OPERATION SEPARATION (Chapter 2)
KINDLING
(DAY 2)
John awoke in the morning, blinking post sleep haze out of his eyes. He felt …alive. It was a marked improvement to three weeks prior, when he used to wake up shaking and gasping, having to remind himself of reasons why he wasn't biting a bullet from his own gun, instead of enduring a pathetic existence that his injury had foisted on him. The reasons had been pitifully few…
In the weeks since shaking Sherlock's hand at the door of 221B; his life had got a major make-over, no offence to Connie Prince. Not even the day before yesterday's near-death encounter could get him down. Of course Sarah's involvement had been unfortunate, but since they had escaped being skewered and shot respectively, it was hard to feel grim about it. Besides, she now thought of him as her hero. He gave a short laugh as he remembered the limping, therapist-certified-PTSD-afflicted mess that he had been and dragged himself off to the bathroom, noting Sherlock's early morning absence from the flat.
Sherlock was at the NSY at Dimmock's behest. Despite his contrary nature against police procedure, even he realized that having more allies at the yard would only increase his pool of 'interesting' cases. The interaction was however only serving to make him grateful for the fact that his main contact at the yard was Lestrade, instead of this short-sighted fool. Even though the Black-Lotus connection was all that had been uncovered, there had been a niggling sensation at the back of his mind, that he was missing something important. As if to confirm his suspicions, Shan had been murdered; her body found with a bullet between her eyes. Though Sherlock felt sorry that he hadn't been the one to put it there, the murder itself had been a bit unnecessary as the General had escaped capture. Killing a senior operative in a smuggling ring to cover all tracks had been a bit drastic and very effective in burying the British connection to the case. In short, it had been a merciless yet brilliant move. Add to that, the graffiti of an eye that was gracing the post box opposite 221B, and he knew that whoever his shadowy opponent was, he was surely not going to make the mistake of underestimating him again.
All in all, he was glad that John wouldn't be there when the danger escalated.
He ran into Lestrade just as he was leaving the building, who greeted him with, "Is Dr. Watson alright? Dimmock mentioned that he had been injured,"
"Of course he is alright, Lestrade."
"Then why isn't he with you? It's a Sunday today. It's not like he has to be at the surgery."
This was the reason, why he had been mentally admiring the D.I. for his astuteness. He had met John all of three times, yet had surmised that his absence was odd. He made his tone sufficiently cutting as he replied, "John Watson and I aren't joined at the hip, contrary to whatever assumptions are made by you and your minions."
Lestrade smirked, "So had a fight, did you?"
Sherlock gave him a withering glare and was about to speak when his phone beeped…
FROM: JW
WHERE ARE YOU?
He ignored it. After about one minute it beeped again.
FROM: JW
IS IT A NEW CASE?
This time there was a thirty second wait.
FROM: JW
NEED HELP?
The man had a death wish.
Ignoring Lestrade's pointed look, Sherlock turned to leave while typing simultaneously…
FROM: SH
YOUR ASSISTANCE IS UNNECESSARY.
This time the phone stayed silent.
John stared at the last message, squinting against the sunlight as he walked to Tesco to stock up on milk, tea and nicotine patches. This was …unexpected. From a man who needed help to send a text via a mobile in his own pocket, it was downright disturbing…or maybe not. Sherlock must be worried that he hadn't fully recovered yet. Once he was reassured that John was fine, he would probably return to convincing him to do his laundry again. He smiled wryly to himself as he added 2 bottles of milk to the cart.
Come to think of it, Sherlock's behavior had been rather odd since the past two days. After the rescue and while seeing Sarah safely home, Sherlock had been strangely quiet and withdrawn. He had spoken with John only to inspect his head and ask medically relevant questions. Once at the flat Sherlock… yes SHERLOCK, had made him a cup of tea and then literally shoved him to bed, but all through the interaction, he had been tense and skittish as though waiting for something unpleasant. Just as he was leaving for bed, John had said, "Thank you for turning up when you did. I guess we are square now."
Sherlock had looked like John had slapped him. At the time he had put it down as a reaction to being thanked. Let's face it; the Consultant Detective wasn't thanked on a day- to-day basis. He had not wished to make Sherlock more uncomfortable, besides having a killer headache to contend with and so had walked off to his room with a view to continuing the discussion in the morning. The following day had been spent in giving statements, recovering the pin and skinning that smarmy git, Sebastian of a neat five figure sum. That had oddly been the most satisfying part of the case for John. Sherlock was just being a mother-hen… he reassured himself and took it as a sign that the chip and pin machine co-operated with him this time around. There was nothing to worry about…
(DAY 4)
Now four days after the kidnapping fiasco, as he called it, he wasn't so sure. Something had changed, though he couldn't put a finger on it. It had started with the text message that he had chosen to ignore, but now there were all the little…or not so little things.
The dreaded violin had made an appearance finally at 3.30 a.m. on the same night. As if his nightmares weren't keeping him awake already, now there was a steady caterwauling to keep him company.The usual mess all over the flat seemed to be replicating itself hourly. Yesterday, John had come home, bone-tired, after an exhausting day at the clinic to find half decomposed human intestines soaking in the bath-tub, in what smelt like sewage water.
Yet, these were not the things getting under his skin. He had been warned about the violin, although he did not understand how that unearthly noise could be called 'playing' in any context. As for the intestines, the eyeballs in the microwave had been warning enough (although he would miss never running a bath in his own flat).
No that wasn't it…
It was Sherlock… To say his behavior had been strange, would be an understatement. Then again, it would have helped if the change had been drastic enough to bring about a confrontation. The only way John could describe it to himself, was that Sherlock was somehow channeling Mycroft (however ridiculous that sounded). He was never rude, so solicitous as to be painful. Even when John had been yelling himself hoarse about the bath, he had listened quietly, offering neither anger nor remorse in return. It was like shouting at a stranger. Their comfortable camaraderie was completely absent, like he had successfully forgotten their interactions over the last three weeks. Although John had known his flat mate for a ridiculously short period of time, his gut feeling told him something was wrong. The same gut feeling that had also told him that he had connected to Sherlock in a way no one had before and refused to let him believe that the last three weeks had been an act. Now he felt like he had been relegated to the 'rest of the world' subset inhabited by people like Anderson and Donovan. This pissed him off to no end. He was desperately itching for a fight, to hash it all out …
Then finally on the fourth day, things came to a head…
"What do you mean, you burned it?" His voice was dangerously calm, determined as he was to not be the first to start shouting. His fists were clenched, all five feet seven inches of him rigidly held stiff. He somehow knew that if he raised his voice, he would snap and hurt the lounging figure on the sofa who couldn't even be bothered to open his eyes to answer.
"I needed to burn paper to bring out the reagent on the strip. It was the final step of a crucial experiment", he drawled.
"I just picked the first thing on the mantelpiece. Usually anything of consequence on it, is pinned under the knife. It was an unfortunate accident." At this, he cracked open a lazy eye, "However, I can see why that would make you furious."
"Honest mistake!" John sputtered. He shook his head now, pressing his eyeballs in to stem his anger and not look at his flatmate. "Sherlock… you burned my paycheck!"
"Stop being so dramatic, John. I will pay you back."
That did it…
"I AM BEING DRAMATIC…for God's sake Sherlock, I work my ass off at a job that is way beneath me, just to be able to pay the rent and share the bills. If it weren't for the generosity of your Uni 'friend', that paycheck would have been the only thing keeping us afloat. You refuse to take cases, unless they deserve your level of consideration. I thought YOU of all people would understand the frustration of getting bored in your job... and here you don't even have the decency to apologize…"
As he paused to take a breath, Sherlock sat up on the sofa, fixing him with those ice-chip eyes. He raised a finger and spoke in a cutting voice that John had hitherto only heard being directed at Anderson. "Firstly, John… I don't apologize. I caused you some monetary loss, unknowingly, and will reimburse you for the same. An apology is a moot point, if in recurrent circumstances, I would most certainly behave in a similar fashion…" He raised a second finger for emphasis, "…and secondly, stop with the self-pity already! You have a tremor in your dominant hand. You can no longer be a surgeon…these are the facts of your life that all the self-pity in the world is not going to change. The sooner you accept your shortcomings, the less tedious it will be for anyone around you."
John had visibly paled by the end of Sherlock's tirade.
"Right…" he muttered, took a deep breath and his face closed off."Right…" he repeated absently.
He turned, took his coat from where it had been draped on a chair, and stormed out of the flat…
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