The Choices Made (Adlock)
Set at the end of The Reichenbach Fall
Motherhood had never been part of the Womanâs plan.
For most of her life, she had been focused on survival and domination, and she had pursued both with a reckless frivolity that burned everyone in her path. None of these things were conducive to raising a child.
Her first discovery of the new little parasite she was incubating was not a joyous moment, as it was for some women.Â
Her initial reaction was of shock, because she had always been very careful. Meticulous to the point of obsession. Though her work as a dominatrix never involved actual sexual intercourse, sheâd had her own set of lovers, both male and female, prior to her acquaintance with a certain consulting detective, and protection was paramount to her.
It must be a mistake. A false positive.
But before the opportunity to analyze how, and which, bout of sexual activity with said detective â it had to be Sherlockâs; all her other recent lovers had been female â had resulted in this little inconvenience, the dread settled in.Â
It was not dissimilar to a wall of rain come crashing suddenly down on her head, invoking a long-forgotten childhood memory of watching little cartoon figures with black clouds above their heads.
Dear God, she was thinking of cartoons. It was already starting.
She drew a deep breath. That felt a little better.Â
Perhaps this was not the black cloud she was imagining it to be. Hell, she wasnât even sure if she really was pregnant.
The dread lifted somewhat, eased by practical thought into a small niggling at the back of her head that could be easily ignored. Tomorrow, she would go to the doctor. Just to make sure.
Tomorrow, however, did not bring the fair weather report she had been expecting.
The moment the doctor walked in with the results, she had known even before the other woman had opened her mouth.
The Woman held up a hand. She didnât even want to hear it. The dread, which until then had been at the back of her mind, came to the foreground and threatened to take over.
But she was the Woman. She was not given to emotion or sentiment. She had already allowed emotion to take over once, and look where that had gotten her â sitting in a clinic with a foolishly smiling doctor offering her congratulations.
Her brain immediately went into damage control, as it always did when confronted with a crisis. Find the root of the problem, and fix it.Â
She quickly went over her upcoming calendar in her mind, and without letting the doctor start a spiel on â God, she didnât even want to use the word â pregnancy and pre-natal care, she cut the doctor off with a cold, professional hand and set up an appointment.
The doctor tried to argue, to offer other options, but she was stopped by the calm look on the Womanâs face. There was no confusion, emotional turmoil or hysteria there. Only calm decisiveness. She had made her choice.
The appointment was made.
There were no major changes to the Womanâs routine. At least not at first. No specific alterations or concessions made for the developing creature inside her, except maybe her morning routine was altered to compensate for the absolutely horrid morning sickness.
Then the âmorningâ sickness turned into âmorning to noonâ sickness. But still, it wasnât that bad. She had always been good at concealing physical ailments. And tea helped.
But when it quickly became âthe whole fucking dayâ sickness, she had to admit, it was harder to conceal. The tea, which was now unpalatable, no longer helped. She had to scale down on her clients, and cancel various appointments because now she just felt violently ill all the time.
She abhorred it. The wretched nausea, the sweating, the heaving and dry-heaving, the dizzy spells and light-headedness, the weakness. It was all so distasteful, especially for someone who had been so meticulous about her body, and so immaculate in appearance.Â
Pain she could handle â she was a dominatrix, after all; pain was her bread and butter â but this prolonged, ever-present discomfort was threatening to undo her. That, and the lack of control over her own body, which before had been a beautiful weapon for her.
Still, she took comfort in the fact that this would all be over soon, and she could return to her normal (if it could be called that) life.
Three days before her appointment, an article appeared on the British news website she frequently monitored.Â
It was accompanied by a photograph of a man in a dark Belstaff coat and a blue scarf lying on the street, face intentionally obscured to spare the readers the manâs gruesome, bloody death. But even through the blurring, the vivid red bloodstains on the manâs face and on the street he had landed on were evident.
The bile that she had been suppressing all day rose to the back of her throat, and she had to look away to keep from being sick.Â
She slammed the laptop shut and tried to breathe.
It took her several long, shaky minutes, but the nausea eventually subsided. Enough, at least, for her to be able to pick up the phone and place some calls. Half an hour later, she was feeling slightly better (physically, anyway), the story was confirmed, and she received an unobscured copy of the photograph.
The nausea threatened to come up again, but she tamped it down with a deep breath, and analyzed the picture as logically and impartially as possible.
The blood was real, and though there was no way to be sure until her contacts at the morgue confirmed it, she would venture a guess and say that it was his. The face, covered as it was with blood, closely resembled his as well.Â
But she, of all people, knew how easy it was to fool someone with a pretty face.
And she had seen his work, too. She had seen the cleverly-edited video of her own âexecutionâ that had made its way into Mycroft Holmesâs hands. As loathe as she was to admit it, if she wasnât alive and whole â and now currently carrying evidence inside her body that would absolutely refute her death in Karachi â she probably would have been fooled by it too if it had been her.
It couldnât be. He was too clever, too good of an opponent to die. True, he had a certain self-destructive streak, but there was no way someone as arrogant as he was would ever commit suicide. And certainly not for something they both knew was a lie.
That thought helped her calm down and settled her nerves.
All she had to do now was wait for the video to prove it.
Fifteen minutes later, the email arrived, and she opened the file. The angle of the video was limited to Sherlock alone, as her contact had been focusing on him, and the sound was less than ideal, but it was clear enough that the detective on the roof was speaking to John Watson, unseen, on the street. She could hear Sherlock confessing to the lie the press and the British public had been fed.Â
Rich Brook. Reichenbach.Â
They both knew it wasnât true. She, herself, was evidence that it was a lie. And yet, here he was, extolling the opposite to John Watson.
âKeep your eyes on me.â
That immediately raised a flag. A magician directing the audience to the illusion and away from the trick. The Woman examined the video intently, trying to spot any discrepancies.
And that was when she saw it.Â
A glint of sunlight from the roof a few buildings to the right. It only appeared as Sherlock said âGoodbye, Johnâ and hung up the phone.
Before he dropped the phone and jumped, disappearing from her contactâs view and the cameraâs.
Frustrated, and though she would never admit it to herself, more than a little shaken, she played the video again, to the part of the timeframe where she saw the glint of sunlight. She knew what that was.
The reflection from a rifleâs scope, revealed only at the last minute before the shot. A shot that Sherlock Holmesâs apparent death had prevented.
And it wasnât pointed at Sherlock.
Sherlock, despite all his arguments to the contrary, was an irrationally sentimental being. He formed emotional attachments to people.Â
While between the two of them, the Woman was more attuned to people, it was Sherlock who actually cared for them. When she had been exposed, it was only too easy for the Woman to abandon all ties, including her loyal Kate, and leave her former life.Â
Sherlock, on the other hand⌠He had a whole brood of people he surrounded himself with. The doctor, his landlady, his brother, the detective inspector, his mousy little pathologist.Â
If an instance occurred where he was required to give up his life for the few people he cared about, especially if it included John Watson, she had no doubt the idiot would actually do it. Hadnât he already infiltrated one of the most dangerous terrorist cells in Asia to save her life?
She stopped the video and closed the laptop.
The day of the appointment came. And went.
She stayed home, phone in hand.
Yeah, okay, so I made this on one of those âwriting gameâ sites where you âfightâ a monster by completing x-amount of words in the allotted time. So my lazy ass didnât edit, proofread or research any of this stuff like I normally would have.
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