I am not lonely [Mystrade]

CHAPTER 84 : Handcuff him

"Is he alright ?" Gregory asked his partner in mid-voice, nodding toward the consulting detective who was looking absentmindly by the helicopter's window.
"He wishes to be." replied the auburn, glancing a quick look to his brother. "He takes great pride in having no feelings whatsoever. I would say that he is doing all which is in his capacities to try to suppress what he is feeling at the moment – quite unsuccessfully apparently -."
"Well, I know that John is his mate and flatmate and all that but I never would have thought that he would be that confused about him disappearing." remarked the inspector, rather astonished.
"Distressed, not confused." Mycroft corrected. "In fact, I think they might be a little more than flatmates."
"Since how long do you know that !" the detective exclaimed, trying to keep his voice low to make sure the younger Holmes wouldn't hear him in case he was less deep in his mind palace than expected.
"Around Christmas last year. After the French events." admitted the official. "More or less."
"And you haven't told me ?" retorted Greg, looking quite offended.
"It wasn't to me to say it ! I thought you were great pal with John !" replied the elder Holmes, half-chuckling. "Plus I wasn't sure. Actually I'm still not sure ..."
"Oh come on, stop being modest. You're never wrong on this kind of subject despite knowing very few for yourself." commented the detective in a grin.
"Eh ! Mind yourself !" laughed Mycroft, breaking his brother's concentration.
"Can you explained me what is funny in a kidnapping ?" wondered the youngest angrily.
"Sherlock. I'm helping you because I owe you a favour – and because you seemed to need help – but you'd better calm down or I can easily enough return to London before we even arrive to Belfast." retorted the auburn. It wasn't really a threat but it was enough to have Sherlock lay back in his seat and limit the expression of his angriness to a few resentful glances.
Sometime Greg wondered why the two of them were acting in this way. He knew firsthand that they both had a lot of love one for each other and that they would be ready to do anything one for the other – today's trip to Ireland was just one example of it – but they seemed to be completely unable to speak one to the other without being resentful or threatening. Of course neither of them were really comfortable expressing their feelings, after all they were Holmeses, but expressing it toward one another was apparently simply impossible.
They soon landed on the top of a hospital in the centre of Belfast. A young military was waiting for them a little further to avoid the wind created by the helicopter and led them to the lift and down to the hospital entrance. They all climbed in the back of an army truck parked there and the driver restarted the engine, taking off for the south's suburbs of the city. It has already been 20 hours since Dr Watson's disappearance and the MI5 officer in charge of Nothern Ireland was more than afraid for John's safety and health already.
In the time that had been required for Sherlock, Mycroft and Greg to arrive from London, the MI5 had sent some agents in reconnaissance mission and had started to deploy the army around the suspected location to allow a quick intervention as soon as they will be sure they could invade the place without the hostage being armed.
The army's truck stopped about half a mile away from the warehouse where Watson was supposedly held hostage. The three of them jumped off from the back of the truck – at least Greg does when the auburn looked a bit bewildered at the perspective before being pushed by Sherlock and nearly falling face first on the floor – and joined the MI5's officer and a couple of army officers' that were studying a map of the place displayed on the back of a Range Rover a few yards away.
"Mr Holmes." greeted one of the military, saluting. "Sirs."
"Are we ready for an intervention ?" wondered the elder Holmes, not bothering with pleasant talk. As always his natural ability for commanding re-emerging instantly.
"I'm afraid we are not." the MI5 officer denied. "We still have issues localizing the Captain in the building. It seems that he is not in any of the room possessing a window, neither in the basement from the informations we'e been able to gather."
"Which leave those three rooms only." deduced the yarder, showing a group of window-less rooms on the ground floor.
"Exactly sir. It wouldn't be a problem if there was only one access to it, but as you can see there is at least two doors in every room which means we can assure that they won't escape if we don't position a group of man before the right doors to prevent that." nodded the second military man.
"How long is it going to take to find out where Dr Watson is held ?" asked Mycroft, taking a look at the other documents that the officers had gathered.
"Well, we hope that we will have sure enough informations in less than two hours, the time to have the heat-detector equipped drones to arrive." the MI5 officer informed the auburn.
"That's too long." Sherlock finally intervene. "Do you really think there is no chance they will notice the dozens of men you had deployed in the next two hours. Even the most stupid human being will notice the gathering."
"I stand with Sherlock on this." nodded Gregory. "I think the risk of them escaping if we intervene now is far lesser important than the risk of something happening to John in the next two hours."
Mycroft took a few seconds to weigh the pros and cons of an immediate intervention before nodding in approval of his brother and partner. "Give the order of intervention. Now." he requested.
"Alright sir." accepted the MI5 officer while pulling a face clearly showing his disapproving of his superior's strategy.
"I just hope they haven't fucked up the recognition." the auburn added in mid-voice in his husband's ear.
The group of men who were waiting beside their vehicle suddenly started moving down to the warehouse through the nearby wood, making silently their way to the place where John was held hostage. All around the place, multiple groups of men take their positions while the MI5 agents that had held their observation positions for a couple of hours, were retreating and that the commending officers were following the entire operation on a couple of screens displayed in the back of a truck and retransmitting the trembling image of a few surveillance cameras installed by the agents earlier.
The officer was to give the order of the assault when Mycroft noticed that the consulting detective was no more by his side. Stopping the action for a moment, he and Greg, dashed through the wood to the soldier's position, finding the younger Holmes weakly hidden in the middle of them, a military helmet on his head.
"Sherlock. You are not going inside !" refused his elder, furious and worried about his brother's safety.
"You can't forbid me. I'm an adult, I do what I want." retorted the consulting detective with an angry look.
"Gregory. Handcuff him." ordered the official, not happy to have to as such a thing but absolutely refusing that his brother put himself at risk.
Sherlock tried to resist but the soldiers surrounding him forbidden him from going anywhere, not really fancying either that a man who was not a military take part in the intervention. Grudgingly, the younger Holmes allowed the yarder to manacle him and to be led back to the commanding camp 500 yards further.
After this interruption, the intervention order was finally given and 80 men surrounded the warehouse while 25 special operations men entered the building, nearly instantly exchanging gun shots with the hostage holders. From the distance the three men had no way of knowing what was going on inside the building and all of them were quite tense, trying to determine who was winning the confrontation. Greg was forced to keep a firm grip on his brother-in-law's arm as the young man was clearly tempted to run to the warehouse, even if his handcuffs still hadn't been taken off.
The only thing they were sure about was that none of the IRA members had tried to escape as the soldiers around the place had not open fire yet and the surveillance camera had not shown any one trying to sneak out. Mycroft was hoping he had taken the right decision when following his brother's opinion on the strategy to use and that he wouldn't have the death of soldiers, or of John, on his mind. This fear of unnecessary death was what had kept him away from this type of intervention since the right beginning of his career. As much as he could be emotionless when it came to take decision, the fact of having to decide of the destiny of innocent man without having all the required informations was one of his greatest fear and if it wasn't for John, and so for Sherlock, he wouldn't have dared to go against the opinion of the MI5 officer.
Suddenly the gun shots stopped and without even having to look at each other the three men dashed to the building, Sherlock's writs still caught in the handcuffs. As they were entering the warehouse, they instantly remarked the bodies of a certain number of civilian, the IRA fighters on the floor, as well as a couple of soldiers, thankfully only wounded, surrounded by other soldiers helping them. Not really caring, they made their way to the rooms in which Dr Watson was trust to have been held, finding a group of soldiers in the third one, surrounding the hostage who had apparently been beaten to the pulp by the IRA fighters but that was seeming apparently alright apart from that, even if the blood loss had made him felt unconscious during the invasion of the building.
Still handcuffed Sherlock felt on his knees beside his flatmate and checked his heartbeat, apparently not believing what he was seeing. The official stepped back, not being very found of the blood and the wounds and was quickly joined by his partner who wrapped an arm around his waist and pulled him close, knowing that it was difficult for the auburn to see his brother in pain as he was at the moment.