Sherlock panicked. And that was the first thing that came to his mind ‘I do not panic.’ The second thing was that he had no idea where he was, or what he was doing there, and then slowly, painfully slow in fact, thoughts came back to him, and he remembered this had happened before, a few times, actually, and Sherlock thought, who could he call? He thought of john, no not john, because john thought he was dead. And then thoughts came back of that day and Sherlock felt a wave of nausea wave through him.
So not john, and then Sherlock realized there was only one person who he could call because he didn’t know where he was and thus couldn’t tell whoever he called, so that left one person. Mycroft.
Because Sherlock remembered that Mycroft would know where he was because he most likely already bugged his phone and Sherlock hadn’t even checked because Mycroft was so predictable.
And so, Sherlock slowly got his mind into place, trying to remember how to use his phone, and how he hated feeling so, so lost, and he called Mycroft.
And he sounded as lost as he felt
“Mycroft. I don’t – I can’t remember-“
There was a sigh at the other end of the phone
“Stay where you are”
And Sherlock did, if not a bit begrudgingly, after all, waiting was terribly boring, especially in somewhere he couldn’t place, he knew it was in England, but where?
He couldn’t even place the names of his surroundings, grass? Gravel? Sand?
He was also tired, very tired, and that was strange because it was rare that he felt tired and he felt exhausted.
And sometime later, after an excruciating, what, one hour? Three? He didn’t know, a car pulled up, and Mycroft, not his assistance surprisingly, got out of the car.
“I thought it would be best, if I collected you myself” Mycroft said, as though reading Sherlock’s mind.
And Sherlock thought ‘and you didn’t want your assistant to see your brother as such a weakling’ and while that was in a way true, not entirely the way Sherlock was thinking, it wasn’t rather Mycroft was embarrassed, rather, he had the same pride as Sherlock and knew full well if he was in the same state, he wouldn’t want many people to see him.
Wordlessly, Sherlock sat in the backseat of the car.
It had happened a few times in Sherlock’s life, sometimes each one would be far from each other, and sometimes it would only be a few months before it occurred again.
Sherlock recalled be nine years old and he had gone in the back yard, to search for insects of differing species and it just happened, Sherlock was suddenly scared, because he didn’t know where he was, he couldn’t recognize anything, and it was until a hand took his and led him back to the house that Sherlock calmed down.
Mycroft, who was in his teens at the time, led his brother back to the house, and made tea, and both Mycroft and Sherlock sipped their tea in silence.
It had happened once when he was with john, Sherlock had been muttering deductions near a corpse and suddenly his eyes widened and he stood erect, he then said, in a almost scared voice “where am I?”, john had then called Mycroft, despite Sherlock’s protest’s, which were almost non-existent, and asked Mycroft if this had happened before, there was a curt yes at the other of the line and then the call disconnected, john had sighed and then taken Sherlock home, john had said to Sherlock things like “Sherlock. Your home, at 221 Baker street” Sherlock had simply replied, in a meek voice “tea please”
And then after tea, john had once more repeated to Sherlock where he was. And sometime later, a few hours later, John repeated this once more and this time Sherlock nodded and remembered and so john added “you were at a crime scene, do you remember?” Sherlock nodded, then blinked, and then he got up and ran out the door, shouting something that sounded like nonsense to john, but probably had something to do with the case, John had just shaken his head and went after him.
Sherlock was presently leaning one side of his face against the cold window of the car, he could feel himself drifting off, he heard a small mumble of “happy birthday, brother” from Mycroft, and Sherlock thought of his eleventh birthday , Mycroft had eaten most of the cake, but that was alright because Mycroft had gotten Sherlock a proper pirate costume.
because when he had said he wanted to be a pirate, he didn’t mean talking parrots and eye patches, he meant real pirates, pirates that only wore eye patches before and during raids to adjust to darkness, which even Sherlock had thought was pretty clever, and when they raided ships they looked for practical things as well, medical supplies, food, even soap, pirates were actually quite logical.
And with that thought, Sherlock drifted to sleep.
