The Vampiric Mystery
Chapter Three: A Fresh Lead
Watching Sherlock Holmes read a book is a rare pleasure that very few have ever had the pleasure of experiencing. It wasn't that he found it difficult, quite the contrary in fact. He scanned through the pages, locking on to specific words and sentences, furiously making little notes on the memo app on his phone. John couldn't see every word that he took down but he caught glimpses of words such as demon, fangs, blood thirst, hunters and nocturnal. To the casual observer, Holmes may have appeared as a man who knew absolutely nothing of vampires. John knew different. He knew Holmes was using these words as keywords to further thoughts. When he had at last put the last book down, he locked his phone, pocketed it and strode out of the aisle of books.
"So?" Watson ventured, hoping Sherlock would elaborate on some information, though he didn't expect much.
"Well it's obviously not a crazed fanatic at the least. The bite marks were too precise for it to be the work of anyone without past experience in these things. Even the most devout fan of a work of art cannot replicate it perfectly. Plus, the canine teeth of humans are usually curved slightly whereas those of real vampires are defined clearly as perfectly tapered. A human tooth would have left slight tear marks on the surrounding skin rather than precise pin holes. All of this can of course be disputed by someone willing to say 'but he could have sharpened his teeth' or 'he could have used a weapon that was reminiscent of vampire teeth'. Sadly, these people would be wrong, otherwise the killer would be rather easy to find. No, this was definitely performed with perfectly tapered teeth, a shape impossible to recreate individually and, even with the help of the most skilled dentist/sculptor one would find it impossible to taper one's teeth to such a fine point."
At this stage, they had reached the front desk but the librarian was nowhere to be seen. This didn't stop Sherlock's tirade of commentary however and John could tell that he was just getting to the good bits.
"Now, if we were to assume that we are dealing with a seemingly fictional, nocturnal hunter here, the best time to catch him would be when John?"
Not prepared for a question and answer section to Holmes' ideas (although perhaps he should have been seeing as they frequently occurred) John could only stammer two little words.
"A- At night?"
He immediately knew he was wrong because Holmes chuckled deeply before returning to a straight face.
"No. During the day John. If we are indeed dealing with a vampire, however unlikely the situation appears to be, we must be wary. I have never put much stock in fairytales or legends but it appears that we have no other choice but to follow through on this lead. Now, according to several sources, vampires are at their most powerful when the sun goes down. So, if we want to find and catch this creature, we must exercise caution. During the day is our best bet to contain the threat and extrapolate the victimiser. The only problem is, we only have one simple murder victim with little bite marks on her neck to go on as a lead. None of the sources I read there gave solid information on the general hangouts of vampires. So we shall have to wait for the next victim to arise and, if needs be, await another after that to try and get a sense of any themes or similarities."
Watson was shocked at Holmes' words.
"You're kidding right? Please tell me you are kidding! We can't just let people die so that we can catch this bastard! That's the whole reason that we get called in to help, so as few as possible get harmed!"
"I know John. But circumstances dictate that we must at least await another attack. Otherwise we are walking blind."
Watson was having none of it.
"You're Sherlock Holmes! Solve it for the love of God!"
"I CAN'T SOLVE THAT WHICH I DO NOT FULLY COMPREHEND JOHN!" Sherlock roared, his deep voice raised and resonating throughout the library.
From somewhere in the back of the library, the two men heard a harsh 'shh' sound, ordering them to keep it quiet. From behind one of the shelves emerged the short librarian with a stern look on her face. Briskly walking over to them, she spoke in a hushed tone.
"What in the name of God are you shouting about? This is a library!"
Watson began to apologise but was beaten to it by Holmes.
"Sincerest apologies dear librarian. We were just leaving, come John."
Shaking the librarian's hand once more, Holmes turned on his heel and strode out the door.
"I'm going to strangle that bastard!" Watson muttered, before thanking the librarian again and following Holmes out the door.
Looking around, he found Holmes crossing the road to a small coffee shop where he sat down at one of the outside tables. Mumbling to himself, Watson quickly made his way over, nearly getting hit by a car trying to catch the lights in the process. Sitting down, he opened his mouth to give Holmes a good bollocking, only to have his friend silence him with a raised hand.
"Don't! I'm thinking. Don't interrupt my thinking."
It took all of his resolve to not punch Holmes in the nose and start yelling at him but Watson restrained himself. He sat in silence while Holmes took another trip to his 'mind palace'. His hands were positioned on either side of his head, not quite touching the temples and he was swishing them to his right, as if grabbing a file, seeing it was wrong and casting it to the side. Leaning back in his chair, John called the waitress over and ordered a coffee. She was just about to ask Holmes if he would like to order anything when his eyes flew open and he shot to his feet.
"Of course! Stupid, stupid, stupid!" Holmes exclaimed, pulling his phone from his pocket and walking away from the coffee shop.
Huffing loudly, Watson cancelled his order and followed suit. When he finally caught up to Sherlock, he was on the phone to who Watson could only guess was Lestrade.
"Yes Lestrade, the girl from the other night. I need you to check her for bloating. When? Now you moron! Why else would I be calling you right now if I didn't want it for now? I'm on my way over to Bart's, be sure to have the results ready for me when I get there!"
Hanging up, Holmes took one quick look at John before quickening his pace slightly.
"I can't believe that we think we're dealing with a vampire and we forgot to check the girl for bloating! Honestly, even Lestrade would have thought of that and he's an idiot at the best of times!"
Seeing the general idea of checking the girl for bloating, Watson phrased his next question carefully.
"What are you expecting to find from her bloating? Surely it will only confirm your suspicions right?"
"No John. Not only confirm my suspicions. If the girl has bloated substantially then we know she has a healthy diet, leading us to believe that the vampire is picky in his victim choice. However, if she has minimal bloating then the vampire is not picky over his victims, showing a possible hunger or blood-thirst in him that he cannot fully sate. If this is the case, then he will be likely to strike within the next few days rather than wait for the next time that he need feed himself."
Holmes appeared fairly pleased with himself, a wide grin plastered across his face as he hailed a taxi and climbed in.
"Come John. Our first real lead awaits us!"
Shaking his head at his old friend's dramatics, Watson got into the taxi and asked the cabbie to take them to St. Bart's Hospital.
"'Ere, aren't you that famous police lad? Mr. Holmes is it?"
Holmes looked positively disgusted with the cabbie's words.
"'Famous police lad'? I've never been so insulted. No sir, I am not a 'famous police lad'. I am a consulting detective, previously the only one of its kind though I imagine that my rise to fame has inspired those of considerable intelligence to take up the mantle in their own areas. But to answer you question sir, yes I am Mr. Holmes but no I am not to be affiliated with those buffoons, especially the ones at Scotland Yard."
"I didn't mean no offence sir! I was-"
"Use of a double negative, however benign your verbal intentions may have been, says that you did mean offence. The correct sentence you should have used was-"
"Holmes!" Watson interjected harshly. "He didn't mean it, alright? No need to be such an arsehole."
Holmes leaned in close to Watson, his tone lowered to a murmur.
"Well he shouldn't have associated me with those idiots. Honestly how these people function is remarkable."
Watson was about to reprimand him when the cabbie called back again.
"I expect that you're off solving another case then sir?"
Giving John a look that basically said 'this man is an imbecile', Holmes answered the unfortunately slow-witted cabbie.
"Yes sir I am on a case. Now I would very much appreciate it if the remainder of this journey could be carried out in silence. I require a quiet atmosphere to think."
The cabbie (thankfully) said nothing but merely raised his hand in acknowledgement. For the remaining ten or so minutes of the cab journey, Holmes sat up straight, his eyes closed and his hands miming playing the violin, something he often did when he needed to think. When they finally arrived at Bart's Hospital, Holmes bolted out the door of the cab.
"There's a fifty on my seat John! Pay the man!" He shouted over his shoulder as he quickened his step towards the hospital.
Watson handed the driver the fifty note and told him to keep the change.
"Thank you very much sir! And good luck with catching that vampire of yours!"
Watson nodded, still slightly pissed at Sherlock's behaviour. It wasn't until he was halfway to the door of Bart's Hospital that he fully registered what had been said by the cabbie.
"Hang on! How did you kn-" Watson exclaimed, spinning around to confront the cabbie, only to find that he had taken off down the road at a great speed.
'As if we didn't have enough to worry about.' Watson thought to himself, turning around and following Sherlock into Bart's.
Chapter Three as promised. As was the tradition with the last two chapters, I have something I'd like to apologise for/explain. In the last chapter, I wrote that Sherlock had only ever felt strongly about two other women. Irene Adler and Janine, the Irish girl from the BBC show with whom he entered a relationship to get close to Magnusson. Despite his overall intentions, it was shown as a moment of significant weakness in Holmes' character when he first met Janine. Whatever his intentions were, it was evident to me that he did (at least briefly) have some feelings for Janine. That is why I mentioned her as one of the only women who Holmes had ever felt 'romantic' feelings for. I realise I may be nit-picking my own story and assuming that at least one reader was a little miffed at seeing her name down there but I'm being safe with this apology. Other than that, there's not much to say other than I hope you enjoyed this chapter (as mundane as it was) and that the semi cliff-hanger that I threw in there at the end doesn't piss you all off too much. Thank you all for reading. Until next time my friends! ~ An Inconvenient Arrival