Summary: When Irene Adler contacts Mycroft Holmes with some shocking information and instructs him not to share it with Sherlock, he believes it to be a calculated power play against him. In some ways he's right, but the truth is more complicated, and personal. AU sequel to my other story Neither A Soldier Nor A Gentleman, with a post-Reichenbach timeline. It's not necessary to have read that, though it might be helpful. While that is part of this world, this is not necessarily part of that world, if that makes sense? Well like I said - AU.

I have no idea where this idea came from, but it refused to be ignored, and so we'll see what happens with it...

Also I'm torn about whether or not Mycroft actually knew about Sherlock's rescue of Irene in Karachi, but for the sake of this story, he really was fooled.

Finally, please note that 'Andrea' is the character 'Anthea.' A script side from the episode A Study in Pink shows that this is her real name.

Disclaimer: No money coming to me, just lots of love for Sherlock and its actors, writers, and creators coming from me!

Prologue

Mycroft Holmes, British Government De Facto, was patiently listening to the chords of a Liszt concerto through the earpiece of his office telephone when his assistant Andrea barged through the heavy paneled door without knocking, a white envelope in hand, and a complexion to match.

She stopped short at his desk and started to open her mouth, but he put up one forestalling finger, and to his expectation but satisfaction, it shut again immediately.

"Not now, please," he said in a patient but non-negotiating tone. "I'm on hold with Angela, and you now that she gets tetchy when-"

Her voice, more assertive and present than he had ever heard it before, cut directly through his dismissal: "Sir."

His eyebrows jumped involuntarily, more in surprise than displeasure, and he scanned his memory to determine whether she had ever interrupted him. She had not.

For a brief moment she looked grimly pleased that she had earned his attention, and then, holding firm eye contact, she placed the single envelope in front of him. The instant he properly caught sight of it, he slammed down the receiver, his eleven o'clock phone appointment with the chancellor forgotten at once, and her expression intensified.

In the upper right corner was affixed a reddish-orange and cream coloured stamp depicting a small aeroplane taking off over ostentatious post-modern buildings. Flight From Karachi, it said, in commemoration of some famous but presently irrelevant air journey, and at once Mycroft's lips thinned and twisted with bitter understanding.

On the centre of the envelope feminine script addressed him by name and even by his euphemistic title, and though the upper left corner was left blank of the identity of the woman whose hand had done so, the stamp had already told him everything, as it had been meant to.

Irene Adler.

For a brief but difficult moment, he struggled to reconcile the two parts of his mind. On one hand he clung to the thought No, it's not possible. He had been so thorough this time. He recalled the way he had personally put in legwork for the occasion, something he was loath to do apart from the most urgent of situations. Usually he simply enlisted his brother's competent services, though for obvious reasons Sherlock had not been trusted with this mission, despite his show of callous triumph over the woman when they had all last assembled. And so Mycroft had traveled to Pakistan himself to interview everyone even peripherally involved, and not only had all the details of her death coincided with the varying testimonies, but all the statements had uniformly agreed with one another. He had left Asia satisfied that the Adler catastrophe had been put to bed (pun most vehemently not intended), and that he could now primarily focus his efforts on the burgeoning threat of James Moriarty.

In fact, he had been so sure of Ms. Adler's death that he given both the Americans and the Germans his word that the security breach had been permanently contained, not to mention he had made assurances to his colleagues at MI5 and MI6. Confirming the kill had been a necessary step towards repairing relations with both countries after the AirBond debacle (and one the MI6 had rather insisted upon), and yet he would never have done so if he had not been absolutely certain—his professional standing was sacrosanct to him. Without his reputation for infallibility, the position he so greatly enjoyed was precarious.

And yet that was precisely the predicament he now faced, because he could not ignore the proof of his oversight that this envelope represented: Sherlock had reached Irene Adler first, and she was alive.

A spark of rage towards his brother for his ongoing folly over the Adler woman flared, but with practiced determination, he suppressed it for the time-being, and channeled his energy away from the tawdriness of emotion and towards the purity of brainwork.

He stretched a hand towards the envelope, then stopped, took a breath, and reached into a drawer to pull out a pair of leather gloves. He looked up to Andrea's face; now her eyes were wide and avid with interest.

Carefully he slit open the envelope to reveal a single sheath of paper, a small bindle made of opaque blue plastic, and a loose memory card.

Without inspecting the other items more closely, he shoved away from his desk and strode to the digital projector mounted above a handsome mid-Georgian mahogany secretaire. He reached up to insert the card into its corresponding slot, grabbed the remote, and jabbed the power button.

The image that filled the immense wall-mounted screen caused his assistant to gasp in shock in a rare show of reaction, and for Mycroft's part, the remote control nearly fell from his suddenly nerveless fingers, though apart from a slight widening of his eyes and blanching of his colour, his face remained cold and expressionless. Even while his mind felt icy and numb, his body seemed to go onto autopilot, and he hit the advancing button. Again and again variations of the first image flashed across the screen, slightly unfocused due to the level of magnification, and yet still unmistakable.

"The..." he somehow found his voice, despite the fact that he was shaken in a way he had never before experienced, "sachet will contain DNA evidence, I'm sure. Not hair, she's too clever for that. She knows we have people who could track her through her location's unique signature of air pollutant levels, embedded in the strands. Perhaps nail clippings..." He said, sounding distant.

"I'll send it to the lab right away, sir - alpha priority," his assistant said, her voice slightly breathless but her manner as competent as ever.

"Yes. Do. Although I expect it will be just as it appears..." He took one long, agonising breath. "The child is the picture of my brother when he was that age."

When Andrea left, the physical evidence in hand, he allowed himself to sink into his seat in a daze, and he recalled that there had been a slip of paper included as well. A note?

He lifted the envelope, and contemplated its exterior, this time with greater scrutiny.

The Karachi stamp had postmarks indicating that it had been sent one week before, but obviously she wasn't still there and she was merely toying with him. She was underlining his failure to realise she had not been executed, and perhaps also making an implication about where the boy had been conceived. He quickly did the math and yes, it did appear that during the time she had allegedly died, she had actually been creating a new life instead—in a way other than simply taking on her new identity.

He studied the envelope itself. The paper was not expensive; it was flimsy and low-quality cardstock, and of non-standard dimensions. He inferred that it came from an upper mid-range hotel, perhaps the very hotel Sherlock had arranged for them... But the thought ignited that anger again, and he deliberately turned back to his observations.

She must have taken some of the stationary with her, knowing that she would eventually taunt him with her escape (or alternatively it was sentiment, although that seemed rather implausible, given the woman in question). But it was the pen that was far more telling. Palladium-silver alloy nib, perhaps a Sheaffer, and dye-based ink. That certainly seemed to imply that wherever she was now, she wasn't destitute.

He unfolded the single sheet of paper, and the masthead reading Hotel Mehran confirmed his earlier conclusion. Below that, centred on the page, she had written in small, embellished script just three words: "Don't tell him."

In that instant, Mycroft understood almost everything that had happened.

First: Sherlock had deceived him on a staggering, unprecedented scale. But of course that much had been obvious from the moment he'd laid his eyes upon the stamp on the envelope.

Second, and the far more salient matter: this envelope and the secret it carried constituted Irene Adler's revenge upon him.

He wasn't so arrogant as to believe that her motives for the conception itself were at all connected to her desire to taunt him or garner protection against him—he wasn't even certain whether it had been planned on her part or if she were taking advantage of an accident.

However, now that she had given birth to (biologically, at least) a Holmes, she was certainly exploiting the situation: her notification of the infant's existence clearly was meant as retribution, and her revelation that she was alive after he had staked his reputation on her death certainly was, as well. Because now of course it wasn't just Sherlock from whom he had to withhold critical information—it was the MI-5, the MI-6, the Germans, the Americans, and several other powerful parties who had been delighted to learn of her demise.

She's terribly good, he thought, but unlike his brother it was in bitterness more than in admiration.

In one neat little package (literally) she had targeted the only two things for which he cared: his career and his younger brother. Without the complication of the child, Mycroft might not have hesitated to respond ruthlessly this time, tracking her down until reality matched the story he had given his colleagues, and he was no longer an unwitting liar. One part of him was still tempted to do so, and place the infant under his stewardship—perhaps that would be better for the child anyway, more stable. Sherlock would never have to know of any of it; Mycroft could set up a house in some rural, hedge-rowed corner of England, and the boy's care could be managed by a litany of nurses and tutors, and then when the time came: boarding school. It was a childhood he would've rather envied, himself.

But almost as soon as he became convinced that he should take that course of action, he realised that in fact, such a scenario was unsustainable. It would be difficult enough to prevent Sherlock from figuring out this secret as it was, with his nephew God knew where. But if Mycroft personally oversaw his upbringing? Impossible.

Third, if experience with Ms. Adler had taught him anything, it was that this wasn't merely hollow revenge, but also a prologue to something greater—something that would directly benefit her interests.

Yes, she certainly had an agenda, but she would still enjoy the setting of the stage and intensifying of the suspense before she made her next move. Though when that came, it was sure to be cold, concise, brutal, and brilliant. She would slice all that previous pretension away as deftly as a surgeon.

But even though this revenge was simply the preface to what was to come, it was a palpable hit, because it created an agonising dilemma for him. On one hand he felt that he must confront Sherlock about his clear role in (i.e. obvious engineering of) her rescue...To have him explain how he had done it, how he had tricked Mycroft so successfully. And then demand to know what had possessed him to make himself so vulnerable to such a person... To risk precisely this scenario. How could he have been such a bloody fool?!

But on the other hand he wanted to shield his younger brother from her, as he had not before, protect Sherlock from being drawn into her renewed power play, but also protect his lifestyle, a life that had been so hard-earned in its relative tranquility and productivity. Knowing he had sired a child with that wretched Adler woman would undermine everything—especially if he had any type of emotional attachment towards her, which was becoming ever more clearly evident.

And so he must adhere to Ms. Adler's request and keep the dreadful burden of his knowledge to himself. He could not push Sherlock into her path again, this time with most likely permanent repercussions. For now, he would do as she asked, as terribly as that chafed.

She had secured for herself perhaps the only thing that would not only stay his hand against her, but actually incline him to provide her protection or financial support of any kind. As troublesome as his mother was, the child was his nephew and the unexpected continuation of what had been a very long and historied English line, which he had been certain would end with he and his brother. And the infant was an innocent, despite the fact that he would doubtful remain that way for long, given his parentage, particularly on the maternal side.

He felt his fury towards his brother kindle again, and this time it was harder to control. He didn't begrudge the fact that Sherlock had tricked him in and of itself (he was actually subjectively impressed and proud of his brother for accomplishing such a feat), but he could not abide how he had so degraded himself with that woman. If Sherlock had been able to exhibit any semblance of self-control, he would not have created this situation, for which his older brother was now paying the price.

But of course, Mycroft reminded himself, breathing through his nostrils, I am personally to blame for all of this. He had pushed Sherlock right into Irene Adler's trap in the first place, and now he must face the consequences with stoicism and dignity.

Still, that wouldn't stop him from tracking down "the late Irene Adler." Perhaps she wouldn't be between his crosshairs, but he needed all the data he could get, and though he was usually content to sit passively and have others gather intelligence for him, this time the matter was altogether too personal and potentially destructive—to himself and to his brother—to trust anyone but a Holmes.

And in this case, Sherlock would most certainly not be on hand.

For several weeks he and his assistant dedicated themselves to following every ghost of a thread left by Sherlock.

He re-confronted everyone whom he had previously interviewed, this time informing them that he knew that they were lying to him, and menacing them with untold things in the same civil tone he might use to order a tea from his PA. Inevitably each person folded, and he began to piece together how Sherlock had tricked him. As aggravated, bordering on furious, as Mycroft was, he couldn't help but feel a measure of fraternal pride over the beauty and complexity of Sherlock's exfiltration, and begrudging respect for how his younger brother had so shrewdly covered his tracks. Sherlock had designed the entire rescue with one central objective: to use every vulnerability of Mycroft's against him in order to craft a lie exactly tailored to him. Mycroft was certain that no one in the world could even perceive that he had any weaknesses, let alone plan and carry out an entire ex-fil based on the exploitation of them.

Correction, he amended, ever striving for precision. Sherlock—and Irene Adler. Her discernment and exploitation of his vulnerabilities were, after all, the twin catalysts for his return to Pakistan.

They are indeed a pair, Mycroft mused darkly. However, where Sherlock's deceptive actions were an ex post reaction to her capture and means to what he obviously perceived as just ends, hers appeared to be ex ante and aggressive—a power play, and certainly soon to be even more. And that, he thought, was the singular difference between she and his brother.

And yet, despite the increasingly comprehensive picture he had of what had happened in Karachi and its immediate aftermath, no one knew where she had gone after they had parted ways, nor what her current alias might be. The trail went cold at a radius of 130 miles in any given direction of the city, land or sea, and the one man who could tell him everything, Sherlock, was the one man he wasn't willing to confront. Oh, caring was such dreadful a disadvantage—every conceivable element of this scenario proved that again and again.

On his fourth night in Pakistan, and the final evening before their return to London, Andrea knocked gently on the door of his guest room in the High Commisioner's house, where he was staying for the duration of their repeat investigation. He called for her to enter, and when she did she silently handed him a dossier of A4 sheets. He flipped it open expecting to find new intelligence on the location of the Adler woman, but instead he was confronted with the insignia of an internal laboratory to which he had full access. It stated that the DNA evidence Irene Adler provided (skin cells swabbed from inside the cheek, as it turned out) proved conclusively that the child whose images were stored on the USB stick was indeed the progeny of she and his brother. Despite his belief that he had already internalised and to a degree accepted this catastrophe, he had still gone faint when he'd read the official words.

From the time he had first received the letter, onward, he avoided getting in touch with his brother full stop, and though it did irritate him that Sherlock never initiated communication himself, Mycroft reminded himself that until he received Adler's next communication (which precedent told him was inevitable) it was best that he refrain from any contact. He prided himself on his iron self control, but Sherlock had always been Mycroft's weak point, as apparently Irene Adler was Sherlock's. And so Mycroft was gripped with the fear that he would unintentionally blurt out the news in a blend of concern and anger, unable to look at his brother and contain such explosive information. And so he waited.

It irked him that on top of everything else, he had no way of even contacting her, which distinctly put him in her control even further, and completely re-established the dynamic of power that had existed between them prior to Sherlock's little revelation the year previous. He could only learn of the next fragment of her plan when she chose to reveal it to him, and even then she would do so in such a way that would decidedly favour her and her agenda. And yet still his eyes jumped through his mail each day looking for her elegant hand, an uncontrollable tic which filled him with loathing—towards himself, towards her, and even towards Sherlock at times.

It was a bitter reminder of how she had gained full control of both Holmes brothers once again.