2002 -  1 year, 2 months

"And so, the prince and the princess lived happily ever after!" Jane closed the book, smiling at her daughter.

"For god's sake, Jane, the child can already walk and talk. She's too old for fairytales—especially ones that promote female fragility and white supremacy!" 

Jane turned around, her face changing immediately to that of annoyance. "Oh, hello, William. I didn't hear you come in."

"Sherlock!" The child cried with glee, pronouncing the o with an exaggerated ah.

Sherlock gave a crisp smile to the child, one he usually gave people he didn't really know—the kind of smile he only gave Octavia whilst in Jane's presence. But there was something in his eyes; a sparkle that matched the excitement and adoration of his child's. "Hello, Octavia."

"At least I read her stories," Jane proclaimed, rather haughtily. 

The elder Holmes snorted. Little did Jane know, he did read Octavia children's stories. But not ones that were racist and sexist. Stories like Matilda and The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. He remembered loving those books as a child.

But instead, he retorted, "She doesn't need to fantasize about 'happily ever afters!' The child knows the Fibonacci Sequence, for Christ's sake!"

Jane looked at him skeptically. Octavia giggled, realizing they were talking about her. To prove his point, Sherlock asked, "Octavia, what's the square root of 15?"

"3.87298!" the infant chirped joyously, proud that she knew the answer. 

Sherlock couldn't help from grinning. "That's correct."

Jane stared at her toddler with a look of bewilderment. "Octavia..." she started, voice low. "How do you know that?" 

"Sherlock teached me, last Monday." Octavia answered her mother, exaggerating the lahck again.

"Taught," Sherlock corrected her.

"Tahhht!" Octavia mimicked.

"Why on Earth are you teaching her these things already?!" Jane shouted. "She's barely one year old!"

Furrowing his brows, Sherlock shot back. "I could recite fifty digits of pi by the time I was one!" 

Jane stood up, her face red. "Well, I'm bloody sure you could, couldn't you?!" she left the room in an with an eerie silence, and Octavia gave a sniff. She entered again a few moments later with her daughter's little jacket in her hands. "Just go, William." She gave Sherlock a cold stare, shoving the jacket into his hands.

Then she turned to Octavia, and her expression immediately softened. "I'll see you on Friday, sweetheart. There's a bag of crisps in your jacket pocket in case you get hungry on the way to William's." 

Octavia smiled and gave Jane a little peck on the cheek, which made Jane laugh. Sherlock looked away. Then Jane stood up, and said to Sherlock, "Now, get out."

2006 - age 5

Sitting at his desk, Sherlock put his hands together and rested his thumbs on his chin. This new case... it seemed so simple, but no worthwhile case was ever that easy. 

A pair of little hands set something on his desk and caught his attention.

"I made you some tea, Sherlock." the little voice chirped. Mrs Hudson stood in the doorway of the kitchen, looking at the father-daughter duo fondly. 

"Thank you, Octavia," Sherlock accepted the drink. Mrs Hudson had taught Octavia how to make tea a week ago, and she had gotten quite good at it by now; Sherlock had never had a cup of tea more amazing than his daughter's. 

"What are you working on?" little Octavia inquired. She went up on her tippy toes to try and see over the top of the desk. 

"Just another case from Scotland Yard. I'm having a bit of trouble figuring it out..." Sherlock usually never admitted it when he didn't understand something, but his daughter was an exception. Before he had adopted her, Sherlock probably would've stuck a knife through the file that he wasn't able to figure out, but Jane had convinced him to stop that violent attitude whilst Octavia was around. Jane didn't want her little girl to catch on to Sherlock's bad habits.

"Read it to me!" Octavia cried with joy. Cases were like stories to her. Even though they were more violent than the stories that her Mummy read her, she loved how Sherlock always seemed to find their conclusion in the end. 

"Alright," Sherlock picked up the little girl and set her on his lap so she could see the file. "Dr. Rick Andrews, a physician at Barnes Hospital who is married to his wife, Julia Andrews, is found dead in the morning by his assistant, Jonathan Portland, in his office. Dr. Andrew's co-workers report that they saw him go home that night, and security cameras do not show Andrews' entrance back into the building. There is a deep knife wound from one of his medical knives just below Andrew's heart, almost as if the killer tried to murder him via the heart, but missed. The gash is not the cause of death, however, as experts report that 5 grams of sodium thiopental had been injected into his bloodstream and killed him an hour before the stabbing. His body was found at five in the morning and Andrews went home at 9 at night, so I have determined that he was killed at about 11 to 11:30am. But... I don't know who the killer is or how Andrews got back into his office."

Octavia looked at her father. Sherlock had always given her an ending to his stories, but he didn't have one this time. I'll help him think of one, she thought.

Sherlock watched Octavia sat silently in his lap for a while after he'd spoken. At first, he worried that maybe the case was too mature for her, and she was in shock. But then he contradicted himself with the fact that she had heard much worse things before, and it hadn't bothered her much. He sighed in relief, but then watched as the toddler raised her hands up to her chin in a praying position and closed her eyes, with a very serious and concentrated look on her face. Sherlock looked puzzled, and Mrs Hudson's laugh was heard from the kitchen doorway.

"What is she doing?" Sherlock turned to the landlady and asked, "Is she praying?"

"She picked that up from you, I expect!" Mrs Hudson snorted and turned back into the kitchen.

The little girl awoke for her trace and stated, turning to Sherlock, "Portland is the murderer. He followed Andrews home, gave his wife the sodium thiopental to slip into his evening tea and once he was unconscious, took him back to his office at Barnes, and stabbed him with one of his medical knives. They got in through the window of his office, with the help of Andrews' wife."

The sociopath thought this verdict over in his head. It made sense, he realized. But one more thing was left out. "That could work, except, why would Portland and Mrs Andrews want Andrews dead?"

"I don't know," the little Holmes shrugged. "Maybe he wasn't very good at his job?"

Sherlock let out a laugh. "Good job, Octavia. But remember: you must always solve the entire case, even if you don't immediately know the answer."

The little detective nodded in reply, grinning because she'd gotten the case right.

2007 - age 6

"Sherlock?" the little Holmes peered up at Sherlock with large doe eyes. 

"Do you need something, Octavia?" Sherlock turned to her from his chair.

"As a matter of fact, I do," she said in her small voice, with an air of authority she'd learned from her male guardian. "I'd like to be known as Silas Holmes."

"Alright. Do you have a reason why?" Sherlock asked, turning back to his mind palace. 

Little Silas tugged on his shirt sleeve, in order to get his attention again. "Well, your real name is William, isn't it? I want a different name, like yours."

"Do you... dislike the name you have?" Sherlock asked. He was admittedly a little miffed that she wanted to be called Silas—it was the name Jane had chosen. But, of course, now he understood how his parents had felt when he'd announced his name was Sherlock. The only difference was that he had decided on his name sometime during his later Primary School career.

"Of course not!" Silas protested. "I just want a name like you have."

2010 - age 9

Silas looked across the courtyard to see her mother standing near her blue bug vehicle and waving to her. She enthusiastically waved back and watched as Jane started walking towards where she was playing on the school's playground. 

"Hello, sweetheart!" Jane picked up her daughter and spun her round. "How was your first day?"

The toddlers smile dropped as she responded, "Boring."

Jane winced behind her smile as she caught a glimpse of William in her little girl. "Well, I'm sure it was just..." she trailed off as a little boy sitting next to Silas caught her eye. "Who's this, sweetheart?" she asked her daughter, her smile fading to a fake one.

"This is Crispin, Mummy. He's in my class. He's really good at telling stories!"

"Nice to meet you, Mrs Holmes," the little boy stuck out his hand for Jane to shake.

"Oh, I'm not..." Jane looked at his hand, which was the colour of chocolate, and decided whether or not to take it. "I'm not Mrs Holmes. Jane, please," she shook his hand, not wanting to seem unfriendly. Her smile grew faker by the second, and both of the 9-year-olds most certainly noticed. 

Silas made eye contact with Crispin and gave him an apologetic look. She didn't understand why her mother was acting so strange. Meanwhile, Crispin just ignored the way Jane was acting--people acted that way around him often.

"What were you two doing, just now?" Jane asked the children. 

Silas grinned. "We were playing Cops and Robbers!"

Crispin made a little gun with his hands, smiling happily. "I'm the Cop, she's the Robber! Pew pew pew!"

Silas fell over laughing, faking gun wounds. She especially loved being the Robber after all of the stories she'd heard from Sherlock about criminals. Jane felt a bit unnerved, but tried to laugh along as well. 

A tall man with the same skin tone as Crispin approached Jane and the kids. He had a piercing in his nose and a beanie on his head, and a shirt with a crown on it. "Time to go, Crispy," he told the little boy. Then he turned to Jane. "Nice to meet you, by the way. I'm Arran Taylor, Crispin's dad." He smiled and extended his hand. 

Jane hesitated again, but eventually took the man's hand and shook it. She noticed that his grip was strong. "Jane Carrigan--Silas' mom. Apparently, our children have become close friends during school."

Silas noted how nice Arran's smile was. "Glad to hear it," he said. "Well, I hope we see you around! Say goodbye, Crispy. Mum's waiting at home with your sister and they've got takeout."

"Bye, Silas!" Crispin said, smiling at his friend. 

"See you tomorrow!" Silas responded, waving as they left. 

Jane watched them go, rather unsteady. Then she turned to her daughter. "Let's go, honey. We're going to meet William at work."

Silas nodded and followed after her mother.

~

Jane and the little Holmes approached Sherlock, who was standing near a mortician's table, looking at a body that Molly had uncovered. Silas ran and grabbed on to Molly's leg. "Hello Molly!" she greeted her.

"Hey there, Silas!" Molly looked down at the little girl with a smile. "How was your first day?" she led Silas out of the lab, telling Sherlock that they'd be in the lobby.

The pair left in the lab were silent for a moment. Then Jane told him, "Silas made a friend today." her expression was serious and concerned.

"That should be good news, correct?" Sherlock responded, only turning to her for a millisecond. Jane nodded. "Then why does the look on your face seem so worried?" 

"It's a little boy. His name is Crispin."

Sherlock didn't reply, waiting for her to continue.

"He's black."

The consulting detective stopped. Then he sighed. "So? What's your point, Jane?"

Jane shrugged, inspecting the dead body as well. "I don't know. I'm just concerned about who she's making friends with, is all..."

Sherlock's fist met the examination table harshly, attention immediately on Jane, glaring. "So she's friends with a black boy. What difference does it make? He's still a child. They're still friends. I don't see any problem."

"Fine. Forget I said anything, William!" Jane put her hands up in defense, her face red and flustered. "I'll see you next week." Sherlock turned back to his work, and she stormed out of the room.

~~~~~

Finally, an update! Thank you to everyone who stuck with this story. Remember to vote, and let me know what you thought of the chapter! Love,

~Olive

29.3.18

WC: 2124