Still Talking When You're Not There- Chapter Seven


The first time someone died, it was an accident. Honestly, John. I had no intention; the first one just…happened; a by-product, an unintended consequence, unplanned. He'd been letting himself into the old office block in the financial district of Moscow each night for the past week, using the time between one and three am to ransack the hard disks of each of the PCs in the room. The software said Microsoft, but it was one of the pirated copies so prevalent in the Russian Federation; even came in plastic shrink wrapped boxes looking like they were straight off the plane from Seattle. No way was he going to risk a USB transferring this virus-ridden crap onto his laptop.

He'd cased the place originally by posing as Lars Sigurson, Moriarty's Norwegian consultant. It was a name known to the Moscovite office. He'd worked hard at establishing the cover story even before he left London. His blond hair and grey green eyes were convincing enough when matched with a Scandinavian-accented Russian. He had talked his way into a meeting with the Moscow office head, claiming that he was working on a money laundering scam that needed cooperation with the Russian bank owned by the Moscow dark angels. It was enough to get him into the office for a good look around. He had promised to return with the money in ten days' time.

In the meantime, he had to break in to do his work in situ, in the middle of the night when he wouldn't be disturbed. That was the theory anyway. The plan was simple- gut the computers for the details of the network in Moscow, in particular, the dark angels who were keeping them safe from the prying eyes of the few authorities who actually were trying to hold back the tide of organised crime.

Whatever he'd experienced in America, working with the FBI and the CIA had not prepared him for the sheer scale of Moriarty's network in Russia. It was virtually a clandestine government in its own right, sometimes competing but often collaborating with the country's local authorities to siphon millions of roubles out of the legal economy. Whereas in the USA it was a case of tracking down the odd villain in a key position- be it a bank, public office, or company- in Russia, the network actually owned its own banks, city halls and corporations, employing thousands of people.

That made setting up the cascade of in-fighting harder, just because of the sheer scale of things. But, there was one advantage of working in the Russian Federation- it was relatively easy to provoke one faction into fighting another. When you have your own private armies, bloodshed is much more the resort of first choice, rather than last.

That's why he was now hiding inside a filing room, waiting for the security guard to clear the floor- so he could plant the key piece of evidence that would set Moscow's network at the throat of St Petersburg's fiefdom. The traditional enmity between the cities was mirrored in the network; it would not take much for one side to believe the worst of the other- and start shooting.

The armed guard was old enough to have been born in the Soviet era. His plodding passage through the floor could be detected from the squeak of his rubber soled boots. Every night for the past six, he'd made his rounds every two hours, giving Sherlock all the time he needed. And he made so much noise coming up the stairs that he could always get out of the way in plenty of time. Downstairs, three more guards with guns watched CCTV cameras on the stairwells, lift lobbies, the back and front entrances. Sherlock had copied the digital feeds and was looping them through the circuits, so the screens would not show him entering by the roof and getting into this office.

As the double doors at the far end of the office closed behind the guard, Sherlock was already in motion. He settled back into place and re-opened the file. He referred to his sheet of paper, being careful to type the sub-routine into the email that would plant the virus which would be detected by the next morning's security scan. It was tailor-made; a Trojan horse programme that would open the door to file theft, and it had St Petersburg's characteristic coding. Once found, the Moscovites would retaliate, and then the series of embedded files would kick into action in both St Petersburg and Moscow. He estimated it would take a week at most before guns were used instead of keystrokes.

(It's easier this way, John. In America, everything took FOREVER because it all had to be 'by the book' and lead to successful prosecutions. I used to think the British security services were constrained, but in the US, the criminals use the legal system to stymie law enforcement so well that the FBI and CIA are obsessed with due process. Thank God for the lawlessness of the Russians- I can wrap this up in a matter of a month. That will mean the two biggest operations are down- only thirty more to go before I can become un-dead and think of returning to you.)

Perhaps because he was having one of his internal conversations with John, or maybe it was just that he had not slept properly for the six nights when he was at this work- whatever the reason, he did not hear the arrival of the intruder.

One moment he was closing down a programming string, the next he was pulled right out of his chair, by a man whose arm was across his neck, his right hand with a knife pressing it against Sherlock's throat. There was a loud shout- остановитесь - злоумышленник!* – almost certain to recall the armed security guard.

The Bartitsu manoeuver he used to dislodge the offending arm did nothing to stop the point of the knife dragging across the side of his neck, but it did mean that the burly Russian was now at the mercy of the younger man he had just attacked, caught in a headlock with Sherlock's right hand across his mouth to stop a half stifled shout.

He dragged his attacker back into the filing room, where he had hidden earlier from the security guard. His stranglehold against the man's windpipe was having an effect, and his struggles grew weaker. He pushed the door with a foot, but it did not quite catch. He felt something wet and warm on his neck, as the knife clattered to the ground, from the man's numb fingers. As the man sagged and he let the winded assailant slump to the floor, Sherlock heard a call from the guard, "Alexi?" at the doorway into the office he'd just vacated

Sherlock faced a conundrum- the first assailant would recover consciousness if left untended. But, the security guard would soon investigate the filing room- which had no other exit. He was bottled up, caught like a rat in a trap. He sighed.

He picked up the knife, pulled the winded man to his feet, and grabbed him in the same lock-hold as before. He knew that Russians had the same macho tendency as Americans to shoot first and ask questions later. So, he used the first man as a shield and pushed him in front, through the door, and almost into the back of the security guard, who was bent over the computer screen trying to figure out what was going on. He whirled around as Sherlock put the knife to his assailant's throat, and said quietly, "подавите оружие". But the guard did not put his gun down, growling "Вы подавляете нож".

To break the deadlock, Sherlock began to move slowly towards the door, keeping his hostage between him and the gun. Somewhere along the way, he realised that his hostage had stopped resisting. In fact, he'd stopped breathing. Staggering slightly under the weight of a now dead body, Sherlock reached the door. The security guard kept his gun up as he fumbled at his belt for the radio that would connect him to the front desk and help. Sherlock couldn't risk that call being made. He shoved the body at the guard, and attacked. The gun went off, but the body that took the bullet was already dead. Sherlock did not hesitate- he had no choice if he wanted to get out alive before the rest of the office's security arrived. So, he slashed the knife across the neck of the guard, severing both carotid arteries. He'd be dead before the others could reach him, and would not be able to identify him.

He pushed his piece of paper into the pocket of the shot man, and put the knife in the hand of the man who had attacked him - it might confuse the first people on the scene; let them think it was a disagreement.

He calmly walked over to the computer, finished typing his code and shut the system down. Righting the chair, he then walked to the far door of the office and slipped through the double doors. He could hear the other guards arriving on the scene behind him as he ran up the stairs to the roof, where he had gained access and would now make his escape.

oOo

Now back in the relatively safe confines of the third class tourist hotel in a seedy area of Moscow's suburbs, Sherlock was trying to clean the knife wound across the side of his neck. Superficial, but still bleeding a lot. He'd used bottled water to irrigate the wound. He fished in the first aid kit for an antiseptic wipe to clean the area around the wound, then opened the special bandage. He'd got a dozen of these off the Americans- used a special chitosan compound to stop bleeding fast. It was still a military patent, but he knew that he could not risk a doctor or hospital visit. (You'd approve, John, used in Afghanistan first and now coming on stream for normal consumers- one of the few good things to emerge from all those battlefield wounds.)

It had been a close call. (The first one was an accident; I didn't mean to choke off his oxygen supply to the point where he actually died. It was inconvenient; I wanted him to be able to walk out with me at least as far as the stairs, where I planned to dump him unconscious. But, with hindsight, it worked better this way.)

"And just how could you think that killing someone was better than leaving him alive?" John's attitude toward killing was …perplexing. On the one hand, the ex-army doctor had shot Jeff Hope through the heart for trying to tempt Sherlock to take a poison pill. On the other hand, his flatmate's medical instincts were to save every patient, irrespective of whether they were a murder suspect or a best friend. Sherlock had summed it up to Lestrade on that first night, even before he knew it was John who had pulled the trigger. "Acclimatised to violence, he didn't fire until I was in immediate danger, though, so strong moral principle." Somehow, on John, the contradictions didn't seem a problem. He wondered if John would be so forgiving of Sherlock's version. Probably not.

(But, it will actually work to convince the Moscovites. I planted the cypher code sheet in his pocket- it will look like the guard interrupted a St Petersburg mole, they fought and killed each other. This way the two hubs of Moriarty's network will be at each other's throats faster. A good result, John, really.)

The only surprise of the evening, really, is that this is the first time that Sherlock has ever actually killed two men, even in self-defence. Apart from the very few times he 'borrowed' John's weapon, he wasn't armed with a gun in the UK unless he took it off a criminal- and even then, Lestrade had made it clear that there would be 'issues' arising from shooting someone, even in self-defence. Knife wounds (Always in self-defence John, you know I don't carry the knife; I use it to pin the bills to the mantelpiece, or the Cluedo board to the wall), beatings, sometimes a criminal ended up dead from a chase, but he'd never used a weapon to kill a man, nor had he ever throttled a person to death.

What surprised him is that he felt no different. It was just a process, done without emotion and without any particular personal animosity. He felt no regret. He found that he was more curious than anything. He'd have liked to examine the bodies of the two men at leisure, perhaps in a morgue, to see the actual extent of the damage done, and how it had been inflicted.

The only other thought that occurred to him was that he was sure John would be disappointed in his reaction to the deaths.

oOo

The next time it happened, it was with malice of forethought, premeditated, pure and simple murder. He felt no compunction at all. The man in question was Boris Yerinilko. He was a big man, more a weightlifter in physique than what you might expect from an assassin. Sherlock had recognised him from Baker Street; he was the "workman" hired by Mrs Hudson to do some the minor repairs. Simple, of course, and with all the hallmarks of Moriarty's warped sense of humour. Keep an eye on her, to be able to deliver the threat-one of the "three bullets, three gunmen; three victims" that Moriarty used to incentivise Sherlock to jump.

Sherlock took his time- four days and three nights of stalking in Yekaterinberg. Before he left Moscow, he'd managed to pick up an old, but well cared for Makarov pistol and ammunition, so common in Russia that it would be almost impossible to trace. The serial number had been removed, probably decades before.

He did the deed in one of the side streets. The man was walking alone, it was late and he was a little drunk, so not paying a great deal of attention. The weather had turned very cold; winter was coming early to the Urals, so there were few pedestrians on the street. Dressed like any sensible local in a great coat and furry hat, walking with his collar turned up against the wind, Sherlock simply came out of a building doorway, walking towards Boris. When they were about to pass one another, he stopped, and said quietly in English, "Good Evening." In surprise, Boris looked up at him, and then in the split second when he recognised Sherlock, the tall brunet closed the gap between them and shot him in the heart.

(I know, John. You wouldn't approve. You didn't object when I threw Nielsen out of the window at Baker Street the first time, but I do recall you weren't happy by the time I defenestrated him the fourth time. Tough man- took a lot to break a few bones to make up for hurting Mrs Hudson. I never did "half kill" him as you accused me of doing that last night in the lab at Barts- he was fit enough to return to duty that night when Bond Air didn't take off from Heathrow. But, I never told you that, did I? Well, Mycroft was being funny; 'need to know' and all that.

So, I don't suppose you will understand why I killed Boris. Strange, I thought there would be some feeling attached to it; a sort of closure, maybe a little sense of revenge? But, there was…nothing, nothing at all. I think that I have become empty, a hollow vessel. What little sense I once had of what was good and not good seems to have vanished. I seem to have left the better part of me behind, with you. Perhaps this is what Moriarty meant, when he said he would burn the heart out of me.

In his mind, there was no answer from John. He wondered if there ever would be, should he ever get back to Baker Street, and should he ever be brave enough to tell the truth about what he did while he was away. No matter, you're alive- that's all that counts now to a dead man.


*Author's Note: "остановитесь - злоумышленник!" = Stop Intruder!; "подавите оружие" = Put the gun down; "Вы подавляете нож" = Put the knife down