"My God! You ever clean that thing?"
It had started so simple.
"I did before."
Probably wasn't a good idea to show Sebastian his gun.
"What's stopping you now?" Moran's fingers were just twitched to disassemble and deep clean every part. John wondered if Moran polished bullets too.
"Sherlock kept blowing holes in things when I took it out for any reason."
"Well, he's not around." John swallowed a nasty comment that threatened to bubble up. Sebastian was never going to like Sherlock, and Sherlock was dead so what did it matter? "Tomorrow you come to my flat and we'll have a proper cleaning."
It had started so simple.
John came to Moran's flat for the first time in order to clean his gun for the first time since Sherlock died, and probably well before that. John, having never seen Sebastian's flat, was properly surprised at how sleek and modern it looked, how most of the living room was glass that over looked London, and how Moran had a sniper rifle disassembled on his coffee table, reading to be cleaned and reassembled.
"You really go all out, don't you?" John asked, walking to a seat offered.
"A bit. I try to keep everything in top shape," Sebastian said, pride in his voice. It wasn't work that kept him on such good maintenance, it was his own hubris. Gun nut.
"How many do you have?" John asked.
"Iced tea?" Moran asked.
"Ice tea?"
"I've got a house in South Georgia. The little old lady I lived next to liked to swap recipes," Moran said simply, going and pouring John and himself a glass.
"I forget how strange you are sometimes," John said, accepting his glass as he pulled his gun out and set it on the coffee table. "I can assume you've got the right kit?"
"Give me some credit John, not like I don't have three of these," Moran said.
"Of course you do," John said. "Just how many illegal weapons do you have?"
"I bought them legally," Sebastian said. "You've got no idea how easy it is to buy guns in the Southern United States. I've got the proper licenses and everything."
"How easy?" John asked.
"There's a gun free for public sale which is honest to God a grenade launcher in a more domestic package. I own two," he said.
"You're fucking with me," John said.
"Yeah, I am… I own four," Sebastian said, laughing at the expression John pulls. "Okay, now let me see this baby," he said.
Seb popped the magazine out, setting it aside before starting to disassemble the handgun. He separated the parts, slide off the receiver, barrel, and recoil spring out of the slid and set them aside. "Seriously John, I could beat you for how filthy this thing is. Didn't they teach you anything in the army?"
"Didn't they teach you?" John asked, taking the receiver while Sebastian took the barrel. "Hand me the brush," he said.
"Here," Sebastian said, handing it over while he attached the patch to the cleaning rod. He moved the solvent so they could both reach before dipping the patch into it and starting to clean out with inside of the barrel. "Seriously John, I mean, you can't do this type of shit."
"You're worse than my drill sergeant's mother," John said, earning himself a nasty glare. He dipped his brush in the solvent and started to scrub at the inside, trying to dig into all the crevices and get out all the dust and shavings and powder he'd been letting build up for far too long. "Used to go on and on about how your weapon is you life, and if it's not well oiled you could die."
"You could," Sebastian said. He was taking this far more seriously than John was.
"Not likely here in London."
"If you don't do regular maintenance then it'll fail you when you need it most. What would you have done if you hadn't cleaned it properly and it messed up while you were being chased around London?" he demanded. "What if someone had your detective and was about to kill him?"
John was reminded very suddenly of the Golem, who'd disappeared never to be found. What would John have done if his gun had failed him at that moment because he'd been too stupid to care for it? What about all the other times? What about the time with the cabbie? John had killed a man for Sherlock before, and he would have done it every time if he had to. He suddenly felt very guilty for letting the cleaning go so far.
"You're right, I'm sorry," John said.
"Damn right you are," Sebastian murmured, changing the tip on the rod to the copper brush. John could see the very filthy patches (Sebastian had needed to use more than one) set aside. Yes, he'd really needed to clean before this.
"I won't let this go again."
"I should hope not," Sebastian said. "Especially because I'll be there to remind you to do it."
"Yeah," John said, smiling a bit.
"Do you miss it?" Sebastian asked.
"Miss what?"
"This?" Sebastian said, indicating the table.
"Cleaning?"
"No," Sebastian said, wrinkling his nose a bit at John's very purposeful stupid answer. "Needing them."
"That's a complicated question," John said. "How about answering your own question first."
"My answer isn't complicated. I don't feel separated enough from my job to miss needing them, yet…" He trailed off for a moment and then shrugged. "I doubt I'll ever get to a place where I'll miss it."
"You enjoy it," John said.
"Absolutely."
"That's dangerous with Molly."
"I try to keep her separate from it."
"Snipers don't die of old age," John said. "Not when they're for hire, not if their skills slip."
"You either join some set of government offices, or you do something else completely," Sebastian said. "I'm very good, and I have enough connections to keep my name and face out of it. I'm as safe as it gets."
"Still not safe enough."
"You're train for this too," Sebastian pointed out.
"I probably pick my targets better," John said, moving from the receiver to the slide, allowing Sebastian to do his own cleaning of the receiver for good measure.
"A cabbie who killed a bunch of people and who didn't really have a family, or a bunch of insurgents who attacked a hospital unit?"
"Your level of research is nearing Mycroft Holmes levels of disturbing," John said.
"Well, we aims to please," Sebastian said, smirking a bit. He set the receiver aside and worked on the magazine instead. He just wiped it down with a rag, not using the solvent or anything on it.
"In any case," John said. "Mostly the job of the gunman to stay out of sight."
"If he can help it," Moran said.
"You'd be the one who could. I don't normally," John added. "But then, I'm normally in a situation where I'm not after civilians."
"The cabbie was a soldier?" Moran mused, smirking.
"You know what I mean."
"I do," Sebastian said. "And I note that as good a man as you should not be in the apartment of a sniper who you know does private work that hurts civilians."
"Not everything's good or evil," John said, handing over the slide before starting to as a bit of oil to the receiver where it would be needed for being reassembled.
"Or: it's okay so long as it's you?" Sebastian asked with a smirk.
John glanced over at him, noticing the amount of carefully loving work Sebastian Moran put into cleaning a gun that wasn't even his. There was something almost artful about it, a man who had cleaning down to an exact science, who took pleasure in the chore, and the knowledge of what cleaning meant, and the respect for the instruments that could take life so easily and the magnitude of what that meant, although he felt no guilt for his body count. John recognized himself in that man, though Sebastian had a greater respect, in some ways, for the life and for the instrument. John felt guilty all over again.
"You're not responding," Sebastian said.
"What?"
"I made a terrible joke and you're not saying anything," Sebastian said, not taking his eyes off his work for even a fraction of a second. This was the man who could get anyone, who not just had the great eyesight but the knowledge of how to look.
"You must be very good at your job," John said.
"I am, but there's a good reason for it," Sebastian said.
"Feel like sharing."
"I know why you're staring. You're comparing us. Let me tell you the difference. When you kill someone you feel completely justified and so you sleep fine with no guilt or regret. When I shoot someone I know it's not justified, and I just accept that I'm a terrible person for what I do. I'm honest with myself about who I am."
"You're rather bleak on it."
"Doesn't matter. There's not man alive that should have the power of life and death. That belongs only to the state and to the gods, and that's just reality. Whether I'm a sniper who kills in a war or a sniper who kills as a hired hand, I'm still killing people. I have no right to do this. You kill people in war or to help your friend, and you feel justified. They're bad people, evil, about to hurt someone. You stop a bad situation. You end something before it goes wrong. You're justified."
"You keep saying that."
"The justified kind are also the ones who lead the crusades and the inquisitions. Justified means that you will do anything and everything with no remorse, and that you have the most potential to do the most actual evil. A man like me, who will never see himself as justified will never be the one who guns down a family or a town and not see what I did as wrong."
"You do have a very bleak look. Do you think I would gun down a village?"
"No, but then you've got a lot better control than most men," Sebastian said. "More than I have, that's for sure. You're also possibly a better judge of character than I am, when it really matters." John was again reminded of Sherlock, so much that it hurt.
Sebastian started oiling the slide, letting John oil the barrel. "I would have killed anyone for Sherlock."
"You would have tortured James Moriarty for Sherlock," Sebastian said. John looked over at the other ex-soldier. It was just a feeling he had. For all that Sherlock knew him and understood him and cared about him, Sebastian saw that one part of John that Sherlock could never understand. Sebastian could see exactly what John was capable of with no qualms with what he saw. It was an ugly thing, one John had accepted al long time ago.
"Yes, I would have. I never would have regretted it."
"It's fine," Sebastian said. He took the pieces of the gun, reassembling it with easy before grabbing ab it of polish to work on the outside. "Moriarty was a bastard anyway."
"That's true. Do you think anyone will miss him?"
"Yes," Sebastian said. "Oh, don't be daft," he said, still not looking up from his task. "The people who get a paycheck from him will miss him. The people who he helps will miss him when he's no longer around to fix it. Even if he never had anyone who liked or cared about him, someone would really miss him and the part he played in their lives."
"You're very practical aren't you?"
"Possibly," Moran said. "There, done," he said, slipping the gun over to John, who'd spent the last two minute watching Moran polish while he (John) sipped the ice tea.
"Thank you," John said. "This is delicious by the way."
"I'll trade you the recipe if you'll give me the jam one Mrs. Hudson gave you."
"Fair trade," John said. He leaned back in his chair, letting the conversation end.
Sebastian moved back to the riffle he'd been working on before John arrived. He made no indication of needing John to leave. He was content with the quiet company as he worked anyway. Nothing would distract him from his work. Sebastian mused that he was a bit like James in that respect.
"Thanks," John said after a while.
"You already thanked me for the tea."
"No… for reminding me a bit of who I am… I think I may have not realized I'd displaced a bit of myself when Sherlock died."
"Don't thank me. You're have figured it out on your own. You're not the type to go on forever not in top for."
"Still, nice to get it over with now."
"Well, you can thank me by cleaning your gun more often."
A/N:
Just a one-shot. This fits in I Tried to Spare You, but not really in the story. It's after Sebastian's met John, but before things start to go crazy.
This also is something of a companion piece to Bad Days, although BD is so general about how I see John, that it can fit with basically every Sherlock story I've written. This is specifically with ITSY.
Thank you for reading.