I know nothing about guns. I know they kill you, and that there are 300 million odd in the USA, or so I'm told. But that's it. John's is a Browning? Y'see, that means nothing to me.

John felt his throat constrict. A tiny, blistered claw, grappling at his jugular until it had a firm grasp on his trachea, just below his trembling larynx; where it tensed, and John found himself feeling the air go dead in the heavy bags of his lungs.

The gun was still pointed at him. That same gleaming barrel he knew so well- the elegant shape, sa chiffre, wont beneath his poised digits. He knew how many rounds that gun had loaded, right at that moment. He knew how it felt against the curve of his back, and how Sherlock wouldn't be so familiar with the cool metal, and the texture of duty and honour on its hilt. He knew how fast its bullet would travel through the air, into his skull, and through the squishy grey matter beneath; because Sherlock would go for the brain, it was simply the kind of person he was. The heart meant nothing to him: he spent his whole adult life playing to the whims of the hearts of others, and yet he lived in a seperate world. Aloof. Where thoughts and ideas were currency: John could see it between him and Mycroft. The hatred, and the sparks of ideas that lasted a mere fleeting second. John wondered if that was what was going on here, between Jim and Sherlock- a mind-game. Alas, no: Sherlock held the gun to John's eye-level. He considered the other man his equal. The mind was his target.

For a stupid moment, John considered trying to slip his Browning out from his belt, before realising just how extraordinary such a feat would be, considering he was looking into its own beady eye.

"All that time you spend, playing to the games of the idiotic and indulgent, Sherlock. Imagine; living free of restraint, no one on your back, watching your every move. No drain in your pocket, and the freedom to do what you want, say what you want... Wouldn't that be just wonderful, Sherlock?"

John wouldn't blame him for pulling the trigger. It was either him or all of them, after all. And there was some other instinct hanging in there... Empathy? He'd seen the hand-shaped bruises, the controlling arm of his employer, and the way Ms Hudson looked at John when she came up with biscuits, the morning after Sherlock had stumbled through the door at 7AM.

Plus, it was him who had gotten them into this particular mess.

His overly-divulgent blog posts could be an ironic epitaph.

Sherlock's hands were trembling now; and quite obviously, too. He had to raise the other hand up to cup the poised hand in his palm, gulping as he did so. Jim passed no comment on the uncharacteristic tremour in Sherlock's limbs- perhaps because his face was so calm, his facial expression ironed into one of stoicism. Though his eyes- his eyes were ablaze.

"What if I choose neither?"

"That's cheating, Sherlock. Oh, the look on your face when you thought you'd get away with that one!"

Jim's face went stormy.

"I'll obliterate you," he expanded, just for clarity.

"But why? No one just does it for the thrill, Moriarty."

"We've already been through this," Jim snapped in reply, and both John and Sherlock flinched. Had Molly have been conscious, she certainly would have visibly jumped a bit. "Stop wasting time trying to sentimentalise this, Sherlock. Your clients have whims, as do I. It's just... ordinary people are stimulated by sex. What excites me, is something much, much more... invigorating."

"What's that?" John asked. He could tell Sherlock was stalling, and Jim could see it too- but Jim's problem was, after spending so long working in the shadows, he quite clearly loved to boast, and to make John, and, in a way, Sherlock, feel small. It seemed so simple a weakness, for a man so intricately complicated.

"Good question," he glanced down at John, one eyebrow raised. "I like manipulating people, watching them dance like helpless marionettes. And ordinary people are so boring. So I chose you, Sherlock. You know people, don't you?"

"And you claim to know people-"

The rest of Sherlock's sentence was lost, as a gunshot rang out through the car park.

Once John had established he was still alive, he looked at Sherlock and Jim. Every single sniper laser had disappeared from Sherlock's chest, and he stood, frozen, gun still aimed at John; his expression a mixture of shock and knowing. No time. There was another shot, and what sounded like a body slumping to the concrete.

Jim's face was twisted in rage. Sherlock, for the moment, free of the threat of explosion, turned the threat on Jim, steady.

"Sebastian!" Richard screamed, his eyebrows heavy with shadows, and his expression that of a man John wouldn't dare cross, even if armed. He was glowering at Sherlock as the man moved behind John, and, with one hand, scrabbled at the binding around John's wrist, whilst glancing intermittently back at the sullen psychopath.

There was a click, that echoed around the walls, just as Sherlock freed John's wrists. Both men looked up, to see a figure slumping out of the shadows on light-feet, with a rather antique-looking rifle to hand. That, however, was no what had made the click- Jim had his own gentlemen's hand-pistol, a tiny but powerful thing, clenched in his hand. His grin was manic- a catastrophic collision of terror and sadism, as he regained control of the situation.

"Two against one, Sherlock," he cackled, even though John had now managed to untie his own ankles, and stood up gingerly. As a medical man, his instincts wanted him to check on Molly, but the fact that two men were pointing guns at the pair of them made him stand stock-still. He wasn't frightened- his form was military, so neither confrontational, nor waving a metaphorical white flag.

"Is it?" Sherlock grinned. What was he playing at, egging Jim on like that? Especially when he had a back-up thug...

Said thug slumped to the ground, as there was yet another firing noise. A shiver jolted John's spine as he watched crimson liquid bloom in death on the dirty floor beneath the man's potato-like head. In a way, he looked like Mike Stamford. Lost, but no ketchup stains.

Plus, the real Mike Stamford was miles away, probably taking an unhealthy late-lunch, unaware of the things his supposedly cunning plans and loose-lips had caused.

The person who had fired the fatal shot, this time, decided to join the party: with steel-capped footsteps nearing at a leisurely pace.

"Mycroft Holmes," Jim sneered, and John turned around. Indeed, looking better for wear than the rest of them, and sneering just as much as Jim, only in a much loftier manner- passively looking down his nose at the three of them rather than contorting his face with common hatred.

"Jim Moriarty. It's been a while. Taken a liking to my baby brother, I hear? John, take those ghastly amateur explosives off Sherlock's chest, would you?" he drawled.

John obliged. There were two guns pointing at Jim now- and chances were, Mycroft was yet another intriguing character for Jim to spin.

The explosives were relatively easy to dismantle from Sherlock's body. John tried to ignore how close they were- especially as John owed Sherlock an apology or two, and Sherlock ought to give John an explanation. And there was no talking, too, from the other two men. John couldn't tell if it was because they were watching them or each other; either way, the air hummed with electricity.

The wires slipped off, and John felt a subtle loosening of Sherlock's body. His shoulders dropped, and her gained back a bit more of that dark arrogance John had been acquainted with for little more than a week.

And the gun was pointing back at Moriarty's chest, as John slid the explosives as far away as he could, and grasped Sherlock's arm.

"I'm not sure it's completely requited," Jim's eyes flicked lazily between the three men. He winked at John, who gulped. "Still. Thank you for joining- I just thought it was going to get boring. I can see," he strode forward a step, "That I need to consider how I want to do this."

And he shot John.

"Oops," was all he said, as John made a strangled noise. Pain tore at every nerve in his left shoulder, and his knees felt so far away. He was bent in some way, and there was a hand- no, two- keeping him in a standing position. He couldn't think about anything- nothing but the pain, and the sadistic smile of the man who had inflicted it.

"Look, Sherlock, I shot him. Has it gone deep enough? Is he going to live? How do you feel? You loved him, didn't you? Well... Don't you want to punish me, Sherlock? Shoot me, Sherlock. SHOOT ME."

Sherlock looked down at John. It was probably as close to crying as Sherlock would ever get, watching John's eyelids flutter as he held his wound, teeth gritted.

Why did Richard want Sherlock to shoot him now? What was the other option? Sherlock was holding the gun steady now. And there was a gun staring back at him.

"Oh, I've had enough of this," came a far-off voice in John's ear, and the whole world exploded around him, and, through the bleary, angry world of pain, John saw the man he once loved; the man who had had him knocked out; the man who had kissed him on the Embankment; the man who strapped Sherlock up in Semtex; and the man who had lied, fall straight backwards, almost rigid, and hit the floor with a glassy, gaze-less stare.