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The air in the Tube feels too close, too warm. John is hyper-aware of the smells and sounds of all the Alphas surrounding him, the bitter or jealous glances of the Omegas tucked into the corners of the subway car.
Shit, he thinks. Not now, not yet. At least let me get home first. But the clammy crawling sensation across his skin, the cramps low in his abdomen, they all point to one thing. His heat's coming early, and he's still twenty minutes from home.
John feels trapped, as though the tunnel could come crashing down on him at any moment. He flexes his fingers, making a fist over and over in an unconscious stress-release gesture, and keeps his face neutral and impassive, staring out the window into the vague darkness beyond.
A couple of greasy-looking Alphas catch his eye in the reflection of the car window, and he drops his eyes to the ground. He feels one of them looming behind him, breath too hot and too close on his neck. Probably looking for a proprietary bite mark. John kicks himself mentally. Why hadn't he let Sherlock claim him? It would have been easier than turning these idiots down. Damn his stubborn pride.
Doing his best to keep his body language treading that fine line between non-threatening and stay the fuck away, John squares his shoulders and continues ignoring the two Alphas. He can feel his traitorous, useless body reacting to their pheromones, a warm hum deep in his belly, and he fights back a shudder.
"Don't you smell good, little Omega?" The taller one murmurs, dipping his head close to John's neck. John stares at him in the window reflection -- He's tall, taller than Sherlock, but skinny in that underfed way, not lean and fit. His dark hair hangs in unkempt hanks nearly to his shoulders, utterly unappealing. He's the type who relies on pheromones and biological urges to mate then, expecting needy Omegas to fall all over him.
The other one -- shorter (but still taller than John), a little thick-set around the middle, and losing a battle with his hairline -- is humming Blondie's One Way Or Another under his breath, and John can't hold back the shudder of clammy nausea that runs through his system at that.
"'E'd be such a nice addition to our collection, dontcha think?" The short one murmurs, and John's skin crawls.
Something's pressing against the small of his back, and John's certain he left his gun at home this morning. A decision he greatly regrets now.
"I'd really rather not do this, lads." His voice is a garrote wire; thin and soft, but with a clear edge of malice. All it would take to snap it is a bit more tension. Unfortunately, they're either too addled by their urges, or too stupid (or possibly both) to take the hint. Skinny wraps his fingers around John's bad shoulder, and John bites the inside of his cheek.
After an interminable wait, the hiss of the doors opening is a welcome reprieve. John doesn't even bother checking which station he gets out at. The walk up above ground, no matter how long it takes, is better than being trapped in that cage. A quick glance over his shoulder confirms that the pair has followed him. He's not surprised. Disappointed, yes, but not surprised.
He runs up the steps, vaguely noting that he's made it as far as Edgeware Road, so the trip the rest of the way home won't be too bad after all. There's a bit of an alley just off to the left and he ducks into it. The aching, crampy feeling in his abdomen has intensified and he knows they'll be able to follow his scent into the alley. He takes a few deep breaths to steady himself and leans casually against the filthy brick of the wall.
It's not long before they skulk into view, highlighted by the setting sun. It gives them an incongruously warm, golden glow, nearly angelic. Something predators like that should have no right to. John finds himself unreasonably incensed by something so coincidental and immaterial, and flexes his fingers.
"Look at the pretty one, waiting for us like a good little slut."
John looks up at them, locks eyes with the shorter one, and smirks slowly.
"I'm not going to let you do this to anyone else." His voice is still impressively neutral, not betraying an ounce of the fury simmering under his skin.
The taller one steps towards him and John steadies himself, but the thug manages a surprisingly successful feint to John's right, catching him off-guard. There's a sickening thud, a shock of white behind John's eyes, before he's aware that Baldy's smashed a brick into his ribcage.
Fuming, John spins and lands a solid punch against Baldy's abdomen, up into his diaphragm, knocking the wind right out of him. He drops to the ground just as Skinny manages to trip John up.
The fight, for a moment, is scrabbling and uncoordinated, and far beneath John, but he's still aching from the brick to the ribs, and his hormones are rushing to his head, befuddling him and clouding his perception of his surroundings. He thinks to himself, not for the first time today, that his body is a traitor to his mind.
At one point, Baldy manages to slip a hand into the front of John's trousers as they scramble for dominance. Even flaccid, there's no denying the size and heft of John's decidedly Alpha penis, and he scrambles backwards, pulling his hand away as though he'd been burnt.
"What... what the fook is that? You bloody freak. What the hell's wrong with you?"
The blood in John's veins, nearly boiling with rage at this point, freezes almost immediately and affords him such clarity of thought and movement that it feels as though time has slowed down.
"There is nothing wrong with me." John breathes deeply, wincing at the sting across his ribs. He's fairly certain they're not broken, but they're going to look awful in the morning. His shirt clings damply to him, and he knows he's bleeding. "I'm not the one ganging up on vulnerable Omegas."
A trance-like calm settles over John, the righteous fury and the knowledge that he's doing what needs to be done -- if not for himself than for anyone else they might have assaulted. It is a painfully sharp contrast to the confused, defensive scrabbling of the two thugs, who seem to feel personally wronged by John's body. Serves them right. The rest of the fight passes in a chain of sharp visceral images: blood splattering against the wall, the wet crunch of knuckles against soft cartilage, and finally the soft thud of two limp bodies falling against each other.
John wipes his hand across the back of his mouth and realises his nose is bleeding slightly. He doesn't even recall being hit in the face. He makes a feeble attempt at cleaning himself off with his ruined shirt, but gives it up as a lost cause and decides to stick to the quieter roads on the way home.
He pulls his phone out of his pocket. He stands for a moment, debating calling Sherlock, but what would he say. Hello, love. Nearly got raped on the tube, beat up some thugs, be home in ten minutes?. No, there's no point. Sherlock will be able to read it all over his face as soon as he gets home, without a doubt.
Instead, he shoots a quick text to Lestrade. This sort of thing technically isn't his division, but John knows that at least this way it'll be dealt with quickly and quietly. He could easily claim self-defence, but it's still an ordeal he doesn't feel like handling right now.
To: DI G Lestrade
From: JW
Couple of former sexual predators in alley next to Edgware Road station. Please send someone to collect.
He pockets his phone and wipes his hands on the thighs of his jeans, smearing blood and grit everywhere.
The trip home is not quite as awful as John had anticipated. He gets a few stares, ranging from concerned to horrified, but he ignores them all. He is still fuming internally, furious at the two thugs for starting this bullshit, at himself for not being more aware of his oncoming heat, and mostly at the world in general for allowing this sort of mentality to thrive. There is a buzz deep within John's body. It's as though there is a cord, an elastic, that has been pulled to its maximum and is vibrating like an angry wasp.
All he wants to do is get home and shower. Get the blood off his ribs and face, the dirt out of his hair, and most importantly, the sick, slimy feeling of violation off his body. More than the pain in his torso, more than the sting of his nose, the sensation of that arsehole touching him in such an intimate way clings to John's body like a slimy rag.
As John turns the corner onto Baker Street, the shining black door of 221 gleams like a beacon. Whatever was holding him together crumples, and he is suddenly, painfully, alarmingly aware of how battered his body actually is. Aside from the ribs and nose, his knuckles have split open and started to swell, and his right ankle throbs every time he puts weight on it.
The seventeen steps up to the flat loom huge and interminable, as if suddenly there are seventeen stories instead. John sighs and wraps his hand around his throbbing ribs. His footfalls are slow and heavy, and the uncharacteristic noise must pique Sherlock's interest, because John's only gone three steps when that familiar head of curly hair peers out through the kitchen door.
Sherlock's expression is a mix of curiosity, concern, and shock that John would have found hilarious at any other time. Right now though, he just can't.
"Leave it, Sherlock. Just don't ask."
The crease between Sherlock's brows deepens and he opens his mouth to argue, but John holds his free hand up and for once, Sherlock listens. He reaches out awkwardly, as though offering John a hug. The gesture is so very un-Sherlock that John snorts out a chuckle despite himself, and then groans.
"Not now. Just don't touch me, alright? Please?" John hates himself for sounding so pleading and whiny.
"You..." Sherlock inhales deeply, and his body language shifts dramatically. Predatory, hungry. John sighs.
"Yeah, heat's coming on early. It's still a bit irregular, side-effect of being on the suppressants for so long."
John gets to the landing at the top of the stairs and leans against the wall. He's likely smearing blood all over the wallpaper, but that can wait. It certainly wouldn't be the first time.
"Can you move out of the doorway, please?" He looks imploringly at Sherlock, who is still hovering around, looking for all the world like a lost soul. His eyes are wide and his hair is in disarray, and it looks as though he's torn between fussing over John and fucking him into the floor. Christ, John's not even fully in heat yet and he's already screwing with the one stable constant in his life.
"Please, Sherlock. I just need to go shower."
"Tell me."
John sighs again and pinches the bridge of his nose, wincing in pain as he does. He tastes the sharp tang of fresh blood in the back of his throat and tips his head forward slightly.
"I'd rather not right now."
"Who did this to you?"
"Drop it, Sherlock."
But Sherlock is nothing if not stubborn. John looks up at him, pale eyes cold and glittering, jaw set. Sherlock is determined.
"Someone... no, two someones. You're far too skilled and strong to have suffered this level of injury from a single assailant, particularly an unskilled street thug. You were attacked by a pair of ruffians."
Leave it to Sherlock to use the word ruffians. His deductions are so familiar, so comforting, that for a moment John forgets everything else. But only for a moment, until their faces swim back to the forefront of his mind. He cringes, and groans as the motion pulls at his ribs yet again.
Despite himself, John motions for Sherlock to continue.
"Hungry Alphas. If I smell you this strongly now, you were likely already emitting the pheromones on the tube. They underestimated you. Small, quiet, unassuming. Thought you'd be an easy mark."
John nods. "Figured I'd teach them a lesson. And then one shoved his hand down my pants."
The look on Sherlock's face breaks John's heart all over again. Possessive jealousy, which John expected, and bleak disappointment, which is a surprise. Surely he's not going to blame John for this? No... John studies the tension around Sherlock's eyes, the sharp set of his lips. Sherlock is blaming himself for this, somehow.
"Isn't it...." Sherlock looks unsure of himself, which is nearly enough to make John crack a smile. "My duty to protect you? I'm your Alpha."
That was absolutely, positively the wrong thing to say. That fragile thrumming cord inside John snaps. He slams his hand down flat on the small console table in the hall, wincing as one of the clots of congealing blood on his flank splits open all over again. He sucks in a sharp breath through his nose, attempting to calm himself.
"I. Am. My. OWN ALPHA! I was a soldier, for fuck's sake. I don't need your stupid bloody protection." John shouts, and the words feel awful in his mouth, oily and acidic all at once.
Sherlock pulls back as though John had slapped him, but comprehension dawns in his widening eyes, a drop of ink in a bucket of water. He slinks back into the kitchen and John storms up the stairs in impotent rage, his shower all but forgotten.
He debates locking the door to the small room off the landing, but knows it would be a futile gesture. The lock is flimsy and old, and it would take Sherlock less than thirty seconds with his lock picks. He closes the door loudly enough that it should be heard downstairs, but doesn't really expect Sherlock to respect his privacy.
The upstairs bedroom is stale and dusty with disuse, which suits John's mood just fine right now. Slowly, his body protesting his every move, he settles onto the narrow bed, heedless of the blood clotting all over him. At some point someone removed the coverlet -- probably Sherlock, probably for an experiment -- so all he's ruining are some sheets.
John sits on the edge of the mattress and folds his hands in his lap. His knuckles throb with every motion, and, as if to add insult to literal injury, the muscles low in his belly have started to contract rhythmically with a distinct ache of their own. Part of John wants to run back downstairs and throw himself at Sherlock's knees, and the rest of John hates that part. He grits his teeth and fights down his urges.
He stares out the window, watching darkness settle fully over the city, and remembers the way the dusky light framed his assailants. Has it really only been half an hour or so? It feels like John has been sitting here for years. Sighing, he begins the arduous process of peeling off his ruined shirt. It stings a bit when he peels the shredded cotton away from the blood clinging to his ribs, but it's a relief to get out of the clothes nonetheless. John debates having the shirt cleaned and repaired, but no matter how decent-looking he gets it, it will always be tainted. He dumps it on the floor to be thrown out later. Or possibly burnt.
It's not long before Sherlock's familiar, over-eager footfalls echo up the staircase. John hadn't really expected him to stay away, and he can't quite prevent the smile from creeping across his lips.
What he hadn't been expecting was for Sherlock to bring up a bowl of warm water and a pile of clean flannels. He's standing hesitantly in the doorway, holding the bowl and cloths in one hand as his other rests on the knob, and John studies his face in the semi-dark for a moment before reaching over to turn on the bedside lamp. John tries to muffle the pained hiss that escapes his lips, but Sherlock hears it anyway.
"Well come on in then. When have you ever waited for an invitation?"
Sherlock's face goes soft and slack with relief and a strange sense of yearning, and it sends a throb of desire through John. He tightens his fists, the pain in his knuckles keeping him focussed. The bed dips slightly as Sherlock settles down next to John, the bowl of water balanced precariously on his knee.
John knows Sherlock isn't going to apologise for what he said, but it's obvious he understands why John snapped. With more care than afforded to even his most delicate of experiments, Sherlock takes John's right hand in his own and gently begins wiping the grime and dried blood off John's swollen knuckles. John feels all his former ire seeping out, dissipating like the red cloud in the bowl of water every time Sherlock dips the flannel in.
Every touch between them is electric, and John tries to convince himself it's not simply due to the swirl of chemicals between them. Once the back of John's hand is clean, Sherlock turns it over with painstaking delicacy and strokes the flannel down between John's fingers, over his palms.
He cleans John's left hand with as much care as the right and tosses the flannel onto the floor with the remains of John's torn shirt. As Sherlock begins wetting another cloth, John examines his hands. Once the dirt and dried blood have been cleaned away, they're not nearly as mangled-looking. Swollen, certainly, and they'll likely be a lurid shade of purple come morning, but the skin is barely abraded. Most of the blood must not have been John's then. The thought is satisfying.
With an almost terrifying tenderness, Sherlock begins cleaning the fragile skin of John's face. He can feel that one of his cheeks is a bit torn up, and winces every time Sherlock passes over the bridge of his nose, but a quick internal check assures John that nothing is broken. Sherlock wraps one finger with the damp flannel and strokes it over John's eyebrows, along his cheekbones, over his lips. John sighs softly, his skin warming under Sherlock's touch, despite the trauma beneath.
Once his face is clean, Sherlock leans forward and brushes his lips gently against John's. John pulls back slightly, making sure to place one soothing hand on Sherlock's knee.
"It's not you, I promise. Just... give me a moment."
Sherlock, thank god for small mercies, nods and says nothing. He wrings the flannel out and dips it again, and John watches the water in the bowl turn murky.
Eventually, Sherlock reaches the worst of the damage, the patch on John's ribs where the brick hit. John grits his teeth and breathes steadily through his nose as those long, clever fingers palpate and explore, no doubt checking for contusions or fractures. The thought makes John laugh quietly, even as he's wincing.
"Isn't that my job?" John's voice sounds fragile, and Sherlock looks at him, his face inscrutable.
"You've examined me for fractured ribs often enough that I'm confident I know what I'm doing."
"I'm sure you do. Which should probably terrify me. And yet... here I am."
As Sherlock's fingers slide through the furrows between John's ribs, John gasps slightly, and it has nothing to do with pain or discomfort. Sherlock's touches are light and lingering now that they've confirmed nothing is seriously damaged. John moans quietly, blood slowly and steadily flowing south, his cock thickening with each beat of his heart. His internal muscles quiver, eager to be filled, to contract around something thick and unyielding, and John can't quite bite back the moan that escapes his lips.
Bypassing John's filthy jeans entirely, Sherlock drops to his knees in front of the mattress, resting his head tenderly on John's knee while unlacing John's oxfords. John looks down to study him and notices some blood splatter across the toe of the left one. He curses inwardly, determined not to let the day's earlier experiences rob him of everything. He's definitely going to bin his clothes, but those shoes were bloody expensive. He'll clean them later.
Sherlock gets his feet out of his shoes and pulls his socks off. John hisses quietly as Sherlock manipulates his swollen right ankle, rolling it and testing for mobility. Again, it's painful but not serious, and John runs his hands soothingly through Sherlock's hair. How is it that after everything he's been through today, he's the one comforting Sherlock? He shakes his head and smiles down at Sherlock, as if to further reassure him.
"I'll live. Not even sprained, just pulled something. I'll have to stay off it for a few days."
"Good," Sherlock purrs, voice vibrating against John's leg. "I had no plans to let you out of the flat until you’ve stopped smelling so attractive."
John rolls his eyes and bites his lip at the discomfort it causes around the fragile skin around them, but for once Sherlock's ridiculous possessive streak warms his heart instead of irritating him.
Despite the fact that they're essentially clean, Sherlock runs another damp flannel over the tops of John's feet and under his arches, gently cradling one heel at a time in his broad palm. There's a religious allegory to be had here, John's vaguely Christian upbringing reminds him in the back of his mind and he pushes the thought aside awkwardly. Sherlock's pressing firmly on the underside of his left foot with both thumbs, and the pressure sends a throb to the base of John's cock. He feels the last of his anger crumbling away, along with the remaining shreds of his resolve.
"Get up here, Sherlock." He tugs feebly at Sherlock's shoulders, trying to avoid straining his ribs, and leans back against the pillows. Sherlock scrambles up and curls up beside John, surprisingly mindful of his injuries.
It's obvious that as the washing shifted from routine to ritual it had even more of an impact on Sherlock than it has on John. Sherlock's eyes are wide and clear, shining with an intensity even John rarely gets to see. The outline of his cock in his trousers is so distracting John has to look away, tongue running over his lips in absentminded arousal.
Sherlock leans in to try to kiss John yet again, and there's a sharp pang in John's chest as he places one hand against Sherlock's chest.
"Not yet." For a moment Sherlock's face falls, but John reaches out and runs his fingertips along the side of Sherlock's neck. "Let me wash first, yeah? I can't bear to have you touching me while I feel so unclean."
"You're not--"
"Not literally, no. I don't need you to understand, Sherlock. I just need you to humour me."
Sherlock falls back onto the bed with an irritated groan and throws one arm over his eyes. He's squirming against the stained sheets, hips rocking absently against the air.
It was repeated so often it had started to feel like the gospel truth. Omegas are needy, Omegas are desperate, Omegas are just gagging for it. John has prided himself on being able to remain in control of his body for as long as possible, even during his heats. Now seeing Sherlock like this, trembling in desperation, a victim to his own hormones, gives John a perverse sense of satisfaction.
"Come shower with me, then." John stands, not even bothering to try to hide his own arousal, and holds his hand out to Sherlock. "Help me get clean. And then help me get dirty again."
The flush that creeps up Sherlock's throat is a sight to behold, but his expression is even more precious. He looks as though he's been allowed to deduce his Christmas gifts early. He unfolds himself from the bed and takes John's hand in his own, following him down to the shower.