BEEP BEEP BEEP

GUYS I'M PUTTING THIS UP HERE FOR A GODO REASON PAY ATTENTION: I'M PLACING A TRIGGER WARNING FOR EMOTIONAL ABUSE AND VIOLENT IMAGERY ON THIS CHAPTER AND THIS CHAPTER ALONE, SO DAMN WELL READ THESE NOTES

ALSO

I LOVE YOU GUYS

SOME OF YOUR REVIEWS AREN'T WORKING SO IF YOU DON'T GET AN ANSWER IT'S ALL BECAUSE OF THE SITE. IF I COULD I WOULD WALK 500 MILES AND I WOULD WALK 500 MORE JUST TO GO TO YOUR HOUSE AND HUG THE CRAP OUT OF ALL OF YOU

"Sherlock!" John called inside the door of 221B, quickly turning to tend to Mrs. Hudson, who had apparently tried to fight off whoever had intruded the house. She had been knocked out, but should be alright.

His mind was screaming to get upstairs, but the rest of him was frozen, paralyzed. The honest-to-god truth was that Sherlock very well could be lying dead up there with an origami lotus on her palm. For a moment he could see it perfectly: the slow horror as he ascended the stairs and went round the partition wall, the sight of Sherlock sprawled boneless with her feet still hanging on the edge of the sofa while the rest of her had fallen, wide open eyes red with burst capillaries, pink cupid's-bow mouth open in a silent scream, arms spread crookedly like a flightless bird, and to top it all off an origami lotus sitting over her heart. His limp would come back, of course, and his tremors and nightmares. He would never see Alex again. He would be alone for the rest of his life, because how does one move on from Sherlock Holmes?

But the flat was empty, John discovered when Lestrade and Sarah's presence made him drag his leaden body up the stairs. There were signs of a struggle, and the cypher had been stuffed hastily under the sofa cushion, to be found when John sank down onto it in disbelief.

"I've called an ambulance for your landlady," Sarah came up to tell him before going back down the stairs to see to Mrs. Hudson.

John looked at the printed out photograph from his phone with a hand over his mouth; his mind was going at a hundred miles an hour even as Lestrade took the paper from his hand and inspected Sherlock's scrawling handwriting across the cypher. "Well, they haven't gone far," said the DI, settling Alex's car seat on the table. "Think you ought to get your gun, Doctor Watson."

He'd said it so casually, so cavalierly, that John mindlessly nodded and stood up before his awareness caught up with him through the fear. Eyes wide and mouth gaping, he watched as Lestrade laughed anxiously. "Come on, mate, I'm not an idiot. You want to know how I knew not to arrest you, that you were a good enough man to trust?" John nodded. "Because Sherlock stopped deducing to protect you. She wouldn't quit showing off for the bloody Queen. She'll outlive God trying to have the last word. But she stopped for you. Now go and get your gun."

There was no need to say it twice. Sarah was already volunteering to stay behind and wait for the ambulance and watch Alex while they went on their bloody rescue mission. She almost looked a bit put-out by missing the action. Once John's gun was tucked into his belt they were off with the cypher in hand.

-

"A book is like a secret garden hidden in your pocket..."

The woman, General Shan, was speaking to Sherlock even though she was slumped almost double in the chair she'd been tied to, blood sliding down the side of her face - by God, she really wasn't having the best week, physically, was she? - from a head wound, probably pistol-whip. Sherlock's replies were weak and slow, indicating a likely concussion, but her eyes, on the other hand, John noticed when he peered carefully around the corner, were alert and slowly taking in everything they could without moving her head. She was biding her time, planning, deducing, even then. Behind her back, her clumsy hands were slowly working at the bonds holding her to the chair. John couldn't fight a surge of pride.

At least until two rough pairs of hands seized him by the arms. He had just enough awareness divided to tell when Lestrade reached from the shadows and plucked his gun from the safety of his belt while remaining unseen.

"Oh, it looks as though we have a volunteer," said Shan as if the show were still going on, while the two thugs wrestled him into another chair and tied him down. "Please, sir, sit."

Sherlock's head snapped up and her eyes widened dramatically. "I don't know where the treasure is!" she tried to tell Shan, but the old woman wasn't listening. "I don't even know what it is! John!"

He wanted to say something reassuring to calm Sherlock down, but a gag was being forced into his mouth. Shan arranged the enormous dart-shooter from earlier so that it was aiming right at him, and John felt sweat beginning to blossom across his upper lip and forehead. He'd been in worse fixes than this, certainly, having been shot and kidnapped and brutalized before nearly dying of malaria, but every brush with his own demise was different and therefore equally terrifying.

The blood was pumping viciously through his ears, deafening him even as he could see Sherlock continuing to shout and eventually breaking free of her bonds. But none of that mattered, even as Lestrade dove from his cover and started swinging John's pistol down onto smugglers' skulls in an attempt to keep from shooting until it was needed. A really proper panic-attack was settling over him when Sherlock vanished from sight and the sandbag continued to sink nearer to the mechanism. It was Maiwand all over again.

At probably the last possible moment Lestrade caught the mechanism in an impressive rugby-tackle that would have made John's dad proud, and the dart shot just past him to hit whoever was behind him. For a second Lestrade looked horrified, then horribly relieved as he ran to where John was trying very hard to reign in his breathing.

The DI only loosened his gag and patted him on the shoulder. "I'll get the rest in a minute; Sherlock's pretty bunged up." John nodded and let him go, grateful for the minutes alone to get control over himself. He hadn't had a near-attack like that in ages, since before he'd even met Sherlock.

Another few minutes and he was free rom his bonds. Sherlock was looking ashen and resolutely refusing to speak for the pain in her throat, but at least she was conscious. John hugged her without a thought. None of them had seen where Shan ran off to.

-

The next morning, John left Sherlock asleep on the sofa and Alex with Mrs. Hudson to go back to Van Coon's office and have a word with his receptionist. Sherlock had used the last reserves of her energy to finish the cypher and identify just where the missing treasure had gotten to, then fallen inelegantly (for the first time in her life) on top of him in his bed and refused to move for twelve hours.

They hadn't talked about their unresolved feelings in the wee hours of the morning, mostly because Sherlock had been too drained, but John suspected it was also better that they didn't talk about it. At least not right away; he wasn't sure he was ready to admit just how much that slip of a woman had impacted his life in only two months.

Still, at least the receptionist had had a good morning.

She offered to buy him lunch in her good mood; John declined, but did stop for a coffee in Speedy's before going up. Had he accepted the receptionist's offer, he wouldn't have been sitting in the cafe window when a sleek black car pulled up to the curb of Baker Street. A woman well into her sixties though still beautifully striking stepped out, and for one moment John's breath froze in his throat - she looked just like Sherlock. Even before the woman stepped up to the front step of 221B he knew it had to be Mrs. Holmes. For five minutes he agonized over whether or not he should make himself scarce, but Sherlock had never mentioned her mother outside of arguing with her brother. She'd never mentioned any of her other family, really, and John wanted to meet the woman.

Trotting up the stairs at a casual pace, John knocked on the door to alert Sherlock of his arrival, and froze in the door. Something was very wrong.

The tall, black-and-grey-haired woman was standing tall in the center of the sitting room with arms crossed. His flatmate was sitting in her usual chair, but everything about her posture was screaming wrong wrong wrong all wrong. It wasn't her usual lounging sprawl, nor was it the sort of straight-backed position of a child trying to appear at equals with their parents. Sherlock's knees were pulled in tight, feet crooked in toward one another, shoulders slumped and rounded forward with head bowed slightly down, and hands opening and closing into loose fists at her sides. Her eyes were rimmed with red and face was very pale; her hair was still mussed as though her mother's arrival had woken her up.

"Sherlock?" asked John from the door.

His flatmate didn't look up, but her mother turned at once to him and smiled through red lips; it was sharp as a double-edged sword. "Ah, you must be Doctor Watson," she said, marching to him and shaking his hand. "It's wonderful to meet you; I'm Violet, Sherlock's mother."

He shook her hand, though, seeing Sherlock still frozen in the chair, it felt like a small betrayal. "Her mother."

Violet ended the handshake in the perfectly appropriate amount of time and moved to stand behind her daughter's chair, hands discreetly rubbing her shoulders and still smiling like a bird of prey. "Yes, I know, it's a shock, isn't it? The way my daughter speaks of me, you'd think that both of her parents got cancer and died!" She laughed and squeezed Sherlock's shoulders, and she squirmed. "Oh, sweetheart, stop fussing, you know I'm joking and it was years ago. Do you mind if I smoke, Doctor?"

"I wish you wouldn't," he admitted, unsure of how the words were even coming out of his mouth. "Secondhand smoke and all that."

The older woman rolled her eyes and lit up regardless. "Oh, come now, that's all just a myth. Now perhaps you'll tell me: where's my grandson?" Identical plumes of blue-gray smoke left her nostrils in thin streams, and for a moment she perfectly resembled a dragon. John looked to Sherlock, expecting and grimly hoping her to just say something - forbid her mother from smoking around her child, tell her it was none of her damn business, hit the woman, for God's sake anything. But she just sat in her chair, staring at the same spot she'd been staring at since John walked in, unmoving. Like a caged animal. So, he did all he could do. He spoke for her.

"He was born with breathing problems; I won't have you smoking if you're going to see him," he insisted. Violet pressed her cigarette into the back of Sherlock's chair while staring at John with a mix of disdain and respect, mindless of the ash falling down into her daughter's hair. The women really did look shockingly similar when side-by-side, and yet they seemed nothing alike. He opened the window despite the March chill to air the place out, then faced the room again. "Er. Shall I put the kettle on?"

"Sherlock can do it," announced Violet, giving Sherlock's shoulder another squeeze. "Can't you, dear? You can make a nice cuppa for us. Go on, love, you'll do fine." Haltingly, as thought she were fighting herself every step of the way, Sherlock stood up and walked to the kitchen like a marionette on uneven strings.

The moment the younger woman was gone Violet was ushering John into his chair and seating herself on the sofa. "I'm so very glad we have a chance to finally meet, Doctor," she said with a put-upon sigh. "I've just been so worried that Sherlock wasn't properly looking after herself - I never wanted her to leave home, you see, thought it was too risky - so I'm just so very pleased you're here."

"I...I'm sorry, I don't think-"

"Oh, it's alright dear, Sherlock isn't listening."

"Isn't she?"

"Of course not, she's making tea."

Violet said this as though it were the most obvious thing in the world, and more than impossible for her daughter to concentrate on more than one task at a time.

"Mrs. Holmes-"

"Call me Mummy, dear."

"Ah. Mrs. Holmes. I'm afraid I don't quite follow you."

Smiling and obviously puzzled by his apparent lack of understanding, Violet shook her head. "Doctor Watson, you must have read Sherlock's psychological profile. Unsociable, loud, impolite with spurts of violence, completely unable to relate to her peers or respond to social cues? She's a sociopath. She's retarded."

There was a loud crash in the kitchen. John turned to look and found Sherlock standing over three shattered mugs with one hand pressed tight to her mouth. Fury unlike any he'd ever felt before bloomed in his chest, murderous and cold. "Sherlock, sweetheart, it's alright," Violet called in a sickly condescending voice, "just try again; I'm sure you'll get it right. Eventually."

"Perhaps you ought to get to the point, Mrs. Holmes," he said with very little room for interpretation. "It's been a pretty rough few days for all of us."

"Yes, I heard. Strangled twice and beaten to a pulp, all in four days, Sherlock? Dear me." Violet reached compulsively for her cigarette case, but fought against it and returned her attention to the matter at hand. "Yes, that's what I'm here about. I didn't know Sherlock was pregnant. Somehow she managed to manipulate her brother into secrecy; she's clever like that. If I had known she would have had an abortion, believe me, and it would have been for the best. But Doctor, obviously her reckless behavior of these past few days indicates that she's hardly able to take care of herself, let alone a - oh, thank you dear, and you remembered how I take it! - let alone a helpless infant."

Sherlock had come back in with three mugs of tea precariously balanced in her hands and handed them off before sinking back into her chair to hide in the steam. It was perfect; in the three times Sherlock had ever made tea before that day, it had never come close to this much effort.

He forced himself to meet Violet's eyes. "I don't understand what you're getting at."

"She wants to take Alex home with her," concluded Sherlock quietly.

Violet rounded her gaze upon her and she visibly shrank. "You named him Alexander?" Sherlock nodded. Violet turned back to John. "As you can probably see, she doesn't have the faintest idea how to raise a child, especially one that is very likely to have the same - peculiarities - as her, surely you understand. A child like Sherlock has to be dealt with a firm hand. Her father never understood that; he indulged her. Every time she started to cry because 'the lights are too bright' or 'the air vents are evil' he would run right over with some little toy or trinket for her to play with. Alexander spoiled her."

"They weren't toys," whispered Sherlock, now sunk so low in her seat John could barely see her behind her knees.

Things were getting out of hand, and fast, and John had no idea what to do short of resorting to violence, which was a very appealing option. He had never thought...well, now he knew why Sherlock never spoke of her family. For goodness' sake, why had Mycroft never mentioned any of this? For how protective the man was of Sherlock, he seemed blind when it came to the devil inside their own house.

"You understand, Doctor," continued Violet, apparently giving up and pulling another cigarette out of her antique case. "It would be wisest to leave the child in my care, as I already know how to raise him. Isn't that right, Doctor?"

Yes, obviously she knew how to raise children properly, without damaging or traumatizing them. John stood up and marched over the coffee table in order to stand above Violet Holmes, plucking the cigarette from between her lips and crushing it on the coffee table. "Actually, it's not Doctor; it's Captain Watson," he said in a steel-edged voice. "And I do believe it's time for you to leave, ma'am."

He waited, never tearing his eyes away, and at last the older woman stood. Her shock and being ordered around seemed to have reduced her to half her height, and her hands trembled as she forced the cigarette case into her purse. "I'm afraid I don't understand what I've-"

"You've outstayed your welcome, Mrs. Holmes. Now if you please, I'll show you to the door."

Within the span of a blink he had the woman on the front step, looking deeply ruffled and upset. "Can't I at least see my-?" The door slammed with a most satisfying echo in her face before John locked it.

Sherlock was still sitting frozen in her chair when he went back up. He didn't dare come too close, not knowing just how she would react yet. "Are you okay?" he asked after a few minutes. She nodded, though her jaw was clenched tight and eyes sparkling. "Has she always been like that?"

Again, a shaky nod, but this time Sherlock swallowed and briefly pressed the back of her hand to her mouth before replying. "Since I was eleven. Mye left for uni, and she tried to fix me."

He'd never heard her call her brother by anything but his full name before. That, if anything, was what made John get up and cross over to sit on the arm of her chair, draping a loose arm around her shoulders. Sherlock leaned into his body and hid her face like a child might in their mother's skirts. "Sherlock, there is nothing to fix," he told her gently but firmly. "You are just fine exactly as you are." He swallowed hard. "And I love you."

She sucked in a shaky breath and wrapped her arms tightly around his waist, letting all the air out in a drawn-out cry of what could have been either relief or utter despair. John hoped for the former, since she refused to let him go, but didn't ask questions.