They ended up in a restaurant similar in class and quality to the first Moriarty had taken them, but different in other aspects. This one seeming to have more of a flair for more Indian cuisine…which John wasn't complaining about. As before, Moriarty had a private booth for the two of them which he received with little trouble or fuss. The criminal throwing an almost smug smirk at the assassin as they were seated, their sever going off with their drink orders. John didn't correct the other this time when he asked for two scotches.
"How have you been since our last chat, Johnny?" Moriarty asked, tone pleasant and warm. John knew the other well enough not to take that at face value.
"Well I haven't had anyone try to kill me yet," John replied, and he didn't even try to retain the persona of the 'doctor.' While there were certain aspects of his personality that were in the mask he wore for the benefit of the civilian population, the vast majority of that was nothing but an act. The sense of morality that Sherlock often grew irritated with? Obviously that was a bit toned down considering John didn't loathe his profession. An assassin that hated what they did for a living didn't last very long, and weren't nearly as effective as someone that took some pride into their work. John would be lying if he didn't get a bit of an adrenaline rush from ending another's life. Being the one to cut short their existence with a simple pull of a trigger or slash of a knife. It was the addiction to danger that he'd been unable to hide even when wearing the mask of the 'doctor.' The one that made his hand shake and tremble when there wasn't enough excitement. If only Mycroft Holmes, or even Sherlock, had noticed and made the connection that it was only his trigger hand.
"Darling Sebastian doesn't count?" Moriarty questioned, and John smirked a bit in response.
"Considering that I was just a few seconds short of blowing his brains out, I'd say that I was fine." He said.
"Oh, you're confident aren't you." Moriarty chuckled, leaning forward a bit to regard him. "Just how long have you been taking these contracts?"
"See, if we're going to go through this round of question and answers, let's be fair." John said, eyes flashing a bit. Playfully predatory.
Moriarty laughed openly. "Are you suggesting we take turns? Question for question, answer for answer. The thing ordinary people do in grade school?" John only hummed innocently in response, eliciting a sigh from the other even as his dark eyes conveyed a bit of interest at the idea. If not a guarded interest.
"Alright, Johnny-boy. We'll see how your little game goes." Moriarty agreed, and the server returned. Leaving John to watch the criminal with an easy smirk while Moriarty watched him, ordering for the two of them without even looking at their server…Nameless to John as he really hadn't been paying that much attention to them.
"Seventeen, eighteen years," John stated once they had regained their privacy. Moriarty's eyebrows rose a fraction as if he hadn't been expecting the information. The man mouthed 'eighteen,' and John nodded in confirmation. He was met with a low whistle.
"Not an amateur then," Moriarty said. "And not a soldier turned killer either." The fact that the criminal seemed a bit awed at the aspect that 'little John Watson' could have actually been more exciting than first believed. That he wasn't a good man that had simply decided he'd liked war a bit more than he should have, but a man that had gone into the profession he now excelled at when he was around eighteen and pushed it further.
"Just how far does your network stretch?" the assassin asked, knowing vaguely that it went all around the world and back again, but wanting a bit more of a clear-cut answer.
"Waste of a question," Moriarty replied, tutting disapprovingly. "I have people everywhere. Most of the people I have under my thumb don't even know it. They like to think it's the other way around." Advantage of being a consulting criminal, John supposed. Help others get what they needed done all while steadily gaining control over everything behind the curtain while the 'front runners' still believed they had any power left.
"What was your first contract?" the criminal asked, raising an eyebrow expectantly.
"Taking out a few witnesses for a drug lord," John answered with a shrug. "It'd be boring now, but it was my first contract so it was alright at the time…What about you? What was your first 'job.'"
"My first effort as a consulting criminal wasn't really all that 'official' so to speak. Carl Powers was the first, and it grew from there." Moriarty answered, then moved on with little elaboration. "Why are the Russians so interested in you, Johnny-boy?"
"I took a contract where I had to kill a few of the more important Mob bosses off, and they haven't forgotten about it yet." John said, sipping his scotch before giving it an appreciative glance as the pleasant burn slithered down his throat. "They're a bit obsessed…What happened with Carl Powers? Why kill him?"
"Ah! Ah! Ah! That's two questions, isn't it?" Moriarty grinned. "Now I'll get to ask two…Carl Powers was quite the brat. He may have been a good swimmer, but everything else? Not so much. So of course he'd pick on the freak Irish boy that was far more intelligent that the rest of the idiots in the school.
"You see, Johnny , this little Irish boy decided that he didn't like Carl. Not one bit. So, he talked with a few of the other students around the school that Carl liked to bully, and he asked them to contribute one thing. Some things from a few chemistry students, someone to swipe the locker room keys, someone to get into Carl's locker, someone to take the shoes afterward. No one felt responsible because they were just being told what to do, and the little Irish boy was never linked with any of it when Carl had a fit in the pool.
"You see, Johnny, I've never gotten my hands dirty." Moriarty finished, and the sever was returning with their meals. It gave the assassin some time to collect his thoughts as it were. Sherlock had known how Carl Powers had died, but hadn't been overly concerned with anything afterwards. There wasn't really a point when all he'd needed to know was how he'd died and then they'd been moving on to another puzzle and another person with a bomb strapped to them. Knowing the whole story threw a little bit of perspective into it all.
They ate in silence. Not bothering with anything but eating as it was late, and John was honestly hungry. By the time they'd both finished, John had finished the scotch and moved to water. He wasn't one to drink when he was on a contract…and he was just going to think of this as one considering that Sebastian Moran was still alive and kicking. He'd need to fix that eventually.
"So, Johnny, I think I'll save my questions for a rainy day." Moriarty grinned at him, checking his phone before slipping it into a pocket of the Westwood he was wearing. This time a darker blue color with a complimenting tie. "We have some business to discuss."
Here you are! Bit better than the last one I suppose, but still not great :-/
Have a good day,
Reaperess ^_^