For the longest time, John thought that he'd left this life. The trials he'd been through, the suffering he'd endured, he thought that it had all been worth it in the end.

And it was.

For five years, John and Helen were just that. John and Helen. A married couple living the life that anyone could have wanted. There were no worries to be had, just living for the sake of love.

It was a life that John never imagined he would be living. And he savored every single moment of it.

Then, a trip to the hospital and it all came crashing down. He still remembered her face, as his entire world crumbled in front of him, how she looked at him with eyes filled with sadness and acceptance in equal measure.

He couldn't sleep that night. He'd contacted everyone that owed him that could possibly help Helen. None of them could. Her disease had progressed to a point that treatment was impossible.

He remembered screaming to himself, not willing to accept that she'd be gone. The one good thing that had happened to him, the one good thing he wanted, was going to be taken away from him all too soon.

Helen held him for that entire night. Even though she was dying, she became his pillar through those tough times.

A scoff.

When she passed, John couldn't find a reason to live anymore. He'd left his old life behind. Helen didn't know much about the details of his career, and he didn't still knew it was something dangerous, and had made him promise not to go back.

He wouldn't. It was the last promise he made to her before she died in front of him.

It was shortly after she passed, when he was debating what he was going to do with himself, that something arrived for him.

A dog. A beagle, named Daisy. He thought it was a mistake, at first. Who would trust him with a dog of all things?

Only the one person that trusted him till the very end.

He cried when he read Helen's last message for him. Even now, she was helping him.

A sliver of sun piercing through the darkness that had shrouded his life.

It was taken from him just as quickly.

And he just as quickly fell back to what he was.

A killer.

"You arrogant asshole."

And he did kill. He killed so much, and it all led back to this. Traitors and friends, both dead because of him. A gun at his head.

"He didn't shoot."

"Con…sequences."

BANG


The softness beneath him was unfamiliar. Comforts like this were supposed to be a farfetched fantasy after everything that had happened. In fact, why was he even feeling this in the first place?

Groggily, John opened his eyes, immediately closing them as the blinding sunlight filtered through the window. For a moment, John thought that despite everything that he'd done, all the vengeance and deaths, he'd gone to heaven.

That maybe God wasn't so cruel to separate him and Helen again.

Then the pain hit him.

Definitely alive.

He slowly opened his eyes, before taking in the room he found himself in. It was strangely rustic. The bed, table, even the floor were all wooden. Rotten wood, at that. On the table sat a book, a folded set of clothes, as well as an oil lamp. Looking down, he found himself dressed in a simple white shirt and boxers.

None of that helped in recognizing where exactly he was.

Winston?

It was the only explanation. Winston taking him somewhere where he could recover after his duel was the only reasonable answer as to what happened. But it didn't make sense why he'd be in what amounted to be a shack in the middle of nowhere.

Moreover, it didn't make sense why he was still alive.

Caine's shot was lethal. He knew it, John knew it, Winston knew it, the damn Harbinger knew it. He was nothing more than a dead man with his last words.

And yet, here he was. Lying down on the surprisingly comfortable bed.

He lifted the sheets as he attempted to get up. Key word being try, as a sharp pain where Caine had that last sho-

There was no bullet wound.

As he tapped down to stem what should have been blood, he was met with unblemished skin. Sure, it hurt, but there was no wound. As he felt around his body, all of the wounds that he knew for a fact he had were gone.

How long have I been out?

Something like those wounds didn't just go away after a week. It would take months and months of treatment to heal them. That meant that he must've been out cold for at least that long. John grit his teeth bitterly.

They should've let me die already.

He grabbed at the book on the table, barely missing the oil lamp. If nothing else, Winston would have left a note explaining things. That, or he'd come strolling in soon enough. The book didn't have a title on it, but the moment he opened it, he frowned.

The book was practically falling apart at the seams. Whoever had been reading this had clearly been rereading it repeatedly over the years, without the proper care that should be put into it. Clearly not the reinstated manager of the Continental then.

That Tracker then? It obviously wasn't Caine - the book was written in plain English. The Tracker was the only other one there that could own this book that had an interest in John, if only to repay the debt he owed.

As he flipped through the book, looking for a clue, he caught glimpses of words - words he was unfamiliar with.

Mondas? Whiterun?

Maybe it was some sort of fantasy novel? That narrowed down the list of possible owners down into nothing. None of his acquaintances ever showed an interest in fantasy. None of the remaining ones that is.

With no other lead, John grit his teeth as he got up. The wounds were gone, sure, but he still felt them fresh enough. He put his suit on piece by piece, noting that each of them looked freshly laundered. He was both relieved and despondent feeling the kevlar lined suit on his body.

A soft click of the door.

"-left it-AAAAAAHHH!"

John didn't turn around. To some, it may seem that the assassin had lost his touch. That had he been in his prime, he would've been able to react to the door faster than the person could open it. Those who knew him would know the truth.

I'm so tired. Please, just let me see Helen again.

If the person who opened the door would kill him, then so be it. Helen would hate it, of that he was sure. But it was as the Elder said, that John Wick would only have freedom through one thing.

Death.

He'd already accepted death when Caine shot him. So why would he regret that now?

Unfortunately, he wasn't met with another assassin looking for his head.

"MOM! DAD, THE GUY'S AWAKE!"

He was instead met with the shrill screams of a young girl.


"Easy now, don't eat too fast." John forced himself to slow down. The woman was right. The food wasn't going anywhere, and any faster might just upset his stomach even more.

It didn't change that he was hungrier than he'd ever felt before.

"Who," John's voice was scratchy from disuse, "Are you? Where am I?"

The woman smiled warmly at him, "I'm Sigurd, and you're currently in Riverwood." He hadn't heard of a Riverwood anywhere, but judging from the accented English that these people were speaking, he'd guess it was somewhere in Europe. Likely the Nordic countries.

"My husband found you bleeding out in the treated your injuries as well as we could, but I'm afraid we can't do anything about the pain."

"It's fine. Thank you." And he meant it. As much as he had accepted his death, he would not spit on the efforts of others in being good people. He still had one question left in him.

"Why?" Why help a stranger like him? They didn't get anything out of it. For all they knew, he could be some psycho that would kill them the moment he could. He wouldn't, of course, but it was worrying how close he was to that.

"Well," The front door opened as a man walked in, "Couldn't in good conscience leave a man to die out there." The man walked towards the sitting John, and had he not been himself, John would have missed the wariness in his eyes.

The assassin relaxed a fraction. If anything, that wariness was a good thing. It meant that the man was looking out for his family.

"Alvor." The man introduced himself.

"John." He grasped at the extended hand that the other man extended. He gripped as firmly as he could, grimacing at how weak it was compared to normal. If Alvor noticed, he didn't make a big deal out of it. Instead, the man knelt down and whispered to a figure that John hadn't noticed before.

He berated himself. He had to be more tired than ever to miss the child that had greeted him as he woke up.

The girl nodded towards her father and rushed downstairs, taking one last look towards John's form.

"Now," Alvor's somewhat friendly disposition shifted to a more guarded one, now that his daughter had left the room. His wife as well, now moved to his side with an uncertain look on his face, "Who are you? You say your name is John. Are you a bandit? A survivor from Helgen?"

"I'm not a bandit." John winced internally as he spoke. It hurt, "Don't know about Helgen."

"Don't know about-out with it man, the dragon, Helgen! Did you not see it?" Alvor incredulously asked him. This time it was John's turn to look at him in askance. What was the man talking about? He shook his head. No, enough of this charade.

He'd played along to whatever this was, but it was high time he got back home.

"Alright Winston, game's over." He called out to the room. Obviously, this was all some joke that Winston had done, possibly as one last hurrah before John went on to fully retire. The entire set was just done so painfully accurately, that it couldn't be anything but that.

From the smell of musty old wood, the scratch marks on the table. The tallies he could spy on the doorframe, height markings for the apparent girl he'd seen. He had no doubts that the child was already part of the criminal underworld.

The two people in front of him were another thing he'd have to give praise to. They'd done so well in hiding that they knew him, and even now, the looks of confusion that they gave him really sold the realism of the set.

"Winston?" He called out again, disregarding his scratchy voice. Alvor, or whoever he really was, looked towards it in apparent uncertainty.

"Lad, I have no idea who you're asking for." A look of worry on both their faces, "Are you sure you didn't hit your head or something?"

John shook his head in annoyance. He just wanted this to end already. He wanted to go home. Go and live the rest of his life. Take care of the dog he still hadn't named. He wanted to live the life that Helen would have wanted for him.

Go beyond his past and live for the future.

But he couldn't do it if these people were this adamant in playing their roles.

He stood, stumbling slightly as his underused legs almost gave out from under him, "Woah, easy now." Alvor steadied him, his earlier hostility gone and replaced with worry once again, "You're still not well, you need to..."

The rest of Alvor's words went unheard as John stared out the window. Sunlight had given way to soft evening hues. In the sky, he could spot something that nobody could have done.

Two moons stared at him.

Where the hell did he end up?


Commissioned by: brutal crab

A/N: This is the second commissioned story that I'll be doing. Like Altered Emblem, this won't be a scheduled upload, but it'll still get updates.

If you like what I do and want to support me, check out my P-atreon at P-atreon•com(slash)Almistyor.

Thank you to my newest patron: Tassimo.

And a special thanks to: Oliver vazquez, brutalcrab and Tassimo. Thank you for all the support.