John could hear Mikheia's laugh from down the hallway as he neared the boy's door. So the nurse hadn't left yet. He should wait until she was done giving him the rounds.
Mikheia had been remarkably upbeat about the whole event, despite having a hole punched in his shoulder, despite blacking out from the pain right as Mycroft's helicopter landed on the front lawn (John hadn't missed Sherlock's eye roll), despite the hour long helicopter ride to Berlin, and despite being on three different kind of antibiotic-painkiller cocktails. Maybe that was what made him so happy…
He hadn't seen Sherlock since the detective had grazed his fingers over the raised skin, that scarring condemnation, that I.O.U. like it was a chalk mark he hoped would wipe off before he stood and without another word stalked off down the hall. Part of John wanted to feel hurt, wanted to feel rejected, but he pushed back against it, knowing that it was Sherlock's nature to do things no one understood. But John understood; he understood very well actually.
Sherlock used his aloof attitude to distance himself from an issue, to give him a vantage point and clarity so he could spot and gather facts that his emotions blinded him of, but with John his mind was in constant fog and mist that hung over him like spider web, unable to escape, unable to burn away. He needed space, especially to clear his mind of the previous night's events, and John understood that, at least in essence. John, contrary to appearances, understood many things about Sherlock, like why he had allowed Mikheia to come with him to Bruges and then Leipzig (because nothing was ever just an accident with Sherlock), why he had looked at John so forlornly in that hotel room (because he didn't know how to say sorry, but John knew he wanted to), why he let John kiss him (because John was saying sorry), why he kissed John back (because he was saying sorry too), and why he had all but sprinted off down that hospital hallway after seeing John's ear.
John sighed. Mikheia had offered him a painkiller or two, just to take the initial bite out of his wounds, but John had refused, although not on the grounds of personal safety. The medicine was perfectly fine and appropriate for both of them to use, but he didn't want to. The pain kept him focused, kept him reminded of just what he had been through and that he had survived.
Maybe one day he would have the heart to tell Sherlock all that had really happened.
Something about this hospital made him uneasy. Mycroft had assured them copiously that the security on the hospital was airtight and that they were perfectly safe here in Berlin, but John still felt uncomfortable, especially after Sherlock's scoff at his brother's declarations of safety. Yet Sherlock would not allow Mikheia to be treated here if he felt it was fully unsafe. John smirked. Like Sherlock had any say in what happened now, much less where Mikheia was treated. And it wasn't like they had had many options to choose from after he'd been shot. They'd had to do the best with what they had. But he and Mycroft had silently agreed long ago to pretend in all situations like Sherlock was the one in charge and let him feel important, even if he was being an arsehole; especially if he was an arsehole, because that was usually when his mind burned at its brightest and they couldn't afford or care to break him from his revelations.
He dedicated himself to Sherlock, to going out to get groceries because Sherlock didn't like to, he took calls and cases like a secretary because Sherlock didn't care to talk to people if he deemed it unnecessary, he was at Sherlock's every beck and call like his own personal butler, and what did he get in return?
John shut his eyes tightly and sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.
He'd been having misgivings to say the least about a relationship with Sherlock. He had doubts and fears just like everyone else, but they ran deeper whenever Sherlock was tangled in them.
He knew he was behaving too rashly, he knew that something so fresh shouldn't be spoiled so fast, but he couldn't stop the shadows from rising where they lay. He felt dazed, stunned, like everything around him was in motion and blurred yet he remained still among it all.
Everything had happened so fast, but he was to blame for kicking it into motion. He had kissed Sherlock first. He was responsible for whatever happened afterwards. Yet…he had thought he was going to die. He had stood up and kissed Sherlock and lock him in and left the room thinking he was walking to his death. But he was confident in his abilities, confident that he was the better man in the situation and, if anything, he'd get Mikheia out alive (which, technically, he had), confident that he could steal a gun, aim, and shoot before the other two. And he was proven right. But when Sherlock had kissed him, when their roles had switched and it was Sherlock kneeling over him, John's back soaking with someone else's blood, with a desperate emptiness on his face, John knew what his actions had done. He knew he had opened the box and there was no lidding it again. Sure, he could ignore it and then he and Sherlock could part ways (never again, not in a million years). Sure, they could pretend like it never happened and go back to their own happy little adventures like they did before. But none of that could ever, ever match up to what could happen if he accepted it. Accepted the fact that he, a man, loved Sherlock, another man, and it felt okay—more than okay—it felt fucking beautiful, like he belonged there in that small, cramped space of Sherlock's heart, and Sherlock belonged in his, although he was getting the better deal, as John's was roomier.
Yet Sherlock scared him. In many and most ways but in violence. His coldness, his ability to separate himself from everything, to sever off reality like a gangrenous limb and live without it, his distance…was he able to cut John out and then sew him back on like a reattached arm? John knew nothing of what their separation had been like for Sherlock, he had only gotten glimpses, flashes of light before the darkness returned. John's fears were open water concerning Sherlock, and he found himself threatening to drown more often than he was comfortable with.
And where was Sherlock now?
John didn't know. Somewhere, being a mad genius alone in a corner, he supposed.
He needed to stop thinking about this. He was tired, he was crashing off adrenaline and shock and he was possibly feverish judging by the burn of the wounds on his back.
The nurse came out quietly, shutting the door with a smile on her face.
"How is he?"
"Better." She said brightly. "Much better."
John knocked on the door before going in.
A bright smile lit Mikheia's face when he saw John walk in.
"Morning!"
"Hey Mikheia…how are you feeling?"
"Good, sir. I feel very tip and top of the shape."
"Mikehia, I'm sorry."
"Why?"
"For that." John said, motioning to the bandages. "For everything we've put you through."
Mikheia stared at him for a moment.
"You are…moving on without me. You and Mr. Holmes are continuing your quest."
"Yes…but quest isn't the word I'd use."
"But you are knights ridding the world of evil. That sounds like a quest to me, sir."
"A quest has one goal, though. I don't know if Sherlock wanted just one when he—when he left the first time."
"What is your goal, then?" Mikheia asked and John fell into silence, thinking.
"I want to drag Sherlock back to Baker Street kicking and screaming if I have to, and I want to live the rest of my life in relative peace." John paused. "With him, I suppose." He added with a smile.
"To be together at the end, without interruption." Mikheia reiterated. "It is a quest now." Mikheia smiled as he stared at his hospital bracelet. "I think, in that tale I was the bumbling saddle boy."
"Mikheia, you know you're anything but a saddle boy."
"Then I was the horse."
They both laughed.
"You know, when I go back to Novgorod, I will tell my friends of our adventures and they will not believe me. They will think I am telling a pale lie."
"A white lie?"
Mikheia nodded.
"Ah, well…I mean you can't fake a bullet wound, can you?"
"I suppose not." Mikheia smiled. "I guess I should just not wear my shirt all the time, then? And then they might believe me."
John laughed and Mikheia looked to his left shoulder, where the bandages wrapped around a new scar. His smile faded to a quiet grin.
"We match now, sir." He said quietly.
John smiled.
"You know, you don't have to call me that. I'm not Sherlock. I'm not your boss."
"It is an act of deference, sir. I owe you my life now."
"Well, you owe it a couple times over, so I might just overlook them all."
They both chuckled and fell into a comfortable silence. John liked that. He liked that he wasn't expected or required to talk much in either Sherlock or Mikheia's presence and that there could be silence where nothing wanted or needed to be said.
"It is curious, though, is it not?" Mikheia said, scratching at the burn mark on his collar.
"What is?"
"Well, in his travels, Mr. Holmes made the choice to go alone, but instead he let the both of us join him."
"Sherlock didn't let me join him…" John scoffed then thought better. Sherlock had indeed let John join him. He had let him live in his flat with him, had let him go on that call on the adventure he had dubbed the Study in Pink, had let him call himself colleague and then friend…Sherlock had let John do many things.
So what did that leave John with to do on his own? What could he do without the direct permission of others? He had kissed Sherlock, for one. He hadn't asked or been granted permission for that one. Was that all? Were spontaneous acts of affection all he was limited to? He needed more than that to go on, surely. He had spared and saved Sherlock's life twice in the church, and he had expressly gone against permission from his superiors. So that was it, then? Affection and perfidy was all he was allowed to use for his own freedom to do what he wanted?
This was one hell of an existential crisis.
"I'll see you later, yeah?" John said, affectionately patting the boy on his uninjured shoulder.
"Most indubitably, sir."
"Good. Get some rest. Doctor's orders."
Mikheia smiled as John shut the door. Once he knew John couldn't see him, Mikheia shut his eyes and let himself collapse into pain.
What was wrong with him? Was it because of the ambiguity of his and Sherlock's possible relationship? Was it because he was tired? Was it because he had learned that the price of his freedom, concerning the agency, involved lies and drugged deceit?
John supposed it was a cocktail of all of those.
He sat outside Mikheia's room, on an empty stretcher tucked away in an alcove, hands clasped in front of him like a penitent man.
"John."
John looked up, into Sherlock's face, calm, pale, and beautiful. He had figured something out. John hadn't wanted him to, but Sherlock was Sherlock, and so of course it was inevitable.
The question. The question he knew Sherlock had wanted to ask since he had shown up at Mycroft's door, bloody and barely coherent, but had never known how to bring it up.
"Where is Mary?"
John shut his eyes.
And thus ends Arc I! Have no fear, Arc II begins next chapter! I'll be home tomorrow, so I'll try to get it up by then!