Chapter Text
The post-clean up meeting had - in the typical parlance of parliamentary understatement - not gone as well as it might have done.
Mycroft Holmes resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose and close his eyes as he watched Sherlock preen and prance for the stuffed shirts in the debriefing room. He was riding high on his own brilliance, and had nicked all the biscuits laid out round the conference table whilst Mycroft explained just how many government resources, i.e. taxpayers’ money, had gone into covering up his little brother’s latest chaotic foray into the world of diplomacy and counterespionage. A world he knew nothing about, but insisted upon embroiling himself in regardless.
Sherlock had become obsessed with smoking out a Russian online troll factory currently sowing discord amongst the general populace with damaging disinformation. They had already swayed election results, and launched propaganda campaigns to influence political and business decisions, allowing hundreds of unsuitable people with dodgy connections to run some of the country’s biggest organisations behind the scenes.
There was evidence to suggest the cabal had facilitated cyberattacks on the NHS, and the Home Office databases. Classified evidence, which Sherlock had only seen by infiltrating Mycroft’s niche MI7 unit – which hardly anyone in the upper echelons of high spy society even knew existed. Mycroft had never even had to deny it existed, because no-one had ever confronted him with the fact there was anything to deny. Sherlock never mentioned that he suspected it. But evidently, after years of trying, the younger Holmes had broken the extremely secure virtual fence and obtained free run of the world’s most top secret files.
He had traced one particular operative, Sergey Kokorin, directly to the Russian mafia, and thence to the Russian government. This had resulted in a confrontation in the middle of a State banquet hosted by the Prime Minister, during which Sherlock had denounced the Russian President, and had roughly a hundred FSB and SVR semi-automatics held to his head before being bundled off to a basement in the Mansion House. John, rattled by how out of his depth Sherlock really was this time, had been reluctantly informing on his flatmate for months. Mycroft’s team had been ready to swoop when trouble finally arrived. They found Sherlock strapped to a table, about to be pumped full of something toxic in a syringe. It had been a close call, and Mycroft was simply horrified.
Anyone observing the current debriefing meeting would wonder what all the fuss was about, from the way the wild-haired rogue detective was bouncing all over the place with careless glee, throwing his brilliance in the faces of the gathered heads of national security.
Mycroft was mildly proud of himself for only nearly losing his rag once. He was unaccustomed to letting his frustration show except for when dealing with Sherlock. The incident of recent memory was a particular low point for loss of self-control. He had ranted at his brother in full view of the Secret Service and most of the MPs in the House as they bundled him away from the scene of near-tragedy.
He sighed inwardly. His temper was only ever lost around the overgrown teenage menace who held the unfortunate position of world's only consulting detective and second most intelligent man in the country. All this posturing, even after the silly boy had done a very silly thing which he, the actual most intelligent man in the bloody country, had been forced to spend precious time and effort accounting for. Who'd be an elder sibling?
And now there was this. Tweeting. Hashtagging, for God's sake, in the middle of a classified meeting. Showing him up again, and roundly enjoying himself. Glorying in his misdeeds. Begging for it, frankly. It was high time. Mycroft Holmes knew a coded message when he saw one.
Oh, don't you worry, Brother Mine. Comeuppance approaches.
Mycroft patiently presented his summary of events, making clear what favours had been called in to smooth things over with the Russians, who were delighting in extracting concessions from the British which they would not otherwise have expected. But the British saved face, which was the main thing. Fortunately, Mycroft still had enough capital to convince the Powers That Be not to throw his brother into a cell on a remote island somewhere. But it had been a close-run thing.
Mycroft hadn't expected gratitude. No, he hadn't expected it. But he would have liked a little all the same.
After the suits had left, coldly ignoring the reclining and recalcitrant detective - who had put his feet up and was happily munching custard creams three at a time - Mycroft calmly put his papers and memory sticks into his briefcase, smoothed down his already immaculately smooth suit jacket, and forcefully opened the door.
"Out," he commanded, trying to keep his voice level.
Sherlock paused mid-biccie, smirked, shrugged and leapt up, propelled by nervous energy and post-showing-off adrenaline. He made for the door, briefly changed his mind and turned back to grab the last two biscuits from the table. He smiled sarcastically at his livid elder brother and stuffed them into his mouth as he skipped from the room, shedding crumbs onto the immaculate taxpayer-funded carpet and treading them in for good measure.
Mycroft's temper flared in his chest as he was forced to walk at an undignified brisk pace to catch up with the flapping coat tails of the cockily striding renegade. Curse him. Physical exercise was not a welcome addition to Mycroft Holmes's day at the best of times. He resented this unnecessary display of athleticism. Of course, it was a deliberate provocation. He breathed deeply, and let the energy from his uncomfortably increased heart rate channel into strategic thoughts of retribution.
"Breaking a sweat, Myc?" sniped Sherlock, without even bothering to turn round as Mycroft hastened to keep pace and disguise the fact he was slightly fraying at the seams.
"My office. Now," replied Mycroft, through clenched teeth, as he finally caught up with a spurt of effort.
"I'll take that non-sequitur as a yes,” snorted Sherlock. “How you must hate getting all sticky in your very important work clothes. Best stick to the treadmill. Still, a few more calories burned, eh?"
Sherlock reached the end of a long corridor and turned smartly left.
Mycroft came to a dead stop as his brother veered off.
"Not that office," he said, smiling with smarmy superiority.
Sherlock stopped suddenly, then turned slowly back to face him, cocking his head to the side, his expression suspicious and marginally insecure. Caught off guard, thought Mycroft, with the first glow of genuine satisfaction he'd felt in days. Good.
"This way. Come along, Brother Mine," he said in a low, dangerous voice.
He turned abruptly to the right and was delighted to hear Sherlock's faltering steps behind him. Sherlock did so hate to follow. It completely ruined his free-wheeling adventurer vibe. Or, as Mycroft preferred to think of it, his pirate act.
Mycroft could hear the unspoken thoughts firing in his little brother's not inconsiderable brain. He voiced them aloud in a sickly sing-song voice as his brother fumed not-so-silently.
"'But where, oh, where can we be going? What's awful Mycroft up to? I've never been down this corridor before. That's annoying. Out of the modern part of the building now - no glass or polished steel here. Original historic wing, early 19th century. Corridors of power, is it?’”
“Shut up, Mycroft!” hissed Sherlock, infuriated. But he continued to follow, curious in spite of himself.
This was a new and profoundly aggravating bit of business Mycroft had hit upon recently - performing Sherlock's thoughts out loud. All the more aggravating to Sherlock because they were mostly correct, as much as they were intended to be belittling. Mycroft continued his narration.
“’Not many people come here. Unworn ugly carpet. Hasn't been decorated in decades. Abandoned. Convenient. Oh, look! A door hidden in the wood panelling - not very subtle. Did he think I'd be impressed? And, oh, look, a big obvious oil painting. And, yes, it slides out to reveal another door. Yawn. Left turn, right turn. And, here, a shabby broom cupboard, which of course no cleaner knows about. Ah, and inside, another door - thick metal, highly secure. Oh, really, how absurd of big brother to have a secret office disguised as a broom cupboard, with actual brooms in it. How very stupid. How bo-o-o-ring.'"
Mycroft ceased his mimicry as he placed his palm onto the reader next to the door, and turned to the side for the retinal scanner to do its job. He tapped twice on a seemingly blank touchscreen. The door opened. He turned to Sherlock, who was leaning on a broom in an attitude of undisguised disgust.
"In," he ordered, with grim satisfaction, and stood to the side of the open door. Sherlock sighed with exaggerated condescension. He sloped past, pretending to stifle a yawn.
Once inside, the irritated detective planted his feet, folded his arms, and gazed around, quickly calculating everything in the unsurprisingly large room. A typical Mycroftian bolthole. Contemporary, tasteful, dull. Grey, silver, blue. High ceilings, LED lights, soundproofing. One large window that looked out onto the House, disguised as a solar panel. Blah-blah, computer, screens, snore, snooze. The telltale hum of a fridge unit somewhere. A poncy en suite bathroom.
It looked like one of those awful luxury flat conversions, taken from Victorian grandeur to modern irrelevance in one fell makeover. Who puts a flock wallpaper feature wall in their secret office, for God's sake? It smelled new - the carpet laid only a few months ago.
Smells of Mycroft. Sandalwood, nutmeg, tea and superiority. That monstrous leather sofa converts into a bed.
A few ergonomic, hidden doors most likely contained suits, shirts, shoes.
He lives here sometimes when he works late. Why didn’t I know that already?
Sherlock ceased his calculations and span round to Mycroft again, insults dancing on his tongue.
"Turn your back," ordered the British Government, sternly, now fully in command of himself, safe within his private lair.
"Why?" sneered his brother, wishing that hadn't sounded so petulant.
"Security. And because I say so."
"Security," scoffed Sherlock. "It's pointless. You know I can deduce anything you're up to and I can get out of any room you put me in. Eyes in the back of my head."
"Yes, dear boy, of course," said Mycroft, with supreme sarcasm. Then, sternly and sharply, "Turn!"
Sherlock turned, pissed off beyond belief at the instinctive pull of obedience that tugged his body round the other way. The pull, that thing that only happened with Mycroft.
Stupid Mycroft. Bloody, buggering Mycroft.
"'How I loathe my horrid big brother, always so bossy, never any fun at all'...," said Mycroft, mockingly. Sherlock huffed and feigned indifference, badly.
A small sound. Almost indiscernible. A little buzz of electricity.
"'He locks the door,'" said Mycroft, slyly, once again accurately stating Sherlock's thought process. "'Why does he lock the door?' Mm?"
Realisation dawned. Suspicions confirmed.
"No," said Sherlock, quietly but firmly. He knew all too well where this was leading now. He realised he'd known since the minute they turned right instead of left.
"Oh, but yes," said his brother, with sardonic cheerfulness. "Oh, yes, Brother Mine."
"Nope. Definitely not. Bugger off." Sherlock shook his head in denial.
Mycroft resumed his imaginary quotation. "’What is he planning? What will he do next? How can I stop him?’"
"I can bloody stop you!"
Mycroft ignored him and said it. In that voice. In that low, dark voice: "On. Your. Knees."
"No, Mycroft!" it came out almost as a whine. Almost.
"Immediately." Mycroft’s tone brooked no dissent.
Much to his annoyance, Sherlock found his knees descending to the tediously grey carpeted floor. Funny thing, inevitability. So disruptive to logic. He found he'd taken his coat off voluntarily, without being asked. Sod it all to hell.
Mycroft, pretending not to notice the action taking place in front of him, continued his ironic narration of Sherlock’s internal monologue. “'He locks the door, yes, but with what? No click. Not an ordinary lock, then. But so what? For I - clever-clever me - can pick any lock and decode any system. He locks the door with something silent. A pass card. A tag. A microchip in his hand perhaps?'"
"Do shut up, Mycroft, you sound ridiculous! You sound like bloody Moriarty, it's not convincing, you know!"
Sherlock suspected that his attempts at smart-arsing weren't entirely convincing either, snapped as they were by a man kneeling on the floor of his brother's slick, secret government office.
"No, perhaps not. I haven't quite the flair for the dramatic that you seem to find necessary," drawled Mycroft, eminently calm.
"Not dramatic. Stylish," sulked Sherlock, more irritated at himself now for getting drawn in.
"Oh, is that what you're going for? Well, well. It seems rationalism loses to sentiment once again. You really are making a habit of it, little brother."
Sherlock stayed silent, letting his sulk fill the room.
"Dearest, you wound me," said Mycroft, dry as toast. "'Now," he continued in his Sherlock voice, "I can overpower stupid, slow, chubby old Mycroft any day of the week. I can get up and I can shove him, twist his arm, wrest the pass key from him, or break his hand if I want to. I'm taller, stronger, quicker, fitter, so there.'"
"True," said Sherlock, smugly.
In his own voice, Mycroft intoned, "But that would be dull, would it not? How predictable. It would disappoint me. And you don't wish to disappoint me, do you, baby boy?"
"Don't call me that!"
Mycroft ignored him, enjoying himself now.
"You won't use vulgar brute strength, because you don't want to. You never want to, not really.”
His voice hardened, growing louder.
“And please bear in mind that I have shown you the courtesy of not dragging you out of that meeting by your ear in front of the entire civil service and kicking you down the corridor like you deserve."
Sherlock snorted derisively, but felt his ears grow hot and tingly in spite of himself.
"In any case," Mycroft continued, noting with pleasure the faint pinkening of his brother's ear-tips, "it would serve you nothing."
Mycroft finally moved round to face Sherlock, looking down upon him from on high, like some disgruntled falcon at a particularly troublesome mouse. Sherlock refused to be mouselike, and refused to make eye contact, choosing instead to let his gaze wander the room with exaggerated ennui.
"You'll like this, Brother Mine: it's a Time Lock," continued the elder Holmes.
In spite of his resolve to give Mycroft nothing he could use, Sherlock’s curiosity was indeed piqued, as his brother naturally knew it would be. Confound him. He quirked an eyebrow up at Mycroft, as if to say, ‘Go on, then, astound me.’
"A Time Lock, Sherlock," said Mycroft, emphasising the homophone. Sherlock rolled his eyes. But focused them when Mycroft presented a little blue metal counter, no bigger than a coat button.
"This little key locks the user in for an hour, regardless of any change of mind he might have once he's locked himself in. It's a simple concept, but rather cunning. The security applications speak for themselves, I trust. It locks but it does not unlock. So, you see, even if you used distasteful violence - which you do seem rather distressingly keen on of late - and swiped the key, you would still be quite shut in here. With me. If you held the pass to the door again, thinking to release yourself, it would not open but simply add another hour to the lock-in, and if you did so again, another hour would be added to the timer, and so on and so forth. You would simply have to wait out the increased time until you learned to stop trying to unlock the door. The Time Lock is the scourge of the impatient. So, you see, neither of us leaves this room until a full hour has elapsed. There is no override. And I am going to require every single second of it to deal with you. I may even require two, if you try me."
Mycroft sighed internally. Ah, the pleasurable afterglow of having truly impressed and annoyed - and excited and rattled - the great Sherlock Holmes. Serve the little beast right.
"That's... Just...stupid, Mycroft! What a pointless mechanism. Pathetic! Why would anyone want to lock themselves in a room for an hour?! Especially this ghastly room," spluttered Sherlock, indignant, outraged, and suddenly mildly claustrophobic.
"You do so love to ask questions you already know the answer to, don't you, frater meus?"
Sherlock huffed extravagantly and threw himself off his knees to sit cross-legged on the floor, elbows braced on folded legs, propping his head up on one hand. "S'ridiculous."
"I didn't say you could sit."
"Don't care. Stupid. Waste of time. I have things to do, you know!"
"Fine. I see we are having difficulty today. Let's find something to help."
"Mycroft!" Definitely a whine.
"Up."
"No! Bastard..."
"Sherlock!" Mycroft barked. Then he breathed and remembered his resolve to count to ten in the face of what was fast turning into a full-blown tantrum. Sherlock smirked at his brother’s momentary cracked composure, and then remembered how angry he was and settled in for a good glower.
Mycroft felt his control return again, as the pendulum of power swung from his brother back to himself. In that same calm, menacing voice he said, "Enjoy it while you can, then. That's the last time you'll be sitting for quite a while."
He walked with no apparent haste to the large glass desk at the far end of the room, feeling the look that could kill burning between his shoulder blades. He sat with an infuriating air of authority on the comfortable padded swivel chair, and casually pulled open a few of its drawers. In his peripheral vision he saw Sherlock drop his head down to be really sure that Mycroft knew he wasn't watching and didn't care what he was rummaging with.
Mycroft hummed to himself, knowing how his brother loathed it, and pulled out a number of interesting items from the side cabinets, and one very interesting one from the long drawer underneath the table itself. He placed each one carefully and deliberately on the hard glass surface, letting its weight drop with a variety of differently textured sounds. Sherlock's ears pricked up and Mycroft saw his prominent Adam's apple bob as he swallowed in nervous anticipation.
"Up, Sherlock."
"Make me."
Mycroft huffed a small, disbelieving laugh. "I shan't. I never shall. Your choice or nothing." He held his breath slightly, wondering which way this would go. There was a fleeting possibility... But no. No. The choice would be made in his favour, he knew it. They both knew.
A silence. A longer silence. Decisions were made and unmade. Thoughts whirled through the younger Holmes.
Just stay put, he can't make me. Just sit here for an hour. Hateful Mycroft. Helpful Mycroft. Bloody handsome lovely Mycroft in his nice suit. Need help. Need this. No, don't want to. Embarrassing. Desperate. Want to, don't want to. Stupid, messy feelings.
The thoughts were clear and then clouded. Confusion, so hateful! And the noise, the noise in his head, the punching of his heart, the coiled springs in his body, the rush of blood... And then the storm broke in a thunder of unspecific language.
"Arrrgh!" roared Britain’s premier solver of crime, like a furious toddler.
Mycroft's eyes briefly closed at the sound of Sherlock's cacophonous raging, and he watched impassively as the lanky man-child sitting on the carpet, yelled and screamed his heart out – incoherent with helpless, primal fury. He kicked his long legs, slammed his boot heels into the carpet again and again, then threw himself onto his face and pounded the floor in a rather fetching display of wild cathartic violence. Et voila. A full-on Holmes tantrum.
Sherlock pulverised the carpet as if it had personally offended him (which - Sherlock's ever-active brain fleetingly noted - it had, the stupid, boring, grey fucker), and slammed himself against it as he tried to rid himself of all the uncomfortable thoughts and feelings. He could deal with either in some measure, but not both.
Mycroft couldn't remember the last time he'd seen a good tantrum. Would Sherlock have been eight? No, there was that time when he was seventeen. Oh, and twenty-three. And on his thirtieth birthday. Come to think of it, this was not exactly unprecedented. How he'd missed them. Mycroft smiled, indulgently, proprietorially. A little performance all for him. How charming.
The tantrum finally burned itself out. Mycroft subtly checked his watch. Ten minutes of lock-in down, fifty to go. Still plenty of time, with the option of renewal for bad behaviour. We'll see.
Sherlock's voice finally gave out to hoarseness. He was red in the face, panting, sweating, quivering with the tension that pulled him taught like a violin string, and his silverish eyes were bright with unshed tears.
Well, thought Mycroft, let's see if we can't shed them for the poor boy.
"Finished?" he said, pleasantly.
Sherlock sagged into the floor on his front. A muffled little shamefaced "Yes" came from the depths of the shagpile.
"Good. Knees, please."
Gentle now. Kind. Still annoying.
Defeated, head hung low, Sherlock raised himself shakily onto his knees again.
"Are you ready to begin, baby brother?"
"Yes," sniffed Sherlock, with more certainty than he'd felt for a long time. Relief was lurking in this room and he wanted it. An hour. An hour for all to be made well again. Well, 49 minutes.
Listen.
All he had to do was listen to the Voice outside of himself. The Voice that always knew.
"Good boy," praised Mycroft, moving to stand over his brother once again.
Sherlock stayed silent. Mycroft thanked gods he knew weren’t there.
"Bad boy, though," he said, deeply.
Sherlock only shivered.
"Very," continued the Voice of the British Government. "Very naughty this time, Lock."
Lock. The name.
"Yes."
"Yes, what?"
"Yes, My."
My. The name.
"Good. We are in agreement, then."
"I had to do it, My."
"That's not quite what I was referring to. But let's start with that, if you like."
"I had to."
"I know you thought you had to. I know why. This isn't a confessional. And it's not why I'm...let's say it, upset. Yes, I am upset. Against my personal preference not to be upset, I am very upset," said Mycroft, sternly, meaning every word this time, no element of pantomime about it.
"Yeah," nodded Sherlock, sadly.
"Do you understand why?"
Sherlock snapped as guilt prodded at his core. "Because of stupid boundaries, and lying to you, and yes, I know! I bloody know!"
"Attitude, please." The two words contained deadly fate. Sherlock quite sensibly fell silent.
Mycroft resumed. "Lying to me is certainly very stupid. You have overstepped yourself, Sherlock Holmes. You have hurt yourself. It is not…appropriate."
Sherlock shook his head. "Haven't."
"Have though. Tell me, have I ever allowed you to hurt yourself, when I could help it? Is that who I am?"
The sullen detective shook his head again. Mycroft eyed the heavens. A sudden image of Sherlock lying prone and struggling on a table, panic in his eyes... He relived his own intense anxiety as he called off the rescue squad, fearing they’d shoot and his brother would get caught in the crossfire. The note of panic in his own voice as he commanded them not to fire. The dizzying fear that he might be about to lose the love, the meaning, of his entire life.
"God almighty, what possessed you, Sherlock?! Have you any idea how close this was? The lengths I've had to go to get you out of this one?!"
"Yes, you made that quite clear at our little meeting. How you must have enjoyed yourself! At least I gave you something to do instead of all that boring paperwork!" shouted Sherlock, deflecting a burgeoning sense of something heavy in his chest.
"Shut your mouth, this instant. You have already said things you will have cause to regret later, I assure you. Stop digging yourself a grave. Be quiet and listen."
Sherlock looked down, cowed, and, to his own bemusement, slightly ashamed.
"I repeat. You have hurt yourself in this deed and I will not countenance it. Not drugs, not lack of sleep, or food, or days spent in endless, unlimited Mind Palace wanderings, nor reckless, thoughtless behaviour which puts you in danger. Do you understand?! I will not have it, Sherlock!"
Sherlock looked up defiantly once more, ready to issue the standard denial.
"No? You didn't hurt yourself. You're fine, are you? Weren’t scared?” asked Mycroft, with deep irony.
Sherlock stayed resolutely silent. Mycroft continued.
“Were you saving the nation, or were you just bored? Did you need to do that, or did you just want to? Had you foreseen all outcomes or did you only see yourself triumphant and heroic, bringing down the villains? Was it truly a rational, calculated decision or was it bloody showing off?!”
"Yes, damn it, Mycroft, it was a rational decision – they’re holding the whole bloody country to ransom!"
"Indeed they are! Since when have you cared much for that? There was no puzzle to solve here! No game for you to play. Did you think I wouldn't handle Kokorin, and his ilk?! These things must be handled delicately. They must be given time to play out. More time than you have patience for, I know. But this is not your area of expertise, brother. You stick to your cases – do not try to pre-empt mine! I will always call for you when you are needed, but you must let me do my job properly first. For God's sake, Sherlock, did you think it was beyond my capabilities?”
Anger welled up in the detective's chest and bubbled over. "No, just beyond your desire! You did nothing, Mycroft, nothing! You let Kokorin and his lot run the whole show! You let him get his hooks in for years!"
Mycroft stepped back imperceptibly, as if to avoid the pain of the accusation; the aspersions cast on his decency, on his competence.
He exhaled steadily, and replied, softly, sadly.
"How could you know that, Brother Mine? You have such little faith in me, even after all this time? I'm not sure I quite deserve that. Plans were afoot. Ruined by your impetuosity and your need to prove something - your need to do something, to feel something...exciting. And now we’ve given away so much more than we needed to - all to prevent embarrassment. Or armed bloody conflict!"
"He needed to end, Mycroft," insisted Sherlock, desperately.
"So he did. And you had to be the one to do it, did you? Or was it perhaps not about that at all? Was it in fact because it galled you to see someone running rings around us? Around you. A better hacker, a better infiltrator, a better processor of stolen data. No wonder he was coming out on top. You are supposed to think before you act, are you not?!"
“I did think. I thought it was worth it!” protested Sherlock, desperately, trying to convince himself now.
“Worth it. Really? I had hoped, I do hope, that you might consider what it’s worth to me! Jesus Christ, Sherlock, do you think I could live with it? If they’d gunned you down out of hand, or pumped you full of poison?! Do you think they couldn’t cover that up too? If I hadn’t been there… I know I can’t be there all the time. I’m not your keeper. I’m your brother. I’m your…” His voice cracked. “Damn you, Sherlock, I’m your lover. Or is that what you were trying to tell me? Am I not worth keeping yourself just a little safer for?”
Mycroft softened his voice as he realised Sherlock's shoulders were hitching up and down in silent, repressed sobs.
"Yes, My," he whispered.
"Yes?" breathed Mycroft, his voice dropped from fever pitch.
“Of course you’re worth it. I just forget! I forget everything except the noise in my head. I forget there’s even such a thing as safe. When the game is on, when it feels… You know!” he wailed, despairingly.
“God, yes, I know! How I know. But this can’t continue! You must, you WILL call me when that noise begins. So I can put measures in place. Like the lists. I have no wish to stalk you or trap you. But I will not lose you to your own demons, and I will not be responsible for putting you in the ground! I would grieve – do you know what I mean by that?! My soul would die with you, brother. What is it that you don’t understand?!”
"You’re shouting at me again," said Sherlock, quietly, like a child.
Mycroft let out a shaky breath, holding back the inconvenient tears prickling insistently at the corner of his eyes, swallowing down the lump in his throat.
"I am. I am. I don't like to, dearest one,” he said, quietly.
And that final sweetness undid Sherlock entirely. Tears flowed freely down his face and he breathed great sobs of air until his lungs burned.
Mycroft tried to retain his own composure. He still had a job to do, after all. He tutted with loving exasperation.
"Up. Here."
He pulled his gangly brother up and led him over to the large sofa. He sat at one end and manhandled Sherlock’s unresisting form down into an awkward embrace. Sherlock’s long spidery legs hung off one end. He twisted into Mycroft’s chest and sobbed his eyes out into his shirtfront, clinging to his back, seeking the absolution he had already been gifted, if he but knew it.
How rare were these moments – sights no-one in the world had ever seen, or would ever see. The Great Detective and the British Government. Soft and sweet.
After some minutes Sherlock’s frantic cries ebbed away. His breathing slowed, the hitching gulps calmed, and he snuffled snottily. Adorably, so Mycroft thought, though he still looked miserable and defeated. Boyish.
"Lock?" he said, softly, as he stroked comforting circles on his brother’s back and up into the unruly mop of hair.
"Mmm?"
"What's your job?"
"To find the dragons."
"To find the dragons. Yes. It's my job to slay them, Brother Mine. Not yours. You only need find them for me."
"Yes."
There would be no apologies. Mycroft loathed apologies. Besides, they were unnecessary when he knew everything that took place in the brain and heart that were near-imprints of his own. So alike, so different. Comprehensible to him alone, and yet still unfathomable.
"I will clean up any mess you make, you know I will. The physical ones out there, and the ones in here.” He tapped his brother's head with a gentle finger.
"Yes." A simply stated fact.
"I want you to rely on it, but for both our sakes, you must...act as though that isn't the case. I want you to fly freely, but with some care. Just tell me where you’re going, so I can catch you if you fall. Don’t work without me."
"My. Tha..."
"Hush, none of that. It's what I do. It's what I'm for, since the day you were born. Tell me why."
"Because my big brother loves me best of all."
"Best of all, mon petit frère."
Sherlock sighed in contentment, and turned his face up to Mycroft's, taking in the cool grey eyes, more metallic and harsh than his own, but full of an alien softness only he was privileged to witness. Mycroft gazed down at his brother's tear-streaked face, so so unlike the almost reptilian shell he presented to the world at large. He supposed, in these moments, he himself was notably less the lizard-like creature he was so often thought to be - that he sometimes believed he was.
Not cold-blooded at all, either Holmes. Not with each other.
Mycroft knew no greater pleasure than this. His beautiful boy, pliant in his arms; trusting, vulnerable, fragile, unbroken, and still alive, looking up at him with wonder, as though he were the answer to something. To everything. Slowly he pressed his cool, thin lips against Sherlock's warm, bow-like mouth, as they sighed into each other in perfectly familiar, familial harmony.
Tongues met, licking up tears, seeking more, giving rise to so much sudden heat. The Iceman and the Virgin, indeed. How stupid people really were, thought Mycroft. How stupid everyone was, not to see what was as plain as Molly Hooper - the glorious taboo of the Holmes boys, entwined in erotic obsession. Same as it ever was. Since they were old enough to understand what those feelings were. Too early, probably. But they were not ordinary, in mind or body. They had always understood one another. All their words, all their conversations, public and private, revealed this essential truth. And no-one saw it but them.
Reluctantly, Mycroft pulled away first. Business before pleasure, he cursed inwardly.
“All right, back to your place. And you can lose the clothes now, I think.”
Sherlock whinged at that. He flung himself off the sofa, edgy, irritable, not yet cleansed, and itching with unfinished business.
He peeled off his dark jacket, glad to be rid of it, and undid a few top buttons on his shirt before pulling the whole thing over his head. He kicked his boots off, hooked a finger under each sock and removed them. Mycroft scowled at him as he discarded everything on the floor in a heap. Sherlock sighed impatiently and stooped to pick them up, folding them neatly over the sofa arm.
Bloody OCD, Mycroft, that’s what it is. Who cares about clothes in this situation, for God’s sake?
“Not there. I’ll be needing that. There, on that footstool.” Mycroft tutted. Little Brother was a slob about clothes. He thanked the fates for bringing Captain John Watson and his military ironing abilities into their lives.
Sherlock gulped and shivered a little as he did as he was bid, trying not to think too much about the sofa arm and its intended use.
He attempted to kneel back down but was pulled up by his hair. He grimaced and stood again, the iron grip yanking his curls painfully. He was met with Mycroft’s displeased face. Sherlock didn’t like Mycroft’s displeased face when he was nearly naked.
“It strikes me as ironic, my little detective, that I spend an inordinate amount of time demanding that you put your trousers on in inappropriate situations. Must I now lose my temper to make you remove them in an entirely appropriate one?”
“All right, all right, fine!” snapped Sherlock, bristling at the nickname and impatient to have this over with. Why had he thought he’d get away with keeping them on, even? He was self-aware enough to know he was feeling slightly guilty, just a tiny bit, at having taunted his beloved brother with public nude protests in the recent past. Mostly, he still found it funny. But he was also delaying, dreading removing his trousers and fully giving himself over to his brother’s mercy. Or lack therefore.
It was useless to resist. And anyway, he didn’t want to, which was by far the worst part of this.
Drawers duly dropped, he looked to Mycroft for permission to kneel again, trying to look demure and sorry.
“I think we’ll have your pants off too, Lockie,” smirked his evil brother. “Fetching as they are.”
“Oh, Myc!” moaned Sherlock, lashing out in retaliation with his brother’s most hated nickname.
Mycroft frowned. “Definitely off. Now stop stalling me, and get on with it.”
Sherlock complied, slipping the tight black jockey shorts off. He tried to ignore the sudden feeling of self-consciousness as the air hit his bare bum. That wasn’t the only thing that would be hitting it, he thought with self-pity.
“There, isn’t that better?” said Mycroft, taking the trousers and pants over to the footstool and carefully folding them.
Sherlock saved himself the bother of replying. He wanted to cover himself from the front but didn’t dare. It was pointless anyway. He tried for the confident-casual look, but he never knew what to do with his hands. He felt like twelve types of twat.
Mycroft removed his own jacket and placed it neatly over the chair. He began slowly undoing his cufflinks and rolling up his sleeves. Sherlock felt deeply conflicted about this essential part of the ritual. Dread and anticipation roiled in his stomach, but he couldn’t help the appreciative glance at his brother’s forearms. Although he knew this was not prelude to a fuck (yet), his cock thought otherwise and began to take an interest - the only part of Sherlock Holmes that was impervious to mind control. Well, that wasn’t quite accurate. It was only Mycroft that did this to him. Mycroft had some kind of override button in his brain that made his cock hard. Only Mycroft.
“Stop that, you’re not supposed to enjoy it,” smirked Mycroft, knowingly. “Though, as always, it is a delight to see you like this, little brother. All bare and eager for me...”
Sherlock blushed. Only Mycroft made him do that too.
Fixing him with what Sherlock imagined was meant by ‘a gimlet eye’, Mycroft seemed to be asking a silent question. Sherlock had obviously answered it to his satisfaction, as he nodded slightly, and picked up a hefty-looking riding crop from the desk. Sherlock swallowed thickly.
“This? Or…” He reached down again and brandished a long, thin, wicked cane. Sherlock blanched. He hated it.
“Yes, I think this…” Mycroft whipped the cane through the air, enjoying the involuntary flinch the high-pitched swish induced in his brother. “The crop is perhaps too reminiscent of certain events.”
“No, it really isn’t! I mean, that was…” protested Sherlock, struggling to say anything at all.
“Hush. I know what that was. Curiosity that didn’t kill the cat. I can live with it. Now, up with you. Bend over the sofa arm, please.”
Sherlock groaned. “Oh, no, Mycroft! Can’t you… I mean, aren’t you going to…?”
He lost the ability to express himself, which Mycroft took as a sure sign that he was doing something right.
“I beg your pardon? I don’t catch your drift, Brother Mine. Something wrong?”
“I thought you’d… You know…” Sherlock sighed, realising he was going to be forced to ask for it. “Can’t I go over your knee instead?”
His face flushed with humiliation.
Mycroft’s face, on the other hand, flushed with delight.
“How sweet of you to suggest it. Yes, I think you may. Before, though. Not instead of. Not this time.”
“Oh!”
“I know. Come here at once.”