Everything was fuzzy. Well, not everything, one thing was fuzzy. John. Always John. John and his fuzzy jumpers.
There was chlorine, not strong enough to be concentrated. A pool, it must be. THE pool. Oh. OH.
And there was the floor. He was on the floor. It was cold. And hot at the same time. Nitrate in the air. Sparks. Fire? No, no. Too disperse. Bomb. Already detonated.
But John. Where's John?
He could get up. Wobbly and detached, intoxicated with pain he couldn't quite feel. Dark curls soaked with blood and pool water. Too much blood to be his. Not Moriarty's. Moriarty was too far.
John.
John, all warm tea and fuzzy jumpers, lying there. Underneath the rubble.
What was left of John, burnt to a crisp. His heart, lying there, burnt. Dead. Irreversibly altered. Not his John. Because John was all warm tea and fuzzy jumpers. This John was charred, unrecognizable, gone.
John.
John."John…"
Sherlock Holmes woke up, to find himself sprawled out on the living room sofa. But it wasn't normal. No, no, quite abnormal. Sweat, elevated breathing. Nightmare. He deduced. At this he should have gone back to sleep, should have gotten over the slight lapse in emotional detachment, but his legs seemed to have other idea's, they willed him on to get up, and after that, pushed him over in a tangle of sheets and silk and too-long limbs towards John's room. Where warm, fuzzy John would be.
Would he? What if he wasn't? Sherlock hesitated at this thought, furrowed his eyebrows and pressed his lips together, then deleted the sentiment. Though didn't ponder why he'd not yet deleted the sentiment of needing to go see John.
But really, he would be lost without his blogger. Even if his blogger got everything wrong and evaded writing down any information of importance.
He'd be lost without John. Who else would make warm tea and have fuzzy jumpers?
Sherlock continued on towards Johns room, turned the handle, only to be greeted by an unforgiving, restrained 'click' indicating that the door was locked.
Locked? Why would John lock his door? The fact that Sherlock had never gone into John's room at this hour seemed irrelevant. It was foreign to him that John could ever require this level of privacy.
As his mind began to wander over everything that involved John, he saw it again. John under the rubble, charred and black, not fuzzy and warm. This wasn't John, but he could no longer see the proper John in his mind.
"John." Sherlock attempted nonchalance, but the name ended up falling out of his mouth like a prayer.
But there was no answer.
Sherlock didn't give up that easily, "John! You may be an idiot but surely you haven't forgotten that it is polite to respond when someone addresses you!"
Still no answer.
Sherlock blinked, "John? John! Answer me!"
No response.
Break the door down.
So he did. Panting with anxiety as he went, pummeled his right shoulder into the middle left of John's door, closest to the handle so it would open with ease.
The door swung open with a bang resembling a gunshot.
Sherlock felt himself breathe for what was like the first time in the past few moments as he watched the soldier jolt out of bed, already alert, with a worried yet slightly annoyed expression on his face.
"Sherlock?" John's voice was still sleep thick.
But it was John. John. No warm tea yet, but fuzzy and safe and oh so alive. He quickly deleted the macabre image of John that his dream had inflicted upon his mind and replaced it with the sight before him, of the rumpled, alive version. His version.
His legs once again pushed him forward, forward until his knees hit the edge of Johns bed so that he flopped into it in a relieved, panting pile of silk, pale skin and wild curls. As he watched Johns bewildered, speckled dark blue eyes widen in bewilderment, he felt his throat tighten. So he swallowed and willed it to go away.
"I…you…the pool." He swallowed, shocked at his sudden inability to speak, so he settled for; "Nightmare."
"Oh..Sherlock…" John's face immediately softened in understanding.
Sherlock merely began to squirm up to Johns level, bringing his head to the pillow and he just looked, just took John in.
He looked with pleading eyes that screamed, behind the façade; please, I need this, you. So John nodded, and let himself sink off of his elbows, so he was once again submerged in his bed, facing Sherlock.
"He burnt the heart out of me." Sherlock whispered, voice wavering, and oh, oh – tears. Hot and foreign, were cascading down Sherlock's flawless face. They had no place there.
John swallowed.
"But I won't let him get you, ever again."
"Sherlock…"
"No."
John nodded again, and welcomed Sherlock into his space, resting his chin upon Sherlock's head as the consulting detective snaked a long arm around the doctors waist, and they fell asleep. In a tangle of silk, long limbs, fuzzy jumpers, brown curls and not tea, just quite yet.