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Who: Sherlock and John
What: Dealing with the mirrorverse fallout
Where: Sherlock's cabin
When: BACKDATED to just after the breach

Sherlock was in his chair, with the violin. The noises he was drawing from it, could possibly, in some avant garde circles, be called music. Most people however, would agree it was just hideous screeching. The kind that penetrates through walls and irritates with its off-key, off-beat repetitions.

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John wanted a return to normalcy as quickly as possible, but it was a little difficult considering how much tidying up he had to do when the flood had finally ended. There were the purloined pills, the general mess of the infirmary, and a few debaucles with patients that he had to deal with first before he could even head back to his cabin.

He needed to talk to Sherlock. It had been...it had been bad. It had been really, really bad, and the awful noises (sounded a bit like a cat being swung around by its tail, actually) proved that Sherlock knew it too. John had automatically started for the kitchen, but stopped short once he had reached his usual chair - the one that faced Sherlock's - and winced at the screech of the violin.

Sherlock ignored him. Pretended to ignore him. Same thing. Similar. He drew his bow back viciously and snap went one of the strings. He hissed in irritation. Considered continuing, but, there were limits.

He placed the violin carefully on the carpet, no reason to take it out on the instrument. And it was far less replaceable than the wall.

He avoided John's eyes and flicked the bow from side to side, fast enough that it made a whipping sound as it parted the air.

John stayed where he was, both listening intently to Sherlock to gauge his mood and looking for a reason to scoot away.

He cleared his throat and dropped into his chair. His decision was made. He was going to attempt conversation, even if Sherlock didn't want it.

"I sorted everything with the infirmary."

Damn, He was going to do that, John thing and attempt to talk it out.

Sherlock whipped the bow to point at John and met his eyes. Fascinating," he said, entirely dead-pan.

He had a momentary flash of sympathy, this couldn't be easy for John either. But then, he was the one who wanted who talk about it, not Sherlock. The sympathy was hastily smothered and put out.

Not even a flinch. John stayed as he was, staring straight at Sherlock.

"These memories won't go away, you know." He'd checked actually. John had asked around, but apparently just because the personalities went away didn't mean that everything else just disappeared too.

He leaned forward, scratching the back of his head and frowning a little. Yes, this was awkward. More than that, actually, because this was Sherlock. "What we did..." He cleared his throat. "It's not going to just go away, no matter how much we want it to."

He sighs. "I didn't expect them to." No, that would be too easy.

"Who says I want them to go away?" And, pre-empting John's disbelief. "The actions of our counterparts have as little bearing on our lives, as my inmate's did on hers." That was delivered with admirable steadiness, considering he didn't believe a word of it.

Too late, Sherlock. John's face still managed at least a look of disbelief, even if he hadn't been able to interject.

"You really think so?" He raised a brow, then flumped back against the chair, running a hand over his chin. He hesitated once or twice before he spoke again, but when he did his voice was soft and steady. "Have you ever killed anything in your life, Sherlock?

Sherlock glared at John, tight-lipped. After a long moment, he replied. "Things? Yes. People, no." A pause. "Until recently, of course."

His gaze slid sideways, towards his desk drawers, towards that file, but he didn't say anything else.

There was this ill feeling in the pit of his stomach, and he tried not to let it show on his face. (He wasn't exactly sure why he tried to hide it; it was Sherlock, after all.)

"Sometimes you can justify it. Sometimes you tell yourself that you weren't in your right mind, and so you're not actually responsible," he murmured, staring at his hands. "But it's something that stays with you, whether you like it or not. Whether the person you killed comes back from it or not."

He tried to swallow down the lump in his throat. "They were horrible people, Sherlock."

"Horrible? How subjective of you. Criminals, certainly."

And of course, if this had just been another case, that would have been it. Moral judgements were outside of his purview, and emotional responses even more so.

But they weren't talking about strangers. They were talking about themselves. Sherlock could still remember the rush as he drugged Eddie's drink, the thrill of watching him drown, the satisfaction of clipping the lock of hair from his head.

His stomach roiled suddenly, and he pressed his lips together, throat closing as he swallowed.

"Horrible," John repeated, his stare becoming serious. He wasn't going to let Sherlock just brush it all aside.

"Even if that person I had been hadn't....helped in the ways that he did, he would have been a horrible, miserable human being." God, the things he remembered himself saying. The things that he had done. It was all so sickening.

John lowered his head and brought his hands up to comb through his own hair. "Christ. I could have been like that. It would have been so easy."

So easy. Yes, that was it exactly. So easy to see the choices that would have led him there. The obsession that turned into something altogether more sinister. The vastness of his intellect, set on a different path.

So easy. And yet. "We aren't those men," Sherlock said softly, half to himself and half to John. "We didn't make those choices."

That was the truth of the matter - they weren't those men. The choices their other selves had made weren't their choices. He still missed the war, but he didn't miss the violence. He wasn't bitter, and he hadn't lost all sense of purpose.

Though the other version of himself had believed Sherlock was brilliant - which he was, of course - but he supposed that was his lot in life. All John Watsons, no matter what time they lived in or what universe they came from, had to find Sherlock Holmes brilliant and amazing.

His gaze was still on the floor, but he finally managed a nod. He sat up a little, risking a glance in Sherlock's direction.

"Do you think you would have caught you? Hypothetically speaking and all."

He was surprised into a laugh. Now there was a question, outwitting himself.

"The fundamental element of the chase, is imagining myself in my target's shoes. Provided I didn't know I was after myself, yes, I would have succeeded. The moment I started to out-think myself..." He glanced over at John. "Double bluff, triple bluff... the game could have easily gotten absurd." Look at Moriarty, the mess they'd made of things there.

The amusement his laugh had lent his expression gradually faded away.

The laugh was encouraging enough to earn a soft smile from John. He sat up and stretched his arms out, listening to Sherlock theorise about going up against himself.

"True," he said with a shrug. He'd notice that Sherlock had gone serious again. "But you have to consider the wild card in a situation like that."

"Oh?" Sherlock knew where John was going with this, but he was willing to let him elaborate, appreciating the attempt to keep the conversation light.

"And which wild card might that be?"

John smiled again. He liked when Sherlock humoured him - it made him feel slightly less like an idiot.

"Me, of course." He gave a little nonchalant shrug. "I mean, of course you'll try to out-think yourself, but with all the bluffing and double-bluffing and triple bluffing you're going to forget that I've followed you to the crime scene, and then I'll go and do something stupid and ruin the whole setup."

He gestured vaguely to himself. "Wild card. Unpredictable in my idiocy."

Sherlock frowns. "Perhaps. Perhaps you'll cut through our bluffs and see to the heart of the matter." He holds John's gaze for a moment, then abruptly stands. "Not likely of course, but miracles do happen." He makes no attempt to hide his smirk, and heads into the kitchen.

"Tea?"

"Stranger things have happened," John replied, smiling in a self-deprecating sort of way. He'd deemed the change of topic a complete success.

"Tea?" He glanced over his shoulder, following Sherlock into the kitchen with his gaze. "You're making tea? Absolutely."

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