"I'm gonna kill him." John muttered as he sat up in his warm, cosy bed. He glanced at the clock on his bedside table. "Yeah, I'm definitely going to kill him."

3 o'clock in the fucking morning. John almost growled as he ripped the covers off his body and stormed out of his bedroom. Yes, it definitely wasn't the first time John had been woken by the sound of the violin playing downstairs, but it certainly had been the first in a long time. John had gotten so used to his (almost) full nights of sleep during the 'living with not-so-Sherlock weeks' that his system had now just automatically adjusted to wanting to kill the son of a bitch who wakes him up at three o'clock in the morning.

As he reached the living room, the violin stopped for a few seconds until he reached the door way and then it started back up again. Sherlock must have been composing.

"Do you have any idea what time it is?" John tried to stop himself from yelling loud enough to wake the neighbours, but he assumed that was pointless now.

Sherlock didn't answer, he was facing the window, holding the violin and bow with delicacy as he, what John assumed, thought. He took this chance to admire his flatmate from a different angle, one where he's relaxed and distracted, not rushing into danger and pissing people off.

John let his eyes wonder over Sherlock's body, sucking in every detail - every curve and dip, the way his skin glowed in the dimly lit light, and that arse-

The violin had stopped and Sherlock had slowly turned around to face John, confusion obvious on his face. John swallowed hard and flickered his eyes away from Sherlock before regaining his angry expression. God he was tired. "Oh, did I wake you?" Sherlock asked almost too innocently as he placed his violin gently on his chair.

John stared incredulously at Sherlock, he opened his mouth to speak but decided not to, it was late - early - and he knew he would end up saying something he would regret in the morning - later in the day - meaning he would have to apologize to a sulking Sherlock who wasn't actually offended by what John had said, he just loves to be dramatic.

The man was one giant wonder. How somebody could be that brilliant yet so...abnormally childish in some ways and strangely intreguing in others. Well, Sherlock was always so intreguing, similar to a drug-

Wait, that's a bad metaphor.

John stopped thinking and snapped back to reality. "Did you wake me? Did you wake me-do not even ask that-it is three o'clock in the morning Sherlock-OF COURSE YOU WOKE ME." John tried not yelling again but just couldn't stop himself. Sherlock may be brilliant, talented, extremely attractive and-

Stop.

He may be brilliant, but he was beyond annoying. Not all the time, probably fourty percent of the time but that wasn't the point.

John reviewed Sherlock's taken back expression, obviously he hadn't even noticed the time because he was too busy in his 'mind palace'. John loved that expression; it was rarely ever used and when it was, John sometimes had to fight the urge to just hug the other man.

"I-" Sherlock began, but John wouldn't let him finish.

"No, shut up, I'm really not in the mood for your remarks right now." It sounded harsh, but it was partly true.

Sherlock, as it looked, was observing John's stance, trying to figure out why he was moody - John could feel his eyes scanning his body and he felt his face heat up slightly at the thought before he sighed and sat down in his chair, looking into the fireplace. "I know you need your thinking space and I know you play the violin to help you think, but it wakes other people up so could you perhaps-"

"All right." Sherlock nodded slightly.

John looked up from the fireplace with puzzlement, "what?"

"You were going to ask me to stop playing the violin at ridiculous hours of the morning, weren't you?" Now Sherlock looked puzzled.

"Well, yeah, but-"

"And I said all right. I will take note not to disturb anybody during the late hours of the evening and the early hours of the morning by playing my violin." Sherlock glanced at the clock, "I'm rather tired. Goodnight John." And he glided through the kitchen, into his bedroom and with a quiet shut of the door, he was gone.

John was alone, sitting in the chair, extremely baffled by what had just happened. That, that was unusual, even for Sherlock.

Maybe he didn't have the old Sherlock back.

After sitting in his chair for ten minutes trying to understand who stole his flatmate and replaced him with this, this imposter, John finally decided to head back to bed, only to be woken a few hours later by Mrs. Hudson knocking gently on his door.

"Inspector Lestrade's here to talk to you- oh sorry, did I wake you love?" She asked as she opened the door slightly, "didn't think you'd still be asleep, it's just gone ten."

"That's fine Mrs. Hudson." John did his best to smile even though he was extremely tired, "Lestrade's here?"

"Yes, he's downstairs in the living room, I thought I'd better let him in and make him a cuppa because he is a lovely man, not too old, not too young. And he always has that natural feel about him, don't you think? Such a-" John sat up as Mrs. Hudson rambled on in the doorway. He rubbed his eyes and stepped out of bed just before Mrs. Hudson had finished, smiled and finally said, "I'll leave you to it."

"Mrs. Hudson?" A thought suddenly crossed John's mind, "is Sherlock not awake?"

Mrs. Hudson shook her head and shrugged. "I'm not sure, I did knock twice but he didn't answer."

John paused. "Right, okay. Thanks."

"No worries." Mrs. Hudson smiled and left.

John pulled on some jeans and a shirt, lost in his thoughts. Surely Sherlock would have been awake by now, especially if Mrs. Hudson had called on him. Twice! He thought to look for himself, and he was going to.

After slicking his hair back slightly, John went downstairs and regarded Lestrade with a small nod. "Just getting Sherlock up, won't be a minute."

"Blimey, lucky sod gets a chance for a lay in and uses it." Lestrade leaned back in the chair as a small chuckle left John.

John knocked on Sherlock's bedroom door.

Once. "Sherlock?"

Twice. "Sherlock."

What the hell is he doing? A tiny sense of worry was weighing on John's shoulders, especially after the strange encounter last night.

He placed his ear on the door to hear nothing, after a few minutes of hearing nothing, John sighed, "right, I'm coming in." And John opened the door to find-

Nothing.

An empty bed, sheets ruffled and pillows strewn over the bed, but other than that, nothing. John felt a wash of relief then the worry came back, so he rushed into the living room to find Sherlock's coat not there and his scarf gone too.

"What's wrong?" Lestrade sat forward, obviously seeing the concern on John's face.

"Sherlock's gone." John said to himself more than Lestrade, "Sherlock's not in his room, his coat's gone and- this is not right. There is something definitely wrong with him, Lestrade, I don't know what's going on with him but I know something isn't right."

"Now wait a second," Lestrade stood from the chair and approached John's panicked body. "Start from the beginning, what happened?"

John sat down on the sofa and put his face in his hands, Lestrade sat opposite him on the coffee table. "Right, where do I even begin?" John tried to laugh. "Before, I thought he was acting strange because of Irene Adler - you know, The Woman, The Dominatrix." Lestrade nodded.

"Well, it turns out it wasn't because of her. And by acting strange, I mean...well, just not being himself, sometimes he's himself, other times he'll just lie here and not even notice anything. Of course he's still frustrating at times, but other times he's just, almost like a shadow of himself." John sighed and looked at his hands in his lap. "And I don't have a clue what's causing it."

When not hearing any reply from the other man, John looked up to see Lestrade staring at him. John immediately saw the flicker in his eyes and his mind backflipped.

"You don't think..." Lestrade began.

John rubbed the back of his neck and exhaled heavily, "maybe. Just maybe. It makes sense."

Lestrade stood and took his phone from his pocket. "I'll get the team down here, they can-"

"No, no. Don't." John stood suddenly and shook his head. "I'll have a look, and if I find anything I'll let you know straight away. I want to talk with him on his own."

There was a heavy silence as Lestrade and John stared at each other before Lestrade put his phone away and nodded. "Right, yeah, okay. That's fine. I, uhm, I just came over to ask about the Billy Regent case, if you've gotten anywhere with that, but I'll come back after-if you find anything, or even if you don't." Lestrade struggled with the words before shaking his head and smiling to himself. "Christ, I really hope you don't."

"I hope I don't either." John replied, hiding all of his anger and concern. They exchanged goodbyes and as soon as Lestrade left, John darted to Sherlock's bedroom; he wasn't sure whether it was worry or doubt that made him want to get it over and done with. If Sherlock was using again, he did a bloody good job of hiding it.

Anger suddenly flushed over John and he began searching every part of Sherlock's room, from under his bed where boxes of old files and random pieces of paper were stored, to on top of his wardrobe, where there were more case files covered in a thin sheet of dust. John gave up after half an hour of full on searching.

Then he noticed something.

One of the floorboards under the nightstand was free of any dust, even though the gap was small, John could easily see it with his sudden hypersensitive vision. He got down on his knees and moved the night stand to reveal a loose floorboard.

Bingo.

He lifted it up and inside was a fairly small, rectangular object, John assumed it was a box, wrapped in a black, silk cloth. Something pushed John to reach down and lift it out from under the floorboards. He placed it on the bed and moved everything back, not caring if it wasn't 'perfect' because if this box had what John thought it had in it, Sherlock was going to get more than an earful. As he moved the nightstand back, an address book fell on to John's head and landed half open on the floor. Since John was being nosy anyway, he decided to take a quick peek, and to his surprise, he didn't find much apart from his and Mycroft's name written down.

John turned his attention back to the box on the bed and something ached in his chest. He didn't want to look, he didn't want to know if what he thought was true. He was thinking of putting it back and not ever mentioning or even thinking about it again, but he decided against that as he reached out and unwrapped the cloth. All he could think was why. Why was Sherlock doing this again? Why turn to drugs when John was perfectly available to speak to if he had problems. The thought of drugs had never even crossed John's mind because he'd forgotten, and that made him feel ten times worse.

The box looked expensive, similar to an old cigar box except slightly bigger. The inside was lined with black silk and the whole thing was complete in tact; as if it were treasured.

Peering inside box, he discovered just what he feared.

Inside the box was a carefully placed syringe - Ultrafine U-100, 1cc, to John's medical knowledge: an insulin syringe - and a small clear bag of white powder. Along the inside of the box, lining the lid, were neatly placed needle gauges in a row. Three were missing and John shook his head slightly.

It was all so specifically placed that John's concern grew even bigger, seeing as everything of Sherlock's was messy. Some of his belongings were tidy, that word being used lightly, but not like this - not organised as if it were extremely precious.

John shut the box, wrapped it back up and left Sherlock's bedroom, taking it with him and placing it in his own armchair. He didn't want to have to do this, he didn't want to cause a fuse to erupt between him and his flatmate, his best friend, his crush.

But John was angry. He prepared himself once he heard the front door shut and footsteps coming up the stairs to the flat. Sitting in his chair with the box on his lap, he waited.

Why is everybody so sensitive? So boring.

So unbelievably dull.

Sherlock had recently just been to see Jacob Phillips' family, he was the previous victim of this 'Amy' - the murderer - and he must have miscalculated the reaction of that simple question the mother didn't answer.

'Apart from your husband's drinking habit and your heroin addiction, do you have any idea why Jacob hated you?'

Although that could have gone better, he did find out a few interesting facts. Amy wasn't Amy for long, she had gone by the name of Hazel before. There must be a link somewhere. Anywhere.

Recently Sherlock had become frustrated with this case. Everything was so simple yet nothing made any sense, who is 'Amy', why does she change her name, why is she doing this?

It made Sherlock want to rip his hair out, he felt beyond stupid - the answer must be somewhere - and John wasn't of any help. They had gone over the files again and there was nothing, absolutely nothing that Sherlock hadn't already pointed out. But, no, John just had to keep asking the same thing over and over again until it just got so incredibly clutched-

So aggravating-

So fucking maddening that Sherlock had to get out. He'd stood up and ignored John's puzzlement as he retreated to his bedroom. He knew it wasn't John that caused it, he knew the other man was trying to help (as always), but the case and the confusion was too much.

He needed it, and he needed it too much.

Sherlock had promised Lestrade to stop, and he did, but then the stress of John had entered his system. He was feeling too much for the other man; it was questionable as to why he was feeling anything for John, he had never felt anything for anybody - well that was obviously a lie, perhaps he just had never felt so strongly about John as he had about other people. He certainly wouldn't compare his feelings to John with his feelings about Mrs. Hudson, God no.

And before he thought he sounded rather deprived, Sherlock knew exactly what feelings were. He knew what anger was, he knew what compassion was, he knew what love was. It just seemed as of recent he had been feeling a lot of those certain emotions and he wanted to know why he had been feeling them for the shorter, much more attractive John Watson.

John was John, there was nothing else he could say. Out of every single word within the English language - or any other language for that matter - not one of them could describe John.

It sounded idiotic, too pathetically romantic and cliché; it sounded just like Sherlock had wanted it sound, although he didn't know why. And as everybody knows, Sherlock doesn't take too kindly to not knowing things.

Which is another reason why he needed it. He needed the cocaine for these exact purposes, because he didn't know why. And it seemed as if he didn't know anything at this particular moment in time because he was too much of an idiot to figure out something - this stupid case - so plain and simple.

As much as he tried to hide his non-addiction, it was beginning to get difficult. John was asking questions about how he felt and it was getting too claustraphobic. He felt like John was closing in on him, he felt as if John would find out about his idiotic senses of need when he felt ignorant.

His head was starting throb - he needed it.

It's not so much that he needed it because he was an addict - because he wasn't - it was just a need to become slightly more intelligent, if that was possible, and a need to fight the surfacing human natures of interest.

Sherlock thought back to last night, when he'd accidentally woken John up with his thinking method. John had been angry, of course, and then he seemed to calm down and Sherlock just knew John was going to speak about feelings or some other nonense that would make his craving more intense. He decided to just go to bed, make a fake promise to John and go to bed before things got out of hand.

Then a few nights ago when John had told him he was concerned about him, and Sherlock couldn't help but let a small smile cross his features, because John cared and it felt nice. But the silence that followed - that wasn't nice. Sherlock was going to do it, he was actually considering telling John everything, from his non-addiction to his want for human intimacy with John. Then he had re-considered and cowered out.

As usual.

His thoughts were interrupted when the cab driver called out his address, he looked up to 221B after paying the driver and stepping out of the cab. Something felt...wrong.

He pushed himself forward and into the flat, climbing the stairs as his limbs felt heavy and his breath quickened - he really, really needed it. As he thought, John was in his chair, reading an article in the newspaper. If Sherlock disregarded him, no questions would be asked, so he did. When walking into the flat, he glanced at John quickly and went straight to his bedroom and shutting the door.

Removing his coat and scarf, he quickly moved the night stand, lifted the floorboard and-

No.

No.

He stood and noticed his hands were beginning to tremble. The dread began to rise from the pit of his stomach like bile and he suddenly felt sick.

Then he realises, just at the last minute, he wasn't careful enough - he wasn't smart enough - to know that John was on to his movements, his behaviour. Those tiny moments in the living room and kitchen where he would stall himself, those hours of quiet - oh how he had underestimated John - where he would stare for longer than usual in need for the drug and all that time,

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

John had noticed - John knows.

If only he had seen the misplaced address book on the nightstand, where it had been accidentally knocked off (perhaps on purpose) and put back with no effort to put it back in the exact position it was in before.

Turning his nervous - how ridiculous - body around, he sees John in the doorway, holding a small, black cloth covered box, and just in those few seconds, he feels his whole world crumble from underneath him.

John knows.

Well, well, well. I would say that's a plot twist but it isn't, and I wish it was.

It's kind of difficult juggling a case and Johnlock in one fanfic, so please don't hate me if it's confusing or annoying how I suddenly bring up the case and then romance and then the case ect.

But anyway, this was fun to write, even though my girlfriend fell asleep half way through (so much for being supportive :c), because I had this idea for a long, long time and it's usually around 1am when I get inspiration to write things. Especially when I have an exam in a few hours! WOO! I also hope the whole Sherlock bit is okay? I was iffy with writing from his POV but it was really fun c:

Until next time my lovelys!

p.s. any grammar or spelling mistakes, apologies! Nobody betas my work so I am sad :c