Sherlock - The Game Is On!

The Hounds Of Baskerville- Ten

Chapter Ten

In a small room full of cages, Doctor Stapleton is examining a fluffy white rabbit on a metal table. She looks up when Sherlock comes through the door, followed by us. "Oh. Back again? What's on your mind this time?"

"Murder, Doctor Stapleton. Refined, cold-blooded murder." He reaches back and turns off the light switch by the door. The limited lighting coming from the window at the end of the room is just enough to show that the rabbit is glowing a bright green. Sherlock turns the lights back on. "Will you tell little Kirsty what happened to Bluebell or shall I?"

"Okay. What do you want?"

"Can I borrow your microscope?"

In a larger lab, Sherlock has taken off his coat and is sitting at a bench and gazing into a microscope. Unhappy with what he's seeing, he turns away from the 'scope and crushes something which looks crystalline into smaller pieces with a little hammer. News flash it's sugar. Time passes and he varies between sitting with his back to the microscope, his hands folded in the prayer position in front of him while he thinks, or gazing into the 'scope, or scribbling chemical formulae onto the desk with different coloured marker pens. Nearby, John sits on a stool with his head propped on his hand, gazing blankly into space. Myself and Doctor Stapleton is standing near him. "Are you sure you're okay? You look very peaky."

"No, I'm all right."

"It was the GFP gene from a jellyfish, in case you're interested." This caught my attention. "In the rabbits."

"Mm, right, yes."

"Aequoria Victoria, isn't it?" I asked. John looked at me before questioning Stapleton. "Why?"

"Why not? We don't ask questions like that here. It isn't done. There was a mix-up, anyway. My daughter ended up with one of the lab specimens, so poor Bluebell had to go." I look towards Sherlock who seems overly irritated. "Your compassion's overwhelming." John replied, cynically. "I know. I hate myself sometimes."

"So, come on then. You can trust me I'm a doctor. What else have you got hidden away up here?"

"Listen: if you can imagine it, someone is probably doing it somewhere. Of course they are."

"And cloning?"

"Yes, of course. Dolly the Sheep, remember?" I stated. "Human cloning?"

"Why not?"

"What about animals? Not sheep... Big animals."

"Size isn't a problem, not at all. The only limits are ethics and the law, and both those things can be ... very flexible. But not here, not at Baskerville." With that Sherlock chucks the slide at the wall, Savagely. "It's not there! Nothing there! Doesn't make any sense."

"What were you expecting to find?"

"A drug, of course. There has to be a drug, a hallucinogenic or a deliriant of some kind. There's no trace of anything in the sugar." Sherlock stated whilst pacing. "Sugar?"

"The sugar, yes. It's a simple process of elimination. I saw the hound, saw it as my imagination expected me to see it: a genetically engineered monster. But I knew I couldn't believe the evidence of my own eyes, so there were seven possible reasons for it, the most possible being narcotics. Henry Knight, he saw it too but you didn't, John. You didn't see it. Now, we have eaten and drunk exactly the same things since we got to Grimpen apart from one thing: you don't take sugar in your coffee."

"I see. So..."

"I took it from Henry's kitchen, his sugar. It's perfectly all right."

"But maybe it's not a drug."

"No, it has to be a drug." Sherlock moves to sit on the stool with his head buried in his hands. "Something buried deep." Taking a sharp breath he points to us. "Get out."

"What?"

"Get out. I need to go to my mind palace." John sagged in his chair whilst I stare humourlessly at him. "Your what?" Stapleton questions, but receives no response. With his head turned away we make our way out the room. "He's not gonna be doing much talking for a while. We may as well go." John explains. "Stay." Sherlock mumbles. John nods at me as they take there leave.

I begin to pull up a chair, until Sherlock looks at me with arms open wide. He looks so adorable. I stand in between Sherlock's legs gently stroking his head whilst his face is burrowed in my breasts. Well this is new. He turns is head repeatedly as he walks through his memories. Minutes tick by until he jolts three times. "You alright?" I question quietly, moving his head away from me. "Liberty, Indiana.
H.O.U.N.D." He murmurs. He settles for a moment, arms slowly hugging around me. I start to massage his head slowly until he sets his chin on my chest looking up. "What?" He continues to stare at me. I eye rolled but bend down to him capturing his lips.

Third POV

The hound howls and Henry races across the grass, his pistol in one hand, terrified as the hound snarls behind him. Henry runs on, glancing back repeatedly as he hears his pursuer gaining on him. Two red glowing eyes loom out of the darkness each time he looks around, but now he suddenly seems to realise that he has a gun in his hand and he turns and fires towards the eyes.

Glass shatters and Louise Mortimer screams and throws herself out of her chair in the sitting room of Henry's house and cowers on the floor. Just beside her chair, the mirror on the wall has shattered under the impact of the bullet which Henry just fired into it. Sobbing and cowering, she looks up at Henry as he continues to aim at the mirror, his face blank, but now he comes back to himself and looks at the pistol in horror. "Oh my God." Louise continues to sob. "Oh my God. Oh my God. I am so... I am so sorry. I am so sorry."

Henry turns and runs from the room.