With cautious quickness, Sherlock made his way to the other side of the room. He quickly swung open the door and stepped into the small room gun first. He was greeted by a high pitched yelp from a frightened woman on the floor. She was in bad shape, wild hair and bruised face. She stared wide-eyed at the gun but said nothing, as if she we reading him as he read her. Between two blinks, her eyes flicked to the left and Sherlock's gaze followed suit.

Everything. Everything in his mind, in his blood, in his bones, switched off. An atomic explosion, silent as an unmarked grave, roared to life in the pit of his unfed stomach.

John is dead.

The impossible thought rocketed through the empty night sky in his head. For the first time in his whole life there was absolutely nothing to think, to say, to do. His legs refused to move as he stood in the door way, a look of pure, empty horror being carved across his elegant features.

John.

Any type of bravery, sturdiness, grace that had occupied his being fled from him, like smoke from a flame. After what felt like a life time, thoughts began slowly trickling back into his deadlined mind, each one right after the other. Painfully loud and clear and terrifying. This wasn't supposed to happen like this. He didn't come back into the land of the living to still be alone. How? How was John here? As much as he craved the way John could always surprise him, this was the second time since he returned from the dead that John got a morbid jump on him. Why? What the hell was he doing here? Tied to a tub?

Tied. No one ties up a dead man.

A rush of air bolted into his chest, reminding him it was a requirement for living.

Sherlock took a stumbled step forward, wildly unfamiliar with the sensation of numb legs. The woman on the floor sat staring at him, so silent it was easy for Sherlock to forget she was there. He even forgot about the gang occupying the rest of the building, and about the almost certain rush of police cars, one carrying Lestrade, on their way. All that was there, all that mattered, was John.

There was nothing he could do but stay painfully focused on the unmoving form. He had thought about this moment over and over again, on nights when all he wanted to do was to shut his brain up. What would his first words be to him? What would they be doing, where would they be, and how would he possibly get John to understand? It would have to be strategic. Well thought out. Careful not to hurl his past 3 years in a frenzied word-vomit at John. But it had been far, far too long since he's seen that face- now bruised, bloodied, and still. But it was John's face. Being so close to him after so much time apart halted anything he could have planned.

Sherlock stood before the tub now, and all he had to do was kneel down to be as close as he needed to be. But he found, as the threat of John's potential death faded and he hovered over him, how absolutely terrified he was to move forward. This was the final step. This was home laid out before him. This was his acceptance of his humanity, his need for human contact. His need for John. This was putting himself up for a prospective rejection. Oh God. The thought of John rejecting him, of running away from a ghost in his past, leaked iron into his very core.

Looking like he's seen a ghost, Sherlock slowly lowered himself to be eye-level with the unmoving face slumped against a tiled wall. It felt as if every piece of him, down to his very last cell, called out for John. The need probed him, pushed him, screamed in his ears to reach out. To wipe the dirt off John's brow, to run his shaking hands through John's rumpled hair. But his body turned to stone, unable to move, to speak.

The next though that crossed his mind held a truth he was too disgusted to face.

He couldn't do it.

He wasn't strong enough, wasn't built for this type of interaction. No matter how much he wanted John, he couldn't have him. Before they had fallen into place together, like an accidental puzzle. This time he had to take a jump over a canyon he couldn't make. Seeing John he knew, he knew that there was no denying what he felt was love. It was the deepest, most crippling sensation he ever felt. And he was too afraid to hand over the power to destroy him. He didn't fear danger, Moriarty, or even falling, but he was afraid of John, of John's heart not responding to his own.

He stiffly rose from his squat, cold eyes still locked on John. He closed them and turned to look at the woman, who still held a strong gaze on him. It was just finally registering in his head who she was. Mary Morstan. John's fiance. Lesbian in search of her other fiance. He subtly rolled his eyes with a huff, annoyed at himself for taking so long to realize something so obvious. Of course. The woman on the bed in the other room. That was the one John and this Mary person had been looking for. They must have tracked her to here when they were caught. Sherlock reached into his pocket and pulled out a folding knife he'd lifted off the guard in the elevator. Stifling the burning hole in his chest, he silently he bent down and reached around the toilet to Mary's bonds. He slide the blunt side of the knife carefully against her wrist and gently tugged.

"Who are you?" She hesitantly croaked as he worked. He flashed his eyes away from blade, to meet hers.

"Why were you looking at John like that?" She asked when he didn't respond. He moved his eyes back to their hands.

"You know," he began to stand after freeing her, "there was a very confused, tattooed woman on the bed in the other room." She didn't wait for a response. With a dark look of hope flashing into her eyes, she scrambled to her feet and was out of the room before he could blink. After a few seconds he could hear the desperate sounds of broken hearts being pieced together again. She got her reunion.

He turned to look at John again.

Hating himself for being too afraid of his own, he moved to be closer to the tub. Unsure what compelled his body to move without his mind's consent, he dropped to his knees again and carefully swooped his head down to John's. He solemnly pressed his lips against John's damp temple. The connection was instant and warm and perfect. It sent an unwelcomed shock of longing through his veins. He closed his eyes and pulled away, not wanting to see John's face up close. It would do nothing but make him feel worse. H stood upright again and didn't look back down to John.

Wiping away an unexpected tear, he turned and fled. Fled from the only life he wanted, and the only life he couldn't have.

Mary sat on the back of an ambulance truck, in an amazingly tired daze, watching flashing lights and dozens of men and women in uniforms running around. She was a block or so down from the building where they'd been held. Holding an icepack to her head, she tried to convince the EMT for the 10th time that yes, she was okay, and when would she be allowed to leave?

Everything in the last hour had happened so fast she could barely understand it all. From the impossibility of getting Trisha back, to the strange man who saved them, to Lestrade not letting her go to the hospital yet, it was all too much to take. All she wanted to do was get the hell out of there and curl up next to Trisha and watch her sleep. They had taken her and John away in ambulances but Greg insisted that because she was able to walk and talk that she stay to answer questions. She was ready to gouge Lestrade's eyes out for making her wait any longer, but obviously he had an insanely busy night and looked more tired and sorry than she did. This was a huge case, and her just happening to be there, on the bed clinging to Trisha while John was tied up in the next room looked a bit suspicious. Which Lestrade would easily over look any other time, but the fact that he was under the microscope too now made him have to act a bit tighter. Apparently an anonymous tip from an untraceable number wasn't enough of an excuse for suddenly having the location of such a high profile criminal organization.

Mary's mind wondered back to the moment she saw Trisha again. Her world had stopped. Touching her, holding her again for the first time in far too long. She thought she was dreaming, that whoever had captured her had drugged her. But there Trisha was, barely conscious, crying and reaching out to her. That first embrace after years away was more desperate, more heart-scattering than anything she could have imagined. She had expected to feel relief once she felt Trish. To smile wider than possible and hold her tight until her arms ached. What she had felt were burning tears seeming to wrench themselves from the pit of her broken heart. It was as if every night she had spent alone, desperate and terrified, had flooded back into her all at once. She felt no calmness, no solace in holing Trisha. There was part of her that broke when she lost her, a part that couldn't be fixed. Her heart would heal in time, but those years apart had scorched a burn into her very being, a scar that wouldn't fully heal.

An approaching Lestrade caught her attention. He had just existed the building followed but a man trying to speak with him. Lestrade said a few brisk words to the other man then turned, crossed the police yellow line, and walked up to a very tired Mary.

"How are you feeling?" He asked, concern plastered on his face.

"Fine. Can I leave now? Please. Greg, I answered all your questions-" her plead was cut off.

"Well not all of them," he said with an exhale as he looked to his left, seeing if anyone was coming.

"What does that mean?" she asked. He let out a heavy sigh and ran a hand through his hair.

"Look," he began warily, "this is gunna sound nuts. But I think…I think I knew the man. The guy who saved you and John. And Trisha." She remained quiet, waiting for him to continue.

"I got a text, telling me where to find you guys. Where to find this hide out. But it was from an number I didn't recognize. I ran the number through ever database we have but no name came up. The only way that can happen is if someone with a higher pay grade than Scotland Yard says so."

"So, what? The queen then, Greg? Look what does it matter who tipped you off? Let it go, he obviously didn't want to be caught. He was probably a member-"

"It was signed S.H." He said, with an awkward sort of finality. Mary quirked an eyebrow.

"Fascinating," she said dryly, "But Trisha is-"

"Mary would you listen for a second? Please. Look I'm sorry, I didn't mean to raise my voice it's just…I think the man who saved you was the same one that texted me. And your description of him, tall with dark hair. It's crazy…"he trailed off, as if now that he was actually thinking about it, there was no possible way. That it had just been a very tiring day and he was letting the lack of sleep get to him.

"S.H…you're not thinking it was Sherlock Holmes, right? The dead man?" she asked incredulously.

"I know. I know its insane. But really…who did he text with his signature? Me, John, possibly his brother? If it was some imposture how did they know how he texted? And then your description of him. Some person who looks like him and texts like him."

"Greg, I hate to break it to you but there are a lot of tall men with dark hair in the world and plenty of people sign their names like that. And they could be the same type of hacker that makes phone records untraceable. Look I've been kidnapped, chained to a damn toilet, reunited with my fiancé and then had to watch her be dragged away. So tell me you did not make me stay behind to ask me if I saw a dead man come save my life!" There was that firey Mary.

He sighed and looked away, his hands hanging awkwardly in his pocket. "Yeah. Yeah I guess you're right. But please. I'm sorry. I trust you enough to push on this. One last question and then you're free to go, alright?" He pleaded and she rolled her eyes.

"Fine, but you're paying for my cab fair over to the hospital," she ordered.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket and swipped his finger around the screen a few times before he looked back up to her.

"Is this the guy?" He asked, turning the phone to face her. He had gotten a picture of Sherlock from a news gossip website relatively easily. She stare back at the picture.

Without saying anything she slowly reached out and took the phone from Lestrade. She looked down at it intently, studying it.

It was impossible. Truly.

She looked back up with a look of pure shock, meeting Lestrade's hopeful one.