A/N: I wanted another play at the two narrators complementing points of view. I know it's not the standard style of this collection, but I needed to balance the John-centric narrative. And this came about.

Keep safe, keep strong. -csf


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This is what a quiet, strong hero looks like.

Sherlock Holmes has been unapologetically staring at his sleeping flatmate. Friend. Partner. Best mate.

That's what John calls it, being best mates – the connection they have – and John's the experienced one. Feelings are clearly John's milieu.

Sometimes it still gets to Sherlock. That he'd have a best friend. Or a reliable friend, for that matter. Least of all, a friend such as John Watson. A strong, brave man who enjoys Sherlock's eccentricities, who admires Sherlock for all the traits others in the past have so willingly labelled the detective as a weirdo, a misfit, an aberration. John sees valorous strength in Sherlock in the days Sherlock can't see much sense in his own choices and actions. John sees beyond the smoke and mirror tricks with which the detective dazzles the world, and admires Sherlock for the showmanship not the spectacle. The short blond doctor reads and navigates through the consulting detective's tantrums because there's a moratorium on body parts from Molly at the morgue for as long as the pandemic lasts and it's not safe – it's lasting forever – and John quietly incentivises Sherlock to solve cold cases, study science, or play the violin; an object beloved to the taller man, but that the restlessness of a disrupted quotidian had made farfetched and discomfiting in its echoes of better days.

Just a couple of hours ago, Sherlock once again played his violin. He should know it's been a while. His bruised fingertips throb and his long neck feels a bit stiff from resting his chin against the smooth surface, leaning towards the curvaceous crafted instrument and bow.

For weeks now, Sherlock had avoided playing his violin. Its haunting melodic performances best saved for the cold evenings after the physical exertion and mindful victory of another criminal chase. One of those all too common evenings where Sherlock and John return to 221B tired, dirty, sometimes wet (from rain, a gutter, the Thames, or all three). When John fights the adrenaline flowing through his compact lithe body, and he's still too hyped up, his left hand trembling, his leg muscles spasmodically twitching under the fabric of the jeans, his expression filled eyes still too quick to chase shadows across the room. Sherlock finds it his duty to play then, lulling John's quiet undertones back to the surface, bringing out the domestic doctor, until John is fully back home safely.

Some other times, playing the violin is less peaceful, but more cathartic, as when Sherlock is in the throes of a complicated case with too few leads (too many, contradicting leads are the easy cases, it's the cases drenched in blurred shaped unknown that give the detective no footing to climb up from the abyss of obsession). Rationality prevails and at a moment of cathartic ecstasy – both in the whirlwind melody and in the firing synapses of his light speed brain – the solution comes together and Sherlock's endorphin high is mightier than any opioid in the world Sherlock could ever experiment on (but he wouldn't, he promised John as much and he meant it).

There are no good cases now, stuck at home as a grounded misbehaving child on account of a big bad virus that Sherlock – for the record! – had absolutely no hand in.

It's odious how much it has limited Sherlock's movement and shut down all good cases. A hand full of cold cases badly investigated from the onset is Sherlock's meagre dietary supply for the time being. Again, why is Sherlock being punished?

A third favoured moment to share the limelight with the warm sounds of his violin are homely celebrations at Christmas, at birthdays, and every astronomical blue moon (John hasn't picked up on that last one yet, and Sherlock has just about given up on the too frequent habit of dismaying over the doctor's inattentiveness). Those are the rare instances when Sherlock's adopted extended family gets to see that side of the detective that he'd usually keep locked up under the cold reasoning façade.

John was the one incentivising Sherlock to play the violin at the get-togethers. There were no get-togethers before John. Sherlock had no real inkling anyone would actually welcome hearing him play. Sure he knew he was dexterous at playing the violin – he was methodical in his practise and confident with a number of difficult scores from the classical masters, and has even written his own pieces from time to time, developing his personal style. But apart from his mother at times in his infancy, no one had been brought in to witness the exercise. In fact, he'd at times got the opposite reaction to joy from the ones within earshot of his music. Mycroft's squeaky pre-teen voice had often yelled across the family home "keep the racket down, you moron!". Sibling love is a twisted thing. At the halls of his Uni residence he'd been yelled "play some hip-hop and come out of the dark ages!" and several blanket profanities. Sherlock had indignantly hacked at his violin in discordant screeches and harrowing chords until security was called and Sherlock had to find a new dorm. In fairness, Sherlock had managed to stay up playing the violin for three days straight before moving out, feelings too hurt to express himself another language than the one coming out of his violin. His fingertips a sad mangled sight at the end of those three days, no wonder.

Sherlock looks down on his reddened, slightly swollen fingertips, and this time he can safely say, it was worth it.

Chronologically he hadn't played nearly as long, even taking in relative time analogies. Perhaps it was the intent he had placed and infused in every penetrating note with which he had reached out to the sleeping doctor, knocked on the edges of his unconscious mind, beckoned to be let inside, to roam free and tidy up that cluttered space, to cool down the frustration and exhaustion of a hero on a deadly battle fight, being pulled in and out of the battlefield in long shifts and expected to make sense of the haunting game on his own and cope with the losses in the interim. It had been building up for days. Sherlock saw it coming. John was drowning in apathy; numbness the preferred self-harm mechanism of choice for an army soldier, battling on at the surface. The deep wrinkles, too deep on the young face of a hero, had ashen through badly slept nights, the dark pools under the eyes echoing those trophy shadows he carried with him, incapable of abandoning them. As if letting go of the memory of lost patients was a disrespect to the lives once lived, and the ones left mourning. Or as if the good doctor felt he needed to constantly worry about those pulling through as a superstition to keep them on the right side of healthy. John was carrying too many patients, too many consciousnesses in his own, and was overwhelmed by the numbers. Even in John's quiet strength they became too many. Sherlock knew the had become too many when he heard the first half-strangled, half-sobbed shout from the sofa. The exhausted doctor who had just fallen into an easy doze, after yet another long shift at the hospital, had dangerously tipped into the throes of a nightmare.

Sherlock suspects John had been surrounding himself with his dark shadows, rallying them up in his sleep, hoping to marshal them into submission, to make sense of them, and heal them in his sleep as he couldn't in real life, only to succumb in a desperate fight. John refuses to part with his shadows, always tries to reason with those memories, same old John, too reasonable and sensible. The shadows don't always comply.

So Sherlock did the only thing he could think of, with a mechanical reflex of his hand he reached out to his violin case, brought out both violin and bow, soon producing a melodic defence wall to John's shadows. It took some building, and there were some unknown booby traps in the unconscious fields of the soldier and doctor, but in the end Sherlock once more restored a safety net around his friend's resting mind.

John sleeps now, peacefully. Sherlock is incredibly thankful. And the detective looks on.

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'Sherlock?'

My voice is groggy and pasty, as I glance around and immediately relax at the familiar sight of 221B's living room. What am I doing here? Did I fall asleep on the sofa?

'You're staring at me', I mutter, still a bit groggy.

Sherlock is smiling, and I could get angry at that, but I don't sense he's mocking me. Maybe he's just thought of something funny. He's got a big brain, it can get a big crowded in there with a lot of thoughts. I hope he's got a couple of good jokes in there too.

'How observant, John.'

Okay, now that is mocking me. I push through my stiff muscles to get up. A nice cuppa will do me a world of good.

'Are you getting bored again, mate? You could always read a book or play the violin. You know I love hearing you play the violin...'

His smile mysteriously shifts sideways, a fully fledged smirk.

Burying his hands in his pockets – wonder why he'd do that – he says: 'Oh, I don't know, John, maybe not tonight. Give it a couple of days, will you?'

It's an odd answer, I contemplate as I bring the kettle to a boil. 'Yeah, sure. How about giving Mrs Hudson a call? Make sure she's alright?'

Sherlock nods. It's a sign of the shifting times that he won't protest at the appointed task. He normally would, because it wasn't his idea, and I haven't tricked him into thinking it was his idea. I'm still collecting tea bags and mugs, when Sherlock gets the call on speaker, taking an elegant sprawl on the now vacant sofa, as if reclaiming it for himself.

'Oh, Sherlock dear, that was wonderful!' soon come the excited tones of our landlady's voice, answering from downstairs. Beats shouting across the landing. I hand the detective a tea mug. He nods the briefest acknowledgment, ignoring my latent questions. What did I miss? 'How I loved it! How about some Paganini next?' she adds.

Sherlock chokes on his tea, and I don't get to sit down with mine, I'm already soothing and checking over my friend. He's sputtering and coughing, and pushing me away, and I'm feeling guilty and confused – have I made such horrible tea (is that oxymoron a possible thing)?

I dismiss Mrs Hudson telling her not to worry and good night (no reason ever to not be polite), before I turn all my attention to the skinny detective (getting skinnier through the long suffering days).

'Sherlock, deep breaths, mate.'

'I'm alright', he manages, clearing his throat repeatedly. What he hell brought this on? I'm holding his back up with an arm wrapped around him, carefully studying his breathing. He stops pushing me away and suddenly pulls me into a heartfelt hug.

I find no difficulty in reciprocating the hug.

It's a weird tense time for all of us. Maybe we no longer need a fully rational reason for a hug these days.

'Better?' I ask, as he starts awkwardly pulling apart. He nods, childlike shy.

I feel better myself too.

'Just drop it, John', he pre-empts as I pull up breath to say something jokey about two blokes hugging each other.

I huff, a bit surprised at the mind reading, but diverge instead.

'Wanna watch some mindless drivel on the telly instead?'

It can give Sherlock a chance to stack up his mind powers against the unrealistic ingenuity of crime drama screenwriters. Sherlock usually demolishes the investigative procedures featured (DNA analysis takes longer than that, her dress would have shed fibres all over the crime scene, did he just pick up evidence off the floor with bare hands and he is running it for prints? John this is terrible! Even Anderson does a marginally better job on his off days!)

Sherlock nods to the telly suggestion and shuffles over so I can sit next to him on the sofa. He hands me the remote and I turn over channel after channel to find something to distract us both from the strangeness that has befallen the world outside our windows.

Silently, and slowly so to wait for valid consent from my ascetically educated friend, I wrap an around behind his back and lean in to his warm shoulder. He hums tonelessly, in a way I know to recognise as it's alright. Soon I find his chin resting atop my head (damned height difference!), making mine shift to the crook of his neck where it fits comfortably. The telly drivels on. The cold tea dregs taint inner rims in our old mugs.

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