When Moriarty spoke up this time, John noted the lights weren't on. No, that wasn't it- he was blindfolded. The fabric was lightweight but pulled taut around his head. Not a single bit of light was let through. "Johnny, tell me you hate him." Second day- it was the second day, roughly. John had to piss.

Then excruciating pain ripped through John's leg and spun his head. A very tight grip was wrapped around the wound, squeezing. John jerked his leg, trying to get the grip to loosen even a little bit. His hand found its way to John's knee and it held him still. Then something sharp was cutting the stitches away. It wasn't neat, not a good line, and he felt newly healing flesh ripping with the stitches. It shot jolts of electrical-pain from the tips of John's toes to his head. He clenched his hands, the pin-pricked one screaming in protest, and tossed his head backwards as he tried to keep himself from passing out. He fought the erratic breathing, keeping steady and keeping himself from shock. He needed something to focus on as he felt something tugging at the remnants of the stitches, pulling them away from the wound. Good and bad; would keep it clean but hurt like hell.

The music. A new song was playing. John focused on that…

This is the Army Mister Jones,
No private rooms or telephones,
You had your breakfast in bed before,
But you won't have it there anymore.

Moriarty really knew how to pick them. John grimaced and let them roll through his head, repeating in his head the lyrics he'd just heard. "You hate him for this, don't you Johnny. It's Sherlock's fault you're here. Not even his brother came to help you. You don't really think Sherlock cares that you're here, do you?" his voice was breaking through the music. John took a deep breath and counted the beats of the song.

Do what the buglers command,
They're in the army and not in a band.

Moriarty's fingers jerked inside the wound as they took out the last of the stitches. A new bout of pain rushed over John. "Well, this doesn't look good, John. Unfortunately, we're a bit limited on medical supplies. You see, they frown upon me stealing things from the lab. But there are so many ways to clean a wound…" His voice trailed away from John and John figured he'd turned his back on him. It gave John a few moments to catch his breath.

John's ears strained as he heard something being opened. If he was quiet enough perhaps he could figure out what was in the container. He didn't have to guess for long. All of a sudden the sound of little pieces of something sliding over cardboard resounded in his ears and a very sharp, specific burn sizzled up his leg. Salt. Again, good and bad. It would clean the wound, to an extent, and it burned terribly. John couldn't help but cry out this time. His voice was raspy from lack of use and troubled sleep; it sounded familiar, like when he woke in a tent in Afghanistan.

A hand came down onto the wound and ground into it. Suffice it to say, John no longer felt like pissing was the top of his 'to do' list. "Just making sure, Johnny boy. You know how it is."

John was tired of hearing that. John was tired of the pain in his leg. There was no way he was going to be able to jump the rooftops of London if it wasn't given time to heal itself. There was no way Sherlock was going to take him back. He was just another case, another experiment, and this one failed. John had walked out and now he was broken, useless to Sherlock.

"Tell me, just how much do you hate the man?" Moriarty's voice broke through the pain in a soft, caressing set of notes.

"I hate him." John felt his chest pulse painfully but he ignored it. "I hate him!" The scream was piercing and echoed around the room.

Suddenly the straps were let loose from his body and two sets of hands were grabbing him up again. He hadn't even realized the others were in the room while this was going on. He ground his teeth and hated himself silently. He ignored the wetness on his cheeks as he focused on the feeling of being dragged off of the table. The blindfold was holding tight. He was back into the chains though, moments later. At least he'd have a chance to move.

"Good night, Doctor Watson. We'll come play some more tomorrow, hmm? I've got a new case for Sherlock tonight though. Oh, I shouldn't say that name, should I?" Moriarty left with a laugh. The sound of something clattering on a table jerked John's head upwards. The sound of three sets of receding footsteps calmed him down though. Sagging against the wall, hand and leg throbbing, John pulled the blindfold away.

A tray of food sat on a table he could reach despite the chains. It looked welcoming. There was also a bucket next to the table and John frowned. Nice loo. The thought of pissing all over Moriarty's floor briefly flickered through his mind, but John was more civilized than that.

At some point, maybe a few hours later, one of the Black Ops guys came down. The one with the broken nose. He deposited a few water bottles at the edge of where John could reach. Flicking the light off, he retreated back upstairs, leaving John alone and in dark silence. Silence, yes, they'd at least cut the music off. That was a privilege for his time spent with Moriarty apparently.

John judged the passing of the next two days by the shift of light from under the door at the top of the stairs. The chains were biting into his wrists rather painfully, the water was nearly gone, and the strong scent of ammonia was making his head hurt. The unpleasantries of being chained up in a basement were enough to make anyone go crazy. At least the camera wasn't on while he was stuck alone.

His thoughts were heavily on the last conversation with Moriarty. John didn't hate Sherlock. His rational self knew right well that it wasn't Sherlock's doing that had him here. In fact, he wasn't even sore at Mycroft for not having an eye on him. It was a relief to know the man hadn't been keeping such close tabs on him as to have a guard detail following him around Afghanistan. Certainly it would be helpful had he, but the past was over and John had something more to think about. There was no blame he could place on anyone outside of himself and Jim Moriarty.

When the door opened again, with a scuffing shudder, John looked up from his spot on the ground. His back was stiff as he'd been leaning against the wall for most of those two days. Putting his hands on the ground, he pushed himself upwards, relying heavily on his unharmed left leg to keep him steady. Moriarty was coming down with a set of keys and neither of those Black Ops brutes tagging along. Perhaps this was his chance at escape.

The two days and some water bottles had allowed John some time to clean up his leg and let it heal. It was stronger, if only a little, but enough so that he would be able to fight his way out. If Moriarty wasn't lying and they were, in fact, in London he'd be able to get away. He knew the streets pretty well after Sherlock had spent a whole three nights making John memorize the whole damn map. Not the "London A-Z" one; no, the one that Sherlock had drawn up including shortcuts and signs for cars.

Standing upright, shaking slightly, but hand perfectly still John watched Moriarty carefully. John blinked a few times, still slightly adjusting his eyes to the onslaught of light. Fortunately, he'd been interrupted by Sherlock in the middle of the night enough that he was able to adjust fairly quickly. He was beginning to realize just how much influence Sherlock had on his life.

"Johnny boy, it's good to see you again. Your leg is looking infinitely better. Fantastic." Moriarty stood at that point of the room that John could reach if he had his arms jerked back painfully by the shackles.

Stupidly, John lunged forward anyway. He hit the ends of the shackles just short of knocking into Moriarty. There was a painful pop of joints in his shoulders but he smothered the yelp with a curse, "Bastard!" John snarled and shook the chains, throwing the pain from his leg into the cursing. "I'll put a fucking bullet between your eyes. I swear to God, I'll see you damn well dead."

Moriarty just clucked his tongue at him. "Dear boy, you're going to hurt yourself if you keep that up. Come now." He pulled out a handgun and leveled it to John's throat.

John's eyes flickered to it and the thought, interesting, passed through his mind. He stood still and eased back so that his shoulders were sitting properly and he wasn't putting so much weight on his bum leg. "Right, fuck you, for good measure."

The laugh leaked through the room and sent a shiver down John's spine. "Alright, I'm going to unlock your cuffs. You are going to walk over to that set there." Moriarty flicked the barrel of the gun to the single loop on the floor with the shorter chain. "I will shoot your other leg if you try anything stupid."

John scoffed but didn't tense as if to run. "Thought you didn't like getting your hands dirty, Jim."

"It's Doctor Moriarty, remember? Keep up with the role playing John, you were so good at it at the pool. I don't normally like to get my hands dirty but, Doctor, you and your sociopath intrigue me enough to make an exception." Moriarty leveled the gun off again and tossed John the keys. "Unlock yourself." Moriarty stepped back enough that he was out of the reach of John's arms.

John quickly found himself kneeling on the ground facing the wall, as Moriarty instructed. The chain that was connected to the ring on the floor was attached to manacles on his wrists. His wrist cuffs were attached to a shorter chain that went to a collar around his neck. He wasn't able to move rise any further. Turning his head as well as he could in the hunched kneeling position, John tried to look up at Moriarty standing in front of him. He was carrying a rod the length of the sword and was tapping it against his open palm.

It came down a little harder, with a resounding smack, and John cringed. "New question, John Watson. What is it about Sherlock Holmes that you love? Is it the danger, or the man?"

This wasn't how John wanted to confess. He didn't want to be forced and he'd prefer to be facing Sherlock when he said it. John tried to swing his head around to see the camera in the corner behind him. The crack of the rod across his jaw brought his head swinging back around to look at the wall he was mere metres away from.

His face stung smartly and he sucked in a breath, trying to balance mostly on his left leg. Moriarty started to pace around John. He raised his arm again and brought the wooden rod down across the back of his thighs. The shock of it made him clench his muscles. His leg was starting to hurt again. Push it from your thoughts, focus. John didn't cry out, yet.

"Oh dear me, I know what's wrong. We forgot our music!" He sounded so damned cheery. John heard his footsteps trouncing off towards a corner of the room where the music player sat. He snapped it on and out poured another military song.

My sweetheart is a soldier.
As handsome as can be.
But suddenly they sent him
away across the sea
So patiently I waited
until his leave was due

"That's much better, hmm? What's say we get back to the question." Moriarty moved up in front of John and placed the rod under his chin, lifting it up as high as it would go. John choked and coughed when the band around his neck tugged tightly. "Tell me you love him."

John heaved out a breath when Moriarty moved the rod away and blinked a few times. "What are you getting at? What exactly are you looking for from me?" His mind was struggling to find some game amongst all of what Moriarty was trying to pull from his mouth.

"Oh, no, no, Johnny Boy. It's not about you, not really. You're merely a means to an end." Moriarty smiled and brought the rod up and down across John's shoulder, the left one in which he'd been shot the first time he'd been released.

John gasped and tried not to fall forwards. It wasn't that painful, not compared to his leg, but he hadn't been expecting it so suddenly in their conversation. "What are you trying to get out of Sherlock in all of this? You already said yourself- he's not coming for me. I left him."

"Don't be dull, John." Moriarty had found himself behind John now. He fisted his hand into John's hair and pulled him upwards. He stuck the rod between the back of John's neck and the collar and jerked it backwards, pulling the collar tight across John's throat.

John coughed against the quickly tightened band around his neck. He could feel it rubbing the skin beneath raw. With a grimace he shot a glare at the ceiling he was being forced to look up at.

Moriarty set his chin on John's shoulder and whispered into his ear as John choked for breath. "And sit up straight. It's not awfully proper to slouch, you know." Moriarty let him go, and circled around John, letting a foot fall to each beat of the music playing.

Lay down your arms (Lay down your arms)
Lay down your arms and surrender to mine

"You know as well as I that even though you broke poor Sherlock Holmes' heart, he'll still come for you." Moriarty paused long enough to smack across the front of John's thighs with the rod, then continued through John's groans and teetering, "I'm quite sure you're the only thing that's made that man's heart beat." When he came back around he placed the rod under John's chin again. "Tell me you love him."

John remained silent. He knew the camera was running and this wasn't how it was supposed to go. So he remained silent. The feel of the wooden rod bit into the soft skin under his chin but he welcomed the feel as a distraction to Moriarty's words.

Moriarty crouched down to look John in the eyes. He looked so pristine in that suit…perfect, evil, out of place. John wanted to spit at him, to ruin something about him, but he kept his teeth tightly together. An ache was setting in his jaw from all of his teeth-grinding, but again, yet another welcome distraction. "You know he's seeing all of this? I pull the discs and send them to him. Little bits, made up just for him. You should tell him, because right now all he knows is how much you hate him."

John had heard that tone before, the same tone Moriarty had used to tell Sherlock he would burn out his heart. If Moriarty was right, then Moriarty had his hands on Sherlock's heart right now. While he wasn't burning, it still hurt. John wanted to tell Sherlock how he felt… he really did.

"Go to hell, Jim." John couldn't help the smile at the quick injection of annoyance. He knew already the usage of 'Jim' would bother the psychopath. At seeing Moriarty's eyes light up with a crazy anger, he suddenly regretted the smart remark.

Come to the station, Jump from the train.
March at the double, Down Lovers Lane.
Then in the glen where the roses en-twine
Lay down your arms (Lay down your arms)
Lay down your arms and surrender to mine

Not sure how long Moriarty had been bashing away his anger on John's body, John felt ready to pass out. His body was bruised, possibly some ribs were broken and the kneeling position was getting to be too much on his leg. Whether or not it was psychosomatic didn't matter. His leg was screaming at him, shooting fire through his body, and John wanted it to stop.

"Love…" he gasped.

Moriarty pulled his hand to a stop, the rod milimetres from John's jaw-line. "What was that?" he breathed out. He bent down to get a better look at John's face.

John rasped out what he hoped was a full sentence. "Love…him. I-"

"Louder John, the camera can't hear you." Moriarty was smiling pleasantly, tapping the wooden rod against the floor near John's bum leg.

"I love him." John forced out past the band on his throat, past the dry scratch inside, and past the enflamed pain in his chest.

"Who, John?"

"Sherlock."

John woke up on the table. He only knew this because of what he could see, being the ceiling and the medical cart. What he couldn't do was feel his body. He was sure he could move, at least his head, and swiveling that around he found Moriarty standing back against a wall staring at him. And that music- another song. Old and upbeat once again.

Another figure moved into place. It was feminine and familiar. Molly. She was holding a scalpel and her face was half-covered by a surgical mask. John felt panic rising in his chest. He didn't think Molly, of all people, would be in on something like this. John tried to yell out to her, to reason with her, but something was blocking it. He gnawed for a moment and found a ball gag stuck tightly between his teeth.

"Jim told me what you did, John. How you hurt Sherlock. How you took off to Afghanistan because you like to kill. I knew you were bad for him, you turned him away from me. Then your unit? Your own unit! How could you, John? You're a doctor." Molly's voice was shaking, tremors rocking her small frame with her anger.

John's eyes were wide and he shook his head. He couldn't believe what he was hearing. Molly really hated him and that was a big surprise. He glanced at Moriarty and found the reason and cause behind her snap of sanity. Jim Moriarty was smiling from ear to ear and his eyeswere flooded with amusement. Whatever he'd told her was enough to snap that innocent little mind and now John was going to pay for it. He honestly hoped that Sherlock wasn't going to see this part.

"Oh Johnny Boy, we have to start with a question again, don't we?" Moriarty stepped up, wrapping an arm around Molly's waist to pull her back and keep her from lashing out with the scalpel too early. "Do you want me to stop? Do you want Sherlock to stop seeing this? Do you want to die?"

John watched Moriarty carefully and worked his mouth around the gag. Well, he wouldn't have to worry about shouting anything this time. His eyes flicked to the camera in the corner and he slowly closed them.

"No!" Moriarty screamed out and rushed to the head of the table. He grabbed John's head and John shut his eyes harder. "Open them, you're going to watch this." John felt his head lifted and then dropped to the table, but he didn't really feel it. It was like a nudge to a very numb body- a dull, water-flushed yell into flooded ears.

John's eyes snapped open, assessing how his vision was handling the hit to determine how hard his head smacked the table. Couldn't have been too hard as his vision was just fine. He watched Molly brandishing the clothing scissors. She put them at the base of his brown t-shirt and cut upwards, tearing the fabric away from his body. John saw it all like he was watching this happening to someone else. He couldn't feel any of it really. It was like the caress of water maybe. Or wind. There, but not really.

"Whenever you start to feel again, just scream. I will take care of you fairly quickly." Moriarty lifted a bottle of some sort of clear liquid. A needle was already poking through, waiting to be used.

Trying to swallow against the strap at his neck, John cocked his eyebrows and tried to breathe in hasty gasps of air. There was only so much he could drag through his nose. He wondered briefly if he could choke and drown on the saliva overproducing in his mouth. His eyes flickered back to Molly as she picked up the scalpel again and placed it at his shoulder. She dragged it down slowly to the bottom end of the breastbone and John watched. The blade dug deep into his skin and blood automatically bubbled around it, dripping downwards. He couldn't feel it. Christ, he couldn't feel it! How the hell was he still awake…

"It's a little drug my, uh, colleagues came up with just for me. Amazing what a consulting criminal can get his hands on." Moriarty blabbered away as Molly worked along his shoulder in the traditional Y-cut. She then took the scalpel and traced it along the scars of his bullet wound on his shoulder. "You know how it is, I was even able to get a last minute interior decorator to set up this little room. Just for you. I didn't have anything like this until opportunity arose. I rather like it, actually."

John flinched when the blade dug deeper into his scar, not that he could really feel it, but watching it cut into his skin was disconcerting. He could see that he was bleeding, that she was really cutting him, but he couldn't feel it. Be a dream, just a dream. You'll wake up in a stupid hospital bed and then get back to Sherlock…

"Eyes!" Moriarty's scream jumped out at him and snapped his eyes back open. Molly had made quick work in those few wishful seconds.

John watched as Molly placed the scalpel at the top of his chest and dragged it down to his pant line, leaving a trail of crimson in its wake. John's breathing was coming in quickly, raising his chest up and down, and his left hand was shaking. He knew only because he could see out of the corner of his eye. Then it was at his leg, the one without the wound. She used the scalpel to cut into the pants and his leg. John's head spun as fabric and blood fell onto the table.

He watched as his body was starting to shake. There were a lot of cuts, there was a lot of blood. Then his vision started to waver and his eyes were rolling to the back of his head. He was going into shock. He heard Moriarty yell something, heard some crashing of instruments and felt a jab into the side of his neck. That one hurt, quite a bit actually.

A heady rush flew through him and John felt his heart jump. His breathing picked up and his vision returned to normalcy. Adrenaline. Moriarty had shot him up with adrenaline to keep him from passing out. He coughed against the ball gag, trying to suck in some much needed air and came up with nothing. Moriarty's fingers were at the object when he realized John was choking. Ripping it away, he allowed John to suck in a gulp of air. John coughed a few more times, his throat thick and compressing.

"Water, Molly. I don't want him out so quickly. There's too much left to do." Moriarty caught the water bottle she tossed at him. Opening the cap, he came back up to the head of the table. Gripping John's head, he pulled it back, "Open your mouth." When John complied he poured water down into his mouth. John choked on it at first but Moriarty was good with his timing and soon there was a pattern of pour-swallow-breathe, pour-swallow-breathe.

Moriarty ran his hand over John's forhead, brushing his hair back away from his face. "Alright Molly, continue. And John, we'll leave the gag out so that you can ask me."

"Fuck you, Moriarty." John was rewarded with a backhand across the face. Then he went back to watching the scalpel make valleys of sliced skin and blood across his body. His gray-hazel eyes were diming and growing murky as his mind became crazier and more muddled. John took another shot of that new drug Moriarty had been given and received another stab of adrenaline.

His eyes went to the camera again. John wondered how much of this Sherlock would see, how much he had seen; if he had actually seen any of it or if it was just one of Moriarty's twisted games. John stared for long moments until he realized feeling was seeping back into his body. There wasn't the feel of a blade to his skin, just the sharp sting of open wounds. He turned from the camera and looked around himself. Molly was gone, the bloodied scalpel laying unattended on the medical cart top and Moriarty standing next to it with his hands tucked into his pockets. "Ask me," he whispered.

John's eyebrows were crushed together, tears welling along the rims of his eyes, and his body was quivering with the pain of the gashes. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. "No, I won't ask you." In John's mind he could see Sherlock's face, those liquid silver eyes, and the sharp intelligence that rested in both. Please God, let me see him again. Just once, before you take me.