Pressure on every centimeter of skin. Like the water is being compressed around them, solidifying.
How soon can we come up for air? Are the snipers still there? Is the building falling? Is the sky burning or is that just the way that it feels?
The explosion seems to be frozen in water too, suspended in time, trapped in amber, as if they'll find them there in a few centuries time, reaching towards one another, like Pompeii.
Strange, the movies had it right. It is slow motion, or maybe that's the water again, because John's a powerful swimmer, but he doesn't seem to be getting any closer to Sherlock at all.
The cardigan is waterlogged and heavy. His shoes prevent him from kicking out properly.
What a foolish thing to go swimming in. Must be worse for Sherlock—that narrow suit doesn't give much range of motion in the arms. I have to go to him. Isn't that just the way.
Kisses are rubbish under water. The movies lie about that. You can't breathe, and you can't hold yourself in position without flailing and hitting the other and dragging them down and the water gets in your mouth and the chlorine burns your eyes.
We can stay under and drown when we gasp for breath as we're both about twelve seconds from doing, or we can risk surfacing.
And I love you so much, you fool, and are you alright?
John tries to convey all of this with a few waggles of his fingers and movements of his eyebrows. There is confusion as they both try to pull the other up and only end up pushing each other down.
They break the surface, and the sky isn't burning, but the building is not doing well at all.
Kisses with your head above water are better, but not much at this moment because there's smoke everywhere and it's adding to the burning in the eyes, and everything tastes of chlorine and not of one another.
I love you too, and I never, ever wanted to put you at risk. Are you okay to swim for the side?
Sherlock doesn't have enough air to say this, but he manages to convey this a bit better than John did with his agile face and nimble fingers.