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Who: Sherlock Holmes and Jim Moriarty
What: The Final Problem
When: August 10th, 9:00 PM
Where: Community House 2, Room 21
Summary:
Rating: PG-13
This time, when Moriarty comes, it is under invitation from Sherlock Holmes.

The flat is done up so closely to Baker Street that one might, for a moment, think that Luceti was but a dream. But, no, it's quite real.

Sherlock stands at the window, watching the man approach from outside and turning only halfway when he hears the door open.

"Thank you," the politeness seems almost genuine, "for coming."

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James hummed aimlessly, pushing the door closed with the edge of his fingers. Instantly his eyes were rolling about the apartment; taking in every inch. This obviously wasn't a social call - this was Sherlock Holmes - nothing was ever so bloody simple.

A minute shrug of his shoulders and tilt of his head and Moriarty could almost seem human and kind. "No trouble. No trouble at all."

Everything was so boring after all.

It looks like a social call on first glance. Tea had been set out, two cups newly fixed. There's still steam rising from them, even. The two chairs-- his and John's-- are turned toward each other, a little table in the centre.

It holds the saucers, cups... and a vintage chess set.

He turns about fully, waving a long at the chairs and board.

"I thought we might play a game."

It's honestly playing out like deja vu and James sighs, wants to roll his eyes but decides against it in favor of feigning interest. His tone peaks as he drifts forward, neck jutting forward to peek at the set-up. Just like old times, even though it wasn't that long ago that they did this. Sat in these chairs - not the same but the people that sat in them were so it still counts - and had a little heart to heart.

He smirks.

"What kind of game, Sherly darling?" He says it just to grate the detective. See how hard he was trying to avoid wringing Moriarty's neck before the perfect moment. Or how close he was to giving up. Either or, he would take one.

Perhaps it's a triumph. Or perhaps it ought to be cause for concern.

The detective barely reacts. He goes over to the chess board and takes something out of his pocket. Sherlock seems, in a way, a thousand miles away, mentally.

There's no air of the showman or arrogance. This is simple determination. A course has been charted, and he is following it to its inevitable destination. In a way, he's almost resigned.

"It's been done before, but... you do have the tendency to repeat yourself." Subtle dig, hardly meant. He's barely trying to sound like himself. "I thought you might appreciate it."

And he fishes something from his pocket. He'd found them at the same time he'd found his skull-- absent. It's been given away.

He sets down two items on the chess board. Two little glass bottles with screw-on tops and a pill in each. The pills-- capsules-- have obviously been tampered with. Their edging is rough from being pried open and forced back together, and they're white powder inside, rather than red and white balls.

"A game of chance."

He sees it. The subtle difference between them are staggering now and while Sherlock walks, talks and acts like himself he is not Moriarty's mirror. Not right now.

It's confusing instead of alarming and intriguing because of the fact that he doesn't know what to make of this. But when the bottles are set down he can't help but grin because it's so sweet that he knew it was him and not the taxi driver. The motivation was in the man but not the creativity. While imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, James knows this game is going to be different. And exciting.

He sits in one of the chairs, ignoring the tea (he knew it would taste like crap) in favor of the bottles. Moriarty does not touch them but his eyes never leave the one in front of him. He's hooked.

"Attempting to bring it full-circle, Sherlock?"

"It makes for the better story."

Sherlock settles himself in the old-fashioned chair. John's chair.

For only a second, he closes his eyes. He can see the man now-- a deep frown, eyes narrowed in a challenge. Silent, though. Holding his tongue. Because he won't rebuke him in front of someone else. Least of all Moriarty.

"That's what you do, isn't it? Risking your life to prove your clever."
"Why would I do that?"
"Because you're an idiot."

"To bring back the beginning for the ending."

His eyes open.

"Touching."

His voice is hollow. And there's some kind of endless intelligence in his eyes that leaps at the chance to do something dangerous. He always laughed when Sherlock jumped in front of the metaphorical bullet to prove he was the smartest, that he knew everything. Wasn't that was James was about to participate in? But who was he validating? Himself or Holmes?

The winner would find out, wouldn't they.

"Very well, let's play," he says it and the words fall flat. He isn't paying attention to how he should sound and instead focuses on the game. Deriving what he knows of Sherlock and what Sherlock knows of him to come to a conclusion. This is fun.

While he waits, Sherlock begins picking at the chess set. It's simplistic. Maybe it's meant to be an irritant that throws Moriarty off, like the cabbie's persistent commentary. Perhaps it's a streak of melodrama. Either way, by the time he's done, two pieces are left on the board.

The black king and the white king.

He isn't looking at either bottle. His fingers haven't given a nervous twitch toward one or the other, either as a bluff or double-bluff. He is leaving the choice wholly up to Moriarty.

"No sniper. No soldier. No aces. No proxies."

There's almost a note of satisfaction in his voice.

"Just us. Like it should be."

"It's always been just us, Sherlock."

And it's true. They've only ever been on their own playing field. It was like the world operated in multi-leveled chess boards with the mere mortals always one or two boards down and them at the very top circling one another.

Tonight it was just simplified down to them. It was a lot more peaceful.

"You're too easily distracted," a simple commentary.

The white rook. The black bishop. The white knight. The black pawn.

He can assign a name and a face to every piece on the chess board, and it's the white queen he doesn't set down immediately once the rest have been put away. That particular piece, he turns over in his hand.

A piece some chess players sacrificed at will and others protected fiercely, nearly as much as the king.

He was of the latter school of thought.

Perhaps that was one difference between him and Moriarty. There weren't many that really mattered.

But the queen was just a piece from the chessboard. Here, in Luceti, there were only the kings, and they could battle as they would. Lestrade and Molly were here. Dr Brennan, too. And, yes, they had to be protected. But this would be ample to protect them.

Even if he only bought them one week.

"It's in your hands, not mine. One potassium cyanide, one sugar. I'll take whichever you don't. A very simple game-- hardly requires my concentration."

The smile that curves on his face is simpering and his head lolls back with a grunt of: "Good God you're a frustrating one Sherlock."

His face slumps back into view, still calculating and playing the game - but there's no reason they can't talk while they play is there?

"Always leading me on, letting me think you understand." You'd think he was talking about a date or something typical with the phrases he uses. But he trusts Sherlock to read the fine print.

"Terribly rude." James clicked his tongue, and went reaching - for a moment it looked as if he were going toward the bottle in front of Sherlock - but his hand altered course toward a cup of tea.

He sets the white queen on the table, not in the box with the rest. Sentiment. The same thing that made him hesitate on the roof. Always sentiment.

"Caring is not an advantage."
How true, big brother. How true.

But, then. He picks up the black queen and sets it down between the two bottles. He meets Moriarty's eyes, his pale ones calm and steady. It's a challenge.

"I do understand."

The instant the base of the queen touches the board, James fixes it with such a look it's a wonder the piece doesn't spontaneously combust. "Do you?"

There is heat in his voice now. Hate. His ever-searching glare does not waver from Sherlock's as he dumps sugar into his tea.

"Do you really?"

Sherlock shrugs his shoulders. Moriarty had played this game often enough with him: find the buttons, push liberally.

This was payback.

The consulting detective says nothing as he takes something else out of his pocket. A silver chain made up of little balls, with two circles the size of coins dangling down. There's something engraved on them, but even the distance between the two chairs makes that illegible.

It's a bluff, but his face remains completely impassive.

"I think so, yes."

His jaw works back and forth while the chain swings. It's familiar and another cube of refined sugar goes into his tea.

Moriarty sits back into his chair. Waits a moment. In this second not a part of him moves; he does not breath, he does not twitch. Nothing.

"There are times that I think so too." In speaking, he gives Sherlock an answer to his bluff.

Another lump of sugar

"Play the game," he says, coiling the chain around his fingers to close his hand around the tags, "and they're yours."

It was theatrical, but he would have sworn he felt the tags in his hand burning, the name on them-- John Watson-- leaving a scar on his flesh. They were the one personal item that had stayed. That hadn't vanished with John.

His jaw hurt just thinking about the punch he'd get if John knew how he was using them.

"If you win."

And you can't win.

"Oh, Sherlock. What makes you think I even want your little bauble, hm?"

He shakes his head. Acting for all the world as if Sherlock was being completely idiotic. His gaze dips down to his tea - really now starting to be more of a sludge than anything.

"Complicating things again, darling."

After all, winning meant being alive with his opposite dead. But for how long....a week? Then they'd just be doing this again. God that would get boring quickly.

"But, then again, you always did hate simplicity didn't you?"

"A week is a long time for people like us." He answers the implication, rather than the statement.

He could accomplish things in a week, he knew, that John couldn't have managed in a month. And John, at least, was fairly capable. Compared to someone truly average? A week for him or for James Moriarty was like a year.

Without another word, he puts the dogtags in his pocket, as if to say, Well, if you don't want them...

He hummed his response, neither confirming nor denying the fact that without an almost constant stream of stimulation - they might die of boredom. The thought brought a smile to his lips and he set his tea down.

"What would you do without me?"

And vice versa. James wasn't tired...just fed up. This game might be worth it after all. But he had no evidence of how good his odds were. If he chose wrong, would he die? Would he come back? Or be gone forever?

"Why don't we find out?"

It's not even a challenge. In a way, it's a confession. He doesn't know. He can't imagine not having Moriarty, not having that fight and that challenge. Not spending his nights looking at every little thing and wondering where it fell in the grand scheme. Not going over journals or newspapers. Or whatever he had to look through to find out what Moriarty's next move was. His life would be strangely quiet.

Quieter still when John isn't here.

Which puts the fire in Sherlock's pale eyes. The reckless, careless fire. That puts the thought in his head. That makes him smile just a little.

I have nothing left to lose.

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