'You dreamt I was shot,' London said, his whisper robbing the statement of his usual bluntness.

Elliot glanced up sharply, taking in London's face for the first time since waking up. He had not wanted to look, before, in case all he saw was blood and broken bone. Now, though, there was just London's pale skin, eyes slitted in the gloom and still bracketed by lines of discomfort as his lips pulled down into a worried grimace.

He stared at his fingers where they were still pressed between London's eyebrows before curling them back towards his palm, dropping his hand and his head at the same time and letting his cheek rest against his chest. Part of him was certain he should roll to one side. This took invading personal space to a whole new level, and the last thing London needed with a pounding migraine was a deranged army doctor sprawled all over him. Yet Elliot's muscles did not want to move – did not dare to shift and lose London’s vital heat in case his absence somehow made the nightmare real.

'Something like that,' he managed at last, his throat pulsing as he swallowed. The lingering memory of the dream – shattered, vivid fragments that plagued him still – coated his mind like pitch. He pushed back against the dark veil, trying to shove his own feelings aside as he hurriedly changed the subject of the conversation. 'Did I wake you?'

For a few moments, London's only response was silence, suggesting his mind was still sharp enough to know what Elliot was doing and to question his reasons. Elliot held his breath, silently praying London would not resist the effort to ignore what had happened, and after a moment, his pleas were answered.

'No. The Norazophen's still wearing off, and the pain is increasing. It's too –' He paused, eyes flickering shut as he searched for the right word.'Intense to sleep.'

'Sorry,' Elliot murmured, forcing himself to move at last. 'I can't be helping, pouncing on you like that.' He glanced at the clock, staring blankly at the numbers which said he had been out for several hours. Some sleep must have happened before the dream, then, but he could not recall anything between the warmth of London's arms and the heat of Afghanistan's plains.

'You didn't hurt me,' London replied, one hand catching around John's wrist and dragging him over so he lay on his side, the two of them face-to-face. There was a hint of familiar scrutiny in London's gaze, though the shadows beneath his eyes and tension in his jaw suggested that the effort came at a price. 'Surprising, since you were having a borderline panic attack.'

At Elliot's questioning look, the Consulting Criminal began listing symptoms. 'Rapid pulse, cold sweat, trembling, hyperventilation and disorientation...' The next question was quiet, as if London was thoroughly expecting to be told to fuck off for even asking. 'Is it always like that?'

It would be incredibly easy to lie – to brush it off as any other nightmare, normal in its horror, but it had been more than a year since Elliot had such a crippling, physical response to his dreams. A few moments of fear and confusion before awareness set in were more typical these days – not that: cringing desperation and clutching, feral terror.

'No. It's not usually that bad. They wake me up, yeah, but...' Elliot shook his head, screwing his eyes up tight before opening them again. Exhaustion nibbled at the edges of his vision, but there was no way he was going back to sleep tonight. He did not dare, not if that scene was all that awaited him once he shut his eyes. 'I've not woken up that frightened since moving here.'

London's thumb stroked back and forth across Elliot's hand in silent comfort, a silken sweep of skin-on-skin that had Elliot half-mesmerized. His breathing slowed down to match the pace of London's caress, and part of him dimly wondered if it was deliberate: the Consulting Criminal taking care of him while Elliot was still helpless to do a damn thing against the migraine that caught London in the vice of its grip.

Normally, he would have fled and found some comfort in the obviously waking world. He would have made tea and sat in the armchair, cementing himself in the reassuring burden of normalcy even as the night slipped on. Often, London was awake as well, and he would merely glance at him, assessing and silent, before asking him to pass him something or make him tea. Occasionally, he was playing the violin, and Elliot could listen to the music and just forget.

Yet somehow his usual behavior held no appeal. It felt too isolated, in that moment. Out there, in those dark hours of the past, he and London were utterly separate. Here there was none of that. London was right there, and though the migraine dulled his mind, all available power was fixated completely on Elliot: alarming and compelling in equal measure.

'You're not going to be able to go back to sleep, are you?' London asked quietly, his lips twisting when Elliot shook his head. There was a moment of peace, as if he was considering his options before he spoke again, his voice still hushed. 'Sit back against the headboard,' he ordered, letting go of Elliot's hand and reaching for one of the pillows.

For a moment, Elliot just blinked at him, trying to understand what was rushing through that brilliant brain. 'Why?'

The Consulting Criminal looked at him, and the flicker of conflict on his face suggested he was considering telling a lie before a sigh passed his lips. 'Your behavior suggests your nightmare was as much about being powerless as it was about the war. You want to be useful, and I know a 
way you can make the pain more bearable, but you'll be more comfortable if you sit behind me.'

There was nothing he could argue with there. Even without all the details, London still seemed to have picked up on the root of Elliot's dream. He'd probably been more obvious in his frustrated helplessness than he had intended, and while his subconscious painted bloody, horrific scenes of London dead at his hand, the living, breathing man himself was trying to think of ways to ease Elliot's inadequacy.

Wordlessly, he did as he was told, propping a pillow between himself and London's headboard before leaning back. He lifted an eyebrow as London nudged his legs apart, dropping another pillow into the vee they made before reclining. His head rested against Elliot's sternum.

'I know you were trying to comfort yourself,' he murmured, 'but you rubbing your fingers over my forehead was – it was good. Distracting. External sensation is –'

'A simple way to detract from internal pain where no swelling or muscle damage is present,' Elliot finished for him, pressing his own fingertips to his palms before sweeping them ever so-lightly over London's skin.

Before, it had been instinctive – a quick, fundamental need which he had fulfilled without even asking permission. Now London was lying there, head tipped back in surrender. In the dim light from the towel-covered lamp, Elliot could see the strong, pale line of his throat and the planes of his bare chest, a bit too lean but powerful in their own way.

Warm flesh was pulled tight over the frontal bone, and Elliot felt it grow more dense over the inward arch of London's nasal ridge. He traced the line of his forehead, moving in steady, tender circles up over the delicate vaults of his temples and back to the center of the brow.

He fell into a rhythm automatically, using his fingertips and the sides of his thumbs to apply the lightest touch of pressure, always watching for any sign of additional discomfort from London. 'Tell me if I hurt you,' he requested quietly, watching the flicker of London's eyes beneath his closed eyelids and the part of that cupid bow mouth around his response.

'You won't. It's just audio and visual sensitivity and a crippling headache, for now anyway.'

'Hmmm, I don't think the word “just” can be used in conjunction with any of this, Holmes,' Elliot murmured, his fingers drifting back to toy absently with dark, lank curls, idly stroking the skin beneath as he explored the contours of London's skull. 'Did someone else do this for you? When you were younger, I mean?' He asked curiously, perhaps a kind nurse in one of the clinics he had been forced to attend.

'No,' London replied, and the softness of his voice had taken on a faint hum of pleasure as Elliot's ministrations continued. 'Everyone was afraid to touch me. They seemed to think I would break.'

'That's horrible. No one helped you?'

'That's what the medicines were for,' London replied. 'I can't really blame them for their fears. I was – less controlled as a child. Less able to cope. I cried endlessly, screamed sometimes, which did not help.' His mouth twisted, his fingers tightening into fists. 'As a teenager I became vicious with it. More wounded animal than something sane. When I reached adulthood I discovered that it was better to get through it alone than worry people.' He licked his lips, tilting his head to the side to let Elliot's fingers wander around the zygomatic arch above his left ear. 'By the time I realized I couldn't escape this attack, it was too late to distract you with something else.'

'Good,' Elliot replied firmly, wincing as London flinched at the volume of his voice. 'Sorry,' he added quickly, his words softer and less jarring. 'I just don't want you to think you ever have to hide anything from me. I keep telling you, I don't want to be kept in the dark. I want to help, however I can.'

'I know from the outside all this must have been strange in the extreme,' London began.

'Try terrifying,' Elliot cut in, his smile crooked on his lips as London looked up at him. 'Only you could take a migraine to a whole new level.'

'And only you could remind me that it will end,' London replied softly. 'It can be so easy to get lost in it all, to assume that it won't improve and my mind will be broken forever. You've made sure I don't forget that.'

'It's the least I could do. The idea of you going through this with no one to help...' He shook his head, staring unseeingly out of the window. 'I know you managed before, but I hate the thought of it. I've never seen your mind like that – so lost in itself. Your senses played tricks, half of what you were saying made no sense and the rest of it was in a foreign language. Even now that it seems to be getting better you can still barely even stand. You needed someone here, and I couldn't have left you if you asked me to.'

'This migraine's not over – not yet,' London replied, his voice heavy and exhausted as if he could not bear to think about it. 'What languages was I speaking?'

'Spanish, Italian, Danish' he replied, relieved that London did not pursue the full meaning of Elliot's clumsy words. 'Mostly French, though. You kept coming back to it. There was one thing you said to me...' He frowned in confusion, staring at the wall as he tried to remember it. Something like “m'as je échoué.”'

Elliot looked back to see London frowning, his eyes glazed as if he were struggling to remember things lost within a sea of sedatives and torment. In the end, though, something like recollection twitched across his face. 'Was it “Tu ne m'as jamais échoué.”?' he asked slowly, wrinkling his nose when Elliot nodded his head. 'It's not even a phrase a French person would use. It's just English words switched into French counterparts.'

'Can you remember what you were trying to say?'

For a minute, Elliot thought that London would not answer. He believed he would brush it off or stagger from the bed and bring this strange, perfect interlude of closeness to an end. Yet after a few heartbeats of silence, London lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug, clearing his throat awkwardly before delivering his translation.

'You've never failed me.'

Elliot's face still bore the lingering strain of his nightmare, writ large in the tense lines around his eyes and the wrinkle in his brow. Yet at London’s words, the stress lessened, eased away by a warm, open smile. It was as if, in the story of sentiment, the Consulting Criminal had managed to say something right, and the transformation of Elliot's expression spoke volumes. Despite everything, from the terror of his dream to the burden of taking care of London, he was happy.

'Thank you,' Elliot murmured, ducking his head and scratching his ear for a minute before meeting London's gaze again. Yet there was more there than mere gratitude. An answer in kind, perhaps, though one not verbalized, told in the cartography of Elliot's features and the endless patience of his care. 'I – I know you wouldn't say that to most people.'

'It's not true of anyone else,' London managed, wishing the bass throbbing in his head would cease for long enough for him to try and explain.'And I suspect you would be the only one to care if you did fail me somehow.'

He hissed in a breath through his teeth. 'It seems to be worrying you,' he added, wincing at the dim lamp on the bedside table before lying down again, this time on his side parallel to the headboard. He had wanted to sit up, to watch Elliot with sharp eyes and a clear mind, but his head was too full of vicious, cracking pain to do so. How hateful to be so exposed in feeling and yet utterly unable to concentrate the strength of his intellect on the interaction. 'You seem to think that all your assistance is somehow not enough, when it's the most anyone's ever done for me.'

Elliot swallowed, and London watched the bob of his Adam's apple through slitted eyes. He looked conflicted – angry, perhaps, at distant, meaningless people in his past who had offered the synthetic pity of drugs and thought nothing of the respite simple touch could offer. Yet there was grief there too, its mystery clarified when Elliot spoke.

'It shouldn't be like that. You shouldn't – shouldn't be so thankful for basic compassion.' He tugged at the blanket, reorganizing it so that it was draped over London's body: soft feathers and a serpentine symphony. 'It should have been offered to you long before now.'

'Perhaps it was offered, and I pushed it away. My personality is not conducive to sympathy,' he pointed out softly. Sometimes it seemed to him that Elliot saw a very different London Holmes than everyone else, as if he were looking at him through a different lens.

Elliot pursed his lips, his fingers tracing idle patterns on the blanket as if he did not know what to do. 'That's not the way I see it,' he said at last, twisting the fabric between his fingers. 'I just wish I could give you more. I've dealt with other people who had migraines now and then – auras and headaches, that's all – I give them basic medication or refer them to a neurologist if they're particularly severe. This –' He waved a hand, gesturing to London as a whole and his head in particular. 'Even with the information your brother gave me, I don't bloody know what to do.'

'Neither does anyone else,' London pointed out, bunching the corner of the blanket and resting his cheek on it. 'Not even people who have studied the brain for decades.' He winced as another, sharper lance of agony crashed through him, making him draw his knees up to his chest and turn his face down into the mattress, muffling his voice. 'Idiots. Them, not you.'

The faint snick of the lamp reached London's ears – Elliot turning off the subtle glow of the bulb – but it didn't do any good. Where his suffering had previously been driven on by external influences, it was now like a spiked ball of lead in the center of his skull, twisting and ramming around his cranial space as a rough moan of discomfort scratched at his throat.

Sitting up had been a mistake. Now the pain pulsed and writhed, waxing and waning in intensity. He could almost feel the individual sections in his brain: glorious forests of neurons falling victim to the raging inferno. His neck had become a cracked steel bar, utterly inflexible. Muscles contracted, tight and unforgiving, and all he wanted was for it to stop.

He felt Elliot's hand at his temple, slippery over the sheen of sweat as he brushed London's curls back from his skin. 'Does this still help?' Elliot asked quietly. His touch was feather-light, a breath of sensation and no more. What had been comforting and relieving a short while ago was now as distant as starlight trying to melt the polar ice caps. Yet for all that the movement was ineffective for offering relief, the gentle stroke of Elliot's fingers at least made London feel like something to be treasured – guarded with the utmost loyalty and protected at any cost. It was rare, that kind of regard, and he could not bring himself to turn it aside.

'A little,'. His thoughts broke and shattered amidst the vortex of discomfort that was rising behind his eyes.

It reminded London of the time when he was sixteen and trapped in an endless loop of recovery and deterioration. There had been so little of him left by the end of that year, scattered out and strewn thin by the passing havoc of his mind. He had hated it. Hated that his once incredible thoughts were reduced to so much white-noise bringing him neither the joy of deduction nor the peace of silence. He could recall frenzied cries, his fingernails clawing at his own skin, biting bleeding lines into his scalp in a desperate effort to rip out the torment inside his head.

London's jaw clenched as another, fuller wave washed through him, bringing panic with it. God, he'd do anything to bring it to a halt, anything: sell his soul, fill himself to the brim with drugs, even put his head in a fucking guillotine if it brought him respite, but there was none to be found. He could feel his own breaths turning sharp at their edges as the minutes passed, catching on sounds he could not stifle even if he tried. Dimly, he could feel Elliot moving, slipping down to lie at his side and murmuring his sympathies in a tight, hurting voice, as if the Consulting Criminal's own horror was echoing back at him.

Unfortunately, life was not a fairy tale. His torment was not magically banished, and all too soon the sensation faded, lost beneath the migraine's rage. He had warned Elliot it would get worse, but this went beyond even London's expectations, grating against bone and shrieking along nerves until his entire mindscape was filled from one edge to the other with the looming, brutal presence.

It was like being lost at sea, pitched from one jarring wave to the next, slammed down into dark, choking crevices only to emerge and repeat the process all over again. More than once he lunged upright, only finding the bucket by blind luck in the dark. Yet his retches were futile, doing nothing to ease the spin of returning nausea and only increasing the percussive pressure in the catacombs of his sinuses.

Elliot was there through it all, the only thing outside of London's head of which he was fully aware. It was as if Elliot was forcing his way into the arena in which London lay at the migraine's mercy, making his presence known: arms folded and chin raised as if he could challenge the thing that lay the Consulting Criminal's mind to waste.

He was not asleep, London knew that. He could still feel Elliot's warmth next to him and the bed beneath: a boat on the tumultuous ocean of dizzy uncertainty, yet some when in the darkness of the night a new scene built itself before his eyes. Dusty ground and Roman stone rose around him, tumble-down and ruined like his mind-palace. Yet the hard-packed earth beneath him was stained with the blood of those previously vanquished. Bleached white bones, pitted with claw marks, lay in the curve of the oval space, and all around the edge the lions paced in their cages, their rising growls filling London's ears as he waited for their attack.

Elliot stepped forward, past London's hunched form, to stand between him and the threat that lay ahead. He bore no spear, no weapon with which to fight off the creatures, yet his readiness for battle seemed to radiate from every angle of his body. He was braced, grim-faced and determined as the quiet wind brought with it the phantom cheers of an audience who had long since turned sedimentary in their graves.

Not real. London thought to himself, yet when he opened his eyes to the dark bedroom his eyes were full of grit and his mouth tasted of blood. Elliot was still awake, still watching him as if he could not bear to turn away, his profile thrown into relief by the sallow street lamps that glowed beyond the curtains.

He looked wrong, neither soldierly nor gladiatorial, but battered and fractured, as if for all his wars and all his battles he had finally found something which he could not win. London watched Elliot purse his lips, their corners twitching downwards as if he were trying to suppress a sob.

'If this is the price you pay for being so bloody brilliant,' Elliot whispered, 'then I'm not sure it's worth it.' His voice was shaking, tense and miserable as he clung to London, returning his grasping, drowning grip in equal measure.

He thought of the flash and rush of the mystery, the puzzle, the game – all such a distant memory now. He thought of his own mind, marvelous when it was whole, but now lying in useless decay, and when he answered, it felt as though the truth was tearing itself free of him, limping and wretched.

'Neither am I.'

Morning's light crept through the window like a funeral procession. There had not been any respite in the passing hours of the night. London had not been exaggerating when he had told Elliot it would get worse. There were no more fascinating symptoms – no more riddles of language or senses entwined – only ravages that took the glowing metropolis of London's brilliance and shook it utterly to dust, leaving them both lying in its rubble.

London wept, far beyond shame in the net of his own agony.

Elliot prayed, too desperate to remember he believed in neither God nor the church.

He had tried to help – ice-packs, cool, wet towels, anything and everything to somehow allow the Consulting Criminal to focus outwards, rather than getting caught up in the tempest that lay waste to him – but he was too far gone. It was so different from the times when London had stood, dripping blood or cradling broken bones, injured and furious but still himself in the midst of it all. This was an assault on who London was and all that he could be. 

A hoarse moan against the skin of his throat had Elliot pulling back and looking down. London's eyes were shut, the pale skin of their lids turned pink with burst capillaries and his lashes salted by the mute passage of involuntary tears – dry now. His hair was sticking to his forehead in a tangle, and Elliot teased it back away from his skin, murmuring something meaningless as London pried his eyes open: a sliver of silver between the dark lines of his lashes.

'Time?' London managed to ask, his voice a rough rasp in the air. Elliot knew he had not been asleep, but he could see the confusion in London's face – the obvious need to tie himself back in with the real world, even if the very thought made his head ache more.

'Half-six in the morning. The sun's just coming up. I should –'

'Don't...'

He sounded wrong – a million miles from the arrogant confidence Elliot now knew so well. He had never doubted that London was human, but it had never been so obvious before. Illness did things to people, tore them up and broke them down. Sometimes they were made new again by it. Other times they never recovered at all. Right now it was difficult to see how London could ever be himself again – hard to understand that this could possibly come to an end – and Elliot had to clear his throat to remove the faint tremor of fear from his voice.

'I'm just going to shut the curtains, get you some more ice-cubes – stuff like that. I'll be back in a minute.'

London did not argue, though whether that was a sign of agreement or because he simply did not have the strength, Elliot wasn't sure. Quickly, he unwrapped London's hand from around his arm, giving those long, slender fingers a squeeze of reassurance before getting to work. He eased the curtains along the rail, blocking out the encroaching day before padding across the bedroom floor and pushing the door open. The bucket at the side of the bed was empty still, so he left it where it was as he paced out into the kitchen.

Elliot's eyes ached from an endless night. He had not slept for even a minute since waking from his nightmare, and he did not dare glance at his reflection in the mirror above the fireplace. Instead he focused his attention on the kitchen, ignoring the faintly sticky linoleum beneath his bare feet as he retrieved ice cubes from the freezer before filling a large saucepan with lukewarm water. A quick hunt in the bathroom revealed a flannel, and he grabbed it from the side of the bath before returning to the bedroom with his supplies.

'You still with me?' he whispered, half-hoping that perhaps London had finally managed to slip into slumber. However, his hopes were dashed by a faint sound of acknowledgement that hissed past London's lips.

Elliot settled carefully on the edge of the bed, careful not to slop the water as he considered his options. Part of him longed to be more pro-active – to hunt out something that would wipe this blight from London's mind altogether – but he already knew that it was a lost cause. Specialists with years of time had found nothing to relieve London's misery during these attacks, and as much as he hated it, Elliot knew he could do no better.

Palliative care was all that remained; Elliot would happily shoulder the burden of looking after the needs of the body in an attempt to reduce London's suffering. He gave London ice cubes in silence, allowing the slippery cells of water to skim from his fingertips to his mouth. He never crunched them, and Elliot suspected it was because the act of biting down was too cataclysmic for the spasms in his head. 

Sweat had left its salty traces across London's face, and Elliot dabbed away the clammy residue in silence, concentrating on the planes and angles of London's features. He moved along the clear frontier of his hairline, dark on pale, allowing the damp cloth to linger across the sharp lines of London's cheekbones before moving down to his neck.

'Is this all right?' he murmured, narrowing his eyes as London swallowed roughly, his next breath jagged before he managed to speak.

'Yes. Thank you. It's – ' London did not finish the sentence, and Elliot let the peace close around them again. It hurt London to talk, that much was clear, and he continued to rinse and drain the flannel before patting down London's neck. 'Good. Cool.'

Elliot blinked, a prickle of alarm rushing down his spine. Stopping in the middle of sentences was not abnormal, generally speaking. Hell, he could remember London doing it when all this started, but carrying on as if no intervening time had passed was enough to set alarm bells ringing in Elliot's mind.

Dropping the flannel back in the bowl, he forced himself to look at London properly, drawing back his perspective to see him as he would a patient. London's eyes were still shut, but as Elliot watched his eyelashes fluttered – too fast to be a conscious reaction. It was painfully subtle, and only lasted a short while, but it coincided with a chewing motion of the Consulting Criminal's jaw. If there had still been ice in his mouth it would not have caused concern, but Elliot felt his heart stutter as he leaned forward and cupped London's face.

'Can you open your eyes for me please?' No response, and Elliot sucked in a breath through his teeth as he tried again, injecting more urgency into his voice. 'Holmes? Come on. I need you to look at me.'

This time, he obliged, eyelids parting to reveal silver irises that watched Elliot with a mixture of confusion and exhaustion. 'What's wrong?'

'Did you hear me ask you to open your eyes the first time?' Elliot asked, brushing his thumb over London's cheek as he gazed intently down into his friend's face, seeing the faint lines of uncertainty etch their way into his skin. 'It's important; it's –'

His words died in his throat, falling to nothing as he saw the presence slide out of the Consulting Criminal's gaze. One minute he was undeniably there, the next he was gone – leaving a doll-like absence behind his eyes.

'No!' Elliot spat, his hands dithering fretfully for a moment before he pulled himself together and began to count, breathing a shuddering sigh when he got to fourteen and London blinked back into the world. He did not seem frightened or alarmed. It was like someone flicking a switch, turning London on and off inside his own head. To anyone not looking for the signs it might seem more like a distracted daydream, but Elliot knew London too well to believe that.

He'd seen things like this before.

'You're having absence seizures,' Elliot managed, forcing himself to sound calm and professional as he gripped London's shoulder. 'Does this normally happen?'

Now London looked baffled, his brow cinching in a frown. He was looking at Elliot as if he had lost his mind. 'Seizures?' he repeated, blinking again as if trying to fit the word into his reality. 'Convulsions?'

'No, they tend to be characterized by short periods of blankness.' Elliot shrugged fitfully, letting go of London. 'Staring spells. The person suffering has no awareness of them. I'm calling an ambulance.'

London groaned, and some of the fear in Elliot's chest eased a little to hear that familiar displeasure at the thought of hospital so evident in London's voice. 'Is that really necessary? It's over. It's gone.'

'Yes it's bloody necessary,' Elliot growled. 'Holmes, migraines are one thing, even ones as fucked up as yours, but seizures as well? You need to be in hospital in case they get worse. If you've not had them before...'

London closed his eyes, his tongue darting out across chapped lips as his throat pulsed around his voice. 'I don't remember.'

Elliot shook his head, punching the call button with his thumb and trying to control his voice as the line went live. 'Ambulance,' he ordered, hearing the brief click of the transfer before he was calmly asked to provide details. The woman on the other end was clearly used to talking to people in a panic, because her voice was calm and smooth as she requested the address.

He spelled out the post code in the phonetic, an age-old habit as both a doctor and a soldier, never taking his eyes off London as she confirmed an ambulance was on its way. Without pause, she asked for more details, no doubt handing the information on to the paramedics as Elliot quickly explained.

The woman assured him that the ambulance would be there in a matter of minutes, leaving Elliot to hang up and follow her quick, practical advice. It was easy to manipulate London into the recovery position so that, should a more violent seizure occur, he wouldn't choke on bile or spit. London merely gave him a very weak glare, licking his lips again before he managed, 'An ambulance, really? How unbelievably dull.'

'Yes, really. You think I should try and take you to hospital in a cab?' Elliot demanded. 'The drivers already have enough to put up with from you without adding this to the mix. I'd better call Alexander.'

'I'm sure he already –' His voice died in his throat, falling silent as the faint lines in London's face went slack again, void and lifeless.

Elliot shivered, glancing towards the clock and checking the interval before he began to count. His experience with seizures was limited at best, which was part of the reason he had called an ambulance. In theory, he knew what to do – knew that fits were rarely fatal – but he wanted London in hospital, monitored and under surveillance with life-saving equipment nearby. That was probably where he should have been all along...

'Knows.' The last word of London's sentence sounded stranded and lost, so far separated from its fellows, and Elliot pursed his lips as London gave him a puzzled look.

'They're lasting about ten seconds,' Elliot informed him, grabbing his boots and shoving them on his bare feet. Socks were pointless, and he didn't give a damn that he was still in his pajamas. All he cared about was getting London to a medical center. 'You don't even know they're happening, do you?'

London's face twitched in a grimace, his eyes narrowing a fraction as the wail of a siren cut into Baker Street. For the first time since this had all begun, he looked not just pained or miserable, but afraid, and Elliot quickly grasped his hand, holding on tight. 'Don't worry. The ambulance is here, and this is all a precaution. For all we know you've been having these seizures for years and no one's noticed. I just –' Elliot licked his lips, shaking his head to himself as he confessed, 'I'm sorry but I can't help you with these, so I have to get you to people who can. Okay?'

'You'll come with me?' London asked, his whisper rasping through the air, tight and fretful as a knock rattled the front door and the sound of Mrs Hanson's alarmed questions rang out up the stairs.

'I'd like to see anyone try and stop me,' Elliot said firmly, meaning it all the way down to the core of his bones as he slipped his hand free of London's grasp and hurried to let the paramedics in.

'Is it bad, dear?' Mrs Hanson asked, her hands clutched tight around the lapels of her pink dressing gown. 'Alexander told me about the migraines of course, but –' She gestured weakly, her hands fluttering to her lips as she stood to one side to let the medics carry London down the stairs on a stretcher.

'This is ridiculous,' he muttered as he went, one arm draped over his eyes. 'I'll be back soon, Mrs Hanson.'

'It's just taken an unexpected turn,' Elliot promised her, squeezing her arm briefly. 'Better safe than sorry. If Alexander shows up –'

'I'll tell him where you are, but he's probably already waiting for you,' she said. 'Look after London, Elliot. Goodness knows the boy is no good at taking care of himself.'

With one last, fleeting smile that did not touch his eyes, Elliot hurried out, climbing in the back of the ambulance as the medics called out readings and checked London's reactions. Elliot hastily filled them in on the migraine's path, seeing a mirror of his own bafflement at the array of symptoms London had exhibited. This went beyond the realms of their expertise, and Elliot held onto London's hand throughout, listening to the familiar jargon flow around him as the ambulance blazed through the traffic.

The noise was probably escalating London's discomfort, yet he remained alert, watching the medics as they worked and occasionally meeting Elliot's eyes with a hint of his usual impatience. To the Consulting Criminal, the seizures were probably undetectable, and Elliot knew he thought this was all a fuss about nothing, but that did not stop his palpable relief when the ambulance came to a halt and the doors were flung open.

Elliot latched on to the side of the stretcher, all too aware how easy it was for the hangers-on to get lost amidst the chaos of patient admission, but he was more than a concerned bystander. To all intents and purposes, he was London's doctor, and even if he wasn't dressed the part, his voice fit the bill as he interjected details to the nurses.

London's smile was weak, but smug at its edges, as if he had expected no less from Elliot. It was a hint of the London Elliot was used to, and he felt himself begin to relax. There had been no more sudden, jarring absences, no more vacant stares and involuntary twitches, and Elliot was just starting to wonder if his fears were unfounded when a sharp cry escaped London's throat as his eyes rolled back and his body jerked, every muscle going rigid. His fingers flexed, and Elliot released his grip, a cool sweat beading across his forehead as he stared. The nurses moved hurriedly, rolling the Consulting Criminal onto his side and calling out details as he began to convulse, arms thrashing and neck jerking, making the bed clatter and shiver in metallic harmony.

Elliot twitched, fighting against his natural instinct to restrain London – to stop him from hurting himself or breaking a bone with the violence of his motions. It was one thing, medically, to know what a tonic-clonic seizure was like, and another entirely to witness it. Fear scraped along Elliot's skin, raising the hairs on his arms and curling his shoulders as he watched one of the best minds in the world reduce itself to this: a storm of electricity and nothing more.

Worse, this was no stranger. It was London. Brilliant, incredible London, utterly betrayed and erased by a malfunction in the one part of him he treasured above all others.

And there was nothing Elliot could do but watch the nurses work and wait for it to end.

It was in equal parts fascinating and terrifying. London had never given seizures much thought, previously. In those brief, fleeting moments when they had played a role in a crime scene – poisoning often presented with convulsions – he imagined the horror of the mind being aware while the transport was lost in a hurricane of conflicting impulses. He had pictured himself awake and thinking behind a wall of physical turmoil, able to sense the world but incapable of interacting with it.

He had been wrong.

It was like being switched off. Everything was just – gone. One moment he was watching Elliot give orders to the nurses, his voice strained but firm like a soldier in a crisis. It had amused him to see Elliot being so commanding, short despite his best efforts and rather uninspiring in pajamas and boots with their laces trailing, yet authority over-ruled appearance.

In the blink of an eye, everything changed. He felt a rash of numbness spread through him: fingers, arms, chest and lips all unresponsive as his spine stretched, pulled taut by the contraction of his muscles. A cry left his throat as the air was forced from his lungs, and the world went black. For a few moments he was there, alone in darkness, vaguely prescient of the clamor and the pain before even that was gone.

The next thing he knew, he was sitting up in the hospital bed, right hand clenched hard around the wrist of one of the nurses while a warm palm rested on his shoulder. Alexander was halfway across the room, his jacket pitched into the corner like so many rags and his expression intent, but London had no recollection of his brother arriving, and he was sure there had not been this many nurses before. Hadn't the bed been out in the hallway?

A vicious spike of adrenaline was surging through his veins, making them feel swollen beneath his skin, and his breathing was quick and harsh between his dry lips. His teeth were gritted in a snarl and his spine curled, halfway through the act of recoiling from the people around him. Fear raced along every nerve, jarring and nonsensical as his mind grappled with his surroundings.

Through it all Elliot's familiar, calm words washed over him. He spoke in the easy, measured tone of someone who had grown used to talking to men as they bled out on desert sands, making promises to the dead and dying in equal measure.

'– all right. I know you're confused, but they're trying to help you. I promise.'

'Elliot?' London swallowed, tasting blood in his mouth. His tongue felt sore and ravaged, and the treble, pounding ache in his head was now competing against the low thud of exhausted, aching muscles. He felt as if he had run a marathon. Everything hurt, from the large muscles in his thighs to the small ribbons between his ribs, clenching and throbbing as he began to shiver.

'There you are,' Elliot murmured, his smile not reaching his eyes as he examined London's face, taking in every clue his expression had to offer. Whatever he found seemed to satisfy him, because his hand squeezed London's shoulder, the ghost of a tremor transmitting itself through his touch. 'You need to let the nurse go now.'

London blinked at where his fingers were still banding the slender arm of one of the young women. To her credit, she looked neither pained nor unduly alarmed, and she waved away his apology with a smile as he released her.

'What –?' London pressed a hand to his head, easing himself back down onto the pillows as he tried to bully his blank memory into offering up some information. All he could grasp were isolated sensations of danger-conflict-hostile that made no sense. 'What happened?'

Elliot stepped back, moving out of the way of the nurses as they worked. London watched him slump into a chair nearby, pulled as close to the bedside as possible without becoming an impediment to the medical staff. He tried to deduce something other than concern from the slackness of Elliot's features, but his head was still ruthlessly uncooperative, losing itself in discomfort and panic even as Alexander hovered nearby, tense and wan.

'A different kind of seizure,' Elliot explained, scrubbing his hands across his face before he continued, and this time it was Doctor Elliot speaking, laying out all the facts as if he knew what treasures they were to London's tattered mind. 'A convulsive fit. You passed out and experienced violent muscle spasms. If you're aching, that's why.'

Elliot frowned as one of the nurses took London's left hand. The cannula went into the vein in the back with a sharp, snake-bite sensation, and the IV line was attached immediately.

'If there is a risk of another seizure, is that really the best idea?' Alexander asked, gesturing to the drip and narrowing his eyes distrustfully as if he felt the NHS staff were probably unfit to take care of his little brother.

'It's standard,' Elliot explained, sparing Alexander the briefest of glances. 'Hydration and electrolytes are essential during recovery, as is medication. Better that it's ripped out than your brother doesn't get what he needs.' His attention turned back to London in the bed, blue eyes intense and pinched with concern. 'Can you describe how you're feeling?'

The Consulting Criminal shut his eyes for a moment, trying to catalogue the mess of stimuli, but the challenge seemed too great. It all felt so unreal, like the fleeting transience of déjà vu, both alien and familiar all at once. 'Everything hurts. Head feels funny. I – I don't remember anything.'

'You won't. You already know seizures are like short circuits in the brain, right? The ones you were having back at the flat were relatively minor. They only affected the highest brain functions. Cognition and awareness.'

He paused, shuffling to the edge of his seat to be nearer to London. 'What you experienced just now was more like shutting down. Everything but your most automatic functions go, and when you wake up again its like you're coming back online from the bottom up.' He shrugged, shaking his head as if he was struggling to find the words to offer reassurance. 'The convulsions lasted –'

'Three and a half minutes,' one of the nurses supplied, already scribbling details on a chart. 'Basic consciousness was regained at about six minutes, and awareness returned after eleven minutes.'

'Your brain switched on without you,' Elliot explained, giving London a faintly apologetic smile, weak and weary. 'Your fight or flight response, muscle strength, movement, all that came back first. The last thing to return is awareness. I'm guessing you've not had anything like this before?'

Mutely, London shook his head, letting his eyes flutter closed as his stomach twisted itself into anxious, bitter knots and his neck grated from the motion. To his right, he heard Alexander speaking in those soft, rounded tones he only used when he was afraid and trying to hide it. London had not heard that from his brother very often. The last time was years ago – after the last overdose – when every word Alexander had said to him had sounded like goodbye.

It should have been.

'Doctor Patel, the specialist you used to see, is already on his way. I'm trying to reach Father to see if he's aware of anything that I'm not.' His voice changed slightly as he looked up at Elliot, addressing the doctor rather than his little brother. 'I had left for university when he began to suffer from the migraines. I wasn't there when I should have been.' Alexander's hand reached out to touch the back of London's wrist, drifting around to the radial pulse as if he did not trust the government-owned machines to do their job and monitor London's welfare. 'Should I be worried about him?'

'You already are,' Elliot pointed out. 'Constantly.'

London wanted to snap at them that he was still here, but the effort was too great. Connecting and engaging with the world felt like too much of a challenge when his head was still aching fit to split in two and his body was struggling not to shake itself apart. Instead he listened, allowing himself to take comfort in the knowledge in Elliot's voice: firm foundations on shaky terrain. He might not know what was happening to him, but Elliot did.

'Migraines can be associated with seizures, but they'll want to rule out anything else like emerging epilepsy, trauma or infection. It's possible that the fits were an isolated event, but...'

'But they could indicate something worse,' Alexander murmured, and London felt the shake in his brother's fingers where they rested at his wrist. 'I should thank you, Elliot, I really should. If he had been on his own – it doesn't bear thinking about.'

Elliot jumped as London jolted, clenching his teeth hard as alarms began to beep. The two nurses already in the room moved forward quickly, pushing both Elliot and Alexander aside with firm hands before attending to London, guiding his jerking, insensate frame onto his side again. More medical personnel hurried in, each moving with the kind of competence Elliot knew well, but he could not bring himself to admire it. How could he, when London was like this?

Alexander was watching, the horror evident on his face: the most expressive Elliot had ever seen him. He had not witnessed the first tonic-clonic convulsion London had experienced, arriving once the violence of it had already passed.

Yet even having seen London through the first one from start to finish, Elliot did not feel any better watching it happen again. In fact, it was worse: not a one-off, but a pattern of repetition that made his heart patter in his chest.

He could see blood staining London's lips – no doubt from his tongue, and as he watched a thin trail of red dripped from his nose, ghastly against the pallor of his face. His eyes were rolling beneath the shield of his eyelids, his jaw clenching and relaxing. Electrocution looked the same, but at least that was brief: one sharp jerk and it was over. This seemed to go on forever.

'Why aren't they –?' Alexander made a quick, abortive movement, gesturing to the nurses. To an outsider it must look like neglect, in a way: a patient violently caught in the cradle of their bed and the staff only stopping him from rolling onto his back. Some of them watched the clock and counted, their lips moving in silent confirmation as another monitored the spike and trough of blood pressure and heart-rate readouts. Medication was administered with care, and another checked London's airway, but there were no efforts made to keep him still.

'They can't. There's nothing to do,' Elliot explained, hating the words even as he spat them out. 'You can only wait for it to pass.'

For a moment, Alexander looked as lost as Elliot felt, watching the Consulting Criminal with unmasked fear. He was a far cry from the government official Elliot knew – his shirt beginning to rumple and his umbrella nowhere in sight. Yet in a moment the expression was gone, replaced by the kind of determination Elliot was sure had ended as many wars as it had started. Alexander walked away towards the door and spoke out in the direction of the hallway. He did not snap or shout, but although Elliot could not hear the words, the tone said everything. 

This man may as well rule the world. His will would be done, and if that meant helping his brother, then Elliot was not about to argue.

Abruptly, London's shudders stopped, and Elliot felt the tension ease out of the room. A quick glance over his shoulder showed him that Alexander was standing in the doorway watching London's lax body like a hawk, lips drawn down and eyebrows pinched into a frown. Perhaps on someone else it would look cold, almost indifferent, but Elliot knew emotion from a Holmes when he saw it. 

Subtle, true enough, but no less real.

'Come here and give me a hand,' he ordered, making Alexander jolt in surprise. He half-expected one of the nurses to argue when he grabbed some gauze and blotted at London's nose and mouth, but instead they moved around him, recording their measurements and giving each other instructions. One of them, the one who still bore the bruises of London's last awakening, handed Alexander a piece of cotton-wool and gestured to the Consulting Criminal's hands, indicating the scrapes and gouges in his palm where his nails had cut in.

'The convulsions only lasted two minutes this time.'

'I'd rather there hadn't been a second one at all,' Elliot replied, checking London's nose. There was no blood in his ears, and nothing leaked from around his eyes to suggest the bleeding was from the cranial space. High blood pressure had probably just burst London's capillaries, but “probably” wasn't cutting it any more. 'He needs his doctor now.'

'Doctor Patel will be here within twenty minutes to begin whichever diagnostics he deems relevant,' Alexander added. 'I've made sure of it.'

Elliot did not question exactly what Alexander had said to some nameless, faceless minion somewhere to get London's specialist here all-the-faster. The lengths Alexander would go to in order to protect his little brother were often implied as limitless – his protectiveness unbound by the constraints of the average person. Now, it was easier to see the intentions behind the overbearing behavior, exposed as they were in a moment of helplessness.

Yet Alexander's care was not just obvious in his willingness to use the power his job provided to assist London. Here, now, there was more ready evidence. Alexander was hunched over the bed, diligently cleaning London's bloody palms. Somehow, Elliot doubted there was anyone else in the world for whom he would stoop to something so – simple.

In truth, the action was more for Alexander's benefit than London's. He needed to do something in order to feel as if he had some element of control – the same as Elliot. They both cared for London, and seeing him like this was – Elliot shook his head to himself, at a loss for words. Ever since London had first started showing signs of a migraine, Elliot had thought he knew the full extent of what it meant to be powerless, but it was nothing compared to this. How could he get so far on in his life, see battle, bloodshed and bullet wounds and still be so fucking useless?

'Careful,' one of the nurses warned, noticing an increase in London's heart rate. 'I think he's coming round. It'll be the same as before: confusion and fear. Try and reassure him if you can. Familiar faces will help.'

Elliot nodded, turning his attention quickly to Alexander, who had only witnessed the very final moments of London emerging from the previous episode. 'He might lash out. The best thing to do is keep talking to him and see if he recognizes either of us.'

'Was he violent after the last seizure?' Alexander asked, watching the faint hints of tension appear in London's face, the coordinated twitch of fingers and the sudden, deep intake of breath that suggested a return to consciousness.

'He was getting there: high level of confusion and distrust. You saw his grip on the nurse.' Elliot squared his shoulders. He almost hated this more than the convulsions – almost – because while London would be awake during the postictal phase, he did not seem to connect, either with his environment or the people in it. He hated to see that lack of recognition in London's eyes.

That fear, as if he thought Elliot would hurt him.

The Consulting Criminal breathed in like a man surfacing from beneath the sea, hauling in a gasp so deep he almost retched on it as his muscles jerked him upright: fight or flight automatically engaged. That quicksilver gaze, so often swarming with intelligence and knowledge was instead a skim of moonlight around the wide pool of dilated pupils. A faint gloss of sweat lingered at London's temples, and his lips were parted around rapid pants of air as his gaze skated around the room, processing everything and reaching a conclusion that had him baring his teeth. His fingers bunched in the sheets as if he were considering tearing himself from the bed and fleeing whatever he saw.

'London. It's all right. You had another seizure,' Elliot managed, trying to keep his voice level as he fought the urge to reach out and touch. Even in the worst kind of situation where life and death were balanced on a knife edge, London never looked this feral – this far beyond his own self-control. 'You were asleep when it started this time, remember?'

'You're in Hospital,' Alexander added, furnishing London with the facts as if it were second-nature, 'and Elliot is right here.'

He did not seem to include himself in the equation of comfort, but Elliot did not have time to dwell on that as he deliberately sat down, putting himself lower and submissive, non-threatening as the Consulting Criminal glared at the nurses distrustfully.

'I won't let you do it,' he growled, his voice wild in his throat, jaw clenched and biting off the words in a way that made them sound as much of a threat as a promise, and Elliot shuddered to think what London thought was happening. 'You can't look inside.'

'No one's trying to.' Elliot promised. He had clearly made some sense of his surroundings – understood the scene of hospital and medical staff, the scent of antiseptic and the sensation of rough sheets even if he still saw it as a danger. 'No one's going to do anything to you at all, okay?'

He reached out without thinking, comfort the only thing on his mind, but London visibly recoiled, hands pulled in sharp to his chest and clenched into fists. A fresh ribbon of blood welled up as the cannula shifted, dripping crimson onto the sheet, but London was too busy staring at Elliot as if he didn't know him at all:

A stranger with his best and only friend's face.

'No,' he said again, and there was a healthy, hideous dose of genuine terror behind the shield of anger in his eyes. 'I know what you're trying to do. You can't!'

'Brother mine –' Alexander flinched as his brother cringed in the bed, and he shared a quick, agonized glance with Elliot. They were still lost, the pair of them, and it was Elliot who started talking about anything and everything, detailing their last case, talking about Baker Street, anything to weave a sense of familiarity around London as the minutes ticked by.

His heart was hurting with every beat beneath his ribs, thudding out a Morse code of distress. Elliot kept trying to tell himself that London would return – would step back into the shell of this snarling, cringing body and know who he was – but the fear that he wouldn't was trying to choke him. Elliot had been doing his best not to let himself jump to all the things the seizures could represent – had been trying to believe it was all down to the migraine, nothing more – but it was hard to be rational when London was like this.

The only thing that kept him even close to placid, at least outwardly, was the knowledge that London would pick up on his tension. Like this, base and animal, he was running almost entirely on instinct, and fear was contagious.

For London, at least, Elliot could be brave.

He took a breath, ready to continue in his endless, staggering monologue, but the air got stuck in his throat as, just like that, London stepped into himself. His lips trembled around his bared teeth and his brow folded into a frown. Pain tightened his features, carving minuscule lines into his skin as it bit through his body, but what had just been a chaos of lightning behind his eyes became a glow – something solid and stable that Elliot would recognize anywhere.

London's throat pulsed as he swallowed, licking blood from his lips as his shoulders sagged and he let his eyes drop closed, leaning back, half-reclined against the pillows. 'Another one?' he asked, dropping his hand from where it was still clenched against his chest to lie, palm up and waiting for Elliot's grasp, on the mattress.

Elliot took it without even thinking, rubbing his fingertips over the slender shape of London's hand. 'Yeah. You were asleep when the convulsions started.'

There was a flicker of recollection in London's face, and he cracked his eyes open, giving the room another hard glare as if trying to pry its secrets from the plaster. 'I remember waking up, sort of. Except I was convinced –' He shook his head a fraction, screwing up his face as the motion caused discomfort before he shuffled further down the bed. 'Thought you were going to saw my skull open and take my brain away.'

'Not an unrelated delusion, considering the circumstances,' Alexander pointed out quietly, a very fragile smile perched on his lips. He seemed pleased that London had managed to maintain a sideways kind of rationality, even if the conclusions he had drawn were fairly horrific. 'Was this seizure the same as the first?'

'It was shorter,' one of the nurses provided as she placed the chart at the foot of London's bed. Her name tag said she was Becky, and the freshness of her make-up suggested she had only been on shift a couple of hours. Elliot allowed himself a moment of pleasure at his own deduction; London's influence in full evidence. 'The duration doesn't necessarily mean that matters are improving, but it's often a positive sign. The scans will show us more.'

'Doctor Patel may also want to run other diagnostics,' Alexander added. 'In fact he requested blood be drawn for a quick analysis. He wanted to check the half-life of the Norazophen.'

Elliot's ears pricked up at that. A half-life of anything pharmaceutical was linked with the amount of time it took for the body to process and clear it from the bloodstream. In any fully-tested drug, that measurement should be known and well-documented. 'Please tell me I have not been injecting your brother with something experimental,' he hissed, the gratification at Alexander's discomfort short-lived as London's fingers tightened around Elliot's hand in faint, weary restraint.

'No. It's been rigorously trialed, but with London's – history,' Alexander lifted one eyebrow, 'there are always additional factors to consider. His use of recreational substances could come into play here, resulting in a new symptomatic spectrum.' The older Holmes touched the back of his brother's hand, a mute, fleeting gesture of apology, as if he were reluctant to bring up his brother's addiction when he was lying in a hospital bed, pained and unsure. 'It is simply another consideration. However, if I am honest, I would rather the seizures were caused by a foreign chemical than something more sinister in my brother's physiology.' His eyes met Elliot's, calm and logical, but with a hint of something more.

'I am sure it's a sentiment you share.'

Before Elliot could reply, there was a subtle noise from the door to the room, Alexander calmly walked over and opened it. He was greeted by one of his people. A few muffled words were exchanged before Alexander gently closed the door and addressed the room. 'Doctor Patel has arrived. I will go and retrieve him from the reception. If you would be so kind as to draw that blood?' He left the question hanging as he strode out of the door, moving with a brisk sense of purpose that Elliot had rarely seen. A saunter was more Alexander's style.

'He's worried but he'll be eating cake within an hour,' London murmured uncharitably, pulling a face as the nurse extracted a vial full of rich, claret fluid from his vein. 'Are you going to help me escape back to Baker Street, or am I doing it on my own?'

Elliot's incredulous laugh was weak, but at least it felt better than sitting in a taut web of worry. 'You're joking, aren't you? Holmes...'

A frail smile curved London's lips, half-hidden by the miserable-excuse for a pillow. 'I wish I wasn't. They'll keep me here for weeks.'

'I doubt that. Whatever happens, they'll make you better,' Elliot promised with the conviction of someone who believed in medical science through-and-through. He straightened his spine and his shoulders, finally looking up to meet London's eye with what he hoped was strength and certainty, rather than hesitance and fear. 'And if you're in here that long, then so am I. I don't care if I’m not family; they'll have fun trying to kick me out.'

London's smile became a grin, tired and subdued, but honest all the same. His eyelids were drooping again, dragged under by the sheer exhaustion wrought by the migraine and convulsions, but the words he murmured were enough to make Elliot's heart clench.

'You're more important than family. That's why you will stay.'

Doctor Patel was very much as London remembered: talented within his field, and far more interested in the contents of his skull than anything else about him. He perused his medical notes with tight-lipped interest, asking the occasional curt question and offering nothing in the way of comforting small-talk. London approved, Elliot did not.

London was fairly sure that, when dressed in only their pajamas and faced with a leading member of a highly specialized branch of the medical tree, most doctors would be suitably cowed. Of course, Elliot was different. He glared and scowled and carried on doing so as swift, no-nonsense instructions were issued to the nurses. Doctor Patel scolded them when the blood test results were unavailable before he swept out of the door to commandeer the machines necessary for diagnostic scans.

'He's one of the best,' Alexander said by way of an explanation, although London could see the tiny lines of disapproval around his eyes and mouth. Doctor Patel had not been chosen by Alexander, but by their father, who cared more about qualifications than bedside manner.

'There's more to being a good doctor than knowing what you're talking about,' Elliot pointed out coldly. 'Your brother is a person, not a brain in a pan or a slab of meat.' He folded his arms, sitting back in the deformed chair at London's bedside and tapping the heel of his foot on the floor: a sharp beat of annoyance amidst the muted noise of the hospital.

Yet Elliot's anger was a thin veneer over something else: a tangled mass of deeper emotion. London allowed himself a steady blink, trying to force himself to observe through the thick veils of lingering weariness and haze that occupied his mind.

Oh.

Elliot was still afraid. Small valleys etched their way into his skin, creasing his brow and bracketing his lips. His hands shifted and slid as he pressed them, palm-to-palm in his lap before one gave a quick squeeze of his own leg – the psychosomatic limp threatening once more – all because of the Consulting Criminal. He remembered in a quick, vivid flash the Elliot in his internal Baker Street holding onto him as if he were terrified to let go. Now, in the real Elliot, the one who mattered, he saw an echo of that desperate need.

He had stopped holding London's hand when Alexander had returned with Doctor Patel. Shame seemed unlikely, since he had not cared about physical contact when London's own brother hovered at the bedside, all tense worry and half-hidden, opalescent surprise. Perhaps he thought he would be getting in the way? Whatever the reason, London missed the touch. He had grown used to Elliot being right there, almost an extension of himself, and now the slender distance between them felt wider than a mile.

Worse, it left him disconnected and untethered. The vertigo at least had faded, lost somewhere in the fury of the convulsions, and the ache in his head and body had reached a strange equilibrium. The sharpness was gone, and instead a leaden beat thudded through him from the top of his head to the tips of his toes, sharpening with occasional percussive ferocity only to ebb again. Elliot's healing hands were not so magical that the slightest touch could banish the sensation, but it made it more bearable.

Without a word, London stretched out, shifting on the bed and ignoring the creaking protests of his body and mind as he snagged Elliot's wrist and drew his hand back into his own grasp. The stupid IV line, now replaced and pumping liquid into his veins, would not let him roll on his side to block out Alexander, and he pointedly ignored his brother's careful sideways scrutiny as he felt Elliot's fingers curl, warm and real, around his own.

'Doctor Patel is a bit like me. More about solving the puzzle than anything else,' London explained, hating the way the movement of his jaw made small detonations of pain fire in his temples. 'It gets the job done, and you know I find platitudes from strangers tiresome.'

'Most of the people you see are beyond pity anyway,' Elliot pointed out, leaning forward and propping one elbow on his knee. 'There's a big difference between a patient and a – a corpse. You have a right to sympathy.'

He wanted to argue, to point out that compassion from anyone but Elliot was neither here nor there, but before he could open his mouth to speak again a couple of orderlies strode in, closely followed by Doctor Patel.

'Since your blood-work is still being processed, Mr Holmes, we'll proceed. We must take advantage of our moment, and a cancellation means we need to move now to make the most of our time.'

'A cancellation?' London asked quietly, shooting a quick glance at his brother.

His brother gave an indolent shrug and the faintest hint of a smug smile in response. 'No one will suffer adversely,' he said.

Doctor Patel cleared his throat in a pointed manner before turning back to London. 'Since you've had both forms of scan in the past, I assume I don't need to inform you of the procedure?'

'No,' he replied, adding a healthy dose of  “just get on with it” to his tone. Elliot might think Patel was a bad doctor, but he seemed to have forgotten that London could be a truly terrible patient.

'He will probably be back in an hour or so,' Doctor Patel informed Alexander . 'Longer, if there's need for further investigation.'

'We're going with him, aren't we?' Elliot interrupted, retrieving his hand from London's grasp as he got to his feet, arms folded and chin tilted at a pugnacious angle.

'That really isn't necessary,' the doctor replied, not looking up at Elliot as he made notes on London's chart. It was only when he spoke again – his voice deeper, harder, far more war-zone than hospital ward – that he glanced up to see Captain Elliot.

'I think it is,' he said in a clear, blunt tone, the kind London often heard when an argument about an unsanitary experiment had reached the point of no-further-negotiation.

'If he has another seizure, the medical staff will be in place to assist,' the doctor explained, lingering on the side of logic and avoiding the thought of sentiment. 'He'll be in no danger.'

'That's really not the point,' Elliot replied, and London glanced across to catch Alexander's eye, gathering together enough focus to communicate the need for his brother's interference.

'Doctor Patel, Elliot will accompany my brother for –' Alexander hesitated, as if selecting his words with particular relish as he lifted one eyebrow in London's direction. '– moral support. I assure you, he will be there in a non-medical capacity and knows better than to get in your way. I have a small amount of business to attend.'

'Business more important than your brother?' Elliot asked, his voice rough and edgy, spoiling for a fight: too much concern and not enough sleep, London surmised. Elliot's emotions always were closer to the surface during times of exhaustion and stress.

'Business pertaining to my brother, which cannot be completed from here,' Alexander replied, entirely unruffled by Elliot's words. He reached for his jacket, flicking out the creases and slipping the sleeves onto his arms. 'I'll be back within the hour. And brother mine, behave.'

He would have flicked his middle finger at Alexander if the effort of moving his arm weren't painful. In the end, London had to settle for a mere grunt of acknowledgement as the orderlies raised the bars on the side of the bed and began to wheel him out and through the corridor.

Industrial walls and ceilings skimmed by, painted in neutral tones of white, beige and blue. The fluorescent lights charted their way past like white lines down the center of the road, and London shut his eyes against the sensory input. It was a mirror-image of another time and place. Another test, another scan: torches flashed in his face and stupid, hateful questions about pain levels and coordination while doctors tried to take apart his complex mind with clumsy tools.

He peeled his eyes open to take in Doctor Patel, older now, more plump than he had been. Happily married, eight years, two children looked after by nannies and day care and the like. Busy parents: all money and no time. Perhaps they would regret that, one day, but probably not.

He had the sharp eyes of a person with an above-average mind. That, at least, was something London could recognize and admire. He had never worked with children, before him. No doubt they would have found him terrifying, but there was respite, of a sort, to be found in his clinical indifference to anything but physiology. He was interested in his parts, not the sum of them.

Elliot cared for it all: flesh, blood, bone and the man within. It was part of the reason he was so tense-angry-tired-strong as he marched along at London's side, steady feet keeping up with rickety wheels. Fear was the other part of that equation, all of it for London. Elliot was scared of what would show up on the scans and what evils may be lurking beneath the calciferous curtain of the Consulting Criminal's skull.

In a way, London thought, finding something would almost be a blessing. It would be a problem to solve, an ill to cure. His migraines had always been a flower of pain with no root to anchor them. There was nothing there to treat, and yet the symptoms bloomed time and again, rare desert flora responding to the rains after droughts that lasted years.

Somehow, he doubted that this time would be any different. The seizures were something else, a new fruit to explore, but the story was unlikely to be written in the structure of his brain.

Elliot glanced down at him, his grim mouth curving into a faint smile which London answered in kind. He wanted to say something – to reassure that this was all a fuss about nothing, and that it was his fault for calling the ambulance in the first place – but he doubted that would go down well.

Whatever he thought of Doctor Patel, Elliot clearly knew hospital was where he belonged.

'Can you stand?' one of the orderlies asked, looking more than prepared to bodily lift London to the machine if he had to. London's expression must have answered for him, because he stepped back, passing Elliot the ridiculous, thin hospital gown for the Consulting Criminal to wear.

'It could be worse,' Elliot pointed out when he noticed the faintly repulsed look on London's face. 'At least you've still got your underwear.'

'Only because it's all I was wearing when the paramedics took me away.' Carefully, London propped himself on his elbow, waiting for his brain and body to work in harmony before he swung his feet over the side of the bed and wobbled gracelessly to his feet.

God, it was awful, like being fourteen and nothing but knees and elbows all over again. His legs felt too long and his thighs shook with the effort of supporting his weight, but he forced himself to do it, noting with some satisfaction that although his head was still shrieking at him, it was not nearly as crippling as it had been that morning.

'There's no metal in them, is there?'

'In my underwear?' London asked, leaning slightly against Elliot as those nimble, rough fingers did up the tie on the ridiculous gown.

'Knowing your expensive taste in clothes, it wouldn't surprise me to find out you had gold thread or platinum buttons on your pants,' Elliot replied, the smile becoming a grin at London's gentle laugh.

'There is a line between stylish and ridiculous.' London shut his eyes, taking a steadying breath as Elliot helped him towards the machine. 'No, there's no metal on me at all.' He glanced at the plastic cannula, seated in a different vein now and free from its IV line. It looked like an alien bulk on his hand 'Stop worrying?' he asked softly, wishing he could make Elliot obey the simple request. 'Please?'

'Easier said than done,' Elliot replied. 'I'll stop worrying when you're back to yourself again. Come on, up you get.'

He gestured to the waiting device, and London bent his knees, obligingly lying down as Elliot gave him one last look and followed the nurse's guidance into the small control room.

London had been anesthetized during his scans as a child, when the act of keeping his head still had been too much for him. Those times were long gone, and hours of lying motionless on the couch stood him in good stead. Claustrophobia was not an issue for him, and he forced his shoulders to relax as the orderly carefully padded London's head and gave him some ear plugs to protect him from the noise.

'Twenty minutes, Mr Holmes,' Dr Patel's voice came over the speaker system. 'We'll monitor you for further seizures in the duration.'

'And if you need to get out, just say something,' 

Slice by slice, to the screens beyond: his grey and white matter offered up for their viewing. Yet for all that they could examine every section, every transience and fissure, they would see nothing of what made him who he was. Dr Patel would not discern the cause of his intelligence, only the home of it. He would not be able to tell what made him laugh or stirred up that beautiful, white-light moment of epiphany.

Elliot was the only one in there who would look at those pictures and see London, rather than merely another brain passing by. They shared it like a secret – this is who I am.

And for once in his life, the Consulting Criminal was not afraid to be known.

Elliot watched the bloom of images on the machine, strange shapes resolving themselves into the unmistakable cross-section of a human brain. He had seen it before, of course, long-ago on his residency, but that had been a stranger lain out; their mysteries surrendered in the name of diagnosis. This – these pictures ghosting past him – were London. That was the mind he carried around in that thick skull of his, the one that gifted the world with dazzling deductions and cool analyses.

It was humbling, in a way, to realize that one of the best men he had ever known could be reduced to something so simple, and Elliot watched each impression go by, fascinated. He was no expert on brain physiology. He knew where it should be and where it shouldn't, and what to look out for to suggest something was seriously wrong on an exterior level, but the tiny nuances of shape and structure showed by the scan were beyond his expertise.

Doctor Patel, however, was engrossed. He was leaning over the radiologist's shoulder – a fact that probably irritated the man no end – giving each image a perfunctory examination as it passed. Normally, a doctor would see other patients while scans were being performed, then either send them off for review by the relevant experienced staff or, if they were adequately knowledgeable, examine them themselves. Elliot was not sure whether the fact Doctor Patel was overseeing every moment of London's diagnosis was reassuring or cause for concern.

'Ten more minutes, Mr Holmes,' Doctor Patel said as he flicked on the switch to the microphone. 'Then we will add the contrast dye to check that we are not missing anything.'

'Is that standard procedure?' Elliot asked, unable to keep the question back. He expected a cool, dark look from Doctor Patel, but he retreated from the screens, rubbing at his eyes for a moment before meeting his gaze.

'I find that the words “standard procedure” and “London Holmes” do not often come into close contact with each other,' he murmured, and there was a faint smile on his lips that lessened the severity of his demeanor. 'However, it is relatively normal for a patient who has developed seizures. Usually, we would wait for a distinct trend: three or four events, perhaps, but given his history prompt action is the best. 

'I'm surprised he wasn't transferred to a private clinic,' Elliot said quietly, watching the minutes tick down on the clock before one of the nurses went through to add the contrast dye to London's bloodstream. 'You're – you're not doing this on the NHS' bill, are you?'

'No, Mr Holmes will ensure the financial situation is under control, and that other patients are not put at risk by our requirements for equipment.' He said it like such interference with the NHS bureaucracy was completely normal, and Elliot forced himself not to dwell on just what strings the older Holmes would be pulling behind the scenes.

Doctor Patel craned his neck, watching the nurse carefully as she went about her work. 'If it were up to me, I would admit him to my own clinic,' he admitted. 'It's both quicker and more efficient, but Alexander thought it best to keep his brother closer to home, so to speak. My patient does not recall his time in my care with any fondness, and I have to admit I cannot blame him.'

Elliot watched the nurse return to the shielded room. London seemed fine, flexing muscles and shifting slightly, bracing himself for further motionlessness as the machine resumed its task. For a few minutes, Elliot kept quiet, expecting Doctor Patel to return to the screens, but instead he leaned back, letting the radiologist work.

'Have you always been his specialist?' Elliot queried at last. Reading London's notes was one thing, but meeting one of the doctors who had penned them gave him a different kind of insight.

'I was called in about a year after he first began to suffer, when the initial diagnostics found nothing of note. His father was willing to pay for the best, and I was what he got for his money.' Something flashed across the doctor's face, and Elliot recognized it. London got the same expression when he recalled a case he had not managed to solve – a sort of self-loathing mixed with resentment at the puzzle for not giving up its secrets. 'It did not do any good. In the end we were forced to focus on trying to alleviate his pain, which was a challenge in itself. Once he reached adult-hood, he moved away. This is the first I have heard of him since he was nineteen, I believe.'

'And he has a new symptom,' Elliot murmured, unable to edit the dread from his voice. It sounded leaden in the enclosed space of the shielded chamber in which they stood, and he felt the intensity of Doctor Patel's gaze on him as he stared at the floor.

'It is always worse for doctors when their loved ones fall ill,' he said with a surprising amount of delicacy, 'if only because we know just how unwell they might be.'

He did not bother to correct his assumption about loved ones. 

It was pointless. 

It always was.

'That said, there is no obvious cause for concern on these scans,' Doctor Patel gestured towards the screens, and Elliot looked up to see he was still focusing on the data in front of him. 'I'll need to do a more thorough examination, and I'll run a comparison with the last images we took. There will be some small differences, since Mr Holmes was still a juvenile at the time, but it can offer us a wealth of information.'

'How long?' Elliot asked, straightening up as the scan came to an end and the heavy clatter and clunk of the machine fell silent again. 'How long until you know?'

'A couple of hours, perhaps,' Doctor Patel said, and now he was back to his previous perfunctory behavior, dismissing him as if he were nothing but furniture. 'We should also have the results of the blood test very soon.' He turned to one of the nurses. 'Please see Mr Holmes and Elliot to room 122.'

Elliot raised an eyebrow. Previously they had been in a holding bay for new admissions, private in itself, rather than a ward, but not equipped for anything but a medical emergency. Now it seemed London would get a room to himself, and Elliot could very easily sense Alexander's influence smoothing the way. Some of his “business” perhaps.

The nurses retrieved London's bed from the corridor and helped him to the mattress. Elliot watched him lie back with a sigh, removing the ear plugs before pressing one hand over his eyes. It was the same light-blocking gesture Elliot had seen repeatedly over the past couple of days, and he held his tongue, keeping back the tide of questions about London's welfare. 

Linoleum squeaked beneath his boots as he walked, one hand resting absently on the bar around London's bed: a meek bond between them as they made their way to the room Doctor Patel had mentioned. It was standard fare, decorated in neutral tones and with enough space to let doctors and nurses work if necessary. Elliot watched silently as a new drip was connected to London's cannula – more hydration – and the pulse monitor found its way back to his fingertip.

A couple of bags were on the floor inside the door, and Elliot glanced inside to see clothes for him and London, as well as a couple of books to read and some toiletries. He doubted that Alexander had gone back to Baker Street himself, but obviously someone had been given instructions.

Mutely, Elliot toed them aside, glancing up to realize London was watching him from the bed. He was wan against the sheets, his face deprived of color except for the shadows under his eyes. He looked like he did after a case had gone on for too long, except that even then the Consulting Criminal was animated, burning bright even as he ran on empty.

Now, there was none of that. He just looked tired and ill, his skin paper thin and his hair a mess of tangled curls across the pillow.

'You don't look much better than me.' London's words curled through the air, answering Elliot's unspoken thoughts as if they had been written on his forehead. Yet in his voice, at least, there was something of the man he knew, and Elliot's shoulders slumped as he sat in the chair by London's bedside.

'Talk to me,' London ordered. 'Why are you so worried?'

Elliot's laugh sounded a bit sick, weak in his throat. 'Why are you not?' he demanded before biting his lip hard. London being stressed would not help the situation. The fact he seemed so unconcerned was a good thing.

'You didn't see yourself. Your migraines are unbelievable as it is, but with seizures?' He shook his head, almost unable to force the words out of his throat. 'I'm worried that it's something worse. That you won't be the same, even if they can make it better. Your brain isn't just part of what keeps you alive, it makes you into the person you are. I don't –' He choked, and Elliot took a deep breath, bowing his head and hating himself for sounding so broken. Maybe if he'd had more sleep he would be in better control, but right now he felt too wrecked to keep it together. 'I don't want to lose my best friend.'

He heard the sheets rustle and looked up to see London swinging his feet over the edge of the bed. He tugged at the cable with the pulse monitor on it, making it stretch enough so that he could crouch down in front of Elliot, narrow-eyed and a bit unsteady, but totally indifferent to his protests.

'Look at me,' he commanded, batting Elliot's hand off his shoulder and grabbing it in his grip instead. 'If it were a serious brain tumor, I would demonstrate more complex symptoms on a more subtle curve. If it were an infection at the very least I should be running a fever.' He moved his head slowly from side to side as if dismissing the possibilities. 'It's a migraine. I'm not going anywhere. You have to believe me.'

'But you do. After the seizures –'

'That's meant to happen. You know that. You told me yourself after the first instance.' The hand without the catheter in it clenched tight around Elliot's fingers, almost painful and surprisingly strong for all that London seemed so frail.

'You don't know what it looks like,' Elliot whispered, clearing his throat before speaking again. 'And do you honestly think that the symptoms you're displaying aren't “complex”?' he asked. 'I've never seen anything like it.'

'But I have. Ever since I was a child it's been the same thing,' London pointed out, his voice knowing and logical in a way that eased some of Elliot's taut nerves. 'Sometimes the symptoms occur in a different order, but they're still familiar to me.'

'Except the seizures,' Elliot murmured, leaning forward and blinking in surprise when London's forehead touched his own lightly, the two of them almost propping each other up. It was a comforting position.

Lifting his eyes, he felt his breath catch in his throat as he met London's gaze. Like this, the two of them were painfully close, the shared breaths between them making Elliot very aware of their proximity.

A sound by the doorway stopped the thought dead in its tracks, and Elliot flinched guiltily. London cast a dark look back over the bed to where his brother stood on the threshold, his expression completely impassive but for the tiniest lift of one eyebrow. A couple of nurses were waiting behind him, one looking faintly disapproving, the other trying hard to hide his smile.

'Glad to see you feel able to get out of bed, brother mine.' Alexander said. 'Now lie back down.' He paused for a moment, letting out a very small sigh when his brother did not immediately oblige. 'Please?'

With a tut of annoyance, London wobbled to his feet, releasing Elliot's hand before climbing back onto the bed. 'I think I could manage a wheelchair,' he muttered, and Elliot saw one of the nurses shake her head.

'Sorry, Mr Holmes. The bed's better in case of another seizure.' She lifted the bars quietly, easing them up so they wouldn't clang.

Elliot got to his feet, dragging his shaky composure back together as he prepared to follow. Yet before he moved even a pace Alexander stopped him, standing in his way with a faint, empty smile.

'I'll go with him. I think you've done enough.' Alexander raised a hand quickly, stemming Elliot's response with a shake of his head. 'That is meant as praise, not a criticism.' There was something in his gaze, an emotion Elliot had not seen before. It was enough to make him hold his tongue, waiting, tense and impatient, for Alexander to continue. 'As I said earlier, I wasn't there when he suffered his first migraines, but I did witness a few. He hated to be touched. Did he inform you of that?'

Elliot frowned, pursing his lips in thought. 'Allodynia, you told me. Experiencing touch as pain...' He trailed off as Alexander shook his head, glancing after London as if considering saving the conversation for another time. After a few seconds, he appeared to decide that his brother was in safe hands and turned back to Elliot.

'While that symptom does present during his migraines, it's one of the first to leave. Yet by the time he was thirteen he would not let me or father touch him at all for the duration of his episodes.' Alexander shrugged, and there was a hint of sadness about him now. 'He barely tolerated the nurses, even. Perhaps he picked up on our fear of making it worse, or maybe being in another person's physical presence made him feel trapped, but you... He seeks you out. He wants the comfort you offer.'

Alexander straightened his cuff absently, glancing at the back of his right hand and the gold ring that gleamed on his ring finger. 'You're the first one he has reached out to during these times in almost twenty years. Do you know what that means?'

Wordlessly, Elliot shook his head, turning the information over in his tired mind. London had told him about the lack of physical comfort from his family, but not that he had actively repelled it.

'No,' Alexander murmured, regarding Elliot carefully. 'Neither do I. All I know is that you cannot help my brother if you're ill yourself. When was the last time you had a meal?'

Elliot shrugged, his mind falling back over a tangle of worried hours, both of darkness and light. 'I can't remember.'

Alexander tipped his head to one side, a fractional gesture as if he were simply absorbing the information. Yet as Elliot watched, he thought he saw something brief and warm creep across the older Holmes' expression. Nothing as overt as a smile, but a faint softening around his eyes as he nodded once in understanding.

'You have about forty minutes. I suggest you make use of them.' Alexander turned away, crossing back over the threshold to follow his brother before calling back over his shoulder, 'My brother in good hands, Elliot, but he'll want you here when he returns. No one else. Think about that, won't you?'

'I was wrong.'

London opened his eyes to see Alexander, who had materialized at his bedside. Realistically, he knew that he had merely approached unobserved, but just for a minute he could almost understand why his eight year-old self had worshiped his eighteen year old brother so – before he buggered off and left him to migraines, analysts and behavioral tests.

'What?' London rasped, lifting his head off the pillow as he grappled with that statement. Those were not words that often collected themselves together and escaped Alexander's lips. When his brother's only response was a raised eyebrow – they both abhorred repetition –  London allowed himself to sag, letting his voice fall flat and cold. 'You often are, though you rarely acknowledge it. Should I celebrate the momentous occasion?'

'Your sarcasm is back in full force, I see,' Alexander murmured, curling his hands around the bar on the side of the bed in an absent-minded way. No umbrella to hold onto. 'I was wrong about Elliot.'

'Yes, from the first moment you met him and every moment after,' London said, allowing his mouth to move while his brain turned the words over. 'You always were one to make assumptions.'

'Untrue.' Alexander drummed his fingers, the soft patter of flesh creating a little melody, trifling and whimsical, hints of early Mozart. 'Initially, I believed that he could be a useful tool, one I could manipulate. His instant, dogged loyalty to you put paid to that notion. However, I still perceived him as –' Alexander hesitated, and London knew his brother was selecting his next words with care. He made no vague gestures to encapsulate an unvocalised concept; he could never be so imprecise. He was an architect of communication, careful to the extreme. It meant London found himself listening out for the unspoken, as much as that which was given voice.

'Say what you mean,' London snapped at last, but it was a flimsy sound. 'I'm too tired to pick apart what you're talking about.'

'I thought he was transient, temporary – someone pulled along in your wake. Just like Sebastian, James and Victor. You led, they followed blindly.' Alexander looked down at his hands where they rested, his lips curving in that tight, pinched smile that was more about awkwardness than joy. 'I did not realize how integral he had become to you – to your happiness.'

'My happiness?' London repeated, not bothering to clear away the rough exhaustion that edged his words as he pressed his hand against his aching forehead. 'Since when has that concerned you? My efficiency and obedience are all you care about.'

'Do you honestly believe that?' Alexander asked, and London heard the subtle inflection. Not a sneer, but something creeping up to genuine regret. Deliberate manipulation or actual sentiment? London knew the former was the most likely, but a quick glance made him hesitate. Alexander tended to meet the eyes of those he was making dance to his tune – an effort at forthright honesty. Real emotion was treated like something shameful. On those rare occasions it was admitted, he looked as he did now, eyes cast down and away, head turned a fraction – as if he could not bear to stare his own feelings in the face.

'What is this all about?' London asked at last, rolling his head on his pillow and trying to marshal his mental resources on the simple act of observation. 'You must have a point, or you would never have spoken in the first place.'

Alexander's shoulders squared, braced, and London saw his throat convulse beneath his shirt collar as he spoke. 'Elliot is a man of many favorable qualities, which I have perhaps overlooked. However, understanding the subtle does not appear to be one of his strengths.'

Now Alexander met London's eyes searchingly. 'Your behavior, your dependence on him – out of character for you even when you are like this – speaks volumes to me about your regard for the man, but your message may be getting lost in the interference of Elliot's own doubts.' He looked back down at his hand where it rested on the frame of London's bed. 

'Like you, you mean,' London muttered with a hint of a sarcastic sneer before his teeth clenched. 'If I thought it would do any good, I'd tell you to mind your own business.'

'You are my business. You always will be.' Alexander replied without hesitation. 'My younger – my only – brother. Who, before Elliot, would take an interest in your safety and welfare if I did not?'

The outburst was subdued, but shocking, more due to its source than its content. There was a reason Alexander did not often discuss such things, choosing to prevaricate and hide his concern behind unforgivable, overbearing forays into London's day-to-day life. Yet here it was, genuine feeling rashly expressed, and with it the faint loss of control they both hated so much. Sentiment forced a person to rely on others – revealed too much while somehow never quite saying enough. He and Alexander both had their reasons for emotional distance, and London found himself staring, half-alarmed as his brother smoothed his tie and cleared his throat.

'I found Elliot's obvious admiration for you amusing at first, so obviously doomed to fail through your sheer lack of interest. I was prepared to intervene if he became inconvenient, or if I felt he was beginning to pressure you in some way.'

'Pressure me?' London asked, the simple word laden with doubt as the doors to the room were opened and another patient – elderly man, second week in hospital, terminal – was wheeled away.

'Yes, an unreasonable concern. I see that now,' Alexander replied, standing back to let the nurses manipulate the bed through the doorway and following, walking on a level with London's head. 'He is not afraid to let his disapproval of some of your less charming traits be known, but coercion does not enter into it. Rather, it has become obvious that he occasionally inspires you to do better.' Alexander raised an eyebrow, and this time when his eyes met London's they were meaningfully intense. 'I believe he is the only person to have ever done so.'

Wordlessly, London climbed onto the makeshift bed there and reclining as directed. For a moment there was a flurry of activity, and a brief, half-whispered discussion about kidney function and contrast dye before Alexander caught his attention again.

'You observe everything around you, brother mine, except occasionally that which is right under your nose. He cares for you and you clearly return his regard. I hope that you won't let this opportunity pass you by.'

'Is running the country really so dull that you're turning to match-making?' London asked, penning in a sigh when Alexander merely gave him an irritated glare. He was not about to give his older brother the satisfaction of anything like agreement. 'I don't need your blessing, or your interference.'

'Or my encouragement?' Alexander asked, his voice archly innocent before it fell into his normal, clipped tones. 'I'll not mention it again. Somehow, I don't imagine I'll have to. The shift in the dynamic between you and Elliot is obvious now.'

The nurse was approaching with a large syringe, the contrast dye for the scan prepared, and instead he found his teeth clenched, his spine arching and his free hand gripping the sheet as she injected the volume of fluid into his bloodstream.

He had forgotten this – how very uncomfortable the procedure was. However, the dye had to be pushed, fast and hot into his vein, making him agonizingly aware of his own circulatory system as it flowed down into his fingers and up his arm.

Alexander's hand took his, his brother mute for once and their discussion forgotten. He did not murmur platitudes, but remained stoic and silent, as if his grip on London was more important than the economy and the world's diplomatic stage combined. He considered recoiling from the touch, or snapping at Alexander that he had no duty to London's comfort, but the words died in his throat. Yes, he would rather it was Elliot there, warm and sympathetic, but in truth even his brother's presence was better than nothing.

'Mr Holmes, I'm afraid you can't stay while the scan is in progress,' one of the nurses explained, her smile hinting at the apologetic even as Alexander nodded his understanding.

London expected him to simply disengage, cutting himself free as if he was merely holding him back. Instead his older brother gave his hand one brief, cautious squeeze, delivering a message of uncertainty and concern without a single word.

'I'll wait for you outside,' Alexander told him at last, stepping back and turning on his heel. London expected a parting shot – a final demand for him to consider his brother's words – but instead there was only one brief look back before he slipped out of the room, leaving the Consulting Criminal's thoughts to navigate the obstacles of his brother's advice.

Elliot stared blankly into the plastic cup of coffee. Strong and bitter, it tasted of pure desperation, acrid on his tongue. It washed down the dry sandwich he had forced himself to eat, but now the whole mess was sitting in his stomach like a rock: indigestible. At least the hot drink was keeping his hands warm, breathing life back into numb fingers as his brain skipped like a broken record caught forever on a loop of 'London-London-London'.

Alexander meant well, probably, by sending Elliot away to find food, though it was always best not to make assumptions about the older Holmes' motivations. Whatever the purpose, it still felt like exile, enforced distance when all he wanted was to bind himself to London's side and keep him safe from even his brother.

It was pathetic, really, clinging and unsavory. That's how London would see it once he was back to his normal self. These past couple of days had played tricks on Elliot, fooling him into thinking that closeness and affection were the norm, rather than an aberration. Did he really think the Consulting Criminal would still reach for him once this was over?

'God,' Elliot muttered, bowing his head and closing his eyes. Tiredness prickled along the seam of his lashes, and he stiffened his neck, forcing his head not to loll forward in miserable exhaustion. He hated being like this, carved out by confusion and filled with the ice-damp chill of worry and fear. Perhaps he should go home, get some sleep and come back when he was more rational. Then at least he would be able to keep his distance, rather than blurring the lines of his and London's relationship beyond recognition.

Yet at the thought of leaving... No. The idea of going back to Baker Street without London made him ache. Besides, he had made a promise to stay, and he had no intention of breaking it.

“He'll want you here when he returns. No one else.”

Elliot dragged his eyes open again, staring unseeingly at the Formica tabletop as Alexander's words returned to him. He had made it sound so important. It was as if there was a great big something staring Elliot in the face and he was too tired to get his head around it. London didn't do comfort, both he and Alexander had made that clear, but he obviously wanted it from Elliot. Was that really as significant as Alexander made it sound?

A dark shape moved into the corner of his vision, and he glanced up, an unwelcoming frown aimed at the intruder who had sat down opposite him. It took him an uncomfortable few seconds to process Cruz's familiar face. He was giving Elliot a half-horrified kind of look, and Elliot really did not want to know what he could see: a tired, wrung-out wreck of a man, probably. Cruz had actually gone pale, the color draining from his cheeks.

'Jesus. What...' He trailed off, clearing his throat and shaking himself as if trying to rattle his thoughts into line. 'What are you doing here?'

Elliot twitched his fingers against the cooling plastic of the coffee cup before lifting one hand to rub his eyebrow. 'London started having seizures,' he managed, his voice weak in his throat. 'They're running tests and things.'

The Inspector breathed out a sigh, and it took Elliot a moment to recognize it as relief. 'Christ, don't scare me like that.' At Elliot's puzzled frown, Cruz scrubbed a hand over his jaw. 'I mean seizures are bad, but, you look like someone's died.' The Inspector reached out, plucking the coffee from Elliot's unresistant fingers and replacing it with his own, warmer cup. 'Here, you look like you could use this more than me. How long have you been here?'

Elliot blinked before shrugging his shoulders. 'No idea. Feels like forever.' He screwed up his face in the effort of thought, realizing just how untethered from reality he felt. In here, amidst bland walls and beeping machines, time didn't seem to work in the same way, and he dragged in a shaky breath as he realized they had probably been at the hospital for less than twelve hours.

Cruz was watching him with a searching gaze, and after a moment he seemed to reach a decision. 'Come on, come with me.' He got to his feet, waiting as Elliot followed suit with a groan, muscles protesting from disuse. He followed the Inspector like a lamb, docile until he saw the reception and the sliding doors leading to the world outside.

'Greg, I can't leave –'

'You're not going anywhere,' Cruz promised. 'You think I'm stupid enough to try and separate the two of you when one is at less than their best? I tried getting London to go home that time, a few months ago, when you were knocked out by that mugger and had to be kept in overnight for observation. The look on his face... I thought he was going to kill me.'

Elliot frowned; his memory of that day was indistinct. He could vaguely recall a throbbing headache and a hissed argument, but judging from The Inspector's amused expression there was more to it. 'I don't remember that.'

'Come and stand outside, blow away some of the cobwebs, and I'll tell you about it,' Cruz promised with a smile. 'Five minutes, no more.'

After a moment's hesitation, Elliot's feet shuffled forward, his undone shoelaces clicking on the pavement as he stepped out into the late-afternoon. The air was cool, brushing against his face and hushing through the thin cotton of his t-shirt. It was enough to raise goosebumps along his arms, but Cruz was right. Within a few seconds his head had begun to clear, and his mind found a slippery grasp on something like intelligent focus.

'What are you doing here, anyway?' he asked, leaning back against painted brickwork. All around them people were coming and going, intent on their own business. A few huddled patients interrupted the flow, sucking desperately on the cigarettes they weren't allowed inside.

'Anderson fell down the stairs at a crime scene,' The Inspector explained, the grin on his lips unapologetic. 'He's in x-ray. I promised I'd stick around to give him a lift home. He shouldn't be bothering Holmes for a while.'

Elliot hummed, wondering if London would be well enough to take advantage of Anderson's absence. It was hard to see any possible way they could get from here – seizures and scans – back to that: their life as it had always been before the Consulting Criminal's migraine reared its ugly head.

'Hey, come on,' Cruz said, giving him a nudge in the side. Elliot realized he must have been slipping back into his own thoughts, his eyes glazing over as his concerns hurried in once more. 'You two really are as bad as each other. You know nothing's ever slowed him down for long.'

'You weren't there,' Elliot replied, dragging in a steady breath that tasted like nicotine and exhaust fumes. 'It was – bad.' He rubbed his hands over his eyes, his tongue fumbling around words that were completely inadequate to convey what he meant. 'I've never felt so helpless in my life. There was nothing I could do.'

The Inspector's hand on his shoulder was a strong, reassuring weight. Gruff and awkward, but appreciated all the same. 'He's no better when it's you, you know,' he pointed out at last. 'All that brainpower can't help him when you're the one in a hospital bed, and it shows in just the same way. More vitriolic, more angry, but still lost underneath it all.'

'Tell me about it,' Elliot urged, shuffling to one side to let a nurse guide an old woman in a wheelchair past. 'I only really remember being hit and then bits and pieces of hospital.' The retrograde amnesia had not bothered him at the time – a standard side-effect of being moderately concussed – but now Elliot was wondering what he had missed.

'That much was obvious as soon as we got to you. You were out cold, and so was the mugger, except his nose was flat, his right eye black and his three front teeth were missing. It took a while for me to notice the mess of London's knuckles and do the math.' The Inspector shrugged, shaking his head as he narrowed his eyes at his own recollections. 'He was very quiet. That's what I remember most. Calm. He bullied his way into the ambulance and stayed with you throughout. God knows what he told the nurses, but no one dared to try and make him leave.'

Something stirred in Elliot's memory: a faint hint of leaning against someone's strong shoulder and the band of their arm around his back, palm rubbing in meaningless circles of comfort as they waited.

'By the time I'd dealt with the mugger and come to check on you, you were asleep and he was slumped in a chair. He looked knackered the way anyone does after a fight – like you do now, in fact. Too much adrenaline and not enough of anything else. As soon as I suggested he go home...' Cruz shrugged, a grin playing on his lips as he met Elliot's eyes. 'He didn't say anything, just gave me this look. I didn't bother wasting my time trying to change his mind.' He ran a hand through his hair, shifting restlessly before shrugging his shoulders. 'Alexander, on the other hand....'

'Had to give it a go, I bet,' Elliot replied with a faint snort.

Cruz nodded, folding his arms and leaning back on the wall beside Elliot. 'London said something. I didn't catch what it was, but one sentence and his brother shut up completely. Maybe it wasn't what he said, exactly, but the tone he said it in. Final. Utterly final. The only way someone was going to get him away from you was if they killed him first. He was still there when you woke up in the morning.'

He could recall that: London looking artfully disheveled, his endless legs stretched out and his eyes narrowed at the slim view of the corridor offered by the doorway, perhaps deducing everyone who went past, or possibly just staring for the sake of it, lost within his own head. As soon as Elliot had moved though, he had been there, alert and present, relieved and unwilling to show it. He had been angry on the surface, but there was something deeper in his gaze that Elliot had not been able to identify at the time.

'Feeling any better?'

Cruz's quiet question made Elliot squeeze his eyes shut, concentrating for a moment on chill air and the distant, incessant hum of traffic that raced through the capital. He was still concerned, shaken through-and-through by what could still lie ahead, but now it was less overwhelming, caged and contained by the simple act of getting some distance and recalling that there was a life beyond all this.

The story Cruz had told him was probably just meant to take his mind off of what awaited him within the hospital walls, but Elliot could hear the message underneath it all. For all his intellectual superiority and disdain of sentiment, when it came to Elliot at least, London's response was visceral. He shared the same need to care and protect. It wasn't much, but it was enough, at least, for him to feel as if he could breathe around the weight of his own uncertainty.

'Yeah, thanks. I appreciate it.' Elliot breathed out, cuffing a hand through his hair and glancing through the hospital doors. 'I'd better get back. Hope Anderson doesn't give you too much trouble.'

'He's a model patient compared to London, I know from experience.' Cruz replied, sauntering along at Elliot's side as they picked their way back into the antiseptic-scented world. 'Tell him to get better soon, all right? Call me if you need to.'

Elliot could hear the unspoken “If it gets worse” in The Inspector's words, and he nodded in agreement, bidding the Inspector a weary farewell as they went their separate ways.

London's room was empty when Elliot got there, and he tried not to let a prickle of alarm consume him. He had been gone for less than the forty minutes Alexander had suggested, drawn back by his own inability to be anywhere else.

He longed to head to where the Consulting Criminal was, but he had no right to be there. He wasn't even next of kin. Something told him that it was really only Alexander's influence that had prevented the nurses from kicking him out. Before long, visiting hours would come to an end, and he braced himself for the potential battle to remain at London's side.

With a sigh, he turned to the bag Alexander had brought, pulling free some clean clothes and a toothbrush. The scent of stress and sweat lingered around him, impossible to cure completely, but at least he could change into something faintly presentable. Perhaps it would help him feel more human.

There was a tiny bathroom off to the right, and he made use of it, splashing cold water on his face before dragging on pants and a jumper. The toothbrush rasped over his teeth, chasing away the taste of the coffee. He refused to meet the eyes of his reflection, choosing instead to stare at the bland sink until the job was done. His feet were cold in the loose confines of his boots, and Elliot dragged on some socks, sitting on the closed toilet lid to do so before he emerged back in to London's room.

He had not heard the rattle of the bed being returned, but London was there – still too pale and tight-lipped, though a weak, brittle smile curved his mouth when he saw Elliot. Alexander was nowhere in sight, and Elliot wondered if he was elsewhere in the hospital, leaning his weight at integral points in an effort to speed up the bureaucracy. For a moment, the nurses fussed around London's bedside, taking a new set of measurements, but after a few minutes they withdrew, leaving Elliot and London in peace.

'Why was Cruz here?' London asked from where he lay, breaking apart the peace with the deep baritone of his voice. For once, he did not wince at the volume of his own words, and although he looked as tired as Elliot felt, there was an awareness behind that gaze that he had missed beyond measure these past few days.

'How do you know he was?' Elliot asked, sitting down in the chair and leaning forward, his forearms resting on London's mattress. He had never, ever thought he would regret the loss of London’s “You're an idiot” expression, but seeing it now was enough to crack the icy case of worry that still wrapped Elliot's frame in its grasp, letting through the first breath of relief. London was more himself than he had been for days: the genuine article, rather than a monochrome facsimile.

'Someone took the time to reassure you, someone with whom you're familiar. Alexander was with me and would only have made you angry anyway. There are no medical staff within this hospital who would claim your friendship. Cruz is the most likely suspect,' London explained.

'You had a cup of coffee, though you held it more than you drank it judging from the spill on your hand.' He reached out, tapping a thin, dry residue on the knuckle of Elliot's thumb. A hot splash neglected and left to cool. 'You've been outside. Your hair's ruffled by the wind, and you smell faintly of cigarettes. The smokers always hover by the door.'

'Brilliant,' Elliot said, unable to stop the grin that crossed his lips as London gave a faint huff that was more gratified than annoyed. 'If you know all that then why don't you tell me why Greg was here?'

'Because I would be guessing,' London pointed out. 'I can extrapolate possibilities, but –' He winced, and Elliot got the message. For all that his brain was coming back to its normal excellence, London was still in pain. The signs of a headache lingered in the tension of his neck and the tightness around his eyes. His lips were bracketed with faint lines, and his eyelids drooped with every blink.

'Anderson had an accident at a scene,' Elliot explained, watching a brief phantom of amusement dance across London's features, smug and reprehensible. 'Cruz was taking him to x-ray, saw me, and stopped to chat. He says to get better soon. No doubt he'll be paying you a visit soon enough.'

London hummed a faint sound. 'Because he can't solve crimes without me.'

'I think he's managing,' Elliot corrected, trying not to smile at the Consulting Criminal's lazy arrogance. It would only encourage him. 'No one likes to know their friend is in pain. He just wants you to be back to your old self. You seem to be getting there?' He didn't mean to make it a question, but hope took over, adding its own inflection.

'No more seizures,' London replied. 'My head still hurts, but it's better than it was.'

It wasn't much, but Elliot was willing to look for the silver lining. Compared to the previous night, London's improvements were noticeable. He was more coherent, and did not move as if every breath caused pain. Yet he could not forget previous times, measured in a slim number of hours, where London seemed to recover a fraction only to slide down into the abyss.

Was this just a brief reprieve? 

Or was it finally the light at the end of the tunnel?