Note: This chapter contains violent and disturbing content. Please read at your own discretion.
CHAPTER 9: USEFUL
DAY 6
Monday, 18.17 hrs
Hours and hours had passed, and Moran had not returned. Nor had Mary. John was left with rotating guards, Pete, Lex, and Daz. Pete more or less ignored him. But when John spoke or tried to move from the chair he had not been chained to, Pete reacted: he punched him in the face or stomach, kicked him in the back or groin. Then, when Pete tired of his pleading and his questions about Mary, he took a long, thin metal rod from a drawer—a meat skewer, dull on both ends—and punched it through a pinch of skin on his neck.
'Don't talk for one hour,' he had said, in a rare moment of verbosity, 'and I'll take it out. Speak one more word and you get another stick in the other side.'
The pain was excruciating, but he bit his tongue and tried not to think of the blood running down the side of his neck, mixing with the warm sweat sliding over cold skin.
Lex was a different sort to Pete. He didn't have the courage to strike or to cut, and knowing that John wasn't tied down made him nervous; but he did seem to revel in the voyeuristic pleasures of watching a man suffer. So Moran had given him a taser.
'For if he becomes unruly,' Moran had said, handing over the taser and watching John out of the corner of his eye, a small smile on his lips. 'Or if he looks at you funny.'
It took Lex only ten minutes' being alone with him to try it out, whether out of curiosity or a demonstration of power, John wasn't sure. Probably both. He waited until John seemed most placid, walked around him in a wide arc, and then pressed the taser against the bloody shirt on his back. John's whole body seized, sensory nerves on fire, motor nerves contracting violently and beyond his control. He toppled the chair, a scream trapped behind a locked jaw, and when his body stilled again, Lex, with a chuckle and a snide remark—'It's beautiful, in a way'—tasered him again, this time in the back of the neck. When he was satisfied, and when John's body had at last stilled, he backed away and made John climb back into the chair under his own power, never mind his bound wrists, under threat of another jolt.
Then Daz began his shift. First, he had given him water, just a little from the dog dish, and watched as he crouched on the floor, elbows and knees, to drink it. He also took him to the corner to relieve himself. Unfortunately, John could barely stand, not on his slashed feet and with the cramped leg muscles, and had to rely on Daz to bear him up. With his hands being bound so tightly together, he could not even undo his own flies. To John's mortification, Daz pulled down the zip, pulled him out, and held him while he peed. And then, before putting him back inside his trousers, he had given him one long stroke with his thumb while kissing the side of his face, rubbing his nose along the hairs of his young beard. John fought but failed to suppress the flinch that ran up his body like a rake, and Daz chuckled, then returned him to the chair.
And then, Daz left. John stared around in amazement at the empty kitchen. Was this a new game? The only time he had been left alone since the cab ride was while in the freezer where it was certain he couldn't get out. But now, he wasn't even tied to the chair. What were they expecting him to do? What punishment would accompany any action? If he did nothing, would they laugh and declare that they had trapped him without binds?
He didn't get to dwell too long on these things, however. Soft footfalls were drawing nearer. To his astonishment, he looked up to see Mary walking toward him.
She came alone, her wrists no longer cuffed, and from what he could see, there were no new marks on her face or body. She walked with her head held high and her mouth a firm line. But her eyes betrayed her fear. She came to a stop a few feet in front of him.
'Mary,' he said.
'John,' she said. Instantly, tears spilled down her cheeks. 'Oh John.'
'Shh, shh, Mary. Mary, it's okay. What are you doing here?' His eyes flicked to the door and back. 'Where are they?'
'Waiting. Out there. They said . . . They said we can have five minutes. Just the two of us.' She wiped a hand under her cheek, smearing the line of tears. When he began to stretch his wired hands out for her, she shook her head and took a small step backward. Her face twisted in pain. 'I'm not allowed to touch you.'
His hands dropped. 'Did they hurt you?'
'No. That man—Sebastian—he just wanted . . . to talk. But oh John, look what they've done to you!'
'What, this?' John made a valiant effort to smile and hide his bleeding wrists in his lap. It was a pathetic gesture, given the state of his face. 'It's not so bad. They've just knocked me around a bit. Nothing I can't handle. I've known worse. In Afghanistan.'
It was not true, not even close, and Mary didn't buy it. 'John, they're looking for you. I called the police, and they're looking.'
'I know,' he said, again trying to smile at her, to show her his gratitude.
'They'll come.'
'Of course they will.'
'And your friend, Greg. He's looking too.'
John's smile slipped as he felt a sudden rush of affection for his old friend. 'You spoke to him?'
'He came to see me. I told him what I could, but I didn't know, then, that they are looking for Sherlock Holmes.' She was wringing her hands, looking suddenly and distinctly disturbed. 'Why didn't you tell me? That he is still alive?'
John frowned. 'Is that what they told you?'
'John, listen to me. They're searching for him. They're going to find him, and they'll kill him. But if you tell them where he is, they'll let us go. They've promised. Then, you can get word to him, warn him, before it's too late.'
'No, Mary,' he said. The desperation in her eyes was like a needle in his heart, but he couldn't allow her this false hope. 'They're lying to you. They're lying. I don't know why, or whether they're just crazy, but there's no one out there to warn, no one for them to find. Sherlock . . . He's dead. I saw him fall.' He swallowed and looked away, remembering and hating the images that swam before his vision. 'I saw his blood on the pavement.'
'I know—' She stopped, pressing her hands to her lips and closing her eyes. She took a deep breath. 'I know he is special to you. I know because of the hurt I see in your eyes whenever his name is spoken, whenever you try not to remember. I see it even now. You love him, you want to protect him. I know. But sweetheart.' Her voice rose in pitch and her hands fluttered in front of her mouth as she began to cry. 'They'll kill you.'
John's eyes burned with the heat of his tears. 'They sent you in here to get me to talk.'
She let out a mangled sob and nodded.
'I love you, Mary. I love you, and I would never lie to you. Sherlock Holmes is dead.'
Her halfway controlled sobs broke through like a burst dam now, and she covered her face with her hands.
'That's enough,' said a voice at the end of the room. Moran came speedily down the aisle between tables, his men directly behind him. 'So sorry, Mary, I know you tried. And you. You disappoint me, John. You've a cold, cold heart. Take her.'
'I can't tell you what I don't know!' John shouted. 'Please. Just let her go.'
Daz and Pete grabbed Mary and began to drag her away. Lex stayed with Moran, gnawing a thumb, watching John with wild, anxious eyes. But they didn't take her out of the room. Instead, they drove her to the ground behind a table where John couldn't see.
'What are you doing? What are you doing?'
'You brought this upon her, Johnny,' said Moran dispassionately, cleaning his nails with the scalpel.
A second later, Mary let out a horrendous scream. John couldn't stop himself—he started to his feet. Lex lunged forward with the taser, caught him in the stomach, and jolted him with fifty thousand volts. He collapsed to the ground, Mary's scream ringing in his ears. He twitched and jerked, each scream hitting him with as much force as the voltage from the taser. Then the screaming stopped. Don't be dead, don't be dead, John thought. His silent prayer was answered when, with his next laboured breath, he heard her crying.
From where he lay on the floor, he saw Pete stalking toward him, his blank, detached visage utterly unnerving, for his hand was dripping red. He threw something down in front of John's face, and a splatter of blood crossed his cheek. It was a finger.
Moran tsked. 'I believe that's the one you were going to slip a ring onto.'
Monday, 20.21 hrs
'Kill me, please,' said John. 'Let Mary go, and just kill me.'
'How quaint. Yet how utterly predictable. Why do the noble-hearted ever try bargaining like that?' Moran asked, his voice mild and uninterested. He was seated on the edge of one of the long tables, playing with his scalpel again, flipping it in the air and catching it by the handle without fail. 'Be reasonable, John, and think it through. We let her go, she goes to the police, the police come here to collect your corpse, and yours truly doesn't have the information he started this whole rollercoaster ride for in the first place. No no no, Johnny boy, that's not how this thing plays out.'
He snapped his fingers and called out 'Oi!' to Daz, who was on the other side of the room with Mary. Obedient as a well-trained dog, Daz lifted her heavily and set her on her feet. She had wrapped her bleeding hand into end of her own shirt, which was now soaked through.
'We're long past the point where either of you walks out of here alive,' he continued. 'The question, now, is how much pain you're willing to endure, how much you're willing to make her endure. The longer you hold out, the worse it gets. Tell me what I want to know, we end this today. Or do you want her to die? I'll only too happily oblige.'
By the time he had finished talking, Daz was standing at his side, towering over Mary and holding her upper arm with a claw-like hand. 'Mary, Mary, quite contrary,' sang Moran, scraping out a fingernail with the point of the scalpel. 'You're making piss-poor work of your job. Our Johnny's still clamped up tighter than a puckered arse.'
Mary knew better than to retort. Her whole body was quivering from the pain, and her face had drained white from blood loss.
'Did he ever tell you, Mary,' Moran continued, 'about the kind of man Sherlock Holmes was? Mm? No? Then let me tell you. Holmes was brilliant.Proper genius. That's what they say. And prideful. He touted his genius like a trophy, like a badge of honour. Honour, as if he had any idea what the word really meant. Up and down the countryside and on every street in London, he flaunted his quaint little deductive skills as if he were king of all England, and long live the king! We were all expected to fawn and faint and bend before his majesty. This one here surely did.' He threw a thumb at John and barked out a laugh. 'But his wasn't real genius. It was so limited, to naming tobacco ash and identifying dust on boots and discerning what someone's jewellery said about her love life. How trivial. How utterly mundane. His little demonstrations were restricted to London, his successes announced in little London papers, his circle of friends never growing. For a man who saw himself as so large and important, he was so very small.'
John was unaware of how his right hand had balled into a fist until he felt the nails bite into his palms.
'Proper genius? Nah. He didn't even brush the edge of that elite circle. Not like my employer. Not like James Moriarty. Now there was a man who knew how to wield a brain. He was a mastermind known the world over, orchestrating the affairs of men in Japan that turned the fortunes of men Mexico. He could pluck a string in China to kill a man in France. He composed symphonies, Mary. Symphonies! Notorious, feared, respected, but so perfectly hidden that no one, certainly not the great Sherlock Holmes, could ever find him, not if he didn't want to be found.
'But forgive me; I was talking about Sherlock. About how his jealousy of brilliance drove him mad. He just had to be the star pupil, mummy's favourite, teacher's pet, Britain's darling in the funny hat. Moriarty just wanted to play. And Sherlock murdered him. That is who Sherlock Holmes is, the kind of man your Johnny admires so desperately. A murderer. Jealous, spiteful, and ultimately, a ruddy coward.'
'He was a good man,' said John through gritted teeth, unable to keep silent. 'And Moriarty wasn't even a man. He was a snake.'
Moran sprang toward him so quickly he seemed like a cobra himself. His hand grabbed John at the throat. 'You want to say that again?'
'John, no,' said Mary.
But he didn't seem to hear her. Eyes narrowed and jaw firm, John spat it out again: 'Snake.'
A hand flew against his face; the resounding crack rang throughout the kitchen.
Moran straightened, his face suddenly bright with pleasure. 'We should show Mary what we've been working on. What day is it, Johnny boy Watson? What number are we on?' John spat blood onto the floor and glared hatefully at the man. Moran only laughed. 'Lex, you hold Ms Morstan, why don't you. If she gets feisty, use the taser. I need my man Daz to help John out of his shirt.'
Daz did not crack a smile, but his eyes were suddenly alight and feral. He passed Mary off to Lex, grabbed John up by the front of his shirt, and threw him down again onto the floor. John heard Mary's muffled whimper as his head rebounded off the tiles. Then Daz was on top of him, ripping open the front of his shirt so viciously that he heard buttons skittering across the floor, and a hollow ringing as one fell into a drain. The white vest beneath was already stained with blood, particularly around the neckline.
'Cut them both off,' said Moran. He tossed Daz a knife from his toolkit, saying, 'Those wire cuffs sure make it difficult to undress.'
Daz made a notch in the hem of John's vest but set it aside, preferring to rip the fabric with his own two hands until John's entire chest was exposed. Then, looking over his shoulder with a half-grin at his boss, he rubbed his fingers along the bare skin, teasing over the cold nipples and through the coarse hairs. John turned his face away, squeezing his eyes tight.
Moran chuckled. 'Such a flirt, this one.' Then, in mock scolding, he said, 'No, Daz. Bad boy. Not yet. Just get that man out of his shirt.'
With the knife, he cut up the length of the sleeves, as the makeshift wire cuffs made it impossible to get the shirt off any other way. He worked carelessly, nicking the point of the knife into John's skin, wrist to shoulder, like perforating paper, one arm then the other. John forced the moans of pain to die in his throat, before Mary could hear them. When Daz was finished and John was naked from the waist up, he stretched John's arms above his head—his torso lay flat against John's and his lips grazed John's chin—before rolling him over; his bare chest and stomach pressed against the ice-cold tiled floor.
John heard Mary's gasp at seeing his mangled back, and he turned his head to make sure that she couldn't see his face when Moran made the first cut.
'Now then, Johnny boy,' said Moran walking over. 'Like always, the question. Will you answer it this time, before I give Sherlock yet another gift?'
'Damn you,' said John; he could feel his heart pounding as if it were outside his body, lying on the floor beside him.
'That's what I thought. Fine then. Let's shut you up.' He straddled John again, but he paused before he began to carve.
'Pete, re-soak John's gag.' As Pete set to work, dipping the rag in ammonia and wringing it out, Moran, traced his wounds lightly with his middle finger and said, 'No words, just screams. I like those. Scream all you like.'
The rag was twisted and placed once again between his teeth and fitted tightly around his head. When the fumes hit his nose and throat, John tried not to retch.
Daz held John's arms, and Pete took his legs. Moran petted his back. 'Looks like we're running out of space. Ah, but here. Another will fit nicely.'
John felt the lightness of Moran's fingers on his left side, just at the bruised ribs. A moment later, the scalpel plunged deep into his flesh and dragged. He couldn't stop it now. He screamed out his pain into the gag, and Mary with him. Moran took his time with this one; he let the scalpel sink, twist, and jerk in his flesh, inflicting as much pain as he could with a single instrument. He went deeper than before, pulled the skin apart so the blood flowed more quickly, and when the tip of the scalpel scraped against a rib, when John thought he might faint from the pain, the pressure lifted from his backside, arms, and legs.
'How 'bout that, Mary. Ain't he beautiful?' said Moran, wiping his hands on a fresh rag.
'Bastards, you goddamn sadistic bastards!' she sobbed.
'Language, my dear. Be nice, or I'll have that filthy little tongue cut right out.'
'Why are you doing this? He doesn't know anything! He says he doesn't know!'
'You are confusing ignorance with loyalty, I'm afraid. That's what this is, Mary. Loyalty at its very deepest. That's who John Watson is at his core—a slave, a man who has bound himself heart and soul to Sherlock Holmes. And it doesn't matter who he hurts—neither his lover nor himself—as long as he remains loyal to his master.'
John's head rolled on the floor, trying to shake his head no.
'That's it, isn't it, John? Your devotion to Sherlock Holmes is simply stronger than your love for Mary Morstan.'
'No,' he said through the gag.
'No? Then prove it. Prove it.Tell me where he is, right now, or I take another finger.'
John wept; his tears stung the wounds growing around his wrists.
'Two seconds. One, two. Whoops! Too slow. Okay, boys, maybe something from the right hand this time? Balance things out a little.'
Mary panicked; she struggled out of Lex's grip, lost her balance, and caught herself on the edge of a table. In that moment, before she had a chance to run, Lex rammed the taser into her side. She fell to the ground, seizing. Moran shrugged. 'Here will do fine.'
John watched in helpless horror as Pete fitted the ring that looked like a cigar clipper around her finger, and snapped cleanly through the bone.
Monday, 23.01 hrs
He awoke again in the freezer without remembering having been put in there. He must have been unconscious. This time, they hadn't bothered to tie him down, though his wrists were still cut with wire and joined together. For several minutes, he struggled to sit up, but the pain racing up and down his limbs and reverberating in his head and back held him to the floor.
The door opened. They dragged him out. They set him in the blood-slick chair. But another chair had been brought, and in it sat his Mary, bleeding and frightened. On the left side of her head was a gaping wound. They had taken an ear. Fresh blood coursed down the side of her head like a river.
'God, Mary. Oh God, oh God,' said John. Daz stood behind him, the weight of his hands pressing down on his shoulders to detain him. Moran stood behind Mary.
'Mary and I have been having a nice long chat,' said Moran. 'About you. About the things you have told her and the kind of man you are. And I'm a smart man. Smart enough. Putting together all the pieces—her testimony, my personal witness—you know something? I believe you, John.'
John felt no relief at these words. He waited tremulously for the next blow to fall.
'I believe you love her, as much as you say you do. You really don't want to see her hurt. That's sweet. And I also believe that you've been telling the truth all along. You really don't know how to find Sherlock Holmes.' He laughed lightly. 'I think I've suspected it for a couple of days now. You really believe he is dead. Don't you?'
'I know it,' said John weakly. 'I know it.'
'Rather like you know that, say, Irene Adler is dead.'
To John, it seemed that the fluorescent lights were fading rapidly. 'The woman . . . ?' he said softly.
'Ah. So Sherlock never told you. Hm. Interesting. He didn't trust you after all. Not like we had thought.'
'Irene Adler . . .' said John. 'She was beheaded by terrorists. Mycroft. He told me—'
'No, Sherlock saved her life. Touching story. Irene loves telling it. Funny how he rushed off to save her, thousands of miles away, but when it comes to you? He's a no-show. So it got me to thinking: If he didn't tell you about that, then maybe it's true he didn't tell you about how he faked hisown death.'
'No. No, no, no. He's dead. He's dead.'
'He lied.'
'He wouldn't . . . not to me . . . not all this . . . He's dead!'
'So our game has to change, if only a little. See, as of right now, you are merely a missing person. The police have no reason to suspect you are in any immediate danger, and that's how this was going to play out. After we got what we wanted from you, we were going to make you,' he waved his fingers, like casting away a flower, 'disappear. Drop hints that you had fled to France and then down to Greece. Drop your body in the Channel, attached to some free weights or something. We were still in the planning stages of that one. No one, not even dear Mary here, would ever know what had happened to you. But now, well, now we invite attention to your . . . plight. You're useless to us as an informant, but as bait, the creative possibilities are endless. We'll let the police know we have you. We'll tease Sherlock Holmes out of hiding—some men can't resist a hunting game—and when he comes for you, we'll kill him.'
John hung his head, shaking it from side to side.
'But here's my conundrum, Johnny boy. We brought in Mary here to force you to give up Sherlock's hideout. But you can't, can you?'
'N-no, I—'
'So, really, sweet Mary's rather outworn her usefulness. What to do, what to do? You see my problem, of course.'
'Please, oh god please no. Please no, I'll do anything.'
Moran lifted a knife from the table, and Daz's hands tightened around John's arms to keep him in the chair.
'I'll do anything! Anything! God! No, please!'
'There's nothing you can do.' He set the blade against Mary's throat.
'God, no! Mary! Mary!'
Her eyes were wide with fear. She mouthed I love you as a single tear slid down her cheek.
'Hush, pet,' said Moran. Then, with his eyes fixed on John, he plunged the knife into Mary's neck and tore the steel through her throat. Something tore through John in the same moment, engulfed him, and he didn't know whether he was within his own body or without, but it took him, dragged him down into blackness, a place he had been before, a prison and a hell, and this time he put up no resistance as it devoured him, heart and soul.
End of Part 1
