#well if I can go about the latter in a real roundabout way via being A Buncha Guys then I'm gonna take it lol

[purrality]

I think one of the best parts of being plural is being able to make stupid fucking jokes whenever I want and it's guaranteed someone else will think it's funny always forever no matter what and sometimes they even tell equally good jokes back until we have no choice but to kiss about it inside of our brainmeat

[feather-dancer]

Now Ghosts he left behind Chapter 3 has been out nearly a couple of weeks suppose now is an acceptable amount of time to go on about ~*themes*~ that have been cropping up in the fic so far that aren’t at all plot relevant but are still important things I want to do justice to: LGBT+ rep and mental health particularly centred around anxiety. Understandably the following will contain spoilers I can’t avoid it, sorry!

~~~

Mental health

It probably doesn’t come as too big a surprise on the latter front, after all in the second chapter of the Strickler fic I tagged for unhealthy coping mechanisms which are loosely based on my own which also happened to have a reference at the end of the second chapter in Ghost!AU showing how far he’d come since then. Now I’ve read some excellent fics on the PTSD front, a few on dysphoria regarding the change from human to half troll but in regards to anxiety many seem to fall into the trap of thinking somebody is a bit more skittish or that it just gives you a more nervous nature. As somebody who has generalised anxiety myself, I really wish it was that simple.

In this fic’s case the anxiety is being heavily tangled in the dysphoria of the change where he’s left alone to process everything while being hit with reminders of what he no longer is thus putting more fuel on the pyre as a result. In a stressful situation (Sometimes not even then!) it can get stuck in a loop of self-created belief such as here Merlin kept him away deliberately though we know this isn’t the case and will warp reality/memories to fit like how he misremembers that Merlin also said his visions are imperfect if there’s nothing to snap you out of it then those spirals often lead to panic attacks or worse a full breakdown. Here his brain is trying to make sense of the impossible, jumping to the most logical conclusion it can come up with and through bad luck has this very wrong thought process that he’s a threat to everyone else. Having been on one or two of these they really do suck! Quite often dissociation goes hand in hand whether you’re aware of it happening or not and thus far he’s had a couple bouts that he’s dubbing blackouts currently. There is also the classic ‘background’ noise variant where for no real reason your fight / flight reflex is jammed on when it feels like it though Jim as shown by the CBD techniques at the start of chapter 3 is doing his best to keep a handle on those spiking too far and Claire mentions he taught her a few to help out to show that his friends know and he is able to talk about it without feeling the need to hide in plain sight every waking moment. If you’re forced to stealth you get frighteningly good about hiding full blown panic attacks and it’s not a healthy situation to be in.

On Toby’s end he mentions a specific situation where anxiety was likely involved before Jim was diagnosed. In it when confronted with a situation option a was bad, option b was worse and there was no good outcomes because his brain got stuck on those. He also mentions being moral support helping get Jim into a position that he would be able to go home but refused to leave him alone until he was sure he was okay. It’s worth pointing out he figured the reason everything kicked off was the ‘problem’ of coming out to Barbara and her not reacting well (Which was an understandable conclusion!) and only later realised anxiety was what made the entire thing even worse and he unintentionally did the right thing to help. Barbara also mentions Jim being on medication for it, the original ones to mysteriously stop working which are implied to be while Toby was pretending to be Jim then moved onto another treatment which was brought up via Strickler’s concern about going cold turkey. As much as anxiety freaking sucks I felt it was important to show that nothing in relation to it is treated as abnormal, it is simply life with having your brain being a bit on the funky side and that sometimes makes you think illogically. It’s not your fault when it happens.

~~~

LGBT+

When I began writing this fic one thing I wanted from the get go is that characters who are LGBT+ are not forced into a scenario created by the plot to out them to the reader/someone else nor signposted in a cheap way to score points because even when you’re with friends who know you’re not saying it every two seconds and even more so when in a stressful circumstance where your son/best friend is currently missing. With this thought in mind, Jim has always been written as Trans but prior to Chapter 3 I simply had no way to bring it up because right now he’s too busy freaking out about being a half troll to notice if anything is different and on this same coin, Claire is Bi while Toby is Pan with a bonus order of trying to figure himself out. There’s others too! Sadly much like confirming Jim is also Bi I’ve not had a way to naturally bring it up as yet if I will at all but they are being written with it in mind.

Jim was a trickier one to bring up because he’s not about to vouch for himself so it was a much easier route to instead hint drop and hope one if not all of them clicked with a reader who he is without any of them being done in a way that could come across as dickish. Barbara got the first two with mentioning Jim should know better about using a given name in regards to Not!Enrique and a second one in regards to another form of medication he’s taking but because she didn’t know if Strickler knew (Incidentally he does) thus she deliberately phrased it vaguely and was ready for the possibility of upset without outing her son because she’s a good parent!! Toby is who gets the rest through a roundabout way mentioning how bad his pre-medicated anxiety could be when he came out as mentioned in the previous section and a second time where he says he didn’t care what he looked like because Jim is always Jim to him. The final important note was how he specifically said that he would not second party exactly what happened because it’s Jim’s choice if he tells her or not. We love and support good friends in this house.

Then there was the inclusion of the river troll Trisantona who is marked as non-binary by calling themselves the child of and the kids think absolutely nothing of it and are more annoyed with their attitude than anything else. Personally I see many trolls and changelings particularly very eh about gender and wanted a little implication they are far from the first troll they’ve encountered who doesn’t fit a human binary so it doesn’t even register as unusual. 

In Claire’s case she had two hints, the first bring a straight joke because it might be low hanging fruit but it’s hilarious I can’t help it while the second was her commentary on Toby’s reactions to name drops because she couldn’t resist teasing him. Small but both very deliberate.

Toby in the meanwhile has been having hint drops since chapter 2 which has only continued in how he keeps comparing reactions Claire is causing to what Jim does to him then you get him openly telling Claire about how it feels like his heart is a bunch of apartments and can the world stop having so many good-looking people in it. That ties in with the two mentions of doing research for a word he hasn’t quite got yet but he’s mostly been sidetracked by everything going on right now.

Homophobia, biphobia and particularly transphobia is rife and only increasing in this country where it feels like every week it’s only getting worse. While in the grand scheme of things it’s probably inconsequential it is important to be the change you want to see in the world. Mine? Even in this mess of an angst fic I want to showcase LGBT+ peeps who are treated as they should be with love and support by friends, family and strangers alike. Being Trans, Bi or whichever label that particular character uses it is simply part of who they are and not a character trait slapped on afterwards for easy points plus if I see one more fic where a Trans character gets outted to others without their consent because the author figured that’s the only way you can do it I’ll go feral.

In a completely unrelated note Douxie is non-binary Panromatic Ace in everything I write and anybody who doesn’t like that can suck it.

[kyloren]

Regarding the Finale and the upcoming Season Two

So, I feel like the finale’s purposeful hinting that Jughead’s possible joining of the Southside Serpents might create tension between him and Betty — given that she obviously gives him a concerned look when he puts on the oh, la la~ jacket, which understandably dampens his spirits some, more on that later — is a sort of red-herring.

The same way the pilot queer-baited viewers, the finale is V→A→B→J-love-square-baiting the audience and stirring up drama just to keep us guessing until Season Two premiere.

The finale established Varchie and Bughead as canonical ships, with the former going from semi-dating to actual dating, and the latter being a solid supercarrier (is it? or is it still a dreadnought?). And while sure, both vessels can hit turbulent waters and, hey, Riverdale is an adaptation of Archie comics, so V/A/B tension is expected (although I have an inkling the A/B part of it might be just from Archie’s side) — we have been hit over the head so many times with the Jughead/Betty and Archie/Veronica soulmate parallels that I honestly think that the show-runners intend those two ships to be eventual endgame. Please, please let Bughead be endgame. #CrossingFingers #HopingNoOneJinxedIt.

But back to my original point; it being that I have a few theories regarding the Southside Serpents storyline. One of which is that Jughead will eventually accept being a Serpent — hopefully with Betty’s support, but maybe without — in order to uncover the truth about the drug-ring in Riverdale and clear the Serpents of the allegations. He and Betty are too much of Intrepid Reporters to let that one go. Plus, Betty’s speech to her mother and then later to the town hinted she will take the truth by its dirty underpants and drag it into the light. 

Maybe he won’t even join them in any official capacity, and his putting on the jacket was just the show-runners teasing the audience, but it was a very clear symbolic gesture that his allegiance is now with the Serpents and the Southside, and he will take their side over that of the people of the…err, I guess the Northside…? (Southside is still part of Riverdale, right? Does the better off side of town have a name?) 

Somehow I feel like Betty will join him on the whole support the Southside…side. *face-palms* being real eloquent here. But as much as I would want a serpent!Bughead with Betty going all ‘Full Dark, No Stars’ on everyone’s asses, I am fairly sure Jughead will ultimately return to Riverdale High after an indeterminate amount of time at Southside High. As much as the Southside accepts him, Betty was right in saying he is Riverdale and he will return to where he is needed soon enough. 

Plus, from a meta point of view, it is clear the entire core four is having some sort of Coming of Age storyline with Betty becoming a more confident person who stands up for what she believes in, Jughead coming to terms with his insecurities and finding both a place and the people he belongs with, Archie’s whole find-yourself arc, and Veronica unlocking a well-rounded-person achievement and becoming better, just as she promised to herself to do. So, Jughead’s season two storyline will obviously bring him back to Riverdale High. 

All in all, the show-runners are trying for Romeo&Julet, Westside Story vibe for Bughead in the finale, but ultimately I think it is Varchie that will play out the star-crossed lovers theme in Riverdale, given the blatant allusions to the Hiram Lodge-Fred Andrews antagonism, while Bughead will have a more Neutral Good take on the Bonnie&Clyde-esque Battle Couple of Justice and Truth.

If it wasn’t blatantly obvious already, I could probably gush about Bughead moments in Sweet Hereafter for another 3k words, but I shouldn’t. I really shouldn’t. Though I will say this: hand-holding while running through the forest is a pretty underestimated romantic gesture. And now, I’ll try to reign in the Yes, that is my OTP! vibes. 

Tangential observation, but I think the reason why Jughead was #WhenHeSmiles over the jacket was because it was concrete proof, along with the whole biker-gang spreading out at his doorstep, that what FP told him — “Serpents take care of their own” — wasn’t just him wishing on a star and stubbornly holding out on the law, but actually adhering to a code. So, Jughead got validation that his father wasn’t just being a stubborn moron and screwing himself over by not taking the deal, but was “sticking by his own”.

Side-bar: Who else teared up a bit when FP told Jughead in a roundabout way that he was proud of him; please, raise a hand? 

Also, I think that Archie and Cheryl might not have a romance arc, as much as a substitute-sibling arc where a lot of Cheryl’s unresolved feelings regarding Jason will be projected onto Archie, who actually is a legit good person and probably is the best choice to be their recipient. I just really want those two to bond, okay? 

In the same line of thought: Poor Cheryl. She needs a hug and some decent friends because her face in that scene where she was talking to Jughead and Veronica was about to ask her if she was okay, but was interrupted by Archie (or was it Kevin?) who ran there to tell them about Betty’s locker, well, it was just heartbreaking. Seriously #GiveCherylAHug2k17. 

I’m fairly sure that Hiram is behind Fred’s shooting. That’s the reason why Hermione was so keen on buying him out; she was trying to protect her friend-slash-ex-lover from her husband, who, need I remind you, had already used violent underhanded tactics against Fred before.

Also, I wouldn’t be surprised in the least if Hiram is involved in the drug trafficking and Clifford landing him in jail was his attempt at cutting Hiram out of it. But it might be just me. I tend to assume Hiram has his fingers in all the pies. All of them.

P.S. Can we go back to Jason, pls? In one of the first episodes Archie said Seventeen-years-old and how he will be remembered?, and when you look at Jason in hindsight, that line can’t help but break my heart. 

Although I tend to think of Jason as a Base Breaking Character given how much of his characteristics are expositioned via other people’s subjective opinions of him, so he is very much subjected to Alternative Character Interpretation, he turned out to be a pretty solid kid. I mean, I used to think Cheryl was just waxing poetic about her bro-bro, viewing him through rose-coloured glasses and all that, a point that seemed to have been confirmed in episode 3 with the score-book, but…maybe he wasn’t a wolf in sheep’s clothing like I assumed.

The kid got his girlfriend pregnant, wanted to do the right thing by her, loved her enough to defy his family (Fridge Logic moment, but if Jason and Polly’s babies are ultra-super-Blossom, something Mama Blossom was totes okay with, then why didn’t the Blossoms want him to date Polly? I get why Coopers didn’t want that. Hal is anti-incest and Alice is very anti-Blossom, but C&P are very cool-with-casual-incest parents, so Jason dating Polly wouldn’t have been that horrible a thought for them to swallow.), and started being a drug mule in order to get the funds for them to run away. Which, I guess, was how he figured out Clifford’s involvement with the drug trafficking. Maybe he wanted to do something about that, too; he did have drugs stashed in his getaway car. Jason wasn’t the most upstanding citizen, but he tried to do good and was killed for it. …just…poor kid.

P.P.S. Also, slight confusion over here at my end. Let me get this straight. Jason got drugs A from the Serpents to move them somewhere. Since FP claims they don’t deal with hard stuff, drugs A might be marijuana or something. Somehow Jason found out that Blossoms traffic drugs B, which might be cocaine or something equally hardcore. The same drugs he had stashed in his getaway car. But since the show insists on calling all drugs just ‘the drugs’ and using virtually identical packages in their footage, I am still not sure if drugs A≠drugs B. Give me evidence, I beg you. 

Rant over? Rant over.

[finalproblem]

Bolt Holes

So if John Watson didn’t really have an affair--he only thinks he did due to a corrupted memory courtesy of TD 12--what was the deal with the note from “E”?

When I first looked at this question it was before TLD aired, so I didn’t know about the memory wipe to come. I was just kind of cataloging things involved in the E scenes that could function as clues. (They keep showing the time, a newspaper could have a secret message like in The Red Circle, and so on.) Some of those things could still turn out to be relevant later, but I’m going to cut to the chase and just highlight the clues that stood out most to me because those are the ones that I ended up getting anywhere with.

Potential spoiler warning: There are two setlock photos from The Six Thatchers filming in this post. One of them is just there to make a point about filming, but the other could be considered to give away something for the future if I’m right. On the other hand, if I am right, it’s something you could have theoretically figured out with just the in-episode clues. I was on the track and might have gotten there eventually that way. But by chance I happened to find a setlock photo that gave me a push first, so I’m not going to write this post pretending to have done anything cleverer than I actually did. (If this is even right and I’ve done anything clever at all.)

So as far as I was concerned, there were three main features of interest in this case.

The Bus Ticket

It seemed notable that E appeared to have written her number on the back of a paper bus ticket.

Even moreso when Googling for images of London bus tickets brought back this (setlock-photo-containing) post as one of the first results. In that post, setlockers discussed whether it made sense for her to have a paper ticket for a London bus at all because they’re no longer available.

As far as I can tell, they’re right. Paper tickets aren’t available for London buses anymore, because they’ve switched everyone over to using Oyster cards and passes. That means either the fact that E wasn’t using an Oyster card may’ve been a clue, or that there was something significant enough about that ticket that the writers decided to cheat reality to say people still use paper tickets for the sake of a clue. (I would lean toward it being the latter, since it’s asking a lot of the international audience to know about Oyster cards when they haven’t been explained in the show. On the other hand, we are running a canon oyster reference short... So maybe it’ll be both reasons in the end.)

What kind of clue could a bus ticket hold? Was there something about the time or route or other information on it that could’ve tipped John off that not everything was what it seemed?

The Bus Route

I thought it was interesting that they decided to come to London and shoot this scene at a real, specific London bus stop. A ton of the stuff in this show isn’t shot at the real location it’s supposed to be set at, so why care this much about getting to shoot at a certain bus stop as a location?

This is the real Lambeth North bus station. You can compare to the Google Street View version here.

Not only did they use the real bus stop, but they made sure to put the correct route numbers to match on the side of that bus.

And no, it’s not just that they rented out the real Route 59 bus for filming. That was definitely a detail that Sherlock’s crew added, because in this setlock photo you can see they were using a bus with a different route number:

(image via, original from)

And that they would go to all this trouble and make it for a bus stop that’s on Route 59... Doesn’t that number sound familiar?

They called our attention to it earlier.

So what’s so special about 59?

The Flip

The other interesting thing was what happened when John got home with the ticket-note.

He’d apparently folded it up, so as he unfolded it, the onscreen text flipped and flopped appropriately.

That reminded me of the flipping effect they’d done with “AMMO” to “OMMA” earlier in the episode.

The “OMMA” effect hadn’t been particularly useful or relevant to the plot. But it had been a good reminder that sometimes you can flip a word or message around and it will read as a different word or message instead.

As you can probably guess, this is when I started thinking about different ways to flip E’s message or something about the ticket, and what alternate meaning there might be in it once flipped. Before I got very far with that, though, I took another peek at the setlock image that was included in the post I mentioned about whether paper tickets still exist. Tracing back to the original version by @weloveyousherlock gave a closer look:

It looked to me like the ticket was for Route 65.

E had a ticket for the wrong bus.

65 is not 59.

If you take the number 59 and flip it upside down, though...

...it reads as 65.

As a shot in the dark, I figured it might be worth looking up what stops were on Route 65. One of those stops stood out.

That’s the first bus stop recommended to people wanting to visit Kew Gardens:

And Kew Gardens? That’s relevant to Sherlock because of what we learned about Sherlock’s bolt holes in His Last Vow:

Mycroft: Five known bolt holes. There’s the blind greenhouse in Kew Gardens and the leaning tomb in Hampstead Cemetery.

The printed side of London bus tickets contain enough information that it would be really easy to slip in the time and place for a meeting...

...without making it too obvious in the event the ticket fell into the wrong hands.

Granted, John did not appear to look at the printed side of the ticket before he decided not to throw it away.

But maybe the face he made when he decided not to trash the note from E wasn’t an “actually, I’m going to keep this and flirt with her” face.

Maybe it was a “hang on, what does it usually mean when a pretty woman randomly comes up to me on the street?” face.

Mycroft. It means Mycroft.

(Okay, in A Scandal in Belgravia it meant Irene. But John still thought it meant Mycroft at first, so the point stands.)

The show cut away from the bus stop right after John made that face, but lets assume he took a closer look at the ticket after catching on this might be a roundabout message from Mycroft.

Then John headed over to the blind greenhouse at Kew Gardens for the secret meeting to find Mycroft and Mary waiting there. This is when John got pulled into what would become the “let’s fake Mary’s death” plan.

E had simply been serving as a messenger for Mycroft the whole time.

They foreshadowed this with earlier dialogue (well, we heard it earlier in the episode, anyway, even if it wasn’t earlier in the actual timeline):

Sherlock: [referring to the John balloon] What is that? John: That is me. Well, it’s a me substitute.

John: What’s this? E: This is me.

If the balloon was “me” and a substitute for John, E was “me” and a substitute for Mycroft.

So when John added the number for E to his phone and sent a text later, he was either contacting E as an intermediary for Mycroft or texting Mycroft directly using a different number than usual. In which case, Mycroft’s use of an uncharacteristic “Hey” as a reply was a way to keep up the pretense that it wasn’t him John was texting. And all of this subterfuge was necessary because they needed it to look like John was just texting some random woman and not plotting with Mycroft Holmes. In the bigger picture they are going up against rogue hackers and corrupt uses of government surveillance--they can’t trust that no one is reading their text messages. Which is also why they had to have the initial meeting in person at the Kew Gardens bolt hole.

But what about all the other texts we saw John send? Those didn’t seem like they were for Mycroft...

If you’re a mystery writer, the great thing about John’s texts is that they all look alike and have no identities attached. Unless there’s a clear clue in the message, any text could be to or from anyone. So all you need to do is lay those texts on top of specific background actions or edit two text messages back to back and people will assume everything’s connected and part of the same story thread. You don’t even need to lie to the audience--they’ll do it to themselves.

After “Hey,” I don’t think the other implied affair texts we saw were to Mycroft (or Mycroft via E).

John seems like he’s hiding these texts from Mary, or doesn’t want her to see him texting at least.

We’ve already established John’s not having an affair. And he’d hardly need to hide from Mary that he was working on her own faked death plan.

Others have suggested these texts could be a conversation with John’s sister, Harry. And I think that’s a good suggestion--especially when you consider that we’re obviously going to have some sibling themes running through the next episode.

I’ll throw out one more possibility as well--John could also be texting with Clara, Harry’s ex-wife. She was mentioned as part of the phone deduction in A Study in Pink:

Sherlock: Did I get anything wrong? John: Harry and me don’t get on, never have. Clara and Harry split up three months ago and they’re getting a divorce; and Harry is a drinker. Sherlock (looking impressed with himself): Spot on, then. I didn’t expect to be right about everything. John: And Harry’s short for Harriet. (Sherlock stops dead in his tracks.) Sherlock: Harry’s your sister.

It would be a way to bring things full circle in The Final Problem if it turned out Clara texted John because she was worried about Harry and wanted to stage an intervention or something. Which could explain John’s later text as well:

And it’s not as if you couldn’t say “it was nice to get to know you a little” to an estranged sibling, but that line might play slightly better with a former in-law you never knew well because you’d spent the three years before their divorce serving in Afghanistan.

And all of this background drama with Harry could also fit with the scene right before John and Mary got the texts about going to the aquarium. Mary was saying how John didn’t make things easy by being so perfect, and he hesitantly responded that he needed to tell her something. We know he wasn’t having an affair, so maybe he was going to tell her that he’s actually not so perfect all the time, because he wasn’t doing a great job dealing with his sister’s issues.

So for now Clara’s my top pick for the secret texting partner. (And if they wanted to have Jenna Coleman go ahead and play her so people can finally stop asking for a Wholock crossover and to promote her new show that premieres on PBS right after The Final Problem airs, I won’t complain. 😉)

Meanwhile, with that text having absolutely nothing to do with E, it was just a nice audience-misdirecting coincidence that she was sitting at the bus stop right after John sent it.

Instead, E was probably there to deliver another secret message of some sort from Mycroft to John.

Getting back to the bolt hole theme...

Since Mary’s death was faked, when we saw John in a cemetery at the end of The Six Thatchers, it was a misdirection. He wasn’t visiting her grave or leaving her funeral or anything like that.

Instead, John was either going to or coming from the other bolt hole Mycroft mentioned in His Last Vow: the leaning tomb in Hampstead Cemetery. (I’m not necessarily saying this shot was filmed in the real Hampstead Cemetery, and I don’t have the time to check whether this particular angle of view could even exist there. I’m guessing it’s more likely they used a stand-in cemetery, though. But wherever they are, the place looks like it could be from the Victorian era, which makes it work for Hampstead.)

If you watch the whole cemetery shot, you’ll note that it looks like John turns his head and looks to the side once he goes out of focus. He may be checking to see that he’s not followed.

With Kew Gardens and Hampstead Cemetery already looking likely, we got this from Mycroft’s notebook in The Lying Detective:

The list on the left half appears to say:

Monitor--

Baker Street Blind Greenhouse Leaning Tomb Clock Face--    Elizabeth       Tower?

I’ve theorized above that John’s already been to the Blind Greenhouse and Leaning Tomb (and in the listed order, no less).

The next bolt hole in the list is the one Mrs. Hudson referred to in His Last Vow as “Behind the clock face of Big Ben.” I think that’s the next bolt hole we’ll see. (And if you go back and listen, there were ticking clock type noises in the soundtrack when John sent the “Hey” text.)

It is interesting that they didn’t list that bolt hole as simply “Clock Face” or even “Clock Face -- Big Ben” to match the language of the HLV mention.

Elizabeth Tower is the proper name of the clocktower most people refer to as Big Ben. (”Big Ben” is actually the name of the bell in the tower.)

The character we saw at the bus stop was only “E” in the episode, but in the end credits she was “Elizabeth.” They’re also playing name games with Elizabeth and/or Alicia Smallwood, whose card was sitting on the notebook in the same scene. And by The Lying Detective, John was teasing Mycroft about a secret brother in a tower and the song played during the Eurus reveal was named “In the Tower.” So the writers are definitely working multiple angles at the same time. Probably partly as hints, and partly in an effort to give us enough seemingly-related information that we end up getting our theory wires crossed.

(Since I’ve theorized before about moles in the government and Mycroft feeding them false info on purpose, I don’t know if we should consider it suspicious that Mycroft left his notebook sitting open on his desk. He may be trying to bait someone into reading it... Or the writers may’ve just wanted to let the audience see for the clue’s sake and decided that was the least-awkward way of doing it.)

John never cheated on Mary--he was only helping her and Mycroft plan Mary’s fake death. The reason he now thinks he cheated is because when Mary and Mycroft used TD 12 to erase his memory of the fake death, they couldn’t let him remember why he was really talking to E, either. So the truth of the matter was either removed, or became corrupted once John forgot all about the fake death part and could only do his best to piece together whatever memories he still had of meeting E into a coherent story.

Okay, but how does any of this work if E was really Mycroft’s secret sister? And evil to boot?

She’s not really his sister. There is no sister. And I’ll get to the evil part later, because this is one messed-up lady.