The Scientist

Get Molly Hooper

Sherlock went again to the lab to clear his head and was  only partly surprised when he saw that John was there too. He nodded  slightly as a greeting and sat down at the microscope next to Molly's  laptop. Digging through his pocket, he seized a napkin with a sample of  mold he scraped from the bottom of the fridge. He took the fuzzy grey  substance and made a wet slide in order to observe its properties. As he  focused the microscope, he himself was not focused on the task at hand.  Moriarty's face kept popping into his mind palace, whispering into his  ear.

"I . . . owe . . . you . . . " he muttered subconsciously.

He kept working, changing slides. Someone handed him some petri dishes and said, "Your cultures are done, Sherlock."

"Thank you, John."

"Molly."

Oh. "Yes."

There  was an awkward silence between the two, but Sherlock did his best to  make it appear he was working hard on examining this particular slide.  All thoughts were disrupted again by Molly's soft voice.

"What did you mean, 'I owe you'?"

Sherlock's  eyes flicked up to John, who crossed the room at that moment. John  still didn't know about Moriarty's call. Even though he knew about the other  thing that was slowly killing him, he didn't necessarily need to know  about the one that struck more fear into his heart. This was because he  knew that Moriarty would very well hurt his loved ones apart from him  while his disease would hurt only him. No one else.

"You said, 'I owe you.' You were muttering it while you were working."

"Nothing," he responded, lowering his gaze back to the microscope lens. "Mental note."

Once  again, awkward silence. Sherlock directed his attention to the cultures  that Molly had given him. He took a knife and prepared a wet slide with  the bit of bacteria in the center. He put the slide under the  microscope and again looked into the lens. All his motions were  automatic, and his facial expression turned a little sadder.

"You're doing it again," Sherlock heard to his right. "Being like my dad before he died."

"Molly,  please don't feel the need to make conversation," he said, feeling anxious that she would figure out his inner turmoil. "It's really not your area."

"You look sad--" she said pointedly, glancing toward John "--when you think he can't see you."

Sherlock  looked up at John, who was sitting on a bench, looking through some  papers, unaware of the conversation unraveling between the detective and  the pathologist. A needle of pain shot through his chest and he felt  his mood dampen further. He looked up at Molly, feeling both glad and  terrified that she could read him so easily.

"Are you  okay?" Molly asked. Before Sherlock could answer, she interrupted him.  "And don't just say you are, because I know what that means, looking sad when you think no one can see you."

Sherlock raised his chin and challenged her. "You can see me."

Molly smiled briefly, reminded of the same conversation that happened nearly five years ago, and shook her head. "I don't count, remember?"

Sherlock was taken aback for a moment and looked at Molly. Really looked at her. How could this pathologist, a near-genius, be so insufferably idiotic? Did she really think that she meant absolutely nothing to him? She meant everything. Sherlock froze in his thoughts, stopping short. What?

"What  I'm trying to say," Molly continued, "is that I'm here." She tentatively rested her hand on his shoulder blade, spreading her fingers slowly in a subtle caress. "I'm always here." A pause. "Well, not always here here, at my house too, and--" She closed her eyes and pulled away. "You can talk to me."