It's everything, you and me. It's everything.
Now completely sober, John poured over the books that Zatanna had brought along with her and she sat beside him. She had found some decent information but then that was no surprise. She had access to the largest collection of magical books and information in the world. He had access to the same number of things of course but then John's side of magic tended to be a little more questionable than Zatanna's was.
She had informed him of all of the things that she'd found, he was impressed but then he had no reason not to be. She always did know how to stun him, she was a captivating person, brilliant, beautiful... He hated to see her in the amount of pain that she was in right now. He didn't want to feel it himself but he supposed he deserved it more than she did.
John had done a hell of a lot of things wrong in his time, it wasn't much of a stretch to think that he needed to be punished nor that he deserved it, but Zatanna didn't. She'd made a sacrifice just as he had in order to pull off their plan. The 'save the world' thing never came without a cost.
Eventually, Zatanna looked up at him.
"It's her birthday today," she whispered. It was why today was so hard for both of them but then, she had no doubt that he remembered that too. "John, I need to bring her home. I miss her. It's been six months." Six whole months.
Six months may not seem like a long time but... It felt like an eternity. Six months was long enough. Hell, it was more than long enough.
"I know, love," he replied as he placed his hand against her cheek, his thumb brushing across her cheekbone. "We're going to fix this," he promised, "everything you have here gives us more than enough spells to try."
Spells to try, God how stupid he must sound to her. She already knew something and he knew she did. Opening portals to other universes was as easy as blinking for Zee, he'd never met anyone who was as powerful as she was. She made magic look so effortless whereas he was a dumbass dabbler who occasionally got it right and even when he did, it had disastrous consequences that he couldn't have predicted.
"I have a spell, John," she stated almost like that shouldn't be a question. It should've been obvious. She frowned at him. "I have a plan, I wouldn't have come here and I wouldn't be asking you about this if I didn't have a plan and you know that. I need to do this and I was going to do it with or without your support. We need to bring her back. Six months. Six whole months John. I didn't want to do any of it, to begin with, and I know you didn't either but we thought we were doing what was best. If Selina and Bruce can raise Helena, if Pam and Harley can raise Lucy in this universe, we can do it."
He nodded his head in agreement. He knew that she was right. It was time. They had waited long enough, he'd seen the children from this world find normal-ish lives with their dysfunctional families and he knew too that they could do it. She hadn't wanted to do any of this, neither of them did. It was time to fix it.
"I need our daughter back in my arms," she whispered quietly. "I miss our baby," she spoke as she fought back a sob.
He did too. He didn't want to crack because he wanted to be strong for her sake but even he was struggling to hold it together. The unshakeable John Constantine, the man that had a snarky answer to the world. He could fight against monsters and demons but he couldn't fight against the pain of what he was going through.
He couldn't stop the pain that was consuming the woman that he loved. He pulled her into a hug, a kiss placed on the top of her head as he nodded. He sighed. "I love you, and we can do this. I promise you we can do this. We will do this because we can raise our baby and I know we can." love wasn't a word John used lightly, in fact he surprised himself - and her - when the words slipped his lips but right now she was preoccupied and he was keen to brush over it.
Keeping up that bravado was important after all, but it was the truth. He did love her, this was just the first time he'd outright told her that. He wasn't good with the touchy feely stuff.
She'd been less than a year old when she'd been sent to an alternate dimension to be protected by a woman he knew there. It was safer, the world had been ending, two realities colliding and he knew that there was very little chance that their daughter would be safe. She was connected to the same magic that her parents were, which made her a valuable prize to be sought out by bad people. He wasn't going to allow that to happen and neither was Zatanna so they'd made a heartbreaking decision.
"When do we start?" he questioned.
"Right now," she replied easily as she pulled out of his arms. "I don't want to wait any longer."
"I think we should scope out dangers here first, love," he spoke carefully. She looked angry, she looked hurt, and betrayed and he couldn't blame her one bit. He just didn't want her diving in head first and he knew that it was reckless.
"Stop it! John, Stop it! I'm not waiting anymore. I can't," she snapped. She shoved him away as she pulled out of his arms and stood up, she paced, running her hand through her hair as she did. She let out a loud groan, it was almost a cry of pain but he could tell that she was fighting that. She was fighting the urge to break down. She didn't want him to see the weaker parts of her but he already had. He'd seen it when they'd done what they had. He'd seen it when she thought that she was crying alone.
She had thought that no one saw her pain. She had thought that she was dealing with her agony privately but that had been so very far from the truth. She wanted to plead with him, she wanted to plead and tell him that she truly couldn't do this. She needed it to stop. She needed it to come to an end today and one way or another, it would. With or without his help, she was opening that damn portal and she was going to bring her baby home.
John knew that he wasn't going to win this, he wasn't going to dissuade her, and he wasn't going to get her to pause or consider caution. He knew that he needed to do this with her because otherwise, she'd put her life in danger, and usually, he was the reckless one. Evidently, the pain that a mother went through wasn't something that she could easily overcome.
He stood up to brace himself for what came next. She spoke the spell so effortlessly and as the air around them came alive, crackling with electricity as the spell brought the room to life, he braced himself to step through the portal that she'd opened even if he was worried that it was unstable. He reached out to take her hand as she lowered it to her side and he nodded.
"Together," John spoke in a sense of gentleness that he hadn't thought himself capable of. He was only ever this vulnerable around her. He was only ever this genuine around her.
Zatanna nodded her head in agreement with his statement. Together. It all sounded so damn easy. She didn't know what would happen to them on the other side of this. None of them knew what dangers may be waiting for them but she knew that she'd rather face those dangers than spend another day without their daughter.
They did face dangers on the other side but it was nothing, at least not to her. She'd face them a million times over just to have their baby in her arms again only it turned out their baby wasn't so little after all. A year old, a year old, and she looked like a toddler. Zatanna had almost cried at the things that she'd missed. Her first steps, first words...
She hadn't even truly recognized her parents. It was hell. If she had to describe hell, it would be standing face to face with her baby as the child asked in a broken sentence who she was and what she was here for. John's friend had been wonderful with explaining it all to her. She'd explained that they were her parents. She explained to her that it was time to go home just as she'd promised she would someday. The little girl had been terrified. She had clung to the legs of the woman who had taken the place of her parents and John felt just as broken as Zee seemed to be.
As she pulled her daughter into her arms, she breathed out a deep sigh of contentment filled with sadness and agony at the same time. It was a terrible mix of emotions and Zatanna wished more than anything that it was just the positive things that she was feeling but she knew that it wasn't, it couldn't be. There was too much pain there, too much uncertainty.
Zatanna looked toward John to signal that she was ready to go home. She was ready to take their baby back to the place where she truly belonged. While they may not be sure of where they were going to go from here but they'd figure it out together as a family and he wanted nothing more than that.
"Let's go," he spoke as he wrapped one arm around Zatanna as she held their baby girl in her arms. "It's time to go home," he promised. Time to go. Time to take their baby back to their world. The world that she belonged in, the home that she belonged in with two parents who loved her more than anything else in the whole world. The whole universe, all of them.
"Thank you, John," she whispered.
The portal opened in front of them and they stepped through again into another uncertain situation but they could do it and they could do it together. Their baby, their future... It was so uncertain that it almost terrified him more than anything else in the world ever could and he didn't think it would be possible to feel this level of fear, not even after everything that he'd already been through and everything he'd faced.
John had never planned on being a parent but when Zee had come to him and told him that she was pregnant, he'd been fucking terrified to the point where he'd almost done what he always did and run away, but he couldn't bring himself to do it because he'd never seen her look so scared and so happy at the same time.
Their baby, they were going to be parents. They could do it but they had to do it together. He was one fucked up individual and he was damn sure that he was no good for anyone but for some reason, some goddamn reason that he couldn't figure out, Zatanna thought that he was worthy and that he'd make a good enough father to tell him the truth and tell him that she was pregnant with his child, it had never been a part f whatever chaotic plan he had for his life, one that wouldn't end well but he knew that he'd do every damn thing in his power to protect them, Zatanna and their baby.
He'd do every damn thing in his power to make sure that their daughter was safe and that she'd never face the same kinds of pain and danger that her parents did. She was going to be the very best of him and he knew it. She was going to bring out something in him that he hadn't thought was even there anymore. He wasn't a good man. He was nowhere near a good man, but he could be a good father. He could be good for Zatanna and he could be good for Zorah. He had to be.
He couldn't fuck this up the way that he fucked up everything else in his life.
"Welcome home, love," he spoke lovingly as he spoke to the woman that he'd loved since he first met and to the baby that rested now in the arms of her mother. "We're going to do this together, we're going to get through all of this and I promise you somehow, we'll give our baby the kind of life that we never had. We'll protect her, we'll never let all of the darkness touch her world the same way that it did with us."
God, it sounded so simple. It sounded so easy but he knew that it wasn't going to be. It was going to be far from it. It was going to be hard, it was going to be terrifying and it was going to be everything every day and he was willing to do it, he was willing to do this for her, he was willing to do this for their family.
He had to. They both deserved it. They both deserved the safety and security that he wasn't even sure he could offer but he'd try so fucking hard day after day even if it killed him. John would be a good man worthy of Zatanna's love, and he'd be a good father worthy of Zorah.
He'd never let either of them down again.
Never.