The Soldier, The Messiah & the Pariah

Chapter 3

Inside the house, our heroes walked in just as when Lestrade was putting on a coverall. Sherlock spotted and pointed to a pile of similar items.

"You two need to wear one of these" Sherlock said as he turned to look at Lex and John.

"Who's this?" the detective asked.

"They are with me.

"But who are they?"

"I said they are with me"

As the two men argued, Lex and John had already taken off their jacket and picked up a coverall. John looked at Sherlock who had picked up a pair of latex gloves.

"Aren't you going to put one on?"

Sherlock just looked at him sternly. John shook his head as if to say, 'Silly me. What was I thinking?!'

"So, where are we?" The sociopath asked the detective.

"Upstairs," he said as he picked up another pair of latex gloves.

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Lestrade led our heroes up a circular staircase. He, Lex and John were wearing coveralls together with white cotton coverings over their shoes, and latex gloves. Sherlock was putting on his latex gloves as they went up the stairs.

"I can give you two minutes"

"May need longer" Sherlock told him.

"Her name's Jennifer Wilson according to her credit cards. We're running them now for contact details. Hasn't been here long. Some kids found her"

He led them into a room two stories above the ground floor. The room is empty of furniture except for a rocking horse in the far corner. Emergency portable lighting had been set up, presumably by the police.

Scaffolding poles held up part of the ceiling near where a couple of large holes had been knocked through one of the walls. A woman's body was lying face down on the bare floorboards in the middle of the room.

She was wearing a bright pink overcoat and high-heeled pink shoes. Her hands were flat on the floor either side of her head. Sherlock walked a few steps into the room and then stopped, holding one hand out in front of himself as he focused on the corpse.

Behind him, John and Lex looked at the woman's body and John's face filled with pain and sadness while the woman next to him had a more neutral face as if she had seen a dead body before.

The 4 of them stood there silently for several long seconds, then Sherlock looked across to Lestrade.

"Shut up"

"I didn't say anything"

"You were thinking. It's annoying"

Lestrade and John exchanged a surprised look and then looked at Lex who was looking at Sherlock with fascination. The said man stepped slowly forward until he reached the side of the corpse.

His attention was immediately drawn to the fact that scratched into the floorboards near the woman's left hand is the word "Rache". His eyes flicked to her fingernails where the index and middle nails were broken and ragged at the ends, the pink nail polish chipped in stark comparison to her other nails which were still immaculate.

The woman's index finger rests at the bottom of the 'e' as if she was still trying to carve into the floor when she died. Sherlock made an instant deduction:

Lefthanded

He kept observing different small details. Is mind racing at amazing speed as he processed its clue and made different deductions. When he was done, he smiled slightly in satisfaction.