Hello! Been quite a while, hasn't it?
So, I'm going to try my hand at Sherlock, although technically this won't be my first Sherlock story, it will be my first 'official one'. I know I have other things to work on, but this just won't leave me alone!
First thing first, this is AU, and in it, John is already married to Mary, with a kid. He also has never met Sherlock in the beginning of the story. The rest, well, they're all dead.
I'll explain it later. Anyway, I do hope that I get the the end of this story, but considering my track record... Well...
And I know that 'It is best not to dwell on dreams', but like I said, it kept buggering me.
I don't own Sherlock. If I did, we would have CumberButt by now.
Chapter One
John Watson blinked awake, his eyes adjusting to the harsh fluorescent light above him, too use to a different kind of light, the beating Afghan sun and the yellow-orange glow of the evening and morning sky.
But this was different; this was an artificial light that seemed to penetrate his eyelids and his very being. He blinked a few more times, his vision blurry. He couldn't see anything but vague shapes. There might have been a man behind a desk sitting in front of him, but he couldn't tell.
John gasped as the scene changed to people peering down at him, fellow soldiers looking worried and covered in sweat, muck and possibly blood. There was a dull pain in his shoulder and the vision disappeared, as if being nothing more than a dream.
"John?" A voice called out, from what seemed like a far away distance. "Dr. John Watson?"
"Hm...?" He asked in return, his voice filled with sleepiness and overall grogginess. He blinked a few more times and found himself back in the harshly lit room, sitting in an reasonable okay plastic chair. There was a man in a more comfortable looking office chair, looking at him and patiently waiting for his reply.
"Are you with us, John?" The man asked politely as John looked around a bit, trying to get his vocal cords to work and his mouth to form shapes. He studied the man's desk for a second. No name tag... Cheap looking wood and stacks of paper work. There were a few filing cabinets in the otherwise bare and small room.
"Uh... Yeah... Where am I?" John asked, now focusing on the man. He was average looking, to say the least, maybe a bit pale, even by english standards.
"Good. Seemed like you were slipping back and forth there for a few minutes. Well..." The man looked down at a file and shuffled around a few papers. "We'll get to that in a moment. How's your shoulder feeling?"
"My shoulder?" John repeated. But as soon as the man mentioned it, he noticed that it was hurting. Not roll on the floor, crying and dying hurting, but it was noticeable. John furrowed his brow as he turned his neck to look at his shoulder. How could he have not noticed it until now?
"Yes, well, it'll hurt for a while." The man said, playing with a pen that was now in his hand, not that John noticed. He was staring at his shoulder, dumbfounded, as blood seemed to simple run out of a wound hidden under his military outfit.
"I think... I think I've been... Shot..." John said as he slowly raised his other hand up to his shoulder, but as the seconds went by, it started to stop hurting, turning into a dull ache. He studied the blood on his hand from touching his shoulder, then looked at the man behind the desk for an explanation.
"Well, yes, you have." The man said. "But don't worry, it'll all be taken care of. Now, would you like to know your last words?" He asked, as if just asking John if he wanted a refreshment.
"My last words? What?" John asked, properly confused. The man looked at him as if he had dealt with this all day, but was still willing to help him. In the midst of all his confusion, John had to admit the man behind the desk seemed both professional and helpful.
"Yes. They were as following, and I do warn there is some foul language in here; 'Alpha Charlie... What? Shit! I-I...' And the rest were cut off." The man said flatly.
"Am I..." John took a deep breath as realization washed over him. He felt many things, ranging from sheer panic, to a resentfulness and strange and unnerving sense of calm and peacefulness. He didn't know what scared him more, the panic, or the calm.
"If you need a moment, go ahead and take it." The man said as he pulled something out from behind his desk. John looked at it for a second before turning his gaze to the floor. It was a package of kleenexes.
"Dead?" He said in a quiet hushed tone before clearing his throat and looking back at the man, blinking away tears that stung his eyes. "Am I... dead?"
The man offered him a sad smile. "Yes, I'm afraid so. Our condolences." He said, offering the package of kleenexes.
John waved the kleenexes away. "What-What about my wife... And my kid...?" He asked quietly, his throat beginning to close with emotion.
"They'll mourn you." The man said. "But they'll get over you, eventually. Most people jump to 'Where am I?' But you went to your family, that's nice." He said.
"..." John stared blankly at the man. "Uh... Okay... Where am I?" He asked.
"You are in the afterlife. Heaven, hell, Esyuim, whatever you'd like to call it." The man said with a broad smile. "It's fairly like what you were used to before; get up, go to work and, well, live death."
"...That's it?" John asked. "That's... Just work until the end of... When does this end?" He asked.
"Well, most folks just retire after a couple hundred years, when they've saved up enough for the next few hundred. You're going to be embalmed, according to your file, so rotting won't be much of an issue. Most employers tend to stay away from rotters." He said, looking at a paper on his desk then smiling back up at John.
"Rotters?" John asked, slightly confused about the terminology.
"Well, people here don't age, and we don't die either, because we're already dead." The man explained. "You see, when people get to a certain age, they begin to rot away until there's nothing left. Helps slightly with the population, or it did, until the embalming process began. Now people just stack up, but thankfully we have both plenty of resources and room." He said.
"Okay-" John's next words were cut off as a phone on the man's desk rang.
"I am so sorry about this, but we are a bit busy with the wars." The man explained as he picked it up. "Ah, I see." He said and hung up.
"What was all that about?" John asked, hoping not to come off as pushy and wanting to know it all.
"Ah, nothing, my next appointment has come early. Now, if you can, we need need you to step into a side room and examining you, as well as get you into some new clothes before your mentor comes, is that okay?" The man asked.
"Yeah... Sure." John said. The man smiled and pushed a button on his desk. Two young women, professional dressed, opened the door and went into the office.
"John Watson? If you would come with us?" One asked. They were both... Pretty, but nothing heart stopping. The thought briefly makes John think. Is his own heart beating? Or is it just a useless lump of muscle now?
"Yeah." John said as he got up and followed the girls to another bare room. They left him, were someone similar to medical examiner.
After John finished with the medical examiner, he was sent back into the office with the polite business man, box under his arm with his army clothes. John rubbed his shoulder through the new cotton tee they gave him. It was still hurting a bit, but not terribly.
"Ah, there you are." The man said, smiling at him. "Are you ready to meet your mentor?"
"My mentor?" John asked.
"When someone is new here, we put them to live with someone who has lived here for a while to help get the newly deceased on their feet." The man explained. "We call them mentors. You don't have to live with yours, or even socialize with him past this meeting, but usually it's easier. However-" He paused and looked at the paperwork. "Considering your mentor, we can switch mentors, if you want."
"I'll meet him first." John said.
"Okay." The man said and he picked up his phone. "Send Sherlock in."
A few seconds later, the door opened and a tall man, wearing a long black coat and a blue scarf stepped in. John's eyes traveled up from the man's, Sherlock's, shoes to his face. When his eyes reached Sherlock's face, he couldn't help but gasp. The left side of Sherlock's face was somewhat normal looking, his skin pale as milk, and deep claw marks carved into his eyebrow. His left eye was dull black and sunken in.
The right side of his face as much different. His mouth turned into a large gap that showed jaw bone and muscle. Skin reappeared before his jaw connected back to his skull. There were several deep and long claw marks there too, like before he had died he was attacked and killed by some animal and left to rot. His right eye looked normal, a almost pretty light blue-green color. There were more claw marks on the bridge of his nose and lower, his nose was completely rotted away, showing bone.
He didn't have any skin covering his throat either, and John could see his Adam's apple and muscles move as the man spoke.
"So, Afganistan or Iraq?"
Please review!
I have drawn a picture, showing what Sherlock looks like, but I can't put it up right now. I'll try and get it to be the little cover picture-thingy next chapter, so yeah!