AUTHOR'S NOTES PLEASE PLEASE READ BEFORE CONTINUING ONWARD:

This story has a T rating but I consider this chapter to be rated higher, due to graphic images of child abuse, and it also contains trigger warnings for PTSD-related symptoms.

Also, warnings for John singing. Let the cliche begin; this song is just my headcanon for this whole universe. It's called You Were Born and was written/is performed by Cloud Cult.

THANKS AGAIN TO ALL MY LOVELY READERS AND REVIEWERS I LOVE YOU ALL SO SO SO MUCH C'MERE AND LET ME LOVE YOU

"How is he?"

"He's fine, Sherlock, he's fine," John assured his flatmate-friend-girlfriend-whatever over the phone, shooting Mycroft Holmes an 'OK' symbol as he did. With a crooked smile the elder Holmes picked Alex from his car seat, only looking slightly overwhelmed as the baby squirmed into a more comfortable position in the crook of his elbow. "How's Russia?"

"Belarus."

"Right. How is it?"

Sherlock sighed. "Open-and-shut domestic. Dull. Everything is very...quiet."

Taking that as a hint, John gestured at Mycroft to keep his voice low, putting a finger to his lips. Mycroft continued to play with Alex, but kept his lips sealed firmly shut. "Do you miss us yet?" he grinned down the line.

"I'm not dignifying that with a response."

"We miss you too."

He could quite fairly guess that she was smiling, especially when Alex let out a high-pitched squeal that would someday become laughter, and she let out a small huff of amusement. She'd only been gone for nine hours, but it had apparently been more than long enough to get to Minsk and close the case of the man who had stabbed his girlfriend. The next flight to London was in the morning; technically, it was Sherlock's first time away from her son for more than a few hours, and had been calling practically on the hour since she left.

"Can I talk to him?"

"Who, Alex?" John asked, though he knew it was what she meant. "Yeah, he's right here, I'll put you on speaker." He covered the mic of the mobile phone with the heel of his hand and turned on Mycroft. "Keep quiet, yeah?" The elder brother somberly nodded, and John opened up the speakers on his phone. "Okay, Sherlock, you're on."

There were several long seconds of silent static as the detective seemed to consider what to say to an infant who could not yet even distinguish the visual difference between his mother and an abductee. Then, with John and her brother listening (though she was not aware of the latter), she quietly said, "Alex? Allie, can you hear me? It's...it's Mum. Mummy. I-it's Mum, Alex. Can you hear me - John, can he hear me?"

"He's looking around for you, Sherlock." It was the truth; from the confines of Mycroft's arms the baby was swinging his head around with wide boggling eyes the moment Sherlock started to speak.

He could practically hear the sad smile in Sherlock's voice. "I'll be home soon. I...love you, Alex. I'll talk to you later, John." She rung off before he could say goodbye, though he was hardly able to listen when his eyes were glued to Mycroft's face. He looked oddly touched by his sister's brush with tenderness, as though it was truly a rare event, and only served to remind John of why he really was at the man's office.

The previous afternoon, John had come home to find that Violet Holmes, Sherlock and Mycroft's mother, had dropped in to visit. When at first he'd been rather pleased to meet the woman who had brought up such extraordinary children, within moments the meeting at turned into a train wreck of insight into Sherlock's childhood. The woman was cold, ruthlessly so, and treated her daughter as though she were mentally deficient. She was apparently under the impression that John was a live-in doctor rather than a friend to Sherlock, because according to her Sherlock was incapable of making friends. It was only when the woman had blatantly tried to convince them that she ought to raise Alex, and that the reason Sherlock had problems was because her father - who Sherlock had named her son after - had been a bad parent, that John decided enough was enough and threw her out.

For the rest of the day and well into the night Sherlock had been deeply disturbed by the dredging-up of her past. She'd sat huddled in her armchair with John for an hour before mustering the will to move, let alone speak or even fully function. At John's urging she tried to nap for a while, but kept jerking awake and looking around as though sensing an axe-murderer in the room, and quickly gave that up. Even though she admitted to being hungry she ate like a bird, too jumpy and anxious to focus on any task for long.

Luckily, John was able to get her to go to bed at a decent hour, and climbed in with her to simultaneously keep her company and to get Alex if he woke up in the night. Until three in the morning they all slept soundly until Sherlock suddenly woke up gagging on bile, and vaulted out of bed to be sick and sit awake in the kitchen until dawn. Then she'd gotten the email from Belarus and been off on the first flight, before John could piece together how to help her.

He sat up with a cup of strong coffee and his laptop after Sherlock left, playing around with his blog but otherwise completely lost in thought, trying to make a plan of action. After she'd called three times to check in on them (once from the plane - not good) he had come up with a tentative idea, and cleaned up his dishes. He called Mycroft Holmes, asking if he wanted to see Alex for a while, though fully intending to find out more about the Holmes children's childhood. A car picked him and the baby up at half-three; Mycroft had beamed at the sight of his nephew, but it had done nothing to sway John's grudging feelings for the government man.

"Can I ask you something?" asked John once he'd put his phone in his pocket and settled in the chair on the other side of Mycroft's desk. At his nod, he ploughed on. "Your mother came by yesterday."

The man's eyebrows quirked. "That wasn't a question, Doctor Watson."

Still rankled from the way Violet Holmes had called him "Doctor" in such a condescending manner, John pursed his lips. "Why is it you insist all you care about is Sherlock's well-being, and yet you allow that wretched woman to come within twenty miles of her?"

Mycroft looked puzzled; everything about him seemed to settle and still in the wake of John's question. Even Alex stopped moving. "I know that Sherlock and our mother don't have the best relationship, but I'm not entirely sure I understand your tone," he said.

"You don't-? Listen, did your family have surveillance cameras in the house while you were growing up?"

"Of course."

"Do you still have the footage?"

"I...believe it's been digitized somewhere in the archives, yes. Care to explain, Doctor?"

John shook his head. "I wouldn't know where to begin." At least not without hitting or shooting something.

After several long moments wherein John knew he was being thoroughly examined and tried to keep his features as neutral as possible, Mycroft nodded and picked up the phone with his free hand. Within twenty minutes the files had been found, and Anthea brought up a removable hard-drive with the necessary contents. John thought he saw her smile at Alex before she left, though she could also have been smiling at her phone.

"Just what are we looking for?"

"Anything from after you left for university."

The older man shot him a suspicious glance but handed Alex over to navigate through the files on his computer. "Shall I choose any random day, or do you have a preference?" There was a hint of nervous skepticism in his voice, as though he were hoping if he made a joke the anxiety would go away. He chose their grandmother's birthday the year after her death on a whim, when Sherlock was fourteen years old. The screen divided into four separate views inside the house: one in the foyer, one in what appeared to be a back hallway leading to the garden door, one in a garage, and another in the drawing room aimed at the wide French windows. There were more folders for different rooms of the house as well, the three family bedrooms and the basement. At John's urging, Mycroft used his second computer monitor to bring those up as well.

Mycroft hit the fast-forward key and left the rest of the controls to John, but as the shorter man insisted, he didn't know what to look for. Sherlock was in her room for much of the day, reading; it was strange to see her so young but otherwise alarmingly the same. Still lanky, still with a ponytail taming her long black curls, still with what looked like a permanent scowl on her pretty face, though it was hard to tell with the video's low resolution.

It wasn't until nearly three-quarters of the way through the day's footage that John finally instructed Mycroft to slow down. The family had all vanished from the cameras' view and reappeared as though after a meal; Alexander Holmes had retreated somewhere out of view of the cameras, but Violet was escorting her youngest child into the drawing room. She sat Sherlock in a chair that was only half in view of the camera and stood several feet farther into the room, her tall, elegant stature perfectly framed.

"Is there sound?"

"Mm, perhaps. Let me fiddle." He entered a few key-strokes but frowned. "No, I don't think so. I've never had cause to look back on this footage before. Perhaps if you elaborated what you're-?"

But John had already felt the blood drain from his face as he continued watching the tape, and grabbed Mycroft's shoulder to swing him around and see. Violet was speaking, her shoulders shaking with vehemence. Sherlock had started to curl in around herself in the exact same way she had at the flat the day before - and, John suddenly remembered with a chill, the day before that when he'd been getting worked up about wanting to have a normal life. When Violet noticed her daughter's slumping posture she lashed out and slapped the girl; Mycroft gasped audibly and clapped a hand over his mouth. The show of emotion was startling.

After another few minutes it seemed that the mother-daughter chat had come to a close, and Sherlock scampered up the stairs with a hand clutched to her cheek. "This could be an isolated incident," Mycroft reasoned, sounding more like a plea than statement.

"Then try another day," John practically snarled, still staring transfixed at the screen. He was glad he'd put Alex in his car seat before joining Mycroft at the computer. "Any other day, take your pick."

And so Mycroft chose another day, this time truly random, and got a weekday three years later. That helped eliminate half the day, as Sherlock was at lessons with her private tutor until the afternoon, but John watched the Holmes parents go about their business. Just before Sherlock was due home Violet answered the phone in the kitchen and went dangerously still. Her eyes looked black in the fuzzy picture.

When seventeen-year-old Sherlock arrived home she was instantly brought to the drawing room and placed back in the same chair. Violet's tirade was more passionate than three years before, more heated, with more exaggeration of her arms for emphasis. Then it seemed Sherlock snapped something back at her, simultaneously jerking forward and ducking her head, and Violet lost control. She yanked her daughter by the hair - John was beginning to understand the need for a ponytail, now - out onto the floor. With one hand still anchoring her down, Violet swung her open hand and hit Sherlock repeatedly on the back and sides, using the flat of her palm to prevent bruising. Sherlock's father was in the parents' bedroom, slumped on the bed with his head in his hands.

John looked at Mycroft to see the man white as a sheet and staring at the screen with his mouth hanging open, and felt a small stab of guilt for springing this upon the other man. He honestly hadn't known, whereas John had assumed he just hadn't done anything about it. Which was a foolish thing to assume, he now understood. "Your mother came in yesterday and started saying some horrible things about Sherlock. She called her retarded, and seemed under the impression that she ought to take Alex home and raise him properly."

In an odd mirror-image of his father, Mycroft lowered his head into his hands. "No wonder Sherlock loathes me," he dryly quipped. "All this time thinking I was allowing such gross abuse to carry on, when in reality I was completely in the dark."

"You never knew?" John asked.

"No, I never knew," snapped Mycroft as he raised his head again. "I've spent my life trying to look after my sister; do you really think if I had known I wouldn't have gotten out of that house with her under my arm, whether she wanted to go or not?"

After only a moment's hesitation, John shook his head. Mycroft was creepy and domineering, but he meant well. He stayed another hour, drinking too much tea while Mycroft distractedly played with his nephew. The older man (who really was only a year or two older than John, he realized to his shock after a few minutes' conversation) was completely enamored with the infant, and even volunteered to change Alex's diaper when the time came. When he brought Alex back from the loo his nappy was hanging half off of him and Mycroft looked embarrassed.

The flat seemed darker and very quiet when John brought Alex home, despite the fact that it was still early in the afternoon. In the past weeks he really had become accustomed to Sherlock's presence, and was feelings the lack of it very strongly now.

Alex was tuckered out from so much activity with his uncle and sleeping soundly even as John transferred him from the car seat to his cradle in Sherlock's room. He'd be out-growing that and be sleeping in a proper cot soon enough, and the very thought that John had been right there with this tiny family to see that growth happen made his chest ache. It felt like being granted private access to a very elite club without all the pretentiousness. He got to be there as Sherlock learned how to balance caring for her son and keeping herself healthy - even if that particular leap had only been in the past 24 hours - and been present for Alex's first smile. Usually only fathers had that privilege, and when before that had unsettled John to the point of contemplating moving out of Baker Street, he now felt blessed to live there. It even softened the bluntness of colicky nights and baby-vomit on his only jacket.

He had beans on toast for his supper, not up for cooking up anything extravagant if he was on his own, and shortly after he ate it was time to feed Alex. Then, of course, it was time to burp him, and then change him. He felt admirably self-sufficient, even if a little voice in the back of his head kept reminding him that one day and night with the baby was a lot different from a lifetime. Sherlock had been driving herself half to the grave trying to keep up with the demanding hours of her work and shouldering all the responsibility of caring for her son, and John made a note to insist on helping more often. He liked caring for Alex, and since it was doubtful he would ever have his own children this was a happy compromise for him.

In the evening John looked up developmental milestones on his computer with Alex in his lap, trying to gauge where the child was in his adjusted age. Alex had been born five weeks early, so if he was twelve weeks from birth that put him at seven adjusted weeks. However, John was pleased to see that Alex was a small way ahead of seven weeks; he'd already started reaching out and holding things placed in his grasp, and was able to track movements close to his face to some degree, and recognized Sherlock's voice a bit better than Mrs. Hudson's. The website suggested talking or singing, so John read the rest of the article aloud and smiled at Alex's reactions.

Despite his earlier nap Alex was still tuckered out from playtime with his uncle, and so John gave him a bath in the sink while telling cleaned-up stories from his army days. "Ah, this is fun isn't it, lad? Just us blokes, no Mum to breathe down my neck and tell me I'm doing it wrong, Uncle Mycroft is setting his goonies on Big Bad Granny...this isn't half-bad, is it?" he asked fondly as he cautiously rinsed Alex's hair. It was getting just long enough to start curling around the edges now, like his mum's.

By the time Alex was clean and dry he was fighting sleep and fussy. It was really the only time all day that John felt slightly out of his depth, but it was nothing compared to his colic. He held Alex close and rocked him gently, softly singing a song one of the girls in his regiment had been constantly humming back in Afghanistan, and they'd all known the words to by the end, and they'd all sung together at her funeral. Poor Annika.

"You were born into a strange world
Like a candle, you were meant to share the fire
I don't know where we come from
I don't know where we go
But my arms were made to hold you
And I will never let you go

"You were born to change this life
You were born to chase the light
You were born"

He paced around the flat as he sang in his wobbly off-key voice, trying not to think too much about Annika in an effort to prevent nightmares later on. She'd died in a roadside bombing near Kabul. Whenever they had long walks ahead she would be in the back of the group singing her heart out to keep their spirits up even in the blistering sun. They all pretended to be annoyed because they were men and she was just some girl with a loud voice who talked too much - even called her Little Orphan Annie in an attempt to get on her nerves, but it only pleased her more because she'd always wanted to be in a West End musical - but sorely missed the music when she was gone.

"Oh my precious, oh my love
When they come to take me I will hold you from above
I don't know why we're here
And I don't know how
But I'm here with you now
I am here with you now

"You were born to change this life
You were born to make this right
You were born to chase the light
You were born."

By the time he'd finished Alex had settled down greatly. John kissed the crown of his head and settled him in his cradle, hovering over him for a few minutes just because he couldn't seem to tear himself away before crawling into Sherlock's bed. He was surprised by how tired he felt once he was horizontal, and was asleep within a few minutes of touching the pillow. All in all, it had been a nice day, even if he did miss Sherlock.

It didn't matter that she hadn't replied when he told her he loved her.

It didn't matter one bit.