A/N: My first Sherlock fanfiction, set in a time and place where Sherlock relapses into drug addiction and Watson still has a job at the clinic. Disclaimer: I don't own Sherlock or any of the characters!

Back Again

It is late when John Watson climbs the steps of 221 Baker street and heads for Flat B. A long day at the clinic, and he can still hear the rattling coughs of sickened schoolchildren—Whooping Cough again. It's going around. He mounts the stairs slowly, and wonders for a moment why Sherlock hasn't sent him a pestering text yet: Out of milk—SH or Please buy a kite and string while you're out...I need it for an experiment—SH or some other freakish request.

The landing is dark, and Watson realizes that there are no lights on within Flat B. Something tickles his spine— apprehension, maybe. The door has been left open a crack—just a crack, but it's enough to make Watson worry. He approaches with great caution.

"Sherlock?" It's barely a whisper, but God knows that Sherlock Holmes can pick up a whisper at a hundred yards away. "Sherlock?"

No reply. Watson starts forwards, one foot in front of the other, rolling the weight from his heel to the ball of his foot—military training that will never fade. Could Sherlock have gone out? But where? On a case, maybe, taking some spur-of-the-moment stroll into the city's underbelly (wouldn't be anything new, Watson thinks). He leans forwards and pushes the door open slowly, and, seeing no intruder, allows it to swing fully open.

"Sherlock?" He calls out, a little louder. No reply. Real fear scurries down Watson's spine. It's something that he's learned, through combat, to never ignore. The sense that something is wrong.

It's then that he sees the light in the bathroom. Someone has locked the door and the light is turned on and is seeping beneath the doorframe. The water is not turned on.

"Hey!" Watson starts for the door, is going to knock when he sees that, like the front door, the bathroom door has been left open a crack. "Sherlock?"

And then he's realizing how silent the apartment is, how deathly silent, silent like death itself, and he's sprinting for the door. Watson throws the door open, and drops his jacket and stops breathing for a moment because it's Sherlock there on the floor, half sitting up against the sink, so completely terribly still.

He sees the patches—too many of them, all up and down his arms, and there is a cigarette still smoking on the floor.

"No." Watson drops to his knees, his hands on Sherlock's shoulders, and he is shaking him roughly, and all of his medical training doesn't matter now because this is Sherlock unconscious on the floor, bloody Sherlock Holmes, his best friend. "No, no, no."

Sherlock's overdosed on the damn patches. Watson knows this at a glance. He feels cold with fear and sickness, is about to scramble for the phone, to call for Mrs. Hudson, to start CPR, when Sherlock's eyes flutter and suddenly he is breathing shallowly.

"Sherlock!" Watson cannot breathe, cannot think properly. "Sherlock, can you hear me?"

A nod. Is it a nod? Watson can't tell, but Sherlock is breathing at least. His lips move, as if speak, but for once Sherlock Holmes can't find the right words.

"Oh, God, Sherlock..." Watson moans. "Why?"

Sherlock speaks this time, slow words that obviously cause him great pain. "Couldn't...stop...at...one..."

"No, Sherlock." Watson says, and he is on his knees on the bathroom floor, holding his best friend and Sherlock is struggling to breath.

There are so many patches, plastered against Sherlock's pale skin, and Watson begins to peel them off and toss them away, but it's useless and he's starting to wonder if Sherlock could actually die like this, the two of them alone on the floor.

Sherlock lets out a frightful whimpering sound, and he is slumped backwards against Watson so that his shoulders were in Watson's lap and his head was against Watson's chest. He was trying to speak.

"I..."

"What?" Watson has thrown every bit of medical training out the window, and he's trying to convince himself that Sherlock will be okay. He will be, Watson is sure, but not yet.

"I..." Sherlock lets out a strange weak sound. "I'm sorry."

"Oh, Sherlock," Watson says, "You don't have to be...it's okay." He says it again, to convince himself. "It's okay."

And they sit like that, with Sherlock half unconscious and Watson's heartbeat only just now returning to normal, there in the flat at 221B Baker street. Outside, a half moon hangs over London. From beyond the bathroom window, Watson can hear car horns and the sounds of traffic.

He looks down at Sherlock's prone figure, and realizes that he's never seen the man so brokenbefore.

"It's okay, Sherlock," He says softly, although he's not entirely sure that Sherlock can hear him. "It's all going to be okay."

For the first time in a while, Watson lets the silence fall.

A/N: So...how was it? Feel free to leave a review! Goodnight, dear readers! :)