Sherlock Fic: Maybe There is a Beast, Maybe It's Only Us
Hey friends and neighbors! It has been a busy busy summer over here at my place. Rest assured that I'm still hard at work on the next installment of the In My Master's House 'verse, which has crept upwards of 25,000 words. But, as it's healthy to give my brain a break from that world once in a while, I participated in sherlockmas's lovely summer fest of fanwork, and produced Something Completely Different!
Title: Maybe There Is a Beast, Maybe It’s Only Us
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Sherlock, John (Gen! I know!)
Author's Note: Written for sherlockmas's Sherlock's Summer Vacay, for the prompt "Sherlock and John get stranded on a remote uninhabited island somewhere in the southern seas." Thanks to redandglenda and jaune_chat
Warnings: Mild violence, brief references to drug use.
Summary: After running afoul of pirates during an investigation, John and Sherlock find themselves stranded and dealing with the deepest of their individual fears.
A web of lightning crackled across the sky and lit up the churning ocean, providing enough light for John to catch a glimpse of a dark form sinking among the waves. In the thundering darkness, John dove forward and down. His hand caught on wet cloth. He held on tight and kicked until he broke the surface and could gulp in another breath.
Without relinquishing his grip, he managed to wrap his arm around Sherlock’s chest and pull him backwards. Sherlock’s head flopped back against John’s shoulder. John caught a glimpse of blood before another wave crashed over them.
--
In the pre-dawn light, John sat on the wet sand with Sherlock propped up against his chest. Near-drowning might not be his area, but he had years of familiarity with Sherlock’s various states of altered consciousness, and a concussion should be well within the range of his ability to treat. If it was a concussion. If a blow to the head from the butt end of a rifle followed by a 20-foot uncontrolled fall into the ocean hadn’t done Sherlock permanent damage.
John rested his cheek against Sherlock’s tangled mess of hair and breathed in. He couldn’t smell anything but the salty cold of the sea.
--
John returned from a quick scouting expedition to find Sherlock curled up in the nest of clothes and leaves John had made for him among the trees overlooking the beach. Sherlock thrashed, and muttered under his breath; John couldn’t pick out the words. He dropped to his knees by Sherlock’s side. If the cut on his head had got infected... If he had a fever... John reached out to touch Sherlock’s forehead.
Sherlock jerked back. His eyes flew open. “John.” He squinted against the bright afternoon light shining through the foliage. “I dreamt we were pirates.”
John sat back on his heels and laughed.
--
“I’d rather not drink from standing water, if we can help it,” John said when they found the pond.
“The average rainfall in this area is 150 millimetres a month.” Sherlock began rooting around under the trees. “We ought to have no difficulty maintaining an adequate water supply.”
“Pack a rain barrel, did you?”
Sherlock dragged a small downed tree out of the forest. “You have a knife. We can carve what we need.”
“That seems a lot of time to invest in- “
“Are you too busy, then?” Sherlock snapped.
“No.” John squinted down at the discarded log as Sherlock strode away into the trees.
--
John lay looking up at the stars through the canopy of leaves. “You think we’re going to be here a long time.”
Beside him, Sherlock said nothing.
“Someone will come looking for us. Your brother.”
“The route we took after Brisbane bore no resemblance to the itinerary Captain Miraz provided.”
“Someone else will happen by. We’ll build a signal fire, a-“
“Miraz chose this route because it’s remote, to minimize the risk of someone stumbling across his operation. If anything, a signal fire would alert his allies to the fact we survived. They’d find us long before any rescuers.” Sherlock rolled over, turning his back to John.
“Mycroft?”
Sherlock remained silent a long time. Then he said, “There are thousands of miles of ocean. Even I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“Alright.” John folded his hands over his chest. “Tomorrow I’ll get started on that water trough.”
--
John dipped his fingers into the rough-hewn bowl that contained-John was fairly certain-aloe, and applied it to his patient’s shoulder.
Sherlock hissed and pulled away. “That stings, John!”
“Then don’t stand out in the sun, you lunatic.” John rubbed the probably-aloe onto the bright red skin of Sherlock’s nape.
“You’re one to talk. Your tan is deeper than when I first met you. And the beard. Rustic life suits you.”
“I’m adaptable. Anyway, your beard is-“
“Don’t say anything.”
John smirked behind his hand. “You’ll get used to it.”
--
Muddy prints frequently appeared in the ground by the pond, but it wasn’t until John trekked further into the trees in search of fruit that he saw a group of the animals wallowing in a glen. When he reported his finding, he frowned at look of childish delight on Sherlock’s face.
“No,” John said quickly. “I’ve read my Golding. We are not hunting feral pigs. That way lies madness.”
“Please, John. The two of us are hardly likely to cast aside all rules of society and return to a savage state when left to our own devices. We’re not children.”
“Some of your acquaintances might beg to differ,” John chuckled. “Lestrade, for one.”
Sherlock’s delighted grin faded entirely away.
--
“The garlic bread at Angelo’s,” John said on the walk back from the pond.
“A proper kettle,” Sherlock shot back.
“Crap telly.”
“A microscope.”
“My warm, dry bed.”
“My violin.”
“I actually miss your playing.”
“Is that your go?”
“Yes, your playing.”
“A case. Any kind of case. Something.”
“Sherlock.”
Sherlock walked faster, swishing a stick in front of him to beat back the underbrush. “A box of nicotine patches. Or heroin. No, cocaine.”
“Don’t.”
Sherlock whirled around. “As long as we’re wishing for things we can’t have, why not?”
John stepped past him and kept walking. “Come help figure out the new cover for the rain barrel.”
“It won’t help,” Sherlock called after him.
“Come anyway?” John asked. He waited for Sherlock to catch him up.
--
John ran towards the sounds of inhuman screaming to find Sherlock in a clearing by the pond; he’d buried one of his sharp wooden sticks in the side of a bristly wild pig, the source of the screaming. Sherlock tried to pull his spear free, but the animal’s thrashing knocked him off balance; he tripped on the uneven ground and fell.
Another boar charged out of the underbrush towards Sherlock’s supine form. John snatched a rock from the ground and hurled it at the boar. It turned and rushed toward him, lowering its wicked tusks. A pivot turn took John out of the animal’s path, and a quick thrust of his knife into its throat sent a warm arc of blood spraying across the ground and across John.
--
“Meat, John,” Sherlock explained as John supported him on his twisted ankle. “You said yourself we needed protein.”
“You could have been killed!”
“They’re only animals.”
“Wild boars with pointy tusks that could rip out your guts. I wouldn’t be able to patch you back together.”
“You’d manage somehow.”
“No.” John shoved Sherlock against a tree that towered over the canopy. “No, you wanker. You nearly drowned the night we came here. Watching them throw you off the deck, it was like I was back there again, watching you fall. You’re always the one leaving. You will not leave me alone here. It’s not... You just can’t.” He started to pull away, but Sherlock held on.
“Alright, John.” Sherlock bowed his head. “Alright.”
--
When the beach got too quiet, John went seeking Sherlock, and found him motionless under a tree with his hands steepled under his chin and his eyes closed.
“What are you doing? Counting the ants that crawl over your toes?”
“Nothing.”
“That seems unlikely.”
Sherlock’s eyes opened slowly. “There is no work, John.”
“If you’re bored, there’s firewood to cut, a snare to fix-“
“My work. The work.” Sherlock buried his hands in his too-long hair and held on.
“It’ll be there when we get back.”
“It must be nice to have so much room in your empty head for blind optimism.” Sherlock pushed himself upright against the tree and went crashing through the woods, heedless of any path.
--
Sunset as seen from the ridge above their beach rivalled Afghanistan for beauty. John couldn’t rank the view above the one from the sitting room at Baker Street, but perhaps that was personal sentiment rather than objective truth.
Sherlock sat watching John watch the sunset until John stood. “Shall we go down?”
Sherlock didn’t move. “I can’t read the clues here, John. My method depends on data. I’ve done no experiments on South Seas fauna or tide patterns around tropical islands. I can’t make bricks without straw.”
“Bricks would do us sod-all good.”
“Forty-seven.”
“Pardon?”
“The numbers of scenarios I’ve rejected for getting us off this wretched island. None of it works out.”
“How can you be sure--?”
“I’m sure.” Sherlock stood. “Let’s go down.”
--
Sherlock slept better on the island than he ever had at Baker Street, diverted by blogs and body parts. That meant when John woke up to a single sliver of moon glowing through the trees, he had no difficulty lighting a torch from the banked embers in their fire pit and stealing into the woods.
At the top of the path up the ridge, he stood watching silver light play on the ocean waves. Then he held the torch against the dry leaves of a fern at the edge of the tree line until flames danced from that plant to the next.
Back at the beach, John knelt next to Sherlock and squeezed his shoulder. “Get up,” he said when Sherlock’s eyes fluttered open. “We need to stand in the water for a bit.”
--
The pirates arrived several hours before the Royal Navy, which only meant that all the men who had come ashore to be led by Sherlock and John on a merry chase through the still-smoking island had nowhere to run.
Crouched behind a rocky outcropping near the pond, John kept an eye on the smouldering trees as he listened for the movements of pirates or rescuers.
Sherlock returned from a circuit of the clearing to press himself against the rock beside John. “Burning the entire forest would have been scenario forty-eight, I’m sure,” he said.
“It worked in Lord of the Flies,” John pointed out.
“Must have deleted it,” Sherlock muttered.
“Mr. Holmes! Dr. Watson?” someone shouted, from the direction of the beach.
John grinned. “That’d be our ride.”
--
Sitting in the captain’s quarters on the HMS Dauntless, Sherlock accepted being wrapped in a thick blanket without a word of protest. He peered out at John through shaggy locks of sooty hair. “My calculations put the probability of surviving a direct confrontation with the pirates at less than twenty percent.”
“I hadn’t really done the maths.” John scrubbed his hands together; dirt streaked his fingers, but there was no blood. “The risk of staying had started to outweigh other concerns.”
“Oh.” Sherlock pulled the blanket more tightly around his shoulders. “Then thank you. For the rescue.”
“I couldn’t have done it alone,” John said.
Sherlock reached out his hand, still smudged with dirt and ash. John took it. “I’ll try to ensure you never need to.”
Title: Maybe There Is a Beast, Maybe It’s Only Us
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Sherlock, John (Gen! I know!)
Author's Note: Written for sherlockmas's Sherlock's Summer Vacay, for the prompt "Sherlock and John get stranded on a remote uninhabited island somewhere in the southern seas." Thanks to redandglenda and jaune_chat
Warnings: Mild violence, brief references to drug use.
Summary: After running afoul of pirates during an investigation, John and Sherlock find themselves stranded and dealing with the deepest of their individual fears.
A web of lightning crackled across the sky and lit up the churning ocean, providing enough light for John to catch a glimpse of a dark form sinking among the waves. In the thundering darkness, John dove forward and down. His hand caught on wet cloth. He held on tight and kicked until he broke the surface and could gulp in another breath.
Without relinquishing his grip, he managed to wrap his arm around Sherlock’s chest and pull him backwards. Sherlock’s head flopped back against John’s shoulder. John caught a glimpse of blood before another wave crashed over them.
--
In the pre-dawn light, John sat on the wet sand with Sherlock propped up against his chest. Near-drowning might not be his area, but he had years of familiarity with Sherlock’s various states of altered consciousness, and a concussion should be well within the range of his ability to treat. If it was a concussion. If a blow to the head from the butt end of a rifle followed by a 20-foot uncontrolled fall into the ocean hadn’t done Sherlock permanent damage.
John rested his cheek against Sherlock’s tangled mess of hair and breathed in. He couldn’t smell anything but the salty cold of the sea.
--
John returned from a quick scouting expedition to find Sherlock curled up in the nest of clothes and leaves John had made for him among the trees overlooking the beach. Sherlock thrashed, and muttered under his breath; John couldn’t pick out the words. He dropped to his knees by Sherlock’s side. If the cut on his head had got infected... If he had a fever... John reached out to touch Sherlock’s forehead.
Sherlock jerked back. His eyes flew open. “John.” He squinted against the bright afternoon light shining through the foliage. “I dreamt we were pirates.”
John sat back on his heels and laughed.
--
“I’d rather not drink from standing water, if we can help it,” John said when they found the pond.
“The average rainfall in this area is 150 millimetres a month.” Sherlock began rooting around under the trees. “We ought to have no difficulty maintaining an adequate water supply.”
“Pack a rain barrel, did you?”
Sherlock dragged a small downed tree out of the forest. “You have a knife. We can carve what we need.”
“That seems a lot of time to invest in- “
“Are you too busy, then?” Sherlock snapped.
“No.” John squinted down at the discarded log as Sherlock strode away into the trees.
--
John lay looking up at the stars through the canopy of leaves. “You think we’re going to be here a long time.”
Beside him, Sherlock said nothing.
“Someone will come looking for us. Your brother.”
“The route we took after Brisbane bore no resemblance to the itinerary Captain Miraz provided.”
“Someone else will happen by. We’ll build a signal fire, a-“
“Miraz chose this route because it’s remote, to minimize the risk of someone stumbling across his operation. If anything, a signal fire would alert his allies to the fact we survived. They’d find us long before any rescuers.” Sherlock rolled over, turning his back to John.
“Mycroft?”
Sherlock remained silent a long time. Then he said, “There are thousands of miles of ocean. Even I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“Alright.” John folded his hands over his chest. “Tomorrow I’ll get started on that water trough.”
--
John dipped his fingers into the rough-hewn bowl that contained-John was fairly certain-aloe, and applied it to his patient’s shoulder.
Sherlock hissed and pulled away. “That stings, John!”
“Then don’t stand out in the sun, you lunatic.” John rubbed the probably-aloe onto the bright red skin of Sherlock’s nape.
“You’re one to talk. Your tan is deeper than when I first met you. And the beard. Rustic life suits you.”
“I’m adaptable. Anyway, your beard is-“
“Don’t say anything.”
John smirked behind his hand. “You’ll get used to it.”
--
Muddy prints frequently appeared in the ground by the pond, but it wasn’t until John trekked further into the trees in search of fruit that he saw a group of the animals wallowing in a glen. When he reported his finding, he frowned at look of childish delight on Sherlock’s face.
“No,” John said quickly. “I’ve read my Golding. We are not hunting feral pigs. That way lies madness.”
“Please, John. The two of us are hardly likely to cast aside all rules of society and return to a savage state when left to our own devices. We’re not children.”
“Some of your acquaintances might beg to differ,” John chuckled. “Lestrade, for one.”
Sherlock’s delighted grin faded entirely away.
--
“The garlic bread at Angelo’s,” John said on the walk back from the pond.
“A proper kettle,” Sherlock shot back.
“Crap telly.”
“A microscope.”
“My warm, dry bed.”
“My violin.”
“I actually miss your playing.”
“Is that your go?”
“Yes, your playing.”
“A case. Any kind of case. Something.”
“Sherlock.”
Sherlock walked faster, swishing a stick in front of him to beat back the underbrush. “A box of nicotine patches. Or heroin. No, cocaine.”
“Don’t.”
Sherlock whirled around. “As long as we’re wishing for things we can’t have, why not?”
John stepped past him and kept walking. “Come help figure out the new cover for the rain barrel.”
“It won’t help,” Sherlock called after him.
“Come anyway?” John asked. He waited for Sherlock to catch him up.
--
John ran towards the sounds of inhuman screaming to find Sherlock in a clearing by the pond; he’d buried one of his sharp wooden sticks in the side of a bristly wild pig, the source of the screaming. Sherlock tried to pull his spear free, but the animal’s thrashing knocked him off balance; he tripped on the uneven ground and fell.
Another boar charged out of the underbrush towards Sherlock’s supine form. John snatched a rock from the ground and hurled it at the boar. It turned and rushed toward him, lowering its wicked tusks. A pivot turn took John out of the animal’s path, and a quick thrust of his knife into its throat sent a warm arc of blood spraying across the ground and across John.
--
“Meat, John,” Sherlock explained as John supported him on his twisted ankle. “You said yourself we needed protein.”
“You could have been killed!”
“They’re only animals.”
“Wild boars with pointy tusks that could rip out your guts. I wouldn’t be able to patch you back together.”
“You’d manage somehow.”
“No.” John shoved Sherlock against a tree that towered over the canopy. “No, you wanker. You nearly drowned the night we came here. Watching them throw you off the deck, it was like I was back there again, watching you fall. You’re always the one leaving. You will not leave me alone here. It’s not... You just can’t.” He started to pull away, but Sherlock held on.
“Alright, John.” Sherlock bowed his head. “Alright.”
--
When the beach got too quiet, John went seeking Sherlock, and found him motionless under a tree with his hands steepled under his chin and his eyes closed.
“What are you doing? Counting the ants that crawl over your toes?”
“Nothing.”
“That seems unlikely.”
Sherlock’s eyes opened slowly. “There is no work, John.”
“If you’re bored, there’s firewood to cut, a snare to fix-“
“My work. The work.” Sherlock buried his hands in his too-long hair and held on.
“It’ll be there when we get back.”
“It must be nice to have so much room in your empty head for blind optimism.” Sherlock pushed himself upright against the tree and went crashing through the woods, heedless of any path.
--
Sunset as seen from the ridge above their beach rivalled Afghanistan for beauty. John couldn’t rank the view above the one from the sitting room at Baker Street, but perhaps that was personal sentiment rather than objective truth.
Sherlock sat watching John watch the sunset until John stood. “Shall we go down?”
Sherlock didn’t move. “I can’t read the clues here, John. My method depends on data. I’ve done no experiments on South Seas fauna or tide patterns around tropical islands. I can’t make bricks without straw.”
“Bricks would do us sod-all good.”
“Forty-seven.”
“Pardon?”
“The numbers of scenarios I’ve rejected for getting us off this wretched island. None of it works out.”
“How can you be sure--?”
“I’m sure.” Sherlock stood. “Let’s go down.”
--
Sherlock slept better on the island than he ever had at Baker Street, diverted by blogs and body parts. That meant when John woke up to a single sliver of moon glowing through the trees, he had no difficulty lighting a torch from the banked embers in their fire pit and stealing into the woods.
At the top of the path up the ridge, he stood watching silver light play on the ocean waves. Then he held the torch against the dry leaves of a fern at the edge of the tree line until flames danced from that plant to the next.
Back at the beach, John knelt next to Sherlock and squeezed his shoulder. “Get up,” he said when Sherlock’s eyes fluttered open. “We need to stand in the water for a bit.”
--
The pirates arrived several hours before the Royal Navy, which only meant that all the men who had come ashore to be led by Sherlock and John on a merry chase through the still-smoking island had nowhere to run.
Crouched behind a rocky outcropping near the pond, John kept an eye on the smouldering trees as he listened for the movements of pirates or rescuers.
Sherlock returned from a circuit of the clearing to press himself against the rock beside John. “Burning the entire forest would have been scenario forty-eight, I’m sure,” he said.
“It worked in Lord of the Flies,” John pointed out.
“Must have deleted it,” Sherlock muttered.
“Mr. Holmes! Dr. Watson?” someone shouted, from the direction of the beach.
John grinned. “That’d be our ride.”
--
Sitting in the captain’s quarters on the HMS Dauntless, Sherlock accepted being wrapped in a thick blanket without a word of protest. He peered out at John through shaggy locks of sooty hair. “My calculations put the probability of surviving a direct confrontation with the pirates at less than twenty percent.”
“I hadn’t really done the maths.” John scrubbed his hands together; dirt streaked his fingers, but there was no blood. “The risk of staying had started to outweigh other concerns.”
“Oh.” Sherlock pulled the blanket more tightly around his shoulders. “Then thank you. For the rescue.”
“I couldn’t have done it alone,” John said.
Sherlock reached out his hand, still smudged with dirt and ash. John took it. “I’ll try to ensure you never need to.”