'Round About Midnight
The boys come home after a rough night out and patching themselves up might have some side effects.
When they had closed the door to 221B Baker Street behind them, they slumped down in the stairs, and started to giggle helplessly. Sometimes one of them stopped for a wince when the pain got too bad. Eventually John did his best to get serious again.
"Mate, you need to be looked over. If you don't get up soon, I'll call an ambulance for you. And you know I will," he said worriedly, still trying to catch his breath and to keep his hands off his friend.
"And you know I hate ambulances."
"You hate everything. Now, shut up and get up!"
Sherlock did his best, but only managed to sit up. Standing was out of the question, he realised, as his head swum and dark spots appeared in his vision by only raising it by a few decimetres above the floor. He knew it was only a concussion, and that it was going to be just fine if he got some rest and John kept his calm. Which he didn't.
"OK, I'm calling them right now."
"No, you're not. Why get sloppy care from a tired doctor in a public hospital? It's the NHS we're talking about, damnit. With these injuries we probably have to wait for hours in the Emergency room. You can patch me up just as good, if not better," he said with as much authority he could muster. "No hospital."
"Don't make it my fault if I mess it up. Remember it was your choice to get stitched up by a beaten up doctor with PTSD." John pulled him up, and draped the taller man over him. Even in this state he towered over him, and was all long arms and gangly legs. Sherlock sagged as they slowly braved the stairs, as walking was also not such a good idea. The warmth of their closeness soaked through his jacket, and was a bit too nice and exciting for John to be entirely comfortable. He struggled with the keys for a while and then manhandled Sherlock through the door, and put him down on the sofa.
"They got us good tonight, yeah?" John chuckled and sat down beside him, eyeing the man closely and getting in touch with his inner doctor.
"Still, I think that we're the ones that got away lucky. Lestrade texted me on the way back. They got the whole gang in custody back at the Yard. Except for those who were hospitalized, of course. Apparently you gave that man a nasty jaw fracture. Will takes months to heal," Sherlock said and wiped at his forehead with his sleeve, where a drop of blood had started to trickle down. Then he added: "Good job. Screw the Hippocratic oath."
"Thank you. Now I'm going to get my medical kit upstairs. Don't you move," John said and limped away, his leg was hurt for real this time. Sherlock listened to him going up the stairs to his room. He appeared moments later with a small bag in one hand and a lot of gauze in the other.
"Can you sit up? Makes it easier to…yeah," he said, as Sherlock tried valiantly to rise from the sofa.
"I think I might have cracked a rib or two," he wheezed weakly. "It hurts like the blazes."
"Well, I'm not going to give you anything stronger than Advil, so man up, will you? We can't have you relapse, you know. Who knows what an ex-addict like you will get up to…" John chuckled, obviously not serious at all about the last part of what he had said.
"Don't get snarky. This is just cruel. And you know that I did not use substances like…"
"Yeah, yeah. Shut it. I'm trying to do my work."
The first task was getting Sherlock out of his shirt, which proved to be hard, as it was smeared to his body with rain, dirt and blood. Mostly it was neither his nor Johns. After a few minutes of prying and peeling, John suggested that he simply should cut it off, but got a definite no from his patient.
"This shirt is Egyptian cotton! I know for a fact that Mrs Hudson can save it. No cutting!" After a while they ended up on the floor, with John almost sitting on him and slowly wrestling the shirt off, and Sherlock painfully grunting, face down in the rug. Finally the garment was thrown in a wet heap by the fireplace.
"Those bastards," John breathed as he examined his friends back. There were a few cuts and already dark bruises were forming on his pale skin. John stroked them mindlessly, his thumb tracing red lines and bumps across his back. Sherlock really was surprisingly warm. He felt his friends back stiffen under his hands, muscles tautening. John almost forgot himself, until Sherlock started to stir uncomfortably under him.
"Sorry, I'll actually need to stitch you up. It's nothing serious, but it needs taking care of," John said sobering up, stating the obvious. He started dabbing at the wounds with alcohol infused cotton, and Sherlock tried and failed to conceal his painful hisses. Next came the sutures. John produced a needle and thread from his medical kit and started working. None of the wounds were severe, so he only needed to do make a couple of stitches in total. Sherlock twitched once or twice as he was stung, but then he lay perfectly still, and let the doctor do his work. John wasn't perfectly sure whether he was just very self restrained or if he had fainted.
"You are way too skinny. I really need to start force-feeding you soon. You should take better care of yourself," he said, mostly to see if he could get an answer out of the man under him, but also because it was true. He suddenly felt oddly levelheaded.
"You always say that," Sherlock murmured drowsily at the rug after a while.
"I mean it this time. You have to choose: either you face death from starvation, or death by London thugs. You can't have both, not on my watch. Well, preferably neither, if I have any say." Sherlock didn't have an answer to that, but mumbled something unintelligible into the rug.
"I can't fucking lose you, alright? Tonight was too bloody close," John rambled on, and he knew instantly that he let his emotions shine through a bit more than appropriate. Even in his detached state Sherlock was bound to pick up on it, and the fact that those feelings weren't just out of pure and simple preservation. But seeing him like this, so vulnerable, did things to John. He just couldn't help himself. "In the future, please let me handle the violent ones. I am the one that has military training, after all."
"I can't risk you getting hurt. Who do you think is going to fix me up then? My recuperation ability is better than yours, anyway."
"Don't say things like that."
"Yes, I will. Couldn't do this without you." Sherlock's ears were bright red, and there was a certain sentimentality to his voice that John didn't really recognize. He found it quite endearing.
"No, you really couldn't. Now, stop bothering me and lie still," John said half-heartedly and went back to prodding at the newly formed bruises and cleaning them up. Unconsciously Sherlock arched his back against the warmth of John's hands. His breath was uneven.
"Okay, that's it. We're done. You can sit up now," John said firmly, and climbed of the man, were he still lay motionless on the floor, still face down.
"Could I have a moment, please?" Sherlock sounded distressed and a bit embarrassed in a very uncharacteristic way. Normally he didn't do emotions like embarrassment, and he never ever uttered the word 'please' unless there was no way he could escape it. John had the theory that it caused him physical pain even to think the word. He must be worse off than he thought if he tried to conceal it like that, all things considered.
"Are you alright? Do you think you can sit up? You're not dizzy or anything?" John asked, now with a lot more concern. Head injuries could be nasty stuff. All the worst possible scenarios that he had read about in medical school flashed through his mind.
"No. No, I'm fine," came the slightly strangled and short answer. He kept his head down on purpose John realized, nose pressed to the floor, so he couldn't see his face.
Then it got to him. John quietly went 'Oh Dear God' inwardly and tried not to swallow too noticeably. Of course. When the possible has been eliminated, what remains must be the truth, however impossible it might seem. Here they were after a night of fighting and saving each others lives, with Sherlock lying on the floor undressed with him sitting on top of him, taking care of his wounds, professing his undying loyalty to him and giving him a bloody back massage. Of course Sherlock was aroused. Who wouldn't be in that situation?
That was when something cracked in John's brain. He knew it was really bad, but he just couldn't help himself. Later he would understand that this was the moment when he realized that Sherlock was very available to him and oh so very human. And that he had started it all, even if unknowingly. He reached out his hand, and slid it further down Sherlock's back, with more determination this time.
"Sorry. If you want me to stop, just tell me now," he said, and was a bit surprised at his own broken voice. He did not get an answer.
(I hope you liked it! Pretty please with sugar on top — review!)