Hey! So, I am so happy that this story is going down so well. Like really really happy! Thank you all again for your lovely reviews :D This chapter was one of my favourites to write so I hope you enjoy it!


Scotland Yard was busy. Incredibly busy. Phones were ringing all over the room that John was standing in and there seemed to be far too many people in it too. There were employees rushing around him, not even saying 'excuse me' to try and get past. At one point, a man who looked no older than his early-twenties barged into Mary, knocking her into John who caught her quickly before moving over to the man as he tried to walk away.

"Hey!" He shouted, annoyed and he could feel Mary watching him with a small smile on her face. The man turned around, wearing a mixed look of exasperation and frustration on his face.

"I didn't see you, sorry." He mumbled but John wasn't satisfied.

"You just ran full pelt into my pregnant wife and nearly knocked her flying." He pressed, frowning at him and watched as the man looked at Mary, his eyes widening. He began to stammer as John raised his eyebrows at him and Sherlock suddenly appeared next to John.

"Just say you're sorry with a bit more feeling this time and go. He's having a bad day." He said, inclining his head to John at the last part.

"I'm no-" John began to retort but Sherlock shook his head and interrupted him.

"No time." Sherlock looked at the man again expectantly.

"I'm sorry, I didn't see you. I should have been more careful." He said to Mary with as much sincerity as he could manage. Mary nodded.

"Don't worry, no harm done. And don't mind him, he is having a bad day." She replied and John frowned at her.

"Oi." He moaned but Mary shook her head with a small smile on her face before turning and following Sherlock across the room and towards a glass door that lead to Lestrade's office. John watched them for a moment in disbelief before huffing and following behind, wondering if he was ever going to get used to Mary and Sherlock ganging up against him. The thought made him smile in spite of himself as he walked through the door. At least they got on.

"What the hell is going on?" Lestrade was waiting for them as they entered and stood as he spoke.

"Exactly what John has told you. I need a police escort and I've chosen you for the job. Congratulations." Sherlock replied ending the sentence with a sarcastic smile.

"I don't have time to babysit you Sherlock. In case you haven't noticed, Moriarty, who everyone thought was dead, is alive and we have a line of calls and people to sift through, and every single one of them have claimed to have seen him." He argued, his voice and expression clearly showing how stressed he was.

"Brilliant. I can help you." Sherlock said and Lestrade stared at him for a second, unbelieving.

"Seriously? You'd help me interview all these people?" He asked sceptically and Sherlock put on a hurt expression.

"Of course." He said before walking away from Lestrade and John waited for what else he was about to say. "But I won't be interviewing them. Plus, I'll be expecting some help from you in return." Sherlock added and John smiled as he turned to follow him back at the room, coming to a dead stop as he realised that most of the people he thought were rushing around working were actually standing around waiting to be seen. Word of Moriarty's return had obviously spread pretty fast.

John and Mary stood next to Greg and Sherlock, the latter of which had his hands in his coat pockets, his eyes carefully surveying the group of people.

"One minute." Sherlock said suddenly. Greg raised his eyebrow.

"What?"

"One minute and I'll have gotten rid of the unimportant people." He replied before glancing over at Sally Donovan who was looking over the shoulder of a woman to stare at a computer. "And yes that will include you Donovan." Sherlock added, earning a frown from her.

"Shut up." She retorted before looking back down at the screen.

"Such an intelligent reply." Sherlock muttered sarcastically.

"You're really going to help me whittle down this lot in one minute? There's got to be at least fifty people here." Lestrade said and Sherlock sighed.

"Have you learnt nothing about me over the years Lestrade?" He asked and Greg didn't answer instead, he waited with John and Mary as they all watched Sherlock make his way to the queue of people.

"Okay, to all the people who claim to have seen Moriarty," He shouted loudly and the whole room turned to look at him. "Just to make things much simpler, would you please leave if you are lying." Lestrade scoffed next to John, probably hardly believing what Sherlock was saying. John however knew better than to judge him yet. "If no-one recognises me, my name is Sherlock Holmes and if that isn't enough, I shall tell you this: I know when people are lying even if they believe in their silly little brains they are very good at it. For example - ." He turned to the first woman in the queue who looked at him as if he had two heads. "You are obviously are liar and a chronic one at that." John watched the woman who looked as if Sherlock had just slapped her before John turned to look at Sherlock who glanced up and down at the woman quickly, telling John that a show-off performance was about to come. "There are a few beads of perspiration on your forehead and you've taken your coat off even though you are only wearing a very thin shirt underneath. The room isn't too hot at all, in fact it's borderline chilly, the air-conditioning is always ridiculously high in here so this is probably due to the fact that your blood-pressure is rising. I've also noticed just by looking at your eyes that your pupils are dilated and that you have blinked far too much in the last few minutes all of which are signs that you are very excited about something that is about to happen. I doubt upon knowing Moriarty that if you would have indeed met him that excitement is something you would feel; terror is more likely however there is nothing on your face anywhere to suggest that you feel that at all so, it's not to do with him then.

So then, why are you excited? Well, there is a distinct red mark on your nose where you have been rubbing away your make-up absent-mindedly with your finger, a common tell-tale sign for a liar, known as the Pinocchio effect so the fact that you are excited that you are about to tell a lie points to an addiction to it. That or you're just an attention seeker." He stopped abruptly smiling smugly down at the woman as the whole room remained silent. "You may leave the room." He finished and the woman stared at him for a moment, her mouth slightly open before she adjusted the bag on her shoulder and hurried away, looking flustered. Sherlock watched her leave before turning to the group of people again.

"Now. Would you all like to reconsider again if you are lying and if you are, please follow that woman. Note also that lying would be wasting police time which is seen as a criminal offence and the Detective Inspector will arrest you for it." Sherlock continued, nodding over briefly to Lestrade who quickly cleared his throat and stood up straight.

"Yes. Yes I will do that." He said feebly and John caught Sherlock rolling his eyes before he returned them back to look at the group.

"Now." He ordered and instantly, over half of the people in the line began to move and crowd themselves towards the door, filtering through it as quickly as they could, some looking back with astonished expressions on their faces to which Sherlock pretended to ignore but John knew he was secretly enjoying.

After most of the people had left, Sherlock began to make his way down the queue, occasionally shaking his head at people or muttering 'no' as he walked past them and John almost felt sorry for them as he saw them leave, looking rather confused at what had just happened. When Sherlock had reached the end of the queue, they were left with three people, one woman and two men, all of whom now looked a little intimidated as they stood being stared at by most of the people in the room. After a moment, Sherlock opened his mouth as if to say something before stopping and narrowing his eyes at the woman.

"No. I change my mind about you. You can go." He said, before walking back to Lestrade and stopping next to him briefly.

"Shall we?" He asked, walking back into Lestrade's office, the owner of which shook his head before calling the two people left to follow them into it.

John helped shuffle some chairs around so that the interviewees were sat facing Sherlock and Lestrade. Mary and John waited by the door, not wanting to make them feel too crowded. Lestrade waited for a moment as if thinking that Sherlock was about to say something but he merely stared at them, his eyes flicking across each of their faces and taking in their postures, picking up on things that still impressed John even after all this time. Lestrade cleared his throat again when he realised Sherlock was not going to speak.

"So. You're all here presumably because you think that you have seen Jim Moriarty. Is this correct?" He asked and the two men nodded but only the man in the middle spoke, a strong cockney accent in his tones.

"I was trying to get a cab this morning and the driver wouldn't let me in. I only saw his face for a second but I swear it was him, the guy on the telly." He said mysteriously and Sherlock suddenly sat forward towards them.

"Okay, you're done. Out." He said to the man, nodding to the door and Lestrade looked at him in annoyance.

"Hold on a minute, I've not finished talking to him yet." He argued.

"What else do you need to know? He saw him as the driver of a taxi, we could have figured that out in our sleep. Anything else he is about to tell us is just useless information." He responded, his gaze on Lestrade before he turned back to the man who was looking as confused as the people who had left from the queue moments ago. "I would thank you for your time but that seems unfair considering you've wasted mine." He said and the man took that as his queue and got up slowly, looking back at Lestrade and Sherlock a few times before walking past John and Mary to leave the room.

"Are you going to do that with everyone we talk to?" Lestrade asked Sherlock in a hushed voice.

"Time is of the essence Graham." He muttered in reply, speaking again before Lestrade had time to correct him.

"You, you're the taxi driver that he managed to convince to give him your cab." Sherlock said matter-of-factly to the man who was sat on their right. The slightly balding cab driver shifted in his seat uncomfortably.

"Er... yes, yes I am." He stammered awkwardly.

"Why would you just give someone your cab?" Lestrade asked just as John was thinking the same thing.

"Money." Sherlock answered and the driver looked at him sheepishly before nodding. "He offered you a fair amount of money to borrow it I'm assuming?"

"£2000. That's over two months pay. Plus he only said that he would borrow it. He said that he was going to text me where he left it when he was done. Not sure why." He replied, his eyes flicking to Sherlock and then to the floor.

"Did he give you a reason?" John asked from the door, astounded that this man had been so trusting, even for that amount of money. The man shrugged.

"Not really. He just mentioned that he was planning a surprise for his girlfriend and that to do it properly, he would need to pick her up in a taxi. That's it. He seemed perfectly fine to me at the time, quite a nice man before I realised..." The man tailed off and Lestrade was frowning at him as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing.

"So a man you've never met comes up and offers you a lot of money to borrow your cab without any explanation and you just trust him. Why?" Lestrade asked, sitting back and folding his arms.

"Because the man is desperate." Sherlock answered, rolling his eyes when no-one responded. "I thought this one was obvious but apparently not. His choice and state of clothes suggest that he is struggling for money. Coats and shoes are a fairly necessary piece of clothing but his coat has a rip in the arm and has been patched together quite poorly, same with his shoes, there is glue residue leaking out of the sole, showing another rather bad piece of handiwork, all in the name of saving money rather than spending it on new items." Sherlock was talking once again at his usual quick pace when he was making deductions. John and Mary settled back into the wall behind them, used to it by now as the man Sherlock was speaking of stared in amazement. "Then there's the hair, judging by his complexion and marks around his eyes, he's not much older than his mid-thirties but he is quite obviously grey and is also beginning to go bald, stress-induced most likely. This is probably down to his children; a small patch of baby vomit is visible on his collar and also a little bit of baby food has dried between his nails so, one baby, one toddler and judging by the lack of a ring on his finger and the over-all lack of confidence of his demeanour, I'd say his wife left him not long ago. It should now not be too difficult to realise that with two children to feed and clothe and probably also childcare bills to pay for that one taxi driver's wage would not be enough to support them." Sherlock waited and looked at the man who's eyes had become steadily wider throughout the whole of his speech. The man opened his mouth but no sound seemed to come out for a moment until he final managed to force out two words.

"How did -?"

"He does that." Lestrade replied without waiting for him to finish the question. "So you gave him the cab and he's not replied yet?" He prompted and the man shook his head slowly, his eyes still on Sherlock. "So what do we do? Wait?" He directed his question at Sherlock who stood up suddenly and walked past the chairs.

"What, wait around for Moriarty to contact us and do nothing? Of course not." He replied, annoyed before walking to stand next to Mary and John, his hand on the door as he looked back at Lestrade and the cab driver. "We need to go to St Bart's." He added before walking out of the room, the rest of them watching him, a little confused.

"Well. We'd better follow him then." John said after a moment and Lestrade and the driver stood up."

"Should I -?" He began and everyone in the room turned to look at him. "Should I come too?" He asked and Lestrade shrugged.

"You better had. If we leave you here and Sherlock wants you and you're not around, they'll be bloody hell to pay." He replied before grabbing his coat and walking back into the busy office, John, Mary and the cab driver following him.

"Norman! Be on stand-by for my calls. If I ring you, you answer, got it?" Lestrade called as they all walked to the door and the young man who had bumped into Mary before poked his head above his computer and nodded quickly.

"Ruling with a firm hand?" Mary commented and Lestrade sighed.

"I have to when Sherlock's not around, it's the only chance I get to be the boss." He replied causing Mary to smirk as the four of them followed Sherlock out of Scotland Yard.


So there were two pretty big Sherlock deductions in there. I hope that wasn't too much... I had fun writing them both and I was going to cut one out but I decided, to heck with it, I like them. :P

I am unfortunately now going to be going away for a bit so I won't be able to update for about 5 days so this is why I wanted to leave you a longer update. I shall be writing my a** off though so be you can be sure that I will have lots of stuff ready for you when I get back.

Thanks for sticking with it! Review as always pleeeeeease! :D