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His mobile rang at 3:12. He was not sleeping, of course. He was lying on his back on the sofa, staring up at the ceiling, and he reached out a hand without looking and pulled the mobile over to him.
John.
He answered with, “Hello?”
“I have a five-minute-old daughter,” said John. He sounded both exhausted and delighted.
Sherlock said, “Congratulations,” and ended the call.
Then he texted Mycroft.
Baby Girl Watson go.
Then he rolled himself off the sofa.
***
The hospital at 4:00 in the morning was quieter than it was at midday but louder than most other places at 4:00 in the morning. Sherlock swept through the corridors confidently, knowing exactly where he was going because this had all been planned down to the last millisecond. One could not be too careful, after all.
John was pacing around the little room when Sherlock finally reached it. He looked a mess, anxious and tense, his hair a wreck from his hands being torn through it dozens of times. His clothing was limp and wrinkled and his eyes were red-rimmed and heavy-lidded, although he seemed to be thrumming with energy.
“Where’s Mycroft?” John asked, as soon as he walked in. “Have you seen him?”
“Not yet,” said Sherlock, and he said it very evenly and pretended he hadn’t just smoked two cigarettes in quick succession to calm himself down. “Don’t worry, he’s taking care of everything. It’s what he does, isn’t it?”
John kept pacing and said, “They told Mary the birth was stressful and they needed to give the baby more oxygen, just as they were meant to. So the baby’s exactly where she’s supposed to be right now. But I didn’t think it would take this long for Mycroft to—”
“John,” Sherlock interrupted, steadily. “Show me your daughter.”
“Right,” John said, and blew out a long breath. “Right.”
Sherlock followed John down the corridor, looking over his shoulder as they went and making sure everything was in place, everything was as it should have been, as they had been told. As expected, they had to walk straight past Mary’s room. As expected, a nurse was standing directly in front of it, keeping watch.
John seemed to be registering none of the many pieces of the plan falling into place around him, and Sherlock hated to ever be grateful for Mycroft but he nonetheless was, since clearly John was going to be of little assistance.
John walked straight into the neonatal ward, confident of his path through the incubators to the right one, which was identified as WATSON, BABY GIRL. John nudged the soft pink covering blanket out of the way so they could see inside.
“There she is,” John said, and the tone of his voice was so proud that Sherlock almost felt as if he had to be sure to display proper humility at encountering such a creature as this baby.
So Sherlock braced himself and searched his brain to make sure he would have the right response to give to a brand new father who was clearly already besotted and proud and awed. “She’s…” began Sherlock, searching for the proper adjective. She was swaddled in pink blankets and Sherlock was having a hard time seeing anything to comment on other than, frankly, “pink.” Then the little bundle of pink moved, as if aware of her audience, and out of the blankets she poked a tiny arm with a tiny hand with five tiny fingers. Sherlock ducked his head closer to the incubator and said, astonished, “She is a miniature person,” startled by the sudden truth of that. And then wondered if that had been entirely the wrong thing to say.
John at least sounded amused when he answered. “What did you think she was going to be?”
Sherlock straightened away from the incubator, and John’s daughter stopped squirming, settled herself, sleeping obliviously. Sherlock heard himself saying, “How do any of us ever survive being that small?”
“We don’t do it alone,” John replied.
“Dr. Watson,” said Mycroft, grandly, from the doorway to the neonatal ward.
Sherlock glanced away from John’s daughter long enough to register that Mycroft was looking smug, which was good.
Mycroft made a little motion with his hand, gesturing to one of the nurses, and said to John, “Congratulations.”
“Is it—” began John, and then the nurse walked over to the incubator and carefully removed John’s tiny daughter, and John automatically held out his arms for her, as if he’d already been doing it all of his life. He held his daughter in his arms and looked down at her with reverent adoration and Sherlock thought how he’d die all over again just to get to live this particular moment again.
“Take your daughter, Dr. Watson,” said Mycroft, his manner business-like, clearly unaffected by the tableau of father-and-child, “and follow Anthea to the car.”
John tore his gaze away from the baby long enough to look up at Mycroft. “It’s safe?”
“Perfectly. Sherlock and I will reunite with you within the hour.”
John hesitated, glanced over at Sherlock.
Sherlock said, “He’s right. It’s going to be fine. I’ll see both of you very soon.”
John nodded, tucked his baby more closely against him, and turned toward Anthea, who stepped forward with her typical clicking heels and said, with a quick smile, “Congratulations, Dr. Watson.”
“Thank you,” said John, almost absently, his mind clearly on other things.
Sherlock followed them out of the neonatal ward and stood next to Mycroft, watching Anthea and John and his child walk down the corridor until they turned the corner. Then he looked at Mycroft.
“I can handle this,” Mycroft said.
“No, you won’t,” Sherlock snarled. “She tried to kill me. I’m handling this.”
“If you could keep it professional—” Mycroft began, sounding like he knew the futility of it.
“You get John and his baby safe, I’ll handle Mary,” said Sherlock, and marched down the hallway. Neither Mycroft nor his nurse-agent made any move to stop him when he walked into Mary’s room.
If Mary had been sleeping when he entered, she was wide awake by the time he crossed the room to her bed. World-class assassin habits died hard, Sherlock supposed. He sat in the chair next to her bed and stretched out his legs and smiled at her. She looked back at him warily.
“Doesn’t this bring back fond memories?” Sherlock asked. “You and me in a hospital room together?”
“Where’s John?” asked Mary, already suspicious.
Sherlock didn’t blame her for that, of course. Sherlock had expected that. Clever Mary, who had almost played every single one of them for fools at a terrible cost. “You’re much more alert than I was the last time we were in a hospital room together. You remember that, don’t you? You tried very hard to kill me and then you threatened me whilst I was still mostly unconscious?”
Mary looked at him coldly, her eyes hard. Sherlock tried to remember how her eyes had looked when she’d shot him, but found he couldn’t. There were gaps in his memory around that gunshot wound. John had said that wasn’t unusual. “Where’s my daughter?” said Mary.
“Ah,” said Sherlock. “You are under the impression that you gave birth here today, but you’ll find on the official records that that is incorrect. In fact, you have no daughter.”
Mary’s hands balled into fists. Sherlock looked at them. She spoke through her teeth when she said, “What do you think you’re doing?”
“You ought to stay calm,” Sherlock said, languidly. “This room is surrounded by highly-trained operatives right now. Ones who, I imagine, could challenge even you, weakened as you are at the moment. Every once in a while, my brother does hire effective people. So I don’t think you’ll get away with killing me this time.”
“Where’s John?” Mary demanded. “What did you say to him?”
“Nothing. You said everything he needed to know. When you pulled the trigger on me.”
“You told him that I saved your life—”
“John has never been an idiot, Mary, despite what you seemed to think. He’s a doctor. He found me immediately after you shot me and he was in the ambulance with me and he stayed at the hospital until I pulled through. He knew exactly how serious the injury was. When I said you saved my life, I wasn’t saying it for his benefit. I was saying it for your benefit. To make sure that you would let your guard down enough to stay. To make sure that you might actually believe that you could get away with it. Because, at the time, you had the one thing that would protect you from the full wrath that should have descended upon you for your near-murder of Sherlock Holmes: You had John Watson’s baby. And, luckily for you, I love John enough not to risk taking someone he loves away from him.”
“He loves me,” said Mary, her breath quickening. Her eyes were wide, and Sherlock could see frantic thoughts behind them. She was starting to panic, he thought.
“He loves his child. And to make sure he got his child, he had to make sure he kept you, for at least a little while. So he forgave you everything. And you thought, ‘Oh, this silly, naïve man I’ve chosen, with his too-large heart and his too-generous spirit.’ You’re a bit right about that. But that, of course, is why he has me.”
“What is it that you want?” Mary demanded, her voice low and furious.
“I don’t want anything,” said Sherlock, lightly, rising to his feet and dramatically pulling his gloves on. “John and the baby that you didn’t give birth to today have been moved to a safe and secure location, away from here and away from you. And what you will do, upon your discharge from this hospital, is go far away from here and far away from them. You will never try to contact them, you will never try to see them, you will never come anywhere near them. It would be preferable if you never even think of them. We will know where you are, and we will know what you are doing, and, if I were you, I would never come back to this continent. You are not the only person willing to kill for John Watson. You never have been. That was your fatal mistake.”
“And that’s it? You think I’ll just let you steal my child from me—”
“I know you will. Because if you don’t do as I say, I will use all of the evidence I have to send you to prison for the rest of your life. The real evidence. Not that rubbish you put on that memory stick to try and trick John. Your daughter will know exactly who you are. A choice you will never make, because in the end you will be selfish, and you will take your freedom over your daughter.”
Mary stared at him, and her eyes were icy with hate but she did not contradict him.
“Cheer up, Mary,” said Sherlock. “This is exactly what you wanted. A fresh start somewhere where nobody knows who you are.” Sherlock turned to walk back to the door.
“And you’ll be able to live with yourself, will you?” Mary shouted after him. “Stealing an innocent baby from her mother?”
Sherlock paused and glanced over his shoulder. “The files on me will tell you I’m a sociopath. Are you seeing it now?”
***
John was in a cozy library, a fire dancing in the fireplace, sitting in an armchair and staring down at the tiny infant in his arms. He looked up as soon as Sherlock walked into the room, and his face was lit with love, with joy, with euphoria. Sherlock closed the door behind him and thought of the things he would do to put a look like that on John Watson’s face.
“She’s sleeping,” John said, his voice low.
Sherlock walked into the room and said, “Has life already exhausted her that much?”
John smiled up at him, looking so happy that it hurt Sherlock to look directly at him, like looking into the sun. “She’s a kindred spirit for you, Sherlock: she already finds all the little humans on this planet too dull for contemplation.”
Sherlock acknowledged the joke with a twitch of a smile and looked between John and his daughter.
John looked up at him solemnly and said, “Is it done?”
Sherlock nodded once. “Yes.”
John took a deep breath and glanced back down at his slumbering daughter. “This is a nice place. Country estate?”
“Borrowing it for a while.”
“Do the owners know we’re here?”
“The owners are abroad, dodging allegations of tax evasion.”
“Of course they are.”
There was a brief knock on the door, and they both glanced over at Mycroft as he entered.
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” Mycroft said, looking surprisingly genuinely apologetic. “John, there’s a great deal of paperwork that needs to be completed. It could wait, but—”
“Would it be safer for her if I did it now?”
Mycroft nodded briefly. “The sooner, the better.”
John stood and turned to Sherlock and said, “Hold out your arms.”
Sherlock almost stumbled backwards with the force of his alarm. “I don’t—”
“You’re going to have to do it sooner or later.”
“Am I?” asked Sherlock, dubiously.
“Don’t be such a coward,” said Mycroft, his voice dripping amusement.
“I don’t see you holding any babies,” Sherlock glowered in his direction, and then looked at John.
John, who had asked him to help him save this child. Had asked if he would forego vengeance, help with a plan to keep Mary nearby until the child could be secured, worried that a frightened woman with Mary’s skill set would bolt and disappear forever, baby and all. And Sherlock had agreed, of course, and had told Mycroft that he was to do nothing that might risk harming John Watson’s child. And so instead they had, the three of them, concocted a plan that had led to this moment, all to give this daughter to this father.
John, for whom this child was already clearly the most precious thing on the planet. And John had, almost from the very beginning, somehow decided to trust Sherlock with the task of protecting her. And was still trusting him.
Sherlock swallowed and obeyed John’s directive. John transferred the baby carefully, until she was fully in Sherlock’s arms. She was so light that Sherlock wasn’t sure most of her weight wasn’t blankets.
“Don’t drop her,” said Mycroft, dryly.
“You’ll be fine,” John said. “I’ll be right back.”
And then he left Sherlock alone in the room with a newborn.
Sherlock held her carefully, not daring to move, and looked out the window, because it made him nervous to look down at her. Dawn was arriving, creeping through a foggy haze. Sherlock could start to make out the silhouettes of trees on the grounds.
The baby in his arms began to wriggle and make tiny noises. Sherlock looked down at her fearfully.
“Don’t move,” he hissed. “I don’t actually know how to hold you.”
The baby began to cry, staccato wails that horrified Sherlock. John was going to hear his daughter cry and know that Sherlock had caused it.
“Shh,” he said, desperately. “I didn’t mean that. Of course I know how to hold you. I’m not going to drop you. Don’t cry, there isn’t anything to cry about.”
Miraculously, the baby lost interest in crying in favour of looking up at him in fascination, as if she had just realized that he might be something of interest. It was the first time Sherlock had seen her eyes open, the first time he had really looked at her. It was impossible, he thought, to tell what she looked like; the features on her red face were laughably tiny. But the eyes looking up at him were, in Sherlock’s judgment, John’s eyes. Sherlock knew John’s eyes well enough that he dreamed of them, and there they were, in flawless miniature, gazing up at him with perfect and complete and unerring trust.
Sherlock was shocked to realize that he was in danger of crying, after he had just begged John’s daughter not to do so. But he was standing here, holding a warm and solid miracle that John Watson had created, and it did not matter where the other half of her had come from, because she was John’s, so fully and utterly John’s that Sherlock felt staggered by it. Sunlight crept into the room, gold tendrils curling in and causing the fuzz of fair hair on the baby’s head to glow as it caught the light, and Sherlock Holmes stood with a baby in his arms and fell in love for the second time in his life.
When the door opened, Sherlock almost turned away from it in an automatic reaction, because surely the fact that he was a sudden emotional wreck was going to be obvious. But instead of turning away he looked up, for some insane reason, and luckily it was only John in the room, who closed the door and smiled at him and said nothing about Sherlock being presently a puddle at his daughter’s feet.
“You didn’t drop her,” he remarked.
“John,” said Sherlock, gravely, seriously. “She is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”
John kept smiling as he walked over to the two of them and looked down at the baby, whose wide-open eyes never left Sherlock’s face.
He said, after a moment, “So what do you think?”
“About?” asked Sherlock, confused.
“Do you think we’ll be able to raise a little girl?”
Sherlock felt his heart stop beating, although it felt curiously unlike being shot. “We?”
“Of course ‘we.’ It’s always ‘we,’ isn’t it? Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson.”
Sherlock swallowed past emotion stuck in his throat and wondered what had got into him. He looked down at the baby in his arms, eyes closed now, and felt the presence of John by his side and cautiously opened a door of his future that he had been standing fretfully by forever, terrified he would never quite have the key. “And baby,” he added, and was pleased that he sounded perfectly normal and not at all like he was going to walk out of the room and possibly sob because he was falling to embarrassing pieces.
“She’s going to need a name,” said John. “Any suggestions on that front? ‘Sherlock’ doesn’t count. ”
The baby in his arms yawned and slept as if she could think of no place safer in the world than where she was. Sherlock held her and stared at her and said, “I’ve always been partial to Olivia.”