Note: This is my first try at a NCIS: LA fanfic. I tried to stick as close to the show's style and characters as possible. Please enjoy.
One of Those Days
by Humble Brag
Deeks knows this is going to be one of those days.
He probably knew it before he got out of bed in the morning, before he stopped to get his coffee – not at Sand Dune Convenient store because he'd already been there this week and if he went again, chances were Sam would pop up from behind a bush somewhere and scold him for terrible safety protocol – heck, he probably knew it was going to be one of those days even before they went to the situation room to be briefed on the possibility of a dirty bomb being somewhere in the heart of Los Angeles. It was just that he hadn't seen it coming. He hadn't been paying attention to the signs. The big neon ones that screamed, Deeks, stay in bed today, you'll thank me later.
There were a lot of signs along the way that would have given him the opportunity to call in sick or find some other way to weasel himself out of this case, but he'd ignored them all. And if he's being honest with himself, even if he had foreseen the current day's events, he probably wouldn't have let the team go off and do this by themselves.
Because if it wasn't Deeks having one of those days, it'd be someone else currently with their foot on the trigger of a pressure sensor strapped to a bomb in the middle of a warehouse. Yup, one of those days.
He feels it click beneath his shoe and, in a not so very Deeks fashion, he shouts out a clipped, "Stop," that brings Kensi, Sam and Callen to a full on halt as they make their way through the aisles of the warehouse. Metal shelves filled with boxes and god knows what else block the others from his view, but it's never really been about seeing where they're at with this kind of situation, it's always been about hearing where they are.
Somewhere in this warehouse there are supposed to be terrorists running around. The kind that like to set off dirty bombs in federal buildings to prove the government can be crippled, blah blah blah. He's never understood terrorists, really. All he knows is they like to shoot at him, so he should shoot at them first. He tries not to think that he's just alerted them to the team's presence in the warehouse. But if they're here, they're not making a sound and if he's right and this is a bomb he's stepped on, he doubts they were ever here to begin with.
"Deeks?" He's not surprised it's Kensi who calls out to him first.
Clearing his throat, Deeks looks down at himself to make sure he's assessed the situation correctly and it's not just something that feels like a bomb trigger beneath his foot. But now that he's on top of it, he can see the depression his shoe is in and the wires hidden beneath an industrial rug that run up the sides and into the shelves. The situation screams bomb and until someone can confirm otherwise, he's just going to go with the safe route and assume he's correct.
"No one move," he says and he knows right about now Sam and Callen are exchanging that look of theirs. Deeks has tried to put that look into words, but whenever he tries to explain it to someone, he just falls back on, you know, the look? He sighs and tries to keep his voice calm as he says, "I don't want to alarm anyone, but I may or may not be standing on a bomb."
The team, being the team of course, doesn't listen to his request for them not to move. He can hear it. He can hear the moment they all move at the same time, making a beeline for his current position and abandoning whatever else they'd come here for. He knows they must have come to the same conclusion he had, otherwise they'd be trying to be quieter and wouldn't abandon their hunt for the suspects.
Callen is the first to reach him. He rounds the corner, his rifle held out in front of him. He quickly clears the area visually before looking down at the mat Deeks has stepped on. Sam follows after him, bypassing Callen to crouch near the mat, already inspecting the wires and where they lead. Kensi comes up behind him and crouches down at his side and he stands there in the middle of all of them trying not to shift his position because it may take out the entire team in one fell swoop.
"Did I miss the memo where 'no one move' now means 'everyone converge at the bomb?'" he says, tilted his head at Callen, who smirks at him in response.
"Hetty must have forgotten to CC you," Callen says, eyes on Sam and Kensi as they assess the situation.
Sam sits back on his heels while Kensi kneels and they both look up at him. "It's a pressure sensor," Kensi tells him in that matter-of-fact voice that she's gotten so good at. But he knows. He can see the worry in her eyes and it took him a while to figure out that's what that look was. The first few weeks he'd known her, he just thought she was cold. But he knows better now. Boy, does he know.
"So…bomb?" Deeks asks, looking down at her.
"Bomb," she confirms, nodding her head and starting to look around, already coming up with a plan. She was Lady MacGyver after all.
Deeks sighs. It's one of those days, for sure. "Great," he drawls, tipping his head back to look at the ceiling. "Those are my favorite."
"Don't worry, Deeks," Kensi tells him and he rolls his head to the side to look at her. She's already pulling things from the shelves and reaches to her back pocket to pull out her handy-dandy pocket knife. She turns her head to grin up at him. "This was one of my classes."
Deeks snorts. "What? Bomb disarming 101? I didn't see that on the list."
Sam stood up, taking a step back and putting his hands on his hips as he watched Kensi work. "Hetty probably thought it was a little too advanced for you," he said, that teasing tone of his voice seeping into the words. Beside him, Callen snorted a laugh and Deeks stuck his tongue in his cheek and wondered how he managed to get on a team that even when his foot was currently the one thing stopping a bomb from exploding and blowing them all to smithereens, they still found it hilarious to pick on him mercilessly. If he'd been any less of a man, he would have taken it personally. But he didn't. He just dished it right back at them. It was an odd sort of dysfunction, but it worked.
"Okay, Deeks," Kensi says, her concentration on the wires seeping out of the edge of the mat, her voice growing serious. "Just hold still."
Deeks quirks his mouth to the side and lets out a breath, "Are you sure this is going to work?" he asks. "Because if you blow my leg off, that completely ruins my shot of being on Dancing with the Stars."
Kensi leans back, her focus on the knife in her hand as she slit the coating of a wire. When it's done, she snorts but doesn't look up at him. "In what Universe would you even be considered to be on that show as a Star?"
"Who says I want to be the Star?" he asks, focusing intently on her hands. He doesn't think he's going to be picking up any pointers on how to dismantle a bomb, but if he doesn't focus on her hands, then he'll start to focus on the fact that his foot is on a bomb. He rather likes his feet – and his shins, his knees, his thighs, he pretty much just likes living and doesn't really want to blown up today. "Maybe I want to be the dancer," he says. "You know I took a ballroom dancing class once."
"Why does that not surprise me," Kensi jokes as she pulls a few wires apart and then lays flat on her stomach so she can look beneath the mat.
Callen and Sam are standing there quietly watching her work. Callen keeps looking around like he expects there to be danger in the form of a terrorist, but Deeks is pretty sure Callen knows they've been duped. This was never meant to be the terrorist hideout, this was meant to be a trap. And Deeks is almost the one that killed the whole team.
"It was for an op," Deeks says. "A high class op. I cut my hair and everything."
Kensi snorts. "I'm impressed."
"So was she," Deeks says and he sees Sam give a small laugh, the gun in his arms aimed at the floor, but his grip still tight around it. Deeks tips his head back and gives a reminiscent sigh. "Good times."
"I'm sure," Kensi says and then she's pushing herself up, kneeling next to him as she wipes her hands off on her jeans. "Okay, you should be all set."
Deeks glances down at his foot and it doesn't look any different. Maybe more wires. It still feels like there's pressure beneath the trigger and it's not that he doubts Kensi's ability that he says the next words, it's more that he doubts his own dumb luck. "Okay, well I'll start tapping my toes as soon as you're all outside."
The look the others give him makes him feel a sudden swell of pride because it's an incredulous look that's mirrored on all three of their faces. A "how can you even suggest that?" sort of look. They give it to him sometimes when he says something dumb, which happens more often than he'd like around them, but this time he appreciates it. He just doesn't appreciate that they won't listen to him.
"Deeks," Kensi says. "Just move your foot."
Reluctant still, Deeks licks his lips. "Look, I know you're Wonder Woman and all, but there's no point in taking the risk." He looks over to Callen because he knows out of all of them, Callen will be the one to agree with him. He's good at identifying unnecessary risks and reading situations. He can see the way Callen's eyes and squinting at him and he can't really read what he's thinking. But it's obvious the way no one's moving that they're not going to listen to him. He scowls at all of them and says, "I'm telling Hetty."
Kensi stands up and squares herself in front of him. She's got that playful look in her eyes and she holds her hands out to him, face down and the gesture is so familiar it sparks that familiar trust they've managed to build between them. She quirks a mocking smile at him and she knows she's caught him.
"Are you sure?" Deeks asks, echoing her own words she'd said to him from in the stadium. Only this time there are no lasers to maneuver around and for that he's glad because he doesn't have Kensi's talent in the whole limber area. He reaches out to take her hands anyway and it may not mean anything to Callen and Sam, but it means something to him that she remembers this.
"Nah," she says and he gives a laugh because it's what he'd said to her.
The smile fades from his face and he lets out a breath, puckering is lips and puffing his cheeks as he steels himself to lift his foot. He gives Kensi one last look and he thinks maybe she sees the fear on his face, but if she does, she doesn't call him on it. He know she will later. Later when they're back safe and sound and maybe they can go out for Thai food because he's starving and has been since this morning.
"Okay," Deeks says and it's the only warning he gives before he lifts his foot. The pressure sensor snaps back up as he does and the noise causes him to suck in a breath. He almost loses his foot, but Kensi's grip is strong around his hands and she keeps him upright, moving to stand next to him. He looks down at the sensor and glares at it because he should have seen it. If he'd just glanced down at his feet every so often, he would have seen it and wouldn't have put the team in danger and he thinks again that he's the weakest link.
"There," Kensi says and gives him a smug grin. He sets his lips into a line and just nods his head because when the woman is right, she's right.
Callen turns and calls Eric, telling him to get the LAPD bomb squad out here to the warehouse. Sam gives Deeks a look that tries to be disapproving but doesn't quite make it because Deeks has started to figure out when Sam is really mad and when he's just being Sam.
It takes him a moment to realize he's still holding onto Kensi's hands and when he looks back at her, she's still watching his face. "Well, uh…" he says and trails off because whatever smart comment he was going to say just doesn't cut it this time. So instead he just smiles and says sincerely, "Thank you."
It must take Kensi by surprise because her head quirks to the side and then she's nodding back at him. "You're welcome." Then her smile turns playful again. "Let's go, Fred."
She lets go of his hands and he misses them as soon as they're gone, but he can never tell her that. "Fred?" he asks, following after her.
"Oh, you're right, you're more of a Ginger," she says and he narrows his eyes at the back of her head.
It's just one of those days.