Connections

Author's Note: Two chapters. Chapter 1 has minor spoilers as 'Behind the Blue Line' has been 're-imagined' in my mind. Chapter 2 is all JAM all the time. Jules is the heart of the team, and my characterization of her here defines that. Unapologetically JAM.

In war, there are no unwounded soldiers. ~José Narosky

Men's voices filled the corridor, bellowing at each other. The group was tense and angry. The shoot had not gone as they had planned, as they'd hoped. Sam was upset and angry. The team blamed each other. Jules had been in the truck talking to the father and the coach, feeding the team information, listening as the tragedy progressed. She only caught snippets of the shouts. She didn't want to hear any of it.

"How could you have let him get the drop on you?" Wordy yelled at Spike.

"Don't talk to the involved officer! You know the rules," the voice of the lawyer rose over the din, referring to Ed Lane, the sniper who had killed the subject ending the incident.

Jules could hear Sarge yelling at Winnie, wondering where she was when she wasn't at her desk, roaring like a lion at her to clear the debriefing room, unwilling to hear that it was already occupied. Winnie was flustered and confused. The boss never treated Winnie, or anyone for that matter, that way, ever. Jules had never heard the boss so angry before.

Sam tried to walk away and Sarge got right in his face. "Where do you think you're going?"

Sam held up his bloody arms and hands, his expression hard, daring anyone to challenge him. "I'm going to shower, wash his blood off, and then home."

"No. You are getting in the debriefing room. Go!" Sam had inches on the Boss, but Parker was herding him into the room anyway.

Greg Parker looked around briefly, counting off four, plus him and punched the button that lowered the door and locked them in. Ed was still in incident review. They would start the debrief without him.

Once the door closed, the noise even got louder. Greg called the team to order, his voice cutting across all the raised discord vibrating off the walls. The room grew silent but the tension was high…Jules thought she might scream it was so awful.

Sam stood facing away from the group, looking out the windows, staring at nothing but the inky night sky lit only by the colored night lights of downtown. She thought he seemed empty, a shell of the happy man he had been this morning.

The group sat looking at Sarge, looking at each other, faces angry and edgy, ready to blow any second, Sam probably the closest of all. Jules felt her own heart beating too fast, tried to slow time down taking first one deep breath and then another.

More than anything she wanted to provide a distraction, break the tension just a bit, get Sam to turn around, reengage with the group. Words wouldn't work, she knew. So, just like Sarge had taught her in hostage negotiations… this wasn't a real hostage situation, but it sure felt like one… slow it down, fight against the adrenaline, make the connection.

Jules deliberately stood and walked to the back wall, pulling at the Velcro on her vest. As soon as she stood, the attention of the guys around the table turned towards her, but it was the scratch of the Velcro that pulled the attention of Sam away from the window. Without a word, Jules laid her vest on the floor, removed her gray SRU overshirt, and the gun holster around her leg, piling them neatly on the floor. She walked slowly to the water cooler and took down two large glasses, filling each with cold filtered water. Jules took another deep breath, exhaled and turned to face the table, unhurriedly looking each man in the eyes , finally resting her gaze on Sam Braddock's dark blue ones. Her heart ached at the pain she saw there.

Her eyes never left his as she walked towards the table, leaning across placing the tall cool water in front of his place, a gesture, an invitation to sit and join the group. Jules sat unhurriedly in her chair, her eyes remaining on Sam's, watching him follow her lead, sitting directly in front of her, watching her, breathing with her, the tension leaving him.

Parker watched the exchange and smiled slightly. Jules had learned a lot over the last few years. She had just managed to step up and do what he had been unable to, reduce the tension, use her connection with Sam to help him, use her own skill and connections with the group to help them fight their own adrenaline.

"We need to talk about what happened today," Greg began.

Half and hour later, the briefing had turned to the final few minutes of the incident. The tension was growing again. Sam was standing, pacing, blaming himself.

"Of all the times, of all the people I should have been able to connect with, this time…" his voice drifted away, he stared out the window, starting to close himself off again.

Sarge's voice softened, knowing Sam was pulling away from him, "Sam, sometimes, even with a connection, it doesn't always work out the way we hope. It just doesn't."

Sarge looked over at Jules and caught her eye. She hadn't spoken much during the debrief, unless asked a question, and had mostly just watched Sam, watched as his tension level increased as the team approached the final moments of the horrible day.

Jules took a sip of water, a deep breath and felt her body relax.

"Sam," her voice was barely above a whisper, but that was all it took. Sam slowly turned from the darkened window to face her, his eyes locked to hers.

"Do you remember what the last thing Darren said to you was?" Her voice was still soft, but it held a sense of purpose, of strength.

The rest of the room just melted away. It was just the two of them, connected at a level that went deeper than what anyone else in the room suspected, but could feel just the same.

Not breaking eye contact, Sam said, "Something like 'I'm a good soldier.'"

"Sarge?"

"Spike, can we see the replay?" Spike replayed the last few seconds, trying to bring the volume up.

Jules whispers, "He says, 'See you on the other side.'"

Wordy says, "It's a battle cry."

"Not this time," Sarge says softly, "this time, he's saying good bye."

"Sam, look at the transcript, where you're telling each other your stories. What does he tell you?" Jules asks him another question.

For the first time since she had engaged him, he broke eye contact to flip through the transcript to the pages Jules was referring. "He says he's tired. He wants me to meet him on the ice. He says it has to be me." Realization started to dawn on Sam's face.

"That's when he knew it was over," Jules said, tears were beginning to fall down her cheeks.

"He wanted to die," Sam whispered, "he wanted me to kill him." Sam sat down hard on the chair, pain etched across his face.

Jules spoke again, their eyes holding, "Sam, you had the connection. That connection you had was palpable. Everyone in this room felt it through the coms, in the building, we can read it in the transcript. It was real. Maybe it didn't turn out like you thought it would…hey, like we all thought it would, but none of us would deny it."

Sam spoke to the whole room, but really only spoke to Jules, his eyes never leaving hers. "You know, when I joined the SRU, I wanted to be more than a point and shoot guy. I wanted to help people, to save people." He pushed away from the table, "instead, I've endangered my team, lost objectivity, and got someone killed. I don't belong here." He started to stalk out of the room.

Jules' voice was stern. "Stop right there, Sam Braddock. Do you really think you are so special that you don't get to mess up? We have ALL done exactly what you did today. You have seen us do it… Ed, Spike, Sarge…everyone. We fall down and we get right back up. We watch each other's backs. We pull each other back from the edge." Jules rose from her chair and stood directly in front on him, blocking his path to the door. She looked so tiny in front of him, but she might as well have been a concrete wall. He wouldn't be going around her. "Today, Boss tried twice to pull you back and you kept moving forward. Next time, listen! It's hard in the moment. Learn and move on. We are a team. You are a part of it, like it or not. You do not just get to walk away."

Slowly the other team members stood and surrounded Sam, forming a circle around Jules and Sam. Sam finally looked away from Jules long enough to look at the rest of the team, seeing the emotion in their eyes, the absolute resolution in their faces. It wasn't going to be easy, but he knew he belonged here, with them, with her.

Next up: Jules apartment.

A/N: It's been about 10 months since I wrote anything, and that was in the True Blood genre. Be kind.