Doctor John H Watson woke up with the distinct feeling that something was off. He looked around, expecting to find some criminal or other standing over him with a gun, knife, or some other odd implement of aggression. There was no such thing. He was in his room at 221B Baker Street, London, just like every other morning. He blinked slowly, shaking his head. It still felt like something was wrong.
He got up and walked to the kitchen area. As always, the counter was covered in the experiments of one Sherlock Holmes, quite possibly the most eccentric and brilliant man on the face of the planet. At the very least, he was the most famous private detective in the world, despite being an ‘odd nut’.
The Sherlock in question was sitting in one of his reading chairs, looking intently at his wallet. John took this in stride – Sherlock often found any number of mundane things interesting for seemingly no reason. If the detective decided to share his mind, he would. Otherwise Watson wasn’t going to push.
“John,” Sherlock said, suddenly. “Have you looked at your wallet recently?”
“Hm? Why?”
“Just take a look at your wallet. It’s important.”
John shook his head slightly. There was no talking to Sherlock when he got like this. He walked over to the desk in which he kept his wallet, taking it out. “Did you steal any of my cards for a game?” he wondered, getting no answer. Watson flipped through his wallets. “All the cards are here, Sherlock.”
“Check the name on them.”
John rolled his eyes. “It says James Watson, like always.” He stopped short. “Wait, James!?”
“I’ve apparently become Steven Holmes,” Sherlock commented. “Every single one of these cards, Steven Holmes. And that’s not the only thing that’s off. Everything in this apartment has been moved.”
John looked around. “Things look different, but you always move things around. It’s not unusual.”
“But I remember when I move things around. And the spray paint?” Sherlock pointed at an empty wall. “It’s not there. It’s always there. We’ve never cleaned it.”
John blinked. “Did Mrs. Hudson finally get fed up with it?”
Sherlock walked up to the wall and ran his fingers across it. “This is not new wallpaper. This wallpaper hasn’t been altered in years. Far too much wear on it. There’s no sign that there were ever vandals in here.”
“What does that mean?”
“I have no idea. And that concerns me. Our names have seemingly been slightly altered overnight, the apartment has numerous minor differences that can’t just be explained away, and the phone isn’t ringing with the follow-up to the Richard case. That woman was the type to always call you precisely ten minutes early, and it’s ten minutes after she promised to call.”
John felt prompted to look out the window. He frowned. “Isn’t that house supposed to be a different color? …Sherlock?” John turned to find Sherlock on his phone. “…Sherlock, what are yo-”
“Contacts are all different as well,” Sherlock stated. “Matthew Holmes, not Mycroft. There’s names in here I have no clue who they represent, if anyone we know at all.” His fingers flew furiously across the phone’s screen. He threw the phone across the room and went to his laptop. “At least the password still works…”
John walked over to Sherlock. He didn’t bother asking what the detective was looking for, Sherlock would explain soon enough.
Sherlock typed his new name Steven Holmes into the search engine. A few results popped up, showing “Steven Holmes” to be a small-time detective living in the London area with a couple of high-profile cases, but not all that many.
“What the- have we been erased?” John said aloud. “How does someone do that?”
“I would suspect advanced hacking, if not for one detail,” Sherlock said. “The cards. You can’t just replace those. Too many details are off…” Sherlock read more about “Steven Holmes”, and eventually found an interesting sentence.
He’s basically the legendary Sherlock Holmes in all but name. And almost even that!
Sherlock instantly moved to search Sherlock Holmes. What he found surprised him immensely.
A series of books by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle about the titular detective Sherlock Holmes…
Sherlock absorbed all the information he could about the books – mysteries that focused on the art of deduction through miniscule details. It was a reflection of his life, except in a much earlier time. John was there, Mycroft was there… Many people he knew were there. But they were all slightly different. Less rounded…
“Sherlock, what on earth is going on?”
“I’m running out of explanations that seem grounded in reality,” Sherlock admitted, sitting back from the computer. “It seems as if the structure of the world we live in has changed on a fundamental level. As far as the world is concerned, Sherlock Holmes never really existed. He was fiction, and an old one at that. Yet everything seems to mirror our lives…” He tapped his fingers together. “I have two explanations.”
“Really? I have none.”
“The first is that someone has gone to an extremely large amount of trouble to play a very faulty prank on the world. I find this doubtful, because there’s no way to just ‘create’ a classic story revered by millions unless someone is somehow replacing our Internet - which would be nigh impossible to pull off and slow our connection speed significantly. The other, seemingly unrelated details, also cast doubt on this.”
“The second explanation must be really absurd if that’s still one you’re considering.”
“We’re in an alternate universe,” Sherlock said. “One where we are not Sherlock Holmes and John Watson. Where we did not have all our impressive cases. One where there are a set of stories about us…”
“I was right. That is absurd.”
“When all other explanations have been eliminated, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.”
John groaned inwardly. That had not been the first time Sherlock had uttered the phrase. “I think I prefer the explanation that God is playing a joke on us.”
“Which, if true, could still result in both options,” Sherlock said, putting his hands over his mouth. “For now, I’m going to assume the latter is true, but keep the idea that this is some elaborate ruse in the back. And if this is another universe… We need to learn as much about it as we can. What’s different?” Sherlock pulled a laptop out from under the table and gave it to John. “Start searching.”
“For what?”
“Anything. Historic events. The history of the ‘Sherlock Holmes’ in those books. Yourself. For all we know, even the simplest things we’ve taken for granted could have been altered…”
“Are you boys okay?” an old woman’s voice called to them from outside their door. “I hear commotion!”
“Yes, Mrs. Hudson,” Sherlock called without thinking.
“Well. Be sure to at least go outside today. It’s not healthy to be shut up all the time.”
“At least Mrs. Hudson is the same,” John said, allowing himself to smile.
“Quite,” Sherlock deadpanned.
~~~
“I’m convinced,” Sherlock said finally. “There’s no way this is a joke. This is another world, or at the very least history has been altered on a fundamental level and for some reason we’re still aware of it.”
John sat back in his chair. “Mrs. Hudson would have said something by now if she knew as well… So what, are we alone in this?”
“You’re jumping to conclusions,” Sherlock said, furrowing his brow. “We know very little about what happened. I am certain it happened while we were sleeping, and that yesterday everything was still normal. The fact that both of us are here suggests to me that this is no accident. If it were some natural phenomenon why would it take just us and not Mrs. Hudson?”
“So someone did this intentionally?”
“I didn’t say intentionally. I just said it wasn’t natural.” Sherlock stood up and started pacing. “The world we’ve found ourselves in is almost indistinguishable aside from small details. I recognize everything I’ve seen with the exception of their version of ‘Sherlock Holmes.’ That influence on history is clearly not zero, given how every person on the planet seems to understand what the name represents and where it comes from…”
“So you’re saying you’re more popular when you’re a fictional character?”
“John that’s not what I’m saying at all don’t be absurd.”
John shrugged, taking the retort in stride.
Sherlock tapped the wall, furrowing his brow. “Recent events in history are scrambled somewhat, but that may only be because we weren’t involved in this world. So… That tells us…”
“That we are characters in a book here, and that’s all most people care about.”
“No… Well yes, yes it does, but- hold it.” Sherlock looked outside. “James and Steven are likely in our bodies back at our home. That is, assuming we swapped minds and not bodies. Too many assumptions for my liking here...”
“I can’t imagine that going over very well,” John muttered.
“Don’t sell them short,” Sherlock said. “From the way the apartment is arranged, I can detect very few differences between us and them. It may just be that the difference in names and the existence of a ‘Sherlock Holmes’ in popular culture twisted the perception of what they did… It may also explain why their names are different, while Mrs. Hudson’s isn’t. What self-respecting parent would name their child after such a well-known figure?” He tapped his fingers to his head. “We’re learning more already, John.”
“You’re learning things. I’m just absorbing information being thrown at me like a train.”
“That is what you’re good at!” Sherlock declared with a smirk. “Regardless, I expect the other versions of us will be rather delighted in their sudden fame, and are likely wondering the same things we are wondering now, and making similar deductions. Though I suppose they have access to your blog as a way to fit in…”
John went back to his computer and searched up his blog. “Huh. Sherlock? They have a blog too.”
“…They do?”
“Not as big as the one we had, but it’s definitely here. It describes their cases…” He scrolled through some of them. “We took a few of these, but most of them are different.”
Sherlock was already on the blog on his laptop, reading it far faster than a regular human being. “Curious. James Watson is uncannily similar to you. Slightly less confident in himself, less satisfied about life, but otherwise exactly the same.”
“Are you kidding? This guy’s nothing like me. Look at that! A typo! I would neve-”
“That exact typo exists on your version of the blog,” Sherlock interrupted.
John closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “All right, fair point. I’m not unique. Point taken.”
“Glad you’ve finally accepted your own assembly-line personality.”
John didn’t give this a response. “Found a file. Most recent case of ‘Steven’ and ‘James’. They were doing something for ‘Matthew’… ‘James’ complained that he couldn’t write down any notes because of what it involved.”
“There goes the possibility of lying to Mycr- ‘Matthew’,” Holmes said. “We don’t have any knowledge of the case…” Sherlock narrowed his eyes, a smile crawling up his lips. “…John, I found something interesting.”
“What?”
“If the event that moved us to this world happened last night, perhaps there were other events that happened the same time. Since last night, virtually every government on the planet has begun moving, and moving fast. Almost as if they’re on some kind of alert…”
“Every government?” John blinked. “What, did world leaders get replaced or something?”
“Perhaps… Or perhaps we are just a side effect of some larger, more concerning event.”
“…You’re going to treat this like a case, aren’t you?”
Sherlock grinned. “What else would I do?”
“Right. So, what’s the first step?”
Sherlock pulled out his phone. “We call Matthew Holmes.”
John blinked. Sherlock put the phone to his ear and put on a fake smile. “Hello Mycroft!”
John glared at Sherlock. What are you doing?
Sherlock’s eyes widened. “Well, this is unexpected.”
John shook his head, trying hard to hear what the other half of the conversation was, unable to do so.
“I was playing on what I assumed our dynamic here would be.” More silence. “We will be there.” He hung up.
“What was that about!?” John asked.
“It appears that Mycroft has been dragged here along with us,” Sherlock said. “Which just makes this much, much more interesting. We have to go meet him in a secure location. I can’t wait to hear what he has to say.”
~~~
Mycroft Holmes was often described by his younger brother as the British Government.
It was not all that much of an exaggeration. Mycroft had his fingers in virtually every pie the United Kingdom cared about, and some it didn’t. He was one of those men nobody in the general population knew, but everyone who actually held real power did. Mycroft could not be said to enjoy much, but his particular position in life was something he held a sort of attachment to.
To say he was currently rattled was an understatement.
Even so, let it not be said that Mycroft was a man who wore his emotions on his sleeve. Everyone who saw him would think he was acting completely normally. That is, except his brother.
“You look like you just crawled out of a warzone,” Sherlock remarked upon arrival at the abandoned factory.
John looked at Mycroft, trying to find any hole in the man’s stern exterior. He gave up after a few seconds and just took Sherlock’s word for it.
Mycroft nodded curtly to his younger brother. “I believe my awakening was rather more alarming than yours.”
“Let me guess, you thought you were going mad?”
“Didn’t you?”
“Didn’t get that far. John confirmed I wasn’t crazy before I’d asked the question.”
“Good for you,” Mycroft deadpanned. “But that is not what I was referring to by alarm. I take it you noticed details about your lives had changed?”
“Brother, please, remember who you’re talking to,” Sherlock scoffed.
“You never know…” Mycroft said, turning around. “I realized very shortly after waking that the files on my desk were of conspiracies I was not familiar with. Operations that had nothing to do with anything I had under my purview prior. As a man in my position, I knew how disastrous this would be after only a day of ignorance.”
“…What did you do?” John asked.
Mycroft folded his hands. “I had placed numerous secret documents onto an encrypted flash drive in a location I shall not reveal. The purpose of this driv-”
“Was to, if you went insane and forgot everything, remind yourself,” Sherlock finished.
Mycroft ignored the comment. “The drive’s purpose was to give me power in case the British Government collapsed, became too corrupt, or my hand was forced through some other means. Imagine my delight when it turned out that ‘Matthew’ had the same idea. I only read a short bit of it before you called, but I have been pouring over it the entire time I’ve been waiting. The story contained within is absurd to the extreme, but I assure you it is legitimate and will blow everything you may have discovered out of the proverbial water.”
“We’re characters in a classic series of books here,” John blurted. “Sherlock Holmes, John Watson, you know.”
Mycroft raised an eyebrow. “Aliens own the Earth and are preparing it for colonization efforts in this world. The world’s governments are mostly compliant or ignorant of this fact. Furthermore, I am apparently a party to this heinous conspiracy. Let me assure you that I have since imagined at least thirty different ways to dismember ‘Matthew’ since learning of his involvement.”
John blinked. “…I think he wins, Sherlock.”
Sherlock stared at Mycroft in disbelief. “You’re serious.”
“Do you know me to kid?”
“I know you to mess with my head from time to time,” Sherlock said, beginning to pace. “It’s almost as if we’re in the world of a story. Larger than life conflict, great government conspiracy…”
“You could use that to describe our lives before,” John pointed out. “You know, without the aliens. That’s new. Still processing the fact that aliens exist here.”
“They do not back home, rest assured,” Mycroft declared.
“You could just be covering…” John muttered.
“Believe me or not, the fact remains that they do here.”
“Could describe ourselves…” Sherlock pondered. “What if that’s it? We, the three of us were attracted here not for any specific purpose, but to be part of this… ‘story’.”
“Sherlock, you’ve gone mad,” Mycroft said, shaking his head. “We’re not in a story, and we’ve never been in a story. This is just a world where the incredible is true.”
Sherlock narrowed his eyes, but John recognized the look of defeat in his face. That was a little crazy, even considering the whole alternate-world-with-alien-conspiracy thing. “There’s been a sudden increase of activity since last night,” Sherlock said. “Something’s happened with the aliens, hasn’t there?”
Mycroft nodded, producing a file from his coat. “This was one of the files on my desk. I didn’t recognize what it meant until later.” He handed it to Sherlock. Turning to John, he summarized. “It appears as though the alien overlords made a mistake that’s sending waves through their society. We, as lowly human servants, do not get to know precisely what this mistake was, but we do know it involves something that isn’t from Earth. A third party of some sort or other. Around the same time world governments were sent this image with the orders ‘find and kill’.”
The three crowded around the image Mycroft had just produced. It was an image of five people. Four men, one woman. The image wasn’t of the highest quality, but it was easy to tell that none of these people could be considered normal. The woman had the posture of a frog. One of the men was far larger and more muscular than a human should have been. Another man wore a bizarre outfit that looked like it had been run through a straight razor, while another held a sword that didn’t belong in any sort of modern world. The last individual would have been completely normal, were he not holding a potted cactus in his hand.
“Any deductions?” Mycroft asked his brother.
“Accounting for the painfully obvious fact that they’re from another world, my certainty is significantly lower. That said… the woman and the giant man are Japanese, though what Japan produces giants or frogs is beyond me. The woman, despite acting like an animal, is in such a posture that suggests she’s ready for battle, indicating experience. The giant man is acting as the leader, given how all the others stand behind him, though the swordsman and woman are keeping their distance. Perhaps they don’t fully accept his authority. Swordsman is a simple man with simple goals, though as to what they are I have no idea. The bizarre man is an artist of some sort, for only those types would wear that clothing. Not to mention the fountain pen earrings. And the man with the cactus…” Sherlock stared at the man with the cactus. “I have no idea why he’s holding a cactus. I can tell he’s used to getting his hands dirty and given the way his hands are finely holding the cactus, I’d say archeologist.”
Mycroft nodded. “Of course. You forgot to note that the woman is staring right at the camera. She has intelligence.”
“Not so much ‘forgot’ as realized looking straight at a camera does not guarantee intelligence.”
“It was a hidden camera.”
“Information I did not have,” Sherlock pointed out. “Regardless, this is a team ready for action. They invaded one of your bases, didn’t they?”
“That was never stated directly in the report, but it is true,” Mycroft said. “It just so happens that the base they entered was one I recognized from our home. Reading the files on it in this one, I learned that it held a fully operational spaceship. They presumably wanted to take it and use it. If we are being ordered to kill them…”
“They didn’t get to the ship,” Sherlock finished. “Curious… They will likely try again, will they not?”
“I know almost nothing about their motivations.”
“Determination,” John said. “You can see it in their eyes. They’ll try again, or try something similar.”
“Then we’ll just need to catch them,” Sherlock declared.
Mycroft and John stared at him.
“To talk to them, not to hand them over to the alien overlords. I’m not evil.”
“That’s up for debate,” John commented.
“Nobody has faith in me,” Sherlock shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. We need to meet them so we can learn about them. They are likely to know more about the situation than we do. Unless you want to attempt to talk to your alien overlords directly, Mycroft?”
“Good God, no, the chances they’ll know in an instant are too high. I’m not suicidal.”
“Then we must determine where they’re going to go next,” Sherlock decreed. “How many bases with spaceships are there in the United Kingdom?”
“You know, the kinds of questions that are being asked today seem straight out of the asylum,” John commented.
Mycroft ignored him. “Seven others.”
“I assume you have files on all of them?” Sherlock asked.
“But of course.”
“Good. Let’s cross-examine them all…” Mycroft brought out his laptop, the flash drive plugged in. He brought up the files on the spaceship docks, and the two brothers pored over the information, arguing with each other over what conclusions were accurate.
John just walked to a wall and sat down on an empty crate, staring at nothing.
He made a list of absurd stuff that had happened today.
1) They had woken up in another universe.
2) They were characters in a classic series of books important to British history.
3) There were aliens that had this planet under their control.
4) The aliens were hunting a strange group of humans.
5) One of those humans was holding a potted cactus.
A cactus.
That was the worst part about this, for some reason.
He considered if this could be a dream for the umpteenth time since he woke up that morning. But everything felt real – even his breathing and heartbeat, which are rarely noticeable in dreams. He could feel the air blowing through the factory and was painfully aware of the hard texture of the crate. Nothing was dulled. This was real.
He supposed someone could have slipped him some psychoactive drugs. He wondered why Sherlock wasn’t considering that…
Probably because Sherlock actually knew what that felt like.
“That’s it,” Sherlock said, certainty in his voice. “This is the place they’ll go. If they need a ship, this is the best place. The hangar is in the perfect location for a quick infiltration, the ship could be flown right through the roof if needed, and it’s in the middle of absolutely nowhere.”
“Security will be highly increased,” Mycroft pointed out. “They will have figured this out as well. I know you’re used to being a step ahead of everyone, Sherlock, but the aliens have vast intelligence.”
“Worthy opponents.”
“You’re crazy,” John said, shaking his head.
Sherlock nodded in confirmation. “Regardless, the security will be a problem for them, not for us. We have you.”
Mycroft nodded. “The only problem is I expect a few of the guards will actually be aliens in disguise.”
“What, now they can look like us?” John blurted. “How crazy does this get?”
“There’s a black virus in their blood that will kill you from the inside out.”
“I need to stop asking questions.”
Sherlock stood up. “Mycroft, you need to keep your job for at least the rest of the day.”
“Doable.”
“Tonight, we walk right into a maximum-security government base that hides aliens.”
John put a hand to the bridge of his nose. “Nothing ever changes, does it?”
“Not with Sherlock Holmes,” Mycroft commented.
~~~
The base in question was just known as Site 81. It was a somewhat small compound, only containing seven buildings, five of which were nothing more than warehouses. The entirety of Site 81 was lined with ten-meter electric fences, coursing with enough power to kill an elephant several times over.
The sun was setting when Mycroft, Sherlock, and John arrived. They made no attempt to hide their approach. They drove across the single dirt path in one of Mycroft’s many black vehicles, faces forward. They were halted at the front gates by a pair of men who asked for identification. As Mycroft provided the identification for ‘Matthew Holmes’, Sherlock observed the men closely. One was a man, late thirties, who really hated his job and was waiting for a transfer. The other… Sherlock found him baffling. He stood with completely perfect posture, his expression never shifted from neutral, and his eyes moved without the rapid movement seen in almost everyone else.
He’s one of the aliens, Sherlock deduced. …The deductions I’ve been making today…
The human guard nodded. “Welcome, Mr. Holmes. The Director will want to see you.”
John tensed. That wasn’t part of the plan.
Mycroft took it in stride. “Very well. I have some questions for him myself.”
“Good luck with that,” the guard said, shaking his head. He opened the gate, allowing them to drive in.
“The Director,” Sherlock muttered to himself. “Alan Baker. A complete unknown outside of the file on this location.”
“We’re actually going to talk to him?” John blurted.
“Why not? It’ll make it easier to get near the ship,” Mycroft commented. “Not to mention we do have an actual sanctioned reason to be here. We deduced this is where they would attack. We were ordered to kill them. This is just part of following those orders.”
“Two of us aren’t supposed to be here!”
“John, calm yourself. Let me and Sherlock do all the talking. We know how to act like we know what we’re talking about.”
John wanted to object but found he couldn’t. “If he asks me a question, we’re all dead and you know it.”
A soldier – human, Sherlock quickly deduced – arrived. “The Director would like to see you.”
“We’ve been informed,” Mycroft said, gesturing for the soldier to lead them on.
Sherlock took the opportunity to examine the base they were in – he saw several people who were actually aliens. Now that he knew what to look for, they were pathetically easy to spot. They lacked the humanity everyone else did, wearing their bodies like a suit. Which was basically what it was to them, Sherlock realized. People who didn’t know would consider them uncanny.
The base itself was pretty standard. Sherlock saw military vehicles, crates of materials and technology, and security checkpoints around every building. They were approaching the central warehouse. Mycroft had to slide his identification card through the checkpoint just to be let into the warehouse, but it let him in without fuss.
“You sure you want them with you?” the soldier asked.
“Yes,” Mycroft said. “Though prepare a wipe for Mr. Watson, in case he’s driven insane.”
John blinked. “…You’re joking, right?”
The soldier looked sadly at John and shook his head. “Of course, Mr. Holmes.”
The inside of the warehouse was decidedly more interesting than the outside. Sherlock knew classified technology when he saw it – metals that shone in ways unlike any alloy he knew, chemicals that glowed bright colors, and an extremely large number of warning signs everywhere. Because everything was so alien, he found himself annoyingly unable to determine what most of the experiments around him actually did. He was fairly certain the blue ring to the left was an antigravity device, but the rest could have been sheep shearing devices for all he knew.
They entered another security checkpoint, which let Mycroft in easily. This section of the warehouse wasn’t very open and resembled the interior of an office building, rather than a mad scientist’s lab. They were taken to an elevator that went into the ground a few levels, opening up on a large, white hallway. The soldier led them to the end of the hallway, where another security checkpoint demanded attention. Mycroft put his card in again, opening the third area of the warehouse to them.
They found themselves in a tremendous open space – they could see the walls and ceiling of the warehouse around them, but also where the earth had been cut away to make more space. The prized possession of the base floated in front of their eyes. The ship.
It was an elongated crescent shape, with a single dome on top that could fit maybe two people inside. Its color was a soft gold, while the dome was a dark blue. Its front was angled at the ground, looking right at Sherlock and the others, while the two tails pointed toward the top of the warehouse.
“Hm,” Sherlock said, raising an eyebrow. “A lot of mass for a two-seater.”
The soldier nodded. “I don’t pretend to understand why it looks like that. Ask the Director. He’s this way.” He led them to a cage-lift that barely fit the four of them. The lift closed, raising them far into the air. Soon, they were above the ship, above the interior offices they had passed through, and high enough to see the area where experiments were taking place.
At the top of the lift was a single adjoined room: an office with big windows in every direction. There was only one occupant – a man in a large chair, his back turned to them. The soldier opened the door and gestured for the three of them to enter. Then the soldier left.
The office was bare of all decoration. There was a desk, writing utensils, a computer, and chairs. A rod-shaped device sat on the desk and a large console with a lot of buttons sat at the left of the room, presumably tied to all the major functions of the base.
“Why are you here?” Alan Baker asked from his seat, not turning to address his visitors.
Mycroft placed the photo on the desk. “We were told to kill them. We believe they are targeting this facility. Even if you have it under control, I decided I could come and provide oversight.”
“Reasonable. Why have you brought those two with you?”
“They were working for me on a separate matter at the same time. I presume you are not then aware of my brother’s deduction skills?”
“I know of Steven Holmes. Have you increased their clearance?”
“Temporarily, given the urgency of this command. I do have a wipe prepared for John if it becomes clear he cannot handle what is done here.”
“Good. I see you are taking the correct precautions.” Alan Baker turned around, revealing himself to clearly not be a human. He was humanoid in shape, but that was where the similarities ended. His body was covered in smooth, chrome armor with orange highlights. His head was smooth, hairless, and dominated by two solid black eyes.
John took a shaky step back. Mycroft and Sherlock held their ground.
“I may order him wiped after this is over regardless,” Alan commented, standing up. He was shorter than them, but the armor certainly made him threatening. “As for Steven, it would be preferable if he continued to work for us consistently. We shall see.”
“Do you care to explain who the people are we’re trying to hunt?” Sherlock asked.
“I’m sure you’ve deduced much of it already.”
“It would help to have someone who actually knows what’s going on fill in the holes.”
“I know less than you’d like,” Alan admitted. “At 23:53 local time last night, our satellites observed the meeting of two separate interdimensional units from unknown sources. We intercepted this meeting and acquired one of their dimensionally-oriented devices. It did not take long for us to uncover how the surprisingly primitive piece of technology worked. We used it to detect a signal they had sent out, asking for assistance from another universe to ‘deal’ with us. We were able to analyze the device with enough accuracy to generate a counter-frequency with it, preventing the creation of any portals. We were forced to initiate this in the universe the teams had fled to as well, to ensure they did not attack with a greater force in the indeterminate future. After they realized this was the case, they attacked Site 27. The ship there was destroyed before they could act.”
“You’re right, I did deduce most of that,” Sherlock said. “You don’t know anything about who they are?”
“Before yesterday we had no idea they existed,” Alan pointed out. “But it has already become evident that they are a significant threat. They have a number of traits that have not been observed in this universe. The interpreted messages indicate they plan to interfere with our long-term plans for Earth. I don’t need to tell you why that cannot happen.”
“You do not,” Mycroft agreed. “I assume you have counters to these traits?”
“Advanced technology from above has been moved to this base for defense purposes and several dozen bounty hunters are on site. Most targets only attract one or two of the bounty hunters. This is a special case. They will fall here, today. If not, the self-destruct will be activated and destroy everything in the base along with them.”
“Self-destruct? That’s part of the plan?” John blurted. Mycroft and Sherlock shot him agitated looks.
Alan fixed John with an unreadable expression. “This room will survive the destruction. We’ll live.”
Sherlock narrowed his eyes. He hadn’t been able to deduce much about Alan given the alien face, but he knew that was a lie, given the tone shift that came when he spoke it. Alan would survive the destruction, somehow. Not the rest of them. It was probably that armor.
It was at that point the alarms went off. A second after they started blaring, they stopped, and most of the lights in the warehouse died. The office remained well lit.
“There it is,” Alan said, pointing to the front of the warehouse. Something immensely strong punched the doors off their hinges, flattening a couple scientists. “Watch, you might learn some things.”
Sherlock didn’t watch – he acted. Alan’s back was turned. This was his opportunity. He grabbed the rod-shaped device that was on the desk and activated it, prompting a long metallic needle to extend outward. Mycroft had told them about this thing – a weapon the aliens used against their own kind. One blow to the base of the neck, and they would die. It was apparently the only sure-fire way to deal with them.
Sherlock rammed the needle into Alan’s neck, prompting green blood to spurt out the wound. Alan audibly winced in pain, but didn’t allow this to hold him back. He whirled around with precision, using one hand to remove the weapon from his neck. He tossed the weapon away while the other hand hit Sherlock across the face, tossing him to the side where the first hand was waiting to grab him. Alan thrust Sherlock out the window, holding him tight.
“You missed,” Alan said, eyes narrow. The slightly off-center wound on the back of his neck healed up with alarming speed.
“So I did. I take it you’re a high ranking member of your race’s military?” Sherlock asked. He continued without waiting for an answer. “Clearly, you are well trained to withstand pain and subdue enemies that have the drop on you. What you did was a learned behavior – not so different from humans after all.”
Alan blinked. Sherlock applauded himself inwardly – he had Alan curious. Good.
“I figured the high rank from the armor. That’s not something the other aliens have down there, disguised though they are. You would have given them armor were it available. I also expect you to be a devout follower of whatever your race decides are ‘morals’ or ‘honor’. That’s from the respect you gave Matthew for preparing. Let’s see… The way your eyes are moving suggest you’ve very interested in what’s going on here.”
“That I am. We have worked with you before. You had never given any indication of treachery this rash.”
“Perhaps I wasn’t fully aware of the situation until now?”
Sherlock saw Alan’s eyes twitch. He just made a deduction. Mycroft wasn’t kidding, these guys are smart. “You truly weren’t. But we have you on file actually being aware of the situation. I find it hard to believe, but you are multiversal. All three of you.”
“Well, you’ve got us!” Sherlock laughed. “Wouldn’t you like to stop dangling me over the edge and question me?”
“I’ll keep you dangling from my hand as long as I want,” Alan declared. “How did you get here?”
“Not our choice. Something you did last night brought us here against our will. Funny story, we replaced your versions of us! I’m not Steven Holmes, I’m Sherlock Holmes. Isn’t that something?”
The importance of the name was clearly lost on Alan. “No.”
“Tough crowd…” Sherlock heard explosions of the fight raging on below him. “Well, perhaps you’ll appreciate Matthew’s real name, Mycroft. What an odd name! Speaking of Mycroft – hey, Mycroft. Catch me.”
Alan deduced that a plan was being executed behind him. He began to turn.
The motion of Alan was not enough to sway John Watson’s steady hand – the hand of a doctor, a soldier, and a detective. Even with the motion of Alan’s neck, the needle-like blade struck true, sliding into the alien’s biological weakness.
Alan lost hold of Sherlock. The detective dropped for only an instant before Mycroft caught him, the elder brother cutting his limbs on the broken glass as he did so. “Catch me?” Mycroft blurted. “Really?”
John helped Mycroft pull Sherlock back up to the suspended office while Alan dissolved into a puddle of green liquid before their eyes. The three of them sat down and took a moment to breathe.
“Today…” John began, failing to finish the sentence.
“Has no equal,” Sherlock said, stretching his arms.
Explosions from the fight reached their ears, letting them know it wasn’t over yet. Sherlock stood up tall and set his gaze through the broken glass, examining the battle as it raged. All five of the individuals in the photo were there, facing off against a dozen or so aliens that looked like humans. No matter what injury was dealt, the aliens just recovered because the attackers did not know about their weak point, nor did they have the required specialized weapon.
Sherlock took the moment to take everything in – to figure out something they could do.
So much information…
He focused on the big one, the leader. Huge, experienced, used to using his muscles and fighting others directly. Extreme poker face – he got shot by a bullet and didn’t even flinch. Liked dolphins too much. Father of a daughter of high school age going through quite the rebellious streak. Had an ability that punched enemies at a short distance and allowed for teleporta- no, not teleportation, temporary halting of time.
The frog woman. Young, but still experienced. Intelligent, methodical. Cared deeply for those around her, even those she didn’t know very well. Spent many hours every day taking care of her hair. Fancied herself a superhero. Her abilities… She was essentially a frog with a really, really long tongue. Bizarre, but not overly helpful at the moment.
The man with the sword. He had no ability beyond his impressive height and coordination with the blade. A member of a militia, watch, or something similar. Raised to work hard, given the way held his blade. Possibly a farmer. Honorable, showing more restraint in his attacks than any of the others, even though none of them were making a point of using lethal force.
The man with the cactus. That cactus… Sherlock still couldn’t get a read on that cactus. It was there, and… Sherlock shook his head – it wasn’t important, get everything else. The man didn’t have much combat ability, so he stood in the back, firing a simple gun. He didn’t fire like someone inexperienced, so despite being an intellectual he must have seen combat many times before.
The last member, the artist, fought with an uncaring, dispassionate attitude. He had a power that transformed the skin of those it hit into books, into which he could write instructions – already there were two bounty hunter aliens attacking their kin. That man had virtually no morals. He was going to be late on one of his deadlines because he had been trapped here, and that had ticked him off.
There was also something unseen happening. Nearby pieces of technology would activate and attack the aliens, as if controlled by something. An unseen sixth member hacking into the machines, no doubt. It explained why the power had mostly gone out when the group arrived, and how they expected to fly away with the ship without clearance.
But they weren’t going to make it. The bounty hunters were too strong. It would only be a matter of time before they realized the self-destruct wasn’t activating… Then they would probably destroy the ship themselves. It was taking the otherworldly team too long to get across the warehouse. Far too long.
Mycroft shook his head. “This isn’t going to work.”
“We have to do something…” Sherlock muttered. “They need to succeed…”
John put a hand on Sherlock’s shoulder. “How do we know what they want to do is good for us?”
“They want to fix the problem, set it right,” Sherlock said. “I can see it in the way they move. They aren’t killers, but they are warriors. They’re here to fix things. Look down there – none of the human scientists or guards are dead. None. That’s difficult to do, especially with how much power they have.”
“We can’t do anything from up here but remove security barriers!” Mycroft pointed out. “They can get through those themselves!”
“Yes… Yes…” Sherlock lit up. “Mycroft, do you think you can tap into the speaker systems?”
Mycroft nodded, leaping onto the computer and using his card. Access was granted. He located the speaker program with ease, turning it on. “There you go.”
“YOU! YOU WITH THE POWER TO TURN THINGS INTO BOOKS!” Sherlock shouted. “ALL YOU NEED IS LINE OF SIGHT TO SOMEONE’S EYES. LOOK UP, I’M IN THE GLASS BOX FAR ABOVE YOU! GIVE ME INSTRUCTIONS!”
Sherlock whirled to the broken window and stared right at the artist man. The man saw him and nodded, wasting no time. The power – the invisible power – hit Sherlock dead on, popping his face open like a book. Something quickly scrawled words over his pages. Due to the distance, the instructions wrote overtop of some other words, scrambling Sherlock’s mind considerably – but he pressed on through sheer mental fortitude.
Sherlock’s face closed, allowing him to return to a fully aware status. “I probably have some kind of mental condition now, but that doesn’t matter, I know what to do. Mycroft, stay here and give us access.”
“What are you doing!?”
“John and I are going to fly a spaceship. Then we’re going to use it to destroy the alien experiment on the dimensional device. I’ve been given instructions.”
Mycroft nodded. “Go.”
John blinked. “Sherlock, do you know how to fly it?”
“Nope!” Sherlock declared. “But I’m confident I can figure it out! Let’s move!” He dragged John back to the lift. They descended back to the ground as the battle raged on the other side of the warehouse.
Sherlock dashed to a mobile platform, dragging John onto it. He pressed ‘up’, and it lifted them toward the ship’s cockpit. It was at this point the guards in this section thought that maybe, just maybe, they should try to stop these two. They aimed their guns.
Mycroft must have found something, because green lights started to light up on the walls around the ship. The large back doors began to open, preparing for a smooth launch. The soldiers returned to the exploding sounds happening on the other side of the warehouse - green lights meant everything that was happening was authorized. In their minds, anyway.
When Sherlock and John approached the dark dome, it opened up like an eyelid, revealing two seats appropriate for human use. Sherlock sat down in the front, John in the back. The dome slid shut overhead with a shik, but they could still see through it.
“Everything else considered, this is actually pretty cool,” John admitted.
Sherlock grinned. “It is time to go to space.” He examined the console in front of him. It had almost never been used, so there were virtually no clues to tell him what buttons did what. He was able to deduce that the two softly glowing orbs in front of him were meant for his hands. Presumably the equivalent to a steering wheel.
He placed his hands on the orbs and felt the ship tap into his mind. It knew instantly where he wanted to go and what he wanted to do. He didn’t even need to steer. The crescent-ship rotated a full hundred-and-eighty degrees, pointing out the open end of the warehouse. With no revving up, it blasted out of the hangar with enough acceleration to flatten anything on it to putty. Sherlock and John felt nothing.
“The technology required for this thing…” John said with awe, looking at the ground receding below them faster than he had ever seen it before. “This is incredible.”
“We’re going to get to see a bigger one soon enough,” Sherlock smirked. Within twenty seconds, they had left the atmosphere behind. The orb of the Earth’s dark side was behind them. Before them, a large, blue, disc-shaped ship floated. It looked exactly like a UFO one would see in a cheesy science-fiction movie or cartoon.
“Right,” Sherlock said. “Now to fire weapons…”
The ship didn’t fire weapons.
“…Sherlock…”
“Give me a moment to think…” He processed – he had no idea which of the buttons were weapons. He knew one had to be, but he quickly realized there was probably another button that was the safety. And he couldn’t destroy the ship without the weapons…
Wait, he could. He could ram the UFO. That would do it.
The ship started accelerating again.
“Sherlock, what are you doing?”
“…What the man wrote into me. He told me to destroy the UFO. I think he expected I’d use the weapons, but I can’t figure them out…” He ground his teeth. “And I don’t think I can refuse the command.”
“Sherlock!”
“I’ve been unintentionally turned into a suicide bomber…” Sherlock muttered, the distance to the UFO closing fast.
“SHERLOCK!”
“QUIET! I NEED TO THINK OF ANOTHER WAY TO DO THIS!” He breathed in, put his hands to his head, and thought.
~~~
Sherlock went to his mind palace.
Images flashed past his mind – images of the recent past, images of information, images of his own thought process.
“Right, so, I have somewhere in the span of ten seconds to figure this out,” Sherlock said to himself. “To find a way to follow THIS without dying.”
He gestured at hastily scrawled words that read “WILL DESTROY THE SHIP WHERE THE DEVICE IS CONTAINED.”
“Right right right…” The console of the spaceship flashed in front of his eyes. Every little detail flashed into his focus – their shape, their arrangement, their proximity to his hands… That big middle one might be the fire, or the radio, or the self-destruct. The safety could be the one his thumb could reach instantly…
Thirty-two possibilities that make sense, he decided. “Too many!” he shouted to himself. “Not enough to try in ten seconds! New plan!” The buttons were tossed to the side and he began to examine the UFO they were targeting. Was there a way to hit it to destroy it without destroying themselves?
He examined every facet of the UFO he could manage and found nothing. The technology was too alien for him to recognize weak points. It looked too much like a piece of fiction anyway!
“Think! Think!” he shouted to himself. “Nothing obvious… Think outside the box!”
They had the hacker with them – the one that was controlling technology. That’s how they expected to fly the ship themselves…
“Got it! I can just fly back down and have the hacker do it! Easy!”
The command tore at his mind, demanding he not take an action with such uncertainty.
“OH COME ON!” Sherlock shouted at the words. “That will work! If… If they’re still alive… Or anywhere near the actual location… If I can communicate without giving them time to… Fine. I’ll need to figure out exactly where their hacker is and who they are. I need certainty.”
He replayed the fight he had observed from the glass office. He walked among the otherworldly adventurers and the aliens disguised as humans, watching the way they all moved their heads closely. They saw technology activating, and then glanced behind them. That means the hacker is outside, and nearby good… Right – wait… They weren’t looking outside. They were looking inside. The hacker was with them.
It was the man holding the cactus. But he showed no signs of being a hacker, or even controlling the technology. He glanced at the activating technology after it activated, not before…
But right after, he glanced at the cactus he held in his hand.
The cactus.
There was no way, was there? That the cactus was the hacker? But their reactions – it meant it was. Two of them had invisible powers that could act without Sherlock seeing. Could the cactus have them as well? It… It had to, or had to be the result of one…
The cactus.
“Whatever remains, no matter how improbable…” Sherlock muttered to himself.
The command allowed itself to sink into the back of his mind. It would allow him to go get the cactus.
~~~
Sherlock pulled up at the last second.
“THAT WAS BLOODY CLOSE!” John shouted.
“Yes. Hold on, we need to get a cactus.”
“…What?”
“You heard me.”
“I did, I’m having troubl-”
“Get ready to catch.”
“Sherlock!”
They rushed back to Earth, right where they had just come from. It only took a handful of seconds.
This time, the ship did crash through the roof of the warehouse, right overtop of the ongoing battle. Sherlock twisted the ship sideways and opened the cockpit bubble with a thought. “CACTUS! NOW!”
The man with the cactus saw. “JOTARO I CAN’T MAKE THAT!”
“I know, Daniel,” the huge man – Jotaro apparently – said.
He must have stopped time, because the next thing John knew a cactus hit him in the gut. “AUGH!”
“I told you to catch, John!” Sherlock shouted, closing the bubble cockpit.
“I… WHAT!?”
Then the cactus tapped into the power of the ship, taking control from Sherlock. The ship activated an FTL jump, appearing in front of the UFO in an instant.
“…Convenient,” John commented, momentarily ceasing the act of plucking cactus needles out of his stomach.
The cactus activated the ship’s weapons, firing a barrage of red laser missiles right at the central blue dome. The ship exploded in a burst of blue energy.
Sherlock and John cheered. “Take that, alien overlords!” John shouted.
Their victory was cut short when several dozen identical ships appeared around them. The two humans paled. They knew they would not survive a coordinated attack from this many, cactus or no.
But Sherlock remembered something.
They had just destroyed what was stopping dimensional travel.
Hadn’t the team below been calling for help?
A tremendous ship of a vaguely rectangular shape appeared out of a gigantic portal of energy.
“Does that say… Enterprise?” John blurted.
“Yes, yes it does,” Sherlock said. “…I think we get to enjoy a lightshow, John. If only we had popcorn.”
The Enterprise fired its weapons, showing the UFOs how truly pathetic they were. The aliens fell to the might of an interdimensional flagship within minutes.
John actually wished he had popcorn.
~~~
The next day, Daniel knocked on the door of 221B, Baker Street.
Sherlock opened it, eyebrow raised. “I was wondering when you would show up, Daniel Jackson.” John poked his head out from behind Sherlock, curious.
Daniel nodded. “I figured. I guess you already know why I’m here?”
“To thank me,” Sherlock said.
“Us,” John corrected. “Thank us.”
“What did you do?”
“I killed an alien. And caught a cactus with my stomach.”
“Oh. Yeah, that must have slipped my mind.”
Daniel nodded. “Oh behalf of the Alliance, I thank you for what you’ve done. You helped us not only return to our homes, but also save an entire planet from being subjugated by alien overlords. You did all of this in one day, with no prior knowledge of the multiverse, or the aliens. It was nothing short of incredible, Mr Holmes.”
Holmes smirked. “What’s my reward?”
“We’ll give you a dimensional device and a traveling license. You will have access to all the services our side of the multiverse has to offer.”
“Yeah, no,” John said. “I’ve had enough excitement for a lifetime, and I already had that from what Sherlock drags me to every other day. Of course Sherlock is going to eat it u-”
“I’m going to refuse,” Sherlock declared.
“What?” John blurted. “But…”
“It’s too much for one mind to keep track of,” Sherlock said. “If I expand my horizons that far… The details will become unimportant. And I can’t live without obsessing over the details.”
Daniel smiled. “You know, there have been a few who’ve said that before. I understand. It’s not for everyone, out there.”
“That said, I’m never one to just ignore information. I’m not going to be traveling out there, but I would like a source of information. Would you by chance have an all-in-one guide of sorts I can use to educate myself?”
Daniel smirked, handing Sherlock a data pad. “This has The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Multiverse on it. It should have all you need. And here’s a multiversal phone, just in case you want to make a call.”
“I’ll take it,” Sherlock said, smirking. “By the way, I have just made the most absurd deduction. Even more absurd than a cactus having the power to hack technology.”
“What?”
“You’re married to a horse.”
Daniel laughed.
John gaped. “My God, he’s right isn’t he?”
“Yes. Yes he is,” Daniel confirmed.
“Done!” John shouted, walking back inside. “I am so done!”
“You should go talk to Mycroft,” Sherlock suggested, starting to flip through the Guide. “I think he’ll love to talk policy with you.”
Daniel sighed. “Yeah, we do owe him as well. Wish us luck.”
“You’ve dealt with worse than him.” Those were Sherlock’s last words before he slammed the door in Daniel’s face.
“…What an interesting man,” Daniel commented to himself.
~~~
Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully sat in the X-files division of the FBI.
A news report was playing in the background. “Multiversal entities have come to our world and are in the process of removing the influence of an alien presence…”
“I like to think we helped with that,” Scully said. “You know, at least a little. More than solving a psychoactive drug case.”
“I think I know what happened,” Mulder said. “The spirit séance we were part of mixed with the dimensional energy, triggering the switches required t-”
“Mulder, just stop.”
Mulder sat back and folded his hands behind his head. “I’m looking forward to not being crazy.”
“You believe in ghosts, Mulder.”
“Guess that’s the next thing. Aliens taken care of, time to figure out ghosts.”
“…Mulder, please tell me you aren’t serious.”
Mulder grinned.
~~~
Froppy shook hands with Jotaro. “Ribbit. Glad to meet your people outside a cruel game.”
Jotaro nodded.
“He wasn’t there, you know,” Rohan commented. “That was Pinkie’s group…”
Froppy shook her head at Rohan, ignoring the rest of what he said. “The United States of the Multiverse will be glad to know we found you. Do you have any leads on the blue metal guy?”
Jotaro shook his head. “No. We have found no leads on him, despite searching for multiple years. We do not think he wants to be found.”
“Then we’ll just have to look harder. Ribbit.”
Carrot polished his sword. “It was an honor to fight alongside you, Mister Kujo. You as well, Kishibe.”
“I thought I was an honor-less hack?” Rohan retorted.
“You showed fortitude in the end,” Carrot said. “You should try to tap into that more often.”
“…Right.”
The cactus produced its Stand: an electric dandelion. It sent out a message in morse code. You guys are forgetting me again.
Froppy smiled. “Don’t worry Cak, we’ll never forget what you’ve done for us. I’m expecting medals in your future. Ribbit.”
Cak seemed happy with this.
Jotaro pulled down on his hat. “Yare yare daze…”
“You know what I find interesting?” Rohan said, suddenly. “Sherlock Holmes. He’s from a book.”
“No, he’s not,” Froppy said. “The Sherlock Holmes books have nothing to do with him. His life is nothing like theirs. Different eras, different people. The multiverse is large enough that there would have to be someone named Sherlock Holmes that was an amazing detective.”
“Hrm…” Rohan said, clearly not satisfied by Froppy’s dismissal. He was sure there was something else going on.
~~~
“So, they made contact…” Randall Flagg said, taking a few steps forward on the frozen lake. “Not ideal. But the USM doesn’t have as much power as they think they do.” He turned to Siron. “The plan has not changed. Their nation will fall the moment it is created.”
Siron nodded. “We will accomplish our goal… Or die trying.”
Flagg smirked. “That’s true for you, I suppose.” He held up the dark orb in his hands, looking deep into the worlds.
Siron remained silent, staring into the black orb himself, unable to remove any of his eyes from it.