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Sherlock’s running through the forest, trees cross his vision at high speed, he can't really know if he's been here before but he has the feeling this is not the first time. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knows he can’t stop, because something dreadful could happen if he does. He's not sure how long he has been running like this. He feels it could be hours, days, weeks even. The air is cold, his legs are tired. He can’t remember why he’s running but he feels the hazard upon him. Just like in Serbia.
Serbia. That clicks in his brain and suddenly the bubble of panic bursts in his chest. This is Serbia, he must go on, his captors are following him. Did he escape? Why is he running again? He feels branches breaking under his feet, and he realizes he is barefoot, almost naked. Something warm runs down his back and across his face, though. Is it blood? Is it raining? He can’t tell clearly what is going on, how this happened, why.
Run, Sherlock. Run . His own voice gets louder in his head with haste, this one thought loud in his skull, along with his own breathing. The darkness around him is broken only by the flecks of light cast by the moon. Run, Sherlock, run. His chest burns, the cold creeps into his nose, his throat, his lungs are on fire.
Until his legs give in and his face sinks into the ground as he collapses.
When he opens his eyes he’s not in the forest anymore. Everything is dark though. He tries to move but something restrains his limbs. The cold in his wrists tells him what he needs to know and a heavy thing drops in his guts. He’s back in the dungeon, chained to the walls… He can smell the dampness around him, he can feel the rough ground under his chained feet. He’s shivering. He’s cold. And yet, something hot runs through his veins, the fear . The panic. No please, no. His voice in his mind refuses to say anything else, like a desperate plea.
All of a sudden he’s startled by a known noise of a pair of boots moving behind him. At this point he can’t recall why he’s there, he doesn’t even know what they want from him. But he can see the boots in his mind, he can trace the movement by the noise they make, he can predict the exact second they will shift or stop. He knows by heart every detail of the man behind him, the routine he follows when they're both in there. The smell, the skin, his hands, his face, the expression the man makes every time he beats him. And the grunts he makes when he’s behind him.
Inside his head there’s nothing else than a cry of panic. Sherlock closes his eyes trying to shut his own voice up. To think clearly, to recall why he’s there and how he can get away from this. But his senses are full of this place, sudden memories flashing in the back of his head. Pain. Crippling pain cracking his mind…
When he’s breathing as fast as his lungs will allow without getting enough oxygen something else happens.
“Sherlock…”
John’s voice appears in his head. It’s like a whisper, hidden in the viscous liquid of his panic. All in his mind stops.
He holds his breath. Just to make room for this sound, trying to find it, so different from everything else. He can feel the warmth of John's voice somewhere in there.
“It’s not real,” says another voice. His own voice, bored, unimpressed. "He's not here".
But the whisper comes back. "Sherlock?"
This time sounds like a question, like John looking for him in the dark. That voice ignites like a flame, dancing in the abyss.
He almost forgets about the cold or the fear, hoping for John until a sudden movement at his back drags his mind into the dungeon once more. By what he listens Sherlock knows the man has chosen a metal pipe. Every fiber in his body tenses with anticipation.
The pain. He can remember the pain and yet every time he feels it is like a completely new experience. He should be used to it by now, but the waves of hurt always hit him like the first time. Sherlock closes his eyes once again, trying to hide from whatever will come.
But John's voice is there.
"Sherlock, I'm here"
Where? Where are you? Sherlock wants to ask, he needs to know, desperately needs to find him, to know why he’s there. To feel that he’s really there, somewhere.
"It's not real, idiot" says his own voice. And he can’t really tell if his mind is trying to protect him from madness or just trying to break him.
But John's voice comes back. "I'm here, love".
Love … that ridiculous word floats somewhere, like a sparkle. John would never call him "love". Yet. The word leaves and echo… a trail he feels he can follow.
"John?" He says outloud. The sound of his own voice startles him. It feels unreal.
The man moving behind him snorts loudly. Any flame inside his mind fades when he listens to the laughter, the hollow laugh that terrifies him, because he can deduce by it that this man has no real feeling for any living soul, he’s just anger and wrath.
Sherlock braces himself to take the blow, closing his eyes tightly.
"Sherlock. I'm here"
"John? Where are you?"
"At home, Sherlock."
Home? That place exists somewhere. He knows. He hasn't been in this hell forever. It’s just that the word feels somewhat out of place, as if it was a concept from an absurd fairy tale. Yet John’s voice is like a beam of light. Like a tremulous lantern lighting little corners of comforting memories in the midst of oblivion.
“Home?” Sherlock repeats to himself and he can finally move in his mind, walk through the corridors of his mind palace, look for the stairs, trying to find that place, home.
“Home, yes” says John once again, his voice is that orange light that Sherlock can follow down, even if it’s dark. Slowly, John’s voice traces a place Sherlock’s heart can recognize as his.
“The fireplace. Where you play the violin almost every night for me.”
And Sherlock can see himself on his feet, with a familiar presence under his chin. His fingers can almost follow a pattern, a warm melody echoes in the darkness.
“The wooden table. Here’s the mark your mug left so many years ago”
And Sherlock’s fingers touch the wood as he traces the circle mark there, like a ghost over the table, like an echo repeating in time.
The tapestry
The carpets
The smiling face
The sunlight through the curtains.
Spot by spot, John’s voice lightens something Sherlock had forgotten, even if he knows all of it inhabits his heart. The only place he can be safe, the only place where he could find John again and again.
"Sherlock, I'm here" says John’s voice at last and it lightens John himself.
John's hands
John's smell
John's worried face.
“It’s not real” he listens in his mind once more, but by now that voice is smaller, almost imperceptible. Sherlock can stand up in the middle of his flat. Their flat. And linger in the hidden happiness it brings, where not even the man in boots can get in. Can’t he?
“I’m here, Sherlock. I’m always here.”
Sherlock can almost feel John’s hands cupping his face, Brushing away his frown, softening his clenched jaw, lacing his fingers into his tight fists.
“Open your eyes, I won’t go away.”
But he can’t do that, he’s afraid of losing this again, of falling into the dungeon one more time where there’s only pain, cold and darkness. Where John can’t exist, where he’s alone. He tightly shuts his eyes, refusing to lose this beautiful dream.
“I would never leave you alone. Not again”
Not again. With a gasp Sherlock finally opens his eyes. And he’s not at the dungeon. He’s in his bed, curled tight up, sweating and shaking, but John’s there, as he promised. Looking at him not with pity, but with concerned love. Real love.
“I’m right here, Sherlock”
Something escapes from Sherlock’s throat as John touches his face, just like in his dream, wiping away the fear.
“You had a nightmare.”
John’s arms wrap Sherlock as he tries to make himself as tiny as possible.
“I’m right here and you’re safe, at home.”
Sherlock wonders silently for a second how long this dream will last and when he fears once again he will wake up in the middle of the dark dungeon, with the man, and his boots and the horrible pain, John’s voice lights up again.
“I love you, Sherlock”