Title: Sealed
Summary: Experiments rarely go as planned.
Rating: T

OOOOOOOOOOOO

"Alright, alright!" John shouted over the incessant pinging of his phone. How Sherlock had managed to set it to get louder with every ignored text, he would never know, but he fully intended to re-label Sherlock's test tubes the next chance he got.

Scratch that. Bad idea. Who knew what Sherlock might accidentally put in his food.

While wrestling with a loaded grocery bag and uncooperative keys in his right hand, John dug into his pocket, trying to extricate the obnoxious phone. "I'm here! I'm right here." He awkwardly punched a couple of letters, more to stifle the ringing than in any hope that Sherlock would be able to deduce any meaning from them.

The door swung open under the strategically applied pressure of his foot. "Alright, I'm here! Now what's so bloody important?" John snapped up the hall, hoping that Mrs. Hudson was out. She just hated it when they yelled in the flat.

Sherlock clattered down the stairs with his feet barely touching each riser and his hands bracing the walls and handrail to keep himself steady. "John!"

"Yes, Sherlock. For the millionth time, I'm..."

He skipped the last two steps, reaching for John's throat even as he landed. His fingers tangled in the front of John's jumper, and a quick yank pulled John off balance and into Sherlock's chest.

Snipers? Another bomb? All were plausible, but John wasn't sure why Sherlock had insisted that he come home right now if that was only going to put him in danger.

Before the thoughts could fully sort themselves out, Sherlock hauled him up onto the balls of his feet and kissed him.

Closed lip and it lasted a scant three seconds. It was the kind of kiss you got from a doddering grandmother who has forgotten that you've outgrown kissing your grandmother on the lips and still insists on it.

His brain was providing all sorts of words that would have fit perfectly in this situation, like 'Sherlock', 'what', 'why', and 'hell', but his lips refused to cooperate. He tried to talk anyway, but all that came out was sort of a sick, "Hng," sound that he'd never heard himself make in any other situation.

Thankfully, Sherlock didn't seem to be looking for a response. He stepped to the side, one arm still pressed against the small of John's back, and ducked under John's arm. "Come on, John. The metabolizing rate isn't well-constrained, and I don't particularly want to carry you up the stairs."

"Carry me?" John made an attempt to look up at Sherlock, only to have his head loll back well past the angle he'd been aiming for. "Why would you have to carry me?" His foot caught on the lip of one stair, and John frowned down at it. Walking up the stairs shouldn't take this much effort. If he stared hard enough, he could just manage to get his foot high enough to clear it.

"Hm, it's going faster than I'd expected."

With a gargantuan effort of will, John lifted his attention from the stairs, and the world fell out from underneath him.

Even though John had more than a passing acquaintance with passing out, this was the first time he'd ever experienced his knees buckling. Had it not been for Sherlock's arm around his waist, he would have smashed his face on the stairs.

Sherlock heaved what could only be described as a long-suffering sigh and tightened his grip to take more of John's weight, dragging him up the stairs as John's ineffective feet clashed behind them against the steps.

From the limp angle his head was hanging at, John had a bumpy view of the upper landing. The horizon dropped suddenly, and John's shin made an intimate connection with the edge of the stairs. He cursed.

Interesting. He couldn't move any of his limbs, but he could still talk. "Sh-sherlock?"

"The sealant was ineffective."

"The what?"

Sherlock leapt up the last few steps.

He wondered what the rush could possibly be. He was already paralyzed, and it would probably be hours before whatever drug Sherlock had dosed him with would wear off. Maybe Sherlock had a cliched vat of acid on the stove that he was worried about boiling over.

"John, I don't..." Sherlock pitched forward. His arm sat like a leaden weight against John's back, pulling him down as well.

The floor rose up at an alarming rate, and John started to wondered what kind of damage the wood would do to his nose, given that no amount of struggling would convince his arms to move. At the last minute, he felt a strong grasp on the back of his jumper, and an up close view of Sherlock's shirt swam into his vision.

Sherlock must have still had some control of his body, because he managed to twist around to put himself between John and the floor. He hit the floor hard, grunting at John's uncontrolled bulk crashing onto his chest.

When he'd finally gotten some breath back into his lungs, John coughed. "So, how long is this going to last then?"

"An hour. Maybe two. It's not..."

"Well-constrained," John finished for him. "Right." He should be irritated, but instead he found himself suppressing slightly hysterical giggles. "I suppose it's too much to hope that Mrs. Hudson won't see this?"

"It'll only be her if we're lucky," Sherlock snorted. "This will definitely get people talking."

Definitely. John was infinitely glad that he couldn't move to see the tableau they were making. His leg had split Sherlock's, and he could feel Sherlock's boney hip digging into his stomach. Sherlock's arm still hadn't succumbed to gravity. It rested heavily against his back, the weight almost comforting given his scarily immobile state. If nothing else he wasn't stuck here alone.

"Sherlock, why did you drug yourself?"

"That was an unintentional side effect." Sherlock huffed.

John recognized the signs - Sherlock always got this way when he made a mistake. "Alright, why did you drug me?"

"New case with a femme fatale, as the phrase goes. I believe she doses men with a strong, skin-absorbent paralytic by kissing them."

Ah. Well, that explained a fair amount. John hadn't even bothered to mention that elephant skulking in the corner. Sherlock always had his reasons, and John only got an explanation of about half of them. He'd learned to just take it all in stride.

"But she'd be exposed if she did that."

"She uses a sealant - a wax, perhaps, on top of her lips. Given natural motions of the lips - wetting them, smiling, biting - she'd have sixty-seven minutes before the sealant was broken and she'd be forced to remove the drug or suffer the effects. I was intending to test the structural integrity of the sealant after a reasonable span of time after application. She would have to be extremely careful on how enthusiastic she got."

"Intending?"

"You were late." Sherlock ground the words out. "The sealant was already completely compromised."

"Wait, you were going to properly snog me?"

"It was for an experiment, John."

"And you're married to your job."

"I put my best efforts into my job." Sherlock clarified.

Now there was an unintelligible statement. John couldn't quite work out if he should be offended or flattered. Thankfully, Sherlock wasn't the only one who could execute a subtle-as-a-freight-train topic change. "So, it's skin absorbent. Why didn't she just use gloves?"

"No, too easy to dose someone other than the intended target. We brush our hands against people three hundred and twenty-five times during the day." Sherlock couldn't see his face, not with it pressed against his chest, but it wouldn't take a genius to predict John's expression of disbelief. "On average."

"You made that up."

"I never make anything up."

"Yeah, you do." John chuckled. "Whenever you think you've got a really clever idea that the rest of us peons won't support because it's too far out there, you make up facts to make us feel better about it."

"Sherlock?" The question carried faintly from the hallway below, interrupting them. "The door was open, and I've been calling you. I've got a job and your groceries. They were just sitting on the floor down here."

"It's Lestrade. I can tell from his half-step on the fifth stair. He knows it's going to squeak so he steps carefully at first." Not a single hint in Sherlock's voice suggested that he was joking.

John choked down a fresh burst of chuckles. "Even I could tell it was Lestrade."

"Yes, well, you are more observant than the average peon. Not even close to my league, but you do have your moments."

"Was that almost a compliment?"

"It was a statement of a fact. How you decide to take it is up to you."

"What is going on here?" Lestrade stepped slowly around their tangled mess to stand where John and Sherlock could both see him.

No amount of explaining would make this any better - having a logical excuse wouldn't change the fact that Lestrade had just snapped a photo of them and was undoubtedly e-mailing it to the entire department. The air in his lungs struggled against the laughter threatening to bubble out, but John just managed to gasp out. "We've fallen, and we can't get up."

Beneath him, Sherlock's chest rumbled.

OOOOOOOO

Oh my word, this is a bit silly isn't it? Written for Kiterie's birthday, and I only just found time to post it here. She's absolutely lovely and deserved much more than this goofy ficlet, but it's all I can manage at the moment.

*dives back into her mountain of work*