Sherlock Fic: Category Two, Chapter Eight
Sherlock had an eye for details. He would often blame the people around him for seeing but not observing. Each trifle, each inanity normal people would simply oversee, made sense for Sherlock, appertained to a bigger puzzle and was part of a solution. In his head networks stretched, connections were made, photos, quotes and sounds were catalogued in his memory. John soon stopped imagining what it was like in Sherlocks brain. It had to be noisy and bothersome, always on the spot, never silent, always working. Sherlock couldn’t look at something without deducing, interpreting. Between the cases his brain screamed for a task, longed for labour, for distraction. More than once John stopped Sherlock from fighting the never-ending call and drone of his own head with certain medicine.
But Sherlock wasn’t here right now. John would have to unravel that mystery by himself. He gets the feeling it all adds up to it. The right answer, the solution. Maybe everything gets better then. No more Category Two. No more hallucinations, no more uncertainty, the inability to tell reality and delusion apart.
That detail, John thinks, which detail could Sherlock, the great Sherlock Holmes, have missed? When John closes his eyes he sees him right in front of him. The pale face, the high cheekbones, eyes like crystal, cut, they see through everything. Dark curls. Hands pressed together, placed under his chin, thinking. Tight shirt, the upper buttons undone, long slender legs in dark suit trousers.
How was he, John Watson, supposed to solve a riddle Sherlock Holmes posed him?
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The cab stops right at the front door. Stepping off a car in front of 221 Baker Street feels familiar, doesn’t feel wrong in any way. John looks up to the building, observes every window, then the sunblind of the small cafe next to 221. Nothing changed, as if no second has passed.
John approaches the door, fishes the key out of his pocket. He still owns one, Mrs Hudson insisted on it. No one took the flat so far anyway. Mycroft rented it, he refers to it as an easy way of storing Sherlocks possession, but John believes there’s more behind it. 221b is everything there is left from Sherlock Holmes.
The key fits in the lock, John is careful and quiet, he feels like a burglar. He hopes he won’t get caught by Mrs Hudson. Of course they’ve met a few times after Sherlocks death, in cafés or restaurants, just recently on the graveyard on Sherlocks anniversary. But never in 221b.
When John moves upstairs he has to smile while his feet automatically avoid the planks which make the stairs creak. Funny what his head won’t forget.
John’s plan is simple. He needs Sherlocks notebooks. His head is no library, no mind palace in which he can recall any needed information. He requires material. The notebooks are packed in a black box in the living room. John put them away by his own hands. He never looked into one of them.
The moment John stands in front of the milk glass door he hesitates. His finger tips are tingling, his heart’s racing. Just a few feet, he thinks, it really isn’t very far. Get in, take the box, leave again. He pushes the door open; Sherlock is already waiting for him.
“The wife is a gardener” he says at that moment and goes on deducing. John stands in the door frame, stares at Sherlocks back, then at the glassless window behind him. He breathes in deeply, wants to move his legs but they’re stone still, connected to the ground, impossible to move one muscle. His gaze rests on the slender figure, in front of Johns mouth the first white clouds form, his finger tips are getting numb, he tries to move, closes his eyes for a second and counts his breathes.
“Three scratches on the upper arm, much too collateral to be a coincidence, therefore induced.” John counts the tenth inhaling, his legs break away from the floor, he opens his eyes. Sherlock is now right beneath him, the zoom. Then the weapon, John gazes into the muzzle. It’s cold around him, he hears the air crackling, waits for the shot. “Then how could I have missed that one detail?” The bullet hits him right between his eyes and throws him backwards.
Moments later he opens his eyes wide, he is lying on the ground, next to the sofa, he skims over the carpet up to the black box. He struggles to his feet, doesn’t dare to look at the windowsill, feels a light breeze but can’t make out any frost on the items in the room. Stooped he sneaks to the case, lifts the cover, looks into it and registers the notebooks. Relieved he shuts the box again, grabs it and turns around. His gaze glides to the window where Sherlock is sitting again, this time he can make out his face. He’s vacantly watching outside, the declining sun gives his face an almost natural colour. His lips move mechanically, speaking about lost rings and identical twins.
John forces himself to avert his gaze, the box hugged to his body he flees the flat, whipped down the stairs, yanks the door open and dashes to the edge of the pavement, waving for a cab. He doesn’t look back.