AN: Hello everyone! Sadly, we have reached the end of this story. I want to thank everyone who has taken the time to stick with me and follow along as we go. I hope this makes it all worthwhile. Thank you for any new readers who are reading this as well - I hope you enjoyed being able to read this in its entirety. I adore all of you, and I hope you'll be with me in the coming months while I start deciding what to write next. Thank you for every review, and every minute spent reading these words.

Disclaimer: Please see Chapter 1.

Chapter 12 - ...and A Man Shall Rise

Mycroft was on his third glass of aged brandy when his secretary entered the room. He ignored her in favor of swallowing his drink. It wouldn't last forever, her being able to dismiss his obvious grief as a passing phase, but for now she would simply drop off whatever it was needed his signature and leave. Except, of course, the part where she didn't seem to be leaving.

It took him a moment to realize that she was visibly shaking, with her dark eyes wide and lips white around the edges. It so disturbed him to see her distraught, he lurched up from his comfortable leather seat and loomed over the table and rumbled, "What in the world is the matter?"

She opened her mouth as if to speak, but was cut off by the door behind her slamming open, followed by a deep voice drawling, "In all honesty, Mycroft, you should teach your secretaries to simply bow before me instead of blithering like fools."

The snifter in his hand shattered on the parquet floor of his office as all the breath fled from his lungs. There, in the doorway to his office, stood his dead brother, looking very much not-zombie-like and, perhaps, a bit skinnier than the last time he had been seen. He also wore an expression that managed to be blase, smug, and shocked all at once.

"Sherlock," Mycroft stammered out, gripping the edge of his desk to keep himself from falling over.

The younger Holmes looked slightly out-of-sorts. "You were expecting the Queen perhaps?"

"You're dead." The elder Holmes collapsed into his chair as his knees finally gave up supporting his weight.

Sherlock did not answer, except to raise one of his brows nearly to his hairline. The secretary took her leave, presumably to make sure no one would disturb them further. Once she was gone, the younger man said, simply, "Surely you knew."

"Knew what? That the last thing my men had brought to me was a video tape of my only brother leaping off a cliff like some demented lemming?" Mycroft trembled with the force of his elation, and his anger.

Now Sherlock really did look troubled. "True I sent one of your men along with the video tape, but I also sent with it a note. It warned you of the danger still present. There was another man with her when I arrived, another soldier. I asked you to gather up Mrs Hudson and John and take them here to the safehouse."

Elation and anger gave way to cold fury, "I received no note, just the video." Mycroft pressed the button on his phone intercom, "Elizabeth, find me the agent who collected the video tape from our operative in Germany. Also, get my car ready, we have some guests to pick up."

He did not wait for her to answer before standing and fixing his brother with a stern glare and rigidly pointed finger, "If there is ever a next time, you will pick up a bloody phone and call."

"Come now, brother, you know I prefer to text."

`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.

In three solid weeks, John had not moved. Mrs Hudson had taken to leaving two dishes for him - one of water and one of food - on the floor before his nose in the morning. When she came back up at night, the water would be partially gone, but the food would be untouched. Oh, how it pained her to see him so broken! John had always been so strong, so capable, and to see him laying there day after day, becoming thinner and thinner, was crushing.

At the end of the third week, when she came up to find him laying, glassy-eyed, in the same position, she sat herself down inches from his snout and patted his head gently. "John, dear, you can't carry on like this. Please, eat something!"

John made no motion towards the food at all, or even any indication that he had heard her. His bold eyes had taken on a gray, glassy hue and stared almost unceasingly into the dark grate of the fireplace. Only the slow rise and fall of the visible ribs of his chest showed that he lived at all.

Gently Martha stroked the silken fur of his ear, "Oh, John. I'm so sorry, dear."

The sound of the door downstairs opening called her attention, and Mrs Hudson gathered her skirt about her and hoisted herself from the floor. She quickly crossed the room to the stairwell, and peered down at the newly arrived guest. At the bottom of the stairs stood a man in a police uniform, who glanced up at the sound of her shoes on the wooden floor.

Martha's smile of greeting rapidly disappeared at the slow, malicious grin that spread over the man's face.

`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.`.

Sherlock waited a full seven rings before picking up his brand new mobile. "How many times, Mycroft, must I remind you," his brother cut him off swiftly.

"Yes, yes, you prefer to text. My fingers, however, are currently busy on another task."

The detective couldn't resist the opening, "Now isn't really the time for self-pleasuring or cake eating, Mycroft."

"Shut up," the elder Holmes snapped brusquely. "My people have located the man who brought us the video and identified him as Private Tobias Gregson, once a soldier in Moran's unit."

"Who is now Detective Inspector Gregson of Scotland Yard!" Sherlock snarled angrily. The car he was sitting in pulled slowly to a halt before the door of 221B Baker Street, and the detective snarled again at the sight of a police car already parked in front. "He's already here, Mycroft!"

"I am sending backup to you right now, Sherlock, please do not do anything ra..."

Ringing off without listening to his brother's caution, Sherlock leapt out of the car and bolted into the building. Pausing briefly to listen for the tell-tale sounds of human and canine habitation, Sherlock mounted the seventeen steps up to his flat. He hesitated at the door, listening to the conversation occuring within.

"You will never get away with this, Sir!" Mrs Hudson was half-sobbing.

"Be quite, old woman!" The detective almost roared.

With a hearty shove that caused the door to slam against the wall, Sherlock burst into the living room, "You should listen to her, Gregson. She is right, after all."

Outwardly, Sherlock kept up his haughty, aloof façade, but inside he took in the state of the tableau presented before him. Mrs Hudson had been struck in the face, at least once, and was now tied to a chair from the kitchen. Gregson was kneeling beside her, finishing the last tie of the knot holding her captive. Sherlock's eyes trailed to the floor nearby, where the little dog lay prone, and all the air fled his body.

John was a wreck. His bones were standing out, visible even beneath his coat, which was bedraggled and stringy from neglect. The brilliant blue eyes were dulled to ashen gray, unmoving.

Gregson took advantage of his distraction to pull the gun from his ankle holster and train it on the consulting detective. "You should have just died jumping over that stupid waterfall," the man hissed angrily. "This time there's no convenient parachute to save you."

There was pure madness in Gregson's eyes, and Sherlock raised his hands above his head as escape plans rapidly flashed through his mind. None of them were particularly plausible, although he could probably manage to slip backwards down the stairs if he tried. The Inspector stood up slowly, cocking his weapon with deliberate intent.

"Congratulations on your death, Mr Holmes."

As his arm straightened to prepare for the recoil of the gun, movement from the floor caught Sherlock's eye. Gregson pulled the trigger, and time seemed to slow as the bullet whipped straight for Sherlock's chest. It never penetrated.

A golden blur flashed upwards into the bullet's path, and John let out a loud yelp of pain as his thin body reconnected with the floor. The Inspector looked as shocked as Sherlock did as they both stared at the whimpering form between them. When both detectives raised their eyes to one another, Gregson raised the gun again and Sherlock tensed.

Snarling like a fiend, John launched himself upwards to clamp his jaws around Gregson's wrist. With a scream, Gregson fell to the ground, and his head crashed sickeningly into the stone hearth behind him. John collapsed back to the floor with a heavy sigh.

Sparing no thought for his weeping landlady, Sherlock rushed forward and hoisted the small dog gently into his lap. Smoothing a large hand over the small head, the genius felt a pair of crystal tears gently trace paths down his sharp cheeks. Eyes of slate peered up at him fondly as John lolled out his tongue in a slow pant, his tail sweeping back and forth twice.

"John, it's going to be alright. I'm here," Sherlock soothed, his deep voice rough and soft. Closing his eyes against the pain in his heart, Sherlock pressed his forehead to John's. "Everything will be fine."

Behind him, Mrs Hudson smiled through her tears and chanted softly,

"When a man in canine shape

saves a friend from Death's embrace

so too shall friend, freed from witch's spell,

help a man to rise from his mongrel shell."

A gusty sigh tickled Sherlock's pale cheek, and the detective pressed his forehead harder against the silken texture of John's head. The hair beneath him shifted as John took in a deep breath and let it out again. Sherlock dismissed the sound of movement near his leg as a sweep of John's tail.

If he hadn't, he probably wouldn't have squeaked like a six-year-old girl and skittered two feet to the right when a familiar voice irritatedly asked, "Hold on, did she just call me a mongrel?"

"You try coming up with a rhyme on the spot sometime," Mrs Hudson snapped. "By the by, would one of you two mind terribly untying me, please? I'm not as young as I used to be, you know."

Sherlock opened his eyes to find a blonde-haired man dressed in a khaki shirt and desert camouflage pants laying on the floor of his flat. As the detective watched, the man lifted his hands above him and flexed them before his eyes. Without sitting up, the man tilted his head back until eyes of bright sapphire met with the detective's pale green ones.

Even if he hadn't spent months staring at recordings and photos of the man before him, Sherlock would have known those powerful eyes anywhere. A brilliant smile lit the detective's face, and he practically scrambled back over to loom above the very human face of Dr John H Watson. Sighing happily, he flopped down on the sturdy body beneath him and squeezed. John made a 'hmph' noise of surprise beneath him before wrapping strong arms around the detective's shoulders and gently patting him on the back.

"Seriously, boys, this chair is the most uncomfortable thing I have ever had the misfortune to be tied to. If one of you could cut me loose before I lose all the feeling in my bum it would be marvelous."

With a hearty shove, John knocked Sherlock off his torso and lurched to his knees and made quick work of the knots binding their landlady to the kitchen chair. Straightening his collar, in order to maintain some form of dignity, Sherlock popped to his feet and helped Mrs Hudson up. Her smile lit the room as he scooped her into his arms. Martha laughed as John wrapped his arms around them both, and Sherlock's chuckle bounced around the room.

"Well," Mycroft's smug voice startled them all. Once they were all looking at him, he continued, "It seems all that is left is to get rid of the deceased gentleman bleeding on your hearth. You might wish to remove yourselves from the premises for the time being."

A swarm of men and women in black jumpsuits moved into the living room, and Sherlock bundled his landlady and friend out of the room with a hateful glance over his shoulder for his brother. Once on the landing, Martha stretched up on her toes to kiss both men on the cheek. She tweaked the end of Sherlock's scarf and John's dog tags.

"You boys run along and have something to eat. I'll make sure Mycroft doesn't bug your things." She leaned against the door of the flat and made a shooing motion with her hands.

Sherlock and John stared at one another for a long moment. The detective let loose another blinding smile and wrapped his arm around John's, tugging him down the stairs, "I discovered a Thai restaurant nearby."

John smiled boyishly and twined their fingers together, "You can't discover something that was already there."

"Of course I can," Sherlock sniffed haughtily, one side of his mouth still held up in a smirk. "I'm brilliant."

"Yes," John chuckled warmly as he closed the door behind them. "Yes you are."

Fin