The trouble it took to find you.
Feb. 7th, 2014 11:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
solrosanNotes: This fic is written for letswritesherlock, challange 10. I apologise for my Wikipedia-only-knowledge of Serbia and I’ve chosen to go with the ASiP script’s name for “Anthea” because I can and it makes me happy!
Summary: It was nine weeks since Sherlock last contacted his brother and it is time to start tracking him down.
It had stopped raining when Mr Holmes and his assistant stepped out of Parliament. They had been to yet another debate about the proposed anti-terrorist bill the people seemed to think was going to rob them of their personal integrity. Andrea found that very naïve and endearing – like they had any privacy to begin with.
Mr Holmes looked up at the lingering grey clouds, as if contemplating whether to trust the sky or to turn up his umbrella.
“I will need your services tonight, Ms Somers,” he said without taking his eyes from the sky.
Previously when he had stated a request in this manner – especially in front of other people – she had been slightly annoyed by how much it made her sound like a prostitute. These days she knew that it meant he wanted help with a personal matter and at the moment “personal matter” could only mean one thing.
She still felt obligated to ask the rhetorical question: “He still hasn’t been in touch?”
“No.” Mr Holmes opened the car door for her. She slipped inside without another word, closely followed by him.
They rode in silence, Mr Holmes absently looking out through the window as he always did. Andrea took the opportunity to check her mobile, making absolutely sure that there had been no contact with Sherlock Holmes for the last nine weeks.
In their vigorous planning to bring Moriarty and his network down the Holmes brothers had agreed that Sherlock were to check in with Mycroft every third week by whatever means he had available at the time. If he failed to do so three times in a row Mycroft were to take action. This wasn’t the first time Sherlock had, for one reason or another, missed to contact his brother in time, but up until now the most overdue he had been was ninety-four hours. Today at noon, GMT, was the third check in that he had missed.
Andrea glanced at Mr Holmes as they stopped at a traffic light. He looked perfectly calm to her, with just the same mixture of boredom and discontent as he had shown during the entire terrorist debate. Perhaps she had been looking at him too closely during these last years and for some reason took “worried” to mean “normal”.
She lightly put her hand on his thigh. “Last we heard he was in Pernik heading for Vranje. His passport confirms he crossed the border sixty-seven days ago and twenty-nine days ago he withdrew Serbian dinars in Lescovac.”
Mr Holmes looked at her hand for a moment before meeting her eyes.
“I think he’s still in Serbia and that we will find him,” she said.
“I don’t doubt that we will,” he said, turning back to look out the window. “The question is in what state we’re going find him.”
Andrea turned back to her mobile to ignore the hard knot forming in her belly. The first thing she did when they got to the Diogenes Club, or rather the office space underneath it, was to put on a kettle and order dinner. When she joined him in the office he was already on the phone with the Bulgarians. She sat up camp at the opposite side of his desk, using a chair she’s brought from the corridor, and started to go through the paper trail, starting with Sherlock’s bank account.
It took them an hour and a half to feel secure in the conclusion that Sherlock hadn’t left Serbia. It took them another four hours to confirm that he had been in contact with the Serbian Information Agency, the BIA, eight days after their last contact with him. After that their luck seemed to run dry. It was way past midnight when Mr Holmes finally hung up the phone after having agreed to a not entirely moral trade with the Rumanians in exchange for information.
“Well?” Andrea asked, looking up from the text conversation she was having with her contact at the SIS (who didn’t understand why he wasn’t allowed to sleep).
“Yes.” Mr Holmes rubbed his face, sighing deeply.
“And he’s alive?”
Mr Holmes nodded, actually smiling a brief, relieved smile. “Three days ago, at least.”
“Are we going to extract him via Bosnia Herzegovina?” She asked, discarding her phone in favour of her laptop. “I know we have good people in Sarajevo: Reid, Mosley… I think Moore, too.”
“If Bojović’s people have had him for all this time I’m not sure he has time for that,” Mr Holmes said, reaching for one of the left-over egg rolls. Andrea couldn’t help smiling slightly because sometimes her boss was wonderfully predictable.
“I thought you’d say that when we finally found him,” she said, opening up another file on her laptop and turning it around for him to see. “I’ve started to make arrangements for you to leave for Serbia the day after tomorrow – I haven’t arranged the actual trip since I didn’t know where we were going to find him, but at least one of MI6’s smaller aeroplanes must be available even with this short notice.”
“As much as I appreciate your efficiency, there is no way to defend that type of resource use for… this.” Mr Holmes waved his hand. “There are enough regular flights to get me there.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir. Of course we can use national resources.” She handed him her phone with the text conversation still open. “There is an imminent terrorist threat directed at London.”
Mr Holmes raised his eyebrows at her before he took her phone to go over the details she had received from her source. “There’s always an imminent terrorist threat directed at London.”
“Isn’t it lovely?”
Mr Holmes glanced up for long enough to frown.
“What I mean is: we have a known terrorist threat and an anti-terrorist bill up for a vote in Parliament. Even a dead agent.” She smiled cockily. “I won’t have a problem convincing them that we need Sherlock Holmes back in London now.”
Mr Holmes looked at her with undisguised gratitude for a moment. “I will need a Serbian dictionary and all the audio files of the language you can gather.”
“Two hours?” she asked, muffling a yawn.
For a moment it looked like he was going to protest, she almost believed he was going to send her to bed, but instead he just nodded and got out of his chair. He left the room and when he came back he had carried a tray with freshly made tea and sandwiches. Andrea didn’t believe for a second that he had made any of it himself, but she recognised it as his way of saying thank you.
They had their tea, talking light-heartedly about the debate they had witnessed today, even shared a brief laugh, before turning their attention back to Serbia and what Andrea had unimaginatively named Project Baby Brother.
And outside it started to rain again.
Summary: It was nine weeks since Sherlock last contacted his brother and it is time to start tracking him down.
It had stopped raining when Mr Holmes and his assistant stepped out of Parliament. They had been to yet another debate about the proposed anti-terrorist bill the people seemed to think was going to rob them of their personal integrity. Andrea found that very naïve and endearing – like they had any privacy to begin with.
Mr Holmes looked up at the lingering grey clouds, as if contemplating whether to trust the sky or to turn up his umbrella.
“I will need your services tonight, Ms Somers,” he said without taking his eyes from the sky.
Previously when he had stated a request in this manner – especially in front of other people – she had been slightly annoyed by how much it made her sound like a prostitute. These days she knew that it meant he wanted help with a personal matter and at the moment “personal matter” could only mean one thing.
She still felt obligated to ask the rhetorical question: “He still hasn’t been in touch?”
“No.” Mr Holmes opened the car door for her. She slipped inside without another word, closely followed by him.
They rode in silence, Mr Holmes absently looking out through the window as he always did. Andrea took the opportunity to check her mobile, making absolutely sure that there had been no contact with Sherlock Holmes for the last nine weeks.
In their vigorous planning to bring Moriarty and his network down the Holmes brothers had agreed that Sherlock were to check in with Mycroft every third week by whatever means he had available at the time. If he failed to do so three times in a row Mycroft were to take action. This wasn’t the first time Sherlock had, for one reason or another, missed to contact his brother in time, but up until now the most overdue he had been was ninety-four hours. Today at noon, GMT, was the third check in that he had missed.
Andrea glanced at Mr Holmes as they stopped at a traffic light. He looked perfectly calm to her, with just the same mixture of boredom and discontent as he had shown during the entire terrorist debate. Perhaps she had been looking at him too closely during these last years and for some reason took “worried” to mean “normal”.
She lightly put her hand on his thigh. “Last we heard he was in Pernik heading for Vranje. His passport confirms he crossed the border sixty-seven days ago and twenty-nine days ago he withdrew Serbian dinars in Lescovac.”
Mr Holmes looked at her hand for a moment before meeting her eyes.
“I think he’s still in Serbia and that we will find him,” she said.
“I don’t doubt that we will,” he said, turning back to look out the window. “The question is in what state we’re going find him.”
Andrea turned back to her mobile to ignore the hard knot forming in her belly. The first thing she did when they got to the Diogenes Club, or rather the office space underneath it, was to put on a kettle and order dinner. When she joined him in the office he was already on the phone with the Bulgarians. She sat up camp at the opposite side of his desk, using a chair she’s brought from the corridor, and started to go through the paper trail, starting with Sherlock’s bank account.
It took them an hour and a half to feel secure in the conclusion that Sherlock hadn’t left Serbia. It took them another four hours to confirm that he had been in contact with the Serbian Information Agency, the BIA, eight days after their last contact with him. After that their luck seemed to run dry. It was way past midnight when Mr Holmes finally hung up the phone after having agreed to a not entirely moral trade with the Rumanians in exchange for information.
“Well?” Andrea asked, looking up from the text conversation she was having with her contact at the SIS (who didn’t understand why he wasn’t allowed to sleep).
“Yes.” Mr Holmes rubbed his face, sighing deeply.
“And he’s alive?”
Mr Holmes nodded, actually smiling a brief, relieved smile. “Three days ago, at least.”
“Are we going to extract him via Bosnia Herzegovina?” She asked, discarding her phone in favour of her laptop. “I know we have good people in Sarajevo: Reid, Mosley… I think Moore, too.”
“If Bojović’s people have had him for all this time I’m not sure he has time for that,” Mr Holmes said, reaching for one of the left-over egg rolls. Andrea couldn’t help smiling slightly because sometimes her boss was wonderfully predictable.
“I thought you’d say that when we finally found him,” she said, opening up another file on her laptop and turning it around for him to see. “I’ve started to make arrangements for you to leave for Serbia the day after tomorrow – I haven’t arranged the actual trip since I didn’t know where we were going to find him, but at least one of MI6’s smaller aeroplanes must be available even with this short notice.”
“As much as I appreciate your efficiency, there is no way to defend that type of resource use for… this.” Mr Holmes waved his hand. “There are enough regular flights to get me there.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir. Of course we can use national resources.” She handed him her phone with the text conversation still open. “There is an imminent terrorist threat directed at London.”
Mr Holmes raised his eyebrows at her before he took her phone to go over the details she had received from her source. “There’s always an imminent terrorist threat directed at London.”
“Isn’t it lovely?”
Mr Holmes glanced up for long enough to frown.
“What I mean is: we have a known terrorist threat and an anti-terrorist bill up for a vote in Parliament. Even a dead agent.” She smiled cockily. “I won’t have a problem convincing them that we need Sherlock Holmes back in London now.”
Mr Holmes looked at her with undisguised gratitude for a moment. “I will need a Serbian dictionary and all the audio files of the language you can gather.”
“Two hours?” she asked, muffling a yawn.
For a moment it looked like he was going to protest, she almost believed he was going to send her to bed, but instead he just nodded and got out of his chair. He left the room and when he came back he had carried a tray with freshly made tea and sandwiches. Andrea didn’t believe for a second that he had made any of it himself, but she recognised it as his way of saying thank you.
They had their tea, talking light-heartedly about the debate they had witnessed today, even shared a brief laugh, before turning their attention back to Serbia and what Andrea had unimaginatively named Project Baby Brother.
And outside it started to rain again.
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Date: 2014-02-08 06:57 pm (UTC)As always, much, much love for everything you've written!
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