AN: This is the sequel to "After the fall". It probably makes sense to read this first, but I think it should work as stand-alone.

It was late afternoon when John finally arrived at the graveyard. He had taken the day off, wanting this anniversary a private memento of his friend.

His best friend.

Sherlock Holmes.

It was one year since the detective had committed suicide, jumping from Barts' roof. And still John was struggling with it. Sherlock wouldn't do something like this. It was completely out of character. And yet he had seen him jump, had not felt any pulse on the body when he finally reached him. He knew Sherlock had a confrontation with Moriarty on this rooftop. But Moriarty had been dead before Sherlock jumped. John just wished he knew why, wished he knew what Moriarty had told him, what had convinced him to kill himself. He guessed that was the question which would trouble him for the rest of his life. This and the image of Sherlock's lifeless body on the pavement.

He hadn't slept last night, once again kept awake by 'what ifs'. What if he hadn't left the lab? What if he had said something different on the phone? In the end he had decided to go for a walk. He ended up at the college where he had shot the cabbie on their first case. From that on he simply walked through London, visiting places of old cases – the South Bank shore of the Thames, the Hickman gallery, the tunnels where he and Sarah had been held hostage, he had even walked by Buckingham Palace. His last destination had been the lab. It seemed appropriate since this was the first and the last place he had spoken to Sherlock face to face. His day had filled him with memories of Sherlock alive, brilliant and annoying and apart from the strange incident with Molly, it had been almost perfect. As perfect as any day without Sherlock could be.

With practiced ease he swallowed the lump in his throat and entered the graveyard to spent the rest of the day with his friend. The path to the grave was by now so familiar, every tuft of grass, every root, every step engrained in his muscle memory that his feet found it automatically. As usual he just stood in front of the tombstone, staring at the golden letters and seeing his reflection in the black surface. During the first few visits, he had hoped for a miracle, that his friend would magically appear behind him, but he had realised the disappointment made every visit worse. And Ella had talked him out of it.

Sometimes he felt the urge to explain his presence to Sherlock, but not today. Even the Consulting Detective would understand today's visit. Although he would probably frown at the display of sentiment. The thought of it made John almost smile.

But the almost-smile faded away like most of his smiles still did.

It took him a while to notice the change in his reflection. It took him even longer to recognise the addition to his own. A familiar reflection. So, so aching familiar.

It couldn't be!

It couldn't!

It wasn't possible!

How?

John squeezed his eyes shut, but when he opened them again, the reflection became larger. More than anything else he wanted to turn around and look and be sure, but the frightening prospect that he was imagining things left him petrified.

The touch of a warm hand – oh, so warm – startled him. Alive. So alive. A faint movement.

And then he heard the whisper:

"I'm not dead, John."

It was the one sentence he wanted to hear for every damn second during the past year, but he had known it couldn't be. His knees got weak and if it hadn't been for the body behind him he would have dropped to the ground. But long arms encircled him, an embrace.

He saw those long fingers on his chest. Fingers that had once tortured a violin or mixed some dangerous acids. John covered those fingers with his hands, finding somehow the strength to search for a pulse.

A steady beat.

He kept his fingers there, concentrating on each beat, listening to the breathing behind him and trying to match his own ragged breath to this. Once again he closed his eyes, let his other senses take over. He still touched the wrist of the other man. He felt the other man's body behind him, felt the warmth where they were pressed together. When he managed to inhale a deep breath he smelled the mixture of woods and grass and earth and Sherlock. John had never been able to describe the unique smell of his best friend, but he could identify it out of any other scent. Somehow breathing in Sherlock helped him to finally relax in the embrace. John didn't know how long they were standing there in this silent embrace. Neither man spoke, as if words might destroy this.

In the end it was a buzzing phone which woke him from this state of protected wonderfulness.

His buzzing phone. It took John a while to register to noise and a little bit longer to finally realise it was in fact his phone that made this noise. Probably Nick or Greg – they had more or less forced him to promise not to turn his phone off. Although he had expected they would wait longer until they checked on him.

Long pale hands retrieved the phone from his front pocket and presented it to him. Something about those hands holding his phone felt wrong. With a small frown the doctor realised that usually those hands had demanded a mobile phone from him. It felt strange the other way around. The caller ID showed it was none of his friends. It was the hospital.

"Dr. Watson?" Doctor Harrison's urgency left barely room for an affirmative noise before he continued: "Thank god, I finally got you. I know it's you day off, but I need you. I really need you. There is a little gang war going on in Camden and they got civilians involved. Police says something about three casualties and dozens injured. I need someone experienced with, well, war wounds. Can you come?"

The little rush of adrenaline starting because of the agitation in the usually calm voice of Dr. Harrison cleared John's head enough to simply answer:

"I'll be there as fast as I can."

"Thank you." The relief was unmistakable.

John rang off. Sherlock had released him during the phone call, but John could still feel where his body had been pressed against his. When the doctor turned around he saw the question in those grey eyes. God, he was alive. Adrenaline, shock, euphoria made him dizzy and he needed a moment to focus.

"I need to go, the hospital needs me."

Those bottomless eyes scanned his face for a second. Whatever they saw it seemed to answer the questions in his brilliant head.

"Then you should go."

John had thought he would never hear this voice again.

"Just don't …" John hesitated a moment, unsure what else to say. Don't die again, don't disappear, don't leave me alone, don't jump from a rooftop. All of this.

But apparently Sherlock hasn't lost his ability to read his friend's mind.

"I won't."

With a nod John turned to the entrance of the graveyard, only to return after a few steps. He laid one hand on his friend's chest, closing his eyes momentarily while feeling the steady heartbeat below his fingers. When he opened his eyes again, grey ones darkened with some unreadable mix of emotion watched him and a pale hand covered his fingers.

"You need to go."

This time John managed the walk back on the street and to hail a cab. His head swirled with feelings and questions and it took remarkably will power not to ask the cab to go back. It helped that the cabbie had the radio on, with reports from the gang war. The shocked voice of the reporter, the background noises speaking of violence brought John back from his own shock and memories of Afghanistan. Slowly he calmed down and by the time he arrived at St. Mary's he had put all thoughts of Sherlock aside, mentally preparing for a war scenario.

It was a war scenario. Not as bad as Afghanistan – nobody was aiming a gun at him and the medical equipment was better – but that was about it. John almost literally waded through blood, while he operated on gun wounds, flicked stab wounds and straightened broken bones. He changed his doctor's coat twice and lost count how often he changed in OP scrubs. He rushed from patient to patient, calmed them and ordered the nurses around. And only sometimes, in very little moments of calm, he allowed some of the euphoria bubbles in his chest to the surface. Sherlock is not dead. But those moments were never long, because there was always another patient waiting for him. And he continued to cut through human flesh and sew it back together, to calm patients with his voice and painkillers, to tend bruises and dry tears.

Almost 16 hours after he had left the graveyard John found himself sitting on one of the stairs of the hospital with a coffee in one hand and his mobile phone in the other. The flood of incoming patients had stopped by now and some of the other doctors took care of the regular visitors to the A&E. He would only do one round on his Post-OP cases before going home to bed. He was exhausted, yesterday seemed like a lifetime away. The wave of euphoria bubbles when he thought of Sherlock had stopped somewhat ago, drowned in blood and tears and despair. And now everything felt like a strange dream. Like one of those he had during the past year only to wake up and realising that it hadn't been real. Every time when the memory set in, the pain was almost too much to bear. But this time the pain hadn't come. Although it was not enough to convince him.

His fingers found the numbers easily as if eager to prove that Sherlock's memory was still constantly with him.

It rang once before the familiar baritone answered.

"Sherlock Holmes."

Relief washed through him while he leaned weakly on the railing. This was real.

"You're not dead."

John heard the small smile in his friend's answer: "I'm not dead."