NOTES:
1) Listen, I know, I'm a terrible person. Go to the notes at the end of this chapter to read me rambling apologies and whining.
Also: if you find it in your heart, read this chapter before telling me how much you hate me because I've been told it's the best one so far.
2) Quick, but necessary recapitulation:
(you could read everything again, of course, but here is the outline of what is going on.)
This story is set after the events of The Empty Hearse.
John is engaged to Mary, they live together. After a very, very difficult period of time, John and Sherlock have managed to become friends again - even though it's still hard and it still hurts. This story is about John's struggles.
John was given bits and pieces of information about what has happened with Sherlock while he was away. Too much violence for John's liking. Sherlock was stabbed and left to die in Morocco - he's got a scar to prove it, John has seen it. Mycroft and John have managed to find some common ground and can maybe call each other allies of sorts - maybe.
The remaking of their friendship included bonding over dinner and crime scenes, as well as a birthday dinner with Mrs Hudson and her sister Mrs Reid, with whom John developed a strong connection, and Mary. They also bonded over wedding plans. Sherlock knows all shades of salmon, thank you very much. Sherlock also attended to a party at John and Mary's house where he met a woman called Janine, who also happens to be Mary's best friend and Sherlock's fan. Imagine that!
Sherlock has been receiving death threats - or at least John thought so, until the moment he went through some papers he found on Sherlock's desk and discovered that the threats were aimed at the detective. John is at lost. Obviously, Sherlock hasn't shared anything about it. The Holmes brothers have been trying to find who's behind the mysterious envelopes. Or at least John thinks they have. John knows close to nothing, really.
Currently Mary's been in Ireland helping a friend who fell ill. John doesn't know much about that either. I wonder why?
Sherlock has a new friend. Actually, he has a new old friend. A bloke called Victor Trevor showed up yesterday at Baker Street and took the detective out to dinner at Angelo's of all places. John chose to stay at Baker Street (where he's been staying since Mary flew to Ireland) trying to enjoy his tea. It wasn't his best moment, but the night ended with a glass of wine and the sweet sound of the violin. John hadn't been happy like that for a long time. He could finally enjoy his armchair again.
This is the morning after that. And it's bloody important.
SUMMARY:
"He had to protect Mary, it was the right thing to do, the rational thing to do. But John was ready to admit to himself that his first instinct was to stay with Sherlock, to protect him. Sherlock had become a basic need to John a long time ago. John was too tired to continue lying to himself. He didn't deserve that."
CHAPTER 22
A screechy ring woke John from the slumber, the sound leaving him disoriented for a minute. He cursed the person who was calling at the fuck hours of the morning on a Saturday and groaned, pressing the phone to his left ear.
"John Watson," he said sluggishly, sitting up in bed. He had no idea of what time it was. Too early.
"John Watson as in my future husband John Watson, you say?" Mary said, and John could tell she wasn't happy with him. He couldn't blame her. "It is nice of him to answer his bloody phone for once," she added.
"Hi, Mary," he said, sheepishly. He rubbed his face and sighed, trying to shake off the sleepiness. He needed all his brain's capacity to have this conversation. "Isn't it a bit early for this?" He asked and winced immediately.
God, of all the sentences he could have chosen to start this conversation...
"Really, John? Is that all you have to say to me?" Mary asked, sounding shocked. John was surprised with himself too, he rarely lashed at her that way.
"'M sorry," he sighed. Rationally he knew he had absolutely no right to feel spooked, but the truth was that John felt trapped in a way he hated. Hated because he knew he wasn't supposed to feel this way about his future wife. "I just woke up," he offered as a mean of explanation.
He held his phone with his shoulder and rearranged himself in bed, resting his head on his pillow again. He would at least be comfortable.
"I sent you an email yesterday," John insisted when Mary didn't sound too keen on forgiving him. "Have you seen it? I tried to call you, you never picked it up either," he argued, even though he knew he was wrong.
He was trying to mask all guilty and confusion he felt with anger. He didn't know how he could look himself in the mirror doing that to Mary.
He heard her sigh and waited.
"Yes, I saw your email," she answered. "I was too mad to answer it, though," she said with a faint smile in her voice. It took some of the weight off John's chest.
"How are you?" He asked, trying hard to focus the conversation on anything other than how much of a crappy significant other he was.
"Oh, you know, homesick," she said.
And god, it was the worst possible answer; John's heart sank with it. If only he could say as much of himself... How could he say he was homesick if the faint noises of the morning at Baker Street brought down all his defences? How could he feel homesick if maybe home was right where he was?
It was too bloody early for this. He just wanted to go back to sleep.
"John?"
"'M here," he said, glad when a yawn concealed the strain in his voice. "So, how is your friend?"
"She is fine," Mary replied, sounding more like herself. "So guess who is going back home tomorrow?"
Shit.
Just great timing.
No time to organize his thoughts, no time to staple all the mess inside him in tiny little boxes and hide. No time to–
"John? Did you just fall asleep?" She asked, amused.
"No, of course not," John tried to smile. His face was cramping, he could feel. "Tomorrow then?"
Maybe he had heard it wrong.
Not that he hadn't been missing Mary. Of course he had. They shared a life, it was impossible not to miss her presence. She was a great woman, she had saved John, had given him something to look forward to.
He was missing her.
He really just wished he had a bit more time.
"Tomorrow," she answered, sounding hopeful and happy. "God, I can't wait. I've been trying to organize the rest of the wedding preparations from here, but it's been awful. Thank Sherlock for me, will you?"
That name brought John's mind into short circuit.
"Sherlock?" John asked, baffled.
He could practically hear her rolling her eyes through the phone. "Yes, he's been helping me. Us. He and Janine have been discussing the table plan. He didn't tell you?"
Of course he bloody didn't.
"No, he didn't. I did see the guest list somewhere. I thought he was just being meddlesome," he said, trying to sound less panicked. The idea of Janine and Sherlock joining efforts to make John's wedding happen formed a knot in his stomach.
It seemed that everybody had accepted John's fate, except for him.
And how fucked up was that?
"Listen, I have to go," she said. "I'll be back tomorrow, my flight arrives at 7 pm. Go pick me up, okay? Then we can go back to our house. God, I miss you," she moaned. "I miss your body, I miss your skin, I miss every little thing about us."
John closed his eyes, feeling disgusted at himself. There it was: the woman who had accepted to be his companion for life and he was destroying every little thing they had built together.
Being missed and wanted like that, it just served to increase his guilt. He wished he felt it as wholeheartedly as Mary felt. "Tomorrow," he said instead. He knew Mary would hear it like a promise.
Fuck, it felt like walking down death row.
John put down his phone and looked blankly ahead at the wall in front of him. One day. He had one day to get his shit together.
One day to stop bloody dreaming about Sherlock and Sherlock's skin, Sherlock's voice, Sherlock's violin and all things Sherlock. Only a day to disentangle himself from Baker Street yet again.
And why, for god's sake, had he succumbed to it again in the first place? What was he doing here? He felt so stupid for having allowed himself to be dragged in again.
But it hadn't been like that at all, if he was honest with himself. He had volunteered to it, he had needed it back.
The problem of denying a physical need was that the body inevitably would take what it could get. And John had been denying himself that this was the life he wanted since the very moment he had seen Sherlock again.
God, he was completely screwed.
John walked down the stairs still thinking about the talk with Mary. He needed to embrace reality again, to resettle himself in his life.
This life – this place where everything was a combination of Sherlock and science and John and happiness, but also so much heartbreak it could fill a teenage romance – all this, he had to leave it behind.
Noise coming from the living room brought John back from his thoughts. Sherlock and Mycroft were already hissing at each other at that ungodly hour in the morning.
As if John had any need of his day getting worse.
He stopped in the kitchen and made himself a cup of coffee before facing the most cunning men in England. The brothers were still arguing when the doctor entered the living room.
"You will stay out of this while I try to make up for your stupidity and I won't repeat myself, Sherlock," Mycroft said. It was crystal clear that it wasn't the first time he was saying those words.
Sherlock sat in his armchair, dressed as pristinely as ever, shoes on and everything. Why the hell he insisted in getting all dressed up this early was something John had never fathomed. Mycroft was sitting in John's chair – he looked somewhat wrinkled and worried; it made something cold set in the pit of John's stomach.
"Fantastic!" Sherlock clapped his hands. "Because I am bored of you telling me things I don't care to hear. If you can excuse us," he pointed out the door to Mycroft in his best impression of a civilized human being.
John sat on the coffee table, drinking his coffee, watching the brothers as if they were a tennis match. Something in the way they were holding themselves told John that this wasn't just their usual banter.
"This is not one of you investigations," Mycroft said, as if the last word pained him. "It is not time to play detective. This isn't Moriarty, obsessed with you and bored literally to death," he continued. His lips were hard and his voice left no room for argument. At least not to any other human being apart from Sherlock.
"I am not afraid of him!" Sherlock hissed.
It made John sick. He didn't know what was going on, but it never ceased to make him queasy how careless Sherlock could be with his own life.
Mycroft gave a humourless laugh – a piercing sound that made John recoil slightly. The older Holmes leaned forward in John's armchair. His voice was low and dangerous when he spoke again. "You are terrified. That is exactly the problem."
John waited for the denial that would surely come, but for once, Sherlock kept his mouth shut. He didn't seem happy about it, but when he tried to argue, no sound came out of his mouth. It was so very unlike him to develop aphasia in the middle of an argument.
"There is no point in denying it, little brother, not now," Mycroft continued. He had some smugness about him, but his eyes weren't as hard as they had been before.
"We need to do something, Mycroft," Sherlock said. His cold mask was slipping off slowly. He sounded more and more like the younger brother he was. John could count on one hand the times he saw Sherlock looking as devastatingly fragile as now. "I need to do something," the detective repeated.
John itched to get close to him. It always had that effect on him to be reminded that despite the effort he made, Sherlock was just a man. An extraordinary man, but a man, nonetheless.
"No, Sherlock," Mycroft sighed, somewhat sadly. "What you need to do is back off before something worse happens."
"Worse?" Sherlock's mock laugh sounded hysterical. John stood up and walked to his side. It was the only thing he could do without understanding exactly what the bloody hell was going on. "How can this get any worse? He is done playing with us, Mycroft. I am not his target anymore and you know it!"
What. "What?" John asked dumbly to the room at large. What the fucking hell was–
"John is right here, right now," Mycroft said, pointing at John's direction with his umbrella without sparing the doctor a mere glance. John felt glad for being acknowledged because he was beginning to think he had become invisible.
Sherlock stared hard back at his brother. "You wouldn't be here if he weren't," he said angrily.
"You have to stop trying to avenge things that didn't happen. Not everything is a dragon to slay," Mycroft scoffed.
Sherlock's chest seemed ready to explode. He brought his feet onto his armchair and held his shins tightly. John knew it for what it was: a way to calm down from whatever life trauma Mycroft was throwing at him. If John could only understand what all this was about... For all the claim they made of being a rational breed, the Holmes brothers were the best at talking in riddles.
"Okay, that's enough," John said to Mycroft. He had no idea what else he could do. At least it distracted him from the urge to rub soothing circles in Sherlock's exposed nape. The man looked right about to shatter out of his skin.
Mycroft ignored John completely and continued to talk to Sherlock. "You will hand me everything you gathered and I will look into it again –"
Sherlock snorted. "Oh, will I?" He raised one eyebrow. "I wasn't aware of that. Are you going to send one of your minions to search my flat?"
"Yes," Mycroft smiled menacingly. "It's the cocaine thing all over again, isn't it?"
"Mycroft!" John shouted, wrathful, jumping to his feet without even thinking about it. He was ready to punch the older Holmes in the face.
"I am not a teenager anymore, Mycroft," Sherlock said, simply.
"No, you are right, you are not. You are seven and it's my fault Redbeard is gone."
The look on the detective's face was too painful for John to bare, he chose to squeeze one of Sherlock's shoulders. He knew Sherlock was being bullied somehow. If he could only understand–
Mycroft got to his feet and straightened his suit. "See, it's always my fault with you," he sighed tiredly. "If we do not coordinate, Magnussen will crush both of us in a heartbeat and you know it. He already knows how," the British government said finally looking at John.
After Mycroft had left the flat, John continued to stare at the open door, trying to make sense of what had just happened. Who the fucking hell was Magnussen? The name was vaguely familiar, but–
He looked down at Sherlock, who was staring straight ahead, as if lost in his mind. John squeezed his shoulder once again to call his attention before walking over to stand in front of Sherlock.
"I am going to make some tea and we are going to talk," he said, firmly. Before Sherlock could even open his mouth to argue, John interrupted. "We are going to talk," he jerked his head to indicate Sherlock should follow him to the kitchen.
Sherlock sat in front of his microscope watching John walk around the kitchen pouring milk in his mug and grabbing an apple for himself. John could almost feel the stare in the back of his neck. He asked himself which one of them needed the reassurance the most. He felt apprehensive as he always did when Sherlock was nervous for reasons unknown to him.
He put Sherlock's mug in front of the detective and dragged the other chair to his side. This would make it harder to punch Sherlock in the face if it came down to it. He had a lurking feeling that it was the inevitable future.
"You have to tell me," John said quietly, sipping his tea. He wasn't sure that Sherlock would start the conversation on his own. He still looked shaken.
Sherlock looked sideways at John. His pale eyes were disoriented. His long fingers braced the mug, but he didn't bring it to his lips. "It's better if you stay out of it, John," he said, stubbornly.
John sighed. It wasn't anything different from what he had been expecting, but for the life of him, he couldn't understand how Sherlock still thought that was possible.
It also made him feel a bit pathetic. Here he was having dreams about Sherlock all around him while the other man couldn't even trust him with this.
"We both know this isn't possible. I am already in it too deep," John said lightly. Sherlock had absolutely no idea how deep in it John was.
"No, John," Sherlock shook his head. "I–"
"Sherlock," John said firmly, but still trying to keep his voice down. "Four years ago was already too late."
John was well versed in what his therapist called trust issues. It made him sad that Sherlock's trust issues now included him.
Well, he couldn't deny that Sherlock had been the worst betrayal John had ever suffered.
They were a strange pair. They trusted each other in an irrational way, but in reality they kept walking on eggshells.
It was tiresome.
"You have to let go, you know," John said, also for his own benefit. We have to let go, he wanted to say. They had to stop probing new bruises and nourishing the old ones. "I need to know what we are dealing with," he said, trusting Sherlock to understand it for what it meant. That they were facing whatever it was together this time.
Sherlock stared at him. John let him, feeling like it was a test he couldn't fail. Then, a moment later, Sherlock's face morphed into something more tired and older than John had ever seen. He finally sipped his tea, closing his eyes and sighing heavily. "What do you wish to know?"
John let his right shoulder brush Sherlock's left arm, providing comfort for them both and smiled faintly. "I want to know everything, Sherlock. So, please," he said, looking intently at the man beside him. "Tell me everything. Who is Magnussen and why is he targeting you? What have you done to piss him off?" John asked. He didn't really voiced it as a compliment, but he was pretty sure Sherlock would take it that way.
Git, he thought fondly.
"For once, I didn't do anything," Sherlock smiled self-deprecatingly. "His goal is not me. It's Mycroft."
John had not been expecting that, but maybe it make some sort of sense. Sherlock had been absorbing the blows aimed at Mycroft for a long time. He had been doing Mycroft's legwork for as long as John could remember.
And if this Magnussen was big enough to go after Mycroft like that, he sure as hell wasn't an amateur.
"So, who is he?" John asked, when Sherlock yet again didn't seem likely to share anything else. "Some kind of Mob leader?"
Sherlock snorted. "He is the British press. Like Mycroft is the British government."
John raised his eyebrows in alarm. The British press had destroyed too much of him. He forced himself to control his words. "Isn't Rupert Murdoch the British press?" He asked, even though he was almost entirely sure that Sherlock would have no idea who that was.
"Murdoch needed someone to coordinate the illegal surveillance he wanted," Sherlock answered, surprising John. "I had to make some research about all this press rubbish," he said defensively, before John could voice his thoughts. "It's been cluttering my mind palace," he pouted.
John snorted, shaking his head. "So is he Murdoch's evil twin?"
When Sherlock looked back at John then, his eyes were hard.
They were so bloody close. John kept his eyes from wandering to Sherlock's lips.
"Magnussen is the most dangerous man I have ever encountered, John," he said flatly. "Mycroft is trying to deal with him politically and that would be reason enough for us to be alarmed. But it's not going to work," he said.
John's heart felt constricted. They had been through a lot, how could Sherlock say this man was the most dangerous? "Worse than Moriarty?" He asked, because that was everything he wished to know.
"Yes."
John tried to wrap his mind around someone who could be worse than Moriarty for them. Moriarty had strapped John to a bomb, had taken everything John had. "What does he want?"
"He wants Mycroft in his pocket."
"Okay," John nodded. If you were in Britain and wanted to obtain power, you should go after the most powerful man inside the British government, it made sense. "So, to get to Mycroft, he went after you," he said.
John knew this MO. And to go after Sherlock, Magnussen had–
"Pressure points, he calls them, if I am not mistaken," Sherlock supplied. "He is not only the mind behind several political schemes, he took blackmailing and manipulation to a new level. He will use whatever information he can gather against whomever he sees fit."
"Okay," John said again, dumbly. While Sherlock's words seemed well weighted, his voice made something in John's chest tremble. It had a raw quality in it, as if Sherlock were telling something personal about himself.
"An intricate chain of pressure points gives him leverage," Sherlock swallowed hard. "He is not very different from Mycroft at that."
"How long have you known this?" John asked, holding his mug of tea for dear life. It kept him from grabbing Sherlock's collar and shaking the bastard until he bloody stopped keeping things from John.
"I –" Sherlock cleared his throat. At least he had the decency of looking apologetic. "A month. Sort of," he cringed. "My coming back gave him the chance of using Lazarus against us. It's what he has been doing since I got back," Sherlock looked at John. "Only Magnussen could have gathered that much information about my work. He knew I was alive and he has been waiting all this time to use it against Mycroft."
"But everybody knows you are back now," John argued weakly.
"But no one outside a very restricted group of people know every detail of that operation," Sherlock said. John himself still knew almost to nothing in relation to it. "It wouldn't have been possible if Mycroft hadn't pressed his connections across Europe. It wasn't as easy as he would like me to believe. I know it; Magnussen knows it. Having us in his pocket is his last move to checkmate my brother," Sherlock said, seeming lost in his thoughts. "But then again Mycroft is the greatest chess player I've ever seen."
John smiled at Sherlock. He wasn't going to comment on Sherlock's display of admiration towards his brother, but it was a good look on him.
Sherlock rolled his eyes, but didn't get sidetracked. "This is his final move. He let me get near enough that I know it's him. I have enough to work this like any other case," he brought his hands to his hair. "But he knows this is what will pressure Mycroft into giving in."
"I don't understand."
"Mycroft wants to neutralize him, John. Me," Sherlock paused, "I want him dead." It made a chill run through John's spine. "Mycroft and I will never agree on this."
John breathed deeply, letting the air out through his mouth. He had never seen Sherlock talk about a criminal like that. He knew Magnussen wasn't just any suspect – and okay, maybe Sherlock himself wasn't the same as he was two years ago – but Sherlock wasn't a murderer.
John stood up and paced about the kitchen, willing some of the tension away. He recognized the energy that made his instincts sharpen and his trigger finger itch. However, the idea of Sherlock once more confronting someone so dangerous made John feel conflicted.
He looked at Sherlock then, examining every bit of the face he knew so well. He would do whatever the hell he had to do to keep that man safe. He understood Sherlock's words, he wanted Magnussen dead too, but now wasn't the time for them to fight Mycroft on this.
Because he couldn't–
He couldn't lose everything again.
He sat once more and braced himself for the strenuous argument that would surely follow. He heard Sherlock sigh. John decided to try a different approach.
"How come you have information Mycroft doesn't have?" John asked.
"I have sources," Sherlock answered, vaguely.
John wasn't fooled for a second; he smiled humourlessly. "Stop bullshitting me. Are you telling me your homeless network is following Magnussen around? Give me a break. How did you manage to get near Magnussen, Sherlock?"
"It was thanks to you. Well, to Mary, actually," Sherlock said, finally.
"What?"
"Janine," Sherlock replied. "Mary's friend," he explained, mistaking John's surprised expression.
"I know who Janine is. Is that why you've been flirting with her?"
"Flirting?" Sherlock asked, bemused, as if he didn't understood the word. Which was completely bollocks since he knew very well what that meant and had used that trick countless times.
"Talking, flirting, whichever," John said, defensively.
What the fuck. It was a bit too much for him to understand how Mary's friend could be suddenly connected to all this.
"It wasn't random," Sherlock said, before John could ask. "I was very curious about this person with Irish background who showed an unfathomable interest in me a week after I was knocked unconscious in Ireland. It seemed too much of a coincidence, the universe is rarely so lazy."
"I knew she worked in the press," John muttered to himself.
"Not just in the press, John," Sherlock explained. "She is Magnussen's PA."
Oh. It didn't make any sense – or maybe it made too much sense and John just couldn't face it yet. "So his PA happens to be what? A Sherlock fangirl?"
Sherlock snorted at the word. "It's not his PA who happens to be a fangirl," he said. John still didn't get it. "She was planted, even though she has no idea. She thinks she is manipulating me into an affair so she can be in the papers and she is clever at that, but she has no idea about the rest."
"Affair?" John asked, dumbly.
"She doesn't normally tell me anything on our dates, but I can infer Magnussen's movements from her notebook when I stay at her flat, and I can deduce her comings and goings easy enough," Sherlock said.
"Dates?" John was stuck.
Sherlock continued talking as if John wasn't even there. "I imagine she is going to sell a fake story about our relationship to one paper or another when she finds out I am using her, but I don't think that will matter since she will be using me as well by that point," he mused. "Anyway, this is of little importance. The thing is that I've been gathering information. I know where he keeps his files. His house has a security vault – very medieval of him," he observed. Then he seemed to notice that John had been staring blankly at him. He raised his eyebrows expectantly.
"Your relationship?" John asked. And he did not sound hysterical, but it was a near thing.
Sherlock frowned in confusion and then scowled. "Is this the only thing you gathered from what I just said?" Sherlock asked exasperated.
"No," John shook his head. He had heard... Something or other about a medieval dungeon. "But relationship?"
"It is useful," Sherlock explained when it was clear that John wasn't going to let that go.
"Useful? You are doing the same thing Magnussen is! She thinks you like her!" John tried not to sound was wrathful as he felt.
"No, I am not," the detective said, calmly. He sounded so bloody decent it made John want to punch him in the nose. "She is the one planning on selling our story to the press," he shrugged. "She is good company," he mused. "Although I could do without the kissing."
Kissing? Oh fucking Christ. Since when did Sherlock kiss, for God's sake.
John was not thinking about that.
Did Sherlock kiss Victor? John asked himself deep inside his brain – really deep inside.
And when Sherlock did kiss Victor, did he like it? Would he like it?
Shit. John had to stop thinking about that right now.
"You are using her," he said, awkwardly, trying to clear his throat. He had to stop spinning. "You shouldn't do that to people who like you," he sighed. And he wasn't talking about anyone other than Janine at all.
Sherlock scoffed. "People do not like me," he rolled his eyes. "Fortunately for them," he snorted, as if John was being the most stupid human being on earth.
"Shut up," John told him. "Get to the fucking point," he said angrily. John wasn't fortunate at all. But it wasn't exactly news to him.
Sherlock frowned at him. "You were the one who asked about Janine! I told you it was unimportant," he scoffed.
Well, it was true. John covered his face with his hands and took a deep breath. This wasn't getting any easier. "You are using her and that's wrong–"
"She is using me just as much," the detective interjected.
"Yes!" John shouted. "And I hate it, okay?" He slammed his right fist on the table. "Jesus!"
Sherlock using people for his own advantage was not news to John. How could it be? Sherlock had done it to Molly a thousand times. He had done it to Greg and Mrs Hudson, maybe even to John himself. But the idea of Sherlock finding it normal that Janine used him right back, just as Irene had done it, that made John feel queasy.
Was he dumb for feeling about Sherlock the way he did? he asked himself uselessly.
On his last day at Baker Street with Sherlock Holmes, John was feeling too raw to lie to himself.
He looked sideways at the detective.
God. After everything they had gone through... After all the hurting, the betrayal, after feeling completely undone... There was still a big part of John that wanted to give Sherlock all the love he had.
That realization was a bit like a drill bayoneting his body in two. He hurt all over.
"John?" He heard Sherlock call him, but the sound was distant and blurred.
John was fighting to find the ground under his feet again; it was a curious sensation. After everything he had experienced in the past few days, maybe it should have been obvious, but somehow it came as a surprise to find himself like this.
There had always been a part of John that was in love with Sherlock Holmes. It was a teenage passion in the heart of a fortysomething man and it was ridiculous – John felt as much – but it was manageable. John had been able to keep it in check since the first day they had dinner. It was simple enough. John wasn't a teenager, he could get a hold of himself.
But this right here, this was something else entirely. This was the thing John could not control, the sentiment that had made John stop looking for girlfriends right after Jeanette.
The problem wasn't the part of John that got excited over anything Sherlock did and blogged about it like a fanboy. The real problem – the one that was fucking up his brain right now – was that the rest of John loved Sherlock in a way that couldn't be denied. And god, John would know, because he had tried again and again to do it.
John could keep in check the part of him that wanted to jump Sherlock's bones and kiss him until his lips felt numb. What he couldn't do – and he was getting married, god, he was feeling nauseous – was to stop his heart from clenching at the need to make Sherlock happy, to provide him with whatever he needed. To keep him safe. To show him that he could have so much more than being used, if only he wished to.
Shit. How would John be able to leave this place tomorrow?
"John?" Sherlock called him again, and he sounded alarmed. He touched John hesitantly on the shoulder and John stood up, freeing himself hastily of it. It felt like being scalded.
It was too late for that. Too late for love, at least for them. Sherlock had died, they weren't the same anymore.
John had to at least try to keep together the fragile life he had built for himself.
He poured a glass of water to buy some time. Sherlock was looking at him, devouring every little bit of information he could gather from John's expression. But he was an idiot when dealing with sentiment, he would never know that John...
Well, that John loved him, that he had always–
Fuck. They had other things to worry about, for Christ's sake. Janine, John, Victor, they weren't the point.
John leaned on the counter. "Did Magnussen manipulate Janine into being Mary's friend?" He asked, going back to the subject, trying to ignore the strain in his own voice.
Threats, danger, all this John knew how to deal with.
Sherlock seemed surprised by the sudden question and he stared at John for a moment before replying. "No. He chose her between Mary's friends. Mary is the final link in this chain," Sherlock cleared his throat. "She is your pressure point. It wraps the path up to Mycroft neatly."
"Jesus, Sherlock," John groaned. "Mary is travelling about thinking she is safe!"
"She is safe. Mycroft put us all under surveillance. And Magnussen doesn't want us dead. He wants us scared, aware of his presence, like a camera in the corner of a room," Sherlock explained. John wasn't convinced. As long as Mary were still out of his sight, he wouldn't be convinced she was safe.
"He didn't threaten Mary yet, that's something at least," John said.
"Indeed, he did not, which is curious. None of the envelopes sent to your place were about her."
"What?" John let that sink in. "You and Mycroft have been intercepting our mail?" He asked, tiredly. He wanted to feel outraged by it, but he was a bit glad for Mary's sake. "So, the envelopes you didn't let me see–"
"Some of them were addressed to you, yes," Sherlock nodded.
"But they weren't about Mary," John said, fitting that information with everything he had learned this morning.
The thing that had made Moriarty the worst nightmare John had ever had was the fact that he had learned not only to use John as leverage to get to Sherlock, but to use Sherlock as a way to make John completely powerless. Moriarty had figured John out even before the doctor himself.
All that epiphany about love... Well, Moriarty had known from the start.
Magnussen must have been observing them for a long time. John remembered the envelope he had seen days ago, the details about his surgery–
"No, they weren't about Mary," Sherlock confirmed. "He'd mistaken me for your pressure point–"
John snorted. "No, he didn't." It always mesmerized him how stupid Sherlock could be.
"Yes, he did," the detective argued.
"My god!" John exclaimed. He wasn't going to have this argument now. If Sherlock still didn't understand how much John cherished what they had then he would never do. And that was that. John had to accept it.
Sherlock rolled his eyes at John. "It's a chain, John, each one of us is a step to Mycroft. Magnussen planted Janine and she connects all of us. She gave me all the information I needed without even knowing," he said, standing up and pacing around the kitchen. "I have to do something."
John breathed deeply. There it was. The moment everything would go south. He braced himself for it. "No, you don't. You will let your brother handle this the way he see fit. For once, stay out of it."
Sherlock's surprise made his eyes comically wide. "How can you still side with Mycroft after everything I told you?"
"I am not siding with Mycroft, Sherlock," John replied, feeling himself getting drained by this conversation. "But this is way out of our league. This guy has everything on us. And I bet you don't have much on him, because if that was the case you would have gone after him already."
The fact that Sherlock didn't deny it was confirmation enough.
"I can't let him get away with this," Sherlock argued. For all that he liked saying that he wasn't a hero, he sure as hell was behaving as such.
"So work with Mycroft! You two are the most brilliant minds in England, I doubt even Magnussen can face you two! But if you work against your brother, you will be doing exactly what Magnussen wants!" John said.
"He threatens people for being different," Sherlock said, quietly. "I can't–"
"I understand, I really do – " John countered.
"You really don't if you think I should stay here and wait for him to crush me!" Sherlock hissed.
A bubble of anger rose in John's chest. He honestly didn't know why he still surprised himself by how selfish Sherlock could be. "Of course! You, the big hero!The great Sherlock Holmes can't be detained from a puzzle, even if it means–"
Sherlock's expression morphed into something ugly and cold that took John completely by surprise and made him stop mid sentence. He tried to rethink about what he had just said.
"No, listen. I wasn't making fun of it–"
"Now it's very ironic of you to lecture me about being a hero, isn't it? Aren't you our perfect soldier?" He asked, mockingly. And maybe John should have felt hurt by that, but he was too shocked by the bitterness in Sherlock's voice to care.
"I didn't mean to–"
"Of course you didn't!" Sherlock shouted. "Just like Mycroft didn't, minutes ago!"
"I just don't want you to get hurt!" John shouted back at him.
"Oh, yes, because you are also our perfect doctor, aren't you?" Sherlock belittled him. And this time it hurt like hell. Sherlock looked disdainfully at John from where he was standing. "And why would you care?" His voice had a chill in it that John knew well. He just had never heard it directed at him before.
"What?" John asked, dumbly. Sherlock couldn't–
The detective walked slowly over to John. John knew that mask, he knew the cruelty Sherlock used against people who had hurt him.
"Tell me, John, why do you care?" The detective smiled humourlessly. "Aren't you going home in what? Three days, two days...," he trailed off. "Ah, tomorrow, I see," he said, analysing John as one of his experiments. Sherlock leaned over John, staring straight into his eyes. "Aren't you going back home to be a hero to your soon-to-be wife, John? Hm?"
He was so close. John was losing himself in the glassy eyes. If he closed the distance between them and sealed his lips to Sherlock's, then the detective would understand why John cared that much. If life were as simple as stealing kisses and living happily ever after, then John would take this moment and never let go of it.
But reality was a bit harder than that.
"She is in danger, she is not like us, she needs me," John said, quietly. And he didn't think about the implications of what he wasn't saying. He just needed Sherlock to understand.
"Yes, she does! Isn't that wonderful?" Sherlock laughed a painful sound. John could feel the detective's breath on his nose. He wanted to taste it.
John needed to understand what was happening. Sherlock seemed broken and a broken Sherlock was always dangerous, especially to himself. Halfway through their talk John had said something; if he could only undo it, he would. He hated when Sherlock whirled out of control.
John tried to put his hand on Sherlock's arm, but the detective brushed it off immediately.
"I can't leave her now!" John shouted desperately, growing more and more restless by the seconds. "She is caught up in the middle of this mess, I can't abandon her right now, it's too dangerous!"
"Oh, please," Sherlock rolled his eyes. "This isn't about Magnussen!"
"No, it isn't!" John replied. "Tell me, what is this about?" He stared hard back at Sherlock, meeting him halfway. He'd be damned if he would start feeling intimidated by Sherlock's height now. "What are you asking of me?"
"I am not asking anything of you!"
"Really? Because it looks like you are asking me to come back home," John gestured between them, pointing the four inches that still separated them.
John hoped to god he had read this right. All this talk about John leaving Baker Street, if it had gutted Sherlock the way it gutted John, then maybe–
Sherlock went very still and looked between them.
"Are you?" John asked breathlessly, because he couldn't keep his mouth shut. Because that day had barely started and he was already tired and sweaty. The clock hadn't showed 9 am and John Watson was already fighting a war. "Sherlock, what are you asking of me?"
"I am not asking anything," Sherlock said again, his voice still too loud in a room that seemed to be the whole world for them. He was trying to slip back into his stoic mask, John could see. "I am not asking anything!" He said, distancing himself a little, but still too close for John's sanity.
"Good!" John yelled at him. "Because if you were asking me to come back, how the fuck could I ever say no?"
The statement rang between them like an alarm buzz. John hadn't meant to say any of it, but it was all true, he wouldn't take it back, not now.
Sherlock's eyes reminded John of that swimming pool years ago. Just as had happened that night, they made John realize that he would do anything to keep Sherlock safe. Anything.
He had to protect Mary, it was the right thing to do, the rational thing to do. But John was ready to admit to himself that his first instinct was to stay with Sherlock, to protect him. Sherlock had become a basic need to John a long time ago. John was too tired to continue lying to himself. He didn't deserve that.
And Mary – beautiful, loving Mary – she didn't deserve it either.
"John," Sherlock breathed, making it sound like a question.
"God, shit," John covered his face with hands, trying to protect himself from the feeling of Sherlock's face so close to his. This wasn't how this was supposed to go. What the fuck was he even doing, for fuck's sake.
"John–"
'Ah-Ah-Ahhhhhhh-Ah, Ah-Ah-Ahhhhhhh-Ah. We come from the land of the ice and snow. From the midnight sun where the hot springs blow'
Not any interruption would have been enough to dissipate the thick air between them, but John couldn't ignore this. Sherlock's phone ring was suddenly Led Zeppelin and it was too much.
John tried to laugh but it came out ragged and broken. His chest felt too heavy and he was suddenly glad for the distance Sherlock put between them. Maybe he'd be able to breath normally again. "What is that?" He asked, staring at Sherlock's back while the detective grabbed his phone from the kitchen table.
Sherlock looked back at him with something akin to hysteria on his face. If John weren't too busy trying to breath again, he'd find it endearing. The detective scowled down at the screen. "Victor," he said, showing it to John. "He must have changed his personal ring."
Oh. And John didn't feel the air leave his lungs because there wasn't any air in them to begin with, but.
That. Victor. John had not forgotten that Victor Trevor existed in this universe. Honestly he hadn't.
Sherlock seemed conflicted between picking up the phone and continuing the conversation, so John decided the matter for him.
"Okay, go ahead," John said, swallowing hard. He turned his back quickly, leaving the kitchen.
"John? Where are you going?" Sherlock shouted from where he was still standing.
John ran upstairs without looking back. "Shower and change. I'm going out, I need air."
John didn't know what exactly had happened. He didn't know much of what was going on around him. But what he knew was enough for now.
He loved Sherlock. Fully and completely, with every little ounce of his heart. He had to stop bloody pretending, Victor and Janine be damned.
And the wedding – shit – he had to stop it.
NOTES:
*groans*
listen, I know.
I have absolutely no idea of what to say to all of you who have been supporting this story since the beginning (it's been more than a year, for crying out loud!), and I have no idea of what to say to you who have just found this story and are already frustrated by the last date of update.
what can I say?
I don't do well with planning ahead, and it just kind of happened that for weeks I was too lazy, then I started to doubt myself, and then I was so ashamed to come back that I refused to even look at my user page here or to open the email linked to my account. I wish I had some better explanation, but that is basically it.
It's not lack of plot, I have a thousand ideas for this story. It really isn't. I know exactly where I am going with this, if only I wasn't this much of a piece of shit.
*sighs*
Other interests got in the way, I became a little scared of the Sherlock fandom, there were changes at work, my anxiety tried to cripple me, yadda yadda yadda.
I'll try to be better, that's the only thing I can say. If you want to continue reading this story, thank you very very much and leave me a comment cursing me or telling me off or whatever. Just try not to be to mean.
I love you all, thank you for the kudos and comments. Come chat with me on tumblr. It's the same url as my username here. I swear I'm not completely mad.
I swear I don't lie too much either.
Last but definitely not least: thanks to Archie because her words after this chapter were amazing. Made me feel good and loved. And made me feel that it was really time to come back.