Skull and Cross (Saw) Bones
Angry. Short. Dreadfully dull.
Sherlock Holmes will deduce anyone, any time. He'll deduce you before he's met you, he'll deduce you after three words, he'll damn well deduce you from the teeth marks you leave in your toast.
Which is why Sherlock was sanguine about deducing Dr. John Watson despite their acquaintance consisting of four grumpy phone conversations.
Sherlock knew Watson's type: Brave when hiding behind a title, a rule, a telephone, but get full-face in front of them and they'd always wilt.
"—and I said you could work for the fucking pope but I'm still not giving you the god damn skull."
Standing in front of his messy desk the angry doctor—Sherlock had totally been right about that—scowled. Ordinarily John was perfectly content working graveyard shift in St. Mary's morgue. Despite being wildly over-qualified, despite spending most long nights alone with a tiny TV and his own moods, John often sometimes somewhat almost actually liked his job.
Except when the loonies rang up. Or loony, because he just had one, a deep-voiced git who wanted pints of blood, or eyes, or left thumbs for Christ's sake.
This time he'd shown up at the morgue in person, demanding John's skull. Well not John's actual skull, but the one on his desk.
"Detective inspector Lestrade said I could have it."
The short doctor—Sherlock had totally been right about that—seemed to grow six inches. "Listen, you over-pretty little shit, the DI has no claim on that skull and no right to give it to anyone and I'm betting he never even said that and even if he did you're not getting it. She's mine, she's been mine for a long time now, and you'll have to pry her from my cold, dead hands before you have her."
Sherlock was given pause. Over the years many sobriquets have been applied to him. He's been called a dick, a prick, an annoying bastard, an arrogant shit and, most memorably, a freaky little fuck. However, until today no epithet has included the word pretty.
Sherlock smiled. And, even though John had just met the man, the good doctor was absolutely certain that the smile was real and that it was rare. Suddenly John felt sorry for the awkward idiot.
Which was why he said, "You can borrow her. For a little bit. A few days. Maybe a week. Borrow. As in bring her back. Here. You have to bring her back. To me. Okay?"
Sherlock's grin grew.
"But first you have to say please."
This time Sherlock was not given pause. Because Sherlock will do anything for a thing he wants and he long ago ceased being on speaking terms with embarrassment, shame, or self-consciousness. So the good detective clasped his hands behind his back, he bowed at the waist, and he inclined his shaggy head and he said soft and sweet and low, "Please, Dr. Watson?"
For his part Dr. Watson would spend the next six days, three hours, and twenty minutes—John didn't count, he just happened to, uh, know—thinking about the pretty bowing fool with the fluffy hair and the big coat. While he was thinking about him he'd think about things he'd been meaning to think through for awhile now, things about himself he wasn't sure about. Things he was pretty sure he was now pretty sure about. By the time Sherlock came back with the skull six days, three hours, and twenty minutes later John was sure and John was ready.
For his part Sherlock took his time coming back not because he needed the skull for as long as all that but because he'd deduced a whole lot of things about the short, angry doctor in their unusual acquaintance and he knew the doctor needed time to deduce those things about himself.
So when Sherlock did come back he was pleased to see he'd correctly deduced that John had deduced the things he'd needed to deduce. Though right then and for a good couple years after Sherlock was irked he'd got one bit of his original deduction wrong: Dull was the last thing John Watson was. The very last.
It's always something.
At last, a wee, slightly-skull-based story for Mid0nz, who is so very patient.
