for Mycroft

[highfunctioning]

John still refused to talk about Sherlock's "death," and while it was touching that he was so bereaved, Sherlock needed to process. He'd spent some time in the Moriarty wing of his mind palace, which hadn't been as helpful as he would have liked. In fact, it left him feeling rather dreadful. Which led him to his next course of action; seeking out Mycroft.

He'd never questioned the fact that he and his brother had been taken from the same day on Earth, even after learning about the shifted timelines of others. Mycroft was inscrutable like that, and had basically looked as he presently did since the mid 1990s.

Sherlock found him on the observation deck, as he knew he would; umbrella in hand, he might have been idling on a Brighton pier.

"Whatever it is you've done, you might as well tell me now and save us both some time."

Comments

[the_iceman]

It was a habit. He didn't often on this ship, but sometimes, he sported an umbrella. Pointless, but as traditions went, reason was not an issue.

Now, when Sherlock approached him so violently, one might think that he was referring to his incident (any of the incidents) with Stuart Dakin. Perhaps he could have meant the vampire incident, or the one with large green man. But this was Sherlock and he wouldn't be interest in knowing the details of any of that. There was only person that would cause such a reaction from his brother and only one incident that he could think of. So yes, Mycroft knew exactly what Sherlock was talking about.

"I have no idea."

[highfunctioning]

Sherlock narrowly avoided a sneer, as the appearance of attitude would surely only make Mycroft even less tractable.

"You do. It's the only explanation."

John was visibly angry when Mycroft's name came up, but refused to tell Sherlock why, which obviously meant it had something to do with "the fall." If Mycroft was from a similarly ignorant point in time to Sherlock's, John's reaction would have been totally different. Mycroft knew. Sherlock knew he knew. In all likelihood, Mycroft knew Sherlock knew he knew.

The dissembling was incredibly annoying.

[the_iceman]

"I know what John has told me," Mycroft retorted dryly. "But his judgment is obviously compromised. He thinks he saw you die."

[highfunctioning]

Mycroft was every inch his cool, dispassionate self, but Sherlock wasn't convinced.

"No." He crossed the room in two long strides so that he could better watch his brother's face. This was, no matter the manners involved, an interrogation.

"John's information might be wrong, but his judgment rarely is." The fact that he's acting as though you're dead as well tells me he's judged your actions to be quite unforgivable.

"His assertion that I jumped off of a building is ridiculous, though clearly I took great pains to make him believe it. You have no trouble discussing that, a situation where John's misinformation has led him to an incorrect conclusion, but you're obfuscating in order to avoid sharing what John thinks your part was in all of this, which if it was equally unfounded you would have used to further discredit his opinion; so in fact you know his information to be correct."

"So let's start with what John told you, and I'll be the judge of what's useful." His tight smile was pure sarcasm, meant to show how utterly serious he was about having that information.

[the_iceman]

Sherlock was right, of course, but interrogation was never his strong point. Or perhaps Mycroft was too used to this sort of thing.

"I - like you - have not lived these events yet. I - like you - do not hasten to draw conclusions based on what someone tells me. If you want to know what John has said, ask John, and draw your own conclusions, if you wish."

The fact of the matter was that - as he didn't believe Sherlock would ever commit suicide - John had not seen the whole truth. He saw some of it and drew his conclusions. Mycroft would not make the same mistake.

[highfunctioning]

One of these days Sherlock really would make good on the promise he'd made at Boxing Day brunch 1986 and feed Mycroft his own tie.

"The only thing John will tell me is that it's all due to a master plan of Moriarty's. That he somehow publicly discredited me and exposed me as a fraud."

The regurgitation of what little John had told him wasn't for its own sake; he watched for Mycroft's reaction through that passive mask.

[the_iceman]

Mycroft had no intention of discrediting himself based on the words of an angered army doctor.

"John also said that you jumped off a building to your death. I think there's not a doubt in either our minds that that is a lie. He might think that's what he saw, but it's a fabrication, a show you have put up to suit your purposes," Mycroft drawled. "As long as I do not know the extent of this lie, the implications of it and reasons behind it, I will not blindly follow the accusations of a man who has only seen the front of the lie."

"I'm not playing guessing games with unreliable witness accounts."

[highfunctioning]

Unless Mycroft stopped talking in circles, he was going to find himself a very sorry gentleman indeed.

"Keeping me in the dark isn't going to improve the situation, Mycroft. You are at liberty to hide your head in the sand as long as you like -in fact, I might prefer you that way, but first you're going to tell me that I want to know."

[the_iceman]

Mycroft gave Sherlock a hard look. "He's under the impression that I spoke to Moriarty. That I gave him information. About you."

[highfunctioning]

He's under the impression-

Mycroft was speaking hypothetically, but Sherlock had already established that John had the right about his behaviour. It was more surprising than painful to find out that his brother had given aid to his deadliest enemy. Sherlock thought it best to keep the conversation hypothetical, to allow Mycroft to avoid any possible display of feelings; emotional honesty was not in their shared vocabulary.

"And why are you supposed to have done that?"

[the_iceman]

"From the way he looked at me, I gather he thinks I enjoy the man's company over tea," Mycfort replied, but as Sherlock's look didn't falter, he opted for a more serious answer. "Information. An eye for an eye."

[highfunctioning]

Mycroft didn't know much about Sherlock that he wouldn't have freely admitted himself; the drug use, the scrapes and childhood run-ins with the law, it was all rather boring by his definition. He was much more interested in the other eye, to use Mycroft's metaphor.

"And what information were you hoping to barter out of dear Jim?" Though it was hardly a worthwhile inquiry; of course Mycroft would have been asking about Moriarty's criminal activities. The idea was to keep his brother talking in the hopes he inadvertently said something of interest.

[the_iceman]

"Don't play obtuse, Sherlock. It never suited you," Mycroft retorted dryly, quite done with this conversation.

[highfunctioning]

Fair enough. Sherlock had almost forgotten who he was talking to.

"Get anything good?" Because obviously Mycroft had 'lived these events,' whatever he might say.

[the_iceman]

Mycroft hadn't quite lied, but had so far only spoken from John's perspective, leaving it unspoken that he had in fact spoken to Moriarty.

It had been the only way to getting Moriarty to talk. An eye for an eye: criminal information against harmless gossip on his brother. Even then he had a inkling that he was walking into a trap, but that hadn't stopped him. And now there was a John telling him of the consequences of his actions. Still, he wasn't blindly going to believe these consequences coming from the mouth of someone who believed he saw Sherlock die.

"No."

[highfunctioning]

"Not surprising." James Moriarty was a very smart monster, and only so interested in Mycroft. Sherlock was his end game in this case; his brother was little more than a overdressed pawn.

"I'dve done the same, most likely." He saw what might have been a micro expression of relief flash across Mycroft's features.

"But we both know how likely that situation is to arise." As dangerous as Moriarty was, Sherlock took a certain amount of satisfaction at being interesting enough to have an arch nemesis.

[the_iceman]

Whatever Sherlock thought he saw, there was no such thing. Relief - small though it might be - would only come from knowing that he had not helped the criminal mastermind plan his brother's demise. If he could not establish that, than there would be no relief.

"Have you got the answers you came here for?" He dead-panned. He was through with this conversation and he was through pretending he didn't mind having it.

[highfunctioning]

"More or less." Being from the least advanced point in time was making him very irritable about the whole thing. Sherlock was accustomed to having the most information by default, and hounding John and Mycroft for answers that he would in other circumstances already have was tedious and just a little unflattering to his ego.

Mycroft's attention was ostensibly back on the window, and Sherlock took his leave without so much as a goodbye.