Chapter Three

"John?"

"What?"

"You're not asleep?"

"I'm sitting up, Sherlock."

"You could sleep sitting up."

"Not on the edge of the bed."

Sherlock fell silent and John sighed, raising a hand to rub at his eyes. They had been sitting in Sherlock's room for the better part of two hours now. Periodically, they had had their own bouts of vomiting, although John's seemed to have come a rather abrupt end. Not the cramps, though. The cramps had gone nowhere. Or the headache, or the chills, or the fever, or the body aches. He was so damn achy that he couldn't sleep. Not that he had really tried, because he hadn't been able to bring himself to move away from Sherlock's room (which was within ten feet of the bathroom) and to his room (which was a whole lot of feet from the bathroom).

"Why haven't you slept?" John asked, drawing the subject of his thoughts away from illness, even though everything here would wind back up to it.

"Ill."

"I think I noticed that, Sherlock." John looked at Sherlock, and for one, wild moment, John could have sworn that the detective looked almost abashedly uncomfortable. Sherlock shifted his weight as it were, knees still drawn to his chest.

"No, John, still ill," he said, emphasizing the word as if it could change the meaning. And it did. John understood.

"Sherlock, if you're still nauseous, you really need to get it out of your system," John replied tiredly, watching the detective swallow.

"You can say that," Sherlock replied dully.

"I was sick before you were," John started, but trailed off in a sigh. It was too much hassle to argue with Sherlock, even more so when they were both sick.

Sherlock only rolled his weight again, to which John was sorely tempted to demand that the detective stop fidgeting, before that certain man launched himself off the bed and ran for the bathroom. John resisted the very childish urge to press his hands over his ears- he'd had enough of vomiting for a lifetime.

"John- how do I make it stop?" Sherlock demanded, in a voice that John would have normally said sounded like a whine. Sherlock didn't whine. But he was coming pretty damn close to it.

"You can't, Sherlock." John reached for the bottle of water that he had given Sherlock, which hadn't even been opened. "You need to stay hydrated."

"But it'll just cause me to vomit more!"

John fixed him with a glare. "Fine, then. But don't come complaining to me."

Sherlock licked his lips and shook his head, taking the step from the hallway into his bedroom. And then he was crumpling to the ground, all so suddenly.

John's instincts took over and he threw himself to his feet to catch the lanky detective. Sherlock's weight, combined with John's still-turned-to-jelly legs, did absolutely nothing to assist. They didn't hit the floor but instead fell into the wall, narrowly missing the doorway, John's breath leaving him with a soft gasp from the mild impact slash weight combo.

"Sherlock," he breathed, hooking his arms around Sherlock's torso. "Sherlock- come on," he hissed, half-helping, half-throwing Sherlock onto the duvet. Sherlock didn't resurface, only mumbled something that was lost within the blankets. John stumbled the few feet to the bed, flopping down as well. He was panting and the nausea that seemed to have left had come back in a roiling sensation, although he knew all hope of walking the few feet into the bathroom was crushed. "Sherlock, you okay?" He didn't receive a response and he sighed heavily, swallowing as he forced down a wave of nausea again. "You're not getting... not getting any better, Sherlock," he murmured, choking the words out. The small, yet far too rapid, movement had left him completely winded. Not to mention the pain. He had his eyes closed against tears of pain, or possible just watering eyes, arm drawn over them.

John became aware of Sherlock moving at one point or another, sometime when he had gotten his breath back a bit. John opened his eyes to find Sherlock curled up in the fetal position, an arm drawn over his face and the other around his stomach.

"Sherlock... Sherlock," John rasped. Sherlock moved his arm minutely, opened his eyes slightly, a whole new emotion visible there: pain. "Sherlock, you have to stay hydrated... This is probably... probably why you're more ill than I am. Because you don't take care of yourself..." John was babbling. He knew he was babbling, could tell even more so because he was still short on breath. In truth, he was nervous. Nervous because Sherlock had actually given into the pain, and John could see it. Sherlock never let anyone see anything.

"And your body's too hot..." He slowly propped himself up to touch-take Sherlock's temperature, snaking his fingers under Sherlock's arm. "It's imperative..." He faltered slightly when he found Sherlock to be warmer than before. "... that you drink something."

"Don't touch me," Sherlock hissed, biting the three words off on one breath. However venomous Sherlock was trying to be, however, he was failing spectacularly. John had seen into the pain riddling his mind. He knew.

Painstakingly, John sat up. Every nerve ending in his body was protesting. Not to mention his stomach. His own fever had probably gone up as well, and he knew that it was necessary to avoid physical activities when one had a fever, such as, oh, being body slammed into a wall by a too tall detective. This didn't bode well for him. But it wasn't boding well for Sherlock, either.

He managed to stumble his way into the bathroom, to grab the thermometer and a rag and douse the latter in cold water. He contemplated the toilet for a brief moment, but decided to go against his own advice (because he had had enough of vomiting for a day) and stumbled back to the bedroom.

Condition? Rapidly deteriorating.

Prognosis? Not good for either of them, if they didn't get rest.

Likelihood of rest? Zero to none.

John sank back onto the bed heavily and gripped Sherlock's wrist, pulling the detective's arm away from his face. Sherlock's eyes immediately opened again but John didn't deter from wiping the sweat from his flatmate's forehead. Sherlock, weakened as he was, had other plans, though, it seemed.

He jerked backwards quicker than was healthy for a man of his state, only to come to a muffled-moaned stop seconds later.

"Sherlock, stop moving..." John muttered, his fingers having snatched at Sherlock's shirt the instant he moved. "Please..." He relented in his doctoral duties, but draped the cold cloth on Sherlock's forehead all the same. Sherlock didn't respond to that.

John allowed himself to hit the duvet again, sighing weakly. Maybe Sherlock was right (and he almost usually was)- eating was bad.


John found himself waking to pressure on his forehead. He shifted to dislodge it, was met by the barrage of pain that he was hoping had been a dream, and stiffened with a low moan. Twenty four hours hadn't gone by then. He was pretty sure that this would clear up- unconditionally, for the most part- in twenty four hours. He had fallen asleep at one point... but the pain wasn't gone still now. He wished he would have stayed asleep.

"John?"

The voice was familiar, but not Sherlock's, and John sat up rather abruptly. The world ran into a dizzying tumult of colours and a flash of heat encompassed him- still had the fever, then. Wonderful.

"Careful there," warned the voice, hands reaching out to his shoulders to steady him.

John recognized that voice... It had taken him a few seconds, but he had. "Greg...?"

Lestrade smiled down at him apologetically, removing his hands and holding them up. "Mrs. Hudson let me up saying that you two were sick, but I didn't expect this."

"Oh... Right, yeah." John took a glance around him, realizing that he had fallen asleep in Sherlock's room, on Sherlock's bed, with Sherlock curled up in his fetal position, but clearly asleep, next to him. "Oh," he stated again, rather blandly.

"He's fine," Greg said, following his gaze. "At least, I think he is. Hasn't been awake." He didn't make the expected comment, as though he thought John and Sherlock sleeping in the same bed was completely natural. Unfortunately, John realized that was probably spot-on. Either that, or Lestrade just knew that they were too sick to care. John hoped it was the second option.

"Oh, God..." John muttered, hesitantly attempting to stretch. Every movement brought on a new round of pain, but thankfully no nausea. He looked again at Sherlock, noting the detective's complexion.

"Your fever's gone down, but it's by no means gone." John looked back at Greg at the DI's words. Greg gave that sheepish smile again. "Thermometer," was all he said, motioning towards the nightstand where it sat.

John nodded slightly. "Sherlock?"

"I haven't attempted that one yet," Lestrade replied.

John nodded again. "Right..." he murmured, attempting to stand so he could grab the thermometer and take Sherlock's temperature himself.

Greg stopped himself. "Wait, wait- what do you want, I'll get it."

"Thermometer." Lestrade grabbed it off the nightstand, passing it over. "It's been sterilized?" John asked.

"O' course."

John muttered a thanks, shifting to- carefully, mind- place the thermometer in sleeping Sherlock's mouth. Sherlock didn't rouse from his sleep. John breathed out a quiet sigh of relief.

When the reading was done, and John had seen that Sherlock's temperature wasn't dangerously high, he grabbed the rag with all intentions of going to re-cool it. However, Lestrade was still looming in his way and he just passed the rag off with a very abashed smile, hesitant but thankful, and let Lestrade do it for him.

"So, how long have we been asleep?" John murmured, after he had gotten Sherlock settled again. He was much more comfortable with the sickness now, despite the fact that he should have been uncomfortable with Lestrade taking care of him. He found, however, he didn't mind. They owed him one. (They owed him a lot, actually.)

"I've been here a couple hours. Made the most of your utilities and the marathon of crap telly running."

John laughed quietly. "Well, has to be better than watching us sleep."

"Nah, I don't mind. I take care of the wife when she's ill-" Lestrade paused. "I think I've just made this awkward." They both chuckled at that.

Fifteen minutes brought a much more mobile John to the living room, the telly flicked on but the volume nearly muted, and a glass of ginger ale for the sickened doctor. They were chatting, confined to the living room, nonetheless, but chatting about idle stuff that John was sure Sherlock would call dull. It took John fifteen minutes to realize that Lestrade had probably not come on a social visit.

"Was there something you needed?" he asked abruptly, looking from his mug to Greg. Greg looked away from the telly, looking at John in confusion. "Well, you normally don't come unless you need Sherlock..."

"Oh, that," Lestrade said, looking back to the telly in favour of whatever infomercial was playing. "Sherlock said that I could rely on him for finding the details of a cold case, and told me to stop by today." The infomercial flickered off and Lestrade looked back at John. "But, I find both of you indisposed so I decided to stick around and make sure you got better."

"Ah, that made your day, right?" John joked, sipping at his ginger ale.

"Well, at least I'm not dealing with stiffs," Lestrade replied wisely.


Sherlock is rapidly deteriorating and Doctor John knows it. And I got to throw some caring Lestrade (a new weakness of mine...) into the mix. Hopefully you guys are liking it!