Sherlock Holmes, after a fashion

Conversations with Mr Mayer are always so delightful. Sherlock returns home happier than he left, just like last time, resolves to look into that fellow's collection of mysteries—just like last time—and reluctantly shelves the project in favour of more pressing matters. Just like last time.

At least, on this iteration, the pressing matters are much more pleasant. Cal should be arriving any minute now.

Now that he's had a day to settle in at home, Sherlock has a few minutes to himself.

Naturally, he calls Peter Beardsley.

After a very inconclusive day and a rather more informative conversation with Jarvis, Sherlock is lying in his hotel bed with his fingertips together, staring at the ceiling. It is no longer a conscious imitation of the classic pose; over the years he has made it his own.

Where do you go when you want to find a vampire in Sunnydale?

Well, that depends on the vampire, does it not?

For this one, Sherlock will not start out by wandering the streets aimlessly at two in the morning.

It's five in the morning—closer to sunrise; the cautious vampires are likely to be tucked in for the day already—and he is aimed somewhere very specific.

It has been a day and a half, and the afternoon sun is sinking through a bank of clouds. Last night contained only minor revelations.

He is not precisely sure what he expects, but he is reasonably sure he won't like it. Nevertheless.

Sherlock phones Cal.

Right. Cal is due to arrive any minute now. Tony is downstairs in his workshop, playing with his cars. Sherlock puts away his violin and descends to the ground floor, pondering the choice of living rooms.

Despite everything, he can't help the smile on his face as he takes the slow, pleasant walk up the driveway. Tom is just so... well, cute.

On reflection, not doing anything about that smile was probably a tactical error.

Tom Riddle and Bellatrix Black have astonishingly unblemished records at Sunnydale High for two such shady characters. In fact, given his first and so far only conversation with them, Sherlock concludes from the available data that they must have conducted a deliberate campaign of projected innocence while at school.

Well, he already knew they could be quite subtle.

No doubt they will make their opening move any day now. He politely asks Jarvis for a little help with the necessary research; Sherlock does the field work, and Jarvis looks up common and uncommon curses on the Internet. After last month's accident with the ghost of Nikola Tesla, Tony has set up the whole house as a magical Faraday cage, but Sherlock has no intention of hiding under his bed until Riddle finds a way to disrupt the shielding. It will protect Tony from any incidental effects and that is quite enough.

Speaking of which, he decides that informing Tony of his latest adventure can just wait a little while longer. Say, until after he has found some students of their year at the Bronze who are willing to reminisce. He could ask Tony, but Tony has all the social memory of a goldfish. If he can't remember the names of the women he's dated he will not remember anything useful about these two.