Not much to say.

Enjoy.

Not Meant to Be

7

When he came back late that evening, after Mycroft's driver had dropped him in front of the hospital, nothing had changed; Sherlock was still as pallid and motionless as he had been before. And in that very moment, entering the room again, the pictures taken by the security camera still present in his mind, John couldn't even bring himself to imagine that anything ever would change.

John fell asleep in that night, slumped in the chair, only to be awoken by his own nightmares, nightmares in which he was in the narrow street with Sherlock, Sherlock who was nonetheless lying on the concrete, staring up to John with wide and pale eyes, blood-shot, more blood pouring from his nose, and whispered accusations in a husky voice.

John's feet had gone numb during his unintentional nap, and as he stretched his legs in front of him, he kept his eyes fixed on Sherlock whose eyes didn't open this time and who didn't haul insults at him. John didn't know what was better - the dream or reality.

"We will keep him sedated for at least a few more days," he was informed in the morning by a different doctor than the day before. "No reason to worry, it's simply a measure of precaution."

Precaution.

It did not feel like one, though. To John, witnessing his best friend in an artificial coma rather appeared like the last option available, when everything else had failed.

Four hours. More than four hours.

John had spent the entire night - before and after his nightmares - thinking, worrying, fearing for the worst.

Four hours of time for the blood to collect, for the intracranial pressure to rise and for damage to be caused, irreversible damage, maybe. All of his medical knowledge seemed to have vanished all of a sudden, vapourised into thin air, leaving him clueless and wondering if Sherlock could even survive this.

"Despite the flatline, it could have been worse," the young doctor went on, rambling, while checking the readings on some monitor. Worse? John found it difficult to believe. Worse, yes, in one way: Worse would mean that he was not sitting in a hospital, but rather in a morgue, crying over his best friend's dead body. "Not as much blood as we had expected had accumulated, and finally, we succeeded in stabilising the patient. We…"

John stopped listening, again. What good would it do him to hear that everything could have been much worse, that he should be happy to still have hope left?

"… no signs of infection yet," the doctor ended, causing John to flinch and tighten his grip around Sherlock's hand.

John's throat constricted at the sight of the smile the doctor gave him. "I'm sorry," he carked, "but could you… could you just leave me alone, please?"

Compassionately, the man nodded and left.

Compassion was the last thing John needed.

He did not leave Sherlock's side again.

No matter how often Mary told him to come home, at least for the nights, or to let her continue his mostly silent vigil for a while. No matter how often Mrs Hudson, having been told by Mary, came by and kept clinging to him, begging him to take better care of himself, clearly wanting at least one of her former two tenants to be fine. No matter how often Greg appeared, always quiet and clearly uncomfortable, not knowing what to say, avoiding to look at Sherlock, squirming in his chair. John did not leave.

He couldn't, not after what he had seen. He had abandoned Sherlock once, and he wouldn't do it a second time. And ironically, the only one who never suggested that he should go home, at least for a while, was Mycroft, visiting once in the first three days, instead he only looked at John's hand still entwined with Sherlock's, and nodded.

Nothing changed in the next two days, doctors coming in now and then, talking to John, informing him about 'stable' and 'no more bleeding' and 'swelling has reduced', but again, he couldn't bring himself to listen. Sherlock didn't have to listen to what they were talking, so why should he?

Then there were other doctors, talking about 'reducing amount of sedation' and 'waking up', and hours and days later again, saying words like 'no signs of waking yet' and 'coma'.

John understood although he tried not to, understood that although he wasn't sedated anymore, that he actually was supposed to wake up, Sherlock didn't.

Never did as he was told, of course. Or as he was expected to do.

On the fourth day since the… since it, John suddenly felt as if he couldn't take it anymore.

Sitting next to Sherlock, knowing that this here, this… status of his best friend was no longer intended to help him recover, no longer planned, but a completely unexpected and unpredictable reaction of his body, a reaction to what had happened to him, it was slowly ripping John apart. And it was becoming so difficult to keep on hoping, hoping for his second miracle.

"Give him time," Mary told him softly, her eyes glistening, too, nonetheless trying to encourage him.

Time. How much more time?

"Oh, my poor boy…," Mrs Hudson was sobbing into his shoulder, and John found it didn't help at all.

"I wished… I wished all of this hadn't happened," Greg said. "I…," and then cut himself off, maybe realising how stupid everything he might have wanted to add would have sounded. "And nobody knows what happened?" was his next question.

John simply shook his head, rubbing his tired eyes with his right hand.

He hadn't told anyone, not even Mary. Somehow, it… he couldn't. He couldn't find words for it, and besides, he didn't see any use in it. It had not been a planned attack, not really, an accident. An accident after which they had run away. Run away and left Sherlock. Mycroft would be able to deal with everything.

Should Sherlock… The thought alone was enough to nearly stop John's heart. Should he… should… if he shouldn't recover, then he didn't think the knowledge that they had not done this on purpose to Sherlock would stop him from tearing them to pieces himself.

"How come you had a camera in that very spot," John asked Mycroft flatly while they were sitting next to the bed, both of them drenched in silence.

A thin-lipped smile crossed Mycroft's features as he gently tipped his fingers on his thigh. "I have told you before, John," was his answer. "I worry about my brother, and since I have known this street to be one of his usual meeting places with his… employees…, a camera appeared convenient… years ago." His gaze slowly wandered to Sherlock's face. "I assure you, they will be taken care of."

John had simply nodded, not really paying attention anymore. This wouldn't help Sherlock.

When the doctors removed the original bandage and revealed the wound, the still present swelling, the shaved skin, John turned his eyes away, focusing on Sherlock's hand with the IV line instead. While the doctors were covering his head with another dressing and a sterile gauze cap instead, the IV line suddenly reminded John of other tubes, the urinary catheter, the feeding tube keeping his best friend nutured, the tracheal tube making him breathe.

John's relief when he was finally alone again, able to grip Sherlock's hand once more, was immeasurable.

"Wake up," he whispered, close to tears. "Just wake up, prove them all wrong."

In the nights, when no-one, not even Mary, was there except for him and Sherlock, he kept talking for hours - yes, talking, although he had deemed it ridiculous at first - until his mouth became fuzzy and he needed to leave for a short amount of time, head for a restroom and drink a few sips from the sink.

One should speak to coma patients, it said somewhere in the back of his head, to simply show them that someone was there, that someone cared. And, he figured while clinging to Sherlock's in the meantime warmed up hand, he might want to make up for the time Sherlock had to spend on his own, lying in the gutter.

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