Fic: Observations on Sentinels & Guides in Victorian London - Part Thirteen (Epilogue I) (PG-15)
Title: Observations in Sentinels & Guides in Victorian London
Author: Ryuuza Kochou
Pairing/Characters: Holmes/Watson
Rating: PG-15
Word Count: 7910
Spoilers: None; complete AU
Summary: A Victorian era AU where Sentinels and Guides are members of everyday society. Starring Sentinel! Holmes and Guide! Watson.
Part Thirteen: And it’s...the end.
Authors Notes: I did warn you I’m no good at sexy scenes right? Sorry for all those expecting full on sexy times, what I could manage wasn’t very graphic. Sorry folks! But if anyone wants to go into greater detail, go for it! So sorry for the delays in getting this out. Real Life can be merciless at times. Oh, and I’m also posting this on AO3, and many thanks to rabidsamfan for the invite.
Notes/Warnings: Adult themes, a lot of violence, light gore, man-kissing and sex scenes and light bad language. General badass behaviour.
Disclaimer: All owned by the estate of the late Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and associated folk. Written for fun and not for profit
Part One:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/684238.html
Part Two:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/698815.html
Part Three:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/699151.html
Part Four:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/728249.html
Part Five:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/728426.html
Part Six:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/738373.html
Part Seven:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/752970.html
Part Eight:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/767937.html
Part Nine:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/798168.html
Part Ten:
http://community.livejournal.com/holmeswatson09/839282.html
Part Eleven:
http://holmeswatson09.livejournal.com/851707.html
Part Twelve A:
http://holmeswatson09.livejournal.com/859319.html
Part Twelve B:
http://holmeswatson09.livejournal.com/859556.html
Observations on Sentinels and Guides in Victorian London - Part Thirteen (Epilogue)
The closest Tower to Baker Street was the Regents Park Tower, placed dead centre in the Botanical Gardens. It tended to be a sought after Tower for two reasons: one, the Gardens were a haven of foliage and solitude from the sensory hell of London and when the Sanctuary was too far, the Gardens were an ideal substitute; and two, any criminal foolhardy or ignorant enough to try anything in the Dark Sentinel Holmes’ backyard had a death wish, whether they actually knew it or not. As a result, the Regents Tower saw very little actual business. Bakers Street’s surrounds, Londoners knew, were the safest in the city; young maidens and the elderly stepped confidently across the cobblestones with nary a single thought towards potential molestation, and the criminal classes obeyed their primal instincts and eschewed the area entirely. Only the Sentinels of the city - and the members of Scotland Yard - actually knew why, though.
Regents Tower was seeing business now though.
Sentinel Voltz shrugged his Germanic shoulders and exchanged a rueful, resigned look with Guide Lane as he heard the tinkle of silver bells of a very special carriage pulling up to the Tower door.
“We all knew this was coming,” his Guide shrugged. He was already blushing bright red which his Sentinel secretly found adorable.
Voltz turned one of his Guides hands palm up to press a kiss into the wrist joint by way of commiseration before turning to greet their guests.
They were soberly dressed. They were extremely soberly dressed - no man could manage to be that drab without special effort. Voltz suspected it was their way of combating the sheer awkward embarrassment engendered by their role within the clans and the duties therein.
The Record Keepers, Voltz sighed internally. Like muckrakers, undertakers and nightsoil carters. Respected as hell, but preferably not thought of much and best viewed from a distance.
It was perhaps a little unfair to think of these two sober, blank expressioned men in such a light. They did a necessary and vital job for the Clans. They traced every partnership in the city, archived their actions and injuries, their service to the nation, births, marriages, deaths, children. It was important and useful information, and affected things like legalities in criminal cases, seniority, pay scales, pensions, mandatory service...the entirety of the life-long partnership, in a nutshell.
Unfortunately, the legal ramifications started from the bonding....ahem, from the first moment of bonding. Which meant this pair was here to well....record it.
Voltz face remained stoic but inside he cringed. This was an era of moral prurience; you didn’t talk about intimacy, you didn’t show affection in public or profess yearning to any but the ear it was intended for - and yes, alright, Victorian models of behaviour had never actually claimed victory over the intensity of the Sentinel Guide bond, that was true; but still, even in a city of pin drop sharp ears, it was considered the height of vulgarity to listen in let alone write it down. The only reason Voltz had no trouble with idea that men just like these - maybe even these two very men, argh, argh - had pretty much been in the room when he had claimed his own precious Guide was that he never, ever allowed himself to think of it.
“You’re just in time,” Voltz greeted them, desperately trying to be jovial in the face of the rising tide of hot pink embarrassment that automatically followed these men wherever they went. “The Sentinel is coming up Baker Street at a dead run.”
Every step he’d taken had been bounced throughout the system; only when he reached his territory did the Towers fall silent. London was breathless with anticipation. Except for us, Voltz thought, breathless with humiliation.
“Sentinel Watt,” one murmured. “My Guide, Huxley. May we...” he gestured to the Sentinel Guide chair.
They were remarkably matter of fact about the whole business. Voltz supposed they’d rather have to be. He took his Guide’s hand and retreated to the signal fire, taking refuge in the crackling wood and rumble of the fire to drown out other sounds.
Lane squeezed his hand. He was still red as a Royal uniform, staring at the fire, but Voltz could feel undeniable curiosity running the length of their bond. Voltz silently raised an eyebrow at him, and Lane went redder still. His Guide wanted to know too? Well that was....charming actually. In a spicy way, which was just how Voltz liked it.
Voltz couldn’t exactly fault him for wanting to know. After all, this was no ordinary bonding. Even under all the uncomfortable vulgarity, Voltz couldn’t deny he was also somewhat interested....
Voltz closed his eyes and concentrated, feeling Lane ‘s silent assistance as he did so. He was nearly jolted out of his trace from shock when he finally locked onto them. He felt rather than heard Watt murmur in surprise. Surely the duel heartbeat phenomenon was supposed to develop after bonding? But there it was; two hearts, in duet, sometimes one would jolt faster, but then the other would match it within a beat, then one would skip, slow down and the other would follow it down...music, Voltz thought in awe. Already, their hearts make music. Usually that beat-echo-beat effect would only occur in old pair bonds, after a lifetime living one life.
Then the words came through and Voltz was recalled to task. While the pen of the Keepers scratched on the paper, Voltz took his Guide’s hand and traced the letters discreetly on the palm. He felt his Guide’s breath hitch and his heart flutter gently as the words became clear, and Voltz found himself clutching the hand when the words ended, lost in the beautiful, transcendent joy that his Guide projected.
“I think that’s it,” Lane whispered to him. “I can feel....I think that’s it.”
“That can’t be right!” Watt exclaimed from the chair. The others turned to him. “The bonding ceremony is very clear and remains unchanged from the centuries. Every pair recites the ‘Claimed and Marked’ oath.”
Voltz and Lane exchanged glances. “You have never actually met Sherlock Holmes, have you?” Voltz asked, not unkindly.
Watt and Huxley both answered in the negative.
“Holmes is not very...traditional. And judging by that tearing sound...” Voltz hastily reeled in his ears. “There won’t be...uh....anymore speaking tonight.”
“But that is the official...how are we to record the official moment of bonding without the ritu-?”
Whatever else Watt meant to say was long gone in the cataclysm that followed.
Voltz was just able to Shout a warning to the next Tower before curling around his Guide on one side of the Tower, whispering love sonnets in German in order to keep from actually tearing his clothes off.
When they woke up hours later, none of the four ever spoke of what happened again; at least, not to anyone else.
This was a common phenomenon throughout the city, it turned out.
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This is what happened to the Dark city.
The stones and pipes were still slightly damaged and twisted from before, but that didn’t matter. Over the horizon, where the dark river met the endless fall, light was rising....
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It was like a lightning storm, raining down, earthing strikes into any and every receptive mind available. Pain wound around pleasure winding around pain wound around pleasure - each end of the spectrum pushing the other higher, and higher, and higher.
None could ignore it, any more than they would ignore a flood, sweeping them off their feet.
Watson never did have any talent for shielding. How could he? How could any power that big be contained?
And yet, there was something that could.
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The light spilled out from cracks between cobblestones, from drain covers and Underground entrances, from parks and palaces and pathways, until all the roads were a glowing filigree of light.
The stones started to turn cherry red, molten, until the whole city gave off hellish red light....
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It wasn’t always a welcome sensation. Untrained Guides, those being returned on ships and carriages, clutched their heads and hearts. It wasn’t bad exactly, but it was overwhelming.
Untrained Sentinels clawed at their ears and noses and skins. There couldn’t possibly be this much in the world, could there? This much to sense, this much to know...
Sister Augusta, in one of the train of mismatched wagons currently being led through inner London, laughed and laughed and laughed until she cried. “Oh Holy Father,” she gasped between great, heaving sobs of laughter. “You work in such wondrous ways.”
Unbonded Sentinels had pretty much abandoned the Charpentiers boarding house. It was either that, or be hit with a ten pound breakfast skillet. Madame Charpentier was not about to let anything interrupt her sons bonding.
In the corner of his office, Carmichael was curled in a ball, weeping.
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The city burned; it burned so hot that it melted and boiled, metal dripping molten yellow in pools of orange, liquid stone. Water in pipes and aqueduct boiled and whistled into vapour.
And over the horizon, a great glittering cloud plumed miles high in the twilit sky, reaching higher and higher, before collapsing toward the city like a tidal wave, pushed in a speeding torrent by a killing wind.
The sandstorm hit the city, exploding in magnesium white flames....
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At some point in the bonding, it doesn’t matter when really, Watson felt beloved, callused fingertips trace speculatively across the three parallel scars on his back. “My brother....” Watson faltered after that, and lips replaced the mapping fingers.
“He wasn’t feral,” Holmes stated between kisses.
“When he slashed? No.” Watson whispered. “But he still wasn’t in his right mind.”
Well of course Holmes couldn’t argue with that. No one who touched his Guide to harm him was in their right mind.
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It seemed as if the city would be turned to ash and smoke, that it was being wiped away....but then the river began to rise, spiralling up into the streets on great gouts of steam....
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“They crucified you?”
“They tried.”
Watson pulled gently on the old white scars near the ankle joints with his lips and teeth, as if he wanted to excise them.
“They are quite dead, my own.”
“Pity. I wanted to do that.”
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It was hard to see past the fog; the steam so thick the city was engulfed in a low lying cloud.
But slowly, surely, points of light emerged....
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Sherlock Holmes mapped the life of his Guide. He read the history of his skin, the politic of his preferences, the geography of his soul. His Guide was a complicated and mysterious puzzle, and one Holmes himself would be happy to spend a lifetime never actually solving.
“...Let’s see, what else? You can’t swim.....you don’t fear the water but you like land under your feet...you went into medicine early in your college career, probably for the sake of the elderly aunt who raised you...you are an exceptional surgeon, that much is clear enough...” he made and interrogative noise in his throat while Watson whimpered and whatever his mouth was doing. “Hmmm...allergic to walnuts....”
“Oh come on,” Watson huffed breathlessly. He laughed helplessly as talented fingers traced the ridges of his ribs. “This is.... how....how do you do that? How? How could you know any of that without ah-ah-asking someone?”
Holmes laughed, his torso rattling against Watson’s spine. “Whom could I ask, except you? Why would I share any part of you with another?” Teeth scraped deliciously against one earlobe. “You are mine.”
“Yes,” Watson moaned. “You are amazing...”
He murmured it against his Sentinels skin for hours. “Amazing, amazing, amazing....”
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It was hard to really understand what it looked like when first seen. The surfaces played tricks, the fireflies darting this way and that fooled the eye, twisted perception.
But slowly, as the eye drew back, perception came and filled the world with awe.....
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“The five cups?”
“Ah, Sentinel...” Watson sighed.
“I just want to know how many people I have to kill over them.”
What could Watson say to that? “When the enemy captured us, there was this Guide and he....well. He amused himself with the survivors. Do you understand thirst, Sentinel? Of course, you must. Do you understand what it would feel like to have the water put in front of you, within your reach, no restraints, no obstacles....but reaching for it to drink causing torturous agony? Because the Guide had gone into your head and...” Watson broke off.
Holmes arms were like iron bands around him.
“They wept, Sentinel. Those strong, brave men, they didn’t blink when the army flooded us, didn’t flinch when all around them died...but faced with those cups lined up in front of them, every attempt to drink like being stabbed with a thousand knives, they...”
“You didn’t.” A statement of fact.
“It...didn’t work on me. But watching the others in pain and despair was just as much torture to me. It was all so new and I had no control. The enemy only realized what I was at the very end. By then the wandering Sentinel came and began killing them all.”
“They left you there.” Came the growl.
“They were frightened. And Murray didn’t. Murray stayed, begged the Sentinel for help...I was in no state to do anything but curl up and die. And the tribe helped me...helped us. Got us back to the regiment.” Watson shifted uneasily even as soothing hands ran up his back. “I hated that Guide for what he did. For taking away their own minds, destroying their humanity like that.” He thought of Strangerson and winced.
Fingers curled around his jaw, forced him to face his Sentinel. “You are not now, nor could you ever be anything remotely like him, my own.”
“Because you would never let me,” Watson smiled weakly.
“Immaterial,” Holmes insisted. “It would never be an issue. There has never been a person in your life to whom you haven’t brought dignity and humanity to.”
Watson asked a wordless question while his fingers combed sable hair, but Holmes just smiled and proceeded to make his Guides world fly apart with ecstasy.
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