8. Watching my back

The grey light streamed through the windows of the abandoned office. The rain-streaked windows illuminating strands of cable, overturned office chairs and frames that must have been the base of a desk or a divider.

John and Sherlock turned toward the door where they had entered and saw a large man enter the room behind them. He was so large that he ducked as he passed through the door.

Sherlock tilted his head toward John. "Did you bring your gun?"

"No," John said, "I thought that you said that no one would be here."

"I suppose that I was wrong," Sherlock said as he started sidling toward the other door to find another man coming toward them carrying a metal pipe.

They looked back at the first man who pulled out a knife.

"One on one. At least the odds are good," John said.

"Are you forgetting the weapons?" Sherlock asked.

"A weapon is only as good as the man who wields it," John said sliding up closer to Sherlock. "I have your back."

Sherlock and John stood in the middle of the office as the men approached cautiously.

"When was your last martial arts match Sherlock?" John asked.

"Official or freestyle?"

But they didn't get a chance to finish because the man with the pipe took a mighty swing that he angled down at Sherlock's head. Sherlock raised his arm to block it.

Block the arm not the weapon, never touch the weapon.

He wrapped his arm around the other man's arm and kneed him in the groin.

The large man approached John and smiled at their difference in height. John bent his knees deep making him seem even shorter as he squatted in a boxer's stance. The man's smile grew wider and he put the knife on his belt as he raised his fists to box with John.

Sherlock hit the base of the man's neck with his elbow and raised his arm higher until a loud crack revealed that he had dislocated the man's shoulder. He chopped the man on the neck in a sharp movement, and the man fell to the ground hard, bashing his head against a bit of square chrome covered pipe and knocking himself out.

Sherlock turned and looked at John who was boxing with Goliath. He was just wondering how to help when the man hit John on the chin spinning him completely around. He turned in a full circle passing under the man's arm and grabbing him at the waist. The man, not a true boxer, had unbalanced himself so that it was relatively easy for John to take him down. The man fought to get up only to find John on top of him, his own knife at his throat.

"Now I wouldn't try that if I were you," John said, "It's been a while since I've killed a man in hand to hand combat, but I wouldn't mind refreshing my skills a bit. Sherlock, do you think you might be able to text Lestrade?"

"Already done it?"

"When?"

"In my pocket when we first saw them."

"You must have incredibly fast fingers."

"So, I've been told."

"If it was anyone but you Sherlock, I'd think you were making a sexual innuendo."

"Pardon?" Sherlock said.

"Never mind," John said as the sound of sirens filtered in from outside the building. John grinned down at the man. "That's what you get for underestimating one of Her Majesty's finest."

A group of officers rushed in, weapons out as they swept the area. Sherlock stood where he was. The officers gathered around and stared at John who looked quite the little assassin with his knife at the large man's throat. Donovan came over and snapped a picture with her phone.

"Are any one of you going to help me or are you just going to keep staring?" John said.

The men suddenly leapt into action; picking the man up by his arms and putting on cuffs. Sherlock grinned widely.

"I'm taking these two straight to the station, but I need your statements," Lestrade said glancing down at the man that Sherlock had incapacitated. The officers pulled him to his feet and he staggered with them across the room. "What was this all about anyway?"

Sherlock strode over to the wall kicking a bag which concealed a large plastic phone.

"You'll find that this is where Rhodes called from," Sherlock said, "If we're lucky, it will still have his fingerprints on it."

Lestrade motioned Donovan over. "Dust this will you, and bag it."

As Donovan passed John she smiled. "Good job, you," she said before bending down to do her work.

"I suppose that with this last piece of evidence, not to mention the statements from those two men who will find that a triple homicide is not the sort of bullying that they signed up for, we have enough evidence to send Rhodes to prison for a long time. Don't you think inspector?"

"Well, yeah" Lestrade said.

"Then you don't really need us do you? Come on John, I'm famished. I feel like I could eat a lion," Sherlock said.

John chuckled and turned to follow him out as Donovan mimed clapping at his back.

"Like a bloody whirlwind," Lestrade said as he bent down to examine the evidence. Sherlock clattered down the stairs with John on his heels.

They strode down the sidewalk, the sound of sirens shrinking behind them as they walked through the light rain.

"Are you really not going in to testify?" John asked.

"We'll go tomorrow, John," Sherlock said. "Most police work is time consuming and deadly dull. Never go when they ask you to. You go when they are ready for your evidence. Too much time wasted otherwise."

Sherlock and John stood side by side on a busy street. Sherlock reached out his hand and hailed a cab. He talked for a minute with the driver and then they climbed inside.

"So John, not exactly the Queensberry Rules that move you did."

"Well, there's only one rule in the army," John said, "and that is to win."

Sherlock glanced at John and then wiped the inside of the glass with his gloved hand as he looked out at the passing buildings.

"If it's all the same to you, Sherlock," John said, "I'd prefer to go home and get take out. I think that I might have pulled something in that fight."

"Certainly," Sherlock said tapping on the window to convey the new address to the driver.

John rubbed his hands together, "I can't wait to write about this on my blog."

"Oh you can't mention this case, John," Sherlock said to John's affronted face. "Rhodes is too powerful. Any mention before the trial will be seen as slander."

"It's not slander if it's true," John said.

"Even so...besides I don't think your reputation will suffer any just because you can't post it in a blog. I'm sure that before the night is out Donovan's picture of you will be hanging up by the water cooler in Scotland Yard."

John smiled saying, "I suppose that you're right." The two laughed.

Immediately after dinner, John went to bed. Sherlock paced and thought.

John was amazing again today.

He let himself get punched in order to distract the man so that he could get up close and take his knife.

His cheek must really hurt now.

He needs an icepack to prevent it from swelling.

An icepack or a steak.

I don't have any steaks.

I do have ears, and they're in the freezer.

Sherlock ran up the stairs. A plastic bag of frozen ears in his hand. He knocked on the door and then opened it to see John sitting on his bed, medical kit open, applying something to his face while looking into a shaving mirror.

John glanced up at Sherlock with a puzzled expression on his face.