The Cold Case {Sherlock/Johnlock}

ONE

Sherlock had hailed a taxi, and now he and Watson were rattling down the wide streets of central London in the back, both of them deep in thought though for very different reasons. John's was a significant degree of trepidation- Sherlock had used the 'game is on' line again, and the only memories he had of anything coming after that didn't tend to be very pleasant. It was a good job there was some tiny warped part of John that craved the adrenaline and excitement that came with trying to solve a case with Sherlock (by that, he meant 'following Holmes around in the hopes he wasn't going to shout at him'), because he would have, by now, utterly despaired with his flatmate.

"Have you got any ideas?" John asked suddenly, the end of his train of thought becoming almost unintentionally audible.

Sherlock shrugged with just one shoulder, though it was a fluid and measured movement- barely a shrug, really, but the closest thing that the detective could express. He sniffed against the London cold that somehow still managed to worm its way through the gaps between the windows in the taxi. "Nothing solid."

John grimaced slightly. "Is this a good idea, Sherlock? It's an old case, don't forget."

The detective sniffed again, and affixed his flatmate with a serious stare. "I've got all the files, John." That part, at least, was true. There was a large stack of papers on the seat next to Sherlock, balancing precariously since he'd left them in the hopes they wouldn't fall over. It had taken about fifteen minutes of trawling through the archives and avoiding the judgemental stares from the officers who worked there to find the files on the murder of Michael Clare. A lot of them were filed incorrectly, there were several missing, and Walker had made it perfectly clear that the rest of the force couldn't give half a shit about the case of Michael Clare, and were only keeping the files at all because they were obliged to. No matter how cold the case, if it was lying unsolved- the files weren't allowed to move anywhere from the central archives.

That didn't explain why Sherlock Holmes was now transporting a rather large amount of them in a taxi across London for no reason other than that he was bored, and the case had been intriguing him since his beginning days as a detective. It did explain, however, the fact that the archive facility would soon be receiving a significantly large photocopying bill, and John was still uncomfortably warm from running to Sherlock from the copying room and back again for the majority of the afternoon. Walker knew what he was doing- though he was alone in that. Everyone else who worked in the archives had simply left Sherlock to it, and hoped that it wasn't going to affect them. If he managed to find anything at all.

"If it could be solved with files, Sherlock, they'd have done it by now."

Sherlock had sunk into a hunchbacked posture since he'd last spoken, his balled fist covering his mouth, his expression one of deep thought. At John's remark, though, he took his hand away to reveal one of his trademark knowing smirks.

"Actually John, I disagree."

There was something so unmoving in the detective's expression that John decided- to best keep ahold of the remaining shreds of sanity that he had where his flatmate was concerned- simply not to even ask him further. He must have had some kind of plan, no matter how insignificant or indefinite, because Watson knew that assured manner far too well. He consoled himself with the fact that maybe this case would prove too hard for even Sherlock, and it would be abandoned soon enough. Then he could try and convince his flatmate to actually get a proper job, because the times that John had been left stranded in Asda without means to pay for the bread and toilet roll were beginning to reach the tens. Accepting dodgy cheques from Mycroft wasn't an option, either.