Chapter 15

Month: June

One hour after that plane flew over their island, Hiro and K were picked up by a rescue chopper. It was a surreal moment as they sat in the aircraft, looking down at the place they'd called home for two years. There was an empty feeling that came with leaving their island, empty and yet exhilarating.

As Hiro clutched Yuki's book to his chest, he watched the island disappear out of vision. Blink. It was gone just like that. He felt a pair of arms wrap around his frame and he huddled into K's embrace.

Both were silent, there was no words for two men that were lost for so long. The pilots talked to them but they seemed holographic, their words alien. This couldn't be real, yet it was, this could be just a dream but it wasn't. The paramedic examined them for health and K heard them say they were fine, but she offered tranquilizers if they wished to rest, or for the fear they might have during the flight.

K and Hiro refused them.

No, maybe it was better to remember this experience, this rebirth to the civilized world. Maybe a good shock to the system would waken their minds faster. Bring them back to reality faster.

But thus logic was not sound really. As much as they wanted to fight and be brave, the world before them was extremely large. They weren't ready for the pace and the bright florescent lights of the hospital in Hawaii. This was where they were taken. Some doctor explained that it was a Hawaiian aircraft that reported a smoke signal from their island. He allowed them both to get examined together, seeing the disorientation on their faces.

Hours later, after many examinations and interviews with some officials, they were told their friends and family had been contacted.

"Mommy Mommy!" hollered a young child around eight years old.

"Michael I'm busy getting my nails done, tell whoever it is on the phone that I'll call them back," Judy spoke indignantly.

"But…it's about Daddy…"

Jumping up from her seat, knocking the beautician's tools all over the place, Judy ran to the phone. Breathlessly she said, "Hello?"

Authorities spoke to her.

"This better not be joke!" she barked into the phone. But the person explained this was no joke and gave some further details. Forgetting about her wet nails, Judy smudged them all with the grip she had on the phone…as if the handset might keep her balance before she sank to her knees.

"Claude…"

Walking into their house with arms full of groceries, Shuichi and Yuki headed straight to the kitchen to unload.

"I'm going to cook you the BEST dinner ever Yuki!" clamoured Shuichi, digging out choice items from the bags.

"Don't you think we should put the food away first before you kill me with your crap?" Yuki asked with chagrin.

Shuichi didn't listen and began to hum Nittle Grasper's Angel Dust song. He was going to make beef teriyaki and grabbed the meat tenderizer.

BANG!

Yuki growled at the racket. "I have to listen to my messages, slice mushrooms or something… NO! Wait you'll murder yourself," Yuki said and thought, "I know grate cheese." And the novelist slammed a grater and cheese in front of Shuichi.

"But Yuuukiii…we don't need cheese," the singer whined and watched Yuki head to the answering machine. Shrugging Shuichi began to grate cheese. Anything for Yuki he muttered under his breath and began to hum again.

"Shut up! This message is directed at you."

Shuichi stopped humming and tried to stop the tears that threatened to build behind his eye lids. Wait, what? A message for him? Sucking it up and putting the cheese down, he ran to stand next to Yuki.

"…calling on behalf of Hiroshi Nakano and Claude K. Winchester. We'd just like to inform you Mr. Shindou that they have been found alive, stranded on an island. They will be returning to Japan in forty-eight hours at the Narita International Airport, gate 12 at four pm your time if you would like to greet them. Good day."

Shuichi blinked, he looked down at the answering machine like it held the secret of Atlantis. He stopped the next message and rewound it to listen to his message again.

"Are you ok?" asked Yuki, he too was very shocked to hear this news. He placed a hand on Shuichi's shoulder with concern. "So they weren't…"

But Shuichi grabbed the machine, ripping the cord out of the wall and cried, "I knew Hiro wasn't dead!" He hugged the answering machine with a huge goofy grin, tears spilling down his face. "I just knew it…"

Tohma got the news as well. He sat back in his office chair and propped his feet on the desk and threaded his fingers together. "So you have been returned to us alive K and Hiroshi. I think this deserves a big welcome home," the president of NG said to himself with a smile.

He picked up the phone.

After they'd been given clean clothes, a button up shirt and a pair of jeans for each, undergarments and shoes, Hiro and K got on another plane. After a fight with the hairdresser, both men insisted they had long hair to begin with. So they got to keep their locks, which only got tidied up with an inch or two of trimming. Now freshened up, smelling of cologne and laundered clothes they looked at each pensively in their seats.

"I don't know about you but I'm nervous," Hiro whispered inside a private jet paid for by NG. It had arrived this morning and by the afternoon he was seated inside of it.

"I know Hiro, I'd lie if I said I wasn't either," K replied. "To see the faces of everyone that thought we were dead." He sighed and tried to forget he was on a plane. K didn't feel so easy on a plane anymore; he reached for Hiro's hand.

A stewardess stopped and smiled at them. "Would you like anything, water maybe?"

Water? Hiro understood her English for water, "Yes please," he answered back in bad English. "Want some Cl…I mean K?" Hiro asked. K nodded sure.

In mere seconds two cups with clear, parasite free water was handed to them. For a moment they simply stared at the free water. It was like magic, no boiling, no standing under a vine, no caught rainfall…it was just free.

They huffed incredulously.

"I never thought I'd taste this kind of water again," Hiro said amazed over something so simple.

They sipped the water like it was gold. Funnily enough they weren't very hungry when the hospital fed them very bland things. The doctors warned introducing too many potent foods to quickly would upset their stomachs and cause them pain. But they weren't too concerned about that anymore.

Before they had gotten on the plane they got a message that Tohma was hosting a welcome back. There was to be press, friends and family all waiting for them when they stepped off the plane. Apparently all of Japan knew of their rescue and were warned the airport might be a circus.

Hiro gripped K's hand even tighter.

A few hours later they landed and both peered out the window. The crowd was massive.

"Jesus," K muttered.

"Let's just get this over with, although I never thought that many people would be here for us," Hiro offered swallowing hard.

Both walked out of the plane and stood looking over the gathering of people that were waiting for them. Camera's started to flash and realizing they were still holding hands, K and Hiro let go feeling unsure. They walked down the steps and towards familiar faces. Hearts racing, that incredible rush of disbelief coursed through their veins. They heard gasps from parents, from friends, they heard their names being called and one smaller voice broke through the crowd.

"Daddy!"

K watched his son race towards him, ahead of everyone else that rushed at them. Kneeling, K caught his boy in a fierce hug. "Oh god Michael," K said his voice cracking with emotion. He held onto Michael so tight, as everyone surrounded them. "I'm home sweetheart…I'm home." Unable to stop them, tears spilled down both K and Michael's cheeks.

"Hiroshi!" screeched an older Japanese woman's voice. It was his mother, followed by his father and even his brother. They all grouped hugged, "Mom, Dad…Yuuji," Hiro said incredulously. His mother began to weep and soon the whole family was crying. "We buried you my boy…we buried you," Hiro's father struggled to say, kissing Hiro on the forehead his eyes filled with tears of happiness. "It's good so have you back brother, I've missed you so much," Yuuji exclaimed he to weeping along with his parents.

Camera's still flashed and murmurs of Bad Luck could be heard from reporters. K holding Michael stood up now. Judy finally let go of her ex-husband, dabbing her eyes with a handkerchief. Hiro finally pulled back from his parents as he too heard the murmurs. Both men looked to see Shuichi, Suguru, Sakano and Yuki. They had been told that their friends lived, but to see them now…was paramount.

They stood before each other with unreadable faces. It was like looking at each others tragedy, each others nightmare, the anguish they'd all shared…the pain. Everything they'd all experienced during the crash, the feeling of losing each other. It was almost maddening and yet it was also the most incredible joy for them all.

"I thought you were all…" K stumbled.

"We thought you were…" Suguru started to say at the same time.

"All this time you were alive!" Shuichi screamed and best friends hugged and cried. "Two years Hiro…"

Eventually things calmed down enough for everyone to go inside the airport rec-room. Hours went by as everyone filled each other in on details of the crash and how they had to bring Hiro and K back to life. Everyone asked about how they survived all this time and K and Hiro both found themselves unable to say much about it. It was too soon. A part of them was left behind on that island, but then another part they took with them.

Hiro often caught K glancing at him, they didn't smile or wave. They just wanted to remind themselves they were still there and that this wasn't a dream.

"Gosh look at your hair Hiro," Shuichi muttered, touching his friends hair, "It's almost all blond. It's like you only have streaks of red in it now." But Shuichi noticed Hiro wasn't listening to him but looking across the room. Out of the corner of his eye, he knew he was looking a K. "It must have been so hard out there," the singer said tenuously, patting Hiro on the shoulder.

Hiro returned his gaze to Shuichi and offered absentmindedly, "I had Claude."

"Claude…Claude?" Judy said a few times before she got his attention.

"I'm sorry, everything is just…just," K hesitated unable to stop watching Hiro. But when he looked away he focused back on Judy and Michael.

"So it's settled then?" Judy asked again.

K nodded, "Yes I'll come back to the States for awhile."

A week later, NG threw a party for them all and things started to fall into place. Bringing someone back from the dead wasn't easy and K had to wait awhile before he could fly back to the States. He'd spent most of the time in a hotel with Michael and Judy but he had his own room. At night he tossed and turned, but he didn't want to watch television and he didn't listen to the radio. Instead he spent much of his time staring out the window, in complete silence.

When Judy and Michael took him to diner for the first time he began to eat with his hands. He stopped himself and grabbed the chopsticks. They felt so foreign to him now. But he didn't stop himself from groaning at how wonderful everything tasted. Judy looked embarrassed and Michael giggled.

"I bet you can't wait for dessert right Daddy?" Michael offered enthusiastically.

"You got that right squirt," K said and hoped he wouldn't pay for this later.

But K was stuffed before he even had a chance to eat dessert.

"You barely cleaned your plate darling." Judy blinked looking at K who was once the human trash compactor.

Later that night K was back in his room and like every minute since he'd returned he thought about Hiro. Gawd, how he longed to see him even if it had only been a week. But right now to K he was the one thing that equalled normalcy. He sighed as he sat in a chair looking out over the Tokyo skyline, savouring a beer. He knew though that Hiro was busy with his family as he was with his own. K sighed again, Judy had already suggested letting their marriage have another chance. It was touching that she cared so much after the fact and now he felt a little torn. After abandoning Michael for two years, K was feeling kind of obligated to Judy. But at the same time he yearned for Hiro.

The phone rang.

Startled, K got up and answered the shrilling phone.

"K?"

"Hiro!" clamoured K, "I…I was just thinking about you."

"Everything has been so hectic. I'm so overwhelmed K, I feel like I'm losing my mind," Hiro said quickly, sounding as if he really needed to talk. Of course he reached out to the only person he felt he could talk to right now. "It's only been a week but it feels like months man."

K picked up the phone and brought it to his chair and sipped his beer. "I know, but we'll get through it. It's just the whole change. Hell I can't sleep comfortable on the bed, I barely eat anything, and I have a brand new gun on the table that I've barely batted an eye at. You think you're going crazy?" K offered and chuckled at how relieved he was to hear Hiro's voice.

They both sighed into the phone.

"I want so much to come see you…but my parents. I can't you know?" Hiro said quietly.

K guessed he was calling from his parent's house as he whispered that last part. "I understand. I have to go back to the States for awhile. I can't pick up where I left off right away…you know Michael."

"I know you have to be there for him. But we'll see each other before you leave right?" Hiro asked almost desperately.

"I'll come see you alright?" K offered. He wasn't sure what was going to happen between Hiro and himself but he had an idea. Only he'd they'd have to wait until they saw each other. "So I'm guessing Shuichi wants to put Bad Luck together again?"

Hiro sighed at the change of topic, "Yes he mentioned it. I wasn't surprised that he wouldn't start another band without me." He chuckled, "Stubborn fool I told him, but he's been working at clubs just singing our old songs solo…just to pay the bills."

"Hmm, sounds like him alright."

"Do…you think…well that maybe…one day…" Hiro beat around the bush.

"What?" K wondered, perplexed by Hiro's mumbling.

"You know come back to work at NG?" Hiro said in a rush. There was a long pause. "K?"

"I'm here," sigh, "I don't know Hiro. I made a promise to myself on that island. I promised I would be close to my boy and stop being a lousy father. Right now I don't even know if I'd make a good manager anymore…"

Hiro made a small hrmph into the phone, "I know what you mean…I'm not ready to face a group of fans quite yet. I mean everyone in that crash seems pretty normal now, they got over it and so will we. And one day everything will be normal again and you'll be back to scaring the shit out of us."

K laughed, he knew that he was truly going to miss everything. But this was now. Things would get better they had to. But right now he needed to be near his son…if only they didn't live so far apart. And after a two hour chat for the first time in last eight days, K could actually sleep.

A/N: Thank you all that read my story and encouraged me throughout it. I really appreciate it, truly --hugs-- I have one more chapter after this and its full of drama and good stuff. I hope you enjoy it Much love!