Ghost of You - A Sherlock Fanfic (WIP)
This is my NaNoWriMo novel, so I may not be posting regularly during November, but I liked the first chapter at least, and I will edit and post the rest sporadically during the next couple months.
And I'm searching for a beta, so if anyone is interested, please message me!
Title: Ghost of You
Rating: T
Genre: Angst, Romance
Summary: Sherlock survives the explosion at the pool. John, however, is not as lucky, and he suddenly finds himself as a ghost, a mere imprint of himself. He struggles to adjust to the afterlife, and as he searches for whatever is holding him from moving on, he finds a new role for himself.
Warning(s): Character death, drug use.
Length: ~1,700 in this part. (Potentially 30 parts)
Sherlock lowered the gun slowly, aiming directly at the bomb.
John’s eyes widened. Sherlock, he wanted to say. But his heart had gotten wedged in his throat, and suddenly, no sound would come out.
Explosions. Blast wave, shockwaves, fire and heat, fragmentation, blast wind. Get in a ditch, if possible. Protect groin.
He could see Afghanistan again. Hot, desert heat. Heart-shattering booms when he thought everything was still. Confusion. Lying face-down on the dirt, listening to the screams of shrapnel as it flew by. A sickening crack; someone hadn’t gotten out of the way of the blast wave in time.
Sherlock.
John drew himself up onto his feet, painstakingly slowly, and took a deep, shuddering breath. “Sherlock,” he managed to murmur, but it was just a ghost of a breath slipping past his lips, far too soft for anyone to hear. “Sherlock, I . . .”
But there was no time. Sherlock’s hand had steadied, and there was the steely glint of determination hardening in those pale eyes of his. His mouth formed a hard, thin line as his eyebrows angled down and in.
John’s heart was pounding frantically as he steadied himself, finding his feet again. He stiffened his legs. “Sherlock . . .”
Sherlock’s finger tightened around the trigger. At the same moment, John launched himself from the wall, directly at Sherlock.
“Bang!” went the gun.
John threw his arm around Sherlock’s waist and threw him bodily out the way, shoving him hard until he toppled into the pool.
The tile was cold under John’s fingers. He had nanoseconds, he knew, before the bomb would go off and the shockwave, like a solid brick wall, would slam into him. I should tell him, he thought frantically. I need to tell him.
“Boom!” went the bomb.
And there was blinding white pain, an unearthly howl, and John’s world went black.
Most people are supposed to look peaceful when they sleep, John found himself thinking as he watched Sherlock’s chest rise and fall slowly with his breathing. Sherlock probably knew that, of course, and was doing the very best he could to look like a complete mess, just to spite the cliché.
His hair was an unruly mess, still matted with blood from when the gash on his head had reopened a few hours ago. The doctors hadn’t had time to clean it up yet, and the bandages that swathed half his head were stained a dark red-brown. His arm was splinted; apparently, when John had pushed him into the pool, he’d managed to sprain it badly. There were cuts all over his body, stitches running up his forearm and across his shoulder blades, and his expression was fixed into something akin to disdainful discomfort.
The machines beeped steadily. He was stable, at least.
“Oh, Sherlock,” John breathed softly. “Wake up, you bloody idiot.”
There was no response, of course. John let out a heavy sigh and resisted the urge to reach out and bush aside the curls that rested on Sherlock’s forehead.
After a few moments, the door opened, and John glanced up. Lestrade walked in, his eyes red and bloodshot, but dry, as if he’d run out of tears. He didn’t acknowledge John; he simply walked over to the nearest empty chair and dropped down, resting his head in his hands.
“You had better wake up, Sherlock,” Lestrade said after a long moment. “We need you.”
John fancied he saw Sherlock’s lips twitch into a smirk for a moment. He knew that was ridiculous, but it didn’t stop him from smiling a little in return.
Lestrade was silent for a long time after that, just watching Sherlock quietly from behind his spread fingers. John wanted to say something to him; he looked so distraught that he felt he needed to assure him that Sherlock was alright - of course he would be, this was Sherlock. But every time John opened his mouth, he couldn’t find the words. Instead, he just smiled weakly at him.
Eventually, a nurse entered, pushing a rattling cart before her.
“Nurse, what are his chances?” Lestrade asked as she checked Sherlock’s IV.
John wondered vaguely why he hadn’t asked him. Perhaps he thought that John was emotionally compromised. Which was probably true, John admitted to himself silently.
“It’s only been a few hours,” she replied kindly. “Don’t get too worried yet.”
Lestrade nodded dumbly and put his face back in his hands.
John watched Sherlock, leaning closer subconsciously. Sherlock’s right hand was hanging off the side of the bed, and after a moment’s hesitation, he reached out and took it. Sherlock’s arm tightened almost imperceptibly.
“Wake up, Sherlock, come on,” he murmured softly, so that Lestrade couldn’t hear him. “I need you, Sherlock, don’t leave me behind. Don’t you dare die on me, you hear? I’ve seen enough death. I don’t need more of it. Please, Sherlock . . . I need to tell you something, please wake up.”
Sherlock didn’t, of course.
The clock perched above Sherlock’s bed ticked ominously.
The night continued to pass on in rigid silence. Around four o’clock in the morning, Lestrade dozed off, snoring soundly in his chair. John, on the other hand, despite the hour and the lack of sleep he had gotten the past several nights in a row, didn’t feel tired in the slightest. In fact, his skin felt almost energized, the nerve endings in his palm jolting at every tiny tremor of Sherlock’s body. He figured it was probably adrenaline.
As the hours dragged on, he watched Sherlock with a soldier’s vigilance, barely blinking, hardly breathing. And only occasionally, when the silence grew too loud, he would murmur things along the lines of “please don’t leave me” and “oh God, please let him live” into the unresponsive room.
Eventually, John let out a soft sigh and let his gaze drop to where their fingers were intertwined. His years of medical training were whispering in his ear, murmuring the chances of irreversible brain trauma, of permanent disability . . . and death. He screwed his eyes shut and tried to shut out the steady hum of clinical statistics in his head. His thumb was stroking the back of Sherlock’s hand softly, and he found himself mapping the crisscross of tendons and veins across the skin, as if memorizing it
Sherlock’s hand was too still. It should be pressed to his other hand, tapping out a rhythm between his forefingers as he thought, or splaying out wide in the air before him as an epiphany crashed down upon that massive brain of his. It shouldn’t be still like this - unanimated, unthinking, limp.
But, John’s treacherous mind whispered softly, it may never move again.
John swallowed hard, ignoring the sharp tightness of his throat, and he heaved a deep, shaking breath. His eyes were beginning to burn. His hand clenched on Sherlock’s, and he leaned down close to rest his forehead against Sherlock’s knuckles.
“Sherlock . . . ,” he murmured. There was a faint tremor in his voice, and for half a second, he was almost glad Sherlock wasn’t awake to hear it. “Please . . . please . . . please wake up.”
He inhaled deeply and willed Sherlock to wake up, focusing every particle of his being on that hand in his grasp - that warmth, that life, that spark that made Sherlock, Sherlock. It had to come back, it had to. And it would.
“Sherlock,” he breathed again.
An odd sensation of warmth suddenly washed over John, making him gasp. It swept through his whole body and radiated up, through his arms, and then concentrated in his hands, palms, and fingertips. There, the feeling grew hotter and more intense, but just when it was teetering on the brink of actually painful, it abruptly passed as quickly as it’d come. John was left gasping and suddenly feeling incredibly exhausted, as if he’d just run around the circumference of the earth.
The hand twitched.
John’s eyes flew wide, and he jerked upwards so quickly that he almost knocked his shoulders against the back of his chair. He stared at Sherlock, hardly daring to breathe.
Sherlock’s eyelids were flickering slightly under the dark curls that had fallen down across his forehead. His lips had tightened into a cold, hard line, and as John watched, they seemed to purse, then stretch again, as if not sure what to do.
“Sherlock?” he squeaked
“Nngah,” Sherlock replied. His lips parted, and his Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat for a moment - and then slowly, excruciatingly painstakingly, his eyes cracked open. “John…?”
Lestrade’s head jolted upwards. “Sherlock?! You’re awake! Hold on, I’d better call the doctor -!”
John wasn’t listening - his entire face had broken out into an ear-to-ear grin that he was trying desperately to suppress (God forbid Sherlock realize how worried he’d been!), and the heaviness in his chest had suddenly exploded, ripping itself to shreds. The relief that washed through him was almost painful, but John didn’t care. “Sherlock!”
“John,” Sherlock said again.
A sudden shadow passed over Lestrade’s face.
But John didn’t notice; he leaned close over Sherlock’s face, reaching out to pat his arm gently. “I’m here, Sherlock, I’m here. You’re going to be alright.”
“John,” Sherlock repeated, this time sounding a little more insistent. “Where are you, John?”
John’s grin faltered for a second. “I’m right here, Sherlock. Can you hear me? It’s John; I’m here.”
But as John tightened his grip on Sherlock’s hand, Lestrade suddenly cleared his throat. John glanced up: Lestrade was staring at the ground, and his face was gray, verging almost on green.
“I’m sorry, Sherlock. John didn’t make it. He’s - he’s . . . dead.”
“What?!” Sherlock and John replied simultaneously.
Sherlock’s face had turned a deathly white, and his blue eyes were wild and icy. He fixed Lestrade with an unblinking stare, as the monitors began to beep frantically. “No . . . ,” he gasped. “No, it can’t be.”
“Why are you saying that?!” John demanded furiously. “I’m right here! Can’t you see you’re making him upset? I’m fine; I’m here! Sherlock, listen, I’m here.”
He lifted his hand up slightly - and then froze deathly still.
Sherlock’s hand slipped right out of his. Through his.
Oh God.
And I'm searching for a beta, so if anyone is interested, please message me!
Title: Ghost of You
Rating: T
Genre: Angst, Romance
Summary: Sherlock survives the explosion at the pool. John, however, is not as lucky, and he suddenly finds himself as a ghost, a mere imprint of himself. He struggles to adjust to the afterlife, and as he searches for whatever is holding him from moving on, he finds a new role for himself.
Warning(s): Character death, drug use.
Length: ~1,700 in this part. (Potentially 30 parts)
Sherlock lowered the gun slowly, aiming directly at the bomb.
John’s eyes widened. Sherlock, he wanted to say. But his heart had gotten wedged in his throat, and suddenly, no sound would come out.
Explosions. Blast wave, shockwaves, fire and heat, fragmentation, blast wind. Get in a ditch, if possible. Protect groin.
He could see Afghanistan again. Hot, desert heat. Heart-shattering booms when he thought everything was still. Confusion. Lying face-down on the dirt, listening to the screams of shrapnel as it flew by. A sickening crack; someone hadn’t gotten out of the way of the blast wave in time.
Sherlock.
John drew himself up onto his feet, painstakingly slowly, and took a deep, shuddering breath. “Sherlock,” he managed to murmur, but it was just a ghost of a breath slipping past his lips, far too soft for anyone to hear. “Sherlock, I . . .”
But there was no time. Sherlock’s hand had steadied, and there was the steely glint of determination hardening in those pale eyes of his. His mouth formed a hard, thin line as his eyebrows angled down and in.
John’s heart was pounding frantically as he steadied himself, finding his feet again. He stiffened his legs. “Sherlock . . .”
Sherlock’s finger tightened around the trigger. At the same moment, John launched himself from the wall, directly at Sherlock.
“Bang!” went the gun.
John threw his arm around Sherlock’s waist and threw him bodily out the way, shoving him hard until he toppled into the pool.
The tile was cold under John’s fingers. He had nanoseconds, he knew, before the bomb would go off and the shockwave, like a solid brick wall, would slam into him. I should tell him, he thought frantically. I need to tell him.
“Boom!” went the bomb.
And there was blinding white pain, an unearthly howl, and John’s world went black.
Most people are supposed to look peaceful when they sleep, John found himself thinking as he watched Sherlock’s chest rise and fall slowly with his breathing. Sherlock probably knew that, of course, and was doing the very best he could to look like a complete mess, just to spite the cliché.
His hair was an unruly mess, still matted with blood from when the gash on his head had reopened a few hours ago. The doctors hadn’t had time to clean it up yet, and the bandages that swathed half his head were stained a dark red-brown. His arm was splinted; apparently, when John had pushed him into the pool, he’d managed to sprain it badly. There were cuts all over his body, stitches running up his forearm and across his shoulder blades, and his expression was fixed into something akin to disdainful discomfort.
The machines beeped steadily. He was stable, at least.
“Oh, Sherlock,” John breathed softly. “Wake up, you bloody idiot.”
There was no response, of course. John let out a heavy sigh and resisted the urge to reach out and bush aside the curls that rested on Sherlock’s forehead.
After a few moments, the door opened, and John glanced up. Lestrade walked in, his eyes red and bloodshot, but dry, as if he’d run out of tears. He didn’t acknowledge John; he simply walked over to the nearest empty chair and dropped down, resting his head in his hands.
“You had better wake up, Sherlock,” Lestrade said after a long moment. “We need you.”
John fancied he saw Sherlock’s lips twitch into a smirk for a moment. He knew that was ridiculous, but it didn’t stop him from smiling a little in return.
Lestrade was silent for a long time after that, just watching Sherlock quietly from behind his spread fingers. John wanted to say something to him; he looked so distraught that he felt he needed to assure him that Sherlock was alright - of course he would be, this was Sherlock. But every time John opened his mouth, he couldn’t find the words. Instead, he just smiled weakly at him.
Eventually, a nurse entered, pushing a rattling cart before her.
“Nurse, what are his chances?” Lestrade asked as she checked Sherlock’s IV.
John wondered vaguely why he hadn’t asked him. Perhaps he thought that John was emotionally compromised. Which was probably true, John admitted to himself silently.
“It’s only been a few hours,” she replied kindly. “Don’t get too worried yet.”
Lestrade nodded dumbly and put his face back in his hands.
John watched Sherlock, leaning closer subconsciously. Sherlock’s right hand was hanging off the side of the bed, and after a moment’s hesitation, he reached out and took it. Sherlock’s arm tightened almost imperceptibly.
“Wake up, Sherlock, come on,” he murmured softly, so that Lestrade couldn’t hear him. “I need you, Sherlock, don’t leave me behind. Don’t you dare die on me, you hear? I’ve seen enough death. I don’t need more of it. Please, Sherlock . . . I need to tell you something, please wake up.”
Sherlock didn’t, of course.
The clock perched above Sherlock’s bed ticked ominously.
The night continued to pass on in rigid silence. Around four o’clock in the morning, Lestrade dozed off, snoring soundly in his chair. John, on the other hand, despite the hour and the lack of sleep he had gotten the past several nights in a row, didn’t feel tired in the slightest. In fact, his skin felt almost energized, the nerve endings in his palm jolting at every tiny tremor of Sherlock’s body. He figured it was probably adrenaline.
As the hours dragged on, he watched Sherlock with a soldier’s vigilance, barely blinking, hardly breathing. And only occasionally, when the silence grew too loud, he would murmur things along the lines of “please don’t leave me” and “oh God, please let him live” into the unresponsive room.
Eventually, John let out a soft sigh and let his gaze drop to where their fingers were intertwined. His years of medical training were whispering in his ear, murmuring the chances of irreversible brain trauma, of permanent disability . . . and death. He screwed his eyes shut and tried to shut out the steady hum of clinical statistics in his head. His thumb was stroking the back of Sherlock’s hand softly, and he found himself mapping the crisscross of tendons and veins across the skin, as if memorizing it
Sherlock’s hand was too still. It should be pressed to his other hand, tapping out a rhythm between his forefingers as he thought, or splaying out wide in the air before him as an epiphany crashed down upon that massive brain of his. It shouldn’t be still like this - unanimated, unthinking, limp.
But, John’s treacherous mind whispered softly, it may never move again.
John swallowed hard, ignoring the sharp tightness of his throat, and he heaved a deep, shaking breath. His eyes were beginning to burn. His hand clenched on Sherlock’s, and he leaned down close to rest his forehead against Sherlock’s knuckles.
“Sherlock . . . ,” he murmured. There was a faint tremor in his voice, and for half a second, he was almost glad Sherlock wasn’t awake to hear it. “Please . . . please . . . please wake up.”
He inhaled deeply and willed Sherlock to wake up, focusing every particle of his being on that hand in his grasp - that warmth, that life, that spark that made Sherlock, Sherlock. It had to come back, it had to. And it would.
“Sherlock,” he breathed again.
An odd sensation of warmth suddenly washed over John, making him gasp. It swept through his whole body and radiated up, through his arms, and then concentrated in his hands, palms, and fingertips. There, the feeling grew hotter and more intense, but just when it was teetering on the brink of actually painful, it abruptly passed as quickly as it’d come. John was left gasping and suddenly feeling incredibly exhausted, as if he’d just run around the circumference of the earth.
The hand twitched.
John’s eyes flew wide, and he jerked upwards so quickly that he almost knocked his shoulders against the back of his chair. He stared at Sherlock, hardly daring to breathe.
Sherlock’s eyelids were flickering slightly under the dark curls that had fallen down across his forehead. His lips had tightened into a cold, hard line, and as John watched, they seemed to purse, then stretch again, as if not sure what to do.
“Sherlock?” he squeaked
“Nngah,” Sherlock replied. His lips parted, and his Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat for a moment - and then slowly, excruciatingly painstakingly, his eyes cracked open. “John…?”
Lestrade’s head jolted upwards. “Sherlock?! You’re awake! Hold on, I’d better call the doctor -!”
John wasn’t listening - his entire face had broken out into an ear-to-ear grin that he was trying desperately to suppress (God forbid Sherlock realize how worried he’d been!), and the heaviness in his chest had suddenly exploded, ripping itself to shreds. The relief that washed through him was almost painful, but John didn’t care. “Sherlock!”
“John,” Sherlock said again.
A sudden shadow passed over Lestrade’s face.
But John didn’t notice; he leaned close over Sherlock’s face, reaching out to pat his arm gently. “I’m here, Sherlock, I’m here. You’re going to be alright.”
“John,” Sherlock repeated, this time sounding a little more insistent. “Where are you, John?”
John’s grin faltered for a second. “I’m right here, Sherlock. Can you hear me? It’s John; I’m here.”
But as John tightened his grip on Sherlock’s hand, Lestrade suddenly cleared his throat. John glanced up: Lestrade was staring at the ground, and his face was gray, verging almost on green.
“I’m sorry, Sherlock. John didn’t make it. He’s - he’s . . . dead.”
“What?!” Sherlock and John replied simultaneously.
Sherlock’s face had turned a deathly white, and his blue eyes were wild and icy. He fixed Lestrade with an unblinking stare, as the monitors began to beep frantically. “No . . . ,” he gasped. “No, it can’t be.”
“Why are you saying that?!” John demanded furiously. “I’m right here! Can’t you see you’re making him upset? I’m fine; I’m here! Sherlock, listen, I’m here.”
He lifted his hand up slightly - and then froze deathly still.
Sherlock’s hand slipped right out of his. Through his.
Oh God.