Despite some misgivings, Henry decides to donate one of his kidneys to the young Hanson boy. He sincerely hopes that he's made the right decision.

Jo was already on her phone to Mike to alert him of Henry's change of heart. "Oh. Okay. See you in a few." She ended the call, stepped on the gas, and activated the siren. "They're at the hospital," she said, the worry in her voice controlled but evident. "Thank God you changed your mind in time to help him."

As they rushed toward Presbyterian Hospital, they both realized that there wouldn't be enough time to tell the Hanson's anything about Henry and his condition. Only moments after they'd arrived, the hospital staff took over and quickly prepped Henry for the removal of his kidney. Jo called Abe to let him know what was going on and then joined Mike and Karen in the small waiting area. Abe closed up the shop and joined them as soon as he could. Three hours later, Dr. Winthrop informed them that the surgery and transplant had been successful.

"They're in recovery but the prognosis is good for both of them," Dr. Winthrop said. He sighed and gave them a weary but happy smile.

"How soon can we see our son?" Karen asked.

The doctor explained that their son's progress needed to first be monitored for any signs of organ rejection. "Once he truly appears stabilized, we'll let you know," he replied. "But, hopefully, you should be able to visit him by this time tomorrow." They thanked him and he turned his attention to Abe and Jo.

"Dr. Morgan is a hearty specimen and is recovering well," he told them. "Plan on visiting him tomorrow at this same time, as well." They thanked him and the doctor left the waiting area.

"Well," Abe blew out, "good news all around, looks like."

A much relieved and smiling Mike and Karen hugged each other. "What made him change his mind all of a sudden?" Mike asked Abe. "I mean, I'm glad that he did but he was so against it for so long."

"You ... know Henry," Jo falteringly replied with an equally faltering smile.

Abe shrugged with his own more genuine smile and reminded him, "But it all worked out in the end, right?" The others nodded and he invited them all over to the shop for dinner. Mike and Karen at first begged off because they had to pick up their younger son, Donny, from school.

"Bring him, too!" Abe happily encouraged them. "We're connected now. Family."

vvvv

It was 9:33 AM the morning after the surgery and transplant operations. Henry closed his eyes and assessed his own condition, enumerating his symptoms to himself and issued a positive prognosis for his recovery. He tried hard to concentrate on the talk show airing on the TV in an effort to ignore his doubts about having donated a kidney to the Hanson boy. It was too late now, though, he realized. Now, if he could just manage to stay alive for the duration of the boy's lifetime. He muted the TV when Dr. Winthrop appeared at the foot of his bed.

"How are we feeling today?" Dr. Winthrop asked.

Henry laughed to himself at the doctor's addressing him as 'we'. "Fine, Dr. Winthrop, thank you."

The doctor opened the file he was holding, reading it as he slowly drew closer to Henry's bedside. He then closed the file and met Henry's gaze. "I'll check in on you later today but most likely you'll be able to go home tomorrow."

Henry smiled and nodded, recalling a time when a patient could expect to spend a week or more in the hospital after surgery. "How is young Hanson doing?"

"Came through like a trooper," Dr. Winthrop replied. "Oh, Doctor, would you mind telling me how you got that terrible looking scar on your chest?"

Henry gulped before replying, "I was young. Very young." He actually had been much younger. More than 200 years younger.

"So, you can't really say how you got it," Dr. Winthrop stated, assuming that Henry had been a very small child or even a baby when the injury had occurred.

"No, I really can't," Henry replied. It was the truth, though. He really couldn't say anything about it to anyone other than Jo or Abe.

"Your parents never told you how you got that scar?" he asked, frowning.

"No. Never," Henry replied. Again, it was the truth. Neither of his parents was even alive when he'd experienced his first death.

Dr. Winthrop looked at him consideringly, then nodded and left. Abe and Jo showed up right after and visited with him for a while.

vvvv

Three months later ...

"Dad, I think this is the longest you've gone in a while not, uh, you know," Abe remarked after dinner one evening. "Congratulations on being so extra careful."

Henry sighed before replying. "Yes, but ... Abe, this is eating away at me not telling them about the possible consequences of Mike, Jr., having my kidney in him. Mike is so proud of his son participating in little league again."

A spark of remembrance lit up in Abe's eyes and he raised a hand, sitting forward in his chair. "Wait. Do you recall telling me that a small piece of Adam's skin was found embedded in a ring worn by one of his victim's? That, that guy at the bank he tortured and killed."

"Yes, yes, yes, ah, Julian Glauser," Henry replied.

"A physical part of him that had survived after he'd offed himself to escape the crime scene," Abe pointed out. "Mike's kid is gonna be okay with your kidney in him."

"Why couldn't I remember that?" Henry wondered aloud.

"You were just too worried about the kid, Pops," Abe quietly reminded him. "But now you won't have to reveal your secret to them, the kid is healthy, and everybody's happy, right?"

vvvv

The next day Henry received even further proof that a physical part of him would survive after one of his deaths. While sitting behind his office desk in the morgue working on a report, photos were suddenly plopped down in front of him. Surprised, he looked up to see a smilingly pleased Jo Martinez standing on the other side of his desk.

"Hello, Detective, and, ah, what are these?" he asked.

"Crime scene photos," she replied. "Specifically, photos from inside a home in the Bronx in which several refrigerators and chest freezers full of stolen organs, bags of blood, and tubes of blood samples were found." She placed her index finger on one of the photos. "Including your blood samples," she proudly announced.

Henry shook his head, pleasantly astonished. "I always assumed ... well, this is proof positive that a physical part of me would survive after one of my, ah, departures."

"So, no more worries about Mikey," Jo told him as they exchanged broad smiles. Her smile faded as she checked her phone and put it away. "DB in the basement of that same house." Henry traded his lab coat for his top coat and scarf, joining Jo and Mike as they raced to the crime scene.

vvvv

The threesome made their way down the narrow staircase that led into the basement. The smell of decomp hit them hard in the small, musky area, prompting Jo and Mike to cover their noses with masks provided by the CSI Unit when they'd first arrived. They watched Henry in disbelief as he not only opted to use the mask but inhaled deeply several times as they slowly surveyed the small room.

"The body was found in that old steamer trunk over there," Mike said, pointing to it. "No ID yet and no telling how long it had been there. But they got the body out of here already. Why does it still smell like it's still here?"

"Because there's another one down here," Henry grimly replied. His eyes zeroed in on a small, drawer-like compartment inside the steamer trunk. He tugged at it with a gloved hand and pulled it open. The stench of death suddenly increased as the remains of a small child not quite a year old was revealed. Henry finally put his mask on and they all eyed the grim discovery with great sadness.

"What's this?" Mike asked, peering at a maple wood coffin-shaped box about the same size as the compartment that contained the child's body. "You don't think ... ?" He cautiously approached it, frowning, and reached out to tug it open when Henry noticed the glint from an almost invisible string of fishing line attached to the box's handle.

"No!" Henry shouted, pushing Mike out of the way. The box snapped open and there were a spark and the sound of a discharge. Henry felt a painful, burning sensation in his chest near the bottom of his scar. He realized that the fishing line was part of a trip-wire booby trap that had propelled a small caliber bullet into him. Since he and Mike were about the same height, Henry knew that the bullet would have hit the detective in the same spot. He also knew that his wound was fatal but unlike the detective, he would die and return.

Consciousness was leaving him and he felt himself being lowered to the floor. As he lay there he could hear Mike cursing under his breath.

"Geez, Doc! I'm callin' for a bus!"

"Don't!" Jo told him, surprising him by snatching his phone away from him. She was already on her phone calling Abe. Mike began to argue with her.

"It's okay, Mike," he managed to say. "I'll ... be back. Cover ... for me, Jo." She tearfully nodded as his eyes glazed over staring sightlessly at the ceiling.

Mike cursed again out of frustration when he realized that Henry's life had ended. But when they heard his last exhale and saw his body vanish in a flash of ultra-white light, he could only stand and gape at the empty space where Henry's body no longer lay.

"Holy ... Mother of - "

Jo quickly wiped her tears away with one hand and said, "He was going to tell you."

"Whaddya mean? Tell me what?" Mike demanded.

"No time," she replied as she ran out of the side door and up the concrete stairs in the small backyard space. Mike was right behind her asking where she was headed.

"The East River," she breathlessly replied as they piled in and drove away in her car, "to get Henry."

While Jo drove with a speechless Mike beside her, she called to alert the crime scene personnel to avoid the basement for now and let the bomb squad clear the entire house because there might be more booby traps in it. She drove to the river as quickly as she could without sirens.

They reached the spot near the East River of Henry's many past arrests for public nudity after Abe had managed to retrieve him. When they arrived, they saw Abe's car driving away with a familiar-looking passenger drying his hair with a towel. At the sight of him, Mike gasped his name out in awe and Jo heaved a sigh of relief. They followed Abe to the shop and parked the car, hurriedly exiting it and jogging up into the shop.

vvvv

"This happens to you, this dying and ... vanishing and ... wow, uh ... " Mike didn't know exactly how to end that sentence.

"Which is why for so long I refused to donate any part of my body to your son or anyone else, for that matter," Henry replied. "Everything disappears when I die. Blood, matter, everything," he animatedly clarified. "If my kidney in your son's body would vanish whenever I died again ... " His voice trailed off as he shuddered. "I thought that it could cause him to die instantly, as well." He took in a deep breath and exhaled. "Fortunately, I was wrong," he admitted and sipped from his wine glass.

Mike began to smile then laugh softly, shaking his head. When Jo asked what was so funny, he replied, "I found out before Lucas did. He would probably cry like a baby if he knew," he added, laughing louder with the others joining in.

Having finished his glass of wine, Henry rose from his chair and announced to them all, "Now, if you will all excuse me, I must go shower and change into some more suitable attire." He nodded slightly and left the room.

"Your ... Dad's quite a guy," Mike told Abe.

"That he is, Detective. That he is." Abe quickly rose to his feet and faced him and Jo with clasped hands and a mischevious smile. "Now, if I could only get the stick out of his - "

"A-bra-hammm - " Henry's warning voice interrupted as it drifted in from the hallway.

"Oh, c'mon, Pops!" Abe called back to him. "Mike can teach you some New York, tough guy slang and help me and Jo - "

"Jo and me ... " Henry's voice sing-songed back, correcting him.

"Me and Jo!" Abe defiantly replied. He then turned a weary expression to the two detectives, made the shape of a square in the air with his fingers while mockingly lamenting, "My old man."

vvvv

Over the next ten years, young Mike Hanson, Jr., grew up healthy and strong to manhood, finished college, and followed in the footsteps of his father by joining the NYPD. He and his parents were forever grateful to Henry and to keep his secret hidden, his doctors never knew that he only pretended to take the prescribed medication to prevent organ rejection. From time to time, he would visit his donor, the Immortal medical man, whom he knew would outlive them all.

Notes:

The dead bodies found in the basement (which should have been in a chest freezer) were of a man and a toddler who'd had their organs farmed for profit before the perpetrator(s) realized that selling stolen organs and blood was easier than kidnapping people and killing them. Really icky business.

Information about transplants, suppression medication for organ rejection, and organ storage were found on the Internet.