A/N: Well, it's been awhile. Sorry. :P High school is crazy.
Thanks to Leah Holmes for being a super awesome beta! :)
After the handshake, the flat was quickly enveloped in a thick, resounding silence, the type that makes one's ears ring. John softly cleared his throat after a few seconds. "Um, I'll walk you home, Ms. Harrison," he offered.
May paused before responding. "Well, if it isn't too much trouble," she said. "Because I'm perfectly capable of walking home alone." She pulled her coat on and began to do up the buttons.
"No, no," he said, shaking his head. "It's too late to go alone. It's no trouble, really." May hesitated, taking in the man's earnest expression. She supposed it would be impossible to get him to change his mind.
"... Okay," May conceded. "Thank you." She nodded at Sherlock, who was at that moment plucking at the strings of his violin, looking miles away from the London flat. There was, of course, no answer.
When they reached the street," May pointed the way back to her flat. Next to nothing was said, aside from May's directions.
"Well, thanks, Dr. Watson," said May, a tiny, strained smile pasted to her face.
"Not a problem," he replied, shaking her hand. "Sorry about Sherlock's, um, abruptness, he's—"
"Always like that," May finished with him. "Goodnight, Dr. Watson," she whispered, closing the door to her flat on an extremely confused John Watson.
As soon as she heard his footsteps recede, she sank to a crouch against the wall, tears slipping down her cheeks again. "Why would you do this?" she questioned the ceiling. "Take it out on me, not my son." May cupped her hands under her chin. "It's me you're mad at, not him!" her voice rose to a scream, and then dwindled into yet more shoulder shaking sobs. She slowly got to her feet and made her way with shuffling, broken steps to her bedroom.
The crib on the left side of the room drew her eyes to it, no matter how much she tried to resist. It was as though her eyes and the crib were opposite poles on a pair of magnets. To attempt to combat this, May kicked her shoes off and fell into bed without bothering to get undressed. If she thought she'd get any decent amount of sleep, it was only a cruel trick her mind played on her.
In the very little sleep she got, her brain was plagued with strange dream after strange dream.
Dream
"What do you mean, you want out?" May cringed at the venom in the man's voice.
"You-you heard me," May's voice quivered. She'd stared down the most coldhearted assassins ever to walk the face of the earth without so much as a blink. But him, he was different. His voice wound in tight, constricting circles around one's brain after slinking in through one's ears with the lightest caress, like silk against skin. It could make you feel emboldened and powerful, or small and terrified in the same instant, depending on his mood.
"May I ask why?" his voice was deadly calm, masking a rage that could bring the toughest man to his knees in an instant.
May's thoughts raced like a wild horse. She'd been planning this escape for days, but now, in his presence, the words were tumbling around, out of reach. "I'm pregnant," she said evenly, meeting the charismatic, insane eyes.
"Is it his?" he asked sharply, pacing stiffly, like someone had put far too much starch in his clothing.
May was glad that it was all he had said. This was a scenario she could work with. "Absolutely not!" she feigned disgust at the very idea. "It's Jack's—my fiance," she referred to the other spy currently working for the man. The lie seemed to appease him, for his shoulders released a tiny fraction of their tension.
"Have you worked everything out with your 'other establishment'?" he sneered, pacing again.
"Of course," she said, as though stating the obvious. "That was the first thing I did." He nodded in approval.
"We shall miss you," he said, a sickly sweet smile etched onto his face. "It's not often I find a spy as good as you." And that was as close to a compliment as she had ever heard from him.
"T-thank you," she murmured, hating the frightened note in her voice and trying not to drown in the maniac eyes. He stepped uncomfortably close and May used every ounce of her willpower not to back away.
"It's such a shame you didn't get to finish your mission," he said, an obviously fake look of melancholy painted on that blank, reusable canvas of a face. "I expect I'll be getting the final report soon?" his voice was tinged with a note of anticipation that also intoned that he would get it in one way or another.
Now it was May's turn to screw on a false smile. "As soon as it's done, you'll get it," she insincerely promised. Hasty goodbyes were bade and May hurried out of the abandoned warehouse, her hand clutching her bag so tightly her knuckles were turning white. He won't get it, she promised herself. He won't.
When she got home, Jack immediately pulled her into a kiss. "Hey baby," he said, stroking her hair. "The meeting go well?" Another faux smile turned the corners of her mouth up.
"Uh-huh, but I don't really want to talk about it," she said, kissing her fiance's cheek.
Two weeks later...
The white, plastic pregnancy test slipped between May's numb fingers and landed with an echoing clatter on the tile floor. Her eyes seemed tattooed with the little smiley face. Pregnant? Her brain raced through a mental calendar of the last month. It had to be Jack's, it was the only explanation. Unless... no, she told herself. It couldn't be his. It just couldn't.
"Jack?" she called down the hallway, making a concerted effort to keep her voice from quavering.
Nine months later...
Pain. Deep, flashing, blinding pain.
May's hair was plastered to her forehead with sweat, her breath came in sputtering gasps. "C'mon, honey, you can do it!" Jack's hand clutched at hers reassuringly.
Contract. Gasp. Pain.
"I don't think I can!" she cried out, nearly breaking Jack's hand in the process. Out of the corner of her blurred vision, she saw him wince.
"Of course you can!" he said. "But try not to kill my hand, yeah? I need that one." May attempted to chuckle, but it came out as a shuddering gasp.
Pain. Resonating, deep-set pain.
Then... relief.
The frail cries of a newborn who has just taken it's first breaths pierced the air like a needle through a piece of embroidery. May sighed, slumping back against her fiance, who caressed her cheek and hugged her softly.
A few minutes later, a nurse came back with a small bundle in her arms. "Here's your son, Ms. Harrison," she gently transferred the baby into May's waiting arms. "He's a beautiful, healthy, baby boy." She smiled at the sleeping child in her arms.
"Hello there," she whispered to him. "What's your name, then?" He sleepily opened his eyes and May noted with mild surprise that his eyes were blue. She vaguely wondered how parents with green eyes and brown eyes and no blue eyes previously on either side of the family could have a child with bright blue eyes.
Jack crouched down. "Hello, son. You're a handsome boy, aren't you?" A proud smile stretched his features and his hand gently stroked the baby's head. May was again surprised to note that the boy had black hair. Jack had flaming red hair, as did most of his family, and May had golden blonde hair like the rest of her family.
"D'you like the name Charles, little fellow?" Jack inquired, gently taking the bundle into his arms and swaying back and forth slowly. "Charles Jackson Harrison?" They had liked that name for a boy and had agreed that the child should take May's last name until they got married.
"My Charlie," May murmured once their son was situated in her arms again. A slight frown creased Jack's forehead, but it was gone so fast that May thought she might have imagined it.
"I'm just going to go walk around for a bit," Jack said, kissing May's cheek and going out the door. She settled into the scratchy, white hospital sheets the best she could and gazed at her son, feeling a huge happiness bloom inside her.
As she looked at him, May noticed yet one more thing. Charlie had some of her features,but none of Jack's. He looked a little like May, but not very much. He looked even less like Jack and May wondered where the features came from.
When Jack came back into the room, he was not happy. Every last thing about him bespoke anger; the tightness of his gait, the taut, thin line of a mouth, the furrowed brow, and the angle at which he put his body. "Is something w—" May began, but Jack cut her off in a low, angry voice.
"Yes, something bloody well is wrong!"he hissed. "This boy is not mine!" May's eyes went wide.
"Of course he is! How could he not be, Jack?" May whispered, clutching the infant tighter against her chest.
"I had the lab do a rudimentary blood test; our types don't match up," Jack paced, and then stopped. "Jesus," he breathed. "He's his, isn't he?" he asked, fury snapping like fire in his eyes.
"No, he's not!' May exclaimed. "Those tests don't show everything, Jack," she protested.
"He doesn't even look like me!" he growled. "I should've guessed—you fell in love with that bastard, didn't you?"
Tears sparkled like sad diamonds in May's eyes. "No, I didn't! Jack, that was acting to get a job done, nothing more. You have to believe me, please."
Jack eyed her coldly. "I'll not stand by and raise a child that doesn't belong to me." He stomped out the door and nearly ran down the nurse carrying in the birth certificate forms.
She took one look at the tearful May and sighed sympathetically. "We get that sort in here all the time, dearie. Shall we move on?" When it came time to name the father, May earned herself a strange look when she requested it remain blank, but the order was obeyed.
May didn't want to remember the father of her child. He had been part of a job, nothing more. He had been the man she wasn't supposed to fall in love with.
And until now, she hadn't remembered him. She'd simply pushed him to a corner of her mind and kept him buried there. But now she did remember and there was no escaping that fact.
End dream
May awoke with a start, hand clutching at her racing heart. Her hair was plastered to her face with sweat. Memories that she thought she'd suppressed were tumbling around in a sickening free fall inside her head, making normal thought impossible. She glanced at the clock and bit back a curse when she saw that it was three am. There was no way she was getting back to sleep tonight.
OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo
Sherlock sat alone in 221B. Baker Street, waiting for John to return. Then he remembered that it was probably "one of those law things" to call the police to report a crime. Even of they're just going to call you to solve it anyway.
He sighed and pulled his phone out of his pocket to dial Lestrade's number.
"What the bloody hell could you possibly be calling about at this hour?" the extremely irate note in Lestrade's voice was an indicator that he had just been woken up and was not pleased about it.
"Sorry to wake you," the apology slipped through his lips without thought or meaning. A huff from the other end implied quite heavily that the sleepy DI didn't believe him. "But there's been a child abduction about a block and a half from here."
"Sherlock, I'm at home and it's midnight. What on Earth am I supposed to do about it now? Look, call me in the morning, at a decent hour mind you, and I'll get the details then. Goodnight." Lestrade hung up and Sherlock tucked his phone away, mentally going over the case info in his mind until the sound of John returning distracted him.
As soon as John came into the sitting room, Sherlock stood up. "I'm going out," he informed the shorter man.
"What—Sherlock, it's the middle of the night!" John exclaimed.
"You mentioned groceries and a stroller in your report, and yet neither of them were with Ms. Harrison." At this point, John clapped a hand to his forehead.
"I knew I was forgetting something," he muttered.
"I'm going to find them," Sherlock pulled his coat on and turned the collar up in anticipation of the biting London wind.
"Do it tomorrow-" John began.
"It'll be gone by then," he cut across him. "Don't wait up." Sherlock stepped out of 221B. and started to track down the items. May had given John more than ample information and it was a matter of minutes before he came across a lonely stroller. The bag of groceries was, predictably, gone, but Sherlock could get information from this.
Noting that the couple opposite him were each having affairs with their partners' best friends, he began to examine the object.
Items hurriedly stuffed into the storage, scuff mark, fairly recent on the outside of the front left wheel, light grip marks on the handle, and a small tear in the fabric of the hood. Deduction, the only time May goes for walks with her son using this is when she's stressed or in a hurry, or both, Sherlock thought.
Upon better examining the interior of the stroller, Sherlock saw a note tucked into a blanket. The angle at which it sat said that it had been planted by the kidnapper.
He delicately extracted the paper and unfolded it. What met his eyes was a language even he couldn't decipher, which was saying a considerable amount. It just looked like a load of thick, black scribbles.
Left-handed, expensive parchment, inexpensive ink, water-based, fine-tipped brush, man's writing. Definitely from the kidnapper.
Sherlock sat on the bench and stared at the jumble of symbols. He ran through every single language, code, number system or combination thereof, but came up empty handed. Hours passed as he carefully sifted through the contents of his Mind Palace, but to no avail.
This was driving him bonkers.
And then it came to him. He knew exactly who could solve it. If it was sent to her, she obviously knew how to decode it.
Sherlock got up and began to walk through the quiet, sleepy streets toward the residence of May Harrison.
OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo
May braced herself against the sink in the bathroom, trying to bring her erratic pulse back down to a slightly more tolerable level. Sleeping again was out of the question. She was afraid of what she might see if she closed her eyes again.
With a sigh, she pulled on a pair of sweat pants and a t-shirt and sat on the edge of her bed, staring out the window.
The sound of a lock being picked, the lock to her front door to be exact, brought her back to the present with a crash.
In an instant her old shotgun, which always resided on her night table, loaded, was in her hand, the safety clicked off, and it was leveled at the shadowy head of the intruder. She'd learned to do or die in most situations. This was probably one of them.
A/N: *Loud, obnoxious, dramatic music plays* I really hope I'll have the next chapter up sooner. I'll try my best, I promise!
Review? :)
