Hey, guys, I know I *said* this was a one-shot... But it isn't, not anymore. But this is the end, I mean it! I know you were probably hoping I would relieve the angsty ending to part 1, but anyone who knows me knows that ain't happening. SO, all in all, that's the gist of it. Please please review!

Disclaimer: Moffat and Gatiss, all hail. {I have actually seen series 1 of Sherlock now, guys). Also, thanks to the creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, because I've started reading him now too.

It was the middle of the night. It wasn't particularly quiet or dark, London being such a bustling hub of life, but the clouds obscured the stars and cast gloomy shadows over 221b Baker Street. Sherlock Holmes stood facing the window in his day clothes of black trousers and a purple silk shirt, clutching his violin. He drew the bow across it slowly, wringing a high, haunting note from it that hovered in the warm air. He did it again, closing his eyes and focusing on the sound vibrating through the wood.

Vibrato, a voice whispered in his mind. It was called vibrato, what he was doing. He remembered only a few hours before, in John's bedroom, the vibrato of the ex-army doctor's voice catching in his throat. Was it vibrato or tremolo? No, he decided, a series of sharp sawing motions pulling a trembling series of notes out of the instrument. He had played tremolo in the softness of John's mouth, drawing his tongue along the strings of John's self-control and producing a trembling mess.

That was what they had been doing, he decided. Making music. Not having sex or making love, or those debauched terms like banging or shagging. Making music. They engaged in a two-part harmony, his body doing two-four time while his brain only pulled an eight-four, John's moans forte, then fortissimo, their hearts beating staccato, their melody soaring until it reached crescendo at the end.

One note was a beginning, but two notes, that was a song. If only Sherlock understood John the way he did the violin, knew how to pluck and stroke him, to coax forth controlled chaos, perhaps things would have been different. As it was…

He heard John moving about in the other room but ignored him, finally tearing a song from his violin, furiously passionate, almost angry. Why must you ruin everything? he thought. With your foolish emotions, why do you ruin everything?

"Sherlock!" John's voice cut through, his hand resting on the detective's shoulder. Sherlock realized he had spoken aloud through the din of the music.

He dropped the bow and lowered the violin, casting his eyes down. "It wasn't what I wanted. The music–"

"I hope it wasn't what you wanted. It sounded like a wailing cat." John sounded exhausted, bone-tired, as though he hadn't slept for days. It occurred to Sherlock that it wasn't only geniuses kept awake with their thoughts. "It's three in the morning, you'll wake Mrs. Hudson. You can't find a quieter hobby?"

"The violin isn't a hobby," Sherlock amended irritably as he set the instrument down. "I play because it helps me think. I need to think right now, after… everything."

"Really? I'm trying to forget everything." Sherlock whirled around to face his flat mate. It was rare that the good doctor showed his age, but there it was, sorrow and pain and age etched all over his face. Low light softened the lines of his face further while somehow brightening the ash-blonde silk of his hair. His eyes glinted a warm brown beneath his nearly closed lids. For once the great Sherlock Holmes had no deductions to make.

When John first confessed his feelings– or rather, when Sherlock figured it out– the detective locked himself in the bathroom and stared into the mirror, trying to understand why. He supposed he could accept the attraction held for his dark curls, blue-green eyes, and porcelain skin, but what did John see in the angle of his cheekbones, the gaunt hollows of his cheeks, the unusually defined cupid's bow of his mouth?

He knew his brain was extraordinary, yes, his eyes that saw so much, but what about his face was appealing? He couldn't deny there was an element of physical attraction– John was aroused by the thought of him and had once moaned Sherlock's name when he thought the younger man couldn't hear him getting off.

Emotion like this confused Sherlock. It wasn't that he didn't feel, of course he did, he just often dismissed it as irrelevant. Love was boring but John wasn't. He might not have the unquestionable brilliance of his companion, but his courage and strength were admirable, and although he too often concerned himself with trivial matters, he was also willing to perform mundane tasks such as fetching milk and paying the rent.

All of this went through Sherlock's mind in mere seconds. He glanced to the side, where his and John's shadows lay. His own was tall and ribbon-slim, a willowy caricature. John's was shorter and stockier, but the two seemed right next to one another. "John… I never wanted this…" His voice was a husky baritone, unexpectedly pleading.

"Sherlock, don't, please. I don't want to have this conversation. All you can do is apologize for not feeling the same, and I don't want to hear that."

"What do you want to hear?"

"Hopefully, not your violin. I was sleeping–"

"You were not. You've got dark patches under your eyes from lack of rest, probably a few days worth. Your voice is not in any way clouded with sleep, and–"

"Stop it!" John shouted, completely disregarding the "You'll wake Mrs. Hudson" argument. "I'm sick of you deducing me! Can't you just leave me be, just once? I'm begging you, stop." The last part came out in a whisper.

Sherlock swallowed, his eyes darting from the flush of John's cheeks to the sharp rise and fall of his chest to the shine in his eyes, and despite the fact that John asked him to stop deducing, he couldn't help but realize John was trying not to cry. He must have been genuinely hurt. "I can't imagine how this…"

"No, you can't. The older man turned abruptly away, taking a deep shuddering breath. "It's like being tortured. Everywhere I go, there's something to remind me of you. Every night you're the last thing that crosses my mind, and every morning there's a blissful second of nothing before I hear you, or see you, or just plain remember you, and then it all comes back. It's like I'm bleeding to death internally, being with you, but I can't leave because it hurts even more to be without you."

Sherlock swallowed. He had asked John before what being in love felt like, and thought that maybe, just maybe, he was more human than anyone suspected. But this put a new spin on things. He ought to have assumed even love wasn't this perfect, easy path; it was a lot of pain, a lot of broken, a lot of generally awful things. He didn't know why, but that was the way it was.

"You don't get that, do you?" John's voice was quiet. The detective shook his head, even knowing that John couldn't see him. He didn't feel pain, not about John. It didn't hurt, not at all. He didn't feel like he was dying inside, so if love is a whole lot of pain, what he felt couldn't be love, because all he felt was good. He got a little thrill of pleasure when John proclaimed his deductions amazing, which of course they were. He missed him when he wasn't there but was always pleased when he came back. "You don't know how much it hurts, do you?"

"No," Sherlock confessed. "I don't. So it would seem I don't…"

"Feel the same?"

"Right," he whispered. Why did everything have to be so confusing? He was hurting now, because John was hurting. Was that what John meant, or was it empathy? He decided there was only one way to find out (well, there were many ways, but this seemed the simplest solution to his sleep-deprived overworked brain) and put his hand on the good doctor's shoulder, turning him around so they were face to face. He bent down and kissed his flat mate, closing his eyes and shuddering when John started kissing him back.

He slid his hand to cup John's cheek, but pulled away to assess his situation. Heart racing, breathing shallow, heat rising to my face... He looked at his other hand. It was shaking, why was it shaking? Putting that aside, he knew his physical reaction could be written off as attraction, so he began analyzing his mental condition. No pain. He did not hurt but rather felt like he had been shot up with something incredible, no drug he'd ever found before. Final conclusions: physical reaction suggests arousal, mental state is coherent and painless. Evidence points away from love due to absence of suffering. A more amiable relationship is most plausible.

He let out a slight hum of understanding and went in for another kiss. He had worked out the feelings bit, which was nice, since he rarely enjoyed having to think about trivial things. Not that John was trivial; he was anything but, but even that didn't stop Sherlock from being irritated by too many emotions.

It seemed John mistranslated the hum as one of enjoyment and deepened the kiss, turning an experimental touching of lips to a full-on snog. Sherlock was surprised to note he was completely disinterested in ending their embrace, because (as he was also surprised to note) he was growing hard again. Arousal was not a constant threat to him, as it was to so many other men. It was rare he mustered the energy or inclination for such a thing, and in fact only bothered to get himself off once every few weeks or so, but John… John stirred up feelings he didn't know he had, playing him like the violin, knowing where to rest his fingers in such a way to play the most beautiful melody.

Making music, he reminded himself. He hadn't the practice for something slow and controlled, like a waltz, but perhaps a sonata…? He admitted, sonatas were not commonplace for a violin, but when did he ever act according to custom? When, for that matter, did John?

Oh, if Mrs. Hudson ever finds out what transpired here tonight, she'll simply die, he thought with a hint of amusement. He knew such couplings didn't bother her– there were married ones next door– but John had spent so much time trying to convince everyone he wasn't gay… Sherlock couldn't care less about his own reputation, but he wasn't going to defile John's, the truth being what it was.

Stop it, stop it, he urged his brain, trying not to think. Under the usual circumstances he would never wish such a thing, but there had been one moment earlier in the night, when John had looked at him and smiled, in the middle of their… concerto, and there had been a surge of pleasure up his spine, and there wasn't a thought in his head but the sheer perfection of that moment… He wanted that again, to be one with John, no deductions, no thoughts of any kind, just pure feeling. Just John. He would ordinarily punch anyone who made him lose control like that, but what were friends for if not to push you beyond your comfort zone?

Just as he started to feel it again, the fuzziness in his cerebrum that preceded loss of voluntary motion, John tore away from him. Sherlock was left standing, eyes blurring and mouth slightly agape, trying to remember his own name. "J-John?" he stuttered. No matter what, he would never– could never– forget John. There was a moment of missing in Sherlock's mind, where he remembered having John's body weighing his down, and he missed it sorely. He missed the pressure of the doctor's bones on his (John, you were always so down to Earth) like a phantom limb, still hurting even after it's gone.

"I can't do this, Sherlock!" John cried, weaving his hands through his hair and tugging. "I can't just keep being your– your sex toy, to fool around with when you want to get off!"

"Why would you ever think…? You know you're more than that."

"Do I? Because I told you how I feel, you knew I'm weak, vulnerable–" his voice hitched on that word. "That I couldn't possibly resist you. You've made it quite clear about your feelings or lack thereof, so how could you pull me in like this?"

Sherlock swayed on his feet. How could John think he was a thing, to be used and put away when it wasn't wanted? How could he think Sherlock was using him? He wanted so much to kiss him again, to lose himself, but John wouldn't have that. Didn't he know Sherlock was only trying to make him feel good? He was hurting, he said, why wouldn't a kiss with the man he loved (the word caught in Sherlock's brain, snagged like cloth in a pricker bush) make the pain go away? Didn't he get the same rush, the same inexorable painlessness? Why is he still hurting?

"John," he said in a voice far too even for the maelstrom churning within him. "John, that's not what I… That is, I didn't…" He took a shuddering breath. Why was he so shaky? Was he ill? "John," he repeated, liking the sound of the name even in this serious moment, "I was not trying to hurt you. I thought– I thought you would feel better." His vocabulary was thoroughly limited, which only slightly concerned him.

He closed the distance between them and slid his hand down the doctor's chest. "I'm not going to hurt you," he murmured when John trembled at his touch. "I only want to make you feel good." The hand nimbly lowered John's zipper and popped the button open. He sunk to his knees.

"Sherlock, don't, please," John begged even as he rested a hand on the detective's curls.

"Don't what? Don't do this?" He slipped a hand into his flat mate's shorts, finding and stroking the length of him. "Or this?" He tugged his trousers down but continued his ministrations. "Or this?" He pushed his shorts down too, and time slowed. On some level Sherlock knew what he was doing; he was on his knees before John, stroking the older man's cock and licking his lips, in the early hours of the morning. On any other level he couldn't begin to rationalize this, but most of his brain seemed to be shutting down, starting (of course) with the frontal lobe, where rational thought took place. Only his limbic system seemed to be fully functional; emotions were winning the battle of rational versus irrational.

"I'm not going to hurt you," he said again in a soft, calm voice. "Just let me… let me make you happy."

John seemed to waver, but he couldn't resist Sherlock. He gave one curt nod and twisted his hand further into dark hair. Sherlock gave him an odd sort of grimace that he meant as a smile, parted his plush lips, leaned forward, and wrapped his mouth around the head of John's cock. John inhaled sharply, which Sherlock took as an encouraging sign. He licked along the length of the shaft, up one end and down the other, until he was back to where he started.

He pulled his head back just a bit to examine his subject (it was easier, thinking of it as one of his experiments), then stuck his tongue out to lick just the very tip, noting John's low groan. He slipped a hand between his own legs to tease himself. That was what he did, on occasion: brought himself to the brink of orgasm and stopped, waiting for the desperate throbbing to cease before going at it again. Once he had managed that for almost an hour.

He decided not to tease John, however, who was clearly just desperate for some friction, from the way his hips were moving. Sherlock swallowed his cock in one go, surprised he could manage it. Having almost no gag reflex helped, of course, but still the size…

He moved his mouth back until he was only sucking the head, using the hand that wasn't pleasuring himself to stroke John. He could tell the other man was close; his entire body was flushed, his breathing was loud and ragged, his moans were closer together, and the muscles in his thighs were twitching. Sherlock wondered, somewhere in the back of his mind, how John could come so quickly, but suddenly there was a great flood of heat in his mouth and he didn't have to think about anything anymore.

John came with a strangled sob, his body wracked with pleasurable shivers, his hips thrusting forward of their own accord. The taste, Sherlock observed, wasn't entirely unpleasant. There was the taste of salt, of course, something dark and rich, earthy, and something that was unique to John, something he couldn't identify. He found he quite enjoyed the experience, and had to twist slender fingers, buried in his trousers, around the base of his own cock to keep from coming.

He stood fluidly, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and looking down at the mess he had created in John, who was feebly trying to redress himself. "And how was that?" Desire had deepened the baritone of his voice further.

John's eyes widened, pupils blown. "Are you joking? That was– that was bloody brilliant, Sherlock."

The detective was pleased to hear the positive review on his skills. He was, as John knew, as of yet very inexperienced in sexual matters, but he hoped to remedy that soon. "I was hoping–" he started in a low voice, intending to explain to John that there must be some arrangement they could work out where they could be– what was the term?– "friends with benefits" or some such thing.

John suddenly took a deep breath, as though remembering a painful experience. "Sherlock, no," he said immediately, sounding horrified. "We shouldn't have– that wasn't– blimey, I told you we couldn't do this, and you've disobeyed me. We can't live like this!"

Sherlock blinked. What in the name of God was he on about? "You didn't seem so concerned a few minutes ago, when my mouth was on your–"

"But that's exactly my point! I just said, ten minutes ago, we couldn't do this because I love you and you don't love me and it hurts. It hurts, Sherlock, which you don't understand! Yes, I quite enjoyed that, but I'm not going to let this become a regular thing, because–" He sighed sadly. "It's late. Things always seem different in the morning. Just… think about what I've said, all right?"

Think? What could Sherlock Holmes do if not think? He had been thinking, about everything! He had weighed the pros and cons, debated with himself, considered all possible outcomes, and this seemed to be the most beneficial. Beneficial for whom? John's voice said in his mind. For you or for him?

For once he had no answer. If what John wanted was to be left alone… Sherlock didn't have the heart (the use of that expression never seemed to apply before, because previously he had believed, as so many others did, he had no heart) to deny John what he wanted, anything he wanted, even if the thought of going back to what they had before made Sherlock feel ill. Before he could find the words to voice this, John had pulled his trousers back on and shuffled back to his bedroom, softly shutting the door behind him.

"John," Sherlock said, knowing the other man couldn't hear him but needing to say the words aloud. "If all this confusion and pain and joy is just friendship, what does love feel like?"

There was no answer. He didn't expect one.

Er, yes, well. I want your thoughts on this point: who, in your opinion, is worse off? John, convinced Sherlock can't and doesn't love him, or Sherlock, who doesn't even know what he's feeling but only knowing it's hurting?