A/N: I know sometimes there are problems for a lot of you to access new chapters. Try back a few hours or so later, and they usually resolve: if not, I'll figure it out and repost. Thank you again for all the reviews!
Some of you were a bit surprised/uneasy regarding the Sherlock/Mycroft parts. Thank you for your honesty and comments. I see them as not having a normal brotherly relationship as far as how they interact. In "Belgravia," Mycroft basically tells the room Sherlock is a virgin! What brother Mycroft's age does things like that! I have a hunch Mycroft is not a virgin, and that's something he taunts Sherlock about. They do things just to try and get a reaction from each other.
In today's chapter: Sherlock and Molly get deep and have fluffy goodness, and Sherlock introspection in the hour before he gets Molly for their date. Next chapter is Monday.
S&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS&MS
Molly looked up as Sherlock entered the lab. No one else was there at the moment. He closed the door and turned to face her.
"I just ran into Mycroft, leaving as I was arriving."
Molly nodded. "He… he came to talk to me about you. About us."
Sherlock's mouth tightened. "He tried to get you to leave me."
Molly nodded, feeling uncomfortable, as though she was causing trouble between them.
"Don't be concerned, Molly," Sherlock said. "This… conflict… with Mycroft isn't the first, and it won't be the last."
She nodded again, looking him in the eye with difficulty. "He… he said you'd come to your senses and break my heart. That I was in danger and should let him hide me somewhere safe, out of England. He asked me if you were worth dying for."
Sherlock stared at her. "What did you tell him?"
Molly returned his stare. "The truth."
The air suddenly seemed thinner to Sherlock. "Which is what?" he asked softly.
"That I wasn't leaving you. That my love is stronger than that: stronger than Moriarty, or fear, or death."
Sherlock felt a flood of emotions. Amazement, disbelief, affection, admiration, and relief. He didn't know which one to process first, and in a rare instance completely unlike him, decided just to experience them now and contemplate them later.
"Molly… that's…" he swallowed. "That is extraordinary."
She looked down, a blush on her cheeks. "Well. It's just the truth," she said simply.
"There is a great deal to be said about someone courageous enough to tell the truth in a world filled with lies," Sherlock said quietly, and she looked up and smiled.
She had never been as beautiful as she was in that moment, he decided. That moment of quiet strength, of irrational love and brave conviction and excessive adoration. Suddenly those things he'd once considered silly didn't seem quite so silly anymore.
He'd always thought love was a weakness. He'd never really stopped to consider that it could also be a source of strength.
Mycroft's words came back to him. His brother was right: Molly had changed. She had become the woman she had always been capable of being with the right stimulus and circumstances. He had brought about this change in her. She'd turned from a shy caterpillar into a breathtaking butterfly. She could have freed herself of him: left him, left England, run away out of fear. But she had stayed. Come back to him. She was his in every sense of the word and it elated and frightened him.
And it frightened him that he was elated and frightened.
Even if he wasn't bound to her by Moriarty, Sherlock was not entirely certain at that moment whether he would want to leave her.
Molly moved closer to him. This time it was Sherlock who embraced first, rubbing his cheek against her soft hair as she slipped her arms around him. They stood for a long moment that way, the silence not awkward but peaceful, and he sighed.
"What's wrong?" she asked, looking up at him.
He shook his head. "I never knew," he said softly.
"Knew what?"
"That it could be like this. You still the restlessness. I feel… safe with you."
Molly smiled. "Good."
"Is that how you feel?" he asked, curious.
She laughed. "I've always felt that way with you, Sherlock. Even when you're being a git."
He raised his eyebrows. "Good to know there are constants in the universe."
She pressed against him, and he inhaled sharply as his body reacted to her body molded to his. He closed his eyes, breathed deeply, accepted his desire without trying to fight it. It amazed him how much he wanted her. The chocolates could only explain it so far. The rest, however mad, was just him. And just her. Just the truth.
She pressed a kiss to each eyelid, then his nose, which caused his eyebrows to rise again, then lingered on his lips, which caused something else entirely to rise. He felt her warm breath exhale in amusement.
"As much of a temptation as you are, Miss Hooper, I'd best leave if I'm going to be on time for our date tonight," he said wryly, pulling back and kissing her nose, making her giggle.
"What, no wicked fantasies about shagging on an autopsy table?" she teased.
"Of course. However, call me old-fashioned, but I'd like our first time to be a bit more traditional," he said softly
She smiled, looking shy again. "I would too, actually."
"Then stop tempting me, Molly, and let me leave."
"Certainly," she grinned. "I need to actually appear to be doing some work anyway."
"I'll see you at seven," he told her, pressing one last kiss to Molly's lips before leaving.
It was the only mystery he could not solve.
Sherlock Holmes, the world's only (and therefore greatest by default) consulting detective, could not solve the mystery of Molly Hooper.
More specifically, her love for him.
He understood the science of what people called love: the biology, the psychology, the physiology. Chemical reactions, defects as he'd said before. Hormones and neurotransmitters and agents of the body affecting-afflicting-the mind.
He could tell anyone who cared to ask exactly why seeing Molly smile made him want to smile in return now.
But no one cared to ask, because Sherlock Holmes didn't have many friends.
He could count them on one hand, even if he included Mycroft.
For a moment he was preoccupied with analyzing which finger each friend would be.
He realized he'd gotten off track, and this irritated him.
Sentiment. Romance. Affection.
Love.
He drew a deep breath and noted absently that it was a bit unsteady.
None of it explained why Molly loved him.
He was not loveable. Most of the time he was not even likeable.
But she loved him nonetheless.
She was everything that he wasn't, in many of the ways John was everything that he wasn't.
It was easy to see why someone would love John, would love Molly: if he subscribed to love.
Trying to see why they loved him was beyond his ability.
Ordinary people let themselves feel all kinds of rubbish: useless things like love and anger and jealousy.
Moriarty had made him feel these things. For John, for him, for Molly.
Well, to be honest he'd felt them all before. At times. Especially as a child.
But he was no child now. He was a man: a man that Moriarty had turned ordinary.
Except that he still was himself.
Himself, but different.
Was this what evolution was like?
Was he becoming, as Lestrade had once hoped, not just a great man but a good one?
It was more than even Sherlock's mind wanted to contemplate.
He almost wished he'd never laid eyes on Jim Moriarty.
Except that the man gave him the greatest challenges of his life.
They had both cheated death, taken turns outsmarting each other, like some sort of bizarre Siamese twins that had been separated at birth and had lived very different lives.
And now he'd made it personal, Moriarty had. Playing this game with him and Molly.
Forcing him to feel. To let himself feel. The thing he'd despised and tried to avoid as much as he could.
But here, now, alone in thought if nothing else, Sherlock Holmes knew he had to face the truth.
He no longer hated to feel this.
What he felt for Molly gave him a sense of peace he'd never experienced before.
She had become his comfort, his sanctuary.
How was he supposed to leave it?
Sherlock shook his head. Speculating at this juncture was useless. He'd deduce Moriarty's intentions eventually. For now, it was enough to know everyone was safe.
He had, as Moriarty had so maliciously put it, sold himself like a whore; used the only thing of value he could offer the madman. His surrender.
To feelings, to sex, to Molly.
To love.
He supposed he should regret it. It went against his nature, submitting. Especially to feelings.
But he didn't.
If that was what it took to give Molly the dignity she unknowingly deserved, give himself the sense of rightness he needed, and hasten the game, it needed to be done.
It had, in a sense, freed him: as Moriarty had repeatedly pointed out. He could let himself experience all of it without resistance or hesitation. He didn't have to concern himself with the morality of it, because he'd done this for a far greater good.
It would make it easier for all of them: himself, Molly, Moriarty.
He lifted his violin. John would be returning soon with Mary Morstan, and he wanted a final moment of calm before the storm.
Before, he would've played some Bach, Schubert, Tchaikovsky… something from the classics.
They didn't fit this.
He chose something that, if anyone had heard him play it that knew him at all, they would have been astonished.
But no one besides him and Moriarty was going to hear it except Molly.
Someday, soon, he would play it for her and her alone.
She wouldn't recognize the significance at first. But someday she would understand.
Sherlock took a deep breath, his expression tranquil, and lifted the bow.
Slowly, reverently, the first notes of "Green Destiny" floated into the air and settled over his heart.
"Green Destiny", Love Theme for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, from the import soundtrack, copyright 2000, performed by Yo-Yo-Ma.
And yes, I know YYM is a cellist and Sherlock is a violinist. It's transferable, and perfect.