Chapter Text
October came with cases, and Sherlock turned down every single one of them, on the grounds that he was "incredibly busy right now, Gilbert, please do get out of my flat". And he was indeed busy.
He'd stolen( or persuaded Molly to give him, which essentially amounted to the same thing) some sort of a tool for measuring brain activity, and he'd been conducting tests on a bemused John and himself in pursuit of the reason for their seemingly telepathic connection. John, privately, thought that there probably wasn't a scientific explanation out there, but he kept this to himself because, frankly, Sherlock's search for a reason was keeping him in the flat and intellectually content, and while perhaps it was a bit selfish John very much liked having Sherlock there
always
always
always
because John still had dreams in which he woke up in the morning and the other side of the bed was cold, in which he made tea for only one, in which there were no songs or connections or if there had been they were all severed and gone and when he woke up from these dreams and found the other side of the bed very much warm and sprawled out like a starfish, sometimes he would cry, and sometimes he would laugh, but he would never wake Sherlock if he could help it, he only snuggled back down into his technicolor man's warmth.
So John didn't mind the neurotransmitter experiments because they kept Sherlock home, and home is where he belonged.
They were all inconclusive, anyhow.
No anomalies, no spikes or lulls, no mirrored paths.
Sherlock had proclaimed it Christmas many times.
The only experiment in which anything of import was discovered wouldn't happen until mid November, after Sherlock had, at John's instance, reluctantly returned the neurotransmitter, having done all he could think of with it pertaining to their connection.
It was late afternoon on a Saturday, and John was puttering about the kitchen, trying to decide whether dinner would consist of chinese takeaway or indian, when Sherlock bounded through the door like a puppy, all unbridled energy and yet somehow still graceful.
"John, come on, I've an idea, oh, I've got it this time, we've been going about this all wrong, John, it's US, it's always been us, that's where the answers are, come on now, don't be slow, best do this in the sitting room, comfort is imperative for a successful experiment!"
"Alright,alright" John cut him off with a chuckle, allowing himself to be cajoled into the sitting room and onto the sofa.
"Well." He said expectantly, as Sherlock paced a bit, back and forth behind the couch, his blue dressing gown billowing with his sharp turns. At John's voice he stilled, suddenly, and locked his glowing technicolor eyes with John's own.
"Ah. Yes. Well. Well, the idea is, this thing we have is unheard of. It's unprecedented, and it appears to be unmeasurable, but the idea is to experiment with the flow of thoughts. Find the absolute limit of where we can take this, and that, is the only way we'll get any closer to an answer."
Purposefully, he flipped himself over the back of the sofa so he was sitting beside John.
"We'll start simple. What's the most comfortable position for you to receive deleted information?" He asked, his eyes burning with mischief and ideas. John found that it didn't matter how many times he was fixed with that piercing gaze, he always felt his heart quicken, his breath catch, and God, if he snuck a glance down to those pale pink lips, so infinitely begging to be shut up with a kiss, the things it did to him-
"John,answer my question. I am going to need your entire attention for this experiment to go smoothly." Sherlock chastised lightly in his deep baritone tones.
"Believe me, you have it." John murmured in reply, not bothering to conceal his rather obvious affections.
"Crass, John. Plenty of time for that later, believe me. But now, the question, if you please." Sherlock replied, leaning in close.
John closed his eyes.
"When you press your forehead to mine," John admitted in a whisper, "it doesn't... It doesn't hurt then, at all, obviously, but it doesn't just not hurt, it feels...it feels like summer, sort of, like heat, like warmth, like laughter feels in your throat but a million times more and everywhere...it feels...it feels"
"It feels like the most beautiful notes of a violin prelude in b major, like for a moment, we are completely and utterly one," Sherlock finishes for him, his voice breathless and shy and reverent, as if he hadn't imagined it would feel the same for John.
And then suddenly the gap closes, and Sherlock's forehead is pressed to John's, and it feels like ecstasy, and he lets the words transfer tantalizingly slowly, and somehow his arms wind around John's waist, and John's were fisted in Sherlock's button down, and when it's over John realizes it's only a recipe for sherbert but that doesn't matter, because it was Sherlock's and now it was his and he slumps down, his head on Sherlock's shoulder, his eyes still closed, as Sherlock asks questions.
"You received the thought successfully, yes?"
"Mhm", John responds, still savoring the tingling of new words.
" now, lets try something new. You try and delete something."
John cracked an eyelid. "What?"
"Go on," John sat up fully, looking somewhat incredulously at Sherlock.
"I don't think it works that way, Sherlock."he replied, carefully
" Experimentation, John, won't know until you try."
"Fine" John straddled Sherlock this time, because if the bastard wanted to continue experimenting as opposed to having sex which was CLEARLY what they should be doing right now, he might as well be made aware of it. John pressed his forehead down to Sherlock's, and tried. He really did. He made a valiant effort. But it was as he had said; it simply didn't work that way.
"Sherlock", he said through gritted teeth after a good ten minutes, " This isn't working."
Sherlock cleared his throat. "Quite right. Um. Perhaps a different approach. Just...just relax. I'm going to try something."
And then, suddenly there was a tingling in John's head, like tendrils reaching forward, and suddenly something was empty. There was a...void. The sherbet recipe, which he knew had been there, was gone. He could remember it being there, but he couldn't remember it itself at all.
He shivered, and choked. He opened his eyes, looking shaken. Sherlock looked conflicted between triumphant and stricken.
"I can get them back." He whispered, in horror and in awe.
John pressed his lips roughly to Sherlock's.
"Please. Please don't."