Ahahaha poor Molly, yes? Well guess what? No, no I can't tell you. Read away! But sorry for the insanely late chapter. Okay I also think I should warn you, there are some pretty gruesome bits coming up, there is a reason this is labelled an M and it's not for my crappy attempts at smut.
Tom smiled as he observed the broken woman in front of him, completely disregarding Sherlock.
"You know, had Jim lived, all of this could have been avoided. It's your fault this is happening again, Molly. All you had to do was help him fake his death. But no. You saved THAT instead!" He pointed angrily at Sherlock, as her eyes found his.
"Do you know what the best part is? You didn't even recognise me. Even after I became so very possessive, you blindly trusted me to live with you."
Molly shuddered at his slimy tone, refusing to break eye contact despite wanting with every fragment of her soul to be as far away from that revolting room as possible.
"I broke you, Molly Hooper, and you are never going to be fixed. I have made contingency plans, of course. In case your boyfriend here decides to avenge you. Or something stupidly romantic as that.
"You've become quite domesticated, haven't you, Sherlock? But the best part of all of this is that not only do I get the pleasure of gutting you, but Sherlock will know how it feels to lose the one person that matters the most to him." He laughed cruelly as he called for assistance.
"Tie Sherlock up. Tightly, will you, Bill? And check him for weapons."
Bill moved towards Sherlock, blocking Tom's view of him momentarily as he slipped a pocket knife into Sherlock's hands before wrenching them behind his back and tying them securely. Sherlock struggled futilely as Bill patted down his coat and trousers, removing a small blade from his shoe and throwing it out of reach.
"Very good. You can go now. Oh and remove the other man, he's blocking the doorway. Now, where were we?" Tom stalked forwards predatorally, a slow evil grin spreading across his features.
"Oh yes, I was telling you about how I intend to gut you, slowly, from the crown of your head to the tips of your toes. Maybe I'll even skin you, for the hell of it."
Sherlock's cold gaze belied the turmoil roiling inside of him, his stomach turning even as he sawed subtly at the robes binding his hands behind his back.
"How shall we start, sweetheart?" Tom extracted a log, slim knife from his inside pocket that glinted in the half light.
She grimaced as it bit smoothly into her hollow cheek, determined not to make a sound. Blood ran in a steady stream down her chin as he carved intricate patterns into her face, her eyes holding Sherlock's even when she wanted to screw them shut and whimper pitifully.
Tom stepped back to examine her face, tilting it to and fro to best catch the light.
Drawing the bloodied knife to his lips, he carefully licked it clean, smiling at her disgusted expression.
"Oh my, do you find that unpleasant? Well suck it up, slut. I know you were sleeping with that shit over there behind my back. Not that I overly care, I shall make that clear. But I object that you slept with Jim, the 'great' Sherlock Holmes, and then me. You really do like your psychopaths, don't you?"
Lifting her chin defiantly, she spat some blood out of her mouth at him.
"My type is high functioning sociopaths, actually. Do your research. I find you pathetic."
He slapped her face forcefully, causing her to cry out as he hit the fresh, oozing cuts. She refused to look away from him, challenging him to do his worst.
"I will teach you, Molly, to respect your betters. You didn't deserve Jim. Of course, he was only using you to get to your boyfriend, but you knew that. You were nothing to him, nothing to me, nothing to Sherlock. You. Are. Nothing." He pulled her head back by the hair, holding her head in place as he drew the knife down the column of her neck and over her collar bones.
"Argh! Th- the bodies. I-in the m-morgue. They w-were y-you?" Forcing the words out as she panted for breath against the pain, she watched as his face contorted angrily.
"Well done. Aren't you a clever little girl? Has Sherlock been teaching you some tricks? Yes, I have been killing people. It's what I do." He paused, dipping his finger into the dip in her collar bone where a pool of blood was collecting and bringing it to her lips, proceeded to smear it over them.
"I made them suffer. I fed them chemicals too radioactive for normal people to touch and watched them as they died, their bodies killing themselves from the inside out until I put them out of their misery. I left London and killed the rest of them, slowly, intimately, in more ways than you could imagine." He hissed into her ear, making her shudder with revulsion.
"Why. W-why wou-ould you do that?" She glanced at Sherlock, whose face had hardened into a disdainful mask of horror.
"Because I can. That's it! I can and I am good at it." He stabbed her sharply in the belly, leaving on oozing hole inches from her stomach wall. Non fatal, but a lot of blood.
"Do you know what's growing inside you? Nothing so pleasant as a child, of course not. You're too skinny, now, thanks to me. No, something far more deadly, far more beautiful is growing inside of you. Can you guess?" She shook her head sharply as tears, unbidden, mixed with the blood dripping down her face.
"What about you, Sherlock? I bet you'll know. The Great Detective, of course you've worked it out." He looked to where Sherlock sat, pain contorting his features as he watched her struggle for composure.
"C..." He cleared his throat, swallowing down the lump that had formed there. "Tumours." His voice rang out clearly in the almost silent room. Jim's face mocked them on the walls, a grotesque mime played on repeat.
"Oh you clever thing, I bet you've known for weeks, haven't you." Sherlock's stricken expression confirmed it.
"...No."
Her voice cracked, betrayal flitting across her features as his face crumpled and a tear slid down his pale cheek.
"Naughty boy, Sherlock. Didn't tell your girlfriend? I'm sure you've worked out by now that those men I killed? I practised. Over and over, making sure the quantities wouldn't kill her - them - outright, but slowly and without detection. I couldn't have them giving off radiation and alerting people. You going away, Sherlock, was just perfect timing. And to be away, for soooooo loong! It was like Christmas every day." He sidled over to where Sherlock was bound, making a small nick in his cheek and licking the drop of blood that formed there.
"Your blood is so much sweeter, Molly dear. Of course, I can't drink too much of it. Who knows what is in your blood now, after so many months of such a volatile mix of chemicals. Jim gave me the idea. You see, we used to have brain storming sessions of different ways to kill people, and your death came up surprisingly often."
He squatted in front of her, forcing her chin up so her face was level with his.
"Look. At. Me."
She stared bravely over his right shoulder, taking in the image of Jim beating her in the same room from years before, played out on the walls to ensure that if she survived, she would not forget.
He brought the knife up to her eye socket, applying gentle pressure. The tender skin parted effortlessly and a shiny ribbon of crimson blood trickled out, blinding her slightly.
"I dreamed of cutting you open, of making you suffer for letting Jim die. You are the reason so many innocents are dead. It's all your fault. Look at me or I swear on Jim's grave I will remove your eye." The pressure of the knife increased almost imperceptibly, only the increased pace of the flow of blood showing how far he had penetrated.
She cleared her throat raggedly.
"If you...remove my...eye...I won't...Be... able to...look at...you."
He laughed unexpectedly, withdrawing the knife and throwing her a handkerchief.
"Clean yourself up. You're a beautiful mess, my own little canvas. And yet, I feel like perhaps I should move to a different part of you. Perhaps, I think, your legs? What fun we had with those last time. Don't you remember, sweet pea?" He withdrew a projector clicker, moving through the collected recordings until he came to one from out side the room, Molly tied spread eagled on a bed whilst Jim stood at her waist.
She flinched as the film began to play, her terrified voice echoing from the speakers surrounding the room as she begged them to stop burning the insides of her legs. Jim's shrill laughter rang out as she screamed, Tom holding a glowing poker millimetres from her leg to ensure no scarring would occur. Her flesh visibly bubbled though the glowing tip was not touching her; Sherlock thanked any and all deities that existed for that. The sight of her flesh melting beneath the poker would have been too much for even his steady stomach to handle.
Tom smirked as he sidled over, dropping the knife to the floor and undoing his trousers. Molly's eyes widened as they slid to the ground with a sickening slithering sound, watching the bulge in his boxers grow as her eyes widened in fear and comprehension.
"No. No! You bastard!" She thrashed against him as he forced her legs apart, pulling his boxers down and reaching for the discarded knife. Sherlock's numb fingers stilled as horror overtook his body momentarily.
He was scared for her.
Her muffled cries filled the room, mingling with the echoes of those from the speakers of three years before. His hand clenched around the blade of the knife involuntarily, tearing into the soft flesh of his palm, the pain bringing him abruptly back to his senses. Blood dripped from his hand to the floor, sharpening his mind and determination to end her suffering.
He forced his mind away from her, despite the sounds threatening to shatter his hard won control. He scanned the room for exits - three, any weapons he could use -crow bar, hammer, at a push bed post, and pocket knife - and anything he could use as a distraction, like an exploding projector or something.
He resumed his efforts to free his hands from the bindings.
Molly screamed, the sound setting his teeth on edge and causing his heart to die a little inside his chest.
He glanced up, meeting Molly's terrified eyes, full of tears as Tom used the knife to slice open the tender skin in the inside of her thighs. Her blood ran thick and red down the pale skin to the floor, coating the front of his thighs as he thrust forcefully into her.
Sherlock noticed a faint whistling as he sawed frantically at the last few threads of rope binding him. His heart beat erratically with fear, adrenaline and revulsion as Molly's whimpers grew fainter. Tom grunted and strained against her, the sound of his legs slapping against her blood coated flesh sickening Sherlock as her neared completion, finally collapsing on top of her.
The windows near the ceiling smashed open, raining glass and splinters of rotting wood down on them, casting a shimmery, deadly, snow like layer over them, cutting their faces and arms and casting a deathly pall of silence through the room.
In seconds, Sherlock was up, pen knife pressed to Tom's jugular, knees pinning his arms to his sides. He applied a little pressure, letting blood bead where the knife had ruptured the skin and allowing a sense of control sweep over him as he looked into the eyes of the man below him.
Molly lay prone beside them as he slid the knife cleanly into Tom's throat, wishing he had had time to make him suffer as Molly had.
Standing, he looked down with disgust at the man who had almost cost him Molly. She lay in his arms, seeking desperately to stay conscious as she felt her body go into shock, uncaring that Tom's blood was pressed against her face having soaked into Sherlock's shirt.
"Can... we...go...?"
They left the room, the projector still playing whilst a little bird flew in through the open window, chirping happily in the dying sunlight.
OOoooooooh! How almost exciting! Sorry again for the late chapter, I've been surprisingly busy *watching Coriolanus* but the next chapter will be up soon. Much sooner than this one, any way :)
