Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS:Los Angeles or any of the characters that appear on the television show. I only claim rights to the characters that don't sounds familiar in this story - they came from the recesses of my mind.

So after seeing several little teasers and tweets online about the upcoming season 5, my brain went to work and came up with this...

Nothing had gone the way it was supposed to with that case. Partners had been split up; agents had been betrayed, captured and tortured; personal boundary lines had been crossed unexpectedly; and communication lines had been severed in so many ways. Several NCIS teams from around the country had been integral in locating and rescuing Sam and Deeks. Due to the extent of their trauma and the effect it had on the rest of their immediate team members, the rest of the mission – finding Siderov and the nuclear weapons – had been handed off to the FBI and CIA. Nell and Eric remained on the case as consultants due to the intel they had, but otherwise NCIS did not have much to do with the case. Their focus was on helping their team members.

Hetty wasn't sure exactly what that would entail because so much had happened in such a short time. She had never before faced quite this dire of a situation with her team. They all looked to her for wisdom and gentle guidance but she wasn't sure she had any to give right now. Slowly she rose from her desk and picked up a file folder. She read through a few pages and frowned. It was such a waste of talent and skill to not have them work this one, but in the fractured condition they were all in, it couldn't be helped. Hetty closed the folder and walked over to a group of desks opposite the vacant bullpen. She placed the folder in the inbox of Agent Moria's desk, and returned to her space. She knew the B team was capable and could get the job done, but they didn't have quite the same finesse that her hand-picked elite team had. There would never be another team like them.

She returned to her desk and looked around. Had it been worth it? Yes, the nuclear weapons had been recovered and were secured, but at what cost? She had tried to reach out to them. She was at the hospital with Mr. Hanna and Mr. Deeks. She made sure all arrangements for their best care were made. Mr. Callen shut her out. One word answers to her questions and then he quickly ushered her out of his home. He had made it very difficult for her to remain composed and not show the emotions raging inside her, but she knew her breakdown would not help him. Ms. Blye was polite enough the one time they had been able to meet, but her female agent wasn't ready to open up. None of them were, really. Hetty had even noticed changes in her dynamic duo upstairs. They had taken on more of a leadership role with the other teams, but their personalities weren't the same. There was only one person she could think of who might be able to help. She picked up the phone and dialed a number from memory.

"Hello? Yes, it has been a while. You are needed in Los Angeles. I have already made all the necessary arrangements, and the paperwork is filed. You are assigned to OSP for an undetermined amount of time. Your flight itinerary and electronic ticket should be in your email now. I will see you in two days. Rest up; it's going to be a bumpy ride once you arrive. Good-bye."

BAM! The sound of the hard cover hitting the wall echoed through the house. Michelle came running. When she reached the living room, she found Sam standing in front of the couch, fists clenching and unclenching. Sweat was beading on his bald head, and a hardcover book lay on the floor across the room. It was open and several pages were bent at odd angles; a small dent was apparent in the wall just above where it lay.

"What happened in here?" she asked her husband.

"Nothing. Didn't like the story," Sam said angrily.

"Mmm hmm," Michelle answered not believing him. "When are you gonna start talking to me baby? I am here for you. You need to get this out of your system so we can get back to being a family again. I miss you. Your kids miss you."

"I haven't gone anywhere. I'm in this damn house all the time," he muttered back.

"You're here, but you're not with us. You sleep alone, you eat alone, you won't talk to us unless it's to tell us what we're doing wrong. We love you," she told him gently as she placed her hand on his arm.

"Maybe I shouldn't be here. It never should have happened this way," Sam blurted out and shrugged her hand away. Michelle's eyes got wide. She had seen him after tough cases before, she had been here when he had returned from SEAL missions a shell of the man he was, but she had never heard him talk like this.

"That damn Deeks!" Sam shouted as he slammed his right fist into his open left palm. "What the hell was he thinking diving in that pool? He had to try to play the hero – to what, be my savior and get his picture on the front page of the newspaper? He should have just let me drown right then and there."

"No, baby, no. Don't say that. He saved you. He saved your life so you could come back to me and the kids. Deeks doesn't care about getting credit and you know it. Please don't even say that you should have died. Don't scare me like that," Michelle pleaded with him, her eyes filled with tears.

"It's all my fault. Deeks is messed up, probably worse than I am. He shouldn't have had to go through what we did. I don't know how he's doing now because I can't bring myself to call him or even text him. I can't even take care of myself most days. I can't sleep. I can't work. I can't be the husband and father that you need me to be. It wasn't supposed to be like this," Sam admitted, sinking down into the couch cushions and holding his head in his hands.

Callen rolled out of bed and pulled on a pair of sweatpants. It was all his fault. Mrs. Gormier, one of the foster mothers he had when he was 11, had been right. Everything bad thing that happened was his fault and he was no good to anyone. G Callen thought he had outgrown that particular "flaw", but everything had crashed down around his team because of him: because of his need to know better than everyone else, because of his need to be in control, because of his need to be right. He had been so sure that his proposal, his idea, was the best one for that case. If it hadn't been for his damn plan to bring Janvier back, everyone would be good. Probably not holding hands and singing Kumbaya good, but better than the hell they were all experiencing.

He shook his head, as if trying to shake the recurring guilt out, and pulled on a t-shirt. How could he have been so utterly stupid to have let Janvier alone for even a minute? How could he have been duped into believing he could trust that nut job to help him with a case? He didn't trust anyone, and yet he had actually thought he could trust the lives of his partner and his team to a man who wanted nothing more than to see G Callen dead. Maybe Gibbs was right – he was getting too old for this job. The onset of dementia was the only explanation that would be plausible for why he went ahead with it. Look where it got him, where it got everyone he cared about. There was no way any of them could ever forgive him, and there was no way he could ever ask them to. Callen hadn't seen anyone except Hetty since the rescue. It was just too painful. How could he look his partner in the eye and know that he was responsible for the pain reflecting back? How could he be around Deeks and know that he was the one who stole the playful sparkle out of those blue eyes, ones much like his own? Kensi hadn't been tortured, but his actions had effects on her, too. She had been separated from her partner to fetch that monster with him. And then the look on her face when she found out what had happened to Deeks… god, it was a look he had never seen on the junior agent. That too, was his fault.

Maybe it was time to move on, just like in his childhood. Callen remembered hearing his foster parents tell the social worker that he - the boy without a name - was just too much trouble and couldn't stay any longer. As he tied his running shoes and grabbed his keys and phone, he figured it was time to think about packing up his things and moving on to the next alphabet agency that would take him.

Chapter 2 will give a peek at Deeks and Kensi since the rescue. Future chapters will bring the team together, and there will be more dialogue not just description. Hope you like this start and will hang in there for more!