CHAPTER 15: 'GET SHERLOCK'

TUESDAY, APRIL 28, 2015

Sherlock pressed down on the gas, but it was no use. Another traffic light red, and the line of cars ahead of his slowed to a crawl, then stopped completely.

'I'm gonna . . . I'm . . .'

In the passenger seat, John sat curled forward, holding his hands together in his lap while pressing the wound beneath a ring of twisted tissue around his blood-stained finger.

'I'm gonna throw up,' he said.

Sherlock hit the button for the window, and cold April air rushed into the car. It wasn't squeamishness at the sight of his own blood, nor a reaction to the pain. It was the dregs of the panic attack, no longer all-consuming but still in force. That meant it was a matter of the mind, and convincing it the danger had passed. Oxygen would help.

'You won't,' said Sherlock. 'Just breathe.'

'I'm breathing, but . . .' John was shaking his head back and forth, looking fairly green.

'Do your exercises. Inhale one, two . . .'

'I've been bloody well counting for an hour!' said John crossly.

'Almost there, John.' He swung a hard left on the A5. 'Last time I ask: home, or A&E?'

'Home, home.' He took a deep, shuddering breath and let his head fall back to the headrest, then angled it toward the window. 'I need to be home.'

The air helped. By the time they reached Baker Street, John's nausea had passed. Sherlock dropped him off at the door, then drove off to find parking. Another three minutes passed before he jogged to the front of his own front door, and once inside, found Mrs Hudson a few steps up the stairs, hand bracing on the hand rail as she cricked her neck looking up to the first storey.

'I heard a crash,' she whispered when he had closed the door behind him.

He held up four fingers to her, their secret sign of warning for John's state of mind. She frowned, but he smiled to reassure her that he would handle it.

'If you need me . . .' she said.

'I know.' He squeezed her arm appreciatively, then hurried on up to 221B.

The crash Mrs Hudson had heard from her kitchen had happened directly above her head, in Sherlock's kitchen. There, he saw that the table was off-centred, a chair overturned, and the medical kit on the floor, its contents scattered across the lino. John was at the sink, the tap running on as hard as it would go, and he scrubbed, scrubbed, scrubbed his hands together, a manic energy about him.

Stepping over the spilled plasters, scissors, medicated creams, Sherlock reached John's side, lifted a tea towel, and twisted the water off. He dropped the towel over the wounded hand, then covered it with his own like a mitten, and squeezed. 'It's cleaned,' he said. Keep him distracted, keep him working, don't let him dwell.

'Needs surgical spirit,' John said weakly. His eyes were wet, his throat thick. He was seconds away from breaking down altogether. 'Glue.' His eyes flicked up to Sherlock's but couldn't hold it. They darted, unable to rest on anything for two seconds together. 'I— It— She— Sher—'

'Don't, don't,' Sherlock whispered. He put his other hand around the back of John's neck and quietly drew him in until John's forehead rest against him. John's skin jumped, shoulders hunched, and muscles stiffened. It seemed the tension was building in him, and Sherlock braced for the rejection, or a body that might fight or flail. Until that happened, he woudn't let go, and maybe not even after. But the mounting energy suddenly drained. John let out a shaky sob, and his whole body sagged against him.

'Sorry!' John said, voice pitched, embarrassed he couldn't maintain composure one second longer. 'I— I can't—'

'Shhh.' He let go of John's hand to wrap his arms more securely around his friend. 'Don't talk.'

The chill became a tremor, and he was holding back. With that, Sherlock let go all the questions he was holding inside. What had the woman said, her exact words? What threats had she made? Did she mention anything of Moran? Why had she cut him as she had? He let it all go. Now was not the time for an interrogation. There were more important matters at hand. Softly, he stroked the back of John's head until his breathing evened out and the tremors lessened.

'Sometimes,' John said, his voice muffled and strained, 'it's like I can't breathe.' His head was heavy against Sherlock's shoulder.

'Sometimes, it's like I'm still falling,' Sherlock said in kind. And sometimes, when he closed his eyes, he still saw himself on that precipice, and John standing below with his hand outstretched, and the distance between them stretched into years, three years, and four months, and a world in between. He pressed him tighter.

'I thought I saw him,' said John. 'I didn't, but I thought I did. I smelt him. It wasn't real, but I thought . . .'

'It's the exhaustion,' Sherlock replied. 'You need to sleep.' He massaged John's neck with his fingertips and heard him sigh.

'I can't . . . If I do . . .'

He didn't need to finish. His mind was overworked with fear and had not properly calmed since the cottage; he was already suffering from intrusive images, and if he slept, he would be trapped with them. Sherlock knew this. He also knew he couldn't persist in waking, or it would get worse.

Sherlock gave the back of John's neck a gentle squeeze. 'Come on,' he said softly. 'Sofa. First, we're going to take care of that finger.' He steered him toward the sitting room as he continued. 'Then you're going to lie down, right in this room, in the light, and I'm going to play. It's been a while since I've played.'

Though they had never acknowledged it openly, both knew the effect Sherlock's violin had on John. It was like a balm, violin strings and heartstrings vibrating at the same frequencies, instruments in harmony. It was a romantic notion, and an unscientific one. More accurately, it was because the same brain structures responding to other euphoric stimuli, like food or sex or drugs, were also activated when listening to music, and these kinds of stimuli were also influential in therapies for anxiety and depression. But no matter the science, the truth of it remained unaltered: his music helped. Sherlock knew it, and John knew it, and accepted it.

Following John's instructions, Sherlock cleaned the wound. He worked with the clinical detachment he had so often observed in his capable friend. It was a single line slicing a circle around the third finger of his left hand, near the knuckle, like a wedding ring. He forestalled his questions for another time as he traced that line with glue, and blew on it to dry the glue faster. Then he wound a length of bandage around the hand to protect it while John slept.

'Shoes off,' he said. 'I'll grab a pillow.'

They each situated themselves. With the pillow beneath his head, John lay back on the sofa, shoes kicked to the floor and arm covering his eyes. Sherlock opened the case to his new violin, remembering Mycroft, and tuned it to the fork. Then he stepped to the window, and softly, sweetly, began to play.

Within minutes, John rolled to his side, back to the room, and he was fast asleep.

John slept for five hours, never moving once, and when he woke, other than some stiff muscles and a throbbing finger, he felt calm, and rested. He didn't remember dreaming.

At some point, Sherlock must have laid a blanket over him. A sensation of familiarity settled on him like falling snow, like déjà vu, but it melted through him and disappeared, and he couldn't put his finger on the memory, nor grasp it enough to know it was real. And then it was gone.

He sat up and found Sherlock in his chair, on his phone, the violin resting in an open case on the table, easily at hand, should he need it. But the light in the room had changed; the sun was lower in the sky, and the room was cast in an orange glow. Absorbed as he was, Sherlock made no acknowledgement of his rising, or maybe he was letting John set the pace, the mood. There were things they had to talk about, an accounting to be made, and it was in his hands. He knew it, and Sherlock knew it. And with his mind again his own, he was ready.

But first.

He stood and stretched his back. He needed the toilet, his meds, and some cool water on his face. He stepped around the coffee table, passing by Sherlock's chair.

Does he touch you?

Damn that woman. What did she know about touch? All touch to her was titillation and precursor. Had she herself never known the warm embrace of a friend, the reassurance of a hand grasping your own, the calming presence of another's body just being there? How the hell could she possibly understand what Sherlock was to him, what there was between them? The woman and her perversions of touch and intimacy, they had no place in Baker Street—they had kicked her out long ago. So, perhaps needing to prove something to himself of what she couldn't possibly understand, he paused at Sherlock's elbow and laid a hand on his shoulder, squeezing gently, a kind of thank you he didn't know how to put into words.

Sherlock looked up in surprise.

'Five minutes, yeah?' said John, a little embarrassed. He dropped his hand and walked away to the bathroom.

By the time he returned, Sherlock was already setting a mug of tea on the small table beside his armchair while his own steeped beside his laptop.

'She has Mary's ring,' John said without preamble, still standing at the threshold to the sitting room. He was relieved to hear his voice so steady, so normal. A few hours ago, he would not have been able to say those words.

Sherlock's head came around sharply, his mouth curving into a frown.

He indicated his neck. 'She was wearing it on a chain, like a necklace. The ring I picked out, what I was going to propose with. She must have got it while . . .' He breathed. 'While I was laid up in hospital.'

'Is that what this is?' Sherlock asked, pointing to his wrapped finger. 'Some sort of wedding ring?'

John nodded once. 'She wanted to mark me, like Moran did with all his . . . messages. She called it a promise.'

'What promise?'

John walked into the room. 'To keep me alive. She said, as long as I'm alive, you won't kill her. Because if you do, someone will kill me. That is, she's using me as insurance.'

Sitting in his leather armchair, Sherlock said, 'Not to be flippant, John, but you and I are already marked men. How is this any sort of new threat?'

'I suppose,' John answered, reaching into his back pocket to where, in the bathroom, he had transferred the envelope after examining its contents on his own, before deciding to hand it over, 'because now she has a plan.'

He stretched out his arm to Sherlock, gravely placing the envelope in his hand. Then he resumed his chair as well.

It was as if John had handed him a grenade and pulled the pin. Sherlock's jaw was rigid and eyes chary, and it seemed to be only with concerted effort that he didn't ball it up and cast it into the fireplace. Instead, he calmly turned over the flap and removed a single slip of white paper with a handwritten note. It was torn from a notebook, presumably in Dr Thompson's office, when Irene had perceived the need to adapt and change her plans. It read:

Darling Sherlock,

Today was supposed to be all about us, but your little doggie got in the way again. No matter. If I can't go to you, you will come to me, and you will come alone. Last game, my love.

If you solve it, I make you this promise: Sebastian Moran will never again lay a finger on John Watson. Ever. He will be safe, and free to live out the rest of his days in peace. I'm sure that's of some importance to you.

I'll meet you at the gate to the port, where old things are new.

All my love,

Irene

Slowly, he lowered the letter to his lap.

'Don't you dare,' John said softly.

Sherlock raised a questioning eyebrow.

'Don't you dare even think about meeting her. Not for anything. Not for anyone.'

'John—'

'You made me a promise. Good, bad, and worse, do you remember that? Because I sure as hell do. I remind myself every day. So don't. You. Dare try to save me. Not like this.'

'I did promise.' Sherlock fixed him with a hard look. 'I've not forgotten it.' He glanced down again at the letter. 'I shouldn't think of meeting her without you at my side.'

'I don't want to play her game, Sherlock. Whatever riddle she's given you? Whatever puzzle she wants you to solve? Forget it. We've wasted too much of our lives playing their damn games.'

'So do what?' Sherlock asked, waving a hand over the letter. 'Just ignore this? Get on with our lives, knowing they're still out there?'

'We don't get distracted. We find Bill. We toss the letter and seeds in the bin.'

'Seeds?'

'You see, you just don't observe,' John said. Sherlock cracked a smile. 'Check the envelope again.'

Sherlock looked inside, and when he saw what lay at the bottom crease, he cocked his head in confusion, then spilt the remaining contents into his palm.

'Lemon seeds, I reckon,' John said.

'I observe just fine, thank you,' Sherlock muttered, but a half smile still pulled on his lips. He brought the seeds to his nose and sniffed. 'And I think you'll find, John, that they are oranges. Five dried orange seeds. Interesting.'

John sighed. Not only because Sherlock was already, despite all cautions, engaged in the mystery, but because he, too, wanted to know what Sherlock was thinking. He was hopeless, really. 'So?' he asked.

'If I recall correctly, and I do, orange seeds—pips—are a traditional warning of avenging death, originating in America. Irene had not intended to write that note. She thought it would be I who turned up for the appointment, so there was no need for a note. But she prepared the pips, and meant for me to have them.'

Shaking his head, John said, 'We know this. Moran wants vengeance for Moriarty. We're marked men, you said it yourself. This is nothing new!' He crossed his arms. 'That's why we should just forget it, and go after Bill.'

But Sherlock's mind was not to be dissuaded from its current course. 'I need you to tell me everything that happened today at Ella's office. Everything.'

For the next twenty minutes, John related everything he could remember, with the exception of the sexual taunts. That was irrelevant, just a goad. A few times, Sherlock asked a question of clarification. John, however, had improved greatly in his ability to anticipate Sherlock's questions and needed very little prompting for the details, and he spared none of them. It was simply easier, he knew, after all this time, to lay all the cards on the table for Sherlock to examine.

He was the storyteller, and having done his part, he sat back and waited for Sherlock to do his.

Sherlock's fingertips were pressed together, and his eyebrows knitted, in concern for what John had experienced, yes, but also in deep thought, like he was piecing together a puzzle in his mind and needed absolute concentration. For a few minutes' silence, Sherlock thought and John drank his tea. Then:

'Brilliant.'

John blinked and his jaw hardened. After all, he'd just finished explaining how the perpetrator of so much of their misery had degraded and terrorised him, all while tormenting him with Mary's memory. 'What's that?' he asked stiffly.

'The schism, John.' He had one foot in the sitting room, one in his mind palace; John could see the wheels still turning behind the slightly unfocused eyes.

'What schism?'

'Obvious, isn't it?' He cocked his head and said, partly to himself, 'Is it? Why didn't I see this until now? Am I seeing it clearly at all? Maybe I'm wrong.'

'Sherlock,' John interrupted. 'To me, please.'

Straightening his head, focusing his eyes, Sherlock returned to the present. 'You know, of course, that they are divided: Moran and Adler.'

'I did not.'

'They stand in opposition, not solidarity.'

'How do you know?'

'I heard it from their own mouths. You were there, John, you did, too. Moran declared that he is building a kingdom, and he murdered three men he believed to be defectors. Defecting to whom? One shouldn't wonder. Who is it that derided Moran by calling him a foot soldier, a man who is called by his own people 'colonel', who thinks himself a king? But he's not an unchallenged inheritor. Irene Adler stands as rival for what Moriarty left behind: a network of criminals that spans the world. We know it now. The kingdom is named.'

'Named what?' But then John saw it. He nearly gasped. 'A.G.R.A.'

'Just so.' Sherlock pulled his hands apart and leant forward, fixing him with a schoolmaster's eye. 'How did you arrive at it?'

John shrugged. 'I don't know, I just . . . Well, A.G.R.A. is a crime network, isn't it? Blackmailers and money launderers and businesses that clean up after other people's messes. Those initials led us to Murray's cottage. That's where . . .' He was thinking quickly now, trying to understand how the pieces fit. 'That's where Moran—or someone who works for him—held Karim. Where Daz tortured and raped him. But when we saw it, the place was spotless. Because Andre's cleaned it up. If Andre's is a member of A.G.R.A., and they're connected to Moran, well then, they're connected to Moriarty. That's the code name for his syndicate. Whatever it really stands for, it's his. Isn't it?'

Sherlock smiled. 'My Boswell is learning.'

John shook his head against the compliment but couldn't control the blush.

Dropping his hands the armrests, Sherlock's fingers began to drum. 'I'm beginning to see the bigger picture, the longer story. Their motives are becoming clearer, and I'm an idiot for not identifying it sooner. I've closed one chapter and forgotten it. I've divided the book between a live Moriarty and a dead one, and that has been one of my biggest mistakes.'

'You're doing that riddle thing again,' said John.

'Moriarty knew he was going to die. He was planning for it. He wanted to destroy me, as well, and he had designed a sure-fire way of doing it.'

'Yes, I remember.'

But to his own surprise, he felt no ire. God, he loved this. Sitting across from Sherlock, listening to his rapid-fire deductions and elucidations. It was precisely what he needed right now—brainwork, to override the emotional misfiring circuits. He thought he understood his friend a little better each day.

Sherlock's eyes all but twinkled, like he knew. 'Again, my apologies. But what was Moriarty going to leave behind once he was dead? His network. His masterpiece. What would happen to it? Did he think it would crumble? Would he allow it? His masterpiece, John. If it was allowed to erode without a head to maintain it, then the law would reign in its stead. That's not Moriarty's style. Chaos—that is what delighted him. And how can he ensure chaos from beyond the grave? Easy. Make his people vie for the throne.'

In his mind's eye, John saw Sherlock once again standing atop St Bart's Hospital, like he had so often whenever he closed his eyes. For weeks, months, it had been only a visage of tragedy. Now, he was seeing the battle. Sherlock was the order to Moriarty's chaos, the sanity to his madness, the only thing that could set right all the many wrongs the genius madman had committed against the people of London, and beyond. It was no wonder he had plotted for Sherlock to fall.

'The question, then,' Sherlock continued. 'How to determine a new king?'

John nodded slowly. 'And how to let them all recognise the winner?'

'Ah, but John, you know how. He told you, too.'

'Come again?'

'He told everyone. In the Tower of London, when he stole the Crown Jewels, just to prove he could.'

With a start, John recited the vindictive, written on glass before being smashed into thousands of crystalline shards: 'Get Sherlock.'

'Just so.'

'But . . . that was for the code. The code that didn't exist. It was a ruse, a red herring.'

'A misdirection,' Sherlock corrected, 'a misinterpretation, my mistake. He told me, on the roof: Last one to Sherlock is a sissy. That's the game, John! The first person to"get" me, kill me, inherits A.G.R.A. and becomes the new Moriarty. But then, the roof. It was Moriarty himself who got me, or so it seemed. But none of his people knew his plan to off himself. In fact, they believed I had done it. So Moran named himself inheritor, without being legitimised. And for three years he acted as though he were the new Moriarty. He took the reins and began to build up his power. I know, I saw it. I followed the spider's silk wherever it led, and the network was still strong. Whatever I dismantled, he rebuilt. It was like trying to thaw ice in the Antarctic. The moment I'd step away, everything would just freeze over again. He was effective.

'What happened, then, when Adler told him I was still alive? Suddenly, his claim to Moriarty's throne stood in question. All his work, his presumed authority? It didn't matter. I hadn't been destroyed after all. You see? It wasn't just vengeance for his fallen master Moran wanted. It was legitimacy for himself. Because all of the sudden, there was a challenger: the Woman. Moran and Adler may have conspired together to bring me back from the dead, but they are not allies. They both want me destroyed, need me destroyed, just not at the other's hand, lest the other be recognised for having got me. Now, each is laying claim and recruiting to her or her own side. And what is it they say about a house divided?'

'It cannot stand,' John said, breathless.

'It cannot stand,' Sherlock reaffirmed. 'That's it, John, right there! The schism in Moriarty's house. We need to exploit it.'

John nodded slowly. He did see it, as Sherlock did, the chink in the armour, the hole in the dam, and the pressure building. What they could do about it, he did not know. But for the first time, he saw the enemy's exposed belly.

Only one thing was unclear, a hole in Sherlock's logic.

'She could have have done it, though,' said John. 'That night you found me at the convent. She stopped Moran from shooting you, but she could have done the deed herself and won the game. Why didn't she?'

Sherlock frowned and said the thing he despised most in the world. 'I don't know. There's something else, something I'm not seeing.'

'She didn't try to kill you in Libya, either,' John pointed out.

Pensive, Sherlock hummed his agreement.

'Maybe . . . she doesn't want you dead after all.'

Slowly, Sherlock lifted his eyes. 'Why wouldn't she?'

It was true. If Sherlock's theory were correct, then Irene would need him dead to take the crown. Unless . . .

'You may have missed it,' John said sardonically, 'but she did try to seduce you.'

Sherlock gave a deliberately dismissive shrug. 'And?'

John returned it, but with an icy stare. 'Why else? Queen needs a king.'

TUESDAY, APRIL 28 - MONDAY, MAY 4, 2015

Later that evening, Lestrade came to Baker Street. Ella Thompson and Naomi Mosaku were recovered, and with no lasting effects from the sodium thiopental, John's assumption on the drug having proved accurate.

'Where are they now?' Sherlock asked. John was sleeping again, but Sherlock was too keyed up to even sit. He'd been pacing his floor for hours.

'Safe house. Likely, they're no longer in danger. From what I gather, holding the women was a stunt to get John to cooperate, nothing more. Clearly, Adler has no qualms with secrecy, not if she let both Naomi and Dr Thompson live. And John, for that matter. All the same, we're taking no chances.'

Sherlock nodded solemnly. 'And they're all right?'

Lestrade let out a long breath. 'Ms Mosaku is pretty upset, understandably. Doesn't like the thought of going into hiding, especially because we aren't letting her boyfriend go along. Dr Thompson? Well. She's a bollard, that one. As rooted and steady as they come. She wanted to come over tonight and talk with you—talk with you both—but I told her now wasn't the time.'

'Thank you.'

'She also gave a very thorough accounting of what happened.' Lestrade gave Sherlock a meaningful look. 'May I see the envelope, please?'

Sherlock pointed to the letter, lying face-up on the desk, and the seeds beside it.

'What's this mean?' Lestrade asked, once he'd finished reading. 'Gate to the port?'

'No idea.'

Lestrade thought. Giving the note a little shake, he asked, 'Is this another of those riddle things, do you reckon? A nursery rhyme?'

Sherlock didn't know. He didn't object when Lestrade the note for evidence, and then the seeds, and he made no comment whatsoever when he went on about alerting his people to Irene Adler's activities in the city and they were out there even now, looking for her. The police did what they had to do. But they wouldn't find her. Sherlock suspected Lestrade knew it, too.

Next day, Sherlock and John returned to the penthouse. Mycroft, though spending much of the day asleep, was more lucid when he woke stayed awake longer, enabling more thorough examinations of his state of recovery. He was weak, unable to hold even a spoon well enough to feed himself. His lack of gripping power prompted the initial concern of muscular nerve damage, but as the weakness was apparent in both hands and arms, Dr Nash discounted this possibility. Nerve damage was unlikely to affect both sides of the body in equal measure. More realistically, the weakness was due to the prolonged state of disuse, which had to be recovered. Already this was proving true. After just two days, Mycroft could grip a pen, though they still didn't trust him with a cup. It would take time, therapy. And he needed more help.

Under the strictest measures of secrecy, Anthea arranged for more medical personnel to come and go—consultants, neurologists, physical therapists, and the like—but Dr Nash was growing concerned that the treatment he could receive in-house was too limited and wanted to move him to a larger care facility. Anthea denied him a long-term move, but she made arrangements for temporary transport to a private hospital to receive MRI scans, sending him under the name William Sherrinford.

The scans revealed no more answers than they had while he was still in a coma. But as the days drew on, the effects of the aconitine became apparent, with or without the brain scans.

'You don't need . . . stay . . .' Mycroft said weakly, shifting tiredly in the bed. One leg bent. A shoulder rolled. His head came off the pillow. Every movement seemed to cost him, and he sank back, exhausted. 'I'm . . . alive.'

'More or less,' said Sherlock. He put a hand around Mycroft's neck to lift him, then swapped out his flattened pillow with another, freshly fluffed.

'Where . . . ?' Mycroft's eyes searched the room, sluggish. He made a circling motion with his hand. 'Where's . . . er . . . little one?'

'Sorry, what? Dr Saluja?' Sherlock guessed, thinking he meant the shortest of the medical staff.

'No no, little . . . erm . . . friend.'

Sherlock wrinkled his nose in confusion. 'John?'

'Yes.'

It was true. Mycroft struggled to remember names, of both people and things. He just couldn't seem to get his words out. Early assessments did not reveal any trouble with his comprehension, and he seemed to follow conversations well enough. But speaking fluidly was another matter.

Dr Barlow, Anthea's hand-picked speech therapist, ran a battery of tests before she concluded: 'His speech patterns are characteristic of what's called anomic aphasia.'

'Like with stroke victims?' asked John.

'Most commonly.'

'So it's not a result of the neurotoxins?' Sherlock asked.

'Not directly. If there were neurological injury, like with dysarthria, it would most likely manifest in the motor-speech system as well, the muscles that control the articulation of phonemes. That's not what we're seeing here. This form of aphasia results from lack of oxygen for a short period, affecting the parietal lobe. Now, the speech you're hearing from your brother may sound distressing, as though his cognitive abilities have been greatly damaged or that he's reverted to a child-like state of comprehension or mental capacity. That's one of the most common fears of family and loved ones. But that's not what's going on inside his head. He fully comprehends speech by others, even complex sentence constructions. But when he goes to talk himself, he can't remember the names of people he's known his whole life. He searches for basic words and gets frustrated when he can't find them. I want to stress that this is normal for people with his condition. What is also normal is that most patients undergo spontaneous recovery with time. Therapy helps it along, of course, but I think you'll begin to see improvement even with minimal exercises.'

'How long?'

'I can't promise. With some patients, it's a matter of a few short weeks. Others, years. It all depends on the extent of the injuries. I will tell you, many never fully recover. But we're still in the early stages of assessing the extent of the damage, and I'm quite optimistic, Mr Holmes. Your brother has passed through the worst of it.'

That may have been true, but knowing it didn't make it easier to cope. Mycroft was aggravated with his circumstance. He wanted to get out of the bed but was not strong enough to stand. He wanted to feed himself but could barely hold a fork to his mouth. And he wanted to speak, but the words just wouldn't come.

'Doctors . . . child . . . hard . . . brother . . . er, time, time . . .'

He slapped his hand down on his leg in frustration, though with little force.

'It'll come, Mycroft,' said Sherlock, trying to be patient, which he himself found difficult. The isolated words Mycroft spit mostly seemed meaningless, though sometimes he was able to make sense of them. 'You think the doctors are treating you like a child?'

'Yes.'

'They're not. They're treating you like a patient. Which you are.'

'None . . . hurt . . .'

'I beg to differ.'

'Water . . . cat . . . er, cat, er . . .'

'You want your cup?'

'Yes.'

Sherlock helped him drink.

'The doctors . . . doctors, they're . . . this.' He slapped the side of his head.

'Idiots, yes, yes, you're still the smartest man in the room,' said Sherlock, smirking at him.

Mycroft glared.

Dr Barlow likened the aphasia to having a word on the tip of the tongue and not being able to find it. As the days passed, Mycroft's language became more fluid, but he still struggled to find the right words. He would confuse words of similar sounds (like substituting cat for cup) or belonging to the same category (calling his spoon a pen) or making up words altogether (saying mrem-mrem when trying to indicate the IVs and medicine, or so they surmised; they weren't quite sure with that one). He'd taken to calling Anthea, Ann, presumably shortening it for simplicity. He called Sherlock only brother, and John was called the little one, which John was learning to take in stride. They found humour where they could. John's favourite substitution was when, during physical therapy (they had begun to work the muscles in his thighs and calves, restoring strength to his legs for walking), he called John's cane, candy.

John was alone in the room when he woke one morning, reviewing the doctors' most recent notes and test results. Slowly, he became aware that he was being watched and turned his head to see Mycroft awake, propped up against the pillows where just minutes before he'd been fast asleep.

'How am I, doc?' he asked wryly. He could never remember John's name.

Returning to the charts, John bobbed his head and answered positively, 'You'll be back to running the planet again in no time.'

Mycroft snorted, hacked a little to clear the phlegm in his throat, and reached for the plastic mug of water. John set aside the file to help him.

'You think I'm a . . . a . . .'

'Pain in the arse?' John supplied, jokingly.

Mycroft pointed to John's leg.

'Oh. Invalid.'

'Yes.'

'Cheers. I didn't realise you'd been playing tactful all these years.'

Ignoring that, like he didn't hear it or didn't care, Mycroft turned his eyes to the ceiling and said, 'My driver is dead.'

John frowned. Maybe he wasn't the best person to be here right now. There was something uncharacteristically melancholic about Mycroft, a kind of sorrow John had never seen in him, even in those first few days of his waking. For a moment, he considered retreating and finding Sherlock. But retreat felt heartless. He knew how he'd feel about it. He'd been in that bed once himself.

'Davenport,' he said, providing the name. 'I don't think he suffered.'

'Driver, yes,' said Mycroft. 'He's dead.'

'I know.' He didn't know what else to say. There were no words that could make it right.

'When was . . . er . . . with the . . . ?' He mimed something large and box-like.

'The funeral?' John guessed. At Mycroft's nod, he continued, 'A week ago, I believe.'

'He had a wife. Two sons. A little . . . little . . .'

'Grandchild?'

'Yes. A girl. Grandgirl.'

'Granddaughter.'

'Yes.' There was a pause. 'I'll make sure . . . all of them. Care. Money. All of them.'

'Like you took care of me?'

Mycroft's eyebrows rose at the unexpected comment. 'He told you. My brother.'

'Lestrade. He said he probably shouldn't've done. But I'm glad he did. I went too long without knowing all you did for me. Back then, though, I wouldn't have wanted it. I was pretty angry with you, and for that I'm sorry. I'm not angry anymore. Just . . . worried I would never get to say thank you.'

'Don't.'

'Yeah, yeah, I know,' John said, smiling sadly. 'Sentiment.'

'I did it for him.'

John nodded without offence. 'Doesn't mean I'm not grateful.'

Seeming desperate to change the conversation, Mycroft's eyes flitted to the door. 'Is . . . she here? Ann?'

The pain on Mycroft's face startled him. It seemed unnatural in the man who had so long been the epitome of stalwart suppression. 'Anthea? Always. Probably waiting for her briefing. Shall I go get her?'

Mycroft shook his head tiredly. 'I hoped she would . . . erm . . .' He searched fruitlessly for the word, flinging his hand toward the door. 'S-stop.'

John quirked his head. 'Stop what.'

'Stop. Stop.'

'What, you mean quit?'

'Quit. Yes.'

'Why!'

'I don't want . . .' Mycroft frowned, unable to express his thoughts. He slapped his hands together. 'I have to . . .' He slapped his hands again.

'Sack her?'

'Yes. She's been . . .' He squeezed his eyes shut and rubbed his face. 'Compromised.' While John gaped, Mycroft fumbled with his words to express his well-ordered thoughts. 'I'll give her a . . . good . . . redundancy . . .' He made another shape with his hands, like a bundle. 'New identity. New name. She has experience. It will be fine.'

'All right, listen.' John stepped closer so Mycroft couldn't comfortably pretend not to see him. The man might be still be recovering, but he couldn't let this sort of thinking abide. Though Mycroft was endeavouring to be cool and rational in the way he thought and spoke, John sensed what only someone who had spent a lot of time around a Holmes could pick up on: worry and affection and trying to do right by someone by doing exactly the wrong thing. 'I get it. You're trying to save her from getting hurt again. Don't.'

With a put-upon sigh, Mycroft opened his mouth to berate him, but as he couldn't remember John's name, he couldn't get anything out, and John took advantage.

'So like a Holmes. Intent on saving everyone but yourselves. You know, some of us are actually trying to save you. Don't take that away from us. It may be the only thing worth it to us in the end.'

'You love him,' Mycroft said, a tear in the corner of his eye.

John blinked. 'Of course—'

'And he loves you. More than me.'

'You don't give him enough credit.'

'You are the family he should have had. The . . .' He tapped his own chest, and John understood: brother. It seemed strange that he could remember to call Sherlock brother, but not remember the word for himself. Softly, he whispered. 'Should have had. I've only . . . ever . . .' He made a helpless gesture that John didn't understand.

'Mycroft—'

'All my life. All my life.'

John gripped the side of the hospital bed and leant toward him. 'Sherlock is alive today because of you. You've protected him. You did that. Not me. You told me to look after him, remember? And what did I do? I watched him fall.'

'I told you.' Mycroft's eyes flashed, and he looked suddenly panicked. 'Before. I told you. About . . . them.'

'Who?'

'Them, the . . . the'—the word wouldn't come—'four. Them.' He touched the centre of his forehead.

'I don't understand. Who is them?'

'We knew. I knew. I told you. I told you. You need to know. Them.'

Sherlock was in the bathroom, dressing after a short but hot shower, when his phone lit up with an unfamiliar number.

'Hello?'

There was a pause, and Sherlock, who was wary of silence on the other end of a phone, almost hung up. Then: 'Hiya. This Mr 'olmes, is it?'

He recognised the voice, and his heart picked up the pace, not for fear, but for intrigue. He ran a hand through is wet curls excitedly. 'Ms Heslehurst, hello.'

'You said I should call, eh? If and when I 'eard from Bill?'

'I said exactly that, yes.'

'Well, I just been on the phone with him, 'aven't I? So, I'm ringing you up.'

Sherlock resisted the urge to shout, or leap into the air, or crash through the door calling for John. Barely containing himself, he said, 'And? What did he say to you? Do you know where he is?'

'Don't know where 'e is,' she said. 'Only where 'e's gonna be. See, he wants me to meet him. Tonight. And I said I would do. Promised 'im and everything, lying through my teeth, like, and now I'm calling you.'

'Where, Anita? Tell me exactly where.'

Two minutes later, Sherlock pushed open Mycroft's door and all but slid into the room where he found Mycroft and John conversing together, though surely it was a frustrating conversation for each, what with the aphasia. The strain showed on both their faces.

'John,' he said.

John stood, looking concerned at the phone in Sherlock's hand.

'The game—' he began.

But it was Mycroft who finished: 'Is on.'