The pressure is raised.
AN: You have all been wonderful. I hope wading through +100k words was worth it! Kissing ahoy! Oh yeah and case stuff...
Enjoy!
xxHoney
'I need you, Jane Watson. Like I need air to breathe.'
The words wash over her, and she closes her eyes. She breathes deeply through her nose, her head still swimming. Sherlock's hand lightly cups her face, thumb brushing away an errant tear.
"Jane?" he intones.
Her heart kicks wildly against her ribs, and for a moment she's propelled back in time where the only thing keeping her together amidst the terror, the pain, and the unforgiving desert was that dangerous spark of hope combined with the one person that shared her nightmare. At the time she knew it was wrong, a relationship bred out of a series of awful circumstances and the fear that they wouldn't make it to see another day. He gave her everything, and she couldn't return it the way he needed — she couldn't — and then he —
But this wasn't Afghanistan. This wasn't Bill.
This was Sherlock.
She opens her eyes, and puts her hand over his.
"What changed your mind?" she says, her voice hushed. In that moment she desperately needed to know why now of all times.
"It was during the first bombing. You left angry with me that night, and when you came back the next morning you looked at me like…" Sherlock trails off searching for the right words. "I knew what you were thinking. It was how I felt when I got back to the flat the night you were abducted. The culmination of a fear you didn't even know existed."
"The cost of almost losing," she says, and he nods.
"I knew then that we are infinitely stronger together than apart. The threats you were receiving further proved my conjecture. Moriarty is thorough. He knows as much about us, and has attempted to dissever us from each other."
She tilts her had curiously at this. "You really are inside his head, aren't you?"
Sherlock curls his lip in a bitter smirk. "He said so himself. Two sides of the same coin, remember?"
"Nope," Jane says, and he looks back at her. "Just because you can see how his twisted mind works doesn't mean you're the same."
"People would argue that you would be wrong."
"Oh, people. Idiots, all of them," she says with a smile, feeling another tear escape the corner of her eye.
A laugh startles out of him, and he looks at her with something akin to bafflement. His hand makes its way from where he was caressing her cheek down to rest against the side of her neck.
"I think I need to kiss you now," he says.
"Yeah. All right," she says grinning, and in their combined eagerness, they end up clashing teeth and bumping noses — hopelessly clumsy and absolutely beyond caring — before they break apart again giggling. "Sherlock Holmes: an expert in most things."
"I resent that," Sherlock growls playfully and reels her in even closer. "Besides when was the last time you kissed anyone either?"
"It was you, you berk," she says shoving him playfully in the chest, before another sobering realisation capitulates her. When I thought I would never get to kiss you again.
She breathes out a shaky breath, and winds her arms around the back of his neck. She closes her eyes and presses her forehead against the side of his jaw, overwhelmed with the fact that this was her life and someone, somewhere decided she deserved all of this.
His fingers curl under her chin, and he lifts her head to meet his gaze. His eyes, like morning fog search hers, and she shivers lightly. They lean in towards each other again, this time slower, and all Jane can hear is the rushing of her pulse in her ears. He ducks his head, but hesitates suddenly unsure and gripped with the same fear that dogged her constantly as of late. The fear of the unknown. Her hand twines into the hair at the nape of his neck in silent understanding, and that's all it takes before the last remaining inches between them are finally breached.
The kiss is tender and somewhat chaste. Not at all like the first time when all they could think of was their desire and their urgency. No, there was something tentative and sacred in the way Sherlock's lips moved over hers. Savouring, she realises. Cataloguing. Experimenting. Seeking. Trusting.
Asking…
She parts her mouth just so in answer to the meek question posed by Sherlock's tongue sipping at the bow of her lips. His hand tangles into her hair as she sighs and allows him to explore to his hearts content. He tastes of spicy mint, and entirely too much caffeine, and something reminiscent of oranges, and the cacophony of flavours makes her almost giddy with how perfect it all is. He's quite talented, (of course he is, bloody good at everything) and Jane's head goes pleasantly foggy as she loses herself in the kiss.
The low burning flame that she had tamped down for so long since that first night rears up in a full blaze, and she clutches at his shoulders. He reciprocates, earnest hands grasping her waist, and moves her backwards.
Her foot hits the coffee table, and she stumbles for a moment only to be righted again by Sherlock.
Their lips break apart, and she laughs as he grouses, "Bloody thing," before manoeuvring them around the obstacle and towards the sofa.
Jane falls back when her legs hit the cushions, and pulls Sherlock with her. He lands on top of her in a truly undignified heap, and she can't help but chuckle even more as she fixes one of his wayward curls that was standing up on the top of his head in a playful little arch. He tries to keep his composure, but can't help but join in with her as she laughs even harder, unable to contain the joy bursting through her. It was apparently contagious, because they both carried on until they had matching tears in their eyes.
"We're a couple of idiots, aren't we?" Jane says breathlessly. She frames Sherlock's face with her hands, her thumb tracing one of his eyebrows.
"Mm. Perhaps," he says, a gleam in his eye. He braces himself over her, and simply looks, his pupils wide, and his expression one of awe.
Suddenly, Sherlock's mobile rings from somewhere near by making them both start. "Lestrade?" she says, and Sherlock groans pressing his face briefly into the curve of her neck before tearing himself away.
Jane wills her heart to slow its frantic beating, and she pulls herself up into a sitting position. She shakes her head a little trying to clear it, and gets to her feet at the sound of Sherlock barking down the phone from the kitchen. She pauses in front of the mirror, and tries to fix her hair. The process of finger-combing it into submission was getting her nowhere, so she sighs and grabs one of the elastic hair bands looped over the utility knife embedded into the mantle.
"I told you earlier, Inspector!" Sherlock snaps just as Jane walks into the kitchen. "It's Moriarty. I know it is." There is a pause while Lestrade's tinny and very irate voice filters through the small speaker, and Sherlock growls in frustration. "Of course you wouldn't find anything. Do you really think he's so stupid as to go by his real surname?" Another pause before Sherlock cuts off the DI with a strident, "You have all the proof you require! Yes, yes the witness. The old woman. She heard him speak and can confirm that his voice is the same from the video I sent you." She frowns as Sherlock suddenly stills. "What?" he says, a hard edge in his voice, and Jane bites her lip. A gravid silence settles over him like a shroud as he listens intently to what is being said on the other line, his face darkening bit by bit. Finally he takes a sharp breath, his eyes glazed over as he rings off.
"Sherlock?" Jane says, an uncomfortable twinge lodging itself low in her gut. He continues to stare at some unmarked point on the wall for a moment before suddenly slamming his mobile down on the table so hard he causes a rack of test tubes to rattle and a Petri dish to fall to the floor.
"DAMN it!" Sherlock roars kicking a chair over in the process.
"What? What happened?" Jane says, alarmed. Sherlock utters another dark curse and grabs an empty beaker, ratcheting back his arm as if to hurtle it at the wall. Jane stops him. "Sherlock! Tell me what's going on! You're scaring me."
A little of the vitriol drains out of his avid frame, and he settles with banging the beaker down on the worktop making her flinch. He turns around and wipes a hand over his mouth, and Jane waits anxiously for him to gather himself. Finally he looks up at her.
"We were ahead of him for once, Jane!"
"What are you talking about?" she says, voice rising to his level. "Start from the beginning."
"The old woman! She was the only one who could give us a positive I.D. on Moriarty's voice from the video."
"What video?" she says reeling, and he nods making his way quickly out to the sitting room. He grabs his laptop sitting on his armchair and sets it up on the desk. Her blog was already up, and with a succinct tap of the return key, the embedded video starts playing.
Jane watches it with growing horror, and sinks down to sit on the coffee table, a hand poised over her mouth. She looks around their flat feeling violated and exposed at the knowledge that a serial bomber and murderer was in their very flat touching their things. Oh god what if Mrs. Hudson came up in that instant? She swallows back the sick feeling at the thought.
"He was here?" Jane says.
"It appears so, but that's not all," Sherlock says and brings up his own website. "You aren't the only one who was hacked. You remember the cryptic messages?"
"Yeah…the ciphers? I thought it was just a prankster. You think it's him?"
"Yes. Too big of a coincidence. The universe is rarely so lazy. He left a video for me too. I only just discovered it today." Sherlock taps the return key again, and Jane holds her breath as the second video starts.
At first, blackness fills the screen until the lens cap is removed and the focus is adjusted. It's trained on a random scrawl of graffiti on the side of what appears to be a phone box, and Jane stares at the white spray paint in confusion. Then the familiar lilting voice Jane had only ever heard once yet grew to despise instantly, floats through the speakers. Unlike the conversation in Lestrade's office, the voice was clearer yet unaffected by any discernable accent but it was definitely the same one.
"I'm watching you, Sherlock," it says, and Jane suddenly realises she's looking at a rough rendition of the All Seeing Eye. Sherlock freezes the image.
"Look familiar?"
"Should it?"
"See for yourself," Sherlock says, and she follows him to the window. He pulls back the drapes and points across the street.
There, next to the kerb, is the very same telephone box. Her hand begins its hateful tremor, and she flexes her fingers rhythmically. She feels ill, and she doesn't want to know the answer to the question she knows she has to ask next. She licks her lips.
"Sherlock…what happened to the old woman? Did he — did he kill her?"
"No. Might as well have," he grumbles, and Jane gives him a reprimanding look. He has the decency to look a little contrite at this, and clears his throat. In a much gentler tone he says, "There was a charge found in the head set the woman was using. It was small, but given the proximity of both ear pieces, it managed to effectively render her deaf when it was set off."
Jane closes her eyes against the horror he was implying. "So let me get this straight…he blew out a blind woman's eardrums?" Sherlock presses his lips into a grim line, and Jane has to actively choke back bile. "What a sick bastard!"
"She won't be able to identify the voice on this video, and without the cross-reference with the previously recorded phone conversation, Lestrade can't really go any further. His supposed 'crack team' of criminal profilers are apparently wasted." He runs a hand through his ragged curls. "It was a long shot her testimony would have made any significant leap, but it was all we had." He presses his fists on either side of his head and screws up his eyes, growling angrily at himself.
Jane huffs out a breath, and makes a decision. She nods once to herself and makes her way to the frame on the mantle that had a taxidermied bat mounted in the centre, and flips it over. She peels off the single cigarette from where it was taped to the back, and marches over to Sherlock.
"You will figure it out, Sherlock. You always do," she says pulling away one of his hands from where it was trying to apparently squeeze the answers out of his skull, and places the fag into his palm. "Now: you are going to smoke that, and I am going to make tea, and then we are going to go over what we know while we wait for our favourite fanatic psycho-bomber to give us a ring. Sound good?"
-oOo-
Sherlock takes another long drag of the cigarette abandoning his attempt to savour it as the delicious nicotine floods his veins. He glares at the defaced phone box from his position on the pavement, and lets the crisp spring air clear his head. (This was definitely what he needed. This proves his point even more that he functioned better with Jane than without.)
He drops the end of the cigarette and crushes it under the toe of his shoe and opens the door where the smell of freshly brewed tea beckons him upstairs.
When he enters the sitting room a hot steaming cup is thrust directly into his hands by Jane.
"Drink," she commands and steers him back to facing the ever-growing maelstrom of data plastered to their wall. "Solve."
"Not a dog, Jane," he remarks taking a sip. (Like usual it was perfect.)
"Quiet. I hear tea is good for the synapses as long as you let it do its job. Now, tell me what I can do. I want to help," she says standing next to him.
"We have to start at square one with Powers," Sherlock says.
"Classmates?"
"None of them checked out."
"Could he have been older?" she asks.
"The thought had occurred," he drawls. Just then the pink phone pings its text alert, and Sherlock nearly pounces on it from where it was sitting on the desk. "Finally!"
His thumb slides the unlock key and he opens the newest message.
Beep…beeeeep!
A photo pops up, and Jane and Sherlock tilt their heads in tandem.
"The Thames…?" Jane says.
"Yes. South bank, somewhere between WaterlooBridge and SouthwarkBridge. Check the papers and I'll look online," he says, thumbs flying furiously over the keys of his own mobile. He looks at the tide times while simultaneously pulling up the local news.
"Archway suicide," Jane informs him flipping through a newspaper.
(Ten a penny, they are.) "No keep looking." He thumbs through reports in the radius of Waterloo, Battersea, and Greenwich. Nothing.
"Two kids stabbed in Stoke Newington."
Sherlock searches the duty log under Thames Police Reports and comes up empty handed.
"Man found on the train line — oh, Andrew West," she says glumly.
"No, no, no!" he huffs, scowling down at his mobile. After a long moment, he caves and submits himself to dialing Lestrade. He picks up on the first ring.
"Sherlock?"
"Have you found anything on the south bank between SouthwarkBridge and WaterlooBridge?" he says skipping all preamble.
"How did you know about that? I was just about to phone you," Lestrade says.
"Picture message of the Thames. We'll be there shortly."
…
"So this is definitely connected, then?" Lestrade asks leading them down the shore where a group of forensic officers were still processing the body. (At least Anderson wasn't here so hopefully the evidence was still in tact.) (Mostly.)
"It has to be, although he's broken his pattern. He hasn't been in touch," Sherlock says holding up the pink phone for emphasis before putting it back in his pocket.
"Maybe he ran out of hostages?" Lestrade says hopefully.
"I wouldn't count on it."
"So it's probably safe to assume some other poor unfortunate is primed to explode?"
"Yes," Sherlock says looming over the body of a man in what appears to be a generic issued uniform.
"Any ideas?" Lestrade asks.
(Uniform: standard. Overweight. Supermarket manager? Public transportation? Security guard? Insignia on shirt removed. Mugged? Revenge? A hit? Bruising around nose and mouth. Personal. Fingertips? Oh fingertips…)
"Seven…so far."
"Seven?!" Lestrade says incredulously.
"Mm," Sherlock acknowledges. "Need a closer look."
Sherlock crouches down next to the man and pulls out his magnifier. He examines the bruises over the mouth and notes that they are indeed fingertips. (A hit, then. He would recognise this particular signature anywhere.)
He moves down the body, and examines the shirt pocket where it has been ripped apart, clearly a ruse to mask this man's place of employment as well as his name. He wanders down and notes the plastic clip on the man's belt. (Security guard, then.)
He checks the watch. The alarm button doesn't offer much give, and he sees that it is habitually set for half two in the morning.
By the time he reaches the guard's feet, it's just reaffirming what he's already pieced together. With a smirk, Sherlock rises from his crouch just as Jane kneels to examine the body.
"He's been dead for about twenty-four hours. Maybe longer." She looks up to Lestrade. "Did he drown?"
"Apparently not. Not enough water in his lungs. He was asphyxiated."
"I would agree," she says. "There's a bit of bruising around his nose and mouth."
"Fingertips," Sherlock murmurs, and searches local missing persons. He narrows it down to a hand full of possibilities.
"What was that?" Lestrade asks, and Sherlock absently waves his hand in his direction as if batting away something bothersome. He looks up Interpol's most wanted on a hunch, and finds what he's looking for. (Threads. You have to follow the threads. Moriarty likens himself to a loom weaver, the patterns and choreographed chaos of the entire tapestry was connected by one continuous thread. Like a spider's web, even. The description was more than apt.)
CzechRepublic.
(a wink in the form of expensive bohemian stationary)
Most Wanted: Oskar Dzundza aka the Golem.
(a hit, obviously a hit, security guard – where? gallery attendant — yes back up: gallery attendant but why a hit? newspapers newspapers newspapers — something about a painting? search)
Lost Vermeer Painting.
Hickman Gallery Proprietor: Berta Wenceslas.
(summary – stationary: Czech, hired assassin: Czech, Wenceslas surname: Czech) (oh how poetic almost.)
A clever smirk lilts the corner of Sherlock's mouth as the puzzle falls beautifully into place.
"He's in his late thirties, I would say. Not in the best condition," Jane says concluding her diagnosis and pushing herself back upright.
"He's been in the river a long while. The water's corrupted most of the data," Sherlock says standing straight and triumphant. "But I'll tell you one thing: that lost Vermeer painting is a fake."
"What?" Lestrade says, baffled.
"The key is identifying the corpse," Sherlock says over him as if he hadn't spoken. "We need to find information on his friends, interest, associates, the like…"
"Wait, wait, wait," Lestrade says just as Sherlock starts to walk off back in the direction they came. "What do you mean a painting? What are you bloody on about?"
"Haven't you seen the news? Dutch Old Master, supposedly destroyed centuries ago; now it's turned up. Worth thirty. million. pounds," Sherlock says emphasisng each word in turn.
"And what does this have to do with our friend over 'ere?" Lestrade says gruffly, patience wearing to almost transparent.
"Everything. Haven't you ever heard of the Golem?" Sherlock says, equally frustrated.
"Golem?" Lestrade says stupidly, and Sherlock clenches his jaw in irritation. (Honestly, it was like he was being this slow out of spite.)
Before Sherlock can tear into him however, Jane pipes, "It's a horror story, isn't it?"
"Jewish folk story," Sherlock nods, "Giant man made of clay that comes to life and squeezes the life out of his victims. It's also the name of one of the deadliest assassins in the world: Oskar Dzundza."
"So this is a hit?" Lestrade says attempting (and failing) to spell the name of the culprit correctly in his pocket notepad.
"Oh most definitely," Sherlock says, "Fingertip bruising dappling the face: that's his trademark style. He likes to kill his targets with his bare hands."
A grim silence follows this as all three of them look back at the body in understanding before Lestrade cuts in again.
"Yeah but what has all of this got to do with that painting? I don't see…"
"Arugh! You do see you just don't observe —"
"All right, girls, that's enough," Jane says effectively putting an end to their bickering. Sherlock tugs his coat collar up petulantly even though there is hardly any chill. "Sherlock? Why don't you take us through it?"
Sherlock clears his throat and eyes Lestrade. He grudgingly flips a page on his notepad and licks the tip of his pencil. He nods for Sherlock to go on.
"Fine. As I was saying earlier: the key to this is identifying the corpse. The killer's not left us with much, just the shirt and the trousers. Formal, so maybe he was going out, but the quality is cheap, ill-fitting polyester so it speaks on behalf of something else. A uniform, standard issue. Dressed for work, then. What kind of work? There's a plastic hook on his belt from a walkie-talkie."
"Tube driver?" Lestrade asks, eyebrows drawn. Sherlock grimaces.
"Security guard?" Jane says, and Sherlock nods.
"Most likely if you consider taking a look at his backside."
"Backside?!"
"Are you just going to repeat everything I say, or are you going to use your brain for once, Inspector?" Sherlock snaps.
"Sherlock," Jane says.
"This man obviously led a sedentary life given his physique, however the soles of his feet and the varicose veins in his legs says otherwise. So a lot of sitting, and a lot of walking. So far, security guard's looking good. The watch helps matters, too. The alarm shows he did regular night shifts."
"Why regular? Maybe he just set his alarm the night before he died?" Jane says.
"No. The buttons are stiff. He set it a while ago, meaning his routine never varied. There was clearly an insignia on his shirt that the killer tore off in his haste suggesting that he worked at an institution; somewhere recognisable. It was between either the museum or the art gallery, and when I did a search the Hickman Gallery recently reported one of its attendants as missing." Sherlock gestures down to the body. "Meet Alex Woodbridge, works the graveyard at the Gallery. Now the real question is: why would anybody hire a hit on an ordinary security guard like him? The unveiling of that painting is today. Inference: the dead man new something about the painting — something that would prevent the owner from getting paid thirty-million pounds. Inference: the picture's a fake."
"That was…fantastic," Jane says after a beat of stunned silence.
"Meretricious," he shrugs even though his face heats slightly under her praise.
"And a Happy New Year," Lestrade says, attempting to recover his dumb astonishment. Sherlock rolls his eyes as the DI flips his pad closed. "I better get my feelers out for this 'Golem' character."
"Pointless. Wasted over-time on your part; you'll never find him. But don't worry. I know a man who can," Sherlock says turning swiftly on his heel.
"Who?" Lestrade says struggling to keep up.
Sherlock huffs a laugh, tucking his scarf more securely about his neck.
"Me," he grins.
Hooray for a Doctor Who quote! If you noticed it, kudos to you!