Disclaimer: I don't own a thing.
Bless Mike
Sherlock will never admit that he found John's Tumblr while looking for wank material. But that's what the internet is for, isn't it? And Tumblr has enough adult material to make it a place just as likely to yield juicy fruit, and less compromising than any website with a more explicit url.
You'd think he wouldn't need to worry about leaving traces, but mummy still visits occasionally, and she's the only one who never had trouble breaking his passwords no matter how random he tries to make them.
"Nothing is really random," she quips every time.
Just wiping his history clean is not always feasible. What if he's interrupted by a case, and finds out that Mrs. Hudson let mummy in to wait for his return? Should he tell Lestrade to wait until he's deleted the compromising websites? He'd be laughed out of the room.
Mummy won't check his blog though – there's Mycroft for that (lurking, not following of course, so Sherlock doesn't even get the pleasure of blocking him). And as long as he doesn't reblog, looking things up is safe. There's a limit to the resources his brother is willing to waste on him.
The name doctorcaptain is very promising. The posts were a healthy mix of team photos, science side of Tumblr and frankly adorable anatomically correct gadgets (hearts and kidneys and bacteria, before your mind goes into the gutter), and a few fandoms.
Sherlock cannot resist – he follows the blog. He'll just stick to what is safe to reblog. After all, Torchwood features prominently, and not even Mycroft will bat an eye at that. John Barrowman (and more so Jack Harkness)is a model for the curly haired man, and he'll always be grateful to Mrs. Hudson for making him watch the show, one day when he was in a fit of boredom.
He expects to be ignored…but when he isn't, he can't stop his heart from skipping a beat. Doctorcaptain (John, his profile says, but of course the name is generic enough that it could easily be a pretence) has sent him a private message and followed him back. Which makes no sense.
Nobody follows him – well, except for the inevitable porn bots, but these don't count. Of course, makingbricks isn't the most appealing of names; but he's offering precious analyses – data that at least the scientifically minded should look forward to. Not that he minds – mostly, he publishes them to make sure that they're uploaded and won't disappear if his computer dies on him. Needing a tumblr for his private purposes, it seemed easier to combine it with a cloud storage function. Hopefully Mycroft would be bored into lack of suspicion.
John wrote, - Thank you for following me! …Wow, your blog takes a lot of effort. I feel so lazy now, I reblog 90% of my content. -
It's two days old. Since Tumblr notifications are usually only bots and spam, Sherlock ignores them…but he's just finished a tobacco ash analysis he needs to upload. The notification shocks him so much he forgets to. Surely John must hate him now. But for some reason John hasn't got around to unfollowing him yet, and when Sherlock tries to reply, he finds out he's not blocked.
He erases at least two dozens replies, before settling on, - I should be the one exercising some self-critique. And thanking you. I apologise, but when I have an experiment going, I forget everything else. -
No reply. Of course, he deserves that. Perhaps he hasn't been blocked on purpose, and will be after being ignored a couple of days himself. He's half tempted not to post his analysis at all, but he shrugs and does it all the same. There's no reason to let his one not strictly professional human contact ruin his routines.
Another message notification a day later stops him mid sulk – because he's been without a decent case since a month ago, and now he's without an experiment too. Obviously.
– Believe me, I understand real life getting in the way. In fact, I can't promise I'll ever reply promptly. I've seen your last post. As a doctor, please tell me you didn't smoke them all yourself. ;-) -
– Nope, not all. Okay…most, - he replies. Immediately. If it makes him look needy, he doesn't care.
For that day, no other messages come. He'd hoped that being so quick would mean John would still be free, but…apparently not. Oh well. Wait, was his reaction off putting? For a second (okay, 15 minutes) Sherlock worries that his admission alienated his one…follower? Friend? People don't send emoticons to perfect strangers they hate, do they? But John is back the following day, with apologies about not saying a proper goodbye and mention of an emergency.
They start a weird kind of relationship, made of no more apologies – as otherwise they'd take up most of their conversations – oddly timed messages (Sherlock's insomnia helps) and discussions of interesting injuries both on the detective's side (case victims) and John's (brothers in arms, the odd civilian). Sherlock deduces a lot (his friend's rugby past and – cheering and defeating at the same time – his crush on his major), John unexpectedly sings his praises for it, both worry about the other taking way too many risks.
Oh, and Sherlock wanks himself raw and thanks a God he doesn't believe in that John, as smart as he is, would never deduce the Niagara Falls from a droplet if he was born in the desert where he currently resides. Having one's infatuation deduced back would be much worse for him, since the deducer would be the object of his pining. Which is why, even while he exploits her, he does his level best to play painfully oblivious to Molly's attentions.
John figured out her crush, by no more than his mentioning in passing that she'd get him ears for an experiment, so how she can believe it to be unnoticeable is beyond him. At least, the ensuing misunderstanding let him point out to his captain that him having a girlfriend would not happen. Not in this lifetime.
John's badgering brings to a surge in his followers, once Sherlock is finally talked into showing his transport. It's inconsequential, he maintains for the longest time. His brain is the best part of him – his body is…too much. Too thin, too angular, too many things to name.
He empties his closet, disguises included, seriously considering everything, from a bulky firefighter uniform to a glittering – and hopefully distracting – feminine dress. In the end, he opts for what he would wear at work, since John shows the same. A proper suit, the only question which shirt he should match with it. After careful pondering, he goes with the aubergine one. He really should just have sent his selfie as a message, but he makes a post out of it on a whim. No words, just the photo.
John reblogs it, asking underneath, "How can you solve cases when you're blind? :O" Later, in his message, the soldier praises his looks more in detail. Almost lyrically.
Sherlock flushes brightly, but he would believe it a cruel joke if not for all the other likes and reblogs wondering which model or actor he is. He thought that his peers offered plenty of data on that particular issue growing up, and having to reconsider requires some serious mind palace remodelling. At least, he's still intolerable to most people – John being the mysterious and thrilling exception.
Or not. Just when John finished the transformation from 'wank material' through 'object of longing' to 'dearest, if fragile, hope of his heart'… he disappears. No new posts. No messages, not even in answer to his – honestly – increasingly pathetic requests to know what's up. True, he's not blocked, and the army is a high risk career, to understate things…but Sherlock refuses to think of his (never his) captain as just another body littering the sand, or – worse – a prisoner of war, maybe tortured for information. Not John. And no, he's not asking Mycroft. While his brother would easily be able to check anyone's status, even with Sherlock's still depressingly scant data, the truth is for once not what he wants.
It's easier to imagine that John became so frustrated with him that he dropped the blog altogether, started another under a new name and expects Sherlock to be smart enough to take the hint and not seek him out.
It shouldn't matter anyway. He started with nothing, he's left with nothing. No effective change. So* why is he haunted by such a keen sense of loss? It's just a bunch of messages (he's forcing himself to forget the precise number, without much success, so he tries to be careful of his thoughts). People appear and disappear out of each other's online lives all the time, and even dumb people manage to delete them, even before the last email hits the bin. He just needs to find someone – a client, a victim – named John to more easily overwrite the man's folder. How hard can that be in Britain?
Shockingly so, it turns out. Not finding someone named John, obviously…but overwriting the file. In the end, he drops the folder in a drawer, locks the drawer, and – for good measure – locks the room of his mind palace the cabinet is in, too. Keeping it out of sight hurts less than fiddling with it all the time to no avail.
The only reminder of his loss is the slow – and then much quicker – trickling away of his new followers, once they're forced to acknowledge that his isn't a celebrity blog, or even one where he shares lots of selfies. Not that he minds, of course. If he kept this blog for the sake of followers, or likes, he would have deleted it long ago. All these people are just proving that they're morons, but he's never doubted that everyone but him (and his brother, he grudgingly admits) is an idiot anyway.
Well, not everyone unfollows him – even if Sherlock wishes they did, because the let down of discovering that the new message waiting for him is not John's is just as bad as coming down from drugs, the only difference that this high lasted only a fraction of a second. Instead, it's someone with the ridiculous name of Ihelmalltheships
- Hello Sherlock, it's Mike Stamford by the way, I use the blog to relax, please don't check it ;D It's just that an old pal of mine wants to meet you, so I thought I'd check your plans for tomorrow :D -
Annoyed, he replies, - Why would they want that? -
- Let's say they've heard a lot. Believe me, you won't regret it. Do you have a case going? Can I tell him to meet you somewhere maybe? -
There's only one sensible answer to that. So the detective retorts, - Is this a trick against him, me or both? -
– Man of little faith! Give me an hour and a place, and if you're not happy with the result, I'll be in your debt and you can collect whatever you want. And yeah, I know how dangerous saying this is. ;D -
Even if it is a practical joke, Mike's offer is worth it. He hasn't promised to behave, after all. – Speedy's, 9AM. I won't wait more than 15 minutes.
– Fine. You can thank me later! ;D -
Sherlock is still tempted to give this meeting a miss, but he can waste a few minutes. He just takes the precaution of donning a black shirt with his suit, the following morning. Should the situation devolve to fisticuffs – it wouldn't be the first time that meeting him causes such an apparently natural reaction – blood spatters will be less noticeable on it.
Thankfully, it seems that this time it's nothing worse than the tired joke of being sent somewhere only to find no one. Juvenile, really. That's why he set such a short waiting time for himself. Nine minutes passed already, when the door opens – and the loud thud of a cane echoes.
"Sherlock!"
He raises his eyes from the phone, and his breath stops. "John," he says, almost to himself.
The man is wearing a cream jumper and jeans, but he's still as breathtaking. He plops into a chair at Sherlock's table, the left hand rubbing his nape. "I was so afraid that I wouldn't be on time. Sorry about disappearing like that, by the way, but –"
"Being shot is not exactly something you can plan in advance for, or conducive to regular blogging," Sherlock ends for him, waving his apologies away. "Can I get you anything?"
"Just a coffee, thanks. Black, no sugar." John grimaces. It's obvious that he isn't used to being offered anything when one-on-one, but military pension forces him to accept any small kindness.
The detective is back in a moment, with two coffees and two sandwiches. At the other's raised eyebrow, he replies, "Just a game. I want to see if I can deduce what you would enjoy. You don't have to eat, if you're full."
The doctor grins. "Okay, what betrayed my passion for bacon sandwiches? In another century you'd burn at the stake, you know."
"Oh, some people would love to do that anyway," Sherlock replies, smiling back. "As for your tastes, you're likely to enjoy something that reminds you of childhood, and considering your age and what I can deduce of your background, this was my best bet."
The former soldier bites into it with relish. "Brilliant." What he's talking about isn't clear, but, "Genius," made that clearer.
The sleuth tries to hide his blush with a sip of coffee.
"You know, I never told you but – I always hoped to meet you. I just hoped I'd be in better shape," John admits, looking at his food rather than his friend.
"Nonsense. I have objections to your sense of style… or lack of it, rather, but there's absolutely nothing wrong with you. For one thing, your limp is psychosomatic." Sherlock bites into his sandwich, then looks at it for a second, as if he forgot it was there.
"That's what my therapist says, too. But how do you figure that out?" John asks, tilting his head to the left.
"You rushed in and weren't even winded. Clearly the cane is more an hindrance than a support, when you are properly motivated," the consulting detective explains.
"Amazing," the other breathes.
"I'd like to keep you motivated. Entertained. Busy," the sleuth blurts out, "I could do with an assistant."
"…In bed?" John quips.
"Sorry?" Sherlock blinks. Then blinks again.
"Oh, of course no, it's…a game, you know. Finish all kinds of sentences with 'in bed' and see how ridiculous the results are."
"You're lying," the detective retorts.
John blushes. Why had he even tried?.
Sherlock got his bearings back by then. "The answer is yes. In bed. Out of bed. In Britain and abroad. I've been thinking about you, too. It's just next door, you know."
"What?" It's the doctor's turn to be befuddled.
"My bed. If you want to get a headstart." Sherlock winks.
John gets an even earlier headstart. The kiss is the sweetest he ever had.