by the time it got here Sherlock would most definitely be done. The phone rang, and he politely asked for the cab. He has the cab service on speed dial now, although he almost always simply uses it for London- it didn't take too much convincing to get them to drive all the way to Birmingham, they used the cab service all the time...They got a bit of leeway for 'helping the public'.

John, ventured back near the house and gathered himself. He straightened his back and put on his military stance- he could deal with it. Making it up the the porch he stepped up and saw Sherlock peering at the two parents on the couch.

"Ah- hello John, figured you'd be back soon. It's fairly obvious how they died, the carbon monoxide poisoning is obvious it left red mark on their sides. I've deduced that the children are nothing of interest, both fairly normal, their older son had a marijuana habit- but it doesn't affect the case. The infant however is much more interesting, there are obvious signs of malnutrition."

John was slightly taken aback, "Malnutrition? Was it done before the murders? Torture?" John was horrified now. It was horrible already, he didn't need more reassurance of the fact.

Sherlock shook his head, "No." Sherlock gave him a fleeting look that John had learned to identify as Stupid, "It was purely environmental. The mother was showing signs of anxiety and depression. Look closer at her ring, uncleaned. Her hair- not well taken care off. Her nails, bitten to stubs. This could simply be a case of a failing marriage, but as we can see hear she was obviously happy with her husband. Her children were also well taken care of. The malnutrition of the child was simply caused because the nutrients the infant were receiving from the mother's breast milk was insufficient."

John sighed, "So what does all this mean?"

Sherlock stood up and slapped his hands together in front of him.

"I have no idea- I can't wait to find out though, I assume you've called a cab."

"Yes."

"Well then, it seems they have arrived."

They headed out of the house and looked at the black cab with large letters Dial-A-Cab.

Lestrade headed up to them before they made it, "What did you find Sherlock? Do you know anything more about the killer?"

Sherlock brushed him off, "I haven't connected all the information yet expect to see something soon."

They headed into the cab and Sherlock looked out the window and glanced at John. John was obviously upset, if the way his shifting eyebrows hadn't implied and his hand ran through his hair as he looked out the window. He was disappointed in Sherlock for not showing sympathy to the family, Sherlock noticed, but what could John expect from him? For him to kneel down crying and start grieving for the dead? That wouldn't help them, all he could do was solve the case. Find the murderer.

The trees rushed by.

The house had been overall normal, they were a happy family. All the children were very obviously theirs...Then why had they been targeted? Why couldn't have Sherlock solved the case? Why wasn't he given a chance to solve the case?

There were no lives to save, no one was strapped to a bomb hoping for the godsend of a puzzle to be solved. Why had the family been targeted? He assumed that it had to do something with the mother...But it was perfectly normal.

A women has a child and gets postpartum depression, she was getting help for it. She had a supportive family, her children were happy. There was nothing interesting, and that's what made it so much more intriguing. There must have been something he was missing. A puzzle piece. He let the case rest in the back of his mind, there was nothing he could gather yet he'd have to focus his thoughts on other problems.

The new Moriarty. He had obviously been wrong about him, he vastly underestimated his new foe.

"John."

"Yes Sherlock?"

"How far do those power-lines go out?"

John turned to Sherlock, "I don't know, pretty far out. Towards the trees...The whole house is just surrounded by them no wonder Lestrade had interference trying to call you."

"Then how did he call?" Sherlock smiled.

"What do you mean? Lestrade didn't call-"

"No, the killer, how did he call? My phone led us to that exact location, the power lines were surrounding it however- there would have been too much interference for pseudo-Moriarty to call from there. How would they have called us there? How would I have gotten the location?" Sherlock was now musing to himself. This person was much more interesting then he thought, much more clever. He smirked.

John seemed interested, "I don't know."

"Neither do I John."


This chapter was actually really difficult to write. Like you have no idea...Sorry for all these chapters being so short. I plan on having the next ones being somewhere around 3500 words rather then 2000. Tell me what you think! Thank you.

(P.S. I've been doing a little research on my first chapter. Since I'm an ignorant American, I used the Imperial system and not Metric- I did do further research though, and traditionally apparently people do use the Imperial system to describe height in suspect descriptions in England...If you would like me to change the chapter name and edit it the rest to say "One Meter Fifty Seven" then I will happily oblige)