---
title: "Rabbit Song"
author: "Basser"
lang: en
id: "CRV-03"
series: "Can't Rewind Verse"
series_part: 3
fandom: "Sherlock (TV)"
rating: "Teen And Up Audiences"
warnings: ["No Archive Warnings Apply"]
words: 17524
chapters: 10
date: 2013-01-27
status: "complete"
written_by: human
summary: "Sherlock smelled of cigarettes and chemicals, of borrowed soap and fabric softener... and still, faintly, of strawberries. Missing scenes and snippets from Can't Rewind Now as told from the point of view of Eric Crenshaw. The angst-ridden fluff of a doomed romance."
---

# Rabbit Song

## Chapter 1: Heartbeats

**««**

Sherlock smelled of cigarettes and chemicals, of borrowed soap and fabric softener... and still, faintly, of strawberries.

Eric catalogued all this as he lay quietly in the pre-dawn twilight of his room, pinned to the bed by the skinny prat of a supergenius who'd apparently decided to use him as a pillow sometime during the night. Anyone else, and he'd have most likely shoved them off by now - grumbled something about *keep to yer own side* and resolutely scooted as far over to his half of the mattress as possible. Not that he necessarily had a problem with *touching* people, of course... it was just that ever since breaking up with Luce he'd been *(pretty understandably, he figured)* more than a bit wary of any sort of intimate contact not expressly initiated by himself.

But as he lay there, listening to the soft breathing of the man curled around his chest, he found he really just didn't *want* to push Sherlock away. True, they'd only met about eight hours ago... but in that time they'd played several (hilariously one-sided) matches of Halo, committed half a dozen crimes together, and then went and bloody *snogged.* How in the hell things had managed to progress that quickly or in that *order* Eric honestly had no clue.

Did it really matter, though? *Live in the moment*, that's what he'd been repeating to himself over and over for months now. Life was too short, too fleeting, too *cruel* to waste precious time worrying about the *what ifs* and the *whys.*

Sherlock was a drug addict - that much was *completely* bleeding obvious. Visibly underweight, dependent on cocaine to function and probably well on his way to some sort of fatal lung disease if the chain smoking was anything to go by. And if Eric were looking for anything like a long-term relationship that would be just about the holy trinity of *things to damn well avoid.*

But 'long-term' as an attainable goal was a concept Eric had abandoned years ago. Now he just drifted, hoping for a flash of something like happiness before the inevitability of death finally got round to his number.

Eric was *frightened* of dying, of course, didn't like to think about it... but that fear was little more than the basic backdrop of his life at this point; the constant dread of something you had no hope of changing, no chance of ever avoiding. Weed could take the edge off the tangled knot of anxiety, make it halfway *bearable*... never erase it completely, though. Still there always loomed the knowledge that he was *nothing*, no one, a near-useless castoff of society, tenuously employed by a criminal organisation, alone and *defenceless* just waiting to be arrested or shot or stabbed or any of another million *horrible* *horrible things...*

A sudden spike of terror shot through his gut, an all-too-familiar rising tide of anxiety creeping along his lungs in its wake. Without really meaning to he raised his arms and hugged Sherlock closer to his chest. Probably tighter than was comfortable for either of them, really, but since Sherlock was almost certainly out for the count *(crashing plus the shakes never worked out great for anyone, genius or not)* he figured it was permissible, just this once, to hug the living daylights out of him.

He only held it for a second or two though, then let his grip relax and just lay there cradling the bony, awkward prat who'd so inexplicably chosen *him*, of all people, to latch onto. Because, yeah, maybe they were both gay and maybe finding other homosexuals their age was a bloody nightmare around this district... but hell Sherlock was bloody *gorgeous*, he could probably convert half the fucking neighbourhood if he set his mind to it.

Eric had been hovering around the man like a schoolgirl with a crush for the last few hours, honestly just hoping he'd be noticed. Certainly not *kissed -* no bleeding *way*... he'd have been happy enough with a passing glance, a word or two. But strangely, *incredibly*, Sherlock had not only accepted the undue attention but seemed to take it as some sort of invitation to *hover right back*. The two of them had spent the afternoon orbiting each other like the universe's most socially inept pair of satellites. And somehow or other that had all managed to lead right to... well, to *this.* To lying in bed, legs entwined, Sherlock half on top of him and Eric hugging the other boy to his chest like a goddamned stuffed bear.

Would Sherlock come to his senses when he woke up? *(Okay, well actually probably not... he'd be hung over from the cocaine bender - likely not even halfway coherent for another ten or twelve hours unless he did another hit... but still, metaphorical musings and all.)* Or would perhaps some dashing young dealer or junkie knock on the door tomorrow and steal him away? Eric wouldn't exactly have a snowflake's chance in hell to compete for the genius's attention against someone else, timid and useless as he was.

No... the best he could really hope for was to try to keep himself from overthinking this and ruining it all like he usually did. Had to accept the inevitable - that life goes on, people leave, he'd end up alone - but not let that knowledge upset him. Enjoy this while it lasted.

Sherlock would be a fleeting moment in his life - like a comet, streaking across the sky before it either disappeared forever or impacted the ground to leave a smoking crater where they'd both once stood.

That was really it, then, wasn't it? In the end it would all come down two possible outcomes: abandonment, or death.

And as he lay there listening to Sherlock's soft breathing, feeling the thump of their heartbeats in tandem, watching the shifting shadows on the ceiling above... Eric found that, somehow, he wasn't afraid.

Oh, the dull thrum of anxiety that followed him everywhere was still very much present - but for once it wasn't worry for the future or the pointlessness of life or senseless tragedy that knotted up inside his chest and stole his breath away. In fact all he could really think to be nervous about right now was how on *earth* he was going to manage to keep this thing with Sherlock going for as long as possible.

As far as goals went that was a bit stupid, honestly; no *live happily ever after*'s or *find true love*'s... just a simple, flat, *try not to fuck up.*

But hey, even a stupid goal was still a *goal*, wasn't it?

With a quiet chuckle at his own silly thoughts he let one of his arms flop down to rest on the mattress beside him, leaving the other loosely curled around Sherlock's shoulders. It was probably a decent enough time to get up - find something for breakfast, maybe, and see what sort of business needed doing today.

Getting up would mean moving, though... and moving would mean shoving Sherlock away.

Eric glanced down at the sleeping boy on his chest.

*... not a chance.*

With a smile he shut his eyes, letting himself be lulled back to sleep by the quiet pulse of two heartbeats.

**««**

## Chapter 2: Distraction

**««**

Waking up with a cast on one arm and a pounding headache wasn't, as far as Eric was concerned, the picture perfect way to greet a morning.

Upon opening his eyes, however, he quickly decided he wasn't all that upset. Mostly because along with the pain and discomfort there appeared to be a pair of grey-blue eyes staring intently into his face, the press of a warm (if somewhat uncomfortably bony) body against his, and the distinctly foreign sensation of being... *safe.*

Why he should feel *safe* when a bloody nutcase with terrifying fighting skills was staring him right in the face Eric had no idea. But he did. Really quite sound and secure in general. Compared to the usual knot of undefined neurotic worry that tended to dominate his existence it was practically heaven.

... but it was also really, *really* weird.

He was so preoccupied with this puzzling lack of anxiety that he didn't immediately notice Sherlock had been saying something.

"Wha'...?" he asked, blinking back up into the other boy's gaze. Sherlock frowned in vague consternation and poked him in the side *(evidently they were tangled up in an awkward half-hug, half-sprawl again; Eric really had to figure out how Sherlock kept managing to get him in this position)* before not-quite-irritably repeating himself.

"I *said* it's almost ten," he reiterated, gesturing toward the bedside clock with his shoulder. "Your arm is going to start hurting very badly if you don't get up and take a pain reliever soon."

"Oh... yeah, I guess so." To be honest his arm was *already* hurting pretty badly, but Eric wasn't all that bothered by it. He'd broken his fair share of bones back when he was younger, after all, and had a couple bad dislocations thanks to football. But with Rose and Bailey to look after there really hadn't been much time to fret over his own health, so he'd gotten pretty good at ignoring things like lack of sleep, hunger and injuries.

Sherlock didn't seem inclined to let him sweep this one under the rug, though. He pushed himself up on one arm *(Eric noticed with some amusement that the skinny prat had stolen one of his shirts out of the clothes hamper sometime last night)* and turned to regard the rest of the bedroom over his shoulder.

"Where did you put the pills they gave you at the hospital?"

Eric scrunched his face up trying to remember. Everything from last night was sort of... hazy.

"Er... in me coat pocket, I think," he finally recalled.

He and Sherlock both looked over at Eric's coat, hanging on the closet door a good few metres away. After a moment Sherlock huffed to himself and let his arm give out, flopping gently down on Eric's uninjured side with a sullen frown.

"I don't want to get out of bed," he muttered petulantly.

Eric shrugged, ignoring the twinge of pain the action produced in his wrist. "So don't."

"But oxycodone has a biological half-life of four hours, and it's been nearly seven since you took any."

That was a valid enough point, but Eric was more interested in how completely weird it was for anyone to just know something like that off the top of their head.

"Is yer brain like a giant library?" he asked somewhat blankly. For some reason he was picturing just like... stacks and *stacks* of books all crammed into the other boy's skull. No *wonder* the prat always seemed so distracted - his whole head must be full of little bits of knowledge all constantly clamouring for his attention every which way he looked.

Sherlock blinked at him with an expression of vague confusion. "What does that have to do with pills or not getting out of bed?"

Eric shrugged again. "Nothin', just wondering."

"Oh, well..." Sherlock trailed off, glancing away with a sort of thoughtful look on his face. "I think a library implies some degree of *organisation*. So no, not really."

"What's it like, then?"

Sherlock frowned at him. "What's *your* brain like?"

"I... dunno? I never really thought about it," Eric admitted after a slight pause. "Maybe like... shelves, I guess? Wit' stuff on 'em?"

That really didn't cover the spaces *around* the shelves - the writhing storm of anxiety and fear and buried terror of old memories... but he figured that wasn't really the sort of stuff you talked about with someone you'd just started dating *yesterday.*

"Shelves," Sherlock repeated flatly. He rolled his eyes and let his head flop down onto Eric's chest. "How utterly boring and practical."

"Well I ain't exactly a big thinker, am I?" Eric countered with a quirked smile for Sherlock's obvious exasperation.

Sherlock didn't reply besides a halfhearted *hmph*, evidently halfway to falling asleep or zoning out or whatever it was he did when he was tired but still half-tweaked on coke. Taking that as a cue that they were more or less done with conversation Eric let his eyes drift shut. True, his arm was actually starting to hurt like a right *bitch...* but maybe if he just focussed on something else he could force himself to go back to sleep anyway. He decided to work on keeping his breathing as even as possible - that usually did the trick.

After a few moments, though, Sherlock raised his head again. "I *told* you your arm would start hurting."

"Who says it's hurtin'?" Eric replied in a sleepy grumble. He opened one eye to find Sherlock regarding him with an odd, sort of half-stern, half... *something...* expression.

"You're attempting to breathe at regular eight-second intervals, an obvious distraction technique."

Eric huffed an annoyed sigh and opened both eyes, scowling slightly. "An' it were workin' just fine until you went an' bothered me 'bout it."

They stared each other down for a brief moment, before Sherlock's face abruptly shifted into a devious smirk. "If it's *distraction* you're after I can think of a few more effective options than breathing patterns."

"Can y'now?" Eric responded, trying to contain a snort of laughter. Not that Sherlock was all that bad at flirting, really - because granted that *was* a rather sly come-on, and quite hot besides - but it was just, y'know... *Sherlock.* Making an *innuendo.* The very thought was hilarious simply for how completely impossible it should have been.

Still, Eric found his smile creeping into a grin. Sherlock smiled too, then leaned forward to kiss him.

And what followed after *that*, Eric had to admit, was a pretty damned good distraction.

**««**

## Chapter 3: Human

**««**

Sherlock was, yet again, prodding at the basin of cold water in the sink where his coat and sweatshirt were busy soaking.

Eric thought about telling him to stop, or perhaps walking into the kitchen and physically dragging the git back into the sitting room... but decided against it, choosing instead to simply continue lying on the sofa. His head was swimming a bit thanks to the oxy, and he really just didn't feel like doing much of anything at all. Let Sherlock fuck with the wash as much as he wanted - they were his clothes to mess up anyway.

"Does the salt help break down the serum proteins?" Sherlock asked as he finally wandered back into the sitting room. "It must, I suppose, but then how are the wool fibres spared? There's a stark difference in scale of course but you would think the underlying principle would result in degradation at a fundamental level regardless."

"Sherly, I ain't got no fuckin' clue what yer talkin' about," Eric muttered from under the arm he'd flung over his eyes. He was really starting to wish he'd just foregone the oxy entirely and smoked himself into a stupor instead. At least then he wouldn't be feeling so bloody *ill.*

"I'm trying to figure out how your stain removal technique works," Sherlock clarified, sounding ridiculously cheerful about what really should have been the most dead-boring topic imaginable; obviously he was quite high. Eric didn't really mind, though - ever since he'd told Sherlock about being creeped out by the whole *bleedin' android* thing the other boy had tended to default to talkative and happy instead of frigid stillness whenever he did a hit.

But of course that only applied when it was just the two of them. No matter how giddy he'd managed to get himself on coke Sherlock would, without fail, *always* snap back to his cold façade the second anyone besides Eric was in earshot.

As if the universe was reading his thoughts Eric heard the sound of the front door opening. He looked over to Sherlock (who'd been hovering by the arm of the sofa, hands tucked into the front pocket of the dark green jumper Eric had leant him while his Oxford sweatshirt was soaking) and watched as, sure enough, the lanky prat immediately locked right up into his chilly *robot aristocrat* persona.

Ben strode into the room a second later. "Hey, guys!" he greeted cheerfully.

"Benjamin," Sherlock intoned in a bland monotone, quite suddenly looking as if he couldn't care less where he was or who he was with. Eric just barely managed to resist the urge to roll his eyes at the act. That was just how Sherlock dealt with social anxiety, he reminded himself, and it was hardly fair to judge the guy for what was obviously an effective coping technique... even if it *was* a bit two-faced and occasionally disturbing.

"'Lo, Benny," Eric mumbled as he lowered his arm back over his eyes.

Ben ambled over and poked his head over the back of the sofa. "You still feelin' like shit, mate?"

"Yup," Eric replied.

Ben clicked his tongue slightly in disapproval. "Ah, well... just remember to hit me up if you need anything with a bit more *pep*, yeah? Racer's got the good stuff right now, post-holidays and all."

"Thanks, Benny. Think I'll be fine wit' what I got," Eric mumbled back. It was a nice offer and all, but he *really* hated stimulants. They always put him on edge, even *more* terrified of mundane shit than usual, prone to panic attacks... plus they tended to make his heart feel as if it were seconds away from exploding. He'd never once experienced the sort of energetic euphoria Ben seemed to derive from the stuff, and *certainly* never got... well, whatever the hell it was Sherlock got off coke. Hyper-calm? *Roboticised?*

Speaking of the prat, though... Eric shifted his arm a bit to watch as Sherlock's face darkened imperceptibly at the mere mention of Racer *(and jesus christ, of all the dealers to get on the bad side of...)* while Ben just smiled genially at them over the back of the sofa.

"Right-ho, then!" he exclaimed with a laugh. "Thought I'd offer anyway. So, what're you kids up to today?"

He said this last with a glance up to Sherlock, who stared impassively back before shifting his gaze away toward the kitchen with a slight shrug. "I'm purifying cocaine."

Ben quirked an eyebrow. "Huh. Well... that sure sounds like fun."

"Not really," Sherlock responded in an unimpressed deadpan as he looked back to them. Eric honestly couldn't tell if he'd missed the sarcasm or just chosen not to acknowledge it.

Ben hesitated, apparently also confused by the reply, and Eric decided he should really speak up before this ended up any more awkward than it'd already gotten. He let his arm flop off the side of the couch with a heavy sigh and stared morosely up at Ben.

"Me, I ain't doin' shit but lyin' here."

"Well yeah, I kinda figured *that*." Ben smiled again, chuckling, and took a step away from the couch as he tucked his hands into his jeans pockets. "Welp, anyway! I been up since like yesterday, gotta get some sleep. You two lovebirds stay out of trouble!" He flashed them a roguish wink and a grin, then turned to amble off toward the stairs whistling to himself. Eric scowled at the word *lovebirds* but felt too ill to really do anything about it. Ben was already on his way to his room anyhow - well out of kicking range.

"*Lovebirds?*" Sherlock repeated a few seconds after Ben had gone, his chilly façade evaporating as quickly as it had come in favour of scrunching his face up in abject, almost comical disgust. Despite the general shit state he was in Eric smiled and huffed a short laugh - of *course* Sherlock would go and drop his android act with a look like *that*, of all expressions.

"He's just teasin' us," he assured, still smiling. Ben *always* said that kind of stuff - innuendos and silly jabs about Eric shacking up with anyone they even remotely interacted with, laughing like a jackal whenever his younger friend got embarrassed. Presumably Eric having *actually* slept with someone after god-knew-how-long would be a source of constant amusement to their housemate for weeks to come.

Sherlock looked like he didn't know quite what to make of that. After a short pause he half-rolled his eyes and turned toward the kitchen, apparently deciding to change the subject. "How long until my coat is clean?"

*Ugh*, back to the bleeding wash again. Eric sighed and let his head flop sideways into the couch cushions. "Y'asked me that ten minutes ago."

"Did I?"

"Yeah," Eric shifted his head to glower up at Sherlock. "Y'forgot already?"

"No," Sherlock replied with a vaguely affronted look. A beat later though he frowned to himself and looked away. "I thought it had been longer than that."

*Oh*, Eric realised, that was right - for all his crazy genius superpowers, Sherlock actually seemed to have serious difficulty keeping accurate track of the passage of time. He'd think fifteen minutes had been an hour, a couple hours a whole day... and apparently a large portion of the morning spent filtering his cocaine solution had somehow registered to him as no more than a few seconds, judging by how startled he'd looked when he finally caught sight of a clock. Must be confusing as hell.

Eric felt his expression soften. Beyond all the aristocratic poise and impossible wealth of knowledge it was nice to know Sherlock still had *some* shortcomings.

"It's noon," he supplied helpfully, nodding toward the ancient plastic clock on the wall behind the telly. Sherlock glanced over.

"Oh." Another pause, then he huffed to himself and looked back to Eric. "Don't tell anyone I didn't know that."

"Won't breathe a word," Eric promised with a bemused smirk. Sherlock regarded him dubiously for a moment, then seemed to accept the assurance and nodded once in a matter-of-fact way.

"Good," he quipped, and went back into the kitchen - probably to fuck around with his coat and sweatshirt again, but who cared. Not like he could do much more damage to the items than they'd already sustained anyway.

Eric smiled and leant back to throw his arm over his eyes again. If Sherlock wanted to continue pretending to be perfect around everyone else, that was fine. Keep up appearances, throw on the android act... whatever helped him deal with things.

But between the two of them, he'd always just be human.

**««**

## Chapter 4: Pasts

**««**

There was an unspoken rule in the distribution ring: don't talk about pasts.

None of them were really there by choice. Each tenant had come to the organisation through a series of personal tragedies - lost loved ones, driven from their homes, abused or abandoned or any number of terrible situations. Asking about someone's family, their life before the distribution ring... it was just another cruel reminder of everything they'd lost.

But still, Eric wondered.

Ben, he knew the most about. They'd been friends for a couple years now, actually, having met just a few weeks after Eric finally gave up on everything. Marijuana had been just about the only thing keeping Eric from jumping off a bridge at that point - smoking let him forget, and forgetting made it stop *hurting*... even if only for a little bit. Those fleeting moments of empty-headed bliss became his sole purpose for living.

Of course then he'd quit his job, dropped out of anything even remotely resembling civil responsibility, and in doing so had rather abruptly found himself without the means to buy weed. A few days of unwilling sobriety, lacking even the medication he'd been forced into taking after the whole "incident" *(which at the time hadn't seemed to help him one fucking bit, but then maybe that was just because illegal chemicals were so much stronger)*, and taking a dip in the Thames had started to seem like a pretty decent alternative.

Luckily he'd decided to at least make an *attempt* to get some quick cash before going for the more permanent solution. Ben had been a plucky young dealer back then, grinning like a loon as he flirted with any remotely female-shaped figure heading past his street corner. Pretty obviously straight, but Eric figured even if *he* wasn't interested he could at least point him in the direction of someone who might be.

Ben hadn't given him directions to any other dealers, though. No, he'd taken one look at the miserable kid huddled in front of him, palms pressing together fitfully in an attempt to keep from breaking down in hysterics, and promptly offered to buy him a stiff drink.

From there Eric had found himself shepherded into one crew after another, always dogging along in Ben's shadow. Apparently having grown up learning to maintain his sanity while trying to raise a couple of rowdy little girls and look after his frequently-deranged mum had given Eric something of a golden touch when dealing with drug addicts. Not much anyone could say to phase him, after all - not when the most frequent dinner conversation back home had been a spirited discussion between his seven year old sisters and his schizophrenic mother on the merits of clingfilm versus tinfoil in keeping the alien signals out of your brain.

He'd quickly found his niche as a sort of mediator. Dealer having trouble with a client? Call in that freckle-faced gay kid, he'll get it sorted. Someone threatening to shoot the place up if they don't get their shipment? Nobody can stay mad at the little faggot, throw him in there to peace-talk. Eric wasn't entirely convinced of his so-called 'skills' now being passed around as some sort of recruiting beacon, but Ben took care of the advertising for him. Got him a job with Flanagan's crew, smoothed things over with Luce even when the brief romance he'd shared with the half-mad speedfreak collapsed into a smoking ruin. Eric honestly owed his life to Ben several times over.

It had taken him awhile to figure out why someone like Ben would even *do* any of this - why take some neurotic little stoner under his wing, stick his neck out for him over and over, with no hope of repayment?

But he'd caught on eventually: Ben was just as alone as he was.

A few drunken conversations and late-night talks had pried the majority of the story out of him. Ben's dad had been in the military - overseas, deployed and returned a half dozen times. Whenever he was home, he'd teach his young son all about the importance of responsibility, kindness, generosity. Ben's mum had been your typical doting military wife, proud of her husband, supportive of her only son... really just the perfect little family unit.

But then came the last deployment... the one where Dad didn't come home. The one where a crisp letter and a phone call broke the news instead - shot through the heart, dead in seconds. Ben's mum held herself together for nearly a year afterwards, long enough for her son to take his GCSEs... then she'd succumbed to the depression with a fatal vodka-and-valium mixer.

Ben hadn't had any other family to turn to. He'd tried to continue his education, perhaps go on to uni, but for one reason or another it hadn't worked out. Dealing drugs had been a quicker, easier alternative. *Especially* when he discovered how much better he felt tweaked than sober. Sell a little weed, buy himself some Ecstasy - instant happiness.

He'd never forgotten the sense of belonging he'd had with his mum and dad alive, though. Nor the lessons his dad had taught him, the stories of bravery and compassion. So when a sad, trembling little wreck of a traumatised stoner came looking for help in the worst way possible, he'd taken him in as a friend. They became each other's family - brothers, sometimes annoying and *always* looking for a way to get under each other's skin, but bound in blood regardless.

Charley was a little bit more difficult, mostly because Eric didn't know him all that well.

Chuck and Ben had gone to the same school when they were younger, which was how they knew each other, but aside from that the muscular parkourist didn't seem to have much in common with *any* of them. Obsessed with personal health, to the point of refusing to eat or drink anything he hadn't prepared himself, and choosing to use his formidable maths abilities to help a distribution ring balance its finances instead of, say, getting a proper job. Ben said Chuck did it for the money - Eric really couldn't see what on earth would make *this* a more lucrative option than legal employment. Surely taxes weren't that much a drain?

One day he caught sight of a stack of outgoing post, though, and suddenly Charley's almost fanatical devotion to healthy living and saving every last scrap of his money made a lot more sense. An envelope, stuffed with cash by the looks of it, addressed to a hospital room. The name had been covered up by a handful of postcards piled on top of it *(Ben liked to send unsolicited mail with dirty messages written on to his mates in other parts of the city, just to piss them off)* but Eric didn't really need to know who it was. Family or friend, parent or sibling... hell maybe a *child?* Whatever the case it was obviously personal. Eric didn't pry.

Sherlock was the easiest to figure out. (Though granted, it was a bit of a cheat to puzzle out the history of someone who willingly let you see them naked. But hell it wasn't like Eric was trying to get some sort of high score with all this nonsense.)

Bullying in school was a given, just based on how Sherlock locked up around people. And the fighting skills, obviously... nobody learned how to throw a punch like that unless they needed to know how to defend themselves. So, fine, he'd got the shit kicked out of him a few *(dozen)* times. Judging by how utter crap he was with basic social graces and his general level of impossibly frustrating knowledge that wasn't too much of a surprise. Maybe even enough to lead to dropping out and developing a coke habit. But that wasn't all of it...

No, because then there was the whole *mimicking people* business.

As far as Eric could tell, Sherlock had three basic personas he used regularly: there was the 'normal' version, apparently reserved for conversations with Eric - the personality he used when he didn't have to worry about offending anyone with his strange, frequently off-putting rambles about whatever-the-hell and random jumps in topic as his brain out-paced his mouth. Eric liked that one the best, of course. Next up was the *android aristocrat*, which he used around people he either didn't know or didn't like. Eric wasn't too keen on that one but he could tolerate it well enough.

The last, however... his last persona was *fucking terrifying*.

Eric had only seen it in full force once now - when Sherlock had frightened off that thug on the night Eric's wrist got dislocated. There'd been hints here and there before then however. Used it on Ben when the enterprising thief had nicked his bank card *(Eric was convinced Ben just did that to screw with the new guy, but it was always difficult to tell*), and again toward Devin before he'd snapped and started yelling instead. On the surface it was nothing more than a sort of frigid calm; his robot act ramped up a notch, perhaps, or just a trick he'd learned to scare people.

Take a longer look, though, and there was obviously something much deeper - something dark, cold, and *horrifying.*

Because Sherlock was *definitely* imitating someone when he did that. Eric could see it in the way his whole demeanour shifted, speech patterns and diction changing... he even held his body differently. This wasn't a set of tricks he'd come up with himself, but a *person* - someone he'd been around long enough to learn how to mirror. And, judging by how he seemed to use it as a last-resort tactic... someone he was *scared to death of.*

Pinpointing who this *mysterious person* might be wasn't exactly difficult. In fact the 'disowned' comment over lunch that first day pretty much settled it. What kind of parent kicks out their kid over a drug addiction, after all, but a supremely awful one?

What confirmed it once and for all, though, were the scars.

Not many, and not very big - honestly just a few short rough patches of skin on his back. He'd waved them away as some sort of childhood tree-climbing accident. Eric pretended to accept that. Easier than pointing out how falling from a tree didn't generally leave perfectly horizontal marks in the exact diameter of a cane, or asking how crashing through a trunk full of branches only left a handful of faded cuts right in the middle of one's shoulder blades.

And anyway for all his social ineptitude Sherlock was actually something of a master at changing the subject *(subtly or not)*, meaning that every time Eric so much as *mentioned* child abuse or scars or poor parenting he'd somehow suddenly find himself dragged into a conversation about bees, dirt samples, genetics, chemistry... all stuff Eric had absolutely *no hope* of keeping up with; which, he supposed, was probably the point. Sherlock was trying to confound him with facts, make him forget what they'd originally been talking about through sheer mental overload.

Embarrassingly enough that tactic worked brilliantly. Eric's eyes tended to glaze over at the merest hint of anything related to academics, *especially* anything resembling maths; Sherlock had of course picked up on that escape route almost immediately and had no qualms about using it to his advantage.

But still, when all was said and done, when Sherlock's nattering on about physics equations had finally forced Eric's brain into a full systems shutdown and he was forced to ignore his boyfriend or go mad... still, he wondered.

Wondered about families, about life, about the future. About how random fate and human cruelty could conspire to bring two lost souls together, and about whether the chance to find someone you truly cared for could ever be worth the heartbreak that forced your separate paths to cross.

Mostly, though... he wondered about pasts.

**««**

## Chapter 5: Films

**««**

In retrospect getting Sherlock to sit still long enough to watch a film should probably have struck Eric as a bit more impossible than he'd originally bargained for.

Still, sometimes he liked to believe his boyfriend was at least *somewhat* capable of behaving like a normal 20-something adult. So while the mysterious collection of beakers and tubes in the kitchen was busy doing whatever magic it did to get stuff out of other stuff and leave pure cocaine behind Eric thought it might be fun to watch a DVD together.

Sherlock, of course, was much less than enthused by the idea.

"I hate films," he groused as Eric muddled his way through the menu screen of his Xbox one-handed. "Sitting in one spot for hours just to observe some contrived, encapsulated little story play out. It's the very *definition* of a waste of time."

"Sherly, you spent like forty minutes this morning lookin' at a goddamn spiderweb," Eric pointed out half-irritably as he glared at his selection pointer skittering about the screen. Stupid bleeding controller was just so bulky, it was practically impossible to work the joystick and hit the right buttons all with one hand.

"It was an *interesting* spiderweb." Apparently catching on to Eric's issues with the controller he leant forward with a short huff of a sigh and grabbed the device himself. "What am I doing, then?"

"Select th' little DVD thing an then hit 'play'," Eric supplied. Sherlock obeyed, and soon enough they managed to get the disc up and running. Despite this minor success Sherlock still seemed extremely annoyed.

"I could be re-organising my beakers," he grumbled as Eric took the controller back and set it on the floor. As usual they'd ended up sprawled half-on, half-off each other on the undersized sofa.

"Just shut up an' watch th' film."

Half an hour later and Eric was beginning to realise that, just maybe, he should perhaps have chosen a different movie. Because introducing someone like Sherlock to modern cinema with a film like *Donnie Darko* was going exceedingly... well, not quite poorly, but at least very strangely.

"Does this *ever* start to make sense?" Sherlock asked, sounding almost indignant as on the screen Donnie started to dream again. "What's he got an axe for!?"

Eric elbowed him lightly in the stomach in a futile attempt to shut him up. "If ya quit askin' questions and *watch* maybe you'll find out."

"Or maybe I won't," Sherlock retorted hotly. Still, he stopped whingeing long enough to hear the next scene, which did in fact explain the axe. A further half hour managed to pass by in relative peace... punctuated, of course, by Sherlock's random outbursts in response to whatever he percieved to be plot holes and Eric intermittently elbowing him in the midsection.

"So the whole plot of the film is set in a tangent universe which split off from the moment where he wasn't crushed by the jet engine," Sherlock finally decided a little after the midpoint of the film.

"How th'*fuck* did you figure that out?" Eric replied, blinking. They weren't even to the last section yet and Sherlock had already pieced together the entire thing?

"It's said as much about four times now, hasn't it? And if you read the book pages between scenes it's practically spelled out for you," Sherlock pointed out in an unimpressed monotone. "Can I go back to my chemistry setup now?"

"No," Eric asserted, shoving the brunt of his bodyweight on top of Sherlock to make sure the lanky prat couldn't escape. "We're watchin' a bleedin' film together and we're gonna watch *all* of it."

Sherlock sighed heavily, but didn't try to get up. "Fine. He's only going to get flattened by the engine at the end though."

Sure enough, Donnie ended up dead. Sherlock seemed ridiculously smug about this, until Eric pointed out that he hadn't been able to figure out ahead of time exactly who Frank was nor that Gretchen would be killed, which seemed to put him in a bit of a sulk.

"I can't deduce things without sufficient data!" he'd snapped, shoving Eric off him. "And anyway who cares what happens to a load of fictional people in some American film? It's not important."

Eric grinned and let himself flop back onto the couch cushions as Sherlock made to storm off in a huff. "Yer just grumpy cause y'ain't quite as clever as you think y'are."

"I am *every bit* as clever as I think I am," Sherlock retorted. "Your choice of entertainment is simply *moronic.*"

Yawning slightly - between half an oxy and perhaps one too many joints he was actually starting to feel a bit exhausted - Eric raised his good hand in a sarcastic salute. "Whatever y'say, mate."

Sherlock paused in his retreat to the kitchen. After a brief moment of apparent indecision he turned back around. "If you can find something less ridiculous to watch I'll be done with the next purification step in around fifteen minutes."

Eric grinned. "Oh aye? Gonna spend the whole time figuring out th'end before the story's halfway through again?"

"Probably." Sherlock shrugged and turned to amble off toward the other room. "You didn't actually mind me doing so the first time, however, so I expect you're fine with that."

And with a flippant little wave over his shoulder, he disappeared.

Eric huffed to himself, pretending to be irritated. "It were really bleedin' annoying, actually!"

Sherlock didn't acknowledge him. Eric frowned, then shifted his head toward the milk cartons they called shelves in their run-down little rat's nest of a house.

A grin split his face as he caught sight of the DVD furthest from the left. *Hah!*

Ignoring the faint twinge of protest from his wrist Eric clambered off the sofa and retrieved an old, battered copy of *The Matrix.* Let's see Sherlock deduce all the fun out of *this* one.

Forty minutes later they were both shouting at each other like idiots as Sherlock proceeded to pick apart every single possible plot hole in the story, no matter Eric's insistence that it was *just a bleedin' movie, yer not supposed to think about it so much!* And maybe that should have been completely annoying, infuriating, downright bloody stressful.

But somehow it wasn't. No, Sherlock had (as bleeding usual) been entirely correct in his assessment earlier - Eric didn't actually mind one bit.

Because no matter how much they irritated, confused, or pissed each other off... they were still together. Two halves of a pair, not just a couple of scattered lonely hearts.

And that, Eric decided, was enough to keep him content.

... even if Sherlock *did* ruin films.

**««**

## Chapter 6: Dreams

**««**

Sherlock seemed to prefer to keep to something like a 36-hour-to-a-day schedule as a general rule. Most stimulant addicts were like that, Eric knew, but it didn't stop the vague worry that one of these mornings he was going to wake up to find the stubborn idiot facedown in one of his chemicals, dead asleep.

So he did his best to try to drag Sherlock off to bed whenever it seemed remotely possible to persuade him to rest. This usually happened between doses of cocaine, when Sherlock was too distracted by his chemistry or fiddling around with Eric's guitar or failing miserably at Halo to remember to shoot up. Eric would watch for the heavy blinking, the furrowed brow against a growing crash headache, slight slurring of speech... it was all really pretty obvious when you knew what to look for.

Then he'd begin with that particular brand of gentle but persistent nagging he'd perfected so many years ago with his baby sisters. Always *suggestions*, never orders - that way they thought it was their idea. The method seemed to work equal wonders on both primary school girls and twenty-something geniuses.

Actually in honest truth rather a *lot* of Eric's techniques regarding keeping an eye on Sherlock stemmed from his skills in looking after young children... and that was probably quite a bad sign when discussing someone you were meant to be *dating*.

But hell whatever worked, right?

"Y'should sleep sometime soon," he pointed out as Sherlock yawned for the second time in ten minutes. Eric had actually succeeded in getting the prat to eat a halfway-decent meal and they were now sitting at the kitchen table, Sherlock fiddling with the last dregs of his chicken soup and Eric debating the best way to do dishes while the sink was full of lab equipment.

"I've got things filtering," Sherlock objected halfheartedly.

Finally Eric decided to simply dump their two bowls in the basin alongside the beakers and figure out how to go about washing them tomorrow. He plucked Sherlock's mostly-finished dish out from under the prat's idly prodding spoon and stacked it on top of his own.

"I don't see why shit filterin' means y'gotta stay awake."

Sherlock frowned as his food-based entertainment was washed out into the sink. "Something might... knock them over. Or get stuck, I guess... I don't know."

Eric half-smiled to himself. And there was the most obvious sign of Sherlock-sleepiness: complete inability to string together a sentence. Apparently even geniuses could get too tired to talk.

"I think they'll prolly be fine overnight." Eric turned back around to find Sherlock leaning his head heavily on one hand, spoon tapping listlessly against the scuffed tabletop.

"Maybe," he mumbled. Eric raised an eyebrow in mild exasperation and grabbed his boyfriend's arm to drag him into a standing position.

"Bed," he ordered simply. It was a testament to how completely knackered Sherlock must have been that he didn't bother arguing - just grumbled something indistinct and wandered off toward the stairs under his own power.

Soon enough they were both in their pyjamas (which in Sherlock's case just meant he'd taken his jeans and sweatshirt off - he still hadn't bothered to obtain any clothes of his own, instead preferring to perpetually ransack Eric's wardrobe for t-shirts and underthings). Eric, for his part, was quite ready to fall asleep the second his head hit the pillow.

Hours must have passed in an instant, because the next Eric opened his eyes it was to the twilight darkness of his room. His scant collection of secondhand furniture stood bathed in the half-light from the streetlamp outside, the muted sounds of Stockwell's night life filtering like phantom noises through the walls. Eric lay still under the covers and blinked at the far wall with a slightly quizzical furrow to his brows as he tried to figure out what in hell had woken him up. He didn't usually have vivid dreams on oxy - the stuff knocked him out far too fast and way too heavily for any real images to form. So probably not a nightmare... but what, then?

That question was answered when he finally mustered the willpower to shove himself over onto his back, looking around the rest of the room - and more specifically to the other side of the mattress.

Beside him Sherlock was sitting up ramrod straight, legs tangled in the duvet as he stared at the darkness of the room with an expression of blank terror. Eric pushed himself up on his good arm and regarded the other man with concern - the skinny prat was trembling very slightly, panting like he'd just run a marathon... and good christ he looked bloody *scared.*

"Sherlock...?" Eric asked hesitantly after a moment. He wasn't entirely sure if Sherlock was awake or still trapped in some sort of dream world.

Sherlock startled, head whipping around to look down at Eric. His skin glowed a deathly pale white in the weak light.

"Who-?" he started, then abruptly cut off as he seemed to realise where he was. With a jerky shake of his head he scrunched his face up and pinched the bridge of his nose as if fighting off a headache. *"Fucking hell..."*

"Nightmare?" Eric guessed, quirking a sympathetic smile. Sherlock scowled under his hand and let his arm drop as he turned to glare out the window.

"No," he uttered tersely. The lie was dead obvious, but Eric didn't press the issue. Instead he just smiled again, expression soft and tinged with a hint of pitying sadness *(and hopefully Sherlock would miss that in the gloom, else Eric was in for a solid day of stoic robot instead of the usual spastic nutcase - if there was one thing Sherlock absolutely hated it was pity).* Well, that was probably it for sleep tonight then. Even though it was barely half past two in the morning, and they'd gone to bed at eleven... but really four and a half hours was about as good as anyone could ask for with a coke habit like Sherlock's. Quite decent actually.

"You gettin' up, then?" Eric asked with a half-stifled yawn.

Most likely the prat'd go do another hit - chase off the lingering wisps of fear in a chemical haze then spend the next twenty hours happily immersed in his chemistry work. That was just fine with Eric; he rather fancied having the whole duvet to himself again anyway.

Sherlock didn't immediately answer him. Instead the fierce glare of his expression slowly melted into a blank, faraway look. Still staring out the window he spoke again.

"Do you think I'm insane?"

Eric blinked. Where the hell had *that* come from? What, had Sherlock been dreaming about some sort of fucked-up acid trip magic adventure or something? Eric snorted softly to himself in amusement at the mental imagery and let himself flop back onto the pillows.

"Yer a bleedin' nutter," he replied without hesitation. Sherlock seemed to startle a bit and turned to blink down at him with a somewhat affronted look - apparently he'd been expecting a denial or some other sort of reassurance. Eric just smirked back. "But so's everyone else. Ain't nobody quite right in the head, s'what makes 'em all different."

Sherlock regarded him for a few seconds, an expression of vague confusion creeping over his face. Finally his features settled into a perplexed sort of half-glare. "That doesn't make any sense."

"No?" Eric frowned to himself. He made a token effort to analyse what he'd said - thoughts meandering along through the half-stoned, still-sleepy haze in his head - but almost immediately gave up. It hardly mattered anyway; Sherlock would just argue circles around any explanation Eric could possibly think up. With an unconcerned shrug and a yawn he rolled over onto his uninjured side and flapped a dismissive hand over his shoulder. "Eh, I dunno then. Yer prolly fine."

He heard Sherlock huff a quiet breath of bemusement, but there was no sign of a clever comeback. Instead another few minutes of companionable silence passed between them.

Sherlock had apparently chosen to continue sitting upright on the mattress staring at whatever-the-hell, still and unmoving in the darkness. Beside him Eric found himself beginning to slip back into slumber under the warm blankets.

Eventually Sherlock's voice broke into the settling fog of sleep.

"Do you mind if I stay here and read for a while?"

The question was accompanied by shifting weight, the soft clicks and whirring of a computer booting up - he'd evidently retrieved Eric's laptop from beside the bed.

Eric didn't even bother opening his eyes. "Y'know I don't."

"Thought I'd ask anyway," Sherlock replied in a low mumble, voice slightly distracted as he clicked around whatever website he'd pulled up. Seconds later he added on a muttered; "... good lord, your browser layout is *completely* inefficient."

Eric pressed a fond smile into his pillow, content to let Sherlock's litany of quiet complaining follow him into his dreams.

**««**

## Chapter 7: Protecting

**««**

Eric huffed an annoyed sigh into the soft fabric of Sherlock's sweatshirt, feeling the body under him flinch slightly as the screeching sound of the doorbell drowned out the noises from the telly. The two of them were curled up on the sofa, with Eric's face buried against Sherlock's chest while Sherlock unsuccessfully tried to avoid getting killed every five minutes in Halo.

"Your problem," Sherlock muttered distractedly. His tongue poked out from between his teeth in concentration as he navigated his endless one-man crusade to be the absolute worst Halo player in all existence. Eric grumbled something indistinct (*'lazy arse ponce'*, or the like) and reluctantly propped himself up on his good arm. Sherlock, still holding the controller, raised his hands to let Eric wriggle out from under his arm, then resumed playing without having bothered to so much as pause the game.

"Yer gettin' the next one," Eric tossed over his shoulder as he plodded towards the front door.

"Not my job," Sherlock replied. Eric rolled his eyes. True enough, that, but sod Sherlock for being enough of a prat to point it out.

With a heavy huff of a sigh Eric finally reached the entryway and tugged open the door.

"'Lo?" he mumbled tiredly. Upon spotting the man on the front porch, however, he was forced to do his best to hide a grimace. Oh, *brilliant*.

In front of him Racer flashed an easy grin, hands tucked into the pockets of his faded brown trousers. An unlit cigarette dangled from between the man's lips as he eyed Eric up and down appreciatively.

"Ello then, love," he drawled. The tone of his voice was enough to make Eric's skin crawl. Racer had a bit of a reputation for chasing after street kids, young blokes especially, with an enthusiasm bordering on the disturbing. It was a habit Eric had fortunately yet to find himself on the wrong side of, due in large part to his status as an employee of Corey. Devin's elder brother controlled the bulk of Racer's supply lines, and it wouldn't do well for business to be interfering with the workforce of his distributor. Racer knew that well enough, meaning Eric, Charley and Ben had all been thusfar spared any serious advances from the man. Didn't stop him coming off as a massive creep, of course, but one had to take what positives you could get in this business.

And so, leering creep on his doorstep or not, Eric resigned himself to doing his job. And that was to assist clients. He pasted on the friendliest smile he could manage and stepped back to open the door wide enough for his guest to enter.

"Hey, Racer. Restockin' again?"

"Aye, lad, same as always. Toss us a pinch'a that pure snow, too, f'ya got a gram or two. We'll see wot we drum up wit' that."

"Right." Eric smiled again, less forced this time *(Racer wasn't in too much of a teasing mood, it seemed, which might keep his usual lewd comments to a minimum)*, and turned toward the storage room about halfway down the hall where the majority of their stockpiled drugs were kept. Easy enough to toss together a packet of Racer's usual assortment; though as far as the pure stuff went he'd have to find a baggie somewhere, see if he could pester Sherlock into weighing up a few grams of his freshly-processed batch. Ordinarily Eric would do it himself, of course, but the cast on his arm made for a slightly difficult time with the scales.

As Eric made his way down the hall Racer trailed along behind him. "Got yerself a bit roughed up there, eh love?"

"Oh, er…" Eric glanced down at the sling on his arm. He shrugged, faintly embarrassed, and shot Racer a sheepish grin. "Yeah... s'just dislocated. Me an' Sherlock got jumped by a couple tossers walkin' back from th'pub after the last show."

At the mention of Sherlock's name Racer's eyes seemed to light up - not an entirely pleasant expression to witness. Belatedly Eric was reminded of the way Sherlock tended to go all odd over any mention of the weasel-like dealer and wondered whether he should have avoided mentioning his boyfriend altogether.

"Ah, did ya now!" Racer was grinning like he'd just discovered something hilarious. "I heard about that one, I'd wager. Lowell's boys been runnin' round screechin' their fool heads off 'bout a toffee-nose cokehead wot clobbered 'em all. That'd be yours, would it?"

"Erm…" Eric hesitated - partly because he wasn't sure if he should confirm or deny the question, and partly because Racer's accent was fucking impossible to decipher. The man had apparently been Scottish at one point, but years spent skulking about the alleys of London had infected his lilting brogue with all the worst elements of Cockney.

"Lad's a *fighter* though, eh?" Racer went on smoothly, not bothering to wait for a response from Eric. "And a proper boffin by Flanagan's talk." Grinning, he shot a lewd, meaningful glance towards the front of Eric's trousers with his subsequent words. "Boy sure as hell's got himself plenty a *skills*, then, hasn't he? Imagine you've had yerself more'n a few demonstrations by now, y'timorous dog you."

Racer's lecherous tone and teasing wink made it plenty clear what sort of 'demonstrations' he was referring to. Eric's face immediately went beet red as Racer cackled.

"W-we're… I mean, I'm not… it ain't none'a your business!" Eric tried to set his expression in an affronted glare but failed miserably as his cheeks were still burning crimson. The sling on his injured arm kept his hands from their usual nervous habit of pressing together, which wasn't at all helping him regain his composure. In desperation he cleared his throat and turned resolutely round to begin gathering Racer's supplies from the storeroom.

Racer was still chuckling. "Now, now, there ain't no shame innit, love. Though… may wanna be wary there, y'ken? Couple grams'll get ya damn far with that'un. No tellin' who all's had 'im on his knees for a quic-"

"Right!" Eric exclaimed suddenly, cutting Racer off by shoving a brown paper bag in the man's hands. "Usual stuff, best quality we got, good t'go!" Ears and cheeks still flushed a fiery red, but he'd resolved to ignore it in favour of getting Racer the hell out of their house. Priorities, here.

"And th'pure shit?" Racer opened the bag to glance inside, idly checking for the correct contents. His expression remained locked in a sort of faintly vulgar smirk as he glanced back up toward Eric.

Eric baulked a bit. Ah *fuck*, right, the purified cocaine… he had no idea where it was being kept, either, as Sherlock had been the one in charge of storage. That meant he'd have to go and ask, which would probably mean letting Racer tail him into the sitting room, which would lead to Sherlock having to interact with a bloke who'd pretty much just flat-out admitted to having blackmailed him into… oh *christ*, no, fuck all aspects of *that* plan. Find a way out of it, quick, quick!

"Actually I, er… just remembered I ain't s'posed t'sell that lot until Corey gets a client list set up for it an' all. Y'know, high rollers and th'like? All them's got first dibs."

Racer quirked a dubious, slightly annoyed brow. "Think I damn well qualify on *dibs*, love."

"W-well yeah! Course you do," Eric stammered. Ah shit shit *shit*, he'd accidentally offended *Racer*, of all people. All traces of jovial silliness were quickly vanishing from the man's demeanour, replaced by a dangerous sense of impatience. Not good. "I just… wanna make sure y'get the right price an' all, yeah? Corey'd have me head f'ya got overcharged."

A few seconds of silence passed between them, Racer fixing Eric with a cold, calculating look and Eric doing his best not to look utterly terrified. Finally, with a sudden smirk (which very nearly caused Eric to pass out right there in the hallway out of sheer fright) the dealer tossed his paper sack of drugs a few inches into the air and caught it again, chuckling.

"Ah, Crenshaw…" he muttered with a fond chortle. "Yer a real piece o'work, love. I do wish ye'd take me up on me offer sometime, eh? Have a bit of a go street-side? Be a bleedin' natural, y'would."

Heart still hammering away, Eric forced a shaky smile. "I… I'm good where I'm at for now, thanks."

"Ah well. Someday, yeah? Always a shame t'leave ya, lad."

With a roguish wink and another light toss of his bag Racer turned to amble down the hall. Eric followed after, shutting the door behind the man after offering a passably-polite parting wave, then turned to lean against the wood panelling in mixed terror and relief. His heart had kicked into high gear some five minutes ago, whole body gone icy hollow and trembling with excess adrenaline. He wondered if it would be too ridiculous to just sink down and curl into a ball right there in the entryway. Would anyone be likely to stumble over him before he managed to work himself back out of panic mode...?

Probably, he determined. Ben was due back soon, as was Chuck. And besides which, he reminded himself, he had a *boyfriend* in the other room. And skin-and-bones or not the prat'd be far more comforting to lean up against than a cold wall. All Eric had to do was make his way to the sofa. Not difficult, that. Well worth the effort.

Limbs still a bit shaky he managed to pull himself up to his feet, then navigated the short stretch of house back to the sitting room.

"Have you actually taken the time to look at these sodding spaceships?" Sherlock exclaimed almost the instant Eric came within his field of view. "None of them make the slightest ounce of sense within the context of the narrative. I mean what are the odds of architecture featuring a *sheer drop* in the midst of a *corridor* making it past health and safety inspections? There's not even a guard rail or anything! Complete rubbish."

Despite the trembling fear still working its way out of his limbs Eric smiled and huffed a small laugh. Evidently Sherlock had been too engrossed with the logical inconsistencies of Halo to take note of who'd been at the door. Probably for the best, considering.

With a frown Eric flopped down on the worn cushions, then after a moments' hesitation shoved his way back into the position he'd been in before - practically curled up in the space between Sherlock's chest and the Xbox controller in the other boy's hands, face pressed against the cigarette-and-laundry scent of Sherlock's jumper. Sherlock let him without much fuss, engaged as he was with his sorry attempt to play video games.

Eric tried not to dwell on the implications of Racer's words earlier, but of course it was impossible not to. Wasn't much of a surprise anyway, really… it was a well-known fact round the back streets that any junkie Racer took a shine to would end up doing whatever disgusting thing the man asked of them, lest they find themselves cut off for miles around. The dealer boasted a web of influential pushers spanning nearly a dozen districts' worth of drugs trafficking all grovelling at his feet. Clearly Sherlock had run afoul of that whole mess and gone with the only option he'd have had available to him. Awful, yes, but understandable.

… still, though.

Eric shifted around a bit, repositioned himself so his head was resting in Sherlock's lap, and blinked rather forlornly up at the other boy's face. Sherlock furrowed his brows in confusion and glanced downwards.

"What?"

"… Nothin'," Eric muttered after a moment. He turned his head sideways to glance at the telly, watched as Sherlock's pathetic iteration of Master Chief scarpered behind an energy shield to escape a horde of Covenant grunts. "You really suck at this game, mate."

"Shut up," Sherlock snapped with a scowl. Eric smiled, then turned back over to curl up on the sofa cushions. He pressed his face against the warmth of Sherlock's stomach and tried to will his body to stop feeling so cold and panicky.

*Calm down*, he told himself. Honestly. Nothing had bloody happened - Racer got his drugs, Sherlock hadn't so much as registered the guy's presence, whole business went as well as could be expected. And yet still he couldn't help this feeling of dread creeping up through his guts... bleeding *hell*, stupid sodding fear response.

Racer was terrifying enough, yeah, and by all appearances he'd targeted Sherlock as one of his sick little playthings quite some time ago. That was probably legitimate reason to fret, Eric figured. But, still... in the end of it all Sherlock was an adult. Capable of looking out for himself. Moreso than most, really, considering he'd soundly beaten the tar out of a trio armed blokes without a seconds' hesitation. Eric shouldn't have to worry about him. Whatever Racer had forced him into… it was all in the past. Only to be brought up if it happened again.

Which it wouldn't. Ever.

Because even if Sherlock didn't need the interference - even if he didn't *want* it or so much as know about it… Eric decided he'd do his damnedest to keep Racer away from now on. Evils of the world abound, and perhaps Eric wasn't much of a fighter. More of a worrier, really. Fretting over everything without doing anyone much good.

But in this, maybe... in his own small way, perhaps he could help. Or try to, anyway.

Sherlock, after all, was well worth protecting.

**««**

## Chapter 8: Joint

**««**

"Have you ever even smoked weed before?"

Eric smiled bemusedly as Sherlock, nose wrinkled in disgust, coughed and handed back the joint which he'd just taken a drag off of as if it were a cigarette. *Way* too much, of course, but Eric wasn't planning on saying anything. Honestly he was dead curious to see what Sherlock would be like whilst massively stoned. And an entire bleeding lungful of pot smoke would certainly do the job.

Sherlock covered his mouth with his sleeve and coughed hard, grimacing. "*Yes*," he spat defensively once he could speak again, voice a bit strangled. "Just... not that strong. How much tobacco did you use?"

Eric grinned mischievously. "None."

As he'd expected, Sherlock shot him a startled glare; they'd agreed to a 20/80 split, owing to Sherlock still technically being high on cocaine. Not wise to mix too many mind-altering chemicals in one go. Of course that had been the justification put forth by Sherlock - Eric was fairly sure the *real* reason behind this newfound sense of caution was because Sherlock knew full-well he had no tolerance for marijuana and would end up stoned out of his mind if the bud wasn't heavily cut with something.

Since that scenario was exactly what Eric wanted to happen he'd secretly foregone the addition of any tobacco at all and just rolled up the weed straight. Bit underhanded, maybe, but he figured it wasn't like Sherlock wouldn't be able to tell what he'd done with a glance. Had to have known before they lit up, right? Some impossible little clue giving the prank away. And, to be fair, he'd *really* not expected Sherlock to be stupid enough to treat the thing like a filter cig anyway. The moron.

Said moron was now blinking at him rather dazedly. Eric quirked a grin at him and took a short drag of his own. Not enough to do much, of course - wanted to keep mostly sober. Both because he needed to be able to supervise, make sure Sherlock didn't do anything too outright stupid or embarrassing, and because he knew he'd definitely want to be able to remember every detail of this little scene.

"You still with it, mate?" he asked after a short silence between them. He couldn't help but snicker a bit along with the question; Sherlock's normally-poised features were currently arranged in an uncharacteristic look of bewildered, innocent confusion.

"Er..." he replied slowly, then scrunched his face up as if thinking very hard about something. "I... yeah? Yes, I mean. Yes. Sort of." A quick shake of his head, looking like he was trying to hold on to a tiny last scrap of sobriety, and he glared Eric down somewhat unsteadily. "You did this on *purpose,* you arse. You wanted me incoherently high."

Eric just shrugged. "Yeah, I did. Sorry. Too good a chance t'pass up... you *do* know you're s'posed to just take a quick puff an' hold it, though, yeah? It's not a bleedin' cigarette."

"That would have been excellent information to have about five minutes ago," Sherlock replied, tone sounding like he'd gone for snippy but got lost somewhere and just ended up a bit bewildered. He frowned and looked around the room - they were both sat criss-cross on top of Eric's duvet, with the rays of a setting sun through the window casting odd patterns on the bedspread. Sherlock regarded those for a second but then quickly appeared to lose interest and glanced up to Eric instead. He opened his mouth, blinked once, and then closed it.

"I... completely forgot what else I was going to say," he remarked perplexedly. "That... hang on, that shouldn't happen. I'm s'posed to be able to..." He made some sort of strange hand gesture, apparently at a loss for the right words. Eric just grinned at him.

"You're stoned, mate," he helpfully reminded his befuddled companion. "You're not *s'posed* t'be able t'do much of anythin'." As if demonstrating his point he took a pull off the still-smouldering joint, careful not to draw too deep or hold the breath long enough to have any real effect, and blew the smoke playfully in Sherlock's direction. Sherlock scowled and waved his hand to try and clear it, making a noise like an indignant child. Then he promptly got distracted by the swirling eddies of smoke in the window light and spent a few seconds watching those disappear with a look as if he'd never seen something so fascinating in his life.

"That... theoretically you could write an equation to calculate precisely where every particle in that cloud of smoke is going to be at any arbitrary point in time, you know... can't find the velocity though, obviously, because if something's got a velocity then it's moving and if it's moving then by definition it's not at a fixed point. Never understood why that's got to be a principle with a name and everything. S'just common sense, really..."

Eric blinked and fixed Sherlock with an extremely bemused look. Was he... rambling about *science*? Was that seriously the sort of thing he thought about whilst high? Maths shit? Christ what a nutter.

"I dunno what th'hell you're even on about," Eric replied, mostly because Sherlock seemed to have gotten sidetracked again by some internal thought process, staring into the middle distance as if contemplating something, and Eric didn't want him to go all catatonic rather than talk. Thankfully this tactic worked; Sherlock abandoned whatever he'd been pondering to instead look to Eric with a disapproving frown.

"You should do, though. You're not stupid."

Eric snorted in disbelief. "Well that's a marked change of opinion, ain't it?"

"There, see!" Sherlock exclaimed, pointing at him like he'd just done something scandalous. "See? *A marked change of opinion?* That's a complex... erm, word... grammar... oh, you know what I mean. It's *smart*, is the thing. Like what I'd say. You talked like *me.*" He paused, looking vaguely alarmed, then shook his head. "Spoke, rather... I meant spoke. Oh god now I'm talking like *you*. We've swapped."

"We ain't swapped, mate, you're fine," Eric assured him, laughing in response to Sherlock appearing genuinely distressed at the thought of his posh rich-boy accent being infected with cockney.

A second later though he seemed to forget all about it and instead began to wilt sideways until he'd flopped face-down on the bed. Exhausted, looked like. Probably the cocaine was wearing off, or he'd not had a cigarette within the last hour. Doubtless a bad sign, Eric supposed, that the guy needed to be on some sort of stimulant just to retain consciousness. Textbook definition of dependency.

Not that either of them could really do anything about it now. Quitting cold-turkey would just put Sherlock out of commission for a few weeks, during which he wouldn't be able to purify any drugs, which would likely get him kicked out of the house. And Eric in his current state wasn't exactly up to earning enough money to feed and shelter two fully-grown men. Especially not when one of them would be literally starving with a sudden loss of stimulant-induced appetite suppression, and probably not capable of doing anything but sleep for a good fortnight besides.

Trapped where they were, then, probably until one of them died. Sherlock, most likely... considering he seemed about half there already.

Eric frowned and, in an effort to drive such thoughts out of his mind, took another quick drag off the joint. He blew the smoke towards Sherlock's head as a sort of gentle reminder that he could have more if he liked. Wake himself up a bit.

"Y'gonna just fall asleep, then, or...?"

Sherlock shoved his face into the duvet for a second, doubtless unhappy about the smell, but held out his hand anyway. He propped himself up on his elbows once Eric had handed the smouldering bit of paper over, and, once again, seemed to completely forget it wasn't a cigarette. Eric rolled his eyes as he accepted the joint back (Sherlock having got himself into a massive coughing fit, predictably) and leant over to stub the thing out in the ashtray he kept by his bed. Right, then, no more of that. Not if Sherlock couldn't figure out how to not smoke it like a complete dumbarse.

The dumbarse in question had flopped back down on his face, groaning in response to what Eric presumed must be quite the impressive head rush. Served him right, god's sake.

"I *told* you it ain't a damned cig, y'moron." Eric's exasperated tone was mitigated somewhat by Sherlock having chose that moment to lift his head a bit and give him a pathetic, half-terrified look. It was hard to decide whether the expression was more worrying or hilarious. Accordingly Eric's response ended up caught about halfway between the two reactions.

"Y'alright?" he asked with an amused snort. After a pause he decided it probably wasn't nice to just start laughing over the poor bastards's self-inflicted predicament and did his best to straighten his face. Sort of a difficult proposition when Sherlock was blinking vacantly up at him like a child.

"I, er... dunno?" Sherlock responded very slowly. In a somewhat rare display of unprompted physical affection he suddenly shifted himself to be more or less hugging Eric round the midsection, upper body draped half over his lap. Eric smiled a bit and patted the miserable sod on the head.

"Yeah. Pretty sure y'just fucked yerself over there, love."

Immediately Eric snapped his mouth shut, cheeks going faintly red - *shit*, hadn't meant to use that word. He tended to call people 'love' rather frequently, just as a sort of friendly nickname, but he'd been determinedly avoiding doing so towards Sherlock. It just... didn't seem like something one should use to refer to a new boyfriend without it being meant seriously. Certainly not something one should say in reference to *Sherlock Holmes* without first thinking through every possible facet of what you could mean by it, because god knew *he* would.

Or... he would if he weren't currently stoned to high hell. Eric's burst of internal panic faded quickly as he looked down to the very muddled supergenius now occupying the majority of his lap. Sherlock had just had his face shoved into Eric's thigh the whole time, shoulders all hunched up like a hedgehog. Didn't seem to have even processed the words.

"Every minute's stretched to *eons*, good god," the man mumbled half-incoherently into the silence between them. "Shouldn't've... whatever you did to make me think this was a good idea... left out the tobacco... *christ* you can be such a manipulative bastard."

Eric, still trying to fight back the blush over his accidental slip, smiled with fond, if somewhat apologetic, amusement.

"Yeah, well... who's the one who keeps on lettin' me pull that shit, eh? Ain't like you're not clever enough to spot when I'm messin' with you."

"No, that's the thing. M'really not." Sherlock was actually stoned enough to be slurring, now, which Eric had to admit was just about the most hilarious thing he'd ever heard. Luckily the juvenile grin on his face was quite thoroughly wiped away by Sherlock's next words.

"I trust you too much."

Eric blinked, mouth gone slack in surprise. That... what?

"You're *safe*, is what I mean," Sherlock continued on, not even seeming to realise he'd just candidly admitted something he'd be absolutely mortified to say if he were sober. "Never going to be a threat. So there's no reason to bother sussing out if you're planning anything." He finally lifted his head a bit, frowning out at the room in what looked like utter confusion. "Which is... entirely stupid of me, f'course, because you bloody always *are*. But I s'pose even when you're being a deceitful arsehole there's no sense worrying over it because you're not going to... er..." He trailed off, obviously disgruntled. "Oh, no, I've forgotten the word. How did I forget a *word*? I don't forget words. Eric, I've become an idiot. You've made me *stupid*."

With that he seemed to give up on talking entirely and just let his head flop into Eric's lap, covering it with his arms as if blocking out the world might help him sober up faster. Eric, for his part, was a bit too stunned to really say anything.

He... had no idea how to react. Sherlock *trusted* him? The bloke who was suspicious of literally everyone he met, lest they turn out to be spies or assassins or just regular old arseholes waiting for an opening to attack... had been dropping that hyper-vigilant caution in regards to anything Eric did? *That's* why he'd been able to play his silly little pranks and tricks and convince Sherlock to go along with things so easily?

There was no immediate way he could think to respond to that, so he just let a few minutes drag by in silence. Sherlock didn't seem to mind, of course - he was still curled up half-draped over Eric's lap clinging to his abdomen in what might very well have been a desperate attempt to keep hold of some last piece of reality. Certainly he was hugging him hard enough to make the contact seem like it must be vitally important. Eric hesitantly shifted his weight - he'd been leaning back on his good arm - and had a complete loss for what to do with his now-free hand before he settled on just patting Sherlock's head like a puppy.

"I, er... trust you too, you know," he said after a long pause. Tried to force the words to sound sure and honest and not a hesitant stammer. Sherlock wasn't listening anyway, he reminded himself. Too busy with the terrible eon-minutes or whatever he'd been complaining about. He'd not even remember any of this. Still, Eric wrinkled his nose and glanced elsewhere before adding a quiet, "... a lot."

"Good, because there's about a dozen different ways I could murder you and get away with it."

Sherlock's flat tone was clearly meant to be a joke. Eric startled badly anyway (though that was more because he hadn't expected any sort of response, let alone a completely coherent one) and glared. He shoved Sherlock's head lightly, eliciting an indignant grumble and half-hearted swat at his hand.

"That ain't fuckin' funny."

"Sorry."

Despite the apology Sherlock's voice was absurdly cheerful, even giggling a bit. Clearly still out of it. Eric was a bit baffled, regardless - the idiot shouldn't have been anywhere *near* sober enough to carry on a coherent conversation, inappropriate giggling or no. Not with how much he'd inhaled. Had he just been...? No, no Sherlock wouldn't be able to fake being stoned that well. Not enough to fool Eric, at least, who was intimately familiar with the effects. He must be... but, no, christ. That was crazy.

"You're seriously soberin' up already?" he asked, incredulous. It had only been twenty bleeding minutes - there was *no way* someone with no tolerance could process that much THC in less than a half-hour. Being a supergenius couldn't change basic human biology.

"Oh *god*, no. Not at all," Sherlock half-mumbled, half-moaned. He'd gone back to burying his head under his arms, making his words slightly difficult to decipher. "I just put my speech centres on autopilot - stopped trying to assemble conscious responses. I don't actually know what we're talking about."

"You..." Eric trailed off, making an extremely confused, dubious face. "How can you *not know* what we're talking about, *while* we're talking about it?"

For some reason Sherlock started laughing. "I have no idea!"

Eric smiled, still incredulous. Not sceptical, though... no, he actually had no trouble whatsoever believing Sherlock could pull a trick like that. Talking like he was perfectly clear-headed yet having no idea what he was saying. And without the slightest clue as to how it worked, either, because of course he wouldn't.

More and more Eric was beginning to suspect his friend's brain might as well be functionally magic. Sometimes uncontrollable, frightening, *destructive* magic, yeah... but by all rights a thing of extraordinary power. Made one wonder just what Sherlock might have been capable of, had he ended up on a different path. Given the chance to actually be someone instead of beaten down at every turn.

After a long minute of listening to Sherlock try and fail to stop himself giggling over absolutely nothing, Eric smirked and reached down to ruffle his hair.

"Yeah, mate... we really gotta teach you how t'properly smoke a joint."

**««**

## Chapter 9: Cat

**««**

"If ya feed it it'll just keep comin' back."

Eric frowned out the back door at Sherlock, crouched down near the edge of the garden trying to coax something out from under a bush. It was, Eric was fairly certain, the same mangy cat that'd been skulking around the place since Christmas. Not being particularly fond of animals (cats especially) Eric had been rather meticulous of late in making sure no scraps of meat or any other edibles got left out where the strays could get them. One just didn't go around inviting disease-ridden animals anywhere near their living space, simple matter of common sense.

And then here, of course, was Sherlock. Feeding a damned alley cat in the back garden.

"It also won't die," Sherlock intoned blandly, not bothering to look up from what he was doing. Eric huffed an annoyed sigh and reluctantly strolled out from the warm(ish) kitchen into the frigid air of early morning.

Sure enough, there was a ragged-looking brown tabby curled up under the bush, hackles raised and tail all puffed out. Eric regarded it with an unimpressed stare. Sherlock had made a little pile of torn-up lunchmeat near the edge of the shrubbery and had apparently decided to just sit and wait until the thing came out to eat.

"It's probly got rabies or some shit, y'know that," Eric pointed out in a supremely unenthusiastic deadpan. Sherlock waved him off over his shoulder.

"Rabies is only transmissible when the animal is symptomatic," he rebuked with a slight huff. "And anyway it's easy enough to treat with appropriate prophylaxis, no danger of systemic infection."

Eric didn't know what half those words meant, which was generally par for the course when speaking to Sherlock, granted, but still a bit irritating. Especially when a cat was hissing at them.

"Well leave it the hell alone so it can eat or whatever, then. Y'don't gotta sit there an' watch it," he grumbled, adjusting his cast in its sling before shoving his right hand as deep into his jeans pocket as he could manage. Bloody freezing out here, christ.

"It was limping, I want to know why," Sherlock objected. He very deliberately didn't budge from his spot crouched down in front of the cat. Eric rolled his eyes.

"It's a street cat, some kids probly kicked it about or somethin'. Why does it matter?"

Instead of answering, Sherlock just frowned. In front of them the cat had stopped hissing and now had them fixed in a frozen glare, hackles still raised. Eric eyed it warily. If it lunged at them he was getting the *hell* out of dodge, sod helping Sherlock – prat could deal with a scratched-up face all on his own.

After a moment of silence Sherlock sighed very slightly to himself. He shifted his crouch a bit to rest his chin on his forearms, pillowed atop his knees, and regarded the cat with a pensive gaze. Very nearly sitting on the dew-soaked grass, but of course he didn't seem to notice or care if his jeans got wet.

"Shouldn't really matter at all, I suppose," he muttered. Something seemed a bit off in his tone, but Eric was far too cold and in far too close proximity to a vicious animal to feel much like analysing it. "It's just that it sort of looks like..."

He trailed off with a deep frown and stared at the cat for a few silent, thoughtful seconds. The animal's seafoam-green eyes flashed in the morning light as it opened its mouth to hiss again. Eric unconsciously leant away with a grimace – he'd been taught fairly firmly from early childhood on that one just didn't bloody go around bothering with stray cats. People lost hands that way, fingers all rotted off from infection. It went against every fibre of his being to just stand there without chasing the thing off.

"Looks like a mangy cat with a limp t'me," he ground out somewhat more spitefully than he'd intended. Sherlock glanced up at him with an odd expression – a sort of half-confused, half-forlorn look. Eric just scowled in response. He took step back, his movement making the cat growl, which did not at all improve his disposition towards it. "Look, it ain't even friendly," he pointed out, trying (and mostly failing) not to sound too tetchy. "All it wants to do is bite the shit outta us. There's no point bein' nice to it."

"It's just scared," Sherlock rebuffed in a rather petulant tone as he turned his attention back to the stray. "Trying to look intimidating so we'll back off – it doesn't know we're not going to hurt it."

"I might," Eric mumbled crossly. Sherlock shot him a sharp glare, something very nearly verging on dangerous in his eyes, and Eric backed off with an apologetic hunch of his shoulders. "Not *really*, christ... I just don't like cats, alright? They're mean little bastards."

"Only the frightened or aggressive ones. Well-socialised cats are perfectly companionable," Sherlock countered. Mercifully he'd dropped the flash of anger, though he still didn't look particularly happy. Eric wasn't sure if it was to do with his comment or if Sherlock just didn't like the idea of having to leave the stupid alley cat alone after he'd gone to all the trouble of feeding it.

"Yeah, well, anythin' with knives on its feet an' a mouth fulla bleedin' fangs can stay the hell away from me, companionable or not."

Sherlock didn't deign to respond to that. Finally, after several more seconds' staring, he straightened up from his crouch. As soon as he took a step backwards the cat bolted – nothing but a streak of brown fur in a straight shot over the fence, gone in a blink. Sherlock tucked his hands into his hoodie pocket and gazed after it with an unhappy look on his face.

"It'll be back soon enough," Eric assured. His resentful tone wasn't perhaps the most sympathetic, he acknowledged, but then this was one of the very few things he found he honestly couldn't tolerate – luring diseased animals off the streets near to where people lived, practically inviting a bite. Dangerous and irresponsible, even by Sherlock standards.

As was beginning to be a habit when he was upset about something, Sherlock chose to very pointedly ignore Eric as he turned and stalked back to the house. Drama queen. Eric failed to avoid rolling his eyes at the theatrics and followed along behind. Honestly, pissed off over a stupid cat. How ridiculous could you get?

Fully prepared to let Sherlock's little freeze-out run its course (he was fairly sure the prat would just forget he'd been angry in a few hours, anyway, so it wasn't like this would be a permanent thing) Eric shut the kitchen door behind him and made to head back up to the bedroom. Maybe waste time on the internet for awhile or something, he didn't know. Whatever got him far enough from Sherlock to avoid being scowled at for the next however-long.

Sherlock had stopped near his counter full of chemistry things, meanwhile, and as Eric glanced back at him he was unsurprised to find he'd already lit a cigarette.

But, then... ah, hell. Frowning, he paused and stared at Sherlock for a few seconds. The man was looking moodily out the window, watching to make sure the cat returned for its meal. Clearly upset that it'd run off. He was, for whatever unfathomable, irrational Sherlock-reason, legitimately concerned about the wellbeing of a mangy half-dead stray.

After a minute or so Eric sighed. He rubbed his good hand through his hair, then let it flop down again, defeated. The nonsense he was willing to put up with, bloody hell.

"We'll go an' find some proper cat food later, alright? Don't keep feedin' it the damn sandwich meat."

Sherlock startled slightly and glanced over, apparently not having realised Eric hadn't yet left the room. He blinked, confused, then opened his mouth to ask a question. Something outside seemed to catch his attention first, however, and his gaze quickly darted back to the window.

"Ah, it came back," he exclaimed, sounding honestly delighted by that. Eric, now more or less resigned to his fate in enabling all this, moved to stand next to the sink and followed Sherlock's line of sight out the window. There was the cat, alright – inhaling the little pile of shredded ham like it hadn't seen a meal in days. Damn thing'd never leave now.

"It's *not* comin' in the house," was all Eric could think to say, unhappy scowl firmly in place. Beside him Sherlock wasn't paying any heed whatsoever – he was far too busy watching the animal eat. A faint, probably unintentional smile had crept onto his face. Eric glanced over to him, bit back a sigh for the injustice of it all, then settled his gaze back toward the scrap of fur and claws lurking in the garden.

Of all the stray animals Sherlock could've taken an inexplicable liking to, it just *had* to be a bloody cat.

**««**

## Chapter 10: Trauma

**««**

Sherlock dissociated with alarming frequency.

Of course he'd never admit that's what was happening. Or, perhaps more likely, didn't know. Eric did, though, because Mum had lived her entire life on the razor's edge between lucidity and madness and he'd learnt to break her out of staring spells by the age of four.

He wasn't sure quite how to feel about having to do the same for a romantic partner. On the one hand it was lucky he had the skillset, else Sherlock would've been dead ten times over by now with how often he'd space out in the middle of the road or whilst handling some dangerous chemical. On the other hand, it was hard not to get nervous over needing to mind someone similarly to how he'd done for Mum. Scared of what might happen if he fucked it up again.

Eric sat in a pub booth now across from Sherlock as they waited for their housemates to finish up after a show. Sherlock was sat sideways on the seat with his back pressed up as far as possible against the wall and was making a tremendous effort to pretend it was for some reason other than trying to avoid being spotted and recognised as the guitarist by folks who liked their music. Not an unrealistic concern, to be fair - their little trash pub band may not have earned itself a name yet, but Charley's compositions were catchy and unique enough to have developed a small local following. So, while the crowd tended to be made up primarily of folks attending for drugs-related reasons, there were always at least a few genuine fans of underground punk rock milling about. And many of them were admittedly very interested in chatting with Sherlock, as his symphony experience leant his guitar an unusual sense of precision which meshed remarkably well with Ami's more chaotic bass.

Eric had always found chatting music theory with random strangers to be the least stressful bit of this whole pub band experience - dreaded being up on stage with the vast sea of eyes watching him, but mingling with fans afterwards was usually a bit of fun. Sherlock, of course, felt exactly the opposite. Performing to a raucous crowd in an unfamiliar genre on an instrument he'd picked up less than a fortnight ago somehow didn't bother him in the least; a couple friendly punk scene blokes asking him about chord progressions may as well have been literal torture. Yet another instance of an amusing pattern Eric had started to notice where Sherlock turned out to be confident in all the areas Eric wasn't, and vice-versa. Perhaps if they could somehow merge they might form a single functioning adult.

Had this been a typical show night Sherlock would've retreated to the back room ages ago and likely fell asleep on the sofa until it was time to go, as had become his habit. (Eric had no quarrel with this - much more convenient knowing exactly where the prat would be, with the added benefit of keeping him well away from Racer.) Tonight, though, Corey had claimed the space for a private meeting, so Sherlock was stuck out here with the commoners. And Eric was, for the moment, stuck sitting here with him, because he could tell the prat was coming perilously close to exceeding his stress limit and wanted to be nearby to snap him out of the dissociated trance he'd fall into when that happened.

"We should come up with a disguise or sommat, steer folks off tryna chat with ya," Eric mused, idly working his jaw to flip the end of the joint between his lips up and down. He'd have offered a puff to Sherlock, of course, but every time they'd got stoned together the silly bastard had worked himself into a panic attack over the flow of time having broken, whatever that meant, so he wasn't allowed to have weed anymore.

"There's no good way to disguise an emaciated giraffe," Sherlock grumbled back. His hands were folded between his knees in that odd prayer-like gesture he adopted sometimes, gaze directed past the end of the booth as if scanning for threats in the dwindling crowd.

Eric snickered, then quickly collected himself to deliver his rebuttal in a comically serious tone. "C'mon now, a giraffe? Wit' hair like that? Yer clearly more of a starved llama."

That elicited an amused snort, which sounded enough like an actual llama to set them both giggling. One of the things Eric liked best about Sherlock was his willingness to laugh together over incredibly stupid jokes.

"I'm fine on my own if you'd rather hang about with Ben. You don't have to sit here with me," Sherlock eventually offered, once they'd quieted down. His attention seemed to have been caught by something off across the room, and his voice came out a bit distracted as he watched whatever it was.

Eric shrugged. "Eh, nah. He's been after some girl all night, I'm no help for that. No harm bein' antisocial with you for a bit."

That was a lie, but only partly. Ben had indeed been after a girl most of the night but had got himself rejected nearly an hour ago. In truth Eric had only come over here because Sherlock hadn't yet taken to trailing around after him like an aloof second shadow, which had seemed to imply he'd already got overwhelmed enough to go hide somewhere.

"Victor used to drag me out to clubs all the time and I'd just put on the extrovert act and be fine. I don't know why it's so difficult now," Sherlock muttered glumly. Eric flicked a bit of ash from his joint and frowned over at him - wasn't like him to get so down about stuff like that, was he starting to check out?

Quickest way to tell was to tease him a bit - if he got angry or annoyed instead of flustered he was either crashing or about to dissociate. Or both. Probably usually both, actually.

"Bah, ain't no need for social skills with an arse that cute."

Didn't get flustered. Nor angry or annoyed, either. In fact he'd not seemed to register Eric's words at all. He was still looking out into the pub, but his gaze had shifted into a fixed, unfocused stare. Eric's stomach flipped unpleasantly - the too-still posture and vacant expression Sherlock got during these absent spells always brought to mind that sick sense of dread he'd felt as a kid when Mum would do something similar. Never sure if it meant she'd gone off her meds, if they'd stopped working again, if she'd still be herself when she came back.

Following Sherlock's gaze was a good excuse to look away from his face, avoid the terrible emptiness there, but Eric almost immediately regretted doing so. Near the brick wall directly across the room from them Racer was stood smoking a cigarette. A dark smirk played on the man's lips as he eyed them with predatory interest. Eric replied with a hateful glare, but dropped it quickly in favour of swinging himself round to the other side of the table so as to block Sherlock's line of sight with his body. Should've sat there from the beginning, probably, but he'd not thought to as he'd assumed Racer would be at Corey's meeting.

Experimentally Eric reached out and jostled Sherlock's leg a bit, checking if he'd actually dissociated or just got caught up thinking about something - it could be hard to tell. No reaction. Checked out, then.

Eric had seen this happen quite some few times by now, starting from that first night just before they'd got jumped. Benny mentioning Racer had put Sherlock into some sort of dead-eyed trance as they walked, not seeming to register anything Eric said. After a few minutes of awkward, then vaguely concerning silence he'd brought the both of them to a stop and forced Sherlock round to face him. That had driven a bit of the vacantness out at least, got him to briefly glance up, though he'd still not seemed all there. Eric had instinctively gone with a tactic he'd used often on Mum and ordered the idiot to look at him. That had done the trick.

It had been tempting, once the spark of consciousness returned, to demand Sherlock explain what the  *fuck*  that had been - try to quell the coiling worry of whether this new bloke was just like Mum. But as he'd studied Sherlock's confused (and vaguely annoyed) face he'd realised the poor bastard didn't actually seem to be aware anything had happened. Not worth the argument to try to convince him right then, if that were the case, and besides which they'd both still been quite drunk. Snogging seemed a better option.

Over the course of the next few days Eric had witnessed a half-dozen or so more of the vacant spells, of varying length and with varying degrees of automatic behaviour. He also determined that, for the most part, Sherlock had no awareness of them whatsoever. Eric had worried that might mean he'd get offended when Eric finally figured out how to broach the subject, ask if he knew how often he spaced out, but he'd done nothing of the sort. Instead he'd got all anxious and bloody  *apologised* . Like he'd thought Eric would be cross with him. Plainly then he'd had this issue for some time and been scolded harshly for it in the past. Yet another clue as to how fucked up his home life had been.

Thankfully the tactic Eric had used that first night turned out to be an extremely reliable method of breaking Sherlock out of trances. With repetition it turned into a bit of a silly little ritual: say his name to get his attention, make some sort of skin contact, gentle order to look at Eric. Probably didn't matter where he looked, to be honest, but it was nice to feel like the sight of one's face was helpful.

Turning his back on Racer, Eric grabbed light hold of Sherlock's nearest wrist with his good hand.

"Sherlock," he said, enunciating as clearly as possible, aiming for that particular firm yet calm tone. "Look at me."

As with every other time, the trance broke immediately. Sherlock's eyes snapped back into focus and he blinked, frowned, then shifted his gaze to Eric.

"Weren't you on the other side of the table?" he asked, suddenly confused. Yep. Zero awareness.

Despite the dour circumstances Eric quirked an exasperated smile.

"Yeah, mate. Turns out I could teleport this whole time."

Sherlock frowned for the sarcasm but seemed to deem it not worth acknowledging. Instead he huffed a frustrated sigh and drew his knees up to bury his face against them.

"Fuck's sake, why does this keep happening?" he mumbled into the little ball he'd created. Eric took the opportunity to glance over his shoulder - Benny had moved in, engaged Racer in conversation, seemed to have convinced him to go off somewhere. As he drew the vile man away Eric's friend glanced back at him with a little wink and a smile. Eric smiled back. Good ol' Benny.

Back to the more pressing matter, though. Eric had a fairly good guess as to why this kept happening, especially why it kept happening whenever Racer turned up, but telling Sherlock his problems were the result of failing to process trauma seemed unlikely to help. Bit hypocritical, too.

"I dunno, mate," Eric answered instead. Sherlock was on the wrong side of him to be able to hug, on account of the cast, so he did the next best thing and just scooted close enough to share body heat. "Could be worse, I guess? Least you snap out of it easy enough."

"Only if you're around to do it. Eventually it's going to happen while you're off somewhere and I'll be stuck staring like a fucking idiot and get murdered or something. Miracle I've not been already, considering there's no bloody way to predict it."

Eric gave an amused snort, causing Sherlock to lift his head and shoot him a perplexed glare through his fringe. This just made Eric laugh properly instead, both because Sherlock now looked like a sulking toddler and because he couldn't believe the idiot seriously hadn't noticed how Eric always managed to be around for these spells.

"Sherly, why th' fuck do you think I came over here to sit with you instead of stickin' with Benny?"

"Because he was… after some girl?" Sherlock hedged, his glare dropping into a look of vaguely annoyed confusion. Eric just laughed again.

"Jesus christ, you daft ponce."

Finally Sherlock seemed to catch on. "Wait… can you tell when I'm about to freeze up?"

"Nah, mate, I just conveniently happen t'be right next t'you every single time."

Eric's bland sarcasm earned him a childish pout, made even funnier by Sherlock still being sat curled up in a sad little ball, and then funnier still when his response to Eric snickering was to go to all the bother of extricating an arm just to swat at his shoulder like a petulant cat.

"Stop laughing! Tell me how you know when it's going to happen!"

"I just can! It ain't somethin' explainable!"

Sherlock huffed, but had thankfully by this point learnt that sort of answer meant there'd be no use trying to argue. Instead he rested his chin on his knees with a thoughtful sort of frown.

"Could you… say something ahead of time, maybe? When you notice? There might be a pattern I can spot."

Eric was still smiling from his laughing fit, but it drifted a bit towards melancholy. Well, there was definitely a pattern, but likely not one he'd be able to spot. Not until his defences lowered enough to let him see how badly he'd been hurt, at any rate. Still, though, no harm letting him try.

"Sure. I'll warn ya."

That earned him a smile - one of those rare, genuine ones that smoothed over all the cracks and hard edges and let Eric pretend for an instant they were just regular blokes having a laugh.

In a fit of silly fantasy he allowed himself to imagine them being like that for real, someday. Far in the future, perhaps, having somehow skipped the bitter end to all this. How might they both look, fully grown into their awkward height? Would they have proper jobs? Families? Bills to pay and businesses to manage? Would Sherlock ever take full stock of the horrors he'd buried? Could Eric face the part of him still stood frozen over lifeless bodies, screaming?

He shook his head to clear it and huffed a rueful laugh. Fuck's sake, how absurd. Burnouts like them living actual lives.

Sherlock shot him a curious look but didn't bother asking what was funny. Instead he shifted around until he'd got himself sat in a more proper direction, then flopped sideways to rest his head on Eric's shoulder. Eric turned and pressed a kiss to tangled curls.

Nah, they'd never be adults. Growing up was something real people did, not walking collections of trauma.

**««**