This is my first attempt at a Sherlock AU...I'm not sure how this will turn out, but feel free to let me know what you think of it! Disclaimer: I don't own 'Sherlock'.
Chapter One
"Seven Sisters"
London
Winter was coming. John Watson walked north towards the neighborhood of Seven Sisters, leaning into a heavy wind. The evening was dreary and cold, and charcoal-colored clouds promised rain later on. A plastic shopping bag swayed at his side, its light load hardly a burden: John Watson, only recently returned to London, was running out of money. He'd had to root through his pocket at the Tesco, paid for a loaf of bread and two apples and a carton of milk with change found in his back pocket. If he kept this up, he'd be homeless by December.
The Seven Sisters Motel was a small place, rundown, hunkered on some dreary anonymous street corner between a strip club and a tattoo parlor. Watson climbed the dank stairs, shouldered open the door of his room. It was small and dim and cheerless, furnished only with a narrow little cot-like bed and a desk with a plastic chair. There was, however, a mini-fridge that smelled of sour milk and probably something dead—but was still in working order—and this was where John Watson put his scant groceries.
He went to the desk, pulled his old laptop from the drawer and opened a writing document. The curser blinked at the top of the page, taunting him. Upon return from the Middle East, Watson had made himself a promise to record his memories in a sort of diary. So far, he had not written a single word.
It would not be difficult to write the happenings of each day, Watson thought, but oh-so-boring. His fingers lingered on the keys. He really ought to write something.
November 10
Nothing happens to me.
There. Watson leaned back, stared hard at the computer screen. It was bright against the dim room. Not for the first time, John Watson felt empty.
He went into the tiny bathroom and took a short, cold shower, came out and dressed in sweatpants and a jumper. Attempted to shake the hollow feeling that had trailed him since his return to Heathrow airport. The day that he had come back from the Middle East. The sky too hard, to gray, the crowds too dense. Walking into a Tesco near Trafalgar Square and staring at the rows of garishly colored foodstuffs. Walking home that day, he had felt suddenly detached from the city's other residents. There had been military police standing around on the street corners, armed to the teeth. He would have once saluted them, maybe nodded, smiled thinly. Now he turned away when he saw them. He did not belong to them, and yet they were the only people with whom he belonged.
Darkness fell early, and it was a total sort of darkness, and Watson went to bed long before he felt truly tired. He lay there on top of the blankets for a long time, on his back, watching the flash of the strip club's neon sign. Throbbing music came through the thin walls. In the hotel room next door, mattress springs squeaked and he could hear distant noises of pleasure.
Laying there in the half-light, the empty feeling overtook him. John Watson closed his eyes, and drifted into an unsettling sleep.
A marketplace. Morning. The sky a blue too bright. Sun in the sky, burning a hole in his eyelids. Soldiers. Black uniforms. Friends. They walked in a single-file line, guns in their hands. A truck parked between the market stalls. A man climbing out. Heavy coat, too heavy for the dry heat. Seeing the man, knowing in an instant. Trying to scream, to warn. Explosion. Seeing it from a distance. An arm on the roadside, pavement wet with blood. On his hands and knees, pressing hands to still chests, unable to breath. Sick. Everything going white. The dry heat closing in like an inescapable blanket. Screaming. Another explosion, knowing that death was close at hand, seeing the bomb, seeing the bullet, seeing death coming closer coming closer almost there—
"Ohgodno!"
Watson woke with a jolt, propelled upright by some invisible force. He was alone in the dark hotel room. The strip club next door was shut down, but the neon sign still flashed silently over his face, his blankets. It was yellow and blue and kind of orange. He was breathing hard.
For a long time, Watson lay in the semi-darkness, on his back, on top of the thin plaid blankets. He waited for his breath to return to normal.
There was a gun in a drawer in the table beside his bed, and Watson felt both safe and unsafe with it there. Safe, because there was only one person who could reach that gun and fire it. Unsafe, because that one person was him.
He did not trust his mind enough to sleep again. The computer on the desk was still and silent. The world beyond the window was vast and cold and dreary. The strip club sign blinked silently.
John Watson inhaled and exhaled. Start from there. He did not close his eyes again. There was frost on the window.
Winter was coming.
It was noon on a gray Saturday when he saw Mike Stamford. Watson had taken a walk at the nearby marketplace, under a canopy of dark trees. His leg ached. He used the cane but hated it. The psychologist had said that it was all in his mind, but Watson did not want to believe her. It made him sound sick, disturbed. He did not want to be sick or disturbed.
"John?" The man came out of a bodega with a paper bag in his hand. He had put on weight and wore a floppy hat. He flagged Watson down somewhat frantically. "John Watson?"
Watson froze, suspicion leaping into his mind like a fast dark animal. He was poised to run (as if he could have gotten far with the cane...) but he recognized the face beneath the hat.
"Mike Stamford!"
They shook hands.
"I thought you were..." Mike Stamford glanced around nervously. "Involved in the conflict. Overseas."
"I was." Watson said. "Not a soldier," He added quickly, because these days being a soldier or policeman was bad news. "Medic. That's all."
"You're walking with a cane." Mike said, and gestured.
"Got shot," Watson replied, awkwardly. "It's not so bad."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be." At least it got me out of the that hellhole, he wanted to add, but refrained. There was a soldier on the nearest corner, watching them with narrowed eyes. Maybe, Watson hoped, he was just bored.
"Well," Mike said, "You're back in London now."
"Yes."
"Where are you living?"
"Motel, around the corner."
"That crappy place?" Mike whistled. "Get yourself a flat, John."
"I wish I could." Watson longed for a fireplace, for a comfortable bed, for a real kitchen with a sink and dishwasher. "Can't afford it on an Army pension, though."
"You know something?" Mike said, and did not wait for Watson to ask what. "I know a chap who's asking around."
"Really?" Watson felt a small spark of hope. "Wonderful."
"Want to meet him?"
"Sure." And they set off through the streets together, under the watchful eyes of the soldiers on the corner and the cameras mounted on roofs and eaves and lampposts. Always watching. Always.
The hospital had once been a grand old building in the center of the city, a place of learning and healing. That, however, was the Bart's of John Watson's day. It was now a crumbling facade, a grim, rundown building crouched on a street corner. In London's society these days, hospitals were not places of healing. They were places where people went to die.
Mike Stamford headed straight for the morgue. It was a chilling room, vast and brutally white, deep underground. The cold seeped into Watson's bones, and he very nearly shivered. The smell of death pressed close around the, damp and stinking.
A pretty young girl was standing over the corpse of an old man, her face drawn. Mike waved to her, airy.
"Hello, Molly!"
"Hello, Mike." She cast a frightened look at John. "Who's he? Personnel without clearance can't be down here."
"It's alright," Mike said genially. "He's an old friend. We went through school together."
"Oh." The girl, Molly, nodded quickly. "Okay."
She was quite young, but her face was pale and serious. Her brown hair was pulled back. She had nice eyes, sort of hazel.
"Molly Hooper," Molly said.
"John Watson."
They exchanged quick, cheerless smiles. Watson was glancing around the morgue, marveling over how much it had changed. The doors slid open suddenly, hissing loudly, and a tall figure in a long coat swept in. Watson worried for a moment that this was some sort of administrator who was going to have them all thrown out, but then Mike said,
"Sherlock!"
"Mike," The tall man said, almost flippant, and turned to Molly Hooper. "Have you got the lab report back?"
"Natural causes." She said timidly.
"No, it wasn't." Tall and Mysterious said loudly; Molly pressed her lips together. "Honestly, Molly Hooper...is the government paying you well for your ignorance?"
"Sherlock..." Molly began, almost pleadingly. Watson felt that he ought to speak up on this poor girl's behalf when Mike Stamford crossed the room in three easy strides and clapped the tall man on the shoulder.
"John, this is Sherlock Holmes. He's got a flat over on Baker Street, and he's been casting about for a flatmate for quite some time."
Watson surveyed his potential flatmate from a distance: Sherlock Holmes cut an imposing figure—tall and thin, dressed in a dark suit and coat. His was a thin, severe face, gray eyes exceedingly sharp against pale skin. High cheekbones and dark hair only added to the strange intensity of his appearance.
"Very good." Sherlock said at once. "We'll meet at 221b Baker Street at nine o'clock tomorrow morning. Please don't be late." He unzipped a body bag with great purpose and examined the corpse within. Molly Hooper hovered anxiously behind him, wringing her hands. Watson sensed that the conversation was over.
"Jolly good!" Mike Stamford announced, and all but ushered John through the door. As they stepped into the boxy little lift and rose steadily upwards, away from the morgue, he turned to Watson. "He's a bit eccentric sometimes."
"Sometimes?"
"Well," Mike shrugged. "Most of the time. All of the time."
Wonderful. Sherlock Holmes certainly was a strange man, Watson thought. Probably would turn out to be a horrible flatmate. Still, he figured, a nice flat on Baker Street sure as hell beat living in a crappy motel in Seven Sisters.
"Thanks," He told Mike, and they shook hands outside the hospital. "Thanks very much." He meant it.
They parted ways then, and John Watson returned to Seven Sisters on foot. He felt considerably cheerful, despite the gloomy weather and the memories of the Middle East and the military policemen on the corners.
Perhaps things would start looking up, now. Perhaps he would be able to rebuild his life from the ruins of the past. It would take time, certainly, and be a bit painful, like ripping off an old band-aid...but maybe, just maybe, John Watson's future was not completely hopeless after all.
A/N: What did you all think? Leave your thoughts/criticism in a review! (Also, if you would like something clarified shoot me a P.M!) I'll be giving more background within the next few chapters! Thanks for reading!
