Like Wire (A BBC Sherlock Fan Fiction)

[twenty three]

Evetually, Sherlock was able to pull open his eyes, fighting back for his conciousness. His vision was still distorted, any movement of his head caused his head to spin dizzily.

There was someone in front of him, a girl. The girl. In his mind, Sherlock spat at her in disgust, in annoyance.

"I can't believe," he slurred, stopping at the realisation he had no idea what he was intending to say.

The girl didn't move, didn't talk, she just sat there.

"You can't do this to me and then just not talk," Sherlock whined, his voice drunk, "It was sodium pentothal, yes? The drug you used on me?"

Silence.

He rubbed at his eyes, trying to regain focus on his surroundings.

"Well your a bit rude. Most murderous kidnappers say something," Sherlock criticized, somewhat disappointed.

He squeezed his eyes tightly closed, frantic to be reunited with his vision.

Oh god.

Suddenly, now he preferred being unable to see the girl in front of him. There was a logical reason behind the girls silence - she was dead. Her skin was tinged green and she slumped weakly in her wooden chair. A bottle of pills rocked on the floor beneath her body, her hand dragged towards them, swaying over the empty bottle. It was an unjustifiable suicide. Disjointed, unconnected: it didn't make sense.

Why would she drug Sherlock, bring him here - to a dimly lit and unfamiliar room, just to kill herself? Well, the answer was simple: she wouldn't.

Sherlock jerked his hands, two loops of rope tying them to the chair he was on. They slashed through his skin, cutting into his flesh, his hands squirmed and thrashed but the rope clung tight to his thin wrists.

"So, are you going to introduce yourself?" Sherlock asked into the darkness.

A silhouette emerged, his face drowned in shadows, his body clothed in an expensive jacket, a shirt and jeans. He inhaled proudly, ready to talk.

"Jim Moriarty. Hi," He sang.

"Jim Moriarty, of coarse. Irene Adler insisted I should team up with you, I suppose you set her up for that?"

"Of coarse," Moriarty smiled, approaching the light so his young, pale face was illuminated.

Stubble climbed it's way up his face, from underneath his chin up towards his heavily gelled, jet black hair. His eyes were dull black orbs sat in his eye sockets which were surrounded by deep lines.

"But it wasn't you, you didn't kill Alexa Brown, you didn't kill Samuel King," Sherlock rooted through his brain for an explanation, he desired answers more than his survival.

"Nope," Moriarty confirmed, with a high pitched giggle.

"What are you?" Sherlock hissed, his voice rasping in his throat.

"I told you, I'm Jim,"

"Not who, what. What are you?" Sherlock repeated, still writhing in his seat.

"Oh," Moriarty chuckled, pacing around Sherlock, finding the whole situation weirdly amusing, "Consulting criminal, Sherlock," he winked, "I've already got a permanent job, I'm not doing bad,"

"A what? A consulting criminal. Oh," Sherlock trailed off, "Someone asked you to kill those people and you hired her," He eyed the corpse opposite him.

"I don't like getting my hands dirty," Moriarty explained, tracing one of his hands with his index finger. "There were two girls and one mistake. Her name was Delilah White, you know her - the body at the morgue? She was the one that tried to asphyxiate Willow, not her, not Amelia," Moriarty leaned against the chair with the shell of Amelia on it. "But of coarse, there was a mistake, Amelia was accused and went insane, properly insane. I could trust her, so I bought her back to this school,"

Sherlock rocked about in his chair, "So, Amelia returns, poisoning Delilah and then you - you hire her. But who hired you to kill Alexa and Samuel? They were together in year seven so I doubt it was coincidence," He wiggled his body, trying to escape his trapped position, "The obvious would be Willow, she was jealous, she loved Samuel and then her best friend - Alexa takes him away. But that was years ago, do people really have a burning need for revenge for that long?"

"Of coarse not," Moriarty replied, observing Sherlock as he worked with his racing brain.

There was silence while Sherlock sorted out the facts, arranging things neatly in his unorganized head.

"Alexa Brown," Sherlock whispered, raising his head from its lowered position he had held it in while he was thinking, "Alexa Brown. Samuel broke up with Alexa, so Alexa hired you to kill herself and Samuel - so she died innocent - then you hired Amelia, who had gone insane after being misjudged as guilty for attempted murder against Willow,"

God, this was complicated.

Alexa hired Moriarty to kill both herself and her ex boyfriend Samuel; Moriarty planned the murder and then hired Amelia Brown, who had just poisoned Delilah White for revenge. It was so obvious and yet so confusing.

"Basically, yup," Moriarty confessed with a mischevious grin.

"What did you do? Forced her to take the pills?" Sherlock quizzed, looking back at the corpse of Amelia.

"Wasn't hard," Moriarty chortled.

"Delilah is guilty of attempted murder, Alexa is guilty for sking you to murder, you're guilty of planning the murder and Amelia is guilty for committing them. But three of them are dead," Sherlock muttered, maintaining a cold eye contact with Moriarty.

"Exactly!" Moriarty claimed excitedly, "But, do you know what the best bit is?"

Sherlock didn't speak, he was unsure what was going to be said next.

"You, the genius, sociopathic Sherlock Holmes have just figured everything out and now the worst thing happens to you. The worst outcome for you," Moriarty hummed, dancing around, flailing his arms as if he was centred on a dance floor.

"And whats that?"

"You die," Moriarty purred.

"Hardly the worst outcome," Sherlock laughed carelessly.

Moriarty just shrugged, tossing a match onto the gasoline coated wooden floor before blowing Sherlock a kiss, "Love you," he called before adding, "So does John,"

"What have you done to him?" Sherlock screamed, watching Moriarty walk off. He shook in his chair - toppling over but Moriarty never turned around or spoke again.

The nascent flames licked the leg of the chair with Amelia's body on it, the sunset colours: orange, red, yellow intertwined, coiling around each another in an elegant and well rehearsed dance. It cracked and hissed and spat, Sherlock could feel the warmth of the glowing embers as they twirled and span.

"John?" Sherlock shrieked into the flames, which were greedily engulfing the wood of his surroundings, devouring everything in sight. "John! John! Oh god, John!"

There was no way of seeing anything other the blinding amber flames, there was nothing but a wall of intense heat, threatening to burn his lungs.

His eyes watered from the harsh, extreme feverish warmth from the tower of unforgiving flames and Sherlock couldn't breathe, nor could he hear his anxious heart in his chest, reminding him he was still alive. He was still alive.