Home Again

"Hanna," he said quietly, eyes fixed on the small man before him. His shoulders stiffened as his body froze at his name. Hanna whipped around to face him, incredulous and mute fury warring on his face. He didn't dare hope that he saw something more, some softer emotion hiding behind it.

"..." Hanna made a noise as if he was about to say a name, only to have it lodge in his throat. After a long, tense moment, just before he was about to give up and leave again, Hanna managed to unfreeze enough to fling himself at his former roommate with a wordless cry.

He braced himself for the blow - any blow - but still staggered back when Hanna's full weight came crashing into him, his thin arms coming tight around his neck, pulling his face onto his shoulder.

"I knew you'd come back," Hanna babbled, his voice choked but fierce. "I just knew it."

"Yes," he replied simply, his own arms circling Hanna's waist, pulling him into his body. It should have been uncomfortable, Hanna's no longer negligent weight dragging down on his neck, forcing him to hunch down to Hanna's level, but it wasn't. In fact, for the first time in a long time, he finally felt like he was coming home.

He could tell the exact moment Hanna realized that something was different by the way his breath caught. Hanna clung for a long minute after the realization, before resting his hands on his shoulders and shoving him back lightly to star at his face in confusion.

"-how on earth...?" He mumbled, staring into his now brown eyes, taking in his flushed pink face, the unsightly white scars that marred his skin. His hands reached up to brush against his cheekbones, smoothing over the hair along his jaw and sliding down his neck before stopping to feel the pulse there, to trace along the scar that slashed across it. He tried to pull away from Hanna's intense scrutiny, but the hands that settled on his shoulders were like steel bands, holding him in place. Slowly, Hanna tipped his head down and pressed an ear to his chest, listening to his heart beat, wonder spreading across his features.

"How?" Hanna asked again a little more insistently this time. He could only shrug in response, cursing his faulty memory. It seems he was forever doomed to no know what had happened to him in death or his own rebirth. He couldn't help but be fiercely glad that he hadn't lost this, lost Hanna. "Do you remember anything?"

He started to shake his head, but stopped suddenly when a distant memory of fire and pain came washing over him. He stiffened, but Hanna just made shushing noises, his palms sliding warmly from his shoulder down his back, rubbing. He took a deep breath and was once again startled by the feel of air being dragged into his lungs. He felt a prickling heat in his eyes and on his face and when he tried to blink the feeling away, he felt the burn of tears on his cheeks. He tightened his hold on Hanna's small body, burying his face even harder against his shoulder as he cried.

They stayed that way for long moments before Hanna finally said, "Y'know, we really should take this inside," and pulled him into the apartment. He tugged him over to his small bare mattress, gently pushed him down on it. He felt exhausted all at once, the energy and adrenaline that got him here - got him home - abruptly leaving him. He sank gratefully sank down into it, his eyes slipping closed as Hanna took off his shoes and placed a blanket on him. Hanna might have said something as well, but sleep already claimed him.

An indeterminate amount of time later, he blinked his eyes open, shattering the nightmare. Before, when he was among the undead, he hadn't needed to sleep. Now he was forced to and when he did it seemed all he had were nightmares. He lay stiffly on the bed for a long time, staring at the shadows on the wall and listening to Hanna shift restlessly and work on his laptop.

"Hey, Jude," Hanna called softly, "you awake?"

"Ummhmm," he murmured back, rolling over to look at Hanna, who was smiling softly at him. It occurred to him that he had never seen such a soft expression on his face before, and he wondered what he had done to deserve it now.

"Good, good," the other man cheered, "Are you hungry?"

He opened his mouth to respond but his stomach growled in agreement before he could say anything. He glared down at it, a blush rising on his cheeks while Hanna laughed.

Hanna grinned down at him and the so christened Jude smiled back a little. "Do you want me to make pancakes?"

Hanna just smiled harder. "Only if you feel up to it."

"I do," he said simply, getting off of the mattress and heading to the tiny kitchenette. He was just pulling the ingredients out when Hanna spoke again, he voice a little more subdued than his wont.

"I know you weren't too fond of getting wet when you were, um, undead, but I got you some clothes and stuff when you were sleeping, so maybe you could wash up a little before we go see Doc," he said in a rush. He blinked at the smaller man for a moment, methodically stirring the batter.

"Are you trying to tell me something?" He asked, voice wry.

"Ahahahaha," Hanna laughed back nervously, "ah, no?"

He felt his lips curl into a small smile, and was pleased to see Hanna's face light up as he added another mark to his mental tally. "It would be nice to get out of these clothes."

"Awesome! I'll just go make sure the bathroom is all clean and stuff and find my extra towel-" Hanna babbled as he rushed around the apartment. He watched him for a long moment before dropping the first pancake onto the griddle.

The end of breakfast meant a quick clean up (complete with a hilarious - for Hanna, at least - lesson on How To Use the Toilet 101) and within the hour they were making their way down the dark streets towards Worth's place.

Hanna kept up a light prattle the entire walk, speaking of the various cases be had worked on ("Didn't even need to see Doc once!"), about some of his adventures at his "day" job, the random meet ups he had with Toni or Veser. But nothing with regards to his disappearance was mentioned. After the first tearful greeting, Hanna seemed content to never even mention the fact that he had disappeared one rainy evening. It hadn't even occurred to him to wonder how much time had passed until Hanna described some of the cases he handled.

There weren't many, fortunately, and none of them seemed to have caused Hanna great difficulty, but it disturbed him to think that so much had happened in his absence. Looking at him whole he dashed ahead, he couldn't see anything that might be physically wrong with him. Looks were always deceiving with Hanna, however; and he had been attuned enough to the other man to know when he was hiding something. It also wasn't unusual for him to try to hide the fact from him, so all he could do was wait it out until Hanna could no longer hold his secret in. His thoughts were brought up short by the sight of a very familiar door.

Hanna paused for a moment in front of it before whipping around to face him. "Sorry, sorry," he said at his startled expression.

"No," he replied, "it's OK. Hanna are you alright?"

"Its just that I haven't told anyone that you've returned yet. I mean, I. Um, I wasn't sure that you were actually here to stay or if, maybe, I don't know, you'd leave again or something. So no one else knows that you're here, so..."

"Hanna..."

"I mean if you want to go, that's totally your decision, but I-"

"Hanna."

"-didn't want to get anyone else's hopes up that you would be staying either and-"

"HANNA."

Hanna quieted for a moment, but his mouth continued to work as if he was trying to find the right words to say. He struggled to say something as well, but before he could get any reassurances out, Hanna continued in a small voice, "We all missed you, Dante. I missed you, very much."

He watched as Hanna seemed to curl in on himself, as if saying the words had taken something vital out of him. He stepped forward into Hanna's personal space, drawing him into a loose embrace. "Hanna, it was never my intention to leave."

He leaned into the hug, mumbling in that same small voice, "Then...why did you?"

"I don't know, Hanna. I just woke up In the graveyard again. The only thing I've done since then is come home." The words "to you" remained unvoiced, but were no less true for it. Hanna nodded against his chest, his arms finally coming around his back to return the hug.

After a long moment, Hanna eventually sighed and pulled out from the embrace. "Guess we'd better go see Doc. I don't know if there's anything he can do beyond determine that you are alive, but I'd feel better having you checked out anyway."

He nodded solemnly, following Hanna in as he called out to Worth. "Doc? Doc you in?"

"Wha'the hell do ya want?" the man snarled, crawling out from under his desk. "Y'didn hurt y'self agin, didja?"

"No, no, it's not for me."

"Aw, hell, Hanna what'ja do this time?"

"Nothing!" He replied defensively.

"I seem to have been given a third chance at life," the former zombie cut in, and Worth's head snapped around to stare at him. "Or perhaps this is really only my second, if we only count the ones where I've physically needed to breathe."

It all went downhill from there, but he just smiled at the antics of the two men in front of him, letting himself be poked and prodded by Worth. It really was good to be home.

END