Description: Their first kiss is a mistake. Well, not a mistake—obviously. But, it slips out, when Sherlock is exhausted, and overwhelmed, and terrified, when John is on a white, polished, marble floor, one hand gripping his thigh, the other slipping in the swiftly expanding pool of his own blood.
Review: A 5 + 1 story of kisses! I'm not usually s fan of short fics but this one was really well written and I liked how each of them was a continuation of the previous, they weren't just a random instance in which they kissed. They were connected.
do you know if there’s any fics out there about if John’s limp wasn’t psychosomatic?? Or him with any disabilities?? This is probably v niche but i’m a cane user and, John just genuinely having a limp is one of my favourite headcannons 😔
Hey Nonny!
Ah, you can check out my Disabilities and Medical Conditions for those, and I know John has a real limp/uses a cane in these fics:
Ten Hours by morningdawn202 (T, 2,242 w., 1 Ch. || Angst, Friendship, Worried Sherlock) - It’s been ten hours since Sherlock saw John last. (John has a cane)
Maintenance and Repair by patternofdefiance (E, 106,650 w., 71 Ch. || Future AU, Augmentation || Augmented John, Depression, Body Modification, Slow Burn, Worldbuilding, Sci-Fi, Self-Care, Body Dysmorphia) – John wants to explain the rush of sensation and data, which is just another form of sensation (or is it the other way around?). John wants to say:Augmentation circuits report temperature, pressure, various forms of quantitative input. Sudden changes are reported as pain, since sudden changes are dangerous, and pain is the quickest way to encourage reflexive extraction. But all John can manage is, “Nng.” Because this sudden touch is not reporting as pain. Part 2 of STATIC (John has a fake leg)
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There’s also this one where John has an accident and is disabled permanently:
Breakable by MissDavis (E, 117,627 w., 34 Ch. || Established Relationship, Major Character Injury, Fluff/Angst, Depression, Paralysis/Disabilities, Hurt/Comfort, POV Sherlock, Mental Health Issues, Drug Use, Happy-ish Ending) – After John is seriously injured, Sherlock struggles to figure out how to help him, keep himself sane, and maybe, just maybe, get their life back to the way it's supposed to be. Part 1 of Breakable Not Broken
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So those are my recs for those!!
If anyone has any they can suggest, please do!!! <3
John Watson, James Sholto, and The Blanched Soldier
I haven’t been able to find any metas written about this, but TSOT was so long ago that perhaps parts of this have been discussed already. I read The Case-book of Sherlock Holmes recently, and since S4 appears to be all about the Case-book stories, it seems appropriate to write something on this one now. This story wasn’t at all what I expected it to be, even knowing Sherlock inside and out.
The Blanched Soldier is one of only two Sherlock Holmes stories that Holmes narrates himself:
“Speaking of my old friend and biographer, I would take this opportunity to remark that if I burden myself with a companion in my various little inquiries it is not done out of sentiment or caprice, but it is that Watson has some remarkable characteristics of his own to which in his modesty he has given small attention amid his exaggerated estimates of my own performances. A confederate who foresees your conclusions and course of action is always dangerous, but one to whom each development comes as a perpetual surprise, and to whom the future is always a closed book, is indeed an ideal helpmate.“
But of course, the bulk of this story is not about Holmes and Watson at all; it’s about two soldiers with a very close relationship.
“We formed a friendship--the sort of friendship which can only be made when one lives the same life and shares the same joys and sorrows.“
... 91-year old spoilers and more under the cut.
James Dodd comes to Holmes as a client. Holmes describes him as “a big, fresh, sunburned, upstanding Briton” (sigh... here it is that I miss my Watson). After Holmes deduces Dodd’s military career from his tan, his face, and his accessories, Dodd explains that he is worried about his missing friend Godfrey.
Godfrey Emsworth is the missing former soldier. In the end, it turns out he hasn’t actually been missing; he’s been in hiding on his father’s estate. He has forcibly become a recluse because believes that he’s contracted leprosy, leaving him disfigured and a danger to those around him.
So far, so obvious. On the surface, it seems clear that James Dodd is represented in The Sign of Three by John, and Godfrey Emsworth by James Sholto. But, hold on a minute. That’s not right.
Godfrey Emsworth was released from service after being shot in the shoulder. Hmm.
Godfrey’s father, Charles Emsworth, was also a military man, and very tough on his son. He’s described as a bully and a martinet, linking him to the another hard-nosed military character on Sherlock, Major Barrymore.
Handshake denied by the martinet. (The Hounds of Baskerville)
We tend to think of men like Barrymore and Major Reed, who John interviews during The Sign of Three, as stand-ins for John’s father. They disrespect his military career, and they dismiss him out of hand. They don’t value him. It hurts.
“You could be a used car salesman, for all I know.” (The Sign of Three)
Just before this interview is interrupted, Reed realizes where he recognizes John from. He says with a sneer, “You hang around with that detective... the one with the silly hat.” These interactions, while small, are all we’re given to explain John’s present character, so of course we run with them. It sounds like John’s father was homophobic, and it sounds like John has internalized that to some extent.
“I’m not his date!” (A Study in Pink)
Godfrey has an abusive military father. He’s courageous and reckless. He had a close relationship with another soldier, whom he cannot see again. He left the war with a bullet in the shoulder and a scandalous secret, leprosy, so he needs to hide himself away. When approached, he literally flees from the man who loves him.
Godfrey is John, not Sholto. But John hasn’t been disfigured. Where’s the parallel there?
In The Blanched Soldier, when Holmes finally exposes that Godfrey has been living on his father’s estate, he brings along a specialist on skin conditions, who discovers that Godfrey had not, in fact, contracted leprosy at all. His lesions are real, but the cause was not contagious, but psychosomatic. Oh.
It’s starting to look like John’s psychosomatic limp is not solely linked to feelings of uselessness.
Doyle chose to leave Watson out of this story entirely, as a participant, as a first-person narrator, or even as a third-person narrator (which there is precedent for in the Case-book), despite his direct relevance as both a doctor and a soldier. Doyle wanted Watson as far away from this story as he could possibly place him. It’s easy to see why Mofftiss decided that the relationship between James and Godfrey must actually be a part of John Watson’s secret backstory, and why they needed to create Sholto’s character in The Sign of Three particularly, and why they gave John a psychosomatic limp in A Study in Pink to begin with.
In The Sign of Three, Sherlock saves Sholto’s life, not John’s, from a physical threat. In The Blanched Soldier, Holmes saves Godfrey Emsworth from a life of shame and isolation, and reunites him with his partner. In the context of Sherlock, the Blanched Soldier case can’t be resolved by saving Sholto’s life – it’s John he needs to save. Sherlock cured John’s limp in A Study in Pink, but he still has more to do.
Interesting that we’re reminded of the limp once again in The Lying Detective.
It’s also interesting that there are parallels between James Dodd’s experiences with Godfrey Emsworth’s father and Holmes’ experiences with Victor Trevor’s father in The Gloria Scott. Sounds like John and Sherlock will have a lot to talk about.
We’ve been given pieces of The Blanched Soldier in an episode of every series so far: ASIP, THOB, TSOT, and TLD. This story isn’t resolved yet.
