mind-forg'd manacles (Sherlock/John, Mycroft; PG-13)
Title: mind-forg’d manacles
Author: etharei
Fandom: Sherlock (BBC TV)
Pairing: Sherlock/John
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: ~3,500
Summary: “Mycroft could have taken care of that lot without even leaving his car.” He feels Sherlock following close behind, so he turns and leans back on the counter. “But you still did it.”
WARNINGS:: homophobic language, mild violence (non-explicit)
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters mentioned herein; they’re based on the BBC modern adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle’s works. No profit was made in the writing or posting of this piece of fiction.
Notes: Many thanks to red-adam for beta and brit-picking awesomeness ♥ Any remaining mistakes are mine. Fill for this prompt at sherlockbbc-fic. Title is from 'London' by William Blake.
+ can also be found on AO3
mind-forg'd manacles
Either the presence of more than one genius under their roof automatically fills the air with warning static, or repeated exposure has permanently tuned John to Radio Holmes; he’s only put one foot on the first step up to their flat and he knows, like he knows forty-eight hours of silence will lead to more bullets in the walls and jam jars full of wasps, that they’ve got a visitor. He makes no special effort to be quiet when he clomps his way up the stairs.
“Something is wrong.” It’s the tone that stops John outside the door, not the words. “You’re worried.”
“Stop projecting, Sherlock, it’s rude.” The faint tap, tap of an umbrella glancing off a table leg.
“I’m agitated. You’re worried.”
“And what could I possibly be worried about?”
“Indeed.” John can feel the ratcheting intensity of Sherlock’s attention, despite the solid door between him and whatever is taking place in his living room. “I will find out.”
“I know better than to underestimate your inquisitiveness. However, there are still certain matters that are not your business.”
“Mycroft.” Another new tone, or at least one that Sherlock’s never applied to his brother.
“I must leave for my next appointment. You can come in now, Doctor Watson.”
John simply shrugs and opens the door. Mycroft is in the process of standing, and they nod amiably at one another. The only difference between this scene and dozens of others since John took up residency in 221B is the narrowed, too-sharp gaze Sherlock has trained on his brother. John has seen the same expression make hardened criminals stutter and stumble, but Mycroft only dons his coat and nods his farewell.
“Tea?” asks John after the door closes. Sherlock ignores him, starts rooting around the pile of stuff that always accumulates on the table despite Mrs. Hudson’s best efforts. John takes this as a maybe and heads for the kitchen.
To his surprise, the sounds of the evening news drift in as he’s plugging in the electric kettle. Sherlock rarely turns the telly on of his own accord; the flat doesn’t look any more disordered than it had that morning, so John doesn’t think Sherlock’s reached that level of boredom yet.
“No visiting dignitaries, important elections, or bomb scares,” reports Sherlock when John wanders back into the living room. Mostly out of curiousity. “No new wars since his last visit. A few international incidents, but none of them are his style.” Sherlock bounces up, sits on the armrest of his chair. “No, no, no, it won’t be anything to do with work. But not personal, at least not entirely personal, or he wouldn’t have come here at all. Must have been sudden, unexpected. Something he overestimated his ability to hide.”
John can’t help wondering what could worry someone like Mycroft, much less catch the older Holmes unaware. But it’s gratifying to see Sherlock actually being concerned, for all that he calls his brother an arch-enemy. John goes to make the tea before Sherlock can read his face.
Turns out that it’s markedly easier to get Sherlock to eat when he’s focused on the telly. John watches him finish a cup of tea and two slices of John’s toast whilst flipping between channels, so he runs out to get takeaway Chinese before the spell is broken. When John returns, Sherlock doesn’t appear to have moved, aside from the hand holding the remote. John sets out the oily, steaming boxes and presses a pair of chopsticks into his flatmate’s other hand.
They’re almost done with dinner when Sherlock finally goes, “oh.”
John braces himself for the subsequent frenzy of activity, but Sherlock just stares at the screen. A tightness, hardness, steals over his features, anger, slow and intense like John’s never seen before. Sherlock’s mercurial temperament is prone to bursts of temper, sharp and bright - this is different, something new.
“No, it’s old,” mutters Sherlock absently. He’s settled back into his chair, fingers steepled in front of him. Clearly thinking. Planning.
John clears away the boxes and puts the leftovers in the fridge. There’s a petri dish containing a pieces teeth that he has to move to a different shelf; he looks at the teeth and just knows, in a series of mental flashcards, that the jaw from which they had come had not quite reached adult growth... they’d been regularly used to bite down on hard candy, maybe ice... had a smoking habit, maybe...
He refills the kettle and plugs it in again. Moves to where he can see Sherlock, sitting so still, the shifting light-shapes on the telly giving his skin an electric glow. John had thought, before, that if the man ever snaps, Sherlock would go with a bang, a spark of genius finally unfettered and bursting outwards to wreak merry disaster on the world. But no, this is more frightening, the quiet and the focus, eviscerating, his natural detachment turned up to a laser.
“Mycroft received a threatening letter right before coming here,” says Sherlock, his voice a quiet rumble. Again, that slow thoughtfulness where he’d normally be spouting off deductions with manic energy. John realises, this is Sherlock being careful. “E-mail or text is possible, but infinitely more traceable, and these things usually involve a personal touch.”
“Not just any letter, though, I’d imagine,” John prompts him.
“Quite right,” agrees Sherlock. “He gets general death-threats on a daily basis. He sees opposition to his work as signs of accomplishment, indicators of the extent of his influence. No - this is especially personal. An old issue.” He points the remote at the telly and brings up the volume.
It’s BBC News, running a special on a recent rash of homophobic attacks in the public sector. Images flash on the screen: slurs spray-painted on cars, mutilated photographs sent in the mail, threatening emails and letters. The somber newsreader suggests that it’s the work of a small, local group, though none have claimed responsibility yet.
John clenches his hands, feels his nails digging into his palm. “This group has targeted Mycroft?”
Sherlock glances at him, eyebrows hitching up briefly before settling back down again. “Ah, yes, your sister.” He takes a breath. “I believe so. It’s the most likely hypothesis, considering the extremely limited list of things that can get under my brother’s skin. Quite juvenile, but that is why he was not expecting it.”
John wants to ask, is Mycroft being attacked because he’s gay, or because he has a gay brother? but he’s not sure it’s the thing to ask about someone who occasionally follows him around London via CCTV. He settles for aggressively thinking the question at Sherlock.
“Yes, Mycroft is homosexual,” answers Sherlock. “Though in terms of the sex he finds physically attractive, he is bisexual. But his personality and habits are more suited to male partners, so he identifies as homosexual.”
“Right.” The water is boiling. John makes them both a cuppa and settles into the other chair. “What are you going to do about it, then?”
“Work out the identity of this group, their goals, how they operate, etc. Hand me my mobile.”
“I’m fairly sure you’re sitting on it.”
John is half-expecting Sherlock to ask him to get it anyway. Sherlock doesn’t, and he even takes a sip of his tea whilst the other hand taps out a text. “I’d have thought Mycroft would have taken care of this particular chink in his armor by this point, though,” mutters Sherlock, frowning at the small screen.
Harry had been fifteen when she’d come out. Some kids do it gradually, but Harry had approached it like ripping off a plaster. It could have gone worse, but that had been the only time John truly wished he had the height and build to make other kids back off. “It never quite leaves you, I think,” says John quietly. “Being told you’re wrong. Being feared or hated when you express something that should make you happy. Not being trusted, because of something that’s part of you. And you usually realise when you’re a teenager, when you’re being walloped by hormones and identity issues at the same time.” Belatedly, he remembers who he’s talking to, but Sherlock just looks thoughtful again.
John’s not sure if Mycroft quite has Sherlock’s aversion to social interaction, but both Holmes seem well-matched intellectually. Those teenage years must have been... interesting.
There’s a knock on their door. John gets it and is somehow not at all surprised to find Mycroft’s assistant on the other side. She doesn’t look up from her Blackberry, just pushes a large envelop into his hand and goes back down the stairs. John tosses the envelope at Sherlock.
“Ah, the letter,” says Sherlock. “She must have been waiting outside. It’s worse than I thought.”
Of course Sherlock would have a direct line to his brother’s assistant. John shifts the piles on the table to a corner of the room before Sherlock can shove them all to the floor. The letter itself is three pages of cut and pasted letters. Sherlock sighs and makes a noise like the world has disappointed him. “Really? This is child’s play.”
John just gets the paper-testing kit from the bookshelf, and says nothing when Sherlock goes to work anyway.
Four hours later, Sherlock pushes open the door to a storage space in the back of a pub and walks inside with a swish of his coat. “Evening, gents.”
There’s a flurry of movement, the scraping of chair legs and a disorganized scattering of heavy-soled shoes. There are two ways in and out of the room, not counting the high windows, and a couple of the quicker men soon discover that the other door that leads into the pub has been locked fast from the other side.
“Cosy place,” says Sherlock casually. “Did you know that this room was once used to store tea-leaves? And part of the pub used to be a stable. It’s fascinating, the things that can get caught in glue.”
“Who are you?” demands one of the men.
“Unimportant.” Sherlock’s gaze sweeps over the array of fearful, confused, and angry faces staring at him. “I don’t care who you are, either, but you should know that I’ve compiled a list of your names and personal details for my records.”
One of the men, the biggest of the lot, growls and makes to rush at Sherlock. John takes that as his cue and slips out from the shadow outside the door where he’d been lurking. His Browning is already in his hand, and he kicks the door close behind him. He doesn’t bother to raise the gun, yet; all movement stills when the men see it.
“What do you want?” asks the man who’d spoken earlier.
“Immediate cessation of your current activities.” Sherlock’s expression turns scornful. “Normally these small-minded ventures are beneath my notice, but there is a line you have crossed, albeit in ignorance and lacking any sort of imagination whatsoever.” He sounds particularly put-out by the latter; John resists the urge to smile. “Nevertheless, I’m afraid I must put a stop to it.”
Another man lets out a dismissive huff. “Told you it wouldn’t be long before the fucking shirtlifters go running and crying.”
This seems to put the men back on familiar ground, for the rest of the group seem to suddenly find their voices. “And what are you two, the big gay superheroes?”
“- don’t send queers to do real men’s work-”
“- did we hurt your feelings, you fucking pansies?”
“Don’t fuckin’ come near me, you dirty bastards.”
“Perverted freaks.”
My God, John thinks, it’s even worse than all those playgrounds and schoolrooms and lonely walks home - he’s still one of the smallest in a room full of blokes, but now he’s got a bullet wound in the shoulder and a loaded gun in his hand.
Of course, even armed, John is aware of being only the second most dangerous person in the room.
“Your mother wasn’t converted into lesbianism by her girlfriend, Mr. Niall,” drawls Sherlock, blatantly unruffled. “I suspect it was your father’s alcoholism and penchant for using his fists on her that drove her away from your childhood home. You can ask him, if you would like to confirm,” says Sherlock, looking for all the world like he’s talking about the weather. “Mr. Schenck, the HIV virus does not, in fact, care about the sex or orientation of your intimate partners. Perhaps adhering to a medication regimen would be more beneficial to your well-being than citing religious text in order to equate homosexuality with disease...”
Eventually, one of the men does gain the presence of mind to attack Sherlock. It’s the big one, of course, and exactly when John had been expecting: after Sherlock points out that it’s hypocritical and childish for Mr. Allman to be throwing homophobic slurs at people just because he had homoerotic feelings towards his heterosexual roommate during university and said roommate turned him down.
John blinks at the charging man, and the weight of the gun is so familiar, so tempting. There’s a breathless moment, John’s thumb hovering over the safety - then his hand swings around and brings the butt of the gun crashing against the side of Theo Allman’s head.
The man hits the ground with a roar, leg lashing out. John dodges it easily, throws in another punch and a couple of kicks for good measure. He’d been worried about the man’s bulk, against his relatively smaller frame, but Theo clearly never learned how to use it. He slumps on the floor and starts swearing at John. Faggot. Die and burn in hell, homo. It’s not even worth anger, it’s just stupid and infuriating. John tucks his gun away and punches him on the jaw, textbook, body vibrating with the knowledge, the bloody memory of how much worse he can do.
“That’s my sister you’re talking about,” John forces the words out through gritted teeth. He grabs Theo by the hair; looks up and glares at the other men, and feels only a small thrill when they all take a step back. “Every person you call names and hate and wish dead is someone’s daughter, someone’s son. Maybe a brother, sister, father, mother. So fuck all of you.”
“John,” interjects Sherlock, low and calm.
John lets the man’s hair go and steps back. Sherlock lets the silence stand for a few seconds, eyeing everybody in the room.
“No more threats,” he finally says. “No more attacks. Not even so much as a pseudo-humorous post-it. As far as the world knows, this group never existed.”
“What are you going to do, sue us? Send us to jail?” says the man who’s been doing most of the talking. But John can hear the wavering note in his voice. “The police will have your descriptions by morning. We’ve got friends in the right places, you won’t be able to touch us.”
“I don’t need to.” Sherlock gives them an enigmatic smile. “My friends, you see, are down low, the lowest sort, and invisible. You all occupy mid-level positions in business or government, and this is the dirtiest your hands have ever gotten. My friends are the dark and the dirt, the debris you walk over every day, and you won’t see them coming. There won’t be a scandal for you to cover up, but everybody you know, everybody around you, will know every little secret you’ve tried to hide. I can make your life unpleasant in a hundred tiny, unavoidable ways. I could kill you easily - something slipped in your morning coffee, Mr. Niall, or a bee inexplicably finding its way into your bedroom, Mr. Cipriani, I believe you are deathly allergic to them.”
Sherlock strides up to them, passing each man close enough to breathe on them. “I can kill you, but I won’t. Instead, you’ll find your wallets picked, your expensive suits ruined, your neighbors looking at you with suspicion. Mysterious lipstick stains for your wives to find, unexplained charges on your bank statements. I want you to live every day wondering if people are talking about you, looking over your shoulder in case of another little ‘accident’. I want you to understand what you’re part of. And I can do it because you’ve spent your lives gazing upwards, cradled by bureaucracy - your sort never truly understand that there’s as much danger from below.” His voice drops, silky and dangerous, and John has to swallow, breathless. “You will go away, and there won’t be so much as a whisper from you again, or you will find out what it means to have London turn against you.”
A whirl of his coat, and Sherlock is striding out of the building. John follows him, mostly out of instinct, his mind still reeling from Sherlock’s words. Bugger that, Sherlock’s voice.
(The soldier in John’s soul envisions, for a moment, an alternative reality where Sherlock cares enough for a cause outside himself to dedicate that intellect and force of personality to a goal, to rallying people to him. Is Mycroft disappointed or relieved that he doesn’t? Then John realises - in that world, he wouldn’t feel any different, he’d still be caught in the Holmes orbit. Moreover, he would have to share; so really, he’s better off right where he is.)
“That was amazing,” he says, once they’re in a taxi. “Also, bloody frightening.”
Sherlock blinks at him. He looks genuinely surprised. “I was frightening?” He reaches between them, picks up John’s hand without a trace of self-consciousness. His palm is warm and dry under John’s, and gentle fingers trace over where John’s knuckles are already swelling up, the skin sensitive.
“Right, forgot about that,” admits John, a bit sheepish.
They don’t say anything else, but Sherlock doesn’t let go of John’s hand for the rest of the drive, and John doesn’t pull away. It’s strangely comfortable; even the usual tension between them is familiar. John doesn’t hide the way he’s staring at his friend.
He thinks of Mycroft, and remembers, He is the British government.
But what does that make Sherlock? Sherlock and his homeless network, his perfect knowledge of London’s streets, the way he can become a different person as easy as changing scarves. Sherlock finds government boring; individual people are less predictable, their problems far more intricate.
Back in their flat, John heads for the kitchen, saying, “Mycroft could have taken care of that lot without even leaving his car.” He feels Sherlock following close behind, so he turns and leans back on the counter. “But you still did it.” Mycroft must have known what Sherlock would do. And the fact that John realises this means Sherlock knows it too.
“If he became involved, it would become clear that this is his weak spot,” murmurs Sherlock quietly. He drifts closer, crowding John up against the counter. He’s still wearing his coat.
The two of you make things unnecessarily convoluted. John slips his hands under Sherlock’s coat, gliding his palms over that long, lean body and pushing the thick fabric off his shoulders. Sherlock leans down, and John breathes in the scent of him, of the city; a shared breath, and then they’re kissing, soft and hot, and John happily drowns in the onslaught of Sherlock’s full attention.
Later, in bed, John uses his lips on Sherlock’s skin to say, I know how important it is, for there to be a difference between the things you say and the things you do. I know which one matters.
He’s trying to catch his breath when the words tumble out, “Harry and I never got on.” Sherlock is sprawled out beneath him, sweetly pliant in the way he can be only after sex. “Can’t talk for five minutes without arguing. She knows all my weaknesses, all my childhood mistakes.” I’ve hit people for her. When I was dying in Afghanistan, I wanted to hear her shout at me one more time.
Sherlock wordlessly cards a hand through his hair, and the other hand closes over the knuckles that must be starting to bruise.
In the morning, a brand new electric kettle is sitting in the kitchen, one of those shiny high-end ones, and they somehow have six months worth of tea in the cupboard. There’s a conspicuous lack of comment from Sherlock, though he eyes the old kettle in a worryingly calculating manner. John just shakes his head and starts figuring out where to put the water in the new contraption.
+++ end +++
Author: etharei
Fandom: Sherlock (BBC TV)
Pairing: Sherlock/John
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: ~3,500
Summary: “Mycroft could have taken care of that lot without even leaving his car.” He feels Sherlock following close behind, so he turns and leans back on the counter. “But you still did it.”
WARNINGS:: homophobic language, mild violence (non-explicit)
Disclaimer: I don't own the characters mentioned herein; they’re based on the BBC modern adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle’s works. No profit was made in the writing or posting of this piece of fiction.
Notes: Many thanks to red-adam for beta and brit-picking awesomeness ♥ Any remaining mistakes are mine. Fill for this prompt at sherlockbbc-fic. Title is from 'London' by William Blake.
+ can also be found on AO3
mind-forg'd manacles
Either the presence of more than one genius under their roof automatically fills the air with warning static, or repeated exposure has permanently tuned John to Radio Holmes; he’s only put one foot on the first step up to their flat and he knows, like he knows forty-eight hours of silence will lead to more bullets in the walls and jam jars full of wasps, that they’ve got a visitor. He makes no special effort to be quiet when he clomps his way up the stairs.
“Something is wrong.” It’s the tone that stops John outside the door, not the words. “You’re worried.”
“Stop projecting, Sherlock, it’s rude.” The faint tap, tap of an umbrella glancing off a table leg.
“I’m agitated. You’re worried.”
“And what could I possibly be worried about?”
“Indeed.” John can feel the ratcheting intensity of Sherlock’s attention, despite the solid door between him and whatever is taking place in his living room. “I will find out.”
“I know better than to underestimate your inquisitiveness. However, there are still certain matters that are not your business.”
“Mycroft.” Another new tone, or at least one that Sherlock’s never applied to his brother.
“I must leave for my next appointment. You can come in now, Doctor Watson.”
John simply shrugs and opens the door. Mycroft is in the process of standing, and they nod amiably at one another. The only difference between this scene and dozens of others since John took up residency in 221B is the narrowed, too-sharp gaze Sherlock has trained on his brother. John has seen the same expression make hardened criminals stutter and stumble, but Mycroft only dons his coat and nods his farewell.
“Tea?” asks John after the door closes. Sherlock ignores him, starts rooting around the pile of stuff that always accumulates on the table despite Mrs. Hudson’s best efforts. John takes this as a maybe and heads for the kitchen.
To his surprise, the sounds of the evening news drift in as he’s plugging in the electric kettle. Sherlock rarely turns the telly on of his own accord; the flat doesn’t look any more disordered than it had that morning, so John doesn’t think Sherlock’s reached that level of boredom yet.
“No visiting dignitaries, important elections, or bomb scares,” reports Sherlock when John wanders back into the living room. Mostly out of curiousity. “No new wars since his last visit. A few international incidents, but none of them are his style.” Sherlock bounces up, sits on the armrest of his chair. “No, no, no, it won’t be anything to do with work. But not personal, at least not entirely personal, or he wouldn’t have come here at all. Must have been sudden, unexpected. Something he overestimated his ability to hide.”
John can’t help wondering what could worry someone like Mycroft, much less catch the older Holmes unaware. But it’s gratifying to see Sherlock actually being concerned, for all that he calls his brother an arch-enemy. John goes to make the tea before Sherlock can read his face.
Turns out that it’s markedly easier to get Sherlock to eat when he’s focused on the telly. John watches him finish a cup of tea and two slices of John’s toast whilst flipping between channels, so he runs out to get takeaway Chinese before the spell is broken. When John returns, Sherlock doesn’t appear to have moved, aside from the hand holding the remote. John sets out the oily, steaming boxes and presses a pair of chopsticks into his flatmate’s other hand.
They’re almost done with dinner when Sherlock finally goes, “oh.”
John braces himself for the subsequent frenzy of activity, but Sherlock just stares at the screen. A tightness, hardness, steals over his features, anger, slow and intense like John’s never seen before. Sherlock’s mercurial temperament is prone to bursts of temper, sharp and bright - this is different, something new.
“No, it’s old,” mutters Sherlock absently. He’s settled back into his chair, fingers steepled in front of him. Clearly thinking. Planning.
John clears away the boxes and puts the leftovers in the fridge. There’s a petri dish containing a pieces teeth that he has to move to a different shelf; he looks at the teeth and just knows, in a series of mental flashcards, that the jaw from which they had come had not quite reached adult growth... they’d been regularly used to bite down on hard candy, maybe ice... had a smoking habit, maybe...
He refills the kettle and plugs it in again. Moves to where he can see Sherlock, sitting so still, the shifting light-shapes on the telly giving his skin an electric glow. John had thought, before, that if the man ever snaps, Sherlock would go with a bang, a spark of genius finally unfettered and bursting outwards to wreak merry disaster on the world. But no, this is more frightening, the quiet and the focus, eviscerating, his natural detachment turned up to a laser.
“Mycroft received a threatening letter right before coming here,” says Sherlock, his voice a quiet rumble. Again, that slow thoughtfulness where he’d normally be spouting off deductions with manic energy. John realises, this is Sherlock being careful. “E-mail or text is possible, but infinitely more traceable, and these things usually involve a personal touch.”
“Not just any letter, though, I’d imagine,” John prompts him.
“Quite right,” agrees Sherlock. “He gets general death-threats on a daily basis. He sees opposition to his work as signs of accomplishment, indicators of the extent of his influence. No - this is especially personal. An old issue.” He points the remote at the telly and brings up the volume.
It’s BBC News, running a special on a recent rash of homophobic attacks in the public sector. Images flash on the screen: slurs spray-painted on cars, mutilated photographs sent in the mail, threatening emails and letters. The somber newsreader suggests that it’s the work of a small, local group, though none have claimed responsibility yet.
John clenches his hands, feels his nails digging into his palm. “This group has targeted Mycroft?”
Sherlock glances at him, eyebrows hitching up briefly before settling back down again. “Ah, yes, your sister.” He takes a breath. “I believe so. It’s the most likely hypothesis, considering the extremely limited list of things that can get under my brother’s skin. Quite juvenile, but that is why he was not expecting it.”
John wants to ask, is Mycroft being attacked because he’s gay, or because he has a gay brother? but he’s not sure it’s the thing to ask about someone who occasionally follows him around London via CCTV. He settles for aggressively thinking the question at Sherlock.
“Yes, Mycroft is homosexual,” answers Sherlock. “Though in terms of the sex he finds physically attractive, he is bisexual. But his personality and habits are more suited to male partners, so he identifies as homosexual.”
“Right.” The water is boiling. John makes them both a cuppa and settles into the other chair. “What are you going to do about it, then?”
“Work out the identity of this group, their goals, how they operate, etc. Hand me my mobile.”
“I’m fairly sure you’re sitting on it.”
John is half-expecting Sherlock to ask him to get it anyway. Sherlock doesn’t, and he even takes a sip of his tea whilst the other hand taps out a text. “I’d have thought Mycroft would have taken care of this particular chink in his armor by this point, though,” mutters Sherlock, frowning at the small screen.
Harry had been fifteen when she’d come out. Some kids do it gradually, but Harry had approached it like ripping off a plaster. It could have gone worse, but that had been the only time John truly wished he had the height and build to make other kids back off. “It never quite leaves you, I think,” says John quietly. “Being told you’re wrong. Being feared or hated when you express something that should make you happy. Not being trusted, because of something that’s part of you. And you usually realise when you’re a teenager, when you’re being walloped by hormones and identity issues at the same time.” Belatedly, he remembers who he’s talking to, but Sherlock just looks thoughtful again.
John’s not sure if Mycroft quite has Sherlock’s aversion to social interaction, but both Holmes seem well-matched intellectually. Those teenage years must have been... interesting.
There’s a knock on their door. John gets it and is somehow not at all surprised to find Mycroft’s assistant on the other side. She doesn’t look up from her Blackberry, just pushes a large envelop into his hand and goes back down the stairs. John tosses the envelope at Sherlock.
“Ah, the letter,” says Sherlock. “She must have been waiting outside. It’s worse than I thought.”
Of course Sherlock would have a direct line to his brother’s assistant. John shifts the piles on the table to a corner of the room before Sherlock can shove them all to the floor. The letter itself is three pages of cut and pasted letters. Sherlock sighs and makes a noise like the world has disappointed him. “Really? This is child’s play.”
John just gets the paper-testing kit from the bookshelf, and says nothing when Sherlock goes to work anyway.
Four hours later, Sherlock pushes open the door to a storage space in the back of a pub and walks inside with a swish of his coat. “Evening, gents.”
There’s a flurry of movement, the scraping of chair legs and a disorganized scattering of heavy-soled shoes. There are two ways in and out of the room, not counting the high windows, and a couple of the quicker men soon discover that the other door that leads into the pub has been locked fast from the other side.
“Cosy place,” says Sherlock casually. “Did you know that this room was once used to store tea-leaves? And part of the pub used to be a stable. It’s fascinating, the things that can get caught in glue.”
“Who are you?” demands one of the men.
“Unimportant.” Sherlock’s gaze sweeps over the array of fearful, confused, and angry faces staring at him. “I don’t care who you are, either, but you should know that I’ve compiled a list of your names and personal details for my records.”
One of the men, the biggest of the lot, growls and makes to rush at Sherlock. John takes that as his cue and slips out from the shadow outside the door where he’d been lurking. His Browning is already in his hand, and he kicks the door close behind him. He doesn’t bother to raise the gun, yet; all movement stills when the men see it.
“What do you want?” asks the man who’d spoken earlier.
“Immediate cessation of your current activities.” Sherlock’s expression turns scornful. “Normally these small-minded ventures are beneath my notice, but there is a line you have crossed, albeit in ignorance and lacking any sort of imagination whatsoever.” He sounds particularly put-out by the latter; John resists the urge to smile. “Nevertheless, I’m afraid I must put a stop to it.”
Another man lets out a dismissive huff. “Told you it wouldn’t be long before the fucking shirtlifters go running and crying.”
This seems to put the men back on familiar ground, for the rest of the group seem to suddenly find their voices. “And what are you two, the big gay superheroes?”
“- don’t send queers to do real men’s work-”
“- did we hurt your feelings, you fucking pansies?”
“Don’t fuckin’ come near me, you dirty bastards.”
“Perverted freaks.”
My God, John thinks, it’s even worse than all those playgrounds and schoolrooms and lonely walks home - he’s still one of the smallest in a room full of blokes, but now he’s got a bullet wound in the shoulder and a loaded gun in his hand.
Of course, even armed, John is aware of being only the second most dangerous person in the room.
“Your mother wasn’t converted into lesbianism by her girlfriend, Mr. Niall,” drawls Sherlock, blatantly unruffled. “I suspect it was your father’s alcoholism and penchant for using his fists on her that drove her away from your childhood home. You can ask him, if you would like to confirm,” says Sherlock, looking for all the world like he’s talking about the weather. “Mr. Schenck, the HIV virus does not, in fact, care about the sex or orientation of your intimate partners. Perhaps adhering to a medication regimen would be more beneficial to your well-being than citing religious text in order to equate homosexuality with disease...”
Eventually, one of the men does gain the presence of mind to attack Sherlock. It’s the big one, of course, and exactly when John had been expecting: after Sherlock points out that it’s hypocritical and childish for Mr. Allman to be throwing homophobic slurs at people just because he had homoerotic feelings towards his heterosexual roommate during university and said roommate turned him down.
John blinks at the charging man, and the weight of the gun is so familiar, so tempting. There’s a breathless moment, John’s thumb hovering over the safety - then his hand swings around and brings the butt of the gun crashing against the side of Theo Allman’s head.
The man hits the ground with a roar, leg lashing out. John dodges it easily, throws in another punch and a couple of kicks for good measure. He’d been worried about the man’s bulk, against his relatively smaller frame, but Theo clearly never learned how to use it. He slumps on the floor and starts swearing at John. Faggot. Die and burn in hell, homo. It’s not even worth anger, it’s just stupid and infuriating. John tucks his gun away and punches him on the jaw, textbook, body vibrating with the knowledge, the bloody memory of how much worse he can do.
“That’s my sister you’re talking about,” John forces the words out through gritted teeth. He grabs Theo by the hair; looks up and glares at the other men, and feels only a small thrill when they all take a step back. “Every person you call names and hate and wish dead is someone’s daughter, someone’s son. Maybe a brother, sister, father, mother. So fuck all of you.”
“John,” interjects Sherlock, low and calm.
John lets the man’s hair go and steps back. Sherlock lets the silence stand for a few seconds, eyeing everybody in the room.
“No more threats,” he finally says. “No more attacks. Not even so much as a pseudo-humorous post-it. As far as the world knows, this group never existed.”
“What are you going to do, sue us? Send us to jail?” says the man who’s been doing most of the talking. But John can hear the wavering note in his voice. “The police will have your descriptions by morning. We’ve got friends in the right places, you won’t be able to touch us.”
“I don’t need to.” Sherlock gives them an enigmatic smile. “My friends, you see, are down low, the lowest sort, and invisible. You all occupy mid-level positions in business or government, and this is the dirtiest your hands have ever gotten. My friends are the dark and the dirt, the debris you walk over every day, and you won’t see them coming. There won’t be a scandal for you to cover up, but everybody you know, everybody around you, will know every little secret you’ve tried to hide. I can make your life unpleasant in a hundred tiny, unavoidable ways. I could kill you easily - something slipped in your morning coffee, Mr. Niall, or a bee inexplicably finding its way into your bedroom, Mr. Cipriani, I believe you are deathly allergic to them.”
Sherlock strides up to them, passing each man close enough to breathe on them. “I can kill you, but I won’t. Instead, you’ll find your wallets picked, your expensive suits ruined, your neighbors looking at you with suspicion. Mysterious lipstick stains for your wives to find, unexplained charges on your bank statements. I want you to live every day wondering if people are talking about you, looking over your shoulder in case of another little ‘accident’. I want you to understand what you’re part of. And I can do it because you’ve spent your lives gazing upwards, cradled by bureaucracy - your sort never truly understand that there’s as much danger from below.” His voice drops, silky and dangerous, and John has to swallow, breathless. “You will go away, and there won’t be so much as a whisper from you again, or you will find out what it means to have London turn against you.”
A whirl of his coat, and Sherlock is striding out of the building. John follows him, mostly out of instinct, his mind still reeling from Sherlock’s words. Bugger that, Sherlock’s voice.
(The soldier in John’s soul envisions, for a moment, an alternative reality where Sherlock cares enough for a cause outside himself to dedicate that intellect and force of personality to a goal, to rallying people to him. Is Mycroft disappointed or relieved that he doesn’t? Then John realises - in that world, he wouldn’t feel any different, he’d still be caught in the Holmes orbit. Moreover, he would have to share; so really, he’s better off right where he is.)
“That was amazing,” he says, once they’re in a taxi. “Also, bloody frightening.”
Sherlock blinks at him. He looks genuinely surprised. “I was frightening?” He reaches between them, picks up John’s hand without a trace of self-consciousness. His palm is warm and dry under John’s, and gentle fingers trace over where John’s knuckles are already swelling up, the skin sensitive.
“Right, forgot about that,” admits John, a bit sheepish.
They don’t say anything else, but Sherlock doesn’t let go of John’s hand for the rest of the drive, and John doesn’t pull away. It’s strangely comfortable; even the usual tension between them is familiar. John doesn’t hide the way he’s staring at his friend.
He thinks of Mycroft, and remembers, He is the British government.
But what does that make Sherlock? Sherlock and his homeless network, his perfect knowledge of London’s streets, the way he can become a different person as easy as changing scarves. Sherlock finds government boring; individual people are less predictable, their problems far more intricate.
Back in their flat, John heads for the kitchen, saying, “Mycroft could have taken care of that lot without even leaving his car.” He feels Sherlock following close behind, so he turns and leans back on the counter. “But you still did it.” Mycroft must have known what Sherlock would do. And the fact that John realises this means Sherlock knows it too.
“If he became involved, it would become clear that this is his weak spot,” murmurs Sherlock quietly. He drifts closer, crowding John up against the counter. He’s still wearing his coat.
The two of you make things unnecessarily convoluted. John slips his hands under Sherlock’s coat, gliding his palms over that long, lean body and pushing the thick fabric off his shoulders. Sherlock leans down, and John breathes in the scent of him, of the city; a shared breath, and then they’re kissing, soft and hot, and John happily drowns in the onslaught of Sherlock’s full attention.
Later, in bed, John uses his lips on Sherlock’s skin to say, I know how important it is, for there to be a difference between the things you say and the things you do. I know which one matters.
He’s trying to catch his breath when the words tumble out, “Harry and I never got on.” Sherlock is sprawled out beneath him, sweetly pliant in the way he can be only after sex. “Can’t talk for five minutes without arguing. She knows all my weaknesses, all my childhood mistakes.” I’ve hit people for her. When I was dying in Afghanistan, I wanted to hear her shout at me one more time.
Sherlock wordlessly cards a hand through his hair, and the other hand closes over the knuckles that must be starting to bruise.
In the morning, a brand new electric kettle is sitting in the kitchen, one of those shiny high-end ones, and they somehow have six months worth of tea in the cupboard. There’s a conspicuous lack of comment from Sherlock, though he eyes the old kettle in a worryingly calculating manner. John just shakes his head and starts figuring out where to put the water in the new contraption.
+++ end +++