It was then that Sherlock was swept up into the arms of someone behind him, strong arms, a man's arms. The arms wrapped around his chest and Sherlock leaned back into him, feeling the stranger's heavy breathing behind him, letting himself sway to the music and to the man's heartbeat. He didn't know what happened to John in that moment, that moment that lasted for more than just a couple of moments, but when he was finally released from the man's grip he found that John had disappeared from the dance floor entirely. Sherlock spun around in a confused circle, seeing that John was now back at the bar, bent over the glass counter irritably. Sherlock sighed heavily, making his way over once more and sitting in the empty stool beside him.
"John, where'd you go?" Sherlock asked immediately, noticing a large, half-finished drink in John's tired hands. John looked up, as though he were almost surprised to see Sherlock back so soon.
"Oh, well, I didn't want to interrupt." John said plainly, sounding very irritable once more.
"Please interrupt." Sherlock assured, leaning against the counter so that he could face John more easily. John's smile was gone, and he was staring into his drink with a look that Sherlock recognized so painfully well. A hopeless look, a scared look, the look you gave yourself when were about to do something you knew you would ultimately regret.
"I just...it's stupid, I'm being stupid." John insisted, interrupting himself before he could say anything more. Sherlock just sighed, leaning closer and putting one of his hands on John's arm, a comforting hand he thought.
"Tell me John." he insisted. John just sighed, looking up at Sherlock in a hopeless sort of way.
"You bother me Sherlock, in a way I can't admit without breaking my vows." John said finally. Sherlock let his hand slide off of John's arm very cautiously, shaking his head and trying to blink some sense into himself. This was wrong, obviously, but he wanted John to keep talking.
"I bother you?" he clarified.
"Yes, you do. I just...I try to find a flaw in your face, in your everything. But the more I try to find a flaw the more I catch myself staring at your perfections, I stare so much and I just...I can't tear my eyes away." John admitted heavily. "And it's wrong, I know it's wrong, but I think that maybe there are more things to my life that are wrong."
"Your life is fine John, I envy the peace and the clarity that you have." Sherlock defended softly.
"But if living in peace and clarity also means living with Mary, then I don't want it. I would rather live in Hell with you by my side than walk through Heaven with her on my arm. Sherlock I just...I just..." John just shook his head, taking a long sip of his drink and looking as though he were about to cry.
"It's alright, John." Sherlock assured heavily, forcing the words off of his tongue as if they were reluctant to be said. Because it was wrong, but then again, he knew that it was right.
"What if I built this life with the wrong person? What if I rushed too much into my future and I left you behind?" John wondered with worry. Sherlock just breathed softly, brushing a blonde strand of hair off of John's forehead with a white finger. He liked the way John looked right now; he liked the desperate, drunken expression that beautiful face wore.
"Well I'm here now, am I not?" Sherlock whispered.
"Yes but I'm not allowed..." John said with a failing voice. Sherlock just leaned closer, so close that his arm overlapped with John's, and he slowly slid the drink out of the man's reach.
"How about we go dance?" Sherlock suggested. John muttered something weakly, but he didn't get out of his seat. Sherlock let his fingers play across John's chin lovingly, carefully, and he could feel John's face tense, his eyes were staring into Sherlock's yet they were out of focus.
"This time I promise I won't leave you." Sherlock said in a voice so low it was impossible that John could hear it over the music. But he must have, because as soon as Sherlock made that promise John was easing himself to the floor, his fingers taking Sherlock's hand limply, leading him farther and farther into the mess of dancing people. But this time their hands didn't part, this time Sherlock's fingers stayed in John's, and they stood arm's length apart, swaying and dancing to the music that they heard in their heads. They were happy, they were anxiously happy just to be together but they didn't smile, they didn't dare show it. Their eyes were locked and their faces were expressionless, but the feelings and the emotions that erupted inside of their skulls were like multicolored fireworks. They were together, they were joined at the fingers and they were one. Sherlock was entranced; he was being pulled towards John with every minute, with every motion. And as he stepped forward John would step back reluctantly, turning his head away with an almost pained look on his face. He didn't want to step away, but he knew he had to, he was on autopilot, he was being loyal. Sherlock admired his loyalty, but he was also disgusted by it. John had loyalty to Mary just as Victor had loyalty to the Devil, and that loyalty was going to rip these beautiful men out of Sherlock's grasp for good. As they moved around the dance floor Sherlock stepped forward and finally noticed that John didn't step back. Their fingers grasped upon the other's more agressivley, and their eyes locked for real. Sherlock was tempted to ask what had changed, he was almost tempted to wonder if what he was doing was right, but the multicolored lights playing over John's face were enough to convince him that it didn't matter if it was wrong. It was John, and in this moment, Mary wasn't by his side. Sherlock took another step closer, and John didn't back away, and then John pulled him closer by the arm, so violently that Sherlock ended up falling into John's arms, their chest pressed up against each other, their faces nowhere close. Sherlock couldn't look into John's eyes, only to his forehead, and yet that didn't stop him. There was love that needed to be released, and a height difference wouldn't put an end to that so easily. Sherlock kissed the top of John's head, and he felt John pressing kisses onto his jacket, there was nothing in their way, there was nothing stopping them. Any inch of the other they could find they kissed, until finally Sherlock's lips were trialing down John's cheek and John's kissed strayed up Sherlock's neck, and finally their faces were so near, their faces so close that their streams of breath overlapped. And Sherlock's eyes met John's, and his lips were hovering closer to their final destination...and then he noticed the smoke. It wasn't cigarette smoke rising from someone's lips, nor was it the fog that was clinging to their feet from the fog machine at the corner of the dance floor. It wasn't the darkness from the night sky that clung to John's skin, nor was it the artificial darkness that spewed from the black lightbulbs above their heads. No, it was a demon's darkness, a hellish smoke, and finally John's eyes were glossed over with a yellow. Sherlock screamed loudly, flinging himself away from John's possessed body and falling back onto the dance floor, sprawling over people's feet as he landed. John just laughed in a voice that was not his own, and the entire dance floor went silent. And, just like that, as soon as all the attention was focused on John standing above Sherlock's petrified form, he collapsed as well, his eyes rolling to the back of his head and his legs giving out, falling right next to Sherlock onto the glittering black floor. Sherlock let his head fall back in relief, staring at the lights above as they swerved this way and that, emitting a terrible magenta light, and that was presumably the last thing he saw, because when his eyes opened once again, everything was white instead of black.
"Sherlock, Sherlock, can you hear me?" Molly's voice asked above him, her voice drilling into Sherlock's numb skull as he blinked rapidly. Sherlock yelped, sitting up in the uncomfortable white bed and looking this way and that, trying to find John, trying to protect him from what was brewing inside of him.
"John, John...he wasn't...it wasn't him!" Sherlock exclaimed, trying to heave himself out from under these scratchy white blankets when he found his arms to be restrained, his wrists strapped to the metal bed in cloth hand cuffs. Molly was on her feet now, calling for a nurse, and Sherlock's head spun, he was either having a mental break down or simply a terrible hangover, but either way he was in the most terrible pain.
"Mr. Holmes just lie down, please I'm just going to have to ask you to relax." insisted a calm female voice above him.
"JOHN!" Sherlock exclaimed desperately, and then, for the second time that same night, his world went black. 

 When Sherlock woke the second time he felt a lot more relaxed, he felt strangely high, as if there were depressants pumping through his veins. His eyes slowly opened, and when they did he saw that he wasn't alone. Molly was lying against the bed, her head resting on her arm as she slept. Sherlock groaned, blinking rapidly and finally discovering where he was, at a hospital, in a room that was painted completely white. He didn't know why hospitals were always painted white, but in the few he had actually been in it was always a reoccurring theme. 

"Molly?" Sherlock whispered, trying to prod his sleeping friend but finding that his wrists were still restrained. Molly started to stir, groaning a little bit as her eyes finally fluttered open.
"There you are." Sherlock muttered, letting his head fall into his pillows as Molly finally lifted her own.
"Sherlock, you're awake!" she said happily, looking suddenly wide awake dispute being a sleep not a moment earlier.
"Yes, that does tend to happen." Sherlock agreed miserably, his headache starting to return dispute whatever he was hooked up to.
"Sherlock you idiot! What did you think you were doing?" Molly growled, shaking her head in annoyance and staring at Sherlock regretfully. Sherlock's eyes widened, wondering just what she meant by that.
"What did you hear?" Sherlock whispered fearfully.
"I was told when I arrived that you had gotten into a fight with John, a drunken fight at that, and that as soon as he knocked you unconscious he passed out himself." Molly said simply.
"That's..."Sherlock groaned in annoyance, repositioning himself on his pillows once more. "That's pathetic." he finished finally.
"That's what I thought as well." Molly agreed.
"Irene took over, we were dancing, and suddenly he was engulfed in the smoke, I screamed, and as soon as everyone looked at him he passed out, she gave up. I don't know how, I don't know why, I thought staying up worked, I thought we were safe." Sherlock whispered weakly.
"Was he drinking?" Molly wondered immediately, as though she had already given this some thought.
"Well...yes. He was, we both were." Sherlock agreed, not quite sure where Molly was going with this.
"I think that being drunk counts as the human soul being unconscious, or close to it. I think it was weakened with the alcohol, and that let the Aspiration take over." Molly guessed flatly. Sherlock nodded uneasily, looking at Molly with newfound respect.
"Yes, yes I suppose that would make sense." He agreed carefully.
"I thought so too." Molly agreed proudly, smiling to herself. Sherlock just looked around at the empty room, noticing a rather ugly purse lying by Molly's chair, a purse he didn't recognize. For some reason it made him rather uncomfortable, because he knew that whoever left it had been visiting him. It definitely wasn't Molly's, of course.
"How did you find me?" he wondered nervously, easing himself higher up in the bed.
"I didn't, I was called." Molly admitted heavily, looking around the room instead of making eye contact. This was never a good sign, of course.
"Called by who?" Sherlock wondered, his eyes slanting in suspicion.
"Well, they identified you, someone remembered you from high school, they called the hospital, who then, well, called the first people that came to mind." Molly said with an innocent shrug.
"Which was you?" Sherlock guessed hopefully. Molly just looked down at the floor, as if too guilty to admit what really happened. Sherlock was starting to feel very uncomfortable, looking at the unknown purse and deciding that there was woman he knew that would have a taste for such a rancid thing.
"Well, they called your parents." Molly admitted. Sherlock's face fell, and as if on cue the door opened and in marched the two people he wanted to see the least. The two people he hadn't seen in roughly seven years. Just as Molly had said.His parents.His mother led the way, but instead of throwing her arms around his neck and strangling him like he expected, she just stood in the doorway as if frozen solid. She covered her mouth with her hand emotionally, letting out a feminine squeak before muttering his name against her palm. Sherlock groaned heavily, wanting to either run from this horrible scene or just burry himself under the blankets. But of course he couldn't do anything, he couldn't go anywhere, his stupid hands were tied to the bed, and what was he supposed to do but complain?
"Sherlock, oh Sherlock, look how much you've grown!" Mrs. Holmes exclaimed, running up to the bed and doing exactly what he had predicted, smothering him in hugs and kisses and suffocating him in her motherly love.
"Mother, come on, just...come on!" Sherlock growled, shaking her off to the best of his abilities. She finally withdrew nervously, as if wondering if he was still angry from that argument a good seven years ago. Well, the answer to that question was yes, of course he was. There was a reason he hadn't picked up the phone in the seven year hiatus, it was because he was still livid. They could never understand what it was like inside of his head, the pity, the self-loathing, the wasted talent, the dead. If they couldn't understand all those years ago then there was no possible way they could understand now. Mr. Holmes stood patiently by the door, watching Sherlock with regretful eyes, as if he were trying to suppress his emotions to the best of his ability.
"I think I'll just check on John, make sure he's alright." Molly decided very awkwardly, getting to her feet as quickly as she could and starting to scamper off towards the door.
"Is John okay?" Sherlock asked suddenly, making Molly pause right as she was leaving.
"He's a little bit shaken up, but as far as I can tell he's fine. Mary and Rosie are here." Molly assured, and with that she cast a timid little smile to the Holmes parents before rushing out the door.
"Who's John?" Mrs. Holmes asked hopefully, claiming Molly's chair as her own and picking her purse up off of the ground. Sherlock grumbled hatefully, repositioning himself in the horrible bed so that he was staring at the ceiling and not at his parents.
"Client." He muttered carelessly.
"Nothing more?" Mrs. Holmes asked, almost as if she were expecting that they were engaged or something like that. Sherlock's thoughts trailed to what had last happened, to his last memory, his last good one at least. John, pressed so close, Sherlock's lips on his forehead and John's lips on his chest...
"Nothing more." Sherlock agreed reluctantly. Mr. Holmes lingered very awkwardly by the door, looking very unsure of what to do with himself. They were definitely his parents; they had the same faces, the same eyes, the same boring, dreadful attire. But they looked older, as if those seven years had aged them twenty more. Their hair was white and their smooth skin lined with wrinkles, his father had a new pair of glasses and his mother's hair looked dyed. It was very odd to be back in their presence, it was a reunion that Sherlock had dreaded for so long, but now it was happening, and he didn't even agree to it. This seemed like a horrible way to try to reconcile, forcefully and hungover, Sherlock was sure that the only thing this little meeting would amount to was more screaming and seven more years of solitude.