O soothest Sleep! if so it please thee, close
In midst of this thine hymn my willing eyes,
Then save me, or the passed day will shine
Upon my pillow, breeding many woes,—
Save me from curious Conscience, that still lords
Its strength for darkness, burrowing like a mole;
Turn the key deftly in the oiled wards,
And seal the hushed Casket of my Soul.
- John Keats
John was dreaming. In his unconscious state images swirled and merged with one another in his mind, each one emerging through a shadowy smog of sleep. For the most part the images were pleasant and his sleep was relatively undisturbed. But occasionally fragmented memories of his life before Baker Street would flicker through his brain, images of war and carnage and broken, faceless bodies.
These dreams used to make him wake up screaming. His pyjamas would always be saturated with sweat and his muscles would be trembling. But since he had started living here these bad dreams had decreased both in frequency and intensity up to a point where he barely remembered them at all.
However this night he was dreaming of Sherlock. He didn't like seeing Sherlock in his dreams because it always confused him. Unconsciousness blurred the lines of friendship and opened up doors that John kept firmly shut when he was awake.
In his dream Sherlock was standing at the bottom of the bed, his face and eyes half swallowed up in shadow. Moonlight illuminated the startling pallor of his skin and John found himself staring intently at the white column of his throat and the sharp edge of his jaw.
He watched as the Dream-Sherlock placed a knee on his bed, he felt the pressure of his weight on the mattress and heard the creak of the bed frame. He watched as Sherlock began to crawl towards him, his eyes dark, his black hair wild and untamed.
John recoiled from the Dream-Sherlock, afraid that if their skin touched something would happen, something bad, something that he could never take back.
The Dream-Sherlock seemed to feel John's fear because he smiled and revealed a set of dazzlingly white teeth which looked almost vampiric in the moonlight.
Sweat gathered down the length of John's spine as he watched as the Dream-Sherlock crawled further up the mattress until the bare skin of his knee nudged against John's outer thigh_
Suddenly John felt heavy hands grab his shoulders and shake him into consciousness. His eyes flew open and, somewhat disoriented, John stared into the face of the real Sherlock Holmes.
"Sherlock?" John asked, trying to make sure that the face in front of him wasn't another dream-like apparition.
"Yes."
John blinked a few times and then just stared at Sherlock – who had yet to remove his hands from John's shoulders.
"What are you doing in here?"
Sherlock's eyes looked wild and John could tell, even in the darkness, that he hadn't slept in days.
"You called me – evidently it must have been during a dream-like state – but you called out my name a few times and you sounded... distressed so I thought it best to come in and see if you were alright."
John sat up in bed, pushing himself away from Sherlock's grip.
"I called out your name?"
"Yes, repeatedly."
John could feel a blush rising in his cheeks and he was thankful for the room's lack of light,
"I'm sorry, I was having a nightmare."
"Involving me?" Sherlock seemed almost amused, "Was I the hero or the villain of the piece?"
"Neither." John said as he shoved Sherlock to the side so that he could peer at the clock on his bedside table, "Why are you awake at four in the morning?"
Sherlock shrugged as he sat himself down on the edge of the bed,
"I haven't been asleep."
"Why?"
"My brain is too full of thoughts. They keep crashing around inside my skull." Sherlock said as he pressed his palm against one of his tired eyes.
"Do you ever get that John," Sherlock asked after he had been silent for a long while, "That feeling of being packed so tightly with thoughts that you feel as if you're going to burst. But no matter how many thoughts you have you can still feel each individual one moving around inside your brain like worms, each one struggling to be heard above the others. And they just get louder and louder and louder and you can feel the entire organ throbbing behind your eyes?"
"No Sherlock, I can't say that I have." John said sleepily as his eyes began to close and his body began to relax into the mattress again. John hadn't realised that he had drifted off to sleep until he heard Sherlock snap,
"John!" And suddenly the room was flooded with blinding light.
John hissed and burrowed deeper under the covers.
"Turn off the light."
"John I need you."
"It's four in the morning."
"That doesn't change the fact that I need you."
"What could you possible need me for?" John asked, his voice muffled by one of his pillows.
"I need to use you as a sounding board."
"Talk to your skull."
"I require some level of oral feedback."
"Sherlock," John said as he stuck his head out from beneath the covers, "Are you aware that I have work in the morning. I have to go off and save lives."
Sherlock snorted,
"You're a GP."
"Sherlock_"
"Just take the day off."
"I need the money."
"I have money, I'll pay you."
"Oh, for the love of God!" John said as he threw off the covers and got out of bed, "Go on then, where do you want me?"
Sherlock gave him a strange look before he said,
"Living room."
John plucked his dressing gown off the floor and stormed off in the direction of the living room, Sherlock following close behind him.
The floor was freezing and John shivered as his bed warm feet came into contact with the chilly floorboards. He slid his arms through his dressing gown and tightened the cord around his waist to try and retain as much heat as he could.
The second he walked into the living room, John was greeted with what looked like the external explosion of Sherlock's mind.
The walls were covered in a mixture of photographs, maps, multicoloured sticky notes and Sherlock's spider scrawl like cursive. Bright red wool had been pinned to certain pictures, attaching them to places on a map or particular sticky notes. The room was in chaos and it made John's brain ache just looking at it.
"When I went to bed," John said as he turned to look at Sherlock, "I cleaned this room. This room was spotless." John waved his arms around, "How the hell did you manage to do all of this in less than five hours?"
"Inclination is a very powerful thing." Sherlock said as he crossed the room and began fixing another piece of wool to the wall with a drawing-pin.
"Sherlock," John said incredulously, "This is lunacy."
"Not lunacy John, logic. Never mistake the two."
"With you it's always so hard to tell the difference." John muttered as he sat down heavily in his armchair.
His eyes traced the walls,
"What is all this?"
"It's a web." Sherlock said excitedly as he came to stand in the middle of the room, "The killer links to all the victims and all the victims, in some way, link to me."
"Do you mean that you know them all, that you met them before they died?"
Sherlock rolled his eyes,
"I don't mean I link to them personally, I simply mean that something in my past links to something that these women represent, like Eve Gilbert." Sherlock said as he practically lunged across the room to thrust his finger against a glossy photo of the deceased woman.
"Eve Gilbert was the secretary for the same cab company that employed Jeff Hope – the serial killer cab driver that you wrote about in your stupid blog."
"My blog isn't stupid; it's cathartic and brings in more clients."
"It has a stupid name: A Study in Pink." Sherlock scoffed.
"She was wearing pink; she had a pink phone, pink shoes and a pink suitcase. What would you have preferred me entitle it? A Study in Green? A Study in Scarlet_?"
"I don't have time to have this argument again Watson!" Sherlock snapped.
John shut his mouth knowing that Sherlock only called him by his surname when he was either in a playfully good mood or when he was under extreme stress – judging by the way Sherlock was pulling at his hair John was willing to bet on the latter.
"It could have just been a coincidence."
Sherlock shook his head and pointed at a picture of Isabella Vorn.
"Her link to me is more tenuous but the link is clear. Before she moved to London she lived in York where she worked in dog grooming salon called "The Hair of the Hound." Sherlock stared intently at John, willing him to make the connection before he had to spell it out for him.
"The case we took a few years back," John began, his brain searching his memories like a fisherman would search out a lighthouse through a thick coverage of fog, "the one with the dog and the research facility?"
Sherlock nodded frantically,
"What did you entitle that case as on your blog?"
John swallowed,
"The Hound of the Baskervilles."
"Still think it's a coincidence?"
"Sherlock that's only two cases out of the dozens that we've been on, I know it seems strange but it might not be the link."
"But it's not just these two cases." Sherlock said as he began pacing, "I've checked and every single one of these women is linked to the cases that we've been on, even the ones that weren't successful."
"I never wrote about these women in my blog, you didn't even know who they were until you created this... web." John said as he waved his arms around the room, "How was this serial killer able to find out obscure, and yet incredibly intricate, details about cases that he could have only read about on my blog?"
"I don't know." Sherlock practically yelled as he tugged fiercely at his hair as if he wanted to punish it for growing on his head, "If I knew do you really think that I'd be standing here right now? If I knew I wouldn't be creating a web I'd be setting a trap."
John watched as Sherlock paced, the harsh over head light made the purple rings beneath his eyes look darker and almost bruised.
He'd only seen Sherlock like this twice before and each time he had had to resort to drugging his tea and feeding him intravenously. When Sherlock got like this there was no placating him or talking him down, he wouldn't rest or sleep or eat until he had solved the puzzle in his mind. John knew that if he left him like this he would collapse from exhaustion, dehydration or a combination of the two.
"I'm going to put the kettle on."
"I don't want tea." Sherlock snapped as he began furiously scribbling something on a neon yellow sticky note, "This is no time for tea."
John ignored him and padded into the dark kitchen. As he waited for the kettle to boil he slipped back into his room to retrieve his packet of Diazepam from his medical bag. Even though he knew that Sherlock had been clean for the past three years, John never kept any opiate based drugs in his medical bag for fear the temptation might be too great for Sherlock to resist.
He carefully slipped the strip of tablets into the pocket of his dressing gown and headed back into the kitchen.
The kettle had boiled by now and while John let the tea brew in the teapot he crushed up a few tablets to a fine powder before he stirred them into Sherlock's cup. He added several spoonfuls of sugar and a generous amount of milk to help mask the taste. Before going back into the front room he filled up his own cup and slipped the remaining pill sheet back into his pocket.
"I told you I didn't want tea." Sherlock said as John held out the cup to him.
"Going by the wrinkled state of your lips I'm willing to guess that you haven't consumed any liquids in more than thirty-six hours. You either drink this or I'll hook you up to an IV again."
Sherlock glowered at John before he took the cup and sucked down the tea in three large mouthfuls.
Shit. John had hoped that over the course of maybe half an hour or so Sherlock would have sipped the tea thus slowly letting the drug enter into his system. But having knocked back the entire cup in less than four seconds the drug was going to hit his blood stream like lightning.
"Happy now?" Sherlock asked as he slammed the empty cup down on his desk.
John simply nodded and smiled, trying not to let his mild panic show. He retook his seat and carefully watched Sherlock for signs of change.
"Before I got on the case he killed sixteen women over the course of three years." Sherlock said as he traced his finger across a timeline that ran the length of the far wall, "Once I got on the case he killed a woman every week for seven weeks and then abruptly stopped a month ago." His finger stopped on the image of the last victim: Annie Normans.
John watched as Sherlock stood staring at a patch of empty wall.
"Sherlock?"
"Organised and methodical serial killers like this one don't simply stop killing unless they are in prison, incapacitated or dead." Sherlock suddenly sprang across the room and began shoving his arms into his coat.
"What are you doing?"
"I need to canvass the Accident and Emergencies."
"What? Which ones?" John asked as he hurriedly put his cup down on the floor and struggled to his feet.
"All of them," Sherlock said as he manically tried to force his other arm into his coat, "Our serial killer has to live in London, he'll be in his late thirties, he'll be white_"
"Sherlock, you can't canvass all the A&E's in London."
"Why not, there are only a hundred and three."
"Sherlock." John said as he grabbed hold of the hem of Sherlock's coat and dragged him away from the door, "It's half past four in the morning, you haven't slept in three days_"
"John, there is a serial killer out there who hasn't... who has just..." Sherlock swayed slightly and closed his eyes.
"Sit down." John said as he took hold of the lapels of Sherlock's coat and pushed him towards the sofa.
"I feel light-headed." Sherlock said as he slumped down into the cushions.
"Just rest."
Sherlock, who had been blinking rapidly, suddenly directed his gaze at John. His expression turned menacing,
"You drugged my tea." He whispered incredulously.
"I had to; you turned our living room into a giant cat's-cradle."
"You drugged my tea!" Sherlock thundered this time as he tried to stand up.
John pressed his palm against Sherlock's chest and, with minimal effort, managed to keep him sat down on the sofa.
"I can't believe you would drug me against my will." Sherlock mumbled as he flicked at John's hand.
"Does the concept of irony elude you entirely?"
"Shut up Watson."
John smiled slightly as he grabbed hold of Sherlock's ankles and heaved them onto the sofa, effectively forcing him to lie flat against the cushions.
Sherlock mumbled a string of expletives under his breath while shooting death glares at John. John ignored him and simply draped the multicoloured blanket, which Mrs Hudson had crocheted for them last Christmas, over Sherlock's coat clad body.
"Just sleep."
"Like I have a choice." Sherlock said as his eyelids began to droop, "What did you give me?"
"Diazepam."
Sherlock groaned, "You should have made a small concession and used an opiate based sedative."
"Doctors are generally advised against giving recovering drug addicts opiates."
"If you're conforming to that logic then I would have to argue that doctors are generally advised not to drug patients against their will!"
"Shut up Sherlock." John said as he switched off the over head light, plunging the room into relative darkness. Pale blue light glowed behind the curtains and when John drew them aside slightly he saw that the night had just begun to slip from the sky.
John closed the curtains and felt his way towards his armchair. He would sit here until he was sure that Sherlock had fallen asleep. He relaxed into his chair and took a few sips of his tea while he listened to Sherlock's soft breathing.
Through the darkness John could just make out the shapes of the women's faces in the photographs. He wondered if Sherlock thought that the man who had murdered these women was evil or whether he just considered him interesting, a mere puzzle that he had to solve? Regardless of what view Sherlock held for this serial killer, once the case was solved another one would come along and they'd be thrust back into this sort of situation again.
This realisation made John feel drained and he rested his head against the back of his armchair. Would they both be doing this when they were seventy? A small smile touched John's lips as he imagined Sherlock turning up to a crime scene on one of those electronic scooters that went five miles an hour, his dark hair bleached white, skin wrinkled and creased with age.
John couldn't imagine Sherlock being that old. In fact, John couldn't imagine Sherlock being any age other than what he was now. Sometimes he was sure that Sherlock had simply popped out of his mother's womb, six-foot four, head of curly black hair, even then wearing that coat.
John was brought out of his thoughts by Sherlock mumbling, "Irene."
John opened his eyes and turned his head towards him.
"Pardon."
"None of the women link to Irene Adler." Sherlock slurred sleepily, "Why would he make allusions to all of the other cases apart from hers?"
John remained very quiet. He didn't fully understand what she meant to Sherlock or what had transpired between them but he had known enough to lie to him and tell him that she was in a witness protection program in America rather than beheaded in Pakistan. He knew that Sherlock still kept her phone in a locked draw in his desk and that he hadn't deleted any of her texts. He also knew that until this moment Sherlock hadn't referred to Irene Adler as anything other than "The Woman".
"Why would he leave her out?" Sherlock mumbled as he snuggled himself deeper into the sofa.
"I don't know." John said.
"She was so important_ I mean her case was so important." Sherlock quickly corrected, "Maybe she's another clue."
John felt panic shoot down his spine. He was sure that Sherlock – the man who saw everything – had known that he was lying about what had happened to Irene. But John had always assumed that because Sherlock had wanted to believe that she was alive he had chosen to overlook the lie.
Now, if Irene was some sort of key to cracking this case the truth would have to be laid bare to Sherlock and there would be no lie for him to hide behind. John worried what this realisation would do to him. The first time she had died Sherlock had slipped into a state of total silence; he had composed new pieces on his violin, had barely eaten and had point-blank refused to talk about how he felt.
John didn't want to see him hurt like that again.
"Just sleep." John said as he buried his head in his hands.
He had been putting this off for a while, hoping that Sherlock would solve the case without having to get him involved. But from the direction that Sherlock's thought process had now taken it was clear that John had no choice but to do what he most despised.
He was going to have to call Mycroft.