Stark Raivenne Mad

Greg had meant to be at work for an extra couple of hours, but the late afternoon had been blessedly quiet. Quiet enough that he made a dent in his inbox. The kind of quiet that made him think of his home, not his office. He counted the minutes until he felt it was close enough to the end of his shift that no one would ask whether he might return.

He let himself in without making a sound he didn’t have to. He left his shoes by the door, where he finally was comfortable enough in the perks of being the husband of Mycroft Holmes to leave it to the house staff to handle. With the outside muted, coming home felt like it always did, like it was waiting patiently for his arrival to drown out the world.

He started to head for the stairs, but a voice from the music room caught his attention.

Mycroft’s voice.

Not the clipped, careful way he spoke at work, where the impressed said “brilliant” with warmth, then looked away because that brilliance was cold and sharp enough to cut.

This voice was different.

Softer. Patient.

Greg quietly made his way to the music room, peeking around the wall on the scene.

“Alright,” Mycroft, still impeccably suited as always, was seated on the rug in his socked feet, his shirt sleeves expertly folded up, exposing his forearms.

Their fraternal twin boys, Greg Jr. and Mychael, stood opposite him, each with a neat line of papers with numbers and counting blocks on the floor between them. “From ten comes…”

Mychael excitedly picked up a block,  then made a soft jump on the matching numbered paper as his young voice called out, “Twelve!”

“Almost,” Mycroft said, encouragingly. “You missed a number. Let’s try again. What comes after ten?”

Mycheal picked up a different block and made another jump. “Eleven!”

“Excellent,” Mycroft gave a small cheer.

Greg Jr. leaned forward over a paper with the solemn intensity of a three-year-old making an important announcement to the universe. He held up one finger, then another, then seemed to decide that counting might be a problem that needed solving.

“I have an allergy to one-one,” he announced.

There was a small silence, the quiet kind that happens when something funny has landed in the middle of seriousness.

Greg leaned against a wall just out of their sight, making a noise he couldn’t quite stop. It came out as a surprised breath, the start of a laugh he hoped nobody had heard.

Mycroft looked up, eyes narrowed in thoughtful amusement but gave no other indication of having noticed him.

“An allergy to one-one?” Mycroft questioned, as if tasting the words like he might find the logic inside them. “So… What is one-one?”

Greg Jr.’s small brows knitted together a frown, as if genuinely surprised that his father, who knows everything, didn’t know that pointed to the paper his sibling stood on.

“Oh! Eleven, of course.” Mycroft’s mouth twitched. He resumed with that calm confidence that made even chaos feel organized. “Then we’ll skip it – for now. We have ten, eleven… and then…?”

Mychael’s face lit immediately, eager to keep the game moving.

“Eleven!” he said, too fast again, but this time both sons had the correct blocks and jumped to the right number paper.

“Twelve!” Greg Jr. corrected his brother, “Twelve doesn’t have the one-one allergy!”

Mycroft let out a quiet little laugh under his breath. Then he prompted them on, one number at a time, as if every single one counted -because it did.

“Ten. Eleven. Twelve…”

Greg stood in the doorway, pretending to be a statue. The police department had taught him to read rooms, to read tells, and patterns.

He hadn’t expected to learn a different kind of reading at home.

The way Mycroft’s voice softened when it wasn’t dealing with grown-up expectations.  Or the way his hands, so exact and so particular, were gentle with tiny fingers and wobbling blocks.

Outside these walls, Mycroft Holmes’s reputation lived in other people’s mouths: cold, distant, sharp as winter.

Inside, Greg watched the hidden warmth easily come forward without being asked.

“Thirteen!” Mycheal said.

“Fourten! No, fourteen!” Greg Jr. echoed, mispronouncing, then quickly correcting himself with furious seriousness as he and his sibling raced to find the correct blocks to place on the right papers for each.

And so, it continued, back and forth, until the boys reached twenty.

“Very good, boys!” Mycroft applauded as he stood, returned the blocks to the beginning of the line, then rearranged the number papers before sitting once more.  “Again.”

From the doorway, the statue that was Greg Sr. cleared his throat loud enough to announce himself, gentle enough not to break the spell.

“Daddy!” Both boys turned at once, their smiles widening as they ran to him.

Mycroft looked up at him. His expression shifted, the warmth with the boys falling into something deeper.

Something tender, and unmistakably private.

Greg met his husband’s eyes and held them there a count too long on purpose.

Mycroft stood and walked over.

“Hello,” he said, his voice held that same patient steadiness, now threaded with affection.

Greg stepped closer, kissing him before he crouched down and gave both twins a hair tussle. “And what are we doing?”

Mychael pointed at the papers and blocks like they were evidence. “Papa’s teaching us counting to two-oh!”

“Not two-oh, twenty.” Greg Jr, the senior of the brothers by seven minutes, raised his two index fingers again. “But I think I’m allergic to one-one.”

“Some V-sounding words still tripping him up,” Mycroft explained.

Greg’s grin spread before he could stop it. He glanced up at Mycroft. “So you? You’re letting him skip the bit he can’t handle?”

“For now,” Mycroft rolled his eye playfully; his smile, quiet and real, held the kind of warmth none but he and the boys ever saw. “It’s only their first few days of counting past ten. Today the world eleven, tomorrow, the world. It all counts.”

Greg felt it again, the warmth under public icy exterior, the one that only Greg could count on, because he’d been the one listening when Mycroft’s world turned its face toward him.

“Right, then I’m helping.” Greg stood, looking at his watch. “What do you say, boys - one more or two times like your Papa taught you? Then the last game before we get ready for dinner, the first one to get the correct blocks to the right number paper gets an extra biscuit!”

“Yes!” “More biscuit!” The boys jumped up eagerly.

“But you have to get past your allergy at least once, Greg,” Mycroft added, gesturing to the papers and blocks.

“Yes, Papa.” Greg senior and junior chorused to giggles and deep chuckles all around.

The four Holmes-Lestrade males began again. Mycroft and Greg teasing when the boys went a bit wrong, both fathers guiding them back with patience instead of pressure. Counting one to ten, then eleven to twenty, one biscuit incentive, allergy-shaped joke at a time.

It all counts.

=======================================

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The rain fell in a silver mist over the estate gardens, softening marble statues and turning the clipped hedges a richer green. Mycroft Holmes and his fellow university classmate Langdale Pike strolled at an unhurried pace along the gravel path, a single black umbrella sheltering them both while cigarette smoke curled lazily into the damp air.

Ahead, beyond the ivy-clad colonnade, stood Gregory, the estate's gamekeeper. His broad shoulders were rigid, hands clasped behind his back as he leaned against a column by the boathouse pier, his gaze looked over the rain-speckled lake.

Pike followed Holmes's gaze and chuckled.

"Good Lord, Holmes. Doesn't the fellow look as though the world has ended?"

Mycroft's eyes lingered a heartbeat too long upon the dark curls dampened by the mist, upon Gregory’s solid frame that seemed somehow diminished by sorrow.

"He does look broken," he admitted lightly. "Is it true... that your charming sister has truly done the foul deed and refused him?"

"It would hardly surprise me, if so." Langdale scarcely spared Gregory a glance. "These working people never seem to learn." His lip curled, not even trying to temper his voice. "Perfectly suitable for sweating in fields and inspiring passing fancies, perhaps. But imagining themselves worthy of genuine affection from families like ours?" He gave a dismissive laugh. "Utter absurdity."

Mycroft's fingers tightened almost imperceptibly around the umbrella handle.

Yes, Violet Pike, Langdale's eldest sister, was friendly enough with Gregory, as she was with all the estate’s help, but had never shown the young man the slightest romantic attention. Her opinion of the lower classes, though kinder than her brother’s, still fell along a similar path.

The rumor existed because society found it easier to imagine a laborer pining after a lady than... anything else.

His chest burned with words he dared not utter.

-Gregory deserves better than your contempt.-

Instead, years of careful habit won. "Hm."

It was neither agreement nor contradiction.

Langdale seemed satisfied, and the two men continued down the path, leaving the silent gamekeeper behind.

As much as he wanted to, longed to have one more glance at that strapping form, wondering what Gregory’s touch would feel like under cool bed linens; Mycroft dared not look back.

He knew that if he did, he might not manage to look away from the man he secretly is in love with.

The young man shook in Greg's arms.

Rain drizzled on the pavement. Blue lights painted wet brick in restless flashes. Greg Lestrade, Detective Inspector of Scotland Yard for twenty-three years, held on with the practiced certainty of someone who had spent decades talking people back from impossible edges.

"Glad you stayed," Greg said quietly.

"I... I almost didn't."

"But you did."

“I needed a reason.”

"Now, you have one."

The young man broke.

The sobs came all at once, violent and exhausted. Greg simply stood there, letting him cry until the worst of it passed.

As Greg gently pulled away, there was…

--Silence--

No, not ordinary silence.

Complete. Absolute. Stillness.

The flashing police lights froze mid-pulse. The young man's expression remained fixed.

Even the raindrops hung motionless in the air.

Only one thing moved.

Before Greg floated countless grains of luminous sand, suspended in the air. They swirled together in impossible currents, every grain changing colors —silver into violets, emeralds into crimsons, sapphires into golds. A kaleidoscope of colors bold and dim, of days and nights and lives and deaths, all forming a living rainbow.

And somehow Gareth knew it was looking at him, through him, scanning him.

Greg tilted his head.

"Why do you look like you belong in an hourglass?"

The sands rippled as if amused.

Curiosity overrode caution; Greg extended one finger.

Slowly.

Carefully.

Until it brushed the swirling cloud.

And the world shattered and folded around him.

Buildings stretched and rewove themselves.

People blurred into streaks.

Then the stillness returned.

Greg staggered.

"What..."

He stood on a familiar street.

Only... different.

Across the road stood the young man.

But somehow older; by four or five years.

A little laugh escaped the young man as a small child, who looked like him, clung happily to his shoulders.

Alive. Happy.

"Holy shit!"

The realization hit Greg like a train.

He jerked his finger back and instantly, the vision collapsed.

The father. The child.

Gone.

Then rainbow sands waited patiently.

Heart pounding, Greg looked around.

A teenage girl nearly walked through him before freezing with the rest of the world.

Mocha complexion, dark braid. Freckles. School blazer.

Recognition struck instantly. He knew that face from photographs she'd had reluctantly shown the squad after losing a bet.

“Sally…”

His partner, or rather, his future partner.

"I'm in the past?!"

Greg’s breath caught as the implications flooded in.

Past. Future. Anywhen.

Then another thought appeared. One he had buried for years.

Mycroft.

The man Greg loved with every stubborn piece of his heart. The brilliant man who had accepted an appointment to some strange Office no one could ever explain, smiled sadly one evening, kissed Greg goodbye...

...and vanished.

No body found, no answers given; eventually declared dead.

If this truly crossed time, he could see Mycroft again.

Just once. Just hear his voice.

His hands trembled as Greg's chest tightened in ardent want.

"Greg, no!"

The self-reprimand came out harsher than intended.

"I don't get to undo grief because I miss someone."

He shut his eyes. The temptation hurt more than any wound he'd ever carried.

"But changing the past..."

He shook his head bitterly.

"...that's how detectives become evidence."

Slowly... Deliberately...

He touched the sands once more.

Push just a little forward.

Stop. Forward. Pause.

Tiny adjustments. Feeling the flow rather than seeing, until…

Rain resumed. Sirens wailed.

The young man finished wiping his eyes and stilled again.

Everything was exactly as it had been.

The swirling sands alone remained.

"I don't know what you are... But you're far too dangerous to just be willy-nilly letting people control you like this."

He studied them.

The colors gently pulsed as if waiting….

"Who takes care of you?"

Instead of answering, it flowed around him, through him.

Warm. Cold. Young. Ancient. Endless.

Speaking not in words, but Memory.

He felt civilizations rise and disappear between heartbeats.

Rivers of history branching into futures beyond counting.

He understood the being before him was simply Time.

Asking him to serve - a duty, a stewardship.

An Office.

It was searching for one capable of restraint before power.

Someone who would choose not to change history even when given every reason.

Its current guardian no longer wished to serve.

Because eternity had become enough.

So, Time sought another.

Should Greg accept, he would walk every century, guard every timeline.

Protect Time itself.

For as long as he wished.

“And if one day I too, chose to lay the burden down?”

He would be returned here. To this exact heartbeat.

With no memory.

Because that Time would belong to another Greg. Not this one.

Greg looked around.

Everyone and thing remained frozen in Time.

The young man waited unknowingly for a better tomorrow Greg had already glimpsed.

He imagined the chaos of such power falling into the wrong hands…

A tyrant. A person grieving unwilling to let loss remain loss.

At history rewritten endlessly by someone's preferred draft.

…and shuddered mentally and physically at the thought

The sands answered with a feeling - a different Memory.

Something terrible that had nearly happened but for those in Office stopping it.

And alongside the dark memory, amusement. As though knowing such a person attempting to master Time itself usually ended spectacularly badly.

Greg didn't quite understand it, but he believed it.

The man he'd loved was gone. His career had reached its quiet twilight.

No one depended on him for anything.

Yet untold numbers depended on history to remain exactly what it needed to be. Past. Present. Future.

"I spent decades serving as a custodian of the people... Now I'm being offered to serve as the Custodian of Time.”

I’m not ready for this. But is anyone?

He looked once more toward the young man.

"Live well."

Greg then extended his hand.

"I accept."

The rainbow sands rushed joyfully around him.

London disappeared.

Robes draped his body, and an hourglass floated to his hand.

And somewhere, beyond every yesterday and tomorrow…

Time welcomed its newest guardian -Chronos.

=========================================

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@flashfictionfridayofficial

It takes all I have not to grin as I watch Mycroft approach our booth. I was in the States at an NSY conference. Just before my return, Mycroft had to fly out to handle something far above my pay grade to know about. Thus, it’s been nearly three weeks since we’ve seen each other; the longest we’ve been apart since we became a couple.  

I see him narrowly missing being plowed into by someone’s wayward child. Despite his well-cultivated image of coldness, he is surprisingly good with children, at least once they can talk and be somewhat reasoned with. I am not surprised to see him crouch before the tyke. I am surprised he detains her with the classic coins-from-behind-the-ear magic trick. I was not aware he knew how to do that, as he kept the child entranced long enough for the exasperated mother to catch up and thank him for the assist.

But that is not what has me smiling.

He has clearly gone home and changed, because Mycroft is wearing one of his best bespoke suits.

One of the ones that he knows I love him in and, more importantly, love to get him out of. 

Mycroft generally gives little heed to his looks. Though I know he personally does not see it, he has been on this earth too long not to know people do find him physically attractive; that it’s not just his poshness and the mantle of power he wields effortlessly that make him so. Thus, he is not so humble as not to use it to his advantage when he wants to, like tonight. I was at work when he called to say he landed, and we agreed to meet for dinner once he was done reporting in. While I still wear my everyday suits for work (because heaven forbid the things I come across on crime scenes touch any of my bespoke!), I have learned to keep a good suit at work for a quick change, and the designer prêt-à-porter suit I wear now will stand up to his.

Because tonight, Mycroft Holmes is out to make an impression.

And if the mother’s less-than-subtle rapid blink when he stands to his full long-legged height, as well as the heads, male and female, that check him out, then quickly look away, when he catches them as he passes, he has succeeded.

Still, I know he wears this suit for one reason: the only person he wants to impress -namely me.

And I will not lie to myself about how much it thrills me that someone like him thinks I’m worthy of impressing for no other reason than he loves me.

He loves me, and I him.

I marvel yet again how far he and I have come from those early acrimonious days when we wanted nothing more than to depart each other’s company as soon as possible. With our forced continued association, due to Sherlock,  animosities slowly gave way to a grudging respect that grew into a friendship that frankly shocked both of us. Becoming a friend to Mycroft Holmes had been such an unexpected shot in the dark; when I realized my feelings for him had changed, I was terrified to hope for more.

And after pining for him in secret, I was beyond filled with joy when I learned the feeling was reciprocated. That he had been just as terrified of and in love with me. Even now, two years into our full romance, it is a heady thing to know how deeply we crave each other.

Had we gone home first, neither would have been upset, but meeting up this way?

Feasting eyes on each other at our fine clothing after being separated? Was it better?

Oh yes!

When he sees me and breaks into a smile of his own, it is one filled with happiness and tender pleasure that warms my bones. I cannot help but return the smile.

Normally, I would stay seated, but tonight I cannot. I am out of my seat, needing to touch him.

“Don’t worry, I did not forget to take a taxi in today.” I tease. “But you know that, don’t you?”

“Of course,” he admits.

I know that means Anthea has already arranged for someone to drive my car home from NSY, because I will ride home in the sedan with Mycroft. Another aspect of being with Mycroft I still marvel over.

We give each other quick continental kisses – we are in public after all.

He takes my hand in his, our familiar push-pull of greeting when his eyes sharpen on me.  

Shite. I almost forgot who I was dealing with.

Almost.

Still, I feel myself flush and give him a small, helpless shrug when I see his glance at the pocket where the outline of a not exactly full cigarette pack can be seen. I know he does not smell it and thinks it’s because I changed clothes, but having the pack on me was damning. Though he’s still working on it, I’ve been smoke-free for years now. Thus, he knows whatever would cause a relapse must be heady, and I will tell him when I’m ready, so he says nothing as we sit.

Dinner is its usual fare; its deliciousness is somehow made even better by Myc’s company. We chat about the things we can about our respective jobs, and of course, his brother’s latest nonsense. Being with John has made him easier to deal with, but Sherlock is still Sherlock.

“Alas, John was able to wrangle him away so we could leave at last.” I give an exaggerated sigh of exasperation as I finish my tale of Sherlock’s shenanigans.

“I called Sherlock after I spoke with you. He knew we had dinner tonight.” Mycroft shakes his head in amusement. “But enough about Sherlock.”

I do not miss that his eyes occasionally flick to the jacket pocket even though we are seated and he cannot possibly see it. Just as he knows I do not miss that he again lets me carefully circumvent his subtle attempts to ask, his curiosity mounting.

I signal for the check.

“So, are you ready to tell me what happened?” He blatantly asks.

“In the sedan on the way home,” I respond.

“So, what happened?” Mycroft asks carefully once we’re in the sedan.

Closing the privacy divider, I pull him into the deep kiss we’ve both been longing for all night, but not dare do in public.   

It takes EVERYTHING I have to keep a serious expression as I watch Mycroft mentally shift gears when I  push him away, then pull out the pack of cigarettes.

I slide it across the seat to him without taking one myself.

He picks it up, and I know he can tell it’s nearly empty of its expected contents.

“I needed a reason.” I say, “Something to camouflage… because you would have certainly noticed a jeweler’s box.”

And then he blinks, dumbfounded, at the content it does contain…

His face goes through a lot of complicated changes as his voice drops to a whisper.

“Gregory…”

“I went shopping with my brother to allegedly help him pick out a ring for his gal,” I answer the unasked question on his face, taking the pack back. “And he held it for me until today…”

“Oh, Gregory…”

I patiently wait as he momentarily blanks and returns, as I knew he would.

“Years ago… During one of the worst times in my life, we were sat in that restaurant -same booth as tonight…”  I slowly open the cigarette pack, “And the smartest man I know told me that I was a man who can be loved. Who deserves to be loved…”

Mycroft blinks, and I know he is remembering the dinner when he learned I had filed for divorce from my philandering wife at last. The broken-hearted man I was had asked why I was hard to love and be faithful to, unaware at the time that the person who had secretly been both for me was sitting directly in front of me then.

But it’s no longer a secret now, and I continue…

“…that oh so smart man also promised me that someday, we would be at dinner, and we would look back on that day and laugh.”

“Well, if you want a bit of added humor, I thought your anxiousness tonight was because you wanted to avoid talking about why you relapsed… ” Mycroft sheepishly confesses.

I tip the pack and reveal the ring. “Is this reason to have a pack on me better?”

“Much better...”

“The only thing better than learning of your love for me in secret was proving to you that YOU are equally worthy and deserving of being loved out in the open.”

I was so happy the day I proved that, but not as happy as I am now as I hold the ring aloft. “Will you marry me, Mycroft?”

Now, far removed from the sad sack of a man I was that evening, I mentally laugh at the promise kept as Mycroft all but dives on me, his answering kiss hot, heavy, and hungry.

“Yes!”

============================================

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@mystradepromptsandscenarios

Search for "my vibe + [color you like] =" on Pinterest and choose the first 9 photos you find aesthetic.

(I prefer even numbers, so I chose 10 images.)

Mycroft Holmes had noticed something.

Nothing unusual in and of itself; after all, that was his job – in the loosest sense of the word - as an analyst to notice the things no one else does. It wasn’t anything wrong per se – at least not yet.  Whatever it was, it was subtle; just that little sensation in the back of his brilliant mind that a little something was not quite what it should be.

It was a little something that became a pattern.  

And he was beginning to see that pattern emerging elsewhere, in places like the US, the Eastern Bloc, Asia and South America.

Whether that was a good thing or bad remained to be seen.

His colleagues, lacking his intelligence and keen instincts, told him he was imagining things, but Mycroft trusted his instincts and started putting out feelers.    

It had taken him months of diligence. Months of having his minions covertly follow the tiny filaments of instinct that had become threads he could pull to test his theory.

He knew that he finally pulled the right ones when he received an invitation to a private meeting.

A meeting at a location he'd used before for clandestine interests. It was a tad interesting that this person knew this location.

Whether that was a good thing or bad remained to be seen.

But the knowing of it alone for this particular use made it impossible to ignore, so he agreed.

Checks were made, and naturally, Mycroft brought Anthea, his aide-de-camp and personal bodyguard, to accompany him. The former agent successfully played the part of being somewhat vapid but was very intelligent in her own right.

And also very deadly.

Mycroft arrived at the meeting place a few minutes early only to discover the other person was already seated and waiting, the steam from a fresh cup of tea curling in front of him.

Standing just behind him and off to the side was a tall, baby-blue-eyed man with an old but noticeable scar on the side of his otherwise handsome face. Clearly, he was the seated man's bodyguard.

Though most people would not, Mycroft could not help but notice that beneath the guard’s beautifully cut, bespoke suit, he was armed.  Those blue eyes passed over him and Anthea once, then seemingly dismissed them. Mycroft knew better. Just as he knew that Anthea, standing off to the side and behind him, was alert to everything, so was the guard. Mycroft ignored him, leaving him to Anthea's concern, and focused on the seated man.

“Hello, Michael,” An Irish lilt purred. “Well, aren’t you a delightfully tall cool drink of water.”

Mycroft ignored the obvious attempt at flirting to throw him off. Both knew it was a fruitless endeavor.

So, this is him... The spider at the center of a very dangerous web...

He was exactly what Mycroft expected him to look like…

The man sat calmly yet gave off a sense of menace like a coiled snake waiting to strike.

And yet not at all…

Average in stature, he wore an expensive dove-grey bespoke suit that complemented his fair complexion and, like his bodyguard’s suit, did an excellent job hiding the gun holster at his hip. Mycroft mentally smirked at the silver fox tiepin.

More like a wolf in sheep's clothing.

Mycroft took in the dark, slicked-back hair and dark eyes that he instinctively knew missed nothing in the room. He had never seen eyes so dark, so dead, so impenetrable, and so completely devoid of emotion.

"You always have your minions scout the place an hour before you show up, and you always show up precisely between seventeen and fourteen minutes early, Henry." The man then spoke with a broad Dubliner lilt, using another of the aliases Mycroft employed out of the office. It did not bode well that both were different aliases from the one used on the invite that brought him there.

He wants me to know he knows some, if not all, of my common aliases. He expected that to rattle me? He’ll have to do better than that.

The lilt then turned cold and menacing and was unmistakably elite private-school English. "Or do you prefer Mycroft? You don’t mind if I call you Mycroft, do you, Mr. Holmes?" The voice switched to an American southern drawl as a dark brow flicked. "Oh wait, I don't care. Tea?” he gestured to a tea service off to the side. “I mean this won’t take long, but that doesn’t mean we can’t be civilized about it.”

"No, thank you." Mycroft sat as if already bored. "And you, who do not care...are? Because I do not believe it is the name on the invite."

"No, no, no, no, no…” The man shook his head, as if amused by the antics of a child. “Don't play coy, Mycroft. You don't really know how to fake that.”

“I was not trying to.” Mycroft huffed.

“Yes, you were!” He singsonged in high pitch.

“You've been pulling enough strings that I've taken notice."

And whether that was a good thing or bad remained to be seen.

“As have you.” The man gave something approximating a smile, revealing sharp teeth as the Scouse accent easily slid back into American English. "I’ve given you a glimpse, Mycroft, just a teensy glimpse of what I’ve got going on out there in the big bad world. You know exactly who I am."

The crisp London English was back as he leaned forward. "I know you know what it is, Mycroft Holmes. Say my name."

Even the old ventilation system seemed to hesitate for a moment. Mycroft held the man’s dark gaze without blinking as he rolled off a few names. He took pleasure in the faintest flicker of surprise at one of the aliases he had learned.  

And then Mycroft paused. He brought his cool, storm-gray eyes to meet the dark eyes sat across from him as the room had gone unnaturally still.  

Not silent.  

Still.

Then Mycroft spoke the final name.

"...James Moriarty."

“Are you sure about this, Greg?”

“I am.”

A promise of sorts was broken.  

Which now meant another promise of sorts had to be kept, and someone was about to learn that.

He walked into the dark room and sat.

“I needed a reason.” Greg sighed, “And now you’ve given me one.”

He looked into familiar seafoam eyes; the dark hair, too long to curl, fell in waves across the cheekbones.

Only these eyes held a madness, not held in the other gaze he knew well.

“You would not dare!”

“Wouldn’t I?” Greg just looked at her. “When I last saw you, I said all you had to do was be a good girl and shut the fuck up, but no. You had to be a Scorpion, break out,  cause all manner of trouble, and escape England. It’s been, what, nine days? There are at least thirty deaths -that we know of- as you threatened what’s mine and picked the wrong person to manipulate, namely me…” he casually spread his hands, indicating their surroundings, “… so here we are…”

“You’d have my blood on your hands. And what about them‽”

Again, she tried to use her voice, but whatever gift from the Universe that made Greg immune to the Iceman’s glare also works against her.

Greg smiled at his wedding band and shrugged.

“What about them? You left me no choice.” Greg gave a dark smile, “And I told you: they'll understand. Christmas dinner will be somewhat uncomfortable – especially for you, but they will understand.”

“My brother will hate you for the rest of your life! Do you want that?”

Greg could not help the little snigger that escaped as he reached out behind him and a tablet was handed to him by a seemingly disembodied hand. A tablet that had been livestreaming the entire time.

Greg turned it to face her as he spoke. “Will you, my love?”

“No, little sister, I will not. And neither will Sherlock.” Mycroft’s voice and face appeared on the screen. “You, on the other hand, we will abhor you and what you tried to do to us again, for the remainder of yours.”

“Oh, and do say hello to James Moriarty when you meet him in Hell, if it exists.” Sherlock, standing beside his brother, added. “And give him our thanks.”

Eurus Holmes’ brow rose at the sight of her brothers’ faces.

“James Moriarty? Your thanks for what?” The first hint of worry flared in her luminous eyes.

“For me, of course.” A tall, striking silver-haired man in an elegant waistcoat suit, sans the jacket, stepped from the shadows. “I admit I was surprised to get the call from Greg. I never thought it would happen, but I would never reject such a gift, even with the caveat.”

“On the day of your Christmas present, little sister, I was informed that James made a comment on those who appreciate a certain culinary indulgence.” Mycroft explained, “Granted, I also was quite surprised Greg personally knew such a person; then again, we all have strange bedfellows in our lives, no? But you won’t have to worry about that… for long.”

Understanding the reference, Eurus’ usually stoic face finally went momentarily expressive with disbelief that morphed into worry.

Greg looked at his watch, then stood, turning the tablet towards himself. “I’m leaving now. I should be at the airport in an hour.”

“Understood.” Mycroft nodded and signed out.  

Greg took a deep breath and faced the other man in the room.

“I’ll ask again, Greg. Are you sure about this?” The man asked. “It’s hardly merciful. There’s no coming back from it.”

“I understand.” Greg shrugged. “One part at a time… She brought it on herself.”

“I’ll let you know when...what remains...returns to London and can be picked up.” The man clasped Greg on the shoulder. “Do remind me not to ever get on your bad side.”

“That would be appreciated, both meanings, thank you.”

Greg looked over his shoulder at Eurus one last time. “I understand; you don’t know which one is pain, but you do understand death.”

Her screams followed them as they left until she realized that they wouldn’t work.

Greg knew he should feel, well… something about being here.

About leaving her here.

Especially with him.

He did not. 

“Bon Appétit, Hannibal.”

“Oh, it will be, Lestrade.” Lecter smiled.

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