Gin and Bitterness

Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Rating: M
Setting: Dark Dog Days universe
Characters: Mycroft Holmes, Greg Lestrade
Primary Pairings: Mycroft Holmes/Greg Lestrade
Word Count: 2407

General Summary: Mycroft had only planned to go out hunting; taking a lover was certainly not on his agenda.

Author’s Note: This piece was written for my collaborator after we had discussion about something we thought Mycroft did when he was bored as a young man at university. It was originally posted to Tumblr on 17 January 2012.


Mycroft was on the hunt. He had slipped away, as he was wont to do, and had taken the night for himself. The deceptively inexpensive and currently jacketless suit that he wore in place of his usual expensively tailored one made for an appearance that would have unsettled anyone who knew him. However, he added mentally, carefully rolling his shirt cuffs over his forearms, the small of his back pressed uncomfortably against the edge of the bar, they’ll never know, will they?

The hunt, as he had come to affectionately call it, was something that he had begun to do while at university, at least partially out of boredom. He would dress up, catch a cab to a bar that he had scoped out weeks in advance, and don the mask of a bored barfly. From there it was simply a matter of choosing a target and playing the game. Rather than make the first move, the game required that he slip inside his target’s brain and figure out what would induce them to make a move on him.