Work Text:
"....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 dying!"
I wait in silence.
"You... machine."
At last, you're gone.
I should be moving, follow my plan, and yet, for a span of an endless second, I cannot. Something is off.
I needed you to go. If Moriarty is going to exploit the one thing I am rumoured not to have, I cannot keep you in the crosshair of a waiting assassin.
And yet, some irrational part of me expected you to see right through it. You've said so yourself, you've seen me beat a man for touching her, you've witnessed me throwing a man out of a window for the mere offence of holding a gun to her temple, how could you for a moment think–
Apparently, you could. You are my friend, my only friend, and still you think I would be capable of such thoughtlessness.
Eighteen months together and yet you think so little of me. It's true I am not the conventional friend. I don't remember the names of your girlfriends. I do remember though what kind of beer you prefer after you break up. I never ask you how your day was. But I know the exact number of boring patients it takes for your limp to return for the evening. You keep saying we are not intimate. But intimacy isn't about who you sleep with. It's about who you wake up for.
Maybe I am a machine. Machines don't feel pain. Then why am I–
I guess it comes with the friendship. For the longest time, I've seen our relationship as the improvement of my work, the fine machinery of my brain working faster, smoother, better with you around.
Now it feels like the grit in the gears.
It's probably for the best. You've lifted a great weight from my– from the thing I am not supposed to have. When I first started plotting out this plan, I admit I was worried for you. Now I am relieved.
You'll be fine. People don't grieve the machines, do they?