Not a night went by that Stephen wasn't haunted by nightmares. Every night, his brain would replay the events of that day in Leek's lair. He'd see Nick walking toward the room full of predators, he'd feel him slip out of his strong hold, he'd scream and scream for him to get out, and every single time, Nick would only stare back with frightening determination and conviction. Always the same look. The same ending. The same smothering powerlessness. Stephen was sure this was some sort of cosmic punishment by the Powers That Be he had never believed in.

He'd wake up in the middle of the night, drenched in cold sweat and shaking, Nick's face etched brightly on the back of his eyelids as he tried to steady himself in his dark, empty room.

Every night, the same routine. It had been six months now, and yet Nick still haunted his sleep. He couldn't take it anymore. And so one night, when he woke up from one of his typical nightmares to find a bright, glowing anomaly smack in the middle of his room, he knew what to do. He packed a duffle bag with clothes and weapons, made sure to leave a note on his bed explaining everything to the team, and, taking one last look around his gloomy flat, stepped through the anomaly.

He'd expected a prehistoric landscape, or at the very least a futuristic, post-apocalyptic wasteland. Instead, he found himself in the middle of London, at noon. And right in front of him, wearing a dumbfounded look that he was sure mirrored his own, stood Nick.

"Stephen?"

Stephen dropped his bag on the ground and, without a second thought, rushed toward Nick and pulled him into the tightest embrace he'd ever given anyone.

"How?" Nick breathed, his face buried in Stephen's neck, "How are you here?"

"I don't know," Stephen muttered, pulling back far enough to look Nick straight in the eyes, "how are you here?"

"How am I-?"

"Never mind, I don't care," Stephen said, pressing his forehead against Nick's, "I lost you once, but I got you back, and I don't care how."

And with that, he pressed his lips against Nick's, caring about nothing but showing the most important man in his life how much he actually meant to him. To his surprise, Nick didn't pull back. On the contrary, he seemed reluctant to part from Stephen once Stephen had pulled back again.

"I'm going to ask you to do that again later," Nick muttered, cracking a roguish grin, "when we're not in front of the rest of the team."

It was only then that Stephen noticed Connor, Abby, and Jenny standing a short distance behind Nick, looking thoroughly confused.

"Will do," Stephen muttered, winking at him before turning to the rest of the team with a smile, but not before looking back at the anomaly one more time. It was impossible to understand how he could have been shaking, cold, and alone with only his nightmares to keep him company mere minutes earlier. It felt like a completely foreign world to him now, one he didn't care to return to ever again.

He had questions, of course, such as how an anomaly could've transported him to a parallel world in which he'd been the one to die instead of Nick, or what had changed to create this new timeline in the first place, but there would be time to figure that out later.

"We'll figure it out," Nick said, as if reading his mind. He put his arm around Stephen, and together they walked back toward the team, both smiling harder than they'd ever smiled in their lives.