SPOILERS for Series 3! If you keep reading and you haven't seen it, not my fault for spoiling things. You have been warned.

Rated M – for language, mentions of drug use, angst, and sexual situations. This scene has been playing in my head since seeing HLV. Am I alone in loving bad-ass Molly?

Probably a one-shot. Please review. Any thoughts and constructive criticism are always welcomed. BTW - I promise I have not given up on Loss. I've got half of the next chapter written, but this little piece just could not get out of my head.

The Choice

"I need your help for a case." The detective's baritone voice sounded behind her from the door to the lab. She hadn't heard his voice for weeks since the Magnussen affair which was a good thing for Sherlock. Molly didn't know if she could spend more than a few minutes in his presence without getting angry at him.

Molly looked up from the corpse on which she was working. Straightening her back and looking in front of her, the pathologist refused to turn around. Refused to look at him. Refused to let him see how disappointed she still was by his weakness to start using again.

"Piss off, Sherlock." Her voice no longer squeaked out – mousy, weak, and high-pitched, but dropped down to that tone Sherlock had learned was her danger register. "I'm busy."

"Would there be any use of saying that I'm sorry?" The dark haired man knew that saying one was sorry often worked on people. It was worth a shot anyway.

Molly stared at the wall right in front of her. "No."

"No?" Sherlock tilted his head as he considered the slim woman in her white lab coat. Her long brown hair smooth and pulled back neatly in a pony-tail. He was tempted to reach out an touch it, but then Molly spoke.

"No. Because I'm not in the mood for your manipulative bullshit tonight."

Sherlock sighed in aggravation and started to walk around to the other side of the corpse.

"Don't." Molly's word stopped him in his tracks.

"I want you to look me in the eye and say 'No' to me."

"Fucking hell," Molly swore under her breath and laid down her tools before spinning around and shifting the safety glasses up to her head. "No, Sherlock. No, I will not help you. You can find another pathologist to manipulate. I. Am. Busy."

Sherlock stepped closer and let a smirk slide up the left side of his face. It was a trick that had worked in the past. But instead of turning Molly Hooper in to a mess of fluttering eyelashes with a sweet grin, Molly's mouth was set and straight.

"Piss off. I will not help you when you're high."

"I am not high."

Molly narrowed her eyes as she considered him. Then, without a word, she pulled off her bloodied gloves, stomped over to a cupboard, opened its door, and pulled out a little cup. Rounding back at Sherlock, she held the cup out to him.

"Piss off or piss in the cup."

Sherlock scoffed and looked away, but Molly stood her ground. "It's your choice. I really don't care which one you do. But you are going to make a choice in the next minute and act on it, or I call security."

Sherlock watched Molly take her phone out of her lab coat with her free hand and pull up the number. He stared at her – stunned.

"Forty-five seconds." Molly's voice was calm and cool.

Without a word, Sherlock stepped up and took the cup from her hand. She put her mobile away and followed him as he stalked to the gents toilet. With his longer legs, Molly had to jog behind him to keep up. Just as the door should have closed, he heard it swing open again. He turned and saw Molly standing there – arms crossed in front of her chest.

"Wrong toilet." He said, echoing his words to that awful Kitty Riley.

"Someone has to witness that it is really your piss going into that cup. Since its three in the fucking morning, I guess that will have to be me."

"You don't trust me? Want to search my pockets? Want to frisk me?" As he said as he sauntered over to her, dropping his voice seductively.

"You're not that stupid to put it in your pockets – it wouldn't read the right temperature on the screen."

"Oh, you know me so well, do you? What would I do then, to trick the screen?"

Molly didn't miss a beat. "You'd pay 50 quid to one of your clean homeless network for a small bag of piss that you've got strapped to your inner thigh. That keeps it warm. Then, when you're asked for a sample, you unzip, take the little tube connected to the bag, and fill up the cup."

Sherlock shook his head and gazed down at Molly in shock as she continued.

"As it is, you'll drop your trousers and pants. Once I'm satisfied that you're not concealing any decoy urine, I'm going to watch your cock as you fill up this cup. Only then will I test it."

The expression on Sherlock's face fell as he gripped the cup harder and harder before finally throwing it across the room. The cup ricocheted - hitting the wall and falling to the floor. His yell followed - echoing around the tiled space.

Molly stepped up to him – eyes blazing. "When you can prove you're clean, I will help you – not before. And for the record, I ended my engagement – not Tom. So, if you think that I'm in some sort of weakened state after being rejected, you are sorely mistaken, Sherlock Holmes."

Before Molly realized what was happening, Sherlock grabbed her arm and pulled her body into his. He kissed her hard and slow trying to show her how much he really needed her. When he pulled away, Sherlock gazed down at her. However, he was so distracted by searching for her reaction in her face that he never saw the reaction coming from her fist. Molly's bony knuckles contacted with Sherlock's jaw – making his teeth rattle.

He looked at her with a combination of renewed respect and frustration. When he was high, his violent side was not so tempered with what little judgment his sober self possessed. If Mycroft angered him while he was high, he'd happily snap his arm like the twig it was. Only John had been Mycroft's savior that day.

But Molly was different, she'd slapped him three times when he was high; and he had taken every one of them – his only retaliation being verbal. Now, she stood before him with her fist still clenched. Sherlock's face throbbed from her punch. Even though she had struck him, he could never raise a hand to hurt her.

As she stepped back and started leaving the toilet, Sherlock called out, "That doesn't change the fact that you still love me."

Turning on her heels, Molly's voice shook. "I will always love your mind, your soul. The other things that people love you for: your face, your hair, your body, and even your voice are simply window dressing. Do you think that if you had all your physical features and not your mind that I could love you? Your mind and your soul make you Sherlock Holmes – nothing else. And until you stop killing yourself – killing your mind and soul with this filth – you will stay the fuck away from me."

And with that, Molly was gone. Sherlock closed his eyes in defeat. Hands reaching for his belt, he dropped both trousers and pants before breaking the string located high around his right upper thigh. Taking the bag of yellow liquid, Sherlock threw it into the bin. Then he pulled up his trousers making himself presentable again. Washing his hands in the sink, Sherlock looked up and focused on his reflection: face haggard, eyes tired, Sherlock let out a roar before punching the mirror with all his might. As he slid down the wall opposite the mirror and watched the blood come to the surface of his hand, glass flakes in the flesh glimmering in the harsh toilet lights, Sherlock hung his head.

Molly loved him. She'd just said as much. But her love had given him the choice: the drugs or her. As Sherlock felt his salty tears stinging the bloody wounds on his hand, his tears came out harder. He didn't know if he was strong enough to make the right one.