A/N: Capturing_Essence (AO3): Now can we see some pretty mare chatting up John and Sherlock being Sherlock and chasing her away with his horsey deductions,please?

general zargon (FF): I kind of want to see some worried!Sherlock, maybe John goes missing for a day or so, then turns up again to smooth things over?

John didn't return that night, and Sherlock couldn't sleep. He found that his stall was too big and too open, his body too cold and too vulnerable. The lack of John's presence was obvious, and it disturbed him. The few times he managed to snare a moment or two of sleep, his dreams were the same- him, alone in blizzard, freezing to death and crying out for John, all while someone- something- else looked on.

By the time the sun rose, Sherlock had worked himself into a sweat-lather from worry. His dreams were usually dull, focusing on races or trailer rides, but the nightmares were potent. His body was trembling so hard he could barely stand.

His only thought was asking where John was.

Stan brought two buckets of feed and was stunned to find Sherlock alone and in such a frightened state. He took a moment to consider the situation, then entered the stall and took the horse out, clipping a lead line to the wet halter.

There wasn't enough energy in Sherlock's entire body to put up a fight; it was all trained on trying to find out where John was and why he hadn't come back. Things outside that, outside John, weren't worthy of his focus.

Someone was walking around him, a deep voice muttering about stress and a race. A hand ran down his face, stroking the sensitive skin between his nostrils, while the voice grew unhappier and deeper. It asked where John was, if anyone had seen him. The stroking grew faster, other voices joining the first one, all expressing their concern, but Sherlock couldn't focus on them.

It meant nothing, because what did anything mean when he was so alone?

One of the older stable workers turned jockey, a man Stan had trained himself, saddled Sherlock and got him prepared for the small, unofficial race the stable was hosting, claiming it was to scope out the competition when it was really a test to see how Sherlock was doing. The jockey was beyond nervous, knowing that he was being entrusted with one of the most expensive horses in all of England. The idea of how responsive Sherlock would be, how fast he would carry him, was frightening, almost as much as the things his imagination was telling him Sebastian would do if anything happened to the horse he was now leading to the track.

To anyone who'd never seen Sherlock before, and even some who had, it looked like he was leading a half-dead nag* instead.

The race was disastrous, at as far as the Morans and Sherlock were concerned.

Sherlock barely made it out the gate, and while he had been trapped inside, waiting to run forward, he'd been impossibly restless. The unfamiliar weight had frightened him, but his new jockey calmly did all he could to settle him, caressing Sherlock's already sweat-slick coat and speaking quiet reassurances. No matter where he looked, though, Sherlock's vision was flooded with flashes of grey that never became John.

He managed to take four stumbling steps out the gate before he fell to his knees, his back legs locked and swaying. It was all the veterinarian and stable staff could do to get him untacked and off the track.

As they started to lead him away, the other horses long forgotten, Sherlock caught sight of a short flash of grey, this one short and stocky. It wasn't looking at him, though. It was concentrating on the blur of white and brown. Everything inside him demanded that Sherlock break away and go to them. He let his instincts guide him as he broke out of the vet's too-loose hold and skittered away.

Unfortunately for the skewbald* mare trying to chat John up, Sherlock hadn't lost all his energy. More unfortunate, however, was that he was competitive and fiercely jealous. The moment he saw the way her ears were pointed towards John, her tail swishing lightly, and how far into the ex-police horse's space she was (on the side not ruined, of course) the despair that had been stuck in his gut was shattered by the need to highlight his possession of John.

"John!" he called, his chest heaving as he stood on the edge of hyperventilation.

That his friend's attention was on him the moment he spoke was a good sign- so, too, was the concern written across his brow.

"Sherlock! What are you doing?"

"Who is this?" Sherlock asked, pretending not to notice the worried tone John was using.

"What? Oh! Sherlock, this is Juanita. Juanita, meet Sherlock. Juanita's a show jumper the stable just bought."

"No, she isn't, though she could have been in the past."

Juanita gasped, and John gritted his teeth.

"Sherlock," he warned.

"Please. If someone new was coming here or had been brought over, I would have already known. Humans are unreliable, but I have other sources of information. The Morans are also very careful about overwhelming or overpopulating their stables. Lestrade arrived only a short time ago. There is no possible way that they would have felt it a good idea to bring another one over- particularly not a mare, as they don't earn as much, and definitely not a show jumper. Sebastian in particular looks down on jumping events, and his father is in agreement with him about them. And look at her teeth! They're completely wrong for someone the age of a show jumper. She's way too old, John- practically ancient! She's probably older than you are, John."

"Sherlock, that's enough..."

"Ah, but there's more!"

"No, there isn't. No more, Sherlock."

The soft, almost sad tone made Sherlock look up. He saw that John was shaking his head, his ears hanging down as though chastised, which was confusing at first. Why John would be looking guilty, Sherlock had no idea.

Then he saw the mare (Didn't she have a name? Irrelevant) and her expression, and it all fell into place. She didn't like what she'd heard (true though it was); John was unhappy that she was upset; he was also glaring at Sherlock, clearly blaming him, which was silly. If John had actually paid attention to the mare's appearance, he would have seen everything for himself.

He still wasn't done, however.

"Finally, John, she is a kept horse; her use in life at this point is to be a companion for some over-anxious horse who can't control himself; that chestnut* who ran well enough seems like a worthy candidate. If you're looking for talent and potential, she isn't worth your time, and I while I can see that I've angered you, I felt that you needed to know."

At some point during his finale, the mare had sneaked off, leaving just Sherlock and John- who was wearing a now-thunderous expression.

"A 'kept horse' you say?" he said too quietly for Sherlock not to see that something was quite wrong. "What do you think I am, Sherlock!" John bellowed, his fury causing his entire body to stretch out- elongating and puffing himself up unconsciously. "I'm the most kept horse there is! My life is just watching over you because I'm too weak and old for anything else!" The bluster suddenly left him, and Sherlock was faced with an almost two dimensional version of his friend. "I'm only here because some people thought that I'd keep you- a very "over-anxious" horse- relatively calm, so I'd appreciate it if you didn't say anything against the occupation."

Sherlock shook his head, exasperated. John had completely missed the important bits.

"John, you listened but you didn't understand. I'm not some horse. I have a future, and if you're with me, then you have a future as well. Those two, the chestnut and the coloured? They aren't going anywhere." Seeing that John was wavering, Sherlock struck again. "Besides... I hardly keep you. If I did, would I have spent last night in the stall by myself?"

That made John duck his head, seemingly ashamed.

"I'm sorry, Sherlock. It's just... I needed some space to think, and I couldn't get that around you. You always demand things from me, yet I know next to nothing about you. When you so angry but refused to tell me anything, it got under my skin- mostly because I can't help if I don't know what's going on- so I thought that instead of fighting with you, I'd spend the night on my own."

"You didn't go to Lestrade, then?"

John looked up at him curiously.

"No, I didn't. Why would I-... Sherlock, look at me now." He waited until Sherlock did so. "Sherlock, were you... jealous? Did you think I'd just leave you like that?"

"I... hadn't thought that far ahead. It was just upsetting that you would be so happy when I wasn't there."

"Everyone needs a break sometimes. Red Rum* himself would falter at an eternity exclusively with you, you know that?"

"John..."

"It's fine, Sherlock. It's all fine."

"John, I'm tired."

The short grey huffed, not at all put off by Sherlock's childlike tone.

"Come on, then. Off to bed."

As they walked back to their stall, Sherlock leaned against John's solid body. The heat inside it was warm and pleasant, John's gait rolling and gentle. Perhaps it was the comfort and safety he felt he could find in John that made him decide that he needed to tell his friend something, something to alleviate the imbalance of knowledge.

"I didn't sleep last night. I couldn't... not without you."

John didn't say anything, merely continued his slow walk to the stall.

Once there, he nudged Sherlock against the wall before taking his usual place at his friend's side, his weight something solid to which Sherlock could cling, and just before they drifted off, he whispered something quietly.

"I couldn't sleep without you, either."

*Nag: a horse, esp. one that is old or in poor health.

*Skewbald: a color pattern of horses; a skewbald horse has a coat made up of white patches on a non-black base coat, such as chestnut, bay, or any color besides black coat (black is known as piebald); in British English usage, skewbald and piebald (black and white) are together known as coloured, and the white markings are called "patches." In North American English, the term for all large spotted colouring is pinto, the and the markings are called "spots."
Image- http:/ / upload. wikimedia. org/ wikipedia/ commons/ 3/ 36/ American_Paint_Horse. JPG

*Chestnut: a hair coat color of horses consisting of a reddish-to-brown coat with a mane and tail the same or lighter in color than the coat; also goes by the name sorrel
Image- http:/ / upload. wikimedia. org/ wikipedia/ en/ 2/ 26/ Pottok2. jpg

*Red Rum: a champion Thoroughbred racehorse who achieved an unmatched historic treble when he won the Grand National in 1973, 1974 and 1977, and also came second in the two intervening years. As well as his unprecedented record in the world-famous steeplechase, a notoriously difficult race that has been referred to as being "the ultimate test of a horse's courage", Red Rum was also renowned for his remarkable jumping ability (he fell only once in over 100 races).
Instead of saying "Jesus Christ", I figured John would use a horse's name.