Title: the Touch test
Words: 1,428
Rating: T, work-safe
Fandom: Sherlock (crossover with His Dark Materials)
Characters: Jim Moriarty and Sebastian Moran
Disclaimers: I do not own BBC Sherlock, His Dark Materials, or related content. This is a non-profit fanwork expanding upon existing ideas.
Warnings: Brief mention of blood, mentions of torture via mistreatment of dæmons, suspense, hints of Moriarty/Moran, UST.

AN:
Hey! Starting off with a big thank you to my wonderful beta Radiio ♥ and the fine folks at #BakerStreet ♥ for encouraging me to write this.
This is my first Sherlock fanfiction, and one of my first public fics in general, so please excuse me if I'm a bit sub-par compared to other writers in the fandom. I realise that it's difficult to visualise animals accurately if you've never seen one, so if you like, here are the reference images I used for Moriarty's dæmon and Moran's dæmon.
I know that the act of 'touching' does not have a capital letter in the His Dark Materials universe, but as this is a crossover I took some artistic licence. In my head as I was saying it, it had a strong presence just as Dust did when it was spoken in canon, so I typed it as Touch. With that out of the way, please enjoy!

 

( Gelasia and I stood patiently before the desk as Moriarty casually... )