Okay, I wrote this whole thing at like, three in the morning from a sudden inspiration so if there are any stupid grammar/spelling errors, blame it on the no sleep-too lazy to read over it right now thing. It's the only small-chapter thing I've achieved. The beginning is kinda shaky but I love the rooftop scene. (And yes, I got some ideas from The Sight, if you've read it.) I can't quite tell if it's OOC or not...

Summary: Perry must face something they never thought would happen, that they knew could never happen but when the unthinkable ensues, how long will he keep running? JD can only hope that it won't be too late when he finally comes to his senses...

Rating: It's pretty safe. I couldn't find any bad parts, but just in case, I'll say K+.

Pairings: Not JDCox. It's more of how JD and Perry helped each other without realizing it.

Regular text.

"Speaking."

Thinking.

(Author's notes within story.)

My Heaven

"Stay near the light ... I am there. I am in the rain and the skies. I am in the trees and the flowers. I am in the sunlight and the moonlight too." -The Sight

Part One:

"Where-" Perry burst into the room, panting, "Where's Newbie?" Greeting his question were several tear-stained faces. The older doctor glanced around hesitantly, his mind knowing but his heart defiant to the facts, and approached the motionless figure in the hospital bed.

Starlight illuminated his pale lips, his darkened eyelids and the tubes and wires sprawling over his body. Perry looked unable to move as he controlled his emotions then he swallowed and picked up JD's chart with a trembling hand. It only took a few moments for him to look up from the papers.

"' ... causing the irreversible end to all activity of John Dorian's brain,'" Perry read off the paper then glanced around and knew what they were all thinking. Before it could be certain, several more tests had to be run but Perry could see the worst possible situation unfold behind his eyes. "He's ... brain dead?"

Twenty minutes ago, Turk had called Perry over his cell phone just as Perry had stepped into his apartment. Before Perry could snap for bothering him while he was off, Turk had spoken, voice thick and choking with emotion.

"Dr. Cox, you need to get down here ... It's JD."

Perry had just been able to catch the sobbing somewhere near the phone before Turk had hung up. Ice had spread through his blood. He had recognized Elliot and Carla in the background. And now, as Perry hovered at the end of the bed, he demanded answers. With Turk's arms curled around Carla, he let his cheek rest on her head but he couldn't find his voice. The chances of snapping were just too great. So, Elliot wiped her eyes free of mascara tracks and looked up.

"He was driving home, on his scooter," she began, her voice also heavy, "and he slid on a patch of black ice. They said if he'd just gone a few more feet to the right, he'd have landed in the grass but ... his scooter lost control on the gravel on the shoulder and he fell off and ... Oh, god, he cracked his skull open!"

All the air seemed to have been suck out of the room and Perry swayed. Before he collapsed, he fumbled for a chair and pulled it over then fell, legs numb and rubbery. But, this annoying kid, he was just another intern, he wasn't really a part of his life. JD hadn't seen his personal life and known the details ... Well, actually he had. He'd been there for all the big stuff even when he'd tried to beat him off. Even with how girly, irritating and thick he'd been, Perry had to admit, he'd still been there.

Suddenly, Perry stood up. He couldn't face this. It didn't matter what they said, that he maybe was running away. Newbie couldn't die while he wasn't there, right? So if he left the problem, everything would be alright.

Without another word, Perry swept out of the room just fast enough for them to miss his shaking fists. Carla looked down, eyes void of anymore tears as she muttered miserably.

"We all knew he would do this," she said in an oddly angry growl. "He couldn't suck it up for once and face the situation even for JD. He's a-a spineless-"

"Just give him some time," Elliot muttered. Perhaps the shocking reality had cleared her mind. "Maybe ... Maybe, he'll realize what he should do." Turk flashed her a questioning look but found he didn't have the strength to really think about her response. He figured if he just hovered over the surface and didn't let his mind wander to that morbid reality ... he might be able to get through this without breaking down.

It was several days before Perry reentered JD's room and immediately upon his return, he wanted to leave again. But, Dan had already seen him and was motioning him to come closer. Perry found that, despite the fact he was bad-tempered and ornery enough to fend off anyone, he couldn't deal with grieving people.

Dan was a mess. He usually had a unruly air to his demeanor but this was way beyond the norm. His clothes were wrinkled and hanging off his body as if he didn't care enough about himself to change or leave the room. Perry glanced away, as if looking for some escape, but he sat beside the older brother anyway.

With his head in his hand, Dan was silent for several moments. Perry wondered if the stress had finally gotten to his head and he'd fallen asleep when suddenly, a broken voice grated out. Perry leaned forward in his chair and strained to catch the older brother's voice, apparently rusty from nonuse.

"You probably have spent more time with my brother than I ever did," Dan stated and Perry didn't know what to say. "I'll ask you straight forward. Did Johnny really like working here? I mean, when I visited, he seemed happy, but did he seem to want to do ... something else, like he wasn't satisfied with this job?"

Perry still wasn't sure what to say. Had he ever paid attention to JD's feelings? Perry gave an inward snort, knowing he could never admit that he'd always noticed how happy it made JD to watch one of his patients walk out of the hospital in perfect health, how crushed it made him to watch his patient, anyone's patient die despite years of being a doctor. Even with that, Perry had never questioned whether or not Newbie had enjoyed the job. JD might've been a little emotional for the job but it was the job he'd wanted.

"Yeah," Perry managed to choke. He hadn't gave more than a grunt of greeting to anyone in days. Maybe he was taking this worse than Dan, just in a different way. "He loved being a doctor."

Later that night, Perry paused at the nurse's station to switch off charts when a hand fell on his. Perry glanced up, eyes glazed slightly in numbing exhaustion that he craved so, and was surprised to see Jordan's fierce eyes softening a shade. She seemed to see every thought that wandered in the back of his mind, the ones that didn't involve patients or which medications he needed to prescribe, and Perry felt exposed. Before he could respond accordingly with anger, her softer voice pierced his every thought.

"Your shift ended hours ago. Working yourself to exhaustion in order to avoid the problem won't work. Never really has, you know. Go talk to him, even if he can't hear you. I know you'll regret that you didn't later." Her eyes flashed as if there were more that she wasn't telling. "You know it too. We all know it."

As she walked away to leave a stunned, fatigued Perry where he stood, she paused and glanced over her shoulder. "If you haven't heard yet, the kid's brother, he decided to pull the plug next week."

This could've been when Perry snapped because every sound within hearing distance became no more than a muffled murmur. The sound of the clipboard clattering to the counter top brought everything roaring back and Perry said something about getting some air to the pretty, young nurse who threw him a concerned glance. Something in his heart wanted him to run as far away as possible and yet at the same time, he didn't want to get to far from JD in case ...

He stumbled at a sprinting pace, brushing by people he'd intimidated too much in the past to try and stop him, into an empty stairwell in search of the isolation on the roof.

Once he got there, he realized his plan was a tad flawed, not in the sense that it was below freezing and he wasn't wearing a jacket but in the sense that his heart ached at all he saw. The gray sky unfurling its feathers and stroking the airless void above, the sun dying in fiery, golden glory on the horizon, the neon city rippling with the far-away people who had no idea at all ... Perry felt an odd, tender passion for everything that existed, everything that JD would never see again, everything the promising, young doctor would be losing next week ...

Perry fell to his knees against the wall as his throat constricted painfully and tears burned his eyes in the frigid twilight. "Damn kid," he choked, gripping the ledge as he tried and failed to get to his feet, the city swimming before his eyes. Perhaps the exhaustion had caught up to him, perhaps those blasted tears were finally surfacing. "S'pose he got under my skin."

It took several minutes for Perry to recover his composure and drag his sleeve over his eyes. If he just waited a bit more, the red and puffy look would fade and he could get up, go to his car and leave this hospital for a good while...

No. Perry squared his shoulders and glared around, slightly disappointed that no one was there to witness his turning point. Gotta face this, and then be done with it. Even as he thought this to himself though, he had the strangest felling that he wouldn't be done with it.

Ever.