Love of Heaven and Hell

Three is Company

They drove up to Oak Hill Manor, loading their guns with more silver bullets, just in case. John had given Sherlock a silver knife also, just in case he needed a close combat weapon, and he knew it would make him feel less nervous. Right now the boy was practically shaking in his seat, looking out the darkening window and tapping his fingers against the dash board. It didn't take long to get through the gates and into the housing development, and they found 234 without incident or problem. They pulled up around the corner once again, and now that the cloud cover was out and the darkness had come it was the perfect time to start sneaking around. John and Sherlock opened the car doors and slipped out onto the pavement, their footsteps catlike and unheard. The two of them creeped through the shrubbery and slipped into the yard by the cover of the shadows, staying low so they weren't seen by Mrs. Trevor or the neighbors. As John expected there was a window at the bottom of the house, where there was the faintest light, maybe from a door above, but it was flickering, it looked more like a simple candle. John looked around the windows; all above him were dark, so maybe she wasn't home, or sleeping or something. The moonlight shining down on Sherlock made his pale skin glow beautifully, and perched against the house, with a gun in his hand, he could be anyone's teenage vampire crush. John shook the weird thought out of his head; he wasn't John's teenager vampire crush, more like the helper at the suit shop's. It was silent in the basement, as if whatever it was had been moved or was simply asleep. John gave Sherlock a reassuring nod, which was returned, and, nervously and silently, he twisted the latch for the window. It wasn't too hard to open from the outside, what worried John most was some sort of security system that fancy rich people like to install. But in the end, he slid his hand in and pushed the window open wide enough for him to slip inside. Before John crawled in there though, he turned on a flashlight and stuffed it into his mouth to carry, which was a very unsanitary way of carrying it, but it worked when he needed to get into a house. John got to the ground and slid feet first over the stone wall, which scraped his stomach uncomfortably, but it was necessary if he wanted to get in. Thankfully there was no clutter underneath him, and he was able to land on the cold cement floor. He gave Sherlock a thumbs up, who was watching nervously from outside, and helped the boy crawl in as well. Sherlock had his gun in his hand nervously, and John was sort of worried that it would go off accidently, but it obviously made him feel better, so John didn't say anything. John wandered around near the stairs, where he was careful not to shine the light up, but there was no crack of light under the door, so maybe Mrs. Trevor went out. What caught his attention though was a large pool of dried blood right underneath the wooden stairs, as if someone were trying to run up them. So this must've been where Mr. Trevor really died, before Mrs. Trevor relocated him. So it was the old hag that was the wolf, very predictable. John sighed, taking out his phone and snapping a picture of the blood just so that he could show someone if he needed to. Suddenly he heard commotion, and Sherlock gasp. There was a gunshot and the sound of metal hitting metal, obviously he had missed. There was whining, someone was groaning for help, was Sherlock injured by his own bullet? John rushed to the other side of the basement, seeing Sherlock crouched on the floor, oh no, he was hurt, it had ricocheted... But no, there was another figure; there were the sounds of chains rattling against something, a metal pipe. Sherlock was helping the man, the gun laying forgotten on the ground. Well, it wasn't even a man really; he was around their age, with light brown hair with flecks of blond, with high cheekbones and bright blue eyes. John couldn't see the lower half of him though, because he was being gagged by what looked like a silk scarf. Sherlock was trying his best with the chains, but they needed a key, so all he could do was try to pry them off.
"Sherlock, stand back." John decided, pulling a lock pick out of his pocket and starting at the lock.
"I'm sorry, I probably alerted her, I panicked." Sherlock muttered, but John didn't want to hear it. Obviously the lady wasn't home. Meanwhile the boy just sat there, shivering, with tears streaming down his face, obviously he was so relieved to see other people, come to rescue him. Sherlock crouched beside him and took off the scarf, making the boy start to cough and take deep, heavy breaths.
"Oh thank God, thank God." He muttered. "She's a lunatic, she's a monster, she..."
"Whoa, calm down, we won't hurt you, but you've got to be quiet." Sherlock instructed as John poked the lock pick around some more. He had almost gotten it when there was a sound from upstairs, a door opening. All of them froze, and terror was obvious in the boy's brilliant blue eyes. John hurried, and finally there was a victorious click and the handcuffs released themselves. Sherlock took them off of the boy, who collapsed onto the floor. He looked thin, dangerously thin, as if no one had fed him in weeks. And there was a bloody gash on his forehead, obviously he had been beaten or something. There were footsteps above them, and the boy's thin hand clung to the bottom of Sherlock's dress pants, the closest thing of his captors that he could grasp. John turned off the flashlight and they were plunged once again into darkness. At some point the candle must've gone out, because there was no longer the flickering light. John tapped lightly on Sherlock's shoulder, which made him jump, but he was trying to make it obvious that they had to get going. He turned on the flashlight against his hand, so it turned orange but didn't reflect against anything else. No longer was he making jokes about his hand on fire, this was a matter of life or death. They heard clatter from upstairs, it sounded like she was making something in the microwave or something, but she was directly above them. He saw Sherlock's horror stricken face, and the boy, who was now clinging to Sherlock like a monkey, looked even more terrified of the woman above their heads. Sherlock mouthed something, no doubt what do we do? He had his gun in one hand and in the other he was holding the boy's hand, as if that were going to help in some way. John got to his feet and made his way to the window in the dim orange light. There was moonlight coming out of the window, so they could at least see faintly. He returned to the pipe, where the two boys were sitting on the floor together, both little balls of fear.
"Okay, here's what we're going to do, Sherlock, you'll help him up and get to the car, stay down and out of her range of vision. I'll follow, but you get the car up and ready in case she finds me." John decided in a harsh whisper. Sherlock nodded, and dragged himself to his feet. The boy was leaning heavily on him, looking starved and dehydrated but obviously ready to get out of his makeshift prison. John led the two to the window, which was still open, and gave Sherlock a hand up. He managed to crawl through without too much noise or trouble, and landed on the prissy green grass. Sherlock gave little thumbs up and John looked to the boy, who was still trembling but standing alone. John nodded to him, and he seemed to know what he had to do. Using John's knee as a stool, the boy was able to pull himself up to the ledge, where Sherlock grabbed his hands and pulled him up through the window. When the boy was safely on the grass Sherlock helped him up, and together they scurried through the yard and to the car. That left just John to fend for himself. Then he heard footsteps coming down the house, and with a nervous jolt he heard the door at the top of the stairs open. John jumped to the window, crawling out as fast as humanly possible, without any care to the amount of noise he made or how much harm he did to himself. The basement was flooded with light, and the high heels were coming down the stairs.
"Oh Victor..." sang an old, cracking voice. John slammed the window shut and heard a gasp behind him, but he was too busy tearing through the yard. He jumped the iron fence without any hesitation, and thank god Sherlock was waiting with the engine running. John ran into the passenger seat, and as soon as the door shut Sherlock slammed the gas, and they sped off through on the pavement.
"She heard me, I don't think she saw me, but she knows that someone took him." John said, gasping for breath, stooped over in his seat with no notice to the seatbelt. Sherlock tore through the gates of Oak Hill Manor, gates which should be closing soon, but he didn't care about anything but getting home. He almost forgot about the boy, Victor no doubt, until he rolled over in the seat with a groan.
"He doesn't look too good." John decided. Sherlock shook his head with worry; obviously he was thinking the same thing. Finally they pulled up to the hotel, parking on the other end of the lot so that if she saw the car she couldn't piece it together with their room. It would at least leave enough time for them to get out the back window at least. Between the two of them they were able to haul Victor, who was obviously slipping into unconsciousness, back to their room and let him collapse in a bed. At the moment John didn't care where he was supposed to sleep, he just needed this boy to live. They needed to hear his story.
"Get the first aid kit!" John demanded as he took Victor's pulse. It was slow, too slow. Sherlock ran to the bags and dug out the kit, but John wasn't even sure what he needed out of it. So he cracked the ice bag and put it over the boy's head, which of course did nothing.
"Fill up a cup with water, he needs hydration!" John decided. Sherlock nodded again, rushing to the bathroom and filling up those little paper cups up with sink water. It wasn't much, but John tipped the water down the Victor's throat in an attempt to make him drink it.
"Watch him, I'll go out and get some food..." John decided.
"I've got the rest of my sandwich." Sherlock suggested, going over to the bed and bringing out the wrapped up roast beef sandwich.
"Brilliant Sherlock!" John decided with a smile, but the boy coughed and sputtered so he had to run and get more water. For being a hunter John had no idea what do for this boy, so he kept the ice pack on him but pulled the blankets over top, as if he were cold, and kept tipping more and more water down his throat. Eventually his eyes opened, and he gasped loudly, vaulting up, not unlike Sherlock when he first woke. John seemed to be the babysitter of the innocent affected by supernatural beings.