Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/360687.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Choose_Not_To_Use_Archive_Warnings, Major_Character_Death, Underage,
      Rape/Non-Con
  Fandom:
      Sherlock_(TV)
  Relationship:
      Sherlock_Holmes/John_Watson, Mycroft_Holmes/Sherlock_Holmes, Sebastian
      Moran/Jim_Moriarty, Irene_Adler/Sherlock_Holmes
  Character:
      Sherlock_Holmes, John_Watson, Mycroft_Holmes, Irene_Adler, Sebastian
      Moran, Jim_Moriarty, Greg_Lestrade, Molly_Hooper, Mrs._Hudson, Mummy_
      (Sherlock)
  Additional Tags:
      Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Happy_Ending, Dubious_Consent, First_Time, First
      Kiss, Post_Reichenbach, Friendship, Drug_Use, Sibling_Incest, Death,
      Flashback, Sexual_Content
  Stats:
      Published: 2012-03-11 Words: 15538
****** Long Drive ******
by blackholesun
Summary
     [Post-Reichenbach] Tortured pasts, old resentments, scores to settle:
     there’s a lot standing in Sherlock’s way. This is a story of how
     Sherlock gets back to John, while restoring his humanity along the
     way.
Notes
     The title is from the Modest Mouse album "This is a Long Drive for
     Someone with Nothing to Think About."
     Lots of triggers in this, including drug use, abuse, rape/noncon, and
     underage sex. There are a lot of pairings, but the story follows
     Sherlock closely.
     A big thanks to Emily for listening to my ideas and staying up with
     me for hours while we proofread this together.
See the end of the work for more notes
 
 
 
He shrugs off her icepack.  Curled up on Molly’s couch, nursing a sprained
knee, Sherlock only has thoughts for John. 
For once, his brain cannot handle anything but John thoughts.  No matter how
hard he tries, he can’t focus on what Molly’s caress against his leg may mean
or what the state of her crudely knitted blanket reveals about her anxiety. 
There is only the puff of breath in air as John screams his name.  The fleeting
touch of fingers against his wrist.  The moan of “he’s my friend.”  He has no
room for anything but John John John hammering in his head, and if he’s honest
with himself, John has been encroaching on his thoughts for longer than he’d
dare admit. 
There is certainly no room for the way Molly’s hands shake as she checks his
injuries over, or the defeated slump of Lestrade’s forehead against the floor,
or how Mycroft is hiding from his feelings behind a tabloid in the The Diogenes
Club’s icy silence. 
There’s simply not room at all.
 
 
 
 
*            
I’m dead.  Let’s have dinner. SH
Irene’s sharp nails sink into her palm as she chokes on smoke.  She flicks the
cigarette away and stares at her phone.
Her hands vibrate as another text comes through.
We don’t have to do dinner.  But I need to talk to you immediately. SH
Why? she types.
Do you expect me to beg? SH
After five minutes, her phone shakes again, and she crooks a smile.
I need your help. SH
 
 

 
*            
It doesn’t bother him how the damp soil clings to the front of his pants where
he’s kneeling, or that the beginnings of sunburn sting his neck.  The dirt
gives under his pressing fingers, and he decides it’s a good enough spot as
any.
No plodding footsteps ring out in the distance.  Solitude enfolds him.  The
birds, perched high in the boughs, are the only witnesses to what must be done.
The shovel pierces the surface.  He digs until the sun rises high, and he
doesn’t let the shaking of his hands deter from each controlled, firm
shovelful.  When the hole looks deep enough, he raises his shirt hem to his
brow, wiping away the perspiration.  The sun beats down strongly, and despite
the refreshing wisp of wind, sweat trickles down his body.  But he’s achingly
cold inside.  The ice floods through his veins, and his fingers burn as if
nipped by frostbite.
Grunting, he hefts the body bag into his arms and drops it carefully into the
ground, making sure it lies straight.  Reaching for the shovel, he jabs it deep
into the dirt until it’s standing upright.  He pats down his knees, shaking out
his pants, getting the rest of the loose dirt off.  When there’s nothing left
for him to straighten, he eyes the bag in the ground and feels his chest
constrict.
“Well, Boss,” he chokes out.  His voice sounds strange and hollow, the only
sound in the eerily silent forest.
“I don’t know what to say.  You’d probably think I’m stupid for saying anything
at all.  You know…sentimentality.”
He barks an anguished laugh.
“But you’re not here, so I guess no one will ever know.”
Pausing, he lets his eyes trace where the face is obscured by fabric. 
“It’s just me.  I’d ask your family to come, but I don’t know where they are. 
I don’t know if they’re still alive.  But I suppose even someone like you has a
mother and father.”
Suddenly self-conscious, he bites his lip and tries to wrap things up.
“You weren’t easy, to put it lightly.  But you were human after all.  You can
rot.”
For days, after he’d taken the body from the rooftop, he’s stood vigil, shaking
him occasionally, gently cleaning the blood from the back of his head, waiting
to see if he’d suddenly twitch and blink him up at him with that familiar
crazed grin.  But he hadn’t.  After the third day, he’d zipped up the body bag
and finally let himself sleep off the mixture of exhaustion, fear, and relief.
“And you did rot.  So now…goodbye.  I’ll try to come visit you when I can.  I
marked that tree over there.”
He points into the distance.
“So I’ll be able to find you.”
His throat begins to well up, and he gulps, forcing the grief down as best he
can.
“I’ll…miss you.  Thanks for taking me in.  I’m glad I knew you.”
Silence pulses, heavy and woven, and it seems as if the whole world goes
still.  When a bird call suddenly pierces the quiet, he picks up the shovel and
fills in the hole.
Sinking to his knees once more, he carefully pats down the soil until the grave
is firmed up.
Leaning his forehead against the surface, he whispers, “Bye, Jim,” and presses
a kiss against the grave before he loses the nerve.
And blinking back tears, Sebastian Moran rises to his feet and wonders what the
hell he’s going to do now.
 
 
 
 
*            
Stay put for a few hours.  I’ll send a car that will take you to a private
plane.  Talk soon.
Sherlock tucks his phone back into his pocket and stretches out on Molly’s
couch.  She’s gone to his funeral, promising him that she’ll give a convincing
performance.
“It has to look real,” he’d said firmly, shaking her.
“And would you check—”
“Yes, Sherlock,” she’d said.  “I’ll check on John.”
“Let me know if he’s—”
“I will.”
Sherlock traces the pattern on the cushions, his mind strangely blank.  With
nothing to do but wait, and no immediate plans to be made, all he can do is try
to ignore the agonizing clawing in his chest.  The worst thing to do would be
to think of John, so he lets his mind wander. 
Scanning the room, he notices the small aquarium in the corner.  His legs swing
over the couch, and he goes to the tiny tank filled with bright yellow and
speckled blue fish.  They dart around rocks, swallowed up by crevices and
softly swaying plants.  His reflection swims against the surface, and a memory
suddenly jolts him back.
 
 
 
 
Mycroft’s tank is twice as large, and there are two of them, both glowing
softly in the dim study.  After his father died, a teenage Mycroft had taken
over the office, replacing the heavy, ponderous law volumes with heavy,
ponderous biographies of monarchs and high-profile government figures. 
A nine-year old Sherlock sits nervously in the leather chair, itching his
scabby knees, while Mycroft settles in behind the oak desk.  His brother folds
his fingers sternly, and Sherlock feels a quick pang of fear, although he’s
done nothing wrong as far as he knows.
“Mycroft?” he asks in a small voice.
“Relax.  You aren’t in trouble.”
Despite the reassurance, the tenseness in his shoulders doesn’t lessen any.
“Where did you hear that word?” his brother asks after a while.
“Which one?”
“The one I heard you muttering while you were checking my dictionary.”
“Oh.”
Sherlock had gone straight to Mycroft’s bedroom after school that day, pulling
the thick, worn dictionary from the bookshelf.  Mycroft had found him not much
later, flipping the pages furiously until he’d gotten to the C’s. 
“Sherlock,” Mycroft had snapped.  “The study.  Now.  And give that to me.”
He’d wrenched the book away from his younger brother, who’d recoiled his hand
as if burned.
“Timothy wrote it on the board when the teacher left the room.  He got in
trouble when she came back.  What does it mean?”
Mycroft clears his throat uncomfortably.
“Con—dom?” Sherlock’s young voice sounds out the word slowly, and Mycroft’s
lips pinch.
His brother sighs, rubbing his temples rhythmically.  “I suppose you’re old
enough now.”
And Mycroft proceeds to tell him, in clinical terms and in vivid detail, about
sexual intercourse in all its forms.
When he’s finished, Sherlock, bug-eyed, has sunk deep into the leather, his
hands tightly gripping the arms of the chair. 
“Don’t you have any questions?”
“That sounds…disgusting.”
Mycroft crooks an eyebrow.  “Yes.  The idea takes some getting used to.”
“So—do you have to be—married?  To—do that?”
“No.  Anyone can have sex.  And being married doesn’t necessarily ensure that
the act will happen.  People with unsatisfying marriages may not have sex at
all.  Or just rarely.”
“Hm.”  Sherlock steeples his small fingers, his brow knitted in thought.  “I
don’t think I’d want to…have sex if I were married.   Is that strange?”
“Not at all.  You can do whatever you want, Sherlock, although you may change
your mind in the future.  You don’t have to get married or be in a
relationship.  If you do, however, you’ll want to make sure that you share love
with someone who treats you kindly.”
“Not like Mummy and Dad,” Sherlock says immediately.  “I wouldn’t want a
marriage like that.”
Mycroft’s face drops.  “No,” he agrees solemnly.  “That would not be good.”
His little brother turns his head back to the fish tanks, watching the
creatures swirl around the green water in elegant, loping circles.  Words swell
on the tip of his tongue, slowly forming.
Suddenly, his young face brightens, and he flashes a grin at his brother.
“I’ve got it,” he says with sudden enthusiasm.  “I’ll just marry you.”
Mycroft blanches.  “What?”
“I love you, Mycroft.  I’ll just marry you when I grow up.  And we don’t have
to do the…sex…thing.”
“Sherlock,” his brother says uneasily.  “We can’t marry each other.  That’s
called incest—and it’s morally wrong.”
Sherlock’s face falls.  “Why?”
“Family members cannot marry.  Reproduction between relations usually results
in births with disastrous side-effects.”
“But we wouldn’t be able to reproduce.”
“It’s still—frowned upon—by society.”
Sherlock shrugs.  “I don’t care what society thinks.”
Mycroft stares him as if he’s grown a second head. 
“Well, if we’re done here...”  Sherlock scoots off the edge of the chair and
leaves the study, humming softly.   
Mycroft sits staring at the empty chair for a long while.
 
 
 
 
*            
“My brother has the brain of a scientist or a philosopher, yet he elects to be
a detective.  What might we deduce about his heart?”
 
 
 
 
John Watson’s heart feels like it’s being digested at the bottom of his
stomach.  Mrs. Hudson holds out a plate piled high with cold snacks, but he
shakes his head, glaring holes into his glass of wine.  He sits in his usual
chair.  The one across from him remains empty, although the imprint in the seat
makes it seem like a ghost might be lounging there, plucking silently at violin
strings.
Behind him, Molly and Greg stand awkwardly, glancing at the mess of research
piled haphazardly on the table.  Mrs. Hudson unnecessarily dusts off some of
the lab equipment in the kitchen.  Mycroft simply stares at the wallpaper
pattern, eyes glazed over and mouth slack.
They have all just returned from the funeral, and at Mrs. Hudson’s suggestion,
the handful of them have reconvened at 221B Baker Street for just a bite to
eat, perhaps some tea…on second thought, maybe wine.
But John wants them gone.  He wants to search the flat for some clue—a scrawled
message, a letter hiding under the mattress, an encrypted file on his
laptop—anything to blot out—to disprove—the finality of the warm pool of blood
on the sidewalk.
Looking up, the first thing he sees is Mycroft, and his fists clench despite
his resolve to be civil.  But for how different the brothers may look, some
echo of Sherlock’s features pull at Mycroft’s face, and he snaps.
“I was wrong about Sherlock,” he bites out, and Mycroft blinks at him.  “Before
he—I—I called him a machine.  I was wrong.”
John levels furied eyes at the tall man.  “You’re the machine.  You’re ice. 
Look at you, after what you did to him.  You can’t even change the expression
on your face…for your bloody brother?”
Lestrade steps forward, puts a heavy hand on John’s shoulder.  “John…”
He flinches away, not breaking eye contact with Mycroft.  And then suddenly,
the man’s mask begins to crack.  Lips quiver and eyes crease, and shockingly, a
terrible, wounded gurgle begins to rise from the man’s throat.  Without a word,
he spins on his heel, ripping his umbrella away from its resting place against
the wall, and all but runs down the stairs. 
John flinches when the door slams, and he wonders how many times he could
possibly be wrong about the Holmes brothers. 
 
 
 
 
*            
As the plane begins descending into Switzerland, his head snaps up, and he rubs
the bleariness from his eyes.  The stewardess pulls back the curtain and hands
him a glass of ice water. 
“We’ll be landing in a minute.  Ms. Adler will be waiting for you when we touch
down.”
“Thank you,” he says curtly.  Sherlock throws the drink back, wincing at the
cold, but it feels good after chain-smoking an entire pack of cigarettes. 
His stomach drops as the plane angles down even further.  At the feeling of
falling, his hands begin to tremble, and he has to force the vomit down.  To
distract himself, he thinks over what he’ll say to Irene.
When the plane has landed, he climbs down the steps, a bag slung over his
shoulder.  A black car with dark windows slides silently in front of his path
and rocks to a halt.  The driver gets out, tips his hat with a “sir,” places
his bag in the trunk, and holds the door open for him.
“Sherlock!  Come.  Sit.”  She pats the space next to her, scraping slightly
with long, red fingernails, and he settles in, allowing her to press a soft
peck to his cheek. 
“Back to my place,” she orders the driver, and the man nods his assent. 
And in that moment, when she turns her head and his nose buries into the crook
of her neck, he inhales a sickeningly sweet whiff of perfume.  In his gut, he
knows that he’s smelled it before. 
They drive on silently for a while.  But then he remembers, and his eyes
widen.  A flash of adolescence and long, sweaty summer days pull at the edges
of his mind.
 
 
 
 
After he skips up all the steps to the porch, his mother pulls him into a bone-
crushing hug.  She practically lifts him off his feet, despite her small
stature, and he laughs, burrowing his nose into her hair. 
“Mummy!”
“Sorry, Sherlock.”  She puts him down and squeezes his shoulders tightly, her
eyes tearing up. 
“Look how you’ve grown.”
She grasps his chin, taking in his features with tender grey eyes.  Sherlock’s
hair has grown longer, and his cheekbones jut out sharply in the absence of
baby fat.
“You look older than the last time I saw you.”
“I’m still sixteen, Mother.”
“I know.  But you’ve grown at least a foot since Christmas.  Look at you!”
Sherlock, laughing, finally shrugs her off.  “I’m glad I’m home.  Boarding
school is tedious.  I plan to set up camp in the library this summer.”
“Mm-hm.  Of course you will.  Now go on, go say hi to your brother…he’s down by
the pond.  I’m sure he’ll be delighted to see you, since he missed Christmas
this year.  I’ll go start making lunch for the three of us.”
Sherlock nods, leaping down the steps.  Once he reaches the grass, he hesitates
before calling up to her. 
“New lipstick?”
Her hand stills on the doorknob, and she quirks a smile back at him. 
“Observant as always.  Yes!  It’s called Passion Dangereuse.”
Sherlock raises his eyebrows.  “A bit scandalous for you, isn’t it?”
His mother laughs again, shooing him off, and closes the door.
Taking the familiar path down the hill, he jogs slightly, being careful not to
twist his ankles on the protruding rocks and sharp dips.  Past the grove of
lush maple trees, the pond comes into view, and beside it, Mycroft’s tall, dark
form. 
Sherlock’s breath catches at the vision of the man, standing up straight,
looking out across the water in his starched shirt and black trousers.  It’s
been almost a year since they’ve spoken face-to-face, and Sherlock’s chest
aches at the sight.
As if on cue, Mycroft turns and shields his face from the beating sun. 
Sherlock is too far away to make out the expression on his brother’s face, so
he breaks into a sprint.  The warm summer wind whips against his face as he
runs, sending his messy curls flying like a halo around his head.
When Sherlock is about ten feet away, he slows, nearly stops.  Mycroft’s
handsome browned face contrasts shockingly with bright blue eyes.  He doesn’t
know how to do this, how Mycroft will receive him.  Cautiously, Sherlock toes
forward, as if approaching a wild animal.  But Mycroft closes the space between
them with a few long strides and embraces his brother tightly. 
As he tucks his chin into Mycroft’s shoulder, he realizes that he’s almost as
tall as him now, and a clandestine pleasure blossoms inside his ribcage.  I am
growing up…and he can’t deny it any longer.
Burying his nose into Mycroft’s neatly-pressed shirt, he inhales the familiar
scent of his detergent and the distinctive spice of skin underneath.  His smile
cracks his face, and he shifts his nose up Mycroft’s neck.  And there, on the
collar, he catches the faintest trace of honeyed flowers.  His body freezes,
and Mycroft releases him.
“I know how you hate me pointing out the obvious, Sherlock.  But you’ve
grown…so much.”
But Sherlock feels as though he’s been doused with icy water.  He cannot derive
joy from his brother’s warm voice or nostalgic words.  Despite his self-
control, he feels his shoulders hunch defensively. 
“What’s her name?” he slings at Mycroft, whose mouth hangs open in confusion. 
“What—”
“Don’t deny it,” Sherlock spits impatiently.  “You saw her this morning, before
you drove here.  I can—I can smell her perfume on your shirt.”
Mycroft glances down at the offending fabric, then back up to his brother’s
livid features.
“She—well.  She’s nobody, Sherlock.  She’s just someone I—”
But it’s too late.  With a wrench that seems to rend the very air, Sherlock
takes off across the field, his limbs flapping wildly in his wake. 
Mycroft sighs, cradling his head in his hands, watching his brother’s vanishing
form with grave eyes.
 
 
 
 
They dance around each other all summer, oil and water, never touching and
hardly speaking since that first day.  Mycroft works most of the time,
sometimes staying in London for a week’s stretch, but he returns home quite
often, with the intention of sitting Sherlock down to discuss what happened. 
But each time Mycroft pulls into the driveway, he can feel Sherlock’s elusive
dance in his bones, knowing he’ll be lucky to even glimpse his brother over the
next few days.
His mother’s face grows haggard.  She ghosts the halls in her dressing gown and
slippers, pounding on the locked library door, begging Sherlock to come out. 
That night, for the first time, she sets the table for only two, finally
accepting that Sherlock just isn’t going to come down for dinner.  Such a
gesture of defeat from a known optimist like her is more disheartening than
he’d like to admit.
Mycroft picks up his salad fork and picks uninterestedly at the lettuce.  They
eat their meal wordlessly, and it almost feels like silence has sprouted a head
and become their third dinner guest.
“Mycroft,” his mother says suddenly.
He sets down his soup spoon slowly and pats at his lips with his napkin.
“Yes, Mummy?”
“You two aren’t children anymore.  I don’t understand.  It seemed like you two
were so excited to see each other at the beginning of summer.” 
Her voice cracks.  “I’m so sick of the fighting—the broken family.  I thought
all of that was over when your father left.”
Mycroft reaches forward, intercepting her hand.  “Mummy.  I’m sick of it, too.”
He can’t stand the sight of her swollen eyes and brittle hair, streaked through
with strands of grey.  Resolve pulses through his veins, and determination long
absent suddenly snaps him out of the dreary summer haze.
“He’s going to talk to me—right now.  Even if I have to break down the goddamn
door.”
Pulling her hand to his mouth, he gives it a quick kiss.  He stands up and
flings his napkin to the table with a flourish. 
“Mycroft, wait—”
“I’ve waited long enough.”
And with that, he pushes in his chair and tears up the staircase with a
purposeful stride.
 
 
 
 
“Go away.”
“Open the door.”
“No.  Go away.”
“This isn’t some bloody game, Sherlock.  You’re sixteen-years old.”
No answer.
“Open the door before I break it down,” he says coldly.  “And I will.”
The lock clicks open softly, and the door sways.  He hears Sherlock’s quiet
steps scattering across the carpet, and when he closes the door behind him, he
spots brown curls peeking over a monstrous stack of books. 
Mycroft sighs, taking the pile of books in his arms and dumping them on the
floor. 
“Sherlock, this hasto stop.  You can’t keep doing this to Mummy.  Orme.”
His brother’s face darkens, and Mycroft slams his fist on the table, making
Sherlock jump.
“Would you stop it?  She isn’t my girlfriend—never was.  It was a stupid one-
night stand.  Get over it.”
“But I want—”
“You want what?  For me to be celibate?  Do you want me to put my fucking cock
in a box and give you the damned key?”
Sherlock’s mouth moves, but no sound comes out.
“N-no,” he finally stutters, his mouth twisted in a pained grimace.
“Then what?”
“Y-you.”
Mycroft goes still as Sherlock’s eyes well up.
“I want you, Mycroft.”
His brother gets up tentatively, wringing his hands, and he steps towards
Mycroft and softly traces his cheekbone.  When Mycroft closes his eyes,
Sherlock grows bolder, draping himself across his brother’s lap. 
“Can I?” he whispers, leaning forward.
Mycroft is frozen—can’t force himself to move—even when he feels a soft exhale
over his mouth and smells his brother’s tea-laden breath.
A nervous pressure of lips against lips, and when Mycroft still doesn’t move,
Sherlock swallows, grasping the back of Mycroft’s head, threading his hand
through his hair.  He glides firm lips over Mycroft’s, silky, hot. 
And when he starts begging through each kiss, “Please…kiss…me,” Mycroft’s mind
goes blank, and he responds enthusiastically, taking over.  He bites the soft
swell of Sherlock’s lower lip, nips at his chin, and goes back to devouring
that young mouth until Sherlock is flushed and gasping.  He plunges his tongue
through those open lips, tasting and smooth and wet and yes.  
Only when his jaws grow tired of the thrusting does he slow.  Pulling back, he
begins laving Sherlock’s neck, tonguing the sharp jut of his collarbone.
 Taking a fistful of curly hair, he yanks back his brother’s head and gazes
into those pupils, blown so wide that there’s hardly any trace of icy blue.  
He yanks open the front of Sherlock’s pajamas, tearing at buttons.  Untouched,
unclaimed ivory skin heaves under his hands, and he sucks an ugly red mark onto
that smooth stomach.  Sherlock’s erection pokes into his shoulder, and eyes
darkening, Mycroft lifts him by the bum and shoves him onto the tabletop,
knocking over the teacup and saucer, raining cold Earl Grey onto the carpet. 
He reclaims Sherlock’s lips, devouring his mouth, as he pulls himself from his
trousers.  Mycroft twists his hand over the head of his leaking cock and
groans.
Sherlock’s bottoms are roughly ripped down, and when Mycroft takes him into his
hand, pumping ruthlessly, Sherlock’s back arches like a bowstring as he floods
over Mycroft’s fingers. 
Mycroft bites into his neck, hard, but Sherlock can only shudder weakly, and
after five hard strokes, he’s roaring, shooting over his brother’s chest and
neck and cheek.
He gasps like he’s drowning, curling his fingers into soft brown hair.  His
forehead rests heavily against Sherlock’s, and they pant together, sharing
sloppy, clinging kisses until his heartbeat begins to slow down.
When Mycroft finally raises his eyes and sees that dribble of come—his
come—dangling from his baby brother’s chin, he begins to shake violently.
“Mycroft?” Sherlock asks, deathly afraid.
Mycroft stares at Sherlock likes he’s a stranger.  Fear and shock war in his
face.  He takes a step backwards and nearly trips over the stack of books. 
Mutely, he zips his pants back up, wiping his hand on the fabric. 
Sherlock steps forward.  “Don’t—”
But Mycroft has already fled, leaving the door swinging like a flapping
tongue. 
As the hinges slow, Sherlock sinks to his knees and begins picking up the
shattered shards of the teacup, not noticing how they pierce into his trembling
hands. 
 
 
 
 
“I’m so happy you’ve joined us for dinner, Sherlock,” his mother says softly,
almost afraid that one wrong word could send him dashing back upstairs.
“It looks delicious, Mummy,” Sherlock smiles, draping the napkin over his lap.
Mycroft hums in agreement.
The family eats contentedly, pausing only to speak between dinner and dessert. 
“Your favorite,” their mother says, setting a plate in front of Mycroft.  “Red
velvet cake made from scratch.  With cream cheese icing.”
Mycroft’s eyes bulge.  “Mummy, you know I’m trying to lose weight.”
“I know.”  She winks at Sherlock.  “But don’t you think tonight calls for a bit
of celebration?”
“If you insist,” Mycroft says, scooping a large piece into his mouth. 
His eyes glaze over, and he tries to muffle his moan.
Their mother laughs, and even Sherlock can’t hold back a crooked smile.
When dinner is over, Mycroft and Sherlock stack the plates and take them into
the kitchen.  Side by side, Sherlock washes and rinses while Mycroft dries. 
Once everything is clean and returned to their proper places, Sherlock turns to
his brother.  “I think I’ll go to bed now.”
Mycroft doesn’t look at him.  “Goodnight, then.”
“Goodnight.”
Sherlock kisses his mother on the forehead and goes upstairs for a shower.
 
 
 
 
A sliver of light falls across Sherlock’s face, and he sits up in bed, letting
the covers slide down his body.  Mycroft’s shuttered face glances in the
doorway.
“Sherlock?”
“Come in.”
He moves over in the bed, turning the corner of his covers back, and Mycroft
slides in next to him.  They lay, facing each other, features barely visible in
the pale strips of moonlight.
“It isn’t wrong, you know,” Sherlock whispers.
He reaches out tentatively, stroking the hair off Mycroft’s forehead.  His
brother sighs, reaching an arm out.  He pulls Sherlock against him, smoothing
fingers over his naked back and shoulders.
Sherlock’s ear presses into Mycroft’s chest, and through the thin fabric, he
hears the steady pump of his heartbeat. 
“Do you love me, Mycroft?  Not just as a brother, but—” 
“Yes, Sherlock.”
He cups Mycroft’s face, softly kisses him. 
“Sherlock?”
“Yes?”
Without warning, Mycroft rolls on top of him, pinning his wrists back against
the bed.  He presses kisses to Sherlock’s neck, works his way down over his
sternum, his stomach.  Without hesitating, he hooks his fingers inside the
waistband of Sherlock’s pajamas and underwear, working them off.  Sherlock is
already achingly hard.
“What are you—”  But Sherlock can only throw his head back at the gust of warm
breath over his cock.  Mycroft slides him into his mouth, sucking firmly.  He
moans, holding tightly to Mycroft’s hair. 
With an obscene pop, Mycroft’s mouth lifts off, and he hastily removes his own
clothing.  Mycroft reaches into his pants pocket, taking out a condom and a
bottle of lube.
Suddenly, slick fingers push at Sherlock’s entrance, and he cries out against
the coldness on his skin.
The first finger breaches, and Sherlock’s stomach flutters in discomfort.
“Push down on it,” Mycroft says breathily, and Sherlock tries.
Without giving him time to adjust, Mycroft adds a second finger, and this time,
Sherlock’s eyes blink back tears.  Mycroft rips the condom wrapper open with
his teeth, and before Sherlock can tell what’s happening, he feels the blunt
head of Mycroft’s cock fitting over his hole. 
He grips his brother’s shoulder, hard.  “Wait.”
Mycroft stops, the pleasure blazing in his eyes.
“Stop, Mycroft.  I’m sorry.  I just—don’t think I’m ready for that yet.”
His brother blinks once, twice.  “Not ready,” he says flatly.
“N-no.  Not yet.  I’m s-sorry.”
Mycroft’s mouth twists, and then he’s ripping off the condom, sitting on
Sherlock’s chest, and the weight is so heavy he can barely breathe.
“So,” Mycroft whispers harshly, “You tell me I can’t fuck anyone but you.  You
infect me with this—sickness.  You throw yourself at me in our family home,
with our mother downstairs. And now you won’t let me fuck you.  Because you’re
not ready?”
Sherlock’s lips quiver, and Mycroft begins stroking himself in earnest now,
slapping his cock against Sherlock’s chin. 
“You want me to be with you,” Mycroft jeers, “But I can’t even fuck you. 
What’s the point?”
His toes curl, and then he’s coming, all over Sherlock’s lips and chin.  He
rests his hand against the headboard, panting, and when he looks down, he sees
the look in Sherlock’s eyes.  Mycroft smears the come across his cheek with his
cock, wipes it over tear tracks. 
He climbs out of bed, pulling up his trousers. 
“Is that what you wanted, Sherlock?” he asks.
But his brother won’t look at him.  Sherlock turns over on his side, his back
facing Mycroft, and curls into a fetal position.
After he buttons up his shirt and slides on his loafers, he opens the door. 
When Mycroft looks back, he sees the skinny form shaking beneath the sheets. 
Surprisingly, he can’t feel a thing.
 
 
 
 
The last weekend before Sherlock goes back to school, Mycroft asks him to meet
him in his study.  Sherlock goes without protest, curling up in the worn
leather chair.  The fish tanks in the corner have sat empty for years, so he
examines his chewed up fingernails instead.
Mycroft sweeps into the room, impeccably dressed and groomed as always.
“Thank you for meeting me, Sherlock.  I wanted to see you off.”
Sherlock stares up at him silently. 
Clearing his throat, Mycroft straightens his collar and takes a seat.
“I think you’re old enough now for a bit of realism.”  He pauses, and when
Sherlock’s expression doesn’t change, he proceeds.  “I’m going to keep it
brief—I don’t need to explain anything to you.  But I do have a bit of advice
to pass on before you return to school.”
He drums his fingertips over the desk.  “When it comes to life, you need to
remember these things, because they will protect you.”
Drum drum
“All lives end.”
Drum drum
“All hearts are broken.”
He leans in. 
“Caring is not an advantage, Sherlock.”
Sitting back, Mycroft watches the words sink in.  Sherlock dips his head,
closes his eyes, mouth thinned in an impossibly straight line.  Mycroft waits
for an eternity, almost certain that he can hear the high-speed buzzing inside
that brain.
When Sherlock looks back up, a chill runs through Mycroft’s body.  All traces
of the boy he knew are gone.  He rises to his feet, and Mycroft does the same. 
The Sherlock staring back at him is a cold, composed, closed-off man. 
“Mycroft,” the man acknowledges, extending his hand towards his brother. 
Mycroft returns the handshake firmly, and when their fingers part, he feels a
fluttering in his chest, then a deep burning.  Something inside himself is
curling up to die.
“Goodbye, Sherlock.”
His brother strides out of the room, gathers his bags, and heads down to the
car that will take him back to school.
They don’t speak again for seven years.
 
 
 
 
*            
 “Despite the circumstances, you’re looking surprisingly well, Mr. Holmes,”
Irene smiles.
He twists the pasta around his fork and quirks a smile back.
Her voice goes low with concern.  “But when’s the last time you ate?”
He shrugs, taking a small bite.  “Food is tedious.”
“If I’m going to be helping you,” she continues, “then you’re going to need to
start taking better care of yourself.”
Sherlock grunts.  “You sound like...”
“Is that a good thing?”
He doesn’t answer.
She slides a file folder over the tablecloth and clicks her sharp red nails
against its surface.
“Eat all of your food, and you get this tonight.”
He pauses, wiping his mouth.
“I presume these are details about Moriarty’s network.”
“Name, pictures, locations, habits—everything you’ll need.”
He smirks and takes a larger bite.
 
 
 
 
*            
“I’m glad you came over, Mycroft,” John calls from the kitchen.  The kettle’s
just boiled, and he opens the fridge for some milk. 
“It’s not a problem, John.”
He hears the scraping of a chair and knows that Mycroft has chosen the table,
rather than the armchairs.  A small part of him is relieved.
John sets down the tray carefully, and after the tea has time to steep, Mycroft
insists on pouring. 
“My mother and father were unusual people,” he says, stirring in a sugar cube. 
“This may not be that unusual, but Father always poured.” 
Mycroft raises the cup to his lips and blows.  “After he left, I took over that
duty.”
John adds a splash of milk and takes a slow sip of the steaming brew. 
When he sets the cup down on the saucer, he purses his lips and looks up at
Mycroft.
“The reason I—asked you to come tonight.  I wanted to apologize.”
“For?”
“For what I said to you…after the funeral.  I was angry…and sad.  I lashed out
at you.  I’m sorry.”
Mycroft waves a hand.  “It was already forgiven.”
John coughs, shifting.  “Right.  Well, that’s good.”
The older Holmes studies him quietly, tapping his mouth with his fingers.
“John,” he says thoughtfully, “You were good for him, you know.  Something
about you…made him human again.”
“Mycroft.  If you don’t mind me asking…what happened between you two?  I always
assumed it was some kind of joke—or just you two being melodramatic and
mysterious—but that’s not the case, is it?”
John leans forward.  “Was the feud really that bad?”
The other man sighs, setting his chin in his hands.  “We used to be close. 
Sherlock wasn’t always like this.  But something happened…a long time ago.”
“Did it happen because your father left?” John interrupts.  “Sherlock talked
about him once.  I always got the impression that afterwards—he looked up to
you as a certain…father figure.”
Eyes glaze over.  Mycroft’s mouth wavers.  “What?  He did?”
John doesn’t know what he’s said to upset the other man so much, so he
backtracks hastily. 
“That’s just me assuming.  Well.  Just forget I said that.  I don’t know
anything about it, do I?”
Mycroft sniffs, folding his hands in his lap.
“I can’t talk about it, John.  I would dishonor him by telling you about our
past.  If I were ever to discuss what happened…it would be with him.”
Despite the effort, his voice breaks.  “And not before I told him that I was
sorry.”
 
 
 
 
*            
“You flirted with Sherlock Holmes?”
“At him.  He never replies.”
“No, Sherlock always replies.  To everything.  He’s Mr. Punchline.  He will
outlive God trying to have the last word.”
 
 
 
 
“Dominatrix…”
“Don’t be alarmed.  It’s to do with sex.”
“Sex doesn’t alarm me.”
A sneer.
“How would you know?”
It is only because John sits beside him that he doesn’t fly over the table at
Mycroft, choking him, beating his face into the floor until there’s nothing
left but bloody bits.
Instead, Mr. Punchline says nothing, and it kills him.
 
 
 
 
*            
“I assume you’ll be off tomorrow, then?” Irene asks, sauntering into the room
with her dark wet hair and black-gold robe.  She leans forward, exposing a
strip of smooth skin.
“Assuming you’ll provide the transportation.”
“That can be arranged.”
She kneels at his feet, a position so familiar that he doesn’t have to ask
what’s on her mind.  And there—dilated pupils, gazing widely up into his face.
“What shall we do then, Mr. Holmes…with the rest of our evening?”
Sherlock has been expecting this.  A part of him is exasperated by the
predictability, but he might have been concerned if she hadn’t tried.
“You still want to know,” he says ironically, “Have I ever ‘had’ anyone?”
Irene smiles furtively, her cherry red lipstick an inch from his nose.
“Well…have you?”
Sherlock shifts, looking anywhere but her eyes.
“In a way.  When I was younger.”
Irene startles, pulling back slightly.  “Really?”
“I was sixteen,” he answers dryly.  “An experiment with disastrous results.”
“Would you want to correct that experiment?”
He sighs.  “It seems I don’t have a choice in the matter anyway.”
“There’s always a choice,” she purrs, stroking her hands up his calves.
“No.”  He shakes his head.  “Not always.”
A beat. 
“You were hurt…very badly.  Weren’t you?”
Tipping her chin up, he wraps his hand around her slender neck.  “Don’t ask me
anymore about it.”
They kiss.  He feels no spark, no pull, but he kisses her anyway.
And when she sinks down into his lap and unzips his pants, he doesn’t protest.
 
 
 
 
Afterwards, they lay sprawled out over the couch, her lithe body wrapped up in
his arms. 
“Do you want to get drunk?”
“Tonight’s a good as night as any,” he rumbles, and she untangles herself and
goes over to the bar. 
“Whiskey, I think.”
Irene fills up two large glasses, at least seven shots in each.  Sherlock takes
his glass without comment and cherishes the sharpness on his tongue and the
slow burn down his chest.
“And what shall we toast to, Mr. Holmes?” she asks, sinking down beside him.
“Second chances,” he replies without hesitation.
Irene raises her glass.  “I can drink to that.”
Uncaring, irresponsible, he drains the entire snifter in several large-mouthed
gulps.
“Oh my.  You’re a serious drinker, aren’t you?”
“Just tonight,” he coughs, wiping the whiskey from his chin.  Sherlock
retrieves the bottle and pours again.
“So will we be sharing our deepest, darkest secrets then?”
“I doubt it,” he answers.  “Alcohol doesn’t affect me like most.”
“Yes, you’re not most.”  Irene steals the bottle from him and takes a swig,
stretching her red lips obscenely around the top.  Her hand rests gently on his
knee.
“Did you sleep with me for practice?”
“What would I be practicing for?”
“John.”
The name hangs suspended over the empty living room—a word he hasn’t heard
since he’d said goodbye.
“He isn’t—”
“Yes he is.”  She smiles at him sadly.  “I know this didn’t mean anything to
you.  I know you were thinking of someone else.”
“How?”
Irene tucks her feet into his lap.  “Shall I deduce you?”
“Go on then.”
“It was easy.  You kept your eyes shut almost the entire time.  And you were
painfully silent.”
Sherlock swirls the whiskey in his glass, looks deep into its amber depths.
“But how do you know I was thinking about…”
“John?”
He winces at the name.
“It’s been written on you—on both of you—since the beginning.  There’s no
fooling anybody, Sherlock.”
He throws his drink back, and they gaze silently out the window, taking in the
blinking spread of the city.
When his vision starts to blur around the edges, and he’s sunk deeply into the
cushions, she lights up, and his nose twitches.
“Marijuana, Irene?”
“Mmm.  Have a hit.  Or two.”
She passes him the joint, and he tokes deeply, five times, in quick
succession.  Her face, sluggish in its drunkenness, falters. 
“Oh no, Sherlock.  That wasn’t such a good idea.”
He shrugs as the room starts to spin deliciously.  Sherlock taps his numbed
cheeks. 
“That was really strong stuff.  You’re not supposed to mix that much with
alcohol.  Tell me if you start feeling…”
But Sherlock has already slumped forward in his seat, drool leaking down his
chin and slobbering onto his chest.
“Sherlock.”
But Irene’s voice sounds so distant, already underwater.
The carpet is a magnet, and his head is being jerked into the ground.  The
floor meets his nose with a slam, and his arms stretch out in slow motion,
grasping blindly for anything to help himself up.  His vision goes dark, and he
blindly claws for the light, trying to make out any sound through his buzzing
ears.
Sherlock can’t hear a word Irene is saying.  His head is bubbled.  He can
barely decipher his own thoughts.  But what he does know, with sudden lucidity,
is I am going to die. 
The thought is not profound, not ground-breaking.  But it is different.  Even
when he was standing on the ledge, looking down at the pavement below, he knew
that he was going to survive.  But this is not a controlled variable.  This is…
Teeth bite hard into the carpet.  Scraping at fabric, at arms, at air,
anything.  A desperate sob wrenches from the back of his throat.  Unadulterated
fear, in all its paralyzing clarity.
I am going to die.  I am going to die and I’m never going to see John again.
It is this thought, more than anything, that completely overwhelms him.  It is
the only thought his brain has room for.  Everything else has been deleted,
thrown out of the windows, his palace trashed and burned because nowthere is
nothing else but this.
Sherlock realizes that this is the saddest moment of his entire life. 
Throughout all the years of boredom, the recklessness, the abuse of his body,
he has never realized how desperately he wants to live until now.  Everything
he ever wanted to do—see—say.  None of that will ever happen.  Already, he is
forgetting the sound of John’s voice, and his heart rends. 
“Help me,” he bellows into the carpet, and though he can’t make out anything,
he senses a blur of motion in front of his face.
“What, Sherlock?”
“Help me.”
“Help you up?”
 “No…HELP ME.  Please.”
 “Okay, woah there.”  Irene hauls him up and dumps him onto the couch.
“The pot was laced.”
“What?”  Her moving mouth swirls in front of his face.  “No, the pot’s fine. 
It’s just the mixture of alcohol and—”
Suddenly, chills shoot down his arms and his muscles seize, sending him into
terrible, body-wracking convulsions.  His teeth chatter so violently that he
bites into his tongue.
“C-call an a-ambulance,” he begs.
No answer.
“P-please…call somebody.  I’m dying, Irene.  I’m dying.”
“You’re not going to die, Sherlock.”  Her voice sounds shockingly unconcerned,
stoned and distant. 
“Please.  Call Mycroft.”
Sherlock curls in on himself, crying, convulsing.  His head is being mangled
from every direction.
“Call John,” his voice cracks.  “Call John.”
“I will,” she promises.  But she doesn’t move.
“Call John,” he wails hysterically, his plea echoing against the walls, loud
enough to shake the building to its foundation.  Water leaks out of his nose
and eyes.  “PLEASE call John now.  Please I want John I want John he would
never let me die like you DON’T LET ME DIE.”
He is screaming silently, clawing at the couch, at his swimming face and
blurring head.
“Look.”  She holds her phone in front of his face.  “I’m going to call John. 
Right now.”
He shakes his head weakly.
“No you won’t,” he moans as everything begins to fade.  “You won’t.”
And then a flash of white bursts over his vision, and his brother steps in
front of him, smart in his suit, twirling his umbrella.
“Mycroft?” 
 
 
 
 
What seems like hours later, after he’s yelled and wept at Mycroft, John,
Lestrade, Molly, Mrs. Hudson—even Moriarty, the room begins to focus back in
tiny increments, like the pages of a book turning.
Irene is slumped on the floor with her head thrown back against the couch.
“Irene,” he rasps.  She jolts upright, checking him over.
“If you’re not going to get me help…will you at least stay with me throughout
the night?  Make sure I don’t die?”
“You’re not going to die, Sherlock,” she repeats, running her fingers through
his hair, tucking a blanket over him.  “But don’t worry…I’ll stay up with you. 
Just sleep.”
Sherlock groans.  “No.  If I sleep, I might never wake up.  Don’t let me fall
asleep, Irene.  Don’t let me die.”
But her face is already swirling back out of focus.
 
 
 
 
He wakes with a jolt.  His eyes strain at the sun piercing through the living
room, golden, vibrant.  Gingerly, Sherlock sits up, wrapping the blanket around
his shivering frame.  Throbbing pain pounds through his skull, and his mouth
tastes like vomit. 
“I’m alive.”
His deep baritone shimmers through the stale air.
Sherlock bows his head, nearly weeps at the sound of his own voice. 
Deliberately, he uncurls his long, thin fingers, and then he traces his
features, sliding his fingers up his cheekbones, down the bridge of his nose,
over the pout of his lips.  Warm and soft and alive.  A gallop of breaths.  A
pulse rocketing in his wrist.  Sherlock counts the thumps, presses his lips
against blood-thrummed skin.  Legs tingle and stretch, support his weight
unsteadily. 
More slowly than usual, he makes observations as he scans the room, taking in
the dark vomit stains on the floor, the overturned whiskey bottle, the joint
ashed out on the coffee table.  The air reeks of sweat and pot and liquor and
desperation.  Nail bites skid across the carpet and the battered sofa.
Sherlock sways on his feet as black dots dance before his eyes, and then—then
his brain ignites, blazing.  The pieces collide together in a deafening crash. 
A white hot flash rushes up his brain stem and there—an angular female face
rises to the surface. 
Irene.  Where is she?
His gut churns hot with incredulity and rage.  But it is obvious why she didn’t
get help. 
Of course she would never risk entry of her safe house by people she didn’t
thoroughly trust, nor could she dump him in front of a hospital without
questions being asked.  And why would she call Mycroft or John, who thought
both of them dead?
He slings a whiskey glass across the room as hard as he can and feels the
impact of its shatter.
The door clicks open in tandem with the crash, and he slowly turns as she
tiptoes skittishly into the room.
“You’re awake,” she breathes. 
She sets a bag down on the table, refusing to look at him.  “I went out for a
bit…to get some things.”
Sherlock sifts through the contents.  Lipstick.  Perfume.  Condoms.  Foundation
brushes. 
His mouth drops open in disbelief.
“I just needed…something comforting,” she quickly explains. 
Sherlock turns, eyes her with disgust.  Long brown hair pulled into a bun.  The
slopes of her cheeks.  Her red lips.  Her made-up eyes and precisely plucked
eyebrows.  In less than a second, he knows, deep in his bones, that he despises
her. 
There are too many things he wants to say and do.  He aches with the undeniable
need to cut her deeply, to make her burn.  But that would achieve nothing. 
His hand reaches out, closes tightly around her throat. 
“Look at me, you coward,” he growls, and she does.  Unadulterated fear and
shame glisten in her eyes. 
“I trusted you,” he whispers.  With a sinking heart, he realizes that he has
already lost.  Everything is crumbling—the walls—his battlements—the protection
he’d cultivated years ago in that miserable, sweltering summer.  He lets go of
her as if burned.
Sherlock’s mouth opens, closes.  He has to stop this now, before he gets out of
hand.  The road ahead weighs on him heavily, and he knows that he’s going to
need every piece of help that she can offer. 
He tries to take comfort knowing that Irene won’t matter in the end.  None of
this will—not when he goes back to John and…
Their faces, bathed in white, pulse through his mind, and a surge of panic
leaves him breathless.
 “Did I…did I say anything?  About Mycroft?”
Irene’s eyes go wide and dart nervously around the room.
“You told your whole life story,” she wheezes, clutching her throat.  “But I
won’t breathe a word of it to anyone.”
He puts his head in his hands and whimpers.  Irene steps forward, places her
hand on his forearm. 
“Don’t touch me,” he snarls, yanking his arm away.  “The marijuana.  Was it
laced or not?  Some kind of hallucinogen?”
“No,” she says throatily.  “I promise.  I wasn’t affected.  It was the
mixture.  But I don’t understand how you saw those things…”
“The brain goes into shock when it’s dying,” he snaps, tucking in his shirt. 
He scans the room one last time and sneers. 
“Well, I’ll be off, then.  I need transportation to Hamburg.  I trust you’ll
arrange it?”
She nods with averted eyes, handing him the folder. 
“Have a car waiting for me outside.”
Another nod.
“And Irene?” he calls as he reaches the door.
Her voice sounds small and fragile.  “Yes?”
She still won’t look at him.  Fury tears through his body, but that is nothing
compared to the terrible anguish of betrayal. 
Irene will probably never apologize for her actions.  Perhaps not for as long
as she lives.  And the thought of that is so unbearable that he can’t utter a
single word.
Sherlock says nothing as he slams the door.
 
 
 
 
*            
John wrenches awake, shouting out in terror.  He wheezes, chest heaving as if
he’s run a marathon.  Ghosts.  He’s running from the softly blurred phantoms
that cleave through his mind each time he puts his head to his pillow.  He
sinks back down into the bed with his heart pounding in his ears.
It’s always hardest at night, he tries to tell himself.  But something about
this dream was different.
When he’d tipped over Sherlock’s broken body, blood slick on his hands,
Sherlock had blinked at him for a moment.
John had cried out, cradling that head, slapping at those cheekbones until
Sherlock had twitched again, mumbling under his breath.
“What is it, Sherlock?  What is it?”
Ice blue eyes fly open and pierce him.  “Call John,” his friend gurgles through
the blood pooled in his mouth.  “Please.  Call John.”
He shudders at the memory.  John itches to call Sherlock right now, check up on
him.  But then he remembers that Sherlock’s phone is sitting on the kitchen
counter.  And Sherlock is dead.
John turns over on his side and tucks his blanket under his feet.  He tries to
quiet his racing mind.  But then the sun is flooding through the blinds, and
John realizes that sleep has abandoned him for good. 
 
 
 
*            
Sherlock scans the street from the back of the taxi.  Nothing unusual afoot,
but it doesn’t hurt to be careful.  And that’s what he’s been the past few
months: careful—for the first time in his life.  Determined not to get himself
killed as he tracks down and silences each of Moriarty’s top men and women.
The man living on the eighth floor—Sebastian Moran—is the last name on Irene’s
list, and Sherlock isn’t ashamed to admit that he’s so weary he can barely
think straight.  Since that morning he wrenched awake on the couch, blissfully
alive, he’s noticed that the old thrills—the once-loved dangers—do nothing for
him anymore.  Sherlock’s careful now because he’s scared, and he knows that
fear could cloud his judgment and lead to grievous errors.  And the last thing
he wants is to have his body sent to John—again.  Not now.  Not when he’s so
close he can taste it.
Based on Irene’s information, Moran is currently out of the apartment.  In an
hour, he will arrive, and Sherlock will shoot him in the back of the head. 
He hands some money to the driver and exits the car. 
 
 
 
 
When he gets to the eighth floor, he quickly finds the room number and starts
picking the lock.  It clicks, and he creaks open the door, feeling the wall
with gloved fingers.
Sherlock turns on the light and stares in horror down the barrel of a shotgun. 
“Close the door,” Moran growls in a deep voice, and Sherlock obeys, heart
hammering.
“Sit.”  He points to the chair in front of him.  “Give me your gun.”
Sherlock hands it over, and the man pockets it. 
The pictures in Irene’s file don’t do the man justice.  Up close, Sebastian is
almost painfully handsome, with his strong jaw, straight nose, and long,
dishwater blonde hair. 
They could have been brothers, he thinks abruptly, and it’s almost too much
just to look at him.
“Good.  Now that all of that is taken care of…”  Moran sets down his gun and
crosses his hands on the table.  “I’ve been expecting you, Mr. Holmes.”
 “Have you.”
“Don’t worry,” he says dryly.  “You haven’t been betrayed.  It’s just that with
you traversing the world, picking off my old colleagues...”
Moran gets up and carries over a tea tray.  “Would you like some?”
“Er…what?”
“Tea?”  He pours and hands a cup and saucer to Sherlock.  “I assume you take
milk, two sugars?”
Sherlock wordlessly nods. 
Moran laughs darkly.  “Figures.  Same as Jim.”
He adds a splash of cold milk and drops two sugars into the steaming liquid.
The man sits down heavily and takes his own tea in hand.  “Go on, it’s not
going to bite.  Why would I poison you if I could just shoot you?”
Sherlock can’t argue with that.  He sticks his tongue out, lapping at the
liquid.  Nothing.  Just…high quality Earl Grey.  Puzzled, he looks up at Moran,
but the man is just staring into his drink, looking utterly exhausted. 
He waves a hand.  “So, now that you’re here, Mr. Holmes…you’re going to kill
me?”
“I was going to.”
“Oh.”  Moran pats the gun in his jacket.  “With this, right?  Well, since that
plan’s shot, what now?”
Sherlock crinkles his eyebrows in confusion.  “You want me to point out the
obvious?”
“Go on.”
“Well now…you’re going to kill me.”
Moran smiles.  “And why would I do that?”
“Because I’m an enemy, and—”
Moran holds up a finger and stops him.  “And that’s where you’re wrong, Mr.
Holmes.  I have no reason to kill you.  I work for no one but myself now, and I
have no quarrel with you.”
“So we’re just going to sit here, drinking tea, not killing each other.”
Moran shakes his head.  “But not only that.  We’re going to sit here and talk
about our problem.”
A manic smile shimmers through Sherlock’s mind, and he shivers.  “The final
problem,” he whispers.
“Jesus.”  Moran sets down his tea.  “I’m not Jim, okay?”  His face goes ashen,
stone grey.  “No, Mr. Holmes.  The problem is what we’re going to do now.”
He leans forward.  “This is how it’s going to be—and I do hope you go along
with it.  Neither of us is going to die.  We’re going to talk.  And then you’re
going to decide if you’ll accept my help.”
Sherlock clinks his cup back on its saucer.  “You want to help me?  Why?”
Moran drums his fingers on the table.  “You’re destroying Jim’s network…not for
kicks, I imagine?  You’re picking us off, one by one, because you’re scared. 
You think we’re going to come after your landlady, or the detective, or John.”
There is something familiar, almost sad, in the way he says John’s name.
“Even if you’d succeeded in killing me today, it wouldn’t be over.  There’s
more out there—that you or your brother or Adler have no clue about.”
“And you do.”  Sherlock steeples his fingers.  “But you still haven’t answered
my question.  Why help me?”
Moran shrugs. 
“Everything that happened to you—that was Jim’s business.  But now Jim
is…gone.”
Sherlock notes the hesitation in the man’s voice, files it away for later.
“Most of the time, I didn’t understand why he did the things he did.  He was
insane, you know.”  He laughs humorously.  “Yea.  You probably knew.  But he
was my…friend.  Now that he’s dead, his war should be over—but it isn’t.  Not
for us.”
Moran’s eyes suddenly fill with sadness.  “You may not believe me now…but I
know what it’s like to be a John Watson.”
Sherlock stares, truly seeing the man for the first time.
“Don’t you think it’s time you got back to him?”
 
 
 
 
They screech to halt on the outskirts of Sydney.  Moran slaps at Sherlock’s
hand, annoyed.
“For the last time, you are not going to change the station.  I’ve had enough
classical music to last a lifetime.  Jim already beat me into submission with
that.  The two of you spend more time going on and on about the composer and
the history than the bloody music anyway.”
Sherlock grumbles, turning up his coat collar.
“Besides, you know nothing about classic rock…it’s actually quite sad.  You’re
missing out on—”
“More Than A Feeling” by Boston starts playing, and Moran turns up the radio
with a grin.
“You’re missing out on gems like this.”
“Dull,” Sherlock quips.
Moran slugs his shoulder.  “Shove off.  Just listen, okay?  Live a little.”
The two men stare out silently into the night, growing drowsy from the heater. 
When the song ends, Moran glances over and sees Sherlock’s half-hidden smile. 
“You liked it, didn’t you?”
When Sherlock doesn’t answer, Moran chalks it up as a victory.
“We’ll start getting ready at three.”  He looks down at his watch.  “There’s a
cot in the back if you want to nap.  We have a bit of time.”
Sherlock shakes his head.  “No.  I’ll keep watch.  You get some sleep.”
“But you’re exhausted.”
“So are you.  I can’t possibly relax with the way my mind is racing.”
Moran shakes his head.  “All right, Sherlock.”
He slides out of the driver’s seat and turns back the curtain separating the
front from the back. 
“I’ll know if you change the channel.”
Sherlock waves him off, and Moran collapses into sleep almost immediately.
 
 
 
 
“Sebastian.”
“Yes?”  The man efficiently loads his gun and checks the knife in his boot. 
“How will it be done?”
Sherlock shifts, rustling the bushes they’ve been crouched behind for the past
half hour. 
“Be still,” Moran snaps.  “Silencer, obviously.  Get in and out.”
Sherlock hesitates.  “No, I mean…”
Moran notices the tenseness in the other man’s frame and understands.  “You’ll
do it,” he reassures softly.  “It should be you.  It is the last one, after
all.”
Sherlock nods, grateful.
“Let’s go.”
The cameras surrounding the hotel’s perimeter have already been disabled, but
they still stalk quietly through the dark parking lot, as swift as shadows. 
They creak open the backdoor and quickly climb up several flights of stairs. 
Sherlock’s mind stays clear.  There’s no reason to be nervous with Moran beside
him, and he knows that even if this ambush doesn’t work, they’ll catch up to
her again somehow.  This is the last one.
Oppressive silence and darkness greet them.  Sherlock knows this is a good
sign.  She probably isn’t expecting us.  But he can’t help the nervous chill
that creeps up his spine. 
Keeping their shoulders pressed to the wall, they scan the main room and begin
toeing their way down the hall.  Sherlock reaches the bedroom first, swallows,
and gradually curves his neck around the doorframe.
He freezes at the knife pressed against his throat. 
A low voice hisses in his ear, “One move, I spill your blood.  Follow me
through the doorway.  Now.”
Sherlock lets his neck follow the force of the blade, and suddenly, a wiry
forearm wraps around his shoulder as the knife juts more sharply against his
skin.
Moran reaches in, clicks on the light, and takes in Sherlock’s paling face and
the bright trickle of blood running down his neck.  The woman’s long black hair
curls wildly over her face and down her shoulders.  Her eyes are bloodshot,
crazed, and her teeth clench in a sharp click.
“Throw down your gun, you traitor,” she hisses, gesturing with her head.
Moran lowers his weapon and tosses it to the floor. 
“All of them.  Do you think I’m stupid?”
Carefully, he pulls a gun out of the elastic of his pants and then the two
tucked in his jacket.  He sets each one down under her watchful eye.
“Please—” Sherlock whispers.
The woman twitches the knife, nicking more of his skin.  “Shut up,” she
snarls. 
There.  Moran catches the slight tremor in her hand.  She’s afraid.  Afraid and
stupid and not thinking. 
Slowly, he crouches to his knees. 
“Don’t move,” she yells, the knife shaking hard at Sherlock’s throat. 
Sherlock’s eyes are so large that all Moran can see is ice blue. 
“Just sitting down,” he reassures her, holding his hands out in front of him. 
“Don’t move unless I tell you,” she spits.  “Stay right where you are.  If you
try anything, he’s dead.”
“I’m not going to try anything,” he promises, bowing his head in submission. 
Her shoulders relax minutely, but that’s all the time he needs.  Lightning-
fast, he reaches for the knife in his boot and flings it in a straight line
across the room.  The point strikes her right between the eyes, and her body
slams back against the wall.  Sherlock wrenches the blade from his neck,
gasping, and he turns to the body sprawled out on the floor.  Only the hilt
peeks out of her skull, and blood oozes down over her nose and lips. 
“S-Sebastian,” Sherlock wheezes, his knees buckling.  Moran is at his side in
an instant, pulling him to his feet, checking on the shallow cut over his
throat.
“You’ll be okay,” he says gruffly, smudging the blood with his thumb, his eyes
dark.  “Let’s get out of here.  Now.”
He drags Sherlock behind him, pulling him down the hall and then the stairs.
The cold night air stings when they open the backdoor, and their breath clouds
as they sprint to the van.  The men fling open the doors and jump inside. 
Moran starts the engine, and they speed off with a screech of wheels. 
Sherlock shakes in his seat, holding his head in his hands.
“Sherlock?"
The man shakes his head, hiding his face from view.  Tremors run up his
forearms.  Moran turns his eyes back to the road and gives him some time to
collect himself.  
Ten minutes later, “Born to Run” starts blaring from the speakers, and he
steals a look at Sherlock through sleepy eyes.  Sherlock is slumped in his seat
with his forehead pressed again the glass. 
Sensing the scrutiny, Sherlock shakily reaches over and puts his hand over
Moran’s.
“Thank you,” he breathes.
Baby, we were born to run.
 
 
 
 
“Okay, stop laughing,” Sebastian smiles.  “I know…it’s a bloody tree house.”
Hunched over, grasping his knees, Sherlock shakes with mirth, his ribs aching. 
The birds have scattered at the commotion.  They glide across the sky in long
arcs and resettle in a cluster of tall trees.
Sherlock and Sebastian use the planks nailed to the trunk to haul themselves up
into a roofless, wooden box. 
“You have to admit, Sherlock—it’s a lovely view.”
Miles of untouched, secluded countryside stretch out in the form of rolling
hills.  Trees pepper the lush landscape, and the sky shines bright blue,
cloudless and jeweled. 
“Very lovely,” he admits, shuffling out of his shoes.
“Hope you don’t mind.”  Sebastian reaches into his bag.  “Got us some beer.”
Sherlock smirks and motions for one, undoing the first button of his shirt. 
“My parents used to take me up here for summers,” Sebastian says fondly as they
clink their beers together.
He points down to the little brown cottage tucked away at the bottom of a steep
hill.  “My grandma’s place.  I inherited it after she died.  Now all of this,”
he makes a sweeping gesture, “is mine.
Sherlock stares out over the rows of broad-leafed trees.  “You could retire
here, raise some chickens.”
Sebastian chuckles.  “Perhaps.”
“I grew up in the country, when I wasn’t in boarding school,” Sherlock says. 
“My mother owns a large estate.  Horses.  Pond.  Acres of land.  And most
importantly, an extensive library.”
“No wonder you’re so pale.  Should have taken some books outside with you.”
“Outside.  Boring.” 
“Oh shut up.”  Sebastian grins.  “I did raise one chicken.”
“You did?”
“My grandma let me choose my own that summer.  I fed it, watched over it.  Even
named it—Tiger.  Because it wasn’t speckled like the others.  There were these
strips of red and gold running over its brown back.  Bloody fell in love with
the thing.”
“What happened to it?”
“Had to kill it for supper,” Sebastian rasps.  “But I couldn’t.  My dad did it
for me.”
“Youcouldn’t kill a chicken.”
“I know.”  He pauses, staring wistfully in the direction of the cottage.
 “Ridiculous, isn’t it?    Couldn’t even eat it, either, after my mom cooked it
up.  Psychologists would have a field day with me, probably.”
Sebastian reaches for the bag again and pulls out two more beers.
“Tomorrow morning, would you take a walk with me?  There’s something I need to
do.  But I don’t want to do it alone.”
“Of course,” Sherlock answers without hesitation.  “Are you in trouble?”
“No.  It’s not like that.  I just need to visit someone.”
Sherlock narrows his eyes, then understands.  “Ah.  So that’s why you brought
me out here.”
They silently pull at their beers. 
“You can call me Seb, you know,” he says softly. 
“Is that what he used to call you?”
Sebastian nods.  He leans over and takes a small black book out of the bag,
extending it to Sherlock.
“This was his.  It was on him when I took his body—”  His voice drops. 
“Anyway, I haven’t been able to look at it yet.  He was always scribbling in
that thing.  I doubt I’d understand half the stuff in there anyway.”
Sherlock looks down at the worn moleskine.  “Are you sure you want me to look
at this?”
“Go ahead.  You finally beat him, didn’t you?  You deserve it.”
“I couldn’t have done it without your help.”
“But I did it for a different reason than you,” Sebastian whispers.  “Just…look
at it.”
Sherlock studies the man’s weary profile.  Long, dirty locks of hair flap over
his face.  Thin lines are already beginning to slash across his forehead. 
Purple bags swell under his eyes. 
“Seb…you know I’m not him, right?”
The man’s chin shakes.  “I know.  Please just open it.”
Carefully, Sherlock flips back the cover.  He turns a few pages.  Nothing
remarkable stands out.  Hastily scribbled dates, names.  He turns another
page.  Small pictures of himself and Mycroft are taped down, with the words
“The Ice Man” and “The Virgin” scrawled over them in red ink.  He shows the
page to Sebastian, who snorts. 
“You really a virgin?”
Sherlock shoots him a glare.
“He persuaded my brother to tell him my life story.” Sherlock says.  “That’s
the whole reason this happened.”
“I know,” Sebastian says eventually.  “Do you blame him for all of this?  Your
brother?”
Sherlock shakes his head.  “I’ve blamed Mycroft for many things throughout my
life.  But this—he did what he thought was best.” 
He twists the cap off another bottle.
“I forgave him, though.  For everything else.  After all that’s happened since
the…  I’m not angry anymore.”
Sherlock purses his lips and speaks before he changes his mind.  “I’m not
talking about faking my death.  Five months ago, right after it happened, I was
staying at Irene’s safe house.  I almost died from an idiotic accident.  The
irony.”
He snorts.  “Mixing marijuana and alcohol isn’t the best idea.”
“I could have told you that.”
“So could I.  But I wasn’t thinking clearly.  I was reckless and apathetic.  Do
you know what the worst part was, though?  Irene didn’t do anything, even when
I begged for help.  She just sat in her drugged haze and let me humiliate
myself.  She would have let me die.”
His haunted eyes search out Sebastian’s.  “That was the saddest moment of my
life.  When I was lying on the floor, convulsing, feeling everything begin to
fade.  I didn’t think I—I’d ever see John again.  I thought I’d never get to
tell him that I—”
Sebastian grips his shoulder.
“I began having visions of people—John, Mycroft.  I don’t remember what I said,
but I raged at them.  Begged.  Wept at them.  It seemed so real.  When I woke
up the next morning, I could feel all of that hate vanish.  Nothing remained
but my purpose…what I would have to do to get back to the people I—love.”
Sherlock swallows, tilts his head at Sebastian.  “So yes.  I forgive Mycroft. 
Surprisingly, I even forgive Irene.”
He returns his attention to the book and thumbs through the pages quickly. 
More nonsensical notes, sketches of carved apples that make Sebastian smile. 
Towards the back, a flash of color jumps out, and his fingers seek the page.  A
Polaroid picture taped down at the corners.
“Do you forgive him?” Sherlock asks suddenly.
Sebastian throws his empty bottle through the trees and hears it hit the ground
with a small thunk.
“Of course I do.  I shouldn’t.  But I do.  It doesn’t make a bit of difference,
though.”  Sebastian’s mouth twists.  “What would he have cared?  Why would he
have left if he had…cared?”
Sherlock pulls the tape off the picture and flips it over.
“Seb,” Sherlock whispers.  “You need to see this.”
“What is it?”  Sebastian asks bitterly.  “More apples?”
Wide-eyed, Sherlock shakes his head.  He holds out the picture.
 
“I remember this,” Sebastian chokes.  “Our roadtrip.  We stayed at the beach
for a few days—that’s the only time off he could spare.”
His fingers smooth over the photo.  “I can’t believe he kept this.”
“Look on the back,” Sherlock says thickly.
Sebastian turns it over and freezes at Jim’s familiar handwriting:
 
 
Sebastian’s head bangs into the wood as the rest of his body goes limp.  He
curls into himself, shoulders shaking brutally as a low keen begins rising from
his throat.
Sherlock puts his hand on his friend’s back, and Sebastian lets out a wail that
shakes the birds from the branches below.
 
 
 
 
The pile of empty beer bottles clink in the corner of the tree house, jangling
in the wind.   Sherlock and Sebastian lie on top of their sleeping bags, curled
against each other, gazing through the branches at the blinking stars.  
“Seb?  Do you think you can love more than one person…at the same time?”
Sherlock asks, slurring.
“Absolutely.”
“I mean…in love.”
“Of course.”
“I’ve thought about it from every angle.”  Sherlock covers his face with his
hands.  “But it doesn’t make sense.”
The chirps of hoards of crickets echo up the tree.
“It is possible.  But there’s only ever the one, though,” Seb whispers. 
“You’re born, and if you’re lucky, your childhood years are spent in oblivious
wonder.  Sunbeams blur the edges.  You spend hot summer nights lying content in
your bed.  You run everywhere.  Always.  And you don’t stop.  Because there’s
no reason to ever get tired when you’re that young and have your whole life
ahead of you.”
Sherlock hums, closing his eyes, picturing himself hiding under the table
during Mother’s tea parties, reading next to the fire with his father, Mycroft
hefting him up on his shoulders and sprinting across the field. 
“But then something shifts.” Seb says.  “You grow old.  And the world grows
grey.”
Caring is not an advantage.
“There’s this quote I heard once:  ‘You cannot protect yourself from sadness
without protecting yourself from happiness.’  Do you think that’s true?”
Sherlock says nothing, but Sebastian can feel the wetness spreading on his
shoulder.
“After things change, you spend the rest of your days locked in a car that’s
hurtling down the highway.” Seb whispers.  “I call it the long drive.  You go
and you go and you never stop because you don’t want to.  Not yet.  You want
something more.  With each mile you travel, even unconsciously, you’re driving
yourself down the road towards something better, something good enough.”
He takes a breath. 
“And then you find it, and you stop.  You open the door and see them standing
there, so beautiful you can barely look at them.  Everything they do only makes
you better, just from knowing them.  They rip off your bloody cloak and let the
blinding sunshine pour back in.”
Sebastian tightens his arm around Sherlock, pressing his forehead against the
other man’s. 
“And you know: you’re never going to spend another day of your life without
them again, not as long as you can help it.”
Sherlock can feel Sebastian’s shuddering breaths rattling inside his own
ribcage.
Not if you can help it.
 
 
 
 
“This way,” Sebastian directs.  Sherlock stoops under a low-lying branch,
catching his foot on a half-buried rock.  Sweat trickles down his forehead. 
They’ve been walking for quite some time. 
Every once in a while, Sebastian will stop and pull a wildflower up by its
roots.  By the time they get there, his hands teem with pale yellow and white. 
He points to a tree with red paint slashed across its middle.  “There’s the
marker.”
His eyes scan the ground, and he squats down beside a lopsided, mossy boulder,
patting the earth carefully.
“Here he is.”
He rises to his feet, and Sherlock tentatively stands next to him, feeling like
he’s intruding.  They stare at the lumpy mound, already run over by grass.
“Have you ever had to bury someone you love?”
Sherlock opens his mouth.
“I don’t mean if you’ve ever lost anyone.  I mean…have you ever had carry them
in your arms?  Dig the grave yourself?  Lower them into the ground?”
 Sherlock shakes his head.
“I hope you never will.”
Sebastian gazes down at the grave and locks his hands together.  He hesitates
for a moment, but then his voice comes out strong.
“Hello Jim.”
He pauses, almost as if expecting some kind of reply. 
“I hope you’re doing well, wherever you are.”
Kneeling down, Sebastian delicately drapes the bouquet of wildflowers over the
grave.
“I have Sherlock here with me.  You’d have a laugh about that wouldn’t you?
 Would you call me a traitor?” 
He shakes his head.  “Nah.  You wouldn’t.  He’s my friend.”
Sherlock digs his fingers into Sebastian’s shoulder.
“No matter what you wanted me to believe, despite your coldness and cruelty and
the horrible things you made me see and do, I know a part of you cared after
all.  Whether you wanted me to or not, I saw the flashes of good in you from
time to time—when it was just us.”
Sebastian pauses, his mouth quivering. 
 “It may be too late now, but I wanted to tell you that…”
He takes a deep, shuddering breath.  “That I love you.”
Tears cascade down his cheeks.
Sebastian kneels and kisses the grave.  “Goodbye, Jim.  I’ll see you again
soon.”
He turns away and motions for Sherlock to follow.  The two men leave the
clearing silently and don’t look back.
They return the way they came, swinging branches out of their way and stepping
over anthills.   
“Jim said that I was boring,” Sherlock says suddenly.
Sebastian stops.  “He said that about everybody.”
“He said I was boring…because I was on the side of the angels.”
Sherlock purses his lips.  “But when we were on that rooftop together, I told
him that even though I was on the side of angels—he shouldn’t think for one
second that I was one of them.”
Sebastian stares at him hard, then steps forward and pulls Sherlock into a
tight hug. 
“That’s probably why you drive John crazy,” he whispers into Sherlock’s neck. 
“You fool.  Of course you’re on the side of the angels.”
Sherlock grips him back hard.
“What are you going to do now, Seb?”
Sebastian pulls back, smoothes his hand down Sherlock’s shoulder.  “I don’t
know.  Travel the world, I guess.  After all, I have a lot of money saved up.”
He shrugs.  “Maybe I’ll go to Japan first.  That’s one place I’ve never been.”
“I’m sure you still have enemies,” Sherlock says.  “I could have Irene arrange
for people to follow you, make sure that you remain safe.”
The other man shakes his head.  “No, I’m a big boy.  Didn’t you know that I can
take care of myself?  I’ve made it this far, haven’t I?”
He cocks his head, studying his friend.
“Who knows?  Maybe when I return, you can invite John down here.  We’ll drink
some beer in the tree house.”  He smiles.  “Maybe raise a chicken or two.”
Sherlock laughs.  “I’ll try explaining that one to John.”
“What about you?  What are you going to do now?”
“I have some quick business to take care of first.”
“But then you’re going back to John?”
“Of course,” Sherlock breathes.
Sebastian steps forward and cups Sherlock’s chin.  “I’m going to miss you.”
 
 
 
 
*
Can I come see you?  SH
Mycroft knocks over his cup of tea.
How do I know it’s really you?
The piping hot liquid is soaking into his trousers, but he doesn’t notice.  His
heart pounds in his ears, and his head swims.
Caring is not an advantage.  SH
Mycroft lets out a breath and puts his head in his hands.
Can you come tonight?
I will be there at 7.  SH
 
 
 

*            
They stare at each other in Mycroft’s kitchen, untouched food in front of them.
“Aren’t you hungry?”
Sherlock shakes his head.
“How did you survive?” Mycroft asks after a while. 
He studies his brother closely.  A pang rolls through his chest when he sees
the hint of gray creeping up Mycroft’s temples.  His navy suit looks rumpled, a
few days old.  More lines have cropped up around his eyes and mouth, and he’s
lost at least ten pounds since he last saw him.
Sherlock should feel guilty, but a part of him says I am capable of doing this
to him.
Suddenly, he stands up.
“I’m going to bed now,” he announces.
Mycroft blinks.  “The guest room is upstairs.  There are a few changes of
clothes in the drawers.”
“Good night, Mycroft.”
Sherlock stalks up the stairs loudly, and Mycroft sets down his fork and lets
his tea go cold.
 
 
 
 
Through the crack in the door, the light pours in, and Mycroft turns over on
his side.
“Sherlock?”
His brother shuts the door and crawls under the covers with him.
“What are you—”
Sherlock moves his mouth over his, threading fingers into Mycroft’s hair.  His
heart aches with each gentle press of lips.
“I never thought I’d get to tell you—”
“Shhhh….”
He allows himself to be undressed, slowly, deliberately.  Sherlock kisses the
curve of his neck, his sternum, his left shoulder.  Mycroft barely flinches at
the press of fingers between his legs, the coldness of the lube.  Sherlock
stretches him open, never breaking eye contact.  One finger, two, three. 
Sherlock wipes his hand on the sheets and covers Mycroft’s body with own.  He
groans into his younger brother’s neck, tasting soft, salty skin and damp hair.
Sherlock positions himself and painstakingly thrusts inside him.
Stars explode over Mycroft’s vision. 
“Sherlock, I—”
But his brother claims his mouth, silences him again.  Sherlock hooks Mycroft’s
legs over his shoulders and rocks into him so slowly it’s excruciating. 
Sherlock lets himself slide out almost completely, then fills Mycroft again
with a deep plunge. 
“Please,” Mycroft begs, piercing his fingernails into Sherlock’s back.
He suddenly snaps his hips, drives into Mycroft hard, and they both groan. 
Sweat drips from Sherlock’s curls onto Mycroft’s chest. 
When Mycroft begins stroking himself, Sherlock swipes his thumb over Mycroft’s
bottom lip, and he stares into Sherlock’s eyes, falling into fathomless ice
blue.  Mycroft comes, clenching impossibly tight around his brother, and
Sherlock gasps and shatters. 
He falls into Mycroft’s open arms.
“I was going to tell you that I’m sorry,” Mycroft whispers into his hair.
“I know.”
He wraps his arms more tightly around his brother’s sweaty frame.
“I love you, Sherlock.”
Sherlock leans his head down, and they share a long, slow kiss.  The finality
in Sherlock’s breath makes him shiver.
“I love you, too, Mycroft.”
 “It could have worked out between us.  If I hadn’t…”
“No, Mycroft.”  Sherlock shakes his head.  “You did what you thought was
right…you thought you were protecting me by driving me away.”
“Nothing I ever did was right.  I ruined you, Sherlock.  I destroyed that poor
little boy and made you—“
“You didn’t ruin me, Mycroft.  It’s called growing up.”
“I didn’t make you grow up.”  He shuts his eyes.  “I made you cold.”
Sherlock lays his head on his brother’s chest.
“We could still make it work, Sherlock.”
“No,” he whispers.  “We couldn’t.  We fight.  We clash.  It’s in our blood. 
All we’ve ever done is tried to control each other…and neither of us will ever
budge.”
He looks up into at his brother.
“Do you remember what you said?  Be with someone who shares your love and
treats you kindly?”
Mycroft nods.
“I finally have that…with John.  You can’t deny me that, Mycroft.  Not after
all these years.”
His brother’s voice wavers.  “When I first met John, and he defended you so
ardently, after only knowing you a day…I knew that I had already lost you.” 
He traces his fingers over Sherlock’s smooth back. 
“Do you regret this?” he asks. 
“No,” Sherlock says quickly.  “I regret none of this.”
He leans down, cups Mycroft’s face.
“But I am sick of who I am, Mycroft.  I’ve seen what I can be, how human I can
be—and now I always want to be that person.  I’m tired of the coldness and the
fear and being alone.”
He sits up in bed.
“You were wrong, you know.”
“About what?”
“Caring.  Caring is an advantage.”
He puts his mouth to Mycroft’s ear.  “What’s the point if you don’t care?”
Sherlock stands, and Mycroft watches him walk over to the window, nude and
beautiful in the moonlight. 
“Where are you going?”
“I’m going to take a bath.  Then I’m going to sleep here with you.  And in the
morning, I’m going to go home.”
 
 
 
 
Sherlock stretches out in the tub, letting the steaming water soak the tension
from his limbs.  Resting his head back against the ledge, he slides into the
warm embrace, sighing.  His mind feels strangely clear as he lathers his skin
with soap.
After he towels himself dry, he walks back into Mycroft’s bedroom.  The air
feels cool on his damp skin.
Mycroft holds out Sherlock’s phone.  “You got a text.”
He sits down on the bed and goes to his inbox.  It’s from Irene.
Sebastian Moran is dead. He was just killed in Hokkaido.
“Sherlock?”
His hands are shaking so hard that he can barely type back.
Have the body arranged to be sent to me.  SH
I will let you know the details.
He feels like he is falling through the floor, his chest aching so unbearably
that he can barely breathe.
“Sherlock, what’s wrong?” Mycroft asks, resting a hand on his shoulder.
“A dear friend,” he whimpers.  “He’s dead.”
 
 
 
 
*            
This will never get any easier, he knows.  Seb’s body is stiff and heavy, and
Sherlock has to stop every few minutes.  Each time, he lays his friend down
gently and drops the shovel, trying to catch his breath.  When he’s rested long
enough, he picks the body back up, cradling it against his chest.  Sherlock
places the shovel on top.
It takes an eternity, retracing Seb’s path with such a heavy load, but finally,
when he’s gone deep enough into the forest, he sees the bright red slash across
the tree.  He sets Seb down and searches for the mossy boulder. 
Sweat pours down his back as he digs, and his shirt clings to his skin.  By the
time the hole is deep enough, his forearms are burning with agony.  He throws
aside the shovel and stumbles over to Seb.
He doesn’t want to do this.  He desperately does not want to put his friend so
deep into the ground, to lose him forever to the silent earth.  But he must. 
Slowly, he drags the body over to the black, cavernous hole and carefully
lowers him inside.  Sherlock winces at the thud when he drops him. 
I know what it’s like now, Seb.  To bury someone I love.
Somehow, he forces himself to pick up the shovel, fill in the hole, and pat the
soil down.  When he’s finished, he collapses on the ground, exhausted.
A fresh wave of grief washes over him.  Sherlock’s back hunches over as he
weeps. 
Through his tears, he tries to speak. 
“Seb—it was only chance that we met.  It’s even more impossible that we became
friends.  But it was all because you understood what it was like to be me.  And
you knew what it was like to be John.”
He wipes his burning eyes.
“You were one of the most sympathetic, forgiving human beings I have ever
known.”
Seb’s kind face swims so clearly into his mind.  Sunlight falling through his
blonde hair, across that tan, good-looking face.
“I’m going to tell John everything I ever knew about you,” he promises. 
“Everything.  It’s only because of you that I get to go back to him.”
Sherlock stares down at the dirt, picturing Seb and Jim curled towards each
other in the darkness.  His fists clench when he realizes how easily it could
be himself and John. 
“You don’t have to go another day without him now.  We both knew what would
happen to you when we left this forest…but it wasn’t my place to take that
choice away from you.”
He reaches down, strokes the soil.
“I wish you would have stayed a little longer, Seb.  I wish you could have met
John.”
Sherlock stands up shakily and scrapes his fingers over Jim’s grave, gathering
a handful of shriveled wildflowers that Seb had placed there days before. 
Sherlock scatters them over the freshly dug mound, barely able to see from
behind his tears.
He holds his head with shaking hands. 
“Goodbye, Sebastian Moran.  I will never forget you.”
 
 
 
 
*            
Sebastian rolls down the windows and presses his foot to the gas.  The car
glides over the highway, and the wind violently whips the blonde bangs from his
face.
“Don’t worry, Seb,” Jim drawls, grinning at him.  “I’m not going to torture you
with classical music.  Nope, not on our vacation.”
He smirks, leaning his head out of the window like a dog.  “VACATION!” he
yells.
Sebastian laughs, and Jim plugs his phone into the stereo. 
“Modest Mouse,” he says, flipping through songs.  He cranks up the sound and
the opening guitar flows out of the speakers and drifts out the windows.
There is something both joyful and sad about the music all at once.  Sebastian
can taste the way the chords flow and drip, like waves of salt and water.
Jim throws his head back and sings along.
 
Your body may be gone, I’m gonna carry you in, in my head in my heart in my
soul
And maybe we’ll get lucky and we’ll both live again
Well I don’t know I don’t know I don’t know don’t think so

Seb presses the pedal harder, and they breeze over the cliff road.  The
brilliant blue sea comes into view.

The ocean breathes salty, won’t you carry it in?
In your head, in your mouth, in your soul
And maybe we’ll get lucky and we’ll both grow old
Well I don’t know I don’t know I don’t know I hope so
 
Something is twisting in Sebastian’s heart, some unnamed fear, and he finds
that he can scarcely draw breath.
Jim looks over at him, lowers his sunglasses.
“Seb.  What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”  He grips the steering wheel more tightly.
Jim’s voice lowers, almost gentle.  “Tell me.”
Sebastian meets his eyes nervously.  “Is this trip such a good idea?  Three
days of sitting on the beach.  Won’t you get bored?”  Won’t you get bored with
me?
Jim only smiles, his eyes crinkling, and Sebastian thinks Sunshine. 
Unadulterated light.
He reaches over and places his hand over Sebastian’s.
“Dear, I could never get bored with you.”
Sebastian’s chest loosens, and he turns his gaze back to the road.  A brilliant
smile lights up his face, and he knows with unwavering certainty that there
will never be another moment as happy as this one.
 
 
 
 
*            
“Mrs. Hudson!” John calls down the stairs.  “Are you gonna get that?”
He bites his lip, pecking at the keyboard. 
“Mrs. Hudson!”
John groans and puts his laptop on the table.  Answering the single rings never
gets any easier.  Mrs. Hudson has taken to getting the door for him, explaining
in a low voice that John doesn’t take cases anymore.
“I’ll get it, then,” he sighs, rising to his feet.
John grasps his walking stick and drags his cumbersome leg down the stairs.
He limps to the door and unlocks it.  “Sorry, but we’re not taking cases any—”
He stares into smooth pale skin, sharp cheekbones, and ice blue eyes.
John shakes his head and shuts the door.  He sighs, turning away, knowing that
as soon as he lumbers back up the stairs, he’s going to have to phone his
psychiatrist and ask about the side effects of his new antidepressants.
When the doorbell rings again, he jumps.
“Okay, this isn’t funny,” he grumbles, wrenching open the door.
“John.  I’m so sorry.” 
The man’s mouth trembles as he steps through the archway and closes the door
behind him.  Hesitantly, he reaches out and settles a very firm, very real hand
on John’s shoulder.
“Sher—”  John’s knees buckle.  “No—it can’t—Sher?”
The man cups John’s face with large, warm hands.
“It’s me, John.  I’m really here.”
John’s eyes widen, and he runs his fingers through soft brown curls. 
“I’m home now,” Sherlock breathes.  “I’m home.”
“Oh god, Sherlock.”
John tucks the other man against him, pressing his nose into the curve between
neck and shoulder, and oh god it’s him.
And then John is sobbing brokenly, dragging Sherlock down to the floor as his
legs give out.  Sherlock goes with him, wrapping his arms around John, holding
his head into his chest.
“John,” Sherlock moans.  “I’m sorry.  I faked my death to protect you.  It’s no
excuse, I know.” 
He tremors.  “Moriarty is dead.  I hunted down every man and woman in his
network and killed them all—so I could go h-home.”
John shakes his head, his eyes so swollen he can barely see.  “It’s okay,
Sherlock.  It’s okay.”
“John, I have to tell you.  What I need to say is.  I—”
He presses his nose into John’s forehead.  “I love you.  John, I love you.”
“Oh.”  The breath goes out of John’s chest, and he sags against him.
Sherlock tilts his head down, presses his lips softly against John’s cheek.
“All I care is that you came back.  Like I asked you to.  You came back.”
Eyes blazing, Sherlock tilts up John’s chin and kisses him hard, and John
immediately kisses back, cradling the back of Sherlock’s head. 
This is what it’s like, Sherlock thinks wildly as John devours his mouth,
sliding his tongue around his own.  Stars and lightning and a billion
smoldering fires.  For the rest of his life, he never wants to do anything else
but taste John’s mouth and his tongue and skin and sweat.
Slowly, John pulls back, and Sherlock strokes the bangs out of his face. 
“I love you, too, Sherlock,” he says throatily, wiping the moisture from his
cheeks.
John reaches for Sherlock’s hand and threads their fingers together.  He kicks
the walking stick to the ground and leads Sherlock up the stairs and into his
bedroom.
Slowly, they peel off their clothing and lay in bed together, every inch of
their skin touching.  John sinks his nose into Sherlock’s chest and whimpers. 
“Shhhh.”  Sherlock tightens his arms around John.  “You don’t have to worry
anymore, John.  I’m never going to leave you again.”
John raises his chin and slides his lips over Sherlock’s.
“You know,” Sherlock whispers against John’s mouth.  “when you’ve found the
one.”
John’s hands claw into his back.
“You open the door and see them standing there, so beautiful that you can
barely look at them.  Everything they do…only makes you better.  Just from
knowing them.  They rip off your bloody cloak and let all the sunshine in the
world pour back in and fill up the darkness.”
Sherlock holds John’s face still and looks into his eyes.
“And you know then…you’re never going to spend another day of your life without
them again, not as long as you can help it.”
John weeps, curling his limbs around Sherlock’s smooth skin.  “You never get to
leave me again, you bloody idiot.  Never again.”
“No,” Sherlock says, shaking his head.  “I swear to you, John.  I never will.” 
John sinks into him, and they breathe together, their chests rising, up and
down, up and down, until they slowly fall asleep.  Sherlock shifts, smiling,
with John’s lips pressed right up against his heart.
 
 
End Notes
     Craig Parkinson as Sebastian Moran.
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