Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/6293737.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Graphic_Depictions_Of_Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
  Category:
      Gen, M/M
  Fandom:
      Sherlock_(TV)
  Relationship:
      Sherlock_Holmes/John_Watson, Jim_Moriarty/John_Watson
  Character:
      Lestrade_(Sherlock_Holmes), Sherlock_Holmes, John_Watson, Jim_Moriarty
  Additional Tags:
      Abuse, Emotional_Abuse, Physical_Abuse, in_so_many_ways_this_is_not_a_fun
      fanfic, Sexual_Abuse, Plot_Fic, Omegaverse, but_a_world_building
      omegaverse, Criminal_Network, Criminal_Networking, How_I_Presume_it_would
      work_in_this_fucked-up_world, Alpha!Sherlock, Omega!John
  Stats:
      Published: 2016-03-19 Completed: 2017-03-21 Chapters: 4/4 Words: 14504
****** The Grace of Him on a Divan ******
by Garden_Beast
Summary
     Sherlock Holmes is inching closer to the enigma that is Jim Moriarty,
     whereas John Watson can't get away from him-- bonded as he is to the
     psychopath.
     Both of them manage, somehow.
  This work was inspired by
      Odalisque by bobross, PrettyArbitrary
***** Intellectual Obsession *****
He had scoured through what felt like terabytes of information: Moriarty’s
schooling, his university years, his semester abroad in Abu Dhabi; Sherlock
knew his mother’s maiden name’s origins in Poland and had tracked down his
father’s centuries-long history in Ireland. Prior to his disappearance during
his final year of university, there was nothing about James Moriarty’s life
that was unknown to him. His friends, family, enemies, acquaintances; he’d
solved decades-old murders from when the prodigious young Moriarty had worked
through his own social network, and yet the man’s disappearance left  nothing .
No information. No evidence. Jim Moriarty had been a perfect student at
Cambridge, studying computer science--  everything   about his life was normal,
boring dull, aside from his moonlighting as a serial killer, and yet--
 
When he disappeared, he did so entirely.
 
Sherlock twitched in his chair. Thinking.  Thinking.
 
He had to have begun the very first stages of his criminal empire at the time.
There was no other way around it: he wouldn’t otherwise have the resources to
disappear so entirely, without a single trace or lead. There was nothing of
him, halfway through his last semester at university; nothing from the CCTV
around the campus (and Sherlock had pored through every last horrendous second
of the footage, armed with nothing but a memory of his face and outright
obsession ), nothing with his face on it, nothing with even a hint of James
Moriarty,  nothing.
 
James Moriarty must have had some slip up on his criminal record (literally or
metaphorically) and Sherlock Holmes was determined to find it.
 
___
 
The Scotland Yard paid for James Moriarty’s face to be plastered along
billboards all throughout London; all they had was a grainy police sketch,
courtesy of Sherlock’s description from their little tete-a-tete at the pool,
but nevertheless they had it all over London.
 
Everywhere, Jim Moriarty’s beady eyes stared at the London populace, thin-
lipped smirk looming down at them. Where Sherlock Holmes walked, Moriarty’s
eyes followed, and in a way the whole endeavor felt like a concession: just by
begging the public for information, Sherlock was losing the game.
 
Still, they received phone calls. Emails. Leads.
 
Sherlock Holmes travelled from London to Ireland on hearsay, and back from
Ireland to London on nothing more than word of mouth. He scoured the United
Kingdom, the Isles, villages tucked away behind pristine rolling hills, and
back alleys of Dublin; still, Moriarty, even word of him, evaded him. Like a
wisp of smoke, Sherlock Holmes simply couldn’t pin the man down; word of him
was through a friend-of-a-friend, always with so many connections, missed and
obscured. Sherlock found himself only growing more entangled in the macabre web
that was James Moriarty, and it would only be when his vision swam and his
knees went weak that he would realise that he hadn’t fed his transport in
weeks.
 
The Yard was growing afraid of him, that much was obvious. He had lost weight,
grown thin and waifish, and skulked around the glass building like a spectre.
Weeks in, Lestrade would say, placing a plate of chips at the side table that
was fast becoming Sherlock’s unofficial desk-- “Why not take a break from
this?”
 
He might as well have spoken gibberish. Sherlock only narrowed his eyes.
Rolling his own, Lestrade continued on, “You’ve not had a decent night’s sleep
in ages. Why not take a few days to relax, get some sleep, and then--”
 
“I don’t need  sleep. ” Did no one understand? His transport was secondary; Jim
Moriarty was on the loose, free to flaunt his power and intelligence in front
of Sherlock and the rest of the world, ruling it from some hidden room
somewhere-- Sherlock gritted his teeth. “I need a half decent lead and at least
somewhat  functional means of getting them. Or is the concept of even finding
clues  to a criminal too far out of your depth?” Lestrade went tense, nostrils
flared--
 
And Sherlock was sent home with an unofficial order to get a good night’s sleep
and eat a king’s feast before returning.
 
Forced out of the Yard, and with few other options (the homeless network was
scouring all of London for clues, for hearsay,  anything ) Sherlock considered
his rapidly decreasing array of options: he couldn’t continue using the Yard’s
resources, nor did he have any need of Saint Bart’s Hospital at the moment.
Yes, he could return to the flat, but that meant explaining to his landlady why
he hadn’t paid the rent in several months (and, of course, the inevitable
eviction), as well as meeting with the new flatmate-- no, he’d left a week ago
after the incident with the severed head. No flatmate at all, then.
 
Well. If he made it past the foyer, he could stay the night in his own flat.
Funny that.
 
He made his way home, already considering the mind map of images he was going
to set up in the sitting room: images of the boy Moriarty had killed at the
tender age of eleven, images of the many,  many  omega trafficking groups he’d
puppeteered from the sidelines, many snapped quickly by Interpol operatives
working in Bangladesh, Hong Kong, Monaco, Paris, Berlin, Seoul; where was the
connection? How did he contact and control so many groups, so many human-- let
alone drug-- trafficking operations? Where did he fit into this? How did he
avoid leaving a single  trail ?
 
Already home, (when did he walk home?) shuffling images about on the floor next
to the coffee table, Sherlock Holmes continued trudging his way through the
mystique that was Jim Moriarty. There were stretches of time where he simply
carded through the information in his mind, closing his eyes, letting himself
sift through the information…
 
He was horizontal, and the light filtering in from the windows indicated that
it was afternoon.  Shit.
 
He pulled himself up and off of the floor, squeezing his eyes shut to regain
his bearings.  Moriarty. Omega trafficking rings. Drug trafficking--  he and
Scotland Yard had already interrogated traffickers from multiple countries
(thank you, Interpol), including the London-based ones-- they’d interviewed the
alphas caught making purchases, yes, but they’d never made any attempt to-
-  stupid!
 
Omega victims. How could he have overlooked them? He had actually bought into
the vapid, doe-eyed stereotype, like the rest of the global population. Had he
sunk so low?

 No. No use worrying now: Sherlock texted Lestrade, forcing himself to his
feet-- he needed to eat, he realized, pulling through a vertiginous spell-- and
grabbing a fresh crumpet from the pile that were left on his dining room table.
He threw his coat around his shoulders, leaving the catastrophe of his flat
behind him.
 
___
 
Not a single omega. Sherlock narrowed his eyes, turning to Lestrade in the
chair of his makeshift desk. “What?”
 
Lestrade ran a hand through his hair, repeating himself, “Not a single omega.
We don’t have any in our database. We didn’t interview the victims or ask them
for their identification. We thought they were--” Incapable of giving it, too
distracted by the thought of freedom to contemplate their burgeoning new life
inside a government-run facility, too intimidated by the alpha and beta police
forces, too overwhelmed by their circumstances, to weak and fragile and dumb
and  omega,  Sherlock supplied silently, seething. “It wasn’t our business, not
in our jurisdiction-- they were to be retained in facility, receive therapy
there. The Omega Ministry was adamant, and we couldn’t just go against our
superiors--” Sherlock had stopped listening.
 
Sherlock clenched and unclenched his fist in rapid succession. His voice was
low and threatening when he came to the conclusion, “So we have to go through
every single omega facility to--”

 “We can’t just go into an omega faci--”
 
“We don’t a have a choice, do we?” He stood from his chair, already pacing
through the room, “We have to call every single facility, ascertain which
omegas came from trafficking rings-- and gain access to  multiple  facilities
to interview them.” Mycroft didn’t even have access to facilities, as
restricted as they were to obstetricians, geneticists, physical therapists,
biologists, etcetera; even menial labour required an extensive background
check, not to mention the inevitable facial recognition software installed in
every single hallway--
 
“This isn’t even my bloody jurisdiction!” Lestrade sighed, leaning back into
his chair. “You do realise this is just extra work for me, on top of London’s
murders?”  His whining went ignored.
 
There was no way around it. They’d have to… “How long does it take to request
entrance into a facility? For national security?” Sherlock tried, turning to
Lestrade. A second defeat, this time by the English government. Automatically,
Sherlock knew that it would take longer than he’d hoped: Lestrade began to
shake his head glancing down-- “No, don’t answer that. I’ll have it done.” He
texted Mycroft, citing ‘national emergency.’ In its own way, a third defeat:
relying on the monolith that puppeteered England from the background.
 
Within seconds, he received a response. Grinning, he turned his mobile to
Lestrade. “We should have it within three hours, then.”
 
Sherlock gave himself a celebratory spin on his stolen office chair.
 
___
 
He had never been inside an omega facility; they were exclusive, only available
to alphas with omega-ownership licenses (highly difficult to obtain, usually
requiring costly renovations to one’s property as well as several weeks’
training) and the occasional expert looking to write another article on omega
reproduction, weaponization-- the list went on.
 
So when Sherlock Holmes found himself sat next to Lestrade, being driven
through a slew of gates near Essex, each one of them more or less difficult to
get through, requiring higher and higher levels of restriction to admittance
(making for a total of a ridiculous  eighteen ), he had to admit his surprise.
Was a highly sensitive subspecies of human being kept in ghettos?
 
Ah. Of course not. Past the seventeen-times redundant eighteenth gate,  there
Sherlock saw what he had come to expect: at least an acre of small rolling
hills topped with clusters of trees, flower gardens. Paraphernalia of the dull,
domestic lifestyle omegas were bred to live, topped off by the large cement
building towering over the clusters of foliage. On closer inspection (and
Sherlock always inspected closely), there were anomalies from the picture-
perfect image: not a single person roamed the hills or tended to the gardens.
Parking in a gravel lot and stepping out of their car, Sherlock listened for
the typical sounds of pristine nature, for bird calls and the hum of insects.
Nothing.
 
Just the sound of a soft breeze.
 
“Bit creepy, innit?” Lestrade offered, shoving his hands in his pockets and
looking about. Sherlock hummed in response, before beginning what looked to be
a quarter-mile walk to the only available place of human civilization.

 “Coming?”
 
The entirety of the ten minute walk was passed in silence. From the trees
overhanging the trail to the building, to the two men speeding down it, the
only sound available to them was their breathing and the crunching of their
feet on loose gravel.
 
It was easy enough to get inside: the doors themselves were automatic (“Bloody
should be after  eighteen  admittance permits,” Lestrade joked. He didn’t get
the polite chuckle he was obviously hoping for.) and the receptionists had been
expecting them. All that was required was signing a few non-disclosure
agreements, slapping a patch of some sort onto both of their necks, and walking
down a long sterile hallway to a windowed room, the interior visible from the
hallway. Walking in, Sherlock observed that the receptionists remained where
they were, watching them through the window.
 
Inside was a young man, barely the age of twenty. He was small, thin, with doe
eyes and short brown hair, the perfect image of a fragile young omega. Along
with him came a scent roughly equivalent to a punch in the gut; sweet and
almost cloying, nearing the man was like entering a miasma of potential sweet
nothings. “Right,” Sherlock began, pinching at his nose and squeezing his eyes
shut. “Tell us--”

 “Obviously we’re not here to hurt you,” Lestrade began, elbowing Sherlock. “We
just have some questions about your experience, ah…” He pulled a slip of paper
from his pocket, “Now, I’m Gregory Lestrade, and this is Sherlock Holmes. We
just want to know, well, about what happened six months ago. We want to know
about the people you met, the things you saw when you were in captivity. We
just have some questions.” They sat down at the chairs apparently set out for
them in the aseptic white room, facing the boy. “Can we get your name?”
Lestrade asked, voice soft, while Sherlock rolled his eyes.
 
There was a moment of silence while the boy rubbed at his arms and glanced out
toward the receptionists, “I’m Eddy.” His voice was high and delicate, a
blatant affectation. Wasn’t he in his twenties?
 
“Right, Eddy,” Lestrade soldiered on, “Can you tell us--”
 
“Tell us about anyone interesting from while you were in captivity. Your
caretakers, the people who gave you food-- anything that comes to mind.”
Sherlock leaned forward, elbows on his knees and chin on his hands, listening
and watching intently for an answer, for any potential lie he could catch in
the boy’s face.
 
Eddy was suitably unnerved. He ducked his head down, staring at the floor.
Rolling his eyes, Lestrade took back the baton, continuing, “Ignore him.
Sherlock here’s just trying to get information.” He leaned forward, eyes
playful, “And just between you and me, he’s a bit shit with these witness
statements.”
 
Sherlock reeled back, enraged;  clearly  he could hear their conversation.
Still, Lestrade’s little explanation eased the man somewhat: his lips quirked,
and he pushed a tuft of hair behind his ear. “I--” he paused, glancing again at
the receptionists. “I, ah. That is--” he gulped while Sherlock rolled his eyes:
this was going to be excruciating. “I only met a few people. Mostly other
omegas.”
 
...And? Was this whole hour-long drive just an exercise in listening to
fruitless witnesses?
 
Eddy glanced back up at Sherlock, curling into himself, “But I saw some people,
the people who fed us. They were strong, and tattooed, and, um.” He looked off,
fingers digging into his hands. “There was an omega with them. Who, ah, who
worked for them. Ordered them about, told them off when they were too rough.”
 
Both Sherlock and Lestrade leaned forward, fascinated. An omega leader?
 
“He…” the omega bit at his lip, blatantly uncomfortable, “He didn’t come often.
Only one--once or twice. He looked at us, m-made sure we were safe. Fixed up
cuts, made sure we d-didn’t get infections.” He paused, eyes softening, “He was
nice.”
 
“Did he tell you his name?” Lestrade asked.

 Eddy shook his head. “But he was blond. He had-- had--” Eddy squeezed his eyes
shut, before chuckling a bit-- “A big nose? Lots of scars.”
 
A scarred omega member of an omega cartel. Incredible.
 
Lestrade pulled out a pen and scribbled it on the paper from his pocket, before
stuffing it back into his coat. “Is there anyone else that was memorable to
you?” Naturally they’d ask the other omega witnesses about this one.
 
The continued for several hours, going through every single excruciating moment
of the boy’s captivity: slowly but surely they gained his trust, listened
through the frankly horrendous stories of omegas being beaten (“But only
bruised,” Eddy clarified, “They couldn’t have scars or that would lower their
price in the market.”) their legs tied together to trap them in their
compounds, their eyes and ears covered; sleep deprivation tactics, light
deprivation, light saturation-- the list went on.
 
By the time they had left the boy to see the next omega, Lestrade was pale in
the face. “Jesus Christ,” he ran a hand through hair, “That was awful.”
Sherlock only followed the receptionists in silence to their next witness,
leaving the DI to catch up.
 
___
 
The next omega was simply-- different. Her eyes narrowed upon seeing the
detectives, and she sat up straighter in her seat, her blue-black hair shifting
against her dark skin.
 
When they walked in, then-- into a room completely identical to the one in
which they’d interviewed Eddy before: same white walls, same transparent
window, same lighting-- her eyes only flicked up, and she said, slumping in her
seat, “About time.”
 
Sherlock grinned at the child-- fifteen, this time-- striding over to his
designated chair to the left of Lestrade, skipping the preamble. “Tell me about
your caretakers, Miss--”
 
“Janna.” Her voice was lighter now, and she sat up just a touch straighter.

“Right. And you were--”

“You came here two years ago, correct?” Lestrade cut in, pulling out his scrap
of paper.

 “Correct.” She looked both of them in the eyes, the polar opposite of the boy
from before.  
 
“I see…” Lestrade glanced down at his scrap, before continuing, “My name is
Gregory Lestrade, and this man here is Sherlock Holmes. We’re detectives trying
to stop omega cartels,” Janna’s brow quirked, “and we want to know about--”
 
“To be honest, Mister Lestrade, I wasn’t close with any of my caretakers-- they
gave us food, water, and we ate it. Most of the time it was just a hand through
a small window.”
 
Lying. She was lying. Her eyes glanced away, her body language shifted, and
Sherlock pounced. “No, that’s not right. You knew one of them-- some of them,
Janna?-- well enough to keep them from us.” Sherlock leaned forward, eyes
excited with the hunt: what was she hiding? Could it be the omega? How were he
and Moriarty connected? Obviously the omega was one of the higher-ups, but
could he be connected to Jim directly?
 
Janna went quiet, staring with flared nostrils down at the cement floor. She
knew something.
 
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Her voice, now that Sherlock had
broken her veneer of jaded worldliness, was higher, somehow more fragile. After
a moment of silence, “I just--”
 
“Who are you hiding, Janna?” They had gained her trust, her favor, her fealty,
in some way-- “We aren’t going to hurt them.” Bald-faced lie. Still, the girl’s
eyes went wide, any trace of skepticism gone. “We just need to know a name, a
description-- we only want at the ones who hurt you. Anyone else, we just want
safe. Okay?”
 
She went quiet. Her eyes squeezed shut and she curled around herself, as if
battling her own conscience. “We won’t hurt them,” Sherlock promised again,
leaning forward: this time she’d tell him. This time they’d have a lead,
something  to go off of--
 
“His name is John.” The silence was broken, finally.
 
“Does John have a last name?” Lestrade tried, voice gentle. Janna only shook
her head, face twisted up in shame. “Can you describe him for us?”
 
“He--” she bit her lips closed together, hands covering her face.
 
“We won’t hurt him,” Sherlock repeated for the umpteenth time-- honestly, it
depended upon what he knew.
 
She lowered her hands, shaking, “He’s-- he’s, ehm.” They leaned forward,
fascinated. They’d have a lead of some sort, at the very least a description of
another member of Moriarty’s web-- “He’s omega. Blonde. He--” She pointed at
her arms, at her left shoulder, “He has a lot of scars.”
 
Both detectives sat there, speechless.
 
___
 
They knew that ‘John’ was blond and scarred and omega, with a ‘large nose’-
- although that was subjective. He had worked with no fewer than two of their
interviewed omegas in two completely separate trafficking rings, which meant-
- somehow-- that he was involved with the higher echelons on crime. How,
though? To whom was he connected?
 
He was parsing through, oh, weeks’ worth of information at his makeshift desk
by Lestrade’s office, memorizing each and every name: he was searching through
travel documents, courtesy of Interpol, from train companies, plane companies,
barely-legal bus companies that had gone through Madrid, Spain, and Hong Kong,
China in the weeks before the interviewed omegas were trafficked to London and
caught. Someone who fit the timeline, a white man with a British accent-
- information teased from the omegas through days of interviews, re-asking
questions, tedious police policy-- hundreds of useless,  useless  names
scrolled past his eyes on the computer screen. Anyone who showed up twice
within the several-week span.  Anyone.  He’d have his suspect, he’d have
Moriarty, he’d  finally  catch up to that madman, defeat him once and for all-
- “--Bloody hell, Sherlock, we have to  get going! ” Pardon?
 
Sherlock turned to Lestrade as he pulled on his coat, yelling, “There’s an
omega trafficking bust on, they’ve found a whole twenty omegas holed up
somewhere on the East End, we--” Oh. Unimportant. He turned back to his work,
resuming focus,  focus , “We might get another  lead , Sherlock! For God’s
sake!” Lestrade had the audacity to shake at his shoulder, and  that  got
Sherlock’s attention.

 “Lestrade.” His voice was ice.
 
“Finally! Come on, we need to--”
“The chances of Moriarty, or even one of his higher-ups being at the actual
scene of the crime is infinitesimal. The actual smugglers likely don’t even
know who’s paying them, let alone anyone along the chain command. If, by some
chance, someone of importance  is  caught, then you may inform me. In the
meantime--” He swirled his seat back to his desk, hunching forward and
examining names and times and flight numbers, already too absorbed in the work
to finish his sentence.
 
After some initial fumbling, the office went blissfully quiet. Sherlock was
left to his own devices, eyes on the computer: Blane DeLeone, Pierre LeCache,
Sierra Michaels, Jonathan Junge, Gabriel Ben-Gurian, Sahim Abu-Layla, Qiao Qiu,
Gau Yubi, Peter Dobrev…
 
A total of five suspects. “Lestrade!” Sherlock called, pulling himself out of
his mind palace, and back into…
 
A completely dark room. The only light in the room was the white of his
computer screen.
 
Fine, then-- he’d make the necessary calls himself. He knew the majority of
them were in the EU at the moment, he could have the Court of Justice order
their arrest within minutes-- all he needed to do was make a quick call to
Interpol.
 
___

It would be three hours and nineteen vicious screaming matches with Interpol
later, when Sherlock Holmes would finally read a gloating text from Lestrade,
glowing in the dark of the room: “Come to LLC 13. I think we’ve found ‘John.’”
***** Junge *****
Chapter Summary
     John's had enough dealings with Jim's many behaviors to know what to
     expect.
     Warning: This chapter includes explicit sexual violence.
Chapter Notes
     This one is dedicated my friend Andre, for listening to my woes as I
     wrote this chapter.
He could regain his own balance, when Jim was gone on business. Wake up before
six, take suppressants and scent inhibitors, go on a jog, grab a coffee, head
to the shooting range. Rinse and repeat. John had his own sort of homeostasis,
only forced awry when Jim was around. He was his own man, for the most part: he
had practiced his grappling (“Mind the shoulder, thanks.”), finished his
kickboxing class in the gym down the street, and had surreptitiously bought a
few extra bottles of alcohol while he picked up the groceries (with Jim’s
platinum card). He had six days left of freedom-- not complete, his shoulder
silently reminded him with every single damned twinge-- but it was enough. He
had a life, when Jim was away; not perfect by any means, since he was barely
allowed to use his own medical degree-- but it was enough. It was enough, John
told himself as he placed the groceries in their fridge, their pantry, before
looking around the enormous white kitchen in the enormous white flat that he
lived in, where he slept every night and allowed his whole life to revolve
around Jim-fucking-Moriarty, the man he had been bonded to, the man who had--
 
John gripped his left shoulder hard, calming himself. Breathe. It was just a
lifetime more, hours blending into days, into weeks, into months, into  years-
-  he felt his heart beating wildly in his chest. He had time. He had six days,
all to himself: he could lunch with one of his former coworkers this week. Ask
them about their domestic lives. Listen to Sarah’s continued struggle with her
sister’s drama; Mike’s chuckling about the bloke who kept sweeping through his
lab as if he worked there. He could live their lives awhile, play out the
stories; and that was enough for him.
 
For now, groceries in their places, he needed to head over to Rainham; he had
his own brand of work to do.
 
The ride there wasn’t too bad, nor was the actual getting into the old
warehouse where the omegas were stored-- the worst part was the scent. The air
around John went from the cool air of the Thames on his face to the slap of
pheromones, of sex. Heat: cloying and wet, sweet enough to taste, the scent of
heat swirled around the shabby beds set up for the omegas, thick and
inescapable. John only nodded toward one of the guards-- Maurice-- as he
stepped in, asking, “Where is she?” He rolled up the sleeves of his button-
down, ready to deal with an abscess, according to Matthew and his partner-on-
duty, ‘the size of his fist.’
 
He followed Maurice’s pointed instructions to a far-away corner of the building
(occasionally waving at former patients on the way-- there was Maddy, there was
Ojal, and a ways away sat Jamal, sitting back and reading an old magazine),
where the pheromones began to compete with something more bacterial-- the smell
of decay.
 
John’s stomach filled with dread. Oh, God .
 
He set down his duffle bag and walked into the curtained-off section of the
room-- the only area allowing for some modicum of privacy. The atmosphere of
the dark building, already dampened by the circumstances, by the barely-
available living space-- today it was almost funerial. “Hey,” John called, to a
girl lying still on a pile of sheets. Shivering. She turned her head toward him
by just a fraction of a degree-- acknowledgement, John hoped. On her arm was a
massive abscess, rendering the skin around it stretched and fragile. Thank God
John had brought antibiotics.
 
She was so  young -- barely thirteen or fourteen, and already she had been
whisked away from her family, from her friends, to  this . That it could happen
in London of all places, that it could happen within the borders of a developed
country… John took a deep breath to calm his mind. He had been so close to
calling in, so many times. He had fantasized about it for years, laid in bed
and wondered how he would make the call, how the police would rush in, how the
children here (so many of them) would have another chance at life, at being
with family again--
 
But that was why Jim only let him know the locations of the United Kingdom
omega houses, the German omega houses, the French ones. To be found out and
rescued in any European Union countries just meant more confinement, only under
the protection of the law. He clenched his hand into a tight fist before he
emptied his duffle bag, piece by piece.  And , John considered as he unpacked
his supplies,  the slimy bastard would decimate London’s hospitals, just to be
particularly  personal  with his threat.  Alcohol, novacaine, saline solution,
antibiotics (prescription, thank you), alcohol wipes, gauze, bandages, more
gauze, the emergency-only paper towels-- everything he could do to make it a
sterile environment. He looked at the girl, asked her softly, “What’s your
name?” And, hearing no response, went down to his knees and got to work.
 
He would be done twenty minutes later, with heaps of gauze and paper towels to
be thrown away. She had packing in her arm and was mostly unconscious, but it
seemed that already the infection was lessening.
 
___


He had been organizing the frankly vast collection of makeup in his vanity when
Jim swanned in, five days earlier than promised. John’s fragile little world
disintegrated with the sing-song voice of, “John,  darling .” By the sudden
tension in his own muscles at that smarmy fuck’s voice, John knew his alpha was
home. “There’s my beautiful boy.” Arms tangled around him, and even as he
pulled away, he found himself being dragged into him like a gravitational pull-
- Jim Moriarty’s very presence was a black hole, that way, inescapable and
crushing. John felt hot breath on his cheek, the rough scratch of stubble.
 
“You’re back early,” John replied, eyes down on his collection. How fucking
domestic.
 
“Mm.” John could feel Jim outright rumbling. “Not done with work yet,
Sweetheart.” The arms around him constricted at his chest, caging John in
place.
 
John continued organising his vanity, unfettered. “What d’you need, Jim?”
 
A pause. John quirked his lip for a moment (just a moment, lest he face the
consequences), well aware that he had cut through the bullshit to the core of
the matter. He heard Jim sigh against his back, lean forward onto his neck and
kiss the top vertebra of his spine. “Can my darling boy help me with a little
negotiation?” His voice was syrupy, pleading, as if John had a choice. Jim’s
his hand, already at his chest, slipped between the buttons of John’s shirt to
tweak at a nipple.
 
It was only a testament to what he had become that John could already feel the
slow heat of arousal building in him. John turned his head to his alpha, coy
smile pinned on, and felt lips and prickly stubble at his cheek. “What do you
want, Jim?” Repeated, changed, now a question tailor-made to fit Jim’s needs;
was he to be the novelty of the night, on show like a dog? A human symbol of
wealth? John was many things for the man who’d bought him some fifteen years
ago. He could be paraded around as a human doll, delicate and coy and teasing;
a series of hot-wet-tight holes to plunge into, a carrot for Jim’s business
associates where Jim could otherwise provide a stick; on occasion, a very
specific human weapon. He played his roles carefully, with practiced ease;
every game-piece of Jim’s had their roles to play, and every one could be
disposed of according to his alpha’s whims.
 
John went still as the hand on his nipple pinched. Another hand rose from his
chest to his throat, and John was pinned to him, trapped, his throat exposed.
“I want you to be beautiful for me, John.” His voice was soft, reverent. The
hand on his throat squeezed-- hard enough to constrict his trachea, but not
hard enough to bruise. “Make a few colleagues jealous.”
 
John, humiliated and furious, smiled softly at his darling. “By when?”
 
“By eight tonight.”
 
Fucking hell. John’s mood changed immediately: he swatted his partner away as
best he could, already on his way to the shower.
 
He had to rush through his usual exfoliating routine, for nights like this.
Still, he had the comfort of knowing what came next as he dressed (dove-grey
suit and blood-red tie, matching pocket square) and prepared himself properly,
with a methodical rhythm perfected through practice (post-shower enema). His
eyeliner, made into an exact science, was almost habit by now; thin, sharp, and
black as sin. His eyeshadow was shimmering gold, tapering away to softer browns
at the corners of his eyes, applied with surgical precision and practiced care.
He was working on his highlighter (finished with his contour) when he spied Jim
lounging on their bed, snapping surreptitious photos of him on his mobile. John
sat up straighter in response, angling his face for the best display like an
animal on show. He clenched his jaw and glared into his own reflection.
 
“Good boy,” Jim called, and it took all his willpower for John to keep from
upending the whole fucking vanity right then and there.
 
___
 
It was a gorgeous Italian restaurant in the West End, as opulent as Jim liked
it. The owner touted the menu to them in their private room in the back: fish,
lasagna, tortellini, all starchy comfort foods fit to leave a man adjusting his
belt as he left-- leaving Jim’s Chinese guests fumbling through their orders,
forced to denigrate themselves by asking exactly what was in each dish.
 
It was always the little things, with Jim. Little ways to force someone off
balance, eventually teetering into his hands. John only sipped at the water,
already decided on the salmon dish.
 
(“Don’t want you too full after dinner, baby,” Jim had reminded him in the car,
tenderly rubbing at John’s belly, as if he were expecting-- “God knows you’re
getting filled enough tonight.”)
 
Jim was telling a story in fluent Mandarin. His arms swayed this way and that,
and their guests-- the two of them, dressed in the same general colour scheme
of black and gold-- laughed hard at his little tale, leaning back and shaking
glasses with their boisterous gesticulation. John smiled, silent, sipping at
his wine; no need to get smashed yet, at least. He ignored the two pairs eyes
roving over his person: at his chest while he sat, at his hips and arse when he
stood for the loo, and at his lips when he speared a bite of salmon and brought
it to his mouth. John knew what he was, here.
 
He knew well enough to let his mind wander while Jim would clutch at his jaw
and force rough kisses on his cheeks, his lips, leaving John to wipe off the
brown-butter sauce of Jim’s ravioli from his face. He was meant to be
maneuvered tonight. Used by his alpha as he pleased.
 
Conversation died down into whispers, and all parties excluding John leaned
forward in heated discussion. Eyes flicked toward him, before back to Jim in a
cyclical repetition: clearly John was part of the deal. Jim’s voice went harsh,
and a familiar cold grin had plastered itself on his face. He lifted John’s arm
to the table, pushed back the sleeves of his blazer and button down before
gesticulating at the smooth skin of his forearm. Right, then, best to start
now. Slowly, John took back his arm and rose from the table.
 
John brushed his alpha’s shoulder as he left the room to request a few bottles
of whiskey. Best to be smashed when he was chemically induced into heat.
 
___
 
He didn’t know what dosage of Firestarter Jim had given him when he’d injected
it into his forearm, but whatever dosage he was given, it left him absolutely
gushing . There was one alpha behind him, one of the two from dinner, hefting
his entire body up off the ground, his legs pulled up against his shoulders-
- and another at his front, plowing away with abandon. Two uppermost members of
the Triad, he guessed, and John had been used as a negotiation tool so as to
better tempt the alphas into… well, John couldn’t fathom. Clearly, though,
Jim’s little ploy had worked. No wonder he’d been told to dress to the nines;
his suit was in tatters, bloody torn apart by the two blokes the moment they’d
come to a deal.
 
He felt like a ragdoll. His arms swung back and forth with every thrust inside
him, and his mind simply… Went elsewhere. He stared dumbly at the ceiling of
their hotel room (penthouse, of course), idling his focus around every baroque
swirl that adorned it; loops here, swoops there, and John swam in the delicate
fleur-de-lis motif. He could get away from the ripping pain in his anus, the
wet-hot pleasure that left his nerves fried, confused. The ceiling
accoutrements that gleamed bronze in the light...
 
Slap.
 
His ears rang. His attention was regained, and John turned back with wide eyes
to the man in front of him, knotted inside him. Had he not known better, he
would have been indignant. “Give attention, slut,” the bloke-- John’d not
caught the name-- snarled in awkward, barely-fluent English. Several feet away,
he heard Jim bark a laugh. John sat a moment in wide-eyed silence, staring at
the sneering son of a bitch. He felt his jaw tense, his own eyes flash; he
stretched his fingers as if ready to make a fist.
 
And then he pounced.
 
His hands hit the bloke first, and he took him down with ease. John straddled
him, dug his nails into his chest-- and sunk back down on his prick, taking it
at his own pace, thank-you-very-much. He felt absolutely feral; he pinned the
alpha below him down with his eyes alone, and, bond mark or no, John took his
pleasure.
 
He rolled his hips, seating himself, brushed his aching prick against the man’s
stomach, listened to his filthy sodden groans and felt his stubby hands on his
hips-- he was bouncing on his knot, every ounce an animal. In three days’ time,
he’d regain himself, look back on his actions, and swallow the rising horror
that this was what he’d become.
 
For now, though, he rode.
 
He took what he could and gritted his teeth through what he thought he
couldn’t, heard the wretched slap of his arse against a stranger’s hips, the
wet squelching of a cock in him, a knot pressing at him; and he only leaned
into the touch of arms wrapping around him from behind, hot breath at the back
of his neck. Jim? No-- these arms were thicker, hoary. John arched his back,
threw his head back as if in ecstasy. “Incredible,” he heard at his right ear
as the lips behind him skimmed his shoulder, before the bloke’s head turned up
toward Jim. “How much did you pay for him?” It was as if John weren’t even in
the room.
 
If John stopped moving, it was only for a moment. He turned to the man behind
him with a coy smile, lips brushing a thick beard; “Let’s not talk money
anymore,” he whispered, quiet. The hands on his chest dipped lower, and John
tipped forward, tipping his arse back; the cock in him slid out with a pathetic
wet sound. His message was clear enough-- the bloke behind him seemed to
understand, not hesitating to press in, in,  in -- John held back a moan; no
need to give Jim more ammunition against him. He leaned forward, felt hands
grasp at his chest, and grabbed them, lifted them to his lips, and pressed warm
kisses on the palms of them, the wrists, delicate pecks and long laving licks
that were more fellatio than affection.
 
The bloke in front of him moved, and John leaned forward, pressed his head down
on his shoulder as the one behind him fucked into him, yes,  yes -- a primal
part of him was reveling in it, in the attention, in the two alphas focusing on
him and him alone, on his pleasure, on  having him --
 
He felt a pinch at the rim of his anus, and as he flinched back it was already
too late. The second-- both of them-- John let out a whine, pained, as he was
forced further open. It was searing, so much that John couldn’t move, couldn’t
get away from it; he felt hands clamp down on his wrists, his thighs, and panic
settled in because he  couldn’t stop it.  He flinched as the second moved in
him; bit at the bloke in front of him, scratched at him as best he could, a
blaring tacit  get out!
 
He scrabbled, squirmed, and shouted, drugged with his own hormones as he was,
to no avail. Distantly, he heard Jim make a call, business as usual.
 
It would be four days later when John would walk out of that hotel and back
into the streets of London, limping heavily and dreaming, in an exhausted
barely-awake haze, of the privacy of his own bedroom. Of downing his birth
control pills and forgetting this whole hellish week had ever transpired. He
would try to snatch his hand away from Jim as they walked, have some semblance
of autonomy--  but James Moriarty would only trap John’s hand back in his grip
and tighten it until John’s fingers went numb.
 
___
 
He just needed to walk. To get last week out of his system,  sod  Jim’s current
lockdown, sod that his second-in-command was in the Tube that instant toward
John and Jim’s flat to keep an eye on him, just-- he was claustrophobic beyond
belief, even with Jim back in Germany. He had been on laxatives and bed rest
the last week after his little encounter with two higher-ups from the Chinese
Triad, and John-- he was tearing himself apart. For fuck’s sake, he’d  been
torn apart, battered and choked for days, his head pressed into the mattress
and his hips guided up, up for the two blokes to take while Jim tapped away on
his fucking iPhone, as if it weren’t happening, as if he weren’t being sold out
like a whore to blokes he’d never even met-- and he couldn’t-- he couldn’t--
 
John kept walking, all the way to the Tesco’s and down into the Tube station,
just to help a girl with an abscess. Doing what that education of his had
trained him for. More than a living fucktoy, more than a bitch in heat. He
helped people. He could pretend he lived a life worth living, actually  work
at a clinic ( “No, Johnny Boy, what if someone links you to me? They’ll know
right where to find you, won’t they? Just quit from it and I’ll double your
allowance, how about that, Baby?” ), living with purpose, outside of the human
hamster ball Jim had placed him in, out of range of Jim’s Browning, out of the
knowledge that Jim’d do it, he’d do it again, and when he did, he wouldn’t
miss --
 
The warehouse. John entered the ten-digit passcode and walked in, adjusting the
duffle bag on his shoulder and ignoring the explosion of texts-- Moran, of
course-- to his mobile. Moran could wait.
 
He walked in, beelined for the back corner where the girl was staying, and
pulled back a dreary curtain that must’ve once been a vibrant red. “Hello?”
 
She was napping. Not sweating, not taking heaving violent breaths that left
John worried for her immune system and her health-- just sleeping. He watched
for a moment as she slept, peaceful at least while she was unconscious. Her
arms were splayed out by her head, her fingers curled into her hand, and she
breathed softly, twitching every few seconds as if being tugged by some
invisible string. John snorted, before kneeling next to her (wincing as his
knees cracked) and calling again, softer now, “Hello? This is John.”
 
Her eyes fluttered open, black like onyx, and John opened his mouth to
introduce himself when all hell broke loose.
 
They heard doors slam open, saw some sort of gas flooding the room-- the girl
went from drowsy to alert in moments, scrambling under her thin sheets as if
that would cover her. With no other real recourse, John covered her body with
his so that the passing swarm of blokes in riot gear wouldn’t trample her as
they made their way through. They ran in, shouting orders, telling omegas and
guards alike to stay down, and a cold shot of horror went down John’s spine as
he realised that this was a government operation.
 
Thankfully those curtains-- tattered blankets, really-- were strung up around
their little area; it provided him and the girl some modicum of privacy, a
possible out from the onslaught of troops-- John rubbed her back as she shook,
sobbed into the blankets and into the floor. They could get out of this. He’d
help her out, let her stay at his flat, maybe talk Jim out of a sale-- he just
had to find a window, anything,  anything --
 
The flimsy safety of their curtains was torn down, and John looked for the
third time in his life into the wrong end of a gun barrel.
 
He felt a harsh pinch in his throat, brought his hand up to check the damage,
to check the blood loss. Nothing but a-- dart, of some kind? He looked at the
man before him and felt a sense of vertigo hit him, hit him hard-- felt his
vision swim and his body grow instantly heavy,  so  heavy--
 
John tried as if to stand, to get away from the immediate danger.  Go to Jim .
He had to go to Jim. To J--

And he was out.
***** Dialogue *****
Chapter Notes
     Hey! So this has been a long time coming, largely because of school
     and the like-- hope you guys enjoy this installment!
     That said, I'm not going to pretend to understand how formal
     investigations take place, but thankfully I don't think Sherlock
     does, either. Thanks for reading!
There was absolutely no point taking the elevator; it would just be precious
seconds of delay, sheer torture before he found him. There was of course the
very real possibility that this was a decoy, some extraordinary trap instated
by Moriarty to throw him off the trail, but--  but.  Sherlock raced down flight
after flight of stairs, his knees jarring every few steps,  dammit , was it
real? How could he be caught so easily? It was as if he were being thrown into
Sherlock’s hands, too good to be true. Careful. He couldn’t get his hopes up,
not yet; the universe was rarely so generous so as to toss him this easy a
lead.
 
It would be four floors later when Sherlock rushed to Lestrade in an
underground hallway, sunken below layers of steel, lead, concrete-- “Where is
he?” He was panting, breathing hard, looking hard at any and all nearby doors,
why wasn’t Lestrade  talking --?
 
“He’s a few rooms in,” Lestrade answered, gesturing toward the door ahead of
him, looking-- Sherlock stopped. Looking haggard. Pale, bothered, wary--
 
“What’s wrong?” Was the omega dead? He had to have been found in a raid; what
distinguished him from the other victims? Possibly age, scarification, likely,
but there had to be something else, something macabre enough to have the
veteran DI bothered like this-- Sherlock’s heart stopped.  The universe was
rarely so generous . Murdered, then, likely bloody, violent.
 
“Aside from the fines we’re getting from the Omega Ministry and the calls from
the MI6, it’s--” he ran a hand through his hair, “He’d been unconscious-
- someone in the raid had tranque’d him, had him down, we undressed him to be
sure he wasn’t carrying anything, and, well.” He fidgeted, gulped,
instinctively reached into his breast pocket for a cigarette-- something
stressful, then. Assaulted, perhaps?
 
Whatever. “Just let me in.” Whether he’d deal with a pathologist or a live
omega, he’d have fresh information. No more wandering through weathered old
data for the umpteenth time, no more running in circles-- Lestrade swiped his
ID, and in Sherlock strode, into another preliminary room (why were there so
many damned  intermediaries ?) where, through an enormous pane of glass, sat a
groggy middle-aged man who alternated between rubbing his temples and glaring
through the window. Judging by the scar on his throat, he was mated.
 
“Two-way mirror,” Lestrade offered. Sherlock’s lips twitched, pleased: this
omega at least knew what he was dealing with. He held himself with reserve, his
fingers laced together when they weren’t massaging his evidently aching head.
He retained his calm fairly well, his eyes down on table before him, lashes
fanned out against his cheekbones. This still, half of his body concealed under
the table, Sherlock couldn’t get a good grasp of him: obviously he had nerves
of steel, calm under this amount of pressure, even as he was only just
regaining lucidity in a foreign environment--
 
This would be interesting. Sherlock nicked Lestrade’s ID, and, swiping it,
cracked open the door, walking inside without even a glance in Lestrade’s
direction. No, this was Sherlock’s jurisdiction. The man-- John?-- only looked
him up and down with the arch of a brow. “I’m not being transferred to a
compound just yet, then?” The omega asked, surprisingly sober. When had he been
administered anesthesia, again?
 
“I wouldn’t know.” He hoped not, at least. Sherlock pulled out a seat for
himself, eyeing the man, his eyes and face, his arms, elbows down on the table-
- ah. That was it. Delicate, barely-visible, but there: track marks.
Intravenous drug user-- Sherlock focused back on his eyes, back on his arms
once more-- but not often. Maybe once or twice per month. In which case,
considerable self control. “Tell me your name.”
 
The omega grinned, near-hysterical, leaning forward to run his hands through
his hair, his left arm barely slower, lifted more carefully, favored through
movement of the shoulder. Some sort of trauma there, then, enough to cause
muscular damage; one-too-many dislocations of the shoulder? It couldn’t be too
hard a fall, no, that would only affect the acromion, the subacromial bursa,
maybe the biceps-- this was too internal to the shoulder, the way he moved his
arm. Full-frontal attack of some kind, something that had penetrated deep.
Fingers, maybe? A knife, though that was hardly believable-- who pointed a
weapon at an omega? Ah. He was speaking. “No point to, though, is there? I’ll
be in a compound in, what, an hour? And by then it’s not as if any of my
statements’ll count for anything.”
 
If this were the Yard, the MI6, even Interpol, he’d have a point-- in no EU
court was an omega’s word taken seriously in the court of law, at least not
enough to count as a witness statement. The man was planning to be lost in the
bureaucracy of omega housing, surely, to be forgotten by law enforcement and
deemed yet another victim of trafficking. Well-- it might help to inform him
they weren’t playing that particular game, if Sherlock could help it. “What
happened to your shoulder, then?”
 
The omega’s lips quirked. “I was searched?” He asked, pulling into himself.
Unsafe, reacting to a potentially dangerous situation, already feeling
violated.

 “I wouldn’t know,” Sherlock answered, truthful. He glanced behind him to the
two-way mirror where Lestrade surely watched the two of them. “I want to say
most likely, but I’ve only just heard about you. The officer behind the two-way
mirror can corroborate for me-- all I know is that you’re an omega from the
trafficking ring.” He glanced down at the omega’s hands, saw them loosen,
relax. “Which begs the question,” Sherlock continued, leaning forward, his eyes
locking on the omega’s own, “What happened to you, John?”
 
John reacted just as Sherlock had hoped: instant recognition. His body went
tense, eyes flashed-- Sherlock leaned back with a smirk as John replied, voice
cold. “You’ve made some presumptions already, then.” He was choosing his words
carefully now, as if he hadn’t already given himself up.
 
“We’d learned a few things from previously trafficked omegas,” Sherlock
answered, only tacking on at the end, “Through simple interviews, I assure
you.” John didn’t look particularly convinced. “After that, it was a simple
guessing game: what is a well-dressed, relatively old omega doing amongst a
group of pubescent omegas shipped in from Pakistan?” He raked his eyes over
John’s outfit: designer, tailored to his body, and only scuffed through his
recent run-in with the MI6. “All it took was asking you your name, John.” He
lifted his hand, snapping his fingers, before he leaned his body once more
against the table. “You must be awful at poker, John-- you were so  obvious. ”
 
Sherlock had never before seen a man’s eyes quite so bright with anger. It was
with remarkable calm that the man replied cooly, “And the shoulder?”
 
“You favor it, obviously-- look at how you sit.” John sat up stock-straight
immediately in reaction, of course. “You can barely lift your arm above your
shoulder.” Sherlock felt himself grin, the thrill of an audience speeding along
his speech, “You train often-- peak physical condition, and looking at your
clothes I’d see you as upper-class. Why lean away, then? Why let your shoulder
slump? You’ve been educated-- or trained-- well enough to navigate this
interrogation, which means you should’ve been taught how to sit, how to angle
your body to suit your situation. And yet your shoulder slumps forward. You’re
not sick and bleeding, nor is your pain sharp enough for you to wince as you
move-- an old wound. So.” He looked at the man, saw the blanched peripeteia of
a man who had been outsmarted. “What happened to your shoulder, John?”
 
Rather than answer, John Doe looked up to the ceiling and laughed, evidently
hysterical. Sherlock raised a brow: was this all it took to break what had
become a mythologized omega? “Jesus,” John chuckled, running a hand through his
hair. “I take it you’re not part of the Yard, then?”
 
Pardon? Was that an insult? John looked at him a moment in stunned silence,
before laughing harder. “I’m a consultant for the Yard, actually,” Sherlock
replied, voice cold. “I come in when they’re out of their depth--”
 
“Which they usually are,” John supplied, leaning forward on his elbows and
grinning, “That was impressive.”
 
Impressive.  Sherlock sat straighter in his seat. “It’s not difficult. Just
observation.”
 
John quirked his lips, as if amused. “You’re not getting anything out of me,
you realise.”
 
No? Sherlock sat forward, eyeing him like prey. A new game-- surely not his
intellectual equal, but at least some kind of challenge. “We’ll see about
that.” He sat forward once more, predatory.
 
In response, John only looked him in the eyes, shoulders set. He refused to
cower, as most would in his situation. No, he’d had experience with
intimidation, clearly. “Tell me what you know about Jim Moriarty.” Best to
start at the core of things.
 
John went pale. He breathed fast through his nostrils, and Sherlock could feel
victory at his fingertips. “I don’t kn--”
 
“That’s not true,” Sherlock pointed out, barely containing his excitement. “You
at least know  of  him. Tell me…” he pulled his mobile from his pocket and
opened a saved image of the Moriarty sketch. “Does this look familiar?” The
recognition was so blatant in John’s face that Sherlock was almost
disappointed. “That’s a yes, then,” he smiled, pocketing his mobile and weaving
his fingers together. “Clearly you know of him, John. You know him. You’ve been
caught.” He leaned back, satisfied, “There’s no point in keeping quie--”
 
“I can’t tell you anything, Sir.” John’s nostrils were flared, and his jaw was
set. He was leaning forward, every ounce of his body tense. There was something
being kept from him. A reason. Something held over John’s head.

 “Why not?” Holmes asked, quiet. John held his head, fingers digging into his
scalp. “John.” The omega mumbled something under his breath. Sherlock leaned
forward, brows knit together. “Come again?”
 
“He’s got every hospital in London rigged to explode.”


___
 
Sherlock had never seen all of London shut down at all, let alone so quickly.
Bomb squads were shuttered out of the Yard in full procession, hurtling off to
different hospitals, where professionals would scour every nook and cranny of
every single room. Moriarty had been smart, choosing buildings of such
complexity and low security; London could be shut down for days. Updated on the
status of the bomb search, Lestrade returned to the lower sanctum and informed
Sherlock, who stood watching John through the two-way mirror. “We’ve found one
bomb ready to go in Maudsley,” he explained, arms crossed. “Whoever he is, he’s
high up.”
 
Sherlock didn’t respond; he stood in silence, feet tapping, watching John glare
up at the window. He felt a rush of adrenaline: in a long line of losses, the
first victory. Pulling up the collar of his coat, he swept back into the
interrogation room. Lestrade, looking after him, walked out.
 
“You were right,” he called, pulling out his seat and sitting down.

 “Hello to you too, then,” John responded with a sardonic smile.
 
Surprised, Sherlock replied with a chuckle-- most people weren’t amused by his
antics. “The threat to public safety has all but disappeared,” he started off,
leaning forward. “If you can give us the information, we can have him caught
by--”
 
“You know that’s not how this works, Mister…?”

“Holmes.”
 
“Right.” John sat forward, looking Sherlock in the eye with more than a hint of
desperation. “You’ve only cut off one head of many, Holmes. If you’ve been
following him, you should know as well as I do that he’s already planned
something awful to happen next. He’s got leverage and resources, resources
that--”
 
“What are you to him?” Sherlock asked, interrupting John mid-sentence. No point
in listening to well-established threats when there was more to learn. A
higher-up informant? What did he know that could leave Moriarty working so hard
to ensure his silence?
 
John only covered his face. Went silent for several excruciating moments, mouth
set in a frown so deep Sherlock wouldn’t have been surprised if he saw John
start to cry. “Don’t you have food here, or do you expect omega prisoners to
starve?”
 
___
 
Sherlock watched as John ate up his dinner. He ate in small bites, evidently
educated in etiquette, wiping his hands every few minutes. It was a simple
salmon dish-- Angelo had whipped something up for the suspect, clearly excited
to be a part of an investigation.
 
Despite the certain quality of the food, John looked sick. He pushed his dinner
away, standing and knocking on the window, and-- as Lestrade found-- requested
the loo.
 
He vomited. Sometime later, John walked-- no, limped-- he was hiding a  limp
back to his holding cell escorted by Lestrade. He was ginger on both feet,
shuffling in small steps as if any larger pace would hurt him-- “Lestrade,”
Sherlock called to the DI, “Tell me what you saw on his body. Trauma. Wounds,
scars, the like.”
 
“Oh.” Lestrade went pale in the face, turning to the ground. Something bad,
then, clearly. “He looked… Ravaged, frankly. I don’t know what happened to him,
but there were claw marks all over him. Healing, yeah, but.” He stopped. “Burn
marks around his wrists and back, and, ah. Clear damage to the arse, though we
didn’t look too close at that.” He rubbed his nose, crossing his arms. “Hell,
there’s even a bullet wound somewhere on his shoulder. His alpha must be a
rough sod, treating him like that during heat-- ”
 
His alpha.  Sherlock’s face lit up, and he nabbed Lestrade’s ID card before
slipping back into John’s holding cell, exuberant. How could he have been so
blind?
 
“Clearly your alpha is directly associated with Moriarty,” Sherlock grinned,
eyes pinned on John once more. “It explains your association, Moriarty’s
concern about you, your knowing him.” He slammed his palms on the table,
causing John to jump. “Who knows? He might even use you as a negotiating tool.
It would explain the track marks-- Firestarter?” Oh, he was on a  roll!  “You
attend negotiations with potential clients, business partners, anyone-- your
alpha provides the carrot, you, and Moriarty-- he provides the stick.” It made
perfect sense: have someone else use sex to distract, to convince, and all
Moriarty would have to do is wait for the negotiation to end.
 
John only raised an eyebrow, frowning. “You’re not entirely wrong, at least,”
he finally replied, crossing his legs and leaning forward.
 
Oh? John was correcting him. Filling in the blanks. Where was he wrong?
Sherlock sat down, vibrating with the sensation of victory. Moriarty was a
worthy adversary, certainly, but now it was just a matter of time…
 
Sherlock opened his mouth to investigate further when Lestrade walked in,
followed by two men in hazmat suits. One brandished a long needle, glistening
with what could only be an anesthetic.  “We’re going to have to finish this
later, Sherlock-- the Ministry’s here.”
 
___
 
Sherlock was so close to answers-- legitimate, concrete answers into Moriarty’s
network, he’d felt as if he could have touched them. But instead John’s prone
and unconscious body was being carted into an ambulance vehicle, and Sherlock
was only forced to watch, frantically texting his brother for a renewed pass to
John’s facility. Another concession, undoubtedly, but… He was the lone lead in
this, so close to the centre of Jim’s web. He couldn’t just let John slip
through bureaucratic cracks.
 
“Give it a rest today, Sherlock,” Lestrade called, patting him on the shoulder.
Sherlock brushed his hand off, hunching closer to his mobile whilst higher-ups
from the ministry wiped down the cell, examined every inch of it. “We’ve had a
good day. Hell, we’ve saved lives. At the very least, go home and get some res-
-”
 
“Already slept.”
 
Sherlock heard a familiar sigh. “You slept for one night, if even. Go to bed
and we’ll have this figured out by morning.”
 
‘We’, royal. Sherlock turned to his contemporary, confusion etching a vertical
line between his brows. Lestrade was exhausted, that much was certain-- from
the bags under his eyes to the days-old stains on his shirt, he had been
burning the midnight oil as well. Well-- at the very least Sherlock could
return home, review his evidence there. “Fine,” he answered, pulling at his
jacket and stalking off.
 
Only minutes later he received a text from his brother:
 
Stop by the Yard tomorrow. I’ve got you a pass to see your omega.
 
Finally. He knew he’d come to owe his brother months’ worth of favours. Still-
- worth it.
 
___
 
Once again, back to the grindstone. Last night’s review of evidence had yielded
nothing; it had only put his mind palace in further disarray, leaving him
groggy and silently accepting the coffee proffered to him as he and Lestrade
stepped into an Omega Ministry car.
 
“Look at you. As if you’ve been on holiday,” Lestrade commented, softly
elbowing Sherlock. In response, Sherlock only turned and glared at his
contemporary, flipping up the collar of his Belstaff.
 
Sherlock only rolled his eyes, silently willing this car ride from hell to go
as quickly as possible.
 
It would be later when he would tune back into the world, after spending what
felt like minutes searching through information, evidence about the omega,
images of the bombs planted in London’s hospitals (none of them shared common
technology-- clearly perpetrated by different actors, yet more threads from
Moriarty’s web)-- there was nothing. Sherlock was swimming in the tangents of
evidence, pulling this knot of information apart, only to find more questions:
where did John fit into this hierarchy? How did he become involved with the
likes of Moriarty, given his clearly operational moral compass? And more
importantly-- what did he know?
 
“Oi! Sherlock!”
 
And they were there. Sherlock followed Lestrade’s lead, climbing out of the car
and through security-- tighter this time, despite the lessened number of gates
to drive through. Cameras were everywhere on the premises, and the whole
property was smaller, condensed: there was no facade of nature, here. Only a
large brick building to walk to, and the crunch of gravel beneath his feet.
Sherlock opened his mobile, testing something…
 
Yep. No cellular reception. Sherlock walked the rough gravel pathway to the
facility with Lestrade, surrounded on both sides by guards.
 
Once inside, they flashed their passes-- as if it were necessary, given the
bloody security outside-- and followed two receptionists to what was supposed
to be John’s room. Once again, the building was immaculate: perfectly clean,
constantly under surveillance, and utterly lifeless. There wasn’t a single
person in sight down various corridors, and peeking through small windows into
private rooms revealed what had to be small bands of omegas looking curiously
out at them. They were treated more like animals than people, here, held
captive and surveiled like a lethal new disease. Finally they made it to what
was supposed to be John’s room-- the receptionist produced a ring of keys from
her pocket, and, cycling through them, finally opened the door.
 
He couldn’t have possibly escaped. “Ah-- shoot, sorry,” the first receptionist
apologised, checking her watch and turning to the other, “Seems he’s still in
surgery. He should be out within… What, an hour or so?”
 
Surgery. Both Sherlock and Lestrade turned to one another, for once in unison:
How could one suspect be so difficult to pin down when he was  in custody ?
 
“Fine,” Lestrade responded, pinching the bridge of his nose and closing his
eyes. “We’ll wait, God willing he’ll be alright. D’you two maybe know what…?”
he gesticulated quickly, hands flapping about.
 
“Well, when we were first processing him, he went through a metal detector,”
the second receptionist piped in, smoothing down his hair, “all residents and
employees here do-- and the machine just kept picking something up on him, even
after he was stripped just about naked.” Lestrade and Sherlock made eye contact
at one another, yet again quietly horrified at the treatment to which the
omegas were subjected, before the receptionist continued on, “Anyway, it turned
out to be something  inside  his shoulder. Might’ve been some sort of debris
from a bullet wound, maybe, so he’s in surgery to. You know. Get it out.”
 
A bullet fragment. At the very least they could figure out what it was made of;
possibly ascertain the make of it, who produced it, and then-- they’d have,
albeit likely extensive, a list of possible suspects. After that it would be an
issue of name recognition on John’s part, information obtained from the
company’s database, addresses, leads, information.A lead when, just days
earlier, there had been none forthcoming. An opportunity to snip away threads
of Moriarty’s web. “We need that as evidence.”
 
An hour in the facility’s waiting room. Endless paces along the floor, three
bodyguards who had warned him against startling incoming omegas--  oh, please ,
Lestrade was dealing with them well enough, chatting with them, showing them
pictures from his pathetic family life and ‘marriage’-- and toppling over six
different beige-coloured chairs.
 
Sixty excruciating minutes. Thirty-six hundred seconds, all wasted on  surgery
and  procedure.  Finally a surgeon came out, baggie in hand, a deeply confused
expression on her face. “It’s not a bullet,” she began, holding up the baggie,
“But I’ve never-- it looks like some sort of…”
 
While she trailed off, voice wavering, Sherlock took the bag into his hands,
quickly examining it, ready to compare it against his internal database of
bullets and manufacturers, when--
 
It was some kind of microchip.


***** Chapter update and indefinite hiatus alert *****
So. I'll keep this brief. I've been sitting on this for awhile, wondering
whether I wanted to keep this going-- I'm no longer interested in the show
after the most recent season (don't get me started), and, after having loved
Sherlock's characters for years, pouring time and effort into all sorts of
unpublished works, well, I've run out of steam. To everyone who has enjoyed
this fic, I just want to say thank you. There have been times where, after
months of not updating, one of you would comment on TGoH (This is an impossible
title, jeez) and reinvigorate me. I appreciate every single comment and kudo,
and I decided that I didn't want to just abandon this without any explanation;
especially after all the late nights spent hammering out the details of this
fic. I don't want anyone commenting or wondering if this will ever update: I
just don't have the motivation to do this anymore. 
I just want to say thanks. Really. You guys have been great. I'm posting the
(unfinished) chapter 4 below for those who are interested. 
 
                                      ___
                                        
John was in surgery. The lights, the looming figures-- all of it was too
familiar for him not to recognize it. His vision was blurry; his shoulder
hurt.  A nurse smoothed back his hair, before calling for someone. An
anaesthesiologist, most likely. Something he couldn’t see clicked, and the room
spun and swam and dragged him under.
 
He was looking into the barrel of a gun. Quietly pleading for Jim to  calm down
-- no one was out to get him. No one was going to hurt him. No ‘Sherlock’ or
whoever was going to break into the flat at any minute, no, not even after his
fucking idiot stunt with the bombs. But Jim shot John anyway, and John fell to
the floor and went into shock. It was textbook, really.
 
He was rushed into surgery. He only vaguely remembered being lifted onto a
gurney, being wheeled into an emergency room to be operated upon-- but he
remembered this. He remembered the sting of something foreign forced into him.
He remembered the antibiotics and the fever and the sweats. And he was right
there again, under a scalpel and what felt like pliers in his shoulder, pulling
something out-- John could barely remember looking into the red light of a
clock, the numbers 15:05 searing his retina, visible when he shut his eyes
again and went back down.
 
The next time he woke up, he was in a hospital. Completely different from
Bart’s, however: the walls were beige, the nurses were better trained
(excelling feigning of care, there) and the doctor was outright attentive.
 
John lifted a hand to rub at his eyes, aching with exhaustion, only to find-
- better to use the right one. “How did I--” He was in custody. Right.  Shit .
“Why am I in hospital?” John asked, gingerly sitting up.
 
“Well,” a doctor prepared to explain, scooting near John in a chair and
smoothing out her coat, “You remember having difficulty getting through a metal
detector?” Right. Yeah, he couldn’t get through, because some sort of shrapnel
was in his shoulder…
 
“So you took out, what, a piece of a bullet?”
 
“Well, no.” The doctor adjusted her glasses, before leaning forward-- John knew
that move. When Jim allowed him to practice as a doctor, he had  used  that
move. Shit. “There was some sort of… Of technology imbedded into your shoulder.
We don’t know entirely what it is, but clearly someone… Well, this couldn’t
have been an accident. That’s all we know.”
 
The doctor-- Iver-- was out of her depth, that much was clear. Just as clear
was the culprit: Jim had had him chipped like a fucking  dog.  Likely for
tracking, possibly for something else pertaining to his micromanaging,
possessive needs, but he had had John  chipped . With his good hand, John
gripped the thin polyester sheets of his bed. He’d kill him. If he ever got the
chance to see him, John would just… Just-- he gritted his teeth, and for the
first time in his life could fully, viscerally understand the phrase, ‘seeing
red’. He’d kill him. He’d rip that trachea out of his smug little  throat .
 
There was a knock at the door. Thankfully, the doctor deferred to John, who was
resigned to his fate as it was. “Come in,” he called, sitting forward. It was
the grey-haired officer, the one who was professional, if a little less witty.
“You again.” John was almost surprised-- since when was omega testimony valued
with the constabulary? How long had he been out?
 
“I don’t think I had a chance to properly introduce myself,” the bloke started
off, putting out his right hand for a shake. John took it, his own handshake as
unforgiving as steel. “Er.” Clearly he was put off, “I’m Greg. Detective
Inspector Greg Lestrade. And you must be…”
 
“John,” he answered carefully, omitting both his maiden and bonded name. Best
leave that be for as long as he could. “I take it you’re here to discuss my
connection with this whole crime syndicate bit?”
 
Greg looked pleasantly surprised. “Well, yes, actually. Thankfully my cowor-
- my, ah. My help has been in this facility’s lab, ascertaining the purpose of
the, ah…” he gestured toward his shoulder. “Sherlock Holmes knows what he’s
doing, even if he’s a prick with the victims, here.”
 
Sherlock Holmes.  Oh. Jim had been--  oh.  No wonder Holmes had reminded John
of his partner: seemed that they were cut from the same brilliant, sadistic
cloth. “Right,” John replied, voice soft. He’d seen the dark-haired one on the
telly before, with the bombings. Hell-- John narrowed his eyes, really looking
at Greg Lestrade-- hadn’t John seen him too? “I take it you’re MI6, or…?”
 
“No, ah.” Greg rubbed the back of his neck, “The Yard, actually, partially in
connection with someone…” He flapped his hand as if waving the thought away,
“Someone else. Anyway, yes. We wanted to discuss your connection to a Jim
Moriarty.”
 
“This isn’t a good time to discuss this,” Iver interrupted, stepping in between
John and Lestrade. “While I support your efforts in solving your case, we need
to consider Mister… John’s health as priority number one. He’s only just come
out of surgery an hour ago, and has considerable medication being delivered to
him intravenously. Another time.”
 
There was really no brooking argument, there, and John was grateful for it: he
had avoided ambush, and he could simply sit back, rest up, and… Well. There was
a remote and a telly, so he made do: he turned it on to BBC1, which was
reporting a major bombing of two of London’s major hospitals.
 
Jesus. Jim hadn’t-- no, he didn’t-- everyone in the room stared at the
television, Lestrade stopped halfway through the door. In a stern voice, a
newscaster read out, “At 3:07 in the afternoon, two bombs went off in the top
floors of the Royal London Hospital and the University College London Hospital,
respectively. Thankfully only the top floors have been affected, due to the
structural soundness of both buildings, but there is no death toll as of now.
We will be updating the situation as we are informed. Stay tuned with BBC1
News.”
 
Jim didn’t. He couldn’t have. He didn’t. John turned to the Detective
Inspector, horrified. “At what time, exactly, was this chip extracted from my
shoulder?”
 
___
 
Jesus fucking Christ. John tried to sit forward, but his  fucking  shoulder
wouldn’t bloody fucking work with him-- he took a deep breath, finally alone,
and tried to collect himself.
 
Jim wasn’t coming to get him, that much was certain. Hell, based on the
detonation of the bomb, he might’ve thought John was dead. He was alone in
this. No one was coming to help him. John watched the television, listening as
the body counts skyrocketed into the high hundreds, and realised he had never
felt more alone.
 
All of the threats Jim had whispered into his ear had come to fruition.
Hundreds of people had died, more were likely dying, and a significant part of
London’s infrastructure was in shambles. John wanted nothing more than to curl
into a ball and be left with his guilt, when an awful thought came to mind:
there was nothing holding him back anymore. Everything awful had come through,
and it wasn’t necessarily the end of the world, at least for him. The guilt
would ravage him for years, definitely, but right now...
 
There was nothing holding him back anymore.
 
John looked for a button to call a nurse, and, finding it, considered
requesting a nurse to talk with Holmes and Lestrade. In a bit. Just…
 
Alone and isolated beyond belief, John enjoyed a few moments of respite from
all of this. He could be away from this facility, away from the politics and
criminality of his situation, and just live a normal life. He could imagine
himself working in a clinic, getting married, maybe even having a kid. Anything
but this.
 
He requested a nurse, and in turn accepted another interview with the Yard.
 
Lestrade stepped in almost immediately, apologising for his partner’s
tardiness. “It’s quite fine,” John answered with a wave of his good arm, “I’m
sure you’re both busy as it is. Ah.” Where to start? A maudlin life story? No.
If just for his pride’s sake, he omitted his own life story. “He lives in
Kensington on Harrington Road, partway between Reese and Kendrick Mews; the
penthouse flat. Gaudy little thing.”
 
“You mean Moriarty?” Lestrade asked, shocked-- “He’s not-- how d’you know where
he--”
 
“Yes, I mean Moriarty. He’s likely gone and moved out, but that’s where I saw
him last.” Knowing him, Jim had ordered the furniture and clothes out the
moment John was out of Moran’s custody. The thought shouldn’t have made John
smile; the place he’d made his home the last fifteen years, even if every
decision, from design to use, was Jim’s… Jim would tear it all down in an
instant. John had never felt more assured of a decision, sitting in front of
the DI.
 
“Right. I-- Thank you so much,” Lestrade started, just as Sherlock Holmes
swanned in, pulling off his scarf. “Seems we’ve got an address from him.”
 
Holmes narrowed his eyes. “What changed?”
 
“Aside from the successful bombings of hospitals?” John asked, raising a brow-
- did he not know?
 
If Holmes didn’t, he didn’t show any sign of it. “With you, actually. You’re
acting different from before. Did he play all his best cards?”
 
John turned toward the… Detective, whatever he was, and looked him straight in
the eye. “I’m sure he’s got some other threat out there just waiting,” John
considered aloud, “But in the meantime I’d rather not have him free to use
people as his plaything.” John clenched his right fist. He’d said it. There was
no going back from this, was there? “I only know a few omega holding places in
Europe, but that has to be a start.” Even if they’d just be chattel in an
officially sanctioned human trade service, it was better than what Jim had them
in now.
 
___
 
Two hours. Two hours in his hospital bed, describing names, places, hotels,
events-- with some careful omissions. John hardly had to share his rendezvous
with business partners, or the outright torture he’d forced on Jim’s enemies.
Doctor Iver watched him like a hawk, clearly looking for signs of exhaustion.
Every few minutes she reminded the detectives, “You can’t trust this
information fully, of course. He’s exhausted and drugged-- maybe it’d be better
for you to come around another time, once he’s had his rest.”
 
“I’m fine, thanks,” John responded incessantly, at one point rubbing his eyes.
“Where were we? Wrapping up?”
 
“The Triad, I believe?” Greg answered, notepad out. Holmes only sat and stared.
 
“Right. Well, I can’t give too much information there. I know they stayed at
the Corinthia--” John remembered the ornate decor of their room, the room
number in gold, but after that… “They were in 1509 between October third and
the seventh.”
 
“Did you enter their room?” Sherlock asked, voice low. Shit.  Shit.
 
“I did, yes.”
 
“How long were you with them?” Holmes’s eyes flashed, and he leaned forward.
John turned away, steeling himself.
 
“...From the third to the seventh.” The shame was heavy in his chest.  
 
“Doing?”
 
John bit his tongue. “I was administered Firestarter. What d’you think?”
 
“He tested positive for it,” Iver cut in quickly, picking up his file and
rifling through it, “It couldn’t have been administered more than a month ago.”
 
“Firestarter?” Holmes asked, turning to Iver, “What does that--”
 
“Alright, we’re done for the night,” Greg announced, cutting in. Thank Christ.
John slumped in his bed, using his good hand to wipe at his face. The DI tugged
at Sherlock’s arm, outright pulling him from the room.
 
“John,” Iver spoke gently, placing one hand on John’s own, “You don’t have to
sacrifice your health-- physical  or  mental-- for this. I want you to rest for
the next few weeks, alright? We can have you placed back in your room with the
others, but… Well, we’ll need to do further testing. Firestarter can be
devastating to an omega’s cycle, especially considering the strain--”
 
“I take it you don’t supply suppressants here, hm?” John responded with an
exhausted smile. “I generally don’t do heats unless they’re chemically induced
as it is.”
 
___
 
It was late. After being transported to the facility, receiving surgery, and
then finishing a long interview with the Yard, plus the added
hysterosalpingography, ensuring that, yes, he was still capable of being
gravid. Lovely. It was ten at night, and John was knackered-- the lights had
gone out an hour ago, only slivers of moonlight filtered in through the window,
and he was surrounded by tranquil, lovely silence. Rare, given that he was in
what was supposed to be a hospital.
 
No nurses pattered through the hallways. There was no beeping of other heart
monitors, no thick, laboured breaths echoing through the halls. It was as if he
were the only patient in a state-of-the-art health centre.
 
Christ. To think taxpayer money was going to this.
 
Turning and gripping his IV stand, John stood up on shaking legs. His shoulder
felt-- well, fine, though that might have been the medication. Carefully, he
walked to the door. Curled his fingers ‘round the knob.
 
Locked. Not even the facade of freedom, then.
 
John settled back into bed, alone in the dark of the room.
 
___
 
John was moved into his new quarters during the wee hours of the morning, just
across the hall from an inquisitive young omega who looked strangely familiar.
Abby, maybe?
 
Well, either way. John folded his meager set of clothes (a refreshing change
from his old wardrobe, rococo and gaudy as hell), and put them away in a small
set of drawers. This was his life now, until he was bought.
 
Again.
 
The thought was crushing. John turned away from his drawers, pacing. In some
aspects, Jim had been an exceptional alpha. He allowed John to acquire a higher
education, train in hand-to-hand and even firearm combat. He allowed John his
own space and time to grow past adolescence and into someone with his own
identity. A sense of pride.
 
These kids, though-- shit, John had read the American and Saudi and Emirati and
Chinese and Japanese newspapers. He’d heard of life outside Europe and Great
Britain, where the scant omega population could live a normal life.
Suppressants, heat facilities, legal protections for omegas-- humanity. He’d
read the scathing exposés and studies on omega suicide rates in Germany,
Belgium, France. Britain. The West’s greatest kept secret.
 
The kids here didn’t have a chance. There might have been some sense of
community here-- John didn’t know-- some sense of identity in here. But in the
mansion of some aristocrat alpha, hidden away from the rest of humanity;
treated like precious glass?
 
Eighty-five percent. Eighty-five percent of the kids here wouldn’t make it a
year in an alpha’s household.
 
John ran his good hand through his hair, considering a shower, when there was a
knock at his door. Was he supposed to let them in? John stood a moment, waiting
for a repeat knock, when the knob turned. So that was how it was going to be.
 
“It’ll be better for both of us if you consider waiting for me to respond,”
John called, as Sherlock Holmes strode in, followed by several orderlies-- one
with what looked like a syringe full of tranquilizer. John stepped back,
looking between the group of them. Holmes seemed not to show any sign of having
noticed the needle.
 
“You’re being moved as it is, John, you can hardly expect me to bother with
useless etiquette.” Holmes was removing his gloves, not even deigning to look
at him. John wanted to punch him.
 
“I’m sorry?”

 From his jacket pocket, Holmes produced a small pile of papers, rolled and
crumpled. “The names and places of residence of every employee in every
facility in Great Britain. This is only a fraction of it, being faxed to every
single facility controlled by the Omega Ministry. It doesn’t take a genius to
understand that this is highly coveted information-- you’re being moved.”
 
“I'm sorry?” John started, shocked. Had Jim done this? “What's happened, now?”
 
“Clearly Moriarty’s irked by your being in custody, and is threatening to take
the whole of Britain down to have you out. Surprisingly obvious, really.”
Holmes snapped his fingers as if John were a dog groveling at his feet. “Come
on, now, let's be going.”
 
“Hold on.” John stood his ground, crossing his arms, “What exactly do you have
to do with it?” He glared up at the detective, feet planted to the floor.
 
“Well,” Holmes walked to John’s dresser, grabbing at random shirts and jeans,
“We can’t expect you to stay in another facility, can we? You’re coming with
me.”
 
“You can’t have possibly gotten clearance since-- when did that come out?” He
was taking John’s shit, now? That had to be a record for gaining a license to
an omega, let alone buying one out. “Hold on a moment, you  cannot-- ”
 
“I can, actually,” Holmes dropped John’s clothes, the prick, and pulled out
another card from his pocket-- embossed in gold, on thick plastic, was an omega
license. “You’re being put into my custody, at least until we get to the bottom
of this. I’ve a connection with an adequately prepared property in London
staffed with private employees-- no conflict of interest there.”
 
Holmes bent down, picked up John’s pile of clothes, and waltzed out the door.
“Jesus Christ, hold on a second!” John tentatively followed Holmes out, all the
while keeping an eye on the attendant ready to tranq him. He didn’t need that
again, certainly. With a silent nod from half the attendants, John raised a
brow and followed Holmes out.  
 
“You cannot just take my shit and walk off, you realise,” John shouted,
following him at a speed-walking pace, rolling his IV stand with him, before,
well-- oh, fuck it. He raised his arm, and, as carefully as he could in his
hurry, pulled out the needle, leaving it behind. Holmes hadn’t even stopped.
“Oi! Arsehole!” Barefoot, John ran down the hall and tackled the sod, using his
good arm to put him in a tight headlock. His left shoulder ached like hell even
just lifting his arm to keep Holmes still, but, well. This had been coming.

“Let’s get one thing clear,” he gritted out, wrenching the struggling detective
to the side, “If we’re dealing with each other, then you’re going to be
respectful.  Are we clear?”
 
Silence from Holmes. Fine. “Are we  clear ?”
 
“Yes!” He choked out, stumbling away when he was released from John’s grip.
 
“Excellent,” John answered, picking up his things and walking out of the damned
place on his own.
 
There was a car waiting for the both of them, it seemed, and Lestrade was
standing just outside of it. Puffing on a cigarette, he watched what looked
like a bunch of teens playing football near the building, kicking the ball
about. John took a moment to admire the scene. Kids on their own, enjoying a
day out. If it weren’t for the guards and attendants at the perimeter, John
would’ve thought it was a normal, domestic scene. The children looked over to
Lestrade and John, as if to ensure they were watching. Something in John’s
chest hurt when the young omegas grinned and waved. “We should get going,
shouldn’t we?” John turned to Lestrade, just as Holmes walked out. He only
barely his cough.
 
“Need a cough drop?” John offered, all smiles. He’d choke the son of a bitch
out again, if he had to. Holmes only shot a glare at him, before climbing into
the car and slamming the door shut.




 
 
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