Sherlock looks wrong. John tries to process how wrong he looks whilst also replaying in his head what he just said about sex with men that Sherlock must have heard.

"As you were," says Compton, using the crook of his arm to draw Sherlock after him into the kitchen. "Just popping in for some refills..."

He scoops up a bottle of vodka from the table and proceeds, Sherlock in hand, to the fridge. "Shift!"

Rebecca's twin, and attachment, shuffle to one side to allow Compton to open the door. "How's it going?" Compton enquires as he rummages and discovers a jug of cherry-red liquid.

"Fifteen," says Rebecca.

"Not bad," says Compton with a twist of his lips. "Tweet me." The way he says it, drawled out carelessly, with a bat of his blonde lashes, makes John want to throw up.

Sherlock is leaning on this man's shoulder. His eyes are dull and his mouth is set in a sullen droop. His arms are limp at his sides.

"All right?" says John to Sherlock in as neutral a tone as he can manage.

"Yeah."

Compton plus accoutrements sidles back across the kitchen. "We'll be upstairs. Don't wait up!" he cries in a hideous pastiche of camp, mingled with equally unpleasant threat.

As they swing back into the hall, Sherlock turns his head and looks over his shoulder at John and gives him a lightning wink.


00:49 Party over. In cab. Pay for me. S

John sighs, throws down his mobile and climbs out of the bed he has been in for less than a minute. He abandoned the party in disgust and returned here determined to get some rest and not worry about Sherlock, but failure on the second point has led to failure on the first.

After Sherlock vanished into a glitter ball room with Compton and a mass of giggling teens, John tried to strike up conversations but with zero success.

He was loitering on the first floor landing, pained by noise and rejection and on the point of texting Sherlock when Sherlock himself appeared.

"Hey," was all John managed before Sherlock wrenched open the bathroom door and bundled them both inside.

There followed a weird conversation in a very compressed space.

"You're a handicap," hisses Sherlock. "You just look too old. Like I've got my dad with me." He rolls his eyes. "No one would believe you would take a dare."

This is more hurtful than John would have thought possible. Especially as he knows it to be absolutely true. "I can't just leave you," he says. "I don't like you being the bait."

"I've just told you why it has to be me. You look too" - only Sherlock could make this an insult - "competent."

"So what then?"

"You go home. Leave me to it. Compton is at the centre of all this. His car proves it but I need a closer look and I need to catch him in the act, making the next dare, the one which this whole thing has been about."

"So it's him?"

"No conclusions. Evidence suggests it though. Remember the upholstery, John."

"Right." John cannot think of anything about the upholstery except Sherlock commenting on it after nearly being squashed. "The car interior."

"Exactly," says Sherlock and does not explain.

"Mmn." It is flattering to be assumed to be as clever as Sherlock but simultaneously it is frustrating because in the arena of deduction, John is not. But this is not the moment to confess this, because John needs to ask Sherlock how far he will go to persuade Compton of his willingness to participate in the dare madness. "What if he doesn't go for it, doesn't dare you? What if he just wants - a piece of you, and it's nothing to do with dares?"

Sherlock shrugs. "So what? We'll start again tomorrow."

"That's not what I meant." He gives Sherlock a meaningful glare.

Sherlock puzzles at him. "What did you mean?"

This is stupid, having this surreal conversation in a tiny upstairs loo with the toilet rim digging into the back of John's knees and Sherlock flat up against the door. "I mean - he's vile."

"It's for a case, John."

"Oh, right. The ultimate excuse."

"Why do you care?" Black t shirt, black shirt, black hair, black fire in Sherlock's eyes and he is poised like a kestrel hanging in the air a hundred feet above the quivering prey, the decision hanging too, plummet or soar, plummet or soar...

"Because," says John. "I just do."

"Well don't. I am working. I am fine." Lift of the chin and the kestrel wheels away to impossible heights, catching a thermal, pinpointing more intriguing targets.

"Fine." John folds his arms and scowls. He is not kidding himself that he has won, or even drawn, this argument. Sherlock will do whatever he wants, as usual. John will be left on his own, as usual. Partnership this is not.

But Sherlock grabs John's shoulders. Gives him a small shake. "What is your problem? We are working. At least I'm not in the kitchen watching teenagers groping each other. Or being groped."

"Is that a joke?" John does not know where to put his hands. He is clenched in Sherlock's surprising strong grip and has nowhere to escape to.

"Sort of. What the hell were you saying to that girl?"

"She's sex obsessed," says John.

"Everybody is," says Sherlock. "It doesn't mean you have to go into the gory details."

He lets go of John and sighs. For a second he seems about to speak again, to say something - what? - but then he just shakes his head. "Right. Back to acting dim and rather vulnerable, the kind of person who desperately needs to be in with the in crowd in order to feel that their time on the planet is justified."

"Not exactly like you then." Sherlock is his own clique. Sometimes John is in it.

"Not exactly. I avoided the in crowd like the plague." Sherlock is already moving on, his eyes scanning over John's shoulder to where an open window is barrelling a draught down John's neck.

"I bet it was mutual."

"Oh yes." A smile, and John snorts laughter too.

"Right. I will go home," he says. And here is one of those gaps in their friendship, a space which a lover would fill with a kiss goodbye or an embrace, a quick exchange of promise and intent. But John does not dare, and this, in a cracked-plaster student loo, is not how he pictures it, anyway.

"I just need him to make the crucial dare," Sherlock says then, as if realising reassurance is required.

"I can hang around in case Compton needs decking," John offers hopefully.

"No thanks. I can handle it."


That was three hours ago. John grew very sick of waiting and was relieved to get Sherlock's text. He sprints down to the archway - now free of ancient car - and there is a cab. The door opens and Sherlock falls onto the gravel. John hands the driver a tenner and picks Sherlock up.

"Jesus, what did he do to you?"

Sherlock tries to speak and fails. His phone is still welded to his hand, though: it can't be too serious. Can it?

It is midnight. John drags Sherlock upright and then hefts him over his shoulder and bodily carries him across the quad. Sherlock weighs an absolute ton. It is the pointless giraffe legs. It's certainly not excess fat. The stairs are a challenge but John manages it. Army training and sheer bloody mindedness.

At last John manoeuvres Sherlock into their room, kicks the door shut and lowers Sherlock onto the nearest bed. Sherlock is now mumbling but John cannot make out any proper words.

"Sherlock. Sherlock, speak to me." For once, a valid opportunity to shake him like a wayward teenager.

"I'm ok." Consciousness is returning. "Fell asleep in cab," Sherlock says. He tries to stand.

"What the hell did he do to you?" John demands again.

"Nothing -"

"Clearly not nothing - "John staggers back as Sherlock collapses against him. Sherlock's head just misses the sink. John swears and drags Sherlock's limp body back onto the bed. Fuck, shit, fuck. Yet although he is furious and terrified, battle instinct kicks in and he methodically examines Sherlock for signs of poisoning.

There are none. Sherlock just appears to be very, very drunk.

"What the hell did you do? Cocktails?"

"Jelly shots," mumbles Sherlock.

"Oh for fuck's sake."

"I'm all right. Stop fussing."

"I thought you'd done a dare! I thought you'd killed yourself with your stupid arrogance and your complete and utter refusal to accept any help from me-"

He is so angry and relieved that he cannot continue. Instead he just starts pulling off Sherlock's shoes, socks, jeans.

"What are you doing," Sherlock slurs.

"Putting you to bed. But before you pass out I want you to drink this." John pours a glass of water and holds it in front of Sherlock's mouth. "All of it. Now!"

Sherlock manages about half and then goes green.

"You're all right," John tells him. "Drink the rest. How many shots?"

"Strawberry," says Sherlock.

That explains the sickly sweet smell on his breath. "I said how many."

"Lime. Blackcurrant. Orange. Lemon."

"Well, that's at least five. Pretty stupid for someone who doesn't drink."

Sherlock shakes his head. "Lychee," he slurs and now he is definitely winding John up. "Mango. Dragon fruit."

"Huh. Maybe you've escaped climbing up a pylon or jumping in the river but alcohol poisoning is still a thing. Lie down."

"I said don't fuss."

John takes the glass and then, as Sherlock is now sitting up, removes his shirt as well. The t shirt can stay. He heaves back the covers on the bed - blankets and sheets tightly wrapped around the mattress, like childhood, like prison - and then pushes Sherlock down onto the pillow. Sherlock grumbles and then wriggles into the bed.

"Now sleep," says John. "Sleep it off, and I am going for a walk."

"Stay with me, " Sherlock says pathetically. "I might die."

"No you won't. You'll just have a massive hangover. Which serves you right."

"I might pass out and drown in my own vomit." He is blinking at John like an owl that only wants a tiny favour.

"Wow, sell it to me. -All right, I'll stay. Now just sleep."

Sherlock sits up and points at the empty glass. In his world, victory equals total victory and John will obviously not only stay but also will provide room service.

John grits his teeth, refills the glass, hands it to him. "There." Sherlock drinks, keeping John's gaze over the rim of the glass. John makes his face set and stern. No chink in the armour. No sympathy. Not when Sherlock has been so utterly, dangerously idiotic.

Sherlock gives the glass back. "Thank you," he says in a small voice but John is having none of it. The charm, the crocodile apology, will not touch him tonight. I thought you might die, he thinks at Sherlock. You stupid, stupid -

"Stay with me here. Please," Sherlock says, reaching out his arms to John.

"I said yes just now -"

John is in the act of putting the glass back on the sink when Sherlock grabs him round the waist and pulls him onto the bed. "Stay with me," he mumbles into John's hair and the glass smashes into the basin with the sound of a thousand resolutions breaking.

"God, let go. All right. All right! Let me get my shoes off..."

Despite the unbelievable amount of alcohol Sherlock has consumed, he still smells fresh and clean. How the hell does he do that? John is pretty sure he himself reeks of cheap cigarette smoke and student union beer, but Sherlock still has the faint fragrance of rare flowers - his particular shower gel - and hair product, the hair product which he pretends not to use but John knows better. And his arms are still around John and he is shuffling down the bed so that he can rest his head in John's armpit - surely the least savoury part of John right now - and saying, "John, John," in a sleepy baritone which John cannot resist but absolutely must. "All right, all right," John says, and puts his arms round Sherlock too, and it is so right, to be holding him and comforting him, even though obviously it is completely wrong because John is enjoying it in ways Sherlock cannot comprehend, and because Sherlock is incapable and in the morning will spring up with hisses of outrage at the liberties John has taken.

John heaves a sigh. Sherlock does too and John wants to laugh, and cry. They said they never would but here they are and it only took jelly shots. That is so ridiculous and sad.

John lies with his heart racing and his arms full of drowsy Sherlock and makes a decision. If he is going to be bawled out tomorrow for liberties taken, he may as well take some. He stays still, daring himself to do it, and Sherlock is right, there is something about the psychology of a dare which means that normal considerations (their friendship, their tacit pledge against intimacy, the fact that Sherlock is off his face and John is taking advantage of him) simply do not apply. The challenge has been thrown down: it will be met, or not.

John dithers over emotional choices, but not action ones. And so -

He rubs the back of Sherlock's neck and makes comforting wordless sounds, and lets the silky touch of Sherlock's hair be the only reciprocation he needs. He has him, right here, right now in this moment, his to cherish and scold, and thoughts of the consequences will have to wait. For a time it is just him, and this man, this infuriating and amazing man...

John sighs.

"What."

John leaps, but Sherlock's tone is only curious. He cannot have failed to notice the wandering hands. Can it be that he does not mind? "You," says John, and that is all, it sums up everything, especially at midnight in a three-bed room where two people are sharing one tiny mattress.

Sherlock huffs. Not affront. more like - acknowledgement.

He turns his face into John 's bicep and for some reason mumbles, "Ultraviolet," and then his body goes limp. He is asleep, or drunk asleep.

John puts his lips once, silently, against the soft black curls and then closes his eyes too.


Author's note: I can only apologise for how pathetic John is in this story. He's just rather wet. I will attempt to introduce some BAMF but given what I've got to work with, it won't be easy. -Sef