When John awoke he immediately sensed something was wrong. He turned his head and bolted upright.
"Jesus, Sherlock, what are you doing here? What time is it?"
"It's six."
John groaned, "Why?"
"The hour invariably comes after five and before seven. There's nothing to be done about it."
John looked up at his impossible flatmate. He had his blue dressing gown thrown over pyjama trousers and t-shirt. Strikingly thin, as usual, but never frail; there was visible strength in the sinewy muscles just outlined by the thin fabric. His hair was mussed from sleep. So he'd only just woken as well.
"No," John said, unamused, "I mean why are you in my bedroom, and why am I not asleep?" His alarm was set for seven. He had to be at the surgery at eight. He was owed another hour of sleep.
"Mrs. Hudson woke me up," Sherlock said tetchily. "I'm paying it forward."
"Thank you." John glared.
"We have a client."
"Really? Now?"
"In our living room."
"And you're up here?"
Sherlock crossed his arms. "I thought you liked to be included in these little projects."
"Ok, ok." John tossed the blankets back. He stumbled out of bed and Sherlock caught his elbow with quick reflexes. Their eyes met for a moment before Sherlock hastily dropped his hand and stepped back.
"God, it's too early," John mumbled. "I'll just brush my teeth. Be down in a minute."
The girl was sitting in the hard wooden chair with one leg crossed over her knee, bouncing her foot up and down nervously as John walked into the living room. Sherlock was slouched in his chair, jaw resting on his fist, looking his usual amount of displeased about having anyone in the flat. The girl stood to shake John's hand.
"Hello, I'm Hannah, sorry to wake you, nice to meet you."
John smiled at her politely and she blushed. She was pretty, he noticed. Probably in her late twenties, small and slight (even with her heeled pumps she was still an inch shorter than him) with just enough curve to her breasts and hips. She had a nice face—undistinctive, but the kind that becomes prettier the longer you look. She returned his smile. She was cute, openly nervous about meeting them. Nothing like Mary. Even her long, naturally chestnut coloured hair provided a pleasing contrast to Mary's bleached blonde.
"Have a seat." Sherlock's cold tone sliced through the warmth of their visitor's demeanour. John realised with surprise that her eyes hadn't left him, had hardly even glanced toward his normally unignorable flatmate since he'd entered the room. John was so used to watching clients ogle Sherlock that having her admiring gaze directed toward him put him a bit off balance. Not that he discounted his own appeal with women (in fact he'd had a fair bit of success not only in London but across three continents over the course of his life). However, he also had to acknowledge that in his considerable number of past relationships, he'd never actually been standing next to Sherlock when he met any of his girlfriends. Was she not aware there was a tall, dark, and reportedly gorgeous detective in the room with them now? Maybe it was because Sherlock was in his pyjamas... But then Sherlock looked better in his pyjamas than most men did in a tux. Tosser.
She sat and smoothed her skirt with anxious fingers as John took his seat.
"I see you're a fan of John's blog," Sherlock said casually.
"Oh, well," she blushed again, glancing at John, "yes, I—" was all she could say before Sherlock spoke again.
"So tell us, Hannah, do you have us up at six on trumped up claims as an excuse to meet your favourite blogger and take a 'selfie' in our flat, or is it possible you've actually brought us something interesting?"
"Sherlock," John snapped the warning as the girl's expression changed to horror.
"No! I don't want—I didn't mean—I'm so sorry to wake you! It's just—I didn't want to wait and I thought I'd come before work—"
"Let's hear it then. And pray make it good. It's too early for boring."
John glared at his entirely unmanageable detective. He supposed he wasn't treating her any more abominably than any other client, but she was sweet, and John's more gentlemanly principles objected to Sherlock handling her as roughly as any other bloke that walked through their door.
She scrambled for her purse under Sherlock's icy stare, and John took comfort in knowing that if she was indeed a regular reader of his blog, at least she couldn't be caught off guard by Sherlock's behaviour.
"I work at—" she started.
"A funeral home," Sherlock finished for her. "Easy. I could do this one blindfolded."
John snorted, "Oh come on. She reads the blog; she knows what you can do. You don't have to show off—"
"Your hands smell like latex."
Why do I bother?
"They always will, no matter how many times you wash them—typically the curse of the medical or scientific research professions, but you don't work in either. A dentist, perhaps, but dental work is too mundane for you, the girl who obsessively reads John's blog and not for its literary merit."
John swung his leg up and accidentally kicked Sherlock in the ankle as he crossed it over his knee. Sherlock hardly shot him a glance before zeroing back in on his subject.
"You're not tired enough to be a nurse and not smart enough to be a doctor. Definitely not smart enough for research. Add in the highly specific scents of formaldehyde and methanol—I can smell traces of them in your hair—and the conclusion is quite simple. You're an embalmer, and if you want to completely get rid of that smell you'll need a stronger shampoo than whatever herbal mint rubbish you're currently using."
There was a silence and John, who'd been staring at Sherlock, reminded himself to blink. The deductions went fast and John often found himself transfixed. It was genius, truly amazing and Sherlock had done it based only on his sense of smell.
Tearing his eyes from his flatmate he looked back at Hannah and couldn't help feeling surprised. An embalmer. He never would have guessed. But then he'd known from the beginning that the science of deduction was never going to be his forte (despite Sherlock's continued attempts to get him to try it).
"That's right!" Hannah smiled, apparently willing to ignore that half of what Sherlock said was rather insulting. She had frozen with her purse on her lap and was gazing at the detective. She seemed to have forgotten what she was doing as she witnessed, John assumed, her favourite character in action. But receiving no reciprocal smile she quickly resumed digging in her purse. She pulled out her phone.
"I was working on a body earlier this month and I noticed some strange scarring on his legs."
John's eyes shot to Sherlock, who merely steepled his fingers together. He would play this close to his chest, John knew. He wouldn't let her know the possible importance of her information.
"I didn't think anything of it until yesterday," she continued. "We got another body in with almost the same pattern of scarring, also on his thighs." She handed her phone to Sherlock. He held it up, swiping through to see the photos. He passed the phone to John.
There were pictures of three corpses labelled A, B, and C. Bodies A and C were men with scars remarkably similar to Rodgers': thin silver lines of varying lengths and angles crisscrossing the upper inner thighs on both legs. Body B was a woman with no visible scars.
"A and B died in a car crash on Monday, October eleventh. They were a couple and the families chose to do a joint funeral; I worked on them both. C died on Sunday. There was a break-in at his flat and he was shot, maybe you heard about it."
"Wasn't that the one about the toy collection?" John asked. "I remember reading something—"
"Neil Parker had a collection of original edition action figures valued at over ten thousand pounds. Supposedly word got out and amateur burglar Stanley Howard broke into his flat. He was surprised, however, to find Parker at home when he was expected to be out. In a panic Howard shot Parker five times in the chest."
He was like BBC News if BBC News were a bad-tempered flatmate who stole your chips off your plate and occasionally burned the curtains.
"We got Parker's body in yesterday," Hannah said, "and I just—I thought it was odd to see the scars again. Especially since they weren't related to the cause of death in either case. I've prepped a lot of bodies and I've seen some weird stuff, but never twice, and in two separate cases, on two unconnected people..."
She waited for a response. Receiving none she went on. "It's true I read Dr. Watson's blog." Her blush faintly reappeared. "I couldn't help thinking this was something you might be interested in..."
John handed the phone back to her. He wanted to tell her she was right, that she'd done well, but he knew without question to follow Sherlock's lead. The detective sat silently gazing at her over the tips of his fingers.
Her next sentences were a rush of words. "It's probably nothing. You're right, I just thought it was—I don't know—I've probably spent too much time on the blog and I thought—I'm so sorry for waking you up and then wasting your time, I'm sure it'll be best if I just leave—"
"Sit," Sherlock said.
In surprise she dropped back into the chair from where she'd started to rise.
"I'll take the case," he said.
"Really?"
"We'll have to dig up the bodies," Sherlock said to John.
"Oh, but we just—" Hannah started.
"Send a text to Lestrade and tell him we'll need a warrant for the exhumation of all three graves."
"Three?" John asked.
"The girlfriend who died in the car accident. She doesn't have scars but I want to check her blood too." Sherlock turned back to Hannah. "In the meantime, we'll require any information you have on the three corpses."
"Oh, I've got it," she said brightly, digging into her purse again and pulling out an envelope. "All three bodies." She read his blog; of course she'd come prepared. The dubious legality of such a transaction was something John ignored with practised ease. To operate strictly within legal limits would defeat the purpose of a consulting detective altogether.
She handed the envelope to John. "I wrote my phone number and email on the back of the envelope in case you want to contact me—I mean, in case you need any more information."
John smiled at her fumbling. Definitely cute.
"Thank you for your time," she said to Sherlock.
"Our time is only as valuable as the cases that occupy it," Sherlock said, standing and giving her a tight, fake smile. "Whether it's wasted or not remains to be seen."
"We'll be in touch if we need anything more," John said, flicking his eyes back at Sherlock as he walked her to the door. He stepped forward, shaking her hand.
"I really love your blog," she breathed. "You tell the stories so well."
"Thank you"—John grinned at the compliment—"I'm glad you like it."
"But really we are busy." John almost jumped. He had no idea when Sherlock had appeared at his shoulder. "Crimes to solve, you know murderers don't wait for idle chatter." Sherlock stepped between them to pull open the door.
"Of course," Hannah said, readjusting her purse on her shoulder. "Erm, good luck with everything. Bye then," she said giving John a final glance around Sherlock before exiting the flat.
Sherlock swung the door shut behind her.
"Yes!" he shouted, leaping into the air. "Oh, yes!" he said again, striding across the room and pushing his hand back through his hair. "John, do you understand what this means?" He turned on his heel and swept directly back up to John, gripping his shoulders. His eyes were filled with the excited, mirthful energy he rarely allowed others to see but that John knew so well: a sinister kind of cheerfulness. The colours in his eyes shone, lit by an internal electricity. John loved that look. It was radiant, like catching a sunrise if sunrises were unpredictable and that much more spectacular for it.
"John!" Sherlock gave his shoulders a shake, snapping his attention back to centre. "This is an unprecedented stroke of luck!" He snatched the envelope from John's hand and ripped it open, tearing the girl's information down the middle. His eyes skimmed rapidly across the pages. "Yes, yes, everything is here. Excellent. This morning we had an isolated incident and now we have a pattern! Rodgers isn't the first cadaver with these scars; he's the third."
John rested his hands on his hips. "You could have been nicer to her, considering she just cracked this case wide open for you."
Sherlock's bright eyes sliced toward him over the edge of the paper. "There are many things I could do. Just as there are many things you could do." He returned his attention to the documents. "At the moment, you could be helping me research these people instead of whinging about some overly-decorous airhead who earns a living doing makeup for corpses."
John lifted his eyebrows. The unsolicited opinions of Sherlock Holmes on the women in his life would make for colourful reading.
He chose not to rise to the bait this time. "Or," he said, "I could get ready for work, which is actually what I need to be doing."
"I don't see why," Sherlock muttered, sitting down in his chair and shuffling the papers to read the next page, unconsciously pulling one knee to his chest.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"Did you just say you don't know why I go to work?"
Sherlock lowered the papers and tossed his head back dramatically. "Yes, that's what I said. Why do you go to work?"
"Are you serious?" John asked, suddenly hearing his heartbeat in his ears.
"Yes I'm serious." Sherlock jumped back up from the chair. His eyes flashed: a surge in current that switched shining to burning. "Your work at the surgery is dull and beneath your capabilities. 'Yes, Mrs. Higgins you may take two paracetamols for your headache,'" Sherlock sneered. "'No, Mr. Jones the freckle on your arm is not cancer,' 'Let's have a look at your colon, Mr. Davies.'"
John felt his temper rising dangerously. "Do you know why I choose to work as a GP instead of a surgeon? Because of you, you self-important snob. I choose to do less demanding work with better hours so that I'm more available to you."
"But why bother at all? You could make enough money from our work alone. Why are you wasting your time checking people's ears when you could be doing much more interesting and important things with me?"
John's adrenaline kicked into gear; his heart sped up and he tried to keep his words under control. "Because, Sherlock, I am a doctor. That's what I do. I am John Watson, Doctor of Medicine. I am not John Watson, Sherlock's PA."
"You're my blogger."
"I'm a doctor."
"You're both."
"And I need the other half! I went to school for years to study medicine. It's my skill. God, Sherlock, I won't throw away everything I am just because I met you. I left Mary. My work at the surgery is all I have that's independent from you."
Sometimes it seemed like Sherlock's pale eyes could really cut his skin. "So you work at the surgery to get away from me."
"Not everything is about you!" John's exasperation was peaking. "That's my point! My work at the surgery is mine."
"You're being ridiculous. You don't have to do work you don't enjoy just to prove your independence. People won't think any less—"
"I DON'T CARE WHAT PEOPLE THINK," John shouted. "This is not about you or them. This is about me. I'm a doctor and I'm good at it and not everything in my life can revolve around you."
John stormed up the stairs to his bedroom. A short while later, when he came down again, fully dressed, Sherlock was sitting with his back to him working at his laptop. John didn't say a word as he grabbed his jacket and opened the door, and Sherlock didn't turn around.