[holmes big bang] maintaining inertia part i
Jesus this is the most embarrassing thing on my journal right now.
There is a huge chunk of this missing??? And I cannot find it???? People have pointed this out and I'm trying to find a copy of the oriiginal, but I lost it when my laptop died last summer. I am sorry.
And I really don't think it represents the best of my writing.
So....just keep that in mind. I guess.
Title: Maintaining Inertia, Part I: Man's Inhumanity to Man
Pairing: Developing Holmes/Watson (more than if-you-squint, but mostly developing feelings)
Word Count: 20,500(?)
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: AU, minor swearing, minor violence, minor slash, Americanisms
Notes: Many thanks to my wonderful beta snicks_chan and my fantastic mixer dwg! I wouldn't have finished this without them, for sure.
It's set in Equilibrium's Libria and acknowledges several of the movie's plot elements, but is not a direct crossover. In other words, John Preston is Sir Not Appearing in This Big Bang. General characterization is based on the 2009 movie; however, Holmes is modeled closer to Jeremy Brett in the first two parts.
Summary: Emotion is dangerous. At the cost of their own happiness, the people embraced Prozium, a world-saving drug designed to suppress the root of all the world's problems: feeling.
The Grammaton Cleric is a juggernaut of peace-keeping, trained to eliminate the resisting “sense offenders” and destroy all remaining aspects of culture that might tempt humans into feeling again. Sherlock Holmes, praised for his unorthodox spontaneity and lighting-fast thinking, is one of the most dangerous and efficient Clerics around. But when his roommate is accused of sense offense, the train comes off its rails, and Holmes finds his world less linear, his actions less commendable, and his Prozium less and less appealing.
Mix by dwg: Cover Art | ZIP (Direct Download) | Directory (Individual Download Links)
dwg's notes on the mix: I was so excited to claim this story. I love Equilibrium and I love the idea of Holmes as a Grammaton Cleric and the journey he understakes. This is a bleak future, but not one without hope. I really wanted to have a journey of music that started off as mechanical and eventually became emotive, much like how Holmes goes from being a conformist, to learning how to feel, the confusion, and eventually acceptance of it.
This fic comes with a HUGE author's note. I'm going to cut it and provide a link straight to the fic, if you choose not to read it. It is a very big note.
Skip to the fic!
The extremely lengthy Author's Note:
This could have been better.
I don't write fanfic. This is my first foray into fanfiction exceeding 1000 words since I was twelve or thirteen. That's a long, long time to go without writing fanfic. So...the 20,000 word thing...that was a little ambitious on my part, and I don't think I ever quite adjusted. I got a late start. I struggled with how to work characterization from established works into a completely new universe. I nearly lost the file after bouncing around from timezone to timezone. I started rushing and writing long, philosophical, rambling sentences that played at being artistic run-ons. Finding a “fanfic voice” for my writing was very difficult. Stuff happened! It was a learning experience, for sure.
To really do this fic justice, I could lie and say that I plan to rewrite it all one day, expand it to some 50k behemoth like it deserves. There's so much storytelling to be done in this universe and I hardly scratched the surface. That said, any and all feedback is more than welcome and appreciated! Just because I don't plan to write fanfic again doesn't mean I can't employ advice I get in my original fiction.
So I apologize for not giving this amazing prompt and universe the attention in truly deserved. I apologize for not giving you guys, the readers, the fic you deserve from this world. I bit off way more than I could chew and ventured into experimental territory, and it shows.
I don't mean to sound wangsty or pretentious. “WAAHH, I did it for the art!” I could write. Which is partially true! For the most part I did it because I thought it would be fun. I really wanted the experience of participating in a Big Bang. Now I have and...well, it turns out that Big Bang is not for me.
But I wanted to see this project through to the end. And I did, for better or for worse. I know that I'm not submitting my best work to you today, and I'm sorry for that. I wish I could say I'm putting out something that I'm 100% confident about. That said, I gotta say thank you for sharing this experience with me. It's been a rollercoaster. Even if it may ultimately be my last, thanks for tagging along on my first Holmes Big Bang.
If you're still going to read after all of that, I hope you enjoy! And, seriously, even if you decide not to read, go and download dwg's mix. She put a lot into it and her choice in music is impeccable. I certainly think you'll enjoy it.
I.
Small Room. Two meters by three meters. One window, facing eastward and structurally compromised. A second window, smaller, north-facing, boarded up. They have two light sources, both hand powered and running low on light. There are a dozen offenders crammed into the room.
Total time to clear: 23.7 seconds.
The position: three full strides in, arms at a forty-five degree angle. The two nearest the door pose the largest threat - removing them first eliminates his most vulnerable spots. The third goes through the cracked window in a shower of splintering, exploding glass. Crouch and twist and four and five catch one another in their own crossfire. The cluster of three by the boarded-up window, incapacitated by tangled, shattered limbs, are dangerous only after they regain their range of motion, which they never have a chance to.
Curving to the right locks him to the shadows, out of sight. Six, seven, eight - nine behind him, beneath his shoulder.
Here, he has to move. He has already predicted the kata repetitions necessary to complete the raid from his primary position, but his calculations had failed to factor in the need for restriction.
Knock ten's gun into eleven's left temple. Ten fires, eleven falls, ten falls.
Twelve survives.
A strike with the hand-powered light at crucial points on the man's skull drops him like a stone. This method of incapacitation carries the lowest total chance of casualty or failure - 3.05%. There is the possibility, never to be forgotten, of the target retaining consciousness, in which case the logical following step is to apply a chokehold.
“Cleric?”
Lestrade stared him down, his beady, dark eyes narrowed intently. His large forehead was furrowed expectantly, the expression - seeking some sort of feedback - all too familiar.
Cleric Sherlock Holmes cleared his throat and shelved his calculations. As Lestrade was in charge of the police task force for handling sense offenders, it was not unusual for their paths to cross, but even after some thirty incidents Lestrade still seemed to have a limited grasp on how Holmes' methods worked.
“I'm simply considering my options.” Folding his arms behind his back formally, Holmes turned his gaze down the hall, looking past the curve of Lestrade's ear towards the grimy, splintering door that had once opened into the office of some CEO.
“Pretty sure you don't have them.” Lestrade jerked his head towards the barricaded door at the end of the hall. “I was under the impression you were more of a planning man, Cleric.”
The rest of the abandoned office building had been cleared without a hitch, the full sweep taking less than twenty minutes. That left the office at the end of the hall, where the remaining sense offenders had fled as soon as the raid started, sealing off the door with debris and junk. All surveillance indicated that the sealed room was some kind of armory. No matter how small and unorganized this group of resisting citizens happened to be, they were storing heavy fire power in the room. The police force could have executed the necessary measures to clear them out without help from the Cleric, he had pulled them aside after a hail of warning fire, emphasizing that his presence warranted his assistance. Any raid force that couldn't take down a dozen scared, panicking sense offenders was better off reinforcing their sweep and leaving the final clearance to him. The officers left to search for contraband, leaving Holmes, Lestrade, and a handful of armed policemen behind to handle this last barricade.
“Of course there are options,” Holmes said evenly, speaking slowly to emphasize his point. “A plan is merely the result of a select few efficient options.” When Lestrade opened his mouth to speak, Holmes cut him off. “For instance! Optionally, I could choose to take the room without employing the use of a sidearm, as the disparity between the usefulness of gun kata and hand-to-hand combat is minimized in close quarters.” He walked beyond the stone-faced officer, one hand bracing his chin in thought. “Needless to say, it is still a superior form of combat, but it does have its limitations.”
“Its limitations being he'd rather not use guns,” Holmes thought he heard Lestrade say to his Second in Command, his voice hushed and disapproving.
“It isn't an issue of rathers,” he continued, pushing past the sleight with nary a batted eyelash. “You of all people, Lestrade, should know that there is little room in law enforcement for preferences. If I am to be effective at what I do then I am to consider all aspects of my training, including those which might render it unnecessary or ineffective. Say I chose to employ an alternative method during this strike - what then? My willingness to entertain all potentials - save for when an exhaustive and unnecessary effort - is what enhances my potential as a Grammaton Cleric and why I remain, so gratefully, in this position today. Do you have any complaints about my methods or results? If you do, I suggest you raise them with Brother Moran.”
Lestrade, having no answer, looked to the side. Holmes had never encountered so vocal an officer when it came to Clerical business, but, though Lestrade may have been an obstruction in his own ways, there were few better equipped to handle these situations - and none at all within the police force.
“So, what happens if you don't use guns?” asked Lestrade's Second, a wide-eyed young man who might have been mistaken for dangerously curious if not for his serious tone.
Holmes removed his overcoat, leaving it in a neatly folded, square package on the floor beside the officers, its dark shape stark against the outdated white tiling.
“The window for grievous bodily harm dealt to your or your men increases three-fold, my accuracy rate is cut in half, and the time window more than doubles, halving the efficiency.”
Their reaction was lost on him. Both hands snug against his weapons, Holmes struck off down the hall towards the offenders' last stronghold, already anticipating the trajectory of each incoming shot.
Twenty-three point five, Holmes thought: a full two-tenths off his prediction. The interaction with Lestrade before the strike was likely the cause. If he had been able to be angry the discrepancy could have been more severe.
“Who's this, then?” Lestrade asked, indicating the unconscious man crumpled at Holmes' feet with the toe of his boot. “Looks like you missed.” There was nothing in Lestrade's tone to indicated that he believed Holmes' actions were truly unintentional. He was far too exact and precise a Cleric to have accidentally neglected to kill a man. A bit of blood seeped from the injury behind his ear, matting his dark hair to the area at the back of his neck.
“I think you'll find that you're looking at Vincent Spaulding,” Holmes said, holstering his guns and brushing a hand through his hair out of habit rather than need. It slicked neatly back against his skull, hardly disturbed by the brief, routine altercation. He did, however, feel an accelerated heartbeat, which registered uncomfortably in his mental physical inventory. He may have overexerted himself for such a simple and manageable task after all.
Lestrade's Second watched the unmoving man with a look that registered the absence of contempt - if he could have loathed the man at his feet, he would have.
“Why wouldn't you eliminate him, then?” he asked.
“Vincent Spaulding is an organizer in the resistance,” Holmes said, halfway down the hall already, overcoat across his arms. “Brother Moran has been hoping he would visit the Palace of Justice for a long time. You want him alive, Lestrade. For now.”
II.
Before Libria was founded, the world was in pain.
It was tense and terrible before the worst came, the noose drawn taut around the throats of weary, war-torn countries. Their compassion overwritten by rage, the world's people slowly destroyed each other with their guns and bombs and fury.
Before Libria was born, men suffered at the hands of their own out of control emotions.
The third World War meant the end of civilization as it had been.
A man called Father became patriarch of a new and brilliant society, creating Libria from the ashes of the crumbling former dynasties of hatred and greed. Father sought to destroy the source of all the world's human disasters - emotion. Using a new, experimental drug called Prozium, intended to suppress natural emotional impulses, Father started to craft his less dangerous world. Several doses of Prozium were necessary to maintain complete separation from emotion, but those who remained on the drug for several weeks showed a marked improvement in critical thinking, rationalization, and work output. In that first, small Librian colony, no fights broke out. No men were murdered, and, with the force behind crimes of passion eliminated, no crimes of passion were committed.
The world that would become Libria began as little more than an experiment on some apocalyptic landscape, but soon it became the only nation safe from fallout and danger. Soon it became the only safe place, the center of the world.
All Librian citizens knew that their sacrifice was for the greater good. A world incapable of anger was a world incapable of hatred, of cruelty. Through their sacrifice, there would be a better tomorrow. No war, no murder, no terrible infighting for personal gain.
It cost them love, elation, and excitement, but it was a small price to pay, in the end, for peace.
Libria was to be a well-oiled machine, and humans - humans had to fill a new role.
It was not easy - of course there was resistance to the new world order. And Libria needed her peacekeepers in order to become a functioning world power.
To these necessities the Grammaton Cleric was created. Trained from a young age, these men became the primary line on the war against emotion. Military trained, and versed in the gun kata - mathematically based gun fighting for the new, scientifically structured world - the Clerics became an unstoppable force. Enforcement fell to them when the skills of normal officers fell short, and the Clerics became a symbol for the New Librian in the absence of unidentifiable culture.
Every Librian child knew that information like the It was this world that Sherlock Holmes had been raised to protect. He showed promise, even as a child studying in the Monastery to become a Grammaton Cleric. It was in his nature, even then, to make good on all of his promises, and he graduated at the top of his field.
It was, naturally, a thankless job - there was no need to thank a man performing a necessary duty in order to protect his homeland. It was unorthodox that Holmes would be called in following the apprehension of Vincent Spaulding, but then, his circumstances were unorthodox.
Brother Moran was the mouthpiece for all of Father's transmissions, and a meeting with him was the closest any Librian citizen had been to Father in several years. Standing opposite Holmes he seemed positively small, whip-thin and dressed in a tailored black suit perfectly matching the walls of his office.
“You've done good work today, Cleric,” he said, pacing along the line of the screened window where the sparsest amount of daylight filtered in from the city center. “Father will be pleased to hear it.”
“Thank you, sir.” It was difficult to look down at Brother Moran without looking as though one was looking down at him, but somehow Holmes managed to do this in a least offensive a manner as possible.
“Of course, he knows all about you already,” Brother Moran continued. “He finds the work you've been doing to eliminate the resistance admirable.”
To receive a compliment from Father was the closes thing to a commendation in the field. Holmes inclined his head in acceptance - gratitude.
“Now. About this Spaulding fellow...” Brother Moran turned to face him. “You know as well as I do that he's nowhere near the top of the chain of command, but we think he knows who is.” As he spoke, Holmes nodded shortly at intervals. It was routine, all of it. No Cleric who went into the Nethers - the unprotected, wild land outside the city where sense offenders, those people who chose to eschew their responsibilities to Libria and discontinue their Prozium dosage, tended to hide - would have been unaware of the importance of any big name inside the resistance.
Though the regular riffraff were important, often beyond saving - more willing to be put down than placed back on their dosage - once a man inside the resistance was named he became a valuable target. What he knew, or, more important, the people he knew, then become subject to multiple investigations. His area of the city would be searched extensively and his friends and family members tracked down and questioned.
A man like Vincent Spaulding had to have connections somewhere inside the city, and he had to have connections outside, to the resistance.
“You also know, I'm sure, that he's unlikely to tell us anything, even under threat of execution.” Naturally. Sense offenders often considered themselves invincible, capable of bravery that the average person had no need for once they maintained their dosage. “And yet the information he has could be absolutely vital to our cause. How would you handle this, Cleric?”
Holmes looked straight ahead, filtering through years of protocol training for his answer. “I would approach this as I would any Category Two arrest, sir. Spaulding should be taken to the Palace of Justice on a forty-eight hour timeline. Questioning will commence for those forty-eight hours, at the conclusion of which - if he has displayed no further knowledge of the resistance - he is to be incinerated.”
“You must be wondering, then, Cleric, why we have yet to move Spaulding to the Palace of Justice for interrogation.”
This question did not seem as a routine, and Holmes hesitated briefly before answering. His answer was clear to him, but he forced himself to rationalize the meaning behind Brother Moran's asking.
“It may be out of the ordinary, but I do not question Father's decisions.”
Brother Moran smiled - he was missing one tooth from long ago, and though it had been replaced with a cap identical to all the others, Holmes could see the lining of the filling, distracting though it was.
“We had hoped to begin utilizing more of our Cleric force for interrogations within station limits. The local forces, you see, aren't getting the job done as promised. They haven't the training you have, Cleric. This is fairly new, of course, and so there are others still to come before you. But I would like you to know that should the need arise, we are looking to you to interrogate Vincent Spaulding. I don't see why you would fail to bring us results when you never have before.”
Holmes watched Moran pace the thin line of light beside the windows. It would be too late soon to catch his normal transport home, though he hoped the change in numbers would not throw off the train system too severely. He disliked breaking routine, even when the break came from so important and extraordinary an event as this.
“We'll call you if you're needed, Cleric. I'm sure you're aware as well as anyone that there are certain protocols. It's possible you won't be needed, but Father wanted you informed personally.”
“I understand, sir.”
“Good.” They exchanged handshakes, glove to glove, and Holmes left the building, dismissed. He would miss his train after all, but there would be another some ten minutes behind it, if he was fast enough.
III.
The day was mostly over when Holmes returned to his flat. He was nearly fifteen minutes late, a blemish after years of being entirely punctual. The grey city light was slowly fading, and the uniform light fixtures switched on one by one as their timetables rolled over. It was a bright glow, sharp and without warmth, and Holmes had gone so long without seeing the shift in person that it made him pause to observe, admiring the clockwork of it all.
By the time he made it inside, his flatmate was already waiting for him, another first in all too many years.
John Watson was a tall, broad-shouldered man and a widower of several years. As a young man, he had once had a future in law enforcement. With enough discipline, he might even have become a Cleric, but an injury had left him with a permanent, career-ending lameness and John went into medicine. The field was in continuous upheaval, surgeries and medical procedures becoming less common as the causes of multiple injuries became less and less common. Safer transportation and fewer accidents coupled with the completely eradication of violence left doctors in a slowing shifting career, more likely to extend their talents into treating natural diseases or, like Watson, into Prozium research and production.
Watson had been married once, but no longer. His wife, one Mary Watson, had been a sense offender, her role in the resistance uncovered when a compatriot handed over information during investigation. After her execution, the government took him into custody, but following thorough and unflinching investigation, his own name had been cleared of suspicion. His tenement had been destroyed in the arrest and subsequent searches, and so Watson applied for new provided housing. As a single man, his needs were minimized - no need to cultivate a family or accommodate a marriage - and so he could easily occupy a smaller space with fewer amenities.
That was all Holmes had known about him when they first moved in together and for the longest time it had been enough. Their living arrangement had come entirely by chance, the side effect of a city-wide consolidation of space. As they both lived on their own, the joint decision to take out a flat together had come easily - Holmes found the room and Watson agreed without reservation.
It was the practical, efficient decision to make. That they happened to coexist peacefully was an unexpected benefit to their living together. Watson was a neat and unobtrusive roommate, a dedicated citizen who kept mostly to himself and their home. He was attentive when it came to national issues, following the actions of the military, tracing the the career he might have had, once.
“You're late,” Watson observed over the latest Librian Spectator. Only his eyes and nose were visible, the rest of his face obscured by the sharp letter outlines on the front page of the weekly government standard.
“I was held up.”
Watson made a noncommittal noise in response, and Holmes watched his gaze drop back to the page. He always read the Spectator with narrowed eyes, bent all the way forward in his seat with his elbows braced on his knees. The news had been a distraction, once, before the world went silent and Libria rose from the ashes. The news had been full of death and aggression and human error, the columns nearly inked in blood for all the violence they discussed. The Spectator was without these problems, its subjects limited to scientific advances and the success of Librian law, Brother Moran's messages from Father and updated statistics on the war against emotion. Watson read like a statue, his eyes and page-turning fingers the only evidence of motion left in his body. Every week, it was the same.
No reaction was a good reaction.
They operated in comfortable silence for most of the evening. The Spectator was a short newsletter, so Watson finished his reading shortly and went about his evening business. It was Watson's turn to cook dinner, and, just like clockwork, he left his straight-backed chair for the kitchen.
Most of their meals came in boxes by then. After his wife's death, Watson had adapted to feeding himself, and with simplicity being the heart of Librian cuisine, he had become quite the cook. Now that meat was better regulated and accessible again, the market stabilized, meals were easier to come for, a pair of bachelors easy to provide for comfortably with standard rations.
They sat at opposite ends of the table, eating in the same contented silence that had permeated their den earlier in the evening. Holmes cut his dinner into neat, even pieces, arranging the whole of his plate before beginning to eat.
Watson broke the steady silence first, speaking with his eyes focused on the meal before him.
“I heard about your escapades today,” he said, putting enough emphasis on 'escapades' to draw attention. “The news is spreading like wildfire.”
“It was very successful,” Holmes replied, unsurprised that their actions that afternoon had led to gossip. It was hollow news circulation; a populace incapable of doubt was often incapable of fabrication or lies.
The sense offenders were a threat. Brother Moran had been correct in his emphasis on the role of the Grammaton Cleric in maintaining Librian peace and order. If Librian citizens were exposed to insecurity and temptation, if they were led astray by weakness and emotion, the sensitive state risked collapse and the world hovered on the edge of darkness. The resistance was the most dangerous threat their government currently knew.
In short, it would be impossible to keep the gossip out of the general populace. Faith in the Clerics was important. Faith in Libria was important.
It was good for them to know.
“You made an arrest, the announcement said.” Watson looked at him across the table for the first time during the entire meal.
“Yes.”
“It's good news.” Watson's eyes were back to his meal. “Very good news. Best of luck to you with him.”
Holmes 'tsk'ed, the noise pressurized between his teeth. “I doubt the interrogation will extend beyond the routine. They said they might call me in, but I doubt the necessity of such an action. Offenders like him are often easier to break down, no matter their claims of bravery.”
Watson cleared his throat and took a longer drink than normal, the only noteworthy interruption in his rhythm, But Watson off his rhythm was so uncomfortable and unexpected that Holmes felt pressed to quiet the wave, maintaining order in the way he best knew how.
“But I'll be sure to keep you informed, if anything does come up. I know how these things interest you.” Were it any other man, he would not have gone to such lengths to cater to a fleeting interest.
“It won't be long now, will it, before they're all gone?” Watson trailed a piece of bread along his plate to clear up scraps and remainders.
A few more raids like the one today and they would surely unearth the true business behind the resistance. Spaulding would ultimately reveal the names of his cohorts, revealing the final layer of their infrastructure. It was only a matter of time and patience and power.
“Not long,” Holmes replied. “It'll all happen eventually.”
After dinner, Holmes took the Spectator to the den while Watson hovered over his study desk, poring over his issued medical text. The news issue read as always - Libria remained a constant, and Holmes was satisfied with the bulk of the text.
“What's this bit here?” he asked, the middle paragraph of an otherwise routine update on the public transportation timetable catching his eye. The routes closest to the Nether were being restructured to cut transit times and block some of the recent resistance uprisings by the outskirts. “The moonshine is brighter than fog? In a bit about the function of the final evening bus, regarding the nighttime atmosphere in the city.”
“It has a new printer, doesn't it? Probably one of the quality editors just happened to overlook it. Too bad, making that error in your first month.”
“It's overly sensational and sentimental,” Holmes scoffed. “He could be removed from his position for something like this.”
Watson nodded, head bowed close to the text as he copied something into a journal at his side.
“I absolutely agree,” he said, “but it's been a long day. For paper editors as well as us, I'm sure. Contact them tomorrow, perhaps?”
The sentimentality was suspicious, but based on standard protocol seemed like too minor an oversight to warrant any more of Holmes' attention.
They retired at the same hour, just as the lights in the flat were beginning to wan, a gentle and undeniable reminder to maintain their sleep schedules for maximized performance. With everyone on the same timetable, the world ran uninterrupted, optimally, so that each individual possessed precisely the same direction as another.
He woke just before dawn with the rest of the city, shaving and dressing as the sharp, bright lights blinked out one by one. The machine went into motion, finely crafted like clockwork, the sun rising, muted, on the decrepit skyscape beyond the Nether.
As Brother Moran relayed Father's morning message across the citywide network of speakers and sound systems, he paused to administer his morning interval of Prozium. It caused the slightest twitch of stretched and punctured skin, but it faded quickly, and he was used to it. It was a considerably small price to pay for reassurance and freedom.
“Good day, Watson,” he issued on his way out the door, watching his flatmate press the syringe tightly against his neck.
“Good day, Holmes.”
They called him in to speak with Vincent Spaulding an hour into his shift.
Part II | Part III
There is a huge chunk of this missing??? And I cannot find it???? People have pointed this out and I'm trying to find a copy of the oriiginal, but I lost it when my laptop died last summer. I am sorry.
And I really don't think it represents the best of my writing.
So....just keep that in mind. I guess.
Title: Maintaining Inertia, Part I: Man's Inhumanity to Man
Pairing: Developing Holmes/Watson (more than if-you-squint, but mostly developing feelings)
Word Count: 20,500(?)
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: AU, minor swearing, minor violence, minor slash, Americanisms
Notes: Many thanks to my wonderful beta snicks_chan and my fantastic mixer dwg! I wouldn't have finished this without them, for sure.
It's set in Equilibrium's Libria and acknowledges several of the movie's plot elements, but is not a direct crossover. In other words, John Preston is Sir Not Appearing in This Big Bang. General characterization is based on the 2009 movie; however, Holmes is modeled closer to Jeremy Brett in the first two parts.
Summary: Emotion is dangerous. At the cost of their own happiness, the people embraced Prozium, a world-saving drug designed to suppress the root of all the world's problems: feeling.
The Grammaton Cleric is a juggernaut of peace-keeping, trained to eliminate the resisting “sense offenders” and destroy all remaining aspects of culture that might tempt humans into feeling again. Sherlock Holmes, praised for his unorthodox spontaneity and lighting-fast thinking, is one of the most dangerous and efficient Clerics around. But when his roommate is accused of sense offense, the train comes off its rails, and Holmes finds his world less linear, his actions less commendable, and his Prozium less and less appealing.
Mix by dwg: Cover Art | ZIP (Direct Download) | Directory (Individual Download Links)
dwg's notes on the mix: I was so excited to claim this story. I love Equilibrium and I love the idea of Holmes as a Grammaton Cleric and the journey he understakes. This is a bleak future, but not one without hope. I really wanted to have a journey of music that started off as mechanical and eventually became emotive, much like how Holmes goes from being a conformist, to learning how to feel, the confusion, and eventually acceptance of it.
This fic comes with a HUGE author's note. I'm going to cut it and provide a link straight to the fic, if you choose not to read it. It is a very big note.
Skip to the fic!
The extremely lengthy Author's Note:
This could have been better.
I don't write fanfic. This is my first foray into fanfiction exceeding 1000 words since I was twelve or thirteen. That's a long, long time to go without writing fanfic. So...the 20,000 word thing...that was a little ambitious on my part, and I don't think I ever quite adjusted. I got a late start. I struggled with how to work characterization from established works into a completely new universe. I nearly lost the file after bouncing around from timezone to timezone. I started rushing and writing long, philosophical, rambling sentences that played at being artistic run-ons. Finding a “fanfic voice” for my writing was very difficult. Stuff happened! It was a learning experience, for sure.
To really do this fic justice, I could lie and say that I plan to rewrite it all one day, expand it to some 50k behemoth like it deserves. There's so much storytelling to be done in this universe and I hardly scratched the surface. That said, any and all feedback is more than welcome and appreciated! Just because I don't plan to write fanfic again doesn't mean I can't employ advice I get in my original fiction.
So I apologize for not giving this amazing prompt and universe the attention in truly deserved. I apologize for not giving you guys, the readers, the fic you deserve from this world. I bit off way more than I could chew and ventured into experimental territory, and it shows.
I don't mean to sound wangsty or pretentious. “WAAHH, I did it for the art!” I could write. Which is partially true! For the most part I did it because I thought it would be fun. I really wanted the experience of participating in a Big Bang. Now I have and...well, it turns out that Big Bang is not for me.
But I wanted to see this project through to the end. And I did, for better or for worse. I know that I'm not submitting my best work to you today, and I'm sorry for that. I wish I could say I'm putting out something that I'm 100% confident about. That said, I gotta say thank you for sharing this experience with me. It's been a rollercoaster. Even if it may ultimately be my last, thanks for tagging along on my first Holmes Big Bang.
If you're still going to read after all of that, I hope you enjoy! And, seriously, even if you decide not to read, go and download dwg's mix. She put a lot into it and her choice in music is impeccable. I certainly think you'll enjoy it.
I.
Small Room. Two meters by three meters. One window, facing eastward and structurally compromised. A second window, smaller, north-facing, boarded up. They have two light sources, both hand powered and running low on light. There are a dozen offenders crammed into the room.
Total time to clear: 23.7 seconds.
The position: three full strides in, arms at a forty-five degree angle. The two nearest the door pose the largest threat - removing them first eliminates his most vulnerable spots. The third goes through the cracked window in a shower of splintering, exploding glass. Crouch and twist and four and five catch one another in their own crossfire. The cluster of three by the boarded-up window, incapacitated by tangled, shattered limbs, are dangerous only after they regain their range of motion, which they never have a chance to.
Curving to the right locks him to the shadows, out of sight. Six, seven, eight - nine behind him, beneath his shoulder.
Here, he has to move. He has already predicted the kata repetitions necessary to complete the raid from his primary position, but his calculations had failed to factor in the need for restriction.
Knock ten's gun into eleven's left temple. Ten fires, eleven falls, ten falls.
Twelve survives.
A strike with the hand-powered light at crucial points on the man's skull drops him like a stone. This method of incapacitation carries the lowest total chance of casualty or failure - 3.05%. There is the possibility, never to be forgotten, of the target retaining consciousness, in which case the logical following step is to apply a chokehold.
“Cleric?”
Lestrade stared him down, his beady, dark eyes narrowed intently. His large forehead was furrowed expectantly, the expression - seeking some sort of feedback - all too familiar.
Cleric Sherlock Holmes cleared his throat and shelved his calculations. As Lestrade was in charge of the police task force for handling sense offenders, it was not unusual for their paths to cross, but even after some thirty incidents Lestrade still seemed to have a limited grasp on how Holmes' methods worked.
“I'm simply considering my options.” Folding his arms behind his back formally, Holmes turned his gaze down the hall, looking past the curve of Lestrade's ear towards the grimy, splintering door that had once opened into the office of some CEO.
“Pretty sure you don't have them.” Lestrade jerked his head towards the barricaded door at the end of the hall. “I was under the impression you were more of a planning man, Cleric.”
The rest of the abandoned office building had been cleared without a hitch, the full sweep taking less than twenty minutes. That left the office at the end of the hall, where the remaining sense offenders had fled as soon as the raid started, sealing off the door with debris and junk. All surveillance indicated that the sealed room was some kind of armory. No matter how small and unorganized this group of resisting citizens happened to be, they were storing heavy fire power in the room. The police force could have executed the necessary measures to clear them out without help from the Cleric, he had pulled them aside after a hail of warning fire, emphasizing that his presence warranted his assistance. Any raid force that couldn't take down a dozen scared, panicking sense offenders was better off reinforcing their sweep and leaving the final clearance to him. The officers left to search for contraband, leaving Holmes, Lestrade, and a handful of armed policemen behind to handle this last barricade.
“Of course there are options,” Holmes said evenly, speaking slowly to emphasize his point. “A plan is merely the result of a select few efficient options.” When Lestrade opened his mouth to speak, Holmes cut him off. “For instance! Optionally, I could choose to take the room without employing the use of a sidearm, as the disparity between the usefulness of gun kata and hand-to-hand combat is minimized in close quarters.” He walked beyond the stone-faced officer, one hand bracing his chin in thought. “Needless to say, it is still a superior form of combat, but it does have its limitations.”
“Its limitations being he'd rather not use guns,” Holmes thought he heard Lestrade say to his Second in Command, his voice hushed and disapproving.
“It isn't an issue of rathers,” he continued, pushing past the sleight with nary a batted eyelash. “You of all people, Lestrade, should know that there is little room in law enforcement for preferences. If I am to be effective at what I do then I am to consider all aspects of my training, including those which might render it unnecessary or ineffective. Say I chose to employ an alternative method during this strike - what then? My willingness to entertain all potentials - save for when an exhaustive and unnecessary effort - is what enhances my potential as a Grammaton Cleric and why I remain, so gratefully, in this position today. Do you have any complaints about my methods or results? If you do, I suggest you raise them with Brother Moran.”
Lestrade, having no answer, looked to the side. Holmes had never encountered so vocal an officer when it came to Clerical business, but, though Lestrade may have been an obstruction in his own ways, there were few better equipped to handle these situations - and none at all within the police force.
“So, what happens if you don't use guns?” asked Lestrade's Second, a wide-eyed young man who might have been mistaken for dangerously curious if not for his serious tone.
Holmes removed his overcoat, leaving it in a neatly folded, square package on the floor beside the officers, its dark shape stark against the outdated white tiling.
“The window for grievous bodily harm dealt to your or your men increases three-fold, my accuracy rate is cut in half, and the time window more than doubles, halving the efficiency.”
Their reaction was lost on him. Both hands snug against his weapons, Holmes struck off down the hall towards the offenders' last stronghold, already anticipating the trajectory of each incoming shot.
Twenty-three point five, Holmes thought: a full two-tenths off his prediction. The interaction with Lestrade before the strike was likely the cause. If he had been able to be angry the discrepancy could have been more severe.
“Who's this, then?” Lestrade asked, indicating the unconscious man crumpled at Holmes' feet with the toe of his boot. “Looks like you missed.” There was nothing in Lestrade's tone to indicated that he believed Holmes' actions were truly unintentional. He was far too exact and precise a Cleric to have accidentally neglected to kill a man. A bit of blood seeped from the injury behind his ear, matting his dark hair to the area at the back of his neck.
“I think you'll find that you're looking at Vincent Spaulding,” Holmes said, holstering his guns and brushing a hand through his hair out of habit rather than need. It slicked neatly back against his skull, hardly disturbed by the brief, routine altercation. He did, however, feel an accelerated heartbeat, which registered uncomfortably in his mental physical inventory. He may have overexerted himself for such a simple and manageable task after all.
Lestrade's Second watched the unmoving man with a look that registered the absence of contempt - if he could have loathed the man at his feet, he would have.
“Why wouldn't you eliminate him, then?” he asked.
“Vincent Spaulding is an organizer in the resistance,” Holmes said, halfway down the hall already, overcoat across his arms. “Brother Moran has been hoping he would visit the Palace of Justice for a long time. You want him alive, Lestrade. For now.”
II.
Before Libria was founded, the world was in pain.
It was tense and terrible before the worst came, the noose drawn taut around the throats of weary, war-torn countries. Their compassion overwritten by rage, the world's people slowly destroyed each other with their guns and bombs and fury.
Before Libria was born, men suffered at the hands of their own out of control emotions.
The third World War meant the end of civilization as it had been.
A man called Father became patriarch of a new and brilliant society, creating Libria from the ashes of the crumbling former dynasties of hatred and greed. Father sought to destroy the source of all the world's human disasters - emotion. Using a new, experimental drug called Prozium, intended to suppress natural emotional impulses, Father started to craft his less dangerous world. Several doses of Prozium were necessary to maintain complete separation from emotion, but those who remained on the drug for several weeks showed a marked improvement in critical thinking, rationalization, and work output. In that first, small Librian colony, no fights broke out. No men were murdered, and, with the force behind crimes of passion eliminated, no crimes of passion were committed.
The world that would become Libria began as little more than an experiment on some apocalyptic landscape, but soon it became the only nation safe from fallout and danger. Soon it became the only safe place, the center of the world.
All Librian citizens knew that their sacrifice was for the greater good. A world incapable of anger was a world incapable of hatred, of cruelty. Through their sacrifice, there would be a better tomorrow. No war, no murder, no terrible infighting for personal gain.
It cost them love, elation, and excitement, but it was a small price to pay, in the end, for peace.
Libria was to be a well-oiled machine, and humans - humans had to fill a new role.
It was not easy - of course there was resistance to the new world order. And Libria needed her peacekeepers in order to become a functioning world power.
To these necessities the Grammaton Cleric was created. Trained from a young age, these men became the primary line on the war against emotion. Military trained, and versed in the gun kata - mathematically based gun fighting for the new, scientifically structured world - the Clerics became an unstoppable force. Enforcement fell to them when the skills of normal officers fell short, and the Clerics became a symbol for the New Librian in the absence of unidentifiable culture.
Every Librian child knew that information like the It was this world that Sherlock Holmes had been raised to protect. He showed promise, even as a child studying in the Monastery to become a Grammaton Cleric. It was in his nature, even then, to make good on all of his promises, and he graduated at the top of his field.
It was, naturally, a thankless job - there was no need to thank a man performing a necessary duty in order to protect his homeland. It was unorthodox that Holmes would be called in following the apprehension of Vincent Spaulding, but then, his circumstances were unorthodox.
Brother Moran was the mouthpiece for all of Father's transmissions, and a meeting with him was the closest any Librian citizen had been to Father in several years. Standing opposite Holmes he seemed positively small, whip-thin and dressed in a tailored black suit perfectly matching the walls of his office.
“You've done good work today, Cleric,” he said, pacing along the line of the screened window where the sparsest amount of daylight filtered in from the city center. “Father will be pleased to hear it.”
“Thank you, sir.” It was difficult to look down at Brother Moran without looking as though one was looking down at him, but somehow Holmes managed to do this in a least offensive a manner as possible.
“Of course, he knows all about you already,” Brother Moran continued. “He finds the work you've been doing to eliminate the resistance admirable.”
To receive a compliment from Father was the closes thing to a commendation in the field. Holmes inclined his head in acceptance - gratitude.
“Now. About this Spaulding fellow...” Brother Moran turned to face him. “You know as well as I do that he's nowhere near the top of the chain of command, but we think he knows who is.” As he spoke, Holmes nodded shortly at intervals. It was routine, all of it. No Cleric who went into the Nethers - the unprotected, wild land outside the city where sense offenders, those people who chose to eschew their responsibilities to Libria and discontinue their Prozium dosage, tended to hide - would have been unaware of the importance of any big name inside the resistance.
Though the regular riffraff were important, often beyond saving - more willing to be put down than placed back on their dosage - once a man inside the resistance was named he became a valuable target. What he knew, or, more important, the people he knew, then become subject to multiple investigations. His area of the city would be searched extensively and his friends and family members tracked down and questioned.
A man like Vincent Spaulding had to have connections somewhere inside the city, and he had to have connections outside, to the resistance.
“You also know, I'm sure, that he's unlikely to tell us anything, even under threat of execution.” Naturally. Sense offenders often considered themselves invincible, capable of bravery that the average person had no need for once they maintained their dosage. “And yet the information he has could be absolutely vital to our cause. How would you handle this, Cleric?”
Holmes looked straight ahead, filtering through years of protocol training for his answer. “I would approach this as I would any Category Two arrest, sir. Spaulding should be taken to the Palace of Justice on a forty-eight hour timeline. Questioning will commence for those forty-eight hours, at the conclusion of which - if he has displayed no further knowledge of the resistance - he is to be incinerated.”
“You must be wondering, then, Cleric, why we have yet to move Spaulding to the Palace of Justice for interrogation.”
This question did not seem as a routine, and Holmes hesitated briefly before answering. His answer was clear to him, but he forced himself to rationalize the meaning behind Brother Moran's asking.
“It may be out of the ordinary, but I do not question Father's decisions.”
Brother Moran smiled - he was missing one tooth from long ago, and though it had been replaced with a cap identical to all the others, Holmes could see the lining of the filling, distracting though it was.
“We had hoped to begin utilizing more of our Cleric force for interrogations within station limits. The local forces, you see, aren't getting the job done as promised. They haven't the training you have, Cleric. This is fairly new, of course, and so there are others still to come before you. But I would like you to know that should the need arise, we are looking to you to interrogate Vincent Spaulding. I don't see why you would fail to bring us results when you never have before.”
Holmes watched Moran pace the thin line of light beside the windows. It would be too late soon to catch his normal transport home, though he hoped the change in numbers would not throw off the train system too severely. He disliked breaking routine, even when the break came from so important and extraordinary an event as this.
“We'll call you if you're needed, Cleric. I'm sure you're aware as well as anyone that there are certain protocols. It's possible you won't be needed, but Father wanted you informed personally.”
“I understand, sir.”
“Good.” They exchanged handshakes, glove to glove, and Holmes left the building, dismissed. He would miss his train after all, but there would be another some ten minutes behind it, if he was fast enough.
III.
The day was mostly over when Holmes returned to his flat. He was nearly fifteen minutes late, a blemish after years of being entirely punctual. The grey city light was slowly fading, and the uniform light fixtures switched on one by one as their timetables rolled over. It was a bright glow, sharp and without warmth, and Holmes had gone so long without seeing the shift in person that it made him pause to observe, admiring the clockwork of it all.
By the time he made it inside, his flatmate was already waiting for him, another first in all too many years.
John Watson was a tall, broad-shouldered man and a widower of several years. As a young man, he had once had a future in law enforcement. With enough discipline, he might even have become a Cleric, but an injury had left him with a permanent, career-ending lameness and John went into medicine. The field was in continuous upheaval, surgeries and medical procedures becoming less common as the causes of multiple injuries became less and less common. Safer transportation and fewer accidents coupled with the completely eradication of violence left doctors in a slowing shifting career, more likely to extend their talents into treating natural diseases or, like Watson, into Prozium research and production.
Watson had been married once, but no longer. His wife, one Mary Watson, had been a sense offender, her role in the resistance uncovered when a compatriot handed over information during investigation. After her execution, the government took him into custody, but following thorough and unflinching investigation, his own name had been cleared of suspicion. His tenement had been destroyed in the arrest and subsequent searches, and so Watson applied for new provided housing. As a single man, his needs were minimized - no need to cultivate a family or accommodate a marriage - and so he could easily occupy a smaller space with fewer amenities.
That was all Holmes had known about him when they first moved in together and for the longest time it had been enough. Their living arrangement had come entirely by chance, the side effect of a city-wide consolidation of space. As they both lived on their own, the joint decision to take out a flat together had come easily - Holmes found the room and Watson agreed without reservation.
It was the practical, efficient decision to make. That they happened to coexist peacefully was an unexpected benefit to their living together. Watson was a neat and unobtrusive roommate, a dedicated citizen who kept mostly to himself and their home. He was attentive when it came to national issues, following the actions of the military, tracing the the career he might have had, once.
“You're late,” Watson observed over the latest Librian Spectator. Only his eyes and nose were visible, the rest of his face obscured by the sharp letter outlines on the front page of the weekly government standard.
“I was held up.”
Watson made a noncommittal noise in response, and Holmes watched his gaze drop back to the page. He always read the Spectator with narrowed eyes, bent all the way forward in his seat with his elbows braced on his knees. The news had been a distraction, once, before the world went silent and Libria rose from the ashes. The news had been full of death and aggression and human error, the columns nearly inked in blood for all the violence they discussed. The Spectator was without these problems, its subjects limited to scientific advances and the success of Librian law, Brother Moran's messages from Father and updated statistics on the war against emotion. Watson read like a statue, his eyes and page-turning fingers the only evidence of motion left in his body. Every week, it was the same.
No reaction was a good reaction.
They operated in comfortable silence for most of the evening. The Spectator was a short newsletter, so Watson finished his reading shortly and went about his evening business. It was Watson's turn to cook dinner, and, just like clockwork, he left his straight-backed chair for the kitchen.
Most of their meals came in boxes by then. After his wife's death, Watson had adapted to feeding himself, and with simplicity being the heart of Librian cuisine, he had become quite the cook. Now that meat was better regulated and accessible again, the market stabilized, meals were easier to come for, a pair of bachelors easy to provide for comfortably with standard rations.
They sat at opposite ends of the table, eating in the same contented silence that had permeated their den earlier in the evening. Holmes cut his dinner into neat, even pieces, arranging the whole of his plate before beginning to eat.
Watson broke the steady silence first, speaking with his eyes focused on the meal before him.
“I heard about your escapades today,” he said, putting enough emphasis on 'escapades' to draw attention. “The news is spreading like wildfire.”
“It was very successful,” Holmes replied, unsurprised that their actions that afternoon had led to gossip. It was hollow news circulation; a populace incapable of doubt was often incapable of fabrication or lies.
The sense offenders were a threat. Brother Moran had been correct in his emphasis on the role of the Grammaton Cleric in maintaining Librian peace and order. If Librian citizens were exposed to insecurity and temptation, if they were led astray by weakness and emotion, the sensitive state risked collapse and the world hovered on the edge of darkness. The resistance was the most dangerous threat their government currently knew.
In short, it would be impossible to keep the gossip out of the general populace. Faith in the Clerics was important. Faith in Libria was important.
It was good for them to know.
“You made an arrest, the announcement said.” Watson looked at him across the table for the first time during the entire meal.
“Yes.”
“It's good news.” Watson's eyes were back to his meal. “Very good news. Best of luck to you with him.”
Holmes 'tsk'ed, the noise pressurized between his teeth. “I doubt the interrogation will extend beyond the routine. They said they might call me in, but I doubt the necessity of such an action. Offenders like him are often easier to break down, no matter their claims of bravery.”
Watson cleared his throat and took a longer drink than normal, the only noteworthy interruption in his rhythm, But Watson off his rhythm was so uncomfortable and unexpected that Holmes felt pressed to quiet the wave, maintaining order in the way he best knew how.
“But I'll be sure to keep you informed, if anything does come up. I know how these things interest you.” Were it any other man, he would not have gone to such lengths to cater to a fleeting interest.
“It won't be long now, will it, before they're all gone?” Watson trailed a piece of bread along his plate to clear up scraps and remainders.
A few more raids like the one today and they would surely unearth the true business behind the resistance. Spaulding would ultimately reveal the names of his cohorts, revealing the final layer of their infrastructure. It was only a matter of time and patience and power.
“Not long,” Holmes replied. “It'll all happen eventually.”
After dinner, Holmes took the Spectator to the den while Watson hovered over his study desk, poring over his issued medical text. The news issue read as always - Libria remained a constant, and Holmes was satisfied with the bulk of the text.
“What's this bit here?” he asked, the middle paragraph of an otherwise routine update on the public transportation timetable catching his eye. The routes closest to the Nether were being restructured to cut transit times and block some of the recent resistance uprisings by the outskirts. “The moonshine is brighter than fog? In a bit about the function of the final evening bus, regarding the nighttime atmosphere in the city.”
“It has a new printer, doesn't it? Probably one of the quality editors just happened to overlook it. Too bad, making that error in your first month.”
“It's overly sensational and sentimental,” Holmes scoffed. “He could be removed from his position for something like this.”
Watson nodded, head bowed close to the text as he copied something into a journal at his side.
“I absolutely agree,” he said, “but it's been a long day. For paper editors as well as us, I'm sure. Contact them tomorrow, perhaps?”
The sentimentality was suspicious, but based on standard protocol seemed like too minor an oversight to warrant any more of Holmes' attention.
They retired at the same hour, just as the lights in the flat were beginning to wan, a gentle and undeniable reminder to maintain their sleep schedules for maximized performance. With everyone on the same timetable, the world ran uninterrupted, optimally, so that each individual possessed precisely the same direction as another.
He woke just before dawn with the rest of the city, shaving and dressing as the sharp, bright lights blinked out one by one. The machine went into motion, finely crafted like clockwork, the sun rising, muted, on the decrepit skyscape beyond the Nether.
As Brother Moran relayed Father's morning message across the citywide network of speakers and sound systems, he paused to administer his morning interval of Prozium. It caused the slightest twitch of stretched and punctured skin, but it faded quickly, and he was used to it. It was a considerably small price to pay for reassurance and freedom.
“Good day, Watson,” he issued on his way out the door, watching his flatmate press the syringe tightly against his neck.
“Good day, Holmes.”
They called him in to speak with Vincent Spaulding an hour into his shift.
Part II | Part III