A/N: yes. I deleted the chapter and I've re-uploaded it. It wasn't fair to you guys how short this was and I didn't add in Mycroft yet so, I've done some damage control and here it is, a bit better and a whole lot longer. Though Mycroft feels a bit out of character for me. Leave in the comments what you think! Hey thilbo4ever, if it's all the same to you I'd like that cheese cake now.
Disclaimer: (3rd time)
Doctor: where am I? I have fallen through the void. This must be an alternate universe! I wonder if this is Pete's world... Maybe Rose is here...
John Watson: *walks down the street and accidentally makes eye contact with the Doctor*
Doctor: Rose! *rushes to John and hugs him tightly*
John: *tries to escape the Doctor's hug*
(Since you requested it ;))
Me: no, I do not own Sherlock nor Doctor Who.
5 Stages of Improbability
by: Evelynhunters
Mrs. Hudson doesn't blame him for Sherlock's death. Lestrade and Anderson don't blame him for Sherlock's death. No one blames him for Sherlock's death. And yet, he can't help but feel so guilty when he thinks about the best man he ever knew falling to his death knowing his best friend left him all alone.
He's having dinner with Mrs. Hudson when he first has the thought. It's not the first time he's thought it, but it is the first time he has let his brain completely finish it.
And then it plagues him like an itch. It scratches at the back of his mind when he's making a cuppa, clings to his thoughts when he's reading the papers, and piggy backs on his emotions when he's having a break down.
It's only at night that he dares voices it, because at night is when all the horrible things and thoughts are circling in his head and if he doesn't say it he will go crazy with the guilty thoughts in his mind repeating and repeating and-
"What if I didn't leave Barts?" He asks tentatively into the darkness, voice rougher than it should be.
"What if I didn't leave Barts to check on Mrs. Hudson? What if I stayed, with Sherlock?" He stares at his ceiling for answers, "Would he still have jumped? Would I have been able to prevent it?"
The dreams he fall asleep into are restless, and he finds himself dreaming of a different event, a different situation, and a different outcome. He dreams about violin playing at a god awful hour at night. He dreams about coming back home with the smell of gunpowder in the air. He dreams about the cases they'd get. He dreams about black hair passing out from lack of sleep. He dreams about Sherlock still alive, still deducting and running and arguing and breathing and alive.
And when he wakes up, it's the little pause of breath he takes before yelling at Sherlock to stop playing the violin at night that makes him remember none of it is true.
He indulges in it when he's alone.
When it's only him at the flat, (which is pretty often, since Mrs. Hudson has finally found an honest man in the baker), he thinks of a new way that he could've prevented Sherlock from dying.
If he had stayed...
If he had dragged Sherlock with him...
If he had, if he had, if he had...
And he'll close his eyes, and imagining himself doing those things. He imagines staying with Sherlock even though Mrs. Hudson could be in danger. He imagines himself dragging Sherlock by the collar back to Baker Street. He imagines the next day, waking up, no longer a fugitive with Sherlock but the papers still saying he's a fraud and Lestrade unable to come around and visit. He imagines Sherlock pouting at his ruined reputation and the lack of interesting cases. He imagines Sherlock annoyed and throwing tantrums and being loud and rude to people they meet. John Watson imagines living next to a consulting detective who's alive and breathing and alive.
And he always has to open his eyes. Be it Mrs. Hudson comes back or a noise jolted him out of his thoughts or he can no longer continue the story. It's the part he hates most, because he has to open his eyes and face the messy, cold, lack-of-Sherlock flat and come back to the reality that Sherlock Holmes is dead.
He keeps doing it anyway, any chance that he gets. Because as much as it hurts, for a little while it's the closest thing he can get to living in the reality where Sherlock isn't dead and a little while is all he needs.
Sherlock once told him -late at night during a case where the detective hadn't ate or slept in two days- that he did drugs because they quieted his mind. That they allowed him a moment of peace from himself.
John starts to get why now, even though their reasoning for their addiction are the exact opposite: one to get away from Sherlock and the other to. John Watson finally gets it's so addicting, because those moments are everything he wished had happened instead of the real thing.
Mrs. Hudson doesn't like it when he does it. It's taken over him. He starts doing it during dinner, during tea time, during everywhere. She thinks it's horribly morbid and really John no good can come out of thinking what ifs and John? What are you talking about? We gave the violin to Mycroft at the funeral and I loved Sherlock too, and I'm sure you did more, but this is not the way to heal.
He's too busy imagining the scenario in which Moriarity had never existed to say the usual "I'm not gay" at her. Without the consulting criminal Sherlock's reputation would have never been ruined so he wouldn't have jump so he would be alive. However, without the consulting criminal, half of their cases are gone. No cabbie, the first one they bonded over; no 'The Woman', the first time he's seen Sherlock Holmes mourn; and no bombings, the first time John realized he could be used involuntarily as a weapon.
Moriarity had tore them apart yet was the one that kept them together. Huh.
He's startled out of his musing by Mrs. Hudson's voice. "Go outside today, John! Take a walk. It'll do better than being stuffed inside the whole day. Come on! I'm going to the bakers anyway."
He looks out the shutters, the light streaming through were bright in the darkened room. It was sunny day, maybe it would do him well to take a walk. He brings a light jacket with him and, finishing tying his shoes, starts out the door.
And of course, his eyes land on a black car parked right in front of Baker Street with a woman he's somewhat familiar with leaning against the side door.
Of course.
He approaches the car with a somewhat exasperated tone. "How long have you been waiting?" He questions instead of greeting. "Or did Mycroft Holmes use some special powers so he knew I would take a walk right now, on this day?"
"Neither," she finishes the text she was composing with a flourish of the hand and starts on a new one without looking at him, "Mrs. Hudson was worried about you."
Still not looking up from her phone she opens the side door and slips in the car, and he chooses between the choices of a walk with a limp on a sunny day or a silent car ride to a no doubt damp and abandoned office building. He doesn't like either of them.
He chooses the car, not because he's afraid of people recognising him from the papers by because his leg is tired. From walking from the front door to the car.
Right.
He goes in the car -not so gracefully- and closes the door. The car starts and the tinted windows doesn't really allow him to watch the scenery. He considers starting a conversation with -Athena? Anthea? Which ever it is he knows it's not her real name- but that would just be suicide considering how it went down last time. Or he could start ignoring her and stay in the car long after it stops to play flappy bird on his phone.
Before he's decided the cars stopped and he exits the car on auto pilot. Shot. There goes plan b.
He looks towards the building they've stopped in front of. Dark, gloomy, people less. Seems to fit the criteria for buildings Mycroft Holmes arrange meetings at. He looks back at the car with Anthea inside it, the engines killed and doesn't seem like it's going anywhere. Great.
He's muttering under his breath about the bloody Holmes gene that carries for dramatics when he reaches the end door. It opens with a creak, and, after he's got a good grip on both the handle and his cane, he walks forward.
There's no chair -there never is, he doesn't know why he expected one- and Mycroft Holmes is leaning on his umbrella. John Watson tightens his grip on his cane and walks forward faster.
"Pleasant day, isn't it Dr. Watson?" The elder Holmes drawls out, looking up and down at John, no doubt deducing the lack of sleep from dreams and the lack of meals he's had. "Mrs. Hudson was concerned" -Mycroft says the word with an air of disapproval and John can hear a voice in the back of his mind saying 'sentiment'- "about you. She says you've been... out of it...lately."
John can't help but bare his teeth at him and hiss out. "What I do is none of her nor your bloody business. I know you don't care about Mrs. Hudson's concern, so why the bloody hell am I here?" he spats.
"My brother wasn't the most caring person when he was alive," Mycroft says with the arrogance one who lost a brother shouldn't have, "and I'm tying up loose ends." He finishes his point with a stare, as if willing his point across through telepathy.
"Tying up loose ends? You Holmes are drama queens. If I didn't know any better I'd say you're going to kill me."
"No, I am simply finishing something my dear brother hadn't the heart to finish. Dr. Watson," he pauses, as if stalling before the important subject, "he has lied to you. He had deceived you. Sent you away. Hurt you for no purpose. You know he will never return your feelings-"
"For god sake I'm not gay!"
"-since he is wise not to be sentimental. He had done you wrong on so many accounts, my dear brother." Mycroft continues as if he hadn't heard John's blustering exclamation, leans forward on his umbrella, and parts of John really wanted to see it slip on the tile floor. "Why do you blame yourself for his death?"
John pauses before answering, either from thinking or frustrations. "Because it was. I had driven him to that. Because for a moment, and it was just a moment but still for a moment, I didn't believe in Sherlock Holmes and a moment was all I need to leave him. I should've seen sign before he left. And now I look back they were so obvious." He signs and shakes his head, "he was scared, Mycroft. He was scared and I left him alone and that's why he's dead. It's my fault that he's dead."
There's a pause in the air after his confession, the dark little secret he hasn't said to anyone else because he knows they would realise it's true. It's in the air when things get heavy between him and Lestrade. It's unspoken but always lurking when he's around his therapist. It's here, now, out in the open after he's said it to the person he'd never expected to say to.
"John," Mycroft starts and John thinks it's the first time he hasn't been addressed to as Dr. Watson by him, "my brother would've jump even if you hadn't left. He's stubborn like that. He found a way to stay on drugs after three attempts of rehab. He would've found another way to get you to leave." There's a tone of resignation in his breath, like it's taking him more effort than it should for him to breathe.
"If I..." John's voice cracks slightly before he says the sentence he's imagined so many times before, "if I had trusted him more. If I had recognise the signs earlier..." His voice trails off and he feels the stinging in his eyes.
Great. First he almost breaks down before his therapist and now he's going to cry in front of Mycroft Holmes.
Thinking that thought didn't stop the onslaught on tears, though. And John stands there, with his hand tight around the cane and his jaws clenched and fat, ugly tears rolling down his face. He can feel them trickling down his cheeks and dripping down his jaw. He hates it. He's weak. If he had been stronger Sherlock would be alive. If he had...
The sound of a click echoes through the room, and John looks up in surprise at the elder Holmes holding out a cigarette to him. He takes it and Mycroft, with shaky hands (unusual, John notes) lights it for him. He takes out another and lights it, too. The two of them in silence, both smoking a cigarette that John's sure was too high brand to be something he could afford.
"If you don't mind me saying, John," Mycroft says in a surprisingly soft and raw voice, "my brother was one of the most selfish person ever lived. And I'm sorry-"
His voice catches and John, not believing the sight before him, watches him breaks down. Mycroft's face had crumpled in, his eyes teary and John can see one carving a trail on his face, and something John can only describe as the equivalent of heartbreak and broken resolve on his face. It's just a few seconds, and Mycroft is back to the steely professionalism he has always maintained, with that single tear disappearing, but for a few seconds he sees the human, broken, sad side of Mycroft Holmes that's grieving for his brother.
And for a few seconds, that's all he needed to know he wasn't the only one.
AN/ hello you lovely people! ;)
Thank you thilbo4ever as always, and I will make Mycroft cry, so don't throw away that cheesecake just yet.
To Rielle, I got the doctor here! Hope it was satisfying though it is very short.
And speaking of short...I am so sorry but compared to the last two chapters this seems to be missing ...oh about a thousand words. ...sorry.
I've been weak. And lazy. And not that motivated. Which has nothing to do with you all! If anything it's all the homework I have!
Alright I'm rambling. Anyway, comment your opinion! What you think I should do to continue this! Here are your options for next chapter:
Bring Mary in, have a cameo of Mrs. Hudson and the baker (oh la la), or have John see Sherlock's ghost. Ohhh the suspense. Vote for the choices or make your own. Open to suggestions.
...and also maybe favorite and follow along the way. ;)
Poor John, again. Sorry John. At least he didn't break anything this time.