Status: "The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep." Updates every Friday <3

Deducing Tragedy Part Two: Speak No Lies

Poetic Justice

Lestrade was waiting outside Scotland Yard when they arrived. It was only Sherlock and John as Ann walked past the cars and just kept walking. John wanted to follow her but Sherlock stopped him saying, “We have bigger problems on our hands.” He wanted to protest, that was their friend and she was a far cry from alright, but he understood. People were dying, Hanna would have to wait.

“I don’t know what you did to get on the case,” Lestrade said as they got out of the car. “But thank god you did because these people are running in circles.”

“What makes you say that?” John asked, entering the building behind the two other men.

“I put them in the corner conference room,” he said and Sherlock smirked.

John frowned, “what? I don’t get it.”

“He put them in a fish bowl,” Sherlock explained still smirking, “the glass room; he could see everything they did.”

“And Donavan is damn good at reading lips,” Lestrade smirked. “I may not be clever like this one but I have my moments.” They turned the corner and John could see their destination. Ann was not there but the boy, Ben, was leaning over the table with three others that he didn’t recognize.

The woman was a few inches shorter than him with a mass of dark curls that framed her heart-shaped face. Dark eyes were cast down at the papers between stealing glances at the younger of the two other men at the table. He was sitting across from Ben, his face buried in a tablet. His blue eyes stayed glued to the screen and only looked up to show them something. He was built like a brick house; thick bands of muscles stretched his already tight shirt as he moved. The other man moved around the table to Ben as he pointed something out on a scrap of paper in his hands. He was older than the rest, around five years. He was also physically fit, though he was leaner.

The three of them entered the room and Ben turned around, crossing his arms over his chest. “I'm surprised to see you alive. I was sure she would kill you for this.”

“Perhaps you don’t know her as well as you though,” he offered and the boys’ eyes dropped to the floor.

“Right well,” he turned to the other three. “This is team Alpha, Tate Johnson, Eva Michaels, and Jordan VanRavenswaay. Guys, this is Sherlock Holmes and John Watson, they’re going to be working this case with us even though Ann told them to stay out of it. They are kind of stubborn like that.”

“So we should be bracing for impact?” Eva growled in annoyance. “Or should we just start killing each other and save her the trouble?”

“Eva,” he scolded.

“No she’s right,” Jordan sighed, rubbing his eyes. “Ann’s been in a bad mood since we got here. God only knows what she’ll be like now that he’s on the case.”

“She’s really that bad?” John asked stepping forward.

Ben shrugged slightly, “I told you she changed.”

“Ann is difficult on her best days,” Tate spoke up, lazily looking at the papers spread out across the table. “But she’s always focused. Since we got here she’s been absolute hell. That is when she decides to show up. She’s been running off every chance she gets.”

“She’s just dealing with some things,” Ben said sounding almost desperate. “I told you she has a lot of scars here; A lot of unfinished business.”

“Yeah but we need our leader if we want to find this man,” Eva said shaking her head. “Ann needs to be here, she needs to focus on stopping him!”

“For once I agree with you,” a new voice said from behind them and they turned to see another man entering the conference room. “Quick someone write it on the calendar so we don’t forget!”

“You can fuck right off,” she hissed through narrow eyes before turning back to the table.

“Awe Eva, you’re breaking my heart,” he smirked putting his hand over his chest.

“Fuck OFF.”

He was still smirking when he turned to Sherlock and John, “you’ve met the rest of the team, my name is Jeremy-“

“You’re the one watching us,” Sherlock said with a knowing look.

“Watching us?” John demanded, “What do you mean ‘watching us’?”

“I was assigned to keep tabs on you two,” Jeremy shrugged. “In case the Ripper decided to make you his next vic.”

“Why would we be the next victim?”

“Because of these,” Ben said gesturing to the papers on the table. “Since we were put on the case the Ripper has left notes.”

“More like taunts,” Tate said standing up and crossing his arms over his chest. “Meant to torment and antagonize Ann. Each one has given us a clue to the next body drop or the next victim. Mr. Holmes you were named in the last note. You could be next.”

Sherlock walked over to the table, silver eyes looking over the scattered paper. “These are the originals, yes?”

Ben nodded, “Mycroft dropped them off this morning. We had copies but I want to take another look at them. I'm not sure what, but something about them is off.”

Sherlock smirked at the boy, “your instincts are good.” He moved to grab one of the notes but Tate reached out and grabbed his wrist, stopping him. “I was invited to take a looked,” he said with an irritated sigh.

“Let him go Tate,” Ben said with an amused smiled, “let’s see what he’s got.” Tate let him go but his cold, accusing eyes never left the consulting detective.

Sherlock grabbed one of the notes and looked closely at it. “as I was saying, your instincts are good, should you have chosen to focus what is right in front of you, you might have seen it.”

“Seen what?” he asked, his annoyed tone and gazed directed at the man before him.

“Ordinary people are so concerned with the context of the words that they never take the time to look at the paper it is written on.” He said walking over to one of the glass walls. “And they miss the most important clue of all.” he held the paper up, the light of the office beyond them shining through the paper to reveal a faint ‘I’ printed across the page.

“A Letter,” Eva breathed behind him.

“The rest have them too,” he said turning back to them. “Your killer is not only giving you one message but two. If I'm right, and I usually am, this one will tell you exactly who your killer is.”

~8~

Sherlock walked into Baker Street alone but he was not alone when he got there. Sitting in his chair with her legs kicking slowly over the armrest and a book in her lap, was Ann. She’d made herself at home, her black denim half jacket was tossed carelessly in John chair and her black suede boots were on the floor next to the chair. The thin straps of her top revealed a tattooed pattern across her left shoulder, braille, he realized after a moment.

“Are you going to come in or just stand there forever?” She asked turning the page.

“There is an intruder in my flat,” he said stepping inside slowly. “I should be phoning the police.”

“Why bother,” she sighed heavily, “useless bunch, the lot of them.”

“You are a bit biased.”

“You think so too.”

He smirked; “you were always good at that,” she looked back at him. “Seeing what you shouldn’t.”

“Poetic words since I was blind,” she smirked closing the book and pushing it aside as she turned to sit forward in the chair. Her hands moved between the leather and her thighs making her look like a child trying to keep them warm. “I didn’t know you liked poetry.”

“I’ve never been particularly fond,” he shrugged slipping his hands into his pockets, “but it has come in handy every now and again. Like your tattoo for example.” She stiffened slightly and he smirked. “The woods are lovely, dark and deep but I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep-“

“and miles to go before I sleep,” she finished the poem for him, her head turned down towards her knees as if they were suddenly the most fascinating thing she’s ever seen.

“Robert Frost if I'm not mistaken,” he said walking slowly over to Watson’s chair. “But it is unfinished.”

She looked up, “what?”

“Your tattoo,” he nodded towards her shoulder. “You’ve only got the first three lines; why stop there?”

She smiled softly, but there was no joy in it. It was the smile of a sad and broken woman and Sherlock felt pain flash through him. He was supposed to protect her smile, make sure that it was always filled with hope and love. He failed.

“Tattoos can before for more than self-expression,” she said as her eyes met his. “Mine tethers me to something.”

“I don’t suppose you’ll-“

“You are smart Sherlock,” she said standing up and crossing the distance between them. “Even if I tell you not to go looking, that this is one secret you don’t want to find, you will. But I will keep my secret safe for as long as I can. So no, I will not be telling you this one.”

“The last time you kept things from me people died,” he said looking down into her ocean blue eyes. Eyes that flinched with pain at his words and made him want to take them back. He was supposed to save her from pain. He failed.

“And I am paying for it,” she said take a step back from him. “Slowly, but those women will have their justice.”

“That’s what you’re doing isn’t it?” he asked moving forward. “You seek a punishment for your part in Mathers’ game.”

She let out a long breath, her lips giving him another sad smile that broke the detective’s heart. “When all was said and done I was walking away with more than I deserved. I had a cure to my blindness, friends who pitied me like I was a victim, and I had you, or at least your word to try to remember. There were no repercussions for my actions.”

“So you destroyed what you had gained,” Sherlock said, not letting her eyes leave his. “Burned every bridge you had and you kept your cure.”

“What I had of it, yes,” she said pulling out a thin clear bottle, from the pocket of her jeans, to show him. “But I'm nearly out.”

“You never made more.”

“Ben tried,” she said spinning around and walking over to the window, her finger running across the piano that still sat there. “But I told him I had enough. I kept my sight these three years knowing that it wouldn’t last. I guess after nearly six years of darkness the thought of it coming back was…”

“Too much to bear?” He offered watching her in the window; the silver light of the moon outlining her entire body in sliver.

“It was selfish,” she said turning back to him, her arms crossed over her chest. “To want what I have no right too.”

“Like your happy ending?”

“My happy ending is dead,” she said with venom he wasn’t expecting. “Because I didn’t deserve it.”

He raised an eyebrow, “You put too much blame on yourself. You are not sin free but you are not the monster by any means.”

She walked up to him, her hands sliding up her shoulders and pulling him down to her level. “Do you believe in Monsters?” she whispered in his ear. “Monsters, demons, evil so pure you confuse it for good?” she released him and walked to the door, grabbing her jacket and shoes as she went.

Pausing in the door way she looked back at him, her sad eyes hardening as she fell back behind her shield. “I think you’ve gotten confused Sherlock. If you’re not careful, you might become as haunted as I am.”
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hello loves! im too tired to say much because it's two a.m. and I am not nocturnal as much as I try to convince myself other wise lols.

ya'll been making me so happy as of late so thanks. I hope I don't disappoint

that's all for tonight, im gonna go to bed -_-zzzzzZZZZZZ

NIGHT!