Disclaimer: I do not own Forever or any of its characters.
AN: I didn't plan for the beginning to be quite as gory as it turned out, so warning there. Hope you enjoy.
"So have you seen anything like this before?" Lucas asked the ME as they performed the autopsy of a man who appeared to have been tortured.
"More times than I'd like." Henry answered, passing Lucas the last of the victim's internal organs.
"Now, is that when you were a doctor or an ME?" Lucas probed, ever in the effort to gain just a little information about his mysterious boss.
Ignoring the question, Henry inspected the victim's hands. "The fingers have each been broken in at least two places. And the arms show signs of repeated beating with a baton-like instrument, probable hairline fractures on the bone." The autopsy continued, until nearly the time to leave for the day.
Shortly after Henry had left, as Lucas was just preparing to follow he released that he needed to ask his boss something. Running to catch up to the ME he saw him just around a nearby street corner. What he didn't see was the man standing facing Henry.
"Henry!"
Henry's head snapped in the direction of the younger man's call. "Lucas, stay back!" Within milliseconds of the worried command it was followed by the sound of a gunshot. Henry's eyes, which were still locked with those of his assistant, widened as the bullet pierced his midriff.
The shooter ran off the instant he realized what had happened, leaving Lucas and Henry alone on the corner. Shock wearing off, Henry placed a hand over the wound, it came away covered in blood which was now spreading across his shirt. His gaze shifted, seemingly without aim, around the encircling area, as though looking for something. Henry collapsed to his knees on the hard cement.
"Henry!" Lucas called again, now with a far different tone, as he rushed to his boss' side. "Geez, that looks bad."
Despite the pain, Henry couldn't help a smile. "Yes, thank you Lucas. I hadn't noticed." A bout of coughs shook his form, bringing up blood into his mouth. The force of them forced him to the ground where he lay on his side.
"Oh God, Henry."
It struck Henry as odd that Lucas hadn't tried to call for an ambulance. The young man had likely realized that very little could be done for the man now dieing before him. Henry was however thankful for this, as he suspected he would by this time be able to object only with choked gargles nor could he now instruct the assistant to leave. He was going to die and there was nothing he could do about it, and it was going to happen in front of Lucas and there was nothing to be done about that either. What little pressure he'd managed to apply to the wound lessened as his vision darkened, starting from the edges and closing in to the center.
Lucas knelt in shocked stillness. He worked with dead bodies all day but to actually see someone he knew get shot was something he was not prepared for. All he could do was kneel helplessly and watch, the medical training he had received frozen uselessly somewhere in the channels of his mind. The man now on the ground, dying, was the one born to be a physician, Lucas had heard the detectives and officers talking about some of Henry's medical heroics during cases, he knew what to do and the stress of the situation never brought him pause. Stress which was at that moment bringing the ME's assistant considerable pause.
When the sound of gargled attempts to draw breath ceased, Lucas tentatively opened his closed eyes to find only black pavement. Henry was gone. He stared at the spot for a moment before standing up, weak kneed, for a reason completely unknown to him, his only thought was of his disappeared boss' forays into skinny dipping. He made his way to his car, leaving the empty pavement behind him in an aggrieved haze of confusion.
Lucas pulled up to the East River, surprised to find another car there as well. Getting out, preparing to sit mournfully and alone by the water, he saw two figures down by the shore coming up toward the other car. He couldn't quite make out the pair; or rather didn't quite believe what he saw. The pair appeared to be Henry and Abe, but that was simply not possible. As they came closer he could see that it was indeed Henry, who was wrapped in nothing but a blanket. The person in question froze in shock and terror when he registered a presence and recognized who it was. Henry's pause caused Abe's subsequent hesitation.
"Henry?" For a long moment all of them stood stalk still. Sensing the awkwardness of the situation Lucas tried to break the lengthening silence. "Hi."
"Lucas, I- I… I…" Henry stammered, fear visible, even in the dim light, in his eyes transfixed on the young man. His mind raced with no result in an explanation to give.
"Why don't you come for dinner?" Abe supplied, filling the silence and giving an opportunity to think to his petrified father.
"Sure." Lucas agreed, allowing the pair to return to their car before going to his own. Sitting behind the wheel, all that he'd seen in the last few minutes struck him with the shocking force of a brick wall. His mind spun with all the possible explanations for it all. A thrilled rushed through him, knowing that his suspicions regarding the ME were possibly founded.
On the way to the shop Abe tried to calm the nearly panicking Henry. "Abe what do I do? I can't tell him, Lucas can't keep a secret to save his own life, he's probably blogged everything he's seen to the entire world by now."
"Henry, relax. The kid is loyal as a dog to you. He hasn't and he won't tell anyone anything.
"You're right, I'm over-reacting, everything will be fine." Henry replied, sounding more like he was trying to reassure himself of it.
When they arrived home, Henry went to get cleaned up. Finished, he slipped into the kitchen to avoid Lucas seated on the couch. Inside, Abe handed him a cup of tea. "Kid's in the living room waiting for you."
"I know, I saw."
"Well go on." Henry's gulp of anxiety was audible. "Henry, I know you're not prepared for this and you're scared. But no matter what you say he'll believe you, he as good as hero worships you."
"Alright. Here I go." He said opening the door and faced the music. Hearing him enter, Lucas stood up nervously to face him. "Lucas, I believe I owe you an explanation."
"I saw you die."
"Yes."
"And you came back to life."
"Ahhh. Yes. Listen, Lucas, I-"
"That is so cool! Oh my God, I can't believe it. I always knew here was something about you. And I was right, you're immortal or something!"
Henry blinked, unprepared for that particular reply. "I'm sorry, what? You were- you knew?"
"Eh-he, I guess I have some explaining too." He continued in a rush of nerves. "I didn't know, I guessed, hypothesized, etc. And I've been trying for ages to get you to tell me something. But you don't say anything! Haven't you noticed all my little prompts?"
"Lucas, slow down and calmly tell me what it is you've guessed."
"That you're immortal or something and really old, which is so totally awesome and all."
During this, Abe had entered, carrying a bottle and a filled glass. "Well this was meant for you but by the looks of things, Henry's the one who needs it."
"Thank you, Abe." He said accepting the glass and downing it before sitting down. "And what made you think...?" He asked, trailing off before finishing the sentence at a loss for words.
"Umm… My great-grandfather was a kid on the Titanic, 3rd class passenger. On the trip he made friends with a doctor in second class and became like his assistant. On the night that the ship sank, the doctor gave him his medical bag for safekeeping and put him in a lifeboat. In the next few hours my great-grandfather's boat by chance picked him up from the water. Once they reached New York he convinced the doctor to get a picture taken with him. The doctor's name was Henry Morgan. And because of him, my great-grandfather became a doctor, and you know lived."
"And the boy's name was Lucien Wahl. I never put it together. You look like him."
"Really? Cool! When I started at the OCME and found out I'd be your assistant I thought it was so cool that the doctor I'd be assisting has the same name. Then I met you and you look exactly like the doctor in my great-grandfather's picture. And I thought it would be really cool if you were the same person, who was some sort of immortal."
"I have to thank you for keeping this to yourself all this time. But why did you never mention it?"
"I tried to, vaguely, but I wanted to get to know you better first."
"I suppose I haven't made that easy for you."
"Understatement of your lifetime, Henry." Abe interjected.
"Could I hear the whole story now?" Lucas pleaded hopefully."
"Where to start…"
"I know you were around in 1912 but when were you born?"
"1779."
"Wow, your ancient!" Henry couldn't help but smile at the young man's excitement. "So how did you become immortal, did you fall into a pit of radioactive material?"
An actual laugh came from Abe. "Henry's a lot of things, like paranoid, but Superman he is not." This statement won the man a confused look from the immortal in question, he had heard of the character but was lost for a relevance with Lucas's strange question. "I'll explain later."
"Paranoid? Why?"
"Your two questions can be answered with the same story. I don't know exactly how I became this way, but it began the first time I died. In 1814, I had taken passage on a ship belonging to my family, a slave ship. Infact, the very ship that entered an investigation not very long ago."
"The Empress of Africa. You were the crew member shot by the captain then thrown overboard." Henry was slightly taken aback by Lucas's knowledge of the ship's story. "I read about the ship's story in that issue of the Explorer's Club." He explained before continuing. "You dropped the key, you're the reason all those slaves made it to land."
"Yes. I was shot for refusing to allow the captain to toss a supposedly sick slave overboard. When I died, I awoke in the water very confused. It took me nearly a year to return home to my wife."
"You were married?"
"At 35 it would have been rather unusual if I was not. Her name was Nora. She began asking what had happened to me, and one day I told her. She said she believed me, then the next morning I was dragged from my house in a straight-jacket."
"Oh." Lucas said simply, not really sure what to say after Henry's not so subtle reference to his being clapped in an insane asylum. "So how exactly does this immortality thing work for you? Are there more like you? Is there really the Game?" The flood of questions began to flow uncontrolled from Lucas' mouth.
"I- sorry what 'Game'?"
"You know, swords, beheading, quickenings, 'There can be only one'." Henry's expression remained blank, if more confused. "Or you don't know."
A moment of awkward silence. "Oh, that movie from the late '80's." Abe said in a tone of remembering realization.
With difficulty, Lucas kept himself from face palming. "Yeah, or the tv series that followed. But if not that, what do you do? Is there some purpose to the immortality?"
"I wish I knew if there was some purpose to this." Henry admitted, in a somewhat ironic tone. "As for what I do, I'm a doctor, I've been a doctor since just before the dawn of 1800."
"Not to mention your preoccupying hobby of avoiding human contact as much as possible." Abe added.
"Why?"
"After Nora I avoided getting close to or trusting anyone. It was too dangerous and too painful. So I stayed by myself, until… the two people who changed my life for the better came along."
"Aww. Thanks, pops." Abe patted his father on the shoulder.
"Wha?" Lucas knew his mouth was hanging open, but he didn't care anymore, the bombshell that they had nonchalantly dropped on him was no robin's egg.
"In 1945 I and a nurse adopted an infant survivor of the camps. Her name was Abigail and the boy is Abraham."
"Wait, you're a- you're his- he's your son?"
"Yes."
Lucas then turned on Abe. "But you said that your dad died when you asked me to help find your mom."
"I never said he died." Abe corrected, then more quietly added, "But he does quite often."
"When he asked you what?" Henry asked in disbelief of his assistant, speaking over Abe's defense. "And you!" He turned on his son, with a tone unmistakably paternal scoulding. "You went Lucas? Behind my back, no less!"
"I didn't want you getting obsessive over it again."
"If you're Abe's dad then his mom is- was your…"
"Yes, my wife."
"Oh God, I am so sorry. I mean, I wasn't very sensitive about- when she was- how-"
The boy's distress was evident and he was quickly working himself into a tizzy. "It's alright, Lucas, you just saw what I didn't want to see or accept."
"So are there others like you?" Lucas asked after a short pause, awe sparkling in his eyes.
"Lucas, you do understand that I am human, yes?"
"Yeah, of course I do!" Lucas defended, a little too vehemently, Henry raised a skeptical eyebrow. "OK so are there others with the same… what condition?"
"That's a story all its own."
"Well I've got time. I was just going to have a weekend long Doctor Who marathon. Wait, you're not the Doctor are you?" He leaned forward quickly just as he had begun to lay back to make himself comfortable.
"Doctor Who?" Both Henry and Abe asked, though with highly differing tones; Henry was in utter cluelessness and was staring at his assistant with some concern, whereas Abe had asked it as though it was something vaguely familiar or long ago heard that he couldn't quite recall.