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Papers fall into a heap on the floor, slide over each other, crumple under the pressure of yet more paper dumped unceremoniously on top of them.
The man is searching by flashlight. The room was messy enough to begin with; now what can be seen of it as the torch swings around is a rubbish tip of papers, printed, scrawled upon, white. The searcher mutters inaudibly as he checks through the last filing cabinet drawers before throwing their contents on top of everything else.
There isn't anything recognisable as a sound, but the flashlight swings around anyway, straight into the face of the second man in the doorway. He lifts a hand up, automatic, shielding his face from the strong light. For a moment nobody moves.
"You must be Mycroft Holmes." The searcher sounds delighted. Torchlight flickers down the neat black suit, lingers on gloved, empty hands, returns to the unperturbed face. "Fancy meeting you here."
"Jim Moriarty." The taller man's smile is the briefest of recognitions. "Not, then, dead."
"Not even a little bit dead." Moriarty laughs, stops abruptly. "Do you know where it is? I'm getting seriously bored with this."
"If I might?" Mycroft slowly slides a hand into his jacket's inside pocket, even more slowly brings out a slim black tube. "Illumination," he explains. Moriarty is still crouching in the darkness, shining the torch on him. The second torch sends a weaker, focused beam across the room, skimming over the mess.
"He won't have hidden it."
"So where the fuck is it!" The crouching man's temper is explosively lost. "I'll rip his fucking fingers off one by one if I have to."
"That is unlikely to be necessary." Mycroft's response is studied calm. "Locating the relevant paper is primarily a matter of deduction."
"Deduction." Moriarty laughs. "The family speciality. Do please demonstrate deduction for me then, Mr Holmes." Treat anticipated, his temper seems momentarily gone.
"Very well." Mycroft shines the torch around. "He received it in the post on Saturday."
"And you failed to intercept it then. Bad boy. Your peerage has just been downgraded to Brownie badge."
Mycroft looks very slightly embarrassed. "Circumstances," he says, vaguely.
"Where are your spies, then? Or do you enjoy getting your hands dirty occasionally?"
Mycroft waves a hand and the beam flickers across the back wall. "Sending people in to burgle my own brother is a little gauche."
"Not the reason." The light is back in Mycroft's face. He holds up a gloved hand.
"The intention, if you must know, was to ensure that Sherlock didn't find out that anyone had been here. None of my spies, as you put it, are that good." He glances around the devastated room. "Clearly you didn't have the same concern. And yet here you are in person."
Jim's face is in darkness but the amusement can be heard; "I thought that I'd poke around a bit. Leave a calling card or two."
"Horse head on the pillow, perhaps?" Mycroft enquires delicately.
"I was so tempted." Jim says, reflectively. "But they are awkward. Even Shetland ponies' heads are heavier than you'd imagine. I decided on something more portable in the end."
"Aha." Mycroft sniffs the air. "I did wonder. Rosemary, naturally. How Shakespearean."
"Deduction." Jim reminds him. "I want my paper."
"Indeed." The torch beam circles the chaos. "That heap of newspaper by the fireplace is considerably thicker than the Sunday Times. I would suggest that you are likely to find Saturday's paper underneath. Since that pile is relatively undisturbed it would seem that you have not looked there. Letters frequently get bundled up accidentally with newspapers, especially by people as untidy as Sherlock." The last spoken in a tone of mild despair.
Moriarty crosses to the grate, turns his torch onto the pile.
"Don't imagine" he says cheerfully, "that my attention isn't still on your fascinating self. Sherlock's brother; I imagine that must be a little wearing at times."
"A little, occasionally. Kind of you to care."
"Kind." Moriarty seems to be trying the word out. He is shaking each piece of newsprint carefully. He snatches at a torn envelope, rips the single folded sheet of paper out, smooths it out on his knee, torch shining on it.
"Wonderful!" He grins across at Mycroft, teeth gleaming in the near darkness. "I knew the dear boy wouldn't let me down. I'm inclined to let him live a little longer, just as a way of saying thank you. Or do you think he'd prefer flowers? So difficult to tell. Maybe a small bouquet and, say, a week. One doesn't want to be too effusive after all."
He smirks at Mycroft. "I would ask you to tell him for me. But we may not stay friends, I fear. This is where you demand the paper, I suppose." His eyes are bright.
"You may keep it. Your interest and those of my associates are tangential in this matter. I imagine that your primary interest lies in the acquisition of the relevant assets, while mine is concerned with the identities of the Government personnel referred to on that sheet."
Mycroft pulls- again, very slowly-a small camera from his pocket, sets several buttons, offers it to Moriarty. "If you would be so kind. A simple point and click will suffice."
Jim takes it, examines it carefully. Points it at Mycroft, presses the button. "Sweet smile."
He spreads the paper out on his knee, takes two shots, tosses it back. "Since we're being so nice to each other. Though," his grin is feral, "talking of being nice, I'm tempted to leave Sherlock a gift on the hearth rug. Like an affectionate house cat." A small gun has appeared in his right hand.
Mycroft coughs delicately, for his attention. "Observe. Marcus. You may draw attention to your awareness of the situation."
A low vibration, intermittent. A phone, somewhere in Mycroft's clothing. Moriarty's eyes widen theatrically.
"What clever people you government spooks are. I wish I'd thought of that. A phone call; so sophisticated. What can I do to top that?"
His grin is utterly satisfied. "Karl. Why don't you show the nice man that you're listening in too?"
The machine gun fire is close enough to shake the windows. Gunfire is returned, several shots, then the machine gun starts up again. Mycroft stands still, staring at the darkness outside, until a shot shatters the glass, sending fragments across the sea of paper. Then he moves, diving for the shelter of the sofa. Jim is already there. The shooting outside goes on for a further minute, stops.
"Isn't this entertaining!" Moriarty is laughing. "I wonder who's winning. How many did you start with?"
"You can't win." Mycroft's voice shakes very slightly. "It's not the police armed response unit out there. It's special forces with reinforcements minutes away. Your men are outnumbered and outgunned. There are civilians out there. Stop them killing each other, Moriarty."
"You don't like this!" Jim stares at him, incredulous. "Marcus. He's dead by now. How many of their names did you learn? Bits of them scattered by now over Baker Street, blood and body parts, because you called this wrong. At least have the decency to have a good time."
"You can walk out of here." Mycroft's hands are fluttering in the air. "Safe passage, you and your men. You're not worth a blood bath in central London."
"Wrong!" Jim is indignant. "I'm worth far more than a few trumped up soldiers and half a dozen bystanders. The real question is what Mycroft Holmes is worth, and to whom."
The two men are less than an arm's reach apart. Mycroft's torch has rolled out into the open, its thin beam blocked by the crumpled papers a few inches ahead. Jim's is still in his hand, the light flickering into Mycroft's face them around the room in a fast irregular pattern. The gun in his other hand is steady.
"Take off the wire." Jim's voice slides oddly upwards, just a hint of breathlessness.
Mycroft takes off his jacket, brushes it out in an automatic gesture before placing it on the floor, adds his tie. At the first attempt his fingers fumble the top shirt button; he tries again with better success, moves onto the next.
"What do you hope to achieve?" He sounds genuinely curious. "This is hardly a promising hostage situation. Anywhere you take me, you will be followed. You have your paper. Wiser to leave while you still can."
Moriarty doesn't reply. He is watching Mycroft's fingers in the torchlight, steady now as they pull button after button free. Silence inside the room and out; both gunfire and traffic noise have stopped.
Mycroft completes the last button, pulls both sides of his shirt open. The small transmitter is taped above his left nipple; the skin around it waxy smooth. Jim wedges the torch between his knees, reaches out and Mycroft hisses as the tape rips free.
"Any more little secrets hidden away?" Moriarty holds the wire up in the torch beam.
"Just the phone." Mycroft places it on the floor between them, still switched on.
"Maybe I ought to make quite sure. You could have something hidden anywhere."
Mycroft's voice turns clipped. "You know full well there's nothing else to find."
"Still, I might enjoy looking. Shall I tell you to strip?"
Mycroft sighs. "I am not my brother, Professor Moriarty, nor a substitute for him. Can we please keep this civilised?"
"Civilised? I have a gun, Mr Holmes. I think you'll find that exempts me from civilised behaviour." He tosses the wire at Mycroft. "Drop it out of the window."
Mycroft moves out from behind the sofa, hesitates. "There are snipers."
Moriarty snorts derision. "Sherlock would just have done it."
"My brother takes risks. I don't."
"No?"
A gunshot shatters the silence and Mycroft throws himself to the floor. JIm comes to stand over the face down man, a foot either side of his thighs, torch and gun both pointing straight down.
"Pick up the wire and drop it out of the window, Mr Holmes. If you would be so kind." He steps back.
Mycroft climbs to his feet slowly, wire dangling from one hand. "Tell your people not to fire."
"No." Moriarty sounds amused. "Grow some balls."
"I'm more concerned about losing some." Mycroft hesitates, pulls his shoulders back and walks swiftly to the broken window without looking down at the papers kicked away to either side. The beam followed him, flickers over the small device as it arches into the blackness. Mycroft has backed up again, fast and relieved. The response is almost instant; arc lighting from the buildings opposite shines in through the holes and the glass alike, making the torches redundant. Both men retreat rapidly into the shadows of the kitchen.
"Now the phone."
Mycroft sighs, theatrically. Picks up the phone and hurls it overarm and accurate across the room and through the jagged hole in the glass. "One of the benefits of a public school education," he comments.
"Latin, cricket and buggery." Jim sneers. "Still practising all three, are you?"
"The Latin's a little rusty." Mycroft seems considerably less disconcerted by the conversation than he had been by the possible snipers. He starts to button his shirt back up, then freezes as the gun barrel touches skin, his hands moving up and away, taking a step back against the cupboards.
Jim runs the barrel slowly down Mycroft's breastbone, into his soft stomach. "Your brother would have taken this away from me by now."
"Comparisons are invidious." Mycroft's breathing is faster. "Weapons really aren't my area of expertise."
"No. Sherlock would find this..." He pauses as the gun barrel crosses belt buckle, pokes into Mycroft's groin. "Invigorating. Clearly you don't."
"I'm very sorry to disappoint you. Maybe we should try this over some urgent drafts of White Papers instead."
"Oh, what a clever man you are." The gun is still below the belt. "Not as entertaining as your sibling, but playing with you could certainly pass some time."
"There are two sets of gunmen downstairs," Mycroft reminds him. "This standoff won't last indefinitely."
"Nor will I." Moriarty laughs for a long time at that, the gun wobbling slightly in his grip. A nauseous expression fleets across Mycroft's face before it returns to impassivity.
"If you are hoping to lure Sherlock here, you overestimate his abilities. Nobody will be allowed past the security cordon."
"Really? We had better go out and find him then." JIm steps back, his foot slipping as papers slide under it. He jerks sideways, rights himself again. Mycroft hasn't moved.
"Put your clothes on, Mr Holmes. We wouldn't want people to gossip."
Mycroft does up his shirt, slowly. "I'll need to talk to the commander about safe passage out."
"You really are a coward, aren't you? Not what I'd expected from Sherlock's genes. Are you sure that you weren't adopted?"
There is a little heat in Mycroft's reply. "Sherlock is not brave. He just doesn't care. I have things to live for."
"Do you?" Moriarty sounds curious. "Like what?"
"White Papers, naturally. And the occasional Green one." His voice has steadied again, dry and unemotional. "The commander? I really would prefer not to get shot at by my own side."
"You'll just have to risk it. I don't give advance warning of my movements."
"No need. You're too predictable altogether, Jim."
Both men turn to the doorway and the tall, slender figure standing in it. His hands are by his sides, open, turned towards them. Empty.
"Sherlock!" Annoyance in his brother's tone. "What exactly do you think you're doing?"
"Coming home." Sherlock walks into the arc-lit living room, looks around with exaggerated dismay. "It's going to take John ages to clear this mess up. I presume that one of you you did at least find it."
"l found it." Mycroft's tone is more terse than usual. "If you'd brought it to me in the first place this wouldn't have happened."
"It's not my responsibility to keep track of your traitors, Mycroft. Screen them better next time."
"Thank you for your advice." Mycroft is cold. "I trust that telling me how to do my job is not your only reason for being here."
"Need rescuing, brother?" Sherlock smiles at Moriarty, fast and conspiratorial. "This isn't really your territory, is it? No desk to hide behind. Maybe you'll remember that next time you decide to burgle my flat."
"For heaven's sake, Sherlock! Stop posturing for your psychopath friend and do something useful."
"What would you suggest?" Sherlock pushes heaps of paper off the armchair, sinks down into the cushions. "I don't work miracles. Jim's the one with the gun."
"So why are you here?" The words are bitten off; for the first time Mycroft sounds close to losing his temper. His back is still up against the cupboards, his hands near head height shake slightly.
Moriarty speaks for the first time since Sherlock's arrival, high and amused. The gun hasn't moved away from Mycroft at all. "He's jealous, of course. You and me, we could be having all sorts of fun up here and nothing exciting's allowed to happen without Sherlock Holmes there. Isn't that right?"
"Not in my own flat, certainly." Sherlock seems unperturbed by Jim's assessment of his motives.
Mycroft sighs briefly. "So you're not going to be any use, then. I can't say that I'm surprised." There is a hint of weary disdain in his voice.
Sherlock shrugs. "I'm aware that I'm always a disappointment to you, Mycroft. Please do carry on handling the situation as you see fit. I'll just sit here." He stretches out long legs, tips his head back, closes his eyes.
Mycroft's eyes flicker down to the muzzle of the gun, briefly, back to Moriarty's face. "What do you intend now?"
"i thought I'd watch you two bickering for a while longer. Family's always such a trial. But if you're quite sure that you've finished?"
"Quite," Mycroft says coldly.
"Well then. Due to your brother's inability to keep his nose out of trouble I appear to have a surfeit of Holmes'. I don't have any use for two of you." The gun comes up to sight between Mycroft's eyes and he begins to sweat.
A snort from the armchair. "A singular lack of imagination, then."
Moriarty grins, finger still wrapped around the trigger. "I thought that might get your attention. Your big brother seems uninterested in being appropriately entertaining."
"If your seduction technique is limited to thrusting your weapon into his crotch, I'm not surprised."
Jim frowns at that. "Do you think I should try flowers and chocolate?"
"I rather think that we can be a little more kink-specific. Isn't that right, Mycroft?"
Mycroft blinks sweat away from his eyes. "Sherlock." His voice is low, furious.
"Breaking into my home isn't working out so well for you, Mycroft?" Sherlock's eyes are still closed, his fingers pressed together low over the dark material of his buttoned jacket. " Never mind. Things are looking up. You're about to get the sort of good time that I know you enjoy."
"Sherlock!" That's a growl, startling from the previously controlled man. "You're not going to tell him anything!"
"On the contrary." Sherlock pushes himself smoothly to his feet, turns to face the two men. "I'm about to tell him everything."
Mycroft's eyes are closed, his head hard back against the cupboard door. Moriarty's grin is huge and delighted. "Tell me then."
Sherlock ducks briefly behind the sofa, comes up with Mycroft's tie. "You'll need two of these." He nods at Jim's narrow black silk tie. Outside the shooting starts again, machine gun fire ripping the night apart.
Jim shifts the gun between hands, pulls his tie loose. When the gunfire stops he asks "What now?"
Sherlock moves closer, tongue wetting his lower lip. "The first one goes around his eyes."
Moriarty hands the wider tie to its owner, who holds it between finger and thumb as if it were something long dead and corrupting. The gun barrel jerks and he jerks with it. One last venomous glare at his brother and he ties the fabric around his head, tugs the knot tight.
"Give him a little space."
Jim moves back a foot. "Now what?"
Sherlock starts to clap, slowly, rhythmically and Mycroft moves. Reluctantly at first, his face contorted in a mask of discomfort, but he moves. His feet shuffle around in a circle, his arms, first stiff against his thighs, come up and outwards, wave in time with the steady beat. Mycroft is dancing.
The beat accelerates, and so does the dancer. Muscles have loosened now; he rises onto his toes, the shuffle becomes a twirl. His fingers fan out as his arms sweep through the air. Moriarty is grinning. Sherlock is expressionless, clapping out the rhythm.
"Clothes, Mycroft," he calls out. Mycroft's feet don't falter as his fingers come back again to his top shirt button. This time there is no fumble. He pulls the shirt off with the elegance of a lap dancer, drapes it over the gas hob, sight unseen. Sweat trickles down his smooth white chest from his reddening face. A couple more gyrations and his hands are at his belt buckle.
The belt comes loose, is pulled free. Mycroft runs it through his hands as he dances, then deposits it on the worktop that he brushes against. His trousers sag a little around his waist. Moriarty's eyes have moved to his crotch, watches as it comes in and out of sight as the half naked man gyrates.
The beat increases. Sherlock, too, is watching his brother's hands. Fingers at the fly button, at the zip; Mycroft tugs it down as he faces away, turns back into sight with his arms outstretched and his trousers falling around his ankles.
Jim leans forward a little, his attention all on what was being revealed. Mycroft's right hand hits the mug tree which crashes to the floor, mugs splintering into china fragments. The gun jerks around to the source of the noise and Sherlock moves.
The gun goes off as Sherlock hits Moriarty from behind but Mycroft has thrown himself to the other side of the kitchen, is nowhere near the bullet. They use both ties and the belt to restrain Jim. Sherlock pulls the piece of paper out of the man's back pocket and then a phone out of his own, sends a text.
He tugs Mycroft behind the sofa with him. Mycroft is doing up his shirt again. There are guns, then they fall silent and the two men can talk.
"Dancing. Really, Sherlock. What were you thinking?" Mycroft appears to have regained his composure, but he is not amused.
"I knew you could do it. All those ballet lessons." Sherlock sounds smug.
"I hated ballet. As you know perfectly well."
"You did break into my flat." Sherlock appears unrepentant. "Count yourself fortunate. I did think of another half dozen far more interesting kinks to give you. The only reason I didn't was that you might not be able to handle too much external distraction."
He smiles at Mycroft. "What, or should I say whom were you thinking about anyway?"
Mycroft smooths his shirt down, picks up his jacket from the floor. "Younger brothers and boiling oil. I find it extremely stimulating."
"Fine. Be like that. I'll find out anyway." He pulls the crumpled paper out from his pocket. "This is of vital public importance then."
"Yes." Mycroft stretches out a hand.
"What was that game we used to play called?" Sherlock's hands were busy. "Oh yes. Go Fish." He stands up in the brilliant lights, casts the paper dart. It swoops downwards then up a couple of feet until its nose drops and it falls tumbling through the broken window.
Mycroft tuts. "You are so childish tonight, Sherlock."
"Is that 'Thank you little brother for saving my life?'"
"No. If you'd brought me the paper in the first place..." They barely pause in their mutual recriminations as the soldiers hustle them politely but urgently down the stairs. Only two remain, hands on their rifles, to watch Jim Moriarty, gagged, tied and motionless, lying on his back in the chaos of paper that covers the floor.