You could hurt your hand punching a machine
Lestrade doesn't know the reason he and his team were been called to this warehouse by an alarmed call placed 10 minutes prior. The successfully frightened witness, that, of course, doesn't exist, just gave directions and a strangled, masterfully executed, cry for help. It is a game and Lestrade knows nothing of those.
Well, in Sherlock's opinion, Lestrade knows nothing at all. And it's good all the same, because the man had helped him at one point, even if his mind was too weak and to eager to receive the doubt, so Sherlock acts with just a little more tact when revealing himself to the man. As compared to what he measures the level of tact, no one can say, because when the brave police officer storms inside, his men behind him, Sherlock has just shot a man dead, up close, and the body falls with a thud, covering his words.
"Good evening, Inspector."
The cigarette he smoked and the two...no, three coffees should keep the man's pulse to a high level and away from a bothersome heart-attack. And the surprise can give Sherlock a few seconds to stay out of the officers range of fire. Well, of course to them this all looks like an execution. So he should explain and avoid the standard procedure and receive some metal instead of a greeting.
"Sherlock..." his voice barely registers and only Sally Donovan reacts to the single strangled row of letters that form a name they all but have engraved on their foreheads. Then the detective raises a hand, like in slow motion, thinking that even if he is hallucinating, better make sure before put the tall coated man before him down. He is surrounded after all.
"Keep him in sight. Don't fire," he orders, then "You're alive?" mistakenly formulated as a question, even to his own ears. Lestrade question gets the trademark roll of the eyes.
"Good, very good observation Lestrade. You are getting better. At being obvious. Yes, I am alive, so are you and a thank you is in order, because you will continue to stay alive now that this man is dead, until your next oversight. Or until stress and sugars give you a heart-attack.
Not one of the ten officers present knows what to do. They do know they shouldn't fire and that this man's name is Sherlock, and maybe Donovan also knows this man is Sherlock Holmes and he shouldn't be alive, but he is, and even if his name is cleared, she just saw him murder a man in cold blood and it all makes her head hurt. She can only imagine how the DI feels.
"What in the name of all holly-"
"Oh...yes, the dead man. One of yours...more or less. Technical analyst, quite good, wasted in your department, faked incompetence to become suited for your police force, see, the standards are not very high. Age 32, hired 5 years ago because of his skills. As we determined, meaning I did, his skills are well above your standard -for god sake, look as his right middle finger- and so the reason he was hired was a good placed word with the commander by someone influential. Maybe his father, more likely his previous employer. Turns out it was a government official, no need for you to trouble your mind with a name, he had no idea what the plan was for this fellow, and only did the recommendation feeling happy he could give something back to the man who helped him delete some very indecent records. Anyway, three years ago this man was supposed to kill you if I was to come down of a certain roof by means of walking. Or any other means except on a gurney. And all together now, the name you'll be interested in as the mind behind the plot is ...Moriarty. And you'll be happy to know he is no longer ...your division, we can say, for he is as dead as I am alive."
Lestrade really feels the need to sit. The avalanche of words go at him in full force and if not for his men, he would long be ungracefully sited, probably unconscious, on the dirty floor.
"Simmons. Anthony Simmons, our route coordinator," he manages to recall.
"Yes. And also your personal executioner."
It all sounds like madness, like a dream gone wrong, but with their history of misjudging facts, as surreal as they appeared and more important, doubting Sherlock Holmes, Greg Lestrade is ready to listen this out.
"You placed the call for him. An hour ago. He asked to go home earlier, something about an accident."
"Nothing was an accident. I lured him here to politely ask him to step away from the force and from the face of the Earth."
"You killed him."
"I could say, for your peace of mind, it was self defence and the facts will testify to that, but I did know the outcome. He came by his own and armed."
"I need to...I need your-"
"Tomorrow. I think I'm shock right now. So if you have no more burning questions..."
"Sherlock! You called me here. You killed a man in front of the Metro Police and you just want to walk away?"
"Yes?"
"Bloody hell, you lunatic."
"How can I be sure? I mean-"
"You did that mistake once Lestrade. Please don't do it again. What I just said can be proven and it will be. Tomorrow. You needed to be here to see and spare you the time of investigating a murder. Consider it a gift."
"A bloody gift?!"
"A statement? Retribution? I don't know, call it as you see it. My work here is done and something really pressing is waiting for me across London. So ...if you don't mind."
Pawn like police officers offer little space for Sherlock to move, but he manages with the skill of the ghost they thought him to be. As he crosses paths with a shell shocked Donovan, he glances to the side, pale ice eyes fixing hers.
"Anderson was a poor choice anyway," he murmurs and strolls away into the cold night.
Lestrade kneels near the body left behind, discretely masking the impossibility to stand.
"God helps us all, Sherlock Holmes is back from the dead."
Simmons is
The phone buzzes two seconds later and Sherlock really doesn't want to answer it. But after a more than a few repeating tones, the cabbie becomes annoyed and it's affecting his driving skills, so Sherlock answers only because he needs to get to Bakes Street as soon as possible.
"Clarifications needed?"
"I wanted to know if I'll need to get you out of prison."
"Come now Mycroft, your cameras are on me since I left the warehouse. Stop playing stupid and get to the point."
"You should have told me."
"I told you what you needed to know."
"You tell me only what's convenient," Mycroft retorts and Sherlock knows he isn't talking only about tonight. "This time to place a call, break into a car and replace a gun."
"Don't pretend fatigue. Your men did it."
"I could have helped."
Again, it's not only about tonight he's talking about and Sherlock presses the end button with more force than necessary just to try and imagine what physically shutting his brother might feel like. He likes it. For the millionth time, he avoided the help talk. He needed nothing more than money and resources from Mycroft. That's the only reason why he knew about the plan from the beginning. Managing a fake suicide and a body recognition put him in no position to make Sherlock feel like he owes him. None at all.
Adair did the job. We expect Moran's reaction to know if it
Of course it will work. He planned it for years. The Colonel is smart, but not that smart and all his determination comes from madness. Revenge, in Sherlock's case, is a much powerful motivator.
He takes the time to change and nine o'clock finds him, as well as Mary Morstan, in front of 221B. He never knocked, even if his hand shows like the motion was stopped mid air. It's part of the plan.
"Excuse me, are you looking for Mrs. Hudson or John?"
Ah, just in time. It was becoming uncomfortable to stay there pretending to knock and restraining himself from doing it, while measuring the movements inside and hoping John won't need to make an unplanned trip to the nearby Tesco.
Well balanced, graceful yet, slight inequality of paces, left foot, a limp, barely distinguishable, retired from ballet dancing 5 maybe 6 years ago, not by choice. The limp. The way she hides the affected leg. In her case, it's not psychosomatic.
He deduces her life, her tastes and by the time he lies to her face about who he is, he knows how she met John and why she's important to his flatmate. Mary Morstan is nothing like him. No danger, just predictability and openness. Dull.
He climbs the stairs after being invited inside. So easy to lie to. Describe a common event in John's life, likely for her to know and no one else, and she granted him passage along with her trust. Soon, this will also grant him the way into John's head. He'll make him observe and believe, because the past day, even if he'll never say so, drove him mad. Twelve broken phones stand witness to that. All died with the "I'm not" unfinished text on the screen.
This will work. It will make John react and believe, to have another person there to witness. He refuses to be grateful to Mary Morstan, John's year and a half girlfriend.
"John, I have a surprise for you," she announces even before the door to the room is opened and Sherlock can hear the broken cadence of footsteps, John trying to control his limp, and failing. And the door is open, and he stands there, the light bright and so much more present than the other night and he can see it, the smile he gives her and Sherlock hates for some irrational reason he'll have to analyse later or forget altogether.
Then, as Mary happily announces "Your old army mate Singerson is here", a flicker of doubt crosses the familiar face. Then recognition, then joy, then pain, then agony and at the very last moment, an anger so cold Sherlock believes for a moment that he sees himself, a reflection of what he was three years ago, when faced with Moriarty and his plan.
"John."
Better to start this time with something shorter and familiar. Even if the need to say those words burns inside him, burned for years. I'm not and then the trail of thoughts stops as a gun is pressed to his forehead and this, this is not predicted and not boring at all and almost poetic and for the first time Sherlock allows himself to love poetry.
"A show and tell night at the grief counselling group. Why bring the gun? Oh, now you regret killing that man for me, since you believe the reason you did it is dead and buried. Interesting."
"Shut up."
"John..." Mary lingers in the door, next to the man she knows as Singerson and her wide eyes can't decide on which of them to stay trained on. Sherlock can feel her gravitating near John and that tells him that even with a gun, John is more of a sun than he is. A moronic metaphor, but somehow suiting for the man burning in front of him, his left arm steady for what may very well be the first time in three years. It's worth it, the close view of that.
"You're not him."
"I know you and I know her and your relationship and the fact she's relying on you for emotional support, not because you are so very good at giving it, but because she knows your limp is psychosomatic and she needs to believe your problem is bigger than hers, to make you chose a limp. But sometimes she hates it, and you know it and feel guilty and that is why after a year and a half you still haven't moved in together. Maybe because of your dreams, more likely because of your-"
The punch comes as a predictable outcome, much less interesting than getting shot in the head, close range, by the same man you never text to say you're alive. A man so loyal that only stopped being brave once your name was cleared. A man Sherlock even considered calling home. The same man who five minutes later walks Mary to the door, whispering comforting words and reassurance, then comes back to apply a freezing cold bag of peas over his bruising cheek.
"You were really here."
"Yes. But for you my ...being there, wasn't the first time."
"I used to saw you in the flat, after... Didn't happen for a while now. Until..."
"I'm here."
"Why?"
"I would have thought How was a more pressing matter."
"You thought making me watch you die was a good idea. What you think doesn't matter."
"John..."
It's a little more difficult to stand there and receive lines of dialogue, instead of making them flow in your head. Harder when eyes reflect the light and look older and somewhat unfamiliar all of a sudden. Maddening when all you can concentrate on is rediscovering every line of every feature and you forget to pay attention to the surroundings and the inconceivable happens when Sherlock tries to get up from the couch and the corner of the table plants itself in his bone.
"You moved the table."
"It's been three years."
Not sure if it's an answer to his remark or a passing thought in John's mind, because he can't see those eyes any more, Sherlock decides the evening can stop here. All he wanted was to show himself and say it. To make John believe. He received more. A poetic gun barrel to his head, an obnoxious feeling of completion and separation from the world. It's too much for him. So, more as a selfish act than out of empathy with the silent man in the chair, he decides to make a strategic retreat. But he has to say it, before that, before stepping outside John's gravity pull.
"John, I'm not-"
"Get out," the reply comes silent and then, as an afterthought "Keep the pack...".
That night he did, not on the swelling of course, but he kept it with him in the cold, filthy room he crawls back to every day and when the strangled, pained voice inside the box asked for food, begged for food, Sherlock still kept the peas in his hands, even if it was the only food he had in the place and he's never hungry when playing the game.
The next morning he fed the voice in the box with the leaking peas, more convenient than running to the shop and left to move another piece on his board. And maybe to see John again.
The still intact phone comes to life with the same text he received countless times before, the moment he passes the door into the Yard.
Why can't you stay away from him for a few more days?
It's hell to keep you invisible. MH
Of course Mycroft never says he likes hell, he could be the king in hell and make it work like clockwise if it were such a place, and of course Mycroft talks about John in those words, not Lestrade, and he can never understand why Sherlock needs John to know. He's not even sure himself of the true reasons, but he blames it on his plan and the need to involve John in it and that's enough.
So the brave man that received a disturbing news yesterday still shows up the next day to meet him, doubts all gone, limp almost fading. He should feel sorry for coercing Lestrade into texting John and even plans to say sorry to the man, even just to impress his old flatmate, but the moment he's there, Sherlock forgets about it and his voice, even and robotic in his statement, changes in John's presence.
"So I killed a man in self defence. He was a killer, even if only in thought and you should thank me. Also, you need to keep this under wraps, I'm not ready to be...alive again."
"Something you're not telling me?"
"Plenty. But that is what constantly keeps me alive," and as he says it, even if he starts the sentence with disdain, looking at Lestrade, Sherlock loses the tone as he looks in John's warm eyes. What he sees there throws him of balance, of plan, of orbit.
The DI acknowledges John for the first time and smiles back at him.
"Good job with the punch."
"How could you know-" Sherlock frowns, but gets stopped on track by a smug inspector.
"I don't know Sherlock, I see," Lestrade paraphrases and then concludes. "He avoided your nose and mouth."
And Sherlock's eyes snap back to John, and in John something that resembles a panic attack tries to get to the surface so he leaves the room, no sign of a limp.
"What's the matter with him?"
"The truth. A bit not good, Lestrade," Sherlock counters with his own bitter joke in response to the previous remark and storms out the door, turning back just to bark an order.
"Make that bust tonight, Lestrade. Make it happen."
Lestrade hangs his head, tired after only one hour with the madman.
"Just like the old days."
"Sorry, sir?"
"Nothing Donovan. We need to arrange a bust for tonight."
"Where and what sort of bust."
"Cavalry and Guards Club in Piccadilly. And just pretend you know the reason, it's what I do."
"He told you to do this? Why?"
"Make some fuss, I think. They'll never let us in that place anyway."
"We're playing with him again?"
"No Donovan, he's playing us and them and possibly everyone else. Just because he's bloody brilliant and I'll never doubt him again. And you better learn from your mistakes and keep his ...help, a secret."
"Everything he said about Simmons checks out."
"I know. I was this close to being shot. In my own station."
"And he jumped off a roof to stop that from happening. Never took him for a martyr. Never took him for a human being."
"I know he had other reasons, my guts tell me he did, but even so...he's a good man, no matter what he thinks of himself or thinks he deserve."
"John punched him."
"Yeah. I wanted to punch him. And he knew it the moment he came in. You know what he said? He said -you could hurt your hand punching a machine."