Sherlock - The Game Is On!

The Lying Detective- Seven

Chapter Seven

Third POV

Sherlock walks along the streets, making his way home. His own words echo in his head:

"You said your life turned on one word. A name can't be one word."

He walks past some houses which have basement flats. He walks to the street-level railings of one of those houses and looks over them, flashing back to the last time he stood at the door of a basement flat, when he visited John's home and was met at the front door by Molly holding Rosie in her arms.

"You need to take care of yourself. For Michelle's sake."

In flashback, Molly stands outside the porch looking at him. She pauses for a moment.

"For Michelle's sake."

In the present, Sherlock turns away.

"You're not what I expected." Faith's voice echoes. "What... What am I?"

"Nicer."

"Than who?"

"Anyone."

- - You, Mr Holmes. I'd die for you because you're my world. - -

"Anyone."

"For Michelle's sake."

"Anyone."

"Michelle's sake."

Faith's and Molly's words echo. Over and over again. Repeatedly.

Sherlock spins around and stares intensely down the road. His eyes wide, Sherlock starts to walk down the road.

Further along the narrow street, it's as if the oval table from Smith's glass-walled room has appeared in the middle of the road. Smith's six guests are sitting either side of it with the drip stands beside them and Smith sits at the far end. The street scenery around the table is fuzzy and out of focus. As Sherlock slowly walks towards the table, Smith smiles and stands up and walks towards him. "There's only one way that I can solve it."

"And what's that?" Smith has now passed the table and continues to walk towards Sherlock. "I need to kill someone." Sherlock stops. "Who?"

"Who?" Sherlock repeats Faith's question. Smith chuckles silently. "Anyone!" He laughs. "Of course!" Sherlock begins to realise. Smith continues to laugh, putting the back of one hand up to his mouth. "He doesn't want to kill one person; Be wants to kill anyone." He stares at Smith, his eyes wide. "He's a serial killer!"

"Anyone."

"He could be."

"Anyone." Smith repeats. "Why not? Why shouldn't he be?" He starts to smile, then his smile drops and he looks confused. Smith and the table instantly disappear and a man walks past in front of Sherlock, looking at him disapprovingly.

A man's voice angrily yells, "Move!" Sherlock stands in the middle of a very narrow stretch of road. Cars have come to a halt in front of him, behind him and from a side turning to his right, some of them honking their horns. The driver of the car in front of him has his door open and calls out to him in irritation. "Hey, you! What's the matter with you?"

"Anyone!" Smith's voice trails on. As Smith's voice continues to echoingly repeat the word, Sherlock's vision homes in on the driver, who has got out of his car and is leaning an arm on the open door while looking at him in half-irritation, half-concern. "Do you know where you are? Are you drunk?" Sherlock blinks.

"Shezza." Bill Wigan's calls out. The driver has now been replaced by Billy, who is looking at him sternly. "What are you doing here?" They now stand in 221B. "What were you doing in the middle of a bloody street?"

"You should be at Baker Street." Sherlock's head twitches and he stumbles slightly. "I am. So are you." He gestures around.

Sherlock goes very out of focus as he lowers his head a little and blinks rapidly. "They found your address; they brought you here." Billy explains. Confused, Sherlock turns and looks around the room. "You've 'ad too much..." Sherlock turns back to him, wide-eyed and bewildered. "An' that's me sayin' this. What would Michelle think of this?"

Flailing in panic, Sherlock stumbles backwards and up onto the now solid sofa. His back ought to crash into the wall but instead he lands flat on his back on the rug some distance in front of the sofa.

In a brief cut-away, Smith is on TV looking bored as the audience applauds behind him. He gestures towards the camera. "Kill." He smacks his hand down onto the big red button on the table in front of him.

In 221 Sherlock struggles to turn over onto his side. Then, without transition he's back on his feet, possibly standing on the sofa. He turns and stares around the room wide-eyed.

Brief cut-away of Smith in his tracksuit during a fun run, holding up his index fingers and thumbs to the crowd as he forms the letter 'W' with them.

"Sherlock." Billy's voice drawls out, distantly.

Sherlock rolls onto his back again on the rug.

In a cut-away of a TV show, Smith stands inside the door of a shop, looking out through the glass. A female assistant stands at a cash register deeper in the shop. Smith reaches up to a sign on the door and turns it around so that from outside it reads 'Sorry, we're CLOSED'. In the bottom left-hand corner of the screen are the words 'BUSYNESS KILLER' except the 'Y' is actually a pair of scissors. The word KILLER is in red.

In 221B Sherlock elevates off the rug without using his hands or feet. Bill stares in shock. By the door to the landing, Sherlock begins walking up the wall. Floating impossibly sideways, he clumsily steps over a lot of magazines piled up against the wall, then puts his feet together and turns towards Bill.

Back out in the narrow street, Smith smiles ecstatically. "Anyone."

"Anyone." Faith repeats.

"They're always poor..." And he's horizontally walking up the wall again. "And lonely, and strange. But those are only the ones we catch."

"Who do we catch?" Bill questions. "Serial killers."

"What if you were rich and..." He squeezes his eyes shut. "Powerful and necessary."

Again horizontal on the wall, Sherlock steps unsteadily downward, putting one foot on the arm of the chair beside the sofa.

"Anyone."

In the narrow street Smith puts the back of one hand to his mouth as he giggles.

Horizontally, Sherlock reaches across to put his hands on the wall behind the sofa. "What if..." Bill stares disbelievingly. Sherlock is now horizontally halfway up the wall behind the sofa, his arms spread wide to steady himself as he carefully steps sideways/upwards along the part of the wall which juts out a little into the room. "You had the compulsion to kill and money? What then?"

Sherlock, standing on the right arm of the sofa and tilted towards the sofa at an impossible angle, topples forward and crashes down onto the sofa. Bill watches him go with a look of shock. Sherlock's eyes close as his body settles onto the cushions.