Disclaimer: I don't own Sherlock. Written for enjoyment, not money.

Chapter 1

"I'll be next door if you need me."

"Why would I need you?" Sherlock slurred, already falling back deep into the haze of sleep by the time John's answer preceded the soft sound of the bedroom door closing.

"No reason at all."

The detective had been out for scarcely a second, perhaps a minute at most, when an unusual noise broke through the silence. It was a sensual sound, nondescript but distinctly female, familiar yet foreign. Sitting up, Sherlock squinted in confusion in its direction and presently identified a dark shape hanging on the back of his door as his coat. He frowned. Certainly he'd not hung it there. He never hung it there. That could only mean that The Woman had been in the flat, and without John's knowledge. Intrigued and somewhat disturbed, Sherlock disengaged himself from the bedsheets and wobbled across to the door, noticing a glow from within the coat's pocket. His phone. Likely also the source of the sound he'd heard. Fishing the device from the depths of the garment, he studied the screen.

"Till the next time, Mr. Holmes."

The text message blurred and shifted with his wavering vision, but Sherlock regarded it thoughtfully, his back braced against the doorframe for support. Eyes glancing warily from the phone, out to the surrounding room, and back again to the phone, he made the mistake of simultaneously pushing away from the wall. Gravity pulled, his legs wavered, and he staggered clumsily toward the window. His right shoulder collided hard with the sill, and the sudden pain caused him to overcorrect in altering his course until he lost his footing completely and came to lay sprawled in the middle of the floor. Blinking, he focused again on the text, his shoulder throbbed, and he thought vaguely about sleep, but the floor wasn't a great place for that. He thought about sitting up, too - sitting was better on floors - but not when the floor constantly changed its mind about whether it was actually the floor, or the ceiling, or the wall, or some incoherent combination of the three. With a groan, Sherlock stayed where he was, thumbs working at his phone.

Through the wall he heard the expected ping, followed several seconds after by footsteps. The door opened behind him. "What's this about water - Sherlock!"

Wincing at the volume of John's worried voice and again at the sudden contact of a hand on his abused shoulder as John stooped beside him, Sherlock turned a half-frown on his flatmate. "My hearing is not damaged, John. Kindly keep it that way and refrain from shouting, hm?"

Watson scowled back. "Right, I'll try to contain my concern next time I unexpectedly find you collapsed on the floor."

"Very good."

John rolled his eyes. "Um...why are you back on the floor? I thought you were going to sleep."

"I was - I am. I thought Lestrade should know first, though."

"About the watermelon," John said doubtfully.

"Watermelon? What has a watermelon got to do with anything?" Sherlock scoffed.

John had often found his conversations with the detective to be non-linear, but he was quickly discovering the detriment pharmaceuticals posed to that particular problem. "Your text, Sherlock. 'Tell Lestrade to check the watermelon,'" he quoted, holding up his phone.

Sherlock squinted at his own phone for a moment, then gave up. "Ridiculous. Obviously it's that spell-correction menace again."

"Well then what did you intend? And why not text the detective inspector directly?"

"Why do when you're here?" Sherlock said as if it were a given that John should be his personal text-dictation service at all times.

Watson tipped his head to one side, a bit discomfited by the near-truth in that.

"My intent," Sherlock went on, "was that Lestrade be informed that the object that killed the hiker could be found in the water - or, most probably, stuck in the reeds half a kilometer downstream from the scene of said hiker's death, thereby disproving murder."

"You do realize that you gave the police that exact information hours ago, Sherlock?"

"I did?"

"You did, and the boomerang was recovered after a bit of searching."

"Oh. Well, in that case I'll be going to sleep. Sorry to disturb you." He shifted a bit, getting comfortable, and then lay still.

"Sherlock, you can't sleep down here," John said, exasperated. "Come on." He patted the other man on the shoulder to get his attention and was startled when the detective gasped and flinched away. "What's wrong?"

"You're a doctor, I'm sure you can recognize an expression of pain when you see one," Sherlock ground out. "As to the cause, I presume it has something to do with my shoulder having been stabbed, whipped, and fallen on today."

"Whipped?" Watson raised an eyebrow.

Sherlock looked resolutely away.

"Never mind. Let's get you off the floor and I'll have a look."

"It's fine."

"It wasn't a question."

"I don't care."

"Me either. You're bleeding," Watson said, indicating a dark, damp splotch surrounding a small tear on Sherlock's sleeve. Thankfully, the revelation seemed to stay further argument and John was able to hoist the detective to his feet and deposit him on his bed for the second time that day. Making sure he was steady enough to sit, Watson stepped into the bathroom. When he returned a few moments later, first aid kit in hand, Sherlock was studying his battered shoulder with interest, having discarded his shirt.

John joined him on the edge of the bed, quickly noting the expected puncture wound as well as three distinct lash marks, one of which had left a seven-centimeter split in the skin directly over the puncture. There was too much bruising to identify a point of impact from Sherlock's recent fall, but if John had to guess he'd put that right over the worst of the damage as well. It would explain the renewed bleeding. "That wasn't a standard hypodermic she got you with, despite the look of the syringe I found at the scene," he commented.

"A dart of some sort, I think," Sherlock agreed, wincing as John carefully probed the area around the laceration. "Or an ice pick, perhaps."

"Fitting, given her personality." They shared a wry grin, but Watson sobered, continuing his examination. "I need to clean this up a bit. You shouldn't need stitches, but heaven knows where that whip of hers has been."

"Heaven and four-thousand-odd followers on Twitter," Sherlock muttered.

"Sorry?"

The younger man shook his head, closing his eyes against another episode of vertigo as the floor became the wall again.

"Sherlock!"

Sitting straight with a start, the detective glared at Watson. "Again with the shouting."

"Easier than picking you off the floor," John said with a shrug, taking his hands away from where he'd been poised to stop his flatmate's forward list. "In fact, just lie down. This is going to take a moment and you look like you're thinking of passing out again any second now."

"I'm thinking nothing of the sort," Sherlock said, but gingerly rotated his body until he allowed that he had a greater probability of ending up on the bed than the floor if he let gravity take him. John's guiding grip on his elbow indicated that he'd miscalculated, or perhaps that the good doctor was just a chronic worrier. Well, that much he'd already known.

Distantly, he heard the snap of John's medical gloves going on, and then rubbery fingers gently gripped his bicep, adjusting the position of his arm. He let out an involuntary yelp when a firmer touch sent fire shooting through his shoulder.

"Sorry," John apologized.

"What are you doing?" Sherlock demanded breathlessly.

"Did you actually see the dart when you pulled it out?"

"I...don't remember. Why?" Sherlock craned his neck to frown at John, who was intently focused on the wound. The doctor made a face and looked up.

"I think it's still in your arm...at least part of it. I can see it just beneath your skin. You may have driven it in deeper when you fell."

"Brilliant," Sherlock muttered.

"It will only take a second to pull it out, but I can give you some lidocaine if you want."

"I've had quite enough drugs today, thank you."

Unable to argue with that, John nodded and reached for the tweezers in the kit. "Ready, then?" he asked.

"Yes." Despite the affirmative response, Sherlock still tensed when the cold metal penetrated his skin and the pain increased tenfold. He felt his heart rate spike and flinched as the tweezers found their mark.

"I've nearly got it."

The detective drew in a slow breath, focusing on John's left hand resting gently on an uninjured part of his shoulder, and tried not to think about what the other was doing just a bit lower. Finally, Watson made a sound of triumph and the dart was out, but he didn't have much chance to enjoy it before John was swabbing disinfectant over the area, setting it ablaze once again. Sherlock hissed and twenty nearly-undetectable methods of murder popped through his mind unbidden, before John applied some sort of soothing gel over the butterfly strips he'd used to close the laceration from the whip. The reduction in pain was almost instantaneous and the tension in Sherlock's body slowly evaporated. His head was swimming and he was only minutely aware of John helping him under the covers and applying ice to his shoulder. After that there was nothing, nothing at all, until he woke up screaming.