In woodland just before sunrise, seven year old Henry Knight is running through the trees panting heavily. He is repeatedly looking behind him and having flashbacks to the terrible scene he has recently witnessed where a man was being att*cked by someone – or something. The man was screaming and crying out in terror, scrabbling at the ground as he tried to get away from his attacker, which was growling and snarling ferociously. Henry runs on, trying to get away from the horror. After some time, he has cleared the trees and is out on moorland. He runs up an incline just as an old woman comes over the top of the rise. She is walking her dog.

GRACE: Oh, hello.

(Henry stops and looks at her, but his attention is mostly focused on her dog – some kind of spaniel which just stands there pretty much ignoring him.)

GRACE: Are you all right?

(Still Henry stares at the dog, whose features are mostly obscured in shadow due to the sun rising behind it.)

GRACE: What is it, dear? Are you lost?

(The dog pokes its nose towards him in a friendly way. Henry screams in utter terror.)

Twenty years later, the young boy’s screams are echoing in adult Henry’s ears. He looks around blankly as if he doesn’t know where he is or how he got there, then his face fills with horror as he realises that he is standing in the middle of a deep hollow in the woods. He starts to stumble away.

OPENING CREDITS.

BAKER STREET. As the door to 221B slams closed on someone who has just gone inside, the camera pans across to show two nodding dogs in the window of Speedy’s café. Upstairs in the flat, the living room door bursts open and Sherlock charges in, stopping just inside the room and slamming the end of a long pole down onto the ground. Sitting in his chair, John looks round and his eyes widen at the sight of his flatmate, who is wearing black trousers and a white shirt and whose arms, chest and face are covered with blood – far too much blood for it to be his own – and who is holding a harpoon. He looks round to John, breathing heavily.

SHERLOCK: Well, that was tedious.

JOHN: You went on the Tube like that?!

SHERLOCK (irritated): None of the cabs would take me.

(He walks out of the room.)

Later he is back in the room having cleaned himself up and changed into a clean shirt and trousers with one of his blue dressing gowns over the top. He is still carrying the harpoon and is pacing rapidly between the door and the window, looking round repeatedly at John as he sits in his chair flicking through the newspapers.

SHERLOCK (impatiently): Nothing?

JOHN: Military coup in Uganda.

SHERLOCK: Hmm.

(John chuckles in amusement as he sees something in one of the papers.)

JOHN: Another photo of you with the, er ...

(He points to a photograph of Sherlock wearing the deerstalker hat. Sherlock makes a disgusted noise. John moves on to another newspaper.)

JOHN: Oh, um, Cabinet reshuffle.

SHERLOCK (furious): Nothing of importance?

(He slams the end of the harpoon onto the ground and roars with rage.)

SHERLOCK: Oh, God!

(He looks round at John intensely.)

SHERLOCK: John, I need some. Get me some.

JOHN (calmly): No.

SHERLOCK (intensely): Get me some.

JOHN (more loudly): No. (He points sternly at him.) Cold turkey, we agreed, no matter what.

(Irritated, Sherlock leans the harpoon against the table.)

JOHN: Anyway, you’ve paid everyone off, remember? No-one within a two mile radius’ll sell you any.

SHERLOCK: Stupid idea. Whose idea was that?

(John looks round at him and clears his throat pointedly. Sherlock looks towards the door.)

SHERLOCK (shouting): Mrs Hudson!

(He starts hurling paperwork off the table as he searches desperately for what he needs.)

JOHN: Look, Sherlock, you’re doing really well. Don’t give up now.

SHERLOCK (frantically as he continues his search): Tell me where they are. Please. Tell me.

(As John remains silent, Sherlock straightens up and then turns his most appealing puppy-dog eyes on him, hesitating before he speaks and almost forming the word a couple of times before actually speaking it.)

SHERLOCK: Please.

JOHN: Can’t help, sorry.

SHERLOCK: I’ll let you know next week’s lottery numbers.

(John chuckles.)

SHERLOCK (exasperated): Oh, it was worth a try.

(He looks around the room, then gets inspired and hurls himself to the floor in front of the fireplace. Unearthing a slipper from the pile of papers in front of the unlit f*re, he holds it up and scrabbles about inside as Mrs Hudson arrives at the door and comes in.)

MRS HUDSON: Ooh-ooh!

SHERLOCK (rummaging about in the fireplace as he speaks almost sing-song): My secret supply: what have you done with my secret supply?

MRS HUDSON: Eh?

SHERLOCK: Cigarettes! What have you done with them? Where are they?

MRS HUDSON: You know you never let me touch your things!

(She looks around at the mess.)

MRS HUDSON: Ooh, chance would be a fine thing.

SHERLOCK (standing up and facing her): I thought you weren’t my housekeeper.

MRS HUDSON: I’m not.

(Making a frustrated noise, Sherlock stomps back over to the harpoon and picks it up again. Behind him, Mrs Hudson looks down at John who does the universal mime for offering someone a drink. She looks at Sherlock again.)

MRS HUDSON: How about a nice cuppa, and perhaps you could put away your harpoon.

SHERLOCK: I need something stronger than tea. Seven per cent stronger.

(He glares out of the window, then turns back towards Mrs Hudson and aims the harpoon at her. She flinches.)

SHERLOCK: You’ve been to see Mr. Chatterjee again.

MRS HUDSON: Pardon?

SHERLOCK (pointing with the harpoon’s tip): Sandwich shop. That’s a new dress, but there’s flour on the sleeve. You wouldn’t dress like that for baking.

JOHN: Sherlock ...

SHERLOCK: Thumbnail: tiny traces of foil. Been at the scratch cards again. We all know where that leads, don’t we?

(He sniffs deeply as he finally stops aiming the harpoon at her.)

SHERLOCK: Mmm: Kasbah Nights. Pretty racy for first thing on a Monday morning, wouldn’t you agree? I’ve written a little blog on the identification of perfumes. It’s on the website – you should look it up.

MRS HUDSON (exasperated): Please.

SHERLOCK: I wouldn’t pin your hopes on that cruise with Mr. Chatterjee. He’s got a wife in Doncaster (he adopts a south Yorkshire accent to say the town’s name) that nobody knows about.

JOHN (angrily): Sherlock!

SHERLOCK: Well, nobody except me.

MRS HUDSON (upset): I don’t know what you’re talking about, I really don’t.

(She storms out of the flat, slamming the living room door closed as she goes. Sherlock leaps over the back of his chair from behind it, then perches on the seat, wrapping his arms around his knees like a petulant child. John slams his newspaper down.)

JOHN: What the bloody hell was all that about?

SHERLOCK (rocking back and forth): You don’t understand.

JOHN (sternly): Go after her and apologise.

SHERLOCK (staring at him): Apologise?

JOHN: Mmm-hmm.

SHERLOCK (sighing): Oh, John, I envy you so much.

(John hesitates, wondering whether to rise to the bait, but eventually asks.)

JOHN: You envy me?

SHERLOCK: Your mind: it’s so placid, straightforward, barely used. Mine’s like an engine, racing out of control; a rocket tearing itself to pieces trapped on the launch pad. (Loudly, frantically) I need a case!

JOHN (equally loudly): You’ve just solved one! By harpooning a d*ad pig, apparently!

(With an exasperated noise, Sherlock jumps up in the air and then lands in the seated position on the chair.)

SHERLOCK: That was this morning!

(He starts drumming the fingers of both hands on the arms of the chair while stomping his feet on the floor.)

SHERLOCK: When’s the next one?

JOHN: Nothing on the website?

(Sherlock gets up and walks over to the table, collects his laptop and hands it to John, who looks at the message on there while Sherlock stomps over the window and narrates part of it.)

SHERLOCK: “Dear Mr. Sherlock Holmes. I can’t find Bluebell anywhere. Please please please can you help?”

JOHN: Bluebell?

SHERLOCK (irritated): A rabbit, John!

JOHN: Oh.

SHERLOCK (sarcastically): Ah, but there’s more! Before Bluebell disappeared, it turned luminous ...

(He adopts a little girl’s voice for the next three words.)

SHERLOCK: ... “like a fairy” according to little Kirsty; then the next morning, Bluebell was gone! Hutch still locked, no sign of a forced entry ...

(He stops and his expression becomes more intense.)

SHERLOCK: Ah! What am I saying? This is brilliant! Phone Lestrade. Tell him there’s an escaped rabbit.

JOHN: Are you serious?

SHERLOCK: It’s this, or Cluedo.

JOHN: Ah, no!

(He closes the laptop and gets up to put it back on the table.)

JOHN: We are never playing that again!

SHERLOCK: Why not?

JOHN: Because it’s not actually possible for the victim to have done it, Sherlock, that’s why.

SHERLOCK: Well, it was the only possible solution.

JOHN (sitting down again): It’s not in the rules.

SHERLOCK (furiously): Then the rules are wrong!

(The doorbell rings. John holds up a finger thoughtfully as Sherlock looks towards the living room door.)

JOHN: Single ring.

SHERLOCK: Maximum pressure just under the half second.

JOHN and SHERLOCK (simultaneously): Client.

Not long afterwards, a recording of a documentary is playing on the TV. Sherlock has taken off the dressing gown and exchanged it for a jacket and is sitting in his chair. John has relocated to the dining table chair near Sherlock’s, and a man is sitting in John’s chair. The documentary footage shows scenes of Dartmoor. Sherlock instantly looks bored.

PRESENTER (voiceover): Dartmoor. It’s always been a place of myth and legend, but is there something else lurking out here – something very real?

(Footage of “Keep Out” signs.)

PRESENTER (walking along a narrow road): Because Dartmoor’s also home to one of the government’s most secret of operations ...

(Sherlock’s eyes flick repeatedly between the screen and the man in John’s chair as the footage shows a large sign saying:

AUTHORISED PERSONNEL ONLY

YOU ARE NOW ENTERING A RESTRICTED AREA

BASKERVILLE

By this time Sherlock’s eyes are permanently fixed on the newcomer – who we now see is Henry Knight – as he watches the documentary anxiously.)

PRESENTER (voiceover): ... the chemical and biological w*apon research centre which is said to be even more sensitive than Porton Down. Since the end of the Second World w*r, there’ve been persistent stories about the Baskerville experiments: genetic mutations, animals grown for the b*ttlefield. There are many who believe that within this compound, in the heart of this ancient wilderness, there are horrors beyond imagining. But the real question is: are all of them still inside?

(The footage switches to an indoor scene where Henry is sitting in front of the camera talking to someone offscreen. A caption at the bottom of the screen shows him as “Henry Knight, Grimpen resident”.)

HENRY: I was just a kid. It-it was on the moor.

(There’s a cutaway to a child’s drawing of a huge snarling dog with red eyes. The caption says, “Henry’s drawing (aged 9)”.)

HENRY: It was dark, but I know what I saw. I know what k*lled my father.

(Sighing, Sherlock picks up the remote control and switches off the footage.)

SHERLOCK (to Henry): What did you see?

HENRY: Oh. (He points to the television.) I ... I was just about to say.

SHERLOCK: Yes, in a TV interview. I prefer to do my own editing.

HENRY: Yes. Sorry, yes, of course. ’Scuse me.

(He reaches into his jacket pocket, pulls out a paper napkin and wipes his nose on it.)

JOHN: In your own time.

SHERLOCK: But quite quickly.

(Henry lowers the napkin.)

HENRY: Do you know Dartmoor, Mr. Holmes?

SHERLOCK: No.

HENRY: It’s an amazing place. It’s like nowhere else. It’s sort of ... bleak but beautiful.

SHERLOCK: Mmm, not interested. Moving on.

HENRY: We used to go for walks, after my mum died, my dad and me. Every evening we’d go out onto the moor.

SHERLOCK: Yes, good. Skipping to the night that your dad was violently k*lled. Where did that happen?

(John’s eyes raise skywards at Sherlock’s insensitive question.)

HENRY: There’s a place – it’s... it’s a sort of local landmark called Dewer’s Hollow.

(He gazes at Sherlock who tilts his head at him as if to say, “And...?”)

HENRY: That’s an ancient name for the Devil.

SHERLOCK (quirking an eyebrow): So?

JOHN: Did you see the Devil that night?

(His face haunted with memories, Henry looks across to him and nods.)

HENRY (in a whisper): Yes.

(Flashback to Henry’s father screaming as he is pulled off his feet by something while young Henry watches in horror nearby.)

HENRY (voiceover): It was huge. Coal-black fur, with red eyes.

(Henry’s father finally falls silent. The creature growls savagely and young Henry turns and begins to scramble away.)

HENRY (tearfully): It got him, tore at him, tore him apart.

(Sherlock watches him intensely.)

HENRY: I can’t remember anything else. They found me the next morning, just wandering on the moor. My dad’s body was never found.

JOHN: Hmm. (He looks across to Sherlock.) Red eyes, coal-black fur, enormous: dog? Wolf?

SHERLOCK: Or a genetic experiment.

(He looks away, biting back a smile.)

HENRY: Are you laughing at me, Mr. Holmes?

SHERLOCK: Why, are you joking?

HENRY: My dad was always going on about the things they were doing at Baskerville; about the type of monsters they were breeding there. People used to laugh at him. At least the TV people took me seriously.

SHERLOCK: And, I assume, did wonders for Devon tourism.

JOHN (uncomfortably): Yeah ...

(In an attempt to stop Sherlock’s continuing sarcasm, he leans forward to Henry. Sherlock rolls his eyes as he realises what John is doing.)

JOHN: Henry, whatever did happen to your father, it was twenty years ago. Why come to us now?

(Henry sits forward, staring at Sherlock.)

HENRY: I’m not sure you can help me, Mr. Holmes, since you find it all so funny.

(He stands up and walks around the chair, heading towards the door.)

SHERLOCK: Because of what happened last night.

JOHN: Why, what happened last night?

(Henry turns back towards them.)

HENRY: How ... how do you know?

SHERLOCK: I didn’t know; I noticed.

(John shuffles on his chair with an “Oh dear lord, here we go” expression on his face.)

SHERLOCK (quick-f*re): You came up from Devon on the first available train this morning. You had a disappointing breakfast and a cup of black coffee. The girl in the seat across the aisle fancied you. Although you were initially keen, you’ve now changed your mind. You are, however, extremely anxious to have your first cigarette of the day. Sit down, Mr. Knight, and do please smoke. I’d be delighted.

(Henry stares at him, then glances across to John who averts his gaze and sighs. Hesitantly, Henry walks back to the chair and sits down, fishing in his jacket pocket.)

HENRY: How on earth did you notice all that?!

JOHN: It’s not important ...

(But Sherlock’s already off.)

SHERLOCK (looking at two small round white pieces of paper stuck to Henry’s coat): Punched-out holes where your ticket’s been checked ...

JOHN: Not now, Sherlock.

SHERLOCK: Oh please. I’ve been cooped up in here for ages.

JOHN: You’re just showing off.

SHERLOCK: Of course. I am a show-off. That’s what we do.

(He turns his attention back to Henry and the napkin that he’s still holding.)

SHERLOCK: The train napkin that you used to mop up the spilled coffee: the strength of the stain shows that you didn’t take milk. There are traces of ketchup on it and round your lips and on your sleeve. Cooked breakfast – or the nearest thing those trains can manage. Probably a sandwich.

(Henry half-sobs, over-awed.)

HENRY: How did you know it was disappointing?

SHERLOCK: Is there any other type of breakfast on a train? The girl – female handwriting’s quite distinctive. Wrote her phone number down on the napkin. I can tell from the angle she wrote at that she was sat across from you on the other side of the aisle. Later – after she got off, I imagine – you used the napkin to mop up your spilled coffee, accidentally smudging the numbers. You’ve been over the last four digits yourself with another pen, so you wanted to keep the number. Just now, though, you used the napkin to blow your nose. Maybe you’re not that into her after all. Then there’s the nicotine stains on your fingers ... your shaking fingers. I know the signs.

(His gaze becomes intense.)

SHERLOCK: No chance to smoke one on the train; no time to roll one before you got a cab here.

(He glances at his watch.)

SHERLOCK: It’s just after nine fifteen. You’re desperate. The first train from Exeter to London leaves at five forty-six a.m. You got the first one possible, so something important must have happened last night. Am I wrong?

(Henry stares at him in amazement, then draws in a shaky breath.)

HENRY: No.

(Sherlock smiles smugly. John takes a drink from his mug to hide his “oh bugger it” look.)

HENRY (awestruck): You’re right. You’re completely, exactly right. Bloody hell, I heard you were quick.

SHERLOCK: It’s my job.

(He leans forward in his seat and glares at Henry intensely.)

SHERLOCK: Now shut up and smoke.

(John frowns towards him. As Henry takes out a roll-up and lights it, John consults the notes he’s taken so far.)

JOHN: Um, Henry, your parents both died and you were, what, seven years old?

(Henry is concentrating on taking his first drag on his cigarette. As he exhales his first lungful, Sherlock stands up and steps closer to him.)

HENRY: I know. That ... my ...

(He stops as Sherlock leans into the smoke drifting up from the cigarette and from Henry’s mouth and breathes in deeply. Having sucked up most of the smoke, he sits down again and breathes out, whining quietly in pleasure.)

JOHN (trying hard to ignore him): That must be a ... quite a trauma. Have you ever thought that maybe you invented this story, this ...

(Henry has exhaled another lungful of smoke and Sherlock dives in to noisily hoover up the smoke again. John pauses patiently until he sits down again.)

JOHN: ... to account for it?

(Henry drags his eyes away from Sherlock.)

HENRY: That’s what Doctor Mortimer says.

JOHN: Who?

SHERLOCK: His therapist.

HENRY (almost simultaneously): My therapist.

SHERLOCK: Obviously.

HENRY: Louise Mortimer. She’s the reason I came back to Dartmoor. She thinks I have to face my demons.

SHERLOCK: And what happened when you went back to Dewer’s Hollow last night, Henry? You went there on the advice of your therapist and now you’re consulting a detective. What did you see that changed everything?

HENRY: It’s a strange place, the Hollow.

(He flashes back in his mind to when he was standing in the Hollow the previous night.)

HENRY: Makes you feel so cold inside, so afraid.

SHERLOCK (rolling his eyes): Yes, if I wanted poetry, I’d read John’s emails to his girlfriends. Much funnier.

(John sighs hard in an attempt to release the tension that might make him k*ll his flatmate.)

SHERLOCK (to Henry): What did you see?

HENRY: Footprints – on the exact spot where I saw my father torn apart.

(Looking exasperated, Sherlock leans back in his seat.)

JOHN: Man’s or a woman’s?

HENRY: Neither. They were ...

SHERLOCK (interrupting): Is that it? Nothing else. Footprints. Is that all?

HENRY: Yes, but they were ...

SHERLOCK (interrupting): No, sorry, Doctor Mortimer wins. Childhood trauma masked by an invented memory. Boring! Goodbye, Mr. Knight. Thank you for smoking.

HENRY: No, but what about the footprints?

SHERLOCK: Oh, they’re probably paw prints; could be anything, therefore nothing.

(He leans forward in his seat and flicks his fingers at Henry, gesturing him towards the door.)

SHERLOCK: Off to Devon with you; have a cream tea on me.

(Standing up and buttoning his jacket, he heads into the kitchen. Henry turns in his seat to look at him.)

HENRY: Mr. Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic hound!

(Sherlock stops d*ad in his tracks, then slowly turns and comes back to the kitchen doorway and stares down at Henry.)

SHERLOCK: Say that again.

HENRY: I found the footprints; they were ...

SHERLOCK: No, no, no, your exact words. Repeat your exact words from a moment ago, exactly as you said them.

(Henry thinks for a second, then slowly recites his words back to him.)

HENRY: Mr. Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic ... hound.

(Sherlock raises his head.)

SHERLOCK: I’ll take the case.

JOHN (startled): Sorry, what?

(Sherlock adopts the prayer position in front of his mouth and begins to pace slowly across the living room.)

SHERLOCK: Thank you for bringing this to my attention. It’s very promising.

JOHN: No-no-no, sorry, what? A minute ago, footprints were boring; now they’re very promising?

SHERLOCK (stopping): It’s nothing to do with footprints. As ever, John, you weren’t listening. Baskerville: ever heard of it?

JOHN: Vaguely. It’s very hush-hush.

SHERLOCK: Sounds like a good place to start.

HENRY: Ah! You’ll come down, then?

SHERLOCK: No, I can’t leave London at the moment. Far too busy. Don’t worry – putting my best man onto it.

(He walks over to John and pats his shoulder.)

SHERLOCK: Always rely on John to send me the relevant data, as he never understands a word of it himself.

JOHN: What are you talking about, you’re busy? You don’t have a case! A minute ago you were complaining ...

SHERLOCK (interrupting): Bluebell, John! I’ve got Bluebell! The case of the vanishing, glow-in-the-dark rabbit! (He looks at Henry.) NATO’s in uproar.

HENRY: Oh, sorry, no, you’re not coming, then?

(Putting on a regretful expression, Sherlock shakes his head sadly. John groans.)

JOHN: Okay. (He stands up as Sherlock smiles smugly.) Okay.

(He walks over to the mantelpiece and picks up the skull, taking a packet of cigarettes from underneath it. Putting the skull down again, he turns and tosses the packet across to Sherlock, who catches it and instantly tosses it over his shoulder.)

SHERLOCK: I don’t need those any more. I’m going to Dartmoor.

(He walks out of the living room.)

SHERLOCK: You go on ahead, Henry. We’ll follow later.

HENRY (scrambling to his feet): Er, sorry, so you are coming?

(Sherlock turns and walks back into the room.)

SHERLOCK: Twenty year old disappearance; a monstrous hound? I wouldn’t miss this for the world!

Later, John carries two large bags out onto the street, shuts the front door and walks over to Sherlock who is holding a taxi door open. Next door in Speedy’s, Mrs Hudson is shouting angrily at an unseen Mr. Chatterjee.

MRS HUDSON: ... cruise together. You had no intention of taking me on it ...

(She throws something at the closed door. As it bounces heavily off the glass, John recoils.)

JOHN: Oh! Looks like Mrs Hudson finally got to the wife in Doncaster.

SHERLOCK: Mmm. Wait ’til she finds out about the one in Islamabad.

(John sniggers and gets into the taxi. Sherlock follows him in.)

SHERLOCK (to the driver): Paddington Station, please.

DARTMOOR. After many sh*ts of the beautiful scenery which your transcriber is delighted to sit back and watch while resting her aching fingers, we find our boys driving across the moors in a large black Land Rover jeep. Sherlock is driving ... and if they’re not playing “Yellow Car” I shall be most disappointed. Some time later, away from the road, Sherlock is standing dramatically skylined on a large stone outcrop while John stands at the foot of it consulting a map. He points ahead of himself at a large array of buildings in the distance.

JOHN: There’s Baskerville.

(He turns and points behind them. Sherlock turns to look.)

JOHN: That’s Grimpen Village.

(He turns and looks ahead of them again, checking the map for the name of the heavily wooded area to the left of the Baskerville complex.)

JOHN: So that must be ... yeah, it’s Dewer’s Hollow.

(Sherlock points to an area in between the complex and the Hollow.)

SHERLOCK: What’s that?

JOHN: Hmm?

(He has binoculars round his neck and now he lifts them and looks more closely at the fencing and the warning signs.)

JOHN: Minefield? Technically Baskerville’s an army base, so I guess they’ve always been keen to keep people out.

SHERLOCK: Clearly.

Later, they drive into Grimpen Village and pull into the car park of the Cross Keys inn. They get out and walk towards the entrance of the pub, where a young man who is apparently a tour guide is talking to a group of tourists.

FLETCHER: ... three times a day, tell your friends. Tell anyone!

(The boys walk past the group and see that Fletcher is standing next to a large sign on which is painted a black image of a wolf-like creature with the words “BEWARE THE HOUND!” above it.)

FLETCHER (to the tourists): Don’t be strangers, and remember ... stay away from the moor at night if you value your lives!

(Sherlock has been pulling his overcoat around him as he walks towards the pub, and now he pops the collar. John looks round at him pointedly.)

SHERLOCK (trying and failing to look nonchalant): I’m cold.

(The tourist group walks away from Fletcher. Once their backs are turned he puts on a large shaggy wolf’s-head mask. Sherlock and John walk into the pub, which has a blackboard outside advertising “Boutique Rooms & Vegetarian Cuisine”. Fletcher runs over to a couple of the nearby tourists and roars. They flinch and the woman shrieks in surprise.)

Flashback to Henry Knight’s father being grabbed by something in Dewer’s Hollow, and young Henry’s horrified face. In the present, adult Henry flinches, his eyes closed as he sits half reclined on a comfortable armchair. The flashbacks continue to haunt him until he opens his eyes and sighs. A woman is sitting a short distance away with a notebook and pen on her lap.

HENRY: That part doesn’t change.

MORTIMER: What does?

(Henry runs his hands over his face.)

HENRY: Oh, there’s something else. It-it’s a word.

(Sighing heavily in concentration, he closes his eyes again and sees the word as if it is stitched or knitted into some fabric.)

HENRY: “Liberty.”

(He opens his eyes again.)

MORTIMER: Liberty?

HENRY (closing his eyes again): There’s another word. (He concentrates and sees the next word in the stitching.) “In.” I-N. “Liberty In.” (He looks at his therapist.) What do you think it means?

(She shakes her head. He sighs in frustration.)

CROSS KEYS INN. As Sherlock prowls around the pub, John is at the bar checking in. The manager and barman, Gary, hands him some keys.

GARY: Eh, sorry we couldn’t do a double room for you boys.

JOHN: That’s fine. We-we’re not ...

(He looks at the smug knowing smile on Gary’s face and gives up.)

JOHN (giving him some money for the drink he has just bought): There you go.

GARY: Oh, ta. I’ll just get your change.

JOHN: Ta.

(As Gary goes to the till, John’s glance falls on a pile of receipts and invoices which have been punched onto a spike on the bar. He frowns as he sees that one is labelled “Undershaw Meat Supplies”. Quickly he reaches out and rips it from the spike, putting it into his pocket as Gary comes back with his change.)

GARY: There you go.

JOHN: I couldn’t help noticing on the map of the moor: a skull and crossbones.

GARY: Oh that, aye.

JOHN: Pirates?!

GARY: Eh, no, no. The Great Grimpen Minefield, they call it.

JOHN: Oh, right.

GARY: It’s not what you think. It’s the Baskerville testing site. It’s been going for eighty-odd years. I’m not sure anyone really knows what’s there any more.

(Nearby, Sherlock is still prowling around and now seems to find something of interest at one of the tables.)

JOHN (to Gary): expl*sives?

GARY: Oh, not just expl*sives. Break into that place and – if you’re lucky – you just get blown up, so they say ... in case you’re planning on a nice wee stroll.

(Sherlock loses interest in the table and wanders off again.)

JOHN: Ta. I’ll remember.

GARY: Aye. No, it buggers up tourism a bit, so thank God for the demon hound! (He chuckles.) Did you see that show, that documentary?

JOHN: Quite recently, yeah.

GARY: Aye. God bless Henry Knight and his monster from hell.

JOHN: Ever seen it – the hound?

GARY: Me? No.

(He points out the door past Sherlock, where Fletcher is just outside the pub and talking on his phone to someone.)

GARY: Fletcher has. He runs the walks – the Monster Walks for the tourists, you know? He’s seen it.

JOHN: That’s handy for trade.

(Gary turns to a man who is clearly the inn’s cook who has just arrived behind the bar. Meanwhile Sherlock turns and follows Fletcher as he walks away from the doorway.)

GARY: I’m just saying we’ve been rushed off our feet, Billy.

BILLY: Yeah. Lots of monster-hunters. Doesn’t take much these days. One mention on Twitter and oomph.

(He looks at Gary.)

BILLY: We’re out of WKD.

[Transcriber’s note: WKD is a brand of alcopop aimed at the trendy young – and mostly male – drinkers’ market.]

GARY: All right.

(He walks behind the bar again. Billy turns to John.)

BILLY: What with the monster and that ruddy prison, I don’t know how we sleep nights. Do you, Gary?

(Gary stops and puts a hand on his shoulder and looks at him affectionately.)

GARY: Like a baby.

BILLY: That’s not true. (He looks at John.) He’s a snorer.

GARY (embarrassed, trying to shut him up): Hey, wheesht!

BILLY (to John): Is yours a snorer?

JOHN: ... Got any crisps?

Outside, Sherlock swipes a half-drunk pint of beer from a nearby empty table and walks over towards Fletcher, noticing as he does so that he has a copy of the Racing Post in his trouser pocket. Fletcher has gone over to another of the tables and is just finishing his phone call.

FLETCHER: Yeah ... No. All right? Right. Take care. Bye.

SHERLOCK: Mind if I join you?

(Fletcher shrugs and gestures to the table. Sherlock puts his pint down and sits on the bench on the other side of the table.)

SHERLOCK: It’s not true, is it? You haven’t actually seen this ... hound thing. (He grins in a friendly way.)

FLETCHER (looking at him suspiciously): You from the papers?

SHERLOCK: No, nothing like that. Just curious. Have you seen it?

FLETCHER: Maybe.

SHERLOCK: Got any proof?

FLETCHER: Why would I tell you if I did? ’Scuse me.

(He stands up to leave just as John comes over with his own drink.)

JOHN: I called Henry ...

SHERLOCK (talking over him): Bet’s off, John, sorry.

JOHN (sitting down): What?

FLETCHER: Bet?

SHERLOCK (looking at his watch): My plan needs darkness. (He looks up at the sky.) Reckon we’ve got another half an hour of light ...

FLETCHER: Wait, wait. What bet?

SHERLOCK: Oh, I bet John here fifty quid that you couldn’t prove you’d seen the hound.

JOHN (catching on immediately and looking at Fletcher): Yeah, the guys in the pub said you could.

(Fletcher smiles and points to Sherlock.)

FLETCHER: Well, you’re gonna lose your money, mate.

SHERLOCK: Yeah?

FLETCHER: Yeah. I’ve seen it. Only about a month ago, up at the Hollow. It was foggy, mind – couldn’t make much out.

SHERLOCK: I see. No witnesses, I suppose.

FLETCHER: No, but ...

SHERLOCK: Never are.

FLETCHER: Wait ...

(He shows Sherlock a photograph on his smart phone.)

FLETCHER: There.

(Sherlock looks at the photograph which shows a dark-furred four-legged something in the distance but, with no scale amongst the surrounding vegetation, it’s impossible to tell the size – or even the species – of the animal. He snorts.)

SHERLOCK: Is that it? It’s not exactly proof, is it?

(Fletcher shows the photo to John.)

SHERLOCK: Sorry, John. I win.

(He picks up the stolen drink and makes as if to drink from it, although he never does.)

FLETCHER: Wait, wait. That’s not all. People don’t like going up there, you know – to the Hollow. Gives them a ... bad sort of feeling.

SHERLOCK: Ooh! Is it haunted?(!) Is that supposed to convince me?

(He puts the pint glass down again.)

FLETCHER: Nah, don’t be stupid, nothing like that, but I reckon there is something out there – something from Baskerville, escaped.

SHERLOCK (not really trying to hold back his sceptical snigger): A clone, a super-dog?(!)

FLETCHER: Maybe. God knows what they’ve been spraying on us all these years, or putting in the water. I wouldn’t trust ’em as far as I could spit.

SHERLOCK (nodding to the phone photograph): Is that the best you’ve got?

(Fletcher hesitates for a long moment, uncertain whether to continue, but eventually he speaks reluctantly, lowering his voice.)

FLETCHER: I had a mate once who worked for the MOD. One weekend we were meant to go fishin’ but he never showed up – well, not ’til late. When he did, he was white as a sheet. I can see him now. “I’ve seen things today, Fletch,” he said, “that I never wanna see again. Terrible things.” He’d been sent to some secret Army place – Porton Down, maybe, maybe Baskerville, or somewhere else.

(He leans closer.)

FLETCHER: In the labs there – the really secret labs, he said he’d seen ... terrible things. Rats as big as dogs, he said, and dogs ...

(He reaches into his bag and pulls something out, showing it to the boys.)

FLETCHER: ... dogs the size of horses.

(He is holding a concrete cast of a dog’s paw print – but the print is at least six inches long from the tip of the claws to the back of the pad. Sherlock stares at it in surprise. John immediately pounces.)

JOHN: Er, we did say fifty?

(As Fletcher smiles triumphantly, Sherlock gets out his wallet and hands John a fifty pound note.)

JOHN: Ta.

(Sulkily, Sherlock gets up and walks away. John finishes his drink and follows him.)

Later, Sherlock and John take the car to Baskerville, Sherlock still driving. As they approach the complex, he observes that there are very many military personnel guarding the place, walking the perimeter etc. He drives up to the gates and a military security guard holding a r*fle raises a hand. As Sherlock stops the jeep, the man walks around to the driver’s window.

SECURITY GUARD: Pass, please.

(Sherlock reaches into his coat pocket and hands him a pass.)

SECURITY GUARD: Thank you.

(He walks away with the pass. At the front of the vehicle, another security man encourages a sniffer dog to check the jeep, presumably for expl*sives.)

JOHN (quietly): You’ve got ID for Baskerville. How?

SHERLOCK (quietly): It’s not specific to this place. It’s my brother’s. Access all areas. I, um ... (he clears his throat) ... acquired it ages ago, just in case.

(The security guard swipes Sherlock’s pass through a reader at the gate room. The screen shows a fairly small photograph of Mycroft and names the card holder as Mycroft Holmes, giving him Unlimited Access and showing his security status as ‘Secure (No thr*at)’.)

JOHN: Brilliant(!)

SHERLOCK: What’s the matter?

JOHN: We’ll get caught.

SHERLOCK: No we won’t – well, not just yet.

JOHN: Caught in five minutes. “Oh, hi, we just thought we’d come and have a wander round your top secret w*apon base.” “Really? Great! Come in – kettle’s just boiled.” That’s if we don’t get sh*t.

(The gates begin to slide open as the security guard comes back over to the car.)

SECURITY DOG HANDLER: Clear.

SECURITY GUARD (handing Sherlock his pass): Thank you very much, sir.

SHERLOCK: Thank you.

(He puts the car in gear and eases the vehicle forward.)

SECURITY GUARD: Straight through, sir.

JOHN: Mycroft’s name literally opens doors!

SHERLOCK: I’ve told you – he practically is the British government. I reckon we’ve got about twenty minutes before they realise something’s wrong.

Sherlock drives up to the main complex at Baskerville, parks the car and he and John get out. Another soldier leads them through barriers and towards an entrance to the main building. As they walk, Sherlock looks around at all the military men patrolling the area, many of them armed. Even the scientists in lab coats are being escorted. As they approach the entrance, a military jeep pulls up and a young corporal gets out.

LYONS: What is it? Are we in trouble?

SHERLOCK (sternly): “Are we in trouble, sir.”

LYONS: Yes, sir, sorry, sir.

(Nevertheless, he steps in front of them and holds out his hands to prevent them getting nearer to the entrance.)

SHERLOCK: You were expecting us?

LYONS: Your ID showed up straight away, Mr. Holmes. Corporal Lyons, security. Is there something wrong, sir?

SHERLOCK: Well, I hope not, Corporal, I hope not.

LYONS: It’s just we don’t get inspected here, you see, sir. It just doesn’t happen.

JOHN: Ever heard of a spot check?

(He takes a small wallet from his pocket and shows the ID inside to the corporal.)

JOHN: Captain John Watson, Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers.

(Even before he finishes speaking, the corporal comes to attention and salutes. John crisply returns the salute. Fangirls faint.)

LYONS: Sir. Major Barrymore won’t be pleased, sir. He’ll want to see you both.

JOHN: I’m afraid we won’t have time for that. We’ll need the full tour right away. Carry on.

(The corporal hesitates.)

JOHN (instantly): That’s an order, Corporal.

LYONS: Yes, sir.

(He spins around and walks towards the entrance. Sherlock glances across to John with a proud smile on his face as they follow. At the entrance, which is marked “a*t*matic SECURITY DOOR”, Lyons swipes his pass through a reader, then waits for Sherlock to walk over and do the same with his own pass. The message “ACCESS GRANTED” appears on the reader. Lyons then presses a button and the locks on the door disengage. Sherlock checks his watch.)

(Elsewhere, probably a long way from Baskerville, a message flashes up on a screen:

CCV1 • security authorization requested •

holmes, mycroft • priority ultra

processing CCV1 •

5555*0000*x1 //5894

The security request begins to process. At Baskerville, the door swings open and Lyons leads the other two inside, taking off his beret as he goes. As he leads them towards the next security door, the boys talk quietly.)

SHERLOCK: Nice touch.

JOHN: Haven’t pulled rank in ages.

SHERLOCK: Enjoy it?

JOHN: Oh yeah.

(Reaching the door, Lyons swipes his pass and then steps aside for Sherlock to do likewise. As he does so and another “ACCESS GRANTED” message appears, the authorisation request is sent out again. The doors slide opens and reveal an elevator on the other side. Lyons leads them inside and Sherlock looks at the wall panel. The lift, now on the ground floor, only goes downwards to five floors marked -1, -2, -3, -4 and B. Lyons presses the -1 button and the doors close, opening shortly afterwards on the next floor down. Lyons leads them out into a brightly lit and white tiled laboratory. As they walk forward, various scientific staff dressed either in white coveralls including full breathing masks, or lab coats and face masks walk around the lab. There are large cages to the right of the elevator and as Lyons leads the way past them, a monkey screams and hurls itself at the bars towards them. Sherlock spins on his heel as he passes the cage, looking at the monkey and the chain around its neck.)

SHERLOCK: How many animals do you keep down here?

LYONS: Lots, sir.

(At the far end of the lab, a scientist wearing coveralls and a breathing mask comes out of another room and takes his mask off. Another scientist walks across the lab with a beagle on a lead.)

SHERLOCK: Any ever escape?

LYONS: They’d have to know how to use that lift, sir. We’re not breeding them that clever.

SHERLOCK: Unless they have help.

(The man who just took his mask off comes over to the group.)

FRANKLAND: Ah, and you are?

LYONS: Sorry, Doctor Frankland. I’m just showing these gentlemen around.

FRANKLAND (smiling at them): Ah, new faces, huh? Nice. Careful you don’t get stuck here, though. I only came to fix a tap!

(John chuckles politely as Frankland walks towards the lift. John turns to Lyons.)

JOHN: How far down does that lift go?

LYONS: Quite a way, sir.

JOHN: Mmm-hmm. And what’s down there?

LYONS: Well, we have to keep the bins somewhere, sir. This way please, gentlemen.

(Sherlock is watching Frankland as he reaches the elevator. Frankland in turn looks around to gaze with interest at the new arrivals. As Lyons leads John away, Sherlock walks backwards for a couple of paces before turning to follow.)

JOHN: So what exactly is it that you do here?

LYONS: I thought you’d know, sir, this being an inspection.

(Sherlock is looking at the various scientists around the room, a couple looking at a rat in a glass cage, another one doing something to the leg of a monkey on a leash which is sitting on a metal table. Nearby, another scientist picks up what looks ominously like a glass container of serum.)

JOHN: Well, I’m not an expert, am I?

LYONS: Everything from stem cell research to trying to cure the common cold, sir.

JOHN: But mostly w*apon?

LYONS: Of one sort or another, yes.

(He swipes his card through the reader of the door at the end of the lab, then steps aside for Sherlock to do likewise.)

JOHN: Biological, chemical ...?

LYONS: One w*r ends, another begins, sir. New enemies to fight. We have to be prepared.

(As the door releases, Sherlock checks his watch as the security authorisation message goes out again, the message changing slightly:

CCV1 • security authorization //5894

• query • query • query

CCV1 • 5555*0000*x1

Lyons leads them through the doors and into another lab where a monkey stands up on its back legs with one hand high in the air and shrieks before sitting down again on a high metal table. A female scientist looks at it and then turns to her colleague.)

STAPLETON: Okay, Michael, let’s try Harlow Three next time.

(As she walks away from the table, Lyons approaches her.)

LYONS: Doctor Stapleton.

SHERLOCK (thoughtfully): Stapleton.

STAPLETON: Yes? (She looks at Sherlock and John.) Who’s this?

LYONS: Priority Ultra, ma’am. Orders from on high. An inspection.

STAPLETON: Really?

SHERLOCK: We’re to be accorded every courtesy, Doctor Stapleton. What’s your role at Baskerville?

(Stapleton looks at him and snorts with disbelieving laughter.)

JOHN: Er, accorded every courtesy, isn’t that the idea?

STAPLETON: I’m not free to say. Official secrets.

SHERLOCK (smiling at her): Oh, you most certainly are free ... (his smile fades and his voice becomes ominous) ... and I suggest you remain that way.

(She looks at him for a moment.)

STAPLETON: I have a lot of fingers in a lot of pies. I like to mix things up – genes, mostly; now and again actual fingers.

(Sherlock has had a lightbulb moment when she said the words ‘genes’ and is reaching into his pocket before she finishes the sentence.)

SHERLOCK: Stapleton. I knew I knew your name.

STAPLETON: I doubt it.

SHERLOCK: People say there’s no such thing as coincidence. What dull lives they must lead.

(He holds up his notebook to her on which he has written a single large word: “BLUEBELL”. She stares at it in amazement as Sherlock watches her face closely.)

STAPLETON: Have you been talking to my daughter?

SHERLOCK (putting his notebook away): Why did Bluebell have to die, Doctor Stapleton?

JOHN (bewildered): The rabbit?

SHERLOCK (to Stapleton, as she stares at him blankly): Disappeared from inside a locked hutch, which was always suggestive.

JOHN: The rabbit?

SHERLOCK: Clearly an inside job.

STAPLETON: Oh, you reckon?

SHERLOCK: Why? Because it glowed in the dark.

STAPLETON: I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. Who are you?

(Even as she speaks Sherlock has been keeping a mental note of the time and now checks his watch again. Out in the security system somewhere, the authorisation request changes:

CCV1 • security authorization

•• alert •• alert ••

potential level 5 security breach

5555*0000*x1 //5894

Someone looking at the screen picks up the phone and lifts the handset to their ear. At Baskerville, Sherlock lowers his hand and turns to Lyons.)

SHERLOCK: Well, I think we’ve seen enough for now, Corporal. Thank you so much.

LYONS (surprised): That’s it?

SHERLOCK: That’s it. (He turns and heads briskly back towards the door, John following behind and Lyons trailing after them.) It’s this way, isn’t it?

STAPLETON (calling after them): Just a minute!

(John catches up to his friend and speaks quietly so that Lyons can’t overhear him. His tone suggests that he is not best pleased.)

JOHN: Did we just break into a military base to investigate a rabbit?

(Sherlock reaches the door and swipes his card, then waits for Lyons to catch up to them and do the same with his own card. In Whitehall or somewhere similar, telephones begin to ring as a chain of calls relays the potential security breach and the message goes out:

• URGENT • URGENT • URGENT •

refer holmes, mycroft

Sitting in what can surely only be the Diogenes Club with a cup of coffee on the table beside him, Mycroft takes out his phone as it trills quietly. Looking at the message, he rolls his eyes in exasperation, gazes off into space with a “Good God – what now?!” look on his face for a moment and then begins to text.)

(At Baskerville, Sherlock walks swiftly through the security doors and heads for the lift as his phone trills a text alert. He takes out his phone without stopping and reads the message:

What are you

doing?

M

He laughs sarcastically.)

SHERLOCK: Twenty-three minutes. Mycroft’s getting slow.

(Reaching the lift doors, he swipes his card and Lyons does likewise. The doors open revealing Doctor Frankland standing inside as if he has been waiting there for them ever since they met. He smiles at them.)

FRANKLAND: Hello ... again.

(Narrowing his eyes suspiciously, Sherlock walks into the lift with the others. Very shortly afterwards, one floor up, the doors open again and reveal a bearded man in military uniform waiting for them. He does not look happy.)

LYONS: Er, um, Major ...

BARRYMORE: This is bloody outrageous. Why wasn’t I told?

JOHN: Major Barrymore, is it? (He steps out of the lift towards him.) Yes, well, good. Very good. (He offers him his hand to shake.) We’re very impressed, aren’t we, Mr. Holmes?

(Barrymore refuses to take John’s hand. Sherlock’s phone sounds another text alert and he reaches into his pocket for it again.)

SHERLOCK: Deeply; hugely.

(He walks past Barrymore as he looks at his text message which reads:

What’s going on

Sherlock?

M

The major follows along behind the boys as Sherlock hurries towards the exit door.)

BARRYMORE: The whole point of Baskerville was to eliminate this kind of bureaucratic nonsense ...

SHERLOCK: I’m so sorry, Major.

BARRYMORE: Inspections?!

SHERLOCK: New policy. Can’t remain unmonitored forever. Goodness knows what you’d get up to. (Urgently and quietly to John) Keep walking.

(Lyons has briefly ducked into a side room but now hurries out again.)

LYONS: Sir!

(He slaps an alarm button on the wall. Alarms start to blare, red lights flash and the automated security door locks itself. The others turn back to him.)

LYONS: ID unauthorised, sir.

BARRYMORE: What?

LYONS: I’ve just had the call.

BARRYMORE: Is that right?

(He turns to Sherlock and John.)

BARRYMORE: Who are you?

JOHN: Look, there’s obviously been some kind of mistake.

(A little further back, Frankland is slowly walking towards the group, looking thoughtful. Barrymore holds out his hand for Sherlock’s ID card, which he gives to him. He looks at the card and then up at Sherlock.)

BARRYMORE: Clearly not Mycroft Holmes.

JOHN (getting out a notebook and starting to write): Computer error, Major. It’ll all have to go in the report.

BARRYMORE: What the hell’s going on?!

FRANKLAND: It’s all right, Major. I know exactly who these gentlemen are.

BARRYMORE: You do?

FRANKLAND: Yeah. I’m getting a little slow on faces but Mr. Holmes here isn’t someone I expected to show up in this place.

SHERLOCK: Ah, well ...

FRANKLAND (offering him his hand to shake): Good to see you again, Mycroft.

(John tries to mask his surprise. Smiling falsely, Sherlock shakes Frankland’s hand.)

FRANKLAND: I had the honour of meeting Mr. Holmes at the W.H.O. conference in ... (he pretends to think) ... Brussels, was it?

SHERLOCK: Vienna.

FRANKLAND: Vienna, that’s it.

(He looks at Barrymore.)

FRANKLAND: This is Mr. Mycroft Holmes, Major. There’s obviously been a mistake.

(Barrymore turns and nods to Lyons, who goes back to the alarm switch and turns it off. The lights stop flashing and the alarm falls silent. A moment later the entrance door’s lock disengages noisily.)

BARRYMORE (turning back to Frankland): On your head be it, Doctor Frankland.

FRANKLAND (laughing as he looks at the approaching Corporal Lyons): I’ll show them out, Corporal.

LYONS: Very well, sir.

(Sherlock spins on his heel and walks towards the now open entrance door. John and Frankland follow him while Barrymore glares after them unhappily. The boys go outside, John grimacing anxiously with an “Oh gods, I really hope we’re going to get away with this!” expression on his face. Frankland trots after them.)

SHERLOCK: Thank you.

FRANKLAND: This is about Henry Knight, isn’t it?

(They don’t answer him but he takes their silence as agreement.)

FRANKLAND: I thought so. I knew he wanted help but I didn’t realise he was going to contact Sherlock Holmes!

(Sherlock grimaces.)

FRANKLAND: Oh, don’t worry. I know who you really are. I’m never off your website. Thought you’d be wearing the hat, though.

SHERLOCK: That wasn’t my hat.

FRANKLAND (to John): I hardly recognise him without the hat!

(John tries unsuccessfully to bite back a smile.)

SHERLOCK (tetchily, sounding the ‘t’s loudly): It wasn’t my hat.

FRANKLAND: I love the blog too, Doctor Watson.

JOHN: Oh, cheers!

FRANKLAND: The, er, the Pink thing ...

JOHN: Mmm-hmm.

FRANKLAND: ... and that one about the aluminium crutch!

JOHN: Yes.

SHERLOCK (stopping and turning back to Frankland): You know Henry Knight?

FRANKLAND: Well, I knew his dad better. He had all sorts of mad theories about this place. Still, he was a good friend.

(He looks back the way they came and sees that Major Barrymore is standing some distance away and watching them. He turns back to Sherlock.)

FRANKLAND: Listen, I can’t really talk now.

(He takes a card from his coat pocket and hands it over.)

FRANKLAND: Here’s my, er, cell number. If I could help with Henry, give me a call.

SHERLOCK: I never did ask, Doctor Frankland. What exactly is it that you do here?

FRANKLAND: Oh, Mr. Holmes, I would love to tell you – but then, of course, I’d have to k*ll you!

(He laughs cheerfully.)

SHERLOCK (straight faced): That would be tremendously ambitious of you.

(Frankland’s smile fades and he shrugs in embarrassment.)

SHERLOCK: Tell me about Doctor Stapleton.

FRANKLAND: Never speak ill of a colleague.

SHERLOCK: Yet you’d speak well of one, which you’re clearly omitting to do.

FRANKLAND: I do seem to be, don’t I? (He shrugs.)

SHERLOCK (raising the card that Frankland just gave him): I’ll be in touch.

FRANKLAND: Any time.

(The boys walk away from him and head towards their Land Rover.)

JOHN: So?

SHERLOCK: So?

JOHN: What was all that about the rabbit?

(Smiling briefly, Sherlock pulls his coat tighter around him, flipping the collar up just as they reach the car. John rolls his eyes and turns to him.)

JOHN: Oh, please, can we not do this, this time?

SHERLOCK: Do what?

JOHN: You being all mysterious with your cheekbones and turning your coat collar up so you look cool.

(As he turns to go to the car door, Sherlock opens his mouth to speak but is apparently so disconcerted that for a moment he can’t find the words.)

SHERLOCK: ... I don’t do that.

JOHN: Yeah you do.

(They get into the car.)

Later, Sherlock is driving them across the moors.

JOHN: So, the email from Kirsty – the, er, missing luminous rabbit.

SHERLOCK: Kirsty Stapleton, whose mother specialises in genetic manipulation.

JOHN: She made her daughter’s rabbit glow in the dark.

SHERLOCK: Probably a fluorescent gene removed and spliced into the specimen. Simple enough these days.

JOHN: So ...

(He looks across to Sherlock and waits for him to continue the sentence.)

SHERLOCK: So we know that Doctor Stapleton performs secret genetic experiments on animals. The question is: has she been working on something deadlier than a rabbit?

JOHN: To be fair, that is quite a wide field.

(Sherlock looks round at John in startled surprise as he realises that that’s true.)

HENRY KNIGHT’S HOUSE. His home is enormous – a four-storey stone building that was probably a very important property in the area in the past. A large old-fashioned glass conservatory is attached to the rear of the building on the ground floor (and your transcriber looks round to her LJ friends who read her fic and whispers softly, “world’s smallest jungle ...” knowingly) and a modern two-storey glass extension has been built onto the side of the house to join it to another two-storey stone building nearby. Sherlock and John go into the conservatory, which looks very run-down and clearly hasn’t had a paint job in years, and walk across to the door on the opposite side. Sherlock rings the doorbell and Henry opens the door.

HENRY: Hi.

JOHN: Hi.

HENRY: Come in, come in.

(Wiping his feet on the doormat, Sherlock walks in and heads down the hallway. John follows more slowly, stopping to look into a large high-ceilinged sitting room before following Henry again.)

JOHN: This is, uh ... are you, um ...

(He searches for the right word for a moment before finding it.)

JOHN: ... rich?

HENRY: Yeah.

JOHN: Right.

(Henry leads off again. Sherlock throws a dark look at John before following him.)

Not long afterwards, in the kitchen in the glass extension, Sherlock puts two sugar lumps into his mug and stirs them in. He is sitting on a stool at the central island and John is sitting next to him. Henry is standing on the other side of the island gazing down at the work surface.

HENRY: It’s-it’s a couple of words. It’s what I keep seeing. “Liberty” ...

JOHN (reaching into his pocket for his notebook): Liberty.

HENRY (looking up to him): “Liberty” and ... “in”. It’s just that.

(He picks up the bottle of milk that’s on the island.)

HENRY: Are you finished?

JOHN: Mmm.

(Henry turns around to put the milk into the fridge. John looks at Sherlock.)

JOHN: Mean anything to you?

SHERLOCK (softly): “Liberty in death” – isn’t that the expression? The only true freedom.

(John nods in agreement as Henry turns back around, sighing. Sherlock takes a drink from his mug.)

HENRY: What now, then?

JOHN: Sherlock’s got a plan.

SHERLOCK: Yes.

HENRY: Right.

SHERLOCK: We take you back out onto the moor ...

HENRY (nervously): Okay ...

SHERLOCK: ... and see if anything att*cks you.

JOHN: What?!

SHERLOCK: That should bring things to a head.

HENRY: At night? You want me to go out there at night?

SHERLOCK: Mmm.

JOHN: That’s your plan? (He snorts laughter.) Brilliant(!)

SHERLOCK: Got any better ideas?

JOHN: That’s not a plan.

SHERLOCK: Listen, if there is a monster out there, John, there’s only one thing to do: find out where it lives.

(He looks round to Henry and smiles widely at him before taking another drink from his mug. Henry does not look encouraged by this.)

DUSK. THE MOORS. As night begins to fall, Henry leads Sherlock and John across the rocks towards Dewer’s Hollow. All three of them have flashlights to light the uneven ground below their feet. Foxes scream repeatedly in the distance. By the time they reach the woods it is almost full dark and it becomes even darker as they head into the trees. John, bringing up the rear, hears rustling to his right and turns around to look. The other two don’t notice and continue onwards as John walks cautiously towards the sound he heard. He shines his torch into the bushes as an owl shrieks overhead, but he can see nothing. Raising his head he sees a light repeatedly winking on and off at the top of a hillside a fair distance away. He looks around to alert his friend.

JOHN: Sher...

(It’s only then that he realises that the other two have disappeared out of sight. He shines his flashlight in the direction they went but there’s no sign of them. He looks back to the light on the hillside, which is still intermittently flashing, and gets his notebook out of his pocket because he has instantly recognised that the flashes are Morse code. He starts to write down the letters while speaking them aloud.)

JOHN (softly): U ... M ... Q ... R ... A.

(The light stops flashing. John looks down at his notebook.)

JOHN (in a whisper): U, M, Q, R, A. (He tries it as a word.) Umqra?

(Shaking his head, he looks up to the hillside again but no more light comes from it. Shutting the notebook, he heads off in the direction of the other two.)

JOHN (whispering): Sherlock ...

(Henry and Sherlock are a long way ahead and Henry’s torch shows that they’re at the edge of the minefield with its fencing and warning signs. They make their way along the edge of the fencing as John trails a long way behind them, still whispering his friend’s name repeatedly.)

JOHN: Sherlock ... Sherlock ...

(Up ahead, Sherlock breaks the silence.)

SHERLOCK: Met a friend of yours.

HENRY: What?

SHERLOCK: Doctor Frankland.

HENRY: Oh, right. Bob, yeah.

SHERLOCK: Seems pretty concerned about you.

HENRY: He’s a worrier, bless him. He’s been very kind to me since I came back.

SHERLOCK: He knew your father.

HENRY: Yeah.

SHERLOCK: But he works at Baskerville. Didn’t your dad have a problem with that?

HENRY: Well, mates are mates, aren’t they? I mean, look at you and John.

SHERLOCK: What about us?

HENRY: Well, I mean, he’s a pretty straightforward bloke, and you ...

(Glancing back at Sherlock, he decides not to follow that line.)

HENRY: They agreed never to talk about work, Uncle Bob and my dad.

(He stops and turns to his left. As Sherlock stops and looks at him, Henry nods in the direction he’s looking.)

HENRY (unhappily): Dewer’s Hollow.

(Sherlock turns and looks at the steep drop in the land that leads down into a misty dark valley.)

(Some distance behind them, John is still following their trail.)

JOHN (whispering): Sherlock ...

(As he progresses onwards, he hears an eerie metallic thrumming sound. He stops and aims his flashlight in the direction of the sound, then goes to move onwards just as the thrum sounds again. The sound continues to repeat, now interspersed with a short metallic ping. John walks slowly towards the sound, then quietly chuckles as he sees a rusty metal container, possibly an oil drum, which is lying in the undergrowth. Water is dripping from the tree above it and causing the thrums and pings as it strikes the drum. As John looks at it and sighs with relief, something massive flashes past behind him. John spins and looks but it’s already gone, but a couple of seconds later an anguished howl sounds in the distance. John turns and begins to hurry to find the others.)

(Sherlock is heading down into the Hollow, being careful to keep his balance on the steep slippery ground. Henry follows him down more slowly. Sherlock reaches the bottom and shines his torch around, finding giant paw prints all around the ground. Some distance away, John is now running to get to the others. Another long anguished howl rings out. Still halfway down the slope, Henry pauses. Sherlock shines his torch up in the direction of the sound ... and his face begins to fill with horror at the sight that greets him. Unfortunately for the viewers, we can’t see what he is looking at, but whatever it is growls savagely from the top of the Hollow. As the beam from Sherlock’s flashlight flails along the Hollow’s rim, the whatever-it-is has already retreated. Sherlock recoils, his face confused and bewildered as he tries to take in what he just saw. From his position some distance away, Henry hurries down to join him.)

HENRY: Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. Did you see it?

(Sherlock lowers his head, still unable to get his mind to accept the evidence of his eyes. He stares around, shaking his head, then shoves Henry out of his way and hurries back up the hillside. Henry follows him.)

(Very shortly afterwards, John finally meets up with the other two making their way back.)

JOHN (referring to the howling): Did you hear that?

(Sherlock storms straight past him. John turns and follows.)

HENRY: We saw it. We saw it.

SHERLOCK: No. I didn’t see anything.

HENRY (chasing after him): What? What are you talking about?

SHERLOCK: I didn’t. See. Anything.

(He hurries onwards with Henry and John trailing along behind him.)

Some time later at Henry’s house, Henry and John hurry indoors. Sherlock has disappeared off elsewhere.

HENRY: Look, he must have seen it. I saw it – he must have. He must have. I can’t ... Why? Why?

(He stops in the doorway of the sitting room, turning back to John in anguish.)

HENRY: Why would he say that? It-it-it-it it was there. It was.

(Taking his gloves off, John ushers him across to the sofa.)

JOHN: Henry, Henry, I need you to sit down, try and relax, please.

HENRY (sitting on the sofa): I’m okay, I’m okay.

JOHN: Listen, I’m gonna give you something to help you sleep, all right?

(He looks around the room and sees a bottle of water on a bureau nearby. As he goes over to get it, Henry unwraps his scarf from his neck, smiling.)

HENRY: This is good news, John. It’s-it’s-it’s good. I’m not crazy. There is a hound, there ... there is. And Sherlock – he saw it too. No matter what he said, he saw it.

Sherlock is back at the inn. Sitting in an armchair by a roaring open f*re, his face is still full of shock and disbelief. Unaware of his distress, other patrons sit at tables nearby having their evening meal. John comes in and sits down in the armchair on the other side of the f*re.

JOHN: Well, he is in a pretty bad way. He’s manic, totally convinced there’s some mutant super-dog roaming the moors.

(With his hands in the prayer position in front of his mouth, Sherlock glances nervously at John for a moment, then continues to gaze in the direction of the f*re, lost in thought.)

JOHN: And there isn’t, though, is there? ’Cause if people knew how to make a mutant super-dog, we’d know.

(Sherlock clasps his fingers together, closing his eyes and breathing heavily as if trying to fend off a panic att*ck.)

JOHN: They’d be for sale. I mean, that’s how it works.

(He remembers something and reaches for his notebook.)

JOHN: Er, listen: er, on the moor I saw someone signalling. Er, Morse – I guess it’s Morse.

(Sherlock blinks rapidly and repeatedly.)

JOHN (looking at his notes): Doesn’t seem to make much sense.

(Sherlock pulls in a sharp breath through his nose and then blows the breath out again through his mouth.)

JOHN: Er, U, M, Q, R, A. Does that mean ... anything ...

(He finally realises how distressed his colleague is looking and pauses for a moment, then decides that he can’t be right. He puts his notebook away again and sits back in his chair.)

JOHN: So, okay, what have we got? We know there’s footprints, ’cause Henry found them; so did the tour guide bloke. We all heard something.

(Sherlock blows out another shaky breath. John looks across to him and frowns momentarily.)

JOHN: Maybe we should just look for whoever’s got a big dog.

SHERLOCK: Henry’s right.

JOHN: What?

SHERLOCK (his voice shaking): I saw it too.

JOHN (shocked): What?

SHERLOCK: I saw it too, John.

JOHN: Just ... just a minute. (He sits forward.) You saw what?

(Sherlock finally meets his gaze but his face is twisted with self-loathing as he forces himself to admit the truth.)

SHERLOCK: A hound, out there in the Hollow. (He talks through gritted teeth.) A gigantic hound.

(John almost laughs as Sherlock looks away, trying unsuccessfully to blink back tears. John sits back in his chair again, not quite able to cope with this strange reaction from his colleague.)

JOHN: Um, look, Sherlock, we have to be rational about this, okay? Now you, of all people, can’t just ...

(Sherlock blows out another breath.)

JOHN: Let’s just stick to what we know, yes? Stick to the facts.

(Sherlock looks round at him.)

SHERLOCK (softly): Once you’ve ruled out the impossible, whatever remains – however improbable – must be true.

JOHN: What does that mean?

(Looking away again, Sherlock reaches down and picks up a drink from a nearby table. Looking down at his trembling hand, he sniggers.)

SHERLOCK: Look at me. I’m afraid, John. Afraid.

(He takes a drink and then holds the glass up again, his hand still shaking.)

JOHN: Sherlock?

SHERLOCK: Always been able to keep myself distant ... (he takes another drink from the glass) ... divorce myself from ... feelings. But look, you see ...

(He holds up the glass and glares at his shaking hand.)

SHERLOCK: ... body’s betraying me. Interesting, yes? Emotions. (He slams the glass down onto the table.) The grit on the lens, the fly in the ointment.

JOHN: Yeah, all right, Spock, just ...

(Realising that he is starting to raise his voice, he looks around at the other people in the restaurant behind him and then looks back to Sherlock.)

JOHN (more softly): ... take it easy.

(Sherlock is bl*wing out a few more breaths and still failing to bring himself under control. He glances panic-stricken at John.)

JOHN: You’ve been pretty wired lately, you know you have. I think you’ve just gone out there and got yourself a bit worked up.

SHERLOCK: Worked ... up?

JOHN: It was dark and scary ...

SHERLOCK (laughing sarcastically): Me?! There’s nothing wrong with me.

(He looks away, almost beginning to hyperventilate, then puts his fingertips to his temples, groaning in anguish. John looks at him in concern.)

JOHN: Sherlock ...

(Sherlock begins bl*wing out breaths again, his fingers trembling against his skin.)

JOHN: Sher...

SHERLOCK (loudly, furiously): THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH ME!

(He glares round at John.)

SHERLOCK: DO YOU UNDERSTAND?

(He looks round at the other patrons, all of whom are now staring at him. He looks away again, then looks at John.)

SHERLOCK: You want me to prove it, yes?

(He pulls in a deep breath, trying to get himself under control.)

SHERLOCK: We’re looking for a dog, yes, a great big dog, that’s your brilliant theory. Cherchez le chien. Good, excellent, yes, where shall we start?

(He looks over his shoulder and points at a man and woman sitting opposite each other at a table in the corner of the restaurant. His voice becomes savage and relentless as he goes into deduction mode.)

SHERLOCK: How about them? The sentimental widow and her son, the unemployed fisherman. The answer’s yes.

JOHN: Yes?

SHERLOCK: She’s got a West Highland terrier called Whisky. Not exactly what we’re looking for.

JOHN (quietly): Oh, Sherlock, for God’s sake ...

(Sherlock looks briefly across at the man and his knitted jumper with reindeer and holly leaves on it before turning away again.)

SHERLOCK (quick f*re): Look at the jumper he’s wearing. Hardly worn. Clearly he’s uncomfortable in it. Maybe it’s because of the material; more likely the hideous pattern, suggesting it’s a present, probably Christmas. So he wants into his mother’s good books. Why? Almost certainly money.

(He takes another quick glance at the man.)

SHERLOCK (quick f*re): He’s treating her to a meal but his own portion is small. That means he wants to impress her, but he’s trying to economise on his own food.

JOHN: Well, maybe he’s just not hungry.

SHERLOCK (quick f*re, becoming almost frenetic): No, small plate. Starter. He’s practically licked it clean. She’s nearly finished her pavlova. If she’d treated him, he’d have had as much as he wanted. He’s hungry all right, and not well off – you can tell that by the state of his cuffs and shoes.

(He asks the question he’s expecting to come from John at any moment.)

SHERLOCK: “How d’you know she’s his mother?”

(John, who until now has been looking at his colleague with concern as Sherlock’s voice – while lowered – has become increasingly intense, smiles briefly.)

SHERLOCK (quick f*re): Who else would give him a Christmas present like that? Well, it could be an aunt or an elder sister, but mother’s more likely. Now, he was a fisherman. Scarring pattern on his hands, very distinctive – fish hooks. They’re all quite old now, which suggests he’s been unemployed for some time. Not much industry in this part of the world, so he’s turned to his widowed mother for help. “Widowed?” Yes, obviously. She’s got a man’s wedding ring on a chain round her neck – clearly her late husband’s and too big for her finger. She’s well-dressed but her jewellery’s cheap. She could afford better, but she’s kept it – it’s sentimental. Now, the dog: tiny little hairs all over the leg from where it gets a little bit too friendly, but no hairs above the knees, suggesting it’s a small dog, probably a terrier. In fact it is – a West Highland terrier called Whisky. “How the hell do you know that, Sherlock?” ’Cause she was on the same train as us and I heard her calling its name and that’s not cheating, that’s listening, I use my senses, John, unlike some people, so you see, I am fine, in fact I’ve never been better, so just Leave. Me. Alone.

(He glares at John, who stares back at him in shock.)

JOHN: Yeah.

(He clears his throat.)

JOHN: Okay. Okay.

(Distressed by his colleague’s venom, he tries to settle back in his chair as Sherlock stares towards the f*re, breathing heavily.)

JOHN: And why would you listen to me? I’m just your friend.

SHERLOCK (savagely): I don’t have friends.

JOHN (softly): Naah. Wonder why?

(He gets up and walks away.)

Shortly afterwards, John storms out of the pub and stops just outside, breathing heavily. He gazes up into the sky and blows out a breath, pulling himself together, then looks into the distance and his eyes narrow. The flashing light is back on the hillside. As it continues to flash, he starts to walk in its direction.

HENRY’S HOUSE. Henry is asleep on the sofa at the edge of the kitchen. He has a duvet over him and a pillow under his head, presumably brought in by John after giving him a sleeping pill. Now he wakes, sits up and rubs his hands over his face, sighing. He stands up and walks over to the floor-to-ceiling glass doors and looks out into the dark garden. Still half asleep, he has a sudden mental flash of the word “Liberty” stitched into material, and then the following “In” word. Recoiling from the memory, he buries his face in his hands and sighs in anguish.

MOORS. Using his torch to illuminate the way, John is walking towards the flashing light on the hillside. As he reaches the top of the hill he can hear a rhythmic squeaking noise, and then as he shines his light around he realises that there are several cars parked up there. The drivers sitting in each car flinch and hold their hands up to shield their faces from the beam from John’s torch, but they are also trying to avoid being identified and John now realises why as he turns his beam onto a car which has slightly steamed-up windows and which is rocking from side to side. Its headlights are intermittently flashing on and off. A woman’s voice comes from inside the car.

WOMAN’s VOICE: Oh! Mr. Selden! You’ve done it again!

MAN’s VOICE: Oh, I keep catching it with my belt.

(As the inhabitants of the car groan and continue about their ... ahem, business, John lowers his torch.)

JOHN: Oh, God.

(He hesitates and squints at the car, almost tempted to take another look and half-raising his torch again, but then it fully hits him that the Morse messages he wrote down yesterday were nothing more than the random flashings of a car’s headlights during the sexual goings-on of a dogging site. He turns and heads back towards the pub.)

JOHN: Sh...

(As he walks away from the hillside his phone trills a text alert. He gets the phone out and looks at the message:

Henry’s therapist currently in Cross Keys Pub

S

John writes a brief reply, speaking it aloud as he types.)

JOHN: So?

(The reply comes almost instantly:

Interview her?

John answers:

WHY SHOULD I?

After a moment he gets another alert:

Downloading image ...

Shortly afterwards the image arrives and he opens it. It’s a covertly-taken photograph of Louise Mortimer standing at the bar. She’s pretty, and around John’s age. He looks at the photo for a moment and then walks on.)

JOHN: Ooh, you’re a bad man.

(It’s not clear, however, whether he’s talking to himself or to Sherlock.)

HENRY’S HOUSE. Henry has sat back down on the sofa and has wrapped the duvet around him. The television is on nearby but he is dozing and not paying attention to it. He wakes a little and looks out in the dark garden again, his eyes tired and heavy, then he turns to look at the TV. An old black and white film is showing several dogs running around somewhere dark and spooky-looking. Henry quickly changes the channel to a less thr*at film that looks as if it’s set in a rural village during the 1940s.

Suddenly the security lights outside the house come on. Henry looks anxiously into the garden but can see nothing moving in the bright lights. A few seconds later the lights fade out again. Henry turns his head away and instantly – unseen by him – something moves quickly across the garden by the back fence. Henry changes the TV channel again and picks the worst possible choice as a wolf snarls straight into the camera while a woman screams in terror offscreen. Recoiling in annoyed frustration, Henry turns the TV off. Instantly the security lights come on again. There still appears to be nothing out there but Henry gets up and walks closer to the glass doors. Just as the lights begin to fade again, a huge shape flicks across the garden at the far end. It moves so fast that it’s impossible to see what it is, except that it appears to be fairly low to the ground. Henry recoils in horror and looks across to a small cabinet on the other side of the room. He hesitates, almost afraid to move, but then runs across and scrabbles in the cabinet before pulling out a p*stol. Panting in terror, he turns and looks out into the dark garden again and then, in a move that has every viewer yelling at the screen, “Never go nearer to the danger, you idiot!” he walks slowly towards the glass doors. Just as he almost has his nose against the glass the lights blaze again and a massive shape, most definitely looking like the head of a huge dog, slams against the glass on the other side and then immediately vanishes again. Screaming and wailing in panic, Henry stumbles back and aims his p*stol at the glass. The lights fade out again. Henry sobs and a couple of seconds later the lights flash on yet again. His eyes rake over the garden but there’s nothing to be seen. The lights fade one more time and by now Henry has sunk to the floor, his hands over his face as he sobs in absolute terror.

CROSS KEYS INN. John is sitting with Louise Mortimer in the pub. They are chatting and laughing.

MORTIMER (giggling): That’s so mean!

(John picks up a half-empty wine bottle from the table.)

JOHN: Um, more wine, Doctor?

MORTIMER: Are you trying to get me drunk, Doctor?

JOHN: The thought never occurred! (He refills her glass.)

MORTIMER: Because a while ago I thought you were chatting me up.

JOHN (refilling his own glass): Ooh! Where did I go wrong?

MORTIMER: When you started asking me about my patients.

JOHN: Well, you see, I am one of Henry’s oldest friends.

MORTIMER: Yeah, and he’s one of my patients, so I can’t talk about him.

JOHN: Mmm.

MORTIMER: Although he has told me about all his oldest friends. (She looks at him thoughtfully.) Which one are you?

JOHN (hopefully): A new one?

(She scoffs.)

JOHN: Okay, what about his father? He wasn’t one of your patients. Wasn’t he some sort of conspiracy nutter ... (he quickly corrects himself) ... theorist?

MORTIMER: You’re only a nutter if you’re wrong.

JOHN: Mmm. And was he wrong?

MORTIMER: I should think so!

JOHN: But he got fixated on Baskerville, didn’t he? With what they were doing in there ... Couldn’t Henry have gone the same way, started imagining a hound?

(Louise looks at him pointedly.)

MORTIMER: Why d’you think I’m going to talk about this?!

JOHN (laughing in acknowledgement of her seeing through him): Because I think you’re worried about him, and because I’m a doctor too ...

(His face becomes more serious.)

JOHN: ... and because I have another friend who might be having the same problem.

(They lock eyes for a long moment and finally Louise sighs. She has apparently decided to tell him more than she really ought to ... but before she can even begin a hand claps down onto John’s shoulder from behind him. John looks round and sees Bob Frankland grinning at him.)

FRANKLAND: Doctor Watson!

JOHN (unhappily): Hi.

FRANKLAND (to Louise): Hello. (To John) How’s the investigation going?

JOHN (doing everything but roll his eyes in dismay): Hello.

MORTIMER: What? Investigation?

FRANKLAND: Didn’t you know? Don’t you read the blog? Sherlock Holmes!

JOHN: It’s ...

MORTIMER: Sherlock who?

JOHN: No, it’s ...

FRANKLAND: Private detective! (He claps John on the shoulder again.) This is his P.A!

JOHN: P.A?

FRANKLAND: Well, live-in P.A.

JOHN: Perfect(!)

MORTIMER: Live-in.

JOHN: This is Doctor Mortimer, Henry’s therapist.

FRANKLAND: Oh, hello. (He shakes hands with her.) Bob Frankland.

(He turns back to John. As he speaks, Louise is already twisting on her chair to take her coat off the back.)

FRANKLAND: Listen, tell Sherlock I’ve been keeping an eye on Stapleton. Any time he wants a little chat ... right?

JOHN: Mmm.

(Frankland laughs heartily, claps John on the shoulder yet again and then walks away. John looks at Louise and realises that she has got her coat in her hands.)

JOHN: Oh.

MORTIMER: Why don’t you buy him a drink? I think he likes you.

(She stands up and leaves. John sighs.)

DAY TIME. THE MOORS. Sherlock is back on the stony outcrop again, staring towards Baskerville. His eyes flick between the complex and Dewer’s Hollow as he tries to make sense of what happened the previous night, then he turns and looks back towards Grimpen Village.

HENRY’S HOUSE. Henry goes to the door at the sound of a knock. As soon as he opens it Sherlock surges though, being loudly cheerful.

SHERLOCK: Morning!

(He’s about to head straight for the kitchen but suddenly turns around and clasps Henry by the shoulders.)

SHERLOCK: Oh, how are you feeling?

(Henry looks terrible. Sherlock ducks his head down to get a better look into his face.)

HENRY (exhaustedly): I’m ... I didn’t sleep very well.

SHERLOCK: That’s a shame. Shall I make you some coffee? (He looks up at the ceiling above the door and points.) Oh look, you’ve got damp!

(He grins falsely at him until Henry turns his head to look, then drops the smile and turns and walks away towards the kitchen. Hurrying over to the cupboards, he starts opening and closing each one rapidly. Finally he finds the metal jar that he’s looking for and takes it out, rummaging inside it as he elbows the cupboard door closed. Tucking something inside his coat, he goes over to the sink and picks up a couple of mugs, taking them over to the central island just as Henry tiredly wanders in.)

HENRY: Listen ... last night.

(Sherlock gives him that horrifying attempt at a friendly smile as he takes the top off the coffee tin.)

HENRY: Why did you say you hadn’t seen anything? I mean, I only saw the hound for a minute, but...

(Sherlock has been dumping spoonfuls of coffee into the mugs without even looking, his eyes locked on Henry’s, and now he slams the coffee tin down onto the surface and steps closer to him, his eyes back to their normal intensity.)

SHERLOCK: Hound.

HENRY: What?

SHERLOCK: Why do you call it a hound? Why a hound?

HENRY: Why – what do you mean?

SHERLOCK: It’s odd, isn’t it? Strange choice of words – archaic. It’s why I took the case. “Mr. Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic hound.” Why say “hound”?

HENRY: I don’t know! I ...

SHERLOCK: Actually, I’d better skip the coffee.

(He flares out of the kitchen. Henry sighs wearily.)

Later, Sherlock is walking back through the village but stops as he sees John in the church graveyard, sitting on the steps of a w*r memorial and looking through the notes in his notebook. Sherlock goes through the kissing gate [shut up, my imagination ...] and walks along the path towards John, who looks up as he hears him approach. His expression becomes uncomfortable as he tucks his notebook into his pocket. Sherlock stops in front of him, also looking awkward.

SHERLOCK: Did you, er, get anywhere with that Morse code?

JOHN (stepping down): No.

(He starts to walk away.)

SHERLOCK: U, M, Q, R, A, wasn’t it?

(John keeps walking and Sherlock follows along behind him. He voices the initials as a word.)

SHERLOCK: UMQRA.

JOHN: Nothing.

(In Sherlock’s mind, he puts full stops in between the letters but still voices it as a word.)

SHERLOCK: U.M.Q...

JOHN: Look, forget it. It’s ... I thought I was on to something. I wasn’t.

SHERLOCK: Sure?

JOHN: Yeah.

SHERLOCK: How about Louise Mortimer? Did you get anywhere with her?

JOHN: No.

SHERLOCK: Too bad. Did you get any information?

(John smiles briefly and glances over his shoulder but still keeps walking.)

JOHN: You being funny now?

SHERLOCK: Thought it might break the ice a bit.

JOHN: Funny doesn’t suit you. I’d stick to ice.

(Sherlock looks at John’s retreating back, his face full of pain.)

SHERLOCK: John ...

JOHN: It’s fine.

SHERLOCK: No, wait. What happened last night ... Something happened to me; something I’ve not really experienced before ...

JOHN: Yes, you said: fear. Sherlock Holmes got scared. You said.

(Sherlock catches him up, takes hold of his arm and pulls him round to face him.)

SHERLOCK: No-no-no, it was more than that, John. It was doubt. I felt doubt. I’ve always been able to trust my senses, the evidence of my own eyes, until last night.

JOHN: You can’t actually believe that you saw some kind of monster.

SHERLOCK: No, I can’t believe that. (He grins bitterly for a moment.) But I did see it, so the question is: how? How?

JOHN: Yes. Yeah, right, good. So you’ve got something to go on, then? Good luck with that.

(He turns and starts to walk away again. Sherlock turns and calls after him.)

SHERLOCK: Listen, what I said before, John. I meant it.

(John stops and turns back to face him.)

SHERLOCK: I don’t have friends.

(He bites his lip briefly.)

SHERLOCK: I’ve just got one.

(John looks away as he takes that statement in for a moment, then he nods briefly and glances back at Sherlock.)

JOHN: Right.

(He turns and walks away again. Sherlock looks down, then instantly raises his head again as his eyes begin to flicker in realisation of something.)

SHERLOCK: John? John!

(He starts to chase after him.)

SHERLOCK: You are amazing! You are fantastic!

JOHN (not stopping): Yes, all right! You don’t have to overdo it.

SHERLOCK (catching up and overtaking him, then walking backwards in front of him): You’ve never been the most luminous of people, but as a conductor of light you are unbeatable.

JOHN: Cheers. ... What?

(Sherlock turns round and walks beside him, taking out his own notebook and starting to write in it.)

SHERLOCK: Some people who aren’t geniuses have an amazing ability to stimulate it in others.

JOHN: Hang on – you were saying “Sorry” a minute ago. Don’t spoil it. Go on: what have I done that’s so bloody stimulating?

(Sherlock stops just outside the pub door and turns back to John, showing what he has just written in his notebook:

HOUND

JOHN: Yeah?

SHERLOCK (pulling the notebook back and writing in it again): But what if it’s not a word? What if it is individual letters?

(He shows him the page of the notebook again, which now reads:

H.O.U.N.D.

JOHN: You think it’s an acronym?

SHERLOCK (putting his notebook away): Absolutely no idea but ...

(He turns towards the pub door and trails off as he sees a familiar figure standing inside at the bar. Wearing grey trousers and a grey shirt with a light jacket over the top, heavily suntanned and with sunglasses on, Detective Inspector Lestrade has his hands in his trouser pockets and is looking the absolute epitome of casual drop-d*ad gorgeousness. Fandom’s underwear simultaneously explodes worldwide and hello, Inspector, have you come to take down my particulars? Your transcriber sticks her head into a bucket of cold water for a minute and then continues as Sherlock storms into the pub.)

SHERLOCK: What the hell are you doing here?

LESTRADE: Well, nice to see you too(!) I’m on holiday, would you believe?

SHERLOCK: No, I wouldn’t.

LESTRADE (taking his sunglasses off as John walks over to the bar): Hullo, John.

JOHN: Greg!

LESTRADE: I heard you were in the area. What are you up to? You after this Hound of Hell like on the telly?

SHERLOCK: I’m waiting for an explanation, Inspector. Why are you here?

LESTRADE: I’ve told you: I’m on holiday.

SHERLOCK: You’re brown as a nut. You’re clearly just back from your ‘holidays’.

LESTRADE (trying to look nonchalant): Yeah, well I fancied another one.

SHERLOCK: Oh, this is Mycroft, isn’t it?

LESTRADE: No, look ...

SHERLOCK: Of course it is! One mention of Baskerville and he sends down my handler to ... to spy on me incognito. Is that why you’re calling yourself Greg?

JOHN: That’s his name.

SHERLOCK (frowning): Is it?

LESTRADE: Yes – if you’d ever bothered to find out. Look, I’m not your handler ... (he turns away to pick up his pint from the bar) ... and I don’t just do what your brother tells me.

JOHN: Actually, you could be just the man we want.

SHERLOCK: Why?

JOHN: Well, I’ve not been idle, Sherlock. (He rummages in his trouser pocket.) I think I might have found something.

(He shows Sherlock the sales invoice from Undershaw Meat Supplies which he stole off the bar while he was checking in.)

JOHN: Here. Didn’t know if it was relevant; starting to look like it might be. That is an awful lot of meat for a vegetarian restaurant.

SHERLOCK: Excellent.

JOHN (looking at Greg): Nice scary inspector from Scotland Yard who can put in a few calls might come in very handy.

(As Sherlock and Greg exchange a look, John slaps his hand down on the bell on top of the bar.)

JOHN: Shop!

Later, in the small Snug next to the bar, Greg is sitting at a table looking through paperwork – presumably previous invoices from Undershaw – while Gary the manager and Billy the chef sit at the other side of the table looking at him anxiously. Nearby, Sherlock has poured a cup of coffee from a filter machine and is stirring it. He ostentatiously taps the drips off the spoon into the cup and then picks it up and carries it over to John, offering it to him.

JOHN: What’s this?

SHERLOCK: Coffee. I made coffee.

JOHN: You never make coffee.

SHERLOCK: I just did. Don’t you want it?

JOHN: You don’t have to keep apologising.

(Sherlock looks away with a hurt expression on his face. John relents and takes the cup and saucer.)

JOHN: Thanks.

(Sherlock smiles happily. John takes a mouthful and grimaces.)

JOHN: Mm. I don’t take sugar ...

(The hurt expression comes back onto Sherlock’s face as he looks away again. He’s like a puppy whose owner has just told him off for chewing his slippers. John looks at his face and feels that he has no choice but to take another drink.)

LESTRADE: These records go back nearly two months.

(Grimacing at the taste, John puts the cup back into the saucer and looks at Sherlock.)

JOHN: That’s nice. That’s good.

(He turns away to put the drink down as Greg continues interrogating Gary and Billy.)

LESTRADE: Is that when you had the idea, after the TV show went out?

BILLY: It’s me. It was me. (He turns to his partner.) I’m sorry, Gary – I couldn’t help it. I had a bacon sandwich at Carol’s wedding and one thing just led to another ...

(Sherlock grins behind him. Greg is equally disbelieving.)

LESTRADE: Nice try.

GARY: Look, we were just trying to give things a bit of a boost, you know? A great big dog run wild up on the moor – it was heaven-sent. It was like us having our own Loch Ness Monster.

LESTRADE: Where do you keep it?

GARY: There’s an old mineshaft. It’s not too far. It was all right there.

SHERLOCK: “Was”?

GARY (sighing): We couldn’t control the bloody thing. It was vicious. (He sighs again.) And then, a month ago, Billy took him to the vet and, er ... you know.

JOHN: It’s d*ad?

GARY: Put down.

BILLY: Yeah. No choice. So it’s over.

GARY: It was just a joke, you know?

LESTRADE: Yeah, hilarious(!)

(He stands up and looks down at them angrily.)

LESTRADE: You’ve nearly driven a man out of his mind.

(He walks out of the room. John follows him. Sherlock watches him go, then peers into John’s coffee cup before following. John follows Greg across the bar and out of the pub.)

JOHN: You know he’s actually pleased you’re here?

(Greg throws him a disbelieving look.)

JOHN: Secretly pleased.

LESTRADE: Is he? That’s nice(!) I suppose he likes having all the same faces back together. Appeals to his ... his ...

(He stops and searches for the right word. John provides an appropriate suggestion.)

JOHN: ... Asperger’s?

(Sherlock comes out of the pub and glowers at John, having heard the last word.)

LESTRADE: So, you believe him about having the dog destroyed?

SHERLOCK: No reason not to.

LESTRADE: Well, hopefully there’s no harm done. Not quite sure what I’d charge him with anyway. I’ll have a word with the local Force.

(He nods to the boys.)

LESTRADE: Right, that’s that, then. Catch you later. (He smiles.) I’m enjoying this! It’s nice to get London out of your lungs!

(John watches him walk away, then turns to Sherlock.)

JOHN: So that was their dog that people saw out on the moor?

SHERLOCK: Looks like it.

JOHN: But that wasn’t what you saw. That wasn’t just an ordinary dog.

SHERLOCK: No. (His gaze become distant.) It was immense, had burning red eyes and it was glowing, John. Its whole body was glowing.

(He shudders, shaking off the memory, then turns and walks towards the car park.)

SHERLOCK: I’ve got a theory but I need to get back into Baskerville to test it.

JOHN: How? Can’t pull off the ID trick again.

SHERLOCK: Might not have to.

(He has just got his phone out and h*t a speed dial and now he lifts the phone to his ear.)

SHERLOCK (insincerely into phone): Hello, brother dear. How are you?

BASKERVILLE. After many generic scenes of some of the scientific experiments being conducted at the facility, none of which your humble transcriber can be bothered to type out [buy the DVD and support your favourite production team!], Doctor Stapleton can be seen handling a fluffy white bunny inside a large clear plastic dome. At the entrance gates, the Land Rover approaches and stops. An armed security man goes over to Sherlock’s side as the dog handler and sniffer dog also approach.

SECURITY GUARD: Afternoon, sir. If you could turn the engine off.

(Sherlock hands over his ID pass and switches the car off.)

SECURITY GUARD: Thank you.

(As he goes over the gate room to swipe the card and other soldiers check the vehicle over from the outside, Sherlock speaks quietly to John.)

SHERLOCK: I need to see Major Barrymore as soon as we get inside.

JOHN: Right.

SHERLOCK: Which means you’ll have to start the search for the hound.

JOHN: Okay.

SHERLOCK: In the labs; Stapleton’s first.

(The guard brings the ID card back and hands it over.)

SHERLOCK (quietly to John): Could be dangerous.

(John smiles momentarily. The gate slides open and Sherlock starts the car and drives onto the base.)

LATER. MAJOR BARRYMORE’S OFFICE. The major is talking snarkily to Sherlock.

BARRYMORE: Oh, you know I’d love to. I’d love to give you unlimited access to this place. Why not?(!)

SHERLOCK: It’s a simple enough request, Major.

BARRYMORE: I’ve never heard of anything so bizarre.

SHERLOCK: You’re to give me twenty-four hours. It’s what I’ve ... (he pauses momentarily) ... negotiated.

BARRYMORE (sternly): Not a second more. I may have to comply with this order but I don’t have to like it.

(He swings around to his computer on the desk behind him as Sherlock starts to leave the office.)

BARRYMORE: I don’t know what you expect to find here anyway.

SHERLOCK (turning back): Perhaps the truth.

BARRYMORE (looking round again): About what? Oh, I see. The big coat should have told me.

(Sherlock frowns.)

BARRYMORE: You’re one of the conspiracy lot, aren’t you?

(He grins as Sherlock rolls his eyes.)

BARRYMORE: Well, then, go ahead, seek them out: the monsters, the death rays, the aliens.

SHERLOCK (nonchalantly): Have you got any of those?

(Now it’s Barrymore’s turn to roll his eyes.)

SHERLOCK: Oh, just wondering.

BARRYMORE (leaning forward secretively): A couple. Crash landed here in the sixties. We call them Abbott and Costello.

(He straightens up and turns back to his computer.)

BARRYMORE: Good luck, Mr. Holmes.

HENRY’S HOUSE. Henry is in the sitting room holding a framed photograph of himself when he was about five years old standing in between his parents. As he clutches the photograph he gazes into the distance with a lost expression on his face but gradually exhaustion begins to claim him and his eyelids begin to droop. Eventually his eyes close completely – and immediately the red glowing eyes of the hound flash in his mind. Gasping in horror, Henry opens his eyes again, and then wails in anguish.

HENRY: Oh, God!

(Sobbing, he clutches at his head and then buries his face in his hands and weeps in despair.)

BASKERVILLE. The lift doors open into the first lab that the boys visited but this time only John comes out of the elevator. As he walks forward he sees that there are only two scientists in the room and even they are leaving through a side door. The second one turns off the main overhead lights as he goes, which leaves the room lit far more dimly by a few arc lights on stands which are dotted around and the screens of some computers. John looks around a little anxiously as he realises how spooky and quiet it is, then walks towards doors at the far end of the lab, the doors which Doctor Frankland came out of on the first occasion that they met him. He has a security pass in his pocket and he takes it out and swipes it through the reader. This must be an even more powerful card than the one which Sherlock used last time because it doesn’t require a second card to unlock the doors. John pulls the door open and goes inside, having apparently ignored – or been too BAMF to care about – the handwritten notice on the outside which reads:

KEEP OUT

UNLESS YOU WANT

A COLD!

He walks through the decontamination zone to the door at the far end and taps a finger on the glass window in the door. When nobody replies he pushes the door open and goes into a room which has a glass-walled section on the left hand side. There’s a glass cage inside the sealed section but there doesn’t appear to be anything inside. In front of him is a desk with equipment, folders, a phone and various other things on it, and above the desk are small plastic tubes coming out of the wall and dials that indicate that these tubes dispense various gases. John opens the door of a small cupboard set into the desk but finds nothing of interest and so continues looking around. On the right hand side of the room are large metal pipes which presumably also carry gases. One of them is leaking slightly.

John peers around a little longer and then comes out of the room and goes back through the decontamination zone and into the lab. Just to his right is a large arc light on a stand. As John turns to his right to close the door behind him, the thing lights up and nine bright bulbs shine straight into his eyes. He squinches his eyes shut and turns his head away, grimacing at the pain.

JOHN: Oh, no! Jesus! Ow!

(Opening his eyes a little, he squints and tries to see into the room. All the other lights in the room appear to have come on as well and – with his own vision blanked out by the arc lights – there’s a wall of whiteness all around him. Just then a loud insistent alarm begins to blare into the room. John groans and covers his ears, completely overwhelmed by the bright light, lack of vision and the noise. Grimacing, he tries to make his way across the lab to the lift, holding his hand up in front of his eyes as the after-image of the arc lights keeps blanking out his vision. Finally reaching the other end of the lab, he pulls out the ID card and swipes it through the reader. It whines and tells him “ACCESS DENIED”. He stares in disbelief and swipes the card again but it whines and gives him the same message. Holding one hand to an ear as the alarm continues to blare, he tries once more.)

JOHN: Come on.

(The same whine and message is repeated. John glares at it in exasperation – and at that moment all the lights go out and the alarm drones into silence. The room is now under emergency lighting only, which is dark red and barely illuminates the area.)

JOHN (under his breath): What the f...?

(He scrabbles in his pocket for his flashlight and switches it on, although its beam isn’t very helpful against the continued after-image of the arc lights which is still affecting his retinas. He calls out.)

JOHN: Hello?

(He screws his eyes shut for a moment in a failed attempt to clear the after-images. As he opens his eyes again and peers through the bright dots, a shadow seems to flicker across the room some distance away. John blinks and looks around the room, the after-images still frustrating his ability to see anything clearly. He lowers his head into his hand and rubs his eyes for a few seconds, then raises his head again, realising how ominously quiet it now is in the lab. But that doesn’t last long as something rattles to his right. He walks forward cautiously, looking a little anxiously at the row of large cages which he now realises are all covered with sheeting that obscures their contents. The rattle sounds again. John walks slowly to the first of the cages, turning once to check behind him, then grabs hold of the sheeting and pulls it back to show that the first cage is empty. Pulling the sheet back down again, he walks to the next cage as something clinks near the lift doors. He swings around to look and shines his torch in that direction but can see nothing. He turns again and grabs the sheet over the second cage, tossing that back. Again the cage is empty, and the door is open. He moves on to the third cage and throws back the sheet. The monkey inside hurls itself at him, screaming as it grabs at the bars. John drops the sheet and stumbles back several paces, breathing heavily. He walks to the final cage and looks at it, then slowly his gaze is pulled down to the bottom of the bars where the sheeting has been pushed back a little. The door of the cage is slightly ajar and the bottom of it has been bent back by something that must be incredibly strong. As John stares at the bent bars in disbelief, a low savage growl sounds behind him. John spins around, his eyes going wide as he shines his flashlight around but he can see nothing. He sees the nearby door to the Cold Lab and walks briskly over to it, taking out his ID card and swiping it. The reader whines its ACCESS DENIED alert.)

JOHN: No, come on, come on.

(He swipes the card again. Again it refuses to open the door. He stares in anguish, then pulls his mobile out of his pocket while shining his light around the room. He hits the speed dial and holds the phone to his ear as it begins to ring out and continues to ring.)

JOHN (under his breath): No, you ... Don’t be ridiculous, pick up.

(Eventually he gives up and switches the phone off again.)

JOHN (in a whisper): Oh, dammit!

(Putting the phone back in his pocket he looks across the room determinedly.)

JOHN (softly): Right.

(Trying to shine his torch in all directions at once and making his way cautiously around all the workstations and islands, he hurries as quickly as he can towards the side door through which the scientists left earlier. As he goes, the distinctive sound of claws on floor tiles skitters across the room.)

JOHN (under his breath): Oh sh...

(Ducking low, he hurries to the door and takes out his card again.)

JOHN (in a whisper): Okay ...

(As he reaches towards the card reader, the claws trot across the floor to his right, and then something snarls. John turns and stares, breathing heavily, as there are more sounds nearby – claws on the floor tiles, equipment being pushed aside, and then a low ominous growl. John shoves the card back into his pocket and then claps his hand over his mouth to dampen his own panicked breathing as the growl rumbles on. As the growl finally falls silent, John makes a break for it and races across the room, running towards the cages and pulling open the door of one of the empty ones before scrambling inside, slamming the door shut and bolting it and then reaching through the bars and pulling the sheet down over the cage. Elsewhere in the lab, the whatever-it-is snarls as John retreats from the door and squats down against the side bars, wrapping his hand around his mouth again and trying not to sob as the creature growls again.)

(Suddenly John’s phone starts to ring. Gasping, he scrambles in his pocket to retrieve it. He answers it on the second ring and holds it up towards his mouth. He keeps his voice as soft as he possibly can but even at such a low volume his terror is evident.)

JOHN (softly): It’s here. It’s in here with me.

SHERLOCK (over phone): Where are you?

JOHN (softly): Get me out, Sherlock. You have got to get me out. The big lab: the first lab that we saw.

(He breathes heavily. Outside, the creature growls. John whines loudly in terror and claps his hand over his mouth again.)

SHERLOCK (over phone): John? John?

JOHN (lowering his hand and keeping his voice no more than a whisper): Now, Sherlock. Please.

SHERLOCK (over phone): All right, I’ll find you. Keep talking.

JOHN (softly): I can’t. It’ll hear me.

SHERLOCK (over phone): Keep talking. What are you seeing?

(Throughout the conversation John has been peering through the small gap in the sheeting but the room is so dimly lit that he hasn’t been able to see anything.)

SHERLOCK (over phone): John?

(The creature snarls again.)

JOHN (softly): Yes, I’m here.

SHERLOCK (insistently, over phone): What can you see?

(Getting onto his knees, John crawls closer to the gap in the sheeting, trying to keep his terrified breathing under control.)

JOHN (softly): I don’t know. I don’t know, but I can hear it.

(The creature growls loudly.)

JOHN (softly, terrified): Did you hear that?

SHERLOCK (over phone): Stay calm, stay calm. Can you see it?

(John peers into the gloom.)

SHERLOCK (over phone): Can you see it?

JOHN (quietly): No. I can ...

(He trails off, then slowly straightens up, retreats backwards and sits back against the side bars as his face fills with absolute horror.)

JOHN (in a whisper): I can see it.

(He stares ahead of himself, his eyes full of dread as a shadow begins to move on the other side of the sheeting.)

JOHN (flatly): It’s here.

(The shadow moves closer as the creature growls once more.)

JOHN (flatly): It’s here.

(The shadow moves closer ... and then the sheeting is tugged upwards as the lights come on in the lab and Sherlock’s face appears on the other side of the cage, looking anxiously down at him as he pulls the door open and goes inside.)

SHERLOCK (worriedly): Are you all right?

(John’s eyes widen in utter bewilderment as Sherlock bends down to him and puts a hand onto his shoulder.)

SHERLOCK: John ...

JOHN: Jesus Christ ...

(He grabs the bars and pulls himself to his feet, hurrying out of the cage and stuffing his phone away as he turns back to his friend.)

JOHN (still breathless and panic-stricken): It was the hound, Sherlock. It was here. I swear it, Sherlock. It must ...

(He looks around the lab which – now fully illuminated – shows that there’s nowhere that a large monster can be hiding.)

JOHN: It must ...

(His voice becomes high-pitched.)

JOHN: Did ... did ... did you see it? You must have!

(Sherlock holds out a placatory hand towards him.)

SHERLOCK: It’s all right. It’s okay now.

JOHN (high-pitched, frantic and hysterical): NO IT’S NOT! IT’S NOT OKAY! I saw it. I was wrong!

(Sherlock shrugs as John breathes heavily.)

SHERLOCK: Well, let’s not jump to conclusions.

JOHN: What?

SHERLOCK: What did you see?

JOHN: I told you: I saw the hound.

SHERLOCK: Huge; red eyes?

JOHN: Yes.

SHERLOCK: Glowing?

JOHN: Yeah.

SHERLOCK: No.

JOHN: What?

SHERLOCK: I made up the bit about glowing. You saw what you expected to see because I told you. You have been drugged. We have all been drugged.

JOHN: Drugged?

SHERLOCK: Can you walk?

JOHN (his voice shaky): ’Course I can walk.

SHERLOCK: Come on, then. It’s time to lay this ghost.

(He turns and heads for the door. Still trying to catch his breath, John looks around the lab again, then stumbles after Sherlock.)

In a small room full of cages, Doctor Stapleton is examing a fluffy white rabbit on a metal table. She looks up as Sherlock comes through the door, followed by John.

STAPLETON: Oh. Back again? What’s on your mind this time?

SHERLOCK: m*rder, Doctor Stapleton. Refined, cold-blooded m*rder.

(He reaches back and turns off the light switch by the door. The limited lighting coming from the window at the end of the room is just enough to show that the rabbit is brightly glowing green. Sherlock turns the lights back on again.)

SHERLOCK: Will you tell little Kirsty what happened to Bluebell or shall I?

(He smiles unpleasantly at her. She sighs.)

STAPLETON: Okay. What do you want?

SHERLOCK: Can I borrow your microscope?

LATER. In a larger lab, Sherlock is gazing into a microscope. Unhappy with what he’s seeing, he turns away from the ’scope and crushes something which looks crystalline into smaller pieces with a little hammer. Time passes and he varies between sitting with his back to the microscope, his hands folded in the prayer position in front of him as he thinks, or gazing into the ’scope, or scribbling chemical formulae onto the desk with different coloured marker pens. Nearby, John sits on a stool with his head propped on his hand, gazing blankly into space. Doctor Stapleton is standing near him.

STAPLETON: Are you sure you’re okay?

(John looks up at her, blinking.)

STAPLETON: You look very peaky.

JOHN: No, I’m all right.

STAPLETON: It was the GFP gene from a jellyfish, in case you’re interested.

JOHN: What?

STAPLETON: In the rabbits.

JOHN: Mmm, right, yes.

STAPLETON (proudly): Aequoria Victoria, if you really want to know.

(John looks up at her.)

JOHN: Why?

STAPLETON: Why not? We don’t ask questions like that here. It isn’t done.

(A short distance from them, Sherlock looks increasingly irritated as he picks up another slide and puts it under the microscope.)

STAPLETON: There was a mix-up, anyway. My daughter ended up with one of the lab specimens, so poor Bluebell had to go.

JOHN (cynically): Your compassion’s overwhelming.

STAPLETON (mockingly): I know. I hate myself sometimes.

JOHN: So, come on then. You can trust me – I’m a doctor. What else have you got hidden away up here?

(Exasperated, Sherlock takes the slide out again. Stapleton sighs.)

STAPLETON: Listen: if you can imagine it, someone is probably doing it somewhere. Of course they are.

(Sherlock is staring intently at his latest slide but his eyes drift across towards John and Stapleton briefly.)

JOHN: And cloning?

STAPLETON: Yes, of course. Dolly the Sheep, remember?

JOHN: Human cloning?

STAPLETON: Why not?

JOHN: What about animals? Not sheep ... big animals.

STAPLETON: Size isn’t a problem, not at all. The only limits are ethics and the law, and both those things can be ... very flexible. But not here – not at Baskerville.

(Furious, Sherlock snatches the latest slide out from under the ’scope and hurls it against the nearest wall.)

SHERLOCK (livid): It’s not there!

JOHN: Jesus!

SHERLOCK: Nothing there! Doesn’t make any sense.

STAPLETON: What were you expecting to find?

SHERLOCK (pacing): A drug, of course. There has to be a drug – a hallucinogenic or a delirient of some kind. There’s no trace of anything in the sugar.

JOHN: Sugar?

SHERLOCK: The sugar, yes. It’s a simple process of elimination. I saw the hound – saw it as my imagination expected me to see it: a genetically engineered monster. But I knew I couldn’t believe the evidence of my own eyes, so there were seven possible reasons for it, the most possible being narcotics. Henry Knight – he saw it too but you didn’t, John. You didn’t see it. Now, we have eaten and drunk exactly the same things since we got to Grimpen apart from one thing: you don’t take sugar in your coffee.

JOHN: I see. So ...

SHERLOCK: I took it from Henry’s kitchen – his sugar. (He glares down at the microscope.) It’s perfectly all right.

JOHN: But maybe it’s not a drug.

SHERLOCK: No, it has to be a drug.

(He has sat on the stool with his head buried in his hands. Now he lowers his hands a little but keeps his head bowed and his eyes closed.)

SHERLOCK: But how did it get into our systems. How?

(Slowly he begins to raise his head, still keeping his eyes closed.)

SHERLOCK: There has to be something ...

(The word ‘hound’ keeps drifting across his mind’s eye. He turns his head repeatedly as he tries to follow the words inside his head.)

SHERLOCK: ... something ... ah, something ...

(His eyes open.)

SHERLOCK: ... something buried deep.

(Taking a sharp breath through his nose, he turns and points imperiously at John and Stapleton.)

SHERLOCK: Get out.

STAPLETON: What?

SHERLOCK: Get out. I need to go to my mind palace.

(John sags on his seat with an “Oh, not again” look.)

STAPLETON: Your what?

(Sherlock has already turned his head away again and is staring ahead of himself. John gets off his stool.)

JOHN: He’s not gonna be doing much talking for a while. We may as well go.

(Sherlock is breathing deeply, focusing his thoughts. Stapleton follows John as he heads for the door.)

STAPLETON: His what?

JOHN: Oh, his mind palace. It’s a memory technique – a sort of mental map. You plot a map with a location – it doesn’t have to be a real place – and then you deposit memories there that ... Theoretically, you can never forget anything; all you have to do is find your way back to it.

STAPLETON: So this imaginary location can be anything – a house or a street.

JOHN: Yeah.

STAPLETON: But he said “palace”. He said it was a palace.

JOHN (looking back towards Sherlock for a moment): Yeah, well, he would, wouldn’t he?

(He leads her out of the room.)

(Sherlock gazes ahead of himself, his mind turned inwards as he walks through his memories unearthing everything he can recall in connection with the word “Liberty”. I could do much better justice to describing the visual process that we watch, but if you want this transcript printed this side of the London Olympics, I need to get it finished and I may try to come back and improve this section in the future. As Sherlock accesses different examples of the word and finds them unsuitable, he physically flicks them away with his hands and pulls in new variations before brushing those aside. The word “hound” creeps into his mind and drifts across it as he temporarily gives up on “Liberty” and shifts to “In”, adding various letters onto the word to form new ones like “Inn”, “India”, “Ingolstadt” [and ‘Frankenstein’ fans sob] and “Indium atomic number = 49”.)

(Flicking that line of thought away, he starts calling up images of large dogs, running through various breeds and temporarily being distracted by the image of Elvis Presley starting to sing “Hound Dog”. Irritated, he brushes that aside and tries to pull in all three words – Liberty, In, Hound – simultaneously and suddenly his eyes snap open and he jolts three times as if he’s being repeatedly struck by lightning as the words finally crash into place:

Liberty,

Indiana

H.O.U.N.D.

He sinks back on his seat for a moment, then stands up and heads out of the lab.)

NIGHT TIME. THE MOORS. The hound howls and Henry races across the grass, his p*stol in one hand, terrified as the hound snarls behind him. Henry runs on, glancing back repeatedly as he hears his pursuer gaining on him. Two red glowing eyes loom out of the darkness each time he looks around, but now he suddenly seems to realise that he has a g*n in his hand and he turns and fires towards the eyes.

Glass shatters and Louise Mortimer screams as she throws herself out of her chair in the sitting room of Henry’s house and cowers on the floor. Just beside her chair, the mirror on the wall has shattered under the impact of the b*llet which Henry just fired into it. Sobbing and cowering, she looks up at Henry as he continues to aim at the mirror, his face blank, but now he comes back to himself and looks at the p*stol in horror.

HENRY: Oh my God.

(Louise continues to sob.)

HENRY: Oh my God. Oh my God. I am so ... I am so sorry. I am so sorry.

(He turns and runs from the room.)

BASKERVILLE. Stapleton leads Sherlock and John along a corridor and uses her card to swipe them into the area leading to Major Barrymore’s office. As they go into the room, Sherlock points back to the door they just came through.

SHERLOCK: John.

JOHN: Yeah, I’m on it.

(He turns back to keep an eye on the door as Stapleton goes over to sit down at a computer.)

SHERLOCK: Project HOUND. Must have read about it and stored it away. An experiment in a CIA facility in Liberty, Indiana.

(He stands behind Stapleton as she types her User ID onto the computer, then adds her password. A request to “Enter Search String” comes up and she looks up at Sherlock who dictates the letters.)

SHERLOCK: H, O, U, N, D.

(She types in the letters and hits Enter. A message comes up saying ”NO ACCESS. CIA Classified” and requesting an authorisation code.)

STAPLETON: That’s as far as my access goes, I’m afraid.

JOHN: Well, there must be an override and password.

STAPLETON: I imagine so, but that’d be Major Barrymore’s.

(Sherlock spins around and walks into Barrymore’s office.)

SHERLOCK: Password, password, password.

(Switching on the lights in the room he sits down at the desk.)

SHERLOCK: He sat here when he thought it up.

(Folding his hands in front of his mouth, he slowly spins a full circle on the chair, looking around the office as he goes. Stapleton comes to the doorway.)

SHERLOCK: Describe him to me.

STAPLETON: You’ve seen him.

SHERLOCK: But describe him.

STAPLETON: Er, he’s a bloody martinet, a throw-back, the sort of man they’d have sent into Suez.

SHERLOCK: Good, excellent. Old-fashioned, traditionalist; not the sort that would use his children’s names as a password. (He gestures towards the drawings that Barrymore’s children have done for him and which he has pinned on the board above his desk.) He loves his job; proud of it and this is work-related, so what’s at eye level?

(He rapidly scans around everything in the room without altering the angle of his eyes.)

SHERLOCK (gesturing to the right): Books. (Pointing to the left) Jane’s Defence Weekly – bound copies. (He looks to the right again and at the subject matter of some of the books on the bookshelf.) Hannibal; Wellington; Rommel; Churchill’s “History of the English-Speaking Peoples” – all four volumes.

(He stands up and looks at a bronze bust on a shelf.)

SHERLOCK: Churchill – well, he’s fond of Churchill. (He looks back to the bookcases again.) Copy of “The Downing Street Years”; one, two, three, four, five separate biographies of Thatcher.

(He looks down to a framed photograph on the desk of a man in uniform standing with his teenage son.)

SHERLOCK: Mid nineteen eighties at a guess. Father and son: Barrymore senior. (Looking at the uniform of the older man) Medals: Distinguished Service Order.

(He looks around to John.)

JOHN: That date? I’d say Falklands veteran.

SHERLOCK: Right. So Thatcher’s looking a more likely bet than Churchill.

(He walks out of the office and heads back towards the computer.)

STAPLETON (following him): So that’s the password?

SHERLOCK: No. With a man like Major Barrymore, only first name terms would do.

(Leaning down to the keyboard, he starts to type Margaret Thatcher’s first name into the “Auth code” box but stops as he reaches the penultimate letter, narrows his eyes and deletes everything back to the first letter, then retypes it as “Maggie”. Looking into the screen and gritting his teeth ever so slightly, he hits Enter. The computer beeps happily and announces “OVERRIDE 300/421 ACCEPTED. Loading ...”)

(John comes over from the door to look at the screen. After a slight pause information begins to stream across the screen as everything related to Project H.O.U.N.D. becomes available. Sherlock’s concentration becomes intense as he takes it all in and focuses on certain phrases like “extreme suggestibility”, “fear and stimulus”, “conditioned terror”, “aerosol dispersal”. A photograph comes up of the project team posing happily together and he identifies the five project leaders amongst the larger group: Elaine Dyson, Mary Uslowski, Rick Nader, Jack O’Mara and Leonard Hansen. Clearing the photo from the screen he rearranges the names into another order:

Leonard Hansen

Jack O’Mara

Mary Uslowski

Rick Nader

Elaine Dyson

Standing beside him, Doctor Stapleton finally begins to understand.)

STAPLETON: HOUND.

(She stares in growing horror at the screen as more information from the project appears and words and phrases are highlighted such as “Paranoia”, “Severe frontal lobe damage”, “Blood-brain” “Gross cranial trauma”, “Dangerous acceleration”, “Multiple homicide”, accompanied by photographs of some of the subjects of the project screaming insanely.)

JOHN (softly): Jesus.

SHERLOCK (still scanning the information as it flows across the screen): Project HOUND: a new deleriant drug which rendered its users incredibly suggestible. They wanted to use it as an anti-personnel w*apon to totally disorientate the enemy using fear and stimulus; but they shut it down and hid it away in nineteen eighty-six.

STAPLETON: Because of what it did to the subjects they tested it on.

SHERLOCK: And what they did to others. Prolonged exposure drove them insane – made them almost uncontrollably aggressive.

JOHN: So someone’s been doing it again – carrying on the experiments?

SHERLOCK: Attempting to refine it, perhaps, for the last twenty years.

STAPLETON: Who?

(John nods at the screen, indicating the names of the project leaders.)

JOHN: Those names mean anything to you?

STAPLETON: No, not a thing.

SHERLOCK (sighing): Five principal scientists, twenty years ago.

(He pulls up the photograph of the team and begins zooming in on individuals within it. The closer footage shows that they are all wearing identical sweatshirts. Looming out of a diamond pattern in the centre of the sweatshirts is a large snarling wolf’s head and the legend “H.O.U.N.D.” is printed underneath. There is some smaller text underneath but it’s not yet clear what it says. Sherlock continues to zoom in and out of the photo to look more closely at the faces.)

SHERLOCK: Maybe our friend’s somewhere in the back of the picture – someone who was old enough to be there at the time of the experiments in 1986 ...

(He stops as he sees a face he recognises, and rolls his eyes a little as he realises the truth.)

SHERLOCK: Maybe somebody who says “cell phone” because of time spent in America. You remember, John?

JOHN: Mmm-hmm.

(Brief flashback to Doctor Frankland giving a card to Sherlock and saying, “Here’s my, er, cell number.”)

SHERLOCK: He gave us his number in case we needed him.

STAPLETON (staring at the photo on the screen): Oh my God. Bob Frankland. But Bob doesn’t even work on ... I mean, he’s a virologist. This was chemical warfare.

SHERLOCK: It’s where he started, though ... and he’s never lost the certainty, the obsession that that drug really could work. Nice of him to give us his number. (He reaches into his pocket and takes out Bob’s card.) Let’s arrange a little meeting.

(He walks away from the computer. John walks closer to it and looks at the last image – a very tight close-up of one of the sweatshirts. Stitched below the “H.O.U.N.D.” legend is the name of the American town and state where the project was based: “Liberty, In”.)

(Just then John’s phone begins to ring. He digs it out of his pocket and frowns at the number on the screen, apparently not recognising it. He answers.)

JOHN: Hello?

(Initially the only sound he can hear is a woman crying.)

JOHN: Who’s this?

MORTIMER (over the phone): You’ve got to find Henry.

(John looks round to Sherlock.)

JOHN: It’s Louise Mortimer. (Into phone) Louise, what’s wrong?

MORTIMER (tearfully): Henry was ... was remembering; then ... he tried ...

(She gasps.)

MORTIMER: He’s got a g*n. He went for the g*n and tried to ...

JOHN: What?

(She breaks down in tears again.)

MORTIMER: He’s gone. You’ve got to stop him. I don’t know what he might do.

JOHN: Where-where are you?

MORTIMER: His house. I’m okay, I’m okay.

JOHN: Right: stay there. We’ll get someone to you, okay?

(Lowering his phone, he begins to text.)

SHERLOCK: Henry?

JOHN: He’s att*cked her.

SHERLOCK: Gone?

JOHN: Mmm.

SHERLOCK (hitting a speed dial on his own phone): There’s only one place he’ll go to: back to where it all started. (Into phone) Lestrade. Get to the Hollow. ... Dewer’s Hollow, now. And bring a g*n.

With the p*stol still in his hand, Henry is walking briskly across the moors towards the woods surrounding Dewer’s Hollow. Some distance behind him, Sherlock and John race across the terrain in the Land Rover. Unaware of this, Henry continues onwards, stopping momentarily to stare tearfully at the woods ahead of him, but then he continues onwards. Not long afterwards Sherlock pulls up presumably where the woods begin and he and John get out and continue on foot. Henry reaches the lip of the Hollow and begins to make his way down into the misty valley. Reaching the bottom he slows down and stumbles slowly forward, wandering around vaguely for a moment before coming to a halt.

HENRY (softly): I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Dad.

(Squatting down, he brings the p*stol up and opens his mouth as he aims the muzzle towards it.)

SHERLOCK: No, Henry, no! No!

(He and John scramble down the slope, shining their torches at him. Henry stands up and stumbles backwards, waving the p*stol vaguely in their direction. His voice is high-pitched and hysterical.)

HENRY: Get back. Get – get away from me!

JOHN: Easy, Henry. Easy. Just relax.

HENRY: I know what I am. I know what I tried to do!

JOHN: Just put the g*n down. It’s okay.

HENRY (his voice hoarse with anguish): No, no, I know what I am!

SHERLOCK (as reassuring as he’ll ever sound): Yes, I’m sure you do, Henry. It’s all been explained to you, hasn’t it – explained very carefully.

HENRY: What?

SHERLOCK: Someone needed to keep you quiet; needed to keep you as a child to reassert the dream that you’d both clung on to, because you had started to remember.

(He begins to step closer to the young man.)

SHERLOCK: Remember now, Henry. You’ve got to remember what happened here when you were a little boy.

(Henry’s g*n hand begins to droop momentarily but then he raises it again, his face full of his struggle to understand.)

HENRY: I thought it had got my dad – the hound. I thought ...

(He loses control and begins to scream in anguish.)

HENRY: Oh Je... oh Jesus, I don’t – I don’t know any more!

(Sobbing, he bends forward and aims the muzzle into his mouth again.)

JOHN (lurching forward towards him): No, Henry! Henry, for God’s sake!

SHERLOCK (urgently): Henry, remember. “Liberty In.” Two words; two words a frightened little boy saw here twenty years ago.

(Henry begins to calm a little but still remains hunched over with the g*n’s muzzle against his mouth.)

SHERLOCK: You’d started to piece things together, remember what really happened here that night. It wasn’t an animal, was it, Henry?

(Henry starts to straighten up, blinking.)

SHERLOCK: Not a monster.

(Henry turns to look at him.)

SHERLOCK: A man.

(Henry’s eyes widen as the memories begin to come. In brief flashes he starts to relive the truth. As he has always remembered, his father is scrabbling at the ground as he tries to get away from his attacker, but now for the first time Henry can see that what is pulling him backwards across the earth is not a creature but a man wearing a dark leather old-fashioned gas mask. The glass of the two large eye pieces is tinted a dark red and in the limited light available the eye pieces seem to be glowing. Young Henry watches from partway up the slope, cringing and terrified as the attacker pummels at his father, half strangling him and then punching wildly at his face. Mr. Knight manages to pull himself from under his assailant and starts to crawl away but the other man, growling fiercely, tugs him backwards and Henry’s father loses his balance and falls forward. His head strikes a rock and he collapses to the ground unmoving. Breathing heavily through the gas mask, the other man pokes at him, realises that he isn’t going to move again and gets to his feet. He looks down at the man he has just k*lled and young Henry sees the sweatshirt he is wearing, with its picture of a snarling wolf-like creature, the letters H.O.U.N.D. underneath and “Liberty, In” below them. Young Henry’s mind begins to mix everything up and, some hours later as he meets the old lady walking her dog, his new horror is complete as he screams in utter terror.)

(In the present he gapes at Sherlock as the truth reasserts itself in his mind.)

SHERLOCK: You couldn’t cope. You were just a child, so you rationalised it into something very different. But then you started to remember, so you had to be stopped; driven out of your mind so that no-one would believe a word that you said.

(Quietly John steps forward, holding out his hand encouragingly towards Henry as Greg Lestrade arrives and calls out as he trots down the slope towards them.)

LESTRADE: Sherlock!

JOHN (gently to Henry): Okay, it’s okay, mate.

(He carefully takes the p*stol from Henry’s fingers. Henry speaks tearfully to Sherlock.)

HENRY: But we saw it: the hound, last night. We s... we, we, we did, we saw ...

SHERLOCK: Yeah, but there was a dog, Henry, leaving footprints, scaring witnesses, but it was nothing more than an ordinary dog. We both saw it – saw it as our drugged minds wanted us to see it. Fear and stimulus; that’s how it works.

(Henry stares at him in confusion. Sherlock returns his look sympathetically.)

SHERLOCK: But there never was any monster.

(The hound has different ideas, however, and now its anguished howl rings out in the woods above them. Everyone’s head snaps up and John and Greg aim their flashlights upwards to the top of the Hollow where a low shape can be seen slowly stalking along the rim and snarling.)

JOHN: Sherlock ...

(Sherlock stares up in disbelief as Henry turns to him, horrified.)

HENRY: No. (He begins to wail in panic.) No, no, no, no!

(He backs away as Sherlock tries simultaneously to hold out a calming hand towards him while keeping his own torch shining up towards the creature above them.)

SHERLOCK: Henry, Henry ...

JOHN: Sherlock ...

(The creature continues to slink along the rim of the Hollow as Henry begins to scream in abject terror. He crumples to his knees, continually screaming, “No!”)

JOHN: Henry!

(The hound turns towards the Hollow and looks down at everyone, snarling viciously. Its eyes glow in the torchlight as Henry continues to wail.)

LESTRADE (staring up at the rim): Shit!

(John turns and shines his torch into his face.)

JOHN: Greg, are you seeing this?

(Greg glances at him momentarily and his expression answers the question. Sherlock takes a quick look around to the inspector to see his face before turning back to stare up at the hound.)

JOHN: Right: he is not drugged, Sherlock, so what’s that? What is it?!

(As Henry continues to wail behind them, Sherlock screws his eyes shut for a brief moment, trying to handle the overload in his mind. He stares upwards again.)

SHERLOCK: All right! It’s still here ... (he pants heavily for a moment before pulling himself together) ... but it’s just a dog. Henry! It’s nothing more than an ordinary dog!

(The hound doesn’t think so as it raises its head and let out a long terrifying howl.)

LESTRADE (stumbling backwards): Oh my God.

(And now the hound turns and leaps a short way down the slope, its eyes flashing red in the torchlight.)

LESTRADE: Oh, Christ!

(John stares at it as it stops again, its red glowing eyes now clearly visible as it opens its mouth and reveals a mouthful of long pointed teeth that you would never see on any dog. Its snarl is completely terrifying. Henry has fallen silent, gazing up at it as if he knows that it is going to k*ll him shortly. Sherlock is still trying to believe what his own eyes are telling him ... and now there’s movement behind them. Sherlock looks over his shoulder and sees a tall human figure through the mist. The new arrival is wearing a breathing mask with a clear visor over his face. Sherlock turns and rushes towards him, grabbing at the mask and ripping it upwards to fully reveal the man’s face ... and Jim Moriarty grins manically back at him.)

SHERLOCK (staring at him in appalled horror): No!

(Behind him the hound growls ominously again. Jim’s expression becomes intense and m*rder but then his head begins to distort and flail about, morphing between Jim’s face and someone else’s so quickly that it’s impossible to keep up with the changes. Sherlock grimaces, groaning at the insanity going on in front of him as Jim’s face keeps reasserting itself.)

SHERLOCK (frantically): It’s not you! You’re not here!

(Grabbing at the figure, he spins him around and then headbutts him in the face. The figure crumples slightly and raises his hand to his face as he straightens up ... and now the man in front of Sherlock is Bob Frankland. Sherlock clings onto his jacket, his breathing panicked and frantic ... but then he turns his head to one side and looks at the mist surrounding them as suddenly it all begins to make sense to him.)

SHERLOCK: The fog.

JOHN (still aiming his torch up at the hound): What?

SHERLOCK: It’s the fog! The drug: it’s in the fog! Aerosol dispersal – that’s what it said in those records. Project HOUND – it’s the fog! A chemical minefield!

(Greg instantly throws his arm across his face, trying to stop himself from breathing too much of the mist. The hound stalks closer to the group, snarling.)

FRANKLAND: For God’s sake, k*ll it! k*ll it!

(The hound’s movements become more jittery as if it’s winding itself up to att*ck. Greg aims his p*stol and fires three times at it. His b*ll*ts fly past it and it flinches momentarily but then rises up and leaps towards them. John’s aim is truer and his b*ll*ts strike the hound accurately and throw it backwards as it squeals in pain and crashes to the ground, unmoving.)

(As John and Greg watch it anxiously for any signs of movement, Sherlock runs over to Henry and pushes him towards the hound.)

SHERLOCK: Look at it, Henry.

HENRY (digging his heels in): No, no, no!

SHERLOCK (shoving him forward determinedly): Come on, look at it!

(He bullies the young man forward until they can both clearly see it lying on the ground. In Sherlock’s torchlight it is clearly nothing more than a huge dog. Henry stares at it for a moment and then turns back to where Frankland is still holding his injured face while Greg has his hands over his mouth as he tries to draw breath and come to terms with what he just experienced. Henry looks at Frankland.)

HENRY: It’s just ... you bastard.

(Hurling himself at the older man, he screams with rage.)

HENRY: You bastard!

(Bundling him to the ground, he screams into his face as John and Greg run over and try to pull him off.)

HENRY: Twenty years! Twenty years of my life making no sense! Why didn’t you just k*ll me?!

(Finally the others manage to pull him up off.)

SHERLOCK: Because d*ad men get listened to. He needed to do more than k*ll you. He had to discredit every word you ever said about your father, and he had the means right at his feet – a chemical minefield, pressure pads in the ground dosing you up every time that you came back here.

(He holds his arms out wide and spins slowly in a circle as he gestures around the Hollow.)

SHERLOCK: m*rder w*apon and scene of the crime all at once.

(He laughs with delight.)

SHERLOCK: Oh, this case, Henry! Thank you. It’s been brilliant.

JOHN: Sherlock ...

SHERLOCK (turning to him): What?

(John glares at him pointedly.)

JOHN: Timing.

SHERLOCK: Not good?

HENRY: No, no, it’s – it’s okay. It’s fine, because this means ...

(He starts to step towards Frankland. John moves with him, ready to intervene if he should try to att*ck him again.)

HENRY: ... this means that my dad was right.

(Frankland gets up onto his knees as Henry still tries to move towards him. John and Greg both put a gentle hand onto his shoulders to keep him back.)

HENRY (tearfully): He found something out, didn’t he, and that’s why you’d k*lled him – because he was right, and he’d found you right in the middle of an experiment.

(Frankland gets to his feet but before he can say anything there’s a savage snarl from behind the group. Everybody spins towards the dog as it whines in pain but gets up off the ground. John aims and fires towards it twice and it goes down again. Frankland takes the opportunity of the distraction to turn and run off in the opposite direction. Like the single-minded idiot that he is, Sherlock runs right across John’s line of f*re, forcing him to lower his p*stol, and chases off after the scientist. John turns and follows him up the slope.)

SHERLOCK: Frankland!

(Frankland runs through the woods with Sherlock and John in hot pursuit, Greg and Henry a little behind the other two.)

SHERLOCK: Frankland!

LESTRADE (to Henry): Come on, keep up!

(They run on.)

SHERLOCK: It’s no use, Frankland!

(Reaching the barbed wire fence surrounding the minefield, Frankland doesn’t hesitate and jumps over. His feet tangle in the wire and he falls to the ground on the other side. He jumps up and runs on a few yards but then stops abruptly as his foot thumps down onto a mine, which makes a distinctive clink indicating that he has activated its pressure pad. He stares down at his foot, shining his torch onto the mine underneath and realising that unless he remains completely still and doesn’t lift any pressure off it, the mine will blow. As the others hurry towards the barbed wire, he raises his head, sighs in resignation and deliberately lifts his foot. The others skid to a halt and duck down as a massive expl*si*n rips into the air. As the blast dies down, Henry sinks back against a nearby tree while Sherlock gazes reflectively across the minefield.)

DAY TIME. CROSS KEYS INN. John is sitting at one of the outdoor tables and, for reasons that I’m sure we’d all like an explanation for, appears to be wearing Sherlock’s Purple Shirt of Sex ™. Billy brings out a plate containing whatever is the vegetarian equivalent of a full English breakfast and puts it on the table in front of him.

JOHN: Mmm. Thanks, Billy.

(As Billy walks away, Sherlock brings over two mugs and puts one down on the table.)

SHERLOCK: So they didn’t have it put down, then – the dog.

JOHN (tucking into his breakfast as Sherlock stands next to him and drinks his coffee): Obviously. Suppose they just couldn’t bring themselves to do it.

SHERLOCK: I see.

JOHN (smiling): No you don’t.

SHERLOCK: No, I don’t. Sentiment?

JOHN: Sentiment!

SHERLOCK (rolling his eyes): Oh.

(He sits down on the bench next to John.)

JOHN: Listen: what happened to me in the lab?

(Sherlock looks at him for a moment, then turns around and reaches for a box of sauce sachets, looking worried about how he’s ever going to explain all this.)

SHERLOCK: D’you want some sauce with that?

JOHN: I mean, I hadn’t been to the Hollow, so how come I heard those things in there? Fear and stimulus, you said.

SHERLOCK (rummaging through the box of sachets): You must have been dosed with it elsewhere, when you went to the lab, maybe. You saw those pipes – pretty ancient, leaky as a sieve; and they were carrying the gas, so ... Um, ketchup, was it, or brown ...?

JOHN: Hang on: you thought it was in the sugar.

(Sherlock stares at him while trying to maintain a neutral expression.)

JOHN: You were convinced it was in the sugar.

(Sherlock looks away again.)

SHERLOCK: Better get going, actually. (He looks at his watch.) There’s a train that leaves in half an hour, so if you want ...

(John turns his head away as he begins to realise the horrible truth.)

JOHN: Oh God. It was you. You locked me in that bloody lab.

SHERLOCK: I had to. It was an experiment.

JOHN (furiously): An experiment?!

SHERLOCK (looking at people sitting nearby): Shhh.

JOHN (quieter, but still furious): I was terrified, Sherlock. I was scared to death.

SHERLOCK: I thought that the drug was in the sugar, so I put the sugar in your coffee, then I arranged everything with Major Barrymore.

(John sighs in exasperation.)

SHERLOCK: It was all totally scientific, laboratory conditions – well, literally.

(Flashback to Sherlock alone in a room from where he can monitor the lab. Lazily sitting in a chair with his feet up on the table, he watches the screen in front of him which shows John racing across the darkened lab towards the cages as the ‘hound’ growls. A little later Sherlock wiggles his feet comfortably on the desk as John breathes panic-stricken into his phone. The footage isn’t showing John because he’s hidden inside the cage.)

JOHN: It’s in here with me.

SHERLOCK (into his phone): All right. Keep talking. I’ll find you.

(There’s a momentary silence.)

SHERLOCK (into phone): Keep talking!

JOHN: I can’t, it’ll hear me.

SHERLOCK: Tell me what you’re seeing!

(He switches on a small recorder and holds it up to a nearby microphone. Savage growling is played into the lab.)

JOHN: I don’t know, but I can hear it now.

(Back in the present, Sherlock continues his ‘explanation’.)

SHERLOCK: Well, I knew what effect it had had on a superior mind, so I needed to try it on an average one.

(John looks up from his plate.)

SHERLOCK: You know what I mean.

(John gets back to eating.)

JOHN: But it wasn’t in the sugar.

SHERLOCK: No, well, I wasn’t to know you’d already been exposed to the gas.

JOHN: So you got it wrong.

SHERLOCK: No.

JOHN: Mmm. You were wrong. It wasn’t in the sugar. You got it wrong.

SHERLOCK: A bit. It won’t happen again.

(Sighing, John continues eating, then looks round.)

JOHN: Any long-term effects?

SHERLOCK: None at all. You’ll be fine once you’ve excreted it. We all will.

JOHN: Think I might have taken care of that already.

(Sherlock snorts laughter, then looks across to a nearby table where Gary is pouring coffee for two other customers. He smiles apologetically across to Sherlock, who puts his mug on the table and stands up.)

JOHN: Where’re you going?

SHERLOCK: Won’t be a minute. Gotta see a man about a dog.

(Smiling down at John, he turns and walks away.)

Jim Moriarty sits silently and calmly in a small windowless concrete-lined cell with his eyes closed. In an adjoining room, Mycroft walks towards the other side of the one-way mirror which Jim is facing, and narrows his eyes as he looks closely at the other man.

Some time afterwards, the door to the cell is unlocked and Jim opens his eyes but does not turn around as Mycroft walks in.

Later, Mycroft has left the cell again. A man in a suit has opened the cell door and has walked inside.

MYCROFT (voiceover): All right. Let him go.

(Jim turns and casually strolls out of the cell. Behind him, the man turns and looks around the room. On almost every plain concrete panel of the walls, Jim has somehow carved a single word into the cement. In different sizes and at different angles, the word repeats all around the cell – and the word is SHERLOCK. And with the dust which was loosened by the carving, he has scratched Sherlock’s name backwards on the mirror so that whoever is watching him from the other side of the mirror will see the name the right way round. The man in the suit turns and walks away, closing the cell door behind him.)
{"type": "series", "show": "Sherlock", "episode": "02x02 - The Hounds of Baskerville"}