Walking Toward the End

"There's something I have to do."
"Let us help!"
"No. On my own."

My ceiling is dripping from the rain. No - it isn't rain. It's oil. My ceiling is burning. In the flames, a face emerges. Moriarty. Wait, sorry - Moriarty in a sombrero.
"Señor Moriarty says, fiesta!"
My heart pounds in my throat so hard I feel as if I'm choking. I faintly hear the heart monitor alert the nurse as Moriarty laughs at me through the ceiling. My forehead breaks out into a sweat from the heat, meanwhile my nurse comes in with the doctor.
"Heart rate increasing," Nurse Margaret says as the doctor places a hand on my forehead.
Can't they see the fire?
"Oh, honey," Moriarty says, "this is only the beginning."
"Her fever is coming back," the doctor orders, "give her anesthetic."
Nurse Margaret nods and adds it to my IV. She looks into my eyes and I saw an apologetic look. When the doctor looks away, she mouths words. I'm sorry.
As the room starts spinning, a fire in my stomach begins and nausea overcomes me. I hear John's aggravated screams, see a flash of him punching the wall, and my eyes close.

John and I step in to St. Bart's, where Sherlock is seated against a bench, bouncing a rubber ball against a cupboard.
"Got your message." John says.
"The computer code is key to this - if we find it we can use it, beat Moriarty at his own game."
"What d'you mean, use it?" John asks.
"He used it to create a false identity, so we can use it to break into the records and destroy Richard Brook."
I smile. "And bring back Jim Moriarty."
Sherlock stands up. "Somewhere in 221B, somewhere - on the day of the verdict - he left it hidden."
Sherlock turns and faces the bench, putting both hands on the work surface. John goes to stand beside him. I try not to laugh at the fact he unconsciously mimics Sherlock's stance.
"What did he touch?"
I sit on the other side of the counter, the cold seeping through my jeans.
"An apple, nothing else."
I note Sherlock's fingers drumming on the table. Him. He planted it on Sherlock.
"Did he write anything down?"
"No."
John hisses and looks away. He walks across the lab and lets out another breath.

Hours later, dawn is breaking. Sherlock is still in the same place, although he’s now sitting down with his feet up on the bench. He is rolling the rubber ball from side to side across the bench, his fingers flicking rapidly over the top of the ball. John is sleeping on a chair, head turned down. His phone rings, which he answers, groaning tiredly.
"Yeah, speaking."
He pauses and listens to the chatter on the other end. "What?"
He gets to his feet. "What happened? Is she okay?" Once again John pauses. "Oh my god. Right, yes, I'm coming."
"What is it?" Sherlock and I ask simultaneously.
"Paramedics. Mrs. Hudson - she's been shot."
"What? How?" Sherlock hardly looks surprised, not to mention worried.
"Well, probably one of those killers you managed to attract. Jesus. She's dying, you two. Let's go."
For a second, I had forgotten that I was there. Like I was only an onlooker. Like it is...a dream.
"Eveline?"
I struggle to wake fully. It feels as if someone had replaced my bones with rocks. I am sinking into the induced sleep, unable to swim back to the surface.

"You go. I'm busy."
I'm already halfway out the door, but I stop and stare at Sherlock.
"Busy?" John says, appalled.
"Thinking. I need to think." Sherlock's face is completely calm.
"You need to ...? Doesn't she mean anything to you? You once half killed a man because he laid a finger on her."
"She's my landlady."
"She's our friend, Sherlock!" I shout. "You can go on and pretend you don't need friends, that you're a sociopath who's fine being alone, but you need her, for god's sake!"
"Sod this. Sod this." John grabs his coat and begins to walk out as I hear Sherlock's words.
"Alone is what I have. Alone protects me."
"No, friends protect people." John says as he shuts the door.

John and I pull up to 221B and jump out, John scrambling for his keys. When we burst into the flat, Mrs. Hudson is overseeing the drilling in a wall. When she sees us, she gasps.
"Oh, God, John. Eveline. You made me jump."
"But..."
"Is everything alright with the police? Has Sherlock sorted it all out?"
"Oh my God."

Our taxi pulls up the opposite side of Saint Bart's. As we step out, John's phone gets a call.
"Hello?"
"John."
Sherlock's voice is calm. It is far too calm, to show he is trying to keep it that way.
"Hey, Sherlock, you okay?"
"Turn around and walk the way you came now."
"No, we're coming in."
Sherlock's reply comes frantic. "Just do as I ask! Please."
John goes back until Sherlock tells him to stop.
"Turn around. I'm on the rooftop."
I know what is going to happen. I see myself running into St. Bart's. Except I'm not. I have left my body. I don't mean in a figurative way. I am watching myself.
"Oh god." John mutters in horror.
"I...I can't come down, so we'll...we'll just have to do it like this."
"What's going on?"
"An apology. It's all true."
"Wh-what?"
John had described to me what Sherlock had said in his last moments - piece by piece. It is one thing listening to it being told; another is living it. I wave my hand in front of his face; he doesn't falter. I am invisible, only a whisper in the wind.
"I'm a fake." Sherlock's voice breaks.
"Sherlock..."
Sherlock's voice becomes tearful.
"The newspapers were right all along. I want you to tell Lestrade; I want you to tell Mrs Hudson, and Molly ... in fact, tell anyone who will listen to you that I created Moriarty for my own purposes."
Tears are filling my eyes and I choke back a sob.
"Okay, shut up, Sherlock, shut up. The first time we met ... the first time we met, you knew all about my sister, right?"
"Nobody could be that clever."
"You could." I mutter with John.
Sherlock laughs a little. "I researched you. Before we met I discovered everything that I could to impress you. It's a trick. It's just a magic trick."
Before he was using past tense, but suddenly he switches to present.
John closes his eyes and shakes his head. "No. All right, stop it now."
My throat dries and I take a shaky breath, clutching the hem of my sleeves to steady my hands.
"Keep your eyes fixed on me. Can you do this for me? Please."
"This phone call- it's, er- it's my note. That's what people do, isn't it? Leave a note?"
"Leave a note when?"
"Goodbye, John."
I know I am dreaming now. I try to wake up. I have to. I can't bear to see this again.
My attempts are useless and I stand, frozen in panic and horror, as Sherlock spreads his arms and falls.

"Eveline? Can you hear me?"
The stones are back on my eyelids. I force my head to nod as it feels like I'm moving through syrup.
I hear a sigh of relief. "What happened?"
John.
"We're not sure," Nurse Margaret replied. "Her fever spiked again, we had to give her meds, so she's bound to be tired. Let her rest, please."
The door shuts and I struggle to stay conscious.
"You've been out for almost twenty-four hours."
I slit open my heavy eyes. Early morning light seeps through the window shades. My brain is a puddle of my dreams and things I think I'm seeing. John is spinning and Sherlock is falling through the roof. I try to respond; my throat constricts. My ears ring and Moriarty sings Highway to Hell. A screech burns my ears and
I.
Can't.
Think.