Hello. Good evening.

The character of Scarlet Watson is established in another fic; Just for Fun, but this piece can stand alone.

For any new readers, a short biography of Scarlet is this: She was born to John and Mary Watson, but her mother, Mary, died when she was eight weeks old. John struggled as a single parent for several years, eventually agreeing to move back into Baker Street with Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock inserted himself into Scarlet's life with the assumed role of 'Stepfather'. John and Scarlet never found a reason to move back out again.

In this story, Scarlet is seventeen.

The feel of this one is substantially different to that of 'Just For Fun'. There is quite a lot more drama and anguish. There's quite a lot less 'funny'.

I hope that you enjoy it non-the-less.

Final thing to say; I love reviews. I intend to respond to all of them personally (unless they're unsigned, or you tell me not to), but I won't be using author's notes other than in this case right here. The reason for this is that this story is pretty much finished, though I intend to publish on a daily basis. This change in style for me means I can't respond to suggestions and prompts in the way I have before. Please don't let you put this off reviewing! Reviewers are muses.

DISCLAIMER – the characters of John Watson and Sherlock Holmes and a number of additional characters come from the BBC adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories, by Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat.

The character of Scarlet Watson is mine.

Chapter 1

Sherlock Holmes walked beside Scarlet Watson along the paths in Regent's Park. They were making quite a pace though she was choosing their route at random. They'd been on this walk for nearly an hour and Sherlock was beginning to wonder when she'd calm down so that they could go back to the flat. He wanted to finish his experiment on the effects of soft metals on amputated rat-tails. Though he would put her at about eight on the 'Scarlet temper scale' when he dragged her out of the flat, it surely couldn't be much longer before she started getting rational again.

Sure enough she spun around and faced him.

"He's such an old fuddy-duddy!"

Sherlock smiled at the expression.

"Don't smile like that, Sherlock!" she yelled.

He stopped smiling and assumed a concerned expression.

"Why does he have to go poking his nose in, over and over again? It's got absolutely nothing to do with him and he won't stop going on about it all the time! It's my business, it's my life, and he keeps acting like it's the most important thing in the whole entire world!"

Once again, he tried to resist smiling and the youthful expression.

"Is it not important?" he asked her.

"Of course it's important," she shouted. "That's not the point!"

"OK, what is the point then?"

"The point is... the point is... the point is that it's my bloody UCAS form, it's my choice about where I spend my time at university, and he should just shut up about it!"

"I don't think he wants to make the choice for you Scarlet..."

"Then why won't he shut up about it? It's all the time! Every time I walk through the door I'm interrogated about whether I've filled in the sodding form! I have weeks and weeks left to get it in and he won't stop going on about it."

"Actually, John hasn't mentioned the UCAS form for the past four days since the previous row you had on this subject."

Scarlet stared at him. "Sherlock, stop remembering stuff like that. It's really annoying."

"More or less annoying than offering to help you complete your UCAS form?"

There was the merest hint of a smile. "I just... I don't know. I just don't think I'm ready to complete it yet."

"Why not?"

She looked at him and shrugged.

"It's just a form, Scarlet," he continued. "You fill it in with your name and your address, you say why the University would be stupid not to give you a place, then you send it off."

"I also have to tell them where I want to go to University."

"So?"

"So maybe I don't know where I want to go to university, Sherlock."

"Oh! Well, you want to go to Central Saint Martin's to study fine art. Does that help?"

She sighed. "Maybe I'm not sure about that any more."

"Scarlet, you've talked of little else for the past two years. You've been there to meet the professors, your art teacher's spoken to them about you, you've shown them your work, they raved about it... all you have to do is to put it on the form."

"Maybe."

Sherlock frowned. "What's changed?"

"I don't know. I'm just not as sure as I was."

They stood in silence for a while. Scarlet scuffed the toe of her shoe on the path for a while. Once again, Sherlock wondered how on Earth this child was possibly old enough to be thinking of University.

"Are you ready to go back to the flat yet? Because you looked like you were about to beat John with the fire poker before, and I don't want you to just pick up where you left off."

Scarlet sighed and shrugged.

Sherlock looked about for a moment. Their walk had taken them up to the Cow and Coffee Bean cafe.

"OK, why don't we sit down and have a cup of coffee, and see if we can work out what has changed with regards to Central Saint Martin's."

She gave a hollow sounding laugh. "I don't know whether it's even just the school, Sherlock. I'm beginning to wonder whether I even want to do fine art, or whether I'd be better off doing something more practical like architecture or 3D design."

He smiled. "Then we're definitely going to need coffee. Come on."

She started to follow him, then pulled him to a stop. "Not there," she said, looking at the cafe.

"Why, what's wrong with their coffee?"

"Nothing, it's lovely, it's just... Sherlock, you know when someone serves you in a shop all the time, so you try to be friendly and say hello and comment on the weather and that kind of thing... and then for some reason the whole thing gets a bit... creepy and oppressive?"

"No; I don't try to be friendly to people."

"Oh. Well, anyway, there's a bloke who works in there and he seems to have latched on to me a bit."

Sherlock frowned. "Someone's bothering you?"

"No, well, not really. He's easily avoided. I sometimes still see him around the park when I'm walking home and that's annoying, but I don't go in there any more if I can help it."

"Hm, well maybe I should pop in and have a chat with your oppressor."

"No, Sherlock! Just leave it. He's probably just a lonely old man!"

It was too late, Sherlock had walked briskly into the cafe and Scarlet had no choice but to follow him.

"He's not even here," she told him. "Oh, wait, that's him by the milk steamer."

She turned round to look at Sherlock and found that he had frozen in horror.

"Sherlock? What is it?"

She turned back to the waiter and noticed he was staring at Sherlock too, with a faint smile on his face. He gave Scarlet a little wave. Sherlock suddenly grabbed her round the wrist and pulled her from the cafe. He charged towards the road that runs from North to South through the park.

"Sherlock? What is it? Let go of me, Sherlock, you're hurting me!"

Sherlock didn't appear to hear her. "We need a taxi," he said, "where's a taxi? There's a taxi now, Taxi!" He flagged it down and pulled Scarlet in after him.

"Where are we going, Sherlock? We don't need a cab to take us home!"

"We're not going home," he said, shortly. He pulled out his phone and dialled quickly, and became frustrated when he didn't get an answer. He yelled at a voice-mail box. "Mycroft! Mycroft I'm coming to see you now. I've found James Moriarty and he's after Scarlet!"

He hung up and stared through the window with his fingers over his lips. Scarlet couldn't' get anything more out of him.