His thoughts were the first thing to come back. Before the fatigue that held him pinned to the bed gave the first hint that it would ever go away, even as the heat flashed over his body in waves and left him cold and shivering and empty in its wake. He could think before his voice was enough to mutter Johns name and have it be even close to recognizable in his own ears.
It burned.
To hear him and not be able to reach out, to lay in darkness and do nothing but wait for the bodies to come in, to mutter to him as if he might be asleep and put their hands on John so carelessly the way he could not do with all of his energy.
Like he was not going mad for want even when John lay next to him and held his hand.
It was not enough.
John was his and so close and he couldn't…
And then his body was coming back but it was not his, not like before. Each motion cost him hours of rest, hours of his mind wandering where he could not lead it, falling into dark evil places. To reach out and touch was almost more than he could do, but he tried anyway. Succeeded anyway. Most of the time.
To feel John under his hand, safe and warm and his, and when his hand fell short, when his effort was wasted and the back of his eyes stung and the sound died in his throat and it all burned like acid a hand would close over his and bring his palm flat over a cheek, over his heart, pressed against kisses he could not reach out for on his own. And then he would smile. In the darkness, like none of it mattered, like no one else mattered but them, just for him, he would smile in a way that almost felt like happiness.
John did not talk anymore.
Nana Hudson would sit with them and ask what story they wanted to read and he would wait for John to speak for them both and the silence would come heavier than before and they would all lie beneath it until she smiled like it hurt and picked a book and cuddled them to her as she read like they might break in her arms.
That would be okay. If John did not want to talk for them. If he wanted to save his voice just for them.
But John never even whimpered in his sleep now, he would not cry, if he fell he would not make a noise beyond an almost silent whoosh of breath before standing up with blank eyes. But worst of all, the whispered bubbling words that followed Sherlock into sleep when the darkness pressed in and threatened to drown him, the words that came when they were wrapped tight against each other so that nothing could get them, had died too.
But if he did not want to speak Sherlock would not make him. And if the others tried to make him he would stop them.
It was alright even if it was not. Because John was warm and close and when he looked into his eyes it was all there like the words were still in his head without John saying a thing. The pain and hurt and despair and worry and the yes and yours and it's okay now.
He would be John's voice.
Everyone thinks he is sleeping but he is not. He does not want to sleep, he slept too long already. What if John needs him and he misses it because he is weak and sleeping? What if next time he wakes up and John loses more than just his voice?
But he is too tired to move.
So he lies there.
Wishing to move.
Thinking of ways to make John better again.
But maybe he does not need one to fix the other.
John does not tell him, cannot tell him in more than looks and the press of his body but Sherlock knows what has stolen his voice, what has taken this comfort away from him.
The dreams that come in the day.
He does not know if everyone has them, if Nana and Mycroft and the whole world have them and no one ever talks about them because they hurt or they go away if you pretend they do not exist. He does not want to ask.
He does not want to explain.
To admit he has them if no one else does. He does not want them to know, even if they already do.
They would ask and they would not understand. Maybe they forgot what it was like, maybe they have spent so long pretending that they went away by themselves and if he mentioned it they would come back in a flood and hurt them.
He does not want to hurt them.
Maybe no one else has dreams like that, so real that they stop and you still can't breathe and you can feel the water in your mouth and you are drowning even when you are not.
But John does.
And he needs to protect John.
They make the dreams go away, they always have. They keep each other from falling too far. Whispers and hands and arms that make the thoughts stop and they never drown, they never get crushed.
But John did. All by himself he could not make them stop.
And maybe if he makes the dreams come, if he searches them out and lets them happen and the darkness swallows him and he finally falls, drowns, starves, freezes, suffocates, dies then he can help.
He can make John okay again, he can teach him how to be okay and never leave him again.
They all think he is sleeping, but he is not.
It is like living in two worlds at once, worlds that have nothing to do with one another and neither knows the other exists.
Like being two people at once and neither at the same time.
If he died in one would he slip effortlessly into the other, no longer sure which is the dream and if either are real?
Mycroft is picking him up and holding him in his arms and he is alone in the dark and it is impossibly cold like he will never be warm again and his wrists burn where they touch metal.
Mycroft is speaking but the words wash over him because he is cold, too cold to think, frozen, and words like 'food' and 'eat' and a desperate, impossible whispered 'please' do not make sense and he thinks 'brother' and that does not make sense either. How can food matter when you can no longer feel your fingers move?
And he thinks 'John' and he is ready to die. To freeze. But he doesn't.
He stopped shaking; it stopped being cold at all. How could he have ever thought this was cold? But he can still see his breath in the air and that is wrong. And it is all darkness, blues and blacks and he cannot move but there is another body. Not Mycroft. Even though Mycroft is still there, still begging him to eat without begging at all.
He needs to die! To freeze! For John. But there is a voice, heavy and not cruel, but somehow that makes it worse. Apathetic.
'Remember this.' And he does. He will.
"Sherlock please." And this time it is begging. But he can't, not yet.
It is just fear. Just the twists of empty hallways. But it does not hurt to exist. Somewhere he is lying down with his eyes closed and John is warm, his hair is soft where it is tucked under his chin, his breath on his neck, somewhere else he wanders alone.
Nana is there. She is carrying him and John is reaching up to hold his hand but he is too far away so he smiles and John pretends to believe him. It is warm, hot, and his skin is already turning pink under the intense sunlight but the water is cool and welcoming, his head bobs above the water and there is no one else around. Just the sound of a car nearby stopping too quickly, the slamming of a car door.
Nana runs the tap on the tub and water and bubbles fill the bath, warm and welcoming, splashing, gushing.
Someone else near the water. Not mad, talking to him. He wants to swim away but he does not. They have swim trunks on and the water is so cool. The man laughs.
Nana moves to take off Johns shirt but he takes a step back, worry and fear not needing words. She murmurs soothingly but he takes Sherlock's hand in his and buried his face in his palm, eyes pressing into his hand. She ruffles his blond hair and Sherlock can feel the breath of relief against his skin. John looks carefully up as she walks out of the room.
The man is in the water, he is coming closer but he cannot see his face.
'Do the stroke I taught you.'
And he does. He moves his legs behind him and kicks perfectly, he slides forward in the water like a fish and he can see the way his bare arms look yellow under the surface of the water as they stretch out before him. Beneath him the bottom of the lake is lost in darkness and the water is colder when his feet kick just a little too low. He likes the top where the water is warmer.
He does not like the cold.
Mycroft is kneeling on the ground in front of them, carefully lowered to one knee and he looks pained. John is sitting on the ground behind him, his brown eyes watching them both and he is so tired and he wants to sit down too but he has to be strong. He hears his own voice without ever deciding to use it.
"I will take care of him."
And when Mycroft leaves the room and the pain has nothing to do with his knees it is John who helps him take off his clothing and helps him into the tub. It takes a moment too long but there is trust and gratitude in his face and John follows him in with one parting glance to his long sleeved shirt. John holds him up above the level of the water when the effort of sitting becomes too much.
The man is closer now and he is talking, saying something, his smile is huge, like he has a secret, and it is probably important but Sherlock cannot think. He knows that look.
The water is cooling but John is warm against his back and there are hands in his hair, maybe Mycroft will not be upset if they are both clean.
The water is cold. The water is dark and everything is sick yellow brown and when he kicks the silt kicks up until he cannot see anything at all even though his eyes are wide open. The silt swirls around him and when he screams the water in his mouth is cold.
He is panting and John is holding him tight and he can almost feel the words that are not coming, like Johns throat is his own, but a trickle of water passes his lips and he cannot breathe.
He screams again but this time it comes out silent. The sound nothing but a reverberation in the water, useless. He should not have done that.
His lungs burn and everything else is cold, the cold is seeping into him, infiltrating his bones, his organs. Silt and water in his mouth, in his eyes. A ring around his ankle of burning flesh, fingers trapping him, hot and hard and not letting go.
John is breathing deep and fast against him as if he could breathe for both of them. His body is light and useless and it is easy for John to turn him in his lap and hold his face with both hand so that their foreheads are touching and John is breathing against his mouth and brown eyes are pinning him in place, begging the way Mycroft begged.
He wants to scream again, wants to beg, he looks up and the sun is streaming down at him, almost visible through the water. The hand on his ankle is still there but there is slack, he kicks up and his hand breaches the surface. Hot, warm, air.
The slack runs out, fingers tighten around his ankle.
He sobs into the water.
A wet hiccupping breath and Sherlock realizes that the water in his mouth tastes wrong. Salty and warm. He is not crying, but John is.
Black, around the edges the world is going black and it burns and his lungs are screaming and he takes another mouthful of cold dirty water.
He cannot give up. He has to figure this out. For John. John hiccups through his tears. It is the first sound he has made.
He wants to give up. Has to give up. He cannot kick anymore. His arms will not move. The world is going black.
And the hand lets go and somehow he moves. He breaches the surface and for one horrible second there is air everywhere but he is so full of water he cannot breathe.
The hand has caught him again. He wants to cry out but he does not have the time. One quick breath.
He coughs, deep and raspy and wet and his breath is gone and he wants to cry.
He coughs, deep and raspy and wet and John is crying.
The water is cold and half in his mouth and he will not survive and everything is murky yellow brown and the sun is gone even when he looks up.
There is a yell, a curse, and the sound of a door being thrown open. Expensive shoes on wet tile and he is in the water and he is dying and he is in Mycroft's arms gasping and John is pulling at Mycroft's arm until he too is picked up and the three of them stay like that, holding on and wet, and breathing and crying.
He was so close.
Next time he will not fail John.