Chapter 4

The evidence, as far as they could tell, as they sure as hell didn´t hear all about the cases they weren´t allowed to, seemed to pile up after that.

Apparently there was a witness who put Sherlock two streets away from the murder around 3 am yesterday. The hair in the wound of the second victim was one of Sherlock`s as well and while John tried to argue that Sherlock would never be as careless as to leave a hair behind, no one of the investigators seemed to believe him.

While he, Anderson, Donovan and Lestrade were still in the same room, waiting to be allowed to go home, Mycroft had long since left and was probably investigating on his own.

That left him and the others in an awkward silence after Donovan´s admission. He had tried to talk to her again soon after, but had been told off rather harshly and now no one dared to approach her. Well, he guessed Donovan was probably right, this was neither the time nor the place, but he still couldn´t wrap his head around it.

Sherlock would never...

Hell, it would have been the child of his brother, wouldn´t it?

What did he do anyway?

What had to happen that...

John´s thoughts were cut short as the door opened again and Mr. Simpson came back in, nodding at his men who had been watching them.

„If everyone would follow me." he announced and so they did and followed him into another room, where to John´s surprise Sherlock was seated in a chair, his hands bound in front of him by a pair of cuffs.

„He wanted to say goodbye and I thought I´d give him the opportunity." Mr. Simpson announced and Sherlock huffed.

„Well, I just wanted to tell John that I wouldn´t be home for dinner. And Lestrade, I´m sorry, but any more cases have to wait."

Greg just shook his head, not sure what to say, while John was incredulous. How could his flatmate stay that calm when everything looked that dire again? It was typical Sherlock but he wanted to tell him what he thought about that. Yet his flatmate had already turned to the other Yarders in the room.

He nodded at Anderson and got a nod in return, while Donovan seemed to be more straight forward.

„Freak."

„So you´re glad you finally have me where you wanted me?" he asked, looking at her sternly and John urged him to stop rolling his eyes.

„Not wanted, but it doesn´t surprise me, yes. I just want you to get what you deserve." Sally answered, equally rigid and challenging.

It was clear that there was no love lost between them anymore and once more John asked himself how the hell this could have happened. He just had been away for a week for gods sake!

„Well, I will, I guess." Sherlock answered, scratching the right side of his head rather calmly as if he wasn´t hurting his cuffed hands with this movement and as if he was watching a film or something calming like that. Then he set his hands down again, fiddling for a second to get the cuff further down to the wrist again to make it hurt less. „Now, if you´ll excuse me. I have a cell waiting for me."

Sally just huffed and turned around while Mr. Simpson went out into the corridor already.

„Goodbye Sally. Maybe Norman here is a match for you? I heard he likes them on his knees." That made Donovan stop and John himself had to fight the urge to slap his flatmate. What the hell was up with these two? They acted like children in kindergarten.

Norman didn´t look too amused either and being close to Sherlock he actually grabbed him. „You know if you want to actually hit him, everyone in this room would understand." He mused.

Sally though, seemed to be reluctant, which didn´t surpise John. She normally wasn´t someone who got physical. It took a lot to get her to do that.

Then again...

„Ah no. She´s all about procedure I´m afraid. Far too scared to do something on her own. No surprise there." Sherlock was smiling while fiddling with his hands. He was too sure of himself and it even annoyed John, friend or not. The whole room seemed to glare at him.

Donovan probably had enough as well as she walked over and struck.

Hard.

The crack when her fist hit Sherlock`s nose seemed to make Sally Donovan grin. While everyone else in the room was staring at her with a mixture of disgust, uneasyness and a tiny bit of surprise, the man on her right side seemed to be more in her favor.

„See, that was actually relieving, wasn´t it?" He smiled a particular fond smile at her and Sally nodded.

„Yeah, Freak finally got what he had coming all along."

Her companion laughed, while said Freak just glared at her. But Sally didn´t even seem to pay him further mind, as she already had turned away and was crossing to the other side of the room. That way, she didnt even see the agents who led the cuffed and now bleeding Sherlock away.

„You coming?" She beamed at the man, who had been holding Sherlock for her and the man just smiled and followed her.

John and the others were urged to follow her and Norman as well and John tried to shake what he had just seen. There was something wrong here. The woman in front of him couldn´t be Sally Donovan. He was sure of it.

Then again Sherlock acted like he was nuts as well. His head was actually hurting now and he cursed himself for agreeing to go to the conference. What the hell had happened that all went that wrong when he had been away?

„You know you won´t get anything out of him anyway." That was Sally again and John fought the urge to scream at her or worse, hit her, damn his headache. Yes, he did get she hated him again. He even did get why, thank you very much.

But still. Saying something like that here wasn´t a nice thing to do.

„Oh, don´t worry Mrs. Donovan. We have our methods, haven´t we?" Mr. Norman declared and smiled that John felt a shiver run down his spine. The man was enjoying this no doubt, and while Mr. Simpson just smiled and nodded encouragingly, John fought his urge to grab Sherlock, throw him over his shoulder and take him with him.

#

Sally Donovan was pissed.

Pissed at life never running smooth. Pissed at the god damn system. At the MI6 for being that bland, at Mycroft for not seeing this before or rather, too late. And at Sherlock for just sitting there, as if he wasn´t in any kind of danger and even more because he dared to bait her to get physical.

But most importantly she was damn pissed at the supposed Mr. Norman.

Fucking asswipe of a man. How dare he come and do something like this so close to Christmas? Hell, how dare and come at them anyway? She didn´t care about time and day!

She fought the urge once more to simply kick the guy in the balls, knowing well she couldn´t do this at the moment, with all the agents watching her. So she settled for challenging all her inner anger and her courage to play her role better and told him that he wasn´t going to get anything out of Sherlock anyway.

Which he wasn´t. She firmly believed that. Whatever he wanted with their freak, he wouldn´t give it to him. He might as well stop trying.

Sadly it didn´t seem to have the desired effect. Instead the man smiled and gave Sally a flashback she really didn´t need at the moment.

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How Mycroft had known she was at Sherlock`s that day she could only guess, but she suspected the CCTV.

Or his men. Possibily both.

Although she didn´t care, it wasn´t like he was following her to get her or something. He simply came to get her for their date to dinner she had agreed to last Thursday. So Sally smiled at him as he entered 221b. Orgininally she had just driven Sherlock and John home after a case, but of course Sherlock had gotten her distracted with a experiment, that had gone critical and become downright dangerous, and now she was late. In normal relationships she now would have tried to phone the poor man she hadn´t forgotten on purpose, but being together with a minor part of the british government had it´s perks and meant Mycroft already knew. Hell, she still suspected he had cameras at Sherlock´s apartment although he always assured them otherwise, so he probably had watched the whole panic when they tried to keep Sherlock`s experiment from exploding.

Sherlock though didn´t seem to be that happy to see his brother as he simply glared at him.

„Ah so you took a break from water boarding the latest prisoner, I see?" he announced casually, making Sally stop in her tracks and look at Mycroft.

He wasn´t really, was he? He never would...

But given his job? She couldn´t help but shudder.

What if Sherlock wasn´t having her on?

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Sally still shuddered at the memory. She, to this day, had no idea if Sherlock had been kidding. She and Mycroft hadn´t talked about it, this thing far too heavy for anything like their 3rd date. And even though she wanted to, she hadn´t asked him after that.

Until now.

Though now this wasn´t the place either to ask her boyfriend causally if he ever had tortured anyone of the MI6´s suspects.

Nevertheless one thing she was sure of: the MI6 wasn´t Kindergarten. She didn´t believe for one second that they wouldn´t torture if they had to, be it by Mycroft´s hand or otherwise.

And therefore Sally became even more pissed.

Nobody.

Nobody would torture her friend and live to do it.

Not if she could help it.

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