"I bet you get bored, don't ya? I know you do. Man like you. So clever. But what's the point of being clever if you can't prove it. Still the addict. But this. This is what you're really addicted to. You do anything—anything at all to stop being bored. You're not bored now are ya?"
The dying man's words echoed in his mind; running over and over again, making their mocking intent clearer with the repetition of every syllable. Sherlock held his forehead, briefly rubbing his temples before clasping both hands in front of his lips. He was bored.
"Still the addict." the voice whispered, and for a moment he didn't know which was worse, the intense dullness he felt, or the fact that he knew, the old man had been right. No, he decided, what was worse was that it was his cross to bare - the exhilarating high of a drug and the crushing low that always followed – and he knew it.
Both his mind and body physically ached for distraction, driving him far enough to consider, and promptly dismiss, trying his hand at a Millennium Prize Problem, in spite of the fact that mathematics was not his strong suite. It briefly occurred to him that, perhaps, it was someone and not something, he needed. It was at this moment in which Dr John Watson entered the otherwise static room.
Sherlock appeared to be thinking and this took John as odd, as all Sherlock had done for the past several days was rant about how bored he was. And destroy the wall paper, Mrs Hudson would never let him forget that. John opened his mouth to speak, then thought better of it, shutting his jaw once more. Sighing quietly, he moved towards the kitchen, softly placing the paper bagged groceries the bench, next to jars of dubious looking substances, some of Sherlock's many experiments. John turned to wearily climb the stairs; not noticing Sherlock's reflection staring intently at him in the stairwell mirror.
Sherlock watched John turn the corner, before listening to him rearrange the object in his room in blind agitation. Curious, thought Sherlock, he hadn't seemed restless. Eventually, noises of shuffled of furniture and other such objects became few a far between, as John replaced his tension with weariness. It seemed entirely peculiar behaviour. Sherlock paused for a moment, unable to tell how long he had standing there listening to John. He moved to the curtains, where dirty white light streamed in. It was raining again, not a cleansing rain which removing all the soot and muck from the air, but a dreary blatter, which seemed intent on thickening and coagulating London's pollution to a sludge.
Sherlock turned away distastefully, and briefly glanced towards the stairs; he couldn't help but be curious. Then boredom half-forgotten, he silently made his way to Johns room with a graceful stealth.