well jesus christ I'm not scared to die | little hades reaping (tw: drug overdose)

[logicals]

[ It's morbid, he knows, to stare down at his lifeless body with a mix of fascination and disgust, but he just can't bring himself to look away. He always knew he'd die young, but he'd hoped for something more spectacular - something that involved explosions, snipers, mind games - not this, never this. Not his own stupidity at mixing too many drugs with too many lasting side effects; he hadn't even realised it had been happening until it was too late, too drugged to pay attention to the way his heart faltered, to the way his breath slowed, to the way it suddenly became impossible to remain conscious and oh, it all went very down hill from there.

There are no desperate attempts to claw back his life, no bargains struck and no words of comfort, there's only himself and the people he left behind; his brother, pale and horrified as he resolutely tries to revive him, steadfast and unrelenting in his attempts. His face stays blank, his heart remains still and his lungs persist in their silence; despairing, shaking hands can't pull back what's already too far gone and the disappointment that settles on Sherlock's chest is a weight unlike anything he's ever experienced before.

You've gone and done it now, haven't you, Sherlock? Irish lilt and a familiar sing-song voice; Sherlock ignores it, eyes downcast as he tries to place a hand on Mycroft's shoulder, only for it to fall right through him (and that leaves him feeling disjointed and bizarre, no longer able to interact with the people that were so real and sturdy just minutes before he ended up here, in this plane between life and death).

Was it worth it? No, but how was he to know he was going to be rescued by the very same people that had forced him to accept a suicide mission? He certainly didn't plan on dying due to drugs, but he certainly wasn't as careful as he normally would have been either. This is entirely his own fault; too much too soon and he's only far too aware that he has no one else to blame but himself (which is rather fitting, really, isn't it? He's spent so long blaming himself for everything, that intrinsic self-loathing picking apart everything until there's nothing left beyond cold and calculated apathy and now he has undeniable proof that he is the virus tearing through his own hard drive. Hardly surprising, definitely to be expected but oh what a bitter pill to swallow).

It's one thing to accept his death, it's another thing entirely to watch the world continue on without him - to watch everyone scramble to their hands and knees trying in vain to call him back, but there's nothing to call back. Trying to touch his own body does nothing, trying to push his limbs back into his body does nothing; he just phases through it all because he's a ghost, the very thing he'd never believed in and it's happened to him.

Sherlock Holmes has never felt more alone than he does right now, so close to his brother and yet so far away; separated by entire universes, by unseen barriers and unknown caveats that stop the dead from interacting too forcefully with the living. Oh and god help him he can still feel the residual effects of the drugs making him slow and disoriented, disassociation flowing through him as he tries to wrap his head around everything that's just happened, except he can't, because this is impossible and his eyes look so very, disarmingly blue even though they're unseeing (except they're not unseeing, because he's seeing, it's just from a different perspective, top down and entirely apart from himself). It's like he could be alive, if only his heart would beat and his lungs would constrict; if only his lips weren't matching the colour of his pupils, if only his skin didn't hold such a ghostly pallor and if only his expression weren't so hatefully peaceful. With a sickening jolt, he realises that he almost looks happy, blissfully strung out seconds before his life ebbed away.

Death, as it turns out, isn't as final as he had once thought. Sherlock heaves out a sigh - is it really a sigh, if there are no lungs to force breath out? - and turns his face away from the likes of his grieving brother and the body lying limp on the floor. Distance, that's what he needs; let the disassociation overtake him once again as he hones in on the logical because his life is no more and there's no sense crying over spilt milk. He experiments with how far out he can go, quickly finding that he feels as though he's tethered here, feet stuck like glue to the image of his dead body, unable to absently wander through the strange limbo he'd suddenly found himself in (which is unfortunate, really, as he'd rather not watch his brother mourn him if he can help it - it feels as though it's something he shouldn't be able to see or hear, somehow).]