He hated admitting he wasn't strong enough. He hated that he couldn't anticipate what has happening. This night had gone completely wrong.

They had found the man, Alan Lloyd who voiced the message on Colin's White's message machine. That night, they had gone off on their own after Sherlock got a tip from one of his homeless network about where Alan had been hiding. Alan was Colin's cousin. He was jealous of him because he was in love with Colin's girlfriend. Of course Lestrade and team of police officers had been on their way, but now, every second seemed precious and he cursed himself and his judgment. He believed Sherlock Holmes. He believed him so much that it was going to kill him.

Everyone seemed to know that John was Sherlock's weak spot. Moriarty knew. Those drug dealers had known. They always came after him to try to manipulate Sherlock and Sherlock always, always found a way to find a third option, another way to get out of even the most impossible situations.

Tonight was different, though.

Of course, as always, they had chased Alan through the back streets of London at an ungodly hour. They'd ended up somewhere near the Thames. John was just on the heels of Sherlock, who was only a couple of strides behind the suspect. The Thames was to their right, and to his surprise, John saw Alan seemingly throw himself into the river. To his horror, Sherlock followed him.

Fortunately, in the dark, John wasn't able to see the small strip of land that was jutting out from under the bridge they were on. John froze for a moment as he saw the two men grappling in the moonlight, just steps away from the river.

John did the only thing he could think of, "HEY!" he shouted as loud as he could muster.

He was trying to distract Alan to give Sherlock a chance to gain the upper hand. Thankfully, it worked. Alan glanced away from Sherlock for just a second, which gave Sherlock the chance to throw a few, well-placed punches in an attempt to drop the man.

Alan fell to the ground momentarily. John took a couple of steps forward, getting within arm's reach of Alan, ready to intervene. Alan stood again and lashed out at John, this time, with a knife in his hand. He had pulled the knife from his boot.

Startled, John lost his balance momentarily, but didn't fall, giving Alan enough time to grab John and pull him into a headlock, with the knife to his throat.

It happened so fast and Sherlock didn't have any time to intervene.

Now, he stood looking white as a sheet, several steps away from the two of them with his hands outstretched in a gesture of pleading and surrender.

"No. Let him go." Sherlock stated simply.

Alan laughed. "Fat chance at that happening. I'm not an idiot. As long as I have him, you'll have to let me go because you don't want to see any harm done to your little friend."

Sherlock briefly flicked his eyes down to John's before returning them to Alan's.

"He's not part of this. This is between you and I." Sherlock continued. His voice was steady and low. A slow burn… thought John.

John was surprisingly calm. He knew exactly what he was going to do to get out of this; he just needed enough of a distraction and the right timing…

"How did you know, by the way? I mean, obviously you heard the phone recording, but I mean, how did you know that it wasn't Tom? He was the last one there before me. And how did you plan on proving it to a jury?" Andy asked.

"It was the chess board, if you must know." Sherlock responded.

"Eh?"

"The chess board. It was set up incorrectly. Everyone who looked at it assumed that the players had been mid game when one was dealt a lethal blow by the other when the game went badly. They thought they were looking for a sore loser, and in a way, I supposed they were as in this story, Colin had won the girl and you didn't. But it was a set up. You were trying to set up Tom but you don't know anything about chess. John told me there were two bishops on either side of a rook. That's an impossible position."

Andy started to laugh low and maniacally. He shifted his feet and pushed the blade into John's skin a little at his throat.

Sherlock continued, "Two bishops of a single color can never be separated by a single square in a straight line. Well, I suppose it is theoretically possible for a white to promote a pawn to a second white bishop, but such a move would be colossally unlikely, particularly mid-game. A non-player set up the board, so it had to have been someone other than Tom. Pedestrian, really."

Sherlock was almost grinning at the end of his deduction, but John was getting nervous now. He grit his teeth as he felt Alan's warm breath against his neck. He took a chance to try to get away. He kicked his right leg back into Alan's shin, elbowed him in the gut, and slammed his head back, hard, to try to hit Alan in the face. The quick hits momentarily gave John the opportunity to get away, but not without a well placed cut slicing open John's injured shoulder.

Blood was seeping through his jumper in seconds and John winced as the pain receptors sent the signals to his brain, complaining about the problem.

It appeared that they were at a stale mate for a moment.

Sherlock kept frantically glancing over at John who was trying to stay upright and breathing heavily while also keeping an eye on Alan who was still armed with the knife. Where the HELL is Lestrade? Late… as always! Complained Sherlock in his head.

"Tell you what." Started Alan. "I'll take you on, Holmes. Just you and me… I'll even ditch the knife." The knife clattered against the rocks as he said it. "But your little friend here has to go."

John briefly considered the odds. Though Sherlock was a skilled fighter, Alan was significantly larger than Sherlock. There was also no guarantee that Alan was armed with another knife somewhere else on his body. There was no way that he was going to let Sherlock fight Alan on his own. He immediately started shaking his head.

"No." he stated.

"John-" Sherlock started but was interrupted.

"Sherlock, no. I am not going to let you be –"

"John. GO." Sherlock was angry. Well, he appeared angry. John was confused. Why was Sherlock angry at him? Was it an act? Was it a sign? Was he supposed to deduce something form his anger?

"But Sherlock-"

"Go tell Lestrade where we are. I'll be finished here in a minute." He flashed a quick grin at John and winked.

John had obeyed. John trusted Sherlock's cockiness. To John, Sherlock was cocky because he had to have a plan. There was something that he knew about the situation that John didn't that meant that he had the upper hand.

Just thinking about it now made him sick.

John left and tried calling Lestrade. He saw his police car just as he had climbed back up to the main road. He waved him over and told him that Alan and Sherlock were on the bank.

"What happened to you?" Lestrade asked as they started running back towards the bank.

"Nevermind." John responded.

They got onto the embankment, but neither man was there.

"They were just here! Where could they have…"

"My God." Lestrade exclaimed. A light had been shown down into the water from the officers on the main road and allowed them to see Alan dunking and holding Sherlock under the water.

Without any thought, John was in the water and swimming out into the water towards Alan.

"John! STOP!" Lestrade called.

It's too long. He's been under too long. He thought.

Just then, he heard loud gunshots from the shore. John was barely on his tip toes and he stopped swimming for a moment so he didn't get hit by a flying bullet. Thankfully, the policemen were able to take out Alan.

When Alan's grip loosened from Sherlock's body, Sherlock floated, lifeless to the surface. John could vaguely hear Lestrade berating his team to hold their fire but John didn't care.

Nothing else mattered.

He had to get Sherlock back to shore, NOW.