Dead and Back Again

Entry tags:

Dead and Back Again

Who: Sherlock Holmes & John Watson
Where: Floor 2 Room 021
When: After Sherlock's nostalgic confrontation with Moriarty on the rooftop
Rating: PG-13?
Summary: John finally stops bleeding all over the couch and comes back to life.
The Story:

With a twitch and ragged heave of air, John came back to life.

At least, that's what he figured happened, once his heart was pounding again. The memory of having his throat slashed open was still locked in his muscle memory, and he seized a minute in lingering panic--fight or flight, as it were. But, as John calmed down with each groan tinged inhale and exhale, the former soldier realized that he had, in fact, died out there in the garden. He had literally felt the life drain away from his body. John cleared his throat shakily, fighting a tangle of blankets that had been draped over him to clumsily cup his throat, feeling for a mark or a scar that would not be there.

And now, here he was. Sprawled on the couch in the makeshift 221B, covered in blankets and, he now realized, wrapped in Sherlock's nice coat. That explained why he could smell the detective all around him, reassuring him that he was no longer near the blade of one James Moriarty. But how in the world did he get here?

The answer came to him nearly on demand. There was a weight against his side, which turned out to be a bowed head of curls resting against the couch like someone praying, or perhaps begging for penitence.

"...Sh'rlock?" He croaked, unable to recognize his own voice for a minute as he remembered how to use it.

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Sherlock heard John come back alive but did not feel inclined to move. He hadn't slept. Why sleep? It wasn't as though it would make things better. Or like his mind would have let him even had he tried.

Moriarty killed John. Moriarty killed John because of Sherlock. He always knew he would potentially be the death of his friend. He never intended for that to be true though. Or to not have somehow died first for being an idiot or right after for much the same reason.

He let out a long breath before sitting up, his arms still closed around one of the glass jars, the heart now labeled and properly preserved. He and the heart had had a nice chat in the dark hours of the night when there was no one and nothing. Speaking to John's corpse had felt odd after a while. Speaking to his heart seemed right on par.

But John was alive now. Time to rebottle the pain and hide everything inside. Because cracks are weakness and no one likes a broken man.

"Hello, John," he says, still kneeling but with one hand free to assist with the blanket he'd given him more for warmth than to shield his body. John had felt cold to the touch, after all. Cold bodies needed blankets.

At the casual greeting, the doctor almost smiled, but his dazed mirth at the casualness in this odd situation was shattered by the pinched expression lingering on the edges of his friend's face. The slight puffiness under his eyes, the frown creases pressed into the skin around his mouth and between his eyebrows...

"...You alright?" He said with a vague frown, glancing across Sherlock's features. Had anything happened while he was gone? Had Moriarty gone after Sherlock as well?

His wandering gaze finally fell to the jar clasped in Sherlock's hands, and the label that ran across it.

Oh.

His groping hand fell from his throat and instead brushed against his chest, trying to make sure the organ was still there beating against his ribs. "...Is that really mine?"

Sherlock nodded, gesturing over to the mantel where his other heart was kept.

"I didn't remove them, if that's what you think. They're souvenirs left to me by James Moriarty. I take it by your confusion that it was removed post mortum. I'd hoped as much. Coagulation at the time I discovered you made it hard to determine. Could have used your expertise, really."

He unfolded, setting his jar on the coffee table. He needed to not be where John could see him until he had schooled every mutinous line and coloring that graced his face. He was fine. John was alive now. No lasting damage.

"I'll put the kettle on."

That was his heart. Jim Moriarty had cut out his heart and given it to Sherlock in a jar.

"Jesus." He breathed, pressing the palms of his hands against his eyes as he heard the detective move away. "That sick bastard."

The clink and clatter of Sherlock moving about in the kitchen bid him to raise his hands and shift so he could look over the arm of the couch and watch the other man. John still felt mussed, like he'd slept far too long and wasn't quite awake yet, but something about Sherlock made him restless. The doctor shucked off the blankets and swung his legs over to rest his feet on the floorboards.

"How did I get back here? Did you carry me?" He said with an impressed tone, the corner of his mouth lifting at the idea. He wasn't out of shape, but John seemed quite stocky when standing next to the beanpole of a man that his friend was. As he moved to stand, he felt his shirt and even the heavy weight of Sherlock's wool coat clung to his front in an uncomfortable way. When he looked down, he realized that his entire front was covered with flaking, dark dried blood.

"Ah." From my throat. John acknowledged with medical and soldier calmness as he pressed a hand to the stain. And my gut, apparently. Messy job... "Sorry. It seems I've, uhm... ruined your coat."

Edited 2012-07-12 04:33 (UTC)

Sherlock ignored the apologies for the most part, waving it off with his back still turned. "You're not the one who dressed you in it. I ruined my coat. It was the only way to transport you without your everything falling out."

He'd seen many dead bodies but never one of a friend in such a state. He'd never had to consider the option of perhaps just hollowing out the chest cavity to make it easier to transport or utterly destroy it so John wouldn't come back to it either way. It had been a danger night with those images in his dead and right before his eyes. He'd found solace in his conversational companion but he still felt the urge--the need--for something strong enough to push the pain away.

"But, yes; I carried you here. I didn't want to inconvenience you by letting you bleed out and rot on your own bed." John had been heavy but hardly more than he could bear. He had to. So he did.

Sherlock took his time adding milk to the mug of tea; a mug because a cup was not going to suffice to warm all the places that John might still feel the cold.

Edited 2012-07-12 04:49 (UTC)

"...Thanks for that." John said softly, a recognition of what that experience must have been like for the detective hinted in his words. He took a moment to consider the familiar wall paper, their chairs, the fireplace. "I liked waking up here." Indeed, if he ever had to come back from the dead, or return from a more common from of unconsciousness, 221B was the place he wanted to see upon waking up. Having his best friend by his side wasn't too bad either.

He stood, wobbling a little on uncertain knees as he fumbled with the buttons to get the long, warm coat off. John licked his lips, glancing over at Sherlock's back as he finished thumbing the third one through it's hole, trying to not think of how it hid his gaping chest wound from the detective for however many hours Sherlock had been left with his corpse. "...You sure you're okay?"

"You and Evelyn were murdered and mutilated for the simple fact that I'm alive. And I let your murderer get away with it." He stirred the cup, the tinka-tinka of the spoon against the sides a nice, normal, familiar sound. "It's nothing that won't pass," he lied.

Because John's death is something John can recover from here but there's just as much risk he'll be killed for these same reasons back home. He's a living target with no idea of his danger, living every day by the fulfillment of Sherlock's hubris. It didn't even have to be Sherlock's fault; anything could happen to somehow out his survival from any source outside his control. And then Moriarty's men would murder John and the others and turn Sherlock from being Dead-but-Alive to Alive-but-Dead.

Sherlock has fallen pray to so many chemical defects. Where most people could make friendships and fall in love, he only ended up endangering them all. Perhaps there was a reason all along why he was alone until he met John. The world knew better than to give him something to care about. Like any ill-tempered child, he was just going to break it anyway.

He picks up the mug meant for John and turned back to him, holding it out once his soaked and crusted coat was removed. He'd just get another one from the closet. He wasn't sure where he was supposed to get another John from.

Edited 2012-07-12 13:34 (UTC)

The doctor glanced between the mug and his friend's controlled expression a few times.

"...It's not your fault, you know." John said firmly as he accepted the offered drink, tugging absently at the shirt that still clung to his skin and nodding his head in thanks. He took a long sip, feeling the vague metallic taste that had been clinging to his throat wash away, watching the other man over the rim of his cup. Sherlock had wrapped him in his own coat, carried John's body here, and had been poised against the edge of his make shift deathbed when the doctor had awoken. John might not always observe, but he did see. And what he saw wasn't exactly fitting his friend's labeling of 'nothing.'

John licked his lips and cupped his mug between his hands.

"And what was that, 'get away with it'? Sherlock, we're not exactly anywhere near the British Judicial System. What could you have done?" He frowned, voice begging no question. "Don't you dare fault yourself for that."

Edited 2012-07-12 17:57 (UTC)

"Oh, I could have been very creative. I could have had his limbs cut off so he was nothing more than a harmless torso; remove all his teeth so he couldn't bite off his tongue to spite me. Keep him in a little box and feed him through an IV so I would always know exactly where he was and that he was alive and well. I could have taken that virus from Evelyn's room--not exactly on guard, she was dead at the time--and infected him with him as I'd wanted to do before I promised her I'd ask. I could have told everyone where he was and let social justice run its course, let them do with him as they liked. There's a great many things I could have done. I walked away instead." He shrugged, though. It didn't matter. It was over and done with. The past was forever unchangeable.

He took back up John's original heart and placed it back on the mantelpiece. That was where it lived now. These were his reminders.

"If you want a shower, help yourself. We can eat after." Normal routine. Normal life. Such a funny way to spend the day when yesterday was so grim.

Edited 2012-07-12 18:12 (UTC)

John didn't realize he had frozen with his cup half way to his mouth until Sherlock suggested the shower, wrapped up in what the detective had described to him; no doubt what his friend had wanted to do to their arch nemesis. Placing the steaming mug down onto the kitchen counter, John cleared his throat awkwardly.

"Alright then." He said, frowning at the marble as he attempted to figure out how to respond to that. "I'll... uhm... I'll be back in a moment, then..."

Absently, he made his way to the bathroom, shutting the door behind him and going through the motions of turning on the shower and stripping while his mind was elsewhere, still stuck on what Sherlock had proposed, had considered doing, and what that implied the other man had felt while John was dead. He didn't consider the fact that he'd forgotten to bring a change of clothes in with him.

'I never want him to feel like that again.' John realized as he stepped into the shower and braced his hands against the wall, hanging his head at a sudden rush of emotions that made him light headed and watching the dried blood was off his stomach and down the drain.

With John gone, five minutes given to him alone if John was less than his militant self about it, Sherlock folded gracelessly into his chair, palms bracing his face.

He wasn't okay. Nothing about this was okay. He tried to be very silent as the first and last of the consolation tears fell. John was alive, in no pain, and unnerved at having died but not stricken or enraged. He was just John, awake and slightly groggy, dealing with death like a doctor and the events surrounding it like a well-trained soldier. He'd known he would. Knew everything would be fine once he woke up.

He couldn't understand why he couldn't just snap back out of it even with all that known. Sentimental attachment to a lost life that didn't matter back home. John hadn't lost anything that Wonderland would keep. It wasn't really John he felt sorry for at all it seemed. Like with nearly everything, he was most concerned about himself. How one day watching John in death was hard and now the next time this happened--there would be a next time--he'd have to wait even longer. He couldn't separate himself from it. Even fleeting, he'd caused John's death and that responsibility was heavy and hard to bear. Day one had been a day to react and during the night to reflect. It was almost too much to have him there with everything raw and open inside him.

He'd told himself for so long not to care, to divorce himself from feelings. Caring meant pain, it meant the ability to be let down or injured by the existence of someone else. It was a liability. It was disadvantageous to the extreme. He'd been hurt enough in one lifetime; he'd learn better. He thought he'd learned better. But with Evelyn and John, he'd let his guard down and Moriarty had wounded him more deeply than any physical wound could reach. He'd long since forgotten a cure that wasn't intravenous.

He'd kissed him--John. Dead, cold, and unfeeling, he'd kissed the corpse's lips in an apology. He'd held the heart that contained his own for something of comfort. Still open for hurt, still stupid enough not to stop. All he could ever offer anyone was more danger, more death, and hardly much for consolation that could be loved rather than tolerated or grudgingly accepted. He didn't want that hurt anymore.

He waited till he could hear the water turn off before pulling himself together again, winding the gears to whatever clockwork made the machine move and get some clothes for John from the closet to offer at the bathroom door.

John was busy dripping and grabbing himself a towel when he heard a gentle rap at the door. Tying the towel securely around his waist, he unlocked it to greet who could only be Sherlock, standing at the door blankly offering a pile of lounge clothes for the doctor to use. For a few breathless seconds, John locked eyes with Sherlock, lips parting as he considered the tall, pale man, once again trying to get a read on how to proceed. Was that redness on Sherlock's face? From tears? From anger? Or was that just John's imagination? He felt a few drops make their way from his messed up hair, down his face--in an almost mockery of the tears that John was ignorant to having actually emerged harshly from the detective--over his now clean, and quite healed, throat and chest.

Then, he quirked a small smile at his friend, hoping it expressed enough reassurance to be supportive, but was casual enough to offer normality.

"Thanks." John reached out and took the clothes with both hands, making sure to brush his fingers over Sherlock's--a selfish connection of reality for himself, and an offering for some to Sherlock.

Sherlock's finger's twitched to feel John's own, even though fleeting. He nodded, a tight lipped, fake smile on his own face.

"Well, looks like you are most certainly intact. One can only hope this dissuades Moriarty in the future. Though he did agree this was futile. I don't think you have much to fear of him. Unless I bring it on again. So just the normal need for caution."

It was as much is way of explaining why he didn't bring him something he could hide a gun in as his way of offering some closure where revenge or justice didn't exist or hadn't happened.

"I'd hope so. I'm not exactly looking to deal with Moriarty going on another killing spree atop whatever it is this place throws at us next." John said with a mock frown of disproval as he tugged the boxers and sweatpants on under the towel for some modesty, looking like a put off child a bit more then a soldier or a doctor with excellent credentials. Once clothed, he tossed the towel aside and partially stepped out of the steamed up WC, ending in harsh proximity to the detective because of it.

The teasing nature of his smile faded away, expression falling into soft consideration as his eyes raking over Sherlock's face.

At first, John took a slow step forward, like approaching an easily spooked wild animal. But then, when no negative reaction was observed, he ducked in and wrapped his arms around the taller man, pressing his hands against the sharp shoulder blades, hiding his face into the wrinkled, day old shirt.

Sherlock went rigged in the embrace, in-taking breath sharply as he stood. It hardly took long for him to melt into it, though. He needed the comfort in it, the physical knowledge that things were okay. He bowed his head and let his eyes fall shut as his hands slowly wrapped around John as well.

"I'm sorry," was all he could think to say. Sorry for being the death of him, sorry for walking away from Moriarty, sorry for caring when the safer course of action was not to and sorry for not caring obviously enough about the things he denied.

"None of that," John said softly but firmly into Sherlock's shoulder, gripping him a little tighter. "If there's anything you need apologize for, I've already forgiven you for it, alright?"

And he had. John was the one who chose to stay by Sherlock's side, so he deserved as much blame for his proximity to danger as Sherlock. But that was just how the pair of them worked; they both endangered and saved one another in so many different ways it was useless keeping track of who owed whom. Like their finances, groceries, and cases; it was easier to just think of them as one unit.

And seporation was not an option, at least to John.

Sherlock nodded, bending a kiss to John's cheek.

"Then there's nothing to be done about it, I suppose. Though please remember that the next time you die, you'll stay dead for two days. I'm not sure that's really to anyone's benefit but do be cautious. For me."

John let him, hand briefly brushing the curls on the back of Sherlock's head and feeling the skin where his friend's mouth had pressed sear with warmth. Or perhaps that's the blush that the kiss has inspired, running on his cheeks and temples and hot on his ears. John considers ducking in and dragging their noses against one another, pressing their foreheads together and focusing only on one another and breathing. But he remains still, the memory of a not-so-welcomed spontaneous kiss still lingering in the back of his mind despite recent events bidding him to ignore it and cling to Sherlock like a lost man at sea to his raft.

"I'll try." He promises, sincerity ringing behind the words that could have otherwise be taken as sarcasm. "So long as you do the same for me. Seeing that once is enough." The as I'm sure you realize, now is implied but left unsaid. They don't need that right now. For all intensive purposes, they're even.

Yes, everyone's even now. Even for living with Moriarty and even for dying with John. It's strange to be made guilty for both. With no right choices, he suspects he'll often end up guilty for good intentions. His situations seem to lend themselves to that at any rate.

Not being especially hungry, nor all that well acquainted with hugs to know when one has gone from nice to awkward, Sherlock just holds on. He imagines he can feel his heart beating but he knows it's just his own. He can hear John breathing, though. And that's a comfort.

Something strains at John's heart as the hug continues on, Sherlock holding him hard and close in a way that tells him to not pull away. He swallows a noise and blinks rapidly over his friend's shoulder to stave off the heat that has risen over his face and hidden behind his eyes. He cards his fingers into Sherlock's hair for good measure, getting tangled in the curls in a way that shouldn't be so endearing, but it is.

Finally, he cups the back of Sherlock's neck with both of his hands, drawing back just enough to rest his forehead against the detective's, keeping his gaze low.

"We'll be alright." John says, feeling his friend's pulse under his palms and his breathes steadier for it. You've got me and I've got you.

Sherlock nods again. Intellectually he knows and intellectually he's annoyed with himself. But feelings like this.... they're not something he's used to. Nor is depending on someone like John to make everything okay.

He pulls away slowly.

"Dinner, was it? I'd say breakfast but it's hardly morning."

John lets his hands fall as Sherlock moves away. Raising his gaze eventually to the other man's face, a shared look of indescribable meaning passing between them.

Then, he rolls his shoulders and clears his throat, looking to the side once again.

Despite the nod, he will stay close to his friend, for both their sakes. Until they're both reassured of one another's safety both mentally and physically.

"...Screw the hour. I've got a craving for pancakes like nothing else at the moment. I'll cook?" John said with forced energy, making his way past Sherlock and into the kitchen to look for ingredients.

Sherlock smirks at John. "There's a dining room just down the hall that can make you a plate of pancakes instantly." Not that he isn't willing to go to the closet and get the things he knows he doesn't have out of there.

"Mine taste better." He says defiantly, partially true defense of his cooking abilities, but mostly to keep that smirk on his friend's face. He fishes out a frying pan and ducks to pull out a few mixing bowls from a low drawer. "Besides, no place is more comforting then 221B."

And comfort is most welcome at the moment. The scent of cooking in their old apartment makes it feel like Mrs. Hudson is going to pop in with a cuppa for both of them randomly, or they could just throw open a window and the sights, smells and sounds of London, their London would fill the room.

And that, after dying, is a wonderful feeling.

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Dead and Back Again

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