My first crossover! To be honest, I'm surprised I haven't seen this device used before... it seems like an obvious way to throw Watson in the path of someone who was later famous.

Wordcount: 507

A/N: Some facts and ideas are drawn from Carpenter's biography of Tolkien and Tolkien's Letters. Pyrexia = trench fever.

Written for the shkinkmeme prompt (which also explains the title): Hit shuffle on the nearest music playing device. The title of the first song is the prompt.
Crack out those iPods, dig your hand through a box of 8-tracks, grab the nearest member of a choir. Whatever it takes people.

November, 1916

He woke with a gasp, the dream images remaining clear in his vision even when he opened his eyes. He craned his neck to look around; beds lined up on either side of him with more on the other side of the dimly lit room. Still in a hospital ward somewhere in France, then.

"Nightmare?" a voice asked sympathetically, and he feared the fever was playing tricks with his mind (again) until he caught sight of a doctor standing a few beds to his right.

"Yes," he rasped, his throat dry. Had he been screaming?

The doctor seemed to scan the room, then said, "Give me a moment and I'll get you some water."

He was willing to wait, since it meant he wouldn't have to go back to sleep just yet. He watched the doctor finish whatever it was he had been doing, pour a glass of water from the pitcher on the stand in the middle of the room, and slowly made his way to the bed, limping slightly. He sat up and accepted the glass; the doctor skimmed the chart hanging at the end of his bed.

"Ah, a pyrexia case," the doctor commented, glancing briefly at him. "Some would say you are fortunate to escape the trenches uninjured."

"No, not really," he sighed, laying back down.

The doctor replaced the chart and sat next to his bed on a stool he pulled from somewhere. "I know. The uninjured must not only cope with what they have seen, but also with the guilt of remaining alive and whole while compatriots and friends are shot to pieces." The doctor gazed at him steadily. "Do you have someone back home, Mr. Tolkien?"

"Edith," he replied. "We married in March."

"Will you be able to talk to her about all of this?"

"I can talk to her about anything," he said stoutly.

The doctor's expression was hard to see in the dim light, but it seemed doubtful. "Do you write?" he inquired, appearing to change the subject.

"Yes," he replied immediately.

"Good. Write about it. What you've seen, how you felt, everything." The doctor patted his hand and began to rise from the stool. "It will help, I promise you."

"I'll try," he said uncertainly, not sure he would ever be able to put the horrors he'd seen into words that could adequately describe them. "War is such a waste," he said vehemently, remembering the ruin of the fields now crossed with trenches, the ravaged hillsides, and, most of all, the bodies strewn about like garbage, left to swell and decay where they fell.

"Yes," the doctor agreed softly. "But some wars are worth fighting, even so." He patted Tolkien's hand and stood to leave. "This is unofficial, mind, but I'm fairly certain you'll be shipped back home the day after next. You might be able to see your Edith within the week."

"Thank you," he whispered numbly.

It wasn't until he was on the ship for England that he realized he'd never asked the doctor's name.