Gunfire.

Smoke.

Thick swamps full of mud.

Rain flowing from the sky, almost peeling his skin from his raw face as he pushed through the clinging mud. It began to pull him down further, so he was waist deep in and it kept pulling him down. He fought his way out of the restraints of tall grass and dead leaves, calling out for him team to help him as the gunfire became more distant and the smoke began to fade. He was fighting his way through the darkness until he heard his name being called.

Still fighting, his fist hit something hard and there was a yell. The darkness faded and John opened his eyes, looking around the room he saw Sherlock standing far from his bed, a hand to his nose, blood seeping through his fingers.

John's eyes went wide as he sat up quickly and moved from the bed. "Oh God Sherlock, I am so sorry." He fussed as he tried to inspect Sherlock's bleeding nose.

"Just get me a tissue." Was all Sherlock said as he batted John's hand away with his free one. John didn't hesitate rushing to the bathroom and gathering a large amount of tissue paper and rushing back to hand it to Sherlock, who didn't look too please about having to deal with this whole situation.

Sherlock held the tissue to his nose and looked at his blood covered hand and then down at his crisp white shirt that was now covered in large specks of blood, then up at John, who was extremely concerned about how hard he hit him.

"Stop fussing, I'm fine. My shirt, however, isn't." Sherlock nasally voiced.

"I'm really sorry." John said quickly, "I hope I didn't hit you too hard."

"I said I'm fine." Sherlock assured.

"What were you doing in here anyway?" John asked.

"You said I would have to wait until morning to visit Billy's mother and it's morning. I came in to wake you up but then I heard you yelling and noticed you were having a bad dream." There was a silence before Sherlock looked to the door and started walking out of John's room, "don't take too long."

John watched Sherlock leave and mentally cursed, damn nightmares. He was slightly embarrassed about the whole thing, he thought the nightmares had stopped, and they had stopped when he met Sherlock, because when he was with Sherlock, he didn't need to worry about anything other than the man himself. It was nice having to care about someone. He shook himself out of his thoughts and started dressing himself in fresh clothes.

Although these nightmares were extremely annoying, it was better than the few wet dreams he'd experienced after moving in - god forbid Sherlock walking in one morning to him groaning and- John dismissed the thought, that would be just too embarrassing. Then he wondered what Sherlock would actually do in that kind of situation...

He trotted down the stairs and into the living room where Sherlock was standing, new shirt on, tissue removed him his nose and the blood had been cleared. All that remained was a dark bruise that had already began forming on the bridge of his nose, staring John right in the face. He can't even think about the fact that he had actually hit Sherlock without feeling guilty. Of course during the search for Adler, Sherlock had asked John to punch him in face, although John had hesitated, he knew Sherlock was extremely serious, so he had no choice.

John went to speak but Sherlock spoke first, "For the last time, I am fine. Are you ready?"

"Yes, I wouldn't be waiting here if I wasn't." John smiled slightly, grabbing his jacket from the back of the door as Sherlock put on his coat and scarf.

Billy Regent's home was small and dark, even at 10am in the morning. As soon as John had stepped out of the cab and on to the pavement of the quiet neighbourhood, he sensed the sadness and loss that the whole street possessed. He took a glance at Sherlock, who was looking around the street slowly, obviously observing every tiny detail possible.

"That house, yeah?" John asked, pointing to the small, dark house on the opposite side of the street.

Sherlock seemed to take a moment to reply, still looking around the street. "Yes." He stepped forward and crossed the street, gliding inbetween parked cars almost like a ghost. John followed quickly and walked up the steps to the front door behind Sherlock.

Two rings of the doorbell and a dark haired teen, who John assumed to be Billy's sister because of the youth in her face, answered. A chain was across the inside of the door and the dark haired woman peered out slightly, looking at them. "Hello?"

"Hi, yes, Amanda Regent I suppose. Is your mother in?" Sherlock asked professionally, his stance changing drastically. John didn't like it.

"Who are you?" She asked wearily, looking Sherlock up and down.

"We're with the police." John interrupted, "Er, John Watson and my colleague, Sherlock Holmes."

The young teen, Amanda, nodded stiffly. "Wait here." And she disappeared from her spot behind the door.

John looked at Sherlock. "Try not to be too...try not to be yourself."

Sherlock frowned at him, his eyes showing something that looked like, was that, hurt? "why?"

"This family's just lost a member, and unlike you, they can't just move on and stop caring about it." John wanted to add another sentence but instead waited for a reply. After a few moments, John glanced over to Sherlock who wasn't paying attention to anything and probably didn't hear him. "Just...keep in mind that they're sensitive at the moment. All right?"

It's not that John didn't think Sherlock was capable of caring, God he hoped he wasn't, he just seemed to act like a completely uncaring person when it involved other people apart from John, Mrs. Hudson or Lestrade.

Oh and Molly, should never forget Molly.

Sherlock didn't have time to reply as the door opened full and Billy's mum, Tina, stood there, her face lacking any sort of happiness. "I've already spoken to the police, I don't want to speak to any one else." Her voice was soft and John could tell she wasn't angry, just stressed.

"We understand that, but we have a few more things we need to know before we can continue the investigation." John decided he was going to do all the talking, Sherlock could just 'observe' and explain it all later. Tina seemed to think for a moment before opening the door more wider and ushering the two of them in.

They were led into a dark sitting room which also joined with the dining area. The curtains were open slightly, letting a small streak of daylight into the house, as John looked on, he noticed that that was the only piece of daylight in the home. Tina sat in an arm chair opposite the sofa and pointed for them to sit down.

Amanda had been staring at the two of them from the dining table the entire time they were sitting and asking questions, her stare never wavered even when Tina called over to her to get some tea for them. John narrowed his eyes in her direction after she left, slightly suspicious of her behaviour. Maybe she knew who they were.

Sherlock spoke up suddenly, mentally startling John. "Why did you report Billy missing two months before his murder?"

Tina looked taken aback at his sudden voice. "I-I don't...He went missing."

Sherlock leaned forward in his seat slightly, speaking with a low tone. "Did you know something about her?"

"A-about who?" Tina was visibly crashing, her hands began to shake and her eyes began to water. John gaped at the situation, wanting to grab Sherlock by the coat and slam his head into a wall for being so inconsiderate. I fucking told him.

"Don't play coy, you know exactly who."

"Sherlock..." John warned. He admired the man, but sometimes he wanted to kill him.

"I honestly don't know...I don't know what you're-"

"You knew if you reported him missing before she did, you would disrupt her plans for his murder. But how, how did you know?" Sherlock was mostly asking himself rather than Tina, his stare leaving her face and searching the room.

"I found an old tattoo needle and loads of IDs with different names on them." Amanda spoke as she appeared in the doorway of the living room. All eyes travelled in her direction and she shook slightly at the weight of the stares. "I wasn't being nosey, I swear, she asked me to take her bag to Billy's room so I did and lots of her stuff fell out. She had all these fake IDs with different names but the same pictures on them, like, Laura Faugh, Emily Trot, Jennifer Barlot - those are the only names I remember and she caught me; her face was evil and I didn't know why she looked so angry at the time, I thought she was a fraud or something." Amanda let out a sob before continuing.

"She accused me of spying and she said, she said if I were to tell anyone, she would make sure it was my body that was found next and I had no idea what she meant at the time so I just ran out of the room and away from her, and soon after I broke down to my mum and told her everything, but by this time, Billy had already asked Amy to marry him and had moved out." Amanda was now sitting on Tina's lap, crying into the sleeve of her shirt.

Sherlock and John glanced at each other before Sherlock spoke softly, which surprised John. "How did you know that Amy was going to do?"

"Me and mum watch a lot of TV together, so we saw the murders over the months and we wanted to make sure nothing happened to Billy before- before it was-" She choked out a sob, "before it was too late."

Sherlock leaned back in his seat, the look on his face was obvious that he was calculating all this new information.

"Was Amy a nice person?" John asked. Tina chuckled weakly,

"Certainly not. She was a terrible girl, always putting Billy down and acting sweet and innocent. Billy couldn't see it, but she was very, very manipulative." Tina ran her fingers through Amanda's long hair, "on Amanda's birthday, she-"

"Say that again." Sherlock interrupted. John looked between Sherlock's focused stare to Tina's surprised face.

"Amanda's birthd-"

"No no, before that."

"She was very, very manipulative."

Then he was silent for a few more moments, the quietness making everybody but Sherlock look at each other in a confused manner. "Billy had a tattoo of her name on his wrist before he disappeared, correct?" He spoke up again.

"Yes."

"He kept complaining that it burned and itched, and it bled really badly that he had to put a bandage on it." Amanda sniffed quietly. "It hurt for a long time and sometimes he cried."

"That's all we need, thank you for your time." Sherlock stood from the sofa quickly, John following suit. Tina scooted Amanda off of her lap quickly and moved to the living room door.

"T-that's - it's fine, I could -" She stuttered, unheard by Sherlock as he moved passed her and walked to the front door, letting himself out. Typical Sherlock.

John, on the other hand, stopped beside Tina, "sorry, he's just-he's Sherlock so, you know..."

"I don't, but it's fine." She smiled slightly.

"If you ever need to talk to someone, here's my number, I know it's...difficult losing a loved one." He handed her a small, white card. She happily accepted and smiled again,

"Thank you. So much." She wiped her eyes at the small tears and John smiled warmly at her, saying his goodbyes and leaving. He did genuinely care for their clients, no matter who they were. Tina and Amanda had been through hell and back with this whole murder scenario - being pushed here, pulled there, not being helped - and John guessed it must be quite hard looking after a young teen when losing a son and a husband.

John smiled to himself as he reached the corner of the street where Sherlock was waiting for him.

"It's not a good idea to become close to clients, John." Sherlock had a slight warning tone to his voice which John had never heard before. He looked up at the man who hailed for a uncoming taxi.

"I'm not 'becoming close' to her, I just offered her a shoulder to cry on." John replied once they had climbed into the cab. Sherlock replied with an amused 'mmm' and John wondered what that meant.

"I'm impressed." John admitted.

"With what?" Sherlock asked looking out of the cab window, watching the people go passed.

"That you managed to act like a dick and still get the answers we needed." John grinned at Sherlock, who turned to John and chuckled slightly. They somehow managed to end up staring at each other, and John felt himself melting into the stare - those eyes were just too much not to stare at.

John coughed when realising the cabbie was glancing at them in the mirror and looked away. Sherlock did the same and John damned that cab driver.

"So, Amy was very manipulative." He dared to fight the oncoming awkwardness away with everything he had, even though he was sure he saw a spark between them as their eyes met, John was pretty certain he was too quickly conclusive and that sometimes became a problem.

"She was in control of each man during the relationship." Sherlock began, his voice smooth and low. "She drove each of them away from their families, tattooed them by herself with her own needle - possibly because of her possessive nature - changed her name each time during another relationship, murdered these men for a reason, what is that reason." He sounded frustrated, his fingers tapping on his knee in irritation.

It must be difficult, thinking so much but not being able to put it to use because of lack of information, John thought.

"Calm down, we'll look at the files when we get home and we'll try and find a link."

"It's no use, I've looked over every file, what could you possibly find that I haven't?" Sherlock snapped. His words were harsh but John knew he was just irritated - like a child. As always. John smiled to himself again. Seems like we have the old Sherlock back.

Apologies for spelling/grammar mistakes and shortness of this chapter - this is all I have written ;A; this case is becoming extremely devouring and it's the end of the easter term and I still haven't learnt my lines for drama - god help us all - jesus dicks.

as I always say: bare with me, Johnlock will get more noticeable during later chapters. Hopefully.

I am so terrible at this.