Fic: No Fixed Point - 5/5 (BBC Sherlock, immense AU of AUs)
Title: No Fixed Point
Rating: R
Wordcount: 5.7k/44.2k
Disclaimer: Do not own.
Summary: The AU of AU's: First, he is shot in Afghanistan (again). Second, he wakes on a boat. Third is pain, fourth is normalcy, fifth is agony and sixth is confusion. By the tenth, he's lost hope.
(Original prompt: "ECM!John gets hurt again, and ends up with a few more lives. By overwriting Stranger at the Gate!John and Behavioral Modification!John." Thus, Watches 'Verse with Behavioural Modification and Stranger at the Gate. Prompted and filled here on livejournal. NOT an official continuation of any of these 'verses.)
Warnings: Partial character death, separation, vampire, blood, hypnotism
Red
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Purple and Gold
Orange
Blue
He wakes in Chelmsford before his alarm sounds, wakes and stretches. Seventeen more minutes until he has to get up. His bed is warm and safe in a way he seldom trusts beds to be. He yawns and snuffles into his pillow. He falls asleep.
He wakes to the scrape of a key in the lock. Not to violin, not in an armchair. To a door opening, lying on a sofa. To the sound of heavy footsteps and the humming that means Derek is in a good mood.
John sits up. He stares about his Grant Road sitting room. His right hand closes about his left wrist, recognizing the digital watch by feel. Not binary.
Not Binary.
He tries to go back to sleep. He truly does, but he simply starts giggling. He grabs the remote and turns the telly on as fast as he can, lest Derek think he's gone madder than he already is. He has a few moments to recover, Derek proceeding directly from front door to loo, but it's not much time.
John’s going home. He needs to check, needs to make sure that Binary won't pop up on another cycle through his days, but the certainty of it overwhelms. He's never going back to Binary. He can't anymore.
He doesn't know what will happen to the body there, to the John there, but maybe-he hopes-the other John will fill in the void he left there. The right one, somehow.
Flopping onto his back, staring at the ceiling, he pictures it: Sherlock kneeling at his violin case in the sitting room, watching John sleep. Sherlock approaching, perhaps standing, perhaps walking on his knees. Tentative hands easing John awake with a non-triggering touch on the arms. The moment of confusion before the truth of the reunion becomes clear.
Sherlock will think it his doing. He'll probably hold it relentlessly over John's head through the worst of their arguments. And John will call him an arse and forgive him, because that's how they work.
A niggling worry: what if it's the wrong John?
John wonders. He wonders until Derek wanders into the sitting room.
John tells himself he'll never know, then sits up and makes room for Derek on the sofa.
"Good day?" Derek asks.
"Good day. You?"
"All right. Nothing eventful."
"Yeah," John says. "Me too."
Settling down for bed is an agonizing affair, worse than any Christmas Eve as a child. Sherlock was right: John is shaking with excitement. He lies awake, sorting out what the next glamour should be, and that's how he finally falls asleep.
He wakes cozy, his face mashed against something warm and solid. There's a hand on his side rubbing idle circles. A fire crackles in the room. Back in Boat World, then.
He keeps his eyes closed and drifts back down.
His alarm in Chelmsford goes off. John smacks the snooze button, rolls over, and goes back to sleep.
His watch in Digital London beeps ten minutes before it needs to. He's off work today anyway. Again, he goes back to sleep.
"Sherlock...?"
The thumb tracing circles on John's side stops. "Hm?"
"It worked." John pulls his face away from fabric, his face likely marked from the pressure. Judging by the twitch of a smile on Sherlock’s face, definitely marked.
"For now," Sherlock allows. "We'll see if it lasts."
"It worked," John repeats. He rolls onto his back and Sherlock's hand glides onto his chest. "Thank you."
Sherlock very nearly preens, but a weight in his eyes prevents the full extent of his ego from shining through.
"What is it?"
"You want me to do more," Sherlock says. "Obviously."
"Well... yes. It worked, so. Yes."
"I'd prefer to wait," Sherlock tells him. "There could be lasting effects from what I've done. There ought to be, in fact. The unintentional ones worry me."
John wants to protest, but he would have been an idiot not to expect this. "How many days until you need a sane John Watson?"
Sherlock sighs. "As soon as possible. Three at the most, if we're to go over any feasible plan."
"Then why not try now?" John asks. "Just a question. You're worried. You're taking precautionary measures. Any other reason?"
"Do I need any other reason?"
John hesitates.
"I don't care that you think me unreasonable," Sherlock says. "I'll remove the other two dreams tomorrow at the soonest."
"Sorry?" John sits up.
"Tomorrow at the soonest," Sherlock repeats.
"No, the other part. What did you say?"
Sherlock gives him an odd look, which at this point is more of his typical look. "I can still remove the other two dreams, but I don't-"
"No," John interrupts. "Sorry, no, signals crossed. That's not, no. That's not what I want. That won't help."
"The removal of one nightmare helped, but the removal of the other two won't?"
"The nightmare that wasn't mine," John says. "The other two are mine. Those are mine. I'm keeping them."
Sherlock's eyebrows go from arched to furrowed. "Then what do you want me to do?"
John takes a breath before venturing in. "I think I've worked out a way for me to go home."
"You... want to return north."
"No, I-"
"You'll have your head chopped off, have you forgotten that too?"
"No!" John insists. "But that's not what I'm saying!"
"You can't go home!" Sherlock shouts at him. He slams the book down on the bed cover. "I am sorry, I honestly am, but I cannot change it. If you go home, you will die. Do you understand that?"
"I'm not talking about the north!"
"Then what? You're certainly not 'going back' to some other world, John."
The temptation to strangle rises up and John forces it down. "What the hell will it take to convince you?" John demands. "Anything I say, you already have some explanation."
"Because I'm grounded in reality," Sherlock replies. "That makes it much easier to see. Simpler."
"And you've never been wrong before? Hm?" He rises to his knees. "You've never been wrong about what's going on in my head before? Never? Not once?"
Sherlock visibly pales. "Stop it."
"You've no explanation for how this happened!" John shouts. "None! I do!"
"Another vampire-"
"Was there one?" John leans in, hands on Sherlock's knees. "Besides Moriarty, was there anyone at all who could have done this to your John, or does it have to be something else?"
"There's, there's the possibility..."
"Is there? Really."
"You've been hurt," Sherlock says. "Moriarty's glamour was broken, but that doesn't mean it didn't leave damage. It could have taken some time for it to break you, but it is possible."
John sits back with a glare. "And what about how systematic my story is? You said it was a sign of an active glamour interfering with my mind."
That takes Sherlock a moment. "You always were an exceptional storyteller."
Blogger, John doesn't correct. "Fine," he says instead. "Then I'm going to tell you a story."
The look on Sherlock's face is the definition of emotional agony. "You can't persuade me, John."
"And you can't persuade me, so it looks like we're stuck. In a few days, we'll go to court and I'll end up dead or insane. Or you could budge and maybe that won't happen."
"Or you could leave me to my research and that won't happen," Sherlock counters.
"Maybe I won’t die, but I'll still be like this." John leans forward. "This isn't going to change unless you do something. I know you can."
Sherlock seizes him by the ears, hands cupping John's head. "You're still in there. You're not dead, you still know me, you are obviously present."
John grabs his wrists, tugging Sherlock's hands down. He climbs off the bed and paces away, the chill of the floor seeping up through his socks. He crosses his arms, tucking his hands into his armpits. "Will you at least listen to my plan?" he asks.
Sherlock glares at him, pulling the bed cover over his knees. "That depends on how moronic it is."
"Call him back in Anglic and send me away in English."
"There aren't multiple versions of you, John."
"It's my mind," John counters. "My behaviour is based on what I think, not you."
Sherlock rolls his eyes. "Yes, right until I use my glamour on you."
"If he's still present in me, the Anglic will work on him, won't it?" John demands. "If there's any connection at all. Because I don't understand a word of it. It can't work on me that way, can it? It has to be a language I understand. That's why we had to start slowly when you were teaching me Franc."
"And supposing you understand both commands and the contradiction breaks your mind?" Sherlock counters. "You're an idiot."
"By your logic, my mind’s broken already."
"No," Sherlock says, voice taking on a rasp. "You're improving. You don't remember the damage before."
"The damage caused by what? What Moriarty did?"
Sherlock nods, clearly holding something back.
"Was that like enthrallment?" John asks.
Sherlock's face pales, but he doesn't disagree.
"Then it's all about to come back. Or I die. Sherlock, this is the only logical option."
"No. Because there is no logical option. I won't have you forcing the situation into a false dichotomy."
Distantly, John realises his Franc vocabulary is larger than he'd noticed. "If there's no good choice, then why not the option I actually want?"
Sherlock has no answer to that.
"Are you going to let someone else reach around in my head?" John asks.
"This is obvious manipulation," Sherlock mutters.
"I could just kill myself and solve it that way," John says. "But I'm not."
"Are you threatening to?"
"I'm asking for your help."
"I forbid you from killing yourself."
The order shakes its way into John's bones. It is sharp and staggering, and suddenly, the windows are impossible to leap from. The rails of the staircases will hold him back from any jump. "I wasn't planning on it!" John shouts. "Would you fucking listen!"
"If you'd say something intelligent, yes."
"What the hell was that for, then? You won't glamour me if I ask, if I fucking beg you, but the moment you think it's necessary-"
"The moment you threaten to kill yourself-"
"They're going to kill me anyway!" John shouts.
Sherlock huddles on the bed, legs pulled up, arms wrapped around them. He glares at John over his knees.
"What the hell are you afraid of?" John demands.
"I won't hurt you."
"Oh for-" John turns away to swear at the wall. "For fuck's sake, Sherlock!"
"I won't," Sherlock repeats, eyes on his knees.
A deep breath could never be deep enough to steady him, let alone calm him. "This is my life, dammit! All I want is control over my own fucking head!"
Sherlock looks at him.
John glares back, daring him, just daring him to disagree.
"That's your plan?" Sherlock asks. "Shout and swear until I give in?"
"That's pretty much it, yeah." He sits down on the edge of the desk, arms crossed.
"You honestly think that will work?" Sherlock tilts his head slightly.
"No," John admits. "But that's pretty much it."
"Are you sure?" Sherlock asks, as if John's simply forgotten something. Whatever this is, it's not a game John wants to play.
"I'm sure."
Sherlock continues to watch him from the bed.
John sighs. "Fine." He crosses through the open door into his bedroom and closes it. He nearly locks it, then decides otherwise. He sits in front of the fire until his nerves are less jangled, his eyelids more willing to fall. Then he lies down on the floor and buys himself a bit more time to think.
He thinks in Chelmsford.
He thinks in London.
He wakes before the fireplace with an ache in his back. He relocates to bed and does a spot more of thinking from there.
He thinks until he begins to pop back into this world each time he sleeps in one of the others, a sure sign that he's crossed the line from buying time to think and simply stalling.
After that, he gets up and builds the fire back up a little. He looks to the joining door, still closed. Then, just to actually do something, he returns to his desk, pulls out his guide to Franc letters, and begins his struggle anew with the old fashioned pen.
He takes his dinner in his room yet again. He wonders if this body would feel restless if it weren't for the recent boat voyage. This room is absurdly spacious in comparison, but being confined is still being confined. He's adjusted to the chamber pot but not to much more.
As the sun begins to set, he lights his lamps. It feels too early, might be winter, but it's also possible his internal clock is confused beyond recovery due to his napping. He keeps working, revising, making absolutely certain that this is what he wants to have written.
The knock at the joining door, when it comes, is more inevitable than startling.
"Come in," John calls.
Sherlock sullenly enters. "...My room is cold."
John gestures to the chairs before the fire.
Sherlock approaches, then stares at the rug. "Why were you sleeping on the floor?"
"Because I wanted to," John answers. He blows on the drying ink, then stands. "Here. Will you read this?"
Sherlock's smile is absolutely indulgent as John approaches. Sherlock takes the paper, his eyes skimming across its surface as John sits across from him.
Sherlock frowns.
John waits.
"You... wrote this."
"Yes."
"The set of symbols are in a practiced hand," Sherlock says, brow furrowed.
"Of course it's practiced. That's English writing," John says. "I did the best direct translation I could into Franc above it. And the bit below it, you'll have to translate that into Anglic yourself."
Sherlock rereads the note several more times.
"Would it work?" John asks. "As a glamour."
Sherlock shushes him.
John waits. He stands and builds the fire, prodding it with the poker a bit more than strictly necessary.
Finally, Sherlock asks, "And if this still destroys you?"
"Then I asked for it," John answers. "You've forbidden me from killing myself, but I'm still asking for this. What do you think that means?"
"That you don't recognize the danger, obviously."
John sits back down. "Have you considered what it means if I'm telling the truth?"
"Of course you think you're telling the truth-"
"If what I'm saying is real," John corrects.
"Why should I have? It's blatantly absurd."
"But if it is real, your John is in an entirely different world, completely alone and with no one to teach him the language. If it's real, then he's been like that for days, maybe weeks. He could be somewhere, anywhere, and you are ignoring the very real possibility that he needs your help to come home."
Sherlock's eyes grow wide and round. They look like a child's, so surprised at something so obvious.
"Maybe if you do this-" John touches the paper in Sherlock's hands "-maybe I'll think I'm him, maybe he'll come back. I don't know. So... please. Because I could go back to shouting and swearing, but I think I've frightened the staff enough for one enforced visit."
Sherlock's mouth twists. "Can't this wait until tomorrow?"
John nearly laughs. He nearly protests. Instead he says, "Only if you're not stalling for time."
Sherlock looks down.
So much for that.
"Will you sort out the Anglic translation?" John asks. "This will only work if I don't know exactly what you're saying for that part."
"I'll... consider it."
John nods. "All right."
The wait is agony. Too many naps during the day means John wakes in the night. The second time he wakes, he stays awake. He makes the mistake of opening the bed curtains and letting the cold in. Then he hears the noise from the next room, the pacing.
Regretting the absence of his shoes, he gets up and eases open the joining door. Sherlock keeps pacing but waves a hand at him. John enters. He goes to the window where Sherlock actually has glass and gazes out over the courtyard, over the far roof, over the city. There's little light. The stars are amazing.
"I think I have it," Sherlock says quietly, voice hard.
John turns. "Do you?"
Sherlock clearly hasn't slept. His pallor could be from the cold, could be from a lack of feeding. It could be from many things. "I think so."
"Should I sit down?"
Sherlock takes his hand. "You should come back to bed."
John eases away.
Sherlock keeps reaching. "If I'm going to risk you, I'm going to have this first."
Slowly, John gives him back his hand.
Sherlock draws him to the bed. He directs him under the covers. He climbs in after. He doesn't seek as much as a single kiss. Instead, he simply presses his cheek against John's chest and holds on, as if the world were ending.
It's a slow and painful way to lie awake through the night. John rubs Sherlock’s back until Sherlock sleeps, until the fists in John's shirt are no longer self-conscious in their grip. From a great distance, morning approaches.
They sit in the armchairs before John's fireplace, a position at once familiar and foreign.
"Are you ready?" Sherlock asks, a question perhaps better aimed at himself.
John simply nods, simply says, "Yes."
Sherlock drags his chair forward until their knees knock together, until their thighs are tightly framed between the armchairs. "Close your eyes."
John closes his eyes.
"Picture your desired outcome."
John's mind fumbles through overlapping images of 221B before settling on his analogue watch, on Sherlock's analogue watch lying on the bathroom counter beside it. That. Just that. John nods.
The thrumming begins.
Tension flees his body. He sags down into the seat, relaxed, comfortable. Sherlock is taking care of everything.
The thrumming grows, and John leans in to meet it. A pair of hands catches his shoulders. One hand drops away, and the crinkle of stiff paper reaches John's ears.
Sherlock begins slowly, his accent strange upon the English words. Their earlier practice has resulted in a smooth execution. "This is my command to you. When you sleep, your mind will go forth from here. When you sleep, your mind will not return here. No more will you wake here. This world is behind a door, and the door is closed to you when next you leave. Its memory remains, but your presence here is barred. This body is for another. You are to return to your own body, to your own worlds. You will go home. These are the sole changes I ask to your mind. These are my commands to you. Do you obey?"
John nods, and nods, and begins to giggle. He's going home. It's happening. He's going home.
The thrumming rapidly fades. John blinks his eyes open to meet Sherlock's worried gaze.
"You're laughing. Why are you laughing?"
"I'm happy," John explains. "I'm fine." He doesn't make the mistake of telling Sherlock to keep going.
"Not worried?" Sherlock's hand on his shoulder is absolutely tense.
"Can I be worried under glamour?"
"Not unless I tell you to be or you struggle."
"Well, I'm not struggling, am I?" He tries a smile, a small one. "It feels nice." At the time. Disconcerting in the extreme in hindsight, but good during, at once relaxed and focused. His mind doesn't drift, doesn't strain. He vaguely wonders what it would be like to have sex like this. Like being selectively drunk.
"Nice?" Sherlock repeats. He's offended enough that John laughs again.
"Yes," John says. "Nice."
Sherlock glares at him. "Close your eyes."
Grinning a bit, John complies. He sits up straighter only to sag once the thrumming resumes.
Long, gentle moments pass before Sherlock leans forward and murmurs to him, voice rolling and deep in unfamiliar words. The sounds are round and rolling, beautiful in the way they fill his mouth. John makes out what might be his own name, but only in passing. That recognition quickly fades. It's lovely foreign poetry, and though the meaning is lost to John, the beauty wholly remains.
He feels a hand in his hair and a soft press of lips against his own. Quiet words turn to soft humming. John's body begins to droop. The air feels warm, the armchair comfortable. An untold time ago, John's hand had found Sherlock's knee, and the moment John realises this, dreamlike, it fades away.
It all fades away.
Groggy and oddly drugged, he struggles awake. His alarm begins to blare, announcing another Chelmsford day. It's all too easy to slap the snooze button and allow sleep to drag him back under.
Somewhat less groggy, he wakes on white sheets striped with blue. He jolts upright immediately, staring about the room that isn't at all his. He gasps from the motion, an unexpected ache through his back and arms and a sting in his hands. He lifts his palms from the sheets to inspect the low blisters on his skin. Signs of recent physical labor, no sign of his watch beyond a tan line. He checks about his neck for his ID circles to no avail. Strange, when he has his scar back.
He looks around the room again, the small room, ground floor with a window. There's a tree outside, sky lightening behind it as the sun rises. There's a cottage feel to the place.
"Fuck."
Lacking any other course of action, John resorts to his default: he goes back to sleep.
"You all right?"
"Mm." John keeps staring at the electric kettle. Maybe he'll wake up in Boat World, he tells himself yet again. Yes, he'd had so many naps there that he ought to still be snapping back there every time he goes to sleep, but maybe. Maybe.
"You look a bit hungover," Derek says.
"Just tired," John says.
"Yeah, okay." Derek claps him on the shoulder, his good shoulder. "You sit down."
"I'm fine."
"Fuck you. Go sit." Derek makes small shooing motions.
"I'm fine."
"Go sit or I'll put your favourite mug on the top shelf. At the back of it."
"I'm fine," John repeats, sitting down at their small table.
Derek snorts. The kettle turns off with a click and Derek pours hot water into two mugs. "No you're not. Your hand's shaking again."
"What?"
A splash of milk into both, no sugar in either. Derek puts John's mug down in front of him. "When you keep saying you're fine, you're not fine. That goes double with the hand."
John stares at him.
Derek shrugs. "I notice things."
The laugh bubbles up, desperate and trembling, and somehow John keeps it in his throat. "Right," he says instead. "Well. Thanks."
Derek fixes breakfast with a shrug. John doesn't protest, much too busy trying not to vomit.
He effectively collapses after work and wakes up in Chelmsford with no time left for stalling. He rushes through his morning routine, tries not to scare Marta on their morning ride to the hospital, and then he finds the surgeons' overnight room. He sets his alarm for ten minutes and desperately wills himself unconscious.
The first attempt fails. Morning surgery stabilizes him, fortunately for both him and his patient. He succeeds over his lunch break instead.
He wakes in the cottage. He takes stock.
These are his sheets and his pyjamas. As he has the same pyjamas in Chelmsford that he has in his usual Londons, this counts for little. That his watch is nowhere to be found counts for a lot.
Modern technology, though, that is good. He can't find his mobile even when he rummages through the abandoned pair of trousers on the floor. Also his. He swaps his pyjama bottoms for them. He finds a few of his shirts and jumpers in the closet. His shoes were under his trousers on the floor, socks inside. He touches his face for stubble and finds the usual morning amount.
Dressed, John slowly ventures out of the small room. He enters a slightly larger kitchen, the walls an inoffensive yellow, the windows letting in ample light. By now, the sun has fully arisen, but his body insists it's still jaw-crackingly early. Perhaps this John had been sleeping poorly too.
John finds what he wants on the kitchen table. He snatches his mobile up and immediately searches through his contacts.
There. Oh God. There.
Sherlock Holmes.
Not dead here. In his contacts. Not dead.
He sits down heavily, heart pounding, body shaking.
Not dead.
One here, and one in Digital London. That's... not what he wants, but certainly a better fate than the alternative.
Once the shaking stops, he pockets his phone and continues into the sitting room. He immediately freezes. Slumped on the sofa is nearly the man he wants to see. On the coffee table before him sit a laptop and a camera, along with a fair number of cables and chargers. The laptop has long since followed Sherlock into sleep. John edges closer to tap the screen awake. He recognises a video file and can easily recognise himself in it. The landscape beyond the recorded John is unfamiliar.
Sherlock snuffles in his sleep. Probably cold, the git. There's a fireplace in the room, well-used by the look of it, but the fire must have died last night. Looking at the pile of chopped wood in the corner, John suddenly knows what the blisters on his hands and the aches in his body are from.
You arse, John mouths fondly.
Then he goes into the kitchen and makes tea, because this is going to be a tea conversation. He tries to make toast as well, but has the odd surprise of finding only unsliced bread in the breadbox. Then he tries to find the knives and has to come to the conclusion that they've been padlocked into a cabinet under the counter.
"...Right."
Likely provoked by the sound of the boiling kettle and John's voice, Sherlock groans from the other room. The beep of electronics follows.
John looks over his shoulder, no longer entirely certain he wants to turn his back. Then he tells himself not to be absurd-his door wasn't locked when he woke, no danger here-and simply pulls down the last clean mug from the shelf. He pulls another from the pile in the sink and sets about washing up.
Footsteps behind him, the quiet sound of bare feet. They stop in the wide entryway.
John drops a teabag in each mug and fetches the milk from the fridge. Surprisingly well stocked, actually. The sugar takes a bit of finding. He can feel Sherlock's stare on his back. John's unfamiliarity with the kitchen would be obvious to anyone, let alone Sherlock Holmes. By the time he finds the sugar, the tea's finished steeping.
He finishes up, dropping the teabags into the bin under the sink. Leaving Sherlock's mug pointedly on the counter, John turns around.
Standing in the entryway, Sherlock is recording him. He watches John through the handheld’s screen.
John sips his tea, staring back.
"Day twenty-three," Sherlock announces to the room at large.
"Good morning to you, too."
Sherlock doesn't blink. In an excruciatingly noticeable way, Sherlock doesn't blink.
"Day twenty-three, slash day one," Sherlock corrects. "Subject two. English speaker."
John stares at him a bit, then sips his tea. He picks up Sherlock's mug and hands it over.
Sherlock takes it, shifting the camera into his right hand.
"Where are we?" John asks.
"Sussex," Sherlock replies.
"Er. Why are we in Sussex?"
"No longer relevant. If you can function as a doctor, we ought to return to London."
"I... yes?"
"Good," Sherlock says. "Pack your things."
He turns away and John catches his shoulder. "No. Explanations first."
Sherlock glares at him over his shoulder. "It's nearly an hour car ride."
John pointedly takes two steps back and sits at the table with his tea.
Sherlock keeps glaring.
John keeps sitting.
Sherlock groans and sits across from him. He sets the camera down, still aimed at John.
"So, subject one didn't like London?" John asks. "Or knives, I'm guessing."
"No, he liked knives."
God. "That was my second guess."
"Subject one didn't speak English," Sherlock explains. "Or understand electricity."
John's stomach becomes at once light and heavy, unsure whether it can sink or soar.
Sherlock notices immediately, eyes narrowing. He leans forward.
"This might sound a bit odd," John says. "I mean, more than the usual. Did, um. Did he seem to think you were a vampire?"
Again, Sherlock doesn't blink. "He was extremely confused when I ate or drank. Obviously, 'extremely confused' was his default condition. He also panicked when I showered and when I went outdoors in the rain. Overall, I'd categorize him as extremely traumatized and easily triggered. After the first major flashback, we agreed to lock the knives away."
"Okay," John says.
"Why are you asking about vampires?"
"I'll explain that in the car. An hour, you said?"
Sherlock checks his watch, stretching out his arm to pull the sleeve back. "Slightly longer, this time of day," he says, but John hardly hears him.
"That's mine."
Sherlock frowns. "What?"
"You're wearing my watch," John says. "I looked for it when I woke up." He swallows, mouth dry despite his tea. "You're wearing my ID circles, too, aren't you?"
"His," Sherlock snaps. "Not yours."
"No. Mine." He wraps both hands around his mug and asks, "Would you have any idea what I was talking about if I said that Marta thinks I need to quit caffeine and Derek thinks my PTSD is acting up?"
His mouth frozen on the verge of some doubtlessly biting comment, Sherlock's eyes are very, very wide. Finally, he blinks.
"Oh, thank fucking God," John gasps, shoving his chair back as he stands. The table is small and Sherlock's legs are trapped under it, but these obstacles are pathetic compared to the rest. They nearly fall on the floor and stagger into the counter instead.
"Are you certain?" Sherlock demands, gripping John's head between his hands. "Are you absolutely certain? How did we meet, what do you call our world, how long have you been gone?"
"Mike, Analogue, too fucking long," John answers. He shoves forward into a kiss rough and desperate, Sherlock biting his lips in the attempt to talk through it.
"What happened? Where did that man come from?" He pushes John back with that, not enough to shove him away, not remotely that. His hands seize John's jumper as if about to shake him. "Where were you?"
"We switched. We switched, I fixed it, come here."
Sherlock accepts that for all of three seconds, three wonderful seconds. "How? I tried, we couldn't-" His words dissolve into frustrated groaning.
"It's okay," John says. "I swear it's okay. I died in Afghanistan and-"
"That's 'okay'?"
"No, but-"
"Never die again."
"Okay," John says. "That's completely plausible, good course of action."
"Shut up."
Gladly. This snog lasts longer than the others. It stops when their shaking legs force them to sit or fall, but they mutually agree that they are simply that good at kissing and ignore the feeling that they're about to be ripped from one another at any moment.
"How long can you function without sleep?" Sherlock asks. "It used to be forty hours. It must be longer than that by now."
"I already slept," John says.
"Good, because you're not doing it ever again."
"No, I already slept. From here. Woke up, went back to sleep before I came out."
"So you'll, you'll stay," Sherlock says. "Here. And Chelmsford and Other London. But here."
"Probably not going to get shot anywhere else, so. Yeah. Here."
That is obviously the wrong thing to say, but John ignores the ache in his back when Sherlock shoves him down onto the tile and climbs on top. If Sherlock's goal is to chasten him, he fails. The shaking starts up again and the chastising devolves into very forceful cuddling. Eventually, a bit winded and vaguely awkward, they sit back up. They lean against the cabinets, Sherlock slouching to keep his head under the counter top.
"You died," Sherlock says.
John nods.
"You were shot."
"Yeah. In the leg, actually."
Sherlock's mouth twitches.
"Come on, that is a bit funny," John says.
Sherlock's mouth twitches a bit more.
"Could I have my watch back?"
"Mm... no."
"Arse."
"Mm."
They look at each other.
"What if this is simply a very similar version of you?" Sherlock asks. "If there can be multiple realities, some so varied that you speak an entirely different language, then there must be other versions of you living between those realities."
"What if Analogue London split into other Londons after I left and this is the only one I'll ever get back to?" John counters.
They look at each other a bit longer.
After a long moment, Sherlock clears his throat and looks away. "Your tea's getting cold."
"So's yours."
"I don't care about mine."
Shifting onto his knees and about to stand, John leans in and brushes a kiss over Sherlock’s mouth. "Yeah, but I do."
Sherlock rolls his eyes and permits John to tug him standing. "Fine. But then packing. I've been stuck out here for weeks. There's only so long former clients will remain grateful before they start charging rent. Tea, and we return to London immediately after."
"Analogue London," John corrects, slipping his hand about Sherlock's wrist.
Sherlock shifts his arm, twisting, and then they're holding hands the way they never do. Sherlock looks down at their feet as if frightened to speak, the way he never is.
"Immediately sounds good, though," John says. "I've missed being home."
Sherlock looks out the window and clears his throat. "Mrs Hudson missed you."
John smiles a bit. "I bet she has. I've missed her too."
"Be sure to tell her that," Sherlock mumbles.
"Trust me," John says, leaning up to kiss the curve of his jaw. "You won't ever need to remind me."
previous | END
Prompted in spring of 2012, finished in the fall, and finally posted in the summer of 2013. Everyone give a big hand to threebooks3 for prompting it.
For those of you wondering how this actually had a happy ending:
In the many splitting universes, everything happens. One universe gets to work out. This is that one. Everything else is terribly sad. Enjoy.
Rating: R
Wordcount: 5.7k/44.2k
Disclaimer: Do not own.
Summary: The AU of AU's: First, he is shot in Afghanistan (again). Second, he wakes on a boat. Third is pain, fourth is normalcy, fifth is agony and sixth is confusion. By the tenth, he's lost hope.
(Original prompt: "ECM!John gets hurt again, and ends up with a few more lives. By overwriting Stranger at the Gate!John and Behavioral Modification!John." Thus, Watches 'Verse with Behavioural Modification and Stranger at the Gate. Prompted and filled here on livejournal. NOT an official continuation of any of these 'verses.)
Warnings: Partial character death, separation, vampire, blood, hypnotism
Red
Green
Purple and Gold
Orange
Blue
He wakes in Chelmsford before his alarm sounds, wakes and stretches. Seventeen more minutes until he has to get up. His bed is warm and safe in a way he seldom trusts beds to be. He yawns and snuffles into his pillow. He falls asleep.
He wakes to the scrape of a key in the lock. Not to violin, not in an armchair. To a door opening, lying on a sofa. To the sound of heavy footsteps and the humming that means Derek is in a good mood.
John sits up. He stares about his Grant Road sitting room. His right hand closes about his left wrist, recognizing the digital watch by feel. Not binary.
Not Binary.
He tries to go back to sleep. He truly does, but he simply starts giggling. He grabs the remote and turns the telly on as fast as he can, lest Derek think he's gone madder than he already is. He has a few moments to recover, Derek proceeding directly from front door to loo, but it's not much time.
John’s going home. He needs to check, needs to make sure that Binary won't pop up on another cycle through his days, but the certainty of it overwhelms. He's never going back to Binary. He can't anymore.
He doesn't know what will happen to the body there, to the John there, but maybe-he hopes-the other John will fill in the void he left there. The right one, somehow.
Flopping onto his back, staring at the ceiling, he pictures it: Sherlock kneeling at his violin case in the sitting room, watching John sleep. Sherlock approaching, perhaps standing, perhaps walking on his knees. Tentative hands easing John awake with a non-triggering touch on the arms. The moment of confusion before the truth of the reunion becomes clear.
Sherlock will think it his doing. He'll probably hold it relentlessly over John's head through the worst of their arguments. And John will call him an arse and forgive him, because that's how they work.
A niggling worry: what if it's the wrong John?
John wonders. He wonders until Derek wanders into the sitting room.
John tells himself he'll never know, then sits up and makes room for Derek on the sofa.
"Good day?" Derek asks.
"Good day. You?"
"All right. Nothing eventful."
"Yeah," John says. "Me too."
Settling down for bed is an agonizing affair, worse than any Christmas Eve as a child. Sherlock was right: John is shaking with excitement. He lies awake, sorting out what the next glamour should be, and that's how he finally falls asleep.
He wakes cozy, his face mashed against something warm and solid. There's a hand on his side rubbing idle circles. A fire crackles in the room. Back in Boat World, then.
He keeps his eyes closed and drifts back down.
His alarm in Chelmsford goes off. John smacks the snooze button, rolls over, and goes back to sleep.
His watch in Digital London beeps ten minutes before it needs to. He's off work today anyway. Again, he goes back to sleep.
"Sherlock...?"
The thumb tracing circles on John's side stops. "Hm?"
"It worked." John pulls his face away from fabric, his face likely marked from the pressure. Judging by the twitch of a smile on Sherlock’s face, definitely marked.
"For now," Sherlock allows. "We'll see if it lasts."
"It worked," John repeats. He rolls onto his back and Sherlock's hand glides onto his chest. "Thank you."
Sherlock very nearly preens, but a weight in his eyes prevents the full extent of his ego from shining through.
"What is it?"
"You want me to do more," Sherlock says. "Obviously."
"Well... yes. It worked, so. Yes."
"I'd prefer to wait," Sherlock tells him. "There could be lasting effects from what I've done. There ought to be, in fact. The unintentional ones worry me."
John wants to protest, but he would have been an idiot not to expect this. "How many days until you need a sane John Watson?"
Sherlock sighs. "As soon as possible. Three at the most, if we're to go over any feasible plan."
"Then why not try now?" John asks. "Just a question. You're worried. You're taking precautionary measures. Any other reason?"
"Do I need any other reason?"
John hesitates.
"I don't care that you think me unreasonable," Sherlock says. "I'll remove the other two dreams tomorrow at the soonest."
"Sorry?" John sits up.
"Tomorrow at the soonest," Sherlock repeats.
"No, the other part. What did you say?"
Sherlock gives him an odd look, which at this point is more of his typical look. "I can still remove the other two dreams, but I don't-"
"No," John interrupts. "Sorry, no, signals crossed. That's not, no. That's not what I want. That won't help."
"The removal of one nightmare helped, but the removal of the other two won't?"
"The nightmare that wasn't mine," John says. "The other two are mine. Those are mine. I'm keeping them."
Sherlock's eyebrows go from arched to furrowed. "Then what do you want me to do?"
John takes a breath before venturing in. "I think I've worked out a way for me to go home."
"You... want to return north."
"No, I-"
"You'll have your head chopped off, have you forgotten that too?"
"No!" John insists. "But that's not what I'm saying!"
"You can't go home!" Sherlock shouts at him. He slams the book down on the bed cover. "I am sorry, I honestly am, but I cannot change it. If you go home, you will die. Do you understand that?"
"I'm not talking about the north!"
"Then what? You're certainly not 'going back' to some other world, John."
The temptation to strangle rises up and John forces it down. "What the hell will it take to convince you?" John demands. "Anything I say, you already have some explanation."
"Because I'm grounded in reality," Sherlock replies. "That makes it much easier to see. Simpler."
"And you've never been wrong before? Hm?" He rises to his knees. "You've never been wrong about what's going on in my head before? Never? Not once?"
Sherlock visibly pales. "Stop it."
"You've no explanation for how this happened!" John shouts. "None! I do!"
"Another vampire-"
"Was there one?" John leans in, hands on Sherlock's knees. "Besides Moriarty, was there anyone at all who could have done this to your John, or does it have to be something else?"
"There's, there's the possibility..."
"Is there? Really."
"You've been hurt," Sherlock says. "Moriarty's glamour was broken, but that doesn't mean it didn't leave damage. It could have taken some time for it to break you, but it is possible."
John sits back with a glare. "And what about how systematic my story is? You said it was a sign of an active glamour interfering with my mind."
That takes Sherlock a moment. "You always were an exceptional storyteller."
Blogger, John doesn't correct. "Fine," he says instead. "Then I'm going to tell you a story."
The look on Sherlock's face is the definition of emotional agony. "You can't persuade me, John."
"And you can't persuade me, so it looks like we're stuck. In a few days, we'll go to court and I'll end up dead or insane. Or you could budge and maybe that won't happen."
"Or you could leave me to my research and that won't happen," Sherlock counters.
"Maybe I won’t die, but I'll still be like this." John leans forward. "This isn't going to change unless you do something. I know you can."
Sherlock seizes him by the ears, hands cupping John's head. "You're still in there. You're not dead, you still know me, you are obviously present."
John grabs his wrists, tugging Sherlock's hands down. He climbs off the bed and paces away, the chill of the floor seeping up through his socks. He crosses his arms, tucking his hands into his armpits. "Will you at least listen to my plan?" he asks.
Sherlock glares at him, pulling the bed cover over his knees. "That depends on how moronic it is."
"Call him back in Anglic and send me away in English."
"There aren't multiple versions of you, John."
"It's my mind," John counters. "My behaviour is based on what I think, not you."
Sherlock rolls his eyes. "Yes, right until I use my glamour on you."
"If he's still present in me, the Anglic will work on him, won't it?" John demands. "If there's any connection at all. Because I don't understand a word of it. It can't work on me that way, can it? It has to be a language I understand. That's why we had to start slowly when you were teaching me Franc."
"And supposing you understand both commands and the contradiction breaks your mind?" Sherlock counters. "You're an idiot."
"By your logic, my mind’s broken already."
"No," Sherlock says, voice taking on a rasp. "You're improving. You don't remember the damage before."
"The damage caused by what? What Moriarty did?"
Sherlock nods, clearly holding something back.
"Was that like enthrallment?" John asks.
Sherlock's face pales, but he doesn't disagree.
"Then it's all about to come back. Or I die. Sherlock, this is the only logical option."
"No. Because there is no logical option. I won't have you forcing the situation into a false dichotomy."
Distantly, John realises his Franc vocabulary is larger than he'd noticed. "If there's no good choice, then why not the option I actually want?"
Sherlock has no answer to that.
"Are you going to let someone else reach around in my head?" John asks.
"This is obvious manipulation," Sherlock mutters.
"I could just kill myself and solve it that way," John says. "But I'm not."
"Are you threatening to?"
"I'm asking for your help."
"I forbid you from killing yourself."
The order shakes its way into John's bones. It is sharp and staggering, and suddenly, the windows are impossible to leap from. The rails of the staircases will hold him back from any jump. "I wasn't planning on it!" John shouts. "Would you fucking listen!"
"If you'd say something intelligent, yes."
"What the hell was that for, then? You won't glamour me if I ask, if I fucking beg you, but the moment you think it's necessary-"
"The moment you threaten to kill yourself-"
"They're going to kill me anyway!" John shouts.
Sherlock huddles on the bed, legs pulled up, arms wrapped around them. He glares at John over his knees.
"What the hell are you afraid of?" John demands.
"I won't hurt you."
"Oh for-" John turns away to swear at the wall. "For fuck's sake, Sherlock!"
"I won't," Sherlock repeats, eyes on his knees.
A deep breath could never be deep enough to steady him, let alone calm him. "This is my life, dammit! All I want is control over my own fucking head!"
Sherlock looks at him.
John glares back, daring him, just daring him to disagree.
"That's your plan?" Sherlock asks. "Shout and swear until I give in?"
"That's pretty much it, yeah." He sits down on the edge of the desk, arms crossed.
"You honestly think that will work?" Sherlock tilts his head slightly.
"No," John admits. "But that's pretty much it."
"Are you sure?" Sherlock asks, as if John's simply forgotten something. Whatever this is, it's not a game John wants to play.
"I'm sure."
Sherlock continues to watch him from the bed.
John sighs. "Fine." He crosses through the open door into his bedroom and closes it. He nearly locks it, then decides otherwise. He sits in front of the fire until his nerves are less jangled, his eyelids more willing to fall. Then he lies down on the floor and buys himself a bit more time to think.
He thinks in Chelmsford.
He thinks in London.
He wakes before the fireplace with an ache in his back. He relocates to bed and does a spot more of thinking from there.
He thinks until he begins to pop back into this world each time he sleeps in one of the others, a sure sign that he's crossed the line from buying time to think and simply stalling.
After that, he gets up and builds the fire back up a little. He looks to the joining door, still closed. Then, just to actually do something, he returns to his desk, pulls out his guide to Franc letters, and begins his struggle anew with the old fashioned pen.
He takes his dinner in his room yet again. He wonders if this body would feel restless if it weren't for the recent boat voyage. This room is absurdly spacious in comparison, but being confined is still being confined. He's adjusted to the chamber pot but not to much more.
As the sun begins to set, he lights his lamps. It feels too early, might be winter, but it's also possible his internal clock is confused beyond recovery due to his napping. He keeps working, revising, making absolutely certain that this is what he wants to have written.
The knock at the joining door, when it comes, is more inevitable than startling.
"Come in," John calls.
Sherlock sullenly enters. "...My room is cold."
John gestures to the chairs before the fire.
Sherlock approaches, then stares at the rug. "Why were you sleeping on the floor?"
"Because I wanted to," John answers. He blows on the drying ink, then stands. "Here. Will you read this?"
Sherlock's smile is absolutely indulgent as John approaches. Sherlock takes the paper, his eyes skimming across its surface as John sits across from him.
Sherlock frowns.
John waits.
"You... wrote this."
"Yes."
"The set of symbols are in a practiced hand," Sherlock says, brow furrowed.
"Of course it's practiced. That's English writing," John says. "I did the best direct translation I could into Franc above it. And the bit below it, you'll have to translate that into Anglic yourself."
Sherlock rereads the note several more times.
"Would it work?" John asks. "As a glamour."
Sherlock shushes him.
John waits. He stands and builds the fire, prodding it with the poker a bit more than strictly necessary.
Finally, Sherlock asks, "And if this still destroys you?"
"Then I asked for it," John answers. "You've forbidden me from killing myself, but I'm still asking for this. What do you think that means?"
"That you don't recognize the danger, obviously."
John sits back down. "Have you considered what it means if I'm telling the truth?"
"Of course you think you're telling the truth-"
"If what I'm saying is real," John corrects.
"Why should I have? It's blatantly absurd."
"But if it is real, your John is in an entirely different world, completely alone and with no one to teach him the language. If it's real, then he's been like that for days, maybe weeks. He could be somewhere, anywhere, and you are ignoring the very real possibility that he needs your help to come home."
Sherlock's eyes grow wide and round. They look like a child's, so surprised at something so obvious.
"Maybe if you do this-" John touches the paper in Sherlock's hands "-maybe I'll think I'm him, maybe he'll come back. I don't know. So... please. Because I could go back to shouting and swearing, but I think I've frightened the staff enough for one enforced visit."
Sherlock's mouth twists. "Can't this wait until tomorrow?"
John nearly laughs. He nearly protests. Instead he says, "Only if you're not stalling for time."
Sherlock looks down.
So much for that.
"Will you sort out the Anglic translation?" John asks. "This will only work if I don't know exactly what you're saying for that part."
"I'll... consider it."
John nods. "All right."
The wait is agony. Too many naps during the day means John wakes in the night. The second time he wakes, he stays awake. He makes the mistake of opening the bed curtains and letting the cold in. Then he hears the noise from the next room, the pacing.
Regretting the absence of his shoes, he gets up and eases open the joining door. Sherlock keeps pacing but waves a hand at him. John enters. He goes to the window where Sherlock actually has glass and gazes out over the courtyard, over the far roof, over the city. There's little light. The stars are amazing.
"I think I have it," Sherlock says quietly, voice hard.
John turns. "Do you?"
Sherlock clearly hasn't slept. His pallor could be from the cold, could be from a lack of feeding. It could be from many things. "I think so."
"Should I sit down?"
Sherlock takes his hand. "You should come back to bed."
John eases away.
Sherlock keeps reaching. "If I'm going to risk you, I'm going to have this first."
Slowly, John gives him back his hand.
Sherlock draws him to the bed. He directs him under the covers. He climbs in after. He doesn't seek as much as a single kiss. Instead, he simply presses his cheek against John's chest and holds on, as if the world were ending.
It's a slow and painful way to lie awake through the night. John rubs Sherlock’s back until Sherlock sleeps, until the fists in John's shirt are no longer self-conscious in their grip. From a great distance, morning approaches.
They sit in the armchairs before John's fireplace, a position at once familiar and foreign.
"Are you ready?" Sherlock asks, a question perhaps better aimed at himself.
John simply nods, simply says, "Yes."
Sherlock drags his chair forward until their knees knock together, until their thighs are tightly framed between the armchairs. "Close your eyes."
John closes his eyes.
"Picture your desired outcome."
John's mind fumbles through overlapping images of 221B before settling on his analogue watch, on Sherlock's analogue watch lying on the bathroom counter beside it. That. Just that. John nods.
The thrumming begins.
Tension flees his body. He sags down into the seat, relaxed, comfortable. Sherlock is taking care of everything.
The thrumming grows, and John leans in to meet it. A pair of hands catches his shoulders. One hand drops away, and the crinkle of stiff paper reaches John's ears.
Sherlock begins slowly, his accent strange upon the English words. Their earlier practice has resulted in a smooth execution. "This is my command to you. When you sleep, your mind will go forth from here. When you sleep, your mind will not return here. No more will you wake here. This world is behind a door, and the door is closed to you when next you leave. Its memory remains, but your presence here is barred. This body is for another. You are to return to your own body, to your own worlds. You will go home. These are the sole changes I ask to your mind. These are my commands to you. Do you obey?"
John nods, and nods, and begins to giggle. He's going home. It's happening. He's going home.
The thrumming rapidly fades. John blinks his eyes open to meet Sherlock's worried gaze.
"You're laughing. Why are you laughing?"
"I'm happy," John explains. "I'm fine." He doesn't make the mistake of telling Sherlock to keep going.
"Not worried?" Sherlock's hand on his shoulder is absolutely tense.
"Can I be worried under glamour?"
"Not unless I tell you to be or you struggle."
"Well, I'm not struggling, am I?" He tries a smile, a small one. "It feels nice." At the time. Disconcerting in the extreme in hindsight, but good during, at once relaxed and focused. His mind doesn't drift, doesn't strain. He vaguely wonders what it would be like to have sex like this. Like being selectively drunk.
"Nice?" Sherlock repeats. He's offended enough that John laughs again.
"Yes," John says. "Nice."
Sherlock glares at him. "Close your eyes."
Grinning a bit, John complies. He sits up straighter only to sag once the thrumming resumes.
Long, gentle moments pass before Sherlock leans forward and murmurs to him, voice rolling and deep in unfamiliar words. The sounds are round and rolling, beautiful in the way they fill his mouth. John makes out what might be his own name, but only in passing. That recognition quickly fades. It's lovely foreign poetry, and though the meaning is lost to John, the beauty wholly remains.
He feels a hand in his hair and a soft press of lips against his own. Quiet words turn to soft humming. John's body begins to droop. The air feels warm, the armchair comfortable. An untold time ago, John's hand had found Sherlock's knee, and the moment John realises this, dreamlike, it fades away.
It all fades away.
Groggy and oddly drugged, he struggles awake. His alarm begins to blare, announcing another Chelmsford day. It's all too easy to slap the snooze button and allow sleep to drag him back under.
Somewhat less groggy, he wakes on white sheets striped with blue. He jolts upright immediately, staring about the room that isn't at all his. He gasps from the motion, an unexpected ache through his back and arms and a sting in his hands. He lifts his palms from the sheets to inspect the low blisters on his skin. Signs of recent physical labor, no sign of his watch beyond a tan line. He checks about his neck for his ID circles to no avail. Strange, when he has his scar back.
He looks around the room again, the small room, ground floor with a window. There's a tree outside, sky lightening behind it as the sun rises. There's a cottage feel to the place.
"Fuck."
Lacking any other course of action, John resorts to his default: he goes back to sleep.
"You all right?"
"Mm." John keeps staring at the electric kettle. Maybe he'll wake up in Boat World, he tells himself yet again. Yes, he'd had so many naps there that he ought to still be snapping back there every time he goes to sleep, but maybe. Maybe.
"You look a bit hungover," Derek says.
"Just tired," John says.
"Yeah, okay." Derek claps him on the shoulder, his good shoulder. "You sit down."
"I'm fine."
"Fuck you. Go sit." Derek makes small shooing motions.
"I'm fine."
"Go sit or I'll put your favourite mug on the top shelf. At the back of it."
"I'm fine," John repeats, sitting down at their small table.
Derek snorts. The kettle turns off with a click and Derek pours hot water into two mugs. "No you're not. Your hand's shaking again."
"What?"
A splash of milk into both, no sugar in either. Derek puts John's mug down in front of him. "When you keep saying you're fine, you're not fine. That goes double with the hand."
John stares at him.
Derek shrugs. "I notice things."
The laugh bubbles up, desperate and trembling, and somehow John keeps it in his throat. "Right," he says instead. "Well. Thanks."
Derek fixes breakfast with a shrug. John doesn't protest, much too busy trying not to vomit.
He effectively collapses after work and wakes up in Chelmsford with no time left for stalling. He rushes through his morning routine, tries not to scare Marta on their morning ride to the hospital, and then he finds the surgeons' overnight room. He sets his alarm for ten minutes and desperately wills himself unconscious.
The first attempt fails. Morning surgery stabilizes him, fortunately for both him and his patient. He succeeds over his lunch break instead.
He wakes in the cottage. He takes stock.
These are his sheets and his pyjamas. As he has the same pyjamas in Chelmsford that he has in his usual Londons, this counts for little. That his watch is nowhere to be found counts for a lot.
Modern technology, though, that is good. He can't find his mobile even when he rummages through the abandoned pair of trousers on the floor. Also his. He swaps his pyjama bottoms for them. He finds a few of his shirts and jumpers in the closet. His shoes were under his trousers on the floor, socks inside. He touches his face for stubble and finds the usual morning amount.
Dressed, John slowly ventures out of the small room. He enters a slightly larger kitchen, the walls an inoffensive yellow, the windows letting in ample light. By now, the sun has fully arisen, but his body insists it's still jaw-crackingly early. Perhaps this John had been sleeping poorly too.
John finds what he wants on the kitchen table. He snatches his mobile up and immediately searches through his contacts.
There. Oh God. There.
Sherlock Holmes.
Not dead here. In his contacts. Not dead.
He sits down heavily, heart pounding, body shaking.
Not dead.
One here, and one in Digital London. That's... not what he wants, but certainly a better fate than the alternative.
Once the shaking stops, he pockets his phone and continues into the sitting room. He immediately freezes. Slumped on the sofa is nearly the man he wants to see. On the coffee table before him sit a laptop and a camera, along with a fair number of cables and chargers. The laptop has long since followed Sherlock into sleep. John edges closer to tap the screen awake. He recognises a video file and can easily recognise himself in it. The landscape beyond the recorded John is unfamiliar.
Sherlock snuffles in his sleep. Probably cold, the git. There's a fireplace in the room, well-used by the look of it, but the fire must have died last night. Looking at the pile of chopped wood in the corner, John suddenly knows what the blisters on his hands and the aches in his body are from.
You arse, John mouths fondly.
Then he goes into the kitchen and makes tea, because this is going to be a tea conversation. He tries to make toast as well, but has the odd surprise of finding only unsliced bread in the breadbox. Then he tries to find the knives and has to come to the conclusion that they've been padlocked into a cabinet under the counter.
"...Right."
Likely provoked by the sound of the boiling kettle and John's voice, Sherlock groans from the other room. The beep of electronics follows.
John looks over his shoulder, no longer entirely certain he wants to turn his back. Then he tells himself not to be absurd-his door wasn't locked when he woke, no danger here-and simply pulls down the last clean mug from the shelf. He pulls another from the pile in the sink and sets about washing up.
Footsteps behind him, the quiet sound of bare feet. They stop in the wide entryway.
John drops a teabag in each mug and fetches the milk from the fridge. Surprisingly well stocked, actually. The sugar takes a bit of finding. He can feel Sherlock's stare on his back. John's unfamiliarity with the kitchen would be obvious to anyone, let alone Sherlock Holmes. By the time he finds the sugar, the tea's finished steeping.
He finishes up, dropping the teabags into the bin under the sink. Leaving Sherlock's mug pointedly on the counter, John turns around.
Standing in the entryway, Sherlock is recording him. He watches John through the handheld’s screen.
John sips his tea, staring back.
"Day twenty-three," Sherlock announces to the room at large.
"Good morning to you, too."
Sherlock doesn't blink. In an excruciatingly noticeable way, Sherlock doesn't blink.
"Day twenty-three, slash day one," Sherlock corrects. "Subject two. English speaker."
John stares at him a bit, then sips his tea. He picks up Sherlock's mug and hands it over.
Sherlock takes it, shifting the camera into his right hand.
"Where are we?" John asks.
"Sussex," Sherlock replies.
"Er. Why are we in Sussex?"
"No longer relevant. If you can function as a doctor, we ought to return to London."
"I... yes?"
"Good," Sherlock says. "Pack your things."
He turns away and John catches his shoulder. "No. Explanations first."
Sherlock glares at him over his shoulder. "It's nearly an hour car ride."
John pointedly takes two steps back and sits at the table with his tea.
Sherlock keeps glaring.
John keeps sitting.
Sherlock groans and sits across from him. He sets the camera down, still aimed at John.
"So, subject one didn't like London?" John asks. "Or knives, I'm guessing."
"No, he liked knives."
God. "That was my second guess."
"Subject one didn't speak English," Sherlock explains. "Or understand electricity."
John's stomach becomes at once light and heavy, unsure whether it can sink or soar.
Sherlock notices immediately, eyes narrowing. He leans forward.
"This might sound a bit odd," John says. "I mean, more than the usual. Did, um. Did he seem to think you were a vampire?"
Again, Sherlock doesn't blink. "He was extremely confused when I ate or drank. Obviously, 'extremely confused' was his default condition. He also panicked when I showered and when I went outdoors in the rain. Overall, I'd categorize him as extremely traumatized and easily triggered. After the first major flashback, we agreed to lock the knives away."
"Okay," John says.
"Why are you asking about vampires?"
"I'll explain that in the car. An hour, you said?"
Sherlock checks his watch, stretching out his arm to pull the sleeve back. "Slightly longer, this time of day," he says, but John hardly hears him.
"That's mine."
Sherlock frowns. "What?"
"You're wearing my watch," John says. "I looked for it when I woke up." He swallows, mouth dry despite his tea. "You're wearing my ID circles, too, aren't you?"
"His," Sherlock snaps. "Not yours."
"No. Mine." He wraps both hands around his mug and asks, "Would you have any idea what I was talking about if I said that Marta thinks I need to quit caffeine and Derek thinks my PTSD is acting up?"
His mouth frozen on the verge of some doubtlessly biting comment, Sherlock's eyes are very, very wide. Finally, he blinks.
"Oh, thank fucking God," John gasps, shoving his chair back as he stands. The table is small and Sherlock's legs are trapped under it, but these obstacles are pathetic compared to the rest. They nearly fall on the floor and stagger into the counter instead.
"Are you certain?" Sherlock demands, gripping John's head between his hands. "Are you absolutely certain? How did we meet, what do you call our world, how long have you been gone?"
"Mike, Analogue, too fucking long," John answers. He shoves forward into a kiss rough and desperate, Sherlock biting his lips in the attempt to talk through it.
"What happened? Where did that man come from?" He pushes John back with that, not enough to shove him away, not remotely that. His hands seize John's jumper as if about to shake him. "Where were you?"
"We switched. We switched, I fixed it, come here."
Sherlock accepts that for all of three seconds, three wonderful seconds. "How? I tried, we couldn't-" His words dissolve into frustrated groaning.
"It's okay," John says. "I swear it's okay. I died in Afghanistan and-"
"That's 'okay'?"
"No, but-"
"Never die again."
"Okay," John says. "That's completely plausible, good course of action."
"Shut up."
Gladly. This snog lasts longer than the others. It stops when their shaking legs force them to sit or fall, but they mutually agree that they are simply that good at kissing and ignore the feeling that they're about to be ripped from one another at any moment.
"How long can you function without sleep?" Sherlock asks. "It used to be forty hours. It must be longer than that by now."
"I already slept," John says.
"Good, because you're not doing it ever again."
"No, I already slept. From here. Woke up, went back to sleep before I came out."
"So you'll, you'll stay," Sherlock says. "Here. And Chelmsford and Other London. But here."
"Probably not going to get shot anywhere else, so. Yeah. Here."
That is obviously the wrong thing to say, but John ignores the ache in his back when Sherlock shoves him down onto the tile and climbs on top. If Sherlock's goal is to chasten him, he fails. The shaking starts up again and the chastising devolves into very forceful cuddling. Eventually, a bit winded and vaguely awkward, they sit back up. They lean against the cabinets, Sherlock slouching to keep his head under the counter top.
"You died," Sherlock says.
John nods.
"You were shot."
"Yeah. In the leg, actually."
Sherlock's mouth twitches.
"Come on, that is a bit funny," John says.
Sherlock's mouth twitches a bit more.
"Could I have my watch back?"
"Mm... no."
"Arse."
"Mm."
They look at each other.
"What if this is simply a very similar version of you?" Sherlock asks. "If there can be multiple realities, some so varied that you speak an entirely different language, then there must be other versions of you living between those realities."
"What if Analogue London split into other Londons after I left and this is the only one I'll ever get back to?" John counters.
They look at each other a bit longer.
After a long moment, Sherlock clears his throat and looks away. "Your tea's getting cold."
"So's yours."
"I don't care about mine."
Shifting onto his knees and about to stand, John leans in and brushes a kiss over Sherlock’s mouth. "Yeah, but I do."
Sherlock rolls his eyes and permits John to tug him standing. "Fine. But then packing. I've been stuck out here for weeks. There's only so long former clients will remain grateful before they start charging rent. Tea, and we return to London immediately after."
"Analogue London," John corrects, slipping his hand about Sherlock's wrist.
Sherlock shifts his arm, twisting, and then they're holding hands the way they never do. Sherlock looks down at their feet as if frightened to speak, the way he never is.
"Immediately sounds good, though," John says. "I've missed being home."
Sherlock looks out the window and clears his throat. "Mrs Hudson missed you."
John smiles a bit. "I bet she has. I've missed her too."
"Be sure to tell her that," Sherlock mumbles.
"Trust me," John says, leaning up to kiss the curve of his jaw. "You won't ever need to remind me."
previous | END
Prompted in spring of 2012, finished in the fall, and finally posted in the summer of 2013. Everyone give a big hand to threebooks3 for prompting it.
For those of you wondering how this actually had a happy ending:
In the many splitting universes, everything happens. One universe gets to work out. This is that one. Everything else is terribly sad. Enjoy.