#roleplayifconvenient

He steeled himself for a moment before speaking, willing himself into stillness as his heart rattled in his chest.

“Two,-” he started, only to have his voice crack with the effort of damming the emotion behind it. Sherlock cleared his throat and started again. “Two weeks ago, I was successfully set up by James ‘Jim’ Moriarty, and was arrested in possession of £750,000 of laundered funds and an equivalent armament of paramilitary weapons due for sale to a terrorist cell.”

He stopped, swallowing and clearing his throat. “And yes, I understand how bad it looks.”

He couldn’t meet Lestrade’s eye.

---

“James Moriarty,” Greg repeated. “Insisting on blaming it all on an imaginary man, Mister Holmes? Moriarty never existed, don’t try to fool us again, we won’t fall for it a second time. Let’s try this again. What were you doing two weeks ago that led up to this ?” 

---

Sherlock’s shoulders fell as his heart sunk into his stomach. That hurt. That even Lestrade, who knew him through everything… Nevertheless; he carried on.

“Will you at least call me Sherlock, Lestrade? You’ve never called me Mister Holmes.” He doubted a personal appeal would help, but it couldn’t get much worse.

“I blame him because he is real, and because he is behind all this. The… money was to make a papertrail to me, the contracts for the criminals, the arms deal; If I was a criminal, if I was the genius criminal mastermind they all say I am, why on earth would I do all these things in the open; leaving such clear trails of evidence. Either I’m incredibly smart and also incredibly stupid, or I’m innocent.” He sighed a little, finally working up the courage to look directly at Lestrade.

“And I am innocent of this, Lestrade. Do you-…” his voice choked up again as he saw the remnants of wounds on Lestrade’s skin; evidence of the torture Sherlock was now being charged with. “Can you honestly believe that I would pay someone to… to hurt you like that. To hurt John.”

---

“Yeah, you know what, I think you would. Don’t try to make me pity you, Sherlock- er, Mister Holmes, you faked your own death. Any idea what it’s done to John? To me?” Greg calmed himself, remebering this wasn’t the place to bring up such things.

“Alright, so Moriarty made you do this? Any chance of bringing him in?” Greg asked, folding his arms (well arm, his left still wasn’t what it used to be and moving it was a challenge) across his chest, knowing the answer. 

---

Sherlock’s face scrunched up for a moment, trying to barracade himself against the force of the other’s words. He deigned not to answer the first question; it was likely rhetorical anyway.

“Yes. He had two people I care about very much kidnapped, and informed me that if I didn’t participate as he requested, they would be killed.” He paused, frowning at the last question.

“You know I can’t bring him in. He planned this for three years; there is literally no chance he didn’t have an exit plan.”

---

Greg glanced over the papers again, then closed the file folder.

“This isn’t helping you at all. Either you find Moriarty and prove he’s real or I think I’m finished here, Mister Holmes,” Greg said, standing. Greg reached for the folder, but his left arm still wasn’t in full use and cringed, partly because he really was in pain, but partly because he wanted Sherlock to know the full effect of that he had done. Using his other arm he picked up the folder. “If found guilty, you’ll be having multiple life sentences. Goodbye, Mister Holmes.” 

---

“Lestrade-!” Sherlock cried out, in an attempt to get him to stay. “Please…”

He paused a moment, trying frantically to think of something, /anything/ to convince the other.

“Lestrade, please. I… Look, John met him. He knows he’s real. My brother, though he probably won’t be able to say as much on record and most of that’s covered by the NSA. Lestrade, I would not do this! What on earth did I have to gain by hiring someone to hurt people I care about to force myself to commit crimes for my own gain? It makes no sense, you have to see that!”

---

Greg turned to face Sherlock again, but didn’t sit down, just hovered over his chair. “No, it doesn’t make sense, but then again, Sher- Mister Holmes, you’ve never made sense.” Greg wanted to turn around and leave again, but something stopped him. Maybe it was the way Sherlock looked- broken. Greg kept telling himself it was all an act, he was looking so sad and lost to get off easy.

“Let’s try this again,” Greg said, still refusing to sit again, he didn’t feel he’d be there long. 

---

Sherlock heaved a sigh of relief when Lestrade stopped; at least it was something to go by.

“Lestrade, it… It won’t make sense without backstory. And I can’t tell you the backstory because it’s all under the NSA. My lawyer said he’s going to try to find a way to make it make sense without perjuring myself when it comes to court. Look, can I… Lestrade, I need you to understand. Can we go off-record just for five minutes. Please.”

---

“Or maybe there’s no backstory because there isn’t a backstory.” Greg was about ready to leave again, but he locked eyes with Sherlock, by mistake.

The look he gave him- helpless, simply helpless. Greg put his head down, sighing. “Fine. For five minutes only, understand? Five minutes.”

---

Sherlock nodded, enthusiasm overtaking anxiety for the moment. He gave himself a moment to align his thoughts, then launched into his explanation.

“Three years ago Moriarty challenged me. The cases, the crown jewels, the prison break, all of it; it was a game and I had my hand forced to play. The… The night before the Richard Brook story broke, when you came to arrest me. After John and I ran, we found the story about to be run; we found the journalist, Kitty Riley. Moriarty was staying at her house, and she believed him to be Richard Brook. He ran. The next day Jim and I arranged to meet on the roof of St Bartholomews. We met, words were exchanged. He explained that this was the end-game, and that the point of all of it was to burn me; to destroy my name. He intended to have me kill myself in disgrace. To cause this, he had certain… contingencies in place. Hired killers placed strategically, so that if I refused to kill myself as he wished, other people, people who mattered, would die in my place. I saw a way out; if he was alive I would be able to get him to call them off; I was led to believe he killed himself in front of me to stop this from happening, which I know now was obviously faked. I then faked my own death, destroying my name but maintaining my life and the lives of those at risk.” He stopped for a moment, letting it sink in.

“I spent the last three years destroying what I could of Moriarty’s network, his web. I returned to England two weeks before all this started, just before the eggs were delivered. I had been led to believe that Sebastian Moran was here, and he was, but I was unaware that Jim had been alive all this time.” Another pause. “Because Jim knew me to be alive, the contract on the people’s lives, the ones I thought I’d saved, was still active. My return to England set it in motion without my knowing.” Sherlock sat back in his chair, finding such a release of information held under for so long emotionally exhausting. “The rest is on record. You know what happened after that.”

---

Greg stood there for a moment, taking in everything. It made sense, well it didn’t exactly, but Sherlock was making it make sense. It seemed to fit, seemed to work together with what had happened.

“How do I know you’re not lying to me, Sherlock?” Greg asked. 

---

His shoulders sunk again slightly. “Because it’s true?”

“Look, if I did all the things I apparently did, if I was capable of everything Moriarty ever did as well as my own work, don’t you think I would have been a little more difficult to catch? Everything is perfect, Lestrade. Paper trails, signed contracts, more witnesses than would ever be required. Even if you think I’m the coldest, cruellest person in the world, even if you genuinely, completely believe it, you know I’m smarter than that. If I had done this, and wanted to get away with it, I would have. And I have nothing to gain from being in prison. My… My name is ruined. I have had absolutely no visitors since I was arrested, even Mycroft thinks I’m guilty.”

“I did it all to keep you safe, Lestrade. You and John. If there was another option I would have taken it in a second, but there wasn’t.”

---

“What if- what if you’re just completely insane? Psychotic…schizophrenic…multiple personality disorder…what if you wanted to get caught?” Greg asked, now pacing.

“I want to believe you, Sherlock, I do… but it just,” Greg stopped talking, looking down. 

---

Sherlock shook his head. “You can have me see as many psychiatrists as you like. Personality disorders, yes. But I’m not insane.”

“Lestrade, I know how this looks. I do. But this is me. You know me. I stepped off a building to save the lives of the people I loved, and you have no idea how hard it is to have them turn away from me now.”

---

Greg was about to speak, then paused. Greg leaned against the table and reached across to Sherlock, despite the pain his right arm was giving him to place a hand on Sherlock.

“I won’t turn away from you, sunshine.” 

---

Sherlock’s face crumpled with relief. The hand on him felt strange until he realised; he’d not had this - this contact without the immediate threat of violence - since he’d ‘died’.

“Thankyou, Lestrade.” He leaned forward a little on the table, pausing, then continuing with a weary sigh. “Now all I have to do is convince everyone else.”

---

“It won’t be easy,” Greg said. “Listen…if there’s anything I can do to help…that’s legal, just tell me alright?” 

---

Sherlock nodded slightly. “You know, of all the ways I imagined coming home, this,” he paused, bringing up his wrists to display the handcuffs, “was not one of them. Not exactly the homecoming I’d dreamt of.” He stopped for a moment, thinking.

“I’m not sure that I did the right thing in coming back. If I’d stayed dead, this… None of this would have happened.”

---

Greg slowly nodded. “It’s true, none of this would have happened. what I want to know is why then? Why did you want to come back? At least why did you come back as you? No disguises or anything fancy.” 

---

Sherlock laughed, sheepishly and sadly at the same time. “I had no idea Moriarty was still alive. I came back expecting Moran, but that was all; I thought, I could deal with Sebastian and then things would… go back to normal, I suppose. I didn’t even think that Jim’s suicide was as false as my own, not for a minute. I was right there, I didn’t even question…” He sighed, looking down at the table. “He was right. I was too proud. I was so sure I could win, that I could keep my life and everyone elses’. I thought I had won but… He was just playing a longer game. Now I just have to hope for two things; one, that I don’t actually get sentenced to several life sentences, and two, that the utter destruction that has ruined my name is enough to satisfy him.”

---