A quick update from me, having quite an exestential crisis at the moment and falling apart a bit, so writing is hard. Thank you very, very much to all of you who're supporting this, I never dreamed it would get the response it has. In case of confusion, there are no pies in this instalment, porky pies is rhyming slang for lies- and this carries on from the previous chapter. This chapter is again dedicated to SammyKatz, hopefully this puts a smile on your face.

P is for Porky Pies

Molly was not impressed with herself. Not only was she not angry at the show Sherlock had put on in front of her fiancé and his friends, she was glad for it, as it was an escape from boredom and the untrusting glances Tom gave her when he thought she wasn't looking. Being slung over Sherlock's shoulder was not the most comfortable method of transport, but it was much less organ squishing and bone crunching than the time Tom had tried to carry her up some stairs in an attempt at being chivalrous. Some self-reflection was definitely in order before they starting booking things for their wedding, as Sherlock had decided that they needed to set a date and book a venue as soon as feasibly possible now John's wedding was nearing completion. As fun as it had been at first, she was now wondering if Sherlock's excessive wedding planning was some sort of sign, or even worse, somehow influenced by her mother. She sighed heavily, squealing slightly as she was put back on her feet, attention firmly on the matter at hand.

Sherlock handed Molly the emergency bag, which contained medical supplies, some clothes and food rations in case a situation was deemed unsafe and she had to go into hiding. She pulled out a pair of nitrile gloves and bent down to assess the situation with the body. Strangely, Sherlock hadn't said a word, she was so used to drowning him out during autopsies that it was more than a little unnerving to have him quiet. One look at the body told her why. It was evident that this was a plant, the injuries sustained were not consistent with the environment and the corpse looked to be a few days old at least. She took off her gloves, and having not needed to touch anything shoved them in her pockets. The pair looked at each other, Molly, exasperated and Sherlock moderately amused, he spoke in a low quiet voice that caught her off-guard,

"Mycroft wants a favour from you," He scanned the area for agents, noting a select few monitoring them.

"What on Earth could he possibly want from me?" Molly asked, getting more unnerved by the minute.

"Something of the highest priority and security," Sherlock responded, increasing her panic and guaranteeing she missed the flicker of sarcasm in his voice.

"Are you sure he doesn't want me to bake him a cake or something? I thought they had their own agents for top secret stuff," Molly all but whispered, she'd had numerous weird requests from the younger brother over the years, but did not expect this from the elder. If this was his way of giving her another job offer, he could delicately insert it somewhere she didn't care to think about.

It surprised them both that John was not with Mycroft when he casually strolled up alongside them, brolly in hand and a smug grin on his face. He cleared his throat dramatically, causing Sherlock to roll his eyes so hard they nearly fell out.

"Get on with it, you've made the whole thing overdramatic as it is," Sherlock grumbled,

"You're the dramatic one." Mycroft spat at his brother, forgetting his public image for a moment. "Ms- Dr. Hooper, we are in need of your services over the next few days. It is a matter of some urgency that requires someone with patience, and discretion, which discounts our friend here, and we thought you may be the best person for the job." He explained, trying his best to be charming and witty but failing miserably.

"Oh please, I'm not the one who engineered this situation to ask someone with no ties to us to babysit our parents." Sherlock snapped, irritated with the attempted sweet-talk by his brother, and the thoroughly unnecessary interruption to his day.

Upon hearing Sherlock's blunt assessment of her proposed job several emotions flashed across her face, firstly confusion, followed by a murderous intent, and then she settled on pity. Having spent a brief period of time with their parents following the hiding in the bathroom incident, she could see the clash between the personalities of the parents and their children, but that didn't excuse the rudeness with which they were treated. She knew the brothers were counting on her compassion and general humanity to want to treat their parents the way they knew they should. She glared at both of them,

"So what's in this for me?" Molly asked slowly, deciding that she may as well get something out of this, as it was more or less a foregone conclusion that she would 'babysit' the Holmes parents. Maybe a posh holiday or a Sherlock-free day? Perhaps she could convince Mycroft to take the bugs out of her bedroom.

"Name your terms Dr Hooper, but bear in mind that this arrangement will get you out of pub night and fishing-night for the foreseeable future," Mycroft replied carefully, keeping a watchful eye on his too silent little brother brooding in the background.

"As appealing as missing out on those events is, I think I'd quite like for the visual bugs in my bedroom to be removed, and every other parental meeting to be accompanied by one of you. You can alternate." Molly grinned, she'd been after a way to stop the creepy prying on her sleeping space for a while. She hoped she hadn't gone in too high, over all the years she'd known them, the brothers didn't often negotiate, least of all with her, but maybe she was coming into a little luck. Sherlock looked at Mycroft, his nose wrinkled in disgust, although it wasn't clear as to whether the idea of cameras in her bedroom or spending time with his parents was the cause of his offense. Mycroft remained impassive,

"You will see them monthly, Sherlock and I will join you once a quarter. There will be a car to pick you up every Tuesday and Thursday nights to take you to a pre-approved venue where you can do as you please in quiet. I shall have the visuals scrambled when there is no suspect audio. Good day," He stated, walking off before either party could argue or notice his gleeful smile at getting a better deal than he'd anticipated.

Sherlock whined all the way back to the pub about having to waste his valuable time on actually conversing with his parents, or worse, going to the theatre with them. Outwardly he may appear unimpressed, but this played right into his hands with regards to his little Tom problem. He was quite confident that upon finding out their arrangement Tom would not be best pleased, after all it was fairly common knowledge that Molly and her mother in law did not get along, so for him to find out she'd been enjoying time with mummy could only be amusing. Not to mention the fun of finding out she's actively avoiding him and his friends covertly, facilitated by the British Government himself. He had to actively suppress a grin at the thought of the pre-approved venue being Baker Street, Molly was not going to be impressed and Tom even less so. He did love it when a plan came together.

Unfortunately for John, the cover for this plan necessitated him acting as 'protection' for Tom due to Molly's 'highly secret and security sensitive' work. What was arguably worse was that both Sherlock and Mycroft had negated to tell John that it was all an elaborate hoax, and neither of them wanted to be around when he found out.