John is uncomfortable with the subject of his army career. Sherlock knows John's reticence not to be shame from the way he stands up just that much taller when they encounter uniformed personnel and from the palpable pride when he mentions—offhand because he rightly doubts Sherlock's interest—that one of his army mates has earned another field promotion. John revered the army for all that it gave him, but there is a part of him, however stifled, that equally resents what it took. It is that part that gets the details of conduct wrong ever so slightly.

Sherlock has seen John salute. It was frankly appalling and Sherlock had smirked that anyone would bow and scrape to an officer who couldn't be arsed to salute straight. John had laughed along with him, the censure in it unremarked. John Watson, Captain, Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers. The lie of it is obvious though the truth is more difficult to ascertain. Mycroft has no opinion, which is opinion enough, really.

John's shooting habits are detestable when observed. He blinks when a steady gaze would suit, breathes when breath should be held. He is a terrible portrait of a well-trained soldier, he is one that never misses his mark. And isn't that frightening to anyone with the intelligence to know better? John at his worst and least disciplined is deadlier than many men who live and die by protocol.

Sherlock shivers in deductive bliss. He thirsts to see John draped in protocol, coated in threads of convention not of his own making that he now refuses to accept. It would be the equivalent of seeing John caged—not like Baskerville, never like the Pool—and he craves it.

John might call it 'a bit not good,' but Sherlock can't think of anything better.

He devises a hundred scenarios to make it so. If only he had the courage to enact even one.

Maybe tomorrow.