Everything Spiraled Out of Control

"So cute! Those little curls make you look just like a teddy dog." Sitangna couldn't put down Sherlock's childhood photo. With his adorably chubby cheeks, he looked like a completely different person from the one with the long, thin face he had now.

"I'm a human, not a dog. And my face isn't long. It's well within the normal range for a human skull, all right?" Sherlock didn't understand the joke, but he could tell from the way Sitangna and Watson were looking at him that they were measuring the length of his face.

"It was just an analogy." "We're not even alike."

"Nana means your hair looks like a dog's," Watson explained, thinking he hadn't understood.

"No, it doesn't. Yours does."

"All right, you don't look like a dog. You are a dog."

"Speaking of dogs, I remember we had a long-haired hound called Redbeard when I was little. Why wasn't he in any of the photos?"

Sherlock rarely looked at photo albums and hadn't so much as opened one since he grew up. He thought he had looked too stupid back then.

"How long did you have him? Maybe you didn't have a camera when you had him, so there aren't any photos." Watson helped search through the album.

"Impossible. My family bought a camera very early on. Besides, that dog was already big when I was eight. He was at least as old as I was."

"How could there be no trace of him at all?" Sherlock closed the album, his gaze lingering on a childhood photo of him and Mycroft. "There are many ways memory can become distorted. I'm quite certain none of them apply to me."

"Don't think about it for now. It's late, so let's go to sleep. We can just ask your mum and dad about the dog tomorrow." Sitangna put the album back on the bookshelf and coaxed the great detective, who was still lost in thought, into bed and tucked him in.

"You didn't give me a goodnight kiss today." Sherlock settled into bed, then stretched his neck out to call Sitangna back.

"What are you doing?! Go to sleep already! Kiss, my foot!" Sitangna hurriedly covered his mouth and whispered a scolding, then turned to Watson with an embarrassed smile. "He's asleep and talking in his sleep."

"You said you'd kiss my forehead. Unless you want to kiss me on the lips again-"

"Aaaah, shut up!" Nobody had better stop her. She was going to smother this bastard with the blanket.

"Oh dear, I'm so dizzy and sleepy. I'm going back to bed. Good night, everyone." Watson pretended he hadn't heard, though he was actually grinning from ear to ear. As he left, he shut the door for them with a bang. Sherlock's clinginess had given him goosebumps.

Never mind. He had a partner too!

Back in his room, Watson took out his phone and looked at it. He was done for. He'd been so engrossed in talking to Sherlock that he hadn't seen the messages or heard the ringtone. A full two hours had passed since Janet's barrage of messages.

"Janet! Let me explain!" The call had barely connected before she hung up on him, not even letting him finish a sentence. Watson fell to his knees and wept. He was as miserable now as he'd been happy laughing just moments ago.

What a mess!

"Mum made these. The prettiest ones in here were all made by her. The ugliest ones, needless to say, were made by Sherlock. I made this one that looks like a goldfish. Try them."

Inside the glass cell, the curly-haired woman who had looked pale earlier was eating dumplings. She didn't use the utensils beside her, instead picking them up with her hands. They were warm, not hot.

"What about Dad? Didn't he help make them?"

"Dad rolled out the wrappers." "Oh."

Eurus ate each dumpling in two bites. She ate the ones her mother had made first, then Sherlock's, and finally Mycroft's.

Although the dumplings came in different shapes, they all tasted much the same. After all, it was the filling that determined their flavor.

"Delicious. The filling is seasoned very well, much tastier than the nutritional meals here." After Eurus finished eating, she licked her fingers clean. Mycroft frowned in disgust and passed a handkerchief through the window.

"Sherlock is so lucky. He has a close friend who supports and trusts him, a clever, dexterous lover who understands him, and an older brother who clears away obstacles and solves his problems at every turn."

At that, Mycroft's expression sharpened. He slowly rose to his feet and met his standing sister's gaze.

"You still haven't brought me a New Year's present. I'm not asking for much. Could you send Sitangna in to play with me for a couple of days?"

"Watson would do too. He's very interesting!" She pressed both hands against the glass and looked at Mycroft pitifully with a pair of moist eyes.

"But I still like Nana better. She's so cute when she smiles, just like a kitten." Eurus breathed on the glass and drew a little cat's head in the fog with her finger. So cute. She simply didn't know where to begin.

"How do you know that? How much more do you know? Where did you get the information?"

Mycroft uncrossed his legs and stood up, leaning on his umbrella. "David! Close the door and go back to your office."

"Don't go! I want to chat some more. It's so boring here. Mycroft! Brother! Bro~" Seeing that he was leaving, Eurus anxiously pounded on the glass. The sight of her laughing and making a fuss made Mycroft press his lips together in silence.

Bang! Bang!

Mycroft, who was about to leave, turned back to see Eurus punching the little cat's head over and over. She kept going until her left fist was a bloody mess, then waved at him as though she felt nothing.

"When was the last visit recorded?" Mycroft used the prison's highest-level access card and made his way to the warden's office.

The warden, David, stood before him trembling like a frightened quail.

"No, no one. You've always been Miss Eurus's only visitor. The sole exception was Moriarty, whom you brought that day. There have been no other visits recorded since then, up to today."

David faced the questioning from his superior in fear and trepidation, beads of cold sweat rolling straight down his forehead.

Mycroft looked at the bank of surveillance screens. On the footage, Eurus, seeing that no one was paying her any attention, grew even more deranged and licked the bloodstains on the glass clean.

"Now, grant my office access to all surveillance footage from the past two months. I want a thorough investigation."

Mycroft sent several messages. The national security staff holding their posts in the office received the instructions and immediately got to work. Blue light from the computer screens fell across their composed faces as their sharp eyes began sweeping over every area covered by the cameras.

"What do you mean, telling me this now? You can't treat me like this!" Oliver was agitated, slamming his hand against the desk in the study with a tremendous bang.

"Member of Parliament Cavendish, we understand how you feel, but please watch your attitude."

Andrew's suicide had brought certain things that should never have surfaced out into the open. This was to stop Cavendish from naming the people protecting him if desperation drove him to take drastic measures, and even more to protect the "core gears" on that list who truly controlled the nation's lifeblood.

This was a cold, ruthless internal purge from the very top of the pyramid of power.

"I've devoted myself to you and poured my life's blood into this. I was willing to stay in this lousy position without a promotion all this time. Is this what I get after half a lifetime of hard work?"

Oliver prided himself on being cold-blooded and ruthless. His iron-fisted methods, in the same vein as those of the boss he had sided with, had brought him tremendous success in both his political career and his finances.

He had even gotten rid of his first wife, whom he had loved deeply, and his second-in-command, whom he had painstakingly groomed.

And now they wanted him to get rid of his only child?