A.N.: Yeah... so... this happened. Basically, I was watching Basil the Great Mouse Detective last night, so I decided to look for fanfictions, and there were, and then I thought about writing one. So I did. It's kind of silly...
Disclaimer: Don't own Great Mouse Detective or Sherlock.
"Well, I think that went rather well, don't you?"
Basil, brandishing his violin triumphantly, swung round on the spot to Dawson's armchair, only to see the doctor fast asleep.
"Dawson?" the detective asked tentatively, wondering what had happened in the past few minutes and how he could have missed it. Only fifteen minutes before, they had finished their latest case and returned to Baker Street, yet somehow in that time, the doctor had fallen asleep in his armchair.
It was most curious; Dawson was usually very alert when they returned from cases, and he never fell asleep in the middle of the day.
Basil took a step forward, placing his violin on the ground next to his own armchair.
"Dawson, wake up," he commanded, but received no answer. Basil reached his hand out to shake his friend, but drew his hand back quickly when he realised how hot his companion's skin was.
"Oh, dear..." he muttered. Dawson had a fever and he had no idea what to do about it. His own medical knowledge was infinitely tiny, almost non-existent, and he was completely ignorant when it came to matters of treating a fever.
He would need help. But from whom? Mrs Judson was out, and there was no one else he could contact at such short notice...
Except...
"Right," he nodded in determination, straightening himself up to his full height. "Come on, Dawson. We're going upstairs."
He slipped his hands underneath the still body of his friend and attempted to lift him out of the chair. It was difficult at first, but he eventually managed to manoeuvre the doctor onto his shoulder and began making his way upstairs.
He pushed his way through the little cubby hole that connected the inner pipe system to the flat upstairs, and pulled Dawson through after him. Basil took a look around the flat, seeing no one. He walked around the sofa, looking up and around for any signs of life. The flat was quiet, and Basil was ready to give up, when...
He looked up and saw that Sherlock was lying on the sofa - a familiar sight - with his fingers held under his chin.
"Ha ha!" Basil exclaimed, and he climbed up onto the sofa and the consulting detective's chest.
"Sherlock!" the mouse shouted, but although the human's eyes were wide open, the mouse was completely ignored. "Sherlock!" Still no response. Basil decided to take it up a notch, and began jumping up and down on the man's chest. "Sherlock! Sherlock! Sherlock! Sherlock!"
"I'm thinking," the detective replied in a monotone, not taking his eyes away from the ceiling.
"But Dawson has a fever!" Basil insisted, stamping his foot angrily.
"Ask John," Sherlock murmured.
Basil growled, but jumped down off of the detective and went in search of the human doctor.
He proceeded with caution towards the stairs he knew lead up to the human doctor's room. He had never actually met the man, but - as he checked on the still-unconscious mouse out of the corner of his eye - he knew that he would have to keep introductions brief.
Human stairs were normally something that he desperately would want to avoid, for his size meant that it would take him a very long time to reach the top. But he would do it for Dawson. Anything for Dawson.
Luckily for the mouse, however, the front door opened before he had begun to attempt to scale the staircase, and the human doctor came in. Basil had to jump out of the way of the man's foot as it came down on the ground, and he landed next to Dawson's side. The mouse doctor was still sleeping, though he had shifted a little since Basil had left him. Basil thought that this was possibly a good thing, but didn't wish to jump to conclusions.
"John, you have a patient," Sherlock said drily from the sofa as the doctor took his jacket off.
"What?" John sighed. "I've only just got in. Who?"
"Dawson! It's Dawson!" Basil screamed, but he was too low to the ground for his voice to reach the human's ears.
"Where are they?" John asked as he walked into the living room. He could see no one, because Basil was running around his feet trying to get his attention.
"Look down," Sherlock instructed his flatmate, and said nothing else.
"What?" John exhaled exasperatedly, looking down as he was told. "Argh!"
"Dawson! You have to help Dawson!" Basil shouted, jumping up and down and pointing in the direction of where his doctor was lying next to the sofa.
"Sherlock, there's a mouse in the flat!" John exclaimed, looking up at the detective. Sherlock ignored him.
John leaned down to the mouse's level, ready to pick up the creature and... dispose of it somehow. Yet as he got nearer to the mouse, he saw that the creature was wearing clothes: a suit and an Inverness coat, accompanied with the smallest deerstalker that he had ever seen. They looked like doll clothes; it was an incredibly strange sight.
"Dr Watson! You have to help Dawson!"
John realised that he had to be dreaming. Not only was there a clothed mouse in his living room - that Sherlock seemed nonplussed about - but the mouse was talking and somehow knew his name.
"What... on... earth?"
The mouse stopped jumping and squealing and straightened itself up, looking almost as self-righteous as Sherlock did most of the time.
"Dr Watson, my name is Basil of Baker Street, I live at 221b 1/2 Baker Street with my companion, Dr Dawson. Dr Dawson is, at present, ill, and I implore you to help him." The mouse shifted uncomfortably, as though it was about to admit something painful. "I... er... don't really know what to do... you see."
"Um..." John hummed, looking up at Sherlock, who was still lying on the sofa silently, thinking.
"Sherlock knows of us," the mouse - Basil - explained. "We sometimes help him with cases, and he sometimes helps us with ours."
"You solve cases as well, do you?"
"Yes," Basil nodded. "But we can discuss our work later; Dawson is ill and in need of your medical attention!"
Without another word, the mouse took off in the direction of the sofa. John followed him and saw him come to a halt beside a rather plump mouse who did, indeed, not look very well.
"He has a fever," Basil announced, gesturing to the plump mouse beside him.
"Well... uh..." John mumbled, looking from Basil to his companion, "I don't really know how to treat mice."
"But you have to do something!" Basil implored, his voice strained and desperate.
John sighed, reaching down and carefully plucking the mouse off of the floorboards. The creature didn't feel particularly warm - at least, no warmer than other mice he had handled with his bare hands, which, admittedly, was not a great number. Taking Dawson through to the kitchen, figuring that if Sherlock could do disgusting experiments on the kitchen table, then he could at least do something potentially disgusting for the greater good on the same surface, he laid Dawson on his back, trying not to laugh at the sight of the mouse having a rather prominent moustache.
"Do you know how hot he is?" John asked Basil, looking to the well mouse who was pacing the table and wringing his hands.
"Approximately 39 degrees," the mouse delivered promptly, sounding as cold and detached as Sherlock did most of the time. He stopped abruptly and looked up at John. "Is that a problem?"
Not wishing to alarm the mouse, but not wishing to lie either, John nodded. "We need to cool him down."
"How do we do that?" Basil demanded, looking around as though he desperately wanted to help.
The pair worked steadily for fifteen minutes or so to cool Dawson down, and eventually his fever began to break.
"Let him rest now," John ordered Basil, who was standing expectantly over his friend as though he expected him to jump up at any moment and start doing cartwheels over the kitchen table. The mouse obeyed and backed off, still looking worried.
After another half hour or so, Dawson began to stir.
"Hazaar!" Basil cried, throwing his hands in the air. Dawson flinched slightly at the noise and the detective mouse quietened with a guilty look on his face.
"W... great Scot!" Dawson mumbled as he pushed himself into a sitting position. "What happened?"
"You slipped unconscious when we got back from our case and I brought you upstairs to have Dr Watson treat you," Basil explained in a single breath.
"O-oh," Dawson nodded, looking around at the strange surroundings in which he found himself.
"Thank you, Dr Watson," Basil nodded up at John, who simply nodded - he was still in disbelief over this whole affair.
"Come on, then, Dawson! Back to the hole!"
Basil jumped off of the table and headed for the cubby hole beside the sofa. Dawson heaved himself to his feet, nodding at his healer in thanks before following his companion.
"Aha!"
John left the kitchen and went into the living room, where Sherlock had jumped up off of the sofa and was throwing his coat over his shoulders.
"Come on, then, John! We have a case to solve!"