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Chapter 12

I race out of the hotel and down the concrete steps into a bustling Piccadilly. Car horns rip through the air as I charge right out into the road, flagging down a cab that screeches to a halt in front.

"Hay watch it you nutter," shouts the driver as he hangs out the window. "Are you crazy?"

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Please I'll pay you anything. Can you get me to the Portland Hospital as fast as you can?"

"Alright, calm down. In you get or you'll get yourself killed."

Scrambling in, I'm immediately grateful for the force of which the cabbie pulls away into the oncoming traffic.

"Mycroft are you still there? Talk to me."

"Yes. I'm still here."

"What's happening?"

"His heart rate is slowing and there's nothing to be done. We're just…. waiting John. I'm sorry."

His words were cold but the subtle traces of emotion that both Holmes' disguise so artfully could just be made out. It was only becoming as accustomed to them as I had been 'allowed' that highlighted their presence. Or maybe I was the only one that hadn't been scared off. Either way, I could hear the impending loss of a brother in the crackling of the phone line and could imagine the slight twitch of his right eye; The 'Holmes Tell'.

"Will you do something for me Mycroft? Put the phone to his ear. I want him to hear my voice. Can you do that?"

Silence

"I'm in a Taxi Mycroft God knows how long I'll be. I want him to know I'm here, It could be more important that we know…"

"…Yes, alright."

I take a second to compose myself the best I can as I hear muffled movement and the painfully slow irregular beating of a heart rate monitor. He's giving up.

"God you're a stubborn bastard Sherlock. Why don't you just open your eyes. I'm not going to make this easy on you, do you hear me?"

I say everything to him as if he were there in front of me. I scold him for the way he left the fridge that day. I talk about every time he had amazed me with some ridiculous theory that had turned out to be band on the money. How angry he made me every minute of every day. How he had awoken me from some bad dream that had been my life before him and that he was a selfish prick if he thought he was going to leave me here now, after everything. I reminded him of all the times I had kept him on the right side of sane and how he owed me big time. I would never ever run out of things to say to him. I could carry on for as long as it took and that he should just wake up and tell me to shut the hell up if he thought I was being dull and sentimental.

The backlight of my phone shines up-Battery life at 8%-

Shit.

"Mycroft. Can you hear me?"

"I'm here John", says the uncomfortable voice.

"My phone battery is going to run out any second. I want you to keep talking to him."

"John. I'm not really very comfortable with that idea… It's hopeless. It's not going to change anything. You're a Doctor you should know these things. Besides he makes it continuously apparent he does not, nor did he ever wish to hear my opinions or advice. He's….He's not a small boy anymore."

"Listen. I don't pretend to know how your relationship works. Believe me I don't. But there are only two people in his world Mycroft. One of them is me and the other is you. I understand why you did it okay? In your strange 'Holmes' messed-up way, you were protecting him. I am still angry with the liberties you took, but I understand your reasons. Jesus, when I think of the things I've done for Harry. I know that he isn't easy. I know these things, but you have to try. I mean, God. Only you have the power the piss him off to that level. I mean really piss him off Mycroft. Think about why that is. People are angry when they've lost something. I think Sherlock lost you a long time ago in his eyes, no matter how much he would protest at not feeling things in that way. He spoke once of you going off to school, leaving him with a cold mother and numerous nannies. He was hurt. Now is the time to be an older brother…"

The line goes dead. No more battery.

I feel incredibly dizzy and rest my forehead on my knees, my hands pulling at my hair trying to keep sane in the long minutes that stretch out like a lifetime in front of me. Please, please just let it be that he has heard me.. Just let me get there in time. Please God if you're listening.

The traffic is starting to build along with a dreaded sickness. "Are you alright mate? Do you want me to stop?"

"What? No, please keep going as fast as you can." Wait a minute. What am I thinking? "Hay, Excuse me.."

"Dave."

"Right…Dave, I need to borrow your phone?"

"Sorry mate. Was mugged two days ago. Got me phone, wallet and wedding ring."

"Oh. I see. I'm sorry."

I can feel him looking me over in the mirror.

"I couldn't help overhearing. Is your friend sick is that why you're in a hurry?"

I get a proper look at him for the first time since I got into his cab. He's a little over fifty I'd say. Has a picture of a woman in her forties on his dashboard. She's pretty. The scenario reminds me of the first case Sherlock had involved me in and the taxi driver whose life I had cut short, the man who had almost conned Sherlock out of his life all those months ago. It always has to be about the game with him, even now.

I try hard to concentrate on the cabby's words, to make sense of what he's saying.

"Um, yes. There was… an accident. A terrible accident. I thought he had been killed. I know I'm not making any sense. I just thought that if he heard my voice..."

He smiles sympathetically and I turn to face out of the window again eyeing nervously the mounting traffic that is adding to the pressure in my ears. After a second he points to the picture.

"The wife." I smile politely at the picture, not wanting to make idle conversation in the slightest.

"She died two weeks after that picture was taken."

"Oh God. I'm sorry."

"Agh, such is life, you know? She tripped on the stairs, simple as that. She lasted a week."

He seems to be weighing up his next sentence intently. "What you were saying to the person on the phone. It's true you know, I knew she could hear me when I was talking to her. The nurses and the Doctors tell you to let them know you're there. I knew she could hear my voice, right to the end."

He was smiling at the memory. It warmed me slightly in the place where hope and certainty used to live. God love a nosey Cab driver.

"Agh will you look at this." He slams his hands on the wheel in frustration gesturing at the traffic cones being placed in the road and the grinding halt of the cars in front. "Looks like there's been a car accident up front. They're closing off the road."

"What! No. I'll run from here, I can't sit just waiting."

"No. We're not close enough mate, it'll take you too long." He whips around intently at the sea of vehicles then glances at me through the mirror as I squirm in my seat, feeling increasingly paler and losing the battle with my nerves.

"Right, I'm not having this"-he says with conviction.

He backs the cab up and horns erupt from behind us. I'm slammed into the side of the taxi as we mount pavements and squeeze between buses and other waiting cars. A warning one-off police siren sounds just behind me, signalling us to stop our highly illegal manoeuvring.

"Dave. It would be really great if we didn't get pulled over. I just want to see my friend."

"And I'm going to get you there. Don't you worry about that."

We squeeze down a pedestrianized high street, blasting the horn sending people scattering. Out of the back window I can see the police car turning the corner after us. The siren kicks up a gear.

"I'd put your seatbelt on if I were you Doctor Watson and hold on tightly."

"Of course. Wait, I didn't tell you my name. How do you know my name?"

He smiles through the mirror. "I was a big fan of your blog. That Sherlock Holmes was incredible I didn't believe a word of that rubbish in the papers about him being a fraud."

I manage a smile just before I'm slammed into the opposite window as we screech round a corner.

We miraculously lose sight of the police car but still hear the screeching sirens as we break several more trafficking laws in the process. Minutes later pull up alongside the ambulance bay at the hospital. I scramble out of the taxi and lean in through the driver's window diving into my pockets for some cash. Oh Shit. Shit.

"I don't believe it… I forgot my wallet. If you wait here for one second I'll get some cash from someone inside and I'll be right out. I'm sorry, I'm not thinking clearly. After everything you've done for me…"

"Hay. It's alright forget about it. You've got to get going or the police are going to hold you up, they'll be here in seconds. Let me deal with them."

"This may not make any sense to you, but you've redeemed the London Cab driver in my eyes. Thank you my friend."

"Wash your mouth out doctor of course I understand; 'A study in Pink', my favourite blog that one. Hay"- he shouts after me. "I don't have a clue what the hell is going on, but I hope Mr Holmes is ok?"

Navigating the way to neurology I don't wait for the nurse who is calling me back to the reception desk. I ignore the commotion instead jogging on, peering through doors and shouting his name.

I round a corner at speed at the end of a corridor.

Mycroft stands outside an isolated room. My hand makes a grab at the wall to steady me to catch some breath, but he stands with his tie slightly looser about his neck, his sleeves rolled up staring at the floor in disbelief, a shade of pale so deathly as only the Holmes' can pull off. He lifts his head to stare straight through my presence.

I gasp at the unmoving stale air. "Oh god. No."

He registers reality a little too late as I follow the support of the wall with hands flat against it and crash through the door behind him. "John. Wait."

The room is awash with the evening sunlight and a white so bright that it bounces off the walls leaving me to shield my eyes from it. Eventually colour and sound burst back through to my brain in the form of bright coloured uniforms moving about a hospital bed.

Monitors sound softly in the background; gentle and lulling. Verbal orders are barked out and figures bustle around equipment. A young lady doctor replaces a stethoscope back around her neck, seeming satisfied with the results in front of her and moves to clear my view of the bed.

"Quite miraculous I'm sure," she says. "Mr Holmes, you are quite the luckiest man I've seen in my career so far."

Drowsy eyes peer out from under the sheet, an oxygen mask just visible as Sherlock lies bundled up on his side, shaking gently. His eyes find me and recognition shines in the pools of his irises just before an odd confusion. They flutter closed for a brief second then he strains to try and keep them open.

I kneel on the floor beside him in disbelief.

"You always need everything to be so bloody clever, don't you? Does your quest to make me 'think' always have to be so relentlessly dramatic Sherlock?"

He drags a hand out from under the starched white sheet and brings it up to my face. Cold fingers clinically prod at my cheek and lips, satisfying himself that this particular image is indeed reality and not an hallucination maintained by drugs and injury. I lean into his hand then take it from my cheek to place my own lips there as he returns to sleep.

I close my own eyes and tilt them to the ceiling in relief before placing my arms on the bed, resting my chin on them so as better to watch him.

Just when I think hours could have passed in an instant, he jerks awake with panic visible through the mask as he tries to sit up enough to swing his legs out of the bed.

"Hold it there," I say gently "you're not going anywhere right now."

He moves his head slightly closer with considerable effort and tries to mouth words. I satisfy myself with his oxygen saturations on the monitor before I remove the O2 mask, but his voice is all but a hoarse whisper.

"M.."

"Moriarty is dead, I know.."

He takes a look at his surroundings and gives me a look of contempt.

"They'll…come…for…us. The plan must.."

I lean in close intent on telling him that I'll have Lestrade gather one hundred armed men to surround this bloody hospital and wait it out if we have to. But I won't be letting anyone come to finish the job.

Mycroft clears his throat behind me. "Sherlock is indeed correct John. We left ourselves open to the radar of Moriarty's legacy as soon as we entered these hospital doors. That is why I have set Sherlock's original plan in motion once more,"- his eyes finally land on his brother's form- "now that he has graced us with his presence. The name on his records here is of course now untraceable.."

"Of course…Obvious and ridiculously easy," says the cracked whisper.

Mycroft offers up a sarcastic grimace at his brother's comment. It looks more like a smile now.

"Dr Watson. When his doctors and yourself are satisfied that my brother is fit to make the journey to a considerably better hidden establishment then you will be able to relocate as per the original plan until I am happy that it is safe for you both to return."

"When I am happy" says Sherlock. "We both know brother that your intelligence agency leaves little to be…." His lungs finally start to pay him back for the liberty he has taken in actually being awake and alive.

"Ok boys not here. Not now." I place the oxygen mask back over his head only to have his weak hands bat it away in frustration. I hear Mycroft flip his phone open ignoring the protests of a nearby nurse. He slowly saunters out of the door.

"Sherlock, this master plan you had in mind that was so amazing you neglected to tell me about it. Does it…"

"Take us out of London? Yes."

"For how long exactly?"

He investigates some of his dressings on his shoulder then winces as he turns back onto his side, pale and in obvious pain. "A man is a long time dead John. However long it will take to illuminate his contacts."

I lean back and contemplate this plan. Of course I knew it days ago when Mycroft had confessed all but now it is Sherlock filling in the gaps, albeit a little slower than usual, something felt off. His eyes watched me and I want to lean in and remove all that heaviness from his brow and just tell him to sleep whilst I stayed right here next to him.

He suddenly rallies a little and slides up the bed a fraction.

"But it doesn't matter anymore. You're not coming."

"I'm sorry what?"

"You're not coming John."

"Like hell I'm not. Might I remind you what has just occurred here. You shouldn't even be alive Sherlock. I shouldn't think I'll need one but do you want me to find a way of keeping you in this bed because I have no problem with that. I am a doctor after all. What has changed?"

He shifts uncomfortably, "I work better alone. That no longer means you being involved in my little trip."

I see. Hitting me where it hurts then."

"You'll slow me down."

"Oh yeah? I'm going to take that as an insult from the man in the cast, two chest drains and a head injury that a stunt motorcyclist would be proud off."

"Have you gone mad John?"

"Says the man who leaped 'wrongly' off the top of a building. Yes I rather think I have. You see the man I have sat here praying to live, praying to return to at least some form of what he was before has woken up and done just that. You're being stubborn and dim witted, but I'll let you off seeing as you're in a hospital bed. I know you can do it on your own you idiot but we'll get it done faster together you know we will. Surely you can understand the logic within that, you pride yourself on it, its what gets you by isn't it?"

The lady doctor puts her head around the door and nods at her colleague looking over the charts. "We're going to need to CT scan your head now Mr Holmes, bet you've the worst headache of your life."

"I wish someone would," I said arms folded solid.

It takes a second but he cracks a smile and tries to laugh a little which is instantly regretted.

I gather him up easily and gently letting his head hang on my shoulder and rest there. I press a kiss to the side of his forehead and feel the heaviness of his muscles against me. The hand that lies between us grabs the material of my shirt and his eyelashes flutter closed against my neck.

"You didn't have your uniform dry-cleaned at our local drycleaners. It was done in Piccadilly by a Chinese Gentleman. You've been staying in a hotel we've visited before in that area."

It wasn't a question. I just hold him a little tighter.

"Your safety remains the only goal here John."

"It's the same from here Sherlock, that's what a relationship means you bloody idiot. Now come on lie down, they'll take you in a second."

He does so slowly with his hand still scrunched in my shirt. Before they take him from the room I bend down and kiss him nuzzling the side with no bandages. He doesn't open his eyes again seemingly lost in the punishment his body was beginning to inflict.

"I'll be here when you get back," I whisper.

The bed is wheeled down a dark corridor. Mycroft waits patiently at the end of it, his face lit by the light of his phone as he texts. Sherlock regards him, his expression as cold as his brother's as he lifts the oxygen mask.

"There will be a time when we discuss what you did to John. But for now, I trust you didn't need me to be obvious and voice what I wanted you to do aloud? You have organised it?"

"Of course. These Gentlemen are taking you now. I trust you'll behave better in this transfer."

Mycroft goes to walk away but I hand grabs at his arm.

"You'll permit me some paper and a pen brother?"

He contemplates the request for a second then nods.

"Excuse me are you Dr Watson?"

The gentle tap on my shoulder wakes me from my upright chair-napping and I spill some of the cold coffee on the floor.

"A gentleman asked me to give you this."

A piece of paper folder into a neat square.

My Dearest John

Please forgive me once again.

SH.