bakerstreet | Healing the Broken

Healing the Broken

healing the broken meme
a shipping meme

The events of many canons have left its characters ravaged, unable to be the whole people they once were. They can never go back to the innocence they had before. However, they can find someone who can pull you back from the brink. Some say love can conquer all ills and cure all broken people - the jury is still out on that, but enough people subscribe to the notion that it may have some merit. With the right affection behind it, can it be the elixir to heal traumas or mend angst? For this meme, it can be. No matter what your what your problem is, from daddy issues to being mind controlled to hating all humans or being just a jerk, all you need is healing from the right person.

All in all? This is a shameless meme playing with the idea of "cured by love." Love it or hate it, it's prevalent in fiction, both fan and published. And sometimes, no lie, you just want to play it and not be judge for the pure shlock you know it to be. Here is the place; now is the time. However, you don't have to go for unrealistic escapism. One partner trying to help the other through trauma is not an easy task, and there are bound to be setbacks, resistance, and hurt feelings. And what if BOTH partners are a little bit broken? Can they survive together, or will they bring each other down?

how to play
- Comment with your character and preferences. Feel free to talk about your character's problems. You might also want to mention if your character is the one who needs to be healed or can do the healing. Or perhaps you and your thread partner can play two roughed up characters learning to trust again!
- Reply to others.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only | Expand All

"I'm going to get us invited to dinner with the new Vice President. Maybe fly him up to Khartoum for the weekend if he doesn't have the kind of resources necessary to assure our complete safety. The carnage is supposedly winding down a bit at the moment. He might be looking for advice to keep it going in that direction."

Jim rested his head against Jack's shoulder, the top of his shoulder at the moment because sitting on his lap had skewed their relative heights. "Besides, what sort of 'white guy' could be considered relevant in a civil war? I might as well be some kind of bear wandered onto the battlefield, just another obstacle that both sides need to shoot around in order to get to each other."

"Of course you are," agreement, because Jim could and would do whatever he wished. Jack would be there helping to dodge bullets, taking hits, and striking back. "Bears are rather unusual down here however. Might just shoot you to get a closer look."

That said, "I think he would be puffing if he said he could protect you," from what he knew from the situation. "The fighting hasn't stopped, but the country could potentially support itself."

"He can barely protect himself." Jim furrowed his brow, trying to put the puzzle together with the few blurry pieces he had. Finally he gave a mental shrug and looked back up at Jack with a relatively carefree smile.

"Not enough information yet!" The food was strange, yes, but with actually getting some physical activity and not having an endless supply of anything London could offer was teaching him what hunger felt like. Moriarty bit into it with more conviction.

Khartoum would provide most of those answers, what with the refugees camped outside of town. Only a little bit if information would come from the north as they moved south. His arm tightened around Jim's back for a second, he knew and wasn't someone who needed to have everything planned out, not when he had a direction to keep moving in.

The hot meat stuffed naan was eaten and they had another hour to admire the diamond studded sky before the train shuddered. As the engine strained forward inches at a time, he helped Jim hang off the edge of the car to swing through their open window. Dropped in behind him and wrung out a towel to hang over the window, to keep out the sand and create passive air conditioning, a swamp cooler, that kept their quarters bearable. 'Bearable' was a loose term, considering that the wood and metal tube was an oven. Those riding on top were subject to the direct sun and abrading sands.

They pulled into the city the next day and traveled to the Al Salam Rotana Hotel by dubious cab. The were sandy an smelly, hard to tell them apart from the rest of the population. The pith from Jim's hat was beginning to dry out, his shirt dried then soaked in sweat to chafe against fresh skin.

Despite all of Jack's best efforts, Jim was haggard and exhausted by the time they arrived. That didn't prevent him from striding cheerfully into the building, greeting all of the employees and striking up a conversation with the bellhop about his family, his plans to meet up with friends after work, learning a bit more about Sudanese Arabic syntax in the process. Not that they needed a bellhop, they were carrying all of their possessions in a few sturdy bags, including the leather courier bag that was quickly wearing in to conform to Jim's body.

Though their suite was air conditioned, Jim ran himself a shallow, tepid bath and promptly fell asleep. His fingers and toes pruned in the water, thin layers of sand drifted to the porcelain surface, and the next layer of peeling sunburn was covered in a thick, rehydrated layer of aloe. At least he was over his most recent case of the sniffles?

Grim, he had watched Jim take the lead, their ambassador and self appointed spokesperson. After taking a round of the penthouse for security's sake, Jack showered, sand scraping across his scalp until the second rinse of thick lather. Sand in polite and impolite places, he was relieved when he thought he could finally declare his body sand free, at least for the time being. Helped grease up Jim, then fell over, dozing lightly in the unfamiliar place. His body was used to the rocking train and the lack of movement kept his rest shallow.

After the long nap, a meal was ordered up. A tagine of marinated goat with pickled lemons and olives, naan to scoop up the meal, chilled fruit, and endless glasses of tea arrived, eaten as they looked out over the pool, which was now full in the evening's lower temperatures, and out over the flat ground that stretched out in the city's lights.

"The markets will be a good place to speak with the locals and refugees." Markets were open in the mornings and again in the evenings.

"Don't want to." Substantially revived, all Jim wanted to do right now was wrap himself around Jack and drown in him.

Hadn't meant now, tonight. Tomorrow, the day after perhaps, while he arranged transport via Land Rover or by sail, depending on direction. It was easier to pretend to give in, to be the one giving something up.

"As you wish, Love." The third floor wasn't high up, but with the topography level, the land went on forever until it touched the edge of the sky. "Another day, there is no rush."

"Don't know what I want." He pulled Jack into a long, languid kiss, desperately fighting off the ennui that had returned with a vengeance and now threatened to devour him whole.

A huff against the searching mouth, he threw himself into the affection and desperation. Tugged Jim from the chair and into his lap, poking a grape between his lips, keeping him eating. "You are tired, Love." Dehydrated too, if he didn't miss his guess, not missing the loose waist of the trousers. "Another nap would be good for both of us."
And stuffing you silly.
What?
Food and me.

Jim was tired, that much he knew was true, but it was an antsy kind of tired. He was physically worn out but mentally spinning his wheels in the mud. His skin had finally stopped shedding but now he was crawling out of it, restless and over-alert. "My brain hurts," he muttered, not bothering to deflect the steady stream of fruit and liquids even though he felt he would dissolve in a mushy puddle from being overhydrated. Jack was right, though. Sweat had been pouring out of him for way too long, salt stinging his perpetually raw exposed layer of skin. Half a day hadn't been enough to recover from it, even with Jack's relentless efforts.

His perpetual exhaustion wasn't entirely due to his delicate constitution, a tiny wildflower that could only be found in a tiny hamlet in the British Isles and could not be kept from wilting and dying when uprooted. He had started their journey in laughably poor athletic condition. Every day had challenged his stamina to the breaking point. Starting with long treks through huge marketplaces and most recently climbing up and down the sides of a moving train had beaten his reluctant body into the grudging, but inexorable, process of creating lean muscle mass. Jim didn't have a heavy build, he tended towards a sinewy sort of strength. Even though he lived in his body full-time and tended to notice such details in other people, he was oblivious to what was happening so deep under his skin.

"Teach me something. Tell me a story." Too weary to keep his eyes open and too awake for a small distraction to be enough, Jim started chewing on Jack's fingers in an attempt to persuade him to start biting and scratching, to start leaving new marks on new skin, something to ground and settle him, something familiar in a sea of strangeness.

A slice of starfruit was substituted for Jack's fingers. "Partnership Dominoes is a popular game here as is Fourteen, a type of gin rummy." Gin only required 2 players, dominoes needed four, because as he said, 'partners'. Naan, the hot flatbread with a smear of hummas and a chunk of tasty goat, followed the fruit, held up to be bitten. "I have a deck," Of course Jack had a deck of cards, when there was nothing to read, he would practice his hands and counting what had fallen to the deck.

Jim had been lackluster about the idea of being banged up anyway, and settled down easily when Jack passively refused the suggestion. Resting the side of his head on Jack's shoulder so the silly man could keep sticking things in his mouth, he let his arms hang in a loose embrace around Jack's waist. The food was pretty good, actually, now that he thought about it.

"Tell me how to play poker." Not show me, Jim had no intention of opening his eyes anytime soon.

While continuing to hand feed Jim, a few bites between thrown in his direction, Jack outlined the definitions of the terms used and what the various winning hands were. Play, specifically a typical play of Hold'em, or Texas Hold'em, because it is the game played for the World Series of Poker (WSOP), was explained first. Kept popping food into Jim's mouth, handing off a glass of tea, when he also paused to take a drink. His voice had settled into a comforting rumble. Next, Jack explained five card stud, which he was often observed playing solo.

"The rest of the game is knowing or reading your opponents." That, Jim could do his sleep.

By the time Jack had finished the explanation, Jim was been willing to hold his own glass of tea and drink from it. Now he even opened his eyes, just a bit, to give Jack a sidelong look.

"So, that's it? That's poker? It's a hell of a lot simpler than people make it out to be."

"Luck of the draw, luck which is reduced by counting the cards, again not difficult," agreeing. "Poker is a way to pay the bills. I use it to suss someone out who is being stalked." Not necessarily playing with them however, that was only done if he wanted to actually get closer. "You have easier ways to put zeros in the bank."

"Oh don't worry. I'm not going to try muscling in on your turf. That vice is all yours." Jim snuggles closer after Jack runs out of food, nuzzling at his neck.

"Tell me how to play 'gin.'"

Didn't think that Jim would care for that socialization unless he needed something and didn't think that Jack could win. Realistic.

"Ten cards in each player's hand. In the center one card is face up, the rest of the deck face down. The object to to make sets of what is in your hand, helped by taking the face up card or an unknown card from the deck then discarding any one card in your hand, so you always have ten." Again Jack described what would be a set and the point counting system. "The difference between Fourteen and Gin Rummy is that each player has 14 cards in their hands, jokers are wild, and two decks are used. You cannot pick up the discarded card unless using it to complete your hand and ending the game and the also count the points differently."

Jim contemplated it for a moment, then showed some guarded approval. "Seems more interesting than poker, anyway. So how do you place bets?"

"Muslims do not bet," winking. "If arrangements are made on the side, then that is something else." Yes, he rather liked gin, it took more intelligent to crafting a winnable hand and the points were more comples. But all of that said, but poker was considered to be 'a man's game', so poker it was when down on the docks.

"I'm sure that we, as proper Muslims, could find something of value to wager between us that doesn't constitute betting."

Jack would have to be a stone headed idiot to play against Moriarty for actual stakes, for any number of reasons. None of them would include the boss somehow losing.

Jack was certain of a few things. First that he could easily be read by Moriarty, second that he would be caught if he cheated, third that Moriarty could count card better than he could, Jack was no slouch by occasionally he missed something, and fourth...well he was sure there was something. Besides, at this point, there was very little he had that Jim hadn't provided, except for his weapons, those had stayed the same even if stray things like boots and clothes had been replaced over the years, albeit in Jack's familiar and comfortable style.

"We don't have to play for anything, Jim. A kiss for the winner or some other favor, if that is what you are hinting at," which would also make for bad Muslims, but who was he to point out the obvious? especially when he wasn't Muslim or even a good catholic boy. If anything, he liked the idea of reincarnation and coming back to get things right.

A kiss? Well, that might actually be the sort of stakes he was considering. Nah, they could come up with something better. "Maybe after you rack up a certain number of wins, I would agree to learn how to do something practical, like how to make my own tea. You know, just for emergency situations. That kind of thing." Technically, Jim knew about combining boiling water with tea leaves, but he had refused to pay attention to certain nuances like the actual amount of tea leaves to use, or how long to steep them. It wasn't that Jack had enabled this kind of helplessness. If anything, Jim would have been even worse off with his usual strategy of hiring other people to do it for him. The boss refused to fraternize with the help at all, but his Tiger had been allowed to perform this skill in his presence hundreds of times now. "If I win, you have to make me a page of paper dolls. Or figure out how to hire a local to deliver a singing telegram to me."

What about Moriarty's ability to identify the individual wear patterns on the backs of Jack's deck of cards? Or his sleight-of-hand skills? What, did Jack somehow assume that Jim was a reformed man now, that he would actually play a friendly card game without cheating every which way at once?

Yes, all of that and more, that's fourth. Except it doesn't matter. The game or the cheat or just unrighteous win means something to Jim and Jack will use it to entertain him, to give him something else to think of. A bit of mischief won't hurt one of them and Jack's been too solid as of late, thinking he's the big dog.

"I could go either way," as if he reluctant.

"Oh, don't pretend you're uninterested." Jim pressed his face down against Jack's shoulder, his small amused smile easily apparent even though it wasn't visible. "If waving a deck of cards under my nose has even the slightest chance of working, you would grow a third hand just to add it to your tea-and-food routine."

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject