Disclaimer: I do not own Kamen Rider OOO, and I am making no money off of this. This is solely for my own and other's entertainment.

AN: Here's chapter 2! I hope you all are enjoying this little project (though chapter 2 ended up much longer than I expected). Please look forward to the next chapter as well!

Warnings: Spoilers through 48. Lost of angst (at least for poor Eiji, you'd think I'd get tired of torturing the poor man). Shonen-ai (Ankh/Eiji) though not active at the moment.

Returning and Reacquiring: The Confrontation

It had only been a week, and Eiji was already ready to leave and start traveling again. The only thing keeping him in Japan was the fear that, if he left, then Ankh might just disappear again. It hurt so much more than he'd ever imagined, though, to have Ankh forget him, but Eiji would rather be there so he could at least see the other male, know he was still there – still alive.

Sometimes, though, it became too much, so he would escape to the park closest to the café to sit beneath the trees, but he never left for more than an hour or two, couldn't bring himself to stay away that long. That was where he was now, sitting beneath a tree and trying to put his mask back together again, trying to stop the onslaught of emotions he wasn't sure he could take anymore.

Ankh's POV

It had been a week since he'd been revived, and Ankh was more confused than he'd ever been before. Not about where he was, it was comfortable and familiar enough that he'd decided to make his nest there for now. He wasn't confused about the people either, though they were unusual it wasn't anything he couldn't adapt to given time. No, the only thing he was confused about was Eiji.

The damn brunette had kept up the happy idiot façade since he had arrived, and, though Ankh thought the pretense was incredibly obvious, the others seemed to mostly take it at face value. They smiled and joked and asked Eiji about the places he'd visited while traveling – which he'd evidently been doing for a while, though the brunette avoided the question of why whenever it was brought up – and not a single damn one of them seemed to realize they were being fooled masterfully. It frustrated Ankh for reasons he didn't understand, and that, in turn, made him more irritable. It didn't help that he had now idea how he knew, there were no outwards signs after all, but he knew just as he knew there was something that they weren't telling him.

If he took what they had told him to be the truth – which he did mostly now, it just felt like the truth – then he knew, without knowing how he knew, that parts of the whole story were missing. It frustrated the hell out of him because it felt like he had all but the one key piece to the puzzle, the one piece that would make everything else make sense, and he knew that that one piece had involved Eiji. He'd tried demanding answers from the others, but, despite their willingness to tell him pretty much anything else about that year, they were all surprisingly tight-lipped at that, subtly – or, in some cases, out right – telling him he should ask Eiji about that.

So, after a week of having his questions dodged, enough was enough. He was tired of feeling like he was missing a crucial piece of information, so he decided to hunt down the brunette to get his answers. A quick look in the main portion of the café told him that Eiji wasn't there, and the blonde knew he wasn't anywhere else in the building. That just left the park. He'd seen the brunette heading in that direction every other day or so, and he never came back with supplies so it seemed logical that the other male stopped there for one reason or another.

Jumping out the second story window, Ankh landed lightly, crouching to soften the impact, before straightening up and heading in the direction he'd seen Eiji take before at a brisk pace. Ankh let his feet guide him, walking familiar yet foreign paths by instinct rather than conscious thought, and it didn't take long before he saw a familiar form sitting at the base of a tree. He was about to call out to the brunette when he suddenly noticed the other's body language – knees drawn up to his chest, shoulders hunched and tense with arms wrapped around his legs, and head hanging low, bangs hiding his face – and paused. This…was not what he'd expected. Ankh had known the brunette had been hiding beneath his smiles, but he hadn't expected this level of pain and sadness.

Ankh frowned. This…just wasn't right. That damn voice was screaming in his head again, telling him to go over there and do something, and, for once, Ankh complied. After all, enough was enough and the time for dodged questions and painfully fake smiles was over. He would get his answers now whether Eiji liked it or not.

Ankh took one deliberate step forward, no longer trying to be quiet, and was gratified to see the other male start, obviously broken out of whatever stupor he'd been in.

Gen/Both POV

Eiji sighed. He probably really needed to get back soon. He had stepped out while it had been slow, but he knew it would probably be getting busier soon. Plus, he really didn't like being away from the blonde for very long – it was, after all, the main reason he hadn't gone traveling again.

Eiji was just about to push himself up when he heard the crunch of someone stepping on the uneven ground nearby, and his head shot up, eyes wide as they landed on the person he'd least wanted to see him like this. Suddenly remembering the tear tracks that were sure to be evident on his fact, Eiji brought up the cuff of his sleeve to scrub at his face before turning to smile at the blonde.

"Stop that," Ankh snapped, and Eiji just stared at him, confused because he hadn't thought he'd done anything.

Scowling at his obvious confusion, Ankh continued irritably, "Stop that damn fake smiling. The others may not notice, but I do and it's really starting to piss me off."

Shocked now, the smile fell off Eiji's face as he continued to stare at the blonde. After a moment, Eiji managed to choke out, "How?"

Ankh's scowl deepened as he stalked over to lean against the same tree, and then he replied, "I have no idea. I just know, and I don't know how. Just like I know that no one is telling me something that will explain it, something they keep telling me you should tell me, and it's all really starting to piss me off."

Eiji stared at the blonde for another long moment before turning to stare straight ahead as he asked, "What do you want to know?"

"What was it like?" Ankh asked, and, realizing how vague the question sounded, he was about to explain when he was unexpectedly cut off.

"We were…very close," Eiji muttered, not seeing Ankh's shock at his understanding. Picking his words carefully, the brunette continued, "I know that you were the one person I've been closest to in a long time, and you always seemed to know what I was thinking. It could be annoying sometimes, but, usually, it was quite nice. I believe it was the same for you as I seemed to be able to tell what you were thinking or planning. We could trust each other because of that."

"Couldn't have been much considering the way things ended," Ankh interjected gruffly, but he was brought up short by the small smile that suddenly appeared on Eiji's face. It wasn't much, but it was the most genuine smile Ankh had yet seen on the brunette and the difference it made was startling.

"No, we both knew it would probably come to that. I didn't like it, and I had hoped it wouldn't happen even if I did expect it. I knew, though, that I could still trust you, and you obviously felt the same since you felt you were able to come back without explanation. We obviously didn't always agree, some of our 'disagreements' were rather spectacular actually, but we could still believe each other," Eiji explained, not noticing his or Ankh's expressions.

"There's more," Ankh stated quietly – he knew there was in the same way he'd known how to find Eiji in the park.

Eiji flinched slightly as he muttered, "I don't know if you'll believe me." Feeling the blonde's eyes turn to stare at him, Eiji sighed and asked, "Are you sure you want to know?"

Ankh just nodded, oddly unwilling to interrupt the brunette.

Bracing himself, Eiji said, "We…were lovers, had been for months before you died. We were also…well, I think we may have also been falling in love, especially right near the end when you were becoming more and more human. That was actually why I spent the three years after your death searching for a way to fix your Taka medal…to bring you back." Catching sight of the blonde's surprised expression, he commented, "I never mentioned that did I?"

"I don't…I…" Ankh trailed off, shaking his head and completely thrown by the unexpected answer, yet he could tell that the other male was finally giving him the full truth.

Eiji spoke up before he could get any further by saying, "I know, it's fine. Mostly, I'm just glad you're back safely so don't worry. I didn't really expect things to just go back to the way they were before, so I'll be fine."

Ankh could feel the lie in the other male's words, but, for once, he couldn't bring himself to call the other out on it.

"Anyway," Eiji said, forced cheer coloring his voice, "we'd better get back to the café. Chiyoko-san will need help for the next rush soon."

Ankh just frowned and nodded, following the other male back to the café in silence. Well, he had his answers, and now the blonde just had to figure out what the hell he was going to do with them…what he was going to do now that he'd been unexpectedly handed the brunette's heart.