Work Text:
The world ended nineteen days ago.
Except for those who were left.
---
It was eerily quiet. John looked over the supplies for perhaps the fourth time, mentally checking everything off against the crumpled list he held in his hand. He was finally as satisfied as he could be, and began to pack everything away into two large rucksacks. He did this with great care, occasionally scribbling the locations of some of the smaller, easier to lose items next to their name on the list, and although he’d agreed to split the weight as evenly as possible he couldn’t help but ensure a lot of the heavier items – the tins, pans, toolkit, etc. – went into his bag. There was a lot of stuff, and it took quite a bit of careful arranging to get it all to fit, but somehow it still didn’t feel like there was enough. John sighed and got to his feet; it would have to do.
“Sher –” he began to call, but was then forced to stop as he began to cough. With his body convulsing, John bent over double, clutching at the armchair in a desperate bid to stay standing. Sherlock was at his side in a moment, one hand flat on his back and the other taking a firm hold of his upper arm.
“Come on, John,” he said, voice quiet. “Sit down here. Breathe.”
He helped John settle down into his armchair and then fetched him a small glass of water. It was all they could spare. John gratefully took the glass and drank down the contents in one, big gulp. His face was flushed and his eyes were over-bright with tears, but he managed to gasp out a hoarse “Thank you.”
“The last batch is just about complete. I could have a dose ready for you in ten minutes, if you’d like?”
“No, no, I’m fine,” John replied quickly with a slight shake of the head. “I took some yesterday. It’s probably best we make this lot last as long as possible, in case you can’t make any more.”
“If all goes well, that shouldn’t be a concern, but as you wish.”
John smiled softly at this, but then he clapped his hands together and said:
“Anyway, we’re leaving in about twenty minutes, right? Best get that batch all bottled up and make sure you’ve given me everything you want to take. I don’t want to be unpacking and repacking these bags all day.”
“There’s nothing else,” Sherlock said, voice firm. “Just the medicine. Give me a few minutes.”
Without waiting for a reply, Sherlock disappeared back into the kitchen. John took in a slow breath, taking a long look at the flat around him and drinking in as many details as possible. It didn’t even matter that the room looked like a bombsite; it was possibly even tidier than when John had first moved in. It was home. But they couldn’t stay there any longer.
“Maybe we’ll come back,” John said softly. “Someday.”
---
It was late morning. Birds twittered and sang incessantly, swooping overhead in great euphonious flocks. There was just the barest hint of a breeze, rustling and twirling its way through the bare branches and scattered leaves of the few trees.
There was not a single human being in sight.
It was almost beautiful – in a sinister, desolate sort of way.
Sherlock and John moved quickly, but cautiously. Their footsteps were light on the ground, but to John’s ears even the slightest sound seemed to reverberate and amplify. He took extra care not to jostle his rucksack too much, in case the clinking and clunking of the pans drew unwanted attention, for there may have been no-one around, but John couldn’t shake off the distinct feeling of being watched. It was a prickly, uncomfortable feeling that danced all along the back of his neck, and he readjusted his mask to try and alleviate it. Sometimes John felt like he had spent his entire life on the battlefield.
They walked along pathways littered with broken glass and empty packaging. Every fast food place and corner shop had already been looted, leaving the shelves and refrigerators completely bare. The smell of rotten fruit and vegetables hit John like a punch in the nose, and even Sherlock, who had infamously contaminated 221B with the stench of ammonia for a week after a particularly disastrous experiment, began to gag. They hurried on past.
What was worse, however, was the first body they came across. It had almost been completely picked clean by birds and other animals, reduced to a pile of off-white bones in the sunlight, but it was still a corpse in the middle of the street. They stopped a few feet away from it, staring. John felt surprisingly calm, taking a moment to adjust to the fact that the boundaries between the two worlds he’d occupied were blurring. It wasn’t like he’d never seen human remains before, after all.
After a moment, they came to the unspoken agreement that it was time to press on. They gave the corpse a wide berth, John keeping his head held high and Sherlock glancing back twice, almost thoughtfully.
But the closer they got to the centre of the city, the more bodies they saw. There was some semblance of order on occasion, with the dead being piled high in large heaps at the side of the road and around abandoned cars, but in some ways that was worse. Carrion crows and ravens perched atop of the piles and watched Sherlock and John pass with black, beady eyes, strips of fabric and less savoury substances hanging in ribbons from their beaks.
John kept on walking, having seen this sort of treatment more times than he could count, but soon realised that Sherlock wasn’t following. He turned around, frowning as he saw that Sherlock was still standing and staring at the corpse pile.
“Sherlock? You coming?” he called. Sherlock didn’t reply, so John sighed and walked back over to him, reaching out to touch his upper shoulder. “Hey, come on, it’s not safe here –”
“Stupid of them to do that, whoever they were,” Sherlock said, and John could see that he was trying to be contemptuous, but the effect was somewhat ruined by the slight tremble in his voice. “No better place to breed more disease than in a pile of rotting corpses.”
“Yeah, thanks for that lovely image there,” John replied, going for humour, but Sherlock just closed his eyes and clenched his fists. John’s voice softened and he patted Sherlock’s upper arm gently. “Look, I know it’s not very nice, but –”
“Come on, John.”
Sherlock swept away, and a slightly exasperated John hurried to catch up. Sherlock’s sudden change in mood was more than a little worrying, so John initiated conversation again:
“Are you sure this is a good idea – heading to the city centre? We’re bound to run into someone.”
“We have no choice; I must see if there’s a message. Besides, other, ordinary people may be thinking along the same lines as you and therefore the exact opposite might turn out to be true,” he replied, more-or-less normally, to John’s relief. “There are larger shopping centres and supermarkets in the more commercial areas, and therefore a higher chance of us being able to find something worthwhile. Besides, you have your gun.”
“Mm, but I’d rather not use it,” John said, hand automatically twitching in the direction of his inner coat pocket. “It’s bad enough that people have had to suffer all… this.” He gestured to the grim scene around them. “Without me having a go at them, too.”
“You can’t think like that, John,” Sherlock said sharply, turning to look at him with a hard look in his eyes. “It’s life or death now, more than ever. You of all people should understand that, I’d have thought. No matter what hardships they have suffered, humans will always fight to survive – and they won’t be nice about it. I’m afraid you might have to make the choice between kill, or be killed.”
“You think I don’t know that?” John replied with equal force, matching Sherlock’s hard gaze look-for-look. “I might not like the idea of it, Sherlock, but I will shoot anyone who would otherwise kill us. You can be bloody well certain of that.”
They glared at each other for a long moment, but then (to John’s surprise) Sherlock conceded with a nod of the head.
“I know you will, John.”
They carried on. John couldn’t help but wish that they were heading in the opposite direction, but he was fully aware that the chance of a message waiting for them was too tempting to ignore – without it, they had nothing to aim for. Suddenly, just before they came to the end of a street, Sherlock threw his arm out in front of John to still him, and then raised a single finger in front of his lips.
They had arrived at Oxford Circus.
“Now this is weird,” John murmured with a slow shake of the head. “A pedestrian scramble, without any pedestrians. Oxford Circus: completely deserted.”
“So it would seem,” Sherlock replied softly, but his voice suggested that he didn’t entirely agree. “It would probably be for the best if you had your gun ready, though.”
“Fine. Get behind me.”
Sherlock complied, and they started walking over the crossing. John was still half-expecting to be jostled and bumped into at any moment, but it simply failed to happen. They had almost made it across the crossroads, but then they passed a subway, leading down towards the Underground.
“Sherlock, you know it’s not going to be good.”
John was right, of course, but it seemed that Sherlock’s desire to see for himself had to be satisfied. The buzzing of flies and the rustling of rats added an additional sense of the macabre to what was already a horrific scene. The stairs were littered with bodies in varying states of decay, all the way down into the darkness of the tunnel below. Sherlock started speaking quickly, almost without pause, that note of horrified disgust slipping back into his voice again:
“There was a panic. People wanted to get out, as fast as possible. Probably tourists, judging by how they thought the Tube was the solution. Idiots. A warm, dark space with lots of people all sharing the same, diseased breath. They ran blindly into their own graves.”
“Sherlock, you’ve got to stop doing this to –”
There was a loud noise, like the crack of a whip, and a shower of sparks as something shot to the ground a few feet away from where John was stood. A bullet. In an instant, John was at Sherlock’s side, dragging him away from the subway and ducking him down behind an abandoned car. He then dropped his bag, both hands gripping his gun as he scoured the area for their attacker.
It didn’t take long – the rooftops. A lone figure in a black coat standing on top of the John Lewis building, holding a long gun. Another bullet clipped the ground a good distance in front of the car. John quickly assessed the situation.
“I don’t know what we’ve done to piss him off, but I don’t think his aim’s all that good – and he’s alone. I don’t think it’s even worth wasting bullets trying to hit him; we’d be best off just making a run for it.”
“Right, right.”
“On three.” Pause. “One, two, three.”
John grabbed his bag and they dashed out from behind the car as fast as their legs could carry them. As John had suspected, neither of the two following shots even came close, and it wasn’t long before they were out of range. They were marginally safer once again.
“What did I tell you?” Sherlock said, panting slightly. “It’s kill or be killed.”
---
It hadn’t taken long for the communications systems to fail.
No internet, no telephones – mobile or otherwise.
Sherlock had received a number of texts from Mycroft in the final week, all promising necessary information as soon as it was available. The last message he had received was:
There will be a secure location. I will inform you of the coordinates when I am able. – Mycroft Holmes
That day had never arrived, and so Sherlock had insisted that they go out and find the coordinates themselves. Now they were wandering down streets and past houses that were getting increasingly upper class, and John was getting the feeling that he’d been there before – a suspicion that was confirmed when Sherlock neatly walked up the stairs of –
“The Diogenes Club?” John said with mild surprise, tugging his mask down to take in a gulp of reasonably fresh air. “What makes you think that Mycroft will have left a message here?”
“If his co-workers suspected that he was giving the location of a secret stronghold to somebody outside of the chosen few, I expect he would have been excluded and the location changed,” Sherlock replied, deftly picking the lock (the looters hadn’t bothered with the building, seeing as it wasn’t an obvious source of food) before slowly pushing open the large door and stepping inside. “And as you know from your own experiences, John, The Diogenes Club is—was, rather—a place of secrets. If he could leave anything for me to find, he would have left it here.”
John followed, hesitantly lifting his mask back up to his face and curling his fingers around the comforting shape of his gun.
“All right, I see your point,” he said with a nod, glancing over at Sherlock. “So, what’re we looking for?” he asked, starting to walk inside.
“I’ll look. If there’s anything there, it’ll be for me. You wait here, guard the door.”
“Fine. Hurry up, though.”
Sherlock disappeared up the stairs. John, for his part, waited with rapidly waning patience that was brought on by a sudden case of uneasy nerves. The weight on his back was making him feel slightly dizzy, but he couldn’t risk unslinging it in case they had to make a hasty retreat. What was also unpleasant was how hot and stuffy it was behind the surgical mask, and how he could feel his breath condensing into steam and beads of sweat against his lips. He hadn’t seen the point in wearing the mask, all things considered, but Sherlock had insisted—“there’s no point in inviting something worse,” he’d said. That little gulp of air outside hadn’t been enough.
Five, ten minutes passed without a sound from Sherlock. John sighed and swept his gaze over the street again, before realising that it probably wasn’t a good idea to even have the door open at all, seeing as it would just attract the attention of anyone who walked by… if there was anyone around to do so. John backed up a bit and then pushed the door shut, staring hard at it with a blank expression before calling out.
“Sherlock?” He waited a few moments, and then dared to call a little louder. “Sherlock –!”
“What?” Sherlock hissed, appearing at the top of the stairs. “What’s wrong, John?”
“You’d better come down here –”
“Is there somebody out there?”
“No, but –”
“Then stop shouting before somebody hears you. I haven’t finished looking, yet; knowing Mycroft he’ll have hidden his message in an irritatingly subtle –”
“Sherlock!” John finally snapped, pointing at the door. “Just look, would you?”
Sherlock was down the stairs again in an instant, snatching down the small piece of paper that had been thumbtacked to the back of the door and looking over it keenly.
S.,
### gcnkw4t:BUNKER. ###
-M.
“Think this could be it?” John asked dryly.
“Obviously,” Sherlock said, brow crinkling slightly.
“So, it’s a code –”
“Yes, John, but it doesn’t appear to fit into any of the secret codes Mycroft and I invented when we were younger. The printed format and hashes suggest that it’s been encoded by a computer. Mycroft possibly intended for us to get here before internet connections were cut out; might be impossible to find the coordinates again without the necessary equipment.”
“Computer, yes, but Sherlock –”
“The word ‘bunker’ alludes to a secret bunker, of course, a government hideout somewhere out of the public’s view, but there are dozens of those dotted throughout the country – Bristol, Somerset, London… it would take far too long to try and locate each one.”
“Sherlock, listen –”
“But surely Mycroft knew that it wouldn’t take long for the grid to fail, so why would he leave a message that could only be decoded by a com –”
“Sherlock,” John snapped, for the second time. “I know how it’s been encoded.”
Sherlock blinked.
“You do?”
“Yes, I do. It’s something called geohash, which is why the hashes are even there. Some of the technicians used it in Afghanistan when they wanted to disguise coordinates.”
“And do you know how to decode it?”
“Well, it’s a bit complicated, but I could give it a –”
Sherlock sighed.
“Look, do you want me to help, or not?”
“Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, please.”
---
It was over an hour later (it turned out that John could only remember the very basics of geohash coding and the sheer mathematical complexity of the thing required a lot of mental effort on Sherlock’s part) when they finally cracked it. John was just tucking into a tin of (cold) beans when he was startled by Sherlock suddenly sitting upright and lifting up the piece of paper, which was now covered in various scribbles and workings-out, to show him.
“Corsham,” he said with a decisive nod, then pulling the map out of his rucksack and studying it intently for a few moments.
“Corsham,” John repeated, crouching down beside Sherlock and chewing thoughtfully on his mouthful of beans. The name sounded familiar. “So what bunker’s there, then?”
“Of course - Burlington. I should have known.”
“Wait – you mean the Burlington Bunker? I know about that one. It was a government secret, right? 100 feet underneath the RAF site; where all of the officials were meant to go during a nuclear crisis or something?”
“Correct.”
“But wasn’t it decommissioned in… 2005?”
“2004. And yes, well, that was the story fed to the public. Naturally, that is untrue, and if this note is correct then it’s being put to use right now. How does the saying go: the best kept secrets are the ones that everybody knows?”
“Okay, so, the Burlington Bunker. How far away is it?”
Sherlock scanned the map again, working out both the distance and their route.
“It’s approximately thirty two hours away, walking,” he said after a few seconds, getting to his feet and tugging his bag back onto his shoulders.
“Thirty two hours?” John spluttered, also standing up and setting the now-empty can on a small side table.
“Oh, come off it John,” Sherlock started with a snort, pulling open the door and indicating that John should follow. “It’s not like we’re going to be walking the entire length nonstop. We could even find a moped, if you’d like – uses far less fuel than a conventional car and it’d be easier to push around obstacles. Even if we’re unable to find more fuel it’ll cut the journey time down significantly. Besides, you should be used to walking long distances. Don’t want your military training to have gone to waste; the walking in the deserts of Afghanistan and so on.”
“Yeah, maybe, but I wasn’t dying then.”
Sherlock took in a sharp breath, and John immediately regretted his hastily-spoken words. He cleared his throat and then hitched his rucksack up a little, keeping his head tilted upwards and his gaze firmly away from Sherlock’s.
“So, thirty two hours, then?” he said in a forced, cheerful tone. “Don’t suppose we could stop off halfway – check in at a nice bed and breakfast somewhere?”
“We’ll stop as often as required. The journey will take about three days – two, if we do manage to find a moped. I’m not sure the luxury of a bed and breakfast will be available, but you never know.”
John closed his eyes for a moment; Sherlock making jokes was never a good sign. They were heading down the street again and the sun had arched past its peak, but the additional warmth was doing little to melt the sudden frost between the two of them. John reached out a hand as though to touch Sherlock’s upper arm, but he dropped it again, feeling foolish.
“I’m fine, you know?” he said instead, smiling despite his expression being hidden behind the mask.
“Of course you are, John. The medication I provided for you is doing exactly as it should. Speaking of which, I would recommend that you take your next dose soon.”
“I will, when we stop next. Only got three doses and quite a long way to go, need to make them last.”
Sherlock granted John a barely perceivable nod and said no more on the matter, but he seemed to have accepted John’s reasoning. The ache in John’s chest, throat, and head was making him regret not taking Sherlock’s advice, but there was every chance that (despite Sherlock’s reassurances that Mycroft would have access to the necessary ingredients) nobody would even be there once they arrived. He just didn’t want to risk it.
“So where do you reckon we’ll get this moped from, then?”
---
In the end, finding one was easy. There were hundreds in the vicinity alone, with padlocks and the lack of an engine key being the very least of their worries thanks to Sherlock’s expertise. They soon located a large touring scooter with plenty of room for the pair of them and additional storage so that they could distribute their possessions a little better.
The real problem was getting their hands on fuel, seeing as all of the surrounding stations had, naturally, already been raided, but the prospect of having to walk almost one hundred miles without aid prompted them to resort to slightly more drastic measures.
“These cars have all been abandoned – the majority should still have fuel inside of them. All we need is a hosepipe and a container.”
Sherlock then disappeared, leaving an anxious John to wait once again. Thankfully, he didn’t take long to locate the necessary items and was back within five minutes, a coiled length of clear plastic piping in one hand and a bucket in the other. Without bothering to explain where he’d gotten them from he then whipped around, studying the cars around them with a quiet intensity.
“What’re you looking for?”
“An older model. Modern cars have safeguards against fuel siphoning.”
“There’s an old Ford up that way,” John said, pointing.
Within a few minutes, Sherlock had one end of the piping jammed into the tank and was lifting the other towards his mouth. John grimaced, thinking about all of the wonderful, poisonous chemicals in petrol, but he just let Sherlock get on with it. This turned out to be a mistake, as Sherlock suddenly winced, dropped the piping into the bucket, which then began to fill, and then turned his head to spit out a mouthful of fuel. A few seconds later, he was coughing and spluttering and trying to wipe the awful taste from his mouth with the sleeve of his jacket.
“Sherlock…” John sighed softly, patting him hard on the back. “Hang on; I’ll get you some water…”
John rummaged in the bag, pulling out the bottle and handing it to Sherlock, who took a grateful drink. John also took the opportunity to have one of the vials of medicine Sherlock had prepared for him, and pulled a face at the acrid taste.
“It’s hardly fuel, John,” Sherlock said with a short laugh, his voice a little rough.
“It’s still disgusting –”
“Who’s there?!”
The nearby shout immediately silenced John and he quickly crouched down beside Sherlock, who had clapped his hand across his mouth to try and hush his still-hard breathing.
“I definitely heard someone…”
John motioned to Sherlock that he should stay hidden, and then slowly lifted his head to see if he could spot the source of the voices.
“Three people,” he whispered quickly. “Two men and a woman. They’ve got weapons – two cricket bats and an air rifle.”
“Are they carrying any supplies?” Sherlock replied.
“No.”
“Probably a raiding party, then. If they find us, they’ll try and take ours. We need to move, now.”
“The bucket’s not full yet.”
“It’ll have to do; the moped won’t have that large a tank anyway. Take the bucket, and start filling it.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll be right behind you. Move, John.”
Taking a breath, John tugged the end of the piping out of the bucket and set it on the floor, where it continued to pump fuel. He then picked it up and, in an awkward half-crouch made even more difficult by both the weight of the bucket and the weight on his back, made his careful way back over to the moped. Sherlock had already popped the seat, so John just pulled it open and then unscrewed the cap, his shaking fingers making him fumble several times. He glanced back over to the Ford, but Sherlock was nowhere to be seen.
“Fucking hell…” John groaned, but he continued with his task, slowly lifting the bucket with shaking arms and lining up the lip with the hole, trying to pour as fast as possible without spilling the petrol everywhere. “Come on, come on…”
“Hey, you –!”
John nearly dropped the bucket, but a glance over quickly told him that the shout wasn’t being directed at him, so he stuck to the task.
“Just come out, we don’t want to hurt you…”
“How the fuck does he keep disappearing like that?!”
John finally tipped the bucket up completely, splashing a little of the petrol on the sides but not finding the time to care about it too much. He screwed the cap back in with speed born out of desperation and slammed the seat shut, hopping on top of it and dumping his bag between his feet before reaching for the wires that Sherlock had pulled out of the ignition. With a twist, he looped together the correct ones and twisted the handle, nearly fainting with relief when the moped first spluttered and then roared into life.
“SHERLOCK!”
John revved the handle a couple of times, trying desperately to remember how to control one of the damn things. He’d ridden around on one when he was younger, so it couldn’t be that difficult…
Sherlock dashed out from behind a car while the bewildered trio gave delayed chase. John twisted the handle down to biting point and the moped began to pull off, but he held back from pulling it all the way until Sherlock had neatly and safely leapt up on the seat behind him.
“Move, John, now!”
John pulled hard on the handle and the bike practically leapt forwards with a screech. They shot off down the road – much, much quicker than their pursuers could follow.
“Are we ever going to be able to get to and from somewhere normally, Sherlock?!” John shouted above the whip and roar of the wind.
“You can’t seriously be saying you’d have it any other way?”
---
Seconds ticked into minutes. Minutes bled into miles. They were heading west out of London, weaving between the cars that littered the otherwise deserted motorways. John tried his best not to think of the corpses that would be in those cars; families that had been desperately trying to escape the sudden panic. A traffic jam of the dead.
Those obstacles, combined with the fact that the moped could only go a maximum speed of 50mph, meant that the going was a little slower than John had anticipated it would be, but it was still infinitely preferable to doing the whole trek on foot. In their hurry to find transport, they had also neglected to realise how exposed to the elements they would be on a bike and before long the pair was shivering, their faces tinged blue, their lips chapped.
Sherlock kept his long arms wrapped around John’s torso, pressing his face to the back of his shoulder and only lifting it every so often to correct the route John was taking. His presence at John’s back was a warm and comforting one, but despite having just taken his medicine the exposure to the cold wasn’t doing his lungs or head a bit of good. After about forty minutes of zooming along the M4, they were forced to come to a stop as John could barely feel his fingers, nose, or ears anymore and he could sense the beginnings of a killer headache.
They camped out for a little while a good few miles outside of Slough, setting a small fire so that they could boil up some water for tea and heat two cans of chicken soup. They sat together in a comfortable, companionable silence, warming their hands before the fire, sipping tea, and spooning the hot food into their mouths. While holed up in Baker Street, there hadn’t been any electricity or gas and John had forbidden Sherlock from setting fires indoors, so it was actually a strange kind of luxury for them to have something hot to eat and drink.
“We weren’t really prepared for this sort of thing,” John admitted with a small sigh, cupping his hands around his chipped army mug. “It’s practically winter, we don’t have helmets or protective jackets, and all of those abandoned cars keep getting in the way. God, my fingers are still swollen.”
“We packed gloves and scarves, and two of your jumpers. We’ll put those on before we set off again, and then I’ll manage the driving for the next hour or so; providing the fuel lasts us that long.”
“Alright,” John agreed with a nod, sucking the last remnants of soup off of his spoon and then storing it back in his bag. He then tugged out his pair of gloves, scarf, and the two jumpers Sherlock had mentioned. “Might be a bit short on you,” he said, grinning as he handed one of them over to Sherlock, who took it with a small roll of the eyes and a twitch of the lips that might have been a smile.
“It will be adequate enough. Thank you John.”
They changed and repacked their bags and the moped, and John immediately felt marginally better for the extra layer of clothing. Despite having internally complained about it while they were in the city, he also pulled up the mask to cover his face again – in their hurry to escape from the looters they’d left them down, which was why his lips were so sore now.
“All ready?” John asked as he tugged his left glove on. Sherlock had already buttoned his greatcoat up, possibly to prevent John from being able to laugh at the sight of him in a woolly jumper, but he could still see the bulge of the material beneath and grinned.
“Yes. Do you feel able to continue?”
“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine,” John insisted, still smiling. “It’s not like I’ll have to concentrate on anything.”
Sherlock nodded and got onto the bike, kicking it off the stand and wedging his bag between his legs as John had done earlier before twisting the two wires together and revving the moped into life. John took a moment to kick dirt over their little fire and glanced around to make sure they had everything before clambering up behind Sherlock, wriggling into position and then almost hesitantly wrapping his arms around the man.
“You’re going to want to hold on a little tighter than that, John.”
“Why, do you drive like a maniac?”
“Well, that remains to be seen. I’ve never actually driven any form of motorcycle before, but it should be fine – I watched you do it.”
John immediately clutched harder, gritting his teeth in anticipation of flying arse over tit. Thankfully, Sherlock’s ability to learn by watching paid off and they set off again without a hitch, rocketing (as well as one can rocket at 50mph, that is) back onto the M4 and then continuing west. John still spent a few uneasy moments with his head slightly to the side of Sherlock’s arm, watching to make sure he wasn’t avoiding the cars with just seconds to spare, but after a while the cold air was just making his eyes water and he moved his head back again.
As it turned out, Sherlock made an excellent windbreak, and John started feeling a lot more comfortable almost straight away. He pressed up a little closer to Sherlock, resting his cheek on his back and closing his eyes – not sleeping, just conserving his energy.
The miles just rolled on by…
---
… but then they slowed to a shuddering halt.
John blinked himself out of the semi-stupor he’d slipped into, gingerly shifting his stiff arms from around Sherlock’s waist.
“Everything okay?” he murmured, arching back and wincing at the resulting crack.
“We appear to be out of fuel,” Sherlock replied, not without a trace of humour.
“Oh, right, well,” John said, shaking his head slightly with a small smile. He glanced around, but it was dark and one country field looked much like another. “Guess we’re stopping for the night, then.”
John then eased himself off the back of the moped, but this small movement managed to set off a sudden wave of nausea that left him gasping. As soon as his feet touched the ground his knees began to wobble, and he slid down to the ground in a graceless heap. He tugged down his mask and doubled over with pain, clutching his stomach and coughing hard enough to make his whole body shake and his head throb.
Sherlock immediately dropped the bike and then crouched down beside John, cupping his face in his hands once the coughing had finally subsided and tilting it slightly upwards, eyes darting back and forth across John’s red, tear-streaked face. His gaze lingered on the flecks of blood around his mouth for the longest time, but he said nothing. John watched him for a moment, before curling his fingers around Sherlock’s hands to tug them away from his face again. He didn’t let go of them, however, but simply held them still in his lap.
“It’s getting worse, isn’t it,” he said, voice hoarse but steady, still watching Sherlock’s face. “The drugs are wearing off quicker.”
“The virus will have mutated beyond the capabilities of the medication by now, yes.”
“Right.” John nodded, satisfied with the honest answer. He squeezed Sherlock’s hands once before letting go of them, and then got to his feet again with only the slightest shiver of instability. He glanced around at their surroundings, methodically clenching and unclenching one hand into a fist before lifting it to wipe the traces of blood away. He then began to unpack the necessary supplies from his bag and the storage compartments on the bike. “It’s pretty dark,” he commented as he worked. “You drove for a lot longer than you said you would. Where are we?”
“I wanted to get as far as possible, and there were fewer cars to avoid out on these country roads, so I went a little faster,” Sherlock admitted, rising to his feet in one, smooth moment with his eyes still locked on John’s face. “The bike is empty, now, but we just passed a town called Swindon not long ago. We’re approximately nine and half miles from Corsham. The RAF base is on the way.”
“Okay,” John said, voice quiet as he set the fire. “So we’re walking the rest of the way, then?”
“If we can’t obtain any more fuel, then yes. It’s a three hour walk.”
“Well, that’s a damn sight better than thirty two.”
Sherlock made a soft noise that might have been of amusement and then began to assist John with setting up their “camp”, which involved unravelling the two roll mats beneath a sturdy oak tree. It wouldn’t be the most comfortable place to sleep, but John knew that he didn’t have the strength to go wandering about in the dark, looking for a house to break into. Besides, there was every chance that they could happen upon the only occupied house in the area, and John didn’t particularly feel like running from another pointed gun.
He was just thankful it wasn’t raining.
“How long’s it been, now?” John asked between fresh bouts of coughing as Sherlock came to join him. “Two weeks?”
“Two weeks tomorrow.”
“Two weeks. Two weeks with the bloody flu.”
“I told you, John; the reason that this particular virus has been so devastating is largely down to its long life. It gradually wears down the patient’s immune system until the body can no longer –”
“I know what it does, Sherlock.”
“Of course. I was simply reiterating.”
John stared into the fire as the sounds of the night closed in around them, stifling his coughing and letting the cool air enter his burning lungs. A breeze rustled through the fields, swishing brown stems back and forth while the solitary hoot of an owl on the hunt floated on the air. His head still throbbed, but the silence was calming, peaceful.
“I’ve forgiven you, you know,” he said suddenly. “For what you did.”
“I’ve done lots of things, John,” Sherlock responded almost coldly, picking long blades of grass and twisting them into various kinds of intricate knots before tossing them into the fire. “You may have to be more specific.”
“Specific? Okay, I’ve forgiven you for tricking me, knocking me out cold when I was still determined to go back to the hospital, and then barricading us indoors for over two weeks. I’m still holding a grudge about the head in the fridge, though.”
“Hm. It was entirely necessary, John. You couldn’t have done anything for–”
“What I’m trying to say is: thank you,” John interrupted, sensing a potential argument. “For saving my life.”
Sherlock abruptly closed his mouth, staring hard at the fire before offering a nod.
“Of course. I’d be lost without my blog –”
“Hardly your blogger anymore,” John cut in with a short laugh, miming typing. “I’m lacking a vital component.”
Sherlock’s head jolted upwards to look at him, but his expression was decidedly soft.
“Fine. I would be lost without my – without you, John.”
The night chorus picked up again in the short silence that followed Sherlock’s statement, and the two men simply blinked at one another, the glow of the fire flickering on their faces. John was the first to smile, but Sherlock quickly responded with a small quirk of his own lips. For a short while, it was easy to forget how completely fucked up everything else was, but then John realised that they were still staring at each other and he cleared his throat loudly, glancing away and patting Sherlock’s knee just the once before getting back to his feet.
“Well, I’m going to try and get some sleep,” he said, tone as casual as he could manage. “You staying up?”
“For a while longer, yes. I would like to have some time to think.”
“Good, good. You do that. Give me a shake if you want to trade places; it’s probably a good idea to keep one pair of eyes open.”
“If you insist. Take another vial before you sleep, though. It may not work to its full ability any more, but it will alleviate your symptoms somewhat. Once we reach the bunker I will be able to create an improved batch.”
John didn’t voice his doubts about this, but instead took one of the two remaining vials from Sherlock’s bag, holding it up to show that he had it before gulping the liquid down. He then unclipped his sleeping bag from the top of his rucksack and unravelled it, kicking his shoes off and sliding in. After a little bit of rearranging and scooting around, he actually managed to get into a reasonably comfortable position: facing the fire… and Sherlock’s silhouette. It was a reassuring sight.
“Night, Sherlock.”
“Goodnight, John.”
---
Though John slept deeply, with an unclouded mind and peaceful dreams, the sudden feeling of warmth at his back managed to rouse him into gradual wakefulness. It was only when an arm curled around his body and began to tug him closer that John panicked and sat upright, reaching inside his jacket for his gun and–
“Oh for pity’s sake, John. It’s me. Go back to sleep.”
“Sherlock? But what are you –”
“We’re outdoors; it’s, in your words, ‘practically winter’; and the fire likely won’t last the entire night. You’re a doctor – think.”
John blinked and then, still half-stunned, gradually sunk back into the comparative warmth of his sleeping bag.
“Conserving body heat?” he hazarded.
“Correct, well done, now lie on your side.”
“What about keeping an eye out?”
“We’re in the middle of nowhere and the vast majority of the population has been wiped out.”
“We’ve already seen other survivors.”
“You know I’m a light sleeper; I’ll be able to hear if anyone is approaching. Now please, John, lie down.”
John hesitated for a moment longer, but an insistent shuffle from Sherlock prompted him into realising that protesting further wouldn’t get him anywhere. With a slightly irritated sigh, John rolled back over onto his side, and Sherlock immediately closed the gap between their two bodies, his arm moving once again to drape over John’s body and tug him even closer.
“Is that really neces –”
“No. Go to sleep.”
John fell silent, spent a few more bewildered seconds trying to decide if he was entirely comfortable with this situation, and then settled on giving up and getting back to sleep.
And really, it wasn’t all that bad.
---
The staff of St. Bart’s soon forgot what it felt like to stand still. They were being stretched thin, like plastic wrap: getting pulled tauter and tauter in an attempt to keep everything under control. It wasn’t long before little rips and tears began to appear.
They started having to turn people away; every bed was full and the waiting list stretched on, with names being added far quicker than they were being crossed off. Some of the more inexperienced members of staff were soon both emotionally and physically exhausted, but the ever-increasing amount of patients meant that everybody had to start working longer and longer hours. In the rare lulls, it was a common sight to see doctors and nurses sleeping on their feet – catching a few precious moments of well-earned rest.
It was being dubbed the “new swine flu”. It had all the same symptoms: fever, coughing, sore throats, headaches, muscle pains, and so on. There was just one problem: the vaccinations and antiviral drugs simply couldn’t work fast enough; the virus mutated too quickly, outwitting and defying every cure designed to combat it. As a result, those that got sick, stayed sick, and those that thought they didn’t have the virus soon succumbed. The government ordered a general quarantine, trying to persuade people to remain in their homes until a permanent cure was discovered, but by then it was far too late. In one way or another, practically everyone had had contact with the disease.
People started to die.
Then the panic started for real.
John. –SH
What is it, Sherlock? I’m a bit busy. –JW
You need to come home. –SH
No can do. I’m a doctor, and people are dying. They need me. –JW
They’re going to die regardless. There’s nothing you can do. Come. Home. –SH
John pocketed his phone and ignored his texts. He got on with his work, told himself that he was making a difference, that he had to keep on trying, that they’d work it out eventually.
Then the phone calls started. John ignored those too, at first, but it was becoming increasingly more difficult to tend to his patients with his phone constantly buzzing in his pocket.
“What, Sherlock? What is it?”
“I need you. Please.”
That did it. With guilt in his heart, John let the other staff know that there was a family emergency, but that he would be back as soon as possible. He ran down streets packed with traffic (a cab would be foolish, the Underground even more so) and finally made it back to Baker Street, panting.
Only the fear that Sherlock could be sick too had been powerful enough to drive John from his work, and so his rage when he discovered that Sherlock was perfectly fine was well-justified:
“I can’t believe you’d do this, Sherlock! There are children, little children – people’s sons and daughters! They’re dying, Sherlock, all of them! And you couldn’t care less, could you? You made me think something was wrong with you to get me to come back here, you unbelievable, selfish prick –”
“John, I told you. It’s pointless. A proper cure cannot be developed quickly enough. Mycroft has informed me that –”
“Oh, well, hoo-fucking-ray for Mycroft. Where was he and the rest of the government two weeks ago, when this all started? Why didn’t they fucking tell people to stay in their homes before we reached this state? I’ve heard enough, Sherlock, I’m going back –”
“No, John! You can’t. Please.”
“Give me one good reason, Sherlock. Go on. I’m listening.”
“Because you’ll have already been infected with the disease. I can’t lose y –”
---
“John.”
It was said with such a quiet intensity that John was immediately awake. It didn’t take long to source the reason behind Sherlock’s urgency: a tall, middle-aged man with a hunting rifle aimed directly at them standing not twenty feet away.
“Get up,” the man said. “Slowly.”
They could do little else but comply; neither of them were armed and even if they did rush him there was too great a chance of one of them getting shot. With deliberate care, they both got to their feet and stood side by side, almost simultaneously lifting their hands in surrender.
“Where’re you from?” the man demanded, taking a step closer.
“London,” Sherlock replied coolly.
“Then how come you’re not dead?”
“I’m sorry?”
“London’s wiped out. The disease took them all, so’s I heard – and good riddance, too. So how’s come it didn’t take you?”
“Blind luck, I suppose,” Sherlock said, a trace of sarcasm sneaking back into his tone.
“Sherlock,” John whispered. “Don’t. Not now. He knows how to use that gun - don’t provoke him.”
“Hey,” the man growled, swinging the rifle so that it was aimed directly at John’s chest. “Quit your whisperin’ and answer my damn question – properly.”
“We’re alive for the same reason you are, for the same reason when there are ever any survivors of a national pandemic,” Sherlock said, and John could almost hear him rolling his eyes. “Natural immunity.”
“Fuckin’ immunity,” the man spat – literally, too. “Fat load of fuckin’ good it did for my wife and girls. So where are you goin’, then? What’s around here that’s got two Londoners interested?”
“London’s dangerous,” John cut in before Sherlock could say anything. “Everything’s been looted, there’s no food, there’s nowhere safe there.”
“So you thought you’d move on here, did you? Fuckin’ typical.” He had been moving steadily closer the entire time, until he suddenly stopped – as though he’d just realised something. “Hang on. I know about immunity – just ‘cus you haven’t got the disease doesn’t mean you’re not carryin’ it. You could just end up killin’ anyone you meet.”
“We’re not trying to –” John began as patiently as possible.
“Shut up. What’s in the bags?” the man interrupted with a growl, nodding his head at their rucksacks.
“Our supplies. Food, water, clothes –”
“You,” he cut in again, swinging the gun to point it at Sherlock. “Start unloadin’ them so I can see.”
John could see Sherlock stiffen out of the corner of his eye, but was beyond relieved when he simply moved to comply rather than making another witty remark. John remained standing with his arms raised, trying to look as harmless as possible while Sherlock slowly went onto his knees and then began to unpack the rucksacks, laying out all of the items on the ground.
“The side pockets too. Show me everythin’.”
Sherlock obediently unzipped the pockets on John’s bag, first putting down cutlery and then their compass and small toolkit. He hesitated when his hands moved over the pockets of his own bag, however.
“What’s in there?” the man asked, immediately suspicious. “Gun?”
“No…” Sherlock said with a sigh. “It’s –”
That’s when it happened. John started coughing hard enough to make his knees buckle and force him into dropping his arms so that he could clap a hand to his mouth. The man instantly aimed his gun at John again, eyes wide.
“You said you weren’t sick!” he yelled, finger trembling around the trigger. “You said you were fuckin’ immune!”
John couldn’t stop, even when he felt the warm spray of blood coating his palm. Sherlock lifted his hands again, talking quickly:
“Do not shoot him. I designed medication that would stop him from being contagious, you have nothing to fear – he can’t pass it on. You can’t catch it from –”
“Shut up, shut the fuck up! My whole fuckin’ family died, and I’m not taking any chances!”
“No - NO!” Sherlock shouted.
And then, John is back in Afghanistan.
The screams of the dying, the crack of a gunshot, the dull thud as a bullet slams into flesh, the spray of blood in the air.
Only this time, John wasn’t immediately propelled face-first into the dirt.
In fact, he didn’t feel a thing.
Sherlock groaned thickly at his feet.
John stopped coughing and stared at the man at the end of the rifle.
The man stared back at him and made to readjust his aim.
John reached inside his jacket pocket, drew his gun, and shot him dead.
---
The knowledge was at the forefront of his mind in an instant; John was still on the battlefield.
He worked with a quiet intensity, ignoring the rush of blood in his ears and the twist of panic in his guts, stripping clothes and boiling water and searching amongst their up-ended possessions for the all-important first aid kit. Sherlock lay still in a pool of silence and blood, his eyes shut and his expression still, but his chest continued to rise and fall. He flinched and groaned at the first swipe of the hot, damp cloth, but John gritted his teeth and continued to work; his knowledgeable hands, his doctor’s hands, moving with practiced ease along Sherlock’s body.
There was so much blood, and it kept on coming.
Once he was convinced that he had cleaned the wound as best he could, John folded up a wad of bandages and placed them directly over it. He unwound the thick, wool scarf from around his neck, and took a moment to steel himself before tying it around Sherlock’s thigh as tight as he possibly could. John had expected him to scream, but instead Sherlock’s eyes just flew open and both of his hands clenched into large, trembling fists. He didn’t even breathe a word until John had finished tying the final knot, applying the further, necessary pressure to the wound, and even then it was only:
“Describe.”
“Left outer thigh. Bullet passed straight through – femoral artery and femur both still intact.”
“Our attacker?”
“Dead.”
Sherlock nodded as he let out a slow breath, closing his eyes again and gradually unclenching his fists, but the way his jaw was set told John that he was still in an incredible amount of pain.
“I’ve done all I can, Sherlock. You could still die without proper treatment.”
“We need to keep moving, then. There’s a medical room in Burlington.”
“I don’t know if you’ll be able to walk like this.”
Sherlock hissed with something akin to anger and his hand lashed out to grab John’s, squeezing it tight.
“Painkillers, John, give me painkillers – as many as is safe. I refuse to just lie here and wait.”
He didn’t have to say what he would be waiting for; John understood perfectly.
“Strongest we’ve got is codeine tablets.”
“Get them.”
John did and, after spending a harrowing two minutes helping Sherlock up into a sitting position, gave him two pills and just enough water to wash them down. He then left him there to adjust, propped up by the rolled-up sleeping bags and roll mats, whilst he first re-evaluated their inventory and then packed only the most necessary items into a single rucksack: the toolkit, first aid kit, the last litre of bottled water, and the map and compass. Everything else was stuffed into the other rucksack with the intension of keeping it all out of the way, but before he put it down John had the sudden impulse to check the pocket that Sherlock had hesitated over. He reached inside, but all he felt was shards of broken glass and dampness: the final vial of medicine. It must have been crushed when Sherlock had leapt up to –
John shook his head: he wasn’t going to start thinking about it. What was done was done. Instead, he just put the rucksack down with a resigned sigh, zipped up his jacket, and tugged the other (thankfully lighter) one onto his shoulders.
“How are you feeling?” he asked as he walked back over to Sherlock.
“Fucking awful, but of course that’s to be expected. Are we ready to leave?”
“Only if you are.”
“As ready as I’ll ever be. Help me up – please.”
It took another long, exhausting five minutes, but eventually John had a trembling, sweat-drenched Sherlock up on his feet and leaning heavily on him. The sheer effort required on John’s part was enough to leave him gasping, but he straightened his back and lifted his head, taking in a deep breath.
“We can do this, Sherlock,” he said with a small smile. “One step at a time.”
“With your assistance, John, I have absolutely no doubt of that.”
---
The going was slow.
Agonisingly so.
What should have taken ten minutes took twenty, and the road just seemed to stretch on into eternity. They didn’t talk – they couldn’t. Talking sapped more energy than it was worth; energy that they both needed just to keep on placing one foot in front of the other. The only sound they could make was that of heavy, determined breathing and the occasional, restrained gasp from Sherlock if he placed too much weight on his left leg. John’s vision was beginning to swim and his head was pounding so hard that it was actually drumming out a rhythm in his temples, but they didn’t stop. If they did, there was no telling if they would even be able to start again.
They walked along twisting and empty country roads with feet of lead and iron determination. Step by weighted step the miles gradually succumbed to their relentlessness, and they were finally making progress. But it was getting harder. Sherlock began to lean more heavily on John, which wouldn’t have been too bad except the shoulder he was leaning on was John’s left, and so it was beginning to severely aggravate his old war wound. There wasn’t much he could do about that, however, except soldier on.
And then he saw it.
“Look, Sherlock,” he said, lifting an arm to point.
“It” was a sign, and it read: RAF CORSHAM: 2 MILES.
“Fantastic,” Sherlock muttered. “Water.”
And with that, Sherlock promptly sat down on the ground, swaying slightly. John pushed the sweat from his forehead and then dropped the rucksack down beside him, moving stiff fingers to undo the back and pull out the bottle. The instant he twisted off the cap, Sherlock tugged it from his grasp and took a long pull, emptying about half of it in a single drink. John was too tired to protest, too tired to warn him that it was all that was left; he just wordlessly accepted it back and took a long drink of his own. There probably wasn’t much point in being conservative anymore, anyway.
After slipping the now nearly-empty bottle back into the bag, John crouched unsteadily beside Sherlock, ignoring his protests as he undid and then quickly redid the knot on his thigh, eliciting a sharp hiss of pain and an almost catlike lash of the hand. The swipe caught John on the side of the head, causing a sunburst of pain to flash across his eyes, but he just roughly grabbed Sherlock’s arm and then bullied him into getting back on his feet. Pain, as John knew all too well, had the destructive power to turn friends against friends.
“Two miles,” he said – quietly. “Let’s go.”
---
Thanks to other such signposts along the way, finding the RAF site had been relatively easy – even getting inside hadn’t proved to be too much of a challenge, seeing as the gates were wide open. But now they’d been wandering for half an hour, past deserted concrete buildings and empty Humvees and abandoned fighter jets, and they’d seen no sign of anything that looked even remotely like an entrance to an underground haven. John groaned with exasperation as he realised that they’d just gone in a large circle.
“Come on Sherlock, come on, it’s got to be around here somewhere.”
“It’s a secret bunker, I highly doubt the entrance is going to be in plain sight.”
“Haven’t you ever done any research on it? Just think –”
“I can’t, John. I… I can’t.”
They came to a sudden stop, John’s eyes anxiously scanning Sherlock’s face. His skin was even paler than ever, his lips bloodless and his eyelids dark, making his face seem gaunt and hollow rather than the usual angular and sharp. Blood had soaked through both the bandages and the scarf, turning the pale blue fabric crimson with little rivulets trickling down his bare leg. His breathing was laboured, his eyes dull. John knew in an instant that they were virtually out of time.
“It’s okay, Sherlock,” he began gently, but Sherlock stopped him with a snort.
“It’s useless. I cannot access anything, the pain is just – Give me more codeine. If I can just control my reactions, then I’ll be able to –”
“No,” John said. “No. I won’t have you overdosing.”
“What choice do we have, John?”
“We have this one.”
On impulse, John first stretched up and placed a kiss on Sherlock’s forehead. Then, with an expression that firmly suggested he wouldn’t take kindly to arguments, he helped Sherlock into as comfortable a sitting position as possible by propping him up against a small building with John’s jacket as a cushion.
“You get some rest. I’m going to have a proper look around.”
Sherlock didn’t even argue, he just settled down with his injured leg flat on the ground and closed his eyes. John nodded to himself and started walking away, when Sherlock called:
“Come back soon – please.”
“I will. I promise.”
---
Although it was easier to move around on his own and the thought of losing Sherlock spurred him into moving even faster, it didn’t take John long to realise that he was making approximately the same amount of progress; that is, not a lot. It all boiled down to the simple fact that he had no idea what he was looking for: a conspicuous-looking door? A bolted grate? He was on the verge of tearing his hair out with frustration. What had Mycroft been thinking, leading them here and then apparently abandoning them without any further instruction? They had come so close, but now…
John gritted his teeth.
“Hello? Anyone out there?” he called, turning in a slow circle. “Only, my best friend is fucking dying and it’d be really fucking great if someone could come out here and tell me if we’re even in the right place. Hello? ANYONE?”
With the final shout, John drew his gun and pointed it straight up at the sky. After all, Sherlock had once said that it was quicker than the telephone for alerting the authorities and –
“Sir, put the gun down.”
John was so startled that he nearly dropped it and then, when he spun around to see around ten members of the Armed Forces with their rifles all pointed directly at him, he actually did.
“Thank you, Sir. Identify yourself,” said the same man (a Major, and therefore superior in rank to John) from before.
“Captain John Watson of the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers.”
“How did you come to find this place, Captain Watson?”
“A message – we were left a message. From Mycroft Holmes.”
There was a brief moment of whispering and several meaningful glances were exchanged. After a moment, the Major addressed John again:
“Mr. Holmes did not have the authority to direct you to this –”
“Listen, right. Mycroft’s brother, Sherlock Holmes, is the man I brought here with me. He’s been shot in the thigh and he’s dying. So I don’t give a toss about whether or not Mycroft had the authority to tell us about your precious secret hideaway or not – Sherlock needs urgent medical attention.”
“Captain Watson, we cannot risk letting in the potentially infected. It would be a serious breach of protocol.”
John groaned, and ran a hand through his hair. There was nothing else he could do.
“I’m sick,” he admitted. “But Sherlock’s not. So, please… I’m actually begging you, now. Please just help Sherlock.”
The men had all stiffened at John’s admission, and their slightly relaxed stances quickly transformed back into nineteen weapons all being trained on John’s heart. The Major, however, simply looked John dead in the eye, and then reached for the small radio attached to his belt. He spoke briefly into it, but was too far away for John to catch the conversation, so he just waited with as calm an expression as possible.
“Well?” he asked once the major clipped the radio back onto his belt.
“Take us to Mr. Holmes, Captain Watson.”
John could hardly believe his ears.
“You mean we’re being let in?”
There was a moment of silence and the Major cleared his throat.
“I have been granted permission to admit Mr. Holmes. I am afraid that you will have to remain out here, Captain Watson, until I have received further instruction.”
The weight of his words hit John low in the stomach, and for a moment it felt like his legs were about to give out. But instead, he nodded and lifted his chin, setting his jaw.
“Fine. Fine. Follow me.”
---
The world felt tilted. Sherlock was barely conscious when John crouched down beside him, but with a few words and a gentle touch to the upper arm, John managed to rouse him and tell him a skewed version of what was about to happen. Sherlock was in no state to question him, and simply nodded his head as John told him that some people were going to pick him up, now.
They made John stand about ten feet away as three of the men came and lifted Sherlock from the ground. The Major walked a little closer to John, his expression one of grave respect.
“I will do my utmost to obtain permission for you, too, Captain Watson.”
“Thank you, Major,” John replied, voice quiet.
The men began to leave, nodding their heads in silent salute as they passed John, taking Sherlock with them.
“John –?” Sherlock called, lifting his head slightly.
“I’ll be right behind you,” John called back, lifting a hand to wave. “It’s all fine, Sherlock. It’s all fine.”
In a few moments they had all departed, disappearing around a corner one by one.
And John was… left.