Hallo to all my faithful readers!
Thank you for being patient with me, but I wanted to give you this chapter as soon as I could. I hope that all of you are still enjoying this story as much as I am!
This chapter was actually quite hard to write, as you might already know, I didn't want to reveal too much to keep the tension flowing ;) Please enjoy this chapter, thou it is a bit shorter than the previous ones! I'm desperate for your opinion on this and hope that you will tell me of it in some nice reviews!
Lots of love,
peerme
YOU DOUBT ME
DECEMBER
As Sally's body weakened under mine, lying full length on her carpet, her knife rammed into the floor right beneath her face, I let out a deep breath. Then, my body lost all its tension too and I fell right to the floor, my legs and arms shaking. My breath quickened and my chest rose and fell far too quickly, my lungs being desperate for air to calm my nerves.
After a few moments, a strangled cry escaped my lips, as I rolled over and heaved my weight onto my hands and knees, trying to stand up. But I kept swaying back and forth, feeling the heat of agitation and black despair all over me. I licked my lips and tasted sweet pearls of sweat, threw back my head and took another breath that seemed to burn my insides and let my lungs burst. But my mind was blank and my sight was blurred as the adrenaline shot through my veins.
I would not rest until my job was done.
I crawled to the place where I had dropped my bag earlier and fondled with the zipper, grunting and grumbling like a madwoman, chuckling laughter rolling over my trembling lips.
As soon as I managed to pull out my phone, it fell to the floor a several times until I could calm my trembling fingers to hold it and find the number I wanted to call. I knew I could manage this situation all on my own. I knew how to deal with Sally and everything that regarded her so that I would not gain any harm from it. But I could not do it so easily and I could not do it without support.
After all, Sally was my friend. Maybe even the only one I've ever had. But there was no such feeling of friendship and compassion any longer. Her betrayal had ripped a hole inside my heart, that let escape everything that I had enclosed so well inside it. The darkness, the unknown, the side that even Sherlock would be hesitant to release. Maybe it was similar to what made Sherlock the man he was, while his was just a tamed and supposedly rightfully acting version. But I would not stay quiet and longer. Nothing would keep me away from my desperate need to change into the person I wanted to be.
"Anthea, come up here. I need your help to finish this."
For a long time, the woman I spoke to on my phone, remained silent. But I knew she was only determining the damage I had already done and considering the deeds I would be able to do on my own. No matter on whose side her loyalty was greater, I would not let her believe that I was weak. I would not let Moriarty leave me with such a mess and believing I would stay put.
"I've told you that it is no good to pay her a visit."
"Or make someone else coming."
"I think Moriarty would not consent to it."
" I will do it alone too, but I want to be sure I'm doing it perfectly right."
"There is no right with this!"
"Oh, don't you start lecturing me! I want someone up here right now!"
"Moriarty told you just to live on, not going on a rampage for yourself!"
"He told me not to wait for him, but do whatever I wanted. So I have to do things on my own. And you still have a duty to fulfil towards me, I guess not only because Moriarty told you to do so, but my father did too."
Anthea let out a deep sigh. Finally, I've hit the right spot on her to achieve her help.
"Don't touch anything. I don't want you to leave some unnecessary traces."
As I put the phone back into my bag, I slowly turned around and watched Sally's body. Her limbs were stretched out at an unnatural angle, but I could see on her face that she was in no pain.
Yet.
Another surge of ire rushed through me and I found myself stepping angrily towards her body, clenching my fists so hard that my nails dug into my flesh.
After closing my eyes for a few seconds and calming myself down, I bent down to her face and looked closely at her. Sure, there were some emotions inside me, that I still carried for her deep. But my want of making her pay for what she had down grew stronger and stronger with every minute I beheld her face, along with my longing for making Moriarty see everything I would do to her, just to make him see what I could to do him. Because I wanted him to know that even he himself would have to suffer the consequences of changing me, of intruding my life and of making use of me like a puppet. I would not let him pull the strings all on his own. I would not only make him see me. I would get under his skin. I would make him feel me.
My way of doing things would be simple and even predictable, but it would be effective. And I would be merciless, know no limits and I would not forgive. Even if I have chosen Moriarty, I would not forgive him for his intrusion, for him leaving me, for him making me so dependent from and bound to him.
I will send him a message, one that would be very much to his liking. Just killing off my best friend to demonstrate my loyalty towards him. My love. My madness.
I let myself fall down to my knees and grabbed the hilt of the knife, pulling it out with one quick and fluid movement, that the sharp blade made a rustling and dangerously foreboding noise that echoed with melodiousness in my ears. I let my fingers run over the blade and let it scratch the surface of my skin.
Sally's time has come.
My time has come.
Our time has come to fulfil the focus that we were born for.
Not soon after I was almost finished with what I had set up in my mind, cleaned up myself and prepared everything for my leave, I finally heard a soft knocking at the door. I quickly opened it and saw Anthea standing there, a worried look on her face. I'd never seen her so distressed in my entire life, but that was just perhaps she was not really doing her job of keeping an eye over the little naive student girl. It was perhaps because she was dragged into something that she perhaps would not have ever wanted to be a part of.
Then, I saw the man in her company and took a step back, but a mischievous smile flashed over my stern expression. This was exactly the man I had anticipated to lend me a hand. Dressed in dark clothes, he stood right behind Anthea, his whole body tensing in a deadly posture, ready to kill, as if he anticipated his victims right behind every corner. He had bright red hair and many freckles, even a full beard that concealed almost every facial feature, but his eyes were of such an intense blue, that their gaze seemed to sting burning holes into everything he looked at. Violence and death were radiating from him.
"What took you so long?", I asked and couldn't keep my eyes from him, as he was scanning his surroundings with quick and intimidating looks, his face a grimace of cold blooded concentration. All of a sudden, he turned around and Anthea stretched out her arm to let her hand rest on his biceps. Then, I heard the shuffling of the old woman's feet who had seen me earlier arriving at Sally's place. As she walked around the corner, two bags of groceries in her hands, she looked at us with startled curiosity, only slowly passing by.
I smiled at her genuinely, but I knew my expression had changed into a very straight face and I sucked in my breath sharply. Instantly, I saw a dark glint in that man's eyes as his supposedly calm gaze followed her every languid step, just as if he was a feline predator, tensing up and readying himself to lunge at his prey. Our whole party remained rooted to the spot until the woman had finally reached her flat, fumbling with her keys and finally disappearing behind her door.
"She just got herself to be an addition.", Anthea huffed and brushed her hand over her forehead, as if she just decided on her favourite colour to have her toothbrush in. Her personal Micheletto nodded quickly, just accepting the next jobs she had for him. I felt a horrible feeling of guilt rising up in my stomach so fast, that I feared I would vomit. But I swallowed down several times, leaning myself against the doorframe, to keep the realization off, that I just had buried deeply within my memories. Blocking away the pictures that would haunt me my entire life, haunt my dreams and take slowly away my sanity and strictly lead my path to the madness I've always longed and striven for.
Anthea saw that my sangfroid began to crumble into dust and pushed me inside the flat, her henchman following and closing the door behind us.
"What are you going to do to her?", I asked the man, my voice shaking. But he just returned my fearful and suddenly very much intimidated gaze with complete calm.
"No one will find her. And if one does, they would not want the rest of her."
At this notion, finally, my knees gave in and felt like jelly and I sank to the floor once again. Anthea tried to keep me upright, but she failed miserably and just managed to kneel beside me, stroking my back soothingly.
"I...I...", I started, but failed miserably in raising my voice.
No chance I could speak to them and tell them what there remained to finish my business. But the man Anthea brought with her knew his business and already went stalking through the apartment. After some time, while my sobs filled the air and I cried on Anthea's shoulder, he came back and stopped right in front of my face. As I looked up, I saw that he looked at me with a mixture of a touch of mockery and mounting anger.
"What in God's name have you done?", he shouted at me and I almost collapsed at his harsh tone. Anthea hugged my tighter and glanced up at the man, trying to read in his face why he had been so deeply stirred. But I was just trying to speak the words that I would have hoped never having to speak, not even keeping them in my head, along with all those memories and feelings of horrification and guilt.
"I've murdered my best friend Sally Barnicot."
JANUARY
"When will you finally open up to us?"
Those words, yelled in agitation, only barely drowned the sound of the sharp thwack that he once again had to endure. His cheeks already burned like hell, but with every clout he received, every time that he was slapped the hardest, he grew even more victorious over his interrogators. Because every slap they wasted on him, every sting of pain that rushed through his body, made him stronger to come up smiling.
"Maybe you should read the protocol carefully, it might save you some time to figure that out.", he said nonchalantly, but was annoyed that the hours of constant beating had left some traces of tremor in his voice. Even he could not always control his timbre. "I've already answered this question in seventeen different ways. I could try to find some more if you want."
"We have enough time to keep you here. We will keep you awake day and night if that's what it takes you to open up to us.", the man in front of him grumbled and bowed down so he return the look of the those fathomless dark eyes of the man tied up in a chair. "So when will you finally answer?"
"We could go round again...", the interrogated man sighed, his chest rising high.
"Why do you want to speak to Mycroft Holmes only?"
"..and in a round we go: I will only to talk to Mycroft Holmes. Get Mycroft Holmes. Mycroft Holmes is the only one receiving my attention. Only Mycroft Holmes should be the one wasting his breath in asking me questions. Mycr-"
The next slap was so hard it almost knocked him over, the chair swaying back and forth perilously and he huffed several times, accompanied by short laughter rumbling in his chest. They were all such fools. If they would have listened just once to what the people questioned actually said. But he got enough time too, as everything was already arranged and well planned.
The man interrogating him stepped forward again an took him by his hair, pulling his head up just a little so that he felt a twinge at the back of his neck.
"Haven't you already got enough? Being bound to this chair for weeks, seeing nothing else than this room, hardly any time allowed to stand up and stretch your legs?"
"Your feeble attempts to cause mental fatigue and torment me with your nice caresses won't work on me."
"We will pull out all the stops if it makes you talk. And that involves every sort of physical and mental pain."
"Release me and give me ten minutes to make you experience what I consider torment.", the man in the chair snickered and just boredly looked up to the ceiling, to those flickering neon tubes, as if their flashing contained a message in Morse code, "Or just get Mycroft Holmes here."
The agent grunted again and finally retreated, leaving the room.
That was a perfect time to draw a deep breath and close one's eyes to relax. Even if he loved to play cat and mouse with those people, he was already bored out of his brains. Because they were just staying as they were a few weeks ago, though it would be so simple to make him speak. Bring Mycroft Holmes.
Not that it was obvious that Mycroft had been there and observant from the very beginning. Because from its start this interrogation had not been about what it was actually held for. To a slight extent he was happy about that, because at any rate this would be his best and most effective trump.
Whenever he would manage to get hold of Mycroft Holmes, he would make him open up to him no matter how hard Mycroft would try to withstand his mental assaults.
He didn't even have to open his eyes again as the door creaked and heard someone enter. As soon as some steps drew nearer and nearer, the air in the small room changed. The tension was tangible, but he found himself relaxing for real. No matter what Mycroft would say to him, he would always have the upper hand. Even tied to a chair, exhausted, his brain buzzing of the fading pain that the slaps had left, his superiority towards that man was untouched. He smiled broadly before he opened his eyes and found Mycroft Holmes standing in front of him, casually leaning on his umbrella, one hand in his pockets.
"Finally, Mr Holmes."
"Mr Moriarty."
Moriarty continued to smile at him, returning his observant and attentive gaze with a bright and cheerful smirk. The silence grew thicker between them, but Moriarty let himself be engulfed by it entirely, only knowing that it would unsettle his opponent even more than himself.
"I suppose my mere presence would not give you enough reason to reveal the information that I want to ask you for."
"Supposedly not."
Mycroft's lips pressed together into a thin line and he tapped his fingertips against the handle of his umbrella.
"Well, I presume that you will talk after all, as you so willingly followed my invitation to this interrogation. So tell me your conditions to save us some time.", Mycroft sighed and Moriarty straightened himself up in his chair.
"We both want information, Mr Holmes. Information, that only the two of us are able to give to the other.", Moriarty began slowly, already a hint of amusement in his voice, as he was eager to finally make these weeks of boredom and arduousness worth something, "I want to know everything you can tell me about Sherlock Holmes. His past, his present, his future."
Mycroft's shoulders fell slumped slightly and he looked to the ground, biting his lips.
"I thought you will ask such a thing."
"Business is the salt of life, Mr Holmes. Which implies, that you already have been prepared for what I'm going to ask from you."
"What will you tell me instead?"
Moriarty smiled even broader.
"Presumably not what you wanted to hear from me. Rather something that you don't even know about, dear Mr Holmes. It regards your family."
"I already know that you had some challenging encounters with Sherlock, so that's nothing new.", Mycroft spoke slowly, a shiver in the last words, as if he knew that something would come next, that would not please him the slightest. But Moriarty just hissed and suck the air through his teeth.
"My, my, Mr Holmes. You're not as observant as I expected you to be. But I want my information first, otherwise you can spend another few weeks behind that windowpane watching your men beating me dead."
"Slowly I feel the urge to lay a finger on you myself."
"In fact, even given the many deeds that I've done the past weeks, there's only one person in this world who rightfully deserves to slap me...", Moriarty mumbled wickedly, with Mycroft coming two steps closer, a worried frown on his forehead, "who is no one else than your beloved daughter."
"What do you mean by that?"
"I've left her all alone coping with the mess that's her life right now. Which leads me back to my advice for this interrogation. Stick to the questions that you brought me officially here to answer for, that will be the information of most interest to you."
All of a sudden, Mycroft was only moments away from losing his composure, his facial expressions changed from unreadable to insanely clear, but the last that was plastered over his pale face was disbelief.
"You..."
But Moriarty just raised his eyebrows, merely suppressing his chuckles, waiting for the outburst of anger that was expected to come.
"According to your facial expression I guess now you begin to see it."
"You bastard!"
"Oh, Mr Holmes, I am disappointed. I expected you to have something more fancy in store to insult me with."
"No word in this world could express the hatred and disdain I feel for you right now."
"Don't digress and become all emotional, Mr Holmes. That will just be detrimental to the fulfilment of your part of the bargain."
"Tell me what you did to her."
"Only if I hear what I want first."
Mycroft suddenly threw away his umbrella and grabbed the shirt Moriarty wore and dragged him close to his face, so that they could feel each other's ragged and hot breath on their faces. Mycroft's breath reeked of weakness, fear and panic. Just the mixture that was James' favourite. Yet, add a little pain and you are in heaven.
"You will have my word, that I will tell you everything about Sherlock that you want. His fears, his desires, his every weakness.", Mycroft grumbled and grabbed Moriarty even harder.
"Your daughter would be flattered if she heard you speak like that. Putting your brother at risk just to save her. She has really spoken the truth, the Holmes brothers couldn't care less if the other even walked on earth. But she is really not aware of how much you care for her."
"So you have drained her for information already."
"I expected her to be a bottomless pit of information, but I grew aware that she even holds not very deep feelings for her father, much less for her uncle."
Mycroft's hand closed around his throat in an instant and Moriarty already felt tears in the corner of his eyes. This was torture to him, being prevented from rolling on the floor laughing.
"How dare you say something like that? You know nothing of our family!"
"I know Sharon and she knows me."
"So she's the one girl rumoured to be your mistress? Is she really having an affair with you, not even aware what kind of a man you are?", hissed Mycroft, the grip around Moriarty's throat tightening and letting him choke slightly.
"She knows very well who I am, at least in the way I want her to. To be honest, I've never lied to her, you should give me credit to that.", Moriarty laughed and coughed, but his whole body was shaking and tingling with joy. Mycroft let him go suddenly and strode back and forth in the room, letting his hand run through his thinning hair.
"How long have you been involved with her?"
"Long enough to make her need me."
"How intense has the relation been?"
"Intense enough for her, less for me, but far enough to give me what I wanted."
"What's that?"
"Distraction.", Moriarty chuckled and looked down into his lap. But not yet all distraction needed.
"How can I keep you away from her?"
"You will never achieve that."
"Why?"
"Because she fell deeply and madly in love with me."
Now I'm leaving you with a cliffie ;) hope you liked the change of perspective for once! And soon I hope I can show you the next scene of Sharon and Moriarty
And thanks to GiraffePanda2 for reviewing! It really helps to get some feedback! So please review! ;)