Stuffs and Whatnots
4ip4irgan has translated two more SGA stories into Russian (*squee*): Incorporating a Few Slight Adjustments can be found here and The End of the World as We Know It is over here. Needless to say, this is again very flattering. ♥
Also, WIP-dump, because clearly I'm never going to finish these and they're driving me crazy. If anyone wants to pick them up, please be my guest.
+++++
BBC Sherlock, Untitled Hound of the Baskervilles AU
John Watson lost his life when he was 32.
Oh, he didn't die. That would have been too easy.
Everything would have been much easier if he'd died.
~~~
He comes to with the taste of blood in his mouth and dirt under his fingernails.
A rabbit, he tells himself. Except there's no fur stuck between his teeth. A baby rabbit. Perhaps a snake; there's all kinds on the moor.
He knows better.
He finds a newspaper, later, once he's dressed and cleaned and feeling almost human. There's an article on the fifth page, about a local nobleman dying of a heart attack last night.
John knows better there, too.
~~~
He never learned the girl's name. She died right there in the A & E, struggling and crying, and afterwards John didn't exactly have the time to ask.
Her brother's name was Jack Stapleton. John ran no risk of forgetting him.
~~~
The nobleman's nephew arrives two days later from the States. The sudden heir of a title and a fortune. John doesn't envy him, uprooted from his life like that.
He doesn't come alone. There's a man with him; a detective, the newspaper says, to look into the old man's death.
John wishes him all the luck in the world.
"Remember dear Harriet," is all Stapleton says. Keep your mouth shut, is what he means.
"People don't believe in werewolves," John says. He won't figure it out anyway.
"Just remember."
As if he could ever forget.
~~~
She bit him. It didn't even hurt.
~~~
He doesn't expect to run into the detective, out there on the moor.
"Sherlock Holmes," the man says.
A lifetime ago - four years, forever - John knew how to do this. Introductions, small talk. He was good at it. Now, he flounders.
"Hello," he says eventually. The detective - Holmes - probably thinks he's the village idiot.
Holmes studies him for a moment. "Interesting."
+++++
BBC Sherlock, Untitled Sleeping Beauty AU
0.
The King already had a son.
In the end, that was what it came down to. The King already had a son, an earnest boy of seven years' age who would make a good ruler one day. All the necessary precautions had been taken, all the treaties signed with the faeriefolk, and so what if the second child didn't get a baker's dozen godmothers? One was perfectly adequate, wasn't she? There was no need for a small kingdom to throw a costly state dinner for a second son.
And so, in his security, the King forgot that while one had to think very carefully about whom to invite into one's home, it was equally as important whom one didn't invite.
For every faerie who is chosen as godmother, there is another one who holds a grudge.
~~~
1.
John was only there on a bet.
After the United Albion army had decided that a wounded soldier was even more of a liability than no soldier at all, he'd been sent home with a small pouch of copper coins and a slap on the shoulder. The right one. The good one. There weren't a lot of things a soldier could do on his own, especially if he still suffered from nightmares that sent his sister into a fright when he screamed.
Enter the bet. There was a small kingdom in a corner of Albion which no man or woman had been able to enter for a hundred years, his drinking buddies said. Enchanted, or possibly cursed, with dozens of optimistic princes rotting in the hedges at its borders, they said. A hundred quid a month if you make it in, they said.
A man could get very far on that kind of money.
And so there John was, his trusty army sword - which, technically, he wasn't supposed to have - hacking away at thorns and bramble, cutting through them like glass through skin. He made it through the hedges, and that alone would have been enough for his friends to pay him off, but by then he was curious. So many dead men tangled in the growth. What had they come for?
He went on. Made it into the small kingdom of Middlish Thames and across the river which had named it. Made it to the castle and across its courtyard, where people and horses and chickens slept as if they had all just decided to take a nap. Made it to the highest tower, because towers are where secrets are hidden.
And there he found him.
Had to be another prince from the looks of him; a lanky, well-dressed figure sprawled across a worn-out sofa. He was tall, and pale, with curly dark hair and long, thin fingers. A needle-less syringe was clutched in his hand. He was sleeping with his mouth partway open. He was around 30.
He was beautiful.
John stepped closer to the sofa, drawn by… he couldn't say what. It might have been the small frown line between the man's brows, that didn't smooth away even when John ran his thumb across it. It might have been his cheek, cool beneath the eye but warmer against the nose, or the slight flush that spread when John brushed his fingers over it. It might have been his lower lip, full and rosy and looking so soft.
John couldn't help himself.
He kissed him.
~~~
2.
The man's eyes fluttered open, pale blue and piercing, sharpening as they looked John up and down. The man snorted.
"Well. Hardly."
~~~
3.
The man was indeed a prince, and his name was Sherlock.
"Persia or the Land of the Blue Archway?" he asked. "Never mind," he added before John could even draw a breath, "either is ghastly. You're a soldier, recently returned from the state of your sword and the lines on your skin. You favour your right leg, but it's the shoulder which has been wounded. Curious. You're not too well off and you don't know what to do with yourself, hence your presence here. A bet? Must've been. Now, I'm sure you're a perfectly pleasant…" and there was that appraising look again, "…person, but this simply will not do."
John swallowed.
"There hasn't been a war in Persia for at least thirty years," he said, the first thing that came to his mind.
Sherlock shrugged. "Politics. Dull." He paused. "The Blue Archway?"
"Flared up again," John confirmed, half-annoyed and half-amused at Sherlock's dismissive rudeness. "And what do you mean, this simply will not do?"
That's how John learned he was betrothed to Middlish Thames's younger prince.
+++++
BBC Sherlock, Untitled John-is-a-professional-assassin semi-AU
Embarrassingly enough, their first meeting went something like this:
Sherlock was on a case, the first real one in weeks after London's criminals had suddenly grown inexplicably shy about their chosen profession, and he'd chased his suspect into an alley, only to find that the man had disappeared.
"Where did he go?" he demanded of the smallish, plain-looking man who had just stepped out of a narrow building. "No, don't bother," he added, seeing that the man still had one hand on the doorknob. He couldn't have seen anything. Sherlock briefly considered the man as an accomplice, but the sheer unassuming air around him - the bloke was wearing a jacket with patches, for goodness' sake - made him discard that thought.
His phone rang. Sherlock slapped his hand against the wall in frustration and took a breath before he picked up.
"Sherlock Holmes."
"Sherlock!" Lestrade sounded frazzled; the DCI must be taking a personal interest again. "Tell me you have something."
"Walter Hanau," Sherlock trotted out, "son of German immigrants. [blah blah deductions blah]"
Stunned silence came from the other end of the line. Sherlock hung up with a flourish, a pleased smile on his lips.
"That was brilliant."
Sherlock spun around. He'd forgotten about the man, but he was still standing there, hand on the doorknob, watching Sherlock with open admiration.
Sherlock blinked.
"You think so?" Observation wasn't a particularly challenging skill to cultivate, but he was used to wariness as a reaction rather than applause.
"Of course." The man nodded "That was quite extraordinary." He tilted his head. "Buy you a cuppa?"
"Pardon?"
"You don't seem like the beer-drinking sort, so the pub's right out," the man said, either not noticing or ignoring Sherlock's immense… surprise, for want of a better word. "The Criterion's not far from here. They make a great coffee."
Sherlock looked the man up and down. Military posture; slight tan; peculiar brand of boots. Russian? Interesting. Not nearly interesting enough, however.
"Suppose you're busy, huh?" the man said with a self-depreciating little smile.
"Yes." Sherlock returned the smile with an insincere one of his own. "Sorry."
The man laughed unexpectedly. "No, you're not."
"I'm not," Sherlock agreed, and winked.
"Next time then," the man said as Sherlock strode out of the alley.
Sherlock didn't think so.
~~~
Walter Hanau turned up dead two days later, in the narrow house Sherlock had dismissed as an unlikely hiding place.
"Clean shot." Lestrade sounded reluctantly impressed. "Looks like this was done by a professional."
Personally, Sherlock thought that 'this' had been done by a smallish, plain-looking man with a military posture and apparently nerves of steel, with enough cheek to ask someone on a date while the body of his victim cooled behind the door he had his hand on.
Marvellous.
"Do you want me to look into it?" Sherlock asked casually.
"No need." Lestrade sighed. "Turns out the sudden rise of confessions is because The Soldier is in town. No one wants to be on his hit list, and they all think they're safer behind bars."
+++
Obviously, I know how these would have progressed, but I'm too lazy to write it. As I said above, if anyone wants to take them, do with them as you please.
Also, WIP-dump, because clearly I'm never going to finish these and they're driving me crazy. If anyone wants to pick them up, please be my guest.
+++++
BBC Sherlock, Untitled Hound of the Baskervilles AU
John Watson lost his life when he was 32.
Oh, he didn't die. That would have been too easy.
Everything would have been much easier if he'd died.
~~~
He comes to with the taste of blood in his mouth and dirt under his fingernails.
A rabbit, he tells himself. Except there's no fur stuck between his teeth. A baby rabbit. Perhaps a snake; there's all kinds on the moor.
He knows better.
He finds a newspaper, later, once he's dressed and cleaned and feeling almost human. There's an article on the fifth page, about a local nobleman dying of a heart attack last night.
John knows better there, too.
~~~
He never learned the girl's name. She died right there in the A & E, struggling and crying, and afterwards John didn't exactly have the time to ask.
Her brother's name was Jack Stapleton. John ran no risk of forgetting him.
~~~
The nobleman's nephew arrives two days later from the States. The sudden heir of a title and a fortune. John doesn't envy him, uprooted from his life like that.
He doesn't come alone. There's a man with him; a detective, the newspaper says, to look into the old man's death.
John wishes him all the luck in the world.
"Remember dear Harriet," is all Stapleton says. Keep your mouth shut, is what he means.
"People don't believe in werewolves," John says. He won't figure it out anyway.
"Just remember."
As if he could ever forget.
~~~
She bit him. It didn't even hurt.
~~~
He doesn't expect to run into the detective, out there on the moor.
"Sherlock Holmes," the man says.
A lifetime ago - four years, forever - John knew how to do this. Introductions, small talk. He was good at it. Now, he flounders.
"Hello," he says eventually. The detective - Holmes - probably thinks he's the village idiot.
Holmes studies him for a moment. "Interesting."
+++++
BBC Sherlock, Untitled Sleeping Beauty AU
0.
The King already had a son.
In the end, that was what it came down to. The King already had a son, an earnest boy of seven years' age who would make a good ruler one day. All the necessary precautions had been taken, all the treaties signed with the faeriefolk, and so what if the second child didn't get a baker's dozen godmothers? One was perfectly adequate, wasn't she? There was no need for a small kingdom to throw a costly state dinner for a second son.
And so, in his security, the King forgot that while one had to think very carefully about whom to invite into one's home, it was equally as important whom one didn't invite.
For every faerie who is chosen as godmother, there is another one who holds a grudge.
~~~
1.
John was only there on a bet.
After the United Albion army had decided that a wounded soldier was even more of a liability than no soldier at all, he'd been sent home with a small pouch of copper coins and a slap on the shoulder. The right one. The good one. There weren't a lot of things a soldier could do on his own, especially if he still suffered from nightmares that sent his sister into a fright when he screamed.
Enter the bet. There was a small kingdom in a corner of Albion which no man or woman had been able to enter for a hundred years, his drinking buddies said. Enchanted, or possibly cursed, with dozens of optimistic princes rotting in the hedges at its borders, they said. A hundred quid a month if you make it in, they said.
A man could get very far on that kind of money.
And so there John was, his trusty army sword - which, technically, he wasn't supposed to have - hacking away at thorns and bramble, cutting through them like glass through skin. He made it through the hedges, and that alone would have been enough for his friends to pay him off, but by then he was curious. So many dead men tangled in the growth. What had they come for?
He went on. Made it into the small kingdom of Middlish Thames and across the river which had named it. Made it to the castle and across its courtyard, where people and horses and chickens slept as if they had all just decided to take a nap. Made it to the highest tower, because towers are where secrets are hidden.
And there he found him.
Had to be another prince from the looks of him; a lanky, well-dressed figure sprawled across a worn-out sofa. He was tall, and pale, with curly dark hair and long, thin fingers. A needle-less syringe was clutched in his hand. He was sleeping with his mouth partway open. He was around 30.
He was beautiful.
John stepped closer to the sofa, drawn by… he couldn't say what. It might have been the small frown line between the man's brows, that didn't smooth away even when John ran his thumb across it. It might have been his cheek, cool beneath the eye but warmer against the nose, or the slight flush that spread when John brushed his fingers over it. It might have been his lower lip, full and rosy and looking so soft.
John couldn't help himself.
He kissed him.
~~~
2.
The man's eyes fluttered open, pale blue and piercing, sharpening as they looked John up and down. The man snorted.
"Well. Hardly."
~~~
3.
The man was indeed a prince, and his name was Sherlock.
"Persia or the Land of the Blue Archway?" he asked. "Never mind," he added before John could even draw a breath, "either is ghastly. You're a soldier, recently returned from the state of your sword and the lines on your skin. You favour your right leg, but it's the shoulder which has been wounded. Curious. You're not too well off and you don't know what to do with yourself, hence your presence here. A bet? Must've been. Now, I'm sure you're a perfectly pleasant…" and there was that appraising look again, "…person, but this simply will not do."
John swallowed.
"There hasn't been a war in Persia for at least thirty years," he said, the first thing that came to his mind.
Sherlock shrugged. "Politics. Dull." He paused. "The Blue Archway?"
"Flared up again," John confirmed, half-annoyed and half-amused at Sherlock's dismissive rudeness. "And what do you mean, this simply will not do?"
That's how John learned he was betrothed to Middlish Thames's younger prince.
+++++
BBC Sherlock, Untitled John-is-a-professional-assassin semi-AU
Embarrassingly enough, their first meeting went something like this:
Sherlock was on a case, the first real one in weeks after London's criminals had suddenly grown inexplicably shy about their chosen profession, and he'd chased his suspect into an alley, only to find that the man had disappeared.
"Where did he go?" he demanded of the smallish, plain-looking man who had just stepped out of a narrow building. "No, don't bother," he added, seeing that the man still had one hand on the doorknob. He couldn't have seen anything. Sherlock briefly considered the man as an accomplice, but the sheer unassuming air around him - the bloke was wearing a jacket with patches, for goodness' sake - made him discard that thought.
His phone rang. Sherlock slapped his hand against the wall in frustration and took a breath before he picked up.
"Sherlock Holmes."
"Sherlock!" Lestrade sounded frazzled; the DCI must be taking a personal interest again. "Tell me you have something."
"Walter Hanau," Sherlock trotted out, "son of German immigrants. [blah blah deductions blah]"
Stunned silence came from the other end of the line. Sherlock hung up with a flourish, a pleased smile on his lips.
"That was brilliant."
Sherlock spun around. He'd forgotten about the man, but he was still standing there, hand on the doorknob, watching Sherlock with open admiration.
Sherlock blinked.
"You think so?" Observation wasn't a particularly challenging skill to cultivate, but he was used to wariness as a reaction rather than applause.
"Of course." The man nodded "That was quite extraordinary." He tilted his head. "Buy you a cuppa?"
"Pardon?"
"You don't seem like the beer-drinking sort, so the pub's right out," the man said, either not noticing or ignoring Sherlock's immense… surprise, for want of a better word. "The Criterion's not far from here. They make a great coffee."
Sherlock looked the man up and down. Military posture; slight tan; peculiar brand of boots. Russian? Interesting. Not nearly interesting enough, however.
"Suppose you're busy, huh?" the man said with a self-depreciating little smile.
"Yes." Sherlock returned the smile with an insincere one of his own. "Sorry."
The man laughed unexpectedly. "No, you're not."
"I'm not," Sherlock agreed, and winked.
"Next time then," the man said as Sherlock strode out of the alley.
Sherlock didn't think so.
~~~
Walter Hanau turned up dead two days later, in the narrow house Sherlock had dismissed as an unlikely hiding place.
"Clean shot." Lestrade sounded reluctantly impressed. "Looks like this was done by a professional."
Personally, Sherlock thought that 'this' had been done by a smallish, plain-looking man with a military posture and apparently nerves of steel, with enough cheek to ask someone on a date while the body of his victim cooled behind the door he had his hand on.
Marvellous.
"Do you want me to look into it?" Sherlock asked casually.
"No need." Lestrade sighed. "Turns out the sudden rise of confessions is because The Soldier is in town. No one wants to be on his hit list, and they all think they're safer behind bars."
+++
Obviously, I know how these would have progressed, but I'm too lazy to write it. As I said above, if anyone wants to take them, do with them as you please.