Chapter Text
It was getting dark when Lilly came back into the living room with two cups of tea. Sherlock was sitting gazing out the window.
“Sherlock, Marianna just called. She’s coming home sooner. Should I drive you to the hospital already?”
Sherlock didn’t answer. Lily put the tea’s down and put her hands on her thighs.
“Sherlock?”
He was in a trance. He turned his chin towards Lily, but kept his eyes fixed on something outside.
“Hmm?”
Lily sighed.
“I asked if you wanted to go back to the hospital already? Marianna will be here in 20 minutes.”
Sherlock was quiet for a moment. Lily thought he still wasn’t listening and almost repeated the question again when he stood up, and walked backwards towards Lily. He kept his gaze locked on the thing outside.
“No, I’ll stay here. You should go home.”
Lily frowned.
“Are you okay? You’re being weird.”
Sherlock reached back, grabbed her shoulder and softly pushed her behind him.
“You should really go home.”
“What’s wrong?”
She followed his gaze outside, but noticed nothing weird. Just an empty house and some birds. She stepped away from Sherlock and walked towards the window.
“Sherlock, there is nothing-”
“Get away from there!”
Sherlock’s tone was so urgent that Lily almost jumped. She turned around and slowly walked back to Sherlock. He grabbed her arm and pulled her behind him again.
“Lily, please listen to me. Go home. Something is wrong.”
She sighed.
“Okay Sherlock, except if you are suddenly scared of some birds, I literally see nothing that could be-”
Sherlock quickly turned around, shoved her out and closed the door behind her with a bang.
“- wrong.”
Lily had to process what happened for a second, then turned around and knocked on the door. “Hey Sherlock! Open the door!”
Sherlock didn’t answer. Instead he turned all of the lights in the flat off.
“Sherlock!”
Lily banged on the door again. “If you don’t open this door, I’m getting Aunt Gwen!”
Silence.
Lily scoffed again. “What the?” She rubbed her face and walked down the stairs. She opened the front door and got in her car. “Siri, call Aunt Gwen.” She said to her phone.
“Calling - Aunt - Gwen.” The phone answered in a mechanical voice.
Upstairs Sherlock was busy grabbing blankets and pillows. He needed to make himself a hut, where he would be invisible, but also had a clear view of the house on the other side of the street. He placed a mirror against the wall opposite to the window, so he could sit under or next to it in his “command Centre” (which was basically just a pillow fort) and see the house via the reflection. After he finished the “command Centre”, he grabbed binoculars and peered through them at the house.
His eyes narrowed. The lights in the other house were off, and it was getting dark, but in the streetlight he could still clearly see-
He jumped up and grabbed his wax figure, pulling it towards his closed door with all his might. When he reached it, he opened the door and pushed the figure down the stairs. He was impressed that it didn’t break. He turned around and crouched back to the pillow fort by the window. He grabbed the binoculars and sat like that in silence for a while, observing the Empty House.
“Lilly?”
“Hi Aunt Gwen. It’s Sherlock. He’s being… weird. Even for him.”
“What is he doing?”
“I don’t know, he just shoved me out and now he’s turning lights off and moving stuff around.”
“Why is he doing that? What happened?”
“He was just suddenly totally obsessed with something on the other side of the street, I don’t know, a bird’s nest or something. Then he ordered me to leave.”
“Okay, I’ll finish some stuff here and then I’ll be on my way. You go home.”
“But I could-”
“Lilly, go home. That’s an order.”
Lily groaned and hung up the phone. She threw the phone down on the passenger's seat, quickly tucked her curls into a messy bun, started her car and drove away.
Marianna opened the door of 221 B, soaked, confused and furious. She had found the wax figure at the bottom of the stairs which had scared her to death, and everything was dark, and she just wanted to get Sherlock to go to sleep so she could do the same. “Sherlock! What exactly- wow, I can’t see anything.” She blinked a few times trying to adapt to the total darkness in the room. “Turn a light on!” She felt the wall for a light switch.
Sherlock shushed her from somewhere in the room. Marianna squinted her eyes.
“Where the hell are you? Smartlamp-”
“Do not turn on the stupid smartlamp!” Sherlock whispered aggressively from somewhere in the void. She frowned.
“You can do it from your phone.”
Sherlock rolled his eyes. God why was everyone always so slow. “I know that! Get down, Marianna!”
Marianna took a step back.
“What?”
“Get down! On the floor!”
Marianna sighed. She was not in the mood for this at all.
“Why?”
“Because” Sherlock said dramatically, “When the rabbit feels the wisps of displaced air in the sky above, it knows the hawk is descending. The grounds-”
Marianna wasn’t listening anymore. Sherlock was using big english words and she was way too tired to translate them. She had gone home with the idea to make herself a cup of tea and watch some doctor House until she passed out.
Sherlock sounded genuinely concerned, so she decided to roll with it. She would just have to play his game, get him to go to sleep and then do the same herself. So she closed the door and sat on her knees.
“Am I the bunny rabbit?” She asked, confused.
“Yes, you’re the bunny rabbit.” Sherlock said impatiently.
“Okay…” Marianna raised an eyebrow. “Okay and who is the Hawk?”
“The Hawk is Sebastian Moran.”
Her heart sank.
“Oh… Okay…”
How could he know though?
“Are you a bunny rabbit as well?”
Sherlock shushed her again. She raised her hands, as if to calm an angry dog.
“Okay, okay.”
She squinted her eyes again, looking for any sign of Sherlock in the darkness. Why was it so dark?
“Is mister Moran in the flat with us now?”
Sherlock had to fight the urge to not shout at Marianna.
“No,” he said calmly, “that would be ridiculous.”
Marianna shrugged, then realised it was pitch-black and Sherlock couldn’t know that she shrugged.
“No, yeah. It’s just-” she leaned back against the wall. This was going to be a long evening.
“This kind of feels ridiculous?”
Sherlock turned around. He was now really irritated.
“Does it, Marianna? Does it indeed?” he said, raising an eyebrow.
“Like the hyena that mocks-” “Wait am I a damn rabbit or a hyena?”
Marianna cut him off, she was now angry too.
Sherlock rolled his eyes.
“Can you please be quiet?!”
“Nobody is in here apart from you and me!”
“Yes but there’s no need to shout!”
Marianna threw her hands powerlessly in the air.
“There is every need to shout! What are you doing here?!”
She started to rant about how she did basically everything for them, and Sherlock rubbed his face with both hands. Blablablabla, he just wanted her to listen.
“- to make sure we can be there for John and instead, you’re making forts, and- and closing the all curtains and talking about bunny-rabbits and Hawks?"
Sherlock pouted.
“It’s not a fort. It’s a disguised command centre that has a visual on the target!”
Marianna just wanted to go to bed.
“Sherlock, you are sat in a pile of cushions. What are you talking about?”
“Camden house.”
This was the thing with Sherlock. He had to make everything unclear, irritating and dramatic.
“Okay”, she sighed. “What’s Camden House?”
“You should know, Mrs Hudson” Sherlock sneered.
“It- Wait, you mean the house across the street, 242 Baker street?”
“Indeed. Otherwise known as Camden House.”
Finally, she was starting to understand.
“It’s empty, so what?”
“The empty house, I feel, has a visitor.”
Maybe she wasn’t completely starting to understand, but at least she was getting there.
A few arguments later Marianna was sitting next to Sherlock in the pillow fort.
“It all occurred to me while glancing in the mirror, my opposite, but fated to follow my every move.”
Marianna almost rolled her eyes. He always had to give this big, dramatic explanation for no reason. But she decided to hear him out, as it seemed to be serious. Somewhat.
“No matter how fast he tracks, he can never surpass.”
Marianna raised an eyebrow.
“Yeah, that’s how mirrors work?”
“We cannot move behind Moran any longer. We must move in front.”
Oh, she finally understood.
“You want to predict Morans next move?”
Sherlock grinned at her.
“I already know it.”
Sherlock kicked the door open of the garrideb house. Marianna tore the police tape. They stepped inside.
She wasn’t tired anymore, and loved doing cases with Sherlock, but still. Breaking into an abandoned house to find their friends almost-murderer, was certainly not how she’d expected her evening to go.
Sherlock pointed at the ground.
Blood. John’s blood.
“Oh man…”
Sherlock swallowed. “Yes, it’s rather unpleasant to be back here.”
“John’s blood, from when they pulled him out of the tunnel.”
Marianna felt her eyes water. Jezus Christ this was like a horror movie.
“Are you alright?” Sherlock put a hand on her shoulder. Marianna smiled. He got that from Gwen. She looked up at him and sighed. “Not really, no. You?”
Sherlock shook his head and took his hand off her shoulder. “No, but clues must be harvested.”
The tunnel was dark and freezing.
Marianna’s lips were trembling and her boots were soaked. Sherlock reached up and removed the manhole cover above them. He turned around and cupped his hands below his knee. Marianna put her foot into the cup and pulled herself up. Then she turned around.
“Uhhh…”
Sherlock looked up at her.
“Pull me up!”
“I’m not pulling you up!”
Sherlock groaned.
“I’m not that heavy, just use your arms and core, not your shoulders and back-”
Marianna sat down on her knees and reached down.
Sherlock grabbed her hand and used the other one to grab the side of the manhole.
It took them 15 minutes to get him out, and by the time he finally escaped the tunnel and was lying on the rainy curb, five people were filming them.
Marianna took his arm and pulled him into Hyde Park. They sat down on a bench in silence.
Marianna started to laugh. Sherlock turned his head.
“What?”
Marianna shook her head.
“I’m sorry, just- you wiggling out of that hole looked so funny.”
Sherlock chuckled.
“Ok, back to the case, back to the case.”
Marianna put her hair behind her ear.
“What’s the next step?”
Sherlock pointed at a building at the edge of the park. It was grand and looked expensive.
“Number 1 Hyde Park. The accommodation of Mr. Moran.”
Marianna nodded and looked at him. Then she grinned.
“Let’s go in.”