Secret Santa for SapphireMint! (Sherlock) (M)

[Seniorstatus14]

SapphireMint!!! Happy Belated Christmas/ New Years! I hope you've had a great holiday season, and I'm sorry this is so late. I'm such a horrible procrastinator. I was so excited when I found out that I was writing for you, albeit, nervous too as you're such a fantastic writer! Anyways, I really hope you enjoy your story and the rest of your holiday season!

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An icy wind whipped through the broken windows of the old flat Sherlock and John were investigating; cold air penetrated the thin walls. There were only a few days until Christmas came, and instead of curling up by the fire, reading and drinking a warm cup of tea, Sherlock had dragged himself and his flatmate to investigate a murder. John shivered, bitter about having to be out on a freezing, winter day instead of in his wam flat.

“Fingernails torn… bruising less than 24 hours old… signs of struggle.” Sherlock mumbled on, more to himself than anyone in particular.

Trying to distract himself from the cold, John looked to the window, only to be disappointed to discover that it had started raining.

Lestrade was astonished. “Done? Well, what did you find?”

“It was her sister.” He replied, unamused.

“Her sister?” Lestrade stared at him with disbelief.

“It was obvious—”

“H’ngtCH!” John jerked forward a bit with the force of the sneeze “Ha’NGxch!”

“God bless,” Lestrade acknowledged before he turned his attention back to a slightly annoyed Sherlock — he hated being interrupted.

“As I was saying, quite obvious. Two perfumes could be detected on the victim, they were of similar scent and of the same brand. Could’ve been a coincidence, but by looking in her wallet you can see family photos where someone is ripped out, but the photos were cut short, and you—”

“Ah’hnTSH’oo!” John face flushed with embarrassment.

Greg and Sherlock’s eyes snapped over to John. “God bless.”

“It was the sister. Case closed.” Sherlock turned and exited the room.

John hurried out of the room, knowing that Sherlock would indeed leave him behind if he didn't keep up. He jumped into the taxi Sherlock had already hailed and saw Sherlock waiting expectantly for him.

It wasn’t long before the cab reached Baker Street and John started gathering up his belongings. However, the car didn’t stop in front of their flat. Instead, it continued driving straight before turning right at the end of the street. “He missed our flat?” John turned to Sherlock, confused as to what was going on.

“We aren’t going to the flat.”

John stared at Sherlock. “Then where are we going?” He sniffled discreetly.

“To catch Laura’s sister.”

“Laura’s sister? As in the Laura who was lying dead on the floor of the flat? AHh’ngxch! We’re going to catch the murderer?”

“Don’t stifle, it’s bad for you. Yes. Do try to keep up, John.” Sherlock sighed.

John shivered. It was freezing out, and all he wanted was a nice cuppa and his bed. Not to mention the fact that his head was starting to pound and his throat was a bit scratchy. “Why can’t Lestrade and his men do it?”

“Because they wouldn’t know where to find her.”

“You could just tell Lestrade where to find her!”

“They wouldn’t be able to do anything about it.”

And we can? John left the question unasked. He sighed in annoyance and rubbed his nose. He could feel a sneeze coming on, and soon his breath was hitching. Sherlock turned his phone’s flashlight on and shone it directly in John’s eyes.

“H'NCHh'oo! Eh'tSH!” John sniffled before turning to glare at Sherlock. “What the hell was that for?”

“The bright light allowed you to emit a photic sneeze response, which helped relieve some of the congestion from your cold that was building up in your sinuses.” Sherlock explained, as though it was obvious.

“I don’t have a cold, my allergies are acting up.” John sniffled again as he searched in his pockets for some tissues. Sherlock, who was one step ahead of John, had already pulled out a handkerchief and was trying to hand it to John. “Thandks” He took it and roughly blowing his nose.

“Your only allergies are to pollen, and the flowers haven’t been pollinating recently. That leads me to believe you’re suffering from the rhinovirus, also known as the common cold—”

“I know what the rhinovirus is!” He was a doctor, for goodness’ sakes.

“It’s also the middle of winter, so there’s a higher chance of you catching a cold. Not to mention the fact you’ve been working at St. Bart’s and have seen dozens of cases of the common cold. . You’re sneezing, you’re congested, your throat hurts, and you have a headache.” Sherlock concluded with a smug look on his face.

John rolled his eyes. Always like Sherlock to show off his deduction skills. “I’m find, Sherlock.”

“I believe the word you’re trying to say is pronounced is ‘fine,’ not ‘find.’” Sherlock smirked.

Thankfully, John was saved of having to think of a retort to Sherlock’s mockings as the car pulled up to the edge of the woods. John shot Sherlock a look of confusion. “Our murderer is hiding in the… in the woods? Ah’nxch! H’ntshh! Hehh… ah hah’CHHH’oo! Eh’ngtSHHh!” By now, he had given up on trying to stifle his sneezes.

“Yes. She left behind a slight scent of pine and, I know from my previous explorations of the woods that there was an abandoned house a couple of miles in.”

“Can we make this fast? It’s quite chilly out, and in case you haven’t noticed, it’s raining and we don’t have any umbrellas.”

“Of course we don’t have umbrellas, John. How are we supposed to chase after our suspect if we have to tote around giant umbrellas.” Sherlock rolled his eyes, wondering why John couldn’t deduce even the simplest of things.

They headed into the woods. Sherlock was running, and John was struggling to keep up and gasping for breath. He was quite fit from being in the army and could usually run at Sherlock’s pace or faster, but he wasn’t feeling well and was lagging a bit behind. Sherlock saw John lagging behind, but he didn’t slow down.

Sherlock reached the abandoned house first. He texted the coordinates to Lestrade, and by the time he pressed “Send,” John had arrived.

“So? What’s the plan?” John asked breathlessly.

Sherlock looked back and forth from John to the door of the cabin. He had planned on the two of them just barging in and taking down the suspect, but seeing how pale and shaky John looked, he figured a change of plan was in order. “We’re going to knock on the door and say we were hiking in the woods, got a bit lost, and were wondering if we could use your phone to call our friend for help.” John was so busy trying to catch his breath and slow his racing heart that he just nodded in agreement.

They walked up to the door and Sherlock knocked lightly.

“Hello?” A young, blonde, woman, probably about 23 years old answered the door.

“Hi, my friend and I here went hiking in the woods and we got lost and it started raining. Do you mind if we come in and use your phone?” Sherlock smiled making sure to give the woman his best puppy dog expression.

“Well, actually—”

The woman started with her excuse as to not let them in, but a giant sneeze erupted from John. “Ah’tCHhOO! Eh’sCHhhooo!” John sniffled miserably, rubbing his pinkening nose.

“God bless you.” She said, taking in the shorter man’s pale and shivering form. “Come on in. I’ll make you two a nice cuppa.” She couldn’t just leave such an adorable, sick man standing out in the rain.

Sherlock walked in, and John followed, muttering a quick “thank you” as he entered the shelter. The woman left, leaving the pair standing awkwardly at the door, wondering where she had gone, but she soon returned with two thick, fluffy towels.

“Here you go. Thought you two might like to dry off a bit.” She handed them the towels and then went over to the stove where she started boiling water for the tea. “Phone is on the table!” She hollered out to the two men.

“You stay here and call Lestrade, I’ll be back.” Sherlock whispered.

“Where are you going?”

“To look around” Sherlock stood and started towards the back bedroom.

John sighed and dialed Lestrade’s mobile.

“Hello?” Lestrade answered on the first ring, obviously expecting a call.

“Hey, we’re in Laura’s sister’s house out in the woods. I’m not sure exactly—”

“I know where you are. Sherlock texted me a few minutes ago. I’m on the way.”

“How far a-a- AH’TCHHhh! Far away are you?” John sniffled thickly before starting to cough, pulling the phone away from his face.

Greg winced in sympathy. John sounded awful. That same cold had been going his force the past few weeks and he was amazed that neither John nor Sherlock had come down with it until now. “Not far. Just hang tight.”

“Bye.” John hung up just as Sherlock walked back into the room.

“Find anything?”

“Yes, everything we need to…” Sherlock heard the woman’s footprints approaching the main room. She was carrying a tray that consisted of a teapot, 3 mugs, a bowl of sugar, and a bowl of cream, along with a couple of spoons.

“Thandk you so mbuch.” John smiled warmly up at the woman. For a murderer, she was quite nice.

“Yes, thank you for everything.” Sherlock acknowledged.

“Oh, you’re very welcome. My name is Annabel, but you can call me Anna.” She replied as she sat down and fixed herself a cup of the tea.

“My name’s Sherlock and this is my…colleague, John.”

“Nice to meet you.” She replied as she held out her hand for Sherlock and John to shake. They shook her hand and fixed themselves some of the tea.

The three of them exchanged small talk, though Annabel did most of the talking, until there was a hard knock at the door. Sherlock stood “Ah, that must be our friend, Greg.” Annabel nodded and went to open the door for them. Shocked when she opened the door to reveal an entire police squad.

“Detective Inspector Lestrade. And you, Annabel Greene, are under arrest for the murder of Laura Greene.” Lestrade recited the usual rights. Annabel tried to run, but Lestrade grabbed her arms and efficiently handcuffed her. She tried fighting her way out. She kicked and stomped and bit, but with an entire police squad behind her, she soon found herself restrained and being walked out of the woods.

Once Lestrade finished dealing with Annabel, he turned back to Sherlock and John.“Thank you two. Now I want you to go home and get some rest” Lestrade pointed at John as he said that last part. The two nodded and walked outside, expecting to have to walk back in the rain to the edge of the woods to hail a cab, but they soon spotted a mini car, just big enough for two people.

“Whose car?” Sherlock asked.

“Yours for tonight. I’ll send someone to Baker street to pick it up in the morning.”

John thanked Lestrade as they climbed into the car. Sherlock drove while John watched out the window, struggling to stay awake. John was cold, but leaning his head against the cool glass window soothed his increasingly strong headache. Seeing that John was still shivering, Sherlock cranked the heat up to full blast, and by the time they were out of the woods, John was sound asleep despite his efforts to stay awake. The only noise that could be heard were John’s soft, congested snores. It didn’t take long before they had arrived back at Baker street.

Sherlock parked the car right outside the flat and started to get out of the car, but he noticed that John hadn’t woken up yet.

Sherlock stared at him for a moment, unsure of how to wake him. “John…” He said softly. He didn’t move. “John!” Sherlock snapped. Sherlock sat back and sighed. He thought for a moment before leaning over and gently shaking John’s shoulder. “John, we’re here.”

John groaned and sat up. He opened his eyes to see Sherlock staring at him, inches away from his face. He jumped slightly. “Bloody hell, are you trying to give me a heart attack?” He broke off coughing.

“We’re here.” Sherlock exited the car and then unlocked the apartment door. He moved out of the way, letting John go in first. “Take a shower and put on some dry clothes.”

John just nodded and went to his room. Grabbing the thickest pair of sweats that he owned, he made his way to the bathroom and turned the water on to the warmest setting.

He knew that Sherlock was probably waiting on him and that he should make his shower quick, but all thoughts of a quick shower evaporated the minute he stepped into the soothingly, hot water. He sighed in relief as he felt the water soothe his aching muscles and warm him up. He finally worked up the energy to step out of the shower almost twenty minutes later. He made quick work on changing into his sweats and then stepped out to the living room area. He was surprised to find Sherlock waiting for him with a tray of tea and what looked like a bowl of soup.

“Where’d you get the soup?”

“I went to see Mrs. Hudson and mentioned you were under the weather. She said this would help and wished you well.”

“Yes, thank you Sherlock for going to get it for me.” John smiled slightly, knowing that he hadn’t even seen Mrs. Hudson today and that it was probably Sherlock’s idea.

John flipped on the telly and took the food from Sherlock before taking a seat on the sofa. Sherlock watched him. His intense eyes following his every move. He made a move to sit on the sofa beside him, but John held up his hand. “What are you doing?”

“Going to sit down.”

“No you aren’t, you’re sopping wet. You need to go take a shower and change your clothes.”

“But—”

“Go!” John pointed towards the bathroom, launching into yet another coughing fit from raising his voice.

When Sherlock came out of the bathroom, he wasn’t surprised to see John asleep on the sofa. The food tray had been placed on the floor, and the telly was still on.

Sherlock curled up in the chair, determined to wait for John to wake up, but two hours passed, and he couldn’t wait any longer. He left the room and went to rummage through the medicine cabinet. He discovered that they were out of cold medicine and that the thermometer was… unusable, to say the least, after his recent experiments. Sherlock left the flat and went to the nearest grocery store, sure that John would remain asleep for a while yet.

He walked straight to the back of the store and browsed up and down the medicine aisles. John needed something for his sneezing and congestion, but as he remembered today’s events he figured John also needed something for his throat, fever, and his aches and pains. He found multiple brands of medicine, but then didn’t know whether John would want capsules, or tablets, or liquid medicine. Then there was the question of which cough drops John would like. He decided to just grab one of every type of cough drop and cold medicine. He went to put his armful of supplies in the shopping cart, but then realized that he had forgotten to grab one. He thankfully found an empty one at the end of the aisle, so he deposited the medicine and cough drops into it before continuing his shopping.

The next aisle over contained a variety of tissue products. There were one-ply and two-ply tissues, along with plain tissues and tissues that were infused with lotion. Sherlock sighed, this shopping thing was proving to be more of a challenge than he previously had thought. He grabbed one of every type of tissue along with both an oral thermometer and a temporal thermometer, not knowing which John would prefer.

After paying for his items, he arrived back at 221B to find John still asleep on the sofa, just as he predicted. Swiping all the papers and clutter off of the ottoman, he began to lay out his purchases. He alphabetized the medicine by brand and put them on the left side of the coffee table and then alphabetized the cough drops by brand and put them in the middle part of the coffee table. He went to reach for the tissues and thermometers to put them on the right side, but he accidentally knocked over the medicine bottles, making quite the ruckus as he scurried to pick them up and place them back in order.

“Sherlock?” John rubbed his eyes sleepily as he tried to sit up.

“How are you feeling?” Sherlock spoke softly, hoping not to upset John’s headache. He could see that John’s head was still throbbing by the way he was squinting at the dim light.

“I’ve been better.” John sniffled as he tried to quell the tickling sensation in his nose.

Sherlock nodded and began fumbling with the two thermometers. “Which one?”

“What?” John shot him a look of confusion.

“Which thermometer would you prefer? Temporal or oral?”

“Oral I guess. Temporal ones aren’t as accurate.” John watched as Sherlock finished taking the prefered thermometer out of the box and checking the settings on it.

Sherlock looked up to John and then back down at the thermometer, not sure if he should just hand the thermometer to John, but then he decided just to try and stick the thermometer in John’s mouth.

“What are you doing?” John asked as Sherlock began to stick the thermometer very close to his face.

“Helping.”

“Thank you.” Almost as soon as the cool thermometer tip was under his tongue, the tickle in his nose came back, this time with a vengeance. He tried to inhale deeply through his nose to get rid of the itch, but that only made it worse. His eyes widened as he knew he was going to sneeze. He waved for Sherlock’s attention, hoping that he would remove the thermometer before he sneezed.

Sherlock grabbed the thermometer just as it started to beep, just before John launched into an intense sneezing fit. He barely had time to breathe between each sneeze. “Hahh’hntSHH! EH’ngxch! Hehhh… Hh’ahhshHHOo! Hheh’ngshhH! AHh’hngxtCHHHoo!” He snapped forward with every one, covering his face with his hands.

Sherlock didn’t say anything, only glancing down at the still beeping thermometer, which read 38.3. It was still a fever, but not as bad as he had been expecting. He turned it off before ripping open a random box of tissues for John. He needed them now, he could ask for his preference later.

John took one and blew his nose. “Thandks” He sniffled. “So what’s all this?” He looked over to the piles of medicine and cough drops.

“Medicine. I didn’t know what to get.”

“So what did you do? Buy one of everything?” John joked.

“Yes, actually.”

“You’re kiddig!” John examined all the boxes. “Why the allergy bedicinde?” He asked as he picked up a box of antihistamines.

“I thought you said it was ‘just your allergies.’”

“Oh, shut ub” John laughed, but stopped when he started coughing.

Sherlock helped pull him into a sitting position as his body was wracked with the raspy coughs that left him breathless.

The coughing soon subsided, and Sherlock asked John what medicine he wanted.

“Um, that one will be fine.” He said pointing to a box of cold tablets.

Sherlock gave him a dose of the medicine along with a bottle of water.

“I’ll fix you some tea.” Sherlock offered as he set John’s water down on the coffee table.

“Thandks.”

Sherlock made the tea just the way he liked it, with a little bit of cream, and no sugar. Satisfied with his work, he made his way back into the living room where he found John, once again asleep on the couch. He set the mug on the coffee table. picked up a blanket sitting off to the side in the living room, and laid it over John to keep him warm before walking towards his own room.

“Get better soon, John.”

The End

[silentdreamer789]

Lovely

[sapphiremint]

And we can? John left the question unasked. He sighed in annoyance and rubbed his nose. He could feel a sneeze coming on, and soon his breath was hitching. Sherlock turned his phone’s flashlight on and shone it directly in John’s eyes.

“H'NCHh'oo! Eh'tSH!” John sniffled before turning to glare at Sherlock. “What the hell was that for?”

“The bright light allowed you to emit a photic sneeze response, which helped relieve some of the congestion from your cold that was building up in your sinuses.” Sherlock explained, as though it was obvious.

“I don’t have a cold, my allergies are acting up.” John sniffled again as he searched in his pockets for some tissues. Sherlock, who was one step ahead of John, had already pulled out a handkerchief and was trying to hand it to John. “Thandks” He took it and roughly blowing his nose.

Hehe I love that John's photic, it just seems so right. And Sherlock always knowing exactly what John needs.

He walked straight to the back of the store and browsed up and down the medicine aisles. John needed something for his sneezing and congestion, but as he remembered today’s events he figured John also needed something for his throat, fever, and his aches and pains. He found multiple brands of medicine, but then didn’t know whether John would want capsules, or tablets, or liquid medicine. Then there was the question of which cough drops John would like. He decided to just grab one of every type of cough drop and cold medicine. He went to put his armful of supplies in the shopping cart, but then realized that he had forgotten to grab one. He thankfully found an empty one at the end of the aisle, so he deposited the medicine and cough drops into it before continuing his shopping.

The next aisle over contained a variety of tissue products. There were one-ply and two-ply tissues, along with plain tissues and tissues that were infused with lotion. Sherlock sighed, this shopping thing was proving to be more of a challenge than he previously had thought. He grabbed one of every type of tissue along with both an oral thermometer and a temporal thermometer, not knowing which John would prefer.

Aww Sherlock doing the 'pick one of everything' because he wants to make sure John's happy with his choice

Thanks for writing this <3 I love love love this, you captured all the characters so perfectly. BBCSherlock!John fics are my favorite. Yum yum yum, I'm definitely going to be re-reading this lots.

[stargazer]

This is so cute. I love awkward Sherlock trying to take care of a sick John.

[MyOwnPrivateSFC]

Oh my gosh, this was wonderful! So very Sherlock: knowing everything nobody else does (including how to make John sneeze!), but flailing inside at how to buy cold meds. Not to mention the soup!

[SneezyHolmes]

So cute! Would love to see some contagion~

[AngelEyes]

Sherlock sighed, this shopping thing was proving to be more of a challenge than he previously had thought

This is so Sherlock. And I can relate, I have this same problem sometimes! This is great, I love it!

[matilda3948]

Sooooo marvelous!! I love sick John

Excellent job!

[Choobat]

Yay! More plz!