Break My Heart
Author's Note: I got this idea for a short one-shot after watching a clip of Mycroft and Sherlock from "His Last Vow", which I sadly do not own. This concept has been swimming around in my brain for a while but now felt like the right time to put it down on paper and stick it online. Just a warning, if you are put off by explicit incest, please do not even bother to go past the author's note – there is incestuous Mycroft-Sherlock sex in this story. This is set after the series three finale, but is a Mycroft/Sherlock centric story and has John living back at 221b after Mary's death during childbirth, though I only touch on this as I didn't want it to be a completely overriding element of the story. If this is acceptable to you and – I don't know – maybe even intrigues you just a little, please do read and then, just for the hell of it, leave me a review.
Thank you and I do hope this story entertains you,
DaenerysTargary3n (Follow me on Twitter La_BellaBorgia and/or Instagram username: labellaborgia)
Ever since he had heard those words unexpectedly fall from his usually supercilious older brother's lips the consulting detective had not been able to sleep his usual three hours a night; every time he laid himself down Mycroft's words washed over him as though they were made of caramel, so sticky and sweet that he could not settle down once he had heard them again just in his imagination, vivid though it was.
"What the hell am I supposed to do now?" Sherlock asked himself petulantly, paraphrasing his reply on Christmas Day as sleep eluded him for the seventh night in a row.
It was a quandary for him. He never paid his brother's words any heed at all unless it was absolutely necessary and even then, he reflected on them not at all. So, why could he not force what Mycroft had said to him that day into a back room in the servants' quarters of his sizeable mind palace? Trust Mycroft to master the art of irritating him without trying or putting any effort into it…bastard!
With all the natural exuberance of a spring chicken, he sprang from his bed and proceeded to pace around his room and intermittently punch his already well-beaten wall in frustration. This continued for a few minutes before John came down from his room upstairs to ask the usual barrage of questions he did whenever Sherlock woke him up at a ridiculous time in the morning with some act of violence or just noise.
"What's the matter, Sherlock? Shall I make us some tea? Where's the gun?" John inquired rapidly and with a sigh of exasperation. He had asked that trilogy of questions every time his flatmate roused him with gunshots or striking various parts of their home and the routine was swiftly becoming extremely vexing for the retired army doctor.
"It doesn't concern you, yes and it's in the kitchen," Sherlock rattled off, not bothering to make eye contact with John, just continuing to pace the area around his bed, "to answer your questions. Thank you, John."
And with that, Watson was dismissed from the bat's cave and went away leaving his friend in peace and solitude to put on a brew before returning to bed, though he doubted he would get any sleep for the rest of the morning. He made a mental note to take his laptop back upstairs with him, for if he would not be allowed to sleep, he might as well use the hours before dawn to write up some notes from recent cases for his blog. If he did nothing, he would just end up thinking about his dead wife and child, which would be counterproductive.
Sherlock did not notice when John crept back into his room as he paced and tried to sort out his thoughts to leave him a steaming hot mug of tea, but when the drink had cooled he stopped his motions to take a sip of the tepid liquid and found it oddly soothing and clarifying. The brief respite from walking a hole into his floor and tumbling into Mrs Hudson's kitchen below, convinced him that the most prudent course of action would be to speak to his brother and talk to him about his words that were causing Sherlock such a lot of stress. Needless to say, the high-functioning sociopath in him was screaming at the prospect of calling out the formerly indomitable and stiff upper lipped Mycroft Holmes on his sentiments towards his only sibling.
Need to talk. Come to Baker Street. SH
He only had to wait a minute or two before his mobile phone buzzed announcing his brother's fast response to the early morning text. He was fortunate that Mycroft shared his proclivity for getting very little sleep.
Very well. Will come at midday. Am flying back from Algeria in an hour. MH
"Algeria…" he mused, "probably harbouring some fugitives from Libya. He hasn't managed to get them back. He'd be haughtier if he had."
Once John had left for his shift at the surgery, leaving him alone in the flat, Sherlock spent the rest of the morning playing his way through violin sonatas and burning holes in a number of John's jumpers to discern the amount of time it took for varying thicknesses of wool-cotton blends to stop smoking. A woman's alibi depended on it and besides, Mrs Hudson was an expert at darning…
He was midway through Poulenc's Sonata for violin and piano, having mastered both of Rheinberger's earlier in the day when he observed the black BMW with tinted windows pull up outside 221b Baker Street. He reminded himself to go downstairs after his brother's visit to replace the door knocker, for undoubtedly Mycroft would subconsciously fix the askew brass piece. Of course, Anthea stepped out of the car first and the politician and his aide stood outside for a few minutes talking before she returned to the comfort of the fancy car and he entered his brother's flat.
"Sherlock," Mycroft greeted his brother as he stepped through the door umbrella in hand, "what is the matter? I mean, really, I was overseas dealing with quite the crisis when I received your rather alarmingly vague message."
Sherlock put down his instrument and scoffed, "Alarmingly vague? I have been reliably informed that I am always vague in text messages, but surely you know that?"
"It has been clear to me for many years that you have the tendency to keep your friends and acquaintances in the dark," he smiled as he made himself at home, "because that is how you choose to amuse yourself, which is your prerogative. However, I have never known you to include me in such juvenile behaviour."
The look of surprise on Sherlock's face upon realising that his brother was right in his deductions: he did get his end away by not bringing John and others up to speed but by keeping them guessing so that they would be suddenly hit by his immense intellect.
"Well, it seems you are right, brother mine."
Mycroft groaned, "Enough, Sherlock. Will you be frank, or do I have to call Detective Lestrade and have the place searched?"
"I am not back on the drugs!" The accused bellowed back at his brother sharply.
"Then explain yourself!" Mycroft yelled back just as fiercely.
Sherlock looked affronted and garbled out, "I can't get any bloody sleep, can I?"
"You can never get any sleep…neither of us can ever get any sleep. So, why was I summoned to this hellhole from another continent?"
"Because it's all your Goddamn fault, Mycroft."
The apparent culpable party stood in awe and wondered just how many times in his life he had been held responsible for something that Sherlock could or couldn't do. It had been his fault at school when Sherlock had got himself cuffed round the head until the left side of his face was blue because he told the Head Boy in front of the entire school that the Geography Master slept with half the senior year, not just him; it had been his fault that his dear, little brother managed not to pass his Year Three science test because he couldn't remember the basic properties of the solar system. The list went on…
He sighed, unable to believe he was about to ask his next question, "And why is that?"
The outward sociopath looked at his brother directly in the eyes, his face immediately softened and he whispered, "You said those things at Christmas and I haven't been able to sleep with any serenity since."
Mycroft knew then to what Sherlock was referring. Those things had become a phrase in their own specific Holmes lexicon. They had not discussed his emotional outburst; the desolation of John Watson in the wake of his family's passing had taken priority, but it was evident that Mycroft should have had the sagacity to talk his emotionally stunted brother through the whirlwind of emotions that his audacious statement had brought about.
"Right," he stalled, "I suppose I should thank you for coming out with it, but much like you on that day, I find I do not know what to say."
The fatigued, overextended detective feigned an aghast expression and shrieked, "Anthea! John! Mrs Hudson! Someone, alert the media! Mycroft Sebastian Crispin Holmes has no idea what to say!"
"Yes, yes, yes, all right, all right. You have made your point."
It occurred to the elder Mr. Holmes that the younger had the propensity to be a right melodramatic twat when he wanted to be, but he had grown weary of their infantile bickering and wanted to get this social call over with so he could return to Whitehall and get on with the rest of his life. What needed to be done was to return to the original subject, which the politician would have preferred to avoid at all costs, but it was the lesser evil.
"Sherlock, what precisely about what I told you at the house has been causing you to lose sleep?" He asked endeavouring to be as straightforward as possible.
His brother collapsed into a chair after his rather skittish eruption and then murmured, "Do I really mean so much to you, brother? Or, is it just what I can do for the country you love that you care about?"
"Sherlock…"
He continued without batting an eyelid, "No, I speak truly, Mycroft. Did you mean what you said, that losing me would break your heart, or were you merely swept up in the moment?"
"I meant it. All of it. I could not send you anywhere that truly put you in harm's way. I know I just sat by and watched in Serbia but I brought you home afterwards. I will tell you this, brother dear. There have been two – only two, mind – occasions when I have truly feared that you were beyond my help and thus, losing you was a faint possibility."
"Let me guess," Sherlock interjected but abnormally with no malice or sarcasm in his voice, "Magnussen?"
"Indeed," Mycroft smiled, "you were lucky there, Sherlock. Quite unintentionally, I'm sure, Moriarty saved you from a fate that not even I, with all my influence and power, could protect you from."
"The second has me somewhat perplexed," the detective mumbled, deep in thought, "so give me a minute."
"You probably don't even remember it, Sherlock. You were young then and you didn't seem to recall what happened afterwards. Only mother and I remember the incident really, since father was in Belgium at the time."
Now that mystery truly had the detective sweating for the revelation. If there was some remote possibility that a section of his formative years was hidden from him, he needed to learn now what had befallen him as a child.
"Tell me. It is my life after all, brother." He petitioned with his enigmatic, childish grin.
"Very well, if you insist," Mycroft assented, "I will. It was when you were ten years old and I was eighteen. I was about to finish school and leave for Balliol. You told me one day in school that you didn't wish me to leave home and you asked me to stay. Unfortunately for you, one of the more unpleasant lads in my year, Marcus Wainthropp, was listening. He was the heir to the Earl of Hertford and was in line for an exhibition to Cambridge, but after he impregnated a young girl and the Dean found out, his offer was rescinded and he only managed to secure a place at Loughborough. He was never very civil to folks like us but he especially disliked the two of us in particular, mostly because we got him into trouble for stealing test answers on more than one occasion. Anyway, he overheard what you were saying and you really were…well, quite insistent that I not leave home so once school was over, before we all went back into halls, he and his gang cornered you and they really did give you quite the beating, Sherlock."
"Huh. Why don't I remember this?" He enquired, knowing that he probably had sustained some head injury or developed PTSD to such an extent that the only way he could keep a healthy mind was to purge the memory from his mind, but he knew he had to hear it from his brother.
"They didn't only beat you, Sherlock."
Those words the young Mr Holmes was not expecting. He comprehended the subtext but he didn't know how to believe what he thought he understood from his brother.
"Say it, Mycroft," Sherlock ordered, his lips pursed and his hands already trembling, "I need you to say it…so I can remember. I'm ready and I have to remember what happened now."
The storyteller wiped his pale face with his clammy hands in a futile attempt to steel his soul for what he was about to remember to his beloved brother, "Very well, brother dear, I will obey you. You were violated on that day. It was violent and they left you outside, unconscious. It took me so long to find you and when I did…I cannot describe the state you were in, Sherlock, I still remember it too vividly as if it were only yesterday."
Sherlock could indeed see that Mycroft recalled every last harrowing detail about that day and he was stunned by how it seemed to affect him. It grieved him greatly but he had to know more of this part of his adolescence that he had forgotten.
"Please go on, Mycroft. Please."
The depressed older man went to pour himself a tumbler of some of Dr Watson's cheap (but adequate for the job at hand) Scotch and necked it for the quick burst of Dutch courage he knew it would provide.
"You were unconscious, naturally, you were bleeding and you were half naked. You were just lying there in amongst the plants and that was only what I saw when you were lying on your front. When you were turned over, I will never forget what you looked like. Your eyes were completely bruised over and you had a broken jaw. Just imagine what you looked like."
"Why don't I remember? I mean, come on, Mycroft. When I woke up I must have looked ghastly."
"You did not wake up for a month, brother. When you did, your psychologist thought it unwise to try and reawaken your recollections of the incident, so we merely left it at that. The culprits were punished and you went to a different school. Of course, that was your own idea. All you ever knew was that you had been hurt and had consequently fallen into a coma."
The discovery of this hidden part of his past was like someone opening a door in his mind and a whole other wing to his mind palace was found. His childhood trauma explained so much that he had just assigned to his ASPD. His lack of libido, his abject lack of care for others, his manic behaviour and inability to filter was all beginning to make so much sense. What shook him the most was the fact that he hadn't managed to deduce what had befallen him before he was informed of it.
Mycroft watched as the person he cared for most in the world had to process the worst news he could have ever dealt his brother and it did break something deep within the stalwart politician's heart. He slowly rose as though he was approaching a grazing deer and approached Sherlock, who was just sitting staring blankly straight ahead, totally lost in his musings.
"Sherlock," he whispered, "do say something. This is all quite unnerving."
"I'm alright. I guess I should thank you," he stated, trying to smile sincerely but it did not reach his eyes, "for saving my life."
"No, you shouldn't," Mycroft replied sharply, "don't you understand, Sherlock? It was my fault."
"How do you deduce that?"
"He was out to get me and he heard all the things you said, all the reasons you gave me to convince me not to attend university and to stay at home with you and mummy. He thought you were…homosexual, Sherlock, which is why his assault took the form it did."
"Well, that's that then."
With that concise and deceptively resolute statement, Sherlock got out of his chair and sidled past his brother kneeling before it and picked up his violin but before he could start playing, the fiddle was wrested from his grip.
"That's not that by any means! I am not going to let you repress this, Sherlock. It's unhealthy."
Sherlock groaned, finding his brother's lifelong quest to protect and coddle him sickening even now that he knew from whence it came, "Really, who are you to lecture me on what's healthy? Still putting on weight, after all, aren't you?"
Mycroft rolled his eyes, "You really are such a child! Why can't you just accept my help like a chap and make everyone's lives easier?"
"Because I do not need your help. It is you who needs help," he retorted poking his brother hard in the chest, "with your over-sentimentality and flabby stomach!"
"Over-sentimentality?!"
"Yes, big brother, over-sentimentality. Didn't you hear me…too much fat covering your over-sized ears?"
It actually relieved Mycroft that Sherlock had started to berate and attack him. It meant he would not have to put in that call to Anthea to upgrade Sherlock's surveillance status temporarily while there was the slightest chance that his errant brother might return to old habits. Of course, it had been a subconscious result of the rape he had endured, which was why their mother and father hadn't been as severe upon him as they would have been on Mycroft should he have taken to narcotics.
"Sherlock…" Mycroft crooned to his little brother.
Just hearing someone speak his name with such a soothing and calm way made all of Sherlock's rage and unnecessary blame turn to dust and crumble away. He fell against Mycroft like an anchor with a ship's weight about him. He wasn't prone to displays of affection, particularly towards his brother, but it had been a difficult day. As his forehead rested against his brother's chest, Sherlock felt his baggage fall from his back and the lack of weight had both exhausted and relieved him in one fell swoop.
Sherlock's sudden display of vulnerability moved Mycroft. It reminded him of the brother who idolised him and adored him before his innocence was snatched from him so cruelly. He wound his arms around the morbidly slim and lank body leaning against him for support and just held his brother as he breathed and made his peace.
"Ahem!"
Quickly, Sherlock pulled himself away from Mycroft's consoling embrace and removed himself to the other side of the room, while his older brother smoothed down his waistcoat and adjusted his tweed blazer.
"John, you're home early!" Sherlock exclaimed.
"Erm," John mumbled, unable to work out whether the intimate moment he had just witnessed had been real or a figment of his imagination, "yes. Half day at the surgery on Wednesdays. Good afternoon, Mycroft."
"Dr Watson," Mycroft greeted the other man with a curt nod, "well, I think I'll be going. I've stayed here too long. Need to get back to the office. Things to do."
As his visitor was taking his leave, Sherlock suddenly remembered that they hadn't actually talked properly about why Mycroft's words to him on Christmas Day had been costing him sleep and he couldn't allow that discussion to pass them by.
"Mycroft, I'll see you this evening for a drink, I think." Sherlock stated, inviting himself to Mycroft's home as he was wont to do.
"Very well, brother," he acquiesced amiably, "whatever you need will be given you, as always."
With that comment that led John to believe that something truly deep and significant had come to pass while he had been at work, Mycroft snatched up his umbrella and flounced out of the door and back to his own affairs.
"Everything alright? Anything I should know?" John asked unassumingly.
Sherlock did not have the energy to fill in his companion on what had occurred that day, he would leave that task to another day, so he just waved away his questions and struck up the first movement of Beethoven's Violin Sonata No. 5 – always a good piece to halt undesired conversation.
"Right. Stranger things have happened I suppose, though something stranger than the Holmes brothers hugging might cause the end of the world as we know it…"
◊ – ◊ – ◊
Sherlock shelved his misgivings on the topic of his adolescent rape in favour of focusing all his mental power on why he had so freely and entirely found such release in his brother's arms. Mycroft's embrace was nothing spectacular or singular, in fact, he was downright standoffish towards all creatures great and small. One would not have expected even the most sentimental and emotional of people, such as Molly Hooper, to gain any shred of comfort from his older brother's presence, and yet, in his hour of need Mycroft provided him with exactly that: comfort.
"John, I'm going out," Sherlock announced, remarking that the sun had set and he had to get a taxi to his brother's place as he donned his Belstaff, making sure to pull up the collars, "I will not be back until late."
"All right." His flatmate answered brusquely, a bit peeved that he had been excluded from the Holmes' dinner plans but he didn't mind spending his first night since the death of his family alone in the flat. He would use the time to clear up the remains of Sherlock's latest experiment gone awry.
The taxi ride to Primrose Hill went quickly enough. Sherlock could have merely walked across the park but he was feeling spent from the day's emotional exertion and he found cab journeys to be peculiarly pacifying. He chuckled as he thought about John's expression when he had left him alone for the evening. He was aware that John was put out at being left out but he did not want to tell John about his apparent sordid past just yet and he needed to speak with Mycroft alone. Then again, John still had no idea Mycroft's London residence was so close to Baker Street and it might cause him to move out again if he learned of the older Holmes' constant proximity.
He arrived and was greeted by Custer, Mycroft's butler and shown into the dining room that really belonged in a gothic abbey but had their place in his brother's stylish (yes, even he had to admit it) Edwardian townhouse. When he walked in he was greeted by the almost idyllic and unfamiliar tableau of Mycroft sitting across the large mahogany table from Anthea just having a drink.
"Good evening, brother," Mycroft said calmly in an effort to begin the evening's fraternal activities with less awkwardness than the afternoon's, "wine? Anthea was just heading home."
"No, thank you, Mycroft. I'll just escort Miss Coolidge out." Sherlock replied, giving Mycroft's long-suffering assistant a friendly smile and offering her his arm.
It was strange how being in his brother's company brought out the upper middle class side to Sherlock. He suddenly was transported back to the days when he had to attend highfalutin college socials and converse with spoilt and under-bred second sons. It was a time he wished he could forget and had since before he learned of his attack.
"Very well. I will see you tomorrow, Anthea."
"Goodnight, Mr Holmes," she replied in her musical, pretty voice, "the car will be here at seven."
Mycroft just nodded. He had grown accustomed to beginning every day early and ending it late. It was only on days that were bookended by flights to and from the country that afforded him some time away from the business of running the country.
"This afternoon was quite the revelation," Sherlock announced as he returned to the dining room, "but I don't want to discuss my formative years further. You – fiendishly – managed to distract me from what I actually wished to discuss with you earlier: Christmas Day! So, now we are going to talk about it, no matter how much I really do not want to, but you said those things and I haven't slept well since."
The older man laughed at his brother's petulant chiding but it was what made Sherlock himself so he merely choked out in between guffaws, "Very well, brother, whatever you want. What about that day has you especially riled up?"
"You said I have utility here and then you said my loss would break your heart."
Mycroft nodded patiently, "Indeed I did."
"Did you mean it as a brother or an employer?"
The astounded and injured look that flashed across Mycroft's face as he heard his brother's words was all the answer Sherlock received to his question for at least a minute and a half. It showed him that Mycroft was not speaking to him as the most important man in the country but instead only as his big brother.
"I meant it as your brother, Sherlock," he whispered, still reeling from the question, "do you truly doubt that? I would have thought you knew better than to think I value you only as a valuable asset to England. That, brother mine, is only the smallest – and I mean that, the most minute – reason why I would never survive your death. It evidently has escaped your notice, but with the exception of your forays into my business affairs, my heart has very little to do with my job, Sherlock."
"You have my thanks for the clarification but I still don't understand what made you actually say it. I mean, we have never been the sort to share our feelings, Mycroft."
"Mummy would not have stood for it," he agreed with a glint in his eye, "we are British, after all, stiff upper lip and all that. You were about to take on Magnussen and it seemed like the proper thing to do. I am sorry my decision is now having such a negative effect on you, but there is very little I can do about it, I'm afraid."
"Be honest with me," Sherlock demanded, "there was more to it than your apprehension at my going up against Charles Augustus Magnussen!"
"What are you implying?"
"That you feel more for me than just brotherly love, that you truly love me, Mycroft. Do just save us both a lot of time and admit it."
Mycroft had never been so affronted and so beguiled all at once. It really was the most exhilarating feeling. Certainly, he had always known there was something special and unique about Sherlock and himself, something that bound them together beyond the connection of siblings. He was the one person in all the world who could understand Sherlock's quirks and moods and deductions completely without explanation and he was the only man alive who relished his brother's soul and spirit. Sure, John Watson appreciated it and tolerated it, but Mycroft was the only soul on the planet who craved and yearned for it.
Watching Mycroft plunder through his own emotions and thoughts while unable to form words was a rare pleasure, so to fill the pregnant silence, Sherlock continued, "You really are an open book, Mycroft. When I am in the room or close to you, your pulse quickens. I noticed it when I was pressed against your chest. The only other explanation is that you have a heart condition yet that is unlikely as you did not struggle with your two hour morning workout and Anthea would not have been here having a drink with you so late. I give you my word; it's really quite a relief."
Having been stirred from his agonising analysis of his brother's words, Mycroft spluttered, "Relief?! How can you possibly draw that conclusion?"
"Well, we have been circling each other for the majority of our adult lives and the sexual tension has resulted in us bickering and falling out over every little thing. I personally have tired of us goading each other continually so I have come to realise that in the aftermath of your emotional outburst, my uncharacteristic insomnia was owing to the release from the unresolved sexual tension and the subconscious comprehension that…my feelings were reciprocated."
Sherlock reached across the broad table and slid his hand over Mycroft's, his spindly fingers caressing his brother's tense knuckles as his hand came to rest.
All Mycroft could do at such a tender display of affection was watch as Sherlock's fingers intertwined with his and settled there. He could not believe that all of his concern and love and need to safeguard his brother was not because of strong brotherly instincts but was because he harboured unnatural and disturbing feelings for his little brother.
"Let go of my hand, Sherlock," Mycroft instructed in that ethereal, intimidating voice he reserved only for those who seriously displeased him, "and stop this at once!"
"What? Mycroft?" Sherlock asked, utterly bewildered by the alteration in his brother's manner and tone.
"You should leave now. Go home and get some sleep. I will, certainly, consent to put this unfortunate evening behind us and put your unseemly behaviour down to lack of sleep, but you must go. Now."
He did. He scrambled out of his brother's house, which used to be a place of sanctuary and perpetual safety for him whenever he could not return home due to a case or because John had female company, but now it was a cesspit of humiliation and heartbreak. As he sped from the house and headed for the pathway through Regent's Park, he tried to work out what had happened that had caused Mycroft to clam up and resume his sharp and impenetrable politician's exterior and so callously expel him from the property.
When a bedraggled and burdened detective trudged up the stairs of 221b Baker Street, Watson noted his friend's wrinkled brow and red eyes. He kept quiet while Sherlock just entered his room and presumably just climbed into bed still wearing his coat for the comfort it gave him as he did when something unsettled him on a basic emotional level.
"What the hell did Mycroft do to him?" John mumbled to himself as he took his tea upstairs with him.
Sherlock's acting weird, weirder than usual. You need to come now. JW
I cannot do that. Let him sleep it off. If still acting atypically in the morning I will come. Goodnight Dr Watson. MH
John wondered what on earth the two brothers had had a spat about to render one so catatonic and the other unusually indifferent to his sibling's plight. However, after spending a few minutes eavesdropping through his flatmate's thin door, he was certain the noises he could hear from the man within were muffled sobs.
Whatever it was you've done, you have managed to make Sherlock Holmes cry. So get over here now, you pretentious prick or I'll cut yours off and I will make sure that it hurts. Let yourself in. JW
I am on my way. MH
◊ – ◊ – ◊
When Mycroft let himself into Sherlock's dimly lit, untidy room that was an obstacle course to everyone but its occupant, he did not bother to announce himself. He just walked to the bed – tripping up on several pieces of scientific apparatus en route – and removed his shoes before climbing up and lying behind his brother who was curled up in the foetal position and weeping quietly.
"Oh, brother…" Mycroft sighed as he once more took Sherlock into his arms.
As he felt his brother's strong arms envelope him, Sherlock's eyes closed and his eyes stopped seeping but the older man's embrace was not enough to sew the tears in his heart back together. Though if tonight was all his brother was going to give him to soothe his bleeding heart, he was not going to waste it wallowing in salt water.
He turned to face his bed-mate and slowly he moved his hand towards Mycroft's pale cheek. He didn't dare just place it there; he had attempted direct bodily contact earlier and it had been a resounding catastrophe, so he was now opting for a more hesitant and delicate approach, one that – hopefully – would not see his heart burned any more than it already had been in the past twenty-four hours.
"It's alright," Mycroft whispered breathlessly, "I know. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Sherlock, I'm so sorry."
With each apology, Mycroft planted a chaste kiss on his brother's salty lips and Sherlock held his cheek more strongly with each kiss. Though he knew that when the sun rose, they would resume their platonic relationship and never speak of what occurred during the dark hours of the night again, he would be eternally grateful that Mycroft had conceded and would give in to his feelings first.
Sherlock cupped his brother's face with both hands, his surety increasing with every second, and covered his moist pink lips with his own. To his surprise, Mycroft did not resist or tense up in the slightest but welcomed the forward move and flicked his tongue against Sherlock's closed lips, craving more.
As they became entangled in each other's arms, in each other's legs, in each other's mouths, both knew where their tryst was heading and neither had a problem with it. The love they bore one another outweighing any law or societal taboo for one night at least. It was as important to their survival as breathing that they kept exploring each other's bodies and souls, both of which had remained out of sight and out of touch for so long.
Mycroft felt himself for the first time in years harden. It truly had been that long since the older man had experienced the heat in his blood and when he had last, the sensation had surprised and appalled him so much that he had never let himself feel so vividly again…until now. He was not a virgin but to say the least, his romantic history was not the length of the collected works of William Shakespeare, it was more the length of one of Martial's epigrams. If he wasn't careful and if Sherlock's hands continued to skim over his skin, he would not last very long at all and that simply would not do. For, as much as he wanted to believe that he had come to Sherlock's rescue, that was not all she wrote…Sherlock's revelation had brought something back to life in Mycroft and he felt alive and human for the first time in so, so long.
"Sherlock…" Mycroft groaned, not wanting his brother to halt his ministrations, "Sherlock, wait! Stop!"
With those few words, the detective froze, fearing that the politician in his bed had changed his mind and regretted what they had done and did not wish to further snare himself. He snatched his hands away from Mycroft's warm and soft skin and rolled over.
"Don't be so dramatic!" Mycroft chided in jest, trying to coax his companion back into his arms, "Just slow down, brother mine, there is no rush."
Those words washed over Sherlock like balm after a burn and all he could do – still reeling as he was – was nod calmly and with a faint smile pulling up the corners of his lips. He laid his hands back on his brother, seeking the reassurance that touching Mycroft gave him, but stayed on the still covered areas of his body.
"I have not been…intimate with anyone for a very long time. So, if we continued at this unforgiving pace you have set, our time together will be short, too short and I don't want that for you, for us."
Sherlock cursed inwardly at himself for being so dense. Others were right (occasionally!) when they chastised him for forgetting to be – or at least – appear human. If he had managed to think like a regular human, he might have anticipated this turn of events and sought to devour his older brother a little less selfishly and hastily.
"My apologies. How about we leave the bed and begin again…slowly?" He suggested, rising from his bed and extending his open hand.
Mycroft smiled at him warmly in gratitude and clasped his hand and let Sherlock draw him up from the bed and back into his arms and place a soft, tender kiss on his lips. When he nipped back at his brother's moist and swollen lips, it was youthful and green and innocent, as though they were starting completely from scratch. It was beautiful.
Slowly, Mycroft took control, he moved things forward at his steady and careful pace, first unbuttoning all of his brother's shirt buttons before coaxing the garment off his back and letting it fall to the floor. He marvelled at the definition of Sherlock's upper torso: every rib could be made out and the skin clung to every bone. He was perfectly formed…in God's image, the perfect man: smart and physically captivating. It was in that moment of sheer, unadulterated adoration and marvel that Mycroft knew that once this night ended, there would never be another for him.
"'I ne'er was struck before that hour with love so sudden and so sweet…'" Mycroft whispered, still entrammeled by his brother's fair form.
"What?"
"Nothing, you just reminded me of something I once read," Mycroft said, running his luxuriating fingers through Sherlock's messy, tousled hair, "for it seems I cannot put into words my love for you, but the words of John Clare seem the most apt, as I never realised before how I truly care for only one person in the world and how I was blind to it until tonight."
At that confession, Sherlock found he could no longer contain his love, nor his joy or desire, and shoved himself violently against Mycroft's body, wrapped him in his arms, pressed his lips against Mycroft's and drank from his spirit and his body all of the soothing draught he needed to calm his raging, beating heart. The recipient of the wild gesture found he was no longer concerned with giving in to the primal urges of his body and letting the pieces fall where they may.
Sherlock tore Mycroft's shirt mercilessly from his body and worshipped his throat and his shoulders and his chest with his fevered lips. As his tongue swirled around his pink nipples first the right then the left, he revelled in his power over the older man, now whimpering hard and drinking in every kiss and lick with every breath he took.
"Sherlock…" Mycroft begged huskily, "please, not anymore. No more teasing. I cannot bear it."
He chuckled and obliged. He swiftly and with a deceptively practiced hand whipped off his brother's belt and let his corduroys slump to the floor, leaving Mycroft's pale but muscular legs naked before him. Only the tops of his thighs were obscured from touch and vision by rich, luxurious silk boxers. They had to go in the same direction as the shirts and the trousers and so they did and just as quickly too.
At the beautiful and memorable sight of Mycroft Holmes, the man who was the British Government and the country itself even, in a state of dishabille before him was so erotic that Sherlock knelt in awe and could have come then and there before they had even properly begun. He had never seen his brother sans vêtements,so his first glimpse of his erect member rendered him speechless.
His partner was quite taken aback by his prostration, and did not know what to do except exclaim, "I am not the Queen, Sherlock, so do get up!"
"Why, brother, when I'm so comfortable down here?" He replied before engulfing Mycroft in his mouth, delighting in how his brother's cock filled his mouth, and sucking hard.
"Bloody hell!" Mycroft cussed.
As Sherlock brought his lips up and down his shaft, he tried to commit every feeling and every second of the night to memory, but the synapses in his skull were working on overdrive and it was all too much information and sensation for him to process. Thus, for the first time, Sherlock just stopped. As he made love to his brother, he stopped trying to be himself and just gave in to the love and physical excitement that he was feeling. The relaxation and alleviation of all his worries and sinking thoughts was euphoria that he hadn't felt since his days wasting away on cocaine.
He began to move faster and felt Mycroft get hotter and harder with every lick of his tongue and every little suck he ministered. He was not going to last much longer and when Sherlock glanced up at his brother's face, his eyes were slammed shut, his mouth was open and his brow was furrowed. It was only when his hand shifted to the back of his head and gripped at the curly tendrils of hair there, holding him where Mycroft required him to be, that he knew the event was imminent.
And so, Mycroft Sebastian Crispin Holmes came, spurting his salty seed into Sherlock's ready and willing mouth, with a loud grunt and as he did, his knees buckled and he fell to the floor, slipping smoothly out of the younger man's mouth, in a sweaty and spent mess.
"Well, that was unexpected." Sherlock pronounced once he had swallowed.
Mycroft asked breathlessly, "What?"
Sherlock pulled his brother to him and sweetly, almost innocently, kissed him on the lips, "You. Who would have thought the great Mycroft Holmes could come undone so quickly and with so little effort on my part?"
First, Mycroft looked at him in shock and fear at the prospect of other people knowing intimate details about his sex life, especially his sex life with his brother, but once he understood that his brother was speaking in jest, he laughed freely and replied, "Nobody thinks about me that way, Sherlock, much less in that amount of detail."
It was then that the younger man saw just how his lover was as isolated and though Mycroft was by no means a high-functioning sociopath, on account of his power and influence and keen mind, he was treated and viewed with the same degree of guardedness and difference as he was by the general, unsuspecting public. He knew that it was the loneliest of places to be, but he never once considered that he had company on his island.
"I do," he confessed, though it probably wasn't that much of a revelation after what had just passed between them, "I love you, brother mine."
The elder Mr Holmes was the one who took the initiative in that moment and brought his brother to sit on his lap, despite the fact that his legs still felt as though they were made of jelly following his orgasm. As he perched Sherlock above him, he hooked his hand round his lover's neck and pressed a soft kiss to his plump, wet lips. He then leaned his forehead against Sherlock's and became aware of his brother's still clad lower body.
"I know. I love you too, but there is something we need to deal with at once. It is of the greatest national import."
"What? You wait until now, this moment to discuss a job?!" Sherlock retorted, annoyed that they wouldn't be able to continue their fun but would have to work.
"You're wearing too many clothes."
They both laughed. They laughed together completely unassumingly, just like they did when they were children. Somewhere along the line they had lost that ability to have fun together and laugh together. Sherlock suspected it began in the aftermath of the attack on himself that had affected their relationship irrevocably, but he was overjoyed that slowly they were finding their way back to a true and strong fraternal relationship.
As their laughter subsided, Sherlock moved to divest himself of his trousers and undergarments and as he did from the precarious position atop his brother, he reached behind him to his bedside table for a bottle of lubrication, which he kept close to hand for the times when he had to satisfy his carnal lust. He wanted to feel love again. He wanted to feel his brother, the only man he truly loved and the only person he trusted to be there for him no matter what, quick and hard inside him. He wanted – with all his heart – to give him all the pleasure he could with his tall and slim body, for Mycroft had already given him all the pleasure he could, just by coming to him when he needed him tonight.
Mycroft opened his hand and waited for his brother to deposit the bottle into it. He suckled at Sherlock's chest, fawning over the shallow valley that divided it, lavishing the region around his heart with all the attention he could, comprehending that his brother's heart had been left unattended for far too long. As he did so, he popped open the bottle singlehandedly and squirted the oily liquid onto his warm palm and after his hand was bright with the grease, he brought it down to caress Sherlock's manhood as it stood between their stomachs.
As though he was thanking him, Sherlock snaked his tongue past his brother's full, sensual lips and kissed him as though past his lips lay the secret to life and the reason for living. Kissing his brother was – in fact – the most divine feeling to be had in all the world, Mycroft was sure of it but knew that he would forever be selfish and let no one else partake of such a delight.
"Are you sure, Sherlock? You're sure you want this?" Mycroft asked, certain that once he had made Sherlock come with his hands, they would be past the point of no return and nothing would be able to stop him from taking his brother and showing him just how much he truly adored him with every fibre in his stiff, selfish being.
His brother felt the need and the heat pool in his belly as Mycroft's grip tightened around him and his pumping quickened, but arching further into his elder brother's touch, he managed to rasp, "Yes, God, yes, I want this, I want you. I need you."
That was all the confirmation and permission Mycroft needed to continue his ministrations and swiftly and surely, Sherlock was fast keened and rocking against him, longing for and craving the release that was not far off. Once Mycroft bit down hard on Sherlock's shoulder and sent electricity and heat down through his nerves straight to his groin, the younger man came spewing semen over both of their stomachs and chests with a deep and resonant cry.
"Hush!" Mycroft chided sternly, proud that he had coaxed such a noise from the depths of his brother's soul, but simultaneously anxious lest the noises of their lovemaking permeate the ceiling above them and rouse the other occupant of 221b!
Sherlock waved his concern away, knowing full well that John Watson slept soundly now that his nightmares were a thing of the past. There were times when even the sounds of his erstwhile experiments, which included explosions sometimes, were unable to awaken the slumbering physician. So, if an experiment involving iodide and hydrogen peroxide gone wrong couldn't shake his flatmate from his sleep, there was no chance that the grunts and groans from tonight's activities would.
Their nocturnal activities had so far been relatively one-sided and now that they had both 'started', the correct course of action seemed to both to come together and many times during the rest of the night. Sherlock wished to feel as one with his brother and Mycroft wanted to experience everything he had missed while he was advancing his career with his younger brother before it was all over, for Mycroft Holmes was ever looking forward and anticipating the end.
"It will hurt you, Sherlock. I have no desire to give you pain. You should enter me and let me feel the pain I should have so long ago."
The youngest Holmes sibling stared into his older brother's remorseful eyes and murmured back to him, "No. I know it will hurt, Mycroft, but I want to feel every sensation that our love produces. I want it to wipe away the stain and injury of the only other sexual experience I've had in my life, leaving only the remnants of you: my brother who loves me."
"As you wish."
Affairs went rather quickly from that point. The brothers in heart, mind, body and soul prepared to come together far away from the rules of lower society (as they both deemed the rest of the world's population) and those who would shun them for where their affections lay. Mycroft palmed Sherlock's rear end gently, just massaging his glutei and tenderly caressing the tight skin around his anus as he went.
"I'm ready," Sherlock groaned, "more, more, damn you!"
Mycroft guffawed and knelt to cover his brother's slender body with his own, resting his crotch right up against Sherlock's crack, "Just…one…more…second."
The erōmenos heard the desperation for sexual satisfaction in the voice of his – and only his – erastēs. It was only upon catching the pop of the bottle of lubrication that Sherlock Holmes, the consulting detective, became Sherlock Holmes the man who yearned for love and the full feeling of having his divine older brother plunge into the very depths and core of him.
After a second or two of seemingly endless preparation, Mycroft retracted his fingers leaving a pert, gaping and welcoming hole in their wake. He slid in easily and revelled in the sensation of Sherlock's stretching arse. It dawned on him then that if his perspicacious brother had not sucked him off beforehand, he would have squirted then and there (upon entry!) in the newly traversed orifice.
"Move, move!" Sherlock ordered as he attempted to buck against the intrusion.
In one of the few moments when the older obeyed the younger, Mycroft shifted his weight within his brother and jarred against his prostate euphorically. While Sherlock exclaimed bloody murder feeling the sweet torment of the ascent to release, Mycroft as he careened into his brother's derrière, became aware of his brother's sphincter contorting and his prostate throbbing.
With a few more decisive pounds into what he deliberately termed 'strategic locations', Mycroft sent himself and Sherlock spinning into rapture and away from their corporeal forms as they rode their highs to heaven.
As both lay later with a tumbler of Chivas each in bed beside each other, still coated in a mutual sheen of perspiration, the magnificent Holmes brothers sipped at their whiskies not wishing the dawn to break for it would bring with it the end of their extra-fraternal liaison and a resumption of their usual, almost cordial, brotherly relationship.
Alas, when the imminent sun broke the horizon, Mycroft downed the last of his drink with a hefty sigh and moved to reassemble his carefully deliberated outward appearance.
He said forlornly to the figure still reclining on the bed, "Well, brother, the dawn has come and we must return to our lives as they were and as they were meant to be. You need to return to the mystery of Moriarty and I must fly back to Algeria. The world must never know of our true…feelings for each other. It would be the end of you – of us – far more surely than Charles Augustus Magnussen could have been. Last night must remain in our hearts and memories. That is all, brother mine. That is all."
Sherlock wiped a stray tear from his eye and glanced up at his idol, hero and saviour, "Understood, Mycroft. It will be as you determine."
So, with one last peck on the lips to seal a promise, Mycroft departed 221b Baker Street without looking back at the lover, brother and saviour he left behind him. It was only when he reached the car as it hovered on the kerb that the older Mr. Holmes turned his beady eye towards the window that sheltered his brother from the storms of the criminal underbelly of London that he spoke one last time to his last lover.
"There is only one Sherlock Holmes and he is mine."
Mycroft then harrumphed as he imagined what Sherlock's response would have been to his claim had he been within earshot. No doubt it would have centred on the fact that Mycroft never learned to share what was his to begin with.
As for the second Mr. Holmes, he languished on his bed which still had the aroma of his and Mycroft's assignation clinging to its sheets, and had one last lover's thought of his own.
"Leave me and go out into the world, Mycroft Holmes, but always come home to Blighty and to me. Don't break my heart and forever leave he who holds you dearest in his heart alone without you."
FINIS