The Devil Within

Part Three

Sunlight blinded him and mocked him. The fresh air threatened to suffocate him. The world increased its rotation, turning every colour into a murky blur. Everything was more, so much more, too much more. Sherlock felt as if it could kill him. 

He almost wished it would kill him. 

Sherlock wasn't truly the type to cry...but he also hadn't been the sort who made friends. He'd connected with John far faster than anyone else on the planet, and that connection had been split even faster. 

Just as he'd never been as pleased as he was when he was with John, Sherlock had never felt a grief quite like this. A consulting detective did not often mourn over the corpses they examined - empathy was simply not necessary for his line of work. But this wasn't a corpse. This wasn't a case. 

This was John Hamish Watson, his best friend. More than that. It couldn't be defined within the parameters of a few simple words, if it could be described at all. Now the friendship - the everything -  had been yanked away. 

In these moments, Sherlock wanted to manipulate death. He'd been through flashes of the emotion before in his life, but never like this. This was a constant nagging feeling that wormed a tunnel into his mind. It lodged itself into his mind, the greatest parasite any human had ever encountered. No amount of prying could ever loosen it, or so it seemed. 

And all of it was because of Moriarty. Sometimes other people had gotten involved, but none of them had captured John Watson right after Mary's death. None of them had taken the ex-soldier hostage and then ended up murdering him. And none of them had laughed at all the pain Sherlock had experienced. 

No one was to blame, except for Moriarty. 

He was a criminal seeking to be king of all. This included reign over death. But Sherlock wouldn't stand for this - he would usurp the crown and avenge the death of his John Watson. It wasn't just fighting against Moriarty, it was fighting for the fallen soldier. 

But how could he possibly go affter Moriarty while being filled to the brim with emotions? People always barked at him for eliminating emotion from his life, but this was the reason why he'd sought to clear his mind of these traits. Now he'd let too many cracks appear within him and couldn't patch them before drowning within his thoughts. 

Italy was no longer his safe haven, and he wanted to run. All Sherlock knew was that he wanted to go home - he just wasn't so sure where home was. 

"Sherlock? Oh dear, I'm afraid I've rendered you completely speechless. All I can hear is your heavy breathing." 

Sherlock nearly dropped his phone, almost having forgotten he'd been clasping to it in the first place. Moriarty still spoke to him, even at this point. Now Moriarty knew he was victorious - he played his most surefire strategy, completely toppling everything on Sherlock's side. 

"Too shy to speak. Strange, you couldn't be quite for even a moment just a few minutes ago. Oh, Sherlock, I could never imagine what you might mean." 

"I will kill you," Sherlock said, his voice quivering with pure fury. "I am coming back to London, and I will kill you." 

"Then maybe I'll just have to upgrade my security. That won't be too difficult. Just a little bothersome. No matter, I'll work it out." 

"Security won't keep you safe," Sherlock replied. "I'll end you. You cannot live after what you've done." 

"You can't kill me if you can't find me - and I assure you, my people will be meeting you far before you can manage to cause any damage." 

Sherlock wished he could pull a response out of nowhere as he usually did, smirking with his superior knowledge displayed for all. But he'd already realised how few ways there were to win - after all, he'd already managed to lose it all in a single blow, just one misstep.