Sally Donovan was by no means a simple woman, but she was straightforward. Honesty and an intolerance for bullshit meant she could talk about herself with ease and at length when she wished to; she knew she enjoyed sex, that straightening her hair wasn't worth the effort, and that she was damn good at her job.

Being damn good at her job meant knowing full well who else was, or wasn't. Gillion was good with the press, Manning was the best in forensics - Anderson had a cute arse, but his brain wasn't worth more than the occasional shag - and Plant might have a ditzy voice, but she had a head for numbers and names that put everyone else to shame.

Lestrade was better than all of them combined, and that made Sherlock Holmes all the more disturbing.

'Disturbing' felt like the right word; 'annoying' didn't cover it, and she'd seen enough not to be frightened by him. Even so, it was creepy as Hell to watch him poke around crime scenes like some pale and particularly sociopathic ghost when she knew in her gut some day they'd be looking at a scene he'd made himself.

She rather wished when the time came that it wouldn't be John Watson's corpse lying around; John seemed pleasant enough, and it was easier to forget about a murder when you didn't recall the victim's voice. Without a voice, a corpse was just a corpse. She hoped John's misguided tolerance of Sherlock turning into a misguided friendship with him wasn't a bad omen for the future.

.

She hated Lestrade's belief that they needed Sherlock. Sure, the freak had a good eye for details - she wasn't stupid, didn't hate him enough to forget he could be useful - but the withholding details and evidence and the constant, constant belittling was painful to watch. Sherlock was a brat, plain and simple - spoilt, precocious, and far too pleased with his own cleverness. Lestrade was smart enough not to take any of the criticism to heart but she knew better than to write off the behaviour as 'acceptable'.

Sherlock was a mine of useful information that just happened to be laced with poison, and she'd seen enough poison to last a lifetime already. Lestrade was competent enough to do the job on his own instead of using Sherlock as a cheat sheet, and until Lestrade believed that she was happy to keep reminding him.

The maddening thing about Lestrade was his potential. Sherlock didn't allow true idiots to bother him - there was no point in getting worked up over a hopeless case - but when someone had the potential to be brighter than they allowed themselves to be, it was an irritation he could not avoid.

Most people, 'normal' people, rooted themselves in particular kinds of thinking and would not be budged. They had chosen their areas of expertise, their opinions and interests, and they were content in maintaining those choices. Despite the vast wealth of knowledge to be soaked up and enjoyed, people opted to blind themselves to all but a safe few subjects.

It was frustrating enough to see the average person do this, but the average person only had so much brain power; even if they did open themselves up to new experiences, there wasn't much they could gain in doing so. When someone like Lestrade did it, decided that they didn't know or understand something and didn't honestly try to until someone else explained it for them, it was incredibly annoying.

John was another peculiarity altogether, because where Lestrade appeared to have decided what his limitations were, John appeared to have no concept of his own. He learned almost by osmosis, rarely needing a second explanation of anything, and linking together facts he'd already picked up on quickly. Often incorrectly, yes, but with John there was more than mere potential - with John there were signs of genuine talent, but little confidence in his ability to use it. He'd hesitate at calling John invaluable, but it was pleasant to see someone who not only admired his methods but attempted to mimic them; perhaps more than pleasant. Flattering.

Sherlock refused to consider Lestrade a failure; the man was too bright to write off as incompetent, unlike the hapless crew he worked with. He often required more guidance than Sherlock was willing to give, but the very fact he accepted guidance was a point in his favour.

Perhaps it was unwise to leave John and Lestrade together when he was absorbed in his own work, but he couldn't help hoping that perhaps whatever made John different would rub off on Lestrade. If being around incompetents had left Lestrade's mind a little inflexible, perhaps being around someone like John would leave him open to change.

It was worth a shot, and Sherlock had always been fond of social experiments.

It started to make sense for John when he first heard "if we're very, very lucky, he might even be a good one."

It made more sense when over a half dire, half amazing fish and chips dinner - fantastic beer batter, but the potatoes had turned to mush - Lestrade said, "You can see it too, can't you?"

"Sorry, what?"

"That he's lying through his teeth about the sociopath thing." Lestrade shrugged, eyeing his remaining chips with a grimace before binning the tray and licking his fingers. John pretended not to notice. "He could care if he wanted to. He just doesn't. Sometimes wish I could pull the same trick."

John gurned involuntarily on taking another mouthful of his own appalling chips, having been too distracted by conversation to think about discarding his too; he'd understood easily why Lestrade, why anyone would go to Sherlock for help, but Lestrade didn't need to accompany him most of the time. To crime scenes, sure - but on fact finding missions that didn't involve witnesses or suspects? He didn't have to be there. That alone suggested a fondness on Lestrade's part and a level of acceptance on Sherlock's; given neither man was particularly vocal about their affections, John was left piecing together the clues.

It had been a wise decision to eat first and walk slowly instead of walking fast and eating later; Sherlock ran up from the river bank, proudly waving a bloated, detached human arm and shouting, "Either the Thames has a plague of vicious stickleback with a taste for swimmers, or we have our missing artist! Well, part of him."

"You should take a photo and stick it on the fridge," Lestrade said. "Tell him mum is very proud."

"I'm not his mum," John grouched, ignoring the inner voice saying really? Are you sure?

"You'll get used to it," Lestrade said. "We all are. At least, anyone he almost respects." He chewed his lips for a moment. "Maybe not you."

John ignored the jibe and grinned despite himself, Lestrade's position on Sherlock something he understood in that instant. For better or worse, Lestrade had adopted Sherlock, and Sherlock was a child who had never quite grown out of the "Why?" stage of childhood. "You're right. I'm more of a dad."

.

While John had experienced some success in figuring out Lestrade, Sherlock still had the habit of surprising him. He couldn't honestly call it an irritating habit - the constant whirlwind of activity around Sherlock, not to mention the whiplash changes of mood, meant John never felt bored. John didn't consider himself to be the suicidal type, but he knew boredom was poison; Sherlock was the antidote.

It was still exhausting to actually live with the man, and after spending the better part of a week chasing missing body parts and the providers of said missing parts, John's body opted to remind him that two hours of sleep for every twenty spent awake was insufficient, leaving him collapsed on the couch.

Given his usually being a light sleeper, it was a little strange to wake up with Sherlock's dressing gown draped across him and the union jack cushion usually reserved for the armchair tucked under his head. He didn't say anything when Sherlock later reclaimed the dressing gown, and didn't need to, Sherlock's fidgeting and rambling, unrelated conversation vocal enough. It was an odd mixture of satisfying and irritating to see; satisfying because it proved Sherlock cared - flatteringly enough, about him at that - and irritating because John couldn't pin down why he warranted special treatment. Sherlock didn't 'do' friends, or so he'd heard on many an occasion from concerned third parties.

.

It would be another month before John heard the words "I'm contemplating an affair", and had them followed up by Sherlock deciding to kiss him.

While punching Sherlock would have been melodramatic, he had to admit he was tempted; he settled for kissing Sherlock back angrily instead. Yes, he was pissed at being lied to; yes, he was pissed at Sherlock choosing the Tower of London as an appropriately romantic and private place for making the advance; mostly, he was pissed because Sherlock's kissing him meant Lestrade had beaten him to guessing at the nature of their relationship.

John might not be a military man any longer, technically speaking, but damned if he was giving up the right to be competitive.

"If it's any consolation, I wasn't certain this would happen either," Sherlock admitted afterwards, ignoring the background chorus of wolf whistles from onlooking tourists.

John shrugged before grinning and kissing him again; one thing he could hold over Lestrade, over anyone.

He was the only person to ever find a way of shutting Sherlock up.

.

The End