25 Backlash

Mycroft didn't use the elevator. He deliberately took his time walking up the stairs to the Diogenes Club's upper floor. But eventually, he reached his destination.

He found his younger brother, face still turned to the image of the abandoned breakfast room on the surveillance monitor, stiff back trembling.

However, one of the curtains was drawn back. The little one had watched his friend leave.

"I'm sorry, Sherlock. I've let you down. But believe it or not, it was the right thing to do."

"Get out of my sight!"

The elder brother made a few steps that brought him close to the table with the equipment. Close enough to feel Sherlock's body heat, hear him breathe. Quietly Mycroft put down Sherlock's old mobile, the one that had been with his stuff in Baker Street when Mycroft had cleared the flat. He put it where the younger could see it. "Please, dear boy. Make this call. See him and tell him the truth."

"What if I don't?" Sherlock's glittering eyes, his bared teeth, like a trapped animal.

"John Watson wouldn't spill the beans to the media. He is, other than many I could mention, a very loyal man." Mycroft left the room without looking back. Outside, on the corridor, Sherlock's voiced reached him "I'll never forgive you, Mycroft. Not this time!"

"I know" Mycroft said softly, far too softly for Sherlock to hear him. Once he'd cleared the building he took a stroll through the small park behind the Diogenes Club. He recapitulated last night's meeting. It deserved some special pondering. It might well have been his last private encounter with his brother.

Last night Mycroft had known the meeting would go awry when Sherlock was dead on time.

Eight o'clock, sharp, and the younger Holmes had walked into the office. Dark face, stern jaw, looking scornful.

For a moment Mycroft was sure that Sherlock, with these supernatural senses of his, had found out about the elder brother's eavesdropping at the Italian Restaurant.

The Holmes boys had struck a deal, without so many words but to mutual satisfaction. The younger brother had become lenient towards the elder's obsession with spying on him – what Mycroft called protection – but if and when he decided to temporarily elude the surveillance, he demanded of Mycroft to respect this decision.

Which meant he wouldn't take kindly to big brother violating the agreement.

As Mycroft was already on edge because he had trouble coping with what he'd heard at Angelo's, this wasn't what he would call a comfortable situation. But then, when had been the last time he and his brother had felt comfortable with each other? Oh yes, the days after he'd found Sherlock – or had it been the other way round? - in Kensington Gardens.

Mycroft cherished the memory, although he knew this to be idiotic. After all, the comfort and joy, bitter-sweet as it had been, must have been one-sided. Unlike his elder brother Sherlock had known from the start that the reunion was a fool's paradise.

Had Mycroft really sacrificed John's life, if he'd seen through the fireworks of ruses and false tracks Sherlock had put up back then?

It would have saved Sherlock but turned him into an unforgiving enemy. Doubtlessly he would have revolted and struggled until Mycroft had locked him up in a safe house for as long as it took. Would it have been worth it? Yes. It would have. That and much more. It would have been worth any price, any price at all.

By the way, how peculiar it had been to hear the little one say he knew his elder brother loved him.

"Mycroft!" Sherlock clapped his hands sharply. "Is that you or am I looking at your wooden image? Not that there's much difference between the two."

With an effort Tarantula remembered that this was his office, and that he was not supposed to be in the weaker position on his home turf. "Good evening, Sherlock" he said, meticulously composed. "You're uncommonly punctual."

"We've a lot to discuss and not much time. First of all, I want the recordings and the documents Chang gave to John. You will not keep them!"

"May I ask why?" Mycroft asked, although he had a pretty good idea.

"I don't trust you with them. You might use them in any procedures of your imbecile colleagues or something. What Moriarty did is my affair. Bad enough that you made John see it and doubtlessly you enjoyed it yourself…" Sherlock, without wanting it, ended the sentence on the tone of a question mark, not of a full stop.

It was ample proof for the elder brother of what this really was about. "I did not watch the DVDs. I never doubted you; I know you didn't pal around with the criminal. You can have the dossier any time you want. I only ask you not to destroy it." Mycroft smiled derisively. "Information is power, dear boy. When others use theirs against you, your own set of informaton might be your only defence."

"Agreed" Sherlock said grudgingly. He was baffled by his easy victory. "Thanks, Mycroft ..." but then he broke off. He sniffed the air. Once, twice. His gaze found his brother's bag on the floor by the desk, before it jumped to Mycroft's tie. Sherlock's eyes went wide. "You have been at Angelo's!" he stated, disbelievingly. "You spied on me. Although I made it explicitly clear I wanted to be alone with John!"

"Would you mind..." Mycroft began with utmost patience, but he couldn't go on.

"Of course I mind. This is outrageous. You smell of Angelo's favourite olive oil, there's red brick dust from the next house's building works on your bag and you have most definitely soiled your tie, presumably with the second drink you took – no, make that the third drink. Your hands must have shaken, and your hands never do, unless you're drunk. You came back here, changed your tie, and you'd never wear this shade of green with this jacket and shirt if you were in a clear state of mind!"

Mycroft sighed. "Sherlock, you're right. Intruding on your privacy was wrong, please accept my sincere apology. Would you think it an adequate punishment for my trespass that I needed four grappas before I returned here?"

Again, Sherlock smelled a rat in Mycroft's unheard of indulgence. If it occurred to him that it might be due to what he'd said to John about his elder brother, it only infuriated him further. "Should that tell me something?" he snarled.

"My hands stopped shaking after the fourth, not after the third drink" Mycroft replied.

Sherlock flinched. The implication of that was very clear. But naturally, he couldn't give in so easily. "You're lying" he replied, distrusting every word, even if it merely confirmed what he'd deduced. "You detest grappa!"

"Exactly my point, brother dear."

Sherlock looked away, shook his head. A bit sheepishly, and highly uncharacteristic, he tousled his own hair. "All right, we don't have time for this. Consider my leniency an over-compensation for your broken nose."

"It's just punched. You did not break it."

"Should I be glad to hear that?" Sherlock snapped.

Mycroft inhaled deeply before he answered. It always calmed his nerves when dealing with his sibling. "Thank you, Sherlock. I appreciate your sentiment. By the way, when you told John what I..."

"You're trespassing again, dear brother. I won't tolerate it twice. One more word and this conversation is over!"

One look at the little one's face and Mycroft knew that to be true. "What can I do for you, Sherlock?"

A second later, the 'British Government' swayed on his feet. The sight of Sherlock Holmes, wrathful and shouting just a second ago, blushing with awkwardness was quite overwhelming.

"You must keep John out of my hair, Mycroft. Scare him off, tell him you've had me transported to Siberia, anything, just get him out of the way!"

Mycroft was dumbfounded. At first he did not trust his ears, then he cleared his throat. "Let me get that straight, brother dear. You invite your friend to Angelo's, you tell him all our embarrassing little family secrets..."

"Embarrassing for you!"

"...embarrassing for both of us, now you want me to tell John Watson, after an afternoon of friendship, closeness and confidence, to piss off?"

"I can't Mycroft. I tried, more than once, but I can't. I do not find the right words."

"That never stopped you in the past. If you do not find the right words you take the wrong ones, as long as you make your point. You never consider the damage your choice of words may cause!"

"This is different. John is different." Sherlock's body told the story of how hard he was trying to be patient and what little success he had.

"For sure" Mycroft heard himself replying, with the madness of a man about to be destroyed by the Gods "the man to whom you sent your last farewell when you thought Moriarty would kill you, the man you chose over me more than once, he would be special."

Sherlock rose from the chair he'd taken for himself, pale with anger. "I should have known better than to come here. But I'd never thought you could sink so low. This is petty, Mycroft. Petty and base."

"What about a man who's too much of a coward to tell his only friend the truth? Isn't that petty, too?" Mycroft had the reward of seeing that touch his brother to the quick.

The younger Holmes stopped in mid-stride, pondered, turned back. "It's what you've always wanted, isn't it?" he said. All of a sudden he seemed helpless, fragile and in dire need of comfort. "All right then. I've never begged you for anything before, but I'm begging you now. Do this for me. It needs to be done and I'm unable. I wouldn't convince him, he'd see through my lies, I simply can't do it!"

"But you think he'd believe me? After all that's happened, after all the times we've worked together on your behalf, to help you or save you, John Watson would accept me as the villain who took you away from him for good?"

"After what I've told him today, he thinks you're a heartless bastard anyway!"

Mycroft rested both fists on the desk. "Is it..." he began, but then he needed to clear his throat again. "Is it rewarding for you, to hurt me? Do you enjoy it?"

Sherlock's brows knitted together. For a split second, he lost his surety. But the moment of empathy passed. "Will you do it, Mycroft?"

"Yes" Mycroft heard himself say. "Yes, I will do it."

Sherlock Holmes' smile could, on rare occasions, be described as angelic. His whole face lit up, he seemed virtually radiant. It usually happened when he got what he wanted. "Thanks, big brother. I knew I could count on you. Now, you can phone me when it's over. See you!" He turned to leave.

"Not so fast, dear boy. First, you will witness my encounter with your flatmate. You might as well see what you're doing. Second, if you think you can go to Germany on your own, think again!"

"Who said anything about Germany? I'm not…."

"Sherlock, there may have been occasions when you could fool me, but not today. I've invited Carruthers and some of my staff as well as Demirkan from the German BND to join us tonight for a briefing. You will go to Germany by my command and under my supervision or you won't go at all. My last word!"

The younger brother's eyes narrowed as he scrutinized the elder. Mycroft knew he was being sized up; his sincerity was questioned. Something was going on in the little one's sharp brain; it was visible in the eyes, but what it was …. heaven would know.

"I should have known this was a trap" Sherlock finally drawled. "You would not give something for nothing."

"Of course not, brother dear. What do you take me for? I spend my days with politicians."

Mycroft had the nasty feeling that he was missing something essential when Sherlock just surrendered. "All right, Mycroft, you win. Have it your way."

The elder brother's apprehension worsened when Sherlock was all politeness during the briefing with the other agents, agreeing to every suggestion made by them. Yet Sherlock's demeanour gave nothing away.

Sometime in the early morning hours of the next day, the others finally left and Mycroft knew he had run out on excuses for postponing his call to John Watson.

Now, in the Diogenes Club park, the elder brother again wondered what his sibling might be up to. It was still a more comfortable subject than the fact that he had most likely lost his brother's last shreds of trust and affection.

Right on cue, hasty steps sounded in Mycroft's back. Sherlock's steps. And sure enough, he blurted his latest idea out at once. "If John won't deliver on his threat to whistleblow your deal with Chang to the media anyway, why should I meet with him?"

Oh, little one. So eager to muddle through between two evils, happy to have found a way to indulge yourself. Like a child.

"You wanted me to convince him that he should forget you" Mycroft replied. "You can't know, you were with Moriarty at the time, but I tried that in the past and it didn't work. It didn't work now, either. Leave John Watson with nothing but a load of unanswered questions and he'll never stop stalking us."

Sherlock objected heatedly. "You promised to take the blame because that would make this easier for John, but no, your ego intervened, you selfish bastard!"

Mycroft paid him in his own coin. "For John? It would make things easier for John? It would make things easier for you."

Sherlock glared at his brother but Mycroft won the silent staring match. The little one lowered his gaze to the phone and pressed the key for Watson's number. "John?" he said curtly as soon as the call was taken. "You wanted to talk to me? I can't for the life of me imagine what we should talk about but...all right. I'll be there. Give me fifteen minutes. No, I promise, I won't tell Mycroft."

He terminated the call and looked at his elder brother. "His favourite Starbuck's, on Oxford Street. Call me a cab!"

Mycroft remembered the coffee shop with mixed feelings. There he'd been sitting, spitting the sickly sweet muck over his fellow humans, thinking of his late little brother, only to meet this brother shortly afterwards, only to lose him again to Moriarty a few weeks later, and with him, almost, his livelihood. A bad omen if there ever had been one. But naturally Watson couldn't know that. "Call the cab yourself" he told Sherlock. "I'm not your errand boy."

The younger Holmes snorted while he searched briefly for the short cut of his once favourite cab firm. He hadn't used this phone in quite a while, yet the thing felt uncomfortable rather than unfamiliar. Old-fashioned, after the futuristic things Moriarty had surrounded himself with.

Always the dernier cri of technology.

In a blink the thought transported Sherlock back to the villa in Grunewald. Moriarty sat behind his desk, grinning amusedly, showing off his latest acquisition. "Look at this, Sherlock. Beautiful, isn't it? Such style. Got it directly from London. Whom would you like to call? John, perhaps? He still thinks you're dead. He's sad, so very sad. Shouldn't I bring him here? I could, you know. Any time I want to. We could give him your old room in the cellar."

Sherlock suppressed a shiver. In his mind he saw the smooth, gliding movements of a cat, felt the arms around his body, the hot breath on his cheek. "You do not need the room any longer, do you, Sherlock? No need to bring you back there. Question is, do we need to put your friend in there or not? Hmh, after last night's bad behaviour, I wonder!"

"I was just tired, James."

"You're never tired. Not when you are having fun. But if I want to have some fun, you want to go to bed. It's unfair, Sherlock."

"I hadn't slept in three days." Not that James didn't know that. Keeping the prisoner in handcuffs and depriving him of sleep might be Jenkins' idea of a punishment for 'insolence', but he'd not dared to do it without his master's consent.

"You're such a wussy sometimes, Sherlock. Here I was, looking forward to talking with a friend after a hard day's work and all you want is sleep!" James pouted; his fingers closed over Sherlock's knotted shoulder muscles. He knew how to do it. It hurt enough to make Holmes clench his jaws.

"Besides" Sherlock added, ignoring this 'gentle' reminder of what James could do, "filling a woman up with liquor and then calling in two of your men isn't my idea of fun."

"You know I hate prudishness. It's dull. Dull, dull, DULL! Does John know you are a prude? Maybe he would like my kind of fun. Let's give it a try." Moriarty walked back to his desk, all business now.

"It's ridiculous, James, can't you quarrel with me without involving everybody else? It's unworthy of you, leave John out of this!"

Moriarty stopped, bent over the docking station for his mobile, the surveillance and communication consoles that kept him in touch with his empire. Anyone in the house was only a mouse click or a mobile's jingle away. So was every single thread of Moriarty's complex fabric of power, almost around the globe. "Say please, Sherlock!"

"Get lost!"

"Say please, where are your manners? I thought you'd learned your lesson."

"You're being childish again, James. It's boring!"

Sherlock remembered his cheek burning. The humiliation it had been, having one's ears boxed like a child, unable to do anything against it. And most of all he remembered Moriarty turning back to his desk, laying his finger on the button that would call his men.

There were days when the Consulting Criminal wanted to meet resistance. There were others when refusing him meant playing with a wildfire.

Over time Holmes had got intimate, comprehensive knowledge about Moriarty's international spider web. The wildfire could spring up in any place of the world; consume anyone, at a moment's notice. "Please, James. I'm sorry, please forgive me."

For better or for worse, James' reactions had always been instantaneous. This time it had been an easy smile, a happy punch on the shoulder. "All right. I forgive you. You're sure you do not want to have Johnny here?"

"Quite sure!"

"So be it. You win, Sherlock. C'me on, I want to play chess."

James had won the match, of course. Sherlock had had no trouble losing it because he hadn't paid any attention at all. Moriarty hadn't minded. Holmes had rather done anything else but playing chess, that was what this was about.

The memories were strong, vivid, not to be rejected, but they did not make it through Sherlock's façade.

Under Mycroft's wary gaze, Sherlock called the cab, put on his jacket, pocketed the mobile, all with an expression of virtually flawless indifference. Too perfect.

It was one of the rare occasions on which Mycroft could read his sibling's mind. "I know what you fear, Sherlock. But don't let him win. Don't let Moriarty win, he doesn't deserve to."

The younger hesitated. Mycroft could be very persuading at times. But the memories of how it had felt, being strangled by fear, again and again, persisted. No matter how often Sherlock had told himself that Moriarty wouldn't waste a valuable hostage on trivialities, he couldn't be sure.

Moriarty had eliminated surety.

Sherlock didn't want to feel like that again. And he would not. "You know whose game it is, Mycroft dear."

Tarantula watched his little brother driving away to ruin his life even further.

Briefly he considered to phone Watson and tell him everything. But, in the end, he had to admit he lacked the courage.