okay, so this is something I have been thinking about ever since the end of Being Human. Although personally I think they are all trapped in the AU created by the Devil, I wanted to imagine what coming back to a human life would be like to these three. I could have gone happy, but I decided to go the Being Human way of difficulty and angst, after all, life isn't east is it?

Hope you enjoy

Please review.

Many chapters coming.

Toby Whitehouse owns these characters, and even though he plays with them no more, I am glad he hasn't locked them away so no one else can.

Author's note take two: In this world, Only Tom, Hal and Alex have had their curses removed. Just like when Hal first tried to kill the devil in 1918, the three participants (Werewolf Leader Lady Catherine Glass, Ghost necromancer Emile Parsons and random vampire flunky #2) were effected (killed), so now, the three participants (This time Hal, Tom and Alex) are effected (made human). Vampires, werewolves and ghosts still exist, although our three heroes continue to avoid all that 'supernatural nonsense'

'Alex, your head… You're bleeding.'

'It's not just the cut, I'm aching, I feel like I've been hit by a bus!'

'The wolf's gone. I can't find it.'

'Our curses came from the devil. With him dead, properly dead. They've gone. We're human.'

'I just need to know what else there is for me here.'

'Me, there's me.'

'D'ya have a First Aid kit or sumthin?'

Hal stood behind the desk in reception, his pen poised to update the bookings journal. He looked at the woman, he looked at her hand; it was bleeding, he looked up at her face, blinked and then returned back to her hand.

'Err, Hello?' Said the mouthy guest.

Another Hen Do lady – Hal inwardly snorted, lady. He swallowed and placed down the pen in the bridge of the book before looking her up and down. Weak balance in those heels, It would be so simple: first he would grab her injured hand, jerk her forward so she would fall forward, hitting her head on the desk, then he would push her back, she would fall backwards, he would jump over bar, grab the waist and throw her to the floor harder, front and back concussions. But she may still be conscious so hand on the neck, press down on voice-box to stop sound. Straddle, right leg on thighs to stop movement, grab first left wrist then right and hold at belly level...

'You waitin' for summat?' she said impatiently at his seemingly blank gaze.

Hal gave a small thin smile. 'Apologies.' He began smoothly. 'I will just go fetch it.' He indicated one of the lobby chairs, 'Please take a seat.'

The woman pushed herself off the desk and tottered over towards one of the hotel sofas. Very weak balance. Hal turned away and let out a slow breath.

Was he waiting for something? Of course he was. It has been four weeks since his curse had left him; since his heart starting beating normally and he, Tom and Alex had become the normal understanding of the word 'normal'. He glanced back at the slouched figure currently picking something out of her teeth. But normal now wasn't normal to him. Inwardly his chest expanded and his stomach knotted. He had got so used to feeling something that he was waiting. Constantly waiting for it.

Hal took a deep breath, letting the air fill his lungs and unclog his chest. Slowly and with a shaking hand he reached for the small plastic green box from the shelf, fixing a passive and calming smile on his ashen white face.

'I didn't know what to do.' He said at the house later to a listening Alex who sat balled into a corner of the sofa; a safe distance so as to comfort if needed, and yet seem impartial through physical distance. She had come to understand that Hal did not appreciate intimate proximity when talking about uncomfortable subjects.

He held his head in his hands, running his fingers through his hair, his shoulders hunched. 'Before, before I would have seen that blood and it would have, the smell of it and I'dve…'

'What would you'd done?' she asked quietly.

Hal paused mid sentence and looking at her. He knew what she was asking. For Alex and Tom, this was a new Hal, and they were yet to know who the real him was now.

He had noticed it from the first, they would ask him little questions, or left something to see how he would react – like mix up the spoons and forks in the drawer – he'd left it. Or watched his reaction while they put on a horror film – he'd remained silent his weary irritation hidden behind an all too well-practiced mask.

They understood that being human, he was both Good Hal and Bad Hal, but was he more good than bad, more light than darkness? Or was it the other way around? Hal held his breath, even a sigh seemed dangerous. Another test.

Hal looked away and leaned back, resting his arms on his lap. I would have done exactly what I imagined. I had planned it right down to the last movement every angle, every possibility. Just like I used to when I was at war, and continued when I was him, and exactly the kind of thoughts I fought against so hard when I was yours. He didn't say anything, the room suddenly felt very claustrophobic.

Alex hugged the cushion against her chest. 'What did you want to do?'

Hal shook his head. He was determined not to let himself get angry. Just count, one, two, three, four, five… He could understand why she was asking after all. He decided to come at it from another angle.

'Remember when we were cooking in the kitchen a couple of months ago.' He began, one hand balling into a fast. 'And Tom spilt the hot water where you were standing.'

'Er no,' Alex began alert, she didn't like being reminded of their previous lives, 'And I don't see-'

'You jumped away.' Hal finished over her, raising his voice.

Alex paused.

'You were a ghost; there was no way that water would have burnt, drenched or even touched you but you jumped away.' Alex let her grip loosen and her face relax. 'It was habit. You reacted because you remembered what it would have done to you in the past, even though at that moment nothing did.'

'So you were expecting something to happen with the blood and then it didn't?'

Hal nodded. I was expecting it to make the first move, the scent to pull me forward so I could decide to run or leap.

'I have spent half my life.' He said in a calm measured voice, choosing each word slowly, cautiously. 'Avoiding human blood like a plague and the other half running towards it.' He paused as a memory tried to come into his head. 'And the whole of my five hundred years, I have had it drawing me in like a siren.' And I can remember exactly how all of it felt.

'And now you don't hear the siren's call. But that's a good thing right?' Said Alex, leaning forward and rubbing his shoulder. 'It doesn't control you any more, you're free.' She smiled at him with encouragement. 'You weren't gonna really attack her because that's not who you are any more. You're not a violent murderer Hal.'

He returned the smile, he hoped it looked genuine. 'Come on, let's go to bed, it's late.' She took his hand and led him up towards their shared room. 'And remember, it's all gonna be okay now, we've got exactly what we always wanted.'

Hal let her, he nodded and smiled back. 'It's a good thing.' He repeated out loud.

'What are you doing Tom?' Hal knocked on the door and approached the man that was sitting on his bed in the dark staring out the window. 'We're all downstairs, the film's about to start.'

'Inna minute' Tom said without turning around, not taking his eyes off the glass.

Hal stepped forward surveying the mess that was steadily growing in his friend's room. He frowned but didn't comment, he didn't like mess, but he wasn't about to volunteer to clean it either, not anymore. He navigated a path to beside the bed, observing the frozen form of his friend. He sat next to the former werewolf and followed his gaze out the open window.

'I never seen it this high.' Tom said after a minute. 'Full moons are beautiful aint they.'

'Yes Tom, they are.' agreed Hal softly.

'I never had a chance to just look.' The young man continued. 'Just, watch em for real, you know.'

Hal watched Tom carefully. To be looking at something so beautiful, Tom looked desperately sad. 'I never had a chance before ya know.' He went on. 'It was always like 'Full Moon's comin, must get the chicken out, must find somewhere safe, must do it before the wolf comes'.' He looked at Hal, 'I used to feel it coming.' He said, searching Hal's face . 'Coupla days before I would start feeling stronger, and smellin things, not just nature things, like birds and leaves but people, I could smell their fear, I could hear it. Or the wolf in me could.'

'Tom,' Hal interrupted, he wasn't ready to hear this, not after his conversation with Alex. 'It was a horrific curse that blighted your life. You are now free to do whatever you want.' He stood up, moving his shaking hand behind his back. 'It doesn't control you anymore.'

Tom blinked, his big puppy eyes revealing a question that hadn't quite formed.

'Ah know man. It's just-'

'It's over Tom.' Pressed Hal, his voice getting harder. 'We have been given a second chance at life, and we have to move on.'

By her standards – but probably not Hal's – the kitchen was spotless. Alex grinned at the thought of Hal sniffing around the corners and dragging a delicate finger on the underside of the fridge or something. The smile faltered, Hal hadn't done that since before he was human. If she thought about it, she couldn't remember when he'd last straightened the knick knacks on the fireplace, or rearranged the plates by make rather than colour.

Alex took a deep breath, no point thinking about that now, Human Hal wasn't the same as Old Hal and they were adjusting to their new selves.

She stood in the kitchen looking around: She had cleaned everything she could clean given the limited amount of supplies left in the house. She would need to go to the shop and get some more.

Alex pulled a face. Or maybe she would get one of the boys to do it on their way to work, or coming back. Hal and Tom were at work at the hotel – after the Devil's massacre they were in hot demand as two of only five employees not to have died in the 'gas leak'.

They had asked her to take a job with them but she had declined. 'When I decide to get a job – which may be after I do my world tour, - I want a proper career, a proper boring job in a big office where everyone greets each other with a bullshit polite smile but don't know their names. Not working in a poxy hotel dealing with snotty kids and cleaning up the sick from the last Stag Do.' Hal and Tom had looked at each other, obviously trying not to take offence.

'Besides,' she'd continued, 'I'm not really a big fan of working where the Devil spiked the cool-aid, I mean, who knows how many ghosts are there!'

'There are no ghosts in the hotel Alex.' Hal had said patiently.

'Like we'd know anymore!' she had snorted.

That had silenced them.

After some guilt from the boys she had relented:

'You can't expect us to do all the work Alex. We don't do this for fun we have bills that need paying.'

'We managed before!' she had protested.

'Yes, when you didn't require any food, or drink, or clothes or washing!' Hal and shot back.

So she'd embarked half-heartedly on finding that career. Hal and Tom had nodded and waved her as she crossed the street on her way to the job center. It would be nice, she'd thought, to meet people outside the house again, to talk to co-workers and have a laugh.

That was the theory.

She'd gone into the building, sat down with the jobs officer and stared blankly around her. Twenty minutes later she was outside again with no idea what had happened. She looked down at her hand that held a neatly printed piece of paper with a job spec, company address and time for her interview in three day's time.

That bit of paper had stood on the fridge for two days, and been moved to the bin on the third. Hal and Tom assumed she hadn't got it. She didn't want to tell them she'd never gone.

Give it a few days. She had thought. I just need to get used to being human again first. Then I'll be fine.