The Nutcracker

Christmas. It was always the same. Annoying adverts spreading 'Christmas cheer', the sparkly decorations around every store and house, everybody singing those goddamned songs that are reprised this time every single December.

It was Christmas Eve and John Watson sat solemnly on the floor in front of his plain Christmas tree unwrapping his two presents. The flat he was in had nothing festive in it, apart from the green tree in the corner, because after seeing horrendous sights while in the army, John didn't want cheer and warmth. He was invalided home after a bullet to the shoulder and had no family to stay with or a partner to care for him, so he was renting a flat in central London with just his army pension to cover the costs.

The present he had opened already was from the landlady, Mrs Hudson, and was the biggest present there so he was drawn to open it first. It was a tin of home-made gingerbread men; the icing on their faces had smudged and made them look sinister but the effort was appreciated. He bit the arm off of one and grimaced at the sickly taste before settling it back down with the others.

He couldn't remember who the second present was from – the lack of name tag being unhelpful – and ripped the wrapping paper off cautiously to find a nutcracker doll inside. It was wearing a red jacket with shining gold buttons with black trousers but missing the hat nutcrackers usually wore. John laughed at how random the present was and put it down next to the biscuit tin.

A yawn made him realise how late it was – nearly eleven o'clock – and he felt his eyelids drooping. Maybe I'll remember who the present is from tomorrow...

...

...

He was awoken from his sleep by a tugging on his arms and no matter how much he tried to make it go away, it still persisted. It was only when he had rolled onto his front that he opened his eyes – coming to the obvious conclusion that he must of fallen asleep where he had unwrapped presents earlier as he was greeted by a face full of carpet.

The tugging on his arm was getting more forceful now so John lifted himself onto his knees and saw the sky was still dark outside – Who the hell would be in my apartment at this time of night? – before the mysterious person pulled him all the way up onto his feet and he was face-to-face with a gingerbread man.

"What the...?" He looked around, seeing more gingerbread men climb out of the tin Mrs Hudson had given him as a present, including the one he'd bitten the arm off of that was glaring murderously at him. Then he realised something he should have really noticed before; he was just a bit taller than the gingerbread man. Now he actually thought about it, everything in his flat was a lot bigger than it usually was – the sofa was like a mountain in the distance, the Christmas tree an immense maze of branches that had enough wood to build a large town.

While he was admiring the enormity of everything around him, the other cookies had walked over and they were now dragging him backwards, they weren't so strong individually but with a lot of them tugging it became pretty hard to move. They reminded him of soldiers.

"Hey! Get your hands off of me! Stop it!" John yelled while he tried to struggle free from them to no avail, "No! Get off! Help!"

As if sent from the heavens to answer his prayers, a figure behind the soldiers started pulling them away from John, throwing them to the floor so they broke into mere crumbs and bits of icing. In the confusion, he didn't get a good look at the mystery being until they were battling a gingerbread man over by the Christmas tree; it was the nutcracker he received earlier that day who was now a bit taller than himself but still only tiny in comparison to the rest of the room.

He punched the soldier he was fighting with so hard John swore he saw crumbs fly to the other end of the room, then ran to behind John to batter the final one into the carpet.

"And still some time to spare," the nutcracker glanced over at the clock, "Thought I'd need longer..." He had a deep voice that could make chocolate melt and it was kind of weird to hear it from a toy. What a strange dream... There was mere seconds until midnight and he started fading away, looking pleased with himself.

"Wait! Who are you?" John called after him.

"I'm Sherlock Holmes. I disguised myself as a present so I could stop the gingerbread men from kidnapping you and my time on this world is up. Goodbye."

"Erm..." John didn't know what to say in response to that, "Thank you?"

"Wait! Why am I still tiny?" He ran after the nutcracker who was little more than an outline now, grabbed onto his arm and the world seemed to shift out of focus, he scrunched his eyes shut, and he was falling...

He opened his eyes to see the nutcracker frowning down at him – no longer faded like a ghost and solid.

"Stupid. Stupid. Now you're here too, well done! Don't complain that it's my fault because it is entirely your fault." John was trying to get his eyes to focus again and feeling quite sick so he didn't reply. Sherlock grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him up so he was standing but that didn't help his sickness at all; all he could see was a blurry outline of the nutcracker for a few minutes until he finally remembered how to speak.

"Eurgh... Who are you?"

"I said I'm Sherlock Holmes, weren't you listening?"

"I'm... John? Yeah, John. That's me."

"At least you can remember your name..." Sherlock replied sarcastically, "Now hurry up! Places to go, people to see, stuff to do." He turned and strode off, giving John – now feeling better and able to see clearly – a chance to see where he was exactly.

The sight that met him took his breath away.

The path they were walking on was made of solid chocolate with jelly beans lining the sides as a rainbow border. Liquorice trees grew in the purple grass with candy flowers dotted around under a clear blue sky filled with poofy candyfloss clouds. The ground was dusted with icing sugar that looked like snow blanketed everywhere. A clear sparkling river ran nearby that John assumed was full of lemonade as the surface bubbled far more than water would. It was like being in Willie Wonka's chocolate factory.

"What is this place?" John asked while admiring the scenery in awe.

The nutcracker kept his gaze on the floor as he strode on, "A curse."

"Curse?! This is amazing!" As he said that, he picked up one of the oversized jelly beans from the edge of the walkway and bit into the red sweet as if proving his statement. The sickly strawberry flavour seemed to explode in his mouth and it wasn't long until he had finished it, wondering if he should try a different colour.

Sherlock slowed his pace and turned to make sure John was listening after he had finished eating, "This place was made by the sorcerer Moriarty to lure people that nobody cares about any more in with the endless free candy and then trap them so they could be turned into gingerbread men and made to work for him."

"Why on earth would he do that?"

"He was bored."

"Why aren't you a gingerbread man then?"

The taller man considered not telling but he finally decided that he could trust John, "Me and my brother were just children trying to deduce what our presents were on Christmas Eve when we shrunk and dragged away by Moriarty's gingerbread army. He went to convert us but we rebelled and annoyed him so much that he turned me into a nutcracker and Mycroft into a jelly baby."

John was astounded, "Lucky escape I guess... What about your parents?"

"Oh they had been dead for ages, I assume the nanny just stole everything she could and ran away when she realised we were gone." He grinned a bit at the thought and John found himself trying to stifle a giggle.

They walked on for a bit in comfortable silence, John trying to figure out magic before giving up and just accepting it, until they reached a gingerbread cottage with icing topping the roof. Sherlock knocked on the door twice then strutted in before there was any answer. Just before the door swung shut again, John hurried in after the nutcracker and was amazed that all of the furniture was made of gingerbread too – including an armchair that a grumpy red jelly baby sat.

"Mycroft, Moriarty attempted another Christmas Day kidnapping." Sherlock announced to the jelly baby who John now realised was his brother.

"And you saved the victim? How sweet." It drawled in reply. The man's voice didn't sound right for such a cute looking sweet and John was taken back by it.

The nutcracker glared at Mycroft, "How's the diet?"

"As good as one's diet can be when living in a realm made entirely of confectionery."

"Sorry to interrupt your squabbling," both of the brothers turned to face John, "How do I get home?"

"Oh, you're stuck here now." The jelly baby's mouth curled upwards at the gasp from John.

"What he meant to say was that you'll have to destroy the curse," Sherlock cut across what Mycroft was about to say before he scared John even more, "Which means killing Moriarty."

"Why can't one of you two kill him?"

"We're affected by the curse, it stops us from doing him any harm. He made sure there was no loopholes."

"Couldn't you just send me back using a spell like what Sherlock used to turn up in my living room?"

"Those spells only last until midnight and they are awfully draining on my magical abilities," Sherlock stated with a grimace, "Nope, you'll have to kill him."

"Brilliant. Bloody brilliant. Stuck in a crazy dream and now I have to kill somebody! Whatever will I imagine up next?"

"This isn't a dream..." Sherlock looked slightly sad as he spoke and Mycroft shook his head.

"Yeah right..." John disregarded the response he got, "So... How do I go about murdering a sorcerer then?"

Mycroft got up from his chair, "We go to the castle. If we're lucky then we'll meet Lestrade on the way."

"Sounds like a plan." The nutcracker nodded and headed back to the front door.

"Wait," John stood in front of Sherlock to stop him from leaving, "We're going now?"

"Why waste any time? It'll take long enough if Mycroft starts eating the landscape."

Mycroft ignored the jab at his weight, "We must follow the river which will lead to a waterfall at the base of Moriarty's castle."

The unusual trio left the cottage with quite a few questions from John, shoving from Sherlock and sighs from Mycroft. When John saw the castle in the distance for the first time, he had to stop talking for a second to admire the breathtaking sight. It was just like a fairytale castle straight from a princess story with towers that reached the sky, a drawbridge across a moat, and the entire thing was made with every colour of candy that had ever existed.

After a short while, Mycroft was walking ahead of the other two men who were both ambling along at the same casual pace. John seemed to feel a bit more comfortable with Sherlock even though they hadn't talked since back at the cottage – at the start of the journey Mycroft had asked him basic questions like what his name was and where he was from but they had quickly run out of topics.

"So, how long have you been here?" He attempted to break the silence between them.

Sherlock didn't even bother looking at him as he muttered, "Since I was a child."

"What have you done here for all that time then?"

"Attempted to break the curse."

"You're lucky," the nutcracker looked round at him in bewilderment at this, "I mean, you're not fortunate to be trapped here with a curse placed upon yourself but you have your brother for company – even though you may not get along – and you're not stuck as a gingerbread man."

Sherlock just nodded and continued to daydream while looking out to the distance, not the reaction John was hoping for, "You're not very keen to tell me much about yourself."

"Ah, but I know much about you."

"Like what?"

"You've been recently invalided home from the army after sustaining a wound – there's a tan line above your wrists yet judging by your apartment you don't have much money so you wouldn't be one to go abroad on holiday in the winter and you live in London so it obviously wouldn't be caused by the sun there. You don't have any close friends or family otherwise you'd be living with them and you also had only two presents under your tree, one was from your landlady – sorry about her biscuits being replaced by Moriarty's men - and the other was me in disguise. You suffer from PTSD, judging by your psychosomatic limp that has disappeared since you came here, possibly because you're trying to hide it, more likely due to the shock of everything that's happened. Now, am I wrong?"

John was in a stunned silence for a few seconds before breathing out, "That was brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Wow."

It was Sherlock's turn to be stunned, "Really? That's not what people normally say?"

"What do they normally say?"

"Piss off." Both of them started giggling at that until they nearly walked into Mycroft who had stopped in the middle of the path.

John looked over the jelly baby's shoulder to see that he was talking to a grey mouse in a black waistcoat that was nearby as tall as Mycroft. They were discussing the best route into the castle from what he could hear.

Sherlock nudged John's arm to get his attention, "That's Lestrade, a regular in Moriarty's castle as he's the... let's say, court jester."

As John nodded his understanding, Mycroft turned to face them, "Right, Greg and I will keep away the soldiers while you and John get Moriarty."

"There's really no need for undercover names." Sherlock raised an eyebrow at Lestrade.

"What?"

"Well why else would you be calling yourself Greg?"

"That's his name." Mycroft sighed.

"Really?"

"Yes, if you'd ever bothered to find out," the mouse sighed too, "Oh, hello there. You must be John."

"Hello, Mr Lestrade." John replied timidly to the mouse, unsure how formal he should be.

"Call me Greg. So, lucky escape earlier? Weird of Sherlock to help people," he wiggled his mousey eyebrows at Sherlock, who just rolled his eyes in response.

"I'm glad he was there," John grinned slightly and saw that Sherlock had looked away for some reason, "So, how long have you been here?"

"There's only day here, no night, so I have no idea... All I know is it was October when I was kidnapped."

"Well, the hours are the same length here and back home. It's December right now." Mycroft drawled before pulling Lestrade along with him, "Well, we'll be at the castle by the time you two eventually turn up. Don't fuck it up."

Lestrade turned to wave goodbye to John before following Mycroft down the path.

"What do we do when we get to the castle?" He asked Sherlock as they went in the same direction but at a much slower pace.

Sherlock didn't seem to even think about it before he replied, "We sneak in there – there shouldn't be any guards lurking in the corridors if Lestrade and my brother do their job properly – then you kill Moriarty, simple."

"Doesn't seem simple to me..." In John's opinion, it sounded like there was a very large chance of failing and he didn't even want to think of the risks.

"Why not? You were a soldier, you killed people."

"Admittedly, I had bad days but I would rather save a life any day." He was getting annoyed with Sherlock's insensitivity towards the subject and decided to steer it back towards more useful topics, "How long have you had this planned anyway?"

"Why'd you ask that?"

"Well this all seems very well planned considering I arrived here less than an hour ago and now we're off to kill a wizard."

The nutcracker suddenly seemed more interested in watching the clouds, "A while."

"Elaborate."

"Well, I've had a plan with Mycroft for ages that we would find a way to reverse the curse. I snuck into the portal the soldiers were using when they were going to kidnap you and used the spell that would have sent them back here for myself. I only saved you from the gingerbread men because I didn't want somebody else's Christmas ruined like mine was years ago. You weren't meant to be here though. I just intended to leave you to figure that it was all a dream when you woke up the next morning."

Sherlock now had a sad expression on his face that didn't suit him at all and John didn't press for further information on that topic, "What happens if I don't kill Moriarty?"

"You'll become a gingerbread man, unable to speak and brainwashed to obey Moriarty's every command."

They had reached a bush just outside of the candy castle and ducked down behind it, observing their surroundings. Gingerbread soldiers paced the perimeter, making it almost impossible to enter without being noticed, with candy canes in hand that John assumed were their weapons, "Wait... Did I bite off some person's arm earlier?"

Sherlock took a second to realise what he meant before nodding, "Yep."

He gagged – so that's why it tasted so bad... – and then remembered what else had happened that night, "You killed people!"

"True." The nutcracker saw the widening eyes of the other man and tried to reassure him, "But nobody cared about them in the first place!"

"You're evil!" John spat in disgust before storming off towards the castle. I'll go bargain for freedom myself.

"They were corrupted by Moriarty's magic!" Sherlock called after him but it didn't work as the former army doctor already had his mind set and wasn't listening to the nutcracker now.

Stupid nutcracker getting me into this mess in the first place. It's all his fault. I always hated sweets anyway. Merry fucking Christmas.

He reached the base of the castle and tapped one of the gingerbread guards on the shoulder. Immediately it turned around, candy cane pointed at John's stomach, and in the blink of an eye he was circled by soldiers pointing weapons in his direction.

"Erm... Take me to your leader?"

The soldiers dragged him up multiple staircases until he was shoved into a room he assumed was at the top of the castle or at least a room that's really high up. The room was dark in comparison to the rainbow coloured frenzy outside, the only colour and light coming through a large stained glass window that had a large red apple in a crown projecting a red glow into the centre of the room. In front of this sat a tall dark haired man in a suit lounging on a fancy looking armchair, his feet over one arm and his head hanging over the other, looking at the ceiling. John couldn't see any more furniture but he assumed it was hidden in the shadows by the walls.

"Aah, here you are! Haven't had a good Christmas kidnapping in aaaaages." The man, who John guessed was Moriarty due to him being the only human he'd seen so far, spoke in a playful tone like a child who was a little bit hyper.

"I want to go home."

"Why? You're obviously here because nobody loves you so why go back? We can have so much fun together, Johnny-boy, we could even be best friends." The tone in his voice was becoming less sarcastic and more sinister, "And, anyway, I'm afraid I can't let you do that."

"Why? You have magic, beam me back and take some other poor bugger."

"Oh but I like you, Johnny-boy, I want you to stay."

"How do you know my name?" John went through their past conversation and didn't remember introducing himself.

"Magic," the voice came from just behind John's ear and he whipped around to see Moriarty standing right behind him, grinning like a predator eyeing up its prey, "And magic tells me you've been talking to my old friend Sherlock. Although, I say friend, he's far too grumpy and mean and boring." His voice had changed tone again and he was now doing voices as though he was reading a story to a child.

"Good for you, can I go now?"

"No, no, the fun has only just begun!" John tried to move away from Moriarty but he was stuck to the spot by some invisible force, unable to move, "Now, should I make you into a gingerbread man or another nutcracker? Actually, it'd be a shame to make you gingerbread because they can't talk and I'm enjoying having you around far too much. But then you'd run off with Sherlock and I wouldn't want that to happen. Ooh, I can't decide!"

Moriarty paced around in circles a few more times until he was behind the doctor again – John craned his neck round the furthest it would go in order to keep an eye on him – having made his mind up and ready to perform the spell, "I think I'll do-"

A candy cane flew from nowhere through Moriarty's stomach, cutting off whatever he would say next, yet it did no damage as if it was passing through a hologram. John took the opportunity while the magic around him was weaker to run away, in the only direction he could go, towards the window. He looked behind to see the nutcracker holding a candy cane up as though it was a deadly weapon even though he knew it did nothing at all to the sorcerer.

Sherlock ducked under a punch from Moriarty and then ran over to join John when he saw the sorcerer's hands were glowing blue with magic.

"How dare you attempt to hurt me!" He spat with rage at them, "I will turn you into sherbet, you bastards!"

"Vatican cameos!" The nutcracker yelled before jumping to the ground. Just in time, John managed to duck under a bolt of light that came whizzing by his ear and he would have laughed at the phrase Sherlock used if there wasn't a mad man trying to turn them into sweets.

Moriarty sent another few magic bolts in their direction which they only just avoided, striding towards them like a hunter getting his prey. As John considered jumping out of the window to escape, the nutcracker jumped back up again and started waving his candy cane around at the sorcerer.

John realised that Sherlock was attempting to hit Moriarty even though he knew it wouldn't work to distract him and, acting before he could even think about it, he grabbed the sorcerer by the collar and pushed him out of the window. A beam of light flooded into the room, powering through the shadows and making the space seem emptier in the brightness. The nutcracker watched with him with a weird feeling of glee as Moriarty flew down and his the icing sugar dusted ground with a thud.

He turned to face Sherlock with anticipation, "So when-"

In a flash of sparkling light, the nutcracker transformed into a tall, pale man with curled black hair that flicked out in a messy yet organised fashion. He was still dressed in the same clothes – the gold buttons on his red jacket still shining as though they'd just been polished – but he actually suited it quite well.

As soon as Sherlock realised he had fingers again, he picked up a shard of glass from the window Moriarty had fell through off the floor and admired his reflection. John stayed silent because he didn't want to ruin the moment; Sherlock hadn't seen himself properly since he was a child and the look of joy on his face was enough to bring a tear to anybody's eye. How can somebody who's been eating candy for god knows how long still be so slim?

A swirling, sparkling portal like one straight out of a science fiction movie, appeared a little distance behind Sherlock and he must of seen it in his makeshift mirror because he turned to glance at it before beaming at John, "Thank you ever so much, I really do owe you."

"No problem," the smile was infectious and John was grinning too, "Consider it a favour for stopping me being kidnapped."

"There's your way home," Sherlock said as he pointed to a portal that had opened up nearby, "Go through that and you'll be returned where you was taken from."

"Where are you going to go?"

"Me? I'll probably going to be sent to my childhood home and then I'll make a life for myself from there. Hopefully there hasn't been too many drastic changes to the world while I was absent..." John laughed a bit as he imagined Sherlock discovering all the technology that had been made, "Lestrade used to have a job in Scotland Yard so I might see if he can get me a job there. I could be a detective, no... consulting detective."

"What about Mycroft?" John felt something weird inside of him when he realised Sherlock would probably be living in London too.

"Oh I bet he ends up in the government, he'd like that..."

John turned to look out of the smashed window behind him and took in the sight of the candy paradise once more, ignoring the crumpled figure by the base of the castle.

"All of the soldiers just collapsed and- Sherlock?! You're human too!" Lestrade burst into the room – a human now with greying hair, tanned skin, wearing a smart suit – and stopped suddenly when he saw Sherlock.

Behind him, a flustered man with red cheeks entered the room – John guessed who it was immediately from the black hair and the scowl on his face, "Why's there so many stairs?"

"Getting unfit, Mycroft?" Sherlock smirked although his words contained no venom as he looked at his big brother who was no longer the kid he remembered from years ago.

"Sorry to break up the family reunion but I wanna leave here as soon as possible," Lestrade edged towards the portal, "Thank you, John. We'll have to meet up again sometime."

"Thank you, John." Mycroft nodded at the three men before stepping into the portal and vanishing. Lestrade grinned before following him, disappearing back into the 'real world'.

John smiled and turned back to the view from the broken window. "This has been one of the weirdest dreams I've ever had," he exclaimed breathlessly as he watched the waterfall bubbling below.

"You think this is a dream?" Sherlock sounded hurt but John didn't realise.

"Candy kingdom, magical curse, evil wizard – definitely a weird dream."

The taller man turned and headed towards the staircase that led to the bottom of the tower. John saw him out of the corner of his eye and called after him, "Where are you going?"

"Why should it matter? I'm just another part of your dream." Sherlock's voice cracked a little and John immediately regretted what he had previously said; walking slowly towards the man frozen to the spot, still facing the staircase.

"I'm sorry-"

"Why?!" Sherlock spun around quickly, a tear in his eye sparkling, "Why apologise? It's not your fault you still believe this is just in your imagination!"

"I'm sorry for getting annoyed with you." John was now stood in front of the former nutcracker, "I didn't mean to upset you." He stopped whatever the reply would be by standing on his tiptoes and kissing Sherlock's mouth firmly.

The slightly delayed response from the other man made him feel lightheaded and everything seemed to be fading...

…

...

John woke up with a start. He was back in his flat and curled up on the floor facing away from the Christmas tree. A quick glance at the clock told him it was morning and common sense told him it was Christmas Day.

What he'd just experienced was still vivid in his memory and a guilty feeling filled him when he remembered the nutcracker-man being sad that he thought it was a dream. It really was just his imagination though, Sherlock wasn't real.

He sat up, reached over to the tin Mrs Hudson's gingerbread men were in and opened it to find it was empty. Just a coincidence, she probably took them back before I threw them away. It was then that he realised the floor where he sat was covered in crumbs, icing and the odd gingerbread limb.

"Good riddance." A male voice came from behind him and he whipped his head around so fast it hurt his neck to see Sherlock lying under the Christmas tree, obviously just woken up too, "Oh, sorry! You fainted so I carried you back and the portal kind of closed behind me... Do you mind if I stay?" He looked away slightly in embarrassment, his cheeks turning red.

John just gaped at the man with wide eyes and nodded, "Course you can."

A massive grin grew across Sherlock's face, "Thank you. Lestrade and Mycroft are upstairs, I'm sure they'll love staying too."

"The portal led to my flat?!" John giggled at the thought.

"Seems like it did."

"Merry Christmas, Sherlock."

"Merry Christmas, John."

And they all lived happily ever after.

The End.

A/N: I had an epiphany in the middle of the night and decided to write a series of Johnlock tales based loosely on fairytales. Mega thanks must go to mon ami, Thor Odinson, for beta reading this! Merry Christmas!

Disclaimer: I do not own the characters from Sherlock or The Nutcracker story. I'm only here to bring festive joy and cheer.

- Tony