A/N: So, this is it! Thank you to everyone for your kind reviews and encouraging words. It has been a joy taking part and reading all of your brilliant writing; a lovely and welcomed distraction in what has been a most unusual year. A huge thank you as always to Hades for organising this challenge. You are amazing!

Combining the last two prompts, listed at the bottom merely for one final surprise. :-)


Discombobulate


Watson wakes up.

His eyes sting and his head aches and he has no idea where he is.

He thinks it is snowing, flecks drifting all over, but they are grey and dirty-looking, falling too slowly. There are miniscule glints of light too, blinking orange sparks, and he hears a faint crackling sound. He tries to concentrate on this alone but already it is too much information. He stares at the sky instead, with its weird tumbling colours likes torn up pieces of paper.

So he is outside, this much he knows.

The ground is cold and hard beneath him, his fingers scratching in snow. He makes a fist, a disfigured snowball clutched in his palm. He squeezes at it until the fog over his mind disperses and his vision is cleaner, less mudded.

The floating bits of paper are still there, some clinging to the specks of orange, or the other way around, and above him a dark shape cuts into the sky, a spire outline. His brain helpfully supplies him with: St. Mary's church. He can hear a murmur of voices, a familiar tune playing. A window spills light onto the ground, multicoloured squares from stained glass, washing over plots and headstones covered in snow and ash.

So he is in a graveyard, which seems rather unfitting.

He is laying on cold, wet ground and something, somewhere, is burning, too far away for his immediate concern and too far away for the occupants of the church to notice. His left leg feels like it is wholly made of steel, half-buried and heavy.

He knows he cannot remain here, should not remain, but he does, listens to the voices and watches the burnt flecks meander by to mingle with the stars.

Minutes pass, maybe seconds, maybe something else, he is not sure, just him and the deceased, and then Holmes appears in his line of sight.

The detective emerges like he has been summoned, an angel carved of coal against a bleeding sky. He looks relieved, quickly bends to one knee beside him.

"Are you all right?" Holmes asks. He puts a hand beneath Watson's shoulder, helps him to sit up.

"Yes. I. I'm. No." Watson shakes his head, tries again. "No. My leg. And, uh. Head."

Holmes nods, understanding. "Can you stand?"

He shakes his head again, contradicts the movement with, "I'll try."

It takes three attempts, but he manages it, one arm wrapped around Holmes's shoulder for balance, his friend taking most of his weight. Holmes steadies him, his head bent close with one hand pressing into Watson's hip.

Watson hisses against the pain, confused. He doesn't know how he came to be here. He can fair hear the gaps in his memory being torn away.

"Come," murmurs Holmes, steering him towards the small gate nestled in the stone wall surrounding the church. His cold breath fans Watson's cheek and restores the merest piece of clarity.

"Holmes. What. What happened?"

Holmes looks at him curiously. "Do you know where we are?"

"St. Mary's." He feels pleased with himself for recalling this detail.

"Yes. We were separated by the Jacobs."

"Oh." An image comes to Watson then, cracked wood and the smell of oil. He tries to turn, to look around for the blaze, but it is not a good idea, a slick wave of nausea running through him.

Holmes says his name, a gentle warning, tightening his grip. Watson resurfaces with effort.

"Holmes, he is–"

"I know. I found him near the woodshed."

Watson nods, comprehension and confusion mixing. He remembers the garden, wild fiery sparks and heat, Jacobs running towards him with his hands clawed and reaching for Watson's throat. But he is unable to join up the sequence, no idea how he came to be in the cemetery.

They reach the street. A hansom is waiting with its door open, another puzzle for Watson's mind to solve.

Holmes assists him inside, climbs up to sit opposite him before calling to the driver. The whip against the horse sounds like a firework to Watson's ears, things too loud and detailed now.

He leans against the side of the carriage and watches the world outside the window. In the distance buildings are hunched and crippled, bricks with bad backs, leaning towards the road. Although he knew the church, he is unsure which part of London they were in.

"Kensington," Holmes says. He scans Watson's face, piecing together more of Watson's night than the doctor can himself.

"You must fill in the rest," Watson tells him.

"Of course."

The remainder of the journey is passed in silence. Watson plays out memories only to disregard them, scenes both real and imaginative vying for space in his mind. He gives it up as a bad job, relieved when he sees the soft light above the door of Baker Street.

It is when they are inside and Holmes is helping him into his armchair that the clearest memory returns to him, and he says quickly before it disappears, "Carollers. In the church, I mean."

Holmes's lips quirk upwards. "I know, my dear fellow. I heard."

"They woke me."

"It is possible."

Watson sighs. "It is not how I'd have chosen to spend the new year."

Holmes is smiling now, stands before Watson calmly with his hands in his trouser pockets. "How would you have chosen to spend it, Watson?"

"Conscious," Watson states brusquely.

Holmes chuckles. "Fortunately for you, my friend, those carollers were in the midst of rehearsal. The new year has not yet come."

"How long?"

"Seven minutes."

Watson gives this some thought. "I'd like to be awake for it."

Holmes's gaze softens, the light from the fireplace cutting cleanly across the muscle in his jaw. "You must stay awake regardless."

He nods, brief information about concussions and Doctor Harrington running through the signs and symptoms, his ruler slamming down like gunfire against the desk whenever attention wandered. The students would flinch even though they saw it coming, his thick muscular arm raised to deliver the blow, soft sunlight pushing through the high windows and highlighting that one corner of the chalkboard, a brilliant yellow triangle.

"Watson."

He blinks, exhales. "Yes, Holmes, I'm here."

Five minutes later the clock on the mantel tolls out the midnight hour, ding ding ding echo in Watson's mind. He so desperately wishes to sleep but Holmes will not allow it. Watson unethically accuses Holmes of cruelty and Holmes accepts the judgement willingly, asks if it is Watson's personal or professional opinion. He cannot think of how to answer that.

So he listens to Holmes's account of the evening, the only version available for now, and remembers not a word of it. Eventually he is permitted to surrender himself to blissful unconsciousness, welcomes it without hesitation.

He finds himself stood on a raft in the middle of the Thames, looking up at a night sky that peels away like strips of wallpaper, reveals a rosy dawn beneath. Holmes calls to him from atop of Big Ben, balancing on the giant tip with his coat billowing about him like wings. The clock face is crumbling, hands breaking away to spear the river with giant black arrows.

Watson calmly nudges the raft in the direction of Parliament with his cane. The water turns to ink, splashes and stains the wood. Words scratch the vessel in handwriting he recognises as his own, and of all the things that has happened tonight, Watson thinks this is the only occurrence that makes perfect sense.


End


Prompt 30: From Book girl fan – Sparks.

Prompt 31: From trustingHim17 – Auld Lang Syne.

A/N II: May have gone off topic, but the prompts are in there if you squint and tilt your head, lol. Seemed fitting to end the challenge as I came into it; angst-ing the poor doctor.

On a final note, dedication to this piece goes to one instrumental song: 'Home' by ThePianoGuys. If anyone is ever curious as to what drives my angst pieces, this is it. I listen to this constantly; at home, at work, in the car, and whenever I write angst, of course. For me personally, the song is filled with hope, sadness, despair, joy, love, and every other emotion in existence. It is beautiful and I never tire of it. :-)