Headless
"Holy shit! Sherlock!" cursed the former army doctor who had just entered the bathroom and immediately rushed out again.
"What is it now?" came a bored voice from the sofa in front of the wounded wall. Sherlock, who had folded his hands thoughtfully, did not even open his eyes.
"There in the bathtub…" began John Watson, stopping mid-sentence to catch some air. "…is a headless body."
With difficulty, he managed to pull himself together and to not raise his voice much more than he already had. This time, his roommate had clearly gone too far.
"Well spotted, John," Sherlock answered, uninterested and showing no signs of emotion. "Did you feel the water to check if it's still warm?"
John opened his mouth, aghast, but closed it again, still searching for the right words. "Sherlock, you'll quickly get the body out of there. It can't go on like this!" He finally raised his voice to get Sherlock's attention and to make his point clear.
Sherlock opened his eyes and looked up to the ceiling. "So you have not felt the water temperature, too bad," he commented dryly, leaving John's concerns completely unnoticed.
"Sherlock, you will listen to me! It can't go on like this. You can't simply leave a headless corpse in the bathtub!"John's anger rose, hoping to finally get a reaction from the world's first consulting detective who was still quietly lying on the couch.
"Oh no, of course he's not headless, John. Would you really think that of me? The head is in the fridge right next to the milk."
Again, John's mouth fell open. "In the fridge?" He slightly tipped his head to the left and grasped the doorframe. "Are you insane?"
"Yes, there's no room left. The hands are already in the microwave." Sherlock sat up in a flowing movement. The open blue dressing grown he was wearing hung left and right of his long legs over the edge of the sofa. Resting his elbows on his knees, he put his fingertips together again.
John shook his head and looked around, dumbfounded. "Hands? In the microwave? What have you done with my lunch that I put in there this morning?" Horrified, John had finally found some words but by looking at Sherlock he knew that he would rather not know the answer.
"I'm testing the function of a stomach at a constant temperature of dead organisms," the dark-haired man finally explained.
John had a feeling that his stomach function would quit soon, if he would have to listen to any more explanations of where Sherlock had fed his lunch. "I don't care. Just…get rid of this…this chaos of extremities."
"This is an important experiment; I can't easily stop it!" Sherlock faced him in a quick movement of his head, as he tried to defend himself. If looks could kill, John would have to be more careful from here on out.
"But I can't use the loo when…" John began, but left the sentence unfinished. "Just get the bloody body out of the bath."
Sherlock stood up and walked over the small table, with complete disregard for it. The light blue fabric swung around his legs as he walked to the other side of the room and took the skull from the mantelpiece. "I'm pretty sure he won't see anything he hasn't seen in his former life yet," Sherlock joked blasphemously as he poked one of his long fingers into an empty eye socket and blew over the bald skull. A fine layer of dust was kicked up into the air.
John was close to giving up when he ran a hand over his face and sighed. Sherlock pulled his nerves. "Will you ever listen to me, Sherlock?"
"Probably not."
There was a short silence between the two disputants. "Fine. Only until tonight. Then everything is gone." Sherlock finally gave in and tried to soothe John. Gently, he placed the scull back on its former place. John stared at him. "Thank you. You'll regret it if you don't." At least the madness would find an end this evening and would not go on for weeks as it already happened often enough.
John turned around and went up the stairs to his bedroom. Halfway up he stopped and glanced back. He remembered something Sherlock said.
"We actually have milk in the fridge?"
"And beans!"
Thanks to knightsoftrenzalore from tumblr for beta'ing. This is a translation of the German version "Kopflos", also published here. Reviews are loved. Thanks for reading.