If Pasha mentioned the fucking sunshine one more time, Sherlock was going to take off his last pair of 500-quid shoes and beat him to death with them. The ones he bought in France with money stolen from Moriarty. He hated to get blood on those shoes, but needs must.

To begin with, nothing had led Sherlock to believe that a Russian summer was going to be much different than a London one—some very warm days, a few rare hot ones, frequent pissing rain. Nothing like this. Pasha had told him once, on a frigid April evening, that southernmost Russia actually had 5 distinct seasons. What he had not mentioned, however, was that the fifth season, beginning in mid-July, was (not so) fondly known as Surface of the Sun. It was sticky, searingly hot and breathless—and Pasha loved every bloody second of it. Loudly. Repeatedly.

Pasha was currently sitting shirtless in their elderly truck, sweat trickling gently through his dense mat of grey chest hair. He alternated between beaming out the window and singing along with the nasal, incomprehensible Chechen pop music blasting out of the radio. And every 5 minutes, just like clockwork, he'd turn that gleaming smile Sherlock's way and remark, once again, on how BEAUTIFUL the sunshine was.

Sherlock was long past telling him to shut up. Hadn't worked any of the 8 times he'd tried, in six different languages. Now he just endured, draped wiltingly across the cracked vinyl seat while the little moisture remaining in his system seeped from every pore. Sherlock had learned in childhood, painfully, that (1) he would never, under any circumstances, tan; and (2) he was quite capable of getting a second-degree sunburn on a cool, partly-cloudy day. The current conditions, then, called for drastic measures—sunscreen, when he could get it; long sleeves, no matter how hot it was; and of course Pasha's particular favorite, the bloody straw hat.

The locals thought he was demented. Sherlock knew he was, but not because of his clothing. He was demented because he was currently sitting in this fucking truck, in his fucking dress shirt and crazy-Englishman hat, dying of incipient heatstroke while on his way to pick up a pig. Correction—to probably steal a pig. Ownership, to Pasha, was a flexible term.

Case in point: the ancient refrigerated truck they were currently barreling along rutted dirt roads in. Despite the truck being older than Sherlock, it was nonetheless a fairly valuable commodity in this remote region. Pasha had become decidedly shifty when Sherlock asked him where it came from. "It doesn't really matter, William" (pronounced, as usual, 'Villyam'). "It will be back where it came from before it's missed."

Sherlock had learned the hard way to take nothing for granted in these circumstances. "Missed by whom?" he said warily. Pasha pretended great interest in the weedy cows off in the distance. He muttered something indistinct.

"Pardon?" Sherlock said politely, becoming increasingly suspicious.

Pasha gave a great, put-upon sigh. "If you don't want to know, don't ask."

The hair on Sherlock's neck rose. "Why would I not want to know, Pasha?"

Pasha turned a rueful grin on him. 'Because then you don't have to lie if Borodin asks you about it.

Sherlock didn't choke, but it was a near thing. "Good Christ! You stole a truck from the Mafiya?"

"Borrowed, Villyam. Borrowed. No one sane steals from the Mafiya. But that also makes it much less likely that they would expect anything to go missing, doesn't it?" Pasha smiled benignly, as if all were now explained.

There was so much wrong with that statement, it was difficult to know where to start. "It also makes it more likely that, when something does go missing, they will kill whoever made that happen. Painfully. At length." Borodin had a reputation for imaginative brutality and a wide reach. Sherlock really didn't want to die painfully over a pig, although there was a certain element of amusement in imagining Mycroft's reaction to that kind of news.

Pasha made a rude noise. "Pish. Borodin will be busy with other issues. I may have let it slip to Kaminsky that Borodin's opium run was going a different route this month.

Sherlock gasped like a landed fish. That was brilliant, in a heinous kind of way. "You started a turf war. Over a pig."

Pasha grinned. "Only a little war. And if the big dogs fight the other big dogs, perhaps we little dogs can nick the rest of the kibble while they're occupied. The pig is just an added bonus." He was extremely pleased with himself.

Sherlock decided to ignore him for a bit as punishment. He picked up an old newspaper and tried fanning himself, but only succeeding in moving more hot air through the cab. He dropped the paper and slid back into a full sulk.

Sulking, though, lost its appeal when no one remarked on it or tried to coax him out of it. Pasha, the parent of three grown children, was far more experienced in dealing with adolescent behavior than John Watson. He simply continued to gaze happily out at the sunshine. It was hateful.

Sherlock, predictably, cracked first. "So why are we stealing a pig, again?"

Pasha gave him a disapproving look. "I told you this, Villyam. Twice." Sherlock raised his hand, preparatory to giving a dismissive wave along with a dismissive statement, but Pasha cut him off. "And don't tell me you 'deleted' it. That's a load of balls and you know it." Sherlock's mouth closed with a snap.

Pasha was now genuinely irritated. "I told you, you didn't have to come. I told you I would do this, for my daughter. My only remaining daughter, who is getting married in three days and didn't even tell me. The least I can do is supply the meat for the wedding feast. But if you didn't want to come you should have said so and I would have done this on my own. Or asked Kolya to help."

Sherlock, to his annoyance, felt his cheeks flush. "And of course, Kolya would drive 400 miles to come help you steal a pig. Because that's the kind of giving soul he is."

And oh, he regretted saying that, but as usual when his temper was involved, he found himself pinpointing the one thing most likely to alienate his audience. And the one thing he would bitterly reproach himself for later, when it involved the few people he actually cared about.

But Pasha surprised him, as he so often did. He laughed, ruefully. "Well, perhaps not Kolya. Not without arranging it a year ahead of time and throwing in a monetary bonus and a prostitute."

Sherlock, though, had learned a thing or two in the past year. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

Pasha nodded. "No, you shouldn't." He turned a wry, sideways grin on Sherlock. "But that doesn't make it any less true."

They sat in companionable silence for a bit. Pasha looked admiringly out the window and turned to once again remark on the sunshine but, on seeing Sherlock's flushed, sweaty face, relented.

Sherlock noticed. "Yes, I know. Beautiful," he muttered. Pasha beamed.

"So tell me. Where, exactly, are we going to steal this Godforsaken pig?" This, at least, was a safe topic. Pasha had been very cagey about his source. Given the provenance of the truck, it was probably better that Sherlock know the full scope of this potential debacle now.

Pasha snorted. "That's funnier than you realize. Have you heard of the Monk?"

Sherlock blinked. "Monk, as in rosary beads, chanting, flagellation? That kind of monk?"

Pasha nodded. "Basically. Probably not the holiest of monks, mind you. And I'm not even sure he's ordained, technically speaking. 'The Monk' is the name he goes by. He certainly looks the part—long wool robes, funny hat, poor bathing habits. He lives in a nasty hut, far out in the woods, and grows everything he needs, including pigs and chickens. But he also, from what I am told, used to have a different profession," Pasha waggled his eyebrows, "and so I think perhaps God wouldn't mind if he paid a little additional penance now, to atone for past sins."

"And you're going to take care of that, on God's behalf?" Sherlock asked primly.

"Oh no, my dear—I wouldn't presume to guess the mind of God. But I am fairly sure that God will not be offended if I take the initiative and test the faith of one of His chosen a bit. Suffering improves the soul, or so I'm told."

Sherlock thought idly that if that were true, his own soul, if indeed such a thing existed, must be much improved from a year ago. Then cringed, silently. Sentiment again. This was embarrassing.

And of course Pasha, the perceptive bastard, noticed the sudden silence. He gave Sherlock a quick glance and Sherlock could see, clearly see, him decide not to comment. Christ. When did he become a teenaged girl, and when did Pasha decide he needed coddling?

Enough. "So we're going to rob this Monk, presumably at gunpoint, and hope that he won't tell anyone?"

Pasha accepted the offering for what it was. Moving well away from the doldrums of Feelings, then. "I am shocked that you would even think I would use force on a priest." He widened his eyes at Sherlock, though the smirk took something away from the effect. "How will he tell anyone when he won't know that we are ever there? We will wait very late. And I am told he makes regular market trips to Kursk every Thursday, and does not come back until the following evening. And today is Thursday."

Sherlock huffed. "Then why wait until very late? I don't much fancy prancing through a pigsty in the dark." Well, didn't much fancy pigsties at all, truthfully, but that was beside the point.

"Because while there are few neighbors, the ones that are there have very little to occupy themselves, and are going to remember a refrigerated truck passing. That's an interesting event in the country, you know." Pasha had, at some point, developed the typical city-dweller's contempt for country life, even though he himself came from a village he often described as a beer smudge on the map. "Besides, you're not the one who's going to get the pig out. Pretty little city boy like you? Pigs can smell fear, you know."

Sherlock sniffed. "You say that like I'm going to argue with you. I'm not especially interested in impressing swine, thank you." He dropped his chin and grinned up at Pasha through his lashes. "Nor the pig, either."

Pasha snorted with laughter. "Prick," he said fondly.

Sherlock never realized, until he came to Russia, what true darkness looked like. He wasn't always a city boy, after all—he spent his formative years (when not away at school) in the wilds of Surrey, rambling through woods at will. But there were always other houses within a mile or so, enough to give at least a dim light on even the darkest nights.

This, though—this darkness had teeth. It was easy to see, now, why so many fairy tales envisioned horrors in the dark.

"The least you could have done was to pick a night with a full moon," Sherlock muttered, in a tone just this side of a whine. "We're going to break our legs traipsing around in the woods in this."

Pasha gave a long-suffering sigh. "The idea, Villyam, is not to be seen, remember? If we can see, so can anyone else who might be around. And anyway, that's why I brought the torches."

"The torches that you won't let us use," Sherlock snapped. "And I'm not sure why we couldn't just park the truck and come up to the house at twilight, and wait there for full dark."

"Because we don't want to take a chance on the Monk leaving later than expected for Kursk. Stealth, not force, remember?" Pasha paused to grip Sherlock's forearm as he stumbled yet again. "And stop rolling your eyes. I can't see it but I know you're doing it, and you can't see where you're going when you do it."

"I can't see where I'm going anyway," Sherlock snarled. "Oh, bugger!" He tripped yet again, and fell across knobbly tree roots and spiky pine needles that impaled his palms.

Pasha hauled him to his feet for the third time, and handed him a torch with an exasperated huff. "All right. You can turn it on now, I suppose."

Sherlock took it with poor grace. "I hate the country," he said sullenly.

His mood did improve a bit now that he wasn't stumbling around anymore. This began to seem more like an adventure, and less like a penance.

They came upon the Monk's hovel abruptly, the thick woods giving way to a small, weedy clearing with a grim peasant cabin in the middle, surrounded by ramshackle outbuildings and a vegetable patch. A generator clattered loudly, providing lights for the cabin and the barn lot.

Pasha moved smoothly around the cabin towards the far side of the barn and chicken coop. A pungent odor of manure led them quickly to their target. As they came up to the pigsty, Sherlock found his hand involuntarily sliding up to cover his nose and mouth. The smell was appalling. "My God. And people actually live next to this?" he gasped.

Pasha snorted. "You city boys are all alike. So delicate." Sherlock noticed, though, that he appeared to be breathing through his mouth.

They were suddenly interrupted by an explosive porcine squeal, followed by a cracking impact of 25 stone of enraged pork charging the timber fence around the sty. Pasha leapt backwards and fell on his arse; Sherlock damn near achieved levitation, abruptly finding himself twenty feet away and twitching. "What the hell was that?" he gasped, before he could get a tether on his mouth.

Pasha gave a hysterical titter. "It's a pig, idiot. What else do you find in a pigsty?"

Sherlock, waiting for his heartrate to come back down out of rabbit mode, shot a mistrustful glare at the mass of muscle and lard grunting against the fence. "It's five feet long! That's not a pig, it's a horse with short legs." He noted the small angry eyes following their every move. "And it doesn't like us."

Pasha climbed to his feet, dusting the seat of his trousers. "It's a boar. They don't often like anyone." He took a closer look. "And we're in luck—it's less than half-grown. They can weigh up to half a ton, you know."

Sherlock's brain had come back online. "And you thought the two of us could get a thousand-pound animal in the truck how, exactly?"

Pasha looked slightly abashed. "I thought we could lead it up the ramp and then slaughter it in the truck." He looked again at the pig, swinish fury radiating from its every pore. "I really thought there would be females. They're, well, friendlier."

Sherlock stared. An awful certainty dawned. "You've never handled pigs in your life, have you?"

Pasha flinched. "Well, not as such."

Sherlock waited in stony silence.

Pasha sighed. "All right. I used to feed the neighbors' pigs sometimes when I was a child. And no, before you ask, I never took one of them out of the pen." He rallied a bit. "I do know, though, that they often led the pigs around on a line. Took them out into the forest to graze on nuts, that kind of thing."

Sherlock looked doubtfully at the seething mass of flesh behind the fence. "I can't see us taking that out for a stroll, Pasha. If nothing else, it weighs more than the two of us put together."

Pasha was nothing if not resourceful, though. He reached into the pocket of his cargo shorts and pulled out a large packet of mints. "They like sweets," he said, and edged carefully over to the fence, wary of the enraged panting of the boar. He pulled out a mint and tossed it gingerly over the fence. The pig followed the flight of the little disc, apparently nonplussed at this peculiar action, and then edged over to snuffle at the offering.

There was a sudden snap of jaws, a miniscule crunching noise, and the boar gave a pleased grunt and scuttled back over to the fence, clearly looking for more. Sherlock could smell a waft of wintergreen from its breath despite the miasma floating about the sty. Pasha beamed and threw another mint. Without turning his head from the pig, he spoke out of the side of his mouth. "Go in the barn. Find some rope."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "I doubt he understands Russian, you know."

Pasha kept continuous eye contact with the boar. "I'm not taking any chances. Pigs are smarter than dogs, you know."

Sherlock snorted. "If it's smart enough to figure out your plan, Pasha, we have bigger problems." But he wandered over to the barn nonetheless, flicking his torch on when he realized the decrepit building had no electricity.

The barn smelled of old hay and mildew—clearly it wasn't used for animals anymore, so finding any useable tack was unlikely. Sherlock poked around in the corners in a desultory fashion—this whole proceeding was becoming less amusing by the minute, and his shoes were going to be ruined. Finally, though, he found a length of relatively sturdy rope looped over an abandoned stall and headed back outside.

Pasha was now attempting to bond with the pig. The pig appeared much more interested in securing the rest of the mints and ignored Pasha's offered fingers.

Sherlock dredged up half-deleted information abruptly. "Pasha? Pigs bite. And the males have tusks in their bottom jaws." Pasha yanked the fingers back, but then slowly held them out again.

"No, he won't. He likes me, you see?" He gave a fond look at the behemoth in the sty. The pig continued to ignore the outstretched fingers once the lack of mints was established.

"Let me have the rope. You toss out another mint, right there in front." Sherlock handed the rope over and took the packet of mints, then tossed one in front of the boar. The boar immediately dropped its snout to snuffle up the treat, and Pasha leaned over the fence and quickly looped the rope around its neck. The animal tossed its head roughly as both Pasha and Sherlock jerked backwards reflexively. Thankfully Pasha didn't drop the rope. Sherlock, without any specific instructions to go by, tossed another mint, and the pig glared for a moment before dipping its head once more.

Pasha flashed a manic grin at Sherlock. "See there? Easy as can be."

Sherlock rolled his eyes again. "Yes, indeed. You have now roped an animal that outweighs you by at least 250 pounds. An animal which bites and has tusks. And which you now propose to somehow lead more than a mile through dark, thick forest to the truck. How many mints do you have, exactly?"

Pasha's face fell. "You always have to spoil things." He thought for a moment, and his expression cleared. "I know. You can go get the truck and bring it here." Sherlock glared, and he corrected himself. "All right, I can go get the truck and bring it here. Then all we have to do is lead it up the ramp." He held out the loop of rope. "Just don't let go of this. I'll be right back." He trotted off to the edge of the forest, switching his torch back on. Sherlock sighed and held onto the rope.

The boar grew increasingly restive, obviously aware of the rope around its neck. Sherlock glumly threw over mints, which were grudgingly accepted, but the giant pig's tiny, mean eyes left him with no illusions about how the animal felt about the rope, and presumably about him. He wondered if there was any way this would end well; probably not, but Pasha would require proof, which would almost certainly end in pain for somebody. He sighed gustily and threw another mint.

It seemed to take hours, but it was in reality only about 20 minutes before Sherlock heard the rumble of the truck coming up the track from the main road.

The pig's head snapped up alertly, almost yanking the rope from his hands. It watched warily as Pasha drove the truck over to the edge of the underbrush next to the pigsty and parked. Pasha hopped out and trotted back to open the back doors of the refrigerated compartment, sending a breath of chilled air towards Sherlock and the pig. He reached under the tailgate and slid the metal ramp out, then hooked it in place.

Pasha grinned and dusted off his hands theatrically. "There. Wasn't that simple? Now we just lead him up the ramp and we're off."

Sherlock doubted it, really he did, but resisted the urge to say so. "So what now?" he asked, rope in one hand and mints in the other.

Pasha strode over to the sty. "OK. I put the mints in a line up the ramp, and then open the gate. All you have to do is hold onto the rope until I can get back to help you. When he gets up into the truck, I'll shoot him." He fished his pistol out of the back of his shorts, and looked at Sherlock expectantly.

Sherlock, in a moment of cosmic irony, found himself playing the role of the Voice of Reason. "And if he decides to run, while dragging the two of us along like an anchor?" he inquired dryly.

Pasha snorted. "I'm a good shot." He gave the pig an (unrealistically) fond look. "But I don't expect a bit of trouble." He shoved the pistol back into his waistband.

Sherlock hated it, but he actually heard what was presumably his conscience, poor, neglected thing that it was. He sighed. "Pasha? You should hold the rope, and I'll shoot the damn thing. You outweigh me by at least 40 pounds so you have a chance of slowing it down if it decides to run."

Pasha shook his head. "I'll do any slaughtering that needs to be done. You think I forgot about the chickens? I'm the one who held your head, remember?"

Sherlock stiffened. "It was food poisoning."

Pasha looked him in the eye. "Villyam. I saw your face when you wrung the necks. You should have told me you had never done such a thing before."

Sherlock couldn't restrain his shudder as he recalled the crunch of the tiny bones under his fingers, followed by the horrible stillness of the birds. Pasha, of course, noticed, and nodded. "Yes, exactly."

Sherlock chose to let it go without further comment.

Pasha moved back over to the truck and opened up a tarp that sat next to the open door, spreading it across the truck bed. "No reason to make cleaning up any worse than it has to be," he said. "I'd like to have the truck back in place by Monday morning, so the less time scrubbing the better." He came back over, took the mints from Sherlock, and laid a trail from the edge of the pigsty and up the ramp. "That should do it." He handed the mints back, keeping a few clenched in his hand, and Sherlock stuffed the bag in his trouser pocket.

Pasha walked over to the gate of the sty. "Now then. Hang onto the rope. I'm going to lead him to the gate now, and once it's open I'll come help you with the rope if need be." Sherlock wrapped the end of the rope twice around his hand and wrist, just in case (though he wondered absently what good it would do, since he weighed a maximum of 10 stone at present. If the pig wanted to run, he'd be no more than an annoyance bobbing along behind. Well, swearing and bobbing, most likely).

Pasha, with the air of a Man With a Plan, moved briskly into place at the latch of the gate and whistled for the pig, while holding out the mints clutched in his hand. The boar looked at him suspiciously for a moment, then flexed its nostrils as it caught the scent of the mints. It moved ponderously towards the gate, Sherlock towed along in its wake by the rope around his wrist.

Pasha threw Sherlock a delighted smile, unlatched the gate and flung it open, dropping the last two mints in front of him as he backed towards the ramp. As the pig moved through the opening, though, the plan hit a snag, quite literally—the rope, still attached firmly to Sherlock's wrist, caught on the post anchoring the gate. The pig's forward motion yanked him abruptly over to the fence, much too close for his comfort. And then several things happened in quick succession.

First, Pasha realized the danger and moved quickly over to slip the rope over the top of the post before the pig's full weight fell on it and dragged Sherlock over the fence. At roughly the same time, Sherlock jerked quickly towards the post (and, coincidentally, the pig) to do the same thing. And finally, just as the rope came free of the post, the pig scented the bag of mints resting forgotten in Sherlock's trouser pocket.

The pig spun, terrifyingly fast, and lunged towards Sherlock's leg. Sherlock managed to stumble backwards just enough to keep those jaws from meeting in his thigh, but not quickly enough to keep the pig from latching onto his right ankle with an obscene crunching sound. He couldn't suppress a howl of pain as the jaws compressed, and one tusk slid sickeningly under the skin and grated against bone. Then Pasha was there, leaning over with the pistol in his hand, and shot the pig right in the middle of its forehead.

Pasha shoved his pistol quickly into the back of his shorts, then reached over and rested his palm against the side of Sherlock's face, taking in the shocked eyes and blanched skin. "All right, then. Let's get you out of there, OK?" he said gently. Because, of course, the pig had collapsed, jaws still firmly around Sherlock's ankle, pinning him in place. But things still might have been largely all right, even then, if a very large man hadn't suddenly stepped out of the darkness behind the sty and shoved a shotgun into the base of Pasha's skull.

Between shock and pain, Sherlock wasn't tracking events quite as clearly as he normally would. But he heard a basso rumble, astoundingly deep, tell Pasha to move aside and toss his pistol into the sty. Pasha was suddenly gone, and a stranger with a vast greying beard and a long black robe leaned over him. That deep, deep voice spoke to him, now. "I will get you free now. It will hurt a great deal, but I will do my best not to make it worse." Then the face turned, and he suddenly felt the pig's jaws move, around and, hideously, inside his ankle. And then, thankfully, he fainted.

Notes:

I know, I know-another freakin' cliffhanger. For reasons.