He woke the next morning feeling more himself. He considered the woman tangled in his arms, and had a vague memory of telling her to go there so he wouldn't kill her when he woke up. Seemed like a good idea at the time, and still wasn't a terrible one. He smirked, bending to kiss the vibrant bruise on her neck.
Lorna was a deep sleeper up until the point people started moving around her, a groggy moan coming from her as she shifted, cracking her eyes open to blink blearily at the sniper. "Hi," she rasped.
The corner of his mouth twitched upwards. "Hi." He reached out a finger to trace the bruise over, then tracing her skin to another on her shoulder.
She could feel the ache in the skin he touched without craning her neck to look. Guessed right about the spectacularity of her bruises, then. She let her eyes drift close again, content with just enjoying his touch for the moment. "You admiring your handiwork?"
"Something like that," he agreed, the pad of his finger pressing down a little more firmly than strictly necessary against the center of one of the deeper bruises.
She made a noise of mild complaint, opening her eyes again to squint at him. "Must you?"
"Yes," he said, digging his finger in hard for a moment, before relenting and rolling onto his back. "What do you want for breakfast?"
"I'm not picky. Cereal is fine," she shrugged, in the middle of rubbing the sting out of her bruise. She didn't hold it against him. He was actually being kinda nice, which was a rarity.
He nodded, making no effort to move for the moment. "How'd you sleep?"
"Well. No dreams, that was nice," she replied. "I attribute it to your soothing deadly presence."
"I'm taking that as a compliment." He stretched, knuckles brushing against the head of the bed.
"Take how you like," she chuckled, sitting up and immediately groaning. Christ, she was sore all over. She collapsed sideways dramatically onto the bed, letting out a huff. "Bring me a wheelchair."
"That bad, huh?" his eyes flashed with pride and amusement.
She groaned. "It's like I worked out twice as long as I was supposed to or something. I think I may actually have troubled walking. Well done, you. I'll just... not walk anywhere, it's fine."
"Keep in mind you're talking to a part-time sadist. Keep complaining and I'll order you out jogging."
"'Part-time', right," she laughed. "Point taken, I'll hush up."
He raised an eyebrow. "I have other interests as well, Harrison. I'm not so one-dimensional as you seem to believe."
She rolled onto her back again so she could actually look at him. "People can be multi-layered. You can still be full-time sadist and snuggle with a puppy. They're not mutually exclusive."
He smirked, but didn't press the issue for the time being. "Of course." He yawned, stretched again, and sat up. He was a bit sore, but not terribly so.
She got the feeling that that wasn't the last she was going to hear about that conversation, but she forgot about it for the moment, instead just smirking at the red scrapes she'd left behind on his shoulders, visible only when he was sitting up.
He twisted side to side for a moment, loosening up a few tight back muscles, then climbed out of bed, heading for his dresser in search of pants.
She watched him appreciatively for a few moments and then gathered her courage to get up, pushing herself out of bed with a mumbled swear and shuffling out into the living room for her own underwear. After she slipped those on and remembered that her shirt was in tattered ruins, she put on his.
He headed out into the main room mostly dressed, and headed over to the kitchen. He grabbed a couple of bowls from the cabinet and set them on the counter. "Cereal's there," he said, pointing to a cabinet as he headed for the fridge to grab the milk. "Find whatever you want."
"Cool. Thanks," she nodded, swimming in his shirt from the night before to the point where she had to roll his sleeves up several times to make full use of her fingers once again. When she made her way over to the cabinet and picked a cereal, she chose the most childish one there and poured herself a full bowl. "What do you do with the stuff in your fridge when you go out of the country? You come back to spoiled milk a lot?"
He shrugged. "Depends on how long I'll be gone. If it's too long, I'll bring some of it down to the common kitchen so it doesn't get wasted." He smirked at her attire. "That's two of your shirts that I've ripped now. I have no guilt."
"Christ, I need to start destroying more of your things," she quipped, rifling through his drawers until she found a spoon. "Maybe I'll stick with my theme of upholstery. Better hope you don't ever decide to get rough in a car you like, hm?"
"I'll keep that in mind," he smirked, grabbing a box of Chex and pouring a large bowl.
She hummed around a mouthful of off-brand Froot Loops before swallowing and letting her spoon rest on the edge of her bowl. "On a more serious note, do we have any further orders? We have insurance if someone higher up than Holmes tries to step in, but other than that..."
He shook his head just slightly. "Magnussen's been primed, and the appropriate channels opened. It shouldn't be long before Holmes takes the bait. Then we'll be busy as all hell."
"Well, you will be. The most I'll be doing is sitting back and watching the security feeds. Not much work for my type of job in this one, I don't believe," she frowned, then shrugged lightly and continued eating over the sink.
He nodded slightly. "Who knows. You might be useful yet, don't worry. A lot of this is going to be fear-mongering, and we need information to do that."
"Mm. True. Who knows how often you'll need someone to convince a security guard to open a gate?" she snorted, a tiny bit disappointed. "I more meant this is not going to be fun. Team jobs are never fun. Surely you get annoyed with people wandering into your scope?"
He laughed a bit. "Never thought about it like that. I could see that being annoying."
She smirked, pleased that she'd made him laugh when he wasn't drunk and not quite in his right mind. "Always glad to broaden horizons."
He snorted slightly at that, grinning and shaking his head, before digging into his cereal.
She finished off a good portion of her breakfast before she thought of anything pressing enough to warrant pausing for. "You know, you better hope that the Boss doesn't need me to do any last minute work this week, because it'd be difficult to swindle a man while wearing three scarves to hide your handiwork. And teeth-work."
He nodded slightly, considering that. "He's going to know, either way. Probably as soon as he sees me." He pours himself another bowl of cereal, before letting out a growl of frustration. "I just don't understand his fucking problem."
"Fuck if I know," she snorted, setting her bowl in the sink since she was done. "But I can see it being a problem for him if I can't do my work right."
He glanced over at her, then sighed. "If we do this again, no marking," he conceded, before digging into his bowl of cereal again.
"I never said you were safe," she joked, winking once and then snickering. Then she sighed, sobering. "I don't think it will be an issue. I hope it won't. I heal fast and it doesn't look like I'll be leaving the building for a while anyway."
He drained the milk from his bowl and tossed the empty dish into the sink. "I'd better go get cleaned up. Almost time to report in. Hopefully he'll be in a decent mood now he's slept."
She nodded, taking that as her cue to go gather up her jeans and phone from the floor. "Good luck. I'll get the shirt back to you by tonight. No stealing, I promise."
"You'd better not," he agreed, heading for his room.
She tucked her stuff under her arm with a chuckle and then slipped out into the hall and disappeared back into her own room to get properly dressed and to shower off any dried blood.
He shaved and dressed, shoulder holster in place, hair combed flat. He examined himself in the mirror for any obvious marks or anything beyond a crisp, military-grade appearance, before heading for the door and the elevator. Time to go find out what signs he'd missed for the boss to catch anyway.
Jim was stiff. Inconveniently so, and it was starting to get annoying enough that he was ready for any excuse to get the hell out of this office and to walk up and down a flight of stairs. That would be a grossly inefficient use of his time, however, so here he was stuck, choking down statistical analysis until it felt like his head was just going to pop off. He was bored. Magnussen may have been setting him up for a beautifully dramatic reveal, but god, he was fucking slow.
He took a breath, straightened his jacket one more time, and knocked crisply.
"Enter," he drawled, shoving the packet of data into his desk drawer with a vengeance.
The tone did not sound promising. He cleared his face of expression and stepped inside. "Good morning, sir. Sleep well?"
"As well as one can on a sofa with less back support than a stale marshmallow," Jim said flatly, doing a cursory sweep of Moran and then looking back again, eyebrows lifting ever so slightly. The sniper was even stiffer than he normally was. "Started that up again, have you?"
"I did suggest you sleep on a proper bed, sir," he returned, ignoring the latter comment. "Any new developments on Magnussen I should be aware of?"
"Pretending something's not happening won't make it go away, Sebastian," Jim sang, a chilly smile creeping onto his face. This was the kind of entertainment he'd been hoping for. "Let me guess - it was her idea, wasn't it? Oh, poor Malcolm."
He stood tall, eyes calm. One way to deal with this that he could see. "If you're finished, sir, I think it might be best to focus on matters of actual importance."
Jim drummed his fingers against the wood of his desk, considering the sniper for a long minute. "Matters of actual importance are taking a small vacation for the moment while I wait for Magnussen to pick his old arse up and get fucking moving," he snapped, slamming his open palm against the desk, eyes flashing with frustration. "Do not bring it up again."
He didn't flinch, simply nodded. "Sorry, boss. I wasn't aware that the situation was still stagnated. Any administrative tasks you'd like me to take care of? Or would you like me to find a way to speed things along?"
"You find a way to get that bastard to act and I'll keep the needling about your choking fetish to myself, Moran," he shook his head, pulling open his desk drawer with a bang and grabbing the packet again to drop it harshly on the desk. "I am done waiting."
He grit his teeth, but walked forward at an even pace, picking up the packet and starting to flip through it slowly, eyes scanning. "He still hasn't alerted Morstan of his intent..." he said coolly. "Might I suggest the next step would be to do so ourselves, in his guise? He's intent on playing this game anonymously anyways. If there was two anonymous players, they'd never know the difference. We can force his hand, knock over the first domino."
He went still for a moment as he thought it through, picking out the most likely outcomes and contingency plans until he nodded, moving to turn on his computer. "That just might work. We'll have to keep it in Magnussen's style or later on this might take a bite out of our arses, but otherwise... "
"Seems like we have a pretty good information as to his style. Shouldn't be difficult to fabricate. I have a few ideas which could work." He turned a few more pages. "In fact... Guy Fawkes day is the middle of this week, sir. Lots of crowds and yelling, fire everywhere. It's the perfect time to run something subversive but out in the open. We'd blend right in."
"That's an excellent point... Well, I think Mr. Holmes has been too separated from his dear Dr. Watson, don't you agree?"
Moran flashed a smile. "What do you suggest, sir?"
"Well, it never hurts to have an extra effigy on hand, does it? I think we should see if we can make the good doctor flammable. That would make Sherly sweat."
His eyes became obsidian, smile wide and cruel. "I think that sounds like a perfect idea, sir."
"Good. Make it happen. And throw that damned packet in the can on your way out. It's too boring playing by the book," he snorted, returning his focus to the computer for the moment before glancing back. "I haven't forgotten about earlier, Tiger. You better have left her pretty."
He tossed the packet away. "She's fine, sir," he said coolly. "A few marks, but those will fade by the end of the day."
He flicked his sleeves back and began typing an email to Magnussen's people with something along the lines of 'this is what's happening, now fucking keep up' as a message, not looking up towards Moran again. "Good. I'm not interested in paying for a plastic surgeon to keep her useful. Grifters are a bit like horses that way. They get too damaged, you just have to shoot them."
If that was supposed to make him flinch or react, his employer was vastly underestimating him. "As always, sir, let me know if that needs to happen, but I assure you I won't be the cause of the problem."
"As long as we're clear. You know how I feel about my things," he muttered, sending off the email and leaning back with a satisfied air. "Magnussen should know soon."
He nodded. "Good to know. And I do know, sir." He hesitated, then turned around to face his employer. "When was the last time I caused you or this organization harm, sir? Through action or inaction?"
"You haven't," Jim replied coolly, "But that doesn't mean you won't. We are both, unfortunately, human. Even I've been known to trip."
"And should I fail you, I look forward to your vengeful wrath. But your life would be made easier, sir, if you were able to trust me just a tad bit more than you do now. Simply a suggestion for efficiency's sake, sir." His tone was nothing but respectful, gaze level.
"The day I trust anyone will be the day Lucifer comes to collect his due, Tiger. I'm Irish-Catholic. They may have failed to teach me guilt, but they taught me reservation," he smirked, lacing his fingers behind his head.
He nodded, and saluted casually. "Of course, sir. My mistake." He turned to go.
"See you later, Sebastian," he chuckled, settling into his chair. That had been just the sort of pick-up he'd needed.
He closed the door behind him, a mix of emotions. Part of him was pleased he'd managed to find a way to cheer the boss up, the other was frustrated by his employer's total lack of faith in him. A commander who didn't trust his soldiers got shot. By the enemy, if they were lucky. He headed downstairs.
Harrison found Sebastian a few hours later, her phone in hand and a frown on her face. "Uh.. Johnson has a delivery for you. It sounds an awful lot like that John Watson bloke, though."
"Good, he's early," Sebastian said with a smile. "The boss'll be thrilled. C'mon, Harrison. Where are they, garage?"
"Uh, yeah," she nodded, still confused as to why they had Watson trussed up downstairs. "I think they're taking him to one of the basement rooms, though. Why do we have him, again?"
"Moriarty got bored, we're forcing Magnussen's hand," he said crisply, punching the 'down' button to call the elevator and pulling out his phone to call the boss. "We've got him, sir."
"Excellent," she heard Jim declare through Moran's phone, "You'll need to prep him in a couple hours. Too light to take him out yet. Do what you will with him until then, just don't leave too many marks." She raised her eyebrows at the laughter that came over the phone next.
He grit his teeth, but his expression didn't change. "I was hoping you'd join us, sir. We could blindfold him, as long as you don't speak you wouldn't be revealing your hand. Or do, if you like."
There was silence for a moment. "I have to finish something up, but I'll pop down in a little while. Feel free to start without me. I'd love to see what you're going to cook up."
"Of course, sir. Just let me know when you'd like to come in, and we'll make the appropriate arrangements." He hung up, stepping into the elevator as it opened. He glanced over at her and sighed at the bite mark peeking out under her collar. "He's going to get a kick out of that."
She tugged up at her collar with a grimace, leaning against the wall of the lift. Attracting Jim's humor sounded extremely uncomfortable, and she wasn't looking forward to it. "I tried wearing a scarf earlier, but it was hot, and it kept getting in my way..."
"He would have been amused anyway. You heard the marks comment. He feels I have a fetish." His face was expressionless. He stepped out as soon as the elevator stopped moving.
"Ugh, that still doesn't mean I want him to laugh at me. He scares the shit out of me," she huffed, following him out and tucking her phone into her pocket.
"As well he should," he said, nodding and walking down the nondescript hallways of the basement.
She nodded, kicking a discarded can out of the way. The janitors must have been slacking off. "What are we doing with Watson, anyway?"
"Passing the time," he said with a smooth smile, "Which is personally one of my favorite things to do with these people. We're disorienting him, scaring the hell out of him, maybe getting a little information, but generally just breaking him as much as possible, to make him as much of a vegetable as we can, temporarily. Vegetables are neutral parties in hostage situations."
"Sounds like a lot of fun," she grinned, "You just do what you need to and I'll follow along. This isn't my kind of gig."
"In that you don't know how, or you can't stomach it?" he asked as they approached the appropriate door. He stopped to look at her, waiting for her to answer before they went in.
She put an indignant hand on her hip. "I told you what I did to that man in his own basement. I know how, and I can stomach it. This just isn't my work these days. I don't know exactly what you want me to do. And unless you're going to list it all out for me here I have to follow your example, don't I?"
He raised an eyebrow. "Tone, Harrison. I can't remember every little detail about your personal life." He allowed a hint of a smirk to take the bite off the words, and then headed in. Johnson and two of his nameless goons stood waiting in the well lit room. Each of the walls had seamless storage worked in, containing a plethora of instruments easily at hand, though many more were available in adjoining storage. In the center of the room was a sturdy metal chair that could be moved into a variety of creative positions, and strapped to the chair, blindfolded and gagged, was Dr. John Hamish Watson.
Lorna closed the door behind her and then stood to the side of it, mirroring the blokes with Johnson. She was one of them until Moran said anything to the contrary. Johnson put away his phone after a long second of ignoring the two of them, then looked up. "You want me to take my boys with me or do you want the muscle? I got somethin' waiting for me down the hall."
"Take them," Moran said coolly. "The boss wants to handle this one personally." He hadn't missed the blatant attempt at commanding the room, and wouldn't forget it, either.
Johnson gave a disinterested nod down at his phone and then waved a finger at his goons to lead the way out of the room before following, the door opening and shutting with a faint click. Lorna stifled a snort of amusement. That wouldn't end well for Johnson.
Moran raised an eyebrow, glancing over at Lorna with a bit of a smirk. Then he turned his focus to the man in the middle of the room and walked over, pulling off the blindfold. He waited until the man's eyes focused, slowed by the drugs in his system. "Welcome to consciousness, Captain. Do you know who I am?"
John blinked, trying to clear his vision and adjust to the brightness of the room, and it took him a second to sluggishly muddle through the words spoken by the man in front of him. When he did get there, he shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut. "No.. no. Where.. am I?"
"You're in the custody of the Taliban," he said firmly, softening his accent and altering it with some Middle Eastern tones, but not dropping it completely. "Can you tell me your name and rank?"
"I... no, I don't want to," John shook his head, his words almost incoherent. "Lemme go."
"Name and rank," Moran repeated, and it was absolutely an order from a superior officer. His eyes drilled into John's face, expression calm but icy.
His head drooped, shoulders slumping forward, but he responded, "Captain John Watson. Field Doctor." Lorna watched from the side with curiosity and made a mental note about the impressiveness of Sebastian pulling rank.
"What's the last thing that you remember, Captain?" he asked, not acknowledging the cooperation with anything but a hint of approval in his voice.
"I was.. I was outside the flat. Looking for.. my friend," he muttered, frowning to himself as he tried to bring the memory into clearer detail. "Some bloke just... bumped into me."
"Wrong. You've been deployed in Afghanistan for the past seven months," he said without a shadow of doubt in his voice. "Try to remember. You reacted badly to a drug cocktail and it's confusing you."
"I don't... think that's right..." he shook his head slowly, beginning to look around the room blearily before his eyes got stuck on Harrison. "This is the Taliban?"
He nodded, expression not faltering. "That's correct." He turned, pretending to follow Watson's gaze, and his attention immediately switched to Harrison, trusting to play along. "What the fuck are you doing without that fucking thing?" He almost shouted as he immediately invaded her space angrily. "Do you want them to shoot you? Fucking hell, I don't care if it's fucking uncomfortable-"
She backed into the wall in half-faked alarm, catching onto his meaning a moment later and yanking her scarf from earlier out of her jacket pocket. "It kept falling off, they know to knock, I'll be fine," she insisted shakily, pushing the scarf into his hands with the air of someone trying to get rid of something that had clung to them all day. Watson watched with wide eyes from the side, looking a bit more convinced of their charade.
He shoved it back at her, expression livid, voice shaking slightly with forced control. "Put. It. On. And if you take it off again, I'll fucking shoot you myself." He turned away, made a show of getting control of himself again, and when he returned his attention to Watson, his gaze was cool and clear. "Now. It's my job to ensure that you've returned to health after your episode. You were in a coma for almost two weeks. "
Watson shook his head vaguely at Moran while Lorna stifled a swear and struggled to put on the scarf with any degree of accuracy. "I'm... why? Why am I here?"
"You're being interrogated," he said matter-of-factly. "As you have been since you were injured and captured."
John pulled belatedly at his confinements to the chair, now looking troubled but still quite out of it. "No... no, let me go."
He walked towards the wall, sliding a drawer out on silent rollers and removing a syringe, examining a few bottles. "You were found by the Taliban, badly injured, bullet in the shoulder. You almost died. You've been nursed back to health. So far interrogation has been mild, but you've been under the influence of drugs to keep you alive." He walked back over, syringe in hand, tourniquet in the other. He tied the latter around John's lower arm, waiting for veins. "Now, Captain. What's the last thing you remember?" he repeated.
The doctor made a noise of protest at the tourniquet and then shook his head again, squeezing his eyes shut. "I... no, no, that's not... Mary."
"Who's Mary?" he asked, his voice never raising above a certain pitch, almost hypnotic. He tapped the syringe a few times to clear any air bubbles.
"My... my wife?" John frowned, a veil of confusion settling over his face. "She... this isn't right."
"You don't have a wife, Captain. You've been experiencing hallucinations. This is reality. Pain is reality." He pushed the syringe into Watson's arm, introducing capsaicin to his system. "You should begin to experience an intense burning sensation. Hopefully that will help wake you up, help you remember." He reached out to grab John's neck and jaw firmly but gently, as if to guide him to meet his gaze, fingers carefully placing a mild hallucinogenic patch on the back of the man's neck, enough to keep him a bit foggy. "Now. Tell me Captain, because I'm concerned for you. What is the last thing you remember? Do you remember being shot?" His free hand moved to find the scarred shoulder, thumb moving to press against the center of the old wound just slightly.
John stumbled over his words a couple of times before he managed to get out anything that made sense, squinting as the burning spreading up his arm. "Yes. Yes, I remember," he mumbled, trying to roll his shoulder out of Moran's grip. "But it's... it's healed, isn't it?"
"It's getting there," he said, nodding, frowning slightly at the stumbled words and hoping that he hadn't overdone the hallucinogens. "Do you remember when the Taliban found you?" He watched as John struggled to answer, and straightened. "I'll leave you to think." He turned for the door, motioning for Lorna to exit with him.
Lorna slipped out after Moran, leaving Watson to stew in his drugs. She closed the door behind her as she left, then raised her eyebrows at the sniper expectantly.
"Right. I need anyone who speaks Pashto, down here now. I know Granger does, get at least one more, preferably two. They don't have to know a lot, but they have to be able to speak it convincingly," he said immediately. "Get them to wardrobe, I want close attire matches to videos of the Taliban from the time that Watson was in Afghanistan."
She nodded, already running through people in her head as he finished speaking. "Okay. I'll have them to you in fifteen, thirty minutes top. Do you want them convincingly armed, too?"
"Yes, of course. Everything. Give them ranks, names, I want to sell this. And have someone fix the scarf," he added as an afterthought, observing her hasty attempts to cover her head. Then he hit the speed dial on his phone for the boss. "Hello, sir... I think I've engineered a way for you to enter the playing field and have a little fun."
"If I really need to stand around uselessly, fine," she muttered under her breath, whipping the scarf off her hair and slinging it over her shoulder as she turned to walk away.
On the other line, Jim was grinning. "Nice work, Moran. I'll be down shortly."
"One thing, sir," he said, ignoring Lorna for the time being. "Is Pashto on the list of languages you speak, by any chance?"
"Of course," Jim chuckled, "Do you think I make deals with the Taliban in English? Oohh, is that the little charade you've been putting on for Johnny-boy?"
"Yessir," he said, smiling. "We're working to convince him that he's in Taliban captivity. We've got almost thirty-six hours... I figure if we convince him that Holmes is a fiction, he might be willing to tell us more about him. I'm not sure. Either way, I'm enjoying what this is going to do to him."
"I've always found psychological to be my favorite. Much longer-lasting consequences than anything you can do to a person physically," Jim hummed, "See if you can wrangle a little information about Miss Morstan while you're at it."
"Of course, sir. I'm having some Pashto speakers put into costume to sell things, and we'll go from there. Any questions before I go back in?"
"Hm. Go ahead and ask about what sort of state Sherly was when they last met. I wonder if there's a weakness to be exploited there."
"I'll do what I can, sir," he said, nodding. "Is that all for now?"
"For now. I have yet to think of anything else that I don't already know," he sighed, and abruptly hung up.
He didn't blink, just tucked the phone away and straightened his suit. A moment later, he opened the door to the holding cell, reentering the game.