WHO:Joan Watson & Liv Moore WHEN: Early June WHERE: Coffee shop near Liv's work WHAT: Liv and Joan discussing case work and Sherlock RATING/WARNINGS: None STATUS: Complete
Joan knew that Sherlock made a point in collecting his Unusuals. She also knew that at least attempting to find a coroner who could put up with his antics was par for the course. Ms Moore seemed to be his chosen go to in Orange County, or at the least, she caught his first major serial case in the area anyway.
After her brief meeting with the medical examiner, Joan had meant to reach out to her a little sooner, try to get a full run down on the case from a professional aspect. And to see just what she thought of the situation, and Sherlock. And since Joan wasn’t entirely fond of making it a work sort of thing, she’d invited Liv out of the morgue for some coffee.
Finding a quiet spot in a not too busy coffee place wasn’t terribly difficult. Joan was just waiting to see when Liv could get away to chat.
Social obligations kept coming up when all Liv really wanted to do was play video games when she wasn’t busy solving murders or autopsying bodies. The two went hand in hand obviously, but she had gotten more involved in the investigation of things. Especially the serial killer case with Sherlock. Liv hadn’t tried any of those brains yet. She knew it might help find the killer but the last victim had died a week before she became a zombie. Liv wasn’t sure how she felt about old brains. Well technically she did eat old brains, but the bodies came in fresh then she stored them herself. Taking brains out of a body that had already been dead awhile? She wasn’t sure how that would taste.
Liv fought the urge to go home and play video games on her lunch break and went to meet Joan for coffee instead. She walked into the coffee shop she spotted Joan already at a table and headed directly towards her. She knew they had some things in common. Joan used to be a surgeon too apparently. Although Liv was pretty sure Joan had made it farther along in her residency than Liv had but she didn’t want to dwell on it. “Hey,” Liv said taking a seat across from her. “You have news on the case?”
So far Joan rather liked Liv. She was just enough quirky to put up with Sherlock, but entirely professional enough to do a good job. Which was mostly important when it came to working with Sherlock. The less he could nit-pick at people, the better. “Not so much, but I wanted to go over a few details with you.” She preferred to get some information from sources just the same as Sherlock. Sometimes a page didn’t give you the same information as a person might.
“I know you’ve only dealt with the most recent cases and not the earlier ones,” because the cooling off period for this killer was extensive, which was unusual but they were all still working on theories for that. “But we’re trying to find similarities in weapon marks, to see if the killer is bringing something with him, or removing things from the scene.” And really, Joan wanted to get a feel for Liv, to see just what she was like. Their similarities might be a good fit for Sherlock’s continued rehabilitation.
Liv was still fairly new to the area. Granted she had lived and worked here for a few months now, but she hadn’t been around for the first few victims. Although she had been hoping for news on the case she was just as happy to help out more with the case. Although she had always wanted to be a heart surgeon and had to change her plans. And now she enjoyed bringing justice to those that died. She wanted to do more than just autopsy the bodies. She wanted to help investigate and solve the case. And now that she was a zombie she could use her visions to help more.
“The last two were taken apart by a bone saw,” and those were the only two Liv had worked on, so it was all she had to go by. “So I’d assume he was bringing it with him,” it was doubtful that both the victims had one lying around. At least Liv thought so.
A bonesaw was fairly obvious an item to be carrying around, it was fairly telling in some manners too. It also spoke to the killer deciding that the night be broke in and killed the victims, that was what he was planning to do. Less spur of the moment access and more stalking on his part. “That at least adds something to the profile.” Pre-meditation and organisation, of course they knew he was organised.
“This case seems to be a bit more complicated than any of us would like.” The degree of violence in it all was worrying, considering how well the killer was evading detection. Sipping at her coffee, Joan clasped her hands in front of her, not really wanting to just pounce into Sherlock’s well-being but needing to broach it. “Can I ask you a personal question?”
“Aren’t most serial killer cases complicated?” Liv was still new at the whole investigating thing. Hell she was still new at doing autopsies even. But it seemed like serial killers would be complicated. After all the were able to kill multiple times without getting caught.
Joan’s next question caught her off guard. Well not totally. Liv did want to get to know Joan and she assumed it was the same for her. Personal questions seemed like a good way to start. Right to the point. “Sure,” Liv replied. “But only if I can ask you one too.”
THere was a degree of complication to serials, Sherlock obviously had a lot of theories about them, and the psyche that went with them, and some of that was attached to his dislike of psychology and his propensity to weigh up the likelihood that anyone wanted to be caught. Joan wasn’t sure what it was just yet. But this killer seemed to be an entirely different sort of puzzle.
“Of course.” It only seemed fair, right. Joan was mostly looking for answers to be sure that Sherlock was in the best possible place before she left, that he’d be fully supported and within a good network once they worked through his current predicament. “Working with Sherlock, the assistance and interaction, not just on this case,” because Joan knew that once Sherlock had found a decent, competent worker, he was loath to waste time searching for another one, “is that something you can see yourself sticking to?” Joan was aware that Liv, like her, had changed profession rather drastically. And since Joan was aware of her own reasoning, she was in no way looking to pry through Liv’s scars.
She knew enough from herself and from the addicts she’d helped to know better.
“I feel as though we have different ideas of personal,” Liv joked. Asking about her work life, if she would continue to work with Sherlock that didn’t feel personal at all. Liv thought it was going to be something along the lines of topics she didn’t want to discuss. Like what had happened back in Seattle. That was something she shoved in the back of her mind and refused to think about. She didn’t want to go down that path again, back into depression.
“But, yes,” she replied honestly. “He lets me help. Do more than just the autopsy. Listens to my opinion.” There were a few others that did as well, like Leon. “And I like helping to solve a case, bring a victim’s killer to justice. As weird as it sounds I feel connected to the corpses I autopsy.” In some cases that was a literal connection, if she ate their brains.
“Sorry, sometimes, working with Sherlock, personal and professional lives blend together.” Sometimes Joan got caught up in the bad habit, neglecting her personal life for her professional responsibilities, which just seemed to happen when Sherlock was a focal point of the learning process. “I suppose a better way to ask is if this career path is a lasting one.”
And there were few people who understood alterations to paths previously expected, but Liv and Joan absolutely had that one all stitched up, rather literally. “I only ask because… Sherlock might not show it, or seem the type, but he really does requires a structure of stability. Change is… Difficult.” To say the least.
“It’s lasting,” Liv assured. It was the next best thing to being a surgeon in her open. She still got to operate in a way. And now that she was a zombie she needed the job to survive. It was basically an endless surprise of brains after all. “You don’t have to worry about things changing on Sherlock,” she added. Joan was right Liv didn’t suspect that of Sherlock. He always seemed so calm, put together and on top of things. But Joan knew him a lot better than she did and who knew what went on when he wasn’t working. Although was he ever not working.
“Speaking of change,” Liv began. “When are you heading back?” She was under the impression that Joan was returning to New York at some point. That would be a change for Sherlock. And it was also too bad considering Liv was starting to really like her.
There were very few signs that Sherlock would require any kind of situational circumstances to function well, and in a sense, Joan was somewhat certain that she was to blame for that. She’d never be so bold as to insinuate that she’d made Sherlock better, it was difficult to say if he could be better than he was. Just because he was so very good already. He was flawed and had his moments, yes. But he was still brilliant.
But Joan knew that she’d changed aspects of how Sherlock worked. Post-recovery, while he was battling his on-going addiction issues, Joan provided much different environments than he would’ve been used to, and as a result they would be incorporated to his sobriety. She might not have made Sherlock better, but she offered many better alternatives for coping. It was what made them a good team.
She was mostly interested in making sure that he maintained something like that in order to assist him to not slip back into his closed off, hermit ways. It was much more risky when looking at it from a possible relapse point of view.
“Soon, I think. Maybe.” Going back to New York before she was sure Sherlock was doing well enough wasn’t an option. She wasn’t his sober companion, she wasn’t his partner, but she was his friend, and she wouldn’t want to see him suffer through that again. “I think this case has really just left Sherlock in a bit of a loop, with the obvious and the less obvious escaping his grasp. That doesn’t happen often.” Or at all really.
“Well I’m sure Sherlock will miss you.” And honestly Liv would kind of miss Joan too. There was a certain undeniable bond between the two former surgeons. Though neither knew exactly why the other had changed careers that would just bond them even more.
“The guy is good,” Liv agreed. “And to be able to get away with murder for so many years.” Plus from what she understood he had to have a lot of discipline to go years between killings as well. But if everything she had heard about Sherlock was true she knew he’d eventually catch the guy.
That was the big issue wasn’t it. Sherlock wasn’t meant to miss people. He put so much distance between himself and his own family that it was unlikely that he’d form those connections otherwise. And yet, Joan was sure that part of the reason that he had called her was that she was missed. “Well, hopefully he’ll keep in touch better this time. When it comes to that.” She knew she couldn’t live out of a hotel indefinitely, but she didn’t think moving into Sherlock’s home was a good idea for now either.
“He is, which is helping with profiling him, but not entirely with catching him just yet.” Because there was a degree of finesse there, and Joan knew that this one was going to be more complicated than she’d first believed. She could understand why even Sherlock was coming up on dead ends. “We’ll just have to be better. Hopefully we can avoid more bodies on your tables.”
“Hopefully,” Liv agreed with a not. “Not that I don’t love doing autopsies.” That was only a half joke. Because really she did enjoy it. She just preferred when it was of natural causes over murder. “Well, I hope you stick around awhile. Regardless of the case.”
“I suppose we’ll see.” She really would need to see just what it was like, how Sherlock was doing. She wasn’t sure if rerouting her whole life was on the cards for her again. But then, it was foolish to rule anything out. “I’m sorry, I’ve almost taken up all of your time here. You’re probably busy. But I appreciate you meeting with me.” Joan just gave Liv a warm smile, because she was genuinely glad that at least Sherlock wasn’t entirely isolating himself again.
“It’s no problem,” Liv replied with a smile of her own. “We should do it again sometime. And maybe not talk about serial killers.” Or even Sherlock for that matter. It’d be nice to truly get to know Joan… when she wasn’t itching to get to her apartment. “See you soon,” she added with a small wave before heading off. She knew she would be seeing Joan soon, whether it was for work or pleasure.