John tossed the file of his last patient to the side. He would put it in its proper place later, but for now he needed a break. He loved his job, he really did, but sometimes he felt like he was a glorified school nurse. Their clinic was relatively small, which allowed the flexibility of hours he needed, but it also meant that he was treating sniffles and coughs the whole day through. Quite frankly, he was bored. He missed working in the surgery. He missed the little bursts of adrenalin that accompanied making that first incision. He missed actually saving lives. But working at a surgery was out of the question if he was going to continue to associate with Sherlock. The clinic tolerated his calling off at the very last minute, and he was never scolded for taking obscenely long lunch breaks during which no meal was actually had. And if he came back from on of these "lunch breaks" with fresh cuts or bruises, no one thought much of it. A surgery wouldn't and couldn't allow this sort of freedom.
So John stayed at the clinic, handing out lollipops to children with colds. He was glad that his unofficial employment with Sherlock brought a high level of job satisfaction; otherwise, he'd be miserable from boredom.
"John, dear." One of the receptionists stepped into his office after lightly knocking on the door. She was sweet, albeit in the same way all receptionists are required to be. "We've just had a walk-in. He looks like he needs to be seen pretty soon."
"Sure, yeah. I'll just get set up in here and then I'll bring him in."
She smiled at him pleasantly and handed over the new patient's file. After prepping the exam table, he flipped through the pages of the file, frowning at what he found therein. From the information listed on the admittance form, the patient had a head wound and other minor bruises and lacerations, all injuries consistent with spousal abuse. He continued flipping through the file, noting the patient's other visits to hospitals and clinics. From there, things became more peculiar. There was a large chunk of time spanning years during which the patient's file was completely bare, not a single visit to any medical facilities, but then starting at age seventeen and continuing through childhood, the file reported multiple visits to hospitals every year. Frowning at the stark inconsistency, John flipped it closed and looked at the name on the tab: Doyle, James Adair.
Something was evidently very rotten Denmark, so before telling the receptionist to call the patient in, he peeked into the waiting room to check out this Mr. Doyle and surreptitiously gather some information. At first, he thought his eyes must be playing tricks on him, because there's no way in hell Moriarty would just waltz into his clinic. He thought that maybe it wasn't Jim, maybe it was some freakish doppelganger that just looked precisely identical to Jim. He threw this idea out the window when he heard the man start talking in that strange lilting, sing-song fashion that he had at the pool.
"Se-bas-tian," he whined, "where are we?"
The apparently long-suffering Sebastian readjusted himself to accommodate Jim's writhing and to keep an ice pack pressed to his head before responding. "We're at the clinic, Jim. I told you that already."
"Oooooh." Eyes darting wildly about the room, Jim grew silent for a moment and then began panting and wriggling about as much as the arm Sebastian had thrown around his shoulder would allow. "Can't feel my hand, Seb. It's all numb. Make it stop, Seb. I need my hand for building and stuff. Don't let it be broken, Seb."
"Sh," Sebastian pulled Jim's head against himself and coaxed him into relaxing. "It's going to be fine. You just need to see a doctor, and they'll make it better."
John cursed under his breath and retreated back into his office. He had no clue what to do. On one hand, Jim was a foul human being that belonged in a heavily guarded psych ward, but on the other, it was clear that he was very injured and in danger of dying if not treated. John could do a lot of unsavory things when the time called for it, but he didn't know if he could kill a man when he was as helpless and broken as Jim so obviously was now. He pulled out his phone and thought of calling Sherlock, or maybe even Lestrade or Mycroft, but when he imagined their reactions to having caught Moriarty, a sick twist in his stomach made him stash the phone back into his pocket. Sherlock would likely have insisted that John hold the man captive until he could come and gloat about Jim's weakness. Lestrade would have him sent to a hospital under heavy guard, and Jim would probably respond with violence and chaos. Mycroft would just have him whisked away to be quietly killed in some remote corner of London. No, John couldn't have any of that. He could be a soldier later; right now, a doctor was needed.
He notified the receptionist that he was ready for his next patient before stepping into the bathroom which was connected to his office. He waited there until he heard the familiar sounds of Jim being settled onto the exam table. The receptionist was talking, telling them that the doctor would be right with them and to just make themselves comfortable. He waited for the door to click closed before stepping out of the bathroom. Sebastian caught his eye and gasped, already jumping to his feet and reaching behind to draw a weapon. John had hoped that the henchman wouldn't recognize him, but this hope was quickly snuffed out as Sebastian leveled a gun at John's head.
"Hey," John held up his hands in a sign of submission. "There's no need for that. I'm not going to try to hurt anyone."
"Bullshit." The gun didn't move off its target as Sebastian eased protectively closer to Jim. "What the fuck are you doing here anyway?"
"I work here. I am a doctor, after all." John momentarily thought that he'd miscalculated. His heart was hammering an unsteady beat in his chest as the gun continued to remain pointed at him. "Jim needs help, Sebastian, and he needs it quickly. I'm the best doctor here to give him that."
As if on cue, Jim began stirring on the bed and giving weak little moans. He curled in on himself, whimpering as waves of nausea began rocking through him. "Seb...hurts..." John calmly handed Sebastian a bucket which he eased below Jim's chin as he became sick again.
Sebastian's mouth settled into a hard line when Jim slumped back against the bed, his face far more drawn and pale than usual. He slowly lowered the gun. "Fine. You can look after him, but I'm going to be watching you. Any sign of you trying to fuck things up, and you're a dead man."
John nodded. "Fair enough."
He stepped closer to Jim and gently turned his head from side to side, watching the man's eyes as he did so. He then followed and cataloged the trail of bruised running down Jim's neck and beneath his shirt. "Jim, can you hear me?" Jim gave a slight nod but didn't open his eyes which had fallen closed after John examined them. "I'm going to take your shirt off so I can get a better look at these cuts, okay?"
Suddenly, Sebastian was at Jim's side and shoving John away. "No, I'll do it." John held his hands up once again to show that he wouldn't interfere as Sebastian gently stripped away Jim's shirt and then the bandages that had covered the more serious of the cuts. The damage was worse than John had anticipated, which would only make his job more complicated in the future.
"Okay, I need to know what happened." He turned to Sebastian with a raised eyebrow.
"He was mugged."
"Mugged? Really?" John couldn't decide whether he wanted to laugh or punch Sebastian for thinking he was so dense. "I don't believe it."
"It's the truth." The hired muscle's eyes were glinting dangerously as he glared at John. "He went out earlier today and wouldn't let me follow him. He wouldn't even let his usual security detail follow him. I thought about tracking him anyway, but he does this every year, so I didn't really think much of it. Figured he had some personal business or something. A few hours later, his emergency signal is going off and I find him in an alleyway. Mugged."
"Oh." His eyes flicked back to Jim and continued cataloging the extent of the damage. "What happened after that?"
"Well, I knew he had a concussion, but I didn't think it was that bad. He was pretty coherent when I found him, so I thought I could just take care of it at home. Then he kept getting sick, and he started having seizures. He's had two so far. And he asks the same questions over and over again."
"Shit." John ran his fingers through his hair, suddenly feeling like life would've been a lot easier if he'd just told them to go on their merry way and leave him the hell alone. Things were getting more complicated by the minute. "What you've just told me says one of two things: either the blow to the head caused a clot to form, or the swelling from the injury is causing the damage. Either way, he's in serious trouble. I need a CT scan to confirm which it is, but the clinic doesn't have the proper facilities. Nor does it have the equipment to treat either cause of the seizures."
"So what do you propose we do? We can't go the hospital without all your little friends swarming on us."
"Yeah, well maybe you should've thought of that before strapping bombs to people willy nilly."
Abruptly, the gun was back out and pressed right up against John's nose. "Are you going to help him, or am I going to have the pleasure of painting these walls with your brains?"
John gritted his teeth. He was really fucking tired of having this gun in his face. In a flash, he snapped his fist up into Sebastian's elbow, causing him to cry out and drop the gun. John then landed a solid kick into his stomach, knocking him flat on his arse so John could retrieve the gun and level it at Sebastian's head. "I'm trying to find a way to help him, you dim-witted prick, but it's a little hard to concentrate when some bastard keeps waving a gun in your face. Now would you shut the fuck up so I can figure this out?"
Sebastian's eyes were wide with shock and his mouth was gaping open, but he didn't make a noise as John began pacing the room. He turned around and jerked the gun from where Sebastian was sprawled on the floor to Jim's limp form on the bed. "You could make yourself useful and get him to drink some water, then put that compress back on his head." Sebastian mutely nodded and rose to do his bidding. He was quickly reevaluating his opinion of the doctor and deciding that maybe he wasn't such a push over.
"Okay. Okay, I think I got it." John pulled out his phone and punched in some numbers. Sebastian froze, suddenly afraid that he had made a serious error in judgment. This fear was compounded when John began talking. "Hello, Sherlock...Still no cases then?...That's too bad, but I have something that might interest you...No, that's not me trying to get into your pants again, not that I've ever tried in the first place...Will you shut up and listen to me for a minute? It's important...Good. Listen, an old friend of mine from the army needs some help. He got himself into a spot of trouble and came to me for some medical care. He's hurt pretty badly, though, and I need to get him a CT scan without it being on any sort of records. Think you could help?...I know that breaking into a hospital's lab equipment isn't as interesting as a serial killer, but it'll at least get rid of the boredom for a bit...Yeah...Okay...I'll be waiting at the clinic for you to pick us up."
Sebastian was clenching and unclenching his jaw in anger. He couldn't believe that he'd been fooled by this nothing of a doctor. "You said that you were going to help him."
"I am."
"How in bloody hell is handing him right over to Sherlock helping him?"
"I'm not handing him over. I'm using my resources. You and I aren't nearly clever enough to figure out how to get the equipment we need without drawing attention to ourselves, but Sherlock is. He'll take care of getting us in and getting us what we need, and he'll be none the wiser about who he's helping treat. Get it?"
Sebastian's scowl remained firmly in place. "I don't like it."
"Well too damn bad, because it's the best we've got right now." John strode over to Jim's side and began cleaning and bandaging the wounds on his abdomen once again. "These will need stitches, but it'll have to wait until later. Hand me a roll of gauze out of that drawer." Sebastian did as he was told and John began wrapping the gauze around Jim's head, making sure to get his hair firmly covered. He then went to the supply closet and retrieved an oxygen tank and mask which he affixed over Jim's mouth. As a final touch, he bundled Jim up in a blanket, obscuring the thin lines of his body. He stepped back and looked over his handiwork, smiling as he noted that Jim wasn't recognizable under all the layers of covering.
"Okay, I think he'll be pretty well hidden, but you're going to have to hide when Sherlock gets here. You can follow us to the hospital, and I'll text you where we're at, but you can't let Sherlock see you."
"No, there's no way I'm going to just leave him with you two! How dense do you think I am? You could do anything, and I wouldn't be able to stop it. No. Not happening."
"Seriously?" John stared at him in disgust. "I don't see that you have any right to having trust issues. You and he fucking strapped me to a bomb, and here I am risking my job, my friendship, and pretty much everything that's good in my life to help you bastards. So, fine. If you don't want to do it my way, then I'll just sit back and watch and laugh as your little buddy over there goes into a coma and then dies. That sounds like a fucking perfect way to spend my Thursday afternoon."
The two stood glowering at each other from across the room. John could feel the tension crackling between them, could feel themselves edging towards violence. Finally, though, Sebastian relented, dropping his gaze and allowing his fists to relax by his sides.
"Fine. We'll do it your way."
"Good. And from now on you're not going to say a damn thing about my decisions. I'm the doctor, I'm the one in charge here. From now on, you're just the nurse that's going to do whatever I say, or else risk seriously screwing this up. Got it?"
Looking as if he had a lemon firmly wedged in his mouth, Sebastian nodded sharply. If before he hadn't much liked the doctor, he now hated him. He was a soldier, was used to taking orders, but not from some pip-squeak with a penchant for hideous sweaters.
John had gone back to Jim's side and was sticking more bandages over his face to help further conceal his identity when his phone began buzzing. He glanced at the screen and stuck it back in his pocket. "Alright, Sherlock's here. We're going to St. Bart's; you can meet us there when I give you the okay. I'm going to sign off duty, and then head out with Jim."
Giving John a nod, Sebastian gently squeezed Jim's shoulder and leaned down to whisper something in his ear. The only sign of comprehension Jim gave was a tiny quirk of his lips. John wondered what twisted joke they were sharing, but then he decided that he didn't much want to know.
-oOo-oOo-oOo-
John had known that fighting off Sherlock's curiosity would be nigh impossible, but he had hoped to avoid it by giving Sherlock as much information up-front as possible. Of course, most of it was lies, but he had become rather good at lying to the detective.
Sherlock gave Jim a cursory glance as John pulled him into the cab, barely looking him over before turning back around to stare out the window, acting as if he were hardly interested in John's affairs. John knew it was a charade, and that Sherlock was just biding his time until he could rip Jim's life story open and bare it to the world, but John had no intentions of allowing Sherlock to do that.
"His name is Bill, if that's what you're wondering. We served together for a bit in Afghanistan. He was my med tech. Always had a habit of getting into a bit of trouble." John subtly readjusted Jim such that his head was resting on his shoulder, and therefore out of Sherlock's sight.
Sherlock's eyes swept over the two of them once again, this time lingering for a moment on the unconscious form cradled in John's arms. "Your friend," Sherlock said the word as if were an exceptionally offensive slur, "smells of Burberry cologne and rubbish. Mugged, then. Why wouldn't he want it on file if he had been mugged? Surely he'd want to have whomever did it arrested."
"No. Let's just say that what was stolen from him would get him into more trouble with the police than he would like. Honestly, Sherlock, the less you know about the whole affair, the better."
John silently cursed himself for saying that. Of course it would just provoke Sherlock into digging up more answers, and eventually he would find that there were no answers to be found. Just pathetic, over-sympathetic John helping the most dangerous man alive to stay that way.
Sherlock's hand abruptly lunged out and grasped Jim's wrist, dragging the criminal's hand up for examination. He flipped the pale extremity over, closely peering at ever appendage before drawing it up to his face and sniffing at it. John would have been appalled if he wasn't so terrified that he was about to be discovered.
"Hm...Expensive hand cream and cologne, so he has quite a bit of money, or else he's masquerading as such. Altogether possible, but not likely if one is to judge by his cashmere pajama pants. But there's something else there, just hidden under the cologne..." He took another, deeper sniff of Jim's hand, this time looking up with a grin. "Ah ha! Marijuana, of course. Your little friend here has been quite successful in dealing drugs, hence his money. However, one of his deals went pear-shaped, and he not only lost his bounty, but he was also severely injured; head trauma, obviously. Since he couldn't go to the police due to the drugs, he had to come to you. And now here we are." Sherlock settled back with a self-satisfied expression, smiling at having conquered the puzzle that was John's friend.
John calmly exhaled, trying to pretend as if Sherlock hadn't come within centimeters of exposing him for a liar and a criminal by proxy. Thank the heavens for Jim's smoking habits. Of course, he should've known that the consulting criminal's perpetual grin was at least partially chemically induced; no one could be that absurdly happy while strapping a bomb to another man without the aid of some "herbal soothers."
"Brilliant. Very good, Sherlock. Now can you tell me what clever scheme you've come up with to get us into the hospital?"
The cheeky grin that inevitably caused all girls in the general area to flush and begin to flirt shamelessly with the detective adorned Sherlock's face. "You were right, John. This was a rather interesting challenge. Doctors are so protective of their equipment, always keeping track of who's using it and when. Really, the only option we had would be to enter him as a patient. Since you wanted anonymity, I had to create a suitably convincing alias." He whipped a file from the folds of his coat, proudly displaying cleverly faked medical records and ID. "Meet your dear friend, Jensen Ackles."
John frowned as he thumbed through the folder. Everything looked in order, but something wasn't quite right. "Sherlock, how did you come up with the name?"
"Oh, that was easy," Sherlock flippantly tossed his wrist in his version of a shrug. "I just logged onto the internet for a bit and used Google's search suggestions to pick one. After I had typed the letters J, E, N, and S, that was the name that popped up. It sounded nice, so I used it."
"Sherlock...Did you name my friend after an actor from an American television show?"
"Of course not. I named him from Google's search suggestions. If it happens to be an actor from an American television show, then you should blame Google, not me."
"Okay," John sighed, "We've got the means to get him into the hospital, now what about getting the equipment I need?"
"See, now this is where it gets a bit more exciting. You're going to pretend to be a doctor!"
"Sherlock, I am a doctor."
"I know, but you're going to pretend to be one that works at St. Bart's. See? I've even brought you a uniform and the proper IDs."
John looked those over with admiration. "Really, Sherlock, your ability to make forgeries is quite astounding. I'd hate to think how much money you'd get for making these sorts of things for high schoolers."
"It was nothing, really. I simply used the ID I stole off Molly as a template to make yours. No one's going to look too closely at it, anyway. The really hard part was getting you usage of the CT scanner. They're very controlling of who gets to use it when, so I had to hack into their computer system and and plug your little friend into the schedule with you as the attending physician. That was quite the puzzle, far more difficult than cracking the password on your computer. And then erasing the evidence that the schedule had been tampered with by outside sources was even more stimulating. Honestly, John, if this is the sort of thing that Moriarty does on a daily basis, I can see the appeal. Everything's so much more complex when you're the one causing the trouble."
"Okay, Sherlock. Remind me to never, ever ask you for a favor again. I'd rather not be the cause of you turning to a life of crime."
"Please, John. I would never do that, if only because it would be like letting Moriarty win."
"Of course. What was I thinking?" John rolled his eyes and turned to stare out the window. He fully trusted Sherlock's abilities, and he had no doubts that everything would go without a hitch, but he couldn't help but feel nervous. He hadn't done something so illegal in ages; even killing the cabbie hadn't been that bad of a crime, especially considering that Sherlock had been in danger at the time. Somehow, thinking that he was saving the life of a criminal didn't ease John's nerves.
-oOo-oOo-oOo-
Jim could feel a gentle rocking causing him to loll onto a firm but comforting presence. He was dimly aware of conversation going on around himself, but he couldn't grasp it; it danced out of reach of his comprehension, and he allowed it to slip through his fragile clutch of awareness.
He was time traveling now, dropping into old ages and dimensions, feeling the uneasy crush of youth weighing him down, dragging him into old wounds and tearing open scars. He was being suffocated by it; he could feel himself falling into the darkness which had brushed against his legs before, but never with such utter certainty that it would grab him and pull him into its murky depths.
"Don't you think you're a little out of your depths, babe?"
"Never." He smiled through bloodied teeth and torn lips.
"I think you'd best get home. Someone' s going to be looking for you."
"That's the beauty of it," he laughed. "No one's there; no one's going to care. They never did anyway, but now the house is empty. It's just me and my own."
"Oh, honey, I'm sorry. I didn't realize. But drinking's not going to make it any better. You should go home and try to get some rest. You'll feel better in the morning."
"No, you don't understand. I'm not sad. This is perfect, so fucking perfect. It's just what I wanted."
"You're crying."
He wiped at his cheeks, his fingers coming back smeared with salt water and blood. "So I am," he smirked. "Had to pretend at the funeral, you know. I'm an awfully good actor, but it's hard to stop when I've started. You know how it goes. You get stuck in character. Pretending to be the loving son, pretending to be upset when you were the one that put the virus in her tea. Biological warfare, you know, is the wave of the future. But always pretending, it gets fucking exhausting. And holding her hand in that hospital, god, what a bore! I thought about stopping it sooner. Thought about cutting off her IV when no one was looking. She would've died three days earlier if I had. But watching it towards the end was kind of fun, you know? Like watching the last embers of a fire burn into nothing. God, I'm such a fucking poet, aren't I?"
She was staring at him now, shocked and horrified. He rolled his eyes as she began to reach behind herself for the phone. Predictable. Dull. Inconvenient, but not unfixable.
"Oh dear, I've said too much, haven't I?" He drew a gun from beneath his jacket, pointing it at her quivering hand. "Touch the phone, and you'll lose that hand. Now if you don't mind," he jumped over the counter and tore the cord from the wall. "I'll be off."
He oh so calmly emptied the register of its contents and snagged a bottle of whiskey from the shelf before turning back to the girl. She had been pretty before, but now she was beautiful; her cheeks flushed in fear, her eyes stretched wide as he pressed himself against her. "You've been wonderful, you really have. I'd like to thank you for all that you've done for me tonight." He gently tipped her chin upwards, claiming her lips in a fierce and lusty kiss. It was all an act, of course; everything was a game of charades to him, but it felt nice to be so damn good at it.
He pulled away with a pleasant smile, stroking his fingers over her neck. "I suppose this is good bye, then. I hope you'll wait twenty minutes before calling the cops; I'd hate to have to come back and take that pretty hand of yours later."
The rocking stopped and strong hands dragged him away from the past, pulling him back into the here and now of pain and confusion and blurred vision and oozing wounds.
"Don't worry, Jim," a voice whispered in his ear. "We'll have you fixed up soon."
He certainly hoped so. He didn't know how many ghosts his past could dredge up before insanity finally took hold. Maybe letting go would be a relief, maybe he was fighting for nothing, but he didn't much want to find out for sure. He knew there was no swimming back to the surface once one dove into the deep end.