Beyond The Grave

by Nothingtoseeatall

Sherlock may have been gone for almost two years but he certainly hasn't been forgotten... Written for the Sherlock Mini-bang this is a post-Reichenbach, johnlock reunion fic, including BAMF John, BAMF Sherlock, and a side order of Greg/Molly. Also containing violence, blood, guns, injuries and minor character death. And some Greg & Sherlock bromance.

6. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Greg gratefully accepts the cup of coffee Hopkins holds out as he walks into the foyer and jabs the button for the lift. The majority of his body still wishes it were dozing on the couch, head in Molly's lap, but since he learnt long ago that you don't get what you wish for in this job he gulps the scalding liquid down and forces himself to concentrate.

'So … same anonymous caller, same heart graffiti outside, but nothing's on fire and we've only got one body.'

'Yes, Sir. It's on the top floor, Sir,' says Hopkins as the lift doors swish open and they step inside. He's practically vibrating with enthusiasm as he adds, 'We had to break the door down.'

'We?'

'Well, Hammond and Yates, Sir. They've already completed the door to door, Sir. Half the flats aren't occupied and the people in the ones that are didn't hear anything. Sally …' Hopkins catches sight of Greg's face - eyebrows raised and gaze stern - and hastily amends his words. 'Sergeant Donovan is searching the flat. Anderson's on forensics.'

The lift halts and they step out into the corridor together, Hopkins gesturing to the left. 'It's right down the end, Sir. Round the corner.'

They fall into step as Greg asks, 'And our victim?'

'Male, late twenties, fit.'

'Fit?'

'I mean he's well muscled. Like he works out … Um … '

Greg watches the blush spread across Hopkins' face as he stammers to a halt and wonders, not for the first time, how on earth anyone could get promoted to CID and still be so … innocent. Still, he shouldn't tease.

'Sorry. Yes, I know what you mean. Do we know who he is?'

'No, Sir. The bullet made a bit of a mess of his face on exit. Although Sa ... Sergeant Donovan …'

'Sergeant Donovan what, Hopkins?' Greg says when nothing more is forthcoming.

'It's probably nothing but, well, she made a very strange face when she first saw the body, Sir.'

'Indeed.' Greg doesn't know what else to say to that, but is saved the need as they turn the corner to find two uniformed officers standing in front of the nearest door. Nodding to the men he stops on the threshold, shoves his half-finished coffee at Hopkins and looks around.

Observing, Sherlock's voice echoes in his head, you're observing, Detective Inspector. Ensure you do it properly.

Ignoring the splintered door frame he filters out the crime scene lighting rig and the presence of Donovan and Andersen working inside and scans the space. It's the corner flat, so is probably larger than most in the building and looks larger still because of the absence of furniture. There's one armchair, facing the state of the art TV above the fireplace – built in, Sherlock's voice supplies, so doesn't tell us anything about the victim – and a small stretch of kitchen units, a cooker and a sink occupy the back left hand corner. They don't look as if they've ever been used, the cooker splash back and extractor unit gleaming like new.

The only other pieces of furniture are a dining room table and chairs, set to the right of the kitchenette. There is a laptop set on the table, the back of the screen facing him and obscuring his view of the victim, who is slumped forward over the table top. The spotlights above the table reflect dully in the pool of red liquid surrounding the laptop.

Looking up he sees the bullet hole in the topmost pane of the window in the far wall and almost absentmindedly notes that the lower windows are covered with a sheet. There is a blind still rolled up at the top of the window and a quick glance at the end of its frame confirms the mechanism is broken.

'He was hiding here,' he says aloud as he walks toward the body, 'the question is, who from?'

'What, Sir?' Donovan emerges from the door to Greg's right which looks to be the entrance to the bedroom.

'His blind breaks and, instead of doing what most people would normally do and just ignore it, he covers as much of the window as he can with a sheet. If he was at street level it would be understandable but up here, where there isn't anyone who could see in, not with the naked eye, at any rate, there's no point.' Greg stops far enough away from the body so that he won't contaminate it and crouches, so he can see what's left of the face. There is something familiar about the one unblinking eye but he can't quite place it. 'Unless, of course, he was afraid someone was looking for him.'

'Well we were.' Donovan holds out a wallet, flipped open to show the ID card in the front pocket. 'This was Ronald Adair, the body guard to the US ambassador. I thought it was him when I saw the tattoo on his arm but this confirms it. I found it buried at the bottom of a bag hidden under the bed.'

'And we weren't the only ones, obviously.' Greg stands, pulls on a pair of nitrile gloves and takes the wallet. There are no credit cards in there but the wad of twenty pound notes is worth nearly five hundred pounds.

'I can't say for sure until we get the autopsy results and the ballistics report, but this does look like the work of our sniper.' Anderson says, holding up a misshapen bullet he's just dug out of the back of one of the dining chairs. 'This is a point three three eight Lapua Magnum, just like all the others. Must have been relatively close, for the range of the rifle, when he took the shot though, for it go so deep into the chair.'

'Great.' Greg turns, hands the wallet back to Sally and closes his eyes for a moment.

He can almost touch the shape of all this but he's missing something. Mycroft said earlier that the two cases were related and apparently he was right. The annoying thing is that he feels he ought to know why … that he actually already does but he just can't remember. But there's been so much happening, he's so tired and …

'How did you know he had a tattoo, Donovan? It wasn't on the description we were given.'

'I saw it when I interviewed him, Sir. After the ambassador's children were kidnapped.'

Greg's stomach lurches and he has to swallow hard to stop his coffee making an unwelcome reappearance.

'He was part of that investigation? For fucks sake, Donovan, why the hell didn't you say anything before?'

'I didn't remember, Sir, not until I saw the tattoo just now.' She holds her hands out placatingly and he takes a deep breath, noting for the first time that she looks far more keyed up than usual.

'I'll speak to you in the bedroom in a moment,' he says, inclining his head towards the door. 'No, don't argue.'

She glares at him but leaves without another word and he looks across to Anderson, who is also glowering balefully at him.

'Are you nearly done?'

'Yes, but …'

'Then get on with it and get the body out of here. The sooner we get an autopsy done the sooner we can classify the cases as linked. And no, before you say anything else, I don't need your input on how I handle my team, thank you, Sergeant.'

'Fine,' Anderson bites out, grabbing the UV light with far more force than necessary.

Greg turns to find Hopkins hovering two feet behind him, looking deeply worried.

'Arrange for the flat to be properly secured and monitored twenty four seven, then find out who owns it, when Mr Adair took possession and how long he's paid the rent for. Then see if you can find any CCTV footage today of any comings and goings. And work out which of the nearby tower blocks the sniper could have used and get some of the lads to go door to door. Quick as you like.'

As Hopkins scuttles off he shoots another warning look at Anderson and the other forensic technician, whose name he can't remember, then follows Sally into the bedroom.

She is standing ramrod straight, jaw jutting forward dangerously, and starts to speak the moment he shuts the door.

'Sir, I …'

'I'm not about to give you a bollocking.' He interrupts. 'I just wanted to have this conversation in private.'

'What conversation, Greg?' she asks, shoulders unstiffening ever so slightly.

Here goes nothing, he thinks, taking a deep breath.

oOo

John stares at Molly, unable to find any words. She's right to be horrified, of course. It's one thing to know that your friend was a soldier who killed people on the battlefield, it's quite another to know they're running around London doing the same thing.

'Get your top off,' Sherlock says, reappearing next to them and dumping the first aid kit on the floor. 'I can't treat something I can't see.'

'You'll not be treating anything.' John struggles to his feet. 'We shouldn't have come here. We've put Molly in an impossible position.'

Sherlock looks between him and Molly and then gently pushes John back down again.

'Molly, I think John has misinterpreted your reaction. Please tell him why you're upset that we've been doing our own dirty work.'

Molly blinks, forehead and nose wrinkling, then her eyes widen and she makes a noise that, under any other circumstances, John would classify as a giggle.

'I'm not upset you've been killing those awful people, it's just I'd assumed Sherlock was stirring up trouble and letting them kill each other, like Mycroft said he had been in all the other countries. God, some of the things those people had done, I should think everyone is grateful. I'm just worried you're going to get caught!'

'Oh,' John says, somewhat stupidly, 'I thought you …'

'No, you didn't. You didn't think at all.' Sherlock cuts him off with more than a touch of asperity. 'So let's not waste any more time on you being wrong. Get your top off.'

John ignores the jibe, knowing that worry for him is what's making Sherlock snap, and lets Sherlock help him out of the hoodie. Molly's sharp intake of breath tells him how much of a mess he's in before he even looks down at his blood drenched side.

'Is the bullet still in there?' She asks, reaching for an antiseptic wipe and kneeling up as Sherlock starts working on the now scarlet knot of the bandage.

'No. It just grazed me, thank God. I …' He breaks off, clenching his teeth together and gripping the chair arms hard enough to turn his knuckles white as Sherlock starts peeling the bandage away from the open flesh. 'Fuck that hurts.'

'Almost done.' Sherlock's hands are trembling as he fights to get it unstuck, his face paler than usual.

'Here.' Molly takes hold of the bandage, hands steady and face serene. 'Let me sort this out while you go and get John a glass of water. There's codeine in the cupboard above the kettle too.'

Sherlock leaves quickly and John redoubles his grip on the chair arms and Molly shoots him an apologetic smile and then resumes the removal.

'Is the codeine on prescription?' John asks once the bandage is completely off and he can speak without gasping.

'Yes, from when Greg had a tooth out last month. It should take the edge off, at least.'

'It should.' John shifts so he's got a better view of the raw, weeping furrow, and takes the wipe out of Molly's hand to clean the undamaged skin around it. 'I'm going to need the biggest dressing pad you've got and tape as well as bandage.'

'Right.' Molly is silent for a few moments as she rummages through the box. 'Who did this to you?'

'Sebastian Moran.' Sherlock says from the doorway. He's holding a glass and the painkillers but he doesn't come any closer. 'I did say this wasn't just a social call.'

'Oh God.' Molly sounds genuinely frightened. 'How did he find you? How did you get away? Where … Where is he now?'

'Sherlock,' John bites out as he starts to clean the wound itself. 'You explain, please. I, ah …'

'We found him.' Sherlock places the water and tablets down on the coffee table, then joins Molly on the floor, motioning for her to continue helping John whilst not actually looking at John's side himself. 'We were intending to capture him but, unfortunately, the plan went slightly awry and he was the one who got away.'

Molly rips open another wipe and cleans her own hands again, before opening the dressing pad and holding it out to John. Her hands are still steady but her voice quivers as she asks, 'What about Greg and Mrs Hudson? Won't he …'

'No, he won't,' John says firmly, taking the pad and laying it over the patch of mutilated flesh, hissing slightly at the contact. 'We let Mycroft know as soon as it happened. He's got men at Baker Street keeping watch over Mrs Hudson and a team shadowing Greg … Tape, please?'

'Oh, yes, sorry.' Molly grabs it and rips off a strip. 'You hold the dressing in place, I'll stick it down … What about the policeman you said Moriarty had paid to watch Greg? Is he with Greg now?'

'DS MacKinnon is dead.' Sherlock's voice is sharp enough to cut diamonds. 'I killed him myself.'

'MacKinnon? But … that was the Sergeant who committed suicide. Greg told me all about it. Said he left a note saying he'd been paid to mess up cases, pass information on raids and stuff to the suspects. The note also implied he was involved in framing you. Only he didn't say who was paying him so they had to open an investigation and …' Molly's voice trails off as she stares at Sherlock with something that looks suspiciously like awe. 'You wrote the note?'

'I'm good with my hands. Forgery is hardly difficult for me. But if it's any consolation, everything in the note was true.'

'Okay.' Molly takes a deep breath, finishes taping the dressing down and picks up a roll of bandage. Then, as if working through a mental checklist, asks, 'So who's following Moran?'

'Mycroft's looking for him on CCTV and I've got my homeless network on it too.' Sherlock pulls his phone out of his pocket and gives it a disgusted look. 'Nothing yet, which means he hasn't gone back to his house. He'll turn up somewhere soon though. Most probably here or Baker Street. He doesn't have many options.'

'You came to protect me?'

'Yes.' Sherlock's tone makes it clear he thinks it's ridiculous that Molly needs that confirmed, and sends a small smile creeping to the corners of her mouth. 'Moran still doesn't know Moriarty's dead, or what part you played in my survival – will never know actually, I had Mycroft change all the paperwork soon after, so none of this could ever be traced back to you – but he wouldn't baulk at killing you to get to Lestrade.'

John watches Molly's face as she hands the other end of the bandage to him so he can tie it off himself. It might be the pain clouding his judgement but he's sure he can see relief there.

'So no-one can ever find out what I did?' she clarifies, popping two pills out of the blister pack onto John's palm, then motioning for Sherlock to give him the water. 'I can pretend to be just as surprised as everyone else when you finally reveal you're still alive?'

'If that's what you want, yes.' Sherlock says as John gratefully gulps the pills down and gingerly sits back in the chair. 'Lestrade need never know you knew.'

Not just the pain then, John thinks as Molly nods and then says, very brightly, 'So what do we do now?'

John opens his mouth but Sherlock gets there first. 'Now, we wait.'

oOo

'So you think this is all Moriarty trying to cover up the fact that he is real and Sherlock wasn't a fake? That he used Ronald Adair to kidnap those kids and frame Sherlock. That he's the one who was paying MacKinnon, to prevent any evidence of his existence coming to light?' Sally asks, when Greg stops talking. He looks up at her in surprise. He expected scepticism or outright derision at first but she sounds as if she's actually considering what he's said.

'Yes, I do. I've never believed that Sherlock created Moriarty and paid an actor to play him. You heard those men this …' He looks at his watch – God, gone one am already! 'Yesterday morning, even if you dismissed them out of hand at the time. Plus …' He struggles against the impulse for a moment, then pulls the newspaper proof out of his jacket pocket, offering it to Sally. '… This appeared on my desk earlier.'

Sally's eyebrows shoot up towards her hairline as she reads it. 'Do you know what the articles are going to say?'

'Other than the obvious, no. But I do know this is a genuine proof of tomorrow's paper and they wouldn't be publishing if they hadn't triple checked their sources. They're basically reversing their own position on the whole affair.'

Sally hands the paper back to him without meeting his eyes. 'If this is true …' there is a tremor in her voice that tells Greg exactly what she's not saying.

'It is true.' He knows he sounds far too vehement but he can't help himself. 'Moriarty won because he duped us all and Sherlock jumped because … because Moriarty had beaten him, I suppose, and he thought there wasn't any point in going on. We can't bring him back but we've got a chance to fix what we did wrong back then … Only I can't do it alone.'

'And you want me to help you? When I was the one who accused Sherlock in the first place?'

'You followed the evidence and brought a possibility to the attention of your superiors. You did what you thought was right. Question is, do you still think you were right?'

'I … I …' Sally turns and takes two steps away from Greg. Her voice is low and rough when she finally says, 'I don't know any more.'

Greg doesn't say anything else and eventually she turns back to him. Her face is tight but her gaze is unwavering.

'I want to find out though.'

'Good.' Greg gestures towards the door but before Sally can even take hold of the handle there's the sound of running footsteps and then Hopkins practically falls into the room.

'Sorry to barge in, Sir, Sergeant Donovan, but you need to come now. A lad called the Yard about half an hour ago from one of the tower blocks just over there.' He bounds over to the window and yanks back the curtain, pointing eagerly into the night toward a looming lit up shape in the direction the shot would have come from. 'I'm not quite sure exactly what he said, dispatch wasn't very clear, but I think we've found where the sniper took his shot from.'

oOo

By the time Sherlock's phone vibrates with an incoming text the codeine has muted the pain in John's side to a dull thud and the coffee Molly made – so thick you could have mistaken it for treacle – has banished the fog in his head.

'Where is he?' he asks as Sherlock's mouth curls into a predatory grin.

'Seems he thinks you need taking out first. He's at Baker Street, in the house opposite.' Sherlock's already on his feet, phone back in his pocket.

'The one up for rent?' John stands too, flexing his shoulder muscles before testing the give of the bandage around his torso, which holds admirably. 'Where he was watching me from before?'

Sherlock nods. 'The man's an idiot.' He scoops John's hoodie from the floor, only wincing slightly as his ribs protest, and hands it over before turning to Molly, who is just getting to her feet.

'You'll be fine going to bed now. I don't anticipate Moran slipping through our net a second time but I'll not take risks with you. Mycroft's men are already positioned around the house and you can call him if you think for a moment something is wrong.'

Molly's cheeks colour slightly but otherwise she doesn't react to Sherlock's pronouncement, instead picking up the remaining blister packs of codeine and handing them to John.

'I think you two might need these more than we do right now. Take care of each other.'

'We will.' John says, pushing them into his jeans pocket. He's echoed a beat later by Sherlock who adds, 'Mycroft will text you when he's caught.'

'Thank you,' she says as she follows them to the back door.

'No, thank you, Molly Hooper.' John swiftly kisses her cheek. 'For everything.'

He doesn't look back as they slip out into the night once again, but he hears the whispered "Good Luck" as they disappear through the garden gate and into the network of alleys that behind the house.

He's beginning to wonder how they're going to get across London – he doesn't fancy a night bus, not looking as roughed up as they do and they can't walk all the way – when a scruffy teenager steps out of the shadows in front of them.

'Have you got something for me, Raz?'

'Might of. You got the cash?'

Sherlock drags a wad of notes out of his back pocket and grins at the teenager. 'Keys, please.'

'Keys?' John says as Raz drops some into Sherlock palm and grabs the money.

Raz runs his thumb over the edge of the notes with practiced ease and then grins back at Sherlock. 'Bike's at the end of there.' He points over his shoulder into another alleyway. 'Wiv 'elmets n all.'

'Excellent. And Pog?'

'Waiting where you said.'

'Fine. Don't spend it all at once,' Sherlock says as Raz continues to fiddle with the notes, then grabs John's hand and pulls him away before he has a chance to ask any questions. Most of which become redundant a few seconds later, when they turn a corner to find a large black Kawasaki parked in the middle of the path.

'That's hardly unobtrusive,' John hisses at Sherlock as he takes the offered helmet and puts it on.

'Quick though,' Sherlock says, eyes sparkling in the moonlight before he pulls his helmet on and gracefully swings himself onto the bike without so much as a wince. 'And neither of us has so much as touched one since we met, so it isn't predictable.'

'Very true.' John slings the bag across his body, strap crossing the opposite side to his wound, and clambers on behind Sherlock. A small part of him thinks he'd have liked his first ride on a motor bike with Sherlock to be in difference circumstances but he quashes that ruthlessly. Images of him and Sherlock roaring through the countryside in full leathers not being helpful right now.

'You'll have to hold on lower down, my ribs may not be hurting thanks to Molly's pills but I doubt they'll take kindly to this otherwise,' Sherlock says, taking John's hands off his waist and pressing them to his hip bones. Then he reaches back, almost grabbing John's sides before he remembers and pulls on his hips instead, until John's chest is flush to Sherlock's back and they are pressed tightly together from knees to stomach. 'Yes, that's better. Grip with your thighs as well.'

John opens his mouth to ask if Sherlock's sure he'll be okay but there's no time, Sherlock kicks the bike into life and takes them roaring off through the almost empty streets.

oOo

Mycroft allows himself a congratulatory smile as an intercepted text message appears on the screen in front of him. It is the first non-routine message the number has received in two years and tells him that, although everything is not going to plan, their final objective is still eminently achievable. Reaching for his phone to inform Sherlock of the whereabouts of Moran he pauses, aware that he didn't pick up the man's arrival at the house, and pulls up the relevant CCTV feeds on his monitor. No sign of movement, not that he'd expect to see any, but there are, if you look in the shadows of the doorways round and about, more people sleeping rough than has been normal for the past few weeks.

He's about to send a text to Sherlock anyway, not willing to leave anything to chance at this point, when a motorbike, with two black clad riders, appears in the feed showing the south end of Allsop Place – the road directly behind the east side of Baker Street - and rolls to a halt in front of some bins. A figure appears from the shadows between them, takes both riders' helmets, puts one on and then takes the bike. Mycroft pockets his phone, massages the bridge of his nose with the thumb and forefinger of his left hand for a second, and then sighs as he notes down the registration number of the bike.

Turning from the screen once all three figures have disappeared, and wondering as he does so why Sherlock has to needlessly complicate his life at every given opportunity, he presses a silver button on the corner of his desk.

'Get someone to modify the last three minutes of the footage on Allsop South to clear all evidence of a motorbike and riders, then have them trace and clear the bike from the feeds before and after that time,' he says as his assistant appears in the doorway between her office and his. 'Instruct Annabel to intercept any report of the theft of the bike.' He hands her the page with the registration written on it. 'Then I need you, and a small extraction team, at 232 Baker Street immediately. The package will, I should imagine, be ready for transportation on your arrival. It must not be allowed to escape this time.'

'Sir.' She nods crisply, then strides towards the outer office and reception desk, thumbs already moving in a blur over the keypad of her Blackberry.

Mycroft walks over to the window and, for a moment, allows the weight of the day to show in his body as he slumps against the window frame. St James' Park is still shrouded in darkness but the faint cheeping of a blackbird tells him dawn is imminent. If I were given to sentimentality, I might draw an analogy between this and the events intended for later today, he thinks to himself, closing his eyes for a moment and drawing in a deep, slow breath. As it is, I shall get on with my work and simply hope that John subdues his erstwhile comrade-in-arms before this new dawn provides too much unwanted illumination.

oOo

Moran fights down the urge to check his phone again. He'll feel the vibrations if the Boss does respond, if not, then tracking him down becomes the fourth task on the list, once the three original targets have been eliminated. He'd like to take out Sherlock Holmes too, fecking little gobshite that he is, but his death has never been part of the remit. Besides, he's pretty certain the Boss is going to want to handle it personally; in the same way he wants Johnny's blood on his hands, in recompense for being so thoroughly tricked.

I won't make this clean, he decides, as he moves his eye to the rifle's scope once more, focusing on the half open flat door just visible through the window of 221B, illuminated by the street lights outside. A stomach wound at this range will be untreatable and agonising. Plus he'll be alive long enough to really regret throwing his lot in with that lanky streak of piss who won't be able to do a damn thing for him and it'll bring the old lady running, so I'll get a crack at her too.

A slight noise that might have been a creak from the corridor behind him has him turning and sliding off the table he'd shoved against the window to use as a resting position, dropping into a crouch in the shadows below it. Knives appear in both his hands so fast it would look like magic if anyone was observing him. Through the door, which he left open because the hinges were shot to hell and made a bloody awful noise if you tried to open it quietly, he could see only empty space. There was nothing there, neither on the landing nor at the top of the staircase that was visible beyond.

Tamping down on his own breathing until it's barely audible, even to himself, he listens, hard, for long minutes. Other than the rumble of the sparse traffic outside there is nothing. No creaking of floorboards or doors, no shuffle of feet on carpet, no hints of anyone else in the house at all. You're jumping at shadows because you've not got your handgun, he chides himself, unrolling from the crouch and replacing the knives into his thigh sheaths. You bolted the back door after you and you know no-one saw you come in here. Take a deep breath and fecking well calm down. If you miss Johnny because you're acting like a pussy you'll deserve whatever punishment the Boss dreams up.

He swings himself back up onto the table top, making it creak and groan in protest. It's no wonder the place hasn't been rented out yet, filled with cheap furniture that wouldn't stand up to daily life. Repositioning the rifle so its barrel is flush against the window frame and thus not obvious to anyone looking up – the faint greyish blue tint to the world outside telling him it will be light very soon - he stares across at 221B.

Nothing. It looks just as it did when he … a flicker of movement reflects in the window pane and he's turning, reaching for his knives only to freeze into stillness a second later. For the second time in under twelve hours he has the barrel of a gun pressed to his forehead and this time he doubts there'll be an easy way out, because it's Johnny's finger on the trigger.