Author's Note: I'm very, very sorry for the lateness of this chapter. I'll update this regularly!

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"You stopped his letters."

John wasn't asking Mycroft this time. John's voice was confident this time because he knew Mycroft Holmes. They had grown up together.

"John, I tried my best. I tried my best. Sherlock is clean and I want you to keep with this flat-share, with your identity. If Sherlock finds out..." Mycroft Holmes looked down, not being able to meet John's eyes. "If Sherlock finds out, I don't know what consequences that may have."

It could be dangerous. SH

John put his phone back to his pocket and turned around, making his own way back to the car. He didn't have more words to say.

On his way back to Baker Street, he asked the good brunette woman who was obviously under Mycroft's wing to take him to his place before going to see his brother again. Something about Sherlock's texts sent shrives to his spine. If his brother was in danger, he was going to fight for him.

John was conscious he couldn't make it for the time he was gone. But for now on, he was going to protect Sherlock.

"Took your time."

The doctor was greeted by Sherlock lying with his back over a large sofa, with his left hand pressing three patches on his right arm, just above his wrist.

"Are those nicotine patches? Three!"

Sherlock nodded. "It's a three patch problem. Helps me think. It's hard to sustain the habit on London these days."

"Good news for breathing."

"Breathing? breathing is boring."

"Well…you asked me to come, I'm assuming it's important."

"Oh, yeah, of course. Can I borrow your phone? Don't use mine, always a chance that my number will be recognized. It's on the website."

John was glad Sherlock needed him. But he needed to act. He needed Sherlock to think he was a completely stranger who entered into his life by destiny or casualty. He needed Sherlock Holmes to believe he was John Watson.

So he smiled and continued pretending.

"You brought me here, to send a text?"

John kept his eyes fixed on the window. The black car was still outside and something inside him told him Mycroft could come upstairs and tell Sherlock all the truth. All the things he ignored and all the life he erased from his mind with cocaine.

"Text, yes. The number's on my desk. What's wrong?"

"I... I met a friend of yours," lied John.

Sherlock looked shocked."A friend?"

"Your arch enemy, according to him."

"Did he offer you money to spy on me?"

John didn't hesitated, but Sherlock's words told him everything he needed to know. Apparently Mycroft was still using those kinds of methods to keep an eye on Sherlock. He used to do it when they were in University together.

"Yes."

"Did you take it?"

"No."

"Pity. We could have split the fee. Think it through next time."

His brother had his hands glued together under his chin. And John remembered.

"What are you doing, Sherlock?"

"Thinking."

"It's looks like you are praying."

"I'm thinking what I can do to convince mother to get me a skull."

"She won't get you one, you know it."

The two ten year old boys continued experimenting and thinking a way to convince mummy to get them a skull to play.

"There's a card with a number on the table. Type it."

John sighed and looked at the card. It was a mobile number with neither an inscription or a name.

"Have you done it?"

"Hold on, yes!"

"This words exactly 'What happened at Lauriston Gardens? I must have blacked out. 22 Northumberland Street. Please come'"

"You blacked out?"

John was worried, but he tried to keep it to himself. Sherlock shook his head and got up, showing him the pink suitcase he had been talking about on the crime scene.

"That's…that's the pink lady's case, that's Jennifer Wilson's case."

"Yes, obviously. Oh, perhaps I should mention I didn't kill her."

"I never said you did."

"Why not? Given that text and the fact I have her case it's a perfectly logical assumption."

"Do people usually assume you're the murderer?"

"Now and then yes," admitted Sherlock.

"OK. How did you get this?"

"By looking."

"Where?"

His little brother explained her mobile was missing. Everything else was in there, but Jennifer Wilson's mobile wasn't. John suggested she could just have left it back home, but Sherlock was right after all, having a string of lovers, none woman would leave her mobile back home.

And John had just texted a murder.

"Have you talk to the police?"

Sherlock shook his head and took his coat. "Four people are dead, there isn't time to talk to the police."

"So, why are you talking to me?"

"Mrs Hudson took my skull," said Sherlock, a bit hurt.

John had to fight a grin. "So I'm basically filling in for your skull?"

"Relax, you're doing fine. Well?"

"Well what?"

"Well, you could just sit there and watch telly."

"What, you want me to come with you?"

Sherlock nodded. "I like company when I go out, and I think better when I talk aloud. The skull just attracts attention so…problem?"

John explained what Donovan had told him, and Sherlock didn't say much. If John knew Sherlock enough, he could tell something happened between the.

A bad love-relationship?

Was it just work?

John knew he would have to find out later.

They went to a very cosy restaurant. Both sat on a very little table next to the window and soon they were approached by a old man who seemed to know Sherlock.

"Sherlock. Anything on the menu, whatever you want, free. On the house, for you an for your date."

Sherlock ignored the comment. "Do you want to eat?"

But John didn't. "I'm not his date."

Apparently Sherlock got the man, who seemed to be the owner of the restaurant, off a murder charge. While Lestrade wanted to send Angelo to prison after a triple murder, Sherlock proved to him Angelo had been in the other side of the town, house-breaking.

If you're the owner of a very lovely restaurant, what makes you go to the other side of the town to do some house-breaking?

"I'll get a candle for the table. It's more romantic."

John shook his head. "I'm not his date!"

"You may as well eat. We might have a long wait," suggested Sherlock.

And John accepted it.

After all, it had been years since they last saw each other. It had been years since they last saw their faces, since they last shared a laugh, since they last ate dinner together.

Dinners with Sherlock were funny. They had always been funny, even more when they were kids and teenagers. Sherlock liked to annoy Mycroft, and John laughed so much. Even when their parents told him not to do it, Sherlock kept doing it. And John kept laughing.

Even when they grew up, they continued doing so.

But even when Mycroft was not there, and even if he was, John knew they were not going to laugh and make jokes as they used to do it.

Because Sherlock didn't remember John. He didn't even remember having another brother apart from Mycroft.

"People don't have arch-enemies," said John between bites.

"I'm sorry?"

"In real life. There are no arch-enemies in real life. Doesn't happen."

"Doesn't it?" asked Sherlock, still focused on the building on the opposite street. "Sounds a bit dull. What do real people have, then, in their…real lives?"

"Friends. People they know, people they like, people they don't like…brothers, sisters. Girlfriends, boyfriends."

"That's dull."

"You don't have a girlfriend, then," said John, when what he really wanted to ask if Sherlock had brothers.

Sherlock continued staring at the window. "Girlfriend? No, not really my area."

They had never talked about it, John had a few girlfriends when he was a teenager and then when he was in uni, what that was it. Sherlock never introduced him to some girl or... boy, or whatever shook his boat. John never asked, and Sherlock never said a words about it.

But now, after so many years apart, John wondered if Sherlock had got a wife, a husband maybe.

"Mm…oh right. Do you have a … boyfriend? Which is fine, by the way -"

"I know it's fine," snapped Sherlock.

"So, you've go a boyfriend then."

"No."

And John didn't know what to say. "Right, OK. You're unattached. Just like me. Fine, good."

A few seconds passed, when Sherlock turned to face him. "John, erm…I think you should know that I consider myself married to my work, and while I'm flattered, I'm really not looking for any…"

"No, I'm not asking. No. I'm just saying, it's all fine."

God, now it was awkward, thought John. It was meant to be a calm, get-to-know-you conversation, but it ended in a big confusion. John didn't want to sound as a man who was interested in Sherlock. Sherlock got the wrong idea.

Before John could say something, Sherlock spotted cab waiting outside the place they had texted about. Sherlock immediately took his coat and scarf and ran after the cab, but John was not going to leave Sherlock alone. He ran after him, forgetting he had a walking stick.

And a psychosomatic limp.

They ran for minutes, and they even climbed some buildings and jumped over rooftops. Sherlock's legs were long and athletic while John's were short and stiff, but they managed to get to the cab.

But it was a false alarm.

"OK. That was ridiculous. That was the most ridiculous thing…I've ever done," said John, resting his back against the walls of Baker Street, still panting, trying to catch his breath.

Sherlock was next to him, smiling too. "And you invaded Afghanistan."

"It wasn't just me."

Both shared a warm laugh. And John enjoyed it. He enjoyed hearing Sherlock laugh again, like they used to do when they were kids, then teenagers and then young men.

However, never John had expected to open the door and find Angelo with his walking stick.

He wasn't limping anymore.

"Sherlock, what have you done?" asked Mrs Hudson, the landlady, with tears in her eyes.

Sherlock frowned and both John and Sherlock made their way upstairs, where they found a whole police team going through their things.

It was a drug bust.

And John had to pretend. "Seriously? This guy a junkie? Have you met him?"

Lestrade looked at John confused.

Sherlock tried to make him understand. "John -"

"I pretty sure that you could search this flat all day, you wouldn't find anything you could call recreational."

"John, you probably want to shut up now."

"You?"

Sherlock turned to face Lestrade. "I am clean! You know I am. I don't even smoke!"

It turned out to be 'Rachel' was the pink's lady stillborn daughter. Even when Sherlock asked himself why the pink lady, in her last moments of life, was thinking about her stillborn daughter.

"You said that the victims all took the poison themselves, that he makes them take it-well, maybe he…I don't know, talks to them. Maybe he used the death of her daughter somehow," suggested John.

"Yeah, but that was ages ago. Why would she still be upset?"

Everyone looked at Sherlock with wide eyes. Everyone but John.

"Not good?"

John nodded. "A bit not good, yes."

"Look if you dying…if you'd been murdered, in your very last few seconds what would you say?"

John wanted to say Sherlock the truth; that he had been in that position, he had been close to death and he asked God to let him live enough time to see his brothers again.

But John couldn't tell Sherlock that.

"Please God, let me live."

Sherlock realised 'Rachel' was her password code. Being a woman who probably had a job in the media, and who was smartly dressed, she probably had a smart phone with gps.

Using her email address and the password, they could see where the phone was.

It was in Baker Street.

"Sherlock you OK?" asked John, worriedly.

"What? Yes, yes, I'm fine."

"Where are you going?"

"Fresh air, just popping outside for a moment. Won't be long."

"You sure you're all right?"

"I'm fine."