Fic: Observations on Sentinels & Guides in Victorian London - Part Three (PG-13)
Title: Observations on Sentinels & Guides in Victorian London - Part Three
Author: Ryuuza Kochou
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: None, complete AU
Disclaimer: Sherlock Holmes stories are all ACD's works. This is all fun, and no money.
Summary: Holmes is his usual self at the Yard...those poor Yarders.
Part One:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/684238.html
Part Two:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/698815.html
Observations on Sentinels And Guides in Victorian London
Part Three:
Inspector Sentinel G. Lestrade, Scotland Yard, was in an unenviable position.
There was to start with the much sung policemen’s lot, which was an unhappy one by all accounts. Lestrade was overworked, underpaid and underappreciated, even with the Sentinel’s Allowance added on the pay scales. Of course, he did get to work alongside his beautiful and accomplished wife and Guide; so there was a silver lining there; though after spending days been treated as some sort of sensory machine, going hither and thither to every crime scene in the city to see what was what, literally, the greatly touted nobility of the Sentinel way was extremely hard to fathom. Especially, he thought darkly, with men like Inspector Guardian Gregson lording it over him, never a slave to his nose because his only enhanced senses were touch and hearing. Oh, how Lestrade envied the ordinary people with their ordinary sense of smell in this city! The only way you could describe it was...ha! Unenviable.
His most unenviable position was of a political kind though, as follows thusly; they had no official Prime Alpha in London. There were clans in every district, of course, but the pride - the Sentinel population that guarded the ‘tribe’ as a whole - was lead by the Prime Alpha. Because Prime Alpha’s who were powerful enough to hold onto the position through all the challengers for any length of time were rare, the city mostly got along without one and clans that covered each district all squabbled amongst themselves for position and space within London. Society may pretend to put the lacquer of civilisation over Sentinels, but when push came to shove Sentinels fought to death or crippling when it came to becoming an Alpha. Outlawing it would do nothing; Sentinels recognised the strongest and the most powerful as the leaders. It may not be democratic, but Sentinels were of an era far, far removed the invention of democracy.
Sherlock Holmes was the Prime Alpha Sentinel of London. Everyone who saw him knew it. Even Sentinels he’d never met before unconsciously recognized his authority; when he gave an order or asked for assistance, they fell over themselves to obey. There was absolutely no mistaking the sheer, distilled Sentinel presence when he entered a room, none at all.
But he wasn’t bonded; which automatically dismissed him from taking the top job on a permanent basis, because Sentinels as a whole tended to only permanently follow a Sentinel who had a Guide. They would respect his demands temporarily, but he could not change the inner workings of any clan as an unbonded Sentinel, in the same way a Captain would not follow a Private, even if he took a Private’s advice.
Here’s where the problem came in. He was, unofficially, considered an Alpha; despite being unbonded. There was too much...well, too much there for him not to be. And like all Alpha’s, he had at least one recognised Beta.
Guess who was lucky?
It hadn’t been anything deliberate; at least Lestrade hoped not. You never could tell with Holmes, he seemed to live and breathe on the deliberate destruction of others personal presentiments and assumptions.
It was just...when he was starting out in his criminal investigations, Lestrade was the one he came into contact with the most. Almost against Lestrade’s will, the Inspector had been drawn into Holmes’ strange, sharp magnetism and had unconsciously bowed to his authority. By the time Holmes true nature as a powerful, Dark Sentinel was truly clear (and Lestrade was sure it had been clear to Holmes long before anyone else; the man was a hugely talented deceiver), it was too late. Holmes had, unconsciously, recognised Lestrade as his Beta.
Of course, unbonded this was all unofficial and would have not a whit of consequence in any of the clans. However, the very instant the Dark Sentinel bonded to his Guide, he would be above them all. All the clan leaders knew it and feared it. Some of them were the product of political influence rather than brute strength, because politics gets in everywhere; these were the ones that feared the coming of the Prime the most. Holmes, and by association Lestrade, were threats.
Everyone knew how Sentinels reacted to threats, didn’t they?
Lestrade was currently under the thumb of the Alpha Sentinel Thomas Ascot; the Superintendant within his division Scotland Yard. He was, technically, Lestrade’s own Alpha; each division had a clan of it’s own. He knew of Lestrade’s unofficial status; and therefore made his official status a living hell. That was why he was on crime scene duty every moment under the sun.
Ascot’s rise though the ranks had been helped by being bonded and married to Lady Beatrice Ascot; who had been appointed the Matchmaker by the Lord Royal Sentinel. All royals in Britain had a Sentinel and Guide advisor pair known as the Lord Royal Sentinels, who ran the Royal Sentinel Guard; tasked with protecting the court. In political and aristocratic circles it made them quite powerful, but their authority with the Sentinel clans was mostly titular. They followed the Alpha Prime just like everyone else, if necessary.
Holmes was, technically, part of Ascots clan as he lived in Ascot’s division in London. But Holmes was...well, Holmes, and not truly subject to any conventional authority. So if Holmes bonded and therefore became the Prime, Ascot would lose his position as an Alpha, even if he kept the title of Superintendant. Holmes, infuriatingly, had neither joined the military or the Yard as almost all Sentinels did. But then, Holmes had never been normal.
What made the whole ghastly situation worse was that Holmes’ work with Scotland Yard had made Ascot more esteemed; to the point where Ascot couldn’t get rid of Holmes, could not expel him from the clan area and most definitely could not challenge him physically.
To be fair, Ascot wasn’t one of the political Alphas. He was a large, heavyset Sentinel who had earned his place in combat, breaking the knee joint of the former Superintendant right in the police training yards after working his way up to Inspector from Constable.
But if anyone had seen Holmes fight, that meant nothing. Holmes truly roused was a force of nature and in a fight a vicious and savage dancer, blood caked poetry in motion. The worst thing - the absolute worst thing - about it was that it wasn’t the mindless, uncontrolled berserker rage that was normal for Sentinels who went feral. Holmes still thought even his most violent episodes. That’s what separated Dark Sentinels from Alphas; Dark Sentinels maintained a perfect sense of self, even while dismembering their opponents. Their decisions were calm, considered, even sensible; just completely removed from civility and conscience. It was as if they had hammered a cold, hard diamond of rationality out of the raging storm pressure of their anger.
Lestrade remembered - oh, yes, he remembered with a shudder - the one instance where he had seen such a thoughtful cataclysm of rage.
There was only one tenet every Sentinel on every land had in common; Protect the Guide. Given Holmes’ opinions of Guides, one might form an opinion he cared for them not a whit, and was barely a Sentinel at all. You would be mortally mistaken.
Lestrade had the whole sordid case etched into his memory. A pack of ruthless men under the direction of a lordly Puritan aristocrat had been snatching Guides from the streets and taking them to the manor of said aristocrat, so reviled by the ‘unnatural’ and ‘satanic’ ways of Guides and of the perversions he ascribed to them, that he was compelled to ‘purify’ them before putting them to death; the Guides had not died quickly, or painlessly. They had been the recipients of the kind of indefensible torture that had not been seen since the Inquisition; the half-mad Inquisitor even had some of the implements in his hellish den.
Almost the whole pride had assisted in hunting him down. Holmes had gotten there first.
He had calmly and collectedly removed the surviving Guides from whatever diabolical instrument held them, ignoring the preachings of the Puritan. And then, while the whole clan watched, he had turned around a broken every single bone in the man’s body.
And it hadn’t been a figure of speech. The Dark Sentinel had been quite methodical about it; starting with the toes and armed with nothing more than fists and fingers he had mapped his landscape of pain upwards, deaf to the hideous animal screams of the torturer. He broke leg bones in multiple places, shattered knees, snapped hip bones, destroyed ribs, cracked spines; working his way along as he crushed shoulders and fractured elbows, turned wrists all the way around in a circle and fingers pointing backward before fracturing his way past the neck and even managing to break the tiny bones of the inner ear before reshaping the skull.
The torturer had been barely human by the time the Dark Sentinel had finished and he still wasn’t dead. He been irreversibly crippled, blinded, deafened; he’d been covered in his own blood and bone spurs and waste, barely able even to make a sound. The Dark Sentinel’s hands were split and wounded, and he was bloody to the elbows. He walked out of the manor silently, leaving the still living wreck of a human being behind him.
There was one other thing, besides that horrifically rational punishment, that had made such an indelible impression in Lestrade. It had been the other Sentinel’s expression. It had been as tranquil and pleasant as a man resting in his sitting room; even with his ruined hands. The twisted preacher had deserved to die; there was no doubt of that. Some of the remaining Guides had begged the Sentinels who came to rescue them, had pleaded with them to be allowed to die. It had been sickening.
But still, they were oddly thankful the man hadn’t lasted long. Without any orders from anyone, they had cleared the house and burned it to the ground.
Oh yes, Holmes was a Dark Sentinel. No one ever doubted it after that. And not Sentinel in the Empire would challenge him to a fight. At least a feral Sentinel would want his target dead as quickly as possible, he would have no inclination to inflict suffering as well.
His lovely, dark haired Guide looked up from her paperwork; she, like all Guides, shared an L shaped space with her Sentinel in the main room, the desks set up in such a way that the Guide was tucked in behind the Sentinel nearest the wall. Sentinels required boundaries wherever they were; they required some sort of area that was clearly delineated; especially when accompanied by their Guide. Giving the whole force of Sentinels their own rooms was deemed impractical; so the Sentinel offices were just large spaces, each with it’s own separate province of desks.
“Your favourite Alpha enters, Inspector,” Lady Guide Lestrade warned with a hint of a smile. “And he is in a fine fettle today.”
“He’s always in a fine fettle, my own,” Lestrade grumbled, before linking his smallest finger with hers for moment. Sentinels constantly needed to ground their senses in their Guides; that grounding, and the fine control it offered, was why Sentinels required Guides; otherwise they would be trapped into a sensory fugue and die, or be driven mad by the influx. Of course, it was best done by tactile means; but constant public touching was considered extremely vulgar. Sentinels and Guides had to, as much as possible, keep from offending public sensibilities. As grounding rituals went, theirs was a subtle, unobtrusive one that staved off any scrutiny.
He rose to meet Holmes; and yes, Lestrade could tell just by Holmes’ impatient stride as he entered that he was in one of his mercurially changing black moods. “Mister Holmes,” he greeted, trying to keep neutral. “I see you got my message.”
“Yes I received your message, Lestrade, as evidenced by the fact that I am here. You really should be an Inspector or something,” Holmes snapped. There were dark bags around his eyes. “What plebeian journey into the depths of dullery have you in store for me today?” Was the acid riposte.
That was unusually blunt even for Holmes. Lestrade looked him over, and didn’t like what he saw. He knew the other was having trouble with his senses lately. It had been worrying the clan. They may not like him personally, but losing a Prime Alpha Dark would be a tragedy for any pride. Lestrade stopped scanning when we saw Holmes dark warning glare. “Superintendant Alpha Sentinel Ascot has asked for you,” he explained quickly, to get it over with. He knew it would not go over well.
He was right. Holmes waved a dismissive hand and turned to go. “Well you can inform the Superintendant that I am on a case at the moment; and will be for the foreseeable future. Something has been stolen and I am trying to find it.”
Lestrade was momentarily diverted. “What? And from who?”
Holmes stiffened. “That,” he replied icily. “Doesn’t matter in the slightest. Now if you are finished draining my intellectual reserves for the day...”
The man was being his usual insufferable self, obviously. “May I speak with you?” Lestrade broke in and herded the dishevelled man towards the Mute. Holmes must not be close to an answer on his case, because Lestrade would never have been able to get him there if Holmes had been set on being elsewhere.
He led the consultant through the outer door and stepped over the heavy jams of the inner door, waiting for Holmes to follow. The Palace, Lestrade had once been told, had a Mute room made of glass, but the Yard one was made of metal and wood.
An ordinary person would have heard faint sound of the water, rushing though a complex system of pipes and pumps, flowing all around them, walls, ceiling and floor. To a Sentinel it was a din of white noise, designed for delicate conversations in a city where a small part of the population could hear a pin drop at a miles distance. It was always cold and stank of damp, but it was a remarkable commodity. There weren’t many like it.
It had a bed in it. Most people who weren’t Sentinels found that odd. But they were ignorant of how the bonding heat worked.
“I sure I am about to receive an amusing lecture of using proper Alpha respect to Ascot,” Holmes voice was sardonic and facetious.
“Whatever you may think of my deductive faculties Holmes, even I am not blind enough to flog a dead horse,” Lestrade replied wearily. “Whatever your current bonnet bee is, don’t blame me for it. How are your senses?”
Holmes sniffed. “Well enough, if entirely none of your concern.”
“It certainly is my concern, Sentinel,” Lestrade snapped, losing patience. “As you are of my clan, for my sins; whatever evidently unforgivable ones they must have been. We all know you are having trouble with them.”
“What you all know,” Holmes replied derisively. “Could nary fill a teaspoon, Inspector.”
“Maybe so, but we all know it nonetheless,” Lestrade retorted levelly. “You will have a choice soon whether to bond or to die, and for reasons completely unfathomable to me, most of the Yard Sentinels would rather see you bonded than dead.”
“However would I know these most blindly obvious things without you Lestrade!” Holmes yelled, losing his temper, pacing the room.
Lestrade felt his heart sink. If the man was actually admitting it, it must now be extremely bad. “There must be some Guide who can help you, Holmes,” he replied quietly.
Holmes snorted derisively. “You mean those obedience trained lap dogs from the House?” he sneered. “A statue has more acumen. I think I would sooner die.”
“Yes, well, we shall see on that as that possibility looms,” Lestrade muttered. “If Ascot gets wind of this you will never find a Guide. His wife is the Matchmaker.”
“Ascot,” Holmes spat dismissively. “Is a joke of a Sentinel. If I wanted to walk into the palace and kill the Queen, he could not stop me. He could not stop a single drop of water from running uphill. Defeating him in combat would be a disgrace to the winner. If I am to find a Guide he will be of no concern. It does not matter a whit to me what he thinks he knows, so you, as his lackey, are free to tell him.”
Lestrade felt a spurt of temper. “Oh you can’t give me that, Holmes. I have never acted against you even if you believe I never assist you. And Ascot blames us when you insult his leadership,” he took a risk in poking the Sentinel in the chest. “I am just following orders. For all our sakes if not for your own, I suggest you do the same.”
Holmes glared at him, before scrubbing already askew his hair. “Very well. I suppose a moment of hellish mind destroying boredom here will at least make me appreciate the finer things in life.”
“That’s the spirit,” Lestrade muttered sarcastically before opening up the door.
They adjourned to the Sentinel office; Ascot was standing over Lady Guide Lestrade, who was stubbornly denying him access.
“My Sentinel,” she intoned firmly. “Will return momentarily and I do not allow other Sentinels into his space. That would be most improper.”
“Guide!” Ascot snapped at her.
“Alpha,” Lestrade’s interjection was quiet as a stone, but also about as hard. If a Guide was being threatened, Alpha or not, the Sentinel would eliminate them.
Even Ascot recognised this, and stepped backwards to show he was no threat. His lips turned to a sneer. “Sentinel Holmes, how good of you to obey my summons.”
“Alpha Ascot,” Holmes replied, smiling like a shark. “How good it is to see that you maintain proper standards of behaviour around Guides of your division.”
You could have heard a pin drop in the ensuing silence. Lestrade nearly groaned.
“Holmes,” Ascot repeated, this time through gritted teeth. “The Yard requires your assistance today. Since you are so clever with spotting deceptions from trifles and such. Come,” he marched imperiously away.
Holmes gave Lady Lestrade a respectful nod before following. Lestrade brushed his fingertips feather light on her shoulder before doing likewise.
He led them to a questioning room past a pile of travelling boxes and through a door where two men, one bulky and heavyset and the other thin and phlegmatic, both dressed expensively, sat behind a heavy table. A bowl had been placed before them, which was bubbling and hissing with some chemical effervescence. It made do for white noise in a pinch.
The larger man gave an offended glare and rose, speaking in an accent clearly from America. “I do protest this damned treatment. We’ve been waiting far too long for our interview. Who is this, then? The Sentinel who was supposed to question us hours ago?”
Ascot pursed his lips at the man. “Yes, Sentinel Drebber. If you will kindly take a seat, we will interview you and you may leave. Sentinel Holmes?” He turned to the other smugly. “As you know, all foreign Sentinels must be interviewed by the clan when travelling through Britain, for state secrecy and all that. If you would interview Misters Drebber and Strangerson.” He gestured to the other chair in the room.
It was a job any half trained Sentinel Constable could have done. Technically the Alpha could call on any member of his clan for any purpose, but calling in a Sentinel of Holmes’ calibre in here was a calculated insult.
Holmes expression didn’t change however. He merely viewed the men impassively, taking a token sniff, before turning back to Ascot. “I’m finished Alpha.”
“What?”
“What?”
“What in the hell?” That came from Drebber.
“I said,” Holmes spoke slowly, as if to a child. “I have completed the necessary fact finding, Alpha.”
Ascot was flabbergasted. “But you haven’t done anything!” He accused.
Holmes gave him a special smile. “They hail from Cleveland, Ohio, as evidenced by the dye in their coats. They originally hailed from Salt Lake City in Utah, though, judging by the leather of their boots. They have travelled most of Europe; I see wool from Russia in the socks and a distinct flavour of Italian cigarettes in Mister Strangersons breast pocket, the silk laced cotton of the shirts in distinctly Spanish and, of course, there’s an ornate silver buckle on Mister Drebber’s belt that suggests Switzerland and a very professional French shine on his fingernails; they arrived on the...lets see, the ten fifteen berthing steamship at the Tilbury docks before taking an open carriage into Whitehall judging by the mud on their boots; the pamphlet protruding from Mister Strangerson’s coat pocket indicates their destination is Liverpool, and their last stop before reaching London was Copenhagen, though admittedly I took that fact from the tags on their luggage outside.”
He grinned while the rest of the room gaped. “As to their characters...well, I personally would not share a meal with them at my club, but they are not spies. Judging from the bible verse notation jotted on Mister Drebber’s hand for memory, they are men of a religious sort. The sheaf of cue cards that creates the rather unflattering bulge in Mister Drebber’s pants pocket is no doubt a stirring address to the congregation they are going to speak at. Mister Drebber is our Sentinel but judging by his ribbons he is neither Alpha nor military; Mister Strangerson is not his Guide, but his secretary as the marks on his nose left by his oft used reading glasses and the calluses of his thumb and forefinger indicate a great deal of letter writing. You would do well to instruct them on proper customs procedures as they did not come straight here as required. They shared a very large steak meal at the Royale - don’t they just make a divine pepper sauce, Mister Strangerson - followed by a raspberry torte and a good amount of extremely fine brandy and a walk around the Botanical Gardens - the city is quite a dreadful swamp for the nose is it not, Mister Drebber? As to their religious persuasion,” Holmes shrugged. “Who can truly fathom the workings of the fanatically faithful? Some degree of Mormonism by the religious insignia embroidered rather neatly on the good Mister Strangerson’s handkerchief, though it must be a strange, new interpretation of their usual tenets. Mister Drebber has had, shall we say, extremely close, even intimate encounters with...” he sniffed delicately. “Two women and one man since his arrival. Not a bad tally in such a short time, I suppose, but very unusual for a priest.”
Drebbers chair was nearly flung into the wall as he rose in outrage. “You damned mountebank!”
Holmes leaned in, dominating with his height and presence. “Correct me if I am wrong, sir,” he purred silkily. “But every Sentinel’s first lesson is how to tell when others lie.”
Drebber’s face was a red and purple masterpiece of impotent rage, but something in Holmes’ eyes backed him down. “No, sir,” he half snarled. “We have nothing to add.”
“Well then, the interview is complete and you are free to go,” Holmes replied cheerfully. “Of course, you must pay a late reporting fine, is that not right Superintendant Sentinel Ascot? Oh, I’m sure you noticed the hundreds of other little trifles that indicated their current lifestyles and histories; I just pointed out the painfully obvious ones for the benefit of reporting.”
Ascot was struck utterly dumb, gaping like a buffoon at the sudden tide of deduction.
“Well gentlemen it has been a time consuming waste to see you,” Holmes gave a little wave. “Mister Drebber; you so much as harm the hair on the head of any one of my tribe and I will personally run you down like cat with a rat; with much the same results. You gentlemen have yourself a nice day. Goodbye.”
He strode out, Lestrade in his wake and Ascot was left with the two red faced men to deal with.
“There,” Holmes said pointedly. “I have followed orders. Now I must get back to actual work.”
Lestrade cocked his head as they approached the Sentinel offices, hearing the ringing laughter from all the amused Sentinels listening in. “You certainly make an impression, Holmes.”
“Ha!” was the only reply.
There were sudden running footsteps and Lady Lestrade burst from the offices. “Sentinel. Can you feel it?” she demanded breathlessly.
Lestrade took his wife by the shoulders. “Feel what, my own?”
Lady Lestrade closed her eyes as if she had just had a strange thought, and that’s when they felt it.
There was an undeniable presence moving though them like a slow, treacly wave. Lestrade felt it, but couldn’t describe it properly. It was almost akin to a beam of sunlight, warm and harmless, but powerful.
“What is that?” Lestrade breathed.
“I am not sure. Guides are feeling it all over the place. I’ve sent the Bradstreet’s down to the Sanctuary to see if they know.”
Lestrade heard a sharp intake of breath from Holmes, quick and almost panicked, and quite unlike him.
The presence vanished. Holmes keeled to the floor.
It was so out of character that Lestrade froze as he watched. Holmes folded up around himself, huddling almost like a child; pressing his arms to his chest. There was another choked of gasp that spurred Lestrade. “Holmes! Sentinel can you...”
Holmes gaze snapped to him and Lestrade leapt for his wife, dragging her back and away. Those eyes weren’t the playful, powerful eyes of a deductive genius; they were the bottomless pools of the Dark Sentinel.
They didn’t remain though. Lestrade actually saw him wrestle it back into some cage deep in his admittedly extremely disciplined mind.
Holmes rose, breathing hard like he’d run a race. His limbs were uncertain; for the first time Lestrade saw him move with less than a hundred percent grace. His self control was iron, though; it passed quickly.
His finger jabbed toward Lady Lestrade like a knife. “Where,” he growled lowly. “Did it come from?”
Lestrade stifled the urge to block his Guide from view. Holmes, Dark Sentinel or not, had never raised a hand to any Guide.
“The Sanctuary, Sentinel,” Lady Lestrade replied quickly. “All I could sense was the Sanctuary.”
Holmes muttered under his breath so only Lestrade heard it. “Well that helps me not at all.”
“Never mind,” the Sentinel straightened abruptly. “I’ll take the case, Lestrade,” he said before striding away.
“What case?” Lestrade called after him, puzzled.
“The Disappearing Guides case,” the man replied calmly, still walking away. “The photo of the deceased man in connection with it was clearly a boxer. Just look at the ears.”
Lestrade’s mouth opened and closed. “You mean the one where a suspected group is kidnapping Guides for export? The one where one of their comrades was shot while they fled the scene to keep him from talking? The one that was upside down on my Guides desk at the far back of the room with no accompanying paperwork?’
“Yes, Lestrade,” Holmes’ voice drifted up from the stairwell, unseen. “That’s the one. I’ll take it.”
Lestrade gave up. “You’re welcome.” He cocked his head and felt his Guide’s hand on his shoulder, anchoring him as he stretched out his hearing to listen.
‘Really Lestrade; you are the one thanking me; not I you.” Came from the street.
His wife’s eyes asked the question, and he shrugged in reply. He didn’t know what the hell just happened either.
--------------------------------------------------------------
End Part Three
Author: Ryuuza Kochou
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: None, complete AU
Disclaimer: Sherlock Holmes stories are all ACD's works. This is all fun, and no money.
Summary: Holmes is his usual self at the Yard...those poor Yarders.
Part One:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/684238.html
Part Two:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/698815.html
Observations on Sentinels And Guides in Victorian London
Part Three:
Inspector Sentinel G. Lestrade, Scotland Yard, was in an unenviable position.
There was to start with the much sung policemen’s lot, which was an unhappy one by all accounts. Lestrade was overworked, underpaid and underappreciated, even with the Sentinel’s Allowance added on the pay scales. Of course, he did get to work alongside his beautiful and accomplished wife and Guide; so there was a silver lining there; though after spending days been treated as some sort of sensory machine, going hither and thither to every crime scene in the city to see what was what, literally, the greatly touted nobility of the Sentinel way was extremely hard to fathom. Especially, he thought darkly, with men like Inspector Guardian Gregson lording it over him, never a slave to his nose because his only enhanced senses were touch and hearing. Oh, how Lestrade envied the ordinary people with their ordinary sense of smell in this city! The only way you could describe it was...ha! Unenviable.
His most unenviable position was of a political kind though, as follows thusly; they had no official Prime Alpha in London. There were clans in every district, of course, but the pride - the Sentinel population that guarded the ‘tribe’ as a whole - was lead by the Prime Alpha. Because Prime Alpha’s who were powerful enough to hold onto the position through all the challengers for any length of time were rare, the city mostly got along without one and clans that covered each district all squabbled amongst themselves for position and space within London. Society may pretend to put the lacquer of civilisation over Sentinels, but when push came to shove Sentinels fought to death or crippling when it came to becoming an Alpha. Outlawing it would do nothing; Sentinels recognised the strongest and the most powerful as the leaders. It may not be democratic, but Sentinels were of an era far, far removed the invention of democracy.
Sherlock Holmes was the Prime Alpha Sentinel of London. Everyone who saw him knew it. Even Sentinels he’d never met before unconsciously recognized his authority; when he gave an order or asked for assistance, they fell over themselves to obey. There was absolutely no mistaking the sheer, distilled Sentinel presence when he entered a room, none at all.
But he wasn’t bonded; which automatically dismissed him from taking the top job on a permanent basis, because Sentinels as a whole tended to only permanently follow a Sentinel who had a Guide. They would respect his demands temporarily, but he could not change the inner workings of any clan as an unbonded Sentinel, in the same way a Captain would not follow a Private, even if he took a Private’s advice.
Here’s where the problem came in. He was, unofficially, considered an Alpha; despite being unbonded. There was too much...well, too much there for him not to be. And like all Alpha’s, he had at least one recognised Beta.
Guess who was lucky?
It hadn’t been anything deliberate; at least Lestrade hoped not. You never could tell with Holmes, he seemed to live and breathe on the deliberate destruction of others personal presentiments and assumptions.
It was just...when he was starting out in his criminal investigations, Lestrade was the one he came into contact with the most. Almost against Lestrade’s will, the Inspector had been drawn into Holmes’ strange, sharp magnetism and had unconsciously bowed to his authority. By the time Holmes true nature as a powerful, Dark Sentinel was truly clear (and Lestrade was sure it had been clear to Holmes long before anyone else; the man was a hugely talented deceiver), it was too late. Holmes had, unconsciously, recognised Lestrade as his Beta.
Of course, unbonded this was all unofficial and would have not a whit of consequence in any of the clans. However, the very instant the Dark Sentinel bonded to his Guide, he would be above them all. All the clan leaders knew it and feared it. Some of them were the product of political influence rather than brute strength, because politics gets in everywhere; these were the ones that feared the coming of the Prime the most. Holmes, and by association Lestrade, were threats.
Everyone knew how Sentinels reacted to threats, didn’t they?
Lestrade was currently under the thumb of the Alpha Sentinel Thomas Ascot; the Superintendant within his division Scotland Yard. He was, technically, Lestrade’s own Alpha; each division had a clan of it’s own. He knew of Lestrade’s unofficial status; and therefore made his official status a living hell. That was why he was on crime scene duty every moment under the sun.
Ascot’s rise though the ranks had been helped by being bonded and married to Lady Beatrice Ascot; who had been appointed the Matchmaker by the Lord Royal Sentinel. All royals in Britain had a Sentinel and Guide advisor pair known as the Lord Royal Sentinels, who ran the Royal Sentinel Guard; tasked with protecting the court. In political and aristocratic circles it made them quite powerful, but their authority with the Sentinel clans was mostly titular. They followed the Alpha Prime just like everyone else, if necessary.
Holmes was, technically, part of Ascots clan as he lived in Ascot’s division in London. But Holmes was...well, Holmes, and not truly subject to any conventional authority. So if Holmes bonded and therefore became the Prime, Ascot would lose his position as an Alpha, even if he kept the title of Superintendant. Holmes, infuriatingly, had neither joined the military or the Yard as almost all Sentinels did. But then, Holmes had never been normal.
What made the whole ghastly situation worse was that Holmes’ work with Scotland Yard had made Ascot more esteemed; to the point where Ascot couldn’t get rid of Holmes, could not expel him from the clan area and most definitely could not challenge him physically.
To be fair, Ascot wasn’t one of the political Alphas. He was a large, heavyset Sentinel who had earned his place in combat, breaking the knee joint of the former Superintendant right in the police training yards after working his way up to Inspector from Constable.
But if anyone had seen Holmes fight, that meant nothing. Holmes truly roused was a force of nature and in a fight a vicious and savage dancer, blood caked poetry in motion. The worst thing - the absolute worst thing - about it was that it wasn’t the mindless, uncontrolled berserker rage that was normal for Sentinels who went feral. Holmes still thought even his most violent episodes. That’s what separated Dark Sentinels from Alphas; Dark Sentinels maintained a perfect sense of self, even while dismembering their opponents. Their decisions were calm, considered, even sensible; just completely removed from civility and conscience. It was as if they had hammered a cold, hard diamond of rationality out of the raging storm pressure of their anger.
Lestrade remembered - oh, yes, he remembered with a shudder - the one instance where he had seen such a thoughtful cataclysm of rage.
There was only one tenet every Sentinel on every land had in common; Protect the Guide. Given Holmes’ opinions of Guides, one might form an opinion he cared for them not a whit, and was barely a Sentinel at all. You would be mortally mistaken.
Lestrade had the whole sordid case etched into his memory. A pack of ruthless men under the direction of a lordly Puritan aristocrat had been snatching Guides from the streets and taking them to the manor of said aristocrat, so reviled by the ‘unnatural’ and ‘satanic’ ways of Guides and of the perversions he ascribed to them, that he was compelled to ‘purify’ them before putting them to death; the Guides had not died quickly, or painlessly. They had been the recipients of the kind of indefensible torture that had not been seen since the Inquisition; the half-mad Inquisitor even had some of the implements in his hellish den.
Almost the whole pride had assisted in hunting him down. Holmes had gotten there first.
He had calmly and collectedly removed the surviving Guides from whatever diabolical instrument held them, ignoring the preachings of the Puritan. And then, while the whole clan watched, he had turned around a broken every single bone in the man’s body.
And it hadn’t been a figure of speech. The Dark Sentinel had been quite methodical about it; starting with the toes and armed with nothing more than fists and fingers he had mapped his landscape of pain upwards, deaf to the hideous animal screams of the torturer. He broke leg bones in multiple places, shattered knees, snapped hip bones, destroyed ribs, cracked spines; working his way along as he crushed shoulders and fractured elbows, turned wrists all the way around in a circle and fingers pointing backward before fracturing his way past the neck and even managing to break the tiny bones of the inner ear before reshaping the skull.
The torturer had been barely human by the time the Dark Sentinel had finished and he still wasn’t dead. He been irreversibly crippled, blinded, deafened; he’d been covered in his own blood and bone spurs and waste, barely able even to make a sound. The Dark Sentinel’s hands were split and wounded, and he was bloody to the elbows. He walked out of the manor silently, leaving the still living wreck of a human being behind him.
There was one other thing, besides that horrifically rational punishment, that had made such an indelible impression in Lestrade. It had been the other Sentinel’s expression. It had been as tranquil and pleasant as a man resting in his sitting room; even with his ruined hands. The twisted preacher had deserved to die; there was no doubt of that. Some of the remaining Guides had begged the Sentinels who came to rescue them, had pleaded with them to be allowed to die. It had been sickening.
But still, they were oddly thankful the man hadn’t lasted long. Without any orders from anyone, they had cleared the house and burned it to the ground.
Oh yes, Holmes was a Dark Sentinel. No one ever doubted it after that. And not Sentinel in the Empire would challenge him to a fight. At least a feral Sentinel would want his target dead as quickly as possible, he would have no inclination to inflict suffering as well.
His lovely, dark haired Guide looked up from her paperwork; she, like all Guides, shared an L shaped space with her Sentinel in the main room, the desks set up in such a way that the Guide was tucked in behind the Sentinel nearest the wall. Sentinels required boundaries wherever they were; they required some sort of area that was clearly delineated; especially when accompanied by their Guide. Giving the whole force of Sentinels their own rooms was deemed impractical; so the Sentinel offices were just large spaces, each with it’s own separate province of desks.
“Your favourite Alpha enters, Inspector,” Lady Guide Lestrade warned with a hint of a smile. “And he is in a fine fettle today.”
“He’s always in a fine fettle, my own,” Lestrade grumbled, before linking his smallest finger with hers for moment. Sentinels constantly needed to ground their senses in their Guides; that grounding, and the fine control it offered, was why Sentinels required Guides; otherwise they would be trapped into a sensory fugue and die, or be driven mad by the influx. Of course, it was best done by tactile means; but constant public touching was considered extremely vulgar. Sentinels and Guides had to, as much as possible, keep from offending public sensibilities. As grounding rituals went, theirs was a subtle, unobtrusive one that staved off any scrutiny.
He rose to meet Holmes; and yes, Lestrade could tell just by Holmes’ impatient stride as he entered that he was in one of his mercurially changing black moods. “Mister Holmes,” he greeted, trying to keep neutral. “I see you got my message.”
“Yes I received your message, Lestrade, as evidenced by the fact that I am here. You really should be an Inspector or something,” Holmes snapped. There were dark bags around his eyes. “What plebeian journey into the depths of dullery have you in store for me today?” Was the acid riposte.
That was unusually blunt even for Holmes. Lestrade looked him over, and didn’t like what he saw. He knew the other was having trouble with his senses lately. It had been worrying the clan. They may not like him personally, but losing a Prime Alpha Dark would be a tragedy for any pride. Lestrade stopped scanning when we saw Holmes dark warning glare. “Superintendant Alpha Sentinel Ascot has asked for you,” he explained quickly, to get it over with. He knew it would not go over well.
He was right. Holmes waved a dismissive hand and turned to go. “Well you can inform the Superintendant that I am on a case at the moment; and will be for the foreseeable future. Something has been stolen and I am trying to find it.”
Lestrade was momentarily diverted. “What? And from who?”
Holmes stiffened. “That,” he replied icily. “Doesn’t matter in the slightest. Now if you are finished draining my intellectual reserves for the day...”
The man was being his usual insufferable self, obviously. “May I speak with you?” Lestrade broke in and herded the dishevelled man towards the Mute. Holmes must not be close to an answer on his case, because Lestrade would never have been able to get him there if Holmes had been set on being elsewhere.
He led the consultant through the outer door and stepped over the heavy jams of the inner door, waiting for Holmes to follow. The Palace, Lestrade had once been told, had a Mute room made of glass, but the Yard one was made of metal and wood.
An ordinary person would have heard faint sound of the water, rushing though a complex system of pipes and pumps, flowing all around them, walls, ceiling and floor. To a Sentinel it was a din of white noise, designed for delicate conversations in a city where a small part of the population could hear a pin drop at a miles distance. It was always cold and stank of damp, but it was a remarkable commodity. There weren’t many like it.
It had a bed in it. Most people who weren’t Sentinels found that odd. But they were ignorant of how the bonding heat worked.
“I sure I am about to receive an amusing lecture of using proper Alpha respect to Ascot,” Holmes voice was sardonic and facetious.
“Whatever you may think of my deductive faculties Holmes, even I am not blind enough to flog a dead horse,” Lestrade replied wearily. “Whatever your current bonnet bee is, don’t blame me for it. How are your senses?”
Holmes sniffed. “Well enough, if entirely none of your concern.”
“It certainly is my concern, Sentinel,” Lestrade snapped, losing patience. “As you are of my clan, for my sins; whatever evidently unforgivable ones they must have been. We all know you are having trouble with them.”
“What you all know,” Holmes replied derisively. “Could nary fill a teaspoon, Inspector.”
“Maybe so, but we all know it nonetheless,” Lestrade retorted levelly. “You will have a choice soon whether to bond or to die, and for reasons completely unfathomable to me, most of the Yard Sentinels would rather see you bonded than dead.”
“However would I know these most blindly obvious things without you Lestrade!” Holmes yelled, losing his temper, pacing the room.
Lestrade felt his heart sink. If the man was actually admitting it, it must now be extremely bad. “There must be some Guide who can help you, Holmes,” he replied quietly.
Holmes snorted derisively. “You mean those obedience trained lap dogs from the House?” he sneered. “A statue has more acumen. I think I would sooner die.”
“Yes, well, we shall see on that as that possibility looms,” Lestrade muttered. “If Ascot gets wind of this you will never find a Guide. His wife is the Matchmaker.”
“Ascot,” Holmes spat dismissively. “Is a joke of a Sentinel. If I wanted to walk into the palace and kill the Queen, he could not stop me. He could not stop a single drop of water from running uphill. Defeating him in combat would be a disgrace to the winner. If I am to find a Guide he will be of no concern. It does not matter a whit to me what he thinks he knows, so you, as his lackey, are free to tell him.”
Lestrade felt a spurt of temper. “Oh you can’t give me that, Holmes. I have never acted against you even if you believe I never assist you. And Ascot blames us when you insult his leadership,” he took a risk in poking the Sentinel in the chest. “I am just following orders. For all our sakes if not for your own, I suggest you do the same.”
Holmes glared at him, before scrubbing already askew his hair. “Very well. I suppose a moment of hellish mind destroying boredom here will at least make me appreciate the finer things in life.”
“That’s the spirit,” Lestrade muttered sarcastically before opening up the door.
They adjourned to the Sentinel office; Ascot was standing over Lady Guide Lestrade, who was stubbornly denying him access.
“My Sentinel,” she intoned firmly. “Will return momentarily and I do not allow other Sentinels into his space. That would be most improper.”
“Guide!” Ascot snapped at her.
“Alpha,” Lestrade’s interjection was quiet as a stone, but also about as hard. If a Guide was being threatened, Alpha or not, the Sentinel would eliminate them.
Even Ascot recognised this, and stepped backwards to show he was no threat. His lips turned to a sneer. “Sentinel Holmes, how good of you to obey my summons.”
“Alpha Ascot,” Holmes replied, smiling like a shark. “How good it is to see that you maintain proper standards of behaviour around Guides of your division.”
You could have heard a pin drop in the ensuing silence. Lestrade nearly groaned.
“Holmes,” Ascot repeated, this time through gritted teeth. “The Yard requires your assistance today. Since you are so clever with spotting deceptions from trifles and such. Come,” he marched imperiously away.
Holmes gave Lady Lestrade a respectful nod before following. Lestrade brushed his fingertips feather light on her shoulder before doing likewise.
He led them to a questioning room past a pile of travelling boxes and through a door where two men, one bulky and heavyset and the other thin and phlegmatic, both dressed expensively, sat behind a heavy table. A bowl had been placed before them, which was bubbling and hissing with some chemical effervescence. It made do for white noise in a pinch.
The larger man gave an offended glare and rose, speaking in an accent clearly from America. “I do protest this damned treatment. We’ve been waiting far too long for our interview. Who is this, then? The Sentinel who was supposed to question us hours ago?”
Ascot pursed his lips at the man. “Yes, Sentinel Drebber. If you will kindly take a seat, we will interview you and you may leave. Sentinel Holmes?” He turned to the other smugly. “As you know, all foreign Sentinels must be interviewed by the clan when travelling through Britain, for state secrecy and all that. If you would interview Misters Drebber and Strangerson.” He gestured to the other chair in the room.
It was a job any half trained Sentinel Constable could have done. Technically the Alpha could call on any member of his clan for any purpose, but calling in a Sentinel of Holmes’ calibre in here was a calculated insult.
Holmes expression didn’t change however. He merely viewed the men impassively, taking a token sniff, before turning back to Ascot. “I’m finished Alpha.”
“What?”
“What?”
“What in the hell?” That came from Drebber.
“I said,” Holmes spoke slowly, as if to a child. “I have completed the necessary fact finding, Alpha.”
Ascot was flabbergasted. “But you haven’t done anything!” He accused.
Holmes gave him a special smile. “They hail from Cleveland, Ohio, as evidenced by the dye in their coats. They originally hailed from Salt Lake City in Utah, though, judging by the leather of their boots. They have travelled most of Europe; I see wool from Russia in the socks and a distinct flavour of Italian cigarettes in Mister Strangersons breast pocket, the silk laced cotton of the shirts in distinctly Spanish and, of course, there’s an ornate silver buckle on Mister Drebber’s belt that suggests Switzerland and a very professional French shine on his fingernails; they arrived on the...lets see, the ten fifteen berthing steamship at the Tilbury docks before taking an open carriage into Whitehall judging by the mud on their boots; the pamphlet protruding from Mister Strangerson’s coat pocket indicates their destination is Liverpool, and their last stop before reaching London was Copenhagen, though admittedly I took that fact from the tags on their luggage outside.”
He grinned while the rest of the room gaped. “As to their characters...well, I personally would not share a meal with them at my club, but they are not spies. Judging from the bible verse notation jotted on Mister Drebber’s hand for memory, they are men of a religious sort. The sheaf of cue cards that creates the rather unflattering bulge in Mister Drebber’s pants pocket is no doubt a stirring address to the congregation they are going to speak at. Mister Drebber is our Sentinel but judging by his ribbons he is neither Alpha nor military; Mister Strangerson is not his Guide, but his secretary as the marks on his nose left by his oft used reading glasses and the calluses of his thumb and forefinger indicate a great deal of letter writing. You would do well to instruct them on proper customs procedures as they did not come straight here as required. They shared a very large steak meal at the Royale - don’t they just make a divine pepper sauce, Mister Strangerson - followed by a raspberry torte and a good amount of extremely fine brandy and a walk around the Botanical Gardens - the city is quite a dreadful swamp for the nose is it not, Mister Drebber? As to their religious persuasion,” Holmes shrugged. “Who can truly fathom the workings of the fanatically faithful? Some degree of Mormonism by the religious insignia embroidered rather neatly on the good Mister Strangerson’s handkerchief, though it must be a strange, new interpretation of their usual tenets. Mister Drebber has had, shall we say, extremely close, even intimate encounters with...” he sniffed delicately. “Two women and one man since his arrival. Not a bad tally in such a short time, I suppose, but very unusual for a priest.”
Drebbers chair was nearly flung into the wall as he rose in outrage. “You damned mountebank!”
Holmes leaned in, dominating with his height and presence. “Correct me if I am wrong, sir,” he purred silkily. “But every Sentinel’s first lesson is how to tell when others lie.”
Drebber’s face was a red and purple masterpiece of impotent rage, but something in Holmes’ eyes backed him down. “No, sir,” he half snarled. “We have nothing to add.”
“Well then, the interview is complete and you are free to go,” Holmes replied cheerfully. “Of course, you must pay a late reporting fine, is that not right Superintendant Sentinel Ascot? Oh, I’m sure you noticed the hundreds of other little trifles that indicated their current lifestyles and histories; I just pointed out the painfully obvious ones for the benefit of reporting.”
Ascot was struck utterly dumb, gaping like a buffoon at the sudden tide of deduction.
“Well gentlemen it has been a time consuming waste to see you,” Holmes gave a little wave. “Mister Drebber; you so much as harm the hair on the head of any one of my tribe and I will personally run you down like cat with a rat; with much the same results. You gentlemen have yourself a nice day. Goodbye.”
He strode out, Lestrade in his wake and Ascot was left with the two red faced men to deal with.
“There,” Holmes said pointedly. “I have followed orders. Now I must get back to actual work.”
Lestrade cocked his head as they approached the Sentinel offices, hearing the ringing laughter from all the amused Sentinels listening in. “You certainly make an impression, Holmes.”
“Ha!” was the only reply.
There were sudden running footsteps and Lady Lestrade burst from the offices. “Sentinel. Can you feel it?” she demanded breathlessly.
Lestrade took his wife by the shoulders. “Feel what, my own?”
Lady Lestrade closed her eyes as if she had just had a strange thought, and that’s when they felt it.
There was an undeniable presence moving though them like a slow, treacly wave. Lestrade felt it, but couldn’t describe it properly. It was almost akin to a beam of sunlight, warm and harmless, but powerful.
“What is that?” Lestrade breathed.
“I am not sure. Guides are feeling it all over the place. I’ve sent the Bradstreet’s down to the Sanctuary to see if they know.”
Lestrade heard a sharp intake of breath from Holmes, quick and almost panicked, and quite unlike him.
The presence vanished. Holmes keeled to the floor.
It was so out of character that Lestrade froze as he watched. Holmes folded up around himself, huddling almost like a child; pressing his arms to his chest. There was another choked of gasp that spurred Lestrade. “Holmes! Sentinel can you...”
Holmes gaze snapped to him and Lestrade leapt for his wife, dragging her back and away. Those eyes weren’t the playful, powerful eyes of a deductive genius; they were the bottomless pools of the Dark Sentinel.
They didn’t remain though. Lestrade actually saw him wrestle it back into some cage deep in his admittedly extremely disciplined mind.
Holmes rose, breathing hard like he’d run a race. His limbs were uncertain; for the first time Lestrade saw him move with less than a hundred percent grace. His self control was iron, though; it passed quickly.
His finger jabbed toward Lady Lestrade like a knife. “Where,” he growled lowly. “Did it come from?”
Lestrade stifled the urge to block his Guide from view. Holmes, Dark Sentinel or not, had never raised a hand to any Guide.
“The Sanctuary, Sentinel,” Lady Lestrade replied quickly. “All I could sense was the Sanctuary.”
Holmes muttered under his breath so only Lestrade heard it. “Well that helps me not at all.”
“Never mind,” the Sentinel straightened abruptly. “I’ll take the case, Lestrade,” he said before striding away.
“What case?” Lestrade called after him, puzzled.
“The Disappearing Guides case,” the man replied calmly, still walking away. “The photo of the deceased man in connection with it was clearly a boxer. Just look at the ears.”
Lestrade’s mouth opened and closed. “You mean the one where a suspected group is kidnapping Guides for export? The one where one of their comrades was shot while they fled the scene to keep him from talking? The one that was upside down on my Guides desk at the far back of the room with no accompanying paperwork?’
“Yes, Lestrade,” Holmes’ voice drifted up from the stairwell, unseen. “That’s the one. I’ll take it.”
Lestrade gave up. “You’re welcome.” He cocked his head and felt his Guide’s hand on his shoulder, anchoring him as he stretched out his hearing to listen.
‘Really Lestrade; you are the one thanking me; not I you.” Came from the street.
His wife’s eyes asked the question, and he shrugged in reply. He didn’t know what the hell just happened either.
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End Part Three