It Started With Thieving | Sherlock Holmes

3 - Tension

A/N - Wherein the two ghosts have some time to chat and get all emosh...

What's your fave emotional scene in Sherlock?

I think mine is probably...either Sherlock losing it in THoTB or Mary's death in TST (I'm so sorry if you haven't seen series 4 yet but I'm surprised if you are reading this without having watched it first 😬).

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After having lost Hanna, Elizabeth brought Sherlock and Salim to her home with an air of verklempt clinging to and dragging down her entire being. Outside, Salim explained that, as it appeared they were in a safer area of the city, he felt the understandable need to check on his troops. As the detective knew he was more than capable of looking after himself, as was Elizabeth, he agreed to the suggestion. Before he left, Salim handed Sherlock a radio in case he needed to contact him at all and, in turn, the detective handed over the note and drive that the ex-thief had given back to him.

Only once Salim had left, did Elizabeth continue to lead Sherlock to her flat.

The floorboards creaked as they shuffled into the girls' home and a fraught silence hung in the air as Elizabeth removed her veil. She tossed the coarse material on one of their poorly manufactured beds and approached the rickety table where Hanna's makeshift workbook lay.

Sherlock watched her carefully, acknowledging her chopped hair - as opposed to shoulder length, it now stopped just below her jaw line in a dishevelled fashion. It suited her, he thought, as he waited in silence, unsure as to whether he should speak or not.

But he didn't need to speak first for Elizabeth did, the words tumbling from her mouth in a low growl, "This is your fault."

"Elizabeth - "

"No." The ex-thief spun to face him, seething and more so seething because if she wasn't focused on her anger, then she knew she would have a breakdown, "You knew what you were doing when you gave me the note and drive, you knew that there was a risk of making us targets - I mean, who the hell does that? Who the hell puts a target on a young girl's back?"

Sherlock tried to calm her, genuinely remorseful, "I know you're upset - "

"Upset?" She laughed, "My - Hanna is now in the hands of terrorists," Pacing right up to him, she hissed, pointing out the window to drive home her point, "The same terrorists who killed her parents and the same terrorists who rarely take prisoners - upset doesn't even begin to describe how I feel right now."

"I am sorry this happened but..."

"But what?"

"But I'm glad you're alive."

Holding her furious gaze with his contrite one, a shaky breath left her, one that she wished was like the fire from the scolding throat of a dragon but she found that it felt only warm enough to mist up glass. The hotness in her expression went from boiling back down to simmering.

Deep down she was glad he was here, here meaning alive, but him being here had also jeprodised what she had now, "I wish I could still say the feeling was mutual."

"I think you already expressed that when you decked me in the jaw."

A very quick, short laugh escaped her but it evaporated quicker than frost in sunlight, "Don't. Don't make me laugh...and besides you took a sharp swing at me first. That hurt, by the way."

"In all fairness, I didn't acknowledge you were a woman until after I hit you."

"Typical," She nodded, turning away from him briefly, "Was it the shape of my eye socket that informed you of that?"