Sherlock - The Game Is On!

The Hounds Of Baskerville- Five

Chapter Five

Henry Knights home - Daytime

To say Henry's home is enormous would be a understatement. A four-storey stone building that was probably, very important property of the area in the era of the past. A large old-fashioned glass conservatory is attached to the rear of the building on the ground floor and a modern two-storey glass extension has been built onto the side of the house to join it to another two-storey stone building nearby.

Walking hand in hand, John in tow, we head towards the conservatory, which looks run-down and clearly hasn't had a paint job in years, and walk across to the door on the opposite side. Sherlock rings the doorbell and Henry opens the door. "Hi."

"Hi." Wiping our feet Sherlock and I head down the hallway, but not before checking some rooms out. This is, uh... Are you, rich?" John tries to find the right words within his vocabulary. "Yeah."

"Right."  Henry leads off. Sherlock throws a dark look at John before following him. In the kitchen, the glass extension, Sherlock spoons two sugar lumps into his mug and stirs them in. Sitting on a stool at the central island, me in between the boys Henry stands at the side of the island gazing down at the work surface. "It's a couple of words. It's what I keep seeing. 'Liberty' and 'in.' It's just that. Are you finished?" Gesturing to the milk. I nod. "Mean anything to you?" John directs at us. " 'Liberty in death' isn't that the expression? The only true freedom." I respond. John and Sherlock nod in agreement.

"What now, then?"

"Sherlock's got a plan." John abbreviates. "Yes. We take you back out onto the moor..."

"Okay..." Henry nods, nervously. "And see if anything attacks you." I finished, drinking my tea. "What?!"

"That should bring things to a head."

"At night? You want me to go out there at night?" Henry questions further. "That's your plan?" John snorts. "Brilliant!"

"Got any better ideas?" I ask. "That's not a plan."

"Listen, if there is a monster out there, John, there's only one thing to do: find out where it lives." I directed. "Get ready about eight-ish, Henry." With that I down my tea and leave.

The Moors - Dusk

As night begins to fall, Henry leads us across the rocks towards Dewer's Hollow. We all carry flashlights to the uneven ground below our feet. Foxes scream repeatedly in the distance. By the time we reach the woods its practically dark and it becomes even darker when we head into the trees.

John, bringing up the rear, hears rustling to his right and turns around to look I turn to follow whilst Sherlock and Henry continue onwards. Walking cautiously towards the sound heard we shine our torches into the bushes as an owl shrieks overhead, but we see nothing. Raising our heads we see a light repeatedly winking on and off at the top of a hillside a fair distance away. John looks around to alert Sherlock. "Sher..." I smile at him. "Oh your here, that's good." He nods, agreeing with himself. Shining my flashlight in the direction they went, there's no sign of the boys. I glance back to the light on the hillside, which is still intermittently flashing, John gets his notebook out of his pocket and starts reading the morse code aloud. "U... M... Q... R... A. U, M, Q, R, A. Umqra?" He turns to me in question. "I've no idea what it means or stands for. Let's go back to Sherlock." Nodding his head in confirmation we head on.

"Sherlock..." We call out numerous times. Progressing onwards, we hear eerie metallic thrumming sounds. John aims his flashlight, whilst I cross my arms. Torch in one hand, handgun in the other in the direction of the sound, then goes to move onwards just as the thrum sound picks up again. The sound continues to repeat, now interspersed with short metallic pings. We walk towards the sound, with caution. John quietly chuckles when he sees a rusty metal container, possibly an oil drum, which is lying in the undergrowth. Water is dripping from the tree above it and causing the thrums and pings as it strikes the drum. I sigh in relief however, something massive flashes past behind us.

We spin around and look but it's already gone, but a couple of seconds later an anguished animalistic howl sounds in the distance. We turn and begin to hurry to find the others. We begin to run to get to the others. Another long anguished howl rings out.

Very shortly afterwards, We finally make it to the other two making their way back. "Did you hear that?" John refers to the howling. Sherlock seemed to be having non of it though so he storms straight passed John, grabbing me in tow. "We saw it. We saw it." Henry states scared but proud of the achievement. "No. I didn't see anything." Sherlock dismisses. "What? What are you talking about?"

"I didn't. See. Anything." Sherlock spits out. I turn to look at him. Somethings wrong. Picking up pace, we leave John and Henry to trial along. Or at least attempt. "Sherlock?" I question, delicately. He does nothing but squeeze my hand a little tighter.

Oh Sherlock.