Not Gone Yet

I got this idea watching "House," and it wouldn't let go.

Dr. John Watson stepped into his flat, holding the door open for his wife Mary. "Welcome home, Mrs. Watson."

"Mm, I like the sound of that," said Mary, giving him a kiss.

"So do I," said John, giving her another kiss.

Mary stepped into their sitting room as John set their bags on the floor and closed the door. "I gotta be honest, I'm surprised Sherlock didn't text you. Surely, he's bored by now."

"Yeah, a honeymoon isn't really high on his list of 'Do Not Disturb,'" John agreed. "Maybe I'm rubbing off on him. Or maybe he hasn't been bored."

"Or, knowing we're coming home today, he's been texting your dead phone," Mary supplied as she fell onto the sofa.

"That'll be it," John agreed, sitting down next to her.

"You better respond, or he'll just show up, and then you really won't be able to rest."

John heaved out an exhausted sigh. "Damn, you're right."

He pulled himself off of the sofa and headed for his bag, pulling out the charger for his phone. He plugged it into the outlet by the end table and attached the cord to his phone, turning it on. He waited a few moments for it to get started, and sure enough, alerts began going off about text messages, missed calls and voicemails.

"Wow, he's really bored," Mary chuckled.

John looked up at her with a frown. "None of these are from Sherlock." He scanned through the missed calls. "Greg…Molly…Greg…Mrs. Hudson…Greg…Mrs. Hudson…Mrs. Hudson…Molly…" He frowned. "Mycroft?" He looked up at Mary. "He never calls unless Sherlock's in trouble."

Concerned, Mary stood so she could look at the phone over his shoulder. John pulled up the text messages.

Greg Lestrade

John, call me. ASAP

John, answer your phone.

You need to get to Bart's as soon as you get home.

It's Sherlock.

Heart pounding, John flipped over to the other new texts that hadn't been read.

Molly Hooper

John, please call us. There's been a horrible accident.

Mycroft Holmes

Dr. Watson, I advise you to call me as soon as you get this. Don't listen to any voicemails.

John looked up at Mary, dread flooding his mind at all the horrors filling it. Was Sherlock in a coma? Was he dying in the hospital? Had he overdosed? Had one of the criminals he was after gotten in a lucky shot?

He phoned Mycroft—on speaker phone, for Mary's benefit—and waited through two long rings before it was answered.

"John—" began Mycroft.

"What happened?" John blurted out anxiously. "Is he all right?"

"You might want to sit down for this, John," said Mycroft in a tone of voice John had never heard him use before.

"Mycroft—" began John, his voice rising in worry.

"He was in a car accident," Mycroft told him. "Yesterday evening, he and Tom Richmond were in a cab together when a bus came around the corner and collided with Sherlock's side of the cab. He suffered a broken femur, lacerations on most of his internal organs, a shattered clavicle, a ruptured spleen, multiple fractures to the face, a perforated intestine, and third-degree burns over seventy percent of his body."

John felt his legs go numb as he collapsed onto the sofa behind him. How could one person suffer so much?

"But he's…" John began, swallowing the lump in his throat. "I mean, is he…"

Mycroft was silent for so long, John thought the phone had been disconnected. But then, he finally said—in a voice that John finally recognized as grief-stricken, "His injuries were too severe. He passed away a few hours ago."

Mary gasped as John just stared at the phone in shock. Dead? Sherlock Holmes was dead? So soon after coming back from the dead? It couldn't be true; it couldn't.

"You're welcome to come say your final goodbyes, but I warn you…it's not an easy sight to take in," Mycroft told him.

"Thank you, Mycroft," Mary spoke up. "We'll be there in a few minutes." She ended the call and knelt in front of her husband. "John…"

"It can't be him," said John in a hollow voice.

"John—"

"Sherlock Holmes would not die in a car crash," said John, his tone becoming more emphatic. "He's supposed to die facing off against some criminal mastermind, like he did with Moriarty, not like this. Not creamed by a bus—"

Mary enveloped him in her arms as the tears and sobs suddenly burst from him. He held onto her for several minutes as he calmed back down.

Mary slowly pulled away from him. "Ready to go?"

John nodded. "Yes. Yes, let's go."

Molly sat next to Tom's hospital bed, unable to believe her eyes. In the car crash that had killed Sherlock, Tom had suffered a crushed right foot, a fractured skull, a broken jaw, a broken left radius, third-degree burns to the right side of his head and torso, and had been impaled through the liver by a piece of the bus's grill. Luckily, it had missed any major arteries and he had not bled out. However, he could be in pain for quite some time, mostly due to the burns.

Metal pins were sticking out of his right foot, held in place by an external fixator, and his foot was elevated from the bed by a lift sling. His arms lay on top of the blanket that came up to his waist, the left one in a cast that ran from his fingers to halfway up his upper arm and the right one wrapped in gauze. His bare torso was spotted with livid, purple and black bruises. There was a dressing taped over his midsection where they had stitched up the gash over his liver. Spreading from the edge of the dressing to his side was gauze covering the burns he had sustained, which also covered his right arm, a small patch on the right side of his neck and the right side of his face from the middle of his cheek to his ear and his scalp. The portion of his face not covered by gauze was marred by bruises, cuts and swelling. He was barely recognizable.

They planned to do a skin graft once he was stable enough. So far, his tests looked promising. They were keeping any infections he may have acquired at bay with a wide spectrum of antibiotics, and he was stable for now, his heart having only stopped once in the ambulance. Now, it was pretty much a waiting game.

Molly glanced at the sealed bag on the cabinet by the wall, which held a badly charred and singed Belstaff coat and a burned scarf. The rest of his clothes and his shoes had been completely ruined and thrown away. The nurses had given her the items that had been in Tom's coat pockets: a keyring with three keys on it, an engagement ring, a wallet whose plastic credit cards and ID had melted in the heat of the fire, and a note. It was this final item that Molly stared down at now.

"Tom,

I'm sorry for leaving a note instead of calling. I guess I'm too much of a coward. You're a nice person and a great boyfriend, and I care too much about you to see the hurt I'm about to cause you.

You were right. I tried to tell myself that I was past it, but I do still have feelings for Sherlock. I didn't mean to lead you on. I truly thought I had moved on, but I guess I was just in denial.

I hope you can find someone who appreciates what a thoughtful and respecting man you are. And again, I apologize for any hurt I've caused you.

Molly"

The guilt swept through Molly yet again. It was her fault that Tom was lying broken in this hospital bed, that Sherlock was dead. Tom went and sought out Sherlock after reading this note. Why else would they have been in a cab together? Upset at Molly, Tom had confronted Sherlock, and it had ended in Sherlock's death—possibly Tom's as well. He wasn't out of the woods yet.

The tears fell again as Molly thought of Sherlock. He was dead—all because of her. Why now? Just when she had decided to try and go for it again. She had seen such a different side of him since he'd come back from his two-year exile, and so she had thought maybe it was worth waiting for him. Especially after he'd told her that she had mattered—the person who mattered the most. There might have been something there, but now, she'll never know.

The heart monitor started beeping a little faster, and Molly pushed herself from the chair, leaning over the bed. Tom was moving slightly on the bed, his eyes clenched tight.

"Easy," said Molly. "Easy."

Eventually, Tom opened his eyes and looked up at the ceiling, one of his irises surrounded by red instead of white.

"Hey…" said Molly.

Tom's eyes tracked slowly over to her, hazy.

"You were in an accident," Molly told him, trying not to cry again. "You have some broken bones and internal bleeding that they're keeping an eye on, but you've also sustained some serious burns. They're going to do a skin graft eventually, so there will probably be some scarring."

Tom blinked a few times as the heart monitor finally leveled back to its regular pace. At least he seemed to understand what she was saying.

"Are you in pain?" asked Molly. "They've got you on some pretty heavy painkillers."

Tom let out a groan, and his brows scrunched together, confused.

"Don't try to talk," Molly quickly told him. "Your jaw was broken, so they wired it shut. Just nod or something. Are you in pain?"

Tom nodded his head slightly.

"How bad?" asked Molly. "On a scale of one to ten. Five?"

Tom shook his head.

"More?" asked Molly.

Another shake.

"Less?" asked Molly, relieved.

Tom nodded and slowly held his broken arm up a little, showing her three of his fingers.

"A three?" said Molly as his arm fell back to the bed. "Good. At least they've got you on a good combination of pain medicine." She nodded a few times, staring at the floor. She then looked up at him with tears in her eyes again. "I'm so sorry! This is all my fault. If I hadn't written that note…"

Tom was shaking his head, instinctually trying to speak again before giving up and simply taking hold of her hand, his fingers barely able to do so above the cast covering his palm. They shared that moment together before his brows shifted, clearly questioning her about something, and from the way his grip tightened on her hand, she knew what he was asking.

Molly closed her eyes and shook her head, tears falling again. "He didn't make it."

It was an awkward moment as Tom simply held her hand, apparently at a loss for what else to do.

"If I just…hadn't written you that letter…" muttered Molly.

Tom's brows furrowed in confusion.

"If I had broken up with you in person, maybe this wouldn't have happened," said Molly.

Tom was now shaking his head, still apparently confused.

Molly stopped herself. "Listen to me. What am I saying? Talking about breaking up with you when you're in hospital. And Sherlock's…"

Tom's eyes suddenly cleared in understanding, and his head shaking intensified as his hand clasped even tighter onto hers.

The automatic door opened, and John and Mary entered the room, Mary with red-rimmed eyes and John with a blank look on his face.

Molly pried her hand from Tom's grip and stepped over to John, giving him a hug. "I'm so sorry, John."

"Me, too," said John quietly. He pulled back from the embrace. "Part of me doesn't quite believe it yet, like he'll pop up in two years and say, 'I'm not dead' again. But…the test results say it's him."

The heart monitor began racing again, and they all turned to see Tom frantically shaking his broken arm at them, trying to talk through his broken jaw. His swollen face didn't allow much to get through his lips, though.

"Tom?" asked Molly.

Tom shook his head and motioned for something with his hand, but his fingers were impeded by the cast. He rolled his eyes in frustration, glanced at John and started tapping at the bed rail repeatedly. Molly stepped closer as John did the same, the doctor in him taking over.

"Tom, what is it?" asked Molly.

Tom shook his head emphatically and carried on tapping the bed rail. The heart monitor was starting to sound an alarm at the frantic pace of Tom's heart. As soon as John had stepped close enough, Tom lunged out with his burned right arm—ignoring what had to be enormous pain—and latched onto John's wrist.

"Whoa, hey—" began John, trying to calm him down.

Tom stared intently at John, tapping away at the bed rail.

The door whooshed open, and two nurses rushed in.

"What happened?" one of them asked.

"I don't know," Molly answered. "He was fine when he came to, and then he just started panicking or something."

"You should probably leave," said the other nurse.

Tom's grip tightened on John's wrist.

"It's too much stimulation for him right now," the nurse continued. "He needs rest."

John leaned over Tom, gently grasped his gauze-wrapped wrist. "It'll be all right. You're safe here. They'll make sure you're taken care of."

Tom yelled something—or tried to—through his wired jaw and stiff, swollen lips as he shook his head. A nurse approached the IV line with a syringe in hand, and when Tom spotted this, he started protesting with vague yells.

"Is that really necessary?" asked John, concerned about Tom's reaction to seeing the sedative.

"He's going to tear his stitches," the nurse answered as she stuck the needle into the port and depressed the plunger.

Tom's grip on John's wrist slackened, and he was able to pull his arm away. Tom gave one last protest that sounded almost like "John" before his eyes fell closed.

The nurse peeled the gauze back from his torso and inspected it. "Everything looks fine." She put the gauze back in place. "He's probably just overwhelmed."

Molly frowned up at her. "I don't know. He's not really a panicking type of person."

"Well, this is an unusual situation," said the nurse. "You can't blame him." She then ushered the three of them out, claiming he needed rest.

"I think he was trying to tell us something more than just, 'I'm panicking,'" said John.

"Tell you, specifically," agreed Mary, a thoughtful look on her face.

"I've never really talked to him much," said John. "What could he possibly have been trying to tell me?"

They looked back through the glass door at the sleeping Tom, and the next second, the nurse drew the curtain to give him some privacy.

John sat in the waiting room with Molly and Mary. He didn't know Tom very well, but he was Molly's fiancé. They should be here for her. Not to mention, going home would mean accepting that Sherlock was dead, and he wasn't quite ready to do that again.

A nurse approached them, and Molly stood to face her.

"He's awake again, and he's calmed down," the nurse told them. "The three of you can go in, but if he starts up again…"

John nodded. "We understand. Thank you." He stood with Mary, and they followed Molly back towards the room.

Tom glanced over at them as they came in, and he immediately started motioning to them, although less frantic than he had last time.

"What is it, Tom?" asked Molly as she reached his bedside.

Tom rolled his eyes and—wincing—he brought his burned arm up, miming writing on his cast.

"Of course," said John, feeling like he could kick himself.

He moved over to the cabinets and started searching through them. Finally, he found a pen and some spare paper. He moved back to the bed, noticing the pained look in Tom's eyes as he motioned for the pen with his burned arm.

"Tell you what, I'll write it down," John told him. "Your arm must be in agony."

Tom rolled his eyes with a frustrated huff but dropped his arm gently back to the bed, seemingly resigning himself to the long process.

"I guess, tap the rail when I get to the letter you need," John told him. "A…B…C…" He proceeded through the alphabet until Tom tapped the rail with his cast after "N."

The process repeated through four more letters before anything happened.

"E…F…" John was reciting when Tom's eyes closed and the heart monitor let out one long beep. "Tom!"

"Oh, my God!" Molly exclaimed as John dropped the paper and pen and rushed forward to examine Tom.

"V-fib," said John, eyes pouring over the screen at the same time as he took the pulse in his neck. He instantly started on CPR as nurses and a doctor hurried into the room.

"Sir—" began the doctor.

"I'm a doctor," John immediately told him as a nurse stepped up to the bed opposite him and started pumping air into Tom's lungs. "V-fib."

The doctor consulted the screen for just a moment before turning to his nurses. "One milligram of epinephrine." He stepped up to the other side of the bed alongside the nurse and monitored John's CPR efforts.

A nurse injected a syringe into Tom's IV as another moved the crash cart to the doctor. Both John and the doctor watched the monitor, and when nothing happened after several seconds, the doctor turned to the cart.

"Charge 260," the doctor ordered as he grabbed the defibrillator paddles.

A nurse quickly pressed some buttons. "260."

"Clear," called the doctor.

John and the nurse with the Ambu bag stepped back slightly from the bed. The doctor placed the paddles on Tom's chest and hit the trigger. Tom jolted as the electricity coursed through him. As the doctor lifted the paddles, the nurse and John immediately moved back into position, but John paused when the heart monitor began beeping again.

Molly let out her held breath in relief as they then worked to stabilize Tom, running through tests and his symptoms to figure out what went wrong. Half an hour later, the doctor was talking to them in the waiting area.

"We're not sure at this point what caused his heart to stop," said the doctor. "I would say it was a hemolytic reaction, but the blood we gave him is compatible with his blood type. We're going to run some more tests."

"Thank you," said Molly.

"Dr. Westham," said John. "Right now, it's hard for him to speak through his injuries. Do you have anything that would be easy for him to use to communicate, especially with his cast."

The doctor paused and thought for a moment. "I believe we might have something for special cases like this. I'll have the nurses set it up for you."

"Thank you," John told the doctor as he left. He turned back to the others. "You okay, Molly?"

Molly nodded. "I just don't know how to handle all of this right now."

Mary placed her hand on Molly's shoulder. "It's always hard seeing a loved one go through this, even after you've gone your separate ways."

John frowned. "Separate ways? You guys aren't engaged anymore?"

"Oh, I forgot you guys didn't know," said Molly. "After…everything…" The tears threatened to fall again at the reminder of Sherlock, and she blinked them away. "I ended things with Tom. It just wouldn't have worked out."

"Oh, I'm sorry, Molly," said John, putting his arm around her shoulder and giving it a brief squeeze.

"It's okay," said Molly. "It's nothing compared to…" The tears finally won out and fell down her face.

"Yeah…" said John sadly.

The three of them stood in silence for a moment.

John looked back up at them. "Is it just me or does anyone else expect him to walk through that door?"

Molly chuckled a little. "Him faking his death sure has ruined his real death, hasn't it?"

John chuckled a little as well. "Maybe that's why I haven't really felt it yet. Or maybe the first time around was enough practice that now…"

Molly nodded in agreement. "Yeah…it's like there's something there, numbing the whole thing." She stared down at the floor. "But he really is…"

John looked away from her, not wanting to face it just yet.

Molly shook herself, changing the subject. "So, what did Tom want to tell us?"

"Oh," said John, pulling the crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and holding it out in front of them all.

O

Mary frowned. "Notto…"

"Not T to?" speculated John. "Nott O.?"

"N. Otto?" asked Molly.

"Not to…" said Mary. "Not to, what?"

"We'll have to find out when he wakes up," said John.

Molly glanced up at the sounds of Tom rustling in the hospital bed. "Guys."

The other two stood and approached the bed just as the door of the room opened.

"Hey, how is he?" asked DI Greg Lestrade, stepping up to the foot of the bed.

"They had to restart his heart a couple hours ago," said John. "How's everything going at the Yard?"

"Turns out, the bus driver was intoxicated," Lestrade told them. "We're looking at involuntary manslaughter."

John nodded. "Good."

Molly placed her hand over Tom's fingers where they emerged from the cast. "Hey, there."

Tom opened his eyes and looked up at her, frowning.

"Your heart stopped," Molly told him. "They don't know why yet."

"It looks like a hemolytic reaction, but the blood they gave you…" John trailed off as Tom began nodding. "You think it was a hemolytic reaction."

Again, Tom nodded.

"But your blood is compatible with type A positive," said John.

Tom shook his head, motioning writing with his burned hand as he winced.

"They're working on getting you something to be able to talk with," Molly told him.

Tom rolled his eyes, blowing out a breath in frustration but seemingly resigning himself to wait. Apparently, whatever he had to say wasn't life-threatening.

The door opened once more, and a nurse entered, carrying a computer tablet with her. She looked up at the bed. "Oh, look who's awake!"

She had said it with a cheery tone of voice and a smile that would probably have been more at home in the children's ward. John glanced back at Tom to see him with an almost horrified look on his face as he stared at the nurse. John frowned at the reaction, something needling at the back of his mind.

"All right," said the nurse, looking over his vitals on the screen and jotting them down on the tablet. She looked at Tom. "What would you say your pain level is?"

Tom held up his casted arm and showed her four fingers.

"A four!" exclaimed the nurse. "Well, that's not so bad. I have good news. The doctor has prescribed something that should take care of your heart."

"Yeah?" said John, intrigued.

"It looks like his heart stopped due to hypovolemic shock caused by his burns," answered the nurse. She held up a capped syringe. "This should help."

Tom tapped loudly on the bed rail, holding his hand up and fixing John with questioning eyes.

John looked back at the nurse. "What did he prescribe?"

"Dobutamine," replied the nurse.

Tom's eyes widened as he shook his head, protesting through his swollen lips. He glanced fearfully at the nurse and her syringe as he struggled in the bed.

"Oh, my," said the nurse. "Looks like someone doesn't like needles."

Tom gave a few loud, muffled yells, his gaze flying over to John, his eyes pleading with him. John frowned, unable to figure out what had Tom freaked out so much. He hadn't started panicking until he heard the name of the drug. He wasn't afraid of needles.

As the nurse approached the bed, Tom began struggling in earnest, his broken foot rattling the sling.

"Whoa," said John, stepping up next to Molly in concern. Tom was going to end up hurting himself.

"Mr. Richmond, you won't even have to feel anything," the nurse told him. "I'm going to put the needle into the IV here." She motioned to the IV port up near the saline bag.

Tom reached up with his burned arm, grabbing at the IV where it was inserted into the jugular vein in his neck.

"Hey!" exclaimed John, grabbing his arm as gently but firmly as he could and pushing it back to the bed. "What are you doing?"

As the nurse went to grab a restraint from the cabinet, John looked down at Tom's face, stunned by the expression there. It was like he was begging John to save his life. The nurse returned, and they strapped Tom's right arm down on the bed. They left his other arm free since his mobility was limited with the cast. They stepped back as Tom began yelling and tapping at the rail with his cast again.

"Mr. Richmond, I promise this won't hurt you," said the nurse, grabbing the syringe and uncapping it.

John watched in sympathy as Tom banged away at the rail, nearly hyperventilating and well on his way to getting another sedative so he wouldn't hurt himself. Wasn't there something they could do before giving him the medication? It looked like it was doing more harm than good. Tom's heart just might stop again with the strain he was putting on it as he yelled and thrashed while the nurse swabbed the port with an alcohol wipe. And he just kept banging away at the rail in a Morse code-like fashion.

As soon as that thought ran through his head, the pattern of the bangs finally got through to him.

John's eyes widened as he yelled, "Stop!"

Molly jumped a little at the sudden shout. Both Tom and the nurse froze and looked over at him, the nurse with startled eyes as she stood with the syringe at the IV port and Tom with alert, desperate eyes as he breathed heavily.

John looked over at Tom as he stepped closer to the bed. "It can't be…"

"What is it, John?" asked Molly.

A smile started to break out on John's face. "Vatican cameos…"

Tom released his breath as his head fell back onto the pillow, his body finally relaxing. And was that a faint smile on his face?

Lestrade stepped up to the foot of the bed. "What's 'Vatican cameos'?"

"It's a code phrase Sherlock and I use when we can't communicate openly," explained John in an amazed tone of voice. He pointed at Tom's cast. "He was using Morse code to say 'Vatican cameos.' It means, 'Take cover. Someone's about to die.'"

"How would he know about that?" asked Mary. "And why would he tell you?"

"He's trying to tell us he's allergic to dobutamine," said John.

The nurse frowned and moved to the cabinet, where she had set down her tablet.

Molly was shaking her head. "No, he's allergic to dogs and shellfish."

The nurse looked up from the chart. "There isn't anything about a dobutamine allergy in here."

"He's not allergic to dobutamine," Molly insisted.

John shook his head. "No, he isn't." His smile widened. "But Sherlock is."

"What do you mean?" asked Lestrade.

"That isn't Tom," John said, pointing at him. "That's Sherlock."

Molly looked down at Tom in the bed, who was looking up at them and nodding. "But the lab tests…"

"Well, we all agree that the two of them look very similar," said John. He pointed at the bag containing the ruined Belstaff and scarf. "Tom did dress like him. If some lab technician mixed up the samples, how hard would it have been to confuse the two of them? Maybe a nurse even accidentally switched the charts between the two. It would explain his panic when hearing what drug he was going to be given, the transfusion reaction—Tom is type AB positive, and Sherlock is type O negative; the most severe reactions happen when you give A positive blood to an O negative person—the panic after he woke up and we were talking about Sherlock being dead, the note—" He pulled the paper with "NOTTO" written on it out.

"Not Tom…" said Mary in realization.

"But he had…" began Molly, hesitating, "he had my engagement ring and a letter I wrote to Tom in his pocket."

Tom—or maybe not Tom?—started tapping his cast against the bed rail in what was apparently Morse code.

"Oh, for—" began John, grabbing a pen from the cabinet and handing it to him. "Use that, you berk. You're gonna break your arm again."

Tom took hold of the pen and started tapping it on the bed rail.

John listened for a moment before speaking. "Tom called him to talk… He showed him the letter…and told him about the break-up… After the crash…Tom gave him the ring…and said to tell you…" he looked at Molly, "that it wasn't your fault… He knew you would blame yourself…but he didn't blame you."

Molly felt herself blush at the thought of Sherlock reading her letter but pushed it away. No. Even though she had technically known he hadn't been dead, she had already lost him once and gotten him back. There was no way she could be so lucky again. "But…"

The man in question began tapping the pen on the rail again.

"I don't blame you either…" John translated. He then hesitated, glancing with an uneasy expression between the two of them. "You're still the one person who matters the most."

Molly's eyes narrowed as she looked into the eyes of the man in the bed. Was it true? The hazel eyes looked back into hers, and suddenly, Molly knew. Sherlock was the only person she had ever known that could put that much emotion and thought into his gaze. It was like he could see right through you.

A smile broke out on Molly's face. "Sherlock?"

Sherlock smiled back at her.

The nurse stepped up to the bed, her eyes pouring frantically over the tablet in her hands. "I'm sorry, but this just seems highly unlikely."

"His scar," said John suddenly in inspiration. "Did the nurses put distinguishing features in his file to be used for identification?"

The nurse flipped through several pages on the tablet before stopping. "Yes. This says Tom should have a birthmark on his right shoulder and a scar on his stomach."

They couldn't check the birthmark since it was amidst the burns on his right side, but John reached forward and pulled the blanket a little further down to Sherlock's waist. The nurse examined the skin there, and while the skin was cut and bruised, there was no scar where she expected there to be.

"Four years ago, Sherlock and I were chasing a criminal," John began. "He was some kind of long-distance runner, and he jumped across an alley to the roof of another building." He pointed at Sherlock with a smile. "This idiot decides to follow him and falls short. He fell onto the fire escape, and a loose piece of metal impaled his leg. It left a pretty nasty scar."

He pulled the blanket from the foot of the bed and to the side to expose Sherlock's leg. Sure enough, there was a mottled patch of skin on either side of his calf.

The nurse opened Sherlock's file on her tablet and looked at it. She then looked up at them with wide eyes. "I am so sorry. I don't know how this happened. I'll go tell the doctor immediately." She hurried out the door as another nurse entered.

The nurse stepped up to John. "Here's the tablet you asked for, Dr. Watson." She handed him a computer tablet and left.

John waved the tablet that would help Sherlock communicate in exasperation, calling after the nurse. "Your timing is impeccable." He handed the tablet to Sherlock, who propped it against his good leg.

"So, Sherlock Holmes back from the dead again," said Lestrade.

"Had the press gotten word of it yet?" asked Mary.

Lestrade pulled a newspaper from inside his coat, waving it at Sherlock. "Congratulations. You made the front page. Again." He handed the paper to John, who unfolded it to see the front page.

"'Consulting detective Sherlock Holmes, who achieved a spell of fame months ago by returning from his supposed death at the hands of criminal mastermind James Moriarty, has been killed late last night in a bus accident,'" John read. He looked up at Sherlock. "Oh, they are going to love another resurrection."

"I better get down to the Yard and correct my reports," said Lestrade, holding a hand up in farewell. "Glad you're not dead, mate." He then made his way out the door.

"Of course, this means that Tom's the one who died," said John.

"Oh, God…" muttered Molly. I break up with him, and then he dies. It's all my fault.

Sherlock tapped away at the tablet for a while before the computerized voice began speaking.

"It was Tom who decided to seek me out. He told me he had felt the two of you growing apart for some time and he was not upset with you at all. You did not drive him to that crash."

"But he still wouldn't have been there if I hadn't written that letter," said Molly, tears falling.

Sherlock watched her for a moment before looking over at John, catching his gaze and then glancing to the door and back.

"Er, I think Mary and I are going to get something from the cafeteria," said John.

"And call Mycroft," Mary added. "If he doesn't already know."

"Yes, right, Mycroft," said John. "I nearly forgot." He looked back at Sherlock. "Get some rest." He and Mary then made their way out the door.

Sherlock looked back at Molly and started typing on the tablet.

"When I came back, I invited you to solve crimes for a day. That wasn't my original intention. I had wanted to ask you to dinner."

Molly stared down at him, stunned. Dinner?

"But then, I saw your engagement ring. I decided to let you move on if you were happy. It seemed Tom wanted to return the favor. He had considered ending it himself because he could tell you wouldn't have been happy with him. He was glad you took that choice away from him so he wouldn't have to hurt you. He gave us his blessing. He died at peace."

Molly finally let a small smile onto her face. "Do you really think so?"

Sherlock gave her a look that said quite plainly, "I never think. I know."

Molly took hold of Sherlock's hand over the cast. "Thank you for telling me."

They stayed that way for a moment before Sherlock made a move to type on the tablet with his burned hand.

"Oh, don't do that," said Molly, releasing his hand. "Use this one."

Sherlock relented and typed at the tablet.

"Is this when I ask you to dinner? It may take several weeks until I'm able to get out of bed."

Molly smiled. "How about dinner right here? We can talk over a mediocre plate of hospital food."

Sherlock typed on the tablet. "Just not the pork."

Molly laughed at the reminder of Sherlock's banter when he'd come to ask for her help in the morgue years ago.

The End