A/n: Hello again! Chapter five, woo! Hope you all are doing well. As of tomorrow, I've been on this story for all of two weeks. Wowzers. I feel like I've been delaying my action, so here we are? A warm-up? Long one at that.

Disclaimer: Not mine.

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My Absence, Hardly Worth Noting

Chapter 5

Sherlock groaned and tried to lift his head to survey his surroundings. Before he could register how heavy it felt, he fell hard into merciless, damp concrete, smacking his skull once more. Opening his eyes, he strained to see the meager amount of visible light in the distance. Thoughts scrambling, Sherlock closed his eyes tightly against the throbbing pressure that his head was generously gifting. He was captured somewhere, but where? Who? Why? Where was he before this? Which case was he solving? Unable to answer any of his own questions, Sherlock tried to force his way back up but found he couldn't move any of his limbs. Settling back down, he fell into unconsciousness.

o-o-o

"Wakey, wakey!" Sherlock heard as he felt a sharp slap to his face. Eyes snapping open, the detective looked into a dark void at a towering, shadowy figure before him. From where he was sitting, Sherlock could determine the man was nearly two meters tall but nothing else. His head throbbed and the irritating voice continued, "I'm glad, I see you're awake...Now we can continue this little game of ours."

As the lights switched on, Sherlock flinched, temporarily blinded. His head aching, he wriggled his hands only to find them bound behind him. Shivering, he realized that his feet were bare and bound and he was in thin clothing without any extra warmth from is curls; they had cut his hair. Cursing his hackneyed kidnapper, the detective fought to see that man. Eyes slowly adjusting, Sherlock could see the man's features as they came to him. Caucasian, chestnut brown hair, light stubble, dressed finely, fingernails clean. Manager. Criminal. He was talking to the head of a crime organization. Derek McCollum.

"Ah, remember me, do we?" the man announced, his voice echoing around the stale room, which couldn't be more than someone's leaking basement.

Sherlock eyed him and then the surrounding space. Jars of canned food filled several shelves along the far wall while a matching washer and dryer set sat against the next wall over, a stack of folded, floral shirts resting in a laundry basket. "Choice of location, as always. Won't she want her clothes?" Sherlock asked, gesturing towards the neat array.

"She's no need for them," Derek assured his captive with a sinister smile. "You needn't be worrying over her..."

She's dead, the detective thought. For a long time too, not murdered. Police would be sniffing around, the house would be sold already. No, this was a old woman, must have died upstairs. "Can we hurry this process along?" Sherlock asked, boredom beginning to overcome him. Why couldn't his captors be in the least interesting? Before he knew it, John would surely arrive and end this all if he couldn't get out himself.

McCollum said nothing and dug around in his coat pocket. Extracting several photos, he walked over and stooped next to Sherlock, offering the first for the detective to see. John stood among a flustered crowd, leaning against two of the nurses with his eyes dead set on a pool of blood. My blood... McCollum flipped to the next, showing a depressed John, eyes sunken and sullen, forehead creased, deeply frowning. He was sitting down, slouching on his interlocked hands as if in a silent prayer in what he knew to be St. Barts interior. The next, John was crying alone. Sherlock's heart sunk, remembering just what he had done before this, why his head hurt. Was he dead now? McCollum turned to the next picture, and Sherlock saw his family, Molly, Mrs. Hudson, and John standing around a cemetery, standing before an unidentified grave. Knowing it was his own, the detective studied each of the face. John was blank, Molly in hysterics, and Mrs. Hudson's lip was quivering, silent tears sliding down her face. Mycroft wore a disappointed face and was standing beside their mother, holding her hand for support. Mrs. Holmes herself was upset, hardly able to fathom why her baby boy had declared himself a fraud and committed suicide. He couldn't help it; Sherlock would rather them sad on his behalf than dead. Mycroft was right, caring wasn't an advantage. If he didn't bring himself to care about these people, he never would have put them in danger; he never would have died for them.

When the crime boss flipped the next picture over, the final nail was driven in Sherlock's coffin. Close up, the detective could see a shiny, black grave with his own name emblazoned on the front. "Touching isn't it?" McCollum asked. "Sherlock Holmes, befallen by emotions!"

Sherlock's eyes widened. Moriarty, McCollum. They were in cahoots. "Moriarty wanted to 'burn my heart out'...is this what he meant?" the detective questioned, not wanting to give the criminal further suggestion to his punishment.

"Now you get it!" McCollum exclaimed, "I suppose you understand that you're not in London anymore. That we smuggled you out, half-alive. That your big brother doesn't know any different!" Sherlock had to hide his glare. The very notion of Mycroft not knowing exactly what he was up to seemed positively absurd, but proved to alienate him further. "Good, good, you understand. Let me explain the rules to our game," he continued, shooting the younger man a toothy, demented smile. "I wouldn't give you a game that's completely impossible...But it's rather challenging none-the-less. Every month, you must disable - kill, ruin, whatever - a few people of our choosing. If you die or don't complete the assignment by the deadline, we will kill your little friends and leave you begging for the same fate. Same goes for if you come into contact with any of your old acquaintances; they will be shot on the spot. In your spare time, feel free to come after us. Actions against us are only between involved parties. In fact, we welcome the challenge, you welcome your own consequence." The man's smirk increased, knowing Sherlock couldn't refuse.

I'm helping a criminal get more powerful...By taking Moriarty's place, Sherlock noted. He couldn't half-complete the job now. He couldn't just jump off a building to save his friends only to have them killed by a dead man's folly.

Walking behind the chair, McCollum lifted Sherlock's arms up from behind the chair and slung him forward to the ground. Bound and awkward, Sherlock clattered to the cement once more. The crime boss removed his belt and snapped it loudly behind the detective to intimidate him. Gearing it in place, McCollum yelled, "And this is for my brother!" In one swift motion, he whipped at Sherlock's thinly-clothed back until gashes and welts formed, profusely bleeding through the white layer.

o-o-o

Awaking to a harsh thud, John bolted upright from his chair, muscles crying their objection. His eyes fell upon the form of Sherlock, who was thrashing about on the floor, mumbling and crying, tears flooding down his cheeks. John immediately dropped to his knees and grabbed his friend's shoulders to jostle him awake. "Sherlock, Sherlock! It's alright!"

The man's eyelids fluttered open, but his eyes rolled back into his head. John pulled his friend into his lap and propped him up against his own shoulder. "Sherlock!" he cried once more. "Wake up, it's just a dream!"

Sherlock gasped and propelled himself into John's shoulder. Realizing he had hit solid skin, the detective pushed back. In a moment's notice, Sherlock was facing John, breathing hard and staring at him with wide, red eyes.

"...Sherlock?" John called in a soft tone.

Breathing slowing down, the man blinked and rubbed at his eyes with his loose sleeve. Sherlock focused on John and took a shaky breath. He was back at Baker Street with a perfectly complete John; he was safe. "I am fine," Sherlock assured the stout man, voice shaking.

"You're far from 'fine'," John returned, scooting closer to the man in question. "You'll be lucky if you didn't tear any stitches with that fit of yours..." John trailed off, slipping into his doctor mindset.

Without another word, Sherlock removed his sling, careful to keep the cast close to his body as it fell inches to the floor. Unbuttoning his shirt with his right hand, he slipped it off, and lifted his undershirt up and off his chest. "Take a look," he offered.

Completely flabbergasted, John wondered just what had come over Sherlock. Cooperation wasn't a word Sherlock particularly understood. With a cursory glace, the doctor could tell that some of the superficial lacerations bled from impact, but were sufficiently clotted. Moving over to the man's stab wound, John peeled the clumsily-taped square (that Sherlock himself had applied) back far enough to figure that though he had bled, he had only slightly torn at the stitches. "You are lucky, but you need to be careful...You can probably let this air out for a while...just wear loose clothing." His eyes falling to Sherlock's frame, John could still see medley of scars marking the man's chest and arms. "Sherlock...what's happened to you?" John asked, eyeing a massive gouge to the side of the man's left wrist.

Sighing, Sherlock awkwardly slid back into his overshirt, closing it without buttoning it. "Nothing in particular," Sherlock answered, wondering how he could get off of the topic.

"If this is nothing, what in God's name was it that we were doing? You rarely got hurt on cases...This wasn't just fighting..." John began, swallowing the rest of his words. This was torture.

"I said it was nothing!" Sherlock cried, pulling his legs up against his chest.

I'm not getting anywhere... John decided to change his tactics and began, "You know. When you called me - at St. Bart's , that is - and I looked up, I swear my heart stopped. I didn't know what to say, what I could possibly do to make you stop doing what you were doing. You said you were a fake, that you made Moriarty up for your own devices. I couldn't - I just couldn't believe you. Then you jumped. You bloody jumped, and I couldn't get over to you fast enough. A bike hit me...I hardly felt it. I just ran over with my ears ringing, heart throbbing only to see you sprawled on the pavement. It couldn't be real, I thought. My knees faltered when the nurses turned you over. It hadn't been a joke; you were the one who really jumped. You killed yourself. I checked your pulse myself...I thought you were gone."

Feeling tears spilled down his own face, John choked back the phlegm in the back of his throat and looked at Sherlock, whose face was devoid of any emotion. Steadying himself, John continued, "As much as I believed in you, as much as I rejected your obvious, final lie, I betrayed you. When the authorities overheard that I was the last to hear you speak, I was beside myself, babbling about what you had said to me. They spread the rumors. Donovan, Anderson, even Lestrade started to believe it. For a while, they even investigated me! Thinking I was somehow part of the crimes that we solved, trying to get me to force all the blame on a dead man. I couldn't do it. I couldn't drag your name through the muck anymore than I already had.

"And then there was the funeral. Just me, Mrs. Hudson, your family, and Molly. When they called for a eulogy, I could hardly speak, hardly breathe. I couldn't say what I wanted to say. I'm a coward. I couldn't say what I wanted while you were alive; I took it for granted. I felt like we had some sort of understanding, but I guess I was wrong." Sherlock shook, wanting to proclaim to the world just how wrong John was.

"Sherlock, you saved me. This hobbled, broken, bored man. You picked him up, probably for amusement, and spiffed him right back up again. I was so alone, and then I wasn't. I couldn't picture my life...I couldn't picture where I'd be without you having been...in it," John continued, sniffing back another batch of mucus. "I cursed you for being so selfish. For leaving me back alone again at the drop of pin. You tempted me with happiness and tore it from beneath my feet faster than I could comprehend. It would have been a favor had you never taken me in..." Clutching his trousers, Sherlock tried to calm his trepidation. He needed to hear the rest of the story.

"I couldn't come back to the flat, but I couldn't abandon it either. I told myself I'd never come back, but here I am. I came back, I got a job at that clinic, and I began paying both portions of the rent. I didn't want to let this place go, I couldn't. Mrs. Hudson packed up your equipment and stuffed it into your room. Mycroft told me he'd take possession of your things with my consent, but I never could quite tell him to pack what little I had left of you and go stuff it in some dark room. I couldn't have the rest of you interned. Every time, every single time I ventured to your grave, I prayed for a miracle. That you would stop being dead. That you would just return and that would be that. It soon became a wish that I knew would never come true. I continued my life, but I couldn't call it that. I died with you.

"And then you showed up. Out of the blue. Back into my life. I was shocked, I was angry. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have kicked you out in the first place. I don't know what I'd do if you decided to leave again..." John trailed off, embarrassed by his own emotions. Tears slipping down his face once more, he felt a clammy hand touch his own. John looked up and saw Sherlock facing him, eyes watering, lip trembling.

I hurt John... Drawing another deep breath, Sherlock whispered, "I'm sorry." The words tingled in his mouth. He hadn't said those words since his mother would screech that he apologize to Mycroft for some childish shenanigan, which usually involved hitting him with his wooden pirate's scimitar.

John blinked, not sure he had heard those words from the figure before him. "You're sorry?" John asked in a confused tone.

"I'm sorry, everything is all my fault." Sherlock didn't know what else to do. John didn't forgive him, and he didn't understand what would make the situation right again. No amount of clumsy talking would help him, no stories, no made-up excuses. He couldn't tell the truth; it would hurt John more than it could possibly help. "What else can I say?" Sherlock asked earnestly.

"Do you want to stay here?" John inquired.

Looking at John, their hands, and around the flat, Sherlock answered, "Yes." He doesn't know what to do if I left again... I die for him, I hurt him. I live for him, I kill him. Is live with him even an option anymore?

"Good, we're not lying anymore," John sighed, pulling his own hand away. "Why did you jump?" the doctor continued, hoping he could get a straight answer this time.

Sherlock stretched out his sore legs on the floor and took a deep breath. "I-I can't say," the detective stammered. He couldn't tell John that he jumped to save his life; he couldn't admit that these last three years were for the sake of keeping John alive, he couldn't tell him that he had lost the game, that Moriarty had gotten him.

"What are you afraid of?" John asked, his voice softening further.

You, Sherlock thought, I am deathly afraid of you. Your reaction to the truth. I cannot allow myself to hurt you anymore than I already have.

"I won't press on, but you still owe me an explanation...and you better not leave until you do." Sherlock nodded in agreement and John stood from his place on the floor. "Good, because my bed is calling me. It's three in the morning. You should get some sleep, too."

"Good night," Sherlock gave his friend a meager smile and watched as he left the room, carefully attuning himself to the new creaks in the steps as John ascended. He couldn't be anything more than awake. Setting to his dusty desk, Sherlock rummaged around until he could find his outdated but fully-functioning laptop. He had the evidence to his innocence lined up, and somewhere along the way, he hoped he could muster how to explain the whole process to John.

Recounting the first year leading up to and succeeding his death, Sherlock typed until he could see light streaming through the windows. Throughout the night, the detective relocated to the couch and turned on the telly in the background to help soothe the ringing in his ears. Silence was maddening, aggravating when the detective couldn't be trusted alone with his own thoughts. At least late-night infomercials for poorly-engineered products made noise (no matter how nasally and fluctuating the presenting voice), served as some entertainment, and kept his mind from focusing entirely on the subject at hand.

John will be up soon, Sherlock mused, still clacking away at his laptop. The word document was the whole of thirty-one pages in length, written as a constant stream of consciousness. Details still clear in his mind, Sherlock recounted the entirety of what he thought was his first year without a pause. Blinding himself against his typos as well as poor choices in grammar and syntax, the detective steamed forward, watching as the infomercials evolved into early morning soft news.

As Sherlock stretched, he felt a pang in his midsection but ignored it. Pain was only a superficial problem as it stood, and he refused to let it get to the better of him. A healing stab wound was the least of his problems. How was he to continue living as Sherlock Holmes? Like a story put on hiatus, he couldn't simply dive right back in. There were explanations to make, family and friends to meet, evidence to present, and his old name to restore. Even then, he still needed a comprehensive story to the public, something that wouldn't expose his weakness, but wouldn't raise too many questions. Who was he trying to kid? Anything he said would raise questions. Sherlock Holmes was still trapped in the grave.

End of Chapter 5

A/n: Now that you've read, please review (and I'll love you forever...even if you don't have an account)! I really could take this a lot of routes (though I have my general plot currently in mind)...As of now, I can promise content will be gory for sure, but I don't know if I'll develop a smidge of the latent romance as subtle as I can. Or just when I'm introducing Mycroft (well, he'll probably appear next chapter). How John's getting told the truth (next chapter maybe, too?)...Dun really know? We'll see. Bye!