A/N: Last installment you guys (at least until we get to the epilogue anyway)! Obviously it would be the longest one. -.-; Hope you guys enjoyed! Thanks for reading!
Warnings: Same as the first chapter, nothing's really changed. Though the Pre-Slash... definitely still there. Lol. Can be read as Gen though!
Disclaimed: DON'T OWN ANYTHING. D:
"Chorus romance says goodnight.
Close your eyes and I'll close mine.
Remember you, remember me
Hurt the first, the last, between.
Chorus romance says goodnight.
Close your eyes and I'll close mine.
Remember you, remember me
Hurt the first, the last, between."
-'So I Thought'; Flyleaf
kiss the stars with me
part three: remember you, remember me
The nightmares after that night had not abated during the three years John had carried on alone.
What were once memories of a burned battlefield were replaced with dark edges of blurred out images, paper cut men with grim Cheshire-Cat grins with eyes the size of blocks of granite leaning over his prone figure which thrummed with pain.
John never awoke with a gasp of fright or a sigh of relief.
The worse part of these dreams were that they were not really dreams at all and nothing John could do could make them go away as easily as Sherlock had.
John's dreams blurred together when he finally woke up, fragments remembered and lost as his deep blue eyes blinked open and the ceiling of his bedroom took up the space the painted images had given up in return for wakefulness.
It didn't feel like he was grounded in reality but John knew by the water stain peeking out of the corner of his eye and the tiny webs of dust collecting overhead that this was not another dream. The muzzy fog had dispersed seconds ago to reveal the shady discourse that made up a majority of the doctor's fractured mental state while wide awake, alluding to a world that was even more chaotic underneath its unassuming surface. An off kilter paradox that John now fit within quite well.
Gangly limbs and frazzled curls blanketed over the entire right side of the former soldier's prone body, the heaviness of his friend's slight frame an afterthought until he was finally noticed. Informative eyes bleak with newfound knowledge stayed closed, even as the breathing pattern pressed against John's rib cage became increasingly more erratic.
The dreams that he remembered began to crinkle at the edges as well, even as John attempted to hold onto them. Closing his eyes didn't prevent the memories from going away but the drowsiness returned in the remembrance's stead until John floated back into the comfort of sleep in hopes of better, nonsensical dreams.
Even as he slept, however, dark, decrepit eyes still lingered as pictures of bruises and broken bones were torched in favor of stifling dark rooms and stretches of pale luminous skin everywhere.
Sherlock sat next to his doctor's prone figure clustered within the multitude of warm blankets, tiny body curled into itself in a sloppy version of a fetal position. The laugh lines around John's mouth were crinkled in a facsimile of a frown even within sleep, though the detective had long guessed that that was a façade as well.
The breathing pattern was all wrong and the way John's left big toe curled with nervous energy gave him away completely but Sherlock kept his mouth shut for once, preferring to let his thoughts run on autopilot while watching the rugged physician keep pretending he wasn't as conscious as they both knew he was.
In this instance it was near impossible to force his emotions away from the matter at hand, disgusted that they had kept the detective blinded from the truth for so long. Granted it had only been 24 hours but Sherlock was usually able to spot a victim of abuse within minutes, if not seconds depending on bruising patterns, posture, eye contact and sporadic involuntary flinches. It had taken Sherlock nearly a whole day and a lecture from Mycroft of all people to finally see what had been obvious.
His blogger had not even been hiding it, not very well anyway. The aversion to touch, the limp that was now very real, the emotional outbursts that were so very random, it had all been pointing at some type of abuse. But Sherlock attributed almost all of it to the shock of his return, the betrayal that now seemed to burn more vibrantly at the knowledge that it wasn't just emotional violence that Sherlock had inflicted on him by leaving.
Mycroft had stated it plainly; his leaving was the catalyst. Sherlock was sure that John had seen it as a punishment, what had happened to him. In the older man's mind it was irrelevant how the retribution was to be administered; he had let his friend of a year and half, the man who had revitalized him and transformed him from a useless former soldier with a penchant for suicidal thoughts to a soldier of a different kind. A new warzone had been presented to a broken doctor courtesy of the infantile detective everyone knew to be dangerous.
But John loved dangerous. Craved it in a way a junkie needed his next fix.
Sherlock had not anticipated how far John himself would fall along with him.
Mycroft had sarcastically imposed the word 'hero' on his head the first time he had managed to make contact with the elder Holmes. The icy rage cleverly disguised under surreptitious cloves of phrases that had not penetrated through Sherlock's state of mind at the time, not fully realizing how much leaving his friend by his own grave would take out of him; certainly more than he had believed he had had to give.
Months of hiding and planning and obsessing (not about John though, how could he even bother to do so after everything that had happened?) had made Sherlock into even more of a hermit than before. Even the assassins that had been tipped off by his small purposeful missteps could not seem to find him.
Sherlock had hoarded the greatest part of himself for the better part of a year and even once the madness had crawled into a steady white lunacy the once thought to be dead man had continued his various planning until it was the only thing he could see. Nothing else existed except bringing down whatever was left of Moriarty's empire and the Why had crumbled into stardust, speckles of nothingness unimportant in the greater scheme of things.
And right at the center of his obsession was Sebastian Moran.
Mycroft's second call had been filled with terse silences and steady reminders.
He had promised the sniper's head on a platter.
Instead of being placated Mycroft had immediately shut his mouth and let Sherlock continue on his merry way.
At the time Sherlock had not found anything suspicious about this.
For eight months after that spectacularly disastrous phone call Sherlock found himself thrust out into the real world once again, laying out triggers and leads so beautifully that even he had to be in awe of his own genius.
Sebastian Moran had fallen for every single ploy.
Each and every trap.
It was glorious.
Slowly Sherlock's name began to chirp up within the dregs of the underground once again, a sort self-induced boogeyman for those who had once had the name Moriarty stamped on their person and now carried the crucible that Moran continued to burden them with. His silent cheer slowly grew into a crowing rush of merriment. There wasn't a moment that Sherlock had not enjoyed the chase. He had played the game so well that it hadn't felt like there was anything missing.
Except there was.
Two years into his forced solitude and Sherlock had had his first crisis.
Obviously not his first first crisis but the first time in two years where Sherlock had not enjoyed the chase or lived off nothing but the thrill of the puzzle and felt… complete.
Coincidentally that was also the day of Mycroft's phone call.
Sherlock's tongue had wanted to form the name 'John' and instead all that could come out was 'London'.
Thinking back on it, the nostalgic scientist wondered if Mycroft had known even then that Sherlock had been confused. He had thought he had been content with what he had, as minimal as it was. But he hadn't. Things were not like before.
He was not like before.
After that, everything became fuzzy. He remembered the mistakes and the pitfalls (drugs) and the wounds. Everything began slipping and all of the plans that he had so carefully laid out just a year earlier disintegrated in mere weeks.
Three whole years wasted.
One wasted planning, one wasted enacting and one watching everything fall apart.
After striking out as many members as he could in a multitude of kamikaze attacks, Sherlock had slowly come to realize that he was finally coming out of his self-imposed shell and becoming something different. Not exactly the same man that he was prior to The Fall but definitely not all that different from it.
Those last few months, as Moran's army drifted into complete nothingness and Sherlock's world narrowed into one constant scope of destruction, he finally remembered Why.
The final phone call occurred the night before Sherlock had decided that travelling to London was his final chance. Mycroft had known even before his little brother that Sherlock would not be able to continue on, not if the rogue investigator wished to keep his sanity intact.
It would be his last chance to catch Moran, his last chance to regain his rightful position among London's lost causes and his last chance at a semi-normal life worth living again.
A life worth living with John.
There had been so many close calls and distant thoughts of 'just another centimeter over' that Sherlock had forced himself not to think of the one person who would have taken those moments and made them their own.
Fingers gripped around the handle of a semi-automatic handgun, tightened knuckles bloodless and strong. He still remembered that moment of complete peace with both himself and his decision to return. Mycroft's smug voice hadn't even caused the younger man to second guess himself as it usually would, too sure of this choice to allow his older brother to bother him into thinking otherwise.
In this moment now, the moment if the Consulting Detective were honest with himself, Sherlock finally found himself thinking on John's own moments and decided, 'So Would I'.
As much as Greg Lestrade wished to say that he had been surprised to find Sherlock Holmes within his office at 7:30 in the morning rifling through his papers as if they were his, he really was not.
It had started off with a text message sent in the middle of a stressful murder investigation with no leads and worse, no Sherlock Holmes to show them the trail of clues they so often missed even after multiple glances. Where it would take the Consulting Detective minutes to figure things out it took weeks to be able to piece things together, if they were lucky. Lestrade had not paid much attention to the musical lilt tinkling the air the first time it rang, but by the fifth reminder the grey-haired detective gave up all pretenses and read his text.
How far out of their depth has NSY fallen without me to cushion their fall? No pun intended of course.
SH
Lestrade hadn't been all that amused to say the least.
The text had gone on to be ignored for the rest of the day. Greg had barely managed to make it into his flat the next night before he was accosted at the doorway and Mycroft Holmes' smarmy grin had greeted him within the nondescript black sedan waiting outside.
Needless to say, the DI didn't know who to hit harder, Sherlock or Mycroft.
"It was for your safety, though that could be debated extensively, do believe me Detective Inspector." Mycroft had thrown out casually, as if he had stated it would be a bit cloudy outside later on, and oh, you should definitely bring a scarf just in case it was a bit nippy. "He honestly thought he was doing the right thing, the poor boy."
After a few days of going through the renewed five stages (Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance) the emotionally-drained inspector felt stable enough to finally contact the younger man but was not surprised when an answer was not forthcoming in return.
It would be a day later that Greg would be informed that Sherlock had returned back to John and the instant reaction to rush to his latter friend's side and wall him away from the unerring force of nature that was Sherlock was stifled only by, once again, Mycroft's hand.
"Let him figure it out. It won't take more than a day, I promise you, and when he does there will be no one more willing to damage Sherlock more than Sherlock himself."
And lo and behold who was shuffling through the refuge of files that littered Lestrade's desk but the one man he wished he could hurt almost as much as the unholy bastard that had wounded the one person who had not once stopped believing in Sherlock Holmes.
"You're not supposed to be here," Lestrade uselessly commented as he dropped his bag and coat on his sofa. "I'd ask how you managed to get in but I'm pretty sure I'd have to arrest you if I did."
"I think we both know what I'm looking for Detective." Sherlock had off-handedly muttered as he threw another file onto the ground (Jesus how had Greg missed those when he first entered?) and sloppily opened another. "Now do be quiet and let me work in peace."
"Is that all John is to you then, another puzzle for you to solve?" Dark brown eyes narrowed dangerously as almond-shaped grey orbs barely even glanced up in acknowledgement. "Because if that's the case then I'll kindly ask you to get the fuck out of my office and not come back Sherlock."
"Don't be an idiot. The day I'd treat John as some sort of piece of evidence is the day I grow bored of his presence and as it has been almost five years and I have yet to tire of him you should not be allowed to keep making such ridiculous statements Lestrade." Sherlock threw the file on the floor and grabbed another one without even breaking his speaking stride, the tight tension within his shoulders belying the torturous rage coursing through his veins. "John has been hurt. The case is obviously still unsolved as it's not with the shut cases. I have checked the open ones as well and funnily enough it is not available there either. Obviously they were good and you without me, you just weren't up to snuff. As you keep all of your cold cases in your office it is rather obvious it must be here. But let me formally reiterate for you my opinion on this matter just so you can understand how serious I am about this and how conscientious you should be of my devotion to see this case's end-"
Sherlock finally looked up from the stack of papers half-hazardously perched upon the DI's desk with the steeliest stare Greg had ever seen grace the younger man's sight.
"I have come home thinking that I protected my closest friend from harm only to find out that not only is that not the case but I was not here to neither console him or track done those who have done John wrong. I can't erase it, not from his mind or mine. But I need to know that I am right in thinking that I know who did this and why. Because if the facts are what I believe them to be and the person responsible is who I think it could be, then Hell shall be coming in the form of one man and that man is me."
"Right," Lestrade grabbed his key and unlocked the cabinet closest to his person. Sherlock's eyebrows furrowed as the DI pulled the file out of the now-unlocked cabinet next to his desk after a moment of finagling with it and presented it to attention-deficit detective with all the enthusiasm he could manage this early in the morning with the little amount of sleep the DI had been able to manage these past few weeks, "you really shouldn't do this and I really shouldn't give this to you but I know that if I don't give this to you now you'll just manage to get it through more unconventional means so I'll just save you the trouble. And myself the migraine."
Sherlock stood and grabbed the file but frowned when Lestrade didn't relinquish it right away.
"Listen, just one second before you rush off." He had to make sure the former dead man's attention was on him, afraid to lose the detective to the thrill of the game when there was still one thing Sherlock needed to understand. "He's not the same man you knew or the same man I had come to respect after watching him chase after you all those years ago. He lives with a devotion I don't think any other person in this world has it in them to expend and reserves it for you. He's a new person under all that bluster, one I have come to admire even more than I did before, if only because not only did he survive your death and his near destruction, he continued to believe in something much greater than anyone of us could imagine with a fortitude he refuses to give up, especially now that you're here. Sherlock, what I need you to understand is when you find this fucker you better tell me, and Hell won't even cover the half of what this bastard has to face."
Sherlock's grin was tinged with a variety of inappropriate emotions that the moment called for but Lestrade couldn't speak against the man.
Not when his own smile spoke just as many volumes.
"I've thought about it," John began as he entered his apartment, not the least bit surprised to find Sherlock slumped over a pile of folders and papers "and I think we need to finally just… talk about it."
Sherlock glanced up at the older man stumbling over to the sofa, the cane barely a necessity at this point but obviously bearing just a bit of comfort to his friend who was steeling himself up for something he most certainly did not wish to share.
"Stop it."
"Stop what?"
"I would've thought you'd have gotten rid of The Look by now."
"I've told you before, it's just my face."
"The Look is more than that. I have never met someone who could make me feel like the stupidest person on the planet just by giving me that… Look."
"I still don't understand."
"Thank God for that then."
"I am working on something of extreme importance. John, I told you that Moran was the last. I meant it." Sherlock huffed as he moved another folder aside, the file close to joining the many others still scattered among the floor.
"So that's not my file on the floor next to your foot?"
"How did you-?"
John smirked. "Large coffee stain on the whole left side. Lestrade spilt his coffee on the file when he found out who it was that had been attacked. Probably didn't help that I was in the same room with him, yeah?"
Grey-blue eyes narrowed as the aforementioned folder was picked up and delicately placed on the detective's lap. Piece by piece, the folder came apart right before John's very eyes and became something much more than just a pile of papers clumped together in an effort to keep organized.
"I'm not surprised if that's what you're going to ask." John stared at the folder splayed open on the table, the photos glimmering with remembrances that the doctor preferred would have stayed just that; memories. "Actually, no, I am bit surprised that you haven't just rushed off without me to have some sort of duel in a fit of detective-ly valor."
"Is that sarcasm again John, so soon in the evening?"
"I think I'm entitled just this once." John smirked again, a faint imitation to his angry snarl veiled behind a tight smile. "Now, let's have a chat shall we?
John stared at his best friend with all of the intensity of a man who knew what it was like to lose everything and keep marching forward with the voracity of a soldier. The wounded doctor had had his whole life ripped away from him so many times before that the predictability of destruction was not a blow that could overcome him as easily as men near or at his caliber of preparedness. John did not need to be a High Functioning Sociopath to pack away everything he felt and live life as if he hadn't been grounded from flight. The spiraling scar rippling across his left shoulder and those steady dark blue orbs assured Sherlock of that fact.
At one time, John may have "needed" Sherlock, but that time had been stripped away from the older man and he had been forced to survive once again on his own without the thrill of the chase to remind him that yes, there is more to this miserable existence isn't there?
Sherlock cleared his voice in an attempt to break the awkward silence now teetering between them but John had no such inclination to move past it. He was wholly comfortable, a turn-around to their usual repertoire.
Instead of being annoyed by the inconvenience, Sherlock appeared if anything bemused.
"You will allow me to ask my questions with impunity?"
"As much as my temper will allow me."
"That is not very convenient for me then. Your temper is rather notorious, John, especially in concerns to me."
"Years can give a man temperance you know."
"Ah…"
"If you're expecting me to cry about it you'll be waiting a long time Sherlock."
"I wasn't."
"Good."
"Fine."
"Right."
Sherlock brought his hands underneath his chin and gave his friend his most penetrating stare, obviously re-cataloguing all of the differences now that he had a better perspective of the situation at hand, probably lining up every single question so that the most pertinent ones would be answered; Sherlock's personal path of least resistance for John.
"It happened after the funeral."
"Well, that's not a question."
"Obviously it was after the funeral. I was there for it and you did not appear to be additionally distressed on top of… the usual."
"There was nothing usual about my distress, Sherlock. I was absolutely crushed and you know it! And what do you mean you were-Hmph. This is your ego we're talking about. Of course you wanted to see what everyone would be doing on the day of your funeral. God, you idiot."
"Egocentric I may be but my visitation had nothing to do with my personal love of myself." Greyish-blue eyes tightened at the edges, creases that had not been there three years prior deepening into wilted scars around those gorgeous spheres. "I wanted to see you one last time before I left."
"And that's supposed to make me feel better?"
"No, I just wanted you to know. I didn't want to leave you behind John but it seemed to be the most logical solution at the time."
"Perhaps logic isn't all that should be considered next time a decision like this needs to be made then? Or let me re-phrase; logic better instill in you that you bloody well tell me what's going on next time at your earliest convenience Sherlock Holmes because if you ever put me through this ever again I will murder you myself. And I am a doctor as well as a soldier. You do the math on how well I could mutilate your corpse and make it look like a complete accident."
Sherlock for a moment didn't know whether to be proud of his friend or frightened of him, but he knew that the ill-begotten combination he held within his chest was most likely not a normal reaction.
Thank goodness he abhorred normality then.
"Next time… yes, indeed. However this is a separate conversation for another night. I realize that retribution will be required to gain back your forgiveness," Sherlock didn't pause at John's sudden snort, "but tonight, tonight is about Moran and what he has done to you, John. Please, tell me what you can. I know I am primarily at fault but let me do what little I can to bring this man the punishment he deserves for ever seeing fit to harm you."
"Have you… met him?"
"Moran you mean?" Sherlock's left eyebrow quirked at the odd inquiry. "Formally, just the once. He's phoned me more than enough times to know what it was I was seeking from him."
"And that was?"
"His life of course."
"Imagine how you would've reacted had you known."
The twitch pulsing against Sherlock's lower lip was enough for even John to realize that no, he did not appreciate that jab thank you very much.
Oh well.
"He'd already be dead," The quietly enraged investigator murmured, the sound between a rumbling growl and a serene lull, full of deadly menace that abrupt anger could not compare to "or being tortured continuously as we speak. It is difficult to say at the moment, as it has been an arborous time since I have felt this… much. But back to the matter at hand, John?"
"As always, you are… right. It happened after your funeral. About a week after actually. I hadn't been at my best to say the least." John leaned back into his seat, appearing smaller after the abrupt motion as if the cushioned chair dwarfed his tiny frame in a twist of a moment. "I had been getting the rest of my things from Baker Street. I knew I couldn't stay there, not after everything that… that we'd been through. I couldn't even look at your things the first day after the f-fall without wanting to throw everything against the wall but I knew I would regret it. It was all that was left of… you."
"So I kept everything of yours where it was and told Mycroft to deal with it how he saw fit. It took me just a couple of hours to gather my things from my room, though at the time it was more because I didn't really want to go downstairs. I didn't want to-to leave because to me it was the final goodbye. If I had just gotten downstairs, though, I could've done something."
John paused for a moment, recollecting himself. The hand around his cane tightened; the strange quirk a recognizable habit from four years back that John had obviously not been able to kick.
"Mrs. Hudson had said she had wanted to help me but I figured she had probably found something else to do. How stupid is that? She had already lost you and then I told her I was leaving, of course she would want to be there with me! But, I'm not you Sherlock. I didn't, couldn't, connect the dots. I just wanted to wallow in my own self-pity and the more I wallowed the worse my thoughts got. I just kept reliving it over and over again and it was just too fresh damn it!"
Dark blue eyelids fluttered in a brave attempt to stave off the tears liquidating at the ducts of the shorter man's eyes. The lethargy pouring from the stout figure began to settle over both men until Sherlock was postured in an identical pose, eyes wide and just as probing as always.
"I barely made it to the front door before I was tackled from behind. I heard Mrs. Hudson screaming from inside her apartment but I couldn't reach her. They told me that if I came with them without a fight that they would let her go. I was drained, there were more of them inside and I wasn't in a position where taking them out would have gotten me anywhere."
"So you of course went."
"Obviously." The sardonic smirk on John's lips didn't match up with the deadened expression behind his glare. "I didn't want them to hurt her and I… I didn't care what they did to me. I was done, Sherlock."
"Do you know what it's like to know that you've lost everything and have nothing to lose? It's the most freeing experience in the world. I felt it in Afghanistan every day I was there and when I got shot, that was when I fought. I wanted to matter more than just another dead soldier overseas. I wanted to leave a mark worth remembering, to have something mean more to me than just another fight for my life. And then I met you and everything was terrific, but then I lost you and then I lost myself again. I just wanted it all to be over."
"I don't understand. I shouldn't mean this much to you." Sherlock muttered under his breath.
"And if I didn't mean this much to you, you wouldn't even be asking about this now would you?"
"Where did they take you?" The detective winced at the abrupt non-sequitur, obviously not willing to give away just how much that line of questioning disturbed him.
The unusually perceptive doctor let his smirk grow just a little more, not fooled in the least for once. "They took me to Moran. The destination wasn't important; honestly, I could barely remember the car ride there or how long it took or any other rubbish you could possibly ask. It was irrelevant to me. I just knew that they were taking me to my execution and all I could think was 'I hope I can still see him wherever I end up'."
"But it wasn't an execution."
"It was. Of a sort." Hands, scar-tangled, beautiful, aging hands, twisted in a way that indicated discomfort. They were getting to the crux of it and Sherlock wasn't sure he wanted to know any of it anymore. "When they brought me inside the building I thought it was the end and in a way, that was true. I didn't know who their boss was at first but the way he looked at me, I knew he knew me. He kept making all these 'pet' jokes… it was like he didn't care one way or another whether or not I knew that he worked for Moriarty. Or had worked for him in any case. He was completely unhinged, as if he were still at war with something not entirely man-made. It was probably what made Moriarty interested in him. He had the look of a man that had been tortured relentlessly and had only managed to survive with his madness intact and nothing else."
A brief pause caught the engaged investigator off guard, dark blue eyes meeting clear grey-blue. "I knew at that moment that I wasn't going to die."
"You recognized in Moran what had been alive within you when you came back to England." Sherlock theorized.
"No, it was worse." John's mouth tightened at the edges. "I had only wanted to hurt myself. Moran wanted everyone to suffer for him."
"They locked me in the back after a good beating, but they were sloppy about it. None of the men searched me, not thoroughly. I still had my phone and luckily I still had coverage." John little by little felt more of the event become clearer the more he spoke about it. "I phoned Lestrade and told him about Mrs. Hudson. He had told me not to worry, that Mycroft had taken care of it. That they were looking for me and that they would find me. I just had to keep my phone on. So I did. I threw it in the farthest corner, turned it over so that the light wouldn't refract in the room and thanked God that I had had the foresight to keep the damn thing on silent since the funeral."
"But Moran wasn't satisfied with just hurting me a bit. He had ushered the other men out almost immediately and came barreling back into the room not even five minutes later. He kept going on about Moriarty, how he had lost his place. He blamed us, but more importantly he kept digging at our relationship. Said he had envied me, the way you looked at me. How human I had turned you when he couldn't even get Moriarty to remember his first and last name."
"Moran was completely on point the first year I was gone." Sherlock mumbled out loud, not even realizing he was speaking. "It must've been… yes. Hurting you must have been cathartic for him somehow. Without that, he would not have been nearly as difficult to dismantle as he has been."
"Glad to know that I was so instrumental to The Game." The moniker was spoken with so much disdain that John himself looked shocked at the tone. Sherlock didn't reply but lowered his eyebrows, internally berating himself for letting loose that small bit when John was so obviously trying to get through all of this without so much as having had faced all of it in three years.
"He knew you were important to me. Moran thought I was dead so the best way to get back at a dead man is to target his closest kin. That is what you are to me John. There is no mockery there… but I can't stop being me either."
"I don't want to talk about this anymore."
"John, please."
"I said I don't want to talk about this anymore!"
"If not now when John? I already read the file and it says next to nothing about what happened! You refused to cooperate with the investigation and I already know that any attempt Mycroft made to apprehend any of those responsible were met with nothing but disdain from you!" Not cowed in the least by the stone-cold glare settled over John's wrinkled features, Sherlock let his manic explosion of frustration loose. He couldn't hit the wall now, not when John was obviously getting to his… incident. "I am not Mycroft however and I refuse to sit here and not know John! Not when… not when it's you."
"What more do you need to know, Sherlock? That he went absolutely insane and began to hurt himself against the wall the longer we stayed inside? That I waited for Lestrade but hoped he didn't show because hey, if I can't be killed might as well do the next best thing for letting my best fucking friend down! Moran couldn't be contained for long and the beating himself became the beating of me and the sick arse-hole almost came in his pants at the sight of me just taking it all and figured that fucking me would be hilarious. He broke my leg, cracked my ribs, nearly obliterated my windpipe and I let him. Because he was wrong, Sherlock and I couldn't wrap my head around it and worse, I didn't want to. I didn't matter to you. Not a bit! If I had, you wouldn't have jumped. That's what I thought. God, I was still right. You might not be dead but you may as well have been and I didn't even matter enough to warrant even the slightest of warnings. Three fucking years I had to live with this, with not being good enough to save you."
"You were always the exception Sherlock. To every single rule, law, everything I can and can't think of, you were it Sherlock." John felt his fingers grow cold the longer they stayed limp on his lap, waiting to be picked up, caressed, anything. "I lived my life around you because I wouldn't have a life without you. I failed you, Sherlock. And I don't know if I'm more furious with you or just so, so sorry."
Sherlock didn't know how to react to the words falling from John's mouth. Each one felt like another regret he couldn't take back. It had been one thing to hear from Mycroft how much Sherlock's 'death' had affected his friend and the subsequent result of that debacle, but to see the results head on was more than the younger man could take.
His friend was meant to be strong and a constant source of morality whereas Sherlock had had none. It wasn't that Sherlock could not function without John or vice-versa, but together they made a whole puzzle. They fit together in places that other people could not fill and to be missing one whole half of you for any length of time was torture.
Sherlock had managed by walling that part of himself and refusing to think about the one person whom he cared for above all else.
John had managed by mentally decimating himself piece by piece and reliving the entire premise over and over until it all happened on autopilot.
They were two men who only knew how to self-destruct apart but together, now together…
People will talk.
Shifting himself closer to the older doctor, Sherlock refused to leave a hair's breadth of space between the lengths of their bodies. Faces enclosed, practically millimeters apart, John shivered, part in anticipation and part from revulsion.
Sherlock understood the medico's reticence but could not bring himself to move away.
People do little else.
"The only one who failed and should be apologizing was and is me. And I promise that this is something I won't ever delete John. I swear."
Out of all of the places John had ever woken up, he could not complain about the place he was in now, not quite cradled against his former flat-mate's tall frame but certainly close enough. Afghanistan had to be a close second, always alone but waking up to the warming glare of the sun after a multitude of cold nights barely slept through and a continual sense of duty, followed by 221b Baker Street which had always brimmed with life and eclectic chaos all amassed into the form of one Sherlock Holmes. Of the worse places, if not the worst, was his childhood home. It was a place that represented a fate worse than death and physical decay; mental and emotional wounds, however, were present every single day until John had finally had enough and walked out those plywood doors and cemented his own path without the doubtful gaze of his mother circling his back or the reminder of a father whom had been nothing but abusive and had shown his sister how to be the same.
Here, in this formerly lonely apartment saddled next to a still sleeping (and formerly dead) detective, John could see himself waking up each and every day as close to content as he could be as long as he had his friend by his side.
The day before had been a huge weight off of the former soldier's shoulders and the missing crux was evident within his stocky form. There was a visible lightness that had been missing from before within John's smile and everything, from his posture to his still fingers benefited from it.
Like his best friend, John had been wondering what results their conversation would yield, if for different reasons.
Now that Sherlock knew the vitality of his presence within John's life instead of simply suspecting as he done prior the three years of absence the question remained whether the inquisitive scientist would take further advantage of the now well-known fact or ignore it completely.
Sherlock, however, was still currently comatose and unable to give John the answers he needed. Unlike his counterpart, whom would violently wake him if the situation were vice-versa, the conscientious doctor patted down the ruffle of stray curls overlapping his sore shoulder and carefully unfolded himself from the younger man's half-hearted grip. John didn't expect much of a reaction though he certainly didn't expect for Sherlock to recalibrate himself so that his lengthy limbs would abscond the space still thrumming with the injured medic's body heat. Watching the usually energetic detective rearrange his head so that it was twisted into a rather uncomfortable angle against the greatest source of John's escaping heat made the blond feel equal measures of discomfort and affection within his chest.
John didn't know what that said about him but the less spoken about it the better.
Making his way to the bathroom after getting his fill of the malleable detective in action John wondered how long this good mood would last (obviously until Sherlock woke up) and whether tomorrow would, hopefully, begin the same way.
There was usually an instant snap between the unconscious and lucidity for Sherlock whenever he slept so the fact that this time out of so many wakefulness had not been within immediate reach was blindingly disconcerting. It did not belong in the routine Sherlock had carefully cultivated within his mind whenever he was forced to rest and he was not sure how to take the absence of something so familiar in the wake of so much change. The spot that had at one time been reserved for another body was conspicuously empty and now filled with the lithe investigator as an unfamiliar chill of panic crawled down Sherlock's spine, a turbulent emotion not meant to be savored.
He had no idea why he felt so fidgety but the thought of getting off of the sofa and going to face an empty flat, or worse, a completely indifferent John Watson, made Sherlock's insides freeze.
Was this what caring for people did to you? Make you 'kill' yourself for the people within your care in a blink of an eye only to turn you into an overly-emotional simpering wreck when you came barreling back into their lives? Sherlock had not asked for all of these messy feelings nor had he personally cultivated the scenario that had pushed him over the edge (figuratively and metaphorically) and he had most certainly not, not for even one second, wanted John to get hurt. This had all come to the detective in a maelstrom of event after event, each bringing him further into the void without even noticing what kind of game he had truly been playing.
Being a genius didn't make you privy of every single thing before anyone else. Sherlock was not suddenly spiritually divine for all of his great qualities. He could only piece together what couldhappen with the information presented to him and proceed from there. Just because he was much more observant than most didn't grant him special powers and even if it did, he wouldn't waste them on something as boring as predicting the future.
That would take all of the fun out of living it.
But at this moment, what he wouldn't give to have some semblance of how John was feeling.
He wasn't the same man he was three years ago but after last night, Sherlock knew he wasn't the same man he had been yesterday either. Wherever John was (not in the flat, too quiet, sun is out at about… 11:00 o'clock, been gone for at least an hour and a half, maybe two) he had with him a new power.
Those trembling hands held the heart of the world's only Consulting Detective and didn't even realize it.
After almost five years of denial it was time to finally admit that what he shared with John went beyond anything either man could have imagined. Sherlock steepled his fingers under his chin and stared up at the ceiling with his somber grey-blue eyes.
This, he knew, would probably be the greatest problem he could ever hope to solve and Sherlock was not even the least bit equipped to handle it.
When John came home from work the next day, he wasn't sure exactly what it was he was expecting but it certainly wasn't what he actually did come home to.
Everyone who got to know the Great Sherlock Holmes knew that the spastic man did not do conventionality. He abhorred anything relatively relatable to things other people did, no matter what the activity.
Wanted to watch some telly? Hate it, so boring it could melt my eyeballs out of my sockets. Can't we just go to the mortuary instead? I'm sure they have something for me there!
Go out for dinner just because? Why bother? We don't have the money to cover the bill anyway or did you just conveniently forget that fact John?
Go to bed at a reasonable time? What is considered 'reasonable' and why the hell do people think such a thing could be measured in terms of normality? Really, whatever happened to all of that 'individuality' nonsense?
Movie date? NOT. MY. AREA. John. Honestly. It's like you don't even try to listen to what I say.
These were things that John had come to terms with in the time he had spent with Sherlock and no time apart would make him re-catalogue just how hateful they were to the introspective investigator.
So when John entered his flat and took in the dim lights, dinner steaming from the kitchen table and telly playing in the background, John wondered if he had stepped into the 9th dimension of Hell and whether or not an immediate escape could still be taken.
Unfortunately that was the exact moment that Sherlock floated from John's bedroom (which John was sure would be assumed to double as their bedroom since Sherlock didn't seem inclined to leave his flat anytime soon), dressed to the nines in his slim-cut suit and open-necked dress shirt, looking as if he had just stepped out of a photo shoot and was here for everyone's viewing pleasure.
Since it was just John here he supposed he would have to do.
"Sherlock," the already rattled physician began as monotone as possible, not sure if really wanted to know, "what are you doing?"
"I made us dinner. Isn't that what people do John?"
"People, yes, you, no."
"Really John there is no need to be so trite. I am doing enough of that for the both of us at the moment."
"You blew something up didn't you? Sherlock, this isn't 221b, you can't just do whatever you like when you're not even on the lease!"
"I didn't conduct any experiments!"
"Lestrade phoned you for a case then? Evidence hidden in the flat? C'mon, Sherlock, the last thing I need is the landlord to think he has a junkie in his building when a whole group of police officers come rounding up for a pretend drugs bust!"
"What are you not understanding about this? Your brain can't have devolved so much since I've been gone. I. Made. DINNER. That is all."
"For no reason other than the eating kind?"
"I'm beginning to think this was a terrible mistake." John heard his friend mutter under his breath, mouth twitching into a wayward frown. "Is it really so difficult to imagine that I did something… nice for you John?"
"There's no reason to do so." And it was true. John didn't expect any sympathy from Sherlock, not when a near fatal wound in his shoulder and life-threatening illness hadn't done much to make the younger man look at him as some sort of invalid. Nor did he want it for that matter.
And the thought of Sherlock trying to empathize with him, well, that was even worse.
"Oh, don't be an idiot." The obvious irritation within Sherlock's voice was a wonderful reminder of who it was that John was dealing with. "You're not different now. I know. But you're still… John."
Thin fingers disappeared within the tangle of curls artfully perched over the younger man's brow. John knew he shouldn't have been gaining such amusement from his best friend's overtly suffused state of emotion but when you knew someone to be so out of touch with their feelings for so long and finally saw them crash head first into them it was a sight to behold.
"You're not the first rape victim I've ever encountered nor will you be the last." Bluish-grey eyes widened immediately after the words left the detective's mouth, the mottled flush encompassing his cheeks, making the gangly man appear even younger than he usually did. "Uh… that. That wasn't what I meant to say. You are not a solitary figure in your experiences. That is to say that you have been in situations that may be abnormal to the norm obviously because of your propensity towards violence and adrenaline-heightened environments but in this instance, even if the circumstances are not within the range of an average citizen the main staple of the wound is more pedestrian than you would assume. Why is everything coming out so… wrong?"
"I… think you should stop trying to make me feel better."
At first, Sherlock had thought he had finally managed to irreparably damage their friendship as he watched his companion hunch over the sofa, leaning unsteadily on his cane. John's face faced away from his own, which left only the auditory clues to be deciphered and the increased breathing and shaky breaths were telling to say the least.
'That's it, I've finally done it,' Sherlock thought to himself in horror 'I've finally managed to drive way the one man who has stood by me even when he has least wanted to and it wasn't even intentional.'
But a wheeze followed by an incredibly high-pitched giggle broke through Sherlock's inner thrashing. John turned his head and glanced up, dark blue eyes twinkling with hysterical mirth as thin lips twisted into a wide, if slightly unhinged, grin.
'That's it, I've finally done it,' Sherlock rewound himself mentally, not entirely sure if his eyes were deceiving him for once 'I've finally managed to drive my closest friend insane and it wasn't even intentional.'
"John…?" The blond doctor managed to make it onto the sofa in one piece, dropping his cane onto the floor with a loud thud. The tentative baritone soothed the former soldier out of his current state of mind and grounded him back to the situation at hand. Sherlock's patience, which was hardly worth much on a good day, was a thread's breath away from disintegrating completely.
"You didn't say anything that wasn't exactly true Sherlock. Insensitive, yes, but I honestly don't expect much mush out of you so I think you're in the clear for now."
"I don't know what you expect from me anymore John. I've never had to, that is to say, I've never cared enough to bite back my own words." Sherlock's face became spotted with the earlier flush, pale cheeks blooming red in a rather endearing manner. "Stop laughing at me. This is not an appropriate response to this situation."
John felt his lips smooth out onto a straight line, not even noticing that he had been smirking as his friend was talking. "Yes because we're both so normal."
"Normal is… boring."
"For us you mean?"
"I suppose." The nervousness within Sherlock's demeanor began to shiver up and down his limbs. There was obviously more to this dinner than any type of deliberate apology the criminologist was trying to make without actually making it. "There is also something I wished to speak to you about. Shall we have dinner first?"
"I'm starved. What do you think?"
John barely had the spoon in his mouth when the shivers accompanied of being watched slithered down his spine. Sherlock didn't even make an excuse as he stared a hole in the middle of his forehead, his plate of food cooling and untouched. The rabid interest within those almond-shaped blue eyes were escalated by the bright color debilitated by the dilation of his pupils, dark lashes brushing the full brows with each flicker of a lid.
"What is it?" John finally asked once he swallowed. "I know that look at least. You have something to say so just say it Sherlock."
"I want you to assist me in apprehending Moran." Sherlock bluntly stated. "I know that things are different now, but your injuries are not to the point where you are not without your uses and I know that this, this is a personal vendetta. Not just for you, but if anyone deserves to be involved… even I know enough that this would be good for you."
Sherlock's eyes flickered at the sudden closed off features now appearing over his best friend's face. This, obviously, may have been more than John could take.
Hold my hand!
"John… I'd be lost without my blogger." The last ditch attempt at lightening his best friend's visage was not in vain, as those dark blue eyes finally focused back on the moment at hand. The new lines around John's mouth and the crow's feet rumpled sagely around that tempered gaze smoothed out until they were only faint echoes of John's oncoming age.
Now people will definitely talk!
"You know I'd follow you anywhere."
Sherlock's smirk was nowhere near as bright as John's smile, which, after so many years of lack of use, did not even skip a beat.
The rest of dinner was passed amicably, secret beams and awkward jokes being traded as if the three years had finally disintegrated between them and all that was left was Sherlock being Sherlock and John appreciating everything that came with that fact.
If their hands brushed more than what was used to or their legs became entwined underneath the table between them, nothing was said about it.
They were both finally home.