"Good morning, Doctor Watson." His secretary smiled at him.
John smiled back and quickly walked into his office, began the first day in his own clinic.
5 minutes later the secretary send a cup of tea in, finding her boss already made tea for himself.
"Sorry." They both blurred at the same time. Then the secretary put that today's newspaper on his desk.
"Thank you, Miss Wooch." John added, "Don't bother with the tea, you've done very well."
Lestrade's face was on the headline, embarrass and worried. John glanced at the words below. "The spokesman of Scotland Yard refused to give any explanation on the car explosion of Faraday Garden last night, and claimed the identification of the dead male body was still in process, although much delayed by its damage condition. He also denied the rumor that the body had no nose, yet admitted the man was dead before the car explosion…"
There was a knock at the door. John put down the papers. It must be difficult for Lestrade, the loss of that man, that genius and freak, was not his own.
John cleared his thought, got himself collected for a new yet repeated day.
What made the day a little different happened when John left his clinic. He received a call from Lestrade.
"Hey." He said.
"Hey." Lestrade sounds uneasy. "Could you come to my office for 5 minutes." He paused, "We want to hear your opinion on last day's accident."
"It was not an accident." John replied.
"What?"
"That was intentional murder, in an accident there is no one to blame." He found himself saying this.
"Yes." Oddly enough the inspector's voice showed relief. "You see you could give us some help, indeed."
A long pause, then John said, "I'm not him."
"None of us is." The reply was quick. "But you know his method, and you know he helped us out of his own will."
Yes. John says quietly to himself. He hung up the line, and took a taxi to Scotland Yard.
Sitting at the back seat of a taxi, he felt his friend was so near him again. He missed him so much and thought of him so deeply, even not noticing tears streaming down his own face until the cabbie pulled up the car.
"Sir, Scotland Yard."
"Yes." He handed him a 20-pound note, left without waiting for change.
"I want to see the body" was his first words to Lestrade. The latter nodded understandingly. "It was in Barts'." Autopsy, of course. No surprisingly he would see the girl, Molly again there.
Some part of John Watson began to breathe again, slightly and eagerly from his chest. He felt the blood running warm in his body. It was a war, even the best partner one could possibly had was no longer in company. John would try the best he could.
"The nose…" He began.
"No," Lestrade looked at him, drily said, "There was no nose on the face. Not any bone we could find near the body. It was damaged in the boom, but we are sure the nose was ripped out before it, even before he died."
"I dare say the boom was not from inside of the car?"
Everybody gazed at him now, Donovan, Anderson, new faces he didn't know.
"Freak." Donovan finally said, in a friendly tone.
John smiled back. "The boom itself was not the aim. The murderer or whoever behind it…" Everyone held his or her breath. "…set the boom to draw our attention to the dead body. He made an effort to make sure we notice it. "
"Why?" Anderson asked.
"It held some information, clearly." John smiled again, trying not to copy his ex-flatmate's exact words.
"What's that?" He asked unbelievably.
"Nose." There was silence in the office, ridiculers, clownish silence. Of course it was nose, or what. Everyone wanted to say something yet found nothing to say, until John broke the silence hopefully, "Did you find anything else?"
Lestrade smiled bitterly, "Exact question I want to ask you. From our side," He shrugged, looking tired, "Nothing at all." Then he looked at John hopefully.
"I'm going to disappoint him." John thought, "I'm not that one, I told him and he knew that, but I still disappoint him."
In the rest of the day, they examined the car, reported stolen 3 months ago in Menchester, and went to Bart's, where Molly received them. The girl looked into John's eyes bravely, lifting the sheet of the dead body with steady hands. The head was in much better condition compared to the rest of it, and apparently the man was dead long before the explosion.
"Ice." John said. "The body was preserved in ice, I bet the head was still in ice cube in the explosion, protecting the head and leaving no evidence."
"So?"
"So it was cruel, thoughtfully planned murder, indicating us to the single hint, nose."
"What does that mean?" Lestrade looked confused, so was John himself.
He shook his head, "I don't know, and I don't know why the murderer left hint at all." Then he added, "But with all the effort and hint, I guess this is just beginning."
Around him, people exchanged gravely glances.
It was a long day, yet John felt hard to get asleep. On the contrary, he sat before his laptop, looking at the screen where a file named "Him" was opened. He stared into it so hard and so long, his eyes dazzled to tears.
"You should not die." He murmured to him, to the documents that were carefully copied from blogs about "him" (as the latter had sharply and proudly pointed out, when John even didn't bother to deny). There must be a lot more cases before he knew him, should have been much more after.
"You should not die." He murmured criticizing. "You should not waste yourself on one criminal. He was just one and you were much more, much better than that. How stupid and selfish are you."
"You should not die." He murmured, voice barely been heard by himself, "Please don't be… dead."
John fell asleep sitting there. In his dream he heard some familiar voice and laughter; he forced some stupid people admitting the mistake of not eating regularly, and promising to take doctor's order.