a/n: Yes, I know technically "The Game" refers to the cold war between British and Russian intelligence that took place in Pakistan and Afghanistan and such - but really, you can't expect me to come up with titles as inspired as 'rakes on a train' EVERY time.
I did not like to see my friend used this way. Not by government. Not by his brother. Not by anyone. The cost was not worth it to me. I think Holmes let me meet him on the train to assuage my worries, but the effect was hardly that. The work he was doing was taking it's toll on him. I could see it as I entered the compartment, before he had even looked up.
He sat hunched forward, elbows on knees, slim fingers twining between one another distractedly.
"Hello, Watson," he grinned as I sat down across from him.
His tone was bright enough, but exhaustion was written on his every feature.
His generally notable eyes peered up at me through a fringe of unkempt dark hair, now made almost fever-bright by the shadows fatigue had drawn beneath them.
He was dressed like a common workman and I could see how pronounced the hollows of his collar bone had become beneath the open collar of his shirt.
He must have seen the concern on my face, because the grin faded to a wry sort of expectation and he looked away before I said:
"Hello, Holmes. Have you been well?"
Holmes sighed, leaning back into the bench he sat on and stretching an arm out along the top of it. "Watson. You sound as though I'd been away at a sanatorium or something."
"I haven't seen you in months," I shrugged.
"Quite. Lets not make this a sad meeting, shall we? I've been very well. Mycroft's little problem has been keeping me busy. And you? How are things in London? You've had some trouble with that rising damp in your cellar again, if I'm not mistaken."
"You are correct, I'm afraid."
"Hm. That's a bad business."
"Indeed."
I said nothing following this, and filled the time by removing my gloves as I considered the state in which I'd found things. Holmes watched me silently, lips pursed, before his eyes flicked back towards the compartment window. "I don't suppose you've had the chance -" He began, but I cut him off.
"It won't do, Holmes." I shook my head and pushed both gloves into my coat pocket.
"What wont?"
"The small talk. Telling me you're alright. You ought to give me more credit than that."
He looked back at me, eyes flashing a warning. "Watson -"
"You look tired, Holmes," I stated.
He glared at me. "So do you."
There was silence between us for a long moment. "My practice -" I began at last.
"Your practice," Holmes scoffed. "Naturally. You must understand that I've been busy as well, Watson. Of course I look tired."
I shook my head. "It is not only that."
"What, then?" Holmes demanded, patience clearly wearing thin.
"It's that...this - whatever you're doing for Mycroft - it's changed you, Holmes."
He said nothing, and only continued to regard me with no small amount of frustration.
"Every time I see you lately," I explained, "few and far between though those occurrences may be, it's the same. It's the way you conduct yourself, the way you speak - you're...a different person than the detective I used to write stories about. Every time we've spoken since you left London we have not so much held a conversation as an interview. It's always sparring, with you - you manipulate conversation and I talk all about myself and you manage to say an awful lot that basically amounts to you are well and busy. Can you not even talk to me anymore?"
The sharpness did not leave Holmes eyes as he glanced down, sighing. "I regret that I must be less than forthcoming with you about the nature of my work, Watson."
"But you can tell me nothing."
He nodded. "I can tell you nothing."
"I understand that. It doesn't matter, I suppose. I don't need you to tell me what you're doing, Holmes, you must understand that it's effects are written all over you."
He all but recoiled at this.
"How long have you been involved in this business?," I wondered aloud. "Since Reichenbach? And it has not ended yet."
"You would not expect me to abandon it before it had," Holmes growled.
"No. I daresay I know you better than that. And because I know you, I think I can safely see my way to what this is doing to you, whether you acknowledge it to yourself or not."
Here he turned away with a positive snarl on his face.
"I saw what killing Moriarty did to you, Holmes. An enemy. And it hurt you. I can see that whatever you are doing now, the effect is the same."
"Don't make me something I am not, Watson," he snapped.
"A human being, you mean? You are, unavoidably, a human being, Holmes. And a good one. And you must consider that when this is over, you're going to need someone - and what will you do if you've cauterized all your ability to trust anyone?"
"That will do!" he all but shouted, straightening up where he sat.
This silenced me for some time. Holmes and I merely looked at each other - he with anger and affront in his face, I, like as not, with something pleading in mine.
"You don't trust me, Holmes," I concluded at last. "Not even me, anymore."
He glared at me another moment. Something else, though, was lurking behind his eyes and eventually his features softened by the smallest of margins. He rubbed a hand over his face laboriously, letting it fall to rest on his knee and looking back up out the compartment window.
"I am coming back when this is over, Watson," he said quietly. "You shouldn't be afraid for me." He glanced back towards me, and when I had not responded to this somewhat cryptic statement, added, "I promise you I am coming back. How is that you suppose I couldn't trust my Boswell, anyways?" He turned his gaze back to the window and thumped a fist on it, fidgeting, uncomfortable.
I let the breath I'd been holding out in a long sigh. I understood what he was trying to say, of course - Holmes - my Holmes, not the elusive shadow of him I'd recently been acquainted with - would still be there when this matter he'd become entangled in was concluded. I could only hope he was right.
"Very well," I murmured. "I trust you, then."