Author's Note: Thank you so much for all the wonderful feedback last chapter guys! It was a bit light and dark in places and I'm glad you could appreciate the funny things and the darker side of what was going on. You all seemed to like my rendition of drunk Mycroft :P. By the way! Congratulations to all of you who picked up on Mycroft calling Anthea "Ali"! That was the little thing I was wondering if you'd notice. So this chapter… I was going to do this one but I was unsure so I asked you guys on Tumblr and you all wanted me to advance the plot so I went with this one after all. I hope you really like it! Read, review, and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Clearly I don't own Sherlock. The show is the baby of Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, while Sherlock Holmes itself is the creation of Arthur Conan Doyle.

The First Time He Surprised Them Both

Anthea dropped the piece of toast that she had made for dinner back down on her plate, placing her head in her hands. She hadn't been hungry in a few days and every time she forced herself to eat she almost felt like throwing up – had done so twice in the last two days. If she didn't at least try to eat though Anthea's stomach had a gnawing pain as if trying to eat itself. Really, Anthea just put it down to stress at work – what with all this Moriarty business. The thing is, as work calmed down her appetite didn't come back and the gnawing pain didn't go away. The usually observant Mycroft had been so busy between normal work and making time to meet with his brother that if he had noticed anything off he hadn't said anything.

Anthea groaned out loud, admitting defeat to the single piece of toast. She stood up and with some malice picked up the plate from her dining table. She threw the toast in the bin and placed the small round plate on her sink. Anthea stopped in the kitchen, considered the fact that she really should have a glass of water, decided that she really didn't feel like trying to force anything else down, and decided to just go get changed and go to bed. She didn't have to be into work until 9am tomorrow and surely going to bed early and getting the recommended amount of sleep for once could only do her well.

Anthea threw on one of her old t-shirts she bought in university with shorts from a pyjama set that she despised the frilly top of, and collapsed onto her bed. With how hard she worked, Anthea deserved a nice, long sleep.

Anthea woke up, crunched into a ball, feeling what could only be described as a searing, stabbing pain in her abdomen. She made muted groan as she clutched at her stomach and grimaced. She'd woken up in pain last night too, but not like this. Subconsciously Anthea pulled herself into a tighter ball as the stabbing felt like it increased. Okay, maybe she wasn't just stressed. Maybe she actually had some type of stomach ache or a virus. Anthea opened her eyes, blinking hard, as she focused on breathing through the pain. If she could get up and get to the bathroom then maybe some antacids – that hopefully weren't passed their use by date – would help her out. Maybe they could let her sleep and then she'd use her extra hour off in the morning to go to a doctor.

Anthea pushed through the pain to sit on the edge of her bed. She rubbed her face hard with both hands, trying to wipe away both the searing feeling and the tiredness that still enveloped her. Alright, the bathroom was adjacent to her room, the medicine kept in the top drawer, that meant minimal steps and no crouching required. Good, this was achievable. Anthea hesitated, taking another deep breath before she stood up. With one swift movement Anthea got to her feet. She blinked. No extra pain. Good, good. This was very good. Testing the waters Anthea decided to try and stretch out a little bit. She placed her hands on her hips, pulled her shoulders back, and leant backwards. Almost immediately Anthea leant forward, clutching just below her ribcage with her right hand. Nope, stretching turned out to be a bad idea. This did not bode well for moving, but considering that standing wasn't a problem maybe she could just take small steps.

Taking tiny steps, going slower than a small child might walk, Anthea made her way into her bathroom. Okay, good. She had tiles beneath her feet and was surrounded by her blue walls. Now to get those antacids and go back to sleep for a few hours. Anthea opened the drawer and quickly scanned the contents. There was her pill, headache tablets, blemish cream, Band-Aids, even left over cough medicine, but where were her antacids? Surely she didn't run out. Surely Anthea James, the shadowing figure who kept Mr. Holmes' office running like a well-oiled machine didn't forget to replace an emptied item! No… but Alice Clarke who had put an important USB into her washing machine and forgot to eat breakfast, she might have forgotten. But hey, maybe she just misplaced them. Maybe it was with her less important medical supplies in the kitchen, where those Band-Aids should probably be.

Anthea clutched the bathroom sink as another stabbing sensation hit her hard. If she was going to throw up, as she thought she might, at least she was in the appropriate room. The pain turned from stabbing into that slightly duller but constant searing. Slowly she inched herself to the cold floor in order to lean against the bathtub for support. The pain will pass soon. As soon as she no longer felt the need to huddle into herself to fight the pain, then she'd go looking for the antacids.

As the pain subsided into the gnawing feeling once more, Anthea rested her palm against her head and closed her dark eyes. Now this was ridiculous, she needed to do something about this soon, she didn't know how much more she could take. But that required getting off the floor. Anthea opened her eyes and stared at the blue wall across from her. She placed the image of Mycroft in her mind, shot in the shoulder and bleeding out and still fighting, standing, pulling her into safety, and disarming a guy. If Mycroft who despised doing anything he didn't have to do could do all that, then Anthea could stand back up and make it to her bedroom. With her moment of courage and strength, Anthea got back to her feet, still huddled over slightly. Slowly she made it back to her room. She wanted to fall back on her bed but knew better and edged herself to sit on the edge. She needed to do something about this pain. She needed it to go away, it was annoying, in the way, stopped her eating, and was hurting more every day rather than getting better. Anthea's chocolate eyes flashed over to the bedside table and she paused. She snatched up her phone. Okay, good. She could call someone. But who? She was effectively alone. Technically Tim would come, but then others would get mad at her. Anthea unlocked her phone and stared at the screen. She really didn't want to call an ambulance and go to the hospital all alone only to be told it was all in her head or something. Anthea hit call and held the phone up to her ear.

The phone kept ringing.

And still ringing.

Beep. She heard a ragged breath.

"Who is making inappropriate phone calls at 3am now, Miss James?" Anthea let out a shaky breath, just hearing that melodic voice making her feel better. Safer.

"Hi, Mycroft I-"

"You do realise, of course, that the reason you get to come in late tomorrow is because I have a meeting at six which effectively means I need to wake up in around two hours." Anthea gulped silently.

"Yes, I know, sir. Sorry, sir." Her voice was still shaking, she realised and fought to control it.

"This had better be good."

"It's just, I-" Anthea blinked back the tears from sheer exhaustion that were forming in her eyes. She cleared her throat and shook her head. "You know what, it's nothing, I shouldn't have bothered you. I can deal with it." Mycroft hesitated.

"Anthea?"

"No, no, I'm really sorry, sir. It's an amateur mistake to do something like this. I'm okay – everything's fine with work, sir. I'm sorry for waking you."

Click.

Anthea hung up. Why had she done that? She hadn't even really thought of it, she did it on instinct. It was these stupid feelings getting in the way and making her want to rely on Mycroft. Or maybe her boss was the only person she felt close enough to rely on… Or both. Either way, it was stupid to bother him. What did she expect to happen? Anthea lay in her side, pulling her body back into a ball in order to get as comfortable as possible. Might as well at least attempt to sleep.

Still lying awake in her bed, trying to ignore the pain and force herself asleep, Anthea heard the sound of her front door being jostled and opened. She opened her eyes and frowned, tilting her head to listen to the noise. They hadn't broken open the door. Which meant they either knew how to pick a lock or had a key.

"Anthea?" So had a key then.

"Sir?" Anthea called out, sitting up on her bed a little too fast and wincing sharply. She grunted to keep down the cry. Movement stopped breifly before it continued and she heard footsteps coming up the hallway to her room. The door was open but there was still a polite tap on the doorframe by her boss' knuckles. "Yeah, come in." The bedroom light was flicked on. Mycroft was dressed in a three piece suit – albeit a little messier than usual meaning he had rushed – but he was dressed as he usually was. His hair was merely combed back rather than combed with product.

Mycroft stood in the door way and folded his arms across his chest as his steely blue eyes analysed every detail of his assistant. She imagined her face was a mixture of confusion, pain, and their infamous neutral mask.

"As I said before you so rudely hurried off the phone, my dear." Mycroft cocked his head to the side and offered up one of his sly fake smiles. "This had better be good." Anthea frowned and shook her head at her boss.

"What are you doing here, sir? I told you everything was fine." Mycroft pursed his lips together and raised his eyebrows.

"No, my dear, you told me that all was fine with work. You said you were okay." He looked at her poignantly. "Okay with you means you are surviving. Also, you called me in the middle of the night, it wasn't about work, and you sounded – and appear – completely sober. What might we deduce from that?"

"That something was wrong."

"Congratulations, Miss James. You've discovered the holes in deception skills." The sarcasm oozed, but it was light and playful. "So are you going to tell me what is wrong or am I going to have to do a Sherlock and tell you what is wrong with you?" She let out a single laugh as she looked down. Anthea ran both her hands through her hair and took a deep breath.

"I've had a bit of a stomach ache for days." She started with a sigh. Mycroft nodded.

"Yes, I've noticed. You ignored lunch entirely yesterday." He pointed out, his voice oddly calm and understanding for a Holmes who had been woken up and forced to deal with someone's personal issue.

"It's worse at night. Tonight it's been pretty bad." Anthea tucked her hair behind her ear. Mycroft's eyes narrowed and she could tell he was doing that thing where he ran his tongue over his teeth in though. He took a single step into Anthea's bedroom.

"Care to tell me what the pain feels like?" He hummed. Anthea shrugged.

"It's different at different times, sir. Gnawing most of the time, after I eat it's more like a burning. At night I feel like I'm being stabbed." Steel locked to brown. It was a moment before Mycroft next spoke.

"Would you mind if I came in and tested a few things in order to eliminate some possibilities?" Anthea cocked her head and quirked an eyebrow.

"Why, Mr. Holmes, this wouldn't be a ruse or sorts just to get near my bed, would it?" She had not lost her sense of humour, after all it liked to surface at inappropriate times. Mycroft clicked his tongue and rolled his eyes.

"Miss James, I'm not the one whose pupils dilated at the thought." Anthea rolled her eyes.

"You had to go and make it real." She sighed, earning a small chuckle from her boss. "No, I don't mind sir, please help." Carefully, almost as if he were afraid to enter any further into the room, Mycroft walked over to where Anthea lay on her bed, resting against her headboard.

"Now, I'm just going to press down in a few areas, is that alright?" Mycroft rubbed his hands together, warming them, as he gave Anthea an earnest look, waiting for her response. For a moment she got lost in his eyes, the way she always did when an honest to god emotion or sincerity crossed them. She shook her mind clear before her staring became too obvious.

"Go ahead." She answered, giving Mycroft a reassuring smile. He nodded solemnly. Carefully he poked and prodded in different areas of Anthea's abdomen in order to gauge her reaction. After what Anthea considered too many pokes, Mycroft clasped his hands together and sighed.

"Well, the good news Miss James is that I don't think it's immediately life threatening." Anthea rolled her eyes, Mycroft smirked. "I wanted to eliminate the possibility of a burst appendix." He clarified. "Whatever it is, it is still causing you a great deal of pain. With that in mind I would suggest going to the emergency room." Anthea shook her head.

"I don't want to take an ambulance down for something that's not 'immediately life threatening' and I don't know if I could drive." Mycroft looked Anthea dead in the eye like she was an idiot.

"You've already dragged me into this, Miss James. I did drive here, I don't just magically appear in places." Anthea blanched and shook her head.

"I wouldn't want to impose on you, sir." She argued. Mycroft rolled his eyes.

"You've already imposed on me. What's one more imposition?" Mycroft went to outstretch his hand, hesitated, took a moment to think, and then continued to offer out his hand. "Here." He said, offering a hand to help herself up. Gratefully, Anthea took it and slowly got to her feet. Though they did not let go of their clasped hands, Anthea could feel Mycroft's free hand hovering around her lower back but not touching it, getting as close as he could to supporting her.

"Will you be okay to walk?" He asked. Anthea nodded.

"Can I just grab a book or something before we go?"

A pause.

"I swear, if its Wuthering Heights again, I will leave you here."

Anthea sat in the cold plastic chairs, leaning as far forward as she could, eyes closed against the pain. She heard the scratching noise of a page being turned. Mycroft had apparently in his boredom picked up the copy of Pride and Prejudice Anthea had brought along and was thumbing through it. Anthea leaned back in the chair and took three deep steadying breaths as the last of the stabbing past. She looked at the plastic seat next to her. Mycroft, legs folded, reading through her book with a bored expression and a quirked eyebrow, clearly not enjoying it. He looked tired, she could see that. There were the tell-tale signs of bags under his eyes. It wouldn't surprise her, Anthea herself was exhausted.

"Sir," Anthea breath. Mycroft tilted his head in her direction but did not take his eyes off the book. "It's been over an hour and I haven't gone in yet. You should go home." Mycroft turned the page of the book, completely ignoring his assistant. "Sir, go home." Anthea added some oomph to her voice.

"Alice, you've wasted so much of my time, I might as well follow this through." He hummed. Anthea rolled her eyes but smiled to herself knowingly. The gnawing increased again. Anthea winced, rubbing her forehead as if that would help. Suddenly she felt a hand rub her back. She dare not so anything or move, lest it be moved away.

After a few different tests and waiting around for the results it turns out Mycroft was right, it was nothing 'immediately life threatening'. Anthea had quite bad stomach ulcers. She was told that she was luck and it was the type that could be solved with antibiotics but it would be suggested that she takes it easy on such things as tea and coffee until she was better. By the time they left the hospital, with all the waiting around, it was seven in the morning and Anthea just wanted to pass out.

Mycroft walked Anthea to her flat. He insisted that she have the day off so he helped her get settled on the couch with anything that she may need situated around her – including her laptop so she could at least deal with emails. Mycroft then went to the kitchen and brought Anthea over a glass of water and the first dose of her antibiotic. Anthea took them from him with a warm smile. She placed the tablet on her tongue and skulled the water, almost immediately regretting that choice. She waited for her stomach to settle.

"You know I'm fine to come into work, sir." She looked up at her boss who was standing next to where she was sitting on the couch. "If I just stay in the car and sat down at office chairs." She offered. "It's really only at night that I'm really uncomfortable." Mycroft gave her one of his half smiles that didn't reach his eyes and shook his head.

"In that case, my dear, all you would be doing is answering emails. You can do that from the comfort of your own home today."

"But what if you need me?" Mycroft clicked his tongue.

"I can make do for one day, Anthea." Anthea huffed.

"Alright, fine. I'll sit here and go through your emails, sir." Mycroft chuckled. He pulled his phone out of his breast pocket and frowned.

"Ah," he hummed to himself. "It seems I have a meeting to reschedule." Anthea inhaled sharply. She felt like slapping herself across the forehead.

"You missed your early meeting!" She exclaimed. Mycroft raised his eyebrows.

"It would appear so." He spoke but his mind was focused more on coming up with a solution.

"I'm so sorry, sir."

"Don't worry, my dear." Mycroft sighed as he locked his phone and put it back away. "Some things are more important than work."

The room froze.

Time stood still.

Blue and brown locked on to each other, both aware of what was just said, neither knowing what to do.

Anthea looked down at her hands, frowning, she laughed nervously.

"Mycroft, you just said I was more important than work." She stated.

"It would appear that I did." He answered, sounding distant.

"A few years ago you said some of the information I carry is more important that my life."

A pause.

"Yes, I remember." Anthea looked back up to Mycroft. He was looking at the wall.

"So, does it go; family, information, John, me, work, everything else?" She gestured as if going down ranks in a ladder.

Another pause.

"I-" Mycroft cleared his throat. "You'll have to excuse me, Miss James, I'm quite tired. I'm clearly delirious and am not entirely sure what I'm saying." Anthea watched Mycroft carefully. Mycroft closed his eyes and scratched his eyebrow. "If you'll excuse me, I have work to do and so do you." Mycroft began walking at a fast pace towards Anthea's front door. Anthea blinked her brain clear.

"Mycroft." She called out. Mycroft froze at the door. "Thank you." He looked down to the floor and back up.

"Any time, Miss James." He called over his shoulder before opening the front door.

As the door shut Anthea could have sworn she heard Mycroft mutter "apparently…" to himself in a disgruntled tone.

Author's Note: So? What did you think? Decent enough chapter? The title didn't really pay off until the end which is a nice change for once. Okay! Time to thank my guest reviewers! Thanks to anukriti, anon, Britta, Corrine, Wink, Wheezzy8, ovejalucifer, and JohnsStethoscope. Thank you of course to everyone who reads and reviews this. You're all so awesome. And those of you on Tumblr who answer my random questions about characters and then say lovely things… I'll say it once, I'll say it again, I love being in the Sherlock fandom.