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In classical mechanics, the two-body problem is to determine the motion of two point particles that interact only with each other—such as a planet orbiting a star, or two stars orbiting each other.
The Kepler problem is a special case of the two-body problem, in which the two bodies interact by a central force that varies in strength based on the distance between them.
The force may be either attractive, or repulsive.
_______
>> error code: 1881
>> location: BAK 2212
>> description: route bot disabled, emergency repair required
>> dispatch: Hudson
>> passengers: 1
The red blinking message projected onto the wall of John’s room required him to squint in the dark to read it. And once he had, he sighed.
This was not the first time John had received this directive, nor did he expect that it would be the last. BAK 2212 required more bot repairs than any other planet monitored by their exploration company. While John’s last few visits had been relatively painless, John knew that if the Hudson had been dispatched, this trip would not be a quick job. John wasn’t particularly thrilled about the prospect, and neither would Greg be, when he heard.
“Again?” Right on cue, Greg’s voice came groggily through the same device projecting the unpleasant news onto the wall, John’s inspector clearly having also just been woken up.
“Another solo job I take it,” John said, leaning up in bed and starting to pull on his first base layer. BAK 2212 was cold this time of year, if he remembered correctly. The planet’s seasons changed at a faster rate than the home base’s calendar year; he’d experienced the equivalent of three BAK 2212 winters in the last few months. It seemed to be in a perpetual state of either autumn or winter, not that one could tell beyond the difference in temperature.
John was in the midst of slipping into his standard issue navy coveralls when he was startled by the sudden high-pitched tone of an incoming signal, causing him to bang his elbow hard against the back wall of his coffin-sized sleeping quarters.
There was a mumble of voices John could just make out through the speaker, indicating Greg had received another call. “What? What are they saying?” John asked, but could only hear Greg’s side of the conversation, which mostly consisted of an occasional grunt.
In the meantime, John swung his bad leg over the side of the bed and strapped on his assistive device, first to his upper thigh and then to his calf overtop his clothes.
“Look, you’re not going to like this,” Greg replied after a delay, “but the powers that be want you to stay on longer this time. The cost of sending someone back and forth is starting to add up.”
“Christ.” John leaned his head back against the wall he’d banged his elbow on not a moment before. “And how much longer is ‘longer’, exactly?” He’d been right to think it was a bigger trip. With the Hudson as the designated dispatch ship, of course it was.
“Just a few weeks,” Greg rushed to say, aware he was breaking bad news. “We need to keep an eye on the bots. Maybe even figure out what keeps happening out there.”
“Fantastic,” John griped, only partially under his breath. “I’m the bot babysitter.”
A few weeks’ time was by far the longest he had ever been asked to stay out on a job. Working in uncharted space explorations continued to be much less exciting than advertised.
“I know it’s a bit of a raw deal, but hey, at least you get the Hudson! She’s well stocked I hear, meant for a much bigger job that got delayed. And the ship’s all ready to go.”
John supposed he could have kicked up more of a fuss, maybe demanded to get sent back after a more reasonable period of time. He might have, if not for the relentless boredom of living on the company’s main base. Not to mention all of his clothes were already folded and packed.
“Well,” John said, fully dressed and lifting his rucksack. “I suppose, so am I.”
_______
The journey to BAK 2212 went without incident. John slept in one of the many available pods in the sleeping area while the ship took care of the rest. After not nearly enough shut-eye, John was woken by an older woman’s voice, encouraging him to have his afternoon tea ration. John doubted that it was afternoon wherever they were, but he appreciated the pretense.
“Are you on the ‘English mum’ setting?” John muttered as the tea was poured and delivered to his podside via the in-ship bot. Some of it was spilt on John’s hand, which John suspected was rather on purpose. The Hudson only tsked at him in response, as if he was the one who’d been careless.
The in-ship bot was sleek and white like the rest of the Hudson, and anchored to the ship by a mechanical arm attached to tracks in the ceiling. Despite being essentially an extension of the ship itself, John would still swear the blank oblong robot looked unimpressed with him.
The Hudson landed shortly after with little more than a huff, orienting itself such that the hatch at the back unhinged towards the BAK 2212 station base. John would have normally moved all his gear over to the station, but for once he’d traveled in far more comfortable lodgings than the station primarily intended for housing and recharging the bots.
John suited up in the Hudson’s antechamber, detaching and reattaching his leg’s assistive device to the outside of the suit, and worked the clunky helmet on over his head. After taking a moment to breathe in the helmet’s supplemental oxygen, confirming the suit was in working order, John opened the ship’s hatch. He made his way to the station, barely focusing on the familiar blue cratered surface of the planet, his repair kit slung over his shoulder. There was a slight bounce to his step before his boots’ weights kicked in.
The station was unchanged from his last visit. John walked through the base’s door and headed straight for the charging bay, wondering which bot required his attention this time.
He needn’t have bothered wondering at all. John checked the control room before entering the bay, and it was Anderson again, in keeping with the usual routine.
John, perhaps out of boredom and maybe even out of loneliness, had names for all the bots. His therapist would probably have had a few things to say about that, if he had ever told her.
While John did prefer to keep to himself, even he found the desolate planet a bit lonely after a few visits. The bots were his only company while he was on tour, and he had grown somewhat attached to them, as well as BAK 2212. John’s memory for meaningless numbers and digits was also not strong, and the human names made the unenviable task of distinguishing between them much easier.
Stepping between the control room and the charging bay, John found each rectangular bot currently in-house at their designated charge stations, the soft green lights in the top right corner of their faces blinking in silence. The bots resembled roaming boxes when at work, using caterpillar tracks underneath them for traveling to save on energy, but which could retract for hovering when necessary. Admittedly they didn’t have faces at all, but John couldn’t help but see the system status lights as little eyes peering at him as he walked through the bay.
Unlike the other bots, Anderson was flashing an amber alert, making it easier to find. Otherwise, the bot looked no worse for wear. Anderson had still been able to return to the dock, despite its dysfunction.
“Why can’t you be more like your neighbour, hmm?” John asked, unscrewing Anderson’s front panel. “Sally never needs repairs.”
The Anderson bot gave a muffled whir, as if miffed by the dig. The sound was promising—the bot would probably only require a few quick fixes and replacement parts.
Everything seemed to be in working order, although several of the circuit switches had been turned off, and the video feed line frayed, possibly from being overheated. The damage would have seemed odd, except it constantly happened to the bots at this particular station. The bots always seemed to veer off course, appearing to be damaged by the unexpected terrain not on their programmed route.
If John were anywhere else, he might have wondered if the damage was caused from the bots being tampered with. Except, of course, there was no one on BAK 2212 to tamper with them.
It was just a glitch with this group of bots, John supposed. He wasn’t about to become paranoid.
Though it did not go past John's notice that he was alone on a planet very far from Earth and the main base, the definition of the middle of nowhere, and strange things kept happening to the routing bots.
And now John was expected to stay indefinitely, or at least until the main base decided he could return.
John looked out of the small circular window of the charging bay to the bleak landscape beyond. It appeared more violet than blue for the moment, seemingly endless and uninhabited.
What was that saying about screaming in space?
_______
Anderson’s functionality was easily returned, unlike John’s peace of mind. The routing bots continued their circulation, which they did whether John was present or not, with Anderson in their ranks once more. John watched over their progress from the video feed in the adjacent control room for the next day, but nothing happened. Nothing ever happened.
The bots’ main purpose was to search for natural resources, with their secondary function to map out the area around the planet’s base. The secondary purpose had become their main over time, as they hadn’t met with much success in finding anything of use on BAK 2212. To John, the whole endeavour seemed to only grow more costly and unnecessary as time continued, but the project still hadn’t been pulled.
As riveting as it was to watch the bots plod along the planet’s never changing landscape, John suited back up to return to the Hudson. If John was more on edge while walking the short distance to his still open hatch, surveying the area and craning his neck within the suit’s helmet, at least there was no one there to see.
Or so John hoped.
_______
John blessed the Hudson for its liveable living area. Off the ship, he spent his time observing self-sufficient operations, which was exactly as engaging as one might have expected.
John alternated between watching films projected in the cozy living area of the ship, and the video feeds from the bot cameras. This required brief walks between the Hudson and the BAK 2212 base, but as this was his only real exercise besides the work-out machines available, John couldn’t complain. He just prayed that he’d be recalled sooner rather than later.
It was almost a relief when one of the video feeds on a bot finally cut out. John waited for the connection to return with bated breath, and had to resist the urge to pump his fist in the air when it didn’t come back online within ten minutes of shorting out.
The appropriate response was to wait for the bot’s timed return to the loading dock, as it was possible of course that the bot was still continuing on its route. John barely managed to wait that long, the excitement of a possible outing thrumming through him. When it didn’t return on time, John waited under a minute before hurrying back to the Hudson to grab his kit.
“Don’t forget,” the Hudson’s voice chimed out. “Your next food ration is in 3.4 hours!”
The ship nagging at him to eat should have been more annoying than it was.
“Don’t wait up for me Hudson,” John said, and then, as an afterthought, “and call Greg if I’m not back within twenty-four hours.”
"John,” the Hudson scolded, “that’s hardly a reasonable amount of time to wait before contacting the main base.”
“Then let’s hope I’m back long before then,” John said, reopening the hatch and heading for the hangar where the base’s scouter was kept.
John was always keen to take out the one scouter available at the base, which despite essentially being a metallic frame with wheels, was built for driving through varied terrain and adapted for the gravity unique to BAK 2212. If nothing else, John was thankful for the bot breakdown providing him with an excuse to take a trip.
The bot’s video feed and locators had malfunctioned in a sector that John was easily guided to by the bot generated route maps loaded in the scouter. John hoped that the missing bot, which he’d recognized as Mike, wouldn’t have traveled too far from its breakdown spot.
But John’s heart was racing from more than just the prospect of driving the scouter; if he’d been sent out to identify the cause of the repeated damages, John had a feeling he was about to discover just that.
However, when John finally reached the exact mark of Mike’s dropped signal, there was no sign of any routing bot. In fact, there was no sign of anything at all.
John’s unease from the first day he’d arrived returned in a flash. His current situation at once felt dangerous. Which was to say, John was having the most fun he’d had in a long time.
Mike had to be somewhere, John reasoned, so the only thing for it was to drive further out, past the route map zones.
John drove the scouter out in spirals and avoided craters where possible. There wasn’t much that could hide a broken bot, beyond the blue hills and dunes. He’d find Mike eventually.
It wasn’t long before John spotted something metallic at the cusp of a crater in the distance, which shone in the small amount of light that reached the planet’s surface from the stars. John sped the scouter towards it, half hoping for an easy resolution, half hoping he’d find something extraordinary.
When John came closer he hopped down from the scouter, and found that the metal he’d seen was only part of the bot, specifically a part pulled from inside. John suspected that if he continued past the crater, he’d find the rest of Mike.
John might not have been much of a ‘people person’, but he had allowed himself to grow attached to the bots. There was an abstract kind of horror in following a trail of Mike’s body parts across a vacant planet.
John hadn’t felt this alive since he’d been in a warzone.
The terrain John now faced was formed by many deep craters with thin plateaus in between, which even the scouter was ill-equipped for. The areas bridging the craters were rocky, and his body wouldn’t thank him for it later if he were to drive over them in the vehicle. John would have to continue on foot. He wondered if this was just a coincidence.
After sliding down the side of the closest crater, and into its substantially deep pit, John didn’t see another part of Mike till he climbed up the other side. John began the arduous task of collecting the bot’s pieces, and storing them in his emptied kit. When the kit filled, he returned to the scouter to unload, and then went back out once more.
John became so engrossed with finding the rest of Mike that he was caught entirely off guard by the trap he was voluntarily entering.
This was in part because the trap itself was quite invisible to his human eyes, or at least, was initially. In any event, it was quite a surprise when on his approach to the next crater, both of John’s legs were caught in a vice-like grip.
Whatever it was that had grabbed him didn’t break through his protective suit, which John counted as a positive. On the down side, John was unable to escape the restraint.
He cried out at first contact in surprise, though there was nothing that could hear him. This wasn’t a luxurious routing station; the scouter wasn’t voice activated, even if it had been nearby. John thought of the bots currently on patrol, and tried to remember if any of them even came close to passing the general area he’d walked into. All the while, John never stopped struggling in his invisible bonds. He could feel sweat begin to collect along his hairline within the helmet made humid by his panting breaths, his heart thumping louder each time he twisted to no avail. Deliriously, John thought that at least he had finally managed to find something on the infamously barren BAK 2212.
John’s futile attempts at freeing himself eventually landed him on his front, as he soon lost balance in his bad leg even with his bloody assistive device. John’s arms shot out to protect his helmet’s visor from the impact, but whatever had his legs was long enough to also break his fall.
This realization caused John to momentarily still. He was lying on top of something that matched the colouration of the crater around him perfectly, but which he could feel was different from the ground even through his suit. And he felt certain that, whatever it was, it was alive.
John watched as the seemingly translucent form beneath him gradually turned opaque, until he found himself lying on top of a creature.
Of sorts.
An alien, John supposed. Though, the alien looked rather like a human man, with a long face inches from his own, slanted blue-green eyes, and a shock of dark curls atop their head. The only discordant feature was their skin, its pigment still the same as the planet’s blue-purple terrain surrounding them. John also belatedly noticed that the creature had gills along their neck, suggesting they were able to breathe the planet’s atmosphere.
This was about all John had the wherewithal to notice, given that the alien was still wound tightly around his body with what John now knew were its legs. When antennae appeared, growing out from the alien’s forehead, John jolted backwards in their grip, but it was no use. He was still quite successfully trapped.
The alien began to brush their antennae over the front of his helmet’s visor, as if trying to reach his face. The antennae ran over the surface of it in broad strokes, before beginning to tap at his visor incessantly.
“Oi! Enough of that!” John yelled, though his voice came out muffled through the helmet. John once again tried to squirm out of their grip, but again, the alien did not let go so easily.
The alien made a single long whirring sound, and continued to rub at the surface of John’s helmet with enthusiasm.
John reached for one of the antenna, ready to break it off if need be, but the creature immediately retreated while making rapid clicking noises.
The clicking and the whirring threw John entirely for a loop. It suggested the creature was robotic, and yet, they looked almost human.
John took the opportunity of being released from their hold to roll off and scramble to his feet, which was unusually difficult given the extra balance required due to the somewhat weak force of gravity.
He now stood while the alien crouched. The alien slowly rose up to their full height, and as they stood, the colour of their skin changed from blue to silver. Almost metallic. John wondered again if maybe they really were a bot, before observing that their skin was now the same colour as his protective suit. They had touched him, and now they were copying his appearance.
Which meant they were adaptive, which was… brilliant. And still did not rule out the creature being a machine. A tall, long-limbed, naked machine. John couldn’t see anything else unusual about their body, besides the lack of genitalia, which was perhaps in favour of the robot theory.
The creature was making more clicking noises, while gesturing to the remains of Mike that John had come to retrieve.
“So,” John said, “you’re the one who’s been breaking all the bots, I take it.”
John was finally looking into the face of what had caused him to practically live on BAK 2212 on and off for the past several months.
A different man might have been frightened to learn that the reason was an unknown creature destroying the equipment, and that he and the creature were currently the only two living things on the planet.
Luckily, John Watson was not that man.
“Is this the rest of Mike?” John asked, motioning to the parts next to them on the floor of the crater. “Are there any more?”
The alien stared at him with eyes unsettlingly keen as a wrinkle formed between their brows, but otherwise did not respond. It seemed they’d given up on the robotic sounds from earlier.
John sighed. “All right, well, I’m pretty sure this is all that’s left of him. So you bring the parts, and come with me,” John instructed, miming out each of the actions with his gloved hands.
The alien cocked their head at him. The tips of the alien’s antennae pushed together in the center of their forehead in a facsimile of a prayer pose, as if contemplating the suggestion. After a beat, the creature obediently swept up the bot parts, including Mike’s outer rectangular frame, and clambered towards John on long silver legs.
John walked alongside his new acquaintance, though at a distance, and began the journey back to their ride. He kept one eye forward, and the other on the unidentified humanoid next to him. The alien walked without issue despite the low gravity, and appeared to be completely docile. This seemed almost too easy.
When they reached the top of the crater, the alien seemed to know exactly where they were heading. They even had the cheek to walk ahead of John, and at one point, John could swear they turned back to look at him and winked.
Once they reached the scouter, John made sure to stand guard over the open entrance to the vehicle while the alien set to work on reassembling the bot with clinical precision.
Mike’s box-like outside frame was still mostly intact, and the alien began by opening the front panel. The alien paused after completing this task and, to John’s momentary horror, the alien’s stomach began to concave as stubs grew out from the sides of their torso. The stubs shortly turned into another set of arms, hands forming at their ends, and the creature’s upper body thinned as if to allow for the redistribution of its mass.
John had heard tales of strange and fantastic abilities in the other intelligent lifeforms known in the universe, but only select people were afforded the chance to travel to the middle ground between galaxies to see them in the flesh. With confidentiality agreements with other lifeforms, rumours from the borders spoke of exaggerated alien biology, and it was never entirely clear what was fact or fiction.
Producing additional limbs as needed was the sort of thing John would have been inclined to file under fiction. Apparently, he would have been wrong.
John watched as the alien’s four sets of long, dextrous hands made short work of a job that would have taken him a quite a bit more time, and require some additional tools. Mike rebooted, whirring and clicking as it came back online.
“That was … amazing,” John praised in response, and truly meant it. “Honestly, quite impressive.” He smiled, laughing slightly.
The alien looked up at John sharply, blue eyes shining in contrast against their still silver skin. John knew that likely nothing he said was communicated to the alien, but he thought for a moment that they could understand him, as the silver appeared to darken across their face, with small gold freckles scattering over their high cheekbones.
Mike, now that it was fully repaired, promptly folded up its caterpillar tracks and levitated off the ground, speeding back in the direction of the base. John watched its departure before turning back to the alien, who was now lifting themselves from their crouched position. They were still observing John with a muted curiosity.
Before John could convince himself to act like a sane person, he pointed at the alien, and then at the scouter.
The alien’s antennae rotated in response, but they didn’t hesitate to climb into the passenger seat of the scouter, leaving space for John near the controls.
John lifted himself into the scouter after them, and drove back to base with an alien in tow.
John didn’t know what he was doing, but he did know that he wasn’t bored anymore.
The entire ride he was very aware of four hands, tentatively touching the sides of the scouter’s seat, unmoving beyond an occasional twitch of their fingers against their leg.
_______
John removed his suit in the Hudson’s antechamber under the watchful gaze of the creature, who barely kept an appropriate distance as John peeled away his outside layer. John tried his best to not feel self-conscious, sitting down on the available bench at one point to detach and reattach his leg brace, the most annoying step in the process.
The alien, unsurprisingly, had no concept of social mores. The second John finished, they were already reaching out to touch the bare skin of John’s wrist, and the silver skin changed once more to resemble something closer to John’s skin pigment. John had recently worked a job in AFG 115, which was much closer to a sun-like star, and had developed a tan even through the base’s windows.
The creature struggled to achieve the exact same tone, and ended up with something much paler. When the alien realized they were unable to replicate the colour exactly, a dimple formed in their chin, and their mouth turned down at its sides. They looked rather put out.
“That’s all right. It’s...er, close enough,” John said, before furrowing his brow. Why was he placating an alien?
He needn’t have bothered, as the alien’s focus then shifted to John’s leg, and the leg brace newly reattached to his upper thigh and calf. They made an inquisitive sound, which John noted was entirely different from any previous noise they had made.
“I was injured, though not actually in my leg. I used to be a soldier,” John responded, stupidly, considering the alien could not understand him. It was dawning on John that he had voluntarily brought a person of unknown origin into the Hudson with him who he couldn’t communicate with any better than a bot. John wondered if he’d gone a bit mad.
He was mad enough to add, only a moment later, “I’m John by the way. John Watson.”
John thought that might be a pretty good starting point, actually. “John,” John said again, pointing at himself.
“J...ohn,” the creature repeated, drawing out the only vowel. If John hadn’t already been sitting down, he might have fallen over. The alien had spoken, for one, and for another, they had done so in a voice significantly deeper than the earlier clicks and whirs.
“You can imitate English,” John said in wonder. “That’s fantastic!”
The alien made a new sound, not unlike a purr, and the gold flecks returned, shining bright across their skin. John wasn’t sure what to make of any of it, and so merely motioned for the alien to follow after him past the boarding area.
“Hudson!” John called, stepping into the ship’s main area when the antechamber door slid open. “Do we have anything like language education on board?”
“Oh, John,” the Hudson nearly gushed from overhead, ”did you meet someone?”
The alien stepped into the sterile white of the ship’s main hallway, peering around as if looking for the source of Hudson's voice. John attempted to the lead the way to the ship’s bridge, but the alien had swept past him, opting instead to bound down the hall to the living area.
John followed after them and watched as the alien pulled a book down from one of the living area’s many bookshelves that lined one wall. The alien proceeded to rapidly flip through the pages, pressing their many hands to each page as they sped by.
John watched on, bemused, eyes barely able to keep up with the alien’s movements.
“Well, that’s one way to do it,” John said with a laugh. He also preferred a book to a projected screen, but wasn’t sure if there was any actual reading getting done at that rate.
The alien finished, snapping the book shut with finality, and slid it back onto the shelf with one hand. The two additional arms the alien had been sporting receded back into their chest, and their torso returned to its earlier, fuller form. The gills the alien had been breathing from while outside seemed to fade back into their neck, vanishing into the surrounding pale skin, and the antennae shrunk down till they were two stubs partially hidden by the alien’s dark fringe of hair.
Once the transformation was complete, they turned to face John looking mostly human. Specifically like a human man. However, John was not going to be making any assumptions there, as from his very rudimentary understanding of aliens, they did not necessarily align with the human gender construct.
“My name is William,” the alien said clearly, and in a shockingly sophisticated accent.
John’s mouth dropped open. “You can… talk,” John said, too taken aback to care that he was stating the obvious.
“The book,” William (apparently) replied. “I now know all the words that were used in that book. I can learn more.”
John’s mouth was still open. He closed it, though he continued to stare. “How do you have an English name—a human name—if you couldn’t speak English a moment ago?” Not to mention a male name, though John knew that didn’t necessarily mean anything either.
“I could speak before, but I—” William paused, obviously frustrated, searching for the right words. “I made myself forget, so I could know other things.”
“O—kay,” John said, and then a moment later thought to comment, “so, John and William.”
“Yes?” William sounded confused, and a bit defensive.
“Yeah, it’s just, God—we’re a bit boring, aren’t we?” John pointed out, his mouth twisting up at the corners.
“Boring?” William repeated, trying on the word like a new article of clothing. “It is my human name.”
“Human name. What’s your real name then?” John asked, realizing after the fact that this was perhaps impolite.
“For you, it would sound closest to…. Sherlock,” they said, with an odd hesitance. John didn’t understand how this Sherlock would have an English name, or how they knew what their actual name sounded like in a tongue they had apparently endeavoured to forget. John wondered quite a few things actually, but didn’t ask.
“Well,” John said, “Sherlock it is.”
_______
The first book was only the beginning. Sherlock proceeded to give all the books in the Hudson’s library the same treatment while John watched them work, thankful for the company.
John didn’t even realize until several hours later that he should have performed a routine check on Mike in the charging bay before coming back on to the ship. John would have left Sherlock to their reading, but Sherlock dutifully followed him from the living area to the base when he’d stood to leave—though it was unclear why, seeing as Sherlock was not assisting him in the least.
“You have four arms,” John commented, elbow deep in the bot’s front compartment, “and I suppose not a single one of them is going to help me here.”
“Perhaps you haven’t noticed John, but I only have the two arms at the moment,” Sherlock replied with, to John’s surprise, obvious sarcasm.
Of course. He should have known that he would manage to pick up an alien with an attitude.
And, John had in fact noticed that Sherlock’s additional arms did not make a reappearance. He’d actually found it strange, given that less arms seemed to slow down Sherlock’s reading.
“You didn’t like the other ones,” Sherlock said, as if responding to John’s unspoken thought.
John paused in his work to squint up at Sherlock from the charging bay’s floor. “Who said anything about not liking them?”
“You didn’t have to say it. You didn’t like them.” Sherlock declared this, as if it was only a matter of fact.
“Can you read minds now too? And it’s not that I….” John trailed off, eyes shifting to Sherlock’s bare rib cage, which had been alarmingly visible earlier. “It’s just, you look like a human. And the arms were…. that was a very....”
“Yes?” Sherlock prodded, crossing their remaining arms against their chest.
“Well,” John stalled, “it wasn’t very human. Sprouting other arms.”
John also almost mentioned that it had made Sherlock look too thin, emaciated even, which had set off all of John’s caretaker instinct alarm bells. John wondered if Sherlock could tell he’d thought it anyway, in the same way Sherlock seemed to know other things.
“Noted,” Sherlock said. “And I can’t read the minds of others. I don’t need to. I simply observe, and that tells me everything I need to know.”
John knew he should have found Sherlock’s belief in their omniscience not on, but there was something about the petulance and over the top manner that John found strangely charming.
He went back to work on the bot, and Sherlock continued to ‘observe’ John in silence. Sherlock’s eyes on John were very intent, but Sherlock didn’t offer to help him, nor grow any new appendages either.
John supposed he should have also found being watched disconcerting, but again, he found that he liked the attention. He also suspected he had been watched by Sherlock before.
One of the bots on the other side of the bay let out a lone chirping noise, signalling it was ready to depart for its route, and it reminded John of Sherlock’s noises from before.
“Earlier when I tried to speak to you, were you imitating the bots?” John guessed, looking up once more.
“Hmm?” Sherlock hummed.
John gestured to Mike.
“Oh, yes,” Sherlock confirmed. “The ‘bots’, as you call them. I thought their sounds were a form of communication.”
John supposed that made sense. “And you thought I spoke it as well?”
“Yes,” Sherlock admitted, their brief frown suggesting they were irritated by the mistake. “I’d never heard you speak. Why would you make things that could communicate, but that you couldn’t speak to?”
“The bots aren’t exactly sentient, they can’t really communicate at all,” John explained. “Those noises are them, uh, moving about. Inside.”
“Are you serious? ‘Moving about, inside’, John?” Sherlock mocked. “Aren’t you their official technician?”
“Look,” John said, defensive, “I think you’ll find that I fix them up just fine. Which I wouldn’t need to do, I might add, if you’d stop ripping them to bloody pieces all the time.”
Sherlock’s glowing gold freckles returned at this comment, bizarrely, and Sherlock looked away. “I was—curious about them, that’s all.”
“How many do you need to take apart to satisfy your curiosity?” John asked, incredulous. He’d had to make the return trip to BAK 2212 God only knew how many times, and it had apparently been out of curiosity. “Before you get any ideas, just to be clear, I’m not a bot and I don’t speak bot. I’ll be unimpressed with you if you tear me open for fun.”
“Unimpressed,” Sherlock repeated, lips twitching, seemingly amused by the understatement. “And I know now that you are not a bot. I simply had never seen a suit like the one you had on before, and I had never been close enough to tell if you were human, or—”
“Or what?” John questioned. “A human hybrid of some kind?”
Sherlock’s eyes lowered as he looked away from John once more. “Something like that.”
“Sorry to disappoint you, but I’m not even part bot. Not even a little.”
“Hmm. Aren’t you?” Sherlock eyed John’s leg.
John would usually react poorly to being reminded of his psychosomatic injury and his always present assistive device, bulky and awkward along the side of his leg, but oddly found himself smiling instead. “Well. You’ve got me there.”
Sherlock’s lips slid upward at one corner, as if trying smiling for the first time. It was sweet, John thought. Endearing even.
John realized that if Sherlock was content to stay with him for a time, he would let them. John thought he might let them stay with him for as long as they liked.
This was reckless, ill-advised, and arguably insane, but John didn’t care one whit. One encounter, and John was already captivated by that tentative grin, and the gold specks glowing just beneath the skin.
_______
Unspoken, it was agreed that Sherlock would stay aboard the Hudson. That was to say, John never suggested Sherlock leave, and so Sherlock never left. Sherlock was apparently more than delighted to play with the ship and speak in John’s general direction at a mile a minute, using every new word they had learned with a vocabulary quickly surpassing John’s own.
Once Sherlock had learned enough words, and enough about the territories surrounding Earth, they began to showcase skills that they had been unable to demonstrate without the necessary language and context.
Sherlock had a knack for ‘observing things’. They knew all about John’s military career without being told, which planet he’d been on recently enough to develop tan lines, and that his estranged sister had substance abuse problems. Sherlock was even able to tell that it was actually John’s shoulder that had been shot rather than his leg — though Sherlock was annoyed at John for having provided the key clue the first day instead of letting them deduce it, and John still thought Sherlock knowing the correct shoulder was a lucky guess. It was an infringement on John’s privacy that he found himself inviting, only hoping that Sherlock wouldn’t get tired of having only one human to analyze.
Sherlock had turned from an unusual creature John had found in a crater into a very human-like person, all in a matter of hours. John hadn’t actually offered, but Sherlock had even begun wearing a pair of John’s navy coveralls.
Sherlock had also fashioned themselves a scarf, tearing one long strip of material from a particularly old pair of coveralls, which they used to wrap around their neck at most times. John couldn’t decide if this was born out of necessity to prevent a cold neck, or if Sherlock was trying to add fashionable flair to the drab outfit with the material they had available to them.
If the latter, John had to admit they were somewhat successful.
The pair of John’s coveralls that Sherlock wore as intended didn’t fit them well of course—the garment was too short in the arms and legs, and the waist sat too high. The overall effect was almost cute, or so John thought, while also really wishing he would stop thinking things like that about a person he had found in deep space.
John had no idea where Sherlock had been staying before on the inhospitable planet, but couldn’t imagine it had been particularly homey. John wondered how Sherlock had come to be on BAK 2212 at all, what Sherlock had been doing this whole time, and whether they had ever gotten lonely.
As Sherlock was currently curled up in John’s armchair, reading with their forearms while chattering away about how asinine the book was (beyond its use of interesting words), John thought he might at least know the answer to the last question.
Another mystery that had plagued John earlier on was how Sherlock had sustained themselves. The Hudson had more meal portions aboard than John needed, as it had been stocked for more than one crew member and for a much longer journey. John had more than enough to share, however Sherlock elected to only drink tea and eat pieces of toast, and that was only if John did the buttering for them rather than the Hudson’s in-ship bot. Slowly, Sherlock was coming around to eating more varied foods under John’s insistence, the image of Sherlock’s thin frame still fresh in John’s mind.
The mystery was however solved when he had found Sherlock pressed against the glass of one of the few windows on the ship.
“Do you photosynthesize then?” John had asked.
Sherlock had blinked, and seemed annoyed by not knowing what John had said. Before John could explain, Sherlock had scurried off in a huff, which John had learned was Sherlock’s preferred means of exiting conversations. At the time, John had assumed that would be the end of that discussion.
“Ah!” Sherlock cried out now, still curled in their chair as their hand excitedly tapped the page of the book. “Photo-sine-the-size!”
John looked up from his game of checkers that he was currently losing against the in-ship Hudson bot. “What?”
“I gather from the context it’s how plants on your home planet generate energy.” After trailing one of their long fingers further down the page, Sherlock added, “The process is indeed similar, though I was living on very little fluid and mostly starlight. That was still rather astute of you to guess, John.”
“You know,” John said, turning on the sofa away from his game to face Sherlock, “you could have just asked me.”
Sherlock waved their hand, dismissing the suggestion immediately. John found Sherlock’s various gestures and tics entertaining, as while they were certainly strange, John was always able to understand what they meant.
“Also, it’s pronounced photosynthesize. The ‘y’ isn’t a hard vowel sound,” John clarified. Sherlock pouted, as Sherlock often did when John knew things that they didn’t.
“Photo... no, actually, say it again,” Sherlock demanded, climbing out of the chair and pushing the floating games board out of the way to crouch in front of John. Sherlock peered down at his mouth waiting to see how the word was formed, while the Hudson bot tutted as it began to the right the board where it had been tipped on its side in the air.
“Photosynthesize,” John repeated, as slowly as he could without being patronizing. “So, do you just adapt to whatever environment? Because if you can eat food now, surely that means you have a digestive system - ”
“Say it again,” Sherlock interrupted. John sighed, and repeated, “Photosynth-”
The rest of the word was rather garbled as Sherlock had chosen this moment to close the distance between their mouths, and formed a tight seal around John’s parted lips. John stopped speaking abruptly, eyes wide open and fixed on the face inches from his own. John held perfectly still.
Sherlock pulled back, mouth turning down at the corners into a frown. “Why did you stop? Say it again.”
“You—I—” John stammered, feeling entirely out of his depth. John did not have the faintest idea of what had just happened. Sherlock began to flap their hands in front of John’s face in a signal that John assumed meant to hurry up.
John began to mouth the word ‘photosynthesize’ once again, however this time Sherlock pressed their mouth against his from the start of the word’s formation. Sherlock lips molded to John’s as he continued to pronounce the word. It was by far the strangest form of physical intimacy John had ever shared with another living creature.
But then, Sherlock’s mouth felt like any other person’s. The lips were soft, and yielded to his own, and the mouth was wet and hot against his. Kissing Sherlock was like kissing any other person, and yet, John couldn’t recall ever having his heart race quite like this.
However, John reminded himself, Sherlock didn’t even know it was a kiss.
Sherlock was slower to draw away after the second attempt. Sherlock’s eyes had drifted closed, and when John’s lips finished their movement, they blinked open, dazed as if waking from a long sleep.
John felt the urge to ask if he should say the word again, just to be sure, but cleared his throat instead.
“Did you get it?” John asked, the timbre of his voice much deeper than was usual.
“What? Yes,” Sherlock said, their eyes still blinking. “Photosynthesize. There. Did I get it right?”
“Yes, perfect,” John praised easily, feeling very aware of the fact that Sherlock had not moved away from him. John could see that the blue colour of their irises was lighter up close than in other lighting. It wasn’t an attribute alien to humans, but John found it otherworldly regardless.
Sherlock lifted their chin slightly and puffed out their chest, pleased with getting it right. They then returned to the armchair, and daintily lifted the book from where it had fallen open on the armrest.
“Is that how you usually learn how to speak then?” John finally thought to ask—but Sherlock was already re-immersed, and despite seeming to only need hands for reading, did not look back up from the book.
_______
It didn’t go unnoticed by John that Sherlock completely evaded his question on their digestive system. John didn’t broach the subject again, assuming that he’d never get a straight answer, but it didn’t stop him from wondering about Sherlock’s anatomy, and the obvious questions it raised.
Such as, if Sherlock was drinking fluids now, surely they must have to—well—secrete the waste in some way. John considered whether this could be done through sweat alone, or by other means, and assumed that had to be the case. While Sherlock wore coveralls at all times now, John had seen Sherlock naked the first day, and there hadn’t been anything resembling genitalia in their groin area. Not that John had been looking, and not that John was thinking about it.
Which was why it came as quite a surprise when John entered the ship’s toilet, assuming he was only the person who used it, and found himself facing Sherlock’s back. They were standing in front of the toilet like anyone who had—well—a penis, would. Except Sherlock didn’t. Did they?
“If you don’t mind John, I’m just finishing up in here,” Sherlock said, as if they didn’t mind in the slightest that John had walked in on a rather private moment.
“Right, yeah,” John said, taking a step back, and allowing the sliding door to automatically close.
John heard the toilet flush, which abruptly brought him back to himself, and prompted him to speed away from the door.
John supposed that had answered the question of the digestive system. There might not have been anything in the crotch area when John had first seen Sherlock, but now it was evident Sherlock had something that at least resembled a cock. Perhaps another appendage, that could appear and disappear like the arms.
John wished he could say the curiosity of it didn’t eat at him, but he would have been lying. He knew nothing of extra-terrestrials (or at least, nothing ever validated), let alone whether they had similar sex organs. And he couldn’t exactly ask.
John discovered later that night that his curiosity might not have been one-sided, as John was startled awake in the sleeping area by the creeping feeling of being watched. This feeling turned out to be absolutely correct, as there were two eyes peering at him, shining in the dark, reflecting the starlight spilling in from outside.
“Jesus Christ, Sherlock,” John mumbled, rubbing his face, “do you ever sleep?”
Sherlock actually did sleep quite often, but in naps taken in the living area rather than during the long hours of the night which John associated with resting. Sherlock had certainly never come into the sleeping area while John was asleep before, and John had just assumed Sherlock didn’t have any interest in using an actual bed. “Actually, honestly I don’t care, just don’t watch me do it, okay?”
“You sleep naked,” Sherlock remarked, as if participating in an entirely different conversation. John realized that at some point in his sleep he’d kicked of the bed pallet’s covers, leaving his body exposed.
“Well, I’m definitely not going to be any more,” John muttered, pulling the discarded coveralls next to the bed onto his legs and up to his waist. Christ.
John’s shyness was somewhat uncharacteristic, but there was something unsettling about Sherlock seeing him like that while he was unaware. John knew he didn’t have anything to be ashamed of, quite the opposite really, but wasn’t sure if an alien would have any appreciation for that.
John guessed that Sherlock was likely just as inquisitive about John’s form as John was about Sherlock’s. However, John would have hazarded a guess that Sherlock’s curiosity might not have run in the same vein as his. Knowing Sherlock, they probably had a purely academic interest.
Whereas John wouldn’t have classified his interest as “pure” in any sense of the word. While John wished it wasn’t the case, he also didn’t blame himself for it much either. He’d never met anyone like Sherlock in his life, and in a way that went far beyond the difference in their origins. John imagined that Sherlock was exceptional, even amongst their own kind. How could he help himself, with someone like that?
And of course Sherlock kissing him by accident, even though they hadn’t understood it, hadn’t helped John banish those thoughts. Not in the slightest.
_______
John had only been on BAK 2212 for two earth days before finding Sherlock, but those had passed in such excruciating slowness as to feel like a lifetime, especially in comparison to the madly entertaining fourteen earth days John subsequently spent in Sherlock’s company.
John had almost forgotten he was meant to be on an actual mission, until he received a call from Greg coming through on the ship’s communication feed.
John went to the ship’s bridge to receive the call, informed by the Hudson that it was not in fact part of a spaceship’s function to hold people on the line for him.
Before answering Greg’s signal, John made sure the door to the bridge was firmly closed behind him. He’d left Sherlock in the living area, where he hoped his unusual companion would stay put.
John then reported back to Greg’s grim hologram projection that the broken unit he had come to fix was fine, and that the bot that had needed repairs after two days was also handled.
John did not report anything else.
“I guess we still don’t know what’s breaking them then,” Greg commented, his face cutting out periodically due to the poor signal reception on BAK 2212.
John’s eyes unconsciously drifted towards the bridge’s entrance, and the window in the door. “Who knows,” John eventually responded. “Maybe this planet just isn’t cut out for the bots.”
It wasn’t a lie, John thought. It was true that the bots weren’t designed to withstand an alien regularly dismantling them.
“Between you and me,” Greg said in a lower voice, “I don’t know why we’re still routing it. Never seen anything of use on it, have we? And I am sorry about the long outpost John. You must be bored stiff out there.”
“Bored?” John repeated absent mindedly, eyes once again sliding to the left as he watched the end of a blue tail pass the bridge door’s circular window. “Oh, I’m never bored.”
John cut off the call soon after, traveling down the hallway in the direction he’d just seen a tail wag past.
John peered up at the ceiling. “Having fun are we?”
Sherlock glared down at him from the hallway light fixture. Sherlock then swung their legs down from the ceiling, still holding their upper body up by the tips of their fingers, before dropping to the floor.
“It wasn’t for fun, John. I was studying the ship.” Sherlock made sure to face John, effectively hiding the long, blue-purple tail that had been protruding from the back of the coveralls, over top of the sleeves tied around Sherlock’s waist.
John resisted the urge to grin. John could still see part of Sherlock’s tail, and was able to watch it disappear in time with Sherlock’s legs returning to their normal thickness as it retreated into their body.
“No need to hide it from me,” John said, bemused. “Once you’ve seen four arms, you’ve seen it all.”
Rather than delivering a sharp comeback, as John had come to expect, Sherlock slid their arms back into the sleeves of the coveralls, and zipped up the front. Their cheeks momentarily matched the blue of the fabric, with gold freckles shining dimly underneath. “It helps me balance better,” Sherlock said, their chin tipped up, allowing them to look down their nose at John.
“Ran out of books to read?” John guessed. Sherlock’s eyes looked to the left, before they nodded stiffly.
“Well, there’s only one thing for that then,” John said, turning back towards the living area. “Time to start you on films.”
_______
John brought the white sofa out from the living area’s wall, and after browsing the Hudson’s database, began to project the selected action film. The projector on the Hudson wasn’t quite up to home theatre quality, but John thought the explosions still looked pretty good, especially given that the cubed display was no wider than the game board.
“They call it 6D, but really it’s more like vintage 3D just done proper,” John explained to Sherlock, curled up on the sofa to his left. “The D stands for—”
“Dimension, yes, thank you, John,” Sherlock said, in that terse clipped tone which John had learned to not take personally. “Which doesn’t make any sense by the way. How is this possibly in six dimensions?”
“I know,” John said drily, preparing himself for more snide commentary.
Sherlock proceeded to critique all aspects of the film—from the storyline to the acting, even the projector quality—despite never having seen one before. This sort of behaviour would have normally driven John mad, but John found himself laughing at half of Sherlock’s remarks, or shaking his head ruefully. His discouragement of Sherlock talking during the film ended up not being particularly discouraging, and so Sherlock continued with fervour.
Or so they did, until the hero of the story kissed the heroine, causing Sherlock to drop into silence and, when John looked sideways at him, complete stillness. John was almost relieved when Sherlock started talking again shortly after, of course to provide a rapid fire explanation of how the pyrotechnics in the background had been triggered.
John noticed Sherlock stumble over their words before launching into this tirade, and John wondered briefly if Sherlock had been reminded of how they’d come to learn the word ‘photosynthesize’ a few days prior.
But, then again, perhaps not. John might have considered asking, if he’d thought Sherlock would let him get a word in edgewise.
There was eventually another period of silence, during which John was actually able to watch the film, before Sherlock spoke again.
“You haven’t told them about me,” Sherlock stated, apropos of nothing.
John twisted his head to stare at them.
“How do you always just know things like that?” John said, a bit thrown by the sudden change of topic. “And no, I havent.”
“Ah,” Sherlock said. After another pause, Sherlock answered him. “I know because I deduced it. You show the signs of everything you think and do, whether you know it or not. People everywhere do. Even where I’m from.”
John’s eyes widened at that, once again surprised.
Sherlock had never discussed where they were from before, and didn’t seem interested in saying anything further.
“About telling the exploration company,” John said, “did you think I would?”
Sherlock didn’t respond, which John supposed was answer enough. John’s eyes eventually drifted back to the projection to watch the film credits roll and spin in circles.
John turned off the projection. He’d always hated the 6D gimmicks. “So, I guess that was a bit of a failed experiment.”
“What do you mean?” Sherlock asked, head turning towards him sharply.
John huffed a laugh. “I mean the film. You didn’t like it.”
“Oh. On the contrary John, that was extremely informative,” Sherlock said, sitting higher up in their seat, and curling their legs further underneath them. “Turn it back on. I want another.”
_______
Another two weeks passed before John heard from Greg again.
In that time, Sherlock and John occupied themselves with watching as many films as possible (Sherlock largely dissatisfied with all of them), and at several points, disastrously attempting to play games on the game board. John thought Sherlock might have left the Hudson once they grew bored of John and the few entertainments he had to offer—but Sherlock stayed with him, and never once mentioned going back out beside accompanying John on his regular checks of the bots’ charging bay.
In any event, there was still no news to tell Greg. Besides the fact, of course, that John had befriended an alien who he was now allowing to live on the ship and was concealing from home base. But other than that, nothing much.
“The thing is John, upper management’s been on my back a bit about getting answers about the bot malfunctions,” Greg said, apologetic tone clear even through the low quality of the video feed. “Maybe take some readings in the areas where the bots have been breaking down? Just so I have something to report back.”
John appreciated Greg’s dedication to the bare minimum, and agreed easily. He already knew they wouldn’t find anything, but John wasn’t about to turn down a home base approved reason to take out the scouter.
After the call, John returned to the living area to find Sherlock had acquainted themselves with the 3D printer.
A 3D printer which John did not remember them having before.
“Do I want to know where you got that?” John asked, shooting an accusing look at the Hudson bot, which was currently projecting a block of text for Sherlock to read.
Sherlock didn’t even bother looking in John’s direction. The rectangular printer sat on the floor between them, every part of it transparent, including its currently fast-moving nozzle. It had just completed printing an L-shaped object by the time John finished crossing the room.
“Did you know it’s almost entirely self replicating?” Sherlock asked with childish excitement. “There were a few starting pieces in one of the ship’s drawers, and the printer was able to create the rest of itself on its own. Neat.”
“I suppose you can relate to that,” John commented. Sherlock finally did look up at him then, though in irritation.
“I’m not a printer,” Sherlock said, clearly peeved.
“I know,” John placated. “I meant—”
“Yes John, I know what you meant,” Sherlock snapped. They turned back to the projection, with their back facing John. “You meant because I can grow limbs. Ha ha, John.”
“Okay,” John said, ignoring Sherlock’s bad mood and crouching down on his heels. “And what have you used it to print, besides itself?”
John could just see the outline of the creation through the translucent panels of the device, which Sherlock now reached into, pulling the newly printed object out to show him.
John didn’t fully realize what it was until Sherlock’s finger was on the trigger.
“Jesus, Sherlock! Don’t shoot it, for God’s sake!” John cried out, pulling the gun away from Sherlock’s loose hold. Sherlock released it without resistance, but pouted after as if John had taken away a new toy.
John stuffed the gun into the back pocket of his coveralls, after making sure the safety was on. He and the in-ship Hudson bot were really going to need to have a talk.
“The downloaded templates come with bullets already in them—” John began to lecture, rubbing his forehead with his thumb, “and why am I even saying this? You probably know and just don’t care. Why are you making weapons?”
“Are you quite finished overreacting?” Sherlock asked, rising languidly from the floor. “I noticed you don’t have any weapons on board.”
“We don’t need them to do bot maintenance on uninhabited planets,” John recited, and then wished he hadn’t, as Sherlock of course immediately picked up on his tone.
Sherlock’s eyes lit up in understanding. “Oh, I see. You tried to take one with you once—your military issued weapon I imagine—and it got confiscated.”
“How do you bloody do that?” John still managed to sound more impressed than annoyed. “Anyway, I gather you’re bored again if you’re trying to shoot up the ship.”
“Dreadfully,” Sherlock replied, falling backwards into the armchair a few paces away.
“I’ve got good news for you then,” John said, reaching for the instrument he’d stashed in his other back pocket. “How does taking the scouter out to gather some data sound?”
Sherlock’s eyes narrowed in on the instrument as they sat up in their chair, letting out a single happy chirp. Sherlock immediately covered their mouth with one hand after letting the noise escape, seemingly annoyed with themselves. Their antennae however still twitched beneath their fringe, rotating in small circles.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” John said, attempting to suppress a smile and not succeeding.
_______
John offered Sherlock the chance to drive the scouter, with the ulterior motive of hearing them whir and click again, and he was not disappointed.
He also offered Sherlock the instruments for collecting samples and taking atmospheric pressure readings for the same reason, and to the same result. As John watched Sherlock chip away at the blue crater and delicately lift the dust with tongs into tubes, he imagined the work would be of much better quality than the data he normally provided.
John attempted to take some of the pressure readings while Sherlock chipped, but Sherlock claimed he wasn’t doing it right, and so that job was handed over as well.
They traveled to three separate locations where bots had broken down, with Sherlock driving recklessly fast to each, and laughing every time they hit the edge of a crater and were momentarily suspended in air.
It was the happiest John could remember being, so it was with reluctance when he eventually disturbed Sherlock’s scraping to comment, “we’re not going to find anything.”
Sherlock, miffed, looked up at John briefly through their dark fringe. “That’s patently untrue. We’re finding dust, apparently. And pressure,” Sherlock said, rattling the instrument in their hand as if to demonstrate. “Isn’t it interesting that there’s almost negligible difference between the different areas we’ve visited? I wonder if the atmosphere is consistent across the entire planet’s surface, or if—”
“You know that’s not what I meant,” John interrupted, despite a large part of him wanting nothing more than to listen to Sherlock rattle off theories on pressure across BAK 2212. “You’re the genius. You know why we’re out here. They want me to find out why the bots were breaking, and you’re well aware these samples aren’t going to tell them anything about the actual reason.”
John was looking at the actual reason, and Sherlock’s silence spoke volumes. As John continued to stare, Sherlock continued to scrape. John wondered if Sherlock knew their pale skin was starting to turn blue-purple, as if attempting to blend in with the crater. John wondered if Sherlock was doing it on purpose, and that Sherlock was subtly communicating they’d bolt if John didn’t reconsider his chosen conversation topic.
“I’m not stupid, you know,” John said in a lower voice, but still refusing to back down.
“Hmm,” Sherlock hummed, fiddling with the dials on the instrument. “Where do you get that idea?”
John forged on. “I know why they haven’t recalled the bots on BAK 2212, even though they must know by now the base here is a waste of time and resources.”
Sherlock stood from their crouched position, but didn’t turn to face John. “Good for you.”
“Sherlock,” John said, softening his accusatory tone, “why are they looking for you?”
“You said they wanted to find out why the bots are breaking,” Sherlock said after a pause. “You have your answer.”
John squinted at Sherlock’s coverall-covered back, but didn’t belabour the point. He sighed. Clearly he wasn’t ever going to get much out of Sherlock, even though Sherlock always got everything out of him.
Sherlock’s hand twitched against their side, the fingers of their hand flexing upwards repeatedly. At once, Sherlock returned to the scouter several paces away, and began opening one of the overhead panels.
“What are you -” John began to ask, but didn’t manage to finish before Sherlock had pulled a wire out from within the overhead compartment, and had bit clean through it with their teeth.
“Okay,” John said, and debated whether he should be worried. That hadn’t been something necessary for them to return to base, was it? John wondered for one desperate moment whether, now that he had shown he was no longer playing dumb, Sherlock was going to keep him from telling home base.
This thought passed from John’s mind as quickly as it had come when Sherlock spat the wire from their mouth, and eyed John with obvious nervousness.
“There’s something I want to show you,” Sherlock said, with no further explanation. “Will you come?”
“Off the record I gather,” John commented, smiling stiffly at the hanging panel he now realized was likely related to locating the scouter.
Sherlock snapped it closed again, and nodded.
John climbed back in. He had already well learned that when Sherlock said jump, he jumped. And when Sherlock said ‘drive into unknown territory on a planet in the depths of space with me’ John just simply—well, did.
John wasn’t surprised when they traveled far outside the boundaries of any of the current bot routes, and had a feeling he wouldn’t be surprised by what lay at the end of this journey. It was left unsaid, much like John’s many questions, which Sherlock seemed to be about to provide some answers to.
Sherlock brought the scouter to an abrupt halt, causing the front of John’s helmet to smack against the left side of the scouter. John glared, but Sherlock was already exiting the vehicle, and running one of their hands across a symbol that had been carved into the blue ground.
After presumably confirming they were in the right spot, Sherlock walked to the lip of the deep indent of another of the ubiquitous craters. “Come on John,” Sherlock called, already sliding downward.
John stumbled after them, far less graceful in his hulking suit than Sherlock who glided down effortlessly.
When Sherlock reached the first outcropping along the crater’s side, John was still several meters above him along the slope, and watched as Sherlock crouched down and gripped the edges of the rock. Sherlock eased themselves along the protrusion’s side, rather than continuing their descent to the bottom of the crater. John followed suit, swinging his body down to where he found Sherlock perched on a narrow ledge at the bottom of the outcropping.
John waited a moment, and knowing Sherlock could see his face, lifted his brow and turned up both his palms in the gesture for “what?”. Sherlock held up one finger signaling for John to wait, before they drew back the face of the crater’s outcropping like a curtain. Where there had been solid blue rock before, there was now what appeared to be an entrance to a cave. The sheet Sherlock had pulled off must have been capable of mimicking the appearance of its surroundings, just as Sherlock could, and had been draped over the front of the opening.
Sherlock chivalrously continued to hold the camouflaged material back for John, motioning for him to go in first. John walked into the dark opening without a second thought. He realized belatedly that his trust in Sherlock was the kind that could get a man easily killed, but just as before, he didn’t dwell on that thought for long.
John was in fact rather distracted by Sherlock slipping out of the sleeves of their coveralls, the top half falling loosely around their waist, and the cave’s walls becoming visible as it was now illuminated by Sherlock’s exposed upper half. The gold freckles that were occasionally visible beneath Sherlock’s skin were now glowing, now closer to green than gold, John noted. Sherlock’s skin, normally in a constant state of imitating John’s pale tone, appeared purple in the darker light.
“So, what do you think?” Sherlock asked, a small grin growing across their features.
“Beautiful,” John said without thought, eyes still fixated on Sherlock’s body.
Sherlock’s brows scrunched together in confusion. “What—? You’re not even looking.” Sherlock’s lip dipped, forming a small frown. “Behind you, John.”
John turned his head and, once his eyes had adjusted to the dim glowing light, saw the outline of a large oblong object. John instinctively moved closer to see it better, with Sherlock close behind to light the way. He was soon able to make out the general shape of it in the dark.
“A ship,” John surmised. Admittedly, he would have never been able to guess that if he hadn’t been somewhat expecting Sherlock to show him how they had come to be on a deserted planet. The ship itself appeared more organic than machinelike, as if made from naturally-growing materials. It was roughly in the shape of any single-passenger ship John had piloted, with the front narrowed, and the back designed for propulsion. The outer shell was however flesh-like in a dark shade of green, and the window for the pilot to see from, while translucent, seemed to be oozing.
So, this was how Sherlock had arrived on BAK 2212. John found he now only had more questions.
“It’s certainly… something,” John commented, turning back in time to see Sherlock’s face fall into a frown.
“As always John, you have a way with words.”
John laughed. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“That’s not surprising. Your pay grade wouldn’t allow you to get anywhere near where I’m from.”
“Thanks, Sherlock, I’m well aware. Nothing has ever been brought back like this either. I mean, you’d think there’d at least be pictures.”
Sherlock nibbled at the edge of their lip at this, seeming oddly hesitant. “We don’t normally… share our technology with the humans who come to the outer reaches. It’s mutual - humans don’t share anything either.”
Sherlock seemed awfully put-out by that. John wondered if Sherlock had honestly traveled into Earth’s greater territories purely out of curiosity.
“You’re from the outer reaches of another galaxy then, one of the areas where humans have managed to intermingle,” John concluded. It would have been almost impossible to start the journey from anywhere else, but Sherlock didn’t confirm or deny. “What’s it like there? Sort of like a zoo, but where the animals are also interested in the humans?”
The right edge of Sherlock’s mouth slid upwards. “Yes, I suppose so. It’s quite a lot like that.”
“The people who come back always make it seem like everything learned on the borders is confidential, but then there’s these tell-alls in the tabloids from supposed visitors. I always assumed it was all rubbish, but then...” John trailed off, thinking better of it. He’d been about to mention Sherlock’s limbs again, before remembering this had already been established as a sensitive topic.
“But then?” Sherlock prompted.
“Never mind, load of rubbish,” John repeated. “Back to the ship. How did you get it in here? You couldn’t have lifted it.”
“No,” Sherlock confirmed. “I dismantled it, carried the pieces, and then reassembled it.”
John whistled, though it warbled through the helmet. “God, that must have taken ages.”
“I had ages,” Sherlock replied, walking past John to ease open the hatch on the side of the ship. Inside, there was barely enough room for John to stand. Sherlock would have had to hunch. John imagined that Sherlock had slept in the ship, whenever they actually did sleep, cramped inside of it and alone in the cave.
John thought of Sherlock alone on the empty blue planet, occupying themselves with ship reconstruction and breaking open bots. John thought of himself, back on his own blue planet, lonely in a bedsit after being discharged, and setting off into space the first moment he got the chance.
John thought that, maybe, Sherlock was more like him than any human John had ever met.
“It’s all right,” John said quickly, as Sherlock bent their body into the ship’s opening. “You don’t need to go back in.” Sherlock retreated, and closed the hatch.
“What happened, exactly?” John at last asked.
John almost assumed Sherlock wouldn’t answer him, but eventually they turned away from the ship to face him.
“As you may have already guessed, I wanted to journey into Earth’s territories to explore, but I underestimated the fuel required. I had to land on the nearest planet, and my ship had a rough landing.”
“You must have realized the planet was monitored, and so relocated the ship and hid it,” John inferred.
“Yes. I saw the bots from afar. They were easily avoided, but I thought perhaps they were powered by something I could use for the ship.”
“Oh, yeah. They’re charged, no real fuel in them I’m afraid. Certainly nothing as organic as your ship,” John remarked, though it was a bit beyond his knowledge.
“As I learned,” Sherlock said drily.
“But then, you saw me repair them,” John realized. “Why didn’t you approach me?”
Sherlock scoffed. “If you were traveling in my galaxy, would you approach the first living creature you saw?”
“Right,” John said. “Yeah. You didn’t know if you could trust me.” He paused, taking in the bizarre ship in the poor light. Except, his eyes kept drifting back to Sherlock’s skin. “But you did. Eventually. You grabbed me.”
Sherlock tugged at one of the sleeves hanging loosely at their sides. “Let’s go back. You’ve seen all you would wish to, I assume.”
Sherlock walked back towards the entrance, and John had no choice but to follow.
While John appreciated Sherlock explaining some things, he had truthfully already guessed everything Sherlock had told him, and they had left everything of real interest out. As John left the cave, watching as the ship once more became an outline in the dark, he had a feeling the ship had not be lawfully taken on this little excursion.
It was likely this thought that led John to be distracted as he eased himself out onto the narrow ledge, causing him to be unable to avoid the oncoming collision with a large blue boulder.
The dislodged rock of the crater hitting him square in the back wouldn’t have caused much damage on its own, if not for it sending John sailing off the ledge, and down the crater’s steep incline. The tumble off the side of the cave caused him to land hard on his bad shoulder, and as he rolled to the bottom in a cloud of raised dust, he felt the hit only worsen.
Once John came to a full and complete stop, he was on his back with the wind blown right out of him. After a moment of gasping in his helmet, John tested the injury by moving his left shoulder, only to discover that it hurt, badly. He might have broken his clavicle. John remained motionless after that, attempting to assess the situation from his prone position.
John was soon shrouded in more displaced blue dust as Sherlock joined him, shouting his name as they slid to the bottom. “John! John!”
“Yes, yes, I’m fine, I’m all right,” John reassured them, his pride even more injured than his body.
“You’re not fine John,” Sherlock said, voice a touch high as they crouched down next to him. Their hands reached out to feel his upper body through his suit, and John couldn’t do much beyond groan in pain.
“I’ve studied human anatomy from the ship’s selection of resources as well. From what I could gather of your fall, and your reaction now, you’ve definitely broken bone.”
“That’s great,” John griped, tilting his head back, his helmet resting against the ground. “That’s just perfect.”
“Don’t be like that,” Sherlock said, “I can fix it.”
Sherlock’s hands were still on him, and the top of Sherlock’s coveralls was still off, bunched around their waist. John wondered how desperate for contact a man had to be to interpret being touched through a suit as sensual.
“How are you going to fix it, exactly?” John asked, a touch tetchy. “You said it was broken. This isn’t just pushing a dislocated shoulder back in.”
Sherlock hesitated. “There’s something my kind can…. do. Something that I think will be the quickest fix, rather than taking you back to the base in pain, and seeing what the Hudson is equipped for.”
“Are you going to tell me what this thing is?” John asked, expecting he already knew the answer.
“Please John,” Sherlock said, and it sounded uncomfortably close to begging. “Let me try.”
John could see the earnestness in Sherlock’s expression even through the visor of his helmet. He had trusted them this far, hadn’t he?
“Fine, yes. Do your thing,” John said, before grabbing Sherlock’s forearm with his good arm. “Just—don’t make me regret it.”
Sherlock met his eyes and nodded, and then focussed very intently on their hands, still touching his collar bone and shoulder.
Sherlock’s entire body turned blue for a brief flash, and John instantly felt warmth seeping through his suit, through the point of indirect contact between him and Sherlock. John had never felt anything like it before. It was exceptional, and painless, and when Sherlock drew their hands away they slumped against him as if all the energy had drained from their body.
John moved his shoulder. He moved it again. It was completely healed. “Jesus, what did you do?” John asked, sitting up from the ground, amazed.
Sherlock, still leaning on John’s legs, propped themselves up on their elbow. “The best translation I can think of is ‘mass transfer’.”
“Like how you can grow limbs? And your mass redistributes in your body?”
Sherlock nodded, strangely shy given that they had performed a rather marvelous trick. Normally, they would have been crowing their success, and asking John to join in.
Sherlock was acting like someone who had given much more away than their mass.
“Amazing,” John cried, feeling his shoulder through the suit. “You can do it for other people. It’s not just restricted to your body. And you can do it through clothes.”
“Yes, John, of course,” Sherlock said, and their haughtiness had returned. “If you’re quite all right, let’s return to the scouter.”
“Transfer,” John muttered as he stood again, standing on his bad leg, with his aid luckily still clamped tightly to his upper thigh and calf.
“You’ve given me part of your mass then.” John eyed Sherlock’s body. There didn’t seem to be anything missing.
Sherlock turned back, and rolled their eyes when they saw the direction of his gaze. “I only transferred enough to reform the bone! It was hardly anything.”
Sherlock continued to climb back up the side of the crater, and John followed behind shortly after. John understood Sherlock’s hesitance now, as Sherlock had indirectly answered his earlier question. If anyone knew what Sherlock’s kind was capable of, there would be a high price on their heads to be sure.
John should have been more occupied with the very real threat of someone knowing Sherlock was here, but John couldn’t help but think about how, even though it was perhaps only a small part, he now had some of Sherlock within him, always.
_______
They returned to the Hudson that day, but the easy, carefree tone of their interactions felt changed.
The atmosphere aboard their safe haven had shifted. John wasn’t sure if this was due to the transfer between them, or from being shown Sherlock’s ship, or both. John had been provided with the pieces to the puzzle of Sherlock’s origins, and the possible reason as to why people would be looking for them in the first place; John wondered if Sherlock regretted revealing so much.
The following day, John attempted to play chess with Sherlock at the game board, but they were not well-matched. Sherlock’s strategy was infinitely better than his own, and Sherlock’s patience infinitely less.
Sherlock moved a projected piece forward, effectively killing John’s queen. John sighed. “Another round?”
“The data we collected yesterday,” Sherlock said, staring at the game board. “Has it already been sent back?”
“Yes,” John replied, turning the game off, but leaving the projection on.
“And how long have you been stationed here now? And how long were you meant to be?” Sherlock asked, two fingers tapping against their own cheek, eyes shifting back and forth restlessly.
John didn’t feel like answering, so he didn’t. He wasn’t in the mood to be reminded that living on BAK 2212 wasn’t a permanent situation.
“John, how long?”
Sherlock’s appearance was altered in that moment, almost feral with their lips pulled back, and their face underlit by the projection of the game board. It might have made another man wonder if the way Sherlock had acted all along had simply been a portrayal of humanity, and whether this was Sherlock’s true face now surfacing.
John knew that would have been the sensible consideration, but he was far more preoccupied with what he thought were the gold freckles, which he could just make out when Sherlock’s face was illuminated by the unnatural lighting.
“Indefinitely,” John finally answered. “Like I said, they wanted me to find out what was breaking the bots. I guess, now that I’ve sent back data that shows nothing interesting, and none of the bots have been reported back to the home base as broken in awhile….”
John trailed off, watching the movement in Sherlock’s neck as they swallowed. If nothing turned up, John imagined they would ask for him to return soon, but it felt callous to say it.
John suddenly felt like the idiot he was for not thinking of it sooner. Was he just going to leave Sherlock here when he returned to home base? He supposed he’d done that exact thing, many times, but back then he hadn’t known Sherlock was here, all alone.
But he couldn’t very well take Sherlock back with him, could he? Sherlock had been right to be distrustful of him and others of his kind. Aliens had never traveled this far into Earth’s territories. There were rumours of poachers, roaming space bounty hunters of sorts, who attempted to capture alien lifeforms on the outskirts. John couldn’t risk Sherlock being captured.
As John’s thoughts on the subject became more muddled, Sherlock launched themselves from the seat across from him, and padded out of the room at a breakneck pace.
“Where are you going?” John called after them. The Hudson was a decent sized ship, but there weren’t that many areas that were comfortable to lounge in. So where was Sherlock off to then?
John, ever conscious of his alien companion growing tired of his constant presence, chose to not follow after them. The Hudson bot brought him his tea ration, gently placing it on the tray next to his arm chair.
“Did you have a little domestic?” it asked, adding an extra sugar ration as if to soften the blow.
“Who uploaded these concepts into you, I’d love to know,” John said, sipping the tea in thanks, though without the sugar.
John took one gulp, feeling himself immediately calm, before spilling the rest of the hot beverage all over his arm when the Hudson’s alarm went off.
“Hudson!” John shouted over the sound, “is Sherlock still on the ship?”
“No dear,” the Hudson bot replied, wiping his arm down with a towelette pulled from its front compartment. “Sherlock went to the BAK 2212 base.”
John groaned, abandoning the tea mug on the Hudson’s outstretched arm still holding the towel. The BAK 2212 base alarm communicated with the ship’s alarm system of course, and clearly Sherlock had gotten rather busy in the last few minutes.
John went to suit up in the Hudson’s antechamber, and made the short trip to the base in record time, heading straight for the bot charging bay. And sure enough—there was Sherlock, pulling out the insides of the Anderson bot, once again.
Sherlock must have grabbed the bot just as it had undocked for its route, causing the alarm system to believe the bot had been disabled while out in the field.
John took off his helmet, figuring it was easier to yell without. “What the hell, Sherlock?”
Sherlock ignored him completely, electing instead to continue their work on Anderson. Sherlock’s face was splotchy, in some places partially blue-purple, and glowing gold in others. Their antennae were no longer hidden beneath their hair, and they twitched as Sherlock’s hands moved inside the bot.
Sherlock was agitated. Almost desperate, as if they couldn’t work fast enough.
John thought, for perhaps the hundredth time, that Sherlock’s extra arms would have made this easier, but still Sherlock stubbornly remained with two.
The room was silent, aside from John’s heavy breathing, and Anderson’s parts hitting the floor.
“You said it yourself,” Sherlock eventually replied. “The bots aren’t doing anything of use here. What does it matter if I take this one apart for a bit of fun?”
“Are you really that bored?” John asked. He left the ‘with me’ unsaid.
“Haven’t we already covered that John?” Sherlock replied, clipped and dismissive.
John felt his temper flaring. If he was being honest, his frustration with Sherlock was due to much more than just being cross at him for becoming destructive. He wanted Sherlock to look at him. Specifically, he wanted Sherlock to look at him, like they sometimes did, like Sherlock didn’t mind being cramped in a base in the middle of nowhere, as long as John was there with them.
John knew it was far more likely that he had been a momentary distraction, and the novelty of him had worn off. He couldn’t even blame Sherlock, if that were the case. He was just a regular sort of person, and Sherlock had learnt everything they could from him in a matter of days. After which, they had then spent extended periods of time in each other’s company. It only followed that Sherlock would eventually grow weary of him.
The issue being that John wasn’t tired of Sherlock. Far from it, in fact, and John didn’t think he ever would be.
“You can’t just tear up whatever you like whenever you like,” John eventually said, but he sounded tired, already resigned to Sherlock’s behaviour. “Christ, this is going to get logged as a broken bot. Just—put him back together when you’re done, all right? And turn off the bloody alarm. I’ll be back on the Hudson.”
Sherlock did finally turn towards him at that. “It’s not a him, John. It’s a robot.”
John paused, about to pull his helmet back on. “When you’ve looked after them as much as I have, see if you don’t start to humanize them a little.” John laughed once, without humour. “Actually, God, what am I saying. I suppose you wouldn’t.”
John got his helmet back on then, before he could say more, and returned to the ship. He felt Sherlock’s focus on him for his entire exit from the charging bay.
_______
The next time John received a call on the bridge, it wasn’t from Greg.
A day after the spat between him and Sherlock over the bot, a man, who John had never seen in his life, appeared over the ship’s feed. The man didn’t waste time on introductions, apparently preferring instead to launch straight into an interrogation.
“Hello, John. Allow me to be direct. Have you found anything?” the man asked. His smile was stiff, intended to be unpleasant.
“As I’ve already told Greg, no, I haven’t found anything here,” John replied, his spine straightening as his body instantly rose to the perceived challenge.
Something had in fact found him, John thought, but didn’t say.
The man hummed. “You’re rather loyal quickly.”
John felt caught out, and also reasonably confused. How could the man possibly know there was anything to find on BAK 2212?
“Sorry, who are you? Someone from the company?” John felt the muscle in his right jaw twitch, and mentally urged it to still.
“Name your figure,” the man said, leaning heavier on an umbrella—of all things—in his hand.
“There’s no figure to name,” John replied, struggling to keep his tone cordial, “because I don’t know anything.” As Sherlock reminded him daily.
The man silently assessed John for a long moment with a look that felt strangely familiar. It gave John the impression that the man was trying to decide whether John was in fact an actual idiot, or if he was hiding something.
“John,” the man began again, “why do you suppose this trip was scheduled to be longer than the others?”
“I have no idea,” John managed to say through his clenched jaw, his body naturally positioned at parade rest. “I just follow orders.”
“Yes, ever the soldier.” The man’s eyes swept over him in one dismissive glance.
“You see John, I’m not the only one... interested in what might be on BAK 2212. Originally, the planet was only monitored by our company, but as of very recently there was a breach in security.”
“I imagine this breach happened not long before I was sent out,” John concluded, easily. He was well aware that he wasn’t normally woken in the middle of the night over a single bot repair.
If the man was impressed by the quick thinking, it didn’t show. “Quite right. There are a series of planets we’ve been exploring for a very specific retrieval mission, the group of them referred to as ‘The Ugly Duckling’ circuit.”
“Charming,” John said with tight smile. “You’re saying that the company’s system was breached, and that there are now, what? People running through all the planets in that group, till they somehow find something? On an entire planet?”
“The planets don’t have much to them, as I’m sure you can attest,” the man responded. “And what these people are looking for can be pinpointed quite easily using heat sensors. That is, if it isn’t sufficiently hidden. Make sure that it is, Mr Watson.”
John may have been playing dumb, but he was not in fact a dumb man. It was readily evident to John that both he and the mysterious video feed person knew exactly what (or rather, who) was on BAK 2212, but hell if John was going to give an inch.
“Well, thanks for sending me out here alone then with that distinct possibility on the horizon,” John said, voice rising at the end.
“You always knew there was a risk to these missions,” the man responded without even a flicker of guilt in his expression. “I imagine that’s why you got into this business. That, and you like to look after things, don’t you? With technology surpassing the need for humans involved in medical intervention, you look after bots. How quaint.”
John bristled, but wasn’t given an opportunity to interrupt.
“Besides John, there won’t be any trouble,” the man continued. “That is, there won’t be if you haven’t found anything.”
He smiled grimly, and raised his brows, as if offering John another opportunity to confide in him.
“Then there won’t be any trouble,” John agreed, before turning off the feed.
_______
John wasted no time in confronting Sherlock, unsettled by the conversation with the mystery man to say the least. He found Sherlock lying outstretched over the living area sofa, all four hands pressed against their respective pair in prayer beneath Sherlock’s chin.
The extra set of arms slunk back into Sherlock’s body shortly after John entered the room, but Sherlock otherwise did not stir.
“There’s a man,” John began, staring at the back of that dark curly head, “and he definitely knows you’re here. Who is he, and how does he know you’re here?”
“‘There’s a man’ he says, and I’m just supposed to know?” Sherlock complained, one of their remaining hands coming to rest on their temple. “As for how someone knows I’m here, oh I don’t know, all those bots I broke might have something to do with it.”
John sniffed, one nostril flaring. “Yeah that maybe tipped him off—and God, why did you break so many if you knew you were at risk of being found? You even said the parts you could get out of them were useless. Did you want to be found?”
Sherlock hadn’t been looking at him, but had now turned their head even further away from him. “Does it matter?”
“Yeah, it bloody matters!” John cried out, unable to contain himself any longer. “There are people looking for you now, who you do not want to be found by, I can guarantee. Why did you risk your hiding place?”
“You,” Sherlock said, sitting up on the sofa. It was spoken so quietly, that John could only assume he had misheard.
“What?” John asked, the volume of his voice dropping immediately.
“You, John,” Sherlock pushed out the rest of the sentence between gritted teeth while pushing themselves from the sofa, and turning on John with a ferocity that made him take a step back. The skin across Sherlock’s cheeks was flushed violet, and their teeth shone white against the dark pigment.
“You, John Watson. It’s always you. When I broke the bots you always came. And—! I was bored. Bored, bored, bored!”
Each ‘bored’ was punctuated by a swish of Sherlock’s antennae, which were lengthening beyond the confines of the dark fringe.
“Okay,” John said. He laughed under his breath in disbelief. “So you made me come back here, again and again—for what? Was it funny for you, watching me have to do the same thing over and over?”
Sherlock’s skin was no longer the pale imitation of John’s, the blue seemingly traveling through their veins, and peeking out at the edges of their coveralls. “I—” Sherlock began, but never finished.
“Do you ever think about how you affect others, hmm?”
There was a desperation to this question that made John feel as if he’d revealed far too much, and he quickly steered the conversation away from how Sherlock affected him.
“All because you were bored. And now you’re—what—bored of this?” John asked, gesturing to the ship, but in the end, to himself. “Is that it?”
Sherlock appeared shocked, and for a moment Sherlock’s eyes, with irises perfectly matching the tone of their skin, betrayed a depth of emotion John wondered if he was imagining.
John however was not able to gather whether that had been the case, as any openness he had seen in Sherlock’s face shuttered closed when the Hudson’s alarm system began to blare through the overhead speakers. Sherlock’s antennae twitched at the first loud blast of sound, but they did not seem to feel the need to cover their ears as John did.
Sherlock’s eyes widened a fraction, and then became expressionless, almost blank. It was the kind of look that put John immediately on edge.
“What the hell?” John yelled over the sound, grimacing with his hands firmly over his ears. “Sherlock, do you know what that’s about?”
“Yes,” Sherlock replied, voice empty, and barely audible over the alarm. “I took the in-ship Hudson bot to the charging bay. I wanted to see if it was different on the inside from the others.”
“Jesus, Sherlock!” John admonished, still having to shout. “Must you antagonize her?”
Sherlock shrugged. “You’d better go repair it then.”
“You’re not coming? To fix the bot you tore up, the Hudson by the way, who waits on us on hand and foot?”
“The bot doesn’t have hands or feet, John!” Sherlock snapped. “It’s a bot.”
“Well sorry for getting attached to the thing that speaks to me and looks after me on the regular!” John shouted, annoyance building as he tried to deactivate the alarm via the side panel in the living area’s wall. “It’s only—human.”
Sherlock was chewing on their lip, biting it so hard John would have expected it to bleed.
“Well,” Sherlock said, chin raising, “I’m not.”
“Unbelieveable,” John murmured, definitely going unheard, half of his attention on Sherlock and the other on turning the alarm off. The alarm type couldn’t be overridden from the side panel apparently, which was bizarre for a broken ship bot, and excessively aggravating.
“Sod this!” John yelled, barely giving Sherlock another glance. “I’m going to go find the Hudson’s bot.”
John was not a patient enough man to handle discordant tones and Sherlock in a dark mood all at once—and Sherlock was clearly in some kind of a snit.
Or at least he hoped, as John didn’t particularly want to consider the alternative. He’d seen evidence of Sherlock’s care, but at times their behaviour made John question everything he thought he knew about his otherworldly companion. Despite both of them tinkering within the routing bots on a regular basis, the idea of Sherlock taking apart the Hudson bot with that same kind of analytical efficiency made a cold lump settle in his stomach.
John’s senses were so overwhelmed by the alarms as he suited up and crossed over to the BAK 2212 base, that he didn’t pay much attention to anything beyond his own lumbering steps to reach the base’s door.
John searched the charging bay for the Hudson in-service bot, but found nothing beyond the routing bots charging peacefully, and that the alarm system inside was fully functional. John moved on to the control room, only to find the alarm code flashing on the control panel to be one he’d never seen before in his life.
“Of course you don’t provide a bloody description,” John muttered, again attempting to override the alarm to cut off the sound. John could connect to the Hudson’s line, at the very least.
“Hudson, are you there?” he called through the connection, and over the noise.
“Yes John, no need to shout,” the Hudson responded, and irrationally John was happy to hear its voice.
“What has Sherlock done with your in-ship bot, and what is alarm code TRF 201202?”
“Are you feeling all right, John?” the Hudson asked, somehow managing to sound concerned. “The in-ship bot is on board, where I always am. Currently on the bridge, waiting for instructions for how to handle the alarm. Alarm code TRF 201202 is unidentified ship landing.”
“Oh my God,” John said in dawning horror, rushing back out of the control room and breaking into an awkward sprint through the charging bay.
As John exited the base, with his attention now more attuned to his surroundings, he could see a cloud of dust had been kicked up in the distance, directly beyond the Hudson’s front.
John’s panic shifted to steadiness in the face of a situation he could strategize. His first instinct was to run straight for the cloud, except he knew he might need something from the Hudson. He reboarded, not bothering to take his suit off, and returned to the living area.
As John had known to expect, Sherlock was no longer on board. John carried on to the ship’s center hallway to the bridge where the in-ship Hudson bot was waiting for him, and appeared well enough at least to nag him. “Oh, the two of you running in and out, and letting these alarms go on and on!”
John ignored the bot, and instead swiftly turned off the God awful alarm. Displayed around the room in red projections was the error code John had read in the base control room, followed by “Unidentified Ship Landing”. Coordinates were also helpfully provided. John spared one more glance for the opaque dust cloud visible from the bridge, before turning on his heel again.
John stopped off in the living area, pausing to grab one item, and returned out through the back of the ship. He crossed over to the charging bay once more, reaching its outside control panel, and began adjusting the settings. If he was currently outnumbered, he wouldn’t be in a moment.
And, at last, John ran around the side of the Hudson, and into the unknown of the blue dust ahead.
Sherlock had purposefully misguided him, clearly to get him off the ship and away from learning of the actual reason for the alarm—and John wanted to know why.
John was unable to see more than an inch in front of him as soon as he passed the nose of the Hudson, but it wasn’t long before the outline of a ship appeared quite literally out of the blue.
It was much smaller than the Hudson, appearing to be no larger than a shuttle, typically used for transport between neighbouring planets. If they’d been going head to head in the ships themselves, John would have had the advantage. John cursed Sherlock twice over for putting them at a disadvantage.
Luckily the shuttle ship’s hatch was not speedy, and was still dropped open enough for John to grab onto the edge, and hoist himself up. Luck was in his favour again as the hatch’s safety mechanism kicked in, lowering the ramp and giving him the opportunity to climb on. John walked up the ramp till he stood in the entrance of the small spacecraft.
While John had known what to expect, his blood still boiled at the sight of a suited man holding something akin to an electric prod against Sherlock’s bare throat, with the man’s other hand clasped tightly over Sherlock’s mouth.
The man was surprised to see him when John emerged from the thinning blue dust, arms outstretched with a gun aimed at the man’s head, but only momentarily.
“The lifeform said you were out on one of the routes,” the man remarked, pushing the prod harder against Sherlock’s neck. “Bad news for you that it was wrong.”
“The lifeform?” John said incredulously, still pointing the 3D-printed gun at the man, his finger feeling trigger-happy after hearing Sherlock called ‘it’. “You poachers aren’t much for naming things, are you?”
The poacher shrugged, though his hold on Sherlock tightened.
He wasn’t particularly remarkable, John noted. Middle-aged with an accent and old gear, all suggestive of his lower social class. He also seemed to be operating alone, which John thought was rather good news for them. Surely, with two against one…
John took a step forward, and the man tutted. He proceeded to press so hard against Sherlock’s throat that the gills John hadn’t seen since the first day he had met Sherlock reappeared, flapping rapidly, taking in large gulps of atmosphere.
“Let - them - go,” John practically snarled, each word bitten off, and the temper beneath them evident.
The poacher’s smile in response was filled with crooked teeth, and a touch of surprise. “Have you grown attached to it? You’ve rather shown your cards there mate. Now I don’t even need to point a weapon at you. You’ll put yours down on your own I think.”
John watched Sherlock’s gills fluttering, the only sound in the shuttle those small gasping breaths, as BAK 2212’s air was taken in through those thin slits. John lowered his gun.
“No, John! Run!” Sherlock managed to shout from beneath the man’s hands, and got zapped at the juncture of neck and shoulder with the electric prod for their trouble. Sherlock cried out once, and stilled.
All John was able to articulate was a sound not unlike a growl before he was hurtling forward, intending to the knock the man to the ground—but before he could even get close, he was pulled back by metallic restraints.
He’d been caught off guard by the shuttle’s in-ship bot, which had been lurking along the side near the entrance, nearly indistinguishable from all the other junk technology in the ship’s main area. John struggled, but the bot’s strength far outmatched his own.
So much for two against one, after all.
“Take off his suit,” the poacher directed, and the in-ship bot proceeded to follow the instruction, starting with pulling at his protective gear.
“No! John!” Sherlock shouted again, the noise seeming to come out from their gills while their mouth was covered. “He can’t be exposed to the natural environment of this planet!”
John began to struggle anew, though it wasn’t any more successful than his last attempt. He was completely trapped in the in-ship bot’s metallic embrace, while an additional robotic limb attempted to pull his suit off from his legs. When it realized his leg brace on the outside of his suit was hindering the removal, the bot snapped it off his thigh without a second thought. John slumped down in its hold as his leg crumpled beneath him, forcing the bot to grip him tighter.
Just as John thought he was maybe a bit done for, given that his skin was about to be exposed to elements it couldn’t possibly survive, he was saved by a sudden collision against the side of the ship, causing it to rock to the left. The small shuttle shifted back and forth for a moment, before settling once more, but the bot had paused in its disrobing of John and didn’t continue.
“What the hell was that?” the poacher asked, craning his neck to see through the murky window in the side of the ship. And, as if the question triggered its reappearance, the ship tilted again as something outside collided with it, and then again, and again.
The teetering of the ship continued as it was bombarded by an external force, and Sherlock’s would-be kidnapper was hardly able to hold onto Sherlock with all the excessive movement of the ship, a problem that the bot holding John unfortunately did not have.
“Do you know what that is?” the poacher asked him. John shrugged in his confines.
“Forget about him, he can’t even stand on his own without that thing!” the man ordered the bot holding him. “Go check what’s outside!”
As the bot released John to the floor, where he landed hard on his knee, the poacher made sure to emphasize that there was still a prod against Sherlock’s neck. “Repairman, don’t get any ideas. Hand over your weapon.”
John made eye contact with Sherlock, who nodded their head once. John, still up to that point holding his gun with a death grip, dropped it from his hand. At that precise moment, a particularly strong hit struck the ship’s right side, causing the gun to be set off-course.
“Will you check what that is already?” the poacher shouted, and the in-ship bot finally rolled to the shuttle’s entrance before detaching from the ship’s ceiling track, and began to roll down the hatch’s ramp on its caterpillar tracks.
The next jolt of the ship sent Sherlock and the poacher practically flying forward, and almost collided with John, who was still unable to fully stand.
Taking advantage of the brief opportunity, one long third arm grew out from Sherlock’s side, ripping through their coveralls, and snaking out over the short space separating them to attach itself to John’s leg. Sherlock’s eyes met his, and this time, John was the one to nod.
Mass transfer for a psychosomatic injury. Well, John supposed, it couldn’t hurt.
The same spine tingling feeling he had felt in his shoulder now spread through his leg, with the entire exchange occurring in the few seconds they had before the poacher slammed the electric prod against Sherlock’s additional limb, sending an electric shock that traveled into both John and Sherlock.
“None of that!” the poacher chided, and looked at John with new interest. “So, you’re one of those, eh?”
“What?” John asked, though it was more like a groan of pain.
“Oh, don’t be coy. Getting into it with other lifeforms. This must have been a dream come true for you, finding one.”
John didn’t dignify that with a response, but was taken slightly back by Sherlock’s reaction. Their eyes were blazing above the gloved hand covering their mouth, but John could see gold freckles shining cross the bridge of their nose, and traveling up to their ears.
The ship took another hit to its side, and John seized his chance. Putting all his faith into the placebo effect, John rose onto his bad leg just as his gun slid back to him. Grabbing it just in time, John stood and aimed straight at the poacher.
He appeared shocked for a moment, before flashing John all his crooked, stained teeth once again. “Are you really going to try that again? Remember, I’ve still got it.”
Sherlock, clever thing that they were, pulled in the poacher’s arms slightly to the left, and John fired, the shot going clean through the man’s left shoulder.
The impact of the bullet pushed the man backward, finally freeing Sherlock from his grasp.
“Sherlock!” John cried out, hurrying to Sherlock’s side. Before he even realized what he was doing, John had taken hold of Sherlock’s face with both of his hands, turning their chin left and right to see the damage along their neck. There were starburst scars where the electric prod had hit. John ran his gloved hands around the edges of them with care.
“It will heal over, John,” Sherlock reassured him. When John looked up from Sherlock’s neck, he found himself warmed by Sherlock’s gaze even through his dusty visor.
A groan from behind Sherlock drew their attention away from one another, and to the man currently bleeding out onto the ship’s floor.
“Shall I go deal with the shuttle’s bot while you…?” John left the rest implied, motioning to the dying man.
“Interrogate the poacher? Yes John, excellent suggestion.”
John left Sherlock to it, trundling down the ship’s hatch to the outside world where the dust cloud had finally cleared. John walked to the right side of the shuttle and found the in-ship bot easily, as it was currently boxed in and overpowered by a ring of routing bots from the BAK 2212 base station.
The in-ship bot in the center of their circle attempted to escape as John walked forward, only to be pushed back in once more by the routing bots, acting on their programmed response to unidentified moving objects. From a distance, it looked like a ring of cardboard boxes restraining a tall collection of junk metal.
“Thanks, but I think I’ll take it from here,” John said amiably, slipping past the Anderson routing bot and stepping into the inner ring. John took great joy in disabling the shuttle bot that had attempted to hold him back from Sherlock, with Sally helpfully pushing it back towards him whenever it tried to escape the bot formed circle.
When John came back round to the opened hatch of the ship, Sherlock was already back on the ground, waiting for him. They were holding the 3D printed gun loosely in their hand.
John glanced up at the entrance to the shuttle, assuming the poacher to now be dead. John found he felt no remorse.
Sherlock seemed to think otherwise. “Are you all right, John?” Sherlock asked, concern evident in their tone and watchful gaze.
“Yeah, of course I am,” John replied easily.
“You have just killed a man,” Sherlock reminded him. “A human man.”
John read the implication loud and clear: he had killed a human to save a non-human. And he’d do it a thousand times over, if need be. For this particular alien, at any rate.
“Yes,” John agreed, “but he wasn’t a very nice human man, was he?”
Sherlock smiled, seemingly appeased. “No, and apparently neither are you.”
John couldn’t disagree with that.
“He was also a frankly awful shuttler,” Sherlock commented, “I went into the ship navigation system. You should see the route he took to get here.”
John laughed, and Sherlock grinned back. They fell into step with one another, even with John’s clunky walking, and returned to the Hudson in a comfortable silence.
Once on board, the Hudson bot tutted and fussed over them, and insisted on scanning them both excessively for injury. Sherlock managed to evade the Hudson early on, and John followed after them as soon as he was released from the bot’s motherly clutches.
They naturally found themselves back in the Hudson’s living area, where they always seemed to converge.
Sherlock had ripped through their coveralls when they’d grown out their third arm, and when John entered the room after them, Sherlock was standing near the sofa playing with the framed hem.
Sherlock turned to face him, but seemed unable to look him directly in the eye.
“John, that—um—that thing you did…”, Sherlock stammered, still holding the 3D printed gun, and now rubbing it against the back of their neck.
“Which thing?” John asked, moving forward to remove the gun from Sherlock’s hand, and depositing it on the side table.
Sherlock blinked at the brief contact between them, before continuing their fidgeting with the hole in their coveralls. “Coming after me, to the poacher’s ship. That was—um—good.”
Sherlock paused, and then added quickly, “And, re-programming the bot routes with the shuttle’s coordinates so that they all hit the ship. Good thinking. Brilliant, even.”
“All right, all right, don’t overdo it,” John said, though touched nonetheless. “It was better thinking than your plan at any rate. Which was, apparently, leaving me behind while you got captured.”
“I had a plan!” Sherlock protested. “I was going to allow him to kidnap me and then outsmart him, which I could have done easily. Hope, the man was called, thought he was very smart indeed. Thought he’d been chosen especially for this task.”
“Yeah, sorry, my mistake, what a fool proof plan that was,” John commented, hands settling on his hips. “Must you always prove you’re clever? And I suppose you mean, the poacher was working for someone? The person who hacked the company’s system?”
“Of course,” Sherlock replied, waving his hand in the air dismissively. “It’s more than just one person. An organization, or a criminal hierarchy of sorts.”
Sherlock seemed uninterested in going into further detail, and instead continued to search John’s face with their keen pale eyes.
“Did he maybe give you the name of this person who hired him?” John asked, wondering if Sherlock had done a thorough interrogation after all.
“Yes,” Sherlock drew out the word in annoyance, still distracted. They kept alternating between staring at John, and looking away.
“And?” John prompted, unaccustomed to Sherlock not wanting to spill the details.
“For God’s sake, John!” Sherlock exclaimed, hands raising in the air, their earlier agitation returning swiftly. “That’s not important right now!”
Their hands dropped back to their sides, where one returned to playing with the frayed hem, ripping the hole even larger, before leaving it be.
John laughed in shock. “Not important—? When will the name of whoever is hunting you be important then?”
Sherlock scoffed. “That’s not quite what I meant. I mean—it’s not important for you to know.”
John’s hand spasmed, which he quickly attempted to hide behind his back. “How do you figure?” he bit out.
“You said, earlier,” Sherlock explained, speaking more softly than they had been before. “That I never think about how I affect… people. Haven’t I already involved you enough?”
John’s hand stilled, and his posture relaxed. Sherlock was actually trying to be considerate. Which was, still, idiotic.
“Okay, well, that’s not what I meant,” John clarified, “and like you just said, I’m already involved. You can’t just leave me out of it like you did earlier. I could have helped you - ”
“Fine,” Sherlock replied, voice now tight and reedy. “I’ll explain it to you in full then shall I? We both know you have to return the Hudson to your company’s home base, and that my ship in the cave is inoperable. I would have thought that with the recent developments, the answer to my predicament would be obvious.”
John breathed in deeply in a poor attempt to calm himself, and dipped his chin in closer to his chest. “What are you saying? That you’re going to take the poacher’s ship, and that’s that? We go on our separate ways?”
Sherlock hesitated. “That’s... what I’m suggesting, yes.”
“And that’s what you want?” John asked, the volume of his voice dropping, throat closing around the words.
Sherlock wouldn’t meet his eyes, again, casting them down to the ship’s blindingly white floor. The starburst scars along Sherlock’s neck were starting to fade, and John supposed, so would everything else. Everything they had done here, killing time, goofing around with each other, wasn’t meant to last. There had always been an expiry date on their ‘odd couple’ friendship.
John turned from Sherlock, as if to leave the living area entirely, before he pivoted back on his heel.
“No—no, actually. Fuck that. Am I crazy?” John asked.
Sherlock looked up from the floor, and stared at John as if they were seriously considering their answer.
“Tell me if I’m crazy, Sherlock,” John said, summoning another act of bravery far more difficult than running into a poacher’s ship with a gun. “But we - ” John broke off.
He struggled. Sherlock watched, and waited.
“We - ” John started again, motioning between the two of them.
John sighed, dropping his arm to his side, and looked at Sherlock helplessly.
Sherlock’s mouth grew into a V-shaped smile, and their eyes shone with so much tired fondness that John thought he might burst.
John was rubbish at this, which he well knew, but he had to forge on.
As his mouth attempted to say the words John wasn’t sure he even knew how to say, he was prevented from forming them once again. But this time, instead of being hindered by his own inability, he was stopped by Sherlock’s lips clumsily, but warmly, covering his own.
Just like the time many weeks ago in that exact room, Sherlock’s mouth met John’s at the beginning of him forming a word, and moved against his as if attempting to guide him through completing the sound.
John pulled away almost instantly, and tipped his head back to look into that strange face he had become so familiar with in such a short period of time. John knew that two twitches of the antennae near Sherlock’s hairline like that meant Sherlock was nervous or excited, and that Sherlock’s skin returning to the blue colour it had worn for months on BAK 2212 meant Sherlock was distracted, and—what John had come to suspect just recently—that the gold freckles that occasionally spread across Sherlock’s cheeks were akin to a blush.
By that list, Sherlock was flushed, excited, distracted, nervous—all signs John would have normally been able to interpret without question. But John still had to be sure.
“You know this means something … to humans,” John said.
Sherlock nodded once with a fond smile tugging at their lips, as if greatly humouring him.
“Yes John,” Sherlock began, their patronizing tone returning from wherever it had gone, “you’ve made me watch enough ‘6D’ Bond films for me to catch on to that particular nuance of your culture.”
John was prepared to be exasperated, except—that hadn’t been the tone Sherlock used for telling the whole truth.
“Oh my God,” John said, jaw dropping open for a moment. “It wasn’t the films. You always knew. You always knew what kissing meant, from the start -”
Sherlock’s face was glowing, gold flecks dotting the entire expanse of their face, visible even in the fluorescent white light of the ship. “Well, I - ” Sherlock mumbled. “Not good?”
“No. It’s good,” John said, low and gruff. “That’s very good.”
John’s hand raised to Sherlock’s throat, tracing the slowly fading scars there, before sliding up and along their jawline to lead their chin down to meet him halfway. The first time John was the one to initiate a kiss, the touch was sweet and careful, still chaste. It was a relief to press his lips to Sherlock’s while knowing they were now both very aware that they were, in fact, kissing, and aware of the significance of the act.
John wanted to move slowly, to savour every touch that Sherlock allowed, but reliving the memory of their first strange encounter made his whole body feel like one live wire. The knowledge that Sherlock had wanted John, and as instantly as John had wanted them, was tipping their kissing over into open, desperate presses of mouth to mouth. Sherlock received and responded to each kiss with nothing less than enthusiasm, and each time John licked past the seam of Sherlock’s lips, he was distantly aware of Sherlock’s gills fluttering against their neck as they drew in gasping breaths.
Sherlock’s body gravitated toward his as the intensity of their kisses skyrocketed, and John without thought ground against Sherlock’s front, surprised when he felt a reciprocated hardness.
John drew back from Sherlock’s lips, mind fuzzy from the kissing and blood hot from the grinding, but attempting to think with his brain rather than his cock. “Um,” John said, blinking. “Not to be rude, but - ”
“Yes John, I have a penis,” Sherlock answered, their attempt at haughtiness given away by the purple blush across their face. “I’ve been able to practically hear you thinking about it. You might have just asked.”
“Where I’m from asking someone if they have a cock is frowned upon,” John responded and, wanting to wipe that smug look off of Sherlock’s face, dipped the hand pressed against Sherlock’s chest down their front. Sherlock took in a quick breath of air, becoming motionless as John began to rub at the growing firmness he’d felt in the crotch of the coveralls.
John had a lot of questions—like, how did an alien come to have a cock? And, how was it possible that an extra-terrestrial lifeform could be in any way sexually compatible with him?
Instead, John asked while continuing to run his fingers along the length pressing up to meet his hand, “Do you like that?”
Sherlock’s answer was garbled, and followed by a series of clicks and whirs that John was always very happy to hear, even in this context.
The sounds Sherlock was making were intoxicating, driving John absolutely wild. He was high off of being able to touch, and from just the act of being like this with them. Physically speaking, it barely felt any different from rubbing off any of the men John had slept with in the past, though admittedly he had more experience with women. But then he supposed, he was more experienced with humans in general.
As John continued to tease the obvious erection in Sherlock’s coveralls, he began to notice that there was in fact one aspect of this that was a bit out of the norm. Namely, that the front of Sherlock’s coveralls was growing wet. Very wet.
John was used to pre-come causing a bit of a damp spot, of course, but the crotch of the coveralls was now practically sopping.
“God, you’re so wet,” John gasped, the words out of his mouth before he could even think to hold back. His own arousal had ratcheted up several notches, his brain immediately associating wetness with a very aroused partner. John reached for the zip on Sherlock’s coveralls, ready to finally see as well as feel, but he was stopped by Sherlock pressing his hand against their chest, and holding it there.
“Wait, don’t,” Sherlock said, eyes shut tight.
“All right,” John reassured them, instantly drawing away his other hand from Sherlock’s groin. “What’s wrong? Should I stop?”
Oh God, John thought. What if he had managed to read this entire situation wrong?
“No, not that, just - ” Sherlock breathed out noisily through their nose. “Look it’s … it’s like a penis, but it’s not, exactly.”
John wasn’t sure what to say to that. He settled for, “Oh?”
This did not help with Sherlock’s apparent frustration, as their head hit the wall behind them with a soft thud. Sherlock shut their eyes again, but John’s hand on Sherlock’s zip was still clutched to their chest.
“I have to focus to reduce the aspects that would seem... unnatural to you. And I can’t focus when you’re - ” Sherlock paused, while their other hand gestured vaguely to their crotch. “While you’re doing that.”
John felt his chest expand, barely realizing he’d been holding his breath, which he then released in a sigh of relief.
“Sherlock, if it’s me that you’re worried about, don’t be. I promise that whatever is happening down there, I am too far gone to care.”
That at least made Sherlock laugh, though it was barely louder than a quick exhale of air.
“You say that now John,” Sherlock said shakily, in a way that made John’s heart squeeze in his chest, “but your reaction to the reality of it may be very different.”
“I’ve already seen it all, haven’t I? Listen,” John insisted, “I don’t want you focused on anything else other than—well—this.”
“But that only holds if I maintain appearances, John!” Sherlock cried out at last, and as if to prove a point, began to regrow their two extra arms, tearing another hole in the other side of the coveralls. The thinning of Sherlock’s frame as a result was a sight John had grown used to by now, aware that it was normal for Sherlock’s body.
John was being tested he realized, and he planned to pass with flying colours.
Sherlock was breathing heavily, eyes glaring daggers at him, as if daring John to do something, anything—even if it meant reacting poorly. John was willing to rise to the challenge.
John advanced on them, sliding his shorter leg between Sherlock’s, and pressing Sherlock back against the wall next to the sofa. Slowly, John wrapped his hands around the wrists of Sherlock’s newly grown arms, and slid them up along the wall till they were pinned gently above Sherlock’s head, crooked at the elbows. Sherlock’s other two hands came up to rest lightly on John’s chest, knowing that they could push or pull John away if needed. Sherlock peered down at him, their faces close enough to touch if one of them moved an inch.
“I want you,” John said softly. “Like this or, however. I don’t even know how to not want you.”
Sherlock’s chest was heaving as they breathed in through both lungs and gills. Their eyes were still fixed on John’s face, but now wide with disbelief.
John wrapped his right hand around both of Sherlock’s wrists, holding the arms above Sherlock’s head in one hand, and using the other to trail back down to the zip of Sherlock’s ruined coveralls. John kissed Sherlock’s neck near the gills once, then twice. John left his hand on the zip, unmoving, waiting for the sign.
Sherlock breathed in deeply, and then nodded. “Yes, all right. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
After that, the coveralls were soon dropped to the floor. Sherlock stepped out of the pool of material on the ground once John released their arms, unselfconscious in their nudity despite their earlier concerns.
John took in the view with nothing but appreciation. Sherlock’s cock, as it turned out, appeared very much the same as John’s, though smaller. Perhaps the arms were already demanding most of Sherlock’s mass, or maybe Sherlock had difficulty maintaining the shape and appearance any larger than it was. It occurred to John that Sherlock was mimicking him, as always, and that sneaking in to see John that one night might have been for this exact purpose.
Sherlock had said they might lose focus on maintaining appearances if distracted, which in John’s mind translated to this: if Sherlock’s cock seemed like any other, John wasn’t doing his job properly.
John held off on touching Sherlock as directly as he’d done before, instead leaning up on his toes to kiss along Sherlock’s neck, leading the way back up to Sherlock’s mouth. He kissed languidly, focusing all his efforts on relaxing Sherlock, and drawing out more of Sherlock’s soft moans that seemed to come from the back of their throat to vibrate out through their gills.
Sherlock kissed with their whole mouth, as though they didn’t have any idea what they were doing, but were fully committed to giving it their all. It was heady being on the receiving end of it. Meanwhile, all four of Sherlock’s hands couldn’t seem to get enough of touching him, and wanted to be everywhere at once. While cupping John’s face with one palm and the back of John’s head with another, Sherlock’s additional arms wrapped around John’s back, stroking his shoulder blades and spine before trailing down to his bum, and using the hold to drag John in even closer.
Sherlock’s hands over his arse squeezed until John was flush against their body and, likely unconsciously, Sherlock began to grind their hips against him in small, needy circles. John grunted at the motion, the act almost innocent in its unconscious desperation, and rocked his hips back to meet theirs. He told himself to focus on Sherlock’s lips, to not make them self-conscious, even as he felt the front of his own coveralls begin to dampen from the leaking cock rubbing up against them.
When John finally allowed himself to steal a glance downward, he discovered the source of the unusual amount of pre-come, and the difference he imagined Sherlock had been alluding to earlier.
There were slits along the cock, not unlike the gills along Sherlock’s neck, which formed a lattice pattern. The cock when fully aroused appeared almost floral, like leaves stacked in layers that blossomed out from Sherlock’s skin. When John lowered his hand to run over it lightly, the fluid collecting at the edges of the slits released from the slight pressure, slicking John’s palm in Sherlock’s naturally produced lubricant. Sherlock’s hips had stopped their rotating. Sherlock was also staring down at where John’s hand was still resting, wrapped loosely around their cock.
John wanted to know what the fluid tasted like, and followed that instinct by slipping to his knees, enjoying his newly acquired freedom of motion. Once on the floor, he kissed the junction of Sherlock’s groin, close enough to the cock to feel some of it drip onto his shoulder.
“Ah,” Sherlock sighed, and John smiled against their skin, which turned violet where he was pressed against it. John thought he could do even better than that.
John licked the head of Sherlock’s cock once, where there was surprisingly less fluid, causing Sherlock to gasp his name. John began to suckle on the head, and then, loosening his jaw, swallowed Sherlock’s cock down, running his tongue along the raised skin of the slits as he went.
Sherlock shouted at the first contact, followed by a murmured stream of breathless, “yes, yes, yes”es. As John moved his mouth over the engorged flesh and tongued at the individual slits, Sherlock could barely do more than keen. With Sherlock’s cockhead pressed against the back of his throat, John licked along the edge of one dripping slit near the base, working the tip of his tongue as far as he could manage into the thin opening. Sherlock came with a shout, accompanied by another veritable river of fluid pouring from the slits. John’s mouth was completely flooded, forcing him to draw off with dripping lips as soon as Sherlock’s hips stilled their final jerky thrusts. John felt incredibly dirty, and incredibly hot. He’d never been harder in his life.
John couldn’t undo his zip fast enough, opting instead for opening the flies on the coveralls, and pulling his cock out through the opening. Sherlock’s legs were weak and flushed bright violet, but two sets of arms dragged John up from the floor, just as John reached down to fist himself in his slicked hand. John groaned loudly at the first brush of contact with his own palm, barely aware of Sherlock’s hands grabbing at his arms listlessly, active but not reaching down to help as John stroked himself.
John kissed Sherlock with his wet mouth while continuing to get himself off, his movements fast and uncoordinated. Sherlock was still so close to him that, by accident, John rubbed briefly against Sherlock’s still hard cock. Sherlock gasped, and finally managed to use their additional arms to pull John back against them, both of them moaning as their cocks made contact.
The friction between them was just enough to be maddening, but the slick fluid removed any risk of chafing. John wrapped his hand around both of them together, though it barely spanned the combined girth, causing only more fluid to be squeezed from Sherlock’s slits.
Sherlock’s arms now once again hung useless by their sides, and a glance up at Sherlock’s face made John groan. Their eyes were unfocused, completely blissed out, and their cock twitched each time John gripped particularly hard, with more pre-come dripping out onto his hand.
“John,” Sherlock eventually pleaded, “It’s—I can’t—”
John realized Sherlock was likely too oversensitive from their recent orgasm, and released them from his grip, not wanting to give Sherlock more than they could handle. John’s cock rested against his stomach, now dripping with excess fluid, and still desperate for more contact.
Once freed, Sherlock turned away from John, leaning all of their forearms against the blank white wall of the ship. Sherlock then twisted to look back over their shoulder at him.
“John, please,” Sherlock demanded, arching their back, and apparently able to be imperious now that they’d had an orgasm. “Get on with it.”
Sherlock shifted their weight, drawing John’s eyes naturally down to their frankly delectable arse, but assuming human anatomy held true there, he knew there was nowhere near enough time. “I’m too close,” John managed breathlessly as way of explanation, unsure of what Sherlock was even asking.
“I know, there’ll be time for that later,” Sherlock snapped, growing impatient. “Be. Creative.”
John gave in to the first thought that crossed his mind, which was spreading Sherlock’s cheeks apart with his hands and slotting his cock between them, beginning a gentle rocking motion. John thought his heart might beat out of his chest thrusting into that damp, hot space, with Sherlock gasping each time he rubbed the ridge of his cock head over their entrance—but the angle just wasn’t quite right for it.
John reached around to Sherlock’s front, stroking their cock once, and causing Sherlock to practically wail. John used his slicked hand to lube his cock once more, and slipped it between Sherlock legs, which pressed it up against the underside of Sherlock’s still erect cock when pushed all the way through the gap.
“Squeeze,” John whispered and started to thrust again, mouth hot against the back of Sherlock’s neck.
Sherlock was leaking anew John realized, dripping down onto John’s cock as he rocked between their legs, and John wondered if Sherlock’s refractory period was inhuman as well.
John reached around once more, testing the waters as his climax approached, rubbing down Sherlock’s chest absently. While still propping themselves up against the wall, two of Sherlock’s hands grabbed John’s, and pulled it down to their cock, sighing when John began to stroke them again. They pushed back to meet his more forceful thrusts, but Sherlock seemed mostly focused on bracing themselves against the wall as the momentum of John’s own desperate movements drove them forward with each snap of his hips. Sherlock’s pleasure was vocalized by a low whir that only grew louder, the vibrations of which John could practically feel in his cock as he slid against them, harder and faster.
Sherlock’s second orgasm was softer, announced long before by Sherlock’s hums, soft sighs and quiet pleas for more, while John’s first and only hit him hard, his hips jerking against Sherlock, drawing it out for far longer than he could ever remember coming.
John came down slowly, still pressed along the line of Sherlock’s back long after. John eventually thought to gently pull Sherlock away from the wall, and led both of them over to lie on the sofa, where perhaps they should have really started. They collapsed in a pile of loose limbs, both soaked from Sherlock’s secretions, and completely satiated.
John’s breath didn’t return for quite some time, but when it did, he pointed out, “Well, I didn’t run away screaming,” making light of it with an easy smile. “Now what are you going to do?”
“Keep you, I suppose,” Sherlock replied, but despite appearing exhausted next to him, the furrow between their brow had returned, and they were looking at John like he was the one who had antennae growing from his forehead.
“What did you think was going to happen?” John asked seriously, turning on his side to look at Sherlock more directly. “What were you afraid of?”
“I don’t know,” Sherlock said, reluctant, eyes shooting to the side. “That you’d see, and be repulsed. One thing would be too far, and that would be it. It would all be too much for the man still clinging to his normalcy to handle.”
John ignored that last comment. “Well, I’m not. And I can’t believe—with the way you always know everything, that you didn’t know this.”
“Know what?” Sherlock asked, lower lip jutting out in a pout.
“That I’m possibly insane about you,” John said with a laugh. “Literally quite barmy. Anything but repulsed. Attracted, I think the word is.”
A slow smile spread across Sherlock’s face, and they turned onto their stomach and arched their back.
John couldn’t take his eyes away from them, which was when another realization took hold. “The bots,” John said, half-way through completing his thought.
“What about them?” Sherlock asked dreamily, arms splayed out around them, and a dopey smile on their face just visible where it was pressed against the sofa.
“You said you broke the bots so I would come,” John stated, sitting up on his forearms. “But it wasn’t done maliciously.”
Sherlock buried their face into the crook of one of their arms. “No, it wasn’t.”
“Was it…?” John dared to hope. “Was it because you wanted to see me again?”
Sherlock groaned. With their face still hidden from view, and the skin of their arms flashing purple, Sherlock mumbled, “How slow can you be? Yes, of course it was to see you!”
There was a growing warmth in John’s chest that he didn’t think was going to go away for a very long time. He leaned forward, pressing his nose into Sherlock’s dark curls. They smelled nice.
“Did you have a bit of a crush?” John teased, smiling against their hair. “Was it the suit that did it for you, or….?”
Sherlock whacked him in the head with one the arms John had earlier thought useless. “Shut up!”
Their tone was angry, but the part of their face that John could still see was blazing gold, glowing even in the fully lit room. John’s heart kicked to one side in his chest.
John realized he had greatly misinterpreted Sherlock’s occasional standoffishness. Sherlock had wanted to befriend John all along, and had perhaps not known how. The idea of Sherlock watching him from afar all those months, and maybe simply wanting to know him, made John feel like he’d been an idiot twice over.
John’s fierce protectiveness from earlier returned, and he remembered in a flash that there were still people after Sherlock. They’d disposed of the poacher, but there would be more to come. And who had that other man over the feed been?
“You’re thinking,” Sherlock said, poking their head out from under their arm. “It’s painful to watch. What is it?”
“Who was that man then, the one I spoke to over the feed?” John asked, hating to spoil the mood, but worried as well. “Is he actually someone from my company, and if so, why is he after you?”
“From your company, indeed. He owns your company, John,” Sherlock sighed, rolling onto their back in the tight space. “And he’s my brother.”
“Brother? Owns—? My boss isn’t human?” John asked, incredulous, thinking back to the image of the man projected over the feed.
Sherlock sighed, again. “He’s half-human. He chooses to present his more human attributes, and to live as a human man. As I am willing to do as well, though you have recently encouraged me not to.”
“You’re half-human,” John said in disbelief, “and you didn’t think to maybe mention that to me?”
“Why?” Sherlock asked flippantly, “so you could have only half of a moral crisis over being interested in me?”
“Hardly a moral crisis!” John protested. Though truthfully, Sherlock’s parents not having any issue with the arrangement did alleviate some of the residual issues John might have been experiencing. He supposed inter-humanoid relationships were possible—well, clearly—if you happened to meet someone from that far off.
John looked at Sherlock pointedly. “Well? Go on, how did that all happen?”
“My parents met at one of the galaxy borders. My mother is a great scientist and logician, and was interested in learning of other life forms. My father was a human diplomat, interested in bridging the communications between the species.”
“He got up to quite a bit of bridging then I gather,” John said with a flirty smile, which made Sherlock look as though they were in a great deal of pain. They groaned and rolled their eyes.
“So where are your parents now?” John asked, imagining a painful split, dividing the family line —but then, maybe he was projecting.
“They both still live at the galaxy border, quite happily I might add.”
Definitely projecting, John thought. “So, why did you leave? And why did you not know how to speak any human language?”
“My father hasn’t spoken English since I was a child. I told you I’d known it once and had deleted it. I thought I could relearn it when it became necessary, which I did.”
“Wait,” John said, arm stretching out to curl around Sherlock’s chest in a half hug. “So you left, but have been evading your brother this whole time? Your brother who has clearly been looking for you? Why didn’t you let the bots find you if you knew he owned them?”
Sherlock looked at him, aggrieved. “Let Mycroft find me? You’ve met him, so to speak. Do you have any idea how overbearing and controlling he is? He left long ago to lead a rather ambitious human existence. I was planning on avoiding him. He’s probably only searching for me so I don’t blow his cover, which is also incidentally why he couldn’t do the searching himself. If anyone connected the two of us genetically, he’d be at risk for being poached himself I imagine.”
John might have asked why Sherlock had left the border if that was the case, but already suspected that the younger sibling wanted to be a bit more like big brother than they were letting on.
“So then, you don’t want to return to your brother,” John summarized.
“Dear God no,” Sherlock shuddered.
John smiled. That invigorating feeling John always got before doing something absolutely, completely mental was beginning to course through him.
There was nothing for it. What else could he do? He was hopelessly, and impossibly, in love.
“Well, there’s only one thing to be done then,” he remarked.
Sherlock eyed him warily. “And what’s that? Don’t you have to return to your company’s base?”
“They’re going to regret ever giving me the big ship,” John muttered, pressing a kiss in between the two antennae on Sherlock’s currently wrinkled forehead. “Are you ready to say goodbye to this planet, and go exploring?”
“Yes,” Sherlock replied, not unlike the affirmations Sherlock had been crying out earlier. “John, really?”
Their skin was shining bright blues and purples, and John was absolutely certain he’d never seen anything lovelier.
“Yes, really. Now will you tell me the name of the person after you?” John asked, teasingly, belying the seriousness of the question.
“Oh, that can wait. Their first attempt failed and they’ll need to regroup. That’ll be twenty-ninth on our list of things to do,” Sherlock informed him primly.
“Oh?” John said. “That’s a rather long list. What’s first on it I wonder?”
In response, Sherlock stole a kiss from his lips, and slid one of their many hands down his front. “For starters,” Sherlock murmured, “you haven’t even taken the coveralls off yet.”
John had a feeling that he very much approved of Sherlock’s prioritization.
Exploring the universe could wait a couple more hours yet.
_______
>> error code: 1895
>> location: BAK 2212
>> description: unauthorized ship departure, route off-course
>> dispatch: Hudson
>> passengers: 2