Ahh, sorry, I meant to post this yesterday! :D Hope it's still acceptable today :)
Warnings for drug references. Also, there's a possibility the rating MAY go up next chapter (wait and see how I feel when it's written) so bear in mind if that happens it may be filtered out. Just a heads up! :)
John wakes up the next day with the same sense of impending dread and worry that weighed in his stomach the day before. The prospect of getting up has been getting increasingly unappealing the past few days, but he dresses nonetheless, and stumbles downstairs, not relishing the idea of having to spend the entire day with a grouchy detective.
However, upon entering the kitchen, he notices that Sherlock is actually properly dressed too: and not in the uniform of pyjamas that he seemed to have adopted recently. He's wearing both his coat and shoes, and judging by the packets on the table that were not present the day before, John guesses he's already been out. A faint spark of hope begins to glow…was Sherlock actually doing something?
His gloom diminished somewhat, John surveys the cupboards for something to eat, managing to procure some cereal and milk that was neither off, nor contained levels of acid unsafe to human beings.
"What's in the packets?" he asks, pouring muesli into a bowl. They were small, with zip-lock tops, and contained some kind of powder that John was not prepared to attempt to identify at this time on a Sunday morning. He stifles a yawn.
"Diacetylmorphine hydrochloride."
There's a very brief pause: in which John blinks sleepily, and Sherlock rests his hands behind his head; the action accompanied by a quirking of the lips that might have been a smirk.
"Heroin in crystal form, then," John translates, unable to prevent a smile at his flatmate's shock. The hands are removed from behind the younger man's head; and the smirk replaced with a far stonier expression. There's a second pause, filled with John's amusement and Sherlock's resentment.
"I am a doctor, Sherlock."
Sherlock's attempt to keep the scowl off his face fails abysmally.
"Probably got illegally," John shoots the man a reproving look, "judging by the fact that it's brown not white – means it's adulterated in some way."
He looks up from the bowl he'd been pouring bran flakes into, to sneak a glance at his flatmate. He can't help but feel a little smug that his knowledge in this instance well keeps up with the consulting detective's.
"You are on excellent form this morning," Sherlock tells him, looking impressed. "Not standard knowledge for a doctor, though."
"Yeah, well," John says, moving his eyes back to his cereal. "I did some research after Harry started drinking…drugs and alcohol aren't so separate. And there's been some drug problems in Afghan in the past: would be stupid to be completely ignorant."
"Agreed."
There's silence for a moment. John has millions of questions in that instant; but he's uncertain of how to breach his concerns. It's not a conundrum he's used to, being around Sherlock. Generally, bluntness will suffice just fine, but they've had one too many disagreements recently, and he doesn't want to start another.
The sooner this case was over, the better. He chews on his cereal by the counter, mulling his thoughts over.
"Why the hell is it here?" he asks finally, keeping his voice as friendly as possible, but hearing the slight hysteria he felt as his voice rose significantly at the end of the question, and cracked.
"Don't overreact, John."
The detective's calm disdain does not pacify the doctor.
"You'd better have a decent explanation." He persists, folding his arms, and swallowing his mouthful.
He watches Sherlock very carefully. The detective takes his time answering, first propping his feet up on an available chair, and shifting the packets around on the table. Although he was almost certainly doing it to be annoying, John wants to slap his hands away from them.
"I'm merely gaining the dealers' trust, so I can find out more about them: their motives, strategy."
"Right," John says stiffly. He's not entirely convinced. "Could you not do that another way?"
"No. This is the most effective. Of course, the police would never have thought of it. Armed policemen showing up in the middle of the night was never going to make them more open."
John sighs, turning back to his breakfast.
"Maybe they didn't want to spend police money on illegal drugs," he comments, only half joking.
Sherlock rolls his eyes and picks up a packet, examining it.
"Besides, I can use this for experimentation. I haven't had decent access to it for some time, and hard drugs are often closely linked with crime."
John joins him at the table, carefully setting his bowl down as far away from the heroin as was possible. He takes another mouthful, looking at his flatmate with suspicion, which draws a sigh from him.
"What kind of experimentation?"
"Not on myself."
John nods, chewing. There's still some doubt in his mind, and apparently it shows on his face too, because Sherlock rolls his eyes again, and stands up.
"Stop worrying. I'm going out. You can put it in the margarine tub if it bothers you so much."
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A week passes. The margarine tub is checked frequently by both inhabitants of 221B during that time – Sherlock periodically raiding the contents for his experiments, John peering into it suspiciously and replacing the lid with a frown when the stock appeared depleted. On many occasions, he had asked for the details of the detective's experiments, which Sherlock had then had to tediously relay. On some levels he appreciated John's concern; but the appreciation was tainted somewhat by annoyance at having to recount his experiments (wasting valuable working time) and indignation that John seemed to trust him so little. There had been a number of instances where John had actually threatened to inform Lestrade of the substances in the flat when Sherlock refused to tell him of his experiments. Hiding the drugs would be mind-numbingly tedious, and John unfortunately did not tend to make empty threats.
His flatmate's suspicion was certainly a hindrance; and were John Mycroft, Sherlock would have paid him no heed at all, and his attitude would have in fact hastened the speed at which he returned to the dealers. However, this was John, and the respect he had for the man had in fact waylaid his return. But a week had passed, Sherlock was restless, and the trust of these people was vital to solving the problem. John was not stupid; he would grit his teeth and try to understand.
Sherlock sighs, his eyes drifting to the school gates just a few feet away from him. The building certainly strikes an ominous picture in this weather: water droplets pouring off the peeling paint of the railings, the building dark and looming behind the bars. One window seems to have been left open by a careless cleaner, the metal banging intermittently in the wind.
The detective's shoes splash slightly in the grime accumulated on the pavement, his coat swirls around his calves in the wind. Being a weekend, the playground is completely deserted, but in the week it would be crawling with police, trying to prevent the students from inadvertently being sucked into the drug scene, and ultimately signing their own death certificates. The painted markings on the concrete leer garishly through the gates and the rain: the yellows and reds too cheerful for a place where such sombre happenings had root.
The murders keep coming, steadily, and people are getting nervous. The number of students at this school is dropping frighteningly – a small proportion murdered, a much larger proportion being pulled out by their parents, and being moved to schools across the city. Sherlock inhales, his mind wandering. Why just this school?
He looks around him, pulling on the lapels of his coat to draw the garment closer around him, breathing in the cool air. The spot seems entirely deserted, and he turns from the school, faces the houses opposite instead, and meanders across the sodden road towards a little alley. On the surface, there's nothing suspicious about it – just concrete with grass forcing through at the edges, and dripping pine fences encasing the walkway. A few spots of chewing gum spatter the ground, but it looks perfectly respectable. Children would walk home down here; play here in good weather.
There's a man waiting there. He's short, with brown hair and a matching beard, and is sporting a bulging overcoat. Sherlock sniffs, his grip on his own coat tightening a little. Instantly, he catalogues the man's face: the set of his jaw, his cheekbones, his eyes crinkled at the edges. He's late forties, lives alone, ex-engineer judging by his boots, but fallen on hard times and sucked into drugs. He's different to the man Sherlock met last. That surprises him: he would have thought the group would be more careful, allowing customers to see only a very select number of them, just in case one turned to the police. Then again, he reasons, as a gust of wind blows a strong smell of smoke from the man, he himself hadn't given his name. This business was inextricably entwined with secrets and double-crossing, and revealing your identity was unwise. All they had to lose from revealing another member to him was another garbled description to the police. Of course, they didn't know who they were dealing with.
Or, did it mean that they did know who they were dealing with; and they didn't want one member too extensively researched? Not enough evidence to be certain. Annoying.
Even in his days being dependant – as Mycroft had put it – on the drugs, Sherlock had never been keen on staying in the dealers' company for too long. Rather like in the case of the homeless network, disinfecting oneself after prolonged contact was necessary. Unfortunately, with this case, prolonged contact was vital. Trust. He needed to burrow beneath the hard exterior; he needed to them to trust him.
He approaches the man, giving him a wary nod, which is returned. They both contemplate each other for a few moments, before Sherlock draws closer. The man's expression seems to be fixed permanently in a state of suspicion, but the taller man is unperturbed. From experience, he knows such people to be very wary, particularly of outsiders, new customers – the drugs trade is so interlinked with crime and double crossing that it would be foolish to be complacent. There's rivals, and people so desperate they'll do anything to get what they need.
The exchange is quick: notes swapped for the same little packets that resided in the margarine tub at Baker Street, passed under their coats. There's no CCTV in this alley, but they both no there's nothing to gain by being sluggish. There's too much suspicion, too much they both have to lose by being caught. They exchange the same curt nods as they did in greeting, both leaving the opposite end of the alley that they came. The man, Sherlock notes, removes his coat before striding into view of the cameras near the school. Sherlock catalogues it, and fires off a quick text to Lestrade.
Possibility murderer is changing clothes between cameras. Bear in mind. SH.
The amount of the drug he pockets this time is far less than previously. He needs more frequent meetings to speed up the process of gaining these people's trust. All he has at present is a mutual need to be discreet.
Upon exiting the alley at the opposite end, Sherlock finds himself emerging onto a quiet little street: all houses, with a little corner shop at the end. He enters the shop, buys a newspaper, and heads home. No point having the police suspecting him to have a part in the murders. That got tiring very quickly.
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When he returns home, it is to find a very agitated John Watson, not dissimilar to the John Watson he has had to endure since the Sunday previously, when he first brought the heroin into the house. Unsurprisingly, the man is not encouraged by their fresh stock of it. Sherlock is genuinely touched by the concern – though still faintly insulted by John's perception of his willpower – but the constant worry is grating. He can feel it radiating off the doctor even in the silence, and it's annoying when one is trying to think.
He sinks into the sofa, takes one look at his flatmate, and rolls his eyes.
"Go on then. Let's hear it."
He reasoned that perhaps if John got it out of his system, he would be more bearable. People liked to voice their opinions. He watches the doctor closely, his pale eyes not leaving his face. John looks more strained than normal: there's a crease that seems constantly etched into his forehead now, that was never present before. That glint of excitement, always present on their cases, was tarnishing. He just looked tired.
At Sherlock's words he grins and shakes his head. Sherlock frowns pointedly, and nudges him with his toes.
"I'm just worried."
"About?"
"You. Those kids."
"John, I promise you I will not touch those drugs except for experimentation purposes," Sherlock tells him, injecting as much sincerity into his voice as he could muster. He meant it. He didn't want to see John like this.
John gives a smile, albeit a small and uncertain one.
"I know."
"Good."
There's silence for a moment, which John thankfully breaks. Sherlock had assumed he still had something to say, and as such had kept his own mouth shut. Of course, he had been right.
"This is a lot…more sinister than anything else we've done before. It's just getting to me."
Sherlock gives a sympathetic smile, and sighs. Although he wouldn't admit it out loud, this case has been 'affecting' him similarly. Not as much as John, but then, he was far more accustomed to switching off every shred of humanity. Here, the humanity kept on crawling back through his defences. He found his head reeling, his eyes stinging and his stomach lurching at random intervals; whenever his mind disobeyed him, calling up the images of the children from the morgue. He knew John was suffering from something similar, if his restless sleep was anything to go by. He could hear the doctor tossing and turning as he sat awake, thinking.
He'd tried desperately to delete the horror he felt at those little bodies, to retain only the ability to look at them analytically. It never worked. There was always that massive sense of waste, of those lives that had barely begun, snuffed out before their worth could be discovered properly.
He spots a fresh file stashed next to where his flatmate sat, and reaches for it automatically. John opens his mouth to explain, but Sherlock knows without the apologetic explanation. Lestrade had come to call.
Murder number seven.