Lestrade was trying, and failing, to keep his temper with the journalists. One had claimed to have had seen the 'Fallen Detective' wandering the streets, and, of course, the rumour had spread like wildfire. After much pestering and weeks of having his mailbox stuffed with requests to take an interview about the possible return of Sherlock, Lestrade finally decided to resolve the problem and give the journalists their interview. He felt bad about blatantly denying the fact that Sherlock could still be alive, as he knew that a public confrontation on the topic of Sherlock would not help John's condition. Even after three years, John was still grieving over his best friend's death and it had been getting harder to keep in contact with him.

"Donovan!" Lestrade called irritably.

The sergeant came hurrying over, carrying various folders under her arm.

"Yes, sir?"

Lestrade took a deep breath and nodded. "All right, let's go. Let's just get this interview over with, no disclosing any details of the autopsy and try not to upset John too much."

The moment Lestrade, flanked by Donovan, walked briskly into the conference hall, they were greeted with seemingly never – ending bright flashes of the journalists' cameras and shouts of "Over here!". Lestrade and Donovan took their seats at the long table amid the flashes of light, Donovan noisily dropping her stack of notes down on the table. Lestrade put his hands together on the table top and pressed his lips together, surveying the crowd of journalists. Out of the corner of his eye he saw John limp in, leaning heavily on his cane, a hollow, unreadable expression on his face. Lestrade tried to catch his eye and nodded in his direction, but John didn't seem to notice the brief greeting. He sat heavily down in a chair in a corner, away from the reporters. Hope the poor guy doesn't get mobbed by the press, Lestrade thought. Unfortunately for him, all the attention was turned to the Detective Inspector at the moment. "First question," Lestrade stated, and he mentally prepared himself for the oncoming melee of questions.

John sat and brooded in the corner, almost forgetting the main purpose of his coming to the interview. It had taken him days to pluck up the courage to go to the conference after Lestrade had informed him of it. Originally, John had decided to come to the interview to ensure that Lestrade hadn't given any revealing information or intruding questions had been asked by the reporters. Although the conference would have lasted only a while, it had still taken much of his courage for him to come. John had taken Sherlock's death very badly. His limp had returned with a vengeance and the trembling in his left hand was frequent. He was no longer the John that Scotland Yard knew, but there was little they did that actually managed to cheer John even the slightest bit. Somewhere in the whirlwind of his thoughts, he heard Lestrade call for the first question from the group of journalists.

A reporter in the front row, a short woman with large framed glasses and hair pulled back in a strict bun, called out: "Is it true that Sherlock Holmes is a fake?" John felt a sudden swell of anger and snapped out of his thoughts. Of course Sherlock wasn't a fake! He looked at Lestrade, expecting him to come to Sherlock's defense. Lestrade's eyebrows knitted together, clearly disagreeing with the question, and opened his mouth to respond. However, nobody there was prepared for what happened next.

A loud chorus of notification tones rang throughout the conference hall, and all the journalists fell silent. Lestrade glanced at Donovan, a look of utter disbelief and confusion written all over his face. Donovan had an expression of pure shock all over her face, but she quickly wiped the expression off and quickly whipped out her phone. Meanwhile, everyone else was hastily doing the same.

When John heard the strange chorus of messages, his head snapped up to look around the room. It can't be. John badly wanted to believe it was his best friend, that Sherlock was back. But it couldn't be possible. He had watched Sherlock jump off St. Bart's hospital, watched him fall and hit the ground with a sickening thud. The memory of his best friend lying in the rapidly spreading pool of blood came back to him, and he reeled back, squeezing his eyes shut as if the memory had forcibly hit him. Just someone playing a prank, he decided.

Until one of the journalists said uneasily: "It says 'Wrong!'.

Deathly silence spread throughout the room. John yanked his mobile out of his trouser pocket, fingers fumbling with the keys in his haste to open the message. Just as the reporter had said, the message read 'Wrong!". John stared at the message until the screen blurred. He slowly raised his head to meet Lestrade's gaze. Lestrade clearly had confusion and shock written all over his face as he stared back at John in disbelief. Donovan quickly cleared her throat. "Next question."

Lestrade mentally thanked Donovan for her quick input as he sat dumbly in his chair, trying to process what he just saw. It couldn't possibly be Sherlock. Molly had examined the corpse in the morgue, and turned in a report. It had to be a prank. Just a prank. He took a deep breath and shut his eyes. Just as Lestrade was scrambling to collect his thoughts and regain his composure, the next question threw him off again. "Is Sherlock Holmes actually dead?"

The chorus of notification tones sounded even faster this time. A heavy curtain of silence hung anew in the air. Just like the first message, the messages also read 'Wrong!'. Lestrade glanced at John. He looked as if he'd lose his lunch any minute. That is, if he had eaten any lunch.

John felt like he would start crying right there and then when the second round of messages came. What a cruel trick someone was playing! Roughly grabbing his mobile as he blinked away the tears that threatened to fall, he stared at the screen again. It was the exactly same as the first message, directly answering the journalists' question. He looked up, trying to find anyone in the crowd who could possibly be responsible. However, upon finding the same dumbfounded expression on every face in the room, he shut his eyes and took a few deep breaths to calm his raging emotions. Just a mean joke that some hacker was playing.

"Last question!" Lestrade hastily asserted, in an attempt to break the expectant silence. "DI Lestrade, did you expect this to happen?" A man in a suit shouted.

"Of course I didn't! We can't yet confirm if these messages are being sent by Sherlock himself, but we will definitely look into this matter." With that, Lestrade abruptly stood up and strode off the platform at the front of the room, Donovan at his heels.

For a moment, the press didn't know what to make of the events in the last half – hour. Surprisingly, they didn't swarm after Lestrade and Donovan like they usually would have. They slowly began to pack up their equipment and leave. Luckily, many of them missed John, who was still seated in his corner and staring dumbly ahead. Just a joke, he told himself. It's just a prank.