A/N: I behaved like a child over this story and the reviews I received from it. Yes it could have been deemed sloppy but it was just three different time slots in chapter. I have amended this to three chapters.
Molly looked dreadful but as Sherlock opened his mouth to say so John nudged him in the ribs.
"Molly go home." Doctor Watson stepped around his best friend to take a closer look at the sniffling woman. She suddenly blew her nose in an unladylike fashion that made Sherlock recoil slightly whilst John smiled sympathetically.
"I can't John. You guys need a pathologist." She threw one tissue in the bin and pulled another out of her pocket before sneezing twice. She tactfully didn't say that many of the other technicians downright refused to deal with the abominable behaviour of Sherlock.
"I'd rather you didn't contaminate our samples with your mucus." Sherlock's haughty voice came from the doorway before he stood over the microscope and repositioned his slide. He also elected to ignore John's noise of outrage and exasperation and examined the slide before him.
"Sherlock!" Sherlock sensed John's explosion was imminent but Molly interrupted.
"Honestly he's right, I'll just move to the side. When you want to move onto the morgue give me a shout." The artificial brightness to her voice was interrupted by a wet cough before she shuffled away.
"Sherlock really?" John hissed.
"Oh John so you want this murderer to walk away and all because a lab assistant contaminated the evidence with her paltry cold?" The detective scoffed and for a moment John was silent. Presuming he'd won, Sherlock turned back to the microscope.
"Molly is a pathologist Sherlock, a qualified doctorate in her name not just some lab assistant you can sweep aside." John fell silent for the remainder of the hour they spent in the lab, refusing to be drawn into Sherlock's deductions.
"The morgue now." Sherlock announced loudly and both soldier and detective looked over to the desk Molly had sat at. The desk that her head now rested on, eyes closed, breathing painfully heavy.
"Don't you dare…" John began but could not finish his threat as Sherlock already rapped on the desk with his knuckles, looking impatiently down at Molly as she snuffled back to life.
"She's fine." Sherlock silenced any argument that John was about to give and a slightly dazed Molly swiped them through to the morgue, repeating his words with a chirrup. "See John." Sherlock's smug face continued as Molly wheeled out four separate cadavers and then sat heavily at the desk inside the morgue.
An hour later and John was gently shaking her awake once again, before Sherlock finished his conclusions and John went into Doctor mode as he felt her forehead.
"Christ Molly you're burning up. I knew you should have gone home earlier!" John knew she was too sick to be scolded properly, his words were for Sherlock's benefit not Molly's.
"I'm okay." She mumbled, sniffling back her gunge.
"No you're not. We're heading home. Now." John ordered and spun when Sherlock made an incomprehensible noise.
"We have to go to Lestrade though!" He sounded almost petulant.
"You go to Lestrade. I am going to take Molly home because you don't care about her. I'm a doctor as well as her friend." John's voice was firm and luckily Molly had already gone to fetch her coat and bag from the women's locker room.
"John you're an army surgeon." Sherlock was almost dismissive.
"I run my own surgery Sherlock!" John exploded. "Now you've used poor Molly, you've seen the bodies Lestrade tried to bar you from, now go and be smug to him. I am taking her home while she can still walk!" John was pissed off and relieved to see his infuriating flatmate flounce out of the morgue.
As John found Molly sat on one of the benches inside the women's locker room, he quickly nipped up to Mike Stamford and the pair of them got Molly in a taxi, Mike signing her off sick instantly when he saw the state of her.
"Thank you John." She whispered as they sat in the back of the taxi, her head propped against the window.
It wasn't until he locked the front door, found honey for her tea and a range of cold and flu medicines in her bathroom that he stopped worrying so much. Soon she was on the sofa with her duvet wrapped around her and a honeyed tea in her hands and then finally John left her.
"Don't let him bully you this badly again Molly." His parting words drifted through her sick mind.