This drabble is for ImmigrantPhenomenon on AO3, it's a modern AU. John's been gone for a long time, here is his and Alexander's reunion.


"I didn't think you were coming back." I cried in his arms.

"Of course I came back. I promised you didn't I? Didn't I say, 'Alex, no matter what happens, no matter what I have to do, I'm coming home to you'? " He stroked my hair and let me cry.

"You did, but, God, when I heard about your battalion…" I cried harder, holding him tighter, smelling his comforting scent.

"Shh… baby, it's okay, I'm home. I'm home."

"What was it like?" I asked him.

"Which part?"

"When you were… prisoner? Kidnapped? Hostage? I don't know what word to use."

"It doesn't matter. I have better stuff to talk about. Like you."

I nodded, understanding that he didn't want to relive the horrible things that he'd been through.

"I like your hair longer like this." I wrapped a piece around my fingers.

"No barbers in the caves." He smiled half-heartedly.

"Just goes to show how long you were in there." My tears flowed again.

"Shh… Alex, Alex, it's okay. Tell me more about... about what I've missed."

"Um… Whole Foods has fucking taken over, um, everyone died in 2016, Prince, David Bowie, Alan Rickman, Carrie Fisher, uh, Kanye's still Kanye. I don't know…"

"Tell me about what I missed with you, 'Lex."

"I… well… I moved down to Hell's Kitchen to be closer to work, it was really hard to let our place go, but, I did. You were like a ghost in there. I… met a girl."

"Yeah?" His hand stopped its journey up my back.

"Yeah, I love her, but she's always just been a placeholder for you. I didn't even mean to meet her, but she's wonderful."

"Then what are you doing here?" John asked.

I pulled the blanket over my bare chest defensively, feeling exposed, "John, when you came home, a part of me came home. I've been looking for someone shaped even kind of like the hole you left in me when you disappeared, and she's like a tamponade, she's gentle and kind like you are, Jack, she's smart, she's loyal like you… more than I am, I guess, but you're home."

"Alexander… this girl, how long have you been with her? What's her name?"

"Eliza… almost a year and a half."

"You should go to her then. I'll be okay."

"No! No, no, no." I clutched him, feeling my head spin, and my body grow hot and anxious at even the prospect of losing him again.

"Alex," he kissed the top of my head and threaded our naked legs together, "it's okay, you moved on. I was declared dead, I mean, I can't blame you for moving on, I'm glad you did. I know it must have been hard for you."

"It was the worst. I… Hercules had an almost full blown intervention for me. I finally started living again and then a year later you're home, I don't know what to do with… I don't know what to do."

"I'm sorry I wasn't here for you, I'm sorry I'm the reason you were hurting."

"You can't blame yourself, John."

"No. I don't, not really. But I'll always feel bad."

"It's okay, you're home, and you're with me."

"But, what about Eliza? She's important to you."

"I know, but you're you," tears rolled hotly down my cheeks, "you don't have to go back, do you?"

He kissed my head again, "no, babe, never, discharged with full honours, whole nine yards, all sorts of stupid medals coming my way. My shoulder's way too fucked up to let me back out there."

"From when you got shot."

"Three times, couldn't keep my ass down." He grinned.

I clutched him to me, hating him talking like that, "I still don't know why you enlisted."

"Do the right thing, I guess, make people proud,"

"I've always been proud of you."

"I know you have, Alex. God, it's good to be home," he smelled my hair and I watched tears gather in the corners of his eyes again, "I used to pray every night, there was this tiny, tiny little crevice I could just barely see the sky through, I'd look up and find a star at night and just take comfort knowing that you would see the same star the next day. I'd look up through that crack and I'd pray, 'God, just let me see my baby one more time. Let me just go home to my Alex.'"

"Your prayers got answered… mine did, too."

"I know you're still a cynic." He brushed my hair behind my ear.

"I am."

"My prayers were to see you one more time. It can just be that, be this. One last glorious day in my hotel with you. I got to see you again. This one day was worth a thousand in any cave."

"John… no, I don't want that. I can't lose you again."

"Alex, you haven't seen me in four years, that's almost as long as we were together."

"I don't care. I want you. You're all I want, all I've ever wanted." I kissed him like a memory, our mouths anticipating what came next, a step ahead of each other.

I fogged into the kiss, heady and strong, my mind blurred, becoming nothing but sensations. Him, warm and close to me, our naked bodies against each other. He was so skinny, but nothing else had changed, he was still my John. Memories of our last night together flooded me, how tightly I'd held him, pleading with the universe not to take him, to let him stay by my side, sure that I'd never see him again. I knew John, I knew that once he was deployed he'd do something stupid and get himself killed, or stuck in a cave without anyone else knowing about it.

He pulled back and bit his lip, "Alex, this isn't right. You have this girl, she loves you, I'm sure, who could not love you? You shouldn't be here."

I sniffled, my nose stuffy from how much I'd cried today in his hotel room, my face was sticky from all of my dried tears, "I don't care."

"I know you don't, but this isn't right to her. I'm sure you care about her, too."

"Well, of course I do, but John, we had a life together, we were planning our future," I sniffled again and rested my cheek against his chest, I couldn't bear to look at him, "don't you remember? We were going to have babies that look like you."

His hands were in my hair, "I remember, Alex, of course, I remember, that's what got me home, that's what kept me alive. Knowing that halfway across the world, the most beautiful man God created wanted to have a life with me…" his voice shook, "and I think… I think I knew that you probably moved on, I wanted you to. To be happy, to live a good life, but I always kept that memory. That idea."

"I didn't move on, though, John. I just made it work, I've been so lonely… lonely for you."

He lost his composure and cried against my hair, "I'm sorry… I'm so sorry I did this to you, 'Lex."

I reached up to stroke his face, to dry his tears, "you didn't do anything. You went to war… you did it John Laurens style. Obviously, this kind of shit would happen."

"I should have been more careful. For you. I…" he blew out a breath, "after we lost that squadron in the car bomb, I, fuck, I had like, survivor's guilt, I should have been in that van, I should have been blown up, my best men, my best friends, they died that day. I was supposed to have been in that van, it was chance, I was right behind them. I saw them die."

I nodded, staying silent, letting him volunteer whatever information he wanted me to know.

"There was this guy, French guy, he was my best friend over there, we called him the Marquis, he just had this air about him. He was younger than all of us, I took him under my wing, I guess, and he died in my arms that day. He's the one who told me about the cave. He told me that when they'd been out on recon earlier that week they'd seen it. Seen people coming and going. I demanded that we check it out. Y'know, for the Marquis, like if we could just take that base, I could avenge him or some shit. We got there and it was devastating, the losses, they saw us coming a mile away. I'm it, Alex, I'm the only man in my whole battalion left standing. I was reckless, I was, but it was for my friend, and I'm so sorry that I was thinking more of him than I was of you."

"John, I'm so sorry that happened. It's okay, it's okay, you've always been a good friend. I remember you writing about him in your letters. He seemed like a good friend to you, too."

John sniffed and nodded, "he was."

We lie there silently, watching the shadows on the wall get longer. I traced his freckles, sure that he had even more than when he left.

"Do you still want me?" I couldn't make my voice louder than a whisper.

"Always, Alexander. I will always want you. More than that, though, I want you to be happy. I can't waltz in after four years, almost three of them spent being dead and just have the life I left. I know that. I don't ask that of you."

"But I want you, too."

"I know you do."

"Eliza used to pray for you, too. She's really god fearing, just like you. I think I made her love you, too."

"Yeah?"

"Oh, yeah. I talked about you constantly. Tried to make it like you were there with us."

"God, Alex, you're so creepy." He giggled, teasing me.

"I know, but you were never just a ghost to me. I kept you with me always. I'd talk to you at the grocery store, do you know how long it took me to stop buying peaches?"

"You hate peaches."

"But you love them, it was instinctive, 'oh, I bet John wants some peaches,' and I'd get them and they'd rot, and I'd get more. Once they'd told me you were gone, I talked to you even more, constantly, like I do, I talked your ear off. Up late nights with a cup of coffee just telling you about my life and what was happening and I'd almost, like imagine what you'd say, and just keep talking to you. I never told people you were dead. I'd just tell them you were overseas and I wasn't sure when you were coming home. Eliza was the first person I told. I think she always knew that if you ever really did come home it was over."

"That's not fair to her."

"And is me being with her and wishing that it was you fair? We don't even live together, John. You and I lived together. What's four years, really? We're only twenty-five. We still have our whole lives ahead of us."

"I know, I guess you're right."

"I still want the life we were making. I still want the babies that look like you. I still want to move out of the city and live a quiet life together."

"Alex, I'm a little fucked up. I'm different. I'm fucked up."

"I know. You couldn't come back the same. It wouldn't be possible, I don't care. I love you no matter what that cave, what war, did to you, you're still my John. I pick you. Come home, John. With me. Come home. I'll tell Eliza, she'll get it. Come home, don't let me waste any more time without you."

He bit his chapped lip and nodded, "you're sure?"

"I've never been more sure about anything in my life, John Laurens. It's always been you."