What is this? Yet another chapter within a reasonable time frame? It's a miracle! Thank you for all your support, as always :)

U is for Underwear

Tom had returned from Edinburgh a week ago, and was still to raise the issue of how Sherlock's mother had turned up at his hotel, taken the cat and given him a suitcase full of clothing identical to that which had been ruined. He was slowly coming to terms with the fact that he would have to accept these weird and wonderful phenomena in his life if he wished to marry Molly and spend the rest of his life with her. He'd put up with a lot over the last year or so, from kidnappings to sporadic jam attacks, as well as coming home to find all number of things randomly put in his living space. He was coming to the end of his tether, and finding Molly's laissez-faire attitude to it all more and more frustrating as the days went by. He would give it until John and Mary's wedding, then reassess his life choices, because as much as he loved Molly, he loved his sanity more. Today was turning out to be particularly trying, with meetings and conference fall-out that had taken more time than they should have, and meant that he would not be able to pick up his beloved dog from his parents until next weekend at the earliest. To top it off, when he got home he was greeted by the acrid smell of smoke, but without the expected fire alarm beeping, or emergency services. Hoping that it was downstairs or on the wind, he opened the door to find that it was indeed in his lounge. Sherlock was sat at the dining table, with what appeared to a laundry basket, several petri dishes, his microscope, and a Bunsen burner. He did not acknowledge Tom's entry into the flat, not looking up from his experiment, and scribbling down some observations before plucking some frilly knickers out of the laundry basket, petting the cat that was in there, and promptly setting fire to said knickers. Tom's eyes widened comically, those were some of Molly's favourites, which put him in a very uncomfortable position, should he tell Molly and disrupt Sherlock's experiment, or leave the situation alone and be shouted at later for not saying anything? He opted for the former, texting his wife-to-be that Sherlock was setting fire to her underwear at the dining table. It wasn't long before Sherlock's phone rang, which he ignored, continuing his pyrotechnics as if he could neither see nor hear anything else. Tom sighed heavily, decided that directly interfering was not something he wanted to do, made a cup of tea and went to hide in the bedroom with it. As he was finishing the cup, he heard the front door go, and assumed that it would be Molly to lambast the detective, who would take no notice until she physically removed the items from the table. As it turned out, he was a little ahead of himself, and it was John who arrived first to shout at Sherlock, followed by Molly, followed by Mary, who couldn't stop laughing. He was quite enjoying himself, hiding away in the bedroom where he couldn't see the carnage, but hear the ridiculous reasoning that Sherlock always seemed to get away with. Today, it was that his mother, Mrs Hudson, and Mary had refused to give him their underwear to burn, and he had an alibi to prove that required him to do so. Naturally, when those two women turned him down, he'd decided to simply take Molly's instead of asking first, as he needed pre-worn underwear for some long-winded scientific reason.

John was struggling to be surprised at Molly's text, he'd been ranting about women's underwear for a creepy amount of time, with more detail than John had thought capable of a man that had been proclaimed virginal by a dominatrix. John warned Mary about the probability of Sherlock asking for her undies, before shaking his head and leaving the younger man to go down stairs and get caught rifling through the laundry by Mrs Hudson, who chased him back up the stairs with a broom, shouting about 'how his mother would hear about this'. He'd told the detective to simply go out and buy some if he wanted some that badly, but apparently, he needed some that had been worn but not washed. Not twenty seconds later Sherlock had jumped out of his seat and run out of the door, as he was want to do when an idea struck. John did not particularly want to know what that idea was, so he went down to Mrs Hudson for a cup of tea. An hour later, he received Molly's text, rolled his eyes and made his way to her flat. He had a spare key for events like this, although he'd never had to use it before, and had hoped never to use it at all. He let himself in, and tried again to make Sherlock understand that he couldn't just go around setting fire to people's things, even if it was for a case. Unwilling to try and discourage him for a third time in as many hours, John simply made a cup of tea and took a seat on the sofa, texting both Molly and Mary about the outcome of his attempt.

Molly had not been impressed to find that Tom had been entirely right in his text, she'd been hoping for a least a little bit of embellishment. She'd text John to go around and check on him first, as she was in the middle of something she couldn't get away from, and didn't want to return home to no underwear at all. She was not surprised, but a little disappointed to come home to an exasperated John on her sofa, and a smirking Sherlock burning one of her bras at the table. She marched up to the table and demanded an explanation for his behaviour, which as John had warned him, wasn't acceptable. She ranted for a good five minutes about boundaries, property, and how she now had to go and replenish her underwear drawer.

"No need, on John's advice I bought you some. Two pieces for every on I burned, it's all in a bag over there somewhere." Sherlock interrupted, pointing in the direction of the sofa,

"That was not what I said! I told you to buy it instead of setting anyone's things on fire!" John protested,

"You bought me underwear?" Molly exclaimed, horrified and intrigued all at once.

"Who bought who underwear?" Mary asked, leading Molly to wonder just how many people had access to her flat,

"Sherlock bought me underwear to replace the lot he'd set on fire." Molly explained, with a tired smile

"Let's have a look." Mary said, opening the bag that Molly had placed on the arm of the sofa, "Bloody hell, I'd have let you have all of mine if I knew you were going to do that! Boy's got great taste." The blonde woman cried in surprise as she rifled through the silks and satins in the bag. Molly took the bag off Mary, and peered in, one look was all it took and her eyes widened in disbelief, the bag was full of very expensive, and strangely tasteful knickers, and bras - it was evident he hadn't gone for like-for-like replacements.

"NO! I can't accept this, Sherlock, there must be over a thousand pounds worth of underwear in here." She said in a fluster, blushing fiercely.

"Hm... Maybe Mycroft will notice I claimed it on his expenses." Sherlock commented blandly, making yet more notes in his very battered notebook.

"You can't claim underwear as an expense!" John choked out in surprise,

"John, they've claimed duck-houses successfully in the past, I highly doubt anyone will bat an eyelid." Sherlock replied matter-of-factly, as if it were the most normal thing in the world - although John had followed the expenses scandal only loosely, who was to say that it wasn't.

Sherlock sighed, sent a text and stood up from the table, he was not enjoying the impromptu Spanish Inquisition that had come to be in Molly's kitchen. He was quite unhappy that they couldn't appreciate the need to find this woman an alibi before the incompetent officers at the Met sent her down for a murder she didn't commit. He'd tried his mother, Mrs H chased him with a broom when she found him trying to pinch hers, and Mary had objected pre-emptively, the only person left was Molly. She usually understood the need to work outside of ordinary rules, what made underwear any different? He picked up his notebook, put on his coat and made to leave,

"Where are you going?" John asked, exasperated by the whole business, and needing to know whether he should follow.

"To stop an innocent woman from being accused and convicted of murdering her husband. If you're all quite done," Sherlock replied, his voice deliberately monotonous, he did not wish for any more scolding.

"Sherlock-" Molly began, wanting to reassure him that actually she was quite looking forward to having some underwear she could never have previously afforded, but he cut her off before she could,

"No, Molly, I am sorry I invaded your privacy," He apologised uncomfortably before sweeping out of her flat.

Tom heard Sherlock's apology, and took the door shutting soon after as his cue to come out of hiding. His smile was not well received however, with Molly glaring at him fiercely,

"Why couldn't you just leave it alone! I would have come home, none the wiser, and been too enamoured and confused by the blatant underwear swap to be angry! Now someone needs to warn Mrs Hudson before he does something stupid." She growled, aware that in reality she'd have been angry either way and there was nothing that Tom could have done correctly in this situation, but she could apologise to him tomorrow after she'd calmed down. She stormed off into the bedroom, locking the door behind her.

Lestrade had been following the events of the day loosely, with the occasional text from Sherlock and John, and chose the moment after Molly had disappeared to walk in through her front door with a large bottle of vodka. They all looked like they needed it.