Adult-FanFiction.org : Television / Streaming

Guilty Pleasures	By : CodyMThomas Category: S through Z > Sherlock (BBC) > Sherlock (BBC) Views: 8168 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters or content associated with BBC Sherlock, I am merely playing with them for my own amusement and make no money from this fic

Chapter List
- 1-Guilty Pleasures
- 2-2
- 3-3
- 4-4
- 5-5
- 6-6
- 7-7
- 8-8
- 9-9
- 10-10
- 11-11
- 12-Chapter 12
- 13-13
- 11
- 12
- 13
A/N: I LIIIIIIIIIVE! And so does this story, at least a bit. Sorry for the crazy delay but this story got not just stuck, but super glue stuck. We aren't fully out of the woods yet, but I have hope.
Also, when I mention football, please note I mean what the rest of the world calls football, and what we Americans call soccer. Reply to comments at the end.

Chapter 12

Sherlock threw the teacup against the wall, barely paying attention as it shattered against it with a high-pitched crash and the tea started creeping down the wallpaper. There was a momentary reminder that he still needed to do that experiment on all the different types of tea stains, before it was brushed aside as he stalked around the flat like an enraged and caged animal. Mycroft still had his phone off. Forty-seven calls, sixty-seven texts, not a single response. Mycroft had taken John, HIS JOHN, twenty-nine and a half hours ago and Sherlock had been stupid, so stupid and had allowed it, thinking Mycroft had meant to take him to Essex.
'Damage Control' he'd said, and Sherlock had remembered too late the one time that had included another person, a young woman named Shelly when he'd been in Uni, she'd been his supplier, and had been slightly less tedious than the rest of the droning chattel there so he didn't object to her giving him a discount if he let her stay so they could get high together.
She gave him bad stuff once, he'd been so sick from that hit, discovered later he nearly died, but while he was still half conscious, three 'police officers' came in and caught hold of her, because she was about to make a run for it. They had made it sound very official, but at the same time they had also given her a large shot of the same drugs he'd just taken, much larger than the one he himself had done, and she was much smaller than him. They dragged her out as if arresting her, and she never returned. Her belongings disappeared from her dorm the next day and her files held a very abrupt resignation from the program, citing family emergency as the only explanation. Shelly had told him she had been a ward of the state since she was five. There was no mention of her death, but Sherlock knew that she was dead, there was no antidote to combat the effects of what they had taken, and if a regular dose had nearly killed him...
When he had questioned Mycroft his only response had been "Merely a bit of house keeping little brother, you know how I dislike you leaving your broken toys and experiments scattered about. Consider this damage control, before you go hurting yourself even more."
He had forgotten, in fact erased the memory until the moment the task force had entered to take John, and that's when he knew Mycroft had death on his mind. 'Only one place to take their wounded', he remembered too late. Their family's home had served as a fort and an army hospital during both world wars, and during World War Two the wounded had resided in the chapel, which also housed the family crypt.
He had fought them, the ones determined to rip John away from him forever, their hands and faces covered, uniforms pristine, two with guns ready, the rest to obtain their target, and he was fighting so hard one of them had actually let his hand off the gun, come over, and knocked him out with a rag of chloroform and a shot of something very fast acting, most likely a large dose of antihistamine judging by the effects. Nothing long lasting or damaging to his system, meaning they weren't allowed to hurt him, so definitely Mycroft. John was long gone by the time he woke up, they had left through the back door, but knew him far too well, the alley all the way down to the street on both sides had been scrubbed, in fact it was nearly immaculately clean. No witnesses or tire tracks, no evidence of which direction they went, though seven men, six heavily armed, and possibly one other driver and a secondary guard, indicated a van or a large commercial vehicle, most likely with no rear windows. It would have been unmarked and inconspicuous.
Sherlock couldn't remember a time he had been more furious or had felt so utterly helpless. Part of him wanted to phone Lestrade, no matter how big of a blow to his ego it would have been, but the rest of him knew it would be pointless, and not because half of Scotland Yard were incompetent morons, though they were of course, it was simply the fact that it was Mycroft. Sherlock could have gone to Scotland Yard with videotape showing his brother abducting and murdering a man, presented the gun with his fingerprints in the victim's blood, found his DNA at the scene of the crime, and presented a signed confession and there still "wouldn't have been any evidence to support your wild claim against your brother". Mycroft had connections, hell he could probably blackmail the entire world into handing him the reins and letting him rule them all if he got it into his head to be an overlord instead of a manipulating bastard pulling all the strings from the background and pretending like he was no one special. You could assassinate the entire Royal family, The Prime Minister, all of Parliament and the House of Lords, and not even a day later all of Britain would still be ticking away like clockwork as if nothing had happened. Contrariwise, If someone ever got it into their heads to shoot a minor clerk in the British Government, Great Britain and half of the world would fall into utter chaos in less than twelve hours. Unless of course Mycroft had some sort of failsafe in place, and knowing Mycroft, he most likely did.
He had called the house in Essex and neither his eldest brother nor mother had any idea where Mycroft was. Sherlock was furious and terrified, and a full search of the city and his brothers usual haunts had revealed nothing. Then again Mycroft wasn't tied to the city nearly as much as Sherlock himself, Britain, yes, London no, chances were good that he was still somewhere in the territories because he disliked getting his hands dirty, but that was no indication that John was anywhere even remotely nearby him, and most likely nowhere near London anymore. This entire situation was unacceptably infuriating.
His phone rang and he dove for it, barely registering that the number was blocked before answering in the middle of the second ring. "This is low even for you, and it's none of your damned business anyway, now give him BACK! If you have harmed one hair on John's head I will dismember you personally Mycroft!"
"I told him it would be a bad idea to keep you on communications blackout, but Mycroft always seems to think he knows better, even when he doesn't."
Sherlock belatedly realized he had sank down to his knees in relief. John was alright, he was alive, he could keep breathing because John was still alive. "John..." it sounded far more choked up and scared than he would have liked, but gods he couldn't even begin to describe how scared he'd been.
"Yeah Sherlock, it's me. I wanted to let you know I was alright, especially after all of the dramatics. Are you alright? Did they hurt you?”
“No, Mycroft would skin them alive if they hurt me, I'm actually surprised one of them knocked me out. You knicked his phone? I'm impressed. Where are you?”
“No I have barely even seen him since yesterday. He still has my mobile, so I'm using the car phone right now, though he's probably tracking that too, knowing Mycroft. I'm in Essex, spent a whole day patching up a member of his personal army, just had dinner, and now I'm going somewhere to crash into unconsciousness for at least the next ten hours, and I will personally shoot anyone in the head who tries to wake me before then. He wants me to accompany him around for a bit doing god only knows what, but I think somehow my working at the clinic has mortally offended him and he has made it his new personal mission to keep me up to my elbows in viscera until I'm terminated. Doubt it will take him long with how often I call off anyway. Will you be terribly cross with me if I just give in and resign so it's at least on my own terms and make this entire display of his pointless? How are you doing? How's the case? Any leads yet? And please tell me you have at least attempted to eat something today."
The case? Did John really think that he had given one single glance at the case when John had been missing and possibly dead at the hands of his own brother? He had been all over London searching for any possible lead about JOHN, not the mass murderer. And of course he hadn't eaten, he'd felt nauseous since he had woken up and John was gone. He had tried to make tea earlier so he could focus, but it had been wrong, all wrong because John hadn't been the one to make it, and then of course the cold tea had ended up tinting the wall. He'd have to replace the cup before John got back.
"I miss you, nothing new yet. I want to tell you that if you give in I will never forgive you, and to make the bastard work for it, but pointless works too. So go ahead, make him look like an idiot of you want to. And I promise I will eat later. I-I'm glad you're alright John."
"I'm fine Love, though one or both of us owes your brother a punch in the face for busting into the flat and pointing guns at us, so don't be too cross with me if I get to him first if the opportunity presents itself alright? I miss you too, and my old surgery partner wants to meet you, he's somehow gotten the misguided notion into his head that I am a loose and wild living man and therefore believes you must be something quite extraordinary, which you are of course, if you've managed to tame me and keep me monogamous."
"Tame you? Perish the thought, I would never even dream of it, you are at your best the way you are. I'd describe it more like having found a kindred spirit who keeps you so well satisfied that you aren't even tempted to look elsewhere. John, you could punch Mycroft a hundred times and I'd still encourage you to keep going."
John laughed and the rest of Sherlock's anxiety dissipated. There was no inflection of speech tone to indicate that John was hiding anything or being coerced in any fashion, and John was not a brilliant liar.
"Get back to work Love, and remember that eating and sleeping are necessary if inconvenient requirements for that 'transport' of yours which I am so inordinately fond of to work properly. I'll see if I can get Mycroft to surrender my mobile tomorrow so you can keep me updated on the case alright?"
"Alright. Goodnight John."
"Goodnight Sherlock, pleasant dreams."
Sherlock sat on the floor for several minutes after John had hung up, just breathing deeply, making sure the world had righted itself and was once more going in the proper direction. His phone chimed with a text a moment later, it was Lestrade informing him that the toxicology reports on the first two victims, both males, were done as well as the autopsies, and he had emailed him the file, photos, and catalog of evidence so far, as well as everything they had on all the victims so far.
Things finally clicked back into their proper order. John was alive and fine, Mycroft would soon be punched, and the game was definitely on. Very well then. He placed a quick delivery order for copious amounts of Chinese food which would provide him with leftovers for days. He was determined to eat every last bite of it if it would appease John. He owed him that much for what he'd put him through. He left the money with Mrs. Hudson, and asked her to bring it up when it arrived, then dumped the pot of cold tea that he couldn't bring himself to drink, and instead set about making coffee. He knew sleep would be a long way off if he did manage it tonight, but he had ignored his body for over 24 hours and it was beginning to show, so he prepared a small IV bag of his thinking solution of a range of B's, D, K, and E vitamins, added some Zinc, Calcium, Potassium, Magnesium, a little Iron, beta carotene, lutein, and some taurine, which he attached to a saline drip, then attached the IV lines to his inner bicep where it would mostly be out of the way and set the drip on low then popped a few ginkgo biloba, St. John's wort, echinacea, spirulina, chlorella, and fish oil capsules. There, now John couldn't say he wasn't taking care of himself. He set up the portable IV pole and got to work.
When he pulled up the report, they of course confirmed his assessment. Insulin, steroids, PCP, and THC were present in both victims and were the determined cause of death, both had been ruled as homicide. A small, shallow, crescent-shaped mark on the second victim, on the inner hip near the pubis caught his attention. It was from a fingernail.
He digitally circled the area and sent the picture back, telling them to check the area for DNA and fingerprints, and also to dust around the upper arms, throat, and hips. Also the fact that threads of silk fiber had been found on both of the victims clothes or hair was another fascinating clue, since there hadn't been any silk in the vicinity, so for it to be on both men was definitely significant, even if he didn't know what it meant yet. He also requested a rape kit be performed on both men and requested the same for all remaining victims as well, and asked if they could make the exams on victims number 6, 7, 9, 12, 18, and 22 their top priority. Something was off about all of the people in that room, and especially those six but he couldn't tell what just yet.
He took the photos of the scanned ID's and matched them with their crime scene photos and victim numbers, though only four victims had any background information so far, none of them the ones who had caught his attention, then collected the six people who were standing out to him.
Nathan Cornwall age 24 from Carlisle

Anthony Jones age 26 from Lancaster

Timothy MacDonald age 27 from Dublin

Johnathan Mitchell age 35 from Manchester

Margaret Wileston age 34 from Cambridge

Amanda Addlesby age 20 from Kensington
The presence of five of those people in that room had honestly surprised him. Unless there had been several more accomplices than two, which would hint far further towards organized crime than a psychopath killer. But the organized crime type of killer wouldn't have made it so easy to find and identify the bodies or left all of the victims valuables alone when they could be so easily kept or sold for profit, or done the whatever it was that was still off, there was a piece either missing or added to this puzzle and whatever it was, it was important, and something a hired hit or criminal lackey would never do. If their killer was smaller, overweight, and physically weaker like he suspected, it would have been very difficult for him to intimidate one, let alone all five of them at one time without any restraint, guns or not.
Anthony Jones was obviously a body builder and very physical athlete, most likely rugby, possibly wrestling, too bulked for football, and he'd need more data before he could determine if he was just a vain showman who was compensating or if he actually had a spine to go along with those muscles. The lack of a fake or excessive tan or any signs of enhancers was promising. And even if he wasn't in the same league as the others he would have made a competent beta or gamma enforcer in this particular situation.
Nathan Cornwall and Timothy MacDonald had been in the military, both active duty on leave. Timothy was most likely Army or Marines if he had to guess, due to the presence of gun callouses. Nathan however was a Royal Marine Commando according to the dagger tattoo on his right bicep, having recently come back from a third tour in the middle east, the dates of the first two having been thoughtfully tattooed below the dagger.
Johnathan Mitchell was a fireman judging by the varying ages, shapes, and sizes of the burn scars he'd observed on arms and neck, and Margaret Wileston he was sure had been an active duty armed police officer. He knew that type, John was that type, especially in an emergency. These people were the very definition of 'take charge', the alpha protectors, the heroes or group leaders, the ones the others would have immediately looked up to in a crisis, the ones who kept their heads in bad situations, the ones who don't care if they got hurt if they were protecting others.
So collected in a group like that for several days in a bad situation with other people, especially women to protect, and given drugs that would have helped subdue the rational brain even more, allowing their base instincts to take over, they should have banded together and caused a great deal of trouble for their kidnappers as the days went on and the suffering increased. They could have possibly even overpowered their kidnappers without any trouble if there were five of them and only three gunmen. Yet they had been found scattered in different parts of the room without a defensive mark on them. It didn't make any sense!
It was basic animal instinct to seek out the strongest ones for protection, and it was something the primal brain was acutely tuned for even without conscious thought. Anyone could stand in a small crowd of people and with just a casual glance pick out the strongest and the weakest ones in the group, the longer you remained the better the distinctions would become until there was a distinct pecking order, no matter how loosely formed. Four people in that room had been trained to be the very protectors everyone else would have been looking for, and yet none of them had been spotted or began to form a group of their own? Why? They were already used to dangerous, life threatening situations. They would have been able to recognize that same spark in each other in seconds, and yet DAYS had gone by without them banding together? What was missing? It had to be something small but important.
The other person that had caught his attention, Amanda Addlesby, was the one that had also caught Lestrade's. Not only had a twenty year old girl gone missing from Kensington without someone coming down to the Yard with a camera crew screaming bloody murder about it and waving hundreds of thousands of pounds as an incentive for her immediate safe return, but she was also younger than all of the others by at least four years, and was one of the most mutilated. That reeked of being singled out, of it being far more personal with her than any of the others. He needed to know more about her immediately, why was she the one that had caught the killer's interest or ire, who was she or did she remind him of? She may have been the intended target all along, after all the best place to hide a single body is in with a group of other bodies who were all killed in the exact same way.
The takeout arrived and he distractedly grabbed a box and some chopsticks, not caring what it was and began eating out of the carton, completely missing Mrs. Hudson's terrified look at the portable IV. He poured himself another cup of coffee and lay on the sofa to think. How could the killers have immobilized the key four without any retaliation, defensive marks, or signs of restraint? What could they have done to take all of them down at once without a fight? No evidence of explosives or excessive torture, nothing indicating anything besides acute forced starvation through drugs and the symptoms thereof. What was he missing?
He threw open the doors of his mind palace and set his focus on every form of restraint and coercion he knew, searching for anything that could subdue those four beyond retaliation even though it ensured the deaths of not only themselves but all the other people they would have felt a need to protect.
The coffee was cold and the chow mein was starting to dry out when he returned, no closer to an answer that would satisfy him. The IV was long since done and he carefully removed the line and placed a plaster over the entry point. It was dawn, probably about five or six in the morning. At a dead end for the moment he put the Chinese away and decided to go to bed and keep his promise to John to get some sleep. He went to shut his laptop and stopped dead.
Nathan Cornwall's crime scene pictures were up and the added puzzle piece finally clicked. A twenty-four year old military man obviously just back on leave, having been on three tours in the middle east, was wearing a polo with the Oxford University logo on it.
Only twenty-four, been in the military long enough to not only be a fully trained commando but also deployed as such to the middle east three times, the first time three years ago for a full six months, then again a year after that for nine months, and this current tour had still been ongoing before his untimely end. Yet he'd found the time and had also had the money to go to Oxford, whose lowest degree of study was a bachelor's degree which some people could complete in 3-4 years if you went for the right course of study, were there full time and worked yourself to near exhaustion? Most people on average needed about 5-6 years for their bachelors degrees just because they needed all of their classes to line up right in their schedules. Even if he'd graduated early at sixteen, that would have still put him at twenty-one at the time of graduation, and he was about to be on his second tour by then, not finishing his education and joining up.
And why would someone who'd had the brains and ability to put themselves through Oxford immediately turn around and risk their necks on the front lines of a war instead of putting their hard won education to any kind of good use? It made absolutely no sense. Not to mention, this was a man enjoying his military life to the point he not only pushed himself to join the Commandos, but also tattooed his deployments into his skin for posterity. This man would have stayed in the military until it killed him, he was invalided, or he'd climbed as high as he could up the officer's ladder and stayed there until he died. The man had never set foot in Oxford in his life. Welbeck or Commando Training Centre Royal Marines, he would absolutely believe, but definitely NOT Oxford.
Therefore that wasn't his polo, and those weren't his clothes. Taking a look at all the other victims it began making sense. The fit was wrong, the styles, the fabrics, the wear, everything. Not a single one of them was wearing their own clothes he realized, and the conflicting pieces came together. They were all 'costumes' in a sense, each highly identifiable if you knew what to look for. A mother, a father, five 'relatives', three professors, six students, four professionals, possibly co-workers, four managers or bosses, and finally the girl.
The murderer was re-enacting something, like a macabre and demented play that slotted his victims into the roles of either people who had tormented him in the past, people he had already killed and wanted to kill again, or possibly even both. He dialed Lestrade, grabbed his coat and laptop and rushed out the door. It was a mistake to have gone along with Lestrade's request of not doing more than finding an exact cause of death the first time, he would have caught that the first time if they had given him longer at the scene and then Anderson had distracted him completely. The autopsies and toxicology reports would take too long, he needed to see all the bodies and the exact layout of the crime scene again.

A/N: I had an Anon review last time that said the chapter was rushed and sloppy, and they would rather I take my time, and that they were willing to wait a month for a good post instead of a weekend for a bad one. It also included a thinly veiled threat of "I'll keep reading, but don't disappoint me", which I find highly amusing all on its own since I have never written with the audience in mind, nor do I ever intend to.
The funny thing is these chapters up until now were finished last year, I've just been polishing them up from their original rough draft state off of the kink meme. And I don't care HOW short of a time it might be between updates, I NEVER rush. That chapter DID take me a month to write, it's the most heavily researched chapter yet, which is why it was so much longer and more detailed. Amused writer is amused.
I also had one from someone only going by M and the grammar and sentence structure was so bad I had to read through it 5 times before I even caught half a clue of what they were trying to say to me, but even though they made it pretty clear they won't be continuing with this story, and are probably just a troll (Their wanton butchering of the English language certainly suggests so) I felt the need to reply anyway.
Dear M, Sorry you don't like the fact that John said 'gods' instead of 'God'. And it has nothing to do with me being narcissistic and trying to insert myself into my character, or stand out as being non-christian/pagan/'look at me I'm a special snowflake!'. I intentionally use it so that I'm not singling out a particular deity of anyone's faith in order to be respectful, and it's less harsh of an expression. Not to mention a lot of people are polytheistic, not just pagans, do your research. So I'm sorry that's what you are using as a basis to leave over, my suggestion is don't make assumptions about the author's intentions, and don't assume you know someone based on one word you read out of context in a work of fanfiction, it's an insult to your intelligence, not mine.
Too all anon reviewers, I don't mind if you want to stay anonymous for whatever reason, if I did I wouldn't accept anon reviews. But if you are going to harshly criticize, then at least be willing to admit it so you don't look like a troll. Own your words! Be proud of your opinions, and don't be afraid to stand up and be counted apart from the mass of anons.
If you don't like my story I won't force you to read it, beg you to stay, or change it to suit your tastes. It's MINE and I am going to write it however I choose. There's a million other fics out there for you to read, you can find one you like better and good reading to you. That is all. See you soon!
- 11
- 12
- 13
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Guilty Pleasures