The noise infiltrated his dreams. Someone, and John knew exactly which someone this was, had changed his text alert from vibration to... well, John wasn't entirely sure what it was. Perhaps a penguin mating call or something?

John knew it wouldn't stop. Sure, he could turn his phone off, but that would just mean Sherlock would come up here, likely with his violin, and insist John come and see or do what he wanted. And he'd do it all in a way John would have no hope of understanding.

John. -SH

John. -SH

John. -SH

What. -JW

Come here. -SH

Any further chances of sleep had been ruined. John glanced at his clock. At least Sherlock had waited until after 8. He had done this before, many times actually, but the most memorable took place at 4:30am, and John had made it very clear that it was never to happen again unless it was life and death. (Which it had been only once.)

He traipsed down the stairs to find Sherlock fully dressed, perched in his chair, typing madly on his phone.

"What do you want? And, what the hell was that? A penguin mating call or something?"

"A hedgehog mating call. Not a bad guess, at least for you I suppose."

"So what, you're just..." John gestured widely at him.

"Hmm?" He raised an eyebrow as he peered at John with his peripheral vision, not even taking his glance off his phone. "Oh yes."

"Feel like explaining now?"

"No."

"Let me rephrase that. Explain to me why you just stopped talking for a day and then all of a sudden restarted."

Sherlock sighed dramatically, and finished whatever it was he was doing before setting his phone down and looking up at John, standing there rather impatiently.

"I'm not telling you outright. I'll give you more clues though."

John huffed and flopped in his chair.

"None of your readers were particularly helpful. Or even correct. And your search history reveals that you got close, but apparently thought it was unimportant and did not look into it further."

"Hang on, what?"

"You got close. You were even on a page that mentioned it. And typically, you saw but did not observe."

John rubbed his face again.

"I'm going to need tea before I can think about this," he grumbled, pushing himself up and out of the chair.

He puttered around the kitchen and Sherlock returned to his phone.

When his tea was made, John returned to his chair.

"Didn't make me any?"

John eyed Sherlock.

"No, but the kettle has boiled if you want to make it yourself."

Sherlock grumbled.

"I'll take that as a no," John replied, booting up his laptop.

He stared at the screen open mouthed.

"Sherlock, you deleted my browsing history."

"Mmm..."

"That's it," he declared, shoving his laptop away roughly. "I give up."

Sitting up now, Sherlock turned to look at John. "Really?"

"Yes, Sherlock. I do."

"How disappointing."

"Well, you could just tell me."

Silence.

"That's what I thought," John replied, shifting his attention to the newspaper.

It had been silent in 221b for a while, until John spoke up again.

"Why a hedgehog mating call?"

"Isn't it obvious?"

"Nope."

"Oh. Well, I'm not explaining that one." Sherlock Holmes said, picking up his violin once again. "You'll have to figure it out for yourself." And tucking the instrument under his chin, he struck up a lively, happy, perhaps even mocking tune, leaving John Watson the one at a loss for words.