The Mad House

The Parisian Prophet

Victor's studio was everything John might have expected from a Parisian, or rather one who was a little bit down on his luck that is. It wasn't extraordinary, which evidently came as some disappointment to Sherlock, for he made a little noise of disapproval as he stood before the address that had been listed on the website. It was a small little shop, the width only proving to be a couple meters wider than the front door. It wasn't in the most glamorous part of town, either. In fact the cabbie seemed properly surprised to hear of such an address. It wasn't far from the hotel, and yet John was just now feeling the after effects of his alcohol binge and he wasn't much in the mood for walking. Ten blocks seemed to be a hundred miles on legs that felt like lead, and so he was much more content with sitting in the back of a cab with Sherlock at his side, rather than lumbering around a foreign city with black spots in his eyes. Sherlock had been nervous the whole ride, John noticed the whole time the boy was twirling that ring around his finger. Perhaps it was an absent minded habit, or perhaps he was instead pondering Victor, and had gone straight to the ring for comfort. John knew that this moment may very well be the last opportunity he had, the last time he could possibly say anything to make Sherlock stay with him. And yet last night's affairs had been quite enough for them both, and he knew better than to do anything but sit. So here they stood, staring up at this building with flower boxes in the window and a hand painted sign on the door.
"Trevor's Gallery." John read quietly.
"So he really is an artist then." Sherlock said impressively, looking a bit more eager to go inside.
"What, did you think that whole website was fake?" John laughed, although it was rather hard to force a smile onto his face at the moment. It was hard to show any joy at all, for it would seem as though Sherlock didn't understand that this was goodbye.
"Well there was no actual art on it. I don't know, thought perhaps he could be a catfish." Sherlock shrugged.
"Ya, a catfish who had stolen the name we just happened to be looking for, with the intentions of roping us into Paris." John chuckled. Oh if only.
"Evidently not." Sherlock mumbled, walking up the three stairs to the door and trying the knob. It was open, and so he started his way into the little shop, setting off a little bell on the door. John followed, becoming so distracted with looking inside that he almost ran right into Sherlock, who had stopped abruptly in the doorway for whatever reason.
"Sherlock, move, will you?" John grumbled.
"It's me." Sherlock muttered in the smallest of all voices. John blinked, looking towards his companion with a very confused expression.
"I'm sorry?" he clarified.
"It's me. That painting there, don't you see it?" Sherlock asked quietly, instinctively grabbing at John's hand which was hanging at his side. John blinked, his entire body coming afire with that merest touch of intimacy. And yet he could feel Sherlock's fingers clenching around his own, he could feel the fear that was manifesting within this poor boy. John followed his gaze, and his blood ran cold. He followed Sherlock's eyes and was confronted with another pair, another pair of unmistakable eyes, those beautiful blue and greens, staring back at him from the canvas on the wall. It was a beautiful painting, with Sherlock's eyes staring from behind what looked like a bare shoulder, his curls disrupted across his forehead and his gaze gripping with seductiveness. His mouth was opened partially, yet only his top lip was visible from where he was covered by the other man. It was the most intense paintings John had ever seen, for that expression was even more scandalous than the one in the photograph. Sherlock's face in the photograph had been seductive yet inviting, it had been something of weakness, and submissiveness. The gaze in this painting, on the other hand, depicted him as some sort of beast. Someone who treats their lovers like a plaything, yet who could summon anyone to their bed if they wished to. It wasn't necessarily a loving picture, more of a threatening picture, intended to bring about the weakness in all men who saw it. There might have been blood splattered across that painting, that face, and it wouldn't have looked any different. John shivered, knowing that it wasn't a mere coincidence that Sherlock was depicted in that painting. He knew that this was the man they had been looking for, the man they had come all the way from England to find. It was only after he broke away from that painting's gaze that he realized the room was covered in paintings that were very similar, dark paintings, heavy on the black and the red, depicting all sorts of things that Victor couldn't have painted unless he had been to the house before. There was a dining room table, silhouetted under a gigantic chandelier that was perfectly identical to the one hanging in the dining room. Three shadows sat in the seats, and yet the entire painting was dedicated not to the men, but instead to the dining room itself. All the large windows, the mural on the ceiling, he had it down to every exact detail! John couldn't have described it better, not even if he was standing inside! John broke his hand away from Sherlock's, not because he didn't want him closer, but instead because he wanted to investigate. Suddenly he began to see Sherlock's eyes from all around the room, and his own as well. John saw himself, just as he might have in a mirror, in paintings that were equally obscene. Some depicted the scene the two of them had just witnessed the night before, Sherlock lying on the bed with John laying on top of him. It was a fantastic painting; with Sherlock's limbs strewn and his face staring up, directly into the viewer's eyes as if he was looking at a camera. John wasn't entirely visible, only his back (which was depicted as much more muscular as he ever was), and his legs, for his head was buried in Sherlock's neck.
"How could he know all of this?" Sherlock asked apprehensively. John turned to him to find that he was staring at a painting, one that was only too familiar; it was a painting which depicted the billiard room, with the figures strewn on the table just as John had seen in his vision.
"I don't know. Perhaps...perhaps the house had been talking to him as well." John predicted quietly, for of course that would be the only explanation. He turned back to the paintings, spying a particularly unnerving one near the back corner. It depicted himself; the blonde hair was obvious, lying in a bathtub. He was fully dressed, owing to the shoes and trousers that stuck out the other side, and yet there was blood. His arm was dangling, bleeding into a great pool on the floor, and his head was tilted away so that he was virtually unrecognizable to anyone who didn't know him. And yet...John looked down to his own arms, frantically rolling up his sleeve to reveal a long, white scar running the width of his forearm. His blood ran cold, and suddenly he felt unable to do anything but stare. Well certainly that didn't have anything to do with it, these peculiar birthmarks he had grown up with? No, certainly this painting wasn't revealing anything that he hadn't known before, any sort of...suicide?
"Messieurs, bienvenue à..." the voice trailed off, that unfamiliar voice. Yet so familiar all the same, a voice that sounded startlingly like the little voice in the back of his head, yet louder, and more confident. Sherlock and John turned instinctively, and on seeing Victor Trevor for the first time in the lifetime, well John had to admit that his heart dropped. No, not because the man wasn't meeting his expectations, instead because there was nothing about this man which might prove to be subpar. There was nothing about this man that would be considered anything less than perfect. He was beautiful, even John could admit that, and if through all of his intense biased hatred he could see the beauty, well of course Victor must have been positively blinding for Sherlock. Victor stood tall, perhaps even an inch taller than even Sherlock. He was sculpted exactly like the Greeks might depict their most beautiful God, with smooth skin, intense blue eyes, and a thin yet muscular body hidden underneath a thin striped shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and trousers held up with thick yellow suspenders. His hair was a deep chocolate brown, swooped over his forehead in a messy wave, perhaps it was once arranged neatly yet he may have slept on it wrong, and it was letting loose hairs fall into his face in a very irritatingly beautiful display. John felt as though he had nothing else to do but stare, yet evidently it wasn't going to be considered rude, as no one else could say a word either. For a long while Victor stared at Sherlock, his face paling as if he saw a ghost. And Sherlock, poor Sherlock, he looked as though he might collapse from his own good fortune.
"I knew you would come, eventually." Victor said finally, in a surprisingly deep voice that sounded so powerful yet so gentle, all at the same time. He had switched to English, yet there was a heavy accent that made him almost difficult to understand. All the same, it was very suggestive that he should know they spoke not a word of French. As if he knew immediately their origin and their purpose as well.
"You know us then?" John asked, stupidly. Victor blinked, looking towards John as his face fell into a startling look of empathy. Almost as if he pitied John, seeing him now. Almost as if he knew exactly the struggles he was facing, even without having said a word.
"Well no, not your names. But yes, I know...I know a version of you, perhaps." Victor offered, his voice trembling as he clung to his counter, obviously equally as startled. John lost interest in the paintings, no matter how fantastic they might be. The artist himself was much more interesting at the moment.
"From another century." Sherlock breathed, taking a step forward towards the counter, yet obviously unable to go much farther without invitation.
"How much do you know?" Victor whispered, looking from one man to the other, as if wondering if someone was playing a joke on him.
"Why don't you answer that question first, starting instead with how do you know?" John started, stepping forward and stepping protectively towards Sherlock, as if to make sure he didn't do anything stupid in the duration of his terrible shock.
"Dreams." Victor said quietly.
"Of a house?" Sherlock clarified. Victor's eyes snapped back to Sherlock's, and even from this proximity John could feel him shiver.
"Yes." Victor said again, fragmenting his sentences in his own shock. John couldn't tell if he was prepared for this moment or not. The way he greeted them made John assume that he had at least suspected he may not be the only one who had come to life again, yet the weakened, shocked state he was degraded to now said otherwise. He looked, well frankly he looked afraid.
"And this art, this is what, just depictions of your dreams?" John presumed. Victor nodded, leaning heavily on the counter as if he felt as though he wasn't allowed any closer. It was a small room, yet there was plenty of open space as all of the paintings were hung on the walls, or on easels. However even with all of this empty space, John still felt trapped, he still felt incredibly confined. Victor's gaze alone was enough to put a man in chains, not to mention all of these obscene paintings surrounding them, paintings depicting each and every man in this room in their most vulnerable state.
"I paint what I see. I thought myself a prophet." Victor admitted quietly. "I suppose I was wrong."
"We have the dreams too." Sherlock offered quickly. "The house, it supplies us with the dreams. It lets us see what we did before."
"You've been to the house?" Victor asked, sounding startled yet terribly excited.
"Yes, we're both at a college right next to it." John agreed.
"A twelve minute drive." Sherlock added quietly, still seeming unable to form a complete sentence, or at least an intelligent one. Obviously Victor's eyes were just as distracting as John assumed they would be.
"I didn't think it was real." Victor admitted quietly. "I thought it was just a metaphor, I thought that I had made you two up in my head I thought this was all..."
"You thought wrong." John interrupted, before he could get any more poetic.
"What would that metaphor be?" Sherlock wondered quietly, his eyes sparkling as if he was becoming so unimaginably entranced.
"What's your name?" Victor wondered, suddenly regaining some of his confidence as he took a step behind the counter, ignoring Sherlock's question completely yet moving slowly and snakelike over to where the boy stood. Evidently his proximity had erased all questions from Sherlock's mind, and in fact all answers as well. He seemed unable to open his mouth, unable to answer even the most simplest of questions. John felt his own face heat up in humiliation, for even though this was his worst nightmare he had to at least take into consideration Sherlock's happiness. He had to at least give the boy a chance, for they both knew now that it could never work out between them. It may be better to allow Sherlock to move on, rather to allow him to sit and pine over what he could never have lest he lead a man to infidelity. And so John elbowed him, sharply in the ribs so that he could be awoken from whatever trance he had been caught in. It was only after Victor stopped, just some feet away from Sherlock, that the boy came to life just in time to cough out his answer.
"Sherlock Holmes." He stammered. Victor's eyes gleamed, looking comfortable again as he seemed to be playing again to his own strengths. He seemed most confident when he was driving someone else to almost hysterics, due only to his own power of seduction.
"Sherlock, a name that fits the imagination." Victor murmured, extending his hand out in offering, to which Sherlock could only stare. It took him a very uncomfortable ten seconds to do anything, yet finally he raised his hand into Victor's. The artist curled his fingers around Sherlock's and brought his hand to his lips, kissing it for a long moment in welcome. Sherlock trembled, visibly and horribly shuttered from head to toe, and John could do almost nothing but let out a quiet sigh in frustration. He didn't know how to take anything, he didn't know if this was good or bad, he didn't know if he wanted to punch Victor or kiss him, he didn't know if he wanted to punch Sherlock or kiss him...God no wonder they were all stuck in a continuous loop. All of these tensions between them, well they weren't something that just faded away, were they? They weren't so easily killed, not if there was a higher power that found them entertaining.
"And I'm John Watson." John offered in, just as Victor had dropped Sherlock's hand safely back by his side.
"John, yes I know you as well." Victor agreed.
"And you don't have to kiss my hand." John assured, already noticing how Victor was raising his hand in welcome. The man's face split into an amused smile, looking upon John as if he had already met and surpassed all of his expectations.
"I quite agree." Victor muttered, staring at John with a welcoming yet strangely challenging grin. Surely he knew as much as they both did, perhaps even more. It would seem as though everything depicted in these paintings was slightly familiar, whether it be the people depicted or rather the setting which it all took place. It was undeniably the three of them, merely painted in different situations, yet there was not another face painted at all. Of all the hundreds of pairs of eyes around the room, they were only duplicates of the same three. If an onlooker saw these paintings, well perhaps he wouldn't even think them extraordinary. He wouldn't think them historically accurate; in fact he wouldn't even consider the faces which were depicted. Perhaps he would take Victor as a sex crazed lunatic and move on. And yet they all seemed to have some sort of underlying power, underneath them all was the knowledge; underneath them all was the history that all three men in this room shared. All three together...never before had John felt so complete.
"Gentlemen, let my test me knowledge once and for all. Come back around here, and I will show you the house as I see it. It is the last of my collection, thus far. It seems as though even where my story ends, another begins." Victor said with a little chuckle.
"Your story?" John clarified, staring at the man a little curiously as he turned on his heel and headed through the empty gallery towards a small door behind the counter.
"Well yes, it's all been presented to me in a story, chronologically at least." Victor admitted quietly.
"You know the end result?" Sherlock clarified with a gasp.
"You don't?" Victor asked with something of a chuckle. "Is it not your own lifetime?"
"We've not seen as much as you have, evidently. Perhaps the house was making up for your absence with more images." John offered, perhaps a little bit more hostile than he had anticipated.
"Well I cannot be blamed for that." Victor said sharply, throwing open the door with something of a sneer. Inside was a little studio, tiny in comparison to the rest of the gallery (which was really saying something), in fact it looked something more of a coat closet than anything. Yet it wasn't the size of the room that first caught John's attention, it was instead the painting that stood on the easel, still half finished, yet with a pencil sketch that was exactly identical to the house john had stared up at many times before. It was identical in every way, except for the small fact that...
"It's on fire." Sherlock commented, walking up to the half-finished painting, displaying half pencil outline and half shades of black and orange and yellow. The flames jumped from every window, and smoldered from the walls and trees outside. In fact the painting was so accurate that John couldn't help but shutter, for the idea of his own house being torn by flames, demolished into such a state of ruin, it stopped his heart completely. He mourned for the house, all the while knowing that it was still in perfect shape where he had left it. If these flames were recent, he knew that they would feel something. With all of that house's power, it would not go down without a fight.
"Well yes." Victor agreed. "Is it not just charcoal now?"
"No, it's untouched." John assured quietly.
"That's...odd." Victor admitted quietly. "If you two are alive, and if everything else I've seen was proven true..."
"Well maybe you're not a prophet after all." John snarled.
"Watch your tongue, Mr. Watson. For I'm sure I could tell you a great deal about yourself that even you don't know." Victor challenged.
"You know the ending, Victor? The house catches fire and what happens to us? How did we die, why are we here?" Sherlock asked excitedly, taking a step forward towards the artist, however Victor stepped away. He leaned against the wall, rooting around in his pants pocket and unearthing a carton of cigarettes.
"If the house hasn't shown you yet, I imagine it's none of my business." Victor decided with a shrug. For a moment he busied himself with his cigarettes, lighting one and taking a deep puff of breath. He exhaled the smoke from his lips, letting it trail into a great big puff. All the while he kept his eyes on Sherlock, with that infuriatingly romantic gaze that evidently made the boy melt like butter.
"You both wear rings." Victor observed finally, kicking one of his feet up on the wall and leaning like some sort of beautiful male model.
"This is yours!" Sherlock exclaimed immediately, crying out in such an embarrassing, desperate way that John nearly told him to shut up. Yet he knew that would only escalate things, he knew that it would just make him sound jealous.
"I know." Victor teased quietly. "I just wanted to make sure you did."
"You seem to know a lot about us." John challenged finally, feeling the need to change the topic away from romance as quickly as possible. He knew that Sherlock's innocence was on a thin line now; he could only suspect that after a couple more glances from Victor his virginity would be something of the past. It was infuriating, almost degrading even, to be helpless against any of this. To not even be counted as competition.
"I know a lot about how you used to be, at least. If that really was the past, and not some..."
"No, it was the past. It was, all of the stuff in the house is ancient, with evidence of all of us three." Sherlock offered in immediately. "We're reincarnated."
"We don't know that." John corrected immediately.
"We can suspect as much." Sherlock muttered. John sighed heavily, looking again to the painting of the house and shaking his head quietly. He didn't like the look of it; he didn't like how imminent those flames felt. How hot and familiar they were upon his skin. He couldn't help remembering the death certificates, how they had all died on the same day...
"I've heard stranger things." Victor decided finally, taking another deep puff of his cigarette. "Oh, my apologies messieurs, I hadn't even offered you one." he waved the carton of cigarettes towards them both, yet tucked them disappointedly back into his pocket.
"Thought as much." Victor admitted quietly. "Englishmen are too distinguished to smoke any longer."
"Were you not once an Englishman?" John challenged.
"Born and raised here in France, I'm afraid. And yet your accent betrays you as well, Mr. Watson." Victor pointed out, casting his eyes upon John with that suspicious look. As if he was already calculating how he could use John's nationality against him.
"American." John agreed.
"Ah, all the way from across the pond." Victor scoffed. John felt the need to argue back, he felt the need to do anything except stand there like a mute idiot. And yet he couldn't think of anything, not just the words to defend his country, but to defend himself as well. To defend his love, even as he felt it slipping from his very fingers! Never before had John felt so helpless, never before had he felt so unimportant before in his whole life. Even among the most impressive lot on the earth, the most astonishing three miracles of science, well of course he was going to prove to be the odd one out. Of course he was somehow going to remain average, even if he was supposed to be extraordinary in the eyes of the common man.