Spoilers: Up to 2x03
Warnings: a lot of angst, incapacitated character, disabilities

A/N: Initially I was writing the story for a holmestice exchange but it came so far off the mark in the end of what the recipient was asking for I dismissed it for that but I hope someone out there will enjoy it instead. Also, I've tried my best to research details for this fic but no claims to medical accuracy are made. Betaread by the lovely fififolle.

Loud. Sharp. Bright-eyed. Pouty. Equally likely to be complimentary as he is to be insulting. Looking to her (for body parts, for facts, for snacks, for a listener) and equally looking through her.

These are all things Sherlock is not right now. Things she misses more with each day.

She'd thought maybe he'd started to look at her properly before it had happened - notice her, call on her, not simply depend on her for supplies...But she can't be sure now, and these days though she can ask when the courage finds her she doesn't get an answer.

Deathly as he looks lying there he still manages to steal focus, as the only important aspect in the dreary room.

Sherlock's skin is dreadfully pale, even for him, but there are no bright red lips contrasting it; he is not awaiting an awakening kiss like the end of some creepy fairytale. For all Moriarty tried to twist life into a story Sherlock was never the knight or the prince, or any other character being played, he was always the reinterpreter, viewing it from above and figuring the plot out.

Now they, the old ordinary players in the game, watch him. He's not locked away beneath a case of ice but it feels every bit like he is. She could reach out, able to touch, as his body is here, yet his mind is less accessible than ever, no stream of consciousness emanating from it. There's no flicker under his eyeslids or twitching fingers, just the enforced mechanical rise and fall of his chest. No proof he actually exists anymore in any meaningful manner.

His lips are light pink, and if she's particularly prone to worry when she visits, she tends to fret over the possibility of spotting a blue tinge, but his sats are always fine and all his stats in general are always fine too, for his condition. Not right, not normal – which feels so like Sherlock – but as expected. Surely, she thinks, it's expected they'll improve. That's an outcome no one pushes anymore, which means it's not expected, is it, she reminds herself, this is stalemate exactly as expected.

That train of thought leads to her sitting staring at the wall, the floor, unremarkable things, at anything but Sherlock, who is anything but how he should be.

Loud. Sharp. Bright-eyed. Pouty. Equally likely to be complimentary as he is to be insulting. Looking to her (for body parts, for facts, for snacks, for a listener) and equally looking through her.

Those things are also all things she is scared he will never be again. That she fears more with each day.

She never visits when John visits because it would feel like an intrusion on her time with Sherlock as much as his time alone with his best friend. She knows John visits frequently though. The business-like massive whiteboard standing upright in the corner gets updated almost daily from her reckoning, with theories scrawled across and crossed out, questions left to be answered as if he hopes Sherlock will spring up out of the bed and start pondering the case that he's left unsolved.

Sometimes she tries to figure it all out and she can sense from the scribblings that John is close to something, because she feels it too, her brain scrambling to hold onto a vague notion that feels only just out of reach to her when she considers all the facts herself each visit. John has been doing this sort of thing longer of course. In all likelihood John could solve this case already if he was putting his whole heart into it. She thinks the one reason he hasn't, that he can't end it, is that this is the reason Sherlock will wake up – he can't stand to let a challenge go and John can't let Sherlock go.

She doesn't blame him. Sherlock's own brother can't let go either. Private room these days; plain, not really that much different from the standard wards but perfectly reasonable for his care. The type of care deemed suitable, which to her mind seems far above what most people would expect or be able to provide, seems to include hired nurses and specialist consultants flown in from all over the globe. Mycroft Holmes is throwing all the resources his money and influence can muster at solving this obstacle to Sherlock's continued existence. No one asks why. There is no question heard of turning off that little switch, pulling the plug, even after months and carefully ushered claims – never to be repeated – of Sherlock being essentially brain dead.

Molly goes over those kinds of questions in her head as she sits by his side, she can't help it. Will the months turns into years before they know it? Will they all keep gathering around the bed, separate, displaced in time, but holding together as one in this devotion that people like to consider misplaced? Will she sacrifice her own happiness holding onto the pain, visiting in hope over and over, for the sake of a man who at best was an eccentric friend, in order to not feel guilty, to not feel she has abandoned him? Mike sometimes tries to ask if she has plans in the evening or at the weekend and there's this singular look, a mix of disappointment and pity, that creeps onto his face when he realises despite her attempt to word it differently, make it sounds more acceptable, that her reply is the always the same – going to see Sherlock. As if walking through that door is as much the death of her as it is of their consulting detective.

But honestly, can she, as she's long known she ought to, give up on Sherlock finally? It should be easier now that he says nothing to her and does nothing with her, not banging on her morgue doors or texting her in the middle of the night. The most important question of all, the one that every concerned soul misses, is, does she want to give him up?

She doesn't ruminate on it too closely but suspects the answer is no, just as it is for John. John never gave up when he thought Sherlock was dead, so fat chance he will this time. Molly can't bring herself to either. She thinks about what else she could be doing and can't find anything she would feel right to do instead – what is more important to her than working out how she feels about what is happening to all of them? So that is what she does when she visits.

It's not for Sherlock's benefit, though she does hope talking to him – which is really more rambling without him to interrupt her - as she tries to do, might stimulate his brain and somehow help lift this spell on him, but no, that's hardly the reason. She visits to have something to do, to feel like she is doing something, apart from attempting to apply the theories her late night research into his condition surfaces. Her medical knowledge might not be improving anything of the situation despite her best efforts, yet she is unshaken in the fact she does come here every few days and consider life - hers, his, the meaning of - and death too, at his bedside.

The one time she and John are both in the room at the same time is awkward and stifling. She stops talking quickly, her nonsense chatter to fill the silence trailing off in the face of her embarrassment. John stands across the bed, as if inspecting Sherlock, looking for signs of change before he casts a glance at the doctor's notes attached to the foot of the bed on a clipboard. At finding nothing he looks lost and angry, restlessly changing the pose of his arms from by his side to behind his back to finally crossed over his chest. Then he looks to her, in a manner almost accusatory, and she feels herself shrink back momentarily, thinking to leave, before she comes to her senses.

"I'm gonna stay for a while longer."

"Really? That's...kind of you," John said, sounding full of faux diplomacy to the phrase eventually settled on, "Filling Sherlock in on anything in particular?"

"Nothing much." She tried to reply nonchalantly and not bristle at the wave of anger that seemed to emanate from the man she'd once thought eminently warm and friendly. He was anything but right now. Not today. Probably not any day since...

"You want me to leave, don't you?"

"That'd be nice, yeah," was spoken expectantly by John, like her question was going to lead her to the full-blown conclusion that she should.

"Well, I'm not."

"What the-...excuse, me?"

"He wasn't just your friend, other people care too. Some of them stopped visiting I know. Not everyone though... Not me."

"Why do you though? Why do you subject yourself to this? Why do you come here and sit vigil like it makes a damn bit of difference?"

It's the most aggressive she's ever witness John being and she doesn't know why it's being directed at her. Still, letting him run out of steam seems sensible, so she doesn't interject and he carries on, voice building in volume and volatility that rings coldly in the echo made.

"Huh, why? Do you think your mild mannered feminine voice is going to miraculously wake him or were you only ever interested in him because you're actually a secret masochist and this is just a convenient whole new level to take that unattainable Sherlock obsession to -"

And that comment is one stroke too far for her, loosening her tongue, she lashes back at him.

"I'm angry too, you know. You don't have a patent on it."

John stares at her, like he's looking closer than before, at her and not simply her-as-everyone-else. He isn't saying anything suddenly. The expression on his face makes it seem he's stewing regardless and she wonders if he's just building up to another 'factual comment', taking cues from Sherlock (wanting to keep the sense Sherlock is here in their world). It's wrong for so many reasons, least of all that Sherlock never intended to hurt her. Had he ever wanted to he could have done so more effectively, she's sure, but John is the one who is meant to say 'don't' and without Sherlock here he is egging himself on, probably trying to work out what true observation will cut closer to home.

All the things he could speak out loud flash through her mind - things she already knows are the truth and that will be as obvious to John as they could be to Sherlock – things that would hurt so much more to be highlighted. The tears well in the corner of her eyes and she avoids his gaze, until she remembers why she shouldn't. He's upset, but then so is she and she has a right to be too. She doesn't deserve this.

"Do you know what I can't stand?" she says, voice cracking a little as she tries to sound defiant and attempts not to cry.

"People telling me to stop coming. They say I should distract myself with a hobby... or a date, ha! Or more work, like being in a dank lonely basement is going to help. All those suggestions are, apparently...perfectly fine to get over my friend lying there. I hate that they're thinking 'oh poor Molly, hopelessly in love with that bloke', when they don't know anything about me and they make these crass assumptions. Because as much as they like to make jokes - especially down at the Yard, about how much better it is when he can't yak back and insult your IQ - they're thinking...and it's so obvious when they look at me with pity in their eyes... who'd visit him day in and day out if they didn't have some stupid infatuation gone mad...I...I hate it. I just hate it all! People telling me what to think about this 'tragedy' and people telling me what I should be doing and people doing anything but stopping and thinking about it. What if he did wake up, today, tomorrow, next bloody year, what then? They don't think about that. They don't consider what he might wake up like, that maybe he's not dead and maybe it's not the end of him but maybe he's not going to be the same if he comes back. They don't though, they don't want to, they'd rather let it rest at this. 'Sherlock's properly dead this time'. 'Silly bugger got himself whacked good and proper.' And I hate him as much for that, you know, the reckless bastard. Then there's the guy who did it too, got shot himself and I hate that I like that he suffered-"

By that point she couldn't hold back the tears. She never cried at the hospital. She wasn't an employee in this one but it still felt too unprofessional to her, a habit that was a throwback from when she studied, that she would never let herself get too emotional anywhere in the labs or on the wards, she didn't want that link in her memory of being overwhelmed in such a place that could allow the floodgates to breach again were she reminded, by a familiar sound or a sight or a smell, of whatever moment had first hurt her.

Here she was breaking for the first time and she knew it was mostly because this room held the air of all her pent up rage and bottled up sadness – this was where she came to deal with this and yet she hadn't so far, not truly. Today was changing that, with each word that she spewed at John she had felt a disturbed sense of relief, more so with him since unlike so many she could have vented at, he could understand. It wasn't merely sharing her pain, it was combining theirs; expressing some measure of it for them both where she hadn't previously been able to alone and he had appeared to be deliberately holding it in like a seal that was an emblem of all that was wrong now.

She'd like to say that was when Sherlock woke up, senses catching the cacophony she created and triggering a response. He didn't though. John had wrapped his arm around her as she cried out months worth of upset, and they'd made a pact to come and visit together in future as much as was feasible.

Instead Sherlock woke up on an unremarkable Tuesday afternoon in December, alone.

He is first aware of things not being as they should be. The sheets are different, scratchy. The ambient noises, low as they are, he could tell they are amiss– shuffling footsteps, rattling trays, amiable chatter as if in an office. He knew before he opened his eyes it was not Baker Street. There were only so many options likely and he wasn't too surprised to find himself in a hospital room. What he was surprised to discover was how hard it was to open his eyes, muscles slow to respond – he presumed drugs as the cause, that or lack of use for some time leading to muscular atrophy. He experiments with moving his hand only to find no discernible response. He wills it to spasm at least, to show some sign he has control. It does nothing. Paralysis could be possible, permanent perhaps but no use jumping to erroneous conclusions, medication could explain it equally as well. Whatever the cause, it doesn't change the fact that he lies there awake for a frustratingly long amount of time unable to alert anyone to his presence.

A nurse comes in at a quarter past three, startled when glancing over his person and spots his eyes are open. He can't be sure if she is simply weak-hearted or if her response belies a true surprise that he is conscious.

It's when he sees John's face an hour later that he knows which it is. Mycroft is already there, milling around in the corridor "discussing" matters with the doctors as far as he can tell, but his brother's uncharacteristic silence as he'd first witnessed the apparent miracle through the window into the room had left no clue as to either how he felt or how strange a situation it is.

John - whose hair is much too long now; ill kept, worryingly neglected - slumps into a chair beside him, epitomising the expression 'flabbergasted' as he looks the most dazed and confused Sherlock has ever seen him. His jaw is slack, no words found, leaving the room empty for the lack of explanation.

Sherlock wants every single fact relayed to him, he wants to know the date, he wants to know what injury put him here precisely and what kept him here, he wants to know if they solved the case that had become so blindingly obvious last he recalls. The only thing he knows apart from the fact John is annoyingly speechless and Mycroft deftly distant, is there's a surely non-standard piece of equipment in the room - a half rubbed out whiteboard. It's the single clue he has to go on and so he sets out to decipher the badly smudged lettering that shows tell tale signs of being John's, and oddly in a few places as what he suspects is Molly's, handwriting.

48 hours later several things have occurred.

1. The 'professionals' have seen fit to examine him further, communicating about his condition in front of him this time, meaning he has not more than scant details about it but less than none.

2. He no longer had a tube down his throat. Proving, if nothing else, that he can breathe on his own.

3. Despite that and the often administered ice chips he couldn't speak.

4. John had devised a system to gauge yes and no from his blinking, no doubt inspired by something he once saw in some god-awful film he must've seen on a date.

5. John is an idiot not to realise he hasn't yet got enough control of his motor function to blink on command.

6. Someone had placed a small (but not small enough, i.e. non-existent) fake Christmas tree in a 'cheery' position that obscured a third of the whiteboard.

7. Molly had professed to every single visitor paraded in that 'there's hope yet' after spotting him bend one finger a fraction.

All he really wanted to do was rant at them both and berate Mycroft for his poor choice of staff tending him. That and he wanted to correct Mrs Hudson's grammar which had deteriorated rapidly under the 'distress' of him coming out of a coma, and snap back at Lestrade for his pithy condolences that trail off unfinished.

But he can do none of this. There's no storming out of the room when he's had enough of them swarming around his position like gnats. He can do nothing except slowly blink out of sync with when he tries to and move one finger the smallest amount imaginable. For everyone else it is tragedy averted; for him it is surely the start of madness, of an order far greater than he has experienced up to this point in his life because he can't get away this time, he can't escape them or the boredom. He can't even point out to John that the penultimate musing on the whiteboard "not the tattooist but the piercer?" he'd clearly dismissed so flippantly was an example of the incredibly rare event of him hitting the right conclusion for once.

John doesn't visit him often enough. If he did maybe he'd have spotted the pattern he was attempting to develop with the blinks – accurately timed blinks were not possible, but slow and slower were, making Morse code a much more realistic goal if anyone could be bothered to consider it. These efforts were naturally wasted on nurses, as unlikely to ever have learnt more than . . . - - - . . . and besides which none of them tried anything other than a weak "And how are you today?" as a combined opening and finishing communication with him, where as John he knew ought to be able to spot the code.

In contrast, Molly spent what he considered an unhealthy amount of time visiting him (more so when he calculated between this and her work she would be spending 90% of her waking hours in a hospital). Her initial nervousness around him seemed to dissipate with his current inability to, as John had tended to describe it in the past, 'spectacularly ram his foot in his mouth' and she had dared to reach out and pat his hand last time. An action that was developing into what looked like hand holding, loose as her grip was on his forearm.

His prediction was woefully absolutely correct. It didn't take longer than a week for her to stride in and breezily sit down clasping his hand. She has zoned in on it as if his whole essence is contained in the one finger that shows what he can do now. Probably, he imagines, your average person would cite spending time with family or completing other mundane tasks like feeding oneself as their motivation to get better, to heal. Sherlock doesn't really care for company, he has too much currently, or about the small things – the IV is actually a more convenient food source – but what he does still want is to scream at them all, to release this incessant rage that is fuelled further by the futile stillness present in him. It's the challenge he has to meet. Neurons will fire, like steam pumping the pistons and his muscles will come to life. He has no other choice.

The physiotherapist comes every single day, manipulating his limbs, teasing tone back into them. For that Sherlock is grateful to whomever decided it was worthwhile. Once he gets control of the muscles they at least won't be entirely unworked. Progress there is, however, agonizingly slow.

John sits noting his blinks as he asks questions, sorting results for patterns. Were the questions posed more leisurely John might stand a chance, but alas he can't know that the nature of this method is unfortunately inherently faulty in his case and appears likely to be for some time longer as he can only unreliably twitch his eye with very concerted effort and time taken, and most definitely not fast enough to register as anything crucial for John's understanding.

His finger is infinitely easier to move, though nothing speedy by normal standards. In a show of her base desire to be literally closer to him, Molly is often clasping his whole hand, an action that he would never thought to have tolerated under usual circumstances. Without the ability to reach out of his own accord to anyone he finds her show of affection strangely reassuring, like an anchor in his ethereal existence. Annoyingly though, she has yet to show recognition of the Morse code he taps as staccato as he can produce onto her skin.

As she babbles on one evening about her nephew's spelling test, he realises he has to dispense with the elaborate and go back to basics to invoke communication. It's a stretch to change the movement of his finger in the directions required, but he focuses harder than ever before to curl his finger around in her open palm, lift and tap once more a little further down her palm.

She stops short of informing him what word she found hideously tricky to deal with in her own childhood, glancing to her hand. He hopes for the spark of recognition to ignite. Molly can be extremely good at observing when she wants to be and she will be be again, for him. She was, after all, the person so keen to tack onto the fact he could move his finger. He is disappointed to note the hope he had heard in her words weeks ago is lost in her face as she examines his hand critically. He crooks his finger another time as a show of presence, leading her to peer at him quizzically. All she does in the end is smile grimly, eyes devoid of the optimism, and sighs showing instead a resigned longing that belies her belief she is looking for something in nothing.

Unable to accept her faithless response he curls his finger again, flexing and unflexing it as fast as he can. Her attention is caught by the motion and she gently places his fingers on the smooth skin of her arm and looks back at him, patiently waiting for a repeat that he obliges with. He traces the symbol again and again until her hesitant demeanour shifts into the realm of ecstatic.

"He was drawing it on my arm. "

"I thought you said hand initially, Miss Hooper, or am I mistaken?"

"It's Dr. Hooper actually,"

There's no way in hell Mycroft wouldn't already know given the level of surveillance launched on anyone who is a more than a passing acquaintance of his, but what Sherlock knows so well that Molly does not is that she is incurring the subtle wrath of one who has induced an unnecessary awakening in Mycroft. He's always felt it essentially childish of Mycroft to not just state his displeasure plainly.

"...and yes I did. He did, I mean, on my hand - and my arm.."

"It's very late Dr. Hooper. Time for all of us to be tucked up in our own beds, dreaming there. I suggest you go home."

There is a tell-tale tat-tat of the umbrella used like a cane as Mycroft starts to walk away.

"I'm not imagining it. I can prove it to you."

He can hear from the corridor the rustle of slightly crumpled paper being indelicately extracted from what he guesses to be her pocket (Mycroft is much more organised with his files and he'd spotted the bulge when she'd briefly checked on her return he was awake) and Molly appears, backed by a sceptical Mycroft. She upends the contents of her bag on the bed apologetically and reveals the mystery item she had dashed out to buy no doubt – a red ink pad that she presses his finger into. Holding his finger carefully she slides the paper under it and positions his finger above it.

Oh Molly, Molly. Sherlock wishes he could grin as he watches the colour drain from Mycroft's face as his finger trails the now familiar route in bright red on the paper and his brother truly looks at him in a manner that suggests he recognises him as more than a mere shell.

"So it's a question mark," John states peering at the scrap of torn off notepaper in his hand, "but what's the question?" he exclaims to no one in particular for the umpteenth time the next day. Sherlock dearly wished he could have rolled his eyes at that. How could they not have got it already?.

No amount of practice was resulting in him being able to reliably draw other characters in the ink with the precision for sentences. Except for C, I, J and L, and Molly and John kept disagreeing about their interpretations of anything he'd written down – his elementary b's could be P's or badly drawn D's or G's – and doubting whether he could even form coherent sentences anymore. In any case he clearly couldn't manage a large enough sample of the alphabet to communicate effectively so far. At least they'd sensibly informed the physio to focus extra on the muscles in his hand from now on.

John laughed bitterly when he saw him start using 1's and dots for 0's for ASCII code.

"You should know I'm not translating that for you. You'll have to wait until one of Mycroft's minions turns up for that, he can get some poor misappropriated codebreaker to decipher whatever it is. I've had enough of that malarky with the decoding your blinking, and look where that got us."

He considers it ironic how John would go to such futile lengths when there had been no apparent hope past his being conscious, yet now shrugs off the responsibility precisely when it is required of him. It is of course because now John has hope in abundance, now he doesn't need proof Sherlock Holmes is in here, and, now John thinks Sherlock is being his usual inconvenient self in picking what he considers an obscure form of communication. In his mind Sherlock privately scoffs at John, who has missed every trial of Morse code conversation started by him today. Frustrated as he is, he can't stop feeling satisfied too, because John is looking at him like he used to, with a mix of exasperation and adoration, and it is as if normality rears its head for the first time since he woke up.

John rubs the whiteboard clean and decides he needs to blank his mind like it too, push out all the useless notions that were ultimately fruitless. He turns to the small section of window with the blinds open but finds the view too distracting and so turns to the wall, feeling a bit of an idiot because it's like watching paint dry. Only less interesting. Not to mention it doesn't feel like it's going to make a difference. He's out of ideas.

Molly muses idly in the background as she massages Sherlock's fingers like the physio has taught her. Efforts to minimise the repetitive strain Sherlock was highly likely to be causing himself by incessantly using his one response finger.

"What if it's not literal? Not a code or anything, but just not punctuation...more like a symbol?

Somewhere in the recesses of his brain a gear whirs into action and clicks into place. As he goes to Sherlock's side and looks into his eyes, eyes that are glaring at him, he reckons, he could kick himself for not seeing what's been in front of them the whole time – what's been in front of Sherlock the whole time. The same four empty walls.

"It wasn't a question, it was a plea."

He'd guessed not being able to move or communicate would be driving Sherlock up the wall, figuratively at least. After all, lack of freedom and lack of expression were horrendous for anyone, let alone someone so fiercely independent as him, but John had neglected to consider the mind that was currently trapped inside the body they were all so focused on. There was no getting out for Sherlock, no quick fix for the physical limitations, but that didn't limit his potential for what he could take in. If you were around Sherlock – as he had been - for any measurable amount of time, you tended to focus on the output, glib remarks and astounding conclusions, but at his core Sherlock was defined by the vastly more important aspect of his life, input. He'd often compared himself to a finely tuned machine, and right now, in this tiny space that was Sherlock's whole world there was practically no data to compute.

"He's bored, bored out of his mind."

Molly stopped her administrations and simply gaped, her train of thought no doubt following the same trundling guilt ridden track to confirm the conclusion he'd arrived at.

John swallowed hard, forcing himself to look Sherlock in the eye, and in a near whisper replied directly to the man with the only decent, if utterly inadequate sounding, thing he could say.

"I'm so sorry, Sherlock."

They set up a rota after that. Whether it was him, Molly, Mrs Hudson or Mycroft's assistants, someone checked-in twice a day and refreshed Sherlock's 'entertainment' to make certain he was never unoccupied.

Mycroft had provided a laptop on request, including state of the art text-to-speech software. They'd got it permanently plugged into the wall and following a few blunders with cleaners and the like muting it, John had purposefully mauled the keyboard so no one could easily turn the sound off. It didn't surprise him to find out the rooms to each side of Sherlock's, and across the corridor too, had been mysteriously bought up – an action that had dramatically dropped the number of noise complaints on the floor apparently.

Molly queued up medical studies relevant to Sherlock's condition and pathology journals. John, preferred to mix it up with links to newspaper websites and - a choice that he wasn't sure if he was someday going to be chastised for – crime/thriller novels. He might have snuck a few key e-book and audiobook versions of classics that came under Sherlock's pop culture blind spot – Sherlock could hardly claim he was short of time anymore, since it was actually difficult to find enough new material to feed the system. They'd not failed yet, though he couldn't tell what documents Mycroft queued up for Sherlock as the history in the program was cleared in every instance Mycroft's office had been responsible for filling in. John had the strong suspicion from how Sherlock's hair was moved from his ears post-session that he had been made to wear headphones, and Mycroft's assistant was always strictly standing guard. Why he didn't know but he didn't deem it wise to pry further, no matter how curious he was. Mycroft was a law unto himself and John had plenty to concern himself with ignoring any interference into that.

Mrs. Hudson's insistence to participate in the 'keep Sherlock distracted' campaign had been a bit harder to manage. Lovely as she was, he knew Sherlock preferred her in short doses, or as a comforting background persona, and the longer she spent in his mute presence increased the possibility she'd get onto topics that would bore Sherlock to tears without his ability to ask her to refrain from them. She also didn't happen to like the idea of the automated software reading out to Sherlock, so John suggested she buy the thickest newspaper possible and read it out herself to Sherlock. On the few occasions he'd walked in whilst she was doing that he'd chortled at her own special brand of social commentary interjected between the lines and dearly hoped Sherlock might be doing the same on the inside.

"Shadow cabinet ministers denounce new scheme proposed to decrease poverty as overoptimistic and doomed to fail – well, they would wouldn't they? Can't be seen to agree. They're like little boys, all of them, little boys shooting down squirrels with slingshots, happy as they can be whilst we're punished for their mistakes. Shaking their fists in the air on national TV too, and getting nothing done! They should be ashamed. I always said it was the boys who really needed finishing school, the ruffians."

He watched for a sign of emotion, none apparent, not that it surprised him – Sherlock could sit up a little and waggle several fingers, but he was far off mobile or expressive. That he couldn't show his amusement changed little when John considered how reserved Sherlock tended to be unless he planned to join in with a dry statement of his own. He missed that wit and he found his brain trying to fill in those empty pauses where it ought to be, yet it was never the same.

John came in on many occasions intending to read to Sherlock in person, but generally he couldn't stand to mindlessly repeat what's on the page and in the face of being unable to have a conversation with Sherlock he found it more comfortable to speak of more personal stories, of things Sherlock would never be able to deduce and would never think to ask, filling in the John-related blindspot. With Sherlock in what he presumes is his darkest hour, John confesses his own in heartwrenching detail, elaborating on every little thing he can think of that Sherlock would pick at. This is what it felt like for me, he's saying, this is what happens to us all eventually – made vulnerable, reliant on others – and it's never the end if you can know it.

Months fly past in a haze of hours spent occupying Sherlock as he recovered bit by bit, as he forged new pathways in his brain and taught himself how to do the simplest of things. Like how to sit up. One skill he lacked was fine hand control, his was more of a waggling and curling motion, precluding use of a mouse, however finally he could flex his cheek muscle adequately to spec for the system Mycroft was acquiring and so came the day techs bombarded them setting up an IR sensor at the end of the bed and Sherlock gains the ability to pronounce to the world at the heady speed of four words a minute.

"This," - "is" - "fab," - "John," is his first sentence, broken up in snatches of time as he sat there twitching his cheek frenetically. Ignoring the unsuitable monotone for such a gleeful proclamation, it sounds nothing like him for two reasons. The word choice he can put down to brevity. The North American accent that appears to be the single option he chalks up to Mycroft's brotherly sense of humour.

Four words a minute was 'fab' for about a week. After that it is tiresome. Sherlock got it up to six to ten a minute with careful selection, but it was insufferably slow for him. His new voice couldn't keep up with his stream of thoughts and having to be so precise and deliberate about everything he said definitely grated on him. Witty comebacks fell sort of flat when the timing was off.

A pen was still out of the option, despite progress with his limbs – sustained grip was the problem – and for an unknown reason the doctors liked to blame it on 'head injuries can be like that' Sherlock's vocal chords were unresponsive, as if his brain had forgotten completely how to use them. There had to be a solution they were missing, something to temper Sherlock's blatant aggravation over being rendered mute. As John sat in the living room at Baker Street one morning munching on a bowl of Shreddies he scanned across the bookshelves searching for the location of the book Sherlock wanted taking in.

"Have you got it?" Sherlock's pseudo voice somehow demanded, despite missing inflection, as soon as John crossed the threshold into his room. It could've been odd how eager Sherlock was for a rereading of "Robinson Crusoe" but since it had cannibals in it it sounded like just the thing to nostalgically call back to Sherlock's childhood.

"Nope," he replied, removing his blue scarf - that wasn't really his but felt like it in some way when he'd taken to wearing it in the aftermath some time ago now - "and save your twitching, I've got something better."

He slipped the book out of his rucksack and cracked it open wide on the two page spread of the alphabet, holding it up for Sherlock to read.

Five minutes later he's not sure but Sherlock appears to be signing "John, I could hug you." accompanied by an expression formed solely with his eyebrows that nevertheless clearly denotes he doesn't actually intend to because he doesn't do that sort of thing. John hugs Sherlock anyway, grinning stupidly and the protestations against it aren't quite immediate, Sherlock relaxes into it for a moment, before he indicates he's not having it, complains John can't see him sign from that position anyway and that they shouldn't waste time on sensibilities when there's useful matters to engage in.

Ten minutes later, as he turns the page over to the section on life events – he couldn't not know the sign language for 'death' now could he – he spies confusion on Sherlock's brow at the notes not restrained to the margin, corrections to the instructions mostly, and then Sherlock's eyes widen in shock.

"I've been waiting for that, I have. Why, could it be your handwriting there, Sherlock?" he teases, "Bet you learnt it for a case and then deleted it didn't you, you numpty?"

John bets Mycroft could get his pick of translators, but oh, no, Sherlock insists he's the one to do it. He's already by his side most of the time, argues Sherlock.

When he sends the fourth translator hired, who entered the room moderately cheerful and professionally composed, storming angrily out and slamming the door eight minutes later, John decides to give in. He already knows a fair amount from studying the book with Sherlock, though Sherlock's far surpassed it and watches online videos to bulk up his vocabulary, which means John has to as well.

Molly learns too and they test each other at each available opportunity, teaching new words they expect Sherlock will get round to using in the near future. She picks it up with relative ease and tends to practice it on Sherlock as much as on him, not afraid of Sherlock's ridicule, focused too much on the challenge. She's more prepared than John is, and it's not too long until she's surprising Sherlock with her knowledge of medical and scientific terms he hasn't got to learning yet.

But much to his chagrin, Sherlock tasks John to translate his signing to hospital staff. Whether it's his more amiable or forceful nature that's the reason John goes along with it anyway.

"He wants to go home," John states to the consultant in charge of Sherlock welfare.

Which wasn't necessarily how Sherlock had put it but captured the sentiment and subtracted the needless condescension of the original phrasing.

"I agree it should be possible soon." She glances over her notes as she considers and John glances between her and Sherlock with every word. "Though we'll have to complete a review of his needs first to assess the requirements of his care level. You understand. We've got to make sure there's adequate preparations made or discharging him will put him at risk."

She's not even finished speaking before Sherlock has his own delightful response crafted.

"Excuse me for a moment," John smiles apologetically, turning fully to his friend.

"Sherlock, I don't know what that one is," he says, mimicking the mystery sign. Sherlock sighs as he is forced to spell it out. John switches his reply to signing for fear Doctor Klein will catch wind of what Sherlock's intended

"What – no. I'm not saying that. It's downright rude. If you want to insult people you'll find a way to do it with your own voice, because it's not happening with mine."

Sherlock has a very abrupt motion for him as reply.

"Yeah, well I know that one alright."

Common sense, which John at least is not short on, dictates in any language you learn the alphabet right off. Hello/goodbye are next up, along with the ever practical 'where's the toilets' and then naturally, the swear words.

Sherlock can walk by the time he moves back to 221B. Partly due to the fact that his ability to do so speeds up his discharge by less refurbishment needing to be done to the flat. Crutches are involved, meaning a trade-off between walking and signing, but he can get about almost unaided for small periods of time.

He's up and about intermittently all day, pushing himself harder than he should and exasperating everyone – including three private physios who each quit in a row – when he collapses multiple times in his bullheaded need to prove he can do more.

The fourth physio Sherlock interviews is approved by him on the promise that she will push Sherlock as hard as she can. His part of the bargain is to do as she says. To their relief Sherlock holds to his counter promise.

Three years on and life feels normal again finally.

For so long it was about progress. What Sherlock could do and couldn't do. It isn't like Sherlock's stopped trying – he doubts Sherlock has given up on getting his voice back or regaining more defined muscle control – it's more that whatever Sherlock can or can't do, it's how it is, they deal with it. Sherlock deals with it.

Sometimes he watches Sherlock struggle. He watches out of the corner of his eyes, knowing it can be preferable not to leap to the rescue, because it's far better to be told off for not helping than glared at for doing what he shouldn't interfere with.

Are they as they were before? No.

There are differences – today's Sherlock is not the same as the old Sherlock. Mind you today's Sherlock isn't even the same as yesterday's Sherlock. Sometimes he surprises them with how he gets round his problems or how he reacts to people. Mostly though, Sherlock is Sherlock. Prone to manipulating suspects into telling him what he wants and if he can play the pity card with his walking stick and limp, and a dozen other genuine affectations of his ability as it is left post-trauma, as he approaches them then more fool them and he often will. The time it takes for his merciless bluntness to crack through the barrier of some people's overly hyped benefit of the doubt seems to prove helpful too, but in the end when he's being a git (via use of John's 'oral facilities' no less) no amount of sympathy can sustain for long. Sherlock seems to feel pride in doing his bit to disprove their stereotyped assumptions about him based on the function of his body.

The similarities far outweigh the differences though. Sherlock can't groan his displeasure anymore, but as John had found out the hard way when he'd started ignoring his emphatic angry signing a bit too often when he wasn't in the mood to deal with it, Sherlock was every bit as intent to make himself heard; he'd woken up tone night with his hands being cuffed to the bed posts and Sherlock glueing his eyes open to ensure he got the chance to put his point across.

There were upsides Sherlock has wheedled out of his new existence. He's fond of using sign language to piss people off, insisting John respond in kind at crime scenes like 'some secret bff code' as Anderson puts it grumpily. At that Sherlock had smiled, a crooked smile but a smile at its purest form.

They say people come back broken from war, be it personal or actual, and you don't get put back together the same afterwards. If you do come back, you're different but that's how it is. They'll never be the same as they were. Things change. People change. That is progress. That is living.

Are they happy? It's the question on so many minds still, he can tell, when they see them 'battling on' as it is viewed. They're the brave detective and his faithful friend these days, no more boffin and bachelor.

He won't lie, there are days he despairs. When Sherlock clearly wants to shout out and lash out and can only half heartedly dash the flat to bits. Those days John counts to ten and steers a wide berth. On those occasions it's often Molly who comes to the rescue, a soothing soul to their frayed ones, with near endless patience. Those are some days, but everyone has bad days, from the millionaires to the happily married nuclear families. It's when bad days run into bad weeks and bad months that you have an issue. Bad months like months thinking your best friend was dead. In comparison having him in a coma was mild and this, well, those days are just a blip that washes away.

Sherlock picks up on the sound of the lock downstairs and ambles to his armchair with a touch more speed than is usual - getting into position John thinks of it as. In the time it has taken Molly to open the external door and to climb the stairs Sherlock has perfected a nonchalant pose reading a book that allows him to peer with the lightest interest as Molly walks in the door. She signs an explanatory greeting at Sherlock cheerfully and rapidly, with her shopping bag swaying alarmingly from her wrist for what it turns out to contain.

Sherlock doesn't miss an opportunity to deride her for signing at him, reminding her he's not deaf. Molly bites her lip sheepishly and says "Oops, sorry," out loud, barely looking like she means it as she makes a beeline for the fridge to deposit the major contents. John is pretty sure Sherlock realises as well as he why she does that – it's part levelling the playing field, part normalising what she is choosing to do but he is forced to do, and part something special to share with him that few others will.

John has asked her once, carefully, wanting to avoiding dredging up the memories of the obsession he'd accused her of years ago, if she was in love with Sherlock.

"I know he's never going to want to be with me, not like that. It doesn't matter somehow, this is right, how it is. So I dunno, maybe? But aren't we both, a little bit?" and she'd sipped her tea thoughtfully, leaving him to consider the words that in part echoed ones uttered half a decade ago by another woman he'd pegged as smitten with Sherlock.

Is this normal? Well, when were any of them normal?

What he knows is this. They're non-standard people and his conclusion is he's never trusted the simple vision of happiness that glossies and sitcoms shove at society as good and proper. John doesn't have the perfect body or the perfect job or a wife and 2.4 kids. He has a room in a gaunt flat with a manic flat mate he couldn't do without, who happens to have slightly more problems than he used to and a pathologist in tow to top off his entourage.

Molly has become an integral part of 221B, much like she was a fixture at Sherlock's bedside, purely by being there time and time again. It's likely she is never asked over expressly, but he knows Sherlock requests things of her that bring her here, and neither does he seem distasteful at her hanging out as well or her spontaneous arrivals at other times, having gifted her a key to his apparent advantage for the drop off's she so regularly does. With Sherlock that's as good as an invitation.

She bounds onto the sofa next to John, folding her legs up by her side to get comfy and extracts a sheath of paper he reckons to be faxed case notes. As she flips to the next page the gruesome crime scene photo confirms that.

It's late in the day and he's not quite sure how she's so energetic, except that the case notes could be having that affect – she's the only other person apart from Sherlock he's seen get so excited over pages and pages of pathology reports. Molly is slightly squished up against him as Sherlock joins them on the other end of the sofa; John yawns and rests his head on her now nicely positioned shoulder. Sherlock is reading over her other shoulder, taking an interest in the photo, but John can't get rid of the theory he's had running about for a while now, that there is a dual interest running there and really he's not wanting to miss out on the comfortable familiarity they've brokered under what they endured together. Any old excuse to reach out, as long as Sherlock isn't seen to be soft or any more vulnerable than he wishes to present to the world.

John can't imagine his life different to this, anymore than he could imagine life without Sherlock once he'd met him. His world is expanded by the experiences of the last couple of years and that includes not simply what has happened because of Sherlock – the danger, the thrill of the chase, not being alone any more - but so too everything that has happened to Sherlock as by extension it's changed him, and Molly, and the interwoven dependencies knit so tightly he can't extract what part of this it is that makes him content.

Definition doesn't change what they have or who they are, so in the end John doesn't question it. He'll let Sherlock make sense of it if he can, if he wants to. John is going to enjoy it while he can, because you never know how things will go.