Really, the sitting room and the kitchen were a dump. John knew he hadn't touched the cleaning in a week, and he also knew that Sherlock touching the cleaning was something that only happened if a) Sherlock was inconvenienced by the mound of papers and scientific equipment strewn over the kitchen and sitting room table to the point of tripping over things or b) if John or Mrs. Hudson mother-henned him enough that he took a few cursory seconds to move a few objects idly from one place to another.

The problem with the azaleas and the scimitar apparently wasn't too incredibly serious; it only warranted one nicotine patch so far (though John could tell there were a few more perched on the back of the couch at the ready). Sherlock was on his back, on the couch, praying to the gods of deduction, as John occasionally described it with an eye-roll. There was a good chance that the case would be solved by John's bed-time, which was nice, because even though tomorrow was Sunday, John enjoyed catching up with sleep whenever he could. The anticipation, John decided, had nothing to do with possibly finding himself cuddled up next to his admittedly attractive flat-mate that he was certainly not gay for.

"How close are you to solving it?" He asked Sherlock.

"Three hours."

John raised his eyebrow at the specificity. "Can you think and clean the flat at the same time?"

"Why on earth would I do that?"

"I dunno. To find your skull?"

Sherlock shot him a look of such intellectual disdain that John blew out his cheeks in resignation. "Right, fine, I'll do it."

The trickiest part was always picking over the kitchen table. It was not unusual for Sherlock to have several experiments going at a time, but some got outmoded or restarted, and just began to gather dust, mold, and other unhygienic attributes over several days. Occasionally John would come home to test tubes in the sink, but more often or not it was up to him to decipher which experiments were inactive and which ones would lead to a very irate consulting detective tantrum if they were disturbed in any way. Today there was one ringer of an experiment that had given the test-tubes a brown tinge, so they were moved into the sink. There were also a couple stained beakers, and a pipette stuck in a flower vase which had held flowers from Mrs. Hudson two months ago as a 'moving into the flat anniversary present'.

John checked the fridge, said hello to the head in there which stared back at him rather glumly, had a brief existential crisis in regards to the head-in-the-fridge consisting of wondering what his life was coming to, and finally moved on to the kitchen cupboards which actually didn't contain much other than a few plates and cups, (they got take-away more than they ate in) and some scientific equipment . No skull in the cupboard, no skull in the fridge, no skull on the table. Right.

Sitting Room. The bookshelves were probably the tidiest part of the flat if not for the dust, so John, focused as he was, only gave them a brief skimming over. The mantel was a little more jumbled, but nothing serious besides a forlorn, stale piece of toast with a screwdriver poked through it. Nothing in the fireplace, nothing under the couch (Sherlock grunted irately when John took a couple minutes to scrabble underneath it, but he was mostly lost in his mind palace and so wasn't completely shaken from his intellectual zen-like trance). In the end there was just the table in the sitting room where John did most of his typing, and that was relatively clear except for a large box of police related papers that John didn't remember having been moved since he first set foot in the apartment. He poked around the box a bit, and once he confirmed that the papers on the top were dated circua 2006 he nodded to himself and hefted it in his arms. "I'm just going to shove this in your room" John said, but Sherlock was too lost in his mind palace to notice.

Sherlock's bedroom was meticulously clean, so much so that John occasionally wondered if Sherlock's mess in the rest of the flat was engineered precisely to drive him insane. Sherlock hardly ever entered his bedroom except to change his clothes, however, his sleeping surface of choice was the couch (once Sherlock had laid on the couch for two days without moving except to drink water and chew at some eggrolls John had placed next to him). If the consulting detective NEEDED to sleep, however, he would come in here and occasionally sleep for up to 12 hours straight. Even the great Sherlock Holmes couldn't completely fight against biology and the comfort of a clean, empty bed.

Empty, that is, except for something grinning up at him with dead, hollow eyes. John grabbed the thing from where it sat, nestled in something like a nest of blankets, and stared at it with confusion. The smooth strip up it's back, where Sherlock had rubbed it repetitively. If he had needed this blasted skull so badly last night before he climbed the stairs to borrow John's, why hadn't he checked his bedroom, the most obvious place second only to the mantelpiece?

John strode out to the sitting room where Sherlock was lying, his fingertips still pressed together in his 'praying' pose, and placed the skull firmly on Sherlock's chest.

"That was in the middle of your bed."

Sherlock shook himself and started up, his pale blue eyes widened. He was startled, John noticed, but not exactly surprised. "Thank you John," he said smoothly.

"Why did you lie? Unless you're completely daft you couldn't have missed your skull being in the middle of your bed last night. After being awake for three days you would have gone to your bed, I know you wouldn't have just had a kip on the sofa."

John prepared for a fight. God knew the detective could run his mouth if he had to in order to get his way (for what, John wondered. His own skull wasn't much better than the boney one)

Sherlock stared up at him, his lips parted slightly. Then the corner of his mouth flicked up. "Don't worry John. Now that I have my skull back I won't have any reason bother you in your bed again."