Disclaimer: The characters don't belong to me. Obviously. Well, except for Luke.

Note: It is necessary to read Tomorrow Never Knows first. The first three chapters are okay but once you hit the fourth, there may be some confusion.

Greg Lestrade is six-years-old when his mother has her third miscarriage, the first one after Greg was born. He was playing tag with his friends when Mrs Wendell called him in the classroom. She doesn't tell him then, but she does treat him differently, occasionally asking him if he's alright and if he wants a sweet. By the time his Aunt Louise arrives, Greg has already eaten three chocolate biscuits and is beginning to suffer from a sore throat.

Aunt Louise doesn't tell him at first, but when the hospital finally looms over them, she says that there was a problem with the baby. "You won't have a baby sister anymore," she says in a strange voice. Greg frowns when he realises that she looks like she's about to cry. It scares him a little so he looks away and focuses instead on the solemn grey building before them. "But Mummy is okay."

"Can I see her?"

"After a bit," she tells him. She takes a deep breath then smiles at him. Even at six, Greg knows that the smile is completely fake. "Let's go inside."

Aunt Louise leaves him in the waiting room with a magazine that features strange dogs and a pad of paper and some crayons. She tells him that his father will come by shortly and that she just needs to make sure that his mother is awake and ready to see him. A nurse joins him shortly to make sure he's doing alright. "That's nice," she says absent-mindedly when he shows her his squiggly drawing of a police car.

Greg doesn't like the waiting room, nor does he like hospitals in general. The seats are comfortable but the air smells far too clean, as if someone has painted the walls with layers of disinfectant. There's a telly but it only shows the news, which is boring. In the waiting room with him are a bunch of grown-ups. They're either talking on the phone or talking to each other. A sulking teenager sits as far away as possible from his mother. One of the adults, a woman wearing a bright yellow dress, smiles at him and asks him who he's waiting for. Greg says nothing and goes back to drawing.

Halfway through a drawing of a Dalmatian, a shadow falls over him. "Hello there. Dogs aren't purple," someone says in an accusing tone. Greg looks up.

The boy looking down at him is familiar, though Greg has never spoken a word to him. They go to the same school, his mind supplies when he remembers that he's seen the boy in the same uniform as him. He's older than Greg, by a year maybe. "Hi," Greg says.

"Hello," he says again.

Greg sets the sketchpad down. He's not supposed to talk to strangers but the kid isn't really a stranger. They've met before. Sort of, anyway. Standing in line to get lunch with two people between them is sort of meeting each other in Greg's opinion.

A doctor approaches the woman in yellow. She gets up, follows him, and the boy immediately takes her place. "I'm Mycroft by the way. Mycroft Holmes," he tells Greg as he sticks out a hand. Greg finds that weird. Only teachers do that to you when they're meeting you for the first time.

"I'm Greg."

"Greg or Gregory?"

"Greg." He hates being called 'Gregory'. Only his parents call him that, and only when they're very angry at him. "Greg Lestrade."

Mycroft nods. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Greg Lestrade." His grip on his hand is firm, practiced. Greg shakes back awkwardly. His hand is sweaty and smeared with wax shavings. Mycroft looks disapproving when he wipes his palm on his trousers.

"Your name's really Mycro?" Greg asks once his hand is dry.

"Mycroft."

"Mycroff?"

"Mycrof-t."

Greg tries again but Mycroft just shakes his head and repeats his name. Greg gives up after the fifth time. He's not very good with pronouncing words that end with an 'f' and a 't'. His father says he's a little slow in picking up things like that, but he'll learn, eventually. At least he doesn't have a lisp like Kendra Pelletier. "Myc?" he asks.

Mycroft seems to think about that for a while. "My," he finally says. "I don't like the name 'Mike' very much. It's rather common."

"You talk weird," Greg informs him. Mycroft does talk weird, like he's much older than Greg, older than his father, even. When Mycroft says nothing, Greg thinks that he may have offended him. He looks at Mycroft, then, and fishes for a compliment. "I like your hair," he finally says.

Mycroft's hair is quite interesting. It's neatly parted to the right and is such a vibrant shade of red that it makes him look like a human tomato in his large orange jacket. Greg's own hair is dark and unruly, a fact that has never escaped his mother's notice. He thinks about her right now, a little bit glad that she's not here to flatten his hair with a comb.

Mycroft says 'thank you' again. "I like your smell, too," Greg adds because it really is quite nice to hear Mycroft say 'thank you'. And he does smell nice. Greg can't describe it exactly, but it's certainly not like the sweet scent his mother has.

Mycroft doesn't thank him this time, though. Instead he looks annoyed, like Greg has just done something wrong. Greg then remembers his mother telling him it's impolite to go announcing people's natural scents like that. Betas hate it, but Mycroft's an Alpha. It's obvious from his appearance, even more from his scent. He should be flattered, right?

"My mum lost my sister," Greg tells him instead, feeling a bit angry with Mycroft and himself because of his mistake. "My Aunt Louise said she had an accident and the baby just went away."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"How about you?" Greg wonders who Mycroft has lost, or if he's lost anyone at all. He doesn't look sad. But then, Greg thinks he doesn't look sad, either. He wasn't really too keen on the idea of having someone to share his parents' attention.

Smiling slightly, Mycroft sits up, as though he's trying to look important, then says, "My baby brother was born a few hours ago," he says quite proudly. Greg knows for a fact that he didn't have anything to do with it, but he keeps quiet because it's the polite thing to do. "He was born too early, though, so he's in an incubator right now."

Greg frowns at the word 'incubator'. "Your brother's a chicken?" he asks, remembering that time his uncle brought him to the petting zoo. A man in a farmer's hat had shown him where they placed the eggs. He wonders if the reason why his mother's belly is so big is because there's a huge egg in there. And it cracked and his little sister got out somehow.

Panicking, he thinks of how he accidentally dropped one of the eggs the farmer had handed to him. The man had laughingly told him he'd killed a living creature then threatened to call the police, much to Mr Joyce's annoyance. The yolk had seeped through his laces while he stood there, shaking uncontrollably. He trembles now as he thinks over and over again that maybe he killed his sister.

Mycroft looks at him, confused, but before he can say anything, a tall man with Mycroft's colouring approaches them. "Come now," the man says to Mycroft in a bored voice.

"Goodbye," Mycroft says, as proper as ever. He shakes Greg's hand one more time before he follows his father to the elevator. As soon as the doors close, Greg begins to cry. The mopey teenager who's sitting next to his mother looks at him strangely, but says nothing. Sitting the bench across his, a woman cries as well, though it's nothing like Greg's. Her wails are loud and frightening enough to make Greg stop.

"What's the matter with you?" his father asks when he emerges from the elevator where Mycroft and his father disappeared. He picks him up even though he's already far too big for that. "Are you upset because of your mum?"

Greg nods then buries his face in the space between his neck and shoulder His scent is bland, quite unlike his mother's. "I think I broke Mum's egg," he says, his voice muffled, before he begins to cry again.

His mother is due to stay in the hospital for two weeks. Greg misses her terribly. He's not allowed to see her every day because of school. His Aunt Louise has decided to stay with him until his mother is better again as his father has to work and no one will be there to look after him. Greg doesn't like Aunt Louise very much. She's a Beta like his father so she doesn't have his mother's nice smell. She does the wrong things as well, like giving him eggs for breakfast even though she has been told countless of times that Greg's allergic to them. Also, looking at eggs just makes him feel ill. His father had sat him down when they returned from the hospital and explained to him that no, he had no part in the death of his sister, and that it had already happened before to his mother. He failed to convince Greg, however. Just the mere sight of an egg has Greg thinking of dead babies.

The morning after his first visit, they threw all her things away. Pink was the only thing that came to Greg's mind when his father loaded the baby furniture in the back of the car. His father sold what he could, then tossed away what he couldn't. It wasn't a very fun trip. His father drove too fast and spoke too little. "We were going to call her Angela," he told Greg over the screeching of the tires, over the mockingly happy music the radio played. "After your grandmother."

There are two dead Angela Lestrades, one who lived past seventy, another who didn't live at all. And before Angela, before Greg, there was Mitchell and Joseph. Greg thinks about the brothers and sister he will never have. It makes him feel awfully lonely.

Visits to the hospital make him happy. He still doesn't like the waiting room, but at least he doesn't have to stay there very long anymore. His mother is better now, though she does look a little grey and has tubes sticking out of her arm. Her smell has reverted to the less sweeter one that she had before she became pregnant. Her belly, still large, is empty beneath her hospital gown. Greg refuses to touch it.

He meets Mycroft again the third time he visits his mother. They're in the hospital's cafeteria, one table apart from each other. Mycroft looks bored. He's sitting next to his father who's talking to someone on his phone in an angry voice. Greg waves at Mycroft.

"Who's that, Greg?" his father asks as he looks up from the magazine he's reading. He does a double-take when he sees the man Mycroft's with, then grins and stands up as soon as the other man's put his phone away. Greg leaves his food unfinished then follows his father to Mycroft's table.

Mycroft's wearing a blue coat today. Greg likes it better than the orange one. It doesn't make his hair too hard to look at. "Our parents know each other," he says as they watch his father and Mycroft's shake hands.

"Hello," Mycroft tells him. "You should really say 'hello' when you're meeting someone."

"Oh. Well, hello."

Mycroft nods approvingly. "Your father works for mine," Mycroft tells him. "Didn't you know?"

Greg shakes his head. The only thing he knows about his father's work is that it brings in a lot of money and has something to do with credit cards. He sneaks a glance at Mr Holmes. He doesn't really look like Mycroft, he realises. He's scarier-looking and has very strange eyes. He looks away when they land on Greg's face, then looks again when Mr Holmes is no longer staring at him.

"Would you like to see my brother?" Mycroft asks him.

"Um, okay."

Their parents are too busy talking. Mycroft assures him that he knows his way around, anyway, and that they'll be back shortly. He looks back at Greg when they leave the cafeteria. "Would you like me to hold your hand?" he asks.

Greg blinks. "Why?"

"You're an Omega," Mycroft points out. "and I'm your escort."

Greg looks at his hand. His fingernails are too long and dirty and his palm is sweaty and smeared with mayonnaise. Mycroft looks at Greg's hand as well with a small frown. "No thanks," Greg says as he shoves both hands in his pockets. Mycroft doesn't say it but Greg thinks he looks relieved.

The elevator is a little complicated but Mycroft shows him how to make it work. He pushes the button that leads to the sixth floor. The ride up is uncomfortable but Greg puts on a brave face and tries to ignore the way it seems to flatten his stomach. The only person with them is the same miserable teenager Greg saw in the waiting room. There's a thick white bandage wrapped around his wrist. Greg wants to ask him what that's for but Mycroft silences him with a look.

The floor they go to is quite different from the others. The walls here aren't white, but a soft blue, the same colour as Mycroft's jacket. There are large windows. Greg looks out at one and sees a large room with a lot of small cots. "Oh," he says when he sees the newborn infants. He turns to Mycroft. "Where's your brother, then?"

Mycroft leads him farther. Greg follows until they reach an isolated part of the floor. A man in a dark suit walks by then stops to talk to Mycroft. "Here to see your brother again, right?" the man—a doctor, Greg thinks—asks. He talks to Mycroft as if they've known each other for a long time. Greg decides the doctor must be a relative. He has the same hair colour as Mycroft's and the same pale eyes as Mr Holmes.

"That's my uncle. He's the director," Mycroft explains. He moves Greg in front of another window, a smaller one this time. Greg has to stand on his toes just to see through it.

"My brother Sherlock's there."

There aren't beds here but small tanks that remind Greg of their aquarium back home. Only a few are occupied. Mycroft points at the one to the left. Inside, a tiny infant sleeps deeply. He has tubes through his nose, and he's naked but for a nappy and a small woolly hat. Greg looks at him. Little Sherlock doesn't look like a healthy baby. He's far too pale, so much that Greg can see the blue veins mapped beneath his skin. "He doesn't look very healthy," he admits to Mycroft. "Is he going to live, then?"

Mycroft doesn't look happy about that. In fact, he doesn't talk to Greg at all during the elevator ride back. "I'm sorry," he says once they get back to their fathers. Neither of them seems to have noticed their absence.

"I forgive you." He shakes his hand again when they're about to leave. Mycroft wrinkles his nose slightly when they shake hands. "Goodbye, Greg."

"See you soon?"

"Of course."

They meet each other several times in the hospital until his mother is released and Sherlock is ready to go home.

"You should give him a gift," Greg tells Mycroft. "Sherlock, I mean. That's what I did when my cousin was born."

"What did you give her?"

Greg frowns. "I bought something in the gift shop. Do you know where that is?"

The gift shop is in the ground floor, near the cafeteria. Mycroft and the lady behind the counter watch as Greg rummages through the merchandise. He dismisses the brightly-coloured cards and the balloons that hang overhead. Mycroft shakes his head at each stuffed animal Greg shows him. "Too boring," he says to the brown bear. "Too frightening," he says to the clown that Greg has to admit is frightening. "Too mediocre," he says to the yellow rabbit. Greg makes mental note of asking him later what 'mediocre' means. "Sherlock is a boy," Mycroft says, annoyed, when Greg holds up a Raggedy Anne by mistake.

"How about this then?" Greg asks, pulling out a strange hybrid of a bear and a bee. He holds it at arms-length and looks at it for a moment. "This looks weird."

Mycroft takes it from his hands then turns it around. For a long time, he eyes it critically. The lady behind the counter rolls her eyes at them and asks if they even have money to pay for it. "I do, actually," Mycroft tells her as he puts the bee/bear on the counter. Her eyes widen a little at the money Mycroft hands to her but she bags the toy nonetheless and gives Mycroft his change. He studies her for a moment, then adds, "Good luck with your date tonight, by the way."

Greg doesn't miss the stunned expression on the woman's face. "How'd you know?" he asks once they're outside. "Are you psychic?"

Mycroft scowls at him. "Of course not. She has dark shadows under her eyes from lack of sleep and her hair tells me she went to the salon. She keeps looking at the clock as well, then to her phone. Her lipstick is red so it brings attention to her mouth. It's not a business meeting, then. It's a first date, I think."

"Cool," Greg says. He looks at Mycroft admiringly. "Do me, then."

"You want to be a detective when you're older."

Greg stares at him, open-mouthed. "How'd you know?"

Mycroft points at his shirt. It's Greg's favourite, the Tintin one, so it's more than a little faded. "You draw cop cars a lot as well." Mycroft pauses then says, "Cop cars aren't red by the way, nor are they purple."

Greg sticks his tongue out at him. Mycroft looks away but Greg thinks that, for a moment, Mycroft actually smiled at him.

The house is silent when his mother comes home. When his parents talk to each other, they do so in quiet voices. Greg no longer likes it when they talk to him. It's as if they're clamouring for his attention. His mother keeps telling him she loves him, while his father brings him a new toy almost every night. Frankly, it's just suffocating. Greg knows it's wrong, but he does his best to hide from them, anyway.

"That's not very nice," Luke, his friend and cousin, tells him one day. They're in the park, searching for bugs. Luke's mother was watching them closely a moment ago, but found a friend to talk with and has left Greg the responsibility of making sure Luke doesn't do anything dumb.

It is a difficult job.

Greg looks over his shoulder and sees that both women are seated on a bench, talking about their children and complaining about their partners. A part of Greg wishes they'd pay attention to them because Luke is now wading through the shallow part of the pond.

"They're always talking to me. How would you like it if your parents talked to you whenever you're watching cartoons?" Greg complains as he digs up a rock. Luke watches as he throws it. The pebble skips over the water three times before it disappears.

They search for rocks for a moment but none of them are the right one. "I'll get it back," Luke assures him. Greg doubts he'll be able to do it. The pebble sank far away.

"I don't think you should go farther. You might fall," Greg warns him.

Luke snorts. He rolls up his trousers even though the legs are already soaked through. "No, I won't." He walks farther, slipping a little as he moves through the muddy bank. Greg looks over his shoulder again. Aunt Isobel and her new friend are laughing hysterically.

The water is nearly up to Luke's knees when Greg looks back. He panics a little. "If you don't stop, I'm telling Aunt Isobel," he threatens.

Luke narrows his eyes at him. "Do it and I'll hit you."

Greg thinks about it for a moment. Luke is taller than him, but skinnier. He doesn't know how to punch either but he has a hard kick. He's not above biting either. Greg pulls back the sleeve of his jumper and looks at the part where Luke bit him the last time they had a fight. It's old but Greg can still see the imprint of his teeth quite clearly.

"Aunt Isobel!" Greg yells, managing to get the name out before Luke clamps a hand over his mouth and tackles him to the muddy grass. They roll away from the water. Luke's pulling at his hair but Greg manages to get the upper hand by hitting Luke's face. By the time Greg's done, Luke's sitting on the grass, sobbing.

"I hate you!" he cries. There's mud above his right eyebrow and his jaw is a little red from where Greg's fist landed. "I never want to see you again!"

"We live next to each other, doofus!" Greg yells back.

'Your face is stupid!"

Greg pushes him a little. Luke gets up and pushes back, harder. "You're stupid!" Greg shouts.

"Your mum's ugly," Luke taunts, no longer crying.

Aunt Isobel isn't ugly and neither is his mother but all reason flies out the window when you're having a fight. "Yours is as well!" Greg counters.

"Your grandparents stink."

Greg pauses for a moment then yells back, "We have the same grandparents, dummy!"

They tackle each other half-heartedly. Luke gets the upper hand this time, but doesn't do anything other than lightly slap Greg's cheek. He rolls off then lies quite still on the grass. A fly lands on the tip of Luke's nose but he doesn't even shoo it away.

"I'm hungry," he says, finally. "I want ice cream."

Luke's the only one who has money but it's enough to buy them a cone, each. "Your mum made a new friend," Greg tells him as they make their way to the vendor. There are already other children there. Luke grabs his hand and makes him walk faster.

"That's nice, I guess." He hands Greg his ice cream. Cocking his head to one side, he asks, "Do you know what a 'wanker' is?"

Greg shakes his head. "No. Why?"

"My older sister called me that." Luke frowns then turns to the vendor, an old man with a cartoonish smile. "Hey, mister, do you know what a 'wanker' is?"

For some reason, the man's smile disappears and is replaced by a scowl. One of the older kids laughs. Luke turns to her and repeats the question but she merely shakes her head and goes away, laughing all the time. Greg is beginning to get the feeling that that word shouldn't be said to other people.

Luke, however, doesn't stop. Gran said it's because Luke has something called ADHD, which makes him really hyper. Gran also said it's because he's an Alpha and Alpha kids usually have that. Greg wonders if this is true as Luke is the only young Alpha he's met who has the attention span of a goldfish.

Greg watches as he moves to another kid. "How about you?" Luke asks. "Do you know what a 'wanker' is?"

"I have several ideas."

Greg's eyes widen when he realises its Mycroft. He's wearing a lurid red jacket this time, one that nearly hurts to look at. "Hello, My," Greg greets happily. It's the first time he's ever seen Mycroft outside school and the hospital.

To his surprise, Mycroft smiles back at him. "Hello, Greg." He eyes Luke strangely. "Your cousin?"

"Yeah. His name's Luke. My's a detective." Greg says this last to Luke who stares at Mycroft openly.

"Of sorts."

Luke blinks at him. "You talk weird," he says in a tone that dares Mycroft to disagree. Mycroft says nothing, though, which is just as well. Greg thinks that Mycroft's not the type of kid who enjoys wrestling.

"What's that?" Luke asks. He's already moved away from Greg and is now staring at the push chair behind Mycroft.

"It's 'who', actually." Mycroft sounds peeved. Greg quickly grabs Luke by the scruff of his neck and makes him move away from it. "My baby brother. Don't wake him."

With permission, Greg looks at Sherlock. He's not so sickly looking now but he's still awfully pale. The weird bee/bear Mycroft bought for him is lying next to him. "Stupid bear," Luke mumbles in a low voice. Fortunately, Mycroft doesn't hear it.

"Mummy assigned me to take care of him," he tells Greg proudly. "She's there, talking to a friend, but she says I'm old enough to watch out for him—Do. Not. Push. That."

Luke scowls but obediently removes his hands from the handle. Greg glares at him until he backs away from the push chair. "I'm supposed to tell on you if you do something bad," Greg reminds him.

"And I'm supposed to protect you!" Luke argues. He glares at Mycroft this time. "He's an Alpha. Mum said you're not supposed to talk to them."

"I'm talking to you!"

"We're family." Luke eyes Mycroft critically. "He's not."

Mycroft glowers at Luke. Greg wonders if they'll fight. He's kind of hoping they will. Maybe Mycroft's good at wrestling and just doesn't look it.

"I will be, actually," Mycroft says, his eyes still trained on Luke. "I heard Father talking to Mummy. I'm going to marry Greg."

Greg looks up from his ice cream in confusion. "What?" he asks.

Mycroft isn't able to answer, though. Luke throws his ice cream away then immediately tackles Mycroft to the ground.