Wow ... I am SO flashed by the success of this story. I still don't quite know what to think of it, it's been a blast. Thank you everyone for the support, for the hints sometimes (I took a pointer or two about which aspects to explore more deeply), and for just liking my story. I hope you had as much of a good time reading it as I had writing it. - I can hear you think right now: "That sound's like it's over!" And you're right, it's over. It all happened a lot faster suddenly than I expected. So, sorry that there hasn't been a forewarning. But I hope you'll like this last chapter. I sure do.

Jo had made it home by a little after four. She had called a taxi to Henry's place, and he had let her go that second time, even though he had still seemed anxious.

Now it was ten the next morning, she was supposed to be at work, but instead drove over to Henry's place. If there was a murder somewhere that needed her attention... well, they had her number.

She parked and walked the rest of the way to the shop. She was a little light-sensitive again, but it wasn't so bad that she wanted to whip out her sun glasses on a cloudy day. A little squinting would do.

Henry was waiting for her in the shop, and of course, he looked spick and span and well rested. It was infuriating.

"How do you do that?" she asked. "Is that another side-effect of your condition?"

"No, it's simply smart dressing. It's remarkably hard to look scruffy in a three-piece-suit."

"Even when it's crumpled?"

He quickly looked down at himself. "Only cheap suits crumple up."

She sighed. "I give up. So what is it you wanted to show me?"

"Another forty minutes."

She hid a yawn and decided to play along. There were times when it made sense to put some pressure on him, and then there were times when pressure didn't get you anywhere. Besides, she could use another half hour or so to fully wake up, the drive over had been more tiring that she had thought. She might as well let him have his little game of mystery.

She was surprised, when he called a cab for them. "I have my car parked down the block."

"I'm sober now," he explained, all rational and reasonable.

"Maybe so, but it's still, I mean if you don't like taxis..."

"I can't avoid taxis for the rest of my life, just because of one incident. If I let all my deaths dictate my life like that, I'd sit in a dark corner somewhere not doing anything at all anymore."

All of his... Just how many...? "But still, you don't have to do it all at once."

"I gave in to my irrational fear yesterday night, time to regain control."

"That one was a bad one, huh?" She didn't really want to know, but maybe Henry had had it right all along. The filtered truth didn't work well, because it left too many questions unanswered, which inescapably lead to assumptions. And what assumptions could lead to had just been demonstrated by Filipe Lopez.

He looked away for a second. "Yes. It was rather recent, just before Christmas." He left it there, as if waiting for her to fill in the blanks.

Taxi... Christmas... Henry's pocket watch in the back of the cab they had pulled from the Hudson. The marks of somebody desperately trying to get out when nobody could have made them, because the back of the cab had been very locked, but also very empty. "Oh my God, Henry." She could only whisper.

"I hate drowning."

"What..."

"I don't think we should get into this now."

"I disagree. I know what I said, about you being blunt and all that, but I don't think this works if I don't know everything. Maybe not down to the last detail, but this is definitely not enough."

He cleared his throat. "Maybe just this once," he gave in. "It was Adam. He killed Raj Patel, for no other reason but to take his place when I needed a taxi."

She winced. Henry probably felt responsible for Patel's death, he was egocentric that way.

"He drove to the river, and shot himself in the head. Just to prove that he was indeed immortal. He disappeared, the taxi kept running, I ended up drowning."

Jo had to swallow the lump that had grown in her throat before she could say something. "That's it, I'm driving."

"No," he declined hastily, then added, more calmly: "Thank you, I appreciate the sentiment, but no. I have to get this under control."

She did not like it. She increasingly got the feeling that Henry was keeping more things under control than could be healthy. "If you insist."

"I do."

Jo hoped that her presence would help him overcome that fear, at least for today. But when the taxi arrived and they got in, she saw him carefully check the driver's face against his license, before he named the address.

About half an hour later they stopped in front of an unassuming, modern, five-storey building that gave no indication of its purpose. Even the name, Paulsen Center, could have stood for just about anything.

"Alright, you've had your fun, now just spit it out," she demanded when they stood on the pavement in front of the entrance and their taxi was gone.

He didn't look at her, but up the façade of the building. "I need you to see Adam."

Her breath hitched. "What?" Why would he bring her to see an immortal psychopath?

He rubbed his neck, scratched his eyebrow. "Whether I like it or not, he is a part of my life, and going by past evidence, he will be for a very long time, surely for as long as you live."

That might be true, but she still didn't see how that was a reason for her to meet the man.

He walked inside, Jo hurrying after him. A receptionist greeted them with a polite smile. "Good morning, how can I help you?"

"I'm here to see Lewis Farber."

Jo frowned. Farber? What?

"Are you a relative?"

"Henry?"

He ignored her.

"Henry, I thought..."

"I'll explain in a second," he promised. "I'm not a relative, but I should be on your list, I'm his doctor, Henry Morgan."

The receptionist typed Henry's name into her computer, then nodded. "You can go right up. He's in room..."

"Room 118, I know. Thank you." He gave the young woman a noncommittal smile. "Come on, Jo."

"Farber? What's that about?" Jo asked. "I know he's left Bellevue, but... And since when are you Farber's doctor? He's yours!"

"Not anymore." He gave her a quick look over the shoulder, never slowing down. Room 118 was just a few feet from the stairs. Henry went in without knocking.

"Henry!" She followed him inside and stopped short the moment she saw the interior of the room. It was, for all intents and purposes, a hospital room.

"Jo, meet Adam." Henry stood next to the bed, in which lay a frail looking man, a tube sticking from his mouth, a breathing machine on the side of the bed busily pumping away.

She stepped a bit further into the room, looked around, taking in the surroundings. A thousand questions buzzed around in her head, but she couldn't get a hold of any of them long enough to actually ask.

"Jo?" He strived to remain calm, but she heard the impatience in his voice.

She looked over to the bed. The man on the bed didn't move, but he did look familiar somehow.

"Meet Adam," Henry said once more. "Or, as you know him, Doctor Lewis Farber."

"What?" She rushed over to the bed in three quick strides. True enough, now that he'd said it, she saw it. The quaint English therapist that had been so helpful when they were trying to find Henry's stalker...

"A shame, really," Henry went on in a voice full of sadness and regret.

"Shame? Henry, if this is Adam, and if everything you told me about him is true, then..."

"Such a brilliant mind," Henry went on, ignoring her interruption. "Such a brilliant mind, so much knowledge, so much experience. All locked away inside an unmoving body."

"What... What do you mean?"

"Locked-in-syndrome," he answered. "Not much of his body works anymore. But he is awake in there, awake and alert. He knows I'm here." He bent down to Farber – Adam? – and into his line of vision. "You know I'm here, don't you, and that I'm not going anywhere."

Farber's face was expressionless, except for his eyes. They were deep brown, almost black, and full of damnation.

For a long moment the two men were lost in a conversation that was held entirely with looks. Farber obviously couldn't say anything, and Henry chose not to. But they seemed to understand each other perfectly, even without words.

"I am not a vindictive person by nature," Henry finally said, and she wondered, who he spoke to, her or Farber. "I don't have a need for revenge, not even for the more painful events in my life. But this, this was different. Abigail was my life, there has been none like her before, and there will never be another like her. And you cut my time with her short when it was already woefully limited."

Farber blinked once. His eyes seemed to have grown even darker.

"I had to take the chance. There was the possibility that you were right, and that I was going to die. I had to take the chance."

Farber blinked again.

"I couldn't let you walk around New York, risking you bothering my loved ones, or just anyone for that matter. You are too dangerous to be left unguarded. I could have screwed it up. You might have died from the air-bubble, or it might have not affected you at all. – Of course, between you and me, with us that's pretty much the same thing, isn't it?"

Farber's eyes grew a little darker still. And the expression changed. Was there ... delight? Happiness? What?

"I had to take the chance," Henry reiterated. "And don't you dare be proud of me for what I did. It was necessary, but it's still hideous, and although I would do it all over again to protect Abraham and Jo, and everyone else in my life from your sick little mind games... I detest myself for it."

Farber blinked.

Henry wiped his eyes.

Jo realised he was crying. She did not know what to do, what to think. She did not fully understand what Henry had done, but somehow he had put Farber – Adam – into this hospital bed.

"Let's go." Henry took her by the arm and pulled her out of the room.

They walked down in silence, left the building in silence – not counting the quick good-bye to the receptionist. They waited for a taxi to stop for them in silence, and rode back to Henry's house in silence.

It was oppressing like few things in her life had ever been.

Finally, when Henry had paid the fare and they stood on the pavement in front of the antiques shop, he returned her look. "I don't know what to say in my defence," he admitted, "or if there even is a defence. This is the worst I ever got, doing that to Adam. But he is dangerous. So far removed from humanity that I can't trust him to not hurt anyone else."

"I understand, I think." Self defence in the name of the human race. Or something like that. Like killing Hitler before he could start World War II – if presumably not quite on the same scale.

He smiled tiredly. "I'm not sure you do, but thank you for the sentiment."

She put her hand on his upper arm, hopefully conveying the comfort she felt he needed. "You know, since you told me that whacky story about your long and complicated life," she registered a small smile on his lips, "there's really been only one thing I've been absolutely sure of."

"Yes? And what's that?"

"That you, Henry Morgan, are a good man."

THE END

Hehe, had you fooled, hadn't I? Y'all thought Henry would demonstrate his condition. But no, I had other plans, right from the start. I knew that Henry would show her who Adam really was.

And I'll be back, the moment the muse bites me in the butt. Forever is too good to just let wither away.

Good-bye and thank you for the fish.