take me home (in a blinding dream)

Summary: After every good bye, there is a new hello. (A page turns, silently.) Oneshot- AU season 2 ending. (Team)

Set: Post the season 2 finale.

Warning: Post the season 2 finale. No character deaths. Unabashed fluff. Humor, my version of it. Louis and Rebecca, because they are sweet, Tommy, Eva and Sebastian because I like the three of them together, and… Amanda and Carl. Also, a slight warning for language.

Disclaimer: standards apply. Title from Linkin Park, 'Castle of Glass'.

This will be followed (sometime soon) by a companion piece called "if the seas catch fire".

Tommy and Eva are lingering in the tech room.

It's not its official name.

It's just a room Sebastian took over, because he needed a place with enough space to work with his hardware. It's as bare as the other rooms of their headquarters are; with red brick stone walls and grey concrete floors. The lighting is bright and artificial. But it has a soft, constant hum of electricity playing in its background like a warm undercurrent, and he likes it here. It's his place.

The sound is soothing.

Strangely, so is the sound of Eva and Tommy bickering.

Sebastian never liked working in places with a constant background noise created by people. He preferred the silence – or, the sound of his computers, and whatever sports ran on the screens – and fought with Kathrin over it more than once. But he doesn't mind them, now. It's like they blended into his personal white noise, like they've become a part of his world. When he left Berlin – with a shitload of debts, an itch in his fingers whenever he saw online gambling sites and a very, very guilty conscience when he thought of Kathrin – he didn't expect this to happen. It was supposed to be a temporary job, something to bridge the time until he… Yes, until he what? He hadn't known. Had just felt he had to get away from Berlin for some time, that he had to bring some distance between himself and the Sebastian Burger he had become. But Berlin was his home. He'd always wanted to go back one day.

Now he's not so sure anymore.

Sometime in the course of the past weeks, Tommy got hold of a gummi ball. He is bounding it off the walls, to and fro. The sound itself wouldn't be so bad, but he's close to some of Sebastian's most beloved stuff...

"I am trying to work here," he says, slightly annoyed. The Irishman shoots him a glance that clearly says wimp. Eva smiles. "Sorry. Do you want us to leave?"

"No, it's fine. Just don't-"

"Don't touch anything, we know." The exaggerated eye-roll he receives is familiar. "Hey, just because you're the only one with a degree in computer science or whatever friggin' shite it is you studied-"

"You almost crashed the servers last week, McConnell. Don't tell me you know computers."

"Well, and who was it who told me to plug in the humidifier-"

Eva lifts her hand. "Oh, no. Don't blame this on me. I know an emergency stop button when I see one."

"I didn't see it, that's the point, isn't it? I was trying to plug in that stupid thing with my head almost on the ground-"

Sebastian chuckles. Yes, definitely background noise.

(He doesn't mind at all.)

He focuses back on his code. Eva asked him for the aging program some weeks ago, before their whole team almost went to hell in a handbasket. Sebastian was pretty happy with his results, but careful comparisons had shown that there still were some parameters he hadn't gotten quite right. Well, he isn't an artist, but that won't stop him from trying to give his best. Eva and Tommy – and Eva still looks sad and somehow… fragile, and Tommy knows full well because his banter is only half as acerbic as it could be, and Sebastian can see the same worried glances he casts at their friend mirrored in Tommy's eyes – are still discussing something or other. It's not until he hears a certain name that he actually starts paying attention again, but then he's on immediate alert.

"Hickman really left, huh."

"Yes. And the Major won't be able to do field work in quite some time."

We're losing people left and right.

They don't talk about that. They just… don't.

Eva visibly shrinks from the sudden silence and Sebastian grasps for the first thing he can think of. "So Hickman and Andrews, huh."

"No." Tommy frowns, looks at him. "Ya saying they have a thing? Nah."

His surprise makes Eva smile. She's really pretty when she smiles. Sebastian's not blind, but she's also one of his best friends.

"Of course they have a thing."

"They've known each other for – what? Fifteen years?" Tommy protests. "Nothing happened then. Nothing will happen now."

Sebastian snickers. "Don't be stupid. People change."

Eva's eyes are brighter now. He counts this as a win. "They are a cute couple."

"Hickman?" Tommy echoes. "Cute? The hell, someone kill me now, please!"

Eva elbows him in the ribs. "She did fly over from New York twice."

"Okay, so she has the hots for him. But the other way round? Nah!"

"You just have to look at him."

"Bullshite. Hickman in love? Not in this world."

Sebastian grins, and decides to drop the bomb. "Well, he kissed her first."

Now it's their turn to stare at him as if he had three heads. "Come again?"

"He kissed her first. Do you need a translation?"

"And how do you know that?" Eva demands, as stunned as Tommy.

Sebastian smirks. "I saw them."

"What, when, where?"

"Here, in the hallway."

"Bullshite, again. He wouldn't do something like that in the hallway, when everyone could stumble over them, he's an uptight bastard-"

"Well, it was two in the morning."

Eva's eye brows disappear in her hairline. "And you were still there?"

Ups.

"Not reallyyyyy…"

"Gotcha." Tommy slams his flat hand onto the table. Sebastian saves a flash drive from falling over the edge and carefully puts it back. "You saw them on the video feeds."

"You sneaky little-!" But Eva's smiling, widely, and for the first time since they came back from Spain Sebastian cannot detect any pain in her eyes. Tommy realizes it, as well, because his expression softens almost visibly.

"That's it." The Irishman jumps up and rushes around the table. "Show us. I won't believe the two of you until I've seen the feed."

Sebastian slams down the screen of his laptop as if he had the surveillance video in question open right now – which he hasn't.

"No way."

"What, suddenly getting all prim an' proper, Burger? Show us, come on."

"No. Piss of, McConnell, it's none of your business!"

"I'll show you where my business is, you German-speaking-"

"Guys," Eva interrupts them. "Guys! Stop it. You're missing the point here."

"Oh yeah?" Tommy turns to stare her down. "And what's the point, besides the fact that he-"

"Shut up," Sebastian says, hitting his friend on the arm. "What is the point, Eva?"

Eva smirks, and favors them both with a positively mischievous glance.

"The point is, did she kiss him back?"

"You haven't sent me any suggestions as to whom to fill Hickman's position with."

Dorn, Louis thinks, for his age and his apparent frailty, is pretty good when it comes to sneaking up on someone. Of course, the security at the front desk has alerted him of his arrival minutes ago. Nobody gets into their headquarters without a thorough check. But security aside – Louis knows his mentor and friend, knows the change in the atmosphere, the aura of serenity that precedes and surrounds him.

"Good morning, Michael."

"Good morning."

The white-haired chief prosecutor sinks into the chair on the other side of Louis' desk.

"You heard me earlier. I need the files on my desk until the day after tomorrow."

Louis puts down the pen slowly and leans back in his chair. The shelf comes into view – souvenirs, memories. A lone name tag.

"You don't need files."

"Pardon me?"

"You won't need any files, Michael."

Blue eyes, sharp as knives. This is why Michael Dorn is the best prosecutor you can get: he knows which questions to ask, and pursues his answers relentlessly.

The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

"I take it you are going to promote one of the others to field leader of the team, then? Because your team needs a leader other than you, now that Hickman is gone. They've been operating without anyone to coordinate them for the past eight weeks." He doesn't say: while you were in the hospital, and who knows if you'll ever be able to lead a field team again. "Whom do you have in mind?"

Louis answers his old friend's steady gaze.

"Nobody, actually."

Dorn leans back with something like a sigh. This time, his eyes roam the office, dart to the archway that leads to the main office. From where they sit, they can just barely head voices from the small kitchen. Eva brought in a cake today, to celebrate his return. Louis had planned on joining his team by now.

"Louis," Dorn says, patiently. "Your team needs a field leader. Hickman returned to the US. Whom else are you going to put in charge while you're in recovery?"

"You heard me the first time."

"You can't leave the position open, even regardless the fact that you're missing a profiler now. The team needs someone else to hold them together. There are some good people out there, people whose abilities would complement theirs. They would be an excellent addition."

"The team holds itself together pretty well. I think we've seen enough proof of that in the past weeks, haven't we."

"Am I getting this right: you are refusing to fill Hickman's position again?"

"Yes, that is what I am saying."

Dorn leans forward, his hands in his lap. "Louis, what are you not telling me?"

It is the first time he speaks the words out loud, but he knows he is right. It is a feeling, an instinct, the same instinct that told him Carl Hickman would be the right choice as a field leader for his new team, the same instinct that had him search out Tommy McConnell despite his family issues, Sebastian Burger despite his past. The same instinct that made him chose Ann-Marie Son, Siena Miller and Eva Vittoria out of a pool of numerous other candidates. Louis Daniel never regarded himself as special in any way, but he knows he does his job well. Which is why he is sure about this now.

"He'll be back, Dorn."

Dorn leans back slowly to hide his surprise. Or dismay. Or disbelief. It's hard to tell with him, really.

"Hickman?"

"Yes."

"He left, Louis. He is thinking of replacing his hand with a bionic one."

"He is. He was. He might even still be thinking of it. But he'll be back."

"Even if he came back after the surgery – which still would require a long time of rehabilitation and therapy – he resigned, Louis."

"Did you see his letter of resignation?"

That actually makes Dorn pause. "… No."

Louis opens a drawer, takes out a letter. Either it has taken the one-handed man hours of typing, or he is using a voice-to-text program now. Either way, the paper is unfamiliar to Dorn.

"You held it back?"

A smirk. "I did."

"Oh Louis. What do you expect to happen next?"

He shrugs. "Give him some time. See it as vacation. He'll be back in two weeks, tops. I am sure."

"And if he doesn't?"

"He will. How would Eva say? I made him an offer he cannot ignore."

"I doubt Eva would be quoting The Godfather," Dorn replies, drily. "Did you really do what I think you did?"

Another shrug. Louis takes up the pen again, taps it against his left hand.

"Does he know?"

"No."

Dorn leans back, his face severe. "Oh Louis." And then it breaks into a smile, warm and wide. "You really care for them, do you."

He shrugs again, uncomfortable, this time. "They're my team. My responsibility."

"No, Louis." Dorn shakes his head, still smiling. "They're not simply your responsibility. I wonder…" His voice trails off. He's a master of implication, a master of interrogation, a master of speech, and sometimes Louis feels awed by his way of dealing with people. Sometimes it's annoying, too, but never – never – unwanted.

"I wonder, does Rebecca know?"

He is unable to hide his surprise at the change of topic. "Does Rebecca know what?"

Dorn's eyes crinkle behind his rimless glasses.

"Does she know you adopted all of them?"

It makes him smile.

"Rebecca knows everything."

"That's right, isn't it," Dorn says.

"Eva brought cake today," Louis offers. "How about a piece and a cup of coffee?"

"That sounds tempting indeed." Dorn gets up from his chair. "Let's not make our kitchen goddess wait."

Louis follows his example, leading his friend towards the voices and the warmth of his bullpen.

There are three cupcakes in the fridge.

"Eva," Arabella calls through the bullpen. "Are those for us?"

Eva emerges from the little side room they use as their archive. "What? Oh, those? Yeah, help yourself. One is for you, one for Sebastian, one for me."

Everyone has noticed that sometimes, since their return from Spain, Eva hides in the archive. She disappears in it for ten or thirty minutes and when she comes out again her eyes are red. But Arabella hasn't followed her into it yet, and not even Tommy and Sebastian tried. Hickman probably would have. But since he left they're down a man, lost their field leader, and the Major has only been back a day since he was hospitalized for weeks due to a gunshot wound. They're still adjusting to these changes.

Sometimes she wonders whether they will adjust to them at all. She looks at Tommy, Sebastian and Eva's faces that still can't completely shake off the events, and… Arabella wonders.

(She wants to help them, but there is nothing she can say.)

"Hey," Tommy protests. "What about me?"

He is gifted with a scathing glance. "You don't like sweet things."

Arabella remembers his birthday party. From the glance Sebastian throws her, he remembers, as well.

"But I ate it last time!"

Eva turns away, dismissive. "I didn't know whether you liked it."

The Irishman frowns. "I ate it! That was proof enough, wasn't it?"

Arabella shoots him a very obvious glance. It's fun watching him digging his own grave, but sometimes… As his friend as well as Eva's, she thinks she has an obligation to not let the nuclear blast actually occur. Since Hickman – well, yeah. "Shut up, Tommy."

His bewilderment is slowly turning to annoyance. "Why would I eat something I don't like?"

Behind Eva's back, Sebastian is pulling faces, shaking his head violently and making the universal sign for "you are dead". Arabella almost laughs out loud, but of course, Tommy doesn't know when to stop.

In true Italian fashion, Eva throws her hair over her shoulder and walks towards the kitchen. "Too bad for you, I guess."

Tommy jogs after her. "What do ya want me to say?"

"Maybe that you liked it? That it was good?"

He throws his hands into the air, exasperated. "Women! Do you really need everything spelled out for ya?"

Sebastian covers his face with both his hands. "Way to go, man."

"Come on, Eva." Arabella gets up as Eva passes her desk and follows her into the kitchen. "Let's get a coffee without the guys."

"What did I do?" Sebastian mumbles, but quietly. Arabella shoots them a glare. Eva ignores them completely.

"Shite," Tommy complains. "How are you supposed to know what they want? I'm no freakin' mind reader!"

"Yeah, mate," Sebastian agrees, deciding just to go along in order to not catch any more flak.

"Mate?" Tommy repeats, his eyes forming into slits. "Are ya copying me, Burger?"

This is a madhouse. This is a disaster zone. Sometimes Arabella feels like she works in a kindergarden. Sometimes this feels suspiciously like taking care of her siblings, something she's done all her life. Sometimes she just feels at home. And that… it's not too bad, is it? She's not a complete part of them, not yet, maybe. But she's part of the team. And for now… it's enough. She watches Tommy and Sebastian's glances follow Eva. They are easy to read: they care for her, like Arabella does, too, like all of them do. How much of it is an act, how much is reality? How much of it is teamwork, or collegiality, how much of it is friendship and how much is family? And does it really matter?

It does not. Not if it makes Eva smile.

Since she's almost down with withheld laughter, Arabella decides to take mercy on them. At the same time, she feels like crying. They're good together. She's glad the bullet missed Tommy's stone head, that the Major survived, that they reached Eva just in time.

She doesn't think she could bear losing any one of them, the Major included. Hickman… Well. At least he's alive.

"Boys," she calls over from the kitchen. "Be good. And get your asses over here, pronto."

"Why?" Tommy looks like he's sulking. Scratch that: he is. She almost breaks down into helpless laughter again.

"Do you want cake or not?"

Eva is pulling out a huge baking tray from behind the microwave. Sebastian is already grabbing his mug and making his way towards the kitchen. Arabella can see the Major and Dorn, getting up and walking towards them. The Major walks slowly, painfully slowly, and leans on his cane heavily.

Tommy's still arguing. "But I thought…" God, one would think the guy didn't want a piece!

"Good advice, McConnell, so listen: don't think. And get over here."

By the time Tommy has reached the kitchen, Sebastian has stopped laughing enough to school his features into a passive face.

It's a chocolate cakes with cherries.

It's not that it scares her.

She's used to quite a lot. Still, sometimes, when it gets too much, she just wants to curl up somewhere and hide away, from the world, from its inhabitants. Even from her colleagues, those she considers as her closest friends.

She probably needs more friends.

This time it starts right in the bullpen. It's the silence – the Major is in his office, Hickman is gone, Arabella left early, Tommy is god-knows-where and Sebastian is in the briefing room, updating the tech's software. The bullpen is quiet save for the soft typing of her own keyboard, and suddenly the silence is deafening. Overpowering. The same silence, the same stillness as she experienced in Spain; the drowning absence of everything.

They left me – they left me – they left me –

The stack of folders falls, slamming to the ground with a thump. Eva gazes down on it, dispassionately. She might have pushed it, it might have fallen. She doesn't care.

The archives – or, the small backroom they use as archive – always was more Ann-Marie's and Hickman's place than hers. Ann-Marie liked the smell of old paper and the atmosphere; Hickman probably just liked it because he preferred paper to computer files. Now, the only reprieve it offers is its solitude. The darkness is velvet on her eyes; the soft humming of the air conditioning almost soothing.

Eva curls up in a corner on the floor, draws her knees up towards her chest and wraps her arms around herself until the world fades away.

They left me.

Minutes pass. Hours, for all she cares. She doesn't-

The door opens. Footsteps, two pairs of them.

Sebastian slides down next to her, a careful distance away and yet close. Tommy sits on the only chair, crosses his arms over the back of it.

Neither one says a word.

Finally, Sebastian breaks the silence. He is, she thinks, the one of the three of them most likely to do so. While Tommy would rather bite off his own tongue than talk about emotions… and stuff. And Eva... Well.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

She shakes her head without lifting it.

His voice is soft as he prompts: "Do you want to talk about it some other time?"

Answering this takes her longer. She doesn't want to talk. Not now, for sure. Maybe even not ever. But then… Maybe she will tell them what happened. Maybe, one day, she'll feel like it. Maybe she'll tell them about blood and nightmares and a child who lost her parents, and parents who gave up their daughter without hesitation, just like that, and ran. Maybe, one day, she'll be ready to talk about this. And if she ever is, it will be them she'll be telling.

So she nods, careful, tiny. She can hear Tommy's explosive exhalation.

"You'll be fine, Eva. We're here."

"We are," Sebastian agrees. "I'm sorry we were so late."

"You were there," she says, and finally lifts her head. Her eyes are dry – she thinks she can detect relief in Tommy's eyes and wonders – almost laughs – at how he would deal with weeping women. "That's enough."

"It wasn't," Tommy disagrees, almost as quietly as Sebastian. "But we're here now. And we'll always be."

"I know."

A pause, a heart-beat, and all three of them hold their breath.

Thank you.

Nobody says the words, but everybody hears them.

"Hey." Tommy gets up from the chair, squats down in front of her and pats her shoulder, awkwardly, then drops his hand again. "Hey. Your cake was good, okay?"

To her left, she can see Sebastian smile.

"Thank you," Eva says, grateful. Oh, she loves them. They dropped everything to help her in Spain. They would do it again. There is no doubt in her mind that Tommy McConnell and Sebastian Burger would come for her, whenever she calls them and whatever she needs from them. What, Eva wonders, would she have done had she not been thrown together with these people, just like this? Whom would she have worked with, laughed with, fought with? Who would she be today if it hadn't been for them?

There is nothing she regrets.

"Hey. Come on." Tommy stretches out a hand. "We're on our way to get a beer."

Sebastian snorts and pushes himself up from the wall. "If you can call this stuff here beer." His hand, too, extends towards her.

"Germans are wimps," Tommy snarks. "Go to Ireland, have a drink. Then let's talk again."

"You mean whiskey? I always preferred the Scottish ones…"

"Burger, you disappoint me. Again."

Eva takes their hands and lets them pull her to her feet. She lets go of their hands the second she feels the balance shift from them to her, applies a tiny bit of pressure – and the guys both stumble slightly, crashing into each other in the process.

"Verdammich!"

"Vittoria, what the hell!"

She's already past them, and on her way to her desk. "Come on, boys! You're paying!"

(Oh how she loves them.)

The smile is there, suddenly. Listening to her partners bicker, she grabs her bag and her coat and follows them outside.

The night air feels warm.

He walks so much easier.

It's the first thing she notices.

Then he's there, and he's looking at her: hesitant, questioning. Careful. Words nobody ever associated with him, but she knew he'd always been that way. There were two Carlton Hickmans, one for the public and one for those he valued, and she's been fortunate enough to get to know the latter.

Now, though, his hesitation is unnecessary.

Amanda Andrews hugs him and feels his good hand bury in her hair.

And then, she whacks him on the head – hard. He yelps in surprise and pulls back, his left hand rubbing the offended item. His expression is a mix of what-the-hell and resignation.

"I have no idea what I've done this time, but I guess I deserve it."

It makes her laugh with the giddy feeling bubbling up in her stomach.

"Never again call me baby. Not even on the phone. Not even when talking to my answering machine."

His smile is tiny, but it still blinds her – and shouldn't she be too old for this kind of stuff? She's forty-two years old, feeling like a school girl in love, and stupid for meeting the man she has known for close to twenty years now with something almost like butterflies in her stomach. Stupid, she tells herself. Nothing's changed. Her feelings for him never were trivial – they were partners, and best friends. They've been through the Academy, through the city and through her alcoholism. He's always been important to her, even more than that. But she's come to love him only fairly recently: as the broken man, the lost man – and the man who found his way back. So maybe this is different than their usual interaction. Maybe it's not. Maybe it's only them who have changed.

"Okay."

They walk out of the terminal. Amanda has to stop herself from reaching out to touch him, to make sure that he's really there –

"I am, you know."

"Don't profile me, Hickman."

He doesn't want her to come to the first appointment with the doctor. Amanda understands. She drops him off and leaves again, and returns three hours later to pick him up.

He's not in the foyer.

Her heart rate picks up painfully.

She finds him outside, away from the hospital's main entrance, in a small, deserted park. It is six in the afternoon. The stairs he's sitting on are cold. Shivering, she draws her jacket closer around herself, not daring to lean into him.

He doesn't say anything, and she just knows.

It hurts. She just wants him to be happy. At times, it felt like all he wanted was to return to the work he had been doing for years, so she had wanted to give him that. But if she is honest with herself, it was for her as much as it was for him, too. And in the beginning he thought about it, he really wanted to do it.But. He might have been determined, but his heart hadn't been in it. Maybe he had wanted to do this for her sake, as well? Well, if this is where it has taken them, she refuses to let it break them. Not again. Say what you want – she learns from her mistakes.

"Remember, on the roof, when Genovese tried to take me hostage?"

She remembers more than well, and the way his fist curls into itself tells her he does, as well.

"He had me at gunpoint, threatening to kill me. And I really wasn't afraid. But not for the reason I told him."

His eyes change color with his moods, she noticed before. Now, they are dark-grey, like the sea after a storm.

"I knew that if he shot me, there would have been no way he'd have made it out alive. It was stupid of him. If he had hurt me, you would have never let him get away."

"I would have killed him." His voice is quiet.

"I know. I knew then, too. And I know what you're thinking now."

She can feel his left hand in her hair now, soft, too careful.

"Is it irrational that I don't want to do it?"

"I don't think so."

To others, maybe, it would be. Irrational. He cannot even lift the smallest things with his right hand for the pain in it. He cannot write reports, he cannot lift a gun, he cannot cuff suspects: for a person whose life is his job, and whose job is being a detective, it is a death sentence. A bionic hand would allow him a degree of movement he never had thought would be possible again. He might even be allowed to return. But the price-

Oh, the price.

"I still have this one, after all, right?" He lifts his left hand, grinning self-deprecatingly. It sounds as if it has been a joke for him for quite some time now. "But the doctors said there was some physio therapy I could undergo. It would give me some small range of movement."

Amanda gives in and leans towards him until her forehead makes contact with his shoulder. "So we have at least a few weeks."

"Until what?" He asks, frowning.

She smiles into his coat, despite the mix of sensations that is threatening to drown her. "Until you go back to The Hague."

He looks at her. She can feel it, even if she doesn't look up. "I'm not going back."

"Yes you are."

"I am not."

Now, finally, she answers his gaze. "Yes, you are. They're your team. You can't leave them, you don't want to. You might have come back, but you won't stay. Not as long as Eva, Louis and Tommy need you now. They all need you, Carl. They're just kids."

"Not really."

"Compared to us, yes, they are. Well, except the Major, of course."

"I resigned."

"Louis told me you handed in a letter. He also told me he was holding on to it until you returned."

"You talked to him."

"He called me."

Silence.

Amanda touches his cheek and turns his face slightly, forcing him to look at her.

Flash back: a dimly lit, arched hallway, the taste of cheap lemonade and energy bars on her tongue, and his expression. His eyes: looking at her, and at her only-

"Look. This is your old home, your place. It always will be. But home is not only a place, right? It's the people, as well. You can call me and say you're coming home, but what's the meaning to it when you leave behind everything that became important to you in the past two years? It's not right. The only reason why you're here is me, and I can't live with that. It's not right. They need you, over there, catching killers cross-borders. Who cares if you can hold a gun or not. You can protect them in other ways. You've done it before, you'll do it in the future. And you haven't spoken to Tommy yet, have you? You've got unfinished business in Europe, Detective Hickman. So yes, you really want to go back. And that's fine. It's okay. You should do what you love, with those that are precious to you."

Carl just looks at her, looks and looks. Amanda doesn't know whether to laugh or to cry.

Finally, he clears his throat. "And what about you?"

"What about me?"

"You're here. I don't –"

"I know."

They just sit there. Finally, Carl moves, shifts just a tiny bit to look at her. It's the same expression, again. The same expression he wears whenever he looks at her: vulnerable and peaceful and so, so full of-

"Do you know how much I love you just now?"

It's…. It's frankly not what she expected him to say, but she'll take it. It also makes her cry.

"Bastard."

His arm is warm and steady, and she cannot help but lean into him. Breathes in his familiar scent.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I'll come with you, after all."

She can feel him stiffen in surprise. A tiny part of her jubilates: she can surprise him, too, even after fifteen years. The same way he can surprise her, again and again.

"Didn't see that one coming, huh?"

His grip becomes painful for a second and she grimaces, he lets go immediately.

"Do you mean this?"

There is fear in his eyes. She never saw it before, and she's seen him at his best and at his worst. He never was afraid – not like that. Scared, maybe, worried, careful. Never afraid.

"I do."

She smiles at him, her heart soaring towards him. It feels like a promise. It is a promise.

"I do, Carl."

There are worlds in his kiss.

"Welcome home."

Louis stops in the hallway.

He is out of breath from the short flight of stairs and his side twinges painfully, the constant reminder that it is not healthy to let oneself get shot in the stomach. Even weeks after the incident, weeks after emergency surgery and ICU and the coma and the rehab, he feels fragile. Like he might shatter any moment. The bullet ruptured his spleen and destroyed a whole lot of muscle tissue on its way out, as well as parts of his bowels; he won't ever be able to run a marathon again. But Carl reacted quickly enough, and the ambulance arrived fast enough, he was lucky enough and he's alive.

And Rebecca looks stunning in the soft candle light.

"You look stunning."

She laughs. It's a small laugh, full of unsaid things, but it's a laugh. He thought, just a year ago, that he'd never hear her laughter again. Never see her smile.

It is only one of many things he has been granted, and he will be eternally grateful for it. But there are thoughts lingering in the back of his mind, ever since he was allowed to leave the hospital. Ever since he realized that he was barely able to walk without a cane, and that even the short flight of stairs made him lose his breath. He's been arguing with himself for days now, but he doesn't see another way-

"I'm sorry. I wanted to prepare something special, but I got held up in the office…"

"Anything will be fine." When he takes off his jacket, pain tears through his side. He winces, trying to hide it, but she notices.

Helps him out of the coat without a word, with a gentleness that makes his heart ache and the pressure behind his eyes build. The words press up from his heart, demand to be said. He has been swallowing them for days now, but suddenly he chokes on them so badly he has no other choice. Better said, too. He can't live with this uncertainty any longer.

When he finally sits on the sofa, he has to catch his breath before he can speak.

"Rebecca…"

"Yes?" She sinks down onto the sofa next to him, her entire body poised. A year ago, he thinks, she told him they didn't know how to talk to each other anymore. Since then, things have changed. Obviously, they have learned to talk again, because the weary note in her voice tells him that she knows there is something he needs to say, and something she won't like.

"If you don't…" He has to swallow against the pain in his throat. "If you don't want to stay with me anymore, then that's fine."

Her incredulous gaze is … shocking, to say the least. She gets up, starts pacing in agitation.

"Louis, it's only a few months ago that I told you I wanted a divorce, and you told me that there was nothing I could ever say that would make you stop loving me."

Those were two separate events, but he remembers them. Remembers both, with startling clarity.

"Things have changed since then. Look… look at me, Rebecca. I can barely stand."

She stops to glare at him. "And you think this changes anything?"

"You are a beautiful woman, Rebecca. I don't want you to spend your life with someone like me, when there are other…" Saying the words feels like swallowing glass, but he closes his eyes, takes a deep breath and continues on. "When there are other men who could make you happy."

For a second she looks like she wants to slap him.

Then she drops down onto her knees and grabs his hands, carefully unwinds the tense fists he has held them in. Touches his calloused palms, his gnarled fingers.

"Louis. Nothing you can ever say will change what I feel for you."

There is a lot she doesn't say, and a lot more she says with her eyes only. Louis swallows and swallows and cannot overcome the lump in his throat. Rebecca leans forward and her forehead touches his.

"We've been through so much, Louis. Do you really think I'd let you go, now that I've finally found you again, just because you've been hurt? Do you really think I'd want to lose you, too? I'm not stupid enough to let you go. It might be selfish of me, but I don't care. Do you think I'm that weak? Don't underestimate me. I can be strong for the two of us now, just as you were strong for the two of us for the past year."

Louis closes his eyes against the pressure of tears behind them and feels her lips ghost over his, light as a feather and soothing like a kiss.

"I love you, Rebecca."

"I love you, too. Don't ever forget."

His desk is covered with paper confetti in the shapes of hearts.

Carl glares.

He didn't expect his desk to still be his. In fact, he didn't expect anything like this: like Louis not accepting his resignation, like Amanda knowing exactly that he was hesitant about the replacement. Like Louis offering her a job on the team so they could work together again.

Be together again.

He didn't expect any of it. It makes him… it makes him resigned. That's the trouble with having people in his life he calls family: sometimes, they know you better than you know yourself.

He also didn't expect the confetti. It's obvious the team knows about his relationship with Amanda. Great. They're never going to listen to me ever again. At the same time, he doesn't really mind. This, also, is what family is about, isn't it? If he's not mistaken, at least. It's been some time since he'd had people to call that.

Sebastian can't hide his grin. He looks calmer and more centered, not the haunted man anymore. Tommy and Eva are outright laughing. It's hard to pinpoint changes in the Irishman, but he, too, seems… more real. His blurred edges have smoothed out. Only Eva seems fragile, but he can't blame her for that. He'll have an eye on her. He left The Hague a week after Louis awakened from the coma, and didn't really say good bye. Hadn't wanted to. Good byes were too final, too…

Either way.

From her desk, Arabella calls out a greeting and pretends really hard not to notice anything. She tends to distance herself from the team, he knows. But he also knows she's a member as important as any of them.

There is a sixth desk in the bullpen now, complete with a computer, keyboard and screen.

"You do know how to use one, don't you?"

Amanda smiles sweetly and Sebastian, wisely, shuts up.

Louis and Rebecca walk in. Louis' hair is almost completely silver now, and he looks drawn and thin. But his hand shake is as strong and reassuring as ever.

"Detective Andrews. Welcome to the Team. This is my wife, Rebecca."

"A pleasure to meet you."

They exchange pleasantries. Amanda and Rebecca hit it off immediately. And he shouldn't do it – he knows he shouldn't – but Carl can't help watching Amanda. The way the light reflects in her hair. The way her eyes crinkle when she smiles.

(She looks beautiful, and – God, she's here to stay.)

"Welcome, Detective Andrews. Hickman, it's good to have you back. Dinner is on me today." Michael Dorn walks in, a delivery man trailing behind him.

Eva, Tommy and Sebastian gather around him enthusiastically.

Like children, Carl thinks, with a fondness that is nothing new. Nothing old, either. He can still feel Louis' gaze on him. When he makes eye contact, his friend's eyes wander down to his hand.

Carl shrugs. Didn't feel like it.

Louis smiles. You still have the other one, don't you.

This joke is starting to get old. But somehow, he likes it.

When the others follow Arabella and Rebecca, who have taken charge of everything, into the briefing room, Amanda drops behind to catch up with him. Her hand finds his, naturally, her fingers wrap around his. How comforting a single touch can be. How natural. He yearns to kiss her, but he'll be damned if he does it in here a second time. He's sure they're on some surveillance videos, somewhere. If they're lucky, none of the kids will ever see them.

Amanda leans forward. Her breath ghosts over his ear. Her voice is a caress, as familiar to him as his own hand. The intimacy in it is not new, either, and he loves her for it. Loves her so much-

"Welcome home," she whispers, and her dark eyes smile.

This, Carl supposes, really is it, then.