Summary: Sherlock is shot when he and John are separated on a case.
Disclaimer: I don't own Sherlock, only the specific plotlines that I write. All rights go to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Steven Moffat, and Mark Gatiss.
Thanks to paula. who gave me this plot idea!
Also, I understand that museums have more security than I give them credit for in this chapter, but in order to write this short story I made the security a lot more slack, so yeah :)
John had no idea why Sherlock always seemed to have a "pressing" murder case going on, let alone how he managed to solve nearly all of them, nor did he understand how the detective seemed to hardly ever get hurt while dealing with criminals. However, there were times (though Sherlock didn't like to admit it) when the case had nothing to do with murder and Sherlock didn't solve it due to getting hurt. Though these were rare, they did occur every so often, and this particular case entailed all of those three circumstances. At least it gave John something new to write in his blog aside from "Sherlock made a brilliant deduction" and "It wasn't long before the criminal was caught by my friend".
John and Sherlock were in a museum, crouching behind a statue near a famous painting.
"Sherlock, no one is coming," John said, wanting nothing more than to return to Baker Street. They had been camping behind the statue for several hours now.
"They'll come. They must," Sherlock insisted. "There's barely any evidence pointing to the criminal, but this is the logically the next painting he'll vandalise if he continues his pattern!"
"But the museum is empty!" John protested. "There's no one but us here!"
A recent series of vandalism had already ruined some of London's greatest art. Someone had been putting a single bullet right through the center of valued paintings. It was simple, but effective in angering people of the city and the world. It had already made national television after the first act of vandalism. John wasn't typically and art fan, but even he was hoping Sherlock could catch the culprit soon, because it was a bit devastating to see piece after piece of great art punctured with a bullet.
"Besides," John continued, "they could be in the gallery in the east or west wing - not necessarily this one!"
"They'd want to put a bullet through this painting, though - it's the most famous," Sherlock said, frowning.
"Yes, but they just might have realized that the world is now aware of his crimes," John said sarcastically. "Maybe they knew that this area would be heavily guarded, so they're going to a gallery to vandalize a less famous painting."
"You're right!" Sherlock said, jumping to his feet.
Dang right John was right. Sometimes the detective was too clever for his own good and other times John wasn't surprised at all when he had a better idea than his friend. It really depended on the situation, he supposed.
"Okay, then. Do you want to take the west galley, and I'll take the east?" John asked. "Call me on my mobile if anything goes wrong."
"I prefer to text."
"Right, well, we're dealing with a criminal who has a gun," John reminded Sherlock. "Just - be careful, alright? The west wing is upstairs, not to mention on the other side of the museum - it'll take fifteen minutes to walk from the gallery I'll be at to yours. Be careful!" he reiterated, unsure if Sherlock understood the danger in the situation.
"Am I ever not?" Sherlock said over his shoulder, already dashing away.
The museum instantly felt more eerie the second John was on his own, walking down the dark, empty hallway. He passed the Egyptian exhibit quickly, with no inclination to linger around the sarcophaguses and rotten skeletons, then continued to the Renaissance Art Gallery.
He settled on sitting behind a large bench, where he was shrouded in the shadows and had a clear sight of the gallery. If anyone came through this way, he'd hear them anyway before seeing them because footsteps echoed quite loudly in the museum.
It was because of the silence of the museum that after only twenty minutes, the shrill ring of John's phone made him jump. It wasn't a text. It was a call. John pulled out his phone. It was Sherlock.
"I prefer to text," Sherlock had said earlier.
His heart leaping into his throat, John quickly accepted his call.
"Sherlock? Are you alright?" John demanded into the phone. There was silence on the other end.
"Sherlock? Can you hear me?" John asked, panicking slightly while climbing out of his spot behind the bench.
"John?" came the baritone voice, but it didn't have the proud tone it usually did. The tone on the other end of the line was confused and soft. "I've been shot."
"I'm on my way," John told him, now in a full sprint to the far away gallery that Sherlock was in. "Stay on the phone, alright? Can you still hear me?"
"I can hear you," was the hesitant response.
"Alright, first, where are you exactly?" John asked, because he knew his friend could be anywhere, depending on where he had been camped out to wait for the criminal. "Can you tell me where you are?"
"I'm in the west wing," Sherlock responded, his voice slightly slurred.
"Yeah, okay. That's good. Keep going," John encouraged. "What can you see?"
"Paintings."
John cursed. The lack of comprehension meant Sherlock was probably bleeding heavily. He could go into shock any minute.
"Alright, hang on a minute, Sherlock. I'm calling an ambulance," John said, and hung up, quickly dialing 999 while still running. He called Sherlock again, and after about ten rings, the detective finally picked up.
"John, it hurts," Sherlock said in a small voice. "Are… you c-coming?"
"I'm on my way, mate," John assured him. "I'm almost there. Right, you said you're in the west wing and you can see paintings. What do the paintings look like?" He was running up the stairs now. Almost there.
"One's large and has… knights on it…" Sherlock was mumbling now. "Medieval! I'm… I'm in the m-med-medieval section… J-John." He was stumbling over his words.
"Perfect, Sherlock! Alright, I'm almost there!" John told him, arriving in the gallery and searching for a painting of knights. "Keeping talking to me, Sherlock, I need to find you!" But no one answered on the other end. John abandoned his phone and shouted his friend's name. No one answered.
Sherlock felt quite stupid. He despised not coming up with the most clever plan, and was reprimanding himself for not considering the idea that the criminal might not have come for the most famous painting in the museum. He shuddered to himself, thinking how very Anderson-esque that was.
It didn't take long for him to choose a spot when he heard footsteps coming down the hall. They clearly weren't John's footsteps. He caught a glimpse of a figure walking quickly down the wing.
Female. Typically wears high heels, based on the placement of the ball before the heel. Between age thirty and forty. Divorced. No children.
Deductions were firing off in his head as he stood from where he had been crouched. His plan was to talk to her, delay her until John arrived (he would send a text from behind his back), then they could arrest her. He still couldn't see her face (she was in the shadows) when he called out in his most demanding voice that he usually only reserved for Mycroft, "Don't move and stay where you are. You're not going to shoot anymore paintings. The police are already on their way." This, of course, was a lie, but not many criminals seemed to realize that whenever he said it.
However, to his surprise, this criminal reacted differently than others to his voice. Most just froze when they realized they were caught. This one, however, caught off guard, turned her gun on him without further ado, and he barely heard the bullet due to an efficient muffler. The only indication that he had been shot was from the stain of red blooming over his button up.
Oops.
The woman turned and fled, apparently unaccustomed to shooting people. Sherlock didn't have time to be in shock that she shot him without even questioning his motives, because now he only had to worry about hypovolemic shock.
John's medical checklist for emergencies flashed through his mind, and he found himself pressing his hands against his chest; whether because he knew it would suppress the blood or because it really, really hurt, he wasn't sure.
With shaking fingers he picked up his phone and dialed John's number. He was barely even paying attention to the conversation and what John was saying because the bullet wound was agonizing and he was getting more and more cold. That was the shock, definitely. What had he done last time this had happened? He couldn't remember. Mary had shot him last time, but for some reason he couldn't remember how he had stopped the shock.
Redbeard.
That was how. But Redbeard was his friend, not his dog… His friend. He didn't have friends. Why was Victor Trevor his friend? Who would be friends with him - the person who everyone said couldn't understand emotion?
"You know, friends can be antidotes to shock, too, not just dogs. At least in your mind palace. I'm here for you, Sherlock," John said, standing in front of Sherlock. "You're not alone. I'm here."
How had John made it over so fast? Unless… he was in his mind palace. John wasn't actually here, yet. This was John in his mind palace. Of course.
"Sherlock, you've got to concentrate. If you don't calm down, the shock will kill you before I get here," John said gently. "Come on, mate. Be a soldier."
Sherlock could only make eye contact with him before the pain became much sharper.
"That's it. Keep focusing on whatever will make the shock stop," John said, now crouched next to Sherlock, who was writhing on the floor - it hurt so much - there was no end to it -
"I'm trying!" Sherlock screamed, and his scream shattered the room he was in so that John disappeared and now he was in a black void by himself. Alone. That's how he liked it, right? Alone? But the pain was fading away now, being replaced by the mind-numbing cold again.
"You're going into shock again," came John's voice. "If you stopped trying to detach yourself from friends, I could help you."
Sherlock twisted his head around but John wasn't in sight. Only the black void was around him now.
"Alone is calming. Not friends," Sherlock yelled to John's empty voice. "I don't have friends!"
"Then why are you going back into shock now that you're alone in this black void?" John asked, smirking, and now Sherlock could see him standing next to him. The room came crashing back into view as he left the dark abyss, and the pain was beginning to return.
"Sherlock, keep focusing on me. It's what's keeping you from going into shock," John said, placing his hand on Sherlock's shoulder. As they made contact, that was when every sharp detail of the situation came back into full fledge, flooding his mind with needles of fiery pain, and then he was thrust out of his mind palace and back into the museum.
The real John was running up to him.
"Sherlock, you're alright," he said, immediately beginning his doctor routine. "Your pulse is weak, but I don't think you're in shock yet… Stay awake, mate, it's alright."
But I was in shock. You just helped me out of it, Sherlock tried to tell John, but his voice wasn't coming. He could feel himself drifting away now that John was there to take care of them.
John won't let me die.
"Is he going to be alright?" John asked the nurse who was tending to Sherlock once they were settled in the hospital and Sherlock's vitals were stable. "No permanent damage, right?"
"None that we can foresee. He'll have to take it easy for a few months, though. His lung was damaged," the nurse said. "We can't risk him injuring it further, or then he might have lasting damage."
Two hours later Sherlock had woken.
"John?" Sherlock asked, opening his eyes quickly. Did that man have to be so bloody alert all the time?
"I'm here," John said, scooting his chair over. "You're going to be alright. You got shot right in the chest. Almost the same place as when Mary had…" He didn't finish his sentence.
There was a moment of silence in the room.
"John, I would like to thank you. You got me out of shock," Sherlock said politely (John had taught him to thank people, and he supposed this was an appropriate time to thank his flatmate).
John was confused. "Sherlock, you weren't in shock. I have no idea how," he added.
"No, I was in shock. You saved me. In my mind palace," Sherlock insisted.
"So you managed to get yourself out of shock? How'd you do it?" John asked, impressed.
"No, you helped me."
"But I wasn't there when you were in shock!" John objected.
"But my memory of you and the actions you've done for me in the past were what enabled me to reverse the effects of shock; thus, you saved my life before you even arrived there!" Sherlock explained in a similar fashion as to how he would explain how a murder victim had died.
"Oh. Well… uh… you're welcome?"
"Thank you, John," Sherlock confirmed, closing his eyes again.
Thank you for reading! Please leave me a review with a suggestion for an injury / illness / or experiment gone wrong that could occur to either Sherlock or John! I would be so grateful!