A/N: It's definitely been awhile, and this definitely isn't my best piece of work. I'm satisfied, though, and I hope you all are as well.
It figures that Mycroft decides to visit when I'm not even dressed.
I roll over to see his scrunched up face, shielding my eyes from the light singling out across the room. He heaves a sigh, a burdened sound that carries down to my bed and seems to settle around my ears. With a small yawn, I stretch into an upright position, brushing Gladstone slightly with my curled toes.
"Come to have some tea time, did you?" I breathe, rubbing my tongue over my teeth and grimacing at the feel of them. Glads shifts to place his brick-head on my thigh.
"Most definitely," he says, rising from the foot of my bed with his usual haughty air. He swings his brolly, gesturing to the door.
I frown. "And I suppose it's mere coincidence that Sherlock is out of the flat?" He makes a very distasteful expression, glancing away from me to look out the window.
"If that is what it would seem, then obviously not," he replies curtly, his lips curling in a smirk that looks more pinched than usual. He's quiet for a moment, still until he straightens his tie. "Do you take sugar in your tea?"
I can't help but scoff. "Stop with the idle talk, Mycroft." Sounds like Sherlock's rubbing off on me. Maybe the similarity is apparent to Gladstone, too.
Mycroft cocks his head. The gesture combined with his pointy nose makes me think of a bird. "No need to be so hostile, my dear soldier. Isn't small talk what people do?" He folds his hands over his umbrella handle, almost like how those villains who kidnapped the main character's soulmate stroked their cats.
I scrub a hand along my neck, pulling the duvet tighter around my body. Gladstone makes a small noise of protest. "At least let a man put on his britches," I mumble with an overexaggerated huff. He simply nods his head and exits the room, disappointing considering Sherlock would have at least mumbled something back along the lines of,"Modesty isn't more important than murder."
I sigh, smoothing my fingers over the spiky patches behind Gladstone's ears. "Come on, up an at 'em, Glads."
I take a sip from my teacup, wondering just why Mycroft couldn't have used regular mugs.
"Perfect as always," I comment offhandedly, glancing at his perfectly trimmed hair and nails. His excessive personal grooming really doesn't surprise me anymore.
"Who's instigating the small talk now, good doctor?" he simpers, taking a dainty sip from his china. I frown at him over my cup, making extra sure to communicate to him that he's an utter bastard. Gladstone's face frowns too, laid over top of my socked feet. Mycroft simply straightens his tie. "But I digress." Another gulp.
"How would you murder me?" he says softly, mouth dragging over the edge of his mug. I slowly lower my dish and force my trap shut. "Hypothetically," he adds with a polite smile, setting his dish on the arm of his(Sherlock's) chair.
"Uhm..." Is this some sort of test? What, is he looking for specifics? Is something logical a better choice? Or is an authentic answer applicable? I've thought about killing him before, Brain-Sherlock chimes. I quickly wave him away, trying to bypass Mycroft's cold stare.
"...uhm, illegally?" I say lamely. "Brutally? Slowly?" He actually has the gall to laugh at my floundering, but it isn't very surprising considering he is the actual British Government. "What other adjectives should I use?" His chuckle fades away until his face does this sort of shift that I can only compare to a lightbulb dimming.
"Funny," he acquiesces softly, sounding genuine for a moment, except his smile doesn't quite reach his eyes. He rises from his(Sherlock's) chair, hands coming to clasp together behind his back. "Would you like to hear how I would kill you?"
My scalp tingles, the feeling then ghosting over my fingers and trickling down my spine. "Sure," I agree wholeheartedly, folding my hands in my lap, heart rate already elevated at the promise of danger in his tone.
"I wouldn't," he says simply, and I let a slightly disappointed breath rattle out of me. Glancing over, eyebrows raised in a silent inquiry, he scans my face. "Anyone interesting to my brother is doubly interesting to me." He bumps his umbrella against the desk as he leans it on its surface, letting a stray paper, surprisingly, feather onto the floor, landing softly beneath Sherlock's chair.
"I have reasons to be suspicious of anything my brother likes." He turns back around to face me. "His relationships with what he enjoys tend to be fairly...unhealthy," he says lowly, skimming his fingers once again down his neck tie. Although his implications are subtle, they are incredibly tangible. "But you, Dr. Watson..."
I lean forward expectantly, cautiously inspecting his hawk eyes. "You are special. You make him strive to be better, to listen, to eat and sleep and laugh, to like healthily, with a devotion." He hums to himself, almost as if he's stumbled upon a sudden revelation. "He trusts you. You must realize he has close to none he can trust?"
His eyes narrow. "Your ties to him may not always remain valid, however. Minds change, hearts change, and thoughts and actions shift accordingly." He circles my chair, reminding me vaguely of a shark. "My temperament quadruply so. Merely remember that news figureheads have their place in my arsenal. The power to efface such trivial matters as human death is far within my influence."
"Which figureheads?" I ask slowly, pressing my back farther into the cushion. He frowns, pulling his arms away and grabbing his umbrella from where it's slanted against the table. Clearing his throat, he swivels and starts, a little bit too quickly, for the window.
"Pardon," he whispers. "How presumptuous of me. Never did I intend for this," he turns around again, leaning a little too heavily on his umbrella. "Even I am susceptible to the dangerous disadvantage called 'caring'. All I wish for is the best for my baby brother." He adjusts his suit, re-folding his sleeve cuffs and tightening his tie.
"But why me?" I breathe. "Why of all people does he trust me?" Mycroft tilts his head at me, then slowly returns his gaze out the window with an omniscient pull of lips. With steady steps, he treads to the door of the flat.
"The same reason I trust Gregory," he replies. He sighs again, and somehow it seems like he's done that too much today. "Trust in my judgement. I have dealt with Sherlock all my life. He will not make the first move." Mycroft slowly lays his hand over the door knob. "He will wait and wait until he realizes you don't know what he's been waiting for, that you haven't even known he's been waiting at all. That is frankly the ultimate catch 22 with the predestination of life: a prerequisite requirement of finding and confronting one's soul mate is needed to every attain that predestination."
"I'm not a psychic, Mycroft," I bite out. "You can't just have a whole cryptic spiel and expect me to know what it means." The Government's eyes light up with something that seems a lot like aggravation, which is something I haven't seen on him often.
"If my words seem to hold any merit in your eyes, then you will figure it out on your own." He smooths the wrinkles of his suit vigorously, picking at lint that doesn't seem to be there. "Sherlock needn't anyone else letting him down."
The slamming door could never compare to the sting of his words.
"I'm certain you know I don't ask this lightly," Sherlock says,"but is everything functioning correctly? You pigment has paled considerably, and your hands are clammy," he points out with a flourish, pulling his latex gloves off and laying them beside his microscope.
I laugh because that's all I know how to do. "Sorry, just zoned out a bit." Pulling my body up straighter, I close the open laptop on my lap and place it on my side table.
"If two hours, 45 minutes, and 32 seconds is 'a bit' to you, then yes," he smiles at my weazy intake of breath,"you just zoned out a bit." He slowly makes his way out of the kitchen to our desk, practically clawing his way through the scatter of papers that have remained in that exact spot since I moved in no more than eight months ago.
I crack my neck and swivel to look out the window, realizing just how dark it's gotten before I extend my legs and pull myself out of my chair. Maybe doing something productive can help me.
"Ahh, here it is," I hear beyond the russle of my overcoat. Sherlock erratically waves a set of papers in front of his eyes as he slinks to the door, pulling on his Belstaff from its place amongst our coat rack. "Morgue. Back in an hour."
Before I feel I can even utter a word of protest, his steps sound in the hall with the echo of the door fresh in my ears. Sighing, I manage to settle myself once again in my chair. With a lack of purpose, I simply stare at a point far ahead of me in the flat; the headphones on the bison skull; a red pot handle hanging by a pin on the wall; Skully decorated with washable paints from an experiment.
W.S.S.H.
Scratched in Sherlock's jagged writing on a sheet of worn paper, I recognize the shapes of music notes on it tucked underneath his chair. Curious, I lean forward, practically eating my knees in my attempt to grasp it. I finally reach it and shift to reaffirm my position, recalling this as the sheet Sherlock's brother bumped onto the floor. Marks are bled into the dips and extensions of the sheet, filling the emptiness with constant words.
*too slow
-not jagged enough (Mycroft is being a prick)
*why isn't this working?!
sorrow, anger, loneliness, capitulation, vulnerability, hope, love, style, normal?!
(humans are strange creatures)
My eyes quickly dart away from the mass of pen, trailing up to find the title interwoven in an illegible scrawl of phrases.
"William"
Everything stills. For a moment, even my breath ceases, and somehow it amazes me that no one has paused my world.
Stars are exploding, coalescing with the night and tumbling and throwing me off and I need to stop for a minute. I want to smack myself; I need to think.
With trembling hands, my fingers fold the edges of the paper inwards. Heavy, my breath ghosts over its curled corners.
Somehow, somewhere, I feel an indescribable pull at my gut, like this was supposed to happen. I immediately think the notion preposterous, but then I remember again that my entire life has been mapped out for me. Sherlock was predestined. William, my brain supplies.
W.S.S.H.
W.-William S.-(Sherlock?) S.-(Sherlock?) H.-Holmes
There's so much hope bleeding into my movements that I can't breathe again. I want to tamp the feeling down, but I haven't felt like this since I was a little boy waiting for his chance to imprint something upon the world. I have craved this moment, and its significance is indescribable, so unspeakably wonderful that for a moment, I almost forget myself.
Is Sherlock William? Did Mycroft knock the paper on purpose? Is this what he was talking about? Is this how my life was supposed to unfold?
Is Sherlock my soul mate?
A/N: Once again, sorry for the very long wait time. I have been feeling incredibly unmotivated as of late, but I digress. I won't use that as my excuse, nor blame it on my excessive school work. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. If it isn't too unfounded of me, may I just say Many Happy Returns.