John wakes. He's moving, lying in the backseat of a car as rocks slowly on what can only be smooth expanses of highway.
He's floating. His eyes won't stay open.
He fades.
Someone is smoking. Secondhand smoke is nearly as fatal as if you're actually smoking it (he sometimes wonders if this is the real reason that Sherlock really quit, not for his health but for John's). He doesn't think that this driver deserves to know that fact though; wherever they're taking him, he's certain it's nowhere he wants to be.
They've stopped moving.
His mind wanders away.
It doesn't return immediately when he wakes again and it takes a few moments before it comes crashing back to him with the heavy realization that they haven't killed him yet, which is a good sign. It's all he has to hold onto at the moment. Blindfolded, gagged, crowded into a cramped, hot darkness with only his thoughts for company. A bead of sweat trickles down his back, his shirt sticking to his skin in the damp heat. He thinks he's alone. He hopes he stays that way.
He's not even sure if Sherlock knows he's gone. Some small quiet voice protests—surely he'd know if his flatmate isn't there—but a far louder voice shouts over it, reminding John that this is the same man who carried on conversations by himself and who assumed that John was always in the room to listen. It wasn't uncommon for him to come back from the Tesco or an errand run and remind Sherlock that he'd been gone for a few hours So if John were to be completely honest with himself and the situation, it was entirely likely that Sherlock hadn't noticed his absence since his track record of his awareness that John is in the room was absolute shite.
But this was different, wasn't it? Sherlock must have wondered why his texts went unanswered when the topic they'd been discussing had been so important. John found it hard to believe that Sherlock would ignore a prospective interest in something he previously thought was unrequited, even if it interrupted his research and even if that research involved Moran. Because he'd told John the one thing that gave John faith; the one thing that assured him that everything might be alright, that Sherlock would work with every fibre of his being to find him. He said he loved him.
It's the waiting that's the worst. The time spent not knowing anything, where he is, who's taken him, what their plans are. Something to get to Sherlock, surely. John was never valuable enough on his own to be considered priceless collateral. Like a hungry greed upon seeing gold, Sherlock gave him his worth, yet it was a two-faced blessing, and sometimes they were unlucky enough for others to notice that without John Sherlock didn't shine quite as brightly.
In the dark, he remembers Victor Hatherley, a man who'd come into the clinic with a missing thumb and a shockingly calm disposition. He said he was an engineer, called out to Eyford to look at a malfunctioning hydraulic press that was so large it constituted a whole room on its own. He was in the middle of examining the machine, too caught up in trying to figure out the problem to notice that it had been turned on. Trapped, stuck with no way out, his only option was choosing his means of death: lying on his stomach so his spine would be crushed or on his back, staring up at the descending piston that was growing larger as it laid itself down to crush him. He escaped of course, at the price of a sliced off thumb, but John can't shake the feeling that, here in the dark, he must choose how to face his own death.
He doesn't know which one to choose yet.
Sherlock stands in the empty hallway, the orange sun setting behind London's skyline, burning his shadow against the wall as he stares out of the window.
He's heard a multitude of things over these few hours, shouting, murmuring, the banging of objects, but nothing seems to hit Sebastian Moran hard enough to break him. He wants nothing more than to go into that room and break him, rip him apart like a piece of paper until nothing is left but confetti and then he'll burn it to ash. But not before he gets what he wants out of him. Not before he knows where John is, if he's alive.
He shuts his eyes.
Something inside him aches at the thought of the empty space where John should be, the feeling not dissimilar to the cold reverberations of a stuck metal pipe, shivering through his insides like ice.
He needs a cigarette. He needs that little insignificant burning wad of chemicals and pseudo-tobacco that tastes like heaven until it turns to ash on his tongue.
He needs his blogger.
The door bangs open behind him. He turns as Lestrade comes out and jerks his head towards his office before he strides off down the hallway, haggard and exhausted in the way of someone using all of their might to go absolutely nowhere.
He looks into the room and Moran stares back at him. He winks before the door slams shut.
Silently, Sherlock stares at the space that demon's face had been before he turns on his heel and follows Lestrade, a shadow trailing softly down the burning hallway.
Sisyphus would not envy their task.
Sherlock doesn't need to ask to know that Moran hasn't said anything. He knows him because he knows John and a soldier needs more than threats to sell their loyalty and Moran's lies in the grave beside the body of Jim Moriarty. An embalmed devotion, fossilised and untouchable, preserved in a crystallised darkness.
Lestrade is ripping open a nicotine patch and slapping it on his arm beside its twin as Sherlock stands in the threshold.
"You'll deplete Tesco's stock in two hours at the rate you're going." Sherlock says lowly, leaning against the doorway.
"Well to quote a magnificent git, it's a two patch problem." Lestrade growls at him, shaking his hands through his hair.
"You're paraphrasing. My tolerance has led to a three patch minimum. Two patches just shame the word."
"Sherlock, he hasn't said anything."
"I'm aware of the fact. If he'd said anything important, you'd have informed me—"
"No, Sherlock," Lestrade slams the drawer of his desk shut. "He hasn't said anything." He sighs, gripping the edge of his desk with white knuckles. "Not one bloody word."
Sherlock feels something dark and cold pass through him.
"Nothing?" He asks, and his voice is too quiet for his liking.
Lestrade shakes his head.
"The one thing your force is good at, incompetent violence, and you can't even do that right."
"Sherlock, don't you dare turn this on me, alright?" Lestrade says, whirling around to face him. "You know I'm trying my best and if I had any way to sweat him, any chance that it would lead us to John, I would do it." He pauses, controlling his temper. "Look, I know what John is to you, I heard Moran say it just as clearly as you did, but turning on your friends because you can't hurt your enemy is not what you need to do right now."
"And what is John to me?"
A huff of empty laughter escapes Lestrade . "You don't need me to spell it out to you, Sherlock."
John smiles at him one night, before their lives were synchronised and they were in that black orbit around each other, when Sherlock offers to clean the kitchen, and it was so warm and unfiltered like candlelight and Sherlock feels his heart choke at the sudden memory, spluttering before it breathes again.
"Lestrade, you—you don't know how this feels."
A self-immolation of his soul, hot and bright and burning and it hurts, it hurts so much.
"No," Lestrade says, shaking his head. "You're right, Sherlock. I don't know, but I understand it. If it was Molly, that box of patches would be empty and I'd have alienated everyone that was trying to help me. Don't be like that, Sherlock. It won't help you and it certainly won't do John any good."
"What can we do?"
"Now? We wait. Wait, and hope we can do something that will change his mind. Maybe find out more about this Sam Johnson-Hait, follow up on him once the family has been contacted."
"Where is he now?"
"With Molly. I told her about your theory on the cocaine abuse and she's running some tests."
"I assume she has his possessions, then?"
"Yeah, most likely. Why, saw something you liked?"
"I'm not sure yet."
"Well stop by before you leave; I'm sure she'd like the company."
"Why? Is yours not fulfilling enough?"
Lestrade frowns. "Just because you find me incompetent doesn't mean she does."
"I don't think you're incompetent." Sherlock says solemnly. "Ineffectual maybe, and certainly unorganised, but not…wholly incompetent."
"That's quite a compliment coming from you. I should print it out and frame it."
"Don't count on a personal appraisal." Sherlock says dryly.
Lestrade looks at him for a moment, and he knows that, despite what Sherlock claims, he's every bit as human as the next man. John's absence will be sorely felt tonight.
"Listen, Sherlock," He starts. "I know going home tonight will be difficult, but will you promise me you'll get a good night's rest?"
"I'll try." Sherlock says tensely and Lestrade nods grimly. He doesn't know if he should add anything, any words of comfort.
"I'll call you if he says anything. Go see Molly, although if I catch you nicking anything, it's on your head."
Sherlock waves his hand in departure as he leaves.
"Tell me if you find anything!" Lestrade calls after him.
Sherlock walks back down that lonely hall, nothing more than a shadow against the darkness outside.
Molly walks over to the cold countertop where the body of W. Sam Johnson-Hait now rests, stripped of his wealthy vestments and just as naked as anyone that comes onto Molly's table. "His cause of death was a cerebrovascular haemorrhage brought on by hypertension from the solution of cocaine."
"An overdose."
"Yeah, exactly. You were right, Sherlock."
Sherlock likes it better when John says it.
"How high was the dosage?" He asks lowly, eyes concentrated on the pallid face in front of him.
Molly flips the papers on her clipboard until she finds the one she's looking for.
"The median lethal dose of cocaine is about point two milligrams per kilo of body weight, and he had almost two in his system, so I guess whoever wanted to kill him wanted to be sure he'd be dead."
"Were all the injections intravenous?"
"Yeah, all but one."
"What was the exception?"
"Well, um, this one here," She carefully turns the dead man's head to the side and points to the third injection mark. "It's subcutaneous, but I can't tell if they planned it to be or if it was an accident."
"Was the cocaine solution injected into it?"
"I can't tell yet, but I'll let you know when I find out."
"Thank you."
He pulls the gloves off and shrugs his own on as he heads for the door.
"Oh, Sherlock?"
He turns at her voice.
"You—you left some of your things here earlier, before you left." She reaches underneath one of the tabletops and extracts a small black bag, one of his minor tool kits that he took more out of routine than use.
"Ah, thanks."
"Why did you leave so quickly?" She asks, then upon seeing his face she adds: "I mean, you don't have to tell me, I was just curious…sorry."
"I thought John needed me."
A silence billows between them.
"I heard what happened." She says quietly, her face filling with sympathy. "I'm sorry, Sherlock, I'm sure you and Greg will find him. If I can help you, you'll let me know, right?"
"I will."
"Goodnight Molly."
"Night—"
He's already out of the door before she finishes her sentence.
He goes home, but he doesn't sleep. How can he?
The atmosphere of the flat is pathetically stagnant, the air thick with a silent miasma of heavy emptiness. He will be alone, for tonight.
This investigation is in his most dreaded state, inaction. It's too early to gather the information he needs, but too late to notice anything of value. The inspection of the flat while he was with Lestrade is more than enough information for him to know that any evidence Moran could have left behind was obliterated.
He stares at his bed, his outline indented in the mattress once more after years of inoccupation. It will feel more lonely than it looks, since he knows that, if this day had gone differently, John might be there beside him. Laughing at him, kissing him, holding him.
He can't stay in his room. Not with these hypothetical ghosts. They will only haunt him.
He goes into the parlour, littered with things that are all yelling John's name at him. His mug that he hadn't washed out yet, his medical books, his magazines and war novels, objects that speak loudly of their owner's character. A meticulous nature, honed by time in the army yet frayed by a more peaceful civilian lifestyle. An interest in war, a clean curiosity until it was experience first-hand when one finds that there is no romanticism in the sound of gunfire or screams of the dying. It is this interest, however, that makes him hopeful. John has survived many things. In the best outcome of the situation, this will be one that he can add to his list. Sherlock doesn't want to think of the worst.
He knows Mycroft is watching him. He didn't hide his newest camera as well as the others, and it stares at Sherlock where it's wedged between the corner of the kitchen cabinets and the ceiling. He stares back. He knows his brother won't hesitate to meddle and he fully expects an unannounced visit in the morning.
He decides to do what he does best. Investigate.
He sits at the kitchen table, the background light from John's computer illuminating his face in the darkness.
The Johnson-Haits. Blue-bloods of the highest pedigree, distant relations to the Queen (naturally), and plagued by the personal trouble that comes with old money. The prodigal son, riddled with drug abuse and social scandals. The daughter, high strung, cold, manipulative. The father, distant, absent. The mother, dependent. It all reeked of melodrama. It reminded him of his family.
But despite the petty scandals, he still has no motive for the son's murder. Moran wasn't stupid enough to do it for a name, just because it matched up with John's. There had to be another reason.
It was nearing three in the morning when Lestrade calls.
"Sherlock," His voice is heavy and tired. "He's asking for you."