The Structural Composition of Folly - Epilogue

[jessamygriffith]

Title: The Structural Composition of Folly
Rating: Mature
Spoilers: None
Warnings: None
Pairing(s): John/Sherlock
Word Count: 11,000 for the entire fic
Disclaimer: Interpretation of characters is my own. Standard disclaimers apply. Emails redacted from actual ones sent by Misha Collins. Based upon a real event.
Category: Humour, Fluff, Rom/Com ending
Betas: red_adam for Brit pick, and alltoseek for wrangling and style
Also Found Here: AO3
Summary: John convinces Sherlock to join the Greatest International Scavenger Hunt the World Has Ever Seen, the brainchild of Misha 'Castiel' Collins.
Can Sherlock's superior mental power rise to the insane challenges of the Hunt? How many rules can one consulting detective break? Is he in it to win it? And will John ever be the same after it's over?

Part 1   /  Part 2   /   Part 3   /   Part 4   /   Part 5   /   Part 6   /    Part 7   /   Part 8 

From: Misha Collins <mishacollins@gishwhes.com>
Date: December 20th, 2011 3:07:37 AM GMT+09:00
To: sherlockholmes@scienceofdeduction.co.uk
Subject: And the winner is...
Reply-To: mishacollins@gishwhes.com

Greetings Gishwhesheans, and Team 221!

The winner is... wait for it...

Allow me to explain my process in judging the literally tens of thousands of items submitted. As you know, I like to be thorough and fair, so I look at each submission for five minutes without blinking. Then, I record my impressions in essay form. (If I blink, I start the clock again.) Then, to make sure there is not a circadian bias, I also recheck each submission at midnight, sunrise, high noon, and sunset, and again record my feelings, this time in the form of improvised song.

Also, to make sure I am really giving each masterpiece its due, I dream about the items during brief concussion-induced black-outs throughout the day and when I come to, I paint my dreams in oil on large canvases. As a final precaution, to eliminate human error, I share my essays, songs, and paintings with a particle physicist, a statistician, an ordained priest, and a psychotherapist, and make an audio recording of their feedback in an invented language only we speak. Then, and only then, do we assign points. While this is obviously an efficient process, it does take some time.

'Yes, all right, Misha!' I hear you thinking. 'Shut your pie hole and tell us who won already!'

I have to tell you, this was not an easy decision. There were dozens of incredible teams and thousands of ass-kicking submissions. I was blown away by your creativity, enthusiasm and by the chaos you all created. Thanks for being a collective inspiration.

Now. The winner is…

Team 221. They were simply amazing. They went above and beyond, they usually followed the rules, they walked away with the most points and they won. To everyone on Team 221, I look forward to meeting you in Rome for that promised plate of pasta.

Thank you for mostly following the Rules of the Hunt.

And that's why I love you,

Misha.

~oOo~

Sherlock showed John the message on his mobile, eyes narrowed in pleasure at his team's victory. John smiled lazily and tucked his head against Sherlock's shoulder, hitching a leg over his lover's long ones.

"Congratulations, Hunter Holmes-Watson. I had my doubts at first, but you never cease to amaze me. I should have known you'd be a winner."

"Indeed. But I thought I already had won the real prize. So I think I shall claim him, starting... now." John's laugh was quickly muffled as Sherlock rolled over and pressed his mouth to his husband's.

Thank God for scavenger hunts, was the doctor's last thought before the consulting detective drove all others from his mind.

~oOo~

fin

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Notes: Thanks to the prompter, without whose idea I would never have immortalized the madness of The Greatest International Scavenger Hunt The World Has Ever Seen. Also, to the lovable and insane Misha Collins whose brainchild the Hunt was, and from whose emails I freely quoted and redacted.

Special thanks to J., who involved me in GISHWHES by proxy, and with whom I thrashed out the system for choosing challenges for Sherlock to do while we ate British meat pies in a pub in Tokyo. We actually did choose the five John set for Sherlock by random number generator. See, I do strive for authenticity and versimilitude even in my crack.

There, J.! I am glad you liked it. Next time I will definitely sign up for the Hunt!

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Part 1   /  Part 2   /   Part 3   /   Part 4   /   Part 5   /   Part 6   /    Part 7   /   Part 8   / 





Note: The story can be found on LJ, AO3, and FanFic.net, but will not be found on any comms because of the inclusion of Misha Collin's emails. Crossing fictional characters with real living people is considered verboten by fic comms that prohibit Real Person Fics. Which I find slightly ridiculous - I would understand it better if they'd said that because I wasn't the original author of the mails and because I don't have Mr. Collin's explicit permission, they wouldn't share the fic. I am abusing free use for transformative purposes, after all. (Mm. I bet if I asked whether I could use them in a fic that was not ever going to make money, he'd let me. . He only sent them to over 6,000 people after all. But that would be work.) Sigh. I don't want to re-write, and so... it stays as it is.