Warnings for this chapter: Violence and blood
"This is ridiculous," John muttered, scrabbling over the window ledge and dropping onto the carpet with a thump, narrowly avoiding a sturdy-looking wooden table. Sherlock got lightly to his feet, brushing off his coat. John sighed. "I don't care what the guy's done, Greg won't be happy when he finds out we're breaking and entering. Again."
It was the 'again' that made him feel like crying and laughing at the same time. The case had been going on too long; he was exhausted.
Sherlock didn't look exhausted – he rarely did – but was hopping around the flat with an air of a gleeful, if slightly evil, child. "We hardly broke anything," he murmured. "The window was open."
John rolled his eyes and pulled himself to his feet with a wince, briefly rolling his shoulder to relieve it of the stiffness that always came to it when he was tired.
"This guy could come back at any time. Got a cover story for when he sees us?"
Sherlock made an absentminded humming noise as he flicked through the open letters sitting on the chest of drawers in the lounge, threw them down with disdain, and moved through the kitchen.
"He's at a business convention – his secretary told me. He'll be at least another hour."
John wasn't so sure. The secretary hadn't looked like he knew what he was doing when they'd interviewed him earlier; far too scatterbrained to be a secretary, really. Looked a bit like a permanently confused fish. John didn't trust him, not because he thought he had anything to do with the case, but because he looked entirely hopeless.
"I don't think-"
Sherlock clicked his tongue in a way that indicated he'd had quite enough of John's being sensible, and began to probe the inside of the fridge.
"Make yourself useful; find that memory stick. Probably going to be small, dark colours. He doesn't have anyone to buy him a novelty one as some sort of god-awful last-minute gift."
John went to do as he was told, because it was less tiring than arguing. The flat was unremarkable. Perhaps 221b had set the standard of 'bizarre' so high that the ordinary looked unexciting, or perhaps the man who owned it had no concept of 'interesting' but, either way, John found himself bored just looking. Sherlock was rubbing off on him. It was worrying.
"Even with an hour, I don't see how you expect to find it," he called through to the kitchen. "Not unless he's careless."
Sherlock didn't reply. There were a series of clicks, and then a creak. John moved away from the lounge, saw Sherlock had vanished from the kitchen, frowned, and made his way along the hall to find a door open, still with Sherlock's lock picks resting by it. He sighed.
"Sherlock…"
Sherlock waved a hand in irritation. He was standing in a small office, cluttered with files and not one, but two computers, a frown on his face. "It's got to be here. Only locked room in the place. Makes sense…"
John stood patiently, realising Sherlock wasn't talking to him. He tapped his foot, looked at the ceiling, and wondered if the small black smudge next to the light was a dead fly, or just one of those marks that seemed to accumulate without explanation in any home. Sherlock trailed off to a mutter, and then silence, eyes darting, hands steepled under his chin as he turned this way and that, working out something unfathomable, but no doubt brilliant. It was always brilliant, when it came to Sherlock.
It was because he was standing patiently, with nothing to do, that John heard the front door open. Sherlock, lost somewhere in the recesses of his mind, didn't react until John seized him by the arm and dragged him into the cupboard that stood at the corner of the room, cramming them both in alongside files and boxes, clamping one hand over his mouth to stop him speaking. Footsteps sounded in the hall, and there was a squeak.
Hot breath filled the tiny cupboard very quickly; Sherlock's feet were pressed over the top of John's, and the both of them were being jabbed from all sides by the sharp corners of files and god knew what else. John could feel his toes throbbing as they were slowly squashed, but he didn't dare ask Sherlock to move. There was the sound of a tap being turned, and the soft, plastic clunk of a kettle, followed by and electric hiss and bubbling.
Footsteps again, faster, nearer…slowing. Stopping, right outside the study. The man could hardly fail to notice the lock picks, even if he assumed he'd left the door to his office open by mistake.
A mistake. John got the feeling he and Sherlock were going to pay for it. If they were found. When they were found.
He turned his head, scraping his scalp painfully against sharp cardboard, and gave Sherlock a look. Sherlock looked back, inclined his head to the door of the cupboard, and shrugged, minutely. There was a soft clack of metal, as if someone had just picked up a lock pick, and the squeal of a drawer. Footsteps. Coming closer, hesitating, but always closer.
Slowly, very slowly, John raised his hands, pressing his elbow against Sherlock's cheek, and grasped one of the boxes above his head, hoping it contained papers rather than books. He was strong, but not that strong; besides, books wouldn't be enough of a diversion.
Sherlock gently put one foot against the crack of light that showed between the two doors of the cupboard, just as a shadow fell across it.
John nodded. Sherlock powered forward with his heel; the doors flew outward with enough force to rock the whole cupboard to the side, hit something fleshy, and bounced back. John was already through them, flinging the box forward; he missed his target, unable to adjust to the light in time, but the box burst against the desk, scattering loose sheets of paper over the floor, in the air, into their faces. Perfect.
They were all blinded, all struggling in the confines of the office. There was a sharp thud and a grunt as Sherlock rocked against the desk, attacked by an elbow or a knee; John didn't have time to see which before he charged forward again, grasped the man by the collar, and attempted to bring him to the floor.
He heard the gun before he saw it.
At first he thought the cupboard had toppled over, or that the light had fallen from the ceiling. The crack was loud, bouncing in his ears, and when he realised it was a gun, he found it so familiar he didn't register at first; he was back on a battlefield, back standing behind a window, holding a gun outstretched to shoot a cabbie for a man he'd met only hours before. Only this time, he wasn't holding the gun.
He thought it was Sherlock who'd been hit; he assumed it was Sherlock. Nothing hurt. It had hurt instantly before, on the battlefield. He'd felt the muscles rip in his shoulder. This time he couldn't feel a thing.
It had to be Sherlock. Feeling flooded him. Anger. He reached forward to seize the man by the collar a second time, take advantage of the cracking sound still reverberating in their ears to put him out, and then he would go to Sherlock, he would look after Sherlock, and everything would be fine. His arm stretched, brushed the man's shirt, stopped. Something stopped it.
Pain.
John looked down. Something reddish-brown dripped onto his shoes, suede shoes, waste of money really, but he had liked them. And now they were ruined, littered with dark patches like cow skin. Shame.
His legs buckled, a searing, biting, snarling pain punched its way through his side, the world twisted sideways, up, down, he didn't know which way. He caught a glimpse, in the corner of his eye, of the gun clattering to the floor, the man's head striking the desk with Sherlock's hand pressed over the back of his neck. Blood ran onto the white papers carpeting the floor. Some were sprayed only finely, one or two were already soaked. His ears buzzed.
Sherlock knelt next to him, said something so fast John didn't catch a word of it, and touched his cheek. The fingertips were cold, bracing. Something inside John jolted; he felt realisation run across the bridge of his nose like an electric current.
"-hospital, John? John!"
John didn't speak; breathing was painful enough. He merely seized Sherlock's hand and shoved it to the wound in his side, as hard as he could manage. It was only then he realised Sherlock had his phone in his grasp, and the edge of it was pressing into John's flesh. Sherlock switched hands, holding the phone to his ear with his shoulder. John tried to breathe, lost his rhythm, coughed, yelled, found it again.
At least it wasn't Sherlock, was all he could think.
"John? Can you hear me?" Sherlock was pressing his fingers so savagely into John's side that John could feel his nails scraping the flesh. He hoped Sherlock had clean hands. "John?"
John nodded. "Amb-". He cut himself off, tried again. Breathe. "Ambulance?"
"Coming. Five minutes." Sherlock swallowed; John could see his Adam's apple bobbing. He was pale, but he was holding it together. That was good. They needed to both keep talking, stay focused.
"Knew this was a bad idea," he muttered. "Stupid idea of yours."
He must have looked terrible, because Sherlock merely nodded in agreement, rather than arguing that everything was perfectly fine and that John was being a big baby about the whole thing. As he nodded his arm pressed down even further; John felt something inside his body burn and spasm. It made his vision blur and fade; he didn't realise he'd screamed until his sight returned, and he realised Sherlock was shouting at him. The pain was worse. It was eating him.
"John!"
"Shit!" Swearing. Swearing made it better. He convinced himself it did. "Fuck. Fuck. Always knew you'd be the fucking death of me, with your cases and your…your…shit…" He trailed off, exhausted, head spinning. Everything felt grey.
He had a split-second image of Sherlock looking at him like a startled, hurt animal, and then his eyes rolled – he actually felt them roll, it made him feel sick, he was going to be sick, he was going to scream, he was going-
The flat was musty. John's nostrils curled under the scent of dust and old food; he'd got used to the hospital cleanliness, the pristine walls. 221b was messy, busy, human. Bizarre.
The shot had only grazed his side, although the wound it had created had been more than enough to send him into shock. It had bled fast; it could have killed him if Sherlock hadn't been quick. But it had missed anything vital, and he was healing. He hadn't got an infection. He was lucky. Walking was more painful than he would like to admit, but he made his way doggedly up the stairs and pushed open the door with his lips pressed into a thin line, nostrils flared. He wouldn't show weakness.
He didn't feel lucky. Sherlock hadn't come to see him in a whole week. The nurses told him the paramedics had allowed him in the ambulance, but as soon as they'd reached the hospital, Sherlock had vanished. John had rung him everyday. Mrs Hudson had come to visit, her face pale and pinched, and told him Sherlock was at the flat, and refusing to leave. It had been Mrs Hudson who'd brought him a change of clothes and a card, Mrs Hudson who'd rung around his friends to tell them what had happened, and Mrs Hudson who'd travelled back with him in the taxi. Sherlock hadn't even texted him.
The curtains were shut, putting the lounge in darkness, and John couldn't raise his arm enough to open them. He hobbled, panting, toward the kitchen, desperate for a glass of water, but too proud to call out to Sherlock, ask him for help. Sherlock didn't want to help. John had had a week to fret and stew and turn from irritated to furious, and he wasn't asking Sherlock for a damn thing. He leaned against the sofa for a second, breathed deeply, and limped into the kitchen.
Sherlock was lying on the kitchen table, legs dangling over one end and his head pushed against his microscope, hands under his chin, staring at the ceiling. He didn't turn his head as John came in, didn't say a word. His lips were pale. If he hadn't happened to blink, John might have thought he was dead.
"Thanks for coming to visit me," he spat, unable to stop the words, despite all the promises he'd made to himself in the taxi, that he would make Sherlock come to him. "Thanks for ringing back. For asking how I was. Really. Wonderful of you."
Sherlock said nothing. John filled a glass of water, only just suppressing a groan as his stitches stretched.
John went downstairs in the middle of the night because his side was agony, and he needed to take an extra dose of painkillers. He was sleep-fogged and groggy, uncomfortable and still resentful, but the sight of Sherlock, in exactly the same place as he had been ten hours before, made him stop and sigh.
"You'll ruin your back."
Silence.
"How long have you been there?"
Silence. The beeping of the pedestrian crossing down the street. Silence again. John gave it up, switched on the light, and began to pop pills out of their foil blisters, hands trembling with exhaustion and pain. He swallowed the chalky tablets with a grimace, wiped his chin with the arm he could move without making his stitches shudder, and turned back round to face the table. Sherlock looked like a corpse. Even his blinking was less frequent.
He hadn't noticed it in the daylight, but the electric light caught Sherlock's hands at a different angle, made it obvious. John frowned.
"You've still got blood under your nails. That's disgusting."
Sherlock made a soft humming noise and shifted his gaze to his hands, than back to the ceiling. He didn't look at John, but his cheeks grew darker, his eyes brighter. It took John a couple of seconds to work out that Sherlock looked ashamed. Not of his nails – he'd looked at them – but of John. No, surely not of John. Of what he'd done? Of not visiting?
Always knew you'd be the fucking death of me.
Sherlock's face, before John's eyes had rolled, had been…strange.
"Sit up." When he didn't get a response he made his way to the table, shoved his good arm under Sherlock's head, and forced him into an upright position, grimacing as he did so. Sherlock yielded, but continued to stare at the ceiling. "Sherlock. Look at me. Look at me."
Sherlock did.
"You're not doing either of us any favours. What I said…I didn't mean it. It was a stupid thing to say." He had thought he'd been dying at the time, but it seemed like that wasn't an excuse. In anyone else's book it would have been, but not Sherlock's. Sherlock had a different kind of book. Hell, he probably didn't even have a book. "But not visiting. Not asking how I was, not even calling. I needed you, Sherlock, and you screwed me over. You let Mrs Hudson run around after me instead."
Sherlock blinked. His hands remained under his chin.
"For god's sake! Just…think, in future. I don't care that I got shot – I always knew the work was dangerous, it wasn't your fault, not all of it. It was both our faults. Bad luck." He sighed. "I just care that you didn't seem to give a damn."
Sherlock lowered his hands; John could see them shaking in the sickly light. That made two of them.
"I didn't think you'd want to see me."
"Bullshit. I made it very clear I did. I rang you. I got Mrs Hudson to ask you to come." Motivated by anger and the fact the pills were kicking in, he moved to the side and found the nailbrush they kept by the sink, rinsed it, and returned to the table. "Give me your hand."
Sherlock obediently held it out. John began to scrub at his blood-encrusted nails, the frown between his eyes deepening. "Next time, you don't abandon me. Understand? I don't care what happens, what stupid thing you do, I want to see you."
"There won't be a next time. I won't…" Sherlock sighed. "I won't let it happen again."
John looked at him, scrubbing less viciously, easing the tension. He was still angry, but he was tired. And Sherlock, especially after his absence, was comforting, ridiculous as it sounded. "You can't guarantee that."
Sherlock set his mouth into a stubborn line that made John want to smile, although he refrained from doing so. For now.
"I can try."
Thanks for reading, reviews welcome!
To be continued.
