17"Sherlock Holmes, you have to get your TiMER implanted eventually!"
The tall, curly-haired man squinted his eyes at his brother, plucking the strings of his violin. It was a huge chaos in the tiny flat on Montague Street; there were notes and books scattered all over the floor, in the kitchen there was still a slimy green substance covering the walls from one of his earlier experiments, and a small, sharp pocket knife had been stuck into the bare wall (It had once been covered with atrocious, peach-coloured flowery-patterned wallpaper, which Sherlock had hated so much that he ripped it all off with his bare hands, much to the utter disbelief of his landlord).
"For the last time, Mycroft, no. Soulmates are irrelevant to me and my profession. All that matters to me is the thrill of solving the puzzles that the whole Scotland Yard is not able to solve. Brainwork is what keeps me going, and I don't need a soulmate in my life."
"Brother, as someone who has financially supported this governmental project, I'm afraid must insist."
Sherlock abruptly stopped playing and pointed his violin bow at Mycroft.
"Come anywhere near me with a fucking TiMER and I will stick it where the sun does not shine."
Mycroft sighed, exasperated. "This is a matter of importance, Sherlock, grow up. Then what about your soulmate? They probably have their TiMERs installed already, and it won't work because you are too stubborn to get one yourself."
Sherlock rolled his eyes and tucked his hands under his chin, as if he was praying. "If my soulmate is stupid enough to get a useless device like that, then they're not exactly my soulmate, are they?"
The tall-nosed man pressed his lips together and closed his eyes briefly, trying to regain his composure.
"Dear brother, you have passed your eligible age twenty years ago. You have had plenty of time. You're 34, for God's sake, it's time to get yourself a TiMER!"
Sherlock gave his brother a smug smile. "I'd like to see you try to get me one. Anyway," he added, jumping to his feet and heading for the hallway, "there's something much more exciting going on. Before you arrived I got a call from Lestrade. There's been another murder, they've asked me to give a second opinion on the body." He returned to the seating area with his coat and scarf on, and he gave Mycroft an unreadable look.
"Solving murders and providing families the answers they need, is that not a matter of importance, brother? Good day to you," he said, motioning to the front door.
Mycroft got up and walked past him, giving him an incredulous look before turning to leave. When he almost got out of the front door, however, he turned around and raised his eyebrow.
"You might want to clean up the mess before you go, Sherlock... I don't think your landlord would be too pleased if he saw the mess you've made."
And with a cold smile, Mycroft walked away. Sherlock briefly looked at his flat, shrugged at the chaos, deciding he could always clean that up later, and left as well.
It was a ridiculously short walking distance from his flat to Bart's: he only had to cross the street and walk through a small alley, and he was on the central square of the hospital already. Living near the morgue was very convenient for his work.
He made his way through the corridors and walked down the stairs to the morgue, wondering what delightful answers he could find there. He walked towards the double doors of the morgue, knocked and waited.
A young woman with a mousy brown ponytail stuck her head around the corner and looked at him, blinking in confusion.
"Um... good afternoon to you?"
Sherlock frowned, cocking his head to the side. "You're not Stamford."
"That's right," the woman said, chuckling nervously. "Stamford's teaching right now... I'm new here. I'm Molly. Hooper. My name is Molly Hooper... Sorry, are you working here as well? It's always a pleasure to meet new colleagues."
Sherlock's eyebrows furrowed even more.
"No, I'm a consultant from Scotland Yard, D.I. Lestrade sent me here. I'm here to investigate a body, the body of Andrew Davison. May I come in?" he asked, impatiently.
Molly opened her mouth, as if she were about to say something, and checked her clipboard. "I just did his post-mortem..." she muttered, looking up. "I think I may have heard something about someone coming to check as well, but I don't think I understand... What's wrong with my post-mortems? Is it because I'm new?"
"The police have asked me to do a second opinion. I think you'll find that I'm – no offence – much more observant than you, Millie, so the case can be solved much more easily."
"It's Molly," the woman softly protested, but Sherlock didn't listen and walked into the morgue.
"Now if you could just tell me where you've left the body?"
Molly silently watched the stranger investigate the body she had just properly examined, wanting to say something to break the awkward silence, but not knowing what to say.
"Um," she said softly, "I don't think I caught your name..."
The dark-haired man didn't look up from his investigation, but only gave her a soft "hm" as he looked through his magnifier at the dead man's skin. It surprised Molly how low his voice was – was that even possible?
"No visible marks of violence on the body," he murmured.
"That's what I wrote in my report as well," Molly piped up, and the man briefly looked up, annoyed. Molly swallowed a bit at his icy cold stare and pressed her lips together. The consultant slowly turned his attention to the body again.
"Might have been poisoning..." the man murmured, lifting the dead man's lips with a cotton swab. "Yes, definitely poisoning..."
Molly rubbed her upper arm awkwardly and cleared her throat.
"It's always exciting, isn't it, dead bodies? I mean... it's never nice for the poor fellow on the slab, but they're dead, they can't feel anything..."
The man lifted his head again and raised his eyebrow.
"As much as I agree with you, a bit of silence would be marvellous, thank you."
Molly nodded, a bit dumbfounded.
"Yes, but may I just ask you for your name? I didn't catch it," she repeated, blinking a bit.
The man sighed and turned his attention to the dead man's mouth again.
"Sherlock Holmes," he said in a low voice, and Molly thought it sounded like a purr. She blinked and stared ahead of her for the rest of his investigation.
A short while later, after Sherlock had given many additional details about the man's death which Molly had initially failed to see, he stood up and went to leave. Molly followed him and kept rambling on.
"That was really quite amazing," she said. "I'll have it included on the report and submitted later this afternoon... How did you even do that? Pathology is not even your profession and you did so well, I don't understand h—"
She stopped abruptly when Sherlock reached for his scarf on the coat stand. She frowned and opened her mouth to say something, but Sherlock cut her off.
"Well, I'm off. Laterz," he said, dashing out of the morgue and closing the door behind him with a loud click.
Molly blinked, remembering what she had seen. When Sherlock had reached for his scarf, the sleeve of his coat had fallen back to reveal his pale left wrist.
She had seen that Sherlock did not have a TiMER.
