John sat in a small corner table of the quiet pub he'd chosen as a meeting venue, tapping the table nervously with the fingers of one hand and clutching a pint of beer in the other. He absently realised that he always seemed to have a drink in his hand…he supposed it was another comfort, another way of coping, another addiction. It didn't seem to matter whether it was alcoholic or not, though he had to admit that he was consuming more of that these past eleven months than he had in a long time. After his counseling session he had managed to pluck up the courage to answer Sherlock's text.

Thank you -John

He wasn't sure what he was thanking Sherlock for. For coming back? For the means to be able to contact him? For the assurance that Sherlock would be there? For giving him space? John didn't know. All he'd known was that he wasn't ready to see Sherlock face to face again, not yet, but he had also known that he couldn't just let Sherlock suffer with no clue of John's thoughts. Then he'd almost snorted with laughter at his naive assumption that Sherlock could ever have no clue about something, especially when it came to his thoughts. Had he forgotten who he was dealing with?

The day after that he had decided that the longer he waited, the worse things would be. But he didn't want Sherlock to come to his flat again. He'd discussed it with Celine and had identified that he'd felt too overwhelmed and trapped when Sherlock had shown up there. And there was certainly no way he was ready for a meeting at 221B. To his mind, the place seemed to be a physical representation of everything he had been through in the past eleven months, a place that he had been forced to accept held nothing but painful memories and empty promises of someone who was gone from his world forever. Celine had suggested that they meet in a neutral environment and John had quickly decided that this was a good idea.

So he had texted Sherlock the time and place and now here he was— early and anticipating and waiting. Waiting for him, waiting for resolution, waiting for an explanation, maybe for his world to be rebuilt. No, he dared not hope for that. John looked up just as Sherlock entered the room and his heart throbbed painfully at the sight of the man he loved, who he had only seen twice in almost a full year. He was still amazed that Sherlock looked almost exactly the same as he always had when he himself felt that he had changed so much. Sherlock's hair was the same, his impressive stature as ever before, the same billowing coat with the collar that he would always turn up, much to John's amusement. Not the same scarf though, John knew. His new one was darker and distinctly less covered in blood. John shuddered ever so slightly at the memory of Sherlock's broken body, the image that hadn't faded from his mind in the past eleven months. Sherlock ordered a drink from the bar and spotted John from across the room, walked slowly towards him, no doubt trying to deduce John's state of mind from his appearance and choice of venue. If he started that John decided that he was just going to walk away. He somehow felt that Sherlock didn't have a right to know so much about him when he felt that he knew almost nothing about Sherlock.

Thankfully, Sherlock seemed determined to do nothing of the sort. And suddenly John realised that he had been wrong— Sherlock was not exactly the same as he had been. There was something indefinably altered about his eyes- it was like he there was some crucial element missing, perhaps a touch of the usual arrogance, John thought.
Sherlock smiled at John as he removed his coat and scarf and sat down at the opposite side of the small table.
"How are you, John?" he questioned lightly, looking genuinely concerned.
John considered him for a moment before answering.
"I'm…okay. And I am incredibly relieved that you're back, just in case you didn't get that," John replied, with a slight quirk of his lip.
Sherlock gave him a tiny grin in return.
"Thank you for meeting with me. I was worried that…" - he trailed off, staring down at his drink - "that you wouldn't want to."
Then he looked back up and their eyes locked in an unspoken exchange of everything that was between them and everything they weren't saying. John cleared his throat and took a sip of his pint.

"I really just want answers, Sherlock. I need them."
"That's almost exactly what Mrs Hudson said."

"Are you back at Baker Street then?" Sherlock didn't answer right away, instead looked down again at the contents of his pint glass as though they were fascinating to him.

"No. Mrs Hudson is...well, she's angry with me, John. Quite understandably. So I've been staying at a hotel on Glentworth Street." He sniffed. "She'll come around. I need to lay low for awhile anyway, for obvious reasons."

His words were spoken casually enough but John could tell that Sherlock was hurt. A sudden rush of empathy for the man flooded through him and he hated himself for it.

"She's glad to have you back, Sherlock. We all are. It's a miracle."

Sherlock considered him for a moment, his expression unreadable, then he took his first sip of the drink in front of him.

"So I see you've found a new place," he started, in a voice of forced calm.

John sighed.

"Can we not do this please?"

Sherlock glared at him, and John could practically hear the gears grinding in his head.

"Do what exactly?" he replied, sounding genuinely confused.

"Talk about these trivial things that don't matter. Yes I have a new place. It was too hard to go home. I went there once to get my stuff. I couldn't even go through yours, not really, I let Mrs Hudson take care of that."

Sherlock wouldn't meet his eyes and John briefly wondered if he was being too harsh. Why was this so fucking hard? He almost smiled at that— he knew why, he knew exactly why. He sighed heavily and reached across the small table to touch Sherlock's hand.

"I just mean that it doesn't matter anymore. It's in the past, it's done."

Sherlock looked up and met his eyes and John was surprised to see the intensity that had sparked within them.

"It does matter, John. It matters a lot. Everything you have been through matters," he said forcefully.

John drew back, nodded.

"I just mean that I would rather hear about you, about where you've been and what you've been doing all these months."

Sherlock nodded and seemed to mentally steel himself.

"Okay, I'll tell you. Just...don't hate me," he finally said, and the vulnerability in his voice sent another pang straight through John's heart.

"I don't hate you, Sherlock. I could never hate you."

"Wait until you hear what I have to say, and then tell me that," Sherlock grimly, his low voice, his eyes not meeting John's.

"Just tell me. I need to know."

Sherlock sighed deeply and lent back, steepling his fingers in front of his face.

"Before I tell you, please believe me when I say that I did it all for you…to protect you."

His voice was so sincere that John didn't doubt him, but he said nothing.

"I knew that my life was in danger. And I also knew that if I told you, you would never leave me and yours would be too. So I invented the story about Mrs Hudson, knowing that you would go running."

Sherlock paused here, carefully watching John's reaction.

John was looking at the table, his fingers gripping its edge tightly.

"I was so angry with you," John replied in a voice of forced calm.

Sherlock lent forward, his eyes full of pain and confusion.

"I know. But it was the only way, John. I never would have forgiven myself if anything had happened to you," he said in a low voice.

John considered him for a moment before speaking again.

"Okay, so what happened then?"

"I went up to the roof where I met Moriarty," he continued, snapping back to his all-business demeanor so quickly that John found it a little alarming.

"We chatted for awhile which was all very nice until he casually informed me that he had snipers at the ready trained on you, Mrs Hudson and Lestrade." He paused. "My only three friends in the world, as he so eloquently phrased it."

"I thought you only had one," John replied quietly after a moment, a slight smirk on his face.

Sherlock let out a small laugh, instantly recalling their trip to Dartmoor and the fight that he and John had gotten into. Well, the fight that he'd enforced upon John.

"One best friend," he clarified with a smile.

John smiled back, momentarily transported back to a simpler time when he and Sherlock coexisted happily (for the most part), solving cases and slipping in and out of danger. But all too soon, the issues between them came flooding back and John felt his smile fade as he sat back in his chair, taking another large gulp of his drink and noting the resultant expression that was undeniably disappointment on Sherlock's face.

"Right so you knew that the three of us were in danger, what happened then?"

It took Sherlock a while to answer, and John suspected that he was getting close to the part that he didn't want to tell John.

"Moriarty wanted me to kill myself, thus concluding and confirming his story. I knew that I needed him to call off his snipers, and thought I'd found a way to do it but then..."

He paused again, jaw set and face turning stony cold.

"...he shot himself in the head. And I knew then that I would have to go through with my plan."

John made no attempt to conceal the shock of this last revelation.

"Moriarty's dead?"

"Of course he's dead, do you really think I'd be sitting here talking to you if he weren't? Honestly, John, sometimes I think that if you'd just use your..."

Sherlock abruptly cut himself off with a look that John could only describe as sheepish, and John couldn't help but wish that he'd carried out his insult...this polite, cautious Sherlock was unsettling.

"Sorry," Sherlock said quickly. "Force of habit."

John gave him a small smile.

"Its okay. You were saying?"

"With Moriarty dead I had no choice but to carry out my plan to fake my own death."

John said nothing for a moment, thinking intently.

"But, Sherlock...I saw you fall. I saw your body, broken, covered with blood. I took your pulse."

Sherlock took a deep breath.

"Think very carefully about what exactly you saw, John. I went to great lengths to convince you that was you saw was real. But it wasn't me on that sidewalk, it wasn't me who you buried."

"How did you do it, Sherlock?" he asked, genuinely curious.

"It wasn't just me," Sherlock replied. "I had help."

"Who?"

"My homeless network. Mycroft. Molly Hooper."

John considered this for a moment, his mind reeling, barely taking in the fact that Mycroft (the complete god damn bastard, his mind automatically added) had presumably known that Sherlock was alive all this time. He struggled to put his anger aside, still desperate to find out more, but he knew that his breathing was becoming erratic, his heart rate increasing. Sherlock was watching him carefully, but continued his explanation.

"We organised a truck carrying soft enough materials to break my fall…"

Here John cut him off.

"But I saw you hit the ground…" he argued weakly, breathlessly.

"No. You never saw me hit the ground. Think very carefully about that. I asked you to stay in a certain position, do you remember?"

John nodded vaguely, looking pale.

"I made sure that you would see me fall but not land. You saw what I needed you to see. I asked Molly to place a body disguised as me on the sidewalk. And with Mycroft's help she was able to forge the death and autopsy records."

"No," John said forcefully, shaking his head. "No. No. It was you, I saw you, I…"

He gulped in a lungful of air and Sherlock reached across the table to touch his hand soothingly, his eyes full of worry and regret and pity. John pulled his hand away and Sherlock sighed and sat back slightly.

"John, do you remember the drug we were exposed to at Dartmoor? The one that made us see what we expected to see…what we most feared?"

John said nothing for a moment, then everything clicked into place and his face changed to one of utter disbelief, of his world crumbling around him for the millionth time that week.

"The man on the bicycle…"

Sherlock nodded minutely.

"I knew I could count on your state of disbelief and shock and the fact that you were dazed from a slight head injury to add to the confusion that the drug would offer. I hoped that it would be enough to convince you. It was the only way to ensure your protection whilst I dealt with Moriarty's men. I'm sorry, John."

Sherlock hung his head, looking almost as destroyed as John felt, and when he looked back up he strongly suspected that John was falling apart.

"Are you okay?" he asked cautiously. "I know that it's a lot to take in."

John nodded hurriedly, struggling to get a handle on his traitorous body whose reactions were betraying him. But then again, he thought, was his mind really coping a lot better? He was reeling, unable to take in a single fragment of the information Sherlock had just given him, letting the swarm of knowledge overwhelm him and take him over despite his better efforts.

"I think I should take you upstairs to your flat," Sherlock said gently.

John shook his head again.

"I'm fine, Sherlock, just leave me and I'll be fine…"

"I'm not leaving you, John. Come on," he replied, rising from his chair and gently but firmly taking John's arm and leading him towards the exit.

John allowed himself to be lead, a numb feeling spreading over both mind and body, clinging to Sherlock's arm and leaning against him slightly. Sherlock's familiar frame against his own was undeniably comforting as they made their way down the quiet street in silence and entered John's flat. Sherlock deposited John in his armchair and crouched in front of him, taking John's hands in his own.

"Its okay, John. Just breathe."

John struggled to do as Sherlock instructed, and finally managed to get his breathing somewhat back to normal. He had hoped that the panic attacks had gone for good, but apparently Sherlock was still more than capable of inducing them, whether dead or alive. When Sherlock was suitably convinced that John wasn't going to pass out he retired to the kitchen to make tea and was grateful to see that John was looking much more like himself when he returned, two mugs in hand. He handed one to John, who smiled weakly and took a sip.

"Just the way I like it," he said approvingly, almost sadly.

He moved to the small couch and gestured for Sherlock to sit beside him, and they drank their tea in near silence, John still trying to process everything.

"Do you need me to go?" Sherlock enquired, his tone suggesting that he was scared of the answer.

"No," John replied quickly. "I mean…I'd like you to stay for awhile. Please."

"Anything you want."

John switched on the television, wondering what had happened to the rude, stubborn, disagreeable, almost child-like Sherlock Holmes he had dealt with so often during their time at Baker Street. He decided not to question it, at least not right now. For the time being it was enough to just sit close to one another, drinking tea and watching a detective show on the tellie, John simultaneously frustrated and amused by Sherlock's frequent interruptions to enlighten him with little titbits of information that completely ruined the plot. It was just like old times.

Author's note: Sorry for the delay with this chapter- a lot of fairly full on real life drama has been dragging me down and getting in the way of fanfic writing :( However, this is a longer chapter so I hope that it makes up for the wait. Also struggled a bit because its a huge amount of dialogue, which I don't love writing but felt was necessary, so hopefully it comes across okay and that you all enjoyed it. I also had to choose the best Reichenbach theories out there out of the many awesome ones and went with what I think is most likely so hopefully its at least semi believable to you all. Please please please let me know what you thought! The next chapter is already partially done so won't be far away and will contain a lot more fluffy goodness ^_^