The car ride back to London was silent, not a stifling silence but rather an irritable one. Sherlock and Jen were both nursing hangovers, and neither of them were really looking forward to the noise in the city. It was made worse by the flashing police lights in front of the apartment. Jen looked through the windshield to see John shouting at Lestrade.

"What's going on?" Jen asked as her and Sherlock got out of the car to approach them. Lestrade stared at the pair before he took out a pair of handcuffs.

"Ginevra Lorraine, you are under arrest for the murder of Lynda Walsh," he said bringing her hands behind her back. She should have seen this coming, but truth be told, she thought it was behind her rising panic in her.

"Sherlock," she panicked as Lestrade began telling her her rights. She looked to the detective for answers she didn't have.

"Don't say anything to them, Ginny," he warned her unable to stop Lestrade from taking her in, but he could at least stop her from condemning herself. "Say nothing."

"Sherlock," she continued to panic keeping her eyes on him as she was loaded into the police car. Lestrade approached the two of them as she looked out hoping something could be done. Jail didn't sound like the ideal place.

"Listen," Lestrade looked at the two of them not sure what to say; he was just as surprised as they were, "there's heavy evidence. There are witnesses and-"

"This is ridiculous!" John shouted cutting him off. He wouldn't hear this accusation. John didn't know what she had done, but he was sure that he knew her well enough to believe she wouldn't kill another person. "She wouldn't do this! For God's sake, she won't even let me kill the mouse that lives in the flat! There's no way in hell she could kill another person!" Sherlock didn't feel the need to correct him; they would discuss it later, but for now, they needed to get Jen out of trouble.

"I' m sorry, but I can't-" Lestrade started to tell them, but it was Sherlock's turn to cut him off.

"Just go do your job, and I'll do mine," Sherlock told him. "I'll clear her name." Lestrade nodded before going back to his car to bring Jen into custody. Sherlock quickly spun to look at the street and hail a cab.

"What are you going to do?" John asked watching him already formulate a plan. Sherlock didn't seem happy with the idea, but he would do it if he has to.

"Call in another favor from Mycroft," Sherlock replied flatly. "He won't let her be arrested as much as I won't." Sherlock had yet to really puzzle together why that was, but right now, it wasn't a concern.

"You think he'll be able to-" John started, but Sherlock had no time for conversation.

"I know he will," Sherlock replied as he was about to get into the cab John made to follow him, but Sherlock stopped him. "Stay here." He didn't need John to see Sherlock groveling on his knees to Mycroft. He didn't even want to see himself in such an action, yet he knew he would have to. Lord, the things he was willing to do for that woman.

"Why-"

"I need to talk to Mycroft alone," Sherlock informed him before slamming the door. John watched it rush off with a confused expression on his face.

Sherlock barged into Mycroft's office in the Diogenes Club. Mycroft looked up at him before he sort of rolled his eyes and threw down his newspaper onto the coffee table in front of him. He looked just so thrilled to see his little brother. Perhaps it was because he had an inkling as to why his younger brother was there; it was all over the papers. Yet, Mycroft would play ignorant.

"To what do I the pleasure?" he asked giving Sherlock a thin-lipped smile.

"Ginny's been arrested," Sherlock informed him. Now, that was news. Not good news but news nonetheless.

"Didn't I just help her stay out of jail?" Mycroft asked his little brother with a frown.

"No, you helped her avoid a trial, Mycroft," Sherlock answered simply knowing he would have to defend her case as Mycroft recently helped her. "She would have been exonerated if she had gone through with the trial."

"And this time?" Mycroft questioned.

"This time there's a likelihood that she would will be charged and found guilty since she did it," Sherlock replied causing Mycroft to stare at him for a lot longer than necessary. He knew Ginevra Lorraine, and he may have hoped they crossed paths, but now, he's wondered what he was done. It was a disaster waiting to happen, and for what? All of England could burn for this mistake.

"Sit down," Mycroft ordered willing to try and reverse the situation. He was unsure how attached Sherlock was to the woman, and perhaps, he could pull him away even a little, and if he could, perhaps Mycroft could play the 'for her own good' card. Sherlock frowned at the odd request; Mycroft often asked him to do things but to order him, to sound almost worried was out of character. It was like Mycroft was trying to get him to sit to prepare him for the worse. What did Mycroft know that he didn't? "Sit."

"Why?" Mycroft gave him a threatening look, and Sherlock did as he demanded in hopes to help the case with Jen. Even the smallest effort wouldn't go unnoticed. "Get to whatever point you want to make, Mycroft." He hoped that he just wanted to spout out some of his useless advice that Sherlock would ignore and then help Jen despite his objections to do so.

"She killed someone? How long ago?" Mycroft asked getting straight to the point.

"In November," Sherlock informed him. Mycroft seemed to consider this. That long ago? Good or not good? He tried to assess the situation, but there were so many variables.

"Only one?"

"Yes." He seemed to be careful about his next words as it could provoke a bad reaction in Sherlock.

"Perhaps it would be best if she went to trial, had someone take a psychoanalysis of her," Mycroft told him. She needed to get help even if no one around her besides himself, Robbie, and Damon agreed. Sherlock scoffed disliking the idea more and more. "Let her spend some time thinking on her actions."

"She obviously regrets her action," Sherlock snapped at him not willing to play whatever game Mycroft wished to play. "She killed her brother for God's sake."

"Sherlock, it's not about guilt; it's about stability," Mycroft answered him calmly.

"Stability?" Sherlock asked trying to push away the memories that were trying to flood his mind of all the times she proved to be unstable. Most recently was in the bathroom after she shattered the mirror. Schizophrenic was his first thoughts when she was jabbering on about the woman in the mirror taunting her. Yet, she showed no other signs of such a mental disorder.

"Surely, you haven't ignored the signs," he replied breaking Sherlock from the memory. "Sherlock, I know you don't want to hear it, but Ginevra is... she's not stable. Perhaps, when you first met her in London, she was a little more so, but she's gone without any form of treatment for a long time."

"Treatment? She never took her medication anyways," Sherlock informed him. "She never really had real treatment." She was against it, he reminded himself. It made her feel odd was the best way she could describe it.

"I see," Mycroft muttered allowing a precious piece of information run across his lips. "She didn't feel the need to tell you about her stay in Hanwell Asylum?" Sherlock stared at him blankly before responding.

"What the hell are you talking about Mycroft?" he snapped.

"Sherlock, Ginevra is unstable and prone to homicidal violence," Mycroft answered. He knew that; he knew she was, but she wasn't a serial killer. She wasn't a bad person; she was Ginny. She was the woman who took in Lucy when she had no one else, who defended her friends as if they were blood, who accepted him for all his flaws. She was not an ordinary woman, and she was not a bad person. "She's not good for you."

"I don't give a damn whether she's good for me or not," Sherlock informed him, "and she's not some crazed serial killer. She was fine until her brother came along and began twisting her hand."

"Peter only pushed her toward her natural state," Mycroft responded rubbing his forehead. Natural state, he questioned to himself, did she even have a natural state? Which is her natural state? The demon or the angel or was she some creature trapped in limbo being tugged and pulled and ripped apart?

"Mycroft-" Sherlock started, but his brother cut him off ready to press in a point.

"Do you remember Miss Thomas from down the lane?" Mycroft asked him. Sherlock found his frown deepening as he search for that one particular memory from his childhood of a bright woman, who seemed to always be smiling and wearing bright colors. She was his favorite neighbor always letting him look at her vast collection of books until...

"Yes," he said hollowly remembering the woman. It was a room he often kept board away in his mind palace, but he remembered.

"What happened to her?" Mycroft questioned. Sherlock scoffed.

"You knew very well what happened to her," Sherlock snapped at him, but Mycroft remained silent waiting for the answer. "Her ex-husband came back, and it triggered an episode. She stabbed her daughter to death before she slit her own throat. What's your point?"

"Miss Thomas was completely sane, completely normal until her ex-husband came back into her life. So imagine Ginevra is Miss Thomas, and Peter is her ex-husband." There was a moment of silence between the two brother before he pushed out of his chair.

"This ridiculous!" Sherlock shouted at him signaling to Mycroft that Sherlock recognized that he was right. "Ginny is fine!"

"So she hasn't been acting odd lately?" Mycroft questioned. Sherlock opened his mouth to protest, but he stopped bringing back the times she uttered for his help and the time in the bathroom and just her overall state lately. "Sherlock?"

"It doesn't matter if she is unstable as you put it," Sherlock answered. "It- she fits perfectly into my life unstable or not."

"And the moment she breaks and attempts to kill you and John in your sleep?" Mycroft asked. It could happen, and it's one of the many scenarios Mycroft feared when it came to his relationship with Jen.

"She's a lot of things, Mycroft, and loyal is one of them," Sherlock informed him. "She wouldn't harm me or anyone else she cares for."

"Then how about the moment she changes? The moment she switches sides, and she's the killer you are pursuing. Then what, Sherlock? What will you do?"

"I'll bring her back over to my side," Sherlock replied, "anyway I possibly can." Mycroft watched his little brother carefully before he let out a sigh. It was too late to convince Sherlock to take a step back from her. He had fallen in love with the girl and prying him from her would be disastrous. Which would be more of a disaster, Mycroft mused, prying her from him or letting this little game continue?

"I'll see what I can do," Mycroft finally told him. Sherlock focused his attention on his elder before he spun on his heels and walked out the door to pick up Jen from custody. Mycroft would have it done by the time he got there.

Jen sat in the jail cell with another woman, who was watching her curiously. The other woman was in newer clothing and didn't seem the type for jail. She was something of a plain looking woman in jeans and a t-shirt. Though, Jen supposed she looked stranger sitting in jail in her nice black dress and heels with remnants of makeup from the day before. Though, she did smell like alcohol.

"What are you in here for?" Jen asked her hoping to find some sort of friend or companion in this desolate place.

"I put my boyfriend in the hospital for cheating on me," she replied simply.

"Good for you," she laughed holding out a hand. They shook making the other woman laugh.

"That's not most people's reaction," the inmate replied with grin.

"I'm not most people," Jen told her.

"Then who are you?" she asked curious about the small woman and how she could possibly end up here.

"Ginevra Lorraine. People call me Jen."

"Louisa Carter. Everyone calls me Carter."

"Carter," she nodded liking the name. She smiled.

"What are you here for?"

"They think I murder someone to help my brother: The Carver," she replied with a shrug and a sigh. "I suppose I deserve this, because apparently, it's not enough punishment to have me chose between killing my brother or a man who I love but will never love me." There was a moment of silence as Carter seemed to process her rather unique situation.

"That's rough," Carter nodded feeling sympathetic.

"That's my life in one word: rough," she grumbled.

"So you chose the guy then?" she asked making Jen nod.

"Sounds stupid, I know," she answered, and it really did, but she didn't regret it. Choosing to kill Peter was like choosing to kill the devil, and if you had that choice, you damn well better take it. It didn't make her decision any less regrettable.

"What's his name?" Carter asked breaking her out of her thoughts.

"Sherlock Holmes," she replied thinking of the detective in the funny hat. The hat was starting to grow on her, regrettably.

"Oh! That's where I recognized you," she snapped her fingers pointing at Jen. "I've seen you in the papers; you two seem quaint."

"Thanks," Jen shrugged.

"So then… you two aren't…?"

"I don't know anymore," she scoffed collapsing onto the little bed. She was now using inmates as potential therapists. Wonderful. "Sometimes it seems like he cares about me, but… I don't know. Other days he just sort of seems to shove me aside, which, you know, isn't all too bad. I mean he's got this great big mind, and we're all ants to him, so I mean if he looks over me, I'm really not that offended."

"Maybe you're blind to what others see," Carter told her. "I bet he cares."

"He's not the kind to care easily," she scowled.

"No, I know people like that," Carter nodded, "but when they do care for someone, it's… passionately and loyally to the point of… absurdity."

"I told him I loved him… I was drunk, but I did," Jen nodded remembering the haze of the night previously.

"What did he say?"

"I don't know I was passed out before he could really answer," she laughed. Carter grinned, and the door was thrown open making them both stand.

"I suppose this is like one of those stupid stories where the handsome knight saves the princess," he told her with a smile.

"Sort of, but it's more like arrogant dickhead saves potential murderer," she offered.

"Sounds better," he told her. "Come on, Ginny. Let's get out of here." He gestured to the doorway.

"What about the charges?"

"Mycroft took care of it," he told her. "Let's go."

"He bribed them?"

"Ginny, I don't have time to argue with you. I'm exhausted from trying to plead with my brother over this case. Now, please," he gestured to the door again, and she sighed before she followed him out. She paused as Lestrade, who was waiting to escort them out as they gave Jen back her jacket and purse.

"Louisa Carter… how much is her bail?" Jen asked.

"5,000," he answered as she fished out her check book. She quickly wrote a check and gave it to Lestrade. "Why-"

"She was nice," Jen shrugged before Sherlock lead her through the building toward the outside where a cab was waiting. She could feel the eyes of everyone in the building; they were accusing eyes that knew what she did, knew that she was out due to the people she knew not her innocence, and it froze her blood as she stared at the ground.

Sherlock held the door open for her to the cab; she quickly slipped in, and he followed. He tried to hold his tongue, but he was rather tired of it. It just sort of feel out of his mouth. "Why didn't you tell me you were a resident in Hanwell Asylum?" he asked. She looked to him in surprise.

"What?" she asked.

"Hanwell Asylum. Why didn't you tell me you had a stay there?" he questioned her. "You've told me so much about yourself; why would skip over this? Did you fear judgement?" She shook her head slowly still frowning.

"I... I never was in any kind of mental institution, Sherlock. Why do you think I should be? I'm not insane," she argued with him. "Do you have intentions to lock me away just because I... I know what I did was wrong. I'm not a psychopath; I'm not my brother." Sherlock quickly shook his head.

"That's not what I meant. I was told you was admitted there," he answered her.

"Well whoever told you that is wrong," she snapped before she stared ahead of herself. Sherlock frowned staring blankly at the back of the passenger seat in front of him. He was sure his brother would not say something of the sort just to persuade him, and he was sure Jen was telling the truth. So, there were only two options: Mycroft was wrong, or Jen simply thought she was telling the truth, and Mycroft was never wrong.

They were silent the rest of the way to Baker Street. She said nothing as they climb the stairs. Toby perked his head up from under the piano to look at her before resting his head back down watching as she collapsed in her chair rubbing her forehead. Migraines had been pestering her for days on end, and they were reaching their peak. The lights were bothering, and the sound of Sherlock's feet on the wood floor was enough for her to snap at the man.

"Can you please shut up?" she snapped at him once more. He paused to stare at her. He could see her cringing holding her head in her hands rubbing her eyes.

"Aspirin?" he asked recognizing the signs of a headache.

"Won't help," she informed him quickly. He moved around her to the window drawing the curtains so that the light wasn't so bright. "Thank you," she muttered feeling bad for snapping at him. He said nothing as he moved around her and brought her two aspirin and a cup of tea a few minutes later. "Thank you," she said again taking both from him as he sat in his chair. He watched her take the pills and sip on her tea. He remained silent before her eyes glance to the paper lying on the side table.

"What's this?" Jen asked holding the newspaper that had come out that morning. Her face was plastered all over her condemning her as a murderer. There was no speculation about it in the paper; the flat out blamed her for the deaths of Peter's victims.

"Press had a frenzy," Sherlock told her quietly as her eyes scanned the article with a look of discontent on her face.

"Yes, I can see that," she scoffed reading the article. The guilt seeped in and thee walls suddenly seemed to be closing in on her making it hard to breath. The migraine slammed into her causing her to start to get tunnel vision. She rubbed her eyes with the palms of her hands. "I need a walk," she uttered standing. "Toby," she called, and the dog followed his owner out the flat to go for that walk she needed. The sun would hurt her eyes, and the sound of the city would make her ill, but she thought it was better than sitting in silence with nothing but her own thoughts barreling down on her. She thought wrong.

Ostracization. She walked down the street and everywhere she looked where people's accusing stares. They walked on the other side of the road from her as if she was a disease. They pulled their children far from her. They avoided her eye contact; she could see them muttering to each other before their gaze fell on her. She smiled at a few neighbors, who gave her a hardened look and turned away. She felt herself sinking with no hand to grab.

She slowly turned back to the building and made her back home away from those stares, away from the guilt. She would rather be alone than feel the way she did among them.

"How is she?" John asked glancing at the stairway. He had rushed to the flat as soon as he heard the two of them were back from the police station. Sherlock was standing in front of the window playing the violin and composing, always a bad sign. He was trying to block out his emotions again.

"Upset," Sherlock answered simply. He may not know a lot about why people did things, but he could identify most emotions. When Jen came back, she was a hundred miles away too far for him to reach. He called her name, but she said nothing as she dragged herself up the stairs leaving Toby to whine and lay at Sherlock's feet. Sherlock remained downstairs assuming she would get over what people were saying about her. Harsh words, yes, but not very creative nor nothing to pay attention to.

"Well, I would be too if everyone thought I was a serial killer," John answered collapsing in his chair. He glanced at the stairway again. "I don't understand how they could think that," he muttered thinking about Jen. She had thrown violent fits before, but she never meant anyone harm, or so he thought.

"Because she did," Sherlock replied before stopping his violin to write a few notes down. He had said it so calmly that John was unsure what he was talking about.

"She what?" John asked picking up the paper before discarding it in disgust.

"She killed Lydia Walsh to keep her brother out of jail," Sherlock informed him before he put down his violin and collapsed in his chair across from John, who was staring at him like he had grown two heads. "Oh, I see," Sherlock hummed. "You have false, preconceived notions about Ginny. Allow me to fix those for you. Ginevra Lorraine is loyal in the same depth you are, yet she would go so far with that loyalty as to turn her back on her fellow man and her own feelings to put other people first. She would kill; she would destroy; and she would burn if it meant protecting the select few she holds dear. Now, allow me a question, John," Sherlock paused to consider the question; he needed an outsiders perspective. "Do you think she's stable?"

"Jen?" John questioned. Sherlock scoffed.

"Yes, Jen," Sherlock snapped.

"I think... it doesn't matter, does it?" John asked him. "Stable or not, she stills loves you as much as you love her. Nothing will change there. She's more than a bit rough around the edges, but then again you're a sociopath, who runs around chasing criminals for a living, best friends with a ex-soldier, who gets a high off of dangerous situations." They were both silent before John asked the next question. "What do you think made her that way?"

"Desperation," Sherlock answered having thought on that question for a long time. "Regina left her; Irene left her; Robbie left her. She never knew her real father, and the father she did know didn't bother to try and support them. She's had lover after lover not feeling any sort of emotion for them, and they felt nothing for her. The one man she managed to have some sort of sentiment for betrayed her. Use your best analysis of the situation, Doctor. Borderline Personality Disorder, symptoms?"

"Fear of abandonment," John replied. Sherlock nodded; he had come to the conclusion long ago. It had bothered him, and it was one of the things he would change in her if he could, but it was a problem that went deeper than he could reach. He found that as much as he would like to, he couldn't reach into her depths as he could some people. She wasn't a book; there was a part of her that was out of his grasp, slipping through his fingers, and it irked him.

"Ginny fears abandonment and is desperate for human contact, for love. In her mind, if she had allowed Peter to go to jail, had not killed for him, he would have turned away from her. The fear is so strong, she killed Peter before that could happen. She didn't kill him because what he was doing was wrong; she killed him because she couldn't bare the idea of Peter despising her, turning from her for turning him in, for betraying him." A heavy silence fell between them as they both thought of the woman upstairs.

"And this is the woman you love," John joked with him. Sherlock seemed to suppress a smile, but John pretended he didn't see it. Sherlock wouldn't say it out loud, but he wasn't denying it either.

"Ginny has always been interesting," Sherlock replied letting the hidden smile fall. "In school, outside of school, she posed a problem for me."

"What problem?" John asked. Sherlock frowned trying to find the words for what the problem had always been. He had been drawn to her immediately, and it had always been hard for him to vocalize what it was that made her such a thrilling case.

"She's not right," Sherlock tried to say and shook his head deciding that wasn't right. "I mean that there are times I look at her, and I see something that doesn't match her and what I know about her. For example, a few years ago, from my understanding she didn't drink, yet I have seen her drink rather heavily on more than one occasion. Or, the fact that her hands are small, gentle, and uncalloused as if she's never been a hard worker. Sometimes I look at her, and instead of Ginny, it's as if I'm staring at someone else."

"Who?" John asked. Sherlock shook his head letting the conversation fall. His mind was wheeling, and he began to walk through the halls of his mind palace letting his eyes slid shut. He ignored every room in the palace before he found her solid oak door; he pushed it open to find his Ginny in her green sweater, but she didn't greet him. She was too busy staring at the other side of the room. It was pitch black, no light reached that side. She looked terrified of the dark.

"Ginny?" he asked. She didn't respond as the sound of a person scuttling on the other side of the room caused her to jump back. Sherlock let his sharp eyes focus on the dark. "Who's there?"

"Seven," Ginny told him quietly. He frowned at the response.

"Seven what?" She glanced to him before her figure suddenly separated into seven black and white birds, magpies, and flew out the door surprising him as he covered his head. The darkness began to grow, and he stumbled back to inch away. He didn't know why, but he was terrified.

"What are you so scared of?" a voice asked from the darkness. It sounded like Jen and not Jen. Her voice was grainy as if she recently had laryngitis. "Don't you love me?"

"What are you?" he asked her as he finally found the courage to step in the dark to let his eyes adjust to see a figure standing in front of him.

"I'm Ginny," she told him, but he could neither deny or confirm that. He took a step toward her; she didn't move, so he took another step to her putting a hand on her shoulder. The woman glanced up allowing him to see eyes so like Peter it was terrifying. They were swirled with madness, murderous rage, but beyond that was a deep sadness and loneliness that cut him. She struck out, and he didn't defend himself as she jump on him and bashed his head into the floor over and over and over- He could hear her laughing before her laughing was joined by Moriarty's.

Sherlock Holmes woke with a start, a sheen of sweat covered his body, and his breathing was ragged. He had been more tired from the events than he thought. He stretched his sore body from the chair before glancing at the window showing the darkness had crept up while he slept and then the clock: 3:00 AM. He leaned back with a sigh before running his hands through his hair; he hadn't had a nightmare since he was very young. His own fear for Jen was consuming his thoughts, and the longer the game went on, the more it would eat away at him.

A/N: What am I doing posting so early? The next chapter is very, very short, and I decided to do a two chapter week because of that, and 100 reviews! WHOA! So yeah, have a chapter.

Thanks to reviewers: flaming-amber, Cereza101, scarlet tribe, hannahhobnob, short-skirtbluescarf, Akira Darkness, and zare . downey . okumura. I'll see you all in a couple days! Review please!