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“Bought you a little getting-to-know you present. That’s what it’s all been for, isn’t it? All your little puzzles, making me dance… all to distract me from this.”
Sherlock’s grin had a manic edge, he knew it did, but oh did he love that rush of anticipation, an electric tingle setting his nerves afire, better than any drug. This was the high he chased, over and over. This game with Moriarty… best intellectual high in ages. He held the memory stick high, footfalls echoing in the dark of the pool, and then there was a creaking door and the hesitant sound of footsteps that were not his own. He looked over his shoulder, excitement sparking in his gaze, savoring it, and -
“Evening.” John stood there, wrapped up in a coat, hands in his pockets.
“This is a turn-up, isn’t it, Sherlock.”
“John! What the hell…?” John, the name ringing in his head with a flash of betrayal; his skin prickled with something cold and dizzying (in the back of his mind he analyzed, matched physiological symptoms with emotional definitions gleaned from people more in touch with their feelings, and the label arose, almost clinical: dread/shock).
“Bet you never saw this coming.”
How? How had he missed it? (There’s always something, always missing something, something crucial, the obvious amongst the details…) He followed the line of reasoning back, back, searching through events and past interactions to find evidence of John as Moriarty all along.
[Hypothesis]: John is Moriarty (betrayal/foolish/trusting gets you killed/no, no, self-incrimination later, focus now).
[Analysis]: deeper game than I knew - he’s here, his words, vocal incrimination, admission of guilt - final pip - where, where, surely there were signs before this - he’s always around, of course he’d be able to see my every move, I monologued at him - think, there has to be evidence other than this -
While the bulk of Sherlock’s mind busied itself with his initial reaction and the obvious conclusions (it’s never obvious, I’m missing something again, damnit), the remainder of his attention collected data, studying John, the pool room, searching for missing pieces.
Item: Jacket: heavy, closed.
Item: Pool room: temperate, warm and clammy. Estimate: 29 degrees Celsius.
Item: John’s movements: Stiff, cautious, rigid even by military standards. Rapid blinking. Stilted voice.
Item: Wire: in John’s ear, coiling up from inside the parka.
“What… would you like me to have him say… next,” and John shifted, slowly opening the coat.
…Wires. A bomb. Of course.
The final pip. John, yes, it’s John but it’s John as the victim, not John as the mastermind. John, leaving for Sarah’s, walking, obviously 221B Baker Street was monitored, easy enough to grab him (not easy if he saw them coming, military training, holds his own in a fight; but John was angry [at me - no, guilt later - thinking now - focus], distracted, and not hyperaware at the best of times).
Sherlock’s muscles loosened, tension easing (physiological symptoms associated with mood/emotion: relief), washing away the cold-prickles of betrayal. He scanned the room, probing the corners, shadows and alcoves for the real enemy, concealed somewhere…
“Gottle o’ gear, gottle o’ gear, gottle o’ge-“
Another tide of sensation, neurons on overdrive, a settling of weight in his gut, heavy and dark as his focus sharpened (preliminary diagnosis: fear? but not for my safety: John’s? reminder: caring won’t save anyone’s life, detach, detach, have to think clearly) -
Sherlock found words then, voice cracking like a whip. “Stop it.”
“Nice touch, this. The pool, where little Carl died. I stopped him and I can stop John Watson too. Stop his heart.” John’s voice, speaking in a cadence so completely alien, words out of sync.
More symptoms - a rising pulse, increased body temperature. Hypothesis: Anger. “Who are you?” Sherlock asked the echoes of the pool.
Another creaking door. A voice, naggingly familiar. Nasal words. Footsteps, hard soles, dress shoes on tile. “Is that a British Army Browning L9A1 in your pocket, or are you just pleased to see me?”
Grasp the gun, turn, aim.
“Both.”
His mind stilled in that moment. Data collection: off. Fear: gone, replaced by frost and sharpness (diagnosis: cold, controlled fury). His thoughts crystallized, the world and all his attention narrowing to this, the view down the barrel of the Browning, the slight man with the too-large eyes and the mania-shrill voice, the words in the humid air.
Sherlock’s mind was an ever-active thing, busy even in sleep or at leisure. It constantly multitasked, working through one problem in the forefront of his thoughts and sorting through additional data closer to the subconscious. Well-ordered noise, always observing, gathering information, organizing it, analyzing, deducing. The small ritual of applying a nicotine patch (or two, or three), steepling his fingers, closing his eyes, and breathing - that was the act of concentrating all his thoughts to a single difficult problem, rather than splitting his attentional resources five ways for efficiency. Yet even then it was racing, active, noisy.
His thoughts had gone silent and cold and edged like this only a scarce handful of times in his entire life. It took serious danger and ice-white rage (not the hot anger that led to scattered papers and broken cookware, not the flash-point impulsive anger that resulted in shouting or insults). Fear, sometimes, like he’d not felt since childhood. Sometimes he could almost reach this state when training his body, boxing, or in the timeless suspension of the needle, slowing and muting the racing thoughts for some blissful, indulgent quiet.
In this razor-edged stillness, he could simply act, unhampered by second-guessing (cost/benefit analysis, possible outcomes, odds of incarceration).
In this silence, he was dangerous.
The world narrowed to Moriarty, their tense banter and droll witticisms. Sherlock’s voice: edged, dry. Moriarty’s: chimeric, fanged. The words came without thought. All his awareness was on the trigger until he could feel his own pulse on it, and it would be so easy, so easy to just squeeze with an exhalation of breath -
And yet he was handicapped, too. He might as well have had the safety on the gun for all the firing he’d do with a laser point on John’s chest.