Ingenium (✓) | Sherlock Holmes

🎓 14*anchor

A dozen brawny, bull-looking men were sprinting towards us, each one holding a Glock in his right hand. The air was thick with perspiration, a stale atmosphere setting itself in between the five buildings. The tight, raven black T-shirts of our soon-to-be attackers molded on their pectorals and biceps, indicating their much fitter state.

We could not defeat them using force, of that I was beyond certain. What I actually doubted was finding a way to outsmart them. Even though Rhea was close to compiling a magnetic field, we still had to knock them down. John and I were bruised, our wounds still able to open up at any time. The possibility of our reflexes diminishing increased with every passing second, the lack of food and water – mostly just water – occupying a valid spot in our failure.

My throat was so dry that I would have even accepted a glass of piss to revive my insides. John, being incarcerated for a much longer time, needed prompt medical care, one that could not be provided just yet. His left leg was limping, a visible dagger cut sliding across his thigh. Despite his improvisation – buckling his belt around the wound – blood was still flowing, quite recklessly if I may add.

If Rhea failed to create a magnetic field that would plaster the men to the metallic wall, we were not only screwed, but very much sentenced to torture. Moriarty was not the type of villain to settle for less than a lobotomy.

He was renowned for gathering the most experienced torturers across the world, and signing deals with officials in order to maintain a low profile without questions being asked.

The only long-lasting method of sweeping him off the surface of the Earth was killing him. Prison was just a mouse trap for him, one from which he could escape without much effort.

I sort of envied him for that – performing immoral acts without his conscience pestering him to repent. In my case, although the talkative voice inside my head was as rational as any other scientist's, it still clung onto a code of honour. I had a few slip-ups – one of which being my collaboration with Moriarty on the Fibonacci wires – but my subconscious was mostly alert and ready to decline vicious thoughts.

Well... apart from one. The feeling of a needle being pressed against the prominent veins, the cold metal sensation mixing with the warm surface of the skin between my arm and forearm, pupils dilating as the opioids enter my blood flow. Euphoria soon settles in, clearing my swirl of thoughts, allowing me to enter my mind palace and solve riddles from my cases. Disembodied from the crude reality of self-sufficient peers and judgmental opinions, I would find myself liberated, a firm barrier being propped up between my world and theirs.

When the effect of opioids cancels itself, I would feel lost and estranged, as if cold water were poured from my head to the tip of my toe. And then I would crave more. Much more. With every hour passing from my last dose, I would sense a cringe-worthy taste in my mouth, an urge so demanding that I succumb to it, my body a slave to a substance whose name I have replayed in my mind over and over again. Cocaine. My analytical structure would prove its presence by pointing out the exact amount I use every time. Seven-percent solution, injected with a syringe I keep in a Morocco leather case.

Of course, Moriarty required a more frequent use, yet I hardly needled myself ever since I met Rhea. It was as if she kept me in control, despite being unaware of my habit. It was as if a simple conversation with her would halt the bitter taste, the yearning and the drug-directed thoughts.

And right then, when I was supposed to find a way to stop Moriarty's acolytes, I remembered the syringe was not in my possession. How could I not anticipate it? I needed the C to solve the problem. I needed it so bloody urgently. John soon noticed that my body started shivering, my palms turning into fists as I grinded my teeth.