Rolling in the Deep (15/?)
Rolling in the Deep
Title: Rolling in the DeepSeries: Still Waters (Run Deep) (Part III of IV)
Author:
melody_in_time
Rating: NC-17
Spoilers: Through S1 only
Disclaimer: I wish they were mine, but they aren't. Nor am I creative enough to have written the song that gave this instalment its title. That belongs to Adele, and whomever else had IP rights along side her.
Author's Notes:
Hello all. Still no update on when there will be betaed chapters, but as with the previous update I'm going to post the un-betaed version and once theartofprose has some time we can fix it and provide the betaed version for you.
Thanks to everyone who has kept reading despite that massive delay in updating. Believe it or not, story wise we're still on the same day as the previous three chapters.... Hard to accept given it's taken well over two months for us to traverse the same time period. Thanks for sticking around and hopefully things can be more speedily updated.
Warnings: very slight early onset depression?
If you've wondered here by mistake, you may wish to start at Part I of the series, Rarest of the Rare: Chapter 1.
Chapter 10 - Chapter 11 - Chapter 12 - Chapter 13 - Chapter 14 - Chapter 15 - Chapter 16 - Chapter 17 - Chapter 18 - Chapter 19 - Chapter 20
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For the second time that day Greg found himself sneaking quietly into his own house. Even just that thought, that realisation, drove home to him how exhausting a day it had been, and he had to take a second to lean against the door and breathe.
He was drained. The emotional roller coaster: the case, Mummy, the fight, Sherlock, God, Sherlock… Greg had never expected a pleasant backstory to the Holmes family, but by now they were so far past the benign neglect he’d theorised on years ago it wasn’t even funny. Having the family pet shot in front of your son… Jesus…
Every time he heard more his view of the wider Holmes family got progressively worse. Mummy had gone from being a flighty Omega to controlling step-mother to bitch from hell. Siger, well, he’d already been pegged as an abusive bastard. Now Greg didn’t doubt he’d be getting a report about vandals, or a very short and determined vandal, breaking into a cemetery and desecrating a very particular grave.
If Sherlock was ever dumb enough to tell John where it was, that is. He might not even know. It was the kind of thing Greg would have happily deleted if he’d been Sherlock.
The depth of the potential was what scared Greg the most. There was nothing in what Sherlock had said that outright would be abuse against either Holmes child (though he’d certainly have made a go of it with social services if it had been one of his cases), but an Alpha who would do that… Mummy, who even now sliced Mycroft to ribbons with just a few well-placed words… The potential carried its own pain.
Never ever would Mummy have anything to do with Ben. He would never go to visit, never go to parties, never meet her because she was poison and she would not have the chance to harm him. Ben would be theirs and be happy and if he needed a shrink when he grew up it would not be because his parents had abused and abandoned him his whole life, emotionally or otherwise.
John clearly still saw Siger as the greater evil, the revenant hovering over his son’s lives. He hadn’t met Her, hadn’t been in the same room as Her and felt her toxicity soak ever outwards, infecting everything as it went. Greg had and he was no longer sure it was a Spector causing the troubles at the feast. Not a dead one, anyway.
Ben would have a good life, Greg vowed. He’d take a stand, make them talk and Ben would have the childhood neither of his parents had had. He had no illusions it would be easy, but even if it meant a few fights now it would be better than later when Ben would remember them. Soon, they’d do it soon, and Mummy was only one of the topics they had to cover.
Greg exhaled in a heavy, elongated sigh. Apparently he was still upset. Under all the emotional havoc, he was still smarting at the rejection. Not Mycroft’s Sub, he repeated in his mind, not his Sub. He’d allowed himself to forget again. With the way Mycroft was being so attentive it was hard to remember that from his end all he was offering was friendship and sexual fidelity, and even that was based more off convenience and a lack of desire to look elsewhere than anything softer.
He’d have to go back to reminding himself. Mycroft cared, but not like him. More than he’d let Mummy know, Greg hoped anyway, but nowhere near as much as Greg himself.
Friendship and sex and a life and a son.
Greg pushed off the door and started wearily up the stairs. He’d have to reiterate to Mycroft that he understood the terms and that wasn’t where his issues lay.
Running a hand through his hair, Greg indulged in another long sigh and scrubbed at his scalp. He’d check on Ben first, then bed.
The door to the nursery was open, the pale glow of the bedside, or rather cot-side, lamp just visible as a long golden sliver on the floor. Mycroft must still be up with Ben despite the time.
Well-oiled hinges swung open without a creak at Greg’s touch. The side lamp was indeed still on, as was the CD player, its electronic screen showing the number of tracks on the CD, waiting for someone to press play again. Ben was with Mycroft, both of them sound asleep in the ancient rocking chair.
It was an unbelievable scene for anyone only acquainted with the Mycroft Holmes the rest of the world knew. Asleep his face had relaxed, most of the tension sliding off though he still carried stress in the faint lines around his mouth and eyes. The light highlighted the auburn glow in Mycroft’s hair and the warmth in his otherwise severe charcoal waistcoat and trousers. His jacket was hung neatly over the back of the chair, exchanged for the blue blanket that he’d wrapped around Ben, who lay nestled in his arm, tucked up against his chest.
Greg smiled and turned off the CD player.
“All right little man,” he whispered, easing Ben from Mycroft’s grip. “Let’s get you tucked into bed, shall we?”
Extracting Ben without waking him was a challenge, one that required frequent pauses as Ben’s sweet little face screwed up in a not so sweet scowl, but eventually Greg managed to work him free without waking either of them.
“Okay, beddy-byes time.” Greg cuddled Ben close and surreptitiously checked his nappy to make sure it didn’t require changing before he put him down.
It was dry, so with one last kiss to the dark wispy strands Greg lowered him into the crib and pulled the cover up. Then he turned his attention to the other Holmes.
Mycroft looked adorable, asleep in the rocking chair and still clutching Ben’s rabbit tight. He had in fact rearranged the animal slightly in his sleep, cradling it the way he’d held Ben. More than adorable, he looked soft and approachable, open, loving, and Greg had to force himself to repeat the words he’d drilled into his head downstairs. Not his Sub, not his Sub.
Unable to resist the impulse he snapped a photo with his beyond ancient phone and ignored the lump in his throat.
He could just leave Mycroft there, cover him up with a blanket and let him wake on his own, but Greg drove a desk as well and he knew that angle was murder on the neck when you woke, no matter how comfortable you were when you fell asleep.
“My,” he whispered, crouching in front of him. “Wake up, My.”
Mycroft grumbled sleepily and clutched the stuffed rabbit closer, settling back to sleep with a sigh.
“Hey now, none of that.” Greg scolded, fighting to keep a light tone. “Come on, that’s Ben’s.”
Had Mycroft ever had a stuffed toy as a child? The Alpha heir presumptive, was that something he’d been allowed or a crutch and sign of weakness taken away too soon? More mysteries, and all of them made Greg’s chest hurt.
“You’ll thank me in the morning.” He started tentatively rubbing Mycroft’s knee, trying to bring him to wakefulness.
Mycroft so usually came awake all at once it was always a treat to see him doe eyed and struggling back to awareness. This was the third time Greg had seen him like this. It made him feel special, and that was dangerous.
“ ’egory?” Mycroft mumbled, eyes mere slivers “Came b’ck.”
“Course I came back.” Greg stood and held out a hand to help My up, trying to ignore the way his heart ached at the simple statement.
“Mmm.” Mycroft hummed, accepting the help and shuffling forward to lay his head on Greg’s shoulder. “Home.”
“Yeah,” Greg agreed, letting an arm slip around My’s waist, “I’m home. Just needed some space to let the anger burn off, that’s all. Didn’t want to scare Ben.”
Mycroft nodded into his shoulder, and Greg guiltily let his eyes fall closed as he enjoyed the embrace. God at times Mycroft made it so easy to forget.
“There’s nothing wrong with him.” Mycroft said suddenly into the silence. “You know that right? No matter what she says, there’s nothing wrong with him.”
The hand that wasn’t holding the velveteen bunny fisted instantly in Greg’s shirt front, desperate to prove to Greg that their son wasn’t some kind of half-breed freak. As if Greg needed any convincing. It helped though, the earnest look in Mycroft’s eyes as he pulled back far enough to see Greg, the urgent tone in his voice. It was a weight off Greg’s shoulders he hadn’t known he’d been carrying and he drew Mycroft forward again, kissing his temple.
“I know.” He whispered into the dark strands. “He’s perfect.”
He nuzzled Mycroft’s hair and took a step back, loosening his grip.
“He’s also asleep. Come on, before we wake him and he refuses to go back down.” Greg couldn’t resist one last look into the cot as he passed to turn off the light, Ben still sleeping peacefully. “Nighty night Benny boy.”
“You’re upset.” Mycroft said quietly, toes digging into the carpet where he stood.
Greg managed not to snort and repeated his mantra in his head just to make sure he remembered it as he picked up the monitor. He waved Mycroft out of the room, choosing not to comment that Mycroft hadn’t left the rabbit behind and was now squeezing it in two hands as a substitute umbrella.
“Yeah, I’m upset.” He agreed once they were in the hallway. “I’m angry: angry at you, angry at your harpy step-mum, at your Sire. Just because I’m too exhausted to feel it doesn’t mean I’m not still pissed off.”
“Mummy…” Mycroft hesitate, choosing the right words. “…is very strongly opinionated. She will-”
“Don’t say change her mind.” Greg warned. “A bit of advice for the future: do not defend her to me, and she will never change her mind. Not unless she gets a better deal out of it.”
“You don’t know-”
“I know people like her.” Greg shook his head. “She will only ‘change her mind’ about me if it’s to her advantage.”
Mycroft’s lips pursed, but he didn’t dispute it.
“Come on,” Greg held out a hand to Mycroft. “We need to talk, but I’ve had one hell of an emotional ride today between Mummy and Sherlock, and it can wait until morning. Sherlock’s not the only one pushed too far today, I think.”
Mycroft frowned at him, no less demanding because there were no words.
“We asked what the deal was with Mummy and how that worked, John and I.” Greg pulled his hand back and tucked it in his jeans. “He said a lot more than either of us were expecting, and it wasn’t all necessarily relevant , so I think it was more once he started stopping wasn’t on the cards. Probably needed to get it out or something, but on top of all the fertility issues and Moriarty being back I think it pushed him a bit too far. John too.”
“Moriarty?” Mycroft pulled his lips into a long, thin line.
“Responsible for the body I’ve spent the last week investigating, yeah.” Greg dug his fingers deeper into his pockets. “Apparently.”
He was tired. He didn’t want to have to stand there and discuss Moriarty, not then, not there. He’d have preferred never having to let the psychopath into the life he and Mycroft occupied together at all, but that wouldn’t happen. If Moriarty was back some way or another Mycroft would end up involved.
No, what Greg wanted was bed and sleep, so that he could close his eyes and pretend, if only for a little while, that when he woke up all this would have gone away, a figment of his imagination. Failing that, he’d settle for time to let his head wrap around everything he’d been forced to feel in heady succession, maybe work at how he actually felt about some of it. That was a novel idea.
“Sherlock knows this?” Mycroft’s frown deepened.
Greg snorted. Mycroft tilted his head, acknowledging the superfluous nature of the question.
Absently Mycroft turned the rabbit, long fingers occupying themselves while his genius mind worked. He’d lost the softness he’d worn waking up, and Greg wasn’t actually sure whether he was dealing with Mycroft or the British Government, it could so easily be either.
“Bed.” Mycroft held out a hand.
Greg blinked at him in surprise.
“You said you were tired.” Mycroft reminded him crisply.
The Government then, Greg decided. Mycroft was wondering through his mind working, leaving enough awareness behind to run his body on autopilot. He’d have preferred Mycroft, not his My, by far. The fact that at one mention of Moriarty’s name the Omega had mentally run off left him feeling small and abandoned, probably close to how John had felt through most of the day.
His hurt must have shown quite clearly on his face, because Mycroft’s expression softened, some more of him coming back into the figure in front.
“Come on, Gregory. You were trying to get me there earlier.”
“You were asleep,” Greg pointed out. “Will you be joining me?”
Mycroft hesitated.
“I should start looking into-”
Greg tuned it out. Mycroft was going to go be the Government and work on the Moriarty issue. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Hurt, he thought, but mostly he just felt numb. It wasn’t like it mattered. Greg wasn’t even sure why he was getting worked up about it in his mind, though he was. Mycroft frequently worked later than Greg, it wasn’t new.
“Right, fine.” He said, not caring whether or not Mycroft was still speaking. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“I’ll be in in a couple of hours.” Mycroft grabbed Greg’s hand as he went passed and gently squeezed the weather roughened skin.
Platitudes and reassurances, Greg thought. An old married couple already.
Straight on the heels of that thought came ‘I wonder when one of us is going to start having an affair.’
No, he violently rejected the thought, but it made his tone shaper than it otherwise would have been.
“Do as you want, Mycroft.”
He tugged his hand free with just the smallest amount of effort, Mycroft letting it fall, but then that was the difference between them, wasn’t it? The fundamental fact of their relationship: he chased after Mycroft, Mycroft didn’t chase after him.
He turned and headed into the bedroom, waiting until he was far enough away from Mycroft to mutter “You always do anyway” under his breath.
He fell into bed and lay there, staring at the dark shapes and wondering at what point in the day he’d become so bleak. The conference room, his office, the crime scene, here, Baker Street, here; there were so many contenders. Had he felt this way through all of them, hidden by the more violent emotions, or was it cumulative?
He rolled onto his back with a sigh and tucked a hand under his head, staring up at the ceiling he couldn’t see. Maybe he needed to find someone to talk to about it, a professional. Not the stuff with Mycroft, the feelings of inadequacy and abandonment he’d been having since everyone had run out of the Yard that morning.
Had they been going on longer? He didn’t know.
Wasn’t that a sign of depression or something? Only what was the point when he couldn’t say anything important and anything he did say Mycroft could read at will without even a second thought?
No, that wouldn’t work. John, it was going to have to be John, because humiliating as it was to have his friend look at him and know all the black parts of his soul, at least John already knew the bigger picture and would tell Mycroft to go fuck himself before telling him anything, no matter what Mycroft waved in his face.
It would have to be John. Greg already wanted to apologise for shoving more shit on him, but maybe they could get drunk and he could listen to John for a bit as well. Fair exchange. Help each other.
Decision made, he tried to push the rest of his thoughts away so he could sleep. Some of them went easily - all the good ones. The bad ones - his worry about Sherlock and Moriarty, Sherlock and Mycroft’s past, he and Mycroft and being ‘anoldmarriedcoupleisn’tanaffairnexthealreadyhasagorgeousfuckingsecretaryhe’sfuckedbefore’ - he had to wrestle back into the box.
Sherlock would not go after Moriarty. John would stop him. He wouldn’t upset John.
Sherlock and Mycroft’s past was shit. It was also past. They’d deal with it a bit at a time.
He and Mycroft were not going to make things worse between them. There would be no affairs. Friendship, fidelity, family. That was all, but also all of it and frankly more than he’d had in his last marriage.
He slammed the lid closed and tried to convince himself that he was trying to sleep and that he wasn’t timing Mycroft.
It was more than a couple of hours, but he did come to bed.
In the end.
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Sorry it's a short one. Next one is longer, I promise.
Previous - Next
Title: Rolling in the DeepSeries: Still Waters (Run Deep) (Part III of IV)
Author:
melody_in_time
Rating: NC-17
Spoilers: Through S1 only
Disclaimer: I wish they were mine, but they aren't. Nor am I creative enough to have written the song that gave this instalment its title. That belongs to Adele, and whomever else had IP rights along side her.
Author's Notes:
Hello all. Still no update on when there will be betaed chapters, but as with the previous update I'm going to post the un-betaed version and once theartofprose has some time we can fix it and provide the betaed version for you.
Thanks to everyone who has kept reading despite that massive delay in updating. Believe it or not, story wise we're still on the same day as the previous three chapters.... Hard to accept given it's taken well over two months for us to traverse the same time period. Thanks for sticking around and hopefully things can be more speedily updated.
Warnings: very slight early onset depression?
If you've wondered here by mistake, you may wish to start at Part I of the series, Rarest of the Rare: Chapter 1.
Chapter 10 - Chapter 11 - Chapter 12 - Chapter 13 - Chapter 14 - Chapter 15 - Chapter 16 - Chapter 17 - Chapter 18 - Chapter 19 - Chapter 20
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For the second time that day Greg found himself sneaking quietly into his own house. Even just that thought, that realisation, drove home to him how exhausting a day it had been, and he had to take a second to lean against the door and breathe.
He was drained. The emotional roller coaster: the case, Mummy, the fight, Sherlock, God, Sherlock… Greg had never expected a pleasant backstory to the Holmes family, but by now they were so far past the benign neglect he’d theorised on years ago it wasn’t even funny. Having the family pet shot in front of your son… Jesus…
Every time he heard more his view of the wider Holmes family got progressively worse. Mummy had gone from being a flighty Omega to controlling step-mother to bitch from hell. Siger, well, he’d already been pegged as an abusive bastard. Now Greg didn’t doubt he’d be getting a report about vandals, or a very short and determined vandal, breaking into a cemetery and desecrating a very particular grave.
If Sherlock was ever dumb enough to tell John where it was, that is. He might not even know. It was the kind of thing Greg would have happily deleted if he’d been Sherlock.
The depth of the potential was what scared Greg the most. There was nothing in what Sherlock had said that outright would be abuse against either Holmes child (though he’d certainly have made a go of it with social services if it had been one of his cases), but an Alpha who would do that… Mummy, who even now sliced Mycroft to ribbons with just a few well-placed words… The potential carried its own pain.
Never ever would Mummy have anything to do with Ben. He would never go to visit, never go to parties, never meet her because she was poison and she would not have the chance to harm him. Ben would be theirs and be happy and if he needed a shrink when he grew up it would not be because his parents had abused and abandoned him his whole life, emotionally or otherwise.
John clearly still saw Siger as the greater evil, the revenant hovering over his son’s lives. He hadn’t met Her, hadn’t been in the same room as Her and felt her toxicity soak ever outwards, infecting everything as it went. Greg had and he was no longer sure it was a Spector causing the troubles at the feast. Not a dead one, anyway.
Ben would have a good life, Greg vowed. He’d take a stand, make them talk and Ben would have the childhood neither of his parents had had. He had no illusions it would be easy, but even if it meant a few fights now it would be better than later when Ben would remember them. Soon, they’d do it soon, and Mummy was only one of the topics they had to cover.
Greg exhaled in a heavy, elongated sigh. Apparently he was still upset. Under all the emotional havoc, he was still smarting at the rejection. Not Mycroft’s Sub, he repeated in his mind, not his Sub. He’d allowed himself to forget again. With the way Mycroft was being so attentive it was hard to remember that from his end all he was offering was friendship and sexual fidelity, and even that was based more off convenience and a lack of desire to look elsewhere than anything softer.
He’d have to go back to reminding himself. Mycroft cared, but not like him. More than he’d let Mummy know, Greg hoped anyway, but nowhere near as much as Greg himself.
Friendship and sex and a life and a son.
Greg pushed off the door and started wearily up the stairs. He’d have to reiterate to Mycroft that he understood the terms and that wasn’t where his issues lay.
Running a hand through his hair, Greg indulged in another long sigh and scrubbed at his scalp. He’d check on Ben first, then bed.
The door to the nursery was open, the pale glow of the bedside, or rather cot-side, lamp just visible as a long golden sliver on the floor. Mycroft must still be up with Ben despite the time.
Well-oiled hinges swung open without a creak at Greg’s touch. The side lamp was indeed still on, as was the CD player, its electronic screen showing the number of tracks on the CD, waiting for someone to press play again. Ben was with Mycroft, both of them sound asleep in the ancient rocking chair.
It was an unbelievable scene for anyone only acquainted with the Mycroft Holmes the rest of the world knew. Asleep his face had relaxed, most of the tension sliding off though he still carried stress in the faint lines around his mouth and eyes. The light highlighted the auburn glow in Mycroft’s hair and the warmth in his otherwise severe charcoal waistcoat and trousers. His jacket was hung neatly over the back of the chair, exchanged for the blue blanket that he’d wrapped around Ben, who lay nestled in his arm, tucked up against his chest.
Greg smiled and turned off the CD player.
“All right little man,” he whispered, easing Ben from Mycroft’s grip. “Let’s get you tucked into bed, shall we?”
Extracting Ben without waking him was a challenge, one that required frequent pauses as Ben’s sweet little face screwed up in a not so sweet scowl, but eventually Greg managed to work him free without waking either of them.
“Okay, beddy-byes time.” Greg cuddled Ben close and surreptitiously checked his nappy to make sure it didn’t require changing before he put him down.
It was dry, so with one last kiss to the dark wispy strands Greg lowered him into the crib and pulled the cover up. Then he turned his attention to the other Holmes.
Mycroft looked adorable, asleep in the rocking chair and still clutching Ben’s rabbit tight. He had in fact rearranged the animal slightly in his sleep, cradling it the way he’d held Ben. More than adorable, he looked soft and approachable, open, loving, and Greg had to force himself to repeat the words he’d drilled into his head downstairs. Not his Sub, not his Sub.
Unable to resist the impulse he snapped a photo with his beyond ancient phone and ignored the lump in his throat.
He could just leave Mycroft there, cover him up with a blanket and let him wake on his own, but Greg drove a desk as well and he knew that angle was murder on the neck when you woke, no matter how comfortable you were when you fell asleep.
“My,” he whispered, crouching in front of him. “Wake up, My.”
Mycroft grumbled sleepily and clutched the stuffed rabbit closer, settling back to sleep with a sigh.
“Hey now, none of that.” Greg scolded, fighting to keep a light tone. “Come on, that’s Ben’s.”
Had Mycroft ever had a stuffed toy as a child? The Alpha heir presumptive, was that something he’d been allowed or a crutch and sign of weakness taken away too soon? More mysteries, and all of them made Greg’s chest hurt.
“You’ll thank me in the morning.” He started tentatively rubbing Mycroft’s knee, trying to bring him to wakefulness.
Mycroft so usually came awake all at once it was always a treat to see him doe eyed and struggling back to awareness. This was the third time Greg had seen him like this. It made him feel special, and that was dangerous.
“ ’egory?” Mycroft mumbled, eyes mere slivers “Came b’ck.”
“Course I came back.” Greg stood and held out a hand to help My up, trying to ignore the way his heart ached at the simple statement.
“Mmm.” Mycroft hummed, accepting the help and shuffling forward to lay his head on Greg’s shoulder. “Home.”
“Yeah,” Greg agreed, letting an arm slip around My’s waist, “I’m home. Just needed some space to let the anger burn off, that’s all. Didn’t want to scare Ben.”
Mycroft nodded into his shoulder, and Greg guiltily let his eyes fall closed as he enjoyed the embrace. God at times Mycroft made it so easy to forget.
“There’s nothing wrong with him.” Mycroft said suddenly into the silence. “You know that right? No matter what she says, there’s nothing wrong with him.”
The hand that wasn’t holding the velveteen bunny fisted instantly in Greg’s shirt front, desperate to prove to Greg that their son wasn’t some kind of half-breed freak. As if Greg needed any convincing. It helped though, the earnest look in Mycroft’s eyes as he pulled back far enough to see Greg, the urgent tone in his voice. It was a weight off Greg’s shoulders he hadn’t known he’d been carrying and he drew Mycroft forward again, kissing his temple.
“I know.” He whispered into the dark strands. “He’s perfect.”
He nuzzled Mycroft’s hair and took a step back, loosening his grip.
“He’s also asleep. Come on, before we wake him and he refuses to go back down.” Greg couldn’t resist one last look into the cot as he passed to turn off the light, Ben still sleeping peacefully. “Nighty night Benny boy.”
“You’re upset.” Mycroft said quietly, toes digging into the carpet where he stood.
Greg managed not to snort and repeated his mantra in his head just to make sure he remembered it as he picked up the monitor. He waved Mycroft out of the room, choosing not to comment that Mycroft hadn’t left the rabbit behind and was now squeezing it in two hands as a substitute umbrella.
“Yeah, I’m upset.” He agreed once they were in the hallway. “I’m angry: angry at you, angry at your harpy step-mum, at your Sire. Just because I’m too exhausted to feel it doesn’t mean I’m not still pissed off.”
“Mummy…” Mycroft hesitate, choosing the right words. “…is very strongly opinionated. She will-”
“Don’t say change her mind.” Greg warned. “A bit of advice for the future: do not defend her to me, and she will never change her mind. Not unless she gets a better deal out of it.”
“You don’t know-”
“I know people like her.” Greg shook his head. “She will only ‘change her mind’ about me if it’s to her advantage.”
Mycroft’s lips pursed, but he didn’t dispute it.
“Come on,” Greg held out a hand to Mycroft. “We need to talk, but I’ve had one hell of an emotional ride today between Mummy and Sherlock, and it can wait until morning. Sherlock’s not the only one pushed too far today, I think.”
Mycroft frowned at him, no less demanding because there were no words.
“We asked what the deal was with Mummy and how that worked, John and I.” Greg pulled his hand back and tucked it in his jeans. “He said a lot more than either of us were expecting, and it wasn’t all necessarily relevant , so I think it was more once he started stopping wasn’t on the cards. Probably needed to get it out or something, but on top of all the fertility issues and Moriarty being back I think it pushed him a bit too far. John too.”
“Moriarty?” Mycroft pulled his lips into a long, thin line.
“Responsible for the body I’ve spent the last week investigating, yeah.” Greg dug his fingers deeper into his pockets. “Apparently.”
He was tired. He didn’t want to have to stand there and discuss Moriarty, not then, not there. He’d have preferred never having to let the psychopath into the life he and Mycroft occupied together at all, but that wouldn’t happen. If Moriarty was back some way or another Mycroft would end up involved.
No, what Greg wanted was bed and sleep, so that he could close his eyes and pretend, if only for a little while, that when he woke up all this would have gone away, a figment of his imagination. Failing that, he’d settle for time to let his head wrap around everything he’d been forced to feel in heady succession, maybe work at how he actually felt about some of it. That was a novel idea.
“Sherlock knows this?” Mycroft’s frown deepened.
Greg snorted. Mycroft tilted his head, acknowledging the superfluous nature of the question.
Absently Mycroft turned the rabbit, long fingers occupying themselves while his genius mind worked. He’d lost the softness he’d worn waking up, and Greg wasn’t actually sure whether he was dealing with Mycroft or the British Government, it could so easily be either.
“Bed.” Mycroft held out a hand.
Greg blinked at him in surprise.
“You said you were tired.” Mycroft reminded him crisply.
The Government then, Greg decided. Mycroft was wondering through his mind working, leaving enough awareness behind to run his body on autopilot. He’d have preferred Mycroft, not his My, by far. The fact that at one mention of Moriarty’s name the Omega had mentally run off left him feeling small and abandoned, probably close to how John had felt through most of the day.
His hurt must have shown quite clearly on his face, because Mycroft’s expression softened, some more of him coming back into the figure in front.
“Come on, Gregory. You were trying to get me there earlier.”
“You were asleep,” Greg pointed out. “Will you be joining me?”
Mycroft hesitated.
“I should start looking into-”
Greg tuned it out. Mycroft was going to go be the Government and work on the Moriarty issue. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Hurt, he thought, but mostly he just felt numb. It wasn’t like it mattered. Greg wasn’t even sure why he was getting worked up about it in his mind, though he was. Mycroft frequently worked later than Greg, it wasn’t new.
“Right, fine.” He said, not caring whether or not Mycroft was still speaking. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“I’ll be in in a couple of hours.” Mycroft grabbed Greg’s hand as he went passed and gently squeezed the weather roughened skin.
Platitudes and reassurances, Greg thought. An old married couple already.
Straight on the heels of that thought came ‘I wonder when one of us is going to start having an affair.’
No, he violently rejected the thought, but it made his tone shaper than it otherwise would have been.
“Do as you want, Mycroft.”
He tugged his hand free with just the smallest amount of effort, Mycroft letting it fall, but then that was the difference between them, wasn’t it? The fundamental fact of their relationship: he chased after Mycroft, Mycroft didn’t chase after him.
He turned and headed into the bedroom, waiting until he was far enough away from Mycroft to mutter “You always do anyway” under his breath.
He fell into bed and lay there, staring at the dark shapes and wondering at what point in the day he’d become so bleak. The conference room, his office, the crime scene, here, Baker Street, here; there were so many contenders. Had he felt this way through all of them, hidden by the more violent emotions, or was it cumulative?
He rolled onto his back with a sigh and tucked a hand under his head, staring up at the ceiling he couldn’t see. Maybe he needed to find someone to talk to about it, a professional. Not the stuff with Mycroft, the feelings of inadequacy and abandonment he’d been having since everyone had run out of the Yard that morning.
Had they been going on longer? He didn’t know.
Wasn’t that a sign of depression or something? Only what was the point when he couldn’t say anything important and anything he did say Mycroft could read at will without even a second thought?
No, that wouldn’t work. John, it was going to have to be John, because humiliating as it was to have his friend look at him and know all the black parts of his soul, at least John already knew the bigger picture and would tell Mycroft to go fuck himself before telling him anything, no matter what Mycroft waved in his face.
It would have to be John. Greg already wanted to apologise for shoving more shit on him, but maybe they could get drunk and he could listen to John for a bit as well. Fair exchange. Help each other.
Decision made, he tried to push the rest of his thoughts away so he could sleep. Some of them went easily - all the good ones. The bad ones - his worry about Sherlock and Moriarty, Sherlock and Mycroft’s past, he and Mycroft and being ‘anoldmarriedcoupleisn’tanaffairnexthealreadyhasagorgeousfuckingsecretaryhe’sfuckedbefore’ - he had to wrestle back into the box.
Sherlock would not go after Moriarty. John would stop him. He wouldn’t upset John.
Sherlock and Mycroft’s past was shit. It was also past. They’d deal with it a bit at a time.
He and Mycroft were not going to make things worse between them. There would be no affairs. Friendship, fidelity, family. That was all, but also all of it and frankly more than he’d had in his last marriage.
He slammed the lid closed and tried to convince himself that he was trying to sleep and that he wasn’t timing Mycroft.
It was more than a couple of hours, but he did come to bed.
In the end.
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Sorry it's a short one. Next one is longer, I promise.
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