Friday, Day 5:

Afghanistan

There was a pounding on the door, and John jerked awake. A glance at his watch made it clear that it was very early morning, far too early to be awake. But there was the sound of rotors echoing through the darkness, and feet in the hallway. Another knock on the door. "Captain Watson?"

John rolled out of bed, scrubbing his hands over his face. "Come in," he called, checking to make sure that his shorts and t-shirt were in place. As the door opened, he was already grabbing his pants. "What's going on?"

The young man in the doorway looked strained, and there was a splash of blood across his tan shirt, down to his camo pants. "Sir, we've got incoming wounded. A lot, and we're understaffed. Lt. Adams wants to know if you can scrub in."

John jammed his feet into his boots, yanking his overshirt off the end of the bed frame. "I'm on my way." He flipped his pillow up and grabbed the laptop case, and fell into step behind him. "What's happened?"

"A couple of units encountered heavy resistance, we've got small arms and rifle wounds, and a couple of vehicles were hit by IEDs," he said, and as soon as he was sure that John was up to speed, he sped up, running full out. John kept pace with him, dodging through the moving crowds.

They were waiting for him in medical unit, the nurses and aides ready to get him suited, scrubbed, and in place. They fed him a constant flow of low priority cases, minor patchwork and damage control, and John knew that he was being used for the grunt work, leaving the critical cases for the regular medical staff. It made sense, they didn't know him, and they didn't know his work, and it left the people they did know were qualified open to deal with the difficult patients.

On some level, it was very much like being back in the surgery, but with fewer feverish nine year olds and more shrapnel. Still, it was good to be useful.

Mid morning, he asked after Cooper, and was told, after some investigation on the part of the aide, that his unit was out in the field. That was all John was able to find out, and he glanced at the packed laptop, tucked away in the bottom of his instrument cart, where he could keep an eye on it.

But there was more wounded, and more after that, and John pushed his questions to the back of his mind, focusing on his work, on the steady flow of patients. When the flow finally trickled down to the point where John was able to devote some time to stitching up a minor scalp wound on a cheerful young Scot, who insisted on checking out John's handiwork with a hand mirror. Chortling at the neat row of black thread marching across the right side of his head, he'd smacked John on the back and declared him to be an excellent seamstress.

John had decided to take that as a compliment.

There was no patient after that one, and John was just lowering himself to a stool, stripping off his gloves, when someone slipped up behind him.

"Captain Watson?" The young man had red hair and a strained face, tall and slim, and he looked familiar. "Captain Watson, sir, I'm Royce Warren. I need your help; it's Corp. Cooper."

"What's going on?" Watson found his feet, his eyes flicking over the unhappy looking sergeant. He had been siting next to Cooper at the breakfast table, that's where John knew him from. "What's happened?"

"Our unit got hit. IED, we got some of them back, but he's still out there, and we're out of medics." His face was white, and he slipped into place beside John. "We've had some injuries, I don't-"

"How far?" John snapped out.

"A couple of miles outside of base, but I can't move him, Dorrinson and Murphey are with him, but we need actual medical help."

"Get me a bag." John jerked around, and grabbed the laptop from his cart before heading back for his room. "Red Cross, non-combatant, I need my gear." Heart pounding, he took off running. It took him a matter of minutes to get back to his bunk, and it was still too long, far too long, and he grabbed his body armor, his helmet, securing everything with a firm grip and pulling his extra jacket on over it, and it was second nature, even after so long, to snap everything in place.

He flipped the laptop open on the bed and hit a sequence of keys, uploading everything, everything he'd found, everything he knew, a hard info dump. Locking the laptop, locking the bag, he used the attached cord to secure it to the metal bed frame, and jammed it under the mattress. It wouldn't keep it safe for long if someone was really looking for it, but he couldn't bring it with him.

It wasn't safe.

Digging through his bag, he grabbed the last of his items. This could work. Please, God, John thought, let this work.

Warren looked up as John reached the Humvee. He gave John a tense nod, and handed John a medical bag and an armband to identify himself as medical personnel. John dropped the bag at his feet as he fastened on the medical identification, and Warren moved around the vehicle to the driver's side. Leaning over, John opened the bag, checking the contents, before zipping it back up and opening the passenger side door.

John looked at Warren. "How far?" he asked, fishing out his mobile and checking the time. Warren's eyes followed his, but he put the vehicle in gear.

"We'll be there in ten minutes, sir." Sliding into the driver's seat, he glanced at John. "Buckle up. Ready?"

"Let's go," John snapped his seat belt in place, keeping his mobile out and working,

The ride was fast, disorienting and tense. When they finally came to a stop, it was to put the Humvee behind the cover of a rock formation. John was still on his mobile, but as they stopped, he clicked send and slipped it in his pocket. Swallowing hard, he slipped out of the vehicle. Without another word, Warren started moving away from the vehicle, weaving through a rocky path to a secure location out of sight from the road.

Cooper was still breathing. The relief was overwhelming, and John sank to his knees beside the young man. His medical bag slid off of his shoulder, hitting the ground next to Cooper's arm with a thump and a kick of dust. John unzipped pockets, one after another, a little dizzy with relief and fury as he found gloves and dragged them on.

Cooper's side was soaked through with blood, despite the efforts that had been taken to pack and bind the wound, and his face was pale. He was also alone. He jerked when John leaned over him, his eyes flashing open, panic and pain there until he was able to focus on John's face. "Hello, Corporal," John said, his voice even as he shifted Cooper's clothing out of the way. Removing his helmet, he crouched down, peeling the blood soaked fabric away from the wound. "Got into a bit of a scuffle, did we?"

Cooper's mouth worked, and his tongue flicked out to moisten dry lips. "Get... Out of here," he gritted out, his voice raw. "He's-"

"Oh, I know." John didn't look up from Cooper, probing at the injury. Mentally, he cursed. The shrapnel had impacted just below the edge of the body armor, a weak spot in the side, but the blood flow had slowed, it was sluggish now, and there was no scent of putrification that would indicate that the bowels were hit. "He's wearing a goddamn name patch, Cooper, and I did read the personnel files. And the fact that of the 17 questionable shipments, his signature was on 15 of them. I also read the part of the files that showed his emergency contact is Col. Larson."

He looked up at Warren, who was white faced now, eyes darting. "Your uncle, if I'm not mistaken. My report's already been sent, Sergeant. There's no way to stop it." He pulled his mobile out of his pocket, and wasn't surprised in the least when Warren leveled a pistol at him. John shook his head. "The authorities have all the data. Stand down."

Warren's face twisted. "You're lying. There wasn't time." He sucked in a breath, and John realized he was going off of instinct and panic, never something good to see in a kidnapper. "Give me your phone."

John handed it over, watching dispassionately as Warren dropped the mobile to the ground and stomped on it, hard. The case cracked and the electronic innards shattered with a second strike of the boot heel. He gave a faint smile. "That's not going to change anything. Stand down."

"Get up, we're going."

"Where?" John went back to work on Cooper, putting pressure on the wound to slow the bleeding. Cooper hissed at the pain, but didn't fight it, his head snapping back against the ground, his gritted teeth bared. "It's just you and me and Cooper, and I won't let him die, and you can't shoot me. That's not something you can explain away. People are going to notice if there's a bullet in me." John reached for a gauze pad, ripping it open with his teeth. "So again, where do you think we're going?"

"Away from here." Warren's voice rose. "We're going to put you and him in the Humvee and take you into the mountains. I don't need to shoot you, there's other ways to get rid of bodies in this godforsaken country, ones that don't leave evidence. Get up!"

"There's no way to kill someone that doesn't leave evidence." John checked Cooper's eyes, his pulse, his breathing, rapid fire, vitals the only thing that was important for a moment. "You were at his table, the day I came and got him. He's from your unit. For God's sake, you know him, and you're doing this?"

"This is your last warning," Warren said. "Get up."

"Your uncle won't be able to cover this up," John said, ripping open a pre-prepped syringe of painkiller. "He has to suspect what you're doing, Col. Larson, doesn't he? He's let you get away with this so far, but he cannot cover this up, Warren. This isn't property crime or smuggling or illegal trade in human organs, this is murder."

"Only," Warren said, his voice soft, "if I get caught."

John looked up, and the gun went off, and he felt the impact through his whole body, throwing him back into the rock wall, he felt his head smack into the unyielding stone and then there was nothing.

London:

This might've been a miscalculation.

Sherlock stared down at his hands, his lips pursed. He glanced at the bunsen burner. He studied the layout of petri dishes. Yes. Slight miscalculation.

"MRS. HUDSON!" he bellowed. There was no response, and he gritted his teeth. "Oh, fine," he mumbled. "You come and check on me every single day, and today, of all days, you're going to pull a disappearing act?"

So taking his experiment out of Bart's hadn't been the best idea he'd ever had. In his defense, Molly had been exceptionally annoying today. Usually, he could tune her out, but for some reason, she'd been trying to discuss her mother's cat with him, and to avoid saying that he cared neither for her mother nor the cat, he'd packed everything up, made some half-hearted excuse about needing a controlled environment and left.

It had taken him half an hour to find a cab willing to take him. It probably had something to do with the radioactive warning symbol on the side of the box he was carrying. London cabbies had become squeamish at some point in the last ten years, and he did not appreciate it.

His mistake with the first one was, of course, that he'd tried to explain that even a half hour cab trip wouldn't expose the man to any significant radiation. Then there had been a ten minute argument about what construed 'significant.'

As it turned out, the rest of the world might hold a different definition of this than he did. The things that one learned when one had no choice but to talk to people.

He could not wait for John to get back so he didn't have to do that any more.

Lips tight, he glanced around. Phone was on the table, and he could hit speed dial. But who to call? Lestrade would let it go to voice mail at this time of night, and Mrs. Hudson, if she hadn't come running wasn't around and wouldn't be able to get here, Mycroft... His upper lip curled in a disdainful snarl. He'd prefer to wait for John to get back rather than call Mycroft.

It would appear that he'd have to get creative.

London:

"I don't know, Mr. Holmes." The boy hugged his paper bag of take out as if it was a lifeline. "I'm not supposed to talk to you."

Sherlock stared at him, stymied. "I'm not asking you to talk to me," he snapped. "In fact, I'd much prefer you didn't talk to me. I find it tedious. What I need you to do is come over here and hold this in place so that I can secure it without losing hours worth of work." The tower of glassware tipped to a precarious point, and he nudged it back, resisting the urge to scream at the kid.

The teenager was painfully thin, tall and lanky with a beak of a nose that managed to be balanced by his big, dark eyes and heavy brows. Those eyebrows were now drawn up tight. "Have you been sitting like that since you called the shop?" he asked.

"Thirty-seven minutes," Sherlock gritted out. "Delivery should be more prompt."

"You're fussy about the ingredients, so they have to make a fresh batch for you. Every time." The boy rocked his weight from one foot to the other. "How'd you dial?" Sherlock held up one bare foot and wiggled his toes. The boy's eyes widened. "Really?"

"No, you're on speed dial, I mashed it with my elbow," Sherlock said, rolling his eyes.

He seemed rather disappointed by that. "I don't think," he stared, and Sherlock cut him off.

"Don't think, that is the last thing I need, you attempting to get enough of your brain together to attempt THOUGHT. Get over here," he said, and the boy, sufficiently weak willed to bow to the pressure in Sherlock's voice, did as he was told.

"Gloves in the drawer, goggles on top of the fridge, smock hanging in the closet." The boy stopped dead, not sure which to do first. Sherlock sighed. "Put the bag down." The paper bag full of takeout hit the counter, and hands free at last, the boy scampered off to find the safety equipment.

"You're not wearing any of this," the boy said.

"Yes, I don't make mistakes with my materials," Sherlock gritted out. "You do not seem to be quite so stable, so we're going to do this." It was annoying, but necessary. John had bought, borrowed or brought everything home, and Sherlock had shoved it all in whatever drawer or space he could find, never intending to use any of it. John had sighed, and occasionally slapped the goggles down next to Sherlock's experiments, but for the most part, he didn't make much of a fuss.

In exchange, Sherlock used some of it. Sometimes. When he remembered.

As the boy shrugged the lab coat on, Sherlock frowned at the equipment in front of him. "Who said you weren't supposed to talk to me?" he said, finally catching on that piece of the conversation.

"What? Oh, I'm new, and when I started at the shop, the dragon lady, that's what all the blokes call the manger, she's crazy, but you know, it's a job. She took me aside and showed me the list of the customers we didn't take cheques from, and which ones are always drunk when they call, an' the ones that flake on paying."

"I should not be on any of those lists," Sherlock said, wondering if he should be insulted.

"No, you're not, they've got your picture on the wall, ya know, with one of those red circles with a line through it kind of deals, like, NO. Just NO. And she said, don't talk to Mr. Holmes."

"That seems a bit much," Sherlock said, now pretty sure he should be insulted.

"Yeah, well, Dr. Watson told me to, um, what did he say? Um, to not engage with you, under any circumstances, if you had a problem, you needed to call the shop, that was the agreement. And Mrs. Hudson said to just put the bag on the mat and let you slide the money out under the door, and don't get into a conversation because it won't end well."

Okay, now he was insulted. "Listen, just because-"

"And there was that one time that nice copper was outside-"

"Fine, fine, I'm unstable and unreasonable, I understand." Sherlock glared until the boy had his goggles in place. "Now, reach over here, slip your hand under the dish , fingers at 90 degree angle to mine, and support it from the bottom so I can release it." The boy blinked at him, vacant and confused. Sherlock groaned. "This is going to be a long night."

London:

Greg Lestrade was yelling before he even put his feet on the stairs. "There appears to be some sort of notation in the Yard's system, put there by your git of a brother, no doubt," he shouted, stomping up the flight. "That any and every time your name, your finger prints, or something that is clearly, unmistakably you comes across the wires, I'm the one who gets the call.

"Years and years of bloody beat work, training, education, experience, and my division appears to be babysitting Sherlock Holmes!" He pounded once on the flat door, a perfunctory gesture at best, before he threw it open and stomped in. "And so when there's a report that a delivery boy went to deliver something to 221B Baker street and never bloody came back, guess who gets the call? Despite the fact that I am not on duty, I am not planning on being on duty, and I am doing nothing more than dreaming of a pint and a pillow, here I am, looking for a missing teenager, that I'm sure-"

He paused in the middle of the living room. In the kitchen, Sherlock was bent over his microscope, wearing pajama pants and a too small blue shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. On the other side of the table, a skinny kid in a lab coat, goggles, and a huge pair of thick gloves was standing, a beaker under one arm and a glass stirring rod in the other hand. It was dripping on the floor. His long hair was scraped back in an uneven ponytail on the crown of his head, and there was a faint smell of burnt hair and something horribly acidic in the air, and Greg realized he had a sizable hole in one leg of his pants and one sneaker was a bluish gray. Despite this, the boy blinked at him behind the goggles, a wide grin on his face. To his right, something was smoldering, a curl of smoke rising from a stack of breakfast plates.

A brown paper bag was leaking on the counter beside the sink.

Greg stood there, so exhausted he couldn't see straight. "Sherlock." Sherlock didn't look up. "Sherlock!" That got him a humming sound of inquiry, and he sighed.

"You can't kidnap people," he said. "Kid, you okay? Erik Shah, right?"

"Oh, yeah, sorry, I shoulda called in," the boy said, his dark eyes bright. "But this is brilliant! It really is!"

"Stir," Sherlock said, and Erik jolted.

"Oh, oh, yeah." He went back to stirring as Greg collapsed into John's usual chair.

"I might keep him," Sherlock said, his voice dry.

Cradling his head in his hands, Lestrade groaned. "Sherlock, you cannot keep the kid who comes to deliver your curry!"

"It's okay, he's paying me fifty quid," Erik said, "and really. Brilliant. I'm not kidding. This is great."

"See, he wants to stay. I've always wanted a minion."

"Oh, Christ, you're only a skull shaped hideout away from being a supervillian as it is, can we skip the bloody mention of minions?"

"Taaaaacky," Sherlock drawled out.

Greg rubbed his temples. "When, exactly, is John due back?"

"Sunday. 1600 hours. Heathrow. Flight 1242. Not that I'm keeping track," Sherlock said, and that was an ugly, ugly tone of voice, even coming from him.

Lestrade heaved a mental sigh. "Longest bloody week of my life," he muttered under his breath.

"Oh," Erik said, looking between them. "Is Dr. Watson on holiday?"

"So to speak," Greg told him.

"Not in the least," Sherlock said, just as the beaker in Erik's hand cracked and the bottom fell out. The crash of glass and liquid on the kitchen floor made Greg and Erik jump. Sherlock glanced at his watch. "That took longer than I thought it would."

"Is that toxic?" Lestrade asked him, jumping up and steering the inert boy towards the sink. "Wash. Wash, wash, wash!"

"But there's dishes in there!"

"We'll throw them out! Wash!" Greg jerked his head around. "Sherlock, is this toxic?"

"Not toxic." Sherlock said, tone laconic. He didn't even look up from his microscope.

"Oh, thank God, really, this just isn't acceptable, Holmes!" The kid seemed to think he was done washing his gloved hands, and Lestrade held him in place with one firm hand on his back. "Keep washing til I tell you to stop."

"They're gloves, Lestrade, just have him take them off and throw them away, if you're going to overreact to this extent," Sherlock said. There was more amusement in his voice than Lestrade was comfortable with, and he paused to glare.

"Is this stuff going to eat through your floor tile?"

Sherlock sat back from his microscope, mouth opening. He closed it without saying a word. He considered, his eyes narrowing to sharp slits. "Possibly," he said after a second, and went back to the microscope.

"Jesus!" Lestrade started throwing open the doors to the cabinets. "Where's your dustpan?"

"Under the sink. Why do you care, it's not your floor."

"Yes, but-" Lestrade stopped. Why did he care? He had no idea. But he did open the cabinet under the sink and grab the dustpan and a pair of yellow cleaning gloves. Crouching down, he swept up as much of the cloudy liquid as he could, and the remains of the glass beaker.

Erik was staring down at him. "Um, sir? If it's not toxic, then why would it eat through the tile?"

Greg paused in the act of dumping the disaster into the rubbish bin. His head came up, slow and even and smooth, and he stared at Sherlock. "Well, it's mildly radioactive," Sherlock said, making a notation on the notepad next to him.

"Fuckin' brilliant," Erik breathed, and Lestrade dumped the dustpan, brush, and gloves into the bin. He reached around Erik and scooped the dishes out of the sink, sending them crashing into the trash. He took the gloves off of the kid, and the lab coat, and shoved them in as well. Then he picked up the entire bin, and walked out of the flat. When he came back in, Erik was still standing there, hands in the spray of the water in the sink.

"More soap, lots more soap," Lestrade told him, and the kid reached for the bottle. "I'm using your shower," he said to Sherlock.

"What? Wait, no! No, you are not."

"Yes, I am, in that I have touched something RADIOACTIVE!" Greg yelled back at him.

"If you're going to be naked every time you get exposed to radiation in this flat, you're going to be dropping your trousers every time you come over!" Sherlock glared at him. "And that is not acceptable!"

"Neither is having a radioactive flat, Sherlock!"

"Why is the kitchen bin on the sidewalk?" Mrs. Hudson asked from the doorway. "Didn't John just buy that new bin?"

"Because the biohazard team hasn't shown up yet," Lestrade told her, stripping off his shirt as he walked through the living room. "Hello, Mrs. Hudson."

"Hello, Inspector!" She didn't seem to find it odd that he was stripping in the middle of the flat. "Sherlock, why does it smell like burnt hair in here? It's like a bad hairdressers shop."

"Unrelated to the bin or the current experiment," Sherlock said. "I'm trying to focus here."

"There was something on the stove," Erik explained. "I think the water boiled out."

"Oh, that was the good saucepan, wasn't it?"

"Will you all just SHUT UP?" Sherlock said, sounding frustrated.

Lestrade was perversely pleased. In the bathroom, he stripped down to his shorts and turned the shower on, stepping under the spray. A sudden crash from the kitchen made him start, and he almost broke his leg as he got out of the shower just a little too fast, his foot sliding across the floor and his knee going out from under him.

Grabbing a towel, he wrapped it around his waist and grabbed his gun from his clothes before he ran out back to the kitchen.

"What the hell happened, I was gone for five goddamn minutes!"

Mrs. Hudson was wringing her hands together, Erik was still standing there with his hands in the sink, and Sherlock was clutching a hand towel around his hand, still leaning over his microscope. Mrs. Hudson pointed. "He took the beaker off of the flame and it broke." There was glass and steaming liquid and blood on the table, and the bunsen burner had been turned off, so that was something.

"Minor cut," he said, "put your trousers back on in my flat."

"I can't, they're covered in experiment," Lestrade shot back. "Your experiment. Let me see."

With extreme reluctance, Sherlock held out his hand. Greg peeled the edge of the towel back, and the blood welled up immediately. He, Sherlock and Mrs. Hudson looked, and as one, all three of them yelled, "JOHN!"

There was a beat of silence, then Erik said, "I thought Dr. Watson was on holiday," sounding very confused.

Lestrade cursed, and Mrs. Hudson made a clucking noise under her breath, and Sherlock just went back to his microscope, his jaw tight. Rubbing his forehead, Lestrade made a decision and bit the bullet. "Okay, that's going to need more than a plaster. Let's go, everyone."

"Don't you want to get dressed, dear?" Mrs. Hudson said.

"I'd like to not ever touch the clothes I was wearing, ever again, but I doubt there's anything here that'd fit me."

"Oh, I'm sure John's scrubs'll do, they make those in three sizes, too big, too small and doesn't fit anyone," Mrs. Hudson said, cheerfully. "So he ends up with all sorts of them. One minute."

"Can I stop washing my hands now?" Erik asked.

"Yes," Sherlock and Lestrade chorused.

Sherlock leaned back from his microscope. "Done." He pulled out his phone with his good hand, and looked at it, his face unreadable.

"We need to get you to the hospital." Lestrade glanced down at the phone. "What is it?"

"John hasn't texted. In almost eight hours." Sherlock put the phone away. "Even taking the time change into account..." His jaw jumped, a muscle working hard.

Lestrade sighed. "Yeah, c'mon, let's get you stitched up. And you need to stop playing with dangerous chemicals when your mind's somewhere else."

"I can-"

"No, you can't." Mrs. Hudson reappeared with a pair of scrubs pants and a sweatshirt, which Lestrade took with a smile. "Thanks, Mrs. Hudson. Will you just make sure these two go down to my car? I'll be right there."

"Why am I going?" Erik asked.

"Because my concept of 'significant' amounts of radiation doesn't seem to match up with everyone else's," Sherlock said, his tone wry.

"Any amount is significant," Mrs. Hudson tutted.

"Living in a bloody brick building exposes you to an 'amount,'" Sherlock groused.

"You're bleeding on the runner, dear."

Lestrade shook his head as headed back to the bathroom. Fishing his mobile from his pocket, he sent a quick text to Mycroft Holmes:

'Check on Watson. There may be a problem. Lestrade'

Afghanistan:

Breathing was an agony. John Watson rolled to his side, and sucked his breath in through his teeth, tasting dust and blood and the metallic sting of pain. He closed his eyes, trying to concentrate, trying to deal with the pain, and it took him time to localize it, remember what was going on.

He'd gotten shot in the goddamned left shoulder again. Sherlock was going to be insufferable.

His right hand came up to fumble at his shoulder. The pain was fading now, enough for him to do a self-diagnostic. His shirt was dry and dusty, but there was no blood. The body armor had stopped the bullet, but bloody hell, the pain was fierce. He tried to move his left arm, and the agony racheted up.

Broken collarbone.

His forehead was wet, his hair was sticky against his skull, and there was an ache there, one that made his vision blurry and his perception unstable. He'd probably hit his head when he'd been knocked down; the lump was forming on the back of his skull.

He pried his eyes open and saw Cooper's head turned towards him, the Corporal's mouth moving. John blinked, squeezing his eyes shut and opening them again when he could do it without feeling like he was going to puke. The roaring in his ears slowly decreased, and he took a deep breath.

"Captain?" Cooper's voice solidified finally, and John struggled to push himself up, making the mistake of putting any weight at all on his left arm. The radiating pain was agonizing, and he collapsed back onto his right elbow.

"Yeah, yeah, Jesus." John dragged himself up. "God. Damn."

"Get up," Warren snapped, and if anything, he looked even more panicky than he had before. He'd taken his helmet off, his red hair was plastered to his face with sweat and his eyes were huge and darting, the pupils dilated. John could tell, with a single glance, that his plans, what plans he had, were rapidly collapsing around him. He was working himself up into a true panic, a state of mind that John could manipulate.

"Why would you-" John sucked in a breath and regretted it.

"I knew you had body armor on, but I'd like to keep you under control," Warren snapped. "I'm not interested in getting into a fight with you. Get up. Let's go."

"I am not leaving him." John turned back to Cooper, relieved to see that Cooper's movements hadn't reopened his wound. But there was a lot of blood soaking into the dirt beneath him. John dragged himself over to Cooper's side. "Sorry, Corporal, I know I promised I'd pick up some milk, but the front pocket of my bag isn't refrigerated."

"Wrong guy," Cooper said, with a tight smile. He took a deep breath and coughed. "I'd prefer a pint of Guiness."

"Don't have that either, sorry."

"Get up," Warren said, jamming the gun in John's direction.

John stared up at the black hole of the barrel, a strange sort of calm descending on him. "You are in over your head. You've seen my paperwork, haven't you?" he asked, his voice soft. "Do you really think I can disappear without anyone coming to look for me? Do you really think there is any way I can die that won't make you the first and only suspect?"

The gun trembled, just a fraction of an inch, and John sucked in a breath through his teeth. "You see," he said, with a faint smile, "I'm due home in less than 40 hours. And if I am not at the airport, on time, in one piece, my partner will come looking for me."

"It's a big country. And I'm not leaving your body anywhere it can be found. Get up."

"I don't think you understand the situation you find yourself in. This is not a polite military inquiry, more interested in keeping a lid on things than getting results. This is Sherlock Holmes. He's brilliant, he's terrifying, and he's gloriously amoral. He's part bloodhound and part pit bull. You can dump my body in the mountains, and that might never be found, but he will find you. And he will make you bleed until you give him whatever he wants."

John gave him a faint smile. "Think of me like the water receding before a tsunami. I'm your warning. Run. Run as far and as fast as you can, and you might live. If you shoot me here, if you take me with you, there is nowhere you can hide, no place you can go where he will not find you. It'd take him a matter of hours, at most, to patch together my work, to reach the same conclusion, and then he will come looking for you.

John was calm now, utterly calm, never breaking eye contact, never shifting position. "So you have a choice. Drop your weapon, give yourself up, and take a dishonorable discharge and a quick trip back home. Or spend the rest of your very short life waiting for him to find you, and shred you."

"Shut up," Warren snarled out, but his gun was visibly wobbling now, his eyes panicked, his jaw tight. "This is your last chance. Let's go."

John shook his head. "I won't leave him. Don't do this. This is-" His breath hissed between his teeth. "This is stupid. This is so unbelievably stupid."

Warren's foot came up and kicked, heel first, into John's injured shoulder, and beneath the crippling agony of the blow, he felt the ends of the bone grind together. He struggled to breathe, choking and gagging as the nausea overwhelmed him. As if from a distance, he felt Warren grab him, yank him to his feet, and John's legs weren't really up to the task of holding him, but he was shoved forward.

His good hand grabbed futilely for Cooper, but an instant later, he was out of reach.

"You don't want to get caught," he said, and the words were calm and even despite the pain. He stumbled, grabbing a rock and using it to prop himself up. Warren was breathing just as hard as he was, and John leaned back against the stone, getting himself under control. He could see Cooper, lying beside his tipped over medical bag, behind Warren's back.

"That's what you're thinking of right now, the shame and the fear, and that's something, I know it is, but you haven't crossed that line, not yet. This, what you're doing now, this is murder. Leaving Cooper like this is murder, no matter what happens to me, and you can't risk a bullet hole in me, can you. You need to make this look like an accident, an accident you had nothing to do with, but everything you've done has left a trail, an arrow pointing right at your back. There are too many people who know what's happening, too many connections, you are going to get caught, Warren.

"He will find you. And if I'm alive, he'll just kill you. If I'm dead-" John's teeth flashed, sharp and bright and hard. "If I'm dead, he will make you bleed."

"Shut up!" Warren shoved him up against a rock wall, John's back bouncing against it, stumbling, finding his feet again, wavering as the pain crashed through him. "Just... Shut up."

"There is no way out of this," John told him, as the gun raised, pointing at him, at his head, and he took a deep breath. "Other than to lay down your arms and surrender. That is your only chance to live." John held up his good hand. "Put the gun down."

Warren's eyes were filled with tears, but his face twisted in a grimace, and his arm jerked up, jerked and twisted, and there was the sudden, sharp retort of a double shot.

John jerked with it, even as Warren pitched forward, crumbling to the dust. Behind him, still lying on the ground, Cooper lowered his arm. John's Browning, still clutched in his shaking fingers, hit the dusty stone.

"I knew you were sharp enough to pick up on the hint," John said, crouching over Warren for only an instant, it was clear he was gone, bullet through the neck. "Jesus, good shot."

Cooper was panting. "Milk. In the front pocket. Yeah. I got it." He swallowed, and John made a point of ignoring the tears in the young man's eyes. "Is he-"

"Yes," John said, cutting him off. "I'm sorry you had to do that."

"Yeah, me, too," Cooper said, his head falling back, eyes closing. "Non-combatants aren't supposed to be armed," he added with a faint smile.

"I was being kidnapped by someone I was pretty sure was going to try to kill me. I think I can be excused for bending the rules. Besides, I didn't use it, you did."

Cooper gave a snort of laughter that died off on a cough. "Captain? Don't let me die out here."

"You're not going to die, Jesus, stop being melodramatic." The wound had reopened with the movement, and John grabbed his bag with his good hand. "Help's on the way."

"How do you know?"

"Mobile had a chip in it. Moment it's destroyed, it goes offline, and an alert goes out to-" He paused. "The person I'm working for. I have five minutes to check in, if I don't, he scrambles every possible person to my last known position. They should be here momentarily."

"Sir?"

"Yes?"

"Permission to speak freely?"

"Go for it." John reached for a fresh gauze pad.

"You're an idiot, sir. What the fuck? Why would you get into a car with him? Jesus, I nearly had a heart attack when I saw you."

John couldn't bite back a laugh. "Someday, let me tell you about all the times I've been kidnapped in the line of duty." He paused. "Actually, let's not. It's too humiliating. Instead, let's just say, if there's one thing I've learned, it's that when your partner gets snagged by the criminals of the world, it's your job to go and get him out."

Cooper smiled. "Still a stupid thing to do." He swallowed. "You thought I might be part of it."

"At the beginning, I couldn't be sure."

"That's why-" His words were slurring now, from blood loss or exhaustion. "That's why you told me about Sherlock, isn't it?"

"He has a certain threatening aura once people know a little about him," John said with a shrug. "And I figured it couldn't hurt to make sure you understood that yeah, he'd be coming for me if I didn't get home on time. I'll take what protection I can get." He laughed. "The rest of this was just desperate monologuing to distract Warren long enough for you to get to the gun."

Cooper gave him a look. "Was anything you told me a lie?"

"No."

Cooper's eyes shut. "Then you're lying to yourself if you think you exaggerated at all. If you didn't go home on Sunday, I'm pretty sure the whole base would've been on fire by Monday afternoon."

"Don't exaggerate, Cooper." John grinned down at him, trying to ignore the way his vision was going fuzzy at the edges. "Fire is so inefficient. Did I ever tell you about the time he accidentally made napalm?" He paused. "Well, he claimed it was an accident. In retrospect, I'm not sure if that's the truth."

"Oh, GOD," Cooper said, just as a rush of heavily armed personnel appeared from all sides, appearing as if they sprouted from the ground.

"How much time did you waste sneaking up on us?" John asked, dizzy now that the worst was over. "I need a stretcher, now."

"Captain Watson?" one man said, stepping forward. "We need you to come with us."

"Yeah, I figured." John was pushed out of the way by calm, efficient looking medic, who was already starting an IV line on Cooper. John staggered to his feet. "Call... Adams... Tell him to let my contact know that I'm fine-"

His vision faded out and the ground rushed up to meet him.

Day Six: Saturday
London

"Pictures."

"Yes."

Sherlock gave him a horrified look. "Pictures," he repeated.

"Think we've already covered this, yes." Lestrade looked like he was holding onto his last nerve with both hands and his teeth. "Pictures. I know, I know, you don't like them, but you're going to have to cope. You can do it. I have faith."

"Pictures." Sherlock was still stuck on that. He poked the stack with one finger, disdain leaking into his expression. "I cannot work under these circumstances."

"Wonderful, we've discovered other words! Fantastic." Lestrade leaned forward in his chair, folding his hands on the desk in front of him. "You owe me."

"I'm not sure how you've reached that conclusion, but it's erroneous," Sherlock said, pushing the stack away from him. Inwardly, he gave a little shudder. Pictures.

"Well, there's the little matter of not arresting you last night, convincing Erik's parents not to press charges, not letting the hospital throw you out of the emergency room untreated when you started diagnosing other patients in the waiting room, and not arresting you again when you compounded your injuries by getting into a fight with a group of football hooligans while I was arguing with the admins that they had to treat you."

"They started it," Sherlock said, slumping low in his chair, arms crossed over his chest. He was well aware that his pout could only be called petulant, but there wasn't much he could do about that. "And they had warrants."

"Which is a big part of why I didn't arrest you," Lestrade agreed, rubbing his forehead. "Sherlock, is this what you do to John on a daily basis? A war zone might be safer."

Sherlock flinched, his shoulders hunching. Across the desk, Lestrade sighed. "He's tougher than me, I'm starting to realize that." There was a squeak as he leaned forward in his chair, a soft scuff as he pushed the stack of photos closer to Sherlock. "Look, as a personal favor to me, would you please look at these?"

"I don't do photos," Sherlock bit out, his back up. "I do crime scenes."

"Yes, but this isn't my crime scene. The victim's employer asked me to keep an eye on the case, because they want to be certain it's being properly handled."

"It's not, I haven't been given access to the crime scene," Sherlock mumbled, and a ball of paper bounced off of his forehead. He glanced up, but Lestrade just gave him a wide-eyed, innocent look.

"Just look at the photos," he said, his voice wheedling. "You can do more looking at still shots than most of the department could do at the scene."

Well, that was true. Still, reluctance tugged at him as Sherlock reached for the photos. He hated dealing with photographs. They never gave the full view, they always focused on what the current investigator and his team thought was important, and most of the time, they were wrong. All the details Sherlock needed were just out of frame, and it made him crazy.

Of course, having no access to the rest of the sensory input was just as annoying, but it just added up to the general reason why he despised being asked to look into a crime after the fact. He should refuse, he knew that, but he had the sinking feeling that Lestrade was right.

The football fans were probably a bit over the top, in terms of things Lestrade was willing to deal with. In Sherlock's defense, it had started out rough and gotten worse.

They were drunk and annoying, and they were frightening the rest of the room, and Sherlock was in a bad mood, and they were right there, medical care was mere feet away, and police were already on the scene, and he hadn't been able to make any logical argument for not beating the hell out of them.

Which he'd proceeded to do. After they took the first swing, of course, he wasn't stupid. Of course, it took ten minutes of pointing out the flaws of both teams to get to that point, and even then, the drunks had seemed more confused than insulted.

Left with little choice and with a steadily mounting sense of frustration, Sherlock may have implied, in the most technical terms, that the two opposing team captains had been meeting for what could politely be termed a romantic rendezvous or two, and that had registered as a 'very bad thing' for all concerned.

Sherlock would've thought that pointing out the stupidity of going with a 5-3-2 positioning in the face of a stronger defensive team would've been more insulting than talking about who the idiot was sleeping with, but he'd long since determined that not everyone had his enlightened values.

Lestrade had not been happy to see the brawl, and Sherlock knew he'd determined the source of it immediately, but to his credit, he'd gotten right into the spirit of things. Erik had gone home with a split lip, a black eye, and a book on how not to get hit in the face from Sherlock's library.

It was possible that he did, in fact, owe Lestrade a favor.

Especially since his black eye was even more impressive than Erik's. Sherlock had tried giving him a book, too, but the gesture had been met with stony, unamused silence and a glare that reminded Sherlock a little bit of the ones John leveled at him.

He kind of missed that glare.

With a sigh, he started flipping through the photos, studying each one with a flick of his eyes before he moved on to the next "Background?"

"Killed at home, single shot to the head, close range, he knew his attackers."

Sherlock frowned at a shot of the victims wrists. "He was held down prior to death." Flipping to the next one, his eyebrows flicked up. "The wounds are post mortem." And gruesome.

"Yeah, the DI in charge thinks they were sending a warning."

Sherlock snorted. "No. They were..." His eyes narrowed as his voice trailed away. "Looking for something. Something inside the body. They were interrupted, though, they weren't able to-" He looked up. "Someone walked in on it."

"Neighbor saw the door open and gave a yell from the hall."

"They deserted the corpse, but there's something they need. Something the victim swallowed, and now they're trying to recover it." Sherlock grabbed his coat. "Where's the body?"

"Morgue, St. Barts, are you-"

"I swear to God, if you say 'sure' or 'certain' or any other word that questions my conclusion, I will not be held responsible for my actions," Sherlock bit out. "Get the idiot of a DI up to speed, and I'll go head them off before they can get to the body."

"But how do you-"

"Angle of the cuts, depth, location, severity, clear indications of speed, but not rage, look at the striations, the way-" Sherlock stopped, shaking his head. "They weren't cutting the body, Lestrade, they were cutting into the body. Ask John what the difference is!" He took off for the front door at a dead run. "Get the DI and get to St Barts!"

"Sherlock!"

"His employer's a defense contractor!" Sherlock yelled back over his shoulder. "Get the DI!"

"I hate it when you do that!"

Chuckling, Sherlock shot down the stairs, through the front lobby and out to the street. There was a cab right there, and moments later, he was speeding across the city at what was probably far above the legal speed limit.

London:

Sherlock had hit the lab at a dead run.

Molly Hooper looked up from her microscope slide, blinking in that owlish, curious way that she had, her face breaking into a wide, off-kilter smile. "Oh, hello, Sherlock, what are you-" The words ended in a strangled shriek as Sherlock reached her in two long strides, wrapped an arm around her waist, lifted her off her feet, slapped his free hand over her mouth, and carried her into the nearby closet.

It took a second, but Molly started struggling in earnest as Sherlock dropped her feet back to the ground. He grabbed her, pulling her in tight against his body, not that he had much of a choice, it was a very small closet, and he was taking up most of the available room, and managed to get the door shut. She couldn't get much effort behind her wiggling, but she managed to sink a solid elbow into his stomach, and he winced.

"Stay still," he hissed in her ear, and she jerked against his grip again. "Or they're going to catch us."

She went quiet, relaxing just a bit, but her hands came up and fumbled at his wrist, pulling his palm away from his mouth. "Bad guys?" she whispered.

"No, we're playing hide and seek. Yes. Bad guys." He leaned his ear against the closet door. "Wait, bad guys, that is just-"

"Well, with you, I never know," she said, and he could hear her voice wobble, and immediately felt bad. He hated feeling bad. He hated realizing he felt bad. It was annoying.

God, he wished John was here to keep Molly stuffed in the closet so he could do something else. Something involving being shot at. Right now, he desperately wanted to be shot at rather than be hovering in a closet with a woman who was making the oddest little panicked squeaky noises under her breath.

It was like an asthmatic hamster on a broken exercise wheel.

Sherlock found it very disconcerting. "Could you please stop making that noise?" he whispered, his voice as low as possible.

"I can't breathe," she said, her voice thin.

"Of course you can breathe, if you weren't breathing, you wouldn't be making that noise, and it's very-" His teeth snapped shut before he could say anything that would cause John to strangle him. How odd. His brain had developed a 'John would be disappointed in you' setting at some point, he wasn't sure how he felt about that. "It's hard to concentrate, so please, just... Try to calm down?"

Molly twisted around to bury her face in his chest, and Sherlock tensed. If he had access to his mobile, or dared use it, the text he would've sent to John would be, 'Trapped in a closet with Molly H. Civilian control is your job, not mine, come home. SH'

The thought made him smile, but outside, he heard the lab door open, and his hand closed on the back of Molly's head, holding her still. Through the closet door, he heard the sounds of drawers and cabinets being opened, contents being shifted. The morgue was locked, he realized, and they were looking for a key that would get them in. His eyes closing, he listened carefully. One set of footsteps. He'd seen a group of four, had been in too much of a rush to get to Molly's cheefully lit office before them to note much else, but it appeared that the intruder was alone. Where the other three were, he didn't know.

But it made his task now much easier.

He cupped a hand around Molly's ear, and whispered, a faint trickle of sound, "Follow my lead." He felt her nod in the darkness just as the closet door opened.

"Do you MIND?" Sherlock said, in his most indignant tone, and the man holding the doorknob blinked at them, Molly wide eyed and mussed in Sherlock's arms, and Sherlock could almost see his brain stalling out, trying to figure out what to do with this situation, because he had a gun and had just walked in on two people in a closet who appeared to be making out, and that was not in the plan.

Then the heel of Sherlock's hand slammed into his nose, snapping his head back and sending him stumbling.

Before he could recover, Sherlock followed it with a roundhouse punch to the chin and assisted him to the ground by hooking a foot behind his ankle and sending him sprawling. He caught the man by the front of the shirt and lowered him soundlessly to the ground, recovering the gun as he did.

"Wow," Molly said behind him, and there was a squeaky note in her voice that was completely different from any other squeaky note he'd ever heard from her. Sherlock looked at her, a bit suspicious, but she just gave him a wobbly smile.

"Duct tape," he said, "now."

In a matter of moments, they'd bound the guy hand and foot, and Sherlock taped off his mouth before shoving him into the closet. "Corpse," he said, shoving the door shut and jamming a stool under the knob. "Where?"

"Which one?" Molly asked, brow crinkling, and he bit back a curse.

"Murder victim, the Yard would've sent it over this morning."

She blinked, trying to think, as Sherlock checked the hallway. "Oh! Oh, I know which one you're talking about. It hasn't been brought up yet, we needed to clear space for the autopsy, and it only just arrived, the Yard always assumes that things'll go faster than they really do and-" She caught a glimpse of Sherlock's face and cut herself off. "Downstairs. Ambulance bay."

Sherlock paused, staring at her. She stared back. "What?" she asked, reaching up to touch her hair, her expression nervous. "Is it my mascara, because, honestly, I wear that all of the time, and-"

Leaving her here was a bad idea. The other three were still on the loose; someone would find her. Plus, he would likely need her help to get access to the body. She worked here, they'd release the corpse to her, he wasn't likely to get the same assistance. But she kept talking, and it was disconcerting.

Sherlock checked the hallway, not surprised to find it empty. They'd be busy at the morgue for now, and their best option was to get out of here, and take the body with them. "Is anyone else on duty down here this afternoon?"

"What? Oh, no, light staffing today, just me and Boyce took the day off, you know how it is with the mid-week appointments, I think he's going to the dentist-"

"Shut up and let's go," he said, grabbing her hand and heading for the hall. She stumbled once before she got her feet under her and then they were running together, down the hall and down the stairs, staying away from the morgue and anywhere else where people would congregate, her hand holding onto his with almost desperate strength.

In the ambulance bay there were a couple of emergency vehicles, and a couple of bored looking paramedics, leaning on the hood of their vehicle and sipping tea from paper cups. One of them glanced up when the doors burst open and gave Molly a sunny smile. "Hey, Mol," he called. "You finally ready for this one? I'm bored stiff, here."

"Not me," his partner drawled. "They can pay me to stand around and not get vomited on all they'd like."

"Bad night," the first paramedic explained. "Alcohol cases all over the place." He grinned at Sherlock. "Who's the new guy?"

Molly's eyes slid in Sherlock's direction. "Temp." Her smile was a bit too wide, a bit too bright.

"Temp?"

"Intern," Sherlock corrected her. "Shall we?"

"Uh, yeah, sure." He lead the way around to the rear of the ambulance, and together, they removed the gurney holding the body bag. Molly chatted easily with both of them and signed the paperwork that was presented to her, and Sherlock was grateful he hadn't left her in the closet.

Sherlock pulled the gurney around as Molly said good-bye to the paramedics. As their ambulance pulled away, Molly let out a sigh of relief. She glanced at Sherlock, a sunny smile on her face. "Okay, then, what are we going to do?"

He opened the body bag to check and make sure that he had the right one. Yes, face and form matched the one from the photos this morning, the wounds to the abdomen more brutal in real life. "Steal another ambulance and get the body out of here."

She paused. "Wait, excuse me, what?"

"I spotted four of them going into the hospital, and we only dealt with one, and I don't want to deal with the other three, so we're going to get the body out of here." He pulled his mobile out of his pocket. "Load it up."

"We can't, we can't STEAL an ambulance." She blinked at him.

"Of course we can, I can hotwire one fairly easily." He stared down at her. "Shoo. Shoo, shoo, shoo, load it up."

"This isn't a good idea, Sherlock," Molly said, but she was moving the gurney around to an unoccupied ambulance.

"It's a brilliant idea," he told her, yanking his mobile out of his pocket. "Lestrade," he snapped when the DI picked up, "we've got the body, we're going to clear out of Bart's."

"Wait, no, we're on our way over, stay there. Don't just, ugh, don't take the body, Sherlock."

"No choice, the killers are at St. Barts. I got one of them, he's tied up in Molly's coat closet, but the other three are going to figure out that what they're looking for isn't in the morgue and head down here, and I don't want to be here when they do." He resented the fact that John had taken his gun with him. He liked John's gun. Mycroft had flatly refused to give him one, or official permission to carry one, something about Sherlock being fundimentally unsuited to being armed, whatever that meant.

Sherlock threw open the door to the ambulance, leaning over to check out the steering column and the underside of the dashboard. "We'll bring the body back to the Yard. Get people over here to deal with the-"

Molly let out a shriek, and Sherlock's head jerked up. The elevator was moving, judging by the lighted floor indicator above the doors. "Now would be good, Lestrade," he said, disconnecting the call before leaning over to get to work on the starter.

Molly leaned in the open door and flipped the visor down, catching the keys as they fell loose. Sherlock looked at them, nonplussed. "That works, too."

"They always leave them there," Molly said, as Sherlock got out of her way. She slid into the driver's seat. "Because who would be stupid enough to steal an ambulance?"

"Can you drive?" Sherlock said, running for the rear doors. He manhandled the gurney into place, a task that had been beyond Molly.

"Yes, but-" She worried her lower lip between her teeth. "I don't have a license, technically."

"Don't care," Sherlock said, locking the gurney into place and reaching for the rear door to pull them shut. "Why?" he asked, unable to resist asking.

"It was taken away. Illegal street racing," Molly said as the elevators opened.

"Wait, what?" Sherlock said, just as she threw the ambulance into reverse and stomped on the gas. Sherlock, not prepared, went flying forward, grabbing onto the back of the driver's seat as his weight shifted and he nearly landed on his face. "Illegal WHAT?"

"Kidding," Molly said, and it ended on a shriek as one of the men stepping off the elevator brought up a hand to aim a gun in their direction. Sherlock grabbed Molly's head and shoved it down as the gun went off, but they were already moving, already shrieking backwards across the narrow parking area, and Molly threw them into first gear and executed a sharp turn, barely missing a support column as they tore for the exit.

"Are you? Are you REALLY kidding?" Sherlock grabbed desperately for the walls as they turned onto the public street, hitting a couple of speedbumps fast enough to knock him off his feet twice. Both times, he staggered back to his feet, only to go sprawling again. He grabbed for the gurney as they took a turn.

"Yes, of course." Molly fumbled around until she found the sirens and turned them on. "The Yard?"

"The Yard," Sherlock agreed, a little traumatized by now, but his mobile was buzzing, and he ignored the fact that Molly was babbling at the other drivers, waving her hands in an energetic and terrifying manner. "Lestrade, where are-" Molly jerked them around a corner, and Sherlock was almost certain that they took the turn on two wheels, and he slammed into the far wall of the ambulance.

"Sherlock? What was that?" Lestrade sounded panicked.

"My control of the situation collapsing," Sherlock mumbled, prying himself away from shelves of medical supplies.

"What?"

"Is there any chance that you were able to stop the killers at the hospital?"

"We found the one in the closet, but none of the others. Two ambulances are missing."

"Wonderful." Sherlock stumbled to the rear of the ambulance, staring out at the traffic behind them. "Yes, we're being followed."

"Where are you?"

"We're in the middle of a high speed chase involving two stolen ambulances!" Sherlock yelled. "Could you please put your considerable skills to locating that, in that it is-"

"High speed chase?" Molly said, accelerating through a red light. "What high speed chase?"

"The one that we're in the middle of," Sherlock said to her, his voice sharp, "So speed would be-" She stomped on the gas, and this time he was expecting it and grabbed for the nearest shelf to stay upright.

"I'm going to get arrested," Molly said, her voice thin and pained. She sniffled.

"Are you crying?" Sherlock stumbled forward and grabbed onto the back of the seat. "Are you seriously crying? You cannot be crying right now. Molly, do not cry, I am warning you."

"I'm not crying," she said, and it was a pained wail.

"Oh, God, you are crying, I promise you're not going to get arrested, I'll tell Lestrade that I kidnapped you at gunpoint."

She sniffled. "Will you? Really?"

"It's the least I can-" Another turn and he thumped into the wall again. "Do."

"Actually, that's true, this has been a horrible day," Molly snapped. "You are a horrible person, Sherlock Holmes, I cannot believe we-"

And just like that, they were surrounded by police cars, lights flashing, sirens wailing, and Molly stomped on the brakes. She also threw out an arm to steady Sherlock as he plowed forward. "I am never doing this again," she said to Sherlock.

"Agreed," he said, stumbling back to his feet, scrambling backwards and hitting the rear doors at full speed, throwing them open and crashing through the officers that were heading straight for them, yelling and waving their arms. They scattered like pigeons as Sherlock landed in their midst, cursing.

"The OTHER ambulance," he yelled. "Not us, you bloody idiots! Them!"

Cops didn't like being called idiots, but it was a strategic error that Sherlock made sometimes, and now, with the road filling with cars and honking horns and confusion, he saw the other ambulance try to turn, only to find itself pinned in by the traffic.

Sherlock cut through the cars, jumping a hood and sliding down on the other side, and they'd stopped in just the wrong place, or just the right place, because they were on a bridge, and there was no where that the other cars could go to get out of the way, and the ambulance was trying to turn, and finding no place to go.

Behind him, Sherlock caught a glimpse of Lestrade, and behind him, Dimmock, and behind him what seemed like half of the stupid cops that the Yard had managed to accumulate, it was like a decreasing scale of intelligence, with Sherlock in the lead and the pursuers getting stupider as they went back, and that thought made Sherlock grin.

He wasn't paying as much attention as he strictly should've been as a car shot forward, and the ambulance turned with a squeal of tires, and Sherlock was in just the wrong place, the grill of the ambulance suddenly there, right in front of him, and he jerked backwards, but not in time, he felt the impact along his body, and he was swept up off of his feet, his face smacking into the hood, or the windshield, he wasn't sure. He felt the vehicle swing around, slamming into the stone railing that edged the bridge and the ambulance came to a violent stop.

Sherlock didn't. He felt his body slide backwards, and then he was airborne, falling, falling, he could hear someone screaming, and he tried to hold onto consciousness, reaching out, his lips forming "John."

That wasn't right, John wasn't here, so who was screaming his name? And that was the last thought that managed to make it through his mind before the darkness swallowed him.

Afghanistan

"Dr. Watson?"

John's eyes snapped open. For an instant he was so disoriented that all he could do was sit there, staring at the ceiling, and the worried looking young man that was hanging over him. John swallowed, and his throat was tight and dry and painful. He opened his mouth to reply, and coughed, hard enough to wrack his body.

"Hold on, sir, don't move." The young man, an nurse or aide, judging by his outfit, disappeared from John's view, then reappeared with a glass of water. He guided the straw to John's lips, and John latched onto it, grateful for it. A couple of quick sips, and he relaxed back.

"Thanks," he croaked out. "Corp. Cooper? Is he okay?"

"Yes, sir. Came through surgery with flying colors. No complications." He grinned. "You got him back with time to spare."

John nodded, relief unfolding in his chest. "Where am I?"

"One second, sir, let me get Lieutenant Adams." With a reassuring smile, the man disappeared again, leaving John to catalog his aches.

His shoulder was on fire, but it wasn't so bad, he could cope with that. Broken collarbone would heal, he knew it would, and it would heal clean, provided that he kept it still and didn't let Sherlock lead him off the top of a building somewhere before it could. The problem was, of course, that there was no way he could hide this. It had to be wrapped and his arm would be in a sling, and there was no way to keep that out of sight.

He sighed, just as Adams stepped in. "Captain Watson, how're you doing?" He paused, about to lean back out of the hospital room. "Do you need me to call for the med staff? Are you in pain?"

John waved that off. "It's fine. Cooper?" he asked, wanting a little more reassurance on that front.

"He's fine, sir. Hasn't been out of surgery long, so he's under sedation. I can have a wheelchair brought around, if you want to check on him, but for now-" He held out a phone. "We have someone back in London waiting to talk to you."

John's eyes shot to the clock, and he bit back a curse. Almost a day since he'd talked or contacted Sherlock, which was not a good thing. He pushed himself up, just a little higher on the pillows, and Adams adjusted the bed so he was more or less upright.

"Thank you," John said, taking the mobile from Adams. "Sherlock?"

"No, I'm afraid it's the scary Holmes brother," Mycroft said, his voice crisp and acidic, and out of the corner of his eye, John saw Adams retreat from the room and close the door behind him.

"It's rather funny that you think he isn't the scary Holmes boy." John sighed, trying to find a comfortable position for his shoulder. "I take it you heard about..." His voice trailed away.

"About your complete disregard of the rules of your assignment? About you leaving the base? About getting taken by one of the men you were tasked with exposing? About you getting shot and needing to be evaced? Yes. I have quite the report in front of me." Mycroft's voice had reached that seething ice stage that made John wish that he'd stayed back in his depressing one room flat instead of moving to 221B Baker St. "My blood pressure may never recover."

"Sorry," John said. "Got you your info."

"At far too high a cost. You're under guard now, and will be evacuated as soon as we receive medical clearance to do so. They were wary about moving you while you were unconscious, justifiably so."

"It's fine, I have until tomorrow before I'm due back, don't I?" A solid day of sleep couldn't hurt. But as the silence stretched out, his heart skipped a beat. "Mycroft? What aren't you telling me?"

A faint sigh. "Sherlock's been injured. His prognosis is excellent," he said, cutting John off before his panic could even build to unworkable levels. "But he has been hospitalized. If possible, if medically acceptable, I would like to get you back here as quickly we can."

John was already looking around for his clothes. "What happened?" he bit out. "Jesus. Jesus! Is that why he hasn't called, is he unconscious, is he-" He felt his breath get thin and tight, and a too sudden movement of his shoulder make a stab of agony pour through him. He froze, waiting for it to pass.

"He was struck by a vehicle and knocked unconscious. Also off the side of a bridge, because even in near death experiences, he persists in being overly dramatic," Mycroft said, sounding just as tired as John felt. "DI Lestrade pulled him out of the river before he could drown, but emergency measures had to be taken to resuscitate him."

John was dizzy, and he wasn't sure if it was because of the news or his own pain. "Get me out of here. Now."

"John, you need to be examined. He is fine, he is in no danger at the moment. For safety's sake, they put him on breathing assistance, and he's sleeping comfortably. You need to-"

"Get me out of here," John said, his voice soft and deadly earnest, "or I will hitchhike to the airport and find the first plane heading West."

There was a long beat of silence, interrupted only by John's breath hissing between his teeth, and a faint sigh from Mycroft. "I'll have a military transport together. They can do a final check on the way. If they believe moving you would be detrimental, John, I won't allow the plane to take off."

"I have a broken collarbone and a case of exhaustion, neither of which would prevent me from traveling, and doing it now." Hell, John could probably wrap his own arm if it was necessary, though it would be a lot easier with qualified medical help. "Mycroft?"

"Yes?"

John swallowed. "You're not lying to me right now, are you? He's not in danger?"

The response was immediate and firm. "He is out of danger and will make a full recovery. But your lack of contact prior to the incident was weighing on him. I'd prefer you be here when he wakes up in the hospital." There was a faint, strained laugh. "So I am taking advantage of you to make my own life easier."

John grinned. "I'm fine with that. Keep an eye on him until I get there?" He paused, and, feeling stupid anyway. "Can you give him a message from me? Even if he's not awake to respond to it?"

"Of course."

"Tell him he promised me seven days. A week. I'll be home tomorrow, and if he's given up on me before that, I'll never let him live it down."

Mycroft laughed, a bit louder, a bit more real. "I understand. I'll be sitting with him tonight, so I'll make sure your message is passed on."

"Thanks, Mycroft." Saying their good-byes, they broke the connection just as the hospital door opened again.

"Ready to go, Captain Watson?" the pleasant aide asked. "We have an ambulance standing by to get you to the airport."

"Mycroft, you're such a faker," John mumbled under his breath, even as he nodded. "Thank you. Let's go." Gritting his teeth, he started to move. It was going to be a very long night.