This chapter dedicated to 666Neme666 for suggesting the scene with Sally & John
Sherlock tipped his head back and exhaled in relief. Invincible and focused - he could do anything. Joy tore through his heart; where had that been? He inhaled, flooding his nose with scents and the last of the cocaine. There was human urine and old sweat nearby but he could ignore it perfectly.
Charles Augustus Magnussen. He'd received a letter from Lady Elizabeth Smallwood. She was hoping to go after the newspaper baron and knew she would require protection. She planned to attack the man with or without his help; an incredible woman, orchestrating the demise of her own career. And the perfect cover to hide his own motivations and connections to Magnussen. John would not be happy to hear exactly how easy it was to manufacture a case that'd require the rapid return of his addiction. And he'd hear about it eventually, Sherlock knew. Mycroft was horrible that way.
John. He wouldn't chase after the man, not when John had clearly put so much thought into leaving. He'd rather be alone than look so pathetic. He would be nothing but a genius and a madman in John's eyes, but that was better than pining and useless. Sherlock pressed his nostrils together and sniffed again, hoping to get at whatever cocaine he'd missed. He couldn't think about John leaving. The brave doctor was a one-way street to a bad high.
Invincible and focused. He'd bring Magnussen to his knees. The triumph of his career. He needed nothing more.
And he'd start by learning where Magnussen kept his blackmail materials. Surely someone had to know. He just needed to find the blackmailer's victims and he'd be led to all he needed.
A crackhead was crying in the corner, great gasping sobs full of some sort of irrelevant misery. Sherlock pulled himself off of his mattress and shoved his hands into his pockets to warm them. He needed newspapers, legal documents, evidence of anyone important rapidly changing their public position on something without any obvious explanation. In those cracks between legal lobbying and petty blackmail, he'd find Magnussen.
~~/~~
Greg checked back at 221B for two weeks before he thought to check the bedsit. To his surprise, Donovan came with him every time, her frown deepening every time the kind landlady shook her head and sent them away. Something in his partner had changed in the week they'd spent listening to John's screams and watching Sherlock tear himself apart.
At the bedsit, the attendant didn't even ask for his badge before she started answering questions and giving out John's address. The unit number hadn't changed; apparently the room had never been filled between John's disappearance and his return. Sally noted the unchanged address too. He saw her frown and glance around the small office, as if waiting for Sherlock to appear from nowhere and reassure her.
Greg had to admit, he wasn't surprised that John had ended up back here. Sherlock had made a habit of testing John's boundaries to see where they'd break, and John Watson had never seemed the type to forgive when pressed too far.
"Did a tall, obnoxious man come here with him?" Sally asked finally. The attendant blinked dumbly. She was a thin, pale girl, surely under eighteen years old, and she didn't seem prepared to answer questions that weren't written in the occupancy books in front of her.
"Nevermind," Greg ordered. It'd be easy to tell; wherever Sherlock went chaos followed. He led Donovan to John's door and knocked, grimly recalling the time he'd come here to see John stumbling home, half killed by grief.
John opened the door from the inside this time, but looked no better. His face was rough with a day's unshaved stubble. His right hand, its fingertips still pink where nails should sit, shook constantly in its sling.
"Jesus, John," Greg cursed and John sat down on his unmade bed. John lifted his hands in impotence, the gesture only made stronger by the slings keeping him mostly pinned, and Greg winced. Sally glared at him.
"Yes, well," John said uselessly. Greg nodded, knowing the feeling. He'd been through divorce; he'd paid by the week not that long before. He sat down on the desk chair. Donovan hovered by the door. The room was empty of everything but a travel bag. There was no question; Sherlock wasn't here. John had left him. Which left a glaring problem - where was Sherlock? What would the genius do, when he'd lost the only stabilizing force he'd ever had?
He'd deal with that later, Greg decided. John didn't look any too healthy himself.
"How are things?" Greg asked. John smiled grimly.
"Good, good. I can touch my nose now, pick up seven pounds; things are better," John replied. Donovan shifted where she stood, clearly uncomfortable. Greg swore he would be able to blow off all of John's limbs and have the man still shrugging and saying he'd get by. Greg nodded, unsure what else to do.
"We should get that beer, now that you can lift it," Greg said and John coughed out a laugh.
"Yes, later," he agreed. After his payday, Greg understood. 'I'll buy', he almost said, but caught himself. Not with John.
"Sounds good," he said instead and stood up. John showed him out like he'd been there for hours. Unsure what to say, Greg played along. Donovan stayed inside, clearly wanting a word and Greg closed the door like he'd forgotten her.
"Shite," Greg cursed, glancing back at the door. They'd come full circle. John alone and failing to heal, Sherlock nowhere to be found. Hopefully this time it wouldn't take torture and a missing person's case to get Sherlock home.
Why the fuck did he leave? Lestrade wondered, wishing he'd asked. Still, he doubted John would have answered. Better worth his time to find Sherlock. The loon would be distraught.
~~/~~
"So, you've left him?" Sally asked. John pushed himself up from the bed, unwilling to look up at her.
"What makes you think he didn't kick me out?" John growled, annoyed with the assumption. Donovan didn't answer. She didn't need to. They both knew John could have set all of Sherlock's case notes on fire and the genius wouldn't have gotten rid of him. John pressed his hand flat against the wall beside the desk and leaned into it, letting his shoulder joint flare. The first of twelve repetitions for his physical therapy. It was always the least painful. He leaned in again.
"Why'd you leave?" Donovan asked. John turned his head to glare at her.
"Sorry, who are you?" he asked. Sally swallowed.
"You've followed that madman into warzones. You've killed for him. You've mourned him. Now, what? You walk away? Look, I've been divorced. Don't walk away if you're worse off without him."
I didn't know you were divorced, John thought but didn't say. He knew very little about her. The only bits he did know were what Sherlock announced about her sex life. John sighed and pushed his weight into his shoulder again. Pain shot up his joint and into the muscle but it felt good. Loosening.
"I'm not worse off without him," he lied. Donovan sucked at her teeth.
"You know, that's the most sense you've ever made and I don't believe you for a moment," she commented. "This is what your life is going to be like," she warned. John glanced at the dirty paper plate still on the floor from his dinner. He'd survive.
"I'll manage," he growled, finishing the repetitions on his left arm and switching to the right. He tried to ignore the throbbing tips of his fingers, where his nails were supposed to be. That'd take six months. Six months and he'd be back on his feet. That was what the surgeons told him. John tried to pretend he believed it. Even his therapist had trouble looking hopeful. Donovan just shrugged.
"Yeah. You'll have a job and find another man to love. If that doesn't sound tragic to you, maybe you chose right when you left him."
John frowned, distracted from the pain ripping into his shoulder and back. Another man to love? John stared at her, but Donovan didn't retract her words.
"What do you need from him, then?" she asked. John blinked, wondering what she was trying to do, and she shrugged. "Couples therapy. We've all done it. Might've worked if we'd listened to it," she explained. John sighed and pushed his weight into his shoulder again. His arm buckled immediately. John hissed and clenched his jaw and put less pressure on it for the next round.
What did he need from Sherlock? It was fairly clear Donovan didn't mean help cutting up food or lifting objects over five kilograms.
"Why do you care? You think he's a sociopath," he growled instead. Sally smiled softly.
"No, I don't," she said. John snorted. She'd been insisting so for years and she'd hardly seemed inclined to change her mind, even after Sherlock's jump. "Sociopaths don't care about people. He was out of his mind, trying to find you. He wouldn't eat or drink if you didn't put it in front of him, and every few hours he'd punch a hole in the wall, like clockwork. It was bloody obvious that he loved you, and he was terrified for you, and even if it's only you, he's no sociopath," she said. John nodded, trying not to imagine it. He'd wondered what Sherlock had gone through. Now he didn't want to know.
"I'm not the only one," John replied, thinking of how Sherlock had reacted when Mrs. Hudson had been threatened. He should have guessed Sherlock had been equally enraged and fearful for him. But he didn't know what that was supposed to change. They couldn't live together, not when Sherlock would lie to him and John couldn't stop hating him for it.
"I need not to be lied to," John said finally. Sally's face fell. No doubt she knew about Sherlock's theatrics. His mysteries. She nodded slowly, her understanding clear. John smiled grimly. They both knew Sherlock wouldn't change.
"I'll let myself out," she answered. John nodded and pushed his weight into his arm again, closing his eyes and waiting for the sound of the door to mark when he was alone. He needed to go to the store and spend the last of his paycheck on food.
~~/~~
Someday, Greg swore, he was going to murder Sherlock Holmes. The first time he'd spoken to Molly Hooper in weeks, since the search for John Watson, and he was calling to ask 'have you seen Sherlock recently?'. He could hear the woman hesitate on the phone, disappointed.
Damn it all, Sherlock.
"Erm. No. Is he alright?" she stammered.
"I'm certain he's fine. Just case stuff," Greg lied, trying to switch gears. He could ask how she'd been; was that inappropriate with John getting tortured and hospitalized so recently?
"Oh, well, um. Is there anything else or well, something I can do for you?" she asked. Greg ground his palm into his forehead. That sounded like an invitation. He needed to think of something. His cellphone beeped with another call. The pause was getting awkward.
"No, no that's…that's it," he said, cursing himself now.
"Oh, okay," she replied. He heard a click and to his shock, a dialtone.
Well, at least she was as socially awkward as he felt. Greg stared at his beeping mobile, trying to process that fiasco of a phone call, and picked up the other call.
~~/~~
John forced his head between his knees, ignoring his staring patients. Breathing. He was breathing and the tension in his chest was a symptom of anxiety and fear, not lung failure. Breathing slower would help. A drop of sweat dripped down his back in a cold path and John sat up, wanting to tear at the room around him. Sarah was looking at him over the front counter, clearly unhappy. She pursed her lips, apparently unsure what to say, and glanced over the three scared looking patients still sitting in the waiting room, left unattended while he'd collapsed against the wall, the sound of gunfire and blowtorches in his ears. His brain was tearing itself apart, combining his fears now. A panic attack, with no trigger at all. He was getting worse.
Sarah tried to smile at him, clearly unwilling to fire him. And he couldn't afford to quit. His pride cut at him. He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyelids and concentrated on the feeling of his breathing against his bare arms. He needed sleep. True sleep. Light flashed against his closed eyelids, someone taking a picture, something more for the papers.
He'd waited for a full week before he'd submitted and bought a used cd of violin music and an ancient walkman. It helped at night, but not as much as Sherlock playing. He'd have done better with a cd of a violin screeching and getting tuned, if he could've found it. John pushed himself toward the bathroom. Rag showers were still all he could manage and he couldn't afford a shave yet. He'd spent that money on the walkman.
His phone rang through before he managed to finish wiping down his face and getting himself presentable. John picked it out of his pocket, his shoulder joints stiff with the restless night.
:32 Preston Ave, Croydon. MH:
John stared at the address, disbelieving. Could he never escape the Holmes brothers and their mysterious idiocy? Anger churned in his stomach. Three weeks, not nearly enough of a break. A new phone, the same damn unit in the same bloody bedsit, his pathetic job, could he never return to a life without the shadow of Sherlock Holmes?
Croydon. There were only two possible reasons to go there - Mycroft wanted one of his cryptic 'chats' or Sherlock was in trouble there.
Either way, John decided, he'd want a weapon. He crossed in front of Sarah's desk on the way to his office and she held up a hand, wanting a word. He ignored her and stepped into his office to unlock the drawer with his gun. She was waiting for him when he stepped out.
"John, we need to talk," she said. John nodded and left. He'd apply for new jobs when he got back. He'd figure it out, he vowed, holding up his hand for a cab he definitely couldn't afford.
~~/~~
A/N: My book Spinster's Gambit is on goodreads! So, that's awesome. So whoever did that, thank you! Also, I just got my first royalty check and the book is doing very very well, so I'll be drinking some Sparkling Cider tonight (I don't drink alcohol), sip something for me at 9:00 EST, won't ya?
book/show/25180524-spinster-s-gambit