"There," Sherlock said. "Finished." The flat of his hand is an unacceptable handkerchief, but Sherlock tries anyway to clean up John's little face, tears and sweat catching on his fingertips. It's not something he's tried before. Wiping away tears with his own hands. John smiled at him so wide, his eyes so sweet and gimlet. His little teeth were sharp as stars, startling white and so delicately pointed. "All done now."

John grinned and his little arms came up and pushed. Sherlock flew back, two small hands gripping his shoulders and a big grin before he tumbled head over foot and landed hard on his back on the tile, a weight pressing against his sternum. It was a hard hit, but it didn't really hurt, just stun him a little. When he was able to open his eyes he was met by the eager little face of a coney peering down at him good humouredly with black eyes and a playful twitch of his tall stickup ears. He'd recognize that look anywhere. Sherlock grinned up at him, at coney John, but the grin was cut short when he saw the square of his fold up magnifying glass in coney John's mouth.

"Hey! That's my eye!" he tried for authoritative, but his voice was too high, too light.

Too young.

He looked in panic at his fingers, the small narrow fingers of a child, instead of the long strong ones trained up to violin strings and test tubes. He could feel the softness of his fingertips a little boy's lack of blemish. Except there are the little red spots from where he used to compulsively pick at his cuticles. The only difference was that Mummy despaired of dressing him in suits; his experiments eventually started getting the better of the laundry staff.

Oh my.

What would Mummy say if she-

Wait.

"Oh, you're brilliant John; you can go all the way down, can't you?"

Coney John scratched his ear in consideration and leapt to the tile with the click of his claws. Sherlock shifted awkwardly, he had forgotten what it was like to be this light.

"Where are you going?" Sherlock sat up, trying to get used to child proportions again. "That is my eye, isn't it? I will be wanting it."

There was a twitch of the ears that said quite clearly, It could be dangerous.

***

Sherlock gave chase because John did have his eye and that can't go unchased, can it? He laughed wildly tumbling with coney John who was very careful with the sharp claws on his strong back feet as to not scratch Sherlock and very careful with magnifying glass held in his sharp teeth. But soon John slipped it back into Sherlock's pocket because it wasn't needed anymore. "John! John!" Sherlock breathed out, fresh and curious again. Giggling into the sleeve his over-sized coat. All his clothes are a bit over-sized, Mummy kept buying clothes that were a little too big so that Sherlock could grow into them, but he hasn't yet so everything was still loose and sliding. "Mycroft showed me where some strawberries are!"

John leapt happily around his feet.

"And- and I found a nest. With real eggs, not like the kind from the fridgerator. We can look but Mycroft says we mustn't touch because then their Mummy will be sad." He put his small hands on his hips and looked seriously down at John, small dark eyebrows coming together.

But really he thought, Like me, please like me.

John twitched his ears in affirmation at him, smiling a big crooked rabbity smile.

"Brilliant!" Sherlock's grin split open his small face and he threw his arms up in the air because sometimes he felt so much inside he just had to or else he might burst. He waved his arms and laughed because it was so nice to have a friend, someone who was different, like he was, and wasn't angry at Sherlock because he knew where everyone was hiding for hide and seek and he knew how to read big kid books and because he figured out his maths.

Coney John leapt high in the air with his powerful back feet and they ran and ran and laughed through the forest. It was perfect, absolutely wonderful, running and happy. And it was good because when Sherlock found a really brilliant leaf or a really spectacular hole in the ground John would look at it with him and twitch his ears at Sherlock as if to say, brilliant. And that made Sherlock so happy, like he had a real, for real friend. He knew that John, a quick little coney with his smart ears and his sharp claws and his strong back legs felt the same. That he felt stronger and fiercer than all the other coneys. Like he could take on a fox and maybe he wanted to take on a fox like sometimes Sherlock had to throw his arms in the air, even if they were at church.

They were the same.

Maybe they were even friends.

***

But boys grew up; Sherlock became long legged and coltish before he could even think on what was happening, childhood slipping away as if in a dream. His arms going all elbows and his legs, all knees. He was awkward and hormonal, confused by some of the things the boys his age do, the way they chase after girls. And they disliked him, even his teachers disliked him, but if the teacher was wrong, shouldn't he say something? And everything was awkward and different, before when he needed to run and move and get all the energy out people smiled and said he was cute, and sweet, and you know now they are at that age, now they frowned at him, and hissed at be to be still.

Mycroft doesn't even like him anymore, the great lazy tosser, throwing Sherlock out to the wolves for his own good, which is a betrayal that tasted like wormwood in Sherlock's mouth and made his face contort in contempt and scorn. Learn to be like them, Mycroft said, act like them, so Sherlock tried and tried. Now the energy, without an outlet, had solidified into something razor sharp and letters started appearing like hateful ticker tape until Sherlock wanted to put his eyes out.

He could try going to Mummy or Mycroft, but he was miserable, bitter, wouldn't give them the satisfaction. What he really wanted was to run away. Run, run, run faster than disappointment, faster than little white letters, faster than pain and outsideness and hunger and an intellect like a two edged sword that cut back at him as much as it cut others. He had to run but he didn't know how. He needed to move faster.

He remembered he wasn't alone.

There was a horse, coltish and stocky in nearly pony like proportions, but that was okay, Sherlock needed endurance and much as speed. He distrusted everyone and everything, but this was little brother John, who Sherlock had healed and coney John who had played.

He sniffed and pulled his coat tight around himself.

He was smart, smarter than all those idiots, he didn't need them, liars and, and betrayers all…

Horse John clamped the lapel of his coat to pull him closer impatiently.

"I-" Sherlock started to say imperiously looking into Horse John's black eyes. "Let's run away. Run as fast as you can John."

He boosted himself bareback and threw him arms around John's neck. "Just go before it gets us."

***

They ran very far and very fast, running away from the frustration and disappoint, racing from the sudden cutting knowledge the world wasn't as kind as he had believed it. He kept his face tight to John's mane and let's muscle carry him until the anguish fades. Some of it was hormonal stability, some of it was callous, mostly it was finding a niche they couldn't kick him out of. He was invaluable to the Yard, he made himself that way as soon as he got rid of the cocaine, pointless, needless now. And he was tired of running, tired of being prey; it wasn't natural for him. Not really. He was ready to give chase.

He could feel John shift beneath him, change and so stocky and deadly. There was a whistle and a rocket zipped past and he was in Afghanstan but…

Please, oh my

he wasn't Sherlock now, he was John because this hadn't been about him this whole time he'd been…

Stop, I can't- I can't do this-

In John's head and John was trying to help him understand why and what he was because John was different, John was different like Sherlock was different. But John was also wrong. He was in danger because of it. Because he was Wilde and didn't belong here he belonged a thousand years ago or very far away, or in nightmares but not anywhere man can touch because Sherlock was screaming and throwing up and screaming again because Sherlock saw it all, but without something to focus on, John felt everything.

***

The military was the perfect place for a thing like John, Sherlock thought with his face pressed to the thick blond hair of John's side; he could just feel the shape of John beneath the dog-wolf pelt. John made a soft woofing sound of sympathy and laid his big head over Sherlock's ankles.

At the end of it John was a thing that needs pack, purpose, relationship because without a limited number to focus on he got diffused. Shot through from every direction with the need to belong to care for, to play. In the military he had a unit and his responsibility was the unit and they welcome that attention. It was expected, which was what John wanted, not to be taken for granted, but to be so tied to something that there was no more thought for his saving his fellow's life as his own. As long as he could maintain that, there was equilibrium. Sherlock imagined a string of lovers, the women dragged through 221B; he imagined that John needed them, needed to hold their shoulders, their hands, to take care of them to comfort himself. To sooth the yearning to belong. How perfect then Sherlock must have been with his countless expectations until the line between Sherlock and John had smudged them into a single thing. John's pleasure at his cases, his devotion to Sherlock's work, even his occasional affection for Mycroft but only as far as necessary in maintaining Sherlock's peace.

John lapped up his tears, rubbing his soft cheek fur against Sherlock's face to sooth him while Sherlock huddled with his face against his side. "I'm not-" he had to take a deep breath. "I'm not used to feeling this much."

What? He supplemented in his mind, he and John had conversed enough he had John's tone and turn of phrase perfectly burnt into his head.

"Compassion, concern. I've trained myself…"

He had to stop himself again and instantly Afghanistan was quiet, the dust was faded, everything was still. Memory set on pause.

"I've trained myself to pull away so that I can perform well. So that I can do the Work. It hurt to care about everyone and everything all of a sudden, to know things for sure when I amused myself with grey before. I didn't know that I was good. Or have you just made me that way?" It made sense, simple chemistry. Biology. If an alien organism is introduced to a new body, and was stronger than the body's defenses must cave to it. Therefore if John was introduced, if John was working as a sort of filter for his very blood, for his hearts than his body must therefore take on some characteristics of John as well. He must, according to the laws of science receive a gradual build up of good inside him.

John chuffed. Half laughing, still worried.

Sherlock elbowed him with irritation, twisting into the curl of John's big wolfy body, heavy muscle beneath thick fur. "It was just a lot," he knew he sounded like a pouting child, but he couldn't help it. "It was only a shock. And it hurt a little, I didn't like it."

***

John was laughing at him now, but gently keeping tight around Sherlock, tail flopping peaceably. Not what you'd expect in a war zone, but then his flatmate was currently a big blond wolf, so perhaps it wasn't the biggest sticking point. As John's head turned something glinted around John's neck and Sherlock's body went tense and furious. His tags, John's tags, they had collared him. They had collared John.

His fingers, pale and white as bone against the gold of John's coat, flexed into the fur and pulled out the looping ball chains out and into the sunlight. "They've chained you John," he could feel his skin tense and tighten across his face with the force of his snarl. "Why did you let them chain you up?"

"I'm not chained Sherlock," said Wolf John.

"What is this?" Sherlock snarled, it was like he had been chained himself, as if he had a collar around his own neck. It was unnatural. All his funny feelings of brother, runner, hunter, just like me mixed up and his fist tightened so the small silver beads cut into his palm.

"I just learned how to bite on command, just like you did."

"You are a wild thing; it's not right for you to be domesticated." He felt like he was about to cry which was wrong because it was not something he did.

John grinned his dear crooked grin, "Do I look domesticated to you?" He didn't, he looked like a thing that could bite right through sheet metal, something to make his drugged hallucinations upon the moors of Baskerville whimper and run. Teeth all white and bright with potential and fur so thick it was bullet proof, eyes bright and not brilliant, not needing to be, because they know people, know feelings and love, real love, not the made an abomination by marketing, stripped naked and painted sexy, they know fear. John knows fear, and pain and compassion that was so intent it ripped across his hematoencephalic barrier until his brain bled with it, uncomprehending. John nudged his cheek, his bent down head. "I'm sorry. I didn't know it would hurt you to see that. To see me."

His ears cocked in concern and they're a brilliant poppy red inside, before they folded the right way and shadow obscures the shade.

"You knew I was different!" Sherlock screamed at him, and he was crying but he can't help it because he was frightened. "You know I don't understand it! How I struggle with sentiment and, and saying the right things. I still struggle, even though I… You know it John. That I can't-! Oh." He interrupted himself, head popping up from the protective cave of wolf John's body. War dog. Hunting hound. Whatever he was. Irrelevant. "John, would you say I'm a better man than Moriarty?" he was smiling smug, found a new trick, but half the magic's in the presentation.

John bristled delightfully all over, dangerous and dark. Sherlock laughed in delight, cuddling his face against John's thick fur. He wasn't normally one for cuddling, but it felt good for he and John to be together. Once again, lack of expectation freed him. Comforted. "If I have difficulty dealing with your… overblown protective benevolence how do you think it will sit with him?" He smiled his slow curling smile, the one that had, with the addition of John's benevolence, a secret snick like a stiletto between the ribs. "I would wager quite a lot that if dear Jim has ever felt compassion, it was so long ago he's forgotten the pain of it."

"That is how I'll get him," John said so that Sherlock could hear his answering smile.

"That's how you get him."

***

When John woke up he's in hospital. Well, not in hospital proper, it smelled odd and everything was pale and sturdy and battened down, like it might have need to survive a bomb blast. There was someone arguing on the other side of his door, a rectangular interruption in the blankness of the walls. He hoped Sherlock hadn't had to spend his time here, time was very precious, each second bought dearly. He hated the idea of Sherlock being forced to sit in this room where he would be bored and miserable. One of the men arguing on the other side of the door was Sherlock, he could recognize Sherlock's voice even from a mumble and Sherlock wasn't mumbling. But he couldn't hear the other person. The room had the muffled feel of soundproof walls, so Sherlock was probably arguing with Mycroft again.

He sighed and shifted in the bed and the door flew open, "John! You're awake! How are you feeling?"

"Fine, tired. Are you alright?" Sherlock sprung into the room, narrow fingers crawling over John's arms and shoulders. Checking him over while John submited patiently. He knew the feeling.

Mycroft got as far as stepping one foot in the door and letting the tip of his umbrella tap against the tile when Sherlock spun and snarled at him, "Go away Mycroft. We don't need your meddling anymore."

Gritting his teeth together at the force necessary to sit up again, John sorted himself, got himself upright, "It's time to stop that Sherlock."

"He said you're too dangerous, he wants to separate us," Sherlock turned to his brother, "Everything's fixed now Mycroft. You can't separate us."

"So you keep reminding me brother dear."

"Can't you two be kind to each other?" John covered his eyes, scrubbing away the grit.

"There is not benefit to kindness in one's life," Mycroft said. "Compassion has no reward."

John snorted out a quick laugh.

"Something is funny Dr. Watson?"

"Compassion is necessary. Everyone must either pay the cost of being alive or live dead."

"I live just fine," Mycroft snapped back. Those were the Holmes brothers snapping at everyone and everything. Quick as whips.

"Do you?"

"You have no right to judge my life with some self-help platitudes about how we should all hold hands and be good friends."

That got a tilt down of John's head, the unsubtle, not quite human shift into minor aggression, "You never had to grow up Mycroft. Never had to fight for anything. Never had to pay full price for anything in your life," John tilted his head at Mycroft, his eyes all big and dark. It was hard to tell his expression, where he was looking exactly, whether he was being sanctimonious or mocking. John sounded angry, but when Mycroft looked at Sherlock he appeared calm and only mildly annoyed. "The closest you got, I'm sure was with Sherlock. But even then you were safe. No undue acts of compassion. The frailty of genius is, as always, that it can convince itself of anything. I don't need to tell you you're unhappy. You know it. And you'll defend how miserable you are, won't you? You'll fight tooth and nail to convince everyone you're right, that you know best."

"Perhaps that's because I do, your perspective is unique, I will give you that, but that doesn't mean that you're correct either."

"As someone who deals quite regularly, and if I might say, effectively, in lives, I think I have some authority on the subject. I've bought myself, and I bought your brother too. I'm not trying to replace anyone."

"Let's refine your use of the pronoun since we're being all honest and forthright. Let's really get down to it. You meant to say, 'I'm not trying to replace you.' But you are, rather neatly. A little talk about morality here, a little joint possessiveness there and no one else is necessary but you two merrily orbiting each other. Is that kind then, Doctor? Is that your compassion?" Mycroft's voice was cheery, tripping and trembling over each jolly consonant.

"I don't want to replace you. I've never tried to replace you."

"But you could!" Mycroft's voice broke. Sherlock jolted like he's been shot, seeing real emotion, real anguish from his brother.

"I could lop my leg off. Or blow up 221B. Or stop drinking tea. But I won't. I wouldn't do any of those things."

"And I do get some choice in the matter?" Sherlock groused, trying to get his footing back under him. "I am still capable of thinking for myself. Death, temporary as it was, has not given me any brain damage."

John narrowed his eyes at him, "That's yet to be proven."

"Ha. Ha. You're so funny John."

"So if he told you never to see me again you wouldn't do what he said?"

"He doesn't own me," Sherlock's fingers twitched for his Strad, John could watch them dancing over an invisible neck. "If he did, which I doubt given the annoying pressure he keeps putting on us to 'get along,' I don't have to do what he says. I usually don't."

"That's the truth," John fell back again; he must have fallen into some sort of coma, so he had been sleeping, but he felt exhausted. Sherlock's hand had been on his shoulder pressing him back down onto the bed.

"Don't have a row John, you just woke up," his voice had shifted into that tone that made John relax, sit still and go calm. "Besides I've only got the one brother."

"Don't wander off, I want to go home," John stretched and resettled in his skin. How feel it must feel to shift and stretch in one's head and then be trapped in flesh again.

Sherlock's hand moved, curled in John's sheet, "Regular sleeping, not dream sleeping."

That got an annoyed look, but John seemed to agree, "Blood tomorrow, rest tonight."