A
Study In Satin
by Tigger
For uncounted minutes, Sherlock Holmes simply stood there, alone with his tears, clad in his too-long dressing gown and gripped by the rage that he'd failed to completely suppress when Moriarty had been present. *I am NOT - I WILL NOT be - merely an emotionally overwrought, irrational female,* he assured himself. "But aren't you behaving in just such a manner now?" he asked himself aloud in that husky yet not-very-masculine voice. "Are you not giving your emotions free rein and thus clouding your perceptions and mental processes? Get a grip on yourself, man!" he ordered. "I. . .AM. . . HOLMES! I am objective! I am in CONTROL!" It required a monumental effort, but Holmes ultimately succeeded in regaining at least some semblance of his famous control. Objectivity, on the other hand, proved to be, by far, the more difficult attribute, as this attack had been visited upon Holmes' very self image and most basic identity. Even the great Holmes, champion of rationality and cold logic, found it difficult to be objective about something so personal, something so intrinsic. Depression yet loomed at the still-ragged edges of his control. He felt a burning need to rail against this foul machination of Fate and to demand to know why something so abominable had been visited upon him, but Holmes resisted that unworthy and useless display. However, even as he won out against that urge, a significant question occurred to him. "Why now?" Holmes asked, voicing that question aloud, "Why did Moriarty launch this assault now? Clearly, by his own testimony, he has been experimenting with this compound for some time. Surely, he has had ample opportunity in recent years to attack me in this manner. So the key question becomes why move now? Not sooner, not later, but now?" And just as immediately, an answer occurred to Holmes. "Because some other factor, critical to his scheme, must have changed. He has an idea that may help him solve whatever problems he has with the drug and he is taking steps to keep me from becoming involved. But WHAT is he doing, curse the fates?!? How can I stop him if I cannot deduce WHAT he is planning? Facts, man, you need FACTS!" An almost forgotten habit had the great detective pausing, waiting for another voice to answer his, but none did. Watson was still gone, and Holmes felt more alone than he'd ever felt before. Grimly, Holmes set aside those thoughts, those feelings, and began to reconstruct the events of the past three days. Somewhere, there simply had to be some clue or bit of evidence that he could use against Moriarty. Lost in thought, Holmes paced aimlessly about his study until he found himself near his favorite chair and sat down. Suddenly, he found himself flailing deep within the chair's embrace, his feet no longer able to remain in contact with the floor. The unexpected, forceful reminder of his reduced stature momentarily startled Holmes out of his reveries, but only momentarily. Instead, the experience served to harden his determination to pursue this case to a final, undisputed conclusion. The disciplined habits of a lifetime returned to the fore, focusing his powers of concentration and finally quelling the emotional maelstrom of the past hour. Sherlock Holmes was soon completely engrossed in reviewing and analyzing his memories. Without conscious thought, he reached for his famous pipe and the Persian slipper that Holmes used in lieu of a tobacco pouch. And promptly began to choke. Then he sneezed hugely. Tears began to flood his eyes uncontrollably before he realized what was wrong - an aroma that had once appealed to him was now too harsh - too strong for his now-youthful, newly-sensitized nasal tissues. Eyes streaming, Holmes was forced to rush to an open window and take several deep, cleansing breaths of the cool morning air before he could again breathe normally. Frowning, he carefully took up and examined his pipe. The stench that emanated from the tar-encrusted bowl nearly made him nauseous. Disgusted, he tossed the pipe and Persian slipper into the far corner of the room. "Even my pipe," he growled, "the fiend denies me even that simple pleasure of my lost manhood. Yet another motivation to find Moriarty and conclude our business once and for all." ~------------~ Holmes spent the next hour thinking, more than once catching himself again reaching for now missing pipe. While several avenues of inquiry appeared open to him at that point in time, the most significant immediate problem he faced was the imminent onset of Moriarty's promised withdrawal syndrome. There would, beyond any doubt, be such a withdrawal. Moriarty had been too amused by the picture of Holmes suffering through the condition for it to be a decoy. More importantly, Moriarty had to be involved with some very large scheme - one so large in scope that he had been willing to risk exposing his continued existence to Holmes. Moriarty had to know that, even in this. . . incomplete form, a fully rational, unencumbered Sherlock Holmes would prove to be a major threat to any scheme Moriarty might have planned and, more importantly, to the villain's own freedom and safety. Achieving his ends would therefore require that Moriarty put in motion some mechanism that would prevent Holmes from intervening in the evil Professor's manipulations and games. Ergo, Holmes concluded, the withdrawal syndrome had to be real. That conclusion both greatly complicated and simplified Holmes' plans. Strategically, his time was doubly limited by Moriarty's cursed brew. Even assuming he had enough of the potion to last indefinitely, eventually he'd become so young (and so female) that even his great mind would fall prey to the twin demons of youth and irrationality, whereupon he would no longer be capable of successfully dueling with the great Professor Moriarty. All that aside, if Holmes were to even attempt the battle, he would need some means to blunt the effects of the syndrome and at this juncture, Moriarty's potion was the only agent to Holmes' knowledge that would accomplish this goal. Holmes checked his bottle of the drug only to find a half to three quarters of an ounce remaining from his concentration experiment. "How much time does this buy me," Holmes murmured thoughtfully. At his typical rate of consumption, Holmes used approximately two cubic centimeters of the drug at a time. "I detest making assumptions, but I have no other avenue open to me," he said. "So, assuming that the ordinarily meticulous Moriarty wanted the new drug to be taken in approximately equivalent dosages as the cocaine it masqueraded as, that scant half to three quarters of an ounce should provide about anywhere from seven to ten withdrawal-delaying doses of the drug." *How much time does this afford me?* Holmes wondered again as he swirled the contents of the dark, amber bottle. "Probably not much," he breathed, still not used to the musical tones that issued from his mouth. "Normally, I would take no more than a single dose a day. That would mean this," he held the bottle back up to the light, "Might be expected to last a week, perhaps ten days at the most. Depending on the addictive strength of this compound, however, it might also be considerably less." Holmes slammed his fine-boned fist against the desk. He needed more time! A week simply was not sufficient time to locate, not to mention, stop Moriarty before the effects of the withdrawal killed Holmes. He needed to acquire more of the drug. If he could just balance the withdrawal against the rate of age regression, he might be able to buy enough time to find Moriarty. But where would he find more of the drug? He didn't have enough time or drug to analyze the compound, and even assuming he could determine its constituents, it very likely required exotic, unobtainable materials. Idly, Holmes looked down at the bottle clutched in his hand until his subconscious scanning of the label impinged on his racing mind. "A-HA! That's IT!" he cheered, setting the bottle aside. He'd return to the chemist shop post haste and force the proprietor to admit to being in league with Moriarty and to give Holmes more of the drug. At least then he'd have a fighting chance of stopping Moriarty one last time. Resolutely, Holmes turned to his dressing room. He must have something in his disguise case that would let him move about the city. The chemist shop opened at ten a.m. and Holmes wanted to be the first person in the door.
