Okay. Hello first. This is somehow my first "real" fic in English. I didn't choose the easiest way to start but that's not the matter here. Mycroft Holmes is a very complex character and I apologize if it is not really in-character. I'm more used to write more or less under John's point of view. Any constructive criticism is welcome, on the character itself as well as for my English. Remember I'm French and I'm always trying to improve. This one-shot has been beta-ed but my beta is also French, so please, forgive us if there is any mistake in it. Thank you very much, and enjoy your reading ^^

Four Times Mycroft Repressed His Tears

And One Time He cried

o~o~o

Mycroft never cried. Never since his childhood. He learned really young that showing tears equalled to weakness and that he must never let one roll down his face. But there were few times he really wanted, really needed to cry but didn't let go. And one time he did.

o~o~o

The first time, he was around eight or nine years old. He was in the school yard and like many young boys he was playing, in his own way. His classmate used to call him a weirdo because he liked to read. He particularly enjoyed readings related to politic or war strategists and strategic culture in general. A group of boys marched on him, mocked him and tore his journal where he kept newspapers articles as he was adding new ones to it, sitting down in the shade of a tree. He looked up at them, a knot of powerless rage gnawing his stomach. Their wild and mean grins disappeared as soon as they saw that he wouldn't cry. Even after they left, when the gnawing became a soundless scream in his throat, silently collecting the torn pages, Mycroft didn't allow himself to have the slightest inch of his vision blurred by tears.

o~o~o

The second time, Mycrot had turned fifteen exactly one week ago. And two years ago, Sherlock had entered what would become a permanent rebelling state, refusing to listen to his parents and sometimes his brother. It still was the blessed era when Sherlock liked and admired his older brother. So Sherlock was a rebelling child and was often punished. The only moments the Holmes family could see the young boy behaving was when Mycroft announced that he had a fencing competition. Mycroft knew his little brother had a fascination for fights - the numerous phone calls from the school were enough to prove it. All the family welcomed these competitions: thanks to them, they could enjoy what you could call peaceful and normal moments. That day, Mycroft knew that Sherlock wasn't behaving. He couldn't feel his piercing gaze on his neck, not all the time like he usually did. His heart was screaming something was wrong with this but like always, he chose to follow his brain. The competition, he had to focus on it. He sat down on the bench, and glanced in direction of his family was installed. Mummy, Daddy who was coming for a quick chat, but no traces of Sherlock.

He feigned to be relieved to know that Sherlock was just on a trip to the toilets. When it was his turn again, Mycroft eyed Sherlock's empty seat and again, something was really wrong about this. The boy was far too impressed by his brother during these moments that he wouldn't care if everything around him was blowned up, so he must have felt sick enough to miss the show. During this round, Mycroft couldn't focus, his gaze inevitably sliding to the place Sherlock should be instead of watching his opponent. Twenty minutes later, Mycroft finished the competition in second place. And Sherlock was still missing. Mycroft ran to the toilets to find him lying down on the tiled floor, beaten up, his face covered in blood. The stupid boy was at that time often blinded by his pride to see a trap, and when a slightly older boy had insulted Mycroft, Sherlock instantly stood to defend him and he pretended to go to the toilet to fight. Mycroft had never followed his heart and his natural instincts since he learnt to follow his brain. And never it has failed him. This was the first time, and it was new. Bitterly new. Four days later, Sherlock would be back home from the hospital and three months after this incident, he would take his first boxing lesson. But while waiting for the ambulance, he held Sherlock close to him, Daddy trying desperately to reassure Mummy. All his tears and rage curled up in a giant knot in his throat. His thought at the precise moment was that he had no right to cry for it was his fault if Sherlock was injured. Mycroft was hurt in his pride of big brother because he failed to protect Sherlock.

o~o~o

Mycroft was alone when the third time occured. Sherlock just left the room after spending two hours listening to him reading. Reading the last letter their father left. Mycroft had tried to know what Sherlock felt, because he was certain of that: their father's death had affected the adolescent. Sherlock was then fourteen and Mycroft twenty-one. Long ago, Sherlock had closed his heart and mind to his older brother and after he ended his lecture, he looked at his young brother, sitting in the armchair in front of him, knees pulled up under his chin, arms wrapped around his legs. His favourite position to think. Mycroft really tried but in the end, he couldn't know, couldn't read how much and in what measure this sudden death had affected him. Sherlock was at war with their father, and so did Mycroft, but in a very different way. Sherlock was a wild, delicate, brutal, complex, sophisticated creature and at this moment his face was unreadable.

Their father never seemed to never understand why Sherlock didn't behave, why he had to skip school, why he had to steal things, why he performed weird or gross experiments sometimes on himself, and over the time, it led them in a perpetual conflict, made of screams, shouts, sometimes tears from their father, slamming doors, broken objects and it always ended up with Sherlock storming out of the house or locking himself in the attic, spending the rest of the night looking at the stars. For his part, Mycroft's little war against his father looked more like the Cold War. Who was playing the USA and who was the Soviet Union, they will never know. And reading this letter had changed so much things in the opinion he had of his father.

Basically, the letter said that he wasn't a flawless man and that he could have loved them in a better way but unfortunately, he never learnt this better way. That even during these endless fights they had, he still cherrished them. And that he couldn't ever dream of better sons. He also wished them a life full of love. Then was written a trembling sorry -he was probably crying when he wrote this- and after this followed a list of his belongings divided between the two of them. And this is how Mycroft ended up alone before the fire, avoiding the last lines of the post-scriptum as long as he could.

Son. I will ask you just one last thing: you are the head of the family now, your brother and your mother will need you to be strong, brave. Don't cry.

So did Mycroft, his hands slightly shaking from the effort. He took in a sharp breath, and opened the funeral urn, the wind sweeping away his father's ashes in the grey light of this autumn's day.

o~o~o

For the fourth time, Mycroft was at work. He was one of the youngest men to work for the British Government since ten years already. The day had been very long, full of bows, excessive politeness, false smiles. Mycroft was sitting in his leather armchair, a glass of whiskey next a pile of files. He was about to affix his signature when his personal assistant burst in his office, completely disheveled, a panicked expression on her face. She handed him a phone.

"Phone call for you sir. It's important."

Mycroft assumed it was for work, and he only raised his eyebrows, clearly asking for more precisions.

"How important ?"

"It's your brother, sir."

Mycroft's face went suddenly blank. He grabbed the phone and he didn't recognize his voice when he talked. Three hours later, at Sherlock's bedside, he couldn't believe that this scrawny and ethereal creature was his young brother. Mycroft shook his head, partly to stay awake and partly because the idea that his brother nearly died couldn't sink in him. Twenty-five years old was too young to die.

Officially, Sherlock fell in the drug trap only four years ago. It was the lie Mycroft made up for Mummy. But the reality was he started drugging himself almost two years after Daddy's death. Mycroft was sincerely amazed Sherlock didn't managed to have health troubles earlier. He was like this strange uncle some people had in their family, this uncle who doesn't want to quit smocking and who won't die with cancer. Of course he tried to make him go to rehab, even by force. But nothing seemed to work.

Accidental overdose. A bitter laugh escaped his mouth as his eyes focused on the tube in his brother's throat. He stopped breathing by himself on the hospital way and even if he was now stable, they had to wait for him to wake up. Sherlock always was a light sleeper, and he accidentaly took too much sleeping pills. Another laugh. Mycroft didn't know if he could take this as a suicide failed attempt or as a real accidental overdose. You never know with Sherlock.

A sad smile twitched his lips as he brushed a finger on Sherlock's forehead, arranging a little the damp curls. A quick glance to his watch told him he had still four hours before giving a phonecall to Mummy. He leaned back in the chair, clenching his hand into a fist. He sucked in a ragged breath and the chair hit the floor with a loud noise the moment a muffled sound came from Sherlock.

"Don't try to speak. They had to intubate you."

Sherlock blinked a few times, having difficulties to focus his attention. Mycroft waited for him to nod that he understood what he just said. Sherlock chose to grunt.

"Idiot."

He used the time he took to pick up the chair to hold back the burning sensation in his eyes, as well as he swallowed back the knot in his throat.

o~o~o

"You cannot hide from the world. This is not how it works."

Mycroft looked up to his companion. Gregory was tired. Just out from work apparently, his tie loosely wrapped under his turned up collar and a beer in one hand. A flash of white long fingers turning up a high dark collar crossed his mind. The DI sighed, stroking the back of his head.

"Just go talk to him."

"I can't."

Mycroft instinctively grabbed Gregory's wrist with both hands as he felt one hand clenching into a fist on his shirt. The look in Lestrade's eyes froze him.

"Go and talk to him."

Two days. It was hard, but Mycroft couldn't bring himself to go there. Until now. He was waiting there, in front of the mantlepiece, standing for once in his life in an awkward manner. Mrs Hudson let him in. John was normally on his way back from work. Mycroft had conviced the doctor to stay in the flat through Mrs Hudson. That was one of Sherlock's last wishes.

"What are you doing here ?"

The tone was cold. Sharp. Mycroft turned to face John, his fingers tightening around his umbrella's handle in his back. It took him two goes to finally produce a sound, his heart hammering loud in his ribcage and his head, covering for once the well-oiled mechanical sound of his brain.

"I…" he began, his voice unsteady. "I wanted… Condolences. I am sorry."

Mycroft thought that once he would've said it, the weight on his shoulders would disappear. But it was still here. And John's laugh made it even heavier.

"I don't care about your condolences. I don't care about your excuses. Just get out of here."

"John, I-"

The doctor lifted one hand, the other one fisted.

"No, just shut up. I thought that you would have the decendy to let me mourn him. Let the people who really cared for him alone. You said you cared, constantly. But if you really were his brother you…" John's voice broke and he had to take a deep breath. "For many, like the media, or his clients, it was a suicide. For me, it was a murder. Maybe you weren't on this rooftop, maybe it wasn't your first intention to harm She- to harm him. But that's what you did Mycroft. You gave Moriarty the right weapons to destroy your own brother. Your blood, your flesh ! For God's sake !"

Mycroft was nearly not breathing now. When John's voice rose again in the thick silence, it was full of the tears he'll never shed, alone in the dark empty flat nor in front of anyone.

"You killed him. You pushed him and he'll never come back and it's your fault."

Again, silence fell. There was nothing left to say. Mycroft knew John was right. And whatever he wanted to say wouldn't bring him back. He didn't know how he left, all he knew was that he was alone in the leather backseat of his car. Mycroft absently looked outside the window. The night was falling on London. His gaze was sliding onto the street lights, the couples sharing an umbrella, hurrying back in the comfortable warmth of their lives in their flat where children waited for them, the workers carrying crates and heavy boxes of food or this tall and lean silhouette, hastily retreating back in the shadows…

Mycroft sat straight back up, his hands pressed against the glass of the window. Despite the fact the car had stopped at the red light, even so he couldn't find any trace of that silhouette in the crowd. Leaning back with a soft laugh of desolation, he felt that this time he wouldn't have the strength. This time, Mycroft Holmes didn't fight back the need to cry, the urge to let out this undying suffering of not being the big brother he should have been. To let out the excruciating pain of accepting the unbelievable yet hurtful truth. John was right. He killed Sherlock.

Hours later, when Gregory came back to his flat, he found the man curled up in a corner of his bedroom. He had cried himself to sleep for the first time of his life. The DI was pretty sure to find him that way, after the call he got from John. He had forced Sherlock's brother to talk to the doctor for both their good. He carried him to the bed and stayed next to him until his sleep became peaceful, without any tears.

Thank you for reading ^^ I hope you had at least a nice time reading my little work. Maybe there'll be more in the future, I hope with your help. Again thank you, and I'll be glad to talk with you via PM if you want to discuss more about Mycroft or Sherlock in general. Thank you - Whity