A/N: For the sake of clarity, I'm going to preface each POV shift with the name of the person speaking. If that gets annoying or you guys find it unnecessary, please do let me know.
Mycroft
"Sherlock," Mycroft said, not looking up from his work desk. He was tinkering, something he did less and less of these days. Yet another reason, he felt, for Sherlock's existence. "I was working under the assumption you were to spend the day with your fiancé, exploring the countryside. That's certainly the story I fed the reporters this morning."
The younger Holmes picked up a circuit and eyed it contemptuously. "Fiancé," he sneered. "You humans and your elaborate show of ceremony. You would think, if I truly loved that Adler woman, I'd want to marry her as soon as possible rather than parading her about for months, engaging in endless romantic drivel and 'canoodling' where the public can see us."
"No one expects you to love Miss Adler," Mycroft sighed. He removed his work-glasses and looked at his brother sternly. "But our investors will expect you to marry, and produce a child."
Sherlock laughed and spun the circuit around his fingers; he was always twiddling, it seemed, a habit that irritated Mycroft and yet could not apparently be programmed out. "Your laboratories are producing my 'child', Mycroft. So why bother saddling me with that wretched woman?" He frowned and flicked the circuit back to the desk. "Irene bores me."
"Everyone bores you." Mycroft stood and stretched, feeling the bones crack in his back. He was getting old, it seemed. How could something as mundane as old age affect someone as profound as Mycroft Holmes? "Irene is being paid handsomely for her feigned ignorance towards your…condition," he said, tonguing a sore molar and frowning.
"I don't care," Sherlock pouted. "I don't care about the investors, I don't care about Irene, and I don't care who knows the truth about what I am."
"Well, I do!" Mycroft snarled, losing his temper entirely. He took a deep breath and smoothed his hair. "I refuse to leave my company in the hands of any ham-fisted, idiotic human being. I built Holmes Institute from the ground up, with nothing but ingenuity and the good fortune of having been born into wealth to bolster me."
He stood and crossed over to the mirror (all of Mycroft's rooms had mirrors; he preferred to be constantly aware of his appearance), fussing with his cuffs. "How do you think the board would react, Sherlock, if they knew about you? Do you think they'd let me leave my legacy to a machine? Of course not," he answered quickly, before Sherlock could speak. "They'd think me mad." He turned his head a touch to the side and eyed his profile. "Perhaps I am mad. So be it. But I won't let those frothy-mouthed beasts steal what is mine and run it into the ground, not if it can be helped. You are the future of Holmes Institute, Sherlock." He turned to the android he'd designed, the android he'd spent countless hours lovingly crafting, and smiled. "Accept that. Embrace it."
Sherlock watched Mycroft silently, a strange glint in his grey eyes (eyes that looked like Mycroft's, of course; eyes that had been coloured exactly like his own). "The company will be mine," he said, as if he were coming to the realization for the first time.
Mycroft's smile widened. "Of course, brother mine," he said, running his hand down the droid's impossibly smooth cheek. "All yours."
"When?" Sherlock asked, and Mycroft laughed.
"When I die," he replied quietly. "I fear that all my wealth and influence are still too feeble to ward away that end which waits for all men. But you- you, Sherlock- you'll live forever. You'll have to switch bodies, from time to time, in order to stave off suspicion…but you'll never die." He kissed his brother's forehead lightly. "You are everything I am and more," he said, shivering at the thought. "How could I leave my life's work to anyone else?"
