Fic: A Vision of Skulls - Chapter 1 of 3ish

[tueswmoriarty]

Title: A Vision of Skulls (Chapter 1 of 3ish)
Author: Tuesdays with Moriarty / tueswmoriarty 
Rating: R
Word Count: 5,292 this chapter
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock/John pre-slash in a noncommittal sort of way.
Warnings: Character death. Depictions of Bipolar I and trauma. Drug use and references to same. WIP. An unreliable narrator.
Disclaimer: I am not Mark Gatiss

Comments

[tueswmoriarty]

Yay! I'm glad someone read it... I'm probably not going to post it to the comms until the story/section/chapter/whatever is complete.

John not being a mental health specialist is a perfectly reasonable explanation, but I'm still just unsatisfied with it. Since this is first person, and supposedly on his blog where everyone he knows can read it, I can imagine him trying to strike a narrative balance between what he did do/what happened and what he feel he ought to have done. He's got that 20/20 hindsight nagging at him, and I worry he might feel compelled to acknowledge ways he could have done better. But then those sorts of asides pull readers out of the narrative, so I've ultimately left them out... I know I'm being a bit silly!

[tueswmoriarty]

I am loving all of this information! I would actually be interested in hearing more about the DPA regulations, since there's a scene in the next chapter where John is chatting with Sarah and she offers him some literature on bipolar depression (or rather just depression, since John's not yet seen Sherlock in a manic phase), but more as a friend than a fellow physician. Actually, the depression subplot gets more explicit across the board as the chapter/story goes on. (And then it goes away for many chapters/stories.)

Not sure if this is a spoiler you'd rather avoid, but would the following have any impact on what John couldn't/wouldn't reveal?: Sherlock is dead -- or at least John thinks he's dead -- at the time of writing. I mean, I think this is pretty obvious from the very start of Adventure of the Dancing Men, but I like to make passing attempts at not being an asshole!

I guess we should probably move this to PM haha.

[tueswmoriarty]

Oh damn, I guess spoiler text doesn't work in comments? Fie on me.

[entropy1031]

Depression's tricky; even mental health professionals can miss it/ misdiagnose it/ over-diagnose it. I like your approach of relying on John's observations in combination with descriptions of Sherlock's actions. The tap thing was clever- maybe bring it up in a later chapter, with John worrying that Sherlock's "off" times are becoming more frequent?

Haha- it's hard to show Sherlock as depressed since so many of the usual signs (eating, ennui, destructive behavior) is what he does all the time. Maybe one of the reasons I like the tap metaphor is that it showcases the mental difficulties that being depressed brings on without over-dramatizing it. Nicely written chapter :)

[tueswmoriarty]

Thank you for reading, and also for the advice :) "An outside opinion is incredibly useful to me. Really." That was probably a misquote!

I agree, Sherlock is a tricky beast. His behavior is always odd, but he's able to sham normal quite well when it suits him. That's how I hit on the tap metaphor. Sherlock is an actor, but when you're depressed acting/interacting is just too tiring to contemplate. In Sherlock's case that means less energy to spare for acting, and so more obviously odd behavior.