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holmesticeTitle: Internal System Reboot
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gardnerhill
Author:mistyzeo
Verse: Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, Sherlock Holmes/robot!John Watson, Inspector Beth Lestrade
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Anthropomorphism, sex with an android.
Summary: Sherlock Holmes was never meant to be a widower; now a machine wears his late husband's face.
Also on AO3: Internal System Reboot
I was never meant to be a widower. The honey was never supposed to work. They dragged me back from oblivion with a tube down my throat and assigned me an impossible task: to comprehend the future, and to live with what I had done.
The din of this century is bad enough: the chaos of the flying vehicles and the interminable noise of millions of people, so many millions more than when last I saw it. The pavements are packed with pedestrians and buildings stretch to the sky, all glass and steel. Regent's Park, once our strolling-ground, is a pittance of greenery in this bursting, monstrous metropolis. My own Baker Street flat that once I shared with Doctor Watson is tucked away on what is now a side street, a mausoleum to our life.
The machine they have saddled me with is terrifying. A "compudroid," the young Lestrade called it. I do not pretend to understand how it works inside, but it speaks to me with Watson's voice as if it knows me. As if it knows us. Lestrade even put a face on it, as if I could glean comfort from the sight of my dear friend, knowing that it is but a shell that houses a lie. I scorn it. It stays in this house with me as a guardian, an assistant, but it has made me a prisoner. I have to escape from it. I have to get out of here.
I cannot go backwards, but perhaps I can retrace my steps. I don't even know if our old house in Fulworth still stands. It has probably been worn down to rubble by now. We had no one to inherit from us; I hope it has returned to the earth, as I should have done.
Leaving the flat by the window is simplicity itself. I am out in the thick night air in a matter of minutes, and in total silence, too. Old crevasses find my fingers and the toes of my boots, and I reach the ground with ease. I am not as old as I was. Something about the procedure has restored more of my vitality than I had left. I brush the residue of old mortar and older bricks off on my trousers. I should have brought my coat, or even that cumbersome Inverness; the air is cold, despite the throb of the human race all around me.
The flying car is where young Lestrade left it, parked in front of the building. As I approach it I realise I have no idea how to open it, let alone operate it. I touch the door handle, despairing for my own escape, when it lights up at the ends and inside, and the door pops open an inch. I pull my hand away and stare. My fingerprints linger, luminous, on the handle, and then fade away.
I fold myself into the seat and close the door behind me. My breath steams out on my exhale and the glass windows begin to fog. The handholds that I watched Lestrade steer with are chilly under my hands, but they too respond to my touch. A low rumble starts up somewhere inside the body of the vehicle, and the interior light goes out. It is replaced by a luminescent panel of dials and switches that would not be out of place in a mad scientist's laboratory. I don't know where to begin. I always left the driving to Watson and his little Ford. My heart is pounding. I'm useless. Everything I have learned, everything I have ever known, is useless in this place.
Perhaps I can go backwards. As soon as this New Scotland Yard is done with me I will finish the job I started two centuries ago. I should have walked into the sea, not into a vat of honey. I will not be forced to endure a minute longer than necessary of this hellish world—
The door opens and the overhead light comes on, startling me out of my agonised fantasy. The machine with my friend's face peers down at me.
"Going somewhere?" it asks. The sound of its voice—his voice—tears a hole in the middle of my chest.
"Apparently not," I reply.
"Shift over," it says. "I'll drive."
"You don't even know where—" I protest, but I'm already moving. I clamber into the other seat and let the machine take my place in the driver's seat.
"You want to go home," it says, closing the door. Darkness engulfs us, save for the shining panel of controls. "Right?"
"Don't you dare take me to Lestrade."
The machine smiles; the expression is agony to me. It has the same wrinkles he had around his eyes. "Holmes, I would never," it says fondly. "If I were going to turn you in, I'd just take you back inside."
It knows how to maneuver the car; with a gentle pull on the steering column it lifts the car into the air, and we leave Baker Street behind in the dark.
The city of New London stretches on for miles and miles, glittering and buzzing beneath us. It hurts my eyes, so I close them against the glare. How does anyone sleep in such a place? The light from the city is bright enough to be like the dawn, but there are hours yet until sunrise. Now that we are moving, the car has heated up. The glass on the windows has cleared.
"Would you like to listen to music?" the machine with Watson's face asks.
I turn to stare at it. It reaches out toward the console, and music bursts forth all around us, like a gramophone is concealed somewhere. For a minute I think I've wet myself in shock, but it turns out the seat below me is heated from the inside as well. The machine fiddles with dials, changing the music, and settles on a violin concerto that I recognize.
It's such a relief to encounter a single familiar thing that I give due consideration to weeping like a child. Ultimately, I refrain.
Eventually we reach the edge of the city. The lights are fewer and farther between. I couldn't identify a single landmark, certainly not from this angle, but somehow it feels familiar to be moving out into the countryside. Beside me, the machine is quiet, not making any demands on my inner thoughts. The music winds between us, coming from nowhere and everywhere at the same time. I resign myself to not being surprised by any miracles.
There is a solid darkness ahead that grows as we fly on; it is the English Channel, I realise. I've never seen it from such a height. The machine directs the flying car toward the ground, and we skim along just above the paved streets for a few minutes. The night is fading. The machine is looking around as it drives, turning its humanoid head on its metallic shoulders. It isn't wearing anything; it makes no effort to disguise its unreal nature. Its hair is so convincing. I want to reach out and touch it, feel it slide between my fingers, caress the warm scalp between.
I might be sick. I choke the bile down my throat again and cling to my own sleeves, lost in this strange land.
The cab comes easing to a stop and sinks to the ground.
"We're here," the machine says.
This is not my remote little cottage, separated from civilisation by six miles of Downs. This house is three times the size of that, and barely on the edge of the town.
“This?”
“I’m afraid so. The cottage was demolished in 1958 to make room for a larger house, and that one was torn down in 2065.” The machine looks calmly out at the enormous house. “There was an outcry over the more recent destruction from the civic society. The local newspaper has three articles in the archive regarding the protests. Would you like me to read them to you?”
“No,” I say, opening the door, “for God’s sake, no.”
I climb out into the cold pre-dawn and stare at the behemoth where my house used to stand. It’s all glass and concrete, with little blue lights visible inside in the dark. If a child were to peek out the window now, would they wonder at a strange man and a machine staring back? Does anyone wonder at such things anymore?
I’m shivering. The machine comes around the car and drapes my Inverness around my shoulders. Against my will, I tuck my arms into the sleeves and pull it into position.
“You don’t feel cold, do you?”
“I register the temperature,” it says. “I am aware that it is cold, but it does not affect my ability to function.”
“Pity,” I reply, and start away from the car. The way to the sea is muscle memory, and my feet carry me there almost without my input. But the shoreline has changed, and soon a gate stands in my way. The cliff has fallen away, and the path is long gone.
“This way,” the machine says, turning aside. I follow it along the cliff edge for a quarter of a mile, and we come to a long set of wooden stairs. The body I visited here in last would never stand the descent, but this new one makes no protestations.
“How did you know that?” I asked. “Have you been here since—?”
“I have access to the local maps and walking guides,” the machine says. “I am connected to the Internet.”
I don’t know what that means.
The machine turns back to look at me. “It’s all of the information the human race has compiled.”
“In one place?”
“In many places, but accessible from everywhere.”
“What do they need me for, then?” I muse.
“Making connections,” the machine says. “Anticipating human error.”
We reach the shingle and I crunch my way down to the edge of the water, grateful for the familiar slip and slide of the stones beneath my boots. The sun is starting to break free of the surf, making the cliffs glow. The noise of humanity has been superseded by the crash of the waves, blissfully eternal.
I sit, wrapped in the cloak, on the cold, hard ground. The machine is a sentinel beside me. I watch the sunrise, turning the sky pink and then purple, which fades into white. Watson and I used to watch the sunrise together sometimes. He hated to get up early so we compromised by sharing them in the autumn as the days grew shorter, but before the winter really set in. I can almost feel the weight of him against me, his shoulder touching mine. He would grumble about the chill while it was still dark, but as soon as the sliver of light appeared on the horizon he went quiet, in awe of the majesty of nature. He loved it out here. He loved London as much as I did, but he was so content in his books and his garden.
All at once the sun is up, the sky is blue, and the memory is fractured.
I miss him so much.
I climb to my feet again, stiff and dusty. This isn't what I came for, though it was worth the trip.
The machine moves suddenly, as if awoken from a dream, and turns away from the water. I don't meet its unnatural, uncomfortably familiar gaze as I trudge back up toward the cliff. It doesn't say anything as we climb the long staircase, but I can hear the metallic whir of its joints. Is it powered by combustion? Electricity? It has no tubes or cords; its body is entirely self-contained. It moves like a human, but nothing can disguise its gleaming exterior or its bone-crushing strength.
When we pass the car, the machine stops and moves to get in, but I keep walking.
"Holmes," it calls. "Holmes!" God, how can it do that? Its voice is so like his. When it says, "Oh, for heaven’s sake," in that way he used to, I almost smile.
The air has warmed up with the sun now risen, and I tug off the coat and bundle it under my arm. I wish I had a hat on. I feel bare without one; unkempt.
The car floats up beside me, keeping pace with me as I walk, and the machine leans across the seat to peer out the open window at me.
"You don't know where you're going," it says.
"I'll manage," I reply, but I drop the cloak in the window onto the seat.
"The town's gotten bigger since you saw it last."
"How much bigger?"
"Thirty thousand people."
"Good Lord." It was two thousand when I knew it, if that. "Is the church still standing?"
"Yes."
"Then I know where I'm going."
"Would you prefer I meet you there, or stay with you here?"
I hesitate. I don't want company, exactly, but I'm not sure I could stand to be alone.
"Drive ahead of me. I don't want to speak to you."
The machine shrugs and pulls ahead, rising fifteen feet in the air to hover just below the rest of traffic that is beginning to pick up. It whirs with the effort of going so slowly. Other drivers whiz by overhead and honk in frustration, but the machine does not abandon me for convenience's sake. How do the cars stay afloat? If they were pushing air down, they would have to do so with such force that they would flatten anything beneath them. Is it magnets? Is it chemistry? There's so much to understand I think I might not even bother.
To think that I would ever be uninterested in learning anything. I was not made for this century.
The six miles into town used to take most of an hour in Watson's car. Walking took three hours because of the hills, but already I can tell this journey will be shorter. The wild, windswept, grassy Downs that I knew have been consumed by urban development, and I'm walking on paved paths in residential neighborhoods. Where has nature been relegated to? Is there any left? I'm almost surprised they haven't colonised the ocean. Maybe someone has.
By the time I reach a familiar intersection, I am sweating and footsore and deep into a downtown that bustles with activity and noise, flying cars and weird fashion. In my plain shirt and trousers I am practically invisible. The village green looks nothing like I remember it: the grass has been half-paved over and a metal sculpture installed in the middle is swarming with children. But beyond the green is the church, exactly as I knew it. It is old and carefully kept, like a piece of cloth that has been washed again and again until it is translucent. The churchyard that surrounds it is intact, too. My heart sticks in my throat.
The machine meets me on foot as I approach the gates to the churchyard. It says nothing, just holds the gate open for me.
Stepping inside is like coming home, and I have never liked going to church. Watson and I were not God-fearing men—quite the opposite—but it was in his will and so I was obliged. I know exactly where I will find him. He is surrounded by new neighbors who weren't even born yet when….
His stone is crooked and faded. Almost two hundred years have passed since I bought it and had it installed, and the years show badly. It was broken once and glued back together. At least someone has some sense of respect for their elders.
I am frozen, the grief as raw as it ever was. I cannot allow the emotion to escape. I spent my emotions when I buried him.
Dr. John H. Watson, MD
Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers
1852 - 1937
Beloved Husband,
Companion, & Friend
The Best and Wisest Man I Have Ever Known
My legs won't hold me up. I kneel in the grass. My forehead touches the ground, and I am curled up over the last resting place of my heart, as if I never left. This was a mistake. All of it was a mistake. There is nothing for me here, just as there was nothing when he first left me behind. I wonder if I could die of heartbreak all over again—properly this time; no preservation in honey experiments to keep me at risk of being alive again.
"How did it happen?" the machine asks with the voice of my husband.
"Pneumonia," I say. My voice sounds so calm. "It was a wet winter and a cold spring." I roll onto my side, my cheek in the grass.
"That's horrible."
"It was," I agree, staring at my own hands curled before my face. "I never got sick. I don't know why. Of the two of us, I should have been more vulnerable. I used cocaine and morphine for years. I experimented with everything. I poisoned both of us once but I did it to myself a dozen times. I should— I should have—" I choke on my guilt and have to stop.
The machine sits down beside me, near the headstone, and rests its hand on the crooked top. "The journals stopped a few months before the end. I couldn't get any information on it."
I frown up at its facsimile of a face. "What journals?"
"His journals," the machine says. "The ones that were never published. They're in the museum, now, but their contents are not a matter of public knowledge. The personal journals."
A shudder shakes my frame and I press my face more firmly into the earth, as if I could feel his presence through it. He's not here. He's been gone a long time, and all I have left is a ruined stone. “So you know the truth,” I sigh. “Good. Does Lestrade?”
“No,” the machine says. “Or, I do not know if she does. Her motives are simple: kick the door down, solve the crime, bring the criminals to justice. She wants to be right about Moriarty. She doesn’t look much deeper than that.”
“But you did.”
“I am programmed to investigate,” the machine says. “The stories I was given were only a part of the life John Watson lived. I knew there had to be more. A writer such as he rarely leaves an encounter undocumented. He wrote down everything.”
“Not everything,” I protest.
The machine raises an eyebrow. “Almost everything.”
He would. I rub my cheek against the grass. “You’re not him.”
“Am I not? I have absorbed his memories.”
“You have read a sanitised account of some things that happened to him. That is not the same. And if that is not enough, he was a man and you are…”
“A compudroid.”
“Not a man.”
The compudroid shrugs. The movement is uncomfortably natural on its bulky shoulders.
“There was more to him than what he wrote down, regardless of how incorrigible a diarist he was.” I say, sullen. “Go away. Leave me alone. Don’t come back.”
It nods once and pushes to its feet. I close my eyes and listen to it stride away across the grass. I’m being dramatic but I couldn’t care less.
I must have fallen asleep there on the grave of my dead lover. The next thing I am aware of is being nudged gently by a toe in the sole of my boot. A woman stands over me in a clerical frock, and she frowns when I open my eyes.
"Sir, I'm sorry," she says, "but you can't sleep here. Do you need some help finding somewhere to stay?"
"What?" She thinks I'm a vagrant. "No, no, I'm— I'm all right. I was just… visiting an old friend." Even these people with all their miracles of science probably will not want to hear where I've come from, or that this long-dead man used to share my home and my bed. I struggle to my feet, but I cannot bring myself to simply leave my dear heart behind. I rest my fingertips upon the stone and try to wish him the fondest farewell I can manage. I can visit again, I reassure myself. If I want to come back and see him, I can.
The compudroid is waiting for me, just outside the churchyard.
"Are you ready to go back to New London?" it asks, holding the door of the vehicle open for me. "Lestrade awaits."
I am not ready, but I get in all the same.
---
Inspector Lestrade chides us for disappearing. Her determination to find Moriarty consumes her, and she finds any deviation from her plan annoying and disruptive. I do not apologise, nor, I notice, does the droid. It has transferred its allegiance from the Yard, from Greyson and Lestrade, to me; I suppose I should thank John Watson's stories for that if nothing else.
It remains with me at Baker Street. It keeps me company during the times we are not required by the Yard, and it accompanies me on explorations of the city. London has changed a lot in the time I was—is sleeping a good word?—but some pieces of it are eternally familiar. The machine is always at my side, guiding me home no matter how lost I try to get.
The idea of becoming attached to a machine is abhorrent, but it is the strongest link I have to my old life. It sounds like Watson, and it moves like Watson, and it even jokes like Watson. Sometimes I catch myself calling it Watson, as Lestrade and Greyson do. It’s easy to slip; he was my companion for almost forty years.
It touches me sometimes, casually. It puts its hand on my shoulder, in just such a way that Watson used to. How can it know such a detail? It is not cold like a machine, but warm with circuitry and power.
In the very earliest days of our courtship, Watson and I circled one another like two boats in a whirlpool: our fate was inevitable but we fought it very hard. I remember long evenings spent silently in his presence, unable to go any nearer to him but refusing to put any distance between us. When it became clear that we both suspected the other of an inverted nature and a fondness that bordered on attraction, still we hesitated. It was illegal, then, and the idea of risking our friendship to slake our mutual lust was terrifying. When finally we managed to speak honestly about it, it still took us hours to share our first kiss. We spent that night in his bed, fully clothed, savoring the simple contact of our bodies.
I am beginning to feel the same hesitation around the droid. It wants me to know it for who it thinks it is. I am beginning to suspect I will be able to. I will never have him back: not his youth nor his old age. But could I be satisfied with a simulacrum? Is it close enough? I will not be rid of it. Now that it knows our secret, I do not want it replaced or destroyed. It is almost a comfort, to think that we know something no one else has bothered to learn.
---
Everything changes after the incident in the Underground tunnels. The train car we have absconded with runs wild, crashes through a brick wall, and slides straight into the Thames. Lestrade and I escape as the car goes down, but the droid’s weight pulls it under the surface in an instant.
I stand on the bank, soaking wet, shouting myself hoarse. My coat is heavy on my shoulders. I’ve lost it. I’ve lost my link. I’ve lost him for good now.
“We’ll get you a new droid,” Lestrade says, patting my shoulder.
“No!” I cry. “I want Watson!”
And then he comes out of the water, streaming, stomping up the bank. I’m weak with relief. When he falls to his knees, I am beside him, holding him up. He is holding me up.
They take him away from me to make sure the water hasn’t destroyed his insides. I return to Baker Street with Lestrade to pace a hole in the hardwood. She wants to talk about Moriarty, but all I can think of is getting Watson back.
When he appears in the doorway, cleared for duty and as pawky as ever, I am faced with the truth. I care for it— him— this machine. It is not the Watson I used to have, but it is as close to Watson as I am ever going to have again. It does not remember every argument we ever had, or every time we made love, but what person does? I will take the gaps in its knowledge and fill them with affection rather than scorn.
It is the only logical solution.
Lestrade finally leaves us alone with a promise that she will be back in the morning, and I approach Watson carefully where he stands by the window.
“John.”
He turns in surprise, his eyes filled with wonder.
“Yes, Sherlock?”
“I— I wanted to apologise.”
“Whatever for?”
Everything. I stand in silence, still and uncertain.
Watson steps towards me. He clanks as he moves and I flinch, despite myself. He reaches out and brushes his warm fingers down the outside of my arm, and gathers my hand in his. His grip is deliberately gentle.
"Regardless, I accept," he says, smiling.
I clasp his hand, and then pull him firmly into an embrace. He is hard and stiff in my arms, still undeniably a machine, but the mind is what I truly value. Perhaps I will be able to appreciate this as a blessing: a version of my Watson returned to me.
That night, I leave the door to my bedroom open. He comes to me quietly after I have turned the electric lights out. I make room for him on the mattress, and he climbs in beside me. At first he is careful not to touch me, but I reach over and tug on his arm until we make contact. It's not quite as comfortable as I'm used to; he does not have the body fat to soften his edges. Still, the warmth is welcome, and the weight of his arm on my waist, his hand on my stomach, brings me to the verge of tears. I missed him so much.
I sleep, more deeply than I have since I was resurrected.
---
I wake in the night, disoriented. Light from the streets shines in stripes across the bed. Something is wrong. I listen hard, but the sounds of the city are distant. The house is silent. It wasn't a noise that awoke me; then, what?
Beside me, Watson is cold and still. My heart skips a beat and I turn over to grab at him, shaking him. Not again. Please, I can't, not again.
"Watson!" I call. "Watson, damn you, wake up!"
A hum rises from somewhere inside him, and the warmth returns all over. He stirs and blinks open heavy eyes. When he sees my face, he comes to full alertness. "Sherlock? What's wrong?"
"Nothing," I breathe. "You were— what happened?"
"I suppose I fell asleep."
"You don't fall asleep," I say, angry now. "You can't."
"During periods of inactivity, I reduce my consciousness to recharge," he says. "Most people would call that sleeping."
I clench my jaw. "You were cold."
His expression softens. "I'm sorry. That is an inevitable result of my processes slowing."
"I didn't like it."
"I understand," he says, and takes my hand in his to press it to his lips. "I'll see if I can have one of the technicians adjust it so that my internal temperature stays consistent. I suppose they never considered a compudroid might become an intimate companion."
I swallow hard. "They cannot know about us," I protest. Do I prefer a cold bedmate or for it to be revealed that I have shared my bed with him at all?
He frowns. "Sherlock, you know it isn't illegal?"
I let my head fall back to the pillow. My hand is still held in his. I rest my other hand on his warm, solid chest. "Perhaps not to bed a man, but to bed a machine?"
His lips twitch in a very human show of amusement. "You haven't bedded a machine yet." God, he's flirting with me. It is flirting with me.
"Do you suggest I start now?" I ask. My voice almost doesn't shake. My body misses him as much as my heart does; I am a man, for all my protestations.
He places my hand upon his round shoulder and slides his palm up my ribs. I shiver at his touch. My blood pounds in my veins. This is deviant behavior more extreme than I have ever exhibited; of course Watson would be involved.
"There are certain limits to my… abilities to perform," he warns, dropping his voice low. He cups my face, his thumb tugging at the corner of my mouth. "But as always it is it is my greatest joy and privilege to serve you."
My breath catches in my throat. This is madness. I want it. I lean forward and my lips meet his. How can they feel so normal? When he speaks, his mouth moves as a human's does; why expect this to be different?
I don't understand how this new world works, but for now I decide not to inspect its miracles too closely. Watson kisses me and holds me in his arms, and I am at risk of shaking to pieces.
"Shh," he says, stroking my arms and back, "Holmes, it's all right. It's just me."
"It's never just you," I reply, clinging to him.
"You're overwrought," he says. "You need to sleep. We can recommence this… any time."
"Don't go cold again on me."
"I'll do my best."
---
When I wake again, dawn has broken and spilled its grey light in at the window. I am lying on my side, facing the wall. Watson's hard body cradles mine, his arm across my ribs and his hand on my belly. He is warm and aware; as soon as I stir, he kisses my neck. The precision of the kiss is the last element that causes my belief in him to slot into place. No one but Watson would know what a kiss, given with such gentle pressure to so particular a spot, could do to me. Pleasure ripples down my spine, and I clench my hand in the sheet.
I feel him smile, and he kisses me again. I bow my head, inviting another. When I am rewarded with it, I cannot help the sigh that escapes me. My heart is beating against my ribs and my face heats. Arousal takes root in my gut, beneath the warm cup of Watson’s hand. His palm flattens on my belly, hot through my night clothes. His lips drag against the bump of my last cervical vertebra.
“Is this all right?” he whispers.
I cover his hand with mine and press it more firmly to my body. “Yes.” I cannot ignore how stiff and rigid his fingers feel; they are not made of flesh and bone. I find it doesn’t bother me. His voice in my ear is pure.
“Relax,” he murmurs.
His hand moves slowly up and down my belly, rubbing as if to calm and doing nothing of the sort. He slides it up to brush his fingers over my tightening nipple, and then down to caress the top of my thigh. I am wearing modern drawers under the night shirt: they are small and snug and my burgeoning erection feels trapped beneath the thick, soft fabric. There is a gap in the front of them where I can feel the tip of my cock peep out. I close my eyes, embarrassed at my own eagerness.
“May I?” Watson asks, giving my night shirt a gentle tug upwards. I shift, freeing the fabric from underneath me, and allow it to be pulled up to my waist. We are cozy beneath the blankets, but the sheets feel cool on my bare thighs. Watson's fingers are warm and strange on my stomach. His touch drifts, passing lightly over my navel and down the thin line of hair below it. I can smell my own arousal and I miss the scent of his body with it. I squeeze my eyes shut.
"Talk to me," I beg.
"I've missed you," he says instantly.
I laugh. "You haven't even been here as long as I have," I protest, as his body shifts behind mine. I would feel the press of his erection against my thigh if he were in his own corpus.
"The last few weeks," he says. "To be so close to you and unable to touch you…"
"I'm sorry."
"No," he says, "you don't have to apologise for it; I understand your trepidation. I'm just grateful you're letting me… be with you now."
"How could I not?"
He nuzzles his nose against the back of my neck. "Easily," he says. "You're not one to give in to persuasion, usually."
"Not when it comes to you," I sigh.
His fingers are rubbing against the band of my drawers. I swallow hard and slide one leg up, planting my heel on the bed and spreading my thighs apart in invitation. My cock feels heavy and thick, long neglected. I start to laugh at the thought that it has been two centuries since the last time I had an orgasm.
Watson mutters, "Madman," and slips his hand down to cover my prick. I gasp, pushing up against the touch.
"Utterly mad," I agree. "Is this… pleasurable for you at all?"
"Deeply," he says. He gives me a squeeze. "The usual physical reactions may not be present, but rest assured that my internal processes are running with enthusiasm."
I can feel the truth of it; his body is warmer than it was when I awoke. I snuggle back against him, turning my head to look over my shoulder. "I will have to accustom myself to your altered state."
He smiles, smugly pleased. He kisses my cheek. When I relax again, my head upon the pillow once more, he returns his attention to my stiff cock. A little manipulation of the drawers, and it pokes through the gap in the fabric, eager and twitching. Watson's touch is still so gentle, cautious of his own strength. He curls his fingers around my tool and gives it a slow stroke from root to tip. My back arches as the pleasure washes through me. My blood feels hot under my skin. I reach back and grasp whatever I can of him; he wears no clothes, so I find the smooth plane of his back and the divots of his hip joint. He makes a sound much like a purr and digs his teeth into the juncture of my neck and shoulder. I cry out, spreading my legs wider, pushing my cock into his grip.
He jerks me slowly while I writhe, and then lets go, pulling at my drawers instead. I struggle out of them and turn onto my back, where he can lean over me and kiss me. It feels real. It is real enough. I lick into his mouth and clutch at his shoulders. His mouth is wet and warm and eager, but he doesn't taste like Watson; he doesn't really taste like anything. He takes hold of my prick again and begins to stroke me off. My own eagerness slicks his grip. He rubs his thumb around my tender tip, teasing the foreskin back and rubbing my slit. Then he slides down again, forefinger and thumb circled around the root of my cock, to rub and squeeze my bollocks as they pull tight against my body. I'm squirming, heels digging into the bed, panting helplessly into his mouth.
"Come on, love," he murmurs, biting at my lower lip and pumping my cock through his hot fingers.
"John," I gasp, on the verge.
He ducks his head and worries the skin of my throat with his lips and teeth. I find a grip in his hair and hold him there, clinging to him as the orgasm builds. I look down the length of my body, and the sight of my prick encircled by his silver hand does me in. I tense all over and he says, "Yes," against my neck, "yes, that's it."
I spend, toes curling, head thrown back against the pillow. He strokes me through it, just the way I like, drawing out the pleasure until I'm trembling and panting for breath. Then just as it becomes too much, he lets go, and lifts his head to look into my eyes.
"Was that all right?" he whispers.
My eyes burn. I stare past him at the ceiling, too raw now to really hold myself in check. My heart still thunders against my ribs.
"I'm sorry," he says, misunderstanding, "I shouldn't—"
"It was perfect," I say, and tighten my arms around him so that he can't pull away. "John."
My vision is blurred with the upwelling of emotion, but I think he smiles. "Sherlock."
"I missed you terribly," I admit. "I'll never forgive myself for letting you go first."
"I can't say I'd have forgiven that," he says, resting his hand gingerly upon my belly. Neither of them are clean. "Never mind. We have another chance. You're going to love this world, Sherlock. Once you've learned it."
"I have a lot to catch up on."
He dips to kiss me again. “I have faith in you.”
Recipient:
gardnerhillAuthor:
mistyzeoVerse: Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, Sherlock Holmes/robot!John Watson, Inspector Beth Lestrade
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Anthropomorphism, sex with an android.
Summary: Sherlock Holmes was never meant to be a widower; now a machine wears his late husband's face.
Also on AO3: Internal System Reboot
I was never meant to be a widower. The honey was never supposed to work. They dragged me back from oblivion with a tube down my throat and assigned me an impossible task: to comprehend the future, and to live with what I had done.
The din of this century is bad enough: the chaos of the flying vehicles and the interminable noise of millions of people, so many millions more than when last I saw it. The pavements are packed with pedestrians and buildings stretch to the sky, all glass and steel. Regent's Park, once our strolling-ground, is a pittance of greenery in this bursting, monstrous metropolis. My own Baker Street flat that once I shared with Doctor Watson is tucked away on what is now a side street, a mausoleum to our life.
The machine they have saddled me with is terrifying. A "compudroid," the young Lestrade called it. I do not pretend to understand how it works inside, but it speaks to me with Watson's voice as if it knows me. As if it knows us. Lestrade even put a face on it, as if I could glean comfort from the sight of my dear friend, knowing that it is but a shell that houses a lie. I scorn it. It stays in this house with me as a guardian, an assistant, but it has made me a prisoner. I have to escape from it. I have to get out of here.
I cannot go backwards, but perhaps I can retrace my steps. I don't even know if our old house in Fulworth still stands. It has probably been worn down to rubble by now. We had no one to inherit from us; I hope it has returned to the earth, as I should have done.
Leaving the flat by the window is simplicity itself. I am out in the thick night air in a matter of minutes, and in total silence, too. Old crevasses find my fingers and the toes of my boots, and I reach the ground with ease. I am not as old as I was. Something about the procedure has restored more of my vitality than I had left. I brush the residue of old mortar and older bricks off on my trousers. I should have brought my coat, or even that cumbersome Inverness; the air is cold, despite the throb of the human race all around me.
The flying car is where young Lestrade left it, parked in front of the building. As I approach it I realise I have no idea how to open it, let alone operate it. I touch the door handle, despairing for my own escape, when it lights up at the ends and inside, and the door pops open an inch. I pull my hand away and stare. My fingerprints linger, luminous, on the handle, and then fade away.
I fold myself into the seat and close the door behind me. My breath steams out on my exhale and the glass windows begin to fog. The handholds that I watched Lestrade steer with are chilly under my hands, but they too respond to my touch. A low rumble starts up somewhere inside the body of the vehicle, and the interior light goes out. It is replaced by a luminescent panel of dials and switches that would not be out of place in a mad scientist's laboratory. I don't know where to begin. I always left the driving to Watson and his little Ford. My heart is pounding. I'm useless. Everything I have learned, everything I have ever known, is useless in this place.
Perhaps I can go backwards. As soon as this New Scotland Yard is done with me I will finish the job I started two centuries ago. I should have walked into the sea, not into a vat of honey. I will not be forced to endure a minute longer than necessary of this hellish world—
The door opens and the overhead light comes on, startling me out of my agonised fantasy. The machine with my friend's face peers down at me.
"Going somewhere?" it asks. The sound of its voice—his voice—tears a hole in the middle of my chest.
"Apparently not," I reply.
"Shift over," it says. "I'll drive."
"You don't even know where—" I protest, but I'm already moving. I clamber into the other seat and let the machine take my place in the driver's seat.
"You want to go home," it says, closing the door. Darkness engulfs us, save for the shining panel of controls. "Right?"
"Don't you dare take me to Lestrade."
The machine smiles; the expression is agony to me. It has the same wrinkles he had around his eyes. "Holmes, I would never," it says fondly. "If I were going to turn you in, I'd just take you back inside."
It knows how to maneuver the car; with a gentle pull on the steering column it lifts the car into the air, and we leave Baker Street behind in the dark.
The city of New London stretches on for miles and miles, glittering and buzzing beneath us. It hurts my eyes, so I close them against the glare. How does anyone sleep in such a place? The light from the city is bright enough to be like the dawn, but there are hours yet until sunrise. Now that we are moving, the car has heated up. The glass on the windows has cleared.
"Would you like to listen to music?" the machine with Watson's face asks.
I turn to stare at it. It reaches out toward the console, and music bursts forth all around us, like a gramophone is concealed somewhere. For a minute I think I've wet myself in shock, but it turns out the seat below me is heated from the inside as well. The machine fiddles with dials, changing the music, and settles on a violin concerto that I recognize.
It's such a relief to encounter a single familiar thing that I give due consideration to weeping like a child. Ultimately, I refrain.
Eventually we reach the edge of the city. The lights are fewer and farther between. I couldn't identify a single landmark, certainly not from this angle, but somehow it feels familiar to be moving out into the countryside. Beside me, the machine is quiet, not making any demands on my inner thoughts. The music winds between us, coming from nowhere and everywhere at the same time. I resign myself to not being surprised by any miracles.
There is a solid darkness ahead that grows as we fly on; it is the English Channel, I realise. I've never seen it from such a height. The machine directs the flying car toward the ground, and we skim along just above the paved streets for a few minutes. The night is fading. The machine is looking around as it drives, turning its humanoid head on its metallic shoulders. It isn't wearing anything; it makes no effort to disguise its unreal nature. Its hair is so convincing. I want to reach out and touch it, feel it slide between my fingers, caress the warm scalp between.
I might be sick. I choke the bile down my throat again and cling to my own sleeves, lost in this strange land.
The cab comes easing to a stop and sinks to the ground.
"We're here," the machine says.
This is not my remote little cottage, separated from civilisation by six miles of Downs. This house is three times the size of that, and barely on the edge of the town.
“This?”
“I’m afraid so. The cottage was demolished in 1958 to make room for a larger house, and that one was torn down in 2065.” The machine looks calmly out at the enormous house. “There was an outcry over the more recent destruction from the civic society. The local newspaper has three articles in the archive regarding the protests. Would you like me to read them to you?”
“No,” I say, opening the door, “for God’s sake, no.”
I climb out into the cold pre-dawn and stare at the behemoth where my house used to stand. It’s all glass and concrete, with little blue lights visible inside in the dark. If a child were to peek out the window now, would they wonder at a strange man and a machine staring back? Does anyone wonder at such things anymore?
I’m shivering. The machine comes around the car and drapes my Inverness around my shoulders. Against my will, I tuck my arms into the sleeves and pull it into position.
“You don’t feel cold, do you?”
“I register the temperature,” it says. “I am aware that it is cold, but it does not affect my ability to function.”
“Pity,” I reply, and start away from the car. The way to the sea is muscle memory, and my feet carry me there almost without my input. But the shoreline has changed, and soon a gate stands in my way. The cliff has fallen away, and the path is long gone.
“This way,” the machine says, turning aside. I follow it along the cliff edge for a quarter of a mile, and we come to a long set of wooden stairs. The body I visited here in last would never stand the descent, but this new one makes no protestations.
“How did you know that?” I asked. “Have you been here since—?”
“I have access to the local maps and walking guides,” the machine says. “I am connected to the Internet.”
I don’t know what that means.
The machine turns back to look at me. “It’s all of the information the human race has compiled.”
“In one place?”
“In many places, but accessible from everywhere.”
“What do they need me for, then?” I muse.
“Making connections,” the machine says. “Anticipating human error.”
We reach the shingle and I crunch my way down to the edge of the water, grateful for the familiar slip and slide of the stones beneath my boots. The sun is starting to break free of the surf, making the cliffs glow. The noise of humanity has been superseded by the crash of the waves, blissfully eternal.
I sit, wrapped in the cloak, on the cold, hard ground. The machine is a sentinel beside me. I watch the sunrise, turning the sky pink and then purple, which fades into white. Watson and I used to watch the sunrise together sometimes. He hated to get up early so we compromised by sharing them in the autumn as the days grew shorter, but before the winter really set in. I can almost feel the weight of him against me, his shoulder touching mine. He would grumble about the chill while it was still dark, but as soon as the sliver of light appeared on the horizon he went quiet, in awe of the majesty of nature. He loved it out here. He loved London as much as I did, but he was so content in his books and his garden.
All at once the sun is up, the sky is blue, and the memory is fractured.
I miss him so much.
I climb to my feet again, stiff and dusty. This isn't what I came for, though it was worth the trip.
The machine moves suddenly, as if awoken from a dream, and turns away from the water. I don't meet its unnatural, uncomfortably familiar gaze as I trudge back up toward the cliff. It doesn't say anything as we climb the long staircase, but I can hear the metallic whir of its joints. Is it powered by combustion? Electricity? It has no tubes or cords; its body is entirely self-contained. It moves like a human, but nothing can disguise its gleaming exterior or its bone-crushing strength.
When we pass the car, the machine stops and moves to get in, but I keep walking.
"Holmes," it calls. "Holmes!" God, how can it do that? Its voice is so like his. When it says, "Oh, for heaven’s sake," in that way he used to, I almost smile.
The air has warmed up with the sun now risen, and I tug off the coat and bundle it under my arm. I wish I had a hat on. I feel bare without one; unkempt.
The car floats up beside me, keeping pace with me as I walk, and the machine leans across the seat to peer out the open window at me.
"You don't know where you're going," it says.
"I'll manage," I reply, but I drop the cloak in the window onto the seat.
"The town's gotten bigger since you saw it last."
"How much bigger?"
"Thirty thousand people."
"Good Lord." It was two thousand when I knew it, if that. "Is the church still standing?"
"Yes."
"Then I know where I'm going."
"Would you prefer I meet you there, or stay with you here?"
I hesitate. I don't want company, exactly, but I'm not sure I could stand to be alone.
"Drive ahead of me. I don't want to speak to you."
The machine shrugs and pulls ahead, rising fifteen feet in the air to hover just below the rest of traffic that is beginning to pick up. It whirs with the effort of going so slowly. Other drivers whiz by overhead and honk in frustration, but the machine does not abandon me for convenience's sake. How do the cars stay afloat? If they were pushing air down, they would have to do so with such force that they would flatten anything beneath them. Is it magnets? Is it chemistry? There's so much to understand I think I might not even bother.
To think that I would ever be uninterested in learning anything. I was not made for this century.
The six miles into town used to take most of an hour in Watson's car. Walking took three hours because of the hills, but already I can tell this journey will be shorter. The wild, windswept, grassy Downs that I knew have been consumed by urban development, and I'm walking on paved paths in residential neighborhoods. Where has nature been relegated to? Is there any left? I'm almost surprised they haven't colonised the ocean. Maybe someone has.
By the time I reach a familiar intersection, I am sweating and footsore and deep into a downtown that bustles with activity and noise, flying cars and weird fashion. In my plain shirt and trousers I am practically invisible. The village green looks nothing like I remember it: the grass has been half-paved over and a metal sculpture installed in the middle is swarming with children. But beyond the green is the church, exactly as I knew it. It is old and carefully kept, like a piece of cloth that has been washed again and again until it is translucent. The churchyard that surrounds it is intact, too. My heart sticks in my throat.
The machine meets me on foot as I approach the gates to the churchyard. It says nothing, just holds the gate open for me.
Stepping inside is like coming home, and I have never liked going to church. Watson and I were not God-fearing men—quite the opposite—but it was in his will and so I was obliged. I know exactly where I will find him. He is surrounded by new neighbors who weren't even born yet when….
His stone is crooked and faded. Almost two hundred years have passed since I bought it and had it installed, and the years show badly. It was broken once and glued back together. At least someone has some sense of respect for their elders.
I am frozen, the grief as raw as it ever was. I cannot allow the emotion to escape. I spent my emotions when I buried him.
Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers
1852 - 1937
Beloved Husband,
Companion, & Friend
The Best and Wisest Man I Have Ever Known
My legs won't hold me up. I kneel in the grass. My forehead touches the ground, and I am curled up over the last resting place of my heart, as if I never left. This was a mistake. All of it was a mistake. There is nothing for me here, just as there was nothing when he first left me behind. I wonder if I could die of heartbreak all over again—properly this time; no preservation in honey experiments to keep me at risk of being alive again.
"How did it happen?" the machine asks with the voice of my husband.
"Pneumonia," I say. My voice sounds so calm. "It was a wet winter and a cold spring." I roll onto my side, my cheek in the grass.
"That's horrible."
"It was," I agree, staring at my own hands curled before my face. "I never got sick. I don't know why. Of the two of us, I should have been more vulnerable. I used cocaine and morphine for years. I experimented with everything. I poisoned both of us once but I did it to myself a dozen times. I should— I should have—" I choke on my guilt and have to stop.
The machine sits down beside me, near the headstone, and rests its hand on the crooked top. "The journals stopped a few months before the end. I couldn't get any information on it."
I frown up at its facsimile of a face. "What journals?"
"His journals," the machine says. "The ones that were never published. They're in the museum, now, but their contents are not a matter of public knowledge. The personal journals."
A shudder shakes my frame and I press my face more firmly into the earth, as if I could feel his presence through it. He's not here. He's been gone a long time, and all I have left is a ruined stone. “So you know the truth,” I sigh. “Good. Does Lestrade?”
“No,” the machine says. “Or, I do not know if she does. Her motives are simple: kick the door down, solve the crime, bring the criminals to justice. She wants to be right about Moriarty. She doesn’t look much deeper than that.”
“But you did.”
“I am programmed to investigate,” the machine says. “The stories I was given were only a part of the life John Watson lived. I knew there had to be more. A writer such as he rarely leaves an encounter undocumented. He wrote down everything.”
“Not everything,” I protest.
The machine raises an eyebrow. “Almost everything.”
He would. I rub my cheek against the grass. “You’re not him.”
“Am I not? I have absorbed his memories.”
“You have read a sanitised account of some things that happened to him. That is not the same. And if that is not enough, he was a man and you are…”
“A compudroid.”
“Not a man.”
The compudroid shrugs. The movement is uncomfortably natural on its bulky shoulders.
“There was more to him than what he wrote down, regardless of how incorrigible a diarist he was.” I say, sullen. “Go away. Leave me alone. Don’t come back.”
It nods once and pushes to its feet. I close my eyes and listen to it stride away across the grass. I’m being dramatic but I couldn’t care less.
I must have fallen asleep there on the grave of my dead lover. The next thing I am aware of is being nudged gently by a toe in the sole of my boot. A woman stands over me in a clerical frock, and she frowns when I open my eyes.
"Sir, I'm sorry," she says, "but you can't sleep here. Do you need some help finding somewhere to stay?"
"What?" She thinks I'm a vagrant. "No, no, I'm— I'm all right. I was just… visiting an old friend." Even these people with all their miracles of science probably will not want to hear where I've come from, or that this long-dead man used to share my home and my bed. I struggle to my feet, but I cannot bring myself to simply leave my dear heart behind. I rest my fingertips upon the stone and try to wish him the fondest farewell I can manage. I can visit again, I reassure myself. If I want to come back and see him, I can.
The compudroid is waiting for me, just outside the churchyard.
"Are you ready to go back to New London?" it asks, holding the door of the vehicle open for me. "Lestrade awaits."
I am not ready, but I get in all the same.
Inspector Lestrade chides us for disappearing. Her determination to find Moriarty consumes her, and she finds any deviation from her plan annoying and disruptive. I do not apologise, nor, I notice, does the droid. It has transferred its allegiance from the Yard, from Greyson and Lestrade, to me; I suppose I should thank John Watson's stories for that if nothing else.
It remains with me at Baker Street. It keeps me company during the times we are not required by the Yard, and it accompanies me on explorations of the city. London has changed a lot in the time I was—is sleeping a good word?—but some pieces of it are eternally familiar. The machine is always at my side, guiding me home no matter how lost I try to get.
The idea of becoming attached to a machine is abhorrent, but it is the strongest link I have to my old life. It sounds like Watson, and it moves like Watson, and it even jokes like Watson. Sometimes I catch myself calling it Watson, as Lestrade and Greyson do. It’s easy to slip; he was my companion for almost forty years.
It touches me sometimes, casually. It puts its hand on my shoulder, in just such a way that Watson used to. How can it know such a detail? It is not cold like a machine, but warm with circuitry and power.
In the very earliest days of our courtship, Watson and I circled one another like two boats in a whirlpool: our fate was inevitable but we fought it very hard. I remember long evenings spent silently in his presence, unable to go any nearer to him but refusing to put any distance between us. When it became clear that we both suspected the other of an inverted nature and a fondness that bordered on attraction, still we hesitated. It was illegal, then, and the idea of risking our friendship to slake our mutual lust was terrifying. When finally we managed to speak honestly about it, it still took us hours to share our first kiss. We spent that night in his bed, fully clothed, savoring the simple contact of our bodies.
I am beginning to feel the same hesitation around the droid. It wants me to know it for who it thinks it is. I am beginning to suspect I will be able to. I will never have him back: not his youth nor his old age. But could I be satisfied with a simulacrum? Is it close enough? I will not be rid of it. Now that it knows our secret, I do not want it replaced or destroyed. It is almost a comfort, to think that we know something no one else has bothered to learn.
Everything changes after the incident in the Underground tunnels. The train car we have absconded with runs wild, crashes through a brick wall, and slides straight into the Thames. Lestrade and I escape as the car goes down, but the droid’s weight pulls it under the surface in an instant.
I stand on the bank, soaking wet, shouting myself hoarse. My coat is heavy on my shoulders. I’ve lost it. I’ve lost my link. I’ve lost him for good now.
“We’ll get you a new droid,” Lestrade says, patting my shoulder.
“No!” I cry. “I want Watson!”
And then he comes out of the water, streaming, stomping up the bank. I’m weak with relief. When he falls to his knees, I am beside him, holding him up. He is holding me up.
They take him away from me to make sure the water hasn’t destroyed his insides. I return to Baker Street with Lestrade to pace a hole in the hardwood. She wants to talk about Moriarty, but all I can think of is getting Watson back.
When he appears in the doorway, cleared for duty and as pawky as ever, I am faced with the truth. I care for it— him— this machine. It is not the Watson I used to have, but it is as close to Watson as I am ever going to have again. It does not remember every argument we ever had, or every time we made love, but what person does? I will take the gaps in its knowledge and fill them with affection rather than scorn.
It is the only logical solution.
Lestrade finally leaves us alone with a promise that she will be back in the morning, and I approach Watson carefully where he stands by the window.
“John.”
He turns in surprise, his eyes filled with wonder.
“Yes, Sherlock?”
“I— I wanted to apologise.”
“Whatever for?”
Everything. I stand in silence, still and uncertain.
Watson steps towards me. He clanks as he moves and I flinch, despite myself. He reaches out and brushes his warm fingers down the outside of my arm, and gathers my hand in his. His grip is deliberately gentle.
"Regardless, I accept," he says, smiling.
I clasp his hand, and then pull him firmly into an embrace. He is hard and stiff in my arms, still undeniably a machine, but the mind is what I truly value. Perhaps I will be able to appreciate this as a blessing: a version of my Watson returned to me.
That night, I leave the door to my bedroom open. He comes to me quietly after I have turned the electric lights out. I make room for him on the mattress, and he climbs in beside me. At first he is careful not to touch me, but I reach over and tug on his arm until we make contact. It's not quite as comfortable as I'm used to; he does not have the body fat to soften his edges. Still, the warmth is welcome, and the weight of his arm on my waist, his hand on my stomach, brings me to the verge of tears. I missed him so much.
I sleep, more deeply than I have since I was resurrected.
I wake in the night, disoriented. Light from the streets shines in stripes across the bed. Something is wrong. I listen hard, but the sounds of the city are distant. The house is silent. It wasn't a noise that awoke me; then, what?
Beside me, Watson is cold and still. My heart skips a beat and I turn over to grab at him, shaking him. Not again. Please, I can't, not again.
"Watson!" I call. "Watson, damn you, wake up!"
A hum rises from somewhere inside him, and the warmth returns all over. He stirs and blinks open heavy eyes. When he sees my face, he comes to full alertness. "Sherlock? What's wrong?"
"Nothing," I breathe. "You were— what happened?"
"I suppose I fell asleep."
"You don't fall asleep," I say, angry now. "You can't."
"During periods of inactivity, I reduce my consciousness to recharge," he says. "Most people would call that sleeping."
I clench my jaw. "You were cold."
His expression softens. "I'm sorry. That is an inevitable result of my processes slowing."
"I didn't like it."
"I understand," he says, and takes my hand in his to press it to his lips. "I'll see if I can have one of the technicians adjust it so that my internal temperature stays consistent. I suppose they never considered a compudroid might become an intimate companion."
I swallow hard. "They cannot know about us," I protest. Do I prefer a cold bedmate or for it to be revealed that I have shared my bed with him at all?
He frowns. "Sherlock, you know it isn't illegal?"
I let my head fall back to the pillow. My hand is still held in his. I rest my other hand on his warm, solid chest. "Perhaps not to bed a man, but to bed a machine?"
His lips twitch in a very human show of amusement. "You haven't bedded a machine yet." God, he's flirting with me. It is flirting with me.
"Do you suggest I start now?" I ask. My voice almost doesn't shake. My body misses him as much as my heart does; I am a man, for all my protestations.
He places my hand upon his round shoulder and slides his palm up my ribs. I shiver at his touch. My blood pounds in my veins. This is deviant behavior more extreme than I have ever exhibited; of course Watson would be involved.
"There are certain limits to my… abilities to perform," he warns, dropping his voice low. He cups my face, his thumb tugging at the corner of my mouth. "But as always it is it is my greatest joy and privilege to serve you."
My breath catches in my throat. This is madness. I want it. I lean forward and my lips meet his. How can they feel so normal? When he speaks, his mouth moves as a human's does; why expect this to be different?
I don't understand how this new world works, but for now I decide not to inspect its miracles too closely. Watson kisses me and holds me in his arms, and I am at risk of shaking to pieces.
"Shh," he says, stroking my arms and back, "Holmes, it's all right. It's just me."
"It's never just you," I reply, clinging to him.
"You're overwrought," he says. "You need to sleep. We can recommence this… any time."
"Don't go cold again on me."
"I'll do my best."
When I wake again, dawn has broken and spilled its grey light in at the window. I am lying on my side, facing the wall. Watson's hard body cradles mine, his arm across my ribs and his hand on my belly. He is warm and aware; as soon as I stir, he kisses my neck. The precision of the kiss is the last element that causes my belief in him to slot into place. No one but Watson would know what a kiss, given with such gentle pressure to so particular a spot, could do to me. Pleasure ripples down my spine, and I clench my hand in the sheet.
I feel him smile, and he kisses me again. I bow my head, inviting another. When I am rewarded with it, I cannot help the sigh that escapes me. My heart is beating against my ribs and my face heats. Arousal takes root in my gut, beneath the warm cup of Watson’s hand. His palm flattens on my belly, hot through my night clothes. His lips drag against the bump of my last cervical vertebra.
“Is this all right?” he whispers.
I cover his hand with mine and press it more firmly to my body. “Yes.” I cannot ignore how stiff and rigid his fingers feel; they are not made of flesh and bone. I find it doesn’t bother me. His voice in my ear is pure.
“Relax,” he murmurs.
His hand moves slowly up and down my belly, rubbing as if to calm and doing nothing of the sort. He slides it up to brush his fingers over my tightening nipple, and then down to caress the top of my thigh. I am wearing modern drawers under the night shirt: they are small and snug and my burgeoning erection feels trapped beneath the thick, soft fabric. There is a gap in the front of them where I can feel the tip of my cock peep out. I close my eyes, embarrassed at my own eagerness.
“May I?” Watson asks, giving my night shirt a gentle tug upwards. I shift, freeing the fabric from underneath me, and allow it to be pulled up to my waist. We are cozy beneath the blankets, but the sheets feel cool on my bare thighs. Watson's fingers are warm and strange on my stomach. His touch drifts, passing lightly over my navel and down the thin line of hair below it. I can smell my own arousal and I miss the scent of his body with it. I squeeze my eyes shut.
"Talk to me," I beg.
"I've missed you," he says instantly.
I laugh. "You haven't even been here as long as I have," I protest, as his body shifts behind mine. I would feel the press of his erection against my thigh if he were in his own corpus.
"The last few weeks," he says. "To be so close to you and unable to touch you…"
"I'm sorry."
"No," he says, "you don't have to apologise for it; I understand your trepidation. I'm just grateful you're letting me… be with you now."
"How could I not?"
He nuzzles his nose against the back of my neck. "Easily," he says. "You're not one to give in to persuasion, usually."
"Not when it comes to you," I sigh.
His fingers are rubbing against the band of my drawers. I swallow hard and slide one leg up, planting my heel on the bed and spreading my thighs apart in invitation. My cock feels heavy and thick, long neglected. I start to laugh at the thought that it has been two centuries since the last time I had an orgasm.
Watson mutters, "Madman," and slips his hand down to cover my prick. I gasp, pushing up against the touch.
"Utterly mad," I agree. "Is this… pleasurable for you at all?"
"Deeply," he says. He gives me a squeeze. "The usual physical reactions may not be present, but rest assured that my internal processes are running with enthusiasm."
I can feel the truth of it; his body is warmer than it was when I awoke. I snuggle back against him, turning my head to look over my shoulder. "I will have to accustom myself to your altered state."
He smiles, smugly pleased. He kisses my cheek. When I relax again, my head upon the pillow once more, he returns his attention to my stiff cock. A little manipulation of the drawers, and it pokes through the gap in the fabric, eager and twitching. Watson's touch is still so gentle, cautious of his own strength. He curls his fingers around my tool and gives it a slow stroke from root to tip. My back arches as the pleasure washes through me. My blood feels hot under my skin. I reach back and grasp whatever I can of him; he wears no clothes, so I find the smooth plane of his back and the divots of his hip joint. He makes a sound much like a purr and digs his teeth into the juncture of my neck and shoulder. I cry out, spreading my legs wider, pushing my cock into his grip.
He jerks me slowly while I writhe, and then lets go, pulling at my drawers instead. I struggle out of them and turn onto my back, where he can lean over me and kiss me. It feels real. It is real enough. I lick into his mouth and clutch at his shoulders. His mouth is wet and warm and eager, but he doesn't taste like Watson; he doesn't really taste like anything. He takes hold of my prick again and begins to stroke me off. My own eagerness slicks his grip. He rubs his thumb around my tender tip, teasing the foreskin back and rubbing my slit. Then he slides down again, forefinger and thumb circled around the root of my cock, to rub and squeeze my bollocks as they pull tight against my body. I'm squirming, heels digging into the bed, panting helplessly into his mouth.
"Come on, love," he murmurs, biting at my lower lip and pumping my cock through his hot fingers.
"John," I gasp, on the verge.
He ducks his head and worries the skin of my throat with his lips and teeth. I find a grip in his hair and hold him there, clinging to him as the orgasm builds. I look down the length of my body, and the sight of my prick encircled by his silver hand does me in. I tense all over and he says, "Yes," against my neck, "yes, that's it."
I spend, toes curling, head thrown back against the pillow. He strokes me through it, just the way I like, drawing out the pleasure until I'm trembling and panting for breath. Then just as it becomes too much, he lets go, and lifts his head to look into my eyes.
"Was that all right?" he whispers.
My eyes burn. I stare past him at the ceiling, too raw now to really hold myself in check. My heart still thunders against my ribs.
"I'm sorry," he says, misunderstanding, "I shouldn't—"
"It was perfect," I say, and tighten my arms around him so that he can't pull away. "John."
My vision is blurred with the upwelling of emotion, but I think he smiles. "Sherlock."
"I missed you terribly," I admit. "I'll never forgive myself for letting you go first."
"I can't say I'd have forgiven that," he says, resting his hand gingerly upon my belly. Neither of them are clean. "Never mind. We have another chance. You're going to love this world, Sherlock. Once you've learned it."
"I have a lot to catch up on."
He dips to kiss me again. “I have faith in you.”
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Date: 2016-12-04 02:55 am (UTC)On the one hand, this is not a pairing that had even begun to cross my mind...but its execution here is utterly plausible and flawlessly convincing. In particular, it gets the voice -- and the soul -- of droid!Watson down to absolute perfection. Likewise, presuming a 22CEN Holmes who had been partnered with original!Watson back in the day, I can well believe that he'd have been just this desperately lonely in the wake of his revival into New London.
Beautifully, beautifully done...and the one person I'd have suspected of being most likely to write it happens to be the person it was written for. I think I'm going to need a spreadsheet and a crystal ball to have any chance of guessing authors this round....
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Date: 2016-12-04 09:47 am (UTC)You caught SH22 perfectly, and the underlying pain that the show skirts.
And here is the droid!Watson/Holmes tale I didn't know I wanted, flawlessly carried out. Holmes' reactions are pitch-perfect throughout - including when he dismisses the scandal of having a physical relationship with a machine the way he and Watson defied the scandal of two men becoming romantic partners in Victorian times.
Everything is captured here, from Holmes' heartbreak when he collapses at Watson's grave to his joy in finding passion and love once again, even as he understands that the compudroid Watson is a separate entity from his old lover.
A magnificent offering, and I'm honored you did such a fabulous job on this prompt.
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Date: 2016-12-05 04:19 am (UTC)"It does not remember every argument we ever had, or every time we made love, but what person does?"
It's so bittersweet, it hurts but I'm happy about it.
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