I'M MEETING HER FATHER

We were walking to the Taxi cab when a man with an eye-patch ran into me. He dropped his roses, so I picked them up for him. The price tag dropped, and unbeknownst to me, I thought he might want it back, so unwittingly I offered it to him. He asked if I could throw it away for him, and I said I would. Little did I know that this price tag would be the clue to one of the most gorish cases we had ever worked on together.

My name is Jonathan "Johnny" William, the year is 2227, I am a graduated college student working two part-time jobs; on the side I am a metal worker, turning scraps of metal into art. At the moment I am speaking to my friend's father, Richard "Dick" Holmes. Appropriate name if you ask me.

"And how did you meet my daughter, Jonathan?" I shuddered at the way he asked, the end of his sentence almost resembling a growl.

"W-well," I could slap myself for stuttering like a school girl. "I met her quite a few months ago near Black Cane-"

"Ah, I always thought she might visit that bar, now my suspicions are confirmed." I cleared my

throat at being interrupted, talking about being a 'Dick'.

"Near the bar, sir, near it. as I was saying, I was passing Black Cane on my way to work when I saw two figures in an alley way. I thought nothing of it at first, until I noticed one of them collapse after taking a swig of beer, I believe it was. I rushed to assist the fallen person when I saw the person giving out drinks was a recently registered sex offender that would used a old version of the 'Date Rape' drug to capture his victims. We got into a fist fight, but the fact that he was already drunk was a factor that helped me win pretty quickly." I puffed my chest out in pride, although maybe I shouldn't have because it was a drunk man I had defeated.

"After making sure the sex offender was properly taken care of, I brought Sherlock to my apartment to nurse back to health. When she came to, she started spouting the ingredients used in the drug used on her. I had stared at her for a moment before remarking that she's a bit of a weirdo. We got into some small talk when she asked if I would share my apartment and that she'd be willing to pay half the rent." I finished my story just as Sherlock walked into Richard's office.

"Ah, speak of the devil," Dick said as he scolded at his daughter. "I have a case for you . . ." he went to his desk and got a stack of papers so thick that they were nearly exploding from the manila envelope, "and I think it may interest you."

"What's the-" Richard interrupted her.

"Remember the case brought to us a few years ago? The murders?" He raised his eyebrows at

her, as if they were exchanging some type of code that an outsider could not crack.

"Yes, of course."

"It looks as if the same murderer is on the loose again. The people once thought to be in jail seem to have some type of connections, possibly using people in debt to them as slaves to continue their murders."

Sherlock looked through the file, both her and I knew that the mob wasn't the perpetrator of these horrific crimes. Perhaps she was just lonely… perhaps something else but one day she told me the truth of her past. She was in fact a murderer, the same one from years ago, the mob had nothing to do with any of the murders. It was impossible, but who else besides Sherlock could know exactly how these crimes could be committed?

Dick revealed two pictures within the envelope, one from almost ten years ago, and the other from no more than five days ago. Both used the exact same methods. I looked at Sherlock with terror, not knowing if it would be fit to trust her anymore. She looked at the pictures with a blank face, appearing to have no emotion.

"I think this case is solvable," Sherlock looked down at her watch, "do you have anymore paperwork for me?"

"No, good luck." Dick smirked with sarcasm. I couldn't help but hate him, but neither could Sherlock. We went outside to review the case with one another.

I watched Sherlock take a quick look at the folder containing information of our present case, her shoulders slumping a tad. She let out a quiet sigh, quickly snapping the folder closed.

"What is it?" Sherlock glanced at me.

"My father is a fool," Sherlock handed me a section from the folder. "We know for certain this is a different killer." I raised my eyebrow at her, this isn't the first time she has berated her father. But I can't question it, she is a genius brought to us from a whole other world, and if berating her father calms her down, that's okay with me. Though some might disagree and say she is a devil.

"What is it you wanted me to see?" I gestured to the paper in my hand, trying to push the fact that she had first done this out of my mind.

"Look closely, Jonathan." Sherlock barely looked at me.

"Yes, your majesty." I read everything over, examined the pictures over several times. "Well, the pictures of the crime are a tad different… I mean, the rose in this one is by the side of the head, but that's all I've noticed." I looked over to Sherlock.

"Ah, a mind that could be used for many things, yet it is filled with nothing but trash. I wonder what it must be like." I lightly hit Sherlock over the head, grinning. I could never take her seriously when she acted like she was an adult while the rest of us were mere children.

"What I wanted you to see is that our murderer made a clumsy mistake," Sherlock moved her hand over her jet black hair, brushing it down from where I hit it. "It means that this must be the criminal's first murder. Hm, we may need more time to look it over."

I sighed, sitting down on a nearby hover bench, running my hands over my face. "But I don't have time," I whined to Sherlock.

I looked around when Sherlock didn't respond like she normally would when I whined.

"Sherrie?" I heard Sherlock scoff at the nickname. "What should we do now?"

I heard Sherlock walk up behind me, and place her hands over my eyes. "Sh, let me think," I sat still, being quiet so she could think. "Something is missing from the equation."

'Something missing from the equation'? I would never understand her. Or any woman for that matter. Having to sit still, I let my mind wander. I starting thinking about what I should create next with my metal art.

"Scene." I jumped.

"What?" I tried pulling her hand off my eyes to look at her, but she wouldn't allow me to. "We need to go to the crime scene. Mistakes. Evidence. Small things the police wouldn't notice."

She started rambling, speaking in bullet points. This was one women I would never understand, even if I tried for a million years.

"Then what exactly are we waiting for?" I smiled widely at her, my excitement at working with her on another case together, making my blood boil. She was always so fascinating to watch as she "puzzled" over the small clues left behind.

"Yes. Lets get a taxi and head on over to the first crime scene, Johnny." I chuckled, she always made it sound like she was trying to insult my nickname.

"Taxi!"

We arrived at the crime scenes quickly, Sherlock barely even glanced at the bodies before telling me to take samples to bring to a lab.

Sherlock looked on the ground and noticed a piece of paper laying on the cold, wet concrete.

"A price tag, for roses…"

I jumped up, seeing the similarity, something from earlier that day, and from my hand pocket I extracted a small piece of paper. It was similar to the same price tag to the one she was holding, everything except the bar code numbers.

"When we were getting a taxi to your father's office, a man wearing an eye patch dropped some roses, and this price tag."

"An eye patch, huh?" She took both the papers in her hand. "I think I might know who is committing these murders."

AFTER LAB EXPERIMENTATION

"I know these bodies are older than my father thinks they are. They are on the lawns of my victims . . . and I think he is just trying to trick Dick. The lab said that the blood cells were suffering from severe dehydration and warping, and compared to the other bodies, some of the blood cells were in fact still hydrated and non-deformed. My hypothesis is that maybe he is striking at places that are in fact predictable, but he is preserving the bodies so he can hide them in seemingly random places. Maybe the body found in the alley was merely a place for hiding, until he could place the body somewhere in plain sight," Sherlock said, "All we have to do is find his next place to strike, and we will have him in our grasp… I might know where to look next."

Watching Sherlock working on this case so far made me realize she might have changed from the time she had committed that mass murder from six years ago. I have been working with her for a few months now, and I know I can trust her if she is working this "hard" to find this murderer.

ON THE LAWN

I had never been a part of a steak out before . . it was awfully boring, but nonetheless Sherlock still found a way to entertain my ignorant mind until our perpetrator drove up. Although all we had was a small sudan, somehow the police force managed to jam a sniper rifle and two large men fit to tackle an elephant in the back seat. No one else was out because of the curfew put on after the rise in night-time crime.

Weirdly enough, a car… one that was illegally out during the night, pulled in front of a home.

"Ahh, as I suspected . . ." Sherlock said. It wouldn't be until a year later that I found how she knew he was going to strike there. It was the lawn of the family of her sixteenth victim, and this was his sixteenth crime.

"Shoot his tires." Sherlock said smoothly. Three explosions fired, not a single shot was wasted. He couldn't run.

The buff men took their shotguns over to the van and pointed them into the window, screaming for the man to come out of the car. Put his hands on the vehicle. Cuffed his wrists. He was gone.

A month later Sherlock's files were all set, aligning the evidence together (including a dead body in the trunk of the man's car, and roses in the back seat).

I asked Sherlock how she knew exactly where the murderer would go, she hesitated in her answer. It wasn't one of those hesitations one would make when gathering their thoughts, Sherlock's hesitation seemed to be out of shame, or embarrassment.

"He was a victim of the mass murder I committed those many years ago. I was only thirteen, I was careless, and I made a mistake by not checking my victims thoroughly; I came to this conclusion after you had told me that he wore an eye patch. So he grew up planning this, but I highly doubt he planned on me being a genius with his childlike thinking. He's also a copy cat, and everyone knows copy-cats never win."

I smirked towards Sherlock, laughter bubbling up in my chest. Of course she would point out the fact that she is, indeed, a genius.