A/N: Hello all! I started this before I watched Sign of Three, and finished it the day after. I hope the tone stays the same. Somebody PM me and we can cry about it together. Just a couple more days of being off-hiatus. I don't what I'll do. For anyone who saw my Lost in Paradise thing, I'm sorry. I took it down. That was so bad. It was past midnight and I was crying, okay?!
Anyway. I wanted a fic where Sherlock learned hugs were good. It ended up being a bit more than that, I think. I like it. I might fix it up a bit later. Darkest thing I've ever wrote (LIP aside), rather liked it actually... :)
And this is the first entry in my series of Sherlock drabbles! I've been talking about starting one of these for a while, and I finally did it. Stay tuned, I've got tons of ficlet prompts I want to try.
WARNING: This story has a lot of blood and some slightly graphic descriptions.
Enjoy, and don't forget to leave me a review and tell me what you think!
After a lifetime of being told he was 'different', in varying degrees of affection or hatred, Sherlock didn't assume he needed the things all the 'normal' people did. But once again, John Hamish Watson changed everything, corrupting all of Sherlock's data, forcing him to reach new conclusions. It was inconvenient to be proved wrong, but for some reason Sherlock relished it, in those cases. Very, very few people had ever proved him wrong in his life, and the small army doctor kept on surprising him, his unexplored depths beckoning to Sherlock's curious nature.
Sherlock rose coughing and gasping from the kitchen table where he had been pinned, blood covering his hands. The door burst open with a metallic screech, admitting a stream of Scotland Yard's finest, guns extended. But the weapons were soon lowered, upon seeing there was no need. On the floor at Sherlock's feet was a man, his eyes glazed over in death, his hands clutched around a knife that was embedded in his jugular vein.
"Sherlock! You okay?" exclaimed John, running to the consulting detective's aid. The taller man waved him away, trying not to place his bloodied fingers on anything, thus spreading the thick liquid. He eventually got his breath back, and by then the paramedics arrived, who were also unneeded. Sherlock was uninjured, and the criminal and his latest victim were beyond help or harm. The poor woman lay not very far away, her throat cut and face contorted in terror. They had been too late.
"You killed them?" asked a wide-eyed Sergeant Donovan, looking between Sherlock's stained hands and the pair of people lying in a dark pool.
"The serial killer, in self-defense," retorted Sherlock.
His mind made him relive the moment, when his vision was going fuzzy, the malicious face above him, and thumbs pressing his trachea shut. He had blindly reached for a weapon on the counter next to him, and his fingers found the butcher's blade. The door was trembling under assault from the detectives on the other side, but Sherlock had no clue if they would get there in time. In a kill-or-be-killed moment, he plunged the knife into his assailant's neck, his expression fierce and dark. The man had begun making the most awful, haunting choking sounds, his blood spurting out of the entry point and covering Sherlock's hand and dripped onto his clothes. Before he could be contaminated further, Sherlock shoved him off, leaving his opponent to convulse horrifically on the floor before going still forever.
Donovan's eyes narrowed. "Sure. And you couldn't wait five more seconds for us? Instead you had to go and murder him, you psychopath!" she spat acerbically.
"He was strangling me! And I prefer 'sociopath!'" growled Sherlock, ignoring John's warning look.
"No wonder. We all want to," she said scathingly before turning and doing whatever pointless stupid things someone on her level of idiocy did.
"What happened?" asked Lestrade, walking over with a not-amused look, brushing past Donovan.
"I could ask the same thing of you, Lestrade," Sherlock said sharply. "What took so long?"
Lestrade scowled. "Don't give me any of that, Sherlock. I can arrest you if I so pleased." Sherlock gave the inspector a ferocious glare, which was ignored. "If you hadn't run off without telling any of us where you were going, this wouldn't have happened."
"I was trying to save her!" he said loudly, throwing an arm toward the pale corpse across the room.
"Yeah, you see how that turned out," replied Lestrade, who clearly didn't have any patience to spare at the moment, and pinched the bridge of his nose. Sherlock went silent, dangerously so.
"Tell me. What happened." Lestrade said after a pause, crossing his arms.
"It was him or me. I chose me." Sherlock snapped, and began to make a beeline for the door, shoving aside anyone in his way. It seemed like everyone in the room was yelling at him, to stay or to go, to speak or be silent. Sherlock needed silence. He didn't miss the way everyone looked at him, with the incriminating red sheen on his hands and clothes. The strange psychopath had been found in a room with two bodies. No one was going to forget about this any time soon.
"Aren't we going to arrest him?" he heard some woman ask before he slammed the door behind him.
It didn't matter what they thought, they were all idiots.
He eventually made it back to open air. At least, relatively. London never had the cleanest of atmospheres.
Sherlock had no idea where he was going. He wasn't likely to get a cab in this state. 221B didn't sound inviting, aside from the shower. But he needed to get out of these clothes. So, he walked all the way home, and got out his key and opened pushed the door open roughly. Thankfully by that point the blood had dried, so it didn't spread. Mrs. Hudson emerged, and began to give Sherlock a bright greeting before gasping in shock.
"Sherlock! What on earth-"
"Everything's fine." Sherlock ground out before stomping up the stairs, not trusting himself to say anything else.
He went straight to the shower, throwing each article of clothing off with as loud a sound as he could make, leaving it all in a haphazard pile in the hall. Then he scrubbed himself within an inch of his life, making his eyes blur with pain. Dressed in his most skin-friendly clothing, he snatched his violin off the couch and strode to the window, sitting in front of it.
Then started grinding the bow on the strings. Just sawing away like a madman, producing an unholy screech that filled the air, making it electric.
Sherlock was not okay. He was sad, he was angry, he was hurt, he was guilty, he was lonely.
He couldn't escape the truth that the blood of both the man and woman were on his head. He'd been too slow in solving the case, and too eager to take life. Sherlock was accustomed to death - his line of work brought him in close association with it. But he'd never killed someone with his own hands the way he had today. Never physically took someone's life. Though his skin was pink from being vigourously exfoliated, he couldn't seem to wash away the bloodstains. Sherlock was drowning in it, in the burden of responsibility and guilt that he swore he would carry to his last breath.
Is it nice not being me? It must be so relaxing.
Not a hero, not a villain, a sad mix of the two, that's what he was. He'd failed before, but the woman's terrified expression was burned into his retinas, probably forever. Right along with the image of Soo Lin Yao, with a bullet through her pretty head. The price of being known to be a genius is when you're wrong.
Failure was so... crushing. Final. Sherlock told everyone he didn't care, didn't care about lives or about people, just puzzles. But he was also a very good liar. Just like how he told everyone he didn't care what anyone thought. To a degree, it was true. He cared a great deal less than most people. It still didn't protect him from the slap in the face he felt every time he was assumed to be a murderer.
Mrs. Hudson burst in, and snatched the violin from his hands with uncharacteristic ferocity.
"Sherlock! People are threatening to call the police!" she scolded harshly.
"Let them." Sherlock retorted sulkily to her retreating back. He wouldn't get his violin back for a week, unless John moved himself to use those disarming eyes on the venerable landlady. But considering the nasty way Sherlock was acting, it was unlikely. John had a strong (and strange) sense of justice.
He remained there, staring moodily out the window, the dark cloud of his thoughts almost visible around him.
After the sun went down, Sherlock heard the door open. He didn't turn around.
"You alright?" John asked. Sherlock ignored him, too upset to talk without saying something he'd regret. There were a series of sounds, John putting things down and making tea and making a bunch of unnecessary noise.
"Would you cut that out?!" Sherlock said sharply. He was grimly fascinated by his own anger.
"What?" John asked, bewildered. Such an idiot, couldn't he see Sherlock was trying to pout? When Sherlock didn't reply, John continued whatever he was doing. There were muted clinks, he was stirring sugar into the tea in the cup. Each high-pitched sound drove Sherlock closer to the edge.
Clink.
Sherlock slapped his hands over his ears.
C-clink.
He ground his teeth, trying to stay sane.
Clink.
Sherlock self-restraint snapped in two.
"STOP!" he yelled rabidly, gripping his curls and pulling on them hard enough to make tears sting his eyes.
"What is your problem, Sherlock?" snapped an irritated army doctor. Sherlock could feel his bristling temper from across the room.
"Would you stop making so much noise! You're driving me mad!" The words were spoken with such poison it was withering.
There was a snort, and then it started again. The clink-clink-clink of metal against china. How long did it take to stir in sugar, anyway?!
"JOHN!" Sherlock yelled, and turned and threw a book at his friend's back.
He was facing the window again when he heard the semi-hollow thud of the book against a ribcage, and then a dull clatter when it fell to the ground. He winced but said nothing, horrified at his own outburst. And yet he was still blazing mad. John's very presence contaminated the air with stupidity, he was like a speedbump to Sherlock's troubled mind, keeping it from thinking the dark thoughts he wanted it to.
He hung his head, ashamed of himself and his childish ways. Now John would be angry with him too, just like everyone else in the whole stupid world. He heard approaching footsteps, and stiffened, ready for a row.
"Go away." Sherlock snapped, dreading what John would have to say to him.
There was no response. Sherlock could almost writhe in suspense, his heart high on adrenaline. He was very afraid. John had a mild disposition, but when he got angry, it was frightening.
Eventually, John sat next to him, and placed a steaming cup of tea in front of Sherlock. The consulting detective started in surprise, looking at his friend. John just looked quietly out the window, sipping his tea. One half of Sherlock's brain rebelled, he didn't need anyone or anything, let alone a cup of tea. The rest of it was jaded and defeated, and in the end he picked up the cup and sipped it slightly. It was the perfect temperature, as always.
He was sure that John would start talking, and drive him up a wall with pointless words - about events, about Sherlock, or trying to get Sherlock to talk. But the flat remained silent. Sherlock drank in the comfortable stillness, John's slightly huddled form next to him bringing him comfort. It was exactly what he needed. How John continued to know what that was, Sherlock didn't know. It was almost supernatural. The quiet companionship continued a while longer before it was broken by Sherlock's low timbre.
"Thank you." His hands shook with sincerity, a unique weakness of his.
"Quite right," John said drily, sipping his tea again.
There was a longer stretch of silence, during which time Sherlock's initial distress melted away at the heat of the affection blazing next to him. The ash blond hair, the wrinkly (reminiscent of a daschund puppy) forehead apparently held unfathomable mysteries beneath it, definitely the greatest puzzle Sherlock had ever encountered in his life. Every time Sherlock was sure he had pushed too far, John came springing back, and burrowed deeper in Sherlock's self-imposed isolation. It was - unprecedented.
"I've killed men," said John quietly. Sherlock blinked in surprise, not at the revelation - John had been a soldier, after all - but at the insight. How had John know what had upset him?
"And I've failed to save people. Good people," John continued, his eyes becoming glassy as he relived the memory. Also not shocking - he was a doctor too, of course he would have lost patients. But it had never occurred to Sherlock before how similar their burden was.
"But you can't hold on to it forever. You have to let it go, and learn from it," John said, making eye contact with Sherlock for the first time in the conversation.
Sherlock swallowed and looked out the window.
"When did I sign up for a therapy session?" he said softly with sarcasm lacing his voice, but there was no bite in it.
"Well after an incident like that, most people would be in shock, so you're doing fine," John replied with that pawky humour of his, and drained the last of his tea.
It was impossible to let go, of course. But he would try. Sherlock told himself it wasn't his fault, he did his best, he had no choice. It was like trying to break out of prison bars with a nail filer. Tiring, discouraging, and pointless.
Suddenly an arm snaked around Sherlock's shoulder, making him jerk in shock for the second time that evening.
"Come here, you great sod," said John affectionately, and pulled Sherlock in for a not-at-all-awkward side hug.
"What - what is this? Why-" Sherlock blurted rapidly, blinking in shock, his body stiff.
"Just go with it," John said firmly, cutting him off. "It's called a hug, genius."
Sherlock didn't need hugs, hugs were for ordinary people who couldn't sort out their problems without some happy hormones to push them along. He was a sociopath. Sociopaths didn't embrace. He said as much out loud.
John let his head fall on Sherlock's shoulder, the tips of the hair on top of his head brushing Sherlock's neck.
Sociopaths certainly didn't 'cuddle.'
But the gesture set off fireworks in Sherlock's head. Affectionate physical contact was so amazing, he had forgotten. He sank into the embrace, comfortable. John gave good hugs. Not those awkward things where you stand wishing they would let go, and all you can think about is how there's hair in your face and one particular set of muscles is burning from holding the same position for long. No, this was different.
Better.
He felt better. Stupid hormones, they were affecting him. But oh, it felt so good, he was starved for it. The body's strange remedies for distress were truly bizarre. He rested his head on top of John's, feeling the bundle of hair fibres between their skulls rustle with slight movement.
"This is good." Sherlock mumbled, filing it under 'things to be sorted later'.
"You think?" John threw back, and Sherlock could feel him smiling.
"Should I - do anything?" Sherlock asked tentatively, not wanting to mess it up.
"You're doing great." John said encouragingly.
"Am I?" Sherlock asked in a high pitch, taken aback.
"Yep." John answered matter-of-factly.
"I've always been a quick learner," Sherlock threw in proudly.
"Stop talking, you'll ruin it," John said drily, smile gone.
"Okay." Sherlock meekly replied, settling into the comfortable silence.
Part of Sherlock's brain wondered if this was real. It was so incredible. He needed to experiment in this area more, definitely. He could feel affection welling up in his heart, unbidden. It was oh-so-dangerous for him to invest himself. Detrimental to his work. But if this was friendship, he decided he rather liked it.
Perhaps it was worth the risk.