"I need you to go undercover for me…" Greg Lestrade's voice could be heard coming out of Sherlock's mobile.

John was pottering about in the lounge tidying up bits and pieces around Sherlock who was draped over the sofa in his dressing gown.

"This is barely a 3 Lestrade, why would I bother going under cover?" Sherlock drawled lazily from his horizontal position, his hand barely holding the phone up to his ear as if it was just too much effort.

"Sherlock! Children are involved here… it's really important that we wrap up this case quickly to prevent any more from going missing." Greg sounded agitated but it didn't register with the world's only consulting detective.

"Boring!" He declared loudly.

"Sherlock no, let's take the case! For the Children Sherlock." John interjected before his flat mate could put the phone down on Lestrade.

"Joooohn…" Sherlock groaned. "I'm sure it's very simple. Even Anderson will probably work it out."

John stared at him with a very disapproving face, arms folded and stood firmly in front of him.

Sherlock stared back.

John maintained the eye contact and nodded his head once.

"Fine, fine, apparently we will take the case." Sherlock snapped in to the phone.

"Well thank you for being so gracious about it." The DI grumbled on the other end.

"If you're going to be sarcastic…"

"No no! I'm very pleased that you're on board with us."

Sherlock started slapping on several nicotine patches just to annoy John. "So, elaborate. You need us to go undercover?"

"Yes… children are going missing from a small private adoption centre in London. I want you two to apply to adopt a child and go through their system. I'm hoping you will come across something suspicious."

"You want ME to adopt a child?" Sherlock asked suddenly sitting up straight on the sofa. He thought he heard John choke on something behind him.

"No obviously you don't actually go that far." Greg sounded fairly horrified at the thought. "I just want you and John to go through their process of applying."

"Woah!" Suddenly John had an opinion on the matter. "Me and Sherlock… as in… pretend to be a couple?"

"We should be married really, it would make our application more successful." Sherlock said matter-of-factly.

"Hold on…" John tried to interject.

"It's fine Sherlock, you don't need to go too far. We can get you a fake marriage certificate. Everything will go just fine without you haring off to the registry office." Greg said in a calm and hopefully reassuring voice.

"But…" John was still stood with his mouth hanging open.

"John, it was under your insistence that I took this case… 'think of the children' and all that! Don't throw a strop now because you suddenly don't like the terms of the work." Sherlock dramatically threw himself back down on to the sofa "Honestly, sometimes you're impossible to please!"

He slapped on another nicotine patch in protest.

John closed his eyes, sighed deeply and massaged his temple with the tips of his fingers.

Greg's voice once again sounded from Sherlock's phone. "So are you taking the case or not?"

Sherlock pointedly turned to John with a questioning look.

John collapsed down in to his chair, throwing his hands in the air. "Alright, alright. Let's do this."

"Perfect. Yes Lestrade, send me the details. We will have this wrapped up in a couple of days." And with that he promptly hung up on the DI and turned on to his side to face John.

"For the children John."

"For the bloody children." He grumbled in return.

The next morning saw the best friends entering a children's adoption centre, Sherlock walking quickly and confidently up to the reception desk while John lingered behind looking distinctly uncomfortable.

"We have an appointment. My name is Sherlock Watson-Holmes, this is my husband John." The detective announced, once again showing off his amazing acting ability.

"Thank you Mr Watson-Holmes, take a seat just around the corner and you will be called in a few minutes." The receptionist gestured towards a garishly colourful waiting room full of children's books and toys down the hall.

"Thank you so much." He replied smoothly.

John walked alongside him and sat down silently on the plastic chair.

Nothing was said for a minute or two but Sherlock could tell John wasn't saying something.

"You have questions?"

"Yeah" John whispered harshly in his ear, apparently delighted to be asked.

"How did we get an appointment today?"

"Mycroft." That was all Sherlock needed to say on the matter and he knew it.

"Right… right…" John now seemed at a loss as to what he wanted to say. His body language screamed of his discomfort and annoyance.

"John, look at me." Sherlock turned his body to face him and waited until the doctor reluctantly met his gaze.

"I know you feel unprepared, and that is understandable as your acting skills leave a lot to be desired…" he carried on despite the annoyed face John made. " …But I do know what I am doing. Just follow my lead and we will find these missing children. OK?"

John took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Yeah, sure. Yeah… I know you're good at this sort of thing. I do. It's just… what do you want me to say in there?"

"Don't worry about it. I am going to tell them that we have been together for many years and that it is very important to you to have a family. Hopefully that will help to explain your obvious anxiety."

"Ok…" John seemed to calm down a little.

"Then at some point I am going to excuse myself to use the toilet so that I can have a look around." Sherlock finished smugly, as if his plan was somehow ingenious.

"Wait, you're going to leave me in there… to talk about how much we want children?" John's blood pressure started to climb again.

"Dr and Mr Watson-Holmes?" The receptionist's voice rang out in the empty waiting room.

They rose to meet her and were guided down a maze of hallways until they were introduced to a Mr Shaw.

"Come in, come in. Take a seat." A very friendly man about John's height and stature welcomed them in.

They sat on a sofa opposite Mr Shaw in his swivel chair.

"Hi, my name's Jack." He shook both their hands as they introduced themselves.

"So this session will take about an hour and it is just a preliminary meeting where I can get to know you a little and to give you the opportunity to ask questions that I'm sure you have."

"Thanks, that's great." John replied politely.

The next 15 minutes were spent relating where they lived, what their jobs were, what family they had. John was actually starting to relax, wondering what he was concerned about and chatted easily. Sherlock gave the impression of being keenly interested but John knew he was bored.

"So after living together all this time, you must have some habits that annoy each other?" Jack was obviously trying to get a sense of their characters and how they fit together.

"Well, Sherlock is rather messy…"

"I know exactly where everything is."

"and he plays the violin at random times in the night…" John continued.

"I didn't think that bothered you." Sherlock looked at him, apparently concerned.

"Well…" John felt put off by the intensity of his gaze all of a sudden. "It's just that it wakes me up sometimes and then I can't get back to sleep easily."

"Why haven't you ever said anything?"

"I…."

"Well?"

John felt like he was being interrogated. "I didn't think it would make a difference."

John was being honest but he could tell that Sherlock was hurt by his statement.

After a few seconds of silence Sherlock finally responded. "I can stop."

"No, it's fine, it helps you think." John tried to backpedal.

"I will stop."

"No, honestly, I understand why you need to do it."

"I said I would stop and I will John." Sherlock said forcefully.

John decided to back down, perhaps this wasn't the time or place for this conversation, seeing as they were supposed to be showing what a stable couple they were.

"Umm.. ok."

"John why didn't you think it would make a difference if you said something to Sherlock?" Jack suddenly re-entered the conversation.

The doctor glanced at Sherlock, trying to gauge his mood. He didn't want to offend him again.

"Err… because I ask him to do lots of things and he doesn't usually do any of it. Which is fine!" he hastened to add. "That's just what Sherlock is like and I wouldn't want him to change."

"But if it was important to you John I would off course address the issue." Sherlock continued to stare the doctor down.

"How did that revelation make you feel Sherlock?"

Jack didn't a get a response and watched as Sherlock continued to stare in to John's eyes as if trying to read his mind.

"Sherlock?" he prompted.

"I need to use the bathroom." The detective suddenly blurted out.

Jack was a bit thrown by the swift change in conversation and didn't reply immediately.

"The toilets, where are they?" He demanded.

"Turn left out of here and carry on past the double doors. They'll be on the right."

At that Sherlock left without saying another word.

John was relieved.

"I hope you don't think that we argue all the time, because we don't." John tried to smooth the way in case they needed to continue the pretence of adopting a child for the case.

"Oh it's very illuminating, but not in the way you think." Jack replied cryptically, writing in his notebook.

"Huh? Um.. what do you mean?" John leant forward, his brows creased in confusion.

"He obviously cares for you very deeply. It's a great sign that he could love a child and be attentive to their needs."

"Oh…" John leant back against the sofa relieved that they hadn't stuffed it up. "Great."

"You see John, if you step back and reconsider the conversation you just had. It's apparent that Sherlock cares a lot about your wellbeing, and became upset when he realised that he caused you to lose sleep. Your opinion of him also matters a great deal, which is why your suggestion that he wouldn't have stopped for you hurt him so much."

John wasn't sure what to say, so he felt it best just to stare back at him.

"Indifference is a bad sign in a relationship. There's obviously a lot of passion in yours, don't see it as a bad thing. You two just need to learn to communicate better, especially if you are to raise a child together."

"Yeah I'm not so good at the talking." John admitted truthfully.

"Well I'm going to suggest to you both that we hold a couple of talking sessions like this one before we go any further with the application."

John nodded, thinking that this may be the best thing for the investigation.

"Can we do that this week? I know it's short notice, but after that conversation I feel like things might be a bit tense for a while if we don't get it all out in the open." John hoped he sounded sincere.

"I'm sure we can arrange that." Jack smiled at him kindly.

"Well, I'd better go look for Sherlock. Are we done here?"

"Sure, here let me get the door for you." Jack stood and let him out in to the corridor. "Oh and Doctor Watson-Holmes?"

"Yes?" John turned back to him.

"I suspect your husband would actually do an awful lot for you, if you gave him the chance."

John tried for a smile and a nod and hoped it didn't look too scary as he continued on his way down the corridor. In reception he asked if Sherlock had left the building.

Of course he had, 10 minutes ago.

The bugger.