Silence In Belgravia
Cases of Silence
Rose woke up at ten to nine the next morning, hearing the front door slam loudly. It took her a few seconds to remember why, but once she did, she let our a loud groan, reality catching up with her again; Sherlock was seeing people; unsupervised.
Rose quickly jumped in the shower, taking only fifteen minutes to wash, dress and make herself overall presentable for potential clients, putting on her now usual black trousers, black shirt and heels, just in case Sherlock decided that they needed to go out suddenly. Putting her hair up in a low pony tail, she grabbed her phone, lighter and cigarettes and went to make her way upstairs.
Before she got to the stairs though, a knock at the door interrupted her. Oh, it's going to be a busy day today, isn't it? She thought, hoping that at least one of them would be interesting.
Opening the door, she saw a balding man in a tan coat standing there, looking rather awkward. "Umm…"
"For Sherlock Holmes?" Rose asked, knowing the drill by now of how to deal with potential clients. He nodded quickly and she opened the door wider for him. "Right this way, sir."
Taking him up the stairs, she showed him to the living room, chair already set out from the previous client that had just stormed out, calling out, "Sherlock, client for you."
Sherlock himself came in from the kitchen, dressing in his pyjamas still, dressing gown completing the look. He looked to the new man. "Ah, what have we got now then…"
Rose went to the kitchen to get herself a glass of orange juice and was listening in on the conversation.
"My wife," The man started, "seems to be spending a lot of time at the office-"
He was promptly cut off by Sherlock's dismissive, "Boring!"
Rose left the juice on the side, knowing that she would have to intervene before Sherlock really insulted the man; she knew it wouldn't take much, he wasn't in one of his more social moods today it seemed. Then again, when was Sherlock ever social, she thought absently as she walked briskly to the living room. Sherlock was pacing up and down, completely ignoring the stressed man in the chair.
"I'm sorry sir." She started, smiling slightly, already knowing what needed doing to cover Sherlock's back in these sorts of situations. "Mr Holmes doesn't really take on these sorts of cases."
"Oh." Said the man, looking a little confused. "Sorry to have wasted your time then." With that, he took his leave, Rose offering him a small smile before going to put the juice away.
Going to sit on the sofa, Rose put her drink on the table and lit up a cigarette. "You really should at least try to be a little more pleasant you know, possibly getting dressed and all that."
Sherlock didn't say anything to her, only continued pacing for several more minutes before going to his room at a seemingly random moment. Okay, not speaking to me, but not totally ignoring me either, I can live with that, Rose thought as she drained the last of her glass, contemplating going on the internet for a bit as she took it to the kitchen. Before she could make it back to the living room however, the door bell went off again.
Opening the door once again, Rose knew immediately it was going to be one of those boring days where no one would interest the Consulting Detective and it would be a rare thing for Rose to take one.
The short, dumpy woman just had that unhappy air around her; though that was usually the case when people came to them. If they were happy, there would be no job for them.
"Come in." Said Rose, holding the door open for the woman. After the new woman was seated in the living room Rose spoke again. "I'll go see if he's going to be long."
Going up to Sherlock's room she wondered for the hundredth time what could actually be in the man's room. Pushing away the thoughts - that were possibly boundless, Sherlock having such weird things in the kitchen, what could he have in his own room? - she knocked thrice on his door, noting the lack of noise from the shower. "Sherlock, you've got another client. Are you going to be long?" She waited for him, knowing that he would likely just not speak to her.
As predicted, two minutes later, Sherlock came out of his room, fully clothed, hair slightly damp. He spared her a small glance before heading to the living room to see the client. Rose just sighed and followed after him.
"I think my husband might be having an affair." The stranger started.
"Yes." Sherlock confirmed.
And that was how the day went on; Rose bringing in new clients, then trying to salvage some sort of consultation, Sherlock not speaking to her and insulting and annoying the people who cam in as much as he could it seemed.
After the woman whose husband was cheating on her, they had three more affair stories, a man who was suspected of insurance fraud and wanted his name cleared, a woman who thought her neighbour was trying to kill all her flowers and a case about a missing horse.
Rose went out that evening to get milk, only to come home to Sherlock shooting the wall again. She just made him coffee and a plate of jam on toast and left him to it, going to her room to listen to her music and do a little drawing. When night came, she got ready for bed, setting her alarm first and hoping that John would come home soon.
When she woke up in the morning, she found that the flat was quiet; unusually so. There was always some form of sound in 221B and the silence was usually more unnerving than whatever could be going on.
Quickly putting on her dressing gown that she picked up the other week - a treat that she thought may come in handy come the colder months - and went upstairs to see if Sherlock was about.
Going to the living room first, she found it empty of the man, the coffee cup empty, the toast with two bites out of it. Good enough.
Taking the mug and the plate to the kitchen, she found the man at the table, writing in a quick scrawl in one of his surprising extensive collection of notebooks. Putting the dishes in the sink, she made herself some fresh toast and a cup of tea, making another cup of coffee for Sherlock and then went to sit in the living room.
An hour later, she was full, showered, dressed and sitting on the sofa again, wondering what to do. Just as she was considering going to get a book off the shelf when the door bell rang.
Rose sighed. Here we go again.
Sitting in one of the chairs, Rose watched Sherlock pace around the room out of the corner of her eye, the upset man in front of her about to explain his problem, an urn clutched tightly in his hands.
"She's not my real aunt." He said, Rose raising an eyebrow at his words. "She's been replaced. I know she has. I know human ash-"
"Leave." Demanded Sherlock, Rose too shocked to actually say anything; the guy was creepy.
An hour later, Rose was interrupted in her reading by the door once more, finding three gentlemen on the door step. One sitting in the chair, the other two standing behind in a bodyguard fashion, Rose started the whole thing off.
"So, what's the problem, gentlemen?" She smiled.
The man in the chair spoke, the other two not even moving. "We are willing to pay any some of money you care to mention for the recovery of this fi-"
"Boring." Declared Sherlock.
Rose just smiled politely. "Not today it seems gentlemen. I'll see you out, shall I?"
Half an hour later, there was another trio of not so mature men sat in the living room, again one sat on the chair, the other two stood behind, though the three were far less intimidating then the previous group of men.
"We have this website, it explains the true meaning of comic books because people often miss a lot of the themes…" He started, but Sherlock was getting bored, they could all see, so the young man hurried on, trying not to get kicked out. "…but, then all the comic books started coming true!"
Sherlock paused in his pacing. "Oh…interesting." He seemed quite surprised by this fact.
Rose started paying more attention now, knowing that they would likely be taking this one; even if it was one of the more insane of the ones that they took. "So, something happens in a comic, then it happens in real life?"
One of the boys in the back spoke up then. "Oh, no, comic books aren't actually comics. They're graphic novels." He explained, voice quick and as though he had said the words so many times they were automatically strummed together.
Rose just blinked, not really knowing the difference between the three either way. "Oh… right."
He seemed to be embarrassed at speaking up then. "Don't worry, people usually make that mistake." She just smiled at him, trying to put him at ease again, but he just seemed to turn a little pink in the cheeks.
Sherlock just let out a huff at the break in information, Rose resisting an eye roll. "So, explain a little more. Have you actually seen them?"
"Yes." He replied, as though sure she wouldn't believe him and he was already tired of her arguments and teasing. She just raised an eyebrow though and he calmed himself a little. "Yes, I've seen Sophy, the Wolflady, getting rid of some luggage in New Cross Station as well as The Flying Bludgeon taking down a mugger, just on Wandsworth Common."
While Sherlock looked like this was all completely possible and that the young man's word was all he needed, Rose thought she needed a little more than that. "Do you have any evidence? Did anyone else see it?"
"I don't know about anyone else, we haven't heard anything, but I took a picture of one of them." He took his iPhone out of his pocket, flicking through files until he found the one he wanted, handing the devise over to Rose. "I wanted to be ready that time, wanted some proof."
Rose took the phone off of him, not really knowing what to expect but was surprised to see a blue skinned man, standing just outside of Greggs. Okay, this is starting to get a little weirder…
"Okay, where do we start, Sherlock?" She asked, handing the phone back over.
"What's your name?" He asked the seated young man.
"Chris Melas, and these two are kind of my assistants." The seated young man - Chris - explained.
It had been a long three days of Rose trying to get Sherlock to actually speak to her, but the man was annoyingly persistent. She had tried to ask question after question, each one getting more annoying or obvious in there answer each time. She had given that up after three hours, getting bored with it. In the end though, they solved the case, Sherlock using his homeless network to find a woman who knew about computers to find the answer.
Sherlock and Rose got out of the cab, both dressed in full black, masks on, covering their entire of their heads except for a strip over their eyes, wooden bladed swords strapped to their backs. They had just come back from the middle of Soho, getting a little revenge for the mistreatment of Chris and his friends, since the comic book company couldn't actually be held accountable for any illegal activities.
Heading up the stairs, Rose went to the living room where she had left her cigarettes and lighter as she could only fit her phone on her person in the outfit she wore. What she found sitting in the living room however was a now very freaked out and seemingly stressed Dr Watson, who had frozen at the sight of her and was now glancing over to the desk draw that held the gun they kept.
This will one be fun to explain, Rose thought.
John let himself into 221B, taking his suitcase up to his room before deciding that he could unpack later and that finding his flatmates would be a far better idea.
He had done a lot of thinking over the past several days, having Harry give her opinion on the situation as well. He could still remember his sister's slightly slurred words.
John, he sounds like a genius from what you've said. Just don't expect him to be perfect, he's there when it counts and does good things, even if it's not really for the right reasons. Give the guy a break!
John had realised though - though his sister was a little drunk, as always - she was generally right. Sherlock did do good things. He was there when it counted. He didn't dance around things, he'd either ignore it or be blatantly blunt about the facts. Though many may not see it, Sherlock was in fact a half decent person.
This was why when he had a phone call from Lestrade asking how his two flatmates were, John became a little worried.
"What do you mean, how are they?" John asked, wondering what on earth could have happened in the few days he'd been away.
There was a pause. "What do you think I mean? I'm wondering if they're alright. I know I'd still be a little out of it, even after a few days." Lestrade replied.
"Lestrade, I'm not in London, I haven't been for a few days. Last I knew they were both still working the bomber case…" Then it clicked. "Oh, god, what the hell's happened?"
Lestrade had explained everything to John - all that he knew anyway - and John had packed up his suitcase, getting the first train back to London to find out what had really happened. He knew that with Sherlock - and even Rose sometimes - there was always more than what was in the police report.
Going to the living room, he found it empty. Out on a case probably, he assumed. They can't be that bad then…
Sitting down in his favourite chair John tried not to worry too much, though the fact that he knew what both Sherlock and Rose were like, just because they weren't home, it didn't mean everything was alright.
He suddenly heard a cab pull up just outside though, followed shortly by the sound of the front door opening, two sets of foot steps on the stairs. John let out a breath in relief.
That was until - as impossible as it seemed - a ninja walked in the living room.
What…?
A woman by the looks of the general shape of the person - not so broad shoulders, slim and all round feminine in shape - dressed in full black, several layers of material making up her clothing, a gap about an inch or so in height ran from one side of her face to the other, letting two dark blue eyes peer out to him, each lined with black liner, eyelashes more defined with black mascara.
Not really knowing what to do, John froze. It took him a moment or two to remember the gun in the draw of the desk; the only problem was getting to it.
Before he could move though the person in front of him spoke and his eyes went wide at the voice he heard, recognising it instantly. "Want a cuppa, John?"
It took him a moment for the panic to settle a little but it was a little bit of a challenge as he had worked himself into such a state over his flatmates not being home and then having to possibly fight a ninja that he just blinked and nodded, trying to relax a little bit.
Rose just chuckled slightly, and moved to the kitchen to put the kettle on while Sherlock walked in the room behind her, throwing himself on the sofa. He had taken off his mask, showing his very unruly hair sitting on his head, but he was still dressed in his full black clothing, identical to Rose's, with a few alterations to make it fit better for him.
When Rose returned with two mugs - tea for John, coffee for Sherlock - she took one more trip to the kitchen, getting her own mug and walking to sit in the chair opposite John. Holding the steaming mug with one hand, she took off her mask to drink her own tea, showing her hair having been pulled back into a tight French plait, the tail of which was tucked into one of the folds of material around her back, hiding it from sight. After a moment or two of silence she spoke up, taking a sip of drink first. "Are you okay, John? You seem quiet."
John blinked and looked up at her. "Yeah, I'm fine." He seemed to remember his worries then, coming back down to earth from his cloud of unusual happenings that seemed to occur at 221B. "Are you?" He looked from her to Sherlock and back again, sensing that something wasn't quite right. "I mean… I heard about the bomb…"Her face paled slightly at the memory and she pulled out a box of cigarettes and her lighter, lighting up while avoiding his eyes. "Yeah, we're fine. Little shaken but we always bounce back, don't we, Sherlock?" Getting only a small, hm, in reply, Rose smiled slightly. Taking a deep pull on her cigarette, the end of it glowing brightly, she sighed out a large puff of smoke. "Good enough."
John frowned; what was going on? But at his curious, and slightly worried, look, she waved a hand at him and he frowned slightly, letting her know that they would have to talk about it some other time.
"How's Harry?" She asked instead, changing the subject.
The next morning, Rose got up at her usual time and listened to the familiar sounds of a once again full flat. Sherlock was in the shower, John in the kitchen, presumably making tea and toast. She wondered if they still had any jam in the fridge and made a mental note to check the food supply soon. Now they were all in and had no cases - so Sherlock would be eating more often, not that he would eat much still - they would need to find food in the cupboards at some point; probably soon too by the sounds of the multiple cupboards opening and closing.
Taking a quick shower, she put her hair up in a sloppy pony tail and dressed in her usual attire, complete with steel toe capped boots, ring, necklace and bandana. It was a rare day that she wore anything different, the bandana adding the only colour to the outfit apart from the odd different coloured shirt that came out of hiding every now and then.
Jogging up the stairs, she went to the living room to find John in his usual seat, a cup of tea on the table and a plate of buttered toast in front of him, the morning paper propped up for him to read. So predictable, she thought fondly. "I'll do a shop some time then, shall I?"
John looked up from his reading. "What?"She chuckled, going through to the kitchen to make her own toast and get a glass of orange juice. "We're out of jam. I'll get some soon." She replied while buttering her own slice of toast.
"No rush." Was the reply she got from the living room. When she went to sit with John, he put his paper down and gave her a look. She just raised an eyebrow at him, waiting for the inevitable question he wanted to ask. "What's happened?"
She knew what he was going on about. "Oh, he's just been ignoring me for a few days."
"That's … unusual." Replied John, knowing that his friend had a habit of not speaking for several days at a time, but he always answered eventually if asked a direct question. Something bad happened… "Why?"
"…Because I tricked him. Nothing too big." She shrugged it off, but knew that it was a big thing. This was confirmed by John's eyebrows shooting up as high as they would go, his eyes widening to dangerous levels, almost dropping the slice of toast he had just picked up.
"You tricked him?" He asked, wondering if he heard her right. "Sherlock Holmes? You're sure?"
She just smiled slightly, trying not to laugh. "Yeah…""How?" He asked, face not changing still.
"Well…" She started, not quite sure of herself now she had to tell him what she had done. "I got the pen drive with the Bruce-Partington plans… and switched it and gave him the other one." She chewed her lip for a second while John just stared, eyes slightly wider than before - if that were even possible. "Then gave the real one to Mycroft."
It took John a second or two to realise what she had said. "How did he not…?"
"I don't know." She said, shaking her head slightly. "I thought he would..."
They sat in silence for a while, thinking about the past few days. After a few minutes, Sherlock came down and threw himself on the sofa in his thinking position, but both his flatmates could see he was bored; he had finished checking his experiments and couldn't be bothered to think up anymore for now, and he still didn't have a case!
It was an hour later, when Rose and John were on their respective laptops, Sherlock still sulking on the sofa, when there was a ringing through the silent flat.
Rose frowned; barely anyone ever called her, everyone she knew preferred to text. Looking at the screen however - as Sherlock had complained that she could never know who was calling and she should always look at the screen - she smiled. It was Lestrade.
"Hello stranger." She answered, knowing that he would have something for them to do; if Sherlock didn't find it too boring of course.
"Hey, Rose." He greeted. He had started calling her instead of Sherlock after a gap of them working together mainly because Sherlock was a pain to work with and she was far more friendly than the Consulting Detective. "Listen, we've got a… weird one and we could use a bit of help to be honest…"
She chuckled at his awkward tone. He always seemed to not like asking for their help. "Don't worry, we're all bored out of our minds anyway." At her words, Sherlock looked over hopefully and John looked up, wondering what was going on now.
"Alright." He sounded quite relieved. "Go down to St Bart's morgue, I'll meet you there."
"Grabbing our coats now. See you soon." She replied, standing from her chair and motioning for the guys to get up as well as she spoke. Sherlock begrudgingly did, but John stayed seated. Hanging up, she pulled her own coat on and spoke to Sherlock instead. "Lestrade's got a case. He's gonna meet us at the morgue."
"Finally…" He muttered in reply, pulling on his scarf over his coat and taking out his gloves. "You coming, John?"
John just looked between them for a moment before breaking out in a surprisingly childish smirk for the good doctor. "You think I'm going to let you two go off on your own again after the last time I left? Fat chance!"
Rose just smirked as John shot up and grabbed his coat, Sherlock giving him a faint smile and the three of them were once again off down the stairs and getting in a cab, heading to St Bart's.
Rose was stood next to Lestrade in the morgue, watching as John and Sherlock worked; John going over the medical aspects of the blond body, Sherlock looking at the little details.
Sherlock broke the silence. "Do people actually read your blog?"
"Where do you think our clients come from?" John answered absentmindedly.
Sherlock didn't miss a beat though. "I have a website."
Again, neither did John, Rose just watching the verbal tennis between the two men, wondering if was going to end badly. "…In which you innumerate two hundred and forty types of tobacco ash." Sherlock looked up at his words, distracted from his work then. "Nobody's reading your website." The pair of them stood up and Sherlock gave John a blank look. Rose thought it would be better if she interrupted them before anything serious could start.
"Right then!" She said loudly, Lestrade jumping slightly, having almost forgotten she was there. "Dyed blond hair. Have we got a cause of death?"
"Nothing obvious." John answered, looking over the body once more pointing out his words to them. "Except from these speckles, whatever they are."
Before he had finished however, Sherlock was striding from the room, leaving the three of them looking to each other, wondering what to do. Rose just sighed and followed him, John not far behind, the pair of them familiar with the way they all worked together. Lestrade just followed behind them all, wondering what was going on.
A few days later, the case was closed and it was morning when John was sat in his chair, writing up the blond woman's case. He had entitled it "The Speckled Blond" thinking that it was an appropriate title. Apparently Sherlock disagreed.
Walking through the living room, toast in one hand, paper in the other, Rose watching absently, he passed John and went back for another look at the screen, frowning as he did so, speaking around his toast. "Oh, for god's sake. The Speckled Blond?"
He gave John a look and carried on walking. John however looked to Rose, frowning slightly. She just smiled at him. "It's fine. Ignore him." John just nodded and started typing again.
Later on that day, when they were all dressed and appropriate for possible clients, the door bell rang. Starting their usual routine, John put down his book, Sherlock started pacing and Rose went to get the door. When she came back she had two young girls following her, about eight and five years old. They squeezed together into the one chair, even though Rose had offered to get them another one.
"What's the matter then, girls?" Rose started kindly, not wanting Sherlock to scare them. Genius though he may be, subtlety wasn't his strong point in these situations and children were even less of his forte.
"They wouldn't let us see Granddad when he was dead." Said the younger of the two. "Is that 'cause he gone to heaven?"
Rose felt sorry for the two girls but before she could answer them, Sherlock did. "People don't really go to heaven when they die. They're taken to a special room and burned."
Rose felt her eyes go wide and her face go pale. She could barely form a thought through the shock of what he'd just said. The girls looked at each other and Rose came to her senses enough to say, loudly and slightly outrageously, voice unusually high pitched, "Sherlock!"
John was a little better for it and ignored his two friends, one of which looked so shocked he doubted she would get out of it any time soon, the other just looked as though he had been woken up suddenly from a deep sleep and didn't quite know where he was; he didn't have a clue what he had done wrong this time.
The doctor turned to the two girls who didn't seem to know whether to run or just sit and cry and spoke softly to them. "Is your mummy waiting outside for you, girls?" The older one nodded, putting an arm around her little sister. "Okay. Shall we go and see her, then she can take you home, yeah?"
As the girls nodded, John took them downstairs and back to their mother. When he came back, Sherlock was sat on the sofa and Rose was still looking at him in the same, disbelieving manner.
It was a full minute late when Rose actually spoke. "Sherlock… you can't just say that to kids!"
Sherlock didn't move other than to reply with, "It's the truth. They have to learn it at some point."
Rose opened and closed her mouth several times, trying to thing of some form of argument to his words. Finding the task a little too difficult, she turned to John. John saw this coming though and just shrugged. Sherlock was right in a weird way; reality may be harsh, but it was reality none the less. They would have had to find out at some point in their lives.
Rose just let her shoulders drop and let out a huff, going to the kitchen to make drinks for them all, shaking her head as she went. John just smiled slightly, feeling - strangely - right at home.