Human Error ~ A BBC Sherlock Fanfiction {Book IV}

Chapter XLII - Little Actress (+ A/N)

Hello, all.

It's been a while – I hope the events of last week, with the constant uploading and re-uploading of the same wretched chapter, haven't put you off this account altogether. The following chapter, for those who recognise it, is a combination of the previous update and something new, so do not panic if you begin experiencing a literary déjà vu. If you have read the original update (entitled "Tigress"), do skip to the latter section of the chapter – I've thrown in a little Sherlillie for you.

I've got something rather important to ask you all. GGMA is to be included in Wattpad's fanfiction featured list (recommended by the lovely @KThierry), but I have asked for the process to be suspended whilst I re-write it. If all goes to plan, Games, Guns and Mutual Appreciation will be double its original length and much more consistent in its writing style – however, this overhaul does not come without confusion. Would you rather me write the improved GGMA separately, then remove all existing chapters and update the new body of text in one go (resulting in a mass of notifications), or would you prefer me to take down the original GGMA and update chapter by new chapter on a daily basis?

Also, I'd like to ask you to use this chapter – or the Wattpad private messaging system – as an idea central. I have some marvellously vocal, marvellously creative readers, and it is to you I pose the question: what do you want to see included in the new GGMA? As you know, Human Error is the last book in this twisted little series, so this is your opportunity to highlight anything you would like to witness pre-SOTA Millie, Sherlock, John and Jim be put through. I will credit used ideas accordingly. Any help would be much appreciated (no pun intended).

Merci beaucoup,

~Shem

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-Emily-

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I pull into the allotted parking slot at the base of the apartment complex – clipping, with a characteristic lack of spatial awareness, the edge of the car on a nearby pillar – and twist the keys from the ignition, letting the soft engine purr fade. I rest my head in my hands and dig my fingertips into the hollows of my temples, an attempt at silencing the vicious thoughts circling my brain; cerebral vultures.

She made me feel pity.

I've seen countless shades of insanity over the last year; desperate madness, present in the eyes of lost women with their alcohol and their drugs and their laddered tights, furious mental shutdown, a state of mind that has afflicted me for as long as I am able to remember, Jim's own, defining psychosis – an alluring cocktail of emotional intensity and emotional vacancy – cycling between shouting and smiling and the occasional homicidal outburst. The insanity in Millie Shon's expression, however, was of such acute suffering, such self-loathing, I can't shake it from my mind.

I tell myself that she doesn't warrant pity – that what she does and does not feel is no longer my priority or of interest; I made it my self-appointed mission to expose her to such agony, to hurt her in every way she hurt me, and yet here I am, sitting in a dark car beside a man with darker intentions, doubting my own resolve.

I don't wait for Jim. I push open the car door, restless with unease, and toss the keys onto the front seat, using the small, round lights spotting the ceiling as a guide; I move from parking space to lift, leaning back against the glass and closing my eyes as it ascends through floors and comes to a smooth halt at the penthouse.

She was out alone. At night.

Why she thought a midnight jaunt through streets that are combed regularly by a lover baying for her blood was a rational option, in her cold little world of glass numbers and fact, is utterly beyond me.