Hello there everyone! This is just a little follow up on my story "When Olympus falls..." to fill up some time gap there. I tried with Mike banning's POV this time, I hope I managed to get it down alright.

Shortly I'll watch London Has Fallen, and hopefully can write that part too, it has been my plan all along. Until then I'll just write some more fillers.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you'll enjoy!

File 1

The time you lost

Lee's face was chalk-white with tiny drops of blood splattered all over it. Her breathing was ragged, forced, and I had the terrible feeling that we were too late. She will drown in her own blood if I don't get her to an ambulance soon. Very soon. I felt her hand clutching to my vest like she was hanging onto life itself, and I had no doubt she knew too what was happening. I dared to glance at her, but I only saw raw fear and the lingering touch of death. She was wheezing, and coughed again, and this time there was no intake of breath following. I saw her lips move, and I guessed she wanted to say something, but no air came from her lungs. There was no air in her lungs. Her grip loosened and I had to watch, helpless, as her head fell back, her eyes fluttering shut as her whole body slumped in my arms.

It seemed like forever till we got to the main entrance. The President was following close behind, but he ordered me to take care of Lee first, he could walk on his own. Out of the House there was a flurry of cameras and reporters. Soldiers escorted me to an ambulance, where I put her down on a gurney. For the last two minutes her body was only dead weight in my arms, and my heart sunk at the thought that I was too late. Again. Somebody was dead because I was late. The medics started CPR on her in a second, putting her on an ambulance car, driving away with full speed, with the sirens wailing.

I was lost in the noise, the world was in a turmoil around me, but I barely noticed. I was standing in the middle of the road, while other medics fussed about me, trying to make me move so they could see to my wounds. I let myself be led to another ambulance car, but frankly, I could care less what they did to me. The only thing I could think of was Lee's dead body in my arms.

A day later I was allowed to leave the hospital. My injuries weren't life-threatening, just a few bruised ribs and some cuts here and there. Jacobs came to pick me up and filled me in on what had happened in the 24 hours I was out of the centre of events. President Asher was fine, reunited with his son, and undergone surgery to remove the bullet from his side.

"How about agent Cameron?"

My voice was steady, despite the inner turmoil. But Jacobs knew me enough to realise I was nervous. She sighed.

"Agent Cameron's through the worst, but she's in a coma. She was too long under, the doctors don't know if she suffered any brain damage, and they can't find out until she wakes up. Which can be anytime."

I took a long moment to process the information. We were already out of the room, walking towards the far end of the corridor. So Lee was alive. At least that was something.

"Her family has been notified, I believe they are already here."

"Her family?"

Jacobs threw me a side glance as we were waiting for the elevator to arrive.

"I bet you didn't have time to talk about that. Her parents are living in Iowa, they are both teachers at some high school. Needless to say, they were extremely surprised to find out what their only daughter did for a living."

No wonder, I thought. I couldn't imagine what it could be like, finding out that your child is a government agent, a spy technically, and that now she's between life and death. I had no idea, and I never wanted to find out how it feels.

A few floors down we got out of the elevator. Both President Asher and Lee had been brought to the emergency care. I was the lucky one, getting out almost unscatched, while others were dying around me. Survivor's guilt will kick in shortly, I knew, but right now Lee was the priority. I said goodbye to Jacobs, who was going to check in on Asher, and we turned in opposite directions. It was absolute necessity that I would see Lee, I needed to be reassured that she was alive and breathing. Otherwise her dead weight on my arms will haunt me all the time.

Her room was big, light poured in from the window which was facing the river. I stopped at the foot of Lee's bed, watching her chest rise and fall with every breath. She wasn't hooked to life support, which was a good sign. Her face regained some of its original color too. The device monitoring her heart rate beeped quietly and rhythmically, providing a monotonous background noise. I felt like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders. Whatever will happen, I did what I could, Lee is alive, breathing on her own, her life had not ended. It's not my responsibility from now on.

"Excuse me, but who are you?"

I turned around to see a middle-aged woman standing in the door, a grocery bag in her hand and a frown on her face. Her blond hair was tied back into a tight bun and she was looking at me like at any minute she will shout for the security.

"I'm sorry for intruding. My name is Mike Banning."

"Oh."

Her face betrayed some surprise and equal amounts of curiosity. She ran her eyes over me in a familiar way. I glanced at Lee then back at the woman, their features were quite similar, but not too much. Either way they couldn't deny that they were related.

"That lady from the Secret Service told me you might come over."

She closed the door behind her and put the grocery bag on the nightstand by Lee's bed. I caught her pained expression as her eyes fell on her daughter's face, but it was quickly gone and she turned to me with a small smile. She extended her hand to me and I took it.

"I'm Jennifer Cameron. I know you saved Bathsheba's life. Thank you, Mr. Banning."

Now, I was a bit baffled. What Bathsheba? I looked down on the sleeping woman in the hospital bed. Yes, that was indeed CIA agent Lee Cameron, lying there, I wasn't in the wrong room.

"Bathsheba…"

Mrs. Cameron burst out laughing, which surprised me a great deal. It seems mother and daughter both had some incomprehensible sense of humour I could not follow.

"I'm sorry, I'm really sorry, but your face just now was very funny." Mrs Cameron pulled herself together and pointed at a chair at the other side of the room "Please, sit down. I guess she told you her name was Lee."

"Yes." I pulled the appointed chair closer to the bed and sat down, facing Mrs. Cameron.

"That's her middle name, she doesn't like to use Bathsheba."

I refrained from saying that I could guess why, instead cleared my throat and nodded sympathetically.

"Her father is teaching literature in high school, and he wanted to name her after a character in a book. We agreed on Bathsheba, after Bathsheba Everdene, because we both liked that character. I think, in retrospective, we hadn't really thought it through enough."

She settled into another chair in the meanwhile and smiled at the memory. I started to feel uncomfortable, like I was intruding upon the family. After all, I barely knew Lee, and I doubt she would ever have told me about her family at all. Now I felt like I was spying on her, or something, which was silly, but still made me feel guilty. Mrs Cameron seemed to have sensed my discomfort, and swept it away instantly.

"You are welcome to come visit her whenever you like. My husband stayed home for a few days, but he will join me soon. He would like to see you too, I think. Besides, you're the only one from that side who came for a visit."

I hazarded a guess that 'that side' meant the government. I didn't blame them, the CIA wasn't likely to admit their ties to Lee so fast. But they could've sent a card at least.

"Thank you, Mrs. Cameron."

She smiled at me again, then turned to Lee and took her hand.

"You know it's so hard to understand. We both were sure she was working as a travel agent, guiding tourists everywhere in the world. She would travel a lot and she always came back with stories, souvenirs. And now… And now…" she broke off, wiping away a tear from her eyes. I remained silent, some things you better get off your mind, before they eat you alive from the inside.

"A government official called us that she went missing, that they were looking for her, but the tour she organised was hijacked and nobody knew what had happened to them. We were devastated, worried, anxious, then after a few months we slowly accepted that she would never come home to us anymore. We tried to move on and then came the attack. And there she was, on TV, in Washington, in the middle of the terrorist attack. I remember my husband's face, he looked like he saw a ghost. We couldn't believe it. What would our daughter do at such a place? Why was she there? When and how did she get back to the US? It was all very confusing, you see."

So Lee's cover was a travel agent who organised tours everywhere in the world. Convenient and clever. This would explain the travelling and the need to know multiple languages. The only thing I could not understand is how a girl from the Midwest, with parentage like this, decides to become a spy? But that was a question Mrs Cameron could not answer, obviously.

"Oh I'm sorry, where are my manners? Would you like some water, Mr Banning? Or something to eat?"

"Please, just call me Mike."

She offered me a glass of water I did take, and produced from the grocery bag a wide array of snacks, ranging from fruits to crackers. I declined the offer to take anything.

"Michael. You have a wonderful name. Archangel Michael is the patron of soldiers, did you know? It fits you well."

I nodded again, a bit baffled by this flood of information. I could hear Lee's voice in my head saying 'Then his parents chose his name wiser than mine.' The thought made me smile, but then I looked down at Lee, sleeping soundly it seemed, and my mood quickly waned.

"What did the doctors say, when will she wake up?" I asked.

Mrs Cameron shook her head slightly before answering.

"They are optimistic, but no one could give me a guess. They cannot say when. She probably will, and the CAT scan doesn't show any brain damage, but they can't be sure until she wakes up." her tone suddenly grew cold "You were there when this happened, right? Tell me that whoever did this is no longer among us."

I averted my eyes and recalled the moment when we were on our way to the bunker in the elevator. I remember asking Lee if she was ready, and I know she was annoyed by it. I was about to tell her that I kept asking this because she wasn't combat trained and I needed to know she wouldn't snap - even if she proved herself before. It was a habit of mine. But I had no time to answer, and the Koreans were upon us in a second - or rather, we were upon them. I just brought down the last man of Kang's when I heard the shots. Three, in rapid succession. When I looked up, Lee was standing before Kang, both had their guns in their hands, and I just jumped at Kang without any hesitation. While we were fighting I glimpsed Lee walking along the corridor towards the bunker, I vaguely saw that the Cerberus was active, but Kang occupied my mind for the time being. After I got rid of him I went to the President, who pointed at the bunker, where the screen was blank, and Lee was down on the floor, writhing. By the time I got there she was half drowned...

"Michael?"

Mrs Cameron's voice dragged me back to reality.

"Yes, he's dead. The guy who shot Lee, he's dead."

She looked right into my eyes, her gaze steady, this time she wasn't about to cry. Lee certainly inherited her eyes from her mother, they both had a darker circle of brown by their pupil, and a lighter circle around that.

"Thank you, Michael."

"She would've done the same for me. You know, whatever you thought her to be, she's a damn good CIA agent. You should be proud of her."

Perhaps this wasn't what she wanted to hear, but she nodded all the same, accepting her daughter for who she was. And that wasn't a travel agent, not by far.

Weeks went by and life slowly returned to its normal state. I got my job back beside the President, it was about time, the office was killing me. Due to the tight schedule and the process of rebuilding the Secret Service I had very little time to visit the hospital. Jennifer, Lee's mother, was updating me every now and then, and I tried to go in at least a few times a week.

About three days after the attack, Lee's father turned up too. He had to take care of some things at their hometown, so that they won't be missed, although everyone knew what had happened. Lee's face was all over the news after the attack, and I frequently saw that one picture of us when I was carrying her out of the House.

Which made me wonder what would happen to her job at the CIA, I mean you couldn't be a spy if nearly everyone around the world knew your face. And the guessing game began in the media too, regarding Lee's person. No one knew who she was and what she had been doing at the House, and the official statement was either vague or nonexistent. Someone guessed that she was CIA, but that raised tons of other questions about her role in the attack. And the officials wasn't about to walk out onto this thin ice by answering questions regarding her. So it was a mess all around, the only people who didn't care about it were the Camerons and me.

Some nights I woke from nightmares, which wasn't unusual, but it was a long time ago I had to deal with this much stress. Jacobs pressed me to go see a therapist, which I did after a while, although reluctantly. It calmed me down a bit, though, so it wasn't a big waste of time after all. But I concluded that the only thing that would really calm me down is for Lee to wake up finally. This uncertainty of whens and ifs was irritating and did no good to my state of mind. Even if I was back to normal duty, a good part of my brain was occupied with the picture of Lee sleeping on that hospital bed. I needed to erase that picture somehow.

We had long talks with Mrs. Cameron, mostly about Lee, and her childhood, so I felt that I knew a lot about her already. Except that in her adult life there was nothing her mother could tell me and wasn't a lie. I was getting more and more curious about what made her choose a profession where she had to lie almost constantly to everyone. It just didn't make any sense to me at all. Mrs. Cameron got to know me too a little, although I talked much less. I told her that I was divorced already, that I was born and raised in a military family, my father being a Marine. That I chose to join the military because of him, and how I became a Ranger. How I left the army and married, joining the Secret Service and eventually becoming the head of the presidential detail. How I failed to save Margaret Asher and that I still felt guilty about it. And how I felt guilty about Lee's injury too and the state that she was in.

It was strange that me, a grown-ass man, who's not particularly open about his feelings, could open up to a complete stranger. Mrs. Cameron was a good listener, and she assured me that in no way I was to blame for what had happened. She thanked me over and over again for saving Lee, and Thomas, her father, did the same too, making me really uncomfortable after a while. They started to treat me like family, which made me happy, as I lost mine quite a while ago. I imagined that Lee must've had a very happy childhood, considering that she was an only child and she was born at the last moment so to say. Jennifer told me that they were about to turn to adoption, as a last resort, when she finally got pregnant. The way they both talked about her showed how much they loved their daughter, but I had no doubt that Lee would get a long, reproachful speech about hiding her real profession from her parents for so long.

And then, about four weeks after the attack, Lee woke up. By pure luck I was also there, because it was a Saturday, and I got a day off. Having nowhere else to go, I went to the hospital to check on the Camerons. Thomas was out, doing some grocery shopping for their little apartment they rented out for the time being. I took a seat opposite to Jennifer again, and we just started talking when Lee's hand moved. Mrs. Cameron only noticed because she was holding it right then. We waited for a while to see if it was a false alarm, but Lee's eyes fluttered open for a second, which was enough to call the doctor.

"She's waking up. Michael, will you be a dear and call a doctor?"

I went searching for one immediately. When I got back into the room, behind the doctor in charge of Lee's case, she was almost fully awake, drinking water from a glass. For a moment the world seemed to turn around me, I was so glad to see her really alive and functioning again. It was like a dream and I couldn't help smiling at her. She smiled back, which again was reassuring. The time of wait was over, apparently.

"Let me check your pupils first."

The doctor leaned over Lee and flashed a light into her eyes, then followed up with some other instructions. It seemed that Lee was alright, although it was plain that moving her upper body was painful to her. The doctor explained what injuries she had and I could see on her face that she was confused. She looked back and forth between the doctor and her mother, so I guessed she was thinking about a cover story for her injuries. I helped her out.

"They know."

Lee's face grew rigid for a second, then she looked over at Jennifer, who was shaking her head rigorously. That meant a speech was coming, I knew her enough already to know that, and apparently Lee was anticipating it too, because she tensed a bit.

"Do you know what it was like, seeing you being brought out of the White House after the terrorist attack? Your father noticed that it was you. And you disappeared for five months! We were beyond ourselves with worry and then -"

I had to cut her off. "Mrs. Cameron, please, not now."

I'm sure she was just too stressed out to think it through, and wouldn't want to welcome her daughter back to life with preaching about trust to her. Jennifer looked up at me and I saw her eyes go soft. Lee glanced at me questioningly.

"Exactly how long have I been out of it?"

Now this was a question I did not want to answer. We glanced at each other with Mrs. Cameron, and she too seemed reluctant to speak up. Finally the doctor broke our silence.

"You've been in a coma for almost a month."

Lee was stunned, I could see, she suspected that it hadn't exactly been a short stay, but she didn't count on a month-long coma. I couldn't stay silent anymore.

"After I brought you out of the House they managed to bring you back, but you've been too long..." my voice failed me at this point, which was annoying. I cleared my throat to continue.

"So, you fell into a coma. And now you're awake."

I felt stupid, saying this last part, but it still seemed like a dream to me. I smiled faintly at Lee, who was looking at me like she knew what I was thinking. Then she turned her head towards the window, momentarily leaving our presence. I walked back to the end of the bed, waiting for Lee to put herself together. It only took a minute.

"I... I have to sleep now, I need a bit of time. After that would someone tell me exactly what happened, in detail, and in order?"

Here I could see her glance covertly at Jennifer. Her mother was unarguably a scatterbrained storyteller, it was hard to follow the jumbled up timelines she managed to produce.

"Of course, dear. I'm sure Michael will be glad to talk to you."

I nodded and Lee just burst out laughing, again about something I could not comprehend. This time Mrs. Cameron was baffled too, although she was genuinely happy to hear Lee's laugh, I could tell.

"I love you Mum."

They squeezed each other's hands, then Mrs. Cameron stood up, ready to go. It was the first time she left Lee's side in visiting hours. I never saw her go home before someone practically tossed her out of the hospital, except now.

"We'll leave you now. Rest well, Sweetie."

"Thanks."

Taking up her bag she walked out the door, not looking behind. I followed her, but stopped for a second to look back at the hospital bed. Now it wasn't a sleeping woman who occupied it, but an alert one, with a questioning look in her eyes. She was expecting me to say something, but I only wanted to memorize this moment. So in my dreams I would not see her dead on a hospital bed, but like this, alive. I smiled at her and closed the door behind me, finally feeling free of all the doubts and worries of the past month.