The Slash Man

by Engazed

Book 2 of 'The Fallen': After ten days of unspeakable torture at the hands of Sherlock's worst enemies, John Watson has returned to Baker Street to live with a man whose death, no matter how fake, still haunts him. But his recovery is not easy, his friendship with Sherlock is strained, and a dangerous but hidden menace continues to threaten them both. Violence/Horror/Rape

31. A Few Hours Left of Midnight

CHAPTER 31: A FEW HOURS LEFT OF MIDNIGHT

MONDAY, MARCH 9, 2015

They remembered him from before as the man who haunted the halls of St Bart's. So little time had passed, really, since they had seen him floating in a lonely haze from one end of the corridor to the other, eyes greyed and lost, and face drawn pale as sea-washed rocks. After he had gone, they thought they still saw him, sometimes, out of the corners of their eyes, an ever-present spectre of future gloom, full of sorrow and anger. But he was back now, in the flesh, a solitary figure in the lonely waiting room, elbows to knees and face in his hands, and he had never seemed less solid. The nurses of intensive care whispered to one another.

'What happened? Why is he back?'

'His friend was attacked again.'

'You mean partner.'

'Are they?'

'Aren't they?'

'How bad?'

'Not good. But the man who attacked him, the one they called the Slash Man—he's dead.'

'Is he!'

'Corpse is in the mortuary.'

'Do you know what happened?'

'No one knows.'

Word was, whatever had happened, Dr Watson was not the only victim this time. Beside the Slash Man, another man had died that night. One of Bart's very own mortuary attendants had been taken to A&E, a detective inspector from NSY had sustained a few nasty blows, and a female copper (some said detective, but no one was really sure) had been brought in unconscious. The police were milling about, keeping guard, waiting for evidence from labs and further instructions from above. And all the while, the man called Sherlock Holmes sat on the edge of a chair of institutional green in the shadows of a dimly lit waiting room, unmoving, unspeaking, and unapproachable.

Until someone came for him.

From the entryway, Mycroft Holmes observed his little brother. His face was buried in hands streaked red-brown from a hasty wiping. He'd not washed properly. The bandages of his right arm were soaked through red and fraying, and both hands bore deep scratches and were freshly bleeding. His hair was longer than he normally kept it and hung in limp, disarrayed curls. Both sleeves of a light blue collared shirt were rolled to the elbows, and they too were stained, as was the front of his shirt. One foot wore a medical boot, and both trouser legs were salt stained to the knees from pushing through snow. They had told him that Sherlock was not hurt, but looking at him now, Mycroft didn't believe them.

Sherlock didn't stir as Mycroft softly crossed the room, set aside an umbrella, and sat in the unoccupied seat beside him. There, he leant forward on his elbows, mirroring Sherlock's pose. For a long while, there was silence. Then:

'Sherlock.'

He received no answer, not so much as a twitch of the shoulders.

'Sherlock, has someone seen to you?' He tried to gentle his voice, and it sounded foreign even in his own ears, like he had never used such a voice before. Or, if he had, it was long, long ago.

Sherlock's head moved by increments to say no.

Mycroft paused. 'Has anyone been to talk to you?'

Again, he shook his head.

'All right. Then let me tell you what's going on.' He rested to allow Sherlock an opportunity to insert an objection. He did not, only removed his hands from over his face and balled them together to cover his mouth. 'Two men are dead. Moriarty's men. Whatever they were sent to do last night, they failed. Do you hear me? They failed in every respect. They are dead, and your friends are alive.'

He heard Sherlock swallow before talking; it seemed a struggle. 'They're hurt.'

'Yes.' Mycroft knew that trying to disagree would get them nowhere. 'But they will be well again.'

'They. Are. Hurt. And what did I do for them? Nothing. I didn't reach John in time. I rejected Molly outright. I abandoned Donovan in the storm. I didn't save a single one.'

'There's no sense thinking like that. You were placed in an impossible situation. What could any man have done?'

At last Sherlock turned his head to regard his brother, as though to challenge him, but he lacked the energy even to glare. 'I'm not allowed to be any man.'

Mycroft let out a long, remorseful sigh and sat back, hands clasped in front of him. 'You're right,' he said. 'You're not.'

'Perhaps you should leave.' He spoke without passion, antagonism, or conviction.

'Perhaps I should. But I won't.'

'Why not?'

Mycroft spread his fingers, considering the back of his hand. They had begun to spot, as of late. They were becoming old man's hands. 'Do you remember,' he asked, 'the day I said that you and I belonged on the same side?'

'I remember everything you ever said to me,' he stated plainly and without conceit. Mycroft did not take it as exaggeration.

'Ah. Well. I meant it.' He didn't quite know what to say next, or rather how to say what he needed to, and he almost wished for a squabble, a trivial sort of spat familiar to them both, to break out between them again and spare him the pain of this silence. But Sherlock, for once, was not inclined to speak. So Mycroft steeled himself and continued. 'I was once determined to persuade you to align yourself with me, to trust that I knew best what you should do with your life. I didn't understand, then, that the realignment needed to be mine. You were on the side of right because barely twenty-four hours before I said that, John Watson had entered your life. He changed everything. For you. For me, too, it would seem.'

'I'm tired, Mycroft. I can't think anymore. What are you saying to me?'

'My apologies, dear brother. Crypticism has become more than habit, but second nature. What I am saying is, I've committed many wrongs against you. And I mean to set them right.'

'We don't need to talk about this.'

'We do. Maybe not tonight. Maybe not in full. But there are things you ought to know.' He stopped himself. There were things he needed to know, yes, but not right now. Not here, and not all at once. Pieces. 'I don't know if you were aware, but three days ago, the Woodhouses listed 221 for sale.'

Slowly, as if nothing more could surprise him and no more blows could shake him, Sherlock leant back. The chair groaned. 'They can't,' he said without inflection. 'The property isn't theirs. It's Mrs Hudson's. She would never agree to sell.'

'Legal or not, they listed it. For 1.7 million pounds. Three flats, fair condition, excellent location. Probably worth more than that. But, I imagine, they were keen to be rid of it.'

Sherlock closed his eyes, as if blocking out the world would change anything of its reality.

'It sold.'

He sniffed, something of derision in him, though Mycroft doubted him capable of reaching even half the capacity of full ire. 'Of course it did.'

'Yesterday morning, the paperwork went through. It's done.'

'Someone else was certainly keen, making that kind of purchase sight unseen. Were they told it was once the residence of a psychopath? Do they know it is the scene of a slaughter?'

'Yes.'

'And what about all the bullet holes in the walls? Or the scorch marks on the kitchen ceiling? Or the smell we've never managed to scrub out of the second cupboard above the sink? Did someone tell them about any of those things?'

'Sherlock—'

'They should know, someone should tell them, that one has to twist and lift the door handle in the bathroom to get it to close properly. And they'll want to replace the mirror in there—we never got around to it, you see, after John busted his hand against it. There never seemed to be any time. No time at all, and now . . . The blood in the upstairs room won't easily come out of the floorboards, so they may as well just tear them up and start again. And the stair, the third stair rising from the landing to the first storey. It creaks a perfect D-flat when I step on it, and F-sharp when John does. I've been monitoring his weight by that stair, you see. It used to creak at an A-flat. But I'll have to find other methods now, I suppose.'

'You always did have rather curious methods.'

Sherlock didn't respond to that. 'Who bought it then?'

'I did.'

It was the first thing Mycroft had said that seemed to awaken any real feeling of surprise in him. 'You?'

Mycroft pulled an envelope from an inner pocket of his suit coat. 'Under the name Arthur Doyle.'

'What?'

'I had been designing to purchase it for weeks, when I thought you would be best served by staying right where you are. Now, I'm not sure you'll want to.'

'No, we can't . . . That is, it's not up to me. John, he—he may never wish to set foot there again.'

'I thought as much. The point remains, though, that the Woodhouses have no say in whatever happens to the property from now on. The deed belongs to Mr Doyle, or, if you prefer, to you.' He passed Sherlock the envelope.

Stunned, Sherlock opened it. But inside was more than just a property deed. There was also a bank statement, a credit card, and a small, silver key, the kind suitable to opening small boxes, not full doors. 'I don't understand. What am I looking at?'

'Read the name on the card and make a deduction.'

'But he's not real. He's an invention.'

'As far as the British government is concerned, he's as real as you are. Maybe more so. Mr Arthur C Doyle has a birth certificate, a driver's license, credit history, bank accounts, school records, and passport. Everything but a face. That key opens a safety deposit box in Sussex, should he ever need to acquire these documents.'

'You want me to disappear.'

'I've never wanted that. Not in all my life. All I mean to do is give you the option and, if taken, ease your way. Doyle is yours to do with as you will. Make of him an alias, a benefactor, a scapegoat, or let him lie. It's your choice.'

Sherlock stared for a long while at the name on the card, running a thumb over the raised letters. In profile, his face appeared as Mycroft had often seen it as a child from across a room or while riding in the backseat of Father's car or from within the dry larder—not the carefree, curious, and mischievous look of an as-yet uncorrupted and brilliant child discovering the world around him, but the joyless, introspective, and chastised expression of a boy being punished for something he couldn't help. For a fleeting moment, Mycroft felt the impulse to put his arms around him and hold him, but even the urge, let alone the action, felt alien to him. Like Sherlock, he had had no models of such consolatory acts, in neither giving nor receiving. But Sherlock spared him his moment's indecision by speaking again in a voice fighting to tamp down his emotions.

'And John?'

Mycroft cleared his throat. 'Mr Doyle does, of course, have an associate. A Mr Joseph B Conan, whose history is as complete as his partner's. He's a retired medical practitioner. One can stretch things only so far.'

Sherlock nodded, then hung his head.

'The history of one Sherlock Holmes, I should also inform you, is gradually being erased.'

It was a contained reaction, bound to be missed by most, but Mycroft saw how the muscles in Sherlock's back and shoulders and neck grew taut. He knew that these words were painful for him to hear, no matter how hard he tried to hide it, because once upon a time, his little brother had quite liked being Sherlock Holmes.

'Not all of it. Not all at once. But steps are being taken to, shall we say, ameliorate a past that terribly influential persons have historically found . . . problematic.'

'Birds of a feather.'

'Precisely.'

'So you're deleting me.'

'Rewriting.'

'How?'

'There was once a file—a box—containing certain sensitive information. Damning documentation, that is. It has been destroyed. Another has taken its place. A past rectified. As for your present, I'm working on that too. But trust me, Sherlock, the fewer details you know, the better.'

It was not only for his safety, but given their history and past accusations of Mycroft's meddling, he doubted very much that Sherlock would appreciate knowing how he was using Lestrade to amend his past, or Molly to secure his future, or the likes of Michaela Warner and Henry Knight to alter his current reputation, and a dozen others beside. Most of them didn't even know how they were agents in his own little web, and he intended to keep it that way.

'Am I not to know the details of my own reconstruction?'

'They are fine details, seemingly of little consequence. I told you before that morality is mathematics. Think of your life as a series of numerals. I've done little more than move a decimal point. For those who examine the books, it is not enough to arouse suspicions, though the maths now tell a different story.'

'It won't be enough, though, will it?'

'On its own? No. But I'm not leaving it at that.'

'Then what—?'

'Do me the favour, just this once, of trusting me to take care of things.'

'Why? Why are you doing any of it?'

He spoke quickly now, before he could justify a retreat. 'Because, little brother, your loss would break my heart. You see? When it comes to it, I'm interested only in self-preservation. I'm a very selfish man.'

Sherlock turned his head away, and Mycroft saw it for what it was: an ardent need to hide from Mycroft the emotion that crossed his face. But he wouldn't crack. Not in front of his brother. So Mycroft spared him and steered the conversation away.

'You can't return to the flat, if you mean to at all. Not for a little while, that is. The police have taken it over, photographing every inch of floor and wall to put the story together. And then it will need to be . . . cleaned. You understand. But you needn't worry about any of it. Others will do that for you. Meanwhile, I'm taking you home.'

'John—' He choked and stopped.

'You and John, when he's released. You know I've room to spare.'

'We can't ask . . .'

'You don't get to. It's done. My home is both private and safe, two things you and John need right now. This isn't a debate.'

Weary, Sherlock nodded.

'Good. Well then. That's settled, is it?'

'There you are!'

The Holmeses' heads lifted together. Mycroft rose first, followed more slowly by Sherlock, whom he had to grip at the elbow to keep him upright when he nearly fell back into the chair. Lestrade strode into the room, a sorry sight with left eyelid swollen and sealed shut and a shirt and suit coat stained with blood in a wide circle. He walked straight up to Sherlock, wrapped arms around his neck, and pulled him in.

Lestrade's embrace was fierce, but Sherlock did not return it. Observing from the outside, Mycroft could see that Sherlock's stance was neither accepting nor resisting; he sought neither to prolong nor cut short. He just stood there until Lestrade himself felt the hollowness of his gesture, and he stepped back.

'Molly?' Sherlock asked first.

'Asleep. Sedated, actually. I didn't want to leave her, but the doctors assured me she'll be out for hours, and I needed to find you, see how everyone else was—'

'How bad?'

Lestrade's eyes flicked to Mycroft's, clearly trying to judge Sherlock's state of mind by some signal from his brother. 'Not bad. More scared than anything,' he answered without elaboration. 'She's all right.'

'She shot a man tonight.'

'Yes . . .'

'A man who meant to kill her.'

'I know.'

'She's not all right.'

Lestrade conceded at last. 'No, Sherlock. She's not.'

Sherlock nodded, sharply. 'And Donovan?'

'All wind and piss like a tanyard cat,' said Lestrade, forcing a grin. This time, Sherlock waited with insistent pause. 'Right arm's broken at the elbow. Mild concussion, whiplash, some bruising. She's wearing a neck brace and is loopy from the pain meds, so she thinks she just had her wisdom teeth pulled. If you see her, be sure to compliment her on the ruff.'

Ignoring the attempt at levity, Sherlock pressed on. 'And John . . . ?'

Lestrade shook his head. 'They wouldn't let me see him. First they had a lot of cleaning and stitching to do, and his therapist is in there right now.'

'Dr Thompson is here?'

'Been with him for a while, they tell me.'

'Good. That's . . . that's good. He . . . he needs her.'

Again, Lestrade's eyes met Mycroft's before falling away. 'And you, Sherlock?'

'Me? Fine. I'm fine.'

'Right, but—'

'Look at me, I'm fine. Nothing happened to me, did it? It's you lot, you . . .' He gestured vaguely at Lestrade's obvious injuries, then let his hand fall. 'You should get back to Molly. Asleep or not, you should be with her.'

Mycroft nodded succinctly at Lestrade; he stood just behind Sherlock and out of his line of sight. Fortunately, Lestrade picked up on the signal and took a step back. 'Right. I think I will do. Get some rest, eh, Sherlock? Only a few hours left of midnight, and we'll know more in the morning. Gregson's spearheading this one, and I'm sure he'll have a briefing. Everything will look better in the light of day, I'm sure.'

He left, and Mycroft noted how he favoured his right side. He had probably sustained some injury to his ribs. He had questions for Greg Lestrade, and further instructions, but neither was of highest priority at the moment.

'Come, Sherlock. There's a room down the hall where they'll let you sleep.'

It was the fact that Sherlock made no protest that troubled him most as he followed his brother, wordlessly, from the waiting room.

He slept restlessly, and every time he closed his eyes he saw blood. After four hours fighting the images that intruded into his mind, signifying a horror that had not in fact transpired, he arose to find a change of clothes folded in a chair by the door. He dressed quickly, scrubbed both face and hands at the sink, and left the bloody clothes on the floor to return to the waiting room, having received no word of John nor allowance to go see him. It was just after daybreak, and as he stepped foot past the threshold he saw Ella Thompson sitting in the chair he himself had occupied the night before, eating a yoghurt and turning the pages of an out-of-date magazine. He stopped short. When she saw him, she smiled.

'Mr Holmes, good morning.'

He nodded reservedly. 'Dr Thompson.'

'Sit, please. I've another yoghurt, if you'd like.' She indicated another cup on the table at her elbow. 'Hospital food, but it's not bad.' For having spent the night in hospital, awake and working, she looked remarkably refreshed.

'I'm not hungry.'

'No, I don't expect you are. But maybe you'll sit with me anyway?'

After a prolonged moment of hesitation, Sherlock edged into the room and chose a far seat on the wall adjacent, creating a wide berth between them. There, he sat rigidly—straight-backed and neck taut—and stared straight ahead, expecting her to start talking, to dive straight into her questions (How did he feel, and what were his dreams like, and had he always endangered the lives of his friends, before John Watson? But the joke was on her: He had never had any friends before John Watson.). But she did not, only kept spooning yoghurt into her mouth, one creamy dollop at a time, and idly turning pages in the magazine in her lap. The quiet was maddening.

'Is John awake?' he asked, hoping for affirmation and so an excuse to find his feet again.

'Not for the last couple of hours, no,' answered Dr Thompson. At last, she set the empty cup aside and turned over another page. 'These places always choose the most asinine magazines, don't they? Whatever happened to providing a daily paper? Anything more current than last December would do.'

'I don't read the papers,' said Sherlock tightly.

'No, of course you don't. I wouldn't either, if the press went after me the way they do you. I'm sorry for that, Mr Holmes. It must be very difficult.'

Here it came. Go on. Ask, he thought, almost daring her. How much of it is true? How does it make me feel? Wouldn't my mother be appalled? He scowled as he waited. Again, nothing.

'Did he fall asleep on his own?' he asked next, desperate for information.

Now he expected hedging or the accurate but untrue claim that he was not a family so she couldn't discuss his condition. But once again, Ella Thompson defied his expectations. 'Sedated,' she said plainly. She closed the magazine and let it rest in her lap. 'Doctors needed to get his blood pressure back down and control the pain. Last I knew, he was also being treated intravenously for the ammonia poisoning. They weren't sure how much he consumed but suspect he was out of danger by the time paramedics got him here, owing to the milk you had him drink. They're monitoring all vital signs closely, but, I am told, he's doing very well.'

'You seem to know a lot about it.'

'I've been in consultation with his physicians for the past two hours.'

'And?' If he pressed hard enough, would she tell him anything? 'What do they say? Will he walk again?'

She smiled kindly, though a little sadly. 'I suspect so. He's fine, Mr Holmes.'

'Fine?'

'In the comparative sense. They've taken scans, performed tests, given him a thorough examination. They found no breaks, no bruising on his spine, no evidence of pinched nerves in his hips or knees or ankles. There is no physiological reason for his apparent paralysis.'

Sherlock's heart had begun pounding in earnest, and he wasn't sure if the reaction was joy or fear. 'Then it's psychological. Again.'

'Our initial assessment—mine and the doctors', I mean—is that John is suffering from what is termed conversion disorder. Are you familiar with it?'

'Vaguely.' He thought he remembered coming across the term in his many hours of research into traumatic disorders and psychosomatic illnesses; but he was struggling with his instant recall. The details just wouldn't surface.

'Nothing is conclusive yet, of course. Last night's events are still too fresh, and some things are too early to tell. But we have reasonable evidence for our assessment. Would you like me to explain what may be going on with John?'

He knew this tactic, had even made use of it himself—put the client at ease by offering something they want anyway, make them believe they are in control of the discussion because they verbally conceded to having it. Damn, she was good. Unable to do anything else but fall into her little trap, he nodded stiffly, then said, 'What about protecting the privacy of your patients?'

If she recognised her own words being parroted back to her, this time with a note of scorn, she let it pass. 'For me, always a priority. Until, of course, a patient signs a form permitting me to discuss his condition with family or close friends. John asked for the form himself. You should know, your name is the only one on it.'

He didn't quite know what to make of that. 'Tell me about conversion disorder,' he said.

'It's one form that somatic symptom disorders may take and is characterised by neurological symptoms that lack physical cause. Conversion disorder is often triggered by strong, sometimes overwhelming emotions, such as grief or fear or guilt, and other times by high-stress situations, such as abuse or trauma. More common manifestations include the loss of speech, as well as seizures, tremors, even blindness. Or, as with John, paralysis.'

'But it's not real.'

'It was real to John. Last night, anyway.'

Sherlock had thought it real, too. He remembered very sharply John beseeching him to take him out of room. He had slung one of John's arms around his neck and shoulders, bracing his feet beneath him and trying to balance with the medical boot. John hung on, and while Sherlock gripped him at the waist, he pulled them both up. At the pressure against his battered body, John cried out in pain and let out a sob against Sherlock's neck—was it broken ribs? torn skin?—but when Sherlock made to release him, to set him on the ground again and check for wounds he had overlooked, John's grip around his neck only tightened, and through clenched teeth he said, 'Please. Downstairs. Now.' And with John clinging to him, half draped across his back, Sherlock carried him out of the dark room, leaving the dead man in a bed of blood. John's legs had hung limp and senseless, like dead rabbits. Sherlock's own were clunky and unsteady as they descended the stairs, and he thought they might fold under him at any moment. When at last they reached their sitting room, Sherlock laid John on the sofa and ran to fetch milk, the emergency kit, a dressing gown, and all the while, those legs never moved; not a muscle twitched. Twenty-three minutes later, the police and paramedics finally arrive.

'You know well enough that this was not John's first traumatic experience,' Dr Thompson continued. 'He's been suffering post-traumatic stress at varying levels of intensity for the greater portion of his life, probably beginning with the death of his mother when he was still a child. He was never diagnosed, never even saw a therapist to help him cope, and anyway the disorder was little understood back then, and more commonly associated with war veterans anyway, which he was to become. His experiences in Afghanistan compounded a condition he was already battling. Last October intensified his symptoms drastically.'

'But he's been improving,' Sherlock insisted. 'Little things have been getting better. We've been working on it. The nightmares haven't gone away, but they're less frequent, and his appetite was returning. I was hoping . . .' He had to stop and recompose. 'After last night, it'll be like none of that progress even happened. Won't it.'

For the first time, she leant toward him, elbows on knees. 'Mr Holmes. A few weeks ago, I was called in after John was attacked on the railroad tracks. That night, he was catatonic. His encounter deeply rattled him, leaving him in a prolonged state of mental distress and renewed depression. Though he exhibited some signs of regression, one of the things that bothered him most was that he had frozen in a moment he believed he should have fought. Last night, he did. Despite the fear and pain, he fought for his life. A regressed subject would not have been able to do what he did. The John of just two or three weeks ago would likely have frozen again. But he fought. For John, that was important, no matter the outcome.'

'No matter the outcome? He might have been raped again. He might have died.'

She nodded gravely. 'But died fighting.'

Sherlock wanted to understand how that was better, but it almost seemed worse that, no matter the effort, fight or freeze, a bloody end was inevitable.

'All the same, he's struggling with what happened. He has intimated to me that he doesn't understand why he has survived all that he has. He can't make sense of it. Tonight, he said it again—that he doesn't understand why he is still alive.'

'Is he . . . suicidal?' The word burned in his throat.

'Oh no. Not in the least. Just, shall we say, perplexed. He has reasoned that he should have come off the worse. The fear of what his attacker had done to him before and might do again, was trying to do again, in conjunction with the physical pain and positions that recalled his suffering from before'—the wrists, thought Sherlock remembering that it had been his own phone charger that had bound him, the gag with his own socks, the ammonia—'exacerbated the intensity of the belief that he should be seriously, detrimentally, harmed. But thing is, he wasn't.'

'He was.'

'Not to the same extent as before. Mr Holmes, John was beaten pretty severely last night. I'm not saying he wasn't. The bruising on his neck alone was enough to land him in hospital, and that is to say nothing of the contusions and welts on his back or the skin torn by his attacker's nails and teeth. But not a bone was broken. He wasn't stabbed. He wasn't shot. He never lost consciousness. And he wasn't raped. Physically speaking, things could have been far worse. Some part of him, however, is insisting that it was, which has led to psychological conflict. Amidst the confusion and hallucinations, his mind converted his fear of harm into a psychological paralysis with physical result. In layman's terms, his compromised brain told him that he had lost both feeling and function in his legs. And where are sensations and movement processed? In the brain. It's a convincing lie.'

'But John knows all this now? You told him?'

'He was asleep before we landed a diagnosis. But he suspects. That is, he knows that his mind isn't working the way it should. He admits to being confused about which parts really happened and which did not.'

'Does he know he killed Darren Hirsch? Does he know that man is dead?'

She took a deep breath. 'We told him. He asked, suggesting that he wasn't sure, and we told him. When he wakes up, however, he may need to be reminded.'

Sherlock nodded slowly, thoughtfully. Not for the first time, he tried to envisage exactly what John had gone through from the moment he realised he was under threat. His febrile imagination conjured the fear and raw panic as if it were his own; it was enough to debilitate any man. So how John had managed to surmount both in order to slay the Slash Man was a wonder to him.

'It would be well for him,' said Dr Thompson, her voice pulling him back before he wandered too far, 'if you were there with him when he woke up.'

Sherlock found himself, not in the darkened flat playing witness to a terrifying intrusion, but once again in the sterile, colourless waiting room, to see Dr Thompson inclined toward him, watching him in earnest.

'He kept asking after you last night. Thought maybe you'd gone away, or that you'd never come home to start with. He wanted to know you were all right.'

'Why did no one let me see him then?'

'The primary surgeon overruled me,' she said frankly. 'And then they sedated him. But it might be a good idea if you are the first person he sees when he regains consciousness. He will likely be disoriented and in pain, so you should be there.'

'What about you?'

Dr Thompson smiled but shook her head. 'I'm not the one he calls his safety net.'

'What's that?'

'He needs you.'

'He doesn't need me. I've been little help to him, lately. He needs his therapist, someone who actually knows how to help him.'

'You do help him. More than anyone. You're his touchstone to reality, Mr Holmes. You're the one who reminds him that he's alive, and that being alive is a good thing. But more than that, you're the one who loves him most. Is that not true? I tell all my patients this, because it's a fact: Doctors and therapists, they are indispensable as caregivers and counsellors. But it's those who love us who save us in the end.'

He could think of nothing more to say. Dr Thompson straightened the magazines on the coffee table, collected her rubbish, and left him to his thoughts.

'Thrice dead. That's what we used to call it in school. When your man came in, he was thrice dead.'

'How do you mean?' asked the chief superintendent.

Dr Torrence snapped on a pair of gloves and waved him over to the wall of silver doors. 'I'll show you.' He pulled the latch on one of the doors, grabbed the end of a rolling table, and heaved. 'Uff,' he grunted. 'Hefty bugger this one. 198 centimetres, top to toe. Weighed in at 115.2 kilos. They don't make 'em this big very often.'

Given that the autopsy had ended less than an hour ago, and that he didn't have the manpower yet to move the cadaver into a black body bag, the corpse was dressed only in a thin white sheet. Dr Torrence lifted the top of the sheet and folded it down, exposing the upper half of the corpse of Darren Hirsch. The most obvious and eye-ensnaring wound was at the neck, but Gregson also spotted the slice in the abdomen, pink and puckered like a pair of parted lips, just above the belly button. He noticed it only because he knew where to look. The autopsy had introduced new incisions (a large t-section down the torso and across the chest), which distracted from the fatal wound.

'So which was it?' he asked, indicating between the slashed throat and stabbed belly. 'Which killed him?'

'Take your pick. Any one of them did. Or they all did together. The point is, Hirsch was a man dead three times over by the time you found him. Any one of the injuries he sustained would have killed him.'

'Three? You don't mean the tongue.'

'Absolutely I do.' With gloved fingers, he tilted back the large head, pulled the corpse's jaw down, and shone a light, the better for Gregson to see the severed, fleshy stump of a tongue. 'See that? You can literally see the blood vessels, chomped straight through. One snap of the jaw, that's all it took. The impact rattled a few of his teeth loose, too. You can see, right there, yeah? That one's cracked. Quite the blow. Couldn't have hoped for a more efficient strike—direct and devastating. I've never seen anything quite like it, to be honest. Granted, immediate medical attention might have saved him if this is all that had happened to him. Cauterize the wound, stop the bleeding. I doubt, however, that had he made it out of the flat, he would have had much time to get himself to A&E.'

'Blood loss?'

'Eventually, yes. Lots of important vessels in a human tongue. More likely, though, he would have suffocated first. Drowned in his own blood. We found quite a lot in his lungs. He was weakening fast.'

'Before Watson even stabbed him, you mean.'

'Yes, I'd wager so. But it was the knife to the abdomen that sealed his fate.' He indicated now to what might have been mistaken for a surgical incision. 'One entry wound, six-and-a-half centimetres across, fitting the fifteen-centimetre serrated blade you found at the scene. Obviously, any stab wound to the stomach is going to be very serious. But with this one—he didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell.'

'Why's that?'

'Because, Mr Gregson, his internal organs have been shredded.'

'What?'

'Cut to ribbons. They might as well have been put in a blender. You wouldn't think a single blade could do that kind of damage with only one entry wound, but here we are. No surgical team would have had a prayer in putting that puzzle back together. Everything within six inches of the site of penetration got a taste of that blade, and then some, and in a space as tightly packed as the abdomen, that pretty much means everything. Stomach, kidneys, intestines, bladder, pancreas, even the spleen. Direct punctures, deliberate slices. If this were your typical case of multiple stab wounds, I would estimate between twelve and fifteen. Brutal, but precise. Surgeons need cameras to be so precise. One thing is for sure: the man who felled this beast knows his anatomy. He knew exactly where everything was.'

'Well, Watson's a doctor, isn't he. And a soldier.'

'It shows. Deadly combination, that, doctor and soldier. Yeah, he knew what he was doing all right. This would have hurt like hell. Still, can't say I'm mustering much pity for the sorry sod.' He nodded at the corpse. 'I've been primary pathologist on all the people he's landed in here. If you ask me, the bloke had it coming.'

'So if he was dying already, as Watson must have known, why slash the throat?'

'Hard to say. Maybe to expedite the process. But then . . .'

'But what?'

'He could easily have gone for the carotid arteries.' Dr Torrence now indicated where the arteries lay, just beneath the skin on either side of the neck. The slice of the knife had left a line filling the space between but touching neither. 'The trachea was sliced clean through, one drag of the blade, that's all. It would have been easy to press a little harder, sever both arteries, or even just one or the other, bleed him out faster. But that's not what happened.'

'I see,' said Gregson with a frown. 'Still. Slashed throat. That one would have killed him, too.'

'Oh yes. One cut, deep enough to kill, not lengthy enough to kill quickly. I'd say your man bled out for, oh, eight to ten minutes instead of two. Like I said, thrice dead. As thorough a killing as we see down here.'

'Right. Can't help but wonder, then, if this last bit was, strictly speaking, necessary.' He sniffed, staring down at the defeated killer and reviewing the facts in his mind. The sheer size of him, the monstrous brutality he had exhibited in the past, the disturbing obsession—his people were still cataloguing the contents of his tunnel lair. That Watson had survived long enough even to reach the knife was, quite frankly, miraculous. But survive he had, and had ensured his attacker's demise with a thorough gutting. So why go for the throat? 'Find anything else? Anything I ought to know?'

'More a matter for his doctors, I suppose, but Dr Watson will want to get tested for STIs. Yellow discolouration of the eyes almost certainly suggests Hirsch was infected with a strain of hepatitis, and inflammation of the genitals may indicate chlamydia. Possible crab lice. Not at all surprising, given the unsanitary conditions he'd been dwelling in, the number of people he's raped. Ewan Nichols tested positive for hepatitis B, likely from sharing needles, and Orrin Tippet was HIV positive. We don't know whether Hirsch was or not—still waiting on blood analysis to come back, though even if he was infected, the blood test may come back seronegative for the antibody; on average, seroconversion takes around thirty days, and it's been only three weeks since his contact with Tippet. But any of your boys who came in contact with the body should get checked in thirty days, and again in ninety. Awful lot of blood spilt from this one. Can't ever be too careful. And I know Watson was bleeding a fair bit himself, too. Exchange of fluids almost certainly took place.'

Gregson shook his head pitiably. 'Poor bastard can't catch a break, can he? You'll have the report sent to my office the moment you know anything?'

'Of course.'

'Thank you.' Gregson started towards the door.

'One last thing, chief.'

He rocked back.

'The man who attacked our Molly.' He slapped a closed silver door behind him, indicating said man. 'Any word yet on who he was?'

'The boys are working on it.'

'Thing is, I've seen what these people do. Every one of their victims has come through here, and I've seen what those men and women suffered while still alive. All of it. My team and I, we've noted every single bruise and tear and broken bone. We've witnessed the evidences of his savagery. And I saw Mary Morstan's body. The way they killed her . . . If they had killed Molly, I know how I'd feel about it, and she isn't even family. So this?' He pointed at the gaping red line in Darren Hirsh's neck. 'I'd say it was pretty damn necessary.'

Gregson had no response. His eyes were locked on the gash. Neither did he feel any pity. If anything, he felt that justice had been done. But he was an officer and upholder of the law, and that's just not how things worked.

At last, he left the morgue.

The morning following the storm saw blue skies over Britain, a rarity no matter the time of year. Snow blanketed the city, but the roads had been cleared for the morning commute as Londoners carried on with their lives, the ebb and flow of weather never a disruption, just a matter of course.

Within the intensive care unit of St Bart's, behind a door guarded by two police officers, John Watson and Sherlock Holmes slept, one man curled on his side where the bruising was less severe, an IV running into one arm and ECGs monitoring the beat of his heart; the other lay atop the covers of the nearest bed, on his opposite side. In this way, upon waking, the first thing either of them would see was the other.

Sherlock had not meant to fall asleep, but upon entering the room and ensuring that all was as well as he could make it, he felt inexorably drawn to the bed, and upon lying down, he sank so fast that he didn't even realise that sleep and crashed upon him like a wave. Now, he was drawn from unconsciousness by the soft sound of a plastic spoon scraping the bottom of a polystyrene bowl. He opened his eyes to see John, sitting upright in the hospital bed and scooping the last spoonfuls of soft vanilla ice cream into his mouth. Groggily, unsure whether he dreamed, he lifted his head from the pillow.

'John?'

John swallowed, took one final bite, and set the spoon and bowl down on the tray. 'Morning,' he said lightly, though his voice was a little hoarse. Then he pushed aside the swinging table and folded his hands together in his lap.

Sherlock pushed himself up and felt his head throb; he squeezed his eyes closed against it and let the pain pass. Then he rose to his feet and came nearer. Feeling ungainly and heavy-footed, he swayed and stumbled.

'Hey,' said John, more compassionately now. He reached for Sherlock's arm, and Sherlock let himself be pulled closer to sit on the edge of the mattress. 'You should sleep longer.'

Though sinking back into an unthinking state was greatly appealing, he shook his head dismissively and regretted the action at once. The pressure inside his skull only shifted, making his head ache all the more.

'How are you?' he asked. He was looking at the gauze pads placed strategically around John's neck; the shiny, red, battered skin that outlined the bones of his skull; his cracked, scoured lips; and, where the hospital gown draped down one shoulder and the wires from the ECG pads stuck out, the large bandage covering the severest of the bites, as though from a ravenous animal. Sherlock tried to pull his eyes away from these things and focus on John, whom he expected to be in a state of distress, disoriented like Dr Thompson had predicted, or in unspeakable pain. But John was just sitting there, placid and alert. But when he looked into the one bloodshot eye, his own burned in response, and so he tried to focus on the other instead.

John nodded. 'Ice cream for breakfast. Can't complain. Hungry, to be honest, but I can't swallow too well, so it's water, ice cream, and jelly for me for a bit.' He offered a close-lipped smile, and Sherlock couldn't understand it—not just the grin, but that John had any sort of appetite. 'Have you eaten?'

Again, Sherlock shook his head, bemused. His attention was now focused on the IV running into John's right arm, and the plasters over the skin on his left where they had drawn blood.

'You should eat. You look pale. Probably low blood sugar.' When Sherlock didn't answer, just stared at the old scars looping the outsides of John's wrists, John put a hand on his arm and gave it a little shake. 'Hey. Sherlock?' Sherlock lifted his eyes. 'You with me? What is it?'

The question felt backwards, nearly incomprehensible. Almost on impulse, because it was a question and John was asking, he opened his mouth, feeling compelled to provide some sort of response. But he didn't know how to articulate any of what he felt, and little of what he thought. He managed two words: 'Last night.'

'Yes?'

'I'm sorry.'

'What for?'

Sherlock blinked, stunned. Did John . . . not remember? Did he not even question why he was in hospital with new injuries that would yield new scars? Dr Thompson had said that John might need reminding, but he had expected confusion, not amnesia. 'I . . . left you. Alone. In the flat.'

'Not your fault,' said John, looking concerned. 'Police say you were tricked. That Moran's people were watching the flat. Those texts weren't from you. I know that now.'

He spoke so calmly. He seemed so clear-headed. There seemed to be no confusion at all.

'They didn't tell me much else, said I could give a statement later. But I haven't seen Lestrade at all. Where is he? Is he okay?'

Sherlock gave a noncommittal shake of his head but said, 'Someone went after Molly. Someone was waiting for her when she got home.'

John's eyebrows rose in concern. 'Oh God.'

'She's alive. She . . . shot the intruder. Right through the chest.'

'He's dead, then.'

'Yes.'

'Who was he?'

'One of Moran's, presumably.'

'But Molly killed him.'

'Yes.'

'Thank God. Was she hurt?'

'She'll be okay.'

'Was that why you didn't come home? Because you were helping Molly?'

'I . . . couldn't help her.'

With great need to explain himself, he proceeded to tell John everything that had transpired from the moment he received the first deceitful text, how he and Lestrade and Donovan had all been fooled and driven far from the scenes of planned attacks and to the Slash Man's hideout. But he couldn't bring himself to voice all he had seen there, so he elided over the photos on the walls and described instead the duplicated keys, the untrustworthy locksmith, and the television set with live feed from Baker Street.

'I saw him go into the flat. He knew I was watching, and he taunted me by waiting until I could see him put the key in the lock. And I couldn't warn you. We couldn't even warn the police. The calls were being intercepted, and the radio was busted in Donovan's car. And then the weather—the snow and ice and wind and that goddamn phone call . . .'

'Sherlock, hey, it's okay,' John was saying, squeezing his arm.

But Sherlock had been carrying on with barely taking a breath, and he couldn't stop now. He needed John to know that he had done everything in his power to reach him; he wouldn't just leave him. So he told John about the snow and the bus and the crash and leaving Donovan behind and calling Julian Smalls and coming right up to the front door of 221.

'. . . and there was a van, a black transit van, like the one Karim described, and it was pulling away, just as I was getting closer, and oh god, John, I thought you were in it. I thought I had come too late.'

John nodded slowly, taking in all that Sherlock was saying. 'The getaway car, then. That's what you saw? They were waiting for Daz to bring me out.'

'But they left. If they were still waiting, why did they leave? Even if they saw me coming, what would it matter? They could have taken me out, easily.'

'Or they thought you were bringing the police. Or they had a police radio and were listening in, or hell, they just got scared. They'd been waiting too long. Daz, he . . . whatever the plan was, he didn't follow it. I'm sure of it.'

'What do you mean?'

'Something he said.' For the first time since Sherlock had awoken, he saw John's eyes darken, and the line of his jaw, though black and swollen, hardened.

'What did he say?'

John's thumb was moving absently against Sherlock's arm, and his fingernails were sinking into his skin. He couldn't make eye contact. 'You can already guess, I'm sure, what he tried to . . . That is, that he meant to . . . God, you'd think saying it once, it wouldn't be so hard the second time.'

'You don't have to say it.'

'No, I do.' He held Sherlock's arm even tighter as he took a deep breath and let it out slowly. 'Daz came to the flat last night to rape me. That was his agenda, not Moran's. Mine first, he said. He was determined to . . . have me. Right then. Before Moran could. But I don't believe it was the plan.'

Sherlock placed a hand over John's and squeezed back. 'No. Cock Robin was the plan.'

'What's that?'

'The nursery rhyme. "Who Killed Cock Robin?" It was spray painted on the wall in the entryway.'

'I didn't notice.' He shook his head. 'I'm Cock Robin, am I?'

'In a way, I believe we both are. Irene Adler would have thought herself clever for devising the double entendre with the use of another bird, the final rhyme.'

'What do you mean?'

'Going for the more obvious, John: The media once called you "Robin". It's even on your old blog. Irene would have known that. She would have thought it apropos.'

'Hat-man and Robin.' He laughed shortly. 'I used to be so fond of that.'

'Were you?'

'Of course I was. Go on then. Tell me about the rhyme. I'm not very familiar with it. All I remember is that it's long, and it kind of disturbed me as a kid.'

'You know I only just learnt it myself,' said Sherlock, but only as a disclaimer. 'In the poem, Cock Robin is murdered by a sparrow, who readily confesses his crime in the first stanza, and a fly bears witness of the act in the second, and a fish catches the spilt blood in the third. Thereafter, all manner of birds and creatures—beetles and bulls, linnets and doves—assist in arranging and executing the funeral for Cock Robin: digging the grave, carrying the coffin, bearing the pall, tolling the bell, and so forth. The final stanza reads how all the birds mourned together the death of Cock Robin.'

'So it's a metaphor. The robin wasn't friendless, and he was well cared for, even after his death.'

Sherlock shook his head, having read the poem very differently. 'You think those creatures were his friends? Do you really believe that's what Adler and Moran are implying? That friends have lifted the tragedy of this death? The sparrow is never punished for his crime. These creatures—they prepare for a funeral with enthusiasm. They are given their assignments to carry out with gusto, with only a fair few participating grudgingly. This rhyme is a boast: all the creatures working together in the interest of one man's death. They are Moriarty's network of spies and culprits. They are all participants in the death of one, even if, in the end, only one of them carried out the deed. One man to make the copy of a key, another to rig a video feed, another to spray paint black wings on the pavement. All have played their part. And but for the uncontrollable lusts of one of them, they would have succeeded. They would have taken you, John. It would have been over. Whatever Adler and Moran had planned, it was to be the capstone of their game, all of it culminating in . . .'

'Me,' said John. 'My death, your demise. A coup de grâce at last.'

'And I . . .' Sherlock stammered and pulled away, finding his feet. 'I almost let it happen. If I had solved it sooner, if I had only stopped them when I had the chance . . .'

'No. No. Stop that. Come here. Sherlock.'

Sherlock stopped backing away from John's outstretched hand, but he couldn't come near again.

'It's a tie-back to the bird left in Molly's kettle,' he said, falling back on the only thing that ever made sense to him: not an outstretched hand, but cold facts and puzzle solving. 'The wren with snipped wings. I told you the story, that night, of the King of the Birds. Cock Robin is believed to be a more modern, that is, an eighteenth-century retelling of an even older tale of the Hunting of the Wren, a poem about the symbolic slaughter of the King of the Birds who tricked his way into flying higher than the eagle. Just a trick. All of it, all that he accomplished, everything for which he was admired—party tricks. His whole life, a pretence, a sham. So hunt him, kill him, a just fate for a fraud of greatness. Depose the false king. Do you see John? Cock Robin is merely symbolic of the ancient trickster wren. Hunting you for sport is as good as killing me in effigy. But it's not fair. Why can't they just leave you alone? Why don't they just go after me?'

'Sherlock. Please,' said John, pleading. His arm had not fallen but remained outstretched still.

'It won't stop. You know it won't. The only way I can think to save you is if we . . . John. We have to go away.'

John's fingers curled in and his arm drooped a little.

'We can't stay in London. We can't leave our front door and be safe. We're not even safe behind our front door. Mrs Hudson is already gone, and Molly's a target, and anyone who stands anywhere close to me—Lestrade, Donovan, anyone—is going to get hurt. We have to go.'

'No. No, we can't—'

'Mycroft has arranged things. He has plans. He'll provide us with the means, and new identities, and we can simply disappear.'

'Would you stop?' John planted two fists on either side himself and pushed into the mattress to adjust himself straighter in the bed. 'I'm not leaving London.'

'I'm sorry, John, I never wanted it to come to this—'

'No, would you stop and listen to me?' Silence fell between them as John breathed loudly and gathered his thoughts. At last, he raised his head and spoke. 'Do you know why I'm sitting here, right now, talking to you? Do you know why it's me in this hospital bed and Daz on a cold slab in the morgue, and not the other way around?' He didn't give Sherlock a chance to answer. 'Two reasons, Sherlock.' He held up a stiff forefinger. 'One: They made a mistake. They thought Daz was one of their greatest assets. They thought him loyal to a fault, or they wouldn't have sent him last night. But guess what? He proved himself a weak link in the chain. Well, my guess is that he isn't the only one. Theirs is not an airtight operation. It feels that way, because since it all started we keep getting slammed again and again, but last night prove that it's just not. We can find the other soft spots, you and me, and take them out. That's what we were meant to do from the start.'

'But—'

'Not finished. Two'—he held up a second finger now—'he's dead because he attacked me in my home. Our home. Anywhere else, he would have got the better of me, but that was my territory. However slight, and I know it was slight, I had the advantage. I know every step of that place even in the dark, so when it mattered, I knew where to run. Even if that meant I stayed ahead of him for only a second, it was a second that counted. More importantly, I knew where I had stowed a weapon. That man'—he was trembling now—'is dead because he attacked me on Baker Street.'

Sherlock blinked rapidly as he stared into John's burning eyes.

'I won't leave,' John said with a look of stone cold resolution. 'I'm done taking the hit. They've already taken too much; they're not taking this, too. I was born London, and you chose it for yourself. We have lives here, a home, people we love. And I'll not be chased from it. Damn it, we should fight for it, Sherlock. You know this city—its streets, its people, its secret places and hidden weapons—better than anyone. You see the cracks that others don't see, the underbelly others pretend isn't there, the utility others can't even imagine. So here is where we make our stand. Here we hold that slight advantage. They turned London into a weapon against us; we can turn it back. This is our battlefield. We can take it back.'

Sherlock's nails sank deep into the skin of his hand. 'I used to know this place, John. It's foreign to me now, and rejects me at every turning. I don't know if I can do this.'

'Of course you can. We can. Only we can. No one else is suited to it.'

'Why not?'

'Because we're a weapon, too: You understand the mind of a master criminal. And I know the heart of a killer.'

At the declaration, silence settled into the hospital room like a storm cloud. Sherlock felt the electricity as though it were in his veins, jolting him with each beat of his heart. He had not expected John to utter the plain truth of it, but truth it was. He had glimpsed the mind of James Moriarty and been impressed by what he had seen, more than he had been repulsed. In the beginning, it had been a fascination, even fun. But for John . . .

'You're a doctor.'

'And a soldier.' John's stare challenged him.

Again, silence. Then: 'I'm neither.'

'You help people.'

'Who!' he shouted suddenly. He could practically feel himself light up dangerously from within, and the lightning sought release, an iron rod to strike. 'Who have I ever helped? Nobody!'

'That's not true.'

'People are dead. Not only the victims of the Slash Man, or of Moran, but back further and further still. Not only men like Dr Frankland and Jeff Hope, but good people, too. Soo Lin Yao and the old blind woman and others whose names I didn't even bother to remember, because that's the kind of man I am! Thoughtless, careless, and those around me die. I killed my own mother, John. I carry it with me. I always have.'

John made to get out of the bed, but his movement was arrested by a lower half that remained unresponsive to his commands. And Sherlock, despising himself, was in that moment grateful for the paralysis. He didn't want John anywhere near him. John, trapped in the bed, looked down at his deadened legs, then up again at Sherlock with red eyes brimming with tears.

'Ah. There it is. See? I've seen that look before. I've disappointed you again. Glad to know some things never change.' He circled menacingly to the other side of the bed, just out of reach. 'Whatever you think I am, whoever you imagine me to be, you are wrong. Not a genius. Not a hero. Barely a living man. Did you think I could change the world? The only change I have ever brought anyone is pain and destruction. And you, John, are exhibit A. Since the day you met me, you've been nothing more than target practice for my enemies. You've been kidnapped and shot at and tortured and abused. You've lost friends and loved ones, and here you are, back in hospital, bearing the marks of what friendship with Sherlock Holmes has cost you. They say it's not so bad, that it could be worse, but look at you. Your face is black and blue, your neck has been wrung like a dishcloth, and you've legs that no cane can ever make right. You just barely escaped with your life, again, and who's to say next time won't be worse? Was it worth it, then? Any of it? Was all this worth a few laughs and a handful of ridiculous adventures?'

There was a soft knock on the door, and Sherlock flinched before spinning toward the wall to hide his face. The blood was pounding so loudly in his ears that he almost didn't make out the voice of a timid nurse behind him saying, 'Sorry to pop in, but I need to change the morphine drip and check Mr Watson's vitals.'

'Could you give us a moment?' John asked desperately, unable to mask the hurt in his voice.

'No, it's fine,' said Sherlock, walking to the door. 'Do whatever you have to. Just help him.'

He couldn't look at John again, not right now. He left the room and let the door fall closed behind him.