Coming home after a particularly long day in clinic and too exhausted to eat, let alone attempt to cook something, John sank into his bed. His vision had black swirls lapping at the edges and he hoped tonight he wouldn't envisage his best friend's death again. Unfortunately, as John slept the image of Sherlock falling crept into his dreams. This time though, something was different.

Moriarty had been up on that roof with him.

Surely Sherlock would use his last phone call to his brother, suicide or not, the body would need to be dealt with.

He'd made John stand still. "Don't move!" Sherlock was adamant he stay out of the line of vision for the impact. Why?

'I only saw him fall…'

And with this startling revelation, John shot out of bed awake. 'Everything else could have been faked! In fact his face should have shown more evidence of an impact if he'd hit the pavement face first as his fall indicated.' More and more deductions came to mind as John decided to brew his tea. With each one a voice sounding suspiciously like Sherlock in his mind replied with, 'Good John! You're finally using that brain of yours!'

It didn't matter though. Obviously Sherlock didn't want to be found, or at least didn't want John to find him. There must have been a reason for the lengths he went to though. Why fake a suicide just to get away from a flatmate? That seemed too dramatic even for Sherlock!

John decided there were too many unknown variables for his 'average brain' to deduce Sherlock's reasoning. Anyone else and John would have associated with a protective instinct borne of some deep emotion, but Sherlock barely did warm greetings, let alone love.

Love. Well… John could admit that at 4.37am in the dark with a strong tea warming his fingers and then hide it away again as dawn broke.

'How to stir Sherlock's curiosity though?' thought John. He needed to make him aware John had figured Sherlock out; that he appreciated being his last contact with the world he'd known. The last thing to be on Sherlock's mind was nothing if not an ego boost to the Doctor, but how to prove it?

Draining his mug, John stumbled across the room to the desk by the window, still cluttered with papers Sherlock had thrown haphazardly everywhere. He kept forgetting his damn cane upstairs, 'Perhaps it would be practical to get a second one to keep down here?' but John brushed that thought away. Opening dusty laptop, John hoped he hadn't forgotten the password after all this time. He'd barely been able to look up from the carpet of the flat, never mind use something that had essentially become Sherlock's.

After a few attempts, he gained access and logged onto his blog and simply typed, "You gave me a warning. Where have you been?" and posted the entry. After analysing the vanity of his former flatmate, John copied and pasted the message onto Sherlock's website too.

The exhaustion began to settle in again, so John shut the laptop down and rationalising that Sherlock would need some time to get over being deduced John could safely get a few more hours sleep before dealing with any consequences in the morning.

Around 7.30am John blearily got out of his bed after spending some time seriously contemplating having a 'duvet day' before deciding that was befitting an ex army doctor. Moving across the landing he went about brushing his teeth, using the loo and washing the sleep from his face before heading downstairs. John only remembered he'd used the last of the jam yesterday morning after pressing the toaster down. With a muttered curse he turned to check he still had some butter at least in the fridge.

"In the cupboard above the toaster. I assumed bilberry was still your favourite."

His voice stopped John in his tracks. Turning slowly John and Sherlock faced each other across the kitchen table. An errant thought of, 'I must have passed him on the way in. How did I miss that?' entered John's mind whilst he stood and trembled in front of the fridge with one hand on the fridge door.

Sherlock was sat or rather sprawled in one of the kitchen chairs without his usual grace John had come to know and love. John watched as Sherlock stood, seemingly taking some effort and walked around the table to stand in front of John. Then Sherlock raised both his arms and enveloped a still trembling Dr Watson in a brief, stiff hug. John could feel the confusion swirling within himself, "I was right?" he breathed.

Sherlock pulled away confused, "I…well yes, you were. But your message, I thought you knew and understood? Is that why you are not following typical reunion protocol of exchanging a hug?"

John let out a bark of slightly hysterical laughter at the familiar robotic sounding response. Of course Sherlock wouldn't have missed John. He was 'exchanging' body contact not out of comfort but out of a set of rules deemed acceptable for a given situation.

Even though Sherlock watched and analysed the emotions play out on John's face, he was still slightly shocked by the forceful punch to his jaw. 'Still avoiding my eyes, nose and mouth though. Good to know.' thought Sherlock.

"Why have you fallen back onto your safety net John?" Sherlock asked, nodding towards the cane. "I thought we'd proven it was psychosomatic?"

"Yes well going through a traumatic experience tends to cause a relapse of these things." John hurled back scathingly before ascending the stairs to his bedroom again.

Sherlock was shocked by John's tone. Of course he'd heard it before, but never directed at himself. John thought Sherlock was brilliant, marvellous even, didn't he? He followed John into his room to watch him climb into bed again and pull the duvet over his head. "What on earth are you doing John?"

"I'm having a duvet day. Or couldn't the great and powerful Sherlock deduce that?" came the muffled response.

"But why? Why are you hiding from me?"

"Because… I was right. You are alive and that means I must have been right about other things too. I don't enjoy living in a world where I'm right and you're confused. It's all backwards so I'm not leaving this bed until the universe has rebooted itself or whatever."

For the second time in his adult life, Sherlock felt panic explode within himself. He'd lost John, his blogger. That was the only explanation for his following action of climbing into the bed and under the duvet with John. He needed to find John again.

"What the bloody hell do you think you are doing?!" yelled John, slightly affronted.

"I'm hiding too. If the universe has gone wrong I'd rather be hiding under here with you than facing it on my own again a minute longer. I need my blogger John."

John tried to discern Sherlock's facial expression in the dim lighting. "Are…are you scared?"

"Yes. I'm scared I've actually lost my one and only friend. That you're actually rejecting me and not that I just can't see you to put you in danger."

"What danger Sherlock? You left me thinking you'd committed suicide! How was I supposed to get over that? For months I tried to rationalise with myself that there was nothing I could have done to stop you."

"But you couldn't!" Sherlock interrupted. "I needed to be seen jumping so Moriarty's snipers wouldn't attack you or the others."

"But I still had to watch you fall!" yelled John. "I still had to go about thinking you'd died while you've been off gallivanting God knows where without me!"

"I'd hardly call disassembling a consulting criminal's terrorist cell gallivanting John." Sherlock scoffed. "Besides, I thought you understood? You said you got my warning, you knew I was waiting until it was safe again."

"I understand you intended to keep us safe but is it? I mean is it safe now? I mean I only posted the comment a few hours ago. You arrived fairly quickly."

"I've been monitoring you for a while. Quite closely but obviously not closely enough it seems."

John eyed Sherlock warily, "What does that mean Sherlock? How long has it been safe?"

Avoiding eye contact Sherlock muttered, "A few months. 74 days to be exact."

"Then why the bloody hell didn't you turn up sooner?! Have you just been sat hoping I'd figure it out?"

"You were living your life, going to work each day, not having to chase criminals down alleyways or risking life and limb. You seemed happier, who was I to come in again and ruin that?" Sherlock reached to press his hand against John's heart pounding in his chest in an effort to soothe him.

"You idiot! You don't think it should have been up to me to pick how I live my life? How could I carry on living the life we should have been sharing? I lost my faith in the entire justice system, in fact the world! So how could I figure out who the criminal was I'd need to chase down an alleyway without you?"

"So you missed me then?" Sherlock asked staring at his own fingers fiddling with the loose thread near the collar of John's pyjama top.

"I may regret this later but…" John grabbed Sherlock's face and greeted him how a reunion involving a resurrection should go, with mouths and lips and teeth and tongues. John just hoped Sherlock also had supernova's exploding behind his eyelids and fireworks exploding along the path his tongue traced inside his mouth as John did.

After breaking apart Sherlock seemed at a loss for words and just lay there gazing at John with an awed smile on his face. "I hope that didn't disappoint your protocols for reunions Sherlock." whispered John.

"I think I'm starting to like this strange new universe John. Nothing seems too boring and predictable any more." Sherlock grinned.

"No, I don't suppose anything will be the same again. Although it doesn't seem too different now. I was wrong about you not being interested in me." John smirked back before testing his ability to make Sherlock see explosions again.

Author's note:
I'm back! After a ridiculously long absence and I make me return at 4am! Well I never did pick appropriate times to be struck with inspiration. :)
This is based on Ellie Goulding's Explosions after hearing it on a tv advert for another show called Broadchurch I listened to it and realised how much it sounded like a conversation between John and Sherlock reuniting.
Having said that this piece turned out fluffier and slightly better than I previously planned it to. Or I am very sleep deprived. Either way, it's out of my brain, I can delete it and put more useful medical revision in there instead!
Ta ta for now. If you 'd like to review great but I won't harass you to.
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