Fic: A Matter of Life and Death - Sherlock/John - 2/5
Title: A Matter Of Life and Death
Rating: NC-17
Category: Sherlock/John
Length: ~8000 words in total
Disclaimer: The show Sherlock and that incarnation of its characters belong to the BBC, the show's writers and its actors.
Warning: Rated for naughty bits. Post-Reichenbach.
Summary: Sherlock is supposed to be dead. John is supposed not to know. But as Moriarty once pointed out, Sherlock has a heart after all.
Sequel to A Matter of Convenience and A Matter of Affection, wherein Sherlock and John became lovers (though prior knowledge of these isn't essential).
When John came to, he was lying on his back on the floor in front of the fireplace with the Union Jack cushion under his head. Clearly whoever had left him like this needed a refresher about using the recovery position when someone was unconscious. But any thought of righting the lack of medical training in the general population flew out of his mind when he sat up and looked into the kitchen.
Sherlock was sitting at the table eating with gusto while Mrs Hudson fussed over him, patting his shoulder and head, even ruffling his short hair.
“You do look odd, though, dear,” she was saying. “You looked ever so handsome with your curly hair.”
“I am assured, Mrs Hudson, that it will grow back,” said Sherlock superciliously, though he looked pleased at all her attention.
The smell of baked beans on toast made John’s stomach rumble. He groaned and rubbed his head.
Had anyone told him in the last three weeks that Sherlock was still alive, John might have planned some kind of speech about how much he had missed him and maybe pointing out what a crap stunt that was to pull on his unsuspecting boyfriend. He certainly wouldn’t have imagined that the first words he would say upon Sherlock’s return would be:
“Sherlock, are you eating my lunch?”
“Oh, John, you’re back with us,” exclaimed Mrs Hudson cheerfully. “Look! Sherlock wasn’t dead after all.”
“Yes, I see that,” said John, pulling himself to his feet and observing Sherlock warily. He knew it wasn’t a joke, because Sherlock wasn’t one for jokes, but it was still taking a while for his mind to adjust to a universe in which Sherlock had faked his death but had left John to grieve without telling him the truth.
“I’ll go and cook up another plate for you, John,” said Mrs Hudson. “Oh, I’m so happy!”
She gave Sherlock another motherly pat and bustled off. John sat down on the other side of the table. He watched Sherlock in silence for a moment, taking in the small mole above his left eyebrow and the scar at the corner of his bottom lip. He had kissed both in the months before Sherlock’s -- what? His disappearance? His fall? Sherlock gave him a bright smile and for all his misgivings, John’s heart flipped happily in his chest.
“I knew you’d be surprised,” said Sherlock, indicating the floor with his fork, “but I didn’t expect you to swoon.”
“I didn’t swoon,” said John ruefully. “I just haven’t eaten all day. I didn’t realise you’d come back from the dead to nick my food.”
“Well, obviously, Mrs Hudson’s food is the reason I came back,” said Sherlock just as Mrs Hudson came in with another plate of beans on toast and a mug of tea. She fussed over them both for a moment while John started his meal, then left them to “get on with it” as she put it, closing the door behind her as she walked out.
John used the food as an excuse to collect his thoughts. He could feel Sherlock’s eyes boring into him as he ate in silence.
“Don’t you want to know what happened?” asked Sherlock, sounding disappointed. “I jump off a tall building; you see my limp body on the pavement; you attend my funeral -- along with far more people than I was expecting, I have to admit, but I suppose that’s the other side of celebrity. And yet aside from swooning like a damsel in distress, you don’t bat an eyelid at my return. Don’t tell me you guessed, because that’s obviously not true. I know you’re not that good an actor.”
John decided to leave the question of his acting talent to another day. He ate slowly and looked up when he had finished one of his slices of toast.
“So,” he said, clearing his throat. “Let me guess. Moriarty threatened you with something big -- blowing up London, killing the queen, I don’t know -- and you had to jump and die to make him call it off. But you thought up a way around it and faked your death instead.”
Sherlock smirked. “Essentially, yes.”
“So what was it?”
“He had assassins poised to kill you, Lestrade and Mrs Hudson if I didn’t tell the world I was a fake and kill myself.”
“Oh. I didn’t think it would be that personal.” John was almost disappointed. “Right. Me and Mrs Hudson, I can understand. But Greg?”
“Moriarty knew from experience that I’m not interested in saving strangers. Not that I would deliberately let them die, of course, but... Even so, threatening the man I’m sleeping with and the woman who cooks for me was almost too obvious,” said Sherlock with a wave of his hand. John was still wrapping his head around this dismissive description of himself and Mrs Hudson when Sherlock added, “As to Lestrade... Moriarty must have had enough informants to know that-- I didn’t think it was that obvious,” he concluded suddenly with visible irritation. “I evidently underestimated the observation skills of the people around us, because I can’t believe Mycroft would have known, let alone told Moriarty when we had agreed on the script and that most definitely wasn’t in it!”
“The script?” said John, frowning at the familiar sensation that his head must be filled with cotton wool whenever Sherlock started showing how brilliant he was.
“Yes, of course I’d agreed to everything Mycroft told Moriarty. I obviously didn’t want my real secrets in the press!”
“Obviously. You planned it all with Mycroft...” John remembered how sincere Mycroft had seemed at the funeral; how easily he had looked John in the eye and said nothing about Sherlock being alive. “How does Greg fit into this?”
Sherlock sighed and rolled his eyes. “Moriarty wasn’t being subtle. He evidently realised that I used to have, well, a crush is probably the best way to describe it, though that probably imbues it with a far heavier sexual connotation than I was ever aware of at the time.”
“You had a crush... On Greg,” said John slowly. Clearly he must have banged his head when he fell over. “Sherlock, you didn’t even know his first name until we went to Devon.”
“He was a handsome man with a fascinating job. I didn’t need to know his first name. But that’s irrelevant.” Sherlock’s face scrunched into a frown. “To be honest, I originally hoped he’d only go after you. I had contingency plans if it was just you or even Mrs Hudson, but I’d never thought of Lestrade, so I had to go for the full plan. I waited until you came back -- I knew you’d come back -- and then put the plan in action.”
“And you made me watch you so I wouldn’t notice the setup behind the ambulance station, people preparing to catch you and fake your death.”
“Yes,” said Sherlock, with the kind of pleased expression parents got when their toddlers did something completely ordinary for the first time. “I knew you would make the most credible witness. No one would believe I hadn’t died if my closest companion was grieving for me.”
John tried not to read too much into Sherlock’s dismissive depictions of their relationship, but it was bloody difficult not to draw conclusions. “You couldn’t have just told me?”
“No. You’re a terrible liar,” said Sherlock simply. “You couldn’t even look me in the eyes and tell me that Irene Adler was in a witness protection programme without your entire body language screaming that you thought she was dead. It was rather disappointing, actually.”
“Mycroft told me to say that,” said John ruefully.
“Yes, obviously.”
“So, you know she’s dead.”
“No, I know she’s alive. She saved us at the swimming pool and when Mycroft told me she was in danger in Karachi, I went to help her escape. I think he was testing me... Anyway, I didn’t come back to talk about Irene Adler.”
“Yeah, why did you come back?” asked John with irritation.
Sherlock sighed and stood up, walking over to inspect the contents of the cardboard box in the corner of the living room. John gulped down his last few mouthfuls and turned on his seat to look at him, waiting for a reply that didn’t come.
“I practically memorised that copy of Clarke’s,” said Sherlock, picking up the thick book. “But it’s all online now. You can throw away all my books if you want. It’ll be more convincing if you do.”
“Right.”
John rubbed his eyes with one hand; he hadn’t been sleeping very well recently. After the three weeks in the bedsit, it was surreal to find himself back at Baker Street with Sherlock. A very different-looking Sherlock, of course, and one who it turned out had put John through hell, but even so. It made the last few weeks feel like a bad dream.
Continued in part 3
Rating: NC-17
Category: Sherlock/John
Length: ~8000 words in total
Disclaimer: The show Sherlock and that incarnation of its characters belong to the BBC, the show's writers and its actors.
Warning: Rated for naughty bits. Post-Reichenbach.
Summary: Sherlock is supposed to be dead. John is supposed not to know. But as Moriarty once pointed out, Sherlock has a heart after all.
Sequel to A Matter of Convenience and A Matter of Affection, wherein Sherlock and John became lovers (though prior knowledge of these isn't essential).
When John came to, he was lying on his back on the floor in front of the fireplace with the Union Jack cushion under his head. Clearly whoever had left him like this needed a refresher about using the recovery position when someone was unconscious. But any thought of righting the lack of medical training in the general population flew out of his mind when he sat up and looked into the kitchen.
Sherlock was sitting at the table eating with gusto while Mrs Hudson fussed over him, patting his shoulder and head, even ruffling his short hair.
“You do look odd, though, dear,” she was saying. “You looked ever so handsome with your curly hair.”
“I am assured, Mrs Hudson, that it will grow back,” said Sherlock superciliously, though he looked pleased at all her attention.
The smell of baked beans on toast made John’s stomach rumble. He groaned and rubbed his head.
Had anyone told him in the last three weeks that Sherlock was still alive, John might have planned some kind of speech about how much he had missed him and maybe pointing out what a crap stunt that was to pull on his unsuspecting boyfriend. He certainly wouldn’t have imagined that the first words he would say upon Sherlock’s return would be:
“Sherlock, are you eating my lunch?”
“Oh, John, you’re back with us,” exclaimed Mrs Hudson cheerfully. “Look! Sherlock wasn’t dead after all.”
“Yes, I see that,” said John, pulling himself to his feet and observing Sherlock warily. He knew it wasn’t a joke, because Sherlock wasn’t one for jokes, but it was still taking a while for his mind to adjust to a universe in which Sherlock had faked his death but had left John to grieve without telling him the truth.
“I’ll go and cook up another plate for you, John,” said Mrs Hudson. “Oh, I’m so happy!”
She gave Sherlock another motherly pat and bustled off. John sat down on the other side of the table. He watched Sherlock in silence for a moment, taking in the small mole above his left eyebrow and the scar at the corner of his bottom lip. He had kissed both in the months before Sherlock’s -- what? His disappearance? His fall? Sherlock gave him a bright smile and for all his misgivings, John’s heart flipped happily in his chest.
“I knew you’d be surprised,” said Sherlock, indicating the floor with his fork, “but I didn’t expect you to swoon.”
“I didn’t swoon,” said John ruefully. “I just haven’t eaten all day. I didn’t realise you’d come back from the dead to nick my food.”
“Well, obviously, Mrs Hudson’s food is the reason I came back,” said Sherlock just as Mrs Hudson came in with another plate of beans on toast and a mug of tea. She fussed over them both for a moment while John started his meal, then left them to “get on with it” as she put it, closing the door behind her as she walked out.
John used the food as an excuse to collect his thoughts. He could feel Sherlock’s eyes boring into him as he ate in silence.
“Don’t you want to know what happened?” asked Sherlock, sounding disappointed. “I jump off a tall building; you see my limp body on the pavement; you attend my funeral -- along with far more people than I was expecting, I have to admit, but I suppose that’s the other side of celebrity. And yet aside from swooning like a damsel in distress, you don’t bat an eyelid at my return. Don’t tell me you guessed, because that’s obviously not true. I know you’re not that good an actor.”
John decided to leave the question of his acting talent to another day. He ate slowly and looked up when he had finished one of his slices of toast.
“So,” he said, clearing his throat. “Let me guess. Moriarty threatened you with something big -- blowing up London, killing the queen, I don’t know -- and you had to jump and die to make him call it off. But you thought up a way around it and faked your death instead.”
Sherlock smirked. “Essentially, yes.”
“So what was it?”
“He had assassins poised to kill you, Lestrade and Mrs Hudson if I didn’t tell the world I was a fake and kill myself.”
“Oh. I didn’t think it would be that personal.” John was almost disappointed. “Right. Me and Mrs Hudson, I can understand. But Greg?”
“Moriarty knew from experience that I’m not interested in saving strangers. Not that I would deliberately let them die, of course, but... Even so, threatening the man I’m sleeping with and the woman who cooks for me was almost too obvious,” said Sherlock with a wave of his hand. John was still wrapping his head around this dismissive description of himself and Mrs Hudson when Sherlock added, “As to Lestrade... Moriarty must have had enough informants to know that-- I didn’t think it was that obvious,” he concluded suddenly with visible irritation. “I evidently underestimated the observation skills of the people around us, because I can’t believe Mycroft would have known, let alone told Moriarty when we had agreed on the script and that most definitely wasn’t in it!”
“The script?” said John, frowning at the familiar sensation that his head must be filled with cotton wool whenever Sherlock started showing how brilliant he was.
“Yes, of course I’d agreed to everything Mycroft told Moriarty. I obviously didn’t want my real secrets in the press!”
“Obviously. You planned it all with Mycroft...” John remembered how sincere Mycroft had seemed at the funeral; how easily he had looked John in the eye and said nothing about Sherlock being alive. “How does Greg fit into this?”
Sherlock sighed and rolled his eyes. “Moriarty wasn’t being subtle. He evidently realised that I used to have, well, a crush is probably the best way to describe it, though that probably imbues it with a far heavier sexual connotation than I was ever aware of at the time.”
“You had a crush... On Greg,” said John slowly. Clearly he must have banged his head when he fell over. “Sherlock, you didn’t even know his first name until we went to Devon.”
“He was a handsome man with a fascinating job. I didn’t need to know his first name. But that’s irrelevant.” Sherlock’s face scrunched into a frown. “To be honest, I originally hoped he’d only go after you. I had contingency plans if it was just you or even Mrs Hudson, but I’d never thought of Lestrade, so I had to go for the full plan. I waited until you came back -- I knew you’d come back -- and then put the plan in action.”
“And you made me watch you so I wouldn’t notice the setup behind the ambulance station, people preparing to catch you and fake your death.”
“Yes,” said Sherlock, with the kind of pleased expression parents got when their toddlers did something completely ordinary for the first time. “I knew you would make the most credible witness. No one would believe I hadn’t died if my closest companion was grieving for me.”
John tried not to read too much into Sherlock’s dismissive depictions of their relationship, but it was bloody difficult not to draw conclusions. “You couldn’t have just told me?”
“No. You’re a terrible liar,” said Sherlock simply. “You couldn’t even look me in the eyes and tell me that Irene Adler was in a witness protection programme without your entire body language screaming that you thought she was dead. It was rather disappointing, actually.”
“Mycroft told me to say that,” said John ruefully.
“Yes, obviously.”
“So, you know she’s dead.”
“No, I know she’s alive. She saved us at the swimming pool and when Mycroft told me she was in danger in Karachi, I went to help her escape. I think he was testing me... Anyway, I didn’t come back to talk about Irene Adler.”
“Yeah, why did you come back?” asked John with irritation.
Sherlock sighed and stood up, walking over to inspect the contents of the cardboard box in the corner of the living room. John gulped down his last few mouthfuls and turned on his seat to look at him, waiting for a reply that didn’t come.
“I practically memorised that copy of Clarke’s,” said Sherlock, picking up the thick book. “But it’s all online now. You can throw away all my books if you want. It’ll be more convincing if you do.”
“Right.”
John rubbed his eyes with one hand; he hadn’t been sleeping very well recently. After the three weeks in the bedsit, it was surreal to find himself back at Baker Street with Sherlock. A very different-looking Sherlock, of course, and one who it turned out had put John through hell, but even so. It made the last few weeks feel like a bad dream.
Continued in part 3