A/N: The journey of my original character, Jackie Holmes, through Sherlock Season 2, culminating in the Reichenbach Fall. Acts as a sort of prelude to the next half of my series.

She didn't allow herself to think about him. Atleast not except to remember how he'd disappointed her.

She didn't speak to him all summer. Or Christmas. And well into the new year. Even her mother grew worried. Her mother, who couldn't see beyond the new season's collection on Oxford Street. She asked her, hesitantly, whether she might want to call him, send a Christmas card, even a text. She only glared down each of her suggestions mutinously.

For his part, he respected her decision not to contact him and made no attempts to win her back.

She didn't begin to thaw until the slander started to appear in the daily papers.

No matter how disappointed she might be, no matter how much she still hurt, she could never question his integrity. Her quarrel with him was purely personal, but she knew he was no fraud.

As the papers continued their incessant coverage of his spectacular fall, something began to gnaw at her conscience. She knew, despite whatever pretence he must be putting up, how this must be affecting him. Could time heal all wounds? Perhaps atleast some.

Many times she picked up her phone, even typed in a short, innocuous text to break the ice, but in the end she could never hit 'send'.

But the niggle in her heart kept growing worse. Where would all this end? Inspite of herself, she began to get worried.

But end it did. In that frantic buzzing of her iPhone with the caller ID making her brow pucker as she looked up from her A-Levels prep in the school library.

Uncle John calling.

Even they hadn't spoken in months. Not since Christmas. She'd only texted him a happy new year and posted a link to a silly little video. He kept an eye on her via email. Sort of. But she could imagine he'd had his hands full taking care of him.

She walked out of the library to take the call.

"Hello? Uncle John? What's up?"

What he said next changed her forever.

The next thing she could remember was standing in front of that black door, still so familiar, as though she'd seen it only last week. Everything in between was simply a blur. She pounded up the stairs in desperation, brushing rather rudely past Mrs. Hudson, not paying any attention to her puffy eyes and swollen nose.

She didn't come to a stop until she had barged into the sitting room, her eyes sweeping it all over in a fraction of a second noticing the glaring absence of the one she looked for.

Only Uncle John sat in his old chair, looking far too old, even for his years, staring with blank eyes at the empty chair across from him.

"Uncle John?"

She couldn't hide the faint tremble in her voice. She hadn't been able to bring herself to believe it yet. She wouldn't believe it, until she heard it from Uncle John himself, face to face.

She didn't need to.

The moment he looked up, she knew it was all true.

How was he to tell her this?

Yes, they'd had it rough over the last several months, but this?

How was he to break the news he himself hadn't come to fully accept yet to an eighteen year old girl?

She was looking to him, her eyes begging him to tell her it wasn't true. John couldn't find the words.

He pushed himself out of his accustomed armchair and, without a word, walked over and took her into his arms.

"I'm sorry, Jackie," he found himself repeating over and over again, stroking her hair as her fists pounded helplessly against him and her tears soaked through his jacket.

"I'm so sorry, love."

As happens with all children who lose a parent early in their lives, somewhere deep down, she blamed herself.

She sat through all the condolences, the offered grieving comfort, in silence.

"You realise your father obviously made provisions for such an eventuality."

Mycroft Holmes's calm grated on her more than anything else. For once she wanted to wring some emotion out of the man.

Your little brother is dead! Dead! Do you comprehend, Iceman?! My father is dead!

She turned slightly and swallowed hard to stifle the sob rising in her throat.

"He knew the dangers his line of work entailed."

He sifted through a file of papers on his desk, feigning interest.

"He left a will. You are his principal heir."

Jackie shifted in her chair, gritting her teeth.

"He made me the executor, so I am to see that you have everything you need."

I need my father, you unfeeling old croak!

"Now, I gather you've completed your A-Levels?"

Ah yes. The A-Levels. It was a good thing she was naturally a brilliant student. The examinations had passed by in a post-traumatic haze.

"Yes."

"And have you heard from the colleges you applied to?"

Jackie met his dispassionate grey eyes with her own.

"You have their letters in front of you, don't you, Uncle? Why don't you tell me?"

The faintest flicker of a smile threatened to twist Mycroft's lips.

"I see you were accepted into your father's old college in Cambridge. For... criminal law."

He looked impressed, then looked up again.

"Did he know?"

Atleast the last was said with a touch of genuine sympathy.

Jackie looked away.

No. She hadn't gotten around to telling him. And now she never would.

"I'm not going."

The ice returned to her uncle's gaze and he pointedly steepled his fingers on his desk.

"And why not?"

She glared at him.

"I don't want to anymore."

He lifted his eyebrows.

"In reaction to his death? How is that a solution to anything, my dear?"

Jackie curled her hands into fists in an attempt to physically restrain herself from doing something regrettable.

"It's not meant to be a solution. I told you I no longer want to go to college. There are other things I could do."

"Such as?"

Jackie dithered, biting her lip.

"I don't know," she finally admitted.

Mycroft held her gaze for a moment longer and then nodded, almost to himself.

"Right then. I'll make the arrangements. You won't have to worry about a thing."

"No!"

All her restraint had failed and she was on her feet, balled up fists rigid at her side, almost ready to go to war against her own uncle.

"I'm not going! I won't! You can't make me!"

"I could, but I would certainly not want to try, Jacqueline."

Her uncle's voice was edged with steel.

Jackie lifted her chin in defiance, her eyes blazing.

"You're not my father, Uncle Mycroft. Don't assume you can take his place. I thank you for your kind consideration, but with all due respect, you can take it and shove it up your nethers! I'm done with this."

She scraped her chair aside, tossed her mane of hair back and stalked out.

Mycroft watched his niece storm out and heaved a quiet sigh, rubbing the bridge of his nose. It was almost too painful how much she could remind him of Sherlock as a child.

After a while, he pushed his own chair back and walked out of his office into a secret operations monitoring room. Striding to a secure cabinet, he twisted a combination lock to open one section and took out an innocuous mobile phone.

Lazarus, he typed, We have a problem.

She stood before his gravestone, thick, hot tears blurring her vision of the smooth polished black marble bearing the undeniable legend, "Sherlock Holmes".

She searched for something to say, to bid him farewell, but she kept coming up blank.

"You didn't have to do this, you know," she finally blubbed out in a rush.

"You could have just grounded me like other dads. But no. Sherlock Holmes has to do something so completely out of the box that he ends up in a box!"

She shook her head, wiping in vain at her tears.

"You're the worst father ever, you know that? Yes, the very worst. I'll say it and won't be sorry for it. You could have atleast said goodbye. It's called manners."

She stood for a few minutes more, crying her tears out, but feeling no better for it. Finally, when she just couldn't take the crushing reality of the gravestone anymore, she turned and walked away.

Epilogue:

Detective Inspector Lestrade was pouring himself his fifth black coffee of the day and the ever so slight trembling of his fingers was a dead give-away of that fact, even to him. Absently, he reached up and scratched at his arm.

"Two nicotine patches? Looks like you could use some help around here."

The soft voice emerging half-hidden from behind a pillar nearly startled him into spilling his drink onto his shirt. He turned sharply.

"Here! How'd you get in?"

Jacqueline Elizabeth Holmes walked out into the light, dressed in her school uniform, plucking a pencil out from behind her ear and pointed to a paper badge pinned to her lapel.

"Student reporter. Works every time."

Despite himself, DI Lestrade had to smile.

"Y'alright, kiddo?" he asked kindly.

She tried to smile, she really did, but didn't quite manage it. Lestrade seemed to understand and reached out to lay a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"You come to me if there's anything you ever need, a'right? Your dad might have been a smart-ass, but... he was a friend. And I think that's what I'd like to remember him as."

"Actually..."

Jackie hesitated, looking up at him through her eyelashes.

"There is a reason I came to see you..."

Lestrade looked at her questioningly.

Jackie drew herself up and looked him in the eye.

"Inspector, I want to learn to be a detective. Like my father was. Can you teach me?"