Author's note: I decided to give you more clues what's actually going on – or is that the hallucination? He he, I am evil... sorry, I just enjoy it so much. Plus, I guess you all had a suspicion what these "flashes", "hallucinations" etc meant, so time to make Sherlock realize. But maybe he is on the wrong track... Here I go again. Sorry.
With the three back together, there are so many possibilities... It's unbelievable, really, and I love writing their banter. It's so much fun. Especially this Lestrade. I can't get enough.
I don't own anything, and please review.
John still looks sceptical after Sherlock finishes his report – in record time too, only took him half an hour, this time – but he doesn't tell him to „Piss Off" or storm out or anything like that, so that must be a good sign.
At the end of the story, however, he shakes his head. "So... Basically, we solve crimes, I blog about it..."
"And sometimes I forget my pants" Sherlock says, smiling, remembering the time the made fun of Mycroft at the Buckingham palace.
John looks confused once more, but before he can say anything, Greg decides to comment. "You still "asexual", 'Lock, or should I leave you two alone for a while?"
John shoots him an exasperated look. "Do you have anything – really, anything – to do other than drink and make sarcastic comments?"
"Sure – I have to watch the DNA-machine, remember?" Greg replies, taking another sip from his flask.
John rolls his eyes. "It's called a –"
"John, let's leave it "machine" for Greg, alright?" That earns him a genuine smile from John.
"I suppose - since our favourite Fitzgerald character reject can't even seem to remember your name right".
"Hey, it's a nickname! Plus, it's better to lull." Greg toasts John.
The doctor looks at Sherlock, raises an eyebrow – "Hey! I just got Sherlock to stop doping that, don't want to have to stop you too, mate" – and enquires: "You really take confidence out of the fact that he believes you? An alcoholic who can't go five minutes without taking a sip?"
"I heard that".
"So?"
"Nothing, just a sound analysis you've got going. I can see why Sherlock chose you as his partner in crime."
"Can we please concentrate?" Sherlock decides to try to keep them from spending all their time with bantering – otherwise they could really be called a "merry band of misfits", and that's neither what he wants not what he needs.
"On what, exactly?" John raises his hands – the right one still holding the cane, Sherlock will have to fix that as soon as possible – and looks from Sherlock to Greg and back again. "You just showed up, told me that the life as I remember it was a big mistake, I send you away, then start looking for you, I haven't slept or eaten in over a day, and when I finally find you, you tell me how my life should have been, and now you want me to accept this and move on within the space of five minutes?"
"Basically. Don't worry, he does this to everyone." Greg comments, apparently convinced that will clear everything up.
"But not everyone is an alcoholic who has no other options than to believe him because otherwise his whole life would be utterly meaningless". There is venom in John's voice, and it doesn't go unnoticed, not even by Greg. The DI stands up, makes his way towards John, and his eyes are dark, darker than Sherlock has ever seen them, and John's gaze is maybe even more hostile than it was last night, and suddenly, Sherlock is afraid.
Greg and John are friends, have been almost since the day they met, even when Greg had to arrest Sherlock and he eventually "committed suicide", John never blamed Greg. They helped each other in their grief, in a way.
But they took to each other immediately, John knew Greg's first name before Sherlock ever realized it had to be something different than "DI". So why, now, the hostility? Sure, Greg is an alcoholic, and John can't appreciate that, but Sherlock has explained everything and he hasn't commented yet on his cocaine addiction... well, except for that question why the police would want Sherlock to help, but that was legit.
So, why...
The answer hits him, suddenly, even as Greg advances more towards John.
Because they never had him.
They didn't know Sherlock, until now, and in a way, they still don't. So they can't bond over him, like they did in the real world. Like they should have. Which means...
Now it's Greg's turn. "Even more meaningless, you mean" he asks quietly, in that certain voice that means (Sherlock knows from experience) that the DI will very soon explode if not pacified, "than the life an ex-army doctor with a limp and a shaking hand who hasn't managed to get a job or form a relationship with anyone or even get a hobby in all the years since he returned from war?"
John is going to punch him, Sherlock just knows it. He wants to go between them, but his legs don't seem to obey him –
The room, the ceiling, the blond man, Mycroft.
"Something isn't right, Mycroft, his responses have decreased."
"You will find, John, that my brother has never been what you would "consider" normal, therefore I do not think that him not healing according to standards is a reason to worry."
"He is your brother, you know. You can show you are scared."
"I long ago learned that being scared because of something concerning Sherlock isn't an advantage".
"So? What about your "clean slate" then? I thought you were allowed to say you care about eatch other now?"
Mycroft turns away, the blond man speaks again. "I'm sorry, Mycroft..."
"No, you are right. Please, John, do your best".
Mycroft leaves the room and the man turns towards Sherlock's hospital bed...
Hospital. Of course.
Suddenly, he gets a slap in the face, and in the next moment, he tastes Whiskey on his tongue. He opens his eyes and is back in the lab. Both Greg and John look at him worriedly.
"You feeling better now, 'Lock?" Greg asks, before taking a large gulp out of the flask he apparently just gave to Sherlock, and it's strangely touching that this alcoholic would share his precious booze with him. At the same time, John inquires "What happened? Your blood pressure suddenly dropped and you lost consciousness for a minute..."
Then, just as Sherlock sits up, they DI and the doctor look at each other. And burst out laughing. Which would probably make a normal person angry, his friends laughing will he still sits on the floor after a bout of unconsciousness. But Sherlock isn't a normal person, in neither world.
So, he stays there and thinks about what he's learned.
Hospital, of course. It was the only explanation, really, a coma; but still, this hallucination... But wasn't there something about the wrong drug and delayed responses? Yes... He must have been treated wrongly, when John wasn't looking. So best just go along with this and hope that John and, maybe, Mycroft, find a solution to the problem soon.
When he snaps back to this form of the present, Greg and John are talking amiably.
"Thank God you caught him, I'm not as fast as I used to, and I'd probably let him fall..."
"Well, at least you knew how to take his pulse, I drunk away that knowledge years ago..."
"Sorry?" They look at Sherlock. "Can somebody please help me up? We need to talk about the case."
Greg gives him a hand and soon he is sitting on a chair, one eye still on the DNA. Then John takes the word. "The case about this MP who was murdered, right? By the robbers?"
"We don't know yet if there were any robbers" Sherlock counters.
John looks a little bit sceptical. "Good, so only two went into that house and drank the wine, doesn't mean it's not the same gang..."
"Then why did her Ladyship see three men and identify them?"
"Because..." John searches for an answer, then tries "Maybe she was confused, from the punch?"
"So she invented another robber that exactly looks like the third member of the gang?"
"What are you saying? Are you implying that..."
"Hey" Greg interrupts, "I want to help too. It's my bloody job, after all".
"You haven't done it very well, though, over the last couple of years" Sherlock shoots back.
"Girls, behave!" John says sternly, before resuming "You think that Lady..." He turns to Greg for help, the DI supplies "Brackenstall". "You think that Lady Brackenstall is lying?"
"It's the most plausible explanation, yes."
"So she just... decided she wanted to have her husband out of the way? Because..." Sherlock waves his hands.
"Not enough data. Lover, money, anything's possible."
"But, Sherlock – we need a motive, otherwise no one will take our suspicion seriously" John explains, patiently as always, and Sherlock is strangely happy that he said "our".
"Actually, I think I could help you with that" Greg says rather smugly.
"Why?" John asks, though no longer sharply, "found an Amortillado bottle in the house bar that is worth about a million pounds?"
"No, though if I did, she would be rather disappointed when she came to collect her inheritance..." Greg chuckles, then he turns serious. "I might be a drunkard – but I have been a policeman for thirty years now, and I know when bruises are older than twelve hours at the most."
"Domestic abuse, then?" Sherlock asks, his mind already calculating how many punches, how many years it took for a woman to snap and have her husband's murder arranged by a consulting criminal.
"Looks like it, at least to me. Didn't get a good look at her on the crime scene – I was kept away, and rightly so – " John looks at him "I still have some standards, John. But, when she came to my office demanding to have the house back – apparently she thought everyone would just put the bruises on her arms and her neck down to the robbers, but – they didn't look recent. A few days old, at least in my opinion".
"Well done, Greg!" Sherlock exclaims, and John shoots him a look that is not without affection. Then he turns to Greg. "Does he usually talk to you like one talks to a dog?"
Sherlock doesn't hear the answer –
"Listen to me, you vigilante-wannabe, you will die here, slowly starve to death – or, rather, dehydration will get you first. Like a dog..."
John wants to shake Sherlock's shoulder immediately, as soon as the consulting detective gets lost in his head, but Greg stops him. "That's not what happened before, trust me" he says under his breath. "When he does that, he is remembering something he wishes he couldn't remember".
John looks at Sherlock, who has a haunted look in his eyes. "What does he remember?"
"He only told me a little bit, and I think you should ask him yourself. Let's just say – it's not particularly nice. It's the time he barely told you anything about, the time he spent "dead"".
At this moment, just when John thinks he will get answers regardless, Sherlock seems to shake the memory off and starts talking again like nothing happened. Greg nods at John to make sure he understands that now is not the time to acknowledge what he saw.
"So, Her Ladyship had a motive and lied to the police. I think, with that, we can – "
"But, Sherlock – " John starts.
"Yes?"
"I now this may sound – well, a bit chauvinistic, but how does Lady Brackenstall know to stage a crime scene like this? I mean, is there a handbook for it somewhere or – "
"I guess Google isn't an option?" Greg asks, innocently. Then he looks at Sherlock and seems to see something. "Hey, 'Lock, that's just unfair. You have a suspicion, I can see it."
"How?" John demands, baffled.
"Don't worry, doctor, you figure that out pretty quickly."
Sherlock takes a deep breath, Greg realizing before John is another reminder that this are not the friends he remembers. But the DI is right, and he has to tell them at some point, so why not now?
"Do you remember Moriarty?"
"The criminal mastermind you just told me about?" John asks, just as Greg exclaims "You know, I drink, but I am not yet totally incapable of remembering things I was told less than two days ago".
"Yes, him" Sherlock explains, ignoring Greg. "I believe that he arranged the crime scene."
"But wouldn't he have made it perfect – at least according to your stories?" John asks.
"He could easily have made it perfect, yes, but – I think he deliberately threw in these small discrepancies. I think he's bored. He wants to play. He needs someone to notice what he's doing, so he can play with them."
"What is he, a spoilt five-year-old?" Greg inquires.
"When it comes to playing – yes, I fear, which makes him all the more dangerous and unpredictable."
"Great" John sighs, but his hand isn't shaking and, by now, he seems to put his weight on both his feet, so Sherlock doesn't think he is unhappy with the facts.
"How do we know that Moriarty even exists in this version of reality?"
"Easy, Greg – first of all, because of him, Mycroft had to retire. He helped Irene Adler, the dominatrix".
"Mycroft, the British Government, a criminal mastermind and a dominatrix" John murmurs under his breath, "Really, what have I got myself into?"
"And then..." Sherlock suddenly has an idea. "Greg, we need to get to your office."
"Well, might as well do some actual work there too, while I'm at it" the Di replies, flask in hand. "But why?" He takes another sip.
"Because we need to know what we are up against, which means I need to know what happened to the cases I solved – when I wasn't there to solve them. Plus, the DNA is going to need a while anyway, so we might as well do something productive".
"Right. Makes perfect sense." Greg shrugs, puts the flask away. And stands up. "Well, then, off we go, my friends."
Sherlock leaves the lab, and this time, in all this chaos, at least John is behind him. Like he was always supposed to be.
Author's note: So I did manage and update today, which I'm rather happy about. And, I know, John and Lestrade almost fighting – but I needed to bring in some tension and I thought that their bonding over Sherlock was cute. As cute as a traumatized ex-army doctor and an alcoholic Di can be, which I freely admit I think is way more cute than it probably is.
And now they are going to check on what happened to the cases Sherlock solved. Because I somehow wanted to put that in, too, so... Well, that's how I write. Never mind the story. Sorry for that.
I hope you liked it, and please review.