Hey again everybody, urm, don´t have anything to say actually, so just enjoy it and review please :D
Have a nice day!
I don´t own Sherlock or John, they are Sir Arthur Conan Doyles Characters and from the BBC Series "Sherlock".
9. May 2011, The First Rescue Mission
One week after the first infection
Four days, it had been for days since they had left London behind and John already missed the city. He didn´t hate his current situation. Life on the zeppelin was not bad. The detective and the doctor shared one of the small cabins. The little room was mostly occupied with a bunk bed and two small lockers. Sherlock slept in the upper bunk, he didn´t sleep most of the time anyway.
Sherlock was silent most of the time and John couldn´t blame him. The young man had lost his only way to occupy his brilliant mind with, the murders and serial killers. John was seriously worried for his best friend, but he didn´t really have time to do anything against Sherlocks bad mood. Most of the time he had to run around and look after the health conditions of the survivors, because some of them stopped eating or were still in shock about the resent events. They had yet to realize, that they had lost their family and friends and that nothing would be ever the same again.
The doctor was griefing too. His sister was probably dead. He had tried to call her twenty times, but she had never answered her phone. His parents had died years ago in a car accident and left the two of them behind. And now it was only John, who was left of the Watson family.
"John, honey, please sit down. It won´t help anybody if you collapse!", lectured Mrs Hudson the ex soldier and pushed him to one of the chairs in the big lounge. The lounge was a big room, with large windows on both sides. There the food and everything else was given to the people and they had a place to talk with others about their current situation.
"Okay, Mrs Hudson.", John sighed, he was exhausted.
"And stop calling me Mrs Hudson, I already told you to call me by my first name!"
"Yes, Beverly.", the doctor replied with a small smile. Mrs Hudson... Beverly was a big help. She cooked the meals together with a little group of women and always tried to cheer everyone up.
"John, Mycroft wants us to meet him in ten minutes, but I still have to find Sherlock, do you know where he is?", asked Lestrade. He always talked to the people and worked as a mediator between fighting survivors.
"I will be there and Sherlock is probably in the engine room near the crew cabins. I am worried, Lestrade. He doesn´t talk to anyone, not even me!"
"He just needs time.", replied Lestrade, but he was frowning. The inspector was also worried about the young man.
"I hope so, my friend, I hope so." John rubbed his right hand over his face and tried relieve a bit tension.
"Will you come and look with me for him? Mycroft is planning a mission."
"Sure, let´s go." They walked out of the lobby, after John thanked Mrs Hudson for her help earlier with one of the patients.
The zeppelin was separated into two big decks. One was for the passengers and one was used as a warehouse. In the warehouse deck were also the kitchen, the control room and the card room with the mordern radio equipment. Several stairs went from the warehouse to the upper deck. The passenger deck was full of small cabins, mostly for two people. The community bathrooms were divided for females and males and weren´t as tiny as the cabins. Then there was the lounge in the middle of the zeppelins gondola and finally behind that were the crew rooms, with a small library and a medical treatment room. Johns and Sherlocks cabin was located there. Lestrade and Mycroft shared another cabin next to them and on the other side of a narrow corridor was the cabin of Beverly and Sabrina. Behind the crew cabins were separeted bathrooms and a narrow ladder led up to one of the many engine rooms. It was Sherlocks favorite place. Nobody ever went there and he was mostly left alone.
The whole zeppelin had space for seventy passengers and thirty crew members, enough space for more survivors, if they finally found some. They avoided bigger citys and looked out for any survivors all the time.
John and Lestrade moved trough the crew quarters and stopped in front of the narrow ladder to Sherlocks hideout.
"I think you should go alone up there first, John. It is likely, that he will respond to you rather than to me." John nodded and put his foot on the first step. He climbed trough the small hole in the floor and tried to find his friend in the darkness of the engine room.
"Sherlock?", he asked unsure and stood up in the rather small room. The room was pitch black and John had to stretch out his hand so he wouldn´t bump into a wall or some of the boxes with equipment for the engines.
"Sherlock, where are you?" No answer.
"Lestrad? Could you switch on the light up here, please?", he called out and moments latter the little lamp on the ceiling switched on. John had to close his eyes, the sudden brightness hurt his eyes. After his eyes had adjusted to the light, he started to look for Sherlock again.
Finally he found him on a blanket with the skull craddled in his hand, staring at nothing and probably thinking. His skin was abnormally pale and his eyes were red and puffy, like he had cried for a long period of time.
"My god, Sherlock!", John hurried to his side and kneeled down so he could examine his friend more closely.
"John... Please, give me something to distract me... My mind is killing me! Give me a violin or a cigarette or even better a little bit of cocaine or morphine.", suddenly Sherlock begged and looked at the good-natured man directly. His pale blue eyes were still unfocused and he sounded... scared. Sherlock and scared? Never.
"No, Sherlock, no cocaine and you know, that we don´t have any music instruments here with us."
"But my mind is rotting, John! I don´t have a purpose to live anymore! Four days ago I solved crimes to keep myself from going crazy with boredom."
"Oh, Sherlock, you have a purpose. You have to keep these people safe and bring them to Greenland. You have to help them.", replied John reassuringly. He hated to see Sherlock in this state.
"But my mind, John! My mind will rot in the meantime! I will be useless without my mind!" Sherlocks breath came in short gasps, his eyes were wide open and tightened his hold on the skull.
"It won´t rot, Sherlock. We just have to find a new way to occupy it. You could teach the kids for example."
"Teach kids? John, they are scared of me!"
"They aren´t Sherlock, they just don´t know you.", assured him John.
"And you think I could teach them something useful?"
"Yes, but you would have to learn, that the earth revolves around the sun.", answered the doctor Sherlocks question and had to smile. Even Sherlock had to and they finally started laughing.
"Thank you, John." Sherlock moved his torso up and put his arms around Johns neck, to pull him into a lose hug. John moved his arms around Sherlocks waist and squeezed him tight.
"No problem, Sherlock." The young man pushed the doctor away and carefully studied his face.
"You look tired, doctor, you have to rest more."
"You too, Sherlock, but we don´t have time. Mycroft wants to meet us as soon as possible." The consulting detective watched John a bit longer than necessary and then replied with a small smile:
"I think, he has a mission for us. Probably rescuing survivors or getting more food supplies." John had to smile, his friend was finally back to his old self.
"Then let´s go, I don´t want to miss our first mission."