Sherlock hated being touched. He considered it a boring act of sentimentality with no use. Something to avoid. Or something to bear, if the circumstances dictated so.

He loathed it, especially when he was sick.

This time was no exception.

Mary shot him and he had almost died but somehow he had survived.

There had been faces, greeting him when he first woke up after surgery; John, for sure, and Mycroft, maybe. He vaguely remembered his brother in distress, but he wasn't conscious long enough to think about it.

The voices faded to nothing as his eyelids dropped closed.

The next time he awoke, it was dark. The lights were dim in the corridor and there was just a small table light in the far corner of the room. He could feel someone else was in the room with him but turning his curly head on the pillow required too much energy at the moment.

He was starting to feel a little pain where the doctors had performed surgery on his chest. He knew his pulse was accelerating and his breath was becoming laboured.

He heard the rustling of fabric against leather as the person with him got up from the chair to stand up next to him, entering his field of vision.

John.

Sherlock just stared at the doctor, feeling ashamed of his condition.

John understood and smiled at him.

"Are you hurting?" he asked.

Sherlock croaked something unintelligible and frowned at his own weakness.

Again, John understood.

"I'll call the nurse. Don't worry, you'll soon be back to your usual arrogant self. You just need to take it easy for a while," he explained.

It took only a few minutes for the nurse to come to his room to administer him the morphine. John thanked her and she blushed slightly. She left the room as silently as she had entered. Everything in that hospital was silent and efficient.

John was once again at his side, suggesting that he should rest.

"I told Mary I'm staying with you tonight, so if you need anything just call me. OK, mate?"

Sherlock frowned a little, surely he didn't need to be baby-sat. If he was fine, he would have fought John and his unnerving need to hover over him like a mother hen. But he was tired and aching and the morphine made him drowsy. So he nodded and let sleep claim him.

The following couple of days Sherlock mostly slept, the doctors keeping him on a morphine drip to ease his pain. He was awake only for short periods of time. His memories of those days were confused, a continuum of blurred faces coming in and going out of his field of vision.

At some point Mary was there, wasn't she? Mary who shot him. Mary who asked him not to tell John.

And there were voices shushing him, suggesting that he should rest or take it easy. As if he was capable of doing anything else.

On the afternoon of the third day, the man came. He entered through the door, commented about the flowers Sherlock had received and deducing who sent which ones.

Sherlock followed him with his eyes, still too weak to open them completely and to move too much, too doped up to react to his touch.

Magnussen sat on the chair next to his bed, caressed his arm and his hand with his slightly damp ones. Talked about him being a musician.

Sherlock's breath hitched as the man held his hand, he couldn't understand what the man was saying. Surely he wasn't there to visit him. On the contrary, he was there to deliver a message. Sherlock tried hard to make his brilliant mind work but with no avail.

His hand fell back on the mattress and Magnussen came closer to him, very close to his face and whispered in his ear about Mary. And John. Threatening them.

Sherlock closed his eyes to avoid the man's sight. And then Magnussen was gone. The strain of the emotional stress he had just lived through leaving him exhausted.

He slept. Again.

The following morning he woke up feeling a little more alert. He was still on a morphine drip but they must have reduced the dosage because he was able to "think" a little more.

He spotted Mycroft on the chair next to the bed. His brother looked tired and somehow clumsy out of his environment. He was wearing the grey suit, the umbrella was near the door and he was perfectly shaven; still he looked puzzled.

Sherlock stirred a little in the bed. The elder Holmes was immediately at his side, resting his hand on his arm. Mycroft's hand was slightly damp. Just like Magnussen's hands.

The gesture made the detective flinch. The events of the previous afternoon came to Sherlock's mind and he shivered.

Mycroft frowned.

"It's all right, Sherlock. It's just me, Mycroft," he offered.

Sherlock was studying his brother, deciding if he had to be informed about Magnussen's visit or not. The thought of John and Mary in danger because of him made him sick. But if he let Mycroft in, things would only get worse. No, his brother had to stay out of this business.

He closed his eyes briefly, so as to not let the older man see his panic.

"Do you need me to call a doctor?" Mycroft urged.

Sherlock realized his brother was still waiting for an answer.

"No," he stated simply.

"It looked like you wanted to tell me something important."

Sherlock let out a long breath.

"It's nothing. Can I have some water?" Sorry Mycroft, I can't let you in. Not this time.