Chemical Disaster {JOHNLOCK}

Sweet Chemicals

   Sherlock had waited. Sherlock had let his syringe Rest In Peace tranquilly in his nightstand drawer when a text from Lestrade had lightened his phone screen. Sherlock had solved the case, an outstanding locked-room mystery, his favorite type of murder, but it had been not in the least diverting. His heart hadn't skipped a beat like it ought to have as his brain signals bolted and became zigzagging lightnings, transporting millions of electrifying data. His mind hadn't been monopolized by the puzzle: some electrical signals carried the image of John, others conveyed the thought of how John, good, kind, wonderful John, deserved a friend who didn't rely on homicides and injected chemicals to keep his mind sane.

   It wasn't working. It wasn't enough. The case wasn't enough. Not enough. Not enough. Not working. Not distracting.

The stainless steel syringe casted back a stinging spark of light that originated from the lamp at the corner of the room.

Morphine was a jealous lover. It eased Sherlock, made him feel phenomenally good and stayed by his side even during the hardest times, just as it dug it's nails possessively into Sherlock's flesh when he tried to break up with his deplorable habit. Truthfully, it now didn't seem deplorable at all. It ought to be worshipped. It was fidelity itself. The pain the needle fostered as it penetrated his epidermis was the sweet pledge Sherlock had relished for a long time. Slowly, his fingers pressed the plunger, forcing the rubber stopper deeper into the syringe barrel.

Everything else had left him for John. John took the pleasure he had in solving case, John took his ability to focus, John took his mind, John took his heart. Well, not quite exactly. John gave life to his heart, and one cannot steal what one has created.

   Morphine was his final refuge. A warm, protective blanket.

  

*

  Footfalls promptly hammered the stairs, but to Sherlock's vaporous consciousness, they were drawling beats.

  In a flash, the feather-soft quilt was plucked out of his median cubital vein by a harsh but expert hand. Pulled by an unexplainable gravitational force, Sherlock's stony gaze veered and plunged into two aflame celestial bodies that were once John's irises. Solid ice and undulating flames at the same time, they froze and boiled the morphine solution as he inspected the calibration scale.

"Let's go."

"Where?"

"To the hospital. There's a cab waiting for us downstairs. Terribly sorry to see that morphine slows down your deductive powers." John answered acidly, offering his hand to Sherlock, who was embedded in the couch. John's palm hovered forlornly.

"No."

His arm fell back to his side. "I'm not asking."

John's eyes were now lasers.

"But this is absurd! I'm completely f—" Sherlock's facial expression was temporarily paralyzed, for he had just received his second slap from John Watson, the first of which underwent meanwhile boasting an approximately functional state of mind.

  "No! You're not fine! You're not fucking fine at all, Sherlock!" John cried. The shell of composure and authority his anger had forged melted away like an ice lolly left out on a July's afternoon. He kneeled down to take Sherlock's pulse, and released the gulp of air he had been holding when his thumb met a uniform, vigorous throb. He wanted to wrap his arms around the detective's willowy stature, to hold every cell of his maltreated body together so the brittle creature wouldn't fall to pieces.

   "John..." Sherlock whispered sotto voce. "I—"his lips trembled. They found no words to explain his introspection. "I don't want you to be scared." His gaze escaped John's hold. "I didn't mean to... to scare you."

   "I'm scared, Sherlock. I'm terrified."

   "It was diluted."

   "Let's go to the hospital."

   "I didn't shoot all of it."

   "Let's go to the hospital."

   "I have Prenoxad."

    "Let's— Wait, you do?"

    Sherlock nodded slowly. "I told you I was always careful and meticulous. I'm a scientist."

    From head to toe, John was utterly overwhelmed by this man. He frankly had no clue whether he was an idiot, a genius, a maniac, an arsehole, a marvel or a lunatic; and as for the appropriate reception, he oscillated between a punch and a hug, but ended up going for a stab of naloxone in the upper arm.

   "Have you been thinking about giving me some kind of explanation?" John murmured when he finished cleaning Sherlock's arm crease and the skin mantling his deltoid muscle. "Why are you doing this to yourself? Don't you think you can tell me, after all we've been through together?"

  He quietly left the detective to his ruminations and came back from the kitchen with a glass filled with fresh water from the tap. His eyes settled gently on Sherlock's mouth, like a weightless feather landing in delicate swirls, the water ripples amounting to the crumples at his forehead as his hand quivered in hesitation. Before John could tilt the glass to his lips, Sherlock's fingers had migrated to the cylinder, so John timidly retreated his hand.

     "Is there something wrong? Are you having problems? Sherlock, I want to help, but I can't do that if you don't tell me what's happening."

   There was a prolonged silence manufactured by Sherlock's procrastinatory sips. He let the water flow between his tongue and palate, down his throat, while his eyes drowned to the bottom of the glass.

  "My brain is... magnificent," Sherlock faltered, lacking of practical phrasings. "And, I, uh... please don't consider me as a spoiled sod who complains about his privileges when I say this, but it can turn into a massive inconvenience. My brain is somewhat alike with a wild animal. It runs with agility, but it constantly needs to be fed. It craves for new puzzles to solve, and when life is mediocre, it goes on a tantrum, and I can feel my brain scratching itself from the inside, the same way an imprisoned animal would against its cage."
Sherlock huddled his knees to his chest, his pout contoured by apprehension. "The drugs, they help. Cocaine dominates the fuss, morphine muffles it."

   A single tear leaked from John's left eye and fell along his nose.

   "Sherlock, is there anything I can do to help?"

    John could help. Sherlock knew it factually. If only he would stay by his side, talk with him, laugh with him, oh yes his laughter, Sherlock could never forget it... If only he would hug him, solve cases with him, murmur sweet things and say good night to him, Sherlock would be so distracted stimulants and narcotics would have no way to slither in his mind. It would still be a chemical disaster, but at least dopamine would be produced naturally and, though Sherlock couldn't yet offer any testimony, love is said to be the sweetest chemical.

Except instead of heading blindly to this unexplored territory, precocious, prudent, reserved Sherlock decided to test the waters.

"Why do you care so much? Don't tell me it's your duty as a therapist. What you've done for me is beyond responsibility." It came out forcefully, and Sherlock instantly feared to have unnerved John, but he needed to see clearer in this misted circumstances.

John went to refill Sherlock's glass, then sat himself besides him, wrapping an arm around the detective's rounded shoulders. Sherlock's eyes were frozen mountain lakes, deep midnight blue encrusted with teal and cyan snowflakes, two saphirs on which the light was reflected at different angles, the geometric trick qualifiedly seraphic.

John sighed,"It's time we lay down the facts."