AN: Hello! I'm so sorry I've been out of touch. Ran into some more of that RL trouble. Here's part one of my apology. Beware of John's potty mouth this chapter.

Disclaimer: I do not own Sherlock, or any of the characters herein. I bow before the talented Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Mark Gatiss, and Steven Moffat for the privilege of borrowing their characters for a bit of fun. Thank you, gentlemen, for sharing them with the world.

Chapter 8 – ...Go is the War

John Watson let out a bone-weary sigh and tried to figure out exactly what the hell he must have done wrong in a past life to make the current one so spectacularly fucked up. He lay on the floor of a long-abandoned building, hands cuffed behind him, riddled with the evidence of his recent beating. His captors believed him to be Sherlock Holmes, which was his own damn fault, and would probably soon deep six him considering that they'd had twelve hours in which to discover their error.

Oddly enough, being a hostage was not a new experience for John, nor were beatings or the unspoken threat of torture and death. At least the setting was something obligingly horrifying – it seemed to be an old slaughterhouse, complete with heavy hooks dangling from chains bolted to the ceiling and ancient, mottled-red stains in the floor, all accompanied by the foetid smell of old death. It was a welcome difference to damp caves and scorching desert heat, but that didn't mean he wanted it to be the last place he ever saw.

Shaking off his momentary jaunt down self-pity boulevard, John took a moment to breath. 'Keep calm,' the words of his survival training instructor drifted out of his memory, 'Nothing turns a situation FUBAR faster than a panic attack.' Stuffing his maudlin mood back into its own little box, he began to take stock of his body's injuries and his assets.

The major complaints of his physical state were the extensive and tender bruising to his left side abdominal muscles, three bruised (possibly fractured) ribs on his right side, possible kidney damage, a strained right ankle, and numbness in his left arm and entire buttocks due to the cold and laying unmoving on that side for hours. It would all heal in time, which was a blessing, but of course it didn't change the fact that he would probably be killed by his captors long before that would happen. Moving was going to hurt like hell.

As for assets, he had precious little, and all of it hinged on his physical endurance. They'd taken his coat, which meant he had no access to the tube of gel that made it easier to give someone an effective jolt of electricity, so if he wanted to use that weapon, he was going to need to find a source of water or something else suitably conductive. They'd also taken his handgun, which was a pity, but not the worst obstacle to overcome. He still had a number of tricks up his sleeve, not the least of which was his talent for mimicry.

He had been listening hard to the way his captor's spoke, and he could probably manage to fool them for a short amount of time if he could get himself unbound. He didn't exactly understand what they were saying, but if he could confuse them, it could only help. It also helped that they were keeping him in an unlit room; they would have trouble telling who was speaking, but he would have no problem with his ability to see in the dark. First, though, he was going to have to figure out how to get himself out of his cuffs.


"It's opium."

Provost Marshal Lestrade leaned back in his desk chair to better look the looming Sherlock Holmes in the eye. One of Sherlock's large hands splayed itself on his desk, and in the other was an expensive looking vase that the Marshal was pretty sure should have been in the evidence locker downstairs. Tapping his stylus on the nearest edge of his desk, Lestrade asked, "What the hell are you talking about, Sherlock?"

"The vases have a false bottom, judging by the outside, the bottom of the inside is approximately two inches thicker than necessary for a piece of this size." The consultant smiled in a way that sent shivers up the spines of half the criminals in London, and cheerily smashed the vase on the desk.

Opening his mouth, half in shock and half in protest, Lestrade closed his lips again at the sight of over a dozen dime bags of a white, powdery substance. Groaning, he lifted a hand to his face and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Okay, so the General person is smuggling opium into the country using fake Ming. Still doesn't really lead us to finding her."

"Wrong." Sherlock lifted a few seemingly random pieces of the broken china. "I examined three of these vases minutely and chemically and have found the porcelain itself has trace amounts of asbestos and chemicals that, taken as a grouping, create an acidic detergent commonly used in cleaning facilities which are soiled by animal proteins."

"What's that mean in English?"

Sherlock glared at him in a way that might have cut a lesser man, "It was in English."

"Yeah, but see, when you talk all arrogant and chemist-y like that, all I hear is this tiny little voice in my head telling me to punch you in the face."

The desk creaked ominously as Sherlock leaned his weight on it, and Lestrade fancied he could hear the sound of Sherlock's teeth making the same noise as the consultant ground them together. Through clenched teeth, Sherlock hissed, "It means, you ignorant excuse for a law enforcer, that the vases were made in a place which used to process meat and was built before the health restorations common after it was found that asbestos causes cancer. Mostly likely, they are working out of an abandoned slaughterhouse."

"See, if you had just said that in the first place," Lestrade mumbled as he began gathering up his badge and gun. "Right, let's get a team together and we'll drive over to the old factory district. There's got to be at least two slaughterhouses there. Probably more."

The Marshal stood up and marched into the main office, Sherlock close on his heels with a blank, almost vicious, determined look on his face. Without speaking, Lestrade pointed to Sergeant Donovan and two other officers, and then began walking down to the parking garage. Feet scrambled and voices murmured as a task force formed slowly and then began to file out of the office behind them.

Sherlock grimaced at the sight of the panda cars, but lowered himself into Lestrade's without voicing a complaint. That alone told the Provost Marshal just how affected the consultant was by his Defender's capture. The only other time Sherlock had ever entered a Provost vehicle of his own free will, he had been nearly frozen to death from falling in the Thames.

As the car pulled out into the waning daylight, Lestrade ventured, "You think they'll risk killing him?"

"Hard to tell," Sherlock said softly after a moment of thought. "Mark my words though, Lestrade, John will prove to be a most dangerous captive."

"Does other stuff besides see in the dark, does he?"

"Oh, yes." Sherlock smirked as Lestrade glanced at him sidelong. "John's genetic modifications are many, and I have yet to figure out exactly how much he is capable of, talent-wise. For example, his ability to mimic someone so fully is rather intriguing. I may have to experiment with it further."

"Somehow Sherlock," there was a smile in Lestrade's voice, "I don't think that's going to go over well with John."


Thinking back, as the haze of red pain cleared from his eyes, dislocating his shoulder had been an incredibly bad idea. Effective, since he could now wiggle his arms around his legs to bring his hands back to the front of his torso, but still a definitely bad idea. Breathing sharply in through his teeth, he thrust himself back against the concrete wall and listened as his breath left his lungs and his shoulder joint snapped back into place.

Biting back a moan, he waited out the wave of new pain, propping himself against the wall. He wondered, not for the first time, how long he had been locked up alone, but he wrote that thought off as unimportant. It didn't matter how long he'd been there, it just mattered how long it would take him to get out before his body was completely broke-dick.

Carefully, John levered himself off the ground and slowly made his way to the heavy steel door that closed him off from the rest of the building. Pressing a hand against the metal, he knew he wouldn't be able to hear anyone on the other side of it. It didn't help that the tiny window was just a little too far up for him to be able to see outside.

The door squealed mightily as someone on the other side began to open it. John froze for only a moment before hiding on the side with the heavy hinges, trapping him behind the door as several people entered the room. Leaning cautiously until one eye could see around the edge of the heavy door, John took stock of who had come to fetch him.

Three men, not much shorter than John himself, had entered the room, all holding handguns in the steady way of someone intimately familiar with their use. They moved further into the room, moving their heads in a way that suggested they were looking for him. The light from the door was strong enough to brighten the room, so John gave it a shove with his shoulder.

Moving as fast as his sprained ankle would allow, John darted away from the wall and dropped to one knee in the middle of the room as his captors spun around and began gabbling in agitation. Waiting quietly as they moved slowly back towards the door, John took stock of their positions, and body language. The man on the right was the steadiest, his gun hand and arm straight as an arrow.

John smirked, and moved towards his target as silent as death.


There were, in fact, seven slaughterhouses in the old district, placed at intervals like the points of a Star of David along with a central one in the middle. Lestrade groaned at the area they would have to cover, and gave Sherlock a pleading look. The consultant smirked at the Marshal, even though his eyes darted unseeingly as he went through deductions in his head.

"Predictable," he murmured sadly as the facts fell into place. "They'll be in the central building. The General is smart, but her idea of how to stave off attack is based on gang wars and territorial displays, not military strategy as her title suggests. She's prepared to face down law enforcers or rivals, but not someone as clever as me. Power-hungry local dictators are one thing, but they're more apt to rely on brute strength than mental prowess. Leave the cars here, we'll go on foot, it will be easier to sneak up on them."

Shooing his officers into a sweeping pattern, Lestrade fell into step beside the consultant. "You going to tell me why the central one?"

Sherlock hummed a moment, and the Marshal wasn't sure he would answer. After a few meters, the consultant stated, "It's location makes it easily defensible by a small force, which is easier to get into a country as well patrolled as ours than a large one, and at least half of them will be English-born. I would posit she has a force of about ten people, including herself. Sentries will be posted at all four corners of the uppermost floor to keep an eye on the surrounding area, there will be one person at both the front and rear exit, and any side doors will be boarded up or fortified accordingly. The General herself will be in one of the offices nearest wherever their keeping John, and the last three are probably guarding their captive."

He fell silent as they slipped down an alleyway and their target building appeared in their view. After a few moments in which Lestrade messaged his subordinates to use caution and check in with him before making any movements closer to the building, Sherlock continued, "From what I know, they haven't discovered yet that their captive isn't who they believe him to be, so that at least will keep them from killing him out of hand. If we can infiltrate the building without alarming them, we should have no trouble finding John and apprehending them all without any injuries."

"So you've got some sort of plan or something then?"

"Of course I have a plan." Sherlock plucked at his lower lip and a smile slowly formed on his face. Lestrade could almost see the wheels turning in the consultant's head. With a flare of his dramatic coat, Sherlock turned to the alley-side door of the building on their right. "We'll go in through the roof."


As a man who had been held hostage, kidnapped, bombed repeatedly, and shot at more times than a shitter's been shat in, John is completely floored by how pathetically easy the fight was. Less than five minutes, and there's two enemies on the ground, a gun in his hand, and the last man is trembling before him, weapon discarded. He almost feels bad about it.

Sure, they might be professional hired guns, but they were by no means prepared to deal with someone as well-trained in the art of ass-beating as a soldier. John's skills, drilled into him by the US Navy and Marine Corps, were as far above their pay grade as Mount Everest was above sea-level. John might have laughed if he wasn't so shocked.

"Are you going to kill me?" The criminal before him was visibly shaking.

"I though about it," John let his natural accent slip out in his genuine surprise that the whole situation hadn't gone completely tits up. He raised an eyebrow and shrugged. "I mean, if you guys ah seriously the best they've got, I'm fuckin' disappointed."

The other man's eyes widened, "W-what?"

"You're criminals for fuck's sake! That guy," John indicated one of the downed men, "just frickin' fainted for chrissake! I didn't even do anything!"

"We thought you were still unconscious! Besides, it was dark! Nobody told us you were trained in combat!"

"What the fucking," throwing up his hands in exasperation, John paced a few feet back and forth as adrenaline still pumped through his veins. "You're part of a smuggling ring, gawd-dammit! The least yah could do was put up a fight or somethin'!"

"Hey, mate, I don't do hand-to-hand, okay?" Waving his hands before his chest, the smuggler swallowed audibly. "I can't even win a slap fight with my sister!"

"Least you could do was try some fuckin' Tai chi, Bruce Lee shit!" John ran a hand through his mussed hair. "You kicked me in the shin like a fuckin' toddler!"

Brows wrinkling, the criminal crossed his arms over his chest. "What, because I'm Chinese I'm supposed to know martial arts? That's just messed up, mate."

John blinked at him, then levelled the gun back at the man's chest, "Did you just play the fuckin' race card with me?"

"Sorry! Sorry! Please, don't shoot me!" Holding his hands up like a terrified bank hostage, the man dropped to his knees and cringed with his eyes screwed shut.

Sighing deeply, John rolled his eyes and stepped within arms reach of the man, carefully tucking the gun in the back of his jeans. "I'm not gonna shoot you. It'd be like killing a freakin' kitten." They stared at each other for a long moment, then John asked cordially, "Can I have yah Quellwasser?"

A shaking hand held out the item in question, and John popped the top before spraying some on the man's neck. With swift purpose, John grasped the man's throat and pulsed a shock through his hand. The criminal went rigid as a hearty shock raced through his body, then collapsed.

Doubling over as pain raced through his bruised abdominal muscles, John knew he wasn't going to be doing that again any time soon. He waited a long while for the pain to pass, then stood up straight again and limped over to pick up the other two guns off the floor. Tucking one (safety on) into the front of his jeans, and keeping the other at the ready, John slunk out the door and pulled it shut behind him.


The operation of going through the roof was much simpler than Sherlock had predicted. The nearby buildings were all so closely situated, that the Provosts only had to repel a short ten feet to the top of the slaughterhouse and enter the building through the rooftop door. It was a textbook infiltration, really, and Sherlock was almost disappointed with how easy it went.

None of the posted sentries even had a chance to even pull their guns from their trousers. Not even the second one, who got a warning in the sound of Sherlock's datalet pinging in the announcement of an incoming message. Holmes didn't even bother looking at his screen in retaliation for it almost alerting their quarry.

Lestrade split his force into three teams, one each of which was sent to collect the guards at the front and rear doors of the building. The last group, including Sherlock and Lestrade, made their way into the bowels of the structure, where Sherlock deduced that John was being kept in the room which had once been used for smoking meat. Finding three unconscious men, one of which was just rousing and one of which had a swelling arm with a completely mangled wrist, in the room and no John in sight was not in Sherlock's calculations.

Leaving four of his Provosts behind, Lestrade and Sherlock swept back into the hall and searched out the offices of the building. They went into three before looking into a random door window to find a very battered looking John Watson trussing up a woman they presumed to be the elusive General like a Christmas goose. At the door's opening, John spun around on one knee and aimed at the intruders.

John's chin and mouth were covered in drying blood, and he snarled like a starved wolf as he levelled his gun at the perceived threat he had spun to meet. Lestrade and Sherlock, who both stood in the doorway, held up their hands immediately with their eyes wide in shock. Sergeant Sally Donovan, who was looking over her superior's shoulder, let out a loud shriek of fright.

The snarl cut off as if it had never been when recognition flared in John's eyes and he lowered the weapon slowly to the ground. He cocked his bloody head to the side like a curious bird as he took in their expressions. Licking his lips, a look of surprise flashed over his face before it was overcome by a sheepish one.

Scratching the back of his neck, John asked demurely, "What, uh, what are you doing here."

"Rescuing you," Sherlock said cautiously as he dropped his hands back into his pockets.

John's head tilted to the other side, "Oh."

Sherlock hummed in agreement.

Getting stiffly to his feet, face set in the stoic mask of a soldier in pain, John shuffled over to the side of the room, away from his prisoner. "Um," he bit his lower lip, "thanks?"

For a long moment, the consultant and his defender just looked at each other. John's lips began to twitch, and Lestrade could see the muscles in Sherlock's throat flutter. It was all the warning they got before both of them burst out laughing.

Shaking his head, the Marshal beckoned his team to move around the two lunatics he was forced to work with, and do their jobs. He looked over at the nutters when John yelped like a kicked puppy as his leg gave out, but that only seemed to make the two men laugh all the harder so he decided to ignore it for the moment. It wasn't until he began to call an ambulance, wondering where exactly John had been injured to make his face bloody like that when he remembered the man in the smoke room.

"John," Lestrade's voice was half a pitch higher than usual, "did you bite that man in the smoking room?"

Gasping and giggling, John visibly pulled himself back under control, his head lolling tiredly back to rest against the wall behind him. Nodding, the doctor took a few deep breaths before saying in a relatively calm manner, "Technically, I chewed on him. Also, you should tell the paramedics that he's suffering from a potentially crippling dose of neurotoxin."

"He's what?"

"I'm poisonous," John sighed deeply. "He needs fluids to help flush it out, or the toxin will basically cause his internal organs to haemorrhage."

At the frightened, confused look on the Marshal's face, Sherlock smiled and offered, "Not good, Lestrade. John's DNA includes that of a Gila monster, one of only two venomous lizards in the world. There's no anti-venom because the bite isn't usually fatal to humans, but if it spends too much time in his system the damage will be considerably worse."

"Of course you know that," John mumbled, his face graced with a lopsided smirk.

"Knowledge is power, John." Sherlock's smug smile clouded a bit as John hissed in pain. "Better make it two ambulances, Lestrade."

"Right. Just," Lestrade waved a hand at both of them, "keep your mouths shut at the hospital, okay?" He fixed John with a pointed gaze and finger, "That goes double for you." At Sherlock's chuckle, the Marshal poked the consultant in the arm, "And triple for you."

Sherlock frowned sourly, but John at least gave him a weary salute.


AN: Just a couple of notes here to clarify/define some of the terms that may be unfamiliar to anyone :) In regards to John's accent, just think of it like a mix between Robert DeNiro and Joe Pesci.

Deep six - to dispose of something by throwing it overboard a ship. A Navy/Marine slang way of saying you're going to be killed.

FUBAR - an acronym for 'Fucked Up Beyond All Reason', Marine slang

Broke-dick - malfunctioning, usually used in regards to machinery or male genetalia, Navy/Marine slang

Above (their) pay grade - when you say something is 'above my/your pay grade' you're basically denying responsibility/authority, meaning someone should take the problem to a higher authority; Marine slang

Shitter - toilet, Navy/Marine slang

Quellwasser - a brand of bottled water