Sherlock - The Game Is On!

The Great Game- Five

Chapter Five

It was a bleary morning.

A proper greasy spoon...

Plastic ketchup tomatoes, smeary menus, truck drivers. Lovely grub. A battered TV on a shelf, around turned down, is showing bland daytime TV.

John was shovelling down rounds of bacon at the local café. I sat occupying a cup of tea and Sherlock was sat opposite, anxiously biting his lip. The pink iPhone was on the table in the middle of us. "Feeling better?" I asked John.

"Mm! Christ, we haven't stopped for breath since this thing started... Has it ever occurred to you..."

"Probably."

"No! I mean has it ever occurred to you that the bomber's playing a game with you. The envelope. Breaking into the other flat. The dead kid's shoes. It's all meant for You. And now Michelle is pulled into it somehow because of who she is?"

"Yes. I know." A small smile was plastered on Sherlock's face. This isn't a game. It never was. "So? What you talked to Lestrade about. Is it... Them?"

"Them?"

"This organization. Crime. Whatever! Moriaty."

"Perhaps, John." I stated, drinking my tea. The iPhone beeps and I swipe it before Sherlock can. "Behave!" I growled at him. He pouted.

You have one new message.

Beep.

Beep.

Beep.

On the iPhone another picture appears. A hard-faced, middle-aged women with heavily mascara-covered eyes. "Could be anyone."

"Could be. Lucky for you two, I've been more than a little unemployed." He paused in his talking. We both look at him curiously. "Let me bask in it guys. I know something you don't." He laughed. "Go on." I urged John. "Mrs Hudson and I watch far too much telly." He gets up picks up the grubby remote, flicking through channels. Sherlock and I watch until the iPhone goes off. Sherlock answers. "Hello?"

"This one... is a bit... defective. Sorry... she's... blind. This is... a fun... one. I'll give you... twelve hours..."

"Why are you doing this?"

"I like...to watch you.. dance but don't... worry, the... next one... will be... Michelle's." The line goes dead. We look to the TV, a new channel channeling to us, with the same women on screen from the iPhone. The running strapline 'Make-over queen Connie Prince dead at 48'. "There's really only one thing we can do with that ensemble, don't you think?" An unseen audience start chanting 'off!' over and over again. Kenny grins long-sufferingly as Connie starts to pull of his trousers...

Connie Prince lies prone on the morgue slab. Lestrade was reading the report: "Connie Prince. 48. Had one of those make-over shows on the telly. Very popular. She was going places."

"Not any more. So, dead two days. According to one of her staff, Raoul de Santos. She cut her hand on a rusty nail in the garden. Nasty wound. Tetanus bacteria enters the bloodstream. Good night, Vienna."

"I suppose." John said, unsure of the statement. "So what's wrong with the picture? Can't be as simple as it seems or the bomber wouldn't be directing us towards it. Something's wrong." I get out Sherlock magnifier, that I swiped from him ages ago, and quickly examine the scratch. "John. That cut on her hand. Would of bled a lot, right?"

"Yes."

"The wound is clean. Very clean. And fresh. How long would you say, the bacteria would have been incubating inside of her?"