Nutrisco et exstinguo - Chapter XIV: Ibi deficit orbis

[zoffoli]

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Nutrisco et exstinguo: "I feed from it and extinguish it"

Ibi deficit orbis: "Here the world finishes"

Warnings: Rating for this chapter is K+

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Chapter XIV: Ibi deficit orbis

song: Winter Song, by Ingrid Michaelson and Sara Bareilles

oOo

This is my winter song to you.
The storm is coming soon,
It rolls in from the sea

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John decides he is doing much better.

Sure, he still doesn't have a job, although he has been offered one - Harry meddling with his life again, no doubt. Doctors Without Borders. It is very kind of her to keep trying even after he has thrown her out of his flat. Room. He still refuses to see her, and she does not try to contact him anymore.

But then he had received those documents about DWB and he had known it was her doing, because Mycroft would never have been so stupid as to think John was a man who could be sent abroad and deal with horrors without being on the front line, holding a rifle and not only a stethoscope. Still, it had been nice of her. And it had confirmed John in his belief that they would never understand each other.

Winter has come and John has always found the cold invigorating. It is more pleasant to go for a brisk walk when the temperature is low - not too low, of course, but it never is too low in England. It is in a temperate zone after all, and it would never get cold enough in London for it to be dangerous to take a walk outside. Sleeping on the street is another matter altogether, but one that does not concern John. Yet.

For now, he just enjoys the cold season. He finds he likes it all the more so as the days are getting shorter - not that he prefers the nights. But he is glad his evenings do not drag on so much as before, because he can reduce the number of newspapers he buys.

His sleep has gotten much better too: he still has nightmares regularly, but not everyday, and even when he does, the rest of the night is spent in a deep, dreamless slumber. Waking up is not pleasant, but he is used to it by now. That's always been one of his best qualities: to endure and adapt.

My voice; a beacon in the night.
My words will be your light,
to carry you to me.
Is love alive?
Is love alive?
Is love...

The bad thing about December is that it is festive. John never thought he would consider festive was bad - and it wasn't, really. But walking around London with all those decorations only made him realize that he could no longer feel the Christmas spirit or anything of the sort. His previous Christmas had been a complete failure, and he could not believe it had only been a year. It seemed to belong to another time. Maybe it did.

It did not pain him to see couples and families shopping for presents and laughing happily together, because he had always gone shopping alone anyway. It could not bring back memories and fill him with regrets, but only show him what he might have had in the future, had he married a good woman and had children. Had he chosen mundane over dangerous. Only show him what he would never have.

Well, that should be painful, he admits to himself. However it isn't. Bitter, maybe, and even a little sardonic, but not really painful. As he walks down the street he ponders the thought for a while, wondering why being alone at 40 without a wife or kids when that's what he always thought he'd have as life does not hurt as much as it should. Perhaps because the fault lies with him, and him alone: after all, he is too twisted and crippled to be a good husband and father.

Those are his grim considerations when he notices that he is being followed. Again.

For the past few weeks, Molly Hooper has been stalking him. Maybe even before, but John had not noticed. It would have been funny and even sweet if she had been someone else. If she did not belong to another time, too.

So for once, John sighs and makes up his mind. He waits until she is pretending to look at the jewellery in a shop-window, and he approaches her.

"Hello, Molly. What a coincidence meeting you here."

"Oh, hello, John! It has been such a long time! How have you been doing?"

Her smile is bright and silly, unsure, and he can hear her heart hammering in her chest. But she doesn't seem surprised in the least. He realizes then that she hasn't been trying to go unnoticed: quite the contrary in fact. She's been waiting for him to come and talk to her. Suddenly a wave of weariness hits him and he feels like he's taken ten years in the span of a few seconds.

As he doesn't answer, Molly starts fidgeting a little and says eventually:

"Would you like to have coffee?"

"Black, with two sugars?" he asks innocently, a hint of cruelty in his voice. She pales.

"Oh, John..."

Pinching the bridge of his nose, he sighs.

"I'm sorry, Molly, I'm being a complete twat. Come on, let's have coffee. My treat."

Her face lights up and she is too pleasantly surprised to break the mood by pointing out she has a salary and should probably treat him.

"So, have you been busy at the morgue lately? With all those weird murders by poison..."

"Oh yes, I've seen some of them! Hydrogen Cyanide."

"Don't all apples contain some?"

"Yes, but only some - and they do not contain potassium cyanide. It seems the amount of prussic acid the forensics found in each body was enough to kill an ox."

"What a waste."

She nods and people sitting at the tables around eye the strange couple with puzzlement and frowns. They do not seem to notice.

"That's what I thought too! Why would they use so much poison just to kill off one person? If such an amount is used every time, it can't be a miscalculation either."

"But we don't even know if it's the doing of only one person, do we?"

Sipping her coffee, she looks out of the window.

"No. But they're still all related, whether there's only one murderer or several."

They fall silent and drink quietly. Molly feels trapped: she does not want to ask John about his life, as she knows it can't be good, but she can't talk about that case too much, because something tells her there is more to it than meets the eyes. It is such a weird kind of murder... something Moriarty would have been capable of doing. Maybe helping many different people kill off the person they wanted, even though they weren't related at all, making it look similar each time but preventing anyone from getting to him. Except Moriarty was dead. Wasn't he?

"Something that's more than a man."

She jumps on her seat and looks up at John, but his face is blank. He seems to have made the comment offhandedly. Because he is staring absent-mindedly at his cup of tea, she can take her time and observe him. He doesn't look broken: the bags under his eyes are barely noticeable, and he's gained back some weight - D.I. Lestrade had told her he was very thin when he had last seen him. Good news, then. Maybe he is finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

They say that things just cannot grow
Beneath the winter snow,
Or so I have been told.

John doesn't regret he had coffee with Molly. She's such a sweet girl, after all. He even noticed she looked older today - more mature. Maybe she finally found a serious boyfriend. Then he remembers how she's been stalking him, and thinks she probably couldn't have managed that, working at the morgue and dating someone. When she left, she said they should meet more often for a drink. He agreed. Now as he walks back to his room, he must admit he doesn't intend to see her again.

However she was so kind as to mention he could apply for a job at Bart's. Mike Stamford was working there too, after all. She knew it wasn't the best of places, but...

As he passes Speedy's, John realizes he hasn't walked in the correct direction. At all. His blood runs cold and he stops dead in his track. His steps have taken him to 221B Baker Street. He stares at the door dumbly as Christmas carols fill the air.

"Said the little lamb to the shepherd boy,
'Do you hear what I hear?
Ringing through the sky, shepherd boy,
Do you hear what I hear?'"

Oh yes, he did. And it wasn't the voice he wanted to hear.

"Excuse me, are you Dr. Watson?"

He turns and meets the eyes of a dark-haired man with a chubby face.

"You are, aren't you? I recognize your picture from your blog."

John has no idea where this is going, so he remains silent and stares at the stranger with half-empty eyes.

"Are you mute or something?"

"Who are you?"

"Harry Wilson. Jennifer was my wife."

"I'm sorry, I haven't dated any married woman recently - actually I've never dated a Jennifer, either."

"Are you mocking me?"

This is all so absurd and John is still shocked to be standing in front of his old flat. He can't quite fathom what in the world the man wants with him.

"My wife is dead!"

Oh God, he is seriously starting to give him a headache now.

"My condolences. Now if you don't mind..."

The man grabs him by the shoulder and roars:

"But I do! You were the ones who killed her!"

At this, John feels cold fury rise in his guts and he turns slowly.

"Excuse me?"

"My wife! First you wrote all this nonsense about a string of lovers on your stupid blog and I did not even know someone was defaming my wife on the web! Oh, but I couldn't believe it was her, and it was all so childish on your part that I thought I'd just let you off with your little cases told like bloody adventures when my wife had just been murdered. But then that bloody detective of yours is proved to be a fake and kills himself, and I wonder: how could that blogger of his not be in the know? You planned the murder of my wife and you..."

The iron fist he receives on his nose cuts him short and he screams in surprise.

"You broke my nose!" he cries, holding his bleeding face.

"And if you don't want me to break something else, you'll kindly shut up now."

This pushes the man over the edge and he throws himself at John with blinding rage.

"Threats, now! You murderer, how dare you do this to my wife and defile her memory by saying she was an adulteress!"

"She was cheating on you, moron! And we did not kill her, rather we were almost killed trying to find out who her murderer was!"

That isn't exactly true - John did kill someone that day, but certainly not Jennifer Wilson. However the man's anger was contagious and the fact that they were already fighting like cat and dog didn't help either.

"You, there! Stop this fight immediately!"

Oh great. Could the police ever have worse timing?

They say we're buried far,
Just like a distant star
I simply cannot hold.
Is love alive?

John is thinking his day cannot possibly get worse - something no one should ever, ever think - when as he is waiting to be allowed to go home Sally Donovan enters the room and sees him. He wonders if this is the day he's bound to murder someone with his own two hands. Coming up to him, she looks at his black eye and cut lip, and frowns.

"What in the world happened to you?"

He believes it wiser to remain silent, and ignores her.

"Hello? Can't you hear me? Have you been fighting with someone?"

What's with the chiding and bloody motherly tone? John feels the rage rise up again.

"Oh no, Sergeant Donovan, I just fell down the stairs and the third step decided to press charges."

She gaped, nonplussed.

"Well, aren't you energetic?"

"And so are you, Sergeant. Your guilty conscience isn't smothering you, I can see."

"Guilty? Why would I feel guilty?"

"Right. No idea."

"Look, now... I'm sorry the Freak died. Don't give me that look, he was a freak, and I still think he was an insufferable prick. It doesn't mean I wanted him to kill himself."

"Yes, well your assumptions didn't help."

"They weren't just assumptions! They were logical deductions and even if today new elements tend to show that he wasn't a criminal after all, at the time it was a legitimate conclusion! I wasn't his friend, all right? I am a police officer and my duty is..."

"... to let your petty feelings of resentment and inferiority complex rule your mind and jump on the first occasion you could find to get back to the man who always humiliated you? Good job, you succeeded."

Her face pales at the comment, and she clenches her fists, but before she can say anything a woman comes back with a folder and tells John he may leave, since Mr. Wilson is pressing charges not for aggravated assault, but for the murder of his late wife, without any evidence whatsoever. John does not even bother to answer and stands up to leave.

"Sherlock Holmes was an insufferable prick, Sergeant. Only he can be blamed for turning everyone he met against him, and all the wrong people too - policemen, journalists... One could say he brought it upon himself."

"I never..."

"As a citizen, you were just cheap. As a police officer, you failed."

He did not have to hide his limp as he marched away in his typical military stance.

This is my winter song.
December never felt so wrong,
'cause you're not where you belong;
Inside my arms.

John is very glad Mycroft hasn't come to pick him up at the Met this time. Seeing another face he wants to smash wouldn't have been... good.

He is walking back to his little room, cursing under his breath because it isn't close to the Met and he did not bring an umbrella. Not that he really cares, but he knows he should care, and so he tries to or at least acts like he does. Of course, he doesn't have any cash on him, and vowed never to spend a dime on transportation, even the underground, in order to buy more newspapers. He knows it is stupid, and he should have hated newspapers. Wasn't he always told not to trust them anyway? That he must read between the lines? But he is having a hard time reading the lines already, so he won't even try to be smart.

When the drizzling turns into heavy showers, he tells himself the normal thing to do is to look for shelter, and so he takes refuge just in front of an organic food store. There are people standing there already, and they cast sidelong glances at him because he's drenched, and it doesn't really make much sense to take shelter now.

Among them, John notices a familiar face, and turns slowly, praying she hasn't seen him.

"Oh, John! Is that you?"

Sarah. He takes a deep breath. How can his day have gone so wrong? Was everyone stalking him? And God, even that nutcase of a cuckold...

"John?"

"Hi, Sarah. Dreadful weather, isn't it?"

She searches his eyes and a flash of worry traverses her gaze. But it is gone so soon John isn't even sure it was there in the first place.

Her hair has been cut and her face is bright and flushed. She is wearing a ring.

"I'm getting married in the spring" she says, following his gaze.

"Congratulations." His tone is sincere.

Seeing this woman he flirted with and never managed to properly date because of his flatmate about to get married, sparkling and beautiful on this rainy day, should be a blow, if only to his pride. But in her lovely hands that once clung to him in a Chinese circus, he only sees a tall, slender figure disrupting the show and fighting on stage with assassins. In her charming green eyes that lit up with a teasing glint as she went to take a shower and asked him to make breakfast, he only remembers the sheer panic that seized him and the gut-wrenching fear of having lost the only thing that mattered.

So he smiles perfunctorily and lets her pedestrian chatter wash over him as the rain never seems to stop.

I still believe in summer days.
The seasons always change
And life will find a way.

Finally walking down his street, John hears a carol that makes him stop in his tracks.

"Oh, bring us a figgy pudding and a cup of good cheer

Good tidings we bring to you and your kin
Good tidings for Christmas and a Happy New Year"

John laughs. Of course it has to be that song. He walks past the little choir, ignoring the joyous glow on their faces. Maybe he doesn't even see it.

When he arrives in front of the building he lives in, a very attractive woman is waiting on the doorstep, and John thinks he's had enough.

"Please tell Mycroft I won't start giving him Christmas phone calls either. Have a nice day."

"We wish you a Merry Christmas
We wish you a Merry Christmas
We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Ha..."

He goes in and closes the door on the gleeful song.

I'll be your harvester of light
and send it out tonight
so we can start again.
Is love alive?

So Christmas night has come, and something like jealousy creeps up John's heart. It's ridiculous. Completely ridiculous. But he can't help it.

One year ago Irene Adler was supposedly dead, and he had to deal with a mourning Sherlock for Christmas and New Year's Eve. Jeanette had dumped him and his flatmate had been brooding for weeks and composing dreary violin pieces.

When the Woman had truly died, John couldn't bring himself to tell him. So he'd lied. Only for Sherlock's own good? Really? The gnawing feeling in the pit of his stomach today says otherwise. John had been confronted with death before he met Sherlock. Many different kinds of death and grief. He knew that death somehow conferred a glow to the one we missed. The person was idealized and became so unreachable that their memory was ingrained in the deepest recesses of one's soul. He didn't know whether Sherlock had loved her or not, but he had certainly been fascinated by her. And John couldn't allow her to take any more room in his mind palace. In his heart, adds a little voice soon stifled with a groan.

But today, she had won, hadn't she? Sherlock is dead, and so is she. Almost like she called him back to her. And John hates her for it.

This is my winter song.
December never felt so wrong,
'cause you're not where you belong;
Inside my arms.

When he opens his eyes in the morning and remembers his thoughts from the previous evening, he feels stupid and disgusted with himself. So disgusted in fact he must run to the bathroom and empty his stomach in the bowl. It's the first time he throws up this month: John thought he was done with it.

Panting a little from the rather violent rush upon waking, he lifts his head and catches the eye of his smiley friend. He grins back.

"Merry Christmas."

This is my winter song to you.
The storm is coming soon
it rolls in from the sea.

My love a beacon in the night.
My words will be your light
To carry you to me.

For the first time in months, John hears the silence in his room that day, and so decides to go out. It's Christmas day, and the streets are all empty. But it's snowing, and that alone makes John feel like he was greeted with the loving embrace of a mother.

Standing on the doorstep, he watches the snowflakes fall and cover the silent street.

Sherlock.

Is love alive?

Is love alive?

Is love alive?

Is love alive?

Is love alive?

Is love alive?

.

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