Who did you kill (2/4)
Part two.
Author's Note:
I strayed substantially from the actual plot of the anime arc in this part, mainly because the Masked Man here actually proposes a marriage to the abducted woman and I seriously didn't see Moriarty as the marrying type.
Also, Mary's backstory somehow became darker than I planned.
Sincere apologies to for my use of the name Amy - but seriously, you can't cast a woman named Amanda Abbington in the role of a character with the initials of A.G.R.A. and don't expect the fandom jumping to conclusions.
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Part two
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There were those words, overheard some time during their engagement party, hanging at the back of her consciousness ever since. The words of John’s old pal, Bill Murray, as she heard him talk to John with that disarming, inebriated sincerity:
“Look at you, Johnny, all about to settle down. If that mad bastard of a friend of yours hadn’t dashed off two years ago, I bet you wouldn’t even notice her.”
Sometimes, Mary wondered.
But Sherlock did leave, and John did notice her, and he did accept her into his life. It was all so easy.
“Well, I bet she’s better shag than him at least,” Murray hiccupped with laughter over his poor joke. John never stopped smiling, but she could see the tightening of his mouth from the other side of the room, and she watched him fishing out his phone and calling a taxi for Bill to take him home.
Deep inside, she knew she couldn’t replace Sherlock. Most of the time, she didn’t have to. And if she sometimes cried, if she let silent tears fall into the sink in the locked bathroom; it was because she wanted to.
It was so easy to set the trap. It took all her strength to stay trapped.
***
“What now?”
They were hiding in a small flat somewhere in Chelsea. The owners were on holiday, the neighbours barely looked at them when they met them walking down the corridor of the nondescript building. The anonymity of modern life.
“We won’t be found.”
“Won’t we?” She checked the blinds on the windows. “After that stunt you’ve pulled down there...”
“You’re an American, darling. Don’t tell me you don’t enjoy a bit of a drama.”
“You could go straight for having your face broadcasted on every screen in the country, the effect would be the same,” she remarked, eliciting a manic grin on the face of her companion.
“You’re really getting the hang of it,” he winked at her.
“Well, dramatic entrance done. What about some quiet leaving? Spared any thought on that?”
Instead of any direct reply, Moriarty wandered the flat a while, humming to himself.
“Mary, Mary, quite contrary...” Somehow, it grated on her nerves more than she would expect.
“...and pretty maids all in the row!” Moriarty finished aloud, turning to her abruptly.
“It’s all set, love. I said I could take care of you - well, don’t expect me to be the boring husband you’ve tied yourself to like the good little wife you never were. There are things to do, places to see - people to kill - oh I think you won’t be disappointed.”
“You want to recruit me?”
His smile was reassuring, a strange counterpoint to the cold gleam in his eyes. “What else would you want to do? You blew up your mission of the last two years, and quite spectacularly so, I must say. There’s no coming back now, Amy.”
She flinched as if he slapped her. “I’ll stick with Mary, thank you.”
Moriarty threw up his arms as if begging heaven to crash over such stupid sentimentality. “This is the first day of your new life!”
“I’ve been there already.” She touched her wedding band. “Didn’t last long.”
“Are you deliberately blind to me offering you a reason for living, honey?”
“How do I know I can trust you? I should hate you.” Something felt very wrong as she realised she was fishing for reasons to resent him. “You strapped John to a bomb once,” she added.
“Such are the bedtime stories in the Watson family?” Moriarty rolled his eyes. “Okay, I did that. Business. Pure business. Nothing personal against John Watson. I don’t let sentiments interfere with my job, Mary.”
“You sound just like him,” she made a face.
“Like dear old Sherlock? Of course, you know what they say. Two sides of the same coin. Good of you to mention him, actually. If I ever laid a finger on your precious late husband, it was solely to have one up on Sherlock.”
Now the hate came naturally. She felt rage, fueled by guilt, swelling up her throat. “That’s why anything ever happened to him, isn’t it? Everyone used him just to get to Sherlock. Was he ever anything more than a mean to an end?”
“You tell me,” he drawled, obviously amused by the unfairness of her accusation.
She hated that he had a point. He once used Semtex and laser points. She used home-baked bread and kisses. She was never anything but a little fraud of a wife, and if she actually wanted to be more, nobody cared.
The building tension was interrupted by a sharp sound - Moriarty’s phone pinged with an incoming text message. As he read it, something dark settled on his face, something Mary couldn’t decipher. He made to hide the phone back in his pocket but she was quicker.
“I believe that’s for me.”
He scowled and shoved the phone in her face.
-If your new pet got her breath back, tell her to call me. We may need a word or two. CAM
Mary wanted to hurl the phone across the room but, in the end, settled for deleting the message with vicious meticulousness.
Moriarty was curt. “When Magnussen contacts you again, you may tell him to piss off.”
She wrapped her arms around herself. “He’s got nothing on me.” With eyes tightly shut, she added, in a quieter tone: “Not anymore.”
***
Moriarty didn’t show her any more messages from Magnussen even when she knew they were still coming. Magnussen always timed his reminders well. She remembered the telegram, read aloud in front of the whole wedding party, like a gauntlet thrown in her face:
Mary - lots of love, poppet. Oodles of love and heaps of good wishes from CAM. Wish your family could have seen this.
Spoiling the day that should have been the happiest in her life.
It was the happiest day in the life of Mary Watson, at least.
***
They were in the kitchen, when she heard the sound of the balcony door opening, back in the living room. The thud of the door closing was carefree, whoever found them, they weren’t even trying to sneak on them.
When Mary entered the living room, she found Sherlock lounging comfortably on the sofa as if the flat belonged to him. He began clapping his hands together in mock applause.
“Congratulations. That was quite a wonderful play. I enjoyed it very much.”
Moriarty snarled: “Honestly, your manners. Haven’t they taught you that, once murdered, you should bloody stay dead?”
Mary found it difficult to find any words, and when she did, the result was lame: “That’s not possible. It was a kill shot.”
“Sorry to shatter your belief on how good a shot you are.” His voice was dripping with sarcasm. Then he turned on Moriarty.
“Life. Death. Does it matter? You can feel the difference, but you don’t have to fear the change. You see - pain...” He touched the blood stain on his shirt.
“... loss...” The corners of his mouth curled up in the reverse image of the scowl on Moriarty’s face.
“...heartbreak...” He turned his gaze to Mary pointedly... “It’s all good.”
He sighed the way he always did when he had to explain the obvious. “If I accept my state, it is quite easy to make it work.”
Then he stood up and brought his sword forth once more. “I see you’ve become really cosy in this Form, demon. But where’s your real face?”
Moriarty’s skin began to darken, his hair grew longer and turned white. His features began to resemble a fox, even more than Sherlock’s did.
“Two sides of the same coin,” Sherlock murmured.
“I can’t be you,” Moriarty hissed. Sherlock produced a small mirror from his pocket. When he threw it in the air, it expanded tenfold, hiding him from Moriarty like a shield. In the reflexive surface, all Moriarty could see was his own appearance. With a terrible cry, he fell to the ground.
The floor shattered, multiple cracks ran along the walls of the flat. Mary looked around in dismay. Sherlock came over to her, his voice unexpectedly gentle.
“It was all a fake.”
She fell to her knees to Moriarty’s side, feeling for his pulse. An automatic move of a well trained nurse - never before so pointless. “Why? Why would he do it?”
“Why would you do it? Wanting Moriarty to save you - to offer you a new life? Nobody can do that, Mary, except for yourself.”
“But why this play? Why would I want him to abduct me?”
Sherlock looked pensive. “The demon must be hiding something. Something he needed you not to notice.”
The thought of Magnussen’s text messages flashed through Mary’s mind. She bit on her tongue, not letting out a word.
Moriarty, as if sensing the loyalty in his new ally, sat up and, collectedly as he could, smoothed his hair. It was black again, stark against his pale skin, as usual. “I’m afraid I won’t bend to your will.”
Sherlock merely raised his sword. “If you will not show me your true Form, then at least be quiet for a while.”
Magic filled the air and the Moriarty in the room vanished. Only his reflection in the concave surface of the mirror shield remained, distorted and raging, but silent.
Sherlock: “Well then. Shall we restart our little play?”
To Part 3
Author's Note:
I strayed substantially from the actual plot of the anime arc in this part, mainly because the Masked Man here actually proposes a marriage to the abducted woman and I seriously didn't see Moriarty as the marrying type.
Also, Mary's backstory somehow became darker than I planned.
Sincere apologies to for my use of the name Amy - but seriously, you can't cast a woman named Amanda Abbington in the role of a character with the initials of A.G.R.A. and don't expect the fandom jumping to conclusions.
.
.
.
Part two
.
There were those words, overheard some time during their engagement party, hanging at the back of her consciousness ever since. The words of John’s old pal, Bill Murray, as she heard him talk to John with that disarming, inebriated sincerity:
“Look at you, Johnny, all about to settle down. If that mad bastard of a friend of yours hadn’t dashed off two years ago, I bet you wouldn’t even notice her.”
Sometimes, Mary wondered.
But Sherlock did leave, and John did notice her, and he did accept her into his life. It was all so easy.
“Well, I bet she’s better shag than him at least,” Murray hiccupped with laughter over his poor joke. John never stopped smiling, but she could see the tightening of his mouth from the other side of the room, and she watched him fishing out his phone and calling a taxi for Bill to take him home.
Deep inside, she knew she couldn’t replace Sherlock. Most of the time, she didn’t have to. And if she sometimes cried, if she let silent tears fall into the sink in the locked bathroom; it was because she wanted to.
It was so easy to set the trap. It took all her strength to stay trapped.
***
“What now?”
They were hiding in a small flat somewhere in Chelsea. The owners were on holiday, the neighbours barely looked at them when they met them walking down the corridor of the nondescript building. The anonymity of modern life.
“We won’t be found.”
“Won’t we?” She checked the blinds on the windows. “After that stunt you’ve pulled down there...”
“You’re an American, darling. Don’t tell me you don’t enjoy a bit of a drama.”
“You could go straight for having your face broadcasted on every screen in the country, the effect would be the same,” she remarked, eliciting a manic grin on the face of her companion.
“You’re really getting the hang of it,” he winked at her.
“Well, dramatic entrance done. What about some quiet leaving? Spared any thought on that?”
Instead of any direct reply, Moriarty wandered the flat a while, humming to himself.
“Mary, Mary, quite contrary...” Somehow, it grated on her nerves more than she would expect.
“...and pretty maids all in the row!” Moriarty finished aloud, turning to her abruptly.
“It’s all set, love. I said I could take care of you - well, don’t expect me to be the boring husband you’ve tied yourself to like the good little wife you never were. There are things to do, places to see - people to kill - oh I think you won’t be disappointed.”
“You want to recruit me?”
His smile was reassuring, a strange counterpoint to the cold gleam in his eyes. “What else would you want to do? You blew up your mission of the last two years, and quite spectacularly so, I must say. There’s no coming back now, Amy.”
She flinched as if he slapped her. “I’ll stick with Mary, thank you.”
Moriarty threw up his arms as if begging heaven to crash over such stupid sentimentality. “This is the first day of your new life!”
“I’ve been there already.” She touched her wedding band. “Didn’t last long.”
“Are you deliberately blind to me offering you a reason for living, honey?”
“How do I know I can trust you? I should hate you.” Something felt very wrong as she realised she was fishing for reasons to resent him. “You strapped John to a bomb once,” she added.
“Such are the bedtime stories in the Watson family?” Moriarty rolled his eyes. “Okay, I did that. Business. Pure business. Nothing personal against John Watson. I don’t let sentiments interfere with my job, Mary.”
“You sound just like him,” she made a face.
“Like dear old Sherlock? Of course, you know what they say. Two sides of the same coin. Good of you to mention him, actually. If I ever laid a finger on your precious late husband, it was solely to have one up on Sherlock.”
Now the hate came naturally. She felt rage, fueled by guilt, swelling up her throat. “That’s why anything ever happened to him, isn’t it? Everyone used him just to get to Sherlock. Was he ever anything more than a mean to an end?”
“You tell me,” he drawled, obviously amused by the unfairness of her accusation.
She hated that he had a point. He once used Semtex and laser points. She used home-baked bread and kisses. She was never anything but a little fraud of a wife, and if she actually wanted to be more, nobody cared.
The building tension was interrupted by a sharp sound - Moriarty’s phone pinged with an incoming text message. As he read it, something dark settled on his face, something Mary couldn’t decipher. He made to hide the phone back in his pocket but she was quicker.
“I believe that’s for me.”
He scowled and shoved the phone in her face.
-If your new pet got her breath back, tell her to call me. We may need a word or two. CAM
Mary wanted to hurl the phone across the room but, in the end, settled for deleting the message with vicious meticulousness.
Moriarty was curt. “When Magnussen contacts you again, you may tell him to piss off.”
She wrapped her arms around herself. “He’s got nothing on me.” With eyes tightly shut, she added, in a quieter tone: “Not anymore.”
***
Moriarty didn’t show her any more messages from Magnussen even when she knew they were still coming. Magnussen always timed his reminders well. She remembered the telegram, read aloud in front of the whole wedding party, like a gauntlet thrown in her face:
Mary - lots of love, poppet. Oodles of love and heaps of good wishes from CAM. Wish your family could have seen this.
Spoiling the day that should have been the happiest in her life.
It was the happiest day in the life of Mary Watson, at least.
***
They were in the kitchen, when she heard the sound of the balcony door opening, back in the living room. The thud of the door closing was carefree, whoever found them, they weren’t even trying to sneak on them.
When Mary entered the living room, she found Sherlock lounging comfortably on the sofa as if the flat belonged to him. He began clapping his hands together in mock applause.
“Congratulations. That was quite a wonderful play. I enjoyed it very much.”
Moriarty snarled: “Honestly, your manners. Haven’t they taught you that, once murdered, you should bloody stay dead?”
Mary found it difficult to find any words, and when she did, the result was lame: “That’s not possible. It was a kill shot.”
“Sorry to shatter your belief on how good a shot you are.” His voice was dripping with sarcasm. Then he turned on Moriarty.
“Life. Death. Does it matter? You can feel the difference, but you don’t have to fear the change. You see - pain...” He touched the blood stain on his shirt.
“... loss...” The corners of his mouth curled up in the reverse image of the scowl on Moriarty’s face.
“...heartbreak...” He turned his gaze to Mary pointedly... “It’s all good.”
He sighed the way he always did when he had to explain the obvious. “If I accept my state, it is quite easy to make it work.”
Then he stood up and brought his sword forth once more. “I see you’ve become really cosy in this Form, demon. But where’s your real face?”
Moriarty’s skin began to darken, his hair grew longer and turned white. His features began to resemble a fox, even more than Sherlock’s did.
“Two sides of the same coin,” Sherlock murmured.
“I can’t be you,” Moriarty hissed. Sherlock produced a small mirror from his pocket. When he threw it in the air, it expanded tenfold, hiding him from Moriarty like a shield. In the reflexive surface, all Moriarty could see was his own appearance. With a terrible cry, he fell to the ground.
The floor shattered, multiple cracks ran along the walls of the flat. Mary looked around in dismay. Sherlock came over to her, his voice unexpectedly gentle.
“It was all a fake.”
She fell to her knees to Moriarty’s side, feeling for his pulse. An automatic move of a well trained nurse - never before so pointless. “Why? Why would he do it?”
“Why would you do it? Wanting Moriarty to save you - to offer you a new life? Nobody can do that, Mary, except for yourself.”
“But why this play? Why would I want him to abduct me?”
Sherlock looked pensive. “The demon must be hiding something. Something he needed you not to notice.”
The thought of Magnussen’s text messages flashed through Mary’s mind. She bit on her tongue, not letting out a word.
Moriarty, as if sensing the loyalty in his new ally, sat up and, collectedly as he could, smoothed his hair. It was black again, stark against his pale skin, as usual. “I’m afraid I won’t bend to your will.”
Sherlock merely raised his sword. “If you will not show me your true Form, then at least be quiet for a while.”
Magic filled the air and the Moriarty in the room vanished. Only his reflection in the concave surface of the mirror shield remained, distorted and raging, but silent.
Sherlock: “Well then. Shall we restart our little play?”
To Part 3