The Light That Scorched The Sand [a Sherlock/John mix based on wordstrings' The Dying of the Bees]
Full album art, tracklistings, and download links under the cut.
After reading The Dying of the Bees I knew I was going to mix for it. I had already done two mixes previously ( He Talks In Maths and I Sometimes Save The Day) for wordstrings' phenomenal Paradox series and, just like the others stories in the series, the Dying of the Bees is gorgeous and heartbreaking and raw and simply left me an emotional mess. I started this mix back in August and it's been in a constant state of flux for months because it was just never good enough. But thankfully the latest Local Natives album gave me the inspiration to finally get this finished.
The quotes coupled with each track are from wordstrings' the Dying of the Bees so if you haven't read it yet be careful because this post is full of spoilers for the story.
I really hope you all enjoy the mix. ♥
DOWNLOAD THE ALBUM ZIP
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The Light That Scorched The Sand
a Sherlock/John fanmix
1. Local Natives - Heavy Feet
After everything, after everything
Left in the sun, shivering
"She can hear it too," Sherlock whispers. He's still swaying a little. Only a little, but he isn't nearly at his usual level of rapid-fire coherence. "I think, I think she can. She's like me, you could see it, couldn't you? Oh, she's worried about them too, I'm sure of it."
"About--sorry, who?"
"The bees, John. They're dying. It worries me."
"Oh."
-The Dying Of The Bees: I. The Doctor-
2. The National - Conversation 16 [Live on KCRW]
'Cause all the silver girls
Gave us black dreams
Maybe it's the drugs in Sherlock's system.
Maybe it would have happened inevitably.
Maybe it's actually the drugs, though, and it's all Irene's fault.
Tempting to think so.
John doesn't know why it happens. Or why drugs in Sherlock's veins should affect John's central nervous system. But when he dreams one of Sherlock's dreams for the first time that night, he is very nearly violently ill in their bed.
-The Dying Of The Bees: I. The Doctor-
3. The Vines - Spaceship
Brother meant
Get me out
Sherlock crawls over to John, who is now seventy percent certain he's not going to vomit everywhere. John grabs the sinewy wrist and turns Sherlock's left palm over. There's a tiny white scar there, like a hook. It's the most painful thing John has ever seen. It looks at present like open heart surgery without anesthesia.
"Where did you get this scar?" he asks very quietly.
Glancing down, Sherlock blinks. He seems more frightened by the second. "I don't know."
"Don't know or won't say?"
"I don't know. I deleted it. So I don't know."
"Right. Good. Keep it deleted. Do not...undelete that file. Keep it jolly well deleted. Now, you listen to me." John reaches up and takes Sherlock's face in his hands. Sherlock smells of sleep, and mint, and unwashed hair, and home, and John simply loves him and that is final. "You are amazing. You're a complete arsehole and madder than a March hare, but you are amazing and you are perfect. And you are very particular about language, but I don't give a good goddamn at the moment. I love you so fucking much I can't see straight. I love you. You're so morbid it's ludicrous, you're like the Rembrandt of Gore, but I love every fucking piece of you, do you understand me? I love you."
-The Dying Of The Bees: I. The Doctor-
4. The National - Baby, We’ll Be Fine
Baby, we'll be fine
All we gotta do is be brave and be kind
I put on an argyle sweater and put on a smile
I don't know how to do this
I'm so sorry for everything
"People like being given flowers. So I gave you flowers. I told you already, don't make me repeat myself. I'm going to be different. Normal."
John stares at the floral arrangement in silent awe. It consists entirely of poisonous plants. There are little sprigs of deadly lily-of-the-valley intermingled with gorgeous sprays of violet foxglove and delicate nightshade, oleander mixed in with larkspur and tiny bunches of periwinkle. This bouquet is the maddest thing that John has ever seen, its colors wildly sparring even as the shapes of the blooms do battle for supremacy. It isn't even symmetrical; various segments arc frenetically outward like blood spray from a head wound, and a few spears of delphinium rise triumphantly tall above the rest of the mortally dangerous plant life. Four or five buttercups peek out from the lip of the vase. No one in the world could possibly mistake this bouquet for a gesture even approaching normalcy.
John loves it. He can feel his heart clench and unclench within his chest, as if he'd started gnawing at the blooms. Sherlock pads in bare feet up behind him and kisses the back of his neck.
"They're all poisonous."
"Yes," Sherlock says, deeply pleased. "Deadly, in the proper quantities. You're welcome."
-The Dying Of The Bees: II. The Doctor-
5. Grizzly Bear - Sleeping Ute
If I could find peace
If this night bleeds
But I can't help myself
"It was quieter," Sherlock snarls, "she made it quieter because she was listening to the same thing, she made it fractions instead of the whole, just by being there, she shared it with me and so there was less total volume to be borne individually, and you are making it a fucking cacophony."
Turning, John storms out of the room and up the stairs, slamming the door. Sherlock hears the click of the lock. He's already sorry, but that won't help matters, he knows from past experience. Fidgeting, he undoes the button of his suit coat. He smoothes his hand down the placket of his white shirt. He paces left, then right. John's anger is simmering and loud and charcoal-smelling above him. It's terrible. Sherlock takes a very deep breath. Then he climbs the stairs.
Sherlock seats himself with his back against John's door. There isn't another way out of John's room. The window isn't close enough to the plane tree to be a handy escape route.
"I'm apologizing," Sherlock calls.
No answer. The charcoal smell Sherlock knows is only in his head worsens and he winces.
"John, come out. This is boring."
That was never going to work, he realizes, and rests his head sadly against the door.
"I'm not going anywhere until you come out," he says. "Ever. Do you honestly think you are making any sense at the moment? If you were dead, I would be dead too. Not bored, not annoyed like I am now. Dead. It would be over for me. You aren't listening. She made it easier. She was like maths, very very complicated mathematics. She was like the color teal. I wanted her to exist, the way the Tibetan mountain ranges exist."
-The Dying Of The Bees: III. The Detective-
6. The Amazing Broken Man - New Year Son
Fix my head, love
Fix my head, love
"I did," he says. "It hurt so inside my head, and bleach is clean. Isn't it? For cleaning things. It makes them white. It would have cleaned out my skull."
"Oh, Sherlock," John says helplessly.
Wiping his eyes on his sleeve, Sherlock tucks himself further under John's arm. "I hate Christmas, until the day arrives. Christmas is always hardest."
John cradles Sherlock's downy head in his hand. He can't breathe, this is too much. It's cruel. Sherlock is shaking like a leaf. And John is remembering a tiny burn scar on Sherlock's left ear lobe. For a moment, his throat closes. John reaches down and softly turns Sherlock's head.
The burn is there, red and angry, and oh. What to do with this beautiful creature?
-The Dying Of The Bees: III. The Doctor-
7. Jonquil - Subtle Strains
Softy spoke and biting tongues
It made more sense than growing old
And casual now I did repent
So I go through it all again
But louder now
And in my thoughts alone, alone
Take it back
There'll be nothing left
So here it stays
And so it shall remain
"I'm sorry too. I'm sorry you miss her. I'm sorry she made it quieter and she's gone. I'm sorry I can't do the same."
"I want her back," Sherlock admits hoarsely. "I liked knowing she was there. That isn't normal."
"Yes, it is, you barmy wanker. It's called sentiment."
"I only have that for you."
"No, for the past few weeks I've been wanting you only to have that for me, which is Not One Sodding Bit Fine. Reminds me of you, actually. I've stopped being a complete prat. Talk about her all you want." John brushes Sherlock's hair back from his ear and finds a miniscule burn scar. "What happened to your ear, long ago?"
Sherlock shakes his head. "Deleted. Do you know?"
"Yes," John says, and fresh tears well up, and he gives more of them to Sherlock's lower lip, and then he laughs brokenly, because this is madness. This is certifiable insanity. "Yes, I know. You don't have to. I know. It wasn't important."
"I don't believe you," Sherlock whispers. "I remember it was important. I simply don't remember what it was."
-The Dying Of The Bees: III. The Doctor-
8. Benh Zeitlin & Dan Romer - End Of The World
[Instrumental]
Except that Irene Adler isn't actually dead.
Leaving Battersea Power Complex, Sherlock is hurt that she lied to him, that she forced him to endure miserable months without her, but he understands. People have to die sometimes. It's what people do. And it must have been very pleasant for her, he supposes, being dead.
Silent. Restful. Serene.
Sherlock himself has hardly ever been dead. But on each occasion, only one of which he can recall, it has been absolutely smashing.
-The Dying Of The Bees: IV. The Detective-
9. Clogs - 5/4
[Instrumental]
"That man in there," John hisses, pointing at the place where they live and eat and breathe, "seems to find life more bearable with you in it. So fine, come back from the dead, play with him like he's one of your sex toys, I know what I am to him, I'm in his head constantly. He has conversations with me when I'm not even in the fucking country. I don't have to be in the room for him to direct whole monologues at me. I'm his audience. His entire consciousness is me-oriented. He is bloody John-sexual. I don't care if you want his help, take his help, but don't try his life on as if you're putting on a costume for a fancy dress party and expect me to enjoy the show. This is our house, not his house. The space you are in, that dressing gown, that bed, is mine."
-The Dying Of The Bees: V. The Doctor-
10. Grizzly Bear - The Hunt
Prove it all to me
Check again to see
Leave me with no words
Sherlock beats Irene at her own game, but she escapes nevertheless. Whether or not Irene has anything to do with Sherlock's brief and sudden disappearance some weeks later is up for debate. John hasn't any direct evidence of such.
But when he asks Sherlock where he was, Sherlock says "Working," and when John asks on what, Sherlock says "A case," and when John asks how it went, Sherlock says "Amazing," and when John asks directly if he won, if he solved it, he says, "No," and so John suspects. Then Mycroft tells him as the rain hammers down outside of Speedy's Cafe that Irene Adler is dead for the second time, in Karachi, and that it would take Sherlock Holmes to have fooled him, and John knows.
He knows.
-The Dying Of The Bees: VI. The Doctor-
11. The Mountain Goats - Civilian [Live]
I know my thoughts
But I can't hide them
"I had her phone already, how can you be angry I put it in a drawer?" Sherlock cries.
"I'm not angry you put it in a drawer," John snarls, showing his petite white animal teeth. "You fucking moron. I've angry you have a little shrine to her next to your bed. I'm sodding furious that you let her flirt with you and touch you and kiss your cheek and sleep in our bed and then flew to Karachi to rescue her, yes I know about that, I'm not fucking stupid, and I'm angry that she can do things for you I can't, that you admire her for them, and I know for a fact she tried to get into your pants despite the fact you're mine, mine, and yes, that makes me pretty bleeding furious, Sherlock Holmes, she has no boundaries whatsoever, and then you let me lie to you about witness protection, and none of it can be solved, and none of it really even needs to be solved, because I'm being jealous and petty, and that makes me bloody angrier than any of the rest of it, but you have keepsakes of her in your drawer and I want to hit something."
Sherlock sinks down onto the sofa. He shoves his hand through his curls, deeply disturbed.
There was a night sky and a desert and it was you, all I thought of was you, you simply weren't the reason I was there. But there aren't any stars without you.
"You knew about Ka--"
"Yes."
"So when you--"
"Yes."
"And the witness pro--"
"Failed that test with flying colours, didn't you."
Thinking very very hard, Sherlock makes an attempt at English.
"The stars in the Middle East are beautiful, but they don't know it unless you're looking at them," he says. "You. No one Else. I know what that feels like."
-The Dying Of The Bees: VII. The Detective-
12. Parenthetical Girls - Handsome Devil
But you deserve it
You deserve it, deserve it, deserve it
Number thirty-two was previously on the Fine list, because it wasn't dangerous to anyone save Sherlock, but John moved it to the Not Fine list, where it is presently number twelve, and reads:
12. As an experiment, arrange for John to beat me, for as long as he likes, to see how far he can take it, and I'll be covered with marks John put there for days even if he doesn't kill me, and that will be lovely.
-The Dying Of The Bees: VII. The Detective-
13. Benh Zeitlin & Dan Romer - Particles of the Universe (Heartbeats)
[Instrumental]
After a long silence, John makes a humming sound. "Talk to me."
Normally light tastes like rainstorms, but you shut it off and it was only a color spectrum.
Normally I can remember my name, but I couldn't.
Normally pain is boring, but this wasn't, it wasn't, you're never boring.
Normally I'm not frightened when you take me, but I was the first time, and this time too, and I love being frightened.
Normally I don't feel like a Cubist painting, but I did, pieces of me were rearranged.
Normally loving you only hurts in my heart, but this was better, it made more sense.
Normally I want to be a gift for you but I'm more like a hospital bill and that is slowly killing me but not this time, this time I forgot about it.
Normally
Normally
Normally
None of this is normal.
"I'm just a bit...blank," Sherlock says slowly. "I think you erased me somewhat."
-The Dying Of The Bees: VII. The Detective-
14. Patrick Wolf - Born To Die
Take a walk on the wild side
Let me kiss you hard in the pouring rain
You like your boys insane
"What do you want, then?" Sherlock asks hoarsely.
The doctor thinks about late nights running through filthy corridors, the stink of cheap grease in their nostrils and a killer just out of reach. He remembers thinking that he would have to teach medicine anyhow, wouldn't he, after all he'd done, and taking the loaded pistol out of his drawer and then putting it back because there was nothing whatsoever to shoot at. He thinks about the inside of Sherlock's wrist, pale like dove's feathers and nearly as delicate. He thinks about how he'd slipped once on a fire escape and Sherlock had thrown himself backward and caught him with a look in his grey eyes like the eye of a hurricane. The doctor thinks about all the beautiful things in the world he's ever seen, and how none of them are as beautiful as the one in his bed.
John pulls Sherlock's hand up by the wrist. There's a blank space on his throat, so John takes the pliant index finger he's gripping and writes SHERLOCK HOLMES in capitals across his own Adam's apple.
-The Dying Of The Bees: VII. The Doctor-
15. Local Natives - Ceilings [Acoustic]
We were staring at our ceilings
Thinking of what we'd give to have one more day of sun, one day of sun
All my silver dreams bring me to you
It isn't easy. And they aren't happy. But Sherlock still thinks of John as the sole requirement. That is, until the third occasion John dreams one of Sherlock's dreams, and Sherlock begins to wonder whether having starlight and crime scenes will ever be enough glue to hold them together.
-The Dying Of The Bees: VIII. The Detective-
16. Vitamin String Quartet - All I Need
[Instrumental]
"You're going to nearly die twice in your life. Well, several times, actually--no, strike that, a great many, but here are the two closest calls I know about. One is years later, when you experiment with a drug called devil's foot root for a case, because you are a consummate wanker and perversely enjoy scaring me witless. And the other is now, and they save you. And you're angry for a while about that. But oh Christ, please, Sherlock," John begs, and now his voice is wavering, and he's clutching the young man's black shirt, and the young man looks frightened. "That is a lethal dose. That is--that could kill an elephant, Sherlock. And I need you. I'm not going to tell you that you're a hero to millions or that you save the world, but oh god, love, you matter to me. You matter to me like nothing else does and I shout to the rooftops that I'm fucking you, because I will be fucking you, and loving you, and don't take that away from me just because someone else missed his opportunity. Please. I'm nothing like you, I don't even make it quieter when you feel this way, but when you do feel this way, I still think you're the best man, the most--you're the most human person I've ever known, and somehow I won you. Lower the dose. You're worried about other things, later. About the bees. The bees are not doing well, Sherlock. And neither am I, just now. You don't care about me yet. But do it for me. And for the bees."
-The Dying Of The Bees: VIII. The Doctor-
17. Grizzly Bear - Sun In Your Eyes
You've fallen once you'll fall again and lean on
Your tired hands that crawl and grasp the soft ground
By the look on your face
You set out on a path, never to arrive
By the look on your face
The burden's on your back
And the sun is in your eyes
Stretched out far and wide
The light that scorched the sand
"You were--" Sherlock swallows. "You were unresponsive. I mean, you were talking to me, but not making sense. You said I'd never see the stars again and I'd miss them. I brought you outside. I don't know...I don't know."
John nods. Reality is returning. He has no notion of whether the events he's been experiencing in his dream cycles are simply elaborately imagined nightmares or not. But he knows where the scar is, the very white little scar on Sherlock's left arm, and he knows that the overdose was ruled accidental, and...and that's enough to hurt. It's enough to ask how it came to be that way. He never did. So perhaps Sherlock, in his own peculiar way, is telling him. The man beneath him shifts slightly. John feels very cradled, and warm despite the damp.
"I didn't get to choose this," Sherlock says carefully. He isn't looking down anymore. His eyes have grown distant, just shreds of far-away fog. "Decide whether or not to...to feel this way about you. I know it hurts you constantly. You don't have to tell me. I saw. If I could change it all, look at you the way I look at Lestrade or any other man on the street, of course I'd wish none of this had happened. Now it's already too late, I can't help being myself along the way. Sometimes I don't even bother trying to temper it at all. Did you know that? I do intend to, always, but the threads get tangled. Anyhow, I...I wasn't meant to have a heart, and we were all of us rather mistaken about that, sadly, but I'd get rid of it if that meant never hurting you so again. I'd throw it out this instant."
Pursing his lips, John filters through layered meaning and tender hoarseness and a baritone so silken that he could curl up in it like a nest. John realizes that it ought to be very painful to listen to the man you'd walk through a napalm firefight for describe at length and in detail how he'd erase your entire relationship if such was possible. Most blokes would find that to be just about the final straw. One too many drops of acid in a jar that's meant to hold strawberry preserves, identical to the jar currently in the door of their refrigerator.
But John also knows Sherlock. And so he knows that the previous admission was akin to purposefully treading on a grenade for the taller man beside him. It might just be the most difficult thing he has ever said.
-The Dying Of The Bees: VIII. The Doctor-
18. The National - You Were A Kindness
It doesn't work that way
Wanting not to want you won't make it so
It doesn't work that way
Don't leave me here alone
"I can't think of how to love you without hurting you," Sherlock answers.
"I don't give a flying fuck," John observes.
The detective turns still further away from John, face now entirely sideways and taut with defeated intentions. Then Sherlock's hands pull both of John's up over a warm but eccentrically beating heart beneath the robe, because Sherlock is still Sherlock. He wants this enough to allow it to happen. And John approves. It's better than what used to be enough, and more than most, and beyond what he expected even from a marvel.
So John feels the steady and deceptively normal cardiac vibrations pulse beneath his fingers, doing his level best to listen to whatever story his friend is now telling him.
Whatever the tale, John is listening.
-The Dying Of The Bees: VIII. The Doctor-
DOWNLOAD THE ALBUM ZIP
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If you would like a link to any of the individual tracks, just ask!
[view the mix on tumblr]
[view the mix on 8tracks]
And while you're here, please check out some of the other fandom-y things I've worked on:
more fanmixes + more things sherlock
This Sherlock/John fanmix was created for you with love by suchaprince. The quotes coupled with each track are from the Dying of the Bees written by wordstrings, which served as the inspiration for this mix.