A/N: Thanks as always for your wonderful supportive reviews. No warnings for this chapter except for references to alcoholism.
He was in his mind palace, the part that he rarely visited and was most likely to be overlooked by Moriarty, no matter how hard he searched. A secret room in the attic, hidden behind discarded furniture and shrouded in cobwebs.
The memories of his early childhood. Nothing that usually interested him...and would certainly never interest Moriarty. Nothing useful here, nothing that could be used against him – because no matter what others might speculate, Sherlock Holmes had actually had a rather ordinary childhood, had been raised by equally ordinary parents, put up with an obnoxious older brother, neither of them realizing at first how extraordinarily different they were from other children.
The memories after that knowledge had been thrust upon the Holmes brothers were kept rigorously separate from those that had come before. A clear demarcation, of the combined bliss of ignorance and innocence, until the discovery of difference had been made.
No, Moriarty would not even notice this mental hidey-hole. He might circle around it, but he would never be able to breach the quiet defenses that had long been erected. Oh, Sherlock could feel him, hear him, howling around the perimeter as he fruitlessly sought his prisoner, but like a vampire in an old movie, he couldn't enter unless he was invited in. And Sherlock Holmes had absolutely no intention of allowing his captor access to any more of his mind than he'd already plundered, now that he understood how to erect the proper defenses around his deepest sense of self.
He ignored Moriarty's frantic search, narrowing his own focus on what he'd learned about the supernatural entity that had taken over his body, then used it to do and say such horrific things to the people Sherlock cared about.
He very carefully refused to acknowledge how sickened he'd been when Moriarty used his body to rape Molly Hooper. The verbal damage the madman had inflicted on John and Mary was bad, very bad, but it was all lies and lies could be refuted. What Moriarty had done to Molly, however...that could not be refuted, ignored, or deleted.
It could, however, be temporarily put aside, compartmentalized. He could not dwell on the sick horror he'd felt as he'd been forced to watch, helpless to stop it, any of it. He couldn't stop Moriarty from using his hands to choke Molly into unconsciousness, to strip of his own clothing and hers. Couldn't stop him from using Sherlock's mouth to orally stimulate Molly, or from driving himself into her before she fully returned to consciousness...
With a snarl of rage, Sherlock slammed the lid down on the memories before they had the chance to overwhelm him. He needed to focus, dammit, to find a way out of the trap his own mind and body had become, to find a way to stop Moriarty from doing any more damage – and to get him the hell out.
More than that, he had to be stopped from ever doing something like this to anyone else.
With that goal firmly in mind, Sherlock reviewed everything he'd learned since Moriarty had taken control of his body. The supernatural entity – ghost, spirit, what have you – had access to Sherlock's memories and the ability to use them against him…up to a point. The limitations, however, appeared to have more to do with Sherlock's ability to control his own thoughts rather than any lack of ability on Moriarty's part. The key word, of course, being 'appeared'. If that hypothesis proved incorrect in the future, then it would be discarded. However, for now its validity was holding true, as Moriarty seemed unable to either locate Sherlock's hiding place, or even to recognize its existence in the first place. Good.
Moriarty couldn't control Sherlock's thoughts, only his body. He could share his own thoughts with his prisoner, although Sherlock held no illusions that Moriarty had opened his mind to him completely. No, he limited that sense of mental sharing to only what he wanted Sherlock to know; logic alone told him that.
Logic also told him that there was a time limit on Moriarty's possession of his body, else the madman wouldn't have been moving at such a breakneck speed to destroy the relationships that Sherlock had established. No, he'd have moved with much more deliberation, savoring every victory, wringing as much satisfaction out of every move as he could, rather than ticking items off as if destroying Sherlock's life was a grocery list.
Another fact, interesting and one Sherlock wasn't entirely sure he was comfortable with: he'd been able to physically affect his own body, altering the color of his irises so that Molly had some sort of tangible, or at least visible, proof that it wasn't Sherlock doing those hateful things to her. He'd seen her eyes widen in recognition of the impossible, and gambled that, taken in conjunction with the way Moriarty had deliberately used phrasing she seemed to recognize when he'd finished abusing her, should be enough for her to not simply take things at face value.
The question was, what would Molly do with that information – what could any of them do with the knowledge that James Moriarty's spirit had possessed Sherlock Holmes's body?
With that question in mind, Sherlock Holmes settled himself to research every bit of knowledge he'd retained regarding paranormal activities.
None of them, he swore, would go down without a fight.
oOo
"What do we do, then? How do we get rid of Moriarty?"
Molly had showered and dressed herself, borrowing one of Mrs. Hudson's blouses to replace the one 'Sherlock' had ruined. Fortunately he'd left the rest of her clothing intact, and although Molly had every intention of burning every last piece of it at some future point, for now practicality won out.
She'd flat-out refused to go to the police, to retain so much as a single shred of DNA evidence that would convict Sherlock of a crime she was utterly convinced he hadn't committed. John had rather half-heartedly tried to convince her otherwise – "No matter who did it to you, Molly, you were still assaulted and you should still report it, else you might not get the type of help you might need" – but she'd remained firm. Yes, someday she would probably need counseling and in the next few days she would be very likely writing herself a prescription for the morning-after pill, but that was all in the future. She needed to focus on the now, on the situation as it was currently unfolding, and although John clearly didn't agree with her 100% (nor did Mrs. Hudson, for that matter), he was allowing Molly to decide how she wished to handle things.
She was grateful for that, and for the way both he and Mrs. Hudson seemed to believe her, that Sherlock wasn't himself when he attacked her, although she suspected the older woman of humoring her while secretly suspecting Sherlock of backsliding into drug use. But Molly knew what she'd seen, and the way his eyes had changed color was nothing like any sort of side-effect from any drug, legal or not, that Molly had ever heard of.
She knew what she'd heard as well, those chilling words still echoing through her mind as she restlessly paced Mrs. Hudson's sitting room. There's a love, Molly. How could you doubt me after this?
John stood with folded arms, gazing down at the floor wearing an abstracted frown, and Mrs. Hudson sat and fidgeted while Molly paced, her hands nervously twisting on her lap. Molly's question hung in the air, unanswered, and she bit back a laugh, knowing how likely it was to devolve into an hysterical cackle if she didn't keep tight control of herself. "Mrs. Hudson, have you ever been to a séance, or had your palm read? Is it possible any of the mediums who have shows on the telly actually know anything about real paranormal activities? John, what do you think?"
John looked up at the sound of his name, and Molly repeated the question she'd just asked Mrs. Hudson. "Probably not," was his pronouncement. "Seems to me anyone who had real abilities wouldn't want to advertise them, yeah? At least, I wouldn't," he muttered, but there was something about the way he said it that caught Molly's attention.
"You know something, John," she said, coming to a stop directly in front of him. "There's something...it wasn't just because you didn't believe Sherlock could do something like this that convinced you to believe me, was it?"
John turned away from her, reaching up to run his hands through his hair before lacing his fingers together on the back of his head and taking a few agitated paces of his own, away from Molly and then back again. "Harry," he finally said, after what appeared to be a serious struggle with himself.
Molly gazed at him blankly, then glanced over at Mrs. Hudson for help. The older woman looked almost as confused as Molly felt, but then she said, "What's your sister got to do with this, John?"
He folded his arms across his chest again and took the chair across from Mrs. Hudson's sofa. "Harry's ex, she was...well, Harry said some things about her, things I dismissed because, well, because of her drinking, to be frank," he said after another long moment. Molly took a seat on the sofa, willing her nervous energy under control long enough to listen to what he was saying, because any lead, no matter how tenuous, needed to be followed. "Harry's ex, she was...interested in the occult. I found out after they'd broken up and my sister started drinking again, that that was why she did it, left her, I mean. Because she thought Clara had gone round the bend. Or at least," he added bitterly, "that was her excuse that time. Any time any little bump in the road comes up, my sister takes it as an excuse to go back on the bottle."
Any other time Molly would have immediately begun to commiserate; however, this time she needed John to stay focused and on topic, for the sake of her sanity and, more importantly, Sherlock's soul. If, of course, it was in danger, which she still wasn't entirely sure about. His body, on the other hand, and his mind...those were clearly in jeopardy.
Before John could say anything more, his mobile rang, a romantic pop tune that must be his ring tone for Mary. Molly wanted to protest, but John had been called away from Mary's flat to help her; the least she could do was let John reassure his girlfriend that everything was...well, not all right, of course, but not desperate. Nobody had died, after all.
At least, not yet.
"Mary? Yeah, honey...wait, slow down, what?!" There was a log silence on John's end, and Molly felt her feet tapping as her nerves reminded her that they were far from settled. Mrs. Hudson put her hand on Molly's knee in a comforting gesture as they waited for John's call to finish up. Clearly something was wrong, and Molly's instincts were screaming at her that it was something to do with Sherlock – Moriarty, that is.
Those instincts were confirmed when John finally spoke, promising Mary that he knew what was happening and would take care of it, that she shouldn't let what Sherlock had said to her bother her because none of it was true, and that he would explain everything just as soon as he'd gotten it sorted out. That led to another round of silence on his end while Mary once again spoke, then another set of promises and reassurances from John that he was working on it, that Sherlock wasn't in his right mind and that he loved her, Mary, and would make sure that she received not only a full explanation as soon as he had one for her, but also an apology.
After he hung up the mobile he stood staring down at it for a moment before looking up to meet the concerned gazes of Molly and Mrs. Hudson. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair in an abstracted gesture before shoving the mobile into his pocket. "Sherlock's been to see Mary," he said, voice crackling with tension and restrained fury. "He said some…pretty awful things to her. Things I know Sherlock would never say because they're straight up lies. Lies meant to hurt her and make her doubt me and…" He fell silent, drawing a deep, shuddering breath before letting it out in an explosive blast. "We have to stop him. We have to get Moriarty out of Sherlock's body and make sure he can never do anything like this to anyone else. I'm going to call my sister and see if she has a current number for Clara."
"Right, and Molly, let's get on the laptop, shall we?" Mrs. Hudson proposed, standing up and gesturing toward her kitchen table. "Surely there must be something on that dreadful internet that can help us!"
Grateful for something to do, Molly nodded and followed the older woman as John left the flat, obviously so he could speak to his estranged sister in private.
Someone had to be able to help them, to save Sherlock from being further damaged by his unwanted supernatural invader. She refused to believe otherwise.