From Which Love Grows 13: An Identity
Title: From Which Loves Grows 13: An Identity
Author: red_chapel
Word Count: 3364
Rating: PG+
Characters: Sherlock, John, Lestrade, Mycroft
At a car park the following afternoon, while Sherlock gave his usual performance scouring the scene, Lestrade took the opportunity to start his own investigation.
The small blond man was not the first person that Sherlock had ever brought or called to a crime scene. Over the five years that Lestrade had been consulting Sherlock, he had seen the detective in contact with eight different persons not related to the incident at hand. Five of these were plainly members of the Homeless Network to which Sherlock occasionally referred: their dress, their movements, their eyes-all spoke of life on the street. They were all seen to arrive with or be sent for some item or information that Sherlock required. Another person had approached Sherlock as Lestrade and his team watched from a nearby alley, waiting for Sherlock to give the signal to close in on a suspect. It was obvious from that interaction that the stranger had mistaken the pale, gaunt youth on the street corner as being there for a particular purpose, and that he had been set straight with impressive ferocity. Then there was the large, affable former convict-Lestrade remembered the B&E he’d done time for and the murders he hadn’t-that once brought Sherlock a hot lunch on a cold day. Before Donovan was done with her mocking comments on Sherlock’s oft-made assertion that he never ate while working, one of his homeless arrived with a note and left with the food. Finally, although appearing before any of the others, on just the second case Sherlock had worked for him, there was The Brother: tall like Sherlock, with eyes that cut through you just the same, but apparently enjoying far more money and resources than the younger Holmes. Lestrade would never forget the chilling dockside chat with The Brother, the offer that had been made, his own refusal, the way the man had chuckled at the thought of being charged with kidnapping or attempted bribery of a police officer.
Each of these people had been dismissed and sent away after Sherlock was done with them. (Well, The Brother had not been so much dismissed as ignored into non-existence.) At the end of the day, Sherlock always left alone.
Until this ‘John’ had delivered his phone just days prior. John, standing at Sherlock’s side like he belonged there, had neither looked nor acted homeless; could not, from his appearance, have been a relative. Lestrade couldn’t recall his face from previous attendance on Sherlock or from the too-numerous mug shots that he had fixed in his brain. A different type of acquaintance, then. One that left with Sherlock and was included in his use of the word ‘we’. Lestrade had given Sherlock five minutes to examine the scene; he gave himself the same time to examine the stranger.
‘John, wasn’t it?’ John, focused on Sherlock, had not noticed Lestrade walk up behind him.
‘What? Oh. Yeah. Yes, Detective Inspector.’ John thrust his hands firmly into his trouser pockets and moved a short step away.
‘John -?’ Lestrade prompted.
‘John. Yes.’ Recognizing that Lestrade was searching for another name, John nodded toward Sherlock. ‘You call him in quite a bit, don’t you?’
Lestrade shifted his gaze to Sherlock, on his back, straining to examine a car’s undercarriage. ‘I guess I do’, he acknowledged, slipping his hands into his pockets and adopting an easy stance. ‘He likes the weird cases and we get our fair share of them at the Met. Always seems to figure them out in the end. Known him long?’ he inquired, turning back to John.
‘All my life’, John offered with a small smile.
‘Really? Huh.’ Seeing the slight question in John’s expression, he added, ‘It’s just I would have thought he was a fair bit younger than you is all.’
‘Oh. Well, you know. Approximately all my life.’ Lestrade gave a quick, indulgent smile.
‘So’s he always been like this?’ Lestrade nodded toward Sherlock, magnifier in hand, now manically circling the support pylon against which the car pinned the lower half of a body.
‘As long as I’ve known him’, John offered. Lestrade’s smile changed to one of sympathy.
‘And what do you do? When you’re not following Sherlock to crime scenes.’
‘The housework, mostly. And reading, learning whatever I can.’
‘Ah, unemployed then?’
‘Yes. But, a lot of people are these days, yeah?’ he added, emphasizing his normalcy.
‘Yeah. Which doesn’t help the crime rate any. How’s your neighbourhood that way? You live nearby?’
‘221B Baker Street’, John recited. ‘I don’t think there’s much crime there.’
Lestrade’s brows peaked as he looked from John to Sherlock and back again. ‘You’re living with Sherlock?’
‘Yes.’ John nodded confirmation.
‘Ohh.’ Lestrade crossed his arms over his chest and John felt his scrutiny intensify. It was as if the detective were employing Sherlock’s methods, cataloguing and considering, albeit in a slow and obvious fashion. Sherlock must have felt it, too, because he just then left off his search and looked to John and Lestrade.
Striding toward them, he asked, ‘Problem, Detective Inspector?’
Lestrade answered affably, ‘No, no, just getting to know your flatmate here.’ There was a hesitation before ‘flatmate’, a question in the word.
‘Wouldn’t your time be better spent examining the crime scene, doing your job so I don’t have to?’ Lestrade’s smile disappeared. ‘You needn’t worry; John’s not the criminal element you’re all so afraid I’ll take up with.’ At Lestrade’s look, he continued, ‘Oh, come on, Lestrade. I’m quite familiar with your “analysing the suspect” look.’
‘Professional hazard’, the detective granted. Returning to his friendly demeanour, he asked, ‘So where did you two meet?’
‘St. Bart’s. Couple of months ago. I was looking for a flatmate and so was John. Mutual acquaintance introduced us.’
While Sherlock smiled, pleased with the back-story he’d been developing for them, John’s face froze. Lestrade looked quite interested in the reactions of both men. ‘Really?’
‘Something wrong with two men taking a flat share together?’
‘Not at all. Except, John just said he’s known you all his life.’
Sherlock turned enough to hide his scowl at John from the Inspector’s interested gaze. Before he’d turned back to offer further fabrications, John jumped in. ‘It’s just that I feel like my life began when I met Sherlock.’ He smiled and hoped he’d said the right thing. Lestrade’s shock was unmistakable, as was his effort to hide the grin that followed it.
‘What a lovely sentiment, John’, Sherlock said tightly. He then addressed himself solely to Lestrade, providing the DI with a physical description and two probable motives for the murderer, as well as several places to begin looking for the missing top half of the body. On his final word he launched himself at the exit, his long strides requiring John, agog yet from Sherlock’s rapid analysis of the scene, to jog to catch up.
‘Thanks’, Lestrade called after them, allowing his grin full expression. ‘I’ll be talking to you, John.’
John wanted desperately to know just how he had erred-he knew he had-but didn’t dare to ask. Three blocks away, Sherlock halted and spun on him.
‘“I feel like my life began when I met Sherlock”? Really, John, however did you come up with such a thing?’
‘It was in a show on the telly, something Mrs Hudson was watching. Seemed like it might fit.’
‘Well, it didn’t.’ Sherlock resumed his march home.
‘What was I supposed to say?’ John asked from three paces behind.
‘You might consider saying nothing if that’s the best you can come up with.’
‘I had to say something-he was asking questions.’ John jogged forward again. ‘I told you people would talk to me.’
‘And I told you to say nothing. Let me handle the talking.’
‘I did say nothing when he wanted my last name.’ Struggling to stay abreast of Sherlock, he leaned in slightly and spoke lower. ‘I think I should have a last name. Won’t people wonder?’
Sherlock stopped again and stared hard at John. Finally his face relaxed a bit as he said, ‘Yes. They will; you should. Obviously I brought you out too soon.’ He turned and resumed walking, now at a slower pace that accommodated John’s shorter stride, and began enumerating the items John required: ‘Last name. Place and date of birth. A fleshed-out story of how we met.’ He cast a displeased glance at John on that one. ‘And now, with Lestrade’s suspicions raised, an official, documented presence. He will look into your background once he gets a full name from you. He isn’t quite the idiot his peers are.’
‘“Official, documented presence”. And how do we do that?’
‘Through official channels, of course.’
On reaching the flat, they sat down to discuss possibilities, but Sherlock spoke less and stared out the window more as time passed. Eventually John abandoned attempts at talking with him. He left a cup of tea at Sherlock’s side and took his pot to his room.
At some later hour, Sherlock took up his violin, tuning it as he glanced over the notes John had taken that night. All worthless, he knew. He cleared his head with a tempestuous bit of Paganini, then settled into Sarasate’s Romanza Andaluza, his body moving in harmony with its passionate grace. Mind cleared and focused, he could apply himself afresh to the problem at hand.
The problem was not in creating an identity-Sherlock could easily construct the story of John’s supposed existence. Nor was the problem in obtaining the necessary documents, records, and accounts to give proof to the lie-Sherlock knew enough of the right people, was owed enough favours, that it could be accomplished within the week. Even Lestrade or some other official down the line verifying John’s background posed no threat as the documents would be real, official, indisputable. The problem was much as it ever was: outwitting and outmanoeuvring Mycroft.
Mycroft would notice-must already have noticed-the extra person living at 221B. He also would have looked into the identity of this man and found that he had none. Would have found no matching face in any database in Britain. Would have extended his investigations to other countries, perhaps. Certainly would have started a record of John’s actions, interactions, and modest travels around London. Considered now, it was a wonder that Sherlock had not already had a visit from his brother since John’s appearance. Or that John hadn’t been scooped up off the pavement and whisked away to a private meeting in an empty warehouse.
I’ve been too distracted, he thought. Absorbed in John, like a child with a new toy. It was time to rectify that situation.
Sherlock stretched out on the sofa, hands held prayer-like under his chin, and thought.
He took as working facts: 1) John had been noticed; Mycroft had been curious. 2) John had been discovered to be a non-entity; Mycroft had been intrigued. 3) John’s sudden transformation into an entity would bring Mycroft to full attention, that attention brought to bear on both John and Sherlock. 4) Mycroft could, would use evidence of this illicit creation of an identity at some future time, far or near, to manipulate Sherlock. 5) Worst of all, John would be imperilled by Mycroft’s attention. What would the man who was often the British government itself do with a being like John?
When John returned to the sitting room the next morning, he found Sherlock at the window, in the very posture that he’d last seen him the night before, untouched tea cold beside him. He moved softly to take up the cup and empty it into his pot. As he was placing the container on the ledge, Sherlock spoke: ‘I think, John, it’s time you met my brother.’
The hardest part was the phone call. Sherlock knew the words he would have to use and, even knowing how worthy the cause and that using Mycroft in this way was a victory in itself, it galled him still to use them.
‘Hello.’ Mycroft’s voice held the slightest note of question.
‘Hello, Mycroft.’ A silence, each brother waiting on the other.
Finally: ‘I haven’t the time for games, Sherlock. If you’re going to tell me to piss off again, best to keep it to texting.’
‘I-’ Sherlock stopped, swallowed, ploughed on. ‘There’s something I need.’
And that was all it took to cause the British government to close up shop and make an early day of it. That single word-need-without a negative modifier, entirely lacking in rancour or sarcasm, spoken by a man that had forgotten the little boy he had been. To the only man left who remembered that little boy and all the unanswered needs of his youth.
A short hour later, Mycroft Holmes, for the first time in his adult life, was courteously invited into his brother’s home. It was John that opened the door, led him upstairs, and offered to take his umbrella, but Sherlock sat almost demurely in his chair by the fireplace and did nothing to impede this flow of events.
Brief introductions were made. Tea was offered. Unnecessary pleasantries were omitted. Mycroft seldom took his eyes from his brother, but his interest never left John.
And then, without prelude or explanation, knowing that Mycroft already had a file full of the lack of information on John, Sherlock made his audacious request: an identity for his friend. Mycroft noted the use of that word, tucked it away for future consideration, and studied Sherlock, then John, then Sherlock again.
‘But where does John come from and why doesn’t he already have an identity?’ Mycroft would ask the annoying questions.
‘I don’t think you really want to know the answer to that’, Sherlock replied briskly. Mycroft tilted an eyebrow. ‘You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. It’s too fantastic.’
‘Sherlock, of the many things you have been in life, you have never descended to being-fanciful.’ He spoke the word with a moue of disdain. ‘If you tell me the truth, of course I will believe you.’
Sherlock stared at his brother. Mycroft stared back. John sat silently on the arm of the couch, giving the brothers wide berth. Mycroft had taken his chair upon entering, but John didn’t mind; having had Sherlock’s brief telling of the animosity between them, he preferred to be well away from the action.
Sherlock drew a breath and reconsidered their options one last time. But this was the only option: not to entice Mycroft’s scrutiny through subterfuge, but to draw it fully onto himself and John both; shock him, allow him the favour of granting a favour, and share a truth that Sherlock would another day fight valiantly to hide. Mycroft couldn’t be expected to make it easy. Fine, then, if the truth is what he wants. Sherlock wouldn’t regret keeping from John earlier the acknowledged necessity of telling his secret now.
‘John came out of a plant. Out of its flower, actually. In point of fact, he is the flower.’
Mycroft studied his brother: face, manner, posture. He knew well what a brilliant actor and liar Sherlock was, but he also knew how to see through his acts and lies as only a brother-as only Mycroft-could. And he saw that Sherlock was speaking the truth, or at least what he believed to be the truth; but Sherlock was very good at discerning the truth, too, so what he claimed to be a fact could generally be taken as such. Mycroft also knew the plain fact that people did not spring from plants, that they could never actually be flowers. John was a flower; John could not be a flower. Two facts, each contradicting the other. Mycroft hated those kinds of facts. Always so inconvenient.
So Mycroft considered John and the man’s reaction as Sherlock had spoken. He had startled at Sherlock’s statement. A quick sidelong glance confirmed the fear remaining on his face. Startled and afraid that Sherlock had revealed his secret, but not astonished at the explanation as he would be if Sherlock had fabricated so extraordinary a tale on the spot. So, this man believed himself to be a flower and wanted to keep that a secret. And apparently they had agreed that the secret would be kept. In the span of two blinks, Mycroft ran through dozens of possible means of reconciling all of the facts before him, but the facts simply would not allow themselves to be reconciled. Therefore, Mycroft took the only option left to him.
‘Show me’, he said, smiling pleasantly.
Sherlock turned to John. Some wordless accord was reached and John nodded, the panic melting from his face to be replaced with a stoicism that would be the envy of any British male.
‘Very well’, Sherlock said, turning back to Mycroft.
John stood and walked to the window, tucking himself out of sight from the street behind the drapes. Sherlock did not turn away from his brother, but watched John’s transformation as revealed by Mycroft’s expression: eyes narrowing as John walked to the window, preparing to analyse whatever data were presented; eyes widening as John shifted size and shape, effectively disappearing; narrowing again as he tried to process what he had seen. Sherlock was fairly beaming at his brother’s perceptible confusion and discomfort. Oh, it’s Christmas! Mycroft stood and moved slowly to the window to look down at the simple potted plant, an actual look of perplexity on his face.
He peered down at the blossom, trying to discern anything like a human shape. Leaned closer, squinted, leaned back. He had raised his umbrella barely an inch off the floor when Sherlock informed him: ‘If that umbrella or any part of you gets any closer to John, I will kill you with your own handkerchief.’
Mycroft let the umbrella hang in the air a moment, then rested it on the floor again.
‘He can come back, I assume.’
‘Of course’, Sherlock replied. ‘Step back and he can reappear right now.’ Mycroft obliged, never taking his eyes from the curious plant. ‘John, if you would.’
The bloom released itself from its stem and fell into the soil below as a tiny humanoid figure that jumped over the edge of the pot and grew suddenly back into John-the-apparent-human. Mycroft made note of the facts that would have to be changed and looked John in the eye.
‘What sort of identity would you like?’
The identity that Mycroft delivered four days later was actually borrowed, which saved work, he said, in coming up with the details. There were no difficulties with his first name, and John gained the sturdy-sounding surname of Watson. The John Watson that had been was an army doctor that had served in Afghanistan for nearly the entire war and occupation. He had met an unfortunate end five months before, having been shot through the shoulder and bled out on the field of battle before another medic could arrive to save him. He had spent little time in England during those years, given instead to taking his leave in explorations of other countries and, it was reported, the female inhabitants thereof. His parents were dead. His only family was an estranged, alcoholic sister that would likely never notice that her brother’s identity had been co-opted for a stranger’s use. The identity even served to provide John with a small income, as Dr. Watson was granted a pension in recognition of what he had lost in service to his country. Official records were re-written to reflect that Capt Watson had been saved in the nick of time and invalided home to London and that the doctor held a particular interest in pharmacognosy.
On the occasion of his becoming a citizen, as it were, Mycroft presented John with a wallet containing his ID and bank card. Sherlock gave him a text on general medicine. John gave them both his thanks and set about becoming John H. Watson, MD.
Master Post 12: Developments 14: Realisations
Author: red_chapel
Word Count: 3364
Rating: PG+
Characters: Sherlock, John, Lestrade, Mycroft
At a car park the following afternoon, while Sherlock gave his usual performance scouring the scene, Lestrade took the opportunity to start his own investigation.
The small blond man was not the first person that Sherlock had ever brought or called to a crime scene. Over the five years that Lestrade had been consulting Sherlock, he had seen the detective in contact with eight different persons not related to the incident at hand. Five of these were plainly members of the Homeless Network to which Sherlock occasionally referred: their dress, their movements, their eyes-all spoke of life on the street. They were all seen to arrive with or be sent for some item or information that Sherlock required. Another person had approached Sherlock as Lestrade and his team watched from a nearby alley, waiting for Sherlock to give the signal to close in on a suspect. It was obvious from that interaction that the stranger had mistaken the pale, gaunt youth on the street corner as being there for a particular purpose, and that he had been set straight with impressive ferocity. Then there was the large, affable former convict-Lestrade remembered the B&E he’d done time for and the murders he hadn’t-that once brought Sherlock a hot lunch on a cold day. Before Donovan was done with her mocking comments on Sherlock’s oft-made assertion that he never ate while working, one of his homeless arrived with a note and left with the food. Finally, although appearing before any of the others, on just the second case Sherlock had worked for him, there was The Brother: tall like Sherlock, with eyes that cut through you just the same, but apparently enjoying far more money and resources than the younger Holmes. Lestrade would never forget the chilling dockside chat with The Brother, the offer that had been made, his own refusal, the way the man had chuckled at the thought of being charged with kidnapping or attempted bribery of a police officer.
Each of these people had been dismissed and sent away after Sherlock was done with them. (Well, The Brother had not been so much dismissed as ignored into non-existence.) At the end of the day, Sherlock always left alone.
Until this ‘John’ had delivered his phone just days prior. John, standing at Sherlock’s side like he belonged there, had neither looked nor acted homeless; could not, from his appearance, have been a relative. Lestrade couldn’t recall his face from previous attendance on Sherlock or from the too-numerous mug shots that he had fixed in his brain. A different type of acquaintance, then. One that left with Sherlock and was included in his use of the word ‘we’. Lestrade had given Sherlock five minutes to examine the scene; he gave himself the same time to examine the stranger.
‘John, wasn’t it?’ John, focused on Sherlock, had not noticed Lestrade walk up behind him.
‘What? Oh. Yeah. Yes, Detective Inspector.’ John thrust his hands firmly into his trouser pockets and moved a short step away.
‘John -?’ Lestrade prompted.
‘John. Yes.’ Recognizing that Lestrade was searching for another name, John nodded toward Sherlock. ‘You call him in quite a bit, don’t you?’
Lestrade shifted his gaze to Sherlock, on his back, straining to examine a car’s undercarriage. ‘I guess I do’, he acknowledged, slipping his hands into his pockets and adopting an easy stance. ‘He likes the weird cases and we get our fair share of them at the Met. Always seems to figure them out in the end. Known him long?’ he inquired, turning back to John.
‘All my life’, John offered with a small smile.
‘Really? Huh.’ Seeing the slight question in John’s expression, he added, ‘It’s just I would have thought he was a fair bit younger than you is all.’
‘Oh. Well, you know. Approximately all my life.’ Lestrade gave a quick, indulgent smile.
‘So’s he always been like this?’ Lestrade nodded toward Sherlock, magnifier in hand, now manically circling the support pylon against which the car pinned the lower half of a body.
‘As long as I’ve known him’, John offered. Lestrade’s smile changed to one of sympathy.
‘And what do you do? When you’re not following Sherlock to crime scenes.’
‘The housework, mostly. And reading, learning whatever I can.’
‘Ah, unemployed then?’
‘Yes. But, a lot of people are these days, yeah?’ he added, emphasizing his normalcy.
‘Yeah. Which doesn’t help the crime rate any. How’s your neighbourhood that way? You live nearby?’
‘221B Baker Street’, John recited. ‘I don’t think there’s much crime there.’
Lestrade’s brows peaked as he looked from John to Sherlock and back again. ‘You’re living with Sherlock?’
‘Yes.’ John nodded confirmation.
‘Ohh.’ Lestrade crossed his arms over his chest and John felt his scrutiny intensify. It was as if the detective were employing Sherlock’s methods, cataloguing and considering, albeit in a slow and obvious fashion. Sherlock must have felt it, too, because he just then left off his search and looked to John and Lestrade.
Striding toward them, he asked, ‘Problem, Detective Inspector?’
Lestrade answered affably, ‘No, no, just getting to know your flatmate here.’ There was a hesitation before ‘flatmate’, a question in the word.
‘Wouldn’t your time be better spent examining the crime scene, doing your job so I don’t have to?’ Lestrade’s smile disappeared. ‘You needn’t worry; John’s not the criminal element you’re all so afraid I’ll take up with.’ At Lestrade’s look, he continued, ‘Oh, come on, Lestrade. I’m quite familiar with your “analysing the suspect” look.’
‘Professional hazard’, the detective granted. Returning to his friendly demeanour, he asked, ‘So where did you two meet?’
‘St. Bart’s. Couple of months ago. I was looking for a flatmate and so was John. Mutual acquaintance introduced us.’
While Sherlock smiled, pleased with the back-story he’d been developing for them, John’s face froze. Lestrade looked quite interested in the reactions of both men. ‘Really?’
‘Something wrong with two men taking a flat share together?’
‘Not at all. Except, John just said he’s known you all his life.’
Sherlock turned enough to hide his scowl at John from the Inspector’s interested gaze. Before he’d turned back to offer further fabrications, John jumped in. ‘It’s just that I feel like my life began when I met Sherlock.’ He smiled and hoped he’d said the right thing. Lestrade’s shock was unmistakable, as was his effort to hide the grin that followed it.
‘What a lovely sentiment, John’, Sherlock said tightly. He then addressed himself solely to Lestrade, providing the DI with a physical description and two probable motives for the murderer, as well as several places to begin looking for the missing top half of the body. On his final word he launched himself at the exit, his long strides requiring John, agog yet from Sherlock’s rapid analysis of the scene, to jog to catch up.
‘Thanks’, Lestrade called after them, allowing his grin full expression. ‘I’ll be talking to you, John.’
John wanted desperately to know just how he had erred-he knew he had-but didn’t dare to ask. Three blocks away, Sherlock halted and spun on him.
‘“I feel like my life began when I met Sherlock”? Really, John, however did you come up with such a thing?’
‘It was in a show on the telly, something Mrs Hudson was watching. Seemed like it might fit.’
‘Well, it didn’t.’ Sherlock resumed his march home.
‘What was I supposed to say?’ John asked from three paces behind.
‘You might consider saying nothing if that’s the best you can come up with.’
‘I had to say something-he was asking questions.’ John jogged forward again. ‘I told you people would talk to me.’
‘And I told you to say nothing. Let me handle the talking.’
‘I did say nothing when he wanted my last name.’ Struggling to stay abreast of Sherlock, he leaned in slightly and spoke lower. ‘I think I should have a last name. Won’t people wonder?’
Sherlock stopped again and stared hard at John. Finally his face relaxed a bit as he said, ‘Yes. They will; you should. Obviously I brought you out too soon.’ He turned and resumed walking, now at a slower pace that accommodated John’s shorter stride, and began enumerating the items John required: ‘Last name. Place and date of birth. A fleshed-out story of how we met.’ He cast a displeased glance at John on that one. ‘And now, with Lestrade’s suspicions raised, an official, documented presence. He will look into your background once he gets a full name from you. He isn’t quite the idiot his peers are.’
‘“Official, documented presence”. And how do we do that?’
‘Through official channels, of course.’
On reaching the flat, they sat down to discuss possibilities, but Sherlock spoke less and stared out the window more as time passed. Eventually John abandoned attempts at talking with him. He left a cup of tea at Sherlock’s side and took his pot to his room.
At some later hour, Sherlock took up his violin, tuning it as he glanced over the notes John had taken that night. All worthless, he knew. He cleared his head with a tempestuous bit of Paganini, then settled into Sarasate’s Romanza Andaluza, his body moving in harmony with its passionate grace. Mind cleared and focused, he could apply himself afresh to the problem at hand.
The problem was not in creating an identity-Sherlock could easily construct the story of John’s supposed existence. Nor was the problem in obtaining the necessary documents, records, and accounts to give proof to the lie-Sherlock knew enough of the right people, was owed enough favours, that it could be accomplished within the week. Even Lestrade or some other official down the line verifying John’s background posed no threat as the documents would be real, official, indisputable. The problem was much as it ever was: outwitting and outmanoeuvring Mycroft.
Mycroft would notice-must already have noticed-the extra person living at 221B. He also would have looked into the identity of this man and found that he had none. Would have found no matching face in any database in Britain. Would have extended his investigations to other countries, perhaps. Certainly would have started a record of John’s actions, interactions, and modest travels around London. Considered now, it was a wonder that Sherlock had not already had a visit from his brother since John’s appearance. Or that John hadn’t been scooped up off the pavement and whisked away to a private meeting in an empty warehouse.
I’ve been too distracted, he thought. Absorbed in John, like a child with a new toy. It was time to rectify that situation.
Sherlock stretched out on the sofa, hands held prayer-like under his chin, and thought.
He took as working facts: 1) John had been noticed; Mycroft had been curious. 2) John had been discovered to be a non-entity; Mycroft had been intrigued. 3) John’s sudden transformation into an entity would bring Mycroft to full attention, that attention brought to bear on both John and Sherlock. 4) Mycroft could, would use evidence of this illicit creation of an identity at some future time, far or near, to manipulate Sherlock. 5) Worst of all, John would be imperilled by Mycroft’s attention. What would the man who was often the British government itself do with a being like John?
When John returned to the sitting room the next morning, he found Sherlock at the window, in the very posture that he’d last seen him the night before, untouched tea cold beside him. He moved softly to take up the cup and empty it into his pot. As he was placing the container on the ledge, Sherlock spoke: ‘I think, John, it’s time you met my brother.’
The hardest part was the phone call. Sherlock knew the words he would have to use and, even knowing how worthy the cause and that using Mycroft in this way was a victory in itself, it galled him still to use them.
‘Hello.’ Mycroft’s voice held the slightest note of question.
‘Hello, Mycroft.’ A silence, each brother waiting on the other.
Finally: ‘I haven’t the time for games, Sherlock. If you’re going to tell me to piss off again, best to keep it to texting.’
‘I-’ Sherlock stopped, swallowed, ploughed on. ‘There’s something I need.’
And that was all it took to cause the British government to close up shop and make an early day of it. That single word-need-without a negative modifier, entirely lacking in rancour or sarcasm, spoken by a man that had forgotten the little boy he had been. To the only man left who remembered that little boy and all the unanswered needs of his youth.
A short hour later, Mycroft Holmes, for the first time in his adult life, was courteously invited into his brother’s home. It was John that opened the door, led him upstairs, and offered to take his umbrella, but Sherlock sat almost demurely in his chair by the fireplace and did nothing to impede this flow of events.
Brief introductions were made. Tea was offered. Unnecessary pleasantries were omitted. Mycroft seldom took his eyes from his brother, but his interest never left John.
And then, without prelude or explanation, knowing that Mycroft already had a file full of the lack of information on John, Sherlock made his audacious request: an identity for his friend. Mycroft noted the use of that word, tucked it away for future consideration, and studied Sherlock, then John, then Sherlock again.
‘But where does John come from and why doesn’t he already have an identity?’ Mycroft would ask the annoying questions.
‘I don’t think you really want to know the answer to that’, Sherlock replied briskly. Mycroft tilted an eyebrow. ‘You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. It’s too fantastic.’
‘Sherlock, of the many things you have been in life, you have never descended to being-fanciful.’ He spoke the word with a moue of disdain. ‘If you tell me the truth, of course I will believe you.’
Sherlock stared at his brother. Mycroft stared back. John sat silently on the arm of the couch, giving the brothers wide berth. Mycroft had taken his chair upon entering, but John didn’t mind; having had Sherlock’s brief telling of the animosity between them, he preferred to be well away from the action.
Sherlock drew a breath and reconsidered their options one last time. But this was the only option: not to entice Mycroft’s scrutiny through subterfuge, but to draw it fully onto himself and John both; shock him, allow him the favour of granting a favour, and share a truth that Sherlock would another day fight valiantly to hide. Mycroft couldn’t be expected to make it easy. Fine, then, if the truth is what he wants. Sherlock wouldn’t regret keeping from John earlier the acknowledged necessity of telling his secret now.
‘John came out of a plant. Out of its flower, actually. In point of fact, he is the flower.’
Mycroft studied his brother: face, manner, posture. He knew well what a brilliant actor and liar Sherlock was, but he also knew how to see through his acts and lies as only a brother-as only Mycroft-could. And he saw that Sherlock was speaking the truth, or at least what he believed to be the truth; but Sherlock was very good at discerning the truth, too, so what he claimed to be a fact could generally be taken as such. Mycroft also knew the plain fact that people did not spring from plants, that they could never actually be flowers. John was a flower; John could not be a flower. Two facts, each contradicting the other. Mycroft hated those kinds of facts. Always so inconvenient.
So Mycroft considered John and the man’s reaction as Sherlock had spoken. He had startled at Sherlock’s statement. A quick sidelong glance confirmed the fear remaining on his face. Startled and afraid that Sherlock had revealed his secret, but not astonished at the explanation as he would be if Sherlock had fabricated so extraordinary a tale on the spot. So, this man believed himself to be a flower and wanted to keep that a secret. And apparently they had agreed that the secret would be kept. In the span of two blinks, Mycroft ran through dozens of possible means of reconciling all of the facts before him, but the facts simply would not allow themselves to be reconciled. Therefore, Mycroft took the only option left to him.
‘Show me’, he said, smiling pleasantly.
Sherlock turned to John. Some wordless accord was reached and John nodded, the panic melting from his face to be replaced with a stoicism that would be the envy of any British male.
‘Very well’, Sherlock said, turning back to Mycroft.
John stood and walked to the window, tucking himself out of sight from the street behind the drapes. Sherlock did not turn away from his brother, but watched John’s transformation as revealed by Mycroft’s expression: eyes narrowing as John walked to the window, preparing to analyse whatever data were presented; eyes widening as John shifted size and shape, effectively disappearing; narrowing again as he tried to process what he had seen. Sherlock was fairly beaming at his brother’s perceptible confusion and discomfort. Oh, it’s Christmas! Mycroft stood and moved slowly to the window to look down at the simple potted plant, an actual look of perplexity on his face.
He peered down at the blossom, trying to discern anything like a human shape. Leaned closer, squinted, leaned back. He had raised his umbrella barely an inch off the floor when Sherlock informed him: ‘If that umbrella or any part of you gets any closer to John, I will kill you with your own handkerchief.’
Mycroft let the umbrella hang in the air a moment, then rested it on the floor again.
‘He can come back, I assume.’
‘Of course’, Sherlock replied. ‘Step back and he can reappear right now.’ Mycroft obliged, never taking his eyes from the curious plant. ‘John, if you would.’
The bloom released itself from its stem and fell into the soil below as a tiny humanoid figure that jumped over the edge of the pot and grew suddenly back into John-the-apparent-human. Mycroft made note of the facts that would have to be changed and looked John in the eye.
‘What sort of identity would you like?’
The identity that Mycroft delivered four days later was actually borrowed, which saved work, he said, in coming up with the details. There were no difficulties with his first name, and John gained the sturdy-sounding surname of Watson. The John Watson that had been was an army doctor that had served in Afghanistan for nearly the entire war and occupation. He had met an unfortunate end five months before, having been shot through the shoulder and bled out on the field of battle before another medic could arrive to save him. He had spent little time in England during those years, given instead to taking his leave in explorations of other countries and, it was reported, the female inhabitants thereof. His parents were dead. His only family was an estranged, alcoholic sister that would likely never notice that her brother’s identity had been co-opted for a stranger’s use. The identity even served to provide John with a small income, as Dr. Watson was granted a pension in recognition of what he had lost in service to his country. Official records were re-written to reflect that Capt Watson had been saved in the nick of time and invalided home to London and that the doctor held a particular interest in pharmacognosy.
On the occasion of his becoming a citizen, as it were, Mycroft presented John with a wallet containing his ID and bank card. Sherlock gave him a text on general medicine. John gave them both his thanks and set about becoming John H. Watson, MD.
Master Post 12: Developments 14: Realisations