SHERLOCK HOLMES:

I had anticipated finding the information about the other terrorists sooner, but as homespun as the organization was there was a fairly clever computer code that needed cracking, a secret room that needed to be discovered, and a key that had to be dug out of from under a garden gnome (well, the last was obvious. Why else would a terrorist faction own a garden gnome)? That, in addition to a madcap chase that dragged Lestrade and I through the seedier parts of London to arrive at a more secret secret base, and resulted in a gun fight that left one terrorist dead, one police officer maimed, and made me quite a bit later than anticipated. While I was gone, I missed several texts:

16:36: Done – JW

17:50: Sarah drove me home – JW

19:04: Don't get yourself killed, you berk – JW

I feel indescribably grimy and exhausted, I am sure even my eyeballs are dirty, yet I have a sudden urge to walk home instead of hailing a cab. There is something pleasurable in feeling my muscles slowly relax as I move closer to Baker Street, the adrenaline wears off, the anticipation of John grows in a hot pit in my stomach. The streets are dark and wet, the buildings tall and squashed unevenly together, the cars crammed neck to neck. The masses are wandering along the roads, and few seem to know exactly where they're going, or if they do seem to know, they don't have any plans for when they get there. I could deduce them but I don't need to, I can ignore it for now, there is a clear boundary between them and myself.

As I walk I ponder the human heart. Not the bow shaped thing stretched out on Valentines cards, but the organic valve system, the anatomically correct heart that was prevalent in medical texts and beat quite steadily in John Watson's chest. In the heart, deoxygenated blood enters, is pumped through the lungs, which give it, essentially, the breath of life in the form of oxygen, and then exits to circulate the oxygenated blood throughout the body, including the brain. In the metaphorical sense (and despite my close friendship with logic, art and metaphor do not entirely escape me), I consider that perhaps John Watson is my heart, pumping the feeling of humanity to my disparate organs, most importantly to my brain. I flush slightly, wondering if he'd like that in a card, then realize that since he seems to know me so well and is himself a doctor, he has probably come up with the metaphor himself already.

I remember what I was before him, a creature that ranted almost non-stop in a claustrophobic one room flat, often passing out from lack of food or too many drugs, walking the streets and inevitably finding myself in bad neighborhoods, in the middle of crime scenes, rattling off a deduction to a certain DI before I vanished again, like a stray cat into the night. Mycroft visiting once a month, scolding me for not being more self-sufficient and transferring me money from The Family at the bequest of Mummy, who always said he didn't do enough to help me. Before I met John Watson, I was a creature of instincts, none good. My brain essentially, took over my mind with its careless demands and lack of self-awareness; its desire only for The Work which didn't always make much sense but always tended to roll in the direction of detective work. And, since the police ended up needing me like a bad drug, I eventually named my occupation, The World's Only Consulting Detective.

My brain had waited so long for an opponent to test itself both against and with to escape its inevitable alienation both from my own body and also from the majority of humankind. Moriarty had provided a distraction, but only distanced myself from humanity, especially for those three years which John and I pointedly never talk about now. He worked at the hospital, I worked at bringing down Moriarty's network. When I entered 221B, he took my pulse, sat me down opposite him, and stared at me for three hours straight as I quietly explained myself. At the end he nodded, said, "that's good then", then chuckled almost manically as he apologized for throwing my experiments out as if I had expected him to keep them for me for three years.

I had come home from that after being pitted against the mind of a consulting criminal which still ticked away in the actions of his associates and underlings. There had been nothing beautiful about it, despite Moriarty's brilliance, and I came home broken but more sure of myself than ever before. I am still no angel, but I am more comfortable with being on their side.

When I came home then I felt as I do now, warm and light-headed with thought of him waiting (I had hoped for his patience, I supposed I could not guarantee his wait, but can you blame me if I did anyway?) comfortably in a wool jumper, my anatomically correct human heart.

I am shocked out of my thoughts by a public phone ringing as I walk by it. I scowl, I am within a block of the flat, and I do not want to deal with this right now. I turn around, reach in the box, pick it up. "Not NOW Mycroft!" I snap, then slam down the phone. My scowl only deepens when I see my elder brother on the front doorstep.

"Sherlock. You have been carrying on quite flamboyantly with our good Doctor today." Standing on the doorstep has given him a good three inches on me in height, and about 6 inches on me in obnoxious superiority.

"Get out of the way, Mycroft! I've only just arrived home, and I'm tired. I've captured your terrorist faction, and worked moderately well with the police in the process."

"Interesting. You never really used that word before. Not even in childhood."

I close my eyes in exasperation. "What word."

"Home. I suppose something or someone has made you change your impression of that."

I clench my fists. "Are you here to argue semantics with me, or do you actually have a purpose? Shouldn't you be stopping or starting a war right now Mycroft? Or at least doing some research on fad diets?"

Mycroft looks mildly perturbed, but it doesn't really stop him. I knew it wouldn't. "Sherlock, remember, I don't want to see you get hurt. I have started to wonder whether you depend on John Watson too much. Remember what Mummy longed for you little brother, self-sufficiency! If he were to get seriously injured or die, what would become of you?"

"Stop your meddling, Mycroft."

His hand grabs onto my shoulder as I attempt to shove through him to the door. "Caring is not an advantage."

The door swings inward, and I smirk. He must have been standing there waiting, and both Mycroft and I know it, but he carries on his charade of happening upon us together on chance impeccably. I suppose if you're an acquaintance of the Holmes brothers you eventually learn to ignore the constant deductions. He is leaning on his cane again and the bruise from the punch I gave him is now a bluish red color. He is tired but noticeably relaxes when he sees that I am unhurt.

"That's funny," John Watson says to Mycroft, in the mild kind way that means he would very much like to shoot you with his gun, "because there's two of us, and only one of you. Kind of hard to see the lack of advantage there."

As Mycroft does his best impression of 'rodent with stomach ache', I grin broadly over his shoulder at my blogger.

Baiting my brother twice in one day? I have never wanted to kiss anyone so much just for breathing in my entire life.