spacemutineer (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
spacemutineer) wrote2011-06-05 03:44 pm
spacemutineer) wrote2011-06-05 03:44 pm
Fic: The Land of the Living
Title: The Land of the Living
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
spacemutineer
Word Count: 5827
Characters: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: angst, suicide ideation
Summary: Empty House AU. Watson recognized Holmes in his bookseller's disguise, but it wasn't the first time he had seen him since returning from Reichenbach Falls. He was determined to ensure that it was the last time, however, no matter how much he wished otherwise.
Author's notes: This is an AU blend of both canon and Granada's versions of The Empty House, a remix of sorts of Timing, a terrific piece byrandom_nexus, combined with a lovely prompt from the fabulous methylviolet10b (who also did a spectacular job as beta/midwife -- thank you!).
Sherlock Holmes shifted his slouched shoulders uncomfortably on the stone steps of the coroner's court and pulled the bundles of books on his lap closer to him. A hunchback was an undesirable choice of disguise, awkward and confining, but he must remain as unrecognizable and easily ignored as possible. The tiger uses the concealment of the forest until precisely the instant it pounces upon its chosen prey.
His prey on this day was one Colonel Sebastian Moran, a dangerous man at cards and an even more dangerous man with an air rifle. But it could be equally fairly stated that his quarry was also one Doctor John Watson, who, like Moran, was due to exit the courthouse within the next minute or two.
Being still was a challenge with this much anxious electricity running through him. He wondered if Watson would seem different now. Three years had come and gone since he had last seen the doctor, sitting on a mossy rock out in the cold clean air of the Austrian Alps, reading a letter of fond goodbye from a man awaiting death. It was hard for Holmes to remember that scene now with any clarity, almost as if it had been in some kind of a dream. Or some kind of a nightmare.
A bustling commotion of voices behind him rose as the audience and participants of the hearing began filing out slowly. His keen ears picked up the particular cadence of the footsteps he was anticipating approaching and he held his breath. As the man passed, Holmes feigned an accidental bump into him and the books fell down the steps with a clatter.
Watson picked them up carefully with apology in his voice, which sounded somehow perfectly untouched by time. Everything about him was exactly, exquisitely as Holmes remembered. Even the scent of him was the same, a blend of his favored, earthy brand of tobacco and the peppery musk of his aftershave. He smelled like Baker Street. He smelled like home.
As the unusual collection was passed back into his hands, Holmes could not resist lifting his head and indulging himself in an all-too-fleeting connected glance. It was tempting fate to allow Watson to catch his eyes, he knew, but it was impossible for him to simply allow the opportunity to pass. Three years had gone by since the last time it had occurred. For three years Holmes had been traveling, exploring the world. And waiting.
He had waited in fourteen countries over three continents. All the while absorbing knowledge, admiring the beauty of exotic lands, discovering forgotten places and hidden secrets. And waiting. Waiting. And now here he was, back in London and in a single instant the long wait came to an end.
There was a steep risk in endangering his cover in this way, of course. Moran had yet to exit the court. If he came upon the joyous reunion of two lost friends, one of whom he had been attempting to assassinate for quite some time, the outcome would be disastrous.
But when their eyes met, he discovered with a shock that his exhilaration was not reflected back at him by Watson. Although there was recognition in his gaze, what struck the detective as he looked into Watson's eyes was the disturbing blend of fear and sadness, like nothing that he had remotely anticipated. He could only barely contain a shivering chill at the sight. What had happened to his friend? Was it Holmes himself?
The doctor shoved the books back at him and quickly hailed the first cab he saw. It was all Holmes could do to suppress the urge to call out to him. To chase after him. To help him. Something for Watson seemed so terribly amiss. The doctor was not a man of superstition. If he was afraid of Holmes, it wasn’t because the man believed him to be a ghost. Something else was very wrong. Holmes could feel it in every muscle in his body. But he could not follow, not yet.
First, he had to trail Moran, the last thread remaining in a vile spiderweb it had taken Holmes three years to destroy, and who at that very instant was himself departing the court in a rush for parts unknown. Holmes took one last look at the cab speeding away, then shuffled after the Colonel in the other direction in the doddering bookseller's gait. He made sure to keep his distance as he followed. The trap must be laid with great care when one wishes to hunt a hunter.
///
By the time he was able to track Watson down, a cool dusk had fallen and Holmes' shoulders were aching dully from bearing the guise of the book collector for the length of the day. The detective found his friend in the last place he could think of to check, and the very last place he had in truth desired to go.
In the very cemetery chosen three years prior to hold an empty coffin and an erroneous headstone, Watson stood, motionless. In his hand, he carried a bundle of fresh tea roses, Holmes’ favorite. He remembered. Holmes concealed himself in the encroaching darkness to observe his friend and the vacant grave before him. For five minutes, the doctor simply stood there staring at the granite marker, adrift in his thoughts.
Finally, with a sharp breath, Watson knelt to place his flowers. He glanced over his shoulder, on watch for any interlopers, although he of course missed the only one that existed. From inside his pocket, he removed a small envelope which he kept palmed and hidden. While one hand laid the bouquet delicately, reverently, on the ground, the other surreptitiously tucked the envelope into a small gap between the stone and the dirt surrounding it, and it disappeared. Watson rose, pulled his coat tighter around himself to counter the evening wind, and walked away briskly without looking back.
When Watson was well out of sight, the detective crept out of the shadows and walked over to stand in front of the grave bearing his name. The sweet scent of Watson’s roses hung in the air about him as he crouched to retrieve the envelope. Inside was a letter written in Watson’s always precise hand, but clearly not actually meant for anyone to see. Anyone living, at least. Holmes stood and leaned to rest on his headstone as he read.
Minutes later, he was running. Running harder and faster than he had in years, he tore through the streets of London after the doctor. There was no time to lose.
-----------------------------------------------
I am beginning this letter to you for the tenth time, Holmes. Perhaps this is the time I shall succeed in getting through it.
You would be angry with me about this if you were here. Of that, I have little doubt. You would be disappointed that I could not match your exquisite bravery with my own in reaching this decision. But Holmes, you knew I never was an equal match for you. Indeed, there is no man on earth who could have been. You were an extraordinary creature, standing tall above and beyond all of us mere mortals of the terrestrial plane. That I was able to walk with you for even a short while through this life was truly my greatest honor. I only can hope that you knew that.
Unfortunately, I can no longer pretend my current situation is a viable one. I have been allowing myself to believe that was the case for some time now, since the day my sweet Mary followed you into the next life. She had been my guide, my anchor to ground in the torrent of emotion and loss that clung to me and would not relent after I returned from those dreadful frigid falls of Reichenbach and you did not.
It was October, cold and damp, when consumption finally lived up to its name fully and took my beautiful bride in the dark of night. Six long months of her agonizing decline had led up to that point. To be honest with you, Holmes, through my tears that terrible morning, I also felt great relief. She had been in so much pain in the weeks leading to the end. She suffered deeply, and all my medical arts and skill save large doses of morphine were useless to aid her as she wasted away before me. But on that dawn, at last, she seemed truly peaceful.
I took care of her arrangements and set off on a long walk to smoke as many cigarettes as I could stand and to attempt in some way to clear my head. I walked for hours in the chill and the grey, with no mind to where I was going or when I should return. That day was the first time I saw you. Or imagined I did, at any rate.
Just out of the corner of my eye, I saw you distinctly, running for cover, dashing to hide behind crates in an alleyway as I passed. I stopped dead in my tracks and turned my head to watch for motion. There was none to be perceived, by my eyes at least. Carefully, I crept to where I had seen you secret yourself away. I had no idea what to expect behind the crate when I rounded it. Objectively, I knew it could not be you. You were dead a year then, and that knowledge held fast and firm inside my mind. It had no effect on my expectations, however. When I finally turned the corner to confront whatever stood there, the area was fully empty. You were not there; indeed no one was there. There was nothing there but empty space.
To describe the incident as unsettling would be an understatement of the facts. I attempted to console myself with my knowledge as a doctor that I had only recently gone through a serious trauma and I could be forgiven for fanciful, some would say delusional, wishful thinking in these circumstances. That thought seemed to help somewhat and enabled me to get through the dark weeks that followed.
But then, as it approached Christmastime, I caught a glimpse of you once again. This time, I noticed you ducking into a shop at the last moment to remain just out of my line of sight. I marched straight into the store to find you. Or confront you. To be honest, I am unsure exactly what I intended to do. And, of course, all the while in the back of my mind, I knew nothing was likely to be there. Certainly not you, Holmes, but how could I resist looking for you all over inside the store when I had only moments ago witnessed your presence there? Can you forgive me this strange indulgence? The clerk was very considerate to me, the most bizarre and befuddled customer he was ever likely to have. I have never gone back to that shop.
A few weeks later, in the early new year, I had my first experience of imagining seeing you in disguise. A man was walking toward me on the street as I was headed to my surgery one morning. He looked to be a boatman of some kind, tough and rugged. I have no idea why I instantly became convinced he was you dressed in costume, Holmes. The man looked nothing like you, walked with an odd stagger and carried about him a demeanor of belligerence and low intelligence. But I remember you as a master of misdirection, excellent at hiding your identity and becoming a new personality when the need to do so arose during a case. It was an unrivaled talent and you would have made an excellent actor, a fact of which I'm sure you were well aware.
I was very rudely and absurdly staring at the man as we walked toward each other, and his scowl grew darker and more menacing with each step he took. When finally he passed me, I found I could not break the stare and turned my head to continue watching him. This was crossing a very serious line. The man became enraged, turned and rushed at me to grab me by my lapels and slam me into the brick wall of the building beside us. He demanded my name, demanded an explanation. All I could do was apologize and beg his forgiveness, which seemed to be in terribly short supply that day. Finally, I told him he reminded me very much of a deceased friend of mine and that was what had captivated me into gaping at him. My admission must have been convincing, because his severe features softened a bit at that. The man released me with a growl and continued on his way, as did I, although I could hardly catch my breath for the rest of the day.
In the many months since then, I have seen you dozens of times, Holmes, although I have grown much more careful about investigating these occurrences. I no longer chase blindly after your shadow around corners and I do not allow too long a gaze at someone on the street I imagine to be you in deep disguise. I am well aware these events are simply creations of a troubled mind. It has been a situation under manageable control, something I was aware of and could not simply ignore, but that I had learned to accept and try to take in some form of stride. This all had been working as well as could possibly be expected given the circumstances until this very morning.
I have been assisting Lestrade as a police surgeon in a rather curious case. It's a case you would have loved, Holmes: a man with no gun, shot dead by a revolver bullet in a locked room on an inaccessible upper floor. It is exactly the sort of unusual mystery that you lived to sink your teeth into. Lestrade mentioned that himself, as a matter of fact. He misses your presence quite a good deal. There is no one who admired your detective skill more.
This morning was the inquest, which went poorly. Much to my dismay I have discovered that the court does not put nearly as much weight upon the word of a lowly police physician as it once did with the world’s only consulting detective. As such, upon exiting the doors to the court, I was already in a disconcerted mood. What I discovered outside only added to that effect.
On the steps outside the courthouse sat an elderly gentleman with several bundles of antique books under his arms. Despite the curved hunch in his back, there was something strange about the cut of his shoulders. I felt quite sure I had seen them before, and a wave of apprehension consumed me. I tried to hurry by quickly and avoid all interaction with the man if in any way possible, but my nerves caused me to be clumsy and I bumped into him on the stairs, sending his books tumbling to the ground.
Everything after that seemed to occur slowly, as in a dream. As I scooped up the bundled books, eager hands reached out for them. I handed them over and a set of very familiar thin fingers spider-walked their way across the dusty spines and covers. It was impossible to mistake them, for I had in years now past spent countless hours watching them at careful work, countless hours transfixed by their rhythm and elegance. I would know your hands anywhere, Holmes.
Instantly, I realized my heretofore contained form of lunacy was blazing into new, much more alarming territory. I glanced up to meet the man’s eyes to convince myself this was a nothing but a fantasy of my own device. There was little consolation to be found in that fleeting gaze. His eyes were grey, astute and penetrating. And yours. God help me, I felt utterly sure they were yours as they pierced me down to my soul.
I clambered into the first cab I could locate, shaking and sweating. As we rode away, the images of those hands, your hands, danced in my mind. Teasing out clues in scenes of crime, rifling through papers in a sheaf at your desk, grabbing tightly at the bare skin of my wrist in the darkness of a stakeout. All that I had ever seen or dared imagine hovered in my thoughts and could not be abated. Had I conjured this strange spirit? It was not exactly you but at the same time, I knew at the bottom of my heart that there was no one else it could have been.
After only five blocks, in a sheer frenzy, I shouted at the hansom driver to stop and practically leapt out of the still-moving cab. Whatever was left in my wallet was thrown at him and I took off on foot back to the courthouse. I had to see the old man again. I had to know. I had to know for sure, regardless of the consequences.
The steps were empty when I returned. I looked up and down the street, into the courthouse itself, down the shadowed side paths. No sign of the strange old bookseller I had interacted with remained. The passersby, the cab men, the workers at the court, none of them could remember seeing such an odd fellow on the stairs just ten minutes before.
Of course, why would they? It doesn’t take a detective to pry out the truth in this puzzle and it doesn’t take a doctor to make the diagnosis from these symptoms. They did not remember him because he was never there. He was completely an invention of my own diseased mind, trying and failing to bring you back into my life, one piece of you at a time. What he was, was madness. Complete and uncontrollable madness.
How can I keep going this way, Holmes? I am a madman now, fully certifiable. I am no good to anyone, even as a basic medic. How can I treat anyone when I myself am sick beyond any aid, having ornately detailed and ever-increasing delusions? And what comes next, pray tell? I begin having conversations with the ghost I’ve conjured to haunt myself?
No. No. I cannot allow it. Moreover, I will not allow it. And so the decision has been made. This cannot be allowed to continue. I briefly considered a dive into the black, never-ending swirl of the Thames as I walked back from the courthouse, but there is too high a risk of failure in drowning. My service revolver is a much more guaranteed method. Quick and, if I’m a good enough shot, painless. It already sits as a heavy lump in my pocket, waiting for its moment. It will serve out its purpose at my surgery, which will be quiet and empty at this time of the evening, perfect for this.
Holmes, I sincerely hope that I am able to find you in the next life, my dear friend. God knows I never stopped looking for you in this one.
JHW
-------------------------------------------------
The windows of Watson’s surgery were dark when Holmes arrived breathless and gasping from running. He flexed his hands a few times to try to steady them before picking the lock at the door. All the while, cold tendrils of fear gripped at his heart. Could he already be too late?
Impossible, he thought. The doctor could never have beaten him here with his damaged leg, even with the time it took to retrieve and read the letter. The letter. His blood froze solid in his veins all over again at just the thought of it. He carried with him in his pocket Watson's suicide note.
He had to stop this. It was helping no one, certainly not Watson. Holmes pushed the emotion down into the pit of his stomach and tried to focus his mind logically. No, there was no way Watson could have beaten him here. The logic was sound, but the doubt could not be so easily eliminated.
The tumblers inside the lock fell into place with a click and the door opened for him at last. Inside, as he expected (prayed), was no one. He left the lamps unlit and leaned against the wall to wait in the darkness. Watson needed to be well inside when Holmes revealed his presence. He needed to keep him in the room where he could see him, where he could keep him safe.
Two minutes passed and still there was no sign of the doctor. At the sixth minute, Holmes began pacing the floor. What was keeping the man? Panic began to settle upon him. Watson had written in the letter of the Thames, of watching its dark, endless flow. Could he have altered his plan? He could be on a bridge somewhere about to jump at that very moment, and the only person who could stop him was stupidly pacing a hole into the floor of his surgery.
Holmes carried on an intense internal debate about the correct course of action: leave and search for his friend and risk missing his stated planned return, or stay and wait and remain in the dark, both figuratively and literally? Thankfully, the decision was made for him with the metal rattle of a key at the door.
Watson already had his hand in his pocket as he stepped through the door slowly, and Holmes readied himself to tackle him if need be. He had no wish to hurt the doctor, but he would be damned if he was going to allow him to harm himself. For a few tense, unblinking seconds, he kept his vision locked onto Watson’s hand in his pocket.
Finally, the pocket’s contents appeared. Watson pulled out by the neck a freshly-purchased bottle of Scotch, already missing a good three or four swigs of its contents, and took another from it before hiding it back in his pocket. Holmes watched carefully as he lit one of the lamps in the room to bring up the light and then stepped out of the shadows to stand between the doctor and the door, unable to wait any longer.
"Watson, thank God! You're-" Holmes swallowed hard for a split second and began again, slower. "You're here. Watson, please, I beg of you, you must listen very carefully to what I have to say."
Watson froze at the sound of his voice and snapped his neck to look. When his eyes settled upon Holmes, they widened into a look of sheer horror and he gasped audibly. He began backing away, ever quicker, trying desperately to escape what (who) he was seeing. At the back of the room, he ran out of space as his hands hit the wall behind him. With nowhere left to move, Watson dug into his other pocket pulled out his service revolver and pointed it at the approaching detective.
“St-Stay away from me! Get back, I tell you!”
He clenched his eyes shut for an instant as if wishing with all his soul to dissolve the sight in front of him.
“You're not real. I know you're not real! Get away from me!"
Holmes raised his hands to demonstrate his harmlessness and to try to calm his agitated friend, but stood his ground.
"Watson, please listen. I-- oh, no."
The disguise. He was still wearing his disguise. Holmes cursed his own idiocy under his breath. Why had he left his disguise on? The letter had clearly said-- ah, that was why. He had read the letter and simply taken off running without giving his current appearance another thought. This was a terrible mistake made at the worst time possible. Carefully, desperately, he made an effort to explain.
"Wait, Watson, please, allow me to show you. It is only I, your friend, Sherlock Holmes."
He peeled away the false nose covering his own and removed the white wig from his head to unveil his dark, tousled hair.
"You see? It was a disguise only, one which you were quite clever to see straight through earlier today. Please believe me when I tell you I had no intention of frightening you in this way. There can be nothing in this world I wanted less than to alarm you, Watson, you must believe me in that."
Watson looked confused and scared, almost childlike, talking more in an attempt to reassure himself than anything. As he spoke, the gun wavered.
"But... no. No. Holmes is dead -- I was there when it happened. You aren’t real. You are nothing more than a wishful imagination conjured from a diseased mind. Holmes is- Holmes is dead."
"Watson, no. Look at me, please, if you will look, you will see. I am flesh and blood before you. I know I cannot begin to account for the wrong that I have done you, but I stand before you as your friend, Watson. Please, you must listen to me."
The doctor’s entire body shook as he aimed the gun more squarely at Holmes’ chest and cocked the hammer back with a click. The first of a number of tears slipped past the corner of his eye and glided down his cheek leaving a wet trail behind.
"Stop talking, stop talking! Stop this and go away! Please, I am begging you to just go away. Have the decency to allow a suffering man to die in peace!"
Holmes winced as if he'd been kicked in the stomach. Certainly the sensation was the same. He put his hands back up and lowered his head to look less threatening, but didn't move his eyes away from Watson's as he began again to slowly creep toward his friend.
"No. No, I will not. Shoot me if you must, Watson. It is no less than I deserve for what I have done to you. For what I have done to the best man I have ever known, my truest and kindest friend. You may as well shoot me, for I will not have any kind of life without you. Three miserable years have taught me that lesson quite well indeed. Watson, please, please..."
Watson hadn't moved by the time Holmes had made his way across the room. He seemed dazed, lost, and offered no resistance when Holmes reached for the revolver. He dumped the bullets from their chambers into his pocket and threw the gun as far away as he could manage. It clattered with a metallic crash against the wall.
When Holmes turned back to his friend, Watson was watching him with wide, confused, and frightened eyes. Holmes reached for his hands and gripped them tenderly, hoping his touch might break through to him. Watson’s fingers felt so terribly, painfully cold.
The doctor simply shook his head. He looked exhausted, and when he finally spoke again, his voice was small and defeated, barely above a whisper.
"You're not real. He died a long time ago. You can't be real. My Holmes is dead and gone."
The words cut the detective like a thousand shards of glass. His poor, dear friend reminded Holmes of nothing so much as a rabbit stunned still in fear, its body trembling and its heart pounding. It is then it occurred to him, an idea that might work.
"Watson, I can prove it to you!"
In a flash, Holmes shrugged the bookseller's seedy frock coat off his shoulders and tossed it aside. He moved to quickly unbutton his shirt, but found much to his frustration that his hands were shaking now, making this difficult, taking too long. His fingers slipped once, twice, three times before he gave up all pretense at delicacy and simply tore his shirt open. The buttons came flying off at random angles and skittered like skipped stones across the floor. He pulled apart the fabric to expose the taut, pale skin of his breast and pressed Watson's hand flat to it.
"Do you feel that, Doctor? Do you feel it? You remember my methods. Observe and deduce. I am no spectre, no mere figment of your imagination. I am real, John. I am here, I am alive and... and so are you. So are you, my dearest."
With his free hand, Holmes reached out to caress Watson's face gently and rub tears away with his thumb while Watson stared blankly at the back of his hand, transfixed. Holmes pressed it harder with his own until he could feel his heart racing wildly through it as well. Again and again, each heavy beat telegraphed the same insistent message.
Believe me.
Believe me.
Believe me.
Believe me.
Finally, at last, Watson moved his eyes up to meet with Holmes’. They sparkled in the soft light as realization slowly blossomed in them.
“H-Holmes?”
Holmes would have loved to speak, but the best he could do in that moment was expel the breath he’d been holding much too long and nod. The corners of his mouth crept up into the smallest of smiles.
"You... Oh, God, Holmes."
At once, Watson leaned forward and pushed his lips onto Holmes'. The detective lost only a second to wide-eyed surprise before gladly returning his kiss. This was not what he expected at all. It was so far beyond that, beyond anything he had ever allowed himself to hope for. Watson’s hands were roving, up his back and into his hair.
He kissed the doctor with abandon, melting himself completely into him, savoring the taste of him (with just a hint of the tang of Scotch) and the rich smell of castile soap on his skin. Then, strangely, the adventurous fingers tangling in his hair slowed, and then stopped entirely. Holmes broke away from the kiss long enough to say his name, but Watson was already going limp by then, falling deeply into a full swoon.
Holmes caught the doctor’s unconscious body and laid him carefully across his lap on the wood floor. The pulse bounding in his wrist was fast but even. He was fine, merely overwhelmed. Indeed, he wasn't the only one. Holmes loosened Watson’s collar and fished out his trusty flask of brandy. The detective looked at it for a second, then took a long pull on it himself before giving a bit to Watson in an effort to wake him.
The brandy worked its magic, and slowly but surely Watson’s eyes fluttered and focus gradually returned to them.
“Watson. There you are. Welcome back to the land of the living, Doctor.”
Holmes laughed then, incredulous at him, at himself, at everything. His laugh was brief, but the smile after lingered. Watson laughed weakly back, well beyond belief himself.
"The land of... Holmes. It's you. You're here. How on earth did it come to pass that you are here now... with me?"
He unwrapped Holmes' fingers from his wrist and carried them gratefully to his lips. Holmes could only watch, half-faint himself at the indescribable sensation of the tiny kisses that started on his fingertips, moved down through his palm and ended on the inside of his wrist.
Cautiously, with curiosity in his eyes, Watson reached up to touch Holmes’ face. His fingers glided gently, mapping every line, every curve with care as if he were trying to find their lost years apart somewhere inside them. Holmes closed his eyes and bowed his head to allow him to touch everything he wished.
Watson continued exploring with his fingers, down along the strong sinews of Holmes' neck and into the sensitive hollows of his throat. Fingers slipped around his shoulder and into what was left of his shirt. Holmes inhaled sharply as the delicate touch ran down his ribcage, down to trace the scar on his side left from the night he had been stabbed. The doctor’s skilled stitches had made what would have been a vicious scar merely awful.
"I thought I had lost you that day as well."
He was very quiet for a moment as he ran his fingers along the scar once again, then clutched at the detective’s side.
"Don't leave me alone again, Holmes. Please. It is all I ask of you. Don't leave me alone again without you."
Holmes' eyes flashed open to give him a look backed by intensity.
"No, never. I swear that to you, Watson. Never again."
He shifted himself up to kiss Holmes again and the kiss was deep and powerful, unlike anything the detective had ever felt. Watson’s hands kept exploring, anywhere and everywhere, pushing Holmes' shirt off his shoulders, leaving space for his lips to continue the cartography. As he kissed muscular shoulders and prominent collarbones, his hands moved further down to brush by Holmes' now firm erection. He paused and glanced up for their eyes to meet.
Watson was looking at him with desire in his eyes, but beyond that, there was a hungry need, a compelling want there that sent a shiver down Holmes’ spine. He leaned backwards onto his hands and Watson moved down to open his trousers.
Laid bare by the doctor, Holmes shivered, nervous and vulnerable. This was edging very close to simply too much to take. He blinked hard, tried to assemble his thoughts in his mind, but everything evaporated the instant Watson put his mouth upon him. He took him in deeply and Holmes gasped and slipped further back, onto his elbows. He could see dimly that Watson had slid his hand into his own trousers as well and was pleasuring himself as he worked elsewhere with talented lips and tongue.
To describe the sensation of it would be like trying to describe being swept out to sea in an ocean tempest. It was exquisite, intoxicating, and more than anything, overpowering. The warmth of Watson’s body against him, the feel of his mouth, hot and wet, all of this washed over him in waves. Beautiful, perfect, crashing waves.
When Holmes finished, he found he could not do so quietly, and his throaty moans brought the doctor across as well. He ground his hips into Holmes' leg while he shuddered through his own tremors of sensation. Holmes ran his fingers through Watson’s fine, soft hair, relishing the extraordinary texture as their bodies gradually eased. The doctor pushed him back to lie flat on the floor and curled himself around him.
There were words that they both knew needed to be spoken. Explanations that needed to be made, thanks that needed to be given, apologies that needed to be offered, joys that needed to be shouted. But no more words were forthcoming. The verbose detective and his romanticist biographer were both left utterly silent. All that needed to be said was done in motion, as Holmes laced his fingers with Watson's and pulled him in even closer. There would be time enough for words later.
Thank you for reading! Your comments are always greatly appreciated. If you like, you can read more here at my master fic list.
Author:
spacemutineerWord Count: 5827
Characters: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: angst, suicide ideation
Summary: Empty House AU. Watson recognized Holmes in his bookseller's disguise, but it wasn't the first time he had seen him since returning from Reichenbach Falls. He was determined to ensure that it was the last time, however, no matter how much he wished otherwise.
Author's notes: This is an AU blend of both canon and Granada's versions of The Empty House, a remix of sorts of Timing, a terrific piece by
random_nexus, combined with a lovely prompt from the fabulous methylviolet10b (who also did a spectacular job as beta/midwife -- thank you!).Sherlock Holmes shifted his slouched shoulders uncomfortably on the stone steps of the coroner's court and pulled the bundles of books on his lap closer to him. A hunchback was an undesirable choice of disguise, awkward and confining, but he must remain as unrecognizable and easily ignored as possible. The tiger uses the concealment of the forest until precisely the instant it pounces upon its chosen prey.
His prey on this day was one Colonel Sebastian Moran, a dangerous man at cards and an even more dangerous man with an air rifle. But it could be equally fairly stated that his quarry was also one Doctor John Watson, who, like Moran, was due to exit the courthouse within the next minute or two.
Being still was a challenge with this much anxious electricity running through him. He wondered if Watson would seem different now. Three years had come and gone since he had last seen the doctor, sitting on a mossy rock out in the cold clean air of the Austrian Alps, reading a letter of fond goodbye from a man awaiting death. It was hard for Holmes to remember that scene now with any clarity, almost as if it had been in some kind of a dream. Or some kind of a nightmare.
A bustling commotion of voices behind him rose as the audience and participants of the hearing began filing out slowly. His keen ears picked up the particular cadence of the footsteps he was anticipating approaching and he held his breath. As the man passed, Holmes feigned an accidental bump into him and the books fell down the steps with a clatter.
Watson picked them up carefully with apology in his voice, which sounded somehow perfectly untouched by time. Everything about him was exactly, exquisitely as Holmes remembered. Even the scent of him was the same, a blend of his favored, earthy brand of tobacco and the peppery musk of his aftershave. He smelled like Baker Street. He smelled like home.
As the unusual collection was passed back into his hands, Holmes could not resist lifting his head and indulging himself in an all-too-fleeting connected glance. It was tempting fate to allow Watson to catch his eyes, he knew, but it was impossible for him to simply allow the opportunity to pass. Three years had gone by since the last time it had occurred. For three years Holmes had been traveling, exploring the world. And waiting.
He had waited in fourteen countries over three continents. All the while absorbing knowledge, admiring the beauty of exotic lands, discovering forgotten places and hidden secrets. And waiting. Waiting. And now here he was, back in London and in a single instant the long wait came to an end.
There was a steep risk in endangering his cover in this way, of course. Moran had yet to exit the court. If he came upon the joyous reunion of two lost friends, one of whom he had been attempting to assassinate for quite some time, the outcome would be disastrous.
But when their eyes met, he discovered with a shock that his exhilaration was not reflected back at him by Watson. Although there was recognition in his gaze, what struck the detective as he looked into Watson's eyes was the disturbing blend of fear and sadness, like nothing that he had remotely anticipated. He could only barely contain a shivering chill at the sight. What had happened to his friend? Was it Holmes himself?
The doctor shoved the books back at him and quickly hailed the first cab he saw. It was all Holmes could do to suppress the urge to call out to him. To chase after him. To help him. Something for Watson seemed so terribly amiss. The doctor was not a man of superstition. If he was afraid of Holmes, it wasn’t because the man believed him to be a ghost. Something else was very wrong. Holmes could feel it in every muscle in his body. But he could not follow, not yet.
First, he had to trail Moran, the last thread remaining in a vile spiderweb it had taken Holmes three years to destroy, and who at that very instant was himself departing the court in a rush for parts unknown. Holmes took one last look at the cab speeding away, then shuffled after the Colonel in the other direction in the doddering bookseller's gait. He made sure to keep his distance as he followed. The trap must be laid with great care when one wishes to hunt a hunter.
///
By the time he was able to track Watson down, a cool dusk had fallen and Holmes' shoulders were aching dully from bearing the guise of the book collector for the length of the day. The detective found his friend in the last place he could think of to check, and the very last place he had in truth desired to go.
In the very cemetery chosen three years prior to hold an empty coffin and an erroneous headstone, Watson stood, motionless. In his hand, he carried a bundle of fresh tea roses, Holmes’ favorite. He remembered. Holmes concealed himself in the encroaching darkness to observe his friend and the vacant grave before him. For five minutes, the doctor simply stood there staring at the granite marker, adrift in his thoughts.
Finally, with a sharp breath, Watson knelt to place his flowers. He glanced over his shoulder, on watch for any interlopers, although he of course missed the only one that existed. From inside his pocket, he removed a small envelope which he kept palmed and hidden. While one hand laid the bouquet delicately, reverently, on the ground, the other surreptitiously tucked the envelope into a small gap between the stone and the dirt surrounding it, and it disappeared. Watson rose, pulled his coat tighter around himself to counter the evening wind, and walked away briskly without looking back.
When Watson was well out of sight, the detective crept out of the shadows and walked over to stand in front of the grave bearing his name. The sweet scent of Watson’s roses hung in the air about him as he crouched to retrieve the envelope. Inside was a letter written in Watson’s always precise hand, but clearly not actually meant for anyone to see. Anyone living, at least. Holmes stood and leaned to rest on his headstone as he read.
Minutes later, he was running. Running harder and faster than he had in years, he tore through the streets of London after the doctor. There was no time to lose.
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I am beginning this letter to you for the tenth time, Holmes. Perhaps this is the time I shall succeed in getting through it.
You would be angry with me about this if you were here. Of that, I have little doubt. You would be disappointed that I could not match your exquisite bravery with my own in reaching this decision. But Holmes, you knew I never was an equal match for you. Indeed, there is no man on earth who could have been. You were an extraordinary creature, standing tall above and beyond all of us mere mortals of the terrestrial plane. That I was able to walk with you for even a short while through this life was truly my greatest honor. I only can hope that you knew that.
Unfortunately, I can no longer pretend my current situation is a viable one. I have been allowing myself to believe that was the case for some time now, since the day my sweet Mary followed you into the next life. She had been my guide, my anchor to ground in the torrent of emotion and loss that clung to me and would not relent after I returned from those dreadful frigid falls of Reichenbach and you did not.
It was October, cold and damp, when consumption finally lived up to its name fully and took my beautiful bride in the dark of night. Six long months of her agonizing decline had led up to that point. To be honest with you, Holmes, through my tears that terrible morning, I also felt great relief. She had been in so much pain in the weeks leading to the end. She suffered deeply, and all my medical arts and skill save large doses of morphine were useless to aid her as she wasted away before me. But on that dawn, at last, she seemed truly peaceful.
I took care of her arrangements and set off on a long walk to smoke as many cigarettes as I could stand and to attempt in some way to clear my head. I walked for hours in the chill and the grey, with no mind to where I was going or when I should return. That day was the first time I saw you. Or imagined I did, at any rate.
Just out of the corner of my eye, I saw you distinctly, running for cover, dashing to hide behind crates in an alleyway as I passed. I stopped dead in my tracks and turned my head to watch for motion. There was none to be perceived, by my eyes at least. Carefully, I crept to where I had seen you secret yourself away. I had no idea what to expect behind the crate when I rounded it. Objectively, I knew it could not be you. You were dead a year then, and that knowledge held fast and firm inside my mind. It had no effect on my expectations, however. When I finally turned the corner to confront whatever stood there, the area was fully empty. You were not there; indeed no one was there. There was nothing there but empty space.
To describe the incident as unsettling would be an understatement of the facts. I attempted to console myself with my knowledge as a doctor that I had only recently gone through a serious trauma and I could be forgiven for fanciful, some would say delusional, wishful thinking in these circumstances. That thought seemed to help somewhat and enabled me to get through the dark weeks that followed.
But then, as it approached Christmastime, I caught a glimpse of you once again. This time, I noticed you ducking into a shop at the last moment to remain just out of my line of sight. I marched straight into the store to find you. Or confront you. To be honest, I am unsure exactly what I intended to do. And, of course, all the while in the back of my mind, I knew nothing was likely to be there. Certainly not you, Holmes, but how could I resist looking for you all over inside the store when I had only moments ago witnessed your presence there? Can you forgive me this strange indulgence? The clerk was very considerate to me, the most bizarre and befuddled customer he was ever likely to have. I have never gone back to that shop.
A few weeks later, in the early new year, I had my first experience of imagining seeing you in disguise. A man was walking toward me on the street as I was headed to my surgery one morning. He looked to be a boatman of some kind, tough and rugged. I have no idea why I instantly became convinced he was you dressed in costume, Holmes. The man looked nothing like you, walked with an odd stagger and carried about him a demeanor of belligerence and low intelligence. But I remember you as a master of misdirection, excellent at hiding your identity and becoming a new personality when the need to do so arose during a case. It was an unrivaled talent and you would have made an excellent actor, a fact of which I'm sure you were well aware.
I was very rudely and absurdly staring at the man as we walked toward each other, and his scowl grew darker and more menacing with each step he took. When finally he passed me, I found I could not break the stare and turned my head to continue watching him. This was crossing a very serious line. The man became enraged, turned and rushed at me to grab me by my lapels and slam me into the brick wall of the building beside us. He demanded my name, demanded an explanation. All I could do was apologize and beg his forgiveness, which seemed to be in terribly short supply that day. Finally, I told him he reminded me very much of a deceased friend of mine and that was what had captivated me into gaping at him. My admission must have been convincing, because his severe features softened a bit at that. The man released me with a growl and continued on his way, as did I, although I could hardly catch my breath for the rest of the day.
In the many months since then, I have seen you dozens of times, Holmes, although I have grown much more careful about investigating these occurrences. I no longer chase blindly after your shadow around corners and I do not allow too long a gaze at someone on the street I imagine to be you in deep disguise. I am well aware these events are simply creations of a troubled mind. It has been a situation under manageable control, something I was aware of and could not simply ignore, but that I had learned to accept and try to take in some form of stride. This all had been working as well as could possibly be expected given the circumstances until this very morning.
I have been assisting Lestrade as a police surgeon in a rather curious case. It's a case you would have loved, Holmes: a man with no gun, shot dead by a revolver bullet in a locked room on an inaccessible upper floor. It is exactly the sort of unusual mystery that you lived to sink your teeth into. Lestrade mentioned that himself, as a matter of fact. He misses your presence quite a good deal. There is no one who admired your detective skill more.
This morning was the inquest, which went poorly. Much to my dismay I have discovered that the court does not put nearly as much weight upon the word of a lowly police physician as it once did with the world’s only consulting detective. As such, upon exiting the doors to the court, I was already in a disconcerted mood. What I discovered outside only added to that effect.
On the steps outside the courthouse sat an elderly gentleman with several bundles of antique books under his arms. Despite the curved hunch in his back, there was something strange about the cut of his shoulders. I felt quite sure I had seen them before, and a wave of apprehension consumed me. I tried to hurry by quickly and avoid all interaction with the man if in any way possible, but my nerves caused me to be clumsy and I bumped into him on the stairs, sending his books tumbling to the ground.
Everything after that seemed to occur slowly, as in a dream. As I scooped up the bundled books, eager hands reached out for them. I handed them over and a set of very familiar thin fingers spider-walked their way across the dusty spines and covers. It was impossible to mistake them, for I had in years now past spent countless hours watching them at careful work, countless hours transfixed by their rhythm and elegance. I would know your hands anywhere, Holmes.
Instantly, I realized my heretofore contained form of lunacy was blazing into new, much more alarming territory. I glanced up to meet the man’s eyes to convince myself this was a nothing but a fantasy of my own device. There was little consolation to be found in that fleeting gaze. His eyes were grey, astute and penetrating. And yours. God help me, I felt utterly sure they were yours as they pierced me down to my soul.
I clambered into the first cab I could locate, shaking and sweating. As we rode away, the images of those hands, your hands, danced in my mind. Teasing out clues in scenes of crime, rifling through papers in a sheaf at your desk, grabbing tightly at the bare skin of my wrist in the darkness of a stakeout. All that I had ever seen or dared imagine hovered in my thoughts and could not be abated. Had I conjured this strange spirit? It was not exactly you but at the same time, I knew at the bottom of my heart that there was no one else it could have been.
After only five blocks, in a sheer frenzy, I shouted at the hansom driver to stop and practically leapt out of the still-moving cab. Whatever was left in my wallet was thrown at him and I took off on foot back to the courthouse. I had to see the old man again. I had to know. I had to know for sure, regardless of the consequences.
The steps were empty when I returned. I looked up and down the street, into the courthouse itself, down the shadowed side paths. No sign of the strange old bookseller I had interacted with remained. The passersby, the cab men, the workers at the court, none of them could remember seeing such an odd fellow on the stairs just ten minutes before.
Of course, why would they? It doesn’t take a detective to pry out the truth in this puzzle and it doesn’t take a doctor to make the diagnosis from these symptoms. They did not remember him because he was never there. He was completely an invention of my own diseased mind, trying and failing to bring you back into my life, one piece of you at a time. What he was, was madness. Complete and uncontrollable madness.
How can I keep going this way, Holmes? I am a madman now, fully certifiable. I am no good to anyone, even as a basic medic. How can I treat anyone when I myself am sick beyond any aid, having ornately detailed and ever-increasing delusions? And what comes next, pray tell? I begin having conversations with the ghost I’ve conjured to haunt myself?
No. No. I cannot allow it. Moreover, I will not allow it. And so the decision has been made. This cannot be allowed to continue. I briefly considered a dive into the black, never-ending swirl of the Thames as I walked back from the courthouse, but there is too high a risk of failure in drowning. My service revolver is a much more guaranteed method. Quick and, if I’m a good enough shot, painless. It already sits as a heavy lump in my pocket, waiting for its moment. It will serve out its purpose at my surgery, which will be quiet and empty at this time of the evening, perfect for this.
Holmes, I sincerely hope that I am able to find you in the next life, my dear friend. God knows I never stopped looking for you in this one.
JHW
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The windows of Watson’s surgery were dark when Holmes arrived breathless and gasping from running. He flexed his hands a few times to try to steady them before picking the lock at the door. All the while, cold tendrils of fear gripped at his heart. Could he already be too late?
Impossible, he thought. The doctor could never have beaten him here with his damaged leg, even with the time it took to retrieve and read the letter. The letter. His blood froze solid in his veins all over again at just the thought of it. He carried with him in his pocket Watson's suicide note.
He had to stop this. It was helping no one, certainly not Watson. Holmes pushed the emotion down into the pit of his stomach and tried to focus his mind logically. No, there was no way Watson could have beaten him here. The logic was sound, but the doubt could not be so easily eliminated.
The tumblers inside the lock fell into place with a click and the door opened for him at last. Inside, as he expected (prayed), was no one. He left the lamps unlit and leaned against the wall to wait in the darkness. Watson needed to be well inside when Holmes revealed his presence. He needed to keep him in the room where he could see him, where he could keep him safe.
Two minutes passed and still there was no sign of the doctor. At the sixth minute, Holmes began pacing the floor. What was keeping the man? Panic began to settle upon him. Watson had written in the letter of the Thames, of watching its dark, endless flow. Could he have altered his plan? He could be on a bridge somewhere about to jump at that very moment, and the only person who could stop him was stupidly pacing a hole into the floor of his surgery.
Holmes carried on an intense internal debate about the correct course of action: leave and search for his friend and risk missing his stated planned return, or stay and wait and remain in the dark, both figuratively and literally? Thankfully, the decision was made for him with the metal rattle of a key at the door.
Watson already had his hand in his pocket as he stepped through the door slowly, and Holmes readied himself to tackle him if need be. He had no wish to hurt the doctor, but he would be damned if he was going to allow him to harm himself. For a few tense, unblinking seconds, he kept his vision locked onto Watson’s hand in his pocket.
Finally, the pocket’s contents appeared. Watson pulled out by the neck a freshly-purchased bottle of Scotch, already missing a good three or four swigs of its contents, and took another from it before hiding it back in his pocket. Holmes watched carefully as he lit one of the lamps in the room to bring up the light and then stepped out of the shadows to stand between the doctor and the door, unable to wait any longer.
"Watson, thank God! You're-" Holmes swallowed hard for a split second and began again, slower. "You're here. Watson, please, I beg of you, you must listen very carefully to what I have to say."
Watson froze at the sound of his voice and snapped his neck to look. When his eyes settled upon Holmes, they widened into a look of sheer horror and he gasped audibly. He began backing away, ever quicker, trying desperately to escape what (who) he was seeing. At the back of the room, he ran out of space as his hands hit the wall behind him. With nowhere left to move, Watson dug into his other pocket pulled out his service revolver and pointed it at the approaching detective.
“St-Stay away from me! Get back, I tell you!”
He clenched his eyes shut for an instant as if wishing with all his soul to dissolve the sight in front of him.
“You're not real. I know you're not real! Get away from me!"
Holmes raised his hands to demonstrate his harmlessness and to try to calm his agitated friend, but stood his ground.
"Watson, please listen. I-- oh, no."
The disguise. He was still wearing his disguise. Holmes cursed his own idiocy under his breath. Why had he left his disguise on? The letter had clearly said-- ah, that was why. He had read the letter and simply taken off running without giving his current appearance another thought. This was a terrible mistake made at the worst time possible. Carefully, desperately, he made an effort to explain.
"Wait, Watson, please, allow me to show you. It is only I, your friend, Sherlock Holmes."
He peeled away the false nose covering his own and removed the white wig from his head to unveil his dark, tousled hair.
"You see? It was a disguise only, one which you were quite clever to see straight through earlier today. Please believe me when I tell you I had no intention of frightening you in this way. There can be nothing in this world I wanted less than to alarm you, Watson, you must believe me in that."
Watson looked confused and scared, almost childlike, talking more in an attempt to reassure himself than anything. As he spoke, the gun wavered.
"But... no. No. Holmes is dead -- I was there when it happened. You aren’t real. You are nothing more than a wishful imagination conjured from a diseased mind. Holmes is- Holmes is dead."
"Watson, no. Look at me, please, if you will look, you will see. I am flesh and blood before you. I know I cannot begin to account for the wrong that I have done you, but I stand before you as your friend, Watson. Please, you must listen to me."
The doctor’s entire body shook as he aimed the gun more squarely at Holmes’ chest and cocked the hammer back with a click. The first of a number of tears slipped past the corner of his eye and glided down his cheek leaving a wet trail behind.
"Stop talking, stop talking! Stop this and go away! Please, I am begging you to just go away. Have the decency to allow a suffering man to die in peace!"
Holmes winced as if he'd been kicked in the stomach. Certainly the sensation was the same. He put his hands back up and lowered his head to look less threatening, but didn't move his eyes away from Watson's as he began again to slowly creep toward his friend.
"No. No, I will not. Shoot me if you must, Watson. It is no less than I deserve for what I have done to you. For what I have done to the best man I have ever known, my truest and kindest friend. You may as well shoot me, for I will not have any kind of life without you. Three miserable years have taught me that lesson quite well indeed. Watson, please, please..."
Watson hadn't moved by the time Holmes had made his way across the room. He seemed dazed, lost, and offered no resistance when Holmes reached for the revolver. He dumped the bullets from their chambers into his pocket and threw the gun as far away as he could manage. It clattered with a metallic crash against the wall.
When Holmes turned back to his friend, Watson was watching him with wide, confused, and frightened eyes. Holmes reached for his hands and gripped them tenderly, hoping his touch might break through to him. Watson’s fingers felt so terribly, painfully cold.
The doctor simply shook his head. He looked exhausted, and when he finally spoke again, his voice was small and defeated, barely above a whisper.
"You're not real. He died a long time ago. You can't be real. My Holmes is dead and gone."
The words cut the detective like a thousand shards of glass. His poor, dear friend reminded Holmes of nothing so much as a rabbit stunned still in fear, its body trembling and its heart pounding. It is then it occurred to him, an idea that might work.
"Watson, I can prove it to you!"
In a flash, Holmes shrugged the bookseller's seedy frock coat off his shoulders and tossed it aside. He moved to quickly unbutton his shirt, but found much to his frustration that his hands were shaking now, making this difficult, taking too long. His fingers slipped once, twice, three times before he gave up all pretense at delicacy and simply tore his shirt open. The buttons came flying off at random angles and skittered like skipped stones across the floor. He pulled apart the fabric to expose the taut, pale skin of his breast and pressed Watson's hand flat to it.
"Do you feel that, Doctor? Do you feel it? You remember my methods. Observe and deduce. I am no spectre, no mere figment of your imagination. I am real, John. I am here, I am alive and... and so are you. So are you, my dearest."
With his free hand, Holmes reached out to caress Watson's face gently and rub tears away with his thumb while Watson stared blankly at the back of his hand, transfixed. Holmes pressed it harder with his own until he could feel his heart racing wildly through it as well. Again and again, each heavy beat telegraphed the same insistent message.
Believe me.
Believe me.
Believe me.
Believe me.
Finally, at last, Watson moved his eyes up to meet with Holmes’. They sparkled in the soft light as realization slowly blossomed in them.
“H-Holmes?”
Holmes would have loved to speak, but the best he could do in that moment was expel the breath he’d been holding much too long and nod. The corners of his mouth crept up into the smallest of smiles.
"You... Oh, God, Holmes."
At once, Watson leaned forward and pushed his lips onto Holmes'. The detective lost only a second to wide-eyed surprise before gladly returning his kiss. This was not what he expected at all. It was so far beyond that, beyond anything he had ever allowed himself to hope for. Watson’s hands were roving, up his back and into his hair.
He kissed the doctor with abandon, melting himself completely into him, savoring the taste of him (with just a hint of the tang of Scotch) and the rich smell of castile soap on his skin. Then, strangely, the adventurous fingers tangling in his hair slowed, and then stopped entirely. Holmes broke away from the kiss long enough to say his name, but Watson was already going limp by then, falling deeply into a full swoon.
Holmes caught the doctor’s unconscious body and laid him carefully across his lap on the wood floor. The pulse bounding in his wrist was fast but even. He was fine, merely overwhelmed. Indeed, he wasn't the only one. Holmes loosened Watson’s collar and fished out his trusty flask of brandy. The detective looked at it for a second, then took a long pull on it himself before giving a bit to Watson in an effort to wake him.
The brandy worked its magic, and slowly but surely Watson’s eyes fluttered and focus gradually returned to them.
“Watson. There you are. Welcome back to the land of the living, Doctor.”
Holmes laughed then, incredulous at him, at himself, at everything. His laugh was brief, but the smile after lingered. Watson laughed weakly back, well beyond belief himself.
"The land of... Holmes. It's you. You're here. How on earth did it come to pass that you are here now... with me?"
He unwrapped Holmes' fingers from his wrist and carried them gratefully to his lips. Holmes could only watch, half-faint himself at the indescribable sensation of the tiny kisses that started on his fingertips, moved down through his palm and ended on the inside of his wrist.
Cautiously, with curiosity in his eyes, Watson reached up to touch Holmes’ face. His fingers glided gently, mapping every line, every curve with care as if he were trying to find their lost years apart somewhere inside them. Holmes closed his eyes and bowed his head to allow him to touch everything he wished.
Watson continued exploring with his fingers, down along the strong sinews of Holmes' neck and into the sensitive hollows of his throat. Fingers slipped around his shoulder and into what was left of his shirt. Holmes inhaled sharply as the delicate touch ran down his ribcage, down to trace the scar on his side left from the night he had been stabbed. The doctor’s skilled stitches had made what would have been a vicious scar merely awful.
"I thought I had lost you that day as well."
He was very quiet for a moment as he ran his fingers along the scar once again, then clutched at the detective’s side.
"Don't leave me alone again, Holmes. Please. It is all I ask of you. Don't leave me alone again without you."
Holmes' eyes flashed open to give him a look backed by intensity.
"No, never. I swear that to you, Watson. Never again."
He shifted himself up to kiss Holmes again and the kiss was deep and powerful, unlike anything the detective had ever felt. Watson’s hands kept exploring, anywhere and everywhere, pushing Holmes' shirt off his shoulders, leaving space for his lips to continue the cartography. As he kissed muscular shoulders and prominent collarbones, his hands moved further down to brush by Holmes' now firm erection. He paused and glanced up for their eyes to meet.
Watson was looking at him with desire in his eyes, but beyond that, there was a hungry need, a compelling want there that sent a shiver down Holmes’ spine. He leaned backwards onto his hands and Watson moved down to open his trousers.
Laid bare by the doctor, Holmes shivered, nervous and vulnerable. This was edging very close to simply too much to take. He blinked hard, tried to assemble his thoughts in his mind, but everything evaporated the instant Watson put his mouth upon him. He took him in deeply and Holmes gasped and slipped further back, onto his elbows. He could see dimly that Watson had slid his hand into his own trousers as well and was pleasuring himself as he worked elsewhere with talented lips and tongue.
To describe the sensation of it would be like trying to describe being swept out to sea in an ocean tempest. It was exquisite, intoxicating, and more than anything, overpowering. The warmth of Watson’s body against him, the feel of his mouth, hot and wet, all of this washed over him in waves. Beautiful, perfect, crashing waves.
When Holmes finished, he found he could not do so quietly, and his throaty moans brought the doctor across as well. He ground his hips into Holmes' leg while he shuddered through his own tremors of sensation. Holmes ran his fingers through Watson’s fine, soft hair, relishing the extraordinary texture as their bodies gradually eased. The doctor pushed him back to lie flat on the floor and curled himself around him.
There were words that they both knew needed to be spoken. Explanations that needed to be made, thanks that needed to be given, apologies that needed to be offered, joys that needed to be shouted. But no more words were forthcoming. The verbose detective and his romanticist biographer were both left utterly silent. All that needed to be said was done in motion, as Holmes laced his fingers with Watson's and pulled him in even closer. There would be time enough for words later.
Thank you for reading! Your comments are always greatly appreciated. If you like, you can read more here at my master fic list.