I don't own the characters. They are Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's, but these versions are Mark Gatiss's and Steven Moffat's. I simply get to play.

A/N: Okay guys. Here's chapter three. It's longer than the rest, and it took forever to write, but at least I got it done. Tell me what you guys think so far, and feedback is always welcome! On that note, enjoy chapter three!

Moving Forward, or Stepping Back?

It had been almost three weeks since John had witnessed Sherlock in his worst possible state. Sherlock had willingly given up his razor blades, but John had to confiscate the drugs. It seemed that Sherlock had more track marks than razor scars, so he obviously was more of a drug addict than a self harm one. Even though John had everything that Sherlock could possibly hurt himself with, he still kept a close eye on the detective and periodically checked Sherlock's favorite hiding spots.

Sherlock found John's constant watch on him annoying. He was like a hawk stalking it's prey. It was extremely unnecessary and tedious, in his opinion. Sherlock had to ask John for his shaving razor, and John would stand in the bathroom to make sure he didn't try anything. After he would finish shaving, John would take the razor back and hide it in his room somewhere. Sherlock could only roll his eyes.

What was extremely annoying to Sherlock was the temporary house arrest that he was put under. No experiments, no cases, no whipping dead bodies until John saw some improvement. In Sherlock's mind, he was improving, but he didn't know how to show John. So, while he was stumped in the way of finding proof that he was feeling better, he was either stuck at home or forced to go with John to the surgery.

Sherlock hated the surgery. He couldn't observe John doing his work, that would violate the HIPAA laws, and John had told him not to deduce anyone's life story because they would freak out and either call the cops or hit him. Or even cry. Sherlock was stuck in the nursing home with the old people, eating mashed potatoes and playing checkers. The old people were annoying. They yelled too much because of their failing hearing, they talked about their children too often, and they never remembered anything. Sherlock decided that sometimes, their life stories were interesting, but for the most part, they bored him to death. Sherlock was stuck there every day besides Saturdays and Sundays for a month. After that first month was up, John finally let him stay home alone. Sherlock practically jumped for joy.

The first Monday in March came around, and John left for work at nine o'clock in the morning, as usual. As soon as Sherlock heard the door of their flat click shut, Sherlock jumped out of bed and immediately slapped a nicotine patch on his arm. He felt energized almost instantly and decided to go downstairs to pick up on his experiments. He had so much work to get done and so little time to do it.

He began his day by taking a cab down to St. Bartholomew's Hospital Morgue, where he took home a jar of eyeballs, a bag of thumbs, and a dismembered head. As soon as he got back to 221B, he put the head in the refrigerator, as well as the thumbs. He stuck the eyeballs in the microwave and let them sit in it on high for five minutes, recording the data as the time ran out. His finished result was several popped eyeballs and three intact optic nerves among the eyeball mush. He took the time to examine each one under his microscope, recording the differences and similarities of the nerves. He concluded that two of them were from the same subject, deceased three days ago, and one from a young female, he guessed, deceased twelve hours before.

Sherlock put the nerves in formalin and stuck them in the fridge. He them proceeded to peel the skin off of the thumbs to study the bone structure, concluding that every thumb was slightly different. He decided that he'd work on the head the next day because he was tired of dead bodies already.

Sherlock sat on the couch and stared at the wall with his hands steepled under his chin until John stepped through the door.

"How was your day?" John asked anxiously.

"Mm," Sherlock replied, deep in thought.

"Sherlock."

"Hmm."

"Sherlock!"

"What?" Sherlock asked, annoyed now. He had been busy trying to determine the cause of death of the optic nerve subjects.

"How was your day," John asked again, enunciating each word.

"Fine," Sherlock replied curtly.

John walked up to the couch and inspected Sherlock thoroughly, pulling up his shirtsleeves and pant legs. No cuts or new track marks. John sighed with relief. Sherlock just yanked himself away from him and turned into the couch to sulk. John snickered.

John began walking to the refrigerator; he was hungry after his long shift at the surgery. I better be getting payed overtime, he thought to himself.

"Want anything to eat?" John asked his flatmate politely, knowing that the answer would be no.

Sherlock didn't reply.

John opened the refrigerator door, and closed it almost immediately. He looked down, trying not to get sick on his shoes.

He took a deep breath and opened the door again, staring straight into the eyes of the decapitated head in front of him. He once again closed the door.

"Is that a head?" John questioned.

"Just tea for me, thanks," Sherlock said monotonously, ignoring John's question.

"Is that a bloody head in the fridge?" John nearly shouted.

"I'm performing an experiment. I'm measuring the coagulation of saliva after death," Sherlock said matter-of-factly.

John just shook his head and returned to the kitchen to order take-away and make tea. After his dinner and tea, John went to bed while Sherlock typed away on his laptop. John smirked at the detective, shouted, "Goodnight," and went off to bed. He had dozed off after about ten minutes, dreaming about a happy Sherlock.

John woke up to a shrieking violin, clearly being abused by Sherlock. He rubbed his eyes and groggily looked at his watch. It was three twenty-two in the morning. John groaned and stuck his head under a pillow. "Four more hours," he muttered, then dozed off again.

o0o

It had been three days since John had begun leaving Sherlock at home. In those three days, Sherlock had managed to burn the floor trying to set fire to a cactus, scare John out of his skin with a dismembered head in the fridge, almost kill John with tainted butter, and blow up half of the items in the kitchen, as well as leave a stinking cloud sitting in the house for days to come. John had managed to live with everything that had happened, until Sherlock decided that he was going to record John's breathing pattern while he slept. As soon as he had woken up with a pair of gray-blue eyes in his face, he knew that he needed to talk to Sherlock about his behavior.

"Sherlock, we need to talk," John told him, early Friday evening. John had had the day off.

"What about," Sherlock responded, clearly uninterested.

"Sherlock, I know you're angry with me for dragging you to the surgery and for watching you like a hawk ever since the drug and self harm incident, but if you keep on doing these experiments, Mrs. Hudson is going to kick us out of 221B. Can you please find a way to get back at me without blowing up the flat?"

"I suppose," Sherlock replied quietly, his mind caught on a new thought.

John watched him for a few minutes, then asked, "Are you okay? Sherlock?"

Sherlock automatically broke out of his reverie. "Fine, John. Really." He gave his most convincing smile.

John grinned back. "Good. Then, lets have dinner."

John and Sherlock ate left over Thai take-away while they watched crap telly. John conversed with Sherlock, the detective paying attention, but actually focusing his brain on something else.

"Alright Sherlock, I'm getting sleepy," John said with a yawn. "I think I'm going to hit the sheets."

"Okay. I think I may actually follow tonight," Sherlock responded.

John gave a tired smile. "Now that's a good lad. Night Sherlock."

"Goodnight John."

They parted ways, Sherlock striding to his room while listening to John climb the steps to his. Sherlock shut the door to his room and created an elaborate scheme as to how he would get his drugs back from John's room the next day. Sherlock had found it easier to stop the cutting, he didn't feel that he needed it as much as he needed the drugs. Yes. The drugs. Sherlock found himself dizzy with want, and dozed off thinking of his heroin.

The next morning, Sherlock actually ate breakfast, just to please John and keep him off of his tail about something not seeming right. They chatted over eggs and toast, and then went back to their rooms to get dressed. Sherlock had naturally made it back the the living room before John, startling the army doctor when he walked in.

John grabbed his coat off of the rack next to the door. "I'm going to head out to pick up groceries. Are you going to be okay here alone?"

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "I was fine here all week last week."

"Just checking. Be back soon." With that, John swiftly stepped out the door and shut it quietly.

As soon as Sherlock heard the heavy door at the front of the building shut, he scrambled up from the couch and ran to John's room. Normally, Sherlock would have taken time to pick the lock so as not to make his intruding so evident, but this time, he was so needy for his drugs that he kicked down the door.

John hid his things in such obvious places; Sherlock found the heroin in his sock drawer. He picked up one of the syringes and ran back to the living room. He held it in his hand and stared at it, watching the amber colored liquid slosh back and forth in the barrel. He was so wrapped up in watching the heroin that he almost missed the sound of footsteps on the stairs. He froze for a minute, and then he struggled to pull up his shirtsleeve before John stepped through the door. He was too late though.

"Sorry, forgot my-" John started, but shut up abruptly when he saw Sherlock with the syringe. They stood there, staring at each other for approximately five and a half seconds before John lunged at Sherlock, pushing him to the ground. The syringe fell from Sherlock's hand and rolled several inches away from the two of them.

Both men struggled to reach the heroin, but Sherlock had longer arms, so he got it first.

"No! Sherlock, you're better than this! You're doing so well, don't give up now! Hand me the heroin!" John and Sherlock rolled around on the floor, kicking and hitting each other, John trying to pry the syringe from Sherlock's death grip.

"Sherlock!" John yelled.

"No!" Sherlock shouted back.

"SHERLOCK!"

"NO!"

John had had enough of their petty cat fight, so he drew back his right arm and punched Sherlock square in the cheek with as much force as he could muster. Sherlock dropped the syringe, all thoughts of a fantastic high wiped from his mind. His best friend had just hit him.

Sherlock's hand flew to his face while John rolled off of him, picked up the heroin, and ran to the sink. When Sherlock took his hand away, his fingertips were stained scarlet. He turned his head just in time to see John plunge the amber liquid into the sink while he ran the cold water. John discarded the syringe and came to Sherlock's aid as soon as he possibly could.

Sherlock had his hand pressed to his face, stopping the blood flow. He glared when John came into view.

"You hit me!" Sherlock accused, pouting like a toddler.

"Sorry mate. Had to stop you from shooting up. Move your hand."

"No," Sherlock pouted.

"Sherlock, stop being a child. Let me see."

Sherlock slowly moved his hand. The cut wasn't too bad; the blood had already stopped flowing.

"Well, good news is you don't need stitches. Let me go get some ointment and an ice pack. I'll be right back," John said, the doctor visible in him.

Sherlock moved to sit on the couch; John joined him a few minutes later. Once Sherlock was all doctored up and holding the ice pack to his face, John turned the telly on a random channel, neither paying attention. They sat in silence for what seemed like forever.

"I'm sorry." Sherlock had spoken out of the blue.

"S'alright mate. Me too."

"It's okay," Sherlock replied.

"Feeling better?" John asked. Sherlock just nodded.

They were silent once again, watching the program on the telly.

"John?" Sherlock said.

"Yes Sherlock?"

"Thanks. Again."

John smiled.

"Any day, Sherlock."