Trust Issues

102 Dalmations

 John was about to fall asleep when he was shaken awake by someone. Immediately thinking it was Greg, he shooed the arm away and turned on his side.
“John!” a voice whispered. They sounded close to tears, so he knew it couldn’t be Greg. Blinking away whatever sleep he had left, he rolled onto his back to see Sherlock hovering over him.
“Captain, hi, sorry.” John said quickly, trying to make sure his hair looked okay without moving. He doubted it did. Sherlock looked down on him and looked very nervous, scared even.
“Sorry, what do you need?” John added, remembering that it must be ten o’clock at night. Everyone else must be asleep if Sherlock had come to wake him up.
“Can I have a word?” Sherlock asked his voice shaky.
“Sure, what do you need?” John asked, trying not to yawn in his face.
“In private if it’s not too much trouble.” Sherlock added, looking among the sleeping men as if they were listening. John groaned internally, but dared not do it out loud. He didn’t want Sherlock to think he was interrupting his sleep or irritating him.
“Ya, okay.” John agreed. Sherlock moved aside and let John crawl to his feet, careful not to bump Greg, who was asleep on his back with his mouth open, drool slipping disgustingly down his chin. Sherlock’s hand was patting his thigh impatiently, looking around as if he was on some kind of schedule. When John got to his feet he made his way to the fruit room, opening the door, and, as usual, holding the door and letting John in. Sherlock shut the door silently, holding a torch in front of him that seemed to appear out of nowhere.
“What’s wrong?” John asked.
“It’s gotten worse, much worse, and they hurt.” Sherlock admitted. It took a while for his sleepy brain to figure out what he was talking about, but he guessed now that it was the black spots on his skin.
“How much worse?” John asked nervously. Sherlock shook his jacket off and started to unbutton his shirt, making John a little bit uncomfortable and very interested in the moldy fruit on the floor. When he looked back up, he saw Sherlock’s pale, bare chest was covered in black spots, resembling a Dalmatian. John’s heart dropped, it looked bad, really bad.
“It feels like burns, like their burning my skin.” Sherlock admitted, his voice cracking. Tears were forming in his eyes now, as if he thought he was going to die. John didn’t think Sherlock was going to die; he refused to believe that the almost indestructible captain would die like this.
“I don’t know what to do; I don’t think I can get through this.” Sherlock muttered. Even muttering he sound panicked, and John wanted to do whatever he could do to help, and if that was nothing then he would make sure to pretend, for Sherlock’s sake, that there was actually hope.
“No you’re not, you’re not going to die, you just have to fight it off.” John insisted. “When did it get this bad?”
“This morning, I checked the one spot and saw that there were more.” Sherlock admitted.
“You’ll be fine, don’t worry.” John assured, but even he had his doubts now. He saw a tear drop down the captain’s face, reflecting off of the torch light. John did his best to avoid looking back at Sherlock’s chest, he didn’t want the captain to think the wrong thing.
“Do you think it’s the scythe that’s making it worse?” Sherlock asked.
“Maybe.” John admitted. It would make him feel better to blame this all on the scythe, it was the scythe that made this all happen, the disease, the spots, everything. But unfortunately his brain kept reminding him that he was the one that had done this to the captain, not the scythe. The scythe wasn’t the one that kissed Sherlock, which passed the disease onto him, it had been John. He sighed deeply, wanting to do something to make him feel better, a hug maybe? But looking at Sherlock he knew that they all just needed to get off this bloody island, away from the scythe, from the rotten black goo, from this stinky fruit room, from the church labyrinth.
“You will be okay.” John assured. More tears rolled down Sherlock’s pale cheeks, making John feel even worse.
“I’m sorry for waking you up, I just don’t know what else to do right now.” Sherlock said, trying to wipe his eyes with his hand.
“I don’t care if we’re in two different ends of the earth, I’ll drop everything to help you and you know that.” John assured. Sherlock nodded, but that obviously didn’t make him feel better. He sniffed, looking around and suddenly realizing how awkward this situation must be for both of them. He started to button up his shirt again, pulling his jacket back on, pulling the sleeves as long as they could go to hide the marks. With the spots covered he looked normal, like the captain that had stolen John’s heart on the docks in Selsey what felt like years ago.
“Come here Sherlock.” John said, holding out his arms for a hug.
“I don’t want to get you sick.” Sherlock pointed out.
“I’m already sick.” John pointed out. Sherlock reluctantly shuffled over to where John stood, wrapping his arms around John and stooping over to set his head on John’s shoulder. It was kind of awkward since John was a lot shorter than him, but he hugged Sherlock back, and for a moment nothing else really mattered. They were together; everything was going to be fine. He felt tears splash onto his shoulder, but he ignored it, Sherlock had every right to cry. In fact, John was surprised he hadn’t broken down long ago. If their places had been switched, John would be a wreck, trying to go back, trying to encourage everyone to find a cure for him, anything to save his life.
“You’re going to be all right.” John assured, but he had doubts himself. Sherlock didn’t answer, but John was able to guess what he was thinking. He had doubts, he had all of the doubts in the world, plus a ton of pressure on his shoulders from the crew counting on him, and he was barely able to hold himself up. That’s why he needed John, he needed a shoulder to cry on, someone to take care of him, to share the burden of life that comes crashing down on both of them. Sherlock pulled away, and John could see, even in the dim torchlight, that his eyes were red and watery from crying. He felt bad for him, out of everyone that might deserve this type of fate, Sherlock was the absolute last.
“It’s probably late.” Sherlock muttered.
“It’s probably eleven o’clock in the morning, but to us, having no sense of time, yes, it’s late.” John agreed. Sherlock cracked a small smile, but this time John didn’t fall for it once.
“Get some sleep, you’ll feel better in the morning.” John assured.
“Lies Mr. Watson.” Sherlock pointed out. “I’ll wake up a pile of goo, but I doubt we’d be the only ones to care. Good night, for now.” And with that little trace of his past self, his energetic, sarcastic, peppy self that John didn’t know he missed, Sherlock walked out of the room. As soon as John followed him though, the captain’s posture faltered and he hunched against the wall, sliding down to sit and stare at a spot in space, no trace of a smile on his face.