Chapter II. Attacked by a Beast

Christmas should be a case. The next day found Sherlock much in the same position as the day before, and John caught himself close to considering somehow getting his partner a case. Or a cat, to keep him occupied, but perhaps that was not such a great idea.

He had returned from work with a sigh of relief, after having to divert his attention between keeping a patient's child of four years occupied, and its mother, who, as she was being examined by him at that time, couldn't quite see to that herself. He had thought he was by now thoroughly used to answering plenty of seemingly mindless and absurd questions and could now handle the unnerving mannerism with ease – alas, it seemed he had erred. The child had left his head positively spinning.

After putting away his coat, he stopped to consider Sherlock who appeared to not have moved a muscle since John had left him in the morning. He was still lying on the couch, flat on his back and in rumpled pyjamas, with one arm almost hanging to the floor and the other flung across his eyes in a vaguely dramatic looking fashion, only he seemed by now to have dozed off. John shook his head with a sigh. He would never have considered the possibility of someone boring themselves to death, and as a doctor could even medically explain why it was impossible no matter what Sherlock at times claimed – however, if anybody came close to suffering precisely that as a cause of an untimely demise, it was a Sherlock Holmes without a case to brood over. John was starting to think that he would rather have Sherlock eager and hyperactive and distracted from anything he might wish to say than lazy and tired and well-nigh depressed with ennui. Although, if he was honest, it did sting a little, that apparently he himself was never enough to keep his partner from being bored.

Discarding that train of thought, John resolved to let Sherlock sleep for now. He had no wish to be subjected to grumbling and growling should he dare awaken him, though he suspected he would in lieu thereof hear a lot of grumbling about an aching back or neck in the near future.


As he turned away and towards the kitchen, a faint notion of a cup of tea in mind, John just barely kept from stumbling over the edge of the carpet and certainly breaking his nose on the door he had not yet fully closed when there was a loud clanging and clattering sound coming from downstairs, followed by a muffled "oh dear Lord" in Mrs Hudson's voice. John lost no time in abandoning his intentions in favour of flinging the door back open again after he regained his balance. Shortly, he felt a sense of astonishment at the fact that Sherlock hadn't even stirred at the sudden commotion, but the thought fled soon enough as he hurried down the stairs.

"Mrs Hudson? Are you alright?" There was no response, and for a moment he worried that she might actually have injured herself, but then the door he had just knocked on was opened before he could raise his hand a second time. The lady in question stood before him, a large, colourful porcelain-looking shard in her hand and her expression visibly displeased, although it softened slightly when her eyes landed on him.

"Oh John, I'm sorry – I'm quite fine, I didn't mean to startle you, I was just so startled myself, you understand, and..."

John had to suppress a smile at her chattering. "Mrs Hudson. What happened?"

It appeared that while trying to put up some fairy lights in her home, Mrs Hudson had accidentally knocked over a big, heavy vase that had been standing on a small stool – devoid of flowers and water, thankfully, but still John had to tread carefully for the shards were now scattered all over the floor.

Relieved that nothing worse had transpired and their landlady had stayed unharmed, he bent down to help cleaning up the mess, quickly disposing of the larger pieces of porcelain by placing them into a large bag that she provided with a grateful smile. She looked as if just seconds away from patting his head or pinching his cheek like a fond grandmother might do, and after he had carefully wiped away the remaining small pieces with a damp paper towel, she invited him to stay for a cup of tea so she might properly thank him.

"Do the two of you have any plans for Christmas celebrations?" she asked after he had also put up the fairy lights for her. John hesitated and took a sip from his cup as he considered his answer.

"Hard to say," he said finally with a shrug. "I'm planning to try and get him out at least a bit over the weeks before Christmas Eve, but... well, you know him..."

Mrs Hudson nodded gravely, although she did seem to be faintly amused. As she parted her lips to respond, however, there was what could only be described as a startled shriek from upstairs which would have resulted in the floor being full of shards once more had she not just set her cup down on the counter. "John!"

Since in his earlier hurry he had not closed the door to his and Sherlock's apartment, and neither, apparently, to Mrs Hudson's, the call was relatively loud and distinctly panicked. With a hasty apology to his landlady, John was out of the door and on his way up the stairs in a whirl. His mind instantly came up with half a dozen probably ludicrous scenarios about what might have happened, who might have gotten past them and through the open door and surprised Sherlock in his sleep, unable to defend himself, and John sped up to the point where he almost lost his footing on the stairs.

"JOHN!"

"I'm coming! Sherlock, I'm coming, what's... happening...?"

The picture that greeted him when he burst into the living room was positively absurd. Sherlock was still on the couch, tousled and dishevelled but at least with his eyes open and decidedly awake, and on his chest...

"John." Sherlock's voice was deliberately calm as he stared unblinkingly into a pair of large green eyes. "There is a cat on my chest. There is a cat on my chest."

Not quite believing that this was the fact that had his partner so panicked, there was not much John, who was still panting from his sprint up the stairs, could respond with. "I can see that."

"Put it away!"

The cat, a small, fluffy calico, appeared entirely unaffected by its newly found pillow's alarm as it curiously patted Sherlock's cheek with a tiny paw before planting all fours firmly on his chest again. From there it proceeded to softly knead its claws into the fabric of his pyjamas and the skin beneath, purring loudly as it nuzzled its face against Sherlock's chin. Sherlock himself appeared to be in a frozen state, stiffly holding both of his hands as far from the little animal as possible and by now having clenched his eyes shut, angling his head away from the pink and black nose.

John sighed deeply. "It's not going to hurt you, you know," he muttered, exasperated, but nonetheless made his way towards the couch. "It's a pet cat, not a tiger. Where did it even come from?"

"I don't know. Put it away," Sherlock repeated instead of an answer, his voice half muffled by a cushion, and John snorted and picked the cat up, to the obvious relief of his partner.

"Oh dear, I am so sorry!" Both of them turned their heads at the exclamation, and Sherlock finally deigned to sit up properly on the couch with a small groan and a wary glance towards the cat, now purring innocently in John's arms. "She must have sneaked out while we were talking," Mrs Hudson continued as she sidestepped a stack of books to take the cat into her own arms. "And she's curious, you cannot imagine, she probably just wanted to-"

"Mrs Hudson." John sent Sherlock a reprimanding look for his rude interruption which went ignored. "What are you talking about? You don't have a cat. I'd know if you had a cat."

"Sherlock, really!" She patted the cat in a soothing manner as if it might be offended by the sceptical words. "I do have a cat. Since yesterday, as it happens. I even believe you might have noticed had you bothered to ever leave this flat!"

Sherlock narrowed his eyes for a heartbeat and then leaned back, drumming the tips of his fingers against each other. "Be that as it may," he said curtly, "I don't want it here, Mrs Hudson. Do see to it that the beast leaves us alone up here."

"Sherlock!" John hissed, and then turned towards Mrs Hudson. "I'm sorry, just ignore him. It's a, uh, lovely cat." He was not much of a cat fan himself, but found that that was by no means a reason to be as impolite as Sherlock.

Mrs Hudson seemed to mind it little, though. She merely uttered another apology for the cat's intruding, thanked John for his assistance downstairs, and sent Sherlock a chastising glance before taking her new furry friend back down again.


"Don't say a word," Sherlock muttered from the couch. He was holding a cushion in front of his face and looked to be contemplating the merits of going right back to sleep. "It's a horrible cat. It left hair in my nose. And in my mouth."

Sitting down next to him, John pulled the cushion from his grasp. "You'll survive. When I heard your screaming I thought you were being attacked."

"I was!" John's eyebrows lifted at the sight of pouting lips. "And I didn't scream."

"Of course not."

"No."

"Mhm."

Sherlock rolled his eyes. A few seconds passed without either of them making an attempt of speech.

"I hate cats."