Update 5 September 2016
Please accept my apologies for the long wait. I've been working on the story for months now, but it just wasn't saying what I wanted it to say. So, I dumped about 20k words and started over. This is the result, and as much as I regret making you wait so long, I'm glad I waited until the story I wanted to tell finally appeared on the page.
There were aspects of series 03 that I loved, and a lot that I didn't. Not everything made sense. Not everything was what I would have wanted to see happen. This story starts at the end of HLV, and ignores the trailer that's been aired for series 04. This is purely my take on where Sherlock and John's relationship is headed. I hope you'll let me know what you think of my solution.
The entire story is complete, and I will be posting a chapter every week. The chapter count is still not finalized because I tend to change the chapter breaks during final beta. The chapter I'm posting today will be followed by another on Friday, and that will become my scheduled posting date.
Ghyll
(Mycroft)
Mycroft ended the call with his brother and let the hand holding the phone drop to his lap. Matters were moving much more quickly than he had anticipated, and it had begun with another phone call less than an hour earlier from Lady Elizabeth Smallwood. She had wanted to meet with him privately, at her home. There had been no need to ask the reason. There was only one topic so personal that not even the security of their offices would suffice.
Mycroft was well aware that Lady Smallwood felt some responsibility for Sherlock's current predicament. She had, after all, engaged Sherlock to address her personal issues with Magnussen. As far as she knew, it was the sole reason Sherlock had been at Appledore. Mycroft was perfectly willing to let stand her ignorance of Sherlock's existing obsession with Magnussen. It would not do to dilute her sense of obligation. Her remorse made her an even stronger ally in the only battle Mycroft cared about right now. She had been the lone dissenting voice when Mycroft had persuaded the others that the best alternative was to send his brother into exile on a virtual suicide mission. The video broadcast offered her a legitimate reason to overrule them all, and she was eager to take advantage of it. She had made only one demand in their meeting this morning, and that was for Mycroft to give her his word that he had had no involvement in engineering the broadcast, which he had been able to honestly confirm.
Sherlock's pardon was all but assured now. Mycroft had been planning how and when to share that information with his brother when Mary Watson's call had rung through to his private mobile, demanding to see him at once. She was suddenly concerned that Sherlock, after all this time, was putting the pieces together, and Sherlock's call just now seemed to bear her out. Mycroft's unholy alliance with Mary Watson had been a desperate attempt to keep John alive until Sherlock's eventual return. It had been done with the best intentions, which seemed to confirm that the road to hell was indeed paved with them.
He didn't believe in hell, or its counterpart, but the concept of unrelieved torment was entirely real and familiar.
He tapped on the privacy screen, and his driver lowered the panel. "Yes, sir?"
"Baker Street."
Mycroft glanced up at the windows of 221B when he got out of the car in time to catch a glimpse of Sherlock as he backed out of sight. When he reached the top of the stairs, he found Sherlock glaring at him from his chair, still wearing his coat and scarf.
"I thought you were sending a car," he snapped.
Mycroft paused just inside the door. "I was in the neighbourhood," he began, and was met with a derisive snort.
"Clearly, since we only spoke eight minutes ago. And why was that?"
Mycroft crossed to John's chair and sank into the worn cushion. "I have good news and wanted to share it in person, since you ask. Lady Smallwood has seen to your pardon. You are officially absolved of all charges."
Sherlock's steely gaze narrowed with suspicion. "In exchange for what? I've made no progress on the case."
This needed a careful blend of truth and fiction which he had had insufficient time to prepare. "There is no case."
Sherlock's brow creased in confusion, and he leaned forward so abruptly that Mycroft flinched. "What are you saying?"
"I am saying that the source of the video has been identified, and it has nothing to do with Moriarty or his network. It was perpetrated by someone on the inside who hoped that suspicion would fall upon me. The threat has been dealt with. You are free to resume your life."
Sherlock sank back, fingers drumming rapidly on the arms of the chair. "If there's no case for me to solve, then why am I being pardoned?"
"Because your future value continues to outweigh the havoc you create. And because Lady Smallwood feels responsible for having involved you in the Magnussen business."
Sherlock's gaze sharpened, full power deduction centred on Mycroft for a long moment. "Yet she initially agreed to my exile. What changed?"
"Circumstances. The fact that such a hoax was engineered by someone in a position of trust has provided the ammunition she needed to force the outcome she had wanted all along. Call it assuaging her guilty conscience, if you like. Call it good fortune. Just accept it, and move on." He pushed up from the chair with effort, suddenly weary to his bones. "Now, if you don't mind, it has been a very long day."
"Sit down, Mycroft." The words fell between them like a gauntlet.
Mycroft resumed his seat, unsurprised by the absence of any sign that his brother might be grateful for his efforts. "Please be brief."
Sherlock responded with the expected sneer. "Easily done. You are to stay out of John's life, and mine, permanently. No interference of any kind, under any guise or motive. At the first whiff, I will make it my life's work to sabotage you at every turn. I will hack my way into your business and use it all against you in ways that only I can do. I will be your worst enemy, and you will never see me coming." He leaned closer, hands braced on the arms of his own chair. "Look carefully into my eyes, Mycroft, and understand that I mean every word."
It was far worse than he expected. No recriminations. No demand for an explanation. Banishment. Irreversible exile. "I have no doubt that you mean it. I have heard it before, little brother, from men who had far more ammunition to wield against me than the sins you've catalogued for me your entire life. Sins, I might add, that were largely committed in your name. Your pardon came at a similar price, if you intend to hold that against me as well. I know better than to expect gratitude."
"For what? You lied to me the entire time I was away. You let me believe John was fine when he was anything but. As for the pardon, you did everything in your power to have me sent on a suicide mission rather than have my crime taint your reputation. I'm not an idiot, a fact you seem to forget on a regular basis. And don't think for a moment that you've slipped the noose. I may not have put it all together quite yet, but I will. There's something about you and Mary Watson that I'm still sorting out. When I do, we'll talk again." His lips tilted up in a mockery of a smile. "Trust me." He got up and walked to the window, his back pointedly turned. "Now, get out."
Every instinct argued against letting this go. Sherlock was perilously close to the whole truth, and Mycroft was desperate to throw him off the scent. So desperate that the urge to do it now kept him frozen in place while his mind raced at light speed. Sherlock would not expect him to leave quietly. Doing so could well increase his brother's suspicion. But there was equal danger that Mycroft might inadvertently provide a fragment of data that would give it all away.
Quite unexpectedly, John Watson's voice popped into Mycroft's head.
Don't speak. Just leave.
Mycroft had no choice but to agree. He rose and walked out of the flat.
(Mary)
The skill that had saved her life so many times over the years, more than her fabled marksmanship or her steely nerve, was her ability to read people at a glance. Since childhood, she had been able to measure the value of a friend or the threat of an adversary with speed and accuracy. She could tell instantly if her parents were angry with each other, or with her. She knew when to stay out of someone's way, or when to ask a favour. And she was almost never wrong. Even her rare mistakes were valuable because each one revealed a new factor to watch for, and added to her arsenal. Her siblings thought she was the favourite because she always got what she wanted. She simply knew how and when to make her demands, and when to stay silent. It was as natural as breathing, and it had only improved over time. Her colleagues half-kiddingly accused her of being able to read minds.
That was before she had met John Watson.
Mycroft had told her when he put her on this assignment that she was expected to leave as soon as Sherlock returned, and she had agreed without question. She would have scoffed at the idea that she would ever consider giving up her career to spend the rest of her life playing house. But she had made that commitment without all of the facts. Had she known that she would be hand-holding a man who was grieving someone who was much more than a friend, she might have recognized the trap in time to avoid it.
The only men in her life who had become important to her had been exactly like John, but not in character, or appearance. They had each belonged to someone else, and there was something in her that had always found the unattainable to be irresistibly attractive. John's devotion to a man he believed to be dead had confounded her, at first. And then, it had fascinated her. She should have recognized the effect it was having on her and backed away, told Holmes that he could keep his fee, and run in the other direction. Instead, she had burned every bridge behind her, and the ones in front of her were quickly disappearing.
And she had done it to herself. Painted herself into a corner that had Mycroft Holmes planning her exit, John pulling away from her, and Sherlock seemingly on the brink of becoming the most dangerous adversary she had ever faced. If she couldn't find a way to convince him that she was John's only chance for happiness and divert him from working out the alliance she had with Mycroft, it would all be over.
John had been talking to Sherlock in his sleep more and more lately, and it was clear to her that she was running out of time.
The look on John's face when he walked into the flat tonight told her that it was now, or never.
(John)
Taxis had recently passed into the category of luxury items in the Watson family budget, but John was granting himself an exception because there was no place short of 221B that still felt like home.
When he and Mary had first started seeing each other, he had let her believe that his aversion to the iconic black London taxis had been about the expense because it was less awkward to have her think he was cheap than to admit that he still couldn't bear to be in one without Sherlock. If she had drawn any conclusions from the fact that he had hailed one for the first time the night Sherlock interrupted their engagement dinner by rising from the dead dressed as a French waiter, she had never let on.
But she was very good at hiding the truth, or maybe he was an even greater idiot than Moriarty had said that night at the pool. Maybe people like them could spot stupidity in people like him with one practiced glance. Maybe his gullibility was as obvious as the yellow light on the roof of a taxi.
But Sherlock had believed her, too. In spite of everything she'd done to both of them, Sherlock wanted him to stay with her. But all of the rationalizations Sherlock had come up with over the past six months, wearing John down with the sheer relentless weight of persistence, could never balance out the moment she had pointed a gun at Sherlock's chest and pulled the trigger. Sherlock seemed incapable of grasping that simple fact. John had seen that tonight. And if there had been any doubt in John's mind that Sherlock was not hearing him, the man's last words to him tonight made it clear. Give Mary a chance to explain, he'd said, steadfastly ignoring that there WAS no explanation that John would ever accept.
Mary had dinner waiting for him when he walked in. She helped him out of his coat and practically frogmarched him to the table when he tried to tell her that he wasn't hungry and that he wanted to talk, not eat. He had sent her a text from the cab to that effect, in fact.
"We can do both. I'm starving, and you haven't had a proper meal in a week. Sit." She was still smiling, but her eyes had cooled noticeably.
"I think you know it's not going to be that kind of talk."
She put down her fork and let the smile drop. "I know that you've been put through hell for most of a year now, and I'm responsible for a lot of it. But I hope you're not blaming me for all of it."
John pushed his plate to the side and rested his arms on the table in its place. "It's not about assigning blame. It's about correcting a mistake. I thought I could live with what you did. I was wrong."
"You're not talking about my past, are you?"
"No." He had meant what he said about her past. It was the present he could not forgive. "It's about Sherlock."
She made a short sound that could have been a laugh. "When has it ever been about anything else?"
"You made it about him the second you pulled that trigger."
Her eyes hardened, and then filled with tears. "What do you want me to do, John? I can't take that back, no matter how much I wish I could. I love you, and I love Sherlock-" Her voice cracked apart on his name.
"And for reasons I will never understand, he still loves you. But I can't." He had never put that into words, even in his own head, until this moment.
Mary pulled in a sharp breath, and quickly looked down. "What are you saying?" When she looked up at him again, her cheeks were streaked with tears.
"I'll stay until the baby is born." He would support her and the baby, of course, and he wanted to be part of his daughter's life. He just could not pretend to love her mother. It wouldn't be fair to any of them.
She swiped at the wetness on her face with both hands. "Sherlock won't want you to do this, John. You know that. He won't let you."
"He's been trying to make me stay with you since you shot him. It was literally the first thing he said when he woke up. So yeah, I expect he'll keep at it, but it won't change how I feel. I grew up knowing my parents hated each other and were only staying together for me and my sister. I'm not going to do that to my daughter. It's a waste of life."
"You don't hate me, John. You hate what I did. Sherlock knows you better than you know yourself, and he believes with all his heart that you belong with me."
"He doesn't know me as well as he thinks." Starting with not understanding what would happen to John when he jumped off that roof, because John believed now that Sherlock had truly had no idea then, and still didn't.
She took a shaky breath. "He knows you're in love with him."
The shock was physical, like touching a live wire. It was a lie. An outrageous, self-serving lie, and he was instantly furious. "That's what you think, isn't it? All this time. That's why you tried to kill him." He was on the edge of shouting, hands clenched into fists.
His fury seemed to make her calm. "It doesn't matter what I believe, John. Sherlock believes it. He wants you to stay with me because he knows he can't be what you need him to be."
"Is that what you've been telling him?" It would explain so much. So fucking much. It had to come from her because if Sherlock had really believed that before, he would not have faked his suicide in front of him. If he believed it now, it was because Mary had convinced him.
"You said you don't understand why he keeps pushing you back to me. This is why, John. It's obvious to everyone but you. They all think you're in love with him. All of your friends. Think about it."
He was shaking his head, but it didn't dispel the images flooding his mind. The two years Sherlock was 'dead', and the way Greg had hovered over him that first night. Greg had taken away his gun because he'd been worried that John would use it on himself. And Greg had found him at Barts, thinking about going off the roof. No one understood that it was guilt, not love. But how would they be expected to know that?
Mary placed her hand over his clenched fist, and he looked up at her. "John, I'm not trying to upset you, but you need to accept that he believes he's doing this for your own good. He doesn't want to hurt you. He's trying so hard not to."
Tonight, when Sherlock had sat so quietly, letting him ramble on about leaving Mary. He'd listened to John, and sent him home to her. The look on his face that John had tried to interpret. He recognized it now. It was pity.
"I'm sorry, John. I promised I wouldn't tell you, but-"
He stood up so abruptly that the chair tipped over, and Mary gasped in surprise. The image of Sherlock and Mary, discussing him like this. The thought of Mary making him look like a pathetic fool in front of the only person on earth whose opinion mattered. He was speechless with rage. He had to get out of here, but there was nowhere to go. Not Baker Street. Not now. Maybe not ever-
Mary gasped, and there was an edge to it that made him look hard at her face. When he recognized what he was seeing, his instincts pushed the fury aside. "What's wrong?"
Mary gripped the edge of the table with both hands and looked up at him with wide eyes. "The baby-"
It took the ambulance seven minutes to arrive. The medics had few questions, and they were at the hospital less than ten minutes later. John held her hand in the ambulance, bathed in guilt. When they arrived at King's College, he stood next to the bed while a consultant young enough to make John feel ancient examined her. The memory of running into Mike Stamford in the park, the day he introduced him to Sherlock, popped into his head. 'Teaching now. Bright young things, like we used to be. God, I hate them!' He'd been talking about his students at Barts. Making small talk. An hour later, they had walked into the lab at Barts, and John's life changed forever.
"Mr Watson, do you have any questions?" The consultant was looking closely at him, and his tone suggested it wasn't the first time he had tried to get John's attention. Mary was looking at him, too.
"Doctor Watson," he corrected him, but it felt stilted. "Will you be doing any more tests?"
Mary and the young man exchanged a look. The man cleared his throat. "Um, yes. We're taking your wife down to have an ultrasound done in a few minutes. Her cervix is effaced, but not dilated. There's no leakage of amniotic fluid, and no detectable contractions. We just want to make sure before we send her home." It all had the vaguely miffed sound of repetition.
He followed the gurney to the ultrasound room, and sat next to the bed as the technician smeared gel over Mary's distended belly. He had seen the images from scans Mary had had done during their separation, but this would be his first time seeing the live images.
He was completely unprepared for his reaction.
He had felt the baby move against his hand many times, and been nudged awake by the poking of tiny feet against his back. He knew the baby was real. But seeing her move on the fuzzy display screen, watching her clench her fists to her mouth protesting the push of the technician's wand, took his breath away.
Mary's fingers twined with his, and he looked down at his hand. When he met her soft, knowing gaze, he felt everything shift. Priorities reordered. This child did not get to choose her parents. She had not asked to be born to an assassin and a fool.
"John, I'm so, so sorry."
He didn't believe her, but didn't matter because the truth that was moving on the screen made his own wishes irrelevant. He looked into Mary's eyes and saw them light with hope as his own flickered out. "I'll take you home."
(Mary)
"There's no need for you to hover over me all day, John. I'm fine. The baby's fine." She was propped up in bed with the cup of tea John had brought up a moment ago. He was dressed for work, but seemed reluctant to leave, and it wasn't hard to read the guilt in his grim smile. She would have preferred actual concern, but it was a start. "In fact, I'm going to get up in a few minutes and have a shower. Go to the clinic, and stop worrying."
"Are you sure you're ready for that?"
"I'm sure, and I'm going to take a nice walk afterward."
John nodded absently. "Don't overdo it."
"I'll be careful." But she could see his mind was already elsewhere. It wasn't hard to guess where. "Are you going to stop by and see how Sherlock is doing?"
John looked at her sharply. "Until he's back to normal, yeah." He started for the door, then stopped. "I don't want you to talk about me to Sherlock." He met her gaze and held it. "Not now. Not ever again."
"I can hardly cut him off every time he mentions you." Which was virtually every other sentence.
"You know what I mean."
Of course, she did. "I won't discuss you and me."
He nodded and left without kissing her goodbye.
As soon as he was safely on his way to work, she pulled out her phone. Mycroft answered with his usual business-like detachment. She smiled into the receiver. "Plans have changed."
"Oh? In what way?"
"I've decided to stay in London."
There was a brief pause. "For how long?"
"Permanently, Mycroft. I need your help to stop the people who are likely to come after me. I can tell you who they are. That should help."
The pause was longer this time. "Why?"
"Because John wants me to stay."
His distant tone turned icy. "We had agreed that you would not tell your husband you were planning to leave until the arrangements were completed."
"I didn't tell him. He wants me and the baby. That's all I need to know."
"You seem to be overlooking one obvious obstacle. Sherlock, as you pointed out, may well be about to discover your mission. He will surely tell John. What do you imagine will happen when he does?"
"Let me deal with Sherlock."
"I would advise you to choose your words more carefully."
"It wasn't intended as a threat, and you know it. Sherlock trusts me to take care of John. I'm simply going to make that work to our advantage."
Mycroft was in no position to argue, and they both knew it. She told him that she would be meeting with Sherlock at the first opportunity, and she would update Mycroft with the outcome. She promised not to reveal, or admit to, her alliance with Mycroft. He reluctantly agreed to let her stay. For now.
"We will revisit this arrangement in a few weeks. Or sooner, if your pursuers should happen to turn you up." There was a touch of hope in that last bit that he clearly intended her to hear.
She sent a text to Sherlock, asking him to call her. Then she got out of bed to get ready for the most important meeting of her life.
(John)
The clinic was mercifully crammed with patients when John arrived for work. The very last thing he needed this morning was time to think. A steady stream of normal people with fixable problems would keep him from dwelling on the total absence of both in his own life.
He considered leaving his phone on in case Mary needed him, then turned it off for the same reason. He got a text notification the instant he turned it on at six o'clock as he was leaving for home. He had decided to call Sherlock instead of checking up on him in person, simply because he had no idea how to retract everything he'd said to him last night. But it seemed Fate had decided to force his hand. The text was from Sherlock.
There's no case. The video was a hoax.
He didn't bother to reply because it would just give Sherlock the chance to tell him to go home, and there was no bloody way that was going to happen. Not with what this was likely to mean for Sherlock's reprieve. If there was no case, there was no need to keep him in England, and worse, no way for Sherlock to redeem himself by solving it. If they tried to send him away again, it would be over John's dead body.
He found Sherlock stretched out on the sofa in a black suit, eyes closed, hands folded on his chest like a corpse in a coffin. John stopped and waited for those hands to rise with Sherlock's next breath, suddenly irrationally convinced that they would not.
"Didn't you get my text?" Sherlock asked imperiously, and John relaxed.
"Not until I was already halfway here," he lied with the confidence of one not being observed. "How do you feel?"
Sherlock rose to his feet with convincingly fluid ease. He tugged at the hem of his jacket, brushed invisible lint from his sleeves, and squared his shoulders. "I'm fine. Memory's all sorted. The video was a hoax. Mycroft stopped by to tell me that my pardon has been approved. I expressed the appropriate gratitude and told him to stay out of my life."
All of this was expelled at Sherlock's customary speed without pause for breath. John gave his head a shake and held up one hand. "Hold on. How do you know it was a hoax?"
Sherlock stepped across the coffee table and headed for the kitchen. "Tea?" he called over his shoulder.
John caught up with him as he was setting up two mugs. "Sherlock, look at me." Sherlock complied with a put-upon sigh. John leaned in close and examined Sherlock's pupils, then stepped back satisfied that there were no signs that the sedatives were still in play. "How do you know it was a hoax?"
Sherlock turned back to the tea preparations, talking to John as he placed a tea bag in each mug and closed the box that must have come from Mrs Hudson's kitchen. "One of Mycroft's enemies. Someone who thought it would look like Mycroft trying to save me. Obviously, whoever it was doesn't know him very well."
"You didn't ask the name?"
"Doesn't matter." He turned and rested his left hip against the worktop. "There is no case. Moriarty is dead."
John frowned at the clipped delivery. Sherlock could out-terse anyone, but this was not just terse. It was rapid fire sentence fragments that would have had John looking for needle marks, if not for the normal pupils. "You're still pardoned, even though the threat wasn't real?"
Sherlock gave him a narrow look. "Is that relief, or disappointment?"
"Don't be an arse. I just want to make sure nobody's going to show up here with handcuffs to haul you back to the plane."
"I am officially pardoned. And you are officially reconciled with Mary."
Instantly furious, he spit the words, "Did she call you?"
Sherlock sniffed. "I don't need an interpreter, John. It's written all over your face." His eyes narrowed. "And why would she call me?" He seemed genuinely confused.
Without bringing up points from his conversation with Mary that he had no intention of ever discussing with Sherlock, there was no believable explanation for his anger. He shoved it back, and forced himself to calm down. "Forget I said that. You just surprised me. I should have known you'd figure it out." The lie seemed to work.
"You're not moving back here."
It had sounded like an order, and John's hackles tried to rise once more. "Not at this time."
Sherlock gave him one of his rare, true smiles. "Not ever. I told you it would work out." He turned back to his tea preparations.
Sherlock was clearly pleased by this turn of events. John should be feeling relief. He was not. "Sherlock, I meant every word I said last night. It's just that Mary had a health scare, and we went to A&E to have her checked out. She's okay, and the baby's fine, but-"
"You must be very pleased." He handed a mug to John and sipped from his own, watching John over the rim.
"You're not going to let me explain, are you?"
"No explanation is necessary, John. You've been under a great deal of stress. I understand completely."
John set his mug down on the worktop. "It wasn't about being stressed, dammit. I meant every word, but..." But what? He'd meant it, but now he didn't because he was embarrassed about being found out? No, wait. Not found out. Misunderstood. He-
Sherlock put down his own mug and strode out to the sitting room. John followed, still searching for the words he wanted to say. He found Sherlock putting on his coat. "Where are you going?"
"I wasn't expecting company. I have an appointment. Finish your tea, if you want." He turned on his heel and walked out of the flat.
John followed, but took a detour through the kitchen to turn off the kettle, purely out of habit. It was enough of a delay that Sherlock's cab was pulling away from the kerb when John came out of the front door.
(Sherlock)
"I think that fella there is tryin' to get yer attention, mate."
Sherlock didn't turn to look. "He can catch the next cab."
The cabbie met his eyes in the rear view mirror. "You sure 'bout that address?"
"I'm sure."
Mycroft would realize he'd left the flat before long, but clearly hadn't been expecting him to do so. There was no surveillance van out front to follow him, which meant they would have to try tracking him on CCTV. Sherlock smiled, and mentally wished them luck.
Mary had met him this morning at a cafe near the Watsons' home to tell him the good news. She told him how excited John had been to see the baby on the scan for the first time. She was so relieved that she couldn't wait to call and tell him how much she owed him for all his help and support in getting John to give their marriage a chance.
It was interesting that the very outcome he had worked for could produce such mixed emotions on his part. He absolutely accepted that John was meant to be with his family, and now it seemed John was no longer resisting that role. Mary said she had seen him transformed by the image of his baby on a display screen. The concept of fatherhood was too far outside Sherlock's area of experience to be a useful measurement, but he could appreciate its potential from a clinical standpoint. The survival of the species depended upon it, so he could understand that it must be very strong. Instinctive for someone like John. There was no downside to this result. No reason to feel pushed aside. None at all.
Be careful what you wish for.
Sherlock was free to do as he pleased now. Smoking in the sitting room. Avoiding food until he felt like eating. Leaving his experiments wherever he chose for as long as he could stand the stench, which was considerably longer than John had ever been willing to do.
And he could indulge his flirtation with illegal substances at will.
Wiggins would be surprised to see him. Or, perhaps surprise was the wrong word. He would soon find out.
End of chapter 7
