Note from author: I think I have started to get a handle on where this story may be going. On that note, I've changed the title "The Case of the Dangling Musician" to its current form "The Anathema and Beleaguered". Essentially, "The Hated and Harassed". Many of the chapters will stick to a brief format (though not as small as this one), mostly because writing twenty pages in one go intimidates the crap out of me right now.
It is also going to be going into far darker material than I previously anticipated for both John and Sherlock. If you are squeamish or like your characters squeaky clean, I'm warning you now, this is not fluff.
Much thanks to my reviewers! You are AH-MAZING.
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John Watson was bound.
He thrashed as violently as he could in his current state at this escalating and sobering realization.
Everything spun with the stomach-turning and salty fogginess only being knocked unconscious could provide. The static that reverberated in his ears slowly subsided, giving way to an equally discomforting level of silence. His clothing felt damp, but hardly the 'just spent a lovely holiday at the beach' type. No…it was oil like, balmy and thick and reeking. He gasped in air – filthy scorching air – which made him feel all the more ill as he dared to open his eyes.
It was dark…everything was dark and yet so blisteringly hot.
He tested his constraints and found his limbs were knotted fast to his body, possibly ropes, but he wasn't certain. He was on a solid surface which given the sensation of touch in his right side and pinned hand, was the ground. With a shuttering breath through his nose, he calmed himself – pushing back the warranted panic - and tried to deduce his current situation.
Bound, but not gagged. Clearly his assailant was not concerned with anyone hearing shouting and coming to his aid. Not good.
It was pitch black before him, but last he'd remembered the sun had been rising. Either he'd been out for at least 12 hours or he was in a basement of sorts. His body ached terribly and what was he drenched in? He shifted to roll on his stomach, but he seemed to be wedged against a mound of dirt.
Swiftly that slight movement alone made his shoulder feel as if it were exploding. White hot pain radiated outward, lighting up every nerve like one domino clacking down upon the next ceramic tile after it until the entire wave of agony had swept through him. He moaned softly, choking slightly on the sand that had molded to his face.
Sand.
There was creaking and shuffling on the far side of the room. Had someone stood up from a wooden chair? Foot steps followed, but they were not coming directly at him.
"You finally wake, doctor." The disembodied words made John startle slightly, sending another roll of pain though him. It was a man's voice, heavy with an accent and baritone from what was more than likely a smoking habit. "It is good to see you have not died." There was a pause then, with audible shifting of clothing and rubber soles at least 10 yards away. "Now you will help us."
John withheld a snort at that, checking his temper that thrummed with adrenaline and fury in his veins. "Why on Earth would I do that?"
Two more foot steps, and then a click.
Blinding light seared though Dr. Watson skull and he blinked rapidly to allow his pupils to catch up. The vertigo he had suffered earlier doubled ten fold, nearly causing him to wretch right beside himself. Three dancing images reduced to two and then a focused one, before he realized he hadn't been wedged against a pile of earth. He was staring directly into the dead eyes of his commanding officer – throat slit garishly, flesh and vessels severed by a dull and jagged blade, blood soaking into the ground and consequently, his camos. John mimicked his horror struck face – forever frozen and lifeless. A low sound crescendoed from the back of his knotted throat as he grasped that there were at least two other bodies of British shoulders near him as well. They were young boys as still, silent, and gruesome as the one whose blood he was soaking in.
The shock wore off and John suddenly kicked violently, desperate to be away from it. His muscles physically pleaded with shudders just to be a centimeter farther away from the congealing life force - from the man he was wedged againt's unending stare - from everything.
And oh God all this blood and sand everywhere! All this slaughter of good men!
John.
This, this was how he was going to die!
Draining out into the endless desert half way across the world where his corpse might be dragged through the streets in celebration.
John.
This was it!
JOHN.
…
John jolted suddenly, as if being dredged from the water's surface. True light of the sun flitted into his vision and his mouth was still agape, the scream having only died moments before. His lungs burned as he took in greedy amounts of air and his heart beat roared in his ears like a thousand step dancers upon a stage.
In England. In London. His bedroom.
Not Afganistan. Not Helmand.
A shivered took over him as the cold sweat that saturated his hair caught a draft from the wall he was against. It seemed he'd managed to wrap himself tightly in his sheet and had fallen from the bed.
"John." Sherlock nearly whispered it, but nevertheless it elicited John's head to snap 'round in dazed alarm.
His flat mate, still garbed in the previous night's crumpled suit, was crouched just beside him. A hand was extended out and his finger tips pressed into the doctor's shoulder firmly. There was an impassable expression on his face which was hardly surprising. 'It almost looks like he'll whip out his magnifying glass and start prodding for clues' John sardonically mulled. His gaze, however, held a depth and intensity that John had rarely seen. The emotion was complicated to pinpoint, though he was relieved that it seemed to be neither annoyance nor pity. It denoted a form of 'it's okay', but even that as a phrase was wildly broad in it's many given tones.
He gave the other a curt nod and whatever grateful smile he could muster. With that nothing more was said and Sherlock took the opportunity to dismiss himself, creaking down the narrow attic downstairs. It had been quite some time since it had all be so vivid. A weight of hopelessness crushed his chest and wrapped glacial fingers around his heart…he'd actually though those nightmares were over. The ache of his head had disappeared as quickly as the dream. He yet again prayed - begged the memory would do the same.
John felt like he should be more embarrassed than he was, having someone see him like that…especially Sherlock. It was in the Holmes nature to identify a flaw or disadvantage and capitalize upon it, but this was one time the dark haired man wouldn't. He wouldn't dare tread the waters of that insult and John knew it.
It appeared to be midday and sunlight cast hard shadows on the row of flats beyond his window. Everything was quiet but for clacking of dishes and the whistle of kettle in the kitchen. John allowed a genuine smirk to pass over his lips.
Sherlock was making him tea.
John choked on a breath, which was absolutely not a sob, closed his eyes for a moment, before gathering the will power to untangle his limbs from his bedding.
The shower he took was borderline frigid and no amount of scrubbing could removed the stains and grit that seemed imbedded in his flesh. He knew their names, the soldiers who had been in that room with him. He knew the pictures of the loved one's they'd tacked above their bunks and the letters they'd read until the edges of the paper softened like cloth. And he'd survived. Him, with the pictures of his family and the letters they had sent. Him…with no wife or children…no admiring community at home, was alive. Ella said he was experiencing survivor's guilt, but her experience was summed up in the pages of her volumes of psychotherapy studies. The butt of the joke was that it wasn't survivor's guilt, it was just plain sodding guilt.
John shivered under the water. He'd forgotten for a moment he was still taking a shower in a vain attempt to scrub off the filth of his mind. When he pulled away the loofah, it was a rosy pink. 'Pink?' He tossed it away from him like a child would do with a spider, wide eyes shooting down to his forearm, just next to his old scar. The flesh was raw with pricks of his own red budding up from his pores…he'd scrubbed to the point he'd made himself bleed. 'Jesus Christ…' He muttered sickly. 'That will be quite enough with the shower.'
He dried and leaned his hips against the cool of the ceramic sink, meeting his own eye contact in the mirror.
Sherlock had never deduced John had been a prisoner of war.
He had one thing, one secret from the great detective.
Opinions? I'd really love to hear yours.