After dark on the next night, John stretches awake. Though sleep was not part of his plan in the morning, it pulled him under in the end. Sherlock's out of it still, and likely will be for a while as his body works on healing the stake wound, with the help of Mrs Hudson's concoctions. So John shuffles into the sitting room, intent on reading the evening paper. (It's good for a vampire to keep up with the news, even when it isn't relevant.)
Instead, he finds Mycroft - pale and wan – sitting in John's usual armchair, the bandage on his left arm indicative of the night before and its full moon. (Hell on werewolves when they try to control themselves, though the arm appears to be Mycroft's only wound this time.)
John sighs – used to the elder Holmes brother popping in like this just before nightfall to be sure to catch them when they wake – and settles into Sherlock's own chair, raising an eyebrow.
"How is he?" Mycroft asks softly, voice intentionally low, not that it could wake Sherlock at a time like this. (John suspects their mother is downstairs with Mrs Hudson, and Mycroft wants to know precisely how bad the situation is without worrying her. He behaved the same way after the Change, when all of the animosity between him and Sherlock dissipated.)
"Still sleeping. It'll take him another couple of hours to wake after an injury like that," John replies, equally softly. (Strange to whisper in his own flat, he thinks, but Violet Holmes is a force to be reckoned with when she's worried, especially about her boys. Much like Mrs Hudson, that way.)
Mycroft nods, as if he suspected as much. "The report said he was staked, but it didn't specify where. And I knew he wasn't dusted."
"It was the leg. Thigh. We hardly made it home before sunrise, but he insisted on killing the Slayer one way or the other."
"He would, wouldn't he?"
Before John can reply, the door swings open and Violet bustles in, red hair greying slightly now. She envelops John in a hug, and kisses him on both cheeks, as she always does when she sees him.
"Mycroft told me what happened," she says, voice hoarse with un-cried tears. "How is he? Will he be alright?" She pulls back, dark eyes studying his face carefully. "Oh, of course he will. You wouldn't be out here otherwise." She smiles slightly, clearly relieved, and lets John go before hurrying into her son's bedroom, door closing quietly behind her.
John sinks back into the chair, exhausted already though the night has only just begun.