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The Rehabilitation of Dr. Joan Watson	By : LadyLaran Category: 1 through F > Elementary Views: 4616 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own "Elementary" nor do I make money from this story.

Chapter List
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Author’s Note – I cannot tell you how happy your reviews for the last chapter made me. The choice of bringing in Mrs. Hudson seemed to be a popular one with all of you, and I’m ecstatic all of you agreed with me. It made me eager to plot out the next chapter and since I have time and the urge to write, here it is!
Please keep in mind that my knowledge of police protocol is practically nothing so any mistakes I make are due to ignorance and lack of internet to do the research needed. Please forgive any mistakes made.
Disclaimer – I do not own “Elementary” nor do I make any money from this story.
Chapter Four – Drawing the Memory
Joan was quiet when Sherlock went to answer the door, watching the entryway into their living room. She was as comfortable physically as she could be, but it was her mind that didn’t want to slow down. She was fighting herself and using whatever meditation tools she had to try to bring the pace of her thoughts to a level she could work with.
“Watson? This is Mrs. O’Hara from NYPD,” Sherlock informed her, escorting a middle aged woman into the room.
The police sketch artist had white streaks in the shoulder length copper colored hair that danced in untamed ringlets. There was a look of warmth in the woman’s green eyes that helped to relax the former surgeon, but it was the rich Irish accent that emerged from their guest that really set her at ease.
“Hello, Ms. Watson,” she said to reclining woman. “You can call me Eileen.”
“Call me Joan,” the Asian-American woman responded, watching as Sherlock set the woman’s bag next a chair that wasn’t far from the couch. “Can we get you anything?”
“I’d love a cup of tea,” Eileen replied and Sherlock nodded, calling back as he headed to the kitchen.
“How do you take it?”
“White, two sugars,” she replied, pulling her sketch pad out as well as her pencils. “Once Mr. Holmes gets back, we can get started. Both Capt. Gregson and Det. Bell said that you would be more relaxed having him with you, and they found something he can do while you and I work on putting this sketch together.”
“Really?”
“Not many people are aware of this but there is a database that NYPD has access to that contains pictures of tattoos taken each time a person is booked and put through the system. It’s available only to police departments and the FBI,” she told the injured woman. “I brought the log in information with me so Mr. Holmes can take the description of the tattoo you saw and see if it’s there. I’ll be sketching it if it’s not, and Det. Bell will be passing it out along with the sketch.”
“Sherlock might find that interesting,” Joan commented, teasing her roommate as he came back into the room with the requested cup of tea.
“Indeed, it should be,” he answered back, setting the cup on a small table near the chair. He took the paper with the log in information, picking up his computer to get logged on.
“Okay, Joan,” Eileen began, taking a sip of the tea. “Thank you, Mr. Holmes. That is lovely.”
The artist set the cup down, looking over at the other woman.
“We’ll start with the tattoo. Det. Bell said that it’s one of the things that stands out to you right now so we’ll work on that to help you relax and allow your memory a chance to warm itself up,” she said. “Before we start, if you need to take a break, just let me know. We’re doing this at your pace, all right?”
“All right,” Joan replied, shifting a bit to get herself comfortable and wincing when her ribs gave a twinge of pain in protest.
“Okay, let’s get started,” Eileen said, pencil hovering above the paper.
“It was a cross, very gothic in a way,” Joan began, pulling the memories of the times she’d seen it up to the forefront of her mind. “It was strange because the cross piece of it wrapped around his wrist like a bracelet with the bottom was drawn almost in a snake like pattern and ended in the inner wrist.”
She trailed the pattern over her own skin, showing how the bottom of the cross moved from the back of the wrist to the inner wrist. Both Eileen and Sherlock watched the motion, and the artist quickly drew it in a two dimensional way so she could place it onto a wrist when she was ready to ask about it.
“Like I said, the cross was almost gothic in a way, very dark. The main structure of it was bone instead of the usual wood that you see for them,” she said. “Thinking about it now, it was strange because the main post was drawn from what looked to be the bones of a human leg and the cross piece the bones of the arms.”
“Are you sure,” Sherlock asked, looking up from his computer.
“I am,” she said. “The bones in the arms are different in shape and length, and the cross piece had more of them in the design to make it balance out. Both pieces had two rows of bones. The two beams intersected and were bound together with what looked like a broken string of prayer beads.”
“Catholic prayer beads,” the artist asked, knowing that several religions had beads used for meditation and prayer.
“Actually, no,” she answered, shaking her head. “They reminded me of the ones you see Buddhist monks with – larger, not as ornate as rosary beads usually are. The strings were red and dangled past where they tied the cross off, and I could see beads coming off of the string. It was the only splash of color the whole tattoo had. Everything else was black, including the beads coming off of the string.”
“Anything else,” the Irish woman asked, looking up from the paper.
“No, that was it. I just remember it standing out because of the odd blending of a Christian symbol with something Buddhist,” she commented. “Even then, you don’t see crosses made with arm and leg bones very often.”
“Very true,” Eileen answered, showing her the pad. “Is this what you saw?”
Joan nodded, forcing her hands not to shake. The cross had been drawn out as if the skin it had been inked on was laid out flat instead of curved around the bones of the wrist.
“What I’d like to do next, Joan, is to try to recreate this on how it was inked on his hand and wrist,” she told her. “What can you tell me about his hands and wrists? Bone structure, anything?”
“Larger bone structure,” she answered, holding out the arm that wasn’t in a cast, using her fingers to indicate how much larger the wrist had been in comparison to her attackers. “Skin tone was slightly darker than mine but Caucasian, not Hispanic or Native American. He kept his nails neat and clean so I’m not sure he worked with them in a blue-collar setting.”
“Was it his right or left hand, Joan?”
“Left hand,” she answered. “I did get a look at his right and there was an odd scar on the ring finger of it.”
Eileen’s pencil flew as she drew, focusing on the other woman’s words.
“Good, what kind of scar was it?”
“It looked like he’d been wearing a ring that had become superheated and couldn’t get it off before it burned him,” she described. “It was a band several millimeters thick and from what I could tell, it went all around his finger. It must’ve been a bad burn that didn’t heal too well judging from the scarring. It would hinder movement on that finger.”
“Excellent, details like that will help the police immensely,” the red haired woman replied. “Now, I want you to hold your hand out and show me just how the tattoo was done on his hand.”
Joan nodded, tracing the main beam of the tattoo first on her hand and wrist before doing the same for the cross piece. She repeated it a few times before setting her hand back down and accepted the pad.
“I want you to verify that this is what you saw,” the artist said, waiting for the woman to look at her work.
The former surgeon swallowed against the tightness of her throat, looking at the drawings. Eileen had drawn out the both of the man’s hands, right one showing the scar, and the left one was from both the top and bottom view to show how the tattoo had been inked.
“That’s exactly it,” she answered, handing the pad back to the artist.
“All right, this is a great start,” Eileen praised, showing Sherlock the tattoo and how it laid out so he could continue the database search. Once he nodded, she turned the page and settled back in her seat.
“Do you need a break for a few moments before we continue,” she asked, watching the other woman.
“I’d rather get this over with,” Joan answered shakily.
“Just remember we can take a break at any time,” the artist said reassuringly. “Okay, so let’s get an idea of bone structure and weight.”
“I came up to his chin,” she started.
“You were wearing the black dress pumps with the two and a half inch heels that night,” Sherlock supplied. “That would put him above six feet in height.”
“That’s a start,” Eileen said, focusing on Joan. “Was he thin, heavy, scrawny, or muscular?”
“Thin but lean muscle, like what you’d see with a swimmer or runner,” she answered, dragging up what she could remember of her attacker. “Dark hair, I think it was tied back at the nape of his neck. I couldn’t tell you how long it was but wasn’t short like most business men would wear it.”
The artist nodded, pencil flying over the paper.
“Do you remember what the nose or cheekbones looked like?”
“Somewhat high for cheekbones,” she said. “The lighting wasn’t good, and I was trying so hard to fight him off. I really didn’t get a chance for a good look. Clean shaven, I remember that because when he was behind me, his cheek rubbed against my temple a few times while he spoke.”
Joan answered a few more questions before an image popped into her mind, surprising both herself and the other two with her.
“He had Asian blood, not full though,” she informed them. “His eyes had the shape but nowhere near as pronounced as someone who is full blooded Asian.”
Eileen made the corrections, then showed the drawing to Joan. She’d been able to put the drawing together based on the other woman’s information and hoped this was accurate.
“Is this him?”
The long haired woman shuddered, staring at the drawing. It was a dead ringer to the images in her nightmares the night before.
“Yes,” she managed to get out. “That’s him.”
Eileen handed her a document to sign, putting her things away. Her voice was kind as she addressed the other woman.
“You’ve done an amazing job today,” she told her. “I’m going to leave you my number so if you do remember anything else, I can make adjustments for you. Thank you for working so hard with me, Joan.”
“Thank you for coming here to do this, Eileen,” she managed to reply.
“You’re most welcome,” the woman said kindly while Sherlock rose.
“I’m still going through the database at the moment,” he told the woman as he escorted her out. “When you speak to either Capt. Gregson or Det. Bell, tell them I’ll keep in touch as soon as I find something.”
“I will,” Eileen answered. “Just keep a good eye on her, Mr. Holmes. She’s got a long hard road ahead of her, and she needs her friends to help her get through this.”
“I plan on it,” the consulting detective told her. “Thank you for coming by.”
After the woman left, Sherlock returned to the living room to find Joan huddled on the couch, shivering hard despite the blanket he had left for her to wrap up in.
“Watson?”
“I need a shower,” she managed to rasp out, trying to hide her tears. “Please, Sherlock?”
The tattooed man picked up his cell, sending a quick text and reading the answer that came back.
“Mrs. Hudson is four minutes away, Watson. Can you hold on for that long?”
“Yes,” she whispered, voice tight with the effort to hold back the sobs. She looked up to spot his hand being held out, offering comfort, and she reached out to take it.
The warmth of his hand was comforting, and Joan held tightly to it as she waited. Everything was a mess inside of her head, and she just needed to find some sort of stability. Right now though, what she wanted most was that hot shower.
Joan waited, holding onto his hand, and listened to his accented voice start another monologue on bees again, letting him ground her. She honestly had no idea what she would do without him right now and hoped that she wouldn’t have to find out.
Author’s End Note – The emotional ending snuck up on me, but I find it’s the perfect way to end the chapter. Please let me know what you thought of it. See everyone next chapter! ~ Laran
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The Rehabilitation of Dr. Joan Watson