Diclaimer: Nope...just nope
It had been two days. At least, he had been told that it had been two days; he had only been awake for a few hours, with a few patchy memories of the time in between.
John Watson had never been one to panic when it would do no good; he was a soldier, he had to keep a cool head. Especially when there were other people to look after. And there were other people, for once.
So he did what Sherlock would if he ever found himself in that situation; he observed, and tried to work out what the hell was going on. The room that they were being kept in was wide both ways, with a low ceiling, built of dark brick that was cold to the touch; there were no windows, and minimal lighting, so they were probably underground. Around the edges of the room were six steel beds, with thin mattresses, welded into the walls; four of these were occupied, but John was sure that there had been a fifth person there…at some point…a woman…but they were gone now. Each prisoner, John was certain now that they were prisoners, was cuffed to their beds, attached via long chains that allowed movement in their own area, but not enough that they could physically interact with each other. So whoever did this didn't want them dead. John's first thought was that Moriarty was to blame, and he must have been dreaming about that when he was drugged, but that couldn't be true; Moriarty was dead.
That brought him to the people. There was one man, and two women, as well as him. The man, Clint, he'd said his name was, was American, and had apparently been trying to engineer an escape since the moment he had arrived. He'd even told John 'not to worry', and that 'everything would be fine', just to give his 'team' some time, and they'd 'kick the asses' of whoever had taken them. John hadn't reacted to being talked down to, but he had mentioned, on the side, that he was actually a soldier, and Clint had suddenly become far more conspiratorial. He was asleep now, curled with his back to the wall, tensed as if on edge, ready to pounce should someone walk through the door.
The first woman was definitely English; it was approximately 5.3 seconds before her sharp accent tore through the air, presumably hurling abuse at the person that John, in his just-awakened state, couldn't see leaving the room. Donna, she'd snapped when asked, had flaming red hair, and a temper that matched; when she saw John's appraising look, she had declared loudly that she already had a man back home, and not the sort that John would want to pick a fight with. She hadn't taken Clint's protective stance on the chin, but rather called him 'sunshine' in a scathing tone. Once she'd calmed down though, she had actually been quite lovely, comforting everyone, telling that everything would be alright, but she denied ever having been in this kind of situation before. Now, Donna was sitting stiltedly on her bed, picking furiously at her cuffs, to no avail.
The other woman, Jane, she was quiet. She, unlike the other two, did not appear to have the situation under control, or be angry enough about it to yell her frustrations. She was stunning, John could tell that much from a glance, but she was also intelligent. Not quite Sherlock levels of genius, where he could tell your life story from the way you styled your hair, but science-clever; when prompted, she had explained that she was an astrophysicist, and then proved her smarts by reeling off explanations of what exactly she was studying, all of which flew straight over John's head. She, unlike the other two, seemed more concerned with who had taken them and why than how to escape; she had deduced very quickly that she had been taken to get to someone called 'Thor' (John assumed that his parents were the oldy-religion types), and that therefore, the others must have been taken for similar reasons. In fact, she was more upset that her boyfriend might be in trouble than the fact that she already was; well, John thought, that was love.
Then again, once Jane had pointed out that Sherlock could be in danger, John's thoughts had turned to worrying about who wanted to hurt Sherlock this time. He hadn't been back long enough for someone to try and take him away again. Cowards, John inwardly cursed, If they wanted a bash at Sherlock, they should have done it face to face.
That begged the question then, who could be so important that the others had also been taken as bait? Clint was enough of a danger himself by the look of it; John was beginning to suspect that he was some kind of Bond-like assassin, even though under the black coat he'd been provided with, he was only wearing beach-wear.
John sighed out loud, flopping back onto his bed. There was literally nothing he could do. He couldn't even work out why they were there. It was insane. The sound of someone shifting on their thin mattress caught his attention. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jane sit up and lean her elbows on her knees.
"John?" her soft voice called across the room.
"Yeah?" he replied. There was little else to do other than hoist himself into a sitting position to face the woman. She licked her lips, she must have been parched, so little water had been provided, but her eyes held a kind of confidence than was refreshingly encouraging in the current predicament.
"Who do you think's got us?" she asked, although it was clear that she only wanted a discussion, she didn't expect him to know, "I mean, they've gotta be powerful, to snatch all of us the way that they did, and they gotta have big plans, if they're going after people like Thor, Bruce, and Natasha."
John didn't know who Bruce and Natasha were, but it had become apparent early on that Jane, Donna, and Clint all knew each other distantly, if only by name. That, if anything, made him feel more scared than he was; if Sherlock was getting tied up with something this big, they'd both get pulled down.
"Well…I don't think this is something that we can look at from underground," John answered slowly, after a moment's thought, as he gestured around their prison, "I mean, I've watched my friend, Sherlock, get targeted like this before…but that was so that this psychopath could have his fun, and then remove the threat that Sherlock posed to his bigger business plans." Jane nodded in understanding ,and Donna had stopped rattling her chains, although she didn't look up, "What I mean is…whoever took us, they must want to lure in whoever's willing to come and save us. In my case, that's Sherlock…in yours, 'Thor'…then they get rid of them, so that they can do something even worse."
"Well we can't just sit around then, we need to learn whatever we can next time that guy comes in." Jane said firmly, looking to Donna, who nodded in agreement.
"We can try." John muttered; he didn't hold high hopes for getting information out of anyone that could kidnap the four of them with such ease.
"We'll do more than try!" Donna cut in, looking between the two of them, her eyes burning, "If they think they can treat us like this, then try and hurt our friends, they've got another thing coming."
John wasn't sure how to reply to that, so merely nodded his assent.
"What I don't get," Clint's voice broke the silence, and John jumped, as he hadn't heard so much as a change in breathing patterns from the man who was now perched on the edge of his bed, "Is why you're even here John."
"To get to Sherlock." John suggested. It was obvious why he was there; that was the only reason he ever got kidnapped. Well, apart from that time that the circus had thought he was Sherlock.
"No, that's not what I mean. What I mean is, why even go for this Sherlock guy?" Clint continued, drawing the attention of the three other occupants as the tension in the room grew tauter than it had been, even before, "The rest of us, we're attached to this group called the Avengers, and to SHIELD. You don't need to know what that is…let's just say, the kind of trouble that bad guys would want to stop us interfering with, is 'saving the world' kind of trouble."
"But Sherlock doesn't save the world, he's not even interested!" John insisted; he realised that he was now way out of his depth, and the chill that had been threatening to creep up his spine from the moment he woke up began its ascent, "He's just a detective."
"Exactly!" Clint replied, clasping his hands together and pointing at John, as if he'd got a question right in class, "Get rid of the Avengers, take over the world; but include this detective…that's personal."
"So who's got a grudge against Sherlock?" Jane asked quickly, shuffling to the edge of her bed.
At that moment the door to the room swept silently open, and John only cut his reply off because of the funnel of warm light that poured into the room as it did so.
"I rather think I do." Answered a soft, lilting voice, that managed to warp an otherwise dulled Irish accent. John was on his feet in seconds, a mixture of fury and terror pulsing through his veins fast than his heart could pump it. He wasn't sure if he was trying to back away or charge forward, but neither occurred as the chain attached to his wrist kept him rooted to the side of the bed.
"YOU! NO, NO…NO!" John shouted, and he barely noticed the way that Jane and Donna flinched back at his anger; flinched from him, not the other man, so he must have visited before, "YOU'RE DEAD!"
James Moriarty extending his arms either side and did a little twirl on his heels, smirking wickedly as he did so. His eyes, empty yet piercing at the same time, bore into John.
"I was Johnny-Boy, I was." He said darkly, and John couldn't be sure if that was menace or enjoyment, "And I've got a pretty good idea of who I should blame for that."
"You know this guy?" Clint's voice once again cut across the tense atmosphere that had formed, but John was still fuming far too hard, his chest heaving too quickly for him to formulate a response. It didn't matter though, as Moriarty was there to fill the gap.
"Of course we know each other," he drawled, looking down his nose at Clint as if he were something off the bottom of his shoe; nothing like the way Sherlock would, John reminded himself, "You watched me stand over him for an hour and a half when he first got here, and before he woke up. Do you honestly think I'd waste that kind of time on you plebeians?"
"What the hell is going on here?" John was finally able to hiss through gritted teeth. Moriarty cocked his head, and then actually looked towards Jane as if waiting for her opinion as to whether he should reply. When none was given, he rolled his eyes and turned his attention back to John.
"Oh…things far bigger than you, with your medical degree and your battlefield of London, could ever hope to imagine." he explained in a stage-whisper; Clint shifted and tensed, listening intently, "I just want Sherlock here so that I can thank him for opening my eyes to the possibilities that I never would have seen had I not put a bullet in my brain. As for the rest of it…press-ganged suicide bombers and demon hounds are like ants, tiny, miniscule insects, compared to what we have planned."
Nobody but Moriarty breathed, and John didn't know what to do. His mind was reeling. Moriarty was dead, but he was there, and Sherlock was in incredible danger. Everyone was in incredible danger. His knees seemed to give way, and he managed to drop onto his bed, the chain clanking fitfully against the steel.
Moriarty's expression had shifted from malevolent to bored, and he was picking at his nails.
"Well…" he drawled, looking at the prisoners one at a time, smirking at Jane when she averted her gaze, "I'd best be off…the powers that be are unexpectedly incapable of coping on their own."
He turned on his heel, his designer shoes squeaking on the tiled floor. He had nearly made it through the door when Donna called out after him, making him halt in his tracks.
"What happened to that other woman?" Donna demanded, her face set, and her eyes defiant; John was torn between pride and fear on her behalf, "The one that was here before, she said her name was Lucinda-"
"Oh her?" Moriarty glanced around the room, and shrugged dismissively, "She was so boring, always crying: 'who are you?' 'Why are you doing this?'"
"Where is she?" Donna repeated, her bottom lip coming close to a pout as she refused to be cowed. A chilling smile appeared on the psychopath's lips, but his eyes remained dead, cold.
"I had her fed to the dogs." He replied emotionlessly, following it up with a small chuckle, "That, I'll admit, wasn't so boring."
"Oh god…" John muttered, and he heard Jane whimper, as Donna bit out something that sounded like 'you bastard!". Only Clint remained unmoved, the widening of his eyes the only indication that he was disturbed by the man who was again striding towards the door.
"You said we!" Clint called after the retreating figure, "Who else is working with you?"
Moriarty didn't stop this time, and John was eerily reminded of the criminal's exit from the pool, that night so long ago, as his sing-song voice floated back into the cold brick prison.
"Oh don't you worry you heads about that…very soon you'll all be kneeling before your Master."
Ok, I'll admit, this was dark. I actually felt bad writing it. But...did you see that coming?
Moriarty is so hard to write, but I hope I've done him justice
Thank you to everyone who's been commenting so far, they've been lovely