01. An Improbable Case
London, 2:46 am, October 12th 2013.
The night was full of storms. It had been dark and watery the night Sherlock returned, too. The sky mirrored the turmoil of emotions currently clouding John Watson's head; confused and…well, dark. Like shadows, twisting in ribbons. He couldn't help but draw similarities tonight.
(October 5th)
– It had all started with a man stumbling breathless through the door of 221B, twitching and staring, claiming to have travelled through a time portal. John had been entirely ready to dismiss the man as a paranoid schizophrenic, but Sherlock had been Sherlock. He acted as if he'd never left (as he'd been doing ever since he'd got back) and insisted the man tell him every detail.
The man was a runaway from a Yemeni terrorist sect. Was lucid and was telling the truth. Was from the future (he believed that, anyway).
John felt the rain soaking through the material on his shoulders; dripping down his back. His skin felt brittle. It was bitterly cold. Somehow, though, he couldn't bring himself to seek shelter.
– Oh, they'd gone to Lestrade with the ex-future-Yemeni terrorist. They'd needed somewhere to put him and Sherlock was genuinely intrigued. But no one at New Scotland Yard believed a word (oh-so surprisingly).
Even the DI – newly reinstated following Sherlock's exoneration due to the influence of a certain sibling – wanted simply to send him on his way to the nearest psych ward. Until the man, becoming more and more agitated by the minute, started babbling about a hostage.
A woman.
MI5.
Agent Anna Harper.
Held for eight months, captured along with SAS technician Nicholas Eric, later executed by the group.
Recon expert. Extremely dangerous. Sent to observe and stop the development of a particular piece of stolen technology (the time portal machine).
He described the operation in great detail for the limited number of people actually listening.
"John?"
"Hmm?"
"Um…you okay?"
Raindrops on tarmac.
"I don't know, Greg."
- When it came to describing what happened to Anna Harper, however…
The man was coherent enough describing the events leading to her capture (and what sort of information she'd managed to obtain) but then the man started shaking. His eyes had unfocussed and it'd become almost impossible to decipher what he was saying. It was enough, however, to assume she was dead.
John had hoped she was dead.
Sherlock had postulated a trauma brought on by involvement in a genuine organisation and that Anna Harper probably did exist (or had, as the case may be).
They went away, come back, searched the man intensively, went away again, and, to everyone's growing apprehension, came to the conclusion that the man didn't exist. There was no record of him ever having existed. No record of his birth or terrorist involvement (they accessed Mycroft's intelligence in Yemen) and none of the places he described. Not even of the particular group he babbled about.
They were stumped.
More than one person decided to default to position one: the man was a loon who needed to be sent back to whatever hospital he'd wondered off from. Donovan didn't help in the slightest by shouting at Sherlock and continuing the argument which had raged on and off since his grand return.
To which John responded with a defence that surprised even him (given what the selfish git had put him through).
It must have been reflex.
"John…look I know it's not for me to say, but you have to talk to him."
The ex-army doctor avoided the pointed look and stared hard at the ground. It glittered black and gold beneath the streetlamp.
"John?"
"What?"
The DI sighed heavily, voice becoming suddenly very quiet.
"Just talk to him John."
"There's nothing to say. Nothing at all. Why –" He cut short. He didn't know whether he was about to break down or start shouting.
Home.
He couldn't avoid him at home, though.
Sherlock…
(October 7th)
– Mycroft had shown an unusual amount of interest after a few days of them taking the case. At first, John thought it had to do with his operations in the Middle East. He seemed…worried. Genuinely.
John had started worrying too.
Because it was impossible for Mycroft Holmes (of all people) to get emotionally invested in his work, wasn't it?
Then...the murders.
An office woman, late thirties: cyanide poisoning.
A man, early fifties, courier: head-shot with a sniper rifle.
Girls, fourteen and fifteen, both dead at the scene from explosives planted in their shopping bags (one other critically injured in the blast, later to die.)
In total, there were twelve bodies.
All obviously murdered, nothing connecting them save for the fact that they each died within thirty-six hours of one another.
The most horrifying thing of all was the lack of any leads whatsoever. No CCTV, no evidence left at any of the crime scenes, no slip-ups with IDs or witness recognition.
Nothing.
Even Sherlock's observations turned up a blank, though John later suspected he'd worked it out already. Looking back on the fear; the looks he gave to John when he thought John wasn't looking. The pattern must've given it away – a dozen murders, all independent, yet all co-ordinated.
All different, yet together they made a whole.
A web pointing towards the centre…
John's head snapped up. Without explanation to Lestrade, he turned and marched back across the wet carpark, through the doors of the YHA fitness club, and shivered with the blast of warm, conditioned air. He didn't realise he'd stopped until his leg crumpled beneath him.
"John!"
"I'm fine! I'm fine, Greg, just…"
"I'm taking you to the canteen and you're going to have something to eat. Bet you haven't eaten since you two started tonight, right?"
"You sound like me."
"Yeah, well…someone has to."
John fell silent as the DI guided him to the gym's shop.
Closed, of course, but there were places to sit and vending machines. It wasn't until he saw them that he realised how truly tired he was. He sank into an uncomfortable metal chair as if it was a silk chaise and accepted the aero bar and crisps without resistance. Greg then left for a few minutes and returned with a dishevelled-looking Consulting Detective.
Sherlock did resist the food and the sitting down, but for once there didn't seem much fight left in him. He looked numb.
"I've just gotta round up everyone else," Greg's face was taut, but determined. "Get forensics down here and release statements for the ambulance crews."
"What about our statements?"
"If you want to get them hammered out now, that's fine, but I'll understand if you want to wait 'til tomorrow."
"Later today." Sherlock mumbled. Lestrade bit back a groan, but nodded all the same. John was just relieved (more relieved to hear that baritone than he'd ever admit).
"Okay…okay. I'll see you both later, then."
It was as much an 'I'm letting you sneak away from this mess while you can' as anything else.
Sherlock had already tuned him out and settled to staring avidly at the stainless steel table. He was pale as a ghost. To the untrained eye (probably the eyes of most Yarders) he looked a little shaken.
Mostly normal.
Just Sherlock.
John knew better.
"Look –"
"Thinking."
His eyes didn't move.
John tried not to flinch.
He did a poor job.
There was nothing he could do, though. Too tired to pretend he wasn't, he stared at the man for long minutes, taking in the dark mop of curls; the eyes that were currently the colour of sleet in the morning. His still too-thin frame, clad in the black belstaff.
His companion.
His friend.
(October 8th)
– Mycroft had given them the key after the police turned up nothing. Haltingly, he let them see the Classified Files. John remembered that as the point where things stopped making sense.
Normally, even in the strangest of cases, a word from Sherlock and everything would become clear again. Rational. What Mycroft showed them was…impossible. Actually, no, it wasn't just impossible. It was absurd.
None of them believed it.
Mycroft hadn't expected them to.
Nonetheless, he gave them free reign and full access to what they were dealing with (mostly, anyway). Mycroft always had his secrets and there was something about this…
They'd returned to the yard after visiting the British Government…
...to utter chaos.
No. Chaos made it sound as if a few files had been thrown about. A bit inconvenient.
What'd actually happened was that someone had planted a neurotoxin in the coffee. Or the milk. Or the sugar. Or something like that. Anyway, NSY was full of paramedics and the dying when they got back.
How the hell it had happened was beyond anyone's imagination. It was only through blind luck (and quick thinking from a few John hadn't previously thought capable of genuine intelligence) that the buildings hadn't been turned into mass graves.
John hadn't felt so hyperaware since Afghanistan.
The worst came as they'd gone to check the cells. With Sherlock and Greg behind him, John had run, gun in hand. The man who'd stumbled through the door of 221B was visible from the end of the corridor.
Or…half of him was, anyway.
Someone had taken his hands and tied them together so that they could pull his arms up and hang the man upright from the ceiling.
Lower half…no longer attached.
He'd heard Lestrade retching.
After that, events had blurred together. The only good thing that came from attacking the Yard was that it gave Sherlock what he needed.
"Serial killer's always hard. Have to wait for them to make a mistake."
They'd left evidence this time. The poison they'd used had traces of other substances: lead, mercury, sulphur – it'd been mass produced in liquid solution and less than an hour in the lab told Sherlock it contained substantial amounts of a chemical only produced in any significant quantities by runoff from Battersea.
They'd used water from that part of the Thames.
The base had to be close-by.
They'd pulled Mycroft's resources (already primed and ready).
It was quick.
Most of the men they found seemed under orders to commit suicide in the event of discovery, but four were able to apprehended for questioning. They were conscripted London criminals knowing nothing as it turned out; scared out of their wits by something they couldn't name.
Mycroft took custody.
Sherlock made the connection to Yemen by the sand found under their fingernails and on the crates hidden in the sub-basement.
And all the while, John had run through the impossible things in the files on a loop. Because they were actually (horrifyingly) starting to make sense.
They wouldn't have got any further, however, if it hadn't been for the erstwhile Anna Harper. She'd collected almost everything she'd needed to collapse the operation before she and her teammate were captured. Fortunately for Mycroft's team, her work had been recovered. The man himself had been reluctant to explain how he'd acquired the journals, but for the moment simply having them sufficed.
In them was included a complicated series of experiments (acknowledging Nick Eric's help) proving anything that touched the terrorist's…technology…would be infected with a very unique type of radiation. Harmless. If a bit…lingering.
A signature.
With the signature confirmed as persisting on the crates, they proceeded in hunting it down. John felt as if he'd stumbled into a science fiction novel at that point. They found traces in an abandoned warehouse down the docks, but it was a false positive. Sherlock identified movements from around two to three months before, but nothing more recent than that. The place had long since been picked clean.
He'd seemed most despondent then, despite there being no further murders after the attack on the Yard. It'd been almost a week and the strain showed.
John didn't know how to help him.
Twelve hours later the signature was picked up from a youth hostel gymnasium in Croydon. Most of the force turned out to siege the buildings, armed, joined and backed-up by MI5. John wondered how many of the Yarders knew the gravity of what they were doing - it was hard to miss when field agents went in first to detect and disarm traps.
Bullets. Death.
The area had quickly dissolved into a battleground, the terrorists forcing them to pay for every inch. And, of course Sherlock had insisted on sneaking round the back of the building (John with him, obviously) to see what they could find.
"When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be true."
Wasn't that what Sherlock said at Baskerville?
Improbable. There, right in front of them...had been a hole. A literal, very real hole. Floating in mid-air.
A portal through time and space.
...through which Sherlock had stepped without hesitation.
John had felt a tad woozy, so he'd followed Sherlock feeling more than slightly light headed. The portal opened into a sandstone cave network with wires running like arteries all over the walls and ceiling. Somehow, they'd gotten away with finding a computer room (very old models, luckliy; still compatable) and downloading the entire contents of the hard drive onto a small external Sherlock just happened to be carrying cushioned in his coat.
Then they legged it back out.
Fuck science fiction, really.
They were back on their side, though, on the home stretch, when things actually went tits up and John realised that they'd stumbled into a nightmare.
"What d'ya say, Sherlock Homes...up for another round?"
"...you."
John had barely heard the word whispered in Sherlock's breath.
The man was alone. No guards, no snipers (though John wouldn't have bet their lives on that). And yet here he was, scarier than the pitched battle still audible above.
The Spider.
So this was what the terrorists wanted; why Mycroft was so desperate to stop them. Those stupid bastards had gone and –
"Come to gloat?" Sherlock snapped icily.
Moriarty giggled.
"Oh, no, no, no, Sherlock! I'm just in a…very good mood."
John's throat had failed him. Moriarty had stepped forward, eyes on him; smile predatory.
"Hello Jonny Boy. Miss me?"
Sherlock gave an odd sort of…spasm. His face had been bloodless, knuckles white where they held the gun...and Moriarty had laughed as he backed off.
"You know they'll come running if you fire that in here. I wonder what they'll do to John. Can't be worse than what they did to that runaway…"
"What do you want?"
"Oh honey, have you forgotten? We still have our little game to finish."
"The. Game. Ended."
Moriarty's smile vanished.
"No, Sherlock, you CHEATED!" The last word he screamed. "You...cheated. Only fair for a rematch, Sherlock."
"'Rematch?'"
"Oh, but it was such a good cheat," the madman was suddenly smiling again. "You deserve a reward for that."
"What kind of reward?"
"Come here, Sherly," his voice dropped seductively. "Let me tell you…"
John watched in mute horror as Sherlock approached stiffly and let the purring Moriarty whisper something in his ear.
Sherlock didn't react.
Moriarty stepped back, evil mischief dancing about him. If he'd thought it impossible for Sherlock to lose any more colour, he'd been wrong. His face was taut. Sherlock's gun trained between Moriarty's eyes as he backed away.
"So that's it?" John burst out. "This all over again?" Then, on impulse: "Loosing all over again?"
"Oh so sure, Jonny Boy? Ooh, this should be good – did you like my entrance? A little welcome back party I organised." He chuckled like it was some sort of in-joke. "But…" he suddenly checked his watch with an exaggerated wince. "…things to do. Can't hang around here all day! Chou…"
And then he was gone again.
After a few minutes, John had begun to doubt whether he'd been real.
"Come on."
Sherlock's voice was urgent.
The blood didn't return to his face as together they managed to get back. Mycroft's personal men were nothing if not efficient and only a short while later, MI5 routed the terrorists.
They were there to make sure the area was secured. End of.
All John really acknowledged of the immediate aftermath was Lestrade's indignation about the portal room being absolutely Off Limits to his team. People ran round doing things: paramedics, policemen, agents…with him and Sherlock standing numbly in the middle. After a while, they cornered Lestrade and Mycroft (who turned up in person for the occasion) and broke the news.
Lestrade swore violently.
Mycroft looked gravely unsurprised.
And Sherlock had said something sarcastic, callous and generally ill-timed and John, unable to take any more, had shouted bitterly. He'd said things he didn't mean entirely and stormed out of the room, out of the building, and into the freezing rain.
"I'm sorry."
Sherlock's breath seemed to hitch.
John was mesmerised by the way the detective looked slowly up from the table, his eyes silver with the barest hint of blue. Like the colour that forms at the edge of glacial ice. So many times John had looked at them and it'd been like trying to stare through a brick wall. Or to see something there when in fact the detective was miles away. Always they were a puzzle all of their own. Enigmatic. Closed. Now they were deeper than the bottom of the sea, lost; holding to John's as if he were a lifeline.
At long last something seemed to break, and the astonishing eyes shut exhaustedly.
"We'll have to burn our clothes."
John frowned.
"The radiation will have infected us quite thoroughly, I fear."
"Bugger."
The doctor let out the faintest chuckle.
"You know, Sometimes I think you do this on purpose just to ruin my jumpers."
"You make me sound so vindictive. I always leave your favourite ones! Unless of course they're truly terrible, proving once and for all your truly appalling taste in attire. In which case my destroying them would be something of a relief to the world."
"Just because you wonder around London in silk shirts! Anyway, if you had your way I'd walk out the flat in a bed sheet. And you think I have bad fashion sense."
Sherlock rolled his eyes, but John could see the smile lingering on his lips. The tension, so harsh between them since the Fall (a term the tabloids used and which had ended up sticking like a limpet) seemed to melt suddenly away like dust blown in the wind.
Odd how it took near complete cataclysm to break down that inexplicable wall, but John felt, for all that'd happened, suddenly…alright again.
The blood on the floor ran fresh.
He let loose an honest, unexpected smile.
Him and Sherlock, smiling in the storm's eye.
It was when they were outside Baker Street that the other man stopped suddenly, giving John a look the doctor couldn't quite see in the half light.
He was too tired to even try to process it, though, just grateful they were no longer ignoring these in-between moments. It was like trying to sleep on the floor: possible, but begrudgingly, and eventually you screwed your back. Eventually you remembered you didn't have to be sleepless. Alone because you were stubborn.
He put a hand on Sherlock's shoulder and squeezed gently before opening the door.
...home.
A.N: just edited this. Really needed it once again. So: Johnlock, little bit of time travel (though only a bit, still working out the kinks in organising the cannon), swearing, sex, violence and my first attempt at a whodunit. Think I've got this chapter down at last. Reviews, my lovelies? (and thank you to those that have already reviewed :)
Edit 1.3