The underground sanctuary was silent from the chaos above save for the laboured breathing of Mycroft Holmes who lay ashen faced on the cot quickly vacated by Sherlock.
Watson's shaking hands unfastened the large, brass buttons of the unconscious man's riding coat. A large wooden box with a red cross was dropped onto the floor by the cot, Sherlock unable to hold it any longer from wherever he'd procured it. The riding coat dropped to the earthen floor.
"Bullet proof," Sherlock sighed, picking it up, his long fingers playing along the finely corded fabric. "Will he be alright, W-Watson?" he asked, unable to mask his own pain but wanting with every fiber of his being to appear strong in the eyes of his best friend.
Watson didn't answer. Not because he wanted Sherlock to suffer, because that would be very wrong.
Molly silently followed John's instructions as Lestrade stood guard at the secret entrance glancing between where John worked on Mycroft and Sherlock who swayed on his feet behind him.
"Sherlock, sit down before you fall down," Lestrade ordered but there was no backup from John Watson as he would have hoped.
Watson carefully placed his fingers to Mycroft's carotid artery. The well stocked medical box provided a stethoscope and penlight. Watson pulled Mycroft's right eye and then his left eye open. Equal and reactive. Good. Heartbeat rapid but strong. Okay. The pulse was strong but Mycroft Holmes would be in a world of agony when he woke up.
And still the doctor couldn't answer Sherlock; couldn't face the man who stood behind his shoulder, shaking with determination to stay on his feet this time. Not because he was mad at him because that would be very wrong. Watson was in tune with his patient. He was listening to Lestrade and Molly make sure their … whatever this place was, would protect them from the outside forces until they could figure out what to do. He wasn't ignoring his friend. Because that would be wrong.
Sherlock drew a sharp intake of breath that sounded very painful when Watson lifted Mycroft's shirt again to see the bruises that already formed on his brother's chest from the four bullets that had tried their best to rip into his flesh.
"Broken ribs," Watson proclaimed solemnly. "Git could have avoided this if he'd told us what was going on." He heard Sherlock's mouth open to defend the man who lay beneath his still shaking hands but it closed. Good. That mouth had no right to speak to him right now when it had stayed silenced for so long, locked in lies and deceit.
Once Molly had quickly explained to Lestrade the workings of this room as she understood it, Lestrade took a moment to rub his shins which had scraped painfully down the well's unforgiving stone walls. Lestrade aimed his gun upwards at the scraping sounds from above.
"The outside lever is overridden," Sherlock said tiredly. "S-successful game."
Lestrade looked to Molly for an explanation as the poor medical examiner gathered the other blankets from the cots to cover the other wounded man with.
"Sherlock, Mycroft's going to be okay," Molly said cautiously looking at Watson for confirmation. A curt nod in her direction only in the affirmative was all she got as Watson gently tilted Mycroft's head back on the pillow to keep his airway open.
"I'd like to have him on oxygen but as we don't have any, we'll just have to keep an eye that he keeps breathing and doesn't go into shock," Watson said.
Sherlock sat down again, sucking in a pained breath as his body folded into the position but there was something besides pain behind the downcast eyes. He coughed and the accompanying rattle he tried to hide behind a hand on his mouth didn't succeed.
Watson didn't want to hear the rattle, he wanted to ignore it. But on the other hand had taken an oath in what seemed like forever ago. After helping prop Mycroft's legs up on aged pillows and checking his breathing again, Watson turned toward Sherlock, professional conduct held in every movement until he reached the cot upon which his patient sat seemingly unwilling to look up at him.
Molly stood nearby, hands on her hips. "He's been getting worse since we had to make a run for it," she said to John.
"Molly, please," Sherlock asked, looking past John's shoulder at the pathologist pleadingly. Molly was having none of it and made a helpless gesture toward John.
Captain John Watson bypassed Sherlock's opportunity to cry foul. He bypassed the gentle touch that would come from a friend too, shocking the young man on the cot with the cold stethoscope firmly placed against his back before he could wrap himself further into the blanket. After the indignant huff Sherlock was silent.
The silence, more than anything else scared John. Sherlock was supposed to be complaining loudly about the invasion but he just stared at his brother and still John couldn't think of a single to say as he listened to the wheezing and crackling in Sherlock's chest. Even his expected instruction to, "breathe in and hold it," sounded hollow because the last time John had asked Sherlock to breathe, he hadn't complied. Because he was dead. He had no pulse. And it was a lie. And it hurt…
"Um … John – Sherlock needs to breathe out now," Molly said anxiously.
"What? Oh! Yeah, let the breath out now," John ordered his patient, clearly annoyed with himself. Since when did the great Sherlock Holmes comply with anything he said?
Sherlock's shoulders heaved with the effort to catch his breath held for song. He waited. Had he held it long enough for John to figure out that he hadn't died on purpose? That he'd never meant to hurt the person who meant the world to him? That if he had to, he would stop breathing forever for real?
Watson lifted Sherlock's cotton shirt in the front, daring the sick man to argue when he gently helped him withdraw his arms from their protective position around his body. The compliance unnerved the doctor.
"Jesus," Watson cursed under his breath as he tapped his patient's chest and back.
Molly winced in sympathy as Sherlock's head titled back, his chin obediently under Watson's cupped hand as the doctor peered at his pupils with a light. The entire examination was silent save for rattling sounds in Sherlock's breathing that seemed to settle into his lungs since he'd sat down. But more than pain, shame showed on the young detective's face. His blue tinged lips stark against the white light reflected down his long nose.
Sherlock fought not to bite the thermometer in pain as John checked his pupils yet again while waiting for the readings to come up. Molly saw the pain in the blue eyes, the pupils remaining resolutely large even after the flash of light. If john saw the teeth marks in the thankfully plastic tipped device, he made no mention of it.
Watson sighed and paced a few steps looking at the thermometer he'd plucked from Sherlock's mouth as another round of gunfire erupted above them. Instinct born of years in Afghanistan had him crouched in front of his friend in seconds, having pushed poor Molly to the dirt ground to save her as well.
Sherlock knew his thoughts would be unwelcome so he remained silent. The doctor had suffered post traumatic stress disorder from time to time since his arrival back home and being in a bunker with the sound of gunfire all around them would do that to a person.
"Um, thanks?" Molly said, regaining her footing and brushing herself off.
But Watson remained where he was, his head down, mere inches from Sherlock's own bowed head. The doctor's hands were on either side of Sherlock's head as if protecting him from the sound as much as from the flesh-ripping metal that finally ceased.
Heat radiated from the curled head he held between his shaking hands. John was all at once Captain, doctor, best friend but still none of the three could find words.
Mercifully cold hands held Sherlock's head, bowed together with the other. The smell of gun powder and a woolen sweater; Captain John Watson was here. Antiseptic soap and stickiness from plasters applied to Mycroft; Dr. Watson was here. Old Spice, shampoo, coffee and mint; John was here. Right here in front of him.
The doctor's shoulders visibly relaxed but still the two figures remained in that position for some time, their heads finally touching, appearing as if neither of them could stand the weight any longer. Watson's shoulders shook uncontrollably now and incoherent words escaped him.
"Jesus = Sherlock = I thought … God! Why?" Over and over again until Sherlock's pained eyes looked up to find his friend's red rimmed ones.
"'M'sorry, J-John," Sherlock mumbled. "No oth-other way. Please forgive m-me."
"I know, Sherlock. I know," John told him, his voice sounding very raw and weak.
"Good." With that one word, the detective slumped forward unconscious.
"Jesus!" Watson swore again against his shattered nerves as he held his friend's limp form at arm's length, one hand slipping down toward his carotid artery. The slight thump let John know that Sherlock had held on long enough to be forgiven and now that it was done…
"Sherlock?" John called louder than he intended. It was all John could do not to shake his friend like an untrained bystander as images of Sherlock's lifeless, bloodied body on the pavement ran through his head.
Molly helped John stretch Sherlock out onto the cot. The silence from before melted away into indecipherable pleading as John's practiced hands discovered every injury James Moriarty had inflicted. And Sherlock hadn't asked for pain meds, hadn't complained, had only waited to receive blame and forgiveness. And once he got that, he simply said, Good. And John knew that for once, what he had done, was a bit not good, and he'd give anything for Sherlock to wake up and tell him so.
"He's got pneumonia and there's more liquid in his left lung than his right. He's cyanotic. I need equipment. How long has it been since he's had fluids?" he asked Molly, taking in the needle that was still taped in place and capped off at Sherlock's inner arm.
"The IV drained away about an hour ago. It kept getting tangled in brush and since it was empty, we unhooked it."
Watson looked at his watch as he fumbled in the medical box for anything he could find. Fresh bandages were welcome as the ones covering the incisions from where Sherlock's lung had been re-inflated were seeping blood. The wound was infected.
Molly knelt beside John to hand him fresh bandages. "I was careful," she vowed, reaching forward but not touching the wounds she'd inflicted.
"Yes, Molly, you were," Watson assured as he peeled more bandage away. "But Mycroft informed me that the care Sherlock received was less than stellar, the doctor being a double agent in Moriarty's employ."
Mycroft woke with a groan at this inopportune time. There was so much self inflicted blame to go around when the true cause of all this misery was a dead man whose grip reached even from beyond the grave.
"Sherlock?" Mycroft grit out as he tried to sit.
Lestrade kept his gun aimed at the ceiling as he spoke to Mycroft. "Mr. Holmes, listen, Sherlock is fine. You've been injured. You need to stay still. Doc says you've got some broken ribs. That's one hell of a fancy riding jacket you've got there by the way," he added for levity.
But no one, even a man from Scotland Yard told Mycroft Holmes what to do. With a dignified, stifled cry of pain and a literal stiff upper lip, Mycroft Holmes rose from his cot and limped to his brother's side.
Another report of gunshots above convinced Lestrade that no one was getting through the barrier above any time soon. The exhausted officer let his arm fall limply to his side as he massaged his sore shoulder and made his way over to let the taller Holmes lean on him.
"Is he going to be alright?" Mycroft asked, taking in his brother's pale features.
"Yes, I believe he will if we can get him treatment soon," Watson said but he could feel the elder Holmes deducing … (if that was a proper verb) his every syllable and he wondered if Mycroft could sense a lie as well as his little brother.
Mycroft tried his cell phone again. How infuriating to have his own wireless system hacked against him.
"Already tried that," Molly said without need.
"Right then," Mycroft said, opening a small cabinet and drawing out an old short wave radio. The piercing feedback of the speakers as the machine awoke from its ancient slumber told them the machine worked. But who on earth would be listening to an old thing like that in this era?
XXXX
Mrs Hudson's keen ears picked up a beeping coming from the top of the ladder where the painting of the handsome stallion hung. She climbed the ladder cursing her bad hip the entire way up until she swung the horse out of the way and beheld the shortwave that sat on a shelf behind it.
"Mrs. Hudson! Mrs. Hudson!" Mycroft yelled as loudly as his broken ribs permitted and when he paused to cough, Molly and Dr. Watson took turns calling.
"Mycroft is that you?" Mrs. Hudson said, climbing the ladder a bit more so she could perch one butt cheek on the shelf beside the shortwave radio.
"Of course it's me," Mycroft said in astonishment before softening his tone. This woman had saved his life and bless her, she alone could do it again.
Lestrade took the microphone from Mycroft. "Listen, Mrs. Hudson … Yes, we found them. Yes, they're all alright," he lied as Mrs. Hudson lost focus for a minute. "Listen, please, Mrs. Hudson, Sally Donovan and Anderson should be arriving any time now at the stables. I called them. See if you can flag them down and…"
"They've just pulled up," Mrs. Hudson said in astonishment as lights flickered through the slats in the barn. "Yes, it's them from your description."
Mrs. Hudson aimed the remote control that she was glad to have remembered to take up the ladder and the side of the barn opened up as Donovan and Anderson climbed cautiously from their car, guns aimed into the structure and right up to Mrs. Hudson herself as she called to them.
"Don't shoot, dear, it's me," Mrs. Hudson called to Donovan though the two had never met. Mrs. Hudson hid the large gun Mycroft had left her with behind her back.
"You're Hudson," Donovan said, not lowering her gun. "Where's Lestrade?"
"I'm here, Donovan," Lestrade's voice boomed out surprisingly loud for such an old contraption. "Well not here but…"
Mycroft Holmes identified himself over the radio. Even the witch of a cop Donovan couldn't and wouldn't mouth off or disobey this man. Now was the time for action. Donovan and Anderson entered the barn and the door closed behind them. In a cupboard behind several saddle stands was a cache of gas masks just as Mycroft had directed. Holmes made promises to the two cops that outweighed even Lestrade's promises if they could pull of what he was requesting.
Mycroft directed the two cops to don the masks and make toward the coordinates he gave them to the bunker. They were to shoot on sight anyone they came across. The fact that there were no rescue helicopters or jets in the sky over Mycroft's estate told the man everything he needed to know about the men who were still on the grounds. Turned. All of them.
Donovan and Anderson set out as Mrs. Hudson crept slowly from the ladder to ready the car. She cringed every time a gunshot rang out as she herself donned a protective mask. There was a brief gun battle in the distance and Mrs. Hudson prayed for the hundredth time that day that everyone would come out alive.
Mrs. Hudson readied the car and stared off into the gloom of the night. Owls stretched their wings from the various out buildings, flying away against the peek-a-boo moon. A bluish tinged vapour mingled with the white mist and a strange silence crept upon the land as if the trees themselves had gone to sleep. The moon peeked around the corner of the barn and a rabbit fell silently to the ground outside as he crossed the footpath to the garden that grew wild raspberries which were nearly frozen on the vines.
Mrs. Hudson's kindness carried her from the car to the poor downed creature to find it still breathing apparently in sleep. She did what she could and moved the warm, little form to the cover of some bushes so he would be less likely to be eaten by a predator who might happen by later unaffected by the unnatural air.
A/N We still haven't seen Sherlock here in Canada, it's supposed to air on February 13th. Our PBS broadcaster, WNED decided not to air season three yet for reasons I didn't agree with but could at least understand. Many people were rude and callous toward employees of that station in letters and phone calls and used profanity and personal insults which I feel is terrible and embarrassing as a fan of the show. Social media has made a lot of people feel entitled to express their opinions in inappropriate ways. Inarticulate fans took to Twitter and were just ignorant and illiterate in their childish expressions of disappointment about the air date. There are a lot of horrible people in many fandoms who make normal people look bad. Most fanfiction writers are just people who like the hobby of writing but the way some people act on social media and even in some stories towards the show, its creators and actors and even the stations that air it, leaves a lot of humanity to be desired. Everyone is entitled to their opinions but it would be a nicer world if people could just think before they communicate in any form.
Thank you so much for the reviews, they have made my day!