by S. K. Lloyds
Sherlock tucked his hands behind his back. The left hand locked around the right. His expression was completely smooth and abstracted. He might have been a resin doll.
“Sherlock,” John said quietly. There was no indication he’d heard. “All right?”
In the elevator, Reese held the door. She looked up at Holmes wordlessly.
He started forward without hesitation, the cell returning to his hand so that he could browse the internet on the way. Special Agent Young followed closely, with Scott.
“What the hell was that?” Lestrade asked quietly.
Lewis lowered his voice, “Oh. Oh yeah. The big guns, the really smart ones, they have an adjustment period when they first meet. There’s always conflict. Reese is the best we have, so there’s been a lot of rivalry around her since she’s been about fourteen. I’m surprised he did so well. I didn’t think he’d get the little greeting ritual our Assets do.”
“Let me get one thing straight with you and your people,” John said softly. “He’s not an Asset. He’s not equipment. He’s just a man, and if you mess him about, I will seriously make you regret it.”
A moment after, John stepped into the elevator. He came to a stop beside Sherlock. Holmes leaned in the back left corner. Reese leaned in the front right. They stared at one another noiselessly, and even with the packed elevator, there might have been no one else there. As if nothing out of the ordinary were taking place, Special Agent Young pressed the G button. The doors slid closed.
“Why?” Holmes asked.
Reese raised her chin a little in challenge. “What did you shoot? I’m betting cocaine. Everything else is just so trashy compared to cocaine. Am I right?”
“Yes.” Sherlock said.
“Expensive.”
“If you’re smart enough, price stops being an issue. Why did you slit your wrists?”
“Because I so loved the world,” She looked away. Her inability to meet his eyes was the second sign of a chink in her steely armour.
“Are you satisfied that you failed?” He asked. “The scars are old, perhaps half a decade old.”
She peered through black forelocks and replied. “Four and a half years old…. Very good. You’ve seen a lot of scar tissue.”
“I have.”
Reese thought about it for a moment. “You miss being high?”
Seconds ticked. Sherlock shut his eyes, “Sometimes.”
“Is it better not being high?” she asked him.
There was a long pause before he answered. “Yes.” He opened his eyes again.
Reese, in her corner of the elevator was now softly smiling. It looked disarming, like she was finally offering a greeting. “Yes.”
Sherlock made a soft and inarticulate sound of concurrence.
The bell for the ground floor rang. Sherlock and Reese walked out shoulder to shoulder, and continued through the lobby – coats swaying or fluttering in their wake. They didn’t speak but the odd word, but each seemed to extrapolate the meaning of the other.
Donovan made a disgusted face, “Looks like they’re bonding: Freaks of a feather. Adorable. Soon we’ll be able to mop up the blood of whatever death-orgy she’s going to lead him on, because I hardly think she cares about the victims here either. I didn’t ever think I’d meet someone as psycho as Holmes.”
John ignored her and looked at Lestrade. “Where are we going for the body?”
“Islington.”
“Seriously?”
“Apparently, those criminal geniuses like to be comfortable.” Lestrade zipped up his own coat against the rain and they dispersed among the parking lot, targeting cars. “And, leash, mind your manners around the girl, would you? It will do Scotland Yard no good to offend the CIA.”
“Sir, I’m begging you, don’t call me that,” Donovan turned his way. “Those people are from a galaxy far, far away. The less we have to do with their weirdness, the better.” She paused and shouted, “Hey, Freak, my car’s over here.”
Sherlock said a few parting words to Reese. She nodded and smoothly eased her way into the car beside her. John got in the back of Donovan’s to wait for Sherlock. He slid in the other side and sat still for a moment. Then he hunched. He seemed dazed.
John bent over him a little. “Are you okay?”
After a moment, when the car was moving, Sherlock replied, “I don’t know, yet,” he paused for thought for a moment more and then added, “Wow.”
***
They went to a bookstore – Shady Angel Bookstore, in fact.
John got out and huddled in the rain until Sherlock caught hold of Donovan’s umbrella and yanked her bodily over to shelter him. Donovan didn’t appreciate it, seeing as it had involved Sherlock touching her, but she liked John, and they stood companionably in the rain. Sherlock walked out into the downpour and waited for Reese to disembark the car parked behind Lestrade’s.
“Let’s see how you do where the rubber meets the road, as they say.” Holmes muttered.
As they made their way, John caught hold of Sherlock’s sleeve to steer the tall genius inside. Police scowled at him, openly. The animosity seemed more evident, and much worse, now that Sherlock had a badge. Or was this more likely to be about the market value of a deductive genius? Lestrade had certainly been uncomfortable talking about it. That made John smile. Doctors could pull in a lot of money, but Sherlock, on the right case, could make a working man’s salary in two days.
Inside, Holmes dripped everywhere – on stacked books, on the wood floor, on counters, and people’s shoes – every time he moved rain splashed around him, until John had enough and took off his long coat. Holmes barely noticed this action. He was too engrossed with the shop. Lacking any better surface for it, John slung the coat over the sales counter. He dropped his scarf to one side.
When the front door shut, it was oddly quiet, and John could make out the tail end of Sherlock’s soft muttering, “-not part of the crime scene. Neat as a pin up here. Crime scene is downstairs.”
“Yup,” Reese grunted from close behind him. Her eyes combed through the book stacks lovingly. Her voice was almost a whisper as she passed John, “Love it. Love this place. I always wanted to run a bookstore.”
“Don’t be absurd.” Special Agent Young told her. “And I’ll be upset if you allow yourself to get distracted by nonsense.”
Reese’s lips compressed into a line and she cast a look over her shoulder at the woman, but she dutifully got back on track. She followed Sherlock to the narrow stairs at the back. They led down a truly claustrophobic case to a postage-stamp landing.
No one moved.
Holmes raked fingers through his hair. He squeezed out water, but even then, his hair was drenched black, and sticking to him, a mass of curls. “John, you’re at a distinct advantage here,” he said, almost to himself, before steeling his will and passing down the stairs. There were mere inches between the top of his curling head and the wainscot ceiling. The worn wood stairs creaked alarmingly.
Original structure.
“Old,” Reese said, “this part of the building. Not renovated like the front. The wainscot, and the size of this passage. Victorian.”
“Yes,” Holmes said. “But notice along the closed risers and the treads.”
She tapped her heel on a stair, “DSL cable running into the basement, new.”
“A wireless network,” Sherlock held his phone up over his shoulder and showed her the network name. At the bottom of the stairs, the door, which was a custom job for certain, was shut and crime-scene taped. Sherlock glanced up the stairs. “Very dark in this well. Anyone have a torch?”
Reese burst out laughing, which echoed in the small space.
Lestrade, at the top of the stairs, looked over his shoulder. “Someone fetch a torch.”
Reese reached past Sherlock and pushed the door open. “Well, until they get you a ‘torch’, we should let some light out.” The door made a pronounced squeak. Sunrise-coloured light from the room beyond fell across
Sherlock and Reese – stuffed into the small landing as they were. Sherlock glanced at the colour on his hand and turned. The entire well was papered with fliers.
“So they held events in their downstairs fire-trap?” Reese snickered. “How classically stupid.”
Sherlock scanned the wall beside him, “Book clubs; book readings; doll parties; D&D-”
“Ohmigod, blast from the past, much?” the girl giggled. “It’s geek-tasia.”
Holmes looked at her. “Do speak English.”
“Anyone have a torch?” She said in a decent imitation of his speech pattern. It made John, who stood right behind them on the stairs, sputter. She could be inexpertly cute, this one.
“Stop clowning, Reese,” Young’s complaint resounded like an alarm in the stairwell. John felt a nudge as the torch came down, passed hand-to-hand to him. Reese caught it.
“In the civilised world, this is a flashlight.” She set it under her chin and flicked it on, then used her best mock-spooky voice, “You wouldn’t want a torch in here.”
Sherlock snatched it from her, but John didn’t miss the obvious amusement on his face.
Together, Reese, John, and Sherlock studied the postings on the wall until Reese stepped back up the steps a little and Sherlock shut the door. He found the latest posting, which was a simple white slice of paper with the date and the sans serif words: “The Photography Club.”
Reese cocked her head at it. “How glib.”
John caught her elbow and helped her up on the stairs so Sherlock could open the door again, and they could get access to the basement. Reese looked up behind her and said, “Clear the stairs. It doesn’t matter for you, but we need air to think with.”
“Back up,” Young snapped her fingers at the London police. “Come on.” It was like she was training a collection of small dogs.
Lestrade heaved a sigh, whirled a finger in air and called out, “Get out of the stairs, boys. Anderson, you’re up. You can stand in the landing and watch, but keep your mouth shut and do as he says.” The groan from the stacks was audible. Then Lestrade went down the stairs and entered the room along with John, who had hung back to let his eyes adjust to… twilight?
John went to Reese rather than Holmes. She’d stopped dead and was hugging herself.
“All right?”
“I… I don’t usually come to the crime scene,” she told him. “It smells really gross in here. What if I throw up, or something? I’ll contaminate the scene.”
“You’ll be okay. Deep breaths through the mouth, and the smell will lessen in a minute or two,” John put a protective hand on her back. She honestly looked faint.
Her pale eyes darted around. “Did frau Young come down?” she asked quietly.
“Just me,” Lestrade told her. “You may not remember, but I’m Detective Inspector Lestrade.” He offered a hand which she reached out and shook.
She said, “I remember.”
“John, here – John Watson – is a military doctor. He’s Sherlock’s assistant, is how you can think of it, only a doctor. If you can’t hack the smell, I’ll take you back up for a breather.” It seemed Lestrade didn’t approve of notions like ‘leashes’ or ‘sitters’ any more than John did, and was trying his best to put her at ease.
“Oh. Well… thanks for that.” She looked from Lestrade to John. “It’s not as bad now that I’ve habituated a bit. I should have known Agent Young wouldn’t come down here. She doesn’t like decomp, and the lipids get in your skin, you know. I don’t either, really, but I guess… I mean… what’s he doing?”
“Examining the body,” John looked at where Sherlock crouched like a cat, half over a bloated corpse. It was dim, and hard to see what he was really doing. The Maglite flickered on and off in his hand. John nodded grimly. “I need to go help him. You want to stay back? You should stay with Lestrade, and he’ll look after you.”
“Of course,” the Detective Inspector said.
She edged over toward the body and explained behind John, “I work off pictures. They don’t let me come and see stuff like this, IRL.”
“Because you started so young,” Sherlock said as he searched the body’s trouser pockets. “When? Ten? Twelve?”
“Ten, I started the criminology program at ten. I didn’t see anyone dead until lucky thirteen.” As Reese drew closer to the body Sherlock buzzed around, she caught hold of Lestrade by the hand.
It either surprised him, or it hurt, because he jumped. But then Lestrade’s free hand curled over the back of Reese’s. “Steady there. If you think you might be sick, we’ve got sick bags. You just say something.”
“Okay, stop,” Sherlock said severely. “Stop talking. Lestrade, walk her around the room until her head clears. Do not make noise.”
John squat beside the genius and got his first good look at the body. It was headless, and handless. There was, from what he could see in a quick inspection, no sign of a cause of death. Sherlock’s eyes darted over the sorry state of the corpse.
Bloat.
No or low insect activity.
Pockets empty.
No phone.
No I.D.
No wallet.
No quid.
Careful. Secretive.
Wrist-watch in situ – expensive – RGM.
American. Well to do.
Clothing style – college student.
Bled out here.
Small burn pattern on shirt collar.
Parts removed after blood flow stopped.
Relatively clean cuts. Axe or hatchet.
“Very dirty business,” John said, “cutting someone up. Serious people did this.”
“But they didn’t burn the place down.” Sherlock added to the end of this.
Flier for the meeting 9:00 PM last Friday.
Now: Monday night.
“Small powder burn on the shirt collar,” Sherlock said quietly. “So this boy was shot in the back of his head. He also fell. See the splatter on the back of his shirt? Impact spray from a catastrophic fall that would have killed him… had he been alive. Going in the wrong direction for the shot.” He looked around him in the dark room, and back to the body. “We’re on the tail end of bloat, getting into active decay. The staff would have smelled this from the front door.”
“The hands and head – evidence was removed.” John agreed. “No easy way to identify him without those, unless he has tattoos.”
“He doesn’t.” Sherlock said as surely as if he’d stripped the body himself and checked.
John shook his head. “And they left him here over the weekend.”
“Yes. Consistent with the body’s current condition. Good.” Sherlock said distractedly. He seemed to be busy shining the light across the ceiling.
“We need a sign-in sheet for this club. The store might have one,” John said.
“There isn’t one.” Sherlock said. “Certainly not with the store."
“Maybe Reese will know who this is. This was supposed to be her source, after all.” John turned his head her way and saw her standing on a chair. Her gloved hands fiddled with a light bulb. All the bulbs in here were red. But nothing else indicated that they’d been using this virtually windowless room – seeing as all the curtains were drawn – to develop photos, he assumed.
“This may be her source. It may not. I’d say yes. He’s an American exchange student from a relatively wealthy, politically conservative family, particularly inclined toward physics, politics, and law, but his strong nonconformist tendencies have trained him to be secretive. He hasn’t got tattoos. They aren’t subtle enough. All outward signs must remain nailed down. That dissonance increases the thrill for him when he takes risks. He’s an adrenaline junky; smokes weed to slow down – small traces left in both pockets, so it’s a habit; and a gold chain with diamond solitaire, good chance he’s gay. She wouldn’t have called me here if she knew him on sight, but she doesn’t know, because she’s only ever seen his picture and interacted with him remotely over secure cha
nnels. And here we are. Coat. Where’s his coat?” Sherlock rose to his feet and walked around the blood soaking into concrete. He scanned the room with the Maglite. Anderson winced in the doorway as the light passed over him. Sherlock’s eyes swept the room and came to rest on Reese. Her head rose a little. He said, “Yes. I know.”
“I want them dusted.” Reese said. She held up a bulb by the metal contact.
“Anderson is many things, but he’s not a bad hand with evidence collection.” Sherlock indicated the hawk-nosed man leaning in the doorway again, and noted Anderson’s attention was reserved for Reese. Holmes turned around again, his voice quiet enough that only John heard it. “Nor is he subtle.”
Reese climbed down and crossed to Holmes. “I can’t say for sure if that’s Lawrence Waters, or not. This sucks. But I can tell you this is a warning for the CIA teams looking into these people. I wonder if this is how I’d look now, if they could manage it. It’s why I don’t get to leave Langley, much.”
Sherlock backed up and opened his arms. “So how many people in the room?”
“It looks like there were initially at least twelve people, at least four of whom were women; three are smokers. Lots of genetic material scattered across the cups left sitting around. Mix of coffee, wine, tea, and soft drinks, so we’re talking a wide range of tastes and possible ages.” Reese nodded her head. “But don’t be fooled. These cups and cigarette butts you’re seeing are dead ends. They plant all sorts of evidence. This stuff will lead off in every direction, some of it promising; some of it will go off to totally unrelated crimes; some of it is just trash; all of it bogus. None of what we’re seeing here is real. Except the body. And the lights. The red lights.” She looked at John, “The rods of the eye are not sensitive to red. The rhodopsin that gives you night vision, you know, it’s exhausted much more slowly on long red wavelengths, and once it’s spent it will take about 30 minutes to regenerate.”
Sherlock walked the room, scrutinizing it. “Did you see the shop times on the front door?” He stopped by the chair Reese had been on, and picked up the coat hung over the back. He snuffed it, though how he might smell anything in the stench was hard to imagine. John watched Holmes rifle the pockets and study the ceiling and walls. He seemed to be searching for something specific there. Reese crossed her arms.
