Chapter Text
The first time it happened was two weeks after the incident at the pool. John was walking home from the surgery when from the corner of his eye he saw fast movement in the alley to his right. He turned to look, but it was too late, he was tackled to the ground by a masked assailant. John tried to fight him off, but while he did get in a few good punches (the other man would be sporting an impressive shiner and a busted lip), his attacker had the advantage of both surprise and reach on him and eventually John was overpowered, face down on the concrete, his hands zip-tied behind his back. His feet got the same treatment after he managed to land a solid kick against his attacker’s knee, which made him hiss in pain.
John had to admit that his situation was more than a bit not good. He might have escaped his last two abductions relatively unscathed, but that was no reason to treat this cavalierly. Especially, since he had no idea who was taking him. As far as John knew Sherlock didn’t have a case on and that hadn’t changed in the eight hours John had spent at the clinic if the increasingly creative texts bemoaning boredom were any indication. Having no obvious culprit would make it more difficult for Sherlock to track him down, once he realised that John was missing, well if he noticed. That probably depended on whether or not the agitated boredom from this morning had shifted over to sulking boredom yet. John hoped it hadn’t, because in that case Sherlock would probably notice in about fifteen minutes, when John didn’t arrive home on time.
Once John’s feet were secured the stranger turned him on his back again, so his bound wrists were digging uncomfortably into his lower back and ripped off his mask.
“That was abysmal!” Sherlock complained. Well, that answered one question. Agitated boredom, definitely agitated. Where did that absolute bastard even get these ideas when he was bored? Why couldn’t he do an analysis of all kinds of pens, or printer ink… there had to be something, Sherlock hadn’t analysed to death yet.
“Sherlock!? What the fuck, do you think you’re doing? And if you haven’t brought anything to free me, I swear to god, Sherlock, I’ll –”
“This was laughably easy”, Sherlock continued to rant, completely ignoring John’s outrage, “It’s no wonder you get kidnapped that often! I didn’t even have to draw the knife to subdue you! Anyone could just pick you off the street whenever they wanted! What did they teach you in the army?” Sherlock had tried to pace at the beginning of his little speech, but had given up on it when his knee protested. Probably sprained, judging from the angle of the kick he’d landed and the way he was keeping his weight off it, John thought. Well, served him right! The git certainly wouldn’t get any sympathy from him, especially since the way he was lying on his arms was slowly setting his bad shoulder on fire.
“How to sew people back together, mostly,” John answered deadpan, since that was the kind of answer that might surprise Sherlock out of his strop and therefore shut him up for a bit. “You know saving lives, that kind of thing. And did you just say you have a knife? What are you waiting for? Cut me free!”
“Well they completely forgot to teach you how to save yourself! How am I supposed to do my work, if you get yourself kidnapped every time some lowly criminal doesn’t like the way an investigation is going?” So that’s what this was about. John knew, Sherlock didn’t want to admit it, but the whole Moriarty debacle had shaken him. Well if this was how he dealt with that, by kidnapping John to make sure no one else did, John might even forgive him, as long as he hurried up with that fucking knife before his arm was rendered useless for the rest of the day.
“Lowly criminal? I really don’t think Moriarty qualifies as one and neither did the Black Lotus. Now use your damn knife and let me get up!”
“They might not qualify, but this most certainly does. I’m alone, my only weapon is a knife, which I didn’t even need by the way and I was being careful not to hurt you. Still, I would’ve had no problem whatsoever to abduct you quickly without anyone noticing. Now I know you can fight, but apparently that’s worth nothing when you’re taken off guard, so you have to pay more attention to your surroundings, or you’ll endanger the work!”
“Cut. Me. Free. Sherlock.”
John didn’t know whether Sherlock had finally heard the pain behind the anger, or just decided that keeping John tied up wasn’t entertaining anymore, but Sherlock finally complied.
“Careful not to hurt me, my arse…” John grumbled while gently massaging his shoulder. “The only reason I’m not punching you for this is that my left arm hurts like a bitch… and I already did, now that I think of it.”
“I… hadn’t considered the strain that position would put on the damaged tissue…” Sherlock almost looked apologetic, not about the whole attack of course, but at least that he hadn’t freed John sooner. “It wasn’t my intention to hurt you, as I said before, but you really need to be more careful, if that hadn’t been me, but someone else who attacked you, they wouldn’t be so considerate. Hurting you might even be their goal, so…”
“Yeah, point made, I’ll try not to get kidnapped again. Now can we please go home? You owe me a cup of tea.”
So they went home and Sherlock actually made the tea for once, John noticed Sherlock was still limping and wrapped up his damaged knee to stabilise it, Sherlock saw John hold his mug with his right hand and went to fetch an ice-pack and John told him to get one for his black eye and sprained knee too.
“And if you ever decide to test my awareness again, don’t wear a mask! I might end up actually hurting you.”
“Oh please.”
And so it began.