Chapter Six
John Watson sighed.
It wasn't one of his exasperated 'Sherlock, I said 'no more heads in the fridge!' sighs, neither was it his annoyed 'please tell me you at least know what the third rock from the sun is!' sighs, it wasn't his resigned 'must you be so infuriating?' sighs either.
"Alright? Are we, Johnny boy?" Moriarty smiled at him and Sherlock.
Sherlock and John had arrived at the abandoned building just ten minutes after it's revelation and they found Moriarty waiting for them very patiently. John should've been expecting a twist like this. "Jim Moriarty..." Sherlock hissed between gritted teeth.
Moriarty sent an elated look in the detective's direction. "Sherlock!" he near squealed. "Sherlock Holmes... I've been dying to come out and play again. Did you miss me?" Moriarty's Irish accent sang through the silence.
"Why are you here?" Sherlock demanded, pulling a gun out of his waistband and pointing it at the criminal mastermind. John's heart sank when he saw that it was his own weapon. He'd have to remind himself to Sherlock-proof his personal items when they got back, as if that would stop him, though.
"Why else?" Moriarty inclined his head, patiently waiting for Sherlock to come to his conclusion. The moment the detective had deduced Moriarty's game, the madman turned to John with a hint. "She really is fascinating, isn't she, Sherlock?" He spoke to Sherlock while watching John's expression. Then he turned to see Sherlock's. "Just like looking into a mirror."
"What does Sasaki have to do with-" Moriarty shot John a mock-reproachful look.
"Quiet, Johnny boy!" he admonished. "Sherlock and I are talking."
John shot a puzzled glance in Sherlock's direction, silently demanding an explanation. "Tabula rasa." Sherlock ground out, gaze not moving from Moriarty, his expression unreadable.
Moriarty's eyes lit up merrily and he clapped his hands. "Very good!" he grinned widely. "Very, very good!"
"The epistemological theory that individuals are born without built-in mental content and that their knowledge comes from experience and perception." Sherlock supplied for John.
"Yes, the reason behind the way children tend to look like their parents, and pets, their masters." Moriarty shot John a half-apologetic look.
Sherlock ignored the unverbalized quip. "Where is she?" he demanded.
Moriarty had the gall to look hurt. "I haven't hurt her, Sherlock, but she is... slightly different than you may remember her as." He shrugged his shoulder. "She did resist her captors valiantly, no doubt, due to John Watson's influence. She even managed to send you a hint, telling you her location."
Moriarty frowned, then, bouncing on the balls of his feet. "Ten minutes later," He pointed to himself. "When I came in, she was rudely threatening to sever Katheryn's fingers, shove them down her throat, and rub her wounds in salt." He turned his palms upward and shrugged his shoulders helplessly. "I think Katheryn is a gravely disturbed soul."
'Understatement' John thought with a shiver. "Where. Is. She?" Sherlock asked again, finger twitching dangerously near the trigger of the gun.
"Sherlock," Moriarty smiled patiently. "My dear, you know you can't gain something for nothing."
Sherlock opened his mouth to speak when a series of gunshots rang sharply through the building. Everybody started, heads swiveling around. Where had the gunshots come from? Knowing Moriarty, his henchmen couldn't be too far behind him.
"I believe I gave explicate instructions not to harm the girl!" Moritary roared at nothing in particular, not giving his henchmen's positions away. Sherlock's dominate arm, which held the gun, tensed visibly at the shout. "When will they ever learn?" Moriarty groaned in despair at Sherlock.
They heard the sound of a rusty door creaking open and two sets of footsteps neared them from the darkness. Sebastien walked out of the shadows, dragging Sasaki along by the arm with one hand as he held a gun in the other. Moriarty leveled a withering glare at his henchman for interrupting his and Sherlock's confrontation. "Sorry, Sir, but she tried to escape." Sebastien apologized gruffly, walking the last few steps to Moriarty in long strides, jostling Sasaki and forcing her to jog to keep up with him.
"Oh? Causing trouble, are we?" Moriarty raised his eyebrows. Sasaki glared at Sebastien, clearly irked at being man-handled.
Then she shook herself out of her captor's grip and wiped all evidence of discomfort from her face when she faced the crime lord. "You know I can't help myself," Sasaki smirked up at Moriarty, her smile and musical lilt in her voice made the stomaches of the other residents of the room drop into their feet. "I just love the attention." She was slightly intimidating, at least to Sebastien and John. And she knew it.
Sebastien then held out an empty handgun holster, there were several gaping cavities in the leather. "Made a lunge for the trigger, took the leg out of one of ours and a shoulder of another, had to cut them loose."
Sasaki smiled innocently at Moriarty. "Sure, Jim, I'm grateful that you saved me... saved my arm, at least." John now noticed the tear in Sasaki's sleeve and the splash of red. "But waiting patiently for Sherlock to waltz in on his glorious white steed and save me just wouldn't do." Sasaki shook her head slightly. "It just wouldn't... it's boring." Sasaki grinned smugly at Moriarty like she was just dying to speak those words to him.
"Quite honestly, I'm disappointed." She continued. "From what I'd read in John's blog, I had expected you to be a little more entertaining." She shook her head again, letting out a sad sigh for the sole reason of mocking Moriarty. "But really, you're just barely more than an absolute psycho, arn't you?" Moriarty's eyes narrowed and he pressed his lips into a thin, hard line. "A psychopathic pyromaniac." Sebastien wisely clamped a hand around the girl's mouth, silencing her.
John swallowed hard, did Sasaki have a death wish! Why was she purposefully angering Moriarty? Was she... distracting Moriarty from something? He shot Sherlock an uneasy glance to find the detective's eyes no longer on his opponents, but darting around toward the building's windows. John also gazed around and finally caught sight of a faint shadow moving behind a misty second-floor window. He nudged Sherlock in the ribs and subtly inclined his head in the direction he had seen the shadow.
Sherlock spared a momentary glance and the creases in his forehead decreased drastically. "Moriarty," he called out evenly, showing absolutely no excitement, or nervousness.
Moriarty tore his gaze away from Sasaki and his entire behavior changed. The cold, ruthless crime lord was gone and he had left the charming, but spoiled child in his place. "How thoughtless of me!" The madman exclaimed, eyes widening in mock surprise. "You will forgive me, I was... distracted."
Sherlock smirked smugly. "Yes, you were." Both villains noticed Sherlock's sudden confidence and were immediately on guard, but it was too late.
The glass windows on the second floor shattered and several armed police swung in, guns primed and at the ready. "Not a moving muscle, gentlemen!" Lestrade's voice boomed loudly through the stale air. "You're surrounded, lower your weapons or we will open fire!" The Inspector walked through the front door behind Sherlock and John, flanked by several officers.
John's brow furrowed, wouldn't Moriarty have had a team on the look-out for the police? "Oh." Sasaki must've noticed a sniper before Moriarty's men, distracted, and indirectly taken out the look-out team in her 'escape attempt', John's mind filled in the details.
"Ah! Inspector G. Lestrade! The detective inspector with an exceptionally large heart for case victims, and a small patience for consulting detectives." Moriarty made a sweeping bow. "Jim Moriarty."
Lestrade unholstered his handgun and pointed it at Moriarty. "I am aware." he hissed.
A look of surprise and interest crossed Moriarty's face. "Oh? I don't remember my picture being posted on John's blog." he remarked jokingly.
"I saw your picture ID on Molly's phone and the same phone number signed 'Jim Moriarty' in Sherlock's flat." Lestrade retorted. A look of indignation crawled across Sherlock's face, he'd have to talk to Lestrade about the inspector's recurring 'drug busts'.
"Ah, very clever, Inspector." Moriarty hummed, still calm and smug in his situation. "You are a great detective, after all, in your own right. Pity you had to be associated with Sherlock Holmes. He has the power to make even great men look like bumbling fools." The madman smiled condescendingly. "Well, we can't all be geniuses, can we?"
"No, we can't," Lestrade agreed almost grudgingly. "someone has to do the legwork." Then he turned to Sebastien, gesturing to the gun in the henchman's hand. "Drop it." Sebastien didn't move, his gun was still pointed at Sasaki. The police couldn't move in on them when they had a hostage.
"Now, I don't think so, Inspector." Moriarty cooed mockingly. "While you have been so kind as to gather an entire entourage to escort us to Scotland Yard, we really have somewhere else to be." He rested a hand on Sasaki's shoulder. "Don't we?"
Sasaki rolled her eyes and shook Sebastien's hand off herself again. "Sure we do, don't have much of a choice, do we?" she responded dryly.
Moriarty, Sebastien, and Sasaki made their way slowly out of the building to where a car was waiting for them. "Pity, isn't it?" Sasaki remarked nonchalantly to Moriarty. "That the police should come when they did. I was hoping to see a more climatic end to Sherlock and your confrontation."
It took all of a second-and-a-half for Sherlock and John to realize what she was talking about. The end of the original confrontation. "Lestrade, pull your men back, now!" Sherlock barked loudly, grabbing John's arm desperately as he surged for the closest door.
The explosion rocked the building down to its structuring, throwing everyone, within a fifteen foot radius, to the ground. Sherlock grunted, covered his head with his arms, and glanced up to see the getaway vehicle burning rubber on the pavement before disappearing around a corner on two wheels. He could see John, in his peripheral vision, following his gaze, clenching his eyes shut and groaning in defeat.