Written for the kink meme prompt: "You could be anywhere, doing anything. You make eye contact with another stranger, and suddenly, you know. You would recognize them anywhere. You've found the one. I'd love to see this happen with John and Sherlock. Can be AU or within canon or with a different first meeting, whatever you want."

Unbeta'd and unbritpicked.

Sherlock is aware of phenomena where people allow their bodies to become completely ravaged by illness based on the logic that they were merely unaware that anything was wrong.

Cases where lung cancer progresses to near fatal stages because a persistent cough goes ignored and untreated. The patient claims 'they thought it would pass.' A battered woman fails to press charges because she accustomes herself the abuse.

It was a concept Sherlock never could comprehend. How one could ignore what was right in front of them; how they could simply fail to look when the data was literally right there in front of them.

Morons.

He barely registers the door opening; Stamford's brought someone with him. A friend? Potential roommate, perhaps. Former student? Researcher, doctor, lab technician, technologist…? Someone who spent a lot of time in a lab. Doctor seemed likely, given that he attended university with Stamford.

"Well, bit different from my day."

The warmth in the man's voice shifts something in Sherlock, like a balm for an emptiness he wasn't completely aware of until that moment; a tugging he didn't notice until now calming considerably as the gentle tenor resonates in his mind, familiar in a way Sherlock doesn't understand.

Glancing up curiously, Sherlock takes in the weathered, tanned skin, impeccable dishwater blond hair and straight back despite the obvious limp —soldier; army doctor?— with an odd sense of comfort he has yet to place. It's like coming home.

Dimly aware of his racing heart, Sherlock absently notices the tugging getting stronger, more frantic.

Transport, he reminds himself. Usually, he would wait until the case was over to analyze a new development and deem it irrelevant.

But to pass up this opportunity? Unlikely. "Mike, can I borrow your phone? There's no signal on mine," he asks, deliberately refusing to look up as he tries to ignore the pounding in his ears.

"And what's wrong with the landline?"

"I prefer to text," Sherlock swears he can feel the blond man's gaze on him.

"It's—" in my coat, yes, yes. Predictable. Shut up.

Come on, take the bait, "er, here: use mine," ah. That warmth again.

Sherlock looks up just in time to lock eyes with this familiar stranger and his entire being collapses, only to right itself and mend an imbalance he barely registered prior. Dark blue eyes stare back at him with a similar expression, the one that screams of the world readjusting and settling correctly into place.

The tugging he originally felt coils tightly in his chest once more before finally snapping, releasing, and Sherlock has never felt so delightfully free.

Dazed from a high cocaine could never achieve, Sherlock inhales deeply, allowing the oxygen to clear his mind. There was something he was meant to do here.

Magnetized, Sherlock allows his body to walk toward this man. "Oh. Thank you." For fixing what I didn't know was broken.

"It's an old friend of mine, John Watson."

John Watson John Watson John Watson.

John Watson.

A half formed idea —a new life— takes root in his mind. Sherlock breathes and he is cleansed.

More settled than he can ever recall feeling in his entire life, Sherlock turns to face his companion.

"Afghanistan or Iraq?"