Yay again to Caroline, beta extraordinaire. I'm currently on a job, so I'm putting out chapters a little slower, but the next chapter should (theoretically) be up sooner than later.
John smiled as he stepped lightly down the steps of Lestrade's block of flats to stand next to Sherlock, solemnly holding John's plate in one bare hand.
"Hand that over," John grinned up at him, "so you can get your gloves on."
Lowering the plate without looking away from the road, Sherlock seemed to calculate the chance of getting a cab here against his magic ability to fetch a cab out of nowhere. The odds didn't appear to be terribly in his favour. "If you're not too cold we could probably walk home."
"I just came out of a warm flat, and I've a warm supper in my hands. I can make it to somewhere with a cab at the very least. You didn't happen to lift a-"
Sherlock held out a fork. They giggled most of the way to a main road. They decided once they got there it was really too cold to push on and called a cab, pink nosed and half hiding their grins. Sneaking looks at each other out of the corners of their eyes. John's heart was like a bell ringing in delight. Looking back he couldn't remember what they were talking about, only that he was happy. He would wish later that he had paid attention. That he had solidified those fine, ringing, crystal moments, stored them somehow.
Their cab was pulling toward Baker Street when the explosion hit. The cab tipped in the blast, a solid punch to the ears and eyes and bones. John dropped the plate and fork to the floor mat and braced himself as Sherlock loomed over him like a surging wave. Landing around him, dark coat puddling around them as Sherlock twisted around him, knees and elbows and a sharp edged exhale. In the morning there would be bruises, John's doctor mind noted, but his soldier mind had snapped away to car bombs and that he didn't have his gun with him. The taxi went up on two wheels and something squealed as the cabbie desperately tried to fling the car in reverse. Everything was tight and fervently blasted ready in bursts of adrenaline, glass forgetting its safety covering fell in at them. The inside of the cab filled with shouts, human angles, black broadcloth, silk shirts and quick incessant breath.
The ringing crept and crested between John's brain and skull, his body shaking, pulling, his hands trying to rip free of the crush against his chest, hard edged, holding him. For a moment he was still in Afghanistan from mental habit as much as anything. Like muscle memory. His gear wasn't on his back, which was bad, his vest (why was it so cold?) was gone which was bad but even worse he was missing his medical kit and his gun, even his emergency handgun was missing from his thigh. He tried to remember what he had been doing, where he had been. The desert was a habit a year and more gone, should have been too far away to flash back like this, and his mind fought itself for equilibrium leaving a double image that left him half-panicked and jumbled. "Bill," John panted panicked around the ringing in his ears, searching, struggling. "Bill, just stay still. Where's my kit!"
"Stop," said a deep voice, familiar and safely dangerous. "John, stop. You're safe. Stop. It's alright. I'm here." When John had finished unclenching and opened his eyes he tried to move, his face pressed against Sherlock's collarbone, the starched line of his shirt collar. Sherlock's long hand was curled protectively around the dip of John's neck, tucking him up under his chin. His lean weight spilled over John, covering him, hip taking the brunt of John's panicked feet.
John took one shaky little breath and then a second, longer.
"John, can you tell me where you are?" Sherlock said, breathing rapidly into the top of John's head.
"England, Baker Street. London. Taxi cab."
"Very good John," Sherlock said shakily and tried to raise himself up onto his elbows before retching.
"Stay still," John barked, suddenly in doctor mode. One of his hands lifted to protect Sherlock's eyes from any bits of glass (because that's right they were in a cab, not in Afghanistan) and with the other gently traced his small fingers through the masses of black hair, looking for any abrasions.
Sherlock stayed still, breathing awkwardly, trying to keep himself from vomiting. Concussion then, Sherlock always had nausea after a concussion but no slurring, so minor. "Careful," he said between his teeth. "Glass."
"Don't worry about it," John said simply. "Just concentrate on not throwing up on me." He'd be able to deal of course; being RAMC meant he could face all number of bodily fluids with a stiff upper lip. But really, he'd rather not.
"You're the one who insisted I eat so much." Sherlock shifted slightly and John smiled tracing his fingers up around the soft skin behind his ears and around the seam of his hair and forehead. His upturned collar, which John long suspected was turned up for the purpose of looking cool, had kept most of the glass from out of his hair. John was very careful to brush away any bits that might fall down later and do Sherlock damage.
"You're clear, mildly concussed, be careful sitting up."
"It's nothing, I've had a concussion before," he rolled to the side, hands flexing from where they had clenched around John. Pulling up, John peered up at the cabbie, kicking himself for having forgotten until now there was someone in the front seat. After being confused like he hadn't been for a long time, waking up and wondering why it was so cold. Why there weren't the faint far away sounds of the FOB like vital signs. Although more recently his bad dreams had to do with Grendel and the deep, deep burning of being erased. And Sherlock had seen John forget himself. He couldn't have missed it. John suddenly and desperately needed to be useful, to be helpful, to do what he was meant to do. And the cabbie needed attention, he and Sherlock had been protected somewhat by the corner of the building they were coming around, but the driver had taken a great deal of the brunt. "What are you doing?" Sherlock snapped as John reached for the door. He needed to shake the panic out of him with the Latin names for the portions of the human frame and the steady medical practice that settled and organized his mind.
"I'll be fine, I need to move now where there's debris for cover," it was a testament to Sherlock's concussion that he didn't catch the meaning behind that, didn't hear the unsaid, in case there are snipers, until John was out the door and climbing into the front seat. "Call this in," he called through the glass reaching for the cabbie's pulse.
John got on with triage while Sherlock repeated abrasions on the face consistent with airbag deployment, lacerations face neck and hand on left side to possible fracture of the left wrist, and a catalogue of minor wounds to the operator. Once a flurry of lights and sirens surrounded the blast zone and the bomb squad appeared like space men, Sherlock pulled John out of the car. He dragged John close careful not to cross the line between manhandling and carrying, pressing the side of John's face to his leg. Sherlock was snapping at anyone that got too close, face strung up on upper class superiority and general scornful rage. John was thinking about pips and pink phones thinking No, no it had been too long, the time wasn't right, this can't be the Game. But John doesn't know, he realized suddenly he didn't even know what month it was anymore. It just wasn't that important. He had got out of the practice of watching telly living on the street and even now he would only watch bare snippets caught on the way to somewhere else. He took careful breaths, his hands were steady and his leg felt strong but his heart pacing in his chest. Too close, too close, and how could he protect Sherlock?
The Emergency Services must have been used to Sherlock; they took his snarls in stride and were able to harass him into something still enough to be checked out. He complained about their intelligence when they diagnosed his concussion mild as it was and the mild scrapes that would heal up in a day. He let them shine a quick light into John's eyes to check for concussion and then wanted nothing more to do with them. Closing his eyes, John let his arm loop around Sherlock's leg to steady himself from where he was tucked under Sherlock's coat, resting to the sound to Sherlock's scorn and the paramedics beleaguered long-suffering.
Once Sherlock was able to shake himself free he harassed his way back into 221. "That was downright stupid John," he said coldly. "I would expect better from you than flinging yourself into danger for some stranger who wasn't even particularly interesting." He ripped off his scarf but seemed at a loss as to where to throw it. "I know you are a little overwhelmed by my lifestyle, but do learn to overcome your romanticizing heroics. Sentiment will make you weak."
He didn't look at John, just took off shouting for Mrs. Hudson. The little speech would have meant more had John not heard it before. And if Sherlock hadn't had that white edged pull of concern as he headed toward Mrs. Hudson's. Letting out a stiff breath, John watched Sherlock stalk down the hall; just because Sherlock was worried about Mrs. Hudson didn't mean he had to take it out on John.
John was still hyperaware, hyperstill and Sherlock picked the lock into Mrs. Hudson's apartment leaving John in the hallway. John wasn't sure what he was supposed to do, there had been no motion to follow. He felt sick, his belly felt like wormwood and his hands wore the cabbie's blood, speckled and smeared.
"I should have worn gloves," he said to himself and went upstairs to wash his hands.
He felt extraordinarily calm picking his way through glass and bits of paper, he walked over to where Sherlock's violin case had fallen on the floor and very gently lifted and placed it on Sherlock's chair. He looked around and seeing nothing else he could immediately do wandered into the kitchen to drag a chair over to the sink. He would be very grateful when he gained another six inches. The farther he could get from a meter the better. There was the sound of someone rushing up the stairs and throwing open the door before a pause and a scornful scoff as if the multitude of ephemera should know better than to be blown every which way by semtex. "John, what are you doing up here?" Sherlock peered past their lovely green glass doors that had thankfully survived the blast.
"Where else would I be?" he smiled indulgently at Sherlock's expression. He tried to smile, he had a feeling it was a little tight around the edges.
"Flitting about like an idiot helping the wounded," Sherlock rolled his eyes and John tensed, smile fading.
"Helping people isn't idiotic."
"It is when it's an unnecessary risk," Sherlock snapped back. "Mrs. Hudson is fine, settled again. And my insufferable brother has sent his insufferable cleanup crew to mess up my very complex filing system important for my very vital case work," he projected, titling his head back as if speaking to someone in the other room. There was a sudden flash of what Sherlock may have been like about age fourteen. "It's-"
"Insufferable?" John asked when Sherlock couldn't think of an adjective scalding enough.
That got him an impressive look that wasn't quite disgust. John ha a sudden vision of an annoyed Sherlock might run through the midst of Mycroft's staff like a dog through the pigeons. He had worried over next to John, watching him inspect himself for any leftover reddish smears.
"Come John," Sherlock declared turning off the water and bracing the chair for John to climb down. His coat swirling dust and debris in his wake as he deliberately ignored the bland faced cleanup crew in their living room. They were so nondescript John wasn't sure if he should apologize to them for Sherlock rudeness or let them work in silence. "Are you having any other traumatic stress reactions?" Sherlock asked, startling him out of his cleaner reverie.
"I'm fine," John assured him, back military straight.
"Hmm," was all Sherlock said, leading John away to the edge of everything, verbally gutting a police officer that dared to comment about their not being 'behind the safety line.'
"Sorry," John said rather ineffectually after him. He was pulled into Sherlock's orbit out of the way of everything where the detective could glare at everything in silence.
John huffed out an annoyed breath beside him, but didn't bother trying to make conversation, his mind whirring as it was to try to think of a way to try and defuse the Moriarty mess. It was immediately clear he couldn't tell Mycroft about the pool without being dissected, and he couldn't contact Dimmock with Sherlock staring on. The secret phone was a tool he wanted to keep yet.
His eyes caught, as he was getting himself wound into a rather tight ball of anxiety, on a tall thin kid in a comfortably worn hoodie leaning against the wall of an alley, staring at the edge of things. He shook loose a cigarette and lit it, his hands trembled. Staccato zigzags of smoke rose around his head, his shoulders tight and clenched against his tremors. The kid braced the arm holding the cigarette with fingers tap, tap, tapping in a familiar rhythm. John didn't recognize him until then, he had felt that rhythm enough time against his collarbone, his sternum, his forehead. John bumped against Sherlock gently to get his attention. After a moment Sherlock's fingertips ghosted over John's shoulder, keeping him close as he headed over, his free hand dropping into pocket. The kid twitched, eye dodging back and away, feet dancing, dragging the wrist of his hoodie distractedly across his nose.
Sherlock flicked a pound note at him with two fingers, "What did you see?"
The kid plucked it out of his fingers, eyes bright and quick in a shadowed face pulled hunted and anxious, slightly dull and pulled every which way. "Nuffin' mate. I don't want no trouble, just tryna find a place to sleep." Sherlock narrowed his eyes and the kid jittered the note right back at him, "Maybe for a little more, yeah?"
"Stop it Davey," John snapped. The kid's addict electrified expression sharpened for a split second into a grinning street king before splintering away again into that of one of the city's unfortunates tapping his brother's madness against his wrist.
"How then?" he nodded to John with a grinning little twist to his face as if the two of them were playing some neat prank together. "You spotted me 'fore posh and mighty here."
"Don't be a prat Davey."
"No, go on mate, tell me," Davey grinned back.
John took a moment to give him as sarcastic a look as he could manage covered in dust and debris. "You're like Rooster when he's trying to go to sleep. He thinks he's lying still but he taps on things, over and over."
Davey made a soft sound, "I'd whistle if I could. The detective here is rubbing off. Clev, super clev."
"Are you going to get around to what you want or not?" Sherlock snapped.
"Fine, whatev, didn't need another note anyway. Not like you're wasting my precious time or nuffin. Not like I got work in Whitechapel, not that it's your business." Davey, or rather the strung out kid shaking apart of the edge of manhood Davey was playing, said. He looked away, his bravado betrayed by his anxiety.
"I could call one of those handy police officers over," Sherlock said, his intimidating the suspect face on.
"And I could cut off your face, but let's not borrow trouble?" Bad Davey snapped, suddenly dropping his accent. Sherlock jerked, a minute twitch and narrowed his eyes. For all his crime solving Sherlock was ultimately unfamiliar with malice, at least so far. Real malice from real people always startled him. "No one I have anything to do with. No one saw anything. I'd wait to see what bomb squad says to know what we're dealing with."
"What are you here for then?" Sherlock scowled, face shifted into something hard and aggressive he usually reserved for Mycroft.
"I came for the precious little love, didn' I?" he smiled at John all cheeky affection over the top of uncompromising single-mindedness. It was hard to know which parts of Davey were playing and which parts were full of teeth.
"He's staying with me," Sherlock said solidly.
Davey whistled low and shook his head. "Letting your little gentleman stride right in over all that broken glass, all those chemicals? His flat shaken all to bits? Bad form, even for flatmates. You'll get him back in the morning safe as houses."
John almost said no, but he remembered walking back from Sarah's house and seeing the spill of space where there wasn't meant to be, like a great gaping wound. "It's alright Sherlock," he said. "Davey will just harass you anyway. I'll be safe with him; his flats could withstand a nuclear blast. And this way you won't have to worry about me."
That last part seemed to convince Sherlock, "I don't like it."
"And I don't like hobnobs, doesn't mean I won't have some if I'm all out of jammy dodgers. And you my friend are jammy dodger free." Davey grinned at him
Sherlock hissed at him in frustration, "He needs to be back by eight, that's his breakfast time."
"I'll take care a'that mate," Davey shrugged at him. "I've got a girl, makes a mean English breakfast, and some rather brilliant fake IDs. You ever need any let me know. I just got a ton of those fancy chips, I could get you in anywhere you wanted."
"Okay, that's enough of that," John said, crossing his arms. "Contrary to popular belief, I do occasionally need some sleep." And he needed to text Dimmock, call him back to England. He should probably talk to Davey about Moriarty's little game. For all Davey's bravado and faults, he had the secret shade of subtlety about him; it made him thoughtful and cautious away from the eyes of an audience.
"Meet you at the back fire escape," Davey said with a mouth full of teeth.
"Fine. Good. Finished," Sherlock snapped, caught two fingers under the collar of John's coat and half dragged him off. Sherlock lost his momentum when they reached 221B in favour of yelling at Mycroft's cleaning crew. John had so many things to do, needed to be on his game tomorrow, so he only stopped to grasp quickly at Sherlock's wrist.
"Before eight," he said.
Sherlock seemed about to say something else before nodding at him and getting shouty with the member of the crew handling his bat and beetle display.
John's mind was whirring, picking up and sorting what he remembered as he ran up the steps, tread quietly to the window, slid out and swung over into the illustrious presence of Bad Davey. He took a deep breath and looked up at Davey, still and sharp, smoking.
"It wasn't a gas leak. I mean, that's what they'll decide, it was a gas leak. But it wasn't."
"Good evening to you too," Davey said with raised eyebrows.
"I'm going to need your help," John said. "I can't, I need your help."
"It'll cost you, cost you something dear," Davey looked up, baring his throat in a sarcastic parody of vulnerability.
"Do you know the name Moriarty?" John said.
Davey cursed quietly viciously, kicking the railing of the fire escape once, twice, three times. "This is him then?"
"Yes. He's going to play a game with Sherlock. He's going to pressgang people in to being suicide bombers, all over London."
Davey squatted down, hands in his hair, obscuring his face, but he suddenly looked very young, the arch of his back, the way he was only just growing out of his gangly teenaged years. He tried to hide it, how close to whatever jagged childhood that could spawn a creature like him he was. "I'm not ready to go against Moriarty, maybe if it was just me. But I got Roost, Elsie." He dropped his arms to brace himself on his fingertips. "I don't want to be the sort of person that doesn't have anyone to care about. If you say I'd still have you I'll slit your throat no matter how it'd break Roost's heart."
"I'm not Roost," John said simply watching Davey. "I don't expect to be above your brother."
Davey stood quickly and snarled at John until he presumably felt better. "I do like you Johnny."
"No one else gets to call me Johnny," he twisted his nose in disgust. "Or call me a precious little love."
"I won't really slit your throat."
"Never said you would," John said slipping his hands in his pockets.
Davey grinned, sharp toothed and half mad again, "Mean that don't you?"
"I reserve the right to change my mind," John shrugged.
"There's my precious little love," Davey said and yipped his laughter when John pulled a face. "Tell me then, who are you hoping I'll kill."
"No one, I haven't changed my mind about being against you handing out assassinations as favours to me. In fact I'd like you to stay out of the way as much as possible. But there are a few worst case scenarios you should probably be aware of."
"Come on then, Roost will have fits of joy when he sees you."
D – The Game has started. Contact me. – W