The Black Dog

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Dr. John H. Watson, veteran Captain of the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers.
God, that name seems foreign. My own name. I've done a complete one-eighty since... well... then. The building. St. Bart's. Moriarty |

"Oh, god!" John covered his mouth with his shaky hand as his breath quickened and his vision became temporarily blurry with tears. His non-dominant hand almost instinctively reached toward his desk drawer where he stored his handgun, which only made him sob more. His sob wasn't loud, nor was it silent- it's one of those gasping sobs which are quiet except for the occasional whimper. It would be so easy, he thought, pulling the drawer open a crack, but slamming it shut with a groan, then looking up again at what he had typed.

The deer with headphones had gathered dust along with the rest of the apartment. John didn't have the drive to clean it, and he didn't have the contacts to live with someone else. Well, he did, but his conscience told him he didn't. In the Fusiliers, his Major always told him to "beware the black dog", but John didn't feel like he had a choice. The teeth and claws of this canine were tearing him apart. His face was now soaked in tears which he never bothered to wipe away, and his face felt sticky with the lack of a shower in four days and the overabundance of tears. You're a bloody wreck, his conscience told him. You're pathetic.

John almost got up to get a shower, only because he was tired of the stickiness of his face and the constant itch of his skin (which he felt he deserved), but as the room began to blur alongside his shaky breath, he laid on the floor like the dog he felt he was. He laid there in a gross, heaving, scared and depressed mess on the floor for what felt to him like an hour as he relived the moment over and over.

"Goodbye, John."

"Sherlock!"

The man who made me forget my troubles threw his phone aside and shifted his body forward, falling with waving limbs. My heart sank as I watched him hit the pavement, and I broke into a run toward him.

"Let me though, he's my friend. Please!"

Brrring. The sound of his phone ringing was startling enough to make him jerk. His instincts told him to get up and answer, but his mind and body told him to lay there still. By grace he got up to his feet and answered.

"This is Doctor John Watson speaking." You're not at work, you bloody pillock.

"Care for some fish and chips?" It was Mycroft; he and John had fish and chips every Friday at Speedy's, and John was almost positive it was just so Mycroft could deduct his mental state.

"Same time?"

"As always, Dr. Watson." The phone clicked off, and John sighed at the thought of lugging himself out of the flat. At least I have an excuse to take a shower, he thought, forcing his feet to carry him to the bathroom and his hands to shut the door, undress himself, and pull the curtain back. The cold water hit his back and raised goosebumps along his skin. I hate the cold... and yet I don't want to change the temperature. He left it icy cold as a way of punishing himself, and hoping he might get sick. The tiled wall became a blurry backdrop as he zoned out once again, focusing on a series of self-deprecating thoughts piggybacking on each other: Worthless. Stupid. Weak. Selfish. Disgusting. The train of thought only ended as he realized how cold he was, but he just lathered himself up and stood unmoving, letting the streams of water do the rest. He soon turned the water off and exited the frigid room, going to his bedroom to choose something to wear tomorrow that would conceal his mental state as best it could from Mycroft. Like a normal person.

--♦--

You're trying to convey to me that your mental state is fine by the state of your clothes and the fact you took a shower last night, but your returning tremor says otherwise." John couldn't help but sigh, feeling the chip he had just picked up to eat shake in his grasp, so he set it back down.

"And your point is?" John asked cockily, knowing his response but still wanting nonetheless to piss him off for some humor. Selfish. Arrogant.

"You very well know what I'm going to say, Dr. Watson: are you taking your antidepressants?" John was quiet, and that was enough of an answer as the suit-clad man looked at him disapprovingly. Mycroft would never admit it, nor show it to John, but he was worried. He could deduct what state John was in, and he compared it mentally to Sherlock's intentional overdoses (the ones not meant to kill).

The lunch ended awkwardly, and both parties were somewhat thankful to leave for their sense of comfort: Mycroft's comfortable lounge above the Diogenes Club, and John's strangely-comfortable mindset of self-hatred.

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