"Hey, Ash," Clara greets her friend as the door ring to signal her arrival. Ash is behind the counter, wiping it down.

She smiles at her friend. "Hello, Clara,"

"Is Bill here?" Clara asks, curious to know what her friend thinks of the new helper.

"Yeah," Ash says, putting the cloth down as Clara comes up to lean on the counter. "He's in the back."

"So..." Clara asks, playfully raising her eyebrows, "What do you think of him?"

Ash rolls her eyes. "He's alright. Wiggy's funny, and it's just nice to have a partner." she says, raising her eyebrows as if to say, "so what?" and leaning on the counter.

She's hiding something. Clara thinks. Most likely it's that Ash really likes Bill, more than she'll tell. Also, Clara noticed she used Bill's nickname, which only his friends use. A smug look plays on her face.

"What?" Ash asks, narrowing her eyes at her friend.

"Oh, nothing," Clara smiles sweetly, secretly thinking they'd make a cute couple.

The console room door opens and Bill walks in, approaching the girls at the counter. "Ash," he says in his gravelly voice, "We don't have any of the blue one's left. Hello, Clara,"

"Hi, Bill," Clara smiles.

"Oh, really?" Ash complains stealing Bill's attention back to her. "Alright," she sighs. "Well, Wiggy and I best be off. We need to get more blue LED bulbs for the wall over there." Ash says, nodding towards the wall across from the counter. "I'm redecorating,"

"Why do I have to come?"Bill complains.

"Because you're my helper... And I need a second opinion." Ash says, walking out from behind the counter.

Sure... Clara thought, smirking.

"Clara?" Ash asks, "Would you mind taking care of the Diner while we're out? I know it's not your shift yet..."

"No, I don't mind," Clara insisted, "you two go. There isn't really anyone here anyway." she says, just noticing that the Diner was completely empty. She wasn't worried, though--that was perfectly normal.

"Thanks," Ash says, "Come on. Let's go,"

Bill smiled and nodded to Clara as they walked out. Clara watched them go, then went behind the counter to continue wiping it down.

Soon, the silence began to sink in and Clara found her thoughts wandering off to Sherlock. What was he doing now? Clara still couldn't believe they were actually dating. Her, and Sherlock Holmes. It was kind of insane, really. Who would've thought? If almost seemed too good to be true... though, she wouldn't have it any other way. Right now, dating Sherlock and working at the Diner, her life was right where she wanted it to be.

She was almost done with the counter when the TV across from the counter turned on. Clara jumped and her head snapped up at the sound of it buzzing alive. The TV was turned on to what looked like a security camera filming in an empty cement room. Clara's breaths came out quickly. She was on edge. How did that happen? It was probably a freak electrical surge, she told herself. Trying to steady her breaths, she tried to forget about it. It was probably nothing. It was probably going to turn off in a few minutes anyway.

Having finished wiping the counter down, Clara turned and walked back to the sink. She was just rinsing out the cloth when she hears a voice all too familiar.

"Hello, Clara."

Clara whipped around, dropping the rag on the floor. Her breaths sped up again and she frantically looked for the source of the voice. She hadn't heard that voice in years, and the Diner was still completely empty.

"I'm back."

Eyes wide, Clara's head whipped to the TV. There, on the screen, was Missy.

"Did you miss me?"

Her eyes seemed to be staring straight at Clara.

"Did you miss me?"

The audio and image flickered to Moriarty's face, then back to Missy's in the blink of an eye.

"Did you miss me?"

Moriarty, Missy.

"Did you miss me?"

Sherlock's POV

"How did you know my kitchen was tiny?" Faith asks Sherlock. The pair are walking down a street, and the London rain from before has stopped.

Sherlock shows her the paper containing her handwriting. "Look at the fading pattern on the paper. It's not much, but it's enough to know your kitchen window faces east. Now, kitchen notice boards..."

Walking a few paces down the road, he looks up towards the glistening Christmas lights strung across the street. With Faith watching a few feet away, he draws a rectangle in the air. Immediately in Sherlock's mind, it turns into a noticeboard. Faith watches sceptically but intrigued as he walks toward nothing as if he's seeing something there.

"By instinct, we place them at eye level where there's natural light." Sherlock pulls a drawing pin from the board and pins the piece of paper to it. Smoothing the paper down, he turns to Faith. Sceptical, she walks into the street to join him.

"Now look: the sun's only struck the bottom two-thirds..." Sherlock draws his hand across the paper horizontally, one-third of the way down. "...but the line is straight, so that means we know the paper is facing the window."

Turning and walking away from the noticeboard, he draws another rectangle about forty-five degrees in the air. A window appears, and Sherlock turns around, walking back to the noticeboard. Sun from the window shines down onto the paper.

"But because the top section is unaffected..." continues Sherlock, gesturing to the paper, "...we know the sunlight can only be entering the room at a steep angle."

Sherlock walks back towards the window, the noticeboard disappearing from behind him. "If the sunlight was able to penetrate the room when the sun was lower in the sky..." 

Once again he walks from the window to the now non-existent noticeboard. "...then the paper would be equally faded top to bottom." The window and noticeboard appear again, and the sun hits the paper.

Sherlock continues, "But no. It only makes it when the sun is at its zenith, so I'm betting that you live in a narrow street on the ground floor." he turns his head towards the window and through it he can see terraced houses across from Faith's flat, the sun gleaming above the houses.

The sunlight is now hitting on the bottom couple inches of the paper. Faith's eyes follow his hand, which is pointing to the board again. "Now, if steeply angled sunlight manages to hit eye level on the wall opposite the window, then what do we know about the room?" he asks.

Faith's eyes follow him as he walks to the window again. Sherlock grabs one side of it and pulls it closer to the noticeboard. As he does so, the sunlight moves up the paper. Finally, once sunlight covers about two-thirds of the paper and the window is about ten feet away, Sherlock stops. "The room's small."

Their eyes meet, and Faith smiles at him. For a second, Sherlock feels a hint of an emotion he doesn't recognise, but then a light hits them from above, followed by a deafening noise.

Faith looks up. "Oh." Sherlock follows her gaze to see a helicopter watching them from above. "Big Brother is watching you!" she points out.

"Literally." Sherlock sighs.

~~~~~

[Video Above: Oslock (Clara and Sherlock) - Cross the Line by Whovian Sherlocked] 

Thanks for all the help from http://arianedevere.livejournal.com/88998.html

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-O

23.4.17

Word Count: 1214