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Disclaimer: I don't own anything, I'm just borrowing things for a while and I promise I'll put everything back exactly how I found it when I've finished. Well, almost exactly how I found it. ;)
SH-SH-SH-SH-SH-SH
Watson tries to storm into the room but fails due to the rather large bag he's dragging laboriously behind himself. Of course, the bag is squirming, which doesn't help matters, and occasionally an exclamation, albeit muffled, of *'Well, really!'* can be heard.
"I wish to register a complaint!" Watson announces loudly.
The only other live person in the room, with the exception of the body in the bag, who is supposed to be dead, doesn't reply. Watson starts to think that maybe he took the shop owner home instead, and that his dead purchase is stood in front of him.
"Hello. Miss?" Watson tries again, keeping his voice as mild as possible.
"What do you mean, 'miss'?" Lestrade asks, clearly offended, as he turns and scowls.
Watson is horrified at his mistake. "I'm sorry…I have a cold," he replies sheepishly. A few quiet, awkward moments pass. Then he remembers why he's there. "I wish to register a complaint!"
"Good fer you. We're closin' fer lunch."
Watson shakes his head firmly. "Never mind that, my good, er, man. I wish to complain about this detective I picked up not half an hour ago from this very facility." He points to the bag. Through a hole in the bag, an eyeball glares back.
*"Excuse me."*
Lestrade stares. "You don't have to say 'excuse me'. Already talkin' to you, ain't I?"
"I didn't say anything," Watson replies. "And don't change the subject."
"A detective? From 'ere? Don't think so." Lestrade shakes his head. End of the story.
Watson has other ideas. Another seven chapters to go at least. Well prepared, he takes a carefully folded receipt from his waistcoat pocket. "See this? It's a receipt from here, saying you sold me a detective!"
Lestrade takes the receipt. "Oh yeah." Screwing the paper us, he throws it at the glaring eyeball.
*"Ow."*
"It's, uh, it's the, uh, Sherlock Holmes, yeah? Best consulting defective…I mean, detective we've got. Well, had until you bought him. So, uh, what's…what's wrong wiv 'im?"
"I'll tell you what's wrong with him," Watson says, finally getting irate. "He's dead, that's what's wrong with him!"
Lestrade kicks the body bag.
*"Do that again and I'll chew your ankles off."*
"Nah. 'E ain't dead, just…restin'. Yeah, that's it. 'E's restin'," Lestrade says.
Watson shakes him head. "Look, I know a dead detective when I see one, and this one's dead!"
*"Watson, your deductive powers as so non-existent, they won't emerge from their current amoeba state for another two thousand years!"*
"No, no, 'e's not dead," Lestrade insists. "'E's…'e's resting, see? Remarkable detective, the Sherlock Holmes, innit? Beautiful pluuuumage!"
*"I was about to remark upon the sanity of at least one person in this room, but now I see he is as crazy as you, Watson! Let me out of here!"*
"The plumage does not enter into it," Watson says firmly, completely oblivious to the not-so-dead-detective talking. "He's stone dead. And I want a refund."
The notion of giving money back to a customer makes Lestrade start to panic. "Nononono, no, no! He's restin'!"
Watson thinks this would be amusing if it was happening to someone else. "All right then, if he's just resting, I'll wake him up." He starts to shout at the body. "Hello, Mister Sherlock Holmes! I've got a lovely fresh cup of coffee for you if you show.…"
Lestrade tries to kick the body again, but his aim is a little off and he ends up standing on it in a rather tender place, causing the body to flap like a fish out of water. "There, 'e moved!" Lestrade exclaims.
*"You…idiot…I'll…kill…you!"*
"No, he didn't, that was you nudging him!" Watson replies.
"I never!"
"Yes, you did!"
Lestrade shakes his head so hard he gives himself vertigo. "I never, never did anythin'...ever did nothin'…not me…twernt."
Watson stares for a moment while he decides the best course of action. Beating the living daylights out of Lestrade wouldn't accomplish anything, and he certainly wouldn't be getting a refund if that was the course of action he took. However, Watson feels the sudden need to be violent to someone, and as a result, the body in the bag starts to get battered. "Hello, Sherlock Holmes! Wakey waaaayyyykey!" he shouts loudly. "This is your nine o'clock alarm call!"
*"Watson, if you do not lower you voice, I will break your neck."*
Lestrade watches in mild amusement as Watson attempts to lift the body up into the air; he manages to get the head off the floor before giving it up as a bad job, dropping the head unceremoniously.
*"OW!"*
"Now that's what I call a dead detective," Watson remarks.
But Lestrade isn't giving up so easily. "No, no... No, 'e's stunned!"
"*Stunned*?" Watson asks incredulously.
"Yeah! 'E wuz just wakin' up and you stunned 'im!" Lestrade explains as one would explain astrophysics to an amoeba. "Amateur detectives like Sherlock Holmes 'ere stun dead easy."
"Now look here…whatever you are, I've definitely had enough of this," Watson says impatiently. "That detective is definitely deceased, yet when I picked him up not half an hour ago, you assured me that his total lack of movement was due to him being tired and shagged out after a long…actually, you didn't say what."
"What what?" Lestrade asks, easily confused.
"A long what?"
"What?"
Watson decides, for the sake of his meagre amount of sanity now left, he will abandon this particular line of conversation. "Never mind. Look, this detective is dead."
"Nah, 'e's…'e's, ah...well, 'e's probably pining for his landlady," Lestrade explains.
"*Pining* for his *landlady?* What kind of talk is that?" Watson shakes him head. "Look, I took the liberty of examining that detective when I got him home, and I discovered the only reason that he had to be bought with that damn armchair was because he'd been *nailed* there!"
"'Course 'e was nailed there," Lestrade replies in a tone of voice that makes it all sound perfectly normal. "If I hadn't nailed 'im down, 'e'd 'ave sidled up to the door, forced it open with the crowbar 'e keeps…well, don't matter where 'e keeps it, and voom!"
"Voom?" Watson repeats sceptically.
Lestrade nods enthusiastically. "VOOM!" he repeats, making hand motions to go with it. Though how one makes hand motions for 'voom', Watson isn't really sure.
"This detective wouldn't 'voom' if you put four million volts through him!" Watson says in total exasperation. "He's bloody well demised!"
"No, no! 'E's pining!" Lestrade insists.
Watson finally reaches the end of his tether. "He's not pining! He's passed on! This detective is no more! He has ceased to be! He's expired and gone to meet his maker! He's a stiff! Bereft of life, he rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed him to his armchair he'd be pushing up the daisies! His metabolic processes are now history! He's off the twig! He's kicked the bucket, he's shuffled off his mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bloody choir invisible! All statements to the effect that this detective is still going are, henceforth, inoperative!" He takes a deep breath. *"This is a dead amateur detective!"*
*"I think I must have passed out for a moment. Have I missed anything? Obviously not. Look, I am not dead! Quite obviously."*
Lestrade pauses, a nice, long, theatrical pause. "Well, I'd better replace 'im, then, innit?" He looks around the room. As it's completely empty, it doesn't take long. "Ah. Sorry, luv, but, uh, we're right out of high-rankin' coppers."
"I see. I see, I get the picture." Watson's tone could strip the hulls of oil tankers encrusted with barnacles.
*"At least you 'get' something, Watson, because you certainly don't understand the difference between the living and the dead! And you're a doctor? I shudder to think how that abomination occurred!"*
"I've got a Mycroft," Lestrade says after thinking for a long time. A long, long time.
"Does it talk?" Watson asks, suddenly mild-mannered again.
Lestrade shakes him head. "No, no, it don't. Silent a grave."
Watson pauses before nodding firmly. "Right, I'll have that one then."
Lestrade snaps his fingers and in walks Mycroft.
"Lucky bastard. How come you get to walk about and I have to play dead to this…this…*imbecile?"*
Mycroft doesn't reply. At least that's one product that does what it says on the label. Watson nods, satisfied with his purchase, and leaves the room, Mycroft trailing behind him.
"Bloody customers," Lestrade mutters.
*"Excuse me."*
Lestrade freezes. "Who said that?"
*"I did."*
"You're dead!" Lestrade tells the not-so-dead body.
Holmes, finally tired of lying on the cold, hard floor, springs to his feet. "Now listen to me, you…." He never gets to finish his tirade; Lestrade faints dead onto the floor. "Well really!"
FIN