Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS: Los Angeles or any of the characters and I'm not making any money from this.

AN: Hello Folks, this is an experiment in many ways and I'm praying it worked. For people who like "Easter eggs" there's one here that ties into my other story, "The Date" I'd like to see how many can catch it. Also for Stargate SG-1 fans the character of Hank is heavily inspired by Jack O'Neill, so this is my way of honoring a great character whom I still miss after all these years. As always, a million thanks to Melbelle and Ambrosia Rush, without whom this story wouldn't exist. One more thing, Deeks fans go gentle on me please. Like I said, this is an experiment and I'm very nervous.

I open the door to the bar, and my eyes sting and water from the nicotine cloud that hits me. I shrug it off and walk inside. The door still groans when it shuts, even after all these years. The place is filthy; years of grease, grime, alcohol, tobacco stains, urine, and even blood cover the floor, the walls, and the ceiling. The bar, tables, and chairs are half rotted. One match or a dropped lighter would send this place up in flames. As bad as the actual space is, the patrons are worse. They're a collection of broken down drunks wasting their last years, petty criminals tucked away like rats in a hole, men and women who are slaves to their own vices and nothing more. The stink of desperation overpowers every other stench in the room.

I walk up to the bar. I smile when I see a bottle of cheap Bourbon and a shot glass waiting for me. "Hank, are the natives behaving?"

"More or less. Most of them know not to get on your bad side, Marty," he replies, while pouring himself a coke. "It's been a while, kid. You never call, you never write; heck, kid, is a blasted text message so hard?"

It takes all my control not to chuckle. Despite the levity of his words, I know Hank's ticked-off about me not calling. "Well, I've been busy, Hank. Besides, why should I make use of technology when I can just pop in here to our mutual, 'home away from home'?" I add air quotes just for him.

I can see his dark brown eyes glitter as the corners of his mouth twitch in amusement. "Touché. Glad to see being a cop and a part-time Fed hasn't killed your gift for witty repartee."

"Keep it down!" I softly hiss. "I see that gray hair of yours is finally starting to affect your brain."

I knock back a shot and nearly gag at the taste. I slam the shot glass back on the bar and find Hank smirking at me. "My hair is silver thank you," he says with a false air of wounded vanity. Then his voice turns serious. "I hate to break it to you, Marty, but the entire neighborhood knows you're a cop. As for you moonlighting with the Feds, they don't care."

I shrug, knowing he's right. I know every person here, and they know me, too. I'm Marty Brandel, the boy who dragged his dad's worthless carcass out of this hole from age seven to the day I shot 'The Animal'. "I can't talk about my 'moonlighting' as you call it, just keep quiet. What I will talk about is this lighter fluid you sell, calling it Bourbon."

I grin when he rolls his eyes. "I told you, Marty, it ain't my call. I run the place, I don't own it."

"Yeah, yeah," I sigh and pour another shot. "You'd think Chad would at least clean this place." I mutter as I gulp down more of the battery acid pretending to be alcohol.

Hank laughs. It sounds more like a quick harsh bark. "He knows it's cheaper to torch the place. If the land we sit on were worth anything, he'd do it. Thankfully, this economy has made this place a bit more profitable for him."

I look around and notice that there are people here who I haven't seen often. None of them looks especially threatening, but I make a note of their faces out of habit. "Where's Tammy?" I ask, wondering why the one-and-only barmaid hasn't accosted me yet.

Hank shakes his head and groans. "That twit is probably still pestering the poor guy in back. I keep telling her, 'leave him be, he's dangerous and not interested,' but you know Tammy, give her a man with a hard body and some bright blue eyes, and she'll buzz around him until she's dead. I'm just glad he doesn't come much. I see too much of myself in him; that's why I let him have the spot in the back."

I straighten up and feel my body prepare for a fight. "Who is this guy?"

"I don't know," Hank shrugs. "He came in here the first time after you were banged up in that human trafficking case you worked on. He paid in cash, didn't give a name. He said please, and thank you, when I served him. He didn't speak a word to anyone else. When he left, he asked me if I had been in Desert Storm or Viet Nam."

I laugh and it comes out as a snort. "Did you tell him if you answered that you'd have to kill him?"

I notice Hank doesn't smile back, and it worries me. "I did, and it was the first time in years that someone knew I wasn't joking, Marty. I'm telling you, this guy is like me. He's seen bad stuff, kid, very bad stuff."

I lean back on the barstool and think. This neighborhood doesn't change much. If this guy (whoever he is) had moved in, I'd know him. I've worked with Callen and Sam long enough to be able to spot if any black ops people start walking around my stomping grounds. I feel a familiar tingle at the back of my neck, demanding 'dig deeper'. "Okay, tell me about all the times he's been here."

If Hank is concerned about my interest, he doesn't show it. I could tell he isn't too worried about this stranger, but I can't shake this feeling that I should find out who this guy is. Hank pours himself another coke and sits down. "The second time he came was after Ray."

He pauses for a moment to drink his coke. I never could quite convince him my best friend died. "Did he say anything then?"

"Not much. He did ask if I knew Nicole, and if she ever came around here."

"What did you say?" I demand, biting my tongue when I hear the anger in my voice.

Hank sighs. "I told him that if he was looking for Nicole he had the wrong bar. She doesn't come in here anymore, Marty. For what it's worth, I don't think he was interested in her. It was almost like he didn't want me to know her. He relaxed when I said she stopped coming here."

Now that tingle is a full-blown itch, and a crazy idea begins to form in my brain. Callen had been on me when I resurrected Max Gentry; he called me out on Nicole and never let up. I didn't like it then, but it helped me. Max Gentry was just too easy to lose myself in, and Callen refused to let me get lost, even in the moments I wanted to be lost. Could this mystery guy be Callen? Now, I admit I have a wild imagination. Add to that the healthy paranoia that any good undercover operative has, and it's easy to understand why I get crazy ideas.

However, even I can see this one is up there on the crazy meter. I can even make a list of reasons this is crazy. One, if Callen wanted to disappear into a dive-bar to drink his sorrows away, he wouldn't choose anywhere his team could be. Two, if he wanted to check up on me he'd just break into my car or house. Three, we're not buddies. Okay, yes, we're friends, and we enjoy one another's company. I have a lot of fun tormenting Sam, and Callen likes to play along. I wouldn't go to Romania and help the guy with his blood feud without liking him. Sure, I went for Hetty, but it took me all of one week to figure out that Hetty and Callen are a package deal. Saving Hetty means I'm entangled in the guy's past now. When the bullets start flying again, I'll be there. However, we're not buddies. We don't go out for beers, we don't surf, and we don't go to the wet t-shirt contests down by the pier.

There are more reasons, but I think that should be enough to convince myself that my idea is just fantasy. Still, not even the gut-rot I'm drinking can make me let go of it. I pour myself another shot and make a mental note to switch to beer. I'm not drunk yet, but I'm getting a slight buzz and need to slow down. "Tell me more, Hank."

Hank puts the bottle of Bourbon away and wipes down the bar. "He came in that time you were shot. I remember because it was the one time he ordered Bourbon. The last time he came in was when you came back from Europe. He sat down, had a drink, thanked me, and left. He hasn't been back until tonight."

I grip the bar in order not to fall off the stool. It has to be Callen, this person has black ops experience, 'a hard body and blue eyes,' and the dates matched up to events that only someone that knew me from NCIS would consider important. But why? Why on earth would he come here? The reasons on the list still stand. I'm not Sam, and we're not like that. Besides, nothing happened to me today. A bullet grazed Kensi today. I killed the guy, and everything's fine.

If Callen was going to stalk anyone tonight, it should be my partner, not me. Although, she did threaten us all with death if we even thought about bugging her tonight. Ms. Blye has a date with a bubble bath, a box of real Belgian chocolates (courtesy of Hetty naturally), a bottle of Moet, and a copy of Titanic (for the two hundred and fifty thousandth time)! Now, far be it from me to criticize my partner's way of dealing with a gunshot wound, but threatening to castrate me with one of her dull razors is just mean. I wanted to stay with her tonight to take care of her. I even offered her a massage, because I did an undercover stint at the spa of The Four Seasons (weirdest drug case ever), and she threatens my future children! Okay, maybe I could have not mentioned how awesome she'd look in a towel, but hello, the woman is hot! She knows this and torments me with it every day! What did she expect me to say?

Now that I think about it, she's the reason why I'm here. I have to wonder; did Callen hear her and decide to follow me? Could he tell that a huge part of me wanted to run as far away from NCIS as I could and go back to the solitary life I led in LAPD? My life was considerably less complicated when I wasn't responsible for keeping my gorgeous, insane, and deadly partner alive. Sometimes I wonder if he thinks this way about Sam when they bicker.

I feel something frozen slide down my back and I jump off the bar stool, ready to break someone's neck. Imagine my joy when I see Hank standing there with his arms folded across his chest. "What the- Hank, what if I had my gun on me?"

He looks at me like I am the biggest moron he's seen tonight. "You would be on the floor, my boot would be on your chest, and your gun would be in my hand. You want to tell me what's going on in that head of yours that took an ice cube to bring you back to this world?"

"No!" I snap. How can I tell him my crazy thoughts? I'm not sure if I'm going off the deep-end or not. If someone told me this morning that Callen would follow me to the worst dive bar in LA just to make sure I'm okay I'd have laughed.

"Okay," he shrugs.

I send him my best Max Gentry glare because he knows I hate to feel cold. Unfortunately, Hank is a hard man. In fact, he is the hardest man I've ever known, and I've known hard men since birth. Max Gentry is a marshmallow compared to Hank McCorley. "Give me six Coronas, and the lime juice you keep in the fridge."

"Marty!" he growls out my name in warning. I'm not allowed to get wasted here, despite being a grown man.

"Relax," I reply with my most angelic grin. I can hear Hetty calling me a 'cheeky bastard,' in my head, but I ignore the voice. "I'm just being the welcoming committee as usual."

I flinch at the stare Hank now gives me. If Max Gentry is a marshmallow, Marty Deeks is ice cream in summer. I breathe a long sigh of relief when he gives me the beers and the lime juice. "You be careful, kid. I'm telling you, that man is on intimate terms with death."

I don't think I've seen Hank so serious since the day I settled, 'The Animal's' final bar tab. Still, I can't help but laugh. "You don't know the half of it."