sherlockbbc_fic | prompting part XXIII

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prompting part XXIII

All new prompts go on Part XXIV
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I've seen Labyrinth crossovers before, but I don't think any quite like this:

Back in the day, Jareth kidnapped Sarah's little brother to get her attention. It didn't quite work, she told him off and kicked his butt at his own game. But as the years pass, Sarah finds that human guys don't quite do it for her and Jareth is making an honest effort to show respect this time, so she goes for it and moves to the Labyrinth with him to be the Goblin Queen.

Their children are Mycroft and Sherlock; raised in the Labyrinth, leaving them with an excellent sense of direction (see Sherlock's mental map in SiP) and more knowledge of fairy tales than the solar system(why bother learning the positions of the stars if they'll move?). This also resulted in a flair for the dramatic, Mycroft's gravitation toward power, and general difficulty in understanding human relationships.

As for where I'm going with this . . . that, I'm more flexible on. Scenes from their childhood? Sherlock's parents drop by Baker Street for a visit? Sherlock decides to bring John home to meet the parents? John makes the mistake of eating a peach in the kitchen? oh god I want all of the above

So do I. I want it so much that I may even try and fill, even though it'll probably go Horribly Wrong. ~~Congratulations, this is the first prompt on this part I've been even remotely tempted by.~~

Also, Mycroft says something about a goblin named Mekk being an intern. ...I think he's gone mad.

This is a beautiful, flawless prompt, and I never realised I wanted this so badly until I read your comment!

I especially approve of the prospect of John eating a peach, and Sherlock's reaction to it!

(I'd also like to think that Sherlock deliberately says "I wish the Goblin King would take you away" every time he's talking to Anderson and getting annoyed when he knows that his father just won't give him what he wants!)

(Non-anon because LJ won't let me, but then I suppose I shouldn't be too ashamed of my Labyrinth obsession, should I? :P)

The more I think about it, the more sense it makes. The way Mycroft talks about Sherlock and himself as being seperate from humanity; Mycroft's kidnapping habit; Sherlock's fondness for swooshy coats and the riding crop.

It really does! I can't promise anything (writer's block comes and goes without any warning these days!) but I might just have to write a ficlet.

Thanks for the brilliant prompt!

(this is glorfinniel btw)

Oh my god, this is the best idea ever! I shall wait here for a fill. *Sets up camp*

On this, oh God am I on this.

tw: war, violent crime, drug use
notes: un-beta'd, but once this is done I'll clean it up & un-anon & post, so sorry for stupid mistakes (I should be asleep right now; might be some embarrassing typos I didn't catch)

It was a custom of Sherlock’s, when he was younger, to sit beside his father’s throne and watch his – well, their, as his father sometimes reminded him, as they were all of them royalty – subjects make their cases. It was dull, mostly, but Sherlock’s observations amused his father, and at that age he fancied himself something of a jester. Whatever goblin or Sidhe or human it was before them would finish talking and then Sherlock would stand and whisper into his father’s ear what he had deduced.

This did not change for a very long time.

Both Mycroft and Sherlock went with their parents to the Sidhe Court on feast days. It was, at that time, a celebration, as the Sidhe royalty would gather their families and eat, but it was also something of a competition amongst them, to display their power, dress in their fineries, showcase their children. Sherlock’s father, as the King of the Labyrinth, was, as in all things, contrary, and while he did bring all of his children, all of his children were Mycroft and Sherlock, and while they dressed in their fineries, their fineries swooshed a fair bit more than anyone else’s.

“It throws them off,” Sherlock’s father had once told him as they sat down. “I’ve always found it advantageous to be found somewhat mad, here. They all think I’m exactly what they fear most.”

Sherlock had leaned in and said, “The man in front of us will attempt to poison you at some point during the evening, likely during the fourth course.”

“Why do you think that?”

“That’s the King of the Water’s third son. He rarely wears jewelry besides the traditional necklaces and headwear but he’s wearing a ring that he keeps forgetting about; his fingers move strangely, see? The ring is gaudy. It’s a real gemstone but it’s very poor quality, very dark, why would a man of his station, here, wear a ring of poor quality? It has poison in it.. Probably a powder poison which he could stir into your soup…He’s the third son and thusly in line to inherit very little unless there is some…redistribution of control. The King of the Water has made very unsubtle bids to upset what tenuous stability there is between the Queen of the Sun and the King of the Sky, but I suspect largely as a distraction. Should you fall, there will be far more chaos and far more opportunity.”

Sherlock had been, by his mother’s reckoning (although time passes strangely in the Labyrinth, and it is hard to know these things,) thirteen years old, and he did not know it then, but he had just started a war.

After the fourth course, when Jareth, King of the Labyrinth, found powdered Nightmare Weed in his soup, things were never the same.

+

The Labyrinth felt it when the first foreign armies rose and the Labyrinth waited. Its King fought and snarled and spat, but war came, and there was no stopping it. The Labyrinth felt foreign feet upon its skin and the Labyrinth tricked and snared and lied, and there was no stopping it.

+

“Aboveground isn’t all that bad, you know,” Mycroft said.

“Easy for you to say, you’ve spent half your life here. You could have hardly made it more obvious.”

“That I don’t want the throne?”

Sherlock leaned against the car window and huffed, watching his breath cloud on the glass. “Obviously; was there something else I was supposed to pick up on?”

“I know this is going to be hard for you, but it’s for the best.”

“Mummy’s already told me that quite a few times. I’m of an age where I recognize platitudes and your insistence on using them is beginning to wear my patience thin.”

Mycroft sighed loudly enough to communicate he wanted Sherlock to know that he was being very long suffering and patient with him and he’d like Sherlock to be more pleasant, please. “Well, I think you’ll enjoy university at least. You’ve got a spot in the best of them.”

“Boring,” Sherlock said.

“Really, Sherlock, must you? There’s just not much we can do right now, not while things are as bad as they are, and Mummy wants you to spend at least enough time Aboveground you…get a taste for it, if you will. Please, for her if not for me.”

“You say ‘we’ like you’ve bloody done anything besides prowl around up here making friends with the human versions of the warmakers Underground!”

The car slammed still. Someone behind them laid on the car horn, but Mycroft turned in his seat, face red, eyes dark. “Like you’ve been doing something besides scaring our parents senseless with your magic tricks and your truancy? Where do you think the humans go if the Labyrinth falls, brother mine? Do you think there is another province that will protect them? Do you think the King of the Thorns will change his mind and open his arms, instruct his skullbearers not to eat them? If the Labyrinth falls, I have a place for them, that is what my ‘making friends’ has done, Sherlock, because I may not want to rule but that does not mean I will abandon my duty!”

The noise of London went through Sherlock’s skin to make his insides smolder. He met Mycroft’s stare and smirked. “You know, power suits you. You think you’re doing the right thing, don’t you?”

“Having a contingency plan does not equal surrender, Sherlock.” He sounded as if part of him was straining against the chain of either his better nature or his natural aversion to blood.

“I suppose not,” Sherlock said, as doubtfully as he could, and turned back towards the traffic moving around them, a steady thrum of lights and movement. It was as close as he would get to apologizing to Mycroft for a very long time.

+

Cocaine felt like finally, finally using magic again.

Both at once might kill him.

+

Goblins visited, sometimes, awful, annoying creatures with awful, annoying messages like “By the way, the outer wall has been breached and the King’s been bashed over the head with an awful curse” except they were more like “Bonecreatures outside Labyrinth! King sick in head!”

Sherlock got the point, though.

+

“My God,” someone said, “this one’s still alive.”

It was, as voices went, a somewhat kind one.

“Shit, you sure, mate?”

“He’s got a pulse – someone call an ambulance, he’s got a pulse but it’s weak.”

Oh good. He’d survived. Evidently cocaine and magic concurrently didn’t kill him. Just nearly. Or maybe that had been the whole gun thing. He thought he’d maybe healed himself as he’d fallen. He couldn’t really remember.

“You think he saw this go down?”

“Probably but it doesn’t matter, is there an ambulance coming or not, dammit?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m on it.” That was someone new. Three people, at least. Police.

He didn’t have a chance at fighting them all off, let alone quickly enough they couldn’t call for help. Sherlock opened his eyes. In front of him was a wall. Where was he? Blood on the wall. His blood? No, too much. Remember, remember, remember—

Had to be Deck’s place; no one else he knew had that wasn’t peeling; he remembered going lines off Deck’s miserable charity shop end table; he remembered noise – some sort of robbery. Judging from the pain emanating from his thigh he’d been shot inexpertly or sloppily. They were just trying to take him down, didn’t care if he died – they were after Deck, then. They had Deck if Sherlock was the one ‘still alive.’ Revenge or punishment.

He needed to see Deck’s body. Then he’d know. Simple, of course. If the police were worth the blood in their bodies they’d already know.

Someone tapped at his face. Such a strange sensation when his head ached so. “Listen, can you hear me? You’re going to be alright, boy. You’re going to be alright.”

There was a strange, delirious moment where Sherlock felt…warm, safe, all because someone was slipping his fingers through the hair at the back of his head, because someone had his fingers at his pulse…because someone in this city cared he was alive. Sentiment was awful, especially coupled with pain. He felt tears building up and forced himself to bite down on his tongue until he tasted blood. “Who – who—“

“Hush,” the man said.

He breathed in deep, felt his ribs ache, exhaled, felt them ache again, inhaled. “If Deck was murdered execution style, your murderer is a man named Oscar Eliot who works for an importer, if you catch my drift. If not, I’m afraid I’ll need to know…” Inhale. Exhale, inhale. The room was silent beyond his own body breathing and aching. “…how he was killed, and with what; there were, as you might guess, many with motive.”

“How do you know that?” the man holding him asked.

“Simple observation,” he said.

“What’s your name, then?”

“For when you call me in to figure out if I’m the one that did this all, Sherlock Holmes,” he said. Odd how closing his eyes tight helped stave off the pain. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. He was dizzy. “And you are?”

“Detective Inspector Lestrade,” the man said, somewhat faintly.

They brought him out on a stretcher, hands cuffed together despite the obvious fact he was far too weak to even stand, and it was cold outside, night time, of course, but colder than he’d expected. He glanced back at the building, its windows glinting with the carnival flashes of police lights, and there, in the first story, he saw his brother, pale and grim and dark like a mourner.

He laughed.

+

Mycroft did not teleport into Sherlock’s cell of a hospital room, but he was wearing a glamour – the thin sort, the sort Mycroft had always worn, even before he could magic one on, the sort that kept anyone from looking at him for too long.

Sherlock was saddened that there wasn’t something within arm’s reach he could throw.

“I’m curious to hear how you’ll explain this,” Mycroft said.

“You’ve got a new tailor. Better, pricier, too. Pity he can’t cover up the weight you’ve gained; Mycroft, have you been stress eating over me? I’m flattered, really.”

“I take it there was no reasoning behind your actions whatsoever.”

“Actually, my drug addiction is merely one facet of an elaborate scheme by which I will ascend to power, just like my older brother. Touching, isn’t it?”

“I failed you, Sherlock,” Mycroft said.

Damn. He wasn’t going to play today. Sherlock leaned back in bed and stared at the ceiling. It had more personality. How long until withdrawal started?

“And I have the feeling I’m going to keep failing you. I wish I knew what to do about it.”

“Fuck off,” said Sherlock.

+

This time, Mycroft did teleport .

“The DI seems to have taken a liking to you,” he said acidly. “Try not to mess this one up, would you?”

“Not going to comment on my new housing, then?” Sherlock asked, leaning against the wall of his cell.

Mycroft glared and disappeared.

+

It was some time before anything made sense again. He relapsed because he was partially human and because he missed magic, because magic was so hard to even touch Aboveground unless, apparently, he was dying or desperate,, but eventually he fell into something like stasis. Nicotine and caffeine balanced out by sleeping as little as he could get away with and eating nothing near enough.

When the vertigo hit, he could feel the Labyrinth reach out to sustain him.

For a period of many months, it was the faintest of magic that held him together, and it was then that he felt as if things might turn out alright, even if his home was destroyed and no one would ever understand him.

+

221B was Sherlock’s second home and it may have been a disaster but it was his and he guarded it. He knew every step, the way it creaked, he knew the way the carpets lay, the ease with which each door opened, he knew it. It was his.

This was how he knew Mycroft was sitting on his sofa waiting for him before he’d opened the door entirely. There was a general wrongness, compared to the way he’d left it, and as he scanned, intuition bloomed into observations: the newspaper articles tacked to the fridge slightly skewed (Mycroft checking on what he was eating, or more like if, perhaps); door from the kitchen to the sitting room closed where Sherlock always left it open; the light from under the door, whereas he’d left the lights in the next room off…

“Dare I guess the reason you deign to grace the doorway of my humble home?” Sherlock asked. He slipped his coat off his shoulders to drape it over the kitchen chair.

“They’ve reached a ceasefire,” Mycroft said.

Sherlock nearly ran into the door in his rush to open it. “What?”

“Father and the King of the Sea have reached a ceasefire. It’s to our advantage, really; the other kingdoms tire of the war and sympathize with father, and so hostilities should soon cease.”

Sherlock felt his mind go still. “Has Mummy woken up then?”

Mycroft was sat at the edge of Sherlock’s sofa, his umbrella resting on the ground between his knees, expression blank as ever. “Not yet,” he said. “But Father says she may yet.”

“Well,” Sherlock said. “That’s good to hear. Now get out of my flat.”

Mycroft did.

THIS IS AMAZING. Please don't stop!

oh god yes.

Oh my, this is FANTASTIC. Utterly believable, and Sherlock's thoughts in the cell made me whimper out loud. I'll be stalking this thread, eagerly awaiting the continuation. <33333333

Edited 2012-01-08 23:54 (UTC)

+

Sherlock had expected the body parts or the violin or the decay or the experiments or, of course, his personality to drive John away within two months tops, and was later glad that he hadn’t said as much to anyone. It was impressive, really, because even Mycroft couldn’t spend two months living with him before resorting to violence.

That might have been why, in the middle of the night, Sherlock was lingering outside John’s bedroom, reaching deep to touch the magic, freer, now, and, in peace, greater, at the core of all things. It was child’s play to cast a ward against nightmares, and besides, having Night Mares charging through the flat all night was getting rather…old.

And besides, if John slept more, he’d probably be able to put up with Sherlock more.

It could have been any number of reasons, really, that Sherlock was there, spinning a spell in the air.

Sherlock remained eminently pleased with himself for having been clever enough to throw the ward up so quickly despite years without using magic until he walked into the kitchen, fully intending to resume his experiments on the time it took a blood stain to set in silk, and saw his father leaning against the refrigerator.

“I had a fair amount of trouble finding you until you were helpful enough to cast a spell. Nightmares, really?”

For a moment, Sherlock saw his father as any number of strangers foolish enough to wish others away must have – not like an owl, as his chosen form was, but as some sleeker bird of prey, the sort of falcon that could rend flesh from bone with the same ease as it breathed.

“It wasn’t for me,” he said.

“Oh, are you living with someone, then?”

“I’m surprised Mycroft didn’t tell you,” Sherlock said.

“Hmm,” said his father.

(Dressed in a warcloak, a new one, likely meant he’d had time to have one made for the sake of ceremony, looking good during negotiations, eyepaint heavier than it used to be, bright blue under his eyebrows, under his lower lid – to mask exhaustion, still pulling long hours, he’d never been one to abstain from wards or potions to sleep, why pulling long hours? Not enough data regarding political situations Underground; couldn’t be dire or Mycroft would have said something, at least dropped by; last stages of negotiations? The treaty-making couldn’t be that bad, the King of the Sea’s armies had to be decimated--)

“I’ve been doing my best to try and wake your mother,” he said—

(Oh.)

“But the Labyrinth won’t let her go. My best guess is that until it recognizes that all of…of us are back, it won’t acknowledge that the war is over.”

“You want me to come back.”

“Yes, obviously. But more than that, I need you to convince your brother to come back.”

“He won’t?”

“No. And I would suppose you can guess why.”

“He thinks you want to put him on the throne while the political climate favors a transition to a somewhat younger monarch.”

His father nodded and crossed his arms around his chest. Now that the adrenaline from finding him there had faded from Sherlock’s veins, he could sense the thrum of magic deep in his father’s bones, the sense that he’d spent far too long seeped in something far too old and far too vast. “I didn’t lie to him, and I won’t lie to you. I would like him to take the throne now. I would put him there if I could. But I shan’t force him to. The idea of a reluctant leader is nonsense. Heaven knows that the kingdom is a piece of work, and if he doesn’t want it, he shouldn’t govern it.”

Sherlock considered sitting down. His back ached from work, but then again, he was as tall as his father like this, and why waste that sort of psychological advantage? “I guess the next question is obvious,” he said as distastefully as he could.

“Would you at least consider it?”

“Answer this honestly: can you see me ruling over a kingdom largely inhabited by a species identified mainly by its complete lack of any sort of higher level intelligence, a species that invented the sport of chicken throwing? Can you honestly see that?”

“Sherlock, according to the latest census, goblins only just make up half the population. Stay up to date, really.”

God, he sounded like Mycroft. “Yes, but I’d be the Goblin King, Father, can you honestly see me as the Goblin King?”

“Goodness knows you have the requisite flair for the dramatic. You’re letting vanity stand in the way, really?”

“Oh, it’s not vanity, it’s dignity.”

His father did not visibly flinch in rage, but the magic around him did. “Very well then,” he said, with a voice that made the air go colder. “Please do drop by to attend to your mother at your earliest convenience.”

Right, there was that, wasn’t there? A shame John wasn’t there to be all ‘bit not good, Sherlock’ or ‘remember the woman he loves has been asleep for the past, what is it now, six years, Sherlock.’ “I will,” he said.

“Why don’t I leave something for the woman, then?”

“I beg your pardon?” Sherlock said.

His father opened a hand into the air and there, suddenly, was a peach. Sherlock bit back a groan.

“It’s obvious enough. You’ve cast a nightmare ward for someone, and voluntarily, I assume. Oh, and it’s actually clean here. How could you keep a place clean without someone dogging you? Is that what’s keeping you here?”

“Don’t be daft, Father.” God, was everyone going to assume that he and John were together? “You know what? Leave the peach. See what happens. It’ll just rot there, because that’s not it. You’re so enormously wrong that it’s almost funny.” He’d just tell John he’d poisoned it and was testing the effects on the rate of decay, John would never touch it, one up over Father. Brilliant.

“Don’t mind if I do,” he said.

And then he was gone.

Sherlock had never understood the appeal of the dramatic disappearance. One ought at least have the dignity to stalk through a door, let the cloak flare, and then slam the door before vanishing. Much more intimidating.

+

Sherlock fell asleep on the couch sometime around five in the morning.

He woke up when he heard a very loud thunk in the kitchen.

He pondered the possible consequences of staying where he was. He could get in another hour or two of pure sloth easily, but then again, something might have fallen over.

He got up.

John was sprawled across the kitchen floor in his pajamas, half-eaten peach in one hand.

“Shit,” Sherlock said, rather calmly for the circumstances.

He crouched down and took the peach from John’s hand. He sat against the counter rather carefully – wouldn’t do to be sore when he woke – and, sighing, ate it as quickly as possible.

Dang it I almost want to get a paid account JUST SO I CAN TRACK THIS.

Another gorgeous piece. <3333 Can't wait to see how John reacts!

*keeps tab open, refreshing determinedly*

Wonderful :D

Ha! This is excellent. I'm enjoying the Holmes family dynamics.

This crossover rocks!
I can't wait to see John's reaction to the Labyrinth and the world Sherlock is coming from. Lol not to mention his family. This will be fun!

Any hope of getting more of this awesomeness?

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prompting part XXIII

Sherlock/Labyrinth

Re: Sherlock/Labyrinth

Re: Sherlock/Labyrinth

Re: Sherlock/Labyrinth

Re: Sherlock/Labyrinth

Re: Sherlock/Labyrinth

Re: Sherlock/Labyrinth

FILL: scenes from a book no one wrote -- tw below -- 1/?

FILL: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 2/?

FILL: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 3/?

FILL: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 4/?

FILL: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 5/?

Re: FILL: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 5/?

Re: FILL: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 5/?

Re: FILL: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 5/?

scenes from a book no one wrote -- 6/?

scenes from a book no one wrote -- 7/?

Re: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 7/?

Re: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 7/?

Re: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 7/?

Re: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 7/?

Re: scenes from a book no one wrote -- 7/?