Time Strips the Gears Till You Forget What They Were For

[doctorsoldier]

Continued from here.

The trip home from New Zealand is simply not as pleasant as one should be.  John stares up at the ceiling of the plane, studying the grooves in the walls as they fit together with the rest of the fuselage.  Sarah's very quiet beside him, and not the sort of quiet that happens when one is content and sore from too much holiday

Comments

[couldbdangerous]

Notice? How could Sherlock fail to notice a thing like that? It's not a matter of noticing

[doctorsoldier]

So, back to the way it's always been. John actually grins and though it takes a moment to reach his eyes, but the time it does he's laughing full force, hands moving through his hair before he sits down in the chair that has become 'his.' Except when someone visits, and then it's Sherlock's and he gets the coffee table. John tilts his head to the side, against the edge of the chair, and uses the experiment to gloss over the rest. It's easier that way.

"What sort of experiment is it?" So much easier to discuss potential explosions and unsanity conditions where they eat and the like. "Because if I have to find molars in with the spoons again I really might--" Go out and drink. Actually, that sounds like a good idea.

Never mind the poor shaving or the very long flight or the fact that he needs a shower-- No, actually, yes to the shower.

"Give me fifteen minutes and we'll go to the pub. No excuses, Sherlock. Just get a pint with me and you can explain the funny smell."

[couldbdangerous]

"I don't drink," Sherlock reminds John yet again, but he doesn't expect to be heeded this time either. He stands still until he hears the water begin to run before sneaking into his room to plug in for awhile. John's showers aren't normally very long, but every little bit helps. He'll be out and waiting, dressed and ready, by the time that John joins him

[doctorsoldier]

"If you were," John replies smoothly, hair a little damp but with enough product in it to look purposefully messy when the London breeze finishes the styling process for him, "I'd not have asked you along, now would I have? No, I'm afraid that we can blame Sarah on this one." John's not dressed to impress. This is not a date and though Sherlock looks, as always, bloody fantastic, John doesn't even try to compete with that. Red shirt with a collar, black jumper and he's perfectly ready for a night at the pub

[couldbdangerous]

Sherlock and Annie exchange the usual pleasantries, the faint nodding of the head in acknowledgement, the lingering eye contact in recognition of one another, and then the silent parting. He wonders when John is going to notice that it's almost exclusively the human waiters who bother to ask him if he wants anything, or who wait for his order when he declines to make one.

Though that could just be written off as reputation, he supposes. John has blogged fussily about his eating habits often enough.

"So," he says finally, once they've been left alone, food and drink on the table between them. Sherlock will pick at the fries to keep up the illusion of eating, perhaps take a mostly harmless few sips of John's drink as the night progresses, but no more. "You're not going to tell me why we're here, then?"

He waves his hand to pre-empt the answer. "To eat and drink, yes, obviously; don't be smart, that's my job. Really, though, John; you can talk to me. I'll listen. That's what friends do, isn't it

[doctorsoldier]

"There's just not that much to tell." John is an astoundingly excellent doctor, a fantastic surgeon, and he can and does figure out how to save lives on a near-daily basis but that doesn't mean that he's good at picking up on reactions, emotions, idiosyncrasies or the rest like Sherlock can and does. John is an 'everyman.' His intellect is not really above that of others, he just applies it better than some. Not as well as some. It's a give and take. Sherlock is usually the focus of his attention, but even that isn't exactly telling as he never catches the oddness. Or rather, he now assumes that all oddnesses are simply in the category of 'Sherlock' and filed away between 'ash analysis' and 'sock index

[couldbdangerous]

Well, getting flustered certainly isn't going to salvage the situation. "That's a shame," Sherlock responds drily, quite loudly enough for everyone to hear. "I'd have said yes."

He leans his elbow on the table, his chin on his palm, and bats his eyelashes and there it is, yes, laughter. Excellent. He leans back in his chair, grinning, and gives a dismissive flapping gesture of the hand before sliding the box off the table and slipping it into his pocket. Back to your food. Nothing to see.

He waits for the noise level to slowly climb back to normal before hunching forward again and pilfering more of John's food, chuckling softly to himself. "That's going to get out, you know. Somebody's going to find out about it and that's it, there goes your reputation."

A pause. "Though it'll do wonders for mine, I suppose."

Another wave of the hand. Enough of that. "Anyhow, I don't quite know what you expected. No, shut up, I'm not calling you an idiot. Alright, maybe a bit, but the point is, you have to choose eventually. Your work -- and mine

[doctorsoldier]

"You're not in a deerstalker," John points out, ears still pink as he presses his face against the palm of his hand. He can feel his embarrassment searing a hole through his skin as he breathed out through his fingers. What a day. "No one's apt to recognize you." Sherlock had the right way of dealing with this, though. Just laugh it off. He tries, but decides to drown himself in cheese instead, letting a change in clientel sweep away from of the pride crushing momentum he'd just faced. He listens to what Sherlock has to say, and he agrees with it

[couldbdangerous]

Sherlock grimaces and shakes his head. "No. You can't."

And perhaps he's said that a bit harshly, but the idea that John might want to bring someone else into what Sherlock has come to think of as their world is insulting. If he's insufficient--

Is that fair? Maybe not. He can't tell. "If I'm insufficient then you may do as you wish but my work is mine. I've humoured you in the past but I don't want anyone else joining in and I won't permit it. I don't have to permit it."

He leans back in his seat, arms crossed, lips pressed into a thin line. "Don't mistake compromise for equanimity, John; it won't do you any favours."

No, that's not the way to go about it. Incurably rude though John's presumptuousness might have been, however insulting the implications, he's just as unintentionally abrasive himself more often than not. He sighs and rubs at his face. "Look, John, if I'd any say in the matter she'd never have come along. And if I have any say in the matter now, which apparently I don't--" he reminds himself to breathe,

[doctorsoldier]

Sherlock's mood swings are always very poorly defined and John really has no idea just what's going on between them at the moment. At first, the doctor is shocked by how venomously Sherlock is being against other people going on their little adventures. After that, he's sure he likes the direction of the conversation even less. John's heart rate has accelerated. His breathing has changed. He's absolutely blushing again.

And ordering another whiskey because this is just about too much for him.

Dating another person so soon after breaking it off with Sarah has got to be absolutely terrible but-- But he needs some sort of relief and he doesn't buy women, not because he's got an issue with the profession, but because he knows the diseases his men have returned with from a night out on the town.

John is just going to have to settle on too much alcohol to get his emotions down.

"I'm sure my sister would love that. She's always accusing me if taking after her. That'd just be another way."

[couldbdangerous]

"Oh," Sherlock responds with a sigh. "Well there goes that idea. We clearly mustn't do anything of which your sister might approve."

He picks through the rest of John's chips idly. "Shame, too. It is the obvious conclusion. Quite logical."

Perfectly logical, at least on the surface. He's capable of providing nearly anything John might need. Mentally and physically equipped. But he's also aware of the fact that marriage implies intimacy, which is of course part of the inevitable appeal for a man like John, and Sherlock is both male-bodied and an android. Intimacy inevitably means revealing the latter fact, and the former is obvious and likely to dissuade John from pursuing it in the first place.

"I mean that quite seriously, for the record. Then we wouldn't need anyone else. Well, I already don't, but you wouldn't either. It would be perfect. Problem solved. No need to try to impose anyone else on me-- which is a bit insulting, by the way. I didn't know you thought so little of our little outings, the operative word of course being

[doctorsoldier]

"And yet you managed to invite yourself along at least once a week," John mused, though he'd actually stopped being mad at the other man several months before. He enjoys Sherlock's company. And yes. Yes. He knows why that is too. It's all right though. He can just play it off as-- No. No wonder Sarah thought-- She'd been right

[couldbdangerous]

Sherlock sighs and stands, donning coat and scarf. Enough. Quite enough. He wishes he had some way to control John's intake which didn't involve drinking enough to make himself sick. Androids aren't meant to ingest alcohol. It does horrible things to the nanites which normally deconstruct whatever it is they eat, if they are made to be capable of eating. Too much of it and Sherlock first has to void his 'stomach' as completely as possible by vomiting, and second has to find a way to surreptitiously acquire and then ingest replacement digestive slurry, neither of which are strictly pleasant processes -- not to mention the risk involved. He should have no reason to be purchasing nanite slurry, nor would it be easy to explain the copious amounts of black fluid he'd be vomiting up should he be caught

[doctorsoldier]

Mycroft really needs to invest in some sort of technology to at least simulate a heart beat. Prostitution androids, at least the ones that are almost impossible to tell from real women and men, have them. Early on in their use, it was found that men that frequented them found their lack of an artificial heart to be disconcerting. Not that Sherlock was ever meant to be used for that reason at all. Even if John's thoughts have turned that direction on a more or less usual basis since they'd met.

Drink, however, deadened all of that and John is just able to be John. Well. John with extra giggling fits and extra smiles and a bit too clingy really for anyone's good.

"I'm glad," John's saying as they wind back home, their flat really not that far away, "that you've no intentions to marry anyone. I don't, I really, really don't fancy being left out." Sherlock does it enough all ready that John knows what to expect. Aggravation won't be the only thing he'll have to face for that. "And you know what? No more women. Giving them up

[couldbdangerous]

"So I am," Sherlock responds, opting to ignore it for the time being. "And you're exaggerating. That's a hyperbolic promise if I've ever heard one. Stairs, John; use your legs

[doctorsoldier]

"Then proposing to you is ridiculous," John points out with a dazed, sort of teddy bearish look to his face as he sets his cheek to Sherlock's chest for a moment before he's directed to have the water. Ah, water. A drunk man's best friend. He drinks half of it, neatly, no signs of drippings, before grinning up at Sherlock with eyes of a generally unnameable colour. They look sapphire in the current light but range from a bright blue to a black. They're fixed, as ever, on Sherlock's face.

John can't help himself. Sherlock is not lovely, not beautiful, but there's something wholly miraculous about him that transforms ever odd shape and line into a work of art.

He doesn't realize he's staring. He never does. He just wets his lips and follows through with his reasoning.

"If you're married to your work. And I'm part of it... We've been together for quite a long time now. Nearly a year. Oh, our anniversary! Let's go out for it. Make a real go of celebrating. Maybe there will be a murder."