Chapter Seventeen
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With a casual movement, Sherlock drew his coat tighter about him, the better to mask his bare chest. He could do nothing about the dripping hair and untied shoelaces but, fortunately for him, other people were idiots.
"Oh, heeey!" he said, his speech several octaves higher and rather more American-sounding than usual. "I'm guessing this isn't the way to the mess hall, huh?"
He gave a gormless sort of titter, treating his interlocutor to an inane, rather toothy smile. The lieutenant's death-glare relaxed somewhat, but he didn't lower the rifle.
"Hey, you mind pointing that thing somewhere else? Stuff that can kill me kinda freaks me out a bit, y'know?"
The soldier grunted, his eyes narrowed. "You some kinda lawyer?"
"Naw, photographer. Got mah ID somewhere here." He fumbled in the pocket of his coat, and handed over a laminated card on a lariat. "Charlie Wilkinson, Associated Press."
"And what the fuck are you're doing in here?" the solider growled, unappeased.
"Aw, I'm here covering the trial, yeah? Was meant to meet this guy at the mess hall. Captain Forrest. Maybe you know him?"
"This facility is restricted, you fucking dumbass."
"Aw well, shit. Ahm sorry, man."
"How'd you even get through the gate?"
"Aw, there was some guys comin' through in a truck from the other compound. I just hitched a ride with them."
"And I suppose you can't tell me who it was who was dumb enough to let a fucking journo in?"
"Sorry man. It was a coupl'a guys. Been on the piss a little bit, y'know? Think the kid driving was called Jezza... Maybe Gazza? Reckoned he knew where I'd find that guy Forrest. Hey, any chance you can point me in the right direction?"
"Like fuck, you piece of journo shit. I'm taking you back to your tent and you're gonna bloody stay there, or you'll be on the next plane home. You got that, man?"
Sherlock allowed himself to be grabbed by the bicep and manhandled towards the door. He managed to snag his rucksack on the way past, mumbling about camera equipment. The soldier made an irritated noise and tightened the bruising grip on his arm. Sherlock was frog-marched from the room and out into the compound again. At the nearest gate, he was handed over to a pair of sentries and bundled into a jeep. The drive lasted 26 minutes and passed through two checkpoints along the way, at each of which he was insulted, manhandled, and roundly abused. He adopted an appropriately penitent expression and let it skim over him. Finally, the jeep shuddered to a halt in one of the outermost compounds where, Sherlock knew from his surveillance, the lawyers, press, and other civilians were accommodated. A final gate was unlocked and slammed behind him and a final volley of abuse fired. Outwardly contrite, Sherlock slunk off down the long row of white tents.
He was in.
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Dusk had long since fallen and the evening was well advanced by the time John and Mycroft made it back to the vicinity of their hotel. The closer they got, the more John's feet seemed to drag. He didn't know how to face Mary. He wasn't even sure that he wanted to.
Mycroft, in that uncanny Holmesian way, seemed to divine what John was thinking.
"Mary did not tell the Agency that we were coming, John," he said abruptly, interrupting John's thoughts. "Her loyalty to them was wavering before ever we left London."
"She was still giving them information though," John mumbled. "By her own admission, she was still prepared to shoot you."
Mycroft frowned, not as if the thought of his own assassination was a perturbing one, merely contemplative.
"Not for a while now, I think. She got in too deep. She cared too much for her new life. She justified it to herself with the thought that we were seeking Sherlock only, not endeavouring to tangle with her masters. But from the moment she left England with you and yet kept her silence, I had wondered."
"I think you're wrong," John said quietly. "I'd like to believe you, but… They were warned, by someone. Those soldiers yesterday were looking for me. They knew my name."
"They were warned by someone, I agree. But not, I think, by Mary. The Agency knew that we were coming, yes – and not just any old team sent to round up rogue agents, but we specifically. But – and this is the crucial point – they did not know when or where. Why tell them part, and yet withhold the specifics?"
John frowned. Mycroft's argument made a certain kind of sense, and yet –
"Besides," Mycroft continued, "You were all under surveillance before you left Europe, and not by the Americans. That argues for communication between the Service and the Agency – and not just communication, but collaboration. Collaboration of which I was unaware, and no hint of which has ever passed my desk."
John looked up, his interest caught.
"All of which suggests a traitor," he filled in, following Mycroft's reasoning. "High-level, too."
"Precisely. Whether the Americans are pursing us at the direction of my own people or whether it's the other way around, I couldn't say, but it's rather a moot point in any case."
"You mean 'either way we look at it we've still got both MI6 and the CIA out for our blood'? That sort of moot point?"
"Mm. Something along those lines, yes."
"We're fucked."
"Oh, I don't think so. Not yet."
"So who is it then? This traitor who has a special interest in keeping Sherlock out of Guantanamo?"
"Genius though I may be, John, I can hardly confirm that from here. Not that I don't have my suspicions."
John frowned. The idea that Mary hadn't sold them out was reassuring, in its way, but if it had been Anthea or one of Mycroft's people they were hardly any better off.
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When they were two blocks out from the hotel, they separated. Mycroft loitered unobtrusively in a nearby square while John hastened onwards, chewing his lip in an agony of indecision.
He still hadn't worked out what to think as he fitted his room key into the old-fashioned lock. It was only the thought of what Mycroft would say if he came back to find John vacillating in the corridor that convinced him to turn the key and slip inside.
The sight that greeted him was one of the strangest he could have imagined.
Molly, Greg and Irene Adler were lined up against the far wall, each levelling a large and serious-looking firearm in his general direction. Mary, standing at Greg's shoulder, appeared to be in the middle of dispensing tips. Billie, meanwhile, was standing naked in the middle of the room, jigging about in a sort of dance and chewing messily on a rusk. She squealed at the sight of John and made an un-coordinated dash for the open doorway, her little feet stamping and her face split in a toothy grin.
"Dadadadadada!"
John shut the door hastily.
"Hello Bilbo," he said, endeavouring simultaneously to remove his coat and prevent her from climbing his leg.
Mary gasped.
"John! Oh my god. What happened?"
"Christ!" Greg swore.
Belatedly, John remembered that he was covered in blood from neck to groin. Before he could do anything sensible about it, the woman who he still wasn't sure he was speaking to had an arm around his back and was pressing him down into a chair, her hands fumbling with the buttons of his shirt. He winced as a cold palm found his skin.
"Calm down," he told her shortly, batting the hands away. "It was a nosebleed for god's sake."
Mary slumped in relief, her sleek head bowed and her hands still pressed against his sides. The sight of her kneeling at his feet, so obviously grateful, made him feel uncomfortable; he forced his way out of the chair as quickly as he could.
"What about Mycroft?" Greg asked, sounding worried. "Where is he?"
"He's fine. I left him lurking a couple of blocks away. He should be here in half an hour at most."
John stepped around them all, dodged Billie's attempt to trip him, and grabbed the towel he'd left lying across the end of the bed.
"Now if you lot don't mind, I need a wash."
He ducked quickly into the bathroom and locked the door before any of them could think to follow him.
.
Once safely barricaded in, John turned both taps on as full as they would go and began to fill the chipped enamel tub. A bath was a bit of a luxury, generally speaking, but he rather thought he'd earned it. Catching sight of his reflection in the mirror forced him to conclude that the others hadn't been entirely unjustified in their reaction. He looked a mess. The blood had soaked right through his shirt, and his chest and belly were stained pink. There was a thick clump of the stuff caught in the hair around his navel that would probably be hell to shift by any means short of waxing. Beneath the blood, his torso was heavily bruised. He poked speculatively at a purplish patch over his ribs and winced. That was going to hurt, come tomorrow. His hasty wash in the fountain hadn't done much for his face, either. The bridge of his nose was swollen, and he hadn't been entirely successful at removing the blood from his chin.
Strangely though, John felt good. Oh yeah, he'd be in bloody agony tomorrow morning, but at the moment, he felt… well, a little smug actually. He hadn't had time to count, but there had been at least a dozen blokes trying to kill him earlier in the day, and here he was with barely a scratch. Nothing worth writing home about, at any rate. He flexed his knuckles. Mycroft was a better hitter than John had ever given him credit for either. They could use a bit of work on their communication, maybe, but all in all, John was pretty happy.
He splashed a bit of water from the sink over his face and chest, aiming to get the worst of the blood off rather than sitting in pink bathwater all evening. He stripped off his clothes and stepped into the tub, not even trying to repress his grin. He hadn't been in a proper fight since Sherlock had left.
.
There was a snick from the bathroom lock, and the door opened. Mary stepped inside and shut it behind her, twirling one of John's lock picks between her fingers. John scowled. He must have left them in the pocket of Mycroft's coat.
Mary reached for the buttons of her blouse and began shedding clothes, the tiniest, taunting sway to her movements. She kept her eyes on John's, a flirty twist to her grin. John glowered.
"What are you doing in here? Can't a bloke wash in peace?"
"Mm. Not when he comes home all lovely and sweaty and covered in blood and lets me tear off his shirt buttons."
John snorted. "Got a thing for blood, have you?"
She turned to face him, grinning, and licked her lower lip. "Only your blood."
"Comforting."
Mary stepped out of her underwear and into the tub, settling herself between John's legs. The water lapped dangerously over the sides, but didn't overflow. She ran her fingers up the side of his neck and leaned in to nip his earlobe.
"It is a bit sexy though."
John grunted. "You seem very sure of your reception."
"That's because I know what you like."
She kissed his jaw and John turned his head in protest; but it was a token one, and they both knew it. In truth, he was struggling to stay angry with her. The sight of her obvious distress had softened him, and the hot water relaxing his muscles had done the rest. Her hands on his skin reminded him how long it had been since he'd let himself be comforted.
"Where's Bilbo?"
"With Greg. He promised to feed her and get her to sleep. I wish him luck with it. She hasn't gone down before ten since we got off the plane."
"Mm. To be fair, he probably has a better chance than anyone else."
"There is that. God, I can't begin to imagine what she'll be like when she discovers boys."
She kissed his neck again, and John sighed, capitulating.
"Why can't I stay mad at my nasty, lying, duplicitous wife?"
"Mm. Because I'm sexy. And because I just spent six hours drilling a bunch of clueless muppets in the use of firearms for the sake of your mad best friend."
John snorted. "So how'd they do, coach?"
"So-so. Greg knows his stuff, but he's got some sort of hang-up about actually firing the thing and he won't relax – and even if he does, he can't aim for pants. Irene's got better aim, but her handling's rubbish. Weirdly enough, Molly's pretty good."
"Really?"
"Yeah. Much better than I expected. Good hands and a good eye."
"I suppose she is a pathologist. What were you shooting anyway?"
"Some rather nifty little toys that Mycroft brought in. Handguns and mid-range rifles, semi-auto, and modified to take tranq darts."
"Quiet?"
"As the grave. Lovely action. Wherever he gets his budget from, they hate him less than most people do."
John snorted. "He's not using his budget. He's currently A.W.O.L., remember?"
One of Mary's hands slid up the side of his neck and into his hair. John sighed. He pulled her hand away and repositioned her so she was leaning back against his chest.
"I am mad at you," he said quietly.
"I know," Mary said, sounding subdued. Her persistent hands faltered, falling slack against his thighs.
John exhaled. With her shoulders tensed and her head tilted down away from him, Mary suddenly seemed very small.
John raised a hand and threaded tentative fingers through the hair at the nape of her neck.
"It's mostly because I had to hear it from Mycroft," he admitted.
He stroked the base of her head softly, admiring the many-shaded gold of her hair: dyed, he knew, but still beautiful.
"The thing is…" he said softly, "it's probably not healthy or anything… but once you've forgiven someone for shooting your best friend, anything else seems like a bit of a minor detail."
Mary chuckled weakly. "And yet I somehow manage to restrain myself from treating that as a free pass."
John reached around and flicked water at her. Mary grabbed his hand and kissed it.
"For the record, I am sorry about that." She tangled their fingers together and squeezed.
"I didn't even really mean to do it, you know," she said, after a moment. "I just... panicked somehow. All I could think was that he knew, and he was going to tell you."
And there it was: the thing that they never talked about, the questions they never voiced. John stilled, his muscles tensing and his breath against her neck almost noiseless.
"And that's all it was?" he asked, voice low. "A mistake? You swear it?"
Mary hesitated. It was only a moment, but long enough that he began to draw back. She grasped at him, holding him in place.
"It was a mistake. I promise you that. But also maybe… just the tiniest bit of jealousy."
John inhaled sharply through his nose. His hand contracted around Mary's fingers, and let go.
"You thought I was shagging him?" he asked, in a low, tightly-wound voice.
"No. Not that. I knew you hadn't. But he – the way he just lit you up, so easily, like I'd never seen before. And then… he made my life – everything – so much more difficult, just by being there. You have no idea..."
"So you thought you'd take the opportunity when you had it?" John growled.
"I don't know what I was thinking. That's what threw my aim. I just – at the last minute… My brain kind of kicked in."
"Christ." John pulled his hand away, but only to place it back on her shoulder. He bowed his head against her crown.
"So all that bullshit he span about it being 'surgery'…"
"I don't know why he said that. I… Why did he push so hard for you to come back to me?"
John swallowed, but didn't answer for a moment. His hands resumed their motion, roving absently over Mary's shoulders and across the span of her back.
"I think it was because of Bill'," he mumbled at last. "He knew how much I wanted to be a dad."
Mary twisted and wrapped her arms about him, pressing her face beneath his chin in a wordless hug.
They lay like that for a long time. Idly, John picked up the soap and worked a lather into his hands, running them gently over her arms and breasts.
"Did you really never look at the files I gave you?" Mary asked, after awhile.
John shook his head.
"I gave the memory stick to Sherlock. I didn't want to know… but I didn't want to not know. I told him to read them and tell me what I should do."
"And he was ok with that?"
"He said he wasn't in the habit of acting as other people's conscience," John quoted. "But he's also the nosiest bugger on the face of the planet. He couldn't resist."
Mary snorted, half-amused, half-miserable.
"He told me that, by his reckoning, there was nothing on there that I'd think was worse than shooting him. I remember, because his phrasing was so particular: not that there wasn't anything worse… just nothing that I'd think was worse. Humble, he is not."
Mary chuckled weakly, sniffing back the tears that threatened to spring to her eyes. John shifted away from her a little and poured shampoo into his palm. He spread it between his hands and began to card his fingers softly through her hair.
"Tell me something?" he asked, after awhile.
"Mm?"
"What colour was your hair? Before, I mean."
Mary hesitated. "I thought you didn't want to know about it... me."
John sighed. "It's not going to go away though, is it? And I thought… Well, I guess we might as well start with something easy."
Mary smiled.
"Brown," she told him. "A bit lighter than Molly's I suppose. Kind of mousy really."
"Wow. I can't tell."
"No. I touch up the roots practically every week." She faltered a moment, then grinned. John could hear the smile in her voice. "I used to shave it though."
"What, seriously?"
Mary laughed aloud at the amazement in his tone.
"Uh huh. I even had a mohawk for awhile."
"A mohawk. God, I can't even picture it."
She laughed again, a note of devilry creeping back into her voice. "Yup. I used to wear it that way to um… show off my tattoo."
"You what?" His hands fell back into the bathwater with a loud splash. A miniature wave slopped over the rim of the bath and onto the floor.
"Tattoo. I've got one. It curves right around here." She raised a hand and drew a long, shallow arc above her left ear.
"Seriously? You have a secret skull tattoo that I've never even noticed?"
"Mm. Lucky I have thick hair."
John tilted her head sideways, scraping at her soapy blonde hair with his fingertips, trying to gather it out of the way.
"God, you're right. I can see the colour. Wait, what's it a tattoo of?"
She demurred playfully. "Mm… Don't know if I should tell you."
"Come on! You have to tell me. That's completely unfair!"
She laughed aloud at his outrage.
"Alright, alright. It's a dragon, ok."
John's indignation collapsed into a shout of laughter. "A dragon? Seriously?"
"Hey, it's a cool dragon."
He snorted, amused. "Uh huh."
"Alright, I was nineteen and stupid, ok? At least I never had a hideous grey moustache."
.
John stood at the open window, gazing out at the scattered lights of the town. He was dressed for sleep, in a white t-shirt over blue cotton boxers. Leaning in the doorway of the bathroom, combing the tangles from her hair, Mary watched him. His shoulders were relaxed, head tilted slightly downwards. In the absence of his usual jumpers, John looked neat and trim. There was a softness to his outline that spoke of walks in the park and Chinese takeaways and comfortable evenings by the fire, but no sign of the beer-belly that afflicted so many men his age. His arms were bulky and his hands were broad. There was a long ridge of muscle either side of his spine, not gym-sculpted, but functional. Aside from the streaks of grey in his hair, he could have been the man of twenty-nine who had first walked out of an army hospital in Birmingham and into the life of Sherlock Holmes.
The night air was sultry and still. Tiny beads of sweat glinted at the nape of John's neck, just beneath his hairline. His white shirt was already damp between the shoulder blades.
He had no idea, Mary thought, just how attractive he was.
She had just made up her mind to walk over there and jump him, when he spoke.
"In the interests of full disclosure," he said quietly. "I should tell you something."
He didn't turn to face her, eyes still fixed on the lights beyond the window. Mary took a half step forward to indicate that she was listening.
"Billie's name," John said. "The reason I wanted to call her that. It's short for William."
Mary nodded, though he couldn't see her, and stepped closer, laying a hand against his shoulder blade. Beneath her palm the muscle tremored faintly.
"I guessed as much," she told him softly. "For Bill Murray?"
John laughed a little, surprised. "I never even thought of him… Though I suppose, now that you mention it, it sort of fits."
Mary frowned.
"If not Bill, then who?"
John swallowed.
"Sherlock," he said thickly, and so quietly that she almost didn't catch it. "It's Sherlock's first name."
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A.N. Hello lovely people. I am immensely sorry for the delay between chapters and can only hope that you haven't forgotten me yet! This chapter ended up being a monster and needed to be cut in half, so no Molly this time round (sorry fans). She and Greg get their moment next chapter, I promise! Hope you've all been enjoying the season four previews as much as I have. More soon!