Just so everyone is clear: this is not slash.
I'll say it again: this is not slash.
And for those of you who are really stubborn: THIS IS NOT SLASH!
I really don't want it to be taken that way, thanks. It's just a deep, intimate, platonic friendship.
.
Sherlock stared at the heart monitor in shock, unwilling, unable to comprehend what he was seeing. His wide eyes followed the flat line, waiting for it to leap, to signify life.
It didn't.
The doctors were already backing away, shaking their heads. Sherlock clung to the bars of the hospital bed with white knuckles, eyes glued to the monitor in disbelief. He couldn't believe it, he just couldn't.
But he had to. Because the monitor continued to flatline, and John still lay there motionless.
His whole body went cold and he found himself unable to breath. He trembled violently from head to foot, his chest heaving as he gasped frantically for air. His entire world was collapsing in on itself. John's heart had stopped beating. His best friend was dead.
Dead.
John was dead.
Sherlock collapsed, his legs no longer able to support the full weight of the reality that came crashing down on him. The hospital bed broke his fall, and he found himself gripping the sheets to avoid sliding to the floor in an undignified heap. His hand groped outward in a blind panic; it found John's lifeless one and seized it in desperation.
John, who had tackled Sherlock into the pool and gotten a bullet to the side for his pains. John, whose quick thinking saved Sherlock's life…at cost to his own.
What a stupid thing to do. What a stupid, idiotic, John thing to do.
Stupid…stupid…
Sherlock's breath caught in his throat, and his eyes welled up with hot tears. He had no defense against the grief that flooded every part of his being. The walls that he had spent his whole life building to keep his rational mind safe from the vulnerability of emotion had now crumbled completely. John had been the first to break through them, the first person with whom he had ever felt such a deep level of friendship …and now he was gone forever.
Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid…
The mantra took over all thought as Sherlock sobbed into the sheets that covered the lifeless body of his friend.
I felt really weird after I wrote this. I spent about an hour writing it, getting into the mood, trying to feel Sherlock's pain to make it more accurate. Needless to say, I was in a rather melancholy mood after I finished. Funny how stories do that to you. :-)