A gift for Pebbles66, who requested the angst to continue (continued from the first spoiler for TWH). And in case anyone's worried, this is the extent of what will happen to Watson in the story. Now Holmes, on the other hand...
"C'mon, Doctor, wake up!"
That small, scared voice slowly filtered through my senses again. But it was so cold…
"Please, Doctor!" it pleaded again, shaking me.
A hot pain shot through me and I gasped, feeling fire shoot through my shoulder before turning back to that icy numbness. The voice called again, encouraged by my response, and I finally forced my eyes open – seeing nothing but blurry whiteness.
"Tha's it, Doctor!"
I blinked the snow out of my vision and saw two worried green eyes staring at me. Wanting to reassure the child, I started to sit up – only to fall back into the snow with a choked cry, my head throbbing and spinning.
Alfie flinched, patting my arm uncertainly.
"Doctor, wha' happened?"
"Thrown – f-from the horse," I managed to choke out.
He ran his mittened hands along my arms and legs, actually very capably checking for broken bones.
"Don' look loike yew busted anythin', Doctor – what 'urts?" he asked, his lips trembling.
"My – s-shoulder, Alfie, and –" I struggled my breath through my chattering teeth, "a-and my head. Landed on-n them - I think."
The sturdy lad pulled off his scarf and gently tucked it round my neck as I shivered, my head spinning.
"Thank you," I whispered, closing my eyes as he began to dig me out of the snow-bank.
Yes, I cheated, but you can't just randomly stick a B word into an already-established chapter of spoilers (this is only an excerpt) and not sound stupid. :P
Also, I've had more than one person ask me if I am going to spin any of these off into full-length fics. I have no definite plans for any of them except 43 and 44 - so if you'd like to take one and do a story with it (except of course the spoilers for That Whiter Host), I'd be more than happy to give permission and I'll be the first to review!