Me- Don't write a Sherlock fic. No one is even in that fandom anymore!
Also me-*writes one anyway* ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Disclaimer- I do not own Sherlock...
Trigger Warning- This is set during TRF so there are obviously going to be mentions of blood and (fake) suicide.
Caught in the Crosshairs
The phone call from one of Mycroft's lot informing John that Mrs. Hudson has been shot will surely get him away from Barts.
"What is it?" Sherlock asks.
"Paramedics," John says, out of breath with despondency. "Mrs. Hudson's been shot."
"What? How?"
"Well, probably one of the killers you managed to attract- Jesus, Jesus! She's dying, Sherlock. Let's go."
The phone call will ensure that John leaves. With a few choice words, he'll even do so without Sherlock.
"You go, I'm busy," Sherlock says it in his most monotone voice, disinterested, unemotional in the face of John's overflowing emotion.
It gets the intended reaction. "Busy?" John turns back to Sherlock, tone shocked, his muscles locked.
"Thinking, I need to think," Sherlock goes on, it's far too easy to rile John up, to bring forth sentimentality in place of logical thought.
"You need to— Doesn't she mean anything to you? You once half-killed a man because he laid a finger on her." Getting truly upset now, Sherlock pushes it further.
"She's my landlady."
"She's dying! Y-you machine— sod this. Sod this. You stay here if you want. On your own."
It won't take much more now; John is already leaving. One more barb will ensure that John won't return for some time. "Alone is what I have. Alone protects me."
Awe, but John, he has always been the exception to the rest. "Nope, friends protect people," he answers, letting the door shut behind him.
Yes, Sherlock thinks, that is a lesson that John Watson has instilled within him. One that no one else ever tried to convey to Sherlock, or perhaps one that he was unprepared to learn until he befriended John himself.
It is because of that lesson in friendship that Sherlock has set this plan into motion, to protect those closest to him.
Sherlock absently listens to John's determined stride until it fades away. He vaguely wonders if that will have been their last interaction for the foreseeable future. What's coming next could go a number of ways, there is no guarantee that Sherlock will be returning to Baker Street any time soon.
Closing his eyes, Sherlock takes a long breath, wishing for the pull of a cigarette.
It's all coming to a head now, the months of planning, of anticipation. In only a manner of minutes, Sherlock will have bested Moriarty, and then phase two will commence.
Sherlock sits in wait, fingers steepled under his chin, blood thrumming through his veins.
He is ready.
When his phone pings Sherlock knows it is time. The players are on the board and Sherlock has accounted for every conceivable outcome, it's Moriarty's move, Sherlock's ready to play.
Sherlock departs from the lab, ducking into a utility closet to collect his coat and scarf from where he hid them away. He hugs the Belstaff tightly around himself and situates his scarf, armoured and ready.
It is a right and a left and another right down an empty corridor, then an uneventful ride in the lift to the top floor. Sherlock's footsteps seem too loud against the linoleum, and they seem to only grow louder as he makes his way up the winding stairwell.
Sherlock glances to the camera hidden atop the roof access door. The game is on, Sherlock gives a wink to the camera, better keep a close watch brother dear.
There is no sense in forestalling the inevitable any longer. Sherlock shoves the door open and readies himself for the dragon's den. Moriarty promised to burn the heart out of him. Well, Sherlock is prepared to burn.
The question is, is Moriarty prepared to burn with him?
The cold London air washes over Sherlock as he steps onto the rooftop. He expects Moriarty to be reclined along the edge or staring blandly across the cityscape, nonchalant to the point of absurdity.
The sight that greets Sherlock, however, is one that brings the Detective up short, cutting off his confident stride. Sherlock stops, staring at the other occupant of the rooftop while the unnerving feeling of shock, sends conflicting signals through his brain.
"Well," John says, voice strained, slightly chocked. "Here we are again, Sherlock. You, and me, and John Watson. With our problem, The Final Problem."
Sherlock takes a breath of stale London air and forces himself forward, he swallows down his mounting anxiety and places his perfectly constructed persona to the forefront and takes one step after another. He cannot waver, not now, not with it all on the line.
He scans John for injury, for any change apart from the almost indistinguishable earpiece stuck in his right ear, he finds none.
There is no Semtex this time, just John.
"I was under the impression that this reunion would be clandestine," he says, keeping his voice unattached and indifferent.
Best not show his hand, Sherlock can't afford to give the game away.
Sherlock hadn't accounted for this.
He thought Moriarty would be far cleverer. It's quite unoriginal to use the same move twice. Moriarty's plays are usually more ostentatious, made to be looked at and admired. But this is not cunning or elaborate.
It is simple, far too simple.
"Oh yes, I considered it, truly. A face-off, the final showdown, could have been a real treat," Moriarty says, using John's voice. "But I thought about it, I thought and thought. And this…it was just so much more fun." Sherlock can imagine the manic glee the statement is meant to project, but John's tone is nothing but stiff and forced.
Sherlock doesn't deign to reply, too preoccupied with the sight of John before him. He takes in John's rumpled jumper that speaks of hands on him, the scuff on his left shoe that shows he fought back, the bruise on his neck that means it was three against one.
John is ridged, his hands unshaking and clenched at his sides. He's standing on a red X made of tape, feet spread at full attention, a soldier ready for battle.
Sherlock breathes and does not let his rising panic show.
"Did you almost start to wonder if I was real?" John says over an exhale, anger darkening the pitch of his words. "Did I nearly get you?"
Sherlock may be looking at John, but he is still facing Moriarty. "Richard Brook," he answers.
"Nobody seems to get the joke." John's eyes flash, he doesn't get the joke either. "But you do."
"Of course," Sherlock agrees, mouth running on autopilot while his mind races through possible outcomes and differing contingencies. "Rich Brook in German is Reichenbach. The case that made my name."
"Just trying to have some fun," John says through clenched teeth. He stops, tries to get his respiration under control. Sherlock can see his growing anxiety in the set of his shoulders.
Sherlock, absurdly, finds himself wanting to give voice to a reassurance. Something trite and rudimentary to ease John's fraying nerves. But Sherlock wouldn't know where to begin.
And now is not the time for such a display of vulnerability. Anything and everything Sherlock says will be held against not only himself, but John as well. Moriarty has set up the rules of this game, and to engage with John in any capacity might be construed as cheating.
"All my life I've been searching for distractions," John says, Moriarty says, "and you were the best distraction. And now I don't even have you."
Sherlock's phone sounds off, vibrating in his coat pocket. The ringtone is not one of his own, but the tolling of the death bells is instantly recognisable. Sherlock locks eyes with John for a moment as he pulls his mobile out. John has recognised it as well, his lips pursing unhappily.
A sense of foreboding builds between them as Sherlock presses the phone to his ear, not daring to move his gaze from John.
"Because I've beaten you," Moriarty's voice is clear over the connection, his words echoed outwardly by John with only a minor delay. "And you know what? In the end, it was easy." They both say, "it was easy."
Sherlock watches John as John watches him in return, feeling something within himself waver. The smell of chlorine abruptly fills Sherlock's nose, a morbid assault on his senses that he shoves away roughly.
No. No, he must keep himself in control.
Moriarty may be changeable, but Sherlock is adaptable.
"Now I've got to go back to playing with the ordinary people," Moriarty bemoans over the line. "And it turns out you're ordinary, just like all of them."
This is where Sherlock would have brought up the keycode, where he would've played the fool, act as if he were three steps behind while he was ten ahead.
Sherlock has planned extensively for thirteen of the most likely scenarios, all of which would be the endgame. All where Moriarty would need to believe he had defeated Sherlock utterly and truly.
Within those thirteen scenarios, John being held captive on the rooftop with him was not a possibility that Sherlock had anticipated.
It is a game-changer, Sherlock no longer needs to play the fool, he is one.
"I'm disappointed," Moriarty whines in his ear, but it is John's voice that Sherlock's attention latches onto. "I'm disappointed in you. Ordinary Sherlock." It's disconcerting to hear those words coming from John, even if they are not his own.
His thought must have inadvertently shown on his face because John gives the most minuscule of twitches then, an aborted shake of the head, telling Sherlock that he disagrees. It makes Sherlock want to smile for a moment, John's utter faith in him, his loyalty.
"It doesn't take much does it? Nothing clever, nothing diabolical," Moriarty goes on, sneering and mocking over the speaker. "Just put a target on John Watson's back and Sherlock Holmes is beaten into submission. I won the game the moment you let sentiment get the better of you, Sherlock."
Sherlock doesn't voice a response, he presses the mobile harder to his ear, bites his tongue to keep himself silent.
"It saddens me, truly. I thought you were different, Sherlock. But you've gotten caught up with the angles. Did they give you wings? Think you can fly?"
John's eyes flicker as he repeats this, catching on Sherlock before they glance to the high rooftops around them.
"Would you like to explain it to John, Sherlock? How this game of ours ends?"
Sherlock can see that John has already figured it out. It's in the way his nostrils flare and his fingers clench. It's in the way his breathing is too even and controlled even as he recites the words given to him.
But this scene is not for John, it is for Moriarty, so Sherlock plays his part. "I kill myself, thus completing Moriarty's story. I die in disgrace."
"Genius Detective proved to be a fraud. I read it in the paper, so it must be true," John's voice stutters, a guttural noise escaping his throat. He pushes through, words an echo to Moriarty's. "I love newspapers. Fairy tales. And pretty grim ones, too."
Sherlock looks away from John, he can't face the growing despair in his friend's posture. It's eating at Sherlock, chipping away at his resolve.
"I don't have to give you any more incentive do I, Sherlock? It's simple, if you don't jump, your friends will die."
Sherlock swallows hard, clutches the mobile so tightly it creaks against his fingers. "Who?"
"Everyone, everyone. All your pet angles. Three bullets, three gunmen, three victims."
Sherlock glances back to John as he repeats the threat. There is a determination in the set of his shoulders, a resolve in the lines of his face.
"There's only one way off this rooftop for you, Sherlock." Moriarty sings, high pitched and manic. "Only one way to call off the killers, and that's with your blood on the pavement."
John cringes away from the words even as he says them. Sherlock wonders who these mind games, these theatrics, are really intended to distress, him, or John.
It doesn't matter.
"Go on," Moriarty continues, feigning boredom now. "Not for me, but for John. Do it for John and the old woman and the dull Inspector. Off you pop."
John is panting now, trying to restrain himself from shifting on his feet, from saying the things he longs to say, from protecting Sherlock.
Sherlock gives a twitch of his head, telling John to stop, don't move, don't speak, don't take any risks. It is not just their lives on the line, they need to be soldiers today, there can be no sentiment involved.
Oh, but Sherlock is filled with it.
Sherlock takes a breath, tastes gun oil and smoky cologne and chlorine. "Will you give us one moment, please? One moment of privacy."
There is a pause, Sherlock holds himself completely still, wonders if his request will be denied. "Of course, you have three minutes. I'll be counting."
The phone line goes dead, but Sherlock knows Moriarty is still listening. What happens next will be for his benefit, he must think that Sherlock has jumped, that he has truly died.
And if Moriarty must think that, then John will as well.
Sherlock covertly brings up his brother's contact as he lowers his mobile from his ear, blindly fingering a message as he stuffs the phone into his pocket.
It has been set into motion now.
"John," he starts.
But John shakes his head, interrupts with an adamant, "don't. No, Sherlock, no. We are not— I'm not…you can't—"
"It's all right, John," Sherlock says, tries to be reassuring. "It's going to be all right."
"No, it's bloody not!" John yells, angry and upset. "It's not!" He begins to take a step forward, away from the X on the ground, a red dot immediately appears on his chest.
"John, stop!" Sherlock shouts, half panicked, taking his own step forward. "Stop, please."
"All right," John whispers, hands up in surrender for an enemy they cannot see. "All right," he says again, looking from Sherlock to the little dot on his chest.
Sherlock takes a few cautious steps toward the edge of the roof. He glances over the side, sees the drop, and the agents and homeless in place. Mycroft will have moved the cameras so there will be no visual of the actual pavement below.
Moriarty will watch the fall. He will read the forged records of a post-mortem. But he will not see the impact. Nor will he lay eyes on a body.
"Sherlock," John's voice pulls Sherlock's gaze away from the street, he sounds congested, distraught.
For a moment Sherlock regrets his choice to keep John in the dark. He hadn't realised how deeply this would affect John. It all feels rather cruel now, watching as John tries not to fall apart in front of Sherlock.
John's ignorance was supposed to keep him safe. If he were not fully in the battlefield the chances of injury would be far less, the probability of survival is much higher while side-lined.
But Moriarty has taken that protection away. He has made John a co-conspirator to all the lies and secrets that Moriarty has told. If he speaks a word of them, if he tries to tell the truth, there is no accounting for what Moriarty may do.
Sherlock wants to let John in on the game. But to do so is asking for death. John's reaction, his pain and anguish must be real. Because if Moriarty suspects anything amiss then everything, months of careful planning and meticulous preparation, will all have been for nothing.
So, Sherlock plays the game.
"I want you to tell them. I want you to tell Lestrade, and Mrs. Hudson, and Molly. In fact, I want you to tell anyone that will listen to you."
John is already shaking his head, breathing too fast and too hard. Sherlock finds himself blinking against tears, voice cracking over his words.
"That I'm a fake. That I created Moriarty for my own purposes. Tell them that everything that has been said about me is true."
"No," John isn't having it, even pinned down with no conceivable escape. "No. Stop it now."
Sherlock gives John a watery smile, lets the tears drip down his face unhindered. "This is how it has to be, John. To keep them safe. There is no choice in that."
John closes his eyes, breathes in hard.
The wind tousle Sherlock's fringe and whips at his coat, urging him toward the ledge, to the inevitable plunge. He feels vaguely nauseated, dizzy to the point of disorientation. He has to swallow against the sensation of it, lest it overwhelm him.
Sherlock takes the final two steps to the edge of the rooftop and steps onto the ledge. Their allotted three minutes are almost up, time for the final act, there is no use in prolonging it any longer.
John makes a chocked noise as Sherlock steps up. Sherlock turns around just as John gives a seemingly involuntary jolt forward, pivoting to Sherlock instinctively.
Sherlock thrusts an arm forward, hand outstretched toward John. "No, stay exactly where you are. Don't move."
John swallows hard enough for Sherlock to hear. Nodding as he locks his gaze on Sherlock. There is a moment of silence, of acceptance.
Sherlock hadn't expected this, and even if he had, he is unsure if he could have conceivably prepared himself for it. There are no contingency plans when it comes to such things as the heart.
"It's time to say goodbye, John."
John lets out an angry sob and Sherlock clenches his hands tightly, nails digging into his palms, grounding himself with the dull prick of pain.
"It's all right," he says again, though it is not. It will be, but for now it is the purest of agonies.
"Sherlock," John starts, voice catching over his name. "You are the best and wisest man that I have ever known. And I am glad to have met you."
Sherlock nods, "and I you, John."
Sherlock takes a breath, lets it out to calm himself. "John, there is one thing I need to ask of you," he continues before John can reply. "Don't look," he says. "No matter what, do not look. Please, will you do this for me?"
John's own tears spillover. "Yes. All right," he says in a whisper, almost inaudible. "I won't…I won't look."
Sherlock nods, "thank you, John." He takes the final step backward, knowing that an airbag will be there to catch him.
Sherlock— please no. God no— Sherlock—
John can't breathe.
His ears are ringing with the remembered sound of a bullet, and all John can think is, 'please, God, let him live.'
John pivots atop the red X he was instructed to stand on. He wants to glance down to the pavement below, wants to see that Sherlock has pulled off one more miracle, wants to see if-if…
But John had promised not to look, and he isn't sure what he'd do if he saw a body on the street. John isn't sure he wouldn't just let himself topple off the edge to chase after Sherlock one last time.
John doesn't know how he is still upright when the world has turned upside down around him. The effect is dizzying, leaving John to tremble, his heart pounding.
The door leading to the rooftop bangs open a few moments later, and then people are on John. Pulling him away from the red X and out of the line of snipers. Hands tugging at John and supporting him when his legs threaten to give out from under him.
He catches only snippets of what is being said to him, "all right, Dr. Watson?" and "Moriarty in the wind," and "Mycroft Holmes."
Too late, John thinks, too bloody late this time Mycroft. You betrayed him and failed him, and now that you've deigned to finally intervene it's Too Bloody Late.
John can still hear James Moriarty's voice in his ear, singsong and mocking. "There's only one way off this rooftop for you, Sherlock. And that's with your blood on the pavement."
John chokes against the memory, stumbling as he is escorted down the stairwell. He can still see Sherlock's face as he came onto the roof, as he saw not Moriarty waiting for him, but John.
It's not every day that Sherlock Holmes is surprised. It is always a harrowing sight, seeing someone get the upper hand on the consulting detective.
John has never before wanted so viscerally to erase an image from his mind.
John is steered from one hallway down another, they blur together into something indistinguishable. The sight of it dizzying, so John closes his eyes and lets himself be led.
A ride down the lift leaves John slightly nauseated and unsteady on his feet. But the agents just hustle him down another hall, through a set of doors that John vaguely recognises open to the morgue.
His mind immediately rebels against the idea. Of seeing his friend, -of seeing Sherlock- bloodied and lying still and lifeless on a cold examination table.
The thought of it is sickening.
John is ushered forward, practically shoved into the room, and then he, along with the rest of the world, just, stops.
Sherlock is sat up on the gurney, a bloodied sheet pooled in his lap. He was in the middle of speaking, fidgeting with the cuff of his coat, but at the sight of John he freezes.
Suddenly John is in motion, he's striding forward and marching across the room without conscious thought, grabbing at Sherlock with shaking hands.
He pulls the taller man down, clutching to Sherlock, hands fisted in the fabric of his beloved Belstaff. John feels breathless, like he suddenly found his ability to breathe but his lungs aren't quite sure how.
"John?" Sherlock asks from where he is pressed up against John, his voice uncertain, like when he asks, 'not good?'.
It makes John want to laugh; it makes John want to cry.
John doesn't answer, he's not sure he could even if he tried. His brain has been put into a tailspin and his thoughts are still trying to catch up.
John's fingers move on pure instinct. He sees the blood on Sherlock's face and the wet matted-down curls of his hair, and he has to check. Has to feel for himself that Sherlock's skull is intact, that he isn't truly bleeding, that everything is all right.
Sherlock is quiet and obedient throughout John's examination. More patient than John has ever known him to be. He just mutters a soft, "it's not mine," when John swipes some blood from his temple and prods at his sphenoid bone.
It is then that John can finally take a breath, that he can get his racing heart to calm down, that his fingers no-longer shake.
John pulls away, suddenly feeling self-conscious now that he's remembered that they are not alone in this room and that the eyes of Molly and Mycroft's agents are still on them.
It takes him a moment to find his voice. "So, not dead then?"
Sherlock smiles, and John can't help it when he smiles back. "On the contrary, John. I am in fact, quite dead."
He flings the bloodied sheet off of himself and hops off the gurney. Sherlock always moves with a confidence, with grace, John can't help but be a bit mesmerised by it, the fact that Sherlock is up and moving and alive.
"Pardon me for disagreeing, but you look very much the opposite of dead," John can't help pointing out the obvious.
Sherlock gives him a look, the one that says he is both amused and exasperated by John and all of his ordinariness.
"Do keep up John. I've just committed suicide after being outed as a fraud. I'm sure the news is already spreading like wildfire. The press is going to be utterly rapacious. The masses outraged. It's all quite controversial."
John swallows hard, even while knowing that is not true, it is still gut-wrenching to hear. John isn't sure how Sherlock is so cavalier about it. His name, his reputation, everything about him has just been destroyed.
But Sherlock has never cared about such things, it was John who did the caring for him.
"All right," John says, shifting on his feet. "So, if you're…dead. Then where does that leave me?"
Sherlock's demeanour suddenly changes, his shoulders droop slightly and he fiddles with the cuff of his coat again before he clasps his hands behind his back.
"Awe, yes," he exhales, rolling on the balls of his feet. "I apologise for that, John. You were not meant to get caught in the crosshairs. I didn't foresee Moriarty using you for such a ploy. That has…irreparably changed things."
John feels his stance shift, feet set and shoulders stiff. "In what way?"
Sherlock glances away from John, pale eyes flickering. "I naively hoped that if I were to keep you in the dark, then you would remain safe. Moriarty involving you has changed things, however. In doing so he has made you complicit to the lies he has told, putting a target on your back." Sherlock looks back up at John, eyes bright green in contrast to the blood on his face. "So now you have a choice to make."
John can't help but feel that this is some sort of pivotal moment, but he only has a fleeting idea as to why. "What choice?"
"There are three options," Sherlock says, "you could conceivably stay at Baker Street. But you would have to keep quiet about my survival as well as Moriarty's lies. You'd have to live as if I were dead and Moriarty was never real to begin with. Though there is always the risk that Moriarty will come after you even if you keep silent.
"The second is witness protection. It wouldn't be a problem to place you somewhere with a new name and a new life. We would, of course, set up a secondary false identity and allow Moriarty to catch wind of the decoy, letting him believe he has the upper hand. Though I would insist that Mycroft's people still keep watch over you to ensure your safety."
Sherlock trails off here, seeming lost in thought, so John prompts. "And the third?"
Sherlock sets his jaw, taking a breath before he locks his eyes onto John's, his gaze almost daunting in all of its intensity. "Moriarty is a spider, John, and spiders have webs. He has a widespread network, a criminal empire of sorts, and I plan to take it down one thread at a time."
John can see where this is going, he doesn't interrupt, just listens.
"The third option," Sherlock says, "is for you to die with me. Let Moriarty think that you've gone into witness protection while the rest of the world buys into the lie that he will no doubt spin. That Sherlock Holmes, 'The Lying Detective', killed his blogger in order to buy his silence." Sherlock takes a breath, straightens to his full height. "It will take some time to dismantle his web, years possibly." He lets a beat of silence fall between them before a hesitant smile curls the corners of his mouth. "Could be dangerous."
John thinks about how alone he had felt before he met Sherlock. He thinks about how empty 221B would feel without Sherlock there to bring it to life. He thinks about starting over again, but this time with a new name and no friends to rely on. He thinks about how much he doesn't want to do either of those things.
John's mind is already made up.
It was made up months ago when Sherlock dragged him off to chase after a gigantic hound. It was made up over a year ago when they stood together at a pool with a bomb at their feet. It was made up the moment Sherlock first opened his mouth to asked, 'Afghanistan or Iraq?'.
John has been chasing after Sherlock since the day he met him. Why in the world would he stop chasing after him now?
By the look on Sherlock's face, he's already deduced John's inevitable answer, but he lets John respond anyway. "When do we start?"
I couldn't get this idea out of my head, so I had to put it down on a page instead. :)
If you write in UK English and saw any mistakes please let me know. I tried my best with the spelling, but I'm sure I missed some.
Comments are always appreciated, please drop one if you have the time. ;)