Define 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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Special thanks to my loyal readers who stick with me and especially those who give me feedback. Thank you guys, you're great!
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Chapter 55
Saturday, late afternoon
Two hours after John had returned and Sherlock had found the key ingredients of the drug cocktail, there was a knock on the kitchen door.
"Expecting visitors?" John asked.
"No. It's my brother. Umbrella tip against the floor, though he carried it as soon as he reached the bottom of the stairs."
"Come in, living room," John yelled over the sound of the telly.
"What do you want?" Sherlock rudely greeted his sibling.
"Mummy left this for you. She forgot to give it to you before."
Mycroft handed him a large package of what looked like special blends of coffee and tea.
Sherlock took it with a frown, "Thank her for me."
Now John frowned, saying thank you wasn't something the detective usually did.
"You'll do it. It's the least you can do. You know how much she'd like to hear from you now and then. Now you have an excuse to please her, take it… and thank her for last night. Show gratefulness for once."
Although John shared the idea in general he now looked up at the ceiling in annoyance.
Hadn't they just talked about Mycroft not being smug a few hours ago?
Sherlock returned to type something on his laptop, as if his brother wasn't there.
Mycroft started to inspect the case notes and pictures that littered the room.
"So, this is the case you are currently working on... You woke my interest in this puzzle last night. Seems to be quite a difficult one."
"Are you here to gloat? Go away. I might have a trail and I need to work on it."
"One of my colleagues introduced me to a new face recognition software, he was eager to test it. Do you have a picture?" Mycroft asked casually.
"We only have sketches, useless for this kind of programs."
"Yes, they are. What do you have?"
"Nothing, or I'd have solved it already!" Sherlock exploded, "What do you want?" he repeated.
"Entertainment, to be honest. My schedule today is extraordinary dull and I'd prefer to play deducing with you rather than attend a meeting with… but that's no business of yours."
Sherlock eyed the other Holmes suspiciously.
"Are they still in London?"
John needed a very long moment until he understood the detective was probably talking about his parents. Mycroft of course was more used to the sudden mental leaps and understood immediately.
"No, they left this morning, after breakfast. I was referring to some people at… work."
Sherlock seemed not interested to introduce Mycroft to the case and when John realised that, he decided to push a bit.
"Actually Mycroft, there might be a thing Lestrade can't do, official channels are just too slow and… the military might refuse to help anyway."
John felt Sherlock's unnerved and angry gaze on his back, but he ignored it.
"Oh, military. What is it? Of course I can't promise to be of any help, but it might be worth a try."
The former soldier started to explain, he deliberately did a lousy job, in order to make Sherlock take over, it only took thirty-five seconds until he did.
In the end Mycroft announced that he was sure he'd be able to find out who had used the nickname - if the data still existed. A few minutes later he had vanished down the stairs again.
Sherlock's mood had dropped into a temperature range that was close to freezing by then. John therefore decided to make some tea and wait until the atmosphere had changed to something distinctly positive before heading for the next sensitive topic, antidepressants.
But the detective was not eager to let himself being dragged into any conversation and answered John's questions with monosyllables while he continued to experiment.
The doctor had thought now that he had found the drug that was used in the cocktail he'd stop experimenting, but the chemist tested and tested.
After another hour John finally dared to start discussing the subject.
"Sherlock, I want to talk to you about something, can you listen for a moment?"
"If you must."
"During the last days… I had the impression you were not really with us, you seem to be… absent. Er, concentrated inwards and… in quite a dark mood. Often, I have the impression that your body is physically present, but your mind is somewhere else. Far away and wandering in things that don't do you any good - and I don't mean the case."
The doctor tried to see any changes in Sherlock while he spoke, and found his movements were turning stiffer.
"You're working on autopilot most of the day, aren't you? You're not really paying attention to the physical world. And I… I wondered if you'd let me prescribe some ADs for you, nothing severe, just some mild stuff."
Sherlock halted mid movement, not looking up, though. He didn't respond for almost ten seconds.
John hoped he was really considering the offer, but then Sherlock continued the begun movement and answered with an almost huffed, "No."
John hesitated, not wanting to give in that fast.
"I think it would make things a bit easier on you and help you gather some strength. You know, you wouldn't need so much effort to keep depressive thoughts at bay and therefore can concentrate on the important things."
"I… said… No!" Sherlock repeated, now with a slightly threatening undertone.
"Oh, come on, it's not that I suggest you take the heavy duty stuff, I just want to aid a bit with this. You'd profit from that."
"I'll surely not profit from things that will dull my thought processes, kill my motivation, make me drowsy and my legs restless! I usually suffer more from the side effects than I benefit of those medications, therefore I will not take any of those!"
The last words were spoken quite loudly and to underline the message Sherlock let his flat hand hit the table which send the jars and beakers clinging.
The doctor flinched about the controlled – or pretended - anger Sherlock was broadcasting.
"Alright, then," he said with a firm voice and returned to the living room, sitting down in front of the telly.
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Another two hours later he had gathered enough courage to approach Sherlock again, this time he suggested to do another mind palace session, but the offer was turned down in a similar way, only this time Sherlock seemed not as pissed as before.
Instead, he sounded tired and demanded to be left alone, which made John even more uneasy, feeling unable to help and being sent away.
When he tried to convince Sherlock to give it a try the detective retreated to his room and banged the door shut after himself.
John stood drained and out of ideas in the kitchen, wondering why it was all going so wrong.
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Later that night Sherlock went out to gather some intel about the used drug. He met his former dealers as well as some new ones, the latter were recommended by the ones he knew well.
Of course he was offered a variety of drugs at almost every meeting, and of course he had known it would happen the moment he had made up his mind to seek for information in these circles.
In fact, when he left the house he had he considered buying something to make them talk and then throw whatever he bought away. He had to admit, he had thought about seeking chemical relief repeatedly in the past months, he hadn't given in, but now… now, that everything was in pieces, he wondered what he was even fighting for.
The conversation with John had underlined the argument to take something, to help his mind rest, though not in a way John would approve.
It couldn't happen, he shouldn't do it… No!
He wouldn't even buy anything.
The will to fight was brought back, by the thought of John, for a few hours at least.
It was gone when he finally stood in front of his most reliable dealer - the one with the best quality supplies - and the man offered him cocaine.
He was able to decline, but then bought some morphine pills.
Pills, because they were less obvious and less risky to cause addiction, chances were higher to get addicted by injections.
They were just to have them in the house, for emergencies. He'd store them away and wouldn't use them if not absolutely necessary.
Fifteen minutes later he was back in the cab and he realised it was ridiculous. The dealer had slipped a vial of liquid Morphine Sulphate into his coat pocket when he was about to leave, had told him it was a bonus for coming back, and that he was always available and could get almost everything Sherlock wanted.
Only moments before he had reliably informed him that the things the detective was looking for couldn't be bought from him, too special.
Sherlock hadn't given the vial back, internally argued it would have made the man suspicious.
He just shoved the thought away that it was there and concentrated on the case.
Now, that he was sitting in the cab, he wondered if that had been deliberate.
He decided John mustn't know, and that was when it dawned on him, he had already a subconscious idea of what would happen, and that he'd succumb to the need to get some peace and rest from the cruelty of his current existence.
John was right, he needed a pause, relief… but he needed to be careful, John couldn't know, he'd tell Mycroft and his brother would make his life even more miserable than it already was.
He needed to be strict, exercise control, only take one pill in dire need, carefully avoid to slide down the road of addiction, keep the addictive factors as low as possible.
With a huff of sarcasm, that made the cabbie look at him in the rear-vision mirror, he understood he was weak and had fallen into his own trap already, out of habit.
He immediately had a bad conscience about his own thoughts, but a few moments later he let it all drop, because it didn't matter.
His world was gone, he was broken, everything was lost, he couldn't do this any longer, nothing mattered anymore. John would be better without him and the sooner he'd realise that and give up pretending to want to help the sooner this ordeal was over, for both of them.
Maybe he should retreat to Leinster Gardens and try the purchase, but that would probably have the effect that Mycroft was alerted before midnight, and from that moment he couldn't move around freely in London any longer.
Avoiding Mycroft's cameras would be time consuming and troublesome. Also, by this he risked that Mycroft found out about his bolthole, and that was the last thing he needed, this one was supposed to be a secret from everyone, his last resort.
So he headed back home, the only thing he had learned was that a person, who roughly fitted the description of the suspect, had tried to buy ingredients from someone. A person one of the dealers knew, but he hadn't spoken to anyone who actually had contact with the man or was able to describe him more than superficial, it was all hearsay.
Some of them knew where Sherlock could get the ingredients, because the suspect's request had made people attentive to the stuff, but Sherlock had his own sources and wasn't interested in buying more. So one more trail was getting cold.
Miserable and once more frustrated he sat in the back of the cab, shivering, outside a wet mixture of snow and freezing rain stormed against the windshield.
Would Lestrade be with John? He better be prepared to meet them there.
He felt the vial in his right coat pocket as he reached for his phone.
The detective decided to make a detour to get some stuff from Molly, he was not eager to meet the inspector with the items in his possession. Besides, in his youth he had promised Mycroft – as a rule - to always have Naloxon in stock when he had drugs in the house, too.
Also, he wanted some more blood to be drawn and suspected Molly would be easier to persuade than Mary or John to do it.
As soon as Molly had answered his text and told him that she was on duty this night he ordered the driver to change designation.
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One hour later he stopped another cab, now intending to head home.
Successful meeting, Molly had drawn half a litre of blood, which would be enough for loads of self made confrontation therapy days, and he had nicked meds and syringes.
By now chances were high Lestrade would've gone home. It was past one in the morning and Molly had been delighted to have company on her boring night shift.
Sherlock had just told the cabbie his home address when his phone broadcasted the arrival of a text.
'Where are you? JW'
'On my way back home. Lestrade still there? SH'
'Wasn't here. How long? JW'
Sherlock didn't reply the question and made sure everything was neatly stored in his coat so that it couldn't be seen or looked suspicious.
He assumed John was still downstairs and waiting for him due the tone of the text.
Would he pelt him with questions?
How he knew John he'd be aware this might be a danger night, and now Sherlock understood it was in fact one.
A moment later he sank deeper into the seat and thought about how this was not one in the sense Mycroft meant it, it was more that he needed rest and sleep than that he was tempted to get high from cocaine.
Suddenly, he became aware that his body was pestering him with increasing exhaustion and for once he was ready to give it what it wanted, rest, but his mind needed some rest, too, and he wouldn't get any without a little help. John had suggested it himself.
Filling the blood donation kit might have added to his tiredness, and he briefly wondered when he had eaten last before deciding it didn't matter.
He had in fact felt dizzy while Molly had slowly tilted the bag this way and that to keep the blood from lumping as they watched the red liquid filling it slowly.
The car arrived at 221b.
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A/N:
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Constructive criticism welcome.