Prompting Part XXXII
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"May I?"
"Yeah." Relief was written in every line of his body, but the way Lestrade sighed the word made it sound like defeat. He waved Mycroft to the opposite seat. "Go on, then."
As Mycroft settled himself, his brandy, and his omnipresent umbrella, Lestrade added, "Not the wisest thing, though, being seen with me. You should realise that."
Mycroft brushed imaginary lint from his sleeve. "If all goes well, neither of us will be seen." He watched Lestrade from the corner of his eye. "I've followed the reports in the press. They've been…"
"Brutal?" Lestrade shook with mirthless laughter as he revolved his glass in ninety-degree turns between his fingers. "Yeah."
"I expect that explains your new 'look.'"
Lestrade smoothed a hand over the silver-streaked beard at his jaw and gave a diffident shrug. "If it puts one reporter or photographer off my trail, I reckon it's worth it."
The beard suited him, but Mycroft didn't say so.
"About the suspension, the hearing" - this was harder than Mycroft expected, as he had little practice with such an admission - "there was nothing I could do."
Lestrade looked up at that, and genuine surprise creased his brow. "Never asked you, did I?"
"You did not," Mycroft confirmed.
"We both know if the inquiry's legit, they'll find in my favour. Sherlock was the real thing, and I did my due diligence with every case he consulted on. Every deduction he made was backed up with old-fashioned police work by my team. We couldn't have gotten convictions otherwise. Any honest investigation will confirm it." The words came as a rush. Rehearsed. Repeated, if only to himself.
For several heartbeats, blue eyes held brown. "And you think it will be an honest investigation," Mycroft said.
Lestrade looked away first. Very deliberately, he raised his pint and took several long swallows. Once he'd replaced the glass on its coaster, he murmured, "'Course not."
Mycroft nodded and readied the script he'd prepared. But Lestrade surprised him.
"How are you, Mycroft? Really?"
And how was he meant to answer that? He still lived in his familiar home; he still held his accustomed position. He still possessed a full staff dedicated to his safety and support. Lestrade could claim none of these things.
"Yeah, I thought so," Lestrade said, very softly. "I miss him, too. God, I'm so sorry."
Mycroft blinked.
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"In part, I was going to ask you the same question." Mycroft forced the conversation back toward the path he'd intended. "A man in your line of work accumulates enemies, Greg. And the media coverage of your suspension has announced in no uncertain terms that you're now alone and unarmed-"
"-and that my superiors wouldn't exactly call out the cavalry if one morning I turned up missing. In fact, they'd probably be relieved." Lestrade grimaced. "I can read between the lines, you know."
Mycroft crossed his arms. "And yet you're here on your own."
Lestrade returned his gaze frankly. Sleeplessness and stress and no little grief had drawn new lines on his face and framed his eyes with shadows. "Am I supposed to respond to that, or just sit here like a good lad while you deduce everything you want to know?"
Before Mycroft could reply, Lestrade said, "No, don't answer. I'm here because if I'd spent another minute in that empty flat I might've decided to drink myself to death rather than wait for any hearing or enemies to catch up with me. At least if I drink in public, I know I'll stop."
He took a measured breath and managed to appear both embarrassed and defiant as he began to trace the grain of the wooden armrest with a finger.
"I'm staring down fifty with no marriage, no home, just twenty-six-plus years on the job, and the bureaucrats want me to walk away from that for their convenience. And I can't. I won't. Not if they demote me down to constable or worse. It's all I have, and I'll not apologise for doing my job, and I'll not make it easy for them to push me aside just because I believed in a man who helped me catch murderers - a man who deserved, who still deserves, my loyalty and respect."
After a beat, he looked up. His self-deprecating grin didn't quite reach his eyes as he added, "And it would be a hell of a lot easier to salvage whatever dignity I have left if you weren't staring at me like some specimen under a microscope."
As forthrightness met finesse headlong, any awkwardness between them was familiar enough to be almost comforting.
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Lestrade actually laughed, a throaty, unexpected sound. "Doing what, pray tell? Washing your windows? Shining your shoes?" He ran a palm over his mouth, pausing to scratch at his new beard before waving a hand to dismiss the notion. "You forget I've seen your people, Mycroft. They're half my age with twice my education."
"And only a small fraction of your experience," Mycroft countered. "And none of why I trusted you with my brother's welfare in the first place."
At Lestrade's raised eyebrow, Mycroft added, "Surely you recall the warehouse. What was it? Almost seven years ago."
"Bit of a blur, really. I remember thinking you were going to have me shot. I remember trying not to piss myself." Lestrade shook his head, lips quirking. "And I remember telling you what you could do with your money and your spy games."
"Ah, I was thinking of that last part, yes."
Lestrade leaned forward and began to reach out, but he halted before he touched Mycroft's arm. He'd not consumed nearly enough alcohol in the long or short term, Mycroft thought, to make his eyes quite as bloodshot as they were.
"Ta for the offer," Lestrade said gruffly, "but no, I'm not your mess to clean up. Made my own bed, didn't I? Now to lie in it."
Mycroft drew a breath to protest, but Lestrade cut him off with a gesture.
After a swallow that nearly drained his glass, Lestrade rose - no trace of unsteadiness there - and ducked his head. "This was good of you, Mycroft. Very good. I won't forget it. Whatever happens."
He left without looking back, drawing his coat around his body like armour, hunching into the anonymity it promised.
Raising a hand in a final salute.
Six days later, Mycroft's surveillance team reported that Greg Lestrade was nowhere to be found.
***
TBC...
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*pulls up a chair*
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He took a deep breath. Then another. He counted to ten.
He reopened his door. Mycroft Holmes continued to loom there like a particularly grim example of civic sculpture.
John gave a short, sharp shake of his head and then thrust out his chin. "Right. This? This is not going to happen. This isn't my life anymore, Mycroft." He pointed at the chest of the elder Holmes as he bit his tirade into brittle, staccato phrases. "I'm not going to find you. Standing on my doorstep. Or following me. In your big, black car. If you're running low on minions, pop off to the shop. Buy more. Whatever this is, my answer's no."
"Are you quite through, John?" The silky voice was very hushed, the long body very still. "Because I'm here on a matter that's most urgent indeed."
"I have more," John admitted, "but I think I hit the high points."
Narrowing his eyes, John realised he was unsure how to read the Mycroft who stood before him. He knew from experience that the Holmes brothers had always manifested the emotions they claimed not to possess in startling different ways. It was a disconcerting thought that this might be Mycroft afraid.
What could the man possibly have left to fear, when the worst already had happened on the pavement below St Bart's?
Despite his better judgment, John took a step back and allowed Mycroft to enter.
Suddenly aware of how the pathetic the sterile sitting room with its stacks of unpacked boxes must appear, he mumbled, "I'm not exactly… settled." God, what an understatement. And what an accurate assessment of his life.
Mycroft, however, displayed a rather unHolmesian disinterest in observing his surroundings.
"So what's this about?" John prodded.
After a moment's pause, Mycroft said, "Have you seen or spoken to Lestrade recently?"
John frowned. "No. If you haven't noticed, we've both contracted a kind of social disease; neither of us can buy a tin of beans without inciting some kind of media orgy. It’s far worse for him now than for me. I reckoned any contact would only double the problem."
Not that there was much to say. Each knew the other still believed in the man they'd both lost. That was enough.
John's thoughts marched unbidden to their half-shy conversation after the graveside service. It had been an exercise in anguish, as each man clumsily had attempted to absolve the other of guilt too weighty to carry. Greg was sorry Sherlock had ever been put in handcuffs. John was sorry they'd ever removed them.
"The media orgy, as you put it," Mycroft said, "has effectively declared open hunting season on Lestrade. Now he's missing and, I have good reason to believe, in mortal danger."
"Wait. What?" John shifted, replanted his feet. "I don't understand."
"I need to know now: will you help me save his life, if it can be saved?"
Dozens of questions chased each other across John's mind, scrambling his thoughts, until his consciousness centred on a single image: Greg Lestrade in St Bart's, eyes wet, face grey, arms wrapped around himself in a parody of an embrace as John recounted Sherlock's final words. Mrs Hudson had wept. Molly Hooper had excused herself. Mycroft Holmes had stared into the distance.
Greg Lestrade, however, had spluttered, "What? I can't. It doesn't." He'd cleared his throat. Finally, he'd settled on, "Well, that's a load of bollocks, and we all know it."
Answers could wait.
John met Mycroft's guarded expression and, nodding, drew himself up. "Anything I can do. What do you need?"
"Bring your medical bag," Mycroft instructed. "And your service pistol."
***
TBC...
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Oh, I agree wholeheartedly!!!!
Thanks so much for reading and for your kind words. :)
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After some time Mycroft straightened and turned toward the darkness between them. "It appears members of the Carlson clan are the culprits. They're known for their patience and long memory, and their patriarch vowed vengeance after the youngest Carlson son was convicted for murder some years ago. Lestrade was the DI in charge of investigating the case."
He held out his mobile for John to view.
"Fortunately for us," Mycroft continued, "the youngest Carlson generation is comprised of imbeciles."
A film clip began to play. The jerky, blurred image resolved into the curled fingers of a male hand that was bound at the wrist with a zip tie. John looked with a doctor's eyes, noting the bruising of the knuckles, the drying streaks of gore.
"See 'ere?" came a youthful sneer. "'Ere's the line where a ring used to be. No one's waitin' at home for ya anymore, eh, Inspector? No one's keepin' yer bed warm?"
Laughter sounded from two different sources. With nauseating fits and starts, the camera pulled back to show an angled view of the owner of the hand: Greg Lestrade.
His sound eye, the one that wasn't swollen shut, shifted slightly as his captors moved, tracking their positions without acknowledging them directly. He'd been beaten bloody and secured to a chair. The tautness of his posture and the restraint of his breathing spoke of considerable pain. John feared internal injuries were a real possibility.
"What'd she do," a second voice chimed in, "find a real man?"
John was grimacing at the cruel taunt even before a gloved hand darted out and closed around Lestrade's naked ring finger. A sickening crack followed, and Lestrade thrashed once in his bonds, hissing through clenched teeth.
"Oi!" A shout from an older man. "Thattaphone? Whatthefuckyathinkyerdo-"
The frame span wildly, and the clip ended.
John closed his eyes.
"This footage was taken approximately twelve hours ago," Mycroft noted.
"Twelve hours?! But-"
Mycroft half-raised his hand in a mute plea for silence. "Even I don't have unlimited resources, and handling this… situation… requires circumspection until we're certain who contributed to it - by both commission and omission. But we may yet have time."
"God, Mycroft, in twelve hours…" The words died on John's lips.
"They'll be in no hurry." Mycroft's tone had gone flat, utterly devoid of any expression. "They'll want their fun."
John swallowed, clenching and unclenching his fist. He wanted to clutch his medical kit to his chest. He wanted to draw his weapon from his back.
He wanted to hit someone very, very hard.
"I was so alone," he'd said once, not long ago, at the grave of his best friend.
Now he thought of Lestrade, and "alone" took on a whole new meaning.
***
TBC...
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This is brilliant! I'm eagerly awaiting more of this. Poor Lestrade! *frets*
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Things are about to get very unpleasant for our gallant DI... D: WOE!
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"Why are you doing this? I didn't think daring rescues fell under your job description. I thought you were more about" - he flapped his hand vaguely - "kidnappings and interrogations. You know, making inconvenient people disappear."
Pushing, halfway hoping Mycroft would push back.
Dear God, but he missed Sherlock.
"The night is still young, Doctor." Silk and steel both in that answer, and despite himself John felt his insides warm a bit, imagining what might be in store for the Carlson clan. "Besides, if I don't, who will? I hardly think ringing up the police is the strategy called for here."
But it wasn't enough. "If you wanted to help Greg, though, why wait 'til now, when he's lost everything? Why not help him keep his warrant card?"
It felt a bit surreal, this conversation in the dark, sheltered from the black night by tinted windows, shadow upon shadow upon shadow.
"We are all constrained by our positions." Mycroft's words took on the cadence of a lecture. "To overstep one's boundaries is to jeopardise the very power one has to be of service. Lestrade understands this. That's why he didn't defy his DCI when he was ordered to arrest Sherlock; he knew that if he were to be disciplined or removed, he'd be unable to serve as Sherlock's inside advocate and assist my brother in clearing his name."
After a lengthy pause, Mycroft added a subdued, "There was nothing I could do."
Whether Mycroft was referring now to Lestrade or Sherlock or both, John couldn't be certain.
This begged the question, of course, of why Mycroft cared, why he'd expend his energy on a man who could no longer be of use to him and his various Machiavellian machinations.
In true Holmesian fashion, Mycroft seemed to read John's mind. "We three share a unique bond, John, whether you appreciate it or not. We are the men who, at one time or another - and on multiple occasions - saved the life of my brother."
Not what John expected, this.
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John had no answer, but he doubted Mycroft expected one.
"I walked him through the doors of a dozen of the most exclusive rehabilitation facilities in Europe, and he walked or crawled or ran or climbed back out again - in some cases, before my car had left the lot. But he went willingly to Lestrade's office. And spare sofa. And, once he was clean, crime scenes."
Clues began to fall together in John's mind, puzzle pieces at last finding their missing matches.
He recalled Lestrade's unexpected appearance in Dartmoor, and his token protest at being considered nothing more than the elder Holmes's errand boy. He'd never denied close association with the man, or long familiarity.
Sherlock had suggested that Mycroft thought of Lestrade as his "handler"; the level of trust this implied from a man who worried about his brother constantly was extraordinary, John realised. How long had Mycroft tested the man, observed him, to discover his true worth?
Then John thought of that most fateful night, that ridiculous and amazing night, when he'd entered the circle of panda cars and ambulances, half expecting to be led away in handcuffs for the shooting of the cabbie. Mycroft's black sedan had pulled up beside the police tape and parked there, and Lestrade's team hadn't looked twice. They'd treated the presence of the "minor government official" as commonplace. Expected.
John had left the scene with Sherlock, giggling and flying high on the wings of adrenaline and wonder and rediscovered strength, whilst Mycroft had shown no intention of departing. Had he stayed to compare notes? To conspire?
To chat?
Mycroft's distress when he'd knocked on John's door less half an hour ago took on new significance.
"You… you're friends."
Not that he couldn't picture Greg as the friendly sort. Far from it. John had enjoyed more than one evening of pints and football and darts with the man and appreciated his company.
But Mycroft...
"A man in my position has no friends, John," Mycroft said at last, with an edge to his voice that John couldn't identify. "But if he's fortunate, he may have allies. And if he's intelligent, he will protect those allies whenever he's able to do so."
Just then Mycroft's phone vibrated with a plaintive buzzing sound. Its antiseptic blue-white glow bathed his chin and nose and brow as he studied an incoming text.
His expression didn't change, but he inhaled sharply.
"What?" John said. "What is it?"
Instead of replying, Mycroft thumbed the intercom to speak to the driver. "We have new information. I'm sending you the details of the destination."
Then, with several taps to his mobile, "Change of plan, my dear. I'm sending you new directions. Coordinate with the other team. Arrange for an ATV as well as an ambulance. Time is of the essence."
"Mycroft, what is it?"
"According to my source, Lestrade's been removed."
"Removed." Why couldn't any Holmes bloody say what he bloody meant? "You mean removed from that room in the video?"
"From that room. From that building. From London itself." Mycroft's eyes remained trained on his phone. "Taken to the countryside. Disposed of."
***
TBC...
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"A man in my position has no friends, John," Mycroft said at last, with an edge to his voice that John couldn't identify. "But if he's fortunate, he may have allies. And if he's intelligent, he will protect those allies whenever he's able to do so."
Loved this - quintessentially Mycroft, in that it can be read in several different ways at once!
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