Chapter Text
His leg was aching rather fiercely today.
Usually, it was manageable, but today it seemed to sear with heat like it had been branded, the want just to stop and let it calm down immensely heightened. He had to push through it, however, as should he stop out here, he doubted there would be anywhere he could go to rest. Then again, no fellow doctor he had seen had recommended driving across Northumberland after injuring yourself in combat as a curse, but he couldn’t exactly help that’s what he’d chosen.
Dr John Watson’s life had already been set out years before him.
His family was modest, but quite concerned with their children's education and future careers, hence why most of John’s schooling was in all-boy schools before it was followed by an ulitmatitium when he was 16 by his father. The old drunk (no wonder where Harry got it from, he supposed) sat him down in his school uniform and told him what he was doing, which at the time he fucking hated, but was so scared of the man that he had to follow along.
Sign up for the Army or one of it’s branches or do a trade. Makes more money than a university degree son, you’ll be fine son, make me proud son and all that. Didn’t take him very long to decide that despite not being good with a hammer or a knife, a gun was easy. Turns out after a couple of tours and almost getting sky blown by an IUD, it wasn’t.
He was never going to tell them that of course. Even when he was pulled out on medical grounds, he was still lying to his parents. He’d literally just posted a letter to them yesterday morning at his last stop in Hexham, detailing his participation in a raid that he’d heard on the radio on one of the political channels.
It was in Afghanistan, so they wouldn’t know any different. Plus, he still had a stack of envelopes from when he was on sight, so it seemed legitimate, the would just think the reason it was stamped by English stamps was due to it being flown into the country and all that. His mother and father might be demanding, but they weren’t so bright as to catch onto all of that, given they were constantly dealing with Harry and her problems.
He also supposed, deep down, that was another reason why he’d decided to crisscross the span of a county that he’d never been to. He could have stayed in London feeling sorry for himself of course, but this seemed more appealing. His father had been from Northumberland, his grandparents had lived here all their lives, bless their old souls. He can remember vividly from when he was a child and a teen coming up here for their funerals. He could possibly stop over and clean their graves, given his parents and himself and Harry hadn’t so much as seen them for years, but he would make that choice later once he felt the need to do so.
He would have stayed deep in these thoughts, but something could his attention as the rain sprinkled the windshield of his tan Mini from the side of the road.
A figure, clad in a coat, running through the mud in a way that suggested they were injured, thumb sticking out in front of them like an Army statute. Clearly, it was a hitchhiker and of course, John had been taught to be wary of hitchhikers from when he was a boy and had helped a few not-so-great ones as a young man when on leave, but something compelled him to stop for this one. He couldn’t say why, just that he needed to.
It was obvious the person (by his height, a man) was grateful as he opened the door quite quickly and sild into the small passenger seat shaking, the hood falling off to reveal…a very handsome face.
John gulped in his seat, hands white-knuckled on the steering wheel as he came face to face with the figure. He had black curling hair and blue eyes that looked a hundred miles away, but present at the same time. Sharp. He seemed exhausted, but John tried not to look like a fish out of water when the stranger finally turned to him and spoke. “Thank you, I really needed to sit down. It’s been a trick lately, but you do what you have to do.”
“Uh…sure.” John shuttered out and the stranger actually smiled a little and chuckled, shaking his head. John wasn’t sure exactly what that was about, but he didn’t really have time to ask as for a moment later, the stranger spoke again. “I would start driving if I were you. They’re most likely just about to come though the woods.”
“Who is ‘they’?” John asked bewildered, but saw a flicker of lights coming from the trees in the distance from the side of the road where the stranger had hailed him down, most likely ATVs and people on foot. Looking down, other than the stranger’s coat being misshapen to a certain degree, he was not wearing anything indicative of a prison uniform and he knew in that moment, he had to choose what to do.
Seems his body made it for him more than he did as he made a split second decision to suddenly drive off with no warning. The stranger jerked forward a little, but managed to catch himself on the dashboard, eyes wide like John’s own as he skidded off down the motorway.
There was silence in the car for a long time, before suddenly, the stranger started to laugh. It was a gentle sound at first, but then turned more raucous as time passed. John, still quite overwhelmed at this point, couldn’t help but laugh along. Soon both were snickering back and forth till it finally fell slient again, both looking at eachother.
The man tipped his hand forward as best he could, still wet from the rain. “Sherlock Holmes.”
Sherlock. What a strange name. Still, John carefully kept one hand on the steering wheel and used the other to quickly shake the pale fingered limb. “John Watson.”
“Nice to meet you, John Watson.”