Death Is A Friend

The Morgue And Its Madness

A/N: I'm not sure if this chapter falls into any category of trigger warnings, but just tread carefully I suppose...

Sherlock moved very slowly, walking up towards Victor so that they could look each other in the eyes. Victor's blue eyes looked curious, yet not hungry. Not yet. No, there would have to be a certain aspect of seduction if Sherlock wanted this night to go exactly as planned.
"I'm cold tonight, Victor. Cold and stiff, much like what you're used to." Sherlock promised quietly, taking one of Victor's hands in his own and curling their fingers together. It was no surprise that Victor's fingers weren't any warmer than Sherlock's, in fact they were about as cold as any of the corpses they both handled on a regular basis. Victor felt like he was already dead. "Feel it? The chill?" Sherlock questioned softly. He couldn't tell if Victor reacted, he couldn't tell if he was doing anything except observing. There seemed to be no obvious passion on that man's face, no sparkle in his eyes. He looked just as he always did, even when he was clutching to the hand of a shirtless boy, a beautiful boy, who would do anything to be his.
"I feel it." Victor agreed quietly, very simply. He looked now to Sherlock's eyes, allowing himself to stare deep into his soul. This was yet another instance where Sherlock wouldn't mind if his brain was investigated, if his thoughts were portrayed like a movie on a screen. It really would be much easier if Victor could see his intentions, that way he didn't have to play this all out in the act of seduction. However Victor's eyes showed no recognition, and so Sherlock pulled him back ever so slightly, stumbling back until he made contact with the silver table. Still with Victor's hand in his own, Sherlock pulled himself up onto the thing, sitting with his legs spread and his feet dangling, pulling Victor closer than Mycroft would ever have allowed. He let his eyes close for a moment, taking Victor's captive hand in both of his own and pulling it to his lips. He merely pressed it there, pressed it so that he could fill Victor's empty fist with his warm breath, his eager puffs, pulling his fingers so close to his mouth that they almost brushed against his tongue.
"Come closer." Sherlock begged. "I don't want to end this night alone." He pulled at Victor's arm, pulling him finally close enough so that he could wrap his ankles together around the man's waist, keeping him close and captive between his legs.
"Sherlock, you know that this is wrong." Victor reminded him, and yet it was ever so obvious, his change in octave. It was ever so obvious that his words were struggling to leave his mouth in anything more confident than a whisper. Sherlock knew that Victor could feel his urgency, he could feel his excitement. The hands that clutched him were pulsing with a heartbeat through the fingertips, his legs were clutching in a way that made it clear he was not going to let go, and his lips were panting in a way that intended to make it ever so obvious that they did not want to be alone any longer.
"I know." Sherlock promised, moving himself along Victor's body and bringing his lips close to his neck, bringing his words to settle there on his skin. "But that won't stop me anymore. What have I got to lose?"
"You're too selfish, Sherlock. In thinking that you're the one who would suffer. Remember, you're just seventeen." Victor reminded him, although he seemed to pull his chin up, so as to expose more of his neck to Sherlock's awaiting lips.
"You want to all the same. I know you do." Sherlock reminded him. Victor shuttered under his breath, and finally as Sherlock was able to settle his lips down on his neck he could feel a sort of shock passing through them both. A feeling of ecstasy that made Victor's hands suddenly grasp to Sherlock's torso, one which made the two of them pulse together in a silent, uncoordinated dance of passion.
"I shouldn't." Victor reminded him again, this time with a much sterner voice, as if Victor was scolding himself rather than Sherlock.
"But you can anyway. You can succumb to your own desires." Sherlock whispered, kissing now so passionately that he felt Victor's skin get caught in his teeth. Nevertheless, he continued on. He knew that Victor would enjoy the pain. "For once, allow yourself to be human. And touch me."
"Sherlock..." Victor started, yet Sherlock shushed him, now bringing his face closer, bringing his lips within reach. They were able to stare once more into each other's eyes, and Sherlock saw now that look of hopelessness that had accumulated in Victor's usually confident blue eyes. For once in his life he was facing a dilemma, of what he wanted and what he couldn't have.
"Victor. Allow yourself to enjoy." Sherlock begged, now leaning in for the first kiss, leaning in for a taste of Victor's lips, allowing himself a taste of Heaven, or instead, perhaps of Hell. Yet suddenly there was a change, as Sherlock leaned forward Victor leaned away, and Sherlock wasn't met with his lips...he was instead met with nothing. Victor forced himself out of Sherlock's grasp; he untangled himself from his legs and stumbled away in something of a state of shock. Empty now of that man's proximity Sherlock felt lost...silly even, sitting on this table in such a vulnerable state. However he had Victor right where he wanted him, more human than he ever had been. Perhaps that's why Victor was so afraid; he wasn't used to wanting anything...or rather anyone.
"Sherlock I think...I think perhaps you should go." Victor suggested, shaking himself awake and turning his eyes away from the boy who sat perched on the table.
"What are you afraid of?" Sherlock wondered, easing himself off of the table so that he could approach the man once more. He knew that it took an outrageous amount of dedication for the man to step away; he knew that it wasn't going to be easy to do a second time. He knew that every fiber in Victor Trevor wanted to be with him, it was just that his brain would not allow it. His rational sense, his fear of the law...that was enough to keep him away.
"Must I remind you again, how much I have to lose?" Victor whispered.
"Must I remind you have much you have to gain?" Sherlock asked in response, letting his own trembling fingers run down the length of his chest, falling around his slacks and hooking around the loops of his belt. "You could have me, Victor. You know you can."
"Perhaps I do not want you." Victor said sternly, turning away now, in an effort to recollect himself. Sherlock stepped forward, trying not to take offense. He reminded himself once again that Victor was fighting a losing battle, and all the while he tried to tell himself that he was immune to this seduction that he was instead falling heavily.
"Don't say things you don't mean." Sherlock suggested quietly. And with that, well for whatever reason Sherlock felt something in the air evaporate, that tense feeling vanished out of the air just as soon as the words left Sherlock's lips, and in a quick turn of his heel Victor Trevor returned to the scene. Whoever had been acting in his place was kicked out, repelled like the weakened thing it was, and in instead the strong, confident man reappeared. The persona which Sherlock could not deal with, the man he knew not to challenge.
"I say things as they are, Sherlock, not as you like them to be. And now I offer you to remember your place in this morgue, and who is in control." Victor growled. Sherlock willed himself not to back down; he told himself repeatedly that Victor was just putting on a shell, an exoskeleton if you will, to protect his vulnerable insides from the strenuous pull of love. From the tempting summoning of a boy's precious heart.
"Love me, Victor. And if you cannot find it within yourself, well then at least let me love you! At least let me live, for once in my life...at least let me find purpose." Sherlock begged, stepping closer only to be pushed away with a harsh and intolerant hand.
"I will not have it either way. You are too young to be playing the sl*t, come back when you are old enough to understand what love is." Victor demanded with a sneer.
"I KNOW what love is! I know how to fall in love, I know what it feels like, I know how it hurts. I know how it is to be rejected...over, and over again!" Sherlock exclaimed, pounding on his chest as if to remind Victor that it was not hallow, that there was a heart in there, a heart that demanded love, and attention.
"Well then maybe you'll need to take the hint, and fall in love within your league...or at least within your age group." Victor suggested with a growl.
"You don't know rejection, do you? It's ever so easy for you, isn't it Victor?" Sherlock insisted. "You don't ever get told no, you don't ever get told anything, do you? You pretend you're so morally rigid; well the only thing rigid about you and your love is your partner! F*cking the corpses, you necrophiliac."
"Now don't pretend you're not desperate enough to die." Victor growled, taking a furious step forward with violence flashing threateningly in his eyes. "Don't pretend that you're not willing to die by my hand, with the promise that I'll throw you over the table as soon as the last breath has been lost."
"Do it, then! Do it Victor!" Sherlock demanded, approaching the man so quickly that Victor had no time to react. Sherlock grabbed his hands and forced them to his throat, and from there Victor's instincts took over. His fingers wrapped around Sherlock's throat, not tight enough to kill him, yet tight enough to squeeze. To make Sherlock's already laborious breaths come in even more of a struggle.
"Kill me Victor, kill me. Lift me from the ground, squeeze the air from my throat...crush me." Sherlock begged, holding Victor's hands in place, trying to force his fingers tighter around his windpipe. "Take the breath from my body, force it out of my lungs...and f*ck me the whole time. F*ck me while I'm taking my last breaths, just so that I can still live to feel it. So that I can still live to experience the same pleasures. Then it wouldn't be wrong...then it would simply be criminal. And you love that, don't you Victor? Playing God?" Victor's eyes were wide; oh it was ever so obvious that he was considering it. It was ever so obvious that he was tempted. And he might've, if he had the opportunity. He might have.
"Take me Victor, take me." Sherlock breathed, drumming up his voice into something of a rhythm and moving closer again. He kept Victor's hands around his throat, yet all the same he moved their bodies together, moving up and down along Victor's chest and trying his luck to kiss his chin, and his chest again. "Do it, Victor. Kill me, Victor. F*CK ME, Victor! F*CK ME!" And at that moment, just as Sherlock's words were leaving his lips, and just as Victor's grip was beginning to tighten...the doors flew open. And this was the scene that Mycroft was faced with, his younger brother pushing himself against Victor, with his hands in a chokehold around his neck. Sherlock smiled, looking towards his brother in some sort of twisted irony, making sure those black eyes were set heavily into his soul. And then, with all of the emotion he could muster, he pushed himself against Victor in one last heave, and breathed out one final plea...
"F*ck me, Victor." Sherlock breathed. "While my brother watches." It was then that Victor found his humanity; or rather he found his shame. Right as soon as they were interrupted, and Mycroft made his grand appearance, Victor found it within himself to throw Sherlock as hard as he could away from him. The boy stumbled over himself, falling onto his back against the cold tile floor. He sat there aching for a moment, laughing although he had accomplished nothing. Laughing because he was under the delusion that he had won. It would seem as though his brother couldn't find the necessary words of rage, it would seem as though the man who thought himself so well spoken could find nothing to do but charge at Victor where he stood, as if he had been the problem. As if this was Victor's fault. The umbrella came flying like a mace at Victor's head, and yet the man was quick enough to duck away. At first Sherlock thought he wasn't saying anything either...it was only then that he realized both men were speaking, their lips were moving, and their faces were contorted in tangled sneers of rage. Sherlock's ears just weren't listening, he couldn't hear anything but a faint ringing, and as he watched Victor finally overpower Mycroft, as he knocked the weapon out of the older Holmes's hand and push him away into the cabinets, well it was only then that Sherlock began to tune into the scene. It sounding like nothing more than yelling, high pitched shrieks in no language in particular, just yells of emotion, of strong emotion, formatted together to throw blame at each other. To attack and to defend, depending on which voice you listened to closer. Sherlock then let his head fall back to the floor, waiting for either one of them to remember that he was still here, waiting for one of them to perhaps come to his aid. It was funny, how quickly Mycroft was prepared to blame Victor. Undoubtedly it was because it was Victor who had taught him shame, it was Victor who taught him that all love did not go received. Perhaps Mycroft saw him again as the villain, whereas in reality it was Sherlock's fault this had all occurred. It was Sherlock's blame alone, to have tried to tempt Victor into a situation he blatantly insisted was wrong. Yet Sherlock would not defend Victor, for he knew the man was capable of doing that himself. And so he just sat back, listening to their footsteps as they vibrated through the floor, listening to the screams as they became more and more like words. It was about five minutes before he felt Mycroft's hands on his head, lifting him up only to wrap the oxygen tube tightly around his face, shoving it unapologetically up his nose. Mycroft was sporting a bruise on his eye, already inflamed enough to be noticeable, whereas Sherlock was able to catch a quick glance of Victor as he recollected himself in the corner. He looked unharmed, merely shaken up, and he was adjusting his jacket so as to frame himself appropriately. He didn't seem to want to look towards Sherlock, or return his gaze. Perhaps he was feeling his own bout of shame as well, for the fragile state Sherlock had caught him in. Perhaps this was the first time Victor had ever succumbed to temptations, or had ever let himself take suggestions from someone else.
"We're going home, Sherlock." Mycroft growled, heaving Sherlock's arm so that he was pulled into the air and onto his feet. Sherlock didn't want to stand, yet Mycroft was giving him no choice in the matter. And so he planted his feet on the ground and held his head up, just long enough to glance at Victor, who was just now looking back. His blue eyes looked, for the first time that Sherlock could remember, surprisingly human.
"You know where to find me." Sherlock mumbled, letting his head roll quietly on his neck as Mycroft took his shoulder and steered him violently towards the door.
"He's not coming back here, Victor. Don't expect him." Mycroft growled, stopping only to collect Sherlock's shirt and jacket from the sopping pile on the floor.