Why Fireflies Flash
Chapter Sixteen
"Long Nights"

Anabeth sighs to herself. The letter is half crumpled in her hand as she takes a seat on the stoop of the club's back door. The body had already been taken to St. Bart's and all the witness interviewed all that was left was to wait for the autopsy and inevitably the next body. Of course there's evidence here, with this crime, but none of it would be worth a damn until the next victim.

It wasn't six minutes later that a wet nose pressed against her thigh. She looks down the Siberian Husky and smiles.

"What are you doing here girl?" she asks as she scratches the dog's head.

"I found her, wandering the streets, alone and lost."

Quinn looked up in to blue eyes so similar to hers. "Lies. Lizzy is never lost, are you girl?"

Lizzy, or more commonly Blizzard, presses her nose to her companions thigh in assent.

"So, back to work so soon?"

Alfie shrugs. "Eh, Chris'll understand. My baby sister needs me."

Anabeth shook her head. "I do not need you. I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself."

The brother glances around the alley. "Certainly seems like it."

Quinn clears her throat and glares at him. "Is there a team coming to examine the scene?"

Alfie shook his mess of ginger curls. "No. I believe everything that's worth examining has already been. But of course, you could always have you detective friend come over."

"He is on his way."

Alfie bends down and pushes her hair behind her ear and smiles as he straightens up.

"What was that?"

Alfie smirks. "Just making sure you haven't turned completely Vulcan on us. There's hope for you yet."

"Gee, thanks."

Anabeth paces the alley as Hannah reads aloud the letter, her thigh high purple suede stiletto boots clicking on the dirty ground.

"Harley, will you stop that?" Hannah asks suddenly. "It's giving me whiplash."

"This sick bastard has her, Wayne. And you want me to just stand here?" Quinn growls. "You know me better than that."

"And we've also been here for forty-five minutes," Alfie states irritated. "When is your little detective friend supposed to show up?"

Quinn gives him a glance. "You are just cranky from the cold."

"You're right, I am." He sighs and pinches the bridge of her nose. "I don't understand, Ana, what's going on? You're never this discombobulated. You're always analytical, always together. What does this case have that others don't? You've been found out before so that's not it."

Anabeth's answer is cut off by the sharp vibrating of her phone. She starts to pace again as she pulls the message up.

Hello? Anybody there? Annie-belle?

Her face goes sour at the nickname. She really never did like it.

"So that's it?" Alfie asks. "It's Jim again? Fifteen years and you're still not over him?"

"Will you two stop making me older than I really am? It is fourteen years and yes, I am over him. I have been. And do not think I have forgotten I was not the only one hurt by his leaving me. I seem to remember you both on the couch scarfing down Ben & Jerry's whilst I got ready for yet another therapy session months after the fact."

Hannah gets an aha! look to her face. "You were in therapy because why? Oh that's right, you immediately went into shock and wouldn't speak for months after the fact."

Anabeth groaned. "Do we have to talk about my personal life?"

"Ana, this whole thing, being in London, you trying to nab Jim, is your personal life," Alfie explains. "I hate to break it to you, but unless you drag him into Langley tomorrow morning, your personal life is what we have to talk about."

Hannah cleared her throat and nods to the other end of the alley. Anabeth turns and sighs in relief. She walks swiftly toward the Consulting Detective and his partner-in-crime-solving with Blizzard at her heels. She pulls up her own photos, snapped before the police arrived, and hands the former the phone.

"Sherry Frans, 28, a dancer here at the Stallion. It appears she was killed with a straight razor to the throat. These were the only pics I got before your friend showed up."

Sherlock's eyes had traced her as she waltzed toward him. Speechless now, he looks down to the Joker themed iPhone and swipes through the pictures.

"Lestradecoudnthandlethis?" He clears his throat and shakes his head. "Lestrade couldn't handle this?"

"Should I stop dressing like this?" Anabeth asks looking to John who was trying to find something to not stare at himself. "Because it seems any time I'm in less than a blouse and skirt, Holmes finds himself tongue tied."

"Yes, that would, ahem, be nice," John replies still looking away.

Anabeth gives a humorless laugh. "It would seem so. And to answer your nearly indecipherable question, Holmes, yes, Lestrade could handle the case. And on the record he is. But I need someone who knows my true occupation to work it off the case. I would do it myself but the simple fact of my emotional involvement prevents me from doing so. Hannah is of no use to me and Alfie is not made for the field." She turns to them, "No offense. So that leaves me with you two. Again no offense meant."

Sherlock meets Quinn's emotionless eyes for a brief moment.

"I owe you," she says softly before returning to her previous group. "I found her by the dumpster. Lestrade found this note. Probably in her pocket." She holds up the letter. "The contents are in the memo I sent you. Lestrade should be sending the rest of the information and evidence found, if he hasn't already. I am having Alfie analyze the handwriting, like always. I am treating this as any other op, forgive me if I seem too mechanized." The letter is passed to her brother and she stalks back down the alley to get her phone.

"I did not get very long to look at the body, so I am off to St. Bart's. The woman in the morgue, the little brunette willing to do anything you say, what was her name?"

"Molly Hooper," Sherlock answers. "Are you not staying?"

"And have you stare at the giant bow on my ass or the jewels adorning my brassiere?" Anabeth questions with a sultry voice. "I'm assuming anyway. I'll pass on that one. As I said, I'm off to St. Bart's."

St. Bart's Hospital

"Molly Hooper, correct?"

The slender brunette turns from the buffet and to the voice. She comes face to face with the American woman from weeks ago now.

"Yes," she says slowly.

The dark haired woman smiled warmly. "We met earlier. I'm Anabeth Ryder, part-time dancer, part-time artist, and apparently now part-time detective. I live in the flat beneath Holmes."

"Oh, nice to meet you." Molly's still weary of the woman, pictures of her earlier temper flaring in her mind.

"And you. I was wondering, um Holmes mentioned that you would be my best option, but I was hoping that you might allow me to look at a, um," Anabeth allows her voice to crack here, "girl that came in earlier, uh Sherry Frans?"

Molly looks down at her clipboard and spots the name. "Oh, I've just sent off the paperwork."

Anabeth frowns. "Alright then. You've sent your findings to DI Lestrade I presume then?" She doesn't wait for an answer.

"Miss Ryder?" Molly calls before she's too far away. Anabeth turns with a bright smile on her face, though it looks forced. "Did Sherlock not tell you to look at the body yourself? He always has his... colleague look if he can't."

"I'm not a colleague, Miss Hooper. And please call me Anabeth. I'm not even a friend. I was intrigued by my strange neighbor and when he offered me a chance to tag along, I took it. I wanted to see a friend one last time and inquired of him a way to and he gave me your name. But if you've finished with her, I see no call for you to drag her out again. We weren't that close after all. I knew her from work."

Molly returns the woman's now solemn smile. "I could pull her out for just a moment. It's hardly a big deal."

Anabeth nods once. "You're in need of a friend, Molly Hooper. One not enamored by death. I hope I could be that friend one day. Until we meet again, Miss Hooper."

221C Baker Street

"You know, your detective friend is kinda hot," Alfie says as he lounges on the couch. "I mean, the short one's kinda cute. But if I was you, I'd go after the psychopath."

"Sociopath," Anabeth corrects.

"So you do care."

"Only about the misuse of the word "psychopath." And he has a name."

Alfie looks up at his sister whose sitting sideways in her armchair with the dog under her hand. "Of which you only use the surname of."

"You are here to tell me about the handwriting."

"It's not an exact science."

"I know."

"And it's very easy to disguise."

"Yet most people do not. So what did you get?" she asks as she pick up the letter yet again.

Alfie sighs and looks down at the photocopy on the coffee table. "You see how the letters don't slant? He's like you."

This earns him a glare. "I do not kill and kidnap people."

"Not anymore," he reminds. Anabeth drops her gaze back to the letter. "I meant, he's logical and practical and guards his emotions. Now look at where he's says "I challenge the youngest Quinn..." His writing starts to tilt to the right. He's starting to become manipulative, controlling, perhaps a bit intrusive. His lettering is large, using both the front and back of the paper. He's outgoing and has a big personality, but it might just be an act. Heavy pressure might be a sign of commitment or seriousness, I wouldn't doubt either. But the inordinate amount of it... he's volatile. One wrong word and he'll snap.

"Closed L's and E's mean he's tense and skeptical. Probably about giving you so many hint's in this first letter, maybe about pleasing you, which is given away by the roundness of his S's. Tall upper stokes, as in L's and T's and H's like he has, show he has an unrealistic expectation of what he should achieve with the conquest. The way his G's and Y's lack a loop; he's impatient. The spacing between words could indicate a wish to be with others with the narrowness. It's more probable for him to be intrusive. The small distance between lines mean he's close to the action.

"Now," Alfie states with a deep breath, "the margins. The left margin being narrow, hints to caution and avoidence of being pushed before they're ready. The right being narrow as well, tells of impatience and an eagerness to continue."

"And you said it was not an exact science," Anabeth says amused.

"It's not. Anabeth, listen to me," he tells her seriously, "I know you trust me and my judgment. But it could go either way with this. I could be spot on, or I could be dead wrong. Hell, it could be some variation in the middle."

"What does you gut say?"

Alfie sighs. "My gut? My gut says this is a guy you can't challenge. You do what he says to every letter and don't go off course. Get Emily back and be done with or without apprehending the perpetrator."

"Then it is a good thing I do not rely on not gut feelings but analysis."