CH 9
Sherlock - Holmes - John - Watson
John woke feeling concussed. He was slumped in a chair and could smell blood. He heard a soft crying sound nearby, but he had to get control of his senses before he could take stock of where he was and 'What the bloody hell was going on,' he thought.
He blinked a few times and heard the heartbeats of four extra people. He could smell that Sarah was near him and thought, 'She's probably the one crying. I don't think that she can talk or else she'd have been trying to get my attention by now.'
He blinked a few more times and soon his eyes adjusted to the eerie ambience made even creepier by the fact that the place was being illuminated by candles. He noted that there were old tram tracks, but it was obvious by the disrepair of the tunnel that it had been years since a tram had passed this way.
His hearing was assaulted by the loud heartbeats, which were sometimes cut by the higher pitched dripping of water that 'Plipped' into the puddles of water beneath them. He focussed on his dials and gauges. Luckily he was still wearing Sherlock's scarf and was able to ground his senses in that in order to be able to regain his focus on the situation.
In front of them, the Hostess of the Circus, pulled out a phone and took another picture of John. She then said, "A book is like a magic garden, carried in your pocket."
John looked confused. 'What the bloody hell is that bitch playing at?'
"Chinese proverb, Mr. Holmes," she explained.
John's eyes widened, "I'm not actually..." He felt dizzy, 'Probably from a concussion, remember this from my rugby days.' But he just continued with his statement, "I'm not Sherlock Holmes."
The woman in charge walked over to him and took his wallet. She pulled out the debit card and said, "Name; Sherlock Holmes."
"Ah," John said. "That's not actually mine. He leant that to me..."
She found a bank statement with the name of Sherlock Holmes. She also found the envelope with the name of Sherlock Holmes on the front that contained the ticket stubs for the Circus. "Tickets," she said. "Collected by you and with the name of Holmes."
"Yes...okay," John replied. "I realize how this looks, but honestly, I'm not..."
"Do not toy with me," the woman said, as she threw the papers, wallet and tickets in his face. She pulled out a gun and pointed it at his temple. "Three times we've tried to kill you and your companion: the flat in Chinatown; the museum and tonight at the theatre. What does that tell you when an assassin cannot shoot straight?"
"You're not really trying," John replied, and the woman pulled the trigger. All that came from the gun was an ominous click.
"Correct," she replied with nod and an unfriendly smile. "I am Shan."
"You," John stated. "You're the Mountain?"
"Shan is two words in Chinese," Shan replied with a dark chuckle. "It also means 'The elegant'." She rounded on him and waved the gun in his face. "Blank bullets were fired at the museum. At Soo Lin's flat, you and your companion were allowed to go free."
John snorted softly at that comment, but allowed her to continue with her delusion of that scenario. He'd been prepared to kill the assassin because they'd endangered his Guide. The outcome of that situation was not as certain as she was making it out to be.
Shan ignored him and continued, "Tonight at the theatre, if we had wanted to kill you Mr. Holmes, we'd have done it by now. We just wanted you inquisitive." She waved the gun again and said, "Nothing like firing a gun at someone to make them think they're on the trail of something special. We haven't found what we seek, but no matter. Now we have our own sniffer dog, in you, Sherlock Holmes."
She sniffed at him and he leaned back and away from her with an expression of disgust on his face. She frowned and then said, "The rat who gnaws at the tail of the cat only invites destruction."
"Proverb," John asked in a tone that was planned to irritate her.
"Do you have it," she asked.
John blinked, "Have...what?"
"The treasure," she said.
"I don't know what you're talking about," John replied.
Shan smiled and said, "I prefer to make certain." She used a battery torch to light up another section of the tunnel. She showed them a very familiar shape, covered dramatically with dark cloth. "See!"
One of her henchman pulled the cloth off of the machine and exposed the old ballista.
"I've already seen that performance," John quipped. "Thanks anyway."
She poked at his injury with the muzzle of her gun and forced him to look in another direction. She nodded her head and said, "Everything in the west has its price."
John watched as Sarah and the chair that she'd been tied to was placed directly in the path of the arrow. He winced at the sharp sound of the chair being dragged against the uneven ground. Again he regulated his hearing, until he could make out what the Tong General was saying.
"So," Shan said. "The price for her life...information," she leaned close and whispered in his ear. "Where is the hairpin?"
John looked at Sarah. Her eyes were wide with the fear of the situation. She looked back, but screamed from behind her gag when the device was cocked and the deadly arrow placed in its groove.
"The Empress' pin," Shan asked.
"What?" John asked.
"Valued at nine million sterling," the evil woman explained. "We already had a buyer in the west and one of our people got greedy. He took it. Brought it back to London and you, Mr. Holmes, you have been searching..."
"Please," John looked to Sarah, horrified at the thought that they'd been sent on this chase by the Tong. "Please you have to believe me. I'm not Sherlock Holmes. I haven't found what you're looking for because I haven't deciphered the code."
The Mistress of Ceremony was back and the woman looked around with mocked theatrics. "I need a volunteer." She looked at Sarah and said, "Ah, thank you lady. I think you'll do nicely, very nicely!"
She slashed the sandbag and watched the sand pour from it. She turned and smiled at John. "Thank you for volunteering."
John had had enough and his senses flared, as the presence of one he cared for entered the area. The enemy was in front of him and he played the captive for them. He moved and struggled with a plan. His jacket was old and familiar. Since he'd worked with Sherlock on a few cases with varying degrees of danger he'd prepared several smallish blades, tucked within the seams of his coat sleeves and the bottom edge of his coat. An old trick that he'd retained from his stint the Army.
He managed to get a smallish 'exacto' knife blade out and begin the sawing motions to release the ropes that bound him to the chair. His struggles looked like he protested the fact that he was not Sherlock, all the while he focussed on the woman and the dramatics that she continued to play.
"Ladies and gentlemen," the mistress of ceremony said. "From the distant moonlit shores, we present, for your pleasure, Sherlock Holmes' pretty companion, in a death-defying act."
"Stop this," John shouted and pleaded. "Please!"
"You've seen this act before," Shan said, as she placed a small black paper flower in Sarah's lap. "How dull for you, you know how it ends."
John's senses sharpened. His hands are almost free and he shouted, "I'm not Sherlock."
"I don't believe you," Shan, the general shouted back.
"You should, you know," a deep voice came from behind John. "Sherlock is a great deal more pompous, with a 'U'. And a great deal more...what was the other word, John?"
"Late," John replied with a huff, like he'd say the word 'Imperious' in this setting.
Sherlock swung some kind of metal pipe and knocked out the henchman that had played the warlord at the theatre. This time the man was out cold. He rushed forward to save Sarah, but the leader, Shan, raised her gun and had it pointed at him.
He stopped in his tracks. He looked at it and then said, "A semi-automatic, you fire it and the bullet will travel a thousand metres per second."
"So?" Shan sneered, her question.
"So," Sherlock explained. "These walls have a radius of curvature of nearly four metres. If you miss, then the bullet will ricochet." This made the woman pause. "Who knows where? You could hit anyone. The bullet could very well bounce around the tunnel and hit you."
"I have no intention of missing," she said.
"Still," Sherlock said. "I'd take those glasses off. Can't shoot straight in the dark..." He kicked over the largest candle holder, extinguishing the flames. He quickly dove into the shadows, behind an oil drum of all things.
John released the ropes from his torso and arms. He moved out of the way by bending down and quickly cutting his legs free from the chair.
Shan fired and the bullet did ricochet around the tunnel, just like Sherlock had predicted.
John raced to Sarah and toppled her chair over in order to prevent her from getting hit by the arrow, while he undid her bindings. "Stay put," he said, as he swung the ballista around to aim it at the heart of the acrobatic 'Spider', who'd suddenly been trying to strangle Sherlock once more. The arrow flew, as John raced towards Shan and knocked the gun out of her hands.
She was an expert martial artist, but her opponent knew a few moves that kept him from getting killed from the viciousness of her attack. In the dimness she realized that she needed to escape and she did so when John was distracted by the death of the assassin, who had once been Soo Lin's older brother.
John watched the woman leave, but not before he'd picked her pocket for the ruddy phone that had taken pictures of him. He was certain that Sherlock would like the emails and texts that it contained or at least the man's older brother would. He pocketed it for future study.
He then picked up the gun and found that the man in the warlord outfit was still unconscious. He fired one shot in the man's head, killing him instantly. He'd startled the other two in the tunnel with the sound of the gunshot.
"Danger to the Guides," he muttered softly, wondering if Shan heard him, but he knew that she wasn't a Sentinel because she never had that genetic scent and feel that he associated with Active and GNA Sentinels. She'd had a murderer's scent though. The doctor just looked at the body of the henchman and said, "Justified termination of life!"
John then raced over to Sherlock in order to examine him. "You all right," he asked. He leaned in to sniff and lick the tortured neck. "I hope you found that bloody pin she babbled about because I'm ready for this case to be over."
"Yeah, well," Sherlock shivered in reaction to the tongue on his bruising neck. "Save that for later, Sentinel."
"You will be mine, Guide," John said, as his hand wrapped around his flatmate's wrist.
"Yes," Sherlock agreed with a shake of his arm. He wasn't trying to dislodge the grip, but test its purpose, he supposed. He felt the fingers tighten for a moment and then loosen, but remain latched to his wrist. 'Ah,' he thought. 'Fingers grounding on touch and the pulse point.' He became amused when he suddenly realized that his scarf had changed colours sometime within that darkened tunnel encounter.
John turned to his boss and asked, "All right, Sarah."
"All right," she replied in a shaky tone of voice. "Could one of you get me off this bloody ground, though?"
"Police and such are on their way," Sherlock informed them, as they helped release the woman from her bonds.
"Right then," John said to them. "Let's just move out of this darkness then and let them do what they need to do to sort out this scene."
Several minutes later, flashing blue lights and rolls of police tape cordoned off the entrance of the old tramway tunnels. Sarah had one of those hideous orange shock blankets wrapped around her, grateful for its warmth.
John and Sherlock walk out of the tunnel. They were close enough to touch, but the Doctor had finally released his flatmate's wrist.
Sherlock looked to the youngish DI and said, "We'll just slip off then. No need to mention us in the report."
"Mr. Holmes..." Dimmock's voice trailed off, as though he didn't know what to say or what he wanted to say.
"I have high hopes for you, Inspector," Sherlock informed him. "A glittering career!"
Dimmock then realized that the man was right, if he continued to do one thing and so he responded, "If, I go where you point me."
"Exactly," Sherlock looked back with a grin.
Dimmock received an eye roll and grin from Dr. Watson, as the two men walked away from the area.
Sherlock - Holmes - John - Watson
Back at 221B Baker street, John was not about to put off bonding with his Guide any longer. He just had to make sure. "So," he said. "You figured it out!"
"Yes," Sherlock said in a shuddering tone, as the look he received, registered in some place in his psyche as something that he'd been looking for most of his activated life.
"Good!" John replied with a hungry look. "I'm going to take a shower first and then you can since you didn't spend your time getting dragged about in questionable places." He looked at his flatmate's frowning expression. "You don't want to?"
Sherlock looked up quickly and answered, "Yes, yes I would, but why separate showers?"
"Ah," John replied, as he rubbed the back of his neck. "I don't know that I could hold myself back and I don't want the primary bond to take place in the shower. From what I've read, we'll be merging some of our psyche together and we may need time to recover."
"I look forward to it," Sherlock replied in a deep tone. He gazed at John with half-lidded eyes. His mind already miles ahead of the event and his look said it all.
John smirked and ran up the stairs to ensure that he had the shower first. He stripped completely on the way, not concerned that he'd exposed himself to Sherlock. He knew that the man watched his progress.
He was in his room and listening for his Guide after he'd completed his shower. He hoped that Sherlock would be ready for what being his Guide meant and then again, he hoped that everything they chose to do together would not follow the norms of the SC and GC.
'It'd be boring,' he thought with a grin. He inhaled, looked up quickly, as he noticed the clean scent of his nude flatmate standing in his doorway. "Sherlock," he exhaled. He saw his friend's eyes widen when the man noted the effect he was having on the Sentinel. "Come here," he said. "Please!"
"John," Sherlock swallowed. His confidence slipping a little from the intense gaze he was being subjected to. He delighted in it, but was slightly terrified too. The intimacy of the connection he was about to forge, scared him.
"For every Sentinel out there," John said. "There is a Guide made just for them. You are not lacking in anything and these past few months, we have a good idea of how it's going to be, don't you think."
"I do nothing, but think," Sherlock snorted out, but it had been the right thing for the Doctor to say. He walked over to the bed, took a deep breath of his own and gazed back at the Sentinel there. His own gaze looked the man over and he was pleased with everything he saw. He wanted to study the man and yet each move showed him something new to study. "You are fascinating."
John held out his hand. He watched those long, agile fingers connect with his own and the brushing of the finger pads gave him the shivers, as his sense of touch sharpened. He curled his hand around that of his friend and Guide, tugged him into the bed and together they explored their forming bond.
"Oh," Sherlock gasped at one moment and then the physical world dropped away and together they were pulled into a monochrome wasteland of rolling dunes. Gale force sand storms, mixed with half risen ancient structures and old, twisted, dry living trees dotted the landscape.
He flew over those dunes, hooting a plaintive cry. He searched and sought something that he'd been looking for most of his life and there in the distance he saw something interesting. It looked like small domesticated cat, but this one was vastly different in colour and he'd almost missed it because of the sand dune.
It was headed in the direction of a stone outcropping. It looked at him and then at the outcropping.
Sherlock let out a sound that indicated they'd meet there.
John walked in the sand on all fours. He was small for a predatory feline, but he was comfortable with his size. He had always been comfortable with it. He looked at the flashy and beautiful barn owl that had found him. He looked at it and then looked at the single building wall that had appeared in front of him. He heard the owl hoot and the wings flap, as it flew through the air.
He arrived shortly after the owl had settled on the outcropping. He hopped up onto the ledge and walked towards the owl. The owl turned its head to look at him. They were of a height together, but there was an acceptance of their similarities and their differences.
The sand cat's ears twitched in the direction of the two additional heartbeats and the owl's head twisted to look directly behind them.
"John," Sherlock said in a questioning tone.
"I told you before," John said with an intense look that had his Guide shuddering. "It's all fine."
The sand cat walked into the owl and the owl leaned into the sand cat. The two merged together and in that instance John experienced moments of Sherlock's otherness, the brilliancy of his mind and the loneliness it caused.
Sherlock learned about some of the things that made John, his John. He was pleased to know in the deepest sense that the man had been truthful about his ideas on bonding, that there was always a perfect Guide for each activated Sentinel.
John learned about Sherlock's poor University days and the disappointments that had occurred, as his Guide's preconceptions of such places had been stripped away by the boorishness of the many that attended those institutions.
Sherlock learned about how John was in the war. How the man blended as soldier and a doctor at the same time. He was humbled by the core that held him and steadied his mind. He was accepted and that was enough. He wanted to learn the rest on his own and in his own time.
John looked at him in the dream place and agreed. He leaned forward and kissed his Guide. Then he made Sherlock bend his head, as he said, "I'll mark you, as mine for everyone to see."
"Yes," Sherlock exhaled and leaned into the smaller, solid rock of a man. "Please!"
John bit him high enough under his left ear. It was a sensitive spot, but it was also a very visible one. The mark would fade over time, but the imbedded scent marker, a quirk of genetics, would remain there until the day of Sherlock's death. It was a marker that indicated he'd been claimed and that no other Sentinel could take him as a Guide.
Sherlock's active mind, shuddered to a temporary halt, as his body registered the bond and the needle pin-pricks of venom pooled in his neck, which merged with the Guide genes. They mixed and mingled in a way that was unmistakeable. They were bonded, a unit unto themselves and one that no one could challenge, not even the Government.
His mind didn't remain idle long after that because his thoughts immediately turned to what his Sentinel would do, if challenged. 'He'd win,' he thought. 'Never mind that, he'd decimate them and I'd be cheering him on from the sidelines, as long as I could analyze the DNA of the challenger.'
'Of course you can,' John thought. He laughed in his mind and said, 'We're still connected and from what I've been able to read on the subject, this is a one-time deal.'
'Good,' Sherlock thought back, as he felt the man move physically inside him once more. 'Are you insatiable or something?'
'I'm everything for my Guide,' John purred. 'My Guide is everything for me, but to answer your question, no... I'm not insatiable. I'm just happy and quite ready to have another go. Besides I'm still latched by my teeth.'
'Yes, I can feel that,' Sherlock groaned, as his sensitized neck turned into an erogenous zone of intense pleasure. 'I hope you realize that I've never been that sexually active.'
'Yep,' John replied. 'Like I told you that first time at Angelo's, it's all fine.'
Sherlock grinned and then said, 'As long as there is no case...'
'Right then,' John said. 'It'll be like your meals, but hopefully if you can't see the forest from the trees you'd be willing to take a break and let me turn your mind to more carnal things. We'll have to experiment on whether sex can shut down that big brain of yours long enough to give it a little re-boot.'
He felt the questioning interest, especially since he said the magic word that usually made Sherlock sit up and beg...Experiment, how that man loved the word. 'I mean we'll see if you'll get inspired to think on a tricky case and gain a new direction after a bout of thoroughly focussed, body tingling sex.'
Sherlock's body showed him that it was indeed possible to have a brain shut-down, since his mind was thoroughly engaged at cataloguing the sensations of their second sexual round. He quickly found that his mind stuttered in the process and eventually he gave up on the whole of it to just experience the feel of the carnality of it all.
'Agreed,' he thought back. 'We'll have to test that...later...'
John just grinned, as the marking barbs popped away from their connection to his body, like the stingers of some bees and wasps. The small barbs were sucked into Sherlock's neck, where they would break down within a week's time and become part of the bone structure of his Guide's anatomy.
They gasped and shouted their completion.
John collapsed on his companion and Sherlock was limp from the exertion. Their minds were no longer connected, but their bond was there, very much there, and nearly tangible.
John pulled away slowly and used the damp towel he'd brought up with him in order to clean them off. His Guide looked at him with sleepy eyes and asked, "Tomorrow soon enough to go to Seb's office and tell him the result of the case?"
"Yeah," John replied with a chuckle. "It's soon enough." He pulled up the blankets and covers of his bed and wrapped them around his Guide. They curled into one another. "A long nap and then a meal first, though," he stated through a yawn.
"Of course John," Sherlock replied in an equally sleepy tone.
Sherlock - Holmes - John - Watson
TBC...
