In The Land Of The Blind 2/2
Title: In The Land Of The Blind 2/2
Fandom: Sherlock
Pairing: John/Sherlock
Rating: R
Word Count: 12,679
Warnings: The Apocalypse, possibly disturbing themes, dubious science
Disclaimer: In no way mine, or anything to do with me, I own nothing.
Summary: Sherlock's been acting strangely for days. There's a claustrophobic silence to the flat, experiments tossed aside or abandoned, cases ignored. It's almost as if nothing matters any more. John's determined to know why.
Part 1...
Monday's gone before it really sinks in, the end of the day and the night wasted to sleep and silence.
He's not sure how he manages to sleep at all.
******
John fully intends to get up early on Tuesday, to really make it count. Instead he wakes up at half past eight, because there's a dog barking somewhere outside, and someone's burning toast. He forgets, for a good minute and a half, that it isn't just another morning like any other. He completely forgets the world's going to end. It takes him another few minutes after that to believe it. He should call Harry, though he's not quite sure what he's supposed to say. He doesn't know how to avoid arguments that don't even matter, how to sum up everything in a few words without sounding like an escaped mental patient. Or someone who's planning to commit suicide.
So instead he gets dressed, and then goes to see if Sherlock's toast is actually edible. He makes it through half a slice, and most of a cup of tea without enough milk in it, and he's still not sure whether it is.
"This isn't like you?"
"What isn't?" Sherlock gives John a curious look from over a pile of papers.
"Breakfast." John gestures with the toast that's still threatening to crumble into black dust. "And what are you doing, why are you still working. You said there wasn't a way to fix it."
"There isn't." Sherlock tosses another paper across the living room, pages fluttering apart in slow motion.
"Then why are you still - could you stop, please. Have some burnt toast."
Sherlock raises an eyebrow.
"It really is very burnt," John accuses.
"Then why are you eating it?"
"You made me breakfast," John says slowly. Though he isn't quite sure whether the miracle of that actually gets through.
Sherlock sighs, relents, and sits on the arm of the chair.
John looks up at him. "Isn't there anything you've thought about doing, anything you want to do?” he asks. “The world isn't just ending for me, after all," and there isn't anything tense about the question, though he worries that there is, checks it twice.
Sherlock tosses him a sharp look, something that's layered with judgement and focus. Sometimes John wishes Sherlock would just look at him like a normal person. But then, he wouldn't be Sherlock if he did.
"You could probably solve a case," John adds. "Before the world ends. No one would have to know. You wouldn't have to explain to anyone. You could just pick a case, any case and..."
"Go out with a bang?" Sherlock says slowly.
John swallows, and feels the weight of his mug in a way he hadn't really been concentrating on before.
"Something like that."
John lets the mug revolve between his fingers, without really thinking about it at all. "I'm just saying, if you wanted to, you could."
"No, there's nothing I want to do," Sherlock says quietly.
John's oddly upset about that, and he has no idea why. Maybe it's because he's struck, suddenly, by the realisation that this is Sherlock. Fascinating and clever and brilliant and in two days he'll be gone. He'll be gone and there'll be no one around to know, or care that he was even here. Sherlock will cease to exist, to matter at all, and it's so fucking intolerable that John can hardly breathe. Because it's not fair, none of it's fair. How could the universe set all this up and then just let them fuck it all up. How could it have let them be so stupid?
"I suppose it's hard to solve the little puzzle, when there's a vast and impossible leviathan hanging over your head, an unsolvable one at that."
"Nothing's unsolvable," Sherlock grinds out, though it's more a petulant denial than a truth.
"It's out of your area. I think the world can forgive you for not solving this one, Sherlock."
John's fairly sure the words sink in, but Sherlock's still stiff with irritated failure. John lets his cup slide between the cushions and leans over. He intends to - he doesn't even know - pat Sherlock on the shoulder, or offer some sort of weird one-armed hug. Spontaneous physical affection isn't really his thing, but it's amazing how the end of the world can make you want to make the effort.
He ends up with one hand braced on the arm of the chair the other half draped over Sherlock's shoulder, and Sherlock turns his head just far enough to ask a question with the tilt of his mouth. John has no idea why he does it. Perhaps it's Sherlock's ability to always be somewhere far ahead of him. Or maybe John thinks 'why not' and it's too quick and too strange to stop. He's twisting a little further and he's kissing Sherlock before he even realises it. Pressed into his mouth where it's tilted down and open just a fraction. He crushes a noise, and there's a moment where there's nothing but the rush of breath across his cheek and pressure and quiet and something a little bit like shock that he'd even dared to do something so insane. Because it really is genuinely insane.
All he has to do is think it before he's pulling away.
"Fuck - I shouldn't have done that, I'm sorry, I don't even know why I did. I know you don't -" John digs his teeth into his lip and shakes his head.
Sherlock looks genuinely curious, and he definitely notices when John forces himself to stop looking at his mouth.
"That I don't what?" Sherlock asks, completely unconcerned, as if John kisses him all the time.
John clears his throat, and wonders if he can get away with putting his hands in his pockets and pretending none of this is happening. Distancing gestures, a whole riot of awkward body language which Sherlock could read with his eyes closed. Though he's not sure it really bothers him. It's nice to know someone has a clue what he's doing. Even if he wishes Sherlock would spend more time pretending that he didn't.
"Do relationships, with people and our small brains." John tries for a laugh, even though his mouth still tingles faintly. He doesn't know where the word 'relationships' came from. That wasn't what he meant at all. That wasn't what he meant to mean. The impending end of the world seems to have broken him.
"You think I'd do a relationship with someone who thought like me." Sherlock's face twists at the idea of it. "God, they'd be insufferable. Completely insufferable. We'd kill each other within a week."
His voice is so genuinely horrified that John's startled into laughter.
"No," Sherlock says over the tail end of it. "It would have been someone like you. Just smart enough not to be irritating, willing to make a stab at brilliance at least, for all that you'd be floundering rather far from shore. Smart enough to be brave, but not brave enough to be stupid."
John can't help the noise he makes through his nose, amusement and disbelief and something weirdly like affection.
"That was almost romantic."
Sherlock grunts. "Funny, I assumed you'd think it was an insult."
John nods. "I think I'm learning."
"What, how my brain works?" Sherlock has one eyebrow raised, dubious, amused.
"Oh, I don't think I'd go quite that far," John says. "I pity anyone who discovers how your brain works. Something horrible would probably immediately happen to them. Something Lovecraftian."
"Are you comparing the inner workings of my brain to unknowable eldritch horrors?"
John's nodding, before he decides if he should or not. "I think it's only fair."
"I'm not sure whether to be insulted or flattered."
"You could be both," John assures him. He notices how far they've come from the original conversation, drifting slowly but noticeably away from John's ridiculous attempt at...he doesn't even know. He flatly refuses to use the word 'intimacy' because it doesn't fit. It's too simple, too easy, and much too soft. It's nothing like the almost too-sharp weight of his confused feelings for Sherlock. So, no, he doesn't object at all when Sherlock doesn't push, when he doesn't pick at the strange direction. Instead he leans against the back of the chair and regards John with something that wants to be amusement, but isn't quite. There's still something a little too serious at his jaw line, something that makes the pale of his skin hard.
"It's the last night you'll ever get, John. You could do anything. The laws of society no longer apply."
John throws him a look, which he hopes conveys a little of what he thinks about that. "I think they still do."
"How unadventurous of you," Sherlock decides. But he doesn't protest otherwise. Funny, John rather expected him to.
"I'm not half as adventurous as people think I am." John shakes his head, and maybe there's a little irritation there, but if he'd known he wouldn't have made it to forty he might at least have tried to be a little more - no, no he probably wouldn't. That's quite depressing.
"That's an utter lie," Sherlock says, and this time he does sound amused. John can hear the smile in it. "You're the best sort of adventurous."
"When you say adventurous, I don't think you mean what everyone else would mean." John makes it sound more like a joke than an accusation, but Sherlock sniffs, like he hears the underlying intent.
"Everyone else is wrong," Sherlock says simply.
John laughs. "This is why people think you're arrogant, you do realise that?"
"Yes," Sherlock agrees. "You can kiss me again if you like."
John's so surprised that he finds himself shaking his head before he can form a thought.
"Sherlock."
Sherlock's hiding a smile now, and not very well. He's finding this amusing. John should probably be offended.
"What? It was a suggestion."
"I'm not going to kiss you if you don't want me to," John says stiffly, and he's aware he's making it sound like Sherlock's accused him of taking advantage, even though he'd done no such thing. He's also making it sound like he'd quite like to kiss him again. Which is...something he's only just figured out. That seems unfair, even for him.
Sherlock steeples his fingers, which shouldn't be alluring, but sort of is. "I never said that."
"You gave the impression that you had no strong feeling either way," John admits. "I've always assumed you didn't...that you just didn't."
"I could fake enthusiasm," Sherlock offers.
"No," John says stiffly. Because the idea of it is upsetting in a way he's not expecting at all.
"That was the wrong thing to say," Sherlock says quietly.
"Yes," John agrees.
"Tell me why," Sherlock adds, before John can decide if he has a right to be so annoyed about it.
John exhales - still can't quite look at him. He realises that he's going to say it out loud, and he doesn't quite care. "Because I want to kiss you, not whoever you'd be if you were faking it."
Sherlock doesn't say anything for long enough that John cautiously turns his head to look at him, and finds him much closer than he expects.
"Sherlock -"
"Shut up," Sherlock says simply, and then kisses him.
There's an element of experimentation about it. Though John's not sure Sherlock can do anything without it feeling, in some way, like an experiment, like he's being weighed, measured, and judged. There's something frustrating about that, but John's too caught up in what it feels like to object, fingers dug into the arm of the chair, and the thick fabric of his own jeans. Sherlock's hand dares to be more forward, fingers only barely warm on the side of his neck, like he knows where he's supposed to touch, but isn't willing to grasp, to hold. Or maybe it's just that John hasn't given him permission, doesn't think he has. Not that Sherlock has ever needed his permission - not that Sherlock has ever asked for his permission before.
The experimental edge has become something untidy. It's a much longer kiss than John dared, and he really doesn't want it to stop. It's slightly unnerving that this isn't more strange, more unexpected. Sherlock looks at him from barely an inch away, forehead creased like he's compiling data.
"I think I could have learned to quite like it," Sherlock says at last.
John shuts his eyes. "I hate you," he says quietly. Because he was thinking exactly the same thing.
He half expects Sherlock to huffily ask him why, but he stays quiet. Exercising his ability to be perceptive for once. Or maybe he's just getting better at knowing when not to talk. At learning there are times when not talking can actually be helpful.
"You probably never even thought about it." It's not a question. John's mostly talking out loud. There's not really any reason not to any more.
The noise Sherlock makes, it's low and familiar. It's the one he uses when he's amused by people being wrong. John turns around and looks at him, and this time there is a question there, somewhere, even if he doesn't mean there to be.
"We could have had a messy and very confusing relationship," Sherlock says, blinking slowly like he hasn't just suggested something insane.
John exhales, and very carefully doesn't think about exactly what that would have been like.
"You would have hated it," he says at last.
"I wouldn't have hated all of it," Sherlock counters.
John stares at the ceiling, and wonders how the world managed to make the last few days of his life so incredibly strange.
"I might have put up with the parts I hated," Sherlock says quietly.
*****
John lies in bed for a long time. He can feel the hours he has left dripping away.
Wasting away.
That more than anything else forces him up out of bed, makes him stumble his way downstairs to where Sherlock is already a narrow line of motion. The far wall is a mess. There's the stark headline, 'TEMPORAL EFFECTS POST-EVENT' and then tacked underneath it, equations and printouts, pictures of the human brain. John can see a post-it note with the phrase 'end/perception impossible' on it, scribbled out in a firm hand, over and over.
John doesn't say a word, he just takes his coffee over to the wall and stares at it, at the collage of science and horror that Sherlock has made.
"There isn't enough time," Sherlock says stiffly from behind him. John can hear his bare feet moving back and forth in the paper on the floor. "I don't understand, and there isn't enough time. I can't get it." There's a thump, which sounds a lot like Sherlock's fist against the arm of the chair. "There isn't enough time."
John breathes in the steam from his coffee, and stares at a picture of a metronome, caught mid-swing. "What are you hoping to do here?"
"I don't know." It sounds half angry, and half lost. "But there has to be something. I refuse to just - I refuse. It's ludicrous, the idea that we can just be swept away by one moment of arrogance. By one improbable roll of the dice."
Sherlock holds a hand out.
"Four billion universes we go on as normal, never having the slightest clue what could have gone wrong. One universe we snag on a thread and the world -" he jerks a hand sharply, viciously upwards. "The whole world unravels."
"I wonder if it will be like that?" John says. "Like we're unravelling."
Sherlock looks at him, like he's debating whether that was a rhetorical question. He must eventually decide not.
"I'd imagine the gravitational forces will rip us apart first."
John doesn't want to think about gravitational forces, or how exactly they're all going to die. He's tired, and he just wants to sleep, which feels like the stupidest irony of all. A horrific and terrible waste of time that he doesn't have. He suspects there's a great deal of denial still at work there.
"I'll stay with you, if you want."
He expects Sherlock to protest, to tell him he thinks better on his own. That John can't do any good, that he looks dead on his feet.
"Yes," Sherlock says instead. Which is honest, and quiet, and something gnaws in John's gut that wasn't there before.
******
John falls asleep on the couch at about four in the morning, and the next thing he knows it's Wednesday. Which seems inordinately cruel.
Sherlock's pacing, wearing new trousers and a half-unbuttoned shirt, so pale it looks like snow. The collage on the wall has different pictures today, or the same pictures in a different configuration. John can't tell for sure. No - the picture with the metronome has been replaced by what looks like a giant megaphone.
Sherlock's putting things into categories, 'perception,' 'memory,' and 'temporal effects.' By the look of it, he's been doing it for a while.
"What are you doing?"
"There's a theory..." Sherlock offers over a book. He has it opened so wide the spine has cracked all the way along. "Several theories. No way to test them, no way to test any of them. Working on the assumption that one of them is right. There's an irritating amount of uncertainty in scientific theories, it's infuriating -"
John tries to translate that into something that makes sense in his head. "You think you can stop it happening?"
"No, it'll happen," Sherlock says firmly.
Which makes no sense at all.
John sort of wants cold Chinese for breakfast. Which seems like a fair enough request the day before the world ends.
"There's cold Chinese in the fridge, isn't there?"
"No," Sherlock says, tossing the book he's holding aside, and then dragging the next one off the pile. "Not any more."
John frowns. "When did you eat it?"
"A couple of hours ago."
John shakes his head and struggles his way upright. He figures he can raid the kitchen after he's showered. He's going to shower on his last day on earth. The world may be ending but he's still civilised.
By the time he gets upstairs he's changed his mind. He spends an hour and a half in the bath instead, because why shouldn't he? He stares out of the window afterwards, at the people walking by. No panicking, no looting, no civil disorder. People are just being people. John's not sure how to feel about that. He's strangely numb.
When he gets downstairs he finds Sherlock still working. He's crouched by the wall, long fingers pressing down against paper, glossy photographs and smudged photocopies.
"Temporal effects," Sherlock mutters, there's a deep gouge in the collage John hadn't noticed before, that Sherlock won't stop poking. As if it's an irritation that still bothers him. A loose tooth in the world.
Sherlock spends the last day staring at the wall, like he can stop this whole thing with the power of his huge brain.
John sits on the bed with his phone for two hours, while the sun goes down. He can't decide if he's working up the courage to call someone, or wondering if it's worth it. He leaves it, goes back downstairs and drags Sherlock away from his work long enough to argue over a packet of sugar, and drink tea that's far too strong. Sherlock lingers afterwards, watching John through half-closed eyes with a strange sort of purpose. Like he'd forgotten something he was supposed to be doing.
"You can stop you know," John says. "You can just stop."
Sherlock laughs into his mug, the echo strangely wet. It doesn't take him long before he's back by the wall, working, muttering under his breath in long, vicious sentences, remembering.
The last day drags on, quiet and strange.
John hasn't felt so alone for a long time.
*****
He's in bed by midnight, staring at the ceiling, trying not to think about anything. He's doing a pretty good job of it. Until Sherlock appears in his bedroom doorway, holding a book, with half a dozen pieces of paper slid into it as bookmarks.
John blinks at him, the light from the landing streaming into his eyes.
Sherlock pushes the door shut with a hip, and then tosses the book on the bed.
John can't quite manage more than a gaping sort of surprise, when Sherlock strips to his boxer shorts and slides in beside him.
"Oh don't look so surprised," Sherlock says, voice an irritated drawl. His skin is cold, where it touches the warmth of John's arm.
John tries to put his words in order, he's having terrible trouble with Sherlock sprawled against his side, like it's something they just do.
"I thought it was a thing - you know, not a misunderstanding, but just a crazy thing, something we weren't going to talk about. I didn't expect us to end up -" John tries not to think about how much he wants to end up here, end of the world be damned. He thinks it's a little sliver of madness. A mid-life crisis - or just the view from the edge. Or maybe they're all just excuses.
"It wasn't a thing," Sherlock says, wrecking John's paper-thin wall of denial. "The way you look at me is very distracting, you realise that. And I haven't been ignoring you, I've just been -"
"Working."
"Yes." Sherlock's hands are cold. He seems to want to put them on John anyway. John can't quite work out how he's supposed to mind. But it's all so strange. He doesn't want to stop him. He thinks this moment of madness is exactly what he wants. His body is a traitor.
Sherlock makes a short, meaningless noise at whatever shows in his face. Then he leans in and kisses him and John forgets what he was protesting, and why he was annoyed. It's amazing, what three days and the end of the world can do to someone. Or maybe it wasn't that at all. Maybe this is something that's just always been there. John's surprised by how little that bothers him.
Sherlock's not aggressive, he's curious, clinical, occasionally irritable, moving John's hands when they get too adventurous.
"This is supposed to be a mutual sort of thing, you know," John tells him.
Sherlock makes a dismissive noise, and pushes him into the sheets. He seems to be firm in his belief that he can silence John with enthusiasm, if nothing else. John's not sure if he's just an experiment, not that he wouldn't be weirdly flattered to be an experiment. It's just...he's never been very good at this, and he's fairly sure Sherlock doesn't do this at all. Whether through choice or design, he's not sure it matters. John doesn't know how they got here. But he can't quite stop making himself want it anyway.
"I don't expect anything," John says quietly. "Just because I said things the other day."
"Quiet," Sherlock says, as if John's ruining his concentration.
Sherlock's hand slides into his boxer shorts anyway, and John thinks he should be embarrassed about how hard he is, about how he pushes almost instantly, reflexively, into the curl of Sherlock's fingers. He hisses out a breath, which sounds like an apology, and Sherlock calls him an idiot against his mouth. Which is the most ridiculously touching endearment he thinks he's ever heard.
It's all so quiet, pressed together under the sheets, in a way that's almost claustrophobic with no words at all. But Sherlock is long and warm and everywhere, and John can't help how tightly he holds on. While Sherlock takes him apart, like he's always, always known how.
Afterwards Sherlock fidgets, like he wants a cigarette, even though he didn't actually get off. John watches him lazily, from the other side of the bed, all messy curls of hair and strangely vulnerable jaw line. John thinks he falls asleep, because when he opens his eyes again Sherlock is closer, and his eyes are sharp in the dark.
"What's the time?"
"Just after three," Sherlock says, without looking away from him.
"Stop staring at me in the dark, it's creepy."
"There's something I have to remember," Sherlock says quietly, words a rush against the curve of his cheek.
"You always remember when you need to," John mumbles into the pillow.
Sherlock's fingers press tight into his skin. He thinks the other man's talking again. But John's too tired to understand what he's saying.
******
"Has the world ended yet?" John murmurs from underneath his own arm.
"No," Sherlock tells him from somewhere to his left. "And you stole all the quilt. If I'd known my last night on earth would be a war of attrition, I would have been less enthusiastic about it."
"You kick," John offers. "Like a horse."
"I've never shared a bed before," Sherlock says, like that excuses him. It probably does. It's the last day that mankind is ever going to have. John supposes he can be generous. Sherlock rarely deserves it, but he can't quite stop giving it anyway.
John doesn't want to sleep, there's not enough time until - there's not enough time. He must manage it, somehow, because suddenly he's staring at the wall, and it's lighter than it was before. He's almost angry about it, about how he could possibly sleep.
He can feel the slow drift of Sherlock's knuckles, and the press of a phone, against his back. He can't help but wonder what Sherlock could possibly have to do, on the very last day. He's going to say something, but instead he finds himself staring at the stack of books he's been reading in a slant of sunlight.
"I have library books that are due back the day after tomorrow." John's not quite sure how, or why he manages to sound so worried about that.
Sherlock makes a noise against his back, and for a second John has no idea what it is - until it becomes more obviously stifled laughter.
It quickly becomes not even the slightest bit stifled, Sherlock starts laughing, and he doesn't stop.
-
John wonders if he'll even notice when the world ends. Or whether it will be so quick he won't have time to. Whether humanity will quietly swirl out of existence, like water down a drain.
It's not quiet at all. It's completely and utterly terrifying.
A poet would probably say something trite.
Compare the sensation to being born.
It isn't like that at all.
....
...
..
.
"John."
...
"John."
...
"John."
John sighs and gives in, against his better judgment. He looks up, and glares at Sherlock over the top of his laptop.
Sherlock's sprawled on the sofa, half in and half out of his dressing gown. It's as if even getting that on straight had been too much trouble this morning. John's not quite sure what emotion he's going for over there, expression somewhere between irritation and wounded abandonment. The air of suffering is a little overdone though. John's seen how good he is when he actually has to act. So he's assuming it's just laziness.
"You realise, of course, that I'm not some sort of amusing performing dog, who does tricks to entertain you," John tells him.
Sherlock continues to stare, in a way that seems to be hoping John will be entertaining anyway.
"I'm not," John adds, voice just a little more fierce than before. Because this is a point he's going to be strict on. He's not here for Sherlock's amusement. No matter what Sherlock seems to think. He doesn't exist to pander to his whims.
"What are you doing?" Sherlock asks, though his tone already suggests that whatever it is, it can't possibly be interesting enough to distract him away from Sherlock's terrible boredom. Sherlock's own personal idea of what's important will forever remain tragically skewed from everyone else’s.
"I'm updating my blog." John can't help but wonder whether giving Sherlock more information is ever a good thing, when he's so very good at using it against you. The fact that he can't seem to help it somehow makes it even more irritating.
There's silence for long enough that John swivels round in his chair.
Sherlock's fingers are white, where they're curled round the leather of the sofa cushions.
"Sherlock?"
Sherlock rolls his head towards him, eyes fixing on his face. He inhales, sharply.
"What is it?" John asks, because he knows Sherlock's 'I've just thought of something vitally important' face, and this isn't it. This is something he's never seen before. Sherlock's off the couch and across the room without answering him, then on his knees by the table, shifting through the post. He tosses envelopes violently aside, until he comes to one written in tiny, cramped handwriting. He tears it almost in two getting it open, reads through it, then reads through it again.
He swears, once, twice and then crumples the paper at one edge. Then Sherlock's straightening, tugging his dressing gown off with an impatience that's close to violence.
"Get dressed."
"What - what's going on? Where are we going?"
"Scotland."
"Scotland? Sherlock, for God's sake. I have to work today."
"No, you're coming with me, and there's absolutely nothing more important than that!" Sherlock catches him under the armpit and makes a bloody good attempt at hauling him to his feet. Only the fact that the table is in the way turns it into an awkward stumble backwards.
John's not sure whether to bring a halt to Sherlock's frenzied enthusiasm, or to just go with it. But then, that's something of a constant now. An eternal conundrum. Always wondering how far to let Sherlock push.
"Why on earth are we going to Scotland?"
Sherlock claps his hands down on John's shoulders. "We're going to save the world, John."
John doesn't believe him for a minute.
END
Fandom: Sherlock
Pairing: John/Sherlock
Rating: R
Word Count: 12,679
Warnings: The Apocalypse, possibly disturbing themes, dubious science
Disclaimer: In no way mine, or anything to do with me, I own nothing.
Summary: Sherlock's been acting strangely for days. There's a claustrophobic silence to the flat, experiments tossed aside or abandoned, cases ignored. It's almost as if nothing matters any more. John's determined to know why.
Part 1...
Monday's gone before it really sinks in, the end of the day and the night wasted to sleep and silence.
He's not sure how he manages to sleep at all.
******
John fully intends to get up early on Tuesday, to really make it count. Instead he wakes up at half past eight, because there's a dog barking somewhere outside, and someone's burning toast. He forgets, for a good minute and a half, that it isn't just another morning like any other. He completely forgets the world's going to end. It takes him another few minutes after that to believe it. He should call Harry, though he's not quite sure what he's supposed to say. He doesn't know how to avoid arguments that don't even matter, how to sum up everything in a few words without sounding like an escaped mental patient. Or someone who's planning to commit suicide.
So instead he gets dressed, and then goes to see if Sherlock's toast is actually edible. He makes it through half a slice, and most of a cup of tea without enough milk in it, and he's still not sure whether it is.
"This isn't like you?"
"What isn't?" Sherlock gives John a curious look from over a pile of papers.
"Breakfast." John gestures with the toast that's still threatening to crumble into black dust. "And what are you doing, why are you still working. You said there wasn't a way to fix it."
"There isn't." Sherlock tosses another paper across the living room, pages fluttering apart in slow motion.
"Then why are you still - could you stop, please. Have some burnt toast."
Sherlock raises an eyebrow.
"It really is very burnt," John accuses.
"Then why are you eating it?"
"You made me breakfast," John says slowly. Though he isn't quite sure whether the miracle of that actually gets through.
Sherlock sighs, relents, and sits on the arm of the chair.
John looks up at him. "Isn't there anything you've thought about doing, anything you want to do?” he asks. “The world isn't just ending for me, after all," and there isn't anything tense about the question, though he worries that there is, checks it twice.
Sherlock tosses him a sharp look, something that's layered with judgement and focus. Sometimes John wishes Sherlock would just look at him like a normal person. But then, he wouldn't be Sherlock if he did.
"You could probably solve a case," John adds. "Before the world ends. No one would have to know. You wouldn't have to explain to anyone. You could just pick a case, any case and..."
"Go out with a bang?" Sherlock says slowly.
John swallows, and feels the weight of his mug in a way he hadn't really been concentrating on before.
"Something like that."
John lets the mug revolve between his fingers, without really thinking about it at all. "I'm just saying, if you wanted to, you could."
"No, there's nothing I want to do," Sherlock says quietly.
John's oddly upset about that, and he has no idea why. Maybe it's because he's struck, suddenly, by the realisation that this is Sherlock. Fascinating and clever and brilliant and in two days he'll be gone. He'll be gone and there'll be no one around to know, or care that he was even here. Sherlock will cease to exist, to matter at all, and it's so fucking intolerable that John can hardly breathe. Because it's not fair, none of it's fair. How could the universe set all this up and then just let them fuck it all up. How could it have let them be so stupid?
"I suppose it's hard to solve the little puzzle, when there's a vast and impossible leviathan hanging over your head, an unsolvable one at that."
"Nothing's unsolvable," Sherlock grinds out, though it's more a petulant denial than a truth.
"It's out of your area. I think the world can forgive you for not solving this one, Sherlock."
John's fairly sure the words sink in, but Sherlock's still stiff with irritated failure. John lets his cup slide between the cushions and leans over. He intends to - he doesn't even know - pat Sherlock on the shoulder, or offer some sort of weird one-armed hug. Spontaneous physical affection isn't really his thing, but it's amazing how the end of the world can make you want to make the effort.
He ends up with one hand braced on the arm of the chair the other half draped over Sherlock's shoulder, and Sherlock turns his head just far enough to ask a question with the tilt of his mouth. John has no idea why he does it. Perhaps it's Sherlock's ability to always be somewhere far ahead of him. Or maybe John thinks 'why not' and it's too quick and too strange to stop. He's twisting a little further and he's kissing Sherlock before he even realises it. Pressed into his mouth where it's tilted down and open just a fraction. He crushes a noise, and there's a moment where there's nothing but the rush of breath across his cheek and pressure and quiet and something a little bit like shock that he'd even dared to do something so insane. Because it really is genuinely insane.
All he has to do is think it before he's pulling away.
"Fuck - I shouldn't have done that, I'm sorry, I don't even know why I did. I know you don't -" John digs his teeth into his lip and shakes his head.
Sherlock looks genuinely curious, and he definitely notices when John forces himself to stop looking at his mouth.
"That I don't what?" Sherlock asks, completely unconcerned, as if John kisses him all the time.
John clears his throat, and wonders if he can get away with putting his hands in his pockets and pretending none of this is happening. Distancing gestures, a whole riot of awkward body language which Sherlock could read with his eyes closed. Though he's not sure it really bothers him. It's nice to know someone has a clue what he's doing. Even if he wishes Sherlock would spend more time pretending that he didn't.
"Do relationships, with people and our small brains." John tries for a laugh, even though his mouth still tingles faintly. He doesn't know where the word 'relationships' came from. That wasn't what he meant at all. That wasn't what he meant to mean. The impending end of the world seems to have broken him.
"You think I'd do a relationship with someone who thought like me." Sherlock's face twists at the idea of it. "God, they'd be insufferable. Completely insufferable. We'd kill each other within a week."
His voice is so genuinely horrified that John's startled into laughter.
"No," Sherlock says over the tail end of it. "It would have been someone like you. Just smart enough not to be irritating, willing to make a stab at brilliance at least, for all that you'd be floundering rather far from shore. Smart enough to be brave, but not brave enough to be stupid."
John can't help the noise he makes through his nose, amusement and disbelief and something weirdly like affection.
"That was almost romantic."
Sherlock grunts. "Funny, I assumed you'd think it was an insult."
John nods. "I think I'm learning."
"What, how my brain works?" Sherlock has one eyebrow raised, dubious, amused.
"Oh, I don't think I'd go quite that far," John says. "I pity anyone who discovers how your brain works. Something horrible would probably immediately happen to them. Something Lovecraftian."
"Are you comparing the inner workings of my brain to unknowable eldritch horrors?"
John's nodding, before he decides if he should or not. "I think it's only fair."
"I'm not sure whether to be insulted or flattered."
"You could be both," John assures him. He notices how far they've come from the original conversation, drifting slowly but noticeably away from John's ridiculous attempt at...he doesn't even know. He flatly refuses to use the word 'intimacy' because it doesn't fit. It's too simple, too easy, and much too soft. It's nothing like the almost too-sharp weight of his confused feelings for Sherlock. So, no, he doesn't object at all when Sherlock doesn't push, when he doesn't pick at the strange direction. Instead he leans against the back of the chair and regards John with something that wants to be amusement, but isn't quite. There's still something a little too serious at his jaw line, something that makes the pale of his skin hard.
"It's the last night you'll ever get, John. You could do anything. The laws of society no longer apply."
John throws him a look, which he hopes conveys a little of what he thinks about that. "I think they still do."
"How unadventurous of you," Sherlock decides. But he doesn't protest otherwise. Funny, John rather expected him to.
"I'm not half as adventurous as people think I am." John shakes his head, and maybe there's a little irritation there, but if he'd known he wouldn't have made it to forty he might at least have tried to be a little more - no, no he probably wouldn't. That's quite depressing.
"That's an utter lie," Sherlock says, and this time he does sound amused. John can hear the smile in it. "You're the best sort of adventurous."
"When you say adventurous, I don't think you mean what everyone else would mean." John makes it sound more like a joke than an accusation, but Sherlock sniffs, like he hears the underlying intent.
"Everyone else is wrong," Sherlock says simply.
John laughs. "This is why people think you're arrogant, you do realise that?"
"Yes," Sherlock agrees. "You can kiss me again if you like."
John's so surprised that he finds himself shaking his head before he can form a thought.
"Sherlock."
Sherlock's hiding a smile now, and not very well. He's finding this amusing. John should probably be offended.
"What? It was a suggestion."
"I'm not going to kiss you if you don't want me to," John says stiffly, and he's aware he's making it sound like Sherlock's accused him of taking advantage, even though he'd done no such thing. He's also making it sound like he'd quite like to kiss him again. Which is...something he's only just figured out. That seems unfair, even for him.
Sherlock steeples his fingers, which shouldn't be alluring, but sort of is. "I never said that."
"You gave the impression that you had no strong feeling either way," John admits. "I've always assumed you didn't...that you just didn't."
"I could fake enthusiasm," Sherlock offers.
"No," John says stiffly. Because the idea of it is upsetting in a way he's not expecting at all.
"That was the wrong thing to say," Sherlock says quietly.
"Yes," John agrees.
"Tell me why," Sherlock adds, before John can decide if he has a right to be so annoyed about it.
John exhales - still can't quite look at him. He realises that he's going to say it out loud, and he doesn't quite care. "Because I want to kiss you, not whoever you'd be if you were faking it."
Sherlock doesn't say anything for long enough that John cautiously turns his head to look at him, and finds him much closer than he expects.
"Sherlock -"
"Shut up," Sherlock says simply, and then kisses him.
There's an element of experimentation about it. Though John's not sure Sherlock can do anything without it feeling, in some way, like an experiment, like he's being weighed, measured, and judged. There's something frustrating about that, but John's too caught up in what it feels like to object, fingers dug into the arm of the chair, and the thick fabric of his own jeans. Sherlock's hand dares to be more forward, fingers only barely warm on the side of his neck, like he knows where he's supposed to touch, but isn't willing to grasp, to hold. Or maybe it's just that John hasn't given him permission, doesn't think he has. Not that Sherlock has ever needed his permission - not that Sherlock has ever asked for his permission before.
The experimental edge has become something untidy. It's a much longer kiss than John dared, and he really doesn't want it to stop. It's slightly unnerving that this isn't more strange, more unexpected. Sherlock looks at him from barely an inch away, forehead creased like he's compiling data.
"I think I could have learned to quite like it," Sherlock says at last.
John shuts his eyes. "I hate you," he says quietly. Because he was thinking exactly the same thing.
He half expects Sherlock to huffily ask him why, but he stays quiet. Exercising his ability to be perceptive for once. Or maybe he's just getting better at knowing when not to talk. At learning there are times when not talking can actually be helpful.
"You probably never even thought about it." It's not a question. John's mostly talking out loud. There's not really any reason not to any more.
The noise Sherlock makes, it's low and familiar. It's the one he uses when he's amused by people being wrong. John turns around and looks at him, and this time there is a question there, somewhere, even if he doesn't mean there to be.
"We could have had a messy and very confusing relationship," Sherlock says, blinking slowly like he hasn't just suggested something insane.
John exhales, and very carefully doesn't think about exactly what that would have been like.
"You would have hated it," he says at last.
"I wouldn't have hated all of it," Sherlock counters.
John stares at the ceiling, and wonders how the world managed to make the last few days of his life so incredibly strange.
"I might have put up with the parts I hated," Sherlock says quietly.
*****
John lies in bed for a long time. He can feel the hours he has left dripping away.
Wasting away.
That more than anything else forces him up out of bed, makes him stumble his way downstairs to where Sherlock is already a narrow line of motion. The far wall is a mess. There's the stark headline, 'TEMPORAL EFFECTS POST-EVENT' and then tacked underneath it, equations and printouts, pictures of the human brain. John can see a post-it note with the phrase 'end/perception impossible' on it, scribbled out in a firm hand, over and over.
John doesn't say a word, he just takes his coffee over to the wall and stares at it, at the collage of science and horror that Sherlock has made.
"There isn't enough time," Sherlock says stiffly from behind him. John can hear his bare feet moving back and forth in the paper on the floor. "I don't understand, and there isn't enough time. I can't get it." There's a thump, which sounds a lot like Sherlock's fist against the arm of the chair. "There isn't enough time."
John breathes in the steam from his coffee, and stares at a picture of a metronome, caught mid-swing. "What are you hoping to do here?"
"I don't know." It sounds half angry, and half lost. "But there has to be something. I refuse to just - I refuse. It's ludicrous, the idea that we can just be swept away by one moment of arrogance. By one improbable roll of the dice."
Sherlock holds a hand out.
"Four billion universes we go on as normal, never having the slightest clue what could have gone wrong. One universe we snag on a thread and the world -" he jerks a hand sharply, viciously upwards. "The whole world unravels."
"I wonder if it will be like that?" John says. "Like we're unravelling."
Sherlock looks at him, like he's debating whether that was a rhetorical question. He must eventually decide not.
"I'd imagine the gravitational forces will rip us apart first."
John doesn't want to think about gravitational forces, or how exactly they're all going to die. He's tired, and he just wants to sleep, which feels like the stupidest irony of all. A horrific and terrible waste of time that he doesn't have. He suspects there's a great deal of denial still at work there.
"I'll stay with you, if you want."
He expects Sherlock to protest, to tell him he thinks better on his own. That John can't do any good, that he looks dead on his feet.
"Yes," Sherlock says instead. Which is honest, and quiet, and something gnaws in John's gut that wasn't there before.
******
John falls asleep on the couch at about four in the morning, and the next thing he knows it's Wednesday. Which seems inordinately cruel.
Sherlock's pacing, wearing new trousers and a half-unbuttoned shirt, so pale it looks like snow. The collage on the wall has different pictures today, or the same pictures in a different configuration. John can't tell for sure. No - the picture with the metronome has been replaced by what looks like a giant megaphone.
Sherlock's putting things into categories, 'perception,' 'memory,' and 'temporal effects.' By the look of it, he's been doing it for a while.
"What are you doing?"
"There's a theory..." Sherlock offers over a book. He has it opened so wide the spine has cracked all the way along. "Several theories. No way to test them, no way to test any of them. Working on the assumption that one of them is right. There's an irritating amount of uncertainty in scientific theories, it's infuriating -"
John tries to translate that into something that makes sense in his head. "You think you can stop it happening?"
"No, it'll happen," Sherlock says firmly.
Which makes no sense at all.
John sort of wants cold Chinese for breakfast. Which seems like a fair enough request the day before the world ends.
"There's cold Chinese in the fridge, isn't there?"
"No," Sherlock says, tossing the book he's holding aside, and then dragging the next one off the pile. "Not any more."
John frowns. "When did you eat it?"
"A couple of hours ago."
John shakes his head and struggles his way upright. He figures he can raid the kitchen after he's showered. He's going to shower on his last day on earth. The world may be ending but he's still civilised.
By the time he gets upstairs he's changed his mind. He spends an hour and a half in the bath instead, because why shouldn't he? He stares out of the window afterwards, at the people walking by. No panicking, no looting, no civil disorder. People are just being people. John's not sure how to feel about that. He's strangely numb.
When he gets downstairs he finds Sherlock still working. He's crouched by the wall, long fingers pressing down against paper, glossy photographs and smudged photocopies.
"Temporal effects," Sherlock mutters, there's a deep gouge in the collage John hadn't noticed before, that Sherlock won't stop poking. As if it's an irritation that still bothers him. A loose tooth in the world.
Sherlock spends the last day staring at the wall, like he can stop this whole thing with the power of his huge brain.
John sits on the bed with his phone for two hours, while the sun goes down. He can't decide if he's working up the courage to call someone, or wondering if it's worth it. He leaves it, goes back downstairs and drags Sherlock away from his work long enough to argue over a packet of sugar, and drink tea that's far too strong. Sherlock lingers afterwards, watching John through half-closed eyes with a strange sort of purpose. Like he'd forgotten something he was supposed to be doing.
"You can stop you know," John says. "You can just stop."
Sherlock laughs into his mug, the echo strangely wet. It doesn't take him long before he's back by the wall, working, muttering under his breath in long, vicious sentences, remembering.
The last day drags on, quiet and strange.
John hasn't felt so alone for a long time.
*****
He's in bed by midnight, staring at the ceiling, trying not to think about anything. He's doing a pretty good job of it. Until Sherlock appears in his bedroom doorway, holding a book, with half a dozen pieces of paper slid into it as bookmarks.
John blinks at him, the light from the landing streaming into his eyes.
Sherlock pushes the door shut with a hip, and then tosses the book on the bed.
John can't quite manage more than a gaping sort of surprise, when Sherlock strips to his boxer shorts and slides in beside him.
"Oh don't look so surprised," Sherlock says, voice an irritated drawl. His skin is cold, where it touches the warmth of John's arm.
John tries to put his words in order, he's having terrible trouble with Sherlock sprawled against his side, like it's something they just do.
"I thought it was a thing - you know, not a misunderstanding, but just a crazy thing, something we weren't going to talk about. I didn't expect us to end up -" John tries not to think about how much he wants to end up here, end of the world be damned. He thinks it's a little sliver of madness. A mid-life crisis - or just the view from the edge. Or maybe they're all just excuses.
"It wasn't a thing," Sherlock says, wrecking John's paper-thin wall of denial. "The way you look at me is very distracting, you realise that. And I haven't been ignoring you, I've just been -"
"Working."
"Yes." Sherlock's hands are cold. He seems to want to put them on John anyway. John can't quite work out how he's supposed to mind. But it's all so strange. He doesn't want to stop him. He thinks this moment of madness is exactly what he wants. His body is a traitor.
Sherlock makes a short, meaningless noise at whatever shows in his face. Then he leans in and kisses him and John forgets what he was protesting, and why he was annoyed. It's amazing, what three days and the end of the world can do to someone. Or maybe it wasn't that at all. Maybe this is something that's just always been there. John's surprised by how little that bothers him.
Sherlock's not aggressive, he's curious, clinical, occasionally irritable, moving John's hands when they get too adventurous.
"This is supposed to be a mutual sort of thing, you know," John tells him.
Sherlock makes a dismissive noise, and pushes him into the sheets. He seems to be firm in his belief that he can silence John with enthusiasm, if nothing else. John's not sure if he's just an experiment, not that he wouldn't be weirdly flattered to be an experiment. It's just...he's never been very good at this, and he's fairly sure Sherlock doesn't do this at all. Whether through choice or design, he's not sure it matters. John doesn't know how they got here. But he can't quite stop making himself want it anyway.
"I don't expect anything," John says quietly. "Just because I said things the other day."
"Quiet," Sherlock says, as if John's ruining his concentration.
Sherlock's hand slides into his boxer shorts anyway, and John thinks he should be embarrassed about how hard he is, about how he pushes almost instantly, reflexively, into the curl of Sherlock's fingers. He hisses out a breath, which sounds like an apology, and Sherlock calls him an idiot against his mouth. Which is the most ridiculously touching endearment he thinks he's ever heard.
It's all so quiet, pressed together under the sheets, in a way that's almost claustrophobic with no words at all. But Sherlock is long and warm and everywhere, and John can't help how tightly he holds on. While Sherlock takes him apart, like he's always, always known how.
Afterwards Sherlock fidgets, like he wants a cigarette, even though he didn't actually get off. John watches him lazily, from the other side of the bed, all messy curls of hair and strangely vulnerable jaw line. John thinks he falls asleep, because when he opens his eyes again Sherlock is closer, and his eyes are sharp in the dark.
"What's the time?"
"Just after three," Sherlock says, without looking away from him.
"Stop staring at me in the dark, it's creepy."
"There's something I have to remember," Sherlock says quietly, words a rush against the curve of his cheek.
"You always remember when you need to," John mumbles into the pillow.
Sherlock's fingers press tight into his skin. He thinks the other man's talking again. But John's too tired to understand what he's saying.
******
"Has the world ended yet?" John murmurs from underneath his own arm.
"No," Sherlock tells him from somewhere to his left. "And you stole all the quilt. If I'd known my last night on earth would be a war of attrition, I would have been less enthusiastic about it."
"You kick," John offers. "Like a horse."
"I've never shared a bed before," Sherlock says, like that excuses him. It probably does. It's the last day that mankind is ever going to have. John supposes he can be generous. Sherlock rarely deserves it, but he can't quite stop giving it anyway.
John doesn't want to sleep, there's not enough time until - there's not enough time. He must manage it, somehow, because suddenly he's staring at the wall, and it's lighter than it was before. He's almost angry about it, about how he could possibly sleep.
He can feel the slow drift of Sherlock's knuckles, and the press of a phone, against his back. He can't help but wonder what Sherlock could possibly have to do, on the very last day. He's going to say something, but instead he finds himself staring at the stack of books he's been reading in a slant of sunlight.
"I have library books that are due back the day after tomorrow." John's not quite sure how, or why he manages to sound so worried about that.
Sherlock makes a noise against his back, and for a second John has no idea what it is - until it becomes more obviously stifled laughter.
It quickly becomes not even the slightest bit stifled, Sherlock starts laughing, and he doesn't stop.
-
John wonders if he'll even notice when the world ends. Or whether it will be so quick he won't have time to. Whether humanity will quietly swirl out of existence, like water down a drain.
It's not quiet at all. It's completely and utterly terrifying.
A poet would probably say something trite.
Compare the sensation to being born.
It isn't like that at all.
....
...
..
.
"John."
...
"John."
...
"John."
John sighs and gives in, against his better judgment. He looks up, and glares at Sherlock over the top of his laptop.
Sherlock's sprawled on the sofa, half in and half out of his dressing gown. It's as if even getting that on straight had been too much trouble this morning. John's not quite sure what emotion he's going for over there, expression somewhere between irritation and wounded abandonment. The air of suffering is a little overdone though. John's seen how good he is when he actually has to act. So he's assuming it's just laziness.
"You realise, of course, that I'm not some sort of amusing performing dog, who does tricks to entertain you," John tells him.
Sherlock continues to stare, in a way that seems to be hoping John will be entertaining anyway.
"I'm not," John adds, voice just a little more fierce than before. Because this is a point he's going to be strict on. He's not here for Sherlock's amusement. No matter what Sherlock seems to think. He doesn't exist to pander to his whims.
"What are you doing?" Sherlock asks, though his tone already suggests that whatever it is, it can't possibly be interesting enough to distract him away from Sherlock's terrible boredom. Sherlock's own personal idea of what's important will forever remain tragically skewed from everyone else’s.
"I'm updating my blog." John can't help but wonder whether giving Sherlock more information is ever a good thing, when he's so very good at using it against you. The fact that he can't seem to help it somehow makes it even more irritating.
There's silence for long enough that John swivels round in his chair.
Sherlock's fingers are white, where they're curled round the leather of the sofa cushions.
"Sherlock?"
Sherlock rolls his head towards him, eyes fixing on his face. He inhales, sharply.
"What is it?" John asks, because he knows Sherlock's 'I've just thought of something vitally important' face, and this isn't it. This is something he's never seen before. Sherlock's off the couch and across the room without answering him, then on his knees by the table, shifting through the post. He tosses envelopes violently aside, until he comes to one written in tiny, cramped handwriting. He tears it almost in two getting it open, reads through it, then reads through it again.
He swears, once, twice and then crumples the paper at one edge. Then Sherlock's straightening, tugging his dressing gown off with an impatience that's close to violence.
"Get dressed."
"What - what's going on? Where are we going?"
"Scotland."
"Scotland? Sherlock, for God's sake. I have to work today."
"No, you're coming with me, and there's absolutely nothing more important than that!" Sherlock catches him under the armpit and makes a bloody good attempt at hauling him to his feet. Only the fact that the table is in the way turns it into an awkward stumble backwards.
John's not sure whether to bring a halt to Sherlock's frenzied enthusiasm, or to just go with it. But then, that's something of a constant now. An eternal conundrum. Always wondering how far to let Sherlock push.
"Why on earth are we going to Scotland?"
Sherlock claps his hands down on John's shoulders. "We're going to save the world, John."
John doesn't believe him for a minute.
END