Death Is A Friend

The Body Was Once A Boy

When the car pulled into the parking lot it was empty, too dark for anyone other than teenagers up to no good to be hanging around. This was what Sherlock had expected, and what he had hoped for in the end. He didn't want a witness to this, whatever it was destined to be. Although even a life sentence in prison would be the equivalent of a mere couple of months, he didn't want to spend his last couple of days suffering in a cell when he could be held in Victor Trevor's arms as he withered away into the world of the dead. No, prison would not suit him right at all. John turned off the engine yet left the music running, a slow sort of rock and roll song that he seemed to think was romantic enough to let play.
"Would it be a bad time to apologize?" John asked a bit hesitantly, looking a bit awkward as he looked across the car at Sherlock.
"It would be a bad time to do anything except what we came here to do." Sherlock corrected, clearing his throat and beginning to pull his jacket from his shoulders. John grinned, for obviously that was the answer he was hoping for; however he didn't understand all the underlying connotations. John may have come here for romance, yet Sherlock came here for something much different. All the same, they were here to do what they intended to do. That merely differed between the two of them.
"Of course." John agreed with a little bit of an eager lunge, trapping Sherlock's head between his hands and kissing him very passionately. It wasn't exactly an apology kiss, more of a reuniting one. He had obviously missed Sherlock, missed his kisses, and this was merely the first in a while, the first of what John could only assume to be many. Little did he know... Yet Sherlock kissed him back, for in all honesty it didn't just feel right, it felt special as well. It was yet another difference, between Victor and John, that John's affection actually meant something. When he went about his romance, Sherlock could always tell that there was a passion there. Sherlock was never unsure of whether he would be accepted, or appreciated, or admired. John loved him for all that he was, which of course might be a little bit too much for Victor. Victor instead tolerated him, and allowed him to love him when he didn't let the rest of the world even look at him. And so that was an honor in itself, yet it was nothing close to as self-actualizing as Sherlock would have hoped. Victor's kiss, when it did come, surely would not feel anything like this. As Sherlock predicted, they very quickly ended up in the back seat. Sherlock found himself lying underneath John once more, rather in the same rhythm as before. Yet this time John didn't say anything about Sherlock's lungs, this time he said nothing to complain, nothing to doubt Sherlock's capability. In fact it was mostly the same process as well, shirts off, lips locked, hands going wherever they pleased. And Sherlock let himself enjoy it for a brief moment, he allowed himself to admire John's love, he allowed himself to accept it. Yet all the while he was enjoying himself, he had something else in mind. All the while he allowed himself to melt into John's touch, and move along with John's motions; well he had to remember that this was not the purpose of the night. He was not meant to end up here in the backseat indefinitely; there was a task that had to be completed. And so Sherlock enjoyed these kisses, yet he knew it had to be his decision which was to be the last. Finally he grew anxious, and his fingers were clenching around John's waist, yet anxiously waiting for the moment when they might be able to get at his neck instead. He knew that this was the time, his body was humming with the anticipation, his fingers were feeling strong...and so with a great twist, and with a strength he didn't know he held within his limbs, Sherlock turned them both around. He flipped them, so that he could pin John to the seat and sit atop his waist, looking down at the boy as he grew a great big smile upon his face, a look of pride almost, as if he hadn't expected Sherlock to be able to take control like that.
"Who was I, ever to doubt you?" John said with a little chuckle. Sherlock shook his head in exasperation, he looked down upon the boy where he lay in the seat, he saw the moonlight shining upon his golden hair, that crooked smile on his face that was so typical of a jock. He felt just...he felt guilt, almost. It felt wrong to deprive the world of such a boy, such a wonderful creation. This was the John Watson he had watched from his window, this was the John Watson he had told Mycroft was the love of his life! Sherlock knew he had the strength, he knew that he could do it...but should he? Would he? He had the life of his childhood soulmate in the palm of his hand, and now it was up to him to either crush it or let it fly free. He had the chance, he had the power. For a moment weakness overtook him, sympathy overtook him, and while he raised his hands to John's exposed neck he instead fell down atop of him, bringing his lips to his collarbone as well. Sherlock held John's head in place, falling into his own kissing, moving so slowly about John's body, allowing himself to enjoy the taste of his skin...John let out a deep sigh, shooting his hands out towards Sherlock's hair and running his fingers anxiously through it, as if he was trying to keep him close, as if he was trying to encourage him to keep going. Sherlock found himself with his lips, not his hands, on John's neck, kissing him repeatedly, passionately enough that both of their eyes fell shut. And yet just as soon as he got the idea to spare the boy's life, another thought came to him. Or rather, reality set in. Just as soon as he thought that he could let john live, and perhaps even allow himself to love him once more, the thought of Victor came once more to Sherlock's mind. Perhaps he had forgotten about the mortician all the while he had been so obsessed with John, yet just as soon as he thought of those blue eyes, just as soon as they reappeared into his head...well they were there to stay. And Sherlock's eyes shot open to meet them, staring right back into Victor's gaze where it was staring at him from the shadows of John's neck, those eyes that were there only to remind him what was truly important. The eyes that served to remind Sherlock that he did indeed have a soulmate, and it wasn't John Watson. And so Sherlock laughed, he gave a great laugh to acknowledge his own defeat, and finally sat up. He stared down at John, yet even if he tried he could not find the sympathy necessary to spare him once more. Now when he looked at John, those brown eyes were blue, and they were there purely to remind him of what was necessary. They were there to stare him down, and to remind him just why he was here in the first place.
"Victor." Sherlock whispered, so quietly under his breath that even he couldn't hear himself. Yet obviously his words were loud enough that John responded to them, in fact it seemed so obvious to John that he seemed to wake from his romantic trance. His eyes cleared back to brown, and the light inside of them was suspicious.
"What did you just say?" John wondered quietly, as if he was worried that Sherlock was kissing him so passionately with the idea of another man in his head.
"I said Victor." Sherlock said louder, now making sure that they were both able to hear his words.
"What, your boss? What on earth does he have to..." John's words were cut off when Sherlock finally summoned up his courage, and his strength. His breath was cut off completely as Sherlock wrapped his hands around his throat, grasping as tightly as he could with all of his strength summoned within his fingertips. He could feel John's neck twist and tighten as it tried to gasp for air that simply wasn't available; he could feel the boy's heartbeat first increase and then begin to slow. Oh and this gave him power, this gave him that feeling that Victor always sauntered around with. No wonder Victor had such a high impression of himself...killing someone made you feel undeniably like a God.
"He has to do with everything...John." Sherlock snarled, leaning down to apply more pressure on John's windpipe. The boy's eyes were bulging, and Sherlock knew to stare at them for a long while, as long as necessary. He had heard a lot about the light leaving a dying man's eyes...he wanted to witness it first hand for himself. He wanted to watch the transition, when that gleam left and the eyes instead became glassy, like the corpses in the morgue. Sherlock never thought he'd have that honor. John was struggling, yet not enough as Sherlock might have expected in a dying man. He wasn't giving it his all, that was for sure. For while John's hands clutched at Sherlock's, pulling and scratching to try to get him to let go, he wasn't wiggling or kicking or anything. He was staying perfectly still, as if even in his hour of death he wanted to do what was expected of him. As if he wanted to do as Sherlock wanted him to, even if that did mean dying in the process.
"I'm sorry John, but it's what I have to do. He won't have me if I still have you." Sherlock whispered almost helplessly, feeling now that John's heartbeat was beginning to decrease so rapidly. The boy was beginning to still, there was no longer any strength for him to clench at Sherlock's fingers, or mouth words that were never going to be spoken. His feet gave a single kick, against the door of the car as if it was his last attempt to free himself from the trap he had gotten himself into. And there it was...Sherlock watched it happen. Just a slight second, a passing moment. If Sherlock hadn't been waiting for it he would've missed it, that fading, that quick and sudden passing glimmer before darkness settled in behind his pupils. The light left, he couldn't see where it went to but it was gone before he knew it. And that's when Sherlock knew that it was time to let go. And so, slowly, he released his grip. He let his fingers loosen, which was a task so difficult he thought that he would be stuck to that boy's throat for the rest of his own existence. His fingers were locked to John's skin; they were clenched so tightly around his neck that at first they refused to unclench. They didn't know, perhaps, that their job had been completed. They didn't know that they had just ridded the world of one human life...of one good soul. He was....Sherlock took a deep, rattling breath, feeling a sob beginning to start up the bottom of his throat. He was dead, wasn't he? He was dead. Sherlock finally managed to work his hands away, pulling them to his side in his horror, and staring down upon the thing that had been a boy not seconds before. Staring down upon the body, not any different from the ones sitting in the morgue, waiting for his attention. This body that used to be John Watson. Oh the most terrifying part of killing was that you couldn't take it back. Even when the doubt settled in, even when the shame began to materialize, and the ecstasy of it all began to fade. Sherlock felt a sudden panic build up in his bones, in his throat...coming out as a very quiet scream. He didn't know what to do, he knew nothing else than to suddenly prod at the body, the one that felt so still and so lifeless underneath him. The body that had just been squirming and kissing and sighing not moments before, now nothing more than a lifeless mass of flesh and bone. John was dead he was...that same boy that had been walking through the church, the same boy on the cover of the newspaper, dead by Sherlock's own hand! Sherlock pushed him once more, pushing him in the hopes that he might move back, that he might respond. Yet Sherlock knew the difference between dead and sleeping, he knew what to look for, what was missing. In the dead there was a lifelessness that can be seen even without checking for a heartbeat. It wasn't necessarily something you looked at; it was more something you felt. That feeling of being unmistakably alone, even if there was another human body in such close proximity.
"John?" Sherlock whispered, poking at John's skin, still warm... "John!" he repeated more desperately.
"My God, what have I done?" Sherlock hissed. "My God what...." He fell flat against John's corpse, wrapping his arms underneath his neck in an effort to hold the boy close, in an effort to keep what little he had left of this wonderful boy here on earth. "John...." Sherlock hissed. "JOHN!" he let out in a howl, breaking down into tears when the boy didn't respond back. When he didn't say a word, when his lips were parted yet silent, and all the blood that was still flowing was slowly leaking into his neck in the form of gigantic blue bruises. Sherlock hadn't felt such unmeasurable pain in all of his life; he hadn't before killed someone and instead felt as if he had lost his life as well. The world was a darker place; even now the moon seemed as if it had ceased to shine. There was blood on his hands, blood that now would never wash off, John's blood. That idiot boy, that wonderful boy...Sherlock wasn't his lover anymore, merely his murderer. He was a criminal, with John Watson's soul on his conscience. Oh how did Victor do it, how did he manage such heinous acts over and over again? It would take someone completely deprived of emotions...it would take a sociopath to do such hideous things repeatedly. Even now, with one heavy life upon his shoulders, Sherlock felt more crippled than ever before. He felt tarnished; he felt branded...he felt miserable. God, who knew it would be the exact moment his first victim died when he realized he really didn't have the capability of murder? Just because Victor talked of it as if it was so easy, doesn't mean that everyone had it within themselves to take a human life. A precious thing, a beautiful thing, that had once animated the living and now abandoned the dead. And it was Sherlock's fault, it was irreversible. Maybe that's what made it just so impossible to grasp...for he hadn't even realized the calamities of his own actions before he had completed them. He hadn't realized that one life was worth so much until he had treated it as a mere trinket. Just because he was familiar with death doesn't mean that he could suddenly take upon the role, just because he was comfortable with corpses didn't mean that he had it within himself to make them. Oh that strength which had been flowing through his veins had all since subsided, and Sherlock was left lying atop of John's bare, motionless chest, crying into his skin and wishing with every passing second that he might hear a heartbeat faintly inside of that chest. A heartbeat that might mean he could take it back, he could take it all back, and he could drag John Watson back to the world of the living just as easily as he had plummeted him into the world of the dead. Yet it was silent. 

 It was the first time that Sherlock had ever driven a car, and yet he knew that tonight's adventure would be the most important one of his life. Sherlock knew very briefly the rules of the road, and how there were constantly police out to enforce policies like staying in your lane and speeding and what not. Well, he of course understood that it would take one wrong move and one police man to pull him over to ruin his entire plan, and so Sherlock had to make sure he was extra careful while maneuvering through the lines of traffic, still heavy for even this time of night. John's body lay in the backseat, but Sherlock didn't want to look at it too closely. In fact, he didn't want to look at it all. There was no situation in which he could forget the crimes that lay to haunt him with a mere turn of his head, yet he wanted to at least let the pain work its way through his system, without any fresh developments. He regretted it, he regretted everything, that much was certain. Never before did Sherlock hate himself more than the moment after he realized the calamities of what he had done, never before did he think himself to be a proper killer, a proper sinner, until after he realized he had ridded the world of one of its most pure hearted souls. He had stolen John Watson from the world of the living; he had taken that beautiful boy and degraded him into something so meaningless! Well, meaningless only by Sherlock's standards. To Victor, well...Sherlock could only imagine that Victor saw death as a meaningful first step to any true romance. Sherlock shivered at the thought, for he felt no sort of passion for that corpse. He had loved the man, but not the flesh. He had loved the soul; he admired what made that body human, not merely that body. Oh he couldn't think of it, he couldn't even consider it! Yet he knew that perhaps Victor might think it would be funny to make him try. Victor liked to use people; he liked to make them uncomfortable for his own amusement. Perhaps bringing him John's body wasn't the smartest idea, for he might make Sherlock defile it... But then again, what other proof did Sherlock have? What could he say for Victor to believe that he had actually killed John, what could be more convincing than the body itself? It was necessary, that was for sure. Sherlock had to stop doubting himself, he had to remember the larger goal in this operation, the one reason he was here. It was for Victor, all of this was for Victor. Sherlock, John...well anyone else really, they didn't matter anymore! Sherlock was prepared to leave everything he loved; he was prepared to kill if he had to! His parents, his brother...anyone who might try to get in his way. Victor was his final destination; Victor was who he was meant to be with. And that idea gave him a new light, a fresh new motivation to preserver. When finally Sherlock made it to the parking lot of the morgue he found that he was the only car in the lot. That unsettled him greatly, for he had always rather assumed that Victor knew when he be here, and when not to be. In all honesty, Sherlock had just assumed that Victor lived at the morgue, for he seemed to be constantly there. Yet tonight it seemed as though Sherlock was alone, it seemed as though Victor hadn't known to show up to this meeting. All the same, there was nothing Sherlock could do about that. He couldn't contact the man, and yet he certainly couldn't leave John's body out here to rot in the backseat until Victor finally showed his face. Well of course John's body was destined for embalming, yet Sherlock had thought that might come after. He almost didn't want to do it alone. Then again, it seemed as though he might have to anyway. So Sherlock summoned all of his courage and pulled the car (to the best of his ability of course, he really didn't know how to control this thing very well) up to the doors and turned off the engine. He looked around the parking lot one last time, just to make sure there was no one hiding in the shadows with the sole purpose of witnessing his crimes.