Wednesday, 15:35

Once again, Sherlock Holmes and John Watson were chasing a man down an alleyway.

The man that they were after was a suspected kidnapper. Sherlock, through one of his regular strokes of genius, had figured out that their suspect frequented a particular industrial area, and they had run into this man outside a warehouse. He'd taken off running and Sherlock had made the split-second decision to go into pursuit. John ran a pace behind him, quickly calling Lestrade to ask for some police backup.

After they had run a few blocks, just after John hung up the phone, the suspect, still a good twenty feet ahead of them, seemed to stumble and then turned around. He was holding a gun, and he fired a single shot before taking off running at full speed again, not looking behind him to see if he had hit anyone.

Perhaps the gunfire distracted him, or maybe it was just chance, but at almost the same time that the suspect fired the gun, John tripped, hitting the ground hard. His head bounced on the cobblestones of the street- he didn't lose consciousness, but was definitely disoriented for a few moments. He had somehow managed to hit on his lower chest area hard enough that a few ribs must have been bruised, if not broken. Slowly, he got up on his knees, surprised by how much pain he was in. He put a hand up to his forehead and lowered it to see blood, but it wasn't running down his face or anything- he had a bit of an abrasion, that was all. Looking in front of him, he was surprised to see that Sherlock had also stopped running, and was standing a few paces ahead of John, half bent over and breathing heavily.

John momentarily forgot about his own injuries as both the doctor part of him and the Sherlock's friend part of him were overwhelmed with concern that his friend may have been shot. "Sherlock? Are you all right? Were you hit?"

Sherlock turned around. He was a shade or two paler than his already pale standard, and his right arm was cradled in his left, with an obvious pained expression on his face. Blood was soaking through Sherlock's coat, the dark grey wool showing a darker stain, centered on his forearm. "It's just my arm, John. Though from the amount of bleeding, I suspect that it damaged my radial artery."

"Oh God, Sherlock." John moved to get up, but a new wave of pain stopped him. He closed his eyes for a second to compose himself. When he opened them, Sherlock was standing over him, the pain on his face now augmented with something that looked like concern. "I'm okay," John assured him. "I just tripped."

"Are you sure?" Sherlock asked. "You're acting like you're significantly injured."

"No really, I just need a minute. Give me your arm." John reached into his pocket and grabbed swiss army knife as Sherlock sat in front of John, resting his arm over his own knees. John cut open the sleeve of Sherlock's coat- smiling a bit as he noticed slight anger on his friend's face- then proceeded to do the same to his sport coat and shirt. Sherlock's arm was a mess- the bullet had gone straight through, leaving a hole where it went in and a larger one where it exited. Bright red blood was coming out in pulses. "I think you're right about that arterial bleed. I need to wrap it with something... ah, scarf." Without waiting for a response, John grabbed Sherlock's scarf and wrapped it tightly around his injured arm as a makeshift pressure bandage. Sherlock winced but didn't complain.

John pulled out his mobile phone. Noticing the worry still on his friend's face, he said "It's all right Sherlock. I'm calling an ambulance." He dialed 999, and explained to the operator where they were, and that his friend had a gunshot wound to the arm. She assured him that an ambulance would be there within ten minutes, and he thanked her and hung up. He started to dial Lestrade's number, trying to stand up again at the same time, but the pain in his side increased again, and his head started to spin.

"John? John." Sherlock's voice sounded urgent. John realized that he'd had his eyes closed for quite a while. He snapped them open again. "I think I may have hit the ground harder than I originally thought."

"Or..." Sherlock glanced over to where the gunman had been standing, then to where he had been standing, and then back to John. John could see the gears turning in his friend's head. Suddenly, Sherlock started frantically trying to unbutton John's coat with one hand. "What are you..." John started to ask, taking over on the unbuttoning. Then, as he looked down, he realized what had happened.

Before that moment, it hadn't even occurred to him that he might have been injured before the fall. There was one gunshot, one bullet, the one that hit Sherlock. However, it had gone straight through, changing direction only slightly as it ricocheted off of the detective's radius. Changing direction to go straight at John.

As it sunk in that he had been shot, John collapsed, slumping to one side. Sherlock, still cradling his injured arm to his chest, somehow managed to catch John with the other one, laying him out more or less on his back. The change in position eased the spinning in John's head somewhat- he figured that he must have lost a significant amount of blood, but maybe not too much if he had lasted as long as he had sitting up. A sharp pain spiked in the upper right quadrant of his abdomen- apparently what he had been interpreting as rib pain was actually lower than that- as Sherlock applied pressure with one bare hand. John groaned.

"Talk to me, John," Sherlock was saying. "You're going to be all right. An ambulance is coming."

"Yeah, yeah, I know. I was the one who called it. How much blood do you think I've lost?"

"Don't worry about that, John."
"How much?"
"Not enough to be immediatelylife-threatening."
"Your bedside manner leaves much to be desired."
"I suppose it's a good thing that you're the doctor, then."

Wednesday, 15:43

After another probably five minutes, which felt like hours, John finally heard the sirens. By that time he was feeling rather woozy again, and had closed his eyes a few more times only to open them reluctantly at Sherlock's insistence. Sherlock's one hand wasn't doing much to stop the bleeding, and John could feel that the whole front of his shirt was wet with his own blood. Two police cars turned the corner, a uniformed officer jumping out of each of them. An ambulance stopped farther back, waiting for the all clear from the police. "What happened?" one of the officers asked Sherlock.

"A man shot us and ran away. Just let the damn ambulance through." One of the police officer ran off in the direction Sherlock had indicated with a nod of his head, while the second spoke on his radio to the ambulance. "And someone call DI Lestrade," Sherlock added.

The ambulance came down the alleyway, backing up so that the back doors faced John and Sherlock, stopping a few meters from the two men on the ground. John wasn't really up for lifting his head to look around at that point, but he heard two people running toward him and Sherlock. One of the paramedics, a woman with short blond hair who said her name was Diana, started checking John's vitals, and one of the police officers pulled on a pair of gloves and moved Sherlock's hand out of the way to apply pressure to the bullet hole with a large gauze pad. John moaned- the policeman was able to put a lot more force on the wound than Sherlock had. The other paramedic, who John didn't get a good look at, pulled Sherlock away, while talking into his radio. "Control, this is Unit 4309, requesting a second ambulance, we have two victims at the scene..."

"No, I want to ride with John, he's my friend, it's just my arm," Sherlock protested. The paramedic tried to argue with him, but Sherlock woudn't have it, threatening to refuse care, and finally, the paramedic agreed that if Sherlock checked out all right and was stable, they'd let him ride in the same ambulance as his friend. A few minutes later Sherlock's paramedic - Mike - came back over to John, with the gurney from the ambulance.

"How's Sherlock?" John asked. By then, Diana had him on oxygen, with an IV in his arm delivering saline and a fairly large dose of morphine, and while John knew he was still in shock, he felt little better than he had a few minutes previously.

"Your friend's all right for now- it looks like you managed to stop the worst of the bleeding with that scarf, which I must mention is quite impressive for anyone who's just taken a bullet. The safest thing will be to wait until he's in the ED to take it off." Relieved, John turned his head and could see Sherlock sitting in the back of the ambulance, with a big orange splint immobilizing his arm, talking to a policeman. "Okay, the sooner we get him to hospital, the better," Diana said to her partner. That worried John a bit, but he told himself that that would be true even if he weren't that bad off. The two medics lifted him onto the gurney and wheeled it over to the ambulance.

"All right there John?" Sherlock asked. John reached up with what felt like enormous effort to take the oxygen mask off his face. "Oh yeah. Fantastic," he answered, with as much humor as he could manage, and put the oxygen back in place. Diana secured the gurney into the ambulance and shut the doors, and they sped off toward the hospital with the lights and siren on. After a minute, John felt a hand on his ankle- he lifted up his head and saw that Sherlock had grabbed onto him with his good hand. Sherlock noticed John looking at him. "I couldn't reach your hand," he explained.

Just in case the paramedic was wondering, John muttered, "We're just friends. Really."

Wednesday, 16:02

Minutes later, the ambulance pulled up to the Emergency Department of St. Bartholomew's Hospital. Sherlock was helped, or rather forced, into a wheelchair; he wanted to walk in, but, weak from pain and blood loss, gave in when Mike and the nurse who brought it out firmly steered him into the chair.

When they entered the ED, a small crowd of doctors and nurses had already gathered by the doors. "What have we got?" asked a doctor in a suit, who seemed to be in charge.

"Sherlock Holmes, gun shot wound to the right forearm with suspected arterial bleed, vitals stable, his friend here stopped most of the bleeding with a scarf." Mike told the doctor. Sherlock was sent off to Resus with a Dr. Smith. Next it was John's turn, "John Watson, GSW to the upper right quadrant, about a liter of blood loss, BP is 90 over 60, pulse 120, GCS 14, he's also taken a bump to the head." Diana told the doctors. "All right, Dr. Robertson and I will take him," the doctor in charge said. "I'm Dr. Thomas, and this is Dr. Robertson. I can assure you that you're in good hands, Mr. Watson." "It's Dr. Watson, actually." John corrected him. "Very well, Dr. Watson," Dr. Thomas replied, as they rolled him into Resus.

John was moved onto a bed, and saw Sherlock being helped into a bed opposite him by Dr. Smith and a nurse. John tried to allow himself to banish his worry for for Sherlock's immediate safety to the back of his mind for the time being.

A nurse drew some blood and Dr. Thomas ordered the same tests that John would have, including cross-matching for six units of type-specific blood. Someone hooked John up to a heart monitor, and put a second IV into his other arm. Dr. Robertson, a junior doctor, did a primary survey, assessing John's Airway, Breathing, Circulation, and neurological status. When he was done, Dr. Thomas brought out a handheld ultrasound advice and started scanning around the wound. "Yeah. See that?" he asked Dr. Robertson.

"The bullet nicked the liver," the younger doctor agreed. Dr. Thomas explained to John that they were sending him straight up to theater. John couldn't say he was surprised about that.

Wednesday, 19:36

When they brought John into the hospital room where he would be spending the next several days, he was glad to see the Lestrade was already there waiting for him. Two nurses who went to work to hook him up to various monitors and tubes, showing him how to use the patient-controlled analgesia pump that delivered a dose of pain medication whenever he needed it. Being a doctor, already knew what to do, and for the most part he ignored them. "Have you heard anything about Sherlock?" John immediately asked the Inspector. In the recovery room, he had been assured that his own operation went smoothly and that he would be out of there in about a week. Now he just wanted to know that Sherlock was also okay.

"He's in theater as we speak." Lestrade told John. That couldn't be good, John thought. Sherlock's injury had seemed less serious than his own. No doubt noticing the increased worry on John's face, Lestrade added "They just brought him up an hour ago. I waited with him in the ED for quite a while. He should be fine."

That made sense, of course. Sherlock had had time that John didn't, for his doctors to do additional tests before repairing the damage the gunman had left. He probably even had to wait for another operation to be finished, if it had taken two hours. That's how these things worked. Less serious injuries took longer to be treated.

"Does Mycroft know?" was John's next question. Lestrade nodded. "I called him as soon as I got to the hospital. He's currently in America, however, so he won't be here until morning."

"You'll go tell Sherlock that I'm okay when he comes out of theater?" John asked. "I would go myself, but I doubt that they will let me out of this bed that soon."

"Yes, of course," the Inspector assured him. "Now I've already heard Sherlock's account of what happened, but if you're feeling up to it, I should get a statement from you." John agreed, and told Lestrade everything. Just as he was finishing, Lestrade's phone rang.

"Lestrade. Yes. Great. No. I'm just with John Watson right now. Yeah. I'll be there in twenty minutes." He turned back to John. "They found your guy, I'm going to go help bring him in right now. Unless..." he trailed off, giving John a chance to ask him to stay, but John shook his head.

"No, go. I'll be fine."

"What about Sherlock?"

"I don't know. I'll call someone. Really, go arrest this guy."

Lestrade nodded, then picked up his coat and headed toward the door. "Take care of yourself, John."

One of the nurses had just come back into the room with a cup of ice chips for John. He thanked her and asked if she could get his mobile phone out of the patient belongings bag that someone had put on one of the chairs by his bedside. She reminded him that there was a no cell phones policy in the hospital, and he gave her his most charming smile and told him he'd keep it quick. She rolled her eyes and handed him the phone.

Now he just needed to figure out who he was calling. His initial thought was Mrs. Hudson, but he wanted to wait until he knew for sure that they were both okay before worrying her. Then, he had a different idea, and scrolled through his address book until he found the right number.

"Molly? Hi, it's John Watson. Are you still at the hospital?"

Wednesday, 21:07

Molly wasn't really sure why John Watson had called her of all people, but it didn't seem like saying no was much of a choice when someone calls you from a hospital bed to ask you to visit their friend in the hospital. So here she was, standing in an empty hospital room, waiting for Sherlock Holmes.

A nurse saw her, and stuck her head in the room. "Are you waiting for Mr. Holmes?" Molly nodded. "I'm a... friend." The nurse told Molly that Sherlock would be there in a few minutes.

When they did bring Sherlock into his room, he immediately looked at Molly and said, in the harsh tone he often used toward her, "What are youdoing here?" One of the nurses gave Molly the faintest of dirty looks and asked Sherlock if he would like Molly to leave. He shook his head. "No, that's fine. But I would appreciate an answer to my question."

"Well, John asked me to come," she told Sherlock. He looked all right, maybe a bit paler than usual, or maybe he was just as pale as usual, was it even possible for Sherlock to get paler? A nurse was helping him prop a heavily bandaged arm on a pile of pillows. "He wanted someone to check on you and make sure you know that he's all right."

"In that case, thank you." Sherlock stared Molly down for a few seconds. "But why you?"

Several reasons went through her mind, but none of them seemed like the right thing to tell Sherlock, so she just shrugged. "I'll leave you to get some rest." She turned to leave.

"Molly," he said as she reached the door. "Really, thank you." He sounded sincere this time. And maybe he was. It was hard to tell with Sherlock.

"Okay," was all that she could think of to say.

Thursday, 15:30

John was taking a nap- something that is very easy to do when you are recovering from major abdominal surgery and are taking large amounts of narcotic painkillers- when he heard the door of his hospital room open. The sound rendered him fully awake, but he waited a moment, debating whether or not to open his eyes and alert whoever was visiting to the fact that he had in fact woken up.

He figured that he might as well, and was pleasantly surprised to see Sherlock sitting in one of the chairs by the side of the bed, his arm in a sling but otherwise looking completely himself. "They released you already then?"

"Why did you send Molly?"

"I thought you'd be glad to see a familiar face, and I'm stuck here."

"Yes, but why her in particular?"

"Is it a problem that I sent Molly?"

"No... no, not at all..."

There was a long silence. "If you don't mind, I'm going to sleep some more."

Sherlock nodded. "I'll be here when you wake up."

"To interrogate me again?"

There was the slightest of pauses. "No."