Mary moved into action instantly, reaching forward and pulling John down with her as Sherlock reached for the coffee table. He raised it onto its side, creating a quick shield for John to hide behind while Mary dashed from her crouch around the corner and further into the sitting room.
Marie had pulled her pistol while her friends found cover, and she fired back towards the room door, her bullets whizzing through the latticed door and towards their shooter.
But he was quick, ducking around the edge of the still closed door before firing his own pistol through and forcing Marie to duck behind the wall.
By that time, John had taken full cover, Sherlock was braced tightly against the wall beside Marie, and Mary had pulled her own pistol as well, firing with Marie at their attacker just as he broke through the doors.
Ajay fired back at them, and Marie quickly retracted once more, bracing herself back against the wall beside Sherlock. Mary fired another shot before she too ducked against the wall on Sherlock's other side, while Ajay took cover by the wall's corner, bracing himself against the wall just behind the turn into the sitting room.
"Hello again." Ajay snarled.
"Ajay?" Mary called, while Marie tensed as she heard Ajay's voice from around the corner, right beside her head.
"Oh, you remember me." Ajay growled back, unaware of just how close he was to Marie. "I'm touched."
"Look, I thought you were dead, believe me, I did." Mary tried to plead, but Ajay was beyond reason as he growled: "I've been looking forward to this for longer than you can imagine."
Mary grit her teeth as she answered: "I swear to you, I thought you were dead. I thought I was the only one who got out."
Ajay shifted, obscured from most of their views, before firing at the table that John was still hiding behind. Sherlock held out his hand to Mary, who swiftly handed him her gun. Marie tensed, and she shifted ever so slightly, making absolutely no sound as Sherlock covered them by calling out: "How did you find us?"
"By following you, Sherlock Holmes." Ajay replied darkly. "Through Finland, Germany, Greece… I mean, you're clever, Sherlock Holmes, you and your wife."
Marie's eyes narrowed, her jaw tightening as Ajay revealed he'd researched them enough to even know of their relationship, while Ajay continued menacingly: "You two found her, but I found you, so perhaps not so clever. And now here we are, at last."
At that moment, Sherlock fired at the lamp hanging on the ceiling, throwing them into further darkness while Marie turned the corner just enough to fire at Ajay. He was quick, however, and ducked into the window alcove, barely dodging Marie's bullet.
"Touché." Ajay murmured, a faint smirk in his voice, and John called loudly: "Listen. Whatever you think you know, we can talk about this. We can work it out."
"She thought I was dead." Ajay whispered. "I might as well have been."
"It was always just the four of us, always, remember?" Mary tried pleading again, while Sherlock nudged Marie, silently asking her to crouch down.
She did so – unwillingly but silently – taking a position by Sherlock's feet as he remained standing, both keeping their guns trained on the wall corner, watching for Ajay, as the man breathed in response to Mary's plea: "Oh yeah."
"So why d'you want to kill me?" Mary asked, almost bluntly.
"D'you know how long they kept me prisoner?" Ajay hissed. "What they did to me? They tortured Alex to death. I can still hear the sound of his back breaking."
Marie's jaw clenched even tighter, but she remained absolutely still otherwise as Ajay hissed: "But you, you… Where were you?"
"That day at the embassy, I escaped." Mary answered, her voice tight both from the tension and the news Ajay had dropped on her about her teammates' fates.
"Oh, yeah." Ajay almost spat bitterly, and Mary countered sharply: "But I lost sight of you too, so you explain: where were you?"
"Oh, I got out..." Ajay replied darkly. "For a while. Long enough to hide my memory stick."
His breathing was starting to come heavily once more as he snarled: "I didn't want that to fall into their hands. I was loyal, you see. Loyal to my friends."
Mary glanced at Sherlock, who remained stiff and unyielding as he kept his gun trained on the area where Ajay's voice was coming from as the man hissed: "But they took me, tortured me. Not for information. Not for anything except fun."
Marie suppressed a quick intake of breath at that, her horror and sympathy for the man countered by the very real danger she could feel almost radiating off of him.
Ajay spat bitterly at them, at Mary: "Oh, they thought I'd give in, die, but I didn't. I lived, and eventually they forgot about me just rotting in a cell somewhere. Six years they kept me there, until one day I saw my chance. Oh, and I-I made them pay. You know, all the time I was there, I just kept picking up things – little whispers, laughter, gossip: how the clever agents had been betrayed."
Marie cocked her head, a frown pulling her brows together as Ajay snarled: "Brought down by you."
"Me?" Mary repeated incredulously.
But at that instant, a train sped passed outside the window, whistling as it went while its bright lights briefly illuminated the room. The room sprang to action almost instantly as Marie stood, pressing her gun to Ajay's temple as he made to dash out as well, while at the same instant Sherlock passed his gun back to Mary and the blonde raised it right at Ajay's face.
Ajay didn't even flinch from Marie's gun, his eyes and own pistol trained on Mary as a wild, almost insane, anger burned in his gaze.
Another click told them that John, too, had managed to get to the gun stowed away in one of the bags that had been in the corner of the room, and Marie glanced over just briefly to see John behind the table with a gun pointed right at Ajay's chest. At least that meant they had most of their bases covered.
She returned her attention to the man insane with sorrow and angry vengeance as Ajay stared Mary down, while the blonde woman met his gaze evenly with her own, all of them holding their guns with both hands for extra stability and precision.
"You know I'll kill you too." Mary said in an unnaturally forced tone. "You know I will, Ajay."
The man's eyes were filled with rage-induced tears as he hissed back: "What, you think I care if I die?"
He let his one hand fall from his gun, drawing it ever closer to Mary's face, and Sherlock tensed as he watched while Marie's eyes narrowed as Ajay continued spitefully: "I've dreamed of killing you every night for six years-"
He stepped so close that Mary's gun was now almost touching his forehead while Marie's gun never left his temple, but Ajay didn't even seem to care as he hissed venomously: "-of squeezing the life out of your treacherous, lying throat."
"Take one more step, and I will shoot you, agent." Marie warned, and the cold tone made Ajay pause. It was too familiar for people like him and Marie and Mary, and Ajay's lip curled.
"Ah… I wondered." He murmured. "So, you're one of us."
Marie remained impassive, as Ajay glared at Mary hatefully as he added in a snarl: "But you know – we all know – that I can easily shoot her before either of you can kill me, too."
"I swear to you, Ajay." Mary answered, her grip tightening. None of them were going to back down; they all knew it. Now, it was a matter of who would crack first.
"What did you hear, Ajay?" Sherlock interrupted, his tone calm and authoritative as he provided the voice of reason. "When you were a prisoner, what exactly did you hear?"
Marie's jaw tightened, while Ajay repeated scathingly: "What did I hear?"
His lips parted, and his voice was haunted as he repeated the words that he had had to hear for years throughout all the tortures he was forced to endure: "Ammo."
Sherlock's eyes narrowed, as did Marie's, while Ajay hissed: "Every day as they tore into me. Ammo. Ammo." His voice started to tremble. "Ammo."
His breathing started to become labored, his hands shaking as he repeated: "Ammo."
Mary's face tightened as she saw Ajay was staring to lose it while Marie's hand tightened on her gun, her knuckles white, as Ajay spat savagely: "We were betrayed!"
"And they said it was her?" Sherlock questioned, but Ajay was passed reason as he accused Mary, his face twisted with anger and hate: "You betrayed us!"
"They said her name?"" Sherlock interjected sharply, and Ajay spat: "They said it was the English woman!"
Marie frowned; but… that meant…
A gunshot suddenly fired, followed instantly by another, and Marie reacted automatically. Her own gun fired, piercing Ajay's brain and killing him instantly before he could die from the two shots fired… into his back.
"No!" Mary screamed as she dropped her gun, while Marie whipped her head around to see the Moroccan policeman standing in the room doorway, his gun raised. "No!"
Mary bent over Ajay, even knowing it was too late, and John hurried over to join her. Marie stared, her own gunhand falling to her side as she stared with an ashen expression, when a hand landed gently on her shoulder.
"He was already gone." Sherlock murmured softly, comfortingly, and Marie bit her lip as tears welled in her eyes.
"But I killed him."
Sherlock just wrapped his arms around her, tucking her under his chin as she started to tremble, while Mary cried as she mourned Ajay's death and John placed a sympathetic around her.
There was a crash, as Karim walked into the room and – upon seeing the dead man lying on the floor – dropped the tea tray he had prepared.
The sound of shattering pottery and metal ringing echoed around the group, and Marie turned and buried her face into Sherlock's chest, unable to shake the despair at how aptly metaphorical to them the broken cups seemed at that moment.
"The English woman; that's all he heard." Sherlock was explaining over the phone. "Naturally he assumed it was Mary."
"Couldn't this wait until you're back?" Mycroft grumbled in response, and Sherlock replied sharply as he paced about the Moroccan motel room: "No, it's not over - Ajay said that they'd been betrayed. The hostage takers knew that AGRA were coming. There was only a voice on the phone, remember, and a code word."
"Ammo, yes, you said." Mycroft replied scathingly, still very disgruntled to have to be doing this call, and Sherlock exhaled sharply.
He paused in his pacing to stare at the other side of the room, where Mary and Marie were huddled together, exchanging comfort as Marie calmed Mary while the latter reassured the younger brunette that she held nothing against her. John was standing to the side, his arms crossed as he stared unseeingly out the window.
"How's your Latin, brother dear?" Sherlock questioned, seemingly abruptly, and Mycroft repeated incredulously: "My Latin?"
"Amo, amas, amat." Sherlock recited distinctly, and Mycroft translated, still sounding puzzled: "I love, you love, he loves. What-?"
He broke off as understanding dawned, and Sherlock agreed flatly to Mycroft's silence: "Not 'ammo' as in 'ammunition' but 'amo,' meaning...?"
He trailed off suggestively, and Mycroft was silent for another beat before he stated sternly: "You'd better be right, Sherlock."
With that, he hung up as Sherlock also ended the call, and Sherlock turned back to join his wife and friends once more as – back in London – Mycroft also began to move.
Sherlock spent the whole duration of the flight back to London in his seat, with his eyes closed, while Marie leant against his shoulder and slept. It wasn't a very peaceful sleep, as her brows scrunched anxiously every so often, but sleep she did, with her hand clasped tightly in Sherlock's, his wedding ring glinting slightly in the plane's white light.
In the row in front of them, Mary and John sat, with an empty seat between them. Mary was sleeping with her head propped against her hand, while John sat by the window, staring out into the clouds as he recalled his words to Mary earlier that day.
"So many lies… I don't mean just you."
He glanced briefly at Mary, his guilt welling as he saw her tired expression, even in sleep, before he looked back out the window in silence as they flew into Heathrow airport.
Diogenes Club
"This is absolutely ridiculous and you know it." Lady Smallwood fumed as she stared Mycroft down hard.
The pair were seated in a small interrogation room inside the private club, not far from Mycroft's own office in fact. The Lady herself was livid but controlled, her superior breeding keeping her composed as she stared down an equally composed Mycroft. The only signs of tension were Lady Smallwood's tight expression, her sharp voice, and Mycroft's ticking finger where he had interlocked his hands before him.
"How many more times?" Lady Smallwood demanded, and Mycroft answered coldly; "Six years ago you held the brief for foreign operations, code name 'Love'."
"And you're basing all this on a code name?" Lady Smallwood asked incredulously, staring at Mycroft in utter disbelief. "On a whispered voice on the telephone? Come on, Mycroft."
"You were the conduit for AGRA." Mycroft countered pointedly. "Every assignment, every detail, they got from you."
"It was my job." Lady Smallwood replied just as pointedly.
Mycroft simply unfolded his hands, sitting back as he added coolly: "Then there was the Tbilisi incident. AGRA went in."
"Yes." Lady Smallwood answered, and Mycroft reminded: "And they were betrayed."
"Not by me." Lady Smallwood ground out, her anger flashing in her eyes at the non-verbal accusation.
Mycroft watched her closely, as Lady Smallwood took a deep, calming breath before sighing it out.
"Mycroft, we've known each other a long time." She stated firmly. "I promise you, I haven't the foggiest idea what all this is about. You wound up AGRA and all the other freelancers."
She leant forward, saying grimly: "I haven't done any of the things you're accusing me of. Not one."
She met his eyes squarely as she repeated emphatically: "Not. One."
Mycroft pursed his lips, glancing down at the table, before turning his head and looking to the mirror on his left.
Behind the one-way mirror, Sherlock also pursed his lips while Marie's lips were a thin line as they all concluded the same thing – Lady Smallwood was telling the truth. But then, how had Ajay's captors known the codename 'Amo'?
221B Baker Street
Marie sighed as she walked into the flat, giving Lestrade a tired smile in greeting.
"I'm so sorry about the rushed call, Greg." She apologized. "Thank you so much for looking after the twins for me and Sherlock."
"Nah, it was no problem." Lestrade shrugged as he handed Sheryl over to Marie, while Scott waved his arms as he played in his little playpen. "So, did you sort everything out?"
"Unfortunately not." Marie admitted as she kissed her daughter's cheek, exhaling sharply. "There are still a few loose threads."
"You're starting to sound like Sherlock." Greg grunted as he stretched before nodding at Sheryl. "Well, goodnight little lady, little man." He nodded at Scott too, who gave him a disinterested look before going back to his blocks. "I'm going to look forward to a nice, long ba-"
He was cut off as both his and Marie's phones beeped, alerting them to a text message. Which could only be one person.
"Oh, for Christ's sake!" Lestrade complained even as he checked his phone, while Marie immediately shifted Sheryl in her arms so that she could pull out her phone as well.
'London Aquarium. Come immediately. SH.' The message read. And on Marie's, 'I need you' was tacked on at the end.
"The Aquarium?" Lestrade repeated incredulously, while Marie frowned.
Her mind whirled as she wondered what Sherlock had found, how he could have figured it out. Given the speed with which he had deducted who AGRA's betrayer was meant that narrowing possibilities and suspects hadn't been so difficult after all-
Marie's eyes widened, and she said to Lestrade sharply: "Greg, go, Sherlock will need backup quickly on this one."
"What? Why?" He asked, bewildered, and Marie replied sharply as she placed her phone to her ear, calling someone: "NOW!"
Lestrade scampered out quickly, calling on his own phone for his squad, while Marie placed Sheryl beside her twin brother as she muttered anxiously: "Come on, Molly, please, please, be free…"
'Why did Mrs. Hudson have to choose this week not to be here?' She thought despairingly as her phone continued to ring.
Sea Life London Aquarium
Sherlock walked slowly through the blue-lit corridors, walking through the glass tunnel that walked under the water to give a magnificent view of the sea creatures inside.
But Sherlock was uninterested in simple beasts at the moment as he strode purposefully down the path while the intercom announced: "Ladies and gentlemen, the Aquarium will be closing in five minutes. Please make your way to the exit. Thank you."
Sherlock ignored that too as he walked out into a small area with smaller tanks full of fish, and he slowed as he spotted a lone figure seated on one of the benches before one of the shark tanks.
"Your office said I'd find you here." Sherlock noted neutrally as he walked slowly towards the old woman, her back to him.
"This was always my favourite spot for agents to meet." Lady Smallwood's secretary, Vivian Norbury, answered calmly. "We're like them: ghostly, living in the shadows."
She turned to look at him at last, while Sherlock deadpanned: "Predatory."
"Well, it depends which side you're on." She returned coolly as she turned back to the sharks. "Also, we have to keep moving or we die."
"Nice location for the final act." Sherlock commented lightly. "Couldn't have chosen it better myself. But then I never could resist a touch of the dramatic."
"I just come here to look at the fish." Vivian answered with a shrug.
She finally stood up, walking closer to the tank with her handbag tucked on the crook of her elbow as she said easily: I knew this would happen one day."
Vivian turned back to Sherlock as she added: "It's like that old story."
"I really am a very busy man." Sherlock interjected flatly. "Would you mind cutting to the chase?"
"You're very sure of yourself, aren't you?" Vivian noted, and Sherlock replied very bluntly: "With good reason."
"There was once a merchant," Vivian elaborated, "in a famous market in Baghdad."
Sherlock closed his eyes irritably, tilting his head slightly forwards as he muttered: "I really have never liked this story."
"I'm just like the merchant in the story." Vivian continued, ignoring him. "I thought I could outrun the inevitable. I've always been looking over my shoulder. Always expecting to see the grim figure of-"
"-Death?" A voice called.
*A/N I just wanted to take this time to also say thank you to all my readers, and for all the reviews and favourites. It means so much to me when I receive the notifications, and I wanted to make sure that each and every one of you knew how much I appreciate it. Thank you!
