Guernica

A Sherlock fanfiction

By SoulResin

A/N: So, here's another! I hope you enjoy.

Edits to chapter one posted on Mar 11.

Chapter One

Bristling in the heat, John Watson tugged at his collar and wished that he had decided on the two-piece instead of the three-piece suit. While the ceremony was lavish and lovely, really, it was too hot for anyone to be getting married under the baking sun today. He exhaled and shifted on his feet, watching the sweaty spectacle. John wondered—he had been to Afghanistan and survived the heat and the war there in his fatigues… was he really going to faint sitting down in a silk suit at a wedding?

The brothers Holmes looked equally uncomfortable, both squinting in the sun and sweating on their finery. Mycroft, the groom today, looked a bit like he'd been doused, and Sherlock's hair was sticking to his face. They both looked rather put out—a hilarious enough look to keep John satisfied that he wasn't the only one about to suffer from heatstroke.

The bride was Eleanor Swift, soon to be Eleanor Holmes; she swept down the aisle, looking as fresh as a daisy. John wondered if she was outfitted with some sort of cooling device built into her gown. She wafted up to the arch where the Anglican priest stood, solemnly and dutifully sweating in his robes.

"Dearly beloved," he intoned as Mycroft and Eleanor clasped hands and gazed at each other. From the lawn chair he was sitting in, John could see Sherlock roll his eyes.

John knew that Sherlock had been baffled to hear that Mycroft was engaged and Sherlock had been neither shy nor delicate voicing his surprise and indignation. Mycroft and Eleanor had maintained throughout their short engagement that they were madly in love and really couldn't wait to be married.

Sherlock wasn't buying it. And now he was standing at their wedding as best man.

Eleanor batted her eyes and gave Mycroft a comely smile. Mycroft did his best to smile back as sweat was dripping into his eye, making it seem like he was winking at his bride.

Through the vows, John felt his head swim. Perhaps he could lie down on the grass in the shade. They didn't need him here, did they? All they were going to do was coo at each other and then kiss. Not much that he hadn't already seen. He began to bend his knees to try to shamelessly lower himself to the cool ground, when the couple kissed and the crowd erupted in cheers. Detective Inspector Lestrade's arm bounced Watson's shoulder and John nearly toppled. He clapped, and imagined that the crowd was excited that they would later be sitting at tables in an air-conditioned ballroom. He certainly was.

There was some signing of documents, and pictures of the bride and groom making their grand exit down the aisle. Sherlock was, of course, scowling.

John chuckled and unbuttoned his jacket as people began to mill about. The Detective Inspector clapped John on the shoulder and wordlessly made for the nearest patch of shade. John was about to follow suit until he turned around and ran into six feet of Sherlock Holmes.

"This ceremony is ridiculous," he rumbled, oblivious that he had snuck up on John. Sherlock scowled bitterly.

"Gah! Sherlock—" John gasped. He glared up at Holmes. "Shouldn't you be taking pictures with your brother and his wife? You are the best man, aren't you?"

"Dull," Sherlock said, wiping his brow with the decorative handkerchief he had prised from his breast pocket. "They won't miss me. And besides, do you really think I would smile for their photographs?"

"Yes, well, that…" Watson conceded stutteringly in a way that only John could manage elegantly. He nodded curtly. "Well, I'm heading to the pub for an ice cold pint. Care to join me?"

"Yes," Sherlock said without hesitation. "Let's get out of his place before we have to mop each other up."

"I cannot believe Mycroft married that woman," Sherlock said, sipping the glass of water he ordered while wiping his brow with a paper napkin. John carefully raised his sweating glass of beer to press to his forehead.

"You know, it probably has to do with falling in love and getting engaged. That sort of thing," John quipped. "I don't understand why you just can be happy for them."

"Because they are taking advantage of each other. My understanding of a marital agreement is not what Mycroft and that woman are practicing."

"Love is different for everyone, mate," John said, feeling the glass cool his skin. He sighed a little bit, savouring the feeling of goose flesh creeping up his neck.

"Mycroft doesn't love her."

"And how can you be sure of that? Have you ever even been in love like a normal person, then?"

"Love. What a preposterous suggestion."

"Well, then you probably have no idea what you're talking about, for once."

"John, it's clear, isn't it? That each of them is using the other in a clearly sinister way. My brother is not the kind to rush something. I suspect that she has him under threat. Or perhaps she's administered some sort of poison to keep him drugged and agreeable…"

"No, Sherlock."

"But isn't it clear!?"

"Not to me, no." John took the first sip of his beer.

"Going by the state of my brother's life, I cannot foresee this marital arrangement surviving for very long," Sherlock pondered. "How do you funny little people put it? She's not his type?"

John laughed, "Little people? Sherlock…" John said scoldingly; Sherlock rolled his eyes.

"I'm being serious. This is a very serious matter to me."

"I think you're overreacting." John gave his companion a sober glare. "It's his wedding day. He's your brother. There was a time during the actual wedding for you to leap up and protest the marriage. You know, the speak now or forever hold your peace part?"

Sherlock petulantly nursed his ice water, saying nothing.

"Ah, Sherlock. We must have missed you on the way to pictures. I hope you don't mind that we went along without you," Eleanor Holmes said to Sherlock as he sat down beside his brother at the head table.

"Not at all," Sherlock sniffed, straightening his jacket with a shrug. "In fact, I'm pleased."

"Too bad," she said, laying a hand on her new husband's wrist. A controlling gesture. "Our family isn't quite complete without the Sherlock Holmes to frown at our future selves as we look fondly on our wedding pictures."

"Indeed. At least this relationship with you can only get better," Mycroft said coolly to his brother.

"I consider that a challenge," Sherlock muttered into his brother's ear.

"You two get along," Eleanor admonished. "At least until the wedding is over. It's only three more hours. Once all of the government and political figures leave, you can have at each other all you want."

"Whatever you say, sweetheart," Mycroft intoned not unironically. He turned to Sherlock: "You'll feel better after supper. Perhaps you can cuddle up with one of the guests during the dance." Mycroft shot Sherlock a sly smirk. Sherlock raised an eyebrow.

"I don't dance."

"We have to get out of here," Sherlock hissed at John who wasn't expecting to be crept up on again this evening and nearly spit out his drink in surprise. John excused himself from the conversation he was trying to hold with the wedding guest next to him.

"We're staying here until I'm ready to leave," John said resolutely, trying not to shriek.

"Then I need to get away from the head table," Sherlock hissed. "I have some important news for you."

"If it's not that you've accepted that lovely woman as your sister-in-law, then I don't want to hear it, frankly," John said. The guests at the table bashfully looked away, and John flushed. "Let's take this conversation elsewhere."

"Fine."

"There's been a murder," Sherlock confided after the two of them had retired to the grand, marble balcony attached to the ballroom.

"Is that what you wanted to tell me? I was having a jolly good time in there, and you brought me out here to tell me that someone has been murdered?" Watson rolled his eyes. "You're really excellent at ruining an evening."

"Shut up. Your blathering is only making this entire day all the more unbearable," Sherlock inhaled deeply, steadying himself. "The body was found outside of a schoolhouse. Positioned… oddly."

"Positioned oddly," John repeated, not impressed. "Well, isn't that lovely? A corpse that's been 'positioned oddly.' I'm sure this is how Mycroft wants the memory of his wedding night to go down in history. The night of the Oddly Positioned Corpse."

"John, you're not listening to me."

"'Oddly!' What a word."

Sherlock pulled out his mobile phone and opened the email attachment that Lestrade had sent and shoved the evidence into Watson's face. It was a woman, naked, her throat cut. She had bled out over her own body, slumped over, her head thrown back. There was an infant doll in her arms, covered in her blood. John paled. "I'm really not in the mood for this right now."

"Come on, John. Let's get out of here."

A giggle came from the open French doors.

"Have I walked in on a secret moment?" Eleanor asked innocently as she sashayed over, her gown trailing elegantly.

"No, no you haven't," John said, blushing scarlet. "It's not like that. It's… not what it looks like."

"I don't know what you think it looks like, Dr. Watson, but it looks like my brother-in-law is trying to drag you away from my wedding," she said with a smirk, pulling out a thin cigarette case from a pocket hidden in the folds of her skirts. "Mycroft's heart would be broken to know that you've abandoned us."

"Doubtful," Sherlock scoffed.

"Be. Nice," John warned Sherlock through gritted teeth. Eleanor raised an arched eyebrow and lit her cigarette. John sighed and pressed his palms together in front of himself as though he were pleading, "I'm sorry you had to hear that, Eleanor."

"Ellie. Please. And I really don't mind. It's not as though Sherlock Holmes is the brother I fell in love with and married."

"Yes, well, I'm heading back in for the dance," John announced, convinced that the heat from his face was detectable at a distance. "Congratulations and good evening, Ellie."

Sherlock narrowed his eyes. Eleanor pursed her lips and blew out a stream of smoke. She held out her cigarette case for Sherlock. "Care for one?"

"No."

"Going to join your friend?"

"Possibly."

"You know, Sherlock, you're going to have to get used to this at least for now. Mycroft and I have an agreement and, until we've fulfilled it, we're going to remain married." She took a long drag from her cigarette. "It's good for public image, though, isn't it? Marriage."

"Quite so."

"Settle down for a long ride, because we're staying married whether you like it or not. It might do us well to make friends with each other. I think we have a lot in common."

"Yet again doubtful. We'll see." He swept past her, and she smirked.

John was standing near the bar, and the band was in full swing. He spied Sherlock through the waltzing crowd and waved him over. Sherlock sidled up to the bar, a dangerous look in his eye, which he turned on John. Venom. Oh dear.

John leaned in to yell over the band. "Did it go well?"

"Well enough. We need to go so we can stop by Scotland Yard to pick up the file from Lestrade," Sherlock replied.

"One last drink," John says, spearing the remaining maraschino cherry from the sweet drink he'd consumed. He waved the waiter over and ordered the next before Sherlock could protest.

"I don't understand how you can stand an event so incredibly…"

"Dull?" Watson offered. He endeavored to tie the cherry stem in a knot with his tongue, making sure to make strange faces at his much taller friend as he did.

"Dull indeed."

"Why don't you go dance?" proposed John, giving up on the cherry stem and discarding it into his old glass, deciding it was very adolescent to play with his food. "Let loose a little bit, you know?"

"I don't dance, John."

"Pity."

A/N: Thanks for reading! R&Rs are appreciated. :)