Author notes: This is my own version of the final moments of 'The Great Game'. A walk through Sherlock's thoughts during those minutes. Also, there are some slight changes in the scene. You'll see.

Warning: Spoiler Alert (kind of). SLASH. If you're not into slash, off you go.

Disclaimer: Holmesian Canon characters belong to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and the BBC.

Beta-reader: Fabulous bbjkrss. Thanks for turning my dreadful writing into something much more readable, love. If you still catch some flaws, they're totally on me.

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Weakness

by Maye Malfter

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"Ciao, Sherlock Holmes."

Sherlock looked at him in a calculating kind of way, cold, every muscle of his face tensed due to the effort of appearing calm. The detective knew instantly that Jim Moriarty would not be caught that night, but it was okay. None of that mattered as long as the danger posed by such a strange little man would finally get away from him, and John. Especially from John.

He took a few steps forward, getting closer to John. The L9A1 browning in his right hand aimed directly at the head of his nemesis.

"Catch you... later," Sherlock said, the gun firmly grasped and a slight feeling of relief settling into his chest while seeing how Moriarty slowly disappeared behind the door.

"No you won't!" he refuted, with a singsong tone. An instant later, the door closed behind him.

Sherlock observed the closed door for a few seconds, the gun still held upright. Moriarty could just come back and attack them, but after a few seconds, the detective knew he would not. At least not through that door.

He glanced to his right; John lay motionless, standing with his arms on both sides of his body and absolute terror drawn in his blue eyes. Something heavy that had been stuck inside Sherlock's chest during his encounter with Moriarty dropped suddenly to the ground. If he hadn't been absolutely sure that there was no such thing as a soul, he could have sworn he felt it leave him.

Sherlock lost his breath and composure, put the browning on the floor as fast as his reflexes allowed him to and lunged towards John. One of his knees hit the ground painfully while his trembling hands tried to desperately unbutton the vest trimmed with grapeshot, wires and explosives. He must get that thing off of John immediately, he had to.

"All right?" he mumbled, fighting against the bloody buttons of the garment. "Are you all right?!" he shouted a second after, demanding an answer from John, who apparently had lost his breath too.

"Yeah-yeah…" John said at last in a weak but audible murmur. "Yeah, I'm fine… I'm fine, Sherlock".

Sherlock was desperate. The buttons finally loosened and immediately the detective focused himself on divesting John of the catastrophic garment. He got up from the ground and with both hands he freed John's chest of the weight of the explosives, taking the vest's flaps nearly to John's shoulders.

He walked around John and began to pull away the thick jacket that covered him, along with the cartridge-packed vest. In a couple of movements the detective had freed John from both items, throwing them across the floor as far as his arms allowed him. He felt his lungs filling up with air once again, the same air that had abandoned them at the very moment in which he realized that John was covered in explosives and could blow into a thousand pieces at any time.

"Sh-Sherlock!" John shouted, resisting the detective's sudden movement.

They panted for one second, across from each other, without looking at each other. Sherlock took the gun from the floor and headed back towards the doorway through which Moriarty had disappeared moments ago, making sure he was gone. John took several deep breaths before feeling that his leg was beginning to fail. He held to the wall to keep from falling and bent down, leaning back against it.

Sherlock came back glancing at every direction, still panting and with his heartbeat racing. He had seen him. He had seen Moriarty and had been unable to catch him. His nemesis had discovered his only weakness and had used it against him. Oh, God! How did he not notice before?

"Are you okay?" John asked, from the floor. Sherlock had started to walk from one side to another, gun in hand, trying to process the torrent of information that had beaten him.

"Me?" Sherlock said, absently. "Yeah, I'm fine. Fine".

He kept walking from side to side, taking quick steps to the beat of his line of thought. John had been about to die because of his arrogance. If he hadn't summoned Moriarty to that pool, the lunatic would not have abducted John to make him a human bomb. If he would have been a bit more patient, maybe Moriarty would have found him alone, and when alone Sherlock certainly would have caught him. He did not care about risking his own life in order to capture Moriarty, but John's... John's life was worth far more than Sherlock's desire of winning.

And John, oh, for heaven's sake! John had risked so much. He had taken Moriarty by the neck in an attempt to give Sherlock the opportunity to escape. In order to save him. What the hell was he thinking? They all could have blown right there.

Sherlock had, for a second, a chance to escape, to leave John and save himself, to go out and find a way to catch his nemesis another time, but nor in a million centuries he could do that. Living without John at his side was something that Sherlock could not even imagine. Because catching Moriarty was not anywhere near as important as knowing that John was safe.

The detective bent down to John's level, one knee on the ground and his face a couple of feet away from John's. He needed to see him up close, to see his eyes without that terrified gaze they had minutes earlier. He needed to see him.

John was crouched, his head and back against the wall, eyes closed, his breathing gradually regulating. Sherlock stared at him, scanning every piece of skin, his features, the way his lower lip was trembling slightly, the tension in his shoulders, his clenched hands, his right leg failing a bit and his obvious expression of discomfort. He was tense, still frightened and the pain in the leg had returned, but he was okay. John was fine and so was he.

He felt like he should thank John for offering to save him, risking his own life. He wanted to, but did not know how. Sherlock Holmes did not know how to say "thank you".

"T-that, er...thing that you… did, that you offered to do," Sherlock babbled, trying to look at John but unable to do it at all. The mere memory of it made the air want to escape from his chest again. "that was, uhm… good." and then, the detective laid a hand on the affected leg.

John opened his eyes and looked at him, with that trademark candid smile forming on his lips. He knew that all those babblings were a "thank you" highly misformulated. He knew it and he was happy because Sherlock, being as he was, was thanking him for risking his life. But he had not looked for gratitude when he threw himself against Moriarty. The mere idea that something might happen to Sherlock, even knowing that he himself was covered in enough explosives to blow up the entire block, had been the necessary incentive to risk saving him.

"Don't thank me. You would have done same thing for me, wouldn't you?" John replied, placing a hand over Sherlock's. It was cold to the touch, perhaps due to the adrenaline rush, perhaps for having wielded the gun so long, or perhaps because of something else.

Sherlock felt the urge to pull his hand away as soon as John touched him, like he often did when someone touched him, but he didn't. The warm touch of John's hand made Sherlock feel oddly safe, as if everything was okay, even though he knew that it was not. Moriarty had escaped, and now the criminal knew he could hurt Sherlock. And not physically speaking, because the physical injuries were the least important to the detective. No. Moriarty had found out exactly how to get to him, and the bastard knew it.

"No, my dear John. They wouldn't have captured me in the first place," he said with a cocky smile at the corner of his lips. John stared at him with a raised brow and laughed a little, pressing his hand a bit more against Sherlock's.

"I'm glad no one saw that," John said suddenly, without taking his eyes off Sherlock's.

"Hmm?"

"You," John responded immediately, "ripping my clothes off in a darkened swimming pool. People might talk".

"People do little else," Sherlock argued, grinning at John and helping him up.

And in that instant, Sherlock was completely sure. Sure that he would do anything to protect John, to get him away from danger. Whilst John was safe, Sherlock would be fine. Because John was the detective's Achilles heel, and now that Sherlock knew this he would protect him through thick and thin. Because John Watson, his only friend, his companion, was also his weakness.