A/N: Last but not least. -csf
IV.
Sherlock succumbs first. He's a pale shivering form rolled in a blanket on the sofa. Dark fevered eyes that look so black on the livid face, and dishevelled, drooping curls framing a quiet expression of despondency. My heart clenches when I notice how he grips tightly the edge of his blanket, like an infant's instinctive quest for comfort. I fight back my own urge to go wipe his damp forehead, and smooth the wrinkles on his forehead, murmuring words of comfort and sympathy. Untouched and unapproached, Sherlock closes his eyes and pretends to doze off, but I know he's listening attentively to every sound we make as I check Greg over.
I need to doctor first, my medical knowledge may be the best I can give my two friends yet.
The inspector is a burly, cockney figure refusing to give in to our shared fate. He's a sweaty, tensed muscles statue, squinting at me with the same aversion to light that affects us all, but he too starts looking much like Sherlock; vulnerable and pained.
I don't suppose I'm health magazine cover material either, but I focus on my job and try to push back the queasiness, soldiering on.
'Hold your breath for me, for as long as you—'
I don't need to finish my request. Over eager, Greg took in a deep rattling breath, only to have sputtered it out in a raucous coughing scene.
Still none of the two has much of a high fever, although our core body temperature is undoubtedly higher than normal. I put away my stethoscope and get up from my chair, allowing Greg to get his shirt back on.
'Sherlock, if we get Mycroft's attention... He wouldn't abandon us, right?' the inspector asks with whatever breath he can muster together soon after.
The sofa's consulting blanketed lump answers from the depths of his poly-wool blend: 'We've been playing Dead-Man-Blink since we were six, on and off. We still haven't called a winner on our little duel.'
'Dead-Man-what?'
'I won't ever blink first, Lestrade.'
'We're possibly fighting for our lives here. Couldn't you call me by my given name?'
'Sure, Lestrade.'
'You know Lestrade is not my given— Oh, never mind.'
I return to the living room carrying a stable tray of tea mugs, not trusting my left hand all that much. The old tremor has returned, fuelled by inactivity and frustration.
'Tea anyone? We must keep hydrated.'
Greg nods, negligently. I'm handing him a cuppa when a small strangled whimper emerges from the cocoon on the sofa.
Shoving the mug into Greg's hands I rush to my poor friend's side, kneeling by the sofa. I lay a gentle hand on his forehead, but even as I approach I can feel the heat emanating from the too warm body.
'Sherlock, I have to ease off these blankets, you're starting to burn up.'
A vicious grip on my wrist stops all movement, and in all certainty my very blood circulation.
'Sherlock, it's me, John', I advise quietly. Must be a nightmare. 'Greg', I ask, over the shoulder, 'get me a cold flannel from the bathroom.'
I hear the old inspector grunt as he extends his muscles, following my request. Strained, uneven footsteps follow him out of the room.
'Sherlock, it's just a bad dream. I'm here, I got you.'
Foreign, almost unintelligible, words are muttered from the depths of his scratchy throat.
'It's alright, it's me, John', I insist.
A second strong hand flies to my throat, gripping me with deadly strength. I can feel my bones creak. It's so easy to break a neck if you only know where to exert the pressure.
Sherlock knows where.
That he found the sweet spot so quick tells me more about those missing years Sherlock spent chasing down Moriarty's web of crime, than he has ever formed in conscious, measured words.
'Sherl—' I painfully gasp.
He's beyond comprehension, lost in the throes of an abusive night terror.
My hand drapes over his tense, clawed grip, but I know better than to panic and try to extract his hand. Instead I lower my thumb over the back of his hand and ease gentle, appeasing circles on the smooth skin.
'Pleez, Sherl—' Please stand down. I'm here. Wouldn't ever let anyone hurt you while I'm in the room, right?
There's a flutter of eyelids and an indignant huff of breath, before that dead grip eases, his hand drops, receding back into the blanket covers. All the while the other hand softens its grip but remains united to my wrist, grounded, pacified now. He's found an anchor to his safety.
I would never take it away, his now gentle touch a source of comfort to me.
Greg arrives back with a cold flannel, disparaging over the effort spent. I won't dignify him with an answer nor a recount of events passed.
I lay that flannel on my friend's heated forehead and hear him murmur incoherent words in that same foreign language.
It's alright, Sherlock, the past can't hurt you anymore.
.
It's been over four hours since Greg distracted me, causing me to—
Never mind. I did it. I broke the damned vial. Mycroft's secret plague. Now the older Holmes is less than inclined to be forgiving and get us some antidote, medical facilities and treatment, or just a nice bed to repose in.
Greg took Sherlock's king sized bed a while ago. He was of no help anyway.
They are both sound asleep, weakened by the disease that spreads through their bodies, stealing their vitality and wits.
I put down my mug. Not even tea tastes right at this point. I too feel queasy and without me the others won't have anyone to keep careful watch.
Even if I'm useless. I know first hand what's going on with my friends, but not even the best diagnose can fix the mess I created.
Unless I do it.
I raise tired eyes that drag down with the dust of ages, ogling the top shelves, where I suspect Mycroft has concealed a spy camera among Sherlock's encyclopaedia. Somewhere along the letter M we presume. As the elder Holmes never shown much pleasure from the voyeuristic exercise, Sherlock and I slowly accepted the domestic intrusion over time. Slowly, I say, we stopped putting on elaborate plays to deceive the indiscreet eye beyond the lens.
It's time for a comeback.
I get up, unstable but proud, and face the camera in a military salute. Come on, higher commander of the known universe, come play. I blink, dizzy, and have to set my jaw to keep my focus. I've got a message to convey and it needs the direct attention of the great one, not one of his many underlings. I pointedly look at the table, then the spot where the broken glass from the vial still stands. I look on to Sherlock's indistinct shape in the background, then further to the bedroom at the end of the corridor. Finally I look back onto the high shelves, and raise my mug until it stands in front of that particular tome of encyclopaedic knowledge, blinding it; for I know nothing enraptures better the attention of a Holmes than a mystery, and nothing aggravates Mycroft more than not knowing what's happening.
Mission accomplished, a move back in tired moves to my armchair, a smirk playing at my lips as I close my eyes, trying to gather my failing strengths.
.
I jump at the piercing ringtone on my phone; God Save The Queen. It's Mycroft, then.
Wait, my phone works for Mycroft now?
'Mycroft?'
'I salute you back, John. Now will you be so kind as to inform be what your strange pantomime was all for?' the older Holmes drawls through the stable phone connection.
'Mycroft', I start quickly, afraid to lose the thread to the outside world. 'Sherlock found these vials and one of them broke and now we all have a deadly virus and they are succumbing to it, we all are. Send medics, two ambulances in the least and get a quarantine zone ready for our arrival.'
Mycroft huffs. 'Don't be trying, John. You are perfectly healthy.'
'What do you mean? You think the virus is out of our systems now?'
'The virus is nothing but a reverse placebo, John. You are not ill.'
'That's impossible! We have the symptoms!' Why is he saying this?
'John, you're a doctor. You must know first hand the power of the mind over the body. You believed you were badly diseased... and you started displaying symptoms. May I guess, a fever but not too high and muscular pain in tense limbs?'
'But— Really?'
I've got to hand it to the Holmes intelligence, as Mycroft diagnoses me through the phone and perhaps a blurry spy camera picture. I glance upwards to the encyclopedia in general distrust.
'John, perhaps you should have called me earlier', he starts, aggravatingly pondered. I can swear he's giggling like mad behind that stony faced exterior.
'We couldn't get in touch! Greg was desperate to get a phone call through to his team! You must have hacked the telecommunications system!'
'I assure you I did no such thing. This time.' Mycroft actually sounds amused, breaking his stoic façade. 'You have, of course, tried both your phone and my brother's before assuming they did not connect to a network just as the inspector's?'
'No...' I answer, sheepishly. We spun a narrative where everything seemed to fit so well. 'So we're not, you know, not actually going to die of this?' I can feel myself blush.
This is ruddy awkward.
'I assure you, John, not of this.'
Mycroft Holmes makes for a reliable Oracle and I feel some tension leaving my neck.
'So you wouldn't actually do this to Sherlock? Abandon him to his luck out of spite?'
Mycroft chuckles, on the other side of the line. 'Perhaps I will in the future', he promises lightly. 'John, I assure you I was most annoyed with my baby brother when I heard of the near impossible theft. It had Sherlock's marks all over it. Quite literally, I'm afraid. He had come earlier to my office at the Diogenes and handled my favourite paperweight, unknowingly to him it was covered in ultraviolet ink. So immediately I confirmed Sherlock had taken the missing vials from my top secret labs and when my top secret assistants told me the thief had erroneously taken the unlabelled vials with the placebo, well I didn't see a need to worry further. Nor a rush to alert the unhappy thief. I foresaw a long night of fruitless microbiology, nothing more.'
Knowing Sherlock, yes, the fruitless exercise would have made severe punishment before the stubborn genius was ready to admit defeat.
'So in the vial, it was just... water?'
'Yes, I'm afraid so, John. You have all been in a nervous excitable state, subject to suggestion.'
'But, why keep a placebo among the real McCoy?'
'It's a much needed precaution when the lab test subjects are part of the investigative team, John. We needed to keep the numbers of people in the know to the absolute minimum.'
'So... all this, it was all in our heads?'
'Again I'm afraid so, John.'
I blink. Relief never felt so little saving grace as now. I feel a dry chuckle stuck on my throat, so I force out a little cowardly cough.
'I didn't do so badly, I'll have you know.'
'Is it important to you that I know, John?' The smugness in that well known voice is so familiar to Sherlock's.
'Yes. I'll have you know. You met my therapist, damn it.'
I can practically hear his trademark smirk.
'John, you are practiced at the art of rising above yourself in order to give to others. You have focused a lot of your energy on the other two unfortunate victims, I'm sure. You were thus perhaps not fully aware of the tricks your mind was playing on you, like theirs were.'
The world is upside down; Mycroft is trying to be nice.
'Right. So, just to be sure, after the stupid orange alarm light went off we have been free go come and go from Baker Street.'
'Absolutely. The alarm got triggered automatically, I'll be sure to check the sensitivity of the fume exhaust filters so in the future they don't go off on something so insignificant.'
'Wait! You cancelled the alarm. You had to override it, Mycroft! You knew we were panicking here and you let us—'
The call is abruptly disconnected at that point.
Neither Holmes plays by the rules long.
Well, I won that round. I'll have him know.
I sigh and look around in the utter devastation of Baker Street's usual calming effect. There are tea mugs all about, broken glass on the floor, cushions everywhere, not to mention the scattered contents of my extended first aid kit. I sigh again and just decide to sit back down on my armchair and close my tired eyes for a while.
How can I be so tired after an illness I didn't even have?
.
'John!'
I come to with a start. Sherlock is kneeling by my armchair, keen piercing eyes still a bit wild, but much clearer than before, targeting me.
Someone moves behind him. It's Mycroft, who says: 'I shall check on the inspector. But know this, Sherlock, if I go into your room and find something that shouldn't be there—' he leaves the veiled threat hanging in the air.
'Oh, please, don't you think I've learned to conceal my tracks from you yet?' Sherlock huffs, insisting on stinging his brother with the weight of doubt.
I try to look around me, confused. Who's the hero, who brought the antidote? No, wait. No virus, there never was one.
'John', Sherlock calls back my attention, still monitoring me. 'I miscalculated.'
'Not your fault', I say, roughly. 'I broke the vial.'
'I was wrong.' He gulps drily, as if trying to wash down with saliva the bad taste those unused words left in his mouth.
'Yeah, well, we all knew your kleptomania would get us into trouble some day.'
'John, no. I was wrong because I was wrong.'
'What? You? But you're Sherlock Holmes, you're never wrong!'
'Enough rubbing it in, John', he grunts, tetchily. 'It was merely a decoy. A placebo placed in my path by my odious brother's team, while the real deal remains firmly locked away.'
I nod. I know.
'But it exists. Sherlock, what if someone else finds it and releases it?'
'They won't.'
'How do you know that for sure?'
'I didn't get it. All I found was a dummy. They'll never come near it!'
I smile at his natural arrogance. Then I shake my head, fighting to grasp the concept. 'Still can't believe we all fell ill. You were experiencing hallucinations due to your fever and all!'
Sherlock raises a tentative hand closer to my face, but recoiles as if ashamed. I realise there must be bruises around my windpipe, the type that perfectly matched the beautiful long slender fingers of my friend.
'It's alright', I let him know. That seems to release my friend's repressed histrionics. He gets up, paces and gestures wildly.
'It's not alright, John! Can't you understand? It was all a collective hysteria, a suggestion that had the power to subdue us to our barest, humbler selves!'
I shrug. I'm just happy it's over. It's enough for now. It will do.
'As much as you don't like to admit it, we're only human, Sherlock.'
He growls under his breath as if he had just been insulted.
Greg Lestrade is coming out of the bedroom, looking tired and dishevelled. He too looks a bit blank, a bit confused by the train of events.
Tacitly, Sherlock and I avoid the conversation we both know we must yet have. Sherlock is carrying demons, the kind that assault us deep in the darkest nights, and we must set them free.
Some good may yet come out of this.
'I guess I can go home now, sunshine', Greg comments, eyeing the flat's door. Yet he makes no hurried move to reach it. He looks back on us, something clearly on his mind. 'If I had to go through this, you know, I'm sort of glad it was with you two nutters. I mean, imagine being stuck in this nightmare with Donovan?' He smirks but finally grabs his trench coat. 'I think I'm going to return my ex-wife's call. See if she's still up for that dinner. I mean, something like this puts life in perspective, right?'
I nod, Sherlock holds the door God the detective inspector. 'She's really not the one for you, Greg.' And he bangs the door.
I smile; proof Sherlock knows Greg's name, and he cares.
Might not be the tight time for big life decisions, and I quietly lean back against my armchair, lazily trailing my sight over the drawn curtain's bald patches.
'John?'
'Yes, Sherlock?' I ask, without turning.
A nice fragrant tea mug comes my way.
'Are you up for a long talk? I think it's time...'
'Always, mate. I'm always here for you. '
.
