Only six people came to her funeral. Only John, Mrs. Hudson, Sebastian, Sherlock, Mycroft and James came to pay their last respects to her.

It was a rainy day, the type of day both Sherlock and Mycroft knew she adored. Her room as a child had been covered with drawings of rainy days. As they trudged through the mud to the church that Mycroft had found, each walked differently.

John and Mrs. Hudson supported each other, Mrs. Hudson whipping her face constantly with a tissue. Sebastian held the umbrella for his boss, his head held high as he tried not to cry for a woman he had loved as a sister. Mycroft held his own umbrella high in the air, tears falling down his face no matter how much he tried to stop them. Sherlock held his head in his hands, his body shaking as he continued to see the blood flowing from her chest.

James didn't know how he should feel. He had one way. He had clearly burned Sherlock; he could see it in the man's face. He should be happy. But the beast inside whimpered and cried. It whimpered every second and cried every time he saw Sherlock because it saw her in him. So he couldn't be happy.

She was lying in a dark wooden casket, the top already open. John and Mrs. Hudson went up first. Mrs. Hudson stroked her face and John took her hand. Then he pulled her away to let Sebastian come forward.

Somehow, James had allowed Sebastian to come. No one exactly understood why, but James had allowed Sebastian a chance to say good bye. And he did, with a hand held and a whispering voice.

Mycroft didn't touch his sister as he went up to her. He only stared down at her sleeping form, wishing desperately she would bounce back up, smiling with eyes sparkeling. That she would shout at him in anger of how he wanted to control her life. That she would be anything but dead.

Sherlock nearly collapsed as he stood above her body. His hand shook as he placed on the wooden walls that encased her. "Please be pretending." He whispered, searching her face. His mind tried to tell him that it was obvious she was dead. That there was no way she could have survived. That he had felt her die in his arms. But he didn't want to believe it.

James approached her slowly, his hands pressed deep into his pockets and his head turned low. He tried to avoid staring at anyone, for they all stared back in hatred. But none of them did anything, for they knew that Aura would have hated them if they did. It was only when he was standing right in front of her that he looked up.

She was in a pale blue dress, something she never would have worn on her own. There were no sleeves, meaning that James was able to see every little scar that decorated her arms and neck from what he had done to her. Her hair curled over her shoulders in the way she had always tried to do on her own. The beast scratched weakly in her direction.

Slowly, James bent down and met her lips with his. The people in the room around turned away, but he didn't care. He had to kiss her one last time. And this time, the kiss wasn't to burn Sherlock or to calm the beast. The kiss was for him.

Sherlock was sitting with his head in his hands when there was a knock on his doorway. He didn't have to turn to see who it was. "I've made tea."

"I see." He had stopped moving. "May I sit?"

Sherlock gestured to the chair. "Please, do."

James did it carefully, forcing himself not to look at Sherlock. When Aura was buried in the ground the beast had quieted, but it roared when he saw Sherlock.

Sherlock's hands fell from his face. "Why, Moriarty? Why did you do this to me? What else can you do to burn me?"

"I don't know, Holmes. I just don't know."

Sherlock held out a packet of paper. "She said you helped her write this, but there are some bits that you didn't see. I feel like you should see them, Moriarty. That you should see exactly what you did to my sister."

James took the papers carefully, his hands shaking as he turned them over.

Dear Sherlock,

The fact that you're reading this letter means one of three things. One; I've left after telling you. Two; you believe I've died. Three; I've died. I desperately hope it isn't the last one. That would be most unfortunate (for me and you).

No matter the reason you're reading this letter, I know it has to do with James…God, this will be hard. I know I have to tell you because I know you should know. But now, as I write this, I can't. I'm crying now Sherlock. I'm crying and it is smudging the letters and I'm going to have to start over again. Oh God I'm sorry. I'm going to start where I know I can start; the beginning. Before James.

Ever since you left me for university 17 years ago, my mind has tried to tell me you weren't real. That you were too good to be real. I don't know why it did. Maybe I didn't want to be abandoned. Maybe I wanted to not care. I know now I wasn't being abandoned, but it felt like I was. Why did you abandon me Sherlock? You left me, you did. Why?

What am I saying? You didn't do it on purpose. I'm sorry. But then, as I watched you walk away, it felt like you were abandoning me. That was why I tried to block you from my mind; I couldn't stand the thought you had left me. The thought that you didn't find me worthy enough to stay.

Remember how I told you of my canvas of a brain? When you left, I took a brush and began to paint over the dark splotch that is you. Mycroft didn't help; in his own way he put the brush in my hand.

At university, I was able to escape from the bind that was having you and Mycroft for older brothers. I was finally in a place where no one expected me to be brilliant. Where I wouldn't be pressed down by your past achievements. Where I could be free. That's why I never came back for Christmas diners; the moment I stepped in that house I would be reminded just how much of a disappointment I was. I am sorry I didn't contact you throughout all those years. Perhaps if I had, maybe I wouldn't be writing this letter.

I don't know what to say now. There is so much more I want to say, but I don't know what should come next. My brain isn't built to do this, Sherlock. I don't know what it's built for. Maybe that's the curse of the Holmes family; we don't know how to express ourselves because we don't care.

I shouldn't say we. Because you, Mycroft, Mum and Dad all know how to not care. You've been doing it your whole life. I only started 17 years ago, when you were walking away from me and Mycroft told me that "caring is not to your advantage". I never understood what he meant, never understood how far I was supposed to go with not caring. There was no one to teach me; you all were too busy not caring.

I know you do care for me. We are family, after all. But I don't think I want to believe it. I don't think I'm worthy of you caring for me. It seems too perfect. You're too brilliant to care for me. Everyone in this family is. I'm just the last child in a family of geniuses.

Am I a genius, Sherlock? Because I don't feel like one. I know I'm smarter than most people, but I am no way as smart as you. I'm in the space between normal and genius, one foot on both sides. Just smart enough that I can hide it, and just smart enough that it hurts when I do. I have to hide it every day, Sherlock. Every second because the moment I let it out it hurts and I can't stop myself.

This letter is probably making no sense to you, Sherlock. I'm just spouting stuff that doesn't fit. That's how my mind works. It is full of stuff that doesn't fit. Not like yours. Everything has a place in yours. Everything is accounted for. Is there space for me in there? I don't know. I hope so, but I don't know.

I'm going to go through people now. Go through the people in my life who mean anything to me. But where to start? I know. I'm going to start with the three people who saw how broken I was and tried to help.

Mrs. Hudson. She was the mother to me that I never had. She treated me like I was her family, like she cared for me. She listened to me whine about you and she understood. Better than anyone else.

John. He was the first person to tell me I meant something to someone. That I was good at something. That I was important. No one else had ever done that up to that point. I heard him yelling at you to talk to me through that month we had been silent. Telling you to just apologize. He cared about me, Sherlock.

Sebastian. Honestly, he was more of a brother to me then you were. Even when I was mad at him, he came back and said he was sorry. He wanted to protect me from myself, and he did that. For some reason, he did that better than you or Mycroft ever could.

It was only those three Sherlock; only three people in my entire life. How sad is that?

As you know, I never had a good relationship with our father. He didn't particularly like any of us, but he hated me the most. I don't know why. I tried so hard to impress him, but nothing I did seemed to work. When I got older, I felt his eyes on me every moment. He was watching me so carefully, each second judging my every move. That's why I spent as much time as I could away from the house. So that I could hide from his disapproving glare.

Our mother, on the other hand, at least tried to me a mum. But she never knew what to do with the three of us. I was the only one that appeared the closest to a normal child, even though I was far from it. She must have hoped that I would have a boyfriend, that I'd get drunk and have a baby at 16. Do the things normal kids would do. Maybe that's why I disappointed her. Because I was too much like you.

I had no friends when I was younger and you know that better than anyone. Everyone was either frightened of me or of you or of Mycroft. I wonder what would have happened to me if I had friends. How different I would have turned out. Would I have been like what Mum hoped for me? Or would I be the same? I don't know how to get friends, and there was no one I could ask because no one in my family knew either.

Then there is Mycroft. My oldest brother. He wanted to protect me; that was all he wanted. I see that now. He saw how broken I was becoming and he was trying to protect me from myself in the only way he knew. But he did the opposite of protect me. If he hadn't said anything to me that night as I watched you walk away, maybe I wouldn't be so broken. But he thought he was protecting me.

And that brings me to you, Sherlock. I don't even know how to begin with you. You meant so much to me when I was younger. I thought you were on top of the world. That you were the best. I have so many happy memories of us together, Sherlock. Of times when I thought you cared. And then I have terrible ones. Where I thought I was alone in this world. Where I thought that you hated me.

I still don't know if you cared about me or not. I know now that Mycroft did. Do you want to know why? Because he tried. When I was mad at him, or when I was mad at the world, he tried to talk to me again. He didn't just ignore me. He tried to fix it. But you didn't.

You didn't just abandon me when you left. You abandoned me every single time we fought and you didn't try and make it better. Just when you left, it was even worse. Because that time when you left I knew that you weren't coming back for a while. My brain knew that it was free to erase you all it liked.

I don't think you understand how hard of a letter this is to write, Sherlock. Because I know that these will be the last words I ever say to you. These will be the words you remember me by. There is so much I want to say, but I don't know how to say it.

By now you've most likely been able to tell that I have left no will. This is because I am desperately hoping that the reason you're reading this letter is not that I'm dead. But I felt I should include this section in the event of my death.

The only thing I have left to give is the notebook I left with the letter. It is filled with drawings, filled with memories and images that I wanted to store in someplace other than the inside of my head. I would like you to have this notebook, Sherlock. I would like you to read through this notebook and remember everything I've drawn there. And then show the ones Mycroft would remember to him. I want my brother's to remember our childhood in the way I have to; in images. Not in text that can be deleted. Images that are frozen in my brain. Just do that for me. And tell the stories of your choosing to John and Mrs. Hudson. They deserve to know.

Maybe now it's time to talk about James. Oh God, you must hate me. You must hate me because I went back to him after what he did. Even I don't know why I did it. Something inside me needed him, Sherlock. To calm the voices that screamed inside my head that I was an idiot and that I was stupid and that I was killing myself going with him.

What James did for me was that he told me it was okay that I wasn't exactly like you. That I am worthy of being thanked and congratulated and told I am worth something. He told me everything you never did. He told me everything my dying brain needed to hear.

When he kissed me for the first time, I didn't know what to think. My brain was shouting at me that it was I was terrible. That I would get so hurt and so much more broken. And I would listen. I would listen until I saw James and he told me otherwise. If you had told me the same, then I never would have gone for him. Because you said it yourself Sherlock. A genius needs an audience. And James was mine.

I love James, Sherlock. I know that now. I love him because he calmed the voices and he told me that he cared. I love him because he is not you. Because he is everything but you. Because he very clearly cares about me.

Please don't be mad at James, Sherlock. I am begging you; don't be mad at him. This was not his fault. This was yours and mine.

With all my love,

Aura

James let his head fall down and the papers dangle from his hands. "I am so sorry. Please believe me, I am."

"Then why did you bring her into this?"

"Honestly? I wanted to burn you. I wanted to watch you fall and burn and die. And I saw her. She was your sister. And I knew that even if you didn't want to admit it, you would burn if you saw her hurt. So I pulled her in. And then I kept her there. I don't know why. Because it killed her." James looked up at Sherlock. "Did it burn you?"

"Yes." Sherlock whispered.

"Because it burned me too."

Sherlock carefully took the papers back. "She loved you. She sounds so certain that she loved you. Against everything we were trying to warn her about she loved you. So please tell me something. Did you love her?"

James took his time to think of the answer. The beast inside churned for a yes, yes he loved her. But his mind told him that he had no heart. That James Moriarty couldn't love. But the beast was stronger.

"Yes. I did. I do."

A/N: Thank you everyone who has read this story so far. I loved writing this, and I hope you all enjoyed it. The letter in this chapter was very difficult for me to write, since I wanted it to be perfect. Eventually I just decided to leave it like it was. If you have any complaints about this story, please feel free to tell me. Even if this story is finished it is good to hear from the readers so I can use their input to sculpt the next story.

Now to reveal my idea for the sequel.

Aura leaves Sherlock a notebook. In that notebook, she has drawn memories from their childhood that she wanted out of her head and in front of her eyes for whatever reason. And she wanted to share those memories with Sherlock. The sequel will be the story of their memories, with the beginning of each chapter being a small description of the drawing Sherlock is looking at before the event is actually described.

I would love it if you guys gave me ideas of what should be in that story, what memories Sherlock has to relive. They can be happy memories or sad ones. Sweet moments from when they were very young. I already have a few written and I will be posting one of them when I post the story today. It would be amazing if you would submit ideas; either on this chapter or the sequel. I want you guys to help me mold that story.

Again, thank you for reading this and I hope you enjoy the sequel; Mnemonic.