Devil John

Devil John

Chapter 5 - Tea

Fandom:Sherlock

Rating: Explicit

Excerpt:

The Black Dragon's Blood is long gone. It had given him confidence last time, burning through his veins. Without it, his anger is buried deep, even so, he can feel it simmering like a coal covered in a bed of ash waiting to catch fire again.

“So,”John says, looking back at the newspaper again. “Has it really been over a year?”

“Almost two.”

“I see.”

“But time passes differently in Hell, you said.”

“Yes.”

“Was it much shorter?”

“Hard to say. It's hard to tell the hours apart when things are always the same.”

“It would be interesting to make a calculation of the differences. That is, people have speculated about the afterlife for quite a long time, and this is a unique opportunity to write something definitive on the subject. If you could simply describe what it is like there. I mean, I've read books. There are tales of a tunnel, some sort of light, but no one ever sees what's on the other side of the ...”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

“Is it that you are forbidden from speaking of it? You might let me guess. Then you only need nod. Is it anything like Dante's inferno? Or is it possibly that you...”

“I said that I don't want to talk about it!”

Sherlock stops talking. That more than anything drives John to turn and face him. Sherlock seems much healthier than before. He's underweight, as always, but despite his leg, he seems in good vigor. His blue eyes sparkle in the light from the window, and there is nothing about them that suggests that he isn't sleeping.

“You came back to me,” Sherlock says with eyes soft with feeling.

“Did you doubt I would?”

“No.”

“Liar. If you didn't doubt it, you wouldn't have mentioned in the first place.”

John walks over to his chair. It has been recently dusted and the union jack pillow neatly placed in the center. He thinks of sitting in it, but that would be too normal, so he walks around the chair instead placing his hands on the back to steady himself as he looks down at Sherlock.

Sherlock stares at him in wonder. John looks at his amazed face and then down at his own hands. He is uncertain what to do next. This isn't a completely uncommon state of affairs. Sherlock often unsettles him. When he had been alive, he had felt so confused at times, knowing that he wanted to say something, but not quite knowing what it was. But this is embarrassing. Demons aren't supposed to feel awkward, not in any vision of the afterlife that he's heard of. He rocks back and forth on his heels glancing up at Sherlock who is staring at him as if he believes that tearing his eyes away would make John disappear.

John starts to talk, then stops. Last visit he said some things that he was ashamed of. He wants to apologize to Sherlock for calling him names and for hurting him, but he's fairly certain that apologizing is also something that demons don't do. He had thought that death would change things, but he was pants at this sort of thing when he was alive, and it seems that he's going to be a pants demon as well?

Continued on AO3