Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Prompt:

If anyone ever asked, John would blame this whole situation on the dreams.

John dreamt about a war sometimes. Not the war. Another war. Where he saw mountains piercing high through the sky instead of deserts. There were trees there and all-engulfing flames that he never seemed to be able to stare much. The flames made him shiver despite the scorching heat, like there’s darkness within it and John always felt like he’s going to be swallowed whole if he stared too long.

He always felt like he’d started falling into the flames in these dreams, but startling blue eyes entered his vision each time and he’s drawn towards them instead. Drowning now, instead of flaming.

He woke up gasping like he did from his other nightmares, but these kinds of dreams rattled him in quite a different way than his Afghanistan dreams. It always felt like he’s unsettled. Like he put on his skin the wrong way when he woke up. Putting on clothes, shoes, made him uneasy still, like they weren’t his. If he looked in the mirror, everything from the tidy trim of his hair to the shade of his eyes looked wrong. When he looked out of the window he absurdly longed for clear blue sky and green, rolling hills.

John barely ever seen green, rolling hills. To long for them made him feel like he’s losing his mind. Instead of making him nervous and jittery like his Afghanistan dreams, these war dreams made him feel like he’s not even himself.

On such disconcerting mornings, the last thing he wanted to see as he went down the stairs was Mycroft Holmes. But at that moment, even Mycroft was beside the point.

Standing near the fireplace, gaze scanning the living room like he’s cataloguing the environment, was a tall, dark-haired man John had never seen. But the man turned as he heard him coming down and the startling blue eyes that trained themselves on John’s own were eerily familiar.

John could feel something lodging in his throat, making him feel even less like himself, his feet felt disjointed, unlike his own, like he’d misstep and topple over any minute now. John was certain Mycroft could see his discomfort, though he’d probably chalked it to his psychosomatic limp. Not that Mycroft would care, he probably saw the weakened state John’s in and thought it a good chance to make him agreeable to his little Plan.

He called it a little Plan, of protecting John while his men were credibly certain that John’s life was wanted, and John could hear the capital letter when he said it.

It was a ludicrous plan anyway.

‘No.’

‘John.’ The look Mycroft sent him would’ve been patronizing for a five year old let alone a grown person. ‘I’ve not finished explaining.’

‘I don’t need you to.’

‘It wouldn’t be right by Sherlock if I don’t at least try to help,’ and there it was, the trump card, whipped out as if it was nothing. Mycroft didn’t even change his posture once, leaning against his umbrella as he was because John hadn’t offered him and the quiet man standing by the fireplace to sit.

‘Couldn’t you do that by keeping an eye on me? You’re already doing that anyway,’ John’s eyes reluctantly left the unknown man’s and trained warily on Mycroft’s. There’s a headache starting to throb on his temple and John couldn’t believe he’d have to talk his way out of Mycroft springing his Plan on him out of nowhere.

‘I’m afraid doing that here takes too much manpower that are greatly needed elsewhere,’ Mycroft started. ‘Surely you don’t want to keep superfluously spending taxpayer money on keeping yourself safe?’

‘Then let me fend for myself.’ John said through gritted teeth. ‘I don’t even know anything, why would anybody still be after me? He’s gone!’ John didn’t need to elaborate the subject, Mycroft’s face hardened all the same.

‘For these people, that hardly matters,’ the dark-haired man said, his voice rumbling out of him like a physical touch, snapping John’s focus straight to him, and even that felt eerily familiar. ‘Even if by the slightest chance you would know something of interest to them, they will take it. They’ve hardly anything to lose, and the current power behind them is patient. Thorough.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ John looked at Mycroft. The man sighed, sparing a glance at the unknown man as if he’d rather not tell.

‘Let’s just say Moriarty’s people aren’t your only concern right now. They’ve… made friends. Troublesome ones.’

‘Unrest is at hand. This is why it would be best for us all for you to be in the safe house, Dr. Watson. You’ll be assigned security details. And Mr. North here will assure my peace of mind while the rest of my men can concentrate on dealing with the… complications.’

Without thinking, John’s eyes were already trained back to the man Mycroft called North. He was walking closer now, and John had to crane his neck to look at him as he came near John to hold out his hand ‘Lucas North. At your service.’

A shiver ran down John’s spine at those words as he shook the man’s hand, and he blamed that, and the dreams, and Lucas North’s startlingly familiar blue eyes as the reasons he agreed to Mycroft’s Plan.

It was a daft plan, but John was even dafter for agreeing to it.

-

Thorin:

The place they refer to as the solitary confinement was a dark, freezing place, exactly five by five meters in width—he knew, he’d counted them in an attempt not to lose his mind—and no matter how he tried, Lucas always lost the sense of time in there. They kept him fed, but only barely, and dehydration was a favorite form of interrogation of one of the officers.

In those uncounted days he’d spent in the room, the world seemed to shrunk in size until it’s only him in that room, everything else vanishing, forgotten by him and forgetting his existence. He couldn’t differentiate the nights and days, as he spent most of the time huddled against a wall, his back plastered to the heating pipe lining the one wall. He fingers were still blue and his teeth would even clatter sometimes, but the feel of warmth, faint as it was, against his skin was sometimes the only thing reminding him he’s still alive.

He’d forgotten what his captors wanted from him. He’d forgotten the secrets his interrogators wanted him to spill, let alone the reasons why he shouldn’t spill them.

One of said interrogators, Zuyev—he introduced himself formally the first time he went down to Lucas’s cell, said he liked to be familiar with the people he's assigned to before messing with their heads—wore a gold-plated watch around his left wrist, and Lucas saw his own reflection on it once. He didn’t recognize the bearded man with hooded eyes that stared back at him. He didn’t look like himself. There was something else different about the man, Lucas could sense it once he stopped trying to reconcile the man with his image of himself. Could see that the man carried himself differently than him. He sat straighter in the uncomfortable folding chair of the interrogation room, his eyes sedately assessing.

A smirk bloomed on Zuyev’s lips, ugly and eager. ‘Ah. So I get to meet the other Lucas again, today.’

Lucas realized it was the man Zuyev referred as the other him that sat with his back ramrod straight like that. His chin was held higher, and his gaze when he assessed the whole room as if he’s assessing a battlefield was calm and intelligent. Lucas could practically saw it himself. The other man was unbroken.

He withdrew into himself and found strength from the other man. There was a determination in him, settling warm in his stomach like ember, of conviction in himself again.

It was with the other man in his head that Lucas started believing that maybe, just maybe, he’ll find a way home after all. It was the other man that made him thought he could do anything, even double-cross the man soon to be the FSB’s head of operation in London, Arkady Kachimov, while looking at him straight in the eye. When Kachimov gave him the offer of spying for them, it was the other him that said ‘yes,’ his voice in a different timbre from his normal one.

It was paved in blood, but he’d found his way home.

-

Lucas knew that Harry, though a fair boss in general, was really quite hardline when it comes to some things. Those things, apparently, included his debriefings and readjustment after Moscow. It was a whole week until he was allowed to set foot in the Thames House again. He wondered if Harry was still ticked off about the whole mess with Kachimov in London, even though as far as Lucas was concerned it was wrapped up pretty tidily, bow and all. Even Ros agreed with him.

But Harry made him stayed in his own safe house, stewing by day and chasing shadows by night. Though at least at night he could relax and curled into himself, letting the other him take control of his much too active mind.

By the end of the week, his psych evaluation turned out normal. Ros looked at him with a raised eyebrow, because eight years in a Russian prison should leave its marks on you deeper than that, but Lucas knew it was the other man that had kept him sane. When he reached out to him, there seemed to be determination and strength in abundance within him. It was liberating.

Which was why it unnerved him that they still won’t let him go down to the field. What good can he do to the MI-5 if he sits behind a desk pushing papers? When Harry—brows in a tight furrow after coming out of an appointment with the elusive Mycroft Holmes—approached him about the special assignment, Lucas couldn’t agree to it fast enough.

Of course, he’d still be stuck in another safe house, this time in a house in the middle of a nondescript-enough British country side, and it looked rather Dickensian, all this considered. But he’d be on a job and not stewing over his own demons. That was already a major improvement for him.

The man he and his team—although he was the only one actually stationed inside the house—were supposed to protect was almost as non-descript as their location, and Lucas spent quite some time each day searching around for connections and possibilities that made Dr. John Watson a valuable enough person that Mycroft Holmes himself requested this security measure to the MI-5. Things were getting messier now that they’ve learned the man after John Watson’s life was in contact with the FSB’s new head man in London, and when it comes to the FSB, Lucas was one of the best. And Mycroft Holmes wanted the best.

-

Sharing the house with Dr. Watson was easy enough. Being the ex-military man that he was, he’s tidy and self-sufficient, and he mostly kept to himself. They wordlessly took the bedrooms on the two corners of the second floor—for optimum vantage point if they need to scan the area. On mornings he ate the breakfast that Lucas cook with a thank you and appropriate appreciation—nothing superfluous—and Lucas accepted the tea he brew with a thank you in return. They fell into a simple routine where Lucas would spend most times glued to his computer, keeping track of activities from informants and the rest of the time he’d maintain a steady work out schedule to keep his mind and body alert. He and Dr. Watson left each other be as he stayed on his side of the house and Lucas on his own side.

Sometimes the man would look at him with a faraway look in his eyes and it’d always seemed like he wanted to say something to him, but always in the end he kept the words inside. From the look on his face, Lucas sure it was something gravely important, though his instinct told him it had nothing to do with Mycroft Holmes and the FSB. It would probably take some time for him to spill it out, Lucas had seen every single piece of paper produced with John Watson’s name on it, and he’d seen the notes his psychologist wrote on the doctor’s trust issue.

He barely had time to ponder upon that lately though, as he’s been barely getting enough sleep, surveilling increased activity from the FSB. He made Malcolm ran every intercepted messages through him, analyzing every encrypted messages looking for the red thread connecting it all. Especially the thread that connected the whole activity to the FSB’s perceived nervousness that Dr. John Watson had gone off the radar. Somebody very high up thought he knew something they wanted. But Lucas hasn’t figured out what exactly that they wanted.

A dull throbbing started in his head as he looked up at the clock. Two-twenty-five. He’s been staying in front of his laptop for more than twelve hours now. No wonder his eyes felt prickly and he’s developing a headache. Any minute now, Dr. Watson would come down to the kitchen and drink a glass of water. It seemed like his sleeps uneasy.

Lucas rested his head back against the chair’s headrest and could feel the other him slowly coming to the surface, like a great bear waking up contently from a deep sleep. It happened more often than not now when he’s exhausted, the other him preventing his mind from chasing convoluted thoughts around in his own head until he’s frayed around the edges and instead took control of his consciousness, grounding him. He let the man woke up fully and when his body rose from the chair, he was already carrying himself differently.

The tinkling sound of glasses from the kitchen piqued the other man’s interest and he made his way to the source of the sound.

Dr. Watson stood in the middle of the kitchen in his bathrobe, a glass of water in his hand. He noticed the presence of another person in the room and turned around to greet them.

‘Oh, you’re still awake—’

His words seemed to have caught in his throat as he took in the view of the not-Lucas in front of him, his body visibly shaking, so much so that the glass slipped out of his grasp and shattered on the floor. The other Lucas himself had froze when John Watson turned around, looking at him with knowing eyes. Lucas, curling in on himself inside his mind, barely noticed the jolt of familiarity in his gut. The other man seemed transfixed on the man’s face, as much as John Watson’s shaking form was still transfixed on him. There was familiarity in his hazel eyes, accompanied by a peculiar gaze that looked similar to longing.

Whatever it was, it seemed to be the answer that the other Lucas was looking for, and with easy strides he was already standing in front of Dr. Watson. Painfully, as if he might break, the other man guided Lucas’s hands to cradle Dr. Watson’s face.

‘…Bashag?’ the voice that wasn’t Lucas’s own grounded out. Dr. Watson seemed to physically melted with that, a soft whimper escaping his parted mouth.

It was all the other man needed before he bent down and captured Dr. Watson’s mouth in a kiss. Their movements were slow, familiar, but heated, and Dr. Watson opened up under him delightfully. The other man licked his way into the warm inviting mouth as if he wanted to come out of Lucas’s body and burrowed himself into Dr. Watson's instead. The kiss turned open-mouthed and sensuous, tongues traveling back and forth, and it was such a nice kiss, one he hasn’t had in a while, that it took an embarrassingly long time for Lucas to realize where he was, and what exactly his body was doing.

When he came back into himself, his stance changed, and Dr. Watson seemed to notice that. When he pulled back, gasping, and saw Lucas in front of him, his eyes widened, and tiny miniscule tremor started again along his fingers.

‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t hav—’

‘I’m going back to bed,’ the doctor said, and Lucas had nothing to say to that as he made his way hurriedly back upstairs. Lucas rubbed his face, couldn’t believe what had just happened—couldn’t believe how good it had felt—and collapsed his body onto the sofa. He was too sleep-deprived to deal with this right then; it’d just have to wait until morning.

Except, he didn’t get to speak—or even tentatively tried to—the next morning and the morning after that. The last encrypted message intercepted by their people in Kazan, Malcolm needed Lucas’s help deciphering it, so Ben was assigned to the safe house in his stead temporarily.

It wasn’t until the third night that Lucas came back to the safe house and although the temporary break into the real world was welcomed, the amount of stress that came from such sensitive information didn’t help with his exhausted body. He arrived back at the safe house at eleven-fifty-two and wanted nothing more than to lie down on the floor somewhere and be dead to the world.

But that was when he heard soft whimpers from behind a closed door. Dr. Watson’s room. Lucas stood in front of his door and barely debated with himself before he pushed the door silently open.

Dr. Watson was trashing on his bed and whimpering. There were tremors running down the length of his body. The last time Lucas saw somebody acting that way, the person was on fire.

On fire. That was what Dr. Watson’s convulsing body looked like.

Lucas crossed the room quickly and grabbed the man’s shoulder, trying to shake him awake. The whimpers started anew, and he sounded in pain. Without thinking, Lucas gathered the smaller body into his arms and rocked him like he would a child, shushing in his ear.

The doctor calmed down after a while, and Lucas can sense the moment he woke up completely, as for a split second his body went taut again. Lucas continued shushing in his ear and the body in his arms relaxed again. When he pulled back slightly to look into the man’s eyes, to ask if he was alright, in a flash Lucas felt the other him pushing forward, as if he too was worried about the doctor. John Watson apparently saw that flash of foreign gaze in his eyes, as he whimpered softly again like last time. And this time it was Lucas’s resolve that crumbled as he bent down and fastened his lips on John Watson’s already parted ones.

It felt a bit different, kissing him as opposed to feeling it when the other him kissed the smaller man. He could taste toothpaste and tea and an earthy taste that he’d later identify as John Watson in the man’s mouth, and it felt more heady and intoxicating. He could feel the tremors in John’s body subsiding little by little as he chased the demons away with every teasing nips and licks. When they pulled back they were both breathing heavily, looking at each other with glazed eyes. Lucas felt a weird sensation like he wasn’t the only one peering through his eyes to gaze into John’s pleasingly flushed face. Like the other him was right there with him, looking in awe.

‘Feel better?’ Lucas ventured to ask.

John chuckled at that. ‘Much, thank you,’

Lucas still held the man his arms, and his hand was still making soothing circling on his back. He gently gestured to the door. ‘Should I go?’

‘Can you…’ John seemed to steel himself and looked him square in the eyes when he asked, ‘can you stay?’

‘Of course,’

John guided him down into the bed, body still cradled against Lucas’s own, and for the first time in too long a time, Lucas felt like he could easily fall asleep in the bed.

‘Why does it feel like I’ve known you from long ago?’ John whispered against his collarbone. Something constricted in Lucas’s chest, something that made him realized he felt the same way about the man. But he was too content in that moment to analyze it further. Even the other Lucas inside him seemed to curl satisfactorily inside himself, radiating contentment enough to engulf the both of them.

Lucas wondered if he’s dreaming already when he drifted off to sleep with a whisper of ‘my King…’ against his chest.

End Part One.