Chapter Three.

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John kicked off his work shoes with a sigh of relief, revealing mismatched socks. The one on his left foot was a sports sock, white-and-red, and so old that it was almost worn through. The one on his right was a business sock, charcoal grey and too big for him, so that it bunched uncomfortably around the heel. Nearly two years since his marriage and he was still wearing Sherlock's socks.

There was music on in the kitchen, Mary half-dancing as she sashayed around clattering pans and roasting dishes in 4/4 time. John sighed.

Popular music was his own personal hell. Almost every song he heard had some line that made him think of Sherlock – so much so that he had taken to cataloguing them. The first time he noticed it, he'd tried an experiment: how many songs did it take before he found one that contained no reference, no reminder of his former life?

The first song had been Elton John's 'Daniel'.

'Daniel is leaving tonight on a plane... I can see the red tail-lights heading for Spain…'

No.

After that, he kept a careful record. It was just an exercise. Just a game he played with himself. And yes, he knew that they were all fucking love songs, and didn't that just piss him right off?

'I'm… so much like you… restless and reckless… I need a clue.'

No.

'My mind it kinda goes fast… I try to slow it down for you…'

No.

'I heard that you'd settled down; that you found a girl and you're married now…'

Great. Now even the fucking radio was guilt-tripping him.

When he'd arrived home that first day, Mary had been playing Beatles tracks and he'd thought he might have a chance; but it soon became abundantly apparent that he'd misjudged terribly. 'Maxwell's Silver Hammer' was bloody made for Sherlock Holmes (even as he'd fed his daughter tinned peaches, he could picture the maniac bouncing around the room, clapping his hands together in glee). 'Rocky Raccoon' was not much better. He'd thought that he might be onto a winner with 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds' until he'd heard the words 'newspaper', 'taxis' and 'marmalade' in quick succession, and no, dammit, that was just bloody pathetic.

On that first day he'd been forced, in the end, to switch to some bloody kids' station, and he'd never in his life been so pleased to hear 'Single Ladies' (Hah. Try working your way into that one, William Sherlock Scott Holmes).

He'd taken to keeping track, day by day – at the surgery; out shopping; on the tube. Eighteen songs till he heard one that didn't remind him of Sherlock (thank you very much, Ms. Beyoncé). Thirty-three songs…. Twelve… Twenty-four… In his worst week it had reached a staggering, ludicrous, impossible eighty-one and he'd been forced to switch stations until he was listening to a serious-sounding Arabic bloke droning the Qur'an, but by then he'd had eighty-one songs-worth of missing Sherlock Holmes and it was bloody well worth it.

The postcard from Sherlock was in John's pocket. He'd folded it in half and slipped it into his jeans when he'd dressed that morning. In the time that he'd had it, the fold had softened and the corners had already begun to fray with handling.

He retrieved it now, collapsing back against the head-rest of the couch and contemplating the ridiculous scribble that passed for Sherlock's handwriting.

Mary emerged from the kitchen, humming along to 'Sex on Fire' ('All the commotion… the kiddie-like play… Has people talking…' Nope, that one was out too). She had glasses with ice and lemon in one hand and their daughter on her hip.

"Hey Bilbo," John said, as his daughter was deposited unceremoniously in his lap. She squealed shrilly and tried to insert her fingers into his left nostril.

"Gin?" he asked, eyebrows raised, as Mary passed him a glass. She plopped down on the couch next to him with a sigh of contentment.

"Hey, it's after five. I love not working Saturdays."

"Shut up."

Mary grinned.

"What's this?" she said, indicating the postcard.

"Postcard."

Mary shot him a Look.

"From Sherlock," he elaborated, reluctantly.

Mary reached across, and John was vaguely surprised at the difficulty she seemed to have in prising the card from his fingers. She turned the postcard over and skimmed it quickly, her eyebrows climbing higher and higher up her forehead.

"'I love you'?" she quoted sardonically.

"It's a code," John said quickly. "It doesn't mean – that."

"Right," she said; though the amused look she favoured him with was anything but believing.

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It was after dinner, after Billie's bath and story and bedtime, when there was a knock at the door for the second time in as many nights. It was the same knock. John exchanged a wary look with his wife.

"I'll get it," he said.

Mycroft was waiting politely on the stoop, accompanied by Greg Lestrade and, to John's complete befuddlement, Molly Hooper. She greeted him with a hug and a kiss on the cheek – something that invariably made her blush. John had initially been discomforted by this, until he'd realised that Molly blushed no matter whom the recipient. He returned her hug, catching Greg's eye over her shoulder as he did so. Greg waggled his eyebrows salaciously, but didn't seem to feel the need to kiss him, and they settled instead for a masculine nod of acknowledgement.

Once they were all settled in the lounge, adequately provided with tea, coffee, gin and tonic, banana muffins and biscuits (according to taste), Mycroft opened proceedings.

"I would like to thank you all for coming," he said. From the looks on the faces of Molly and Greg, they hadn't had a lot of say in the matter.

"My proposal, as you are aware, is a relatively simple one: locate my brother, and bring him home."

"Your brother who is currently swanning around Cuba somewhere with a price on his head, right?" That was Greg, pithy as ever. "And this is simple how, exactly?"

"The execution, I grant you, may be a trifle problematic, but the premise is simplicity itself."

"Hang on a sec," John said. "What do you mean, 'a price on his head'? That's the first I've heard of it."

"Inspector Lestrade is being melodramatic," Mycroft huffed, sounding annoyed. John and Greg rolled their eyes at each other (melodrama: not something anyone could ever accuse you of, right Mycroft?).

"Sherlock does not have a price on his head per se, though there are certainly people out there who would like very much to kill him. I cannot fathom precisely what has led him to Cuba in the first place, so I cannot know for sure, but I am almost certain that he is walking into a trap."

John frowned. "He was following up on that agent bloke, you said. What do we know about him?"

Mycroft folded his hands together on the table in front of him. "At one time, I knew him well. He went by the work-name 'Knight' and he was killed in Germany eleven years ago."

"But Sherlock thinks he's found something about him…" Mary said slowly. "What?"

"As to that, I do not know. Perhaps information, which he may have managed to pass to a third party before he died. Perhaps Sherlock believes that he escaped – left the service; made a new life for himself – though I find it hard to credit; the man I knew was exceptionally loyal. In either case, any new intelligence regarding him will be of interest to a large number of organisations – Soviet and Middle Eastern, of course, but also to the Chinese, the Americans, and sundry others. Knight was a powerful weapon in the British service, and he had a great deal of knowledge regarding our protocols and service personnel that could, in the right hands, still be exceptionally valuable today."

"So that means Sherlock will have an advantage, won't he?" John asked slowly. "If he's not playing by your rules."

Mycroft allowed himself a thin smile.

"It is possible," he said. "Sherlock's methods have always been somewhat – unorthodox. But I would not count on this to save him. Sherlock was already a person of interest to those with eyes at the time of Knight's death, and anything that Knight knew of him may now be known by others. Then, too, Sherlock has achieved a degree of notoriety in the recent past which has brought him to the attention of even the general public. I think we can take it as read that others will also have been watching."

John winced internally, recognising the barb. His damn blog. Sometimes it seemed like the only people reading it were drug lords, spies and serial killers.

"At any rate," Mycroft continued, "my brother seems to think that there is something in these rumours that is worth risking his life for. It only remains to determine how best we can prevent him from doing so."

There was a sceptical silence. John dunked a biscuit in his tea, looking around at the others. A doctor, a diplomat, a police officer, a pathologist, and a part-time nurse. Oh, and a baby. Let's not forget the baby. Greg voiced the thought for him:

"Look, I don't want to sound defeatist Mycroft, but what makes you think we have a hope in hell of pulling this off? We're all too old and too fat and too boring to be going up against the bloody secret police or the communist resistance or whatever the hell they have over there."

"Don't be ridiculous, Inspector," Mycroft snapped. He seemed, for the first time, affronted. "Do you think I would have suggested it if it were untenable? Between us, we have every skill set that we are likely to need. Three of the four of you are trained in the use of firearms. Two of you –" (he indicated John and Mary) "are good at it."

"Gee, thanks," Greg grumbled.

"I am positive that you will improve with practice," said Mycroft magnanimously.

"And me?" Molly asked awkwardly. "What am I supposed to do? I mean, I want Sherlock back, of course I do, but I can't um… shoot people or - or anything. I mean, if you get killed I can do your autopsies…"

John winced, hearing Sherlock's voice in his head (Don't try to make jokes Molly); but rather to his surprise, Greg chuckled. Molly looked startled for a moment, and flushed pink, but she met Greg's eyes with a pleased smile. John wondered how on earth he'd missed that one.

Mycroft raised an imperious eyebrow. "You, Miss Hooper, are included in the capacity of babysitter." He smiled blandly. "For those occasions when John and Ms. Agnew are otherwise engaged."

John clenched his teeth. "Mary's not coming," he snapped.

Mycroft had been referring to Mary as 'Ms. Agnew' since the day Sherlock had been shot. Just another subtle reminder that half the world's secret services knew John's own wife better than he did.

Mary herself had never appeared troubled by the epithet. John still didn't know the details of what had transpired between her and Mycroft while he had been in a speeding ambulance clutching Sherlock's cold, still hand or in the hospital waiting room praying every prayer he could remember. The summary of events, so far as he could gather, consisted of "Mary shot Mycroft's brother; Mycroft threw Mary into a wall". He had no idea how much of this stuff Greg and Molly knew. Judging by their perplexed expressions, it wasn't a whole lot.

He would have thought his wife would be pleased to have an excuse to have nothing further to do with Mycroft Holmes. Apparently, he was wrong.

"Mary is coming," she insisted. "I want Sherlock back too, you know."

"That's not the point," John growled. "Billie needs someone to look after her and that someone is her mother."

"What, because I'm the woman?"

"No, because he's my friend."

"And I'm a better shot than either of you, so if there's anyone who'll be staying home minding the baby it'll be you John Watson."

"Mary –" John began, but Mycroft broke in:

"Ms. Agnew's assistance will be exceptionally useful, John. Miss Hooper can travel with you as far as Cuba, at which point you can put her and Miss Watson on a plane to New Zealand. I have an old associate there who can keep them safely out of harm's way. It has the additional benefit of strengthening your cover – four friends on holiday, two couples and a child – what could be more natural?"

Molly flushed pink again at the mention of the word 'couples'. Greg's eyes flicked to John, and then hastily away.

"I notice you're not including yourself in this, Mycroft," Mary said sweetly. "Where precisely will you be?"

"In Tokyo, at least initially."

Mary raised her eyebrows. "Oh?"

"I have a mind to add one other to our number. I'm sure you remember Ms. Adler, John?"

John's head whipped round so fast he spilled his tea.

"What?"

Mycroft smiled. "I think she will prove useful, don't you?"

"You're not serious. She's –"

"Alive and well and living in Tokyo, yes."

John glowered. "So all that stuff about her being beheaded in Pakistan?"

Mycroft gave an elegant shrug of one shoulder. "Sherlock rescued her. I've never quite been able to fathom why. But she got in touch a few years ago and she's been rather useful since, I must say."

"That complete cock." John swore. "That smug, know-it-all bastarding cock."

Mycroft smirked. "Isn't he?"

"Adler's the woman from that Christmas, right?" Greg asked, brow furrowed. "The – um – dominatrix."

Molly's blush, this time, was full-on sunset. John guessed she didn't have too many happy memories associated with that particular holiday. Mary's eyebrows were raised so high up her forehead that they were in danger of disappearing.

"And how exactly is a dominatrix going to be useful?" she asked. John's blog post about the Irene-thing, he remembered belatedly, had been rather short on specifics.

"Oh, she'll be useful," Mycroft said, amused. "She has no particular talent with weaponry, I'll admit, but she is exceptionally persuasive."

"If persuasion's necessary, why can't Mary do it?" John growled.

"Gee, thanks love. Your chivalry knows no bounds, it really doesn't."

"With all due respect," Mycroft said firmly, "Ms. Agnew is a forty-one year old mother, and was still breastfeeding a child until two months ago. Ms. Adler, by contrast, is thirty-four, with the body of a twenty-five year old."

"Mycroft!" Greg scolded. Mycroft utterly failed to look abashed.

John frowned. "Mary's thirty-eight."

"Mm… forty-one, I think you'll find."

"Oh bloody Christ."

Mary scowled venomously. "Thanks for your support, John."

"So that's a 'yes' to Ms. Adler then?" Mycroft asked, ignoring them. He flipped open the sleek leather briefcase that sat at his feet and began handing around sheaves of paper. John's was a towering stack thirty pages high.

"Your instructions and itineraries are here. Please destroy them once you have committed them to memory. My flight leaves first thing tomorrow, so from that point on we shall have no further contact until we rendezvous. I anticipate that I will have four days before I am missed, but I trust that you realise the importance of staying below the radar. My people should have no reason to associate you with my apparent disappearance, but all the same, do not draw attention to yourselves."

"Woah, hang on Mycroft, wait a sec. We've all got work and stuff. We can't just all bugger off to Cuba together on holiday. It'll look suspicious as fuck."

"You are not 'buggering off to Cuba', Detective Inspector. You are enjoying an extended European cruise with several close friends, booked, I think you will find, eight months in advance. Alerts appeared in your superiors' calendars last night, reminding them that you are due to take leave in a week's time."

"Oh for the love of – that is never going to work Mycroft."

"It will," Mycroft said, with his most shark-like smile. "Trust me."

"For Greg and Molly, maybe," Mary frowned. "They work in big offices with lots of staff. But there's only six of us at the clinic and Sarah will know she hasn't given us leave."

Mycroft nodded. "I concur," he said. "Which is why you will need to approach her directly. Tell her whatever you need to, but you must be on that plane. We rendezvous in Cuba sixteen days from now."

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Author's Note: My grateful thanks to everyone who has reviewed, particularly to Lady Zephyr, who's left thoughtful comments on everything Sherlock-related I've ever written. The songs quoted in this chapter, for those who care about such things, are 'Daniel' (Elton John); 'We Don't Have to Look Back Now' (Puddle of Mudd); 'Congratulations' (Blue October); 'Someone Like You' (Adele); and 'Sex on Fire' (Kings of Leon). Apparently, John has eclectic tastes in music. :-P