Lesson in Friendship 8 - Vulnerability
Disclaimer: Sherlock, John and all other mentioned characters belong to BBC, Mr. Moffat, Mr. Gatiss or Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. I just borrowed them for fun. I wrote this for my personal delight and improving my English, no copyright infringement intended. No money changed hands and no profit is being made.
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Chapter 14 - Tuesday evening – Tortured
John wiped his mouth once more and then rinsed it with water to get rid of the foul taste. He needed to get back to Sherlock and help him.
When he stumbled back to the living room Sherlock had indeed not moved. In fact he stood there as if frozen in shock.
"Sherlock?" John stammered.
No reaction.
"Sherlock?… Answer me!" John begged, "Come on, we need to get you cleaned up!"
John rounded Sherlock and when he saw the other man's eyes he fought tears again. Sherlock was staring into the distance, his eyes red but dry.
He looked so… lost.
"Sherlock?" John gently reached for his arm and after a moment of hesitation he wrapped his fingers gently around it, when his eyes fell onto Sherlock's wrists he clenched his jaw. There were marks of metal restrains, they looked as if Sherlock had fought desperately… or as if they had held his weight for quite some time?
John hurt with the emotionless figure in front of him, who was showing so much emotion piled in his own unique way that the doctor wondered how he even was able to stand upright.
What else had to happen to make these walls finally crumble?
"Sherlock? Come on, sit down. I'll have a look at that," John gently stirred Sherlock to the nearest chair. There was no resistance.
"Sit."
Sherlock blinked several times, like fighting his way back to reality… and fighting his distress. John had seen this before, when the detective had spend time in his mind palace he often needed a moment to adjust and switch back to real life.
"On a scale from one to ten how much does it hurt?"
"I don't know," Sherlock breathed.
John checked his watch. He could give him another dose of Ibuprofen soon. He fetched the first aid bag and started to work.
Carefully, he inspected the wounds and while doing so came to the conclusion that it was not a good working position and that he needed more light.
"I need you to lie on your stomach… in your bed," he added before Sherlock could even try to think about the sofa.
"What for?"
"So I can do this without kneeling, and you can relax."
Sherlock blew his breath out in a way that clearly showed he didn't think this was necessary.
"Come on."
John tugged at his elbow, one of the few places that didn't seem hurt.
The detective stood up slowly and shuffled towards his bedroom. John looked after him with even more horror. He looked so very battered. Something he had never thought possible to see on this man.
The doctor fetched the medical stuff and hurried after him.
Sherlock had lain down on the bed and his face was turned away from the door.
After moving the standard lamp into position to light his working area, John sat on the bed.
"Tell me if you need me to pause," John said softly.
With care, he disinfected the whole area as good as possible.
Sherlock didn't make a sound when the burning liquid touched his skin… but a few minutes into the cleaning John felt his trembling get worse.
The torn stitches needed to be redone. It was quite clear the wounds hadn't been taken care of for about eight to ten days, probably since Mycroft's physician had initially treated them.
John cursed silently. Sherlock wasn't even remotely taking care of himself!
"When were those stitches to be removed?"
"Tomorrow."
"And when exactly were you… tor-… eh…?" he couldn't even say it, "When did this happen?"
"Last time they beat me… maybe four days before the restaurant."
"Maybe?"
"I don't know…" Sherlock's voice was a whisper.
"Why not?" John probed, desperately hoping to get some more insight.
"It's… a bit of a blur."
"Why?"
"The journey back was kind of confusing… and later Mycroft's physician knocked me out."
"Journey from where?"
"Serbia?"
"This happened in Serbia?"
"Yes."
"So you came back and went to Mycroft?"
"No… He came in and got me out… Watched them beat me into a pulp before doing so."
"What?" John yelled and Sherlock winced.
"Well, he needed his cover to be convincing, at least that was his argument."
"I'll punch him for that!"
"You punch people a lot lately, don't you?… Although Mycroft might deserves it for this… and I probably did, too."
John huffed in disapproval.
"Is that why you let me hurt you even more, because you think you deserved it? Is that why you didn't defend yourself?"
Sherlock didn't reply but the doctor could feel him tensing up.
"…and why you let this fester instead of taking care of it?… It's inflamed where the stitches were torn. You know what that means… this would have gotten life threatening soon if not taken care of."
Sherlock's shivering was not getting any better, quite the opposite in fact.
"The stitches were torn when I threw you to the floor in the restaurant, weren't they?"
Sherlock didn't answer and John took that as confirmation.
"God,…" he had to fight hard again to keep his emotions in check again. "How long were you held captive?"
Sherlock stayed silent, he had not moved the tiniest bit since John had started treating him.
"Sherlock, please tell me. You know it hurts me more to be kept in the dark than been confronted with the truth, please."
"Hmm… Approximately seven… days, before I was pulled out by Mycroft. I lost count, then, too."
"What did they do, except beating you?"
"Chained me to the ceiling…" Sherlock whispered in distress, "Prevented me from going to sleep and… it was a cellar. No way to know if it was day or night."
So Sherlock had been tortured for several days actually. John closed his eyes and bit his lips to contain his emotions and calm his stomach. Concentrating on the matter at hand was what the other man needed right now, not being confronted with John's emotions.
"I need to clean the infected areas, where the stitches are torn, then close them again," John gently informed, inspecting the wounds carefully. This was not life-threatening yet, but surely causing a lot of pain. The wounds should have healed better by now.
"Okay," Sherlock mumbled.
"I'll give you a local for that, relax."
Sherlock didn't react when John wiped the area again and then administered the anaestetic, piercing the skin at several points to numb the area thoroughly.
While he waited for the stuff to take effect, he inspected Sherlock's 'good' skin. It was dry, and scaly, even cracked at some points. Sherlock was malnourished and the lack of vitamins and certain minerals was visible even on the outside, the prolonged healing was caused by the shortcoming, too.
The detective felt cold to the touch and when John wanted to check his BP the prone man simply refused to move and therefore he couldn't do it. John gave up, no use, he already knew it was low.
The doctor went to the kitchen to get a glass of water and searched for some fizzy-tablets with vitamins or something, he knew he had seen them somewhere before.
Well, that was two years ago. But in the end he found them, they were past their date but looked okay. He also found the prescription meds in the fridge, the ones he had before thought were stuff for one of Sherlock's experiments. There were some heavy duty painkillers, anti-inflammatory, too.
John returned to Sherlock's bedside, the detective hadn't moved and was still shivering, so he turned up the heating.
He rested his hand against Sherlock's lesser damaged shoulder for a moment, lost for words and just wanting to signal his presence as a friend.
"Sherlock, you're exhausted, when have you last slept?"
"While 'go," Sherlock mumbled into his pillow.
"So days then. Are you having nightmares of the torture?… Are there other memories that haunt you?"
Sherlock stayed silent.
"Talk to me, please."
"Can we…" Sherlock's voice was so hoarse he needed to pause to clear his throat, "Can we do this later?"
John hesitated, wondering if the other man was trying to evade it, but then realised that Sherlock must feel like shit and decided to leave it for now… There was just one more thing he really needed to know.
"Alright, but I need to see how far down the injuries go."
The prone figure huffed in annoyance, "They stop about eleven centimetres below the waistline, in the middle of the sacrum, no need for treatment there."
"Please let me see myself. You need to get rid of the trousers for sleeping anyway."
John could almost hear Sherlock roll his eyes, but then he positioned himself on his side and opened his waistband.
"Cold…" The detective mumbled.
After adjusting the heating to the maximum John fetched a blanket that was draped over a nearby chair to give Sherlock time to work his trousers out of the way.
Before the moment could get awkward Sherlock was back on his stomach, his face turned away from John, who then covered his lower body with the blanket. The doctor held the tube of fizzy tablets over Sherlock's shoulder for him to see.
"Did you use those for experiments or are they fit to drink?"
"Fit," Sherlock mumbled and John dropped a tablet into the glass of water.
Once more he started inspecting Sherlock's back. The sacral area looked not better than the rest of Sherlock's back and John tugged down the boxers a bit more to get a better look.
He frowned, a new, far more horrible question springing into his mind.
Had Sherlock been assaulted in other ways than being beaten?
There were cuts on the upper half of the buttocks… but he didn't want to undress Sherlock any more for the moment.
He stood up and rounded the bed to look into Sherlock's face for the next question.
"Sherlock, open your eyes, mate."
The detective did, slowly. His eyes were glazed over with pain when he looked up.
The doctor knelt down next to the bed so they were at the same height. John pushed back Sherlock's hair so get a better view of the other man's face without touching the skin.
"Did they assault you sexually?"
Sherlock blinked slowly.
"Sherlock, answer me…"
"No," Sherlock murmured, looking into John's eyes with an indulgent look, then closed his eyes again. John was sure he was telling the truth and the relief about that fact made his legs wobbly.
A few moments later the doctor had returned to the other side of the bed and sat down without any more words and went to work.
He cleaned the wounds, inspected the torn skin and made new knots with fresh sterile threat.
Half an hour later he was done and bandaged the area. Gently, he applied some antibacterial ointment over the rest of Sherlock's back. The man was still trembling but the movement of John's hands seemed to help him relax a bit. When John noticed that, he prolonged the gentle contact a bit, but just in a medically over-accurate way, no more.
"You need some rest," John ended the treatment session, tying not to disturb the relaxation.
"Hm, what for?"
"Make a deduction, detective."
"Consulting…. "
"Yeah, yeah, I know, shut up. I'll get some painkillers, then you need to sleep."
John went into the kitchen and read the patient information leaflet while returning with the pills. He rounded the bed again and tipped Sherlock's shoulder.
"Here, take them."
Sherlock dawdling managed to get into a position that would allow him to drink from the glass, then downed the offered meds with the now dissolved vitamins.
"You want something to help you sleep, too?" John offered. He was sure Sherlock was suffering from the memories of his imprisonment, if his jerkiness and the nightmares were any indication. Probably there were even more things from the past two years that would pass as traumatic, but he needed to wait for another moment to ask for those.
"No."
"Okay, I'll get some stuff from Tesco. Rest."
Sherlock made no signs that he was interested to move.
The doctor briefly touched the back of Sherlock's head, trying to show support and give some comfort.
"Take a nap. I'll be back in an hour."
Sherlock didn't react and John understood that he might want some peace and quiet after this ordeal.
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A/N:
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