It was like waking up with a giant cat, the sleep-heavy weight of limbs forming a warm cage around his body, hair tickling at his nose. Not that John minded having Sherlock wound around his body, face pressed to his chest. He never had nightmares, though Sherlock vehemently denied being a dreamwalker. More important, though, was that he had Sherlock — beautiful, untouchable, aloof, cold-hearted Sherlock. And he was entirely, unbelievably in love with John.

"I want more," Sherlock had insisted last night, already drifting to sleep without protest, even though he'd slept the night before and the night before that. He'd tucked his head into the hollow of John's shoulder and inhaled so deeply that John had felt the cool drift of air over his chest. "I want to breathe you instead of air. I want to live in you."

For all these past months, John had thought Sherlock a machine, a creature of pure logic and reason — some sort of anti-empath who had deleted emotions as unnecessary, and John couldn't have been more wrong. His arms went tight around Sherlock's shoulders as a shiver passed through him at the thought of how Sherlock must have suffered, hiding this.

"Not anymore," Sherlock said, the words slightly muffled by the sheets twisted around their bodies.

"Are you poking round my thoughts?" John asked, without any real heat. He'd never had any secrets from Sherlock before — not when the man could glance at him and read everything.

"You're broadcasting," Sherlock answered, shifting his body as if desperate for another inch of skin-to-skin contact. His feet flexed up, pressing against John's soles, and he flattened his hand against John's back as if he couldn't bear the thought of his curved fingers denying his palms that contact.

"It's because we're touching," John said, wondering just how far the skin-to-skin contact would go in breaking down the barriers between John's untrained, ungifted mind and Sherlock's.

Sherlock purred. It was the only way to describe the sound, and John found it absolutely adorable. John bit his lip to keep from laughing, but the purr turned into an indignant huff all the same. "John," Sherlock complained. "I am not a cat."

"Yes. Yes, you are." John bent and pressed a kiss to Sherlock's disarrayed curls. "A great bloody cat who's suddenly discovered that us mere humans can be useful for petting," he accused fondly.

With another mock-grumble, Sherlock untwisted and prodded at John with his knee while tugging against his hip until he was on his back beneath John. "Obviously I'm not," he said smugly, wrapping his arms around John's body. "A cat would never tolerate this."

John lifted his head as far as the hand between his shoulderblades would permit. "Have you ever even seen a cat, or have you deleted them all?" he teased. "The one I had growing up insisted on being underfoot and getting attention. Reminds me of this bloke I know —" He cut off with a grunted laugh as Sherlock finally managed to pull him back down.

Nuzzling into the crook of John's neck, Sherlock pointedly asked, "Are you getting rid of me for a cat, then?"

"I've put up with you for all these months, and I'm still here."

A shiver passed through Sherlock. His arms went tight around John as his breath caught. "You always will be," he said tightly. When John answered with a kiss, Sherlock insisted, "Say it, John."

It was heartbreaking to think Sherlock had never allowed this. If John hadn't looked up at just the right moment after they'd caught that murderer, if he hadn't put together a hundred minuscule hints, if he hadn't learned how to observe, he might never have figured out Sherlock's secret. And they'd both still be alone.

"I swear it, love. I'll always be here, with you."

This one was different. Not the usual type who picked her up at all. Sharp suit in dark blue, neat tailored shirt, tie still knotted. No alcohol on his breath, no glazed eyes to betray the use of drugs. He was even polite, all, "Nice to meet you" and "If you wouldn't mind" and even "Thank you".

She didn't get a bad feeling from him. She didn't get a good feeling from him, either, which was strange. She always knew which ones were safe and which ones were dangerous. In her early years, she'd ignore that danger-vibe for enough money, and she'd paid for it every time. So now, she listened to her instincts (because that's all it was — instinct, not empathy, not psy).

Funny. She'd never had one who didn't trigger an instinct one way or another. Not until this one.

No matter what, she'd remember him, she decided as she drifted off to sleep. She didn't normally do that, either, but this one wasn't going to toss the room for the stash of pound notes hidden in the wardrobe. He didn't need to — not with all those fancy cards in his wallet. He'd given her two hundred-pound notes and told her to keep the change, in fact. Too bad she didn't have a mobile, or she would've given him her number. Maybe he'd come back to her corner.

But he was nice and she was tired. Really tired. It was a blank, empty sort of tired, one that pulled her down as her energy seemed to just drain out of her body.

"Don't go to sleep."

Such a nice voice, he had, like listening to a song.

Then, he hit her. Nothing new, but not something he'd done.

"I said, don't sleep."

Rousing was hard, like getting out of a warm bed on a freezing morning. She mumbled something, or thought she did, but her face was still stinging from the slap.

She should have been upset about that. She should have been angry. She wasn't one of those girls. But instead, she just felt pain.

"You can't sleep yet," he said, and the hand that had slapped her now touched gently, stroking her hair away from her face. "Come on. Up."

He helped her out of bed. She was curiously detached from herself. It was like watching the first few minutes of a movie, when you didn't know the characters and didn't care about them. She got up and he pulled her dress down and she put on her shoes, and none of it really mattered.

"Why?" she asked. Or maybe she asked where or what — it was all the same to her. She couldn't really find it in her to care, but she thought she should say something.

"You're an empath," he whispered into her ear as he slipped an arm around her waist, supporting her. "Not enough to register, but enough to get feelings. That's how you know, isn't it? That's how you can tell which cars are safe and who's out for a quick fuck without paying."

She should have been worried. She did get feelings, but she'd never thought anything of it. Lots of nulls got feelings — that's where superstition came from.

Oh, fuck. Was he from the police? Was he looking for unregistereds?

He hugged her close against his side, half-carrying her out of the room. "Shh. Don't worry. You don't have to be afraid anymore," he said soothingly.

She got her coordination back by the time they reached the narrow stairs, but he didn't let go of her. It took effort to rouse herself enough to ask, "Who?"

"The only person in the world who'll ever matter to you." He pressed a kiss to her temple, but it felt cold. Empty.

Together, they navigated the long line of steps and the dark hallway where the light was always out. They went out into the cold, damp night and she shivered, but only for a minute.

She was still cold, but she didn't seem to care.

"You still want to sleep, don't you?" he asked, leading her on the reverse of the path they'd taken earlier that night, heading toward the riverfront.

She nodded. She wasn't afraid, though she should have been, and she examined that lack of fear without any real curiosity.

"Then you should sleep," he told her. "I'll take you somewhere safe, and you can sleep. Would you like that?"

"Mmm-hmm."

Together, they walked towards the river.

John meant every word he said, although when 'here' changed from the cozy warmth of Sherlock's bed to the mucky edge of the Thames, he couldn't help but think that 'there' was definitely better than 'here'.

"Can't believe he won't do this professionally," Detective Inspector Dimmock said companionably as he walked to John's side. He offered a foam cup with steam coiling out the hole in the lid. A block away, the coffee shop was doing brisk business providing caffeinated warmth to the officers and forensics team.

"Thanks," John said gratefully, glancing at the detective only long enough to give him a smile. His eyes went right back to Sherlock, who was striding around like a force of nature, his mere presence driving everyone out of his path. His pale blue eyes were sharp and alive, sweeping the area, brow furrowed in concentration. His £600 shoes were covered in mud and river water had splattered all the way up to his knees.

John sipped at the cup and found it contained coffee, sweet and light. He normally didn't take sugar, but the wind was cruelly cold and the coffee was hot, so it was good enough. "Really, though, would you want to work with him day-in, day-out?"

"You do."

John grinned. "Yeah, but as he once put it, I'm no saner than he is. I invaded Afghanistan," he said, breaking into laughter at the memory of how Sherlock had so calmly and logically pointed out that little fact of John's past.

Dimmock gave John a strange look, but that was nothing new. "Yeah, true. Puts the diviners in tears every time he finds something they miss. Wish I knew how he did it."

It wasn't the first time John had heard that statement, but now, it made his gut clench with apprehension. "The science of deduction," he answered as he always did, and hoped his voice was steady.

Sherlock had turned toward them, thank God, giving John the excuse to end the conversation. Dimmock stepped eagerly forward, asking, "Find anything?"

With a scathing glare, Sherlock snapped, "Of course I did, despite the mess your so-called diviners made of the scene. Next time, leash them so they don't contaminate the scene — or better yet —"

"Sherlock," John interrupted gently, as he always did right about at this point.

Sherlock's mouth snapped shut. His eyes flicked to John before he turned back to Dimmock. Somewhat more politely, Sherlock said, "At least your psychometrist got one right. It's a violent death, not a suicide."

"But..." Dimmock hesitated to state the obvious, though both he and John were thinking the same thing. "The victim's footprints were the only ones we found. Did she walk into the river at gunpoint?"

"Of course not. Why not swim away, if that were the case?" Sherlock looked back at the body, looking garishly colorful under the icy grey overcast. "Look at her clothes. She was a prostitute. She worked this area — knew where to run, where to hide. She wouldn't have gone to the edge of the river, lain down face-deep in the water, and intentionally drowned herself."

"But why? There was no cranial trauma," Dimmock protested. "We'll do a tox screen, but the psychometrist said there was no alcohol in her system."

"You'll find oxytocin in her system," Sherlock said, his gaze wandering as if he were already bored of having to explain. "One set of footprints? No trace of drugs or alcohol? She had a client — one that actually provided a satisfying sexual experience for her. Probably male, though not necessarily — any idiot pathologist can tell you the details. The point is, her brain produced a chemical response that served to relax her, put her off her guard. She fell asleep. And afterwards, she sleepwalked here."

"She what?"

"Must I spell everything out? A dreamwalker, Dimmock. Your killer's a dreamwalker." He stared at Dimmock for just a moment before looking toward the street, entirely dismissing Dimmock and the rest of the investigation team from his reality. "Come, John. Let's find something interesting to do."

"It's a difficult compromise, managing sensory input," Sherlock explained, flopping bonelessly down on the sofa as the kettle whistled. "All psychometrists avoid casual touch, which most people respect, but a sensitive one will often self-shield with artificial fabrics. Polyester and such," he said distastefully.

"But don't psychics describe artificial fabrics as smothering? Suffocating?" John asked as he went to find the tea bags. "Ours were were always issued all-natural BDUs."

"I can only tell you what I've experienced," Sherlock said dismissively. "So you treated psychics in the army."

Steam rose in a cloud as John dropped the tea bags into the mugs and added boiling water. "We had a farseer in our unit. Iain Parker. Saved our lives more times than I can count." John shook off the memory, glancing back at Sherlock.

Sherlock returned the look with sharp, curious eyes. "Did he enlist while in training or after?"

John hadn't spent all these months at Sherlock's side without learning how to follow some of his thought processes. "He wasn't marked, no. He enlisted in his third-year training, and the military sent him to sniper school to understand how to be a spotter. I understand they recruit heavily while trainees are still young, so they can get additional training," he said as he added milk to one mug and three teaspoons of sugar to the other.

Sherlock's eyes narrowed as he considered this. "And it saves the trouble of removing their tattoos. A marked psychic in the field is a target."

"Not all of them, but most. Though you hear stories — empaths sensing people hiding during a building-clear, dreamwalkers picking up hints of planned attacks, that sort of thing."

"The CIA apparently attempted to use dreamwalkers offensively during Vietnam." Sherlock rolled his eyes. John grinned back at him, wondering if Mycroft had done something similarly ridiculous since taking over the British government.

Instead, he mentioned, "Dimmock asked again why you don't do this professionally." He settled down on the couch beside Sherlock, handing over his mug, reflecting idly that their armchairs never got much use these days. Not that he minded.

Immediately, Sherlock burrowed up under John's right arm, one leg sprawled over John's lap, head resting against John's chest. "Dimmock's an idiot."

"He isn't. He's just not you — Don't tickle," John warned sternly, moving his tea to rest safely on the arm of the sofa.

Sherlock's answer was muffled by John's shirt as he skimmed his hand across John's belly to rest against his waist. Sherlock didn't have any trouble keeping his tea balanced on his knee, the bastard. Probably wasn't even cheating with his telekinesis to hold it in place. For someone that tall and gangly, he was amazingly graceful, at least when he chose to be.

John couldn't help but wonder how much of what Sherlock did was based on his psychic gifts. He always had a perfectly logical, mundane explanation for all of his deductions. Well, no — hardly mundane. Really, it was like bloody magic, watching him match up puzzle pieces that most people never even noticed, much less thought were important.

But it was terribly dangerous; John shivered just thinking about it, and his arm tightened around Sherlock's shoulders. Now, Sherlock had established his reputation for genius, but in those early days that he never mentioned, how had he known how to cover up his gifts? Or was his ability to observe just another type of gift, one that was purely intellectual and not psychic?

It had to be. It was something so inherent to Sherlock's whole being, John couldn't imagine him without it, even as a child. Without a single psychic gift, Sherlock still would have been extraordinary.

"You're a bloody genius, you know," John whispered, awed that somehow, Sherlock had chosen him — boring, ordinary John Watson — to share his life.

Always modest, Sherlock's response was nearly predictable. "Of course I am," he said, and burrowed his face against John's neck with a contented sigh.

"No. Sherlock, I mean it," John insisted, nudging him. Somehow, his tea still hadn't fallen. "What the hell are you doing with me?"

Sherlock lifted his head enough to look at John, baffled. Then his head tipped to the side and his eyes went distant. His hand pressed tightly into John's side, pulling him closer. "John... You don't see what's inside you — not like I do. You care."

"Of course I care. God, if you haven't figured that out —"

"No." He shook his head and sighed, reaching for the mug on his knee. He tasted it and moved his other leg over John's lap, leaning sideways against the back of the sofa, keeping John's right arm trapped.

John waited patiently, knowing Sherlock was trying to find the right words. He rested a hand on Sherlock's knee, stroking gently through the fine wool of his trousers. It took a good two-thirds of the tea before Sherlock stirred and took a deep breath, looking at him.

"People say they care, but they don't. Some do, a little: Lestrade, which is why I'll work with him, even when he's irritating. Mrs Hudson," he said, getting a little smile. "Practically an angel, she is. But most people don't, and the lie of it, the conflict between what they think they feel and what is actually inside... That's where you're unique, John. There is no conflict in you. You are who you are, inside and out, which is extraordinary in its own right, but that with all of that, you choose to care for me... That is... remarkable."

Speechless, John could only stare, grateful that Sherlock had chosen words and not his empathy to convey that. He couldn't think of how to respond, and even if he had words of his own, he couldn't have forced them past the lump in his throat or the fire in his chest. His hand went tight on Sherlock's leg, and Sherlock's palm pressed over his fingers before he curled up against John's chest again.

It was a long, long while before he could speak again.