Title: Logic And Lorazepam
Characters: Sherlock, John, Lestrade
Summary: He squints upwards at John, shielding his eyes from the technicolor lights dancing all over John's skin. John Watson never looked so stunning in red and blue and green.
Sherlock Holmes is no stranger to the spike of recreational drugs in his system. But it's a whole new world experiencing a delivery route he normally eschews in favour of others that don't carry a significantly high tetanus and Hep-B risk. Topical applications of nicotine and, previously, lysergic acid diethylamide tend to be gentler on the pain receptors. Needles hurt, and that he doesn't like so much along with the statistically likely blood infections that would follow. Sure, Irene Adler's a professional, so naturally the first deduction he makes in the split second after the needle punctures his shirt lining and the dermis of his shoulder is that her equipment (he can't think of a better word, despite having nine very unsuitable synonyms pedal quickly through his mind) would be sterile anyway, before he can refocus back on the camera phone in his hand.
Then his fantastic, analytical brain turns into alphabet soup and something smacks him hard across the face. Judging by the texture, width and velocity of the object, something along the lines of a woman's hand.
Three lashes later from her leather implement, and he's supine on the ground with a riding crop stroking the gash John made on his stinging cheek. He can't feel his fingers closing into a sweat-coated palm, and his arms feel like wooden logs by his sides. His toes wiggle, and that would be a good sign since he still has some degree of motor function despite being dosed with whatever Irene has pumped into his body, but then again he wasn't trying to move them in the first place. Wasn't he supposed to be holding on to a phone or something? A cantaloupe? Probably nothing important. He can't remember exactly, but he's rather happy about a thing that hasn't happened just yet. Maybe that's why he's waiting on the floor of a naked woman's house. It must be. She's not naked anymore, though, so he thinks he really should stop calling her that.
John pops up out of nowhere, leaning over him concernedly. Silly Doctor John Watson and his product-laden grey hair and his appearing next to him. He likes John Watson. "Sherlock? Can you hear me?" John asks.
Of course I can hear you; why wouldn't I be able to hear you I'm not clinically deaf nor does the frequency of your voice exceed sixteen thousand hertz which is the mean maximum range of hearing for an average human adult why wouldn't I be able to hear you you're so funny sometimes John we should write stand-up together I'm glad we moved in together aren't you –
Sherlock tries to get up and express this sentiment, but the room performs a three-sixty spin and deposits him back onto the ground. Disappointingly, a second try yields the same result. Pity – it'll have to wait until the room stops rotating and he can feel his fingers again, though he's a bit bemused at the moment trying to figure out what his proximal phalanges have to do with it all.
The not-so-naked woman says something about a code and her measurements and there's a question in there somewhere and then she falls out a window. Sherlock finds it a bit sad that no one's going to catch her. He sort of likes her – not as much as he likes John Watson – even if she did just drug him and beat him up and steal his coat like one of her clients. Perhaps he'll call her up one day to see what she could do in a real bedroom – wait, they were in a bedroom when it happened.
"Jesus," John repeats, returning to attend to Sherlock. He pulls him to his feet, after which Sherlock promptly collapses into a crouch and tries to scoot out of the room on his hands and knees. He bangs his head into the bedpost.
"Ow," he moans, pressing his numb fingertips to his forehead, his priorities coming foggily to mind. "John, we have to…uh. John. The phone; the camera phone on her we have to the camera phone pictures. We have to follow her. Follow…uh, follow now. Follow her now?"
"Not like this you're not," John reprimands, seizing Sherlock under the armpits and hoisting him up once again, and this time he holds on tightly to stop him from folding over. Sherlock's head bobs grotesquely like a dummy in a ventriloquist's recital as John sits him on the edge of Irene's vacated bed. "Listen to me, Sherlock," he says carefully. "Are you feeling alright?"
"Quite alright, John, thank you for asking how and why you're very kind indeed bless you old friend I'm positively radiant I'm fine." The entire world seems to lurch like a ship being battered in a storm but Sherlock cannot care any less because John talking to him makes him happy, though probably not as happy as the thing that hasn't happened yet will make him and the thing will happen soon if he waits long enough.
Happen. It's a funny word, and only a few letters away from 'happy'; how come he's never noticed that before?
"Sherlock?" John asks, snapping him back to fuzzy attention. His voice seems a tad garbled, as though it is passing through an electronic scrambler or two. Sherlock can't help but wonder when John had become so tall. Or so amorphous. He squints upwards at John, shielding his eyes from the technicolor lights dancing all over John's skin. John Watson never looked so stunning in red and blue and green. "Lestrade will be here any minute, now. Just stay with me, okay?"
"Stay with you okay. Sure. You and I stay with me. Okay okay. You're a good man, John, you know that? A good, fine doctor man," Sherlock drones, reaching out to pat John on the shoulder. "The best doctor man-thing I've ever had in my life – that's you, John," he adds pointedly, for emphasis. In case John didn't get it the first time round, and clarity is always important for a consulting detective.
"Dear God," John murmurs. "What has that woman done to you?"
Sherlock's too distracted by the invisible pixies flitting around his head to come to a reasonable conclusion.
.
"He's slightly aphasic and a little bit out of his mind," John tells Lestrade over his shoulder as he continues to examine Sherlock, and he cringes. "Well, actually more like completely off his rocker. I couldn't positively identify whatever was in that syringe. It could've been a psychedelic or a deliriant, judging by how he's been—are you filming him?"
"What?" Lestrade grunts distractedly, the lens of his phone trained towards the addled man who is now rubbing his face sensually into the fabric of the couch he's perched on and mumbling incomprehensibly about cars and boomerangs and scantily-clad women. Noticing John's look, Lestrade stows the device into his coat pocket, looking thwarted. "It's not something you see every day," he mutters defensively. He hasn't hit the pause button yet.
Sherlock turns over on his back and stares blankly at the ceiling through half-closed eyes, his mouth lolling open. He seems vaguely aware of their presence, but does nothing to acknowledge them. His tongue pokes out and begins to slide over his top lip, as if he's trying to touch his nose, and he starts to make a gurgling noise that sounds awfully like a botched chord progression from one of his below-average violin compositions. John watches him, flabbergasted, and Lestrade fishes out his phone in time to digitally immortalise the moment, holding down a laugh.
"So, Doctor," Lestrade says, toggling with the zoom function. The screen of his phone fills with a pixellated version of Sherlock's stupefied visage. "What do we do now?"
"Irene Adler said that he'd be fine and she'd used it before," John supplies, trying to peer into Sherlock's eyes. "I'm still deciding whether to believe her or not."
"John," Sherlock breathes dreamily, his baritone voice slurring uncharacteristically. "Your eyes…those eyes of yours. You have such magnificent pupils, John. Where on earth did you get those eyes?"
John arches his eyebrows and stands upright, shaking himself off. "Right now I'm rather inclined towards complete and utter poppycock," he notes dryly.
"Detective Inspector Lestrade! Come over here, Lestrade!" Sherlock chirps, gesturing with an inviting finger for him to approach while continuing to stare at John in amazement. Lestrade looks up from his phone warily and cocks his head at John, who stares back pleadingly with a humour him please until he's back in his right state of mind kind of look. Rolling his eyes, Lestrade sidles over to the couch and bends down, camera phone in hand. "Lestrade, in all your years as Detective Inspector, have you ever seen," Sherlock gulps, his face pulled into an expression of earnest concentration, "eyes as gorgeous, as splendid as John's?"
Lestrade smirks at John. "Erm, well, no," he admonishes with a shrug and a shake of his head. "Finest eyeballs in all of England, I'd say."
Sherlock lunges forward and wraps his arms around Lestrade, pressing up against him, his lips close to Lestrade's ear. "Good man. Absolutely brilliant," he whispers, almost in tears. "You're a lucky man, Detective Inspector. Very lucky indeed. We are all lucky men – Anderson, Mycroft, Sally, Mrs. Hudson, Molly, Irene…and all because of John." He pulls back, smiling widely, and kisses Lestrade wetly on the nose before toppling over onto the couch, fast asleep.
Lestrade rubs the glistening end of his nose where Sherlock had kissed him, pressing the pause button on his phone with the other hand. He keeps it, for good this time. "Complete and utter poppycock," he agrees. "Need some help getting him home?"
"Yes, that would be very helpful," John sighs tiredly, squatting down to pull Sherlock's arm around his neck.
A/N: Feedback?
Just for reference, lorazepam is a potent hypnotic, amnesic, anxiolytic, anticonvulsant and antiemetic. Illicit use of the drug to get a high can sometimes include a hallucinogen to enhance the trip.