Chapter Text

Sherlock: The Case of the Changeling Child

From the Blog of Dr. John H. Watson

An interesting case that Sherlock and I encountered after his return and my engagement to Mary concerned a little girl that showed up unexpectedly at the flat I used to share with Sherlock. Why anyone in his right mind would think it was a good idea to leave his child with Sherlock baffled me (and it baffled Sherlock, as well). Unfortunately, my job at the clinic and some parlous circumstances kept me occupied elsewhere, so Sherlock was left alone to deal with the child much of the time. Since I was not there for all that transpired while she was in Sherlock's care, I've had to reconstruct the events from what he told me, with perhaps a little embellishment.

Chapter 1

Sherlock studied the child sitting opposite him at the kitchen table in his flat at 221B Baker Street. Her head barely cleared the top of the table and she slowly brought each spoonful of cereal to her mouth, careful not to spill any. Her curly, yellow hair was long but stuck out at odd angles from her head and was full of tangles. Her green eyes were focused on the bowl before her and the path of the spoon. She had twice glanced up at Sherlock, but quickly averted her eyes when she noticed him looking at her.

Sherlock once more shifted his attention to the note lying on the table before him. It was written in pencil and appeared to have been hurriedly scrawled on a sheet torn from some sort of ledger. The message was simple. "Mr. Holmes-I need to leave my daughter with you for a while. Her name is Chelsea. She won't give you no trouble, but don't make her cry. She's a changeling, but not the bad sort. I'll collect her when I get back. She loves biscuts. R" The little girl had been clutching the wrinkled note in her hand when Sherlock discovered her sitting on the stairs not twenty minutes ago.

Sherlock's morning had started off fairly normal except that the tea and biscuits which Mrs. Hudson usually had waiting for him were not there. He tied the belt on his purple silk dressing gown and opened the door to call for his landlady when he remembered that she was off visiting her sister somewhere for a few days. It was then he noticed a slight movement on the stairs, just below the turn.

"Hello? May I help you?" he asked. He stepped down only two steps when he clearly saw it was a little girl. She was looking up at him, her eyes wide. One hand had a tight grip on the end of dirty cotton rope which trailed down the next three steps and her other hand held the note. A bulging paper bag was beside her. She was wearing blue and white striped leggings and a pink hooded fleece jacket. Under the open jacket she had on a blue t-shirt top with some cartoon character on the front.

He descended to the landing and stood, towering over her. "Who are you?" he asked. "Wait. Stay right there." He stepped over her and hurriedly went down the stairs to the front door of the building. It was locked. He went back up the stairs, stopping just below her and kneeling down. "Well? Who are you and how did you get in here?"

The child did not appear to be afraid, but she did not answer. She sat very still and continued to stare at him.

"What have you got here in your hand?" He took the note from her and read it silently. The penmanship was crude, written with the right hand, probably a man's, and the grammar and spelling spoke to his education level and held clues also to his socio-economic position. The fact that it was on ledger paper might be a clue to his occupation. "Chelsea?"

The little girl only continued to look intently at him.

"I need to make a call." Sherlock stepped over her and went into his flat and grabbed his mobile phone from the desk, calling me as he descended the stairs once more. I was between patients when my mobile rang. "John, I need you to come here immediately."

"It will have to be after noon, Sherlock. I have patients all morning," I replied. Everything was always so urgent with him.

"I really need you to come now. Somebody left something for me this morning and I'm not at all sure what to do with it. And Mrs. Hudson's gone off on holiday."

My office door opened just then and my next patient came through. "Sherlock, I'll see you later. I have patients."

"No, John, don't hang up. It's a child, a girl! I don't know what I'm supposed to do with it."

"Sherlock, you mean someone left a little girl at your flat? Why?" I motioned for the patient to sit down.

"I have no idea why," Sherlock replied.

"How old is she?" I asked.

"How old are you?" Sherlock asked the girl, who was continuing to stare up at him.

She held up one hand, her fingers spread wide.

"I think she's five years old," Sherlock said to me.

"All right," I said, trying to mentally adjust my patient schedule, so I could take off a few hours. "Listen. I'll be there as soon as I can. Don't do anything to her. Just… just…"

"What would you think I would do to her, John?" Sherlock asked defensively. "I'm not going to hurt her. But I don't know what to do with her."

"She might be hungry," I suggested. "Give her a glass of milk, maybe some cereal. Better check the milk first. Make sure it hasn't gone off."

"Just hurry." Sherlock slipped the phone in the pocket of his robe. "Follow me," he said, crooking his index finger.

The child took hold of the sack in both arms and dutifully climbed the stairs after Sherlock. She stepped into the flat and he closed the door behind her, catching the length of rope. She dropped the sack and tugged frantically to free the rope.

"Wait," Sherlock said, opening the door a few inches so that the rope slid free. The little girl knelt down and gathered the whole length of it in her hands in a loving gesture.

Not sure what to make of her actions, Sherlock left her there on the floor and went into the kitchen. He put the kettle on, popped two pieces of bread in the toaster and then cleared off a spot on the table enough to set a bowl and glass there and a spoon. He pulled a box of Weetabix from the cupboard and poured a little into the bowl. The milk was fresh since he had just bought it the day before so he ignored my suggestion to check it first which came from experience, having shared a flat with him. "Chelsea, would you care for some breakfast?"

Chelsea left the sack by the door but carried the rope with her to the table and climbed into a chair and perched there on her knees.

"We sit at the table." Sherlock indicated for her to put her bottom on the chair which she did without hesitation. He stood there for a moment lost in thought until the whistle of the tea kettle broke his reverie. "I'm sorry. For a moment there I sounded just like my mum. Although she was right. Good manners begin at home."

He fixed himself a cup of tea and buttered the toast and then sat down opposite her at the table, sweeping aside some remnants from his latest experiment. He flattened the note that was left with her and spread it on the table and began to study it for more clues. When he looked up he noticed that the little girl had not yet touched her food. "Tuck in," he said. He watched her as she hesitantly picked up the spoon and tasted the cereal.

She made a face and uttered, "Ger." It was the first word she had spoken.

"What?"

She pointed at the bowl of cereal and repeated, "Ger. Pleach, Man?"

Sherlock considered for a moment how to decipher what she was saying. "Oh. Sugar?"

"Pleach?" she repeated.

He scanned the cluttered tabletop. "I'm sure it's here somewhere. Oh. Here." He took the lid off the sugar bowl and used his own spoon to sprinkle sugar over her cereal then added some to his cup of tea. "Better?"

She flashed a smile at him. It was the first time he had seen her smile. "Thank you," she said, quickly averting her eyes. She resumed eating, very slowly, being careful not to spill anything.

"Someone has taught you some manners, at least. Hardly seems likely that it was the person who wrote this note, though."

Sherlock continued to study the hand-written note while the girl finished most of the cereal and all of the glass of milk. "Well, Chelsea," Sherlock said, after popping the last bite of toast in his mouth and wiping his hands on a paper serviette that he found in one of the piles on the table, "do you have a surname?"

In response, Chelsea pointed towards the doorway off of the kitchen which opened onto the bathroom.

"Oh. Right. I'd guess you'd better go, then."

She slid off the chair and headed towards the lavatory, trailing the white rope behind her. She gathered it inside before closing the door. Less than two minutes later she emerged, part of her t-shirt and jacket stuck inside the back of her tights. "All done, Man."

"Wait. Let's get you straightened out," said Sherlock, adjusting her clothes. "And let's wash your hands." He led her back into the bathroom and held her up by her waist to the sink so she could wash. "You have to let go of the rope for just a minute."

"Brownie," said Chelsea.

"Your rope's name is Brownie? Well, drop Brownie on the floor so you can wash your hands." Sherlock lowered her to the floor when she was finished and handed her a towel. She swiped it once across her hands then gave it back to him and picked up one end of the rope.

"Come in here," said Sherlock. "We need to talk." She followed Sherlock to his desk in the living room. He pulled up a chair next to his and indicated for her to sit there. "First, you do realize," he said seriously, "that your rope is not brown. I'm sure it was white when new and now is a rather dirty gray."

Chelsea screwed up her face.

"Your rope. Why do you call it Brownie when it's not brown?"

"Not the rope, Man" she said in an exaggerated show of exasperation. She pointed at the end which lay on the floor. "Brownie. My invidible dog."

"Your invidi… Oh," said Sherlock, "Brownie is your invisible dog."

"Invidible," Chelsea repeated.

"Then allow me to point out something. How do you know he's brown if he's invisible?"

"He told me," she said matter-of-factly.

"So, Brownie is a talking, invisible dog." Sherlock's lips disappeared into a thin line, as he considered how to interrogate a five-year-old child who carried a rope leash attached to an invisible, brown dog who could talk. "I wonder what is taking John so long to get here," he said aloud. He turned his attention back to Chelsea. "All right. Let's forget about Brownie for just a moment. First of all, you may call me Sherlock. That's my name."

"Lock," said Chelsea.

"Sherlock," he said.

"Lock," she repeated.

"Trouble with pronouncing your S's, I see. Hopefully, you will outgrow that. Or, maybe speech therapy is in your future. OK, I'm Sherlock Holmes and you're Chelsea…?"

"Chelly."

"What comes after Chelsea? I'm Sherlock Holmes and you're Chelsea…?"

"Chelly," she said again.

"Moving on. Your parents? Father's name?"

Chelsea shrugged. "Dad."

"Mother?"

Chelsea looked down at the end of the rope she held and twisted it in her hands. "Went away. Dead."

"It happens, sometimes. So, was it your father who left you here this morning?"

Chelsea nodded, still looking down. "Told me he'd be back. Told me to be good."

"Well, you are being good, I suppose. Do you know your address?"

Still looking down, she shook her head no."

"A phone number maybe."

She shook her head no again and shrugged.

Sherlock sighed in frustration.

"I have a looth tooth," she said.

"I noticed that when you were eating. Here. Let me see."

Chelsea bared her teeth and stuck out her lower jaw. "Thith one." She pointed to one of her bottom, middle teeth."

"It's very loose," said Sherlock. "Won't be long before it pops out."

"Will it hurt?"

"I…uh…don't remember it hurting."

"Good. Do you have any children that I can play with, Lock?"

"Afraid not. Maybe there are some invisible ones around."

Chelsea giggled. "Invidible children. You're funny." She then turned around quickly in her chair. "Maybe there are."

"You will let me know if you see any."

Chelsea turned again and pointed at the couch. "There. A boy named Adam."

"Adam?"

"He has a pony!" Chelsea exclaimed.

"A pony?" asked Sherlock. "Here in the flat? How did a pony get in here?"

"He flew through that window," she explained.

"You tell Adam that he and his pony are welcome here but that he has to clean up any messes that his horse makes."

Chelsea got down from the chair and went over to the couch. Sherlock took out his phone and called me again. Unfortunately, I was in no position to answer this time.

Chapter Text

Not ten minutes after I had first talked to Sherlock that morning, a rather tense situation erupted at the clinic when a deranged young man burst through the outer doors and ordered everyone on the floor at gunpoint. Those of us who had been in our offices, alerted by the sudden noise, stupidly opened our doors to see what was causing the commotion and were also ordered to our knees. I managed to get over to Mary before dropping to the floor beside her.

"I need OxyContin!" the man yelled, waving the Glock 19 handgun.

"Mate," one of the other doctors said, actually very calmly, "this is a clinic, not a chemist. We don't have any drugs here. We prescribe them, not sell them."

"Oh, I know what you have here. Now, somebody get me some before anyone gets hurt." His voice increased in decibels with each word.

Of course, it was just then that my mobile in my lab coat pocket rang and rang…and rang."

"Shut it off!" the man screamed, waving the gun in my direction.

I reached into my pocket and ended the call. There was no doubt in my mind that Sherlock had been on the other end. That was confirmed when moments later it buzzed, alerting me to a text.

"Give it here!" the man with the gun ordered. I reluctantly handed the phone to him whereupon he set it on one of the counters and smashed it with the butt of the gun.

Mary laid a hand on my arm. I don't know if she was afraid I might try to take him down. The thought had occurred to me, but there were twelve innocent lives in the room, counting the staff and patients and I didn't want to risk anyone getting harmed. He didn't seem in the frame of mind that reasoning would do any good, but maybe we could just stall him until help arrived or there was a clear opportunity to jump him.

Meanwhile back at 221B Baker Street, Sherlock was alternating between watching his newly acquired ward talk to her imaginary playmates on the couch and studying the note for whatever information it would yield. He had been gone for the past two years, dismantling Moriarty's network. So if the man who had left Chelsea was a former client, the case would have to have preceded that period. But he could not recall anyone whose name began with an R who also had a little girl. Although, maybe it was from a case before she was born.

Chelsea had been ignoring him for some time, but she suddenly spoke up. "Id the little hand on the ten yet?"

"What?" he asked, not sure whether she was addressing the question to him or one of her invisible friends.

She turned and put her hands on her hips. "When the big hand id on the twelve and the little hand id on the ten, Dad and I go to the park."

"Interesting," said Sherlock. "Do you know the name of the park? That might help me determine where you live."

Chelsea shrugged.

"I believe there is a park near here, within walking distance even. Would you like me to take you there?"

"Can we go now?"

"Of course," said Sherlock, "after I tidy up your hair a bit. Just let me get a brush and see if I can smooth some of those tangles." He hastily retrieved a brush and comb from his bedroom and called her over to the desk.

"Don't hurt," she said.

"I will try to be careful, but some of these look like you got your head caught in a mixer." He turned her to face away from him and started on the back first. It took several minutes and a few yelps from Chelsea before he accomplished the task. "Here, turn around now and let me look. That'll do. Put on your jacket. It's sunny today but still cool."

Chelsea got her hooded jacket from on the couch where she had shed it earlier. She looked up at Sherlock. "Your coat?"

"Mine is downstairs. Do we have to take Brownie with us?"

Chelsea gave him a shocked look. "Of courde! It wouldn't be proper to leave him here all alone."

"Of course. We must be proper. How about the rest of your menagerie?" He indicated the couch.

"They're all gone," she said.

"Here, then, off you go." He pushed her through the door ahead of him, careful not to step on the rope. "Be careful on the stairs. Hold on to the railing."

They stopped at the bottom of the stairs long enough for Sherlock to grab his coat and then were out the door and onto the sidewalk. "This way, I think," Sherlock said, heading off to the north.

"Don't you go to the park every day?" asked Chelsea who was trying unsuccessfully to match his long strides and quickly fell behind.

"No. Too much…nature." Sherlock stopped and turned around. "Wait. Why are you back there?"

Chelsea had stopped with her hands on her hips. "You're pode to hold my hand."

"I'm supposed to hold your hand? Why?" Sherlock walked back to her.

"It the law," explained Chelsea.

"It's not the law."

"I'm pretty chur it id. I might run into the treet and get runned over," said Chelsea, hands still on her hips.

"Why would you run into the street?"

"I wouldn't."

"Then there is no reason why I need to hold your hand."

"I might get lodt."

"Lost," repeated Sherlock. "Not if you keep up and stay beside me."

"Jut hold my hand," Chelsea demanded, taking hold of one of his.

Chelsea skipped beside him as they made their way up the busy street. When Sherlock glanced down at her she was looking up at him and grinning. "Why are you smiling?" he asked.

"You know," she answered.

"No, I don't know. Hey, hold up. We have to stop here and wait for the light."

While they waited, Chelsea looked up at the street sign and began to say the letters. "B…a…k…e…r Baker!"

"That's very good, said Sherlock.

She motioned for him to bend down so she could whisper and not be heard by the others who were standing on the corner. "I like to hold your hand becaude when I touch you, I can hear you thinking."

"No, you can't," Sherlock said, straightening up.

"Really." She put a finger to her forehead. "In here."

"You're making that up, Chelsea. You're pretending, like with your invisible friends."

"I'm not," she insisted, the sheepish grin still on her face.

"But why are you smiling?" he asked again.

"You know," is all she would say in reply.

Sherlock, exasperated with the non-logic of a five-year-old, took out his phone and sent yet another text to me to hurry, but my phone was lying in pieces on the counter and beyond receiving anything.

Sherlock was right about the park being nearby, but even though it was only a ten-minute walk from the flat, he had never been there. It was one of those rare early spring days in London when the sun was shining and the air was crisp, but not cold. There was a wide, paved walking path between the old trees whose branches arched overhead. Since it was late March, the leaves were just coming out and some smaller trees were in bloom. It was a school day, so most of the other people there were those with very young children and some older folks. Regent's University London was nearby so there were also some younger adults walking, while talking on their phones, or sitting on the benches or grass, working on their laptops or tablets.

"Do you go to school, Chelsea?" Sherlock asked.

"No, Dad tell me maybe when I'm older. But I know my A B Cheed and I can count. Do you want to hear me count? One, two, three, four…"

"I believe you," interrupted Sherlock. "No need to demonstrate."

"Can you count, Lock?"

"Of course, I can."

"What the bigget number you can count to?'

"I have no idea. They just keep going. What's the biggest number you can count to?"

"Two hundred and thirty-nine," she answered quickly.

"So, why did you stop there? Why didn't you just continue to 240?"

"Ran out of time. Dad program tarted on the telly so I had to be quiet."

"But the next time you counted, you could have just begun at 239 and continued onward.'

"No. I have to tart at one."

"But you don't have to start at one."

"Yetch, I do, Lock. That the law," she insisted.

And Sherlock sent yet another text to me to hurry, and yet it was another text which I never received. By this time, the gunman had held us hostage almost two hours and the situation was becoming more tense by the minute. Whatever high he had been on when he had entered the clinic had not abated and his speech and actions had become even more erratic. Someone was going to get hurt any moment if something was not done. Fortunately there had been no children in the clinic that morning, but two of the patients were very ill and needed to receive medical attention.

He had locked the door in the early minutes of his arrival and there were no windows in the reception area where we were being held, but I still found it difficult to believe that help had not yet come from outside. Surely someone had come for an appointment and noticed it odd that the door was locked. After smashing my phone to bits, he had confiscated any other mobiles that we had and had turned them off and had thrown them in a waste bin.

And yet as bad as our situation was, my mind kept going to Sherlock and the five-year-old girl who had been left with him. He was even more uncomfortable around children than he was around adults. I could not imagine how he was coping with a strange child. I kept telling myself that Sherlock himself was so childlike in so many ways, that maybe he was getting along just fine. I had a difficult time convincing myself of that, however. I wish I had been able to respond to his call or text before my phone was destroyed. I just hoped that he did not just go off on some whim and leave her alone. I found out later that that did happen, albeit briefly.

"Aren't there any twings in thich park, Lock?" Chelsea still held onto Sherlock's hand as they continued on the walkway that circled the park.

"Twings? Wait." Sherlock closed his eyes as he sought for a translation. "Oh, swings?"

"Yeah, you know. Twings and other tuff to play on. My park id more fun than thich one."

"I suspect there is probably a playground somewhere here. We haven't actually walked very far and it's a rather large park."

"I think we have walked pretty far," said Chelsea.

Just then two teenage boys on bicycles swooped on the pair from behind. One jumped off of his bike and grabbed the rope which trailed behind Chelsea, yanking it out of her hand. He jumped back on his bike and the two of them sped off down the trail.

"Brownie!" screamed Chelsea. She pulled her hand out of Sherlock's and cradled her other hand in it.

Sherlock left her there on the walkway and sprinted after the boys. The teens saw him chasing them and they turned their bicycles off onto a side trail, left it after a few yards and headed into the woods and down a slope. That was a mistake since the uneven ground and trees and roots slowed their progress. Sherlock calculated their intended path and, continuing at a dead run, circled around and intercepted them from the side. He rammed into one bike and rider at full force, knocking it into the other one. The boys scrambled into a fighting position as he grabbed the rope from the one who held it.

"I don't believe this belongs to you," Sherlock said.

One boy lunged at him, but Sherlock blocked the blow and grabbed his wrist and twisted his arm around his back. "I really wouldn't, if I were you," he told the other youth who had started to come at him. The boy stopped. "I know you must think it's very manly to steal things from little girls, but it's really not. And why aren't the two of you in school? Oh, don't tell me, you've already learned all you need to know." He released the boy he held and shoved him into the other one.

You think you're so tough," said the one whose arm Sherlock had held. "Is it manly roughing up a couple of kids? Wait till my old Dad hears about this. He'll come looking for you."

"I'm not that hard to find. And I'd love to stay and chat with you some more, but I have…" Sherlock looked down at the rope in his hands and then looked around him in a panic. "Oh, no."

In the rush of the chase and brief struggle, he had forgotten that he had left Chelsea alone on the walkway. He took off at a run back up the slope and onto the path and back to the main trail. She was standing exactly where he had left her. "Oh, Chelsea," he said, dropping to his knees in front of her and handing Brownie's leash into her cupped hands. His breathing was shallow and labored after the run. "I am so sorry for leaving you here. Anything could have happened to… Chelsea, are you all right?"

The little girl was standing very still and rigid, her eyes screwed shut.

"Chelsea?"

There was no response from her.

"Chelsea, everything's all right now. Brownie's back…and you're safe. Talk to me, Chelsea."

She opened her eyes and looked at the rope coiled and draped over her hands. She clasped it to her chest and exhaled a long sigh. "I'm OK, Lock. I didn't cry. I almote did, but I didn't."

Sherlock was still kneeling in front of her. "It's OK to cry, Chelsea."

"No, it not."

He reached out and gingerly took her one hand that had been holding the rope when it was pulled from her. It was red where the rope had slid through, but the skin was not broken. "But that must have hurt and you must have been frightened when I…when I ran off like a maniac. I should never have left you like that." He sat back on the pavement. "I am rubbish as a nanny."

Chelsea put a hand on his head. "You're not rubbich, Lock. And you had to get Brownie back."

"Maybe we should go on back to the flat, now."

"Oh, we can walk a little longer, can't we? Come on. Get up." She tugged at Sherlock's arm and he leapt up. "Maybe I tould keep Brownie in my pocket," she said, stuffing the rope in the pocket of her jacket, "cho no one can take him again."

"That's probably a good idea." Sherlock took her uninjured hand in his and they started off.

They had not walked but about twenty yards when Chelsea squealed, "Look, Lock! Twings!" She pointed further ahead where just around a curve a playground had come into view.

Chapter Text

It was hard for me to accept that almost four hours had passed before the outside world took notice of our hostage situation at the clinic. The young man with the gun had disconnected the landline office phones soon after disposing of our mobiles. Fortunately, the daughter of one of our clients had been trying to contact her mother on her mobile, and after a long while with no response from her nor getting through to the clinic, had finally contacted the police. Pounding on the locked plate glass door out front signaled the arrival of the authorities, but their view of us was blocked by an interior wall.

This new development only agitated the man even more. "Let me go out and talk to them," I suggested. "I'll let them know what you want."

"You think I'd trust you?" he yelled.

"Listen, you can't keep us here forever. Some of these people need help. We've told you a hundred times we don't have any drugs here and…" I stood up on my knees which was a mistake.

He swung and caught my chin with the gun, knocking me sideways. I tried to grab his arm, but the blow almost knocked me out. Mary leapt to my defense, knocking the gun out of his hand, then expertly twisting his arm behind his back and pinning him to the ground. At the time I was totally unprepared for what I had just witnessed and if I had not seen her do it, I would never have believed it of her. It would be a few months before I would learn something of the life she had led before I met her. This incident was only one of many which Sherlock would store in his mind and eventually use to piece together to learn that she was not who she claimed to be. But for the moment, I was totally taken aback by her actions, though grateful that our crisis was resolved and no one had been killed or seriously injured, although my jaw was discolored and sore for a few days.

After the police came in and sorted everything out, we closed the clinic for the rest of the day and I was finally able to call Sherlock on Mary's phone. I had to listen to his tirade about my absence before I was finally able to get in a word about what had transpired at the clinic. There was a pause on his end of the line and then he asked how long it would be before I could get to his place.

"No, Sherlock, that's not what I want to hear," I said. "I just told you that we've been held at gunpoint by a lunatic for the past four hours. Your first question should have been 'are you all OK?' or 'is Mary all right?' You never show the slightest concern for anyone else. It's all about you."

"I assumed," Sherlock responded, "since you're talking to me that you are unharmed. And I heard Mary's voice in the background and you're calling me on her mobile—"

"Just forget it."

There was a moment of silence and then Sherlock said, "Are the two of you all right?"

"No, Sherlock, it doesn't count if I have to tell you to ask if we're OK. Listen, I'm going to take Mary home, and then I'll be over to see you. I guess you've managed all this time by yourself. It will only be another hour or so. What are you doing now?"

"We stopped on the way home from the park and ate lunch and now we're supposed to be taking a nap, but that's not working out. She's lying on the couch talking to her invisible dog and I'm slumped here in my chair, talking to you."

"Why don't you read to her?" I suggested. "Kids like that."

"Read what?"

"Well what kinds of stories did your Mum read to you when you were little? Oh, don't tell me. She regaled you with Tales from the Periodic Table, the Adventures of Cesium and Sulphur."

"Mixing Cesium and Sulphur would cause an explosive reaction," said Sherlock quite seriously.

"Yeah, I think their nicknames were Watson and Holmes. Just find something online—fairy tales or something. Or ask her what her favorite story is. I've got to go. I'll be there after a while."

"Please hurry, John." Sherlock ended the call and plunged the phone into the pocket of his dressing gown that he had exchanged for his coat when the two of them returned from the park.

"Is John your invidible friend?" asked Chelsea.

"It's beginning to look that way," replied Sherlock. "He's real enough, though. I thought you were supposed to be napping."

"I've tried, but my eyech won't tay chut."

Sherlock sighed. Her mispronunciation of words was annoying but cute. "Well, I suppose I could read you a story.

At that suggestion, Chelsea sat up and smiled.

"Come here and sit on my lap and I'll find us something." Sherlock reached for his tablet on the floor next to his chair and Chelsea climbed onto his lap and wriggled around to make herself comfortable. "Do you have any favorite stories that your Dad reads to you?"

"Robin Hood of Wood Fored."

"Robin Hood of Sherwood Forest?" Sherlock searched on the tablet. "Oh, here's a version published in 1850 and it's free. This ought to be good."

Chelsea laid her head back against Sherlock's chest and raised her left hand to lightly grasp the collar of his shirt as he downloaded the book, Robin Hood and Little John, Or, The Merry Men of Sherwood Forest by Pierce Egan. "OK, from the beginning:

" 'In the year of grace, 1161, during the reign of the second Henry, two travellers, travel-stained and mounted upon jaded steeds, wended their way through the intricacies of the vast forest of Shire Wood or Sherwood, situated in Nottinghamshire. It was an evening in March, chill and cold; the wind came in fitful gusts, whistling now, and anon sighing through the young green leaves and old boughs of the huge trees. The sun was fast declining,…'"

Sherlock read aloud for only a few minutes when he noticed that Chelsea had fallen asleep. It had no doubt been a long day for her since she had been sitting on the stairs when he awoke that morning and they had had quite a long walk to the park and back plus her exertions on the playground. He did not want to risk waking her and he could not reach his laptop on the desk from where he sat, so he took the opportunity to research "changeling" on the tablet. The note she had with her that morning said she was a changeling, but not the bad sort. A cursory study of what was available on the Internet seemed to indicate that in folklore almost all the changelings were bad. For the most part, in the stories changelings were fairy children, or in some cases old fairies, left in place of human children. What could her father have possibly meant by that strange statement? Surely no one in the present day believed in fairies or changelings.

Sherlock was still pondering that question, with Chelsea still asleep on his lap, when I finally arrived. He indicated for me to be quiet and to take a seat at the desk. "The note's there that was with her," he said softly. "Tell me what you think of it."

I read the note through twice. "Do you have any idea who "R" is?"

"Is that the first thing about it that jumped out at you?"

"Well, no, the part about the changeling is pretty odd. I don't even know what to make of that. How has she been all day?"

"Like a five-year-old."

"Did you actually say you took her to the park—Regent's Park, near here?"

"It's not my idea of the way to spend a day, but it did take up most of the morning. I really don't know what to do with her, John."

I couldn't help smiling. The picture of her sleeping on his lap was one that I would not soon forget. "You seemed to have put her to sleep." As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I had a horrible thought. "You didn't give her anything, did you?'

"John!"

"Sorry. I've had a bad day."

"The cut and awful bruising on your chin speak to that. Do you…uhm…want to tell me about the gunman, about what happened?"

"No, but I will tell you how it ended. I think I'm more upset about that than the whole hostage thing." I related how the gunman had knocked me out of the way and Mary had jumped to my defense and had wrestled the man to the ground. "Sherlock, I don't know what to make of that! My fiancée, the woman I'm going to marry, acting like, I don't know, some sort of ninja. I mean, I'm supposed to be the protector, the one taking care of her. And, here, she jumps in, in front of our colleagues and those other people and does that. She might very well have saved my life, she may have saved all of our lives—no telling what that idiot would have done with the police outside. And I don't even know why I'm upset with her for doing that. But I can tell you the ride home was pretty quiet, because I just don't know what to say to her. How would you feel in that situation?"

"I think I would be grateful that I was marrying a woman who could and would do that sort of thing, who possessed that skillset that—"

"Oh, what would you know?" I interrupted. "You don't even have a girlfriend. If you did, you wouldn't say that."

"You asked my opinion, and in my opinion, you're angry because Mary was the hero and not you. I suggest when you go home tonight that you take her in your arms, tell her how beautiful she is and how lucky you are to have such a woman in your life, and that you hope she's always beside you."

"When did you become such a romantic?" I asked.

It was just then that Chelsea woke from her nap and rubbed her eyes with her hands. She reached up and patted Sherlock on the cheek. "Did you finich the tory?"

"No, we didn't get very far. We'll read more later. This is John," he said, indicating me.

"Your invidible friend?"

"He materialized finally."

Chelsea slid off Sherlock's lap and trotted to the lavatory.

"She's cute," I said.

"Back to the note," said Sherlock, standing and coming over to the desk. He sat down opposite me. "People don't really believe in changelings today, do they?"

"Of course not. Maybe he doesn't mean it in the fairy tale sense. Maybe it means something else."

"Like what?"

"Don't know," I said. "Just maybe it has another meaning."

"In the stories," said Sherlock, "people would do awful things to prove the child was a changeling, like holding it over a fire or under water."

"What are you suggesting?"

"I'm not suggesting anything, John. That's just what the stories said, but that's the third time today you've insinuated that I'm somehow going to harm this child. If you and Mary have a baby, you're not even going to let me near it, are you?"

"Hi, John." Chelsea came back in to the room and skipped over to Sherlock's side. "Lock wiched you were here all day."

Oh, Lock did, did he?" I said.

"Not Lock. Lock!" she said, frustrated at not being understood.

"Sherlock?" I asked, confused.

Sherlock put his hands around her waist and lifted her onto his lap. "You have no idea how many S's there are in words, John, until you're around someone who can't pronounce them."

"So how do you say Chelsea?" I asked.

"Chelly," she replied, smiling.

"And there's no discernible pattern to her substitutions," said Sherlock. "Sometimes she replaces the S with a D or a T or a CH sound, or she just drops the S or the whole syllable altogether like in sugar or Sherlock or Sherwood Forest."

"Well, let's figure out your father's name," I suggested.

"I already tried that this morning," said Sherlock. "It's Dad."

"According to the note here, it starts with an R." I said. "Chelsea, when people come to see your father or you walk into one of the shops and people say hello to your Dad, do they say, 'Hi, Robert' or 'Hi, Roy' or 'Randall' or—"

"Richard," said Chelsea.

"Remarkable, John. Keep going." Sherlock scribbled the name on a piece of paper.

Compliments from Sherlock were rare, so I continued. "Well, do some people call your Dad 'Mr. something?' Like in your note, your Dad calls Sherlock 'Mr. Holmes.' Or I'm 'Dr. Watson.' So someone might call your Dad 'Mr.'—"

"Mitter Brook."

"Brook," repeated Sherlock, writing it down.

"No, not Brook," said Chelsea. "Brook!" She slapped her hand against her forehead.

"Don't worry, Chelsea. He gets that reaction from me a lot, too." And then it struck me. "Sherlock! Brook. Richard Brook?"

"It doesn't mean anything, John. It's a common name. There must be thousands of people named Brook in England."

"But it can't be coincidence. Richard Brook? The name Moriarty chose to ruin you? To prove you to be a fraud?"

"John, Moriarty's dead. He's been dead for two years. I was there. I saw him die."

"You're forgetting something, Sherlock."

"What?"

"I was there that day, too. I saw you die."

"That was different. That was staged."

"And you think his death wasn't."

"I know it wasn't."

"OK. If you say so," I conceded. "So, this Richard Brook must have been a client of yours or someone you know. Not a close acquaintance—he calls you 'Mr. Holmes.' Anybody come to mind?"

"No."

"OK," I continued. "Let's work with your whole name, Chelsea. What comes after Chelsea?"

Chelsea shrugged.

Let's try a different approach. When I was little and I did something bad, my Mum would say my whole name. She'd say, 'John Hamish Watson'," I said gruffly. "What does your Mum say when you're bad?"

"Her Mum's dead, John."

"Oh…uh…sorry. What does your Dad call you when he's upset with you?"

"Chelly Mary Troi Brook," she said, imitating my gruff voice.

Sherlock wrote down the names.

"That's a very pretty name and unusual," I said. "Chelsea Mary Troi."

"Oh, John." Sherlock's face had gone even paler than usual.

"What is it?" He had been writing the letters in her names, rearranging them.

"Mary Troi," he said.

"Yeah? What about it?"

"Mary Troi is an anagram." He looked up at me and held up the paper. "Moriarty."

I snatched the paper from his hand. "Jesus. You just reminded me Moriarty's dead."

"So," said Sherlock, "how much of a coincidence is it that her father's bookend names are Richard Brook and the letters of her middle names spell Moriarty?"

"But, Sherlock, James Moriarty died two years ago. And his creation Richard Brook came about in those few months before his death. She's five years old. The timeline doesn't work. And what about the name Chelsea?"

"I don't know."

"What are you two talking about?" the subject of our discussion asked.

"Nothing," I said. "We're just talking."

"Not so fast," said Sherlock. "Chelsea, have you ever heard of a man named Moriarty?"

"Nope," she replied.

Sherlock and I kept switching positions as we argued for and against a possible connection between this child and Sherlock's dead nemesis. But I was the one who suggested what we had both been thinking. "If she is somehow connected with Moriarty, she could be dangerous. I don't know…she could be booby-trapped somehow."

"She's been here all day, John. Nothing has happened."

"Did she bring anything with her?"

"A sack of extra clothes. I went through it this morning to see if I could find any clues to her identity. "

"He could have planted something in her, something with a timer. And I don't mean just explosives. She could be carrying a virus or something. You think because she's a little girl that would stop him? Look at all the innocent lives he blew up and those are only the ones we know about. Maybe that has something to do with the changeling reference."

"Tears," said Sherlock.

"What?"

"Look at the note. It says 'don't make her cry.' What if there's something that's triggered by her tears. Today in the park, John. Something happened. It was like she wanted to cry, but she forced herself not to. She was standing there stiff and unresponsive, almost catatonic, and then she came out of it."

"I didn't cry." Chelsea, still on Sherlock's lap, put her hand on his cheek.

"I know you didn't," said Sherlock. "But why not?"

"Not pode to. It hurt too much."

Sherlock and I looked at each other. "I think we should get some scans of her," I said. "We might find something."

"John, this is ridiculous. We're letting a ghost take over and plant ideas in our minds."

"You're right," I agreed. "You're absolutely right. We're just getting carried away."

"She's just a little girl."

"Who just happened to be left on the doorstep of a sociopath by a dead psychopath."

Sherlock exhaled a long sigh, then stood, still holding her. "All right, kid. Looks like we're going for a ride. Where's Brownie and your jacket?" He sat Chelsea on the floor and she went over to the couch to retrieve the rope where she had left it.

"Who's Brownie?" I asked.

"Her invisible dog."

"Oh, I see."

"No, you don't." said Sherlock.

"Where are we going?" Chelsea asked as Sherlock helped her slip on her hooded jacket.

"We're going to hospital to check some things out," Sherlock answered honestly which was probably a mistake.

"No!" Chelsea screamed as she pulled away from him.

I knelt in front of her. "It's OK, Chelsea. Nothing there is going to hurt you, I promise."

"No!" she shouted. "My Mum went to hotpital and che died!"

"But you're not going to die, Chelsea," I tried to reason with her. "I work in a kind of hospital. I go there every day and nothing bad happens."

"Almost nothing, except for the random maniac with a gun," added Sherlock.

I shot him a look. "You're not helping."

"Sorry. Chelsea," Sherlock said, also kneeling in front of her, "people go to hospitals all the time to get well. We're just going to run some tests to make sure you're all right."

"I'm not tick."

"No," I said, "of course you aren't sick. It's not like when you have a sore throat or a cold. But there might be something else…and we have to make sure you're OK."

"I'm tared," she said.

"You don't need to be scared," I said. "We'll be right there with you."

"And afterwards," added Sherlock, "we'll probably stop for ice cream."

She took one of Sherlock's hands and looked him in the eye. "Promich it won't hurt?"

"On my honor." He separated her index finger from the hand that held his and touched it to his forehead and then touched it to hers. "I'm telling the truth, aren't I?"

She stared silently into Sherlock's eyes for a moment "Ok," she relented, breaking her eye contact with him, but not releasing his hand. "I'll go to hotpital."

"What was that last bit all about?" I whispered after we had gone downstairs and were headed for my car. Chelsea was walking beside Sherlock, still holding his hand.

"Don't let her touch you, John. She can read minds."

"What?"

"She thinks she can anyway."

Chapter Text

It was almost seven o'clock by the time we reached St. Bartholomew's. Sherlock had texted Molly, asking if she would stay and help with the tests. Except for emergency cases, the radiation labs would not be in use during the evening and overnight shifts, so there should not be a delay in what we were doing. Since I had privileges at the hospital I could authorize the tests, but it was a matter of what tests we wanted. I wanted to expose her to as little radiation as possible, but if Moriarty was involved, he could have implanted anything anywhere in her. I decided on a full-body X-ray to begin. It might show us what we needed without further subjecting her to anything else.

Molly met us in the lab when we arrived. "Oh, John," she said, "I heard on the news about what happened at your clinic this morning. Are you and Mary all right?"

"You, see, Sherlock?" I said. "That should have been your first question when I called you."

He ignored me and introduced Molly to Chelsea. Chelsea held out her hand to Molly but when Molly tried to shake hands with her, Chelsea yelped and quickly pulled back her own hand. The little girl slid behind Sherlock for protection.

"Did I do something wrong?" asked Molly. "Chelsea, I didn't mean to frighten you."

"It's been a long day for her," I said. "She's just tired."

Sherlock and I explained the situation to Molly and she agreed that an X-ray was probably the best place to start. "We can leave her clothes on if there's no metal in them. Just take off her jacket because of the zip."

I do not think Chelsea had let go of Sherlock's hand since we left the flat. When we walked into the Radiology Unit, her eyes widened and she once more huddled behind Sherlock. While the lab tech, who looked like he should still be in school, looked over our paperwork, I knelt in front of Chelsea and explained what we were going to do. I know the sterile surroundings and the machines must have been frightening to a five-year-old. Sherlock knelt, too, and renewed his promise that it would not hurt.

"Can Brownie get X-rayed, too?" she asked.

"Sure," agreed Sherlock.

"I didn't even think about the rope," I whispered to him. "It could contain something."

The technician helped her into position and Molly and Sherlock and I reluctantly stepped through the door into the shielded area, but where Chelsea could still see us through the glass. She did not take her eyes off of Sherlock during the entire procedure.

After it was over, we hurried back to Molly's lab. She could access the images from her computer there. While she and I meticulously reviewed them, Sherlock kept Chelsea entertained with a microscope and various slides.

"Well?" Sherlock asked after about fifteen minutes.

"Nothing," I admitted.

"Except here, John," Molly said, pointing to an area on Chelsea's back that was displayed on one of the screens. "Something's not right. There on the scapula. I wonder if she's had surgery."

I looked at the area she indicated. "I see. Along the scapula spine and medial border. It's on both of them." I looked over at Chelsea who was on her knees on a lab stool and peering into a microscope. "There should be visible scars. Let's take a look." I walked over to her. "Chelsea, I need to look at your back."

She straightened up so quickly she just about fell off the stool but Sherlock, standing beside her, caught her. "No!" she screamed. "No one can chee! Dad taid! It the law!" She tried to squirm out of Sherlock's grasp and get to the floor but he held her tight.

"Chelsea, honey," said Molly. "We're not going to hurt you. We just want to look."

"No!" she screamed again.

Sherlock kept a firm grip on her and held her to the stool, facing him. "Why is no one supposed to see your back, Chelsea?"

"Becaude."

"That's not an answer," he said sternly. "Now sit still and let us look."

Molly raised the little girl's shirt, but neither of us was prepared for what we saw. "Oh my God," escaped from Molly's mouth before she stifled it with her hand and all I could say was "Jesus."

Two wide, vertical scars with uneven borders tore down opposite sides of her back. The top of the scars were each intersected by two diagonal slashes. "That's wasn't surgery," I said. "That was butchery."

Still holding her tight, Sherlock stepped around so he could see what had caused our reaction. "Who did this to you Chelsea? Did your father do this?"

But there was no answer from her. She had gone rigid just as she had done earlier that day in the park. Her eyes were shut tight and her breath was coming in short gasps.

"What's she doing?" asked Molly. "What's wrong with her?" She released the hem of the girl's shirt and let it slip back down over her back, hiding the horrible mutilations.

Sherlock stepped in front of her again. "Chelsea, it's all right. No tears."

"No teard." She opened her eyes and looked at him. "I'm not going to cry." She visibly relaxed and Sherlock picked her up in his arms. She laid her head on his shoulder.

"I don't understand," said Molly.

"None of us do," I said. "But I want a CT scan of her back, her head, too."

"I'll call Radiology," said Molly. "We'll need to put a gown on her."

In contrast to her outburst a few moments before, Chelsea was unusually compliant during the CT scan which was delayed because of two patients who had come in through the emergency room. Before the CT test, Sherlock suggested we get a DNA sample from her and a blood draw. The DNA cheek swab was painless but the blood draw did violate Sherlock's promise of not doing anything to hurt her, but she soldiered through it with little more than a wince.

It was past eleven o'clock by the time we returned to Molly's lab to examine the CT scans. Chelsea, still in the hospital gown, curled up under the lab table while the three of us were intent on the computer screens, gleaning what information we could about whatever had been done to her. Well, Molly and I were doing that, anyway. Sherlock was working with a microscope and another computer, researching other avenues of his own investigation.

After just a few minutes of looking at the scans, the screen was becoming so blurry I could barely make out anything. "Sherlock, I'm sorry, I need to call it a day. And we've kept Molly hours past when she should have gone home and she probably has to be back here early tomorrow. What are you looking at anyway?"

Sherlock sat upright on the stool. "What if something was implanted in her using nanotechnology?"

"That's not what made those terrible scars on her back," said Molly.

"No, but I think those scars have sidetracked our original reason for coming here this evening. If nanobots could be used to deliver drugs to certain areas of the body, couldn't they be used to implant something more harmful?"

"Sherlock, you're talking about something that's still in research and development phase."

"But if Moriarty were involved somehow in all of this, he had the financial and technological resources at his disposal to execute it."

"But we're talking way outside my area of expertise," I admitted. "I wouldn't even know where or how to start looking for nanoparticles in her."

"Nor I," said Molly. "And I really don't know what else we're going to find tonight. But I think we have subjected her to enough for one day, although with those scars like that, I think we're obligated to report her to the authorities. That certainly looks like child abuse to me."

"Another day or two," said Sherlock. "I want to give her father time to show up. But maybe you're right, John. Maybe we should call it a day. Here." He picked up my jacket that had lying on the table near him and tossed it to me, then slipped into his own coat. He bent over to look under the lab table for Chelsea. "She's gone, John!" He straightened up and stood up and looked around the lab.

"We've all been right here," said Molly. "How could she have left without one of us seeing her?"

"Stay here, Molly," ordered Sherlock. "She couldn't have gone far. Come on, John." Sherlock and I headed out the door closest to where she had been under the table.

Out in the corridor, we stopped. "Which way?" I asked.

"Follow me," said Sherlock with just a moment's hesitation. He sprinted off. We stopped at a small alcove that housed a few vending machines. There was no one there. "She hasn't eaten since noon. We passed these on the way to the scans. I thought she might have come back here." He put his hands on his temples. "Where would you go if you were five years old, John?"

"As far away from this place as I could get."

"Come on." He was off again, running down corridors, pausing only enough to look down intersecting hallways.

As we neared the exit, I grabbed his sleeve to stop him. "You don't think she went outside? It's bloody cold tonight. She's bare-footed with just a hospital gown."

"Oh, John," Sherlock's face was ashen. "Look." He pointed to the end of a rope sticking out from the bottom of the exit door.

Sherlock opened the door and bent to pick up the cotton rope that Chelsea had kept a tight grip on all evening. At that moment a car's screeching tires drew our attention to the street.

"Christ, Sherlock!" I yelled. "There she is!"

In the dim glow of the street lights, we could see the little girl fleeing down the pavement opposite us. Sherlock stuffed the rope in his pocket as we ran across the street after her, almost getting hit ourselves. She turned down a side street just as we reached the pavement but we were not that far behind her. When we got to where she had turned, there was no sign of her but the street lamps were fewer here.

Sherlock put an arm out to stop me. "Hold up, John. Listen."

There was no traffic on this street at the moment and no other people, either, but a child's plaintive wails could clearly be heard coming from somewhere ahead of us. "In here!" Sherlock turned down a dark alley and whipped out his torch from the pocket of his coat. I had to follow after him in the dark since I did not have one. I had recently begun using the torch app on my mobile which, unfortunately, had been smashed that morning.

The wails became higher pitched screams as we drew closer until, finally, Sherlock's torch revealed the little girl, huddled in the dark against a rubbish bin.

"Oh, my God, John…"

"Jesus Christ…"

We both stopped short of her as the circle of light shone on her back. There on her hospital gown a huge letter M was written in the blood seeping through the material, the lines of the letter perfectly matched to the scars on her back.

Chelsea was screaming and crying so loudly, I am not even sure she was aware of our presence until Sherlock knelt beside her and said her name. That prompted her to spasm violently as she sought to escape. Sherlock pinned her arms and yelled for me to use my phone to take a picture."

"I don't have my phone!" I yelled back.

"Mine's in my pocket. We have to have proof before it's gone."

I fumbled for his phone, while he tried to contain her against her flailing body and kicks. Her cries had coalesced into words. "No!" she screamed over and over and "No one can chee!"

He pulled up the back of her gown, lifting it straight up and away from her skin so as not to smear the pattern. I took two pictures then wrapped my arms around her, as well, which made her cry out even louder.

"You're hurting her, John! Let go!"

I stepped back. The light on Sherlock's phone revealed that my attempts to control her had smeared the blood which was still flowing from what had appeared earlier in the evening as long-ago healed wounds. I pulled the hospital gown back down to cover her.

Sherlock kept saying her name over and over, but it appeared to have little effect on calming her.

"It on fire!" were the latest words that I could make out that she was saying and "I want my Dad!"

"Chelsea," said Sherlock, "what does your Dad do when this happens? How does he make it stop hurting?"

"You think this has happened before?" I asked.

"I know it has. That's why she doesn't cry, John. That's why she stops herself from crying."

Between wails came the somewhat garbled words, "He hold me."

John, come around here and hold her arms. I need to get my coat off." Sherlock and I switched positions and he shed his coat and also removed his jacket, then put his long coat back on. "Chelsea, I'm going to put my jacket over you. It's going to be all right. You're going to be all right," he repeated several times.

Sherlock's gesture actually did have a calming effect on her or perhaps whatever this phenomenon was had run its course. Her cries subsided to sobs. "OK, Chelsea, I'm going to pick you up. I'll try not to hurt you." Sherlock lifted her to her feet and wrapped his jacket securely around her, then rose from the pavement with her in his arms in one smooth movement.

"John, call Molly and tell her we've found Chelsea and that I'm taking her back to the flat."

"Not after what's happened here," I argued. "We've got to get her admitted to hospital tonight and figure out what's going on, what's caused…this."

"No. She's been through enough. I'm taking her home. I'll get a cab and you go back to the lab and collect her clothes and have Molly put the scans on a flash drive so we can study them at our place…at my place… and then come on over."

"No," I answered.

"What?"

"It's midnight, Sherlock. I'll get her things and the scans from Molly and then I'm going home…to Mary. I'll be round your place tomorrow morning. Here's your phone back. But if anything happens to her tonight, it'll be on your head."

"What could possibly happen that could be worse than what we've already seen? And if it does, it will be safer if she's in an isolated flat and not a crowded hospital."

We walked together back to the main road where I hailed a cab for him. He held Chelsea, wrapped in his jacket, tightly to his chest. When he got into the cab, I noticed that her blood had made it through in a few spots to the outside of his jacket.

Chapter Text

Once inside the back of the cab, Chelsea, still cocooned in Sherlock's jacket with only the top of her head visible, had quieted and seemed to be resting comfortably in his lap. They had traveled several blocks when her small voice whispered, "Lock?"

I'm right here," he answered quietly.

"Your jacket mell like you," she said.

Her comment sounded as if she was oblivious to the horrible experience she had just suffered. "Is that good or bad?"

"Good."

Sherlock smiled. "It's late. You need to try to go to sleep. We'll be home in a few minutes."

"My home or your home?"

"My home."

She was asleep before they had ridden much further. When they arrived at 221B Baker Street, Sherlock carried her upstairs and took her into his bedroom. Holding her with one arm, he pulled back the covers on his bed and gently laid her there, still wrapped in his jacket. He pulled the covers back up over her and then went into the living room and sat down in his chair, his palms together and his fingers steepled beneath his chin.

The scars, the blood, her terrible cries of pain played over and over in his mind as he tried to sort through their meaning. He transferred the pictures John had taken to his laptop so he could study them in greater detail, but that awful bloodied M was imprinted on his optic nerves. Who, besides Moriarty, could have done that to an innocent child? After an hour or so, he stretched out on the couch, but not before he had taken some scrapings of the now-dried blood from her back and a pin-prick blood sample from one of her fingers.

Early the next morning Sherlock sat at the kitchen table, examining a slide of her blood under a microscope, when he heard his bedroom door open. Chelsea, still wearing his jacket, except now with her arms in the sleeves, scuttled furtively without a word through the kitchen and climbed into John's chair. She burrowed face-down into the cushion, the collar of the jacket pulled up over her head.

Sherlock stood and rubbed the back of his neck. The couch had not been kind to it. He went over to John's chair and knelt beside it. "Chelsea, are you all right this morning?" he asked in a soft voice. He rested a hand on her back, but she flinched and he withdrew it.

"Does your back still hurt?"

There was a slight movement in the lump beneath his jacket.

"I can't tell whether you are shaking your head yes or no."

"No," came the muffled voice.

"Chelsea, I need to talk to you about last night."

"I'm chorry."

"What? What are you sorry about?"

"I wa bad. Dad told me to be good and I wa bad."

"You weren't bad, Chelsea. Well, maybe a bit bad when you ran off like that. But that was probably our fault. We scared you, didn't we? We were so intent on our investigation that we forgot you are just a little girl. Why don't you sit up here so I can see you?"

"No. You weren't pode to che. Dad said no one can ever che."

"Why? Chelsea, I asked you last night and you didn't answer. Was it your Dad who made those scars on your back? Did he cut you?"

"No, it was the fairy."

"The fairies?"

"When the fairy put me in plache of the baby Mum and Dad brought home from hopital, they cut off my wingch so I would look like the human baby. I can't fly, Lock. They cut off my wingch."

Sherlock tried to digest the story. It sounded like it came straight out of the changeling tales he had researched the day before. "And your Dad told you that?"

"And my Mum. Before she died, che told me all the time that I wanint her real little girl, but that che loved me and would never let the fairy take me back."

"Chelsea, sit up here and look at me." He maneuvered her into a sitting position and she did not resist. "Tell me about the tears. Why are you not supposed to cry."

"Because it hurt and it bleed."

"What happened last night, that happens every time you cry?"

"Yech."

"So you've learned not to cry?'

She nodded. "But sometime, the tear jut come and I can't top them. I feel kind of weapy now, Lock. I'm afraid I'm going to—"

"No," said Sherlock, taking her hands in his. "No. No. Let's think happy thoughts. Oh, I know. Look what I found." He jumped up and went to his coat hanging on the back of the door. He grabbed the rope from his pocket and thrust it in Chelsea's hands. "Brownie's been sleeping in my coat all night."

"Oh, Brownie!" Chelsea gave a squeal of delight, hugging the rope to her chest. "He ran away lat night. I thought he wa gone forever."

"Oh, he'll probably stick around for another year or so," whispered Sherlock to himself. "OK," he said aloud. "Here's what we'll do. We can't go to the park today because it's turned rainy and cold and you don't even have any shoes until John gets here with them. So, why don't we first take a bath and clean you up and then we'll have breakfast. Do you like waffles?"

"With butter and chirp?"

"Of course, with butter and syrup. And then, oh, I don't know, maybe we can bake some biscuits. Your note said you liked biscuits. What are you favorite kind?"

"Oatmeal!"

"Yeah, and now that I've said that, I probably don't have the ingredients on hand to make them. But maybe we can nick whatever we need from Mrs. Hudson's cupboard downstairs. Come on into the lavatory now and I'll draw you a bath."

He was able to get the sports jacket off of her easily, but the hospital gown was plastered to her back by the dried blood. He was afraid that simply pulling it away would reopen the wounds. He had her get into the tub of water then used the flexible shower head to gently spray warm water on her back until the material loosened enough for him to remove the gown. He gently scrubbed the remaining blood from her back. The wounds appeared completely healed with the scars just as he had first seen them in the lab the night before. He had never witnessed anything like it before and could only hope John would have some medical explanation for it.

Sherlock washed her hair since the ends had dried blood in them, as well, and washed the rest of her, while she giggled and splashed him. When he had finished, he helped her out of the tub and dried her, leaving the large towel wrapped around her. "Let's find you another outfit from your sack," he said, leading her into his bedroom.

"Lock, can I wear some of your perfume?"

"Cologne and no, you may not."

"My Dad till has some of my Mum perfume in hich bedroom. Tumtime, he lech me put a little tiny bit behind both my ear cho I can remember what che melled like."

"Oh, all right. Here. Just a little behind your ears." Sherlock dabbed some on his hand and patted the back of her neck.

Chelsea closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

Sherlock sorted through the sack that she had with her when he had discovered her sitting on his steps the previous morning. He pulled out some purple tights and a purple top of a lighter shade. There were extra underpants and socks in the sack, too. "Put these on and I will go start the waffles."

"I thought you taid John wa going to bring my chooes," said Chelsea, later that morning, as she helped Sherlock form the rounded balls of batter and drop them onto the baking sheet. The first batch of oatmeal biscuits was already cooling on the counter.

"I've tried texting and calling. No response. I'm sure he'll be here, though. Not so big!" He took the ball she had just made and divided into two. "They have to be uniform size or they'll bake unevenly. Can you remember baking biscuits with your Mum?'

Chelsea screwed up her face. "I think I remember. Did you make bitcuit with your Mum?

"Hmm…once or twice and then she wouldn't let me near the kitchen anymore. I always wanted to add…extra ingredients."

"Like what?"

"Oh, you know. Caterpillars…spiders…the usual things."

Chelsea giggled. "Got any?"

"Any what? Insects or arachnids? No, I think we should just stick to the recipe this time. How is your loose tooth today?"

"I think it almote ready to fall out, but I'm kinda tared."

"Well, as soon as we pop this batch in the oven, you can try one of those sitting over there, and maybe, when you bite into that warm, gooey biscuit, your tooth will get stuck it in and you won't even know it's out.

"No!" She laughed. "I don't want to wallow it."

"Of course not. You have to put it under your pillow."

"Why?"

"So the tooth fairy can come and—" As soon as he said the word "fairy" he wished he could call it back. After the story she had told him earlier, her image of fairies was probably not a good one.

"No!" she cried in horror. "No fairy. They'll take me back."

"No. Calm down." Sherlock's hands were covered in dough, so he couldn't touch her. "The tooth fairy is just a story. She's not real. It's just something parents tell their children. When children lose a tooth they put it under their pillow and when they're asleep, the tooth fairy takes the tooth and leaves money. But it's just a story. It's really the parents who leave the money. So don't worry, the fairies aren't going to take you back. OK?"

"OK." Chelsea's mood was subdued as she shaped two more dough balls, but then she asked, "They really leave money?"

"Mine did."

"But what if my tooth come out here? My Dad won't be here to leave any money under my pillow."

"Well, maybe it won't fall out until your Dad returns."

After the biscuits were done and sampled, it was still only mid-morning but Sherlock had run out of ideas to keep a five-year-old entertained, although she seemed to be quite capable of entertaining herself. She was currently sitting on the floor, building some sort of structure with several books that she had pulled off one of the shelves. He, meanwhile, was feeling the pall of ennui beginning to sink over him.

"Why don't we go out for a while?" he asked.

"You taid we couldn't becaude it raining and I don't have any chooes."

"We could go out and get you some. I'm tired of waiting for John. Oh, but you don't have a coat either."

"I could wear one of yours."

"They're all too big. Maybe we could find something downstairs in Mrs. Hudson's flat."

Twenty minutes later, the two of them were riding in a cab on their way to a shoe store, Chelsea wearing one of Mrs. Hudson's jumpers that hung on her like an over-sized coat. When they reached the store, Sherlock carried her inside and sat her down on the carpeted floor. The saleslady looked askance at the girl with no shoes, but politely refrained from questioning Sherlock as to the reason.

Chelsea was immediately drawn to some blue and pink trainers with LED lights in the heel that would light up with each step. Sherlock allowed the saleslady to try them on her and Chelsea practiced stomping with them and trying to see the flashing lights.

"But they wouldn't be very practical when chasing someone down a dark alley," said Sherlock.

"I don't do that," countered Chelsea, quite seriously.

He, of course, bought them for her. The shoe store was one of several shops in a covered area and when they left it, a Star Wars window display in a toy store across the way caught Chelsea's attention. She dragged Sherlock over to it.

"I like Tar Wart, don't you, Lock?"

He did not reply but she continued. "If I had a lighttaber like that one there, I could be a Jedi warrior."

"If we had two such devices like that one," said Sherlock, "I could teach you to fence. They would be less dangerous than real weapons."

Chelsea looked up at Sherlock. "You could teach me to be a Jedi?"

"Sure," said Sherlock. "Let's see how much they cost."

Sherlock and a very happy Chelsea were riding back to Baker Street in a cab when I finally caught up with them by phone. "Sherlock," I said when he answered, "I'm here at your flat. Is Chelsea all right? Where are you?"

"She's fine, John. We're on our way there now. Just been shopping. Where have you been? I expected you hours ago. And why haven't you been answering your phone?"

"Sherlock, you never listen. I told you my phone was destroyed yesterday. It's taken me all morning to get it replaced. The shop near my house didn't have the model in stock that I wanted and I had to go to two other places, the last one miles away. Anyway, don't stop and eat. I've brought soup and sherbets."

"Soup and sherbets. Good old John! How I've missed you. We're about 5 minutes away."

When he hung up, Chelsea asked, "What id oup and bet?"

"When John lived with me, he always liked soup and sherbets on rainy days like this one. You like soup, don't you?"

"Depend on what kind, but I don't know what bet id."

"You've never had sherbet sweets?" asked Sherlock.

"Nope."

"Then you're in for a treat."

I knew when they were home. It sounded like a herd of elephants bounding up the stairs.

"Look, John!" yelled Chelsea as she burst through the doorway. I have new choes!" She stomped a few times so I could see their lights. "But they're not very practical for chating people down dark alleych," she added.

"Oh, you do that a lot, do you?"

"No, but if I do, Lock id going to teach me to be a Jedi warrior so I can fight them." She grabbed one of the lightsabers that Sherlock was holding—the other one was still in its packaging—and swished it through the air."

I cleared my throat and cocked my head at Sherlock. "I didn't know you were a Jedi Master."

"I have many skills you are probably unaware of, John." He took a deep breath. "I smell beef vegetable soup." He tossed the matching Star Wars toy on the couch and took off his coat. "Young lady, you need to visit the loo and wash your hands so we can eat."

I retreated to the kitchen to finish laying lunch on the table. Sherlock followed. "I brought her clothes and shoes from last night." I told him. "You didn't have to buy her new ones.'

"It made her happy."

"I can see that. She doesn't even act as if anything happened last night." We were keeping our voices down since the bathroom was right off the kitchen.

"I tried to get her to talk about it a little this morning." Sherlock said. "I will relate the tale she told me to you later."

I set the tin of oatmeal biscuits on the table. "And I had one of these. They aren't from a shop. Where did you get them?"

"I made them, of course. Well, we made them. It killed about an hour this morning."

"You? You…made oatmeal biscuits? I didn't know you could do anything more in the kitchen than open a can or…butter a slice of bread. And I'm not even sure about that last one."

Chelsea came out of the bathroom and held up her hands for Sherlock to inspect them. He pulled out a chair for her. "Here, sit here."

"Why don't you stack a couple of big books on there so she can reach the table," I suggested.

"Good idea, John. See? That's why I need you around. You…know things like that."

After we had finished the soup and hard rolls that I had brought, we passed around the tin of oatmeal biscuits. I noticed Chelsea eyeing me slyly as I started to bite into mine. "What?" I asked her.

"Careful," she warned. "There might be a caterpillar in it."

"What!" I dropped the biscuit into my empty soup bowl.

Sherlock laughed out loud. "She's kidding, John. Chelsea," he said in a mock stern voice. "Tell John you're sorry. You almost gave him a heart attack."

"Torry, John. No caterpillar." She ducked her head, but watched as I picked up the biscuit and bit into it. "But you might want to check for piders."

"Oh, good one!" Sherlock high-fived her and they both erupted in giggles.

Disgusted, I dropped the biscuit back into the bowl. "Jesus, Sherlock, she's been here just over twenty-four hours and you're already turning her into a miniature you. She even smells like you. Why does she smell like you?"

"Lock let me wear his perfume."

"Cologne," Sherlock corrected her. "She wanted to wear some. John, I'm just trying to avoid another scene like last night. I will do anything to keep that from happening again. I'll buy her a pony if that will make her happy."

Chelsea's face lit up. "I can have a pony?"

"No, I was exaggerating. Why don't you go into the other room and play. I need to talk to John."

"What about the bets?" She had been eyeing the small sack of sweets throughout the meal.

Sherlock reached into the sack. "Here's one and one for Brownie."

I grabbed the sack. "Why don't you just let her eat them all? Fill her up with sugar. She'll be climbing the walls and that'll keep you from getting bored this afternoon."

"Two's enough," said Sherlock. "Go, now. Off with you." He helped her down from the books he had put on her chair and shooed her into the other room. Sitting back down, he announced, "She can't fly, John"

"What?"

"She can't fly and you want to know why?" And then he told me her tale of how her fairy wings had been cut off and she was left as a changeling in place of the real baby that belonged to her parents. He also related to me what she had said about the link between her tears and the flow of blood that we had witnessed in the alley.

"I think Molly was right last night," I told him. "I believe we're looking at a serious case of child abuse and her father has obviously filled her head with this nonsense. But I don't understand the connection with Moriarty. Where does he fit into this? Is he her father?"

"Moriarty's dead, John. Remember? And were he not, I hardly think he would have dropped off his daughter with me."

"Unless she was booby-trapped which was our objective last night with the tests."

"But she doesn't show any signs of typical child abuse," Sherlock said.

"Oh? Bloody nine-inch scars down her back isn't enough sign for you?"

"You know what I mean. Oh, and I managed to get a sample of what we thought was blood coming from those scars last night. I looked at it this morning under a microscope."

What was it?"

"Blood. Her blood. I took another sample from her finger last night while she was asleep and compared them. You're the doctor, John. Have you ever seen anything like what occurred last night?"

"The only thing I can think of is it's like a stigmata. In the Roman Catholic church, there are reported cases of people who claim to be stigmatics. They possess marks similar to those of Christ at his crucifixion—wounds in the palms or wrists or along the hairline, sometimes on the back. And these wounds have been seen by others to bleed sometimes. But, Sherlock, scientifically, medically, wounds do not suddenly and spontaneously appear on people's bodies for no reason. There is always some specific instrument that can be identified as the cause of the trauma—a knife or bullet, or teeth, or scissors or pins or anything. Those are old scars on her back. There was something that caused those wounds to open again last night."

"She didn't do it to herself—she would have had to be a contortionist. And you need to examine them today. There's no sign that those wounds even reopened last night. But we both saw them. We took pictures. I have the blood-soaked hospital gown and my jacket. There's even some blood on my sheets.

I took out of my pocket the flash drive that Molly had given me when I went back to the lab. "I haven't had time today to look at the scans. Let's go see if we can find anything." We left the remains from lunch on the table and adjourned to the desk and Sherlock's laptop. While I was bringing up the results on the screen, he helped Chelsea put batteries in the lightsabers.

"Chelsea," I heard him ask. "Would you let John look at your back for just a minute?"

She turned and looked at me. "Not pode to." Her green eyes narrowed as she stared at me for a moment. "OK," she said finally.

"Come on over here by the window so we have better light." I turned her around so that her back was towards me and knelt and lifted her t-shirt. Sherlock was right. The scars looked the same as we had seen them in the lab. "Give me your magnifying glass, Sherlock."

He handed me one off the desk. There were no new cuts or puncture wounds visible within the scars on elsewhere on her back. I ran a finger down the length of one of the scars. "Can you feel that?"

She nodded.

"Does it hurt?"

"No, it kinda tickle." She squirmed and giggled and then spun around and grabbed my hand that was not holding the magnifying glass. She tightly clasped it in both of hers and her expression grew serious. "I'm not Moriarty," she said. "I don't even know him." I was not sure if she remembered the name from when we talked about him yesterday in front of her or whether she had overheard our conversation in the kitchen just now.

"Why would you say that? I don't think you're Moriarty."

"Yech, you do. You think I'm…evil."

"No, I don't, Chelsea. I would never think that of you. I think you are a beautiful little girl that has some secrets that Sherlock and I are trying to uncover, but I would never think you are evil. Never."

She pulled my hand against her forehead and held it there. I looked up at Sherlock who was looking on curiously. "Sherlock?"

"Just a moment, John. Let her finish."

"Finish what?"

"Ssshh."

Chelsea held my hand in that position for almost a minute before she released it and patted me gently on the head. "Poor John."

"Poor John?" I stood up and looked at Sherlock. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"I warned you not to let her touch you."

Chapter Text

We spent the next hour going over the results from the X-ray and the CT scans from the night before, but then I had to leave since I was on evening shift at the clinic. As I was walking down the stairs, Sherlock caught up with me on the landing.

"John, before you go, I really need to ask you something. What exactly is a Jedi?"

"Oh, my god, Sherlock. You never cease to astonish me. You're so bloody brilliant, but you don't have a clue about popular culture. Have you even heard of Star Wars?"

He shrugged. "Maybe."

"Just rent the damn movie—the first one from 1977. Watch it with Chelsea. She's probably already seen it a couple of hundred times, so she'll be able to walk you through it."

I found out later that Sherlock had actually followed my suggestion and the two of them spent the afternoon watching the iconic science fiction movie. They followed that with Chelsea's first fencing lessons with the lightsabers. The day's lessons ended, however, with an accidental bump against Chelsea's mouth by one of the colored plastic tubes. The bump was hard enough to knock out the loose tooth. Fortunately there were no ensuing tears since she was more excited about the tooth being dislodged than she was about any pain.

Sherlock used his handkerchief to pick up the baby tooth off the carpet then transferred it to a small evidence bag.

"I want to tee it," said Chelsea.

He let her examine it through the clear plastic bag then looked at her mouth to make sure that the hit by the lightsaber had not done any other damage.

That night he made a pallet for her in his bedroom, but she was unhappy about the sleeping arrangements. "I think I choud leep in the bed with you," she insisted. Her sack of clothes did not contain any pyjamas so he had dressed her for bed in one of his T-shirts. It came to her ankles.

"There's nothing wrong with sleeping on the floor," he said. "There are enough quilts for padding. It'll be comfortable. You'll be fine."

"But I'm way over here," she gestured dramatically with her arms. "What if the tooth fairy come?"

"We've already been over that more than once today. Remember? There is no tooth fairy. Why don't we leave your tooth in the other room. That way, you won't have to worry."

"No! You taid I have to put it under my pillow. It the law!"

"It's not the law."

"But I won't get any money if it not under my pillow. But I think my pillow and me chould be in your bed."

"Chelsea, I'm not going to argue about this with you. You're sleeping there on the floor. You're six feet away from me. Nothing's going to get you. The doors are all locked. Nobody's getting in."

Chelsea plopped down on the pallet and crossed her arms over her chest and pouted for a minute before pleading, "Why can't I leep with you?"

"Because."

"That not an anter," she parroted his earlier words back to him.

"You need to lie down there and go to sleep. I have some work to do in the other room. I'll leave the door cracked so there will be some light coming in. OK?"

Chelsea lay down and Sherlock covered her. She turned her face to the wall, still pouting. Just as he reached the door, she said, "Lock? If the doorch are locked, how will the tooth fairy get in to leave me money?"

Sherlock pressed his forehead against the doorframe. "There is no tooth fairy."

"But my Dad might come."

"We can only hope," Sherlock whispered. "Goodnight, Chelsea."

"I'm mad at you, Lock."

"I know. Goodnight." He turned off the light and headed to his desk and the laptop there to look once again at the scans that John had brought over that day. It would be another couple of hours before he went to bed.

Sherlock awoke the morning just as the bedroom was beginning to grow light, but when he glanced over at Chelsea's pallet on the floor, he panicked. It was empty! He leapt out of bed and scanned the room then hurried to the kitchen and the front room, calling her name. Both doors to the hallway were still locked. He returned to his bedroom and from the new angle saw what he had missed before. The tip of Brownie's leash stuck out from under his bed.

He got down on his knees and pulled a drowsy Chelsea out from under the bed. "You're ice-cold," he said. "What were you doing under there?"

She put a hand on the side of his face. "I wa tared and you wouldn't let me leep with you."

"Here." He picked her up and laid her in his bed and pulled the covers close around her. "You need to warm up and go back to sleep. It's not time to get up yet."

Sherlock left her there and headed to the kitchen for a cup of coffee and then a shower. Not a half hour later, with just a towel wrapped around him, he was shaving in front of the lavatory mirror when Chelsea began pounding on the bathroom door and shouting, "Lock! Lock!"

He flung open the door, almost causing her to collapse inside. "What's wrong?"

"Money!" She opened one hand to reveal a palm full of coins. "There wa money under my pillow, Lock!"

"How much?"

She squatted and laid the coins on the floor and counted them. "One, two, three, four, five. Five pound!"

"That's a lot of money for just a little tooth. The tooth is gone, isn't it?"

"It wa jut like you said, Lock! I looked under my pillow—the one on the floor—and the tooth wa gone and there wa all thich money." She stood up and tried to move past him. "Now get out of the way, pleach. I've got to usch the toilet."

Sherlock grabbed a towel and wiped the remaining shaving crème from his face as he retreated to the bedroom to dress.

Later as the two of them sat at the kitchen table, eating breakfast, Chelsea was still excited over her newly acquired fortune, but puzzled. "Do you think my Dad wa here lat night and left me the money?"

Sherlock spoke from behind the newspaper he was reading. "What do you think?"

"I think if he came, he would have taid 'hello' to me and taken me home. Maybe there id a tooth fairy, after all. Maybe che idn't like my fairy. Maybe che jut want teeth, not…not…"

Sherlock put down the paper. "Not what?"

Chelsea ducked her head. "Nothing. I don't have any pocket to keep my money in, Lock."

"Oh. I probably have something." He went over to the desk and opened one of the drawers and rummaged through it. "Here." He brought back to the table a small, embroidered pouch. "See, it's just big enough to hold all five coins. But look here." He opened the pouch to reveal an almost invisible flap on the inside of the lining. "There's a secret compartment inside. Let me show you." He took one of the coins and slipped it under the flap. "Now, look." He handed the little bag to Chelsea. "Where did it go?" She examined the pouch and turned it inside out.

"Where id it?"

Sherlock took the bag and showed her how to retrieve the hidden coin. I think there's probably room for two coins in the secret part and no one would ever know they're there."

Chelsea experimented with putting the coins in the pouch and finding them again.

"Now, listen, Chelsea, you need to finish eating. I have a prospective client coming over here soon and I need for you to go to the bedroom and stay there while he's here. Just play quietly with Brownie or any of your other little friends, but not the lightsabers. Nothing that makes noise. You'll have to be quiet while he's here, understand?"

Sherlock barely got Chelsea sequestered in his bedroom when the downstairs doorbell rang. With Mrs. Hudson still gone, he had to go down himself and let in a well-dressed, young man and escort him back up the stairs. What followed was a tedious twenty minutes of the man reciting what seemed to Sherlock to be his entire life story. He kept prompting the visitor to get to the point, but the man insisted on relating every single detail of his serpentine narrative. Sherlock slumped deeper and deeper into the cushions of his chair as the man droned on.

A crash from the bedroom brought Sherlock out of his stupor and the man to his feet. "I've been hearing noises from that room the whole time I've been here. Is someone else here?" demanded the man. "You told me this meeting was strictly confidential."

The bedroom door opened and Chelsea walked out or, rather, shuffled out because her feet were in a pair of Sherlock's shoes. She was dressed in one of his white shirts that came to her ankles and wearing one of his dressing gowns over that. The robe trailed behind her as did Brownie's leash.

It was just at that moment that I came in the door.

"Oh, no, no, no, no!" shouted Sherlock, jumping up. "This is just wrong. You!" He pointed at the man. "You and your convoluted story about your house in the country and your fancy sports car and your dinner parties. It's obvious that you wife is involved with your best friend, Harold, and has been for some time. You don't need a detective, you need a lawyer, and since he'll be paid by the hour, may I suggest you learn to summarize. Now get out! And you!" He pointed at me next. "You're late! And you!" He turned on Chelsea who was standing there in his over-sized clothes with eyes opened wide. "Is this your idea of playing quietly? Who told you that you could go through my wardrobe and wear my clothes? And now, look, you've got something all over the sleeve of my best dressing gown." He turned back to me. "I can't do this anymore, John. I really can't." He retreated to the bedroom and slammed the door.

The would-be client made a hasty departure. I stood there in the front room and looked down at Chelsea, who had not said a word during Sherlock's tirade. I cleared my throat a couple of times. "I guess Sherlock's in one of his moods today, isn't he?" I said, hoping to ease the tension I could see in her face. She looked to be on the verge of tears and I certainly did not want that to happen. "For the record, I think you look cute in his clothes. What's that in your hand?" She held the drawstrings of an elaborately, embroidered pouch that I remembered seeing amidst the clutter in Sherlock's desk. "May I see it?"

She handed it to me. "It my money from the tooth fairy. See?" She opened her mouth and stuck out her lower jaw so I could see the gap where the tooth had come out. I also noticed some slight bruising under her lip.

Sherlock had told me about the earlier conversation he had with her about the tooth fairy so I was surprised when she mentioned that entity as the one responsible for leaving the money. I opened the little pouch. "Oh! Three pounds! The most the tooth fairy ever left me was 20p."

That brought a smile to her face. "No, they're five coin in there."

I shook my head. "Nope, I only count three."

"John, John, John," she said, shaking her head back and forth. "You tee but you do not obcherve."

"Now where have I heard that?" I said and I could not help chuckling. I handed the bag to her and she opened it.

"Hold out your hand," she said. She took a coin from the pouch and placed it in my palm.. "One." And another one and another one. "Two. Three." And then she pulled out a fourth coin and gave it to me. "Four. Five!" she shouted, placing the last one in my hand.

"How did you do that?" I asked. "No, wait, more importantly. Are you telling me that you got five pounds for that little bitty tooth?"

"Yep," she said, smacking her lips on the "p" just the same as I had seen and heard Sherlock do many times.

I handed her hoard of coins back to her and she placed them all in the pouch. "And did that tooth fall out by itself?" I asked, a little concerned about the bruise.

"Lock was teaching me to be a Jedi."

Listen, Chelsea, I…uh…I need to go talk to Sherlock for a few minutes. Will you be all right out here by yourself?"

"Chure," she replied and shuffled in Sherlock's shoes over to the couch.

I did not even bother to knock on the bedroom door. He would have just told me to go away. I walked in and closed the door behind me. I wanted to say "What the hell was that all about out there," but when I saw him standing at the window with his back to me, all I could ask was, "Sherlock, are you all right?"

He did not turn around, but said "I think…I…think it's time we turn her over to Child Protection or someone…someone away from me."

"I didn't think you wanted the authorities involved. What's brought this on? And what happened in here?" His bedroom was a mess. There were drawers opened and clothes scattered and the entire contents of the upper shelves of his wardrobe were in a pile on the floor, along with an overturned chair.

Sherlock turned to face me. "This is what happens when a five-year-old is left unsupervised for twenty minutes. Oh, John, you know me. You know she should never have been left here in the first place. I am…toxic. And I don't know the first thing about children. I can't even draw on my own childhood experience, because I don't think I was ever—"

"Normal?" I suggested. "I agree, Sherlock. I agree that she shouldn't stay here with you. My God, you just about scared her to death a few minutes ago. I was afraid that we were going to have another crying episode with her. But, at the same time, I am intrigued about who or what she is and would like to know Moriarty's connection or whoever did that to her, and I'm afraid if we give her to the authorities that we'll never find out."

"But it would be in her best interest."

"It would be. And when—or if—her father shows up, he'll be made to answer for those scars on her back."

Sherlock was silent for a moment and then went into the living room and I followed. "Chelsea," he said very solemnly. "Come into the bedroom a minute. I need to talk to you. John, stay out here, please."

In the bedroom, Sherlock lifted her out of his shoes. She stood in front of him and he sat down on the edge of the bed. He took off the dressing gown she was wearing and laid it on across the bed without speaking.

"I'm torry I put on your clothche. I was jut playing. Pleache don't be mad."

He started to unbutton his shirt that she wore. "I'm not angry with you, Chelsea. But I have something to tell you." He hesitated for a moment, trying to choose the right words. "You…you can't stay here with me anymore. I'm going to call some people—nice people—and they're going to take care of you until your father comes back for you."

"No, Lock! I want to tay here. I'll be good. I promich."

"It's not a matter of you being good, Chelsea. It's more about me being bad. I'm bad for you. I'm not the kind of person you should be around." He slipped the shirt off of her. She was wearing the last of the clean outfits that were in the sack with her when she arrived.

"Pleache, Lock, don't tend me away. I'll be good. I won't argue and I'll leep on the floor and I won't make mechet and I'll…"

"Chelsea, it's nothing you've done. It's me. I really don't know how to explain it to you in a way that you'd understand. But I'll try." He paused for a moment. "I have dragons within me. Well, I think of them as dragons, but maybe they're more like demons. And these beings inside me cause me to sometimes say things and do things that are hurtful to people, and…and I don't even realize that they're hurtful. And what's worse, probably, is that I don't even care. And in some people's eyes, that makes me a bad person."

"You're not bad, Lock."

"I'm afraid I am sometimes. But it's these dragons inside me that also make me very good at my job. They help me to focus and to see things and figure out things that others miss. But with you here, I can't do my job. I can't concentrate on it."

"Oh, Lock." Chelsea tried to take his hands in hers but he pulled them away.

"No, don't touch me. Don't do…that…whatever it is you do."

Chelsea clasped her hands behind her back. "Becaude what you're taying id not what you're thinking."

"What?"

She just stood there, staring at him while he digested her words. Was he being honest with himself? He, also, like me, wanted to solve the mystery of this little girl and that chance would slip away if he turned her over to Child Protection. "Remind me again how old you are," said Sherlock.

She held up five fingers. "Five yeart old. Lock, I love you and I don't want to go tumplace elch."

"You don't love me, Chelsea. You love it that I bought you shoes and lightsabers and we made biscuits and walked in the park—"

"No. I love you." She leaned forward and wrapped her arms around his neck and he didn't resist.

I was standing in the kitchen, watching the whole scene unfold through the doorway. I could tell he was going to give in to her. Whatever those dragons or demons within him were that made him so callous and yet so brilliant, they were not going to win this time.

"Lock," she whispered in his ear as he gathered her onto his lap, her arms still clasped around his neck. "Do you think the tooth fairy knew that I was five year old and that why che gave me five coin?"

He sighed. "I thought we had decided yesterday that there is no tooth fairy."

"I think you jut told me that cho I wouldn't be tared. Bechide, you have to look at the evidenche and gather cluedch. The tooth is gone and there id all thid money."

Sherlock smiled. "Where did you learn about evidence and clues?"

"From you." She released her hold on his neck and slid off his lap and smiled at him.

"What?" he asked. "Why are you smiling?"

"You know," she said.

"No, I really don't."

"Yech, you do." She scampered through the kitchen and stopped in front of me. "Lock told me I had to leave, but we worked it out and I get to tay."

"Oh, uh, good," I said and looked at Sherlock in the bedroom.

He shrugged and cocked his head. "I guess I can manage for another day or two."

I went into the bedroom. Sherlock was still sitting on the bed, elbows on his knees, his chin resting on his fists. "Listen," I said, "I'm supposed to be at work, but I guess I can make some arrangements if you think I'd better stay here today…you know…just to keep an eye on…things."

He did not look up at me, but replied, "I'll be…we'll be fine."

I turned away and walked back toward the kitchen, but stopped in the doorway. "You were wrong, Sherlock, what you said to Chelsea just now. Sometimes you care. I just hope you made the right decision today.

He did not answer.

"I'll…uh…pop round about six tonight. I'll bring Chinese."

Chapter Text

True to my word, that evening I stopped by Sherlock's favorite Chinese restaurant and bought takeaway. Mealtime was interesting although a little messy since Chelsea insisted on using chopsticks because Sherlock ate with them. After supper, he gave Chelsea a bath then left her with me for a few minutes while he went downstairs to put her clothes in the wash. He had put another one of his T-shirts on her for pyjamas. When he came back up, he sat down in his favorite chair and she immediately crawled up on his lap.

"So what did the two of you do all day today?" I asked. They had both been in a good mood at supper and it was obvious the day had gone well despite Sherlock's earlier "meltdown."

"Was it a good day?" asked Sherlock.

Chelsea was sitting with her back against his chest and playing with the pouch of coins. She reached one hand up and laid it along his cheek and, leaning her head back, looked up at him. "Any day that begin with finding money under your pillow hat to be a good day, dudn't it?"

"I think that's an excellent way to start the day," agreed Sherlock. "Let's see, what did we do today? We went to the park again."

"We took the lightsabert becaude there wa plenty of room there to fight without breaking anything. We weren't really fighting, of courde. Jut pretending."

"And no one got hit in the mouth this time?" I asked.

"No," said Chelsea. "No more teeth to put under my pillow."

"Oh, you'll have some more loose ones soon enough." I said.

"And after the park, we stopped and had lunch with ice cream for dessert," continued Sherlock.

"And that lady paid our bill because che thought Lock wa beautiful," added Chelsea stretching out the syllables of beautiful.

"What?" I asked.

"That's not why," said Sherlock, smiling. "Some woman paid our bill and left a note that the reason she did it was because she thought it was so nice to see a father taking time to be with his daughter. She was gone before I had a chance to set her straight."

"She thought you were Chelsea's father?"

Chelsea shook her head no. "That may be what the note taid, but che thought he wa beautiful."

"She did not," said Sherlock as he gently wrestled with a giggling Chelsea. "You stop making things up. Oh," he continued after the two of them settled down, "and later this afternoon, we worked on pronouncing our S's."

"How did that go?"

"Not too well," said Sherlock. "One of us became frustrated after a bit and stormed out of the room."

"And by 'one of us,' you, of course, mean you."

"Maybe."

"You realize, Sherlock, that what you're saying is that a five-year-old has more patience than you."

"And a longer attention span," he said. "Oh, Chelsea, I think you've put my leg to sleep. Why don't you go over to the couch for a while?" Sherlock slid her off his lap.

"You know, what I don't understand," I said, "is she's always touching you. Why doesn't she ever pat your head and say, 'Poor Sherlock'?"

"Oh, she just looks at me and grins, and when I ask her why she's smiling, she says, 'You know.' It's a little disconcerting."

"It's a little creepy," I said.

Chelsea's voice was audible but indistinct as she murmured to her imaginary friends on the other side of the room.

"Why didn't Mary come over here with you tonight? Oh, are you still angry with her over the hostage incident?"

"She and some of her bridesmaids are doing something. Our wedding is over two months away, but you'd think it was next week the way they're all acting. And no, I'm not still angry with her. We made up. Oh, yeah." I couldn't help smiling at the thought. "We definitely made up."

Sherlock rolled his eyes then ruffled his hair with his hands. "I need a case, John. But I can't concentrate with her here. What if her father never comes back?"

"The note said 'a while'."

"A while what? A week? A month? A year? When she graduates from university? Maybe he'll come back to walk her down the aisle on her wedding day?"

"Jesus, Sherlock, keep your voice down. You want to upset her?"

Sherlock suddenly sprang out of his chair. "Chelsea, what say we go downstairs and put your clothes in the dryer?"

She turned around from the couch. "I don't have any choed on." She lifted one bare foot out from under the oversized T-shirt and wiggled it in the air.

"Oh, be spontaneous," said Sherlock, taking her by the hand.

He left the door open and I listened to their chatter as they descended the stairs. She asked him if the stairs disappeared how they would get out and he postulated some escape routes and she added her own ideas. I clicked on Sherlock's laptop to check my blog website and read through some comments for the next few minutes until I was interrupted by a child's scream.

Downstairs Sherlock and Chelsea transferred her clothes from Mrs. Hudson's washer to her dryer, and then Sherlock picked up Chelsea so that she could reach the knob on the dryer to turn it to the correct setting and push the button to start it. That is when he first noticed that something was not right. When he later spoke of this night to me, he blamed Chelsea for distracting him so that he was caught off guard, and I will admit that it was unusual that he did not detect the two intruders earlier. Sherlock was a man who could walk into a room and notice immediately if a book had been moved or a lamp had been dusted. But on this night, his heightened sense of observation was dulled and one of the men managed to hit him in the lower back with a Taser before he could react to their presence.

Sherlock dropped Chelsea and hit the floor convulsing and the second man swept Chelsea up in his arms. That is when she screamed and that is when I hit the stairs at a run. As I turned the landing, the man holding Chelsea, who was screaming and fighting like a wildcat, fired a handgun twice at me. Had it not been for her flailing arms and legs destroying his aim, I would probably be dead, but the second bullet caught my left shoulder and forced me down on the steps. The two men fled with Chelsea out the front door.

At that point I did not know that Sherlock had been hit with the Taser. Fortunately the probes had only shocked him once. He struggled to his knees, trying to shake off the effects of the electrical assault on his body. "John! John!" he called as he crawled to the bottom of the steps. Forcing himself to stand, he pulled himself up the stairs to me as gradually he was able to regain control of his muscles.

"Forget about me, Sherlock." I tried unsuccessfully to raise myself up to a sitting position to show him I was not badly injured. "You have to go after Chelsea."

"But you've been shot."

"And you're responsibility is to that little girl."

"John, I can't leave you like this." He pulled the bottom of my shirt up to my shoulder and bunched the material to staunch the bleeding.

"Call an ambulance, Sherlock, and go!"

Sherlock wavered. "John, I—"

"Sherlock, forget about me. It hurts like hell, but I'll live. But I swear to God, if you don't go after that little girl, our relationship ends right here, right now. I will never work with you again. You understand me? Our friendship is over. She needs you, Sherlock, and I don't. Not now."

Just then the downstairs front door opened and Detective Inspector Lestrade rushed in. "What the hell is going on? I drive up outside and hear a gunshot and two men leave here at a dead run. It was hard to tell in the dark, but it looked like they were carrying someone."

Sherlock had recovered sufficiently to go back downstairs to Lestrade. "John's been shot. Call an ambulance and we have to go after those men." He grabbed his coat and scarf from the hook by the door.

Lestrade bounded up the stairs two at a time to where I lay sprawled just below the landing. "John?"

"Lestrade," called Sherlock. "We have to leave now or we'll lose them. If we haven't lost them already." He whipped out his phone and called for the ambulance himself.

"I've already called for back-up," said the Detective Inspector, "and I've called in the license and description of the car those two jackals got in. Are you going to tell me what's going on?"

"When we're in the car," said Sherlock, pacing in the entryway.

"Well, we can't leave John here alone."

"Yes, you can," I said, although the pain and the shock to my system were causing me to weaken rapidly. "Sherlock, call Mary for me. Tell her…tell her what's happened."

Lestrade looked from me down to Sherlock who had stopped pacing.

"Detective Inspector," said Sherlock calmly. "Those men have kidnapped a five-year old child who was under my protection. We have to go after her now."

"John," said Lestrade, reluctantly, "someone will be here in a minute, two at the most."

"Go," I said.

Lestrade hurried down the stairs and he and Sherlock left. Sherlock never told me how much he revealed to the Detective Inspector about Chelsea, but knowing Sherlock, he did not reveal much on their drive through the night streets of London. Lestrade was continually on the radio with his dispatcher who was patching through calls on reported sightings of the car containing the two fugitives and Chelsea. The way she was screaming when they left with her, I knew what they would find when they caught up with the men who had taken Chelsea. Her back would be covered in blood from the M-shaped scar and she would be in horrific pain.

Forty-five minutes after they left Baker Street, Lestrade finally got confirmation that the car they were seeking was parked outside a housing complex on Roberta Street in Bethnal Green. Six police cars, including Lestrade's, converged on the location. It was obvious which house they were in because Chelsea's cries could be heard even through the closed door and shuttered windows.

Sherlock pleaded with the Detective Inspector to be allowed to approach the building alone to assess the situation, but, of course, Lestrade would not hear of it and ordered Sherlock to stay in the car. But of course, Sherlock was never one to follow orders. While the officers were huddled, working out what strategy they would use to end the hostage situation, Sherlock used the cover of darkness to simply enter the house next door. He had worked a case in this area of row houses a few years before and knew that some of the flats had interior doors that connected them, and, fortunately, the inhabitants of the adjacent house were not at home.

He quickly located the door that would open into the flat where Chelsea was being held. He put his ear to it. Chelsea's cries had stopped but he could hear a muffled sound. They must have gagged her. As he listened to the male voices, he quickly ascertained that that there were at least four males in the room and that one of them was Chelsea's father who was being held against his will. Evidently, Chelsea had been brought into the room to persuade him to reveal something, but Sherlock could not make out what it was. He did hear comments about the blood covering the little girl's back and how that was nothing compared to what her father would soon witness if he did not start talking. From his moans, Sherlock felt that her father had been beaten so badly that he was almost beyond talking.

It was not until one of the men announced that they had wasted enough time and they should begin cutting Chelsea that Sherlock rammed the door open with his shoulder, his gun drawn. It was at the same time that the police burst through both the front and back doors. A brief gunfight followed but the three men did not have much of a chance. Two of them fell wounded and the third surrendered.

As the police had entered the room, Sherlock had immediately thrown his hands in the air, fearing that he would be mistaken for one of the men they were after. But as soon as the gunfire was over, he whipped off his coat and headed for Chelsea who was huddled on the floor, her wrists taped to the leg of a heavy table that she appeared to have dragged part way across the room in her attempt to reach her father. She was barefoot and still wearing Sherlock's T-shirt, now soaked in blood. He knelt beside her and wrapped his coat around her and ripped through the tape on her wrists.

Lestrade loomed over him while his officers were seeing to the wounded men and restraining the other one. "What the hell are you doing in here, Sherlock, and what the hell are you doing with her? She needs an ambulance."

Sherlock stood with Chelsea cradled in his arms. The tape still covered her mouth and she was still trying to scream through it. "Lestrade…Gr…Greg? She's not…she's not…injured," he stammered. "It's not…what it looks like."

"It looks like she's covered in blood! Now put her down and wait for the paramedics. They're on their way."

Chelsea was struggling in Sherlock's arms and it was hard for him to hold her. She kept reaching for her father who had been tied to a chair but the officers had got him onto the floor. "Please, Lestrade, trust me on this. I need to get her away from here. I need to get her calmed down. Have one of your men drive me back to Baker Street."

"No. Not this time, Sherlock. This is a crime scene and this little girl has obviously suffered a traumatic injury. I can't just let you walk out of here with her. Now set her down. That's an order." He motioned for one of his men to come over and take the child from Sherlock.

When the officer put his hands on her, Chelsea ripped the tape from her mouth and screamed.

Sherlock tightened his hold on her. "Lestrade, please. I promise. I promise I will tell you all that I know about what's going on here—which isn't much—if you let me take her now. Wait!"

He turned and looked at Chelsea's father, lying on the floor. The man's face was a mass of blood and bruises but Sherlock suddenly recognized him. The great detective who was always so conscious of details, had been so concerned with Chelsea since entering the room, that it had just dawned on him where he had seen her father before. "Richard Sherbrooke." Sherlock spoke the name aloud. "Not Brook. Sherbrooke." Richard Sherbrooke had been one of Sherlock's earliest clients while he was still at university.

At the mention of his name, the nearly unconscious man opened his eyes. "Take care of her, Holmes." He struggled to get the words out. "Don't cry, Baby. It'll be all right."

Chelsea continued to alternate between sobbing and screaming for her Dad but she had ceased struggling in Sherlock's arms.

"Please, Lestrade." Sherlock said quietly.

"Officer Winston," Lestrade called out. "Take Sherlock Holmes and this child to his flat on Baker Street. Tomorrow, Sherlock. I'll expect you tomorrow. Agreed?"

Sherlock nodded and hurried out the door, following the officer to his car. He sat in the back seat with Chelsea, cocooned in his coat, on his lap. She gradually quieted just as she had done two nights before when Sherlock and John had caught up with her in the alley. "I am so sorry, Chelsea. I am so sorry," Sherlock repeated softly over and over.

"After several minutes, she finally spoke. "Id my Dad dead?"

"No, Chelsea. He's not dead. He's going to hospital. We'll go see him there but first we have to get you home and cleaned up."

"I taw John get chot. Id John dead?"

"No, John's not dead, either. But he's also in hospital. We'll see him, too."

"I wa cared, Lock."

"I know. I was scared, too."

"I don't think Jedi warrior chould be cared."

"Oh, I think even Jedi warriors might get scared sometimes. Is the pain almost gone now?"

"Almote. It till burn a little. Id my Dad going to be all right?"

"Officer Winston." Sherlock leaned forward. "Do you have some bottled water in here?"

"Oh, sure. Here." The officer passed Sherlock a bottle.

Sherlock took off the lid and made Chelsea drink some water. The crying episode had lasted much longer tonight and he worried that her blood loss was much greater. Maybe he should take her to the emergency room, he thought. But, no, too many people had already seen her tonight and there would already be too many questions that he would have to face from them. He would just keep an eye on her condition.

"Why don't you try to go to sleep? It will be a while yet before we get home."

Once they arrived back at Baker Street, Sherlock put the half-asleep Chelsea in the bathtub and gently washed her back. It was easier this time since the blood had not dried so hard, but the wounds were not quite closed either, although they were no longer bleeding. He dried her off and then wrapped a fresh towel around her.

"Your clothes are still in the dryer. I need to go down and get them because you don't have anything to wear to hospital." It was late but he was anxious to check on John's condition. Mary had texted him several times that he was doing all right, but Sherlock wanted to see for himself. "Will you be all right here alone for two minutes while I run downstairs?"

Chelsea nodded sleepily and he left her standing in the bathroom..

When Sherlock returned she was fast asleep on her pallet on the floor in his bedroom. He sent Mary a text that he would be at hospital first thing in the morning then took another one of his T-shirts out of a drawer. Without waking her, he removed the towel from Chelsea and slipped the T-shirt over her head and down to cover her legs. "Oh, I don't know," he said quietly. "I think you'd better sleep in bed with me tonight. If the Child Protection people were to get wind of it they'd probably have a fit and bring me up on charges, but I'll sleep better with you close and I'll bet you'll sleep better, too." He picked her up and laid her on his bed and drew the covers up. "Richard Sherbrooke," he said aloud then headed for the living room to look up some things on the computer. The discovery of her father's identity only led to more questions.

Chapter Text

When Sherlock awoke the next morning, he looked over at Chelsea next to him. She was lying on her back, awake and counting on her fingers. "What are you counting?" Sherlock asked quietly.

I wa thinking about lat night and I began feeling weepy. Sometime when I feel that way, I count and it make it go away so I don't cry."

"What number are you up to?"

"142."

"Do you still feel as if you're going to cry?"

"No, but I thought ad long ad I wa counting, I might ad well keep going."

Sherlock smiled. "Do you think you could stay here in bed and keep counting while I take a shower? And then we'll go to hospital to see your Dad and John."

"OK," Chelsea agreed.

"Maybe you'll get past 239 and set a new record."

Nearly an hour and a half later, Sherlock, holding Chelsea's hand, walked through the door of my hospital room. Mary stood from the chair where she had been sitting and hugged Sherlock. But when she extended her hand to Chelsea after Sherlock had introduced her, the little girl took it, then looked startled and broke contact and stepped behind Sherlock. I had seen her have that same reaction when she first met Molly. Perhaps having been raised by only her father, she was shy around females.

After Sherlock and I exchanged greetings, I told him that I was scheduled to go home that afternoon. Then he became very somber.

"John, what you said last night to me when I elected to stay and see to your injury rather than immediately to pursue Chelsea, do you remember?"

"Of course. I told you that you had to go after her."

"Or else?"

"Or else our friendship was over."

He nodded and turned away.

"Sherlock?"

He turned to face me again. "Decisions like that are difficult for me. I believe …this time, anyway…you helped me to make the right one. If we had arrived on the scene just a few minutes later, I hesitate to think what we might have found." He paused. "Thank you."

I knew how hard those words were for Sherlock to say. He rarely admitted he was wrong about anything.

"But…" he continued.

"But?"

"But," he repeated. "I dislike you holding our friendship hostage to moral decisions."

"There wasn't time for debate, Sherlock. I didn't know how else to convince you quickly."

"Nevertheless, should the situation arise again, and knowing me…and knowing you…I've no doubt that it will, I suggest we have a code word."

"A code word for what?"

"We have adopted other code words for various scenarios. I suggest we have one for when you think I am making a bad decision," explained Sherlock.

"But I always think you're making bad decisions," I said.

"I don't mean the common, ordinary, everyday things we disagree on, like what brand of baked beans to buy. I mean situations that are serious, that involve life and death, good and evil, major moral issues. I don't ever want to hear you again threatening to end our friendship because of something I've done or am about to do. So when you say the code word, it will be a sign for me to stop and…consider. I'm not saying I will always consider in your favor, but it will signal that you believe that I need to perhaps adjust my moral compass, to align it with yours."

I looked at Mary who had been standing there listening to our exchange.

"How about August sunsets?" she suggested.

"What?" Sherlock and I both said at the same time.

"Listen," said Mary. "We're going to be married in two months, so I'm in this, too. I think I need to know these code words you're going on about. So when we hear 'August sunsets,' we all know that there's a grave decision which needs to be considered more carefully by everyone."

Chelsea, still standing behind Sherlock, tugged on his coat. "Are we going to see my Dad?"

"In a minute," said Sherlock.

"Sherlock, that's another thing," I said. "Detective Inspector Lestrade has already been here this morning. He told me what happened last night. That little girl experienced things and saw things last night that no five-year-old should ever see. She probably needs some counseling."

"She's fine," said Sherlock.

Sherlock, August sunsets!" I said.

"John, if you overuse a code word, it loses its impact."

"But he's right," said Mary. "I mean, look at her. I don't think she's fine at all."

Sherlock looked behind him. Chelsea was standing there with eyes closed, fists clenched, as he had seen her do before when she felt the urge to cry. He knelt and whispered something in her ear than picked her up. She wrapped her arms tightly around his neck and buried her head in his shoulder. She had been holding Brownie's rope leash and it now trailed down Sherlock's back.

"Did Lestrade tell you that her father is Richard Sherbrooke, not Richard Brook?" Sherlock asked.

"You know him?"

"He was a client of mine while I was still at uni. He…uh…is a creative accountant."

"A what?

"He cooks books for a living. He's very good at it. Or, he was, anyway, when I knew him."

"So, wait a minute. You mean we've…we've been trying to find something that's not there, looking for a link to Moriarty when there is none?"

"I believe an appropriate idiom would be 'barking up the wrong tree'," said Sherlock, "although I'm not entirely convinced. Wait, I'm getting a text." Sherlock shifted Chelsea in his arms in order to reach his mobile. "It's from Molly," he said, surprised. "She's found something."

"What?" I asked.

"Doesn't say. I'll stop by her lab this morning before we leave."

"I don't understand," said Mary. "Why did you think Chelsea's last name was Brook."

"It's because of the way she talks," explained Sherlock. "She can't pronounce her S's and she drops the whole syllable when there's an 'sh.' She calls me 'Lock,' sugar is 'ger'—"

"Sherbet is 'bet'," I added.

"So when we asked her to tell us her last name, she said 'Brook'."

"I think she tried to tell us that day that we were wrong, but we both missed it," I said.

Chelsea raised her head from Sherlock's shoulder. "I told you my name id Chelly Brook."

Sherlock shifted her again. "I know you did." He stepped towards the door. "Let's go see your Dad."

"And you two call yourselves detectives," said Mary.

"He's the detective," I said. "I just tag along. Sherlock, I'll come round when they release me this afternoon."

"No, you won't," interjected Mary. "You're going home to rest. You two can play tomorrow."

Sherlock shot me a look that said he could tell who was going to be in charge in my new family and I sent him back a silent message that I hoped he interpreted as to what he could do with his "looks," but knowing him, it went right over his head.

Sherlock set Chelsea on the floor in the hallway when they reached the door to her father's room. She had been unusually quiet on their walk through the hospital corridors. He knelt down in front of her. "Chelsea, your Dad was badly injured last night, remember?"

The little girl nodded almost imperceptibly.

"He'll have some cuts and bruises on his face and maybe some bandages. But it's only temporary…uhm...that means it's only for a few days or week, and then he'll look just like he always has. And I don't know what other injuries he had, so he might not be feeling too well. OK?

Are you ready to go in?"

She nodded again and took Sherlock's hand as they entered the room.

Richard Sherbrooke was lying in the bed, propped up about thirty degrees. He was watching the telly mounted on the wall opposite him, but he switched it off when he saw them walk in. "Oh, my little girl. Chelsea, come here."

Sherlock picked her up and set her on the edge of his bed. She immediately wrapped her arms around his neck. "Oh, Dad." She kissed him all over his face.

"Careful, Baby. I hurt in places I didn't even know I had." His left arm was in a cast and he used his right hand to gently pry her off of him. She sat on the bed and held his hand in one of hers. With the other one she caressed his face. One eye was almost swollen shut and the skin around it was discolored and blotched. "Mr. Holmes, I am so grateful for everything, for you taking care of her. I certainly needed to see her today, but I'm not sure if she should be seeing me like this."

"She needed to know you were all right."

"Have you been good for Mr. Holmes?"

Chelsea did not answer but bared her lower teeth so her father could see where one was missing. "Look, Dad. It fell out."

"Oh, I missed you losing your first tooth. Did you save it?"

She shook her head no. "The Tooth Fairy took it and left me five pound." She held up five fingers.

"Five quid for a tooth!" He looked at Sherlock. "My goodness, Mr. Holmes, the Tooth Fairy in your neighborhood must be rather well-heeled."

"Mr. Sherbrooke, your child has been through…much…since you left her unannounced on my doorstep three days ago. And you have much to answer for. But explanations can wait until…you recover somewhat from your injuries. However, I would like to put to rest one subject. Do you know a man by the name of James Moriarty?"

"Moriarty?" Sherbrooke frowned and shook his head no. "He was in the news a couple of years ago, wasn't he? Broke into the Tower and Bank of England or something? But if you are asking if I know him personally, then no."

"Very well, then. Any word on when you are to be released?"

"The Doc came around earlier. Said I'd be here today and overnight, at least. I have a bruised spleen that he wants to keep an eye on, evidently. Can she stay with you until I get out?"

Mr. Sherbrooke, you have put me in a difficult position. I nearly lost her to the authorities last night and I still may yet, today, when I meet with Detective Inspector. Why on Earth would you leave your child with a known sociopath?"

"I didn't. I left her with you. You were the only one I could trust with her…her secret."

"I'm afraid it is no longer a secret. Too many eyes saw her last night."

"Please, Mr. Holmes. She's all I have in the world."

"Have you talked to anyone from Scotland Yard yet?"

I'm afraid I was out of it last night. The nurse said someone was here this morning but I was out of the room for tests. I think she said they're coming back this afternoon, though. Oh, Chelsea, my lamb. Give your old Dad one last kiss. I'll see you real soon, but I need to rest now."

Sherlock helped her off the bed and, after he and Richard Sherbrook exchanged mobile numbers, Sherlock and Chelsea left the room.

"Can we go home now, Lock?" asked Chelsea as they made their way to Molly's lab.

"We have one more person to see here and then we have to go to New Scotland Yard, although I really do not want to go there."

Chelsea was quiet as they took the stairs down to Molly's lab. It was uncharacteristic of her since she had hardly stopped chattering since they had walked to the park on that first day. Sherlock began to wonder if she, perhaps, did need to talk to a counselor or someone. His own mood brightened when they entered the lab and he saw Molly. "Molly! What news do you have?"

"I think I have found something."

"So you said in your text. What exactly have you found?"

"Well, I don't know exactly. In fact, I didn't find it. Andy in Radiology found it. I mean, it's his job to read these types of scans, and he owed me a favor, so I had him look at them."

"Molly, can you be a little more succinct. This Andy found something in Chelsea's scans from the other night?"

"Look, here." Molly pointed at something on the computer screen. "Here in her skull at the coronal suture where the frontal bone and parietal bone together. See that tiny spot right there? It's less than 2mm and it's actually embedded in the bone. But that's not all. Here." She called up another slide. "This is her left scapula, her shoulder blade. Along the ridge of the bone, the spine, right here. An identical spot. Also within the bone."

"Tumors?" Sherlock looked over at Chelsea who was sitting on the floor, talking to Brownie, her imaginary dog.

"Not according to Andy. He thinks it was something implanted in her. And for the bone to have enveloped it, it had to have been done when she was very young, maybe even in utero."

"But for what purpose? What are they?"

"I have no idea. Nor does Andy. And I don't even think they can be removed surgically at this point." Molly looked at Sherlock for a moment as he stared at the image on the screen. "Sherlock, that night she left here. When John came back after her clothes, he told me what happened when you found her—about the blood on her back and her screams of pain. It sounded horrible."

Do you think these…these spots are related to that?"

"I don't know," Molly said.

"It happened again last night," said Sherlock. "According to what she told me, it happens whenever she cries."

"What would cause that?" asked Molly.

"You're the pathologist. I'm a detective."

"Maybe…maybe the spots have nothing do with the other. Maybe it's mental," suggested Molly.

Sherlock looked away from the screen and directed his attention toward Molly.

"Maybe," continued Molly, "maybe she experienced some great trauma in her life—her short life—and it manifests itself in this way. Maybe she needs a psychiatrist."

They both watched Chelsea for a few moments. The little girl was oblivious to their stares as she appeared to be putting Brownie through different tricks and rewarding him with invisible treats.

"Thank you, Molly," Sherlock finally said. "If you—or Andy—find anything else, keep me informed. I know you can be trusted to be…discrete about all this. Do you think Andy will keep it to himself?"

Molly smiled. "Oh, yeah."

"Come on, Chelsea, we have to go." Sherlock held out one hand and Chelsea got up and grabbed it. "Tell Molly goodbye."

The child instead buried her head in Sherlock's coat and walked that way out the door with him. She did not speak until they were once more walking down a corridor. "Lock, my Dad lied," she suddenly announced.

"You picked up on that, too, did you?" Sherlock said. "What do you think he was lying about?"

"That Moriarty man."

"He said he didn't know him."

"What he taid wa not what he wa thinking."

"What was he thinking?"

"He hate him."

"You father hates Moriarty?"

"Yech."

"Why?"

Chelsea shrugged.

"Did you lie when you said you didn't know Moriarty?"

Chelsea stopped and pulled her hand out of Sherlock's and put both her hands on her hips. "I don't lie!"

"No, I don't think you do." He held out his hand. "Come on."

She took his hand again and they continued walking. "Lock, do we have to come here again?"

"Well, yes, if you want to see your Dad if he stays here for a couple of days."

"I don't like it here. There id pain and people are tad here. It make me tad, too."

"Is that why you are so quiet today?"

She did not reply.

"We don't have to come back here, if you don't want to. I have an idea. Why don't we stop for some ice cream before we go to Scotland Yard?"

She shrugged. "Ok, I guech."

On the cab ride to meet with Detective Inspector Lestrade, Sherlock sought to draw Chelsea out of the reticent mood that she was in today. He had hoped the ice cream might do it, but she had eaten her share quietly. Normally he would have welcomed this respite from her usual questions and comments, but I had planted the idea in his mind that the events of the previous night had traumatized her and that she needed counseling. Molly had added fuel to my suggestion with her comment that perhaps Chelsea had some sort of psychological disorder that manifested itself in her bleeding episodes. And then there were those two mysterious spots that showed up on her scans.

But when he looked at her now, sitting quietly on the seat next to him, her head down and her fingers twisting Brownie's rope on her lap, he could not help but see her current dark mood as a mirror of his own. Did others see him like this when he was a child or even now? Did/do they see him as someone who was/is damaged, who needed/needs professional help if he were to be normal?

"Chelsea," Sherlock said, at last breaking the silence, "do you remember back at the hospital when we were talking about lying?" She did not respond, but he continued. "Sometimes people lie to protect themselves but sometimes they do it to protect someone else, someone they love, and it's not always such a bad thing. In a few minutes, we have to meet with Detective Inspector Lestrade. You probably don't remember him from last night but he saw you…saw the blood… and—"

"I remember him. He didn't want you to take me."

Sherlock was surprised that she knew that because she had been crying and screaming, albeit with tape over her mouth, at the time. "That's right. And you told me that your Dad said no one was ever to see that. Well, Lestrade saw it and he's going to want some answers and—"

"Id he going to take me away…away from my Dad? Dad said that's what would happen if anyone found out." She looked up at him and her lower lip was quivering.

He could not risk another crying episode here in the cab so close to Scotland Yard. He put his arm around her and drew her close. "Not if I can help it." He leaned down and whispered in her ear. "But we're going to have to work together on this… and we're going to have to lie."

She pulled away and looked at him incredulously, her mouth open.

"Remember how Robin Hood disguised himself? That was lying, wasn't it?" The pair had continued reading the Robin Hood book over the past two days. Sherlock tried to think of another example of a hero lying. "And in the Star Wars movie we watched, when Obi…what's his name?"

"Obi-Wan Kenobi," Chelsea answered.

"Oh, yeah, when Obi-Wan Kenobi says 'these aren't the droids you're looking for,' but they were the droids, weren't they? Or how about when you told John there were caterpillars and spiders in the biscuits?"

"But I wa kidding."

"Kidding, lying, there's not really much difference, is there? So we have to lie to Detective Inspector Lestrade," he continued, "but it's for a good reason. We have to protect you. We have to make sure that they don't take you away from your Dad…or me." Sherlock winced even as he said the words. He could almost hear me yell "August Sunsets" from my hospital room. He knew I would never approve of telling a five-year-old to lie to the police.

He pulled her close again so he could whisper and not be overheard by the cab driver. "Here's what we're going to do."

Sherlock walked into Detective Inspector Lestrade's office at the New Scotland Yard carrying Chelsea on his back. He bent down and helped her to slide off. "Detective Inspector, I would like you to meet Chelsea Sherbrooke. There wasn't time for proper introductions last night. Chelsea, this is Detective Inspector Lestrade."

Chelsea was all smiles as she politely extended her hand. "I'm very pleached to meet you, Detective Inpector. Thank you for rechcuing my Dad."

Lestrade was flummoxed but he took her hand and shook it. The little girl standing before him in her purple tights and matching top and pink, unzipped sweatshirt bore little resemblance to the bloody, wild, screaming child he saw the night before.

"And don't you have something else to tell Detective Inspector?" prompted Sherlock.

She bowed her head just a little. "I'm very chorry for the way I acted last night. I wa cared and my Dad…my Dad wa hurt really bad." She looked up and her face brightened. "But he better today. Lock took me to hochpital to che him."

Lestrade looked at Sherlock. "Lock?"

"As you might have noticed," explained Sherlock, "she has trouble with her S's. So she calls me Lock…and has…ever since she learned to talk."

Chelsea took Sherlock's hand and he squeezed hers. "Lock's my fairy godmother…no… fairy… god…father?" She looked up, unsure, at Sherlock.

"Just Godfather," said Sherlock, with a reassuring wink. "Her father and I were pals at university."

"Yeah, right," Lestrade said sarcastically. "I've known you for a few years and never knew you to be pals with anyone, except maybe John Watson. And who in their right mind would have you for a godfather to their child? If I had kids I wouldn't let you within 100 yards of mine."

Sherlock was unfazed by Lestrade's remarks. "Nevertheless, when her father sensed some upcoming troubles recently, he asked me to watch after her for a few days. Her mother is dead and there's no other family. You haven't had a chance to talk to him yet, have you?"

"No, I'm going over to Barts again this afternoon," said Lestrade. "What sort of trouble was all that about last night? I didn't get much from those three we arrested. One's in serious condition and the other two aren't talking."

"I really can't say, but I'm certain they were just hired thugs for someone."

"You can't say or won't say?"

"I really have no idea," said Sherlock.

"And why don't I believe you," Lestrade answered. "But what about this little girl? She seems perfectly fine this morning, but I can't get that image out of my mind of her covered in blood and screaming."

"The blood wasn't hers," said Sherlock. "It wasn't even human blood. Although I've no doubt had we'd been even a minute delayed, her blood would have been spilled." He squeezed Chelsea's hand. "Tell him about the blood, Chelsea."

"Those bad men put it on me. They were trying to make my Dad think they had hurt me and make him tell them tumthing. But he wouldn't tell them." Chelsea squeezed Sherlock's hand when she finished talking.

"So what was he supposed to tell them that was so important that they would harm his daughter?" asked Lestrade.

Chelsea shrugged.

Lestrade looked at Sherlock. "How did you know it wasn't her blood?"

"Really, Lestrade. It was obvious. But that's why I knew there was no reason for her to be seen by the paramedics. She just needed to be taken away from that awful scene. There were two men and her father on the floor covered in blood, there were cops all over. It was no place for a five-year old."

Lestrade was quiet for a moment, thinking. He again turned his attention to Chelsea. "So what have you and …your Godfather been doing while you've been staying with him?"

Chelsea squirmed and looked up at Sherlock, who said, "It's OK. What have we done the past few days?"

"Well," said Chelsea, "we went to the park and played on the twings."

"On the what?" asked Lestrade.

"The swings," interpreted Sherlock. "She played on the swings. I watched."

"And we made oatmeal bitcutch," she continued. "They were good."

"You?" asked Lestrade, looking at Sherlock. "You baked biscuits?"

"But we didn't put any bug in them," said Chelsea. "I was jut kidding John when I told him we did."

"What do you mean bugs in the biscuits?"

"She said there were no bugs, Lestrade," said Sherlock. "What else have we done, Chelsea? The Detective Inspector believes that I couldn't possibly know how to take care of you."

"Oh, but he doech," said Chelsea. "He read to me and he teach me how to be a Jedi."

Lestrade looked askance at Sherlock at that last remark. "And does he feed you? I mean apart from biscuits with or without bugs?"

"Of course he feed me, tilly," said Chelsea.

"Don't call the Detective Inspector 'silly'," said Sherlock, "even if he is being silly with all these unnecessary questions."

"Chorry," apologized Chelsea.

"And where do you sleep?" asked Lestrade.

Sherlock squeezed her hand again and she looked up at him and frowned. "Lock make me leep on the floor and I don't like it."

"Well I wouldn't like it, either," said Lestrade. "Sherlock, you know how this is so incredibly wrong. You…in charge of a five-year-old girl. I mean you are a brilliant detective, but you're not…not…"

"She has survived four days in my care, so, perhaps, in this case, I am…" Sherlock said. "Her father expects to be released from hospital tomorrow or soon, at least, and my nanny duties will be finished and I can resume being a brilliant detective."

"Lock." Chelsea tugged on his sleeve with her other hand. "I have to go to the toilet."

"Right. Lestrade, are we finished here?"

"For now. But, Sherlock, all of this is just so out of your realm. Are you sure you're doing OK with her? I mean, we can call Child Protective Services. You don't have to take care of her."

"Lestrade, she's fine. I'm fine."

"Ok. Go. I'll check with you later."

Sherlock left with Chelsea and waited until they were in a hallway away from Lestrade's office before he stopped and knelt down to talk to her. "You were magnificent," he said and held up his palm and she gave him a high five.

"He believed the lie?" she asked.

"I don't know if he believed our lies one hundred percent, but you were brilliant. What a clever girl you are! And we convinced him enough to let me keep you. But, now, you know," he said and put his hand under her chin, " that lying is almost always bad. And we did it today only to protect you. Right?"

"I know. Lock, I really have to go bad."

"Oh. Right. Let's find the toilet." Sherlock was already texting Richard Sherbrooke the details of the story he had fabricated for Lestrade so that Sherbrooke could corroborate the tale when Lestrade spoke with him later that day. Sherlock could only hope that the man was half as good a liar as his daughter.

Chapter Text

Evidently the collusion with Sherlock at New Scotland Yard was enough to bring Chelsea out of the depression that she had been feeling all morning. They stopped for a sandwich on the way home to Baker Street and she was back to her cheerful, chatty self.

When they stepped out of the cab in front of the doorway to 221B, Sherlock exclaimed, "Oh, good, Mrs. Hudson's back home."

"Uh oh," said Chelsea and stopped him from opening the door. "She'll find out we tole the oatmeal and ger and tuff to make the bitcutch and we took her jumper."

"Oh, what have I done?" said Sherlock and he sat down on the steps to be at eye level with his young charge. "In just over seventy-two hours, I've taught you how to steal and lie. What can I do next to morally corrupt you? Teach you how to cheat at poker?"

"I know how to play poker," Chelsea said.

"Ah, but do you know how to win consistently? Come on," he said as he stood and took her hand. "Let me introduce you to my landlady."

Mrs. Hudson heard the door opening and met them in the entryway at the bottom of the stairs.

"Mrs. Hudson," exclaimed Sherlock. "It is so nice to have you back." He kissed her on the cheek. "I really don't know how I survived without you."

"Oh, Sherlock. I was only gone for a week."

"It seemed like an eternity."

"And who is this?" Mrs. Hudson asked, looking at Chelsea.

"Mrs. Hudson, may I introduce Chelsea Sherbrooke. Chelsea, Mrs. Hudson."

Chelsea extended her hand and Mrs. Hudson took it, and then was surprised when the little girl wrapped her arms around the landlady's legs. "I'm glad you're back, too, Michka...Micha… Hudon…I can't say your name."

"Trouble with her S's," explained Sherlock.

"Don't you worry about that, "said Mrs. Hudson. "You can call me Martha. Can you say that?"

Chure. I like you, Martha." Chelsea stepped back and looked up at her, the little girl's face beaming.

Sherlock did not expect this from Chelsea. He, too, had noticed how she had reacted when she first met Molly and then Mary.

"And don't you worry about your S's either. I couldn't pronounce my S's either, nor my R's. Folks couldn't understand a word I was saying until I was, oh, about 7 or 8 years old. But, Sherlock, who is she and why is she here?"

"She's the daughter of an old client who had a bit of trouble and left her with me for a few days."

"Left her…with …you?"

"Mrs. Hudson, please don't ask me to explain further. Making up lies is very exhausting."

Mrs. Hudson frowned at him. "How are John and Mary?"

"John got chot," volunteered Chelsea before Sherlock could stop her.

"Shot! Oh my goodness, is he all right? What happened?"

"He's fine," said Sherlock. "We had a bit of trouble last night. He's going home from hospital this afternoon."

"Oh...oh my! He's in hospital!" exclaimed Mrs. Hudson, flustered. "I leave for a few days. You inherit a child, John gets shot—"

"Everything's all right, Mrs. Hudson." Sherlock sniffed. "Is that roast beef I smell coming from your kitchen?"

"I've just put it on. I'll bring some up at dinner for you…and…Chelsea. I'm going to have to pop out to the shops for a few minutes. I have to take some things to the dry cleaners and I thought I had plenty of brown sugar and oatmeal and sugar in my cupboard, but I seem to be out."

Chelsea looked up at Sherlock and he shook his head no. Sherlock grabbed a jacket and coat where they hung by the door. They were the ones he had put around Chelsea when she had suffered from her bleeding episodes last night and the first night. "Would you mind terribly dropping some things off at the cleaners for me?" He draped them across Mrs. Hudson's hands. "Be sure and tell the man there that they have blood on them."

"Blood?" She held each up by its collar away from her. "Not John's?"

"Not John's. Not mine. But blood is hard to get out and they are both favorites of mine."

"Oh, Sherlock. Truth be told, I have missed the shenanigans around here. I didn't realize it at the time, but it was very quiet and rather boring at my sister's."

Sherlock left Mrs. Hudson in the entryway and escorted Chelsea up the stairs to his flat. As he helped her out of her jacket, he asked, "So you like Mrs. Hudson, do you?"

"Oh, yech, but chouldn't we tell her that we took thode thing from her cupboard?"

"I will. Chelsea, when you met Mrs. Hudson downstairs just now, you hugged her and told her you liked her. But when you first met Molly at the hospital and Mary, John's girlfriend, you acted, oh, I don't know, as if you were frightened or scared of them. Why was that?"

Chelsea shrugged. She picked up one of the light sabers off the couch. "Can we go to the park now?"

"I think you'd better rest a while first. We had a rather busy morning traipsing around the hospital and the police station. Why don't you lie down there on the couch."

"I'm not tired."

"Yes, you are. Now climb up there and lie down. Besides I think it's the law that little five-year-old girls have to take a nap every day."

Chelsea crawled onto the couch and curled up in a ball with the light saber in on hand and Brownie's leash wadded in her other hand. "It not the law," she grumbled.

"I'm pretty sure it is." Sherlock went into his bedroom and retrieved a dressing gown. By the time he returned to the living room, Chelsea was already asleep. He spread the dressing gown over her since there was a slight chill in the air. Turning his attention to his laptop, he sat at his desk and pulled up Chelsea's CT scans and located the tiny dots in the little girl's skull and shoulder blade that Molly had pointed out to him. His fingers steepled against his mouth, he stared straight ahead. Even when the image disappeared and the screen saver came on, he didn't move, lost in thought.

It was almost an hour later that he was brought back to the present by Chelsea tugging on his sleeve. "Your phone dinged." She had reached into his pocket and got it and was looking at the screen. "It's a mechaage from John. I didn't know there wa an 'h' in John."

"What?" It took a moment for Sherlock to focus on her. He had been completely absorbed in his pursuit down different paths of explanations for Chelsea's behavior and the mysterious implants. "What does he say? Can you read it?"

"Chur. He says I am home." Chelsea read each word on the phone screen slowly and deliberately. "What newch did Molly have?"

"Give it here. Let me text him."

Chelsea hugged the phone close to her body. "I can do it."

"All right. Write Tell you later."

Sherlock said each letter aloud and Chelsea repeated it as she looked for it on the keypad. It took forever before she was finally able to hit "send."

"Are you ready to go to the park?" Sherlock asked as he took his phone from her.

"Oh, yeah. Can we take the lighttaber?"

"Sure."

By the time the pair of them returned from their outing in the park, the smell of Mrs. Hudson's roast beef permeated the entire building. She came out of the kitchen while they were still at the bottom of the stairs and announced that dinner would be ready in less than an hour and that she had bought Chelsea some things while she was out. "Because," she said, "when I came home this morning I was in your flat and there was no sign that you had a little girl staying there—no toys or anything. Except those two plastic tubes you have in your hands. What are those?"

"Lighttaber," answered Chelsea.

"From Star Wars?" asked Mrs. Hudson.

"Lock id teaching me to fight like a Jedi," Chelsea explained.

"Well, if anyone could do it, he'd probably be the one. What's that around your neck?"

Chelsea looked down at the embroidered pouch that contained her coins. "I loched a tooth. See?" She jutted out her chin and bared her lower teeth so the landlady could see the gap. Lock gave me thid to keep my money in that the tooth fairy gave me—five pound!"

"Five?" exclaimed Mrs. Hudson, looking at Sherlock. "The most I ever got was 10p."

"Come on," said Sherlock, ushering Chelsea toward the stairs. "We need to wash up and clear the table to make room for Mrs. Hudson's wonderful meal."

When Sherlock opened the door to his flat, Chelsea ran to the couch where Mrs. Hudson had left some colouring books and a box of crayons and a baby doll. "Are theche for me?" she asked.

"They're what Mrs. Hudson said she bought for you. You be sure and thank her when she brings our food."

"Can I keep them?"

"Sure. Come on, now, let's get some of that grime off your hands and then you can play until time to eat."

In telling me later about the supper, Sherlock likened it to a football game in which he was a goalkeeper as he spent the entire meal deflecting Mrs. Hudson's questions about Chelsea. I do not know that I had ever heard Sherlock use a sports analogy, but I suppose he must have played sports when he was a schoolboy. And I know he fenced when he was at university.

As they were finishing eating, Sherlock reminded Chelsea that she was supposed to tell Mrs. Hudson something.

Chelsea screwed up her face, trying to remember. "Oh, yeah. Lock id going to teach me to cheat at Poker."

"Oh, Sherlock," said Mrs. Hudson disapprovingly.

Sherlock flipped his serviette teasingly at Chelsea. "That wasn't what I was referring to."

"Oh," Chelsea said, thinking again. "We're torry we took tum tuff from your kitchen, but we made really good bitcuitch. There are tum left." She slid off the books that she was sitting on and retrieved the biscuit container from the counter. She took it to Mrs. Hudson who took off the lid.

"You made these, Sherlock?"

"I don't know why that surprises everyone. I do have a degree in chemistry. Cooking is just…chemistry. But, Chelsea, that's still not what you are supposed to tell her."

Chelsea had remained standing by the older woman. "I'm torry I wore one of your jumpers. I don't know where it id now."

"It's in the bedroom somewhere," said Sherlock.

"I don't mind if you needed a jumper," said Mrs. Hudson. "It was rather big on you, wasn't it?"

Chelsea smiled. "Yeah, but I needed to wear tumthing when Lock took me to buy theche choes. Chee what they do?" She stomped her feet so the landlady could see the lights in the soles.

"Chelsea," said Sherlock, "don't you have something to tell her about the colouring books and the doll?'

"Oh!" She hugged Mrs. Hudson around the waist. "Thank you! I like to colour and I never had a doll before."

"You've never…" Mrs. Hudson, still in her chair, wrapped one arm around Chelsea and pulled her close. "Why…every little girl should have a doll." She looked questioningly at Sherlock who shrugged.

Sherlock stood and set his plate in the sink. "Thank you for sharing your dinner with us, Mrs. Hudson," he said, standing at the sink with his back to her.

"I'll just keep out a little meat and potatoes and carrots for me for tomorrow and leave the rest for you. Sherlock, are you sure you're all right with…with her staying here like this? She's welcome to stay downstairs with me."

Sherlock turned around with a forced smile on his face. "We're fine, Mrs. Hudson. Now, you are probably tired from your trip home today and doing all this for us. You go on down and I'll clean up here…sometime."

"I'll put all this away. You'd leave it here until Christmas." She moved Chelsea away so she could stand up. Sherlock went into the living room and sat down in his favorite chair.

"I have a tecret," Chelsea whispered, motioning for Mrs. Hudson to bend down. "I don't want him to hear." The little girl cupped her hands and whispered into one of Mrs. Hudson's ears. "I don't think it wa the Tooth Fairy who left me the money. I think it wa Lock."

"I don't know," said Mrs. Hudson, straightening, but keeping her voice low. "Five quid doesn't sound like Lock…like Sherlock. I think it was the Tooth Fairy. What are you going to do with all that money"

Chelsea shrugged.

"What are you going to name your doll?"

Chelsea shrugged again and smiled. "Maybe Martha."

Mrs. Hudson laid her hands along Chelsea's face. "You are such a sweet thing. But you listen to me. I want you to know that while you're here you can come to me at any time, you understand? If Sherlock ever get into one of his…well, sometimes, he has these…moods. And, well, if you ever need anything, you just come downstairs. All right?"

Chelsea laid her hands on tops of Mrs. Hudson's. "All right."

"Now you go play and I'll finish up in here."

Sherlock was glad that Mrs. Hudson had brought the gifts for Chelsea because they kept the little girl occupied most of the evening. The only time she bothered him was when she asked for some blank paper to make a get well card for me and she needed to know how to spell some of the words. He spent the evening reading and it was only when it was almost her bedtime that she came over with the doll and crawled up in his lap.

The doll had clothes on when it was new in the package, but it was naked now. "I don't think Martha ever had wingch." She showed Sherlock the doll's back.

"I don't suppose she did," said Sherlock, not quite sure how to respond. "Most dolls don't have wings. Most people don't. In fact…no people do."

"It probably a good thing," said Chelsea, "because now che can cry and it won't hurt." She laid her head against Sherlock's chest. "Do you ever cry, Lock?"

Sherlock hesitated, thinking. "Sometimes," he finally said aloud.

"Doed it hurt?"

"Not like it does you."

"My Dad cry sometimes. He cried when Mum died. It wa a long time ago, but I remember. He cried and cried."

They were both quiet for a few moments until Chelsea broke the silence. "What id wrong with me, Lock?"

Sherlock wanted to say there was nothing wrong with her, but he knew differently. "I don't know, Chelsea. You're a mystery."

She sat up and twisted to face him. "But that what you do. You tolve mychery."

"But there are some mysteries even I can't solve."

"I think you chould try to tolve thid one for me." She ran her fingers along the doll's back. "Maybe you can make her tum wingch."

"What?"

"Martha, my doll. Can you make her wingch?"

Sherlock took the naked doll and looked at it. "I don't know how."

"Well, think about it."

"OK," said Sherlock. "But now, I think it's bedtime."

"Can Martha leep with me?"

"Can Martha sleep on the floor?"

"Oh," Chelsea moaned. "I think I promiched not to argue…"

"I think you did."

"But I lept with you lat night."

"But that was different. You had just been through…something terrible."

Chelsea breathed out a heavy sigh. "Id it the law that I have to leep on the floor?"

"Well, yeah, it kind of is."

"OK." She slid off Sherlock's lap and headed for the lavatory.

Chapter Text

The next morning Mary dropped me off at Sherlock's on her way to the clinic. My left arm was in a sling and my shoulder still hurt, but the wound was far less serious than what I had suffered in Afghanistan. Mrs. Hudson met me just inside the front door to the building and fretted over me and my injury. But then she moved on to express her concerns over Sherlock caring for the little girl. She said she would not have been nearly as worried if I would have still been living there. I tried to reassure her, but I had my own concerns about him. From what I had observed the two of them seemed to have developed a good rapport but I knew how mercurial he was. I had last witnessed one of his volatile reactions two mornings ago when she had dressed up in his clothes and interrupted a meeting. He had indicated to me then he could keep it under control, but I knew him too well.

When I walked in to the living room of the flat I had shared with him before he disappeared for two years and left me to think he was dead, Sherlock and Chelsea were sitting on the floor with the coffee table between them, playing cards.

"What are you playing?" I asked as I crossed behind Sherlock and sat down at the table and switched on Sherlock's laptop.

"Poker," answered Chelsea. "Lock id teaching me to cheat."

"That's why I refuse to play with him," I said.

"No," said Sherlock, "you refuse to play with me because I beat you every time without having to cheat. Game's over, anyway." Sherlock laid his cards face down on the coffee table. "I need to talk to John for a few minutes."

"Awww," said Chelsea. "I wa going to win thid time."

"No, you weren't," said Sherlock. "Look." He turned over his cards. Four aces.

"How'd you do that?" she asked, giggling.

Sherlock laughed. "I just showed you. Maybe you'd better practice while I visit with John."

Sherlock stood and leaned over me and called up the scans that Molly had showed him the day before. He pointed out the mysterious spots that we had missed when we had looked at them earlier. I was at a loss for an explanation.

"And I am back to thinking that Moriarty is involved somehow." Sherlock paced around the room.

"But yesterday, you said…"

"That was before I talked to Richard Sherbrooke."

Chelsea had been playing with the deck of cards, seemingly oblivious to our discussion, but she looked up when Sherlock mentioned her father's name. "That my Dad."

Sherlock flopped down in his favorite chair, his lanky frame sprawled across it.

"John," Chelsea said, bringing me over a sheet of paper. "I made thid for you. I'm chorry you got chot. Doed it hurt?"

"Just a little. Did you draw this?" It was a childish crayon drawing of a gun and a man (labeled "John") falling backwards, blood splattering everywhere. She had printed across it, Get well John. Come back. Sherlock needs you. Love Chelsea. "What do you mean by 'come back'?"

Chelsea shrugged. "Lock is tad becaude you aren't here like you ude to be."

I looked over at Sherlock, but he was lost in thought. "Did he tell you that?"

She shrugged again.

"What's this other drawing?" I reached across the table where crayons were scattered across another sheet of paper. I slid it out from under them. It was covered with winged creatures.

"Thode are Lock dragon," volunteered Chelsea.

"The dragons inside him?" I asked, remembering Sherlock's conversation with her two days ago.

"Yech. Thid one," she said, pointing to the largest being, "is named Vera, but I didn't know how to pell it. Che id the one."

"The one what?"

"The mean one."

I looked at Sherlock again. "So, you're telling me that Sherlock has a mean female dragon in him named Vera?"

Sherlock's eyes were closed but he said, "John, she's a five-year-old with an active imagination."

"Oh, I'd say she's a five-year-old with incredible insight." I turned my attention back to Chelsea. "Do the other dragons have names?"

She shrugged. "Did you cry when the man chot you?"

"No."

"Good." She went back over to the couch and proceeded to dress a doll.

"Thank you for drawing me a get well card," I said, but she did not respond. The note that she had with her when she arrived that first morning was lying on the table next to Sherlock's laptop and next to my get well drawing. There were four words that were on both papers and they were written exactly the same. And the style of the letters on the rest of the note matched those that were on the drawing. "Sherlock," I said.

"Please don't bother me, John. I'm thinking."

"But you need to see this."

"Not now."

All right, I thought. If that's the way you want it, you can find it out for yourself.

Chelsea suddenly dropped the doll on the couch and looked at the closed living room door. "My Dad id here!" she exclaimed.

Just then, there was a knock on the door and it opened. "Yoo-hoo," said Mrs. Hudson. "You have a visitor." She ushered in a rather banged up man in disheveled clothes, his left arm in a cast. He had coal-black hair and was standing in a crooked manner, obviously favoring his right leg and abdomen.

Sherlock sprang to life and stood. "Richard Sherbrooke."

Chelsea ran to her Dad and threw her arms around him as he carefully bent down to accept her hug and put his good arm around her. "Oh, Chelsea, my lamb, I've missed you so much."

Sherlock remained transfixed in front of his chair so I stood and offered Sherbrooke a seat on the couch. He limped over to it and sat down. Chelsea curled up next to him on his right side as close as she could get and he put his good arm around her. She held her father's right hand in both of hers.

"Mr. Sherbrooke, you have an extraordinary daughter." Leave it to Sherlock to jump right into it without any social niceties.

"I know," said Sherbrooke and he squeezed Chelsea's hands.

"Gentlemen," I said, "maybe we shouldn't discuss what we're about to discuss in front of her."

Sherlock introduced me. "This is Dr. John Watson, my…associate."

"She can stay," said Sherbrooke. "Mr. Holmes, you told me in the hospital that you wanted explanations. I'm afraid you'll have to get in line. I've been trying to find a way to explain her for five years. I can tell you what I know, but it's not much."

"Then why don't you begin by telling me what your relationship is with James Moriarty."

Sherbrooke did not hesitate. "I told you already. I don't know him."

"And we both know that's a lie. And a third person in this room knows it's a lie, also."

Sherbrooke looked down at Chelsea who looked up at him and smiled. "She gently caressed his bruised and swollen face with one of her little hands. "Doed that hurt?"

He clasped her hand in his and brought it back down to her lap. "Yes, it does," he told her softly. "But it will be better in a few days."

"Moriarty." insisted Sherlock.

Sherbrooke cleared his throat. "All right. He's someone I've tried to bury…for what he did…for what he's done…to me and my family. But if you insist on resurrecting him." He paused. "I started doing some…some book work for him…oh…seven or eight years ago. He started out as just another client, but then as he trusted me more and more, the figures began revealing some…things that I was uncomfortable being a part of. He was involved in some terrible things…horrible things."

"I know," said Sherlock. "I spent two years unraveling his network. But you were not…part of it."

"No, I…uh…got out. I told him I couldn't do it anymore. I had gotten married and we were expecting our first child. I was scared. He was a monster."

"And he just let your leave? I find that hard to believe," said Sherlock. He had sat back down in his chair.

"No. God, no." Sherbrooke bowed his head. "I thought he did, at first. But…but then…seven months into the pregnancy, my wife, Caroline…Caroline was diagnosed with brain cancer…an inoperable tumor." He looked up at the ceiling. "The day...the very day the doctor told us, I got a text from Moriarty. He said…" Sherbrooke closed his eyes and fought back tears.

Chelsea reached up a hand to her Dad's face again. "Don't cry, Dad."

He squeezed Chelsea in a hug, and then continued, forcing the words out. "He said 'Sorry to hear the news about your wife. Your debt is half paid'."

"Moriarty caused your wife's tumor?" I asked.

"I don't know how, but I've no doubt that he did it. She lived for three years. She lived long enough…long enough to hear the news that the man who had caused us so much pain had taken his own life."

"But Mum id in Heaven now, innit che, Dad?"

He squeezed Chelsea again. "Yes, she is, my lamb."

"But what did he mean by your debt being 'half paid'?" asked Sherlock. "Has he collected on the other half? Surely that can't be the recent incident?"

Sherbrooke shook his head no. "This week was from another client who I tried to break off from. The people I work with don't like it much if you want to stop working for them. No, I figured something was going to happen to me—that I would pay the price of the other half of the debt. I never thought that he would harm the baby. As cruel as he was, I just never considered that possibility. We were just so concerned after Caroline's diagnosis about bringing the baby safely to term before she started treatments. I never…I just never thought…"

"What exactly did he do to Chelsea?" I asked.

"Not Chelsea—not this Chelsea," He squeezed her hands. "My wife delivered a beautiful baby girl. She was perfect in every way. She brought her home from the hospital on the third day. We had her…we had her with us for two days at home. And then…and then…on the third night…Caroline was scheduled to begin radiation for the tumor the next day and...we… uh… went to bed early. Something happened…during the night…something terrible happened."

I looked at Sherlock. I knew he hated long, drawn-out tales, but Richard Sherbrooke was clearly in agony recounting this story and I was all for letting him go at his own pace. I still did not think Chelsea should be in the room listening to all this, but she seemed more concerned over her father's turmoil and showed no visible reaction of her own to the story.

"About four in the morning, we were awakened by terrible screams coming from our baby's room. When we rushed in, we found this little thing in the crib and our baby was gone." He put his hand along Chelsea's head and drew her against his chest. "She was covered in blood and crying so loud I thought her lungs would burst."

"What do you mean your baby was gone and Chelsea was left in her place?" asked Sherlock. "Chelsea is not your child?" Sherlock and I were both confused at this turn in the story.

"Look at her," said Sherbrooke. "That yellow hair with all those curls, those green eyes, that fair complexion. Do you see any of me in her? My wife looked just the same as me. Straight black haired Irish and this dark skin of mine isn't from being in the sun, nor was my wife's. How could we produce a child like this? No, our Chelsea looked just like us. She was born with a full head of black hair and the biggest, brown eyes you've ever seen."

"Genetics do strange things sometimes," I said.

"We knew our own baby, Dr. Watson. And this child in the crib that morning was not ours. My wife picked her up, to try to stop the screaming and to see what was causing all the blood…and that's when we saw her back. Oh God, it was awful."

"What did the police say?"

"The police? How could we go to the police? And he knew we couldn't! What would be their first thought? I don't doubt but that you had the same idea when you first saw those scars, Mr. Holmes."

"That you were the cause…or your wife. It's not unheard of."

"Besides, not thirty minutes after we found her, I got another text…signed JM."

"What did it say?" I asked hesitantly.

"'Congratulations on your NEW baby.' And 'new' was in all caps. "She is the redemption for all your sins. Your debt is paid'." Sherbrooke bowed his head. It was obvious he was exhausted from telling the story. Chelsea stroked his arm.

"But you didn't take her to a doctor to see to the wounds on her back?" I asked, horrified that the cuts had been allowed to heal on their own which explained their jagged appearance.

"A doctor would have been no different than the police. She's never seen a doctor, per se. I've gotten her shots at the clinics and she's never been sick. No one in the medical profession has ever seen her...her back"

"Well, that's no longer true," said Sherlock.

"What? What did you do?"

"Dr. Watson here is an MD. And the first day when she came, different clues led me to think that Moriarty was involved somehow. So we had some X-rays and CT scans taken," said Sherlock.

"Oh, no," Sherbrooke moaned.

"But actually," I said, "few people have seen them. And no one in authority. So, for the moment the secret is safe."

"But how could you have suspected Moriarty in the first place? I've never even said that name in Chelsea's presence."

"Well, there was her name for one thing," I said hesitantly. "Her two middle names are an anagram for Moriarty."

"What?" Sherbrooke said, confused. "Mary Troi?"

"Change the letters around," explained Sherlock. "It spells Moriarty."

"My God, I never knew that. That has nothing to do with him. My wife and I both liked the name Chelsea and we decided each of us would pick a middle name. Caroline chose Mary for her grandmother. She thought I wanted Troi for an old school mate named Troy. I never told her it was for Deanna Troi of Star Trek. She was the first person I ever had a crush on." For the first time in our presence Richard Sherbrooke smile.

I glanced at Sherlock. I knew from his expression that he had no idea who Deanna Troi was. "I'll tell you later," I said.

Sherlock stood. "So you are saying that your baby was taken during the night and another one—this Chelsea—was left in its place."

"Not 'it,' Mr. Holmes. My daughter, my baby."

"And you raised her—this Chelsea—as your daughter, even keeping the same name?"

"What else were we to do? We both knew our baby was gone…and probably…probably dead. And we've not kept it a secret from her. Caroline and I both have told her the story from the very first. She knows she's a changeling."

"But in place of Moriarty, who you claim is responsible, you substituted fairies." I was having trouble following his reasoning.

"I needed…I needed to have an explanation, a reason for the terrible wounds on her back, for her screams of pain that we soon discovered were related to whenever she cried. I first went to a priest. You know what he told me? He said the cuts on her back were a stigmata. That they were the marks of the scourge of Christ before he was crucified. That when she cried it was the Blessed Virgin's tears for her son and that's what caused the pain. What kind of a God would do that to a child, Mr. Holmes? What kind of God would curse a baby with such pain? The fairy story made more sense to me. And who's to say that's not where Moriarty got her from? Aside from the bleeding and the pain, surely you've noticed she's not quite right, that she's fey."

Sherlock jerked his head up at Sherbrooke's last statement. "How dare you say that, sir! How dare you say such a thing in her presence!"

I had often heard people make insulting remarks to Sherlock. When I first met him, Sergeant Donovan called him "freak" to his face. I assumed he took those comments as a badge of honor. Maybe they hurt him more than any of us would ever know.

Sherbrooke struggled to his feet. "She knows she's loved. She knows she's safe with me."

"Safe like she was this week when you were almost beaten to death because you have some clients you disagree with? Safe in the home of a sociopath?" Sherlock's face was red with anger.

I stood from my chair at the desk and went to stand by Sherlock.

"I didn't know you were a sociopath," Sherbrooke said. "I knew you were the most brilliant man I'd ever met. I knew of all the people in this world, you were the one man I could trust with her. And I was right, wasn't I?"

Sherlock relaxed his stance and turned away, his hands on either side of his head.

"I was right, wasn't I, Dr. Watson?"

I just stared at the man for a moment before asking, "How many more clients do you have that are likely to…uh…react violently against you or Chelsea?"

"Quite a few, I'm afraid. It's the nature of the business. When you're doing illegal things you can't take your disputes to the police. You have to settle them yourself. That's why this latest attack has forced me to make a decision. I'm getting out. I'm getting out of the business and I'm getting out of England. I'm going to make a new start somewhere—Canada, New Zealand, maybe America. I think I can disappear and make a good life with my little girl."

"John," said Sherlock, turning to face Mr. Sherbrooke again. "Would you show our guest what we've discovered on the scans. Chelsea, come with me and let's collect your things." He held out his hand and Chelsea went over to him, Brownie's leash trailing behind her as usual, and went with him to his bedroom. I heard the door close.

"Mr. Sherbrooke, I think you need to see this." I motioned for him to come over to the desk.

In the bedroom, Sherlock picked up Chelsea's clothes where he had stacked them on a chair and stuffed them back into the paper bag she had brought with her when she arrived. Chelsea climbed up on his bed and started to take off her new trainers.

"What are you doing?" asked Sherlock. "Those are yours."

"I can keep them?" she asked.

"Of course you can keep them. They'd hardly fit me. They might fit John."

She laughed. "No, they wouldn't."

Sherlock sat on the bed beside her. "Listen, Chelsea, I know that you will have forgotten all about me in few days or weeks, but—"

"Lock," she interrupted, "I will never forget you."

He smiled and closed his hands around hers. "Yes, you will, but—"

"No, I won't." She pulled one of her hands from his and pointed to her head. "You will alway be in here. And here." She pointed to her heart. She leaned forward and took a big breath through her nose. "And here." She pointed to her nose and laughed.

"I have an idea." He went over to his wardrobe and found a handkerchief and ripped off a small square of it. He took his favorite cologne and dabbed some on the remnant. "Let's put this in your pouch." He opened the embroidered pouch that hung around her neck. "The fragrance will last for a while. And every time you open it, you can smell it, and remember me."

"Will you remember me, Lock?"

"Of course, I'll remember, and I want you to know that if you ever need anything, if you're ever in trouble or if…I don't know…if something happens and you need a friend you can trust, I will be here. You can always come to me. In fact…" He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small pad of paper and a pen. "I'm going to write down my name and address and number." He tore the piece of paper off and folded it several times. "I'll put this in here in the secret part of your little bag where no one else can ever find it. Just you and I will know it's there."

She stood up on her knees and hugged Sherlock around the neck. "I love you, Lock."

"I love you, too, Chelsea."

She pulled back a little bit and laid her hands along the sides of his face. "And, Lock, you didn't teach me to lie and cheat and teal. I already knew how to do those thing. Well, I didn't know how to cheat at poker, but when Dad and I play checker, I tumtime cheat."

"Yeah, well, I probably haven't been the best influence on you, though."

She kissed his cheek. "You taught me to be a Jedi."

"About that. I really was just teaching you to fence. I know how to fence, but I really don't know how to be a Jedi. Come on. I need to find something to put your doll and things in." He picked up her sack of clothes and moved towards the door but she stayed on the bed.

Chelsea ran her hands along the cotton rope she held. "Maybe I chould leave Brownie with you to keep you company chince John id not here anymore."

"No, I think Brownie would rather stay with you…for a couple of more years, at least. I have Vera and the other dragons for company."

She slid off the bed and took his hand.

"Is Vera really her name?" he asked.

Chelsea shrugged and smiled. "That what che told me."

When the two of them walked into the living room, Mr. Sherbrooke was standing by the desk. His eyes were red and glistened with tears. "What do I do, Mr. Holmes?"

"Exactly what you've been doing. Raising a unique and gifted daughter in the best way you know how."

"But what are those…things inside her? What does the future hold for her?"

"None of knows what the future holds for any of us. You know, you could have saved us a little trouble if you had explained more in your note that you left with her. Even if you had written your name."

"I did."

I handed Sherbrooke the note from the desk.

"This is not mine. It's not what I wrote. It's some of it, but not all. It's certainly not my handwriting. Chelsea, did you write this?"

Chelsea was still holding Sherlock's hand. She looked down at the floor. "Maybe."

"That's not a 'maybe' question," her Dad said sternly. "It requires a yes or no answer."

"Yech."

Sherlock looked down at her in amazement.

"I tried to tell you, Sherlock, and you wouldn't listen," I whispered, gloating inwardly.

"I copied tum of your letter when you were getting ready that morning. You didn't tell him everything. And he needed to know I liked bitcuitch."

"Oh, my dear," said Sherbrooke. "I wish I were able to pick you up in my arms right now."

Sherlock handed me the sack of clothes and bent down and picked up Chelsea. He carried her over to the couch and stood her up there while he packed her doll and the doll clothes and crayons and colouring books into a cloth bag he had found in a kitchen drawer. "She needs to be in school," said Sherlock, addressing the wallpaper behind the couch, "but I realize she can't be."

"I can do all right by her," said Sherbrooke, "and there's loads of educational stuff on the Internet. Maybe when she's older and can better control her…her impulses…her crying. God, what would a school think if that happened in a classroom?"

"I will…uhm…help you carry all this down to get a cab," Sherlock said. "Come on." He hoisted Chelsea in one arm and the bag of toys and the two lightsabers in the other. He came over to me and I arranged the sack of clothes on top of the other bag in his arm.

Sherbrooke and I followed him down the stairs and out onto the pavement where I hailed a cab. I loaded the things into the back. Sherlock was still holding Chelsea.

"Good-bye, Chelsea. Remember what I told you," he whispered in her ear.

She hugged him tightly around the neck and then put her hands alongside his head and looked wordlessly deep into his eyes for a moment before he broke contact.

"Tell John good-bye," he said.

She leaned sideways, still in Sherlock's grasp, and lightly touched my injured shoulder. "Poor John. It will be all right."

Sherlock set her inside the cab, then turned to her father. "Take care of yourself, Mr. Sherbrooke …for her sake. And…and if anything develops, I'm always here."

"Thank you, Mr. Holmes. For everything."

The taxi drove away with father and daughter, Chelsea turned around and watching us through the back window until they were lost in the traffic.

"Are you all right, Sherlock?" I asked as we headed back upstairs.

"Of course, I'm all right. Maybe I can get back to work now."

When we reached the living room, he stopped. There between the cushions of the couch, a frayed bit of rope peeked out. "She left Brownie," he said quietly.

I walked over and pulled out the cotton rope and handed it to him. I won't say there were tears in his eyes, but I think there were. "Maybe her invisible dog went with her and she just left his leash," I suggested.

"John, don't write about all this in your blog, not for a while yet. And if you do, change the names and whatever else so no one can ever find her."

"Of course. You know, about the way she seemed to be able to read minds? Do you think she was really telepathic?"

Sherlock shook his head. "I would describe it more as empathic. She seemed to possess some kind of clairsentience. She had this…I don't know…heightened sense of awareness when she was in physical contact with another person. Although even that's not quite descriptive. Because both times we were at the hospital, that first night and yesterday morning, she was almost overwhelmed by the press of emotions there. But, unfortunately, at age five, she didn't yet possess the vocabulary to articulate what she was sensing most of the time."

"And now with her father taking her out of the country, I guess it's something we'll never know for sure," I said.

"And I suspect that it's something that left unnurtured, will wither and fade in time."

"But I guess this case is closed for now," I said, "Of course, technically, it was never a case at all, was it?"

"Actually, I was just hired last night."

"What? You have a new case?"

"No, last night a five year old asked me…told me…to solve her mystery. So I guess I'll have to do it, no matter how long it takes…because that's what I do." Sherlock's phone dinged. "It's a text from Molly." He scanned the incoming message. "Oh, John."

"What is it? What'd she say?"

"Chelsea's DNA results came back."

"And?"

"The report said the sample was contaminated. It…uh…" Sherlock cursed, which he rarely did.

I grabbed the phone from his hand and read the text. "Unidentifiable. What's that supposed to mean? The lab said we should resubmit it. Sherlock, we took that sample under sterile laboratory conditions. There was no contamination on our end."

Sherlock's lips were pressed together in a thin line. "Molly probably still has the blood draw from that first night. Or I still have her tooth. I suppose we could get a sample from that. If it would do any good. Maybe she really is a changeling. "

"What? You think she's not human? Sherlock, she's a little girl with…with some psychological problems, maybe, and some unknown physical ones, too, but she's a hundred percent human."

"You're probably right." Sherlock sat down in his chair.

"There's no 'probably' about it."

"I hate unsolved mysteries, John. I like to have definite conclusions with things neatly sorted and all the ends tied."

"Life's not always like that," I said.

"It should be." He steepled his fingers against his mouth.

"But then there wouldn't be much call for great detectives like yourself."

The End