Sherlock Dari Drabble Ch 36
A Strong Constitution
A/N: Also known as 'A Strong Stomach', but not anywhere near as disgusting as that sounds, I promise. In this case, it's more the type of strong constitution you need to deal with a shocking event, rather than the sort you need to deal with disgusting things. There's a bit of nice!Sherlock and rather a lot of Lestrade whump. I won't say 'enjoy' because of the latter, but I hope you like the chapter anyway. If you're interested in where the information for the first part came from, searching for 'abandoned London Underground stations' should see you right. There will be two chapters, first from John's POV and then from Greg's.
As they zigzagged through the maze of tunnels under the British Museum, all John could think about was Greg's white, clammy face on a crackly visual feed, blinking owlishly with dazed eyes at the monitor. Sherlock streaked ahead as they passed the old, hand-painted Museum Underground signs, piled in a dank corner to their right in what had been the lower concourse. Their latest quarry had taken Greg in the middle of the night, waiting in his front garden until his keys scraped in the lock then aiming the brutal power of a Taser at the small of his back. They had known that someone with Greg's instincts and the muscle memory of a street-fighter couldn't be taken at full strength, or in the daylight, so they'd waited until he was exhausted and alone. The next-door neighbour had noticed the keys still in the lock when he left for work and had called the police. At 9am, John had awoken to a rather timid rapping on the door. Donovan had greeted him, face tearstained as she huddled on the sofa with a strong mug of tea. Sherlock had come down from a rare full night's sleep, taken one look at her, and gone to grab his coat.
It was a measure of the esteem in which Sherlock held Greg that he'd never even asked where Anderson was.
After three days of dead-ends and fruitless searching, a web address had turned up in a message addressed to Donovan. When they'd gingerly opened it, a masked man had stared into the camera, addressing them in a gruff Mancunian voice ("Obvious, he's with the extorters we're looking at on the Morton case.") before stepping aside to reveal a very bruised, but deeply defiant Detective Inspector. Hands chained behind his back to a pipe on the wall, Greg had scanned the scrap of paper shoved under his nose before wrinkling it with distaste.
"I won't say that."
"Have it your way then, copper."
John had winced, Sherlock's eyes narrowing a tiny fraction, as Sally's hands flew up to her mouth. The mystery man had swung back his foot and sunk it into the middle of Greg's belly, leaving him wheezing. Greg's deep brown eyes had locked on the screen, imploring them to be careful. The monitor had gone black, and Sherlock had combed every inch of the background for clues.
Three days later, a full week since Greg had disappeared, they had received another video. It was this one that John couldn't get out of his head. Greg's head had hung, lolling on his shoulders, its owner barely conscious. When Mystery Man grabbed a hank of hair and pulled it backwards, his eyes had opened to slits, already rolling back into the sockets, but a firm hand on his (clearly dislocated) shoulder had sent him staring to the front with a grunt of pain. His eyes were hazy and fever-bright, his face thinner than it had been. New bruises stood livid on his cheek and neck, a darkly dried trickle of blood from his nose adding to the one from his hairline.
Jerked back to the present by Sherlock's intense gaze and a hand on his shoulder, the two of them, and a panting Donovan, stood at the junction of three tunnels. Taking the most sensible route, each of them took a turning, with a radio to bypass the lack of mobile signal. Hurtling down the right-hand branch, John stopped dead as he came across a sopping wet piece of black wool-a balaclava. Holding his torch and his gun at right angles to one another, he crept along, holding his breath, until he came upon a shaft of light filtering down from an air vent set into the ceiling. It illuminated a right turn into what he supposed had once been a small office. He turned the corner.
Greg was slumped against the wall, white shirt torn and bloodied and salt-and-pepper hair matted with mud and dried blood from a nasty scalp wound. He rested against the white-painted wall, tiny flakes of lime mortar from the bricks crumbling into his cuffed, cupped hands. His feet were splayed, resting in a puddle of filthy water dripping from the sodden plaster above. John knelt, studiously avoiding the stagnant pool, and laid a gentle hand on Greg's uninjured shoulder. Shining his torch downward, he took stock. Greg's face was slack, youthful in its sinister state of sleep; one shoulder was definitely out, the head injury was a definite worry, his skin turgor was awful (dehydration) and there were almost certainly internal injuries to deal with, but most distressing of all was his inability to wake up.
John swallowed as he raised a hand to Greg's carotid. He'd seen friends in worse states-but not by much. He held back a sigh of relief, stomach swooping as he felt the weak but steady thrum against his fingers. Grimacing, he resorted to scare tactics to wake his friend up properly, placing a hand on his hanging arm and squeezing. A quiet, strangled cry wrenched out of Greg's dry throat, and his eyes fluttered open oh-so-slowly.
"John?", murmured the found man.
"Yep, it's me Greg. We've got you, there's an ambulance waiting outside." Turning his head, John spoke quietly into the radio, calling Sherlock and Sally to the right-hand tunnel. Sally thundered through the door, blanching and swaying a little as she took in the sight. Swallowing visibly against a rising tide of bile, she turned away as Sherlock stepped in, placing a fleeting touch on her shoulder as she stepped out to inform New Scotland Yard. John looked up from his kneeling position.
"I need to go and brief the paramedics. Will you be okay 'til I get back?"
Knowing that the question was really for him (Lestrade couldn't answer), Sherlock nodded absently. As he turned to leave, John caught a choked sob, and turned his head just in time to see Greg, cheeks burning with shame and fear, resting his head on Sherlock's shoulder. Sherlock was gently cradling it, stroking a long hand down Greg's back and murmuring in his ear as he shrugged off his coat to cover the older man's lower half.
Letting a small smile of relief quirk his lips, John hauled himself up the ladder and out into the sunlight, walking at a fast clip to the ambulance crew at the perimeter tape.