Just Another Case

A case at last

"I need a case!" Sherlock Holmes said, calmly shooting the annoying smiley face on Mrs. Hudson's wall. Mrs. Hudson came running up the stairs.

"What the do you think you're doing to my wall?!" The shriek echoed throughout the apartment. Mrs. Hudson looked despairingly at the wall, now littered with over five bullet holes. Sherlock threw his gun down on the table beside him.

"I just said," he yelled, "I need a case!" Mrs. Hudson looked around, terrified, before stalking out of the room. She hurried to the kitchen, where she quickly made a cup of coffee. She took it out to Sherlock, and before he had a chance to murder her wall any more, shoved it at him.

"If you can't find a case, at least stop ruining my wall," she told him. Sherlock took the cup. It trembled like an earthquake in his hands. He'd had to many drugs that week. So many, in fact, that he didn't even notice the taste of the coffee, which normally he despised. Apparently Mrs. Hudson wasn't a morning person.

A buzz filled the apartment. "You stay there, dear," Mrs. Hudson said to Sherlock, before bustling out of the room and down the stairs. She opened the door. "Ah, Inspector Lestrade. Thank God! Sherlock needs a case! Please get up here before -" She was cut of by another gunshot. She and her visitor raced upstairs, and found Sherlock pointing his gun at the wall, the smoke still trailing out from the barrell.

"Sherlock Holmes! Mrs. Hudson told me you needed a case, and I quite believe she was right! Are you listening?" Sherlock nodded in response to Lestrade's sentence. "Right," the inspector said in an exasperated tone, "You have a suspected murder case."

Sherlock shot up from his seat. "Thank God! Tell me all about it." He faced Lestrade, fingers steepled under his chin.

"Well, it was done -"

"Never mind that! Just take me to the crime scene! No, even better, take me to Molly. It's about a dead person. She'll have the body. To St Barts! Wait...-" There was a knock on the door.

"Sherlock, how did you... anyway, that was the door, so I believe you have a visitor. Why don't you get your door Sherlock?" Sherlock sighed.

"Just when I get a case. Mycroft has to come!" 

Without a second thought, Sherlock was racing out the door and down the stairs.

"Oh brother dear, I have just received news of a case that will bring me out of this perpetual boredom and haze of drugs, and you of all people come knocking at my door!" Sherlock's finger shot up. "I forgot." He turned his up the stairs and shouted. "John!" Turning back to Mycroft, he explained. "John doesn't tend to be awake at this time of night." Mycroft rolled his eyes.

"I think, little brother, you should let your friend sleep-"

"Mycroft, we are not a couple. You of all people know me. You know I don't do... that stuff..."

"Brother, if you would kindly let me get a word in, you would know I am here to ask you to solve a case, not berate you about your choice of companion."

"Is it the one Lestrade was telling me about?" Or trying to, at least...

"Well, I don't know, Sherlock. Did you give him time to finish his sentence, or were you so eager to get off your drugs that you didn't let him? Not that a case would make a difference. You've always been an addict."

"I'm not an addict. I'm a user."

"Sherlock-"

Just then, John Watson's face appeared at the top of the stairs. "You woke me up, Sherlock? I hope it was important! I don't like being woken up at 1 am in the morning without some tea in my system!" Mycroft sent an "I told you so" look Sherlock's way.

"Oh, yes, John. Very important indeed. We have a case! The game is on! Or was, until Mycroft interrupted because someone was trying to explain it to me!"

"Hey! You told me not to-"

"Oh shut up Gavin! You don't matter. What does is why, brother dear, are you here at 221B Baker Street. Please don't tell me you're a client. That would be insufferable."

"My name is not Gavin..." Lestrade muttered as John looked disapprovingly at Sherlock.

"Well, brother, let us up the stairs, and we can sit down and actually tell you about the case."

Lestrade looked at Mycroft gratefully. "Thank you, Mr. Holmes. It seems you're the only one in this flat who can control Sherlock."

"Oh, no, Greg. No one controls my brother. He's a high functioning sociopath in a room full of people holding a gun. Who knows what he'd do given the chance." The room fell silent with that comment. They all went into the living room and sat, John and Sherlock in their respective chairs, and, by John and Sherlock's insistence, Lestrade and Mycroft very uncomfortably sharing the "client chair".

"Right," Sherlock said, assuming his original position with his fingers steepled, eyes on his brother and the Scotland Yard DI sitting awkwardly in the chair.

"What is the case?"